Sitting of 17 September 2003

Preamble
The House met at half-past Eleven o'clock
PRAYERS
[MR. SPEAKER in the Chair]
Oral Answers to Questions
  WALES
  The Secretary of State was asked—
  WALES

    Contaminated Phurnacite Land
    Ann Clwyd: What recent discussions he has had with the First Minister of the National Assembly for Wales about contaminated phurnacite land in the Cynon valley. [129536]
    The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Wales (Mr. Don Touhig): My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and I have regular discussions with the First Minister. I share my hon. Friend's concern about the site in her constituency, and I am pleased that a taskforce involving all the relevant stakeholders is now up and running. It is moving things forward, and I hope that there will be progress shortly.
    Ann Clwyd: I am grateful for my hon. Friend's answer, but that is hardly progress. The site closed in 1990, and for the last 13 years the residents of Abercwmboi have lived next to 28 acres of highly contaminated land—some of the worst toxic waste left anywhere in the United Kingdom. It is high time we saw action rather this snail's-pace progress, if it can be described as progress at all.
    Mr. Touhig: I pay tribute to my hon. Friend's tireless work on this matter. Trawling through Hansard, I noted that she had asked questions about it back in the 1980s. I too am concerned about the time that it has been taking to overcome the problem, but the taskforce is now minded to move some of the waste from the site, which I know is what she and the residents want. I shall endeavour to keep her fully informed of anything I discover about progress, and I hope that all interested parties will work together to clean the site and make it available for a much better use than that to which it has been put for the past 20-odd years.

    A483
    Mr. Martyn Jones: What recent discussions he has had with his ministerial and National Assembly for Wales colleagues concerning improvements to the A483 south of Wrexham. [129537]
    The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Wales (Mr. Don Touhig): My right hon. Friend and I have regular discussions with ministerial and Assembly colleagues. The Highways Agency and the Assembly have recently carried out public consultation on a route management strategy for the A5/A483 trunk roads south of Wrexham. I hope that the results will be published later in the year.
    Mr. Jones: Does my hon. Friend recall that in the late 1980s, when the road was improved by the Tories, they penny-pinched on the viaduct at Chirk and Acrefair? We ended up with a 10-metre carriageway which is both dangerous and, now, inadequate for the traffic that it is taking. Will my hon. Friend get together with his colleagues as soon as possible to ensure that the road is put right at the earliest opportunity?
    Mr. Touhig: I understand my hon. Friend's frustration. The Tory years were characterised by a lack of funds for major projects of this kind and, given their current proposal for a 20 per cent. public expenditure cut, the road will soon be down to a grass track.
    There are no plans for further dualling beyond Ruabon. The existing road is modern, and of a relatively high standard. Early indications from the public consultation suggest that more acceptable solutions are being considered. My colleagues in the Assembly recently undertook major resurfacing of the Newbridge bypass, and further discussions will take place about how we can make the route safer for all users.
    Mr. Roger Williams: The Minister's travels through Wales will have been delayed by the traffic lights between Llandrindod Wells and Newtown on the A483. Temporary traffic lights have been in place for 15 years. Will the Minister rejoice with me that the Assembly has got round to carrying out roadworks? I wonder, though, why the work was done in August, when people wanted to travel to the Eisteddfod in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Montgomeryshire (Lembit Öpik), causing disruption to the tourist trade.
    Mr. Touhig: I am glad that the traffic lights have been removed, because I shall be travelling along the road next week. There is probably a gap in people's lives now that the lights have gone, but I welcome what has happened.

    National Health Service
    Chris Grayling: What recent discussions he has had with the Minister for Health in the National Assembly for Wales regarding the national health service in Wales. [129538]
    The Secretary of State for Wales (Mr. Peter Hain): I have regular meetings with Assembly Ministers when the Wales NHS is discussed.
    Chris Grayling: What progress is the Secretary of State making in pursuing discussions with the National Assembly and the Department of Health to ensure that England and Wales do not end up with two inspection regimes for health, with all the extra bureaucracy and the additional work for hospitals that that will cause, particularly in border areas?
    Mr. Hain: Discussions are continuing. Obviously the Wales NHS is separate from the English NHS, but the two are linked and co-operation is important, especially in the cross-border areas to which the hon. Gentleman refers.
    Mr. Alan Williams: Will the Secretary of State initiate discussions with the First Minister to establish whether comparative studies can be conducted by the National Audit Offices for Wales and England on performance in the health service, especially relating to orthopaedics, hip operations and cataract operations?
    Mr. Hain: That is an important issue. The fact is that performance in Wales has been much better than performance in England in respect of emergency admissions, but worse in respect of elective surgery. That applies to some of the areas mentioned by my right hon. Friend. The Wanless report, which constituted a pretty robust analysis of the situation, has been welcomed by the Health and First Ministers, who are taking action. I think that that will lead to the necessary improvements in performance, although we should not doubt the improvements that have already occurred. For instance, 200,000 more new patients are being seen than were being seen in 1997.
    Mr. Nigel Evans: The part-time Secretary of State for Wales cannot abdicate responsibility for the severe problems that patients now face in the national health service in Wales. In-patient and day-case waiting lists continue to deteriorate, despite the fact that the Government have massively increased taxation on the people, including the 1 per cent. increase in national insurance contributions. On 12 September, The Western Mail pointed out that Welsh patients can wait four times longer to be seen than patients in England. In England, the out-patient first appointment target is 17 weeks; in Wales, it is 18 months. Is that acceptable?
    Mr. Hain: Of course, we want to improve performance all the time, and I am discussing these matters with Ministers in Cardiff bay to achieve that objective. The hon. Gentleman continually runs down the health service in Wales, yet 200,000 additional
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    patients are being seen, compared with the record when the Tories lost office. How can he make such accusations, given that under the Tories, training places for nurses were cut by 25 per cent., and under Labour such places are already up by 30 per cent.? The truth is that the Tories would wreak havoc on the Wales health service, as they did when they were in power.
    Mr. Evans: I am not talking down the national health service, but it is only right that, as an Opposition, we point out the realities of the NHS in Wales. Yesterday, the right hon. Gentleman talked about having citizens' contracts with the public in respect of public services. Citizens are fully delivering on their side of the bargain through massive extra taxation; it is the Government who are not delivering on theirs. Where were the citizens' rights for the 93-year-old lady who ended up breaking both hips last week when she was released from hospital and taken to somebody else's home, five miles away from her own? Where were the citizens' rights for the 26-year-old Caerphilly man who reported to his hospital that he had taken an overdose of 70 tablets, was left on a trolley for hours and then died? That was an absolute tragedy. The right hon. Gentleman's contract with the people is nothing more than a con trick. People will continue to mistrust this Government until they simply deliver the national health service that the people of Wales are paying for.
    Mr. Hain: Let us look at the facts. In their 18 years in power, the Tories closed 70 hospitals in Wales; we are in the process of building, or have built, 10 new ones. We are recruiting more nurses, more doctors and more consultants, after the long years of Tory cuts.
    The hon. Gentleman rightly describes as tragic the two incidents to which he refers. An inquest is obviously being held into the death of the Caerphilly man who, I understand, took an overdose and died while in hospital. The appalling incident in which the 93-yearold was delivered to the wrong address is the subject of a formal investigation, and as soon as I know its outcome, I shall obviously let the hon. Gentleman know.
    Gareth Thomas: May I draw my right hon. Friend's attention to the massive extra capital investment in the NHS in north Wales, and in the Ysbyty Glan Clwyd hospital in Bodelwyddan in particular? That includes the cancer treatment centre., which cost £20 million, and new procedures to improve emergency admissions. Does he accept that that represents a huge contrast with the under-investment in the health service that occurred under the Tories?
    Mr. Hain: I very much agree with my hon. Friend This is another example of the progress that is being made in the Wales health service. The staff of the excellent and well-managed Ysbyty Glan Clwyd hospital deserve the House's congratulations on their performance. An increasing number of patients are being seen, and the hospital is a beacon for health service provision in the area. That contrasts with the hospital closures that regularly occurred the length and breadth

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    of Wales under the Tories, and which would be repeated if they got into power and implemented their 20 per cent. cuts
    Mr. Elfyn Llwyd: We owe a great debt of gratitude to those working in the NHS. My constituents tell me that when they do eventually get treatment, it is first class, and I am sure that that is right. When the right hon. Gentleman next speaks to the Minister for Health in Cardiff, will he congratulate her on getting the waiting list for those waiting for in-patient treatment for more than one year down to 12,641, compared with a figure of 37 in England?
    Mr. Hain: It is good to hear from the leader of Plaid Cymru in Parliament. Of course he competes for that position with two other leaders of Plaid Cymru, both of whom hate each other and did not vote for each other, revealing a party that is leaderless and schizophrenic about its leadership—[HON. MEMBERS: "Answer the question."] Yes, I will answer the question. If the hon Gentleman's disastrous policies for an independent Wales were implemented, health services and school services would be cut; whereas we now have record investment going in, more patients being seen and waiting times coming down. Patients who use the health service in the hon. Gentleman's constituency and elsewhere know that the service is going from strength to strength under Labour.

    Manufacturing Industry
    Paul Flynn: What recent discussions he has had with (a) ministerial colleagues and (b) Welsh Assembly Ministers on assistance for manufacturing industry in Wales. [129539]
    The Secretary of State for Wales (Mr. Peter Hain): Regular ones. The Government are supporting manufacturing investment through structural funds, regional selective assistance, the research and development tax credit, regional venture capital funds and the small firms loan guarantee scheme, as well as reforming corporation and capital gains tax to encourage investment.
    Paul Flynn: Does the Minister agree—I think that he well might—that the Government have done a magnificent job in Wales by creating 78,000 jobs in the last 12 months and halving unemployment since we were elected in 1997? However, there is the one worry about manufacturing jobs, which have long been the backbone of the Welsh economy. Those jobs are going, particularly in Newport, where a third of employment is in the manufacturing sector. They were well paid, highly skilled, long-term jobs, but they have been replaced with jobs—in call centres, for example—that are none of those things: they are teflon jobs that may be in Wales today, but in Bangladesh tomorrow.
    Mr. Hain: We are competing in a very competitive World economy against countries, including Bangladesh, where wages are a fraction of what they are in Wales. The Welsh Assembly Government's and the Labour Government's policy of value-added investment
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    to increase the capacity of our manufacturing centre at the top end of the markets is the crucial policy to adopt. I am sure that my hon. Friend would welcome the fact that Interbrew, a Belgian company. has recently invested in Newport and created 40 new jobs. There are other stories and reports of massive investment across Wales from foreign and domestic companies, all contributing to the record increase of 78,000 jobs over the last year.
    Lembit Öpik: Now that we know that the Under-Secretary will be driving through my constituency next week, would he be willing to use the time he saves from the road works to visit the town of Llanidloes, which has lost 250 manufacturing jobs as a result of the closure of KTH? What feasible support can the Wales Office give, notwithstanding the support of the National Assembly, to ensure that we avoid an economic catastrophe in the Llanidloes area?
    Mr. Hain: I was privileged to attend the national Eisteddfod in the hon. Gentleman's constituency—a marvellous occasion in a beautiful part of Wales. The position of KTH was obviously desperate. We worked together to try to save it and provide an alternative. The hon. Gentleman knows that I will do everything that I can—and I am sure that the First Minister will do the same—to provide a decent future for the town.
    Llew Smith: Is the Secretary of State aware of the vast number of jobs in the manufacturing industry that have been lost in my constituency? He will know that many of the jobs that have replaced them have too often been low-paid, non-union jobs. Does he accept that one way of overcoming the problem of low wages would be to increase the minimum wage in October not to £4.50, but to at least £5 an hour?
    Mr. Hain: As the Chancellor announced at the Trades Union Congress last week, the minimum wage will go up next year to £4.85 and thereafter to £5 an hour and more. That contrasts with the position under the Tories, who had no minimum wage and presided over poverty pay and the exploitation of workers. Under the Labour Government there has been more and more investment in the valleys. Today, for example, 400 new jobs in the airline industry are being created in Blackwood and Cwmbran, coupled with other manufacturing jobs in the sector. That is a sign of the manufacturing sector being given the support that it needs to go from strength to strength in difficult international conditions.
    Mr. Nigel Evans: I know that the Secretary of State is interested in manufacturing jobs. After all, he has manufactured enough jobs for himself over the past six years. At the last Welsh questions, I suggested to him that he set up a taskforce to address the meltdown in manufacturing in Wales. However, since then, more manufacturing jobs have been lost, and the Office for National Statistics has downgraded Wales's gross domestic product—as compared with England's—from 81.3 per cent. to 79.2 per cent. If that trend continues, the whole of Wales will be eligible for objective 1 status in six years' time.

    847
    Professor Dylan Jones Evans, of the University of Wales, Bangor, has pointed out that
    "manufacturing is continuing to decline and we are not replacing the jobs lost with high value"—
    [Interruption.]
    Mr. Speaker: Order. Questions are too long.
    Mr. Hain: The hon. Gentleman has my sympathy. I know that it is difficult for him to keep up with what is going on in Wales, as he is not a Welsh MP. Let us look at the facts, instead of talking down the manufacturing sector in Wales. Last Friday, I attended the commercial launch of a big power station by General Electric, the multinational company. It involved more than £1 billion of investment, with huge numbers of jobs being created. It located at Baglan in south Wales because that was the best location for the most highly developed gas power technology. Hundreds of people from Japan, Korea, Australia and the US came to Wales to see that it is now a good place to invest, compared with the Tory years.

    Bed Blocking
    Mr. Jon Owen Jones: What consultations he has had with the Welsh Assembly Government concerning the Wanless report recommendations on alleviating bed blocking in Wales; and if he will make a statement. [129540]
    The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Wales (Mr. Don Touhig): My right hon. Friend and I have regular meetings with the Assembly Minister for Health, Jane Hutt. I met her yesterday and I shall meet her again today. I am also keeping in close touch with her on the issues arising from the Wanless report and I look forward to the Assembly's response and its implementation plan, to be announced later this year.
    Mr. Jones: The Wanless report said that the health service in Wales was unsustainable. In particular, it highlighted the problems of bed blocking. It offered four options to deal with that problem and identified an immediate need. Given that the report was published in July—but had been given to the Minister in Wales five months earlier—and that some of the options require primary legislation, I should have thought that the Wales Office would have been prepared by now for those options. If it does not act now, we will face a delay of at least a year and half before any action is taken.
    Mr. Touhig: It is important to bear it in mind that Wanless also said:
    "The provision of health and social care is complex and multifaceted and cannot be summarised in a single sentence."
    The Public Accounts Committee report published this morning on bed blocking highlighted several of the problems that we face, and it will also inform any Government response. The Assembly Minister is preparing a response to Wanless and an implementation plan. If that requires any primary legislation, the Assembly will bid in the proper way and we will give every encouragement to ensure that what is needed to deliver an improvement in the health service in Wales is supported by the Government in Westminster.

    Low-flying Exercises
    Adam Price: What recent discussions he has had with the Ministry of Defence on low-flying exercises in Wales; and if he will make a statement. [129541]
    The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Wales (Mr. Don Touhig): I regularly discuss matters affecting Wales with Ministers in the Ministry of Defence.
    Adam Price: The Minister will be aware that in parts of Wales military aircraft are permitted to fly at an altitude of just 60 m, causing distress to individuals and many fallen livestock. Will he clear his diary to meet urgently colleagues from the Ministry of Defence to ask them why such exercises are allowed to continue in Wales when they have been banned in almost every other NATO country? Why are they necessary when low flying has not been used as a military tactic by British armed forces in any conflict since the end of the cold war?
    Mr. Touhig: I hope that the hon. Gentleman is well skilled in self-defence, as he is about to attend his party's conference. He will need protection from the hand-to-hand fighting and back stabbing that characterises his divided party. However, he raises a serious issue. I experienced low-flying aircraft when I was in north Wales a week or so ago. The UK has no uninhabited areas large enough to meet the essential training needs of aircrew. The Ministry of Defence aims to spread the disturbance, but for operational and weather reasons some areas are busier than others. A reduction in low flying over the hon. Gentleman's constituency, Carmarthen, would obviously increase the burden elsewhere. I sympathise with the hon. Gentleman and I share his concerns, but I point out that less than 10 per cent. of operational low flying takes place over Wales. I will keep abreast of the issue, and do anything that I can to help obviate the problem.

    Inward Investment
    Sir Nicholas Winterton: If he will make a statement on prospects for inward investment in Wales. [129542]
    The Secretary of State for Wales (Mr. Peter Hain): In a tough economic climate, Wales remains one of Europe's top inward investment locations. Wales's share of British projects, together with the levels of jobs and investment, has increased. That is testament to the work of Team Wales and the partnership effort that is clearly achieving great things.
    Sir Nicholas Winterton: Is the Secretary of State aware that the latest report from the accountants Ernst and Young shows that, outside the euro, the share of inward investment going to the UK—including Wales—rose from 26.5 per cent. in 2001 to 28.4 per cent. in 2002. Do we need the euro? Were not the Swedish people right in their decision?
    Mr. Hain: Three quarters of Welsh exports go to the eurozone countries. Clearly, in the right economic

    849
    circumstances—and the Treasury will continue to assess those—an opportunity to join the euro would benefit the Welsh economy and inward investment.
    Mr. John Smith: Will my right hon. Friend join me in welcoming the launch of the aerospace cluster in my constituency last week? It will play an important role in inward investment, and also a crucial role in military aerospace and aviation. Will he do all that he can with colleagues in the Ministry of Defence to ensure that the red dragon project proceeds on course?
    Mr. Hain: Yes. The red dragon project will proceed on course—both on and off the rugby field. My hon. Friend spoke about creating a centre of excellence for air investment in south Wales, and that is certainly happening. I can announce today that 400 new jobs are being created in the aerospace industry, in Blackwood and in Cwmbran. That will link with the excellent increases in investment in the military aerospace industry.

    Public Sector Employment
    Mr. Bill Wiggin: What proportion of jobs in Wales are in the public sector. [129543]
    The Secretary of State for Wales (Mr. Peter Hain): The most recent data from the labour force survey show that one third of jobs in Wales are in the public sector.
    Mr. Wiggin: So why is that not making any difference?
    Mr. Hain: It is making a difference. The increase in employment in Wales last year—78,000—was the largest of any UK region. In the three months to July, Wales was once again among Britain's top-performing regions in terms of private sector output growth, according to the chief economist for the Royal Bank of Scotland.
    Mr. Huw Edwards: Is my right hon. Friend aware that 256 public sector jobs are in the forensic science laboratory in Chepstow? Those public servants provide a superb service to the Dyfed-Powys and South Wales police forces. However, staff are seriously worried about possible privatisation plans. Is my right hon. Friend willing to meet staff representatives to discuss the matter?
    Mr. Hain: I should be happy to meet my hon. Friend's constituents. However, I point out to the House that implementation of the Tory policy of 20 per cent. across-the-board cuts would mean that jobs such as those that my hon. Friend has described and other public sector jobs elsewhere in Wales would be savaged.

    Common Agricultural Policy
    Miss Anne McIntosh: What representations he has received from tenant farmers in Wales on proposed reform of the common agricultural policy. [129544]
    The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Wales (Mr. Don Touhig): The hon. Lady takes a keen interest in this matter, about which she asked me questions in February and April. I understand her persistence. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has received no representations from tenant farmers in Wales on the proposed reform. However, he has regular meetings with the Assembly First Minister, and I also meet the Assembly Minister responsible for the environment and for agricultural matters.
    Miss McIntosh: Does the Minister still think that common agricultural policy reform will happen, given the collapse of the Cancun talks? How will tenant farmers benefit from the rural development strand of that reform?
    Mr. Touhig: The issues relating to tenant farmers are complex, and my colleagues in the Assembly are consulting farming unions and other stakeholders on CAP reform. All sides in Wales have welcomed the reform package as a significant step in sustaining the Welsh farming industry. I shall spend two days next week in mid-Wales visiting Welsh producers, promoting Welsh foods and products, and visiting Welsh farms to obtain a first-hand understanding of some of the difficulties that our farmers face. The reforms that we are pushing for will benefit the industry.

  The Prime Minister was asked—
  PRIME MINISTER

    Engagements
    Mr. Michael Jack: If he will list his official engagements for Wednesday 17 September.
    The Prime Minister (Mr. Tony Blair): Before listing my engagements, I express my condolences on behalf of the Government, the House and the British people following the tragic murder of the Swedish Foreign Minister Anna Lindh last week. She was an inspiration to the Swedish people and an internationally respected Foreign Minister. She will be deeply missed.
    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.
    Mr. Jack: The whole House will share in the Prime Minister's words on the sad death of the Swedish Foreign Minister.

    851
    Can the Prime Minister justify his policy on student tuition fees in the light of research showing that graduates pay £2,000 a year more in tax than non-graduates do, and given that his own parliamentary party has rejected his policies and that he told the British people that he would not introduce student tuition fees?
    The Prime Minister: I suspect that graduates probably pay more income tax because they earn a great deal more money—something like 40 per cent. more. The choice is simple: either we get more funds into universities so that we have a fair system under which no one pays money up front, or we adopt the Conservative policy, which would result, according to the Institute of Education, in a cut of 100,000 students every year.
    Barbara Follett: Will my right hon. Friend do all he can to ensure that when the Post Office consults the public about the closure of a branch, it must demonstrate that it has taken their views into account? That certainly did not happen recently in Stevenage, when a strong case made for the retention of Chells post office was ignored by the Post Office. As a result, we are losing a strong branch and keeping a weak one.
    The Prime Minister: I know that my hon. Friend has campaigned hard on that post office in her constituency. I also understand why people feel strongly about such closures. I know, too, that she would expect me to point out that at the end of the current programme of change in the Post Office, 95 per cent. of the urban population will still live within one mile of a post office. It is obviously important that we should try to provide the right facilities, and she will recognise that we are putting about £1.5 billion into the Post Office over the next few years. In the end, however, every decision of this type must, with the proper consultation, be a matter for the Post Office.
    Mr. Iain Duncan Smith: I associate the Opposition with the Prime Minister's condolences to the Swedish Government.
    On 10 June the Prime Minister launched a roadshow to sell the single currency to the British people. Can he tell us where it has got to?
    The Prime Minister: There have been about 60 visits from Foreign Office Ministers over the past few months. It is important to keep the option of joining the single currency open for the reasons that I have given before. The right hon. Gentleman's policy of closing off that option and saying no in any set of circumstances would not be the right one for the British people.
    Mr. Duncan Smith: The whereabouts of the Prime Minister's roadshow are a mystery even to his Government. The Treasury, when asked, says:
    "There are so many roadshow events we can't begin to list them all."
    The Foreign Office said:
    "The roadshow hasn't actually begun."
    Meanwhile, the Minister for Europe said:
    "It's not a literal roadshow, it's only a figure of speech."
    852
    Given that the roadshow has not even got on the road, will the Prime Minister confirm that there will not be a referendum in this Parliament?
    The Prime Minister: No, I certainly will not confirm that. We should keep our options open. The right test to apply is whether membership is in the economic interests of this country. We said that we would return to that issue next year. I see absolutely no reason for this country to say that it will foreclose its options and rule out membership of a single currency. We should do what is right for this country and keep the option open.
    Mr. Duncan Smith: The Prime Minister is spinning roadshows, wasting public money and legislating for a referendum that he does not have the courage to hold. Why does he not admit what everybody else knows—that his dreams, his schemes and his hopes to scrap the pound are utterly wrecked?
    The Prime Minister: It is slightly odd of the right hon. Gentleman to accuse me of not having the courage to hold the referendum when in his second question he asked me to rule out holding one. We have to decide what is in our best interests as a country. I happen to believe that, in our best interests, we should keep open the option of joining the single currency if it is in our economic interests to do so. The truth is that the right hon. Gentleman now holds a position not merely of blocking any change in the European constitution but of ruling out the single currency even if joining is in our economic interests. That is not a position that will recommend itself to the country, and when his predecessor adopted that position at the last general election, it was rejected.
    Mr. Tom Clarke: Does my right hon. Friend share my concern about the imminent job losses at Sheffield Forgemasters—actually, at a local company that is better known as the family firm of R.B. Tennant? Does he agree that every possible effort should be made to consider the options by which we can retain those vital and highly skilled jobs?
    The Prime Minister: My right hon. Friend is right to raise that issue as it is important. The Sheffield Forgemasters engineering business continues to have financial backing, and I understand that a series of meetings are taking place between the Department of Trade and Industry, the regional development agency—Yorkshire Forward—and the company. I hope very much that a way forward can be found in the coming months.
    Mr. Charles Kennedy: Last September, and again this February, the Prime Minister released dossiers to the British public that included the intelligence assessments that underpinned the case for war in Iraq. Why did he choose to withhold from those dossiers other intelligence that would undoubtedly have undermined his case in the minds of the British public?
    The Prime Minister: I do not accept that it would have undermined our case. If the right hon. Gentleman is

    853
    referring to the Joint Intelligence Committee assessment about the danger of the weapons falling into the hands of terrorists, it would have been totally irresponsible if we had said that that danger meant that we should allow Saddam Hussein to carry on developing them. That would have been a foolish state of affairs to have brought about. That is why I do not believe that it undermined the case for war at all.
    Mr. Kennedy: We now know that the Prime Minister was warned by the intelligence chiefs that war in Iraq could increase rather than decrease the risk of terrorism. We now know that the line in the original draft of the September dossier that reassured our public that Iraq was incapable of launching a nuclear strike against Britain was removed before publication. Why was the Prime Minister not willing to trust the British public to form a balanced judgment on those matters? Why did he not play it straight with the public at the time?
    The Prime Minister: It is extraordinary of the right hon. Gentleman, whose case as I understand it is that those weapons did not exist in any event, now to say—
    Mr. Kennedy indicated dissent.
    The Prime Minister: Oh, I see, they did exist—we should just have done nothing about them. All I can tell the right hon. Gentleman, if he wants it straight, is that the day this country's foreign policy is run by the Liberal Democrats will be the day this country really is at risk.
    Mr. Neil Turner: Recently, a young girl was raped in my constituency, and earlier in the summer a young girl was enticed to Europe from the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Leigh (Andy Burnham). Internet chatlines are the connection between the two cases. Will my right hon. Friend ensure that the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, the Department of Trade and Industry, the Home Office, and other relevant Government Departments, all join together to ensure that chatlines are properly regulated? May I also ask my right hon. Friend whether there is some way to ensure that internet chatline organisers police themselves so that other families do not suffer the same trauma as those in my constituency?
    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend raises a valuable and important point. The Home Office and the task force for child protection on the internet are working together to try to ensure that the internet is safe for children to use. In addition, the Sexual Offences Bill contains measures that bear on the problem and will help. I assure my hon. Friend that we shall continue to work with the industry, law enforcement and children's charities so that we do our very best to ensure that the law is sufficiently tight and also that internet services are greatly restricted whenever they may collide with the interests of children.
    Chris Grayling: When the Prime Minister said recently,
    "We should be willing to experiment with new forms of co-payment in the public sector",
    what did he mean?
    The Prime Minister: We have many examples of that: in pensions, where people make co-payments; in transport, where there is road-user charging in certain parts of the country; and in relation to student finance, where there is already co-payment through fees. It is important to recognise that when we are trying to boost our public services not all the money will come from the taxpayer. It is a pretty extraordinary thing if today's Conservative party is against those proposals.
    Mr. David Borrow: Fire, police and ambulance services in Lancashire are appointing a number of emergency community support officers to work in rural areas, one of whom will be based in Tarleton in my constituency. In addition to supporting the police, those officers will act as the first responder, having been trained by the ambulance service, and will undertake fire prevention work, after training from the fire service. Will my right hon. Friend congratulate the emergency services in Lancashire on that initiative and will he also urge emergency services in other rural areas—
    Mr. Speaker: Order. That is fine. The Prime Minister can answer.
    The Prime Minister: I certainly will congratulate the emergency services on the work that they are doing. It is worth pointing out that there are about 1,200 community support officers—something that the Conservatives opposed when we introduced them. Those community support officers will be especially important not only at present but also when the Antisocial Behaviour Bill comes in, because they will be able to issue fixed penalty notices in respect of antisocial behaviour and truancy. It will be important that we increase the number of community support officers, as they are a huge help to the police—whose numbers are now at record levels.
    Mr. Alistair Carmichael: Does the Prime Minister accept that the restoration of basic services in Iraq is not progressing and will not do so as long as it remains under the control of the United States and the United Kingdom? Does he agree that delay in making the United Nations the principal authority in Iraq simply delays the day when basic services such as water, electricity and health care can be given to the Iraqi people?
    The Prime Minister: First, I do not agree at all that the problem in providing decent services is the presence of the British or American troops. Our troops in the south of Iraq are doing their utmost to provide electricity, water and basic services. The people who are stopping those services are those who are sabotaging them—terrorists and supporters of Saddam. I should have thought that the hon. Gentleman would be getting to his feet to praise our troops for the work that they are doing in the south of Iraq. As some of the facts do not always come across, I shall also tell him that all 240 hospitals in Iraq are now functioning; by the end of June most of the schools were open and about 5.5 million children were able to take their end of year exams; and we are putting in hundreds of millions of pounds of infrastructure investment to provide better power and electricity. That

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    money was denied the people of Iraq by the regime of Saddam Hussein; had we followed the hon. Gentleman's policy, Saddam would still be in charge of it.
    Mr. Barry Gardiner: Yesterday, a report from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development catalogued the decline in standards in British schools, but can the Prime Minister tell the House whether any part of that report related to any period while he was in government, or does it represent a catalogue of the failure of the Conservative party?
    The Prime Minister: It is interesting that the report, which was supposedly about Britain's school performance slumping, was analysing the school attainment of those aged 25 to 64 in 2001, so not a single person involved was in school under this Government. However, the OECD report about this Government and our record shows that, in reading, our 15-year-olds are eighth out of 43; in maths, eighth out of 31; and, in science, fourth out of 31. The report yesterday shows precisely the reason why we needed the increased investment that we have given.
    Mr. Iain Duncan Smith: Can the Prime Minister tell us how much council tax has gone up by since 1997?
    The Prime Minister: I cannot give an exact figure, but it is true that council tax has gone up since 1997; however, so has the amount of Government support to local government.
    Mr. Duncan Smith: The answer to the question—the straight answer—is that council tax has gone up by a massive 70 per cent., a typical family is now paying £413 more since Labour came to office, and the very poorest pensioners spend nearly £1 in every £10 on council tax. Can the Prime Minister tell us all where in his manifesto he warned people of those massive tax rises?
    The Prime Minister: It is correct that council tax has gone up, but it is also correct, as I say, that the amount of money coming from central Government to local government has increased. It has increased by 25 per cent. compared with a real-terms cut of 7 per cent. in the last four years of the Conservatives. The additional money that we are giving to local government at the moment was in the spending proposals, and was voted against by the right hon. Gentleman's party, which is in favour of cuts in that spending, so perhaps he will tell us how the council tax would be lower if we cut the amount of central Government support.
    Mr. Duncan Smith: Let me remind the Prime Minister of what he actually said. In his manifesto, he promised that there would be no "excessive council tax rises". Yet, under Labour, council tax rises have become the biggest stealth tax of all, and next year he and his colleagues will send them soaring through the roof. Is not the reality
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    that the Labour lies on taxes are the biggest single reason why nobody believes a single word he says anymore?
    The Prime Minister: The local authorities set the levels of council tax. The question, surely, for central Government is: are we providing them with sufficient money? [HON. MEMBERS: "No!"] So it is apparently the position of the Conservative party that the increases that we have given are not enough, which is presumably why they voted even against the increases that we gave them. The truth of the matter is that we have given—[Interruption.]
    Mr. Speaker: Order. The Leader of the Opposition must calm himself. [Interruption.] Order. I am telling him and other hon. Members to calm down.
    The Prime Minister: We have put more money into local government, and it is for the local authorities in the end to decide what their levels of council tax are, but that money has helped our education, our social services and our other local services. Whatever the situation is, the position of local authorities could not be improved by the right hon. Gentleman's policy, which is to cut even the money that we have put in. So in the end, it is a matter for local government; but so far as we are concerned, we have been increasing the amount of money to local government, not decreasing it.
    Mr. Martin Salter: Heroin and crack cocaine are flooding into our country, destroying lives and tearing apart families and communities. In my constituency in Reading, street crime recently fell by a third, but the town is still blighted by the scourge of hard drugs, as addicts turn to other forms of crime to feed their habits. What are the Government doing to improve joint working between the police, the courts and the treatment agencies to tackle that menace?
    The Prime Minister: We are making sure that for the first time there is proper working across the agencies, involving the drug treatment agency, the criminal justice system and the police, to deal with offenders who have a crack or heroin addiction. We are saying to them clearly that they can have the treatment that is available for them, but if they do not accept that treatment, under the Criminal Justice Bill that we are putting through the House, they stand at risk of bail being refused. We cannot have a situation in which people who are drug addicts and who have tested positive for drugs are put back out on the street where they will commit further crime.
    More than 6,000 drug treatment and testing orders, which are for those who have already been convicted of a crime, have now been issued, and 50 per cent. of the people on them have either given up drugs or are co-operating with the authorities. That is why the huge

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    investment that we are now making in drug treatment across the country is for the first time giving us the chance to deal with this problem.
    Mr. Tim Boswell: Does the Prime Minister think that a majority of Labour Back Benchers support his current policy on student top-up fees?
    The Prime Minister: I believe that when we come to the debate we shall see what the support is. Yes, I do believe, however, that the vast majority of people here will support that proposal. Let me tell the hon. Gentleman why. We have a simple choice: either we make sure that we widen access to university and allow those universities to bring in more and more people, whom we need in today's world, or we adopt the policy with which he has now associated himself, which is to cut by 100,000 a year the numbers going into university. That is an inequitable policy, and this side of the House will not support it.
    Siobhain McDonagh: Is my right hon. Friend aware that in January the south-west London diagnostic and treatment centre for hips and knees will open? It will be the largest such centre outside America. Not only will it benefit my constituents and those of other hon. Members by performing 1,500 more hip and knee replacements a year, but it will provide an unparalleled base for research in Europe on orthopaedics. Would he support plans to provide such a centre of excellence on this site?
    The Prime Minister: I am delighted about the centre in my hon. Friend's constituency. By 2005, such centres will be providing around 300,000 extra operations in the health service a year, and will be one of the reasons why every national health service indicator is already better than in 1997. I see from the comments of the Conservatives' health spokesman the other day that they are opposed to those centres. Any constituency that gets one of those centres therefore knows that the Conservatives would take it away.
    Mr. Gary Streeter: Returning to the vital issue of drugs, for which I make no apology as it is surely one of the biggest social challenges facing our nation, is the Prime Minister aware that we now have a growing number of heroin addicts—up to 250,000—yet only 2,000 places at treatment centres to which they can turn for help? If an addict therefore makes the brave decision to turn his back on a life of misery and crime, there are simply not enough places for him to get help at the moment. Will the Prime Minister take an urgent look at this problem and, if necessary, redirect resources and make sufficient numbers of places available?
    The Prime Minister: Actually, the treatment position is better than the hon. Gentleman describes. It is improving all the time, and more and more places are being made available. A presentation was made to me yesterday by people working in Manchester on this issue, and, as a result, they are able to extend treatment to the numbers of people that they are identifying as drug addicts in the criminal justice system. The only way
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    we will do that, however, is by investing the necessary money. It is not a question of redirecting it from elsewhere, but of making that basic investment, to which we are committed. Whatever the hon. Gentleman's concern, which I am sure is sincere, the fact is that his Front Benchers are opposed to that money going in.
    Alan Howarth: Given that it is essential to bring more money into the universities and to increase opportunity for people to study in universities, is not the fairest and most effective policy to achieve those purposes to allow an increase in university fees, covering the costs through loans to be repaid by graduates as and when their income permits, while bringing back maintenance grants for people from less-well-off households and increasing support for universities and schools to work together to raise educational aspiration?
    The Prime Minister: I entirely agree with my right hon. Friend, who makes the right argument. That is why I believe that, as the debate progress, people will support it. The alternative is to cut the numbers of people going to university and for Britain to become the only country anywhere in the world that is reducing the number of people with access to higher education.
    Miss Anne McIntosh: Has the Prime Minister seen from the Public Accounts Committee report that 50.000 beds have been lost since 1996? Is he surprised by that when there has been a 20 per cent. increase in fees to the National Care Standards Commission and a 142 per cent. increase in enhanced criminal record checks? What is he going to do about that?
    The Prime Minister: Today's report is about delayed discharges and it indicates that there is still an awful lot to do. However, I point out to the hon. Lady that, under this Government, we have had the first increase in the number of beds in the health service for many years. We have already halved the number of delayed discharges. It is true that we have got to go a lot further, but there is no way at all, if we compare the position now with that of 1997, that we are not in a better one.
    Mr. John Smith: With more than 55 million Britons taking flights abroad each year, does my right hon. Friend agree that it is wholly unacceptable that airlines in this day and age have no legal liability whatsoever for the health or well-being of their passengers? Will he undertake to look into this?
    The Prime Minister: We are supporting the research into deep vein thrombosis that is being carried out by the World Health Organisation. I also say to my hon. Friend that the United Kingdom will ratify the Montreal convention when all 15 members states of the European Union are in a position to do so simultaneously. At the moment, that is not the case, but I hope that it will be. Obviously, the next steps on this will be informed by the research that is being undertaken by the WHO.
    Bob Russell (Colchester): What does the Prime Minister think will give him the most concern on

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    Friday as he looks at the collapse of the Labour vote in Brent—the fact that Labour supporters no longer trust him or the fact that traditional Labour supporters no longer have any faith in new Labour?
    The Prime Minister: If I may give the hon. Gentleman some advice, it would be as well to wait for the verdict of the electorate before the Liberal Democrats presume it. From what I can make out, one of the key issues in this by-election is antisocial behaviour. The Liberal Democrats have been putting out leaflets saying how serious they are about tackling it. However, when legislation was before the House to give the police the powers to tackle antisocial behaviour, the Liberal Democrats voted en masse against it. I thank the hon. Gentleman for the opportunity to tell people that.
    Mr. Stephen Pound: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. You will be aware that the High Hedges (No. 2) Bill died a "mute, inglorious" death a few weeks ago on the Floor of this very Chamber. This Bill, which was piloted with great skill, ability and intelligence through the upper House by my colleague, Baroness Gardner of Parkes, and by a rather less distinguished parliamentarian in this House, deserves a second chance. Will my right hon. Friend give the High Hedges (No. 2) Bill the chance to rise again—even though that will cause some pain to the hon. Member for Christchurch (Mr. Chope)?
    The Prime Minister: Well, it says—I understand the disappointment of my hon. Friend that his Bill did not make better progress, but the Government have had a long-standing commitment since August 2000 to bring forward new laws to give local authorities in England
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    and Wales powers to determine complaints about high garden hedges and will make every effort to get them on to the statute book at the earliest opportunity. I cannot say better than that.
    Mr. Alex Salmond: In three weeks' time, the Prime Minister's tenure in Downing street will exactly match that of John Major. Does he not think that enough is enough?
    The Prime Minister: One of the things that we did on coming to office was to deliver devolution in Scotland. After devolution in Scotland, the nationalists in Scotland had their worst election result. May I also point out to the hon. Gentleman that, since 1997, it is not me who has retired from leadership?
    Jim Dobbin: May I tell my right hon. Friend that a constituent of mine, Mr. Maurice Jones, who was a company director of Lister Yarns and worked for the company for 42 years, retired recently with little or no pension after the scheme collapsed? Can the Prime Minister offer a ray of hope to Mr. Jones and the 20,000 other pensioners in the same situation that retrospective compensation may be looked at? Surely it is a wrong that needs correcting.
    The Prime Minister: I will certainly bear in mind the point that my hon. Friend makes. He will know that the pensions protection fund that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions announced recently is precisely to deal with that situation so that we have insurance underpinning people whose pension schemes collapse. I will look into the issue that my hon. Friend raises very carefully.

WTO Ministerial Conference
12.30 pm
The Secretary of State for Trade and Industry (Ms Patricia Hewitt): With permission, Mr. Speaker, I should like to make a statement about the fifth World Trade Organisation ministerial conference in Cancun from 10 to 14 September, which I attended together with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, my noble Friend the Secretary of State for International Development and my hon. Friend the Minister for Trade and investment. Commissioners Lamy and Fischler negotiated on behalf of the European Union.
The UK delegation included my hon. Friend the Member for Putney (Mr. Colman), who represented the Select Committee on International Development, as well as representatives of the CBI, the TUC, the Consumers Association and the UK Trade Network. I warmly welcome their participation and thank them for their work.
The conference was attended by delegates from all 146 members of the World Trade Organisation, accompanied by many thousands of parliamentarians and civil society organisations as observers. On the opening day, we welcomed the accession of Cambodia and Nepal.
The British delegation worked hard to help to secure an outcome that would meet the needs of developing countries. Ministerial colleagues and I met a large number of representatives from those countries, and we ensured that their views were reflected when we met the United States and EU colleagues and others.
The conference was the WTO's opportunity to restore momentum to the Doha development round, which was launched with such high hopes in November 2001. It is with great regret that I must report that we were unable to reach an agreement. Talks broke down on the final day.
Before the talks ended, however, Commissioner Lamy, on behalf of the European Union, offered to abandon completely negotiations on two of the so-called Singapore issues—investment and competition—which was a position that the British Government fully supported. Many other WTO members also signalled a willingness to be flexible on various issues. With more time, I believe that it would have been possible to reach agreement.
Failure to reach agreement at Cancun is a serious setback for the Doha round, but it is not the end of the round or the WTO itself. In anticipation of Cancun, we had already reached agreement, which was overdue but welcome none the less, on access to medicines for developing countries. That agreement stands and must now be built on, especially through the global fund to fight HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria.
In June, the Agriculture Council of the EU agreed significant reforms of the common agricultural policy. The reforms will mean substantial cuts in the trade-distorting support and export subsidies that we give to our own farmers, which do so much damage to farmers in the developing world. The EU has already offered, in principle, to phase out export subsidies on products of
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particular interest to developing countries. The agreement on CAP reform was, of course, not conditional on agreement at Cancun.
We also saw at Cancun the formation of the G21 and other strengthened developing country groupings. I wholeheartedly welcome the emergence of this stronger voice for poorer nations. Indeed, the Government have led the way on helping developing countries to build their negotiating capacity. We have given £110 million to trade-related capacity building and technical assistance since 1998 and an additional £50 million was announced by the Secretary of State for International Development last week. Furthermore, at Cancun itself we made real progress in discussions on agriculture and other vital issues. There is no doubt that we were closer to agreement at the end of the Cancun conference than we were at the beginning.
We now need to lift our sights once more to the prize that is on offer, particularly for developing countries, if we can get the round back on track. The Cancun conference agreed a new deadline of 15 December to try to resolve the issues that we could not sort out at Cancun. I have already spoken to the director general of the World Trade Organisation, Dr. Supachai, about how the United Kingdom can help to drive that forward.
The final ministerial statement of the conference urged that those renewed discussions be based on the concessions that delegates offered at Cancun and not on their earlier positions. In the case of the European Union, that means that we should accept that, despite our continuing commitment to encourage and to facilitate direct investment in developing countries, WTO agreements on investment and competition are off the EU's agenda.
The International Monetary Fund and the World Bank announced in Cancun a new initiative to help developing countries to overcome problems in adjusting to a more liberal trading environment. I warmly welcome that. The UK Government will make a substantial input to the design and implementation of the initiative.
In the wake of Cancun, it is, I am afraid, inevitable that more emphasis will be put on regional and bilateral trade agreements. Although those could help to promote south-south as well as north-south trade, they risk excluding many poorer countries and leaving others isolated in negotiations with far larger countries. We continue to believe that the multilateral system should be the cornerstone of world trade rules.
All WTO members now need to reflect on the lessons to be learned from Cancun and to find ways of improving processes. We also have to address the issues of substance that prevented agreement at Cancun. We shall discuss how best to make progress on all those matters with our EU partners, the European Commission and others, taking particular account of the views of developing countries.
This Government are determined to do all we can to help to deliver a development round in line with the promises that we made at Doha. All countries stand to

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gain, but the poorest stand to gain the most. That is why we support the round and will continue to work for its success.
Mr. Tim Yeo: I welcome the Secretary of State back from her sojourn in the sun and am grateful to her for making available a copy of the statement in advance of it being delivered.
The collapse of the Cancun talks is a serious setback for rich and poor countries alike. No one can take satisfaction from an outcome that threatens the timely and successful completion of the Doha round. There will be widespread dismay in Britain at the breakdown and at the absence from the Secretary of State's statement of any firm, specific proposals to overcome the difficulties that have arisen.
Reducing barriers to free trade is essential to raising living standards worldwide. If progress towards the goal of freer trade is hampered by the breakdown at Cancun, we need to understand why the talks failed. Does the Secretary of State agree that, despite the fact that the European Union went further than it has done previously in its offer to reduce agriculture subsidies, the continued existence of protectionist farm policies both in Europe and the United States remains a very big obstacle? Will she admit that claims by the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs that the common agricultural policy reforms agreed earlier this year would meet World Trade Organisation needs have proved to be completely wrong? Is not the truth that, within Europe, the British Government have been sidelined from agriculture policy reform discussions by France and Germany?
Will the Secretary of State also admit that, although in 2003 Britain has had a unique and historic opportunity to influence United States policy, it has failed to do so in this respect and that United States intransigence on farm subsidies remains as strong as ever? Does she recognise that these talks are not a one-way street and that developing countries must make serious efforts to tackle corruption and to provide greater transparency? Does she share my disappointment that the breakdown of the talks was apparently regarded by some of the development non-governmental organisations as a cause for celebration?
Given the importance of making progress on steps that will encourage investment in developing countries and the understandable concern of those countries about burdensome negotiations, does the Secretary of State now accept that a specific advocacy fund, as proposed by the Conservatives, would be an excellent and practical way to help developing countries and to resume progress on the Doha round? The general trade facilitation programme announced by Baroness Amos last week and referred to in the statement is no substitute. In relation to Baroness Amos, does the Secretary of State understand the concerns of my hon. Friend the shadow Secretary of State for International Development that that important Department is no longer represented in the House of Commons by a Cabinet Minister?
Will the Secretary of State enlarge on the nature of British input in the IMF-World Bank initiative that she mentioned in her statement? Does she feel that Britain
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was justified in sending such a large and costly delegation to the talks? Does she now regret visiting Honduras, and one minute telling small farmers that they should be protected and the next, behind their backs, that they had no future?
Does the Secretary of State have any concerns about the way in which the talks were chaired? I share her view that their termination at a time when some people felt that avenues could still be pursued was a mistake. Does she feel that the existing arrangements in the European Union create the risk of the Commission sometimes negotiating in isolation without enough political input from member state Governments?
The world will be poorer if the Doha round fails. For the sake of men, women and children in both developed' and developing countries—I share the Secretary of State's view that it is the poorest countries that stand to gain the most—Governments around the world need to work harder to overcome their differences. I trust that Britain will play its part in that process, and if the Government do so they will have our full support.
Ms Hewitt: I welcome the hon. Gentleman's assurance that we will have his full support in our efforts to get the talks back on track.
The hon. Gentleman referred to the CAP reforms that we agreed with our European colleagues, which were described by none other than Ben Gill as revolutionary.
Mr. Andrew Robathan: Labour stooge.
Ms Hewitt: It is wonderful to hear the head of the National Farmers Union described as a Labour stooge.
The reforms were described as revolutionary, and nobody would have believed them possible if we had predicted them only six or eight months ago. I do not think that anyone in the House or, indeed, the NGOs should talk down the significance of the reforms for agriculture policy. They may not do everything, but they go a very long way indeed towards remove the trade-distorting subsidies that do so much damage to the developing world. Having made that enormous step forward in Europe, we are indeed entitled to expect other developed countries to match the reforms, particularly in export credits and food aid.
On the issue of transparency, one of the things that I welcomed at Cancun was the extent to which developing countries in the first two or three days of talks said how much better the process was than at Doha. Of course, it was streets ahead of where we were in Seattle. That, unfortunately, was not sustained in the final days, and it is one of the lessons that need to be learned. I agree with the hon. Gentleman that nobody should regard the breakdown of the talks as a cause for celebration, although some signs of celebration, especially among the smaller developing countries, reflected the fact that the developing countries themselves were much stronger. The dynamics and balance of power in the WTO have undoubtedly been altered.
I do not agree with the hon. Gentleman about the advocacy fund. Developing countries do not want to be given money to hire other countries' experts—they want their own people to be trained and supported so that they can negotiate more effectively. That is precisely

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what we have been doing through the significant investment that I described in trade-related capacity building.
The hon. Gentleman mentioned my visit last week to Honduras, where I was able to see for myself, as I have done in other countries, the effect of abrupt market opening—in this case, 10 years ago, under pressure from the IMF, to subsidised rice imports from the United States. That abrupt market liberalization—that opening to subsidised imports—destroyed the rice farmers of Honduras for many, many years. The rice farmers are beginning to come back into production, thanks to a change in the market rules made by the Honduran Government, underlining the importance of the discussions that we had in Cancun on special and differential treatment and different approaches for products of special concern to developing countries.
Finally, on the Department for International Development, I remind the hon. Gentleman that in the days of the Conservative Government, Baroness Chalker, who I thought was an excellent Minister for Overseas Development, was neither in this House, nor in the Cabinet. I will certainly not take lectures on international development from a member of the party that cut international aid budgets from where we had left them in 1979 to such an extent that developing countries lost out to the tune of £20 billion. We will deliver on development, and we will continue to try to deliver on fair trading rules that will benefit developing countries, as well as the rest of the world.
Dr. Vincent Cable: I welcome the Secretary of State back and suggest that she probably now appreciates the significance of the fact that in the Mayan language, I believe, the word Cancun means "snake-pit". I agree that it is genuinely bad news that the negotiations have broken down, and that those who were celebrating were being premature, if the breakdown opens the way, as it might well do, to much more unilateral and bilateral policy. That would be damaging, particularly to the weakest countries, which have little negotiating power.
I endorse the right hon. Lady's positive remarks about the ability of the developing countries to articulate their case much more forcefully and coherently. However, one of the serious misjudgments in the negotiations was the reaction of the rich countries, especially the patronising attitude of European Commissioner Fischler, for example. with his condemnatory remarks about the developing country group, and, even more, the attitude of the American Administration. The American trade negotiator revealed the protectionist and corrupt heart of the Bush Administration when he argued publicly that as President Bush could not conceivably be expected to give up subsidising his allies who own cotton plantations, developing countries in Africa should find a comparative advantage in something else.
It is not helpful for the Secretary of State to suggest, as she has been doing, albeit in quite subtle ways, that the failure of the negotiations is primarily down to the Mexican chairman or the process. Some severe miscalculations were made by the European Union, and she should be honest about those failures. Why, for example, did EU negotiators go into the negotiations with, as one of their central demands, a set of new issues
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for which the developing countries were clearly not prepared and for which there was little interest or enthusiasm in the investment community?
Why did the EU negotiators go into the negotiations publicly proclaiming, as Commissioner Fischler did on several occasions, that their central negotiating objectives were the interests of the 1 per cent. of the population of Europe who own large commercial farms? They failed to make it clear to the developing countries that there is a real commitment to get rid of export subsidies and production-linked subsidies and—something that was rarely mentioned—to improve market access.
Who does the right hon. Lady blame for that failure? Was it the European Union negotiators? When I criticised them in the past, she responded by saying that they, particularly Commissioner Lamy, are brilliant. Does she now reappraise her assessment or does she take the view that it was not their failure, but that the EU Ministers had a flawed mandate? If that is the case, does she not accept some responsibility for it?
In conclusion, let me turn to the future. The Secretary of State is right to put the emphasis on rescuing this disaster. What specific new liberalisation initiatives, especially in agriculture, will she and the Secretary of State for International Development seek from other member states in the next few months so that they go into the next negotiations with a much more credible position than on emerging from the last ones?
Ms Hewitt: I am grateful for a number of the points that the hon. Gentleman made. First, on the reaction to the emergence of the G21, which also caused some consternation among smaller African countries in particular, my view is that, as with much else at Cancun, there are lessons to be learned all round. All of us need to reflect on what happened at Cancun.
Secondly, in relation to cotton, the hon. Gentleman is right that there was great anger not only among the four desperately poor cotton-producing African countries, but among all the other countries that had supported them. We had also supported them with money to help them in advancing their cause. There was enormous anger about the draft text that appeared on Saturday suggesting that those countries should be helped to move out of cotton production, in which they would be competitive if they were not competing against subsidised products.
Thirdly, as I have indicated, the European Union signalled its commitment to agricultural reform and flexibility in the negotiations. However, one of the problems at Cancun was that the negotiations began so late in the day and that so many days were wasted in restatement of uncompromising and uncompromised positions.
All members of the WTO—especially the larger ones—need to take responsibility for the breakdown of the talks, and we all need to learn lessons. On the next steps, I remind the hon. Gentleman that we have only just agreed far-reaching reforms of the common agricultural policy and that, as we put them into effect, they will have a beneficial impact on developing countries. We will continue to press inside the WTO and outside for other developed countries to match the commitment that Europe has already made to admitting

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"everything but arms" and ensuring that all non-armament imports from the least-developed countries are completely free of tariffs and quotas. As I said, we will redouble our efforts to try to achieve through the WTO in Geneva the agreement that we should—and, I believe, could—have made at Cancun.
Several hon. Members rose—
Mr. Speaker: Order. As I am about to call Back Benchers, I say to hon. Members that supplementaries should be brief.
Mr. Tony Colman: Will the Secretary of State pass on my thanks and those of other parliamentarians to the superb team of officials that we fielded in Cancun? Those of us who attended the conference were appalled at the criticisms made by certain Opposition Members, who questioned whether they should be present. Their skill and knowledge was appreciated not only by the European Commission, but by the many developing countries that sought advice from them and to which they were very helpful.
The Secretary of State mentioned the World Bank-IMF proposals that were announced on the first day of the conference. Will further work be done on them before 15 December, when the WTO reconvenes? What will our input be? In particular, work is being proposed for developing countries that reduce their tariff barriers and subsequently face budget deficits. The World Bank and IMF may be able to help significantly in that regard—for instance, in ensuring that the millennium development goals are not harmed by such reductions in tariff barriers.
Ms Hewitt: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his remarks about our officials, who have done outstanding work not only at Cancun, but at Doha and since.
On the World Bank and the IMF, my noble Friend the Secretary of State for International Development and I will meet shortly to see how we can most effectively support the initiative that he mentioned. For example, we need to find much better ways to help the African, Caribbean and Pacific countries as they face the erosion of their preferences that will come from a more liberal trade environment. We need to deal with the issue of possible loss of revenues from import tariffs, at least in the short term. That can all be achieved by a convergence between the WTO and the international financial institutions so that trade liberalisation, instead of devastating some of the poorest producers as it did in Honduras, can become an effective way of achieving more rapid development.
Mr. Andrew Lansley: The Secretary of State will recall that, in November 2001, I urged that we retain the linkage between investment, competition and new issues and trade liberalisation. I regret the loss of that linkage. If it is taken off the agenda, it will be developing countries that lose the most in the longer term, because of the benefits of inward foreign direct investment. We can see those benefits even in the United Kingdom in terms of additional productivity growth. Will she at least give an assurance
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that we will continue to press hard through capacity building to try to encourage developing countries to build up the capacity to enter into those new issues as soon as possible?
Ms Hewitt: As I made clear in my statement, increasing foreign direct investment into developing countries is essential. The problem that arose was that developing countries did not feel able to participate in negotiations on those issues, given everything else that was going on. On trade facilitation—one of the other Singapore issues—there was general agreement that it was valuable to developing countries to make progress. If and when we secure agreement on the next stage of the Doha round, I hope that we will start negotiations on trade facilitation. However, we will pursue by other means the issue of supporting developing countries in getting the investment that they need, rather than by seeking to add to the negotiating agenda in the Doha round.
Mr. John Battle: It is encouraging to hear my right hon. Friend say that this is not the end of the round and that we must press forward. Will she assure us, however, that the new issues, as they are now becoming known, will not be pushed on to the table in Geneva by our Government or the EU, so that there can be some positive progress on the agenda?
Ms Hewitt: I have already made the position clear: in line with the ministerial declaration made at Cancun, I anticipate that the European Union will no longer seek to press for negotiations on investment and competition. We will continue to support countries in other ways in getting the investment that they need, but not through those negotiations.
Tony Baldry: As one of those who was at Cancun, may I endorse the remarks made by the hon. Member for Putney (Mr. Colman) about the professionalism of UK officials and the contribution that they made?
When the Secretary of State gave evidence to the Select Committee on International Development, she said, with some perspicacity:
"If we do not get progress on agricultural market access and agricultural export subsidies we will not get a round."
We did not and have not done so. The Doha declaration states that we need to place the needs and interests of developing countries at the heart of WTO negotiations. Between now and the end of the round, how does she believe that the needs and interests of developing countries will be put at the heart of the WTO process?
Ms Hewitt: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his compliments to the officials.
We never got into the detailed discussions on agriculture that should have taken place at Cancun, although positions were already starting to shift. Indeed, the Trade Minister of one of the major developing countries, a member of the G21, told me and, I understand, the chairman that, with a further five or six hours of discussions on agriculture, he believed that an agreement would have been reached. That is what we now have to strive towards in the talks at

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Geneva, as well as agreement on industrial market access and special and differential treatment. That cannot simply be left to the ambassadors in Geneva; it will require the wholehearted support of Ministers, and I will certainly give such support.
Helen Jackson: Was my right hon. Friend able to raise at Cancun the issue of steel tariffs, which are having a very serious effect on the special and stainless steel sectors in south Yorkshire?
Ms Hewitt: I did indeed take the opportunity to raise the issue of unlawful steel tariffs with Ambassador Zoellick. I urged on him the need for the US Administration to use the mid-term review of the tariffs, to which they are committed, to withdraw them in line with the WTO judgment that has already been given. Although he made no commitment—my hon. Friend will not be surprised to hear that—he indicated that the Administration would be considering their position very seriously in the mid-term review.
Pete Wishart: Does the Secretary of State agree that the most significant development at Cancun was the emergence of the G21 nations—a bunch of nations that are no longer prepared to be fobbed off, fought off or picked off? Rather than being the rebellion of the midgets, as suggested by some western Governments, is this not the rebellion of the up-and-coming nations—the economies of tomorrow? Will she pledge to meet those nations and take the opportunity to address their agenda? Most important of all, will she ensure that the British Government are part of the solution, not part of the problem?
Ms Hewitt: As I said earlier, the emergence of the G21 and other groups of developing countries has transformed the dynamic and the balance of power in the WTO. I wholeheartedly welcome that, although we must not make the mistake of thinking that the G21 countries speak for the whole developing world, which they clearly do not. Some commentators made that mistake initially.
These countries are enormously important. They form the largest group of countries in the developing world, and include the fastest-growing. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will be pleased to know that, for many months as well as in the past few days, I have had a number of telephone conversations with the Trade Ministers of Brazil, South Africa, India, Pakistan and China.
Mr. Colin Challen: I, too, welcome the birth of the new, assertive developing-world groups, which I am sure we will see as a positive move when we look back on the conference.
Will my right hon. Friend enlarge on her comments in Honduras, quoted in the Financial Times on Saturday? She said:
"part of the development path for any country is to move people out of small-scale subsistence farming into larger-scale production or industrial production".
That, I think, has considerable ramifications for agricultural production in the developing world, especially in the context of employment, the environment and subsidies.
Ms Hewitt: One of the greatest challenges to all the developing countries is the appalling poverty in which
870
small-scale subsistence farmers live. Helping them to move out of that poverty is central to the achievement of the millennium goals.
When I was in Honduras I was able to discuss the issue with the Minister for Technical Co-operation, who is effectively responsible for social inclusion programmes. She made precisely the same point that I had made: that over time, with effective Government and NGO support, small-scale farmers who are struggling to live on less than $1 a day, scratching a living from a hectare or so of land, can move into larger co-operatives and gain some market power. Eventually more will move into larger-scale production, or indeed into other sectors of the economy. That is the development path followed by the rich countries, and we should not seek to deny it to the desperately poor countries of today's world.
Alistair Burt: As the Secretary of State will know, those of our constituents who take an interest in these matters are strongly influenced by the many committed, dedicated NGOs that operate in the area. When one or two of them gave evidence to the International Development Committee on the Doha round, some of us felt concerned about the gap between their perception of what the round would be able to achieve for developing countries and the view expressed by the Secretary of State today, which a number of us share.
Bearing in mind the NGOs' influence on our constituents, is the right hon. Lady planning any initiatives to get closer to them and to ensure that they are given a rather different picture of a complicated issue which, if over-simplified, may give rise to a very clear sense of right and wrong that may not always be accurate?
Ms Hewitt: I pay tribute to the excellent work that many NGOs do in developing countries. I was with Christian Aid when I visited Honduras.
We regularly meet NGOs, particularly in the trade justice network. We all meet them in our constituencies, but, along with my hon. Friend the Minister for Trade and Investment, I do so regularly on behalf of the Government. In Cancun, we had six meetings with the UK NGOs that were there.
Throughout our discussions before and during Cancun, we have tried to ensure that as far as possible we share an analysis of the potential gains for developing countries from a successful Doha round. On some issues, notably trade in services—as the hon. Gentleman and others will know full well—I simply do not accept the statements made by one or two NGOs, which we have sought repeatedly to rebut and disprove; but I am afraid that that is in the nature of those NGOs. We will continue to work with them, because the support and pressure from the Trade Justice Movement is entirely welcome. I wish that it were replicated in other parts of Europe and other parts of the developed world.
Denzil Davies: Is it not less than satisfactory for negotiations with 15 individual European Union member states to be headed and conducted by, in effect, a single European Union civil servant? Given that from next May there will be 25 member states, should we not

871
look at the arrangements again? Should not member states that wish to do so be able to conduct their own negotiations, headed by democratically elected Ministers accountable to democratically elected Parliaments?
Ms Hewitt: The European Union is, of course, a single trading community. There would be havoc if individual countries tried to secure different agreements on some of the highly technical matters with which we deal in the WTO. I shall not name any states in particular, but I think that my right hon. Friend can conclude for himself that such an arrangement might not be entirely helpful in the case of matters relating to agricultural subsidies.
Mr. David Curry: If we were really five or six hours away from an agreement on agriculture, the break-up of the talks is inexplicable. The Secretary of State was right to point to the danger of allowing bilateral trade agreements to take over from multilateral agreements. The principal protagonist in that is the United States, an example being the proposed all-Americas trade agreement. What influence can the United Kingdom exert on President Bush to emphasise the primacy of a rules-based multinational approach to trade? As we approach the expiry of the peace clause, is there not a danger of a spate of extremely angry and violent disputes in the WTO, which would make the situation worse?
Ms Hewitt: The right hon. Gentleman draws attention to an important issue: the expiry of the peace clause at the end of December. It is curious that no one mentioned the peace clause at Cancun. Following its expiry, all the trade-distorting agricultural arrangements could be subject to trade disputes in the WTO settlement procedure. That may prove to be the most powerful lever available to all of us who want the round to make progress, ensuring that everyone returns to the negotiating table and proceeds on the basis of the compromises that were beginning to emerge at Cancun.
Tony Lloyd: Does my right hon. Friend accept that the genuinely intelligent and enlightened view that she has expressed today was not, unfortunately, reflected in the EU's negotiating position? She deserves no discredit for that—and the same applies to the position of the United States.
If we are to return to the Doha commitment that the rich world will listen properly to the developing world, will my right hon. Friend pledge to convey that message to our colleagues in the EU? Will she tell them that we must listen to the developing world, as we did not in the case of the Singapore issues and the negotiating mandate for Pascal Lamy in Cancun?
Ms Hewitt: Both the European Union and the United States played an important role in launching the Doha round nearly two years ago. My hon. Friend is right: if we are to make progress on this round, we must listen to the increasingly powerful voice of the developing countries. We must deliver on the promises that we
872
made at Doha—and that is precisely the message that I shall reinforce in all my discussions with European and other developed-world colleagues.
Rev. Martin Smyth: The Secretary of State will be aware that many supporters of the Trade Justice Movement in the United Kingdom share her disappointment. However, I welcome her announcement that there has been movement in terms of aid going in to tackle the HIV pandemic. Bearing in mind the failure of others to implement the wiping out of debt that we have pursued, does she foresee any problems in implementing the decision on the AIDS pandemic? Will any countries resile from it?
Ms Hewitt: The agreement that we reached on intellectual property and access to medicines was in no way conditional on agreement at Cancun, so it stands and will now be implemented. Indeed, the general council of the WTO endorsed it before we arrived at Cancun. Of course, dealing with the issue of intellectual property is only part of the picture; we also have to ensure that Governments of developing countries can actually afford to buy the drugs, even when they are manufactured under compulsory licence. This Government have already committed more than £1.5 billion to support the strengthening of health care systems in developing countries, and we have pledged an additional $80 million to the global fund to fight AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria.
Ms Diane Abbott: In negotiating these trade issues, will the Secretary of State pay attention to the particular concerns of the Caribbean and other small island states? A completely free market in sugar and bananas would clearly be good for some of the very poorest countries in the world, but it would be unfortunate if that benefit were achieved at the expense of the Caribbean, a region in which 1 million British citizens still have very close family ties.
Ms Hewitt: My hon. Friend makes an extremely important point. Indeed, my noble Friend the Secretary of State for International Development spent a great deal of time at Cancun, and previously, talking to representatives of the African, Caribbean and Pacific countries about the impact on them of trade liberalization—in sugar, in particular. In the next month or so, we are expecting proposals from the European Commission on reform of the sugar regime, and the interests of the ACP countries is one issue that we will bear in mind as we seek to conclude reform of our wholly unjustified sugar subsidies. It surely makes no sense for the European Union to be putting so much subsidy into sugar that Finland is a major sugar beet producer. This has to stop.
Mr. John Gummer: Does the Secretary of State accept that those of us who were in Cancun saw the huge steps that the European Union has taken to reform the common agricultural policy, and that we respected the way in which Commissioner Lamy put the case on our behalf? Does she also accept that the attitude of the United States on cotton and in terms of refusing to go back beyond the Farm Bill makes it very

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difficult for the rest of the world to believe that the Bush Administration are really interested in multilateral trade agreement? Will she bring home to that Administration that until they stop subsidising a $3 billion crop of cotton with $4 billion of subsidy, it will be impossible to take their position seriously?
Ms Hewitt: I agree entirely with what the right hon. Gentleman says about cotton. As I said earlier, US subsidies are having a devastating effect on some of the poorest African countries. Through direct discussions with our American colleagues and through the European Union, we will continue to call for the United States—and other developed countries—to match the steps on reform of agricultural subsidies that we are taking here in Europe.
Mr. David Drew: Although the news is depressing overall, it is not fair simply to say that the outcome was depressing; surely we must also consider the process. Will my right hon. Friend look at ways in which the WTO itself can be further reformed, so that developing countries can have more of a direct voice? If nothing else, they should be able to speak for themselves, rather than having others arrogating decisions on their behalf.
Ms Hewitt: I strongly agree with my hon. Friend's comments, and we will certainly look at how we can help to continue to improve WTO processes. As I said, they were better this time than at Doha or Seattle, and a number of developing country Governments welcomed that fact. We must also recognise that a very real change has taken place in terms of the strength with which developing countries speak for themselves inside the WTO. We in the United Kingdom have helped that process along through our capacity-building measures, which have been hugely important. We will continue to do that, and I hope that we do not hear again from parts of the anti-globalisation movement that the WTO is somehow trampling over the interests of developing countries, which in fact constitute the majority of WTO members and are increasingly powerful within it—a fact that all of us should welcome.
John Barrett: What practical steps can the Secretary of State take to convince the poorest developing countries that what is in our interests is also in theirs? I welcome what she says about high tariffs on sugar, but will she also extend the idea to dairy products? We may see the negotiations as a failure, but for the poorest nations this is a matter of life and death.
Ms Hewitt: I have said repeatedly that the developed world is not going to convince developing countries of our good intentions if we preach and impose liberalisation abroad but practise protectionism at home. That is why the reforms that we secured at the Agriculture Council in June are of such enormous importance. They may not represent everything that we—and some others—wanted, but they are a very significant step forward. Part of our task is to continue to discuss with developing countries the benefits that can come to them as we implement those reforms.
Jeremy Corbyn: Does the Secretary of State recognise that the very welcome development of
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the group of 21 has forced the de-linking of farm subsidies from investments? Will she use the gap between now and December to ensure that the United States addresses the issue of its huge farm subsidies and dumping of products, which are killing the livelihoods of many third-world farmers, and that we respect the independence of third-world nations? They want investment to be made not solely on the terms of the wealthy in west—to ensure the return of 100 per cent. of their profits to western interests—but in the light of the needs of poor people in the poorest countries.
Ms Hewitt: I pointed out earlier the damage that food aid and export credits, as well as export subsidies, do to farmers in the developing world. One of the arguments that we made—albeit unsuccessfully—for a WTO agreement on investment was that from the point of view of developing countries, multilateral rules on investment would be preferable to their having to negotiate bilateral agreements with the USA or other major players. Such agreements generally include far more stringent requirements on investment, which can prove very problematic for some developing countries.
Chris Grayling: It is disappointing that no Minister from the Department for International Development has bothered to turn up for this statement.
Does the Secretary of State really believe, given all that we have heard, that the political will exists in the developed world to undertake the level of dismantling of protectionist structures—in agriculture, for example—necessary to create a truly fair trade system for the developed and developing worlds?
Ms Hewitt: I have no doubt at all that the will is there within Europe. As I said, the CAP reforms that we agreed in June are a very significant step forward. We must to continue to work with, but also challenge, colleagues in other parts of the developed world, so that they step up to the mark themselves. If we do not, and as Cancun made clear, the developing countries—particularly the larger ones, to whose markets we also want access—will simply not agree. They must see far greater and more immediate gains for themselves in this round than occurred in the Uruguay round.
Jonathan Shaw: Is not direct investment in the developing world the right type of investment, because it does not destroy capacity and prevent companies from emerging within those countries? Otherwise, such companies leave and end up in a worse position than when the richer countries made the initial investment.
Ms Hewitt: My hon. Friend makes an important point, but in opening their markets to foreign direct investment, let us not forget that the Governments of developing countries retain the right and the responsibility to put in place whatever framework they want for investment in order to protect the local environment, social standards and so forth. That is an issue to which the World Bank and the IMF should also pay attention.
Mr. Roy Beggs: I welcome the Government's commitment to assisting poorly developed countries, but does the Secretary of State share my disappointment that only two of the poorer countries—Cambodia and Nepal—have actually acceded to the WTO? How many under-developed countries remain outside, and what special efforts are being made to help them join?
Ms Hewitt: It is important for the least developed countries to make their own judgment about the point at which they join the WTO and accept the responsibilities as well as the benefits of membership. In common with the hon. Gentleman, I warmly welcome the accession of Cambodia and Nepal. In the EU, we have sought to conclude agreements that will be of special benefit to the least developed countries. Partly as a result of the everything but arms initiative, to which I referred earlier, the EU is now—I think by a long chalk—the largest importer in the entire developed world of agricultural and other products from the least developed countries, and we want to see that increase still further.
Ann McKechin: I thank my right hon. Friend for her commitment to making further progress in the talks, and I welcome in particular her comments on investment and competition issues. Having been in Cancun, I know how hard she and her officials worked for a successful outcome, and I share her disappointment at the failure to achieve it. Does she agree that the EU and the US need to reflect on the failure to meet prior deadlines in negotiations regarding both special and differential treatment, which particularly affects the poorest countries in the world, and also on the failure to deal with issues of implementation? If we are to follow the spirit of the Doha agenda, we must now recommit to those issues and make substantial offers.
Ms Hewitt: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Since we launched the Doha round, we have unfortunately missed every deadline in the trade negotiations, so she is right that we must redouble our efforts and make offers that will enable us to secure agreements.
Norman Lamb: I, too, welcome the Secretary of State's renewed commitment to multilateralism, but does she agree that the WTO as an organisation now faces a massive challenge, with the US vigorously pursuing bilateral and regional agreements and with Commissioner Lamy being reported today as questioning the EU's commitment to multilateralism? What specific steps need to be taken to get the Doha round back on track? Given that she said in her statement that we need to find ways of improving processes, does she have any specific proposals for reforming the WTO?
Ms Hewitt: I said that I thought we all needed to reflect on what went wrong at Cancun, and I propose to reflect for a little longer than 48 hours. However, I have already said that we will discuss through the Council of Ministers the approach that the EU should
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take and how to strengthen the multilateral system. Nothing that I have heard from Commissioner Lamy suggests that the Commission wants to weaken the multilateral trading system. We will discuss it with colleagues in the Council of Ministers and work, as I said, with the WTO secretariat to help ensure that the EU itself and other countries work in Geneva on the basis of the compromises that we were beginning to reach in Cancun and the offers made there. We want to avoid everyone falling back into their own positions or simply giving up on the WTO and going off into bilateral agreements.
Mr. Tony McWalter: While commending the energy and moral commitment of my right hon. Friend and her team, and wishing her the very best for future rounds of negotiations, may I express a certain disquiet at her response to my hon. Friend the Member for Morley and Rothwell (Mr. Challen)? She seemed to commend industrialised agriculture over small-scale producers. Such agricultural mega-businesses not only profit from very intense subsidies but benefit from the depression of oil prices, which makes fertiliser and the transport of agricultural produce cheaper, and they often avoid having to pay for the environmental damage that they cause. We need to take a different approach to such businesses, and I hope that my right hon. Friend will think seriously about the future of smaller-scale production, which could bring about a more realisable and sustainable agriculture for many of the world's developing countries.
Ms Hewitt: I entirely share my hon. Friend's commitment to sustainable agriculture, whether in Europe or in developing countries. I am sure that he would share my commitment to ensuring that small-scale subsistence farmers are not left in the poverty that now afflicts them. One of the ways forward is to ensure, through measures for special and differential treatment and for special products, that Governments in developing countries have the policies base on which to ensure that vulnerable producers in rural communities are properly supported and protected. That also needs to be taken into account by the World Bank and the IMF.
Mr. Harry Barnes: A major way in which the poverty-stricken in this country advanced their lot against the filthy rich was obtaining the vote on an equal basis. Is not that type of pattern within the WTO something that is necessary if we want to secure wider membership and the type of agreements that will be beneficial to the third world?
Ms Hewitt: My hon. Friend is, of course, right about the importance of democracy, but let us not forget that the WTO is itself based on the principle of one country, one vote. That is why the developing countries have such a strong voice within it.

BILL PRESENTED
  EUROPEAN PARLIAMENTARY AND LOCAL ELECTIONS (PILOTS)
  Mr. Christopher Leslie presented a Bill to make provision for piloting in certain regions different methods of voting at the European Parliamentary general election in 2004 and at certain local elections held at the same time; and to enable consequential alterations to be made to voting procedures at local elections. And the same was read the First time; and ordered to be read a Second time tomorrow; and to be printed. Explanatory notes to be printed [Bill 160].

Stray Animals
1.27 pm
Mr. David Amess: I beg to move,
That leave be given to bring in a Bill to make provision for stray animals and for their ownership; and for connected purposes.
In all our constituencies, as we walk up and down the streets visiting people, we often see pinned to trees notices advertising various animals that have been lost and found. I wonder whether the House has any idea that re-homing animals is in no sense a straightforward matter. Sadly, we live in an increasingly litigious society. Not a week goes by without a new story of individuals suing someone for what most right-thinking people would regard as trivial or malicious reasons. Although one would not think so, that happens even in the world of animal welfare and care. Unfortunately, the excellent work that individuals and organisations such as the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals undertake in re-homing stray animals is threatened by the lack of legal certainty in this area.
The Bill that I seek to persuade the House to accept would clear up the anomalies and introduce some common sense into an area of law that has been neglected for too long. In moving the Bill, I hope to achieve two clear objectives. First, the Bill would assist individuals and organisations to re-home animals more quickly, thereby improving animal welfare. Secondly, it would update our nation's legislation and raise it to the standard enjoyed by many other modern democracies.
Under the current position, literally thousands of individuals, along with large and small charities, regularly re-home stray animals—and I join all hon. Members in paying tribute to those people. In very many cases, the animal is reunited with its owner. Just as often, a new owner is found and the animal goes off to a new, loving home—a happy ending in all senses. That frees up space in the re-homing centre for more strays to be taken in. However—and this is where our law is insufficient—those hard-working individuals have to go to inordinate lengths to prove that they have sought to identify the original owner. If they do not, there is currently no defence to any future civil action by a person claiming to be the owner of the animal.
I recently spoke to a senior RSPCA inspector from the east of England who told me that all too often he and his colleagues get stuck in the middle when owners seek to reclaim animals they believe to be theirs. Only last week, he had to mediate between an aggressive individual trying to take back a cat more than a month after it had been re-homed. Along with all the other excellent work the RSPCA inspectorate undertakes, we should not expect it to have the wisdom of Solomon.
My Bill would strike a balance between trying to reunite an animal with its owner and dealing with animals efficiently, so that capacity is available for more stray animals to be re-homed. Fortunately, there is an excellent precedent that proves that such a change is not just possible in theory, but actually works in practice. It is the New Zealand Animal Welfare Act 1999, and I hope that the Government will study it closely.

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In New Zealand, a section of the 1999 Act deals exclusively with the "disposal" of animals in custody. It states:
"Where a person (other than the owner of an animal) gives that animal into the custody of an approved organisation and that approved organisation accepts custody of that animal, or where an approved organisation takes any animal into its custody, that approved organisation … Must take reasonable steps to identify the owner of the animal; and … May take such steps as it considers necessary or desirable to prevent or mitigate any suffering of the animal."
Furthermore, it states:
"Where the approved organisation cannot identify the owner of the animal, an inspector or auxiliary officer acting for the approved organisation may … After the animal has been in the custody of the organisation for at least 7 days … Sell the animal; or … Find a home for the animal; or … Destroy or otherwise dispose of the animal in such manner as the inspector or auxiliary officer thinks fit."
The Act also states that if the organisation or individual has made every effort to locate the owner, it may then re-home the animal, without fear that the original owner, at some point in the future, can come and claim their animal. That may seem harsh, but it is a practical solution according to all the advice that I have been given.
The effect of such a change would be that more stray animals could be re-homed more quickly, and more animals could be received into re-homing centres. That would lead to a decrease in the number of animals that tragically have to be destroyed through lack of space. It would also certainly lead to a saving in time and money for animal centres that encounter the problem. We should not forget that many of those wonderful homes depend on charitable giving. People who give money do not want it to disappear into the bottomless pit of litigation.
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I understand that some people may be concerned by the Bill and may say that seven days is too short a period before strays can be re-homed. However, the provision is in line with the local authority obligation created in respect of stray dogs by the Environmental Protection Act 1991. Some may be of the view that 14 days might be appropriate to allow for owners who are away on holiday when their animal is found. I say loud and clear that anyone who owns a pet should be responsible in how they care for it. Responsible pet ownership dictates that proper arrangements should be made for pets while people go away on holiday, so that the animals do not stray. Those left in charge should be responsible enough to carry out all reasonable efforts to find the animal, in the event that it does stray.
I am grateful for the support that I have received for this modest measure from both sides of the House. As a result of the Bill, I hope that my phone will not ring endlessly, and that people will not visit my house, to ask me to mediate in such matters or to find homes for stray animals. I gently say to the Government, given that we do not have much time left in this Session, that I hope that I am pushing at an open door and that the Government will seek to take this modest measure forward when they finalise the arrangements for the Gracious Speech. I commend the Bill to the House.
Question put and agreed to.
Bill ordered to be brought in by Mr. David Amess, Mr. David Atkinson, Mr. Tony Banks, Mr. Keith Bradley, Mr. Ian Cawsey, Mrs. Helen Clark, Mr. David Drew, Mr. Andrew Rosindell, Bob Russell, Bob Spink, Angela Watkinson and Miss Ann Widdecombe.

Stray Animals
  STRAY ANIMALS
  Mr. Amess accordingly presented a Bill to make provision for stray animals and for their ownership; and for connected purposes: And the same was read the First time; and ordered to be read a Second time on Friday 21 November, and to be printed [Bill 161].

Northern Ireland (Monitoring Commission etc.) Bill (Allocation of Time)
1.37 pm
The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Mr. Paul Murphy): I beg to move,
That the following provisions shall apply to the proceedings on the Northern Ireland (Monitoring Commission etc.) Bill [Lords]—

Northern Ireland (Monitoring Commission etc.) Bill (Allocation of Time)
  Timetable
  1. Proceedings on Second Reading, in Committee, on consideration and on Third Reading shall be completed at this day's sitting and shall be brought to a conclusion, if not previously concluded, nine hours after the commencement of proceedings on the Motion for this Order.

  Timing of proceedings and Questions to be put
  2. When the Bill has been read a second time—

  it shall, notwithstanding Standing Order No. 63 (Committal of bills), stand committed to a Committee of the whole House without any Question being put;

  proceedings on the Bill shall stand postponed while the Question is put, in accordance with paragraph (1) of Standing Order No. 52 (Money resolutions, and Ways and Means resolutions, in connection with bills), on any financial resolutions relating to the Bill;

  on the conclusion of proceedings on any financial resolutions relating to the Bill, proceedings on the Bill shall be resumed and the Speaker shall leave the Chair whether or not notice of an Instruction has been given.

  3. On the conclusion of proceedings in Committee the Chairman shall report the Bill to the House without putting any Question and, if the Bill is reported with amendments, the House shall proceed to consider the Bill as amended without any Question being put.
  4. For the purpose of bringing any proceedings to a conclusion in accordance with paragraph 1 the Speaker or Chairman shall forthwith put the following Questions (but no others)—

  any Question already proposed from the Chair;

  any Question necessary to bring to a decision a Question so proposed;

  the Question on any amendment moved, or Motion made, by a Minister of the Crown;

  any other Question necessary for the disposal of the business to be concluded.

  5. On a Motion so made for a new Clause or a new Schedule, the Chairman or Speaker shall put only the Question that the Clause or Schedule be added to the Bill.

  Subsequent stages
  6. —(1)Any further Message from the Lords on the Bill shall be considered forthwith without any Question being put.
  (2)Proceedings on any further Message from the Lords shall, if not previously concluded, be brought to a conclusion one hour after their commencement.
  7. —(1)This paragraph applies for the purpose of bringing any proceedings to a conclusion in accordance with paragraph 6.
  (2)The Speaker shall first put forthwith any Question which has already been proposed from the Chair and not yet decided.
  (3)The Speaker shall then put forthwith the Question on any Motion made by a Minister of the Crown which is related to the Question already proposed from the Chair.
  (4)The Speaker shall then put forthwith the Question on any Motion made by a Minister of the Crown on, or relevant to, any of the remaining items in the Lords Message.
  (5)The Speaker shall then put forthwith the Question, That this House agrees with the Lords in all the remaining Lords Proposals.

  Reasons Committee
  (8) —(1)The Speaker shall put forthwith the Question on any Motion made by a Minister of the Crown for the appointment, nomination and quorum of a Committee to draw up Reasons in relation to the Bill and the appointment of its Chairman.
  (2)Committee appointed to draw up Reasons shall report before the conclusion of the sitting at which it is appointed.
  (3)Proceedings in the Committee shall, if not previously brought to a conclusion, be brought to a conclusion 30 minutes after their commencement.
  (4)For the purpose of bringing any proceedings to a conclusion in accordance with sub-paragraph (3) the Chairman shall—

  first put forthwith any Question which has been proposed from the Chair but not yet decided, and

  then put forthwith successively Questions on motions which may be made by a Minister of the Crown for assigning a Reason for disagreeing with the Lords in any of their Amendments.

  (5)The proceedings of the Committee shall be reported without any further Question being put.

  Miscellaneous
  9. Paragraph (1) of Standing Order No. 15 (Exempted business) shall apply to any proceedings to which this Order applies.
  10. The proceedings on any Motion made by a Minister of the Crown for varying or supplementing the provisions of this Order shall, if not previously concluded, be brought to a conclusion one hour after their commencement and paragraph (1) of Standing Order No. 15 shall apply to those proceedings.
  11. Standing Order No. 82 (Business Committee) shall not apply in relation to any proceedings to which this Order applies.
  12. No Motion shall be made to alter the order in which any proceedings on the Bill are taken or to re-commit the Bill.
  13. No dilatory Motion shall be made in relation to proceedings to which this Order applies except by a Minister of the Crown; and the Question on any such Motion shall be put forthwith.
  14.—(1)This paragraph applies if—

  a Motion for the Adjournment of the House under Standing Order No. 24 (Adjournment on specific and important matter that should have urgent consideration) has been stood over to Four o'clock, Three o'clock or Seven o'clock (as the case may be), but

  proceedings to which this Order applies have begun before then.

  (2) Proceedings on that Motion shall stand postponed until the conclusion of those proceedings.
  15. If the House is adjourned, or the sitting is suspended, before the conclusion of any proceedings to which this Order applies, no notice shall be required of a Motion made at the next sitting by a Minister of the Crown for varying or supplementing the provisions of this Order.
  16. Proceedings to which this Order applies shall not be interrupted under any Standing Order relating to the sittings of the House.
  I would like to take this opportunity to explain to the House the urgency with which the Government seek to progress this Bill, and why it is necessary to take the Bill through all its stages in this House today. It would not be appropriate to dwell in detail on the broader context in the debate on this timetable motion. Members will have an opportunity to debate the Government's analysis, and their policy, more fully on Second Reading, and I intend to address those issues in my speech in that debate. However, I should like to say a few short words now about the context to explain clearly why the Government consider that the Bill before the House today merits urgent consideration.
  On 1 May this year, the Government published a series of proposals for the full implementation of the Good Friday agreement and the restoration of the

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  devolved institutions on a stable and inclusive basis. Those had been drawn up in the light of our earlier discussions with the Irish Government and political parties at Hillsborough. As the House well knows, we were unable to proceed with the implementation of all those proposals in the absence of satisfactory commitments on an end to paramilitary activity.
  We have proceeded, with the Irish Government, to take forward certain elements of those proposals as a contribution to building trust and confidence, and the Taoiseach and Prime Minister, on 2 July, reaffirmed the importance of that commitment.
  Among those proposals that we have committed to implement is the agreement between the two Governments on monitoring and compliance. In that text, we undertook to establish an independent body to monitor commitments given regarding the implementation of the Good Friday agreement and the restoration of stable institutions. The Government also undertook to seek to amend the Northern Ireland Act 1998 to broaden the range of measures available to the Northern Ireland Assembly, and ultimately to the British Government, to respond to the commission's recommendations.
  Of course, those are complex proposals, in a completely new field. They required a good deal of working up. Apart from which, the practical side of setting up the commission also required a good deal of work—in particular in the search for people of the highest ability and authority to become members of the commission. I am happy to say that I believe we were successful in that search. The result of this was that it was not possible to bring forward our plans before the summer.
  We all recognise the urgency now of early political advance in Northern Ireland. As I shall outline in my speech on Second Reading, it is our ambition as a Government, quite as much it is everybody else's, that there should be elections at the earliest possible stage to the Northern Ireland Assembly, and also that they should be successful elections, in the sense that they will carry with them a real prospect of a return to devolved Government.
  Mr. John Taylor: Last Tuesday—eight days ago—in the Committee Corridor, an Order in Council was treated as a statutory instrument. The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office, the right hon. Member for Liverpool, Wavertree (Jane Kennedy), offered the Committee a lengthy litany of things that would need to be done by way of acts of completion prior to elections being held. Will the Secretary of State say—either now or later today, after a period of reflection—whether the litany offered to the Committee must be thoroughly and entirely discharged before there can be elections?
  Mr. Murphy: I shall talk to my right hon. Friend during the course of the debate so that I can answer the hon. Gentleman more fully on that point, but I am assured that she said that getting acts of completion from the IRA was an important part of getting all the institutions involved—of which the Assembly is only one—up and running. That has been made clear for
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  months and months. Assembly elections were not held because we knew that the Executive—the Government of Northern Ireland—could not be active unless there was trust and confidence between the parties involved. That trust can be established on the basis of acts of completion.
  Lembit Öpik: I do not want to turn this debate into a Question Time about Northern Ireland, but does the Secretary of State accept that the postponement of the elections in itself has become a barrier to achieving the acts of completion and the normalisation of the political process that we all want?
  Mr. Murphy: I have no doubt that the issue of the elections is hugely important. I shall return to it in the debate on Second Reading, but I fear that I would be stretching the patience of Mr. Deputy Speaker if I did not stick to the timetable motion before the House.
  Rev. Ian Paisley: Perhaps it would be helpful to those of us from Northern Ireland if the Secretary of State were to inform the House, at an early stage in the debate, whether the Government were minded to accept the amendment on this matter agreed in the Lords in the past few days.
  Mr. Murphy: We will come to the relevant clause later in the debate, but I can tell the hon. Gentleman that the Government do not intend to send that amendment back to the other place. My right hon. Friend the Minister of State will deal with that particular clause later, and will refer to that matter.
  Andrew Mackinlay: Will my right hon. Friend answer a timetable point? Although everyone agrees that there is a need for urgency in this matter, I am waiting with bated breath for his explanation of why it all has to be dispatched in one parliamentary day. If there is no Committee stage—as was the case with the previous legislation piloted through the House by the Secretary of State—will that mean, ipso facto, that that Lords amendment is accepted?
  Mr. Murphy: We must wait until we get to the Committee stage to discuss the details of the amendments.
  The return to devolved government requires trust and confidence in the community that departures from the fundamental values of the agreement—including. crucially, the definitive ending of paramilitary activity—will be addressed with determination. In that regard, we believe that the independent monitoring commission has a fundamental role.
  That explains our anxiety to have the commission in place as soon as possible. Developing that confidence remains a serious challenge to all participants in the process. The sooner we can have all the arrangements in place, the sooner we can formally establish the commission. That. we believe, will be a substantial step along the road to creating the conditions for a real step forward.
  The Bill will place the IMC on a proper statutory footing, and so allow it to undertake the full range of its functions as soon as possible. However, its passage

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  would also send an important signal that the Government are committed to taking the steps that we have outlined as essential to promoting trust and confidence. We very much hope that it will be possible for elections and a restoration of devolved government to take place as soon as possible. The passage of this Bill will help to maximise the chances of such progress in the near future.
  I am aware that we have sometimes had cause to ask the House to consider legislation relating to Northern Ireland in relatively quick time. I hope that Opposition Members—and, indeed, Labour Members—will draw some comfort from the terms of today's guillotine motion, which allows us scope for nearly a full day's debate, should the House so choose.
  I hope that hon. Members will agree that the compressed timetable for the Bill's passage, although always regrettable, is necessary in the circumstances, in the interest of the political advance that I believe all sides of this House wish to achieve.
  1.46 pm
  Mr. Quentin Davies: The Opposition reject, absolutely and with passion, the Government's pattern of imposing automatic timetables on all Bills. We are not alone in that. The whole country, and anyone in the world brought up to observe democratic principles, will consider the motion deeply offensive to those principles and to the spirit of the parliamentary system.
  In pragmatic terms, the motion is unnecessary. We would have been perfectly happy to discuss a reasonable timetable for the Bill with the Secretary of State. That would have allowed proper reflection between Second Reading and Committee, between Committee and Report, and then between Report and Third Reading. That is what should happen in any parliamentary system that is not being made a mockery of by an arrogant Government, but I am afraid that that is the case today.
  Mr. Murphy: I think that the hon. Gentleman is rather over-egging the pudding, but does he accept that the length of time available today is, in essence, the equivalent of almost two days' debate in the House?
  Mr. Davies: The right hon. Gentleman will not mind if I reveal the private conversations that we have had, as they are very much to his credit. I would not reveal anything from a private conversation that was not to his credit, or not within the spirit of that conversation. However, the agreement that we came to resulted in our getting more time than we would have got otherwise. Of course I am grateful for small mercies—for crumbs from this almighty Government's table—but that will not prevent me, or those of my colleagues who have the same problems in other departmental areas, from making genuine protests. There must be no mistake about the seriousness of our feelings about the attitude to Parliament taken by the Government since they were first elected.
  I have said already that the Government's approach would be offensive to anyone of genuine democratic principle and bent. I am sure that that applies to many
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  Labour Members too, and the hon. Member for Thurrock (Andrew Mackinlay) has just expressed his view on the matter. It has nothing to do with party politics, but with the manner in which Parliament should operate. Let there be no misunderstanding of our strong feelings on the subject.
  That said, the arrangement to which the Secretary of State referred means that we have more time than would normally be the case on a Wednesday, especially when a statement and other business have also been scheduled. We have been promised nine hours on the Bill and, in that spirit, I shall ask Opposition Members not to adopt our usual course of dividing the House and voting against the timetable motion, but to do everything possible to allow us to use the greatest possible proportion of the time to discuss the substance of this very important Bill.
  I wish to leave one thought on the record. The Secretary of State in many ways endorsed everything that I have said. I noted his comments, and he said that the proposals in the Bill were "complex proposals in a completely new field". They are indeed, and I entirely endorse his description of the Bill. However, I hope that he appreciates that his description is the greatest possible indictment of the perfunctory way in which the Government and their Whips—not the Secretary of State personally—believe that Parliament should discharge its obligations.
  Rev. Ian Paisley: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Davies: I am not going to take interventions, as I want to get on to the substance of the Bill. There should be no misunderstanding on any side of the strength of the Opposition's feelings on this very important subject, which goes to the heart of the way in which Parliament operates.
  1.49 pm
  Andrew Mackinlay: To divide the House on the motion would compound the charade of the process before us. I welcome the fact that the Conservatives do not intend to divide since that would be a waste of our time. None the less, it would be wrong to let pass the way the Government are bouncing through a Bill in one legislative day. I listened carefully to the Secretary of State, but he did not answer my question about why we have to go through all stages in one day. He will try to imply that I and others do not understand the gravity of the situation or the need for expedition. We do, and there is no reason why the Bill must go through in one fell swoop.
  The Secretary of State is making a habit of this. He behaved the same way on the legislation deferring Northern Ireland elections to such an extent that the House was denied a Committee stage. That was reprehensible, and I rather thought that even this Secretary of State might have learned that that truly offended Parliament. It may sound old-fashioned, but there are those of us who believe in this place and its job of scrutinising and probing the Executive and examining legislation. I had hoped that the Secretary of State would not repeat what he had done.
  Rev. Ian Paisley: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that Members from Northern Ireland have no other way to

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  express their feelings on the motion than by voting on it? What is the difference between voting on this motion today and dividing the House on all the other occasions on which it has also been a charade because the Opposition know that they cannot win the vote? We must have our rights, and I regret that Members whose parties represent absolutely no seats in Northern Ireland are telling us that we are not allowed to vote against something totally obnoxious to the people of Northern Ireland.
  Andrew Mackinlay: If hon. Members want to divide the House, we will have to make a decision. I sympathise with the hon. Member for North Antrim (Rev. Ian Paisley) because the 1 million and more people of Northern Ireland do not enjoy enough scrutiny of their legislation in this place. Much of it goes through by Order in Council and cannot be amended in the Delegated Legislation Committees that deal with those orders. When there is primary legislation, we are surely obliged to put it through the House in the proper manner, including a Committee stage that allows proper scrutiny.
  All the textbooks on the British constitution say that we debate broad principles on Second Reading, and then a Bill goes to a Committee of the whole House or a Committee Upstairs to be gone through line by line. I tell students that that is complete nonsense. Governments hardly ever accept amendments, and the few that they do accept often put right their botched legislation. If I am wrong to make that charge, perhaps the Secretary of State can help me by saying whether a day has been earmarked for the House of Lords to consider any amendment that we may make to the Bill. I hope that he will say that a date has been pencilled in. That would at least demonstrate that he is in listening mode and is prepared to accept some amendments to improve the Bill.
  I have referred to what happened when we discussed a previous Bill, and the House will recall that that Bill was introduced in the House of Commons and did not have a Committee stage. It was, however, thoroughly examined in the House of Lords and was, in my opinion, improved there, or at the very least amended. My fear is that tonight's Bill, having been already through the House of Lords, has arrived here, and that, come hell or high water, there is no way the Secretary of State will allow any amendment to it. That would be reprehensible, and if he thinks that I am criticising him unfairly, he might indicate that he is prepared to consider amendments and provide further time in the House of Lords to debate them.
  Rev. Martin Smyth: Does the hon. Gentleman suspect that the Bill before us did not begin its passage in this House last week because it might have been improved if it had gone to the House of Lords this week?
  Andrew Mackinlay: The hon. Gentleman may well be correct. In considering the charges that I am making against the Government, Members should bear it in mind that the elected House of Commons, which contains representatives from throughout Great Britain
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  and, in particular, Northern Ireland, is being given one day for debate whereas their lordships, not one of whom has been elected by the people, had two days and an interruption over a weekend in which they had the opportunity for review and reflection and to table amendments.
  It is a travesty that we are being asked to rubber-stamp the Bill today. The danger is that if we acquiesce in that by our silence, it will happen again and again. Nor will it be confined to Northern Ireland legislation; on more and more general legislation, Secretaries of State will tell us that it is of the utmost importance that Bills are passed in hours. They will tell Back Benchers, particularly those on their own side, "You're not playing the game, you're being uncomradely, you just want to make an exhibition of yourself." I know all that they say about me, but I can tell them that it will not wash. Until the people of Thurrock put me out, the Secretary of State will have to put up with me telling him that he is turning Parliament into a charade, and he can wave his hands about all he likes.
  Mr. Paul Murphy: That is offensive.
  Andrew Mackinlay: If the Secretary of State thinks that I am being offensive, I will be happy to give way.
  I want the Secretary of State to say why it is necessary to rubber-stamp the Bill and bounce it through the House of Commons today without proper scrutiny or an opportunity for reflection. I want a Secretary of State who is prepared to listen and to accept improvements to his legislation.
  1.56 pm
  Lembit Öpik: It is interesting to hear the hon. Member for Thurrock (Andrew Mackinlay) outlining the increasing concern among many of us about the Government's arrogance in assuming that they should be able to use programme motions to speed things through even when there are a considerable number of matters to debate. It is fair to say that, like the hon. Member for Grantham and Stamford (Mr. Davies), we were consulted on the timing, and, in my judgment, nine hours should be sufficient to do all we need to do, especially if we get quickly through the programme motion. For that reason, it would be disingenuous of us to take any opportunity that may arise to oppose the Government if a vote is called. On that principle, we shall not resist the programme motion, but we act with little enthusiasm.
  I am extremely concerned that in a previous Northern Ireland debate, which the hon. Member for Thurrock said had set a precedent, there was at least one occasion on which a Minister spoke at such length that those who are in the front line when it comes to justifying the legislation to those most affected by it—the Northern Ireland Members—were more or less excluded from speaking. We have heard from Members who represent Northern Ireland parties that they felt some frustration about the strictures of previous programme motions. I very much welcome the fact that a Labour Member has sought to highlight to the Secretary of State the dangerous precedents that some of us feel are being set when Bills are taken through in just one day.
  The various legislative stages have traditionally been staggered, for very good reasons. We were meant to have an opportunity to raise general issues without

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  going into detail on Second Reading. There would then be an opportunity between Second Reading and the Committee stage for Ministers and their representatives to seek consensus and resolution in those areas legitimately raised as concerns by participants in the debate. After that, there was meant to be a further opportunity before Report for cool reflection on matters raised by Government Back Benchers or members of other parties that the Government might not have felt they could modify in the heat of debate but which, with the benefit of a slightly longer period, they could accept were valid concerns. After that, there would be a Third Reading when we could survey the work that had been done.
  If all those stages are gone through in one day, all that opportunity is thrown out of the window. The Government have prevented us from having those quiet conversations through the usual channels and there is a danger of railroading the House and parties that are concerned about this legislation—in this case, the other place and the Dublin Government—in a way that will create unnecessary and unwanted frictions. I counsel the Secretary of State to reflect on the potential consequences of moving so fast with legislation which almost by definition walks the boundary between the uncontroversial—the areas that fall within the terms of the Good Friday agreement—and the controversial—the areas in which it challenges that agreement.
  The Secretary of State mentioned elections, which are perhaps outside the terms of reference of the programme motion. However, I hope that we will get a chance to express our considerable concerns and the scepticism on the Liberal Democrat Benches about the wisdom of postponing the elections, not least because that increases the expectation in some quarters that, having postponed elections in Northern Ireland once, the Government will find it less difficult to do so again. Perhaps we can return to that matter on Second Reading.
  In conclusion, the Liberal Democrats have always sought to walk a transparent and honest line in our dealings with Ministers—[Interruption.] We have done so in our dealings with my portfolio—matters relating to the north and south of Ireland. We have tried to do so in a way that enables people to understand where we stand, regardless of whether we expect them to align themselves with our position. While we may have had differences with Ministers and representatives of the Northern Ireland parties, our commitment to the Good Friday agreement and the peace process cannot be questioned. We sincerely hope that Ministers will play a straight bat with us, that they will act in good faith in the debates in this Chamber and that we can be confident that all discussions with the Dublin Government will be held in the same context.
  The peace process can be successful only if people can trust each other. Therefore, as we discuss this controversial legislation today, let us hope that the debate will have the foundation of that good faith. I never feel positive about any programme motion, but under the circumstances and given the sensible consultation conducted by representatives of the Ministers, the Liberal Democrats are not inclined to resist this motion.
  2.3 pm
  Mr. Harry Barnes: Trade unions are aware of the distinction between procedural and substantive agreements. For example, they believe that getting the procedure agreement for their negotiations right is tremendously important in enabling them to sort out acceptable substantive agreements on issues, principles, terms and conditions. The peculiarity for me today is that the Bill—the substantive issue—is basically acceptable, but the procedures being used to deal with it are not. Of course, if we went through the normal, proper procedures, I might develop reservations about the substantive elements of the legislation, as I would have the benefit of the cross-fertilisation of ideas that results from discussion.
  The arguments outlined by my hon. Friend the Member for Thurrock (Andrew Mackinlay) are of great significance. My hon. Friend is a great parliamentarian, both in the Chamber and in the Select Committee on Foreign Affairs. We should all recognise that, emulate the positions that he takes and follow the avenues that he chooses. I am happy to associate myself with him in this matter. He pointed out that the other place has had a better bite of the cherry with this measure. It had a formal First Reading on 8 September to enable the Bill to be printed. It met for a Second Reading on 12 September and had the weekend during which to reflect before dealing with the remaining stages on 15 September when the measure was sent to us. We only have today. Given that we have returned for a fortnight, the arrangements could have been better. Perhaps the Bill should have originated in this House and gone to the other place later, where we could have seen what transpired.
  I feeling considerably disquieted by the procedure but I want to get on to the substantive measures contained in the Bill, so I will take the halfway-house position suggested by the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats. I shall not vote against the programme motion, although I will not vote for it because I want to register my disquiet.
  Interestingly, we are able to pursue this Bill because of the alteration in the timetable of the House. We have returned for a convenient fortnight. I am keen that that fortnight's return should continue, as it gives Back Benchers access to procedures of the House that would not otherwise be available to them. No doubt, the Government will also find it useful so that they can push through any measures that are lying around which they might find it difficult to push through on another occasion. If they are going to do that, they should respect hon. Members and enable them to be involved in the procedures of the House and to reflect on the processes.
  2.7 pm
  Mr. David Trimble: I wish to congratulate the Secretary of State on one point. During his contribution, the word "guillotine" fell from his lips. I was delighted to hear that instead of the rather ugly new Labour phrase "timetable motion." Guillotines are what they are. It is wrong to guillotine legislation, but the Government routinely guillotine everything. As a consequence, the opportunity for scrutiny in this House has been greatly reduced.

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  Many people outside this place are talking about the ineffectiveness of Parliament. People do not realise that the main reasons for the decline of Parliament are the so-called modernisation ideas introduced by this Government, every one of which has disadvantaged the House in carrying out its functions.
  Some hon. Members have referred to the contrast between this House, where this Bill is to be rammed through in one day, and the House of Lords, where it has received more serious consideration. Some may think that that is due to the fact that the Government have a huge majority in this place but not in the other place. I do not think that that is the case; it is simply that the House of Lords has retained greater control over its own procedures than we have. I suspect that the so-called reforms that the Government are proposing for the other place largely have the purpose of trying to subject it to the same amount of control as they exercise here. I very much hope that they will be unsuccessful.
  Mr. Alistair Carmichael: The right hon. Gentleman used the term guillotine, which is an appropriate expression given the procedure's effect on parliamentary scrutiny and accountability. The guillotine is all the more regrettable given that the Bill had its genesis in an agreement between Governments that was made in April. There ought to have been more of an opportunity for this place to look at what those Governments were doing.
  Mr. Trimble: I will come back to the genesis of the measure in a moment. Although I am delighted that the hon. Gentleman supported my point about the guillotine and I welcome that, it is none the less my intention to disrupt the cosy consensus that has emerged between the Government, the Opposition and the Liberal Democrats on whether the House should divide on the motion. It has always been our view that guillotines should be opposed on principle. That will continue to be our view, so we invite those hon. Members who have spoken against the motion, rather than sitting on the Bench for 15 minutes twiddling their thumbs, to carry their principled view through to the Lobby with us when we divide the House.
  I take issue with the Secretary of State on the genesis of the Bill. His account of the origin of the Bill was seriously defective. The Bill owes its being to discussions held not only in April, but in June and July last year. I remind the Secretary of State of a statement made in the House by his predecessor on 25 July 2002, when I think the Government said they were sympathetic to the proposal that there be some form of machinery to supervise and monitor ceasefires. At the same time, we were pressing for sanctions in the event of breaches of ceasefires. It is from that commitment that the measure flows.
  The significance of that point is that the Bill has not come up in a hurry. The proposals have been around for 14 months; they have had a long gestation. The Bill could have come forward much sooner, and had the Government been better focused and followed the advice given by my hon. Friends and me last year, it would have done so. If there is urgency, it is entirely due to the Government's dilatoriness—although I even doubt that the question is urgent.
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  I have said enough to indicate my party's attitude to the motion. Although we shall necessarily divide the House, I do not want to take any more time from the discussion in substance. We have made our point.
  2.12 pm
  Mr. Seamus Mallon: On this issue, I am normally on the side of the angels; over the years, I have agreed with those who are opposed to guillotines. However, this case is slightly different.
  It is remarkable how often the main point is missed. In reality, under the Bill, we cannot amend, change or omit any of the functions of the commission. Those functions, under the 15 clauses of the draft agreement between the Government and the Irish Government are received from that draft international agreement, not from legislation. In terms of the Bill, Parliament has no capacity to deal with the functions of the commission.
  Let me invoke authority for the Government's position, as confirmed in another place by Lord Williams of Mostyn:
  "I remind the Committee, the commission receives its functions from the agreement." —[Official Report, House of Lords, 15 September 2003; Vol. 652, c. 667.]
  He said, in effect, that an amendment to add to those functions could not become law under the Bill. For that reason, my complaint in respect of the procedural issue is not about the length of time but about the fact that on at least two substantive points in respect of which I should have liked to change the functions, I cannot do so because they derive not from the Bill but from a draft international agreement.
  Mr. Carmichael rose—
  Mr. Mallon: I give way to the right hon. Gentleman.
  Mr. Carmichael: I am merely honourable. I may be right, but not in that sense.
  My question is simple: is it the hon. Gentleman's thesis that it is now the Executive and not Parliament who are sovereign?
  Mr. Mallon: I simply present the point of view set out by the Government spokesman in another place on Monday. As the debate proceeds, I await confirmation that he was right.
  David Burnside: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Quentin Davies: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Mallon: I shall give way shortly.
  The point goes to the heart of what has been said not only about the legislative role of Parliament but about the position of a party or an individual Member who wants to amend legislation. I recognise the authority of that Government spokesman. He was saying that we should not try to amend those functions because such amendments cannot become law under the Bill. I am thus precluded from tabling amendments that I would have wanted to make.
  David Burnside: Will the hon. Gentleman join me in asking for an early statement from the Secretary of State

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  on that point about sovereignty? Why are we wasting our time here this afternoon if we cannot attempt to amend the Bill? Does that not have a bearing on the fundamental power and authority of the House? I am glad that the hon. Gentleman referred to the joint agreement between the Governments, because it was not a joint agreement or declaration between the Governments and the parties. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will seek clarification from the Secretary of State as to whether those of us who have tabled amendments and new clauses are wasting our time.
  Mr. Peter Robinson: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. A number of Members have tabled amendments to the Bill, yet the hon. Member for Newry and Armagh (Mr. Mallon) tells us that it cannot be amended. Can we assume that, in accepting those amendments, the House rather than the hon. Gentleman was right?
  Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Michael Lord): That is a matter for debate rather than for the Chair at this point in time.
  Mr. Mallon: I thank the hon. Members for Belfast, East (Mr. Robinson) and for South Antrim (David Burnside) for those interventions.
  According to my understanding of the words of the Government spokesman in another place, the reality is that whatever Parliament's complaints about lack of time, it does not have the capacity to change, amend, add to or subtract from the functions of the international monitoring commission. I may be wrong, or the Government spokesman in another place may be wrong, but as we are discussing procedure I must record that I feel at a disadvantage because if I cannot add at least two further functions, the Committee stage will be rather academic.
  Mr. Quentin Davies: The hon. Gentleman is in a bad way if he assumes that anything a Minister says is the oracle of truth. Yesterday, I, too, read what Lord 'Williams said on Monday and was deeply shocked by it. I hope that, on reflection, the hon. Gentleman and the whole House will agree that what Lord Williams said was arrant nonsense. Parliament can do what it likes; it can decide what it likes in this or any matter—it has no higher authority below heaven. If we change the Bill, it may indeed make inoperative the proposed British-Irish intergovernmental agreement. It will be for the Irish Government to decide whether they want to continue with the agreement and modify it to bring it into line with the Bill. It will be that way round, and I hope that there is no doubt in the mind of anyone in the House about that important constitutional principle.
  Mr. Mallon rose—
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I think we are getting a little way away from the allocation of time motion, which is what we should be discussing.
  Mr. Mallon: I agree, Mr. Deputy Speaker.
  Rev. Ian Paisley: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Can you give us an assurance, Sir, that we will be permitted to move the amendments when we come to do so?
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: A selection list for the amendments has been circulated already, and we shall deal with things as we usually do.
  Mr. Mallon: I take your direction, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I had not realised that my simple observation
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  on what the Government spokesman said would lead to such controversy. I do not always have total respect for Ministers, but I have enormous respect for the Minister who made that statement. I believe that he is right, but I await confirmation of that.
  Mr. George Howarth: Would it not be clearer if my hon. Friend were to put it this way: the fact of the matter is that the House has the right, if it so wishes, to amend the Bill, but, if it does so, that will be a breach of faith in respect of agreements that have been reached between the UK Government and the Irish Government?
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The hon. Member for Newry and Armagh (Mr. Mallon) is again being tempted away from the straight and narrow path that I had encouraged him to take. I should be grateful to him if he returned to that path.
  Mr. Mallon: I am being tempted, Mr. Deputy Speaker, and, like Oscar Wilde, I can resist everything except temptation.
  I shall conclude with this point: this issue arose yesterday in the House in the debate on the European Union and, although it was not expressed in the terms in which it is being expressed in relation to this Bill, the same point of principle is involved. I simply flag it up. I thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for your indulgence, and I shall return to the matter at a later stage when I will seek clarification. If I am wrong, I fear that the other House has been misled.
  2.21 pm
  Rev. Ian Paisley: The Northern Ireland people have been treated in a disgraceful manner again. It used to be that Parliament would fight across the world for the right to hold elections. Now, part of the United Kingdom has been told that it would have an election and that there would be no alteration of it. Then, later on, that election was called off. Now, we are debating something that is to do with parties outside the United Kingdom that relates to whether we will have the right to hold an election. The amazing thing is that we will have an election, according to the Secretary of State, if it gives the right answer. The right answer that he wants is that everyone will bow the knee and say, "Yes, we're going to accept what the Government want." Are we in a democracy, or are we not?
  I am amazed at the statements made by the hon. Member for Newry and Armagh (Mr. Mallon) because it does not matter who says anything: Parliament is the supreme court of us all, and it is entitled to say what it wants and pass what it wants. Whether the Government have entered into a cushy agreement with Mr. Aherne and his colleagues in Dublin and agreed it with the high councils of the IRA so that they can come in on the act, and with Mr. Adams and his colleagues, it matters not: the House has a right to say.
  I regret that those hon. Members who can see how the people of Northern Ireland have been treated take this up as though we were wasting time in saying that we will divide the House. The House needs to be divided so that a proper protest can be on record showing that the people elected from Northern Ireland do not want their

  895
  country to deteriorate into an appendage of two Governments who will make arrangements behind closed doors not only for themselves, but about what the outcome of an election should be.
  It is disgraceful that we will not have time to look fully at the Bill today. The Secretary of State knows very well that some amendments will not be called because there will not be time for them. When he was asked whether he is likely to accept any of those amendments, he was silent. Therefore, we will argue something, but for the Secretary of State and the Government the doors are locked against it and it is all agreed, even before we move the amendments. Who is it agreed with? Is it agreed with paramilitary chiefs, who call the shots in regard to this matter? That is who it is: the IRA—and the hand of the IRA is in the House today.
  We then have a further example. The hon. Member for Newry and Armagh says that we should not really be trying to amend the Bill because we have no authority to do so. All I can say to him is that he should go back and read what the Government spokesman said, and he will find that what was said is not exactly what he said in the House today. Even if it was, it does not alter the fact that the Bill proposes to allow another sovereign state to have an unprecedented say in the internal affairs of the Northern Ireland Assembly.
  If another country were to be given an input into the Welsh Assembly, the Secretary of State would be the first on his feet, saying, "No, no, we are not going to allow some outside Government to enter into an agreement with the United Kingdom Government to deal with the Welsh people. We have dignity; we have our country; and we have our rights." He would fight, as I am fighting now for the people of Northern Ireland. He would say, "No, you can't do that", but he comes to the Dispatch Box to tell us that we have to do such things. What right has the southern Government to tell us what to do?
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I am sorry to interrupt the hon. Gentleman, but he is falling into the trap about which I have already reminded other hon. Members. We are specifically talking about the allocation of time, and he is touching on matters that would probably be better reserved for a little later in the day.
  Rev. Ian Paisley: I was trying to put the argument, Sir, that if what I am saying is so, what is the use of our talking about time at all? We should not really be here in the House at all today, and I am trying to tell the House about the Bill's origins and to explain why we should have time to discuss it. It has immediate and terrible consequences for the people of Northern Ireland.
  This is not the first time that the Government have treated Northern Ireland like this. On 12 May 2003, the Government hurried the Bill to cancel the Assembly elections through the House in a day, wiping out the right of the people to express their views on a certain subject. The Government were not having it. The IRA did not agree to it; Gerry Adams did not agree to it; they did not agree to it; and the southern Government did not agree to it, so the people of Northern Ireland were not to be allowed to vote.
  896
  When it comes to giving the House scant opportunity to scrutinise its work in Northern Ireland, the Government have repeated their offences over and again against the electorate there. The Government have got into a habit and I fear that if such things are permitted again today, they will be repeated again and again, and, as the hon. Member for Newry and Armagh has told us, they will creep into the legislation for England, Wales and Scotland. So we are carrying a flag for the sovereignty of the House and the sovereignty of those who send people to the House.
  Despite earlier claims that progress would not be made until the IRA moved to abandon violence completely, the Government have been negotiating in secret with the IRA already, after telling us that they would not do so. I asked the Prime Minister a question in the House on 27 November, and he said:
  "It is not merely a statement, a declaration or words. It means giving up violence completely in a way that satisfies everyone and gives them confidence that the IRA has ceased its campaign, and enables us to move the democratic process forward".—[Official Report, 27 November 2002; Vol. 395, c. 309.]
  The Prime Minister was saying something that we have been saying for years—that we cannot move the democratic process forward until we are dealing with democrats who believe only in the vote, and not in the bullet and the bomb. There was to be no further discussion—the IRA must decommission. The decommissioning issue, however, has almost been forgotten in this whole debate.
  The IRA still has the power, which is increasing every day because of the deterioration of security in Northern Ireland. In east Belfast on Monday night, serious incidents took place. I was called to those incidents as the MEP for the area. The chief of police for east Belfast said to me, "Mr. Paisley, are you aware of how many policemen I have tonight for the entire policing of east Belfast?" I said no. He said, "I have six men." We know from a Police Authority report this week that only 1 per cent. of all the terrible burglaries that have taken place have been solved in 12 months. With that background, what would happen to the people of Northern Ireland if there were a resurgence of the IRA? Those are issues that this House needs to take into account.
  By speeding this legislation through the House, one can presume only that the Government have something that they do not want discussed. If they have a case, why do they not argue it? Why do they not welcome a full exchange of debate in this House? Why not give us time to debate it? Some very important areas in this Bill need to be put under the spotlight of parliamentary scrutiny. It is clear from what is contained in these proposals that, rather than punish the IRA, the commission will reward it. Sinn Fein-IRA are no more likely to be removed from Government when this Bill is passed, as was attempted previously. Most of this Bill, although Members of the House may not realise it, is directed against the party that I lead. It attacks those who would not sit down with armed gunmen who were prepared even to carry out a spying operation in Stormont. It is aimed against the Democratic Unionist party. The Irish representative on the commission will have a say in the internal affairs of the Northern Ireland Assembly despite what the leader of the Ulster Unionist party tells the country—
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman is now really making a Second Reading speech. I am not

  897
  sure whether he will seek to catch my eye on Second Reading, but, if so, perhaps he ought to leave himself something to say.
  Rev. Ian Paisley: I have said my say.
  2.33 pm
  The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office (Mr. John Spellar): I am mindful, as you have stressed, Mr. Deputy Speaker, of the narrow terms of the motion and of the need to get on to debates of substance. I stress, however, as did my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State, that this is not just a day's debate; it is a much-extended day's debate. I give credit to Opposition spokesmen who have been gracious enough to concede that that is the case.
  As my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State made clear in his opening speech, the Government believe that pressing reasons exist for putting this legislation in place as soon as possible. I shall not reiterate those, but suffice it to say that we consider the Bill's swift passage an essential component of our proposals for political progress in Northern Ireland.
  We have taken steps to take account of the concerns of hon. Members, which have been expressed again today, that this legislation should be debated fully. We have provided that additional time, as well as providing that the time not used in this debate on the timetabling motion should be given over to consideration of the Bill. We look forward to a constructive and illuminating debate on that, which I hope will be conducted in a reasonable spirit. I must say to my hon. Friend the Member for Thurrock (Andrew Mackinlay) that, enthusiastic as he is when he makes points about which he feels strongly, I wish that he would not personalise them in the way that he often does, particularly in relation to someone whom everyone regards as an extremely honourable Member of the House and honourable Minister, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State. On reflection, he might regret those comments.
  Mr. John Taylor rose—
  Mr. Spellar: In that spirit, I bring my remarks to a swift close so that we may move to substantive consideration of the Bill.
  Question put:—
  The House divided: Ayes 243, Noes 21.

  Division No. 316]

  [2:35 pm

  AYES

  Abbott, Ms Diane

  Bayley, Hugh

  Adams, Irene (Paisley N)

  Beard, Nigel

  Ainger, Nick

  Benton, Joe (Bootle)

  Ainsworth, Bob (Cov'try NE)

  Berry, Roger

  Alexander, Douglas

  Blackman, Liz

  Allen, Graham

  Blair, rh Tony

  Anderson, Janet (Rossendale & Darwen)

  Blears, Ms Hazel

  Borrow, David

  Armstrong, rh Ms Hilary

  Bradley, rh Keith (Withington)

  Atherton, Ms Candy

  Bradshaw, Ben

  Austin, John

  Brennan, Kevin

  Bailey, Adrian

  Browne, Desmond

  Baird, Vera

  Burden, Richard

  Battle, John

  Burgon, Cohn

  898

  Byers, rh Stephen

  Hopkins, Kelvin

  Caborn, rh Richard

  Howarth, George (Knowsley N & Sefton E)

  Campbell, Mrs Anne (C'bridge)

  Campbell, Ronnie (Blyth V)

  Hoyle, Lindsay

  Casale, Roger

  Hughes, Beverley (Stretford & Urmston)

  Caton, Martin

  Cawsey, Ian (Brigg)

  Hurst, Alan (Braintree)

  Challen, Colin

  Hutton, rh John

  Chapman, Ben (Wirral S)

  Iddon, Dr. Brian

  Chaytor, David

  Ingram, rh Adam

  Clark, Paul (Gillingham)

  Irranca-Davies, Huw

  Clarke, rh Tom (Coatbridge & Chryston)

  Jackson, Glenda (Hampstead & Highgate)

  Clarke, Tony (Northampton S)

  Jackson, Helen (Hillsborough)

  Clwyd, Ann (Cynon V)

  Jenkins, Brian

  Coaker, Vernon

  Johnson, Alan (Hull W)

  Cohen, Harry

  Jones, Jon Owen (Cardiff C)

  Colman, Tony

  Jones, Lynne (Selly Oak)

  Connarty, Michael

  Jones, Martyn (Clwyd S)

  Cook, rh Robin (Livingston)

  Joyce, Eric (Falkirk W)

  Cooper, Yvette

  Kaufman, rh Gerald

  Cousins, Jim

  Keeble, Ms Sally

  Cox, Tom (Tooting)

  Keen, Alan (Feltham)

  Cranston, Ross

  Kemp, Fraser

  Cruddas, Jon

  Kennedy, Jane (Wavertree)

  Cryer, Ann (Keighley)

  Khabra, Piara S.

  Cryer, John (Hornchurch)

  Kidney, David

  Cunningham, Jim (Coventry S)

  King, Andy (Rugby)

  Cunningham, Tony (Workington)

  King, Ms Oona (Bethnal Green & Bow)

  Davey, Valerie (Bristol W)

  Davidson, Ian

  Knight, Jim (S Dorset)

  Davies, rh Denzil (Llanelli)

  Kumar, Dr. Ashok

  Davies, Geraint (Croydon C)

  Ladyman, Dr. Stephen

  Dean, Mrs Janet

  Lammy, David

  Dhanda, Parmjit

  Lazarowicz, Mark

  Dismore, Andrew

  Lepper, David

  Dobbin, Jim (Heywood)

  Leslie, Christopher

  Donohoe, Brian H.

  Levitt, Tom (High Peak)

  Doran, Frank

  Linton, Martin

  Dowd, Jim (Lewisham W)

  Luke, Iain (Dundee E)

  Drew, David (Stroud)

  Lyons, John (Strathkelvin)

  Edwards, Huw

  McAvoy, Thomas

  Efford, Clive

  McCafferty, Chris

  Ellman, Mrs Louise

  McDonagh, Siobhain

  Ennis, Jeff (Barnsley E)

  McDonnell, John

  Etherington, Bill

  McFall, John

  Farrelly, Paul

  McKechin, Ann

  Fisher, Mark

  McNulty, Tony

  Fitzsimons, Mrs Lorna

  MacShane, Denis

  Foster, rh Derek

  McWalter, Tony

  Foster, Michael (Worcester)

  Mahmood, Khalid

  Foulkes, rh George

  Mandelson, rh Peter

  Francis, Dr. Hywel

  Marshall, David (Glasgow Shettleston)

  Gardiner, Barry

  Gerrard, Neil

  Marshall, Jim (Leicester S)

  Gibson, Dr. Ian

  Marshall-Andrews, Robert

  Goggins, Paul

  Martlew, Eric

  Griffiths, Jane (Reading E)

  Meacher, rh Michael

  Griffiths, Nigel (Edinburgh S)

  Michael, rh Alun

  Griffiths, Win (Bridgend)

  Miliband, David

  Grogan, John

  Moffatt, Laura

  Hain, rh Peter

  Moran, Margaret

  Hall, Mike (Weaver Vale)

  Morgan, Julie

  Hall, Patrick (Bedford)

  Morley, Elliot

  Hamilton, David (Midlothian)

  Mudie, George

  Hanson, David

  Murphy, rh Paul

  Harris, Tom (Glasgow Cathcart)

  Naysmith, Dr. Doug

  Healey, John

  Norris, Dan (Wansdyke)

  Henderson, Ivan (Harwich)

  O'Hara, Edward

  Hendrick, Mark

  Perham, Linda

  Hepburn, Stephen

  Picking, Anne

  Hesford, Stephen

  Pickthall, Colin

  Hinchliffe, David

  Pike, Peter (Burnley)

  Hodge, Margaret

  Plaskitt, James

  Hood, Jimmy (Clydesdale)

  Pollard, Kerry

  Hope, Phil (Corby)

  Pond, Chris (Gravesham)

  899

  Prentice, Ms Bridget (Lewisham E)

  Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)

  Spellar, rh John

  Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)

  Squire, Rachel

  Prescott, rh John

  Starkey, Dr. Phyllis

  Primarolo, rh Dawn

  Steinberg, Gerry

  Prosser, Gwyn

  Stevenson, George

  Purchase, Ken

  Sutcliffe, Gerry

  Purnell, James

  Taylor, Dr. Richard (Wyre F)

  Quinn, Lawrie

  Thomas, Gareth (Clwyd W)

  Rammell, Bill

  Timms, Stephen

  Rapson, Syd (Portsmouth N)

  Touhig, Don (Islwyn)

  Raynsford, rh Nick

  Trickett, Jon

  Reid, rh Dr. John (Hamilton N & Bellshill)

  Truswell, Paul

  Turner, Dennis (Wolverh'ton SE)

  Robertson, John (Glasgow Anniesland)

  Turner, Dr. Desmond (Brighton Kemptown)

  Robinson, Geoffrey (Coventry NW)

  Turner, Neil (Wigan)

  Twigg, Derek (Halton)

  Roche, Mrs Barbara

  Tynan, Bill (Hamilton S)

  Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)

  Vis, Dr. Rudi

  Ruane, Chris

  Walley, Ms Joan

  Ruddock, Joan

  Ward, Claire

  Ryan, Joan (Enfield N)

  Watson, Tom (W Bromwich E)

  Salter, Martin

  Watts, David

  Savidge, Malcolm

  White, Brian

  Sawford, Phil

  Whitehead, Dr. Alan

  Sedgemore, Brian

  Wicks, Malcolm

  Shaw, Jonathan

  Williams, rh Alan (Swansea W)

  Sheerman, Barry

  Williams, Betty (Conwy)

  Sheridan, Jim

  Winnick, David

  Short, rh Clare

  Wood, Mike (Batley)

  Simon, Siôn (B'ham Erdington)

  Woolas, Phil

  Simpson, Alan (Nottingham S)

  Wray, James (Glasgow Baillieston)

  Skinner, Dennis

  Smith, rh Andrew (Oxford E)

  Wright, David (Telford)

  Smith, rh Chris (Islington S & Finsbury)

  Wright, Tony (Cannock)

  Wyatt, Derek

  Smith, Geraldine (Morecambe & Lunesdale)

  Tellers for the Ayes:

  Smith, Jacqui (Redditch)

  Mr. Jim Murphy and Charlotte Atkins

  Smith, John (Glamorgan)

  NOES

  Atkinson, David (Bour'mth E)

  Shepherd, Richard

  Beggs, Roy (E Antrim)

  Smyth, Rev. Martin (Belfast S)

  Campbell, Gregory (E Lond'y)

  Spink, Bob (Castle Point)

  Donaldson, Jeffrey M.

  Thomas, Simon (Ceredigion)

  Ewing, Annabelle

  Trimble, rh David

  Hancock, Mike

  Williams, Hywel (Caernarfon)

  Hermon, Lady

  Winterton, Sir Nicholas (Macclesfield)

  Hunter, Andrew

  Llwyd, Elfyn

  Wishart, Pete

  Mackay, rh Andrew

  Paisley, Rev. Ian

  Tellers for the Noes:

  Robinson, Mrs Iris (Strangford)

  Mr. Nigel Dodds and David Burnside

  Robinson, Peter (Belfast E)

  Question accordingly agreed to.

Orders of the Day

  Northern Ireland (Monitoring Commission etc.) Bill [Lords]
  Order for Second Reading read.
  2.50 pm
  The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Mr. Paul Murphy): I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.
  The Bill is one of the outcomes of discussions with the Irish Government and Northern Ireland political parties that were held at Hillsborough earlier this year. I acknowledge the point made earlier by the right hon. Member for Upper Bann (Mr. Trimble) when he said that the matter was discussed last summer when the then Secretary of State referred to the points that he mentioned. The Bill represents an essential step along the road to a key objective of the Government that is, I believe, shared by the great majority of hon. Members—elections that lead to the restoration of devolution in Northern Ireland on the basis of full implementation of the Good Friday agreement.
  The commitment to the agreement includes, most crucially, a commitment to the use of exclusively peaceful and democratic means by all involved in government in Northern Ireland. It also includes a commitment to operate the institutions in good faith. Those matters are the concern of the independent monitoring commission for which the Bill will make provision, and the Bill will confer new powers to deal with departures from those commitments.
  Let me outline the context of the Bill, which represents the efforts of the Government and the Irish Government—and earlier efforts—to encourage political advance in Northern Ireland. It is essential that we secure such an advance. It is almost a year since we were forced to suspend devolved government in Northern Ireland, but we should all remember that devolution has had many successes. Constructive instincts and talents, some of which were unsuspected perhaps even by those who harboured them, found fruitful outlets with great benefits for the public good in Northern Ireland. New methods of working were found that enabled people with widely different political interests to work together for the common goal of all the people in that part of the United Kingdom. Talented people from outside politics came into the political system.
  We still see that promise at work in some areas. I pay tribute to the excellent continuing work of the Northern Ireland Policing Board and district policing partnerships, and especially, given the current circumstances, to the courage of those who face threats and intimidation when playing their part in those institutions. However, as regards the wider political system, such a time has elapsed since suspension that we now risk some of the gains being lost unless we are able to restore devolved government and the institutions in the near future.
  A great deal has already been done by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister and the Taoiseach to establish the foundations on which restoration could take place with broad support among Northern Ireland

  901
  parties. In the light of discussions with the parties at Hillsborough, we published documents on 1 May that set out our view of the most promising route ahead, including the joint declaration.
  An essential part of that way forward was finding a basis on which there could be confidence among the people of Northern Ireland that paramilitary activity on the part of those associated with political parties in power was definitively at an end. The two Governments made it plain what they meant by an end to paramilitary activity in paragraph 13 of the joint declaration.
  The two Governments also agreed on the establishment of the monitoring and compliance regime that is the subject of the Bill. The commission is intended to build confidence on all sides because confidence and trust are essential for politics to work in Northern Ireland. There must especially be confidence that paramilitary activity is over and that all parties are properly fulfilling their obligations. We remain clear that the agreement marks the only way forward. We do not believe that there is a workable approach that differs from the fundamentals of the agreement, although we will, as ever, try to engage in dialogue all significant strands of opinion in Northern Ireland, including parties that do not share our view.
  There is a good deal of speculation about whether elections will be held this year. We are working hard to try to ensure that they can be held; as the House knows, I profoundly hope that they will be. However, we should remember that elections in themselves are not a panacea for Northern Ireland's problems. If they are to lead to the stable restoration of the institutions—instability has caused much of the difficulty that has faced Northern Ireland over the years—we also need to restore trust and confidence. Of course, we also want the restoration of the Executive to govern Northern Ireland, because it is the combination of the institutions that were set up by the Good Friday agreement that governs Northern Ireland. It is not only the Assembly that governs—important as that is—but the Executive and other institutions.
  People must be reassured not only that paramilitarism is ending, but that if it were to re-emerge there would be authoritative public confirmation of what was occurring and that appropriate measures would be set in hand to remedy and sanction it. That is why the independent monitoring commission and the mechanisms that the Bill will establish will be of central importance.
  David Burnside: Will the Secretary of State clarify an important point at this early part of the debate? Will he confirm that if Sinn Fein-IRA, the corporate body that is the republican movement, are proved to have been involved in Colombia, Castlereagh and Stormontgate, the new monitoring body will have no power or authority to expel them retrospectively from the Executive or the institution of the Assembly?
  Mr. Murphy: Of course, the body is yet to be set up and although the people who will serve on it have been chosen, they will have first to examine the state of what is alleged to be paramilitary activity at this stage. I would not want to comment on individual cases, which are still being investigated by the authorities in three
  902
  separate legal jurisdictions. As we will discover as the debate continues, the body will have to decide how it will operate. It will have to decide its procedures, which is why it is so important to pass the Bill and to enable it to establish its mechanisms. Perhaps we will address the hon. Gentleman's point in more detail in Committee.
  We intend that the commission will be set up under an international agreement between this Government and the Irish Government. It will make assessments about fundamental requirements of the agreement to which we are both parties, and it will be permitted to report fully on activities in relation to Northern Ireland in both the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland. A draft of the agreement that will establish the body has been made available to the House. We intend that it should be signed in that form and ratified in October following the passage of legislation in the Irish Parliament and formal procedures here. The Bill contains several further provisions in respect of the commission, which I shall outline later.
  In line with the Hillsborough scheme, the commission will be composed of four distinguished individuals who will bring a wide range of valuable experience. They will be able to speak authoritatively, as well as impartially, on central questions of public trust. Two members will be appointed by Her Majesty's Government, one of whom will be from Northern Ireland. One will be appointed by the Irish Government and the other will be appointed by the two Governments on the nomination of the United States Government, who, as so often in recent years, have shown that they are a staunch friend of the peace process and of Northern Ireland in general.
  We have already announced the names of those concerned: Mr. John Grieve, until recently a senior Metropolitan police officer; Lord Alderdice, who served with distinction as the first presiding officer of the Northern Ireland Assembly; Mr. Joseph Brosnan, a former secretary general—we would call them permanent secretary here—of the Irish Department of Justice; and Mr. Richard Kerr, a former deputy director of central intelligence in the United States of America. I am deeply grateful to them all for agreeing to serve. I believe that this is a group of very high calibre, with the right skills and experience for the challenging task that the commission faces.
  Mr. Andrew Hunter: Will the Secretary of State explain the reasoning that led him to decide that there should not be in the commission a respected figure of the Northern Ireland Unionist community? Is that not a deficiency if the objective is to restore confidence?
  Mr. Murphy: The appointments were based not on whether someone was a Unionist or a nationalist but on the experience that they would bring to bear. The people whose names I have just read out have a wide variety of experience, much of it in the security sector. Of course, the nomination of Lord Alderdice rests very much on his position as the former Speaker of the Northern Ireland Assembly.
  The commission will be purely advisory.
  Rev. Ian Paisley: Should not it be made clear to the House that, with all due respect to Lord Alderdice, he was never elected Speaker by

  903
  Members of the Assembly? He got in because no one could agree who it should be. To say that he was elected by the Assembly is wrong.
  Mr. Peter Robinson: Totally wrong.
  Rev. Ian Paisley: Totally wrong.
  Mr. Murphy: I have to correct the hon. Gentleman. I did not say that Lord Alderdice was elected as Speaker. I said that he was the presiding officer of the Northern Ireland Assembly. I suppose he was not unelected by the Assembly because he stayed there for all those years. One imagines that he had the support, at least tacitly, of the majority of Members.
  Mr. Seamus Mallon: Will the Secretary of State confirm that all Assembly Members had the opportunity at every turnaround, every week, of electing a different Speaker, had we so wished? I certainly would like to put on record the fact that Lord Alderdice would not perhaps have been the person whom I would have voted for had a vote taken place, but he did a remarkably good job. In fact, if the circumstance arose, I would vote for him, and I have no doubt that he will perform his functions in the commission with the same ability as he did as Speaker.
  Mr. Murphy: I give way to the right hon. Member for Upper Bann (Mr. Trimble).
  Mr. David Trimble: May I remind the Secretary of State that the term that he used in describing the noble Lord was that he. was the greatly respected interim presiding officer of the Northern Ireland Assembly, and in that respect may I assure the Secretary of State that he is absolutely right? Lord Alderdice earned respect on all sides, and the absence since the announcement of his appointment to the commission of any criticism from any serious quarter underlines the extent of the respect that he earned.
  Mr. Murphy: I agree entirely. Lord Alderdice did his job extremely well. Obviously, one cannot please all the people all the time. I suspect that, whatever name emerged as the Northern Ireland representative, as it were, on the body, it would have been very difficult to have got someone whom 100 per cent. of the people of Northern Ireland agreed with, but I will stay absolutely firm on the fact that I believe that he did a very good job and that he is highly qualified to be a member of that body.
  David Burnside: On that point, does the Secretary of State agree that one of Lord Alderdice's advantages is that his political pedigree is that of the Alliance party, which cannot make up its mind whether it is Unionist or nationalist and changes every now and again? Therefore, in the ambiguity of political evolution in the past four or five years, he is exactly right for the job.
  Mr. Murphy: The commission will be purely advisory.
  Lembit Öpik: Does the Secretary of State accept that, from the impartial position in
  904
  which I find myself, I have nothing but praise for the courage of the Alliance party in bailing out the Ulster Unionists when they needed its help? More to the point, does he accept that we run the risk in this debate of setting the precedent of appointing the entire House as the appointments panel for the membership of the IMC? Will he therefore give his judgment on the most effective way of ensuring that we have the right four people, whomever they may be, to serve on the commission?
  Mr. Murphy: Members were appointed by the Governments. Obviously, we looked very carefully at the background, experience and expertise of the people concerned. I am not sure whether it would be worth continuing to discuss individuals in this debate, but I repeat that I think that the four people who have been appointed will be do a very good job indeed.
  Rev. Martin Smyth: The hon. Member for Montgomeryshire (Lembit Öpik) said he was neutral, but I thought that the Alliance party was a sister party of the Liberal Democrats. May I press the Secretary of State not on the quality and character of the four, for I have no difficulty with that, but on the question of whom the commission will be reporting to and how will it report? Will what it says be published clearly, or will it be massaged by Government at some level?
  Mr. Murphy: I hope that we will be able to address all those issues not just in what I have to say—I will touch on some of them in a few moments—but in Committee. Those matters are, of course, crucial to the understanding of the mechanisms.
  Rev. Ian Paisley: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. It would help hon. Members to know what time is going to be allotted. I understand that there is nine hours, but there is no set time for Committee. I understand that the Second Reading debate can run for all that time. Is that so?
  Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Michael Lord): The hon. Gentleman is correct. The total time for the debate, including the debate we have had on the allocation of time motion, is nine hours. There is no specific time for any particular section of that, so the length of the Second Reading debate is entirely a matter for hon. Members who contribute to it.
  Mr. Murphy: It is up to us how we deal with those matters, but it is important that we have a reasonable amount of time to discuss some of the detail that the hon. Member for Belfast, South (Rev. Martin Smyth) mentioned.
  The commission, which will be advisory, will deliver its assessments of the matters referred to it, and may recommend remedial action and measures that the Assembly might take under its powers, as extended by the Bill, but it will make no substantive decision. If the commission recommends that measures should be taken, it becomes a matter for the agreement institutions, and ultimately for the Government.
  The commission will have three remits, the first of which will be to examine and to report on paramilitary activity. The draft agreement makes it clear that that

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  covers every aspect of paramilitary activity: not only bombing and shooting but training, targeting, carrying out so-called punishment beatings, and all the other associated activities, including those set out in paragraph 13 of the joint declaration.
  Mr. Quentin Davies: This would be a good moment to answer the very pertinent question that has already been asked by the hon. Member for South Antrim (David Burnside), which is whether the commission will be able to undertake investigations into previous—that is to say, up until now—alleged breaches, including Castlereagh, Stormontgate, Colombia and so forth, and to make appropriate recommendations, or whether it will be limited to looking at events that follow its setting up.
  Mr. Murphy: I have not forgotten that point. If the hon. Gentleman would wait a little longer, I hope to be able to give him the answer to those questions.
  We shall provide the commission with all the support that we can, and so too, I believe, will the Irish Government. However, the body will reach its own conclusions. The commission will consider progress on security normalisation, which is a key element of the 1998 Good Friday agreement that has yet to be fully implemented. While the security situation that we have faced has prevented us from moving as quickly as we would have wished, the Government have nonetheless made significant progress in this area. I pay tribute to the security forces for all that they have done to meet that objective while ensuring at the same time that the people of Northern Ireland continue to be properly protected.
  Let me make it clear that the programme of normalisation outlined in the Hillsborough texts is linked to the ending of paramilitary activity. Monitoring of that will not begin until the Government set it in train, although at our request the Commission will be able to report on normalisation activity in recent years, and we intend it to start on that at an early stage. The commission will, finally, also be responsible for investigating certain conduct in the political field. The agreement, in its pledge of office, imposes important standards of behaviour, which, if they are not observed, mean that the institutions cannot function properly. The commission may investigate complaints that a party or Minister is in breach of the pledge.
  There is a long-standing convention that matters relating essentially to internal Northern Ireland institutional affairs which, as we all know, in the political talks leading to the agreement were called strand 1 issues, should be decided by people from Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom alone. So, for example, in the talks, those issues were discussed in a format chaired by the British Government—in fact, by myself—without Irish representatives being present. There were concerns that that principle would be undermined in the scheme introduced at Hillsborough, and we have reflected on those concerns. I believe that the draft agreement—the international agreement-fully respects the convention. In so far as complaints made to the commission concern the operation of the internal institutions of Northern Ireland, they will be considered only by those two members of the commission who are appointed by the
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  British Government. The other two members of the commission will not be concerned with them at any point.
  In respect of paramilitary activity and political breaches, the commission or the two members concerned will be required to report their findings and, where they consider it appropriate, recommend what measures they envisage the Assembly taking. Their reports will be published. However, as I have said, decisions are for the Assembly, and ultimately, if it cannot agree, for the British Government.
  Mr. Nigel Dodds: The Secretary of State has made the point that political breaches will be considered by the two appointees of Her Majesty's Government. However, what is the position when it comes to the Secretary of State taking action? Will he take action if he needs to do so alone, or will he first consult the Dublin Government and involve them before he makes a decision? In the latter case, Dublin is involved in strand 1 matters.
  Mr. Murphy: The Dublin Government are not involved in making the decision. May I make it absolutely clear that decisions on political issues should rest with the Assembly, both through the implementation group and the Assembly as a whole? The Assembly, acting as a body corporate, should ideally deal with those issues. It will be self-regulating and will deal with its own disciplinary matters. If that fails, the agreement resulting from the Hillsborough talks is that the British Government will deal with the matter because it is a strand 1 matter.
  Of course, we consult the Irish Government on all issues, but at the end of the day, the decision is ours. It is important that that should happen. The operation of all the institutions derived from the Good Friday agreement, because the agreement was set up between two Governments and the political parties, involves collective discussions. However, it is quite clear that when it comes to decision making the decision rests with me and the British Government—of course it does. I shall return to the issues in more detail later and make the position clear. I would not want to mislead either the House or the hon. Member for Belfast, North (Mr. Dodds) on some of the details.
  Mr. Jeffrey M. Donaldson rose—
  Mr. Murphy: Before the hon. Gentleman speaks, may I say that I want to clarify some of the issues later.
  Mr. Donaldson: The Secretary of State said that matters relating to the Assembly's internal affairs are for the Assembly and the implementation group to determine. Why do we need an independent commission to monitor the conduct of parties in the Assembly in the first place, apart from the issue of a commitment to exclusively peaceful and democratic means, if the implementation group will decide what happens?
  Mr. Murphy: Certainly, it is for the implementation group in the Assembly in the first instance to try to decide how to deal with these issues. As I said, I hope that it will do so, and that such matters will come to the Government very much as a last resort. Obviously, it

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  was a matter of debate in the discussion which took place in the spring whether in fact the commission should or should not have responsibilities beyond looking at what might be called paramilitary and security issues. The decision made by the Governments in the spring was that that opportunity should be given to the commission.
  The hon. Gentleman knows that Assembly Members can go to the implementation group and argue that a breach of the Belfast agreement has taken place. The Assembly has to deliberate on those matters and make its own decisions. The hon. Gentleman and I would probably disagree as to whether in principle the issue of political breaches as opposed to paramilitary activity should or should not be dealt with by the commission. However, that is what was agreed would happen.
  Mr. Donaldson: How does it assist the credibility of the implementation group in the Assembly if a Member has a choice and can decide whether he wishes to make the complaint to the implementation group or the independent commission? Surely it undermines the position of the implementation group if there is another route that Members can take. I cannot understand the need for matters other than the commitment to democratic and peaceful means to be addressed by an independent commission, as the Assembly itself already has a means of addressing those issues.
  Mr. Murphy: I understand where the hon. Gentleman is coming from, but the principle of whether political breaches should be dealt with is a proper one. However, he and I probably disagree about that.
  To return to points made earlier by the hon. Member for Belfast, North, I deliberately did not conclude my remarks on his question, because I wanted to check the position. The House will understand that the procedural aspects of the work of the commission are a matter on which we have not gone into great detail because we are only setting the legislative framework. It is probably reasonable to say that where British members of the IMC have reported on a strand 1 matter, I would not expect formally to consult the Irish Government.
  Mr. Dodds: I am interested to hear what the Secretary of State said on that particular point, because it directly contradicts what was said in the other place by the Government spokesman. Will he reflect on what he said, and clarify the position further? We are told in one House that the Dublin Government will be consulted, but now we are told that they will not be consulted, although the Secretary of State used the word "formally", whatever that means. Perhaps he would clarify what "formally" means. Does it mean "secretly", or does it mean that civil servants will not be present? The fact is that the Secretary of State referred earlier to Dublin being excluded from strand 1—its representatives were not in the room, so why are they being brought into the room on this issue?
  Mr. Murphy: I think that there is a distinction to be drawn about a formal consultation, which will be required, as it were, with regard to the paramilitary activities, and where the four members of the
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  commission are involved. An undertaking was given at Hillsborough in the joint declaration that there would be formal consultation with the Irish Government on that issue. I think the hon. Gentleman would accept that in the real world, if some major crisis was affecting the stability of the Northern Ireland Assembly, it is inconceivable that in the course of a conversation about general matters, I would keep my mouth shut and say nothing. If the whole institutional stability of Northern Ireland was in jeopardy, would I not speak? He knows that that is nonsense and it would not happen. However, the formal position—where there is to be a formal consultation because of paramilitary matters—is now clear, and we will go through it.
  It was also an important part of the Hillsborough scheme that there should be an increased range of measures available against individuals and parties in the Assembly who were in breach of their obligations. The Bill amends the Northern Ireland Act 1998 accordingly. The Assembly will be able to exclude individuals and parties from office in Northern Ireland for a range of periods, rather than for the 12 months that was the only option under the 1998 Act. The Assembly will also be able to withhold pay and party allowances, and pass motions of censure. In taking such steps, the Assembly would, as with exclusion motions now, need to make its decisions with cross-community support. That is in line with the agreement. These are decisions that may be absolutely fundamental to the future of the devolved system.
  Rev. Ian Paisley: What percentage of the Assembly would need to support a motion to meet the requirement for cross-community support? As the Secretary of State knows, a percentage was specified previously.
  Mr. Murphy: That is set out in the Bill, and I shall return to it.
  Those powers are available to the Assembly at any time. However, as we have seen in the past, the Assembly may be deadlocked at a time when the resolution of an issue demands some action, failing which the institutions could become inoperable. The Hillsborough agreement addressed that. It made it clear that there would be a range of discussions in the light of any finding by the IMC that a party or Assembly Member was in breach, and any recommendation by it of consequential measures.
  Those discussions would involve the implementation group, of which the pro-agreement parties in Northern Ireland are members. If the group recommended that a motion should be put before the Assembly for the taking of such measures, the Secretary of State would exercise his powers requiring the motion to be moved, but where the motion had failed to achieve cross-community support in the Assembly, or the implementation group had failed to agree any course of action, it would be for the British Government—to turn now to the paramilitary aspects—in consultation with the Irish Government and the parties, to resolve the matter consistently with the commission's report.
  The Bill accordingly provides powers for the Secretary of State himself to take the measures required. Though the Bill does not set out all the procedures in the Hillsborough text, I confirm now that we would

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  envisage following them in the light of a relevant commission report. We should, in particular, consult the implementation group, and the Irish Government, as the text specifies.
  These are powers of last resort. It is right that intensive efforts should be made by people in Northern Ireland to resolve these issues. They should not end up, before that, on the desk of a British Minister. That is not the Hillsborough plan, and it is far from the 1998 agreement. I should also say one other thing of the spirit in which we should operate these arrangements: we believe it is very important—difficult and painful though it may be in the circumstances—to give effect to the commission's recommendations. We certainly intend to use these powers where the commission had so recommended, but action had not been taken.
  I shall not dwell at length on the details of the Bill. As I said earlier, it is important that hon. Members have an opportunity to deal with it in Committee. I hope that the explanatory notes will have been of use to them. Clauses 1 to 3 make provision for the commission, supplementing the agreement establishing it. Clause 1 provides for it to have immunity from suit, which is essential for the safeguarding of information that it has received in confidence. Clause 2 places on it a duty in carrying out its functions to do nothing to prejudice national security, put lives at risk or prejudice legal proceedings. Clause 3 requires me to lay a copy of its reports before Parliament.
  Mr. Harry Barnes: Clause 3 provides for the reports to be laid before Parliament. The agreement between the two Governments suggests that those may include a wide range of matters relating to paramilitary activity and the people leading it. However, clause 2, dealing with the commission's duty to avoid prejudicial effect, states that a report should not put anyone's life in danger or prejudice future legal proceedings. Might not the situation arise where, although the commission knows the identity of people against whom action needs to be taken, it cannot report that to Parliament because it would be prejudicial under clause 2?
  Mr. Murphy: I repeat that the commission must work out how it deals with its own mechanisms, but I am sure that my hon. Friend would understand that its reports could not include details that would put lives at risk, and it is clearly not a court of law. Its purpose is to monitor and then tell the House of Commons and the people of Northern Ireland whether, in its view, having examined the evidence, there have been breaches of the agreement and paramilitary activity has been taking place.
  My hon. Friend knows, too, that some of the commission's examinations would inevitably deal with highly sensitive intelligence which, if revealed, could compromise people's safety. Members of the commission would be conscious of that, which is why it is so important that we have confidence in them and in their ability to give the House an honest report that reflects its findings but contains essential safeguards to protect the safety of the people concerned.
  David Burnside: The people of Northern Ireland are confused about the recommendations that we are discussing. Could the Secretary of State give an
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  example, without commenting on the legalities of it? If a murder by the IRA occurred, such as the murder of Gareth O'Connor, about which the police will have advised the right hon. Gentleman, and if he is also advised by his police advisers that Martin McGuinness still sits on the army council of the IRA, would that be an offence that could lead to Martin McGuinness's exclusion from the Executive? How long does he think the commission would take before it excluded Martin McGuinness from the Executive?
  Mr. Murphy: It would not be proper for me to comment on individuals in a debate such as this. In general terms, the commission would have to make up its own mind collectively about how best to report what it had discovered. It would make recommendations to me first, and the Assembly would then consider them and take decisions. If it did not, I would.
  Clauses 4 to 8 are concerned with amendments to the Northern Ireland Act 1998 in respect of measures against individual Ministers or parties. Clause 4 provides for the new range of periods of exclusion and obliges me, in requiring the Assembly to consider exclusion, to take account of reports from the commission.
  Andrew Mackinlay: The Secretary of State will see that I have tabled an amendment to clause 4. If the Assembly is not dealing on its own initiative with a motion to exclude, but he is persuaded that there should be an exclusion, why should the vehicle of the presiding officer be used? In what must be extraordinary circumstances anyway, would it not be more appropriate for him to present his case directly to the Assembly?
  Mr. Murphy: The provision follows the 1998 Act and the Good Friday agreement, in which it was decided that such mechanisms were the best way of proceeding. As my hon. Friend knows, there has to be cross-community support, but we shall return to the matter in a little more detail in Committee.
  Clause 6 permits the Assembly to reduce the remuneration of a Minister or members of a political party and confers on me a reserve power in the same sense. Clause 7 makes similar provision in respect of financial assistance. Clause 8 permits the Assembly to pass censure motions.
  Lembit Öpik: I have a question about clause 7, although Ministers may wish to return to it in Committee, as it concerns a point of detail. Around line 19 on page 9 of the Bill, it seems that, while salaries can be reduced, there will be no negative effect on pensions, which implies that if the Assembly were suspended for 40 years, a Member would still retire on a full pension. What is the logic for not penalising the pensions outcome as well?
  Mr. Murphy: I would be 96 after a 40-year suspension of the Assembly, and I would have to consider the effect on my pension in such circumstances. We will come back to the hon. Gentleman on that issue; he is right to highlight the current position.

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  Clause 9 provides for parliamentary procedures in respect of my powers.
  Mr. Dodds: On clause 8, the Secretary of State mentioned censure motions. What is the thinking behind that clause? At the moment, it is possible for a Member or party to table a motion in the Assembly expressing no confidence, censuring a Minister and so on. Clause 8 makes that harder and restricts Assembly Members' freedom. Such provision did not feature in the Belfast agreement or even the Hillsborough talks, and it is not in the joint declaration, as I understand it. Where did it come from? Why does it restrict the right of Members to call for a vote of no confidence or table a censure motion in respect of any other party or Minister? Can he explain that clause?
  Mr. Murphy: I was not aware that the measure made it more difficult to table censure motions, but if the hon. Gentleman will allow me to continue, we will deal with that point in winding up the debate, as it is a technical one. More generally, the reason why the provision is included, as opposed to how it affects the current circumstances, is that there will be a gradation of punishments starting at a motion of censure—a reprimand by the Assembly as a body corporate—increasing in severity in terms of the various measures outlined in the Bill and ending up with exclusion.
  There is provision for those powers to be exercised in advance of approval, as is right given that urgent action may be required, perhaps when one or both Houses of Parliament are in recess. There is provision for the consequences if such an exercise of powers is not upheld.
  We now need to move forward with great urgency in the Northern Ireland political process. We all want to see elections; confidence restored on all sides to the point at which politics can again operate; and decisions that are properly made in Belfast again being made there, in Northern Ireland.
  The independent monitoring commission will be part of the foundations of rebuilt trust and confidence in Northern Ireland. No one who is committed to wholly democratic politics should object to the new independent scrutiny of paramilitary activity that this new body will provide. No one can claim that the men involved will not bring objective expertise and experience to the task, and no one can convince me that the commission will not help to restore the trust and confidence that are required to allow elections to a working Assembly and a stable and peaceful future for Northern Ireland.
  I commend the Bill to the House.
  3.33 pm
  Mr. Quentin Davies: Nobody could possibly object to the fact that the Secretary of State has spoken for three quarters of an hour on a Bill of such importance. He was generous—and rightly so—in taking interventions and giving detailed explanations, at least most of the time. However, that illustrates the anomaly whereby nine hours have been allowed not for Second Reading alone, but for all stages of the Bill's consideration, including
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  the time taken in considering the allocation of time motion, which should never have been tabled. In conducting the debate as he has, he has demonstrated that Second Reading should have lasted the whole day. We should have had a proper Second Reading taking the whole afternoon, after which we would have had time for reflection, discussion and even negotiation. The other stages could then have taken their turn.
  The history of Northern Ireland over the past five or six years is one of great hopes followed by severe disappointments. The Belfast agreement was not in any sense an ideal document—it contained many features that were unpalatable to many people, including me—but it was a great achievement, and I have always given the Government due credit for it. Nevertheless, it was not followed, as it should have been, by full decommissioning, by the disbandment of private armies, by the end of intimidation, harassment and paramilitary murders and by the successful and permanent embedding of devolved government—in short, by normalisation. Five and a half years on, we still await substantial progress in decommissioning. The exiles remain exiled, and the intimidated remain intimidated. Only yesterday, as the Secretary of State knows, there was another resignation from a district police partnership because of intimidation.
  The Government suspended the devolved institutions nearly a year ago. There have been two successive postponements of Assembly elections since then, and in the second instance no date was given for them to take place. Since the second, indefinite postponement—exactly as I predicted—there has been no progress on negotiations for the completion of the peace process. Instead—here I use the words that I used in May—rather than parties being compelled to examine the scope for agreement with each other, they have turned in on themselves.
  Thank heaven it has remained relatively quiet on the streets this summer. I pay tribute to all on both sides who have used their influence in favour of forbearance, patience and moderation. It would, however, be utterly irresponsible to suppose that because things have been calmer over the summer, they can be counted on to remain calm irrespective of progress on the peace process or opportunities for peaceful, democratic expression at the ballot box.
  Who bears the blame for the disappointment of the great hopes of five years ago? Of course it is predominantly Sinn Fein-IRA. Whether through deliberately planned duplicity or otherwise, they have talked peace while continuing to plan and prepare for war—procuring arms, training, targeting, spying, intimidating. We all know the names of those responsible for these egregious breaches of the ceasefire and the agreement: Florida, Colombia, Castlereagh, Stormontgate. No words are too strong to condemn their behaviour. If the peace process collapses—and it could—they will bear, in the eyes of generations to come, the great historic guilt for destroying a precious opportunity for all the people of Northern Ireland.
  But no peace process that was not properly and effectively chaired and managed was going to work. That role could fall only to the British Government. What was required was the application of some classic principles of good negotiation and good chairmanship: clarity, consistency, decisiveness, balance, fairness,

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  rewards for compliance, and penalties or sanctions for bad behaviour. Have we had any of those? The Government have proved themselves quite incapable—consistently—of supplying them. There has been muddle, and there have been U-turns. Just look at the elections. They have been promised, postponed, promised, postponed again and now, apparently, promised again.
  We have had false assurances, such as those given by the Prime Minister at the time of the campaign for a referendum on the agreement in 1998. We have had indecisiveness, we have had unilateral concessions, and we have had complete abdication—complete inaction—in the face of the most serious breaches, including the four that I mentioned.
  I have often said, in this place and outside, that the Government have committed four cardinal errors. Time has moved on, and I am sorry to say that that number is now five. The first error—I have of course said this before and I am afraid that I will continue to say it, because no one should ever forget it—was the catastrophic decision to release all the prisoners without any decommissioning at all, giving away the most valuable card for precisely nothing. It is not surprising that no IRA decommissioning whatever took place for three and a half years after the agreement, until the Americans themselves took a hand and became directly involved, after 11 September. But the Government could hardly have predicted that tragedy and its consequences for, among other things, the peace process in Northern Ireland.
  The second cardinal error was the making of unilateral concessions that went quite beyond the Belfast agreement, and which were not required by it at all. They included the special status for Sinn Fein-IRA MPs and the amnesty for on-the-run terrorists, which, at Weston Park, the Government promised would be delivered by the end of 2001. The Secretary of State has been good enough to acknowledge publicly that it was, in retrospect, a thoroughly good thing that the Conservative Opposition were able successfully to oppose implementation of that concession, and that in consequence that valuable card now remains in the Government's hands, so I shall say no more about that.
  The third cardinal error was the complete failure to respond with any sanction at all to serious breaches of the ceasefire and the agreement by Sinn Fein-IRA. I said after Florida and Colombia that if there were no sanctions—no downside to such behaviour—more breaches would inevitably occur. The right hon. Member for Liverpool, Wavertree (Jane Kennedy)—it is a pleasure to address her in that fashion—has listened to me these past two years, and has heard me say that many times before. I am afraid that it remains as true as when I first said it.
  After what happened at Castlereagh, the Opposition themselves proposed a remedy—a point that takes us directly to the Bill's substance. On 16 July 2002, I suggested that we empower the Secretary of State to exclude from the Executive parties that were in breach of their obligations under the agreement, or that were acting in concert with persons in breach. I also Predicted—this point was raised earlier—that, in the event of a serious breach and a requirement to exclude, it would be ineffective to rely on the Assembly's voting for an exclusion motion. I said:
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  "I think that the Secretary of State may be missing the point"
  that was being polite—
  "which is purely practical—that one has no credibility in this life in threatening a sanction that one is not in a position to enforce. The right hon. Gentleman will get no leverage in the negotiations with Sinn Fein by suggesting that one day there might be a majority of Sinn Fein and Social Democratic and Labour Members who might like to exclude Sinn Fein from the Executive. If he wants to use that mechanism, he will have to take powers in this House."—[Official Report, 16 July 2002; Vol. 389, c. 233.]
  It has taken the Government 15 months to come to this House to try to take those powers. It has taken them 15 months to realise that it was not sufficient to rely on the Assembly to vote through an exclusion motion, and that we need to provide a procedure for dealing with the situation in which the Assembly cannot agree—through securing agreement in both of the two camps, according to the principle on which that Assembly works—to vote through such a motion. But I am delighted that after 15 months, the penny has dropped.
  Mr. Mallon: Will the hon. Gentleman elaborate on what he means by "the two camps"?
  Mr. Davies: I hardly need to describe to the hon. Gentleman how the procedures work in the Belfast Assembly. He knows perfectly well that, to get an exclusion motion through, it would be necessary to have a majority in both the Unionist and the nationalist and republican camps. That is a fact—I do not want to quarrel about it now—and he knows it even better than I do.
  Rev. Martin Smyth: Does the hon. Gentleman agree that, even at this stage, the Government seem not to have woken up, in that, instead of the Bill stating that the Secretary of State "shall", it states that he "may"? In other words, the Bill leaves one means of leverage out.
  Mr. Davies: The hon. Gentleman is right, and I shall come to that when I deal with the Bill in more detail.
  Mr. Mallon rose—
  Mr. Davies: I have already given way to the hon. Gentleman, if he will forgive me.
  The Secretary of State's predecessor never produced any arguments against following up the Opposition's suggestion at the time to introduce a Bill containing exclusion powers. I do not know why he did not; he never explained. Perhaps he could not make up his mind, or suffered from a bad case of "not invented here" syndrome. The Government often seem to suffer from that. Perhaps he could not persuade Mr. Jonathan Powell.
  Whatever the explanation, it was a grave error that had serious consequences within only a few months when, as I warned was likely in the circumstances, the next breach came. Of course it came in the shape of Stormontgate. When that happened, the Government found that they did not have the necessary weapon in their armoury, which I had tried to place there. No effective sanction was available to them, which is precisely why they ended up having to resort to dismissing the whole institutional structure of the Northern Ireland Assembly and Executive. They

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  brought the whole edifice down, unjustly and perversely punishing the innocent with the guilty, and plunging Northern Ireland into the constitutional crisis and political impasse in which it remains embedded. All that could have been avoided.
  As we now see from the Bill, the new Secretary of State has seen the point of exclusion. Although we have several difficulties with the way in which he proposes that it should operate, it would be churlish and ungenerous not to pay due tribute to him, which I certainly do.
  The Government's fourth cardinal error was not to appreciate that every issue in Northern Ireland—its institutions and their working, decommissioning, policing, demilitarisation and so forth—is inevitably interlinked. Some parties are more committed to some aspects and other parties to others, so any solution and any negotiation must be comprehensive, by any definition. It is therefore always an error to believe that some issues can be resolved in vacuo or that side deals can be done with one party without unwinding the commitment of others. We have seen far too many unilateral concessions, one-sided assurances and side deals done with one party, offending another, which then has to be appeased with another concession that in turn upsets another party.
  That was a hopeless way of conducting a negotiation, but every time that I mentioned the word "linkage"—the Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office, the right hon. Member for Liverpool, Wavertree will remember me doing so on many occasions—to the right hon. Gentleman's predecessor, he bridled at it and rejected it.
  Lembit Öpik: The Conservatives called for unilateral exclusion and demanded that Ministers implement it last year, so I am at a loss to understand why they repeatedly criticise the Government for acting unilaterally when they requested such action last year.
  Mr. Davies: The hon. Gentleman has completely misunderstood what I have said. I am criticising any sort of unilateral concession, which I said was completely wrong. Equally, I have said that it was necessary to have a balance, not unilateral action. I said that part of the balance—I hope that the hon. Gentleman was listening, but if he was not, I shall repeat it for him—requires some sanctions for bad behaviour. The Government found themselves in a hopeless position last year when no response was available to them. I suggested a response, but they did not take it. That is why they ended up dismantling the whole institutional structure in Belfast and are now finding it difficult to put it back on its feet again. That, in a couple of sentences, shows the tragic outcome of a series of avoidable mistakes.
  Lembit Opik rose—
  Mr. Davies: I will not give way again, because we are under a time constraint. It is not my fault, but we suffer from a time constraint imposed on us arbitrarily by an arrogant Government.
  To be fair, after the present Secretary of State took office, we had a different approach, which resulted in multilateral and comprehensive negotiations at
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  Hillsborough. As the House knows, we strongly supported those negotiations and they led to some genuinely encouraging progress. Sadly, that progress has not been sustained. The best hope that we have is that it has been deep frozen and can, in due time, be revived and built on.
  The Government committed the fifth cardinal error when they postponed the Assembly elections indefinitely. The difference between an indefinite postponement and a cancellation is a nice philosophical question, but an important pragmatic question that the Government should ask themselves today is how long does an indefinite postponement need to continue before it has the political consequences of a cancellation?
  That postponement was an error is now clear—for two reasons. First, it penalised the innocent, and the democratic process itself, for the failings of one party. It thus breached both an elementary principle of justice and the pragmatic requirement in any process that the structure of incentives should be rational and not perverse. Secondly, it was an error because it made it predictably certain that no progress would be made in the peace process. Before an election, parties and political leaders in Northern Ireland will always seek to strengthen their position in their own sectarian camps. That means talking tough and pointing to rivals' weaknesses. No one can make concessions in such circumstances, nor accept concessions from the other side as adequate. It follows that no concessions will be made. It follows that no negotiations will proceed. The history of the past few months may prove more eloquent than any analysis of mine, and I hope that the Government will draw the right conclusion from that before even greater risks are run.
  The Bill enshrines two principles—the principle of exclusion and the principle of a monitoring commission. We clearly do not object to exclusion, because we first introduced the concept into the Northern Ireland political debate and we feel as strongly about it as we did when we advocated it 15 months ago. We will not play dog in the manger. Simply because we had to wait for 15 months for the Government to come around to our point of view is no reason to fail to support the principle of exclusion. We will hold firm to that principle.
  We equally approve of the concept of a monitoring commission. We cannot claim authorship of that, because the credit goes to the right hon. Member for Upper Bann (Mr. Trimble), who tried to urge it on the Secretary of State's predecessor, with no more success than I had with exclusion. However, the concept was generally accepted at Hillsborough and we greatly welcome it. I recall suggesting to the Secretary of State that to give effect to the monitoring commission, we might simply expand the remit of General de Chastelain. I saw advantages in asking a military man to supervise the essentially military task of unwinding the paramilitary operations of terrorist groups in Northern Ireland. However, that is in the past and I am happy to endorse the Government's approach to the constitution of the monitoring commission.
  We have considerable problems with the Government's original proposal to link the concept of exclusion and the monitoring commission. The Government's original idea was that the Secretary of State would have no power to exclude, except on the

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  recommendation of the commission. To us, that clearly raised a matter of fundamental principle, and I am surprised that it was not equally clear to the Government. We all believe in democracy, and its first principle is that government is conducted by those who are elected or those who are accountable to those who are elected—in the case of our parliamentary system, to Parliament. The original, pristine Bill proposed that four people, who would not be democratically accountable to Parliament or in any other way, should determine who should and who should not serve in the Government of Northern Ireland and exercise executive functions, not the Secretary of State, who is democratically accountable. That is a fundamentally obnoxious procedure, and one that we could not accept.
  I am glad that the Government have—wisely—accepted the Liberal Democrat amendment tabled in another place. My own party made a significant contribution to that amendment, which was also supported by the Ulster Unionists. It gives the Secretary of State a power of exclusion for a period of two weeks, irrespective of the monitoring commission's recommendations. That is a substantial improvement, and it affects the Opposition's attitude to the Bill. However, a point of principle is still involved for exclusions that continue for more than two weeks. I hope later to be able to advocate an amendment that would protect the principle entirely, and another that would require the Secretary of State to take account of the commission's recommendations when making a decision to exclude. We believe that the role of the commission in this matter should be advisory. It is totally inappropriate that it should have a decisive role in determining who should sit in an Executive.
  The Bill enshrines two important innovations. For the reasons that I have given, we strongly support them. The Government have accepted an amendment that attenuates considerably our remaining concerns, although it does not remove them entirely. We shall therefore support the Bill on Second Reading. We hope to improve it further in Committee. Above all, we hope that it will contribute—as I believe that it will—to progress in the peace process.
  3.56 pm
  Mr. Seamus Mallon: I shall begin with a brief account of the context and background of this debate. There is more to this than the nihilistic apologia that we have just heard in respect of who was right and who was wrong. The reality is that anyone dealing with politics in these circumstances is caught between armies, in the quagmire of violence. In that context, rights and wrongs have neither the neatness nor the absolute values suggested by the hon. Member for Grantham and Stamford (Mr. Davies).
  I recognise the hon. Gentleman's point, and in some respects he is technically correct, but we are trying to end 30 years of violence and to bridge almost 100 years of political, religious and sectarian divisions, and in the search for absolute wisdom, we must remember that our own sense of rectitude—of being right or wrong—is not as absolute as we might wish.
  The collective effect of matters such as the Castlereagh break-in, the IRA's spying operation and its activity in Colombia broke the back of a political
  918
  process that was already struggling. It was readily accepted that the Ulster Unionist party could not have stayed in the power-sharing Executive in those circumstances. There is a general realisation that no political party or organisation could live with another party that undertook such activities while involved in government.
  Mr. Donaldson: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Mallon: I have anticipated the hon. Gentleman's question, and I have my answer waiting for him.
  Mr. Donaldson: If, in the circumstances that the hon. Gentleman has described, and following the Stormontgate revelations, a motion had been tabled in the Assembly to exclude the Sinn Fein members from the Executive, would his party have supported it?
  Mr. Mallon: I was not in the leadership of our party at that stage, but I am not evading the question because the answer is in the Bill and in what the Secretary of State said. There already exists a built-in barrier—prohibition would be the wrong word—against that happening, just as there was in the negotiations before the Good Friday agreement. The Ulster Unionist party was then able to resist action against those who would not play a full role in the Executive, and that was so for reasons that we recognised as good ones. I myself tried and failed to find a way to deal with that problem. It was spurned by the Ulster Unionist party, which ignored it for a year. It was spurned by the IRA. Neither made any attempt to see whether that was workable. I failed on both counts, therefore, but I would rather have failed than not tried. That is the approach that I want to bring to this Bill, too.
  Mr. Donaldson: Is this a yes or a no?
  Mr. Mallon: The hon. Gentleman will have time to nibble away as we go along and—he need not worry—I will nibble back.
  I am no great advocate of commissions. I have a concept of the sturdy, independent Ulsterman, standing on his own two feet, going about his own business, looking after himself and not having to resort to commissions. I am on record as praising the commissioners: I know two of them well and hugely respect them, and I have no doubt that I would have similar respect for the other two. However, I would much prefer it if the matter could be dealt with through the political process in the north of Ireland by those who should and could—I hope will—slot into the vision of the sturdy, independent Ulsterman, standing on his own feet and doing things for himself.
  We are not short of commissions. Now we are to have the monitoring commission. We have the international commission on decommissioning, a commission for the disappeared—that is, those who were murdered in various ways—and a human rights commission, the least said about which the better at this stage. However, if the political process were strong, vibrant and self-confident enough, we would not need to appoint people to commissions. We could deal with things ourselves.
  I have nothing fundamentally against the new commission. It may throw some light on Castlereagh. It may be able to look into the way in which some sectarian

  919
  attacks take place. It may be able to establish the role of paramilitary groups in riot situations. It may even look at the Government's credibility when they become tardy in relation to some of their commitments. I am not against the international commission in those terms, but I feel that we will soon have almost more commissions than we have issues to deal with.
  I am not against sanctions, and I want to put that point on the record, although I do not doubt that it will be misunderstood. Along with the right hon. Member for Upper Bann (Mr. Trimble), I saw how difficult it was to sit through a situation in which the basic rules of politics were flouted daily before our eyes. The standards of non-violence and the highest standards of the duty of office that the Good Friday agreement demanded were tossed to the wind, and we were not capable of doing anything about it.
  However, when I say that I am in favour of sanctions I mean the sanctions in the Good Friday agreement, which—except for some people—we have all broadly agreed: sanctions that are workable and sanctions that protect and defend the political process and will not eventually tear it apart. That is one of the difficulties with this Bill and with the draft agreement on which it is based. We must be careful that, while we seek the optimum protection for the political process, we do not create the means by which it could be torn apart again.
  I am not in favour of contrivances. If we are all honest, we will accept that in many ways this legislation is a contrivance—I do not mean that disparagingly. It is a contrivance for various reasons. It is intended to bridge the gap that I identified—the political inability to make the Assembly take decisions. Also in many ways, it has more of a paper value than the real substantive value that it might well have had.
  Indeed, the legislation is a contrivance in the sense that although it is derived from the Hillsborough joint declaration, it was not part of it; it was an addendum. It did not come out of the joint declaration as agreed by the political parties; it was stuck on to it and issued separately, almost as a counterweight to whatever had been agreed about what might be done governmentally about the issue of on-the-runs. In many ways, that adds to the contrivances. The balancing act that resulted from the two addendums has not increased the standing of the approach.
  I am not against sanctions, but this contrivance is political—I can see why it was a political requirement for some, but a political contrivance to get people in may not be the right method of ensuring that everyone stays in or that there is anything in which to stay. I hope that I am wrong.
  I can say with some confidence that the mechanisms within this legislation will in any case never be used. I am firmly of the opinion that the day on which the Secretary of State—whoever he or she may be—decides to exclude without cross-community support within the Assembly will be the day on which the question of pensions to which the hon. Member for Montgomeryshire (Lembit Öpik) referred becomes very relevant indeed. That is when the political process in the north of Ireland will have decided that it cannot sustain itself and cannot stand on its own two feet. That is when the test that is in
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  this legislation will be used. [Interruption.] I will not lose that confidence because of heckling from the cheaper seats. I shall not lose that confidence in spite of those the Americans would call "bleachers"; we might say they were the people up in the stands —[Interruption.] I did not mean that offensively.
  I am confident because there are many good people in the north of Ireland who want the agreement to work. They want devolution to work. They want north-south development, through the Assembly, to work. They want to experience the sense of pride that Northern Ireland people can fairly and effectively administer their affairs. I am not confusing good people with people who think as I do or who believe what I believe; there are many good people right across the board who genuinely believe that the principle of consent is the cement that will bind the people of the whole of Ireland, north and south, into a people at peace with themselves and with others.
  Even as we approach what I hope will be a new electoral situation and a renewed establishment of the political process, I have no doubt that the trust and confidence required are being, and will be, put to the test. There are images in my mind that show how difficult it will be for good and brave people inside and outside politics in Northern Ireland. Those good people in Unionism and in nationalism will have to look at some of the things that are happening around them and face those things down.
  The question put by the Good Friday agreement is whether those involved in violence can be regarded as genuine political partners in the creation of lasting peace and a wholly new political dispensation. Sometimes, it is hard to believe that that can be so. Among the images that I recall, just from the past few weeks, is that of the body of Jean McConville, found at Shelling Hill beach—a place I know well. I remember, too, the awesome comment of one of her relations that she was identified because the cardigan found in her sandy grave was her only cardigan. That is some comment on those who murdered Jean McConville, those who gave the instruction to murder her and those who belong to the organisation that killed that lady. Why? Because she was a person of compassion and humanity and gave comfort and help to a dying soldier on the streets of the city in which she lived. That image does not do much for confidence.
  I recall a photograph of four Sinn Fein TDs, pictured in Castlerea prison with the murderers of Jerry McCabe, the garda killed outside Limerick. Four Members of Parliament went to that prison to be photographed with the men who murdered one of the Garda Siochana and published the picture in An Phoblacht to be gloated over. That is how they feel. Multiply one Jerry McCabe by every policeman killed in the north of Ireland and you see the extent to which those two images alone put the fingers in the eyes of good people in the Unionist community and good people in the nationalist community who want a different and new way of life.
  Mr. Dodds: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Mallon: I will give way in just one second.
  There will be such an occasion in Letterkenny, when a reunion of those who escaped from Crumlin Road prison will take place. There will be dancing and singing,

  921
  photographs and gloating, and others will be reminded of their tragedies. I ask this question, simply because it has to be asked: is that the way to create trust and confidence in the Unionist community about a new electoral situation and a new administration? Is that the way to create confidence in the nationalist community that, in effect, a new way of life is coming from the political process?
  Add to that the fact that Father Dan White received death threats because he had the audacity to carry out a religious service in a graveyard in Greyabbey. Add to that the desecration of headstones at the small parish church at Ballyargan in my own parish at the weekend. And add to that the threats to brave people who sit on the policing partnership boards from, in the words of the Chief Constable, the Provisional IRA. All that is sticking fingers in people's eyes. I believe that those things have got to be looked at. I will give way now, but I want to expand further on that if I may.
  Mr. Dodds: I am very grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way. He is right to draw attention in such a forceful way to the issues that he highlights. On the issue of the Sinn Fein TDs photographed with those responsible for the murder of Garda McCabe, does the hon. Gentleman understand the outrage felt by the families of RUC officers murdered in Northern Ireland who have seen the murderers of their loved ones released and set free, yet people in the Irish Republic—politicians, newspapers and others—say what an outrage it is even for Sinn Fein TDs to be photographed with the perpetrators of such violence? The hon. Gentleman and other Members voted for the release of prisoners—
  Madam Deputy Speaker (Sylvia Heal): Order. I have allowed some latitude to the hon. Gentleman, but I hope that other hon. Members will bear in mind just what we are discussing today.
  Mr. Mallon: I thank the hon. Member for Belfast, North (Mr. Dodds), who asks a valid question. Do I understand? Yes, I think I understand, but this is not just about understanding; it is about feeling. In my view, this is something that transcends understanding, and perhaps that will take us further than a lot of the analysis that we impose on things.
  I have mentioned certain visual images. I hope that the hon. Member for North Antrim (Rev. Ian Paisley) does not mind that I refer to this, but his churches have been attacked—desecrated—in Counties Monaghan and Cork. I include that with the other images as a means of saying to all of us and to myself that, while we recognise that the creation of peace and the creation of new political institutions have created a moral quagmire for all of us, it is the responsibility of politics to proceed, not to be bogged down in that moral quagmire. In my view, the business of politics will survive.
  Politics is about compromise. It is about arbitration. It is about giving a little and getting a little. It is about understanding the other person's position. It is about leaving the other person with enough to ensure that self-respect is not taken away. It is about all those things. It is not about always winning.
  I recently noticed a newspaper article by Professor John Murphy. I forget whom he attributed the quote to, but it was this:
  922
  "God cannot change what happened in the past—historians, revisionists and spin doctors can."
  And they are doing it now. The awfulness of what we are talking about, and the awfulness of the moral quagmire that the good people in the political parties and in the community must wade through rather than get bogged down, is that those who carried out the murders of Jean McConville and young Columba McVeigh—they are digging for his body not far from where I live now—are lionised and heroised. Their dealings and activities are airbrushed in such a way that, in effect, they become folk heroes within their own country. The hon. Member for Grantham and Stamford said previously that history will blame. Unfortunately, the most recent part of history does not. It lionises those who use violence. It makes them the pin-up boys of the political process and it gives to them an aura that they simply do not deserve. That is another problem that the good people in the political process will have to see down and see out, and live with it in such a way that we can bury it eventually by creating the type of society that we want.
  David Winnick: Should not my hon. Friend's words be heard particularly by one or two who can find kind words for the IRA—[Interruption.] I repeat: should not his words be heard by those who have said one or two kinds words about the IRA?
  Mr. Mallon: If I were to answer my hon. Friend's question, I would be here a long time. I would apply those words especially, however, in generic terms, to the media in Ireland and in Britain. Could I apply them also to those commentators in Ireland and in Britain who see something exciting about the whiff of cordite and who are prepared to airbrush the awfulness out of their considerations? May I refer them with the greatest of respect to two sovereign Governments and simply say that the more that those who carry out acts of violence become the beneficiaries—in many ways, the gratuitous beneficiaries—of political negotiations, the more the good people in the political process in Ireland, be they Unionist or nationalist, are sacrificed? I therefore thank my hon. Friend for his question. Those are harsh and difficult words to say, but if we are to get beyond this moral quagmire into real development as a people and in terms of a political process, we must say them.
  I want to make one or two observations about the legislation. As I said earlier—I could not believe the hornet's nest that I was raising—we are dealing not just with this Bill, but with the draft international agreement, which has established the functions. I will not go through that again. I simply raise the issue because of the distinction, which I believe was confirmed by the Government spokesman in the House of Lords— I am convinced of this, and it is the advice that I have received—that the international commission receives its functions from the agreement between the two Governments, not from the legislative process in which we are engaged here. Consequently, any changes in or to the functions cannot be dealt with in Committee. If I am wrong, I have got it terribly wrong and the Government

  923
  spokesman misled the House of Lords. I have far too much respect for him as a person and for his intellect to believe that that would be the case.
  Lembit Öpik rose—
  The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office (Jane Kennedy)rose—
  Mr. Mallon: I give way to the Minister. Ladies first.
  Jane Kennedy: I hesitate to interrupt my hon. Friend, but it would help me to understand the point to which he and others have already drawn attention if he could give me the column reference from the Lords Hansard. I would then be able to read it and perhaps respond.
  Mr. Mallon: So that there is no lack of clarity, I make it clear that the remarks appeared at column 667 of the Lords Official Report on Monday 15 September.
  Lembit Öpik: Surely in any practical sense it is reasonable for us to assume that the will of this House can be seen to prevail. The hon. Member for North Antrim (Rev. Ian Paisley) certainly made the point that this is the sovereign court of the laws of the United Kingdom. For all practical purposes, we can proceed on the assumption that if the House votes in a certain way, it can be taken as the outcome of our deliberations and that will stand in the eyes of our national and international colleagues.
  Mr. Mallon: I take the hon. Gentleman's point, but the conclusion will have no legal effect. [Interruption.] I hear someone suggesting that that is ridiculous, and perhaps it is. However, that is the reality. I am not a lawyer, but there are many eminent lawyers on these Benches. There are those who properly advise Lord Williams. I do not make my point in a legalistic sense because there is a reason for my wanting to make a change in relation to the functions.
  Mr. Quentin Davies: The hon. Gentleman has just said that a decision of Parliament has no legal effect. Of course, that is absurd. Only decisions of Parliament can have legal effect in this country. It may well be that the opposite of what he has said is the case, namely that if Parliament takes certain decisions that have a legal effect, that may invalidate other documents. That is a very different matter.
  Mr. Mallon: I take that point, so perhaps I should at this stage explain the reasons for my belief. In response to an amendment tabled by Lord Maginnis of Drumglass, Lord Williams of Mostyn said:
  "Therefore, however much one sympathises with the thinking behind it, the amendment would have no legal effect."
  Later in the same column, he repeats that point. He said:
  "So if the amendment were carried it would have no legal effect." —[Official Report, House of Lords, 15 September 2003; Vol. 652, c. 667.]
  924
  That may or may not be the case, but I happen to believe that it is.
  Mr. Alistair Carmichael: I think that the hon. Gentleman is absolutely right in his analysis of the words spoken by Lord Williams of Mostyn. However, I also think that Lord Williams is absolutely wrong. This is probably the most significant point that we will deal with today in relation to a Bill that may not ultimately have short to medium-term importance. Lord Williams was speaking about the exercise of a function by the Executive, but the Executive only have the powers that this place gives them. If this place declines to ratify an act by the Executive, that act is surely null and void. To that extent, when the hon. Gentleman says that something that the other place does by way of amendment would have no legal effect, he is wrong.
  Mr. Mallon: I am not saying that. I was simply doing what any Member of Parliament would do by reading what a Government spokesman said. What he said was either right or wrong—I shall leave it to hon. and learned Members to sort that out.
  The issue is important to me because when I read the draft agreement, I noticed one great omission. That has caused my difficulty because I would not have gone down this road at all were it not for that. Article 4 of the draft agreement specifies the things that are to be monitored, which include attacks on security forces, murders, sectarian attacks, involvement in riots, other offences, training and targeting. They all appear in paragraph 13 of the joint declaration, but there is one exception: organised crime.
  Given Northern Ireland's post-ceasefire experiences, why has organised crime been omitted? Living where I live and coming from where I do, I can tell hon. Members that organised crime is the greatest source of benefit for paramilitary groups because it gives them unlimited money to follow their paramilitary activities and objectives and the money is also channelled into their political objectives. It perverts the society in which racketeering exists to the extent that it does in the north of Ireland and changes and perverts the approach in society. It has a long-term effect and it will take decades before parts of the north of Ireland recover from it, if they ever do. I have to ask again why there is such an omission and why I cannot make an amendment. When the lawyers sort this out, we shall see.
  Mr. Donaldson: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that he can seek the leave of the House to table a manuscript amendment? He would have support on this side of the House if he tabled such an amendment, given that he has not already done so.
  Mr. Mallon: The right hon. Member for Upper Bann smiled whimsically at me when he heard the hon. Member for Lagan Valley (Mr. Donaldson) saying that I might get support. The right hon. Gentleman sometimes recognises what that is worth.
  I shall leave it to the lawyers to sort out the situation but in addition to defrauding the Exchequer, creating a mafia culture in our society and perverting the democratic standards for decades to come, organised crime will fill political coffers north and south of the border in a way with which the Bill should deal.

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  There is a serious second issue, although perhaps it is not as dramatic. Again, no attempt has been made to deal properly with the failure to fulfil properly functions in the Executive. The joint declaration at Hillsborough said that the body
  "will also have a more general responsibility to consider claims by any party in the Assembly that another party is fundamentally in breach of requirements in the Declaration of Support or elsewhere in the Agreement."
  The words have been changed so that the draft agreement says:
  "has failed to observe any other terms of the pledge of office".
  There is a substantive difference. The question of the difference between the pledge of office and the duty of office has still not been resolved. It could have been resolved under the terms of the wording of the joint declaration at Hillsborough, in my view. Again, it is questionable. It is a legal matter. It cannot be done in relation to this, in terms of the pledge of office, rather than the duty of office.
  I have already alluded to my third point and will not labour it. There is something weak inherently and something wrong fundamentally, when a political process has to go to a Secretary of State to sort out its problems and has to appoint commissioners from America, the Republic of Ireland, Canada, Finland—name any country in the world and we have commissioners from it—rather than sorting it out ourselves. I very much regret that the cross-community support element can be superseded by a decision of the Secretary of State. I think that I understand the reason for it—I am sure I do—but it tells us something about ourselves.
  Mr. Dodds: Does the hon. Gentleman think it is right that those who are supposedly or allegedly in breach of political obligations should be treated in the same way and possibly have the same sanctions applied against them, for taking a principled political position, as those who are alleged to have taken part in criminal or terrorist activity or who are associated with those who do? Is it right that the same sanctions should be applied in both cases?
  Mr. Mallon: The hon. Gentleman is asking me to quantify guilt. The reality is that it is not possible. If he is asking me whether it is as damaging, it is not—that is obvious—but is it in the best interests of the political process?
  I leave it to people to try to resolve at some time the distinction between the pledge of office and the duty of office, because until we do it will be a running sore.
  Mr. Peter Robinson: The hon. Gentleman is on record that, during the lifetime of the Executive, he sought to have excluded from the Executive my hon. Friend the Member for Belfast, North (Mr. Dodds) and me because we would not sit down at the Executive table with Sinn Fein, yet at the same time the hon. Gentleman did not go after Sinn Fein and its association with the IRA. How could he try to have the Democratic Unionist party, as democrats, removed but not Sinn Fein?
  Mr. Mallon: For obvious reasons, I did not table anything in relation to the hon. Gentleman's position. I
  926
  did not table anything in relation to the Sinn Fein position. As I said earlier, I made an offer that failed on both counts but surely when there is a failure properly to fulfil the duties that are required, as in attending North/South Ministerial Council meetings, that is a breach of the duty of office, however one semantically argues about the pledge of office.
  Rev. Ian Paisley: The hon. Gentleman is on record that the agreement was to bring about an inclusive Government. I have heard him say it, I have heard him preach it. Why now is he so anxious to exclude people who are not engaged in violence, who are not leading people on to kill one another but simply want to have the basic democratic principles upheld, which are, as set out by the Prime Minister, that one is not expected to sit down with people in Government and pretend that one can do something, because one must have faith that everyone in that Government has said goodbye to violence and wants democracy to have the ascendancy?
  Mr. Mallon: I do not want the exclusion of the hon. Gentleman's party or any party. I want the adherence of all parties to the title duties required in the political arrangement and the agreement. and the adherence of all parties to the crucial point of non-violence. I want a situation in which the hon. Gentleman's party and all political parties in the north of Ireland are inclusively involved in trying to create something that is new and that can give us a new way of life. I am confident that that can happen, and to maintain that confidence I have to believe that inclusivity means serving in an Executive, an assembly, committees and every walk of political life with people whom one may not particularly like, including those who in the past have carried out atrocities. That is what inclusivity means, and that is the moral quagmire that I spoke about earlier.
  We must consider which is the more powerful position—not moving out of the moral quagmire because of one's perception of one's own rectitude or having the courage to move out of the moral swamp, and biting one's lip as one goes to do something that will put an end to the swamp. It is easy for all of us to become self-righteous and stay in the swamp because of our beliefs, principles and self-righteousness. However, people of courage get out of the swamp and do difficult things like trying to reach an accommodation, even with people whom they find revolting. That is the challenge that we face, and that is what this is all about.
  Finally, I shall return to the good people in the north of Ireland in all political parties who, I hope, will shortly have the opportunity in an election and subsequently to get out of that moral quagmire. If they do so, their contribution to this period of Irish history will be enormous.
  4.42 pm
  Lembit Öpik: I expressed reservations about the allocation of time motion in our first debate, but I am now concerned that if everyone who wishes to speak in this debate does so we will not complete Second Reading before 10.27 pm. However, we will see what happens.
  I should like to underline something that arose in our discussion of the motion that is relevant to Second Reading and has direct implications for the process that

  927
  we are debating. My biggest reservation about completing all the Bill's stages in one day is the fact that it leaves no time for reflection between Second Reading and Committee, and between Committee and Report. Quite apart from the fact that the purpose of the Report stage has been virtually invalidated, it would have been better if the Government had allowed themselves room to manoeuvre on something that is evidently contentious. On balance, they could have saved time by allowing us to have the sort of dialogue that the hon. Member for Grantham and Stamford (Mr. Davies) said would be helpful.
  Notwithstanding my reservations, I should like to set out the Liberal Democrat view of the Bill, highlighting the things with which we agree and areas that, should we reach a discussion of amendments, we may be able to discuss in more detail.
  First, I must take issue with something that the hon. Member for Grantham and Stamford said. He described, as he often does, the five cardinal sins committed by the Government with regard to Northern Ireland policy. I humbly suggest that the one cardinal sin that he committed was to attempt to take credit for other people's ideas. He said that on 16 July last year he proposed the arrangements that we are discussing today. I am sure that he will remember that 12 days previous to that, around 4 July 2002, the sister party of the Liberal Democrats, the Alliance party of Northern Ireland, suggested something similar in the Hillsborough talks. I am sure the Alliance party of Northern Ireland would welcome the Conservatives' support for the idea, but it a bit cheeky for the Conservatives to suggest that they came up with it first, when the Alliance party has consistently suggested such ideas, perhaps not realising that it was being watched so closely from across the water.
  David Burnside: On the subject of the Liberal Democrats' contribution to new ideas, will the hon. Gentleman confirm that one of the more constructive ideas in recent years from their sister party, the Alliance party, was the contribution from Seamus Close, who suggested that if Sinn Fein cannot turn into a democratic party, we might have to move towards a weighted majority representing both the Unionist and the nationalist community? Perhaps that is the position to which we are now moving.
  Lembit Öpik: The hon. Gentleman raises the issue of cross-community support for legislation, which touches on the present debate. Seamus Close was right to raise that for consideration. We are acutely aware of the sensitivities involved, and the SDLP would no doubt have much to say about the abandonment of that principle. My personal feeling and the view of the Liberal Democrats is that at this point it would be premature to abandon the principle on a wholesale basis, because it underpins a large part of what has been shown to be successful in forcing the many different parties in Northern Ireland to work together.
  I am sympathetic to the hon. Gentleman's concern, and I am sure that he could give examples of business being held up by the need for cross-community support, but it is probably more necessary to have that brake in
  928
  the system than expedient to remove it at this stage. If one considers the history of the Good Friday agreement and the Assembly, one realises that a great deal has been achieved through consensus, but of course that is not reported in the news so much because it is not controversial. In domestic and social policy, the cross-community requirement has served to improve the quality of the legislation passed, and has certainly improved the prospects of ensuring that decisions made in the Assembly have cross-community applicability. For those reasons, I would resist such change.
  It is necessary for the Assembly and all of us to allow space for blue-sky thinking so that more controversial and creative thoughts can come forward. In such a debate, we may come across third alternatives that win on all sides.
  I remind the House what the Alliance party was suggesting—that the two Governments appoint an independent person of domestic and international standing to monitor paramilitary activities in Northern Ireland. That was originally conceived as a means whereby domestic and political pressure could be brought to bear on those engaged in sinister deeds and deeds detrimental to the normalisation of the Province. It was not so much about catching people out in order to impose sanctions as about embarrassing groups into changing their undesirable actions. Sanctions are only a backstop in the event that people do not change their behaviour, and with sanctions come all the dangers about which we have heard from the hon. Member for Newry and Armagh (Mr. Mallon).
  I welcome the recent announcement of the four commissioners. The Secretary of State went into some detail about Commander Grieve, Mr. Brosnan, Mr. Kerr and my noble Friend Lord Alderdice. In my judgment, they have the background, the experience and the authority and respect to ensure that the commission undertakes its role efficiently and effectively. I congratulate the Government on convincing them to take on the role, which was probably more difficult than deciding who would perform it. It is reassuring to know that the tasks of the monitoring commission in investigating paramilitary activity, security normalisation and parties' political commitments will be undertaken by such distinguished persons. I was slightly concerned that we were heading down the path of becoming the appointments panel en masse. Giving 659 politicians the potential to make such appointments will guarantee that we never achieve consensus. To that extent, I am willing to tolerate the concession to the political hierarchy of accepting that the decisions will be made by a small number of individuals connected with the Northern Ireland Office.
  In another place, concerns were expressed about the powers of the Secretary of State. Given the Liberal Democrats' involvement in tabling an amendment on that matter, I feel that it is appropriate to raise it now, not least because the Secretary of State himself was silent about it. There was unease about the feeling that the Bill as it stood did not give the Secretary of State the freedom to work positively, ahead of the monitoring commission, if he or she felt that some people or parties in the Assembly were not committed to non-violence and exclusively peaceful and democratic means. While we appreciated those concerns, my noble Friends in the

  929
  other place were especially concerned that the commission and Assembly should not be sidelined by any remedy in that regard.
  As I said, we support the commission, and we are firm supporters of devolution. As such, we believe that it is vital to tie the Assembly into the process of any exclusion or strategically important decision that is made, for example, by the Secretary of State. In essence, we are saying that it is essential that the democratically elected body in Northern Ireland has the opportunity to discuss the exclusion of a Minister from its own Executive.
  A range of amendments was tabled in an attempt to address that concern. My noble Friends did not feel able to support the amendments tabled by the Conservatives or Ulster Unionists as they thought that they were too wide, strong and exclusive of the Assembly and the independent monitoring commission to be acceptable. As I said, we believe that it is crucial that both those bodies are involved in any sanctions. That is why my noble Friends tabled an amendment attempting to do two things—address the concerns expressed about the Secretary of State's ability to act, and ensure the integrity of the monitoring commission and the Assembly in any decision that is made. The amendment was agreed and is now part of clause 6.
  With the amendment in place, the Secretary of State would indeed be able to exclude Ministers or junior Ministers from office if he felt that there were exceptional circumstances. That would include a situation in which something happened and he felt it prudent to act immediately without waiting for a report from the commission or for the Assembly to discuss the exclusion. There could subsequently be a space of 24 hours before the Assembly could discuss a motion seeking to exclude Ministers, or perhaps a few days. Let us remember that a week is a very long time in politics. We have seen many times in Northern Ireland a situation that began in tension ending in crisis within hours or days.
  That is why we felt that it was appropriate to table an amendment seeking to ensure that the Secretary of State could exclude a Minister from the Executive, but only for a period of two weeks. In that time, the commission would report. Frankly, if something so monumental had happened that the Secretary of State chose to act without reference to the commission, I have no doubt that it would certainly want to investigate and report on it. The Assembly would also debate it. If there is any concern that the Assembly would not discuss exclusion, the Secretary of State can serve a notice on the presiding officer requiring him to table an exclusion motion. There is no question but that a debate could be secured in the Assembly in that period.
  Mr. Quentin Davies: Does the hon. Gentleman acknowledge that, because of an amendment to the Liberal Democrat amendment tabled by my noble Friend Lord Glentoran, which was agreed, the Secretary of State will have the power of exclusion for two weeks, and the two contingences to which he refers are included in the possibilities involved when the Secretary of State exercises his judgment, albeit that he can do so without those contingencies if he so wishes? That is a very important point.
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  On the hon. Gentleman's point about claiming credit for the idea of exclusion, before I brought the proposal to the House, over several weeks previously, I discussed the matter in detail, as I always would do, with parties in Northern Ireland, including the Alliance party, the SDLP and the Ulster Unionist party. If a member of the Alliance party made a statement about exclusion in the days before the debate, he might have been not uninfluenced by his discussion with me in the preceding period.
  Lembit Öpik: I recall the occasion when the hon. Gentleman suggested that Sinn Fein, and perhaps the IRA, had crumbled from their stubborn position on a matter of important policy because—I do not quote him exactly, but this is close to what he said—the Conservatives had chosen to debate it on an Opposition day.
  I applaud optimism. Indeed, as a Liberal Democrat I am a perpetual optimist, not least in regard to a by-election that will take place tomorrow. I will leave it not just to Members here but to the Alliance party, whose members assiduously read the Hansard reports of all our proceedings, to decide who is right and who is wrong: but if it can be shown that the hon. Gentleman was the architect of this inspirational idea, in a spirit of fairness I shall buy him a gin and tonic when we return from the recess, however damaging that may be to my social credibility.
  The hon. Gentleman made a substantive point as well. It would, I think, be very undesirable for the Secretary of State to operate unilaterally, without respect for the commission or indeed the Assembly. As ever, there is a degree of interpretation—and there will always be a degree of precedent—governing how an amendment or legislation is established; but just as I have no doubt that the commission would report very shortly after any period of exclusion implemented by the Secretary of State, I consider it pretty much inconceivable that any Secretary of State could withstand the pressure to ensure that it did report, and that the Assembly—if it was sitting—had an opportunity to discuss the report. Failure to do so would not just be disrespectful to the democratically elected body in Northern Ireland; it would make a mockery of the Bill.
  In the event of the Assembly's failure to achieve cross-community support for an exclusion motion, the decision would revert to the Secretary of State under clause 5. While giving the Secretary of State a certain amount of discretion, the clause ensures that both the commission and the Assembly are ultimately included in any decision about the exclusion of Ministers from office. The Liberal Democrats consider the involvement of those bodies to be critical.
  I realise that there will be some discussion about the latitude within which we can operate. I am aware of the tensions and pressures affecting others involved in this debate, not least politicians in Dublin. I sincerely hope that Ministers will accept their responsibility to ensure that any dialogue with key decision makers, here and in Dublin, that is needed to bring about consensus in favour of the Bill will indeed take place.
  It is here that the compressed time scale is perhaps most critical. The Government, having decided in their wisdom to compress the entire debate into nine

  931
  continuous hours, must also take responsibility for ensuring that our partners in the peace process are involved directly and expeditiously in the ironing out of any problems caused by pressures. Obviously, I hope that there will be no such pressures, but I do not think anyone other than the Government is responsible for disposing of them, given that the Government have chosen to truncate a process that was designed specifically to ensure that no such pressures would arise as a result of our decisions.
  Another key point relates to pensions. I have raised it before, and I hope that if we have an opportunity to discuss the amendments in detail the Minister will provide a plausible explanation for the fact that salaries can be curtailed while pensions are untouched. It massively reduces the credibility of the sanction to say "You will suffer in the present, but in the long term you need not worry, because on the day you retire you will receive everything that would have come to you if you had not been mucking about." Ministers should perhaps consider whether there are grounds for changing the relevant provision, perhaps today on Report. Indeed, if that is possible we need not hold up the very tight agenda that the Government have presented us with.
  It is clear that the Bill's essential purpose is to act as a confidence-building measure for all in Northern Ireland. Matters of interest to everyone in the community will be investigated and reported. Paramilitary activity, security normalisation and any claims that a political party is not observing the pledge of office can come, as I understand it, under the commission's remit. I hope that, in considering the Bill's provisions so quickly, we have not missed some crucial points, thereby making it less effective.
  Andrew Mackinlay: As I understand it—this is really a question for Front Benchers—a Minister's allegedly not fulfilling the pledge of office is one of the issues reserved for the two UK-appointed commissioners. If one were indisposed, could the other act alone—in other words, is the quorum one? Do they have to meet formally, or can they communicate by post, telegraph or pigeon? This is a very real point: do the two British commissioners dealing with strand 1 institutional issues have to come together, or can one of them act alone?
  Lembit Öpik: I shall let the Minister respond to that point. Such salient and practical matters need at least to be put on the record to provide guidance for the future.
  This is a confidence-building measure, but as the hon. Member for Grantham and Stamford rightly said, the most confidence-damaging measure of late was probably the postponement of the elections, and in that regard I am forced to agree with him about the fifth
  932
  cardinal sin committed by the Government. They have postponed the elections twice, and there is little confidence in the Province that they would not be comfortable with doing so again. As he correctly pointed out, that takes the heat off, in terms of focusing on garnering support in the constituencies. We will all agree that it would be totally unacceptable for the Government to choose the election date to try to achieve a particular political outcome, just as they would never dream of doing so on the mainland, on the occasion of a general election. Of course, the difference in Northern Ireland is that they have to change the law to change the election date, which is a serious business indeed. Liberal Democrats do not consider it acceptable to change the election date, but we also feel that the Government have to climb the mountain of credibility again whenever they talk about confidence-building measures. That is a great shame.
  We agree in principle with this measure, which goes beyond the Northern Ireland Act 1998. That Act dealt with exclusion but only the Assembly could exclude, and there was no censure resolution or financial penalties. So this Bill has gone further, and in our view the amendment to it could be regarded in the same category as the censure resolution and financial penalties.
  I hope that the Minister can answer our questions, that we get further reassurance about the election date, that we get some perspective on the amendment passed in the other place, and that the question asked by the hon. Member for Thurrock (Andrew Mackinlay) is answered. I hope, too, that we are all looking for solutions rather than victories, and that we recognise that no single measure will be successful if people set their faces against getting an effective Assembly up and running in Northern Ireland. As the hon. Member for Newry and Armagh pointed out, however hard we try in this place, we are talking about a contrivance that requires a positive attitude to make it work. Still, Liberal Democrats feel that if this Bill succeeds in moving our attitude forward by increasing the mutual good faith that exists in the Province—thereby ensuring that we get back to the democratic process, which must run hand in hand with the peace process—at a strategic level it is worth passing it.

  DEFERRED DIVISIONS
  Madam Deputy Speaker (Sylvia Heal): I now have to announce the results of the Division deferred from a previous day.
  On the motion of the implementation and compliance of the common fisheries policy, the Ayes were 235, the Noes were 155, so the motion was agreed to.
  [The Division List is published at the end of today's debates.]

  Northern Ireland (Monitoring Commission etc.) Bill [Lords]
  Question again proposed.
  5.4 pm
  Mr. Harry Barnes: I recognise the significance of the measures proposed by the Liberal Democrats in the other place to press some extra powers on a reluctant Secretary of State. That can be valuable in certain circumstances. I notice that Lord Smith of Clifton, who was my former politics tutor at the university of Hull, introduced the debate there. If I do not look young enough, it is because I was an adult student at the time.
  I want to refer to the speech made by the hon. Member for Newry and Armagh (Mr. Mallon), certain sections of which were very powerful, especially on the misuse of views about the assassination of Sergeant McCabe and the position on Jean McConville. The rhetoric was particularly important.
  It also seems to me that important rhetoric is contained in the agreement between the two Governments. Paragraph 12 states:
  "Five years after the Agreement, the transition to exclusively democratic means must now be completed. Ongoing paramilitary activity, sectarian violence, and criminality masquerading as a political cause, are all corrosive of the trust and confidence that are necessary to sustain a durable political process."
  Paragraph 13 continues:
  "Paramilitarism and sectarian violence, therefore, must be brought to an end".
  It later refers to the need for paramilitary groups to
  "make it clear that they have made such an historic act of completion, and that this is reflected in reality on the ground."
  The measures in the Bill are attempts to move in that direction. It is important for Governments and politicians to say what it is all about and to be involved in the high hopes of the people. Powerful rhetoric can, if people actively pursue it, change attitudes, so the words used by politicians are important.
  I think that it is bad enough that new Labour has got rid of its socialist policies, but it is far worse that it has got rid of the rhetoric of socialism, because rhetoric offers hopes for the future, for changes and developments. Even if a battle is not won now, people still have some hope around the corner that changes will take place. I might fall into those positions in condemning much of the violence and paramilitary activity that takes place in Northern Ireland, but I realise that words alone will not help to resolve positions. There is a danger, and it applies even to the hon. Member for Newry and Armagh and myself on occasions, that words become a substitute for the hard positions that are necessary for action to take place.
  I read out a few moments ago the principles contained in the agreement. Even if we have agreed to push the barriers further back in the hope that bodies such as the Provisional IRA will fall into line and go ahead with acts of completion, there must be a point at which the barrier remains firmly in place, whatever the consequences might be. The hon. Member for Newry and Armagh was worried about triggering a situation in which the entire agreement came tumbling down when, at last, action was taken, presumably against Sinn Fein, which made it
  934
  face up to its responsibilities. There is a stage at which, when we have tried almost everything under the sun, another measure becomes the next stage of development and we will reach the end-point of the game if no action is taken fully to live up to the measures.
  Rev. Martin Smyth: Does the hon. Gentleman agree that in the agreement the commission was set certain guidelines, targets and dates, to do with government and normalisation, but that the provisions on paramilitaries were open-ended?
  Mr. Barnes: I do not think that the agreement is open-ended on terrorism, because it states in the provisions for the commission that it can report on such matters and seek to initiate legal action. It will have to face up to those issues as they arise. The commission will be tested by those issues. Paramilitaries may back off, because of the action that would be taken against them, or the arrangements might crumble, because the paramilitaries do not like what the commission does.
  The rhetoric of the hon. Member for Newry and Armagh did not carry the day in terms of the legal technicalities of what was said in the House of Lords and whether we could take or leave the Bill according to the occasion. The situation is analogous to an international treaty, in which the Government can engage under royal prerogative powers. On occasions, a treaty might have national implications and would then be discussed by the whole House—as in the case of the Maastricht treaty. What happens then can knock the measure into touch or require the treaty to be tweaked or altered if it is to be adopted. Therefore it is relevant for us to discuss amendments to the Bill later today.
  The Secretary of State has been questioned about whether past issues, such as the problems in Colombia and Castlereagh involving the Provisional IRA, can be investigated. We were promised the answer when the Minister winds up. In my opinion, the answer will be that such issues cannot be investigated, because the agreement talks of
  "any continuing activity by paramilitary groups."
  Some attempt to claim that anything that happens now is in some way linked to events in the past, in order to try to fulfil the criteria of continuing activity. That might be a shortcoming for some people, and they may wish to amend the Bill accordingly.
  David Burnside: It appears that the legal action on Sinn Fein-IRA activity in support of FARC, the terrorist movement in Colombia, will not be concluded before this legislation passes through the House, which will be quite soon. In that case, does the hon. Gentleman think that Colombia should be on or off the agenda?
  Mr. Barnes: I think that Colombia is liable to be off the agenda as far as the commission is concerned. It does not mean that it has to be off the agenda as far as the Northern Ireland Office or the general political process is concerned. An interesting report on the financing of terrorism was produced by the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee, and it raised questions about American involvement and FARC activity. The investigations by the police and other forces, and the NIO, will be able to continue, so that action can take place.

  935
  I asked the Secretary of State earlier about the relationship between clauses 2 and 3. It is possible that my point in that short intervention was not as clear as it should have been. Paragraph 3 of the agreement between the British and Irish Governments states:
  "Any incidents of non-compliance by any party will … be subject to either political exposure or, where appropriate, the process of law."
  I presume that political exposure will happen through reports made to the House. It struck me that a problem with clause 2 could inhibit the nature of a report under clause 3. Obviously, I do not want the contents of a report to put people's lives at risk, or prejudice future legal proceedings, but there is some restraint on what the commission can tell us.
  If the commission believes that it knows who is involved in a certain activity, and that that person should be exposed, that could be achieved by means of a statement to the House, which would be privileged. However, that could still affect future legal proceedings. Alternatively, the life of a person implicated in the serious paramilitary activity proscribed by the agreement could be put at risk, as a result of the activity of opposing paramilitary forces. Does that mean that we will not find out who is involved in paramilitary activity? If so, the Bill will be less effective than intended.
  My final point has to do with on-the-runs. The material on the Bill placed in the Library by the Northern Ireland Office for this debate contains a document—"Proposals in Relation to On the Runs"—that was agreed in April 2003. It makes it clear that, in future, certain rules will apply to people who are on the run, and it seems that some sort of offer is being made to the paramilitary organisations. The offer is that, if on-the-runs play ball with the work of the commission and act according to the principles that it supports, they will get the clearance outlined in the document.
  The document is the carrot and we are now discussing the stick. The problem is that people, when offered a carrot, will sometimes go after that incentive, in the hope that they can get round other limitations placed on them. Before any provisions are implemented in respect of on-the-runs and the conditions that they would have to observe, I want to ensure that people who are on the run from the on-the-runs, and their organisations, are free to return to Northern Ireland, if that is what they wish. The agreement between the two Governments refers to such exiles, if only by inference, and they must be provided for. That matter must be sorted out.
  I generally favour the Bill. I recognise that we are moving the goalposts back in the hope that the game can be completed. However, there must come a point at which we say, "That's it." This is that point, and it must be reached without there being some way of wheedling matters so that those on the run can be got off the hook.
  5.20 pm
  Mr. David Trimble: Let me comment on the closing words of the hon. Member for North-East Derbyshire (Mr. Barnes), without endorsing any form of amnesty, because we have always opposed any provision with regard to on-the-runs. I pay tribute to the hon. Gentleman's work over the years in highlighting
  936
  the plight of those who have been forced to leave as a result of paramilitary intimidation. They have become exiles from Northern Ireland and can return only at risk to themselves. His significant contribution in bringing the focus to bear on that form of paramilitary abuse should be recognised. We would all agree entirely with what he said about exiles.
  The hon. Member for Newry and Armagh (Mr. Mallon) made a compelling contribution, particularly when he talked about the activities of paramilitarism and about how he understood the feelings that exist. I endorse a lot of what he said about that. He referred to the way in which some sectors of society almost glorify those who have been involved in violence, and he criticised in particular the broadcast media and the press. That brought into my mind a newspaper article published today, as did his mention of the planned celebration for those who escaped from the Maze prison many years ago. The Independent today carries a huge spread on that subject. I have not read the article by Mr. David McKittrick, and I do not prejudge it. I did not get as far as reading the article because the graphic at the top of the page was enough for me to throw the paper away. It superimposed on a photograph of the Maze prison small photographs of some escapers along with little notes about who they were and what their contributions had been.
  The note on one escaper referred to his having been
  "at the forefront of the peace process".
  Who was that? Mr. Bobby Storey. Since the agreement, Mr. Bobby Storey may have been at the forefront of some things. but they certainly were not the peace process. [Interruption.] I can hear some comments being made about some of the achievements to Mr. Storey's credit over the past few years.
  The glorification of that gentleman in that newspaper illustrates precisely what the hon. Member for Newry and Armagh was saying. The attitude among some politicians and members of the media has made achieving completion of the peace process more difficult. The whole process is predicated on giving to those involved in violence in the past the opportunity to move towards peaceful democratic politics. That process is impeded or delayed while some people tolerate, or even encourage, the glorification of paramilitary activities and paramilitarism. Any commentator, politician, newspaper or television programme that engages in that behaviour is helping to undermine the process in which we have all been engaged.
  We will broadly endorse the Bill, but it should not, in many respects, be before us at all. If successive Secretaries of State had done their job properly over the past four or five years and if the Government had done their job and kept their pledges, it would not be necessary for us examine such legislation. In that respect, there is much merit in what the hon. Member for Grantham and Stamford (Mr. Davies) said.
  My colleagues and I started to argue in the spring and summer last year for the creation of some sort of arrangement to monitor ceasefires, simply because successive Secretaries of State had failed to do so. After the agreement, we had the unedifying spectacle of continuing paramilitary activity and of Secretaries of State failing to identify it as such and brushing it under

  937
  the carpet—one Secretary of State used the phrase "internal housekeeping" about murder. If it had not been for that approach, we would not have had some of the difficulties that have arisen in the past four or five years and it would not have been necessary for us to consider this measure.
  One of the objects of this exercise—it is sad that this has to be the case—is to make it difficult for Ministers to turn a blind eye. Those people who have taken on responsibility in the independent monitoring commission should clearly understand that. Their job is not to support the Government; by scrutinising paramilitary activity and reporting on it clearly and accurately, their job is to ensure that the Government do not fail to carry out their functions in these matters.
  The hon. Member for Newry and Armagh regretted the fact that instead of doing the job ourselves we are once again turning to someone outside, and I sympathise entirely with him. When the suggestion was made last summer, ensuring that this scrutiny was done properly was in the forefront of my mind—getting the right people to ensure that the Secretary of State did not dodge the column. Indeed, hon. Members may be interested to know that one of the first suggestions that I made—if not the very first—when we were thinking of a single ceasefire monitor was the distinguished Spanish judge Baltasar Garzon, whose achievements in a wide range of fields are extremely well known. Indeed, his achievements with regard to ETA are significant, as are those in outing the dirty war committed by the socialist Government of Spain.
  David Burnside: One of the great contributions of that Spanish gentleman resulted in the proscription of Batasuna—the front organisation of ETA, which I do not believe will be debated later this evening.
  Mr. Trimble: If my hon. Friend looks at the dates, he will notice that that happened after I had identified Baltasar Garzon as a first-class person for this job, so I am not surprised at what he describes.
  In an intervention, I referred to the fact that as a result of the representations of my party and others, we made some progress in persuading the Government of the desirability of moving down this road—establishing some oversight of ceasefires. A statement was made to the House on 25 July last year. Unfortunately, that statement was not emphatic enough in its commitment and it did not give any sense that there would be a radical change in the Government's approach. That was a great disappointment to us.
  The day after the statement, a colleague contacted the Government to say that as a result of the way the issue had been fumbled in the House, we could expect a violent summer and a political crisis in the autumn, which is precisely what happened. As hon. Members will remember, last summer was certainly the worst for violence and public disorder that we have had in the Belfast region since long before the ceasefires. That was no accident, and it could largely be attributed to the Government sending the wrong signals last summer.
  The crisis came in the autumn, with what we call Stormontgate, although it was slightly different from what I had anticipated. Stormontgate was in fact part of the same operation that led to the Castlereagh raid.
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  There were two manifestations, but both arose from a widespread intelligence gathering operation conducted by the mainstream IRA. To ensure that I do not prejudice future legal proceedings, I shall not mention the person in the IRA who was responsible for directing both Castlereagh and Stormontgate— [Interruption.] We should not have sedentary interruptions on that point.
  As a result of the crisis, we had suspension. If, in June or July last year, the Government had taken up the suggestions that I and other parties made in the spring and early summer and put in place some form of ceasefire monitor or sanctions, we might not have had suspension in 2002. These provisions come a long time after the event, to try to repair the damage done by the Government due to their mistakes in managing the process.
  Since suspension, questions obviously arise about the circumstances in which there could be a return to devolution and to the Assembly and the Executive. The criteria have been spelt out by our party, embodied in a resolution of the Ulster Unionist council of September 2002. They were reflected in language used by the Prime Minister in his speech at the Belfast harbour office in October last year and, as was pointed out earlier, elements of them were reflected in comments about the ending of paramilitary activity made by the Minister of State to a Standing Committee last Tuesday.
  The ending of paramilitary activity has repeatedly been defined. Hon. Members should bear it in mind that the time scale, too, has been defined. The relevant paragraph—paragraph 13—of the joint declaration refers to the "immediate" ending of paramilitary activity. The time scale embodied in the word "immediate" is fairly clear.
  Decommissioning is also required; it has not been forgotten. Again, careful perusal of the documentation makes that clear. Actions are needed that effectively carry us towards completion. It must be clear that the process is moving to a conclusion, according to the definitions that have been offered.
  It is necessary not only for paramilitary activity to end but for a clear indication as to the future status, role and structure of the organisation currently referred to as the Irish Republican Army. We need to know that the cessation of paramilitary activity and decommissioning are more than here-and-now events. We need to know what is intended and what is likely to happen in the future.
  Those things have not yet happened, although we know that considerable efforts were made in March and April to obtain adequate responses on those matters and that the republican movement failed to make adequate responses. Hopes have been expressed by several hon. Members that we can make progress, that we can get the Assembly back, reform the Executive and hold the elections that would be necessary for that. However, to do so, the underlying problems of paramilitary activity must be resolved.
  A mere glance at the calendar shows us that, if we are to move to elections in the autumn, it will be necessary for the republican movement to take those steps during the next few weeks. I am not in a position to define how much time there is, but it is important to note that time is limited and that action must occur quickly. We cannot

  939
  have the sort of spun-out, long-delayed process that we have had in the past. Things need to move very quickly indeed. I hope that they do, because to go through another winter with the political process in uncertainty and with the institutions continuing to be suspended would be deeply damaging.
  Mr. John Taylor: Is the right hon. Gentleman acquainted with the words that the Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office, the right hon. Member for Liverpool, Wavertree (Jane Kennedy) uttered in Committee on 9 September, when she provided a litany of the steps to be taken by republican terrorists before an election can be considered?
  Mr. Trimble: Indeed, I am aware of those steps, and the right hon. Lady gave a full and detailed description of what is involved in relation to the ending of paramilitary activity in her contribution in Committee last week. The hon. Gentleman will recall that, in addition, I referred to the need for decisive action to be taken in relation to decommissioning and for clear indications about future conduct because action in the here and now is, of course, extremely valuable, but we also need to find out where things will rest in the future.
  I was referring to the damaging effect if the uncertainty is prolonged into the winter and the spring. A simple point underlies all this, and it was also touched on by the hon. Member for Grantham and Stamford. Suspension punishes everyone for the misdeeds of a few. Suspension took the Northern Ireland Assembly and all its Members out of operation because paramilitaries linked to a few had been engaged in unacceptable activity. It is in itself unacceptable that all the institutions should be suspended, consequently depriving Northern Ireland's electorate of the opportunity of democratic representation in the Assembly, because a handful of people have behaved badly.
  It may be that the Government, for whatever reason, were not prepared to take the necessary action in October. It may be that the Bill will give them the power to take that action in the future, but the legislation will bite only after the resumption of the Assembly. At present, the Assembly is suspended and the offices are vacated, and the penalties in the Bill will have no effect this side of resumption. Of course, without progress from paramilitaries, do we get resumption? So the legislation will have no impact until we are the other side of the resumption of the Assembly, the re-formation of the Executive and, of course, the elections, which should have taken place. There is a significant question that the Government need to address: what happens if we do not see sufficient acts of completion from republicans? We cannot be expected to remain excluded indefinitely from the Assembly and the Executive because of the fault of others? If the Government find that they have been unable to make progress come 15 November, the Government—the Secretary of State, the Prime Minister or whoever—will have to come to the Dispatch Box and give hon. Members and, through us, the people of Northern Ireland, a clear explanation of what the future holds, rather than simply relying on hope and saying, "Well, we'll keep on trying", even after 13
  940
  months of trying time and again. If that is what the Secretary of State says, the general assumption will be that we are going back into deep cold storage and direct rule for years, perhaps decades. There is a danger of drift, and the Government must know that they ought not to allow that drift to occur and that, during the next few months, they will have to find answers to the questions that I have put.
  This legislation is essentially intended for a post-devolution situation, and it is needed because of the lack of confidence that exists. Let us assume that we had a statement from P. O'Neill announcing the disbandment of the IRA, for which many Unionists have called. If such a statement were made, how would we know whether it had happened? The IRA is a secret army—an underground organisation. There are some indications in terms of activities, but how can we tell whether an underground army has disbanded? A huge element of trust is involved in that, and in view of what has happened over the last several years, that trust is in short supply. The need is for the monitoring commission not just to monitor activity but to attribute responsibility, for it to give the people of Northern Ireland a guarantee that, if an organisation says that it has disbanded, that it has ceased activity and that there will not be any activity in the future, someone independent of the Northern Ireland Office or the Secretary of State will blow the whistle if it turns out that that claimed disbandment did not occur and that a secret element within the private army continues to exist and be active. That is why it is important.
  The reserve power for the Secretary of State to act is also important not just because in the practical circumstances of the last five years an exclusion motion was never carried in the Assembly, but to provide a reassurance to the people of Northern Ireland if, as a consequence of an election, it appears that an exclusion motion might never be carried in the future in the Assembly under the existing rules. The reserve power is therefore important for the future, and I will return in a moment to the question of the reserve power for the Secretary of State as currently defined.
  Nothing in this world is without difficulty or free from problems. It has been suggested that there are some fundamental problems with this legislation, particularly with regard to preserving sovereignty. At the strict legal level, there is no problem with sovereignty, because the agreement to create the monitoring arrangement is very clear. In its last couple of sentences, it talks about what might happen in the event of continuing paramilitary activity, and includes the phrases,
  "it would be a matter for the British Government … to resolve the matter … The British Government would envisage amending the Northern Ireland Act … to enable a variety of responses".
  Of course, this legislation amends that Act and confers the power to act on the British Government and the British Government alone. In strict legal terms, therefore, there is no breach of sovereignty on this issue at all.
  There are two areas, however, about which people might have concerns. One is with regard to the ground rules that we developed for the inter-party talks. In developing those ground rules, there was one important issue on which I and my colleagues were careful to insist: that while the inter-party talks included the British Government and the Irish Government, as well as the

  941
  political parties in Northern Ireland, strand 1 of those talks should be between the political parties in Northern Ireland and the British Government alone, and that the Irish Government should have no participation in strand 1. As originally drafted, the paper that appeared at the beginning of May appeared to breach that. I am glad that the international agreement, the draft of which has been published, makes it clear that the strand 1 issue has been resolved. Some people have queried whether that is so, and I have referred to article 6 of that draft agreement, which refers in (a) to whether people are committed to
  "non-violence and exclusively peaceful and democratic means"
  and in (b) to whether they have
  "failed to observe any other terms of the pledge of office",
  which relates to the internal affairs of the Northern Ireland Assembly. The provision that has been made in the draft agreement to preserve the strand 1 issue relates to (b) but not to (a). It has therefore been suggested that the sovereignty issue has not been resolved with regard to (a). To those who make that point, I say that what we have in this agreement is precisely what we had during the inter-party talks. The details of the operation of the Assembly are a strand 1 issue, but the question of someone's fundamental commitment to the process and to peace and exclusively peaceful and democratic means has regard to the talks as a whole.
  The distinction can be illustrated by remembering what happened during the talks. During the talks, a number of violent incidents took place that were attributed to paramilitaries who were related to parties that were engaged in the process. Most of the talks took place in Belfast, but it will be recalled that there were two weeks out—one in London and one in Dublin. By coincidence, when we got to London, the entire week was taken up with the question of whether the Ulster Democratic party—which had links with the Ulster Defence Association, a paramilitary organisation—should be excluded from the talks because of violence committed by the UDA. When we got to Dublin, the whole time was taken up with the question of whether Sinn Fein should be excluded from the talks because of violent acts committed by the IRA.
  How were those issues conducted and resolved? In both cases, exclusion occurred but the decision was taken jointly by the British and Irish Governments in exactly the manner to which article 6(1)(a) relates. The position in the agreement is precisely what happened during the talks. When we were in Lancaster house or Dublin castle and we were urging the Governments to exclude both the Ulster Democratic party and Sinn Fein, it was never suggested that there was any great breach of sovereignty there or that any fundamental principle was being violated. Those who are concerned about the matter should consider it in that context and see that it is entirely in accordance with the precedents established in the talks.
  I have dealt with what is called the strand 1 issue, but there is another aspect of sovereignty that we must consider. I have referred to the reserve power for the Secretary of State; it is crucial that there is that reserve power. However, the hon. Member for Grantham and Stamford was right to say that the Bill, as published, fettered that power unduly because the power would arise only when there was first a determination or report
  942
  by the monitoring commission with a recommendation. If there were no report or recommendation, there would be no power for the Secretary of State. I agree entirely with the hon. Gentleman that that was too great a fetter on the Secretary of State's power and that a power conditioned in that way would not reassure the public.
  I hope that the independent monitoring commission will work. We do not know what the future holds and we do not know exactly how the IMC will operate. The hon. Member for Thurrock (Andrew Mackinlay) asked about the IMC's rules of procedure, its quorum and whether its decisions would be based on unanimity or a majority. We do not know the answers to those questions, and we do not know the pressures that may be brought to bear on the individuals concerned. I am generally content with the individuals concerned but we are moving into uncharted territory. It would be wrong to assume that everything will be all right and that we do not need to make sensible provision for unforeseen circumstances.
  Because it is wise to make provision for unforeseen circumstances and for emergencies that might not occur, it is right for the Secretary of State to have a reserve power that he can actually use. Not making provision for such a power is not something that Governments usually do when they draft legislation. When drafting legislation, efforts are usually made to try to provide for contingencies. Friedman has referred to the law of unintended consequences and unanticipated events, and it is better to have a reserve provision that might at least cope with them than to proceed on the assumption that everything will be all right and that there will be no problems. Given the history of Northern Ireland over the past few years, it is wrong to proceed as though there will never be problems.
  As originally drafted, the Bill was seriously defective. That was why my colleagues in another place tabled amendments, which have been tabled again for consideration today. If the amendments had been passed, they would have resolved the problem entirely. At one stage, we thought that they recommended themselves to the Liberal Democrats but when it came to the bit, they unfortunately went off on a venture of their own and drafted an amendment without thinking the matter through carefully. Their amendment was an endeavour to provide a reserve power but it was seriously defective. I endorse the comments made by the hon. Member for Grantham and Stamford about Lord Glentoran's work in the other place because he improved the Liberal Democrat amendment significantly, although it remains defective.
  Lembit Öpik: Given that that is the right hon. Gentleman's view, it is a matter of regret that, despite my efforts to consult him, he did not try to respond in a like kind. It might have been possible for us to negotiate but his silence indicated that that would not happen.
  Mr. Trimble: I am puzzled by the hon. Gentleman's comments because I had several meetings with Liberal Democrats last week and a conversation with him on these Benches. Subsequently, on Friday, I had a conversation with his party leader, so I am not sure to what he refers. I responded clearly about our position up until Friday night. I do not wish to inquire about the internal affairs of his party because I know that a party's

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  internal activities are sometimes difficult to fathom. However, my limited acquaintance with the Liberal Democrats in the House of Lords has told me that, whatever the difficulties in my party might be, there are huge difficulties elsewhere that are comparable, if not greater. Perhaps we should draw a discreet veil over such matters.
  Although Lord Glentoran improved the Liberal Democrat amendment that appears as clause 6, it is still defective and in need of improvement. I have tabled a few amendments, several of which are technical. Indeed, one would insert a safeguard on the Secretary of State's power so that he could exercise it only if he were satisfied that people were not committed to exclusively peaceful and democratic means—I was rather surprised that the Liberal Democrats omitted such a measure. They also omitted another measure that is fairly obvious if one reads comparable provisions, so I have tabled amendments to make the clause more effective.
  Of course, I would prefer it if the group of amendments that we have tabled that starts with amendment No. 2 were accepted. I refer to those amendments because I have looked at the clock and I am not confident that we shall have the opportunity to debate them. I put on record the fact that, although the Liberal Democrat amendment goes some way toward solving the problem, we would much prefer the group of amendments linked to amendment No. 2.
  May I also draw attention to new clause 5? It is extremely important because it embodies a significant aspect of the agreement that is, regrettably, not
  replicated in the Bill. I quoted previously part of a sentence that appears toward the end of the agreement on the establishment of the monitoring body. It says:
  "it would be a matter for the British Government… to resolve the matter in a manner consistent with the report of the Independent Monitoring Body."
  Rev. Ian Paisley: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Is it in order for the right hon. Gentleman to make a speech about those amendments on Second Reading?
  Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Alan Haselhurst): Let me say to the House that the matter is generally one of proportionality. Obviously there can be reference to possible amendments, but I would not expect any hon. Member to go into too much detail. I was listening carefully to what the right hon. Member for Upper Bann (Mr. Trimble) was saying. I might also offer the view to the House that the progress that we make and whether we shall be able to have a certain number of hours in Committee is up to hon. Members. I appeal to hon. Members to determine for themselves how they wish the time to be shared.
  Mr. Trimble: Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker. My intention was simply to emphasise how important that part of the agreement was to us. I hope very much that we get the chance to have a detailed debate on that and that the Government get the opportunity to accept that new clause. That would go a long way to building confidence. As I said at the outset, part of the reason for
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  this is because of the way in which the Government as a whole have handled these issues and their failure to act at particular times. It is necessary for that reason.
  I am sure that the hon. Member for North Antrim (Rev. Ian Paisley) will forgive me if I comment just for a few minutes on an issue that has been raised by amendments that his party has tabled. There is some merit in the points that he has raised. Hon. Members have referred to the disjunction—the inequality—between failure to be committed to exclusively peaceful and democratic means, which is fundamental to the process, and alleged breaches of other aspects of the pledge of office, which operates on an entirely different plane. It may be thought invidious that those two are linked together and that is a view with which I have much sympathy.
  I will not go into detail or mention names, if only to protect the guilty, but when the issue was first raised at a discussion involving a number of parties, it was suggested that rather than have it look as though we were focusing all our attention in terms of sanctions purely on one particular party, we should have provisions that meant that other parties, not just Sinn Fein, might potentially be in breach. "Why just point the finger at that party? The finger could be pointed at any one of us," was the phrase that was used. I remember in that discussion saying that, when that particular person volunteered for punishment, he was certainly not speaking for me, but, unfortunately, the suggestion was made, the idea was out and other people ran with it. It is not an idea that I have thought appropriate in this context. Consequently, if we reach those DUP amendments, I will feel a lot of sympathy for them, but that depends on circumstances.
  It is desirable that a variety of penalties are provided for. One reason why the Government were reluctant to act on continuing paramilitary activity was that the only sanction that existed was the nuclear option of exclusion—there was a reluctance, sometimes understandable, to use that nuclear option. With other penalties, if the infringements are not that serious or not thought to justify the nuclear option, at least there is a way in which the Assembly or the Government, if that is the case, can formally indicate their displeasure and dissatisfaction, and that is extremely useful.
  I will not say much about the membership of the commission. Some of the gentlemen are not directly known to me but, from what I do know, the membership has a good balance. We have on the commission someone who, as part of the Metropolitan police, specifically dealt with anti-terrorist activity; someone who, as secretary general, the equivalent of permanent secretary, at the Irish Department of Justice has clear familiarity with criminal law and legal procedures; and someone who, as deputy director of the CIA, is accustomed to handling intelligence matters.
  We have three specialists with practical information and that is balanced by someone from Northern Ireland, who will be able to inform the views of those specialists, to tell them how things are perceived in Northern Ireland and to reflect the views of people in Northern Ireland. He may, if it is necessary, be able to act as a whistleblower to the people of Northern Ireland if the specialists for some reason fail to deal with the issues seriously enough.

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  I make one small point with regard to the procedures. It is unfortunate that the procedures in the intergovernmental agreement make reference to the implementation group. There is no implementation group in the Belfast agreement. It is a novel concept that has come forward since. It has tended to undermine some basic concepts in the agreement. When the idea was first proposed, it seemed to have some utility, but the way in which it has developed lately is not advisable. It is unfortunate that it has been given a central role, when its structure is not properly representative. I urge the Secretary of State to reflect on it and things that have been spun off it that are even less representative and capable of developing things that should be done by political parties in Northern Ireland. It is unfortunate that that novel concept, which was originally devised to give comfort to certain parties, is now taking on an unwanted life of its own. It may be dangerous, as it is undermining some of the basic concepts in the agreement.
  That brings me to my final point which, I hope, will commend itself to other Members on these Benches. An important aspect of the agreement is the undertaking that the Prime Minister gave on 10 April. I do not have the text before me, but he said that, if the procedures in the agreement on excluding from office persons who are not committed to exclusively peaceful and democratic means proved ineffective, he would support changes to the agreement. Those were the general terms of his undertaking, and my colleagues and I gave them considerable weight in our decision to proceed. To a certain extent, the Northern Ireland Act 2000—the suspension Act—put that undertaking into effect, but did not do so directly. It dealt with the issue indirectly and, for the reasons mentioned earlier, unsatisfactorily.
  Now, however, the Government, five years late, are fulfilling their pledge—I hope that that is what is happening. But the way in which they originally drafted the legislation was halting and hesitant. If they want the process to prosper, they need to fulfil their pledge wholeheartedly in a way that builds confidence. I hope that they do so and that we get the chance to deal with the detailed amendments. I hope that the Government will respond to them positively, although that hope has not always been met in the past. I hope that they will deal with these matters on their merits, rather than simply arithmetically and that, as a result of all of this, we can make progress in Northern Ireland.
  6.2 pm
  Mr. Hugo Swire: I should like to start my limited contribution by echoing the sentiments of many on the Opposition Benches about the programming of the Bill. It is extraordinary that the Government should introduce legislation with a guillotine timetable, which will necessarily result in our having no time for any scrutiny or considered reflection. The Government would perhaps be more credible if they were as swift and determined to condemn and penalise parties and individuals who repeatedly violate the terms and spirit of the Belfast agreement as they are in trying to get this Bill through the House in just one day.
  I suspect that, in all fairness, the Secretary of State is under considerable pressure from the Irish Government as well as the Prime Minister. We are all aware of the logjam of Government Bills in the other place. The
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  Secretary of State no doubt wishes to get the Bill through the House to concentrate on the November election for a restored Assembly. Crucially, the Government believe that the creation of the monitoring commission will go a long way towards allaying the fears of the Unionist community, which has become increasingly disillusioned with the Government's repeated concessions to Sinn Fein-IRA. To many, that is exactly how recent history post the Belfast agreement appears.
  The Secretary of State referred this afternoon to an absence of satisfactory commitments to end paramilitary activity. The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office, the right hon. Member for Liverpool, Wavertree (Jane Kennedy)—I was in the Standing Committee last week—recently reiterated that acts of completion were needed before the Assembly elections are held. The great majority in all parts of the House agree with both statements. However, many feel that the carrot and stick have not been applied equally in enforcing the Belfast agreement. Many perceive the concessions made at Weston Park in 2001 and the concessions on the dismantling of watchtowers made at Hillsborough in March, with no movement by republicans in return, to be part of a continuing and depressing pattern.
  Let us not forget that decommissioning was meant to have been completed by May 2000. Yet here we are three years later—three years during which we have witnessed Colombia, Florida, Castlereagh and Stormontgate. In a written answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point (Bob Spink) on 13 April this year, the Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office, the right hon. Member for Liverpool, Wavertree confirmed that there had been three acts of decommissioning carried out by paramilitary organisations—one by the Loyalist Volunteer Force and two by the Provisional IRA.
  On 27 April Gerry Adams stated that the IRA was willing to decommission all its arms and ensure that there was complete and final closure to the conflict. However, his careful phraseology drew the proper response from the Prime Minister that he was being extremely ambiguous on the future of paramilitary organisations. That ambiguity remains.
  I fully support the principle of excluding any party or parties in breach of their responsibilities. It is worth noting that, despite what the Liberal Democrat spokesman said, my hon. Friend the Member for Grantham and Stamford (Mr. Davies) initiated the proposal last July. Had he been listened to at that time, we would probably never have had to dissolve the Assembly, and all that ensued thereafter could have been avoided. As a result of the Government's decision at that time, all parties suffered equally, as did the peace process itself.
  I support the establishment of the monitoring commission. When it was first suggested, it met with strong resistance, not least from the Secretary of State's predecessor the right hon. Member for Hamilton, North and Bellshill (Dr. Reid), but Downing street waded in, and as we now know, the matter once again gained prominence at Hillsborough on 3 and 4 March this year. The terms of reference for the commission are clear. Important points such as strand 1 reserved matters, which relate purely to the two British members, are useful and important.

  947
  Other equally important points are less clear, as has been pointed out by Baroness Park in the other place. Where will the commission get its information from? What powers will it have to obtain information from the British and Irish security services? What will its relationship be with the General Officer Commanding Northern Ireland and with the Garda Siochana? How much will it all cost? Where will it be based and how will it be staffed? Will it have access to the ongoing work of the Criminal Assets Bureau and the Organised Crime Task Force? As we discussed this afternoon, will it be able to investigate past and current alleged violations of the agreement?
  The only body with which we can compare the new body is the Independent International Commission on Decommissioning under General de Chastelain, but what has that body achieved? That commission operates in such secrecy that it is difficult to know whether it has achieved anything of significance. We are asked to take too much on trust, and stonewalled when we ask what terms such as "significant" and "verifiable" mean. If the monitoring commission is to have any credibility, it must operate in a more open manner. We must be able to see that progress is being made, that intimidation is stopping, that exiles are being allowed to return and live in peace, and that paramilitaries have ceased both fundraising and stockpiling arms.
  The Government themselves must now take more responsibility for their actions. They cannot continue to set up commissions and abrogate decision making to them. That is why the official Opposition believe that the Secretary of State himself must have the power and ability to exercise his judgment and prerogative to make an exclusion with or without a recommendation from the commission. Anything else would tie his hands and represent an abdication of his responsibility as Secretary of State.
  I concede that Northern Ireland is mercifully a safer place today than before the Belfast agreement, but abuses continue daily, adversely affecting the lives of thousands of wholly innocent people. If we read the papers any day, we will see that that is the case. Only yesterday, The Irish Times contained reports about intimidation of members of the police commission and about a death threat to a Catholic priest made by a so-called loyalist paramilitary group. There was also a report about the dinner that is to be held in Donegal on Friday to commemorate Maze escapees, which the right hon. Member for Upper Bann (Mr. Trimble) mentioned. I earnestly hope that, as we speak, the Chief Constable is in talks with his opposite number in the Garda to ensure that any on-the-runs who turn up are arrested.
  That is everyday news in a Northern Ireland that is still suffering abuse at the hands of a limited number of people with disruptive agendas of their own. Like my party, I shall always support any measure to combat that continuing menace. If a reformed Assembly is the goal of this Government, it must not be achieved at the cost of principle. The Belfast agreement committed all participants to the total disarmament of all paramilitary organisations. Both the Independent International Commission on Decommissioning and the new monitoring commission have their part to play in
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  enforcing the agreement. Ultimately, however, it is the Secretary of State who must take responsibility for ensuring that anyone violating the Belfast agreement will be excluded from the democratic process in Northern Ireland.
  6.12 pm
  Mr. Peter Robinson: Perhaps you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, will give me latitude by allowing me to put on record at the commencement of my speech my condolences and those of my colleagues to the hon. Member for South Down (Mr. McGrady). I trust that his colleague can pass those condolences on. His wife died this week and I think that anybody who has been with him and his wife will know that theirs was a very warm and loving relationship. Indeed, it was a lifelong relationship, which makes the cloud all the darker for him.
  Many in Northern Ireland, or at least those who have studied the Bill, will consider it an odious, unnecessary and loathsome measure that demonstrates two key Government failures. It also attempts to achieve the impossible and prop up the failed agreement. The first Government failure is their admission that, until this moment, they have been unwilling to act on their own behalf or take the necessary powers enabling them to act in order to do their duty by expelling those who have corrupted the political process in Northern Ireland through their involvement in ongoing terrorism. In introducing the Bill, the Government want to share their inertia with others.
  The second Government failure that the Bill demonstrates is that, instead of dealing with those who wish to be at the same time Ministers and members of the army council of the IRA by isolating them and excluding them from the Executive, they seek to link and equate those terrorists with democrats who refuse to partner them in government. I suspect that, in another more enlightened age in society, those who refused to get into bed with the representatives of unrepentant and active terrorism would be applauded and supported by their Government—but not here, and certainly not by this Government. Indeed, the Bill even offers the same range and level of penalties against democrats as against terrorists.
  Let me deal first with the origins of the Bill. Reference has been made to the Belfast agreement, which referred to how the Assembly might deal with those who were in breach of the requirement for using exclusively peaceful and democratic means. The paragraph in question appears under that dealing with executive authority and says:
  "An individual may be removed from office following a decision of the Assembly taken on a cross-community basis, if he or she loses the confidence of the Assembly, voting on a cross-community basis, for failure to meet his or her responsibilities including, inter alia, those set out in the Pledge of Office."
  On a first reading of that section of the Belfast agreement, it was clear that it would never work. From the moment we read the agreement, we warned the people of Northern Ireland not only that it would not work, but that it was intended not to do so. It was a device to create a pretence that tough action would be taken against terrorism, yet the ability to take such action was not allowed for in the agreement or subsequent provisions contained in the Northern Ireland Act 1998.

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  Indeed, the 1998 Act contained an additional provision ensuring that, if the Secretary of State was of the opinion that people had been in breach of their anti-violence pledge, he could submit a resolution to that effect and require it to be debated in the Assembly. Interestingly, in the five years when IRA activity was ongoing and we saw the catalogue of incidents that has been mentioned, not once did the Secretary of State, past or present, make any move to ensure that Assembly met to consider breaches of that pledge.
  When we made it clear to the people of Northern Ireland that the exclusion provision would not be workable, we did so on the basis of never contemplating the possibility that the SDLP would be prepared to stand up and exclude its colleagues in Sinn Fein. It was clear to all but the most politically pubescent that a veto would be used by nationalists to ensure that IRA-Sinn Fein were not expelled, no matter what they did, and that no act, no matter how vile or wicked, would irritate the SDLP sufficiently to lead it to exclude IRA-Sinn Fein.
  The evidence is there for all to see. Gun running from Florida did not make the SDLP take action, and nor was the murder of more than 20 people by the Provisional IRA enough to do it. The Provisional IRA shot more than 200 people, but that still was not enough to prompt the SDLP to act. More than 350 paramilitary beatings took place, but even that did not cause it to take action. The exiling of the IRA's opponents took place, but no action was taken. Even training in Colombia, the raiding of Castlereagh and spying at Stormont did not provoke the SDLP sufficiently.
  I cannot imagine that even the most depraved, murderous act that it would have been possible for the Provisional IRA to commit would have provoked the SDLP to vote Sinn Fein-IRA out of office. What I consider even worse is the fact that nothing they did was enough to force the Government to take action against them. The Government knew that the IRA was in breach of the agreement, but could not bring themselves to say as much. So what did they do? They punished everyone. Rather than putting the provos out, they suspended the whole Assembly. Now what do they do? They produce this Bill, in which once again they attempt to pull others into the provos' net. They equate the behaviour of terrorists with the function of Government to decide the appropriate level of security for Northern Ireland. The Provisional IRA's security level is to be equated with what is described as normalization—or, in provospeak, British demilitarisation.
  In addition, those who will consider whether the IRA is fit for government will seek to punish the unblinkered democrats who have concluded that Sinn Fein-IRA are not fit to be a partner in government, and who therefore refuse to sit with them in the Executive. The Government have sunk to the level of accepting terrorists as bona fide politicians, so they intend to force others to stoop to their position or else be punished for having the principle and courage to resist.
  As for the scaled-down punishments in the Bill, does any Member actually believe that Sinn Fein will alter its position by one iota because it has been threatened with a fine? My colleagues and I passed on our ministerial salaries so that no hardship would fall to us. At no stage while I was a Minister would the threat of fines have influenced any action I took. These lesser punishments
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  are being placed in the Bill to serve as a pretence that action is being taken while terrorists remain in government.
  Let me say this to the Government. If I refuse to sit on an Executive with Sinn Fein and the House considers that to be an offence that should be punished, my colleagues and I will happily bear that punishment; but to suggest that if I refuse to sit on an Executive with Sinn Fein-IRA all the members of my Assembly party should have their salaries stopped for two years is absurd, and probably does not comply with the European convention on human rights.
  Why are these things in the Bill? Why do the Government now want to punish those of us who acted as Ministers but refused to partner Sinn Fein-IRA? Not once did a motion to exclude us come before the Assembly. Our modus operandi never caused a crisis in the Assembly. No Secretary of State ever suspended the Assembly because we had taken a particular position. No one claimed that we did not fulfil our responsibilities to the whole community effectively and fairly. Indeed, it was quite the opposite: three Secretaries of State, in the House and outside, have praised the work that we did. Let me set modesty aside, and remind the House that frequently—and almost universally—the press described my colleagues and me as the best Ministers in the Northern Ireland Executive. But now the Government want to punish us. Why?
  The answer is simple. Indeed, it was given by the right hon. Member for Upper Bann (Mr. Trimble). The Government cannot bring themselves to tackle Sinn Fein-IRA in isolation; they require balance. There is no Unionist terrorist capable of getting into Government who can be excluded from the Executive or fined, so a democrat who refuses to bow the knee will do just fine. As the right hon. Gentleman says, we are the next best thing. The Government have to find someone whom they can balance with Sinn Fein-IRA.
  Breaches in the pledge of office will be easy to identify, and it will be easy for any monitoring body to consider them and reach a conclusion. That does not apply to those who breach the non-violence pledge. They work in the dark, and make their decisions behind closed doors. Under the Bill, they will even be able to argue that the decision in question was made not by the leadership of the Provisional IRA, but by some maverick group. They will be able to jump through a plethora of loopholes—and I shall be interested to discover just how clear the monitoring body will be in tying down the Provisional IRA in relation to any particular incident.
  Why, after all, should the monitoring body differ from former Secretaries of State? As the hon. Member for Lagan Valley (Mr. Donaldson) will recall, one of them even went to court over a case. She then had to justify the decision she had made in relation to Sinn Fein. Her defence was that, in the round, she considered that it was adhering to its ceasefire. If, despite the list of offences committed by the Provisional IRA over the past five years, the Secretary of State is not prepared to take action—if he cannot pin down the IRA—what hope have any of us that the monitoring body will do so?
  The Bill is entirely unnecessary. We do not need a monitoring body to tell us when the IRA misbehaves. The Chief Constable is quite capable of informing the Secretary of State of that, and indeed has a duty to do

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  so. He even tells the world publicly when the IRA misbehaves, and I am sure that the General Officer Commanding and the intelligence services will give the Secretary of State whatever advice is needed in respect of Provisional IRA members who have stepped out of line.
  Rev. Martin Smyth: Did not a former Secretary of State always hide behind the fact that when a Chief Constable gave such advice she would say "Why do you not charge these people and bring them before the courts?"? She failed to recognise the difference between intelligence and evidence that would stand up in court.
  Mr. Robinson: There is indeed a distinction to be drawn between what might be of evidential quality and information that the intelligence services might have. There is another distinction, however: fulfilling the requirement in the legislation for the Government to present the Assembly with a resolution stating that the IRA has breached its ceasefire arrangements does not demand evidence of the kind required for a conviction in the court. A political rather than a legal decision is being required of the Secretary of State, and therefore an entirely different level of evidence can suffice.
  The Secretary of State, of course, was never prepared to make that decision. The monitoring body is unnecessary, because the advice has always been there. At all stages, it has been possible to advise the Secretary of State to act. What we need is not more advice, but action by the Government.
  The monitoring body is, in fact, a vehicle for delay and camouflage. Whenever an incident occurs, there is likely to be a cry for the monitoring body, and all the other cogs in the wheel, to take action against the IRA representatives in the Assembly and on the Executive. The process, however, could be dragged out for months, and indeed that is precisely what the Government want. They realise that, given enough time, they will be able to cobble together something that the right hon. Member for Upper Bann will swallow again, and back into Government those IRA representatives will go. All that is needed is delay.
  Mr. Trimble: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Robinson: I should be delighted.
  Mr. Trimble: I shall not refer to the pejorative language used by the hon. Gentleman, which I consider entirely inappropriate. Let me simply ask this question: if, in whatever circumstances, my party and I return to government, will he follow me?
  Mr. Robinson: Things will have changed so much that—as the right hon. Gentleman will see if he looks at his end of the Bench—the following will be done by him and not by us. As members of the largest political party in Northern Ireland, we will take steps to ensure that very different structures exist in Northern Ireland from the ones that the right hon. Gentleman yielded to. We
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  have seen the mess that his party, which has held the reins of Unionism for so many years, has made of it. The electorate are looking for the opportunity to make changes, but I have no doubt that behind the scenes, the right hon. Gentleman will urge some caution before the Secretary of State moves towards elections.
  On the composition of the IMC, to listen to the Secretary of State and some others, one would think that we had produced four Solomons whom the community will immediately recognise as people who inspire confidence, and whose judgment can be respected. As with so much that the Government do, they have discriminated in terms of this body's membership, just as they discriminated in terms of the membership of the other place, and even of the Equality Commission for Northern Ireland, which includes not one anti-agreement Unionist, even though such Unionists represent a third of the community.
  Someone asked earlier what urged the Government to start the legislation in the House of Lords. The answer is that they do not have to deal with the depth of argument from anti-agreement Unionists in the House of Lords because they have excluded them. Yet the patronage to the right hon. Member for Upper Bann ensures that a disproportionate share of the Lords has gone to his wing of the Ulster Unionist party.
  So we have a four-man commission, none of whom is an Ulster Unionist. Indeed, there is a fervent Irish nationalist on the panel. One can be absolutely certain that the permanent secretary from the Irish Republic will speak the language of his Government and, through them, of the Social Democratic and Labour party and Sinn Fein. I liked the language that the hon. Member for Newry and Armagh (Mr. Mallon) used earlier. He said that he was a sturdy, independent Ulsterman standing on his own two feet. Well, that is not the way I see it. We are talking about a party that has been propped up by the Dublin Government for more than a quarter of a century. Whenever its members did not get their own way, they dug in their heels until Dublin got them out of the mess that they were in. They have refused to stand on their own two feet and deal with Unionism; indeed, doing so on an eye-to-eye basis might have been much better for Northern Ireland than their always getting their parent in Dublin to argue their case for them.
  Two people from outside the United Kingdom have been inserted into this commission, and they will be part of the political decision-making process. Of course, the Government have gifted the Irish Republic's Government with a central role in the internal affairs of Northern Ireland. My colleagues and I are not fooled by the sleight of hand that places only two commissioners on the panel that considers Assembly matters. In addition to the rather evasive language used by the Secretary of State today when questioned on that issue, we have read what the Government spokesman in the other place had to say. As the Secretary of State is doubtless keen to have the reference, I can tell him that

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  the following quote is to be found at column 584 of the Official Report of the Lords. The Government spokesman said:
  "I should underline"—
  so this is an important point that he wants to emphasise—
  "that, as the Hillsborough text makes clear, we would of course consult the Irish Government, as co-guarantor of the Good Friday agreement, in considering the exercise of that power."—[Official Report, House of Lords, 12 September 2003; Vol. 652, c. 584.]
  So the Government spokesman emphasises that the Irish Government are going to be given a direct consultative role before any decision is announced.
  As reference was made to the text, I decided to consult it to see what it said. There are two relevant references, the first of which states:
  "Any motion put before the Assembly following the tabling of a report would be subject to decision on a cross-community basis. Where such a motion failed to attract cross-community support, or where the Implementation Group had failed to agree a course of action, it would be a matter for the British Government, in consultation with the Irish Government".
  So it is very clear: reference to consultation is in the text, just as the Lords spokesman indicated. However, the annexe to it goes even further. Paragraph 3 of the annexe states:
  "At the request of the Governments"—
  plural—
  "the Independent Monitoring Body may be asked to consider claims by any party in the Assembly that another party is in breach of requirements in the Declaration of Support or elsewhere in the Agreement."
  So according to the text, the matter is one for the two Governments.
  We were told in the other place that although we in this House may want to tinker as much as we like through amendments, we cannot make amendments because this is an international, binding agreement, entered into between the Government of the United Kingdom and the Government of the Irish Republic. If the hon. Member for Newry and Armagh were here at the moment, he would doubtless applaud the fact that the Government spokesman in the Lords said that.
  So it is clear that a direct role is given through the text of the joint declaration, and through the text dealing with the monitoring body at Hillsborough—a role confirmed by the Government spokesman in the Lords. The Secretary of State may attempt to side-step the issue by referring to formal consultation, but as everybody knows, the text of an international agreement is pretty formal. I suspect that the Secretary of State recognises that the Government of the Irish Republic have, as many others have been saying for several months, been given a right to interfere in Northern Ireland's internal affairs.
  Of course, if, after consideration, there are those who believe that Sinn Fein-IRA is continuing to promote and support terrorism, no monitoring body and no Secretary of State who offers a contrary opinion will be heeded. What kind of politician would defer their judgment on such matters to any commission, or to any other Government or party? Let me offer an example from the real world of politics, and it is probably not an absurd one. Let us say that the Provisional IRA kills
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  half a dozen people, and that the Unionists in the new Assembly say, "This is absolutely disgraceful! We cannot be expected to sit in government with people who, by night, are plotting to murder and carrying out these activities." It would not be unnatural for Unionists to take that position. So off they go to the IMC—or to whatever Government structure may exist after the legislation completes its passage—which says, "Well, yes, but that was a bit of a maverick act—it wasn't really sanctioned by the leadership. Therefore, we are not going to take any action against them." Does anybody really believe that in those circumstances, the trust that is essential to the Belfast agreement's structure would exist, and that Unionists would be able to continue in government? They would not. Certainly as far as the decision that I have to take is concerned, nobody else's judgment will be able to supersede mine. It would be a very foolish politician who simply accepted another person's judgment on this issue.
  For years, the Government have stretched themselves to prop up this failed agreement. It cannot be propped up by this commission: what is needed is a completely new structure.
  The Government can try to put Humpty Dumpty together again, but they will fail. Better by far that the Government exert themselves in holding an election, letting politicians get a new mandate and make a new start. They should start negotiations for a new agreement, seeking structures that can survive any election result and that IRA activity cannot collapse. They should get an agreement that Unionists as well as nationalists can endorse.
  Hon. Members will have detected that my colleagues and I intend to oppose the Bill. The previous exclusion mechanism has for years been the subject of public ridicule, and this one is no less likely to become the subject of public contempt.
  6.40 pm
  Rev. Martin Smyth: I follow the hon. Member for Belfast, East (Mr. Robinson) and in common with the hon. Member for Montgomeryshire (Lembit Öpik) I recognise the lack of trust in the current position—and that is putting it mildly. In fact, there is a degree of mounting cynicism in Northern Ireland, particularly among Unionists, about the way in which issues that are seen as a threat to the Belfast agreement—or, above all, to republican support—are dealt with. The cynicism has reached a point where people believe that it is highly unlikely that Sinn Fein would ever be excluded on its own, no matter what it did. There have been successive suspensions, putting everyone out of office, when only Sinn Fein has been shown not to be committed to exclusively peaceful and democratic means. The will has never been there to take the terrorists on and force them to leave a democratic Government.
  We should recall some of the issues of the past. I have to say that although the amendments to the Bill state that the Secretary of State "shall" rather than "may", I still have some misgivings, because that will not necessarily restore confidence. Many people will remember that previous Secretaries of State have been involved in the political machinations. No one living in the United Kingdom today should be unaware of the

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  lack of trust in the political system, as revealed by the disclosures over Iraq. We need to go back to recognition of thought processes. Reference has been made to those allegedly in the forefront of the peace agreement. No names were mentioned because other issues may be coming up.
  We must bear it in mind that, in the understanding of Her Majesty's Government, the IRA entered into a military ceasefire. In other words, as long as it was not shooting soldiers or police officers, it could do whatever it liked with civilians. When Mo Mowlam was Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, she ruled that the IRA had probably been behind murders, but that that did not constitute a breach of the ceasefire. Word games do not inspire confidence.
  Paragraph 4(b)(i) of the agreement between the UK and the Irish Governments states that the Commission shall assess
  "whether the leaderships of the such organisations are directing such incidents or seeking to prevent them".
  It has already been mentioned, and I underline it, that these are word games similar to those of the past. The get-out clauses and excuses are already being established.
  Terrorist organisations are made up of individuals who carry out acts. Dare I suggest that the Bill comes on the stage now as a further sop to the IRA demand to have the date for an election before it can take any forward steps on decommissioning? In other words, the British Government must take the initiative while the IRA holds on to its arms and continues to pose threats.
  David Burnside: Does my hon. Friend agree that the legislation will not have any impact or effect until after we get the date for the election? The second measure that will come before the House, perhaps in only a few weeks' time, will be the promises—they are outside the agreement between the Government and Provisional IRA—on on-the-runs.
  Rev. Martin Smyth: That would be what one might call an informed guess. I would not dispute at all that the nods and winks have already been given. Others as well as me believe that Sinn Fein and the IRA are inextricably linked, yet we still play the game that they are not. Is the Bill strong enough in specifying that acts of the IRA be linked to the removal of Sinn Fein from office?
  At least two hon. Members have referred to the celebratory events in Letterkenny. It was fascinating the other evening to hear one of the spin doctors for IRA-Sinn Fein justifying it. He said that it came at a time of high emotions when 10 hunger strikers were killed. As I understand it, the hunger strikers took their own lives; they were not killed. He was turning that into an emotional issue. He said that it was an emotional time for them when the then Prime Minister said that the prison was the best protected in the world and it was marvellous to be part of those who escaped from it. They were able to justify it, even though a prison officer died as a result of the breakout. According to British justice, a person is innocent until there is no reasonable doubt, but the judge in that case ruled that the prison
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  officer died of a heart attack rather than from the stabbing of escaping prisoners. We have to reflect on that.
  Can the Minister help us to understand the current state of readiness in the IRA? If the Chief Constable can confirm that certain people have been involved in acts and Monsignor Dennis Faul can claim that they were involved in the abduction and possible murder of a young man in South Armagh, can the Secretary of State or any other Minister tell us that that is false? Above all, are our own intelligence people not telling the Government that, despite the rumours that Gerry Adams is not in control of the situation and that the dissidents are acting separately, the fact is that he is very much in control and very much part of the command structure. They have reorganised dramatically and are better equipped than they were at the cessation of the spell of violence. It is important that the House has a proper assessment of what is going on.
  Reference has been made to democratic parties and I underline once again that I know only one member of the four-person commission personally. I accept that the others have had experience in different places. One member has had much experience with missing marks on extradition papers in the past, which meant that people were not extradited to face charges in British courts. The Justice Department in the south was certainly adept at turning down claims for extradition. I recognise that one member has been involved in anti-terrorism in this country, and I hope that he will use that expertise to penetrate the terrorists' webs. One member comes from the CIA, but at times its intelligence has not always been accurate and many of our American friends have not always been happy with its actions.
  I ask bluntly how we can expect the IMC to improve a situation that has not been dealt with in the past. It is time that the excuses for inaction were removed, and time for the Government to act. An old friend, Michael Armstrong, who was tragically killed in a car accident, used to speak about those within Northern Ireland who worked with an outside Government to undermine Northern Ireland's place as part of the United Kingdom. He used to compare them to the Sudeten Deutsch, and their existence has been confirmed in this House.
  It appears that this House has surrendered a degree of sovereignty in Northern Ireland, over and above the sovereignty that we have all surrendered within the European Union. Anyone who says that they do not have a say in strand 1 is perhaps protesting too much. Some say, in Shakespeare's term, that a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.
  We have had an interesting development in our prison services, although some of us feel that we have seen it all before. The phrase is now "separation, not segregation", but I have yet to discover the difference between the two. I understand the problem, but I also understand the problems that prison officers will face in seeking to implement that decision, which was recommended by an independent body.
  I ask the Government, in these serious times, to recognise the greater understanding of those of us who work on the ground. In the Roman Catholic community and in the Protestant community, many fear that we have created mafiosi who work together when that is

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  convenient and seek to dominate communities by force of terror. They do not deserve to be recognised as bona fide politicians. I have no difficulty in accepting that some members of Sinn Fein have not been involved in terrorism, but the organisation is led by people who are still leaders in the army council. As someone once said, between the Dail Eireann, Stormont and Westminster, at least half of the army council are elected Members. It is in that context that we have no good reason to adopt this course. We should ask the Prime Minister to implement fully the commitments given at Balmoral and other places and deal with the terrorism in our community.
  6.54 pm
  Mr. Nigel Dodds: I agree with the hon. Member for Belfast, South (Rev. Martin Smyth) that the Bill is unnecessary and avoids the main issue. It does not deal with the fundamental problem that currently exists in Northern Ireland in terms of the political process and the Belfast agreement. It was the avoidance of the fundamental problem that led to the cancellation of the elections.
  The fundamental problem with the Belfast agreement is that while its premise is that it has the support of both communities, Unionist and nationalist, and that that was the basis on which the Assembly was set up and operated, it is now clear—except to those who refuse to admit it or who base their views on opinion polls that they distort to try to get a different result—that the clear majority of Unionists no longer, if they ever did, support the Belfast agreement. A clear majority of nationalists may support it—and why not, because it delivers the nationalist agenda—but the vast majority of Unionists want a new agreement. They are against the Belfast agreement, but they are for an agreement to which they can sign up. As long as the Government and parties from Northern Ireland in this House ignore that reality, we will not deal with the fundamental issue or be able to move on to create political stability. It is to that end that my parliamentary colleagues and I are committed.
  It is vital that we have an election that will show once and for all exactly who represents whom in Northern Ireland. The Bill is supposed to pave the way for the elections, but it is clear from recent remarks by the Secretary of State, and from the Prime Minister of the Irish Republic, that they want an election only if it will produce a certain result. They want an election only if it will mean that an Executive can be formed that will include IRA-Sinn Fein. Interestingly, the Irish Prime Minister repudiated that position in the Irish general election. He made it clear that under no circumstances would his party, or other parties in the Irish Republic, contemplate IRA-Sinn Fein taking part in their Government. Yet the Irish Prime Minister demands that that should happen in Northern Ireland and that the election should not take place until such an outcome is guaranteed.
  The people of Northern Ireland should be given a free choice in free elections, but the Government want to deny people a voice. They deny the people a voice in a European referendum and in Northern Ireland. What are the Government afraid of? They should let the people speak on this and other issues.
  The Bill shows that it is not difficult to change the Belfast agreement, when that is desired. Those of us who share the majority view of the Unionist community in
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  Northern Ireland are frequently lectured that the Belfast agreement cannot be altered. We are told that it is the only show in town and there is no alternative. It must be preserved and upheld in all circumstances. However, the Bill makes it clear that the Belfast agreement is being changed—and it will happen again in a few weeks' time, with legislation on the on-the-run issue. No one should therefore argue that our position has no credibility. In fact, when the circumstances require it, the Government and the pro-agreement parties have no difficulty changing the agreement if they think that it will help their political positions or for the sake of expediency.
  Other hon. Members have mentioned the background to the Bill. The passage of time means that it is difficult to recall the events of October last year, and of the weeks and months leading up to them. People felt strongly about the activities of the IRA and what they had been exposed—
  It being Seven o'clock, the debate stood adjourned.
  Motion made, and Question put forthwith, pursuant to Standing Order No. 15 (Exempted business),
  That, at this day's sitting, proceedings on the Northern Ireland (Monitoring Commission etc.) Bill [Lords] (Allocation of Time) Motion and consideration of any Lords Messages that may be received may be proceeded with, though opposed, until any hour.—[Gillian Merron.]
  Question agreed to.
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Before resuming the Second Reading debate, I must advise the House that an amendment in lieu of the Lords amendment to the Local Government Bill, to which this House disagreed, has been received from the Lords. It will be considered at the conclusion of all proceedings on the Northern Ireland (Monitoring Commission etc.) Bill. Copies of the Lords amendment are available in the Vote Office.
  Question again proposed, That the Bill be now read a Second time.
  Mr. Dodds: It looks as though it will be a very long night indeed.
  I was casting my mind back to the events of last October. The Castlereagh break-in happened on St. Patrick's day 2002. The facts about Colombia were emerging, as were revelations about high-level IRA involvement in the Florida gun-running plan, which involved the importation of arms. The Stormontgate affair was also taking place. All those contributed to a strong feeling that the IRA could not be part of the Northern Ireland Government as long as it retained its capacity and eagerness to carry out such activities. The IRA caused riots and mayhem on the streets of Northern Ireland over that summer, and engaged in all sorts of other nefarious activities.
  The Prime Minister came to Northern Ireland and told us in a famous speech that a fork in the road had been reached. He said that the pressure was on the IRA to make up its mind. People waited to see what would happen.
  It was not long before a process of negotiation and discussion began with IRA-Sinn Fein and other political parties. We had been told that there would be no more inch-by-inch discussions, but just such discussions began in an attempt to resolve the problems. The talks at Hillsborough and elsewhere resulted in the

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  publication of the joint declaration and the attached documents dealing with on-the-runs and with the monitoring of paramilitary activity—the matter that is now before the House.
  The crisis that brought about the fall of the Assembly was clearly the responsibility of the IRA but has led to a package of measures that is a litany of concessions to IRA-Sinn Fein. It covers some of the IRA's most cherished demands—that on-the-runs should not be pursued, and that border security installations be dismantled, even though mainstream and dissident activity is continuing.
  Another demand concerned the future devolution of policing and justice powers. Such powers could have meant that Mr. Kelly—the Assembly Member representing the constituency that I have the honour to represent in this House—could become the Minister with responsibility for justice and policing. He said on television the other night that he was going to Letterkenny to participate in the jamboree celebrating the breakout by Maze escapees that resulted in the death of a prison officer. Mr. Kelly said that he was proud to have been part of that.
  The feeling in the Unionist community can be imagined. I know that some hon. Members in other parties take time to visit Northern Ireland and talk to people. They know what is going on, but many others will troop through the Lobby tonight to vote for this Bill who do not understand the situation at all. They do not take the time to listen to people, especially in my community, to find out the strength of feeling on these matters. If they did, they would understand the community's anger and frustration at a joint declaration that is no more than a list of concessions to IRA-Sinn Fein.
  IRA-Sinn Fein representatives have boasted about their participation in the Maze breakout. They have been involved in the intimidation of independent members of district policing partnerships. They voice mealy-mouthed apologies and explanations in respect of the disappeared, and—as the Chief Constable and others have noted—they are still involved in murder. How can we even contemplate a scenario that is intended to allow IRA-Sinn Fein back into government?
  The hon. Member for Newry and Armagh (Mr. Mallon) described how some republican movement representatives had been glorified. The right hon. Member for Upper Bann (Mr. Trimble) rightly chastised sections of the media for that. However, what could confer more glory on such people than to bring them into the Government of Northern Ireland, or to try to bring about conditions under which they would once again be inserted into the Government of part of the UK? People in Northern Ireland cannot understand how hon. Members can say in this House that they are sickened at the glorification of Sinn Fein-IRA when those same hon. Members have pandered to the IRA agenda, released all IRA prisoners and destroyed the RUC at the IRA's behest. Those people have worked with IRA-Sinn Fein in government. They have put their representatives into the Government of Northern Ireland, and now they want to put them back there yet again. The hypocrisy is simply breathtaking.
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  We are told that there is a need for action to be taken. I shall not rehearse the arguments about why the Government do not need this Bill if they want to act. The Government could have acted on many occasions in the past, but they refused to do so. The Social Democratic and Labour party could have taken action on many occasions in the past, but its members sat on their hands.
  I am sorry that the right hon. Member for Upper Bann is not in his place. He berated the Government for their failings, but how many times have Ulster Unionist Members tabled motions to exclude Sinn Fein-IRA for ceasefire breaches and for not being committed to exclusively peaceful and democratic means? The right hon. Gentleman has highlighted some of what has gone on, but he and his colleagues ran away from Stormont rather than vote against IRA-Sinn Fein.
  There is no need for the Bill. Action could have been taken, but was not. The Government still could act, but instead they have introduced this Bill. It will not work, and it is designed not to do so. Its procedures will be so cumbersome and lengthy that the Secretary of State's final decision on a complaint will take a very long time to produce. In that period, newspaper editorials and various pundits will urge people not to rock the boat. They will say that people are working together, and they will ask whether the price of excluding Sinn Fein is worth tearing down the edifice of the agreement.
  We need a means for the Government to act swiftly and efficiently as soon as a complaint is brought to light, but I fear that the IMC is being established for the purpose of delaying action and distracting attention whenever the republican movement is in clear breach of its obligations.
  I hope that the Minister of State, when she sums up, will deal with the past acts that have been mentioned—Colombia, Castlereagh, Stormontgate and so on. It would be useful to know whether the IMC will consider the outcome of those events, some of which have yet to be divulged by the relevant courts.
  Article 4(b)(i) of the agreement between the Governments deals with the functions of the IMC and is very significant. It says that, in dealing with breaches by paramilitaries of their obligations in relation to criminal activities and all sorts of terrorism, the IMC is to assess whether the leaderships of organisations are directing incidents or seeking to prevent them. That is a significant get-out clause for Sinn Fein-IRA. They will argue, as they have in the past, that they are not the IRA and cannot be held responsible for the actions of the IRA.
  When pressed, the IRA will make it clear that the actions in which it is alleged to have been involved and which may constitute a breach of its obligations were not authorised and were carried out by mavericks and local brigades. It will say that the actions were not authorised at high level and that it is working to try to stop those actions. It is written into the text of the agreement between the two Governments that the IMC has to have regard to that. That is a serious loophole and a get-out clause for Sinn Fein-IRA.
  Over the past few days, the Chief Constable has made it clear that not just dissidents but mainstream Provisional IRA members were involved in intimidation and threats against independent members of district

  961
  policing partnerships, and that is deplorable. Martin McGuinness came straight out to say, "That was not authorised and we are opposed to it." That is a classic example of what the IMC will face—an allegation made by the Chief Constable that clearly sets out the position versus a denial by Sinn Fein that it was involved in any way and a claim that it was trying to prevent it. We know what the outcome will be.
  I fear that article 13(2)(iii) of the draft agreement between the two Governments could also open a major loophole in the provisions designed to deal with IRA-Sinn Fein. The article states:
  "The Commission shall not do anything in carrying out its functions which might … have a prejudicial effect on any proceedings which have, or are likely to be, commenced in a court of law."
  One can well imagine that if, for example, a Castlereagh, Colombia, Florida or Stormontgate were to happen in future, any such incident would be likely to result, as those did, in legal proceedings. Are we to say that in such cases the commission "shall not do anything" that might have a "prejudicial effect"? That will seriously restrict the IMC in dealing with Sinn Fein-IRA, and that point must be clarified.
  Other Members have dealt with the equation of political breaches with breaches by paramilitaries, so I shall not dwell on that, except to note that a number of speakers have made it clear that it is neither desirable nor acceptable. I hope that the Government will consider our amendments and reflect on the fact that attempting equality, for the sake of balance, between those of us who take a principled political stance and those who carry out terrorism and murder and undertake criminal activity, by meting out the same sort of discipline, is neither fair nor democratic.
  When I intervened on the Secretary of State on clause 8, his answer was not clear. He did not seem to understand that clause 8 places restrictions that will make it harder for the Assembly to debate and vote on a motion of censure. Surely anything that restricts the right of the Assembly to deal with a vote of no confidence or of censure against a Minister or party in government is to be deplored. There is no logical reason for the clause being in the Bill, except to try to restrict opportunities for those of us who have tabled such motions in the past to highlight the glaring hypocrisy of Sinn Fein-IRA. The clause was not foreshadowed in the Belfast agreement or the joint declaration. I should be grateful for an explanation of where it has come from.
  Clause 1(1)(b) deals with the IMC's role in monitoring so-called normalisation, which means the dismantling of security in Northern Ireland in order to address Sinn Fein-IRA's political agenda. A detailed timetable is set out on three pages of the joint declaration, giving a detailed list of exactly how much the Government have to do in tearing down security along the border and at other installations throughout the Province, leaving many people defenceless on both sides of the community at a time when dissident and mainstream republicans are very active, and when loyalist groups are active too.
  It will be easy for the IMC to monitor that against the timetable, yet there is nothing on the paramilitary side but vagueness and aspirational talk. There is no detail and no timetable for the dismantling of the IRA. It will
  962
  all be done in a cloak and dagger way. There is no provision to force the international decommissioning body to be upfront and public about acts of decommissioning. We shall have a charade in which so-called acts of decommissioning happen but no one knows what they are because the IRA has asked General de Chastelain not to reveal the detail. How very considerate of the general to accept what the IRA says. Whereas the dismantling of security will be all too visible and people will see security towers torn down and demolished and their security taken from them, anything that the IRA does is to be done in secret. That is totally unacceptable.
  Other hon. Members have dealt with Dublin's involvement and the breach of sovereignty that the Bill constitutes, so I shall not go into detail on that.
  The right hon. Member for Upper Bann promised us that monitoring and sanctions would provide a guarantee and build confidence among the Unionist community. He said that they would provide an opportunity to call to account those who breached their obligations on the paramilitary side of things. It is clear that they will do none of those things. They will provide no confidence for the Unionist community and will simply be a mechanism allowing the re-forming of an Executive of which IRA-Sinn Fein will be part and parcel. We are told that there will be the means to get them out, but the many people for whom I and other Members speak believe that Sinn Fein-IRA should not be admitted to the Government of Northern Ireland in the first place. It is time to stop allowing those people in and then saying that we are putting them to the test or trying to get them out. Every time we do that, it gets harder and harder.
  Government should be for democrats. It is clear that the IRA still exists and is still wedded to the use of violence. Sinn Fein and the IRA are inextricably linked and there should be no question of allowing them back into the Government of Northern Ireland.
  7.19 pm
  Mr. Jeffrey M. Donaldson: Right hon. and hon. Members have touched on the background to the legislation and the reason why the Government have brought this Bill before the House. In numerous debates in the five years since the Belfast agreement, I have warned that the provisions that were being enacted by this House would be futile, would not work and would not succeed in moving the republican movement towards a commitment to exclusively peaceful means—that they would not be successful in dealing with the problems in what has become known as the peace process.
  I must issue the same warning this evening. I do not believe that this legislation will deal with or resolve the problems that face the political process in Northern Ireland. It is merely a cover for trying to cobble together another deal that will be flawed and inadequate and that will fail. The legislation will fail because it does not go to the heart of the problem that has confronted the process since 1994 and the first IRA ceasefire. That is how long we have been engaged in this process—almost 10 years.
  Some people argue that we are further forward. I have heard it said tonight that Northern Ireland is a safer place today than it was before the agreement. That is

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  true if one is a police officer. The Chief Constable of the Police Service of Northern Ireland is the first in recent memory to have completed his first year in office without having had to bury a member of that service—formerly, the Royal Ulster Constabulary—as a result of terrorist activity. As someone whose family has seen two members serving with the RUC murdered in what became known as the troubles, I welcome that. However, Northern Ireland today is not an entirely safe or peaceful society. For many people living in Northern Ireland, the peace process has not brought the peace and stability that we all want.
  Mr. Gregory Campbell: Does the hon. Gentleman agree that figures released by the Northern Ireland Office in the past few months show that, in the past five years, the number of shootings and the number of bombs and bombs defused have increased compared with the number in the five years before the agreement? While he rightly says that the number of deaths has decreased, other violence has increased.
  Mr. Donaldson: I thank the hon. Gentleman for his contribution, which was the next part of my speech so I will not repeat it, save to say that he illustrates well that we can play around with statistics but, for people in Northern Ireland, the violence, threats, intimidation and paramilitary terrorist activity continue to be a reality of life. I will not rest until every citizen in Northern Ireland is liberated from that fear and from the consequences of paramilitary activity and violence. Right hon. and hon. Members will join me in seeking to achieve those objectives. I fear that where we differ is on how we are to achieve that.
  We are here tonight because of a number of events, which other hon. Members have mentioned, including IRA gun running from Florida—importing new weapons when they were supposed to be getting rid of all of their weapons—and the involvement of three republican IRA members in training the FARC guerrilla organisation in Colombia in the use of technology that it has since used to devastating effect there. My hon. Friend the Member for Belfast, South (Rev. Martin Smyth) has just returned from Colombia. FARC guerrillas have been using mortar devices similar to those utilised, and indeed developed, by the Provisional IRA, that have resulted in the deaths of many innocent people in that country.
  Castlereagh was another such incident—perhaps the most serious breach of security in the past 30 years of conflict in Northern Ireland. We are still dealing with the consequences. Police officers have had to move home with their families because of it. Moving those families and the additional security measures required have cost the taxpayer millions of pounds. Then there was Stormontgate. Every week in my office, I deal with prison officers and their families who are struggling to get security measures implemented at their homes because their personal details were compromised when the IRA procured personnel information illegally from the Northern Ireland Prison Service. Hundreds of prison officers have been affected, again at a cost of millions of pounds to the taxpayer.
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  That money could have been much better spent in Northern Ireland on our hospitals and schools. Sinn Fein-IRA spokespersons lecture us on the need to invest more money on this, that and everything—new schools, hospitals, roads and housing—and yet the money that could have been spent on those projects is being spent to protect prison officers, police officers, soldiers, politicians and civil servants because of IRA activities. So, we are here tonight to deal with the consequences of those problems—dealing with the failures of the Belfast agreement.
  The hon. Member for Newry and Armagh (Mr. Mallon) made a significant contribution to the debate. There was much in what he said, but I shall focus on one aspect of his speech because it has serious consequences for the operation of the independent monitoring commission and the implementation of the legislation that we may agree tonight in this House. He said that if a motion were tabled in the Assembly to exclude from ministerial office representatives of Sinn Fein-IRA, cross-community support was not forthcoming for the motion and the Secretary of State acted to exclude those Ministers, it would precipitate the collapse of the political institution. That is what he clearly implied tonight—that his party would withdraw its support in those circumstances.
  We heard much from the hon. Gentleman about the activities of the republican movement. He spoke about that in laudable terms. Yet the reality is that we need this legislation because of the failure of the Social Democratic and Labour party to support any motion in the Assembly to exclude Sinn Fein, even though he accepts that its activities meant that it could no longer remain in office. Many on the Opposition Benches are astounded that he can make those comments and yet his party failed to support the exclusion of representatives of the republican movement in those circumstances.
  The legislation flows from the joint declaration. It contains many proposals, but it is the basis for a possible deal to enable elections to proceed and for the Assembly and Executive to be restored. Indeed, some hon. Members have mentioned this evening that a process is in train that will result in that deal coming to fruition in the next few weeks, provided that Sinn Fein-IRA delivers another gesture on decommissioning and perhaps a statement from the IRA army council. That will result in elections—perhaps, in November and the—possible restoration of the devolved institution.
  The proposals contained in the joint declaration and the legislation before the House are not adequate to deal with the problems in the peace process and the political process in Northern Ireland. The legislation deals with the role and remit of the monitoring commission and the sanctions that will be applied against parties and individual Members of the Assembly. The hon. Member for Belfast, North (Mr. Dodds) was right to highlight the distinction in the ways that normalisation issues are to be tackled, with timetables and clear benchmarks for the British Government—our Government—to implement their commitment to reduce the security presence in Northern Ireland, but a complete lack of any timetable for decommissioning or disbandment of paramilitary terrorist organisations. There are no benchmarks whereby the commission can judge whether those organisations are making progress. We can only

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  conclude that there is little prospect of the commission working effectively to monitor the activities of the paramilitary organisations.
  We object to the Irish Government being involved in security normalisation in Northern Ireland—a matter that should be exclusively for Her Majesty's Government. It is solely the responsibility of the Government to protect their citizens and I can see no role for the Irish Government in deciding what security I, my constituents and the constituents of my colleagues from Northern Ireland require against the continuing terrorist threat. Nor should the Irish Government have any involvement in monitoring the activities of parties in the Northern Ireland Assembly.
  I disagree entirely with the right hon. Member for Upper Bann (Mr. Trimble) in his assessment of the Irish Government's role in this legislation. He referred to the talks process, saying that it offered precedents for the Irish Government's role in such matters. I disagree. No independent commission was required during the talks process to decide whether the IRA, the Ulster Defence Association or the Ulster Volunteer Force were in breach of their ceasefires or that parties linked to those organisations were failing to make a commitment to peaceful means. That decision was made by the political parties and by the Government.
  It is true that, because the Irish Government participated in the talks process, they were consulted about that decision, but that is entirely different from dealing with the strand 1 institutional arrangements that flow from the agreement. We were told that the Irish Government would have no role in strand 1 of the Belfast agreement. Indeed, it was a requirement that strand 1 be hermetically sealed so that the Irish Government could have no say, yet it is crystal clear from the draft agreement between the Governments of the UK and the Irish Republic that establishes the independent monitoring commission that the Irish Government will have a role in strand 1.
  Article 6 of the agreement between the two Governments states that the commission—the whole commission, all four members, including the Irish Government's representative—
  "may consider a claim by any party represented in the Northern Ireland Assembly".
  That could not be clearer. The commission may consider a claim by a party represented in the Assembly; that is covered by strand 1 of the agreement.
  There are two further aspects. One deals with whether a Minister or a party
  "is not committed to non-violence and exclusively peaceful and democratic means".
  That is still a strand 1 issue, because the question of whether a Minister is thus committed is dealt with in the pledge of office in annexe A of strand 1. That pledge requires a Minister to be committed to non-violence and exclusively peaceful and democratic means. The Irish Government are, therefore, involved in judging whether a Minister or party in the Northern Ireland Assembly is committed to exclusively peaceful means. In anyone's terms, that is a breach of strand 1 of the Belfast agreement. For the first time, it gives the Irish Government a say in the internal affairs of the Assembly. That cannot be denied, so there is no point in trying to paper over the cracks or pretend that it is something else.
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  I echo the comments of Lord Kilclooney, who said:
  "So there still remains this proviso that Her Majesty's Government are not sovereign on this issue. But the legislation will proceed through this Parliament, on the recommendation of the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, only after consultation with the Irish Government. To that extent the Irish Government remain involved in strand 1 of the Belfast agreement of 1998. Therefore, this is a clear breach of the agreement."—[Official Report, House of Lords, 12 September 2003; Vol. 652, c. 593.]
  He is right. Unionists will have to consider that point carefully. It has been a key Unionist principle that the Irish Government should not be involved in strand 1, in internal matters relating to the Northern Ireland Assembly. That is why my hon. Friends and I tabled an amendment to remove both the Irish Government representative and the American Government representative from the commission and to provide that the commission shall comprise only representatives from the United Kingdom appointed by the UK Government. Any ambiguity would thus be removed; there would be no question of the Irish Government interfering in matters that are internal to the United Kingdom and to Northern Ireland as part of it.
  The hon. Member for Belfast, North also referred to the clause that deals with the commission's duty to avoid prejudicial effects. That is crucial. It goes to the heart of the commission's effectiveness in dealing with possible breaches of the agreement and of the pledge of office.
  Based on the Government's past performance, I have great difficulty in understanding how they will be able to decide whether a Minister is in breach of the pledge of office. Will the Minister have to be personally involved in terrorist activity to be deemed to have broken the pledge of office? The Secretary of State must address that question, because Sinn Fein will merely repeat what it has often said—"We are not the IRA". Martin McGuinness, or whoever may be in ministerial office, will simply say that it was, or was not, the IRA but, "You can't blame me, I am not the IRA".
  To this day, Gerry Adams, the president of Sinn Fein, denies that he has ever been a member of the IRA. If he were holding ministerial office, how would the Secretary of State prove that he had broken the pledge of office because the IRA had been engaged in terrorist activity? The issue is important, because I have no doubt that republicans will go to the High Court—as they have done in the past—and challenge decisions or recommendations of the commission or the Secretary of State related to their holding ministerial office. They will mount legal challenges, so the Government must be sure of the grounds on which they are proceeding.
  The Government may argue, rightly, that the IRA and Sinn Fein are inextricably linked, but I am not sure that the legislation will be tight enough to ensure that an individual Minister could be firmly pinned down on whether they have broken their pledge of office because of their IRA activity. One could also apply the argument to Sinn Fein-IRA as a political party acting in the Assembly, especially if the commission's activities and investigatory powers were circumscribed by its inability to investigate a matter that could result in legal proceedings.
  As the hon. Member for Belfast, North rightly pointed out, there are legal proceedings in respect of each of the four breaches that I mentioned earlier—

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  Florida, Colombia, Castlereagh and Stormontgate. So will the commission be unable to investigate such matters? If so, what is the point of the Bill? What is the point of the commission in the first place? In those circumstances, we would be back to where we are today, with a Government who are either unwilling or unable to take action to deal with a political party that is inextricably linked to a terrorist organisation that continues to engage in terrorist activities while being in the Government of Northern Ireland.
  I am afraid that the sanctions themselves are weak. As the hon. Member for Belfast, East (Mr. Robinson) said earlier, the Government are trying to apply a lesser form of sanction initially in the hope that that will buy some time if there is a problem, and they will then gradually ratchet up the pressure until we may eventually get a motion to exclude a Minister or a junior Minister from the Executive.
  Sinn Fein-IRA will not be at all impressed by the prospect of a censure motion in the Assembly, a reduction in their pay or the removal of financial support in the Assembly. The republican movement does not rely on the financial support that it receives in the Assembly to finance its operations. We have ample evidence that it is making a lot of money in all kinds of other activities—some lawful, some not so lawful—so it will not be too bothered by the prospect of financial sanctions being applied.
  What really matters is the principle of whether it is right for someone who is linked to a paramilitary terrorist organisation to be in the Government—none of the other sanctions matters; the issue is one of principle. Is it right for someone who is linked to a party that is part of a terrorist organisation that engages in terrorist activities to be in the Government—yes or no? If it is wrong, that party should be excluded from the Government. Indeed, is that not what the Prime Minister promised the people of Northern Ireland when he wrote those handwritten pledges on the wall in Coleraine during the referendum campaign? He pledged:
  "Those who use or threaten violence excluded from the Government of Northern Ireland."
  There was no mention of censure motions or reductions in pay. The pledge was very clear, but it remains to be delivered to the people of Northern Ireland.
  There are very real problems with the legislation. It is flawed. It is inadequate to deal with the current problems that we face in the political process in Northern Ireland. Moreover, although the proposed sanctions relate to political parties, no sanction is proposed in the legislation against a terrorist organisation. Hon. Members may say that the rule of law deals with terrorist organisations. If they breach their ceasefires or engage in illegal activity, it is a matter for the process of law and for police investigation, and so on. That may be so. but what about proscription, which is still on the statute book? Why is that not being considered as a possible sanction? If the Government believe that a political party linked to a terrorist organisation is not committed to exclusively peaceful and democratic means, does that not raise a question in relation to whether that political party is a bona fide democratic party?
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  How will the Secretary of State form his opinion? What evidence will he require to judge whether a person who is a Minister or a junior Minister is in breach of the commitment to democratic and peaceful means? I should like to know the answer to those questions. Will the Secretary of State simply rely on the investigations of an independent commission? Will he still take the advice of the Chief Constable, the General Officer Commanding and the intelligence agencies? That is important.
  The Government do not tell us what the security forces' role will be in influencing the process and the judgments made by the Secretary of State about whether a party or a Minister is committed to exclusively peaceful and democratic means. I certainly hope that the commission will not replace the Chief Constable and the security services in providing intelligence and that its investigatory role will not replace the intelligence gathering capacity of the police and the security services in informing the Government in making their judgments on those crucial political issues.
  We have heard about consultation with the Irish Government. I shall not dwell on that issue—other hon. Members have dealt with it adequately—but it is a concern for us because we have little doubt, given the Irish Government's past performance, that they will be continue to be the dead hand when it comes to taking action against the republican movement. Their past resolve to deal with republican breaches has been less than satisfactory.
  The reality is that the legislation is so ambiguous on crucial matters that are important to political progress in Northern Ireland and—as the hon. Member for Belfast, North said—that the process of monitoring is so convoluted, cumbersome, imprecise and ineffective that there is little prospect of real and meaningful sanctions ever being applied against the political parties that are linked to the paramilitary terrorist organisations.
  The commission's objective may be to rebuild confidence in Northern Ireland. The real polls—the elections—and the opinion polls show that, where confidence has dropped, it has happened almost exclusively in the Unionist community. The most recent opinion poll indicated that, if a referendum on the agreement were held tomorrow, 70 per cent. of Unionists would vote no. If the Government's objective is to address the loss of confidence in the process that has occurred in Unionism, I have to say, as a representative of Unionism, that the legislation will not achieve that objective.
  Indeed, my two colleagues—my hon. Friends the Members for Belfast, South and for South Antrim (David Burnside)—and I felt so strongly about those issues that we resigned the Whip of the Ulster Unionist parliamentary party, so that we could vote against the Bill tonight. It is flawed, and I believe that, in time, it will prove inadequate and ineffective in dealing with the problems that we face and that we will have to return to the House to find another more effective way to deal with those issues.
  7.47 pm
  David Burnside: It is with great regret that I rise, as an Ulster Unionist from the Unionist Bench, at a time when the Unionist cause is once again

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  dogged and damaged, as it has been for so long, with divisions in my own party—the Ulster Unionist party—and without a co-ordinated policy and strategy. Different views have been expressed tonight from right across the Unionist family, and the Ulster Unionist cause continues to be damaged in the House and the nation. That damages us in establishing accountable, democratic government in Northern Ireland.
  We are still dealing with the problem which historically united Unionism back in 1985: opposition to the Anglo-Irish agreement, which was supported by Margaret Thatcher, to her shame, even though she was a very great lady in her time. We are still suffering from that joint authority, even though the 1998 Belfast agreement promised to replace the Anglo-Irish secretariat. Well, the secretariat moved from Maryfield to another headquarters, but the continuing involvement and role of the Irish Republic in our affairs does not help accountable government in Northern Ireland.
  I wish to refer to the amendment, which is in the first group for consideration in Committee, and to the new clause on proscription tabled in my name, which will not be debated this evening. Perhaps you will correct me if cannot refer to them, Mr. Deputy Speaker. The amendment and the new clause are fundamentally important to expressing the Unionists' concerns about the proposed legislation.
  The hangover of the Irish Republic's involvement is not all malign, against the interests of democracy or against the desire of the majority of people in the Republic of Ireland to have a better, stable relationship with their neighbours in Northern Ireland. But the Republic's involvement—as Her Majesty's Government allow its Government a constant say, consultation and involvement in our internal affairs—has created in the past, creates in the present and will create in the future opposition from the Unionist community. The amendment refers to the make-up of the commission, and was tabled deliberately on the basis that the commission should include only representatives from the United Kingdom, including one from Northern Ireland. Let us have help and co-operation, but there is no need to have a representative from the Irish Republic or a representative from our ally and neighbour in the United States. Let us co-operate with them in the normal diplomatic manner.
  The new clause that I tabled with the support of both Ulster Unionist and Democratic Unionist Members lays out the final penalty for a so-called democratic party with a mandate, Sinn Fein. Yes, it has a mandate, but I disagree with my right hon. Friend the Member for Upper Bann (Mr. Trimble) who recently referred to expulsion from the Executive as the nuclear option. The nuclear deterrent should be proscription of that political party on the ground that it is not operating as a normal democratic party. The constitution of the Federal Republic of Germany established after the second world war would not have allowed the activities of Sinn Fein. In my opinion, the activities of Sinn Fein would not be tolerated within our European neighbour Spain at present.
  It is intolerable that this so-called political party with a mandate continues to operate the dirty double game that the republican movement has pursued since 1998. We know what the problem is: we were told and we
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  hoped that it was on the road from terrorism to democracy, which is possible, admirable and should be encouraged. But we have suffered by not having sanction against it, and it is continuing to play the dirty double game. It has not changed, and I believe that we have problems in the Government of Northern Ireland at present. I do not believe that we have a crisis—although I would be worried about ever saying in the House that there was no crisis, as I will always remember Jim Callaghan's dreadful remark when he came back with a suntan from the Caribbean in 1979, which resulted in the defeat of Labour and the Tories' coming to power after the winter of discontent. We have a number of problems that can be dealt with in Northern Ireland, but they are not dealt with by the legislation proposed tonight. I will not go over again the issues of Colombia, Florida, Castlereagh and Stormontgate, to which many right hon. and hon. Members have already referred. I referred earlier in an intervention to the murder, which the police believe was carried out by the Provisional IRA, of Gareth O'Connor, and the Secretary of State and the Police Service of Northern Ireland are well aware of the circumstances of that. With Martin McGuinness and Gerry Adams sitting on the army council of the IRA, should that offence of murder lead to Martin McGuinness being expelled from the Executive? In my opinion, it should lead to the proscription of Sinn Fein as a political party until it starts to behave decently and democratically and to co-operate with its neighbours in Northern Ireland, the Unionist majority.
  Mr. Mallon: I am very aware of the case that the hon. Gentleman mentions, which is within my constituency. It would be helpful to the House, and certainly to me, if he could show where the Police Service of Northern Ireland made that statement or indicated in any way that that was the case. It would be very helpful for many people such as myself who have been trying to resolve that matter. It is incumbent on the hon. Gentleman to put it on the record now.
  David Burnside: Informed sources within Northern Ireland—[Interruption] I will answer the intervention. Those sources have said that the Provisional IRA—no dissident group—have been involved. I quote from Kevin Myers, a respected journalist, who was published at the weekend and who had the courage to stand up and look at the reality of Sinn Fein. He referred to the murder of the hon. Gentleman's constituent, saying:
  "No one in the three governments participating in the peace process ever announces the Shinners must stay within the law".
  That is the view from a southern journalist, writing in what is admittedly a mainland Sunday newspaper. He has been highly critical of the outpouring of the peace process in Northern Ireland that has allowed criminality, including murder, to take place.
  Mr. Mallon: I have here the article to which the hon. Gentleman refers, by the journalist to whom he refers. But that was not the question I asked. My question was whether, to be helpful to everybody, not least the family of the young man who was killed, he could put that information from the Police Service of Northern Ireland

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  on the record now. I am not asking for him to name Kevin Myers, any journalist or any informed source, but the PSNI source. That is crucial.
  David Burnside: It is my information within the Police Service of Northern Ireland, and I would be pleased to ask the Minister—or if she cannot respond, the Chief Constable of the Police Service of Northern Ireland—to make a statement on the subject. It is my information that the murder has been carried out by the Provisional IRA and that no other form of investigation is being carried out within the Police Service of Northern Ireland. The hon. Gentleman refers to confusion, which is buck passing, and it is exactly the same as the false information that came out when we were told that Castlereagh was an inside job by the Royal Ulster Constabulary and the special branch in Northern Ireland. We all now know that there is only one line of investigation into that break-in—into mainstream republican Provisional IRA within Northern Ireland.
  Mr. Mallon: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
  David Burnside: No, I have given way twice.
  I will vote against Second Reading this evening because the legislation is part of the overall declaration, which does not have the consent or the support of the Unionist population. It is not a basis for the way ahead. We are dealing with the problem that we have been dealing with since 1998, which is that, time and again, republicans are let off and not punished for continuing to play the double game of terrorism and masquerading as a democratic political party.
  There has been much talk this evening about whether we are going to have an election in Northern Ireland. I am a selected candidate in South Antrim for the Ulster Unionist party and I look forward to an election whenever it is called. I think that it is a major mistake to postpone it. But many questions have to be answered if and when there is an election. How will the Executive be formed, and can the Unionist population have the confidence that this Bill has any chance of expelling Sinn Fein from the Executive for the type of activities in which it has been involved in Colombia, Florida, Castlereagh and Stormontgate—there are enough instances of which the Northern Ireland Office is aware. If my party, the Ulster Unionist party, goes into an election on a manifesto to rejoin this inclusive Executive, including Sinn Fein, I have no confidence that the legislation before the House tonight will exclude Sinn Fein from the Executive. So we will come back to the House again. If that is the sequence of events that unfolds in the next few weeks and months, the Unionist population and electorate will give one clear message: the fudge and double standards are continuing because Her Majesty's Government have refused to stand up to Sinn Fein-IRA. That is why the Unionist population have lost confidence in the agreement and its implementation. I would love to be able to support this measure as a new way forward in dealing with the problems that were ambiguous in 1998 and to which solutions were not delivered by the Prime Minister's promises at that time. I do not believe that they will be delivered here tonight.
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  If Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness are backing, under this institutional arrangement of the agreement, an Executive who have bureaucratic, slow, complicated and ambiguous legislation, does anyone think that they fear being thrown out of the Northern Ireland Executive? I do not question the credentials of the four gentlemen proposed for the commission, but does anyone think that it will recommend the expulsion of Sinn Fein from the Executive, or that the Secretary of State will expel it? No way. To think that is to live in a dream world. This is another fudge, and I will vote against it on principle on Second Reading, just as I will vote against any other legislation linked to the joint declaration, such as that dealing with the on-the-runs, which I believe has already been promised to Provisional IRA-Sinn Fein and which may be brought before the House in November in an attempt to get the election on its way.
  This is another bad night for Unionism. We have another fudge from the Government. Yet again, they are refusing to stand up to Sinn Fein-IRA.
  8.1 pm
  Mr. Andrew Hunter: I empathise considerably with the hon. Members for South Antrim (David Burnside), for Lagan Valley (Mr. Donaldson) and for Belfast, South (Rev. Martin Smyth) in their present political predicament. I found myself somewhat distant from the Conservative party over the Belfast agreement and matters flowing from it. I substantially agree with what those three hon. Members have said.
  Because of the pressure of time—we have spent a long time on Second Reading—and the fact that the salient features have been well and truly covered, not least by my hon. Friends the Members for Belfast, North (Mr. Dodds) and for Belfast, East (Mr. Robinson), I shall keep my comments to the barest minimum.
  According to some media reports that I have heard and read, the provisional republican movement is unhappy about the proposed monitoring commission, fearing that it may lead to the exclusion of its leadership from political office. At first sight, that might therefore suggest that the proposed commission has some merit. The prospect of at last being able to exclude from political office those who have continually demonstrated that they are not exclusively committed to non-violence and democracy is an appealing prospect. However, as we have heard from many hon. Members, on closer observation, the proposed commission fails to inspire confidence. It will be ineffective for a variety of reasons; cumulatively, because it does not in itself contain the authority to exercise its own judgments and conclusions.
  The Government make much of the swift establishment of the monitoring commission as a key element in what their press release of 4 September says is intended to rebuild the
  "trust and confidence necessary for the restoration of stable and inclusive devolved government in Northern Ireland."
  However laudable that objective may be, the Bill as it stands will not help to achieve it.
  We can be forgiven for having lost count of how many commissions have been created in recent years. There has been the Patten commission, the Parades Commission, the Human Rights Commission, the

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  Equality Commission, the Independent International Commission on Decommissioning and perhaps others. One can cynically wonder what rational grounds there are for thinking that this commission will fare any better than the others.
  The proposed IMC is fundamentally flawed for all the reasons that we have heard. I do not propose to enumerate them at any great length. The Irish dimension has been mentioned a great deal. There is no justification whatever for allowing this intrusion into what should be reserved as strand 1 matters.
  It is the Government's adherence to what they call "demilitarisation", to be monitored alongside terrorist decommissioning, that disturbs me most. Let us be clear. This is not a confidence-building development; it is a confidence-destroying development. The draft agreement asserts parity between the legally constituted security forces of the state and weapons illegally held by illegal terrorist organisations. Such parity is totally unacceptable, politically irresponsible and, arguably, morally wrong because no such parity can or should exist. No wonder that some conclude that the commission appears designed to ensure the speedy reduction in security as promised to the IRA by the Government and apparently endorsed by the pro-agreement parties.
  Secondly, and significantly, the origins of the new body lie in the discovery of the IRA's spy operation at the heart of Stormont. Rather than dealing solely with Sinn Fein-IRA, as they should have done, the Government decided to suspend Stormont and punish every party for the wrongdoing of one. To compound matters, in the face of overwhelming evidence of continuing terrorist activity, the IRA was then rewarded with the joint declaration. This Bill compounds that injustice. Why should the Northern Ireland political parties that have no connection whatever with terrorist organisations but which, on the basis of their democratic mandate, declined to participate in a Government surrender to terrorism be subject to the same punitive regime as Sinn Fein-IRA? No comparison can or should be made between parties exclusively committed to the principles and practice of democracy and those that are a political front for unreconstructed terrorist organisations.
  Thirdly, there is nothing whatever in the draft agreement—or, equally significantly, outside it—to give any confidence at all that the Government might use the power to exclude parties in the event of a negative finding by the commission. Despite having had the power throughout the period of devolution to refer to the Assembly a motion for the expulsion of republicans, the Government never did so, regardless of the ongoing violence sanctioned and authorised by the Sinn Fein-IRA leadership. In the light of those developments, does anyone seriously believe that the Government, having started more than 10 years ago a process that sought to bring the republicans to the centre stage of Northern Ireland politics, will now in any circumstances take action to remove them from the Executive? I very much doubt it.
  The Government's actions over the past few years have themselves destroyed confidence in the process. Nor can Unionists take seriously the claim that this proposed commission will remove Sinn Fein from government when, before any action can be taken, the
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  commission will have to report to a Northern Ireland Assembly in which there is an inherent nationalist right to veto.
  The creation of this commission can and will be no more successful in removing terrorists from government than the current so-called exclusion mechanisms. Quite frankly, it is now too late for the Government to restore confidence in a discredited process. The Bill will certainly not achieve that objective. Confidence can be restored only by elections followed by a fundamental renegotiation of the basis for agreement.
  8.9 pm
  Mr. Quentin Davies: I think that it might be in the interest of the House, given the limited time that we have—
  Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Michael Lord): Order. If the hon. Gentleman wishes to wind up the debate, he will need the leave of the House.
  Mr. Davies: With the leave of the House, Mr. Deputy Speaker, I am grateful for the opportunity to speak. I think that it will be in the interest of the House if I forgo the right to wind up the debate. We have had a good, if predictable, debate. As the Secretary of State said, the Bill is complex and important. We unfortunately have limited time in which to do it justice, so I think that we should make progress without further ado.
  8.10 pm
  The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office (Jane Kennedy): A number of points and questions have been put during the debate, so I cannot reciprocate the speed of the hon. Member for Grantham and Stamford (Mr. Davies).
  I associate myself with the remarks made by the hon. Member for Belfast, East (Mr. Robinson) when he referred to my hon. Friend the Member for South Down (Mr. McGrady). I hope that my hon. Friend the Member for Newry and Armagh (Mr. Mallon) will convey to his colleague the profound sympathy and condolences that I am sure that not only my hon. Friends and I, but hon. Members of all parties would wish to express. That is likely to be the only occasion this evening on which I shall achieve unanimity in the Chamber.
  I hope that the hon. Member for Grantham and Stamford will accept that my comments will be made affectionately, if not entirely respectfully. He entertained us by storming and raging at the inadequacies of Her Majesty's Government. Indeed, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State said that he evoked a college of cardinals, so great was the number of cardinal sins committed by Her Majesty's Government. However, his wisdom and perspicacity know no bounds. I ask him to consider the fact that I frequently think about his colleagues, the hon. Member for East Hampshire (Mr. Mates) and the right hon. Member for North-West Cambridgeshire (Sir Brian Mawhinney), and their time as security Ministers when thinking about some of the difficult issues that my colleagues and I have to consider, sometimes on a daily basis. It is not difficult to talk the talk of peacemaking—we often do that in the House. However, it is much more difficult to walk the

  975
  walk, and I have learned the truth of that. It is difficult to engage with those for whom it is anathema to engage but we do so for the sake of those whose lives we are responsible for and to secure a peaceful and safe society. Sometimes our efforts are successful and sometimes they are less successful than we would want, but they are nonetheless sincere.
  I shall try to respond to several questions that were asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Newry and Armagh and other hon. Members. My hon. Friend asked whether the monitoring commission may receive functions from the Bill, and a great amount of debate was caused by what I am sure he meant to be a helpful suggestion. The model that we have chosen will set up the commission by international agreement. Indeed, in the other place, my noble and learned Friend Lord Williams of Mostyn referred specifically to clause 1, which defines the agreement referred to. Amending that clause would not confer functions on the commission because of the way in which it is drafted. Of course, Parliament could confer functions on a commission in the UK if it wished but that is not the model that we are following. As I said, we have chosen to set up an international commission that will receive its functions through the agreement.
  Mr. Mallon: The Minister is effectively answering a question that I did not ask. I gave the column number and date of the debate in which the Government Minister in the other place was talking not about article 1 but about article 4. That was specific in terms of the wording of his reply. The Minister should again clarify the situation accurately.
  Jane Kennedy: I was referring to clause 1 of the Bill rather than article 1. I thought that I had answered my hon. Friend's question, but I shall read his comments carefully just as I have the comments of Lord Williams. I might need to clarify the point further as we approach the Committee stage.
  Mr. Mallon: I thank the Minister for giving way again, but the reality is that clause 1 does not refer to the functions in any way.
  Jane Kennedy: That is precisely my point. Clearly, we shall not get to the bottom of this confusion and I shall need to re-read the Hansard report that we have received and examine the response that I have given to determine whether I can provide greater clarity. If necessary, I shall write to my hon. Friend and place a copy of the letter in the Library for the benefit of all hon. Members who have an interest in the issue.
  My hon. Friend asked about article 4 of the international agreement to establish the monitoring commission by querying whether the commission would be fettered in presenting reports to which organised crime was relevant. However, article 4 includes other criminal offences and the list of activities that it defines is not exhaustive. Organised crime is caught by article 4 of the agreement if it is carried out by paramilitaries. We
  976
  know that there is significant involvement of paramilitary organisations in organised crime in Northern Ireland.
  Mr. Mallon rose—
  Jane Kennedy: I shall give way to my hon. Friend for a final time.
  Mr. Mallon: The Minister is very kind. Will she confirm that in terms of investigations into organised crime, 14 files exist now, but not one refers to the provisional IRA or those associated with it? Will she put on record her confirmation that that information is correct?
  Jane Kennedy: I am afraid that I cannot confirm that at the moment. I am not aware of the detail to which my hon. Friend referred, so I shall have to examine the matter again. Given that we are under time constraints, I shall try not to be provocative and I hope that there will be few occasions when hon. Members will feel goaded to ask for further clarification of my points.
  My hon. Friend and other hon. Members, including my hon. Friend the Member for Thurrock (Andrew Mackinlay), who is not in the Chamber, asked about the duty of office. I am not sure whether I understood fully the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Newry and Armagh, but I confirm that the pledge of office in the Good Friday agreement and the Northern Ireland Act 1998 contains a requirement to discharge in good faith all duties of office. I hope that that addresses his point but I am happy to respond to his worries further, perhaps after considering them more carefully.
  I hesitate to be provocative but every time I hear the hon. Member for Belfast, East speak, it occurs to me that he would do well to listen to a song called "Paint It Black", which was written by some of my favourite musicians. He does not want colours anywhere and where there are colours, he wants them painted black. He describes a world that I simply do not see. The song is by the Rolling Stones and I invite him to listen to it if he would like to hear not only a good song, but something that describes the way in which we in the Chamber hear his outlook.
  The hon. Gentleman and the hon. Member for Basingstoke (Mr. Hunter) suggested that the Government equate normalisation and paramilitary activities but that is not the case. The timetable for security normalisation set out in the joint declaration was illustrative, and it was set out on the basis that appropriate acts of completion occurred at the time of its publication. Article 15 of the agreement makes it clear that the programme of security normalisation and the timetable associated with it will be determined once the British Government are satisfied that appropriate commitments have been given on an end to paramilitary activity.
  The hon. Member for Belfast, East talked about withholding the salaries of all members of a party and suggested that that might be likely to breach the European convention on human rights. I do not believe that that is the case. We do not believe that withholding, or reducing future income would be a breach of the European convention. However, European case law

  977
  draws a distinction between rights to future salary that is not protected under the law and pension rights, which are protected under the law. That brings me to one of the points raised by the hon. Member for Montgomeryshire (Lembit Öpik) in a characteristically good-humoured contribution.
  Lady Hermon: On the human rights point, I am intrigued by the fact that this Bill does not carry a statement of compatibility with the European convention on human rights. [HON. MEMBERS: "It does."] I stand to be corrected. Perhaps the Minister can explain why it does not appear on the front page. If the Minister could deal with that, I would be grateful.
  Jane Kennedy: It may not be on the front page but it is definitely in the Bill; perhaps it is on the back page.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Montgomeryshire, if I may call him that, raised the question of pensions. This is a complicated area. Whenever I engage in debate about the European convention on human rights, I do so hesitantly and I accept the charge of hesitancy that the right hon. Member for Upper Bann (Mr. Trimble) laid against us in this context. It may assist if I explain why the Government consider that new section 48(2A) is necessary.
  Pension contributions are assessed as a fixed percentage of a Member's salary and pension entitlement is calculated on the basis of a Member's final salary. That provision ensures that any reduction in salary will be disregarded for the purposes of the pension scheme—that is, it will not affect a Member's rights or his obligations. For example, if salary is reduced by half, a member will remain liable for pension contributions calculated as a percentage of his full salary. Similarly, a 50 per cent. reduction in salary will not affect pension entitlement, which will still be based on full salary should a Member decide to stand down while the reduction is in place. [Interruption.] I sense that that has provoked a series of questions. I ask hon. Members to resist the urge to intervene.
  Lembit Öpik: I am sorry but I cannot resist it. Just for clarification, is the Minister saying that the pension contribution is calculated on the basis of the full salary even when that salary has been reduced—in other words, that the reason that the final pension is consummate with the full salary is that the actual payments into the scheme do not alter with variation in the amount that the individual pays?
  Jane Kennedy: The pensions of Members of the Legislative Assembly are contributory, so a Member's share in the pension fund is likely to be protected from interference under article 1 of the first protocol of the ECHR, the protection of property protocol. If a Member's salary was reduced and he retired while a reduction was in place, the value of his pension could be substantially reduced. Therefore, there is, we fear, a serious risk that that would breach the ECHR.
  978
  The hon. Member for North Down (Lady Hermon) is right: the statement is not in the Bill. However, it is separately stated that the Bill is compliant.
  Mr. Peter Robinson: Just to be accurate, it was in the original Bill that went to the House of Lords. It was not in the reprinted one.
  Jane Kennedy: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for clarifying that.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Thurrock asked whether the commissioners can deliberate by correspondence. The commissioners' working methods will be a matter for them to determine. For myself, I can see no reason why they should not maintain contact by a range of methods. That may be particularly appropriate if a commissioner were sick but I imagine that they would also regularly deliberate in person. If a commissioner is incapacitated, it is open to the two Governments to replace him, although obviously I hope that that would not be the case.
  Andrew Mackinlay: It seems to me that if the commissioners are to have any function at all, they have to be inquisitorial. While they may not hold full hearings, dare I say it, like a Select Committee, presumably, they would have to take evidence and to hear from people at some stage. Is the Minister saying that the rubrics of how they work have not yet been thought through? I find that surprising because it seems vital that that should be defined and understood.
  Jane Kennedy: It is not that it has not been thought through. It is something that we are saying to the commissioners. We expect that they will wish to meet as a group not only to discuss and to deliberate on information that they have received but to meet those from whom they wish to receive information, so there is no impediment to that, but I expect that their working practices will evolve.
  The hon. Member for North Antrim (Rev. Ian Paisley) asked what the cross-community voting requirements are. Although it is not in the Bill, it is in the explanatory notes on page 4. That may be of benefit to the whole House.
  A number of hon. Members raised the question of retrospectivity, particularly the hon. Member for South Antrim (David Burnside), who raised it initially in an intervention and was supported by other hon. Members. The commission will be established by the agreement and we intend that its first report on paramilitary activity will for the most part cover matters since its establishment. The commission may wish to include in its first report some recent contextual material but I do not expect that it will spend its time looking backwards. That will not be the answer that he wanted but it is the only answer that he will get today.
  David Burnside: It is not very satisfactory. I specifically asked about retrospectivity regarding four investigations, of which she will be aware with her ministerial responsibility, including Colombia, Castlereagh, Stormontgate. Those are investigations presently taking place. Will the commission have a remit with a view to making recommendations that could lead

  979
  to the expulsion of Sinn Fein from the Executive? That is why the people of Northern Ireland are still confused over this debate tonight.
  Jane Kennedy: I do not think that there is the degree of confusion that the hon. Gentleman suggests. I have made it clear that we would expect the commission to begin its work from the point at which it comes into existence. There will be when it comes into existence, I suspect, occasions when it may want to look at the context within which it has come into existence but I am not giving him any assurance that the four cases to which he has referred will be part of its considerations.
  The hon. Members for Belfast, North (Mr. Dodds) and for Belfast, South (Rev. Martin Smyth) referred to—
  Mr. Quentin Davies: I wonder whether the right hon. Lady would be kind enough to make an important point absolutely clear: she is not saying that the commission will indeed look at those four egregious breaches, but she equally, as I understand it, is not saying that it will not. She is going to leave it to the commission to decide—is that right?—the extent to which it looks retrospectively, the extent to which it looks forward and generally how it responds to any complaints or any incidents.
  Jane Kennedy: Yes.
  I make it clear that my thoughts this weekend will be with the family of Prison Officer Ferris, who was stabbed at the time of the Maze escape, and I am grateful to the hon. Members for Belfast, South and for Belfast, North for raising his case. The hon. Member for Belfast, North also raised the question of elections. We are all working to create the conditions for an election to the Assembly from which a viable Executive can be formed. There has been no secret about that. We have never disguised that that is our objective. We want to put the government of Northern Ireland in the hands of locally accountable representatives and the IMC is a key element but just one part of that drive. Others have commitments to make, too: to rebuild the trust and confidence necessary to move forward to stable and inclusive institutions, and we all know what those commitments are.
  The hon. Member for Belfast, North suggested that censure motions would be weaker as a result of the Bill. The Bill provides that the Assembly may resolve by cross-community vote to censure a Minister or a party on the basis that it does not believe that they are committed to non-violent, peaceful and democratic means or any of the other terms of the pledge of office. It remains open to the Assembly to pass motions censuring Ministers or parties on other grounds according to its
  980
  own procedures. I do not see how in substance the Bill weakens the Assembly. In fact, it widens the range of measures available to it.
  Mr. Dodds rose—
  Jane Kennedy: If the hon. Gentleman will forgive me, I am seeking to make a little progress as I am conscious of the pressure of time.
  Lembit Öpik rose—
  Jane Kennedy: I have already given way to the hon. Gentleman a number of times so, if he will forgive me, on this occasion I will press on.
  My hon. Friend the Member for North-East Derbyshire (Mr. Barnes) tempted me to respond to his comment about new Labour, but I will resist, as that is not within the confines of our debate, but perhaps I will discuss it with him later. However, he spoke about people who have been forced into exile and the need for acts of completion to include scope for them to return. He is quite right to raise that. The practice of exiling must come to an end, and the exiled must feel free to return in safety. That is a point that not only he but my right hon. and hon. Friends and I have made on many occasions both in the House and Northern Ireland.
  My hon. Friend also questioned an issue raised by clause 2, and the need to avoid making reports that are prejudicial to criminal proceedings. Commissioners will obviously exercise discretion about the information that they wish to include in their reports, subject to the provisions of clause 2. While putting an independent spotlight on ongoing paramilitary activity, we must also ensure that any legal proceedings and, in particular, criminal proceedings are not jeopardised. We must not allow the commission to be seen to influence the outcome of criminal proceedings because that could cause the collapse of a case. That does not, however, prevent the IMC from giving an independent and accurate picture of the scale of ongoing paramilitary activity.
  The hon. Member for East Devon (Mr. Swire), in a well-argued and thoughtful speech, referred to a statement by the leader of Sinn Fein last April that represented progress on the part of the IRA, which we have acknowledged. However, as the hon. Gentleman knows, I have said on a previous occasion, that that does not answer the Prime Minister's final, simple question—will the IRA call a halt to all paramilitary activity? The hon. Gentleman also asked about the relationship between the commission, Garda Siochana, the General Officer Commanding the Army in Northern Ireland and the Chief Constable. The IMC will be open and accessible to all interested parties and will consult on issues relevant to its functions, as he would expect. However, the two Governments have made it clear that it should be provided with the information that it needs to do its job. It will have access to the Chief Constable, the General Officer Commanding and other agencies with law enforcement and security roles in Northern Ireland. It would be wrong to go into specifics, but I can confirm that the IMC will receive material drawn from intelligence. It will then be for the IMC to decide what to include in its reports, provided that it does not breach

  981
  the duties under clause 2. As for costs, we estimate that those will be £2 million a year, and a contribution will be received from the Irish Government on a 50:50 basis—I am happy to use that phrase in a context different from that which I normally use.
  The hon. Member for Belfast, South referred to recent decisions regarding prisons. He will forgive me for not being drawn down that path in this debate, but I appreciate his comments and anxieties about prison officers. I share his concerns, but they are not often raised in our discussions of security matters in Northern Ireland. The hon. Member for Lagan Valley (Mr. Donaldson) and other hon. Members asked about the IMC's determination of cases referring to strand 1 questions. In view of the convention regarding the operation of the internal political institutions of Northern Ireland, it would be inappropriate for non-UK nationals to have a role in investigating and reporting on allegations concerning such matters. That is why, for complaints concerning the operation of internal political institutions—strand 1 institutions—the Irish and American members of the commission will stand aside.
  The key point is surely that, on matters relating to the operation of those institutions, the British members alone will examine the issues and report their conclusions. The whole commission will have a role in reporting its view, when asked to do so, on whether particular politicians are genuinely committed to peaceful and democratic means. That is a basic requirement of trust and confidence—it has nothing to do with the workings of the internal institutions.
  Mr. Donaldson: The hon. Lady is mistaken in her interpretation. It is clear in clause 6 of the agreement between the British and Irish Governments that the full commission, including the Irish Government's representative, will be involved in considering complaints from parties in the Northern Ireland Assembly—a strand 1 institution—in relation to the pledge of office, specifically the provision relating to the commitment to non-violence and exclusively peaceful and democratic means. That is specified in annexe A of the Belfast agreement—the hon. Lady is wrong.
  Jane Kennedy: We will have to agree to disagree on that point. I do not accept the premise from which the hon. Gentleman is arguing.
  The hon. Member for Lagan Valley asked whether members of Sinn Fein will escape charges that they have broken the pledge of office by saying that their party is not the same as the Provisional IRA. It is already the case under the Northern Ireland Act 1998 that Assembly parties or Ministers may be excluded from office, as the hon. Gentleman is aware, if the Assembly concludes by cross-community vote that they are not considered to be committed to peaceful and democratic means. However, the international agreement establishing the IMC makes it clear that the commission may make recommendations about the steps that the Assembly could consider taking against Ministers or parties if it concludes that they are not committed to peaceful and democratic means. The nature and consequences of the links between a party and a paramilitary organisation will be for the IMC to
  982
  establish and respond to. Members of the commission will have significant and relevant experience and are not likely to duck the issue.
  David Burnside rose—
  Jane Kennedy: The hon. Gentleman will forgive me if I do not give way to him at this moment in time.
  Finally, the right hon. Member for Upper Bann, in a typically forceful speech, said that the IMC is being created so that Her Majesty's Government cannot turn a blind eye—I understand why he made that comment. He went on to talk about the huge element of trust that will be required. Confidence in the IMC will have to be established, and it will have to win the confidence and respect of the people of Northern Ireland if it is to assist with the process of restoring trust and confidence—that great project to which we are all committed. I very much agree with some of his comments about the nature of that trust and confidence which, indeed, are essential if we are to re-establish the consent for partnership government to work.
  The right hon. Gentleman raised the passage in the Hillsborough text whereby if steps are not taken in the Assembly to give effect to an IMC report it will be for the British Government, in consultation with the Irish Government and the political parties, to resolve the matter in a manner consistent with the IMC's recommendations. I stress again very firmly that we should act in those circumstances. Where an IMC report includes recommendations for action and where the process outlined in the Hillsborough text does not lead to resolution of the issue, we envisage no circumstances in which we would not exercise the power in a manner consistent with the IMC recommendations. That is the spirit of the Hillsborough text—the Government would seek to give it effect, and do so faithfully with the approval of the House and another place.
  Finally, I shall deal with the comments of my hon. Friend the Member for Newry and Armagh. I have tried to answer some of his questions. In a fine speech, in keeping with the highest traditions of the House, he spoke solidly and seriously in favour of the sanctions that the IMC will be able to impose. He recognised the involvement of the Irish Government in the new commission as a strength, not as a weakness. Paramilitaries know no boundaries, and the independent monitoring commission will be able to work closely with and gain the confidence of the security forces, both in the United Kingdom and in the Republic of Ireland, as a result of the bilateral agreement underpinning the IMC.
  The power of my hon. Friend's oratory was evident when he condemned paramilitaries and underscored the fact that those participating in democratic politics in a power-sharing Executive must not be associated with paramilitary organisations that threaten, attack, intimidate, shoot young men in the legs and drive whole families into exile. His comments are not lost on the Government. We have worked tirelessly to bring peace and normality to Northern Ireland. We inherited the foundations laid by the outgoing Conservative Government.
  I met and talked to a former Royal Ulster Constabulary officer at the dedication of the RUC George Cross garden of remembrance, which is a place of great tranquillity, full of powerful images movingly recalling the sacrifice of all too many police families. The

  983
  former officer said that he was struck by the fact that so many police lives had been lost, as one sees laid out year by year as one walks through that garden, as well as the many hundreds of others—soldiers, Catholics, Protestants and others. But he commented on how many lives had been saved since the ceasefires. We should not forget that that move, and the work that we are undertaking to continue it, is saving lives. It is imperative that we continue to maintain the momentum for peace.
  As I said at the outset, it is not difficult to talk the talk of peacemaking. It is much more difficult to walk the walk. Introducing the commission is an important step along the way towards achieving the peaceful outcome that I hope we all seek.
  Question put, That the Bill be now read a Second time:—
  The House divided: Ayes 325, Noes 7.

  Division No. 317]

  [8:42 pm

  AYES

  Adams, Irene (Paisley N)

  Cash, William

  Ainger, Nick

  Caton, Martin

  Ainsworth, Bob (Cov'try NE)

  Cawsey, Ian (Brigg)

  Alexander, Douglas

  Challen, Colin

  Allen, Graham

  Chapman, Ben (Wirral S)

  Amess, David

  Chapman, Sir Sydney (Chipping Barnet)

  Anderson, Janet (Rossendale&Darwen)

  Chaytor, David

  Armstrong, rh Ms Hilary

  Chope, Christopher

  Atherton, Ms Candy

  Clark, Paul (Gillingham)

  Atkins, Charlotte

  Clarke, rh Tom (Coatbridge & Chryston)

  Atkinson, David (Bour'mth E)

  Austin, John

  Clarke, Tony (Northampton S)

  Bacon, Richard

  Clwyd, Ann (Cynon V)

  Bailey, Adrian

  Coffey, Ms Ann

  Barnes, Harry

  Cohen, Harry

  Barron, rh Kevin

  Colman, Tony

  Bayley, Hugh

  Connarty, Michael

  Beard, Nigel

  Cotter, Brian

  Beggs, Roy (E Antrim)

  Cousins, Jim

  Bellingham, Henry

  Cranston, Ross

  Benton, Joe (Bootle)

  Cruddas, Jon

  Berry, Roger

  Cryer, Ann (Keighley)

  Best, Harold

  Cryer, John (Hornchurch)

  Blackman, Liz

  Cunningham, Jim (Coventry S)

  Borrow, David

  Curtis-Thomas, Mrs Claire

  Boswell, Tim

  Davey, Edward (Kingston)

  Bottomley, Peter (Worthing W)

  Davey, Valerie (Bristol W)

  Bottomley, rh Virginia (SW Surrey)

  Davidson, Ian

  Davies, rh Denzil (Llanelli)

  Bradley, Peter (The Wrekin)

  Davies, Quentin (Grantham & Stamford)

  Bradshaw, Ben

  Brady, Graham

  Dawson, Hilton

  Brazier, Julian

  Dean, Mrs Janet

  Brown, rh Nicholas (Newcastle E Wallsend)

  Denham, rh John

  Dismore, Andrew

  Browne, Desmond

  Djanogly, Jonathan

  Burden, Richard

  Dobbin, Jim (Heywood)

  Burgon, Colin

  Dobson, rh Frank

  Burnett, John

  Donohoe, Brian H.

  Burnham, Andy

  Dorrell, rh Stephen

  Butterfill, John

  Doughty, Sue

  Byers, rh Stephen

  Dowd, Jim (Lewisham W)

  Cameron, David

  Drew, David (Stroud)

  Campbell, Alan (Tynemouth)

  Duncan, Peter (Galloway)

  Campbell, Mrs Anne (C'bridge)

  Eagle, Maria (L'pool Garston)

  Campbell, Ronnie (Blyth V)

  Edwards, Huw

  Carmichael, Alistair

  Efford, Clive

  984

  Ennis, Jeff (Barnsley E)

  Kaufman, rh Gerald

  Etherington, Bill

  Keeble, Ms Sally

  Evans, Nigel

  Kemp, Fraser

  Ewing, Annabelle

  Kennedy, Jane (Wavertree)

  Fabricant, Michael

  Key, Robert (Salisbury)

  Fallon, Michael

  Khabra, Piara S.

  Farrelly, Paul

  Kilfoyle, Peter

  Field, rh Frank (Birkenhead)

  King, Andy (Rugby)

  Field, Mark (Cities of London & Westminster)

  King, Ms Oona (Bethnal Green & Bow)

  Fitzsimons, Mrs Lorna

  Kirkbride, Miss Julie

  Flint, Caroline

  Kumar, Dr. Ashok

  Flook, Adrian

  Ladyman, Dr. Stephen

  Flynn, Paul (Newport W)

  Laing, Mrs Eleanor

  Foster, rh Derek

  Lait, Mrs Jacqui

  Foster, Michael (Worcester)

  Lamb, Norman

  Foster, Michael Jabez (Hastings & Rye)

  Lansley, Andrew

  Lazarowicz, Mark

  Foulkes, rh George

  Lepper, David

  Francis, Dr. Hywel

  Leslie, Christopher

  Garnier, Edward

  Letwin, rh Oliver

  Gerrard, Neil

  Levitt, Tom (High Peak)

  Gibson, Dr. Ian

  Lewis, Dr. Julian (New Forest E)

  Gidley, Sandra

  Liddell-Grainger, Ian

  Gilroy, Linda

  Lidington, David

  Godsiff, Roger

  Llwyd, Elfyn

  Goggins, Paul

  Loughton, Tim

  Goodman, Paul

  Luff, Peter (M-Worcs)

  Gray, James (N Wilts)

  Luke, Iain (Dundee E)

  Green, Matthew (Ludlow)

  McAvoy, Thomas

  Greenway, John

  McCabe, Stephen

  Grieve, Dominic

  McCafferty, Chris

  Griffiths, Jane (Reading E)

  McDonagh, Siobhain

  Grogan, John

  MacDonald, Calum

  Gummer, rh John

  McGuire, Mrs Anne

  Hain, rh Peter

  McIntosh, Miss Anne

  Hall, Mike (Weaver Vale)

  McIsaac, Shona

  Hamilton, David (Midlothian)

  Mackay, rh Andrew

  Hanson, David

  McKechin, Ann

  Harris, Tom (Glasgow Cathcart)

  McKenna, Rosemary

  Havard, Dai (Merthyr Tydfil&Rhymney)

  Mackinlay, Andrew

  Maclean, rh David

  Heald, Oliver

  McNulty, Tony

  Healey, John

  Mactaggart, Fiona

  Heath, David

  Mallaber, Judy

  Henderson, Ivan (Harwich)

  Mandelson, rh Peter

  Hendrick, Mark

  Marsden, Gordon (Blackpool S)

  Hendry, Charles

  Marshall, David (Glasgow Shettleston)

  Heppell, John

  Hermon, Lady

  Marshall, Jim (Leicester S)

  Hesford, Stephen

  Marshall-Andrews, Robert

  Hill, Keith (Streatham)

  Martlew, Eric

  Hinchliffe, David

  Maude, rh Francis

  Hoban, Mark (Fareham)

  Mercer, Patrick

  Hope, Phil (Corby)

  Michael, rh Alun

  Hopkins, Kelvin

  Milburn, rh Alan

  Howarth, rh Alan (Newport E)

  Miller, Andrew

  Howarth, George (Knowsley N & Sefton E)

  Moffatt, Laura

  Morley, Elliot

  Hughes, Beverley (Stretford & Urmston)

  Morris, rh Estelle

  Moss, Malcolm

  Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)

  Mullin, Chris

  Humble, Mrs Joan

  Murphy, Jim (Eastwood)

  Hurst, Alan (Braintree)

  Murphy, rh Paul (Torfaen)

  Iddon, Dr. Brian

  Norris, Dan (Wansdyke)

  Irranca-Davies, Huw

  O'Brien, Bill (Normanton)

  Jack, rh Michael

  Öpik, Lembit

  Jackson, Glenda (Hampstead & Highgate)

  Organ, Diana

  Osborne, George (Tatton)

  Jamieson, David

  Osborne, Sandra (Ayr)

  Jenkin, Bernard

  Paice, James

  Jenkins, Brian

  Palmer, Dr. Nick

  Johnson, Miss Melanie (Welwyn Hatfield)

  Pearson, Ian

  Perham, Linda

  Jones, Lynne (Selly Oak)

  Pickthall, Colin

  Jones, Martyn (Clwyd S)

  Pike, Peter (Burnley)

  985

  Plaskitt, James

  Swire, Hugo (E Devon)

  Pollard, Kerry

  Syms, Robert

  Pound, Stephen

  Taylor, David (NW Leics)

  Prentice, Ms Bridget (Lewisham E)

  Taylor, Ian (Esher)

  Taylor, John (Solihull)

  Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)

  Taylor, Sir Teddy

  Primarolo, rh Dawn

  Thomas, Gareth (Clwyd W)

  Prisk, Mark (Hertford)

  Thomas, Simon (Ceredigion)

  Prosser, Gwyn

  Thurso, John

  Purchase, Ken

  Todd, Mark (S Derbyshire)

  Quinn, Lawrie

  Tonge, Dr. Jenny

  Rammell, Bill

  Touhig, Don (Islwyn)

  Rapson, Syd (Portsmouth N)

  Tredinnick, David

  Raynsford, rh Nick

  Trickett, Jon

  Reed, Andy (Loughborough)

  Trimble, rh David

  Robathan, Andrew

  Truswell, Paul

  Turner, Dennis (Wolverh'ton SE)

  Robertson, John (Glasgow Anniesland)

  Turner, Dr. Desmond (Brighton Kemptown)

  Rooney, Terry

  Rosindell, Andrew

  Turner, Neil (Wigan)

  Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)

  Twigg, Derek (Halton)

  Ruffley, David

  Tynan, Bill (Hamilton S)

  Russell, Bob (Colchester)

  Tyrie, Andrew

  Salmond, Alex

  Vaz, Keith (Leicester E)

  Vis, Dr. Rudi

  Salter, Martin

  Ward, Claire

  Savidge, Malcolm

  Watkinson, Angela

  Sawford, Phil

  Watson, Tom (W Bromwich E)

  Sedgemore Brian,

  Watts, David

  Shephard, rh Mrs Gillian

  Webb, Steve (Northavon)

  Shepherd, Richard

  White, Brian

  Simon, Siôn (B'ham Erdington)

  Whitehead, Dr. Alan

  Simpson, Keith (M-Norfolk)

  Whittingdale, John

  Singh, Marsha

  Wiggin, Bill

  Skinner, Dennis

  Williams, rh Alan (Swansea W)

  Smith, rh Andrew (Oxford E)

  Williams, Betty (Conwy)

  Smith, Jacqui (Redditch)

  Wills, Michael

  Smith, John (Glamorgan)

  Winnick, David

  Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)

  Wishart, Pete

  Smith, Sir Robert (W Ab'd'ns & Kincardine)

  Wood, Mike (Batley)

  Woolas, Phil

  Soley, Clive

  Wray, James (Glasgow Baillieston)

  Spellar, rh John

  Spelman, Mrs Caroline

  Wright, Anthony D. (Gt Yarmouth)

  Spink, Bob (Castle Point)

  Spring, Richard

  Wright, David (Telford)

  Squire, Rachel

  Wright, Tony (Cannock)

  Starkey, Dr. Phyllis

  Yeo, Tim (S Suffolk)

  Stevenson, George

  Stewart, David (Inverness E & Lochaber)

  Tellers for the Ayes:

  Vernon Coaker and

  Strang, rh Dr. Gavin

  Gillian Merron

  NOES

  Burnside, David

  Robinson, Peter (Belfast E)

  Campbell, Gregory (E Lond'y)

  Smyth, Rev. Martin (Belfast S)

  Dodds, Nigel

  Tellers for the Noes:

  Hunter, Andrew

  Mrs. Iris Robinson and

  Paisley, Rev. Ian

  Mr. Jeffrey M. Donaldson

  Question accordingly agreed to.
  Bill read a Second time, and committed to a Committee of the whole House, pursuant to Order [this day].

  NORTHERN IRELAND (MONITORING COMMISSION ETC.) BILL [LORDS] [MONEY]
  Queen's recommendation having been signedfied—
  Motion made, and Question put forthwith, pursuant to Standing Order No. 52(1)(a) (Money resolutions and ways and means resolutions in connection with Bills),
  That, for the purposes of any Act resulting from the Northern Ireland (Monitoring Commission etc.) Bill [Lords], it is expedient to authorise the payment out of money provided by Parliament of—
  986

  (a)any expenditure incurred by the Secretary of State under the Act, and

  (b)any amount refunded under the Act in respect of any tax or duty. [Derek Twigg.]

  Question agreed to.

  NORTHERN IRELAND (MONITORING COMMISSION ETC.) BILL [LORDS] [WAYS AND MEANS]
  Motion made, and Question put forthwith, pursuant to Standing Order No. 52(1)(a) (Money resolutions and ways and means resolutions in connection with Bills),
  That, for the purposes of any Act resulting from the Northern Ireland (Monitoring Commission etc.) Bill [Lords], it is expedient to authorise such incidental charges to inheritance tax as may arise from granting any relief from tax provided for by the Act. [Derek Twigg.]
  Question agreed to.
  Bill immediately considered in Committee, pursuant to Order [this day].
  [SIR MICHAEL LORD in the Chair]

  NORTHERN IRELAND (MONITORING COMMISSION ETC.) BILL [LORDS] [WAYS AND MEANS]
    Clause 1

      THE MONITORING COMMISSION
      8.55 pm
      Mr. Gregory Campbell: I beg to move amendment No. 64, in page 1, line 4, leave out from 'established' in line 1 to 'to' in line 6.
      The Second Deputy Chairman: With this, it will be convenient to discuss the following:
      Amendment No. 55, in page 1, line 8, leave out from beginning to end of line 11.
      Amendment No. 1, in page 1, line 11, at end insert—
      '(1A) But, notwithstanding the provisions of that agreement, the Monitoring Commission shall consist of two members only, who shall be appointed by Her Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom, and of whom one shall be from Northern Ireland.'.
      Amendment No. 65, in page 1, line 12, at end insert
      '() establish the Monitoring Commission'.
      Amendment No. 66, in page 2, line 21, at end add—
      '(b) The Commission shall be appointed by the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland.'.
      New clause 3—Requisition of Report from Monitoring Commission—
      '.—When requested to do so by any party represented in the Northern Ireland Assembly to make a report on—

      (a) paramilitary activity, or

      (b) whether a Minister or another party in the Assembly is not committed to non-violence and exclusively peaceful and democratic means,

      the Monitoring Commission shall do so within fourteen days.'.
      Mr. Campbell: Amendment No. 64 would restore the rightful role of this, the Parliament of the United Kingdom. As was said on Second Reading, there is a feeling not only among many people in Northern Ireland but among many Northern Ireland Members that that role has been somewhat usurped. Having been raised initially by the hon. Member for Thurrock

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      (Andrew Mackinlay), the issue was then raised by several others. It was felt that Parliament ought to establish the monitoring commission and ensure not only that it has been established but that its composition is appropriate; any further scrutiny could be conducted through the parliamentary process.
      The genesis of the commission's establishment has been dealt with at length today. It is, of course, rooted in the abject failure over the past five and a half years to deal adequately with the problem of having a terrorist-related political party in government, and the inability either to proceed against that terrorist-related party or to remove it from government without using the proverbial sledgehammer to ensure that all the democrats get a sore head as well.
      The problem has been highlighted in the past 12 months by the suspension of the Assembly. The problem has been compounded by the inadequacy of the voting mechanism to remove the terrorist-related party, namely Sinn Fein-IRA, which is obviously regrettable.
      Amendment No. 64 is very similar to amendment No. 1, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for South Antrim (David Burnside). We shall not seek to divide the Committee on amendment 64, in the knowledge that my hon. Friend will do so on amendment No. 1.
      Amendment No. 55 was also referred to on Second Reading. A number of Members mentioned the Bill's apparent inability to deal with an IRA breach. We have witnessed several breaches in the past five years, and many Members have alluded to the fact that if devolution is restored, we could well face several more. Of course, the problem with the independent monitoring commission—amendment No. 55 attempts to address it—is that such breaches will be very difficult to define, and to relate specifically to the Provisional IRA and, consequently, to its political affiliate, Sinn Fein.
      9 pm
      Let us imagine that a security breach occurs, and that the Chief Constable and the security services indicate that, in their opinion, the Provisional IRA is to blame. If the IMC investigates the complaint that would doubtless be levelled—by an Assembly Member or by someone else wishing to complain—vagueness and greyness could well arise, whereby the Provisional IRA's leadership were not told that they in fact sanctioned action against the innocent civilian or security forces member who was targeted.
      On the other hand, there are those of us who believe that if the Bill is not amended in this respect, a fig leaf may remain. Some Unionists could pass the buck for security breaches to the IMC, in the belief that it will be difficult, if not impossible, for the IMC definitively to say that the Provisional IRA was responsible for such an action, that it sanctioned it at an official level and that the following sanctions should apply. Of course, those who would wish to use that fig leaf would then say, "We tried our best. We established the IMC and we left the issue with it, but it has not been sufficiently precise, clear and definitive for the sanctions to be applied." They could then decide to proceed in government with those terrorists, as they have in the past. They could try to
      988
      hold their hands up as if they were clean, yet they would be sitting in government with those who support terror and murder.
      Amendment No. 1 deals with the fact that the monitoring commission ought to consist only of members appointed from within the United Kingdom. In the circumstances, it also seems reasonable that one of the two members appointed be from Northern Ireland. As was debated at some length on Second Reading, the difficulty is that if the Bill is not amended and someone from the Irish Republic is appointed to a position that enables them to have an input into the internal affairs of Northern Ireland, that would constitute a clear breach of Northern Ireland's internal politics. The amendment seeks to rectify that.
      Amendment No. 65 deals with the establishment of the monitoring commission and the principle of parliamentary sovereignty. If the monitoring commission is not established and approved by the UK Parliament, as outlined in the amendment, the charge will be laid that the Irish Republic is exerting an influence that heretofore the people of Northern Ireland have not had to bear.
      Other amendments are consequential. Amendment No. 66 proposes that the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland should appoint the monitoring commission. Again, if that were not the case, we would be in serious breach of what was previously termed the strand 1 position in the run-up to the Belfast agreement.
      New clause 3 deals with a significant omission in the Bill, proposing a specific time frame within which action should be taken by the commission. The new clause specifies "within fourteen days". We preface the provision with the word "shall" do so within that: period. As with previous breaches, we believe that unless action is taken immediately, there will undoubtedly, as in the past few years, be delay and prevarication. The commencement of legal proceedings will then enter the frame and evidently there will be a prolonged delay in dealing with the issue. We know about what happened in Colombia, which has been ongoing for a prolonged period and the issue is likely to continue into the next calendar year, so we want a specific timetable so that the general public can have some confidence that their concerns are being dealt with expeditiously. Failure to do so would lead to the belief that the Government, perhaps even the commission, had tried to sweep the matter under the carpet in the hope that it would not see the light of day.
      I have explained the reasons for our proposed amendments and we hope and expect to receive some support from across the Chamber.
      Mr. Carmichael: I want to put on record succinctly the Liberal Democrat position on the amendments. In our view, they are all essentially wrecking amendments, given the way in which the hon. Member for East Londonderry (Mr. Campbell) and his colleagues voted on Second Reading. It is, of course, perfectly legitimate for them to table wrecking amendments at this stage, but I am afraid that we cannot be party to them.
      Andrew Mackinlay: I am truly bewildered. I listened carefully to what the hon. Member for East Londonderry (Mr. Campbell) said. On the narrow but

      989
      important issue of there being some time scale, I thought that he expressed an entirely reasonable point of view. I am surprised to hear the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Carmichael) describe the measure as a wrecking amendment. It seems eminently sensible and I hope that the Minister will pick up on it.
      Mr. Carmichael: The hon. Gentleman makes a fair point. I was damning all the amendments in the group by association, but that one is an honourable exception. The effect of amendment No. 1 would be to remove the Republic of Ireland completely from the work of the commission, and that cannot be seen as anything other than a wrecking amendment. A number of drafting difficulties also arise. For example, I have tried to put amendment No. 66 in the context of the Bill but I cannot do so.
      David Burnside: I speak in support of amendment No. 1, which is in my name and that of my hon. Friends. It is not a wrecking amendment and it should cause no offence to our colleagues, neighbours and friends in the Irish Republic. Nor should it cause any offence to our allies, the United States of America, whatever Administration are in power. As an Ulster Unionist, I believe that Unionism suffered badly for many years because it did not promote itself with the American Administration and Congress. Nor, indeed, did we argue our cause with the Irish Republic.
      Amendment No. 1 is based on a matter of principle. Our experience in Northern Ireland since the internationalisation that resulted from the 1985 Anglo-Irish agreement—which I mentioned on Second Reading—is that we have been under a form of joint authority that would not be acceptable in any other part of the United Kingdom. We wish to have co-operation from the Irish Republic. Indeed, we wish that we had had much more co-operation during the 30 years of terrorism from the Irish Republic on extradition, on acting against the Provisional IRA and on removing the arms dumps in the Republic, which were contrary to its constitution. We also wish that we had had more support from the US Administration in undermining Noraid and other fundraising for republicanism and terrorism. Some things have changed. Good has come from evil, with the worldwide campaign, after 11 September 2001, against terrorism from all quarters. We support that, and we want the help and support of the US Administration.
      However, it is not right that a representative from either the United States or the Irish Republic should sit on the commission. It should be the sole sovereign responsibility of the United Kingdom Parliament and Government. We have had enough experience of the Anglo-Irish agreement and its implementation in terms of interference in our internal affairs by the Government of the Irish Republic. We also had an international commission on policing, but it did not reflect the views of the majority law-abiding community in Northern Ireland. It was an internationalised commission that, for political reasons and not good, sensible policing reasons, forced through several changes that did not, and do not, have the consent of that majority.
      We wish to divide the House on amendment No. 1. It is an important principle that the Government of United Kingdom, and thus Northern Ireland, has the sole
      990
      responsibility. We do not need more international commissions or representatives from the Irish Republic. We need help, support and co-operation, but not formal participation from either the Irish Republic or the United States.
      Lembit Öpik: Why does the hon. Gentleman think that two people are sufficient for the composition of the commission? Notwithstanding his concerns about the international nature of the body, surely it cannot work practically or effectively with only two members?
      David Burnside: Not being a Liberal Democrat, I have never been a believer in large committees, either in my business or my political life. I have believed that small, concentrated decision-making bodies, providing advice to the Executive, are the best way to run a Government. I have proposed in this House on a number of occasions that a commission should be set up that would be a Committee of this House. It would comprise the Prime Minister, the Leader of the Opposition and the leaders of the Liberal Democrat and Ulster Unionist parties. It would seek advice from the Chief Constable and the General Officer Commanding Northern Ireland. They would give their views on whether Sinn Fein, which is inextricably linked with the IRA, was involved in terrorist activity.
      That would be a much better and much more British form of institution than yet another internationalised body. I believe that the proposed commission will be toothless and ineffective.
      9.15 pm
      Mr. Mallon: I note the content of the amendments and of clause 1. I am astounded by the insular and isolationist approach evident in the remarks of the hon. Member for South Antrim (David Burnside). That is simply an observation.
      When the Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office, the right hon. Member for Warley (Mr. Spellar), replies to the debate, I hope that he will confirm that clause 1 contains no reference, oblique or otherwise, to the functions of the independent commission. In fairness to me, and in the interests of accuracy, that must be put on the record, and the response to the debate will provide the opportunity for that.
      Mr. Trimble: The hon. Member for East Londonderry (Mr. Campbell) suggested that some awful consequences might flow if it was not shown that the monitoring commission was established by this Parliament. I am not sure what the need for that is, as the proposals show that it is being established under the royal prerogative. I should have thought that that was enough to show the clear British ownership of the concept.
      If the amendments are accepted, the proposed monitoring commission will never come into existence, and the procedures that have been discussed and agreed will fall with it. The commitments that have been given about acting in accordance with monitoring reports will disappear into a limbo, and I do not know whether they can be dug out again. If the amendments are carried, the whole idea will disappear into a limbo, as the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Carmichael) noted.

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      I cannot go along all the way with the comments about insularity made by the hon. Member for Newry and Armagh (Mr. Mallon), but I hope that the gentleman sitting to my left, the hon. Member for South Antrim (David Burnside), will reflect on the fact that the problem with which we are dealing is not confined to Northern Ireland. That might be the place where some of the problems are most acute, but they are not confined to Northern Ireland. We know that it extends further afield—indeed, much of the infrastructure of the republican movement is south of the border.
      Unionists have complained about that, year in and year out. They have talked about the need for co-operation, but how can that be achieved if they will not deal with people? To assume that a person nominated by the Irish Government must be that Government's agent is a little fanciful. However, the basic point remains: if one wants co-operation, one needs to speak to people and set up procedures that allow them to have their input. We need access to intelligence in the Republic of Ireland. We also need the co-operation of the relevant agencies in the US, and much reference has been made to events in that hemisphere.
      Before we cut off all the sources of help, it might be worth pausing for consideration. For that reason, I make it clear that we in the Ulster Unionist party cannot support the amendments.
      Mr. Peter Robinson: This set of amendments goes to the heart of the Bill. I believe that it is the most important set that we will deal with in the short time that we have available. I regret to say that each amendment deals with a number of vital issues. For that reason, since the House will not wish—nor will you, Sir Michael, flexible and generous though you always are—to extend us the time for a vote on each, we must choose which is the most important. I wish to speak about several, but it may help Whips and others to know our view that it would be best to divide on amendment No. 1. There is a similarity between that and amendment No. 64, so we will seek to withdraw that and hope to find the Chairman generous enough to allow us to divide on amendment No. 1.
      Amendments Nos. 64 and 1 deal with who runs Northern Ireland and whether it is appropriate for people from other countries to be directly or tangentially involved in its governance. The amendments make it clear that we believe that the commission is a United Kingdom matter and that those involved in decision making should therefore come from the United Kingdom, and from the United Kingdom alone. I do not agree with the right hon. Member for Upper Bann (Mr. Trimble) that in order to have friends around the world one must involve them in the day-to-day operation of our country. That is nonsense. We can be best friends with our neighbours in the Irish Republic and the best friends of the Government and people of the United States without having them dealing with matters directly relating to Northern Ireland. Where assistance can usefully be given, it is appropriate to ask our friends for it, but it should not come with the price of allowing them a role—I might say an interfering role—in the way in which the Province is run.
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      That is all the more important when one considers that the Government of the Irish Republic publicly announce that they speak at meetings with Her Majesty's Government on behalf of the nationalist community in Northern Ireland. They are a partisan player in Northern Ireland matters. Would that there were someone at the table to represent the Unionist community. The Government do not see themselves doing that; they see themselves as neutral. When consultation takes place between the Government of the Irish Republic and the Government of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, one party is partisan in favour of the nationalist community, arguing for and speaking for it, while the other partner claims to be neutral.
      The IMC should, in my view, be an entirely United Kingdom body, appointed by the United Kingdom through Ministers answerable in this House. There should not be one member appointed by the Government of the Irish Republic, and one by both Governments on the recommendation of the United States. That is a major point of principle, and I do not support the internationalisation of the Northern Ireland situation. That was the folly of the Ulster Unionist party. Lord Maginnis—as he now is—was the one who publicly announced for an international commission to take a role in decommissioning matters, thus starting the process of internationalisation.
      Mr. Trimble: The hon. Gentleman refers to internationalisation of matters relating to Northern Ireland. Can he tell me who agreed to the ground rules and the basic concept of the three-stranded talks back in the early 1990s?
      Mr. Robinson: I hope that everyone agreed to the ground rules for the three strands, which clearly said that only the parties in Northern Ireland and the United Kingdom Government should be party to any discussion relating to the internal affairs of Northern Ireland. The Government of the Irish Republic were to be involved in those matters only where the relationship was between Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic. It seems good common sense that if one wants a relationship with the Irish Republic, one should talk to the Irish Republic. That was the argument. That is why we were round the table with the Irish Republic at that strand. It is not internationalising the Northern Ireland situation. It is having a relationship with your neighbour, not bringing them in to take decisions on the internal affairs of Northern Ireland. Sadly, the right hon. Gentleman and his party, or half of it at least, have been responsible for that.
      Other amendments, of which amendment No. 55 is perhaps the most significant, deal with the responsibility of the monitoring commission. Should it have the broad sweep of responsibility—dealing with monitoring behaviour in relation to the pledge to keep politics exclusively peaceful and democratic—or should it be expanded to deal with normalisation, which is a Government matter, and indeed with political issues relating to the pledge of office? Clearly, the latter two are included only because the Government do not want Sinn Fein to be standing out there on its own. That is no good reason to try to bring other people into the process and to expand the role of the monitoring commission.

      993
      Amendment No. 55 would restrict any role that the Government might give a commission to determining whether people are exclusively committed to peaceful and democratic means, which seems appropriate. We would like to vote on all the amendments in the list, but clearly the key issue is encapsulated by amendment No. 1.
      Rev. Ian Paisley: It would be interesting for the Committee to remember that those of us on the Unionist side who were in at the early talks all agreed that strand 1 was a matter for the people of Northern Ireland and the United Kingdom Parliament and Government alone to decide. The south of Ireland had no say in strand 1—we we won that, only because we took a determined stand—although when we went to strand 2, which dealt with issues of neighbourliness between the two parts of Ireland, the Irish Government were there. However, the Irish Government did not like that situation. On every occasion that they could, they insisted that they were the spokesmen for the nationalist people of Northern Ireland.
      Only one body can speak for the people of Northern Ireland, democratically speaking, and that is this Parliament. The Irish Government did not say that they were speaking in the interests of the Irish Republic. They said that they were the spokesmen for the nationalist community. One cannot have that sort of carry-on at such talks. There must be people who speak officially for each of the parties. The time has come to revisit this issue. We must insist that the southern Government have no say in strand 1. It is not their bailiwick: it is that of this Parliament, this Government and the people of Northern Ireland.
      Lord Molyneaux reminded the other place of what a great Prime Minister and leader of the Labour party and the British people, Mr. Wilson, had to say on the subject: that the governance of Northern Ireland is for the people and the Parliament of the United Kingdom. We hold to that.
      9.30 pm
      The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office (Mr. John Spellar): During the early part of this debate, I found myself in some agreement with the Liberal Democrat spokesman, but I have recovered.
      I am not entirely sure which amendments will be dealt with, so I shall try to encompass all of them in my remarks, as several of the issues that were raised overlap. Amendment No. 55 would limit the role of the IMC to reporting on paramilitary activity. It would remove references in clause 1 to normalisation and the pledge of office. That is not acceptable in policy terms, as it undermines the purpose of the Bill; nor does it acknowledge the realities of the situation.
      The agreement carefully provides for reports on three specific matters. The need for reports on paramilitary activity is certainly not in question, but we want and need to go further in order to ensure that there are independent reports on matters that are at the heart of implementing the Belfast agreement. Those reports will help to rebuild trust and confidence. That is our aim.
      Normalisation reports are a crucial part of that process, as is the stability of the democratic institutions. To those who are concerned that the joint declaration
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      sets out a normalisation programme, I point out that it will not begin until the right security environment is achieved. The IMC will have no role in monitoring the programme until notified under article 15 of the agreement.
      Hon. Members have focused on amendment No. 1, which concerns the membership of the commission. The commission will be established by the international agreement published on 5 September and will take effect once it has been signed and ratified by both the British and Irish Governments. It is that agreement, not the Bill, which establishes the commission's membership and functions.
      The international agreement gives effect to the proposals agreed between the Governments at Hillsborough earlier this year, as set out in the monitoring and compliance document published on 1 May. Specifically, the scheme that we are considering today has always envisaged a commission of four members: two appointed by the UK, one appointed by Ireland and one appointed by the two Governments on a nomination from the United States. That flows from the fact that the commission forms part of the arrangements that we are establishing for monitoring and promoting compliance on a range of commitments relating to the full implementation of the Belfast agreement and the restoration of stable and inclusive institutions. That remains the Government's position, so we are unable to agree to the amendment, as it would be incompatible with the requirements of the agreement.
      Amendments Nos. 65 and 66 would make the monitoring commission purely a UK body. They would put the setting up of the commission and the making of appointments to it solely in the hands of the Secretary of State. They would not of themselves amend the provisions of the agreement published on 5 September.
      The hon. Member for South Antrim (David Burnside) said that the amendments were not intended as wrecking. In part, I take his point. However, they would have an effect on the Bill: namely, the creation of a parallel commission. It would be established by the Secretary of State and appointments would be made by him. Later references in the Bill would thus be to that body and not to the one that would be established by the agreement—the Government policy to which the measure gives effect.
      The amendments would seriously undermine our purpose of helping to restore trust and confidence through independent monitoring of paramilitary activity, normalisation and political breaches, so we cannot accept them.
      New clause 3 is unnecessary. We believe that the IMC should be constituted under the international agreement that we propose. That is the purpose of the legislation. Article 6 of the agreement already permits the commission to consider a claim by any party represented in the Assembly that a Minister or any other party in the Assembly is not committed to non-violence or exclusively democratic or peaceful means. That is in line with the terms of the proposed new clause.
      I am aware of the time and realise that the Committee wants to deal with some of the other amendments, so, in summary, we believe that it is right that the commission

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      is constituted on an international basis, for many of the reasons eloquently expressed by the right hon. Member for Upper Bann (Mr. Trimble).
      Mr. Peter Robinson: Before the Minister strays too far from new clause 3, he might like to comment on timetabling, which is one of its elements. Many of us are concerned that the Bill would allow considerable delay and that weeks or months could pass while a serious issue confronted the Assembly. What is the Government's view as to the length of time that the commission should take when considering such matters?
      Mr. Spellar: I am sorry—I had hoped to make progress, but I will now have to refer to new clause 3 in slightly more detail.
      The current provisions permit the consideration of claims where the allegation is that a Minister has failed to observe any pledge of office set out in the agreement or that a party has not committed its members who are or may be Ministers to doing so. Those in favour of the amendments and new clause 3 would not allow the commission such a remit. We believe that it is essential to cover such matters. [Interruption.] I shall deal with timing in a second. The operation of lawfully constituted democratic institutions in good faith is essential to partnership government, and so to peace and stability in Northern Ireland.
      The international agreement puts the commission on a fixed time scale. It has to report at six-monthly intervals. The two Governments jointly may also ask it to make other reports. In principle, we believe that the reporting cycle envisaged by the agreement is correct. Consideration of paramilitary activity across the board, as opposed to the affairs of individuals or a political party, may require a great deal of evidence to be considered.
      New clause 3 would render proper reporting impractical, by giving any party the right to commission such reports as often as it saw fit. We believe that a workable, practical timetable has been outlined that will not lead to endless delay. Equally, the commission will not be pressed into ducking and diving between a number of different issues, so it will be able to put in the sustained work that is necessary.
      On whether the commission should be placed on an international basis, we believe that it should have a remit to consider not only the commitment to non-violence—absolutely vital though that is, for all the reasons that have been given by hon. Members tonight—but other threats to the stable operation of the institutions.
      The commission should report regularly on paramilitary activity. Subject to that, we believe that it is for the commission itself to judge how long it is necessary to take to evaluate properly and to reach conclusions, and it will obviously want to do so as expeditiously as possible to maintain trust and confidence. Obviously, undue delay would militate against that. For the same reasons, the commission must not produce superficial or insufficiently investigated reports. It must be able to judge in those matters. Accordingly, we believe that new clause 3 is
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      misconceived, and we cannot support it. If Opposition Members persist in wishing to press the matter to a Division, I will ask my hon. Friends to oppose them in the Lobby.
      Mr. Gregory Campbell: I wish to respond briefly, as I am anxious about the passage of time. A number of substantive points were made by hon. Members who spoke in favour of these amendments, but of course, the right hon. Member for Upper Bann (Mr. Trimble) was not one of them, which would not surprise most of us. He suggested on a couple of occasions that the entire concept would fall—I think that that was the phrase he used—if these amendments were agreed to. When we align that with some of the statements and references that we have just heard the Minister make, it would appear that the substance behind the IMC seems to have been agreed in advance, that any amendment is likely to be futile and that whatever deal has been arrived at is one of sum and substance.
      The right hon. Member for Upper Bann suggests that if we tinker with the proposals at all, they will fall. I do not know whether that is because the entire Bill has been discussed between himself and the hon. Member for Belfast, West (Mr. Adams), who also happens to sit on the IRA army council, and agreed with him, and we will have to see whether that is coloured by the public protestations by Sinn Fein about opposition and non-co-operation with the IMC.
      The other issue that leaves us somewhat lacking in information is the Minister's response to the timing. Under new clause 3, we attempted to try to tie down the issues so that the matter would be responded to and dealt with at a brief juncture. He now tells us that there will be a report by the IMC at six-monthly intervals. Given the precedents established by the decommissioning body in Northern Ireland—
      Mr. Spellar: May I clarify the matter for the hon. Gentleman? I apologise if I had not made the position clear. The international agreement, as I said, puts the commission on a fixed time scale to report at six-monthly intervals. The two Governments may also jointly ask it to make other reports.
      Mr. Campbell: I thank the Minister for that. The two Governments indeed may do so. We will wait and see whether there are any reports that do not amount to a string of beans in between the six-monthly intervals. The issue on which I wanted to elaborate slightly, however, was that the precedents are not good in that we have what amounts to an international decommissioning commission in Northern Ireland, which has been in operation for a significant period. It has not exactly been overburdened with work—that is being polite and very kind. In fact, it has cost millions of pounds but it has done virtually nothing. It reports very infrequently. Will the mighty international commission that we are being asked to endorse, without any amendments, it appears, be any more definitive? Will it take any more substantive action, or will it be a case yet again of an attempt to fudge an issue and sweep it under the carpet in an endeavour to try to get the show back on the road and to get devolution restored in the hope that eventually people will be worn down and accept the inevitable, as some people would try to present it?

      997
      To assist the Minister, I will repeat what I and some of my colleagues said: because of amendment No. 1 being similar in substance to amendment No. 64, we will not pursue amendment No. 64 to a Division. On that basis, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
      Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
      Amendment proposed: No. 1, in clause 1, page 1, line 11, at end insert—
      '(1A) But, notwithstanding the provisions of that agreement, the Monitoring Commission shall consist of two members only, who shall be appointed by Her Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom, and of whom one shall be from Northern Ireland.'.—[David Burnside.]
      Question put, That the amendment be made:—
      The Committee divided: Ayes 7, Noes 321.

      Division No. 318]

      [9:43 pm

      AYES

      Burnside, David

      Robinson, Mrs Iris (Strangford)

      Dodds, Nigel

      Robinson, Peter (Belfast E)

      Donaldson, Jeffrey M.

      Tellers for the Ayes:

      Hunter, Andrew

      Mr. Gregory Campbell and

      Paisley, Rev. Ian

      Rev. Martin Smyth

      NOES

      Adams, Irene (Paisley N)

      Casale, Roger

      Ainger, Nick

      Caton, Martin

      Ainsworth, Bob (Cov'try NE)

      Cawsey, Ian (Brigg)

      Alexander, Douglas

      Challen, Colin

      Allen, Graham

      Chapman, Ben (Wirral S)

      Amess, David

      Chaytor, David

      Anderson, Janet (Rossendale & Darwen)

      Chope, Christopher

      Clark, Paul (Gillingham)

      Armstrong, rh Ms Hilary

      Clarke, rh Tom (Coatbridge & Chryston)

      Atherton, Ms Candy

      Atkins, Charlotte

      Clarke, Tony (Northampton S)

      Atkinson, David (Bour?mth E)

      Coaker, Vernon

      Austin, John

      Coffey, Ms Ann

      Bacon, Richard

      Cohen, Harry

      Bailey, Adrian

      Colman, Tony

      Barnes, Harry

      Connarty, Michael

      Baron, John (Billericay)

      Cook, rh Robin (Livingston)

      Bayley, Hugh

      Cotter, Brian

      Beggs, Roy (E Antrim)

      Cousins, Jim

      Bleith, rh A. J.

      Cranston, Ross

      Benton, Joe (Bootle)

      Cruddas, Jon

      Berry, Roger

      Cryer, Ann (Keighley)

      Best, Harold

      Cryer, John (Hornchurch)

      Blackman, Liz

      Cunningham, Jim (Coventry S)

      Borrow, David

      Curtis-Thomas, Mrs Claire

      Boswell, Tim

      Davey, Edward (Kingston)

      Bottomley, Peter (Worthing W)

      Davey, Valerie (Bristol W)

      Bottomley, rh Virginia (SW Surrey)

      Davidson, Ian

      Davies, rh Denzil (Llanelli)

      Bradley, Peter (The Wrekin)

      Davies, Quentin (Grantham & Stamford)

      Bradshaw, Ben

      Brazier, Julian

      Davis, rh David (Haltemprice & Howden)

      Brown, rh Nicholas (Newcastle E Wallsend)

      Dawson, Hilton

      Browne, Desmond

      Dean, Mrs Janet

      Burden, Richard

      Denham, rh John

      Burgon, Colin

      Dismore, Andrew

      Burnett, John

      Djanogly, Jonathan

      Burnham, Andy

      Dobbin, Jim (Heywood)

      Butterfill, John

      Dobson, rh Frank

      Byers, rh Stephen

      Donohoe, Brian H.

      Cameron, David

      Dorrell, rh Stephen

      Campbell, Alan (Tynemouth)

      Doughty, Sue

      Campbell, Mrs Anne (C'bridge)

      Dowd, Jim (Lewisham W)

      Campbell, Ronnie (Blyth V)

      Duncan, Alan (Rutland)

      Carmichael, Alistair

      Duncan, Peter (Galloway)

      998

      Eagle, Maria (L'pool Garston)

      Kennedy, Jane (Wavertree)

      Edwards, Huw

      Key, Robert (Salisbury)

      Efford, Clive

      Khabra, Piara S.

      Ennis, Jeff (Barnsley E)

      Kidney, David

      Etherington, Bill

      Kilfoyle, Peter

      Ewing, Annabelle

      King, Andy (Rugby)

      Fabricant, Michael

      King, Ms Oona (Bethnal Green & Bow)

      Fallon, Michael

      Farrelly, Paul

      Kirkbride, Miss Julie

      Field, rh Frank (Birkenhead)

      Kumar, Dr. Ashok

      Field, Mark (Cities of London & Westminster)

      Ladyman, Dr. Stephen

      Laing, Mrs Eleanor

      Fisher, Mark

      Lait, Mrs Jacqui

      Fitzsimons, Mrs Lorna

      Lamb, Norman

      Flint, Caroline

      Lansley, Andrew

      Flook, Adrian

      Lazarowicz, Mark

      Flynn, Paul (Newport W)

      Lepper, David

      Forth, rh Eric

      Leslie, Christopher

      Foster, rh Derek

      Letwin, rh Oliver

      Foster, Michael (Worcester)

      Levitt, Tom (High Peak)

      Foster, Michael Jabez (Hastings & Rye)

      Lewis, Dr. Julian (New Forest E)

      Liddell-Grainger, Ian

      Foulkes, rh George

      Lidington, David

      Francis, Dr. Hywel

      Llwyd, Elfyn

      Garnier, Edward

      Love, Andrew

      Gerrard, Neil

      Luff, Peter (M-Worcs)

      Gibson, Dr. Ian

      Luke, Iain (Dundee E)

      Gidley, Sandra

      McAvoy, Thomas

      Gilroy, Linda

      McCabe, Stephen

      Goggins, Paul

      McCafferty, Chris

      Goodman, Paul

      McDonagh, Siobhain

      Green, Matthew (Ludlow)

      MacDonald, Calum

      Grieve, Dominic

      McDonnell, John

      Griffiths, Jane (Reading E)

      McFall, John

      Hain, rh Peter

      McIsaac, Shona

      Hall, Mike (Weaver Vale)

      Mackay, rh Andrew

      Hammond, Philip

      McKechin, Ann

      Hanson, David

      McKenna, Rosemary

      Harris, Tom (Glasgow Cathcart)

      Mackinlay, Andrew

      Havard, Dai (Merthyr Tydfil & Rhymney)

      McNulty, Tony

      MacShane, Denis

      Heald, Oliver

      Mactaggart, Fiona

      Healey, John

      McWalter, Tony

      Heath, David

      Mallaber, Judy

      Henderson, Ivan (Harwich)

      Mendelson, rh Peter

      Hendrick, Mark

      Mann, John (Bassetlaw)

      Hendry, Charles

      Marsden, Gordon (Blackpool S)

      Heppell, John

      Marshall, David (Glasgow Shettleston)

      Hermon, Lady

      Hesford, Stephen

      Marshall, Jim (Leicester S)

      Hill, Keith (Streatham)

      Marshall-Andrews, Robert

      Hinchliffe, David

      Martlew, Eric

      Hoban, Mark (Fareham)

      Mercer, Patrick

      Hope, Phil (Corby)

      Michael, rh Alun

      Hopkins, Kelvin

      Milburn, rh Alan

      Howarth, rh Alan (Newport E)

      Miller, Andrew

      Howarth, George (Knowsley N & Sefton E)

      Mitchell, Andrew (Sutton Coldfield)

      Hughes, Beverley (Stretford & Urmston)

      Moffatt, Laura

      Morley, Elliot

      Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)

      Morris, rh Estelle

      Humble, Mrs Joan

      Mullin, Chris

      Hurst, Alan (Braintree)

      Murphy, rh Paul (Torfaen)

      Iddon, Dr. Brian

      Norman, Archie

      Irranca-Davies, Huw

      Norris, Dan (Wansdyke)

      Jack, rh Michael

      O'Brien, Bill (Normanton)

      Jackson, Glenda (Hampstead & Highgate)

      O'Brien, Stephen (Eddisbury)

      Öpik, Lembit

      Jenkin, Bernard

      Osborne, George (Tatton)

      Jenkins, Brian

      Osborne, Sandra (Ayr)

      Johnson, Miss Melanie (Welwyn Hatfield)

      Paice, James

      Palmer, Dr. Nick

      Jones, Lynne (Selly Oak)

      Pearson, Ian

      Jones, Martyn (Clwyd S)

      Perham, Linda

      Kaufman, rh Gerald

      Pickles, Eric

      Keeble, Ms Sally

      Pickthall, Colin

      999

      Pike, Peter (Burnley)

      Strang, rh Dr. Gavin

      Plaskitt, James

      Swire, Hugo (E Devon)

      Pollard, Kerry

      Syms, Robert

      Pound, Stephen

      Taylor, David (NW Leics)

      Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)

      Taylor, Ian (Esher)

      Primarolo, rh Dawn

      Taylor, John (Solihull)

      Prisk, Mark (Hertford)

      Thomas, Gareth (Clwyd W)

      Prosser, Gwyn

      Thomas, Simon (Ceredigion)

      Purchase, Ken

      Thurso, John

      Quinn, Lawrie

      Todd, Mark (S Derbyshire)

      Rammell, Bill

      Tonge, Dr. Jenny

      Rapson, Syd (Portsmouth N)

      Touhig, Don (Islwyn)

      Raynsford, rh Nick

      Tredinnick, David

      Reed, Andy (Loughborough)

      Trickett, Jon

      Robathan, Andrew

      Trimble, rh David

      Robertson, John (Glasgow Anniesland)

      Truswell, Paul

      Turner, Andrew (Isle of Wight)

      Rosindell, Andrew

      Turner, Dennis (Wolverh'ton SE)

      Ross Ernie (Dundee W)

      Turner, Dr. Desmond (Brighton Kemptown)

      Ruffley, David

      Russell, Bob (Colchester)

      Turner, Neil (Wigan)

      Salmond, Alex

      Twigg, Derek (Halton)

      Salter, Martin

      Tynan, Bill (Hamilton S)

      Savidge Malcolm,

      Vaz, Keith (Leicester E)

      Sawford, Phil

      Vis, Dr. Rudi

      Sedgemore, Brian

      Ward, Claire

      Shephard, rh Mrs Gillian

      Wareing, Robert N.

      Shepherd, Richard

      Watson, Tom (W Bromwich E)

      Simmonds, Mark

      Watts, David

      Simon, Siôn (B'ham Erdington)

      Webb, Steve (Northavon)

      Simpson, Alan (Nottingham S)

      White, Brian

      Simpson, Keith (M-Norfolk)

      Whitehead, Dr. Alan

      Singh, Marsha

      Whittingdale, John

      Wiggin, Bill

      Skinner, Dennis

      Williams, rh Alan (Swansea W)

      Smith, rh Andrew (Oxford E)

      Williams, Betty (Conwy)

      Smith, Jacqui (Redditch)

      Wills, Michael

      Smith, John (Glamorgan)

      Winnick, David

      Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)

      Wishart, Pete

      Smith, Sir Robert (W Ab'd'ns & Kincardine)

      Wood, Mike (Batley)

      Woolas, Phil

      Soley, Clive

      Wray, James (Glasgow Baillieston)

      Spellar, rh John

      Spelman, Mrs Caroline

      Wright, Anthony D. (Gt Yarmouth)

      Spink, Bob (Castle Point)

      Spring, Richard

      Wright, David (Telford)

      Squire, Rachel

      Wright Tony (Cannock)

      Stanley, rh Sir John

      Young, rh Sir George

      Starkey, Dr. Phyllis

      Stevenson, George

      Tellers for the Noes:

      Stewart, David (Inverness E & Lochaber)

      Mr. Fraser Kemp and Gillian Merron

      Question accordingly negatived.
      Motion made, and Question put, That the clause stand part of the Bill:—
      The Committee divided: Ayes 330, Noes 7.

      Division No. 319]

      [9:57 pm

      AYES

      Adams, Irene (Paisley N)

      Barnes, Harry

      Ainger, Nick

      Baron, John (Billericay)

      Ainsworth, Bob (Cov'try NE)

      Bayley, Hugh

      Alexander, Douglas

      Beggs, Roy (E Antrim)

      Allen, Graham

      Beith, rh A. J.

      Amess, David

      Benton, Joe (Bootle)

      Anderson, Janet (Rossendale & Darwen)

      Berry, Roger

      Best, Harold

      Armstrong, rh Ms Hilary

      Blackman, Liz

      Atherton, Ms Candy

      Blears, Ms Hazel

      Atkins, Charlotte

      Borrow, David

      Atkinson, David (Bour'mth E)

      Boswell, Tim

      Austin, John

      Bottomley, Peter (Worthing W)

      Bacon, Richard

      Bottomley, rh Virginia (SW Surrey)

      Bailey, Adrian

      1000

      Bradley, Peter (The Wrekin)

      Field, Mark (Cities of London & Westminster)

      Bradshaw, Ben

      Brazier, Julian

      Fisher, Mark

      Brown, rh Nicholas (Newcastle E Wallsend)

      Fitzsimons, Mrs Lorna

      Flint Caroline

      Browne, Desmond

      Flook, Adrian

      Burden, Richard

      Flynn, Paul (Newport W)

      Burgon, Colin

      Forth, rh Eric

      Burnett, John

      Foster, rh Derek

      Burnham, Andy

      Foster, Michael (Worcester)

      Butterfill, John

      Foster, Michael Jabez (Hastings & Rye)

      Byers, rh Stephen

      Cairns, David

      Foulkes, rh George

      Cameron, David

      Francis, Dr. Hywel

      Campbell, Alan (Tynemouth)

      Garnier, Edward

      Campbell, Mrs Anne (C'bridge)

      Gerrard, Neil

      Campbell, Ronnie (Blyth V)

      Gibson, Dr. Ian

      Carmichael, Alistair

      Gidley, Sandra

      Casale, Roger

      Gilroy, Linda

      Cash, William

      Goggins, Paul

      Caton, Martin

      Goodman, Paul

      Cawsey, Ian (Brigg)

      Green, Matthew (Ludlow)

      Challen, Colin

      Grieve, Dominic

      Chapman, Ben (Wirral S)

      Griffiths, Jane (Reading E)

      Chaytor, David

      Hain, rh Peter

      Clark, Paul (Gillingham)

      Hall, Mike (Weaver Vale)

      Clarke, rh Tom (Coatbridge & Chryston)

      Hammond, Philip

      Hanson, David

      Clarke, Tony (Northampton S)

      Harris, Tom (Glasgow Cathcart)

      Coaker, Vernon

      Havard, Dai (Merthyr Tydfil & Rhymney)

      Coffey, Ms Ann

      Cohen, Harry

      Hayes, John (S Holland)

      Colman, Tony

      Heald, Oliver

      Connarty, Michael

      Healey, John

      Cook, rh Robin (Livingston)

      Heath, David

      Cotter, Brian

      Henderson, Ivan (Harwich)

      Cousins, Jim

      Hendrick, Mark

      Cox, Tom (Tooting)

      Hendry, Charles

      Cranston, Ross

      Heppell, John

      Cruddas, Jon

      Hermon, Lady

      Cryer, Ann (Keighley)

      Hesford, Stephen

      Cryer, John (Hornchurch)

      Hill, rh Keith (Streatham)

      Cunningham, Jim (Coventry S)

      Hinchliffe, David

      Curtis-Thomas, Mrs Claire

      Hoban, Mark (Fareham)

      Davey, Edward (Kingston)

      Hope, Phil (Corby)

      Davey, Valerie (Bristol W)

      Hopkins, Kelvin

      Davidson, Ian

      Howarth, rh Alan (Newport E)

      Davies, rh Denzil (Llanelli)

      Howarth, George (Knowsley N & Sefton E)

      Davies, Quentin (Grantham & Stamford)

      Hughes, Beverley (Stretford & Urmston)

      Davis, rh David (Haltemprice & Howden)

      Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)

      Dawson, Hilton

      Humble, Mrs Joan

      Dean, Mrs Janet

      Hurst, Alan (Braintree)

      Denham, rh John

      Iddon, Dr. Brian

      Dismore, Andrew

      Irranca-Davies, Huw

      Djanogly, Jonathan

      Jack, rh Michael

      Dobbin, Jim (Heywood)

      Jackson, Glenda (Hampstead & Highgate)

      Dobson, rh Frank

      Donohoe, Brian H.

      Jenkin, Bernard

      Doran, Frank

      Jenkins, Brian

      Dorrell, rh Stephen

      Jones, Lynne (Selly Oak)

      Doughty, Sue

      Jones, Martyn (Clwyd S)

      Dowd, Jim (Lewisham W)

      Kaufman, rh Gerald

      Duncan, Alan (Rutland)

      Keeble, Ms Sally

      Duncan, Peter (Galloway)

      Kennedy, rh Jane (Wavertree)

      Eagle, Maria (L'pool Garston)

      Key, Robert (Salisbury)

      Edwards, Huw

      Khabra, Piara S.

      Efford, Clive

      Kidney, David

      Ennis, Jeff (Barnsley E)

      Kilfoyle, Peter

      Etherington, Bill

      King, Andy (Rugby)

      Ewing, Annabelle

      King, Ms Oona (Bethnal Green & Bow)

      Fabricant, Michael

      Fallon, Michael

      Kirkbride, Miss Julie

      Farrelly, Paul

      Kumar, Dr. Ashok

      Field, rh Frank (Birkenhead)

      Ladyman, Dr. Stephen

      1001

      L.ait, Mrs Jacqui

      Purchase, Ken

      L.amb, Norman

      Quinn, Lawrie

      L.ansley, Andrew

      Rammell, Bill

      L.azarowicz, Mark

      Rapson, Syd (Portsmouth N)

      L.epper, David

      Raynsford, rh Nick

      L.eslie, Christopher

      Reed, Andy (Loughborough)

      L.evitt, Tom (High Peak)

      Rendel, David

      L.ewis, Dr. Julian (New Forest E)

      Robathan, Andrew

      L.iddell-Grainger, Ian

      Robertson, John (Glasgow Anniesland)

      L.idington, David

      L.lwyd, Elfyn

      Rosindell, Andrew

      L.ove, Andrew

      Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)

      Luff, Peter (M-Worcs)

      Ruffley, David

      L.uke, Iain (Dundee E)

      Russell, Bob (Colchester)

      McAvoy, Thomas

      Salmond, Alex

      McCabe, Stephen

      Salter, Martin

      McCafferty, Chris

      Savidge, Malcolm

      McDonagh, Siobhain

      Sawford, Phil

      MacDonald, Calum

      Sedgemore, Brian

      McFall, John

      Shephard, rh Mrs Gillian

      McGuire, Mrs Anne

      Shepherd, Richard

      McIsaac, Shona

      Sheridan, Jim

      Mackay, rh Andrew

      Simmonds, Mark

      McKechin, Ann

      Simon, Siôn (B'ham Erdington)

      McKenna, Rosemary

      Simpson, Alan (Nottingham S)

      Mackinlay, Andrew

      Simpson, Keith (M-Norfolk)

      McNulty, Tony

      Singh, Marsha

      Mactaggart, Fiona

      Skinner, Dennis

      McWalter, Tony

      Smith, rh Andrew (Oxford E)

      Mallaber, Judy

      Smith, rh Jacqui (Redditch)

      Mandelson, rh Peter

      Smith, John (Glamorgan)

      Mann, John (Bassetlaw)

      Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)

      Marsden, Gordon (Blackpool S)

      Smith, Sir Robert (W Ab'd'ns & Kincardine)

      Marshall, David (Glasgow Shettleston)

      Soley, Clive

      Marshall, Jim (Leicester S)

      Spellar, rh John

      Marshall-Andrews, Robert

      Spelman, Mrs Caroline

      Martlew, Eric

      Spink, Bob (Castle Point)

      Maude, rh Francis

      Spring, Richard

      Mercer, Patrick

      Squire, Rachel

      Michael, rh Alun

      Stanley, rh Sir John

      Milburn, rh Alan

      Starkey, Dr. Phyllis

      Miller, Andrew

      Stevenson, George

      Mitchell, Andrew (Sutton Coldfield)

      Stewart, David (Inverness E & Lochaber)

      Moffatt, Laura

      Strang, rh Dr. Gavin

      Morley, Elliot

      Sutcliffe, Gerry

      Morris, rh Estelle

      Swire, Hugo (E Devon)

      Mullin, Chris

      Syms, Robert

      Murphy, Jim (Eastwood)

      Taylor, David (NW Leics)

      Murphy, rh Paul (Torfaen)

      Taylor, Ian (Esher)

      Norman, Archie

      Taylor, John (Solihull)

      Norris, Dan (Wansdyke)

      Taylor, Sir Teddy

      O'Brien, Bill (Normanton)

      Thomas, Gareth (Clwyd W)

      O'Brien, Stephen (Eddisbury)

      Thomas, Simon (Ceredigion)

      Öpik, Lembit

      Thurso, John

      Osborne, George (Tatton)

      Todd, Mark (S Derbyshire)

      Osborne, Sandra (Ayr)

      Tonge, Dr. Jenny

      Paice, James

      Touhig, Don (Islwyn)

      Palmer, Dr. Nick

      Tredinnick, David

      Pearson, Ian

      Trickett, Jon

      Perham, Linda

      Trimble, rh David

      Picking, Anne

      Truswell, Paul

      Pickles, Eric

      Turner, Andrew (Isle of Wight)

      Pickthall, Colin

      Turner, Dennis (Wolyerh'ton SE)

      Pike, Peter (Burnley)

      Turner, Dr. Desmond (Brighton Kemptown)

      Plaskitt, James

      Pollard, Kerry

      Turner, Neil (Wigan)

      Pope, Greg (Hyndburn)

      Twigg, Derek (Halton)

      Pound, Stephen

      Tynan, Bill (Hamilton S)

      Prentice, Ms Bridget (Lewisham E)

      Vaz, Keith (Leicester E)

      Vis, Dr. Rudi

      Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)

      Ward, Claire

      Primarolo, rh Dawn

      Watson, Tom (W Bromwich E)

      Prisk, Mark (Hertford)

      Watts, David

      Prosser, Gwyn

      Webb, Steve (Northavon)

      1002

      White, Brian

      Wray, James (Glasgow Baillieston)

      Whitehead, Dr. Alan

      Whittingdale, John

      Wright, Anthony D. (Gt Yarmouth)

      Wiggin, Bill

      Williams, rh Alan (Swansea W)

      Wright, David (Telford)

      Williams, Betty (Conwy)

      Wright, Tony (Cannock)

      Wills, Michael

      Young, rh Sir George

      Winnick, David

      Wishart, Pete

      Tellers for the Ayes:

      Wood, Mike (Batley)

      Gillian Merron and

      Woolas, Phil

      Mr. Fraser Kemp

      NOES

      Campbell, Gregory (E Lond'y)

      Robinson, Peter (Belfast E)

      Dodds, Nigel

      Smyth, Rev. Martin (Belfast S)

      Donaldson, Jeffrey M.

      Tellers for the Noes:

      Hunter, Andrew

      Mrs. Iris Robinson and

      Paisley, Rev. Ian

      David Burnside

      Question accordingly agreed to.
      Clause 1 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
      Clauses 2 and 3 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

      RESOLUTIONS ABOUT EXCLUSION
      Andrew Mackinlay: I beg to move amendment No. 22, in page 3, line 20, at end insert—
      '(6A) In subsection (5) (motion for resolution not to be moved unless certain conditions are satisfied), for "Presiding Officer in pursuance of a notice" there is substituted "Secretary of State".'.
      The First Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means (Sylvia Heal): With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:
      Amendment No. 23, in page 3, line 23, leave out from 'he' to 'move' in line 24 and insert
      'may appear before the Assembly and'.
      Amendment No. 67, in page 3, line 43, at end insert—
      '(7A) Where a recommendation has been made by the Commission mentioned in section 1 of the Northern Ireland (Monitoring Commission) Act 2003, the Secretary of State shall within seven days of receiving the recommendation serve a notice on the Presiding Officer requiring him to move a motion for such a resolution.'.
      Amendment No. 68, in clause 7, page 6, line 20, at end insert—
      '(7A) Where a recommendation has been made by the Commission mentioned in section 1 of the Northern Ireland (Monitoring Commission) Act 2003, the Secretary of State shall within seven days of receiving the recommendation serve a notice on the Presiding Officer requiring him to move a motion for such a resolution.'.
      Amendment No. 24, in page 7, line 16, leave out from 'the' to end and insert 'Secretary of State'.
      Amendment No. 25, in page 7, line 19, leave out from 'he' to 'move' in line 20 and insert
      'may appear before the Assembly and'.
      Amendment No. 26, in clause 8, page 10, line 10, leave out from 'the' to end and insert 'Secretary of State'.
      Amendment No. 27, in page 10, line 13, leave out from 'he' to 'move' in line 14 and insert
      'may appear before the Assembly and'.
      Amendment No. 28, in clause 9, page 12, line 17, leave out from 'the' to end and insert 'Secretary of State'.

      1003
      Amendment No. 29, in page 12, line 20, leave out from 'he' to 'move' in line 21 and insert
      `may appear before the Assembly and'.
      Amendment No. 69, in page 12, line 22, at end insert—
      `(3A) Where a recommendation has been made by the Commission mentioned in section 1 of the Northern Ireland (Monitoring Commission) Act 2003, the Secretary of State shall within seven days of receiving the recommendation serve a notice on the Presiding Officer requiring him to move a motion for such a resolution.'.
      New clause 4—Requirement for early debate where notice served by Secretary of State—
      `.—Where the Secretary of State has served a notice under section 30(6), section 47A(7) or section 51A(6) of the Northern Ireland Act 1998 the Assembly shall debate such a motion within 7 days.'.
      Andrew Mackinlay: I want to speak to the series of amendments tabled in my name. Their kernel is encapsulated in amendments Nos. 22 and 23.
      As the Bill stands, if the Secretary of State has not been able to persuade the Northern Ireland Assembly to put in train the exclusion of a Minister from the Executive, he has the option and power to take the initiative. In listening to this evening's debates and thinking about the Bill, I have increasingly felt that much of what it deals with will not happen anyway. I preface my remarks with that observation because we have almost been getting into an academic exercise. However, I am not the author of the Bill and I believe that we need to conduct proper scrutiny.
      The Bill proposes that, in extremis, when the First Minister and his deputy are unable to take the initiative by going to the Assembly and obtaining cross-party and cross-community agreement to the exclusion of a Minister, the Secretary of State can—this is the point that I invite the Committee to consider—instruct the presiding officer of the Assembly to table a motion. That is absurd. In the likely event of such circumstances arising, it would be much better and in the interests of everybody concerned for the Secretary of State to attend the Assembly and speak to the motion himself. That is what my amendments seek to achieve.
      First, it is part of the rules of natural justice that people should be able to face their traducers and probe the reasons for any action against them. Secondly, I invite the Committee to consider this point: if we are in such a critical situation in which there is a paralysis, but the Secretary of State finds it essential that a Minister should be excluded, it will be in his interests to marshal all his advocacy and oratorical skills to persuade the paralysed Assembly—by definition, it would be paralysed—to take the necessary action.
      I do not want to labour the point, but it is nonsense that the presiding officer should be the instrument or vehicle for these matters. Clearly, the legislation as it stands implies that the presiding officer would move the motion formally. If I am wrong, however, the presiding officer will be put in an invidious position, especially as he or she can, under existing legislation, be appointed by the Secretary of State and will not necessarily command
      1004
      widespread support in the Assembly. It seems crazy to introduce a formulation whereby the presiding officer will table the motion to exclude a Minister.
      Mr. Dodds: In seeking to require that the Secretary of State come to the Assembly in person to table the motion, does the hon. Gentleman intend that he should be subject to questions? Obviously, the presiding officer would not be in such a position. Does he think that such questioning would be helpful in elucidating the Government's position in such an eventuality?
      10.15 pm
      Andrew Mackinlay: Absolutely. Let us suppose that, in the absence of the Secretary of State, the presiding officer comes along and tells the Assembly, "I am formally instructed to move this motion." Presumably, that would fall on deaf ears if the Assembly had not already been persuaded, or was not acting on its own initiative. My amendment No. 23 provides for the Secretary of State to argue his case before the Assembly. He would be subject to questioning, and would be able to marshal all his energies to persuade the Assembly that exclusion was crucial to the Northern Ireland political process.
      Mr. Carmichael: I accept what the hon. Gentleman says about the invidious position in which the Bill places the presiding officer, but I am not entirely persuaded that his suggested solution is the best. I understand that the Secretary of State currently has no speaking rights in the Assembly, and amendment of its standing orders would be necessary for him to acquire them. I feel that, by acting through the House of Commons, the hon. Gentleman would interfere with the Assembly's integrity. Surely it is every legislature's right to determine its own standing orders.
      Andrew Mackinlay: That is an interesting point. We need to distinguish between a devolved and a subordinate Assembly or legislature. Whether we like it or not, painful though it may be, the Northern Ireland Assembly—unlike the Scottish Parliament and, to an extent, the Welsh Assembly—is by definition a subordinate legislature.
      We are talking about mechanisms to exclude Ministers who are answerable to the Northern Ireland Assembly. I did not write the provision allowing the Secretary of State to instruct the presiding officer to move a motion to exclude them. If my amendment were accepted, the question of standing orders would become academic.
      Mr. Mallon: The hon. Gentleman may not be giving due consideration to two points. First, in his opening remarks, the Secretary of State made the connection between the proposal as it stands and the agreement setting up the entire political process. That cannot be dealt with arbitrarily, although that is what the Bill effectively does. Secondly, the hon. Gentleman said that the Secretary of State should go and speak to the Assembly. One assumes that he will give the Assembly information. Can we imagine a Secretary of State who cannot divulge intelligence and information that he possesses being able to address an Assembly or answer

      1005
      its questions? Such an arrangement would be dangerous for the Secretary of State, and I cannot imagine any Secretary of State agreeing to be put in such a position.
      Andrew Mackinlay: The hon. Gentleman says that the Secretary of State might not be able to divulge information to the legislature. Surely it would be 10 times worse for him to lob a letter through the letterbox and tell the presiding officer to read it out. Not only is that an insult, it would carry no clout whatever. In the extraordinary circumstances in which the Secretary of State could not get the First Minister or the Deputy First Minister to take the initiative, and in which it was impossible to guarantee a majority in the voting system of the Chamber, the Secretary of State might well think he could swing it. Having done his arithmetic, he might think that the voting could be extremely narrow.
      Indeed, I can foresee circumstances in which the voting could be very close; it could come down to one or two votes. He might be in a position to persuade the legislature to take that initiative.
      Lembit Öpik: This is a very interesting point, not least because it tests the Assembly's status. Given that we are trying to normalise the situation, surely the more that we can ensure that the Assembly conducts such matters itself—even with consultation between, say, the Secretary of State and the presiding officer—the better.
      On the presiding officer's having trouble, even Martin Luther King and Gandhi—and, indeed, the current Secretary of State—who had all the charisma in the world would find it difficult simply to go in and achieve the outcome that the hon. Gentleman suggests, not least because doing so would be regarded as interference by the very people who are resisting the actions of the presiding officer.
      Andrew Mackinlay: I do not want to labour the point, but we are talking about an in extremis situation. The Bill as drafted deals with the situation in which the Secretary of State tells the Northern Ireland Assembly that it must consider the motion, but does so—I am not being flippant—by letter. That is nonsense. If it is so imperative that that should happen, surely it is in everyone's interests that he appear alongside the presiding officer in that lovely chamber, state his case and respond to questions. Inevitably, there would be a wider audience, including a television audience. He might well legitimately take the opportunity to appeal to that audience, to give legitimacy to what would be a very grave act.
      Mr. Iain Luke: No one doubts the sincerity of my hon. Friend's suggestions. Following on from the point made during the previous intervention, the question of the Executive entering the legislature smacks of Charles I entering the House of Commons and asking for Members to be removed. There is a fine line between what the Executive can do and what the legislature's approach is, given that we are trying to foster democracy in Northern Ireland.
      Andrew Mackinlay: One point—
      Rev. Ian Paisley: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
      Andrew Mackinlay: Of course.
      Rev. Ian Paisley: This procedure was in fact carried out in the old Assemblies. The Secretary of State
      1006
      addressed us on many occasions; indeed, a whole series of Secretaries of State did so. We did not feel belittled because they came to address us; in fact, it gave standing to the Assembly. It also allowed us to show that we were reasonable people who could argue our case. The Secretary of State's coming to address the Assembly does not demean it.
      Andrew Mackinlay: On the King or the Executive coming to Parliament, thank goodness that Charles I did come and that Speaker Lenthall was able to tell him where to go. I remember it well: "If it please your Majesty, I have neither eyes to see nor tongue to speak, except for the permission of this House, whose humble servant I am. Get lost!" At least the legislature was able to stand up to traducers. What if Charles I had simply sent a letter saying, "You're all under arrest"? That is what is being suggested here.
      The amendment would improve the Bill, but I imagine that it will not be given further consideration by the Secretary of State. As with much Northern Ireland legislation, the bolts and rivets are being put in the Bill as it goes down the slipway. Bouncing legislation through without due consideration is not the best way to form it.
      Mr. Dodds: There is much merit in the point that the hon. Member for Thurrock (Andrew Mackinlay) makes through his amendment. The argument that the Assembly and its Members are in some way demeaned by the procedure that he proposes is ludicrous, given that the entire the Bill is based on the idea that the Secretary of State will have the power to act when the Assembly has not agreed that such action be taken. Those who argue against the hon. Gentleman do so on a completely wrong basis, because tonight they will no doubt support provisions that give the Secretary of State powers to do what the Assembly has not voted for.
      I want to speak briefly to our amendment No. 67 and consequential amendments. Their purpose is to ensure that, when the Secretary of State receives a recommendation from the international monitoring commission, he would be required to send it to the presiding officer in the Assembly within a set period of seven days. Under the Bill, the Secretary of State has to consider the resolution to serve a notice on the presiding officer, but absolutely no time limit is specified for his consideration before the resolution has to go before the Assembly. That highlights one of the concerns voiced on Second Reading and mentioned by several hon. Members—how long the procedures will take to reach a definite conclusion from the moment a complaint is made. It will first be referred to the monitoring commission and then go through the labyrinthine and byzantine procedures set out in the Bill. As the Bill is currently drafted, when the Secretary of State eventually receives a resolution, he can spend as much time as he likes considering the matter.
      As we heard earlier, the Secretary of State will be required—it applies to allegations of a breach on political grounds or a paramilitary breach—to consult the Dublin Government. On Second Reading, the Secretary of State was rather coy about clarifying the matter. He talked about formal consultation as if it were all about having a chat over a cup of tea in the corridor. The fact of the matter is that the Secretary of State will

      1007
      consult and involve the Dublin Government in the crucial issue of the possible penalties to be imposed on a party or a Minister in respect of a so-called political breach within the Northern Ireland Assembly. That is clearly not a matter for the Dublin Government; it should be a matter entirely for Her Majesty's Government and the parties in Northern Ireland.
      Mr. Peter Robinson: Is the key issue less the procedure that the Government are setting up than the problem of ensuring that there is sufficient time not to deal with the subject matter of the complaint, but to allow the Government to cobble together another deal—as they have on every occasion—by making further concessions to get Sinn Fein to start toeing the line?
      Mr. Dodds: That is precisely the case. By the time any decision would be forthcoming, so much time would have elapsed that people in the community—no doubt including newspaper editors and others—would ask whether there was any point in pursuing the matter. They would say that time had passed and that it was time to move on and, as the Minister of State said earlier, to look to the future.
      Mr. Donaldson: Is not that precisely what the Government want in respect of Florida, Colombia, Castlereagh and Stormontgate? They propose to take no action regarding those breaches, and no sanctions will be applied against Sinn Fein-IRA for the republican movement's involvement in all those matters. They are to be brushed under the carpet and forgotten about.
      Mr. Dodds: That is right. We have just dealt with clauses 2 and 3 and we saw that clause 2 specifically bars the monitoring commission from dealing with matters that may be prejudiced and have to go to court. That will undoubtedly affect cases such as Castlereagh, Colombia and the Florida gun running, which have all been subject to court proceedings. For similar cases in future, the monitoring commission will say that it cannot deal with them, because it is specifically barred from involvement in cases going to court. What therefore is the point of all this? It is designed to act as a fig leaf so that the right hon. Member for Upper Bann (Mr. Trimble) can go around the country pretending that he has an effective sanction—he called it a guarantee—but, as has been exposed tonight, it is nothing of the sort. It is designed to string out complaints so that by the time they are dealt with, another deal or fudge has been put together, as my hon. Friend the Member for Belfast, East (Mr. Robinson) pointed out.
      10.30 pm
      We can contrast that approach with the Government's attitude to the tabling of a censure motion. I raised the matter earlier and the Minister of State said that it would not demean the work of the Assembly or the value of such motions. However, that was not the point that we were making. Our point was that the Bill would make it harder to table such a motion. The Minister did not deal with that point, but with an entirely different one. I hope that Ministers will listen carefully to the points that we make. To make it
      1008
      harder for Members of the Assembly to raise issues or to table motions when other Members are in breach of the commitment to exclusively peaceful and democratic means is reprehensible. Then to have a procedure that could be strung out, without any effective timetable to bring matters speedily to a head, will not provide much—if any—confidence to the Unionist community in Northern Ireland.
      Mr. Mallon: I wish to reply to some of the points made by the hon. Member for Thurrock (Andrew Mackinlay). It is a matter of historical record that the then equivalent of the Secretary of State took a view on the subordinate Administration in Northern Ireland He did not go to that Administration. Instead, he said., "Come to me," and when they got there, he said, "Pack: your bags and go." The absence of an Administration lasted some 30 years. Such an approach will not work with the Assembly.
      I also noted the disparaging way in which the hon. Gentleman referred to the failure of the First Minister and the Deputy First Minister to obtain a majority in the Assembly. He should know that given the difficulties in Northern Ireland politics it can be difficult to get a majority within one's own party—I speak of all parties involved—let alone in the Assembly. I make those points gently to the hon. Gentleman.
      The functions of the body have been mentioned, so I wish to refer again to Lord Williams of Mostyn and what he said in the other place. My earlier remarks were made at least seven hours ago, so one or other Minister should have had the good grace to get up and say that the Government agree with their Minister in the House of Lords. That is the least that he could expect from his colleagues in the Government.
      Andrew Mackinlay: I have been misunderstood enough this summer, so I want to make it clear that I did not mean to make any disparaging remarks about the First Minister or the Deputy First Minister. I am fully aware of the difficulties and constraints of marshalling majorities within one's own party and across the complicated system in the Northern Ireland Assembly. I was looking ahead to when we get the Assembly up and running—I hope that we do, and that it can achieve concord and marshal a majority view—but the Bill foresees a scenario in which the Secretary of State might have to instruct the presiding officer to take that action. I am not the author of the Bill: the Secretary of State is its author.
      Mr. Mallon: I thank the hon. Gentleman for his remarks. Far be it from me to suggest that he might speak in a disparaging way about Northern Ireland parties, or anyone else. I am not suggesting that, but if an Administration in the north of Ireland is to be made to work, we must give it respect. It must be allowed to gain its self-respect, and it should not have to grapple with an overtly subordinate position. Whatever else we know about people in the north of Ireland, we know that they will not respond if they are treated in that way.
      Jane Kennedy: I confirm that what my noble and learned Friend Lord Williams said in another place on 15 September—it can be found at column 667 of the Hansard record for that day—was correct. I hope that

      1009
      that answers the point, but I will look in detail at the debate that we have had on the matter to see whether further clarification is necessary.
      The amendments and new clause moved by the hon. Member for Belfast, North (Mr. Dodds) would curtail the opportunity for reflection among the parties on what the proper response might be to a report by the independent monitoring commission in a way that is inconsistent with the agreement and compliance published on 1 May following discussions at Hillsborough castle. That scheme makes it clear that once a report containing a recommendation has been published by the IMC it is for the Assembly parties to consider what their response might be.
      The parties are not bound by the terms of the IMC report. It remains open to them to respond in line with its recommendations or to take any of the other steps
      1010
      available to them under the Bill. By requiring the Secretary of State to act to ensure that a motion embodying the report's recommendation is laid within seven days of the report being received, and that that motion is debated within seven days of its being notified to the presiding officer, the amendments would reduce the time available to the Assembly parties to reflect on what course of action they might take in response to a report.
      Not only is that not consistent with the Hillsborough text but, by providing that the commission's recommendations would automatically be embodied in motions before the Assembly—

  Deferred Division

    IMPLEMENTATION AND COMPLIANCE OF THE COMMON FISHERIES POLICY
    That this House takes note of European Union Documents No. 7623/03, Commission Communication towards uniform and effective implementation of the Common Fisheries Policy, and No. 10509/03, Commission Communication on compliance with the rules of the Common Fisheries Policy: 'Compliance work plan and scoreboard'; takes note of the Government's support for the work plan; and supports the Government's objective of playing a constructive part in detailed discussion of the proposals to improve co-operation between enforcement agencies and of the feasibility study on the proposed Community Fisheries Control Agency.
    The House divided: Ayes 235, Noes 155.

    Division No. 315]

    AYES

    Abbott, Ms Diane

    Cousins, Jim

    Ainger, Nick

    Cranston, Ross

    Ainsworth, Bob (Cov'try NE)

    Cruddas, Jon

    Alexander, Douglas

    Cryer, Ann (Keighley)

    Allen, Graham

    Cunningham, Jim (Coventry S)

    Armstrong, rh Ms Hilary

    Cunningham, Tony (Workington)

    Atherton, Ms Candy

    Curtis-Thomas, Mrs Claire

    Austin, John

    Darling, rh Alistair

    Bailey, Adrian

    Davey, Valerie (Bristol W)

    Barnes, Harry

    Davidson, Ian

    Battle, John

    Dean, Mrs Janet

    Bayley, Hugh

    Denham, rh John

    Beard, Nigel

    Dhanda, Parmjit

    Beckett, rh Margaret

    Dismore, Andrew

    Benton, Joe (Bootle)

    Dobbin, Jim (Heywood)

    Berry, Roger

    Donohoe, Brian H.

    Blair, rh Tony

    Dowd, Jim (Lewisham W)

    Blears, Ms Hazel

    Drew, David (Stroud)

    Blunkett, rh David

    Eagle, Maria (L'pool Garston)

    Borrow, David

    Edwards, Huw

    Bradley, rh Keith (Withington)

    Ellman, Mrs Louise

    Bradshaw, Ben

    Ennis, Jeff (Barnsley E)

    Brennan, Kevin

    Etherington, Bill

    Browne, Desmond

    Field, rh Frank (Birkenhead)

    Bryant, Chris

    Fitzpatrick, Jim

    Buck, Ms Karen

    Fitzsimons, Mrs Lorna

    Burden, Richard

    Follett, Barbara

    Burnham, Andy

    Foster, rh Derek

    Byers, rh Stephen

    Foster, Michael (Worcester)

    Cairns, David

    Foulkes, rh George

    Campbell, Alan (Tynemouth)

    Francis, Dr. Hywel

    Campbell, Ronnie (Blyth V)

    Gardiner, Barry

    Caplin, Ivor

    Gerrard, Neil

    Casale, Roger

    Gibson, Dr. Ian

    Caton, Martin

    Gilroy, Linda

    Cawsey, Ian (Brigg)

    Goggins, Paul

    Challen, Colin

    Griffiths, Win (Bridgend)

    Chapman, Ben (Wirral S)

    Grogan, John

    Clark, Paul (Gillingham)

    Gummer, rh John

    Clarke, rh Charles (Norwich S)

    Hain, rh Peter

    Clarke, rh Kenneth (Rushcliffe)

    Hall, Mike (Weaver Vale)

    Clarke, rh Tom (Coatbridge & Chryston)

    Hall, Patrick (Bedford)

    Hanson, David

    Clwyd, Ann (Cynon V)

    Harris, Tom (Glasgow Cathcart)

    Coaker, Vernon

    Havard, Dai (Merthyr Tydfil & Rhymney)

    Coffey, Ms Ann

    Cohen, Harry

    Henderson, Ivan (Harwich)

    Colman, Tony

    Hendrick, Mark

    Cooper, Yvette

    Hepburn, Stephen

    Corbyn, Jeremy

    Hesford, Stephen

    1012

    Hewitt, rh Ms Patricia

    Picking, Anne

    Hinchliffe, David

    Pickthall, Colin

    Hodge, Margaret

    Pike, Peter (Burnley)

    Hope, Phil (Corby)

    Plaskitt, James

    Howarth, rh Alan (Newport E)

    Pollard, Kerry

    Howarth, George (Knowsley N & Sefton E)

    Pond, Chris (Gravesham)

    Pound, Stephen

    Hoyle, Lindsay

    Prentice, Ms Bridget (Lewisham E)

    Hughes, Beverley (Stretford & Urmston)

    Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)

    Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)

    Primarolo, rh Dawn

    Humble, Mrs Joan

    Prosser, Gwyn

    Iddon, Dr. Brian

    Purchase, Ken

    Ingram, rh Adam

    Purnell, James

    Irranca-Davies, Huw

    Quin, rh Joyce

    Jackson, Helen (Hillsborough)

    Quinn, Lawrie

    Jenkins, Brian

    Rapson, Syd (Portsmouth N)

    Johnson, Miss Melanie (Welwyn Hatfield)

    Reid, rh Dr. John (Hamilton N & Bellshill)

    Jones, Jon Owen (Cardiff C)

    Robertson, John (Glasgow Anniesland)

    Jones, Lynne (Selly Oak)

    Joyce, Eric (Falkirk W)

    Rooney, Terry

    Keeble, Ms Sally

    Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)

    Keen, Alan (Feltham)

    Ruane, Chris

    Kemp, Fraser

    Ruddock, Joan

    Kennedy, Jane (Wavertree)

    Ryan, Joan (Enfield N)

    Khabra, Piara S.

    Salter, Martin

    Kidney, David

    Savidge, Malcolm

    King, Andy (Rugby)

    Sawford, Phil

    King, Ms Oona (Bethnal Green & Bow)

    Sheridan, Jim

    Simpson, Alan (Nottingham S)

    Kumar, Dr. Ashok

    Singh, Marsha

    Ladyman, Dr. Stephen

    Skinner, Dennis

    Lazarowicz, Mark

    Smith, Geraldine (Morecambe & Lunesdale)

    Lepper, David

    Leslie, Christopher

    Smith, Jacqui (Redditch)

    Levitt, Tom (High Peak)

    Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)

    Linton, Martin

    Soley, Clive

    Love, Andrew

    Spellar, rh John

    Luke, Iain (Dundee E)

    Squire, Rachel

    Lyons, John (Strathkelvin)

    Starkey, Dr. Phyllis

    McAvoy, Thomas

    Steinberg, Gerry

    McCafferty, Chris

    Stevenson, George

    McDonagh, Siobhain

    Stewart, David (Inverness E & Lochaber)

    McDonnell, John

    McFall, John

    McGuire Mrs Anne

    Stewart, Ian (Eccles)

    McIsaac, Shona

    Sutcliffe, Gerry

    McKechin, Ann

    Tami, Mark (Alyn)

    McKenna, Rosemary

    Taylor, Dr. Richard (Wyre F)

    Mackinlay, Andrew

    Thomas, Gareth (Clwyd W)

    McNulty Tony

    Touhig, Don (Islwyn)

    McWalter, Tony

    Truswell, Paul

    Mahmood, Khalid

    Turner, Dennis (Wolverh'ton SE)

    Mallaber Judy

    Turner, Dr. Desmond (Brighton Kemptown)

    Marshall, David (Glasgow Shettleston)

    Turner, Neil (Wigan)

    Marshall, Jim (Leicester S)

    Twigg, Derek (Halton)

    Merron, Gillian

    Vaz, Keith (Leicester E)

    Michael, rh Alun

    Vis, Dr. Rudi

    Miliband, David

    Walley, Ms Joan

    Miller, Andrew

    Ward, Claire

    Moffatt, Laura

    Wareing, Robert N.

    Moran, Margaret

    Watson, Tom (W Bromwich E)

    Morgan, Julie

    Watts, David

    Morley, Elliot

    White, Brian

    Murphy, Denis (Wansbeck)

    Williams, rh Alan (Swansea W)

    Murphy, Jim (Eastwood)

    Williams, Betty (Conwy)

    Naysmith, Dr. Doug

    Winnick, David

    Norris, Dan (Wansdyke)

    Woodward, Shaun

    O'Brien, Bill (Normanton)

    Woolas, Phil

    O'Brien, Mike (N Warks)

    Wright, Anthony D. (Gt Yarmouth)

    O'Hara, Edward

    Osborne, Sandra (Ayr)

    Wright, David (Telford)

    Perham, Linda

    Wyatt, Derek

    1013

    NOES

    Allan, Richard

    Duncan, Alan (Rutland)

    Amess, David

    Duncan Smith, rh lain

    Ancram, rh Michael

    Evans, Nigel

    Atkinson, David (Bour'mth E)

    Ewing, Annabelle

    Atkinson, Peter (Hexham)

    Fabricant, Michael

    Bacon, Richard

    Fallon, Michael

    Baron, John (Billericay)

    Field, Mark (Cities of London & Westminster)

    Barrett, John

    Beith, rh A. J.

    Flook, Adrian

    Bercow, John

    Foster, Don (Bath)

    Blunt, Crispin

    Francois, Mark

    Boswell, Tim

    Gale, Roger (N Thanet)

    Bottomley, Peter (Worthing W)

    Garnier, Edward

    Brady, Graham

    George, Andrew (St. Ives)

    Brake, Tom (Carshalton)

    Gibb, Nick (Bognor Regis)

    Brazier, Julian

    Gidley, Sandra

    Brooke, Mrs Annette L.

    Goodman, Paul

    Burnett, John

    Gray, James (N Wilts)

    Burns, Simon

    Grayling, Chris

    Burnside, David

    Green, Damian (Ashford)

    Burstow, Paul

    Green, Matthew (Ludlow)

    Burt, Alistair

    Greenway, John

    Butterfill, John

    Grieve, Dominic

    Cable, Dr. Vincent

    Hague, rh William

    Calton, Mrs Patsy

    Hammond, Philip

    Campbell, Gregory (E Lond'y)

    Hancock, Mike

    Campbell, rh Menzies (NE Fife)

    Hawkins, Nick

    Carmichael, Alistair

    Heath. David

    Cash, William

    Heathcoat-Amory, rh David

    Chapman, Sir Sydney (Chipping Barnet)

    Hendry, Charles

    Hermon, Lady

    Clappison, James

    Hoban, Mark (Fareham)

    Conway, Derek

    Horam, John (Orpington)

    Cormack, Sir Patrick

    Hughes, Simon (Southwark N)

    Cotter, Brian

    Jenkin, Bernard

    Davey, Edward (Kingston)

    Johnson, Boris (Henley)

    Davies, rh Denzil (Llanelli)

    Jones, Nigel (Cheltenham)

    Dodds, Nigel

    Keetch, Paul

    Donaldson, Jeffrey M.

    Kennedy, rh Charles (Ross Skye & Inverness)

    Doughty, Sue

    1014

    Key, Robert (Salisbury)

    Salmond, Alex

    Kirkbride, Miss Julie

    Sanders, Adrian

    Laing, Mrs Eleanor

    Shepherd, Richard

    Lait, Mrs Jacqui

    Simmonds, Mark

    Lamb, Norman

    Simpson, Keith (M-Norfolk)

    Lansley, Andrew

    Smith, Sir Robert (W Ab'd'ns & Kincardine)

    Laws, David (Yeovil)

    Lewis, Dr. Julian (New Forest E)

    Smyth, Rev. Martin (Belfast S)

    Llwyd, Elfyn

    Soames, Nicholas

    Luff, Peter (M-Worcs)

    Spicer, Sir Michael

    McIntosh, Miss Anne

    Spink, Bob (Castle Point)

    Mackay, rh Andrew

    Spring, Richard

    Maclean, rh David

    Streeter, Gary

    McLoughlin, Patrick

    Stunell, Andrew

    May, Mrs Theresa

    Swire, Hugo (E Devon)

    Mercer, Patrick

    Syms, Robert

    Mitchell, Andrew (Sutton Coldfield)

    Tapsell, Sir Peter

    Taylor, John (Solihull)

    Moore, Michael

    Taylor, Sir Teddy

    Norman, Archie

    Thomas, Simon (Ceredigion)

    Oaten, Mark (Winchester)

    Thurso, John

    O'Brien, Stephen (Eddisbury)

    Tonge, Dr. Jenny

    Öpik, Lembit

    Tredinnick, David

    Osborne, George (Tatton)

    Trimble, rh David

    Ottaway, Richard

    Tyler, Paul (N Cornwall)

    Paice, James

    Tyrie, Andrew

    Paisley, Rev. Ian

    Waterson, Nigel

    Paterson, Owen

    Watkinson, Angela

    Pickles, Eric

    Webb, Steve (Northavon)

    Portillo, rh Michael

    Whittingdale, John

    Price, Adam (E Carmarthen & Dinefwr)

    Wiggin, Bill

    Willetts, David

    Randall, John

    Williams, Hywel (Caernarfon)

    Rendel, David

    Williams, Roger (Brecon)

    Robertson, Laurence (Tewk'b'ry)

    Wilshire, David

    Robinson, Mrs Iris (Strangford)

    Winterton, Ann (Congleton)

    Robinson, Peter (Belfast E)

    Winterton, Sir Nicholas (Macclesfield)

    Roe, Mrs Marion

    Rosindell, Andrew

    Wishart Pete

    Ruffley, David

    Young, rh Sir George

    Russell, Bob (Colchester)

    Younger-Ross, Richard

    Question accordingly agreed to.
    It being nine hours after the commencement of proceedings on the Allocation of time motion, THE FIRST DEPUTY CHAIRMAN put the Question already proposed from the Chair, pursuant to Order [this day.]
    Amendment negatived.
    Motion made, and Question put, That the clause stand part of the Bill:—
    The Committee divided: Ayes 338, Noes 8.

    Division No. 320]

    [10:37 pm

    AYES

    Adams, Irene (Paisley N)

    Clarke, rh Tom (Coatbridge & Chryston)

    Ainger, Nick

    Ainsworth, Bob (Cov'try NE)

    Clarke, Tony (Northampton S)

    Alexander, Douglas

    Coaker, Vernon

    Allen, Graham

    Coffey, Ms Ann

    Amess, David

    Cohen, Harry

    Anderson, Janet (Rossendale & Darwen)

    Colman, Tony

    Connarty, Michael

    Armstrong, rh Ms Hilary

    Cook, rh Robin (Livingston)

    Atherton, Ms Candy

    Cotter, Brian

    Atkins, Charlotte

    Cousins, Jim

    Atkinson, David (Bour'mth E)

    Cox, Tom (Tooting)

    Austin, John

    Cranston, Ross

    Bacon, Richard

    Cruddas, Jon

    Bailey, Adrian

    Cryer, Ann (Keighley)

    Barnes, Harry

    Cryer, John (Hornchurch)

    Baron, John (Billericay)

    Cunningham, Jim (Coventry S)

    Bayley, Hugh

    Curtis-Thomas, Mrs Claire

    Beggs, Roy (E. Antrim)

    Davey, Edward (Kingston)

    Beith, rh A. J

    Davey, Valerie (Bristol W)

    Bellingham, Henry

    Davidson, Ian

    Benton Joe, (Bootle)

    Davies, rh Denzil (Llanelli)

    Berry, Roger

    Davies, Quentin (Grantham & Stamford)

    Best, Harold

    Blackman, Liz

    Davis, rh David (Haltemprice & Howden)

    Blears, Ms Hazel

    Blunt, Crispin

    Dawson, Hilton

    Borrow, David

    Dean, Mrs Janet

    Boswell, Tim

    Dismore, Andrew

    Bottomley, Peter (Worthing W)

    Djanogly, Jonathan

    Bottomley, rh Virginia (SW Surrey)

    Dobbin, Jim (Heywood)

    Dobson, rh Frank

    Bradley, Peter (The Wrekin)

    Donohoe, Brian H.

    Bradshaw, Ben

    Doran, Frank

    Dorrell, rh Stephen

    Brazier, Julian

    Dowd, Jim (Lewisham W)

    Browne, Desmond

    Duncan, Alan (Rutland)

    Burden, Richard

    Duncan, Peter (Galloway)

    Burgon, Colin

    Eagle, Maria (L'pool Garston)

    Burnett, John

    Edwards, Huw

    Burnham, Andy

    Efford, Clive

    Byers, rh Stephen

    Ennis, Jeff (Barnsley E)

    Cairns, David

    Etherington, Bill

    Cameron, David

    Ewing, Annabelle

    Campbell, Alan (Tynemouth)

    Fabricant, Michael

    Campbell, Mrs Anne (C'bridge)

    Fallon, Michael

    Carmichael, Alistair

    Farrelly, Paul

    Casale, Roger

    Field, Mark (Cities of London & Westminster)

    Cash, William

    Caton, Martin

    Fisher, Mark

    Cawsey, Ian (Brigg)

    Fitzsimons, Mrs Lorna

    Challen, Colin

    Flight, Howard

    Chapman, Ben (Wirral S)

    Flint, Caroline

    Chapman, Sir Sydney (Chipping Barnet)

    Flook, Adrian

    Flynn, Paul (Newport W)

    Chaytor, David

    Forth, rh Eric

    Clark, Paul (Gillingham)

    Foster, rh Derek

    Clarke, rh Charles (Norwich S)

    Foster, Michael (Worcester)

    1016

    Foster, Michael Jabez (Hastings & Rye)

    Letwin, rh Oliver

    Levitt, Tom (High Peak)

    Foulkes, rh George

    Lewis, Dr. Julian (New Forest E)

    Francis, Dr. Hywel

    Liddell-Grainger, Ian

    Gale, Roger (N Thanet)

    Lidington, David

    Garnier, Edward

    Llwyd, Elfyn

    Gerrard, Neil

    Loughton, Tim

    Gibb, Nick (Bognor Regis)

    Love, Andrew

    Gibson, Dr. Ian

    Luff, Peter (M-Worcs)

    Gidley, Sandra

    Luke, Iain (Dundee E)

    Gilroy, Linda

    McAvoy, Thomas

    Goggins, Paul

    McCabe, Stephen

    Goodman, Paul

    McCafferty, Chris

    Gray, James (N Wilts)

    McDonagh, Siobhain

    Green, Matthew (Ludlow)

    MacDonald, Calum

    Grieve, Dominic

    McFall, John

    Griffiths, Jane (Reading E)

    McGuire, Mrs Anne

    Gummer, rh John

    McIsaac, Shona

    Hain, rh Peter

    Mackay, rh Andrew

    Hall, Mike (Weaver Vale)

    McKechin, Ann

    Hamilton, David (Midlothian)

    McKenna, Rosemary

    Hammond, Philip

    Mackinlay, Andrew

    Hanson, David

    Maclean, rh David

    Harris, Tom (Glasgow Cathcart)

    McLoughlin, Patrick

    Havard, Dai (Merthyr Tydfil & Rhymney)

    McNulty, Tony

    Mactaggart, Fiona

    Hayes, John (S Holland)

    McWalter, Tony

    Heald, Oliver

    Mallaber, Judy

    Healey, John

    Mandelson, rh Peter

    Heath, David

    Mann, John (Bassetlaw)

    Henderson, Ivan (Harwich)

    Marsden, Gordon (Blackpool S)

    Hendrick, Mark

    Marshall, David (Glasgow Shettleston)

    Hendry, Charles

    Heppell, John

    Marshall, Jim (Leicester S)

    Hermon, Lady

    Martlew, Eric

    Hesford, Stephen

    Maude, rh Francis

    Hill, Keith (Streatham)

    Meacher, rh Michael

    Hinchliffe, David

    Mercer, Patrick

    Hoban, Mark (Fareham)

    Michael, rh Alun

    Hope, Phil (Corby)

    Milburn, rh Alan

    Hopkins, Kelvin

    Miller, Andrew

    Howarth, rh Alan (Newport E)

    Mitchell, Andrew (Sutton Coldfield)

    Howarth, George (Knowsley N & Sefton E)

    Moffatt, Laura

    Hughes, Beverley (Stretford & Urmston)

    Morley, Elliot

    Morris, rh Estelle

    Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)

    Moss, Malcolm

    Humble, Mrs Joan

    Mudie, George

    Hurst, Alan (Braintree)

    Mullin, Chris

    Iddon, Dr. Brian

    Murphy, Jim (Eastwood)

    Irranca-Davies, Huw

    Murphy, rh Paul (Torfaen)

    Jack, rh Michael

    Norman, Archie

    Jackson, Glenda (Hampstead & Highgate)

    Norris, Dan (Wansdyke)

    O'Brien, Bill (Normanton)

    Jenkin, Bernard

    O'Brien, Stephen (Eddisbury)

    Jenkins, Brian

    Öpik, Lembit

    Johnson, Alan (Hull W)

    Osborne, George (Tatton)

    Jones, Martyn (Clwyd S)

    Osborne, Sandra (Ayr)

    Kaufman, rh Gerald

    Paice, James

    Keeble, Ms Sally

    Palmer, Dr. Nick

    Kennedy, Jane (Wavertree)

    Pearson, Ian

    Key, Robert (Salisbury)

    Perham, Linda

    Khabra, Piara S.

    Picking, Anne

    Kidney, David

    Pickles, Eric

    Kilfoyle, Peter

    Pickthall, Cohn

    King, Andy (Rugby)

    Pike, Peter (Burnley)

    King, Ms Oona (Bethnal Green & Bow)

    Plaskitt, James

    Pollard, Kerry

    Kirkbride, Miss Julie

    Pope, Greg (Hyndburn)

    Kumar, Dr. Ashok

    Pound, Stephen

    Ladyman, Dr. Stephen

    Prentice, Ms Bridget (Lewisham E)

    Laing, Mrs Eleanor

    Lait, Mrs Jacqui

    Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)

    Lazarowicz, Mark

    Primarolo, rh Dawn

    Lepper, David

    Prisk, Mark (Hertford)

    Leslie, Christopher

    Prosser, Gwyn

    1017

    Purchase, Ken

    Taylor, John (Solihull)

    Quinn, Lawrie

    Taylor, Sir Teddy

    Rammell, Bill

    Thomas, Gareth (Clwyd W)

    Rapson, Syd (Portsmouth N)

    Thomas, Simon (Ceredigion)

    Raynsford, rh Nick

    Thurso, John

    Redwood, rh John

    Todd, Mark (S Derbyshire)

    Reed, Andy (Loughborough)

    Touhig, Don (Islwyn)

    Rendel, David

    Tredinnick, David

    Robathan, Andrew

    Trickett, Jon

    Robertson, John (Glasgow Anniesland)

    Trimble, rh David

    Truswell, Paul

    Rosindell, Andrew

    Turner, Andrew (Isle of Wight)

    Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)

    Turner, Dennis (Wolverh'ton SE)

    Ruffley, David

    Turner, Dr. Desmond (Brighton Kemptown)

    Russell, Bob (Colchester)

    Salmond, Alex

    Turner, Neil (Wigan)

    Salter, Martin

    Twigg, Derek (Halton)

    Savidge, Malcolm

    Tynan, Bill (Hamilton S)

    Sawford, Phil

    Tyrie, Andrew

    Shaw, Jonathan

    Vaz, Keith (Leicester E)

    Shephard, rh Mrs Gillian

    Vis, Dr. Rudi

    Sheridan, Jim

    Ward, Claire

    Simmonds, Mark

    Wareing, Robert N.

    Simon, Siôn (B'ham Erdington)

    Watkinson, Angela

    Simpson, Alan (Nottingham S)

    Watson, Tom (W Bromwich E)

    Simpson, Keith (M-Norfolk)

    Watts, David

    Skinner, Dennis

    White, Brian

    Smith, rh Andrew (Oxford E)

    Whitehead, Dr. Alan

    Smith, Jacqui (Redditch)

    Whittingdale, John

    Smith, John (Glamorgan)

    Wiggin, Bill

    Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)

    Williams, rh Alan (Swansea W)

    Soley, Clive

    Williams, Betty (Conwy)

    Spellar, rh John

    Wills, Michael

    Spelman, Mrs Caroline

    Winnick, David

    Spink, Bob (Castle Point)

    Wishart, Pete

    Spring, Richard

    Wood, Mike (Batley)

    Squire, Rachel

    Woolas, Phil

    Stanley, rh Sir John

    Wray, James (Glasgow Baillieston)

    Starkey, Dr. Phyllis

    Stevenson, George

    Wright, Anthony D. (Gt Yarmouth)t

    Stewart, David (Inverness E & Lochaber)

    Wright, David (Telford)

    Strang, rh Dr. Gavin

    Wright, Tony (Cannock)

    Sutcliffe, Gerry

    Young, rh Sir George

    Swire, Hugo (E Devon)

    Syms, Robert

    Tellers for the Ayes:

    Taylor, David (NW Leics)

    Gillian Merron and

    Taylor, Ian (Esher)

    Mr. Fraser Kemp

    NOES

    Burnside, David

    Smyth, Rev. Martin (Belfast S)

    Campbell, Gregory (E Lond'y)

    Winterton, Sir Nicholas(Macclesfield)

    Dodds, Nigel

    Paisley, Rev. Ian

    Tellers for the Noes:

    Robinson, Mrs Iris (Strangford)

    Mr. Andrew Hunter and

    Robinson, Peter (Belfast E)

    Mr. Jeffrey M. Donaldson

    Question accordingly agreed to.
    Clause 4 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
    Clauses 5 to 11 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

    SHORT TITLE, COMMENCEMENT AND REPEALS
    Amendment made: No. 81, in page 16, line 35, leave out subsection (5).—[Mr. Spellar.]
    Clause 12, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.
    Bill reported, with an amendment.
    Order for Third Reading read, pursuant to Order [this day.]
    Motion made, and Question put, That the Bill be now read the Third time.—[Vernon Coaker.]
    The House divided: Ayes 334, Noes 9.

    Division No. 321]

    [10:52 pm

    AYES

    Adams, Irene (Paisley N)

    Cryer, Ann (Keighley)

    Ainger, Nick

    Cryer, John (Hornchurch)

    Ainsworth, Bob (Cov'try NE)

    Cunningham, Jim (Coventry S)

    Alexander, Douglas

    Curtis-Thomas, Mrs Claire

    Allen, Graham

    Davey, Valerie (Bristol W)

    Amess, David

    Davidson, Ian

    Anderson, Janet (Rossendale & Darwen)

    Davies, rh Denzil (Llanelli)

    Davies, Quentin (Grantham & Stamford)

    Armstrong, rh Ms Hilary

    Atherton, Ms Candy

    Davis, rh David (Haltemprice & Howden)

    Atkins, Charlotte

    Atkinson, David (Bour'mth E)

    Dawson, Hilton

    Austin, John

    Dean, Mrs Janet

    Bacon, Richard

    Dismore, Andrew

    Bailey, Adrian

    Djanogly, Jonathan

    Barnes, Harry

    Dobbin, Jim (Heywood)

    Baron, John (Billericay)

    Dobson, rh Frank

    Bayley, Hugh

    Donohoe, Brian H.

    Beggs, Roy (E Antrim)

    Doran, Frank

    Beith, rh A.J.

    Dorrell, rh Stephen

    Bellingham, Henry

    Dowd, Jim (Lewisham W)

    Benton, Joe (Bootle)

    Duncan, Alan (Rutland)

    Berry, Roger

    Duncan, Peter (Galloway)

    Best, Harold

    Eagle, Maria (L'pool Garston)

    Blackman, Liz

    Efford, Clive

    Blears, Ms Hazel

    Ennis, Jeff (Barnsley E)

    Blunt, Crispin

    Etherington, Bill

    Borrow, David

    Ewing, Annabelle

    Boswell, Tim

    Fabricant, Michael

    Bottomley, Peter (Worthing W)

    Fallon, Michael

    Bottomley, rh Virginia (SW Surrey)

    Farrelly, Paul

    Field, Mark (Cities of London & Westminster)

    Bradley, Peter (The Wrekin)

    Bradshaw, Ben

    Fitzsimons, Mrs Lorna

    Brazier, Julian

    Flight, Howard

    Browne, Desmond

    Flint, Caroline

    Burden, Richard

    Flook, Adrian

    Burgon, Colin

    Flynn, Paul (Newport W)

    Burnett, John

    Forth, rh Eric

    Burnham, Andy

    Foster, rh Derek

    Byers, rh Stephen

    Foster, Michael (Worcester)

    Cairns, David

    Foster, Michael Jabez (Hastings & Rye)

    Cameron, David

    Campbell, Alan (Tynemouth)

    Foulkes, rh George

    Campbell, Mrs Anne (C'bridge)

    Francis, Dr. Hywel

    Carmichael, Alistair

    Gale, Roger (N Thanet)

    Casale, Roger

    Garnier, Edward

    Cash, William

    Gerrard, Neil

    Caton, Martin

    Gibb, Nick (Bognor Regis)

    Cawsey, Ian (Brigg)

    Gibson, Dr. Ian

    Challen, Colin

    Gidley, Sandra

    Chapman, Ben (Wirral S)

    Gillan, Mrs Cheryl

    Chapman, Sir Sydney (Chipping Barnet)

    Gilroy, Linda

    Goggins, Paul

    Chaytor, David

    Goodman, Paul

    Clark, Paul (Gillingham)

    Gray, James (N Wilts)

    Clarke, rh Charles (Norwich S)

    Green, Matthew (Ludlow)

    Clarke, rh Tom (Coatbridge & Chryston)

    Grieve, Dominic

    Griffiths, Jane (Reading E)

    Clarke, Tony (Northampton S)

    Gummer, rh John

    Coaker, Vernon

    Hain, rh Peter

    Coffey, Ms Ann

    Hall, Mike (Weaver Vale)

    Cohen, Harry

    Hamilton, David (Midlothian)

    Colman, Tony

    Hammond, Philip

    Connarty, Michael

    Hanson, David

    Cook, rh Robin (Livingston)

    Harris, Tom (Glasgow Cathcart)

    Cotter, Brian

    Havard, Dai (Merthyr Tydfil & Rhymney)

    Cousins, Jim

    Cox, Tom (Tooting)

    Hayes, John (S Holland)

    Cranston, Ross

    Heald, Oliver

    Cruddas, Jon

    Healey, John

    1019

    Heath, David

    McCafferty, Chris

    Heathcoat-Amory, rh David

    McDonagh, Siobhain

    Henderson, Ivan (Harwich)

    McFall, John

    Hendrick, Mark

    McGuire, Mrs Anne

    Hendry, Charles

    McIsaac, Shona

    Heppell, John

    Mackay, rh Andrew

    Hermon, Lady

    McKechin, Ann

    Hesford, Stephen

    McKenna, Rosemary

    Hill, Keith (Streatham)

    Mackinlay, Andrew

    Hinchliffe, David

    Maclean, rh David

    Hoban, Mark (Fareham)

    McLoughlin, Patrick

    Hope, Phil (Corby)

    McNulty, Tony

    Hopkins, Kelvin

    Mactaggart, Fiona

    Howarth, rh Alan (Newport E)

    McWalter, Tony

    Howarth, George (Knowsley N & Sefton E)

    Mallaber, Judy

    Mandelson, rh Peter

    Hughes, Beverley (Stretford & Urmston)

    Mann, John (Bassetlaw)

    Marsden, Gordon (Blackpool S)

    Hughes. Kevin (Doncaster N)

    Marshall, David (Glasgow Shettleston)

    Humble, Mrs Joan

    Hurst, Alan (Braintree)

    Marshall, Jim (Leicester S)

    Iddon, Dr. Brian

    Martlew, Eric

    Irranca-Davies, Huw

    Maude, rh Francis

    Jack, rh Michael

    Meacher, rh Michael

    Jenkin, Bernard

    Mercer, Patrick

    Jenkins, Brian

    Michael, rh Alun

    Johnson, Alan (Hull W)

    Milburn, rh Alan

    Jones, Lynne (Selly Oak)

    Miller, Andrew

    Jones, Martyn (Clwyd S)

    Mitchell, Andrew (Sutton Coldfield)

    Kaufman, rh Gerald

    Keeble, Ms Sally

    Moffatt, Laura

    Keetch, Paul

    Morley, Elliot

    Kennedy, Jane (Wavertree)

    Morris, rh Estelle

    Key, Robert (Salisbury)

    Moss, Malcolm

    Khabra, Piara S.

    Mudie, George

    Kidney, David

    Mullin, Chris

    Kilfoyle, Peter

    Murphy, Jim (Eastwood)

    King, Andy (Rugby)

    Murphy, rh Paul (Torfaen)

    King, Ms Oona (Bethnal Green & Bow)

    Norman, Archie

    Norris, Dan (Wansdyke)

    Kirkbride, Miss Julie

    O'Brien, Bill (Normanton)

    Kumar, Dr. Ashok

    O'Brien, Stephen (Eddisbury)

    Ladyman, Dr. Stephen

    Osborne, George (Tatton)

    Laing, Mrs Eleanor

    Osborne, Sandra (Ayr)

    Lait, Mrs Jacqui

    Paice, James

    Lansley, Andrew

    Palmer, Dr. Nick

    Lazarowicz, Mark

    Pearson, Ian

    Lepper, David

    Perham, Linda

    Leslie, Christopher

    Picking, Anne

    Levitt, Tom (High Peak)

    Pickles, Eric

    Lewis, Dr. Julian (New Forest E)

    Pickthall, Colin

    Liddell-Grainger, Ian

    Pike, Peter (Burnley)

    Lidington, David

    Plaskitt, James

    Llwyd, Elfyn

    Pollard, Kerry

    Loughton, Tim

    Pope, Greg (Hyndburn)

    Love, Andrew

    Pound, Stephen

    Luff, Peter (M-Worcs)

    Pretice, Ms Bridget (Lewisham E)

    Luke, Iain (Dundee E)

    McAvoy, Thomas

    Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)

    McCabe, Stephen

    Primarolo, rh Dawn

    1020

    Prisk, Mark (Hertford)

    Taylor, David (NW Leics)

    Prosser, Gwyn

    Taylor, Ian (Esher)

    Purchase, Ken

    Taylor, John (Solihull)

    Quinn, Lawrie

    Taylor, Sir Teddy

    Rammell, Bill

    Thomas, Gareth (Clwyd W)

    Rapson, Syd (Portsmouth N)

    Thomas, Simon (Ceredigion)

    Raynsford, rh Nick

    Thurso, John

    Redwood, rh John

    Todd, Mark (S Derbyshire)

    Reed, Andy (Loughborough)

    Touhig, Don (Islwyn)

    Rendel, David

    Trickett, Jon

    Robathan, Andrew

    Trimble, rh David

    Robertson, John (Glasgow Anniesland)

    Truswell, Paul

    Turner, Andrew (Isle of Wight)

    Rosindell, Andrew

    Turner, Dennis (Wolverh'ton SE)

    Ross Ernie (Dundee W),

    Turner, Dr. Desmond (Brighton Kemptown)

    Ruffley, David

    Russell, Bob (Colchester)

    Turner, Neil (Wigan)

    Salmond, Alex

    Twigg, Derek (Halton)

    Salter, Martin

    Tynan, Bill (Hamilton S)

    Savidge, Malcolm

    Tyrie, Andrew

    Sawford, Phil

    Vaz, Keith (Leicester E)

    Shaw, Jonathan

    Vis, Dr. Rudi

    Sheridan, Jim

    Ward, Claire

    Simmonds Mark

    Watkinson, Angela

    Simon, Siôn (B'ham Erdington)

    Watson, Tom (W Bromwich E)

    Simpson, Keith (M-Norfolk)

    Watts, David

    Skinner, Dennis

    White, Brian

    Smith, rh Andrew (Oxford E)

    Whitehead, Dr. Alan

    Smith, Jacqui (Redditch)

    Whittingdale, John

    Wiggin Bill

    Smith, John (Glamorgan)

    Williams, rh Alan (Swansea W)

    Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)

    Williams, Betty (Conwy)

    Smith, Sir Robert (W Ab'd'ns & Kincardine)

    Wills, Michael

    Winnick, David

    Soley, Clive

    Wishart, Pete

    Speller, rh John

    Wood, Mike (Batley)

    Spelman, Mrs Caroline

    Woolas, Phil

    Spink, Bob (Castle Point)

    Wray, James (Glasgow Baillieston)

    Spring, Richard

    Squire, Rachel

    Wright, Anthony D. (Gt Yarmouth)

    Stanley, rh Sir John

    Starkey, Dr. Phyllis

    Wright, David (Telford)

    Stevenson, George

    Wright, Tony (Cannock)

    Stewart, David (Inverness E & Lochaber)

    Yeo, Tim (S Suffolk)

    Young, rh Sir George

    Strang, rh Dr. Gavin

    Sutcliffe, Gerry

    Tellers for the Ayes:

    Swire, Hugo (E Devon)

    Mr. Fraser Kemp and

    Syms, Robert

    Gillian Merron

    NOES

    Burnside, David

    Winterton, Ann (Congleton)

    Campbell, Gregory (E Lond'y)

    Winterton, Sir Nicholas (Macclesfield)

    Donaldson, Jeffrey M.

    Hunter, Andrew

    Paisley, Rev. Ian

    Tellers for the Noes:

    Robinson, Peter (Belfast E)

    Mrs. Iris Robinson and

    Smyth, Rev. Martin (Belfast S)

    Mr. Nigel Dodds

    Question accordingly agreed to.
    Bill read the Third time, and passed.

    Local Government Bill
    11.5 pm
    Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Alan Haselhurst): Under the orders of the House of 15 September, any message from the Lords relating to the Local Government Bill may be considered forthwith without any Question put. I have to inform the House that a message has been received as follows: the Lords do not insist on certain of their amendments to the Local Government Bill to which the Commons have disagreed; they agree to the amendments proposed by the Commons to another Lords amendment; and they agree to the Commons consequential amendments to the Bill. They do not insist on the remaining Lords amendment to which the Commons have disagreed, but do propose an amendment in lieu thereof. Copies of the Lords amendment in lieu—amendment No. 3B—are in the Vote Office. I should inform the House that the amendment involves questions of privilege.

    Local Government Bill

      USE OF CAPITAL RECEIPTS
      Lords amendment No. 3B
      The Minister for Local Government, Regional Governance and Fire (Mr. Nick Raynsford): I beg to move, That this House disagrees with the Lords in the said amendment.
      I regret that the Lords have seen fit to pass a further amendment to the clause, one of the key financial clauses in the Bill. I particularly regret that, because this House rightly and properly asserted its privilege in financial matters when it disagreed with the Lords amendment on Monday night. The new amendment would have the same effect. It would prevent the pooling of capital receipts and so would alter the financial arrangements made by this House.
      The suggestion made by Baroness Hanham in another place that the latest amendment is somehow a compromise is wholly spurious. Like its predecessor, the amendment would make it impossible for capital receipts received by debt-free authorities to be brought within the pooling mechanism. That directly conflicts with the Government's financial provisions in the Bill. Therefore, once again, privilege applies. Indeed, given the nature of clause 11(2)(b), I cannot conceive of any amendment where this would not be the case.
      It would not only be utterly wrong but a very dangerous precedent for this House to waive its privilege on financial matters and permit the Lords amendment to stand. It would also be wrong, because the amendment undermines one of the key principles of the Government's housing finance policy and, indeed, one of the key principles underlying the financial provisions of the Bill.
      Mr. Edward Davey rose—
      Mr. Raynsford: It is fundamental to the Government's approach to public finance and investment in public services that resources are allocated
      1022
      on the basis of need, not on the basis of accident or chance. On that happy note, I will give way to the hon. Gentleman.
      Mr. Davey: Will the Minister explain the point about privilege a little more? The amendment does not increase or lower taxation and it does not increase or lower overall spending. It just changes the way in which the spending is allocated. How can that relate to privilege?
      Mr. Raynsford: The amendment alters the financial arrangement made by the House and would have the direct effect of making it impossible for the Government to secure the pooling of £120 million worth of capital receipts received by debt-free authorities. That, by any measure, is a significant financial impact on which this House rightly insists on privilege.
      Mr. John Gummer: Will the Minister be kind enough to consider this not as a financial matter, but as a moral matter? Surely this is a moral issue. He is taking away from those who have been careful with their money and giving it to people who have not been careful. That is not a financial issue; that is a moral issue.
      Mr. Raynsford: I am sorry that the right hon. Gentleman was not here two nights ago when we debated these issues in some detail. He would then have heard me explain that this has nothing to do with prudence or good or bad management. We are dealing with the application of capital receipts that come from the sale of council houses under the right-to-buy policy. That reflects the decisions taken not by councils, but by tenants. It also reflects the accidents of geography as to where the properties are located.
      The right hon. Gentleman was a Secretary of State for the Environment.
      Mr. Peter Pike: Will the Minister give way?
      Mr. Raynsford: I am answering the question asked by the right hon. Member for Suffolk, Coastal (Mr. Gummer), but I shall give way to my hon. Friend in a moment.
      The right hon. Gentleman will know that some areas are rich in receipts because they happen to have the good fortune of being located in areas with high house prices. The Government in which he was a senior Minister arranged a mechanism for redistributing capital receipts so that those derived by areas that were fortunate because of their geography and tenants' decisions to buy properties could be used to help areas without such advantages. If that was acceptable and right for the Government of which he was a member in 1990, why is the principle wrong now? What is the morality that differentiates the two circumstances?
      Mr. Gummer: The right hon. Gentleman is avoiding my question. I am not arguing about whether he is right or wrong. I am saying that the argument that the matter is one of privilege because it is about only money is not correct. He has to argue the case on its merits rather than arguing the case for putting two fingers up at the other

      1023
      House. If he argues the case well on its merits, I might well be persuaded by it. However, he cannot say, "I am very sorry but we mustn't discuss this at all because I've already decided that it comes under a nice little box on which I don't have to argue the merits." Will he argue the merits of his case and not be rude about the House of Lords?
      Mr. Raynsford: As I said to the right hon. Gentleman a moment ago, if he had been here on Monday night he would have heard the debate in detail because we argued the point at length. If he had been a member of the Committee that considered the Bill—I am not suggesting that he should have been—he would have heard the debates there. The issues have been explored in the House in enormous detail. The amendment has significant financial consequences. The House decided by a substantial majority on Monday evening not to accept the original Lords amendment and, on a matter of privilege, advised their Lordships accordingly. It is extremely disappointing that they have, to use the right hon. Gentleman's delightful phrase, lifted two fingers. I hope that he, as a good democrat, will join us in advising Members of the other place to respect this House's privileges.
      Mr. Pike: It is right to underline a point that my right hon. Friend is making. If Burnley borough council sold a piece of land, it would get little money for it. However, if the land was only 24 miles away in the centre of Manchester, it would probably be worth 10 times as much, and if it was in London it could easily be worth 100 times as much. The issue has nothing to do with local councils' prudence; it is merely a matter of geography.
      Mr. Raynsford: My hon. Friend makes an extremely valid point that is based on his considerable experience. He speaks for a part of the country that has some of the lowest house prices and, therefore, some of the greatest difficulties. He is working with his colleagues to try to address those problems. The Government are trying to help areas in need through the injection of substantial additional funds and by following the previous Government's policy of recycling capital receipts to ensure that they may be allocated to areas in need.
      Sir Nicholas Winterton: The Minister might well point out that I was not here on Monday either, but I was actually talking about this very matter with the chief executive of Macclesfield borough council. The council has run its affairs extremely well and is debt free, which it has achieved by not embarking on irresponsible and spendthrift policies. Is the Minister not concerned that his policy might deter responsible councils from trying to become debt free? Surely he wants responsible debt-free authorities.
      Mr. Raynsford: That is exactly what we want and our policies are designed to achieve that. Indeed, we made it clear on Monday—I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman could not be with us—that the arrangements that we are putting in place provide real incentives for prudence and good financial management. We want fairness so that
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      authorities that have high needs and low resources are not penalised in favour of authorities that have, by the accident of geography, much greater resources and, in some cases, lesser needs.
      11.15 pm
      Mr. Philip Hammond: The Minister has just agreed with my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield (Sir Nicholas Winterton) that what the Government want is responsible, debt-free authorities.
      Mr. Raynsford indicated dissent.
      Mr. Hammond: That is exactly what the Minister has just agreed with my hon. Friend. What I understood the Minister to say on Monday was that he did not see any particular merit in being debt free.
      Mr. Raynsford: If the hon. Gentleman consults Hansard tomorrow, he will see that what I was saying was that we are keen that there should be arrangements in place that encourage prudent financial management and responsible administration. I said nothing at all about whether that involved the authority being debt free or not. That is an accident—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Macclesfield certainly said that but I made the point that we were interested in prudent financial management and good conduct of financial affairs. The accident of whether an authority happens to be debt free is often simply the product of good fortune and of being in an area with high house prices and high capital values.
      Mr. Gummer: Will the Minister give way?
      Mr. Raynsford: I am going to make some progress now because these issues have been exhaustively covered in the debates that have taken place already.
      As I have said, it would be a dangerous precedent for the House to waive its privilege on financial matters and permit the Lords amendment to stand. I have also made the point that it would be wrong because the amendment undermines one of the key principles of our housing finance policy and one of the key principles underlying the financial provisions of the Bill. We want resources to be allocated on the basis of need, not on the basis of accident or chance. We want resources to be distributed fairly and objectively through transparent mechanisms without favour or special treatment for one authority or one group of authorities.
      I remind the House how important the Bill is to local government. The Local Government Association and indeed large numbers of individual local authorities have repeatedly stressed their wish that the Bill should receive early Royal Assent, so that local government can have the benefit of the significant freedoms and flexibilities that it provides, yet if the Bill is not passed tomorrow, the prudential system cannot be implemented before April 2005. In these circumstances, I cannot believe that anyone who cares about the interests of local government wants to see any outcome other than immediate Royal Assent.
      Mr. Edward Davey: On that point, the Liberal Democrats voted for the Bill on Second Reading. We

      1025
      support the prudential capital regime that the Government are putting in place. The Minister knows that the Government have a vehicle for bringing back the legislation if they think that their argument is so strong: the housing Bill, which is in draft form already and will be in the Queen's Speech. [Interruption.]
      Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. It would be better if one hon. Member at a time spoke, and may I discourage the Under-Secretary of State, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, the hon. Member for Corby (Phil Hope), from interrupting from a sedentary position?
      Mr. Davey: The Minister could use that legislative vehicle. It will be open to him in a matter of months. He could have his way if he could persuade both Houses of the virtue of his argument. The problem is that he has not managed that today.
      Mr. Raynsford: I remind the hon. Gentleman that we have persistently won the votes in this House; we have won the arguments and the votes. It is only in the unelected House that a different position has been adopted. It is a slightly odd proposition to put to us that we should agree to drop our particular policy and accept the Lords amendment in the expectation that we would be able to get our original proposals through next year in a different vehicle. Is he suggesting that he would vote differently next year? If so, why would he vote differently?
      Mr. Davey: It is possible that the Minister may be able to persuade us. [Interruption.] It would be good if the Minister could at least listen to the answer. By then, we will have the information from the housing regional boards about how the housing needs of these different authorities will be met. We do not have that information at the moment. It is not surprising that many of the councils from which the money is being taken are up in arms, as they do not know whether they will be able to meet housing needs in their communities.
      Mr. Raynsford: Local authorities will be up in arms if the prudential regime that they are looking forward to with great enthusiasm is prevented from being introduced in April 2004 as a result of the delaying tactics of colleagues of the Opposition parties in another place, and most recently by their lordships in their vote.
      Mr. David Wilshire: If the right hon. Gentleman is sneering at the other place, why is his Prime Minister going to stuff it full of even more of his unelected cronies to try to get his own way?
      Mr. Raynsford rose—
      Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I do not know what the Minister was going to say in reply, but may I discourage him from following that line, as it is outside the scope of the Bill?
      Mr. Raynsford: Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I was about to say that the general tenor of our debates on these subjects has been slightly more elevated than that
      1026
      adopted by the hon. Member for Spelthorne (Mr. Wilshire). I do not intend to debase the debate by going down to that level.
      I must remind the Opposition parties, who have frequently criticised the Government for not moving faster to extend freedoms and flexibilities to local government, that their colleagues in another place have already put early implementation of the Bill at risk. Any further delay preventing the implementation of the prudential regime in April 2004 would be inexcusable, and those responsible would rightly stand condemned by all involved in local government.
      Mr. Eric Pickles: I doubt that there is anyone in the Chamber or another place who believes that the right hon. Gentleman would throw the Bill away over the provision.
      Mr. Raynsford: It is our wish to get the Bill on the statute book as soon as possible, and we have been working to that effect for a very long time indeed. If the hon. Gentleman believed what he said he would have spent time in recent months encouraging his colleagues in another place to be more constructive and expeditious in their consideration of the Bill. Today, Baroness Hanham advanced a spurious argument pretending that the amendment that she was urging their lordships to accept was a compromise. It was nothing of the sort—it was a further wrecking amendment that sought to overturn the decision of the elected House on a financial matter, thereby breaching privilege. I hope that the hon. Member for Brentwood and Ongar (Mr. Pickles) agrees that the privilege of the House is too important to be allowed to be passed over simply because he wants to score a political point. I urge the House to resist the amendment.
      Mr. Philip Hammond: The original clause 11(2)(b) permitted the Secretary of State to sequester anything up to 100 per cent. of the housing capital receipts received by local authorities. The House of Lords, in its wisdom, removed that provision entirely when the Bill was sent back to us on Monday so that receipts would remain with the receiving authorities. Among the arguments that the Minister deployed against the attack on clause 11(2)(b) was an argument about the use to which housing capital receipts had been put by some local authorities. He argued that they had not been used for housing purposes. Our objection, and that of my noble Friends, to clause 11(2)(b) concerns the fact that it interferes with the right of debt-free authorities to dispose of their capital receipts as they see fit.
      However, in an attempt to compromise and address one of the Minister's principal objections, which he elaborated at great length in Committee during the Commons consideration of the Bill and again on Monday evening, the amendment was framed to allow the Secretary of State to ensure that a portion, determined by him, of those capital receipts is indeed for housing or urban regeneration purposes. That goes to the heart of one of the Minister's key objections to the thrust of the Lords' attack on the clause.
      The Lords amendment does indeed compromise the freedoms of local authorities, which is a cause of some concern. It is a compromise, whatever the Minister says,

      1027
      but it prevents the Government from snatching local authorities' capital receipts in their entirety. The Government have advertised the Bill as being about freedoms and flexibilities for local authorities, but at its heart is a provision that snatches the housing capital receipts of debt-free local authorities, as the Minister himself said, of about £120 million a year to fund the Government's own programme. That is the very antithesis of freedom and flexibility for local authorities.
      Sir Nicholas Winterton: May I follow up with my hon. Friend my earlier intervention on the Minister? In Macclesfield, which is debt-free, if the council does not receive the full amount of capital receipts from the sale of council houses, within a short period the account relating to maintenance and upgrading—the improvement of housing in the borough—will go into substantial deficit. The council has planned for the future. It has been responsible. The measure will penalise a responsible authority such as the Macclesfield borough council, with which I discussed the matter at length on Monday afternoon and early evening.
      Mr. Hammond: My hon. Friend is right. Many prudent local authorities throughout the country that have become debt-free will find themselves in the same position as Macclesfield.
      Dr. Brian Iddon: Is the hon. Gentleman saying that in some authorities housing capital receipts should be spent on things other than housing, when his own party during my time in this place has been headlining the need to spend more money on housing, both in the south and south-east and in other regions of the country?
      Mr. Hammond: No. What my noble Friends have suggested in the amendment is that the Secretary of State should have a power to direct the use of those receipts, to secure that they are indeed used for housing or urban regeneration purposes. That is the thrust of the amendment, under which the Secretary of State would have the power to direct that up to 100 per cent. of the capital receipt could be used by the authority for a purpose specified by the Secretary of State.
      Mr. Gummer: Does not that mean that the difference between the amendment and the Government's position is not a financial difference, but a difference about who makes the decision? Would it not be true that any houses built anywhere are necessary, given the very large deficit? In those circumstances, would it not be better for the Government to allow the local authority to make decisions about its local needs?
      Mr. Hammond: That is precisely the point that I seek to make. The Minister's synthetic anger—to use one of his favourite phrases—about matters of privilege is just that: synthetic. That is not the issue tonight.
      During Monday's debate and before, the Minister argued that it is somehow unfair and even bizarre to allow debt-free authorities to keep and control their housing capital receipts. It is common sense: if one sells an asset and has no debts, one would expect to be free
      1028
      to use the proceeds. Equally, if one sells an asset against which one has borrowed, one cannot reasonably expect to be free to dispose of the proceeds as one wishes. People throughout the country would understand that as the normal way of the world—the way things work.
      The Minister speaks as though debt-free status was a freak of nature. It is not. Many local authorities have worked hard to become debt-free. Many more local authorities aspire to that status, only to find now that the prize is kicked beyond their reach. The Minister says that councils' housing stock is a national asset. Of course we accept that some of it has been built and maintained, in part at least, by Government grants, but those have been grants. The Government cannot change the rules retrospectively. The care and maintenance, the enhancement and improvement, and sometimes the original provision of the housing stock, have also been funded by tenants and council tax payers, especially in local authorities that have been in negative housing subsidy for years.
      The stock belongs to local authorities and local communities, not to central Government, and the capital receipts from sale of that stock should belong to the local authorities for the benefit of their local communities. What does the Minister plan to do next? Does he plan to attack the cash balances of authorities that have been prudent in managing their resources and their assets, and have accumulated cash balances? Is that his next step?
      Mr. Raynsford: Does the hon. Gentleman believe that there should be any mechanism for redistribution between authorities, or does he think that resources should simply rest with the authority that receives the receipts?
      11.30 pm
      Mr. Hammond: I suggest to the Minister that in the current housing crisis, every authority receiving capital receipts could use every penny in its area. Let us be clear that authorities are receiving these capital receipts because they are disposing of housing stock. In my opinion and that of my hon. Friends, that implies an immediate need to replace that housing stock. I suggest to him that every authority could use every last penny of the capital receipts that it receives for entirely appropriate purposes in its own area. I also suggest to him that it is appropriate to fund the programmes that the Government have rightly and understandably introduced, and that the Deputy Prime Minister has announced, through general taxation. That is an appropriate way of funding those programmes.
      Mr. Raynsford: Does the hon. Gentleman agree, therefore, with this statement:
      "local Government needs to be granted a far greater degree of financial autonomy …Of course, there are important limiting factors on how far these additional freedoms can go. There will always be a vital and active role for central Government in providing mechanisms of redistribution that ensure a degree of territorial equity, as well as in enforcing broad financial stability"?
      Mr. Hammond: General taxation in respect of the distribution of Government grant is redistributive by its very nature. [Interruption.] The Minister is attacking—[Interruption.]
      Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I am sorry to interrupt the hon. Gentleman, but we must not have conversations in the Chamber. If hon. Members want a meeting, they should go elsewhere and not interrupt proceedings here.
      Mr. Hammond: The Minister is seeking to grab £120 million—a relatively small sum in the grand scheme of the Government's housing programme—from about 34 authorities that have managed their affairs in such a way that they are debt-free and are situated in areas where capital receipts from housing right to buy are relatively high, which suggests a need to replace units of social housing that have been sold. He is seeking to take those capital receipts and redistribute them to areas that have been less prudent. I argue that, in many cases, such areas will be in less need of affordable housing in the present housing crisis than the areas to which the receipts accrue.
      Mr. Raynsford: In the hon. Gentleman's repudiation of the concept of redistribution, why is he clearly rejecting the views set out by his own party in a document called "Total Politics", which was launched on 11 September this year? Are Opposition Members' memories that short?
      Mr. Hammond: If the Minister would like a hard copy with a glossy cover, I shall be happy to send him one.
      The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (Phil Hope): The hon. Gentleman has not read it.
      Mr. Hammond: As it happens, I have read the document.
      I have not repudiated arguments for redistribution. What I have told the Government is that they have a large pot of money available for funding housing need. I have told them that the proper way of funding such need is to use the resources that they have available and not try to attack a relatively small sum held by a small number of prudent and well-managed local authorities.
      Mr. Pike: Does the hon. Gentleman accept that in a council such as Burnley, which has very low-value properties, we need £115 million to put right the problems that we have in respect of private sector housing, as there are currently 4,500 empty houses? The type of policy that he proposes will provide no solution to such problems.
      Mr. Hammond: As the hon. Gentleman will realise if he thinks about the matter, in the areas where the capital receipts are being generated, empty houses could be a solution to the problem. In areas where capital receipts are being generated because house prices are high, our problem is precisely that there is a total dearth of available and affordable housing to house the very public sector workers whom the Government desperately need if they are ever to deliver on their myriad promises to improve public services.
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      The Minister argues that local authorities with large housing capital receipts do not need housing reinvestment. He ignores the fact that those receipts are being generated by the sale of council houses, which must then be replaced. He also ignores the fact that the areas with high house prices and high housing demand are, in the present crisis, the very areas in which the need for new investment in affordable housing is at its greatest. I suggest to him that the real housing crisis today is in those areas—precisely the areas that he has tried to paint as leafy and suburban, without real housing need and not deserving of the ability to reinvest capital receipts in their own area for the benefit of local people and local communities.
      If the Government's agenda of public service improvement, or even maintenance of basic public services, is to stand a chance of being achieved in those areas, the Minister had better support the reinvestment of those funds in the affordable housing that is so vital for key public sector workers.
      The Minister argues that receipts have been diverted from housing. Our principled objection to clause 11(2)(b) is that central Government should not interfere in local authorities' disposal of their capital receipts. Whatever he may say, our noble Friends have sought to achieve a compromise, and have addressed his concern. Even at the price of compromising on the principle that central Government have no right to interfere with these receipts, they have proposed a power for the Secretary of State to direct that they be used for specific purposes, the clear understanding being that the power would be used to ensure that the receipts are spent on housing investment, housing repairs and urban renewal.
      The Lords, then, have sought to compromise; but they have insisted on challenging the Government's demand to levy what is effectively a tax on the housing capital receipts of well-managed, prudent local authorities. The Government say that it would initially be 75 per cent., but the Bill does not restrict it to that level: it could be increased to 100 per cent. by secondary legislation.
      All that the Government have done by insisting on the original clause is to show that their rhetoric about freedom and flexibility for local government is precisely that—empty rhetoric. They have shown their hostility to prudent management of local authority finances and their indifference to local authorities and local communities that have worked hard to become debt-free, and reconfirmed their hostility to the right-to-buy policy that has given hope and opportunity to millions—a policy that the Government, and the Deputy Prime Minister in particular, have sought to erode, restrict and undermine.
      I urge my hon. Friends and Liberal Democrats who value the principle of local authority freedom to vote to retain the Lords amendment, and send the Government a clear message that we will not give in to this assault on prudent, well-managed authorities by an increasingly imprudent and cash-strapped central Government.
      Mr. Edward Davey: With this amendment, the House of Lords has effectively called the Government's bluff. When we debated this matter in detail in Committee, the Minister gave examples—not many, as he did not have

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      many to give—in which he alleged that debt-free authorities used receipts from the sale of council houses for non-housing purposes. He suggested that some of the money was being used to subsidise council tax levels, and that some was being used for other council projects unconnected with housing. The amendment would give the Government power to ensure that councils used the money for the purposes the Government wanted—for housing, presumably. So the Government's bluff has been called. If they wish to ensure that the money is retained in the housing sector, within the overall housing policy envelope, they now have the means to do so.
      Mr. Raynsford: The hon. Gentleman will remember that, essentially, our debate of two nights ago was about a very simple argument: whether fairness, involving redistribution, should in this case be given precedence over receipts simply resting where they happen to fall, through the accidents of history and geography. We challenged him to say whether he was on the side of fairness, and of redistribution in favour of deprived areas such as Liverpool, or whether he would like to allow receipts simply to fall in the area in which they were accrued, because house prices happened to be high. Is he now confirming that he is against fairness and in favour of the accidents of history and geography?
      Mr. Davey: I am grateful to the Minister for trying to answer my point, but in fact he answered it with a completely different argument. I shall come to redistribution, but I should point out that he did not seek to deny that point in Committee; he used examples of authorities that did not use receipts for investment in housing. Such examples have been shown not to be relevant by the amendment before us; the argument has been well and truly won.
      My speech will be relatively short because what I said two nights ago still stands and has not been affected by events, and because I agree with many of the comments of the hon. Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Mr. Hammond). That said, it would have been good if the previous Conservative Government had allowed local authorities to keep receipts from council house sales so that they could have invested in affordable housing. However, we do not want to return to the sorry history of the Conservatives' many failures in this area.
      One key principle that works against the Government's position is that of prudent financial management and proper fiscal incentives for local authorities to run down their debt. In an earlier exchange, the Minister tried to redefine that principle by limiting it simply to prudent financial management, thereby excluding the incentive to move to debt-free status. At no point during our debates on this key fiscal principle—it is certainly important to us, and, indeed, to the Conservatives—was the Minister able to point to any other aspect of the new regime, or of previous statutes, that would provide such an incentive for local authorities to move to debt-free status. The Chancellor of the Exchequer ought surely to be keen on such an incentive.
      Mr. Raynsford: The hon. Gentleman is eliding two different concepts: prudent financial management and
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      debt-free status. There will be many cases in which it is prudent to borrow to achieve benefits that would not otherwise be achievable for the residents of a given area. Alternatives such as the private finance initiative—his party is not terribly keen on the PFI—might not necessarily be the best way to invest, if a borrowing alternative exists that will achieve the objective. Does he agree that such a situation is possible, and if so, that it might be prudent—I am not saying that it definitely would be—for an authority to take such a decision?
      Mr. Davey: The Minister knows that we do not disagree with that overall point, given that we support the capital regime that the Bill puts in place. That does not mean, however, that no incentive should exist elsewhere in the system to move to debt-free status. The two concepts can exist side by side: the point at issue between us is that the Minister is excluding one of them.
      On the Minister's point about fairness, I agree with the hon. Member for Runnymede and Weybridge. In terms of redistribution, it is important that areas with low resource bases and real needs get funds from central Government, but that is not what the Minister is trying to do here; rather, he is trying to take money from other local authorities. As we know, local authorities in many areas—rich or poor—are cash-strapped; that is why the council tax has been going up so much. The Minister ought to have some sympathy and compassion for such local authorities. Redistribution is needed, but it should come from central Government.
      Sir Nicholas Winterton: The hon. Gentleman is making an extremely good case, but will he also deal with this point? As a debt-free authority, Macclesfield is going to lose out, in that housing maintenance and other projects and budgets will go into deficit. Affordable, low-cost housing is often funded through the money that housing associations receive from the Housing Corporation. In the foreseeable future, Macclesfield will further lose out, in that the money that its housing associations receive through the Housing Corporation for low-cost, affordable housing projects will be dramatically reduced.
      Mr. Davey: The hon. Gentleman is on to a good point and helps to explain why some debt-free authorities feel so passionately about the issue. Many of them worked hard to attain their good position because they wanted to meet some of the Government's own targets—on decent homes, for example.
      11.45 pm
      I know that Three Rivers district council, which I referred to on Monday, worked hard at all aspects of its finances to reach a good position, meet the standards and provide more affordable housing for its key workers. It was a policy target for the council, but the problem is that the Government are changing the rules when councils have worked within them. There is a degree of retrospection, because housing policy has to be considered over a period of years. I am particularly concerned about the retrospection involved in the grab of money from the debt-free authorities.
      Another important principle is the balance between centralism and localism. The Bill was sold to us as one that would liberalise local authorities, offering them

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      freedoms and flexibilities. Yet this week we have already heard that one of the key freedoms and flexibilities for authorities judged excellent and good under the comprehensive performance assessment—namely, no danger of capping—is being removed. We now know that another key financial freedom that existed under the old system is going to be removed. The Government are making it worse than it was under the system that they inherited from the Conservatives.
      I want to touch on the point about privilege, which the Minister focused on in his remarks. He is interpreting the principle oddly. As I said in my intervention, it is not about tax or overall spending going up or down, but about redistribution. I recall when the Minister was in opposition and the Conservatives were passing the poll tax. I am sure that his party, like mine, worked as hard as it could in the other place to defeat that appalling Conservative measure. If the House of Lords had insisted that the poll tax should fall, I doubt whether he would have been too worried—
      Mr. Raynsford: It did not.
      Mr. Davey: The Minister says that it did not, but that is not relevant to my point. He would have supported the House of Lords. Will he tell us whether he would not have wanted the other place to defeat the poll tax if it had the opportunity to do so? On those sorts of matters, the issue of privilege is not so significant.
      The issue of privilege has moved on. We have seen various reforms to the other place—introduced by the Minister's Government—to give it greater legitimacy, so they say. Under his Government and the previous Conservative Government, the House's role in public finance and scrutiny of the public purse has been reduced to a myth. The House does not control the Executive over finances and the Minister knows it. We do not have proper debates on the estimates. We have only three days a year under Standing Orders to debate them, and when we do, we do not really debate the estimates, but the Select Committee report. On one of those days, I had the temerity to ask a Treasury Minister about the estimates before us, but that Minister had not even been briefed to answer the question. That shows how the House does not really scrutinise expenditure. The idea of praying in aid privilege when the House has virtually given up any role in financial scrutiny does not bear analysis.
      I believe that it would be right for the House to agree with the other place tonight. We have won the argument in principle and in practical examples, and it is time that the Government listened.
      Mr. Gummer: It may help if I provide an analogy. If the Government were bringing forward a decision to penalise debt-free Ministers and redistribute their money to Ministers who had not been as careful with their finances, would it stand any examination? The problem is simply this. The difference is not about fairness. If the Minister were saying that local authorities' needs should be examined and, where they have resources far beyond those needs, they should be redistributed, the House might be prepared seriously to listen to his argument.
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      What the Minister is saying is that it is axiomatic that local authorities that are debt free do no have acute housing needs.
      Mr. Raynsford: No, I am not.
      Mr. Gummer: If the right hon. Gentleman does not mean that, he should accept the amendment, which would enable him to direct those authorities without needs to use the money for the kind of housing that is necessary in every part of the country. I challenge the Minister to tell me the name of a single local authority that is debt free and does not need affordable housing. If he can give us a list of such authorities, we can think about his argument, but until he can, we know that this is not a matter of fairness. It is a matter of redistribution, and we know why the right hon. Gentleman wants to redistribute. Some authorities have been careful and have sought a way to provide affordable housing in their high-cost areas. Of course, such authorities receive more money when they sell their council houses, because their areas are high cost. Such areas need more money, not less, when they are trying to provide affordable housing. Therefore, the Minister's argument is not just accidentally wrong: it is nonsense.
      Mr. Raynsford: Had the right hon. Gentleman been here on Monday, he would have heard me presenting the argument. I argued not that there were no needs in debt-free areas, but that there were relative differences in need between different areas. The right hon. Gentleman would have heard me argue that in the same way that the Conservative Government of which he was a member felt that it was right to exercise a degree of redistribution to achieve fairness, we sought to do the same. Does he agree with the Conservative party's document that states:
      "There will always be a vital and active role for central Government in providing mechanisms of redistribution that ensure a degree of territorial equity"?
      Mr. Gummer: It is called the council tax grant. We all know that it is a mechanism used by the Government to ensure that the aid from the centre to local government is tailored properly to the needs of the locality. Everybody knows that, and the Minister knows that we spent much time trying to make it as fair as possible.
      The only reason why I did not have the chance to listen to the Minister on Monday was that I was in Cancun trying to discuss a trade issue of some importance. I have listened carefully to what the Minister said, and I return to my accusation. To make his argument stand up, he has to show that those councils that are debt free have less need—to such a degree that it is worth overriding the local interest—that they need to have their resources taken away from them.
      I do not even argue that every authority that is debt free is so as a result of prudence, although I bet that if Ministers were debt free they would claim it was their own work. The accident that enables some local authorities to have large receipts from the sale of council houses also means that it is more expensive for those authorities to provide housing for teachers and nurses and other essential workers than it is for other areas that are not as fortunate in the amount of money that they receive from selling council houses.
      Mr. Hammond: Would my right hon. Friend also note that the very fact that those authorities have received

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      those capital receipts from housing means that they have reduced their social housing stock? They have sold units to obtain the capital receipts, and the presumption must be that they must reinvest to replace those units.
      Mr. Gummer: My hon. Friend is right, but he is being too kind to the Government. The problem is that the Government claim to believe in local decision making and local action, but in every case they turn to central planning and control. The Government use the fine words "devolution", "devolvement" and "locality" whenever they introduce a measure, but what they are actually doing is imposing the central Government diktat.
      I noticed the paucity of the Minister's arguments because he could speak only about privilege. This is not about the quantum of money involved, or about raising or lowering taxes. It is about fairness, which is a matter that the House of Lords is perfectly able to debate.
      Fairness means that local authorities—where the provision of affordable housing for people who need support is expensive—should be allowed to use the additional receipts that they get. My hon. Friend the Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Mr. Hammond) is right, and the comparison is exact: one sells an asset in an expensive area at a higher price because it costs more to replace it. The Government do not understand the basic facts of supply and demand, or of the provision of affordable housing in areas where that is most needed. That explains why they have presided over the worst housing figures since world war one.
      Dr. Iddon rose—
      Mr. Gummer: The Government must accept that they are incredible when it comes to housing, because they have created circumstances in which fewer houses are built every year. They will make the situation worse unless they allow prudent authorities to use the results of their prudence to provide affordable housing where it is often most needed—in expensive areas where necessary workers who serve the community are not otherwise able to find homes.
      Mr. Edward Davey: Does that not show that the Government do not understand how markets work? In this case, they are taking money that could be used to increase the supply of affordable housing. With the starter homes initiative in London and the south-east, in contrast, they are giving money to increase demand. They are therefore reducing supply and increasing demand, and making the problem worse.
      Mr. Gummer: The hon. Gentleman is right. The Government do not understand the laws of supply and demand. They do not understand that, in the present housing crisis, it does not matter where the houses are built, nor what sort of houses are built. We have a shortage at every level, and in every circumstance. The Minister is merely carrying out the diktat of the Treasury. He must get his fingers on as much money as possible, use it centrally, and put it where it can aid his friends. That is what this is about—taking from those
      1036
      who need and giving to those who might support this Government. We know that, as does the House of Lords. The amendment will be rejected, not because it is a matter of privilege but because it is a way of fiddling the books.
      Mr. Raynsford: I hope that the right hon. Gentleman, who was once Secretary of State for the Environment, will reflect on what he has said and realise that his final remark was unworthy of him. We are discussing mechanisms very similar to the ones for which he, when in government, used to be responsible. They ensured that capital receipts were redistributed from areas with high receipts and relatively low needs to other areas. Had the right hon. Gentleman been here on Monday, he would have heard me say all that then. Alternatively, he could have read the Hansard report.
      Dr. lddon: Will my right hon. Friend give way?
      Mr. Raynsford: Of course.
      Dr. Iddon: I have been trying to make this point for some time. Does my right hon. Friend agree that abandoning the concept of pooling, which Opposition Members appear to want, would mean that there was no hope for owner-occupiers in the 23,000 unfit houses in Bolton alone? That is not to mention all the unfit houses in the private sector.
      Mr. Raynsford: My hon. Friend makes a valid point. He highlights the enormous extent of housing need in this country. We inherited that on coming to government, and it includes the massive backlog of substandard housing, especially council housing. In our six years in government, we have acted to improve more than 700,000 homes which were in appalling condition when we inherited them from the previous Conservative Government but which are now decent and modern homes.
      It ill behoves a former Secretary of State who presided over the worst homelessness and housing crisis in a long time to ignore the fact that we are investing two and a half times as much as his Government did. Because we need to maximise investment, we are rightly taking the same approach that his Government took—redistribution in favour of the areas of greatest need. Indeed, judging from a pamphlet published only a few days ago, the right hon. Gentleman's own party still believes that that is appropriate. That leaflet provides recognition by people who have thought about the issues that redistribution is necessary to ensure that resources are used to best effect and to achieve territorial equity.
      The Liberal Democrats sadly failed the test of whether they were on the side of fairness or opportunism. Presented with the choice of saying, on a difficult decision, that they would favour redistribution to ensure that areas of greatest need got more or of sticking to the principle of leaving money wherever it arose through the accident of geography, they opted for the latter, even though they know that it is wrong. The hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton (Mr. Davey) knows that it is wrong, and he knows that his colleagues in Liverpool would not support what he said tonight. They would argue for redistribution—and I have no

      1037
      doubt that when he goes to Liverpool with other Liberal Democrats, he too will say, "Let's redistribute more money in favour of Liverpool." That is what they will say in Liverpool; they will not say it here because they are appealing to a different audience. That is the Liberal Democrats—say one thing to one group of people and something quite different to another.
      We have established a policy of principle to try to ensure that housing resources are used to best effect and that the needs of our country are met. That policy will be frustrated if the Lords amendment stands. It would deliberately prevent some £120 million in capital receipts from debt-free authorities from being used through recycling to help the needs of other areas. Our policy would not mean that the debt-free authorities would receive nothing: they would stand to benefit and would keep a proportion of their capital receipts. However, it is a principle of fairness that those authorities should be subject to the same redistribution rules that apply to the 200 more authorities that have housing stock. Opposition parties have entirely ignored the argument about why some authorities—a small group of 40 or so—should be uniquely advantaged and given the benefit of keeping their capital receipts in full when all other authorities are subject to a redistribution mechanism.
      The Opposition's arguments are threadbare. Their colleagues in the other place are arguing against the privilege of this House and against logic and common sense. This House should reject the Lords amendment.
      Question put, That this House disagrees with the Lords in the said amendment:—
      The House divided: Ayes 221, Noes 112.

      Division No. 322]

      [12:03 am

      AYES

      Adams, Irene (Paisley N)

      Casale, Roger

      Ainsworth, Bob (Cov'try NE)

      Cawsey, Ian (Brigg)

      Alexander, Douglas

      Challen, Colin

      Allen, Graham

      Chapman, Ben (Wirral S)

      Anderson, Janet (Rossendale & Darwen)

      Chaytor, David

      Clark, Paul (Gillingham)

      Armstrong, rh Ms Hilary

      Clarke, rh Charles (Norwich S)

      Atherton, Ms Candy

      Clarke, rh Tom (Coatbridge & Chryston)

      Atkins, Charlotte

      Austin, John

      Clarke, Tony (Northampton S)

      Bailey, Adrian

      Coffey, Ms Ann

      Barnes, Harry

      Cohen, Harry

      Bayley, Hugh

      Colman, Tony

      Beggs, Roy (E Antrim)

      Connarty, Michael

      Benton, Joe (Bootle)

      Cook, rh Robin (Livingston)

      Berry, Roger

      Cousins, Jim

      Best, Harold

      Cox, Tom (Tooting)

      Blackman, Liz

      Cranston, Ross

      Blears, Ms Hazel

      Cruddas, Jon

      Borrow, David

      Cryer, Ann (Keighley)

      Bradley, Peter (The Wrekin)

      Cryer, John (Hornchurch)

      Bradshaw, Ben

      Cunningham, Jim (Coventry S)

      Brennan, Kevin

      Cunningham, Tony (Workington)

      Brown, rh Nicholas (Newcastle E Wallsend)

      Curtis-Thomas, Mrs Claire

      Davey, Valerie (Bristol W)

      Browne, Desmond

      Davidson, Ian

      Burden, Richard

      Davies, rh Denzil (Llanelli)

      Burgon, Colin

      Dawson, Hilton

      Burnham, Andy

      Dean, Mrs Janet

      Byers, rh Stephen

      Denham, rh John

      Cairns, David

      Dismore, Andrew

      Campbell, Alan (Tynemouth)

      Dobbin, Jim (Heywood)

      Campbell, Mrs Anne (C'bridge)

      Dobson, rh Frank

      1038

      Donohoe, Brian H.

      MacShane, Denis

      Doran, Frank

      Mactaggart, Fiona

      Dowd, Jim (Lewisham W)

      McWalter, Tony

      Eagle, Maria (L'pool Garston)

      Mallaber, Judy

      Efford, Clive

      Mann, John (Bassetlaw)

      Etherington, Bill

      Marshall, David (Glasgow Shettleston)

      Farrelly, Paul

      Fitzsimons, Mrs Lorna

      Marshall, Jim (Leicester S)

      Flint, Caroline

      Marshall-Andrews, Robert

      Flynn, Paul (Newport W)

      Martlew, Eric

      Foster, rh Derek

      Merron, Gillian

      Foster, Michael (Worcester)

      Michael, rh Alun

      Foster, Michael Jabez (Hastings & Rye)

      Miller, Andrew

      Moffatt, Laura

      Foulkes, rh George

      Morley, Elliot

      Francis, Dr. Hywel

      Mullin, Chris

      Gardiner, Barry

      Murphy, Jim (Eastwood)

      Gerrard, Neil

      O'Brien, Bill (Normanton)

      Gibson, Dr. Ian

      Osborne, Sandra (Ayr)

      Gilroy, Linda

      Palmer, Dr. Nick

      Goggins, Paul

      Pearson, Ian

      Hall, Mike (Weaver Vale)

      Perham, Linda

      Hamilton, David (Midlothian)

      Picking, Anne

      Hanson, David

      Pickthall, Colin

      Harris, Tom (Glasgow Cathcart)

      Pike, Peter (Burnley)

      Havard, Dai (Merthyr Tydfil & Rhymney)

      Plaskitt, James

      Pollard, Kerry

      Healey, John

      Pound, Stephen

      Henderson, Ivan (Harwich)

      Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)

      Hendrick, Mark

      Primarolo, rh Dawn

      Heppell, John

      Prosser, Gwyn

      Hermon, Lady

      Purchase, Ken

      Hesford, Stephen

      Quinn, Lawrie

      Hill, Keith (Streatham)

      Rammell, Bill

      Hope, Phil (Corby)

      Rapson, Syd (Portsmouth N)

      Hopkins, Kelvin

      Raynsford, rh Nick

      Howarth, rh Alan (Newport E)

      Reed, Andy (Loughborough)

      Hughes, Beverley (Stretford & Urmston)

      Robertson, John (Glasgow Anniesland)

      Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)

      Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)

      Humble, Mrs Joan

      Savidge, Malcolm

      Hurst, Alan (Braintree)

      Sawford, Phil

      Iddon, Dr. Brian

      Shaw, Jonathan

      Irranca-Davies, Huw

      Sheridan, Jim

      Jenkins, Brian

      Simon, Siôn (B'ham Erdington)

      Johnson, Alan (Hull W)

      Simpson, Alan (Nottingham S)

      Jones, Lynne (Selly Oak)

      Skinner, Dennis

      Jones, Martyn (Clwyd S)

      Smith, rh Andrew (Oxford E)

      Keeble, Ms Sally

      Smith, Jacqui (Redditch)

      Kemp, Fraser

      Smith, John (Glamorgan)

      Kennedy, Jane (Wavertree)

      Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)

      Khabra, Piara S.

      Soley, Clive

      Kidney, David

      Squire, Rachel

      Kilfoyle, Peter

      Starkey, Dr. Phyllis

      King, Andy (Rugby)

      Stevenson, George

      Kumar, Dr. Ashok

      Stewart, David (Inverness E & Lochaber)

      Ladyman, Dr. Stephen

      Lazarowicz, Mark

      Strang, rh Dr. Gavin

      Lepper, David

      Sutcliffe, Gerry

      Leslie, Christopher

      Taylor, David (NW Leics)

      Levitt, Tom (High Peak)

      Thomas, Gareth (Clwyd W)

      Love, Andrew

      Todd, Mark (S Derbyshire)

      Luke, Iain (Dundee E)

      Touhig, Don (Islwyn)

      McAvoy, Thomas

      Trickett, Jon

      McCabe, Stephen

      Truswell, Paul

      McCafferty, Chris

      Turner, Dennis (Wolverh'ton SE)

      McDonagh, Siobhain

      Turner, Dr. Desmond (Brighton Kemptown)

      MacDonald, Calum

      McDonnell, John

      Turner, Neil (Wigan)

      McFall, John

      Twigg, Derek (Halton)

      McGuire, Mrs Anne

      Tynan, Bill (Hamilton S)

      McIsaac, Shona

      Vaz, Keith (Leicester E)

      McKechin, Ann

      Vis, Dr. Rudi

      McKenna, Rosemary

      Ward, Claire

      Mackinlay, Andrew

      Wareing, Robert N.

      McNulty, Tony

      Watson, Tom (W Bromwich E)

      1039

      Watts, David

      Woolas, Phil

      White, Brian

      Wright, Anthony D. (Gt Yarmouth)

      Whitehead, Dr. Alan

      Williams, rh Alan (Swansea W)

      Wright, David (Telford)

      Wright, Tony (Cannock)

      Williams, Betty (Conwy)

      Wills, Michael

      Tellers for the Ayes:

      Winnick, David

      Mr. Nick Ainger and

      Wood, Mike (Batley)

      Ms Bridget Prentice

      NOES

      Ainsworth, Peter (E Surrey)

      Llwyd, Elfyn

      Amess, David

      Loughton, Tim

      Atkinson, David (Bour'mth E)

      Luff, Peter (M-Worcs)

      Bacon, Richard

      McIntosh, Miss Anne

      Baron, John (Billericay)

      Mackay, rh Andrew

      Bellingham, Henry

      Maclean, rh David

      Beresford, Sir Paul

      McLoughlin, Patrick

      Blunt, Crispin

      Mates, Michael

      Boswell, Tim

      Maude, rh Francis

      Bottomley, Peter (Worthing W)

      Mercer, Patrick

      Brady, Graham

      Mitchell, Andrew (Sutton Coldfield)

      Brazier, Julian

      Burnett, John

      Moss, Malcolm

      Cameron, David

      Norman, Archie

      Cash, William

      O'Brien, Stephen (Eddisbury)

      Chapman, Sir Sydney (Chipping Barnet)

      ôpik, Lembit

      Osborne, George (Tatton)

      Chope, Christopher

      Ottaway, Richard

      Davey, Edward (Kingston)

      Paice, James

      Davies, Quentin (Grantham & Stamford)

      Paterson, Owen

      Pickles, Eric

      Davis, rh David (Haltemprice & Howden)

      Portillo, rh Michael

      Prisk, Mark (Hertford)

      Djanogly, Jonathan

      Redwood, rh John

      Dodds, Nigel

      Rendel, David

      Dorrell, rh Stephen

      Robathan, Andrew

      Duncan, Alan (Rutland)

      Robertson, Laurence (Tewk'b'ry)

      Evans, Nigel

      Rosindell, Andrew

      Fabricant, Michael

      Ruffley, David

      Fallon, Michael

      Russell, Bob (Colchester)

      Flight, Howard

      Simmonds, Mark

      Flook, Adrian

      Simpson, Keith (M-Norfolk)

      Forth, rh Eric

      Smith, Sir Robert (W Ab'd'ns & Kincardine)

      Gale, Roger (N Thanet)

      Garnier, Edward

      Spelman, Mrs Caroline

      Gibb, Nick (Bognor Regis)

      Spink, Bob (Castle Point)

      Gidley, Sandra

      Spring, Richard

      Gillan, Mrs Cheryl

      Stanley, rh Sir John

      Goodman, Paul

      Swire, Hugo (E Devon)

      Gray, James (N Wilts)

      Syms, Robert

      Green, Matthew (Ludlow)

      Taylor, Ian (Esher)

      Grieve, Dominic

      Taylor, John (Solihull)

      Gummer, rh John

      Taylor, Sir Teddy

      Hammond, Philip

      Thomas, Simon (Ceredigion)

      Hayes, John (S Holland)

      Thurso, John

      Heald, Oliver

      Tredinnick, David

      Heath, David

      Turner, Andrew (Isle of Wight)

      Heathcoat-Amory, rh David

      Tyrie, Andrew

      Hendry, Charles

      Walter, Robert

      Hoban, Mark (Fareham)

      Whittingdale, John

      Jenkin, Bernard

      Wiggin, Bill

      Keetch, Paul

      Wilshire, David

      Key, Robert (Salisbury)

      Winterton, Ann (Congleton)

      Kirkbride, Miss Julie

      Winterton, Sir Nicholas (Macclesfield)

      Laing, Mrs Eleanor

      Lait, Mrs Jacqui

      Yeo, Tim (S Suffolk)

      Lansley, Andrew

      Young, rh Sir George

      Letwin, rh Oliver

      Lewis, Dr. Julian (New Forest E)

      Tellers for the Noes:

      Liddell-Grainger, Ian

      Angela Watkinson and

      Lidington, David

      Mr. Mark Field

      Question accordingly agreed to.
      Lords amendment disagreed to.
      Committee appointed to draw up the Reason to be assigned to the Lords for disagreeing to their amendment No. 3B: Paul Clark, Mr. Edward Davey, Linda Gilroy, Mr. Philip Hammond and Phil Hope; Phil Hope to the Chairman of the Committee; Three to be the quorum of the Committee.—[Paul Clark.]
      To withdraw immediately.
      Reason for disagreeing to the Lords amendment reported, and agreed to; to be communicated to the Lords.

  PETITIONS

    Winter Fuel Payment
    12.17 am
    Mr. Michael Jabez Foster: I have the honour to present a petition prepared by Patrick Iddenden and others and signed by more than 100 residents of Hastings and Rye, mostly disabled, who seek an extension of the winter fuel payment to disabled people. Sadly, the first person named on the petition, Patrick Iddenden, has died suddenly since collecting the names, but his widow, Jacqueline, has requested that the petition still be presented.
    Addressed to the House of Commons, the petition of Patrick Iddenden, Zena Gould and others declares:
    That disabled people suffer from similar mobility problems, and low incomes, as do the elderly, and that their need for warmth during winter months is equally important.
    The Petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urge Her Majesty's Government to allow those on Disability Benefits to qualify for the Winter Fuel Allowance presently only available to the over 60s.
    And the Petitioners remain, etc.
    To lie upon the Table.

    Chenies Village
    12.18 am
    Mrs. Cheryl GillanI present a petition of more than 400 residents of and visitors to Chenies village.
    The petition declares:
    Strong opposition to the erection of a 16-metre mast together with equipment cabinets surrounded by a 2-metre high edge and fence compound at OS Field 0069 opposite the Van Hage Garden Company in Chenies; notes that it will significantly detract from and adversely affect the landscape and the locality; and further notes that there are conflicting reports regarding the health risks associated with these masts.
    The Petitioners therefore request the House of Commons to urge that that a "precautionary" approach be adopted given the proximity of the mast to local resident children and Chenies Primary School.
    And the Petitioners remain, etc.
    To lie upon the Table.

    schools (Buckinghamshire)
    12.19 am
    Mrs. Cheryl Gillan: I should like to take the opportunity to present a second petition—that of 170 residents of Jordans and others.
    The petition declares:
    Strong opposition to the review of school catchment areas by Buckinghamshire County Council, which will result not only in the loss of four out of five schools but also in children being sent to three totally new schools, two of which are in High Wycombe over ten miles away; notes that although the changes are purported to cut transport costs and journey times, they will result in children travelling to school over ten miles away; and further notes that while the changes are in intended to give parents a choice of schools, they will result in the parents of children in Jordans losing their choice, particularly for girls.
    The petitioners therefore request the House of Commons to urge Buckinghamshire County Council to reinstate Dr. Challoner's Grammar School and Dr. Challoner's High School for the village of Jordans and prevent children from Jordans travelling to High Wycombe, which is over twice the distance away.
    And the Petitioners remain, etc.
    To lie upon the Table.

    Roaccutane
    Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Jim Murphy.]
    12.20 am
    Clive Efford: I have requested this Adjournment debate because of the widespread concern that exists about the side effects of the drug Roaccutane, which is used to treat people suffering from the most acute cases of acne.
    The most common side effects of this drug are worth putting on record:
    Dryness of the skin especially the lips and face and you may get some mild itching and slight peeling. The face may be redder than usual. A dry throat which may cause hoarseness. Dryness of the mucous membranes inside the nose, that may become crusted causing minor nose bleeds…Dry eyes that may irritate. This may be a particular problem for patients who wear contact lenses… muscle aches…you should avoid vigorous exercise. Temporary loss or increase of hair."
    The less common side effects include:
    "headaches, nausea, fatigue, sweating, changes of the menstrual cycle, slight loss of hearing, changes in vision, jaundice, liver disease, anaemia, seizures and inflammatory bowel disease…Some people have experienced mood changes (depression or symptoms of mental disorders)…and in rare cases suicide and attempts of suicide. You may also suffer from systemic infections, localised bacterial infections such as infection of the tissue surrounding the base of the nail, swellings which discharge pus, increased facial pigmentation and swollen glands. There may also be inflammation of the blood vessels, blood in the urine and changes in blood glucose levels (especially for patients with diabetes)…On rare occasions the uric acid level in your blood may increase and if you suffer from gout, it could trigger an attack. Very high levels of uric acid may affect the function of your kidney. You may also bruise or bleed more easily due to changes in blood cells, which are needed to clot the blood. Other blood changes may make you more prone to infections."
    My hon. Friend the Minister may think that I have cobbled together that list to sex up my case, but in fact I have just read out the patient's advice that is issued with this drug. I spared him the list of possible side effects for pregnant women. Irony on irony, the advice says:
    "If any of the above side effects become troublesome you should consult your doctor",
    which is probably unnecessary advice given the scale and seriousness of those possible side effects.
    Mr. Peter Kilfoyle: My hon. Friend is being very kind to the Minister. Perhaps I can play the hard cop to his soft cop routine on listing the side effects of this dreadful drug. I remind my hon. Friend of the case of Luke Garner, who took this drug at the age of 13.
    If I may assist my hon. Friend, I will list the after-effects that Luke suffered. They include mental disturbance, arthralgia, bone pain, bone tenderness, cheilitis, cheilosis, epistaxis, inflammation or burning lips, ocular irritation, skin rash, dry eyes, dry mouth, hair loss, dry skin, severe headaches, nasal dryness, peeling skin, unusual tiredness, depression, joint stiffness, mood changes, muscle stiffness, myalgia, optic neuritis, trouble with concentration, fatigue, weakness, paraesthesias, dizziness, nausea, vomiting, weight loss, loss of appetite, malaise, lethargy, swollen glands, various infections, extreme facial and body flushing, difficulty in walking and panic attacks.

    1043
    According to two neurologists, he also suffers from Guillain-Barre syndrome as a direct result of taking the drug.
    Clive Efford: My hon. Friend illustrates the scale of the problems and conditions faced by people who take the drug.
    I accept that acne can be a serious condition for the people who suffer from it and that there is a balance to be struck between the risk of medication and the effect of the continuing condition on a patient. However, none of the advice that is given to practitioners or patients warns that any of the side effects may be permanent, which is the most important issue in the debate.
    The problems with Roaccutane reached my attention when I was approached by Mrs. Stokes-Perkins. Her son Jack was diagnosed with acne at the age of 13. He was a successful student at school and one of those sickening individuals who are good at just everything they do. He was doing well academically and achieving a great deal at sport. He was a confident and outgoing young man. He developed acne at the age of 13 and tried every course of medication available but although he experienced slight remissions, the acne continued to return.
    In January 2001, it was decided that Jack should take a course of Roaccutane. It was his choice to take the drug. He discussed the situation with his family and knew that there was a potentially serious risk of major side effects such as depression, but with the support of his family, he decided to go ahead with the course. Jack was 6 ft 2 in by that time. He was the house captain of his rugby team and played rugby for the Old school under-18 team and, at weekends, for Blackheath rugby club. He organised sport and social events and was part of his school debating society.
    Jack took the course of Roaccutane and everything seemed fine. On returning to his doctor, he was prescribed another course, which seemed to go fine until the last week of the course when the skin on Jack's lips started to fall away. Consequently, Jack finished up with a condition meaning that sunlight dried and cracked his lips, cold weather made them swell and water made the skin fall off. If he went to places such as pubs, the smoky atmosphere made his lips crack. By August 2002—a year later—he would go out only if he was wearing a mask.
    Jack cannot eat normally because anything that comes into contact with his lips causes the skin to fall off. He cannot work to subsidise his activities because he never knows what his daily condition will be. His social life has been virtually destroyed. He is on permanent medication to try to minimise the permanent side effect of Roaccutane. He has seen two senior consultant dermatologists who both concluded that Roaccutane is to blame for his condition. Dr. Chu from Hammersmith hospital has publicly called for an inquiry into Roaccutane and its side effects.
    Jack has been permanently disfigured as a result of taking the drug but other people have had their lives wrecked and some have committed suicide. The drug is a derivative of vitamin A, an overdose of which can have damaging effects on people's mental state. He was aware
    1044
    of those warnings and, thankfully, did not suffer such side effects but other people have. I have seen figures from the World Health Organisation that report 20,000 cases of adverse drug reaction reports relating to Roaccutane as far back as 1997. Figures for the United Kingdom show that, of 170 million prescriptions of drugs relating to acne, there were 239 adverse drug reaction reports, of which 135 related to Roaccutane—more than 50 per cent. There were nine suicides, eight attempted suicides and six cases of people indicating that they had a desire or intention to commit suicide. All those cases related to people who had taken Roaccutane. Of those 170 million prescriptions in the UK, Roaccutane accounts for just 12,400, yet every suicide-related case related to Roaccutane.
    In the past year, I have tabled a number of questions relating to the drug but unfortunately the answers have not been forthcoming because the Medicines Control Agency has been undertaking a review on behalf of the European Commission. I contacted the MCA today and it has advised me that it has finished its review, has passed its report to the European Commission and is waiting for its conclusions.
    I have discovered today by talking to the MCA that the review will be about not whether the drug should continue in use but what advice will accompany the drug when it is prescribed. I have chosen to have the debate ahead of that report not only because we have been waiting far too long for conclusions but because we need to try to influence the conclusions that the European Commission may come to on the drug.
    I accept that there may be a place for Roaccutane in the treatment of acne sufferers but more needs to be known about the potential damage that it can cause. Roche, the manufacturers, will not accept that its drug caused Jack's condition. How many others is it denying whom we do not know about?
    There are many examples that we do know about, however. Charles Bishop was the teenager who flew a plane into the Bank of America Plaza in Tampa. Hon. Members may recall that that happened soon after the 9/11 twin towers catastrophe. It was seen to be a copycat attack at the time but turned out to be by someone who had been taking Accutane, the United States equivalent of Roaccutane.
    Congressman Bart Stupac's son BJ unexpectedly committed suicide on the night of his school prom at a party at his house. He was a young individual with a life in front of him. The description of him sounds very much like that of Jack. Luke Hassett finished up in a psychiatric unit having taken Roaccutane.
    Today, I went on to the web to find out more information about the drug. I have discovered that it is available on the web. The website that I visited listed 200 countries from which it can be purchased over the internet. In the UK, evidence of prescribing for conditions for which the drug was not originally intended are rife.
    In an article in The Sunday Times, a spokeswoman from Roche said:
    "We have had external scientists and internal scientists look into the side-effects and we have found no causal relationship between Roaccutane and any psychiatric events, from depression or suicide."
    The response from the company is denial and it is the most disturbing aspect of the whole affair. While it remains in denial of the potential permanent effects that

    1045
    its drug can have, the suspicion about the safety of the drug will grow. The list of side effects in the advice that accompanies the drug is simply to cover its back from any legal challenge that may be mounted by someone who has suffered these side effects. Roaccutane should not be prescribed unless it is by a specialist dermatologist who has undertaken a pregnancy test in the case of a female, and there has been a thorough blood test and a psychiatric assessment of the patient concerned, including an assessment of any history of psychiatric conditions in the family. There is clear evidence that that is not taking place. A full inquiry into the drug should be carried out, and is well overdue. We need to determine whether it is safe to prescribe Roaccutane in the first place and, if we decide that it should be prescribed, practitioners need to set clear and enforceable guidelines for its use. Patients need to be warned of the drug's possibly permanent side-effects. The suggestion in the notes that I have read that all the conditions are temporary and that people will return to normal after they have completed a course of treatment is not sufficient.
    I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister has listened to what I have said and to the case described by my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Kilfoyle). If this situation continues and the European Commission does not come to a satisfactory conclusion in its deliberations on the drug, we will back on the Floor of the House debating this matter again. People cannot continue to be put at risk as a result of taking the drug without being given clear advice and information about its possible risks.
    12.36 am
    The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health (Dr. Stephen Ladyman): I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Eltham (Clive Efford) on securing this debate on the prescribing of Roaccutane and on the efforts he is making on behalf of his constituent. He is a strong and persistent advocate. I also congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Kilfoyle) on the efforts that he is making on behalf of his constituent. I understand the distress faced by both my hon. Friends' constituents․their condition and the symptoms from which they are suffering must make things extremely difficult for them. Nothing that I say tonight diminishes the Government's sympathetic view of their condition. I listened carefully to my hon. Friend the Member for Eltham․I promise to read his comments in the Official Report, and shall make sure that all the officials in the Department involved with the issue read them as well. If there are points that I do not deal with today, I shall write to him.
    Neither of my hon. Friends would want me to try to intervene on the Floor of the House in any dispute between their constituents and the makers of Roaccutane, and neither of them have asked me to do so. If they have not done so already, I am sure that they will both advise their constituents to seek appropriate legal advice. I will, however, try to address the general points that have been raised. I shall discuss the broad issues around the use of the drug, its prescription and regulation, and am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Eltham for giving me the chance to update the House on these issues. I will also try to address the
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    serious concerns that he raised about the safety of the drug, including the debilitating chapping and inflammation of the lips known as cheilitis.
    Roaccutane is the brand name for the drug substance known as isotretinoin, which is the name that I shall use for the remainder of my speech. Isotretinoin is the active component of Roaccutane, and is an important medicine that has been on the market for about 20 years. Without in any way minimising the distressing side effects suffered by my hon. Friends' constituents, it is important to recognise that it has helped very many people during that time and has changed many lives for the better. I can assure both my hon. Friends that whenever this issue is raised in public, the Department of Health receives many letters from people whose lives have been changed for the better by the drug, and who want to make sure that we are aware of their experience as well as the negative experience of others.
    Isotretinoin, as my hon. Friend the Member for Eltham said, is a derivative of vitamin A that is used for the treatment of severe and resistant acne. Acne is a common condition that affects about 80 per cent. of adolescents at one time or another and occasionally affects adults. Although it is not life-threatening, it can have a significant impact on the lives of sufferers. In its severe forms, acne can be extremely debilitating and distressing, and can cause disfigurement and permanent scarring. Many forms of acne will respond well to treatment with topical preparations or systemic antibiotics, but for severe and resistant acne, effective treatment options are very limited, and isotretinoin is one of the limited number of effective treatments available.
    Isotretinoin has been authorised in the UK since 1983. It is available worldwide, has been used by millions of people, and is a highly effective oral treatment for the type of severe and resistant acne that I have described. It is important that hon. Members understand that all effective medicines have side effects. There is always the risk of side effects in some people, and unfortunately it is often impossible to predict which individuals will suffer a side effect from a medicine. A medicine will be issued with a licence for use in certain circumstances only if it is considered that, in those circumstances, the benefits of treatment outweigh the risk of side effects. The risks and benefits of isotretinoin were carefully considered at the time of licensing, and because of the known safety profile of the drug, it is licensed for use only in severe forms of acne that are resistant to other treatment.
    Clive Efford: There has been an inquiry at Leeds infirmary, where a number of cases came to light in which people with mild forms of acne were prescribed Roaccutane. If it is decided that Roaccutane can be used, there must be stricter guidelines because it is not being prescribed in accordance with the licence issued back in 1987.
    Dr. Ladyman: I understand my hon. Friend's point, but I emphasise that we issue a licence that describes the conditions under which the drug should be used. It is open to any clinician at any time to issue a particular

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    type of treatment to an individual if they think that it is in that patient's best interest. If clinicians depart from the licence conditions, they do so on their own responsibility because they believe that it is in the clinical interest of their patient. They must answer for that decision under the terms of normal clinical governance․in other words, what happens in those cases becomes the doctor's responsibility. Those are the only cases in which it is possible to diverge from the licence arrangements. I shall have my officials look into the case that my hon. Friend mentions. Unless the doctors involved can answer for their decision to depart from the licence conditions, they are in the wrong. That needs to be investigated and they need to answer for it.
    I emphasise that when isotretinoin is to be prescribed in cases of severe acne, it should be used—this is another of the licence conditionsߞonly when other treatments have been tried and have failed. It is a treatment that should be considered last, not first.
    Since licensing, the safety of isotretinoin has been closely monitored by the Medicines and Health Care Products Regulatory Agency—formerly the Medicines Control Agency—with expert advice from the Committee on Safety of Medicines. Isotretinoin is a highly effective medicine, but it is widely understood that it is associated with some serious side effects, and these must be considered when the clinician decides to use it.
    Most importantly, isotretinoin is extremely harmful to the unborn foetus and therefore must not be taken during pregnancy or when there is a risk of pregnancy. Other common known side effects include dryness of the skin and the lining of the mouth, nose and eyes. The dryness of the skin associated with isotretinoin can take the form of cheilitis, which is the cracking or inflammation of the lips, a condition that can become severe, chronic and debilitating in some patients. It sounds very similar to the symptoms experienced by the constituent of my hon. Friend the Member for Eltham. There has also been significant concern about the possibility that isotretinoin may be associated with depression and suicidal behaviour.
    Isotretinoin is licensed only for use in severe forms of acne that are resistant to other treatment. That narrow indication is not the only restriction to its use in the UK. Isotretinoin can currently be given only by or under the supervision of a consultant dermatologist—one of the conditions that my hon. Friend said needed to be strictly adhered to. In addition, the supply of isotretinoin is restricted to availability through hospital pharmacies or specified retail pharmacies at the request of a consultant dermatologist. The intention of restricting prescribing in that way is that it is those health professionals with most experience and who are best placed to give patients advice about the important safety issues related to the prescribing of isotretinoin who are making prescribing decisions.
    My hon. Friend referred to the internet, which is not a legal and licensed source for the drug. It might be available there, but I fear that many things that are not in our constituents' best interests are available on the internet these days.
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    To underpin the process, all licensed medicines have a summary of product characteristics. The summary, which my hon. Friend described, contains important information for prescribers. Licensed medicines are also accompanied by an information leaflet for patients. These documents are changed and new information is added as it becomes available. The patient information leaflet is an essential document if the patient is to be fully aware of the possible risks of treatment and make informed choices about their care. In the case of skin dryness and inflammation, there is clear advice to expect such effects and on how to relieve or minimise symptoms.
    My hon. Friend mentioned that the leaflet contained no advice about permanent risk. I was not aware that that was the case, and I shall ensure that the people responsible for drafting the leaflet and other officials are aware of that concern. I shall have the matter investigated and I shall ensure that it is acted on if it is within my power to do so.
    Clive Efford: I thank my hon. Friend for that statement. Many people are suffering permanent conditions as a result of having taken Roaccutane. That is the issue that is of most concern and the reason why I have initiated this debate.
    Dr. Ladyman: If there is a risk of permanent side effects, they should be described in the leaflet. I certainly promise to ensure that that is looked into.
    Despite the guidance in the British National Formulary about the narrow licensed indication for isotretinoin in the UK, its use is not always restricted to patients with severe and resistant acne. Ultimately, the clinical care of an individual patient is the responsibility of their doctor and it is an important principle that doctors can prescribe medicines outside the licensed indication if they consider that that is in the best interests of the patient. The doctor is responsible for the safe use of the product in those circumstances and is answerable under clinical governance rules.
    Because of the harmful effects of isotretinoin during pregnancy, it has been the aim of regulatory authorities in Europe and worldwide to introduce measures to ensure that no one takes isotretinoin while pregnant. The summary of product characteristics lays down stringent conditions for use in women who are of childbearing potential. However, the current safeguards have not succeeded in preventing all exposed pregnancies, which has highlighted the need for further measures to be introduced.
    My hon. Friend has also given me the opportunity to update the House on some important European work on the safety of isotretinoin. The UK and France have led a recent European initiative to harmonise the product information for the drug. The aim of the review was to get up to date and consistent product information for prescribers and patients across all member states. The procedure has also developed a set of important principles for nationally agreed pregnancy prevention programmes. The completion of the procedure is imminent, and the Medicines and Health Care Products Regulatory Agency is having discussions with key stakeholders to plan communication of these important new prescribing principles to health professionals and patients who use isotretinoin.

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    The UK lead in the European review has allowed us to ensure that the important restrictions on isotretinoin use that are present in the UK now are not relaxed and are taken forward in Europe. The UK input into the review has been informed by an expert working group of the Committee on Safety of Medicines. The group includes representatives specialising in dermatology, general practice, family planning and psychiatry.
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    I hope that I have dealt with all the points that my hon. Friend made. I assure him that I shall write to him if I have missed any and that I will take action on whether the product description should include information about possible permanent side effects.
    Question put and agreed to.
    Adjourned accordingly at ten minutes to One o'clock.

Preamble
[DEREK CONWAY in the Chair]

Road Haulage Industry
Motion made, and Question proposed, That the sitting be now adjourned.— [Mr. Ainger.]
9.30 am
Jim Sheridan: I am delighted to have secured this debate on some of the most important issues relating to the road haulage industry and the difficulties that it is facing. Perhaps it would be helpful at this stage to give a brief history of organisations such as the Road Haulage Association, which I have been speaking to during my research into the issues.
The RHA was formed in 1945 to look after the interests of haulage contractors in various parts of the country and, in effect, it amalgamated local organisations that had been established previously. It has subsequently developed to become the primary trade association representing the hire or reward sector of the road transport industry. Some 10,000 companies are now members of the association and they vary from major concerns with more than 5,000 vehicles to single owner-drivers.
The purpose of this debate is to highlight the issues facing the road haulage industry that arise from the Government's policies and the consequences for the future of the industry. This debate is not about hauliers having a moan and a whinge. British manufacturers are equally concerned that the high cost of transportation is a major factor in undermining their ability to compete in European and world markets. Indeed, many of them are struggling to compete in our home market.
I want to raise a number of general issues, including fuel costs, foreign competition, proposed lorry road-user charging and, perhaps most importantly, the proposed implementation of the working time directive on the road transport sector, which will be implemented in March 2005. The Government have expressed a genuine interest in working with all interested parties in the transport industry, including employers, employees and employees' representatives, such as the Transport and General Workers Union, of which I am a longstanding member. The Government's 10-year plan for England and Wales is the first long-term plan for transport policy in the United Kingdom for more than 30 years and it represents an important and welcome departure from the previous Administration's stop-start treatment of transport investment. It was warmly welcomed by the industry when it was published in July 2000, and perhaps lessons can be learned from such transport policy and rolled out throughout the UK.
Under the 10-year plan, the industry has a route map of overall spending, infrastructure and, perhaps most importantly, deliverables. It provides a context in which companies can make strategic, long-term decisions about the structure of their supply chains, establish long-term business plans and make significant investments in distribution and logistics. It would help
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the industry greatly, however, if the contract arrangements with customers could be extended to a minimum of five years. That would allow transport companies to plan effectively for the future and to offer their employees limited security. The contracts are currently for one year or for two to three years. Very few run for the full five-year term, although the industry would appreciate that degree of stability.
You will be aware, Mr. Deputy Speaker, of the industry's long-running and, at times, controversial campaign to reduce fuel costs. The European Commission's transport White Paper recommended that commercial road transport uses should be harmonised wherever possible to avoid distortions of competition and the taxation of fuel. The industry would support any action that could achieve that. However, there is recognition that it is unlikely that such a reduction will take place immediately throughout the United Kingdom because of the costs involved.
Mr. David Marshall: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for giving way and congratulate him on securing this important debate. Does he have any information about what the reduction or the increase in fuel taxation on British HGV operations would be if harmonisation throughout the European Union were to be obtained?
Jim Sheridan: I do not know the precise figure—the Treasury would be more able to answer my hon. Friend's question—but the road haulage industry is considering the possibility of at least a freeze, especially on diesel, for the next few years. That would go a long way to harmonising fuel costs throughout the EU. There is a realisation among the road haulage industry that taxes in this country help to pay for the public services that so many of us enjoy. The haulage industry is no different from anyone else in recognising that there is a price to be paid for public services. Again, however, I emphasise that it would be greatly appreciated if this Government could do something to bring about harmonisation of fuel costs throughout Europe.
Mr. Christopher Chope: Is the hon. Gentleman going to say anything about the threat that the road haulage industry faces of a further increase in road fuel duty from about 1 October this year, following the Chancellor's remarks in his spring Budget?
Jim Sheridan: I have no intention today of touching on what the Chancellor does, or proposes to do or not to do, in the forthcoming Budget. The RHA has told me that it is not overly concerned about the Chancellor's forthcoming plans. Certainly, it has not raised any concerns with me.
Mr. Chope: Has the hon. Gentleman seen the September 2003 edition of Roadway, published by the RHA? The whole front page is devoted to a public wealth warning on this issue.
Jim Sheridan: I have not seen the article to which the hon. Gentleman refers. Any reduction in fuel costs for the industry would be greatly appreciated. I and others will be advocating to the Treasury the fact that any assistance in reducing fuel costs would be extremely

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helpful to this important industry. However, I emphasise that it must be recognised that there has to be a certain amount of taxation to keep the required public services. Creating that balance is important.
The industry's problems with fuel costs have been further compounded by oil companies and their distributors changing the terms and conditions of the sale of fuel to some transport companies. There is anecdotal evidence that hauliers, particularly the small ones—the most important ones—are experiencing significant difficulties with changes in how the oil companies and their distributors operate.
A Scottish haulier almost went out of business when fuel giant Shell slashed his credit terms from £60,000 to zero in just 10 days. He has been a Shell customer for almost 30 years and he spends about £300,000 a year on diesel, but Shell ordered him to provide accounts before he could buy any more fuel on credit, even though he had never previously been asked for that. When he explained that he could not comply with that instruction because his accounts were with his accountant, Shell refused to sell him any more diesel. Consequently, his wagons were laid up, as he had no fuel to drive them. Those actions could be understood if the haulier had reneged on payments or if a cheque had bounced—we might then see the sense of it—but Shell left him high and dry and with no alternative. The RHA has received many similar complaints about oil companies from its other members.
Mr. John Lyons: Does my hon. Friend accept that this type of practice will be a threat to small, family-run businesses if it develops more widely in the industry? We need to do something to protect them.
Jim Sheridan: My hon. Friend raises an important point. That practice will particularly affect single owner-drivers, who have nothing to fall back on when faced with that type of difficulty. The houses of many single owner-drivers are mortgaged on their businesses, so when companies such as Shell behave in this way it threatens not only the businesses of single owner-drivers, but their houses and livelihoods. That concerns many of them. It is a real problem for the industry, which is in bad enough shape already without fuel suppliers making life more difficult. I recognise that there are limits to the extent that the Government can influence how major companies and distributors operate, but the Minister's involvement in trying to influence their operating practice and how they deal with their valued customers would be welcome.
I now turn to the issue of unfair competition in the industry from some European businesses, many of which exploit their employees for cheap labour and have the capacity and the knowledge to circumvent the regulations surrounding road transport in Britain and those safeguarding British workers. The problem particularly involves the ever-growing number of eastern European drivers who use our roads without making any financial contribution to their upkeep and
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maintenance. I have written to the Secretary of State for Transport on the matter of continental drivers and the undermining of significant investment.
Mr. Marshall: Is my hon. Friend concerned, as I am sure many of us are, that after the addition of 10 new members to the EU at the end of the year, the situation will become much worse because there will be many more drivers from much poorer countries, which may have poorer standards of driving and driving tests, overloaded lorries and all the other problems associated with the industry? Does he agree that those difficulties will be exacerbated when those countries join the EU?
Jim Sheridan: My hon. Friend raises an important point, particularly as he has a long history of work and involvement in the transport industry and knows a great deal about it. He is right—the problem is ever increasing as many more eastern European drivers, for instance, come into the country. One can only hazard a guess at the standard of servicing and MOT applied to those lorries, how the workers are treated and whether the practices in some countries are undermining the profitability of the industry as well as the employment rights of British workers.
There is concern about continental drivers undermining the significant investment in ports such as the Rosyth container terminal in Dunfermline, which is a valuable route to mainland Europe for many of our hauliers. There is evidence that continental drivers frequently fill up their fuel tanks, including their reserve tanks, and drive the length and breadth of our country using cheap diesel purchased outside Britain. As someone who has used the Rosyth ferry alongside a number of my parliamentary colleagues, I was extremely disappointed by the fact that that route was used mainly by British drivers. However, I have spoken to my hon. Friend the Member for Dunfermline, West (Rachel Squire), in whose constituency the Rosyth ferry operates, and she informed me that the ferry is on the up and in good shape. I was extremely pleased to hear that.
I was also pleased to hear that the Secretary of State for Transport agreed that it was unfair that hauliers from outside Britain could use our roads without making any contribution to their maintenance and upkeep. That is why the Government are introducing the lorry road-user charging scheme, which will be applied to all lorries using our roads, although it is a little disappointing that the time scale for the charge's introduction means that it will not apply until 2006. I am concerned that some of our smaller hauliers could go out of business before that happens. I would welcome any assistance from the Minister in reducing that time scale.
The introduction of the LRUC scheme is probably a precursor to a wider programme embracing the motorist. Most organisations, such as the RHA, support the proposal in principle as the best way to level the playing field between the relatively high-taxed UK-based hauliers and their EU counterparts. They would welcome the offsetting of any reduction in fuel duty as the best way to ensure that, overall, total tax achieved through the LRUC scheme will remain the same. I would welcome the Minister's comments on that. There are concerns about the scheme's impact on the hire or reward sector of the road haulage industry. Again, I would welcome any further clarification.

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The burning issue in the industry is the EU working time directive, which is due to be implemented in March 2005. While it is right and proper that British workers enjoy the same employment rights as their colleagues in Europe, the legislation has major implications for the industry in terms of human and financial resources. Initial reports estimate that an additional 60,000 drivers will be required to accommodate that new legislation. That could be a window of opportunity for the industry to become more representative of the communities that it serves by recruiting more women and ethnic minority workers. Currently, a vast proportion of lorry drivers are white middle-aged males.
The Minister will be aware of consultation between his Department and representatives of the industry on the implementation of the working time directive. I would like an update on where the consultations stand and when the consultative document will be published. I would welcome a clear definition of what constitutes a working day for the British worker. Will waiting time be calculated as being part of the working day?
I hope that I have reflected accurately the views and concerns of those who depend on the transport industry for their living. I look forward to hearing what the Minister has to say on the issues that I have raised.
Derek Conway: Before I call the next Member to speak, I should say that there can sometimes be confusion about whether the person in the Chair should be called by name or addressed as Mr. Deputy Speaker. Some are Deputy Speakers, some are not—I am one of the "are nots". Addressing Deputy Speakers wrongly is not a capital offence, but those who are Deputy Speakers might get very upset while those who are not should be addressed by name. My surname will suffice.
If no other Member wishes to speak, we can move on to the Front-Bench contributions. I call Dr. Cable.
9.50 am
Dr. Vincent Cable: I congratulate the hon. Member for West Renfrewshire (Jim Sheridan) on choosing the subject of today's debate. I regret that more Members have not taken advantage of the opportunity to participate, because it affects all our constituents. After the summer of discontent three years ago, none of us is likely to forget the importance of the road haulage industry; it has a key role in the national infrastructure.
I shall pick up on two of the key themes mentioned by the hon. Gentleman in his introductory presentation, and make a few other points. I start by talking about tax, a highly emotive matter that has dominated the national agenda in recent years. Recent diesel differentials have remained extremely large. The hon. Gentleman spoke about the matter in broad terms, but I can tell the Chamber that the United Kingdom diesel rate after tax is 81p a litre, whereas, in countries where lorries are loaded before they come to the UK, the rate is different. In Belgium, it is 49p; and in France, it is 57p.
The enormous differential presents two problems. The first, described by the hon. Gentleman, is that it affects the competitiveness of UK operators, because their basic input fuel is bought at a much higher price than that of their continental competitors. The second
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problem is the adverse effect on the UK economy as a whole. Large numbers of continental operators use British roads, and the heavier ones inflict serious damage on our roads. Maintenance costs are therefore higher, but those lorry owners make no contribution to our costs through their tax payments. Everyone accepts that that is fundamentally wrong and the problem needs to be addressed.
There is broad consensus on the way forward, and the various statements that the Government made in the Budget and, more recently, in May seem an entirely sensible way of dealing with the problem. All three parties accept the need for a road-user charge that should apply equally to foreign and British users. The charge should be applied in such a way that it does not involve additional costs for UK operators—the money should be rebated through either vehicle excise duty or fuel duty—but is paid by continental operators. That would go some way to levelling the playing field and providing a more rational economic basis for taxation.
The Government are right to have proposed a distance-based charge rather than a time-based one. That will give them the opportunity to apply charges that bear some relation to the environmental and social costs. The proposal currently applies to off-motorway as well as motorway use, and it would permit higher charges on the bigger, more damaging vehicles. That seems a sensible structure.
I would like the Minister to clarify two points. First, although I may have misunderstood the situation, I believe that there are difficulties in making the UK proposals compatible with EU regulation, so I want to check that that is not a problem. Secondly, there is some concern in the industry that the new distance-based charge, which is desirable in principle, may be difficult to apply because of the black-box technology required. The industry has asked the Government to help by setting standards. That would speed up the development of the necessary technology, which would not merely take the tachograph measurements but incorporate equipment for the new road charge and other technology to improve the performance of the UK industry. It would be useful to know how far advanced we are with that technology.
The second key issue raised by the hon. Member for West Renfrewshire was working conditions, including working time, which are important for two reasons. First, although people have different views about tough working standards and the extent to which they should be applied, it has been accepted for decades that road haulage is a special case because safety is an issue not simply for the employees, important though that is, but for the public. There have to be rigorous standards and they have to be enforced. Obviously, we are in favour of that.
The hon. Member for Glasgow, Shettleston (Mr. Marshall) rightly pointed out the second way in which road haulage is a special case. We are dealing not only with working conditions in the UK, which are subject to British rules, but with journeys that cross many borders. Standards across the European Union must therefore be consistent; otherwise they will not be enforced. There will be abuse, standards will fall and safety will suffer, affecting all of us. Whatever people might think about the desirability of tough Europe-wide standards in

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general, they must, emphatically, apply in the case of road haulage. We would fully support such an approach.
There is no fundamental disagreement about that point. There must be strong standards to maintain safety, and the approach used must involve the working time directive. The key point is that that will lead to a substantial need for additional manpower—if hours are reduced, more people are needed to do the same work—so there is a big recruitment issue, which means that there is also a training issue. Although we hear a great deal about the need for more plumbers and electricians, we do not often hear about the need for more long-distance lorry drivers. There needs to be more emphasis on vocational training to address the issue of labour supply. Has the Minister any views about that, and is there any industry-wide initiative comparable to that in the building industry, such as a levy-based system that would enable training needs to be met?
My final point is that I have read through the literature of the Road Haulage Association, which has a legitimate interest in its members. However, if we are considering freight as a whole, as represented by the Freight Transport Association, there is a bigger picture. Freight does not have to be carried by lorries. We know the sad story of the Post Office, which goes back some years. Probably the biggest planning application that ever confronted my constituency was a proposal to convert a big railway marshalling yard, the so-called Feltham marshalling yard, into a sorting office linked to road haulage, with the consequent abandonment of the rail link. Enormous social costs are being paid as a result of what was no doubt a correct commercial calculation by the Post Office. That decision has been replicated many times. It would be interesting to hear from the Minister about the Post Office's current role in freight, and about any support for the rail freight initiative through the Strategic Rail Authority.
I thank the hon. Member for West Renfrewshire for having initiated this important debate. We discovered three years ago that a great deal of complacency had set in with regard to the road haulage industry. That exploded in a politically damaging way through the blockades, so it is important to keep a close eye on the issues in the industry to ensure that that does not happen again.
9.58 am
Mr. Christopher Chope: Likewise, I congratulate the hon. Member for Glasgow, Shettleston (Mr Marshall) on initiating the debate. It is a great disappointment to many of us that there have not been more participants because it is an important subject, which goes to the heart of the British economy.
Jim Sheridan: On a point of clarification, Mr. Conway. I am not from Glasgow, Shettleston; I am from West Renfrewshire.
Mr. Chope: I do apologise to the hon. Gentleman. I knew that he was from somewhere up north but I am sorry that I got his title wrong. That does not alter the fact that I congratulate him on introducing the debate.
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If I were to sit down immediately we would have an hour to hear from the Minister on Government policy on the issue. I begin by asking the Minister why he, and not his hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, the hon. Member for Plymouth, Devonport (Mr. Jamieson), is taking part in the debate. One of the most constructive outcomes of the fuel dispute three years ago was the emergence of the road haulage forum. That forum meets regularly and, as I understand it, the Government's representative from the Department for Transport is none other than the hon. Member for Plymouth, Devonport—indeed, he was at a forum meeting earlier this month. He is the key Transport Minister, dealing on a day-to-day basis with road haulage, so surely he should be present to demonstrate the importance of the issues raised in the debate and respond to them. I fear that, worthy as the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, the hon. Member for Harrow, East (Mr. McNulty), is, as road haulage is not his responsibility he may say that he does not have the necessary answers to questions that have been and will be raised.
The hon. Member for West Renfrewshire (Jim Sheridan) referred to unfair levels of fuel tax. It is worth putting on the record the front page of the September 2003 edition of Roadway, the magazine of the Road Haulage Association. Inside a black border is a statement that says:

"Public Wealth Warning. Chancellor, you threatened to raise fuel duty on October 1, 2003. Please think again, DON'T DO IT! All EU countries must pay the world rate for oil. Only the UK chooses to levy penal rates of duty. That puts transport costs up and makes this country less competitive. It gives foreign hauliers operating in the UK a grotesquely unfair advantage. In the interests of a dynamic manufacturing and service based economy, you should be REDUCING fuel duty for road transport."

I hope that the Minister will clarify the situation concerning that threatened increase in fuel tax. When the Chancellor introduced his Budget, he said that he would not introduce an increase in fuel duty because of the instability in world fuel prices. At that stage, the world price of oil was about $27 a barrel, and it is now about $28 a barrel. The price is higher than it was, and there is clearly a lot of volatility in supply. Therefore, I am surprised that the Chancellor has not made a statement to clarify his intentions for a mid-year increase in fuel duty.
I hope that the Minister will put that omission right today because, as we know, the House rises tomorrow and will not reconvene until after 1 October. It is important to clarify the Government's approach, particularly for everyone involved in the road haulage industry. As I understand it, if there were an inflation-linked increase in duty, the road haulage industry alone would be burdened with an additional £172 million of costs each year. That is a large sum of money.
We heard today on the radio that the Government are making much of spending £50 million on trying to reduce congestion on our roads by giving schools incentives to encourage children to walk and cycle to school. Some £50 million is going to that, but at a stroke another £172 million could come from the road haulage industry alone in the next few weeks—an industry which is already paying the highest fuel taxes in Europe. I hope that the Minister will respond to that concern in the substantial time that will be available to him.

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The second issue that the hon. Member for West Renfrewshire emphasised was concern about the working time directive. He asked for clarification from the Minister as to whether working time would include rest time that is part of the working day. That is a pertinent point, particularly with regard to a recent highly publicised judgment in the European Court that made it clear that, for the purposes of the working time directive, doctors are deemed to be working when they are on call. If that applies to lorry drivers, who are, in a sense, on call or waiting by their lorries while they are being unloaded, the already oppressive proposal contained in the directive would have an even greater impact on the competitiveness of our industry.
At the meeting of the road haulage forum to which I referred, both the Freight Transport Adjuster and the R.HA raised that issue. A report of that meeting says that the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, the hon. Member for Plymouth, Devonport, wanted to be provided with some more information. I am surprised that he needed any more information, because the Centre for Economic and Business Research produced a formidable report in February this year for the RHA, which I am sure the Minister must have read if he is seriously interested in the issues. That report spelled out in the starkest terms not only that there would be a need for 60,000 additional drivers, as the hon. Member for West Renfrewshire mentioned, but that major additional costs to the UK economy would result directly from the working time directive.
The report also said that there would be a significant increase in congestion, which would largely be due to the difficulties of moving freight at night. Under the proposals, anyone working during the core period for night work, which is described as a four-hour period between midnight and 7 am, will be limited to working a maximum of 10 hours. That is likely to make it less economic for hauliers to use the opportunity presented by transport at night on roads that are less congested, and they will be forced to use the roads during peak times and in the working day to a greater extent than they do now.
Jim Sheridan: Against the background that the hon. Gentleman has described—he has claimed that there should be parity with European legislation on fuel costs and so on, and that British hauliers should enjoy the same level of fuel tax as our European partners—will he state clearly whether a Tory Administration would implement the working time directive for transport workers and afford them the same rights as their European colleagues?
Mr. Chope: Unfortunately, as I think the hon. Gentleman realises, we as a Parliament have lost a lot of our sovereignty over such issues. If our power to opt out of that directive is not exercised now and the Government have already either lost or not fought the argument, the options open to an incoming Government will be restricted.
There is another example of that, which concerns speed limiters, and I hope that the Minister can address the issue. As I understand it, the European Commission has decided that the maximum speed for speed limiters for heavy goods vehicles should be reduced from 100 to 90 kph. The British representative in the discussions
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voted against the proposal, but it was carried by other European Union countries. As a result, it will now be imposed on the people of this country against our will.
That is another unacceptable example of how we are finding our sovereignty and power to decide being undermined by the European Union. The hon. Member for West Renfrewshire says that we are in favour of harmonisation, but I have said only that I am in favour of this Government taking action to remove the burden on our industry of uncompetitive taxes. We believe in the freedom of individual countries to decide their own tax rates and regulatory regimes in accordance with the principles of sovereignty, but that is being constantly undermined by the European Union.
It is inconsistent for the hon. Gentleman to argue that he is concerned about the working time directive without looking at the structure underlying such directives. That structure makes the European Union less competitive in global markets and, in particular, undermines the most enterprising parts of the European Union, especially the United Kingdom, which of course includes Scotland.
What has happened so far with the latest part of the working time directive? The original Labour party line was that it would never want the directive extended to the transport sector, but now we see that it will be extended. Labour has done nothing effective to resist it, and we are left with only the residual issue of the extent to which we can introduce regulations that are less oppressive in this country than elsewhere. The absurd result is that lorries will not be able to use the relatively empty roads at night, because their drivers would break the ludicrous regulations, which will add to congestion during the day.
The Minister should consider the CEBR report, which contains horrendous figures about the cost to the British economy of the working time directive, which is due to come into effect next year. It estimates that there could be a loss of £706 million from our GDP and an addition to both the retail prices index and base rates, simply as a result of that particular provision.
What will the directive achieve? Regulations on drivers' hours already exist, and there is no need to extend them and incorporate the working time directive. Working time has never been directly linked to health and safety, which we are all concerned about, but the European Commission has used the notion of health and safety as a ruse to introduce greater controls over individuals' lives. Unlike other parts of the working time directive, which have been introduced in other sectors, there is no opt-out for the haulage sector, which is a direct affront to the rights of individuals to work. There is a well-established right to work campaign in the United States, and I envisage such campaigns being replicated soon in this country if the European Union continues to impose mindless regulations on our workers.
Jim Sheridan: Putting aside employee rights in the working time directive and employers' potential profitability, does the hon. Gentleman accept that drivers in Britain, whether British or foreign, regularly

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work some 60 to 70 hours, driving 40 or 60-tonne lorries through our communities? Does not that represent a threat to the safety of the British public?
Mr. Chope: Frankly, I do not believe that such a threat is borne out by the evidence. If the hon. Gentleman were to look at the statistics, he would find that the greatest incidence of accidents occurs shortly after people come on their shift. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman is arguing in favour of the rigidities that will be imposed by the working time directive, but the concerns that he expresses are not borne out by the statistics. I have always been concerned about health and safety because I have always wanted health and safety rules to be based on facts and evidence rather than on supposition. The facts and evidence show that the greatest incidence of accidents involving drivers on the roads occurs soon after they start their shift, and the same is true of accidents at the workplace. That may be counter-intuitive; nevertheless, it is supported by evidence, which should drive our policy making.
Jim Sheridan: I apologise for pushing the point, but the hon. Gentleman quotes statistics and facts. Could he advise us where they come from?
Mr. Chope: I do not have the documents before me at the moment. However, the hon. Gentleman may know that I have taken an interest in health and safety for a very long time and was privileged to serve as a member of the Health and Safety Commission for four or five years. The statistics are well established. I also recall that they were referred to during the RHA convention earlier this year, which I had the privilege of attending. If the hon. Gentleman wishes to avail himself of the information, I am sure that he will be able to do so using the facilities of the House of Commons Library. I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for the interest he shows in ensuring that policy making in this country is based on evidence rather than the prejudice that we come up against so often from the European Union.
In the time that remains, I wish to ask the Minister to deal with some of the other issues, perhaps finally finishing with the working time directive. When will the consultation process on it be complete? There is a lot of concern from those in the industry that they are being kept in the dark. They know that the working time directive will operate from next year, but they do not know the detail. Surely, they should be told about that.
Will the Minister answer some questions about the road haulage modernisation fund, which is relevant to the need for more drivers—attracting people into the profession—and training? At the time of the fuel duties dispute, the Chancellor of the Exchequer announced with a flourish that he would set up a £100 million road haulage modernisation fund. We now learn that only a very small percentage of the money has been spent. Indeed, it was not a ring-fenced, identifiable sum but simply a notional sum that could be drawn down in the event of sufficient bids being made that qualified for the money.
Despite all their best efforts, the people involved in the road haulage industry have found it extremely difficult to get access to the money in that fund. That is because
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the money in the fund is not ring-fenced but must be provided by the Department for Transport at the expense of some of its other priorities. The Department for Transport is extremely reluctant to make money available from that "fund", which is not even operating at all in Northern Ireland.
The Government should make an open declaration that when the Chancellor said that there was going to be £100 million for a road haulage modernisation fund he meant what he said. That money should be available for training until such time as the whole of that money has been exhausted. What is on the cards at the moment is that a very small proportion of that money will be used and it will not be available for training, which was the original intention. That is another example of the Government pulling the wool over the electorate's eyes, effectively deceiving the electorate and the road haulage industry.
Jim Sheridan: On training, I ask the hon. Gentleman a genuine question from a point of ignorance. Other industries have to make significant investments in the training of their own people—I am thinking of my own background in engineering, where individuals and private companies have to make significant investment in training. From his vast knowledge of the RHA and the road haulage industry, will he tell me how much they invest in the training of their drivers?
Mr. Chope: I do not have access to that figure, but I do know—and I am sure that the hon. Gentleman accepts this—that the Government made it clear when they set up the road haulage modernisation fund that they wished the fund to be used largely, if not exclusively, to promote training to attract more people into the industry. That was the Government's intention—or at least, that was what the Government said that they intended to do. In reality, every time bids have been made to draw down money out of that fund for training, they have been resisted. Only a small proportion of the money has found its way into training a fresh generation of lorry drivers and hauliers. The industry is suffering from a relatively high average age of operative, and there is every good reason to encourage a new generation of younger people to become involved. That will not be possible if the Government do not release the money that they promised for the road haulage modernisation fund.
Has the Minister been able to get the information that was promised to the director general of the RHA at the recent meeting of the road haulage forum about the contrast in the number of continental hauliers being prosecuted for traffic offences in this country as opposed to the very high number of UK vehicles being stopped and being made subject to checks and prosecution? That is a cause of immense resentment among British lorry drivers, who are for the most part law-abiding. They find that they are being picked on when more than 10,000 foreign vehicles travelling on UK roads every day seem to be regarded by the enforcement authorities as too big a problem to address. From our own experience of driving on British roads we know of many examples of lorries with foreign number plates being driven in a way that falls far below the standards that we expect of our own road users, and they seem to be doing so with impunity. The Minister assured the RHA that he

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would look into that matter, and I should be grateful if the Minister present today will let us know the results that flowed from that.
There is also the movement of abnormal loads. From 1 October, which is not far away, regional police authorities will no longer be in a position to escort certain categories of load. The police expect operators to use self-escorting or private escorting for a great number of those movements. It is still not clear what the national guidelines for such movements are. Such things include escort vehicle specification, the qualifications or experience of attendants, and, most important, which loads can be moved under self-escort. The matter was raised at the meeting of the forum and I understand that the Minister himself was surprised that there were no guidelines in place. I ask the Minister present today to say whether those guidelines are now in place so that people involved in road haulage will know where they stand on the movement of abnormal loads from 1 October.
I hope that the Minister will take advantage of the 35 minutes or so that we have left to address the issues in detail and demonstrate to those present and to a much wider audience outside this place that the Government really are committed to supporting the British road haulage industry and to ensuring that it is internationally competitive and is not undermined by uncompetitive practices from the continent, aided and abetted by unfair burdens placed on it by taxation and regulation. If the Minister addresses those issues, I am sure that the low esteem in which the Government are held by most people involved in the road haulage industry may rise somewhat. I look forward to hearing the Minister's comments.
10.26 am
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Mr. Tony McNulty): I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for West Renfrewshire (Jim Sheridan) on securing this important debate. He outlined the concerns of many in the road haulage industry with clarity and some force and cogency—his was not like the last contribution. I am grateful for this opportunity to discuss some of the details that he raised. If I have time, I may refer to some of the obtuse political points raised by the hon. Member for Christchurch (Mr. Chope), but they are not terribly worthy in terms of a detailed and substantive discussion of the problems faced by the road haulage industry.
It is difficult to overestimate the importance of road haulage to our economy. The freight and logistics sector accounts for about 4 per cent. of GDP and 3.5 per cent. of total employment, and the road haulage sector represents a sizeable proportion of that. However, as Members know, it is far more important than that in terms of its interconnectedness, its support for the rest of industry and the relaying of materials. It is a massively important industry.
Mr. Chope: Will the Minister give way?
Mr. McNulty: No, not at the moment. I have just started, thanks very much.
Wider industry depends on efficient freight transport and to a great extent that is what it gets from the road transport sector. I say to the hon. Member for
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Christchurch that this is principally a Back Benchers' debate and I shall address the concerns of my hon. Friend the Member for West Renfrewshire, as I said barely 30 seconds ago. If I have time, I will come on to some of the hon. Gentleman's more obtuse points, made between the anti-EU invective.
The road haulage industry is an important sector. The Government maintain a regular dialogue with the Road Haulage Association, especially through the road haulage forum and its sub-groups, so we are well aware of the concerns of its membership, which have been more than adequately articulated by my hon. Friend the Member for West Renfrewshire. In many areas, we are working with the RHA and other parts of the industry to address the concerns.
Members know that it is not always appropriate for the Government to intervene, but we do have legitimate interests in how the industry operates. First and foremost, we want a safe industry. That requires rules and proper enforcement. The notion, which was alluded to by my hon. Friend, that a past member of the Health and Safety Commission should think that the working time directive has little to do with health and safety—that it is appropriate for lorry drivers, among others, to work however many hours they choose in a given week, taking larger and larger loads around the country—simply defies belief. The anti-EU rant got in the way of logic.
We will continue to work to ensure that where we regulate we do so proportionately. In some cases, such as the working time directive for road hauliers, regulation is established on an EU-wide basis, but the directive allows a degree of discretion in its detailed application.
My hon. Friend asked when we will consult on the implementation of the road transport directive for work. We aim to launch the consultation process and document by the turn of the month. In the context of the directive, he mentioned the need to recruit more drivers. We share the concern of the industry to broaden the recruitment base to include women and ethnic minorities, and we are working with the industry to achieve that.
The hon. Member for Twickenham (Dr. Cable) asked what constitutes working time. The directive allows some flexibility on that point, but the issue is complex. Our definition of working time in the context of our derogation will be covered in the consultation. That consultation will be accompanied, as ever, by a regulatory impact assessment providing our assessment of the costs of implementation.
On what constitutes working time, mandatory breaks and periods of availability do not count as part of the driver's working time in the context raised by my hon. Friend the Member for West Renfrewshire. The consultation will begin at the turn of the month and a degree of leeway and flexibility will be reflected in those consultation papers.
There are other areas where we are keen to work on a voluntary basis with the industry, as our objectives complement each other: haulage companies want to maximise profits; we want to see safe operators offering good-value services with minimum damage to the environment. That is consistent with the thinking behind the road haulage modernisation fund, which is

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devolved throughout the United Kingdom and was announced by the Chancellor in November 2000. The fund will close in 2004. Take-up has not been what he hoped for—far from it—but the scheme has achieved some valuable results.
The hon. Member for Christchurch dwelt on the paucity of take-up, but he did not dwell on the substance of that take-up, whether it is clean-up, fuel economy advisers, the modernising operator scheme pilots or enforcement in Great Britain. Limited funds have been spent on training schemes, but that needs to be seen in the light of other projects—as he well knows, given the answer that he received to a parliamentary question. The driver development scheme, the driver simulator project, the respect for people scheme, the careers website and the modernising operator scheme have been established and there is clearly a lot more to do.
Mr. Chope: If the scheme is so worth while, why are the Government not carrying on with it until the whole £100 million guaranteed by the Chancellor has been spent?
Mr. McNulty: The scheme has been proved effective and successful in substance in those areas where it has been taken up, but given that it is coming to the natural end of its initial three years it must be reviewed in the pot, along with all other priorities, as a draw on public funds. There was not £100 million for ever; there was £100 million to respond to the needs of the industry. It was always subject to take-up. So, the notion put about by the hon. Gentleman, among others, that there has been only such-and-such a take-up, which means that all the rest is available for some other purpose, is wrong. He knows that it is wrong, but it makes a nice little political point for him, along with all the other obtuse political points that he makes.
There will be a review of the processes that have worked and of the efficacy or otherwise of the fund in all its assorted parts, and we will move forward. Take-up has been less than anticipated, not least because of the working time directive. More generally, there needs to be a clear examination and review of recruitment and retention issues and training in the industry. I must say that, at least in part, the implementation of the working time directive may attract to the industry people who have not previously found it appealing.
The fund has delivered some valuable results. For example, we have funded a driver development project to train drivers to drive in a safer and more fuel-efficient way. We are training not only drivers but trainers, who will hopefully embed best practice in the industry. Early results suggest that some drivers can reduce their fuel consumption by more than 10 per cent. If an average lorry consumes £25,000 of fuel each year, such a reduction represents a significant saving, which will go straight to a company's bottom line. It also means a reduction in damaging emissions.
We are funding a project to help companies adopt best practice in their operations. Some 3,000 seminars, which are backed up by our ongoing research programme, are being run around the country to help haulage companies understand that simple steps can
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improve fuel efficiency. For example, setting the right gap between the cab and the trailer improves aerodynamics and can save up to 4 per cent. on the fuel bill. The modernisation fund also supports the fitting of particulate traps, which have so far been installed on 600 vehicles.
We support training initiatives to encourage young people into the profession. As my hon. Friend the Member for West Renfrewshire said, we share the industry's desire to broaden the recruitment base beyond the traditional white male section of the community. The Government have been active, but the industry must also play its part. Many hauliers, especially the bigger ones, have made their operations more efficient and the challenge, as in other industries, is for small and medium-sized companies to do the same.
We understand that there are resource constraints. In the smallest companies, the owner is invariably also a driver who will not want to spend all evening staring at figures after a day on the road, but the biggest gains, both for the industry and for the wider community, can be made in such companies. We continue to put a lot of effort into getting the message across. We also continue to encourage everyone in the industry to take advantage of the help that is still available.
My hon. Friend also raised the question of fuel duties. As he said, it is a matter for my right hon. Friend the Chancellor. Unless I missed it, I did not hear an articulation of current Conservative policy on fuel duty during the deliberations of the hon. Member for Christchurch, but I am happy to give way if he wants to elaborate. He knows that Treasury Ministers attend the road haulage forum and that they are more than aware of the industry's concerns. It is not for me to comment further, not because the matter is the responsibility of the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Devonport (Mr. Jamieson), but because I do not job share and have a job as a Treasury Minister as well as being a Transport Minister.
Mr. Chope: We accept that a threat hangs over the haulage industry. If the Government believe in joined-up government, they should immediately clarify the situation. The Minister is a member of a supposedly joined-up Government. If he cannot tell us whether the answer is yes or no, can he tell us when an announcement will be made?
Mr. McNulty: What I can do is reinforce what the Chancellor said at the last Budget—the hon. Gentleman is more than aware of this. There will be an announcement in October, so, given that we are barely halfway through September, he is being slightly premature. The announcement will be made by the Chancellor, not by a Transport Minister, and funnily enough October means October.
Given where we were in April, the Chancellor felt that it was not appropriate to consider such matters, not least in view of the international context. Rather than making a decision then, he left it until October, which is the normal time at which we return to do business. It is not in anyone's interest for him to rush between now and 1 October to get a decision, whatever it may be, into the public domain, given that we return, as I understand

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it, on 18 October. That more than fulfils the Chancellor's obligation, as he said that he would make a further statement in October. [Interruption.] That was probably the most obtuse of all the hon. Gentleman's points, but if he wishes to persist I will give way by all means.
Mr. Chope: I am grateful to the Minister for that. Is he saying that the Chancellor will make his announcement to the House of Commons after it returns in October, rather than between 1 October and when the House returns?
Mr. McNulty: I am saying that how and when my right hon. Friend the Chancellor makes that announcement is entirely a matter for him. I was referring only to the hon. Gentleman's point that because my right hon. Friend referred to October in the Budget there has to be urgency between now and 1 October to determine the matter. That is not the case at all, as the hon. Gentleman well knows. My right hon. Friend will make whatever statement he chooses, in the context of his April statement on fuel duties, in October. Given the Government's integrity and enormous respect for the House of Commons, I do not doubt that the House will be party, through the appropriate channels, to such an announcement or statement. That is the end of my role in the matter.
I am sad to say to my hon. Friend the Member for West Renfrewshire that I cannot offer any comment on the terms under which the oil companies supply fuel to hauliers, although I am concerned about the anecdotes that he has relayed today. I will ensure that they are relayed to Ministers from the Department of Trade and Industry, who are more appropriate to respond.
I welcome my hon. Friend's support for our plans to introduce lorry road-user charges. As he said, that will ensure that all hauliers of whatever nationality pay their fair share towards the cost of using our roads. We have already made it clear that the new scheme will be cost neutral for the UK haulage industry as a whole, as there will be an offsetting reduction in fuel duties. The hon. Member for Twickenham asked about the compatibility of lorry road-user charges with European Union legislation. The European Commission has just proposed changes to the rules that govern tolls and charges for lorries. Its proposals are broadly compatible with what we want to do, but we shall work during the coming months to negotiate a satisfactory outcome between the two. I understand that there are no deal breakers, to use the vernacular. We just need to arrive at a position of compatibility.
The hon. Gentleman asked how the technology is developing. Details of what technology will be used to operate and manage the charging scheme still need to be worked out in partnership with the private sector, which has the expertise to design the equipment. The technology will probably involve a combination of satellite positioning and mobile communications systems. Measures to ensure confidentiality and to combat fraud and evasion will also need to be developed, as he suggested.
My hon. Friend the Member for West Renfrewshire asked whether the charging could be introduced before 2006. I am sorry to disappoint him and the haulage
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industry, but 2006 is probably the earliest date for introduction, given the complexity of the project and the technology behind it. We want to get it right from the start, rather than introduce it in a hurry, and that takes time.
From the Conservative Front Bench, we have had no policy on fuel taxation, no apparent policy on the working time directive other than to recognise that it has absolutely nothing to do with health and safety, and no real policy that I could discern on lorry road-user charging. We did have almost a condemnation of every police force in the country—they are somehow all abusing their enforcement powers over offences committed by all these foreign lorry drivers who are far more prone to getting away with offences on our roads than British lorry drivers. I know that there is some exasperation in the industry with that, but not in such sweeping terms.
Concerns have been expressed and articulated by the RHA, but to couch them in quite the terms that the hon. Member for Christchurch did is demeaning to him, if I may say so, as is his rant against various aspects of anything remotely European. We have come to expect such rants but, unlike the expression of concern by my hon. Friend the Member for West Renfrewshire, this one did not put in context the real concerns of the RHA with any credit to the hon. Gentleman.
I listened keenly to my hon. Friend when he discussed the issues concerning the haulage industry, and I congratulate him again on securing this important debate. In conclusion—
Mr. Chope: I thank the Minister for giving way, because, obviously, another quarter of an hour is available if he wants to say more about the Government's view of the road haulage industry.
On vehicle stoppages, the Minister has not explained why he is replying to this debate instead of his colleague the hon. Member for Plymouth, Devonport, who serves on the freight forum. At that meeting, that Minister seemed to be concerned about the differential enforcement of the regulations. Today, this Minister seems to be dismissing that as anti-European invective, which it is not. There is a question whether there should be consistent and even enforcement. Will the Minister say how far his investigations have gone in trying to get to the bottom of the matter?
Mr. McNulty: The first thing the hon. Gentleman should not do is put words in my mouth. What I characterised as anti-European invective was how he pursued and articulated the very real concerns—as I think I said on at least two occasions—of the industry, which my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Devonport is taking seriously and considering in some detail. The concerns expressed by the industry do not fall in the context of the anti-European invective that characterised the speech of the hon. Member for Christchurch today. That is what I clearly said. I did not dismiss or belittle the real concerns of the industry. I said that it will not have a particularly useful or articulate champion in the hon. Gentleman if he constantly pursues the matter with anti-European invective, as he does and which anyone who reads the record will see clearly.

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I say again to my hon. Friend the Member for West Renfrewshire and colleagues who have had to leave that the substance and manner of their raising of the issue are to their credit.
Mr. Chope: Will the Minister give way?
Mr. McNulty: Once more, and once only.
Mr. Chope: I am grateful to the Minister. In the time remaining, will he address the issue of speed limiters and the EU's proposal to reduce the maximum speed for lorries with speed limiters? Will he explain the Government's approach to that, because I understand that they voted against the proposal? Why did they fail to carry the day and the argument?
Mr. McNulty: That is a fair point, but I am unable to deal with it. However, I shall ensure that my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Devonport writes to the hon. Gentleman about the matter. I am more than happy to say that I cannot respond and the hon. Gentleman may use whatever political guile he wants to make something of that, as he is trying to do about my presence here instead of my hon. Friend.
The way in which the issue has been raised is important and I assure my hon. Friend the Member for West Renfrewshire that I shall maintain a keen interest in the matter, as will my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Devonport on the matters to which I cannot respond. I am heartened by the 10-year plan and the overall thrust of the Government's transport policy. The FTA said in Freight magazine that it

"will continue to monitor the government's progress in keeping to its promises. While it is gratifying that it is at last beginning to take some of the industry's concerns on board, there is a long way to go before the infrastructure situation can be stabilised, let alone any long term improvements."

I agree with that. In the context of all that we are seeking to do on transport policy for a vibrant and successful haulage industry, we need to tackle the neglect, despair and disinvestment in the overall transport infrastructure. That is what we are trying to do in the 10-year plan. I am grateful that the FTA welcomes that in some regards, although I am not surprised that such a significant body maintains a watching brief over us in terms of broad transport policy and, specifically, the road haulage industry.
10.49 am
Sitting suspended.

Spouse Immigration Visas
11 am
Mr. Jon Owen Jones: "It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife." So begins one of the greatest works in English literature. In her first sentence, Jane Austen plays on the uncomfortable truth that the eligibility of a future wife or husband depends not only on their character, sense of humour and facial symmetry but also on what material comforts and prospects will result from the marriage.
That "universal truth" has not changed during the past 200 years. All other things being equal, the rich and well connected will rarely lack for suitors. Wealth is, of course, relative and the poverty of 18th-century Britain no longer exists in the United Kingdom. However, it is still seen and experienced in much of the world, and a British citizen or a person with indefinite leave to remain in Britain, whatever his or her other qualities, has a significantly enhanced attraction as a marriage partner for those in many other countries.
I represent the diverse and cosmopolitan constituency of Cardiff, Central, which has two universities and a significant Pakistani and Bangladeshi population. Over the past 11 years I have helped hundreds of constituents to obtain visas for their foreign spouses and, as far as I am aware, most of those marriages have been successful. However, some of them are not, and evidence from my constituency suggests that that proportion is increasing.
The typical case that comes to my surgery is that of a young Asian constituent accompanied by one or more senior male members of his or her family. When the foreign spouse has obtained their visa I usually hear no more of the case. However, in an increasing number of instances, the young British Asian comes to see me several months later to complain about the behaviour of their spouse and to ask me to get them sent back. Such complaints are almost always made by young women, who usually come to the surgery alone or accompanied by a sister or friend. Often the young woman will be very anxious that other older members of her family are not informed of the complaint.
My experience suggests that in those cases there is great social pressure on many young Asians to agree to foreign marriages and that the foreign spouse's interest in the marriage is often primarily in gaining access to Britain.
Two recent cases have crystallised my concerns about how the system is working. I cannot mention any names but shall give the specifics of those cases.
Mr. S, whom I know quite well, and his daughter came to see me last year to ask my help in getting his prospective son-in-law into the country. I gave what help I could. However, two months after the marriage the son-in-law absconded. That led to the break-up of Mr. S's family, as the daughter blamed his advice and left home. Somewhat unusually, Mr. S was racked with guilt over his part in the matter and resolved to track down the errant son-in law. He went to India to see the man's family, and through them he eventually tracked him down to an address in London. He phoned the immigration and nationality directorate of the Home Office and told the directorate where the man was.

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However, nothing seemed to happen, so he went to the nearest police station. The police, contrary to what they should do, looked up the errant son-in-law in their files, and said that they had no information on his immigration status. They had, however, arrested him and he had been prosecuted for shoplifting. Mr. S was perplexed and at a loss to know how the system was supposed to work when the police and the immigration department seemed to have no contact with each other and no one seemed to care that this man, with the marriage a failure, was now in the country—he believed, illegally.
On behalf of Mr. S, I wrote to the Home Secretary, who replied that the issue of whether his marriage persisted would not be pertinent until the end of the probationary period. As that period was now two years, the Home Office was saying, in effect, that it would not care if the marriage had broken down until 22 months after it had done so, and that this man would be in this country legally until then. I was at a loss to explain to Mr. S how this was a sensible way of running a visa system.
The second case is more complicated and involves two families: the J family from Cardiff, with one brother, Mr. J, and two sisters, Ms J1 and Ms J2; and the Y family from Pakistan, with one brother, Mr. Y1, a sister, Ms Y, and a cousin, Mr. Y2. The three members of the J family married the three members of the Y family. All those marriages broke down acrimoniously, and all but one of those people contacted me independently of each other.
Ms Jl came to me complaining of domestic violence and saying that her husband, Mr. Yl, should be deported. Mr. J complained that Ms Y had married him only for immigration purposes and should be deported. Ms J2 complained to me that her husband should also be deported. However, Mr. Y1 and Ms Y—although not Mr. Y2, who, as far as know, is still in the country illegally—obtained indefinite leave to remain. Both have been back to see me asking me to help them to marry new people from Pakistan and bring them into this country.
Mr. Ann Cryer: I thank my hon. Friend for raising this very difficult subject, which I know takes some courage. In many of the cases that are referred to me, the person who entered the country for permanent settlement as a spouse has left his wife within days of receiving indefinite leave to remain, and has attempted to obtain a separation or a divorce. Within weeks, that person has often applied to act as a sponsor for bringing in another wife—usually, in my constituency, from Pakistan. In the case of someone who has entered the country as a spouse in order to be granted permanent settlement and has obtained indefinite leave to remain, I suggest that the law could be changed so that he cannot act as a sponsor until he has received citizenship. If it could, the person would have to wait for another three years before acting as a sponsor. That would not entirely stop the abuse of our immigration laws, about which we are hearing, but it might deter a few young men from such action.
Mr. Jones: The point made by my hon. Friend relates precisely to members of the Y family, who, I am told, have successfully brought new spouses into the country.
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This complicated position is extraordinarily difficult to disentangle. I would not be surprised if you were rather confused at the moment, Mr. Conway. The situation is confusing—all the more so because I owe a duty of confidentiality to each of these people and cannot discuss each person's case with any of the others. Whenever I write to the immigration department to inquire about the immigration status of one or another of the spouses, it refuses to answer due to its code of practice on Government information. It is therefore very difficult to understand exactly what has happened.
The cases highlight a number of problems in the system. There is no periodic checking of whether marriages persist during the probationary period, and even when the individuals inform the department that their marriages have broken down, there is no action until the end of the probationary period. There are no checks at the end of the probationary period to ensure that the marriage has persisted, unless there is either an application for leave to remain or a complaint. Many people are just allowed to disappear, and no effort seems to be made to find them. There is no joined-up information sharing on such matters between different agencies, including the police. There is no control on people doing the bare minimum to obtain indefinite leave to remain, divorcing and immediately applying to have spouses come from foreign countries to join them, which was the very point that my hon. Friend has made. Although the point is sensitive, there are insufficient safeguards to ensure that young girls in this country know what they are doing when they enter marriages with men from abroad, and that they are not coming under undue family pressure.
I wrote to the Minister in June with my concern over those cases, and made a number of proposals. I suggested that a computer-generated list of expiring visas could be produced, and letters sent to the sponsor to check whether the marriage subsists and ask whether they will support an application for the spouse to stay. If not, measures can be taken to ensure that the person is sent home. Consideration should also be given to raising the minimum age for a sponsor to 21, in order to encourage more mature relationships, where pressure from families would play a smaller part, to ensure that the sponsor had more control over the choice of partner, and to encourage more marriages between families residing in Britain between people of similar upbringing. Also, I believe that either there should be some sort of delay between the granting of indefinite leave to remain and a person being able to sponsor a new spouse, or only British citizens should be able to sponsor spouses.
In August I wrote to the Department, and I received a reply from the Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, my hon. Friend the Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart). The only argument against my proposals that she could muster was that checking marriages would put more pressure on non-genuine applicants, who might in turn pressurise their sponsors to go along with their proposals, thus perhaps increasing domestic violence. However, I counter that by pointing out that since checking marriages would reduce and shorten the number of sham marriages, the argument is not convincing.

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Such difficult and sensitive issues are, for understandable reasons, rarely discussed openly in public, or even within the families and communities concerned; but I have seen too many distraught and heartbroken young constituents in my surgeries to keep quiet about the situation any longer.
11.12 am
The Minister for Citizenship and Immigration (Beverley Hughes): First, I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, Central (Mr. Jones) for raising the issue and for using the opportunity of an Adjournment debate to do so. I also thank both him and my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley (Mrs. Cryer) for the work that they have done on the topic. She talked about courage, and both my hon. Friends, with sizable populations of minority ethnic groups in their constituencies, are raising some important but difficult issues; I am grateful to them for doing so.
The whole question of how we enforce the law relating to potential abuse in marriage cases is at the heart of the issues that my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, Central raised today, together with the question of what other measures the Government might take to crack down on that route for abuse of the immigration system. I should like at the outset to say something about what we are doing on enforcement at the moment. First, as my hon. Friends know, where a person marries after the commencement of enforcement action, for example, as an illegal entrant, an overstayer or a deportee, we seek to enforce their removal. Secondly, as a general rule, where a person who is liable to enforcement action has a genuine and subsisting marriage to a settled spouse that existed for two years before any enforcement action was taken and where it is unreasonable for the spouse to accompany their partner on removal, we would grant a period of leave. That discretionary leave is now made up of three blocks of two years, with indefinite leave to remain not being granted until the end of a six-year probation period. That restricts the benefits for people who enter, or try to enter, into a sham marriage, because it requires couples to show after two, four and six years that the marriage subsists.
Thirdly, in the immigration service there are teams with the task of investigating the links, which frequently exist, between organised crime, identity fraud and multiple marriages. As my hon. Friends have implied, such links are an attempt at very big business.
Paul Flynn: Will my hon. Friend deal with other sham marriages that are entirely fraudulent, including one that I have drawn to her attention involving a constituent of mine, who married a woman whom he met at the wedding ceremony? The sum of £14,000 changed hands a year after the marriage. The woman had been refused admission to, or been deported from, this country five times. A racket is being run in which brides, nearly all from eastern Europe, are advertised freely on the internet. Agents, mainly solicitors, are used to ensure that the money changes hands. It is a criminal activity.
Beverley Hughes: It certainly is. I cannot comment on the particular case that my hon. Friend has raised, but I am happy to give him information about the work being carried out jointly by the Passport and Records Agency, the immigration service and the police. A considerable number of quite big busts have happened, with many people being arrested at once, as the result of long-term investigations in which false identities are picked up and traced back to identify those engaged in the sort of business that my hon. Friend described. I do not know whether the case that he cited was affected by one of those investigations, but activity is certainly under way to break those networks.
My hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, Central raised a couple of examples that clearly suggested that we could do more about enforcement and, particularly in relation to his first example, inter-agency cooperation. I do not find those instances acceptable; I am happy to say publicly that, notwithstanding the many calls on the enforcement teams, if information is put forward about a particular case, and the person in question has been prosecuted for an offence, we should be able to act on it. I shall certainly take up the issue.
My hon. Friend raised a second case, about the J and Y families, which was more about the potential organised abuse of the system. I and my officials are grateful for the information that he has given us. There is a suggestion of anomalies, at least, at this stage, and an investigation is now being carried out.
I should like to give my hon. Friend an example of some of the work that is being done.
Mr. Jon Owen Jones: I know that it is difficult to do so, but will my hon. Friend find a way to provide MPs with information about a person's immigration status when they request it, having received relevant information from someone else? As long as they give guarantees that they will not disclose the information to third parties, MPs should be given it; otherwise, it is impossible for them to understand whether they are being lied to, and whether the Department is carrying out its duty effectively.
Beverley Hughes: I understand the dilemma for my colleagues, and I hate signing the letters in question. I do not know whether it will be of any comfort to my hon. Friend to know that I also receive them. When I take up cases and another Minister replies to me, I am told the same. I have looked into the matter, but there are great difficulties: unless we can guarantee confidentiality there is a prospect that Ministers or officials could be subject to judicial review in the courts. It is not only a code of practice that defines the parameters of the information that we can give out, but human rights legislation, and a range of other legislation, by which we are bound. I understand the point that he made, and I will look into it again.
I will give an example of a case involving an immigration service visit to a British spouse to investigate a potential case of obtaining indefinite leave to remain by deception. Our officials' suspicions were aroused when an immigration officer recognised the family name of a British spouse whose sister was being investigated for contracting two marriages. Further checks were made with the assistance of the marriage

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section of the Office for National Statistics. An in-depth, two-year investigation took place, which, as I implied earlier, involved a lot of tracking and careful collection of evidence. Finally, the two sisters were prosecuted for marrying 29 foreign nationals between them. They were convicted of bigamy and defrauding the Secretary of State, and received prison sentences of three and two years respectively. Some of the foreign spouses had become naturalised citizens during the investigation, but others were trapped on the immigration service's computerised warning system and were removed as people who had been granted leave to remain by deception.
There will always be cases in which we could have done more, but I assure colleagues that there are also cases in which we vigorously pursue enforcement. We try to focus on cases, such as the one that I described, in which we can achieve a big result in cutting through an organised practice that is highly abusive of the immigration system.
My hon. Friends put forward proposals to which I want to refer. I was asked whether, in the case of those who are given indefinite leave to remain as a spouse, we could delay or require them to have citizenship before they could sponsor other people entering as potential or actual marriage partners. I will investigate, although I will no doubt be told, as I am often told, that such proposals are contrary to the right to human life under article 8 of the European convention on human rights. None the less, I will investigate those possibilities because, as my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley rightly said, they might not stop abuse but they would be a deterrent and a block in the system.
I have replied to the confidentiality issue raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, Central, but he also raised the possibility of periodically, or at the end of the period of probationary leave, checking everyone who has obtained leave on a temporary basis to remain as a spouse. He has suggested before that we might be able to check using computerised identification of applications. I share his reaction to arguments that that could criticise genuine marriages and lead to domestic violence—I do not think that that would happen.
However, there are practical problems with the current capacity of information technology and the scale of the enterprise. If possible, we would like to use the same system to check that those on student visas and other temporary forms of application, not just relating to marriage, were returning, but there are practical problems with that. Although we are updating the computer system for marriages, we cannot put a "bring forward date" of two years on a particular case—the system does not have that capacity. We can try to address that, but we cannot do so at the moment within the limits of the technology. There are also other practical difficulties about the scale of that exercise.
As we try to strengthen our response to abuse of the immigration system—and the related issues of illegal entry and working—an identity card system for foreign and British nationals could be helpful. That would enable us to have an embarkation control, which would be effective and, because it would be electronic, would not delay people leaving the country and cause queues at our ports. If we can get to that point—no decision has
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yet been taken—many issues can begin to be addressed without dealing piecemeal with marriage, student visas and so on. Before I finish—
Mr. Jon Owen Jones: I am encouraged by what the Minister has said about ID cards. I raised the matter in the House 18 or more months ago. If she will tell me and my hon. Friends which of her Cabinet colleagues are causing the problem, I promise that we shall do our utmost to get at them.
Beverley Hughes: My hon. Friend will not be surprised to hear that I would not say that any Cabinet colleague is causing a problem. However, it is right that the detail of a scheme that is massive in terms of technological issues, time scale—probably six to 10 years—and cost should be debated. If the Government do decide to proceed, we can do so with confidence that problems that have been identified can be overcome. It will be a significant step in terms of practicality, technology and cost.
Hon. Members will know that our desire to tackle marriage abuse has been strong. On 1 April, the Home Secretary introduced changes to the immigration rules aimed at tackling the growing menace of fraudulent marriages. The measures included increasing the probationary period from one to two years, introducing a no-switching policy into marriage provision for those coming to the UK for a period of six months or less, removing the "legally unable to marry requirement" preventing a fiancé under 16 from applying for leave to enter and preventing persons under 18 from acting as the sponsor in a marriage application.
I very much welcome the approach of hon. Members, who have spoken on the basis of experience in their constituencies. None the less, my colleague the Under-Secretary of State, the hon. Member for Slough, and I still come under considerable pressure from many other colleagues who write to us, despite our changes to the rules to tackle abuse, arguing that a particular constituent or sponsored spouse of a constituent should not have to abide by the rules and should be granted leave to remain for marriage on an exceptional basis. To some extent, one can understand that. However, we need to take a clear view that we have introduced rules to prevent people from abusing the system. In fairness to everyone, we should apply them equitably across the board.
Hon. Members will also know the other side of the coin. We have reviewed our position on domestic violence. That concession was introduced in June 1999, and as a result of our review of it, we decided that the range of types of evidence acceptable to meet the terms of the concession should be widened. That was done specifically to help some of the women caught in marriages, whether or not they were abusive of immigration rules, who, having got here, found themselves subject to abuse.
It has also been suggested, although not during this debate, that we raise the age of sponsorship to 21.
Mr. Jon Owen Jones: I suggested it today.
Beverley Hughes: I beg my hon. Friend's pardon; I did not remember his having specifically mentioned that. He knows that on 1 April we raised the age of sponsorship to 18. A lot of views were expressed and we decided that 18 was right in the first instance. However, we shall monitor the effect of the change, and the higher age that is used in some countries, and if we think that we need to alter it, we will.
11.29 am
Sitting suspended until Two o'clock.

Schools Funding
2 pm
Andrew George: I am pleased to have secured this debate. The subject is of deep concern to many right hon. and hon. Members, especially in the current financial year when many schools are facing significant funding crises. I raised the issue in this Chamber on 2 April at column 309 of Hansard. The Minister for School Standards responded to that debate, which was entitled "Education Funding (Cornwall)". Our forthcoming 90-minute debate will give us the opportunity to consider more wide-ranging issues, and I have no doubt that other hon. Members will wish to ask questions about schools in their constituencies.
I know that it is customary for debates in this Chamber to descend towards a party political spat, but I want at least to set the right tone. Now that the problem has been acknowledged, I hope that our debate can be constructive and conciliatory. I say that for three reasons.
First, I must congratulate the Government on having achieved many of the outcomes that we want for our schools. For example, the school building programme is at an unprecedented level of improvement and development. Wendron school in my constituency has just had a new school and, after many years of pleading, Bodriggy school is now coming on to one site of the school in Hayle. Many other building programmes have been needed for a long time, and developments such as general investment, identification of need and promotion of teacher training are much appreciated.
Mr. Graham Brady: In a wholly conciliatory and constructive sense, may I ask whether the hon. Gentleman agrees with my identification of one of the greatest tragedies of the schools funding crisis this year? Schools have shifted money, earmarked for capital projects, to revenue budgets to keep the staff on which they depend to educate their children.
Andrew George: I acknowledge that problem; in fact, I shall be referring to it in a moment.
I come now to the second reason why our debate should be constructive and conciliatory. I noted that, in the live online webcast prior to the commencement of the present academic year, the Secretary of State for Education and Skills admitted that the Department had made a mistake. I could not cope with a live online webcast, but I am told that that is what he said via that medium, which is beyond the wit of someone as IT challenged as myself.
Thirdly, the Secretary of State announced his intention to deal with the problems that he now acknowledges exist in many schools with the addition of £800 million from departmental resources over the next two years. Earlier this year we were promised a likely settlement for school budgets in the next financial year.

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In the same spirit—I have to be honest—I, too, must apologise for having got my predictions on 2 April rather wrong. I said that

"many schools that I have visited recently face the stark choice of sacking staff and increasing class sizes or going into debt. They may not go into debt this year but they will do so next year".—[Official Report, Westminster Hall, 2 April 2003; Vol. 402. c. 310WH.]

I failed to get that right; in fact, the situation was worse than I said it was, because some schools are going into debt this year. Many classroom assistants have already lost their jobs—something that I did not mention on that occasion—and the impact is deeply felt.
Mr. John Horam: The hon. Gentleman just touched on classroom assistants. One of the problems in the present crisis—certainly in London, and perhaps in Cornwall, too—is that, increasingly, classroom assistants are being employed instead of real teachers, often even when a supply teacher is available.
Andrew George: I have always understood that the purpose of classroom assistants is to assist the teacher. When classroom assistants are employed effectively, and provided that the classroom can cope, I am reassured, although my concern about large class sizes does not totally evaporate.
Ms Candy Atherton: In the spirit of constructive information, may I ask whether the hon. Gentleman is aware that in January 1999 Cornish schools had 3,570 full-time equivalent teachers, and that by January this year, the number had leapt to 4,020? We need to remember that when talking about any changes in numbers.
Andrew George: There are statistics and statistics. The local education authority has told me about both compulsory and hard-fought voluntary redundancies. In a moment, I will go through some of the extremely difficult circumstances in which many schools have found themselves this year; they are not congratulating the Government on teacher recruitment. The hon. Lady made a brave attempt, but I am not sure that her comment was entirely in the spirit of what the Secretary of State said. He has admitted that there is a serious crisis. All parties accept that, and we cannot simply put a veneer on the situation by the selective use of statistics.
The Secretary of State and the Department have accepted that, in Cornwall, the LEA has passported more money than the Government intended it to. In fact, the agreed figure is 105 per cent. Therefore, some of the claims that the Department made in spring and early summer about LEAs not passporting money to schools were simply not true; in Cornwall, the LEA had gone over the top. Obviously, debates ensued, although my debate came earlier than some of the others. I certainly made it clear that national insurance contributions, teacher pensions, performance-related pay and other matters, all of which arose in one year, clearly increased costs for many schools. Many of them could not cope with those factors within their budgets from the Government.
There was eventual acceptance by the Department for Education and Skills that its model was insufficient; it did not take into account those additional costs. The
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Secretary of State apologised, which was much appreciated, and the Dept promised to work to find a solution.
I have kept in close contact with the Department and my schools since that debate. In a letter of 11 June, the Minister for School Standards, with whom I have corresponded on a number of occasions, helpfully said:

"LEAs and schools would be given flexibility to use their devolved formula capital funding"—

which the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale, West (Mr. Brady) mentioned earlier—

"to support their revenue budgets, where failure to do so would lead to excessive instability within the school."

However, having made those concessions, he went on to say:

"It is now for LEAs, with their schools, to take matters forward locally and to sort out remaining problems."

I am pleased to say that, since June, the Department's position has shifted, and it is prepared, quite rightly, to get more involved in tackling many of the problems that a lot of schools face.
I have kept regularly in touch with schools. In the last few days I have heard from the following primary junior schools: Bodriggy, Connor Downs, Coverack, Grade-Ruan, Gulval, Leedstown, Marazion, Mousehole, Mullion, Nansloe, Newlyn, Parc Eglos, Pendeen, Penpol, St. Erth, St. Ives infants, St. Levan, St. Uny and Wendron. I have also heard from secondary schools: Humphry Davy and Mounts Bay schools in Penzance, and Mullion and St. Ives school. A picture emerges from that ad hoc collection of data. I will quote from some of the examples because it is important that people understand the impact that this year's budget settlement is having on some of the schools.
Mary Holloway, the head teacher of Grade-Ruan Church of England school, telephoned my office just yesterday. Grade-Ruan is a successful school, which achieved beacon status two years ago; I was proud to be there on the day that that was announced and presented. Mary Holloway said that the school has had a really tight year; all reserves have now been used up and, in January 2004, redundancy procedures will be issued for August. That means that one full-time teacher out of the current four will be made redundant, resulting in increased class sizes across mixed school years. That will affect standards because it is a village school.
Rod James, a relatively new and very enthusiastic head teacher from Humphrey Davy secondary school, told me in an e-mail yesterday:

"What we set appeared to be a balanced budget. It also appears that we have not made anyone redundant. However

(1)We did not replace at least 1.5 staff that resigned.

(2)We have not replaced 2.5 learning support assistants that resigned.

(3)We have had to draw down all of our devolved capital money to make the staffing budget balance.

(4)We have had to raid the small reserves we had, the committed pension fund, almost all the staff training budget, the repairs and maintenance, and the capital projects planned.

(5)Capitation to departments was reduced to an unsustainable level.

(6)The only way I can continue refurbishment is by committing 2004–5 and 2005–6 devolved capital.

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(7)The cracks are now appearing in the budget as we say no to everything that staff propose including new books for new courses.

(8)We will be in deficit before the end of the year.

(9)Some of this reduction was planned because we knew that we would reduce by about 15 pupils.

(10)The crunch will be in the 2004–2005 budgets. Although we will start to grow again, we will have no carryover, reserves, devolved capital, a back log of repairs and expectations.

(11)To create a budget with these funding levels we will have to cut staffing by at least two teaching staff and three non teaching staff.

(12)This is at a time when I have a legal requirement to introduce the workload agreement and when 22 of my staff will expect to move to threshold three, a cost of more than £25,000, which the government will not fund.

This is all set at a school that the government should be proud of. A school that works in one of the most deprived communities in Britain, and yet like other Penwith schools achieves above national levels at GCSE, and key stage 3 … A school that works hard to be highly inclusive, taking a truly comprehensive intake and being successful with them."

Roger Bunt, the head teacher at Mullion community primary school, where I used to go, told me that a special needs teacher has been made redundant, that there has had to be a

"change from 5 classes to 4 for part of the week",

and that the

"Head is teaching for 3 days rather than 2."

Paul Hodson, the head teacher at Penpol school in Hayle, the primary school that my children attended, said this to me about the standards funds:

"It is sad to think that the government spent so much money on these very good schemes, designed to be delivered by Teaching Assistants, only to cut funding with so many schools now laying off the very people who were to lead them. At Penpol we have decided to keep everyone in post and try to bring in as much new money as possible. I bring in around £5,000 a year to the school working as an Ofsted inspector and I will plan to double my number of inspections this year."

Mr. Mark Prisk: I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing the debate. Does he agree that in the individual cases that he describes one of the common patterns revealed by the comments of head teachers and teaching staff generally is that the many and varied funding streams complicate the issue, they have clearly upset Government funding and they are working against schools being able to plan properly for the future?
Andrew George: I am sure that schools, head teachers and their governors do not wish to reject the additional money that has been made available through various standards funds, funds to reduce infant classes and so forth, although they may sometimes find the strings attached to those funds irksome and bureaucratic. However, we have learned over the past year that when funds are withdrawn at the same time as significant additional costs are placed on a school, that has a significant impact on the school.
If standards funds are to be reduced, that needs to be planned. The reduction must be achieved in a way that does not result in many schools being left high and dry in the current financial year—which they have told me is
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the situation. Richard Zolkiewicz, the head teacher at St. Ives secondary school, told me that that is hard to quantify, but that this year there is a

"Huge deficit of the order of approximately £100,000."

Schools are being deeply affected.
I have given the Minister for Lifelong Learning, Further and Higher Education advance notice of some of my questions. I hope that that was helpful, and that he will have enough time to answer them.
Mr. David Drew: I apologise for intervening in the first few minutes of this interesting exposition, but I have to attend a statutory instrument Committee, so I shall not be present for long.
Does the hon. Gentleman agree that two specific things have gone wrong this year? First, because Gloucestershire has now been included in the area cost adjustment, it has done significantly better this year than previously—we used to moan like hell about those who got it and those who did not. However, I presume that Cornwall is still outwith the area cost adjustment, and that has a significant impact. I have always argued that the area cost adjustment should be removed. Secondly, until we grasp the nettle of preparation for early retirement and redundancy throughout the entire public sector, there will inevitably be a cost implication. We must be open and honest with teachers and other public sector workers about the fact that retirement at 60 is the likelihood rather than the exception.
Andrew George: I am grateful for that intervention. Time is moving on so I shall try to be brief, and I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman will not be present for the entire debate. The Minister has heard the point that he made about teacher pensions and redundancy ages, and I have some sympathy with it. It is important that the Government, LEAs and teacher unions reflect on that matter.
With regard to the area cost adjustment and local government settlements, the hon. Gentleman is right to assume that Cornwall always seems to get the rum end of any deal for formula funding. Schoolchildren in Cornwall seem to be given significantly less per head than is the average for England. The area cost adjustment has not worked out well for Cornwall, because there are low wages. In fact, it results in Cornwall getting significantly less than we should.
Perhaps the Minister will tell me how the announced extra £800 million for the next two years will be spent. That sum was mentioned earlier. Will there be a formula for that? When will LEAs and schools be told about it? Will his Department make it clear that it will support schools that have no alternative other than to go into budget deficit? When will the LEAs be told the indicative budget for the next financial year? How much of next year's funding for schools will need to be found by council tax payers? Will the guidelines on teachers' performance-related pay change, because those increases are not 100 per cent. centrally funded?
What are schools supposed to do to stop making teachers and support staff redundant? How can secondary schools applying for specialist school status meet the criteria for sound financial management, if, through no fault of their own, they are unable to live

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within their budgets this year? I understand that that is one of the criteria on the basis of which a hid may proceed.
Perhaps the Government will accept that current demographic trends, as is widely predicted, mean that primary school rolls will decrease. If so, does the Minister agree that that would provide an opportunity to consolidate and build capacity and resources, thus achieving a reduction in class sizes, rather than an opportunity to reduce the number of primary school teachers? I believe that the Department has a prediction that by 2010 the reduction could result in the loss of as many as 6,000 teachers. This is a golden opportunity that the Government could grasp.
What is an appropriate level for school reserves? What are schools supposed to do to maintain standards, particularly in learning support and special educational needs? What plans has the Department for the standards funds? The original plan was that they be removed in the next financial year and the year after that. Will they remain, and if so, are they to be used for the same purpose? What assessment has been made of the flexible use of devolved formula capital in building improvements and developments?
Despite a previous debate and an exchange of correspondence with the Minister for School Standards, many difficulties remain in Cornwall. Will the Minister commit his colleague to meeting me, together with representatives of schools in my area, to go through some of the issues that I have mentioned today? There are, of course, many more issues remaining. I am grateful for the forbearance of hon. Members. I look forward to hearing the Minister's reply.
2.22 pm
Mr. Mark Prisk: I congratulate the hon. Member for St. Ives (Andrew George) on securing the debate, not least because I, too, am from his part of the world originally. This is a vital and timely debate, because it deals with something that is strongly represented in my postbag and of great concern for many parents in my constituency.
Moving a little further east of Cornwall, in Hertfordshire the problem of funding our schools this year is severe—that is the word used by many secondary school head teachers in my area. Indeed, according to the Hertfordshire Association of Secondary School Headteachers, which has conducted a survey, 95 per cent. of Hertfordshire's secondary schools have had to make significant cuts this year, including more than 70 teaching posts. Some 90 per cent. of those schools expect that they will be in deficit, despite having already raided their reserves. The average deficit in the county is expected to be £63,400 per school—a total of £4.8 million throughout the whole county. That is a significant sum.
I am delighted to see that the Minister is with us today. However, I am sure that he will understand that it would have been equally pleasant for us if the Minister for Schools Standards had attended. Perhaps, having made notes, this Minister will tell us at the end of the debate how those deficit figures compare with the national average.
On 14 July I met with the heads and deputy heads of the schools in Hertford and Ware. Indeed, I have met heads and deputies in Bishop's Stortford and
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Sawbridgeworth, too. We are lucky because in our county we have many excellent professionals working in schools. However, in all honesty, I have never known them to be more anxious about their schools' future or more depressed about their own. They have explained to me that, although this year is difficult, they fear that the worst is yet to come.
As Members know, our schools face a raft of changes to the standards fund, the EFSS—the education formula spending share—and the Learning and Skills Council. We have had deep cuts in area cost allowances, and there is a continuingly significant gap between what the Government promise on employment costs and what the money provides. In many ways, the Government have failed to think through or cost properly the combined effect of the many changes. Individual changes may not be welcome, but for some schools they are manageable. However, together the changes are confusing. The financial impact means that many schools in my constituency in east Hertfordshire and across the county will face even larger shortfalls in the years to come.
That leads me on to a broader point that I sought to raise briefly with the hon. Member for St. Ives. The complexity of initiatives, proposals and announcements as well as the small streams of funding and the hypothecation of money means that head teachers spend more time chasing little pots of money than undertaking the job for which they were trained. Many of them would welcome what my own party is looking at and what others with expertise in the field have suggested—namely, sweeping away the complexity and giving our schools genuine flexibility to meet the needs and priorities of their areas. I hope that the Minister will address that broader point. The danger in discussing school funding is that, if we look solely at which area does slightly better or slightly worse than any other, we ignore the crucial and fundamental way in which the Government have sought to skew education funding.
I want to look to the next year in detail. For Hertfordshire, the gap between what the county requires and what it has stands at £15.2 million—that is based on the Government's own formula. That is bad enough, yet it could swell to a black hole of £25 million if, as seems likely, schools are yet again unable to draw on their reserves. Over the past year, schools in Hertfordshire, many of which have been putting money to one side to bid for things such as the specialist school status that the Government have been promoting, have had to raid their reserves. We have seen £10 million of that money put into current expenditure to ensure that schools can cope this year. That could mean, in the coming year, a gap of £25 million across the county.
What does that mean in real terms? In human terms, almost 600 teachers in our county alone could see their jobs go. That is bad enough, but the impact for some schools could be even worse. Subjects would have to be curtailed, options for GCSEs and higher levels would have to be cut, and classes would have to be missed. The impact of that would further demoralise remaining staff. They will find, yet again, that they are being asked by the Government to do more with less.
I wrote to the Secretary of State for Education and Skills about those problems on 17 July, highlighting all the fears and raising specific questions. Sadly, I did not get any answers. I merely received a standard letter from

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the Minister for School Standards, who obviously has something more important to do today. In that response, he sought to pass the buck by implying that the local education authority should share the blame. I cannot speak for other areas, but I can tell this Minister that the view in Hertfordshire is not that the LEA is in any way responsible. I asked my local schools, and not one reported any money being withheld by the county council. Indeed, the chairman of the Hertfordshire Association of Secondary School Headteachers went further. In his letter to the Secretary of State on 6 June, Mr. Alan Gray stated:

"We have worked closely with Hertfordshire LEA and are confident the LEA has passported funds to schools as you require."

The fault lies firmly in Whitehall, not in Hertford. I hope that when the Secretary of State meets with the all-party—I stress that—delegation from Hertfordshire next month he listens and responds accordingly.
Will the Minister assure me that all the changes in employment costs for the forthcoming year will be matched? Will he undertake to ensure that when our schools face particular problems from the combined effect of differing schemes the Government will be open to reconsidering whether the combined effect is detrimental to certain types of school in certain types of area? Are the Government prepared to recalculate the net effects of those changes? Will he ask his colleague the Minister for School Standards to ensure that when he responds to Members in future, he does so according to the concerns that they have raised about their LEAs and does not merely issue a standard letter? Frankly, that letter was irrelevant and somewhat insulting to those people I am trying to represent—that is the crucial part.
All we seek is a fair deal for our schools. However, unless there is a significant move from the Government to match the funding of the many initiatives that they promote and unless they ensure that the combined effect of departmental plans is properly accounted for, the danger in Hertfordshire is that many teachers will be lost and many of our pupils left behind.
2.31 pm
Mr. Jim Cunningham: I thank the hon. Member for St. Ives (Andrew George) for securing this timely debate. In Coventry, the Government have done much about class sizes and funding. Nevertheless, there is a problem. Last Friday, the three local Coventry MPs met the director of the local education authority. The LEA raised a number of issues with us. It wants those issues to receive Ministers' attention and it wants to receive some answers. Prior to that, we met the trade unions. They also voiced concern about the arrangements for this and future years.
The view of Coventry's education authority is that there have been problems in relation to the transition to a new system for education and local government finance. The LEA says that the underestimation of the cost of national insurance, pensions and salaries is another factor that has been giving it many concerns. It has also expressed concern about standards fund changes and I hope that the Minister will consider that. Although Coventry recognises that it has done reasonably well, it still has problems of that type.
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This is the second time that I have spoken in a debate about education funding, and particularly about school amalgamations and closures. I initiated a debate two years ago. Coventry is going through the same exercise this year and will be going through it next year. Let me highlight some of the problems. Sixteen schools have had to use capital and convert it into revenue—something that the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale, West (Mr. Brady) mentioned earlier. Another three schools needed loans, which demonstrates that we have some serious problems. There is pressure to pull back in budgetary terms to cover the shortfalls. There are probably at least 43 teaching jobs that are at stake and could go, plus 27 support jobs.
Although Coventry recognises, as most people do, the extent of the Government's investment in education, there are still problems that must be addressed. I understand that the cuts to the standards fund will be deferred from 2004–05 to 2005–06. However, we do not have much detail, so may we have more detail about what will happen?
There is funding for changes, which can give rise to concern about industrial relations. That is a big concern for Coventry, but money may have been allocated for that.
In conclusion, some hon. Members who spoke before me have covered some of the concerns and I do not want to go over them again, but I have highlighted the concerns of Coventry's education authority about the impact that the changes may have. The problem is that while we recognise that the Government have attempted to raise standards and done a lot for education, all that good work could be undone if the problems are widespread throughout the country. I hope that the Minister can give some assurances on that. Members of Parliament and trade unions in Coventry would certainly like to talk to him about those problems.
2.35 pm
Sitting suspended for a Division in the House.
2.50 pm
On resuming—
Sue Doughty: First, I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for St. Ives (Andrew George) on bringing this issue once more to the House's attention. It is part of a long-running saga for all Members present and many others. Members for Surrey constituencies always seem to be standing up pleading for special treatment, or we are treated by the Government as if we are. That is not the case. In Surrey we are experiencing the same problems as those that have been so eloquently described by my hon. Friend and by the hon. Members for Hertford and Stortford (Mr. Prisk) and for Coventry, South (Mr. Cunningham). We are struggling with our schools.
Ours is a tale of despair. We have all been closely in touch with our schools and have talked to our head teachers. The Government wrote to me with a list of schools that received school achievement awards, and although they have been controversial, the Minister suggested that I should go and congratulate those

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schools' staff. I was delighted to take the opportunity to thank all the staff at those schools for the tremendous work that they have done to get those awards.
As is the nature of such occasions, I asked to stay behind for coffee so that I could have a chat with the teachers, classroom assistants, teaching assistants, dinner ladies and everybody else, because giving them a chance to talk to us is part of the day. What did they talk about? A teacher who had changed career in her late 20s said to me, "I love teaching in this school but I am not staying because I cannot afford anywhere to live. I've done living in bedsits all my life and now I need to move forward." A head teacher said to me, "My struggle is holding on to staff at all, yet we have been developing the role of teaching assistants. They look, quite reasonably, for a pay rise and career development, some hoping to train as teachers, but I cannot pay them any more."
One problem is the 25 per cent. turnover of teachers, year after year. There are schools in Surrey where hardly one teacher stays for the length of a child's course through school, so that child will not have the same teachers at the end of school life as at the beginning. We have problems recruiting head teachers. One of the few ways in which we are fortunate in Surrey is that we often attract extremely good teachers by virtue of the fact that they are married to a much higher earner in the county. That takes us back to the days when a teaching job was a second profession in Surrey.
Mr. Prisk: The hon. Lady has described the difficulties that her schools have in retaining their head teachers. Does she share my concern that many leave because they do not feel able to carry out their professional job? They are constantly having to chase lots of little pots of money rather than having the professional freedom to do the job for which they were trained. Does she agree?
Sue Doughty: I thank the hon. Gentleman for that intervention. He is absolutely right. A disproportionate amount of time is spent chasing money, not only by heads, but by chairs of governors and other teachers. They are constantly chasing initiatives and recasting budgets. One result of the Government having left our schools so short of money has been a huge stress on the governing bodies and non-teaching staff—those responsible for managing budgets. They should be managing budgets to go forward, but at the moment they are managing budgets to survive. We have a problem because career aspirations are stunted—if someone wants to get on, they move away from Surrey.
A further aspect of this tale of woe is that the director of education for Surrey has been in close contact with the Government at every opportunity to explain to them the fact that Surrey passported its money through and to show that the finances are completely transparent. We received visits from the Minister for School Standards and, surprisingly, the Minister for Local Government, Regional Governance and Fire on 17 July. On that morning, Surrey MPs and members of the Surrey education department met the Minister and, with the charming smile that he knows how to do, he said, "I can't tell you what this news is, but I am sure you're going to be pleased." We listened to the announcement and more money was on the table, but it was not all the money we needed to stop the rot.
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The announcement said that there was to be a minimum per-pupil guarantee for schools. That has taken away the freedom of counties to juggle in such impossible situations to make the sums balance, which is a problem. This is not an addition to the current funding received by schools. There is no additional money to pay for the per-pupil allowance. Teachers still have to be paid for and the money has to be found—Surrey had one of the highest council tax increases this year to make good Government shortfalls, not extra spending. There is no more money in the pot from the council tax.
Schools' balances have been reduced by £12 million. Of Surrey's schools, 66 will have deficits totalling £7.5 million and 17 are seeking licensed deficits from the county council because their deficits will exceed 5 per cent. Indeed, Guildford county school in my constituency wants permission to go into the red by more than £170,000 each year for the next two years, with overspending continuing until 2008. That school's annual budget is £2.6 million. How are those schools that are going into deficit going to repay that debt? In future years, are we going to see a cycle of money being spent on servicing that debt rather than on what it should be spent on? How is the debt to be managed and how will schools plan their budget?
As has been alluded to by other Members, there is a real threat to the quality of the curriculum, the teaching staff and the courses that will be offered in our schools. Guildford county school is planning teacher redundancies, although it hopes not to have to make any redundant. However, teachers are not being replaced. We have a major problem, which is one that the Government knew was going to happen. They had endless information, and delegation after delegation told them what was happening in Surrey schools. There is no comfort in saying that Surrey is an affluent county. They could be cynical and say, "If they are so rich in Surrey, they could pay for private education." Many do, but many others cannot afford it—the housing costs in Surrey take care of that. Disposable income is no higher than anywhere else in some families.
My concern is for the Minister to recognise where the knife has cut too deeply. He needs to understand that no extra money will come from council taxes—our pensioners are struggling as it is to meet the current increases. He must understand that we need to operate in a debt-free environment, and that we need to move on from that to encourage our schools and ensure that they do not have to take money from the school fabric fund, which has been badly raided, to pay for teaching salaries. We should give real hope, encouragement and fair reward to the people who serve our children so well.
2.58 pm
Mr. David Rendel: This has been an excellent debate, although sadly it has been attended by far too few hon. Members, given the importance of the subject. I would like to start by congratulating my hon. Friend the Member for St. Ives (Andrew George) on raising the subject again. As my hon. Friend the Member for Guildford (Sue Doughty) said, it is of fairly widespread concern across the country. It has affected Members throughout England, and I have no doubt to some extent in Scotland and Wales, although their funding for education is very different. In this country, there has been an enormous problem throughout a large

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part of local education authorities. It is good that we have the chance to debate the subject again, although it has been debated this year on different occasions.
It is interesting how the debate has changed during that time. The Government refused to accept any blame when the problems first became apparent. They were prepared to blame almost everyone except themselves: the LEAs for not passing on the money that they were given, the head teachers for not managing their budgets properly, and the governors for not running the schools efficiently. That was at the start when the Government were perhaps not showing any humility.
Later on, as my hon. Friend the Member for St. Ives pointed out, the good news was that the Government began to accept part of the blame. In July, the Secretary of State admitted that mistakes were made in his Department, and that they had led to a serious shortfall in funding for schools. "Mistakes" barely brings out the extent of what had happened given the catalogue of incompetence and evasion that characterised the Department's handling of the matter. Nevertheless, I honour the Secretary of State for admitting that. It was brave because few Secretaries of State are prepared to accept that there have been problems in their Department's handling of anything. It was a welcome admission from him.
When the Secretary of State made his statement to the House, I was able to catch the Speaker's eye and ask a question. As a member of the Public Accounts Committee, I pointed out that, when permanent secretaries come before the Committee as witnesses and we find out that things have gone wrong, we often ask them whether anyone has been held to account, and whether anyone has lost their job, which they might have done had such mistakes occurred in the private sector. Sadly, it was no great surprise to hear—we have heard it again and again in Committee—that no one had been held to account, and that no one had lost or would lose their job. That is not a party political point; it is a point raised by all members of the Committee, regardless of party.
We treat people very differently in the public sector, and sometimes—this may sound terribly Tory, which is not something that I like to do—there are occasions when the public sector does not hold people to account sufficiently for their failures. It treats people much more leniently than they would be treated if they made the same errors in the private sector, which is a pity.
Mr. Prisk: Without wishing to interrupt the hon. Gentleman while he is being terribly Tory, does he therefore feel that someone should have lost their job over that?
Mr. Rendel: The question that I asked was whether anyone lost their job, and the answer from the Secretary of State was, "No, no one has lost their job." I hope that my question indicated the serious point that so often when such problems arise in the public sector, no one loses their job. It is time that the public sector thought about that. That point is made time and again by Labour, Liberal Democrat and Conservative members of the Public Accounts Committee. There is a clear difference in how public sector workers are treated when they are shown to have failed catastrophically.
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The Government failed to take account of several issues when they set up the funding system for schools this year, which has led to problems. They failed to take account of the extra costs that schools were facing, which have now become clearer with increased national insurance contributions, the costs of teachers pensions and their pay settlement, and the impact of the local government funding arrangement.
The Government failed, importantly, to model how those changes would affect individual schools. My local authority, West Berkshire, sent a delegation to the Department for Education and Skills, where it pointed out that it had fully modelled how the changes would affect its schools. The Department told the delegation that it was the only LEA in the country—let alone the Department itself—to have gone through such an exercise. I found it extraordinary that the Government had not made any attempt to model how those changes would affect schools.
The Government also misled schools about what to expect. Stories said that there would be a growth of about 7 per cent. in funding and that it would be the best sustained rise in education spending for at least a generation. The Chancellor was saying that, and his language was mistakenly repeated by DFES Ministers at the time—the Minister present today has not been in his position for that long, so he can perhaps be absolved of blame for that. However, Ministers throughout the DFES were saying that there would be a huge rise in the grants given to schools, without taking into account that costs would rise by more than that—as much as 10 per cent.
Many schools were left with not only no real-terms increase but a decrease in their funding for the year, with the result that teachers are now being made redundant. As mentioned already, support staff are also being made redundant, with all the difficulties that that entails for the new school system in which support staff are expected to take on more responsibility. Some schools have even been forced to cut aspects of their budget such as capital funding, and we have already alluded to the difficulty that that causes given the underspending on capital funding over many years.
On 29 August, The Times Educational Supplement estimated that 700 teachers had been made redundant and a further 2,700 were not being replaced because of the funding crisis this year. I understand that the net increase in the number of secondary school teachers this year is just 89, while rolls are rising by about 25,000. That is set against the background that the number of fully qualified—I emphasise fully qualified—teachers has fallen since 1977.
I want to raise another point that has so far not been discussed. What has happened to the local authorities that suffered the worst underfunding in the past? The Government's new funding formula for local authorities has led to significant rises in some cases. Those are inevitably for the areas that the Government believe have received less funds than they should have, as that is what the formula means. Having proved that those areas are underfunded, the formula has raised the funds but, unfortunately, in many cases those funds have hit a ceiling.
I understand why the Government have introduced floors and ceilings into the formula. It is important not to allow cash falls and to set a floor to prevent the

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situation becoming impossible for certain local authorities. However, the fact that they have paid for that by introducing a ceiling in other areas means that the local authorities that were underfunded in the past are not receiving as much as the Government's own formula calculates that they should.
Those areas face a particular difficulty. They have been underfunded and so have deficits to make up. There may be a backlog of work in their schools, a lack of library books or funding for special needs, and various other deficiencies resulting from underfunding. Now, although the funds are theoretically supposed to come through, the ceilings mean that they are not doing so.
Andrew George: Does my hon. Friend agree that his statement presupposes that the Government's new funding formula properly reflects the requirements of a local authority area? In my area, for example, secondary school pupils receive about £126 a year less than the average, while primary school pupils receive £220 a year less. Does he agree that, in areas where there are additional costs because of peripherality, rurality and higher transport expenses, the formula may not reflect genuine need across the country?
Mr. Rendel: Of course I accept what my hon. Friend said about the difficulty of getting the formula right. There will always be arguments over exactly what the formula should be, but I was merely making the point that the Government are failing to meet their current funding estimate. I am taking their point of view. I have taken the Tory party's point of view, and there is no reason why I should not take the Labour party's point of view for a while—I like to be even-handed whenever I can.
According to the Government's formula, areas that have been underfunded in the past are being further underfunded in the present, and are therefore unable to make up for the underfunding in the past. I hope that the Government will take that into account. When my authority went to see the Department for Education and Skills, it was told that it could have no more funding for this year, in spite of the fact that the Government's formula says that it should have more funding.
There has been a lack of transparency and openness in how the Government have handled funding for schools this year, which has undoubtedly damaged some schools. Sadly, it has also done little for the reputation of politics and politicians in general. Councils have been left to pick up the pieces. In many cases, they have been forced to increase council tax to make up for this year's lack of Government funding. There is still a mismatch between assessments of local need and the sums that local councils are given to spend. It is the old story of the Government retaining their grip on the purse strings while local councils are asked to accept accountability without responsibility.
3.10 pm
Mr. Graham Brady: I congratulate the hon. Member for St. Ives (Andrew George) on securing the debate and on his consistency, because he previously raised the matter in this Chamber on 2 April. I am always concerned when Members say that they will be entirely constructive and conciliatory, but he did open the debate constructively.
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I am grateful to the hon. Member for Newbury (Mr. Rendel) for taking a slightly more party political stance, even though he spoke as both a Conservative and a socialist. None the less, I hope that that absolves me of any blame that might be attributed for beginning a descent into party political wrangling, which I would never seek to do. We have discussed this important issue on many occasions, but, for reasons that I shall go into shortly, this is a crucial moment in the ongoing saga of school funding.
I should also like to welcome the Minister for Lifelong Learning, Further and Higher Education. He is one of the more persuasive Ministers, which is why he picks up all the impossible briefs. He has already been saddled with the task of defending the Government's policy on tuition fees, and now he has been asked to come here to defend their gross betrayal of parents, pupils and schools the length and breadth of the country.
The hon. Member for St. Ives gave credit to the Secretary of State for Education and Skills for accepting his Department's incompetence in dealing with the school funding situation this year. It would have been so much better if he had taken that stance much earlier. When he spoke to the Secondary Heads Association in the new year, he uttered the memorable words:

"It just floods straight over my head. I don't listen to what you say quite frankly".

That was not a perfect illustration of listening government or of a Government who are prepared to accept their failings. Perhaps we have made a little progress in the months since then.
The hon. Member for St. Ives raised concerns about classroom assistants, worries about redundancies for existing support staff and the implications of the proposed teacher work load changes. The latter is one of the crucial problems faced by the DFES. The Department has put yet another burden on schools and their budgets; they have to try to cope with teacher work load changes this year and, more particularly, next year, when those costs will kick in. The Department has made those changes against the backdrop of this year's funding crisis, which has left many schools with a budget deficit from which to deal with expanding costs.
The gravity of the situation was highlighted by the hon. Gentleman when he referred to a small local school having to make one of its four teachers redundant, which is clearly a serious problem for that school. Such problems have been reflected and picked up by hon. Members from all parties and from different parts of the country. The hon. Member for Coventry, South (Mr. Cunningham) referred to 43 teaching and 70 support staff posts being lost. The hon. Member for Guildford (Sue Doughty) spoke about the problem of attracting and retaining staff, and she referred to the experience of a local school that had received a school achievement award. A few months ago that award was hailed by Ministers as crucial in motivating staff, but it is now being quietly dropped as an inconvenient complication in the arrangements for paying teachers and rewarding them for success.

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The hon. Member for Newbury went on to talk about one of the shabbiest parts of the whole episode: the Government's preoccupation throughout this year with shifting the blame for what has gone wrong instead of tackling the root cause of the problem. They tried to blame head teachers and local government, but eventually they were left with that blame; they have been caught fairly and squarely for what they have done wrong. The hon. Gentleman also spoke about proper accountability in dealing with errors in the public sector.
I do not want to rehearse in detail the causes of the crisis, which we have discussed many times here and in the main Chamber in recent months, but they include the increase in national insurance contributions, the removal of elements of the standards fund and the cost of increased superannuation contributions from schools. That is effectively an additional tax take because the pension scheme is not funded, and the Treasury decided to increase the contributions from teachers' employers towards the cost of paying pensions. There has also been a failure in successive years fully to fund the teachers' pay settlement. All that together has created a serious situation in schools throughout the country.
What steps have the Government taken? Reference has been made to most of them during this debate. Flexibility for capital funds is very welcome for schools in a crisis which are faced with the possibility of making redundancies among valued teaching and support staff. However, head teachers are put in an impossible position, which was memorably expressed by one of the leaders of a teachers union as having to choose between having the boiler fixed in the middle of winter and retaining the deputy head teacher. The flexibility for capital funding does not solve such impossible dilemmas.
The Government have made a U-turn on their decision to withdraw elements of the standards fund, and if that money finds its way to the right schools in the right way, that will help. The rules on deficit budgets have been relaxed, and that was covered earlier in the debate. However, schools that have had to go into deficit this year face an ongoing problem in trying to climb back out of deficit without a reduction in the costs that they face. In addition, as my hon. Friend the Member for Hertford and Stortford (Mr. Prisk) made clear, there is the problem of further increases in employment costs occurring this year.
Measures are being taken in the Local Government Bill, which was debated on the Floor of the House on Monday, and it is proposed to bring forward the timetable for school budgets to the end of December. I shall comment briefly on that, as I did on Monday. It is rather sad that those measures could have been taken much sooner. They may help, but they, or measures very like them, were offered to the Government in January 2002 by the Standing Committee on the Education Bill. There have been constant warnings of the coming problems from Members and from people outside the House who are involved in education. That was yet another occasion—nearly two years ago, in that instance—when Ministers were told that difficulties were approaching, and they were offered a solution that
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they were too arrogant and intransigent to accept. Now, rather belatedly, they are trying to pick up the pieces in a crisis.
On 17 July, the Secretary of State promised a minimum-per-pupil funding increase for schools, but as yet we have no details of what that will mean. We do not know the percentage increase and, more worrying, we do not know what it will be based on. However, there has been a development. On Monday last week, I received a written answer to a question that I had asked which will be very instructive to Government and Opposition Members. I have with me only one of two volumes that give per pupil funding for every school in the country for the current financial year. I also asked for that information for the previous financial year.
The hon. Member for St. Ives gave a long list of schools in his constituency. I could not look up all of them in this volume, but I have found two schools that I assume are in his constituency. St. Ives infants appears to have per pupil funding of £2,360, and St. Ives junior school has per pupil funding of £1,993. I know that Members are looking forward to getting their hands on this mine of information.
If the promise of a minimum-per-pupil funding increase is to mean anything, it must start from the baseline of current per pupil funding. Until we have an absolute guarantee from the Minister and his colleagues that that is the case, we will all look with a rather sceptical eye at what the Government are promising.
We also need to know what will happen in the instance, acknowledged by the Secretary of State as far back as 17 July, of LEAs not passporting 100 per cent. of education funds to schools. He admitted that that would be possible in exceptional circumstances, but he has not been prepared to define them. If there are situations in which money is not passported to schools, how will the Government ensure that schools get their minimum per pupil funding increase? Will it be made by direct payments, thereby circumventing the LEA, or by some other means?
My hon. Friend the Member for Hertford and Stortford spoke of the 95 per cent. of secondary schools in his constituency which face significant loss of teaching posts, and of the average school deficit of some £63,000. He said that head teachers in his constituency had never been more anxious about their own future and that of their schools. That is a picture that we all see wherever we go visiting schools. I hope that the Minister is now prepared to listen to those concerns, which demonstrate the gravity of the situation that the Government have created.
My hon. Friend went on to call for a simpler funding system. One of my concerns is that the Government are now creating, instead of a simple funding system, an utter mess. Effectively, we will have a local funding system that is controlled from the centre—the worst possible combination of factors. The LEA will be responsible for the distribution of funds but that will be prescribed in great detail by Ministers who will not, as they claim, have all the levers to control the expenditure. It is not entirely clear what the mechanism will be for delivering a minimum-per-pupil funding increase.
I hope that the Minister will answer some key questions. I hope that he will give a simple, straightforward guarantee that the minimum increase

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promised will be worked out from the baseline of existing per pupil funding. I also hope that, as my hon. Friend requested, the Minister will confirm that that will mean a net increase above costs for this year. What hurt schools and teachers most last year was that they were promised so much and then the Government took away more with one hand than they gave with the other. Will the Government also guarantee that we will have the provisional local government finance settlement by mid-November?
In conclusion, schools throughout the UK have had a dreadful year. Head teachers have been forced to contemplate and begin a process of redundancies of staff whom they value and need to teach our children well. It would be unacceptable to have another year in which those sorts of problems are inflicted on our schools. If that were to happen, Ministers could not avoid responsibility by seeking scapegoats or otherwise shifting the blame, and they would not be forgiven for it. We all look forward to the Minister's usual persuasive response, but we need more than that. Real and effective action is needed in the coming year, because all the schools, parents and pupils in the country are watching.
3.26 pm
The Minister for Lifelong Learning, Further and Higher Education (Alan Johnson): I congratulate the hon. Member for St. Ives (Andrew George) on securing this important debate, to which I am pleased to have the opportunity to respond, although it has not been as constructive as the hon. Gentleman might have wanted. I have dealt with him on many occasions, and he tries hard, in his own words, to be "constructive and conciliatory." However, after he had finished speaking, those principles disappeared, so it would be remiss of me not to put some balance back into the debate.
I agree that there have been problems, some of which were highlighted by my hon. Friend the Member for Coventry, South (Mr. Cunningham). I am not trying to understate those problems, but I am attempting to put a bit of balance back into the debate.
I had some close dealings with the hon. Member for Hertford and Stortford (Mr. Prisk) when he first came into the House. He was such a pleasant and rational human being at that time that it makes me wonder what happens to people when they have been in this place for a while. The hon. Gentleman commented on the fact that the Minister for School Standards was not present. However, he should know that my hon. Friend has another parliamentary commitment on the Committee Corridor—he is currently strutting his stuff on a statutory instrument Committee. He would have loved to have been here—[Interruption.] The hon. Gentleman is now going through the whole ministerial team, but his point was about the Minister for School Standards, and I hope that he now accepts that my hon. Friend's absence is not an insult to him or anyone else who has taken part in the debate.
I understand the interest of hon. Members in the impact of this year's funding changes on schools, not just in Cornwall, but throughout the UK. I shall say something about Cornwall and then about the national situation. I shall then try hard to answer the 13 questions put to me by the hon. Member for St. Ives; since it is his debate, he deserves a response.
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I shall begin by discussing the performance of schools in Cornwall. When we in the House speak about education, it is important, as several hon. Members pointed out, that we recognise the outstanding work that is done in our schools. Teaching numbers in Cornwall have increased by 11 per cent., from 3,610 in January 1997 to 4,020 in 2003. Over the same period, the number of school support staff working in the county has risen from 1,600 to 2,490, while the teacher vacancy rate remains at 0.1 per cent. I would like to put on record my gratitude for the work of the teachers in Cornwall who have been responsible for significant improvements in the quality of education in the county, and I will give some examples of their achievements.
Andrew George: I fully acknowledge the investment and the increased numbers, but that comes against a backdrop of steeply increasing pupil numbers. The point that I was trying to make in response to an earlier intervention by the hon. Member for Falmouth and Camborne (Ms Atherton) was that although the record is good, we are still having problems this year with some compulsory and many voluntary redundancies.
Alan Johnson: If I have a few minutes at the end, I will come on to that, but it would be remiss of me not to put the points into context; indeed, people would drop to the floor in amazement if I did not.
Returning to the achievements of teachers and support staff in Cornwall, I can tell the Chamber that the percentage of pupils leaving primary schools in the county who are doing well in English has risen from 66 per cent. in 1998 to 74 per cent. in 2003. Over the same period, the figures for those doing well in maths and in science have increased from 62 to 71 per cent. and from 74 to 86 per cent. respectively. I am sure that hon. Members will agree that that represents outstanding work in the county's primary schools.
In the early years of secondary education in Cornwall, there is impressive evidence of improvement with pupils reaching level 5 at age 14. Results are up from 65 to 69 per cent. in English, from 65 to 70 per cent. in maths and from 63 to 72 per cent. in science. We all hope that that can be translated into continued rising achievement in GCSEs, A-levels and vocational qualifications.
Mr. Rendel: I do not know about Cornwall, but I know that when Ministers have claimed increases in figures for some other areas, it has turned out that staff increases have not been in fully trained and qualified teachers. Will the Minister assure us that the increases that he mentioned are in fully trained and qualified teachers?
Alan Johnson: I have not got on to teachers properly yet, but I will later. The increase has been in fully trained teachers. Opposition Members have made the point that some of the teachers come from overseas, but they are fully trained. I have more to say on teacher numbers, which will please the hon. Gentleman, who in his own words is being "terribly Tory" today.
It is also worth reflecting on the increases in funding that Cornwall has received since this Government came to power. The hon. Member for St. Ives mentioned that and congratulated us on it, and I will put some flesh on

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that skeleton. From 1997–98 to 2003–04, Cornwall's total funding per pupil has increased by almost £1,100—an increase of 46 per cent. over five years. The hon. Member for Hertford and Stortford, who was so balanced when he first came into the House, neglected today to mention that funding per pupil in Hertfordshire in the same period has increased by 40 per cent.
Capital investment has also greatly increased in Cornwall. In 1997–98, capital funding in Cornwall was £8.1 million. By 2002–03, it had risen to £23.9 million, and this year, taking into account private finance initiative projects worth £71 million, it is more than £99 million. That jump in capital investment should be mentioned in a debate on school funding. Nationally, there has been a record £2.7 billion increase in funding for schools this year. That will go up by another £4.1 billion in 2004–05 and by a further £2.1 billion in 2005–06, which will mean a total cash increase over three years of more than £6 billion.
Mr. Brady: Do those figures take into account the element of capital funding that the Department has urged schools to transfer to support revenue deficits?
Alan Johnson: I am not entirely sure, but I guess that the figures do. I will come on to that point, because it was raised by the hon. Member for St. Ives.
We recognise that local authorities and schools have had to contend with significant changes in funding arrangements this year, and we are aware that schools have faced tremendous difficulties with their budgets. The responsibility for the funding of schools is, of course, shared between central and local government, and we recognise that the challenge this year has been to manage the interaction of complex changes—the introduction of the new formula funding system, the transfer of funding to reflect teachers' increased pensions, the working through of the teachers' pay settlement and the end of a substantial body of ring-fenced grants from the Department's standards fund. Although there have been large cash increases in education this year, cost pressures have been substantial and have varied at school and authority level, depending on cost structures and local deployment of resources.
Mr. Prisk: The Minister talks of the important shared responsibility between Government and local authorities. The authorities need to have information from Government in order to play their part. Can he explain why the information relating to performance-related pay—a clear Government policy—was not provided to LEAs, which were therefore unable to work thoroughly through their budget considerations? That undermined their ability to do their job. Thankfully, in Hertfordshire, we passported all the money through. Why will the Government not give that information to LEAs?
Alan Johnson: In terms of learning lessons from what has happened this year, the Secretary of State has made it clear that we will try to ensure that some of the issues are raised next year. We accept that it is important for
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LEAs to receive information early enough. I shall come to that when I respond to the points raised by the hon. Member for St. Ives.
There have been problems, and we have sought to help local authorities to manage this year's changes by moderating the impact of the funding formula changes and, through additional grant, to ensure that all authorities have received an effective minimum increase of at least 3.2 per cent. per pupil. The increase for Cornwall is 4.1 per cent. That is on top of the transfer of £586 million to cover the teachers' pension increases, and the transfer of £500 million to cover the transfer of nursery education grant and infant class size grant.
In addition, the Secretary of State announced on 15 May flexible ways in which schools could use their budgets: for this year only, he has relaxed the regulations so that devolved capital can be used for revenue purposes; he has allowed schools to borrow from consolidated balances; and he has allowed LEAs to license schools to set deficit budgets. We consider those sensible measures that will avoid unnecessary redundancies.
I shall move swiftly through the hon. Gentleman's 13 questions, in no particular order, before turning to the general points. This might be a bit of a school test for me. I have been asked what schools are supposed to do to maintain their standards, particularly on learning support and special educational needs. The Secretary of State said on 17 July:

"This year most LEAs' spending on centrally funded pupil services, such as special educational needs … has increased significantly faster than their spending on budgets delegated to individual schools. It is essential that, in future … spending on such central items should rise no faster than spending on the individual schools budget."—[Official Report, 17 July 2003; Vol. 409, c. 456.]

We have, however, commissioned an investigation into SEN spending. With the support of the Local Government Association, the Audit Commission and the head teacher unions, the investigation will provide more detailed information about the ways in which money is spent on special educational needs.
The hon. Member for St. Ives asked what schools are supposed to do to avoid making teachers and support staff redundant. As I have mentioned, the Secretary of State made a statement on 15 May allowing schools to use their budgets flexibly this year—in particular, the formula on capital funding to support revenue spending—to borrow consolidated balances and to set deficit budgets. The appropriate level of school reserves is a local matter to be agreed between schools and LEAs. They are best placed to understand the situation on the ground.
The next question concerned whether the DFES would make it clear that it would support schools that had no alternative but to set a deficit budget. We appreciate that some schools have found it necessary to set deficit budgets this year by agreement with their LEAs. Some have found it necessary to spend from their reserves or devolved formula capital allocations. Schools and LEAs have the primary responsibility to manage the ongoing consequences of such decisions, including maintaining sound financial management and balancing budgets. We recognise that that could be beyond the capacity of individual schools and LEAs, and in those few cases, we will be prepared to consider

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limited, transitional support to avoid damage to children's education, where that is part of the recovery plan agreed locally by the LEA, schools and the Department. We shall discuss with heads and LEAs how best to provide such support.
We intend that the extra £800 million over two years will be provided without any strings attached for schools and that they should treat it precisely as a top-up to their budgets, just like the school standards grant. With our national partners, including LEA representatives, we are considering how best to ensure that we deliver that.
Andrew George: Does the Department intend simply to disburse that money per capita across the country, or will it use a more sophisticated method?
Alan Johnson: I am afraid that I, or the Minister for School Standards, will have to contact the hon. Gentleman because I do not have that information. [Interruption.] I will resist the temptation to repeat what the hon. Gentleman is saying from his sedentary position.
The hon. Gentleman asked me, as did the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale, West (Mr. Brady), when the LEAs will be told the indicative budget for the next financial year. We will announce the figures by the time of the provisional local government financial settlement in November, when we have completed the work with our education partners on the detailed analysis of cost pressures in the system. Once we have that analysis, we will be able to set the minimum percentage increase for 2004–05.
I was asked about the Department's plans for the standards funds, which were originally to be removed in 2004–05 and the following year; the question was whether those will remain and, if so, whether they will still be used for the same purpose. We intend to provide that new money—£400 million in each of the two years—without any strings attached, as I have already mentioned.
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I will write to the hon. Member for St. Ives about what assessment has been made of the impact of the flexible use of devolved formula capital for building improvements and developments. As to how much of next year's school funding will have to be found by council tax payers, I remind hon. Members that council tax is an essential element of paying for local services. Providing funding for education is a shared responsibility, so it is appropriate that it should be met by both central and local taxation. There is no reason why any authority should need to increase its council tax excessively.
I will write to the hon. Gentleman about changing guidelines and teachers' performance-related pay. I am sure that the Minister for School Standards would be pleased to consider meeting a delegation from Cornwall, and I suggest that the hon. Member for St. Ives write to him directly. I am happy to assure the hon. Gentleman that schools facing deficit budgets this year will in no way be disadvantaged in their bids for specialist status. I will write to him also on the question of demographic trends.
I know that the funding situation this year has been difficult. I do not agree with the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale, West that this is a gross betrayal of parents and teachers. I have dealt with him a great deal over the years, and he has made some very flattering comments, but he is the man who put the hype into hyperbole. Let us get some rational balance in the debate. We provided additional help from the centre, and some authorities have provided more from their own resources.
Many authorities and schools have faced up to difficult decisions, and it is clearly vital that we continue to focus on the problems that we face and that we seek to resolve them. We have to look forward and learn quickly from this experience so that we can put in place better arrangements for next year. We have been working hard to do that. We have been working hard to do that, and we will shortly be making a further announcement that will cover many of the points raised by hon. Members from all parties about the necessary changes.

Iran
3.44 pm
Sir Teddy Taylor: I hope that it will not be regarded as condescending if I welcome the Minister to the debate and say that I have always regarded him as one of the small band of sincere and committed MPs with independence and integrity. I was genuinely surprised when he was appointed to his position because I know that Governments of all parties do not like that kind of person in their outfit.
The Minister has a particularly difficult job, as he knows, because the situation in the Foreign Office now seems to be rather like that in Iran, where power is divided between a supreme leader and an elected President. We now seem to have two Foreign Offices: one in Whitehall and one in Downing street. I appreciate that the policy on Iran seems to have been changed in July by Downing street and that, for that reason, the Minister will probably be unable to give a very helpful reply to my arguments. My hope is that he will think carefully about the issues that I raise.
There is certainly no doubt about the change that has taken place. I could cite a multitude of reports of the Foreign Office's positive attitude to Iran. I have the report of a lovely speech by the present Leader of the House, which was made when he was a Foreign Office Minister, in which very positive things were said. However, things have changed and we must accept that.
I am very upset about the change because, given the many and complex problems over the war with Iraq, it must be obvious to the Government and the United States of America that we should be doing everything in our power to show encouragement and understanding to the more responsible, sensible and constructive nations in the middle east. The Minister will be aware that I was one of the small minority who did not support the policy in Iraq, for reasons that I explained in a debate on 18 March. We are in danger of making another huge error in our relations with Iran.
In the case of Iraq there was the 45-minute threat from the weapons of mass destruction. We have now placed a 45-day demand on Iran over its nuclear programme through the International Atomic Energy Agency following the surprise initiative with Australia, Canada and Japan. The demand has caused huge resentment in Iran, particularly as the Government there had been co-operating with the IAEA and had gained the impression that progress was being made. Of course, those could be treated as the pathetic arguments of a guilty nation. However, to my great surprise, I came across a document that had been handed out to the board of governors by the director general of that international authority. I read it through carefully and it mentions some of the problems and some of the ensuing issues. I could quote all kinds of positive things. The document was issued not last year, not two years ago, but on 26 August.
I will simply quote the last paragraph, although many things in the document are positive and encouraging. The last paragraph states:

"Since my last report was issued Iran has demonstrated an increased degree of co-operation in relation to the amount and detail of information provided to the Agency and in allowing access requested by the Agency to additional locations and the
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taking of associated environmental samples. The decision by Iran to start the negotiations with the Agency for the conclusion of an additional protocol is also a positive step".

The report indicates that, although there are and have been problems, Iran has been trying to help and to make things positive. The director general said that he would report further at the November meeting or earlier.
The report contains a huge number of positive and encouraging statements about Iran. For me, the fascinating one was in paragraph 25 where the board appeared to accept the Iranian argument that depleted uranium particles, which have caused so much concern, could have originated from the imported containers. When one looks at the report and considers what we have done in giving an instruction to Iran—the 45-day rule—it seems foolish and almost arrogant to upset, and cause unnecessary conflict with, a country that, if we dealt with it in the right way, could play a really positive role.
The whole business has caused huge anger in Iran, and my greatest fear is that its result will be seen in the parliamentary elections in March 2004. It is no secret that since democracy returned to Iran there has been a huge dispute between those referred to as the modernisers and those referred to as the traditionalists or conservatives. The Parliament and the President are both liberal in attitude, but the manner in which we are dealing with Iran seems almost designed to promote the strength of the negative fundamentalists. The Parliament is at present controlled by the modernisers and the President is very much a moderniser, but if we carry on in this way we are simply undermining good will. That will lead to more stone-throwing, shooting and the rest of it.
Mr. David Lepper: Notwithstanding what the hon. Gentleman has said, I wonder whether he shares the concern of members of the Baha'i faith about the fact that, since the commission on human rights decided to suspend international monitoring in Iran in April 2002, there has been a marked increase in persecution of members of the Baha'i faith in that country.
Sir Teddy Taylor: The hon. Gentleman has made an important point. I have met and talked to members of the Baha'i faith and people from Iran. I am told by the representative of the Iranian Government that members of the Baha'i faith are entitled to move in and out of the country without difficulty. There is a problem with attendance at university, which seems to relate to whether we regard the Baha'i as a faith or a sect. That type of problem will have to be resolved. I certainly hope that it can be, because when all religions, and branches of religions, are treated fairly it makes for a stronger country. I can only tell the hon. Gentleman that my impression is that, overall, religious tolerance is better in Iran than in many of the surrounding countries, but I fully accept that his point is important and significant. I hope that the Minister will raise the issue with the Iranian authorities if he is allowed to meet them or speak to them.
I have referred to my concerns about the 45-day notice, but there are a number of other issues that I hope the Minister will consider. First, there is the basic issue of whether we should show some humility in our

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dealings with Iran. Britain and the USA appear almost obsessed with arguing that we are fighting for the creation of democracy in the middle east. For example, we go around Iraq saying, "We want to make you free again and give you democracy." However, if I were Iranian, I would recall how only a few years ago Britain and its allies gave total and complete support to the hereditary Shah of Iran, who was elected by nobody and who was totally in charge of Iran. It seems that we only support democracy when it suits us.
When the Shah was replaced in the great revolution, the western powers, including Britain, appeared so concerned that we financed and armed an evil military despot in Iraq called Saddam Hussein so that he could invade Iran. There was a frightful war in which Iran survived only because of the determination of its people. There is no doubt about the weapons of mass destruction that were supplied to Saddam Hussein, because they are listed in the Reigle report, produced in America by the Senate. Of course, that is now rather difficult to get hold of, because circulation of such documents is not encouraged at present. However, the list is there, and it is clear and precise. The supply of those arms was in breach of the biological and toxic weapons convention, but I am told that such conventions are not meant to be applied to the nations of the west—according to the United States, anyway.
Then there was the dreadful destruction of the plane above the Persian gulf, which had 270 Iranians on it, almost all women and children. Not even an apology was given for that disaster. I make those points to explain that kindness and consideration has not always been shown to Iran, and we should bear that in mind when making fresh demands on the country.
What is the situation in Iran? There is no doubt that since the time of the Shah, Iran has introduced a form of democracy that enables the people to express their opinions in elections for their President and Parliament. In fairness, the power is shared to some degree between the supreme leadership and the President, but it is clear from all the recent elections that people are on the side of the liberal elements in society. Clearly, we should be encouraging them; instead we seem to be going out of our way to be negative in our dealings with Iran, thereby undermining the moderate and positive elements of Iranian society.
Has Iran helped or hindered in the battle against terrorism? We hear many reports about links with organisations, but we know that Iran was more than helpful in arguing for the release of persons detained in Lebanon and elsewhere, including Terry Waite. It was also helpful in the battle against the Taliban in Afghanistan. I understand that Iran would be glad to help in the battle against al-Qaeda, and it would be helpful if we could do something about those in Iraq who are causing troubles for Iran.
One of the recent, huge problems in Iraq, which the Prime Minister referred to at Question Time, is the shortage of public services. One such shortage, mentioned by the Prime Minister today, was that of electricity. Is it the case that the UK asked Iran to help with the provision of electricity to Iraq and that Iran gave a positive answer?
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What are the Minister's views on Iran's attitude to women? Many of us have concerns about the extremists in the middle east and elsewhere who deprive women of their proper place in society and give them no rights or opportunities. Is it true that Iranian women are given greater opportunities and rights, and that more than half of the students in Iranian universities are women?
How do we respond? We still apply sanctions against Iran because of what we regard as defence matters—of course, the USA has more comprehensive sanctions. I am told that Iran's commercial and domestic airliners are terribly out of date and that there are huge safety problems as a consequence; will the Minister say whether that is right? The US declined to supply Iran with replacement aircraft, and I am told that negotiations for a fleet of Airbuses were suddenly and abruptly stopped. Is this the way to make friends? Do we treat Iran with dignity? It was reported in The Guardian on 4 September that the President of Iran had sent a letter to our Prime Minister assuring him that Iran was willing to meet its non-proliferation treaty obligations following a demand from the Government. However, the newspaper stated that no reply had been received.
Likewise, I would like an explanation from the Government on an issue that has caused huge concern in Iran: the arrest of Hade Soleimanpour—who was at one time Iran's ambassador in Argentina—at Durham university, where he was studying. The fact that he was an ambassador at the time of the alleged crime appeared to indicate that his arrest would be contrary to the Vienna convention. However, leaving that aside, it is known that he was not in Argentina at the time of the crime. As the Minister knows, the case was considered in court on 12 September and the High Court judge stated that there was no evidence that he was involved in the bomb attack nine years ago. In view of the fact that the whole business has caused huge concern in Iran, will the Government say why and how they acted as they did? Clearly there must be an explanation, and I would like to know what it is.
I could go on and on, but the one thing that most worries me is that there seem to be two separate foreign policies on Iran, as with so many other issues these days: one from the Foreign Office and one from No.10. The Foreign Office has shown some positive responses to Iran in the past and they were appreciated and produced results. However, it appears that since the July meeting, people have said that the Prime Minister has changed his mind and is now going to be negative towards Iran and that there has been a change of policy. I am not suggesting that some nations are perfect and others are disaster areas. I know that in Iran there are many problems, one of which, affecting the Baha'i, was referred to. However, I believe that Iran is a nation with a great history, which has sought to play a positive and meaningful role in the world, particularly in the middle east. Instead of trying to encourage and help it in its task, we seem now to be treating it with mere contempt.
My fear is that if we do not show a positive attitude to Iran, we shall probably be throwing away an opportunity to help to resolve the problems that exist in the middle east and which threaten the safety and security of the world. The Minister will know from contacts, from speaking to people and from listening to those in Iraq that the impression is that in the Arab world we are regarded, along with the Americans, as the

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enemies of Islam, and as killers and invaders. Although such allegations may be terribly untrue, we must get friends in the Arab world if we are to win that battle. We must look for people who can help and be positive, so that we can show that we are not on our own and that our particular interests are worth while.
I am not an expert on this subject—I have never been to the country—but I hope that the Government and the Minister will consider these issues. I have a high regard for the hon. Gentleman and, although I know that he is restricted in what he can say as a Minister, I hope that he will make a positive contribution.
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr. Chris Mullin): I thank the hon. Member for Rochford and Southend, East (Sir Teddy Taylor) for his kind words about me. Integrity and independence are two words that I also associate with him. My elevation to Government might bode well for him in some future—distant future, I hope—Conservative Government.
I will jump straight in at the deep end. The hon. Gentleman has raised several issues. He asked whether we recognise the importance of Iran and of treating it with respect, and whether we understand that it is not a totalitarian dictatorship and that it has made great progress in some areas. He specifically raised Iran's nuclear programme; co-operation with it over Iraq and terrorism; human rights, including women's issues; our embargo on arms-related sales to Iran; the recent correspondence between President Khatami and my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister; and the case of Mr. Soleimanpour. I will try to deal with those points in order.
We are in no doubt that Iran is a country of growing international importance. Its size, population, key strategic position and natural resources are plain for all to see, and we have a strong national interest in the policies pursued by its Government. We can and do co-operate with the Iranian Government on questions where we share a common interest. There are respects in which we have a strong interest in encouraging the reformist tendencies that are active in many areas of Iranian life. There are other areas where we continue to have considerable concerns about the policies that the Iranian Government are pursuing. Together with our partners in the EU, it is our policy to pursue a constructive—and, where necessary, critical—engagement. The areas of common interest on which we engage with Iran include the fight against drugs—which is a great concern for many of our constituents and a major problem in Iran—international support for the reconstruction of Afghanistan, and the effort to stabilise Iraq.
For many years, Iran has hosted more than 2 million refugees from both Afghanistan and Iraq. We have provided a great deal of support for that—we have given more than £4.3 million in the past three years for refugee programmes in Iran, and we have also agreed to fund several projects involving United Nations agencies and non-governmental organisations.
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We regularly discuss Iraq with our Iranian counterparts, including the possibilities for practical co-operation. Like the UK, Iran is committed to the maintenance of Iraq's sovereignty and territorial integrity within its borders. My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary has visited Iran four times in the past year and he maintains an active dialogue from week to week with his Iranian opposite number, Dr. Kharrazi. Our relationship with Iran allows us to support reform while maintaining a robust dialogue on areas of mutual concern. This has been made possible only by the changes that have taken place in Iran since President Khatami was first elected in May 1997.
That brings me to the hon. Gentleman's third point, which is whether we understand that Iran is not a totalitarian dictatorship. We support President Khatami's objective of bringing about an Islamic civil society based on the rule of law. We welcomed his re-election in June 2001 with an increased share of the vote, which demonstrated the Iranian people's clear will for reform and gave him a strong mandate. However, as the hon. Gentleman knows, the complex political situation in Iran has created many obstacles to the President's efforts to pursue his policies of political and economic reform. We hope he succeeds and we wish him well with those.
Those are positive developments. It would, however, be wrong of me not to take this opportunity to set out for the record the areas of Iranian policy that concern us most. We are worried by Iran's human rights record and by continuing Iranian support for terrorist groups, including those involved in the Israel-Palestine conflict. We are particularly worried by reports that Iran is developing weapons of mass destruction and about the uncertainties surrounding its nuclear programme. I shall return to that subject in a few moments.
We welcome the efforts of the Iranian Government and Parliament to improve the human rights situation and the position of women. I acknowledge, as the hon. Gentleman asked me to, that the position of women in Iran is a great deal more advanced than in many other middle eastern societies. However, we regret that because of the political stand-off between reformers and their conservative opponents, including some members of the judiciary, there is still a long way to go.
We take every opportunity to press Iran on its approach to the middle east peace process—peace there is in everyone's interests, including those of Iran. We believe that the attitude of the Iranians to the peace process should be more constructive and that they should support efforts to resolve the differences between those involved. We are concerned about Iranian resources being used by Palestinian groups that carry out atrocious and unacceptable attacks on civilians in Israel. We might argue about the definition of terrorism, but attacks on civilians can never be justified, whether in Israel or Palestine, or by terrorist groups in Iran. On wider anti-terrorism co-operation, Iran has told us that it has arrested al-Qaeda figures and that it will cooperate with us against international terrorism. We are pressing Iran to do so.
The hon. Gentleman raised a number of questions on United States Government policy on Iran, including on sanctions. I hope he will forgive me if I say that it would probably be better if those were addressed to the Government of the United States. He was correct to

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state that there remains in place a national UK embargo on the sale of all military-listed items to Iran, including some dual-use items, but that does not affect the provision of medical supplies.
I should also like to reassure the hon. Gentleman that all letters from President Khatami to my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister are treated with due respect. Replies are not necessarily sent according to a fixed time, but are sent after full consideration of both their content and the surrounding circumstances.
The hon. Gentleman asked whether, as a diplomat, Mr. Soleimanpour should have been immune from detention. The short answer is that he is not accredited as a diplomat here. He is a student at Durham university, and as such he enjoys no immunity in this country. The extradition process is currently a matter for the judicial authorities and I am sure that he will understand that the Government cannot interfere with that. It is therefore a matter of regret that some in Iran have consistently misrepresented the nature of the case and the role of the British Government. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will understand that I cannot comment further on a case that is now before the courts. However, I have something to say about some of the non-legal ramifications of that case.
I regret to say that on 14 September there was a further shooting incident outside one of the compounds of Her Majesty's embassy at Tehran. That was certainly the third, and perhaps the fourth, such shooting since the beginning of this month. We have protested strongly to the Iranian Government and have urged them to take the necessary measures to deal with the perpetrators to acknowledge that such systematic intimidation of an embassy is wrong, against Iranian law and will be met with the full force of the law, whoever is involved. We have also pressed them to ensure the full protection of our embassy, and we will continue to make these points strongly to the Iranian authorities. It is difficult to enjoy good relations with a country when some of its citizens are shooting at our embassy with apparent impunity.
I mentioned earlier that one of our particular concerns is Iran's nuclear programme. As the hon. Gentleman will be aware, the IAEA's governing board met in Vienna last week, and adopted by consensus a resolution setting specific steps that Iran should take to help restore international confidence in its nuclear intentions. We regret that ahead of that resolution Iran walked out of the meeting. The aim of the resolution was to set out a way for Iran to resolve outstanding issues with the IAEA, and walking out will not help achieve that. We call on Iran to comply with all the provisions of that resolution; doing so will provide the clearest possible demonstration of Iran's stated commitment to transparency and co-operation in this field.
In case there should be any misunderstanding, and as EU partners have repeatedly made clear, we recognise Iran's right to generate electricity by means of nuclear power, subject, of course, to the necessary international safeguards. However, ceasing to develop facilities by means of which fissile material could be produced indigenously, together with rapid implementation of an additional protocol to Iran's existing comprehensive safeguards agreement with the IAEA, would be key confidence-building steps.
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The requirements set out in the resolution are no more than would be expected of any country that was a signatory to the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, and about whose nuclear programmes there was continued uncertainty. The intention is to enable Iran to resolve its outstanding difficulties identified by the IAEA. I therefore welcome Iran's statement to the IAEA general conference on 16 September, reaffirming Iran's commitment to the non-proliferation treaty and to its safeguards agreement and its commitment to negotiate an additional protocol.
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for raising the issue of Iran. I know that he has a long-standing interest in this area. It is timely that he should have secured the debate now, given the events of the past few days—I do not suppose that they were on his mind when he requested the debate. I assure him and other hon. Members that the Foreign Office and the Government take Iran very seriously. There is the closest possible consultation between my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary and the Prime Minister. The Government are united in supporting a tough policy against terrorism and nuclear proliferation wherever it occurs, and we, together with our EU partners, will continue to do all we can to support the process of reform in Iran, launched by President Khatami in 1997. Engagement is a two-way process and we look forward to Iran's co-operation on the issues of concern that I have outlined.
Sir Teddy Taylor: Might we perhaps have some positive outcome from today's debate if the Minister and the Government agreed to try to co-operate to see whether we could sell Iran some Airbuses to replace the local aircraft that are falling apart? That would bring money and jobs to Europe and good will to Iran and might help to solve all the problems. Would that not be a sensible thing to do? Will the Minister discuss that with his colleagues?
Mr. Mullin: I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will not expect me to clinch a deal in the closing minutes of the debate, but I assure him that I shall take his point away and ensure that it is heard in appropriate quarters.
Mr. Lepper: The Minister referred to the human rights situation in Iran, and I referred in my intervention to the persecution of the Baha'i. Can the Minister tell us whether, when such issues are drawn to the attention of Ministers, they are raised with counterparts in the Iranian Government, either face to face or through the European Union's human rights dialogue with that Government?
Mr. Mullin: Yes, I can confirm that the issue of the treatment of the Baha'i, and of Christian minorities, has been raised repeatedly with the Iranian Government, who are well aware of our views on the subject. The Iranians are fully aware that we believe that the persecution of individuals on the grounds of their religious beliefs is completely unacceptable. While that situation carries on, they will continue to hear from us about it.

National Curriculum
4.15 pm
Mr. Graham Allen: Unlike some other politicians in recent times, I start from the premise that there is such a thing as society. I want the Government to do for social behaviour what they have done so successfully for literacy and numeracy. That policy was an outstanding success in the first few years of the Government. I want them to consider whether they have a vision to take social behaviour to the same levels that have been so well achieved for literacy and numeracy.
We hear a lot about antisocial behaviour. I commend the work of local councils, the Government and our public services to combat the problem. During recent years, it has dominated the postbags of hon. Members throughout the parliamentary spectrum, regardless of party. It blights the lives of ever more of my constituents in Nottingham, North and no doubt in your constituency, too, Mr. Benton.
The campaign must be organised on two fronts. As well as doing what we have done so well in the Antisocial Behaviour Bill and the Criminal Justice Bill by attacking antisocial behaviour, we need to promote positive social behaviour so that the problem is tackled on both wings—the carrot and the stick. I am setting out on my learning curve for the campaign and I have no prescriptions for action, other than a strong sense that a statutory element is needed in the national curriculum up to seven years of age, just as we have citizenship in the national curriculum at secondary level. We need something measurable if we are to initiate the required extra necessary or remedial work at the earliest moment in a child's life. Beyond that, my mind is open. Building on personal, social and health education, developing emotional intelligence and the ability of children to relate to each other without violence can all help to create good, rounded people regardless of academic achievement, which cannot help but increase when more young people are mentally equipped to learn.
I have been greatly encouraged by the good will surrounding the concept. A few weeks ago, David Bell of Ofsted courageously raised the issue publicly. Along with the Minister for Children and my right hon. Friend the Minister for Lifelong Learning, Further and Higher Education, the Secretary of State for Education and Skills is already joining up Whitehall on such issues. He has suggested that I keep in touch with him on the agenda. Indeed, I wish to put it on the record that my right hon. Friend generously allowed me access to discussions with some helpful civil servants.
The former city council leader, Councillor Graham Chapman, is a constant inspiration to me when taking on the toughest issues in our local communities. The hon. Member for South-West Bedfordshire (Andrew Selous) realises, as I do, that the issue transcends party politics. All parties, Ministers and shadow Ministers have a lot to swallow and much to think about, not least the life-academic balance in education. That is necessary to enable good social behaviour, not merely disable the systems of antisocial behaviour.
I am not suggesting that schools alone should take responsibility for inculcating social behaviour in our children. On the contrary, it requires a collective effort
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in which families and carers will play a leading part. However, the plain truth is that, day by day throughout the country, teachers are being forced to assume that task on their own. They are having to cope with children who have never learned how to communicate, how to express their feelings and manage their emotions, how to follow rules and routines or how to act in company with others—in other words, children who have never been socialised.
My right hon. Friend the Minister will know from his postbag—I have learned this during my brief time in the House—that an ever larger percentage of the trouble is caused by us having to skew our efforts to deal with the problems created by children who have not been properly socialised. If nothing else, putting social behaviour on the national curriculum would reward the teacher who succeeded, often against all the odds, in getting persistently disruptive children to stay still and be quiet during their lessons. It would also give teachers some guidance and support in what I would argue is a most important yet scarcely recognised aspect of their job.
I suggest that putting social behaviour on the national curriculum would help to define the required standards, and would force all departments and agencies to examine their input and decide what policies are necessary to achieve appropriate social behaviour. All of us, in our public lives and as private citizens, have to live with the cost of our collective failure to develop social behaviour—parents whose children's classes are disrupted; teachers who have to practice crowd control to the exclusion of teaching; heads who want to include but are made to go through the process of exclusion; truant and welfare officers; and, later in life, staff in social services and housing departments, councillors, those involved in drug rehabilitation, police officers, youth offending teams, magistrates courts and prisons. It adds up to a lifetime of expensive and time-consuming public service input.
Then there are the wider victims—bullied kids, frightened neighbours, repressed communities and victims of criminality—who in turn have their own children, who are often brought up to perpetuate and widen the antisocial cycle. We must not forget the greatest victims of all—the children, who massively fail to realise their human potential, sometimes arriving on their first day at primary school already emotionally disfigured and permanently hobbled by ignorance. I often think that it would be much easier for us to get a handle on the problem if it took a more physical form, and the children showed up at the school gate visibly gnarled and malformed. Thankfully, however, that does not happen.
Academic studies show that good parenting has a higher educational impact than schooling. I am grateful to the Minister for Children for supplying me with the information to support that proposition. It is not about blaming parents in general, many of whom do heroic things to ensure the best for their children's development. Parents must take responsibility for their children, and we should help and encourage them to do so. We should not hanker after a parental golden age—it never existed—nor should we return to the practice of giving children so-called discipline.

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We should look instead to a time when all children can enjoy the right to a decent life, and they should have the social toolkit to make the best of themselves inside and outside school. That will not drop off the Christmas tree; we have to work for it. We have to prepare for that and implement our plans. I hope that the Government will continue the great work that has already been done to ensure that all children are able to prepare for school in the right way.
Much of the problem starts before school. The problems of an antisocial youth can be regressed to the first day at primary school. Head teachers, as hon. Members know from talking to them, can spot the children who are going to go wrong. However, we can and must take that regression back even further—if necessary, back to birth.
What role do we envisage for the health visitor in spotting those children who may be at risk of not receiving appropriate behavioural education? Should additional resources be devoted to them, at the earliest and probably most effective time? Should the Child Support Agency be involved at that point to ensure that the father's responsibility is not merely financial? Should a named local public service officer—this is about devolving responsibilities and making people accountable—be responsible for monitoring a dozen local families and charting their progress through life? A loving mother and/or father armed with the right knowledge at that point is the strongest antidote to the development of an antisocial child.
Parenting classes should be pre-natal as well as post-natal and, in an appropriate form, should be a thread throughout a child's life in the teaching of what could be called a social behaviour hour in the mandatory national curriculum. Parents could make links with the national curriculum through family learning. Parenting programmes are producing some very encouraging results, but they must be complemented by developing programmes to prevent antisocial behaviour in young children, not merely by reacting to misbehaviour when it has occurred, as has to happen.
I hope to work towards some of the answers when I convene a brains trust of primary heads in Nottingham, North next month. Perhaps I can suggest that, as a practical outcome of this debate, the Minister or one of his colleagues write to hon. Members of all parties to encourage them to do the same. We should engage Members of Parliament in this issue, and ask them to convene meetings of primary heads, educational welfare officers and local councillors to pool expertise and perhaps deliver answers, then send reports to the Minister or Secretary of State. The Secretary of State or Prime Minister might then consider giving the matter the political profile that it needs and initiate a genuine national debate. That is not an idea that I necessarily want the Minister to snap up today, but perhaps he could give it some thought.
There is so much brilliant and innovative best practice, not only at Government and local government level but on the ground in primary, pre-school and post-natal education. I know that for a fact from my constituency, where sure start and PSHE teaching are making a real impact; but we must go further. We must set out for the next term and the term after that a vision of what we want to achieve on this very sensitive matter.
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It is also politically sensitive. It concerns all our electors and all our constituencies. One thread must be making best practice universal.
I may appear to be contradicting myself, but I believe that anything included in the national curriculum on social behaviour must have flexibility. It does not have to be prescriptive. As my right hon. Friend knows, Nottingham, North has the ward with the lowest educational attainment in the United Kingdom: it has the fewest kids going to university of any constituency in the UK and five of the bottom 25 comprehensives in the UK. How social behaviour would be taught in my constituency need not necessarily be the model for everywhere. We may have something to teach other people, but they may have something to teach us. Anything put into the national curriculum should have the flexibility to allow for individual circumstances.
If the Government wish to think further on this important topic, which is all that I ask of the Minister today, I am sure that we in Nottingham will do all that we can to pilot and develop the idea. We—and society as a whole—have so much to gain if we take it seriously.
4.28 pm
The Minister for Lifelong Learning, Further and Higher Education (Alan Johnson): I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham, North (Mr. Allen) on securing the debate. I hope that I can reassure him in my response of the Government's strong commitment to ensuring that children and young people can contribute fully to society through the development of positive social behaviour. My right hon. Friend the Minister for Children would very much like to have been here for this debate, because she is passionate about the issue—almost as much so as my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham, North. His is a really good idea, and changing the emphasis from antisocial behaviour to social behaviour has a parallel in social exclusion: we first started talking about social exclusion and then started to talk of social inclusion.
I want to outline the range of opportunities that is already available in the school curriculum for young people to learn about responsibilities, whether moral, social or parental, or those of citizens. I shall set out the work that we are doing to address antisocial behaviour in and out of schools before it becomes problematic, and shall refer to a variety of initiatives that support effective parenting and improve family functioning. Finally, I shall outline the plans set out in the recent Green Paper, "Every Child Matters", both to review family policy and to ensure that we have a coherent account of the work across Government that affects families. My hon. Friend's campaign, which we were at the launch of today, will be an important part of those deliberations.
The national curriculum ensures that schools provide a broad and balanced education for all pupils, and social behaviour is taught throughout the curriculum; however, citizenship, and personal, social and health education are the most important subjects for many schools. Giving pupils opportunities to learn about responsibilities is central to citizenship education, which is compulsory for all those between the ages of 11 and 16. My hon. Friend made the point about moving that range back, which we should consider. The programmes of study for citizenship ensure that pupils will learn

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about the rights and responsibilities that underpin society. Studying citizenship complements the framework of PSHE, which provides for pupils in both primary and secondary schools to be taught about relationships, including marriage and those between friends and families, and to develop the skills to be effective in relationships. The framework also provides for those pupils to be taught about the role and feelings of parents and carers, the value of family life, the nature and importance of marriage for family life and bringing up children, the role and responsibilities of a parent, and the qualities of good parenting and its value to family life.
We want schools to have the freedom to explore with young people a broad range of issues, in relation to which we would all want them to behave responsibly as adults. We believe that PSHE and citizenship provide opportunities to teach about social behaviour in the curriculum and the responsibilities of parenthood and family life. The non-statutory nature of the PSHE framework means that teachers have the flexibility to deliver the subject in ways that best meet the needs of their pupils. Teaching beyond the curriculum, however, is just as important. The Robin Hood primary school in Nottinghamshire, for example, had concerns about poor standards of behaviour, which led to an extensive programme of out-of-hours learning, including football clubs. That built self-esteem and improved results.
It is crucial that good standards of behaviour are promoted and that any problem behaviour is identified and tackled quickly. However, surveys show that the vast majority of teachers consider pupil behaviour to be generally good, with a majority believing that standards are improving, although poor behaviour is of course a serious problem where it occurs. It has an impact not just on the individual pupil, but on the whole class. We are committed to raising standards further still and are investing almost £470 million over the next three years to do so. This September every LEA is being funded to appoint expert behaviour and attendance consultants, in order to help schools maintain and secure high levels of positive behaviour and attendance, and tackle bullying wherever it occurs. In addition, senior staff in all secondary and middle schools are being trained to use audits to identify current strengths and weaknesses in behaviour and attendance, and to draw up action plans.
It is crucial that we instil good standards of behaviour in children from an early age. This month we are rolling out a two-year attendance and behaviour pilot in primary schools in 25 LEAs. The pilot will test new social and emotional behaviour teaching materials developed in line with literacy and numeracy strategies for primary schools, so there is a link there with the points made by my hon. Friend. That will develop a model for supporting school improvement where behaviour and attendance are key issues, which could lead to a social behaviour hour, or a part of the day dedicated to that subject.
Some pupils have greater difficulties that impact on their behaviour and we have developed a range of support measures for those pupils, their families and teachers. They include multi-agency behaviour and educational support teams, which have proved highly
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effective by providing early professional intervention for pupils and their families to help them deal with behaviour issues and prevent problems from escalating. We are currently funding 93 of those teams in 36 local education authorities, and that will be extended to a further 27 LEAs early next year.
Learning support units are helping to minimise disruption in the classroom and reduce the number of exclusions by removing pupils with behavioural difficulties from mainstream classes. Such units provide a setting to educate those pupils and address their behavioural difficulties within the school so that they can be effectively reintegrated at the earliest opportunity.
Involving parents at an early stage of their child's antisocial behaviour helps prevent it from becoming entrenched. That is why we are proposing in the Antisocial Behaviour Bill that youth offending teams will have a statutory power to make parenting contracts with parents of children who are engaging, or are likely to engage, in offending or antisocial behaviour in the community. The introduction of parenting contracts will give youth offending teams an additional tool to tackle antisocial behaviour effectively, and give them some authority with the parents to whom they are offered.
Mr. Allen: I am very pleased to hear what the Minister has said so far. Aside from the cultural aim of ensuring that our estates return to a decent level of social behaviour, I appeal to him economically. He will be aware that given the amount of money that has to be spent on one disruptive child who may then encounter the criminal justice system or drug rehab, public service is paying for a lifetime of getting it wrong instead of spending a couple of thousand pounds on intervention early on in life. That is an economic argument; I know that the Minister is keen to expand the provision for education post-16 and perhaps he may be able to corner a little money if he gets the issue of social behaviour right too.
Alan Johnson: I agree that there is an economic case for early intervention and preventing the problems from arising in the first place. That is a very important part of the Green Paper that I shall mention in just a second.
Recent research commissioned by my Department highlights the crucial role of parenting in children's education. That is the nub of the debate this afternoon. In particular, it highlights the crucial role of parenting for primary age children. That is why our strong commitment to supporting families is central to our vision. Strong families are at the heart of strong communities, and successful and confident parenting is essential to help to create healthy families.
Our role as a Government is to enable parents to do the best they can for their children. Most parents strive to do so, but how they do that will vary according to individual parents' own experiences. An effective means of providing direct support in parenting is through the voluntary sector. For example, the new parenting fund will provide £25 million over three years for voluntary and community sector initiatives to help parents improve their parenting skills. Sure start children's centres—one of the most, if not the most successful

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initiative of this Government—will also have an important role to play. Integrated support programmes provide services such as outreach support, home visits, community support, child minding networks, counselling and parenting classes.
Finally, it is important to identify areas in which more joined-up policy development may be necessary to ensure that work is as effective as possible. I am sure that my hon. Friend recognises that the creation of the department in the Department for Education and Skills, which under my right hon. Friend the Minister for Children is taking in all the various children's issues from other Government Departments, is a step in the right direction.
A review led by the family policy unit will map current Government work and provide a coherent account of what the Government are doing to support children and their families. The Green Paper, "Every Child Matters" did not receive much press coverage, but was an important document in this whole sphere and for education. In it, we set out our aim to ensure that every child has the chance to fulfil their potential. We described our proposals for building on the progress already made and the main areas for further action to improve children's lives. They include improving parenting and family support, and early intervention when problems are identified.
The range of measures that I have described to support the teaching of social behaviour in the classroom provides a firm foundation on which to build. Some of the suggestions made by my hon. Friend are important in taking that forward. We have the foundations and we now need to build on them.
Mr. Allen: I sense that my right hon. Friend is coming to the end of his comments and I want to draw him further on a couple of matters. As well as being a distinguished Minister, my right hon. Friend is a Member of Parliament for an area not dissimilar to mine. He must have seen the consequences of antisocial behaviour, weekend after weekend at his surgeries. He knows what it means to our electorate.
Will my right hon. Friend take back to our right hon. Friend the Minister for Children the idea of involving Members of Parliament as a sounding board on the possibilities that I have outlined today? Will he also take back to her the possibility of convening a group of
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Members of Parliament of all parties with an interest in the matter and using it as her own focus group or brains trust to try to bring forward some ideas from the very good practice that exists across the United Kingdom?
Alan Johnson: I certainly take that suggestion on board. It would be good for parliamentarians and Parliament to play such a co-ordinating role. I cannot think of any other person in a community better placed than the local Member of Parliament to galvanise action in that direction. I am sure that when my hon. Friend has his meeting with primary school heads in Nottingham, North shortly they will turn up in droves, as I am sure they would in west Hull and Bootle. My ministerial colleague will be very interested in that suggestion and in my hon. Friend's point that this is a cross-party issue with huge support throughout the House. Again, it will benefit Parliament to be seen to be acting in a cross-party way on such issues.
We have laid the foundations. Equally important is the range of initiatives to support parents in their role as children's first educators and enduring role models. Most of the social divisions in society and educational attainment problems are embedded by the age of three, which is why sure start was such an important initiative. Those measures and the proposals in the Green Paper to provide better early identification of problems are important.
Mr. Allen: In the last few seconds, could my right hon. Friend outline—he could write to me if he cannot answer immediately—the co-ordination that takes place, in addition to that through our right hon. Friend the Minister for Children, which is very welcome, at Cabinet and Cabinet Committee levels to ensure that social services and work and pensions issues are joined up throughout Whitehall? Everyone has an interest in the matter.
Alan Johnson: My right hon. Friend will write to my hon. Friend. She is very keen for it to work properly throughout Whitehall and the result will be more coherent support for the social development of every child, the result of which will be a better society.
Question put and agreed to.
Adjourned accordingly at sixteen minutes to Five o'clock.

WALES

  Tourism
  Mr. Liddell-Grainger
  To ask the Secretary of State for Wales what discussions he has had with the tourist industry in Wales on promotion abroad of tourism in Wales. [129545]

  Mr. Touhig
  My right hon. Friend and I work very closely with the First Minister of the Welsh Assembly Government. Tourism is a major focus of our discussions. The tourist industry contributes more than £2.5 billion a year to the Welsh economy and provides employment for around 100,000 people.

  Coal Industry (Compensation Schemes)
  Mr. Win Griffiths
  To ask the Secretary of State for Wales what recent information the Welsh subgroup of the coal health claims monitoring group has received on payments made to retired miners or their families under the respiratory disease and vibration white finger compensation schemes. [129546]

  Mr. Touhig
  The latest available figures for Wales indicate that at the end of August under the respiratory disease scheme we had settled over 21,000 claims and paid £258.5 million and under the VWF scheme we had settled nearly 10,500 claims and paid £96.4 million.

  Affordable Housing
  Gareth Thomas
  To ask the Secretary of State for Wales what discussions he has had with(a) Cabinet colleagues and (b) National Assembly for Wales Secretaries about the provision of affordable housing in Wales. [129547]

  Mr. Hain
  This year, Welsh Assembly Government is making available £56.4 million in Social Housing Grant to assist the provision of affordable housing. Together with private funding this will generate investment of over £90 million and provide around 1,000 additional homes for rent and low cost ownership.

  Economic Growth
  Mr. John Smith
  To ask the Secretary of State for Wales what assessment he has made of the prospects for economic growth in Wales in the next 12 months. [129548]

  Mr. Hain
  Most recent economic indicators show that the Welsh economy is performing more strongly now than for a generation, with unemployment continuing to fall, and employment and economic activity rising.

  Friction Dynamex Ltd.
  Hywel Williams
  To ask the Secretary of State for Wales what recent discussions he has had with the Department of Trade and Industry and the Welsh Assembly Government regarding the closure of Friction Dynamex Ltd. [129549]

  Mr. Touhig
  My right hon. Friend has discussed this issue with colleagues at the Department of Trade and Industry and the National Assembly for Wales. We are all anxious that those workers treated so badly receive their due.

  Community Support Officers
  Mr. David
  To ask the Secretary of State for Wales what discussions he has had with the Home Office on community support officers in Wales. [129550]

  Mr. Touhig
  My hon. Friend and I have regular discussions with ministerial colleagues about matters affecting Wales.

  All four Welsh police forces now have funding for Community Support Officers. In July I met a group of CSOs based in my own constituency who are already coming to be recognised as a valuable part of the local policing team.

  Departmental Food Expenditure
  Mr. Lidington
  To ask the Secretary of State for Wales how much was spent on food by his Department in(a) 2001–02 and (b) 2002–03; what proportion of that food by value was produced in the United Kingdom; what guidance he has issued to encourage the procurement of home-grown food; and if he will make a statement. [129384]

  Mr. Touhig
  The Wales Office has a complement of 55 and does not provide a catering service for staff.

  It is not possible to determine how much of the hospitality budget was spent on food; we always ask catering companies to use Welsh produce where possible.

  Health and Social Care
  Mr. Jon Owen Jones
  To ask the Secretary of State for Wales which of the four options to reduce bed blocking outlined in the Review of Health and Social Care in Wales advised by Derek Wanless would require primary legislation to implement. [129674]

  Mr. Touhig
  I refer my hon. Friend to the answer I gave him on 17 July 2003,Official Report, column 447W.

  The Assembly are currently considering all the options outlined in the Review of Health and Social Care in Wales as part of their detailed report and action plan, which is now due for publication in November. It would therefore be inappropriate to comment on the likely need for legislation that may be identified by the Assembly in order to support any proposals detailed in their implementation plan.

DEPUTY PRIME MINISTER

  Deprivation
  Mr. Sanders
  To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what his policy is to assist areas with(a) low average wages, (b) low average incomes and (c) both low average wages and low average incomes. [129157]

  Yvette Cooper
  The National Strategy for Neighbourhood Renewal is designed to narrow the gap between the most deprived neighbourhoods and the rest of the country. Low income is a key indicator in the Indices of Multiple Deprivation 2000 used to target resources and focus activity on those areas in greatest need. Policies for neighbourhood renewal include the New Deal for Communities partnerships, the Neighbourhood Renewal Fund, Floor targets and the development of local partnerships and community networks.

  Government Funding (North-west)
  Mr. Curtis-Thomas
  To ask the Deputy Prime Minister if he will make a statement on the Government Office for the North West financial programmes for(a) UK Online, (b) small retailers in deprived areas and (c) CCTV. [128570]

  Yvette Cooper
  These programmes received the following funding allocations:

  £ million

  (a) 2000–03

  25

  (b) 2001–04

  2.8

  (c) 2001–04

  14.4

  Mr. Curtis-Thomas
  To ask the Deputy Prime Minister which wards and programmes within Sefton have benefited from the Government Office for the North West funding programmes for(a) capital investment in housing, (b) major repairs allowance, (c) disabled facilities grants, (d) Neighbourhood Renewal Fund, (e) Community Empowerment Fund, (f) Community Chest and Community Learning Chests, (g) the Objective 1 Programme, (h) the Objective 2 Programme, (i) the Objective 3 Programme, (j) the Community Champions Fund, (k) Pathfinder Young Community Champions Fund, (l) UK Online, (m) Connexions, (n) Connexions Summer Plus, (o) Transforming Youth Work Development Fund, (p) drug and alcohol training, (q) Lifelong Learning Partnerships, (r) Sustainable Development Regional Promotional Budget, (s) renewable energy, (t) Mersey Basin Campaign, (u) building safer communities, (v) Wardens Scheme, (w) small retailer in deprived areas, (x) partnership development, (y) Partnership Support Programme, (z) CCTV, (aa) Target Policing Initiative, (bb) prostitution and (cc) violence against women. [128569]
  736W
  Yvette Cooper
  Due to the nature of the grants it is not possible to provide specific details of allocated funds at ward level. The following are programmes that have received funding in Sefton:

  (a)£4.852 million (2003–04)—Capital Investment in Housing.

  (b)£7.37 million (2002–03) £7.191 million (2003–04)—Major Repairs Allowance.

  (c)£713,000 (2002–03) £720,000 (2003–04)—Disabled Facilities Grants.

  All the above can be borough wide. Major repairs allowance is only for use on local authority stock.

  (d)£12.671 million (2001–04) £16,893 million (2004–06)-Neighbourhood Renewal Fund is not prescribed but intended for spend in the most deprived wards.

  (e)£435,423 (2001–04) £290,282 (2004–06)—Community Empowerment Fund for use to set up a borough wide community network.

  (f)£651,015 (2001–04) £657,050 (2004–06)—Community Chest. £128,996 (2001–04) £154,796 (2004–06)—Community Learning Chests.

  (g)The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister does not hold information on levels of European funding at ward level. Also as the Objective One programme is Merseyside-wide in scope, a substantial amount of programme-funded activity will be delivered by organisations that have a pan-Merseyside remit. A project based in one particular area (often at the organisations head office) will therefore draw beneficiaries, or have benefits, and spend money outside its immediate locality. However, Sefton will benefit from the £160 million invested through Objective One in Merseyside in 2002.

  (h)Areas that receive Objective 1 monies are not eligible for either Objective Two or Objective Three funding.

  (i)Objective 3—see h.

  (j)There are seven Community Champions receiving a total of £7,257.

  Current Community Champions include:
  Colette Sheerin Oscroft, No. 35—£416; Tony Roberts, No. 63—£1000; Ian Mackinson, No. 65—£180 Margi Robinson, No. 73—£1,209; Mary French, No. 74—£457; John Cunningham, No. 76—£2,000; Eileen Green, No. 100£1,993.77.

  (k)Sefton does not receive Pathfinder Young Community Champions Fund as Sefton is not an eligible area. DIES ran a national competitive bidding process which Sefton did not enter.

  (l)£261,813 for three UK Online Centres.

  (m)£17.4 million (2003–04) for Greater Merseyside Connexions Partnership. It is not possible to provide specific figures for Sefton as the Merseyside Connexions is Merseyside-wide in scope.

  (n)£333,000 (2003–04)—Positive Activities for Young People (formally Connexions Summer Plus).

  (o)£49,000 (2003–04)—Transforming Youth Work Development Fund.

  (p)£22,000 (2003–04) allocation for Greater Merseyside Connexions Partnership-drug and alcohol training.

  (q)£75,000 (2003–04) for Lifelong Learning Partnerships.

  (r)£500 in 2000 to help the local authority with Local Agenda 21 issues.

  (s)Between 1998–2002 Government Office for the North West employed an energy and environmental adviser who visited 87 businesses in the Sefton area promoting environmental management and resource efficiency. This cost GONW approx £9,000.

  (t)Details on funding for Sefton are not held by the Mersey Basin Campaign.

  (u)Sefton has been awarded £298.5k (2003–04). The initiatives under the Building Safer Communities programme are also being funded in conjunction with £196,745 allocated to Sefton Division under the Basic Command Unit Fund.

  737W

  (v)There are no Wardens Schemes being managed by GONW in Sefton at present.

  (w)£21,000 (2001–02), £29,000 2002–03, £29,000 2003–04 Small Retailers in Deprived Areas. Match funding has also been obtained for all three years from the South Sefton Partnership and all South Sefton wards have benefited.

  (x)£50,000 awarded between 2001–03—Partnership Development.

  (y)Allocated on a regional level for 2002–03—Partnership Support Programme awarded six days consultancy to Sefton CDRP to develop a partnership—Training Needs.

  (z)£636,000 has been awarded between 2001–03 for CCTV schemes in Crosby Town Centre, Bootle Town Centre, Southport Town Centre and South Road, Waterloo.

  (aa)No projects were directly supported in the Sefton area from the Targeting Police Initiative.

  (bb)No projects were directly supported in the Sefton area from the prostitution initiative.

  (cc)No projects were directly supported in the Sefton area from the Violence against women initiative.

  Local Government Finance
  Mr. Gardiner
  To ask the Deputy Prime Minister which census figures will be used for the 2004–05 formula funding share. [129852]

  Mr. Raynsford
  The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister intends to use mid-2002 population estimates for the 2004–05 Local Government Settlement.

  The formulae used to distribute grant to local authorities in England make use of various sets of data from the Census, apart from the population estimates that are updated each year. Officials of the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister have been discussing with local authority representatives the use of 2001 Census data other than population in the 2004–05 Settlement. Unfortunately, the late availability of some of the 2001 Census data has limited the options for using it in this years settlement. Therefore the 1991 Census data will be used for the 2004–05 Settlement.

  The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister is announcing this now in order to remove any uncertainty felt by local authorities regarding the data that will be used for the settlement.

  Officials of the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister will continue to discuss with local authority representatives the use of the 2001 Census data in future Local Government Finance settlements.

  Mr. Gardiner
  To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what assessment he has made of the budgetary impact on social services in the London boroughs named in the Laming Inquiry if the 1991 census figures are used to calculate the 2004–05 formula funding share. [129853]

  Mr. Raynsford
  None. The 1991 census data were used to calculate the 2003–04 formula spending shares. Continuing to use these to calculate the 2004–05 formula spending shares should therefore have little impact on any authority's grant allocation relative to 2003–04. The level at which a local authority sets its budget is a matter for that authority, depending on its local priorities.

  Homeless People
  Mr. Hepburn
  To ask the Deputy Prime Minister how much has been spent on providing temporary accommodation for families claiming to be homeless in(a) the Jarrow constituency, (b) South Tyneside, (c) the north east and (d) England, in each year since 1997. [128710]

  Yvette Cooper
  Information annually reported to the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister by local authorities identifies expenditure incurred in respect of bed and breakfast, private sector leasing and all other forms of temporary accommodation used by homeless households. This includes associated costs, such as the provision of furniture, property maintenance/ refurbishment, rent guarantees, nomination fees and administrative costs, chargeable to the General Fund Services Revenue Account. along with any specific capital charges. Information is not available below local authority level, and that reported by South Tyneside MBC, and all councils comprising the north east region and nationally is shown in the following table.

  Local authority revenue expenditure on homelessness

  £000

  Total

  Net

  Capital charges

  South Tyneside

  1997–98

  33

  33

  n/a

  1998–99

  35

  35

  n/a

  1999–2000

  25

  25

  n/a

  2000–01

  29

  29

  0

  2001–02

  39

  39

  0

  GONE

  1997–98

  2,235

  1,497

  n/a

  1998–99

  2,577

  1,631

  n/a

  1999–2000

  2,737

  1,768

  n/a

  2000–01

  2,645

  1,885

  39

  2001–02

  4,277

  3,634

  1,100

  England

  1997–98

  214,802

  122,669

  n/a

  1998–99

  278,474

  150,299

  n/a

  1999–2000

  334,853

  171,492

  n/a

  2000–01

  372,424

  201,321

  2,769

  2001–02

  429,376

  189,426

  4,366

  Note:

  Data on capital charges were not collected prior to 2000/01

  Source:

  ODPM RO6 financial returns

  Mr. Hepburn
  To ask the Deputy Prime Minister (1) what measures are in place to help to reduce the number of homeless people; [128712]

  (2) what further support he plans to offer to help the homeless. [128709]

  Yvette Cooper
  The March 2002 report, "More than a roof", set out the Government's approach to tackling and preventing homelessness. Specific measures included investment of £125 million in 2002–03 to support local authorities and the voluntary agencies working with them to support new approaches for tackling and preventing homelessness. The Homelessness Directorate within the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister has a revenue budget of £70 million and £23.5 million capital allocation for 2003–04. These resources will help to support the Government's commitment that by March
  739W
  2004 no homeless family with children should be placed in a bed and breakfast hotel other than in an emergency, and even then for no more than six weeks.

  Funding will also support new approaches that help people tackle the problems that are making and keeping them homeless and help to sustain the Prime Minister's target to reduce rough sleeping by two thirds of 1998 levels. The number of people sleeping rough on any one night in England has reduced from a baseline figure of 1,850 in June 1998 to the lowest recorded level of 504 in June 2003.

  Other measures include:
  the Homelessness Act 2002, which required local authorities to undertake a review of homelessness in their area and put a strategy in place by end of July 2003 to ensure that support and accommodation is available within their districts for homeless people, and those at risk of homelessness;
  a widening of the groups of people with priority need for accommodation under the homelessness legislation, ensuring that more vulnerable people get the help they need;
  The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister has invested £6 million in 2002–03 and are investing £11 million in 2003–04 on a special initiative to make 500 homes available for homeless families with children living in bed and breakfast (B&B) hotels in London;
  new advice to housing authorities on arrangements to ensure that all babies and children placed in temporary accommodation receive their health and developmental tests;
  The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister launched a three month consultation in May 2003 on legislation and statutory guidance to limit the use of B&B accommodation for families with children, raise standards in all forms of temporary accommodation—particularly B&Bs—and ensure that households in B&B hotels have access to support from health, education and social services. We are currently considering responses to take forward proposals by end of 2003 to help reinforce achievement of B&B target;
  The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister is working to improve access to services and information on services for households in England experiencing domestic violence or the threat of it. The Homelessness Directorate will invest £23 million of capital funding over the next three years to provide additional safe refuge bedspaces for those fleeing violence and their families where this is supported by local authorities as part of their homelessness duties.

  Housing
  Bob Russell
  To ask the Deputy Prime Minister how many of the proposed new dwellings in the Thames Gateway area he estimates will be council houses. [129309]

  Keith Hill
  Provision of affordable housing to meet the needs of Gateway communities and secure sustainable and balanced growth, is an important element of the Gateway strategy. Decisions on central Government funding to support this, which will be allocated through the Housing Corporation's Approved Development Programme (ADP), will be made by Ministers of the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister in the light of recommendations from the East of England, London and South-East Regional Housing Boards. ADP funding is not available for local authorities but they can provide housing through their own capital programme where this a priority and represents good value for money.

  Mr. Jim Cunningham
  To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what conclusions have been drawn from the effectiveness of differing schemes to aid key workers onto the housing ladder. [130041]
  740W
  Keith Hill
  Around 4,100 key workers have so far been helped under the Starter Home Initiative to buy homes they would otherwise have been unable to afford. The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister receives regular monitoring data from the Housing Corporation on activity under the Starter Home Initiative and, in addition, will be commissioning an evaluation of the effectiveness of the programme. This study is expected to start towards the end of the year and will report during 2004.

  The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister is currently discussing with key worker sponsor departments how key worker housing assistance can best be targeted in future to meet recruitment and retention needs. These discussions include the type of properties and tenure required and take into account views expressed by employers, key workers and others about the operation of the Starter Home Initiative, and also key worker housing preferences. Regional Housing Boards are also advising on the allocation of funding for key worker schemes in their areas. Bids for key worker housing schemes will be invited in the Autumn.

  Mr. Drew
  To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what research his Department has(a) undertaken and (b) sponsored into the effectiveness of those local authorities that have transferred their housing stock through large-scale voluntary transfer. [130521]

  Keith Hill
  The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister has funded two studies which explore issues connected with the local authority role after the stock has transferred. They are (i) "Large Scale Voluntary Transfers: Staff impacts and implications" published in August 2003 which explores the impact of the transfer programme on employees in both the local authority and the registered social landlord sectors and considers the role of staff who remain in the local authority post transfer. (ii) "Housing Functions and stock transfer" will be published in late 2003 which will set out the key issues that housing authorities need to consider when deciding whether to retain or contract out the delivery of their statutory housing functions.

  The Audit Commission Housing Inspectorate is responsible for inspecting and reporting on local authority housing services, including those retained when stock is transferred. The Office contributed to the Audit Commission report "Housing After Transfer— The Local Authority Role" which was published in December 2002 and which drew upon previous housing inspection reports.

  Mr. Austin Mitchell
  To ask the Deputy Prime Minister (1) if he will ensure the arguments for and against a large scale voluntary transfer of council housing are made available to tenants in advance of their ballot; [130526]

  (2) if he will take steps to ensure that councils opting for large-scale voluntary transfers provide equal (a) financial assistance to the parties involved and (b) opportunity for them to distribute campaign material to all tenants. [130628]

  Keith Hill
  The "Delivering Decent Homes Option Appraisal—Guidance for Local Authorities" published by the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister in June this year sets out how tenants should be central to the
  741W
  appraisal of options for delivering decent social housing within their authority. Where the choice emerging from the option appraisal is to pursue housing transfer, we then expect authorities to further explain the transfer proposals to tenants and to provide them with the facts surrounding housing transfer in accordance with the Code of Recommended Practice on Local Authority Publicity. The code allows authorities to refute any misleading arguments put to tenants by those opposed to transfer.

  To enable tenants to make an informed choice the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister expects accurate information on the housing association sector to be provided to them by authorities and Independent Tenants' Advisors. The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister would also expect the individual housing associations working with tenants with a view to becoming their new landlord to provide tenants with accurate information on their policies and operations.

  Mr. Austin Mitchell
  To ask the Deputy Prime Minister if he will ask the Housing Corporation to report on the performance of housing associations taking over council housing stock in respect of(a) promised improvements, (b) rent and service charge increases, particularly after the five year moratorium and (c) evictions. [130527]

  Keith Hill
  The information is as follows:

  (a)Promised improvements: The National Audit Office (NAO) carried out a study in 2002, "Improving Social Housing Through Transfer". This showed that transfer associations had met their promises to improve houses, or were on schedule to do so. The Housing Corporation has a role in monitoring the performance of all registered associations to ensure that they meet the Government's Decent Homes Standard by 2010.

  (b)Rent and service charge increases: The Housing Corporation collects details of average rents and service charges for all registered social landlords. These are published annually in a sector study. For the last three years for which data are available, the increase for all whole stock transfers are:

  Percentage

  2000

  4.4

  2001

  2.9

  2002

  4.8

  It is possible to analyse the increase for each association post transfer guarantees, and I will write with further details to my hon. Friend the Member for Great Grimsby.

  (c)Evictions: The number of evictions for all large scale voluntary transfer landlords recorded by the Corporation's Continuous Recording of Lettings (CORE) survey over the last three years is:

  Number

  2000–01

  1,640

  2001–02

  2,095

  2002–03

  2,664

  742W
  Unpublished research commissioned by the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister shows that evictions as a percentage of stock for all housing associations and local authorities is:

  Percentage

  Housing association

  Local authority

  2001–02

  0.63

  0.63

  2002–03

  0.64

  0.65

  The number of evictions as a percentage of stock transferred is less than half of 1 per cent.

  Mr. Austin Mitchell
  To ask the Deputy Prime Minister pursuant to his answer of 18 June 2003,Official Report, column 341, to the hon. Member for Sheffield, Attercliffe (Mr. Betts), on council housing, what proposals he has to provide adequate funding for those council tenants who wish to stay with local authorities after tenants' ballots on council housing transfers. [130624]

  Keith Hill
  Some local authorities will be able to meet the decent homes target using mainstream housing funds and their own resources, e.g. capital receipts, particularly since mainstream housing funds have been increased since the Government came to Office.

  However, alternative options have been provided. The Sustainable Communities Plan made it clear that local authorities seeking additional investment in their housing stock are able to choose from three options; set up a high performing Arm's Length Housing Management Organisation (ALMO); pursue a Private Finance Initiative (PFI) scheme; and stock transfer. Only stock transfer results in a change of ownership of the stock.

  The Sustainable Communities Plan also made it clear that authorities that do not pursue any of the three alternative options cannot expect increased investment above that provided for in the Housing Investment Programme.

  The option appraisal process is designed to ensure that tenants are at the heart of the decisions about the future management of their homes. This process should make a negative vote on the chosen option less likely. However, in the event of a negative ballot the local authority and the tenants will need to revisit the options that will deliver decent homes by 2010.

  Mr. Austin Mitchell
  To ask the Deputy Prime Minister by when local authorities were required to submit their proposals on the future of their council housing stock; and what proposals he has for encouraging early applications. [130626]

  Keith Hill
  As announced in the Sustainable Communities Plan all authorities with housing stock have to produce objective and rigorous option appraisals for Government sign-off by July 2005.

  To ensure that we reach the 2010 target Government Offices for the Regions and the Community Housing Task Force are working with individual local authorities on creating an action plan that will ensure that all local authorities have an option appraisal signed off as soon as possible.
  743W
  Local authorities wishing to take advantage of future Arm's Length Housing Management Organisation (ALMO), stock transfer or Private Finance Initiative (PFI) schemes will not be granted a place on a programme unless their option appraisal has been signed off by the relevant Government Office.

  Mr. Austin Mitchell
  To ask the Deputy Prime Minister how many local authorities have submitted proposals on bringing their council housing stock up to the decent homes standard; how many have chosen between the Government's three options of large-scale voluntary transfer, private finance initiative and arms length management organisation; and how many have not yet notified their intentions. [130627]

  Keith Hill
  The Sustainable Communities Plan made it clear that all stock owning local authorities must undertake a formal options appraisal process for Government sign-off by July 2005. Guidance on the process was issued by the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister in June 2003. No options appraisals have yet been signed off.

  However since April 2001, when there were 246 local authorities that owned housing stock, the following schemes have been put in place:
  22 local authorities have transferred all of their stock to a registered social landlord.
  Seven have undertaken partial transfers,
  18 local authorities are on the 2002 and 2003 programmes for whole stock transfer pending a ballot
  Seven more are proposing partial transfers pending a ballot
  34 local authorities have secured places on the Arm's Length Management Organisation (ALMO) programme, 12 of which have already set up their ALMO and secured additional funding after gaining a 2* or 3* rating from the Housing Inspectorate.
  Nine local authorities have been given permission to let Private Finance Initiative (PFI) contracts for the management of some of their housing stock. Two of these contracts have now been signed.

  In total 74 local authorities are on programmes which account for the whole of their stock. That leaves 172 local authorities that have yet to formally agree an approach.

  Operation Gangmaster
  Mr. Luff
  To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what role his Department has played in Operation Gangmaster in relation to(a) planning, (b) housing, (c) housing benefit, (d) council tax benefit and (e) community cohesion responsibilities of local authorities. [130202]

  Keith Hill
  The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister is not one of the Government Departments directly involved in Operation Gangmaster

  South Sefton Partnership
  Mr. Curtis-Thomas
  To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what steps the South Sefton Partnership have taken to improve access to(a) job and training opportunities and (b) affordable childcare. [128878]

  Yvette Cooper
  This is one of South Sefton Partnership's four key objectives. The Partnership has recently prepared a small booklet "South Sefton Partnership—The Story So Far" which aims to illustrate steps taken to date on these four key objectives.
  744W
  The steps taken in respect of this objective are as follows:
  Establishing an Intermediate Labour Market scheme to act as a 'bridge' back to work for long-term unemployed residents.
  Developing the Sefton@Work project which will help unemployed South Sefton residents gain access to jobs and training through advice, guidance and placement services and encouraging local firms to recruit local people.
  Improving educational opportunities for South Sefton residents through an adult community learning programme in local schools.
  Helping 12 local people to find work as teacher's assistants within South Sefton Education Action Zone schools.
  Supporting the Bootle-based Independence Initiative which helps ex-substance abusers to access training and work.
  Funding the Seaforth Older Children's Service (SOCS) which provides childcare in school holidays allowing local people to retain jobs that might otherwise be at risk.
  Providing laptop computers for looked-after children in the area to help to improve their hitherto below-average levels of success in GCSE exams.
  Supporting Sefton council's IMPACT project which provides vocational experiences for pupils who find traditional school subjects are not for them.

  Mrs. Curtis-Thomas
  To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what steps have been taken by the South Sefton Partnership to create safe, healthy, and managed neighbourhoods. [128879]

  Yvette Cooper
  This is one of South Sefton Partnership's four key objectives. The Partnership has recently prepared a small booklet "South Sefton Partnership—The Story So Far" which aims to illustrate steps taken to date on these four key objectives.

  The steps taken in respect of this objective are as follows:
  Establishing the Green It Clean It Mean It environment fund which provided each Neighbourhood Action Group with 10,000 to undertake local 'green' improvements.
  Supporting the new-build premises of the successful Feelgood Factory health initiative which will provide advice on healthy living, training courses, alternative therapies and a crèche.
  Employing an Active Communities Co-ordinator to give South Sefton residents improved access to sports opportunities.
  Funding a new mobile police station for the area to improve relationships with local communities, provide a more visible police presence. A new community safety officer post has been created.
  Funding an Environmental Hit Squad in the Linacre/Derby area to improve the physical appearance and cleanliness of the neighbourhood and look at ways to reduce the rat population.
  Working with Sefton Council Housing Market Renewal on a £500,000 alleygating initiative to improve the local environment and reduce crime in terraced street across South Sefton.
  Creating the post of a Co-ordinator to work with the Neighbourhood Action Groups on developing and implementing community safety projects.
  Funding important feasibility studies into the restoration of Bootle Derby Park and upgrading the local stretch of the Leeds-Liverpool Canal.

  Written Ministerial Statements
  Mr. Bercow
  To ask the Deputy Prime Minister how many Written Ministerial Statements have been made by the Department since 29 October 2002. [126613]

  Yvette Cooper
  The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister has made 130 Written Ministerial Statements since 29 October 2002.

  PRIME MINISTER

    Correspondence
    Mr. Kaufman
    To ask the Prime Minister when he intends to reply to the letter dated 12 August 2003 from the right hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton with regard to a new post office for Rusholme. [130456]

    The Prime Minister
    I replied to my right hon. Friend on 12 September 2003.

    Director of Public Prosecutions
    Norman Baker
    To ask the Prime Minister (1) what contact took place between 10 Downing street and(a) the members of the panel which selected Mr. Ken Macdonald QC as Director of Public Prosecutions and (b) Mr. Ken Macdonald QC during the process of the decision-making on the appointment; [129241]

    (2) if he will list the (a) dates and (b) attendees of meetings which took place between 10 Downing street (i) officials and (ii) civil servants with members of the selection panel which appointed Mr. Ken Macdonald QC as Director of Public Prosecutions. [129240]

    The Prime Minister
    I refer the hon. Member to the answer my right hon. and learned Friend the Solicitor-General gave to him today.

    Iraq
    Adam Price
    To ask the Prime Minister what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of his pre-war assessment of the challenges of post-Saddam Iraq. [130715]

    The Prime Minister
    The scale of the reconstruction task in Iraq caused by decades of neglect and misrule was greater than expected. But good progress in Iraq is being made despite security setbacks, and Saddam's appalling legacy. The Iraqi Governing Council has appointed Ministers, work is under way on preparing a new constitution, institutions are being rebuilt, the international financial community is engaging, children are receiving better health care and education, and work is in hand to improve the infrastructure deficiencies. We are also giving urgent priority to building up the Police Force, Civil Defence Corps and New Iraqi Army, so that Iraqis assume greater responsibility for their own security.

    Ministerial Visits
    Mr. Amess
    To ask the Prime Minister when he next plans to visit Southend, West. [130959]

    The Prime Minister
    I have no plans to visit in the near future.

    Security Clearance
    Dr. Julian Lewis
    To ask the Prime Minister pursuant to his answer of 8 September 2003,Official Report, column 18W, on Security Clearance, what further clearance is required for Downing street staff in order to see (a) secret and (b) top secret Joint Intelligence Committee material, once they have been positively vetted. [130397]
    746W
    The Prime Minister
    The levels of security clearance that staff need in order to be granted access to classified material are those which apply across Government. They are set out in HM Government's statement of vetting policy, as announced to the House on 15 December 1994,Official Report, columns 764–66.

  DEFENCE

    Aircraft Carriers
    Harry Cohen
    To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what increase in cost for the proposed two new aircraft carriers has been communicated to him; what reasons were given; what his response has been; and if he will make a statement. [127152]

    Mr. Ingram
    I refer my hon. Friend to the answer I gave on 1 September,Official Report, column 894W, to the hon. Member for New Forest, East (Dr. Lewis).

    Apache Helicopter
    Mrs. Curtis-Thomas
    To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what plans he has to upgrade and replace the night-vision system on the Apache helicopter. [129490]

    Mr. Ingram
    An upgrade of Apache's night vision system has been identified as one of a range of possible enhancements to the helicopter during its service life. However, no decision has yet been made on this specific element.

    Asbestos
    Dr. Cable
    To ask the Secretary of State for Defence pursuant to his answer of 26 June 2003,Official Report, column 944W, on asbestos, if he will list the buildings identified as containing asbestos. [130943]

    Mr. Caplin
    There is no central register of buildings in which asbestos is known to be present. Such a register or list could be compiled only at disproportionate cost.

    Battle Group Thermal Imaging System
    Mr. Wray
    To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what progress is being made in the procurement of the Battle Group Thermal Imaging System; on which platforms it will be deployed; when it is likely to come into service; and what capability it will bring. [129191]

    Mr. Ingram
    A contract to supply and support the Battle Group Thermal Imaging System was placed with Thales Optronics Ltd. in 2001. The system is on track to meet its approved in-service date in 2004. It will be deployed on Warrior armoured fighting vehicles and Scimitar combat reconnaissance vehicles and will further improve the effectiveness of armoured combat formations at night and in bad weather.

    Defence Exhibition
    Angus Robertson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many(a) civilian security personnel and (b) armed services personnel his Department assigned to the Defence Systems Equipment International Exhibition in London; and if he will make a statement. [129692]
    747W
    Mr. Ingram
    The security arrangements for Defence Systems Equipment International, including the assignment of civilian security personnel, were the responsibility of the exhibition organisers (Spearhead Exhibitions Ltd.). 31 Ministry of Defence Police (MDP) officers were deployed to the exhibition site, with an additional small marine unit of 12 MDP officers being present at the request of the Metropolitan police.

    Ministry of Defence civilian and armed forces personnel attended the event in an official capacity, but details are not held centrally.

    Dr. Cable
    To ask the Secretary of State for Defence for which foreign delegations attending the Defence Systems and Equipment International exhibition in September the Government paid for(a) travel, (b) accommodation and (c) hospitality; and if he will make a statement. [129775]

    Angus Robertson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will list the country delegations(a) invited to and (b) attending the Defence Systems Equipment International Exhibition in London; what role his Department had in formulating the list of invited countries; and if he will make a statement. [129693]

    Mr. Ingram
    Most of the funding for the attendance of official overseas defence delegations at the Defence Systems and Equipment International exhibition was provided by the exhibition organisers and defence companies.

    However, in addition, the official overseas delegations that attended the exhibition as guests of Her Majesty's Government accepted some contribution from the Ministry of Defence towards their visit for travel, accommodation and/or hospitality.

    The MOD Defence Export Services Organisation prepares a list of countries to receive official invitations to the exhibition, taking into consideration current marketing campaigns and longer-term prospects for business with the countries concerned. The list is then passed to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office for consideration. Throughout the process. political issues, arms embargoes and current international relations imperatives are also considered, as is the cost involved in hosting the delegations.

    Of the 62 countries invited to attend the exhibition as guests of HMG, 56 accepted. The list of countries invited to attend is as listed, with the countries that declined highlighted in italic.

    Algeria

    Australia

    Austria

    Bahrain

    Belgium

    Botswana

    Brazil

    Brunei

    Bulgaria

    Canada

    Chile

    Colombia

    PRC (China)

    Czech Republic

    Denmark

    748W

    Egypt

    Finland

    France

    Germany

    Ghana

    Greece

    Hungary

    India

    Republic of Ireland

    Italy

    Japan

    Jordan

    Kazakhstan

    Kenya

    Republic of Korea

    Kuwait

    Malaysia

    Mexico

    Netherlands

    New Zealand

    Nigeria

    Norway

    Oman

    Pakistan

    Peru

    Philippines

    Poland

    Portugal

    Qatar

    Romania

    Russia

    Saudi Arabia

    Singapore

    Slovakia

    Slovenia

    South Africa

    Spain

    Sweden

    Switzerland1

    Syria

    Thailand

    Trinidad & Tobago

    Turkey

    UAE

    USA

    Vietnam

    Venezuela

    1The official overseas delegation from Switzerland was unable to attend.

    The exhibition organisers, Spearhead Exhibitions Ltd. have also invited country delegations. Their invitees are military/Government personnel who are below ministerial or chief of staff level, as well as industrial visitors, and invitations are extended to reflect the requirements made by exhibitors as well as London based embassies, in consultation with United Kingdom defence attaches based overseas.
    749W
    At the outset of the invitation process Spearhead may take advice from MOD about the attendance of particular countries or exhibitors. However, provided they act responsibly and within the law, Spearhead is not obliged to take that advice. Requests for release of information on the delegations invited by the organisers should be directed to the company.

    Llew Smith
    To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what the cost to his Department was of the Defence Systems and Equipment International Exhibition at the Excel Centre on 9 to 12 September; how many departmental staff were present; and if he will make a statement on the purpose of hosting arms sales fairs. [130293]

    Mr. Ingram
    I refer my hon. Friend to the answer I gave to my hon. Friend the Member for Islington, North (Jeremy Corbyn) on 20 May 2003,Official Report, columns 677–78W. The final cost remains to be established, but we do not expect it to exceed the estimated figure.

    Ministry of Defence staff attended the Defence Systems and Equipment International (DSEi) exhibition as part of their normal duties and to gain greater understanding of defence industrial capabilities around the world. This was at the discretion of line managers and no central record of attendance is held.

    The purpose of defence exhibitions is to bring together purchasers and suppliers of defence equipment and services. DSEi enables the United Kingdom defence industry to demonstrate its capabilities to potential overseas customers and provides an opportunity for those responsible for the defence of their countries to see the range of equipment and services available to meet their legitimate requirements. Formal invitations to DSEi do not imply that Her Majesty's Government would be prepared to issue export licences for the supply of all or any of the equipment displayed, and all export licence applications would be considered on a case-by-case basis in line with the Consolidated EU and National Arms Export Licensing Criteria.

    Export Controls
    Mr. Gardiner
    To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what discussions his Department has had with the US State Department on(a) the use of extraterritorial export control legislation and (b) the need to have strict end-user controls on arms shipments, to reduce threats to military personnel. [130182]

    Mr. Ingram
    [holding answer 16 September 2003]: A range of issues have been discussed with the United States Government in the context of the negotiations, concluded earlier this year, on a text for an unclassified waiver from the US International Traffic in Arms Regulations. These have included consideration of extraterritorial control in relation to the export of strategically controlled goods, but not specifically of end-user controls. The national security of the United Kingdom and its allies is considered at the time an application for a licence to export is made, under the Consolidated EU and National Arms Export Licensing Criteria.

    Iraq
    Matthew Taylor
    To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will estimate(a) the length of time in training that British army units require before deployment in Iraq and (b) the ratio of deployed personnel to total personnel absorbed by operations in Iraq. [130278]

    Mr. Ingram
    The duration of pre-deployment training for military forces deploying on operations depends on two factors: firstly, the existing level of training, which is closely aligned to readiness, and, secondly, the operational task the force is required to undertake. The amount of pre-deployment training required is therefore dictated by the extent to which the troops need to raise their military capability, and it is not meaningful to specify set periods of time.

    As at 11 September there were approximately 10,000 British servicemen and women in the Gulf region. Following the deployment of the balance of the forces announced by the Secretary of State on 8 September this figure will shortly rise to approximately 10,500. Beyond this it is not possible to quantify accurately the total number of people within the Department whose work touches on current operations in Iraq. This information is not held centrally and could be provided only at disproportionate cost.

    Adam Price
    To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what steps are being taken by the Government to ensure that an effective trial-or-release system for Iraqi prisoners is operating in Iraq. [130347]

    Mr. Hoon
    The Coalition is working with the Iraqi people to establish a fair and just legal system, and estimates that some 100 courts are now in operation across the country.

    Mr. Llwyd
    To ask the Secretary of State for Defence when the results of the inquiry into the al Majarr al Kabir incident will be published; and if he will make a statement. [123420]

    Mr. Ingram
    [holding answer 4 July 2003]: The Ministry of Defence is determined to do all we can to establish the facts, and to bring to account those responsible for the deaths of the six RMP soldiers killed so tragically in Iraq in June. It is not possible to say how long this investigation will take.

    Mr. Amess
    To ask the Secretary of State for Defence pursuant to his answer of 8 September 2003,Official Report, column 46W, on civil servants working in Iraq, if he will report on a weekly basis how many civil servants are searching for weapons of mass destruction. [130770]

    Mr. Ingram
    The number of civilian staff working for the Iraq Survey Group on a weekly basis is as follows:

    Week ending

    Number of staff

    2003

    13 June

    2

    20 June

    6

    27 June

    7

    4 July

    7

    11 July

    7

    18 July

    15

    25 July

    15

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    Week ending

    Number of staff

    1 August

    15

    8 August

    15

    15 August

    18

    22 August

    19

    29 August

    19

    5 September

    19

    12 September

    19

    Naval Procurement
    Mr. Wray
    To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what progress has been made in establishing the Maritime Afloat Reach and Sustainability Project; what will new design ships will be procured; what capabilities this will bring; and if he will make a statement on how they will improve flexibility and responsiveness. [128120]

    Mr. Ingram
    The Military Afloat Reach and Sustain (MARS) project is now reaching the end of its Concept Phase, in which the Support Requirement is defined and a plan for procuring it in the most cost-effective and efficient way is established. It is anticipated that the project will progress to its Assessment phase before the end of this year. During the Assessment phase the

    January

    February

    March

    April

    May

    June

    July

    August

    September1

    Total

    RN/RM

    Scotland:

    Aberdeen

    5

    4

    8

    0

    9

    5

    8

    2

    0

    41

    Dundee

    10

    10

    21

    10

    14

    19

    7

    4

    0

    95

    Edinburgh

    11

    12

    25

    6

    11

    15

    8

    9

    0

    97

    Glasgow

    11

    10

    19

    4

    11

    19

    12

    4

    0

    90

    Inverness

    4

    5

    7

    0

    2

    2

    4

    0

    0

    24

    England

    459

    423

    469

    150

    355

    428

    282

    164

    0

    2,730

    Wales

    29

    26

    21

    6

    21

    26

    16

    10

    0

    155

    Northern Ireland

    9

    9

    8

    6

    9

    5

    3

    10

    0

    59

    Army

    Scotland:

    Aberdeen

    20

    14

    3

    4

    4

    1

    6

    11

    11

    74

    Dundee

    69

    20

    15

    19

    13

    7

    20

    40

    37

    240

    Edinburgh

    51

    19

    13

    14

    16

    8

    14

    28

    26

    189

    Glasgow

    153

    86

    49

    49

    44

    21

    58

    68

    95

    623

    Inverness

    20

    12

    5

    10

    8

    2

    8

    10

    17

    92

    England

    2,178

    925

    817

    714

    767

    687

    779

    1,045

    1,382

    9,294

    Wales

    178

    80

    61

    70

    66

    50

    38

    66

    105

    714

    Northern Ireland

    53

    19

    24

    13

    12

    12

    8

    28

    11

    180

    RAF

    Scotland:

    Aberdeen

    0

    2

    5

    4

    3

    1

    4

    5

    4

    28

    Dundee

    6

    8

    10

    13

    6

    7

    3

    8

    3

    64

    Edinburgh

    7

    7

    9

    4

    9

    1

    9

    5

    3

    54

    Glasgow

    10

    18

    9

    14

    9

    9

    12

    10

    4

    95

    Inverness

    2

    5

    7

    9

    5

    2

    5

    2

    3

    40

    England

    140

    332

    305

    273

    250

    172

    279

    201

    83

    2,035

    Wales

    13

    28

    29

    44

    36

    12

    42

    20

    17

    241

    Northern Ireland

    1

    5

    9

    4

    2

    2

    6

    3

    1

    33

    1Figures give the position as at 12 September 2003. No figures available for RN/RM.

    War Pensions Agency
    Mr. Drew
    To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will make a statement on the proposal to redefine the eligibility criteria for disablement through the War Pensions Agency. [130518]

    Mr. Caplin
    There are no plans to change the eligibility criteria used for decisions under the War Pensions Scheme. I refer my hon. Friend to the details 752W
    project team will invite industry to provide solutions to this requirement, including ship designs, and will establish how new technologies, vessel designs and logistics concepts can deliver the increases in flexibility and responsiveness our future forces will require.

    The afloat support capability provided by the MARS programme is essential if the United Kingdom is to maintain the ability to deploy joint forces worldwide to engage in operations where Host Nation Support cannot be guaranteed. As an enabling capability, its effectiveness will be measured by its ability to support our future forces and concepts of operation.

    Recruitment
    Angus Robertson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many people were recruited to the armed forces since January for(a) each of the recruitment posts in Scotland, (b) England, (c) Wales and (d) Northern Ireland: and if he will make a statement. [129220]

    Mr. Caplin
    Statistics for officer recruitment are not broken down by region. The numbers of other rank enlistments for all three Services in each month since January 2003 are detailed in the following table.

    of my statement to the House of 15 September 2003, Official Report, columns 39–40WS. I can confirm that there will be no effect on existing war pensioners. Decisions on whether a condition was caused or significantly aggravated by service will be evidence-based, using a 'balance of probabilities' standard of proof. This is in line with the approach of the civil courts and other modern compensation arrangements. All decisions will be appealable to a fully independent tribunal.

  CONSTITUTIONAL AFFAIRS

    Civil Compensation Cases
    Mr. Curtis-Thomas
    To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Department for Constitutional Affairs how many civil compensation actions have been brought against the employer of the abusing child carer in the UK in each of the past five years. [128397]

    Mr. Leslie
    The information requested is not collected centrally and can be provided only at disproportionate cost.

    Community Legal Service
    Mr. Lidington
    To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Department for Constitutional Affairs what proportion of the population living in(a) rural and (b) urban areas has access to services provided by Community Legal Service Partnerships. [129360]

    Mr. Lammy
    To date, Community Legal Service Partnerships cover over 99 per cent. of the population of England and Wales and so include nearly all rural and urban areas. Although the provision of services within the Community Legal Service (CLS) falls to individually contracted providers, each CLS partnership has responsibility for advising on the co-ordination and planning of local service delivery. Data produced by the CLS partnerships, particularly in relation to priority legal needs, helps to inform the allocation of CLS resources through the contracting system. Along with policy developments, such as the Partnership Initiative Budget (PIB) and the Method of Delivery Pilots, the Legal Services Commission ensures that there is both adequate and improving service provision across all regions in England and Wales.

    Court Attire
    Lady Hermon
    To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Department for Constitutional Affairs how many responses were received to the Court Working Dress Consultation Paper; and if he will make a statement on the responses received. [129828]

    Mr. Leslie
    The consultation period for comments closed on 14 August and 3,406 responses were received.

    The responses are currently being analysed and the Government will make a statement in due course.

    Mental Incapacity Bill
    Miss McIntosh
    To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Department for Constitutional Affairs what representations he has received regarding the length of the consultation for the draft Mental Incapacity Bill. [129630]
    754W
    Mr. Lammy
    My Department has received four letters to Ministers about the length of the consultation period set up by the Pre-legislative Committee which is examining the draft Mental Incapacity Bill.

    Sheriffs
    Mr. Dismore
    To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Department for Constitutional Affairs how many claims for negligence, errors or omissions have been made against under sheriffs in each of the last three years; what was(a) the highest claim, (b) the average claim and (c) the total value of claims; what was the total paid in settlement of claims for each of the last three years; what plans he has to indemnify sheriffs against liability for claims against under sheriffs; and if he will make a statement. [129317]

    Mr. Lammy
    The information requested is not available. The courts do not maintain statistics on the identity or role of defendants; nor does the Department employ or have direct responsibility for under sheriffs.

    We do, however, consider the responsibility for enforcement of High Court writs as an onerous one for sheriffs to undertake, as their position is a voluntary one, and that responsibility extends for up to six years following their term of office. Therefore we are relieving them of this responsibility through measures contained in the Courts Bill. Present insurance arrangements made by under sheriffs cover the possibility of litigation for the duration of a high sheriffs responsibility. The matter of continuing cover once new measures are brought in is under careful consideration by the representatives of those who undertake this work and wish to continue to do so as well as those who represent under sheriffs and high sheriffs. We have no plans to indemnify sheriffs from public funds.

    Mr. Dismore
    To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Department for Constitutional Affairs what the duties of the office of sheriff consist of(a) formally and (b) informally; and if he will make a statement. [129319]

    Mr. Leslie
    High sheriffs are technically responsible for the enforcement of High Court writs, but this is, in practice, carried out on their behalf by under sheriffs, and this duty will be removed from high sheriffs by legislation currently before Parliament. The traditional role of the high sheriff is to escort to court and offer hospitality to High Court judges who visit their area. Informal duties are entirely a matter for individual sheriffs, who also have an informal representational role for their county. The office is unpaid, and the expenses are borne personally by the incumbent. High sheriffs receive no public funds, other than a small allowance for days when they attend judges in court.

  WORK AND PENSIONS

    Disability Living Allowance
    Mr. Wray
    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how many people have appealed disability living allowance decisions in each year since 1997; what proportion were successful in an appeal; and what reasons people give for appealing initial decisions. [128103]

    Maria Eagle
    This is a matter for Christina Townsend, Chief Executive of the Appeals Service. She will write to the hon. Member.

    Disability Living Allowance appeals received by the Appeals Service, cleared at hearing or without a hearing, found in favour of the appellant at hearing and the percentage found in favour of the appellant each year since 1998.

    Number

    Caseload

    Received at the Appeals Service

    Non hearing clearances

    Cleared at hearing

    Found in favour

    Percentage found in favour

    1998

    1,980,200

    62,925

    2,255

    42,950

    20,330

    47.3

    1999

    2,042,300

    40,260

    7,165

    51,680

    25,170

    48.7

    2000

    2,110,200

    95,160

    18,270

    63,050

    31,065

    49.3

    2001

    2,210,600

    87,295

    22,610

    86,285

    45,165

    52.3

    2002

    2,322,800

    82,345

    20,880

    72,815

    39,490

    54.2

    January 2003 to July 2003

    2,468,900

    46,940

    11,715

    41,655

    22,470

    53.9

    Notes:

    All figures are subject to change as more up-to-date data becomes available. Figures for the latest months will rise significantly as information feeds through to the Appeals Service. Figures are rounded to the nearest 5 and percentages to 1 decimal place.

    Source:

    1AD Information Centre, 100% sample.

    Caseload notes:

    1. Cases where payment of benefit has been suspended are excluded

    2. Taken from a 5 per cent. sample therefore figures may be subject to sampling variation.

    3. Caseload as at February each year rounded to the nearest 100.

    Source:

    1AD Information Centre, 5 per cent. sample

    Mr. Wray
    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what proposals he has to speed up the appeals process for disability living allowance. [128104]

    Maria Eagle
    This is a matter for Christina Townsend Chief Executive of the Appeals Service. She will write to the hon. Member.

    Letter from Christina Townsend to Mr. James Wray, dated 17 September 2003:
    The Secretary of State has asked me to respond to your question regarding the proposals that are in place to speed up the appeals process for Disability Living Allowance.
    The Appeals Service Agency is committed to a twin strategy of reducing waiting times and clearing the backlog of older cases that accrue. We have made a determined effort to tackle older cases based on the policy of "first in first out". Wherever possible cases are cleared at first hearing. The average time from a Disability Living Allowance appeal being received by the Appeals Service to being cleared has reduced from 31.1 weeks, in 1998, to 15.1 weeks for the period January 2003–July 2003.
    I hope this reply is helpful.

    Disability Handbook
    Mr. Carmichael
    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what plans the Government have 756W
    Letter from Christina Townsend to Mr. James Wray, dated 17 September 2003:
    The Secretary of State has asked me to reply to your question regarding the number of people who have appealed Disability Living Allowance decisions in each year since 1997, what proportion were successful in an appeal and what reasons people gave for appealing the initial decisions.
    We do not have information on the total number of appeals against Disability Living Allowance decisions nor the reasons why initial decisions were appealed. The attached table shows the number of appeals relating to Disability Living Allowance decisions which were received by the Appeals Service; the number cleared with or without a hearing; the number found in favour of the appellant and the percentage found in favour of the appellant for each year since 1998. We began collecting information for the first full year in 1998 and therefore no information is available for 1997.
    I hope this reply is helpful.

    to update the 1998 Disability Handbook to include a guide on the needs of adults with autistic spectrum disorders. [129900]

    Maria Eagle
    The Department intends to improve and update the medical guidance currently provided to decision-makers. This will be based on information technology that will enable the guidance to be more comprehensive and easier to access. The guidance on all conditions contained in the Disability Handbook, including autistic spectrum disorder in children and adults, will be revised as part of this initiative. A programme for this work is being developed.

    Disabled Employees
    Mr. Wray
    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what measures are in place to ensure that companies provide the necessary access improvements and assistance for disabled employees; and what financial support can be made available for companies to make the changes. [129105]

    Maria Eagle
    The Disability Discrimination Act (DDA) requires that employers consider making a 'reasonable adjustment' to premises, working practices, or other aspects of a job, if a disabled employee or job
    757W
    applicant would otherwise be at a disadvantage compared to someone else. Improved access, or the provision of various types of personal or technological assistance might constitute reasonable adjustments. The Disability Rights Commission (DRC) advises employees, employers and the general public on the law.

    Redress for failure to make reasonable adjustments is via Employment Tribunals.

    The Access to Work programme provides a grant towards the additional employment costs resulting from disability. Help available can include adaptations to premises, special aids and equipment, help with travel to work, and personal support in the workplace.

    Access to Work pays 100 per cent. of the approved costs where an individual is starting a new job, or has been in their job for less than six weeks. It also pays full costs for people in self-employment and where assistance with travel to work, support workers or communicators for job interviews is required.

    In all other cases Access to Work meets up to 80 per cent. of costs above a threshold of 300 and below a ceiling of £10,000 and 100 per cent. of costs above £10,000, over a three year period.

    Forestry
    Mr. Edwards
    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions if he will meet the Association of British Insurers to discuss the level of employers' compulsory liability insurance premiums in the forestry industry. [130426]

    Mr. Browne
    Ministers will meet the Association of British Insurers (ABI) and insurers to discuss the level of Employers' Liability Compulsory Insurance premiums and their impacts on businesses in general. The Department is undertaking a review of Employers' Liability Compulsory Insurance and has already had a number of meetings with the Association of British Insurers and other organisations. We will report progress and next steps arising out of this second stage of the review, in autumn.

    Jobcentre Advisers
    Mr. Heald
    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what the average number of days wait is before an unemployed person's initial appointment with a jobcentre adviser; what research his Department has conducted into the particular problems faced in waiting for appointments by agency workers who become unemployed for short periods of time on a regular basis; and if he will make a statement. [124020]

    Mr. Browne
    The administration of Jobcentre Plus is a matter for the Chief Executive, David Anderson. I have asked him to reply to the hon. Member.

    Letter from David Anderson to Mr. Oliver Heald, dated 16 July 2003:
    As Jobcentre Plus is an Executive Agency, the Secretary of State has asked me to reply to your question concerning the average number of days an unemployed person has to wait for their initial appointment with a Jobcentre Plus advisor and the particular problems faced by agency workers who become unemployed for
    758W
    short periods of time on a regular basis. This is something that falls within the responsibilities delegated to me as Chief Executive of the Agency.
    We want to give every one who needs our help the best possible service, including providing them with prompt appointments when they are needed. Our Customer Charter, which details the level of service customers can expect from Jobcentre Plus, states our aim to make sure interviews, including initial interviews at the beginning of a claim, are undertaken within four working days of the customer making initial contact. This aim applies to all our customers, including agency workers.
    We do not collect dam about the number of days unemployed people have to wait for an initial interview with a Jobcentre Plus adviser. However, we do have a target for the end to end processing of new claims which includes the time leading up to the initial interview. Our target is to make the first payment within 12 days of initial contact about a claim and I am pleased to say that the average clearance time for Jobseeker's Allowance is currently only 10.5 days.
    I hope this is helpful rid assures you of our intent to provide people with the best possible service.

    Targeting Fraud Website
    Mr. Willetts
    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how many hits the Targeting Fraud website has received; how many cases of suspected fraud have been reported to the website; how many of these suspected cases have been investigated; how many of them have led to a successful prosecution; and how many of them have led to a custodial sentence. [126563]

    Mr. Pond
    Information is not collated centrally on sentences imposed by the courts where successful prosecutions have resulted from the Targeting Fraud Website. The available information is in the table.

    Targeting fraud website

    Number of hits

    Number of 'report a cheat' forms submitted

    Number of cases accepted for investigation

    Number of successful prosecutions

    2000–011

    1,431,093

    3,808

    319

    0

    2001–02

    222,421

    8,453

    1,067

    4

    2002–03

    123,575

    8,309

    1,201

    20

    1The 'report a cheat' online form was introduced in May 2000.

  TRANSPORT

    Counter-terrorism
    Miss McIntosh
    To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what the purpose was of the counter-terrorism exercise held on 7 September. [R] [129631]

    Mr. McNulty
    The exercise held at Bank tube station on Sunday 7 September was designed to test the co-ordinated response of the emergency services to a chemical release on a train on the London Underground. The exercise involved rescue and decontamination both at the scene and at a hospital. It also tested the use of new equipment and procedures for the emergency services.

    Llew Smith
    To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what the cost was of holding the simulated terrorist attack at the Bank underground station and its surrounds on 7 September; what lessons were learned
    759W
    from the exercise; and whether the exercise dealt with the requirements of decontamination of the site of the simulated dirty radioactive bomb. [130292]

    Mr. McNulty
    As with other exercises designed to test the preparedness of the emergency services, the costs are being borne by the participating organisations, whose budgets naturally include general funding for training and exercising.

    Our early view is that the elements we planned to test in this exercise worked well. A full assessment is currently being carried out. There will of course be lessons to learn for all those involved.

    The exercise was based on a simulated release of a chemical agent on a train stuck in the London underground and was designed to test new equipment and procedures for rescuing and decontaminating people trapped on the train. The exercise was not designed to test site decontamination or the response to a dirty radioactive bomb.

    Cyprus Turkish Airlines
    Mr. David Marshall
    To ask the Secretary of State for Transport how many complaints(a) he and (b) the Civil Aviation Authority have received about cancellations and delays affecting flights operated by Cyprus Turkish Airlines; and if he will make a statement. [130357]

    Mr. McNulty
    No complaints have been made to the Department for Transport relating to the cancellation and delays affecting flights by Cyprus Turkish Airlines. The Air Transport Users Council, which was set up by the Civil Aviation Authority, has received four written complaints and two by telephone since April this year.

    Devolution (Transport Services)
    Mr. Andrew Turner
    To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, pursuant to his answer of 9 September 2003, ref 127778, which(a) Minister and (b) devolved Administration is responsible for (i) ferry services and (ii) air services between (A) England and Northern Ireland, (B) Wales and Northern Ireland, (C) Scotland and Northern Ireland and (D) Scotland and Wales. [130288]

    Mr. McNulty
    [holding answer 16 September 2003.]Ferry and air services between different parts of the UK are generally reserved matters, and the Secretary of State for Transport has policy responsibility. Explicit provision was made last year for the devolved Administrations in Scotland and Northern Ireland to take responsibility for financial support for a possible ferry service between Campbeltown and Ballycastle.

    East Midlands Airport
    Keith Vaz
    To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what progress has been made with the decision on whether to open a second runway at East Midlands airport. [130947]

    Mr. McNulty
    We are currently considering the responses to the airports' consultation. These will inform our final conclusions on airport capacity which will be published in an Air Transport White Paper later this year.

    Flight Cancellations
    Mrs. Iris Robinson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what statutory duty of care airlines have towards passengers whose flights have been cancelled. [130257]

    Mr. McNulty
    UK airlines currently have no statutory duty of care to passengers with regard to cancelled flights. However, all the significant "full-service" UK airlines (both scheduled and charter) have signed up to the Airline Voluntary Commitments on Air Passenger Rights, developed in 2001 under the guidance of the European Commission and the European Civil Aviation Conference. These commitments contain non-legally binding agreements to deliver defined standards of service to air travellers in a number of key areas, including the prompt notification of known delays, cancellations and diversions.

    At the Transport Council in December 2002 the European Community reached political agreement on a proposal from the European Commission for a regulation establishing common rules on compensation and assistance to air passengers in the event of denied boarding and of cancellation or long delays of flights. We expect this regulation, which is currently under discussion between the Council, the European Parliament and the Commission to become law during 2004.

    Green Transport
    Mrs. Curtis-Thomas
    To ask the Secretary of State for Transport which green transport initiatives the Government have supported in the Merseyside PTA area in(a) 2001–02, (b) 2002–03 and (c) 2003–04. [130433]

    Mr. McNulty
    The Government expect local authorities to reflect the principles of sustainable development in their Local Transport Plans (LTPs). They are, for example, required to show how their LTPs will reduce CO2 emissions from transport sources, how they would contribute to tackling air quality problems, and how they would minimise noise impacts. The Government, through their funding of LTPs, aim to deliver better environmental outcomes across the whole range of Local Transport Plan schemes and initiatives. It would therefore be misleading to identify "green transport initiatives" separately—environmental issues are fully integrated into wider local transport policy.

    The Merseyside local authorities have reported in detail on their delivery of schemes and initiatives in LTP Annual Progress Reports, covering 2001–02 and 2002–03.

    Parliamentary Questions
    Mrs. Curtis-Thomas
    To ask the Secretary of State for Transport how many questions directed to him remain unanswered. [130755]

    Mr. McNulty
    The effective handling of parliamentary questions is an issue to which I, and ministerial colleagues, attach great importance. At 15 September 2003, my Department had 43 unanswered parliamentary questions. Of these, eight were named day questions for answer on 16 September 2003 and 35
    761W
    were ordinary written questions which by convention are answered within one working week of appearing in the Order Book.

    Sky Marshals
    Tom Brake
    To ask the Secretary of State for Transport (1) who will cover the employment costs of sky marshals; [129223]

    (2)how many sky marshals are available for duty on (a) UK airlines and (b) airlines flying into and out of the UK; [129224]

    (3)how many sky marshals are being trained; and how long their training lasts; [129225]

    (4)what the expected establishment of sky marshals will be; [129226]

    (5)whether sky marshals are authorised to carry (a) firearms and (b) other weapons; [129227]

    (6)whether (a) UK airlines and (b) foreign airlines are required (i) to opt in and (ii) to opt out of using sky marshals; and if he will list the airlines that have (A) opted in and (B) opted out. [129228]

    Mr. McNulty
    My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Transport made a written statement on 19 December last year on the capability which has been developed to place specially trained armed police officers aboard UK civil aircraft. Security reasons preclude making public operational details of that capability. Other countries, with an equivalent capability in respect of flights by their own airlines, have adopted a similar approach.

    Chris Grayling
    To ask the Secretary of State for Transport (1) how many special marshals he has appointed; and from which budget funding for special marshals will come; [130951]

    (2) what powers special marshals will have if a person refuses to hand over (a) alcohol and (b) cigarettes. [130952]

    Mr. McNulty
    I refer the hon. Member to the answer given today to the hon. Member for Carshalton & Wallington (Mr. Brake).

    Transport Projects (Warrington)
    Helen Jones
    To ask the Secretary of State for Transport how many projects his Department has supported in Warrington since 1997; and how much funding was allocated to each project. [129926]

    Mr. McNulty
    In April 1998 Warrington became a unitary authority; prior to that they were part of Cheshire. The funding figures for 1997 and 1998 are not readily available.

    The Department for Transport has provided Warrington with funding £11.342 million over the last two financial years. The Department has accepted the urban traffic management control major project, and has provisionally accepted two other major projects, Bridgefoot environmental enhancement and Warrington town centre bus interchange.

    Details of the schemes and spend can be found in Warrington's annual progress report.

    TravelSafe Scheme
    Chris Grayling
    To ask the Secretary of State for Transport how he has measured the success of the TravelSafe scheme; and what the cost of the scheme has been to date. [130953]

    Mr. Jamieson
    TravelSafe is a local partnership initiative, led by the Merseytravel Passenger Transport Executive to deal with crime on public transport in their area. My Department has taken an interest in this and other anti-transport crime initiatives throughout the country as part of its on-going work commitment to reduce crime and the fear of crime wherever it occurs on the transport system. In February 2003, Merseytravel reported to the Government's Safer Travel on Buses and Coaches Panel on the successes of the initiative. The Department for Transport has not funded this initiative and we hold no information on its cost to date.

  MINISTER FOR WOMEN

    Public Appointments
    Mrs. Curtis-Thomas
    To ask the Minister for Women what progress she has made in increasing the proportion of women appointed to public bodies. [129453]

    Ms Hewitt
    The percentage of women on the boards of public bodies at 31 March 2003,was 35.7 per cent., up from 34 per cent. in March 2002. The Government remain committed to the aim that by the end of 2005, and for the majority of departments, women should hold 45–50 per cent. of the appointments to the bodies they sponsor.

  TRADE AND INDUSTRY

    EU Enlargement
    Mr. Hayes
    To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what representations she has received from EU non-applicant states bordering the enlarged EU on access to the Single Market after enlargement. [128175]

    Mr. Mike O'Brien
    My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, met with the Russian Deputy Prime Minister Mr. Kudrin on 26 June this year, and also in October 2002. During both these meetings the issue of current and future Russian access to EU markets was raised.

    Computer Viruses
    Dr. Murrison
    To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what plans she has for reducing the threat from computer viruses. [130197]

    Mr. Timms
    Malicious software—including viruses—is a global phenomenon. No one Government can eliminate the development and spread of malicious software but the Government are playing their part in a range of activities to minimise the impact on users. We are talking to vendors about improving the identification of vulnerabilities in software and the underlying protocols. We are working with industry to disseminate advice a bout the availability of solutions to the problems which are identified and how to deal with
    763W
    the difficulties posed by events, such as viruses, which exploit those vulnerabilities. The Department has taken a prominent role in the promotion of good information security management and has developed promotional material aimed at helping smaller companies understand and deal with common security problems. The detection and prosecution of those who create malicious software is the responsibility of the Home Office and Section 3 of the Computer Misuse Act already criminalises the unauthorised modification of the contents of any computer, which includes modifications caused by viruses. My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary is, however, reviewing the effectiveness of the Act and, as part of this process, will consider whether any further legislation is required to further deter those who write or knowingly disseminate computer viruses.

    Departmental Computer Security
    Dr. Cable
    To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry how much has been(a) budgeted and (b) spent by her Department since April 2002 on (i) combating computer fraud, (ii) preventing theft of computers and (iii) safeguarding the security of information held on computer; and if she will make a statement. [128782]

    Ms Hewitt
    It is not possible to separately identify the budgets and costs requested as they are spread across a number of areas including:

    The overall IT service cost from our outsourced IT services provider;

    Individual project development and system operating costs; Overall physical and building security costs;

    IT systems and network (including firewall) management costs; Overall Internal Audit effort;

    Staff recruitment and training costs.

    Electricity Generation
    Mr. Laurence Robertson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry how much electricity has been used in the UK in each of the last five years for which figures are available; and how much has been used in this year so far. [129941]

    Mr. Timms
    [holding answer 16 September 2003]: The available information is shown in the following table.

    Electricity used in the UK

    TWh

    1998

    345.4

    1999

    352.5

    2000

    360.1

    2001

    363.1

    2002

    364.7

    20031

    189.8

    1First half

    Source:

    DTI Energy Trends

    EU Tariffs
    Mr. Gibb
    To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry if she will list the EU tariffs on textiles and clothing imports from(a) India, (b) Sri Lanka and (c) the United States; and if she will make a statement. [129167]
    764W
    Mr. Mike O'Brien
    There are over 1,000 individual EU tariff lines covering imports of textiles and clothing so it is not possible to list them individually. These duties are applicable to all countries including USA, India and Sri Lanka and range from 0 per cent. to 12.2 per cent. Both India and Sri Lanka benefit from preferential arrangements with the EU that give lower duties for textile and clothing products.

    Everything but Arms Agreement
    Mr. Gibb
    To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry pursuant to her answer of 14 June,Official Report, column 17W, on the Everything but Arms Agreement, what proportion of total trade exports to the United Kingdom are represented by (a) sugar, (b) oil, (c) tobacco, (d) cotton and (e) olive oil regimes for (i) least developed countries and (ii) non-least developed countries in sub-Saharan Africa. [128558]

    Ms Hewitt
    To obtain such information would require extracting information on a large number of commodity codes for 51 countries and therefore could be obtained only at disproportionate cost.

    Export Control
    Mr. Gardiner
    To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what assessment she has made of the feasibility of using(a) mutual and (b) multilateral legal assistance treaties to allow the UK Government to develop effective end-user controls of arms shipments from the UK. [129849]

    Mr. MacShane
    I have been asked to reply.

    The Government have a system for the post-export monitoring of UK-origin arms. Where there is a case of diversion or fraud by a private individual, we look to cooperate with the authorities of friendly countries to bring the perpetrators to justice. Legal assistance treaties are of little use in cases of alleged misuse by Governments.

    Export Licences
    Nick Harvey
    To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry if she will list the export licences that have been granted to Royal Ordnance for the export of TNT to the USA in the past three years. [129284]

    Nigel Griffiths
    [holding answer 15 September 2003]: A list of all UK export licences is published in the Annual Report on Strategic Export Controls. However, details of export licence applications from particular companies are normally commercially confidential and exempt from disclosure under categories 13 and 14 of the Code of Practice on Access to Government Information.

    Gangmasters
    Mr. Luff
    To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what plans she has to introduce a system of registration for gangmasters to ensure minimum standards of health and safety training for the staff they provide. [124890]

    Mr. Bradshaw
    I have been asked to reply.
    765W
    The Government are working with organisations and businesses in the food chain to draw up a code of practice for gangmasters in the agriculture and fresh produce sectors and to devise a system of accreditation gangmasters who abide by this standard. The aim is to test whether a voluntary accreditation scheme combined with a readiness by businesses in the food chain to use accredited labour can achieve an improvement in employment practices in the sector. The option of a statutory registration requirement has not been ruled out if the accreditation approach proves insufficient. The proposed code of practice and the standard it will set would be a key element in either approach.

    Higgs Review
    David Wright
    To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what steps her Department has taken to implement the findings of the Higgs review of the role and effectiveness of non-executive directors. [129916]

    Jacqui Smith
    The Government warmly welcomed the Higgs Review. The majority of the recommendations of the Review were for changes to the Combined Code. The Code is the responsibility of the Financial Reporting Council, which published a revised Code on 23 July this year. The Government believe that this will provide a clear and robust framework to improve the performance of boards and increase investor confidence.

    Following the Higgs Review, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State asked Professor Laura Tyson, Dean of the London Business School, to consider how a broader range of non-executives might be identified and recruited in order to improve board effectiveness. Laura Tyson's report was published on 19 June. The Department of Trade and Industry s currently engaging with various stakeholders in order to take forward Professor Tyson's recommendations.

    The Higgs Review also recommended the development of guidance on directors' and officers' insurance. The Institute of Chartered Secretaries and Administrators are currently developing this.

    IT Security
    Mrs. Curtis-Thomas
    To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what steps she has taken to review the security of the Department's IT system; and how many digital attacks there were on the Department's system in the last six months. [129507]

    Ms Hewitt
    All DTI IT systems are designed in accordance with HMG IT security policy.

    The core Department's internal IT system undergoes a regular cycle of security testing in line with its security policy. In addition, the processes and procedures of those parts of the Department responsible for overseeing its IT services are subjected to six monthly independent audit as part of our certification of compliance with BS 7799 Part 2.

    During the past six months, one attempted digital attack was identified which failed.

    Nanotechnology
    Mr. Wray
    To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what assistance is given to companies researching nanotechnology; what proposals she has to increase its use in British industry; and if she will make a statement on(a) its future and (b) the improvements it can bring. [129153]

    Ms Hewitt
    Support for nanotechnology research and training in excess of £125 million over the last six years has been provided by OST, via the Research Councils, to UK universities. This has laid a solid foundation for future commercial investment and exploitation. The SBS "Smart" Scheme has helped many small companies, including university spin-outs, to develop their ideas from this technology. Other initiatives, for example the LINK Basic Technologies for Industrial Applications R&D programme, and other LINK programmes in the electronics, IT, chemicals, materials, and biotechnology sectors; although not dedicated to nanotechnology, have also supported projects that enable UK companies to collaborate with universities and commercially exploit this technology.

    On 2 July my noble Friend the Minister of State for Science and Innovation announced a £90 million programme over the next six years to help industry harness the commercial opportunities offered by nanotechnology. My Department is partnering with the Regional Development Agencies and Devolved Administrations to facilitate regional investment in facilities.

    Ofgem
    Mr. Helen Clark
    To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what discussions she has had with Ofgem following their announcement of the possible shortfall in the Roc fund; what measures(a) are being taken and (b) are planned to avoid a shortfall; and what assessment she has made of the impact of this announcement upon the renewables industry. [128870]

    Mr. Timms
    My officials are discussing the possible shortfall with Ofgem, and with representatives from the renewables industry. Since the extent of any possible shortfall will not be clear until 1 October, it is too early at this stage to assess the impact on the renewables market or to propose measures to address the possible shortfall or to avoid the problem recurring in the future.

    In the interim, Of gem are in communication with the administrators over compliance with the Renewables Obligation.

    Productivity Gap
    Mr. Dhanda
    To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what action she is taking to close the productivity gap with other European Union countries. [128204]

    Ms Hewitt
    Today my Department publishes its strategy, setting out our priorities for the next five years to narrow the productivity gap with our competitors, including those in the EU. A copy of the strategy has been placed in the Libraries of the House, along with a companion paper setting out the analysis on which the strategy has been built.
    767W
    The Strategy focuses on practical action where the Department can have the greatest impact:
    helping business to access the knowledge and ideas it needs to innovate;
    encouraging employers and employee; to improve their skills and create more productive, high performing workplaces;
    ensuring the right frameworks exist so that markets are open and fair at home and overseas;
    ensuring that all regions are able to fulfil their economic potential.

    DTI will work in close partnership with its stakeholders, customers and other policy makers to achieve these aims.

    Red Tape
    Mr. Bellingham
    To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what assessment her Department has made of the number of jobs that have been lost to the British economy as a result of regulations on business introduced since May 1997; and if she will make a statement. [129390]

    Ms Hewitt
    Since 1997 over 1.5 million jobs have been created within the British economy and the number of people in employment is currently at 27.92 million, the highest since records began in 1984. The claimant count rate of unemployment benefits is the lowest for 27 years.

    A Regulatory Impact Assessment is produced for all regulations that have a cost to or benefit for business as part of the policy development process. These are prepared in consultation with industry and the Small Business Service.

    Safeway
    Mr. Bellingham
    To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry when she will make an announcement on the proposed takeover bids for the Safeway chain of supermarkets. [129394]

    Ms Hewitt
    I will announce my decision on the proposed acquisition of Safeway alongside publication of the Competition Commission report. The administrative target for publication of this report is within 30 working days of its receipt from the Competition Commission. As the report was received on 18 August 2003, our aim is to publish by 30 September 2003.

    Skills Shortages
    Mr. Bellingham
    To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what estimate her Department has made of the annual cost to British businesses, in terms of extra training and lost productivity, of basic skills shortages in the workforce. [129391]

    Mr. Ivan Lewis
    I have been asked to reply.

    There is robust evidence that poor literacy and numeracy skills have adverse effects an the earnings and employment prospects of individuals.

    However there is limited evidence on the cost to British businesses of basic skill shortages in the workforce.
    768W
    One 1992 study that attempted to quantify the costs to employers of poor basic skills suggested that they were costing companies employing over 50 workers an average of £ 165,000 a year and for the largest companies (with over 1,000 employees) the costs could be as high as £500,000 per year (equivalent to £208,000 and £626,000 in 2002 prices).

    Based on this evidence, the total cost to UK businesses (employing over 50 workers) of poor basic skill levels was estimated to be in the region of £4.8 billion pounds per annum (£6 billion in 2002 prices).

    These costs are likely to be underestimated, as they do not account for costs associated with lost future business, the need for additional training because staff may be unable to cope with written material, the cost of work that needs to be re-done or the costs incurred by firms with 50 or fewer employees.

    The influential report "Improving Literacy and Numeracy: A Fresh Start" by Sir Claus Moser highlighted further analysis based on this 1992 research study. It suggested that the impact of poor basic skills on the UK economy as a whole could be as high as £10 billion per annum (in 1999 prices).

    Stock Exchanges
    Mr. Bellingham
    To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry if she will make a statement on the potential establishment of regional and local stock exchange bourses for small and medium sized enterprises. [129392]

    Nigel Griffiths
    Proposals were published by the independent Centre for the Study of Financial Innovation in 2000. I understand that Advantage West Midlands have been developing these ideas, and I have asked for a copy of their proposal.

    I am determined to ensure that all UK companies have access to the finance they need to expand with viable products and services, and the DTI has a number of programmes to assist with this.

    World Trade Organisation
    Dr. Cable
    To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry which(a) Ministers and (b) civil servants will be attending the Cancun conference in September; and if she will make a statement. [128781]

    Ms Hewitt
    My right hon. Friends the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, and the Secretary of State for International Development, and my hon. Friend the Minister of State for International Trade, Investment and Foreign Affairs and myself attended the Cancun conference.

    We were supported by a total of 32 civil servants from Department of Trade and Industry, Foreign and Commonwealth Office, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, Department for International Development and Her Majesty's Treasury. Each Department was able to deploy its expertise during discussions on the various trade and development issues contained in the Doha Development Agenda.
    769W
    I refer the hon. Gentleman to my oral statement to the House earlier today.

    Tom Cox
    To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what discussions she is having with member states of the European Union on the trade policies that will be presented at the World Trade Organisation conference in Mexico in September; and if she will make a statement. [127166]

    Ms Hewitt
    I hold regular discussions with European Union member states on issues relating to the current World Trade Organisation Round. These continued during the conference itself.

    I refer the hon. Gentleman to my oral statement to the House earlier today.

    Dr. Cable
    To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what recent discussions she has had with(a) ministerial colleagues, (b) NGOs and (c) member states of the European Union on (i) policies and (ii) objectives to be presented at the World Trade Organisation conference in Mexico; and if she will make a statement. [128779]

    Ms Hewitt
    I have had regular discussions with my ministerial colleagues, NGOs and member states of the European Union on our objectives for the 5th World Trade Organisational Ministerial conference in Cancun. These discussions continued during the conference.

    I refer the hon. Gentleman to my oral statement to the House earlier today.

    Mr. Yeo
    To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry if she will make a statement on the Government's objectives for the Fifth WTO Ministerial Conference in Cancun. [127598]

    Ms Hewitt
    [holding answer 8 September 2003]: Our main objective for Cancun was to work for a successful outcome to the current round of world trade negotiations that benefits industrialised and developing countries alike. In particular to: (i) secure an ambitious framework for an agreement on agriculture, where the EU has shown its commitment to the Round in agreeing historic changes to the CAP; (ii) press for progress on reducing non-agricultural tariffs, increasing services liberalisation and agreeing special and differential treatment for developing countries. I refer the hon. Gentleman to my oral statement to the House earlier today.

  ENVIRONMENT, FOOD AND RURAL AFFAIRS

    Duty of Care
    Brian Cotter
    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what action her Department is taking to assist small businesses with the implementation of the Duty of Care Regulations; and if she will make a statement. [128692]

    Mr. Morley
    My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has issued a code of practice under section 34(7) of the Environmental Protection Act 1990. The purpose of the code of practice is to provide practical guidance to those subject to the duty of care, including small businesses, on how to discharge their obligations under 770W
    the duty. The code of practice and an explanatory leaflet are available on the Department's website at: http://www.defra.gov. uk/environment/waste/management/doc/index.htm

    Radioactive Material
    Mr. Wray
    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs how many sites in the United Kingdom specialise in the disposal of radioactive materials. [128106]

    Mr. Morley
    Disposal of radioactive waste in the UK is regulated by the Environment Agency in England and Wales, the Environment and Heritage Service of the Department of the Environment in Northern Ireland and the Scottish Environment Protection Agency in Scotland.

    BNFL's Drigg site in Cumbria specialises in the disposal of low-level solid radioactive waste from Sellafield and other UK sites. Around 850 sites in England and Wales are authorised to dispose of low and very low-level radioactive waste under the Radioactive Substances Act 1993.

    Abandoned Vehicles
    Mr. Ivan Henderson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what initiatives her Department has introduced since 1997 to tackle the problems of abandoned cars. [129695]

    Mr. Morley
    Since its creation in June 2001, Defra introduced on 9 April 2002 regulations reducing the statutory notice periods after which local authorities can remove abandoned vehicles from the highway. Local authorities can now remove those vehicles that they consider merit destruction from the highway after the expiry of a 24 hour notice placed on them.

    Defra is consulting on a proposal to reduce the statutory notice period whereby a landowner can object to the removal of a vehicle(s) abandoned on their land. The consultation closes on 24 October. We aim to introduce a Regulation in the new year to amend the Removal and Disposal of Vehicles Regulations 1986.

    Animal Movements
    Miss McIntosh
    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what representations she has received on the proposed amendments to the EU maximum hours for movement of animals. [128387]

    Mr. Bradshaw
    The European Commission published proposals for new rules on animal welfare during transport on 16 July. On 17 July Defra launched a public consultation asking for the views of interested organisations. The consultation period ends on 8 October, after which copies of the responses will be made publicly available in accordance with Defra's policy of openness. Meetings will be held with interested organisations as part of the consultation process.

    Bovine TB
    Mrs. Curtis-Thomas
    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs if she will make a statement on levels of cases of bovine TB. [129496]
    771W
    Mr. Bradshaw
    In the period January to July 2003, there were just over 2,1001 new bovine tuberculosis (TB) incidents in Great Britain. This represents an increase of approximately 2 per cent. over the same period in 2002 when 2,065 new incidents were recorded. To date, just over 1,0001 of the new incidents recorded in 2003 have been confirmed, 8401 are unconfirmed and just under 2601 remain unclassified pending the results of tissue culture tests.

    Defra is working hard to address the problem of bovine TB, and last year we spent £72 million on a programme of public health protection measures, cattle testing, cattle controls and extensive research. In February this year, we announced a review of the current TB control regime. We expect to consult on proposals for a long-term TB strategy for GB, and on short-term policy options, later this year.
    1 Provisional figures—subject to change as outstanding TB test and culture results become available.
    Notes:
    The TB testing and control programme was severely disrupted during the foot and mouth disease (FMD) outbreak in 2001. Since testing resumed in 2002, resources have been concentrated on herds with overdue tests which would have had a longer period in which to contract the disease. Also, the proportion of high risk herds being tested post-FMD is greater than that prior to the outbreak. As result, the number of TB breakdowns being recorded post-FMD is not comparable to that prior to the FMD outbreak.

    Carbon Savings
    Mr. Gardiner
    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs whether she estimates that the Government are on target to achieve carbon savings of 5 million tonnes by 2010. [129850]

    Mr. Morley
    The UK's target under the Kyoto Protocol is to reduce emissions of a basket of six greenhouse gases by 12.5 per cent. below base year levels by 2008–12. We estimate that this will equate to a reduction in emissions of around 26 MtC (million tonnes of carbon equivalent) by 2008–12. The UK's domestic target, to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide by 20 per cent. below 1990 levels by 2010, is estimated to equate to a reduction of about 33 MtC by 2010.

    Data for emissions of the basket of six greenhouse gases for 2001, submitted to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Apri1 2003, show that emissions fell by 12.3 per cent., or 26 MtC, between the base year and 2001. Emissions of carbon dioxide fell by 5.3 per cent., or 9 MtC. Provisional data for 2002 show that total emissions fell by 14–15 per cent. between the base year and 2002, and carbon dioxide emissions fell by 8–9 per cent.

    Progress that we have made to date and our latest projections to 2010 contained in the UK's Third National Communication to the UNFCCC indicate that we are well on course to meet our Kyoto commitment. This conclusion is supported by a recent independent assessment by the UNFCCC.

    Combined Heat and Power
    Mr. Gardiner
    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs when the Department's strategy for combined heat and power will be finalised. [129851]
    772W
    Mr. Morley
    In keeping with the commitment made in the Energy White Paper published in February 2003, the Government will issue the final version of the Combined Heat and Power Strategy later this year. The Strategy will detail the measures we believe will help us achieve our challenging target of 10,000 MW of installed Good Quality CHP by 2010, incorporating the new support measures for CHP announced in the Energy White Paper.

    Committee on Radioactive Waste Management
    Dr. Jack Cunningham
    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what method she has adopted to determine membership of the Committee on Radioactive Waste Management; how many appointments have been made; if she will list those people already confirmed as members of the committee; and if she will make a statement. [129530]

    Mr. Morley
    [holding answer 15 September 2003]: My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State in a reply to my hon. Friend the Member for Dunfermline, West (Rachel Squire), on 16 July 2003, Official Report, columns 318–19W, stated we had advertised in March for Members of the Committee on Radioactive Waste Management, had received over 400 applications, and had appointed Katharine Bryan as Chair; Mrs. Bryan would help select the remaining members. We have since carried out interviews for the remaining posts and we shall make an announcement once the appointments have been agreed with the Devolved Administrations. Our method is to select candidates according to the criteria we published in March and following the Code of Practice of the Office for the Commissioner of Public Appointments, including the use of an independent assessor on the selection panel.

    Conservation Sites
    Paddy Tipping
    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (1) what discussions have taken place with the Countryside Agency about the assessment of European sites designated under the Conservation (Natural Habitats Act etc) Regulations 1994; and whether sites in the south-east and central southern regions will be assessed before the commencement of access arising from the Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000 in the summer of 2004; [130427]

    (2) what information the Countryside Agency has received from English Nature to enable it to make appropriate assessments of European sites in the south-east and central southern regions of England under the Conservation (Natural Habitats Act etc) Regulations 1994; when the information was received; and when the assessments will be completed. [130428]

    Alun Michael
    The Countryside Agency has worked closely with English Nature to adopt an agreed approach in relation to nature conservation and access land. This is embodied in a heads of agreement signed between the agency and English Nature on 10 July 2000, in which both organisations agreed to work together to facilitate improved access and safeguard nature conservation interests.
    773W
    The agency and English Nature have agreed a detailed process to assess European sites designated under the Conservation (Natural Habitats Act etc.) Regulations 1994.

    English Nature has undertaken audits of all European sites designated under these regulations in the south-east and central southern mapping areas and has provided advice to the agency, in July 2001 and February 2003, on 99 sites which contain features that are potentially vulnerable to public access under the Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000.

    The agency will complete the assessments for these sites before access commences in these two mapping areas.

    Correspondence
    Mrs. Roe
    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs when she will reply to the letters from the hon. Member for Broxbourne of(a) 18 June, (b) 15 July, (c) 13 August and (d) 9 September relating to the contents of an article in the Sunday Telegraph dated 15 June, raised by one of her constituents. [129831]

    Mr. Morley
    [holding answer 15 September 2003]: I replied to the hon. Member's letters of 18 June and 13 August on 9 September.

    Unfortunately, the Department has no record of receiving the hon. Member's letters of 15 July or 9 September. If the hon. Member will supply me with copies of her letters I shall ensure that they are dealt with speedily.

    EU Legislation
    Brian White
    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what further statutory responsibilities for collection and disposal will be placed upon local authorities as part of the implementation of the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment Directive. [128371]

    Mr. Morley
    The Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) Directive does not place direct responsibilities on local authorities for the collection and disposal of WEEE, but on producers and distributors. The Government are preparing the UK implementation of the Directive and are discussing with local authorities how best to involve them in maximising use of the existing waste collection infrastructure. Options for implementation will be presented in the next round of consultation, due to be published in the late autumn.

    Fishing Fleets
    Ann Winterton
    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what plans she has to compensate for any virement of moneys under the Objective One fisheries programme transferring financial aid for decommissioning to other sectors of the programme following her earlier announcement denying access to the English Decommissioning Scheme for vessels outside of the North Sea; and if she will make a statement. [129415]
    774W
    Mr. Bradshaw
    Whether decommissioning grant for fishing vessels is available in Cornwall under the EU structural fund for fisheries (FIFO) is determined by the Cornish Objective One programme monitoring committee. I understand that on the advice of the programme's fisheries representatives the decision has been taken not to plan for expenditure on decommissioning for the remainder of the 2000–06 structural funds programme, in order to provide funding for strategic projects to which they give priority.

    The Government have made no decision to make other funds available for the decommissioning of vessels in the south-west fleet.

    Flood Prevention
    Mr. Goodman
    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what progress has been made with regard to pre-feasibility studies to identify options for the alleviation of flooding in Medmenham and Marlow. [128952]

    Mr. Morley
    [holding answer 11 September 2003]: As part of a more extensive study in Medmenham, consultants to the Environment Agency are currently modelling various different options for reducing flood risk. This has taken longer than anticipated due to problems with the modelling, however, the pre-feasibility report will be concluded by the end of October 2003.

    The Environment Agency is undertaking two pre-feasibility studies that are considering possible flood alleviation options for the Pound Lane and Firview Close areas of Marlow. The first study is due to be completed by the end of September and the second is due for completion in October 2003.

    Dr. Cable
    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what assessment has taken place of each area along the River Thames that has been designated as(a) flood plain and (b) at a high risk of flooding; and if she will make a statement. [128783]

    Mr. Morley
    The Environment Agency's Indicative Floodplain Map provides a general overview of areas of land in natural floodplains and, therefore, that are potentially at risk of flooding from rivers or the sea. The maps are created using the best available information, and are based on historical flood records and computer models. The Agency's Thames Region is able to answer queries relating to the source of the floodplain outline in a particular area. Data are available for the River Thames and all other main river catchments.

    The Department's Flood Management High Level Target 5 requires operating authorities to make an overall assessment of the risk of flooding. The Environment Agency's Risk Assessment for Strategic Planning (RASP), combines information on the defence system, the Indicative Floodplain Map and the topography, to give an indication of the category of flood risk in a local area. The data are to be used by the Agency for national monitoring of risk from flooding; strategic prioritisation of investment in defence improvements or other flood management options (e.g. increased storage or diversion); targeting flood warning and emergency response; and highlighting priorities for monitoring and maintenance. The RASP

    775W
    outputs have been supplied to the Association of British Insurers and can be made available to individuals on request. The Agency is planning on being able to put this information on their website by September 2004.

    Fluoridation
    Mr. Hancock
    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what research her Department has conducted into the effects of adding fluoride to water supplies; what recent meetings she has had with colleagues and others on the issue; and if she will make a statement. [128677]

    Mr. Morley
    The Government's public health advisers are the Department of Health who are responsible for water fluoridation policy. The national health service Centre for Reviews and Dissemination at the University of York published its Report, "A Systematic Review of Water Fluoridation", in September 2000. In keeping with comments in the Report that there was a need for more good quality research, the Department of Health commissioned the Medical Research Centre (MRC) to advise on how the evidence base might be strengthened. Its Report was published in September 2002. The Chief Medical Officer and the Chief Dental Officer were asked to examine these recent recommendations and to report on the implications for Government policy. Their Report is expected during the autumn. DoH have also commissioned a research study on the bio-availability (absorption) of fluoride.

    There has been regular inter-departmental liaison between Defra and Department of Health Ministers and officials about amendments that have been included in the Water Bill to the water fluoridation provisions in the Water Industry Act 1991. The amendments were considered by Committee of the whole House of Lords on 9 July and we anticipate that water fluoridation will be considered in Committee in the House of Commons on 21 October. On the Government side there will be a free vote.

    Gangmasters (Code of Practice)
    Mr. Luff
    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs when she plans to publish a code of practice for gangmasters; what subjects it will cover; what legal status it will have; and which bodies will be consulted on it prior to publication. [129771]

    Mr. Bradshaw
    Work is currently going on to draw up a code of practice for gangmasters operating in the agriculture and fresh produce sectors, covering best practice in employing people and supplying labour to other businesses. The intention is that it should cover a range of issues relevant to employment and labour supply, such as health and safety, minimum wages, working hours, entitlement to work and VAT registration. Plans are being prepared to trial the draft code of practice on a voluntary basis with a number of gangmasters and businesses using gang labour during the autumn. Decisions on publication of the code and on its legal status will be taken in the light of this trial. A range of bodies and individual businesses, representing farmers, farm workers, packhouses, retailers and gangmasters, and the Ethical Trading Initiative are 776W
    working in partnership with Government to develop and pilot the Code of Practice. Further bodies will be consulted once a draft version of the Code is available.

    GM Birdseed
    Mr. Meacher
    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what evidence she has that GM birdseed has been released into the UK environment and on what scale; what procedures are in place or planned to separate out GM lines in(a) canary seed, (b) linseed, (c) millet and (d) rape seed mixes that are imported; and what action she is taking to prosecute those who illegally contaminate the UK environment. [129757]

    Mr. Morley
    I have no evidence that any GM seeds are being sold as bird-seed in the UK.

    The seeds of canary-grass, linseed, millet and oilseed rape are frequently sold as food for wild birds. However at the present time no GM varieties of these plants are permitted for this use. It is the responsibility of the supplier to comply with regulations on marketing of genetically modified organisms. One type of GM rape seed has authorisation for import into the European Union as grain, however it must be crushed and processed so cannot be used as whole grain in bird seed mixes.

    We understand that oilseed rape used in UK bird seed mixes is typically sourced in the UK where no GM varieties are permitted for commercial cultivation.

    If we were to become aware through existing inspection procedures that an importer was in breach of the law, we would consider prosecution.

    GM Foods
    Joan Ruddock
    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs if she will make a statement on her discussions with the chief executive officers of ASDA, Tesco, Sainsbury and Safeway on 16 July regarding GM foods; and what plans she has to meet the chief executive officers of Marks and Spencer and Waitrose on this issue. [128868]

    Mr. Morley
    [holding answer 11 September 2003]My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State met with the CEOs of ASDA, Tesco, Sainsbury and Safeway, the four largest supermarket chains, in a listening capacity, in particular to hear their views as part of the public dialogue on GM issues. During the course of discussion, she emphasised the Government's support for proportional and workable measures for the mandatory traceability and labelling of GM foods and crops.

    The interests of other retailers, including those of Marks and Spencer and Waitrose, were represented at the meeting by the Director General of the British Retail Consortium.

    Chris Grayling
    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what discussions her Department has had with the European Commission to ensure that GM foods are labelled and traceable. [130096]
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    Mr. Morley
    The Department, working closely with the Food Standards Agency, has had regular discussions with the Commission and other EU partners on this issue, both at official and ministerial level. Most recently these discussions have taken place in the context of negotiating the new EC Regulation on the traceability and labelling of GM products that was agreed in July 2003,

    LANTRA
    Mr. Drew
    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs if she will list those industries which constitute the representative role of LANTRA; and what plans there are to include additional industries. [130591]

    Alun Michael
    Lantra represents the following 17 industries:

    agricultural crops;

    agricultural livestock;

    animal care;

    animal technology;

    acquaculture;

    environmental conservation;

    equine;

    farriery;

    fencing;

    fisheries management;

    floristry;

    game conservation;

    land-based engineering;

    landscaping:

    production horticulture;

    trees and timber;

    and veterinary nursing.

    Any proposals to extend coverage would be for discussion between Lantra and the Sector Skills Development Agency. Lantra has assured Ministers that it fully appreciates the importance to link to the work of other similar agencies to make sure that the needs of the diverse rural economy and communities are met. Discussions are currently taking place between Lantra, the Sector Skills Development Agency and this Department about a role for Lantra in coordinating the work of Sector Skills Councils with significant interests in rural areas.

    Livestock Disposal
    Mr. Hancock
    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what assessment she has made of the effects of the on-farm burial ban; and if she will make a statement. [129789]

    Mr. Bradshaw
    No formal assessment has been made, although clearly the ban will have an impact on those farmers who had previously buried fallen stock on farm. That is why the Government have announced they are setting up a low cost voluntary national fallen stock scheme in conjunction with the livestock industry to assist farmers in adapting to the new requirements for disposal of fallen stock.
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    In the interim, the Fallen Stock helpline on 0845 8507070 can give advice to farmers on collection services in their area to enable them to dispose of their fallen stock now.

    Royal Mail Deliveries
    Mr. Challen
    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what estimate the Government have made of the change in CO2 emissions arising from Royal Mail's decision to move mail from rail to road. [124150]

    Mr. Morley
    The Government have made no estimate of the impact on CO2, emissions of Royal Mail's decision, which is a commercial and economic one for the Royal Mail to make. The Government encourage all businesses to adopt strategies that reduce emissions overall.

    Rural Development Fund
    Miss McIntosh
    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs when she expects to propose detailed provisions on rural development fund payments and their application to tenant farmers. [R] [129635]

    Alun Michael
    The England Rural Development Programme was established in 2000 and measures under it are available to all farmers, including tenant farmers, on the same terms. Because the Government were keen to ensure that tenants are not disadvantaged in applying for farm diversification or agri-environment schemes, we asked the Tenancy Reform Industry Group to consider this issue. This group, which included representatives from all key industry stakeholder organisations, published its report in June 2003. TRIG has proposed a comprehensive package of legislative, fiscal and other changes that are intended to ensure both landlord and tenant have more flexibility to deal with the long-term nature of rural land management. These recommendations have the support of all TRIG members.

    TRIG did not find sufficient evidence to warrant recommending a change to agricultural tenancy legislation to give tenants a greater ability to diversify or participate in agri-environment schemes. However, they have proposed that a new Code of Good Practice should be drawn up to help avoid disputes between landlords and tenants on consent for diversification into non?agricultural activities. The Group also recommended that if, after a period of years the Code of Good Practice was not seen to be working and there is evidence to show that the legislation is acting as a barrier to diversification, legislative change should be considered.

    The Government's formal response to the Group's report has not yet been published. However we have asked TRIG to take work on a Code of Good Practice forward and a small working group will be working on this over the autumn.

    Softwood
    Mr. Roger Williams
    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what controls
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    there are on the import of softwoods into the United Kingdom to ensure that they originate from sustainable forests. [129661]

    Mr. Morley
    [holding answer 15 September 2003]: The UK Government support sustainable forest management and are committed to tackling illegal logging and its associated trade.

    Under EU law, import controls on illegally logged timber, can only be imposed at EU level. We are therefore working actively within the EU, where this is now being considered. The Government have shown leadership in their strong encouragement of the European Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade (FLEGT) process. The European Commission published a proposed FLEGT action plan on 21 May 2003. The plan includes a proposal to draft a new EU regulation to address imports of illegally logged timber in a way that is consistent with EU obligations to the World Trade Organisation.

    The FLEGT action plan deals only with legality. The EU's wider objective is to encourage sustainable forest management. Since in many countries forest legislation is based on the premise of sustainable forest management, better law enforcement will in general lead to more sustainable forest management. Where this is not the case, the Commission propose that the EU should encourage a review of the legal framework.

    The UK Government are working with other member states to ensure favourable Council conclusions inviting the Commission to proceed with this work as soon as possible.

    Mr. Roger Williams
    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what records the Government have of United Kingdom softwood timber prices in(a) 1999, (b) 2000, (c) 2001 and (d) 2002. [129663]

    Mr. Bradshaw
    [holding answer 15 September 2003]: Average prices for softwood standing sales in Great Britain are presented in the table.

    Financial year

    Average price per cubic metre (£)

    1999 —2000

    8.72

    2000—01

    8.15

    2001—02

    7.52

    2002—03

    5.74

    Note:

    The figures are taken from sales of standing timber on Forestry Commission land.

    Waste Disposal
    Norman Baker
    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what assessment she has made of the choice of waste disposal method by(a) waste disposal authorities and (b) businesses in the event of the introduction of an incinerator tax on the same basis as the landfill tax. [129253]

    Mr. Morley
    No assessment has been made. In this year's Budget, the Chancellor stated that a review of the environmental and health effects of all waste management and disposal options had been commissioned. The review has yet to be completed but 780W
    we aim to report on its findings later in the year. The case for using economic instruments for incineration will be considered in light of this work, and in consultation with other stakeholders.

    Water Pollution
    Mr. Gardiner
    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what assessment she has made of the problems caused by delays in enforcement action being taken against(a) companies and (b) households discharging pollutants into waterways. [129869]

    Mr. Morley
    The Environment Agency (the Agency) has powers to ensure that preventative or remedial action is taken to protect the environment or to secure compliance with relevant legislation such as the Water Resources Act 1991 (as amended by the Environment Act 1995), which makes provision regarding discharges to controlled waters. The enforcement action taken by the Agency will be proportionate to the risks posed to the environment and to the seriousness of any breach of the law. The Agency's powers for prosecution are used when it is satisfied that there is sufficient, admissible and reliable evidence that the offence has been committed and that there is a realistic prospect of conviction.

  SOLICITOR-GENERAL

    Criminal Justice and Trial Units
    Mrs. Curtis-Thomas
    To ask the Solicitor-General what percentage of(a) magistrates' court cases and (b) Crown Court cases were dealt with by joint police and Crown Prosecution Service criminal justice units and trials units in 2002–03. [128715]

    The Solicitor-General
    By the end of 2002–03, 43.4 per cent. of the Crown Prosecution Service's magistrates' court caseload and 27.6 per cent. of its Crown Court caseload were dealt with in collocated Criminal Justice Units and Trial Units.

    Crown Prosecution Service
    Mrs. Curtis-Thomas
    To ask the Solicitor-General in what ways the CPS is contributing to the CJS Case Preparation Project to reform case management in(a) magistrates' courts and (b) the Crown Court. [128725]

    The Solicitor-General
    The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) is actively supporting this Project, and has been closely involved in its development. At a local level, CPS practitioners are playing a key role in local implementation teams at each of the five pilot sites, and on the Local Criminal Justice Boards responsible for overseeing the delivery of the pilots. At a national level, the CPS has two senior representatives on the project board, and others on the national stakeholder machinery. The CPS has also seconded a senior prosecutor to the project team who is leading the 'production' strand of the project.

    Mrs. Curtis-Thomas
    To ask the Solicitor-General what targets were set by the CPS in 2002–03 on(a) the presentation in court of prosecution cases, (b) the

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    testing of defence cases and (c) complying with the duties of disclosure; and what the performance results are of these targets. [128718]

    The Solicitor-General
    The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) set a target in 2002–03 for Higher Court Advocates (HCAs) to undertake a minimum amount of advocacy in the Crown Court. The total national requirement was for HCAs to undertake 8,620 sessions; the outturn was 7,217 sessions or 83.7 per cent. No other targets were set in relation to the presentation of prosecution cases in court.

    The CPS did not set any target in relation to testing the defence case.

    The CPS does not set a target for compliance with disclosure requirements, but performance is monitored by Her Majesty's CPS Inspectorate (HMCPSI) as part of their regular cycle of inspections. The latest published annual data from HMCPSI, for 2001–02, shows that the percentage of cases where primary disclosure was handled properly was 80.4 per cent. and for secondary disclosure it was 75.3 per cent. From 1 April 2003, the CPS has been undertaking formal monitoring of performance on disclosure as part its internal Casework Quality Assurance programme.

    Director of Public Prosecutions
    Norman Baker
    To ask the Solicitor-General (1) if she will list the(a) Ministers, (b) civil servants and (c) members of the judiciary consulted as part of the selection process which resulted in the appointment of Mr. Ken Macdonald QC as Director of Public Prosecutions. [129242]

    (2) if she will make a statement on the appointment of Mr. Ken Macdonald QC as Director of Public Prosecutions; [129244]

    (3) if he will list the members of the panels which (a) interviewed and (b) selected Mr. Ken Macdonald QC for the position of Director of Public Prosecutions. [129243]

    The Solicitor-General
    The appointment of Mr. Ken Macdonald QC as Director of Public Prosecutions was made following a process of fair and open competition.

    Advertisements were placed in the national media and legal journals and, as part of the search process, a number of civil servants and members of the judiciary were approached in order to identify suitable candidates.

    The selection panel was chaired by the independent First Civil Service Commissioner Baroness Prashar. The other members of the selection panel were Sir Hayden Phillips, Permanent Secretary at the Department for Constitutional Affairs, Sir David Omand, Permanent Secretary, Cabinet Office; and Sir Robin Auld, Lord Justice of Appeal. Ken Macdonald QC was recommended for appointment by the panel to the Attorney-General. No other Ministers, civil servants or members of the judiciary, apart from a referee nominated on a confidential basis by Mr. Macdonald, were consulted as part of this process.
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    In line with normal practice, the Attorney-General informed the Prime Minister's office that he intended to appoint Ken Macdonald.

    Sports Events
    Nick Harvey
    To ask the Solicitor-General how many(a) prosecutions and (b) resulting convictions there have been arising from circumstances at British sports events in each of the last 10 years, broken down by type of (i) sport and (ii) offence. [129686]

    The Solicitor-General
    The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) does not keep data on prosecutions or convictions arising out of incidents at British sports events. Any data that might be kept by operational units at the CPS could be obtained only by examination of live and concluded case files at disproportionate cost.

  CULTURE, MEDIA AND SPORT

    Advertising (Children)
    Ms Shipley
    To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport what figures her Department has collated on the(a) proportion of advertising during children's television scheduling that involves marketing of food products and (b) proportion of food advertising during children's television scheduling that involves promotion of food of low nutritional value. [129645]

    Estelle Morris
    The Department has not undertaken research on food advertising during children's television scheduling. However, figures relating to this issue have been provided to the Department by my hon. Friend the Member for Stourbridge and others.

    Ms Shipley
    To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport what discussions her Department has had in the last 12 months with the Department of Health on the issue of food and drink advertising to children. [129646]

    Estelle Morris
    The Department has had limited discussions with the Department of Health regarding this issue over the last 12 months, in the context of broadcast advertising, but will be represented at the forthcoming meeting of the Department of Health's Food and Health Action Plan Steering Group. The Department is fully supportive of Government initiatives to tackle the problem of child obesity and is working closely with the Department of Health and the Department for Education and Skills on these as well as developing its own health initiatives relating to increased physical activity, particularly in children.

    Ms Shipley
    To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport what representations she has received in the last 12 months on the issue of food and drink advertising to children from(a) the advertising industry, (b) the food and drink industry and (c) organisations concerned with providing public health. [129647]

    Estelle Morris
    My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has not received any formal representations from the advertising industry on the issue of food and drink advertising to children, but is aware of the industry's views. The Department has also had informal discussions with the food and drink industry regarding
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    the European Commission's consideration of proposals on broadcast advertising. In May 2003, the Secretary of State met my hon. Friend the Member for Stourbridge and representatives of several public health promotion organisations to discuss this matter.

    Films (North-east England)
    Films Mr. Alan Campbell Films
    To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport what steps her Department is taking to promote film tourism in the North East of England. [130390]

    Mr. Caborn
    Visit Britain is funded by the Department to market Britain overseas and England to the domestic market. Visit Britain's movie map campaign and website have run continuously since 1996. Three sites in the North East where scenes from Elizabeth were filmed are featured: Alnwick Castle and Eamburgh Beach in Northumberland and Durham Cathedral. The map also features Newcastle where the films Purely Belter and The One and Only were set, Hulne Priory in Northumberland which appears in Robin Hood—Prince of Thieves, and Easington where Billy Elliott was filmed. Alnwick Castle, and the wealth of other attractions in its vicinity, is also featured in Visit Britain's 'The Magic of Britain' campaign which promotes Britain through the Harry Potter series of films. Future plans include building on the new Russell Crowe film Master and Commander in Visit Britain's 'SeaBritain 2005' campaign which, among other nautical and maritime locations. will feature HMS Trincomalee in Hartlepool.

    Parliamentary Questions
    Mrs. Curtis-Thomas
    To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport how many Questions directed to her remain unanswered. [130761]

    Mr. Caborn
    24 written parliamentary questions tabled to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport for answer up to and including Monday 15 September 2003 remain unanswered. This includes 21 ordinary written questions tabled to the Department between 9—12 September.

  FOREIGN AND COMMONWEALTH AFFAIRS

    Burma
    Mrs. Spelman
    To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on the relationship between his Department and the Burmese Government: and what recent discussions they have had about(a) the arrest of Aung San Suu Kyi and (b) human rights abuses against minority groups. [130300]

    Mr. Mike O'Brien
    The UK has made numerous representations to the Burmese authorities concerning the arrest of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi. I personally have spoken to the Burmese Deputy Foreign Minister and most recently the Burmese ambassador on 1 September, to register the UK's grave concern over the unacceptable violence and repression that has been inspired, organised and carried out by the military regime. This has been supplemented by representations 784W
    by the British embassy in Rangoon who have been instrumental in pressing for and supporting demarches to the Burmese regime, including on human rights abuses against the ethnic groups.

    International Student Visas
    Mrs. Anne Campbell
    To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs how many international student visas are issued each year. [129424]

    Mr. Mullin
    The table shows the number of student visas issued worldwide each year since 1998. Since 2001, statistics have been collated by financial year (1 April to 31 March) rather than calendar year.

    Student visas issued

    1998

    69,607

    1999

    75,607

    2000

    99,559

    FY 2001–02

    121,466

    FY 2002–03

    120,888

    Afghanistan
    Mrs. Curtis-Thomas
    To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs how many ministerial visits have been made to Afghanistan in the last six months. [129464]

    Mr. Mike O'Brien
    There have been two ministerial visits to Afghanistan in the last six months. My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary visited between 30 June and 1 July, followed by my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr. Rammell) between 22 and 27 July.

    Algeria
    Gareth Thomas
    To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what discussions he has had with the European Parliament concerning human rights violations in Algeria under the European Union Algeria Association Agreement; and what plans he has to introduce measures to increase the level of aid to that country. [130616]

    Mr. MacShane
    My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs has not discussed with the European Parliament human rights violations in Algeria under the EU/Algeria Association Agreement. The Agreement was signed on 22 April 2002, but is not yet in force. Member states, the European Community and Algeria must all ratify the Agreement before it can come into force. When the Agreement does enter into force the EU will be in a position to monitor closely Algeria's adherence to the human rights principles laid out in the Association Agreement.

    The European Parliament debated the conclusion of the EU/Algerian Association Agreement on 10 October 2002. The Parliament welcomed the plan to conclude the Agreement and hoped that the Agreement would give decisive impetus to the political and economic reforms required to improve the economic and social situation in Algeria. The European Parliament also highlighted its concerns over Algeria's human rights record.
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    The UK's bilateral development programme is focused on the poorest countries, particularly those of sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. The Government have no plans to reintroduce a bilateral development programme in Algeria, which is a middle income country. Nor do we intend to press the EC to expand its development programme in the country.

    Gareth Thomas
    To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on the ratification of the EU-Algeria Association Agreement. [130617]

    Mr. MacShane
    The Government have initiated the process for UK ratification of the EU/Algeria Association Agreement, the text of which is contained in Command Paper 5804, laid before Parliament on 9 May 2003. I anticipate that the agreement will be debated in Parliament in this session, and that the UK's ratification procedures will be completed by February 2004. The agreement will enter into force when all parties—EU member states, the European Community and Algeria—have ratified.

    China
    Mr. Drew
    To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on the treatment of Pastor Gong Shengliang, held in Jingzhou prison, Hubei Province, China. [130569]

    Mr. Rammell
    We have been concerned about reports that Pastor Gong Shengliang has suffered ill treatment in Jingzhou prison, Hubei Province. We supported an EU demarche on this subject in Beijing on 18 July. The Chinese authorities said that the allegations of torture and ill-treatment were untrue and that Pastor Gong was in good health.

    We have also raised Pastor Gong's case directly with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. On 31 July the Chinese authorities told us that Pastor Gong had had stomach problems before he was imprisoned and that following treatment the problems had stabilised. His relatives have visited him four times.

    Cyprus
    Mr. Chris Smith
    To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what representations he has made about the provision of education for Greek children recently in the Turkish-occupied part of Cyprus. [129917]

    Mr. MacShane
    The British Government take the welfare of the Greek Cypriot community in the north of Cyprus seriously. Through our High Commission in Cyprus, and with the Turkish Cypriot authorities, the UN and the Government of Cyprus, we do what we can to ameliorate the situation.

    Our High Commission is keeping a close eye on the situation concerning those students who have recently finished their primary education and are due to move to secondary education.

    Nevertheless, this remains one of the many examples of the fact that Cypriots on both sides of the island suffer because of the lack so far of a comprehensive settlement in Cyprus. We are urging the parties to resume
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    negotiations on the basis of the UN Plan, in time to allow a reunited island to accede to the EU on 1 May next year.

    European Union
    Mr. Spring
    To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs how many amendments were tabled by the right hon. Member for Neath (Mr. Hain) at the Convention on the Future of Europe; and how many were agreed to. [129131]

    Mr. MacShane
    We estimate that, excluding the reiterations of amendments tabled more than once, the UK delegation submitted 154 amendments. Many of these were technical or legal drafting amendments. Even when not accepting amendments verbatim, the Convention frequently agreed on language which met our underlying concerns in whole or in part.

    For that reason, it is not possible to put a precise figure on the number of UK proposals that were agreed to. The Convention's final draft text met the majority of the UK's objectives. As the Thessaloniki Council agreed it is 'a good starting point' for the discussions between 25 European nation states which will agree the next EU constitutional treaty.

    Framework Convention on Tobacco Control
    Mr. Jim Cunningham
    To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what action his Department is taking, in conjunction with the Department of Health, to encourage the ratification of the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control by all EU member states. [130044]

    Mr. MacShane
    The UK signed the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control in June and is currently preparing to ratify the Treaty. We will be aiming to encourage early ratification by other Member States too. The ratification timetable is likely to be discussed at the Council on 1–2 December.

    Iraq
    Mr. Challen
    To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what timetable is planned for elections in Iraq. [129613]

    Mr. Rammell
    We believe that it should be for the Iraqi people to determine the timetable for their elections, with appropriate international help as required. A Constitutional Preparatory Committee is due to report by mid-September with recommendations on drafting a constitution, a process which we hope will reach fruition by mid-2004, with the aim that national elections would be held shortly thereafter.

    Mr. Jim Cunningham
    To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what progress has been made since July regarding the involvement of other international bodies in Iraq.[130042]

    Mr. Rammell
    The Government remain committed to a vital role for the UN in Iraq, as provided for by Security Council Resolution 1483. The Security Council is currently considering a draft resolution which would encourage further participation by the UN and the international community in assisting Iraq, including in
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    the political processes leading to the formation of a representative government. The Secretary-General's report of 17 July (of which a copy has been placed in the Library of the House) identified further areas in which the UN could contribute to the initial effort in Iraq. The Government would support an increased UN contribution in these areas. Following the terrorist attack on the United Nations Head quarters in Baghdad on 19 August, the UN's efforts in Iraq have inevitably been scaled back. We are in discussion with the UN on the security measures needed to ensure that the UN is able to resume and expand its role in Iraq.

    Since July, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund have been active in Iraq producing first needs assessments for the reconstruction of Iraq. This in-country work was cut short by the outrage against the UN headquarters on 19 August, but finalisation of the assessments continues.

    It is vital for Iraq that international NGOs continue their work on the ground. It is hoped that, as the security situation in Iraq improves, these organisations will continue with their humanitarian efforts. The Madrid Donors' Conference next month should give a significant boost to Iraq's reconstruction process.

    ISAF
    Mrs. Curtis-Thomas
    To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what recent discussions he has had with representatives of allied countries on extending the mandate of the International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan; and if he will make a statement. [129075]

    Mr. Mike O'Brien
    The UK has regular discussions with international partners at all levels on all matters relating to Afghanistan, including the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF). NATO took over leadership of ISAF in August 2003 and is currently engaged in a review of ISAF's role. It would be inappropriate for us to second-guess the outcome of this review and any possible effect it might have on the ISAF mandate. But any change to ISAF's role would also require amendment of its mandate through the UN.

    Microsoft (Licensing Fees)
    Norman Lamb
    To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs how much was paid to Microsoft in licensing fees by his Department and its agencies in each of the last three years; and how much has been budgeted for(a) 2003–04 and (b) 2004–05. [130684]

    Mr. Rammell
    The amounts paid by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office for Microsoft software licences over the past three years were: £0.12 million in 2000–01; £0.61 million in 2001–02; and £0.45 million in 2002–03. Projected spend for 2003–04 is £0.15 million. There is no specific budget for Microsoft software licences in 2004–05, although the overall software budget is £2.3 million.

    Nepal
    Mrs. Curtis-Thomas
    To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on the situation in Nepal. [129465]
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    Mr. Mike O'Brien
    The collapse of the ceasefire and peace talks between the Government of Nepal and the Maoists is a very disappointing development. It heightens the risk of renewed violence and suffering in Nepal which will benefit no-one.

    It remains the firm belief of the UK Government that no military solution to the conflict is possible, and we welcome the Nepalese Government's expressed willingness to continue to pursue a peaceful solution. We strongly urge all parties to return to the negotiation table, and work together to find a lasting solution.

    The UK Government stand ready to provide support for a renewed peace process. UK assistance to Nepal has included a £6 million Global Conflict Prevention Pool package this year to help tackle the root causes of the conflict. The Department for International Development is providing £22 million of development assistance this financial year.

    Terrorism
    Llew Smith
    To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what studies have been received by the United Nations Security Council Counter Terrorism Committee from(a) academic sources, (b) think-tanks and (c) experts on terrorism; and what the policy is on the availability to the general public of submissions by the United Kingdom to the UNSCCTC. [130359]

    Mr. Rammell
    We are not aware that any reports from academic sources, think-tanks or experts on terrorism have been formally submitted to the UN's Counter-Terrorism Committee (CTC). However, the CTC has an established body of experts advising it. In the course of their work, the Experts draw on all available sources of information to provide the most up-to-date and effective guidance to the Committee. The CTC makes available to the public all reports from member states by posting them on its official website www.un.org/sc/ctc. This includes the three reports that the United Kingdom has submitted to the CTC to date.

    Uganda
    Mrs. Calton
    To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what steps are taken at the British High Commission in Uganda to ensure fair access to the High Commission for those wishing to obtain visas for entry to the UK. [129639]

    Mr. Mullin
    Since October 2002, the Visa Section in Kampala has operated a same day service despite an unprecedented level of demand for visas. UK visas have allocated two extra Entry Clearance Officers to deal with this demand.

    I am aware of problems with the current queuing system. Applications are considered on a first come first served basis but applicants with medical conditions can make pre-arranged appointments to visit the Visa Section. The elderly, children and the infirm are also given priority.

    To improve the situation, from December all applications will be submitted on paper via an outsourced courier service. Applicants will therefore not be required to visit the Visa Section to submit their applications in person.

    UN Arms Embargoes
    Mr. Gardiner
    To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what response his Department made to the UN Panel of Experts Fowler Report on its recommendations for secondary sanctions against states that have been complicit in breaching UN arms embargoes. [129864]

    Mr. Rammell
    The UK supported the recommendation by the Fowler Report to place secondary sanctions against countries complicit in breaching the UN arms embargo against Angola (UNITA) (UNSCR 864(1993). But the UK recognised that there were a number of practical difficulties to overcome, not least gaining consensus amongst Security Council members that there would be sufficient proof to declare a State guilty of deliberate sanctions busting. Initially the issue was kept alive by UNSCR 1295(2000), passed subsequent to the Fowler Report on 18 April 2000. Paragraph 5 of the resolution expressed"its readiness…to consider appropriate action in accordance with the Charter in relation to States it determines to have violated the measures contained in those [ie sanctions] resolutions, and establishes 18 November 2000 as the deadline for an initial decision in this regard".
    But when the Security Council considered the Monitoring Mechanism's (delayed) report in February 2001, Canada called for the Security Council to focus on imposing secondary sanctions, and did so again in November 2001; each time without success due to a lack of consensus.

    United Nations Security Council
    Llew Smith
    To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what plans he has during the United Kingdom presidency of the United Nations Security Council to increase the transparency of the Council's activities; and whether he plans to increase public knowledge of the content and implications of UNSC resolutions. [130369]

    Mr. Rammell
    I presented the Government's programme of work for the UK Presidency of the UN Security Council (UNSC) during the debate on the UN held in Westminster Hall on 11 September. The Programme of Work can be viewed on the website of the UK Mission to the UN in New York www.ukun.org. Wherever possible, UNSC activities are transparent, and the UK's Presidency includes a number of open meetings. For example, there have been Open Briefings on the Middle East and on Liberia, and there will be an Open Meeting on Sierra Leone and an Open Debate on Justice and the Rule of Law.

    Press statements, Presidential statements and all UNSC Resolutions are available to the public, most readily on the UN's official website www.un.org. I also refer my hon. Friend to the United Kingdom in the United Nations Command Paper (Cm 5898).

  EDUCATION AND SKILLS

    Access to Learning Fund
    Mr. Boswell
    To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills if he will make a statement on the 790W
    (a) use, (b) development and (c) cost of the Access to Learning Fund. [129988]

    Mr. Ivan Lewis
    The Access to Learning Fund (ALF) is a new non-repayable discretionary Fund administered by institutions with HE students and aimed at providing additional support for those who need extra financial help to access or remain in Higher Education. Priority groups for assistance include: students with children (especially lone-parents); mature students; students from low income families; disabled students; care leavers and students from Foyers or who are homeless.

    The ALF is being introduced following consultation with institutions' and students' representatives to ensure that awards are made on a consistent and transparent basis. The ALF is currently being piloted in approximately 50 institutions and subject to evaluation it is intended to be rolled out in all institutions from 2004–05.

    In 2004–05 £65.5 million will be available through the Access to Learning Fund.

    Adult Qualifications
    Mr. Willis
    To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills how many people aged(a) 19–30 and (b) over 30 in the working population have not achieved (i) a Level 2 qualification and (ii) a Level 3 qualification. [130719]

    Alan Johnson
    The following table shows analysis of the working population (i.e. economically active) for those aged(a) 19–30 and (b) over 30 who lack a Level 2 and Level 3 qualification. Data come from the Labour Force Survey in spring 2003 and cover England only.

    Age band 19 to 30

    Percentage

    Age band Over 301

    Percentage

    Below Level 2

    1,294,000

    22

    5,646,000

    32

    Below Level 3

    2,629,000

    44

    9.234,000

    53

    Total work force

    5,921,000

    —

    17,568,000

    —

    1This age band covers economically active males aged 31–64 and economically active females aged 31–59.

    Apprenticeships
    Mr. Boswell
    To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what the(a) current participation and (b) latest annual completion rates are for (i) foundation and (ii) advanced modern apprenticeships, broken down by proposed sector skills council areas. [129985]

    Mr. Ivan Lewis
    The Learning and Skills Council (LSC) publish work based learning participation numbers and success rates by area of learning rather than by sector. The 14 areas of learning are used by the LSC, the Adult Learning Inspectorate and Ofsted. Numbers participating on advanced modern apprenticeships (AMA) and foundation modern apprenticeships (FMA) as at 1 November 2002 by area of learning are shown in the following table.
    791W

    Learners on 1 November 2002 by area of learning

    000s

    Area of Learning

    AMA

    FMA

    Business administration, Management and Professional

    12.1

    17.9

    Construction

    11.3

    18.1

    Engineering, Technology and Manufacturing

    46.9

    13

    English, Languages and Communication

    —

    —

    Foundation programmes

    —

    —

    Hairdressing and Beauty Therapy

    5.2

    13.9

    Health, Social Care and Public Services

    11.1

    13.9

    Hospitality, Sports, Leisure and Travel

    8.9

    15

    Humanities

    —

    —

    Information and Communication Technology

    4.1

    4.1

    Land based provision

    1.6

    3.2

    Retailing, Customer Service and Transportation

    10.2

    22.1

    Success rates by area of learning and programme type 2001/02

    Framework (X per cent)

    NVQ Only (Y per cent.)

    Framework or NVQ (X plus y per cent)

    Total leavers numbers

    Advanced Modern Apprenticeships

    Business Administration Management and Professional

    25

    12

    37

    10,400

    Construction

    33

    14

    46

    8,700

    Engineering, Technology and Manufacturing

    38

    9

    47

    13,000

    English, Languages and Communications

    —

    —

    —

    —

    Hairdressing and Beauty Therapy

    22

    8

    30

    3,900

    Health, Social Care and Public Services

    22

    13

    35

    7,400

    Hospitality, Sports Leisure and Travel

    19

    6

    26

    8,400

    Humanities

    —

    —

    —

    —

    Information and Communication technology

    31

    9

    40

    1,800

    Land-based provision

    24

    10

    34

    900

    Other Foundation Programmes

    —

    —

    —

    —

    Retailing, Customer Service and Transportation

    16

    9

    24

    10,400

    Science and Maths

    36

    2

    39

    100

    Visual & Performing Arts & Media

    31

    17

    48

    400

    Unspecified AOL

    11

    11

    22

    100

    Total

    26

    10

    36

    65,400

    Foundation Modern Apprenticeships

    Business Administration Management and Professional

    26

    11

    38

    15,100

    Construction

    24

    12

    36

    7,100

    Engineering, Technology and Manufacturing

    19

    13

    32

    6,900

    English, Languages and Communications

    —

    —

    —

    —

    Hairdressing and Beauty Therapy

    26

    11

    36

    7,500

    Health, Social Care and Public Services

    15

    13

    28

    9,000

    Hospitality, Sports Leisure and Travel

    19

    12

    31

    13,900

    Humanities

    —

    —

    —

    —

    Information and Communication technology

    46

    8

    54

    4,200

    Land-based provision

    26

    15

    41

    2,500

    Other Foundation Programmes

    —

    —

    —

    —

    Retailing, Customer Service and Transportation

    19

    11

    30

    25,000

    Science and Maths

    —

    —

    —

    —

    Visual & Performing Arts & Media

    22

    15

    37

    100

    Unspecified AOL

    0

    2

    2

    500

    Total

    22

    11

    34

    91,800

    Source:

    Individualised Learner Record 2001/02

    Data Protection
    Miss McIntosh
    To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills under what powers a county council may keep a person's P45 details on file after they have been used as part of a student loan application; and for what length of time such details may be kept. [129628]

    Alan Johnson
    The basis for the county council processing the P45 derives from s. 22(2)(a) of the Teaching and Higher Education Act 1998, and the
    792W

    Learners on 1 November 2002 by area of learning

    000s

    Area of Learning

    AMA

    FMA

    Science and Mathematics

    0.2

    0.1

    Visual and Performing Arts and Media

    0.7

    0.2

    Unspecified area of learning

    0.9

    0.8

    Total

    113.3

    120.8

    Source:

    Individualised Learner Record 2002/03

    Success rates by area of learning for those who left a modern apprenticeship in 2001/02 were published on 24 July, 2003 by the LSC in the Statistical First Release ISR/SFR25. These are shown in the following table.

    relevant provision of the applicable Student Support Regulations (e.g. reg 6(3) of the Education (Student Support) (No. 2) Regulations 2002 which states:
    "An applicant shall demonstrate his eligibility for support by providing such evidence as the Secretary of State may require.")

    The basis for keeping a person's P45 details on file is firstly that this is a National Audit Office requirement and as such the NAO is entitled to audit the assessment and payment of loans and can request supporting documentation relating to main ledger financial transactions for a period of up to six years after after the end of the financial year in which the transaction took place. Secondly, the Limitation Act 1980, which applies

    793W
    to proceedings by and against the Crown, and has the effect that proceedings to recover money must be instituted within six years of the money becoming due. Evidence used for the assessment is therefore required to be retained to support or defend any such action.

    1. The four main acts of parliament from which the Comptroller and Auditor General and the NAO derive their authority are:

    (a)The Government Resources and Accounts Act 2000

    (b)National Audit Act 1983

    (c)Exchequer and Audit Departments Act 1921

    (d)Exchequer and Audit Departments Act 1866

    Education Funding (Buckinghamshire)
    Mrs. Gillan
    To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills if he will make a statement on the impact of the area cost adjustment on education funding in(a) Chesham and Amersham and (b) Buckinghamshire. [129888]

    Mr. Miliband
    The Area Cost Adjustment provides funding top-ups for areas where it costs more to recruit and retain staff. It uses the New Earnings Survey to calculate earnings differentials between different areas in the country. A threshold is set below which all authorities are given the same area cost adjustment factor. The area cost adjustment factor for Buckinghamshire is 1.0943. It is for Buckinghamshire local education authority to decide on the distribution of funding within Buckinghamshire, in consultation with its schools.

    Individual Learning Accounts
    Mr. Willis
    To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills how much money has been set aside for Individual Learning Accounts for(a) 2003–04, (b) 2004–05 and (c) 2005–06. [130721]

    Mr. Ivan Lewis
    In order to meet remaining commitments under the original ILA Programme, a budget of £8.013 million has been set aside for 2003–04. The remaining funding originally set aside for Individual Learning Accounts has been re-deployed to support the implementation of proposals set out in the White Paper '21 Century Skills: Realising our Potential' published on 9 July 2003.

    Key Stage 2 (Buckinghamshire)
    Mrs. Gillan
    To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what percentage of 11-year-olds in(a) the Chesham and Amersham constituency and (b) Buckinghamshire have achieved Key Stage 2 in each year since 1997 in (i) maths and (ii) English. [129885]

    Mr. Miliband
    The percentage of pupils achieving Level 4 or above at Key Stage 2 in(a) the Chesham and Amersham constituency and (b) Buckinghamshire local education authority (LEA) from 1997 to 2003:
    794W

    Chesham and Aniersham constituency

    Buckinghamshire LEA

    England

    English

    20031

    85

    80

    75

    2002

    86

    79

    75

    2001

    86

    82

    75

    2000

    85

    81

    75

    1999

    83

    77

    71

    1998

    78

    73

    65

    1997

    80

    73

    63

    Mathematics

    20031

    81

    77

    73

    2002

    82

    76

    73

    2001

    81

    76

    71

    2000

    82

    76

    72

    1999

    81

    73

    69

    1998

    72

    64

    59

    1997

    75

    69

    62

    1 Provisional

    Older Workers
    Mr. Hancock
    To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skill what assessment he has made of the level of career advice available to workers over 50; what plans he has to improve the profile of the service; and if he will make a statement. [129039]

    Mr. Ivan Lewis
    During 2002 my officials instigated a project to gauge the career advice needs of the over 45 age group. The findings from this project are being used to improve services and to inform policy for the reform of the information, advice and guidance (IAG) service for adults. A copy of the report has been lodged in the Library. Part of the reform will be to improve the accessibility and visibility of services through development of an overarching identity for IAG services for adults.

    Pupil Exclusions
    Mr. Damian Green
    To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what powers he has to overturn the decision to(a) exclude a pupil and (b) reinstate an excluded pupil; and what effect legislation enacted since 1997 has had on the powers of his office in this respect. [127890]

    Mr. Ivan Lewis
    The Secretary of State has no powers to overturn the decision to exclude a pupil or to reinstate an excluded pupil. No legislation enacted since 1997 has had any effect on his powers in these respects.

    School Exclusions and Suspensions(North Tyneside)
    Mr. Alan Campbell
    To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills how many school(a) exclusions and (b) suspensions there were in North Tyneside in 2001–02. [130385]

    Mr. Ivan Lewis
    In 2001–02 there were 56 permanent exclusions from maintained primary, secondary and all special schools in North Tyneside. The table shows how the number and percentage of excluded pupils in North Tyneside compares with regional and national figures.
    795W

    Number of permanent exclusions by type of school 2001–2002 (provisional)

    Primary1

    Secondary1

    Special23

    Total

    Number of Percentage exclusions

    permanent of the school population3

    Number of Percentage exclusions

    permanent of the school population3

    Number of Percentage exclusions

    permanent of the school population3

    Number of Percentage exclusions

    permanent of the school population3

    England

    1,451

    0.03

    7,741

    0.24

    343

    0.36

    9,535

    0.12

    North East

    62

    0.03

    409

    0.23

    16

    0.27

    487

    0.12

    North Tyneside

    5

    0.03

    49

    0.35

    2

    0.30

    56

    0.18

    1Includes middle schools as deemed.

    2Includes Maintained and Non-Maintained Special Schools.

    3The number of permanent exclusions expressed as a percentage of the number (headcount) pupils in Primary, Secondary and Special schools, excluding dualy registered pupils in special schools in January 2002.

    The Department has recently started to collect information from Local Education Authorities on both fixed term and permanent exclusions on a termly basis. However, reliable findings from this data collection exercise are not expected to be available until next year.

    Skills Acquisition and Accreditation
    Mr. Boswell
    To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what action he is taking to support local technical agreements on skills acquisition and accreditation between employers and further education colleges below national Sector Skills Council requirements. [129983]

    Mr. Ivan Lewis
    The aim of our recently published skills strategy, "21st Century Skills-Realising Our Potential", is to ensure that employers have the right skills to support the success of their businesses, and individuals have the skills they need to be both employable and personally fulfilled. As with "Success for All", the Department's strategy for the reform of further education, a key part of the strategy is to ensure that colleges and training providers are more responsive to the needs of employers, and those of individual learners. Sector Skills Councils (SSCs) will lead the drive to increase productivity and develop the required skills within their industry sectors. Through sector skills agreements they will work with their employers and with planning and funding agencies like the Learning and Skills Council (LSC) to agree an action plan for addressing priority skills needs. However, further education colleges will continue to determine the specific range and volume of courses they offer and will need to continue to be responsive to their local employers, providing bespoke training based on local agreements as appropriate. The pattern of provision will continue to be agreed in discussion with the local LSC, reflecting national and regional priorities as well of those of the locality.

    Student Finance
    Mr. Boswell
    To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what information he collates on differences in the recovery of outstanding student loans from graduates who are(a) based in the United Kingdom and (b) resident abroad. [129731]

    Alan Johnson
    Student loans are available to students domiciled in the United Kingdom. Data are collected on the payment and repayment of student loans, separately for income contingent loans (which were introduced in September 1998 as part of the new student support arrangements) and mortgage style loans (mostly 796W
    applying to those who entered higher education before academic year 1998/99). These data are split according to the domicile of the borrower at the point of entering HE.

    Data on the current residence of the mortgage style loan borrowers are not available in the Department. The recovery regime for these loans is the same for all borrowers whether resident in or outside of the UK. These loans are repayable on a mortgage style basis over five or seven years, depending on the number of loans taken out. Borrowers may apply to defer repayments for up to a year at a time if their income is below the current deferment threshold, otherwise repayments will be collected, whether the borrower is overseas or not.

    Repayments of income contingent loans from borrowers resident in the UK are reported at the time when the Student Loans Company are notified of the repayments by the Inland Revenue, which may be one or more years after the tax year they relate to. Due to the time lag in collecting the information from the Inland Revenue it is too early in the scheme to have robust data for either comparison or trend purposes.

    The Student Loans Company operates a separate recovery regime for income contingent loan borrowers who are outside of the UK tax system. The mechanism for collecting repayments requires borrowers to declare their total annual income to the SLC who calculate the repayment due, mirroring the rules applying to borrowers within the tax system. Sufficient robust data are not yet available.

    Teacher Workloads
    Mr. Damian Green
    To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what meetings he has had with(a) the Secondary Heads Association, (b) the Local Government Association, (c) the National Union of Teachers, (d) National Association of Schoolmasters/Union of Women Teachers and (e) National Association of Head Teachers with regard to the teachers workload agreement since January. [127878]

    Mr. Miliband
    I have chaired several of the regular meetings of the Workforce Agreement Monitoring Group, which comprises representatives from the signatories to the Agreement. The group includes SHA, NAHT, NASUWT and the LGA.

    The NUT chose not to sign the National Agreement and have therefore excluded themselves from those meetings. However, I recently met a delegation from the NUT to discuss their response to the statutory consultation on implementing the National Agreement,

    797W
    which included changes to the School Teachers' Pay and Conditions Document, draft regulations to be made under section 133 of the Education Act 2002 and accompanying guidance.

    Vocational Qualifications
    Rob Marris
    To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what plans he has to improve the collection of data on the number of people who enter higher education on the basis of (a) vocational and(b) work-based learning qualifications. [129525]

    Alan Johnson
    The main source of data on the entry qualifications of HE students is the Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA) student record. This already identifies students with vocational qualifications and non-academic qualifications (such as accreditation of prior learning). The student record is reviewed regularly to ensure that it collects data which are relevant and fit for purpose, for instance the 2002/03 return has been enhanced to identify students funded by the University for Industry.

  CABINET OFFICE

    Information Technology
    Dr. Pugh
    To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office how much the Cabinet Office spent on IT licences in 2002–03. [124425]

    Mr. Alexander
    The Cabinet Office spent £3,569,807 on IT licences in 2002–03.

    Dr. Pugh
    To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office how much the Cabinet Office spent on(a) IT hardware, (b) software and (c) maintenance in 2002–03. [124432]

    Mr. Alexander
    The Cabinet Office spent £4,094,292 on IT hardware, £1,800,331 on software and £11,249,997 on maintenance in 2002–03.

  HOME DEPARTMENT

    Counter-terrorism
    Miss McIntosh
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will conduct counter-terrorism exercises with respect to(a) aviation and (b) shipping. [R] [129632]

    Mr. Blunkett
    Our current counter-terrorism exercise programme involves both aviation and maritime scenarios.

    Acting Chief Constable Richard Thomas
    Paul Flynn
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what the cost was of the investigation into the alleged conduct of the acting Chief Constable Richard Thomas of Gwent police. [129868]

    Ms Blears
    Gwent police informs me that the West Mercia police conducted the investigation. The total of all invoices received and paid by Gwent police amounts to £20,476.66.

    Asylum Seekers
    Mr. Andrew Turner
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Deparment how many people in his Department deal with immigration and asylum issues, broken down by section; and what the function of each section is. [128755]

    Beverley Hughes
    The number of full-time equivalent staff in the Immigration and Nationality Directorate by business area, at 30 June 2003 was:

    Number

    Immigration Service-(including border controls and removals)

    6,500

    Asylum support, asylum casework and appeals

    2,830

    Managed Migration (applications for leave to remain, nationality and work permits)

    1,690

    Non-operational (includes policy development and corporate services)

    1,880

    Mr. Wray
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what assistance is given to successful asylum applicants to help them integrate within their new community. [129108]

    Beverley Hughes
    Our strategy "Full and Equal Citizens", which we will be reviewing shortly, sets out the Government's cross-departmental strategy for the integration of refugees. It is monitored by the National Refugee Integration Forum, which I chair. In addition to the work of other Departments as set out in the strategy, the Home Office itself helps fund a number of community development programmes being taken forward by the leading national and regional refugee organisations. In addition, we fund small community groups working with refugees through the Refugee Community Development Fund. The Challenge Fund and the European Refugee Fund have also been established on the basis of providing a carefully evaluated programme of projects to identify what does work in integration.

    Mrs. Curtis-Thomas
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many children have been(a) refused and (b) granted asylum since March 2003. [129473]

    Beverley Hughes
    The table shows the outcomes of initial decisions made on applicants aged under-18 at the time of their decision. These figures exclude dependants, and are based on the claimed age of applicants. The figures will overstate the true number of initial decisions since some applicants aged 18 or over claim to be younger than that in their application. Initial decisions may relate to applications made in earlier periods.

    Initial decisions outcomes for asylum applicants claiming to be aged under-18 at time of initial decision1,2,3,4

    Principal applicants (cases)

    2002

    Q1 2003 (January to March)

    Q2 2003 (April to June)

    Total initial decisions

    11,200

    3,085

    1,690

    Granted asylum

    960

    210

    85

    Granted exceptional leave

    6,620

    1,835

    n/a

    799W

    Initial decisions outcomes for asylum applicants claiming to be aged under-18 at time of initial decision1,2,3,4

    Principal applicants (cases)

    2002

    Q1 2003 (January to March)

    Q2 2003 (April to June)

    .Granted humanitarian protection

    n/a

    n/a

    10

    Granted discretionary leave

    n/a

    n/a

    925

    Refused

    3,625

    1,040

    670

    1Figures are rounded to the nearest 5.

    2Excluding the outcome of appeals or other subsequent decisions.

    3Figures may overstate because some applicants aged 18 or over may claim to be younger on leaving their country of origin.

    4Data are provisional.

    Information on the number and outcomes of initial decisions is published quarterly on the Home Office website at: http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/ immigration l.html

    Mrs. Curtis-Thomas
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many Turkish citizens applied for asylum in the UK in 2001; and how many were successful in their application. [129479]

    Beverley Hughes
    3,695 nationals of Turkey applied for asylum in the United Kingdom in 2001 (excluding dependants). In 2001, there were 7,825 initial decisions made on asylum applications from Turkish nationals, 210 grants of asylum, 275 grants of exceptional leave to remain (ELR), and 7,340 refusals. Data on initial decisions in 2001 may relate to applications made in earlier years.

    During 2001, 1,840 appeals against Home Office decisions on Turkish asylum claims were determined by adjudicators of the Immigration Appellate Authority (IAA). Of these, 485 were allowed, 1,295 were dismissed and 60 cases were withdrawn. Appeal outcomes in 2001 may relate to initial decisions made in earlier years. The figures exclude any further appeals (Immigration Appeals Tribunal, Court of Appeal, judicial review, House of Lords).

    Information on the number of asylum applications and initial decisions is published quarterly on the Home Office website at: http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/immigrationl.html

    Charities
    Mr. Sanders
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will list the organisations that responded, and how they responded, to the idea of self-regulation contained within "Charities and Not-For Profits: A Modern Legal Framework", giving the type of respondent. [129154]

    Fiona Mactaggart
    The recommendations on self-regulation in fundraising were made by the Strategy Unit in its review of charity law arid regulation ("Private Action, Public Benefit", published September 2002).

    In its response to the review ("Charities and Not-for-Profits: a Modern Legal Framework", published 16 July 2003) the Government supported the idea that self-regulation should be the first resort in improving fundraising standards.
    800W
    The following people and organisations commented on the recommendations on self-regulation in fundraising

    Action on Disability and Development

    Action for Street Kids

    Agents for Change

    Allen and Overy solicitors

    Alzheimer's Society

    Archbishops Council

    Association of Charitable Foundations

    Association of Charity Independent Examiners

    Association of Charity Officers

    Association of Charity Shops

    Association of Chief Executives of Voluntary Organisations

    Association of Corporate Trustees

    Association of Fundraising Consultants

    Association of Preservation Trusts

    Baker Tilly accountants

    Barnardo's

    Bates, Wells and Braithwaite solicitors

    Birmingham Voluntary Service Council

    Birmingham Charities Council

    Birmingham City Council

    Black Training and Enterprise Group

    Blandford Forum Town Council

    Blue Cross

    Bristol City Council

    British Association of Settlements and Social Action Centres

    British Heart Foundation

    British Limbless Ex-Servicemen's Association

    British Overseas Aid Group

    British Red Cross

    British Trust for Conservation Volunteers

    Campaign for Protection of Rural Wales

    Cancer Research UK

    Caring Together

    Catholic Agency for Overseas Development

    Chantrey Vellacott DFK accountants

    Charities Aid Foundation

    Charity Check

    Charity Commission

    Charity Law Association

    Charles Russell solicitors

    Chartered Institute of Water and Environmental Management

    Chesterfield and North-East Derbyshire Council for Voluntary Service

    Children's Society

    Christian Aid

    Church in Wales

    Community Matters

    Consumers' Association

    Countryside Agency

    Craigmyle

    Crossroads Association

    801W

    Denbighshire Voluntary Services Council

    Derby Mountain Rescue Team

    Development Trusts Association

    Dicky Tickers Heart Support Group

    Diocese of St. Asaph, Church in Wales

    Directory of Social Change

    Disabilities Trust

    Duke of Edinburgh's Award

    Dyson Bell solicitors

    Ethical Investment Research Service

    Evelina Family Trust

    Exeter Council for Voluntary Service

    Fairbridge

    Fifth Estate

    Friends of the Earth and Friends of the Earth Charitable Trust

    Fruitful Fundraising

    Grant Thornton accountants

    Great Ormond Street Hospital Children's Charity

    Growing Place

    Guideposts Trust

    Guy's and St. Thomas' Charitable Foundation

    Help the Aged

    WH Henderson

    Home Farm Trust

    Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales

    Institute of Chartered Secretaries and Administrators

    Institute of Fundraising

    Jordans

    Kingston Smith accountants

    Law Society

    Leonard Cheshire Foundation

    Lichfield and District Council for Voluntary Service

    LionHeart

    Local Government Association

    London Play

    London Voluntary Service Council

    RJA Lonsdale

    Macmillan Cancer Relief

    Marie Curie Cancer Care

    Mazars accountants

    Middle Temple Charitable Trusts

    Roger Morton

    Motability

    Multiple Sclerosis Society

    Muscular Dystrophy Campaign

    National Association of Independent Schools and Non-Maintained Special Schools

    National Confederation of Parent Teacher Associations

    National Council for Voluntary Organisations

    National Library for the Blind

    National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children

    National Trust

    Northamptonshire ACRE

    Northern Ireland Council for Voluntary Action

    Northern Ireland Federation of Housing Associations

    Oxfam

    People's Dispensary for Sick Animals

    802W

    PricewaterhouseCoopers

    Public Fundraising Regulatory Association

    Purbeck District Council

    Raise

    Regional Action West Midlands

    Reigate and Banstead Borough Council

    rethink

    Rose Road Association

    Royal British Legion

    Royal College of General Practitioners

    Royal National Institute of the Blind

    Royal National Institute for Deaf People

    Royal National Lifeboat Institute

    Royal Society for the Protection of Birds

    Runnymede Borough Council

    Salvation Army

    Emma Sambrook

    St. Martins Housing Trust

    St. Oswald's Hospice, Newcastle

    Andrew Scadding and Adele Shaw

    School Library Association

    Scope

    SPARKS

    SSAFA Forces Help

    Staffordshire Moorlands Council for Voluntary Service

    Surrey Care Trust

    Swindon Borough Council

    University Hospital Birmingham Charities

    Voluntary Action Camden

    Voluntary Organisations' Network North East

    War on Want

    Warwick District Council for Voluntary Service

    Welsh Assembly Government

    Wessex Medical Trust

    West Midlands Charity Trustees Forum

    West Somerset District Council

    Woking Borough Council

    Women's Aid

    Women's Royal Voluntary Service

    Woodland Trust

    Mamie Woodward

    WWF-UK

    Wychavon District Council

    Julia Wylie solicitor

    YMCA England

    Yorkshire Rural Community Council

    Levels of support by these respondents for the Strategy Unit's recommendations for self-regulation in fundraising, broken down by type of respondent, are shown in the table:
    803W

    Type of respondent

    Clear support

    Some support

    Non-committal

    Some opposition

    Clear opposition

    Small charities

    —

    —

    —

    —

    1

    Independent schools

    —

    —

    —

    —

    —

    Large charities

    17

    28

    1

    5

    2

    Medium charities

    7

    3

    —

    —

    1

    Umbrella bodies

    13

    5

    —

    2

    1

    Others

    —

    —

    —

    —

    —

    Charity workers

    3

    2

    —

    1

    1

    Professional advisers

    3

    11

    1

    1

    2

    Special interest bodies

    2

    5

    2

    —

    1

    Government

    —

    4

    1

    3

    6

    Umbrella bodies for small charities

    5

    3

    1

    1

    —

    Voluntary organisations

    3

    —

    —

    —

    —

    Social enterprises

    —

    —

    —

    —

    —

    Professional bodies

    —

    4

    —

    —

    —

    Academics

    —

    —

    —

    —

    —

    Total

    53

    65

    6

    13

    15

    Child Trafficking
    Brian Cotter
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what assessment his Department has made of recommendations put forward in the UNICEF report, "Stop the Traffic", to assist victims of child trafficking in the UK; and if he will make a statement. [1290861

    Beverley Hughes
    The Government welcome the UNICEF report drawing attention to the heinous crime of trafficking. Work is already in hand to develop a better understanding of the scale of child trafficking, and the Home Office has sponsored research by the International Organisation for Migration that will be presented to a major EU conference later this month.

    Work to develop intelligence and co-ordinate operations against trafficking is the responsibility of Reflex, the multi-agency response to organised immigration crime. Reflex has supported Operation Paladin Child which is profiling unaccompanied children arriving at Heathrow, as well as similar exercises at Gatwick and Dover.

    The Sexual Offences Bill, currently before Parliament, introduces wide ranging criminal sanctions covering trafficking and sexual exploitation of children. We are committed to introducing legislation covering trafficking for other purposes when parliamentary time permits.

    Responsibility for child protection falls to Social Services under the Children Act 1989. There are wide ranging proposals for changes to the child protection arrangements contained in the Green Paper, "Every Child Matters", published recently. In particular, co-ordination arrangements between social services and the police will be enhanced through greater clarity over the responsibilities of Area Child Protection Committees. The Home Office has developed a Trafficking Toolkit, published earlier this year, with practical advice around identifying and supporting victims of trafficking that is available to police and social services.

    Brian Cotter
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what plans his Department has to introduce a system whereby victims of child trafficking are given leave to stay in the UK for a period of reflection of up to six months; and if he will make a statement. [129087]
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    Beverley Hughes
    There are no plans to introduce a blanket reflection period for the victims of trafficking, children or adults. Rather, each case is considered on its individual merits.

    Brian Cotter
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what resources his Department will make available to provide for specialist training for immigration officers and social workers in order to(a) help them identify cases of child trafficking and (b) provide them with the necessary skills to assist victims of child trafficking; and if he will make a statement. [129088]

    Beverley Hughes
    The Government are committed to protecting trafficked children, and have recently announced a Children's Commissioner for England and other measures to protect vulnerable children in the wake of the recommendations from the Laming Inquiry into the tragic death of Victoria Climbié

    All immigration officers are already trained to a high standard in interviewing skills. In addition to this, the Immigration Service is shortly to deliver specialist training to around 600 operational members of staff nation-wide. Central to the theme of the course will be that children arriving in the UK may be here as a result of coercion or criminal activity, including trafficking.

    Immigration officers also receive regular intelligence bulletins and inter-agency briefings that highlight issues and trends in respect of trafficking so that they may make informed decisions. All UK immigration officers at ports of entry have been issued with a profile of potential child trafficking victims.

    The Home Office has also recently published a 'trafficking toolkit', providing guidance for immigration officers on how to recognise a victim of trafficking and what to do if such a victim is encountered. A vice team consisting of specially selected immigration officers has also been established in London. The team is fully aware of the procedures for the identification of trafficked children.

    It is for local councils to decide training priorities for social workers. However, the Government have made £6 million available in the Training Support Programme grant for post-qualification specialist training for social workers, with a target of 7,000 social workers awarded the Child Care Post-qualifying Award by 2006.
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    There is also new post-qualifying funding for social workers in the Human Resources Development Strategy grant at £0.5 million this year, rising to £13 million by 2005–06.

    Brian Cotter
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what plans his Department has to provide central funding for specialist care and protection for the victims of child trafficking in the UK; and if he will make a statement. [129090]

    Beverley Hughes
    Child victims of trafficking are referred to social services to receive assistance and support based on their particular needs. Social services have a duty under the Children Act 1989 to safeguard and promote the welfare of children who are in need by providing a range and level of services appropriate to those children's needs or, where appropriate, by arranging for the provision of services from other agencies. Child victims of trafficking are likely to be in need of welfare services and—in many cases—protection under the Children Act 1989.

    There is no current specific earmarked funding for services of this nature. Instead, Government funding is allocated to councils with social services responsibilities on the basis of the needs of their populations. A weighted capitation formula is used to determine each body's target fair share of available resources. It is, therefore, for councils, working in partnership with relevant stakeholders, to determine their spending priorities on the basis of local needs.

    Entitlement Card Scheme
    Linda Perham
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what criteria he has set to evaluate the success of his Department's pilot entitlement card scheme. [128276]

    Beverley Hughes
    The Government have not announced that they will be piloting an entitlement card scheme. My hon. Friend is probably referring to press reports of a proposed UK Passport Service project to pilot the recording of facial recognition, fingerprint and iris image biometric information for passports and the proposed passport card. Discussions with short-listed suppliers are still continuing.

    Fixed Penalty Notices
    Mrs. Calton
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many motorists who were served with a fixed penalty notice for speeding in 2002–03 as a result of information recorded on speed cameras were subsequently informed that a mistake had been made and that no prosecution would result. [129770]

    Ms Blears
    This information is not collected centrally.

    Mrs. Calton
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what arrangements are in place for ensuring that motorists are not served with fixed penalty notices for speeding when the details of their vehicle are incorrectly recorded. [129782]

    Ms Blears
    Before the issue of a fixed penalty notice, officers analysing offences caught on film check the registration of the car against the DVLA record and the police national computer. A further check is made on the vehicle model and colour. Plans by a number of 806W
    police forces to introduce in the near future automated viewing technology into the system should further reduce errors. Where an error is identified, the notice is withdrawn and the situation investigated to see whether further operative training or other remedial action is required.

    The most likely reason for an innocent person to be sent a fixed penalty notice is that the vehicle detected had been stolen and given the registration of another registered vehicle to disguise it. The police take this type of criminal activity very seriously and investigate each case thoroughly. To help counter the problem. it has been a requirement since January to show proof of entitlement when buying a number plate; number plate suppliers have to be registered with DVLA and maintain records of transactions. DVLA are currently conducting a consultation exercise on the possible incorporation on number plates of additional features which would make it more difficult to display them on vehicles for which they were not intended.

    Foreign Travel Documents
    Paul Flynn
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what the policy of the Passport Office is on advising members of the public about the travel documents required for foreign travel. [130245]

    Beverley Hughes
    The UK Passport Service (UKPS) has a comprehensive marketing and communications strategy that includes a range of initiatives to advise members of the public about the passport requirements for foreign travel. UKPS works closely with the travel trade and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) to ensure that timely and relevant information is conveyed. UKPS advises travellers to check with relevant embassies about visa requirements and length of passport validity which must remain to travel to each country as these are matters for them to determine. UKPS also distributes its literature to a range of organisations including the Citizens' Advice Bureau and Registrars offices throughout England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

    Media campaigns are normally planned to take place in early January and autumn each year to remind customers to think about their passport requirements and act as early as possible. Most recently UKPS and the FCO worked together to publicise the new requirements for travel to USA, about which there are ongoing discussions between the FCO and US.

    The UKPS has a range of information channels, which it utilises to convey its messages. These include:
    an established 24 x 7 Passport Adviceline on 0870 521 0410;
    a comprehensive website at www.passport.gov.uk; and
    a network of high street partners which include the Post Office and Worldchoice travel agents.

    All these contact details are shown in media advertising.

    The UKPS also produces contact cards, which are available via its website, to businesses, voluntary organisations etc. who wish to provide their clients with contact details for the UK Passport Service.

    Forensic Science Service
    Miss McIntosh
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what representations he has received regarding the proposed privatisation of the Forensic Science Service; and if he will make a statement. [129627]

    Ms Blears
    In his statement of 17 July 2003, my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary explained the reasons for the proposal that the Forensic Science Service should become a public private partnership. To date, representations about the future status of the organisation have been received from two trade unions, Prospect and PCS, from Brendan Barber, General Secretary of the TUC, and from 71 hon. Members.

    Graffiti
    Mr. Ivan Henderson
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what initiatives his Department has introduced since 1997 to tackle the problems of graffiti. [1296941

    Ms Blears
    Graffiti and abandoned vehicles spoil our enjoyment of public places, and can increase fear of crime and produce an environment where crime and anti-social behaviour can thrive. They are a burden on businesses and the local authorities that are left to clean up graffiti on property and remove abandoned vehicles. The annual cost of graffiti clean up in London alone is £23 million.

    We are introducing a package or measures to prevent graffiti and to ensure that it is removed swiftly when it does occur:
    The Anti-Social Behaviour Bill contains proposals to give local authorities new powers to clean graffiti from certain types of private property, including cable boxes, post boxes, phone booths, and property associated with public transport.
    The Bill also contains proposals to ban the sale of spray paints to under 19s. The sale of aerosols will be controlled in much the same way that the sale of glue and solvent are currently controlled. The bill also proposes to give local authorities power to issue Fixed Penalty Notices for graffiti and fly posting. Offenders would have to pay a £50 penalty or be prosecuted through the courts. Councils already use these powers to tackle littering.
    The Criminal Justice Bill contains measures to close the loophole which prevents the police from searching for items which they suspect may be intended for use in causing criminal damage, such as spray paints.

    It is estimated that 238,000 vehicles were abandoned in 2000–01. These nuisance vehicles become a magnet for arson and anti-social behaviour. Measures introduced to tackle this problem include:
    In 2002 the period of notice that local authorities and the DVLA need to give before removing and disposing of nuisance vehicles was reduced. Local authorities now only need to give 24 hours notice of their intention to remove an abandoned vehicle of value. Abandoned vehicles of no value can be removed to a pound immediately—and local authorities now only need to
    808W
    wait seven days before disposing of them. We also made it possible for local authorities to take on DVLA powers to tackle unlicensed vehicles.
    Continuous registration comes into to force from January 2004. From then, the keeper of a vehicle will be responsible for licensing it until DVLA is informed of its disposal. This will enable more rigorous enforcement action against those dumping vehicles.
    There is a lot of good practice already taking place. The "Operation Cubit" model brings together agencies such as the police, local authorities and the DVLA to take action in an area blighted by nuisance vehicles. We will be looking in the coming months at how best to rollout these successes, in the context of our anti-social behaviour agenda.

    International Student Visas
    Mrs. Anne Campbell
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what annual income his Department expects to gain from introducing charges for international student visas. [129427]

    Beverley Hughes
    My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary announced in February 2002 in his White Paper: Secure Borders, Safe Haven: Integration with Diversity in Modern Britain, that he would be introducing charges in order to fund the modernisation of Immigration and Nationality Directorate (IND). The regulations were laid on 10 July. IND already charges fee in respect of Nationality applications, for Travel Documents, and since 1 April this year for work permits.

    We continue to welcome the many foreign nationals, who choose to study, work and live in the UK—they boost our economy and add to our thriving cosmopolitan society. Many apply to extend their stay each year, and it is right that they should meet the costs of that.

    The Government have made significant investment in recent years to improve all aspects of the Immigration and Nationality Directorate, including the standard of service people receive when they submit applications. Charging will help us to continue to improve the efficiency and the speed with which we process these applications, leading to ever-higher levels of customer service.

    The estimated revenue from the introduction of charging for leave to remain applications is £90 million.

    The estimated revenue from international students is approximately £21 million per annum.

    Mrs. Anne Campbell
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he will monitor charges for international student visas to see whether they have a deterrent effect. [129428]

    Beverley Hughes
    The fees are set under Treasury rules to recover the full administrative cost entailed in considering applications and no more. This is calculated by taking the overall costs of processing applications divided by the number of decisions we expect to make.

    Treasury rules require us to undertake an annual fee review at which point we will monitor the level of applications that we have received.
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    However, there are many factors which affect the level of intake of applications so it would not be right to conclude without detailed analysis that any perceived decrease was solely due to the introduction of charging.

    Leicestershire Police
    Mr. Dorrell
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many vacancies there are for uniformed officers in the Leicestershire Police Service; and what proportion this represents of the approved establishment in Leicestershire. [127273]

    Ms Blears
    The establishment figures for the end of 2003 was 2,127 officers. Leicestershire police estimate that they will take approximately 207 recruits in 2003–04; which they estimate will bring establishment up to 2,235 by the end of 2003–04. There are currently around 174 vacancies for new applicants (September figures) and recruitment is healthy. This represents approximately eight per cent. of expected establishment. These vacancies will vary on a day to day basis.

    The Home Office does not set establishment figures for police forces and no central record is kept of vacancies. Decisions about the use of resources, including decisions about the number and deployment of police officers are matters for the police authority and the Chief Constable.

    Open Prisons
    Mr. Jack
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will make a statement on his strategy to minimise the number of prisoners who abscond from open prisons. [125809]

    Paul Goggins
    The Prison Service strategy to minimise the number of prisoners who abscond from open prisons contains a number of strands:a thorough risk assessment process aimed at identifying prisoners suitable for the particular regime and nature of the open estate, including better collation of intelligence data and improved reception procedures;
    physical security upgrades at individual establishments, subject to their own risk assessment process, including better lighting and patrols;
    regular monitoring, on a monthly basis of abscond rates nationally, reported to the director of operations for onward dissemination to area managers;
    analysis of trends, including the impact of population increases which will be fed into the current review of categorisation.

    Organ Donors
    Mr. Hancock
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what guidance his Department has given to electoral registration officers about allowing the annual registration process to be used as means of increasing organ donors; and if he will make a statement. [130203]

    Mr. Leslie
    I have been asked to reply.

    My Department has issued no recent guidance to electoral registration officers (EROs) on this subject. I am aware, however, that the independent Electoral Commission issued advice to EROs on 22 July 2003 which, while recognising the independence and responsibility of individual EROs, set out the
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    Commission's view that additional material unrelated to electoral issues should not be included with registration forms.

    Police Standards Unit
    Dr. Cable
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how performance will be measured for the Head of the Police Standards Unit in assessing his performance related pay. [130023]

    Ms Blears
    [holding answer 16 July 2003]: In common with the principles in place for a number of members of the senior civil service across Government, the Head of the Police Standards Unit will be entitled to an annual bonus, of up to 15 per cent. of his basic salary, subject to his performance against a set of specific objectives and targets to be agreed at the start of each reporting period between himself and the Permanent Secretary, Crime, Policing, Counter-Terrorism and Delivery in the Home Office.

    Publicly Funded Investigations
    Paul Flynn
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he will seek powers to ensure that the conclusions of all publicly funded investigations into the conduct of senior police officers are made public. [129718]

    Ms Blears
    The Secretary of State has no plans to do so.

    The investigation into allegations against senior officers is a matter for the relevant police authority or where the senior officer has left the force and a criminal investigation takes place, the chief officer. They own the report into the investigation and are acquainted with the facts of the case and any decision on disclosure is a matter for them.

    However, the new complaints system which is due to be introduced from April 2004, under provisions in the Police Reform Act 2002, will place a clear duty on those responsible for an investigation to keep the complainant properly informed during, and at the end of, an investigation. The presumption will be on openness, specifically allowing for the disclosure of the investigation report, subject to a sensitivity test.

    Secondments (Iraq)
    Mr. Hancock
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many British police officers are to be sent to Iraq; for how long they will remain there; how their pay and conditions will vary from that in the UK; on what criteria the selection is made; what risk assessment has been carried out; what assessment the Department has made of the effect on crime(a) prevention and (b) detection in the UK of sending officers to Iraq; and if he will make a statement. [128319]

    Ms Blears
    I have agreed to a request from my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary (Jack Straw) to ask the Association of Chief Police Officers to seek up to 200 volunteers to create a pool of United Kingdom police officers for potential deployment to Iraq. The pool is intended to sustain the deployment of up to 100 United
    811W
    Kingdom officers at any one time. Some may be deployed to a third country to assist in the out of country training of the Iraqi police service.

    If UK police officers are required they will be deployed for six to 12 month periods. The terms and conditions of service of police officers from English and Welsh police forces will be protected under section 26 of the Police Act 1996. Officers will be recruited according to experience and the skills required for the post. The preliminary selection procedure is a matter for each force. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office will conduct the final selection process following recommendations on applicants' suitability from forces.

    Every effort will be made to ensure police officers' safety while on mission. Officers will be deployed only when conditions are right. The security position will be reviewed regularly. The advice of the two secondees from the Association of Chief Police Officers presently serving in Iraq will continue to inform any decision on the timing of a deployment of United Kingdom police officers to Iraq. When we judge that conditions are right for deployment, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office will approach the Home Office with proposals to draw on the pool.

    I have considered the demands on domestic policing resources. The deployment of 100 UK police officers to assist Iraq is within the contingency plans for overall police contributions to peacekeeping missions that have been agreed between the Government and the Association of Chief Police Officers. Chief constables and police authorities will take account of local policing requirements before deciding whether to release officers.

    Security (Royal Family)
    Mr. Greg Knight
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will take steps to ensure that the security arrangements in place for members of the Royal Family(a) while travelling and (b) while in residence are appropriate; and what plans he has to review these. [129608]

    Mr. Blunkett
    Security arrangements for the Royal Family while travelling or in residence are subject to continual review.

    It is policy not to comment in detail on such security measures, as to do so may compromise the safety of those for whom such measures have been taken.

    Sexual Assaults
    Mrs. Curtis-Thomas
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if the Government will adopt the recommendations of the Home Affairs Committee on the liability of employers for sexual assaults committed by their employees. [128398]

    Mr. Lammy
    The Home Affairs Committee recommended that legislation should be introduced to overturn the House of Lords decision in Lister v Hesley Hall Ltd. in relation to the vicarious liability of an employer for sexual assaults by an employee. The Government do not propose to change the law in this area. The law on vicarious liability is wholly common law based, and has been developed by the courts over 812W
    many years. It is not desirable or practicable to replace it by statute in one particular set of circumstances in which vicarious liability may be held to apply. It is preferable that the courts should continue to have the flexibility to consider all the circumstances of an individual case.

    Sites of Special Scientific Interest
    Mr. Lidington
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will list the sites of special scientific interest in the ownership of his Department or its agencies. [129346]

    Fiona Mactaggart
    The Home Office has seven establishments, which incorporate Sites of Special Scientific Interest. They are:

    HMP Dartmoor;

    HMP Frankland;

    HMP Hewell Grange;

    HMP and YOI Hollesley Bay;

    HMP Leyhill;

    HMP North Sea Camp; and

    HMP and YOI Prescoed.

    UK Passport and Records Agency
    Mr. Bercow
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many people are employed by the UK Passport and Records Agency; and what the figure was in each of the last three years. [130493]

    Beverley Hughes
    The number of employees within the UK Passport Service throughout the year varies to match the seasonal pattern of demand. August is traditionally a period when employment levels are at there highest. As at 31 August 2003 the UK Passport Service employed 2,429 full time equivalent employees.

    In the last three financial years the average number of employees at the Passport Service has been:

    2002–03–2,384

    2001–02–2,426

    2000–01–2,238

    Work Permits
    Harry Cohen
    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will list all applications of Football League clubs for work permits for foreign players which have been refused in the last 18 months; what the grounds for issuing work permits to overseas footballers are; whether different criteria apply when considering applications from other professions; and if he will make a statement. [129109]

    Beverley Hughes
    The tables provide detail of the numbers of applications received from Premier and Football League Clubs in England and Scotland for overseas players. The information is broken down by season and includes, where applicable, the outcomes of any review panels held. It is not possible to provide detail of the individual applications refused for reasons of confidentiality.

    Work permits are issued to international footballers of the highest calibre who are able to make a significant contribution to the development of the UK game at the highest level. A player must have played for his country

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    in at least 75 per cent. of its competitive 'A' team matches for which he was available for selection during the two years preceding the date of the application. Additionally, the player's country must be at or above 70th place in the official FIFA world rankings when averaged over the preceding two years. Where an application does not meet these criteria, the club may seek a review of this decision by an independent review panel of football experts.

    The criteria for work permit applications for sportspeople are agreed, sport by sport, in consultation with the respective governing bodies and are reviewed on an annual basis. The criteria which apply to any given sport reflect the stage of development of that sport in the UK and are made public via the Work Permits (UK) website.

    Professional football applications for 2002–03 season—summary

    Number

    Applications received (England and Scotland)

    61

    Applications approved

    35

    Applications refused

    25

    Applications withdrawn

    1

    Reviews received

    21

    Successful reviews

    13

    Unsuccessful reviews

    7

    Reviews withdrawn

    1

    Total approvals

    48

    Total refusals

    12

    Total withdrawn

    1

    Professional football applications for 2003–04 season to 1 September 2003—summary

    Number

    Applications received (England and Scotland)

    40

    Applications approved

    23

    Applications refused

    16

    Applications withdrawn

    1

    Reviews received

    14

    Successful reviews

    11

    Unsuccessful reviews

    3

    Reviews withdrawn

    —

    Total approvals

    34

    Total refusals

    5

    Total withdrawn

    1

    Note:

    No applications were received from League of Wales or Northern Ireland

  NORTHERN IRELAND

    Autistic Spectrum Disorder
    Mr. Hume
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what guidance he gives on the extent to which pre-school children with Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD) can benefit from appropriate pre-school education; whether the current main-stream nursery education classes are resourced to deal with children with ASD; and if he will make a statement about plans to provide specialist pre-school education for children with ASD. [118759]

    Jane Kennedy
    The Department of Education's Code of Practice on the Identification and Assessment of Special Educational Needs (SEN) gives clear guidance to Education and Library Boards (ELBs) and schools 814W
    (including mainstream nursery schools) on meeting the needs of children with special educational needs, including Autistic Spectrum Disorders (ASD).

    The ELBs are resourced to support children with ASD in mainstream nursery schools in a variety of ways. Provision may include classroom assistance, or support from ASD Advisory Officers or peripatetic teachers. The boards also provide training in aspects of Special Educational Needs, including ASD.

    The Northern Task Group Report on Autism endorsed early intervention for children with ASD. The Department of Education is working closely with the ELBs and the Department of Health, Social Services and Public Safety to prioritise the recommendations of the report, with a view to improving collaborative working and available provision.

    Through existing Special Needs legislation ELBs have a qualified duty to secure education for children with SEN in a mainstream placement. The proposed Special Educational Needs and Disability legislation will strengthen the presumption to inclusion. However, the level and type of provision is assessed by the boards on an individual basis and ELBs continue to make specialist provision for children with ASD based on identified needs. The Department of Education and the ELBs are taking work forward to consider how best to enhance SEN provision in the pre-school sector.

    Belfast Regeneration Office
    Mr. Dodds
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what his policy is on an Action Plan round for the Belfast Regeneration Office in the financial year 2004–05. [130211]

    Mr. Spellar
    With the launch of the Neighbourhood Renewal Strategy Government has begun to explore the possibility of reallocating Action Plan moneys towards neighbourhood renewal as Action Plan has suffered from sizeable under-spends in recent years. Until decisions have been taken on this issue however it is not clear whether there will be future calls for applications under the Action Plan.

    Mr. Dodds
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many Belfast Regeneration Office teams have issued letters indicating that they are now closed for applications; which teams issued such letters; and when they were issued. [130212]

    Mr. Spellar
    The four Belfast Regeneration Office Area Teams, including Inner West, Outer West, North and South & East Teams issued a letter on 29 July 2003, to all community groups on the BRO database. This letter indicated that each BRO Team would not be open to new applications from 1 August 2003, as Area Team budgets would shortly be fully committed for the 2003–04 financial year.

    Mr. Dodds
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what the budget for each of the Belfast Regeneration Office teams is in the current financial year; and how much of each team's budget(a) was spent, (b) was committed and (c) remained uncommitted when they closed for applications. [130213]
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    Mr. Spellar
    The table shows the budget for each Belfast Regeneration Office (BRO) Team for 2003–04, in addition to(a) amount spent, (b) amount committed and (c) amount uncommitted at 29 July 2003, when the Teams indicated that they were closing to applications.

    £

    BRO team

    Team budget 2003–04 (b+c)

    (a) Amount spent

    (b) Amount committed

    (c) Amount uncommitted

    (d) Potential value of applications currently under assessment

    Inner West

    1,284,500.00

    253,456.79

    801,175.68

    483,324.32

    1,171,202.25

    Outer West

    1,045,500.00

    128,529.99

    300,554.22

    744,945.78

    1,560,711.35

    South & East

    978,500.00

    166,922.56

    501,222.46

    477,277.54

    942,216.38

    North

    1,207,000.00

    116,252.00

    356,833.00

    850,166.00

    1,400,000.00

    Mr. Dodds
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland when the Belfast Regeneration Office Strategy will be launched. [130220]

    Mr. Spellar
    The Government's Strategy for the regeneration of Belfast will be articulated in two documents, namely:The Neighbourhood Renewal Implementation Plan for Belfast which will be published in April 2004. This will follow consultation on the draft implementation plan which we will issue shortly.
    The Belfast City Centre Policy Framework document which was the subject of consultation ending; on 12 September 2003.

    Belfast/London Flights
    Mr. Dodds
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what representations he has received about the number of flights between Belfast and London. [124363]

    Mr. Spellar
    None. I understand any such representations have mainly been directed towards the airline operators.

    Cross-border Health Care
    Mrs. Iris Robinson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what the total cost of providing health care within Northern Ireland for residents of the Republic of Ireland was over the last 12 months. [124693]

    Angela Smith
    The information requested is not available and could be obtained only at disproportionate cost.

    Departmental Budgets
    Mr. McGrady
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland when he will publish the complete needs and effectiveness evaluations in respect of departmental budgetary matters. [123960]

    Mr. Pearson
    The Northern Ireland Executive initiated work on the needs and effectiveness evaluations in 2001. The main findings from the effectiveness report on financial assistance to industry have already been released on the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Investment's website. Further release of the effectiveness studies will be made subject to agreement with appropriate Ministers. As far as needs assessment is concerned the Government have no plans to review the Barnett formula.
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    It should be noted that although each Team had moneys uncommitted at 29 July, there existed applications in the system which had not yet been processed. Column (d) on the table shows the potential value of the applications currently under assessment.

    Departmental Reform Plans
    Mr. McGrady
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what reform plans have been produced by each Government Department; what assessment he has made of those plans; what Departments have not produced such plans; and if he will make a statement. [123959]

    Mr. Pearson
    All Departments have produced reform plans as part of their service delivery agreements (SDAs) which are available on departmental websites and can be accessed through the Northern Ireland administration website, www.northernireland.gov.uk. In addition, copies of each SDA have been placed in the Library. The reform plans constitute initial departmental responses to the Reform Agenda and reflect the importance of reform of public services to the work of both this Administration and the Northern Ireland Executive.

    Departmental Under Spending
    Mr. McGrady
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what steps are being taken to address the underspending of Government Departments through more co-ordinated financial planning; and if he will make a statement. [123958]

    Mr. Pearson
    On the basis of underspends in previous years an action plan to address this issue was set out in a Statement to the Assembly on 1 July 2002 by the then Minister of Finance and Personnel. This included setting spending plans at a level which exceeded the actual spending power available by building in underspend assumptions, and the revised spending plans for 2003–04 to 2005–06, announced on 11 December 2002, built on that approach. Full details are set out in Section 2 of the Budget Document ("Building on Progress: Budget 2003–2006").

    Disabled Housing Adaptations
    Mr. McGrady
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what the waiting time for an assessment by an occupational therapist in respect of disabled housing adaptations is; and if he will make a statement. [126052]

    Angela Smith
    Information is not available on the current waiting time for an assessment by an occupational therapist in respect of disabled housing adaptations, as an assessment for housing adaptation can only be designated as such when the assessment is completed. In addition, waiting time varies according to
    817W
    the complexity of the case and the availability of resources to carry out the assessment. The amount of time waited for assessment to commence is, however, recorded in respect of all persons assessed by community occupational therapists, according to time band. Figures for priority and non-priority cases are shown in the table and refer to assessments which commenced in the quarter ending 31 March 2003, the latest date for which such information is available.

    Number of assessments commenced, by time waited for assessment, quarter ending 31 March 2003

    Time waited

    Number

    (a) Priority cases

    Under 2 weeks

    3,758

    2 weeks—under 1 month

    774

    1 month and over

    982

    Total assessments commenced

    5,514

    (b) Non-priority cases

    Under 3 months

    2,850

    3—under 6 months

    505

    6 months and over

    1,431

    Total assessments commenced

    4,786

    Implementation of the recommendations of the joint Housing Executive/Department of Health, Social Services and Public Safety review of the housing adaptations service, carried out in 2000–01, together with the additional 20 occupational therapy posts funded by the Department in 2001–02, is improving the efficiency of the service. Health and Social Services Trusts continue to strive to further improve the service.

    Equality Commission
    Mr. Mallon
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will involve the Equality Commission in the review of the operation of section 75 of the Northern Ireland Act 2000 envisaged by paragraph 10 of Annex 3 to the Joint Declaration. [125921]

    Mr. Spellar
    The structure of the review is currently under consideration with the details to be announced by September 2003. The Equality Commission is an important stakeholder and we intend, as envisaged in the Joint Declaration, that it should be directly involved throughout the process.

    Fishing
    Mr. Donaldson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland when, and for what year, the last annual report of the Foyle Fisheries Commission was published; when the outstanding annual reports will be published; when the outstanding annual reports of the Loughs Agency relating to fisheries will be published; and what has been the reason for the delay in producing these reports. [121422]

    Mr. Pearson
    It was normal practice for the Foyle Fisheries Commission to publish the Annual Report of its operations together with its financial statements for the period in question. The last Annual report with Statement of Accounts for the Foyle Fisheries Commission was for the year 1996.
    818W
    The Report and Statement of Accounts for the Foyle Fisheries Commission for the periods 1997–99 will be published in July this year.

    During 1997, the Department of Finance and Personnel (NI) introduced new standards for the format and information to be presented in the accounts for Non Departmental Public Bodies, which caused significant technical difficulties for the Foyle Fisheries Commission in its completion of Financial Statements. This in turn resulted in significant delays during audit of the accounts for this period. The accounts and report for this period have since been finalised and are now ready for publication.

    The operational report of the Loughs Agency for 2000 was provided and noted by the North South Ministerial Council (NSMC) on 22 June, as required by the North South Co-operation (Implementation Bodies) (NI) Order, 1999. This report will be published later this year when the financial statements for that period have been certified by the Comptroller and Auditor General for Northern Ireland and the Irish Comptroller and Auditor General.

    The reports for 2001 and 2002 will be published upon the completion of the audit of the financial statements for those periods. These financial statements are currently with the Northern Ireland Audit Office who anticipate their completion by this autumn. The Annual Report and Accounts will be submitted to the NSMC and published following completion of the audit.

    Gap Funding
    Mr. Peter Robinson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many successful gap funding applications there have been in each constituency in Northern Ireland. [123794]

    Mr. Pearson
    The number of successful Gap Funding applications by Parliamentary constituency in Northern Ireland is set out in the following table.

    Table: Number of successful gap funding applications by Parliamentary Constituency in Northern Ireland

    Constituency

    Successful gap funding applications (peace)

    Successful gap funding applications (BSP)

    Belfast East

    32

    —

    Belfast North

    93

    2

    Belfast South

    61

    —

    Belfast West

    83

    3

    East Antrim

    22

    —

    East Londonderry

    19

    2

    Fermanagh and South Tyrene

    29

    —

    Foyle

    72

    10

    Eagan Valley

    17

    —

    Mid Ulster

    28

    5

    Newry and Armagh

    33

    —

    North Antrim

    23

    —

    North Down

    6

    —

    South Antrim

    7

    —

    South Down

    20

    —

    Strangford

    14

    —

    Upper Bann

    22

    3

    West Tyrone

    37

    —

    Unclassified

    13

    63

    Total

    631

    93

    819W
    Note:

    Unclassified successful Gap funding Applications are those that clearly benefited two or more Parliamentary Constituencies, and therefore cannot be classified within any specific Parliamentary Constituency.

    Health
    Mr. Beggs
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what the death rates were from coronary heart

    Ischaemic heart disease death rate per 1,000 population and number of deaths due to ischaemic heart disease by constituency and year (1998–2002)

    1998

    1999

    2000

    Parliamentary constituency

    Death rate

    Deaths

    Death rate

    Deaths

    Death rate

    Deaths

    Belfast, East

    2.7

    215

    2.6

    208

    2.6

    210

    Belfast, North

    2.7

    243

    2.9

    261

    2.4

    210

    Belfast, South

    2.0

    186

    2.2

    210

    1.9

    181

    Belfast, West

    1.8

    165

    1.6

    148

    1.8

    164

    East Antrim

    2.3

    189

    2.0

    165

    2.1

    176

    East Londonderry

    2.2

    193

    2.1

    187

    2.1

    181

    Fermanagh and South Tyrone

    2.3

    211

    2.5

    228

    2.3

    204

    Foyle

    1.8

    189

    1.4

    146

    1.3

    141

    Lagan Valley

    2.1

    208

    2.1

    209

    1.9

    195

    Mid-Ulster

    2.0

    171

    1.6

    140

    1.9

    167

    Newry and Armagh

    2.3

    228

    1.7

    171

    1.8

    182

    North Antrim

    2.4

    236

    2.6

    259

    2.1

    212

    North Down

    2.4

    208

    2.4

    201

    2.4

    204

    South Antrim

    1.8

    178

    1.7

    166

    1.4

    138

    South Down

    2.0

    210

    2.0

    205

    1.4

    148

    Strangford

    2.0

    188

    2.0

    190

    1.7

    164

    Upper Bann

    2.1

    213

    2.3

    234

    1.8

    188

    West Tyrone

    2.2

    187

    2.3

    201

    1.7

    146

    Unallocated1

    —

    36

    —

    39

    —

    23

    Northern Ireland

    2.2

    3,654

    2.1

    3,568

    1.9

    3,234

    2001

    2002

    Parliamentary constituency

    Death rate

    Deaths

    Death rate

    Deaths

    Belfast, East

    2.5

    202

    2.4

    187

    Belfast, North

    2.1

    184

    2.4

    199

    Belfast, South

    1.8

    173

    1.4

    131

    Belfast, West

    1.6

    143

    1.6

    140

    East Antrim

    1.7

    145

    1.6

    138

    East Londonderry

    2.0

    177

    1.6

    141

    Fermanagh and South Tyrone

    2.3

    210

    1.9

    177

    Foyle

    1.4

    151

    1.2

    132

    Lagan Valley

    1.6

    160

    1.8

    181

    Mid-Ulster

    1.7

    149

    1.6

    143

    Newry and Armagh

    1.8

    187

    1.7

    169

    North Antrim

    2.0

    203

    1.6

    166

    North Down

    2.1

    178

    2.0

    170

    South Antrim

    1.3

    132

    1.6

    158

    South Down

    1.7

    180

    1.6

    172

    Strangford

    1.7

    172

    1.6

    154

    Upper Bann

    1.8

    187

    1.8

    183

    West Tyrone

    2.1

    179

    2.0

    172

    Unallocated1

    —

    36

    —

    35

    1 Each year a small number of deaths cannot be allocated to a parliamentary constituency within Northern Ireland—these deaths have been included in the Northern Ireland total.

    Hospital Admissions
    Mrs. Iris Robinson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many hospital admissions there were on average per week in Northern Ireland during each of the last four quarters. [124689]
    820W
    disease in each Northern Ireland constituency in each of the last five years. [128283]

    Mr. Pearson
    The ischaemic heart disease death rate per 1,000 population is shown in the following table, for each Northern Ireland constituency and year between 1998 and 2002. The number of deaths due to ischaemic heart disease for each constituency and year is also shown. Areas with older populations generally have higher death rates and this will explain some of the differences shown as follows.

    Angela Smith
    The table sets out the average number of in-patients (ordinary admissions and day cases) admitted to hospital per week in the last four quarters.

    Quarter

    Average number of inpatient admissions per week

    1 April 2002–30 June 2002

    9,273

    1 July 2002–30 September 2002

    9.110

    1 October 2002–31 December 2002

    9,542

    1 January 2003–31 March 2003

    9.614

    Note:

    Data for 2002–03 are provisional and may change.

    Source:

    Hospital Inpatient's System.

    Mrs. Iris Robinson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many individuals were admitted to Northern Ireland hospitals in the last year who were not residents of the province. [124690]

    Angela Smith
    In 2002–03, a total of 3,992 patients whose address was outside of Northern Ireland were admitted to hospitals in Northern Ireland (ordinary admissions and day cases). The source of this information is the Hospital In-patient's System. Data for 2002–03 are provisional and may change.
    821W
    Mrs. Iris Robinson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what the average cost was of hospital admissions in Northern Ireland in(a) 1982, (b) 1992 and (c) 2002. [130253]

    Angela Smith
    The information requested is provided as follows:

    Average cost of hospital admissions (In-patients including day cases)

    £

    Average cost of an admission

    Year ended 31 March

    Actual price

    Adjusted to 2002–03 prices

    1982

    630

    1,490

    1992

    918

    1,223

    20021

    1,126

    1,159

    1 There may be small definitional differences between the year ended 31 March 2002 and earlier years due to differences in available sources of information.

    Notes:

    1. The figures provided exclude expenditure and activity information in relation to long stay and specialist hospitals.

    2. It should be noted that a straight forward comparison of costs over a 20 year period is difficult, given the substantial changes in the range and nature of procedures undertaken in hospitals. In addition the lengths of stay and therefore costs will vary dramatically within one year, depending on the speciality and the patient's condition.

    Housing Adaptations
    Mrs. Iris Robinson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland whether he plans to abolish the means test for housing adaptations in families with disabled children. [130268]

    Mr. Spellar
    The review group that was set up to look at the issue has just recently sent its report to me. I will write to the hon. Member for Strangford once I have had the opportunity to consider its recommendations.

    Mental Health
    Mrs. Iris Robinson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many elderly mentally infirm unit places there are in Northern Ireland. [130258]

    Angela Smith
    Information on the number of elderly mentally infirm unit places is not available. However, at 31 March 2003, there were approximately 700 elderly mentally infirm persons in residential homes and approximately 1,000 elderly mentally infirm persons in nursing homes, whose care was funded by Health and Social Services Trusts.

    Mrs. Iris Robinson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many individuals aged 18 and younger are receiving(a) antidepressants, (b) antipsychotics and (c) amphetamines in each health trust in Northern Ireland. 1130265]

    Angela Smith
    The information requested is not available.

    MOT Tests
    Mrs. Iris Robinson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what action he intends to take to address the backlog of MOT appointments at the Driver and Vehicle Testing Agency. [124558]
    822W
    Angela Smith
    The principal causes of the current waiting time difficulties have been a significant increase in demand and the temporary closure of test centres for the installation of new test equipment.

    The programme of refurbishment will be completed in September this year. In the meantime, a number of steps are being taken to alleviate the position. These include: continuing efforts to recruit additional staff; increased overtime working; the introduction of extended day working into additional centres to increase capacity; diverting technical staff from other duties to testing; working with the equipment supplier to secure higher levels of productivity; better public information and awareness, so that customers have the option of choosing centres with a lower waiting time; and relocating staff in order to match capacity and demand as closely as possible.

    Physiotherapy
    Mrs. Iris Robinson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement on the recruitment of physiotherapists. [130251]

    Angela Smith
    The recruitment of staff, including physiotherapists, is a matter for individual Health and Social Services Trusts taking into account factors such as service needs and available resources. The Department however has a role in ensuring that sufficient suitably qualified staff are available to meet the needs of the service throughout the health and personal social services.

    The Department has looked at ways of improving regional workforce planning mechanisms and in August 2001 a series of comprehensive workforce reviews was launched. These reviews are across the main HPSS professional groups and the physiotherapy staff group is included in this initiative. The first report on the review of the physiotherapy workforce has been completed and its findings indicated that there are currently sufficient physiotherapists in training to meet the needs of the service.

    The position however is being kept under review, particularly in light of probable increasing demand that will result from developments in physiotherapy services

    Planning
    Mr. McGrady
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many enforcement notices were issued by each of the planning divisions in Northern Ireland in each of the last five years; how many were issued between 1 April and 9 May; how many are still in operation; and what the timescale is for the act of enforcement to be implemented. [116832]

    Angela Smith
    Although statistical records maintained by the Planning Service have historically taken account of enforcement procedures, it is only since 1999 that separate data specifically relating to enforcement action has been recorded. It is not possible to provide a breakdown of enforcement statistics by Division.
    823W
    Presented in the table is the total number of enforcement notices issued for each year since 1999. These figures are published in the Agency Annual Report and Accounts for the years 1999–2002.

    Number

    1999–2000

    82

    2000–01

    54

    2001–02

    50

    2002–03

    40

    1 April to 9 May 2003

    8

    Note:

    The enforcement notices issued since 1 April 2003 remain in effect. Under Article 68(8) of the Planning (Northern Ireland) Order 1991, each enforcement notice should specify the period for compliance. The period allowed for compliance depends on the circumstances of each case.

    Mr. McGrady
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what financial resources were allocated to the implementation of planning enforcement cases in each of the planning divisions in each of the last five years; how many officers are employed to undertake enforcement work in each of the planning divisions in Northern Ireland; and how many there were in 1997. [116833]

    Angela Smith
    The Department of the Environment's Planning Service's annual expenditure on salaries for officers employed in enforcement work, during the last five financial years, was:

    £

    1998–99

    338,100

    1999–2000

    353,300

    2000–01

    369,200

    2001–02

    385,800

    2002–03

    403,200

    There are currently 20 officers devoted to enforcement work. These officers are deployed by Divisional Planning Office as follows:

    Number

    Belfast Division

    3

    Ballymena Division

    3

    Craigavon Division

    3

    Downpatrick Division

    3

    Londonderry Division

    4

    Omagh Division

    4

    The additional officers in the Londonderry and Omagh Divisions are based in the Coleraine and Enniskillen sub-offices.

    This dedicated staffing complement was put in place in 1998. Prior to this, enforcement work was taken forward as an integral part of development control casework and it is therefore not possible to provide comparison figures for 1997.

    A number of measures to enhance enforcement powers were included in the Planning (Amendment) (Northern Ireland) Order 2003, to simplify, streamline and strengthen the Department's existing enforcement powers.
    824W
    Planning Service is also reviewing the resources dedicated to enforcement as part of the Modernising Planning Processes Implementation Plan, and is seeking substantial additional resources to address enforcement and other priority areas. Views on whether the costs of enforcement action should be recovered from planning fees will also be sought in a consultation paper on planning fees, which is due to be published shortly.

    Mr. Dodds
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what his policy is towards third party appeals in relation to planning applications in Northern Ireland. [130216]

    Angela Smith
    I am conscious of the potential implications that the introduction of third party appeals would have for the operation of Northern Ireland's planning system and economy. That is why I have commissioned a Regulatory Impact Assessment of the impact that third party appeals would have, if introduced. When complete, I will wish to give that assessment the most careful consideration before making a decision on how to deal with this important issue.

    Mr. Dodds
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (1) what criteria are applied in determining planning applications in areas of townscape character; [130217]

    (2) what steps he has taken to ensure compliance with development guidance notes in relation to planning applications in areas of townscape character; [130218]

    (3) if he will take steps to ensure that planning applications in areas of townscape character are carefully monitored pending the determination of policy on third party appeals. [130219]

    Angela Smith
    The Department of the Environment is obliged by law to have regard to the Development Plan, so far as it is material, and to any other material considerations in determining planning applications. In relation to Areas of Townscape Character, other material considerations includes the Regional Development Strategy, Planning Policy Statements in particular PPS 1, PPS6 and PPS7 and advice in the form of supplementary planning guidance.

    All proposals in Areas of Townscape Character are carefully assessed to ensure compliance with published policy and guidance taking account of any other relevant matters. As with all planning applications, proposals in Areas of Townscape Character are processed in an open and transparent manner. This allows an opportunity for the receipt of public representations and involves consultation with the relevant district council and other statutory bodies.

    To afford additional protection for Areas of Townscape Character. I intend later this year to introduce control over demolition within these areas. When the relevant statutory provisions are concerned, I will publish an addendum to Planning Policy Statement 6, which will set out my Department's policy for the control of development in Areas of Townscape Character.

    Police HQ, Armagh
    Mr. McNamara
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (1) how extensive the asbestos contamination was at the regional police headquarters in Armagh; when the contamination occurred; and what the cause was of the contamination; [120307]

    (2) what documents and how many case files were contaminated by asbestos at the regional police headquarters in Armagh; what percentage of these papers were destroyed; at what rank this decision was taken; what options were available for copying files; and from what bodies professional advice was sought; [120308]

    (3) how many criminal prosecutions were dropped as a result of asbestos contamination at the regional police headquarters in Armagh; how many civil actions were affected; and what cost was incurred in meeting claims for damages as a result of failing to produce evidence. [120309]

    Jane Kennedy
    I have written to my hon. Friend, a copy of the letter will be placed in the Library.

    Police Property (Meetings)
    Mrs. Iris Robinson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what the policy is on the RUC GC Association and Welfare Associations meeting in police property across Northern Ireland; and if he will ensure that these facilities remain open to them as long as they are required. [123465]

    Jane Kennedy
    This is a matter for the Chief Constable. I understand that he has provided assurances that organisations such as the RUC GC Associations and Welfare Associations will continue to be granted the use of police premises. Any person or persons wishing to gain admission to any police establishment would be required to comply with any policies established by the organisation.

    Police Service of Northern Ireland
    Mrs. Iris Robinson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (1) whether there is a right of appeal for serving or former members of the Police Service of Northern Ireland when a request to use convalescent facilities on the mainland is refused by the Benevolent Fund Committee; and if he will make a statement; [130055]

    (2) whether there is a ceiling on the number of times a serving or former member of the Police Service of Northern Ireland can use convalescent homes for respite purposes on the mainland. [130056]

    Jane Kennedy
    Each case made to the Benevolent Fund Committee is considered on its own merits. There is no ceiling on the number of times an officer or retired officer can use the benevolent fund facilities. However, all instances where a request is made for a third visit are referred to the Management Committee for approval. An applicant who has had their request refused can ask to have their case reviewed and may submit additional information or material to be considered as part of that review.

    Radiographers
    Mrs. Iris Robinson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many radiographers are employed in full-time posts in the NHS in Northern Ireland; how many vacancies exist; and what estimate he has made of how many will be required in total in 2006. [124673]

    Angela Smith
    The information is as follows:

    (a) A breakdown of radiographers as at 31 March 2003 by employment status is shown in the following table:

    Radiographers as at 31 March 2003 by employment status1

    Employment status

    Headcount

    WTE2

    Full-time

    399

    399.0

    Part-time

    159

    89.50

    Total

    558

    488.5

    1Bank staff who cover for staffing shortfalls and fluctuating workloads in order to maintain service delivery have been removed from these figures.

    2 Whole-time equivalent.

    (b) As at 30 September 2002 there were Radiography vacancies amounting to a whole-time equivalent of 26.5. Radiography vacancies detailed by trust are given in the following table:

    Radiography vacancies detailed by trust as at 30 September 2002

    Health and Social Services (HSS) Trust

    WTE1

    Sperrin Lakeland HSS Trust

    1.0

    United Hospitals Group HSS Trust

    4.0

    Altnagelvin Group HSS Trust

    1.0

    Royal Group of Hospitals HSS Trust

    1.0

    Craigavon Area Hospital Group HSS Trust

    6.5

    Green Park Healthcare HSS Trust

    4.0

    Down and Lisburn HSS Trust

    6.0

    Belfast City Hospital HSS Trust

    2.0

    Ulster Community and Hospitals Group HSS Trust

    1.0

    Total

    26.5

    1Whole-time equivalent

    (c) The total required number of Radiographers in 2006 equates to 738 headcount when supply is profiled against the Demand Levels 1 and 2, as identified within the Comprehensive Review of the Radiography Workforce, April 2002.

    Radiology
    Mrs. Iris Robinson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many vacancies there are in Northern Ireland for(a) radiologists and (b) radiographers. [130001]

    Angela Smith
    The information is as follows:

    (a) As at 30 September there were Consultant Radiologists' vacancies amounting to a whole-time equivalent of 8.0. Consultant Radiologists' vacancies detailed by Trust are given in the following table. The number of staff in post at this same date was 73 (68.25 WTE).

    827W

    Consultant radiologists' vacancies detailed by trust as at 30 September 2002

    Health and Social Services (HSS) Trust

    WTE1

    Sperrin Lakeland HSS Trust

    2.0

    United Hospitals Group HSS Trust

    3.0

    Belfast City Hospitals HSS Trust

    1.0

    Ulster Community and Hospitals HSS Trust

    1.0

    Craigavon Area Hospital Group HSS Trust

    1.0

    1Whole-time equivalent

    As at 30 September 2002 there were Radiography vacancies amounting to a whole-time equivalent of 26.5. Radiography vacancies detailed by trust are given in the following table. The number of staff in post at this same date was 566 (496.3 WTE).

    Radiography vacancies detailed by trust as at 30 September 2002

    Health and Social Services (HSS) Trust

    WTE1

    Sperrin Lakeland HSS Trust

    1.0

    United Hospitals Group HSS Trust

    4.0

    Altnagelvin Group HSS Trust

    1.0

    Royal Group of Hospitals HSS Trust

    1.0

    Craigavon Area Hospital Group HSS Trust

    6.5

    Green Park Healthcare HSS Trust

    4.0

    Down and Lisburn HSS Trust

    6.0

    Belfast City Hospital HSS Trust

    2.0

    Ulster Community and Hospitals Group HSS Trust

    1.0

    Total

    26.5

    1Whole-time equivalent

    Regional Cancer Centre
    Mrs. Iris Robinson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will stake a statement on recruitment of staff for Northern Ireland's new regional Cancer Centre. [124686]

    Angela Smith
    The Belfast City Hospital Trust developed a workforce plan for the new Cancer Centre as part of the submission of the Outline Business Case. The Trust is keeping the plan under review. The Regional Medical Services Consortium is currently considering a substantial additional revenue investment of approx £1.6 million per annum to enable a phased build-up in staff numbers towards the opening of the new Centre.

    Respite Care
    Mrs. Iris Robinson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many respite care beds there are in each health board area in the Province for(a) young adults older than 18 and (b) those aged 18 and younger. [130266]

    Angela Smith
    The information requested is not collected centrally.

    Road Tax
    Mr. Gregory Campbell
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what action has been taken to reduce the number of vehicles being driven on Northern Ireland's roads without road tax; and how many prosecutions have resulted in the past 12 months as a result of enforcement action. [124186]
    828W
    Angela Smith
    A range of measures is in place to tackle Vehicle Excise Duty (road tax) evasion in Northern Ireland, including ongoing detection by the police and traffic wardens, wheel clamping; Automated Number Plate Reading cameras; Statutory Off Road Notification (SORN); and special joint exercises by DVLNI, PSNI and Her Majesty's Customs and Excise.

    The most recent period for which enforcement information is available is the year from 1 June 2002 to 31 May 2003. In that year enforcement action was taken against 15,171 offenders. 13,281 settled out of court and 1,890 were prosecuted in court.

    Roadworks
    Mr. Dodds
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland which contractors working for the Roads Service had their contracts terminated in each year since 1999; and what the reasons were in each case. [119468]

    Angela Smith
    I have asked the Chief Executive of Roads Service to write to you in response to your question. A copy of the letter will be placed in the Library.

    Mr. Peter Robinson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what the total length broken down by classification of road is in each council area in Northern Ireland. [123925]

    Mr. Spellar
    I have asked the Chief Executive of Roads Service to write to the hon. Gentleman in response to this question. A copy of the letter will be placed in the Library.

    Mr. Dodds
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what the cost was of repairing public(a) roads and (b) footpaths in Northern Ireland following work carried out by (i) electricity and (ii) gas companies in each year since 1997. [19462]

    Angela Smith
    I have asked the Chief Executive of Roads Service to write to you in response to your question. A copy of the letter will be placed in the Library.

    Royal Belfast Hospital for Sick Children
    Mrs. Iris Robinson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many surgical operations were performed in 2002 at the Royal Belfast Hospital for Sick Children. [130270]

    Angela Smith
    There were 4,260 surgical operations performed in the Royal Belfast Hospital for Sick Children during 2002–03.

    Schools
    Mr. Beggs
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many temporary classrooms there were in each Education and Library Board area in each of the last three years. [128286]

    Jane Kennedy
    The number of temporary classrooms in controlled schools1 in each Education and Library Board area in each of the last three years is as follows:

    829W

    Education and Library Board

    2000–01

    2001–02

    2002–03

    Belfast

    119

    119

    103

    Western

    172

    177

    172

    North-Eastern

    325

    343

    358

    South-Eastern

    509

    452

    394

    Southern

    262

    252

    240

    1Information on temporary classrooms in other sectors is not currently available. However, the Department of Education will be carrying out a survey of maintained, voluntary grammar and grant maintained integrated schools before the end of the financial year to ascertain the exact number of temporary classrooms in these sectors. This information will be supplied to you when the results of the survey are available.

    The increased investment in new schools, together with a £25 million programme specifically to remove temporary classrooms, spanning the financial years 2002–03 to 2005–06, should result in a substantial reduction in these classrooms over the next 3 years.

    Mr. Beggs
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many schools requiring(a) high priority maintenance work and (b) major works there were in each Education and Library Board area in each of the last three years. [128287]

    Jane Kennedy
    The information requested is as follows:

    (a) Number of schools requiring high priority maintenance work1

    Education and Library Board Area

    2000–01

    2001–02

    2002–03

    Belfast

    156

    155

    163

    Western

    238

    215

    188

    North-Eastern

    139

    157

    127

    South-Eastern

    222

    207

    184

    Southern

    240

    262

    234

    1Figures cover controlled, maintained and Irish-medium schools. Maintenance work in voluntary grammar grant maintained integrated schools is met by the schools themselves from their annual LMS budgets. Data is held centrally by the Department on the extent of the maintenance requirements in these schools.

    (b) Number of schools requiring major works2

    Education and Library Board Area

    2000–01

    2001–02

    2002–03

    Belfast

    16

    15

    28

    Western

    22

    20

    29

    North-Eastern

    26

    28

    37

    South-Eastern

    14

    13

    14

    Southern

    29

    32

    30

    2Figures cover all schools included in the Department's Schools' Capital Priorities list as published on its website.

    Senior Citizens (Concessionary Travel)
    Mr. Dodds
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many people have been issued with senior citizen smart passes for free travel on public transport, broken down by post code area. [125839]

    Mr. Spellar
    Translink advise that the information is not readily available in exactly the form requested. However, the table shows the total number of Smartpasses in issue by Northern Ireland postcode area as at 16 July 2003. Over 160,000 of the 164,596 Smartpasses in circulation are Senior Smartpasses, the remainder being made up of Smartpasses for those registered blind and the war disabled. Translink do not have the postcodes for 1,080 pass holders.830W

    Postcode

    Count

    BT1

    41

    BT2

    76

    BT3

    6

    BT4

    3,511

    BT5

    5,774

    BT6

    4,476

    BT7

    1,358

    BT8

    3,078

    BT9

    2,759

    BTIO

    1,520

    BT11

    3,453

    BT12

    2,635

    BT13

    3,313

    BT 14

    3,667

    BT15

    3,550

    BT16

    1,936

    BT17

    2,170

    BT18

    1,815

    BT19

    4,023

    BT20

    4,210

    BT21

    1,115

    BT22

    1,795

    BT23

    4,879

    BT24

    1,292

    BT25

    986

    BT26

    877

    BT27

    2,650

    BT28

    3,451

    BT29

    624

    BT30

    2,627

    BT31

    524

    BT32

    2,001

    BT33

    1,292

    BT34

    4,420

    BT35

    2,994

    BT36

    4,751

    BT37

    3,421

    BT38

    4,187

    BT39

    2,112

    BT40

    3,138

    BT41

    2,901

    BT42

    3,322

    BT43

    2,196

    BT44

    1,528

    BT45

    2,078

    BT46

    591

    BT47

    4,438

    BT48

    3,827

    BT49

    1,465

    BT51

    2,221

    BT52

    1,671

    BT53

    1,945

    BT54

    629

    BT55

    1,097

    BT56

    863

    BT57

    462

    BT60

    2,098

    BT61

    1,345

    BT62

    2,933

    BT63

    1,970

    BT64

    45

    BT65

    371

    BT66

    3,064

    BT67

    1,575

    BT68

    70

    BT69

    187

    BT70

    1,250

    BT71

    2,688

    BT74

    1,568

    BT75

    292

    BT76

    128

    BT77

    80

    BT78

    2,044

    BT79

    1,572

    831W

    Postcode

    Count

    BT80

    1,396

    BT81

    527

    BT82

    1,979

    BT84

    6

    BT92

    929

    BT93

    692

    BT94

    963

    BT95

    1

    BT96

    1

    BT98

    1

    No postcode available

    1,080

    Total

    164,596

    Strategic Investment Body
    Mr. Mallon
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many people are on the Board of the Strategic Investment Body; and how many are women. [125909]

    Mr. Paul Murphy
    The Strategic Investment Board has five directors, none of whom is a woman.

    Teachers
    Lady Hermon
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement on teacher recruitment in Northern Ireland. [129824]

    Jane Kennedy
    The level of intakes to teacher education courses is determined annually by the Department of Education, with the aim of maintaining a reasonable match between the numbers being trained and the projected numbers of teaching vacancies. Currently these courses are oversubscribed with around five applications for each available place.

    Research has been commissioned by the Department to test the proposition that there is or will be a shortfall in the recruitment of teachers in any subject area in post-primary schools in Northern Ireland. The research findings are expected in October.

    Teachers
    Mr. Dodds
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many teaching vacancies there are in North Belfast in(a) the primary and (b) the secondary sector. [126498]

    Jane Kennedy
    The number of vacancies, as indicated by the employing authorities in all school sectors in the North Belfast area at the beginning of the new school year, is seven in the primary sector and nine in the secondary sector as set out in the following.

    Responses from employing authorities and North Belfast voluntary grammar and integrated schools on teaching vacancies as they apply at the beginning of the new school year 2003–04.

    Belfast Education and Library Board

    Currently the Board is not aware of any vacancies in the primary or secondary controlled sectors in North Belfast.

    Council for Catholic Maintained Schools

    Seven vacancies and nine secondary vacancies are expected to be filled in the near future
    832W
    Integrated Primary Schools

    Hazlewood Integrated Primary School, 242 Whitewell Road℄no teaching vacancies.

    Voluntary Grammar and Integrated Secondary Schools

    Belfast Royal Academy℄no teaching vacancies.

    Dominician College, 38 Fort William Park℄no teaching vacancies.

    Hazelwood Integrated College, 70 Whitewell Road℄no teaching vacancies.

    St. Malachy's College, 36 Antrim Road℄no teaching vacancies.

    Transport
    Mr. Peter Robinson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland when the quality bus corridor on the Newtownards Roads is likely to open. [122367]

    Mr. Spellar
    I have asked the Chief Executive of Roads Service to write to the hon. Gentleman in response to this question. A copy of the letter will be placed in the Library.

    Mr. Peter Robinson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement on the plans to upgrade the Westlink. [122370]

    Mr. Spellar
    I have asked the Chief Executive of Roads Service to write to the hon. Gentleman in response to this question. A copy of the letter will be placed in the Library.

    Mr. Peter Robinson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what the status is of each road scheme in the Road Service Major Works preparation. [122372]

    Mr. Spellar
    I have asked the Chief Executive of Roads Service to write to the hon. Gentleman in response to this question. A copy of the letter will be placed in the Library.

    Transport Infrastructure
    Mr. Dodds
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how much has been invested in improving the(a) roads and (b) transport infrastructure in (i) North Belfast and (ii) Northern Ireland in each year since 1997. [119466]

    Angela Smith
    I have asked the Chief Executive of Roads Service to write to you in response to your question. A copy of the letter will be placed in the Library.

    Unadopted Main Sewers
    Mr. Peter Robinson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many households in East Belfast have unadopted main sewers. [122550]

    Mr. Spellar
    I have asked the Chief Executive of Water Service to write to the hon. Gentleman in response to this question. A copy of the letter will be placed in the Library.

    Vehicle Licensing
    Lady Hermon
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what discussions he has had with the
    833W
    Secretary of State for Transport about extending to Northern Ireland measures to improve vehicle licensing in line with those announced by the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport in the written ministerial statement of 22 May 2003, Official Report, columns 45–46WS. [116807]

    Angela Smith
    I can confirm that the proposals announced by the Minister for Transport will apply in Northern Ireland. My officials in Driver and Vehicle Licensing Northern Ireland are working with their counterparts in DVLA and DfT on the operational details.

    Waiting Times/Lists
    Mrs. Iris Robinson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many patients in the Province are waiting for(a) CT scans, (b)MRI scans and (c) X-rays; and what the longest time is that a patient has had to wait for each of these appointments. [130250]

    Angela Smith
    The information requested is not routinely collected centrally and could be obtained only at disproportionate cost.

    Water and Sewerage
    Mr. Dodds
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how much has been invested in improving the(a) water and (b) sewerage infrastructure in North Belfast in each year since 1997. [119467]

    Angela Smith
    I have asked the Chief Executive of Water Service to write to the hon. Lady in response to this question. A copy of the letter will be placed in the Library.

    Water Bill
    Lady Hermon
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what discussions he has had with Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs Ministers to extend the Water Bill to Northern Ireland. [130400]

    Angela Smith
    I have had no discussions with Defra Ministers about extending the Water Bill to Northern Ireland. The Water Bill applies only to England and Wales and, as such, its proposed measures relate largely to the privatised water industry which does not reflect the arrangements currently in place in Northern Ireland. However, my officials have been monitoring the progress of the Bill through its various stages to consider what, if any, implications there are for future policy development in Northern Ireland.

    Water Services
    Lady Hermon
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many(a) households and (b) public sector offices in Northern Ireland have been fitted with hippo bags; and if he will make a statement on the estimated savings made by their introduction. [121934]

    Mr. Spellar
    I have asked the Chief Executive of Water Service to write to the hon. Lady in response to this question. A copy of the letter will be placed in the Library.
    834W
    Lady Hermon
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland whether the Water Service met its targets in respect of domestic water efficiency in(a) 2001, (b) 2002 and (c) since January. [121932]

    Mr. Spellar
    I have asked the Chief Executive of Water Service to write to the hon. Lady in response to this question. A copy of the letter will be placed in the Library

    Lady Hermon
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland when he last met the EAGA Partnership to discuss water efficiency proposals; and if he will make a statement. [121933]

    Mr. Spellar
    I have asked the Chief Executive of Water Service to write to the hon. Lady in response to this question. A copy of the letter will be placed in the Library.

    Lady Hermon
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what comparative studies have been undertaken by the Water Service in Northern Ireland with water authorities in(a) England, (b) Scotland and (c) Wales regarding water efficiency by (i) domestic premises, (ii) small businesses and (iii) public sector offices; and if he will make a statement on the results. [121935]

    Mr. Spellar
    I have asked the Chief Executive of Water Service to write to the hon. Lady in response to this question. A copy of the letter will be placed in the Library.

    Lady Hermon
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what evaluation has been made by the Water Service regarding the distribution of hippo bags in Northern Ireland: and if he will make a statement on the results. [121936]

    Mr. Spellar
    I have asked the Chief Executive of Water Service to write to the hon. Lady in response to this question. A copy of the letter will be placed in the Library.

    Lady Hermon
    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement on his plans to improve water efficiency in(a) low income households, (b) small businesses and (c) public sector offices. [121937]

    Mr. Spellar
    I have asked the Chief Executive of Water Service to write to the hon. Lady in response to this question. A copy of the letter will be placed in the Library.

  HEALTH

    Abortions
    Mr. Rosindell
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health (1) what plans he has to reduce the number of abortions in the London borough of Havering; [129048]

    (2) how many abortions were performed in the London borough of Havering in each year from 1997 to 2002. [129051]

    Mr. Hutton
    The Government are taking a number of steps through the National Strategy for Sexual Health and HIV and the Teenage Pregnancy Strategy to help
    835W
    reduce the number of abortions. We are also working to improve access to contraceptive services and the range of methods of contraception that are available and will be making £1 million available this year to support this. We are also working with the Department for Education and Skills to improve sex and relationships education.

    The number of abortions performed on residents of Havering local authority is shown in the table. The data are not available by local authority prior to 1995 and have therefore been shown by health authority, district health authority, and health district which includes data for residents of neighbouring local authority areas. Data for 2002 will be available from autumn 2003.

    Numbers of abortions to residents of Havering local authority, 1995–20011,2

    Year

    Number

    2001

    862

    2000

    828

    1999

    838

    1998

    815

    1997

    757

    1996

    737

    1995

    691

    1994

    31,288

    1993

    31,350

    1992

    41,557

    1991

    41,703

    1990

    41,777

    1989

    41,839

    1988

    41,750

    1987

    41,618

    1986

    41,435

    1985

    41,477

    1984

    41,435

    1983

    41,308

    1982

    57 69

    1981

    5708

    1980

    31,220

    1979

    31,245

    1978

    31,029

    1977

    3989

    1976

    3933

    1Prior to 1995 records were allocated by postcode to ward and then stored by health authority or district health authority. Data for 2002 will be available from autumn 2003.

    2 The information provided for 1976–94 is for areas that include abortions performed on residents of Havering local authority.

    3 Barking, Havering and Brentwood district health authority.

    4 Barking and Havering health authority.

    5 Havering health district.

    Accident and Emergency Treatment
    Dr. Harris
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health what guidelines he has issued on the target for no patient to be waiting for more than four hours in accident and emergency, with special reference to patients with a clinical need to remain for over four hours. [129682]

    Ms Rosie Winterton
    The NHS Plan established the target that by December 2004 accident and emergency (A&E) patients should wait no more than four hours between arrival and discharge, admission to hospital, or transfer to another facility.

    There are exceptional circumstances in which an A&E department remains the safest clinical environment for a patient even though four hours have elapsed. The Department of Health has been engaged in constructive
    836W
    discussions with the British Association for A&E Medicine, the Faculty of A&E Medicine and the Royal College of Nursing about how these cases should be defined and monitored.

    The product of these discussions is a paper that was published for wider consultation on 11 September. The paper is available on the Department's website, at www.doh. gov.uk/emergencycare/clinical-exceptions. htm. The consultation period runs until 31 October 2003. After consultation we will publish the final version of the paper and develop a process for excluding these patients from the monitoring of NHS trusts' performance against the A&E target.

    Acute Hospitals (Performance)
    Chris Grayling
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health what steps he is taking to support NHS managers in improving performance following the recent Audit Commission reports into acute hospitals. [127729]

    Mr. Hutton
    The Government have a range of measures in place to support national health service managers in improving performance:we have invested significant additional resources in the five-year period 2003–04 to 2007–08. Over this period the average real terms increase will be 7.4 per cent. a year over and above inflation;
    we have set up the NHS Modernisation Agency to support NHS organisations and their front-line staff to improve services for patients; and
    we have put in place a range of recruitment and retention initiatives.

    For the first time, health communities have developed comprehensive local programmes with action across health partnerships to improve health, tackle inequalities and modernise NHS. Alongside the significant increase in funding, these will help the NHS and social services plan for the future with confidence.

    Further details of the Government's support to the NHS in improving performance are detailed in my letter to the hon. Member, a copy of which has been placed in the Library.

    Advocacy Scheme
    Dr. Evan Harris
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health (1) how the funding for mental health advocacy announced in the White Paper 'Valuing People' has been spent; and how much underspend there is from this fund(a) in England and (b) in each region. [128933]

    (2) how many volunteer advocates have joined the mental health advocacy scheme announced in the White Paper 'Valuing People' (a) in England and (b) in each region. [128934]

    (3) what progress has been made towards the target set out in the White Paper 'Valuing People' for one citizen advocacy group in each local authority area; and which local authorities do not yet have a citizen advocacy group. [128935]

    Dr. Ladyman
    The importance of advocacy for people with learning disabilities is a theme running throughout the White Paper "Valuing People: A New Strategy for Learning Disability for the 21stCentury" (Cm 5086)

    837W
    published in March 2001 which sets out our proposals for improving services for people with learning disabilities, their families and carers.

    "Valuing People" announced the creation of two new funds, the Implementation Support Fund and the Learning Disability Development Fund, to support key aspects of its proposals. Two organisations, Values Into Action (VIA) and the British Institute of Learning Disabilities (BILD), are distributing money from the Implementation Support Fund to support the development and expansion of self-and citizen advocacy respectively. By the end of the third year of the funding programme in March 2004, £3 million will have been distributed to advocacy organisations. That figure includes the additional £140,000 which my hon. Friend, the Member for Redditch, announced in February 2002 was being made available from April that year following representations from the Learning Disability Task Force and self advocates. There has been no underspend in the first two years, and funding for the third year has already been allocated.

    Our most recent information is that 449 volunteers have been recruited to citizen advocacy schemes; as a result 394 people with learning disabilities now have advocates who otherwise would not.

    Information on the geographical distribution of citizen advocacy schemes is not available in the form requested, as many schemes cover more than one local authority area. In 2002–03, the first full year of the funding programme, advocacy schemes in twenty four new geographical areas received support.

    The Government's report on learning disability, "Making Change Happen" (HC514), published in April 2003, announced that the Implementation Support Fund would continue until March 2006 and that the Learning Disability Task Force would be consulted on its use.

    The draft Mental Health Bill published for consultation in June 2002 included the proposal for a statutory duty on the Secretary of State to provide for specialist mental health advocates to be available for every patient treated under the formal powers of the Bill and their nominated person.

    At the request of the Department of Health, Durham University has undertaken a study of current mental health advocacy services to assist the Department in developing this new specialist advocacy service. A separate report on mental health advocacy was also published for consultation in June 2002. It contained a number of recommendations for good practice. The responses from both consultation exercises are being carefully evaluated and will be taken into account in developing plans for implementing the new specialist service, including the funding arrangements.

    Autism
    Mr. Wilkinson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health if he will implement the recommendations of the Charter for Persons with Autism adopted as a written declaration by the European Parliament on 9 May 1996. [129443]
    838W
    Dr. Ladyman
    The rights of all citizens of the United Kingdom, including those who have autism, are set out in the Human Rights Act 1998. We are making sure that human rights principles are kept at the heart of services and policies, in particular through national standards, performance assessment and quality management and in taking forward, for example, the social services modernisation agenda and the implementation of the NHS Plan. We will continue to put human rights at the heart of health and social care policy and the delivery of services for everyone, including people with autism.

    Brent and Harrow Health Authority
    Dr. Cable
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many NHS dentists there are in the Brent and Harrow Health Authority area; what steps he is taking to increase the number of NHS dentists in the Brent and Harrow Health Authority area; and if he will make a statement. [128753]

    Mr. Hutton
    Brent and Harrow Health Authority dissolved on 1 April 2002 and North West London Strategic Health Authority is now the local headquarters of the national health service. However the latest available figures show that there were 221 general dental services dentists whose main work was in Brent and Harrow HA at 30 September 2002.

    The proposals in the Health and Social Care (Community Health and Standards) Bill, currently before Parliament, will underpin a modernised high-quality primary dental service provided through contracts between primary care trusts and dental practices properly integrated with the rest of the NHS.

    North West London SHA will ensure that as new primary care centres are developed locally, dentistry will be part of the consideration of which services can be brought together for the convenience of patients.

    Dr. Cable
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health what the prescribing budget was for the Brent and Harrow Health Authority for the financial years(a) 2000–01, (b) 2001–02 and (c) 2002–03; and if he will make a statement. [128759]

    Mr. Hutton
    The information requested is not held centrally. Information from North West London Strategic Health Authority is shown in the following tables. Brent and Harrow Health Authority was dissolved on 1 April 2002 and Brent Primary Care Trust and Harrow PCT now have responsibility for setting prescribing budgets in Brent and Harrow respectively.

    Prescribing budget for Brent and Harrow Health Authority

    £000

    Actual

    Budget

    2000–01

    45,702

    45,344

    2001–02

    49,960

    49,538

    Combined prescribing budget for Brent PCT

    £000

    Actual>

    Budget

    2002–03

    58,722

    56,055

    839W
    Each year the Department of Health issues guidance to the national health service containing advice about factors that should be taken into account in setting prescribing budgets. However it is for individual primary care trusts to set their prescribing budgets.

    Bureaucracy
    Dr. Fox
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many bureaucracy-busting champions have been appointed as part of the Government's anti-bureaucracy drive; and where they are located. [129588]

    Mr. Hutton
    No new appointments have been made as a result of this initiative. Each strategic health authority has identified an existing senior member of staff who will be responsible for ensuring that action is taken locally to reduce the burden placed on front-line national health service staff. This will complement the action already being taken by the Department.

    Child Protection
    Mr. Baron
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health if he will list the NHS trusts which have not yet appointed a designated nurse for child protection. [127011]

    Dr. Ladyman
    According 10 the child protection sell-audit returns submitted to the Commission for Health improvement, by the end of May 2003, the following National Health Service trusts, including primary care trusts, acute trusts, and mental health trusts, did not have a named nurse in post when they made their return.

    Tendring Primary Care Trust

    Black water Valley and Hart Primary Care Trust

    Colchester Primary Care Trust

    Dudley South Primary Care Trust

    Dudley Bencon and Castle Primary Care trust

    Knowsley Primary Care Trust

    Cheimslord Primary Care Trust

    Waveney Primary Care Trust

    Brent Primary Care Trust

    Witham, Bramiree and Halstead Care NHS Trust

    Cardiothoracic Centre Liverpool NHS Trust (The)

    Walton Centre for Neurology & Neurosurgery NHS Trust

    East Lancashire Hospitals NHS Trust

    Rotherham General Hospitals NHS Trust

    West Middlesex University Hospital NHS Trust

    Whittington Hospital NHS Trust

    Five Boroughs Partnership NHS Trust

    Avon and Wiltshire Mental Health Partnerships NHS Trust

    Calderstones NHS Trust

    Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Mental Health Partnership NHS Trust

    East London and The City Mental Health NHS Trust

    Lincolnshire Partnership NHS Trust

    North Cumbria Mental Health and Learning Disabilities NHS Trust

    North East London Mental Health NHS Trust

    Tavistock and Portman NHS Trust

    Worcestershire Mental Health Partnership NHS Trust

    However, 13 of these 26 trusts noted in their return that they were in the process of recruiting a named nurse, or that recruitment would start shortly, and a further four said that they had made alternative arrangements such as access to specialist advice Irom
    840W
    another trust or organisation, a shared team across the whole county, or a combined designated/named nurse post.

    The following primary care trusts did not have a designated nurse in post at the time that they made their return:

    Hensmere Primary Care Trust

    West Cumbria Primary Care Trust

    Rugby Primary Care Trust

    Wafiord and Three Rivers Primary Care Trust

    Tower Hamlets Primary Care Trust

    Redbridge Primary Care Trust

    However, three of these trusts noted in their return that they were in the process of recruiting a designated nurse, and another noted that it had made alternative arrangements for staff to access specialist advice.

    Community Health Councils
    Mr. Burns
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many staff, previously employed by the community health councils, have left their jobs in the last six months. [127518]

    Ms Rosie Winterton
    Figures on Community Health Council (CHC) staff leavers, which have been available since February 2003 when clearing houses were introduced, indicate that to end of June 2003, 100 CHC staff have left their jobs.

    Dr. Fox
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health when he estimates the last community health council will cease to function. [130319]

    Ms Rosie Winterton
    I refer the hon. Member to the Written Ministerial Statement made by my hon. Friend, the then Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Mr. Lammy) on Wednesday 4 June 2003,Official Report, columns 22–23WS. It is still our intention to abolish community health councils on 1 December 2003.

    Mr. Baron
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health what assessment he has made of the staffing levels of community health councils; and what estimate he has made of their likely staff levels on 1 November. [130711]

    Ms Rosie Winterton
    [holding answer 16 September 2003]: The Department is working closely with the employing authorities of community health council (CHC) staff and is regularly monitoring the staffing level of CHCs in the run up to the abolition date of 1 December. It is estimated that on 1 November there will be approximately 380 CHC staff.

    Mr. Baron
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health what arrangements are being put in place to ensure that those community health councils which have to move from their premises prior to 1 December remain fully operational. [130712]

    Ms Rosie Winterton
    [holding answer 16 September 2003]: Each community health council (CHC) has an exit strategy. In the case of those CHCs who have to move premises prior to 1 December the CHC lead will consult and discuss fully with the chair, members and staff the arrangements that will be in place for the operation of that CHC.

    Dental Work
    Mr. Wray
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health what measures are in place to ensure that unnecessary dental work is not carried out on patients by dentists for profit. [127984]

    Ms Rosie Winterton
    Dentists providing general dental services under the national health service are remunerated through fees set out in the Statement of Dental Remuneration. The fees are uprated annually in the light of recommendations from the Doctors and Dentists Remuneration Body. For treatments not listed on the Statement of Dental Remuneration and for courses of treatment where total gross lees are above a specified limit set out in regulations dentists are required to obtain prior approval from the Dental Practice Board.

    The board continuously monitors treatments provided under the General Dental Service (GDS) to identify outlying prescribing patterns. The dental reference service of the Dental Practice Board undertakes random patient examinations of proposed treatment plans and completed treatments provided under the GDS to ensure that these meet patients clinical needs and are provided to appropriate standards. When providing general dental services a dentist's terms of service require that he or she "shall not provide care and treatment in excess of that which is necessary to secure and maintain oral health". A breach of these terms of service can result in a financial withholding.

    Under the provisions of the Health and Social Care Bill currently before Parliament, Primary Care Trusts will commission dental services from April 2005 and will be given the resources to do so. Dentists who contract with a PCT will have a secure income in return for making a longer-term commitment to the NHS.

    In response to the Office of Fair Trading report on private dentistry the Government has published an action plan. This is available at www.dti.gov.uk/topics2/dentists.htm. The plan commits the Government to support the development of evidence based clinical care pathways in the NHS to aid dental professionals in improving clinical and cost effective treatment planning of appropriate patient care. The Department of Health will explore with the General Dental Council how clinical pathways can inform its 'Maintaining Standards' guidance and thus be extended to private dentistry.

    Diabetes
    Mr. Hepburn
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health what measures the Department has taken to reduce the number of people with diabetes. [128893]

    Ms Rosie Winterton
    Some risk factors for developing diabetes, such as family history, increasing age or ethnic origin cannot be modified. However it is possible to reduce other risk factors, such as being overweight, having an adverse distribution of body weight or being physically inactive. The Government have a range of actions under way to tackle these risk factors.
    842W
    Two new initiatives will be key in fostering healthier lifestyles. The Department of Health is leading on the development of a cross-government food and health action plan. The Plan will pull together all the issues that influence what we eat and will address food production, manufacture and preparation, access to healthier food choices and providing information for consumers about healthy eating and nutrition. This is complemented by wide ranging action to increase mass participation in physical activity and sport, which will be progressed by a cross-government activity co-ordination team, jointly led by the Department of Health and the Department of Culture, Media and Sport.

    Mr. Hepburn
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many people had diabetes in(a) Jarrow constituency, (b) South Tyneside, (c) Tyne and Wear and (d) the UK (a), in 1980, (b) in 1990, (c) in 2000 and (d) on the latest date for which figures are available. [128892]

    Ms Rosie Winterton
    The information is not available in the form requested. However, based on information from the Health Survey for England, the following figures may be estimated.

    Number of people with diabetes in the United Kingdom

    1994

    1,378,707

    1998

    1,684,111

    Dialysis Treatment
    Mrs. Curtis-Thomas
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many people are receiving dialysis treatment in(a) Crosby, (b) the North West of England and (c) England. 1129482]

    Ms Rosie Winterton
    The latest figures are from the 1998 Renal Survey commissioned by the Department of Health. This shows there were 13,405 patients in England receiving dialysis in 1998 of these 1,586 were being treated in the North West. Equivalent figures for the Crosby area are not available from this source.

    Drug Addiction
    Mrs. Helen Clark
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health if he will make it his policy to increase the training available to GPs in the treatment of drug dependency. [129142]

    Mr. Hutton
    The Government do not specify the content of the General Practitioner training curriculum. This is the job of the Joint Committee on Postgraduate Training for General Practice (JCPTGP), which is the competent authority for general practice training in the United Kingdom. The JCPTGP is an independent professional body, and it is required by section 9(3) of the Vocational Training Regulations 1997 to determine and publish the curriculum to be followed by a GP registrar (for example a trainee GP).
    843W
    The Regulations do specify seven competencies which must be tested, and which the curriculum must therefore teach:
    factual medical knowledge sufficient to enable the doctor to perform the duties of a GP;
    the ability to apply factual medical knowledge to the management of problems presented by patients in general practice;
    effective communication, both orally and in writing:
    the ability to consult satisfactorily with general practice patients;
    the ability to review and critically analyse the practitioner's own working practices and to manage any necessary changes appropriately;
    clinical skills; and
    the ability to synthesise all the above competencies and apply them appropriately in a general practice setting.

    GPs are expected therefore to be trained in the skills needed to deal with all their patients.

    Failing Hospitals
    Mr. Dobson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health which organisations are included on the Department's list of possible franchisees for the management of failing hospitals; and which organisations have been awarded franchises for running failing hospitals. [129746]

    Mr. Hutton
    [holding answer 15 September 2003]: The National Health Service Franchising Register of Expertise was published in December 2002. All current three star NHS organisations are on the register along with Trent strategic health authority and eight private sector organisations who are:
    BMI Healthcare, BUPA Hospitals Ltd., Capio Healthcare UK Ltd., Hospitalia activHealth gmbh, Interhealth Canada Ltd., Quo Health, Secta Group Ltd. and Serco Health.

    Prior 10 December 2002, six NHS trusts were franchised as a result of their performance in 2000–01, and recruited new chief executives who were already working in the NHS.

    Good Hope Hospital NHS Trust was given a zero star rating for their performance in 2001–02. Following a rigorous competitive tender, Secta won the franchise to run the trust. The new chief executive started on 1 September 2003.

    Falls
    Dr. Fox
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many and what percentage of admissions to care homes of people over the age of(a) 50 years and (b) 65 years in each of the last five years for which figures are available were as a result of a fall. [127349]

    Dr. Ladyman
    Information on the reason for admission to care homes is not collected centrally.

    The number of admissions to care homes supported wholly or in part by local authorities is provided in the table for the years 1997–98 to 2001–02.

    Number of admissions to care homes 1997–98 to 2001–02

    All ages

    18–64

    65+

    1997–98

    402,025

    133,000

    269,025

    1998–99

    403,110

    133,555

    269,555

    844W

    Number of admissions to care homes 1997–98 to 2001–02

    All ages

    18–64

    65+

    1999–2000

    397,905

    135,765

    262,140

    2000–01

    367,350

    130,075

    237,275

    2001–02

    374,925

    133,140

    241,785

    Note:

    Data includes permanent and temporary admissions.

    Source:

    SR 1, Table S2

    Fertility Treatment (Havering)
    Mr. Rosindell
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many individuals resident in the London borough of Havering are on a waiting list for fertility treatment. [129049]

    Mr. Hutton
    This information is not collected centrally. Information from the North East London Strategic Health Authority is that there are currently 30 Havering residents waiting for national health service funded in-vitro fertilisation treatment at Bart's and the London NHS Trust. This does not include those patients that are funding their treatment privately either at a NHS trust or through a private clinic.

    GP Lists
    Dr. Harris
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health pursuant to his answer of 1 September 2003,Official Report, column 936W, on GP lists, what the average list size was in each year since 1992. [129720]

    Mr. Hutton
    Data on the number of general practitioners and patients are published annually. The latest edition, Statistics for General Medical Practitioners in England: 1992–2002, is available at http://www.doh.gov.uk/public/sb0303.pdf

    The table shows the average GP list size from 1992–2002.

    The average list size continues to fall and is 4 per cent. lower in 2002 than it was in 1992.

    Unrestricted Principals and Equivalents (UPEs)1 average list size 1992–2002

    England

    Number (headcount)

    UPEs

    Average list size

    1992

    25,968

    1,922

    1993

    26,280

    1,902

    1994

    26,567

    1,900

    1995

    26702

    1,887

    1996

    26,855

    1,885

    1997

    27,099

    1,878

    1998

    27,392

    1,866

    1999

    27,591

    1,845

    2000

    27,704

    1,853

    2001

    27,843

    1,841

    2002

    28,031

    1,838

    1 UPEs include GMS Unrestricted Principals, PMS Contracted GPs and PMS Salaried GPs.

    Note:

    Data as at 1 October 1992–99 and 30 September 2000–02.

    Source:

    Department of Health General and Personal Medical Services Statistics

    GP Recruitment
    Dr. Evan Harris
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many GPs have been recruited through the(a) GP Returner scheme and (b) Golden Hello scheme; and how many GPs have delayed their retirement through the Delayed Retirement scheme. [128917]

    Mr. Hutton
    The flexible careers scheme has received 198 applications from doctors wishing to return to general practice. 59 of these are already back in general practice and a further 139 are being processed.

    Application forms received by the Department indicate that over 2,900 general practitioners have received the golden hello payment.

    No information is held centrally on those doctors who delay their retirement.

    Health Organisations (Romford)
    Mr. Rosindell
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health what discussions he has had with health organisations in Romford during the past 12 months. [129045]

    Mr. Hutton
    I met with the North East London Strategic Health Authority on 5 February 2003.

    Histopathology
    Mr. Nigel Jones
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health what his policy is on assisting NHS trusts to recruit histopathology consultants. [129111]

    Mr. Hutton
    The Department of Health has a number of national initiatives in place to assist National Health Service trusts to recruit consultants, including histopathologists.

    Under the Department International Fellowship programme, twenty Histopathologists have been recruited and accepted others of employment from NHS trusts. A further nine have been recruited under the global scheme.

    In addition, we are taking forward a programme of work to address key issues of concern to the medical profession as part of the Improving Working Lives initiative. The Flexible Careers Scheme, which is partially centrally funded, allows consultants to strike a better balance between work and other aspects of their life outside work. The scheme enables consultants to work flexibly such as working round the school holidays and job-sharing.

    Hospital Patients (Homeless People)
    Mrs. Curtis-Thomas
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many patients whose address was listed as no fixed abode were admitted to NHS hospitals between January and June. [129489]

    Mr. Hutton
    Data are not yet available for January to June, 2002 or 2003. Information shown in the table is for January to June 2001. Due to the nature of homelessness, it may not always be possible to accurately record information. The figures quoted in the response are likely to significantly undercount the 'true' values. This is because in many cases people of no fixed abode may be 846W
    admitted from temporary accommodation such as a hostel or be sleeping at a friend's home and are coded accordingly.

    Finished Admissions into NHS hospitals where place of residence is listed as no fixed abode

    Number

    January 2001 to June 2001

    3,267

    Notes:

    Data in this table are ungrossed

    Data exclude all healthy newborn babies.

    source:

    Hospital Episode Statistics (HES), Department of Health

    Hospital Trust Deficits
    Mr. Dobson
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health what the underlying deficit was in 2002–03 of each of the hospital trusts which he has authorised to proceed with application for foundation status. [129299]

    Mr. Hutton
    Audited financial information in respect of the 2002–03 year far all national health service trusts is published in their individual annual accounts. This information will not be available centrally until the end of October 2003.

    Hospital Waiting Lists/Times
    Mr. Rosindell
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health what plans he has to cut waiting lists in the London borough of Havering. [129050]

    Mr. Hutton
    The national health service is working to reduce waiting times so that by the end of March 2004, the maximum waiting time for in-patient treatment will be cut to nine months and the maximum waiting time for an out-patient appointment will be cut to 17 weeks.

    Mr. Rosindell
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many(a) cancer, (b) heart disease, (c) hip replacement and (d) liver complaint patients resident in the London borough of Havering are on a waiting list for treatment. [129052]

    Mr. Hutton
    The information requested is not collected in the requested format.

    Hospital Wards
    Dr. Cable
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many mixed-sex wards have been divided into single-sex bays at(a) Darent Valley Hospital, Dartford and (b) West Middlesex Hospital, London since 1 January 2002; and if he will make a statement. [128768]

    Ms Rosie Winterton
    The information is not available in the format requested. Ward level data are not collected centrally.

    The Department of Health set three objectives to support the elimination of mixed-sex accommodation with a deadline of December 2002, designed to deliver separate sleeping areas, separate toilet and washing facilities and safe facilities for the mentally ill. Compliance is measured at trust level, and both Dartford and Gravesham National Health Service Trust and West Middlesex University Hospital NHS Trust are meeting these objectives.

    Infection Transmission
    Dr. Fox
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health what measures are being taken to minimise the risk of transmission of infection via ambulances. [130313]

    Ms Rosie Winterton
    In 2000, the Department of Health issued advice on the management and control of hospital infection (Health Service Circular 2000/02). All national health service trusts, including ambulance trusts were required to take action to:strengthen prevention and control of infection;
    secure appropriate health care services for patients with infection; and
    improve surveillance of infection.

    Measures taken on infection control are a matter for individual trusts. Each trust will have an infection control policy which should comply with current best practice and have access to local advice.

    Medical Students
    Dr. Evan Harris
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health what the total intake of United Kingdom medical schools was in each year since 1990. [128930]

    Mr. Hutton
    The information requested is shown in the table.

    United Kingdom Medical School Intake per Academic Year between 1990 and 2002

    1990–91

    4,311

    1991–92

    4,320

    1992–93

    4,449

    1993–94

    4,531

    1994–95

    4,778

    1995–96

    4,699

    1996–97

    4,833

    1997–98

    5,062

    1998–99

    5,069

    1999–2000

    5,302

    2000–01

    5,610

    2001–02

    6,115

    2002–031

    6,740

    1 Figures are provisional until November 2003 when a final figure will be reported.

    Source:

    HEFCE

    Note:

    By 2005, UK medical school intakes are planned to be around 7,300

    Mental Health Services for Deaf People
    Mrs. Curtis-Thomas
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many graduate primary care mental health workers there are in each NHS region. [129488]

    Ms Rosie Winterton
    The NHS Plan set out that one thousand new graduate primary care workers trained in brief therapy techniques of proven effectiveness will be recruited to help general practitioners manage and treat mental common mental health problems. The target date set for local services through priorities and planning guidance is December 2004; training courses have just been established and arrangements to monitor recruitment are currently in hand This means that the information requested about the employment by specialised trusts of new graduate workers is not yet available.
    848W
    Mr. Grieve
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health (1) what steps the Government are taking to improve mental health services for deaf people; and when he expects to see the results from these improvements; [130031]

    (2) what action the Government are taking with regard to the consultation document, "A Sign of the Times"; [130032]

    (3) what steps he plans to take to implement the proposals in the consultation document, "A Sign of the Times"; and how he plans to measure the effectiveness of the changes; [130033]

    (4) what steps the Government are taking to monitor the impact of the National Services Framework for mental health services on deaf and hard of hearing patients; and what the results are. [130035]

    Ms Rosie Winterton
    [holding answer 16 September 2003]The Government's strategy for mental health services in England is set out in the "National Service Framework for Mental Health" which specifies seven standards that people should be able to expect from services. The National Service Framework standards apply to all people of working age who have mental health problems including those who are deaf or hard of hearing.

    "A Sign of the Times", a consultation document on modernising mental health services for people who are deaf, sought the views of all stakeholders on a number of proposals to improve services for deaf and deafblind users of mental health services through a consultation exercise which ended in April. The Department will publish implementation guidance later in the year that will take all responses to "A Sign of the Times" into account.

    It is envisaged that the implementation guidance will set out comprehensive arrangements for performance management of the implementation process.

    Methylphenidate
    Mr. Paul Marsden
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many children have been prescribed methylphenidate in the last year. [127098]

    Dr. Ladyman
    Information is not available in the form requested. However the figures in the following table show the total number of prescription items of Methylphenidate Hydrochloride dispensed in the community in England in each of the last five years. The majority of prescription items of Methylphenidate Hydrochloride are for the brand Ritalin.

    Number of prescription items of Methylphenidate Hydrochloride dispensed in the community in England. 1998 to 2002

    Prescription items (thousand)

    Total

    1998

    126.6

    1999

    158.0

    2000

    186.2

    2001

    208.5

    2001

    254.0

    Source:

    Prescription Cost Analysis data from the Prescription Pricing Authority
    849W
    In 2002, around 91 per cent. of the 254,000 prescription items were dispensed in the community to children (children under 16 and young people aged 16 to 18 in full time education). An estimated 1 per cent. of the items were dispensed to people aged 60 and over with the remainder being dispensed to other adults. These proportions have been similar in recent years.

    Negligence Claims
    Dr. Cable
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health how much was paid to cover professional negligence claims on London hospitals in each year since 1992–93; what proportion each sum represented of those hospital budgets; and if he will make a statement. [1287641

    Mr. Hutton
    Information on the amounts paid to cover professional negligence claims is not collected centrally.

    General Dental Service: Number of registrations with a GDS dentist since 1997

    Health Authority/Primary Cure Trust

    19971,2

    19982

    19992

    20002

    20012

    20023

    20024

    20034

    England (million)

    26.8

    23.5

    23.5

    23.7

    23.6

    23.5

    23.5

    23.4

    Northern and Yorkshire Region (thousand)

    3.850.6

    3,451.9

    3,447.8

    3,486.1

    3,484.3

    3,439. I

    —

    —

    Gateshead and South Tyneside HA (thousand)

    213.2

    188.6

    191.4

    190.5

    193.6

    190.2

    —

    —

    Newcastle and North Tyneside HA (thousand)

    278.8

    241.5

    245.5

    245.0

    239.5

    239.3

    —

    —

    Sunderland HA (thousand)

    169.8

    147.0

    147.0

    148.8

    150.8

    152.3

    —

    —

    Northumberland, Tyne and Wear SHA (thousand)

    —

    —

    —

    —

    —

    —

    743.1

    751.6

    Newcastle PCT (thousand)

    —

    —

    —

    —

    —

    —

    139.2

    140.6

    Gateshead PCT (thousand)

    —

    —

    —

    —

    —

    —

    101.1

    99.1

    South Tyneside PCT (thousand)

    —

    —

    —

    —

    —

    —

    84.3

    86.1

    North Tyneside PCT (thousand)

    —

    —

    —

    —

    —

    —

    101.8

    103.3

    Sunderland Teaching PCT (thousand)

    —

    —

    —

    —

    —

    —

    150.3

    153.1

    1Registration numbers are not consistent with numbers for later dates because the 1997 numbers partly reflect the previous 24 months registration period (now 15 months).

    2 September

    3 August

    4 Responsibilities were transferred from HAs to PCTs from 1 October 2003.

    Source:

    Dental Practice Board

    NHS Staff (E-mail Access)
    Dr. Evan Harris
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health what targets have been set for NHS staff to have access to email; what the baseline was for the target; in which document the target was published; and what progress has been made towards the target. [128910]

    Mr. Hutton
    The Government's strategy document "Building the Information Core—Implementing the NHS Plan" published in 2000 set the target of March 2003 for all National Health Service staff to have access to email. This target is now reflected in the National Programme for Information Technology in the NHS that provides a new approach to delivering IT in the NHS.

    At 31 March 2003 NHS trusts reported via the information for health tracking database that 79 per cent. of all NHS staff (822,000 of a total of 1,037,000) had access to email and web browsing. Priority had been given to staff directly involved in the patient care process, so that 98 per cent. of consultants (28,600 of 28,700) and 82 per cent. of clinical staff (602,000 of 732,000, including consultants) had connectivity by that date.

    NHS (Public Health)
    Chris Grayling
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many(a) public health tutors and (b) regulatory affairs managers are employed by the NHS. [127678]

    Mr. Hutton
    Information on the number of public health tutors and regulatory affairs managers employed by the National Health Service is not collected centrally.

    NHS Dentistry
    Mr. Hepburn
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many people were waiting to be registered by NHS dentists in(a) Jarrow constituency, (b) South Tyneside, (c) Tyne and Wear, (d) the North East and (e) England in each year since 1997. [128888]

    Ms Rosie Winterton
    This information is not held centrally. Registrations remain broadly stable in these areas and are shown in the following table.

    The new centrally provided NHS national email service is now available to all staff, although take-up is a matter for local priorities. The NHS Directory (electronic address book) is one of the largest in the world and today holds 930,000 entries. The simple mail transfer protocol relay service through which internal NHS messaging, including e-mail, is handled, carried over 30 million messages in August 2003.

    Nurses
    Gregory Barker
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many nurses have been recruited by the NHS from South Africa in each of the last five years. [130037]

    Mr. Hutton
    [holding answer 16 September 2003]: The information requested is not collected by the Department. Information about the number of nurses admitted to the Nursing and Midwifery Council register is published by the Nursing and Midwifery Council (www.nmc-uk.org).

    Dr. Evan Harris
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many NHS nurses were(a) suspended and (b) on gardening or special leave, at the latest date for

    851W
    which figures are available; for how long they were suspended; what the total cost was to the NHS; and if he will make a statement. [128932]

    Mr. Hutton
    The Department of Health does not collect any information centrally on the numbers of National Health Service nurses that are suspended or on special leave.

    Stephen Hesford
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many nurses are in training; and how many were in training in 1997. [130543]

    Mr. Hutton
    In 1997–98 there were 38,412 nurses and midwives in pre-registration training. In 2002–03 there were 60,189 nurses in pre-registration training, an increase of 57 per cent.

    Obesity Reduction
    Dr. Cable
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health what steps have been taken in the last two years in(a) the London borough of Richmond upon Thames, (b) Inner London and (c) Greater London to reduce obesity; and if he will make a statement. [128774]

    Mr. Hutton
    Local strategies on reducing obesity are being developed as part of the national service framework for coronary heart disease and national service framework for diabetes. These programmes include a range of initiatives aimed at promoting healthy eating and increasing levels of physical activity. As part of the national school fruit scheme, over 300,000 children in London are receiving a piece of free fruit every school day. 32 schools in the London borough of Richmond upon Thames (primary and secondary) are part of the healthy schools scheme (launched nationally in 1999 as the national healthy school standard). In addition Richmond and Twickenham Primary Care Trust has delivered two healthy eating support programmes to tackle obesity and related diseases.

    Ongoing initiatives have a role in obesity prevention including the reform of the welfare food scheme, various school based initiatives such as the national school fruit scheme, the five-a-day community programme and the local exercise action pilots.

    Activity to tackle obesity in London is being delivered by a wide range of organisations and initiatives through a variety of funding sources, examples of these are:
    approximately 15 healthy living centres situated within communities with high levels of deprivation and health needs, have a focus on tackling obesity;
    nine five-a-day projects in London have been established in the most 20 per cent. deprived of primary care trusts;
    the national school fruit scheme has 90 per cent. coverage in London in all local education authority maintained primary and infant schools;
    a school sport co-ordinators programme that aims to promote physical activity in out of school hours learning is also in place across London.

    Overseas Nurses
    Dr. Stoate
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health what efforts his Department is making to enforce the ban on the recruitment of nurses from developing countries. [129116]
    852W
    Mr. Hutton
    The code of practice for national health service employers involved in the international recruitment of health care professionals was published in October 2001.

    The code states that developing countries should not be targeted for recruitment, nor should NHS employers contract with agencies, which do not comply with the code. Workforce development confederations are working closely with NHS employers in their area to ensure their compliance.

    The Department has established a list of recruitment agencies that are operating in line with the code. The list appears on the Department website www.doh.gov.uk/international-recruitment.

    Overseas Visitors (NHS Treatment)
    Mr. Steen
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health how much was spent on treatment on the NHS for overseas visitors who are fully or partially exempt from the National Health Service (Charges to Overseas Visitors) Regulations 1989, in each of the last five years. [128702]

    Mr. Hutton
    [holding answer 15 September 2003]: This information is not available centrally. Once it has been established that an overseas visitor is exempt from charges, they are dealt with in the same way as any other patient and national health service trusts are not required to keep a separate record of the cost of their treatment.

    Parliamentary Questions
    Mr. Burns
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health (1) how many named day written parliamentary questions tabled to him between 1 February and 1 July received(a) a substantive answer on the named day and (b) a holding answer; [127498]

    (2) how many named day written Parliamentary questions were tabled to him between 1 February and 1 July; and how many of those which received a holding answer were given a substantive answer (a) within three days, (b) within seven days, (c) within 14 days, (d) within 28 days and (e) over 28 days. [127511]

    Ms Rosie Winterton
    The Department received 549 named day written Parliamentary Questions between 1 February and 1 July 2003. Of these, 146 were answered on the day named, and 403 received substantive replies after being given a holding answer. The breakdown of days within which answers were given is shown in the table.

    Interval (calendar days after the holding answer) within which a substantive answer was given

    Number of PQs

    1–3

    150

    4–7

    117

    8–14

    66

    15–28

    53

    Over 28

    17

    Total

    403

    Mr. Burns
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many written Parliamentary Questions he received
    853W
    in each Parliamentary year since May 1997; how many received no answer due to the information not being collected or held centrally; and what proportion of the total number of written questions received this represented in each year. [127506]

    Ms Rosie Winterton
    Using Table Office information for previous years, the number of parliamentary Questions received in each Parliamentary year since 1997 is shown in the table:

    Number

    1997–98

    4,316

    1998–99

    2,769

    1999–2000

    3,864

    2000–01

    1,798

    2001–02

    9,314

    2002–03

    16,970

    1July 2003

    Information is not collected centrally on the number of PQs that received no answer and could be provided only at disproportionate cost.

    Written Questions
    Mr. Burns
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health (1) how many ordinary written Parliamentary questions were tabled to him between 15 October 2002 and 1 July 2003; [127517]

    (2) how many ordinary written questions that were tabled between 15 October 2002 and 1 July 2003 received a substantive answer (a) within three days, (b) within seven days, (c) within fourteen days, (d) within 28 days and (e) over 28 days. [127436]

    Ms Rosie Winterton
    A total of 5,637 ordinary written Parliamentary Questions were tabled between 15 October 2002 and 1 July 2003.

    The breakdown by days within which answers were given, based on a 10 per cent. sample of the total, is shown in the table.

    Interval (calendar days) after the question's due date in which an answer was given

    Number of PQs

    0–3

    80

    4–7

    201

    8–14

    165

    15–28

    116

    Over 28

    46

    Total

    608

    Patient Readmissions
    Dr. Fox
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health what percentage of discharged patients were readmitted within one month as emergencies in each quarter of the past five years. [130327]

    Dr. Ladyman
    The Department of Health collects quarterly monitoring information on emergency readmissions within 28 days of discharge for patients of all ages. This information has been collected since 2002–03 and the information is set out in table 1.
    854W
    Prior to 2002–03, the target for emergency readmissions related only to those patients aged 75 and over. Table 2 also includes the quarterly information for patients aged 75 and over prior to 2002–03.

    Table 1

    Financial year

    Quarter

    Number people of all ages discharged from hospital

    Number of people of all ages readmitted as an emergency within 28 days of discharge

    Rate of 28 days emergency readmission for people of all ages (percentage)

    2003–04

    Ql

    2,402,573

    135,153

    5.6

    2002–03

    Q4

    2,501,481

    138,742

    5.5

    2002–03

    Q3

    2,429,606

    131,704

    5.4

    2002–03

    Q2

    2.334,696

    124,176

    5.3

    2002–03

    Q1

    2,313,818

    125,085

    5.4

    Table 2

    Financial year

    Quarter

    Number people aged 75 and over discharged from hospital

    Number of people aged 75 and over readmitted as an emergency within 28 days of discharge

    Rate of 28 days emergency readmission for people aged over 75 (percentage)

    2001–02

    Q4

    437,034

    31,493

    7.2

    2001–02

    Q3

    429,124

    31,427

    7.3

    2001–02

    Q2

    422,143

    30,083

    7.1

    2001–02

    Q1

    408,817

    29,878

    7.3

    2000–01

    Q4

    409,335

    31,538

    7.7

    2000–01

    Q3

    411,137

    29,896

    7.3

    2000–01

    Q2

    406,761

    28,820

    7.1

    2000–01

    Q1

    390,010

    28,735

    7.4

    1999–2000

    Q4

    377,277

    28,611

    7.6

    1999–2000

    Q3

    368,244

    26,523

    7.2

    1999–2000

    Q2

    368,329

    26,758

    7.3

    1999–2000

    Q1

    346,079

    26,702

    7.7

    1998–99

    Q4

    365,801

    29,933

    8.2

    1998–99

    Q3

    361,266

    29,110

    8.1

    1998–99

    Q2

    357,275

    28,839

    8.1

    1998–99

    Q1

    342,787

    29,213

    8.5

    1997–98

    Q4

    343,170

    24,435

    7.1

    1997–98

    Q3

    335,188

    23,771

    7.1

    1997–98

    Q2

    333,781

    22,385

    6.7

    1997–98

    Q1

    326,996

    23,557

    7.2

    1996–97

    Q4

    339,389

    23,625

    7.0

    Patients Forums
    Mr. Baron
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health what proportion of patient forums will be fully(a) operational and (b) staffed by 1 December. [130714]

    Ms Rosie Winterton
    [holding answer 16 September 2003]: All patients' forums will be in place and fully operational by 1 December 2003. Staff support for all patients' forums has been in place since 1 September 2003.

    Post-operative Death Rates
    Mr. Hoban
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health if he will make a statement on post-operative death rates at the Queen Alexandra Hospital, Portsmouth. [129667]

    Ms Rosie Winterton
    [holding answer 16 September 2003]: In the 2003 Performance Ratings, covering patients treated in the calendar year 2002, Portsmouth Hospitals national health service trust was assessed as having a 28 day post-surgical mortality rate that was not statistically different from the England average. In earlier years' performance assessments, Portsmouth has always done as well as or better than the England average.

    Prescribing Budget
    Mr. Lidington
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health what the(a) 2002–2003 prescribing budget as notified to the Prescriptions Pricing Authority, (b) most recent forecast out-turn of prescribing expenditure for 2002–03, (c) projected (i) overspend and (ii) underspend, and (d) projected (i) overspend and (ii) underspend as a percentage of the prescribing budget were. [103767]

    Mr. Hutton
    Information on the prescribing budgets notified to the Prescription Pricing Authority (PPA) by each Primary Care Trust has been placed in the Library. They are practice level prescribing budgets. They do not necessarily reflect the total resource set aside locally for prescribing as Primary Care Trusts may hold contingency reserves. Information is now available for the entire financial year (up to and including March 2003) so the outurn and overspend figures are actual figures, not forecasted ones.

    Prescriptions
    Mr. Steen
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many prescriptions have been issued by GPs in each of the last five years; and what steps have been taken to modernise the system. [128703]

    Mr. Hutton
    [holding answer 15 September 2003]: Information on the number of prescriptions dispensed in the community in each of the last five years is shown in the table.

    In June 2002, three pilot exercises commissioned by the Department of Health commenced to examine the electronic transmission of prescriptions (ETP). The pilots explained options for linking computerised general practitioner practices to local community pharmacies and the Prescription Pricing Authority using the NHSnet. The pilots, which formally closed at the end of June 2003, were independently evaluated and have helped to identify the benefits, risks and costs associated with ETP. These findings will be used to inform the development of a sustainable, national prescription service which is an integral part of the national health service information technology strategy.

    Number of prescription items1, forms1, and average items per form of all drugs dispensed in the community in England, 1998–2002

    Total items1

    Forms1

    Average items per form

    Number of prescription items and forms1.excluding dispensing doctors

    1998

    467.1

    268

    1.74

    1999

    481.9

    270.9

    1.78

    2000

    500.5

    276.2

    1.81

    2001

    533.1

    290.4

    1.84

    2002

    560.7

    299.8

    1.87

    BASCD Survey of the dental caries experience of 5-year-old children

    (Mean number of decayed, missing or filled teeth

    Year of study

    1985–861

    1987–881

    1989–901

    1991–921

    1993–941

    United Kingdom

    —

    —

    —

    —

    1.96

    Great Britain

    —

    1.88

    1.80

    1.86

    1.92

    England and Wales

    —

    —

    —

    —

    —

    England

    —

    1.73

    1.62

    1.66

    1.74

    856W

    Number of prescription items1, forms1, and average items per form of all drugs dispensed in the community in England, 1998–2002

    Total items1

    Forms1

    Average items per form

    Number of prescription items and forms1.excluding dispensing doctors

    2001

    597.4

    319.3

    1.87

    2002

    617

    325.5

    1.9

    1Millions

    Notes:

    1. The data are based on all prescription items dispensed in the community in England, i.e. by community pharmacists and appliance contractors, dispensing doctors, and prescriptions submitted by prescribing doctors for items personally administered in England.

    2. The data do not cover drugs dispensed in hospital or private prescriptions.

    3. Prior to 2001, items dispensed by dispensing doctors and personal administration prescriptions are excluded.

    4. Each single item written on the form is counted as a prescription item.

    Source:

    Prescription Cost Analysis (PCA) data from the Prescription Pricing Authority

    Dr. Cable
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health what guidance has been given in the last year to primary care trusts regarding the time limits for prescriptions. [130024]

    Ms Rosie Winterton
    [holding answer 16 September 2003]: We have not issued guidance on the time limits for, or duration of, prescriptions. However, it is common practice nowadays for general practitioner prescriptions to be issued for one month or 28 days at a time.

    Suicide
    Mr. Grieve
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many deaf people have committed suicide in each of the last five years. [130034]

    Ms Rosie Winterton
    [holding answer 16 September 2003]: This information is not collected centrally.

    Tooth Decay
    Mr. Hepburn
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health what the incidence of tooth decay in children was in(a) Jarrow constituency, (b) South Tyneside, (c) Tyne and Wear and (d) the UK (i) in 1980, (ii) in 1990, (iii) in 2000 and (iv) the latest date for which figures are available. [128894]

    Ms Rosie Winterton
    The information shown in the table on the average number of decayed, missing and filled teeth in children aged five has been extracted from reports of surveys conducted by the British Association for the Study of Community Dentistry.
    857W

    BASCD Survey of the dental caries experience of 5-year-old children

    (Mean number of decayed, missing or filled teeth

    Year of study

    1985–861

    1987–881

    1989–901

    1991–921

    1993–941

    Northern Region

    1.97

    1.60

    1.69

    1.71

    1.99

    Gateshead

    1.70

    1.62

    1.09

    1.32

    2.31

    Newcastle

    —

    1.20

    1.28

    1.37

    1.47

    North Tyneside

    2.11

    1.04

    1.46

    1.35

    1.40

    South Tyneside

    2.23

    2.03

    1.80

    1.87

    2.42

    Sunderland

    2.28

    1.64

    1.98

    1.90

    2.13

    Northern and Yorkshire Region

    —

    —

    —

    —

    —

    Gateshead and South Tyneside HA

    —

    —

    —

    —

    —

    Newcastle and North Tyneside HA

    —

    —

    —

    —

    —

    Sunderland HA

    —

    —

    —

    —

    —

    Northumberland, Tyne and Wear SHA

    —

    —

    —

    —

    —

    Gateshead PCT

    —

    —

    —

    —

    —

    Newcastle PCT

    —

    —

    —

    —

    —

    North Tyneside PCT

    —

    —

    —

    —

    —

    South Tyneside PCT

    —

    —

    —

    —

    —

    Sunderland Teaching PCT

    —

    —

    —

    —

    —

    Year of study

    1995–962

    1997–982

    1999–20001,2

    2001–021,3

    United Kingdom

    1.84

    1.68

    —

    —

    Great Britain

    1.79

    1.64

    1.57

    —

    England and Wales

    1.68

    1.53

    1.47

    1.52

    England

    1.63

    1.47

    1.43

    1.47

    Northern Region

    2.08

    —

    —

    —

    Gateshead

    1.85

    —

    —

    —

    Newcastle

    1.52

    —

    —

    —

    North Tyneside

    1.13

    —

    —

    —

    South Tyneside

    2.30

    —

    —

    —

    Sunderland

    2.84

    —

    —

    —

    Northern and Yorkshire Region

    2.12

    1.90

    1.80

    —

    Gateshead and South Tyneside HA

    2.05

    1.32

    1.23

    —

    Newcastle and North Tyneside HA

    1.35

    1.35

    1.20

    —

    Sunderland HA

    2.84

    2.14

    1.93

    —

    Northumberland. Tyne and Wear SHA

    —

    —

    —

    1.68

    Gateshead PCT

    —

    —

    —

    1.31

    Newcastle PCT

    —

    —

    —

    1.60

    North Tyneside PCT

    —

    —

    —

    1.17

    South Tyneside PCT

    —

    —

    —

    2.05

    Sunderland Teaching PCT

    —

    —

    —

    2.05

    1The survey was not carried out for Northern Ireland in 1985–86, 1989–90, 1991–92, 1999–2000, or 2001–02. The survey was not not carried out for Scotland in 1985–86 or 2001–02. The Sruvey did not cover all of England in 1985–86. The combined results for England and Wales were not published from 1985–86 to 1993–94.

    2 Following the transfer from Family Health Service Authorities (FHSAs) to Health Authorities (HAs) in 1996, the results from the surveys from 1995–96 onwards were published by HA rather than by FHSA.

    3 Following the transfer from Health Authorities (HAs) to Primary Care Trusts (PCTs) in 2002, the 2001–02 survey results were published by Strategic Health Authority (SHA) and PCT rather than by region and HA.

    Urology/Gastrointestinal Surgery (Children)
    Tim Loughton
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health (1) what level of support is routinely offered to children discharged from hospital after complex urology and gastrointestinal surgery received in primary care; [129292]

    (2) if he will make a statement on the current situation whereby acute unit nurses are travelling from regional centres to primary care trusts in order to support children who have had urology and gastrointestinal surgery. [129294]
    858W
    Dr. Ladyman
    The successful transition of care for a child in these circumstances is reliant on preparations made by the regional centre in close liaison with local primary health care staff and the community nursing team. Levels of support will accord with the child's degree of dependency and transitional arrangements will include input from the regional centre appropriate to the child's recovery.

    A national service framework (NSF) for children is currently under development. This will set standards aimed at raising the quality of the health and social care

    859W
    services that children receive. The first part of the NSF, relating to hospital standards, was published in April. Successive parts of the NSF will be published next year, and will include consideration of the best means to support children post-discharge following complex surgery.

    Vehicles (London)
    Dr. Cable
    To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many(a) frontline ambulances, (b) patient transport vehicles, (c) fast response cars, (d) medical motorbikes, (e) medical cycles and (f) special baby care units are available for London; and if he will make a statement. [128767]

    Mr. Hutton
    I refer the hon. Member to the reply I gave on 8 September 2003,Official Report, column 185W.

  TREASURY

    Air Passenger Duty
    Mr. Laws
    To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what his latest estimate is of the total cost of the changes to air passenger duty announced in the March 2000 Budget for each year from 2000–01 to 2005–06; and if he will make a statement. [130124]

    John Healey
    The estimated cost to the Exchequer of the changes made to the air passenger duty at Budget 2000 are published in Table 1.2 of that year's FSBR (HC346) as:

    £ million

    2000–01

    5

    2001–02

    80

    2002–03

    90

    No estimates have been made for other years.

    All-employee Share Plan
    Mr. Laws
    To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what his latest estimate is of the total annual cost of the all-employee share plan introduced in the March 2000 Budget for each year from 2000–01 to 2005–06; and if he will make a statement. [130135]

    Ruth Kelly
    Estimates of the cost of Share Incentive Plan (SIP) are published annually in Inland Revenue Statistics and the Tax Ready Reckoner. The latest estimates are:

    £ million

    2000–01

    2001–02

    2002–03

    Income tax

    10

    45

    150

    National insurance

    5

    30

    90

    Total

    15

    75

    240

    No estimates have yet been made for subsequent tax years.

    Capital Gains Tax
    Mr. Laws
    To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer (1) what his estimate is of the revenue yield from 860W
    abolishing capital gains tax and taxing capital gains at the marginal rate of income tax; and if he will make a statement; [130140]

    what his latest estimate is of the cost of capital gains tax exemptions, excluding that relating to the disposal of the only or main residence, broken down in cash terms by each income decile; [130550]

    (3) what his estimate is of the effect on the revenue yield from capital gains tax of simultaneously abolishing the (a) taper relief, (b) annual exempt amount and (c) gains accrued but unrealised at death, in each year from 2003–04 to 2005–06, broken down to show the cash effects on each income decile; and if he will make a statement. [130551]

    Dawn Primarolo
    Estimates of the cost, on an accrual basis, of capital gains tax exemptions and reliefs for 2001–02 and 2002–03 are published in Table A3.1 in the Budget Report 2003.

    There are no estimates of the revenue yield from abolishing capital gains tax and taxing capital gains at the marginal rate of tax, except at a disproportionate cost.

    There are no estimates on the revenue yield of a simultaneous abolition of taper relief, annual exempt amount and gains accrued but unrealised at death, except at a disproportionate cost. The total cost of these reliefs and exceptions in Table A3.1, referred to above, does not take account of any interaction between the abolition of one relief or exemption and subsequent changes in the cost of the others.

    Figures for later years are not available; breakdown of reliefs/exemptions by income decile is only available at a disproportionate cost.

    Mr. Laws
    To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer (1) what his estimate is of the revenue yield of(a) abolishing the capital gains tax annual exempt amount for (i) individuals and (ii) trustees and (b) reducing to £2,000 per annum the capital gains tax annual exempt amount for (A) individuals and (B) trustees; and if he will make a statement; [130149]

    (2) what his estimate is of the revenue which would be raised by reducing the capital gains tax exempt amount to the level of the personal income tax allowance for (a) 2003–04 and (b) 2004–05; and if he will make a statement. [130233]

    Dawn Primarolo
    The total estimated yield on an accruals basis from abolishing capital gains tax annual exempt amount for individuals and trusts in 2001–02 and 2002–03 is published in Table A3.1 in the Budget Report 2003. They exclude any behavioural response to the tax change.

    The total estimated yield on an accruals basis from reducing individuals capital gains tax annual exempt amount to £2,000 or setting it to the personal income tax allowance in 2003–04 and 2004–05 is set out in the following table.

    861W

    Yield £ millions

    2003–04

    2004–05

    Individuals AEA set to £2,000 per annum (Trust AEA = £1,000)

    190

    240

    Individuals AEA set to personals Income Tax Allowance (Trust AEA = half the personal Allowance)

    70

    90

    The figures are consistent with the assumptions made in the Budget 2003 on future asset prices, and take into account the likely taxpayer behavioural responses to the tax change. The Annual Exempt Amount for Trusts is assumed to be half that of individuals.

    The model used to cost CGT changes of this type links the AEA for individuals and trusts according to current practice. It is not possible to separately model the Annual Exempt Amount for individuals and trusts.

    Mr. Laws
    To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what action he is taking to prevent avoidance activities in relation to capital gains tax; and if he will make a statement. [130555]

    Dawn Primarolo
    This Government are committed to tackling avoidance of tax and have introduced a number of anti-avoidance measures relating to capital gains tax. We continue to monitor the position and shall not hesitate to introduce further legislation to protect the tax base when it is necessary to do so.

    Changing Jobs
    Mr. Gardiner
    To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what plans he has to assist those for whom a move to new employment would impose cash flow problems. [129858]

    John Healey
    The Government recognise that the transition from welfare to work can be difficult for many. Consequently it has developed a range of measures to ease the move to new employment. The Job Grant offers £100 to longer-term benefit claimants who move into work. From October 2004 eligibility for the Job Grant will be extended and a new higher rate of £250 for households with children will be introduced.

    These enhanced arrangements will replace the Back to Work Bonus and the lone parent Income Support run-on.

    They will also be complemented by further changes to additional support. From April 2003, access to the Adviser Discretion Fund (ADF) has been extended to all those who have been claiming benefits for six months or more to meet essential costs of moving into work. In addition, from April 2004 a series of measures to simplify the administration of Housing Benefit will be introduced. These will include ending the requirement for claimants to submit a new claim each time they return to work. Instead they will only need to report their change in circumstances, making the move into work easier and smoother.

    Further details of all these measures can be found in the 2002 Pre-Budget Report and 2003 Budget Report.

    Child Trust Fund
    Mr. Flight
    To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer when he will publish the proposals for the Child Trust Fund. [130746]
    862W
    Ruth Kelly
    The Child Trust Fund is intended to encourage parents and children to develop the savings habit. It will ensure that every child, whatever their family background, will have access at the age of 18 when they begin their adult life, to a stock of assets which they can invest in their future.

    It will also help children and their parents to understand the benefits of saving and investment and how to engage with financial institutions.

    Detailed proposals covering the nature of the Child Trust Fund, how it will operate and the information and guidance that will be provided will be published shortly.

    Corporation Tax
    Mr. Laws
    To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what his estimate is of the cost of abolishing the small companies rate of corporation tax and the main rate of corporation tax and replacing them with a single rate of 25 per cent. levied above the starting rate threshold. [130547]

    Dawn Primarolo
    This is not an option that the Government have considered, so no thorough analysis of the potential cost is available. All taxes are kept under review and decisions on tax rates are made as part of the normal Budget process. I refer the hon. Member to the Tax Ready Reckoner for indicative figures on the direct effects of illustrative tax changes.

    Delays (Travellers)
    Mr. Greg Knight
    To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what steps he is taking to reduce delays caused to bona fide travellers at customs entry points in the United Kingdom. [129605]

    John Healey
    The great majority of people entering the UK at ports and airports are not physically stopped by Customs. Customs use intelligence information and risk-profiling techniques to try to ensure that their checks inconvenience as few legitimate travellers as possible.

    When Customs do undertake physical checks, their aim is always to take no longer than necessary to fulfil their anti-smuggling responsibilities.

    Energy Efficiency
    Mr. Jim Cunningham
    To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what recent discussions he has held with the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs on encouraging greater use of energy-saving practices in homes. [129751]

    John Healey
    Treasury Ministers and officials hold regular discussions with Defra on all policies including domestic energy efficiency.

    In August this year, the Treasury and Defra launched a joint consultation document, "Economic Instruments to Improve Household Energy Efficiency: Consultation Document on Specific Measures".

    Income Tax Rates
    Mr. Laws
    To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many people paid(a) income tax, (b) income tax

    863W
    at the lower rate of 10 per cent, (c) income tax at the basic rate and (d) income tax at the upper rate in each year from 1990–91 to 2003–04; and if he will make a statement. [130558]

    Dawn Primarolo
    I refer the hon, Member to National Statistics table 2.1 on the Inland Revenue's website: http://www.inlandrevenue.aov.uk/stats/income tax/it tO1 1.htm.

    Life Insurance
    Sir John Stanley
    To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer when he will receive a reply to the letter from the right hon. Member for Tonbridge and Mailing of 7 March 2003 to the Financial Secretary to the Treasury on the provision of life insurance against loss of life through acts of terrorism. [129755]

    Ruth Kelly
    I have done so.

    Mobile Phones
    Mr. Laws
    To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what his latest estimate is of the cost of the March 1999 Budget decision to remove the income tax charge on mobile phones for each year from 1999–2000 to 2004–05; and if he will make a statement. [130136]

    Dawn Primarolo
    Latest figures for the income tax liability on private use of employer provided mobile phones for the two years before the charge was removed are £30 million for 1997–98 rising to £40 million for 1998–99. These figures are based on information supplied by employers on P11D returns after the end of those years. With effect from 1999–2000, when the charge was removed, employers no longer had to report this information and so no updated estimates, following those given in the 1999 Financial Statement and Budget Report, have been made.

    Pension Provision
    Mr. Laws
    To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer (1) what his estimate is of the revenue effect of introducing an earnings cap on the earnings for which pension provision may be made with income tax relief of £50,000 per annum; and if he will make a statement; [130137]

    (2) what his estimate is of the revenue effect of introducing a maximum level of earnings for which pension provision may be made with income tax relief of (a) £40,000, (b) £50,000, (c) £60,000, (d) £70,000, (e) £80,000, (f) £90,000, (g) £100,000 and (h) £150,000; and if he will make a statement. [130559]

    Ruth Kelly
    Due to the uncertainty of the behavioural effects resulting from such changes, estimates are not available.

    Pensions
    Mr. Laws
    To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what his latest estimate is of the cost of income tax relief on approved pension schemes, in cash terms, broken down by each income decile; and if he will make a statement. [130549]
    864W
    Ruth Kelly
    Available estimates of the cost of tax relief on private pensions are contained in table T7.9 of Inland Revenue Statistics. The latest version is on the Inland Revenue website; http://www.inlandrevenue.gov.uk/ stats/pensions/p_t09_1.htm. It is not possible to break these estimates down by income decile.

    Recovering Money (Court Action)
    Mr. Jim Cunningham
    To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what evaluation his Department has carried out of(a) the effectiveness of court action in recovering money owed to private finance companies and (b) the value for money of bringing proceedings in such cases. [130049]

    John Healey
    The Government keep all aspects of procurement policy under review in order to ensure that high quality public services are delivered on the basis of value for money.

    Stamp Duty
    Mr. Laws
    To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer (1) what his estimate is of the cost of the Pre-Budget Report 2000 decision to abolish stamp duty on property transactions in deprived areas for each year from 2000–01 to 2005–06; what assessment has been made of the effects of this policy on urban regeneration; and if he will make a statement; [130134]

    (2) what his estimate is of the total annual cost of the stamp duty exemption on commercial property in deprived areas; what assessment has been made of the economic benefits of this relief; and if he will make a statement. [130238]

    John Healey
    The cost of abolishing stamp duty on property transactions under £150,000 in deprived areas from 30 November 2001 was £10 million in 2001–02 and £70 million in 2002–03. Estimates for later years are not yet available. The annual cost of exempting commercial properties prior to Budget 2003, included in the above amounts, was under £1 million.

    The estimate of the additional cost from lifting the £150,000 cap for commercial property in deprived areas, as published in table A1.1 of this year's Financial Statement and Budget Report [HC 500], was £90 million in 2003–04 and £50 million thereafter.

    This measure creates an incentive for purchasers of residential and non-residential property to invest in areas that they might not previously have considered. The social and physical benefits that follow when such areas are occupied by residents and businesses will provide a boost to the regeneration of these areas. We are committed to ensuring the effectiveness of the measure and are currently considering a range of options to evaluate the measure in time for the first report to the European Commission in 2004.

    Mr. Laws
    To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what his estimate is of the revenue cost of restructuring stamp duty on residential property sales so as to charge marginal rates of(a) 0 per cent. on property sales of £100,000 or less, (b) 2 per cent. on sales revenue of between £100,000 and £200,000, (c) 3 per cent. on sales revenue of between £200,000 and £400,000, (d) 4 per

    865W
    cent. on sales revenue of between £400,000 and £750,000 and (e) 5 per cent. on sales revenue of over £750,000; and if he will make a statement. [130150]

    Ruth Kelly
    The revenue cost of restructuring stamp duty on residential property sales according to the scheme described above is estimated to be £1.1 billion in 2004–05. This does not include any allowance for behavioural changes.

    Tax Credits
    Mr. Jim Cunningham
    To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what assistance is available to help low income families with their tax credit claims. [125353]

    Dawn Primarolo
    [holding answer 15 July 2003]: A range of measures is available.

    Personal callers to Inland Revenue offices can make a claim to tax credits, as well as getting face-to-face help and advice, from any inland revenue inquiry centre. Jobcentre Plus customers can also get help, advice and make claims through Jobcentre Plus offices.

    For those customers who prefer to make a paper claim, there is a single simple form for claiming both working tax credit and child tax credit supplemented by comprehensive—plain language—guidance.

    A telephone helpline (GB: 0845 300 3900; NI: 0845 603 2000) is available 8am to 8pm every day (except Christmas Day, Boxing Day, New Years Day and Easter Sunday). A dedicated helpline is available for those with hearing or speech difficulties.

    A range of explanatory leaflets is available covering the tax credits scheme in general, other help that may be available and further information about help with child care costs. These leaflets—and the paper claim form and guidance are available in large print and Braille versions as well as in a number of languages other than English.

    By visiting the Inland Revenue website (www. inlandrevenue.gov.uk/taxcredits), families—whatever their income or circumstances—can quickly establish whether they qualify for tax credits and obtain an indication of the amount of any potential award. Claims, and subsequent changes of circumstances, can be submitted online and answers to a wide range of frequently asked questions are also available on the site.

    The Inland Revenue is also piloting new ways of working with intermediary organisations and local community groups to provide assistance with claims. At the same time, Jobcentre Plus offices are making sure their customers are aware of the help they can get, through the working tax credit, as they move into work.

    Tax Credits Computer
    Mr. Willetts
    To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer on how many occasions since January 2003 the tax credits computer system has stopped working. [125404]

    Dawn Primarolo
    IT system supporting the new tax credits did not work initially as well as we expected and there was unscheduled down time as a result. The Inland Revenue worked urgently with their IT partners to improve the system's availability, speed and stability, and it has been performing much better for a number of months.

    Unpaid Taxes
    Mr. Laws
    To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what his latest estimate is of the annual revenue cost of removing the Crown's preferential right to recover unpaid taxes, in each year from 2001–02 to 2005–06; and if he will make a statement. [130122]

    Dawn Primarolo
    The latest estimate of the annual revenue cost of removing the Crown's preferential rights in respects of taxes etc in insolvencies is:

    £ million

    2001–02

    nil

    2002–03

    10

    2003–04

    65

    2004–05

    70

    2005–06

    70

    Removal of Crown preference was one of a number of measures introduced in the Enterprise Act 2002 to make the insolvency regime more supportive of enterprise, and is designed to bring real benefits to unsecured creditors, including many small firms.

    VAT (Historic Buildings)
    Lady Hermon
    To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what plans he has to exempt the cost of restoring historic buildings from VAT; and if he will make a statement. [129836]

    John Healey
    [holding answer 15 September 2003]: Our long-standing formal agreements with out European partners allow us to keep our zero rates as they currently stand, but do not allow us to extend them or to introduce new ones.

    The Government are particularly concerned about the position of listed places of worship. That is why we asked the European Commission to bring forward proposals to extend the categories of permitted reduced VAT rates to include their repair, maintenance and improvement. We are continuing to press this case during the current EU review of reduced rates and have, in the meantime, introduced the Listed Places of Worship Grant Scheme to provide an equivalent reduction in the cost of these repair projects.

TRANSPORT

  Road Safety
  The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport(Mr. David Jamieson)
  The Government's Road Safety Strategy Tomorrow's Roads—Safer for Everyone set out ten-year targets for reducing road traffic casualties and recognised that more could be done to reduce the risks for those who use the roads for work purposes. A Task Group was set up by the Government and the Health and Safety Commission in May 2000 to consider ways to reduce at work road traffic incidents. The Task Group reported in November 2001. They concluded that existing health and safety law adequately covered work-related on-the-road activities and that there was no need for any new legislation. However, one of the Group's key recommendations was that the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) should publish generic guidance to help employers manage at work road risk.

  Today the HSE, in partnership with the Department for Transport, has published a free booklet "Driving at Work—Managing Work Related Road Safety". There will be a small charge for bulk orders of the document to cover postage and packaging. It is also downloadable from the HSE web site http://www.hse.gov.uk/ without charge. The booklet contains generic advice on managing work-related road safety effectively and on integrating it into existing health and safety arrangements. The guidance will be useful to any employer, manager or supervisor with staff who drive or ride a motorcycle or bicycle at work.

  The Department is arranging for over 48,000 copies of the booklet to be issued to road safety, local authority, police, employer and employee interests. Effective management of work-related road safety will help reduce the risk to employees and to other road users, including pedestrians. I hope that all employers will follow the simple guidance set out in the booklet and that the benefits from raised road safety awareness at work will also improve standards of private motoring.

  Copies of the booklet are being placed in the Libraries of both Houses.

HOME DEPARTMENT

  Voluntary and Community Sector Infrastructure Consultation Document
  The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Fiona Mactaggart)
  A Home Office consultation document on the development and funding of voluntary and community sector (VCS) infrastructure in England is being published today. The 50WS
  Government's aim is to help build a VCS, including social enterprise, which is fully engaged in shaping and delivering public services, underpinned by a high quality sustainable infrastructure that enables this to happen. Such support must meet the needs of a diverse sector and should complement support services available from the small business service and others.

  As part of the Spending Review 2002, the Treasury undertook a cross-cutting review of the role of the VCS in service delivery, published in September 2002. The review identified that VCS infrastructure was patchy in distribution and in quality and that this was a barrier to increasing VCS involvement in service delivery. It recommended that
  "Government and the VCS should develop a coherent shared strategy to underpin capacity in the sector".

  Consultation with voluntary and community organisations, and others interested in an effective sector, will inform a final strategy to be published early next year. This will include proposals to guide the investment of approximately £80 million of SR2002 funds.

  The aim is to put a strategy in place which ensures:
  High quality support for voluntary and community organisations delivered as close to the point of need as is economically viable.
  The existence of effective infrastructure locally, regionally and nationally. This may be supplemented by activity at a sub-regional level particularly activities that cannot be afforded more locally.
  Accessible, high quality support available across the VCS, including to support volunteering, black and minority ethnic and other diversity issues, social and community enterprise, community development, rural needs, and to support VCS use of information and communications technology.
  Strengthened specialist infrastructure organisations operating nationally—and regionally where needed—covering thematic areas of VCS activity and service delivery such as youth work, childcare, and vocational training.

  Copies of the consultation document are available in the Libraries of both Houses of Parliament and on the Home Office website. We would welcome views on the proposals and questions outlined in the paper by Monday 22 December 2003. A draft regulatory impact assessment is included with the consultation document.

SOLICITOR-GENERAL

  Crown Prosecution Service
  The Solicitor-General(Ms Harriet Harman)
  The Labour Party 2001 General Election Manifesto promised (at page 33):Despite an increase of 25 per cent. since 1997, we have too few prosecutors. By 2004, Labour pledges 300 new prosecutors.

  At the time, in March 2001, there were 1,828 lawyers in the Crown Prosecution Service. The commitment had been met by October 2002. There were, by July 2003, 2,323 lawyers in the Crown Prosecution Service, an increase of 495 since March 2001.

DEFENCE

  Veterans
  The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence(Mr. Ivor Caplin)
  I am announcing the publication of a new report entitled "Improving the Delivery of Cross Departmental Support and Services for Veterans", which my department commissioned from King's College London last year. The publication of this study demonstrates the commitment of the Government as a whole to the Veterans Initiative through the participation of a working group which included members from the Department of Health, Home Office, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, Her Majesty's Treasury, Department for Work and Pensions and veterans organisations. The aim was to produce a map of veterans' needs, with emphasis on the more vulnerable veterans, match this against current provision and identify priority research gaps. This involved a literature survey, detailed interviews with 'at risk' personnel, and analysis and further interviews of an existing cohort of personnel for ex-Service outcomes.

  This study is a preliminary scoping study and will inform the direction of policy and research. It therefore represents an important contribution to the Veterans Initiative. The report conclusions confirm that
  "For many (indeed most) personnel military life is a great leveller; it is a positive experience (especially for disadvantaged youths who enter service early), allowing them to enjoy a more favourable life trajectory",
  and that
  "Over three quarters of service leavers do well and gain employment after leaving".

  The report finds that there is little peer-reviewed published UK literature on outcomes of veterans, and that most published research concerns US Service and ex-Service personnel, from which it would be inaccurate to draw extrapolations. It also shows that mental health is an important issue—most personnel do not develop problems as a result of their Service, but the small percentage that do can face a range of difficulties in civilian life, including access to appropriate treatment.

  The Government welcome this report and would like to thank Professor Wessely and his team for their work. The report recommends a number of actions, as well as further research on ways to help the most vulnerable groups. I can confirm that we will look in detail at these recommendations and will evaluate them against existing policies and activities.

  A copy of the full report will be placed in the Library of the House, and also on the websites of the MOD and Veterans Agency, at http://www.mod.uk/ and http:// www.veteransagency.mod.uk.

CONSTITUTIONAL AFFAIRS

  Voting Pilot Schemes
  The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Constitutional Affairs(Mr. Christopher Leslie)
  The Government have today introduced a Bill to allow piloting of innovative voting methods at next year's European Parliamentary elections. The European 52WS
  Parliamentary and Local Elections (Pilots) Bill also provides for pilots at local elections where these are combined with and take place on the same day as elections for the European Parliament.

  This legislation demonstrates the Government's commitment to their goal of making voting easier and more convenient and represents a marked scaling up from previous pilots. The Bill is needed as current legislation does not allow for piloting at European Parliamentary elections and the Government are keen to maintain the momentum gained through previous successful pilot schemes. Such schemes have included both all-postal ballots and multi-channelled e-voting and, at this year's local elections, were conducted in 61 local authorities covering 6.4 million eligible voters.

  Decisions on which regions should be chosen for next year's pilots, and which methods should be used in those regions, will be informed by advice from the Electoral Commission. The Department for Constitutional Affairs and the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister are today jointly writing to the Commission with guidance on this issue. The Commission—an independent body funded by Parliament—will consult with stakeholders and report back later in the year.

  Alongside this legislation, the Government have also today launched a consultation on implementation of next year's pilot schemes. This consultation, to be conducted by the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, will outline our plans for the pilots and seek comments from local authorities and other interested parties on our proposals.

  Our proposals have been developed in the light of the Electoral Commission's strategic evaluation of the pilots held at the local elections earlier this year. Their report, "The Shape of Elections to Come", made a number of recommendations, which the Government have considered very carefully, and we have published today our formal response.

  One of the main recommendations made by the Commission was that all-postal voting should be made the normal method of voting at local elections. We welcome that recommendation, but we recognise that it would involve a major change to our traditional electoral arrangements. Therefore, the Government intend to launch a public consultation on the detail of that recommendation later this year.

HEALTH

  NHS Pension Scheme
  The Minister of State, Department of Health(Mr. John Hutton)
  Further to my statement of 28 November 2002, I have now received and accepted the report of the Government Actuary on his investigation of the National Health Service Pension Scheme in England and Wales for the period 1 April 1994 to 31 March 1999. The report confirms that the rate of employer contributions should be 14 percent, from 1 April 2003.

  Copies of the report have been placed in the Library.

NORTHERN IRELAND

  Northern Ireland (Monitoring Commission etc.) Bill
  The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland(Mr. Paul Murphy)
  The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland has made the following statement under section 19(1)(a) of the Human Rights Act 1998:

  In my view the provisions of the Northern Ireland (Monitoring Commission etc.) Bill [HL], are compatible with the Convention rights.

FOREIGN AND COMMONWEALTH AFFAIRS

  Iraq
  The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs(Mr. Bill Rammell)
  Following consultation with the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and the Ministry of Defence, the Department of Trade and Industry recently approved a licence to export Military List Goods to Iraq, The arms embargo against Iraq remains in place under United Nations Security Council resolution 1483 (2003), with the exception of"arms and other related material required by the (Coalition Provisional) Authority to serve the purposes of this and other related resolutions".
  Accordingly Her Majesty's Government consider it appropriate to grant exemptions for these goods to be exported on the basis that they are to used by a private security firm in the protection of the British Office in Baghdad. The work of the British Office in Baghdad forms part of the Authority's functions under resolution 1483 (2003). The export is consistent with the consolidated EU and national arms export licensing criteria. Future applications will continue to be assessed on a case by case basis against the UN Embargo and Consolidated Criteria, taking into account the circumstances prevailing at the time.

TRADE AND INDUSTRY

  EU Structural and Cohesion Funds
  The Secretary of State for Trade and Industry(Ms Patricia Hewitt)
  The Government's long-term economic goal is to achieve high and stable levels of growth and employment. Regional policy is at the heart of our efforts to achieve this goal—ensuring that every UK nation and region fulfils its economic potential, that all parts of the country share in rising prosperity, and that economic disparities between our nations and regions are identified and addressed.

  In March, we put forward for consultation a proposal to reform the EU Structural and Cohesion Funds through the establishment of an EU Framework for Devolved Regional Policy. We argued that this offered the best way to reform EU regional policy so that it supported the domestic regional agenda and responded to the challenge of EU enlargement in a fair and sustainable way.
  54WS
  Since then, we have received almost three hundred written responses, and I would like to thank everyone who has taken the time to engage in the consultation, either in writing or through the consultation events that we have held throughout the UK. Our overall conclusion, in the light of the responses received, is that the Government's proposed EU Framework for Devolved Regional Policy provides the best context in which to develop future arrangements for EU and UK regional policy, that it can be built on to address the key points raised during the consultation exercise, and therefore that it should form the basis of our negotiating position in Europe.

  I am making this short statement today because I wanted to take an early opportunity to explain how the Government propose to move forward in the light of the consultation. Further work, in consultation with key stakeholders, will now be set in hand to flesh out the details of our proposal and to respond to questions and concerns raised in the consultation. This will be the subject of a more detailed statement on the EU Framework and how we see it operating after the recess.

  THE OUTCOME OF THE CONSULTATION

  The proposals we put forward in the consultation were based on the following key objectives:
  We want a EU regional policy that fully supports, and adds value to, the ambitious devolution, decentralisation and regional development agenda already being pursued domestically.
  We want significantly simpler and more flexible implementation and monitoring arrangements, which are proportionate to the amount of funding available and which allow integration with other policies.
  We want EU regional policy actively to support the EU's agenda set at Lisbon and elsewhere for higher productivity and employment and for developing human resources.
  While being in no doubt about the continued need for strong regional policy in all Member States, we believe that it is both fair, and the most effective use of funds, to concentrate the EU's limited financial and administrative resources on the poorest Member States, where they will add most value.
  And we must also ensure that expenditure on EU regional policy, as with other elements of the EU budget, achieves a fair budgetary deal for the UK taxpayer.

  The responses to the consultation are being published on the DTI website today. The vast majority of those who commented on the overall aims for reform of EU regional and cohesion policy supported these key objectives. On issues such as the need for increased flexibility, state aid reforms, and reduced bureaucracy, the majority of respondents also agreed that these should be priorities for reform. Many also supported our view that, in the context of enlargement, current arrangements are unsustainable, and a number of respondents recognised that the UK cannot expect its current level of EU Structural Fund receipts to be maintained after 2006.

  On our proposed EU Framework for Devolved Regional Policy, a small number of respondents expressed wholehearted support for the approach. Some others were firmly against it, and favoured an alternative approach in which Structural Funds would be retained in all Member States including the UK. But the great majority emphasised a desire for more

  55WS
  information about the proposal and how it would operate in practice. The further work we are now setting in hand will respond to this.

  More specifically, in consultation with others we shall be working to provide further information on:
  the structure and content of the EU Framework and how it would operate at Member State and European levels;
  the ways in which the Framework would complement our domestic regional policy agenda;
  how the Government's guarantee to increased domestic funding for regional policy would be met, in the event that the EU Framework approach is adopted, with more information on the scale and duration of the guarantee;
  possible delivery mechanisms for increased domestic funding, designed to ensure that the best aspects of Structural Funds are retained in a simpler and more streamlined system;
  the ways in which different domestic policy agendas, for example urban and rural regeneration and the need to continue to support activities in the National Action Plan for Employment, including priorities such as employability, skills and social inclusion, would be incorporated in the new approach;
  the relationship of the EU Framework approach to developments in other European policy areas such as reform of the State Aid Regime, the Common Agricultural Policy and the European Employment Strategy.

  In addition to this work, officials will need to consider separately what the proposed approach should be to future PEACE funding in Northern Ireland.
  56WS
  CONCLUSION

  The Government remain fully signed up to the objectives for European regional policy we set out in March. We welcome the support we have received for these objectives, and continue to believe that the EU Framework approach provides he best way forward to address them. We have concluded that the responses to the consultation exercise provide a basis for building on the approach set out so far, on which further work will now be taken forward. In the meantime the approach will now form the basis of the Government's position in forthcoming discussions and negotiations with our EU partners.

  By responding to the challenge of enlargement, by focusing EU resources on the poorest member states, by agreeing EU-wide objectives and giving European regions greater flexibility within that framework, I believe we can achieve an outcome that is best for the new member states, for Europe, and for the nations and regions of the United Kingdom.

LEADER OF THE HOUSE

  Business
  The Leader of the House of Commons(Mr. Peter Hain)
  The date of the Queen's Speech to Parliament will be Wednesday 26 November. I plan to announce the date of prorogation as soon as I am able.

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

Energy Policy: Ministerial Responsibility
Lord Peyton of Yeovilasked Her Majesty's Government:
Why energy policy has ceased to be the responsibility of a single Minister.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Trade and Industry (Lord Sainsbury of Turville): My Lords, energy policy remains the responsibility of the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry. Since 1992, however, energy efficiency has been the responsibility of the department dealing with environmental affairs. The Government have seen no reason to change this position.
Lord Peyton of Yeovil: My Lords, I always understood that the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry had other things to do. Still, it may not be so. I did not know that she had the spare time.
Perhaps we can imagine for a moment that the noble Lord is the Minister responsible for our energy supplies and ask him to reflect on whether he would find the soothing syrup of the White Paper a bit unsatisfactory; and whether he would be entirely happy with the idea that we imported no less than 80 per cent of our generally raw material supplies for the generation of electricity—and that through a pipeline, as yet undesigned, unbuilt, unfinanced, right across Europe. Does he agree that the target of a 20 per cent energy supply from wind is also a bit uncertain?
The noble Lord could go on to lament the fact that the Government have ignored the nuclear alternative and their shocking neglect of research. We are drifting into a very dangerous situation.
Lord Sainsbury of Turville: My Lords, I am not certain that the concerns of the noble Lord, Lord Peyton, relate in any way to his original Question: whether or not the responsibility for energy efficiency rests within Defra. That would not have made any difference whatever to the policies that we stated in the White Paper.
The noble Lord very graciously expressed his concerns to me previously. I find it very difficult to imagine myself as energy Minister; I have quite enough problems as it is with science. However, if I were, I do not think that I should agree with any of the noble Lord's points. I think that the energy White Paper set out a very clear strategy. There are of course issues in
898
that document which are extremely difficult and complex. I am very glad that the House of Lords Science and Technology Sub-Committee II is undertaking an inquiry on what practical steps are needed to achieve a move towards renewables sought at the rate proposed in the recent White Paper. These are complicated issues. It would be very interesting to have further insights or evidence on whether our target is achievable of 10 per cent of electricity sales by 2010.
Lord Ezra: My Lords, following on from the Question put by the noble Lord, Lord Peyton, on the need for a single energy department, is it not unsatisfactory that at present the Minister in the DTI—the noble Lord's own ministry—designated with the energy portfolio is only responsible part time for part of energy? He is also responsible for postal services and e-commerce. An important part of energy is the responsibility of another department; namely, Defra. Does not that complex ministerial arrangement suggest that perhaps the Government are beginning to lose interest in energy?
Lord Sainsbury of Turville: My Lords, for some time the Minister responsible for energy has had other responsibilities. That position has not changed with the new energy Minister. As I explained, there are very good reasons why energy efficiency was put under Defra in 1992. There are other considerations that relate to, for example, negotiations on climate change, and so on. Therefore, it is a perfectly sound and workable arrangement.
Lord Jenkin of Roding: My Lords, perhaps I may give a specific example. Is the noble Lord aware that a small all-party group from this House has been seeking help for the coal mine methane industry? We have had to go around the houses in order to ask for support for this fledgling industry. We found ourselves talking to the DTI. On the question of admission to the emissions trading scheme, we were sent to talk to Defra. Both departments said that they wanted to help. Is the noble Lord aware that nothing happened? In desperation I went to the Treasury to ask whether there was a government view that might help this important industry. Again, nothing happened. As a result, the industry is now going abroad, taking its expertise and investment with it.
Lord Sainsbury of Turville: My Lords, the noble Lord will know from his own experience of government that, however one divides these things up, inevitably different departments will have to co-operate and have joined-up government on certain issues. One cannot simply put everything into one department. For example, if one put energy efficiency under the DTI, it simply opens up another interface, which is the interface between energy efficiency and environmental policies. There are interfaces within government. The issue is not continually to move the pieces around, but to make certain that there is joined-up government across the interfaces.
Lord Stoddart of Swindon: My Lords, does my memory fail me? Was it not the Conservative Party

899
which took the energy industry out of the control of government by privatising the gas and electricity industries—virtually closing down the coal industry—and putting them under a regulator? Under those circumstances, there is little left for a government to do, except to arrange overall energy strategy. I do not know that I agree with that strategy, but, nevertheless, that is what remains for them to do. If the Conservative Party wants complete control over energy supplies, perhaps we had better go back to owning the industries that create and provide energy.
Lord Sainsbury of Turville: My Lords, I assume that the question about memory failing was merely a rhetorical one—
Lord Stoddart of Swindon: Absolutely.
Lord Sainsbury of Turville: Of course, all that the noble Lord says is true—as is the point I made in my first Answer; namely, that it was a Conservative government in 1992 who took a single energy department and split it in two parts, one going to the DTI and the other going to Defra.
Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts: My Lords, perhaps I may press the Minister on the slightly cavalier reply that he gave to my noble friend Lord Jenkin of Roding. The DTI website reveals that Mr Stephen Timms is also responsible for sustainable development, e-commerce, communications and information industries, the Radiocommunications Agency, postal services, the Post Office and corporate social responsibility. Why should the House believe that the Government are serious about energy, given that he has that range of responsibilities?
Lord Sainsbury of Turville: My Lords, I have already answered that question in more general terms. The answer is that we work extremely hard in the DTI and do not have the superfluity of Ministers to assign just one Minister to every subject; we share responsibilities.
Noble Lords: My Lords—
The Lord President of the Council (Lord Williams of Mostyn): My Lords, I am sorry, but we are over-running our time.

Street Furniture: Control of Advertising
2.45 p.m.
Baroness Greengrossasked Her Majesty's Government:
What regulations apply to the control of advertising on lamp posts, road signs, traffic lights and other street furniture, and how such regulations are enforced.
The Minister of State, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (Lord Rooker): My Lords, outdoor advertisements are controlled under the Town and Country Planning (Control of Advertisements) Regulations 1992. Local planning authorities are responsible for the day-to-day operation of the advertisement control system and for enforcing the regulations. Enforcement is entirely at the discretion of the local planning authority.
Baroness Greengross: My Lords, I thank the Minister for that reply, but does he agree that the problem is now getting out of hand? One might even say, "Bill Stickers is not innocent". Local authorities are apparently not taking their responsibilities sufficiently seriously. Would the Minister be prepared to consider introducing appropriate measures to ensure that they do?
Lord Rooker: My Lords, as I said, that is entirely a matter for local authorities. They have the legislative power to take action for enforcement. In fact, the power even runs as far as providing that those who are the subject of the advertisement—those whose goods, trade or business is being advertised—can in certain circumstances be held liable for the offence and prosecuted. Again, that is entirely up to the local authority. Coming in from the West this morning, I saw hardly a sticker on a lamp-post or traffic light; but when I was going up to Hackney and Tower Hamlets later, I could not see any paint on the lamp-posts or traffic signals for the stickers.
I may add, for the avoidance of doubt, that the Government have produced a booklet on the matter, as one would expect. As for legislation, there is a plan to strengthen local authorities' powers to combat fly-posting when a suitable legislative opportunity occurs. As noble Lords know, legislative time is incredibly precious and we must be very careful with our priorities. At present, our priorities are already set and fly-posting is clearly coming after other important issues.
Baroness Carnegy of Lour: My Lords, does the Minister accept that most Members of the House are probably extremely glad to hear that, at least on this issue and despite having issued the booklet. the Government are leaving something totally to local authorities?
Lord Rooker: My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness.
Baroness Finlay of Llandaff: My Lords, have the Government commissioned the research that was called for by the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents into the distracting effect of signs, especially at road junctions, given that in 2001 alone, there were 3,247 fatalities not on the motorway and that only about 6 per cent of road deaths occur on motorways, where distractions are regulated to be at a minimum?
Lord Rooker: My Lords, I regret that I do not have the specific answer to the question about research, but

901
the good practice guide, The Control of Fly-posting, may he a partial response to that. There have been other publications and advice on the matter, such as another booklet, Outdoor Advertisements and Signs: a Guide for Advertisers, and general guidance on street clutter. Sometimes one cannot see the wood for the trees and movement around pavements is unsafe when there is clutter. There is general advice to avoid clutter, especially at road junctions. I will find out the specific answer about research and write to the noble Baroness.
Lord Jopling: My Lords, does the Minister agree that legislation to control fly-posting would in general be uncontentious. Although noting that he says that the Government are short of time, would he consider that to be a suitable subject for a government handout Bill in another place for those Members who have been lucky in the draw for Private Members' Bills?
Lord Rooker: My Lords, I thought that Members of the other place balloted for Bills, introduced 10-Minute Bills and were not spoon-fed by the Government. I have seen the words "handout Bill" on documents for suitable legislation that would be ideal for Back-Benchers. I do not know about that.
London boroughs have more enforcement powers than other local authorities. I do not know; it is not the Government's job to know how local authorities operate and whether they prosecute and take action. There is a case for a purge; nevertheless, there is a case for legislative strengthening of what we do. However, while the House is occupied with other very important matters, such as the subject we debated yesterday, we do not have room for fly-posting.
Lord Stoddart of Swindon: My Lords, will the noble Lord consider withdrawing the Hunting Bill and replacing it in the legislative programme with such a Bill as has just been suggested?
Lord Rooker: My Lords, I do not have a view, except that in due course I shall vote against the other Bill.
Lord Lucas: My Lords, surely the reason that people fly-post is that others want to read the information on their posters; otherwise, nobody would do it. Why do we not provide spaces where information can be posted legally, so that people can continue to benefit from fly-posting without the clutter?
Lord Rooker: My Lords, there is plenty of opportunity. Most streets are littered with billboards and advertising blocks—you go commercial and buy the space. Why should you steal someone's space or create danger by defacing lampposts, traffic signs and other street furniture at no cost, causing an environmental nuisance, creating a real problem and probably damaging property, leaving ratepayers to paint and clean such places even faster, and putting a burden on the taxpayer, when you can perfectly well buy advertising space?

Battlefields: Protection
2.51 p.m.
Lord Faulkner of Worcesterasked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether they will introduce statutory protection for historic British battlefield sites so that those using metal detectors are required to obtain licences under Section 42 of the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Areas Act 1979 for the use of such instruments on these sites.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Culture, Media and Sport (Lord McIntosh of Haringey): My Lords, at present, the Government have no powers to protect historic battlefields. We have commissioned a review designed to bring together listing, scheduling of ancient monuments and other regimes, such as the register of historic battlefields, into a unified system. The protection status for those historic sites will form part of the review. Public consultation on the proposals runs until 31st October, and we shall then publish our responses in a White Paper.
Lord Faulkner of Worcester: My Lords, I thank my noble friend for that encouraging and very positive reply. I am pleased that the consultation period is nearly over. I accept that metal detecting is generally a harmless and pleasurable activity that can sometimes be of great assistance to historians. However, does the Minister appreciate that the archaeological evidence of a battlefield generally consists of the artefacts lost during the conflict, and that if they are picked up in an uncontrolled way, such as happened, for example, at the metal detectorists' rally on Marston Moor battlefield last weekend, the archaeological integrity of those battlefields will be lost for ever? Can I impress on the Minister the importance of ensuring that battlefield sites are listed in the same way as other archaeological sites, and are not just treated as parts of historic landscape?
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, I agree entirely that metal detecting, unless done in accordance with proper standards and a proper code of practice, can be very damaging. We knew about the rally at Marston Moor. Liaison officers from the Portable Antiquities Scheme attended and assembled a mile and a half from the centre of the battlefield. I do not know whether that shows ignorance or good judgment. In the end, we recorded all the important objects found. Only nine objects related to the battle itself.
Lord Redesdale: My Lords, does the Minister not agree that, although liaison officers from the Portable Antiquities Scheme were at the Marston Moor rally, they are not often invited to metal detectorists' rallies, which is a problem? Perhaps they could strengthen their hand if they looked further at batty sites. Furthermore, does the Minister not agree that, as the

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Battlefields Trust pointed out vociferously, the danger to battlefield sites and the historic environment is not through metal detectorists in their own right, but through uncontrolled development?
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, I agree with all that the noble Lord says. It is why we have a review that includes historic battlefield sites as part of the general subject of listing and scheduling. At present, it is entirely unsatisfactory that we can do nothing about battlefields, metal detectorists or anybody else, if they operate with the permission of the landowner and avoid scheduled sites. I hope that the noble Lord's parliamentary group will see fit to make appropriate representations to our consultation. It would be very welcome.
Baroness Trumpington: My Lords, does the late Lord Perth's Treasure Bill, which eventually became a government Bill, have no bearing? What is found today may be just a question of yesteryear, but it could be the treasure of future generations.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, it does have a bearing. It is very helpful that we have the Treasure Act 1996. The definitions of what the Act covers are very difficult to understand. Coins—that is to say, two or more—must be from the same find and at least 300 years old. However, if the coins are less than 10 per cent gold or silver, there must be at least 10 of them. It is even more complicated for objects other than coins. We value the Treasure Act. In so far as it is helpful in our review, it will be taken into account.
Lord Luke: My Lords, we welcome the Government's initiative in bringing together these matters, and the forthcoming publication of a White Paper. On the other hand, does the Minister not accept that valuable work has been done by metal detector clubs, particularly in helping to delineate the boundaries of some sites, especially, in many cases, battlefields where documentation is extremely sparse? Does he not think that a sensible compromise could, and should, be reached that would benefit archaeology and provide scope for metal detecting enthusiasts to enjoy their activity?
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Luke, will agree that I was careful not to condemn all metal detecting. Clearly, metal detecting carried out properly under an acceptable code of standards can contribute to knowledge—it can find things that nobody else can find. It is important that we have a proper definition of scheduled or listed sites, which should be the same for all purposes. It is important that, when we have done that, metal detectorists should work in an acceptable and agreed way. That is not to condemn all metal detecting.
Lord Campbell of Croy: My Lords, besides the battlefields in this country, do the Government possess
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the necessary authority in France and Belgium to protect effectively sites of battles from both World Wars in which British troops have been involved?
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, I do not know the answer, so I shall have to write to the noble Lord. From recent debates on driving roads in Belgium across battlefield sites, my impression is that we have no powers—in fact, I am sure that that must he the case. Where there are battlefields in which British troops were involved, we would express our views to those concerned.

Sand Eels
2.58 p.m.
Lord Forsyth of Drumleanasked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether they will insist that the European Union introduce an immediate moratorium on industrial fishing for sand eels throughout the North Sea following the recently announced figures which showed a collapse in sand eel catches and the nonappearance of this year's grilse run.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Lord Whitty): My Lords, the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea is carrying out its assessment of the North Sea sand eels stock. It will be published after review by the Advisory Committee on Fishery Management in October, when we will consider whether further EU management action is needed. It is too early to say how the run of grilse has been affected. However, grilse have been particularly and worryingly absent in rivers in south and west England. It is very unlikely that west coast salmon are affected by the availability of sand eels in the North Sea.
Lord Forsyth of Drumlean: My Lords, the Minister is obviously not a fisherman. If it is too early to say whether the grilse will arrive, something very odd is going on. Is it not totally irresponsible of the EU to allow factory fishing of a species that is so low down the food chain. as a result of which we are seeing pressure on the numbers of young salmon, cod and haddock? Surely we should take action on the precautionary principle to end the factory farming that threatens to empty our seas of a vital resource, and on which rural and coastal communities depend.
Lord Whitty: My Lords, the noble Lord has heard me confess that I am not a fisherman. However, the point that I was making was that it is not clear whether the decline in the sand eel population is affecting the return of the grilse. One of the problems is that the population of sand eels goes up and down very dramatically season by season, whereas it appears that something different is happening, not only in the areas

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where the sand eels have declined, but in other areas such as the west coast, where the fishing of sand eels cannot he the cause.
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer: My Lords, are not the Government really dragging their heels on this? Back in 1999, the fisheries Minister, Elliot Morley, visited the Isle of May and was struck by the plight of kittiwakes and puffins. It is not just fish: birds are affected, as the Minister said. The problem goes very low down the food chain. Four years on, the Government seem to have done nothing. Is there no sense of urgency to stop this industrial fishing?
Lord Whitty: My Lords, a number of measures have been taken. The issue of sea birds was dealt with by the Government and some eel fishing has stopped off the north-east coast. In addition, the north-east coast driftnet fishery has been greatly reduced. A scheme introduced after some very difficult negotiations to reduce the number of driftnet fisheries taking the eels and the hycatch, including potentially salmon, is in place from this year. There is a continuing issue in relation to the industrial fishing of sand eels that we raised with the Danish industry in particular. However, the connection between that and the apparent severe decline in returning grilse and the salmon fisheries is not proven and may well he due to other causes.
Lord Campbell of Croy: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that sand eels are the staple food of some sea birds, notably puffins, whose numbers may also collapse if the seabed is intensely scraped by fishermen? That would be a pity as puffins provide much amusement from their comic features and behaviour.
Lord Whitty: My Lords, we are all in favour of puffins and or ensuring that they have an adequate food supply. However, the problem is that the population of sand eels varies very drastically year by year apparently naturally, or in reaction to previous over-fishing, and is not correlated with the apparent level of fishing. Its effect up the food chain is not necessarily related to the level of fishing that has taken place in any given area. It is something, however, that we, the European Union and the international bodies are keeping a very close watch on.
Baroness Byford: My Lords, is it not unacceptable that the Government are only keeping a close watch on the situation? My noble friend Lord Forsyth of Drumlean asked for a moratorium. How long will we have to wait? I sympathise with colleagues who have asked about the effect of the problem on wildlife, but the businesses and futures of many people, especially up in the North, are in jeopardy. When will the Government do something about it?
Lord Whitty: My Lords, as I have been trying to explain, the population of sand eels, of which there are billions, appears to go up and down every year. The
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issue of the returning salmon appears to be a more generalised problem—a very serious one—that is not solely confined by any means to the areas that are fished for sand eels. As I said, the west coast, Ireland. Iceland and France have all seen a serious decline in returning grilse, which at present does not appear to he a mere delay but an absolute and quite severe decline. That is more likely to be related to climatic conditions than to the fishing of sand eels in one particular location.
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, will the Minister tell us something about negotiations with the Danish Government on the matter? The Danes have enormously competent vessels that have been scraping the bottom of the sea for anything they can find to make fish meal. It is generally accepted that they can do great harm to all the species that live on sand eels.
Lord Whitty: My Lords, persuading the Danish and other industries affected to cut back would require us to be able to establish the detrimental effects on wildlife or commercial fishing. The problem is that the evidence has not yet been established. That is why we need this further assessment which the international bodies are now conducting.
Lord Forsyth of Drumlean: My Lords, when the Minister says that the evidence has not yet been established, let us forget about the other species, what about the sand eels? This year there has been a catastrophic reduction in the number of sand eels being caught simply because they have scraped them off the bottom and they are destroying that population. Urgent action is required.
Lord Whitty: My Lords, the sand eel fishing season has finished this year and the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth of Drumlean, is certainly right that the number of sand eels in the North Sea appear to have significantly declined. That is not unique, however, in the population cycle of the sand eel. However, the assessment post this season will make it clear whether more restrictions on the fishing of sand eels will be necessary and will need to be dealt with both bilaterally and with other member state governments at EU level. We need to make a full assessment. That will be available in October and we will take decisions in the light of that.

Government Communications Strategy
3.8 p.m.
Lord McNallyasked Her Majesty's Government:
When they will announce the name of the senior civil servant who will take responsibility for the non-political aspects of government information and communications strategy following the departure of Mr Alastair Campbell.
Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, on 3rd September the Prime Minister published the

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interim report of the independent Government Communications Review Group. The report makes recommendations about the organisation of government communications at the centre.
The House will be pleased to hear that the Government accept the group's recommendations in full. These include the appointment of a new permanent secretary, government communications, based in the Cabinet Office, and the appointment of a permanent civil servant as the Prime Minister's senior official spokesman who will he the deputy to the new permanent secretary.
There will be an open competition for the post of permanent secretary, government communications. The intention is to get this process under way shortly.
Lord McNally: My Lords, does the Lord President agree that it is very important that senior civil servants have the confidence to say, "No, Prime Minister", as well as, "Yes, Prime Minister"? For that, it is equally important that selection is on merit and on the basis of political neutrality. I take it that his remarks give us those assurances. Would the new post also be strengthened by a Civil Service Act, which would guarantee that senior civil servants had the capacity to give unbiased advice?
Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, the points made by the noble Lord, Lord McNally, are extremely important and well founded. It is important that senior civil servants should maintain their independence, and perceived and actual objectivity. The permanent secretary will be a permanent civil servant. She or he will be selected by an open competition supervised by a panel chaired by the first Civil Service Commissioner. I hope that that reassures, not only the noble Lord, but your Lordships generally.
On the question of the Civil Service Act, I know that the noble Lord, Lord McNally, and my noble friend Lord Sheldon have adverted to this on a number of occasions. I hope that what I am about to say finds favour with your Lordships. The Government commit themselves to publishing a draft Bill for consultation on a Civil Service Act once the Public Administration Select Committee's proposals for a Civil Service Act have been published.
Lord Saatchi: My Lords, does the noble and learned Lord the Leader of the House agree that this would be a particularly good time for the Government to demonstrate their credentials for openness and transparency in their dealings with civil servants? Why does he think that the chairman of the Committee on Standards in Public Life would describe the Government's response to his committee's recent report as a,
"seriously missed opportunity to enhance public trust in the processes of government"?
Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, with great respect, I dissent from that conclusion. The Government will have an independent ethics adviser. I
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repeat the point about our commitment to a draft Bill for consultation for a Civil Service Act, once the Select Committee's proposals have been published. We are proposing a new section to the code of conduct for special advisers, and we are further agreeing that, in future, the appointment of the First Civil Service Commissioner will be made following consultation with the leaders of the main Opposition parties. Anyone who had a spark of objectivity or, indeed, generosity would accept that those are significant steps forward.
Lord Forsyth of Drumlean: My Lords, all of that sounds marvellous, but why is the Prime Minister still insisting on using Orders in Council to give political appointees the power to direct civil servants?
Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, the noble Lord said, "All of that sounds marvellous"; I am sure that it sounded equally marvellous when he was a distinguished member of the late Cabinet. Openness in public life is, in itself, a virtue. It also contributes to the accountability of government.
All the steps that I have put forward ought to meet with the unanimous approval of the House. The noble Lord, Lord McNally, has pressed us on this for a long time, as has my noble friend Lord Sheldon, and we are now delivering. Just occasionally, a spirit of calm objectivity in receiving the proposals might be welcome, if surprising.
Baroness Trumpington: My Lords, it is all very well to have a spirit of great cordiality, trust and love, but will the Minister please answer the question?
Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, I welcome the cordiality: I do not think that I invited love—the noble Baroness seems to be making an inadvertent gesture, and I am sure that the television cameras will have focused on it. If they have not, I recommend that they do and that it be replayed on many appropriate prominent occasions.
Lord Barnett: My Lords, my noble friend Lord Sheldon is absent on parliamentary business in Frankfurt, but I am sure that, if he were here, he would be as delighted as I am with the replies that my noble and learned friend gave. For the first time, I am able to compliment my noble and learned friend completely, and I do not see how anybody could disagree with what the Government propose. Even the noble Lord, Lord Saatchi, must accept that it was a thoroughly objective statement, as my noble friend Lord Sheldon would agree.
Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, normally, I am terrified when my noble friend Lord Barnett offers to be helpful. On this occasion, I believe him to be 100 per cent correct.
Lord Roberts of Conwy: My Lords, will the noble and learned Lord confirm that the measures herald the end of the culture of spin and the return of the Government to a pristine, lily-white condition?
Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, all the governments in my memory have sought to present

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their achievements—or lack of them, in some cases—in the most favourable light. There is nothing new about that, as the longest-serving Minister in the Welsh Office in living memory can well remember.
The Earl of Northesk: My Lords, will the noble and learned Lord help me with a point of detail? In the new arrangements. what will be done with the Strategic Communications Unit? Who will end up running it?
Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, the SCU will continue to work, and the special advisers there will work to Mr David Hill.
Lord McNally: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Sheldon, and I pursued the matter because we thought that the previous arrangement was flawed. We accept what the noble and learned Lord the Lord President of the Council has said today as a recognition that the previous arrangements were flawed.
There is, however, still some clearing-up to do. In a Written Answer to be published today to my Question about whether Mr Alastair Campbell's views on the BBC's coverage of the Iraq war was government policy, the noble and learned Lord said:
"the BBC was responsible for some of the best journalism during the conflict in Iraq. However, as is well documented, the Government were critical of some aspects of their coverage".
That is a long way from what Alastair Campbell said on Channel 4, which was that the BBC had an anti-war agenda. Can l take it that the Written Answer is a withdrawal of that accusation by the Government?
Lord Williams of Mostyn: No, my Lords. I repeat: the BBC was responsible, in the view of the Government, for some of the best journalism during the conflict in Iraq. We ought not to forget, when there are criticisms of journalists—print, television or sound—that journalists discharge an extremely important public duty and public service, often at serious damage to their own life, as we know.
On the other hand, as is well documented, the Government were critical of some aspects of the BBC's coverage, as, indeed, the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, used to be critical, on occasion, of some aspects of the BBC's coverage when his party was in power. I hope that we never have a situation in this country in which there is a perfect identity of interest between government and the free press.
Lord Saatchi: My Lords, did I hear the noble and learned Lord the Leader of the House say that nobody with a spark of objectivity could disagree with the Government's approach? The chairman of the Committee on Standards in Public Life disagrees with the Government's approach. Is the noble and learned Lord the Leader of the House saying that Sir Nigel Wicks does not have a spark of objectivity? If so, what is the point of his committee?
Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, I did not say that. Plainly, the art of selective quotation is not limited to former members of the Bar. I said that
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generosity and objectivity would, I respectfully suggested, require your Lordships to welcome the proposals. I repeat that. and I am grateful for the generous support of the noble Lord, Lord McNally. He has pressed the Government and, frequently, he has been met with answers that he thought were rather less than focused. The measures to which I have adverted today are a reasoned, proportionate response to the points made by my noble friends Lord Sheldon and Lord Barnett and the noble Lord, Lord McNally.
Lord Wilson of Dinton: My Lords, I welcome the Government's continued commitment to a Bill on the Civil Service, but I wonder whether the noble and learned Lord agrees that, if a competition is held to fill a post on the basis of merit, the role of the Minister is either to accept the person who wins the competition or to run the competition again.
Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, I am personally grateful to have that question from the noble Lord. When I was a baby Minister at the Home Office, he was my first permanent secretary. His teaching, instructions and stratagems have guided me since.
It will be chaired by the First Civil Service Commissioner; that is as it should be. The process will start in the autumn. The noble Lord is right: when the recommendation is made, the appointment wall he made by the Prime Minister, with the agreement of the relevant Minister, on the recommendation of the head of the Home Civil Service. Those are significant advances on what we have, and we should welcome them in a spirit of objectivity and generosity, as the noble Lord, Lord Saatchi, said.

Business
3.18 p.m.
Lord Grocott: My Lords, with the leave of House, my noble friend Lady Amos will, later this afternoon—the suggested time is after we have completed consideration of Commons amendments to the Local Government Bill—repeat a Statement on the World Trade Organisation ministerial conference.

Procedure of the House: Select Committee Report
The Chairman of Committees (Lord Brabazon of Tara): My Lords, I beg to move the Motion standing in my name on the Order Paper.
Moved, That the 4th Report from the Select Committee be agreed to.(HL Paper 162)—(The Chairman of Committees.)
Following is the report referred to:
1. Thursday sittings
As we indicated in our third report, we are reviewing the arrangement whereby the House sits at 11 a.m. on Thursdays but adjourns between 1.30 and 3.00 p.m. We should like to obtain the views of Members of the House and are therefore circulating a

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short questionnaire to all Members, to be returned by Friday 10 October. We shall meet again later in October to consider the responses.
2. Proposed Standing Committee on the European Union Intergovernmental Conference
The committee has considered a letter from the Leader of the House inviting it to consider a proposal for a Commons Standing Committee on the forthcoming European Union Intergovernmental Conference. The letter is printed as an annex to this report.
The proposal is similar to that for a Standing Committee on the Convention on the Future of Europe, on which we reported in our second report of last session and to which the House agreed on 24 June 2002. In both cases the procedure permits Lords to attend and speak, but not to vote, nor to move Motions or count towards the quorum. The new proposal is, however, for a Standing Committee that would engage with Ministers rather than parliamentary representatives.
Some members of the committee have reservations about the basis on which Members of this House are to be permitted to participate. A procedure in which Members of both Houses played an equal part might be preferable. We recognise, however. that what is proposed represents a development from the Standing Committee on the convention and that no new precedent will be set.
Accordingly we invite the House to agree to the participation of Lords in the new Standing Committee.

Procedure of the House: Select Committee Report

  Annex: Letter from the Leader of the House, Lord Williams of Mostyn, to the Chairman, Lord Brabazon of Tara, dated 4 September 2003
  COMMONS STANDING COMMITTEE ON THE EU INTER GOVERNMENTAL CONFERENCE
  As I am sure you know, the Convention on the Future of Europe has reported, and an Inter Governmental Conference (IGC) to consider its recommendations will convene on 4 October.
  Parliament scrutinised the Convention by means (among others) of a Commons Standing Committee, with the novel procedure that Lords could attend and speak, though not vote, move motions or count towards the quorum. Our House agreed to this procedure on 24 June 2002, on the basis of the Procedure Committee's 2nd Report. Some Lords expressed doubts about the procedure at the outset, but I believe it is now generally agreed to have been a success.
  The Government now proposes to replicate the procedure, more or less, to enable Parliament to scrutinise the IGC. In the next few days, my colleague Peter Hain will invite the Commons to create a Standing Committee on the IGC. It will differ from the Standing Committee on the Convention in that, rather than engaging with parliamentary representatives, it will engage with Ministers: it will be able to receive written reports from Ministers, and oral Statements on which Ministers can be questioned, as well as holding general debates. And as well as general debates on written reports by Ministers, there will be the option of debates on specific subjects, on the adjournment. As before, Lords will be permitted to attend and speak, though not to vote, move motions or count towards the quorum.
  If Lords are to gain full advantage from this procedure, the House will need to agree to it promptly once a Message arrives from the Commons, and no later than 18 September. Ideally, of course. the House would do so on the basis of a report of the Procedure Committee, as before. Therefore may I invite you to put this proposition on the agenda of the Procedure Committee for its meeting on 9 September?
  As it happens, the House is to debate the Convention on that very day. This will give Baroness Symons an opportunity to explain this proposal, without of course taking for granted the view of either the Committee or the House.
  Lord Barnett: My Lords, the report is a sensible one. I agree that Members of your Lordships' House
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  should be able to attend, speak at or vote at any of the meetings of the proposed Standing Committee on the European Union Intergovernmental Conference. How will we know when the committee will meet, where it will meet and what it will discuss, so that we can decide whether to attend?
  Lord Stoddart of Swindon: My Lords, I have read the report closely. I took part in the Standing Committee on the Convention on the Future of Europe. I attended all of its meetings, and, as noble Lords would expect, I asked questions and spoke at all of those meetings.
  I agree with the report where there is some disagreement on whether the arrangements are satisfactory. In spite of the excellent chairmanship of Mr Frank Cook, who was extremely fair, he had great difficulty in keeping a quorum. Several times the committee had to be adjourned and attending Members had to wait until a quorum could be found, which is entirely unsatisfactory and time wasting.
  I should like to have an assurance—although I do not know where from—that Ministers will treat Members of this House equally with Members of another place. Often, when we pass amendments which Ministers do not like, severe criticism is made of this House. It is implied that this House is less important than another place, which it probably is, and that we should not seek to quarrel with what the Commons has done. I hope that we can be assured that Ministers will recognise that members of the committee, in their questioning and speeches, will be equal. even if they are not equal in making the committee quorate. Perhaps that is a matter which should be pursued further.
  As regards the number of meetings, I do not know how and when they will take place, but I hope that all Members of this House will receive information about the Standing Committee meetings. I do not know whether they can receive an agenda, but we must ensure that every Member is able to attend because they know when the committee is sitting. I am not at all sure that the previous arrangements were satisfactory. With that, I welcome the report and the formation of this Standing Committee.
  Lord Maclennan of Rogart: My Lords, I. too, welcome this move. I share the view expressed: it is a statement of fact that great difficulties were experienced in the keeping of a quorum of the predecessor committee. Although Members of this House are, in a sense, invitees to the proposed committee, as a practical matter, it might be reasonable to contemplate Members of this House constituting a part of the quorum. I cannot see that that would challenge the fact that this is primarily the committee of another place. On many occasions, for practical reasons, such as Divisions in another place, it became quite a fractured experience. If the successor committee is to be effective, such fracturing would be unfortunate, but possibly not entirely avoidable. I wonder whether, underlying a provision to be counted

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  towards a quorum, there is an issue of principle, which makes it an unacceptable practical solution to a practical problem.
  The Chairman of Committees: My Lords, I am grateful to noble Lords who have spoken so far on this issue. I think that they have all referred to the intergovernmental conference. The noble Lords, Lord Barnett, Lord Stoddart and Lord Maclennan, have all talked about the Committee on the Intergovernmental Conference, the quorum, and so forth. Those issues were raised in the Procedure Committee, as will be seen in the second part of its report.
  Future meetings will be advertised, as they were for the convention committee. I should draw your Lordships' attention—particularly, perhaps, my noble friend Lord Campbell of Alloway—to the next item of business on the Order Paper. It is a Motion by the noble and learned Lord the Lord President of the Council that the intergovernmental conference Motion be resolved. I do not want to duck this issue—well, I do want to duck this issue—but the questions might be better put to the noble and learned Lord on the next Motion on the Order Paper rather than the one that we are on now. I commend the report to the House.
  On Question, Motion agreed to.

Inter-Governmental Conference
3.25 p.m.
Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, I beg to move the Motion standing in my name on the Order Paper.
Any questions which your Lordships may have would be best addressed to the noble Lord, Lord Brabazon.
Moved to resolve, That the Commons Message of 16th September be now considered; and that any Lord may participate in the proceedings of the Standing Committee on the Inter-Governmental Conference appointed by the Commons, but may not vote or move any Motion or be counted in the quorum.—(Lord Williams of Mostyn.)
Lord Campbell of Alloway: My Lords, I turn to the point on the quorum. I shall not mention the names, but I have served on two Joint Committees; the quorum is a perennial and constant problem. We cannot be part of a quorum unless we have a vote. Therefore, it requires rethinking, to some degree, about where your Lordships' stand on these committees. I suggest that some thought be given to whether those who accept to serve on these committees do not, as a matter of honour, agree to attend because on so many occasions there has been no quorum. The matter could be considered by an appropriate committee of this House.
Baroness Williams of Crosby: My Lords, perhaps I may shake the Leader of the House by offering warm enthusiasm for what he has done with regard to the
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second stage of the scrutiny of the IGC. In the light of concerns expressed by Members of this House about the issue of noble Lords not counting towards a quorum, not being able to move a Motion arid not being able to vote, perhaps the appropriate mechanism would be a Joint Committee of the two Houses rather than a Standing Committee of the Commons, which obviously implies these limitations on the rights of Peers.
Having said that, although we are grateful for this second stage, we hope that the noble and learned Lord can assure us that it does not set a precedent for any future studies of this kind on matters arising from the European Union. There is a particular reason for that. Apart from procedures which have left us with a Standing Committee rather than a Joint Committee, a tremendous contribution is made by this House towards the scrutiny and consideration of European Union developments and legislation. I hope that the noble and learned Lord is able to give us an assurance that this second stage—which we accept because it is the second stage of a Standing Committee—does not imply any precedent for the future.
Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, first, I shall deal with the questions that remained unanswered, asked by the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, and my noble friend Lord Barnett. Of course, then I shall give way to the noble Lords, Lord Howell and Lord Stoddart.
The noble Baroness is right. This is a Commons committee, which is the reason that Peers will be invited to attend and speak, but not to vote, move Motions or count towards the quorum. The noble Baroness rightly identified the nature of this committee and that this is a second stage. I think that the noble Lord, Lord Grenfell, has indicated that this will be a useful co-operative venture.
For the future, we should determine whether we can agree possible differences with our colleagues in the Commons. The noble Baroness will know that a number of these points were raised at the Procedure Committee. I promised to write immediately to my right honourable friend Peter Hain, as Leader of the Commons. I did, and copied the letter to the noble Baroness, to the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig, and to the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde. I am awaiting a reply because the letter went only a few days ago.
The noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, and my noble friend Lord Barnett asked specific questions which I should answer. There was concern before the committee met on previous occasions about notice of meetings. I think that that was dealt with satisfactorily in the end. It is a Commons committee but, of course, our colleagues in the Commons want to be helpful. Therefore, the plan is for meetings to be set after consultation between the FCO and the usual channels in the House of Commons. The FCO has undertaken to keep the Chief Whip's Office informed. As always, the office of my noble friend Lord Grocott will ensure that the usual channels are kept in the picture. I hope that gives a degree of assurance.

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Questions were also put about whether an FCO Minister would be present on every occasion. I am happy to say that I understand that a Minister will always be in attendance, but not on every occasion can there necessarily be a guarantee that it would be a Minister from the FCO.
I did not want those questions to go unanswered because they were specific and the noble Lord, Lord Brabazon, was quite right to say that I would deal with them.
Lord Howell of Guildford: My Lords, we welcome the continuation of this committee in a new form, but I wish to make a serious point relating to the issue of the quorum which I should like the noble and learned Lord the Leader of the House to take back to his colleagues for consideration. Like the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, I attended all the earlier committee meetings. Because the quorum for the committee is quite large and confined to Members of the other place, interruptions frequently arise. Indeed, on one occasion we had to abandon the meeting of the committee altogether which, after it had been planned a month ahead, was very tedious.
The problem could be solved by reducing the size of the quorum so that it would not be necessary to keep Members of another place there in such large numbers. It would be a simple move and is one that should be given some attention. In that way we could achieve uninterrupted attendance at the committee, which was successful and I hope will be as successful in the future.
Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, I am grateful for that suggestion. It certainly offers one possible solution. A further long-term solution referred to by the noble Baroness, Lady Williams of Crosby, and the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Alloway, is that if one had a Joint Committee, it is possible that the problem of the quorum could be solved in that way.
I undertake to do as the noble Lord, Lord Howell, has invited me: I shall bring this proposal to the attention of the Leader of the Commons. I know, too, that the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Alloway, has very distinguished experience of serving on a Joint Committee when he was a Member of the Joint Committee on Human Rights, which avoided some of these difficulties.
For the moment, however, it is understood that this is a Commons committee which noble Lords attend but in which they do not participate any more fully than I have indicated. However, it seems to me that there is no reason why we should not have perfectly calm and rational discussions to see how procedures can be improved with the agreement of both Houses.
Lord Renton: My Lords, will the noble and learned Lord take the opportunity to have a word with the Leader of the House in another place so that he may tell the members of the committee that, although Members of your Lordships' House will not have a
916
vote, there are among our Members far more people with experience and expertise of the relevant matters than can be found in another place?
Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, I shall convey the message of the noble Lord, Lord Renton, in as tactful a way as possible.
Lord Stoddart of Swindon: My Lords, I was about to criticise the buck-passing which appeared to be taking place between the Lord Chairman of Committees and the Leader of the House, but of course the noble and learned Lord the Leader of the House has now accepted the buck and dealt with it very well indeed.
The only point I wish to emphasise is that Ministers really must treat Members of this House equally. I should like an assurance that they will do so.
Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, as I said earlier, I shall transmit the concerns expressed by noble Lords to the Leader of the Commons. Perhaps the best course for me to follow is to enclose a copy of Lords' Hansard relating to these matters.
On the matter of the quorum, I think I can help a little further. In the committee on the convention, only Commons Members who were members of certain Select Committees could count towards the quorum. In the committee on the IGC, all MPs count towards the quorum, so it is reasonably possible that the problem of a failed quorum may be mitigated. However, I shall take these points forward. We can move on only by agreement, but I do not see why we should not look for a reasonable compromise on this issue.
Lord Waddington: My Lords, I do not want to hold up the proceedings for any longer than necessary. However, while listening to this discussion I have become increasingly concerned. It has highlighted the concern felt by many of us that this is a Commons committee. There seems to be no reason at all why it should not have been a Joint Committee, and the fact that it is not one seems to suggest that, once again, there is not a full realisation in the other place of the important role we play.
Bearing in mind the expertise in this House, I think it extraordinary that it was thought sufficient to have a Commons committee rather than a Joint Committee. I hope that the noble and learned Lord will press on his colleagues in another place our case for Joint Committees to be set up in the future.
Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, the noble Lord has made a perfectly legitimate point and I was not derogating from the theme of his remarks simply by endorsing what was said by the noble Baroness. She pointed out that today we are dealing with the present circumstances: this is a Commons committee and therefore we have limited "rights".
I undertake to put forward all these points to the Leader of the Commons. However, I have to say that both he and Mr Cook, his immediate predecessor but

917
One—his immediate predecessor was in place for too short a time to hold any meaningful discussions—have been extremely helpful and receptive to all proposals that I have put forward in the interests of this House.
On Question, Motion agreed to; and a message was ordered to be sent to the Commons to acquaint them therewith.

Local Government Bill
3.35 p.m.
Lord Rooker: My Lords, I beg to move that the Commons reasons and amendments be now considered.
Moved, That the Commons reasons and amendments be now considered.—(Lord Rooker.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

Local Government Bill
  COMMONS REASONS FOR DISAGREEING TO CERTAIN LORDS AMENDMENTS, COMMONS AMENDMENTS TO A CERTAIN LORDS AMENDMENT AGREED TO AND COMMONS CONSEQUENTIAL AMENDMENTS
  [The page and line references are to HL Bill 43 as first printed for the Lords.]

  LORDS AMENDMENT
  3Clause 11, page 5, line 32, leave out paragraph (b)
  The Commons disagree to this amendment for the following reason—
  3A Because it would alter the financial arrangements made by the Commons, and the Commons do not offer any further reason trusting that this reason may he deemed sufficient.
  Lord Rooker: My Lords, I beg to move that the House do not insist on their Amendment No. 3, to which the Commons have disagreed for their reason numbered 3A.
  I do not need to remind noble Lords that the Commons reason relies on the privilege of that House to determine matters relating to the financial arrangements of the country. That is only right and it is the principle on which relations between this House and the other place rest. However, we now have a further amendment before the House, Amendment No. 3B, which will be moved and spoken to by the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, in due course. First, I beg the indulgence of noble Lords to make the following comments.
  It will be apparent to anyone who reads this along with the previous amendment that the new amendment is designed to have the same effect as Amendment No. 3; namely, to remove the power of the Secretary of State to pool a proportion of housing capital receipts. As we all know, this is a vital issue which, over the past few months, has been discussed at some length at every stage in the proceedings of the Bill. It goes to the heart of the housing capital finance system.
  To put it simply, Amendment No. 3B would remove the ability of central government to redistribute and allocate housing resources on the basis of need. It
  918
  would put an end to this fundamental principle of capital finance, which of course was introduced by the previous administration and has been in place since 1990.
  Without pooling, we would probably have to continue to operate a redistribution mechanism based on the principles underlying the current system. This could be only a partial solution. However, Clause 11, which we have been considering, introduces a system which is simpler, fairer and more transparent. I have used the word "fairer" quite deliberately because it would remove the unfair anomaly which exists at the moment. This anomaly gives special treatment and special benefits to one category of local authority in a purely arbitrary way. These are the authorities—around 40 of them—which are able, because of the mechanics of the system, to retain the housing capital receipts that arise in their area.
  It is simply wrong that some authorities should have more spending power than others, regardless of housing need, simply because they happen to be rich in right-to-buy receipts or are debt-free. This is the fault of the present system which our pooling proposals address.
  As noble Lords will know, I do not accept that the situation in which those authorities find themselves is the result of good financial management or good planning. It is neither of those. We are talking here about funds generated solely by the decision of tenants to buy their own house, not by any action of the local authority. And we are talking about a level of funding determined not through any assessment of need, but by the mechanics of the housing market, in particular in parts of the country where house prices are buoyant.
  There is no justification on intellectual or moral grounds to exempt one category of authorities from their proper contribution to the country's housing need. It goes without saying that redistribution must apply to all if it is to be fair to all. Without it, affordable housing for key workers, decent homes and market renewal for low-demand areas would all be put at risk. Without redistribution, local authorities with debt, with lower capital receipts and with a greater housing investment need will lose out. That would disadvantage most of the nearly 260 authorities with housing stock.
  Let me take at random five authorities which will be damaged by the amendment. Liverpool, Wigan, Milton Keynes, Solihull and Islington will all be worse off if the amendment is allowed to stand in the Bill.
  There is a simple question before us today. Do we in this House accept that fairness in the allocation of funds should be paramount based on principle and transparency? Or do we believe that funding should fall where it arises, which of course is wholly down to an accident of history or geography?
  Finally, I know that noble Lords have been concerned that the debt-free authorities will have made plans to use the receipts generated by their tenants. We recognise that—the point has been put very forcefully—and we have offered such authorities very generous transitional arrangements. This is the

  919
  right response to the concerns of those authorities rather than removing the important new provisions that the Government initially proposed in the Bill. If in due course the matter should be pressed to a Division, I urge the House to reject Amendment No. 3B.
  Moved, That the House do not insist on their Amendment No. 3 to which the Commons have disagreed for their reason numbered 3A—(Lord Rooker.)
  Baroness Hanhamrose to move, as an amendment to the Motion that the House do not insist on their Amendment No. 3 to which the Commons have disagreed for their reason numbered 3A, leave out from "disagreed" to end and insert ", but do propose the following amendment in lieu thereof"—
  3B page 5, line 33, leave out from "receipt" to end and insert "to be used by the receiving authority in accordance with directions by the Secretary of State"
  The noble Baroness said: My Lords, there have been a number of debates on the retention and pooling of capital receipts arising from right-to-buy sales. I do not propose to weary the House by rehearsing the arguments in great detail, but I am hound to say something in view of the fact that the Minister got his say in first. No doubt he will also have an opportunity to get his say in last.
  It is our contention that authorities which have prudently harnessed resources from right-to-buy sales, or successfully promulgated the right-to-buy policy, and ended up debt free, either through prudence or good management, should not be put under pressure and have their capital receipts sequestered—which is how it was put in the other place—by the Government. It is proposed that those capital receipts should be snatched from them and given to authorities which the Government decide need them more than the authorities which got them together and harnessed them. The Minister referred to some authorities that would be disbenefited if the money was not pooled.
  My knowledge is that these capital receipts amount to £120 million, which is not a great deal of money within the Government's capital allocation policy.
  Lord Rooker: My Lords, let us get the figures right. It is £1.2 billion, not £120 million. We estimate that approximately £1.2 billion of housing capital receipts will he pooled.
  Baroness Hanham: My Lords, I disagree, but I shall not pursue the issue because it does not alter the principle of the matter.
  All the way through, the Government have suggested that the Bill will give freedoms and flexibilities, but when it comes to the retention of capital receipts it stops that. A local authority cannot spend its capital receipts on what it perceives its priorities to be.
  The Government seem to have the idea that local authorities that have these capital receipts will rush off and buy Rolls-Royces or do something luxurious and
  920
  debonair with the money. By and large, most of them want the money to carry out small-scale key worker developments; to provide capital for the development of their properties, probably housing; or to provide affordable housing.
  The difference between us is that we say they should be able to do so and the Government say, "Sorry, individual local authority, you should not he able to do that because we want your money to take elsewhere and give it to someone else". The purpose of pooling, of course, is to put the money into one pot and for the Government to distribute it, at their own inclination, to the authorities that they wish to have it.
  We do not believe that the authorities that have accumulated money from capital receipts have done so through an accident of history. Most of them have made good use of the right to buy. They have drawn that right to the attention of their tenants, who were, in the past, in a position to obtain a very good discount. The Government, of course, have put their feet on that system as well.
  The amendment would ensure that the Government could not take the money away at will. The local authorities that have these capital receipts would discuss the issue with the Government and come to an agreement on what they should be spent on. This would ensure that the money was spent on government priorities—for example, on key worker housing—or it may be, amazingly, that the local authority's priorities were agreed to.
  That is the aim of the amendment. The Minister is correct to say that it would stop the pooling arrangement—but that is the one thing that all these local authorities are adamantly against, as is the Local Government Association. I beg to move.
  Moved, as an amendment to the Motion that the House do not insist on their Amendment No. 3 to which the Commons have disagreed for their reason numbered 3A, leave out from "disagreed" to end and insert ", but do propose the following amendment in lieu thereof"—
  3B page 5. line 33, leave out from "receipt" to end and insert "to be used by the receiving authority in accordance with directions by the Secretary of State"
  Baroness Maddock: My Lords, I support the amendment moved by the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham. I have read with interest the debate on this issue in another place. The Minister has today reiterated many of the arguments that the Minister there. Nick Raynsford, made against agreeing to the amendment passed in this House on the use of local authority housing capital receipts.
  One of the reasons given was that it would undermine one of the fundamental principles of housing finance, which allows the redistribution of housing capital receipts to areas of greatest need. Both Ministers said that. It was a principle that the Conservative government followed when they were in office. However, at that time, when the Labour Party was in opposition, my memory is that it did not believe it or support it.

  921
  We on these Benches have always stood by our views on this issue. We believe in local government autonomy. We believe that decisions should be taken closest to those they affect, by elected people who are closely involved in their communities. We accept that this means that different authorities, facing different circumstances and different issues and having different histories, will come to different conclusions and find themselves in different positions. That is what devolution is all about.
  Throughout the passage of the Bill the Government have said that they will sign up to greater local autonomy and incentives for councils that have prudent financial administration. We all agree with that. The amendments the Government are opposing go along with those principles, whereas the Government's view does not; it is against those principles.
  The noble Lord, Lord Rooker, has reiterated the point made by the Minister in another place that accepting the original amendment would deprive housing authorities in areas of high housing stress of the resources they need to fulfil pressing demands for housing. It is the Government's choice about how they wish to use this money.
  The noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, referred to the figures and the finance. This matter is not as straightforward as the Minister said. We had considerable discussions in Committee, when I moved complicated amendments with complicated information, much of which was gathered from the Committee proceedings in another place. To a great degree, these were brushed aside and we still do not have clear financial figures. That is also true of the debate in another place.
  Why cannot the Government use the high rises there have been in the stamp duty take as a result of the increase in house prices over recent years? That really would be redistribution of housing money. I think there would be some justification for that, given the lack of supply within the housing market. The lowest number of homes built since 1924 has led to high house prices.
  Ironically, the Ministers in both another place and here today said that the councils had their money not because it was generated by good financial management or good planning—a fairly sweeping statement if one has any knowledge of the wide range of local authorities in Britain today—but simply because tenants had decided to buy their houses in areas where house prices are buoyant and the stamp duty take will have been high.
  The other principle broken by the ability to take capital receipts from local authorities is the retrospective nature of this course of action. The Government claim that local authorities received grants, and all they are doing is clawing the money back. But they are clawing hack money that local authorities have made over the years for a variety of reasons, money that was given to completely different administrations at a completely different time.
  922
  In another place, the Government resorted to quite a lot of political knockabout. I am glad that has not happened today, so I shall not say some of the things I was going to say. But to vote against a proposal with which one disagrees in principle does not mean that one does not recognise the sort of problems faced by some authorities that the Minister outlined.
  The amendment is a compromise against the principles on which we on these Benches stand. But it gives the Government the ability to direct those housing capital receipts to be spent on housing. As others have said, few authorities in this country do not have pressing local housing problems. We have seen reduced social housing, much of which is not energy-efficient, and elderly people living in cold, damp homes. All over Britain there is a lack of affordable key worker homes. Local authorities have duties under the Homelessness Act 2002 to bring empty properties back into use. Those are some of the things local authorities have to deal with.
  I have been consistent in my stance on this from my days on Southampton City Council under a Conservative Government through four years in another place under a Conservative Government, and I am saying the same things today, under a Labour Government. We have shifted our stance on this: we are supporting a compromise, and I hope that the Government will be able to do the same. We on these Benches support the amendment.
  Lord Rooker: My Lords, I want to make it clear that this amendment is not a compromise. I invite anybody who wants a definition of wishy-washy Liberal Democrats to read in tomorrow's Hansard the speech we have just heard. I think the noble Baroness should be ashamed of herself and her party should be ashamed of itself for the stand that they are taking on this. Not once have either the Liberal Democrats or the Conservatives spelt out the consequences. If you oppose pooling—and I have repeatedly invited answers to this—there are only certain alternatives. They are less investment by the most needy authorities, higher taxes to make good the money that is currently retained or cuts in other programmes. Not one of them has had the guts to stand up and say which one of those alternatives they would go for, unless we are just about to hear.
  Baroness Maddock: My Lords, what I actually proposed was another place from which we could get the money because I disagree with the principle of taking this money. I made that quite clear.
  Lord Rooker: My Lords, the noble Baroness says she will vote for the amendment. I will give her a few examples of who will lose out if the amendment is carried. Brent will lose £2 million. I hope the Liberal Democrat candidate will go to the public tonight and say, "Our Lib Dems have voted to lose £2 million for Brent's housing". Brent has to be an authority in need. As for Liverpool—and I think the Lib Dems are in charge of Liverpool—it would lose £1.5 million as a

  923
  result of accepting this amendment. Bournemouth will lose £250,000, Solihull £180,000 and Wokingham £150,000.
  This is "make your mind up time". Are we concerned about using the resources of the nation based on housing need? It is no good saying everybody has equal need—they have not. I accept that they will all have needs—even in the most well off areas, there will be pockets of need. But it is a question of the scale of the need compared with the resources available. That is what we are inviting the House to accept in this pooling arrangement.
  As I have said, there are alternatives. We will be depriving needy authorities of much needed investment in housing based not on a whim or a hunch but on the housing needs of the people living in those authorities. I have read out some losers and no doubt I could read out more. I invite the Liberal Democrats to think seriously about what they are doing here today.
  Baroness Hanham: My Lords, I think we have finally got to the Minister. I have not seen him so exercised about anything for a very long time. We have been having very calm and balanced discussions throughout the Bill's proceedings.
  I said that I would not tweak the Minister too hard about the amount of money involved, but I wish to refer to Tuesday's Commons debate in Hansard. My honourable friend Mr Philip Hammond asked the Minister to,
  "confirm for the record that the sum involved in relation to debt-free authorities—the only ones that will be directly affected in cash terms by the measure—is about £120 million, and not £800 million, £1.8 billion or any other exaggerated Figure?"
  Mr Raynsford responded:
  "The figure that I quoted—
  which was in a previous part of the debate—
  "was the total sum that we estimate will be brought within the pooling arrangements".
  Those are the billions. We are talking about £120 million. Mr Raynsford continued:
  "That is similar to the set-aside. The figure for debt-free authorities is £120 million, as the hon. Gentleman rightly said".—[Official Report, Commons, 15/9/03; cols. 599–600.]
  I suggest that if the Minister disagrees with that, he disagrees with Mr Raynsford. Our understanding is that the sum is about £120 million. The amounts that the Minister has just said might be lost are to authorities which, I am fascinated to discover, have already been identified.
  Lord Rooker: My Lords, I probably will not be able to come back, but so there is no misunderstanding about this, of the £120 million, the figures are for the authorities I have just quoted, so it might not seem a large sum of money. The estimated pooling of right-to-buy receipts generates £1.2 billion, of which £120 million will come from the debt-free authorities.
  924
  But the amendment affects all authorities as the set-aside will not continue, so there will be damage all round.
  Baroness Hanham: My Lords, we are talking about the right-to-buy money. We are talking about money that will be scooped up from authorities which have had it in their accounts because the Minister is able to take it away from them. He has already identified and made it clear that the Government have already spent the money to be scooped up from these authorities by, if nothing else, at least allocating it to authorities, some of which he has read out.
  The amounts of money that the Minister read out are not fantastic. Two million pounds will not cover much in the way of building in Brent, which would probably require £200 billion.
  The Government will dictate to authorities which have raised this money in capital receipts by good careful management. They will say, "You do not need this money; by some dint or other you have managed to scoop up this money but you will not be allowed to spend it on anything".
  If this is what a compromise is, we have suggested in the amendment that that money should be recognised as part and parcel of the budget and the money for the local authorities, but that they should be able to spend it in line with their priorities and the Government's recognition of those priorities. If key worker housing is not a priority in very many parts of this country—not only for authorities with big debts and big requirements—I know not what we have been talking about for these many months past. I know not what the Secretary of State is talking about when he is trying to develop all the areas in the South East.
  The amendment would allow those authorities to keep the money to use it for their priorities in a way that is associated with housing. I cannot make the matter clearer than that. I believe that the proposal would be a right and proper way to deal with housing capital receipts. Therefore, I must ask the House to agree with my amendment.
  4.1 p.m.
  On Question, Whether the said amendment (No. 3B) shall be agreed to?
  Their Lordships divided: Contents, 139; Not-Contents, 118.

  Division No. 1

  CONTENTS

  Addington, L.

  Blackwell, L.

  Ampthill, L.

  Blatch, B.

  Anelay of St Johns, B.

  Bowness, L.

  Arran, E.

  Bradshaw, L.

  Astor, V.

  Brittan of Spennithorne, L.

  Astor of Hever, L.

  Brooke of Sutton Mandeville, L

  Attlee, E.

  Brookeborough, V.

  Barker, B.

  Brougham and Vaux, L.

  Beaumont of Whitley, L.

  Burnham, L.

  Biffen,L.

  Byford,B.

  925

  Caithness, E.

  Monson, L.

  Campbell of Alloway, L.

  Montagu of Beaulieu, L.

  Carlisle of Bucklow, L.

  Montrose, D.

  Carnegy of Lour, B.

  Mowbray and Stourton, L.

  Carrington, L.

  Moynihan, L,

  Clement-Jones, L.

  Naseby, L.

  Cope of Berkeley, L.

  Noakes, B.

  Crickhowell,L.

  Northbrook, L.

  Dholakia, L.

  Northesk, E.

  Dixon-Smith, L.

  Northover, B.

  Dundee, E.

  Norton of Louth, L.

  Eden of Winton, L.

  Oakeshott of Seagrove Bay, L.

  Elles, B.

  Onslow, E.

  Elton, L.

  Park of Monmouth, B.

  Erroll, E.

  Pearson of Rannoch, L.

  Ezra, L

  Peel, E.

  Falkland, V.

  Plummer of St. Marylebone, L

  Feldman, L.

  Rawlings, B.

  Flather, B.

  Redesdale, L.

  Fookes, B.

  Rees-Mogg, L.

  Forsyth of Drumlean, L.

  Rennard, L.

  Fowler, L.

  Renton, L.

  Geddes, L.

  Roberts of Conwy, L.

  Geraint, L.

  Rodgers of Quarry Bank, L.

  Glenarthur, L.

  Roper, L.

  Goodhart, L.

  Rotherwick, L.

  Gray of Contin, L.

  Russell-Johnston, L.

  Hamwee, B. [Teller]

  Ryder of Wensum, L.

  Hanham, B.

  St John of Fawsley, L.

  Harris of Richmond, B.

  Seccombe, B. [Teller]

  Hayhoe, L.

  Selsdon, L.

  Henley, L.

  Sharp of Guildford,B.

  Hodgson of Astley Abbotts, L.

  Sharples, B.

  Hooper, B.

  Shutt of Greetland, L.

  Hooson, L.

  Skelmersdale, L.

  Howe, E.

  Smith of Clifton, L.

  Howell of Guildford,L.

  Soulsby of Swaffham Prior, L.

  Jenkin of Roding, L.

  Stevens of Ludgate, L.

  Kimball, L.

  Stoddart of Swindon, L.

  Kingsland, L.

  Strathclyde, L.

  Knight of Collingtree, B.

  Swinfen, L.

  Laird, L.

  Taverne, L.

  Lester of Herne Hill, L.

  Tebbit, L.

  Linklater of Butterstone, B.

  Thatcher, B.

  Liverpool, E.

  Thomas of Gresford, L.

  Livsey of Talgarth, L.

  Thomson of Monifieth, L.

  Luke, L.

  Tope, L.

  Lyell, L.

  Tordoff, L.

  McColl of Dulwich,L.

  Trumpington, B.

  MacGregor of Pulham Market, L.

  Ullswater, V.

  Waddington, L.

  Mackay of Clashfern, L.

  Wakeham, L.

  Mackie of Benshie, L.

  Walker of Worcester, L.

  McNally, L.

  Wallace of Saltaire,L.

  Maddock, B.

  Walmsley, B.

  Mancroft, L.

  Wamock, B.

  Mar and Kellie,E.

  Wigoder.L.

  Marsh, L.

  Wilcox,B.

  Methuen, L.

  Williams of Crosby, B.

  Miller of Chilthorne Domer, B.

  Willoughby de Broke, L.

  NOT-CONTENTS

  Acton, L.

  Blackstone, B.

  Ahmed, L.

  Borrie, L.

  Allen of Abbeydale, L.

  Boyce, L.

  Amos,B.

  Bragg, L.

  Andrews, B.

  Brooke of Alverthorpe, L

  Archer of Sandwell, L.

  Brookman, L.

  Ashley of Stoke, L.

  Carter, L.

  Ashton of Upholland, B.

  Chandos, V.

  Bach, L.

  Christopher, L.

  Barnett, L.

  Clark of Windermere, L.

  Bassam of Brighton, L.

  Clarke of Hampstead, L.

  Bhatia, L.

  Clinton-Davis, L.

  Billingham, B.

  Cohen of Pimlico, B.

  926

  Corbett of Castle Vale, L.

  Levy, L.

  Craig of Radley.L.

  Lipsey, L.

  Crawley,B.

  Lofthouse of Pontefract, L.

  Darcy de Knayth, B.

  Macdonald of Tradeslon, L.

  Davies of Coity, L.

  McIntosh of Hudnall,B.

  Davies of Oldham, L. [Teller]

  MacKenzie of Culkein, L.

  Dean of Thornton-le-Fylde, B.

  Mackenzie of Framwellgate, L

  Desai,L.

  Mallalieu, B.

  Dixon, L.

  Massey of Darwen, B.

  Donoughue, L.

  Merlyn-Rees, L.

  Dormand of Easington, L.

  Mishcon, L.

  Dubs, L.

  Mitchell, L.

  Elder, L.

  Morgan, L.

  Evans of Parkside, L.

  Morris of Aberavon, L.

  Evans of Temple Guiting, L.

  Morris of Manchester, L.

  Farrington of Ribbleton, B.

  Palmer, L.

  Faulkner of Worcester, L.

  Paul, L.

  Filkin, L.

  Pendry, L.

  Finlay of Llandaff, B.

  Pitkeathley, B.

  Fitt, L.

  Plant of Highfield,L.

  Fyfe of Fairfield, L.

  Prys-Davies, L.

  Gale, B.

  Puttnam, L.

  Gibson of Market Rasen, B.

  Ramsay of Cartvale, B.

  Gilbert, L.

  Rea,L.

  Golding, B.

  Richard, L.

  Gordon of Strathblane, L.

  Rooker, L.

  Gould of Potternewton, B.

  Sainsbury of Turville, L.

  Graham of Edmonton, L.

  Sawyer, L.

  Scotland of Asthal, B.

  Greengross, B.

  Simon, V.

  Grocott, L. [Teller]

  Smith of Gilmorehill, B.

  Harris of Haringey, L.

  Stone of Blackheath, L

  Harrison, L.

  Strabolgi, L.

  Hogg of Cumbemauld, L.

  Tanlaw, L.

  Hollis of Heigham, B.

  Thornton, B.

  Howarth of Breckland, B.

  Tomlinson, L.

  Howells of St. Davids, B.

  Turnberg, L.

  Hoyle, L.

  Turner of Camden, B.

  Hughes of Woodside, L.

  Walpole, L.

  Hunt of Chesterton, L.

  Warwick of Undercliffe, B.

  Hunt of Kings Heath, L.

  Weatherill, L.

  Islwyn, L.

  Whitaker, B.

  Janner of Braunslone, L.

  Whitty, L.

  Jay of Paddington, B.

  Williams of Elvel,L.

  Joffe, L.

  Williams of Mostyn, L. (Lord President of the Council)

  Jordan, L.

  King of West Bromwich, L.

  Woolmer of Leeds, L.

  Resolving in the affirmative, and amendment agreed to accordingly.
  On Question, Motion, as amendment, agreed to.
  4.11 p.m.

  LORDS AMENDMENT
  6 Before Clause 25, insert the following new clause—
  "Application of provisions of this Part
  The provisions of this Part may only be applied to those local authorities that have been identified by the Audit Commission as at risk of overspending their total budget by more than 10 per cent."
  The Commons disagree to this amendment for the following reason—
  6A Because it would affect the levy of local revenues, and the Commons do not offer any further reason, trusting that this reason may be deemed sufficient.
  Lord Rooker: My Lords, I beg to move that the House do not insist on their Amendment No. 6 to which the Commons have disagreed for their reason numbered 6A.

  927
  As it is self-evident, I do not need to remind noble Lords that the Commons reason relies on the privilege of that House to determine matters relating to the financial arrangements of the country. That is the principle on which our relations exist. I have a massively long note to put to the House on why we are inviting noble Lords not to insist on their amendment. As the amendment was passed with seriousness, I shall take it seriously and use the note to put on the record again why we do not want to accept the amendment and think that the House should agree with the view of the Commons.
  The amendment agreed by this House at Third Reading inserted a new clause, Amendment No. 6, at the beginning of Part 2 of the Bill. The clause said that Part 2 could be applied only to an authority that has been identified by the Audit Commission as at risk of overspending its total budget by more than 10 per cent. We explained at Third Reading the perverse and highly undesirable effects of this overspending test.
  To summarise, the amendment requires the Audit Commission to undertake an entirely new task that will he costly and potentially very contentious. Every local authority budget will have to be scrutinised and assessed to prepare a blacklist of potential overspenders. Inclusion on the list might amount to a statement that an authority had set an illegal budget. In other circumstances, inclusion would tarnish the reputation of an authority that had perfectly adequate reserves to cover the overspend, Authorities at financial risk would not be reliably identified, and it would deny most authorities the use of Clause 30 to deal with a financial crisis, a provision universally welcomed in local government.
  We cannot see how any responsible person could support the inclusion of this clause in the Bill. On the other hand, I could have said that about the previous amendment. We are told that its supporters' interest is not in the precise form of the clause, but in the fact that it will restrict the impact of Part 2. So I should turn to Part 2, and why it was included in the first place.
  The Government's intention to introduce legislation on reserves was signalled in the December 2001 White Paper. It was announced there as part of a package that included the new freedoms and flexibilities—the "bonfire of controls" to which I have already referred which affect local authorities—which we are also implementing in this Bill, if it ever reaches the statute book. If the Bill does not receive Royal Assent tomorrow, then everyone's aspirations for a new local government finance system starting in the next financial year will be down the plughole. That is not a threat; it is, as we have said all along, simply the position that we are in. Local government understands that as well. Unless that happens, the new system of freedoms and flexibilities cannot start in the next financial year. But I digress.
  We regard the financial management provisions as an essential complement to the new freedoms. On the one hand, there is a whole host of freedoms; on the other, Part 2 is available for reasons which I shall explain.
  928
  The prudential system will allow local authorities to borrow up to the amount that they assess they can afford. That is an immense new freedom for authorities and places great trust in their financial competence. Of course safeguards have been built in, largely in the form of requiring authorities to comply with professional good practice. Some authorities have no problem with this approach in Part 1, but see it as an affront to their competence in Part 2. I invite the House to look at the Bill and these changes as an overall package. In that respect, without Part 2, there could have been no Part 1.
  The prudential system will allow authorities to make full use of their borrowing capacity, in a way that the present system does not. Authorities will need to ensure they are adequately resourced to meet the revenue consequences of this borrowing and cope with the uncertainties involved. It is therefore equally important that there are safeguards against risks affecting the revenue account, and the principal ways to do that are to ensure that there are adequate reserves and a rigorous system for monitoring the budget during the year. That is what Part 2 is all about and what it does.
  There are also more subtle links between borrowing and revenue account. Under the former rigid system, there was a ceiling on borrowing set by government for each authority. If an authority was in financial difficulties on revenue account, central government have, in the most difficult cases, allowed revenue expenditure to be capitalised and financed by borrowing. However, under the prudential system, every authority will fix its own prudential limit based on what it assesses it can afford to borrow. An authority would be entitled to borrow up to that limit. If a crisis on revenue account were then to hit them which could not be covered by reserves, there would not be room to accommodate additional borrowing. Borrowing and revenue spending are therefore intimately linked, and it is irresponsible to place safeguards on one and completely ignore the other.
  We will also be giving authorities new powers to trade, a freedom that has met with a general welcome. Trading will of course be carried out with the objective of making a profit, but all trading operations are inherently risky, and an authority can make losses as well as profits. They will need to ensure that reserves are adequate to cover that happening if they are to avoid the risk of their mainstream services being damaged.
  The point we are making is that greater financial freedoms for councils inevitably carry with them greater financial risk. Part 2 is there to reinforce the processes that any well-managed council would follow anyway to safeguard against those risks. However, for the Government not to have taken measures to strengthen those safeguards would, we think, have been irresponsible.
  Much has been made in our debates of the opposition to these clauses from local government. I should like to provide some balance to what was said in earlier debates, which often relied on selective

  929
  quotation. Clause 30, which I have mentioned, has been universally welcomed. That has not been acknowledged. The Audit Commission, it is said, is opposed to Clause 26. In fact, in evidence to the Select Committee, the Audit Commission said:
  "We can see the desirability for the government to have the flexibility to be able, in exceptional cases, to set a maximum level of reserves in support of intervention".
  That is how Clause 26 would be used—in exceptional Cases—a point which we have made repeatedly.
  CIPFA's opposition has been quoted, and it is true that CIPFA opposed Part 2 in its evidence to the Select Committee. However, I ask the House to look at what it said. Referring to the setting of reserves, CIPFA said:
  "it is a very local decision and judgement as to what that level of balances should be".
  We agree. We introduced Clause 25 to help ensure that a very carefully considered judgment is made in the light of local circumstances. We have also made it clear that we will not use Clause 26 to impose blanket minima.
  I repeat what we said about the use of Clause 26. We will make regulations under it only if an authority is disregarding the advice of its chief financial officer and heading for severe financial difficulties. In deciding the level to set, we would have regard to the chief financial officer's advice and any observations of the auditor. I cannot see how we could go further in ensuring that the minimum would be appropriate to the specific circumstances of that particular authority. We have listened to what CIPFA said, and we have acted on its views.
  Part 2 has been thoroughly debated in both Houses and at all stages of the Bill in this House. In another place no Division was moved against it on its initial consideration. The Conservative spokesman, Mr Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, referring to decisions on reserves said:
  "We must all accept that there will be occasions when elected representatives will get it wrong. The problem arises when they get it so badly wrong that the authority cannot deliver its statutory level of services. The higher authority, the Secretary of State and the district auditor have a role to ensure the continuance of services".
  That is an absolutely first-class summary of the role of Clause 26. The removal of Clause 26 was specifically considered by your Lordships at Report stage and was voted down on a Division.
  Another place has disagreed with this House's amendment on grounds that turn on the privileges of the Commons. It is for each House to decide its own privilege but I move that this House do not insist on the amendment not just on grounds of privilege and not just on the grounds of the added burdens and undesirable effects that will flow from the new clause, but principally to ensure that new freedoms in this Bill, which are welcomed on all sides, can be implemented safely and responsibly by all authorities.
  Moved, That this House do not insist on their Amendment No. 6 to which the Commons have disagreed for the reason numbered 6A.—(Lord Rooker.)
  Baroness Hanham: My Lords, I have received advice that this is a privilege matter and therefore I cannot divide the House on it. All I can do is to complain again—if complaint is what it is—about the measure in Part 2 that we are discussing.
  We have debated at great length the reasons behind the disagreement between us on whether the Government should be able to set minimum reserves or whether that is a step too far. The Minister went into some detail again today about local authorities which might have borrowed badly or indiscreetly or should not have borrowed as much as they had or which are running their revenue accounts into difficulties. However, our argument has always been that by the time you get round to setting a minimum reserve, it is too late. The damage is done. The relevant local authorities have got into difficulty. That is not the moment to try to bail them out with a minimum reserve.
  The Minister heard me say on a previous occasion that the director of finance of the authority which I led always insisted that there should be at least two months' worth of salaries and wages in the reserve. He considered that that was the lowest limit. Most finance officers would agree with that and would give the same advice. If we say that the Bill confers freedoms and flexibility, the Government must let go. They must understand that where one confers freedom, one takes to some extent a marginal risk. The marginal risk which we have foreseen during discussion on the Bill is that some authority, somewhere will go horribly wrong. We mentioned the odd local authority that has gone horribly wrong. In those cases it would have been completely irrelevant whether one had said that they ought to have a minimum reserve as they probably would not have had one and, if they had, they would have spent it. The purpose of the measure we are discussing seems to me to be completely arcane in the light of what the Bill is intended to do.
  The amendment that we put forward recognises what the Minister said today; namely, that on a very limited number of occasions it might be necessary for the Audit Commission to recommend a minimum reserve. The amendment was a bit of a compromise as regards the others that we put forward. I believe that it was debated with some vigour in the other place last night.
  We could all quote selectively from CIPFA and from the Audit Commission. My quotes would back up what I wanted to say and the Minister's would back up what he wanted to say. However, that is not relevant. What is relevant is that local government thinks that the measure we are discussing is wrong and unnecessary. The Local Government Association was against the measure from the outset. We have supported local government in that and we believe that that was the proper thing for us to do.

  931
  It has been said that this measure can be decided only by the Commons. I do not wish to disagree with that but I cannot quite understand the decision that was arrived at. However, I shall not cause even more trouble by querying it. I simply say that when the moment comes I shall not move the relevant amendment.
  Baroness Hamwee: My Lords, we on these Benches accept that this is a privilege matter, but it was strange to hear that the amendment which this House passed would affect the levy of local revenues. Certainly it is a financial matter but I would not have described it in that way. Part 2 is about minimum reserves and monitoring. Although the Minister talked seductively about the new powers for local authorities—for example, in terms of borrowing and charging—they are set out elsewhere in the Bill. I thought that the Minister's linking of this part with the other parts of the Bill was interestingly creative.
  The Minister explained how responsibly and carefully the Government will use, or not use, the provision that we are discussing. I accept that. That brings us to the point which we discuss regularly with any Bill; namely, what will happen if a different party gains office? I am sure that if the party of the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, were in power, they would do away with the measure within the first week of coming to office. Our party would do the same. But when one is considering a point of principle, one has to look beyond the immediate term. I believe that the Minister quoted Mr Hammond saying that there are occasions when elected representatives get things wrong. That is true. Although noble Lords are not elected, central government are through the ballot box. The executive is comprised of elected representatives.
  The noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, rightly mentioned freedoms and flexibilities, but they are set out elsewhere in the Bill. They are not in the part that we are discussing. Freedoms do, indeed, carry risks. Both parties in opposition are saying that in recognising that, one should also recognise that local authorities should be allowed to take risks because that is the way that they grow, develop and provide the best service. I am sorry that we shall not have an opportunity to pursue the matter but I accept that it is a matter of financial privilege.
  Lord Rooker: My Lords, I do not think that there is anything for me to say if the noble Baroness intends to capitulate. However, in due course, I invite her to read in Hansard the debate on Amendments Nos. 3A and 6A and tell me tomorrow what the difference is.
  Baroness Hanham: My Lords, this is not a capitulation. I understand that we are constrained by the procedures of both Houses. If I was told that this
  932
  was not a privilege matter, I would divide the House on it. I have been told that we cannot divide on the matter. However, if that is not the case
  Lord Rooker: My Lords, I used the same form of words in the previous debate with regard to the Commons taking a privilege view on Amendment No. 3A. I was ignored and this House has just voted against what the Commons wanted. We are in exactly the same situation with the amendment that we are now discussing. As I say, I invite the noble Baroness to read the debate on Amendments Nos. 3A and 6A in Hansard and tell us tomorrow why she took a certain view on one amendment and not on another when the reasons were exactly the same.
  Baroness Hanham: My Lords, I shall take the Minister's advice. For the moment I shall take the matter no further except to make two small points. I noted the bonfire of controls which the Minister keeps talking about. However, I believe that it will be a damp squib, not a bonfire of controls.
  I want to draw attention to the fact that, from the outset, the Minister has threatened us over Part 4—oh yes—and in particular that, if we did not conform and caused him too much trouble, the whole part would be withdrawn and fall because he did not want to lose the Bill. I have heard that and what he said today on exactly the same point about Royal Assent. None the less, he does it with such charm and such a smile that, for today's purposes, I shall not press the matter to a Division.
  On Question, Motion agreed to.
  4.30 p.m.

  LORDS AMENDMENT
  19 page 32, line 15, leave out "be the same as or different from" and insert "subject to subsection (10A) below, be less than, hut not greater than"
  The Commons disagree to this Amendment for the following Reason—
  19A Because it would alter the area of taxation, and the Commons do not offer any further Reason, trusting that this reason may be deemed sufficient.
  Lord Rooker: My Lords, I beg to move that this House do not insist on their Amendment No. 19 to which the Commons have disagreed for their reason numbered 19A.
  Amendment No. 19 effectively rules out the possibility of transitional schemes which have an element of downwards phasing. The Government cannot accept that we rule out the possibility of downwards transition as a method of funding any transitional scheme. However, I understand the concerns that inspired the amendment and I want to address them in the points that I shall make, which also apply to the amendments grouped with Amendment No. 19.
  Amendment No. 20 allows any transitional scheme to be revenue neutral over the five-year life of the rating list rather than confining it to revenue neutrality

  933
  in each year. The amendment was introduced in this House at Third Reading. The Government have accepted the principle, as I hope is understood, but in Amendments Nos. 20A, 20B and the consequential amendments we have improved the drafting while accepting the principle. The new drafting provides a power for the general taxpayer to be recompensed for, in effect, loaning ratepayers money in the first few years of a five-yearly self-financing transitional scheme.
  Clause 66 fulfils the White Paper commitment to ensure that there will always be a transitional scheme as a result of revaluation of non-domestic properties every five years. Transitional schemes were used at previous revaluations to allow ratepayers time to adjust to changes in their bills, with both significant increases and decreases resulting from changes in rateable values being phased in by annual stages. However, there is currently no legal obligation on the Government to have such schemes. The White Paper commitment was that, in future, a transitional scheme must always be established at a revaluation. That guarantee requires that future schemes be entirely self-financing.
  Two methods are likely to be used to achieve revenue neutrality. First, a transitional scheme could phase in both increases and decreases in rates over time, balancing the rates lost against the rates gained. Secondly, the rates lost could be made good through a supplement on rate bills generally. That is achieved by increasing the multiplier, which ensures that the total revenue remains the same.
  The rating professional bodies—the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, the Institute of Revenues Rating and Valuation and the Rating Surveyors Association—have consistently argued that the Government have tied our hands by limiting any scheme to be revenue neutral in each year. They suggest that we should keep open the option of devising a scheme that is revenue neutral over the full five years of the life of the rating list.
  A scheme which aims for revenue neutrality over five years allows more options to be considered for the way in which any transitional arrangements might be structured. However, it introduces greater complications in calculating how any shortfall in revenue might he covered in any single year. If we used the flexibility of five-year revenue neutrality to devise a scheme that benefited those in downward transition, that would require, in effect, a loan from the Exchequer in the early years to be made up in the later years of the scheme. Government Amendment No. 20A makes it clear that the Secretary of State has a power to recoup that cost to the public purse in latter years.
  By introducing the amendment, we leave open the possibility of devising a scheme that benefits those properties that have reduced in value. Everyone recognises that we cannot decide on any scheme until we have the data on the new valuations. We now accept that we should consider the mechanism of
  934
  spreading the revenue neutrality over the five years when we draw up the options for any transitional scheme for 2005 and subsequent revaluation years.
  Revenue neutrality in each year has the advantage that we could announce any scheme early in the process, therefore giving assurance to ratepayers. Revenue neutrality over five years requires the agreement of the Exchequer, so it will be more difficult to provide guarantees to ratepayers early in the process. However, we are prepared to keep all those options open.
  I shall turn to the second issue raised in the amendments approved in this House and overturned in the other place. The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors and the other rating organisations have argued that downward transition is unfair to ratepayers. It is often in areas in economic decline, where property and rental values have dropped relative to those in the rest of the country. Let me reassure the House that the Government well understand the arguments here.
  However, if we are to ease the tax burden on those whose property values have risen sharply as result of revaluation, as we all agree that we should, we have to seek the best way of funding that relief. We are not prepared to rule out any downward transition, for the same reasons that the amendment we have tabled does not rule out revenue neutrality over five years, or in fact year by year. I can provide reassurance, however, that the issue will not be forgotten as we devise the transitional schemes for 2005 to 2010.
  The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister is in the process of commissioning a research project to model different options for the 2005 transitional arrangements. The project is in three phases. In the first phase, we will consider a wide number of options and the likely beneficiaries and costs of each option based on assumed new valuations. The findings for that should be available in January 2004. In the second phase, we will narrow down the options in consultation with the stakeholders—businesses, in particular the CBI, the British Retail Consortium and other relevant bodies, and the rating professionals. We will then model the agreed options using new valuations that we have at that stage. The results of that phase should be available by late March 2004. In the third phase, we will finalise our preferred option and model it using final valuations produced by the Valuation Office Agency. That report is due in June 2004.
  That project will be monitored by a project group including representatives from the professional bodies and business interests. I assure the House that the issue of downward phasing will be very much on the agenda. We will consider models which include options for immediate or quicker downward phasing. We will not rule out any possibilities at this stage. We need to conduct the research based on the actual data available from the Valuation Office Agency next year. We will make decisions based on the data and the discussions that emerge from that project. We will develop the scheme with key stakeholders including representatives from the rating professional bodies.

  935
  Finally, let me make it clear that the regulations which will set the form of the transitional scheme will be based on the report from the research project and will be subject to affirmative resolution of both Houses of Parliament. Therefore, Parliament will have the opportunity to debate the matter further when we have the relevant information. I beg to move.
  Moved, That the House do not insist on their Amendment No. 19 to which the Commons have disagreed for the reason numbered 19A.—(Lord Rooker.)
  The Earl of Caithness: My Lords, I thank the Minister for what he has said. As your Lordships will know, the matter was not debated by the democratic other place when it was due to consider our amendments. It was simply voted on and that was the end of the matter, so his statement is very helpful and good to have on record.
  I am disappointed that the Government have seen fit not to accept Amendment No. 19. I was grateful for what the Minister said about the new research project. Will that project take into account the work already done by the RICS in preparation for the Bill and for which I argued at all the previous stages, particularly at Third Reading?
  I was pleased that the Minister seems to have shifted his position considerably on downward transition. He now seems to have a greater understanding of the detrimental effect that downward transition has had on businesses and of the persecution they feel by not receiving the full relief to which they are entitled. That in itself is a major step forward, but I should like to press the Minister more on his views on how quickly the Government think that they will be able to end downward transition. Having completed the review for 2005–10, does he think that downward transition will be needed again in 2010–15?
  Perhaps I may remind your Lordships that downward transition is a method by which businesses that are entitled to relief from rates do not receive it. The money is withheld from them. They are the small and medium-sized enterprises that are in most need of that relief.
  On Amendments Nos. 20 and 20A to 20F, I am grateful to the Minister for the movement in his position and the influence that he has had. He has often stood up before your Lordships and said, -Well, I am just speaking on behalf of the Government. I have to report back". We all know that lie has a great deal more clout than that and I am grateful that he has listened to the arguments and used his undoubted influence to persuade his fellow Ministers to change their mind. That is one of the jobs of a Lords Minister and I am grateful to him.
  936
  I am not at all surprised that the drafting has been changed. That is also one of the jobs of the Government. It is our job to agree on the principle and leave the government draftsman to get the amendment right. So a big thank you to the Minister for accepting Amendment No. 20.
  Baroness Maddock: My Lords. I have supported the noble Earl. Lord Caithness, on this issue throughout the passage of the Bill. Like him. I welcome what the Minister has said to us today. It will be helpful particularly to small businesses. As the noble Earl said. the Minister clearly has some influence in his department and has managed to persuade colleagues that perhaps there was a better way, although without securing any more money. He was obviously unable to persuade the Treasury to allocate any more money. It will be beneficial particularly for small businesses. We must always remember that all our big businesses were once small businesses. They are the seed corn of our economy. It is right that the Minister changed his mind and was able to persuade others to change theirs on the way the Bill is enacted. We look forward to seeing what emerges.
  Noble Lords may like to know that the relevant section of the Bill contained incredibly complicated formulas. I do not pretend to understand them. Fortunately, the principles were explained and the Minister has accepted our arguments. We are content with the current position and look forward to what follows.
  4.45 p.m.
  Lord Rooker: My Lords, I seek no personal credit for the change in position. It is due to my right honourable friend Nick Raynsford and the Deputy Prime Minister. They are the listening Ministers. We are the listening Government. However. when I go hack to my colleagues later today, I shall tell them not to listen to your Lordships' House regarding the first vote that we had. I make that absolutely clear. If I do return with any amendments tomorrow, it will be because I have not been listened to.
  With all due respect to the noble Earl—and I appreciate the positive contributions that he has made throughout our debates on this part of the Bill—I did utter one sentence:
  "We will not rule out any possibilities at this stage".
  I cannot say anything. I have explained the research project, which will soon start. It is September now and it will start in January. It will happen very quickly next year and we will no doubt report back as appropriate. The research will not take place behind closed doors. Business and the professions will be involved and we will try to take a positive view of what conclusions are reached and table a package of amendments. Therefore, I hope that we can dispense with our discussion in a spirit of co-operation. which has been sadly lacking in the first part of our deliberations.
  On Question. Motion agreed to.

  LORDS AMENDMENT
  20 page 32, line 39, leave out subsection (10) and insert—
  "( ) In making regulations under this section the Secretary of State shall have regard to the object of securing (so far as practicable) that the aggregate amount payable to him and all billing authorities by way of non-domestic rates as regards a relevant period is the same as the aggregate amount which would be so payable apart from the regulations.
  (10A) For the purposes of subsection (10) above, the Secretary of State shall estimate the difference between—

  (a) the aggregate amount which would apart from the regulations, all billing authorities by way of non-domestic rates as regards a relevant period, and

  (b) the aggregate amount which will be payable having regard to rules prescribed under subsection (4) above,

  and any shortfall in aggregate amount shall be recovered by applying a surcharge of the non-domestic rating multiplier for each relevant financial year."
  The Commons agree to this Amendment, with the .fallowing Amendments—
  20A Line 5, leave out "relevant period is" and insert "particular relevant period is, after disregarding any adjustments made to take account of amounts being payable at times other than those at which they would have been payable apart from the regulations,"
  20B Line 7, leave out from beginning to end of the Lords Amendment.
  The Commons have made the following consequential Amendments to the Bill—
  20C page 32,1ine 46, after "amounts" insert "and adjustments"
  20D page 33, line 1, leave out "for a particular financial year" and insert "and adjustments for a particular relevant period"
  20E page 33, line 3, leave out "later financial year which" and insert "financial year which begins after the coming into force of the amending regulations and"
  20F Page 33, line 5, leave out "differ from his estimate of those amounts" and insert "and adjustments differ from his estimate of those amounts and adjustments"
  Lord Rooker: My Lords, I beg to move that this House do agree with the Commons in their Amendments Nos. 20A and 20B, as amendments to Lords Amendment No.20, and Amendments Nos. 20C to 20F.
  Moved, That the House do agree with the Commons in their Amendments Nos. 20A and 20B, as amendments to Lords Amendment No. 20, and Amendments Nos. 20C to 20F.—(Lord Rooker.)
  On Question, Motion agreed to.
  Bill returned to the Commons with an amendment.

Business of the House: State Opening of Parliament
4.47 p.m.
Lord Grocott: My Lords, before the Statement of my noble friend, perhaps I may confirm what has been widespread knowledge throughout the House for some time about the date of the State Opening this
938
year. Downing Street announced this afternoon that the State Opening of Parliament this year will take place on Wednesday 26th November.
Lord Cope of Berkeley: My Lords, I am sure, that your Lordships will be grateful to the noble Lord for confirming the rumours that have been circulating for a little while. It is a late State Opening in historical terms, but an early announcement, which is welcome. However, it leaves the Government with a tight timescale. We still have nine government Bills before the House, although two are at the ping-pong stage—we were just discussing one of them. Two have not yet reached Committee. Therefore, there is a lot of work to get through. If the Government are to achieve the State Opening by the date stated, they will need to he responsive to your Lordships' House in considering the issues, as indeed they sometimes are. The noble Lord, Lord Rooker, described the Government as a listening Government and they certainly need to be.
Lord Grocott: My Lords, I can do no better. I never try to outdo my noble friend Lord Rooker in the language department. I simply confirm what he said and what the noble Lord, Lord Cope, requested.

WTO Ministerial Conference
4.49 p.m.
The Secretary of State for International Development (Baroness Amos): My Lords, with the leave of the House, I shall now repeat a Statement made in another place by my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry. The Statement is as follows:
"With permission, Mr Speaker, I should like to make a Statement about the Fifth World Trade Organisation Ministerial Conference in Cancun, from 10th–14th September, which I attended together with my right honourable friends the Secretary of State for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, the Secretary of State for International Development and the Minister for Trade, Investment and Foreign Affairs. Commissioners Lamy and Fischler negotiated on behalf of the EU.
"The UK delegation included my honourable friend the Member for Putney, representing the Select Committee on International Development, as well as representatives of the CBI, the TUC, the Consumers' Association and the UK Trade Network. I warmly welcome their participation and thank them for their work.
"The conference was attended by delegates from all 146 members of the World Trade Organisation, accompanied by many thousands of parliamentarians and civil society organisations as observers. On the opening day, we welcomed the accession of Cambodia and Nepal.
"The British delegation worked hard to help secure an outcome that would meet the needs of developing countries. Ministerial colleagues and I

939
met a large number of representatives from those countries, and we ensured that their views were reflected when we met with the US, EU colleagues and others.
"The conference was the WTO's opportunity to restore momentum to the Doha development round that was launched with such high hopes in November 2001. It is with great regret that I must report that we were unable to reach an agreement. Talks broke down on the final day.
"Before the talks ended, however, Commissioner Lamy, on behalf of the European Union, offered to abandon completely negotiations on two of the so-called 'Singapore issues'—investment and competition. That position was fully supported by the British Government.
"Many other WTO members also signalled a willingness to be flexible on various issues. With more time, I believe it would have been possible to reach agreement. Failure to agree at Cancun is a serious setback for the Doha round. But it is not the end of the round for the WTO itself.
"In anticipation of Cancun, we had already reached agreement—overdue but none the less welcome—on access to medicines for developing countries. That agreement stands. It must now be built on, particularly through the global funds to fight AIDS. TB and malaria.
"And in June, the Agriculture Council of the EU agreed significant reforms of the common agricultural policy—reforms that will mean substantial cuts in the trade distorting support and export subsidies which we give to our own farmers and which do so much damage to the farmers of the developing world. The EU has also already offered in principle to phase out export subsidies on products of particular interest to developing countries. The agreement on CAP reform was not conditional upon agreement at Cancun.
"We saw at Cancun the formation of the G21 and other strengthened developing country groupings. I wholeheartedly welcome the emergence of this stronger voice for poorer nations. Indeed, this Government have led the way in helping developing countries to build their negotiating capacity. We have given £110 million to trade-related capacity building and technical assistance since 1998, and an additional £50 million was announced last week by my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for International Development.
"Furthermore, at Cancun itself, we made real progress in discussions on agricultural and other vital issues. There is no doubt that we were closer to agreement at the end of the Cancun conference than we were at the beginning.
"We now need to lift our sights once more to the prize that is on offer, particularly for developing countries, if we can get the round back on track. The Cancun conference agreed a new deadline of 15th December to try to resolve the issues that we could not sort out at Cancun. We in the United Kingdom
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will engage fully to try to make this a reality. I have already spoken to the Director-General of the WTO, Dr Supachai, about how we in the UK can drive this forward.
"The final ministerial statement urged that renewed discussions be based on the concessions delegates offered at Cancun and not on their earlier positions. In the case of the EU, this means we should accept that, despite our continuing commitment to encourage and facilitate direct investment in developing countries, WTO agreements on investment and competition are off the EU's agenda.
"The IMF and the World Bank also announced in Cancun a new initiative to help developing countries to overcome problems in adjusting to a more liberal trading environment. I warmly welcome this. The UK Government will make a substantial input to the design and implementation of that initiative.
"In the wake of Cancun, I am afraid it is inevitable that more emphasis will he put on regional and bilateral trade agreements. Although these could help to promote South/South as well as North/South trade, they risk excluding many poorer countries and leaving others isolated in negotiations with far larger countries. We continue to believe that the multilateral system should be the cornerstone of world trade rules.
"All WTO members now need to reflect on the lessons to be learned from Cancun and to find ways of improving processes. We also have to find ways of addressing the issues of substance that prevented agreement at Cancun. We shall be discussing how best to make progress on all those issues with our EU partners, the European Commission and others, taking into account particularly the views of developing countries.
"The UK Government are determined to do all they can to help to deliver a development round in line with the promises we made at Doha. All countries stand to gain, but the poorest stand to gain the most. That is why we support the round and why we will continue to work for its success".
My Lords, that concludes the Statement.
4.54 p.m.
Baroness Rawlings: My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Amos, for repeating the Statement on what the press have referred to as the "farce and failure" of the Cancun trade talks.
The walkout of the G21 is a stark contrast to the excitement and genuine hope which characterised the beginning of the Doha trade round in November 2001. It is sad that the atmosphere of scepticism surrounding the talks, following the lack of progress, numerous missed opportunities and collapsed deadlines running up to September, culminated in the breakdown last Sunday night.
That major setback in negotiations postponed the implementation of the Doha Development Agenda. It may not be the "end of the round", as the Secretary of

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State said, but it makes the January 2005 deadline defunct. The collapse will damage business confidence. A fear already expressed by officials in Geneva is that momentum will move away from a multilateral agreement on trade to bilateral agreements and projects, such as the US's Free Trade Area of the Americas, thus sapping what little energy is left for Doha. Can the Secretary of State please outline what Her Majesty's Government are planning to do to try to rectify this impasse on trade and explain what will be our "substantial input", which she mentioned, into the joint IMF and World Bank initiative?
With elections due next year in India, the US and France—three key members of the WTO—it is vital that we restart talks as soon as possible. The current situation means that everyone is losing out. All countries—developed and developing—need to be prepared to compromise more. We recognise that the two Singapore issues—investment and competition—were the flashpoint at the conference. We cannot let that hide our own intransigence over agriculture. That continues to be one of the major stumbling blocks to progress so far.
The US and the EU have failed adequately to reform their agricultural regimes. The European Union CAP reforms made in August, although in the right direction, were less impressive than Her Majesty's Government would have us believe, and they fall far short of the radical changes needed to improve the lot of poor countries. We accept that farmers need support, but not subsidies that distort trade.
One major criticism of the negotiations is that the rich members are over-represented, leaving poor countries little voice. In May, Conservative Members in another place made suggestions for an advocacy fund, which developing countries could use to provide themselves with quality legal and economic advice on trade issues. Developed countries would contribute to the fund, thus keeping the cost to individual countries to a minimum, while at the same time ensuring that poorer countries had the means to select the advocates they needed to negotiate on their behalf. Her Majesty's Government have said that they are committed to,
"an agreement that works for developing countries".
The advocacy fund is surely one example of a programme that would benefit poorer countries.
Last week, DfID announced a £50 million allocation to help to integrate trade into their plans to reduce poverty. While that £50 million is an obvious reflection of our proposal for an advocacy fund, it falls far short of any trade capacity-building initiative.
The failure of Cancun has damaged the credibility of the WTO, but can the Secretary of State reassure your Lordships that Her Majesty's Government will do all they can to support this organisation while also pressing for the recommendations that the WTO should become.
"more transparent and facilitate full participation by developing countries"?
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The WTO is arguably more democratic than some other international organisations. It is one of the few international organisations in which poorer countries form a majority, and it proceeds via consensus rather than voting.
The breakdown of trade talks also raises other problems. Recent trade disputes put on hold under the "peace clause" negotiated during the Uruguay round will expire on 31st December 2003. If the Doha round remains stalled, big exporters such as Brazil may resort to litigation. Can the Secretary of State inform the House what plans there are to extend the deadline and how Her Majesty's Government plan to address the consequences of its expiry? There is also the issue of' several simmering disputes between the EU and the US, which could boil up again, for example the foreign sales corporation tax.
In sum, let us not lose sight of the importance of these issues. The World Bank estimates that eliminating all barriers to trade would generate between 250 and 520 billion dollars extra in global income. Up to half of that would go to developing countries. That could lift over 144 million people out of poverty by 2015. The time for rhetoric and missed opportunities is over. We must be prepared to be bold and make the first move in restoring the political impetus into these critical issues relating to multilateral trade.
5.1 p.m.
Baroness Northover: My Lords, I, too, thank the Secretary of State for repeating the Statement made today in the other place. On these Benches we share the deep disappointment that the talks ended in failure. Despite the anti-capitalist celebrations, the real losers in this are the poorest countries. Indeed, there is now a real danger of trade conflict and bilateral agreements, which are likely to benefit stronger rather than weaker countries.
As we have heard, there are some positive developments from Cancun. The new grouping there of developing countries is very welcome. However, is the Minister concerned that many of those in the G21 were stronger developing nations, such as China and India? Might the poorest countries again be squeezed out?
Comments afterwards seemed almost to blame the Mexican chairman of the last session. Patricia Hewitt and Caroline Spelman of the Conservative Party, both speaking on the "Today" programme on Monday morning, seemed very taken aback. Mrs Hewitt stated that there was a deal to be done and that they had been close to achieving that. She reiterated in the other place today that a deal might have been achieved with another six to eight hours of talks.
Does the Minister agree that we need to look wider for the reasons for failure and that perhaps it should not have been such a surprise? Every deadline set in the Doha round has been missed. Did the fact that the agreement in the EU on farm subsidies was not reached until June, long past its deadline, play a part? Above all, can she comment on why the so-called

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Singapore issues were introduced; issues which the developing countries were simply not prepared to discuss while agricultural subsidies had not been settled? Surely, the developing countries made it very plain before Cancun that no new issue should be added to what was already a difficult enough agenda. What part did the UK Government play either in allowing that or in seeking to prevent it? Having raised them, why were these issues not withdrawn from the agenda at an earlier stage? However, I welcome the Government's commitment that they should not be reintroduced in December.
When discussing the EU proposals back in June, the Minister stated that those were an opening position for Cancun and that she expected the EU to concede more. Does she not think that that was a risky position for the British Government to be in, relying on a developing world to put pressure on our EU partners? Was British influence over our French and German partners on these matters weakened as a result of differences over Iraq? Has that moved us to the periphery of influence in Europe?
Yet did our position on Iraq give us any influence at all over the US negotiators, especially, for example, over their position on their cotton industry? Is she concerned that the US negotiator has now said that the US will be encouraged to look at bilateral rather than multilateral deals? I note that the Wall Street Journal has urged the US Government down that line.
We have to move forward and I welcome the commitment that the Government made to get the talks back on track. Can the Minister tell the House more about the meeting in December and the part that our Ministers, as opposed to our officials, may play in that? It seems as if there has been a seismic shift of power within the WTO. Whatever their flaws, it has to be through international institutions such as the WTO that progress is to be made if weaker countries are not to lose out to stronger ones. I therefore welcome the Government's commitment to that, even though we failed to get our negotiating group to present acceptable proposals to this conference.
5.6 pm.
Baroness Amos: My Lords, I thank the noble Baronesses, Lady Rawlings and Lady Northover, for their comments. I shall try to address the comments and questions raised. The noble Baroness, Lady Rawlings, asked about the January 2005 deadline. It is very difficult to believe that we shall now meet that deadline. As the noble Baroness, Lady Northover, stated, we have missed just about every deadline in this round. Looking back, previous trade rounds took much longer than anticipated. This was a very ambitious round. We want that which was unanimously agreed at Doha to be achieved because of the impact it will have on the poorest countries in the world and we are ready to fight to secure that.
The noble Baroness, Lady Northover, asked what would happen at the December meeting. The communiqué states that there will be a meeting at
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official level. We shall push to ensure that the political elements are clear in terms of what we want to achieve. Given our failure to achieve that in Cancun when we had Ministers present representing the majority of countries in the WTO, it is difficult to speculate now where we will be in December. It is still early days.
The noble Baroness, Lady Rawlings, asked what we are planning to do next. The talks broke down only on Sunday. My right honourable friend returned yesterday from Cancun, although I returned earlier. We are currently in discussions on how best to take forward this process. The IMF/World Bank initiative is one of the options we are considering in terms of influencing the way forward. The initiative will consider issues such as preference erosion, the loss of revenue to developing countries due to tariff reduction, financial assistance, and looking at trade issues as part of a development programme, linking in to the priorities of developing countries.
When in Cancun I spoke to the trade Minister for Malawi and was struck when he said that because of an IMF monitored programme, Malawi was forced to open its markets too quickly. That resulted in an excess of cheap imports and it cannot access developed country markets. One of the things we want to do is to ensure that the IMF/World Bank initiative is sequenced and takes on board the very difficult decisions that developing countries have to make with respect to opening up their markets.
The advocacy fund was raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Rawlings, and has been raised many times in the other place. It would be enormously helpful if the noble Baroness, Lady Rawlings, and her honourable friend in the other place, Caroline Spelman, were to look at what we have done. Since 1998 we have put some £110 million into a range of initiatives to help developing countries. I announced an additional £50 million last week.
The noble Baroness, in talking about an advocacy fund, talked about the importance of developing countries having access to legal opinion. We have given £1.25 million to the Advisory Centre on WTO Law. It is an independent Geneva-based centre, which assists developing and least developed countries by providing free or low-cost legal support to members pursuing cases in the dispute/settlement mechanism. We funded the South Centre. We funded a Trade and Investment Access Facility. We have given £7.5 million for the Africa Trade and Poverty Programme. Far from us following the opposition, the opposition is following us.
The noble Baroness, Lady Rawlings, asked about the WTO becoming more transparent and facilitating discussion. In conversations with developing country Ministers, I was very struck by the fact that they all felt the process was more transparent and open, but they remained cynical about that process leading to the outcomes they would wish to see. The next stage needs to be developing countries having a stronger voice and the opportunity to contribute, but with that robust process of dialogue and discussion leading to an outcome that actually takes on board the needs of developing countries.

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I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Northover, that the real losers are the poorest nations. There were differences between developing countries. The noble Baroness referred to China and India and whether the poorest would feel squeezed out. There was the beginning of that kind of feeling at Cancun. Indeed, different developing countries formed different groups. So one had the G21 focusing very much on agriculture and another group, which were the poorer developing countries, with a little bit of overlap, looking at special and differential treatment and the special safeguard mechanism. They were particularly concerned about impacts on the poorest countries.
I agree with the noble Baroness that there is a range of reasons for the failure of these talks. It is not just one thing; the situation is complex and complicated. It is a pity that—although we were closer to agreement when we finished than when we started—many countries spent the first two days re-rehearsing arguments they had already put in the run-up to Cancun. So we needed slightly more time at the end of the process.
On the Singapore issues, in 1998 the European Union was considering what new agreements might help the benefits of trade to spread more widely within developing country economies. So there was a negotiating mandate to propose agreements on investment and competition. Noble Lords will know that the Government's position, which was stated publicly by myself and by my right honourable friend Patricia Hewitt, is that these issues were not a priority for the British Government. However, clearly we were negotiating as part of the European Union. We worked to persuade our colleagues on the best kind of negotiating tactics to use. But, at the end of the day, we agreed a negotiating mandate as part of the European Union and we stuck by that mandate.
I think that I have addressed all the issues and questions raised.
5.13 p.m.
Lord Waddington: My Lords, can the Secretary of State help: is it correct, as reported in the press, that great resentment was expressed by representatives of developing countries at the failure to reform the CAP, which they rightly said ruins Third World farmers through the subsidised dumping of farm produce? Is it correct that the promised reform will do little to change the problem that now exists, which was one factor that led to the breakdown of this meeting?
Should not the Government be impressing on European colleagues the vast importance of sorting out this problem, which is far more important than the construction of a new European constitution? Can the Minister tell us what these promised changes to CAP will amount to? What evidence is there to suggest that they will meet the concerns of Third World countries and stop this subsidised dumping of farm produce, which is ruining their own farmers?
Baroness Amos: My Lords, the noble Lord will know that we were at the forefront of the discussions with the European Union which led to the CAP reform
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deal. The big element of that deal was the breaking of the link between production and subsidies. I am happy to write to the noble Lord giving some of the more technical details of the agreement.
Noble Lords will know that, in discussions on CAP reform, we wanted to go much further. But, obviously, there are very different interests within the context of the European Union. We thought that, given those differences, the CAP reform deal was historic. Despite the disappointment expressed by some developing countries that the CAP reform deal had not gone further, I do not think that that led to the breakdown of the talks. In fact, we were closer to some form of agreement on agriculture than on any other issue. It was on the new issues—the Singapore issues—that the talks fell down. There was a general feeling that—there not being agreement on the Singapore issues. despite the movement by Pascal Lamy—moving on to talk about agriculture would not take us much further. That was not necessarily our reading of the situation. Unfortunately the talks failed.
Lord Barnett: My Lords, I have not had the opportunity to congratulate my noble friend on her elevation to the Cabinet. I do so now. I am delighted with that promotion. I am less than delighted, not just about what came out of Cancun but with the policies of the European Union and, indeed, the United States—where we have no responsibilities of course. However, like the noble Lord, Lord Waddington, I am extremely concerned about European Union policies on agriculture.
I do not know whether my noble friend—she has been rather busy of late—has had an opportunity to read the unanimous all-party report on globalisation of the Economic Affairs Committee, which made it clear that globalisation has not been the cause of trouble in the poorest parts of sub-Saharan Africa; much of it is due to the corruption and civil wars that have taken place in those areas. On the other hand, while I appreciate the increase in aid that the Government have provided, it is a drop in the ocean in comparison with the damage that the common agricultural policy does to those poorest developing countries. Does my noble friend agree with that?
Does my noble friend agree that if there is to be any hope whatever of real help for countries such as those in sub-Saharan Africa, which suffer so much from the effects of the common agricultural policy, the UK Government will need to take measures to try to convince the European Union to change those policies?
Baroness Amos: My Lords, it is really important that we recognise what the CAP reform deal delivered earlier this year. We also need to recognise that it is part of a process of continuing reform. EU export subsidies have fallen by some 70 per cent in the past 10 years. The Government recognise that there is still some way to go. However, let us not rubbish where we have got to, because the split between production and subsidy is a very important step on agriculture. More CAP regimes are up for reform this autumn, including

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cotton, which was a big issue in our discussions at Cancun. Next year, we shall consider sugar, which continues to be an extraordinarily difficult matter.
I agree with my noble friend: we need to work to convince our EU partners to move further. I also agree that the volume of aid to developing countries will not deliver the kind of change in sustainable development that we want. That must come from economic growth. To meet the millennium development goals, developing countries will have to average growth rates of about 7 per cent. In sub-Saharan Africa, they are averaging only 3 per cent, so there is a huge gap to be met. We are attempting to increase aid resources through the international financing facility on which my right honourable friend the Chancellor is working, but giving developing countries access to trade and growth is the key to development.
The Earl of Sandwich: My Lords—
Lord Biffen: My Lords—
Baroness Crawley: My Lords, there is plenty of time for everyone to speak.
The Earl of Sandwich: My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness for repeating the Statement, despite its dismal contents. I listened carefully when she answered the noble Baroness, Lady Northover, who pressed her on the EU position. It is abundantly clear to all of us that there was a strong difference between our position and that of the European Union. The Secretary of State's answer confirmed that.
Does she agree that, as so many non-governmental organisations are saying, the developing countries viewed the Singapore issues as a form of Trojan horse to bring back the much-hated multilateral agreement on investment, which, as she said, we rejected so many years ago? Did they not fear that that would return all over again? Can she also elaborate on why the European Union had not discarded that negotiating position? Is she absolutely certain that it has now discarded it, or will it return in another form?
Baroness Amos: My Lords, first, it is important for noble Lords to recognise that European Union countries agree a negotiating position and a mandate. We stand absolutely behind that mandate. Having said that, my right honourable friend Patricia Hewitt and I have made clear that we did not view the new issues—the Singapore issues—as a development priority.
The concerns of developing countries crossed the spectrum. Some were concerned not to negotiate on new issues because they simply felt that they did not have the capacity to do so. Others were concerned about the impact on their economies. I have a personal view on investment. From talking to businesses about the need for greater foreign direct investment in Africa, it is absolutely clear that one thing that would help would be such an investment agreement.
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That is a personal view that I have expressed to Ministers of developing countries, but I have also made it clear to them that their view of the subjects on which they feel able to negotiate at any particular time should prevail in the WTO. Given that the WTO is a "one member, one vote" organisation and that we cannot discuss issues unless all are agreed, we reached the situation that we did in Cancun.
However, there was by no means unanimous agreement across all developing countries. Some of the middle-income developing countries, as it were, argued that all those issues should be on the table. African countries were saying that all of them should be off the table. The European Union said that we were quite happy to withdraw on competition and investment, and that our starting point for the next round of negotiations assumed that.
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer: My Lords, when Mrs Beckett returned from the CAP negotiations, she said that the results would put us in a good position for the forthcoming WTO round. In retrospect, does the noble Baroness feel that she was over-optimistic, badly advised or simply misjudged the situation?
Baroness Amos: My Lords, none of those. The CAP reform proposals put us in a much better position to move forward on agriculture. As I said in response to the noble Baroness, Lady Northover, we felt close to a deal on agriculture at Cancun, if we had had a hit more time. That would have made a substantial difference, especially to the poorest countries in the world. So I do not believe that my right honourable friend was being over-optimistic. When I left Cancun on Friday—the talks broke down on Sunday—the discussions were robust but there was then no feeling that the talks would collapse. There was still a feeling that, although there were differences, we could reach a deal.
Lord Biffen: My Lords—
Lord Tomlinson: My Lords—
Baroness Crawley: My Lords, we have not heard from the Labour Benches.
Noble Lords: Yes, we have.
Baroness Crawley: My Lords, I apologise.
Lord Biffen: My Lords, with characteristic courtesy, the noble Baroness has put the whole agony of Cancun before the House and. understandably, said that she regretted its failure. But was she surprised? The World Trade Organisation seems to be the most ill-constructed body for decision-taking. The very size of it is a challenge. The dubious principle of "one nation, one vote" and the proliferation of non-governmental organisations make it an enormous gathering that cannot come to decisions.

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We are now told that it was touch and go whether it did a deal on agriculture. If it had, would that deal in any sense be rooted in the real world? How can a whole group of itinerant politicians and their advisers sitting there really get down to carve up the global market in supply of and demand for agricultural products? That is unfeasible even in the context of the European Union trying to make its own painful arrangements in agriculture, which are modest in ambition compared with those of the WTO.
I ask one specific question to bring the issue of agriculture into greater reality. What decisions have been taken in the assessments of agriculture about the use of genetically modified crops? Is it accepted that they may have an enormous impact on the balance of supply and demand not only of agriculture but of many social problems related to it? Are decisions taken at Cancun or in the WTO automatically transferred to each national situation? Is it suggested that decisions in that forum will authorise what may or may not be done about genetically modified products in this country? Or is it accepted that that is a matter of such sensitivity that it properly belongs to this Parliament?
Baroness Amos: My Lords, first, the issue of genetically modified organisms is not on the agenda of the WTO round. I am happy to write to the noble Lord about some of the research that the department has been doing, which has been considering agricultural productivity and ways to enhance products in developing countries—for example, by the addition of vitamin E to help with health outcomes.
In response to the noble Lord's first question, I was surprised at the failure. Although there were robust discussions and very clear disagreements in Cancun, there was a feeling that a deal could be done. My right honourable friends the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry and the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs were very surprised at the speed of the collapse of the talks. South Africa and India both expressed surprise and regret to my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry later on Sunday, after the talks had collapsed.
I agree with the noble Lord that the WTO represents a challenge, but it also represents the best possible opportunity for the poorest developing countries, which do not have the capacity to negotiate bilateral—or, even if they come together, regional—trade agreements with some of the bigger countries.
Lord Tomlinson: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that the common agricultural policy is compulsory expenditure in terms of the European Union budget and is therefore subject to great influence by single member states, as we witnessed in the discussion between the Prime Minister and M. Chirac after a recent European Council meeting? Does not the disproportionate influence of a single country on agriculture make it extremely difficult to get a mandate from the European Union that
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represents anything other than the lowest common factor, when we ought to be looking for the highest common denominator in agricultural reform?
Baroness Amos: My Lords, with respect to the EU mandate at Cancun, I do not think that we had the lowest common factor. There may not have been the maximalist approach that we in the United Kingdom would have liked to see. However, as a result of the CAP reform deal that we managed to do in June—my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs played a very big part in that—the mandate may not have been as good as it was. I repeat what I said previously: a deal on agriculture was there to be done.
Lord Baker of Dorking: My Lords, does the Minister agree that the statement she made a few minutes ago—that the recent deal on the CAP reform was historic—is slightly exaggerated? The link between production and subsidy has not been broken for many commodities. The cost of producing sugar in Europe is three to four times that in the developing world, yet M. Chirac has ensured that the subsidy continues for the next three to four years. Will the Minister explain how the protection of French sugar beet farmers helps the Third World?
Baroness Amos: My Lords, I do not think that protection of specific products in the European Union helps developing countries. That is why it is so important that this is part of a process, and that we will be looking at cotton later this year and at sugar next year.
I draw noble Lords' attention to the fact that the European Commission has made it absolutely clear to developing countries that we are prepared to look at any specific products—where we have high tariffs, for example, which they feel restricts their development. There is frustration that developing countries have not come back to the Commission with a list of products. We are in the process of trying to ensure that developing countries understand what that means, because it is a great opportunity.

Anti-social Behaviour Bill
5.34 p.m.
The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Scotland of Asthal): My Lords, I beg to move that the House do now again resolve itself into Committee on this Bill.
Moved, That the House do now again resolve itself into Committee.—(Baroness Scotland of Asthal.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House in Committee accordingly.
[The DEPUTY CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES (The Countess of Mar) in the Chair.]
Clause 19 [Parenting contracts in cases of exclusion from school or truancy]:
Lord Hyltonmoved Amendment No. 84:
Page 17. line 36, after "parent" insert "or both parents"
The noble Lord said: In moving Amendment No. 84, I shall speak also to 10 amendments in the same group, on behalf of my noble friend Lord Northbourne. He apologises for not having been in his place, through inadvertence, to move Amendment No. 75 last week and for being overseas this week.
The whole group of amendments attempts to clarify the Government's intentions about the meaning of the two words "a parent" in this part of the Bill. It also seeks to make the Bill clearer and easier for ordinary people to understand. It is difficult for a non-lawyer to understand that "a parent" can, and does, include both parents. It is ordinary people whose lives will be affected by the Bill. It therefore needs to be comprehensible to them, as well as to the practitioners who will have to administer it, and who may not have legal training.
Amendment No. 84 and the other amendments in the group, except Amendments Nos. 108 and 144, are designed to make clear beyond doubt that this part of the Bill should apply, not only to one parent acting alone, but to two or more persons acting together, if each falls into one of the categories of persons who qualify as parents for the purposes of this part of the Bill. It is particularly important to avoid any misunderstanding on that point because, where two parents are available, it is often the case that both working together can be more effective in helping the child than either working alone.
Amendment No. 144 attempts to define the categories of person who may qualify as "a parent" for the purposes of the Bill. The noble Baroness, Lady Scotland of Asthal, has written to my noble friend Lord Northbourne a most helpful letter, for which he asked me to express his thanks. It indicates that, for the purposes of the Bill, the definition of "parent" will be the same as in the Education Act 1996, the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 and the Family Law Act 1987. However, the definition of "parent" in those three Acts is not exactly the same. Am I correct in assuming that the Government's intention is that any class of person mentioned in those Acts will qualify as "a parent" for the purposes of the Bill?
Amendment No. 144 as drafted is intended to be probing. It includes some classes of person to test whether the Government intend to include them or not. My noble friend who drafted the amendment is particularly interested in the status, in this matter, of stepfathers and stepmothers, and also of persons living in the home of the child as a partner of a parent of the child. In a society that prides itself on having an increasing number of "flexible families", it is important that the Government should make clear what, if any, are the responsibilities of cohabiting partners in families with children.
Amendment No. 108 addresses the fact that a relatively high proportion of young people who display anti-social behaviour have fathers who are
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either violent or have left the family home. In cases where practitioners or the court identify that the behaviour of the child's father is contributing to the child's behaviour, it is important that the father should not be able to avoid facing up to the consequences of his actions or omissions simply because he is more difficult to contact than the mother. This amendment encourages the court at least to make the father come to court and listen. I beg to move.
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: I very much understand and appreciate the sentiments that have just been expressed by the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, especially those on behalf of the noble Lord, Lord Northbourne, who has had a long-standing interest in this issue. I am very sympathetic to the intention behind these amendments and share the noble Lord's concerns about the "dad deficit" about which he spoke so passionately and so well at Second Reading. I should like to provide a strong reassurance that the Government also believe that engaging both parents, where appropriate, is extremely important in improving their child's school attendance or behaviour in or outside school. The relevant clauses of the Bill have been drafted to ensure that that is possible.
Who is approached and whether one or both parents will be involved depends on an assessment of the child and the child's family circumstances carried out on behalf of either party considering arranging a parenting contract or applying for a parenting order. This assessment should enable practitioners to respond effectively to the particular circumstances of the case. The noble Lord, Lord Hylton, is quite right in saying that those circumstances can vary materially. Both parents would be involved if there is any benefit. We will consider further whether to make this assessment in guidance. In practice, we expect that LEAs, schools and youth offending teams will focus efforts and resources primarily towards parents who have some involvement with the child and are therefore in a position to influence the child's behaviour.
When applying for a parenting order under Part 3 of the Bill, the application will name the parent or parents it is asking the court to consider making the subject of a parenting order. Local education authorities and youth offending teams will put a recommendation to the courts based on the assessment of the circumstances. Guidance on the existing Crime and Disorder Act provisions already requires both parents to he considered for an order. Furthermore, courts already have the power to enforce parental attendance in court if they feel it is appropriate.
As the noble Lord said, engaging fathers can be a real problem, but this is a matter to be dealt with by practitioners who know the individual family circumstances of the children they are supporting. The existing provisions of the Bill are sufficient to ensure the appropriate involvement of both parents. I therefore ask the noble Lord not to press his amendments.

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I reassure him that the definitions and statutes to which he alluded all represent descriptions of what a parent can be, all of which will be captured by our definition of parent. The noble Lord is right: parents now come in many forms and can be birth parents, step parents and, sometimes, partners who are the de facto parent of the child and who may have parental responsibility in relation to the child. All of them, if appropriate, can be captured by the Bill.
Baroness Sharp of Guildford: I was about to stand up when the Minister stood up and therefore did not get to say that I have some sympathy with the amendments in the names of the noble Lords, Lord Hylton and Lord Northbourne. We are returning to an issue that we have debated before, both in this Bill and others—the legal phraseology that is accepted does not actually cover the common sense meaning. I have some sympathy with the point of view put forward by the noble Lord, Hylton, that it would be quite nice if our legal language followed our common sense language.
Lord Hylton: I am grateful to the Minister for the sympathy that she expressed and I very much welcome what she said about both parents being involved in parenting orders or being called to court. I am also grateful for what she said about the variety of people who find themselves in loco parentis. That was very helpful. I also welcome the guidance that will be forthcoming on these matters. My noble friend and I will study the reply with care, but, in the mean time, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendments Nos. 85 to 95 not moved.]
Lord Dixon-Smithmoved Amendment No. 96:
Page 18, line 13, leave out subsection (8)
The noble Lord said: The purpose of this amendment is to leave out certain words about parenting contracts. The Bill itself states:
"A parenting contract does not create any obligations in respect of whose breach any liability arises in contract or in tort".
We want to explore exactly what that might mean. If a parenting contract is not a serious contract and if parents are in breach of their contracts when, to be frank, they are being rather foolish and it might actually cost them, the contract is not worth the paper it is written on. We are dealing with difficult parents who need help. It seems to me that the purpose of a parenting contract is that the education authority, through the school, accepts obligations to assist. The parents accept obligations to take up that assistance and, most important, to get their children to school or improve their behaviour. That has to be a serious contract.
I accept that a,
"liability … in contract or in tort",
may well be a financial liability in which one party sues another. It may therefore have very restricted legal meaning: I am not a lawyer.
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I seek assurance from the Minister that these contracts are serious and that the consequences of either side breaching them—even though they may not give rise to a suit for damages—are none the less serious and will have serious implications for either side should there be a failure. It may be that I am revealing my ignorance in pressing this amendment in this way, but it is psychologically important for us to have an explanation on the record for anybody who wants to study the meaning of these contracts. I beg to move.
Baroness Sharp of Guildford: I rise to speak to Amendments Nos. 109, 112 and 138 and to say a few words about Amendment. No. 96 as well.
My understanding of subsection (8) of Clause 19 is that it specifically seeks to exempt a parent who fails to meet his or her obligations under a parenting contract from any form of legal proceedings; namely, it reinforces the voluntary nature of the parenting contract. I shall be interested to hear what the Minister says on that point, because the voluntary nature of that parenting contract is one on which we on these Benches place a great deal of emphasis. We recognise the difference between the voluntary nature of the parenting contracts as distinct from the parenting order that is not voluntary and is imposed through the courts.
If the Committee will permit it, I shall group Amendment No. 137 with these amendments. It should have been grouped with them, and I missed the fact that it was not. I should have picked that up earlier; I apologise.
Amendments Nos. 109 and 137 would make the voluntary nature of the parenting contract doubly clear by removing the parent's record under any parenting contract from the consideration of a court that is deciding whether to impose a parenting order, which is compulsory. In that respect, the fact that a parent was asked to sign a voluntary contract and refused to do so should be irrelevant. If it is not, what should be a voluntary contract will be tinged with compulsion. In other words, someone who does not sign will have a parenting order forced on them. The key issue is that the court should approach the question with an open mind. If it does not, we will immediately shift parenting contracts from being purely voluntary to having an element of compulsion. We are concerned about that issue.
We are also concerned about the potential for interference with the right to respect for family and private life, set out in Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights. The clause engages particularly with the imposition of legally binding sanctions. The Joint Committee on Human Rights has highlighted the matter. It said:
"in our view, the imposition of requirements on parents under a parenting order would certainly engage the right to respect for private and family life".

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In effect, the Bill makes parenting orders freestanding. The only condition on the court is that it should be satisfied that,
"making the order would be desirable in the interests of improving the behaviour of the pupil"
in the case of an LEA application, or that the child has,
"engaged in criminal conduct or anti-social behaviour, and that making the order would be desirable in the interests of preventing the child or young person from engaging in further criminal conduct or anti-social behaviour".
There is a significant difference between the granting of a parenting order under existing provisions and granting one under those proposed in the Bill in respect of the fact that the court must make a judgment about the nature of the offence for which the parenting order is made.
Amendments Nos. 112 and 138 relate to a slightly different issue: the penalties imposed by the court. As I understand it, the current position is that a parenting order can be made under Section 8 of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 only in relation to court proceedings in which a child safety order, anti-social behaviour order or sex offender order is made in respect of a child or young person or a child or young person is convicted of an offence or a young person is convicted of an offence under Section 443 of the Education Act 1996. The Bill deletes the connection between the making of the parenting order and a related court process by giving powers to local authorities and youth offending teams to apply directly to magistrates' courts for a parenting order. The only condition on the court is that it should be satisfied that,
"making the order would be desirable in the interests of improving, the behaviour",
of the child. Clauses 21(3) and 27(3) make it clear that subsections (3) to (7) of Section 9 of the Crime and Disorder Act apply. Subsection (7) stipulates that the penalty can he high as £1,000, which makes a breach a criminal act. We seek to eliminate subsection (7) and leave it at subsections (3) to (6) because we wish to eliminate the element of penalty and ensure that the breach of a parenting order in respect of criminal conduct and anti-social behaviour does not become a criminal offence.
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: It may be helpful in responding appropriately to the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Dixon-Smith, and the noble Baroness, Lady Sharp of Guildford, if I say a word or two about how the two subjects fit together, so that we do not conflate them.
We envisage a continuum of measures intended to procure the engagement of parents when their children's behaviour causes concern. At one end of the scale, there is a wide range of voluntary involvement that parents have with schools and LEAs. We hope and expect that that will be the most effective approach with the vast majority of parents. At the other end of the scale are parenting orders for parents who refuse to engage and whose children's behaviour is causing the greatest concern. Parenting contracts are designed to
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sit between the two as a vehicle for engagement that, although voluntary and, hence, with no direct implications for failure to comply, sends a strong signal that action is needed and that more serious consequences are a distinct possibility. With regard to that bridge, it is important to remember that the alternative will sometimes be to go directly to a parenting order without passing through any other stage.
Amendment No. 96 would make it possible for legal proceedings to be pursued if a parent failed to comply with the requirements of a parenting contract made in the case of exclusion from school or truancy. Introducing legal proceedings would contradict our aim for parenting contracts. A parenting contract is a measure voluntarily entered into and designed to achieve a change in behaviour, in the spirit of co-operation. It is an opportunity for parents to engage with LEAs or schools without direct legal threat and with the minimum bureaucracy. That does not mean that, if there were a failure to take that opportunity, the evidential basis would not be used in proceedings.
In speaking to Amendment No. 137, the noble Baroness, Lady Sharp of Guildford, said that if the contract was voluntary, no reference should be made to it in any court proceedings thereafter. I have two things to say about that. First, the point of having the intermediate step is to make parents understand that a serious change is sought and that there will be consequences, if they agree to enter into the arrangement and do not comply. Conversely, the parents will be able to rely on the fact that they willingly engaged in a contract. If it is their case that any failure was the result of non-compliance by the LEA or the school, the parents can pray in aid the fact that they willingly entered into the contract.
On the other hand, it would be realistic for us to acknowledge that, if the provision did not exist, the authorities would, in any event, be entitled to call evidence about co-operation or lack of co-operation by the parents, in order to prove their case that a parenting order was necessary. We think that it is a helpful highlight for both parties; that is, that their behaviour in relation to how they pursued their agreement could be relied upon when the matter came before the court.
Amendment No. 109 would remove the requirement that courts should consider any previous refusal to enter into or failure to comply with the parenting contract in deciding whether to impose a parenting order in cases of exclusion from school.
Parenting is challenging; we recognise that. Parenting contracts will allow parents to access support through a formal arrangement where they can expect the school or LEA to work with them to improve their child's behaviour or attendance. We would prefer it if parents were engaged via this route. However, we remain convinced that should an application for a parenting order become necessary, there must be some recognition by the court of a parent's behaviour during the contract process.

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That is not to say that failure to meet the terms of the contract will automatically lead to an order. It will still be for the LEA to decide whether an application for an order is an appropriate next step. As I have already indicated, the court will be required to take into account all the evidence.
Amendments Nos. 112 and 138 relate to Clauses 21 and 27. They would remove the penalty, available on conviction, for failing to comply, without reasonable excuse, with requirements included in the parenting orders or specified in directions given by the responsible officer. In other words, the amendments would remove the teeth from the parenting order provisions. If made, there would be no consequence for a parent who refused to meet the requirements of an order. We do not think that that is right.
Parenting orders will not be sought lightly. In serious cases, where the parent is influencing—or failing to influence— the behaviour of their child so severely that it is resulting in that child's exclusion or that child becoming known to the youth offending team, and where they are refusing to operate voluntarily, it must be right for the parent to be made aware of the seriousness of their actions and to have the opportunity to do something to change them. The parenting order is such a mechanism, but without the possibility of genuine consequences for noncompliance, a parenting order would cease to be a credible sanction. I therefore hope that the noble Lord and the noble Baroness will not press their amendments.
6 p.m.
Baroness Carnegy of Lour: I have not contributed to the discussions on the Bill before. I hope that Members of the Committee will forgive me for asking a question now, but I am extremely interested in this particular proposal. I think that I am right in saying that in California everyone signs a contract when they send a child to school. That seems a very good idea. Asking for a contract to be signed only when their children are in trouble indicates to parents that it is not something that everyone should do; it happens only when there is trouble.
Have the Government considered that it might be better to take the voluntary contract out of the legal process and place it into normal education procedure? Thus, an obligation would be created for everyone. A voluntary contract, which can be used as evidence that a parent is trying to comply, seems to be unfair on everyone else. Have the Government considered a contract for the parents of everyone who goes to school? I see that the noble Baroness has her colleague from the Department for Education and Skills beside her, so she should be able to tell me. It is interesting that a parenting order is being used as part of the legal process, which I find quite strange.
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: As Members of the Committee will have noticed, I have help from everywhere. I shall try to explain the process clearly. The noble Baroness is right about California and, indeed, many other places where a contract is signed
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when anyone goes to school. However, I reassure the noble Baroness that we have similar provisions. On entry to school, many schools have a contact that parents, children and the school sign, which states the behaviour expected from the parents, the behaviour expected from the child, and matters of that type.
We are introducing the parenting contract, as specified in the Bill, to target those parents who are not complying with the generality of good behaviour. More specifically, their children are suffering disadvantage by virtue of not coming to school properly, if at all, and are being excluded. This is a way of re-engaging those parents who fall within that category in a more direct and structured way.
Baroness Carnegy of Lour: I do not want to take up the Committee's time, but I think that the noble Baroness has highlighted my point. Supposing a child was in a school where the parents had already signed a contract. Now they would be signing another one. Would that mean anything? That illustrates my point. For these parents, it would be strange to find themselves promising again to do all those things just because they are in trouble. I do not want to hold up the Committee's time, but. I am grateful to the Minister for explaining the contract in relation to the whole process. If we think that a contract is useful in these circumstances, it might be a good idea if it is compulsory in all schools.
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: We are trying to enhance good practice. The noble Baroness is right to say that there is a different job of work almost that needs to be done in relation to these parents. The noble Baroness should know that it will be put in the context of a school and maybe the LEA, already working in a very targeted and focused way with these particular parents, to deal with identified problems that have arisen with the children.
In terms of the contract, this is an opportunity to do something about the problems. If the parents choose not to take advantage of an opportunity to enter into a contract, it will be for the LEA and/or the school to consider what further or other steps might have to be taken in order to persuade them to do their duty. One of those steps might be a parenting order, which has more teeth in terms of obliging parents to comply. That is how the two fit together. Therefore, there is a difference between the existing Department for Education and Skills home/school agreements arid parenting contracts, as I tried to describe.
I do not believe that I responded to the comments made by the noble Baroness, Lady Sharp, about parenting contracts and the 13th report on the Antisocial Behaviour Bill. Members of the Committee will know that the report also concluded that the Government were entitled to take the view that the provisions of Clause 18 would be compatible with ECHR Article 8. Although there was a discussion, it was decided that it was compatible.
Baroness Sharp of Guildford: I should like to probe further on some of these issues. I am unhappy about

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the degree to which a voluntary contract can be brought into court proceedings—a concern not only on these Benches. A large number of children's organisations are also concerned. Barnardo's, the Children's Rights Alliance for England, the Children's Society, family service units, NACRO, the National Association for Youth Justice, the National Children's Bureau, National Children's Homes, the National Council of Voluntary Child Care Organisations, the NSPCC, the National Youth Agency and the YMCA England have a number of serious reservations about the status of parenting contracts. That is because the refusal to sign one can be cited as grounds for application for a parenting order, the breach of which can lead to a level 3 fine of £1,000. These are the two issues that I seek to raise in this series of amendments.
A £1,000 fine for breaching a parenting order seems disproportionate and excessive. When we have discussed this with the Minister, the implication has been that such a fine is never going to be levied; that under normal circumstances the fines to be levied for breaches of such orders will relate to the income of those concerned and in effect the maximum fine will seldom he more than £100. We feel, therefore, that it is rather absurd to put on the face of the Bill a provision implying that the maximum fine can be a level 3 fine of £1,000.
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: We may again have conflated parenting orders and contracts. Perhaps I may try to unravel that because I believe that the noble Baroness said that the charities she mentioned are concerned that a breach of the parenting contract could lead to another order and that there would be a reliance on the breach.
The breach of the contract would not form the basis on which the parenting order was made. The original failure and non-compliance would be the matters that would go before the court to determine whether there should be a parenting order, but the court would be entitled to know that there had been a parenting contract which had either been reneged on or had failed for some other reason. The court could then make inquiries of both parties—the local education authority and the parent—about what part, if any, they played in the breakdown of that contract in order to assess whether, in the circumstances, a parenting order is merited.
Noble Lords know that the court will be perfectly capable of deciding that, while the local education authority may have applied for a parenting order, it is not minded to make one for various reasons. So it is the original behaviour which could have justified the parenting order that will be relied on when the matter comes to court.
I shall deal now with the question of the appropriate fine. The noble Baroness will know that all that the level of the fine indicates is the maximum fine. Therefore once the court is seized of the matter, it will be in a position to assess which kind of sentence—in the Criminal Justice Bill we are now creating a much broader range of options than were possible before—
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and which type of disposal would be the best one for that case. It may be that the court may come to the conclusion than something other than a fine may suffice. The provision simply sets the outer limit, the maximum fine beyond which a sentencer would not be entitled to go.
Noble Lords will know that families vary in their financial means. What may be a huge burden for one family—a fine of £5 could be such a burden for some—for others, a fine of £1,000 could be a mere bagatelle. We also know that, unfortunately, poor behaviour in children is not the sole preserve of the poor.
Baroness Sharp of Guildford: I thank the Minister for her detailed explanation. I shall read carefully what she has said.
Lord Dixon-Smith: This has been a useful debate. The Minister has made clear the progressive nature of the process. It starts off as an essentially voluntary exercise that seeks to work by persuasion and moves through to what I would describe as coercion and, finally, to compulsion if that is what is needed.
We should all be quite clear that parents have the option to do without any of these actions. They may persuade the child to attend school or to mend its ways and behave in a more socially acceptable manner. That is always a choice for the parents. It could be the case—I am sure that the noble Baroness would hope that it would be so—that parents called in before a headmaster or a representative of the education authority to be warned that this procedure might begin would take the matter seriously. In fact, that would be the step which persuades the parents to take the necessary action vis-à-vis the child.
The position has been made clear and that is most helpful. I have no difficulty with the progressive nature of the process. It must be progressive if one is dealing with recalcitrant parents who will not take their responsibilities seriously. I accept that there are some parents with such problems and that they have great difficulty with this, and I am sure that those cases will be dealt with in an extremely humane way.
We shall study carefully the helpful explanation given by the noble Baroness, but for now I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendments Nos. 97 to 99 not moved.]
6.15 p.m.
Baroness Sharp of Guildfordmoved Amendment No. 100:
Page 18, line 18, at end insert—
"( ) Where a local education authority incurs costs as a result of carrying out its functions specified in this section, the appropriate person shall make arrangements for it to be compensated in relation to these costs."
The noble Baroness said: In moving Amendment No. 100, I shall speak also to Amendment No. 114 grouped with it. Both are probing amendments which relate to the costs borne by local education authorities as a result of setting up arrangements for parenting

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orders and parenting contracts. Of the two amendments, Amendment No. 114 is probably the more significant.
Amendment No. 100 relates to Clause 19 and the voluntary parenting contracts between the LEA, the school and the parents. Earlier in our discussions I argued that such contracts should be made exclusively between the LEA and the parents. I have also made it clear in our discussions that the support services provided by the LEA in terms of advice and counselling must be significant and individually tailored to parents' needs.
In pursuing that route, costs will not be insignificant even for the voluntary agreement. They will involve the drawing-up and negotiating of the contract between the parents and the school. It may take officials much time to set up meetings and, often, to rearrange them if one partner fails to appear. The contract must then be drawn up, signatures collected, advice sessions set up and tabs kept on whether each side is meeting its obligations.
Amendment No. 114 is the more important amendment because it relates to the costs incurred by a local authority in seeking and policing a parenting order, as well as the costs of implementing the requirements of that order in terms of counselling. advice and support. As it stands, Clause 21(4), which we are seeking to amend, makes it clear that the Secretary of State or, in the case of Wales, the National Assembly, may by regulation lay down who is to meet these costs.
The Minister will know that local education authorities are currently very tightly budgeted. By law some 90 per cent of LEA funds are passported directly through to schools. What is left is all too little to meet the demands of central responsibilities such as special educational needs and school transport. These new powers to set up parenting orders are really a part of the law and order agenda rather than the education agenda. The amendment seeks to make it clear that the costs incurred in setting up and administering the system of parenting orders and contracts should fall on the Secretary of State for Home Affairs rather than on the education budget. I beg to move.
Lord Dixon-Smith: Amendment No. 113 is grouped with these amendments. It deals with the same subject, albeit in a different way.
Clause 21(4) states:
"The appropriate person may by regulations make provision as to how the costs associated with the requirements of parenting orders under section 20 (including the costs of providing counselling or guidance programmes) are to be borne".
Why do we need this on the face of the Bill? I assume that the Bill authorises any expenditure necessary in relation to this provision. If so, it becomes part of local government expenditure and part of the negotiations between local government and the Government to determine what funding will be relevant for the government grant in the ensuing year. That in turn, in due course, determines what the council tax payers' contribution will be.
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Why do we need to go further than that? If that is the arrangement, it does not make much difference whether the expenditure arises from the school's budget or the LEA's budget if it is part of relevant expenditure. The two are parts of the same grand formula.
There are two possible reasons for this. First, the Government are attempting to do what they so often do—that is, to micro-manage in intense detail. That should not be necessary because, if this expenditure is part of relevant local government expenditure, it does not need micro-managing. Secondly, it may be that the Government are looking for an opportunity to get out of providing their share and to put it all on the council tax payer. Apart from those two reasons, I have great difficulty in understanding why we need to regulate this issue at all.
I do not agree with the amendments of the noble Baroness, Lady Sharp, which demand compensation for such expenditure. I am quite convinced that it forms a part of general local government expenditure and should he met in the general way through a combination of the council tax payer and the taxpayer. If we start to make exceptions for such matters, we will be heading down an extremely dangerous road. It is not an appropriate way to go.
My amendment seeks to persuade the Minister—I do not think she will need any persuading—to explain precisely the financial arrangements and the need for this peculiar subsection, which does not belong in the Bill.
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: I shall be more than happy to explain. I hope to give comfort to the noble Baroness, Lady Sharp, and the noble Lord, Lord Dixon-Smith. I can assure the noble Lord, Lord Dixon-Smith, that we have no intention of micro-managing this provision, but we do intend to give local education authorities and schools the tools they need to make it work.
The effect of Amendments Nos. 100 and 114 would be to create a specific and compulsory grant-making power which would be completely unsuitable in the light of Section 14 of the Education Act 2002, which introduced a wide grant-making power that is already in force. However, I understand that the noble Baroness is concerned how the costs of guidance or counselling sessions advocated under a parenting contract or order will be met by local education authorities or schools.
I can reassure the noble Baroness that we do not envisage that parenting contracts or orders will lead to any additional costs for local education authorities. As has been identified by the noble Lord, Lord Dixon-Smith, local education authorities already have responsibility for promoting regular attendance and good behaviour in schools, and the costs of parenting contracts will be offset by savings made through preventing the need for prosecutions in cases of truancy and avoiding the need to provide expensive alternative provision for excluded pupils. In any case, the use of parenting contracts and orders is voluntary.

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We shall set out in guidance factors that should be considered when deciding whether to enter into a parenting contract or deciding whether to apply to the court for a parenting order.
Amendment No. 113 seeks to remove the power to issue further regulations relating specifically to parenting orders in cases of exclusion from school. The regulations will be needed to set out who will be expected to meet the costs of counselling or guidance programmes included as part of a parenting order.
Although the local education authority is responsible for applying for a parenting order, it may agree to do so on behalf of the school. We expect that in most cases the local education authority will bear the costs associated with parenting orders, except in cases where an alternative arrangement is agreed with the school. We need to consult with those who are directly affected to ensure that there is an appropriate method of apportioning costs where necessary. That is why detail of this kind is left to regulation.
I do not agree with the noble Baroness in relation to funding. She knows that the Government have put in a huge amount of increased funding since 1997. Indeed, the Committee will know that through the behaviour improvement programme the Government have invested a further £342.2 million in this area. We hope that local education authorities and those responsible for bringing about an improvement in children's behaviour in educational establishments will seek to take advantage of that additional funding and use it judicially and well to the benefit of the children they seek to serve.
Lord Dixon-Smith: I do not have the last word on this issue, which is probably just as well.
The Minister did extremely well until she referred to the need for regulations. At that point, if I understood her correctly, she began to speak about the need for the regulations to apportion the costs between the LEA and the school. I wonder what the relationship between an LEA and its schools might be that we need regulations to deal with a matter like that. I admit that times have moved on since I was involved and that relationships may have become worse, but the idea that you need to regulate this kind of thing from the centre is quite ridiculous.
If the regulations are made within an open framework which allows a considerable degree of variation to meet local circumstances, that is one thing; but if the regulations are specific, that is entirely another. Regrettably, my experience of looking at regulations in this kind of area since I have been in this place has been that the regulations tend to be more and more specific as time goes by. That is one of the reasons why local authorities have so much difficulty. There is too much specificity in these processes.
The noble Baroness may be able to reassure me, but I could not resist coming back to say that I am genuinely concerned. I have always believed in treating
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people responsibly and giving them a free rein if it is at all possible to do so. I have always found that if you do that they then behave responsibly.
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: I shall try to reassure the noble Lord. I indicated how we expect it would work in the normal way. However, we wish to consult those who will be most affected by this to make sure we get it right.
We are looking to craft a model which will be a practitioner's guide and which everyone will know how to operate and understand. We have phrased the provision to allow us to consult on these issues to see what should go into the regulations and what should not. I can give the noble Lord comfort that there is no definitive, defined plan at this point.
6.30 p.m.
Baroness Sharp of Guildford: I thank the Minister for her response. As I stated earlier, my two amendments were probing amendments, prompted by Clause 21(4). Like the noble Lord, Lord Dixon-Smith, I noted that it sought to apportion costs. I have some reservations about the wording used by the Minister when she talked about apportioning costs between schools and local authorities.
I take into account the amount of money that has been put into the education budget for behaviour improvement. I am delighted that it is going in. However, many of the procedures that have been set in place consume considerable funds. I think—indeed, I certainly hope—that in the long run this will diminish other costs. In the short run, it may well increase costs considerably. We all know that we cannot reap where we do not sow.
The assumption is sometimes that local authorities can bear these costs. I know only too well that frequently it is a matter of robbing Peter to pay Paul. If extra mandatory requirements are put on a local authority, the non-mandatory requirements are affected. For example, youth services have been squeezed hard for years because so many other requirements have been mandatory.
I will ponder these matters further. For the moment, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendment No. 101 not moved.]
Clause 19 agreed to.
Clause 20 [Parenting orders in cases of exclusion from school]:
[Amendments Nos. 101A to 107 not moved.]
[Amendments Nos. 102 to 107 not moved.]
Clause 20 agreed to.
Clause 21 [Parenting orders: supplemental]:
[Amendments Nos. 108 to 114 not moved.]
Baroness Sharp of Guildfordmoved Amendment No. 115:
Page 19, line 23, leave out "head teachers and responsible officers"
The noble Baroness said: In moving Amendment No. 115, I shall speak also to Amendments Nos. 117, 118, 120, 121, 122, 123, 125, 129, 130 and 131.
All these amendments concern the role of head teachers and other responsible officers in relation to parenting orders and the issuing of fixed penalty notices. Amendment No. 115 is merely a probing amendment. I have already made it clear from these Benches that we would prefer head teachers not to be involved in administering parenting orders, least of all going to court and seeking such an order. What responsibilities does the Minister have in mind for head teachers under these parenting orders?
Amendment No. 117 and subsequent amendments in the group are more substantive and relate to an issue of principle. Clause 23 extends the use of fixed penalties to truancy, in effect allowing parents to buy themselves out of prosecution by paying a fixed penalty instead of going to court. It grants the power to issue such strict penalty notices not only to local education authorities whose responsibility it is to police truancies but to police constables, teachers and head teachers.
We on these Benches are very unhappy at this extension of responsibilities. We have already made it clear that we do not think teachers should be involved in issuing the voluntary parenting contract. If such contracts are to work, they need to be voluntary and the teachers need to be seen to be a neutral party, helping to make the relationship between pupils and parents work. Giving teachers the power to impose fixed penalties on parents would, we feel, completely jeopardise this relationship.
It is for educational welfare officers within LEAs to take on that responsibility and work closely with schools and families to resolve attendance issues. Their responsibilities are clearly set out in the Department for Education and Skills guidance on Social Inclusions: Pupil Support—SIPS guidance. It includes the following competences: the ability to promote regular school attendance and to help parents in meeting their responsibilities in securing the education of children and young people; the ability to assess and review children and young people and family circumstances, plan appropriate responses and intervention within the statutory framework and evaluate outcomes.
These are core skills which enable educational welfare officers to make an assessment of the individual circumstances on which to base any decisions on what response is most appropriate in cases of truancy. These are not skills the police are trained in or have experience of. The SIPS guidance sets out that schools and educational welfare officers should have clearly defined roles, and the school's role is to be helpful and supportive.
The proposals give power to schools for the enforcement of truancy and would create a radically different relationship between the school and the
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family that could be damaging. Asking a school or an LEA to fine a parent could increase existing tensions between parents, their children and their schools. The proposals could also further exacerbate child and family problems, and may have an adverse effect on family relationships.
There are also broader concerns in these cases, where a criminal offence is alleged to have been committed. The due process of fair trial should not be evaded. Such an extension of penalising powers outside the court process causes concern and possible breaches of Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights.
If the Government are not prepared to amend the Bill, we seek the following assurances: that the Government intend that most fixed penalty notices will be issued by LEAs; that regulations will ensure that the grounds for issuing a fixed penalty notice and the right of appeal are clearly set out; that the amount to be paid will be less than the current fine for a person found guilty of an offence under Section 444 of the Education Act 1944; and that the Government are satisfied that by extending powers to issue fixed penalty notices under these provisions, they are not breaching Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights.
Amendments Nos. 117 and 118 seek to delete the whole of new Section 444A and insert instead a simple requirement that any penalty notices or other procedures should be issued only by a local education authority under the auspices of the educational welfare officers.
Amendments Nos. 120 and 122 require that a head teacher is to be explicitly excluded from among those who may issue penalty notices.
Amendment No. 123 excludes police constables from issuing penalty notices for truancy. This reiterates our belief that the only authorities which should have the knowledge and power to issue penalty notices for truancy should be local education authorities and educational welfare officers.
When we come to Clause 49, we shall be discussing how widely powers to issue fixed penalty notices should be extended. For the moment, suffice it to say that while of course police officers play a very important role in chasing up truants, they seldom have the detailed information about the truants or their family background to know whether it is appropriate to issue fixed penalty notices in these circumstances. That is why we believe that the job should be left to local education authorities and education welfare officers. They are the specialist staff trained to handle such situations, and only they should be authorised to issue penalty notices of this sort.
Amendments Nos. 125, 129, 130 and 131 are all consequential amendments that follow from the position that we have taken. Perhaps I should say, in relation to Amendment No. 125, that in so far as we

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believe that police constables should not be issuing fixed penalty notices for truancy, so a fortiori that applies to community support officers. I beg to move.
Lord Hylton: I should like—
Lord Dixon-Smith: If the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, will forgive me, I have some amendments grouped with these amendments, which I should perhaps speak to so that the whole group is before the House.
Amendment No. 120 would remove the power of the head teacher to authorise others to issue penalty notices. Amendment No. 124 would authorise a community safety officer to issue penalty notices. I note the difference of opinion between the noble Baroness, Lady Sharp, and myself about the involvement of the police in this sector. However, if the police have the power to do that, community safety officers—that new category of catch-all, wonderful people, who will fulfil a very useful role and very often may be the first people to realise that a child is truanting—may be even more appropriate to exercise that function. In some authorities, I imagine that a community safety officer on the ground may realise what is going on while an education welfare officer or truanting officer, or whatever they are now called, because they are relatively few and far between, might not find out until much later. There is a real issue involved in that.
Amendment No. 126 would mean that a head teacher or "his authorised nominee" at a school might issue a fixed penalty notice. Using that wording would restrict it to one per school, which would be necessary for the sake of clarity within the school and for parents and children.
Amendment No. 127 is in a sense slightly inconsistent with Amendment No. 120, as it once again involves the head teacher. That is because of the way in which the Bill is drawn up. The amendment would mean that the person issuing fixed penalty notices for a school would be a member of the non-teaching staff. It would probably be wise to avoid having academic staff involved in issuing fixed penalty notices. That certainly concerns us, and it needs careful consideration.
Amendment No. 128 takes us back to amending the paragraph that refers to,
"a member of the staff of a relevant school in England who is authorised by the head teacher of the school to give penalty notices".
The amendment would take out the head teacher out and revert to the LEA.
It is difficult to see exactly how the new system will work. I imagine that the noble Baroness, who has to devise the regulations to make the provisions work, will have to run a few experiments before she can be absolutely certain of the most appropriate way in which to make progress. There is such a breadth of detail in this very long part of the Bill, which allows an almost infinite variety of possibilities. However, it will be necessary in the end to have something simple and
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straightforward that can be made to work universally. It may therefore need to be broad brush. To try by regulation to define with precision exactly how the provisions will work will be an immensely complex task, and I am glad that it is the task of the noble Baroness and not mine.
Our points need serious consideration, and we thought that they should be before the Chamber.
6.45 p.m.
Lord Hylton: I shall speak to Amendment No. 119A to Clause 23, which is entirely a probing amendment, as Members of the Committee may have guessed.
It is important that fixed penalties should not become a quick fix or substitute for parental contracts or parenting orders. I start from the general proposition that non-attendance and truancy is often a symptom of other difficulties that need to be addressed, and not only something that gives rise to a fine. One can think of many examples of the underlying difficulties, such as bullying at school, violence and abuse in the home, parental discord, the ill health or emotional imbalances of pupils, or pupils being addicted to substances—or even worse, or as bad—to crime. Therefore, I agree with the NSPCC that compulsory measures should be used only as a last resort.
The LGA has argued, as the noble Baroness, Lady Sharp, pointed out, that fixed penalties may adversely affect family relationships, perhaps especially in cases of cohabitation, trial marriages and step relationships. Such penalties could increase the number of children taken into care where, eventually, a parent is sent to prison for non-payment. I note that there is no right of appeal or representation as regards fixed penalties.
What are the Government's views on those last two points and what do they intend to do to minimise the taking into care of children because of non-payment? With the Bill as it stands, will parents suffer prosecution if they deny the facts behind a fixed penalty notice, oppose the penalty or are unable to pay?
Problems of professional ethics already arise under Section 444 of the Education Act 1996 and the Criminal Justice Act 2000. In one county in the South West, parents are invited to a court assessment meeting at the school with their child. A senior education welfare officer chairs the meeting and an education welfare officer gives evidence about nonattendance and reasons for it. The chairman then decides whether to acquit, review the case later, give a warning or recommend court action. He thus appears to act as prosecutor, judge and jury. Furthermore he is often the line manager of the junior EWO, who may be tempted to say what his senior wants to hear.
That quasi-judicial process seems somewhat flawed, especially when dealing with inarticulate parents who do not have representation.
Can the Minister tell us how that may be improved and what the effect of the fixed penalties is likely to be on our existing procedures? Can she give us details of plans for developing alternative kinds of education for

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pupils who simply do not fit into the available standard schools where they are supposed to be, especially when those pupils are disruptive and rebellious teenagers? Can she say whether behaviour improvement programmes are successful in helping children to reintegrate into schools from which they have been absconding?
Finally, I should like to inquire about lines 18 and 39 on page 21 of the Bill. The first refers to a police constable and the second to a community support officer. I can see that it may be necessary to include police and quasi-police in relation to fixed penalties for the sake of completeness. I ask, however—as I think did the noble Baroness, Lady Sharp, and the noble Lord, Lord Dixon-Smith—whether the Government wish to involve the police in cases other than the most exceptional ones. If the police can remain outside this process, that seems wholly desirable. The police have more important things to do and might only aggravate some situations.
I conclude by asking the noble Baroness if she will be kind enough to look again at the drafting of subsections (4). (5), (7) and (8). They seem hardly elegant, and I wonder whether they are really necessary. The answer may be that they seek to improve the poor drafting of previous Bills. However, perhaps they only make matters worse for the lay user of the Bill.
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: I start by immediately reassuring the noble Baroness, Lady Sharp, that these provisions are not a means by which parents can buy themselves out of prosecution. She will know that the application of a fixed penalty notice does not expunge the basis on which it was issued if that penalty is not paid. Indeed, it is hoped that the penalty itself will be one of the catalysts for improved behaviour. It is very important that I make that plain at the beginning, before I begin my other remarks, as I know that some may have had the anxiety which the noble Baroness expressed. I should like very expressly to reassure her that that is not the case.
Amendments Nos. 115, 130 and 131, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Sharp, would remove the power for head teachers and their nominees to act as responsible officers for parenting orders. I say straightaway that I understand the thrust of what the noble Baroness says and the anxiety she has expressed. However, we cannot accept that head teachers or their staff should be written out of the picture in this way. In many instances, it will be appropriate for this responsibility to lie with the local education authority. However, it is also right to allow for the possibility that a head teacher or their nominee should take on this role.
It is not hard to think of an instance where the head or a member of school staff is the person working most closely with the child and parents in order to bring about an improvement in behaviour, and there is no reason why they should not be designated the responsible officer with their consent. Our proposed regulations would ensure that that would be possible only if the school governing body also agrees.
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Guidance will advise on the appropriate circumstances for a school to be involved in overseeing a parenting order. Nothing in these provisions is mandatory or obliges head teachers, LEAs or others to participate. We are simply creating extra tools within the practitioners' toolkit. If they think that they can and should properly and effectively use them to assist a parent and a child on the road to recovery in terms of behaviour, those tools will be available for them.
One could think of a number of examples in which head teachers could be assisted thereby. Indeed, my noble friend Lady Ashton gave me one such example. Sonic basically good parents—by which I mean parents who meet the average developmental and emotional needs of their child—can have a total or almost total disregard for timing or for whet her their child should go to school. Teachers have been able to do very little to encourage such parents. They are not so bad that one would wish to remove the child or take corrective action through the courts, but they are sufficiently in error for one to wish to change their behaviour. If they thought that the school could do something about their bringing their child to school late every day—so that the child missed its first maths lesson, for example, for a year—and that a fixed penalty notice might result, that could be the catalyst in persuading them that it might be better to find an earlier bus. We know that children in such circumstances are sometimes excluded for half a day or something of that sort. So in such cases the orders could be a truly useful tool that could be used if the teacher thought it appropriate. These amendments would introduce inflexibility into the operation of parenting orders that would hinder their effectiveness in dealing with the root causes of poor behaviour.
I turn now to the amendments on penalty notices for truancy. Penalty notices have an important role to play as one of a wide range of interventions to promote better school attendance, which is essential to improve children's educational prospects and to avoid putting them at risk of criminal or anti-social behaviour. I shall begin with the amendments in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Dixon-Smith—Amendments Nos. 120, 126, 127 and 128.
Your Lordships will be aware from the debate in another place of our intention to limit to senior school staff only those who may be authorised by head teachers to issue penalty notices. Draft regulations which have been placed in the Library of the House specify that limitation as applying to deputy head teachers and assistant head teachers. I am pleased that the noble Lord, Lord Dixon-Smith, agrees with me that head teachers should be given the discretion to issue penalty notices. Our proposals would enable head teachers to empower their senior management team to do the same.
We think that head teachers can be trusted not just to issue penalty notices themselves, but also to empower their senior management team to do the same. It is often the case that a deputy or assistant head teacher will take on responsibility for attendance arid discipline matters within a school, and we believe that it is appropriate that they are able to support the head

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teacher further by issuing penalty notices, if the school has decided to make use of this sanction. Our view is that the head teacher is in a better position than the local education authority to decide which, if any, of their staff should be empowered to issue these notices. A number of head teachers have said that they welcome such a power for themselves and their senior management team because it will bolster their and their school's authority to ensure that parents take seriously their responsibilities to ensure that their children attend school.
Similarly, we believe that the senior management team are in a far better position than ancillary staff to know the detailed circumstances of each case and to exercise the professional judgment required. We are not saying that clerical staff cannot provide support in issuing penalty notices, simply that the decision to issue should be taken at a higher level. It is right that schools should challenge as well as support parents and decisions about which approach to take should be taken by the senior management team.
Amendment No. 124 would add the words "a community safety officer" after "a constable" in the list of authorised officers. I join the noble Lord, Lord Dixon-Smith, in commending the good work that has been done by such officers. The Bill refers to community support officers (CSOs) rather than community safety officers but we believe that we are talking about precisely the same thing. The amendment is therefore unnecessary because community support officers are already included. New Section 444B(3) of the Bill amends the Police Reform Act 2002 to give a community support officer the same powers as a constable to issue a penalty notice for truancy.
I turn to the amendments in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Sharp. I shall begin by clarifying one matter. This Bill does not create a new offence in respect of truancy. Under existing legislation (Section 444 of the Education Act), parents of a registered pupil whose child fails to attend school regularly have committed an offence for which prosecution is currently the only available sanction. Penalty notices will provide an alternative and enable parents to discharge potential liability for conviction for that offence by paying a penalty. The reference to "proceedings" in new Section 444A(3) of this Bill refers to bringing a prosecution for truancy under the existing Education Act provisions and is intended to ensure that any prosecution is stayed until the parent has had an appropriate opportunity to pay the penalty. I hope that these comments respond to Amendments Nos. 117 and 118 in the name of the noble Baroness.
The remainder of the noble Baroness's amendments deal with who should issue these notices. I hope that the noble Baroness will be reassured when I say that we expect most penalty notices to be issued by local authority education welfare officers, who also organise prosecutions for truancy. But we believe that it is right also to give a number of others the power to do so. I shall not repeat what I have already said in that
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regard. Instead, I shall explain why the police should have a role in issuing penalty notices. The police nowadays are far more involved in the world of education than they used to be. In some areas there are now police based in schools and in many schools police deliver talks on various subjects such as drugs awareness and personal safety. And of course the police are a key agency in combating truancy at street level as they continue to fulfil their traditional role of accompanying education welfare officers during the operation of local authority truancy sweeps and patrols through the use of the Section 16 power of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 which enables police officers to bring truanting children and young people back to school or a place of safety. So there is nothing new about the police having a role in tackling truancy.
Police officers involved in truancy work locally will understand the issues and in many cases will know the children and families they encounter out of school, whether on a truancy sweep or otherwise. It would therefore be illogical and potentially counterproductive to create a situation where they were prevented from issuing penalty notices.
Naturally we are anxious to ensure consistency in the way penalty notices are used and we intend to achieve this in two ways: first, by issuing statutory guidance which will ensure national consistency and cover the general circumstances in which a penalty notice might be issued. The statutory guidance and associated regulations will be the subject of a full public consultation. Secondly, we intend to ensure consistency through a local code of conduct which will be prepared by the local education authority, the purpose of which is to ensure local consistency and the smooth administration of the scheme. In preparing the code LEAs will consult schools and the police who will subsequently issue penalty notices within the parameters of that local protocol.
Last, but by no means least, I turn to Amendment No. 119A in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Hylton. This would remove all the supplementary provisions relating to penalty notices. These provisions are necessary to ensure the effective administration and consistent application of the penalty notice scheme; indeed, the scheme could not work without them. The regulation-making powers are required to specify who can issue notices—
7 p.m.
Lord Hylton: I am grateful to the noble Baroness for giving way. I explained that it was purely a probing amendment. I gave notice to the noble Baroness's department of the points that I wished to raise. Therefore, I look forward to a very sympathetic reply.
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: I hope that the reply will be sympathetic. I am comforted by the comments made by the noble Lord now and also earlier when he said that the amendment was probing. Others outside the House have also voiced these concerns. I reassure them that the reason we are not pursuing them is because we believe that the measure could have an effect that I know the noble Lord does not seek.

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As I say, the regulation-making powers are required to specify who can issue notices and details about the local codes of conduct—important matters which I spoke about earlier. The power to issue guidance is necessary to clarify the circumstances in which a penalty notice is issued and will ensure national consistency.
I turn to some of the other issues the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, raised. He outlined many of the other reasons which cause and contribute to truancy. That was well said. We know that many of the children who truant have suffered from bullying and have problems at home. One has to try to get a broader understanding of why those children do not attend school and/or why they behave badly. One has to dig a little more deeply and not treat the matter superficially. We agree that there are many causes of truancy, including those mentioned by the noble Lord, and others including boredom, disaffection with school, personal or family problems. The national behaviour and attendance strategy aims to tackle these issues. We are investing nearly £470 million over the next three years in a national behaviour and attendance strategy—which I have already referred to in relation to other amendments—to support schools in improving behaviour and tackling truancy. Through the strategy, all secondary schools will soon have access to training materials and behaviour and attendance experts so that the senior management team in a school is confident and equipped in dealing with poor behaviour and attendance and can pass on its knowledge to other staff.
Schools will be challenged to think about a range of factors, including: whether they have clear rules on bullying and dealing with unacceptable behaviour in the playground; how clubs and other activities outside the school day and at weekends can support what happens during formal school sessions; how to make the best use of computerised registration to identify pupils with attendance problems; how to involve education welfare officers in working with families who have not sent their child into school; whether staff are sufficiently well trained in responding to classroom disruptions and in dealing with disruptive pupils; and how—this is important to— develop the use of learning mentors and learning support units to help children with particular problems. We are recruiting additional people with the relevant expertise and skills to support schools and education authorities in this work. We shall monitor the benefits that accrue from that. My noble friend Lady Ashton, who is present on the Front Bench, will be more than happy to write to the noble Lord and take up some of the specific issues he raised which may be slightly outwith what we can deal with now.
Negative effects on home/school relationships would occur only if school staff used their power to administer penalty notices inappropriately. We should be able to trust practitioners to use their discretion wisely and, as I said, we intend to issue guidance to help them to do so.
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We do not agree that penalty notices will add to the numbers of children in care. Penalty notices are an alternative to prosecution and, if a notice is not paid, the LEA will have to withdraw the notice or prosecute. Before handing down a sentence of imprisonment, which is available only in the case of the aggravated offence of truancy, courts are under a duty to consider the home circumstances of the family, usually assessed via a probation report. That would include taking into account the child's best interests. Courts must consider the parent's ability to pay in setting the level of a fine.
There is no statutory right of appeal against a penalty notice. As I have already explained, they are an alternative to prosecution. A parent who wishes to challenge a notice can refuse to pay and can defend the subsequent prosecution. Guidance and regulations will also ensure that the notice itself makes that clear. Of course, however, a penalty notice will not come to a parent out of the blue. They will already know that the school and/or LEA are concerned about their child's attendance, and our statutory guidance will suggest that parents should be advised as soon as a penalty notice is being considered. It is at those earlier stages that a parent may make representations about the notice if they wish. An LEA will have the power to withdraw a penalty notice.
We do not agree that penalty notices undermine the security that we seek to put in place. In fact, they could reinforce it. They give the parent an opportunity to consider their position, whether they want to change, whether they would rather be prosecuted or pay a penalty fine, or to consider with the school whether any of those courses could be avoided by entering into a well-targeted parental agreement through the contract about which we spoke earlier. It gives them an ambit.
The noble Baroness, Lady Sharp, spoke about the level of penalties. The issue has caused her and others concern. We intend to consult on the level of penalty, but our intention in setting the levels was to reflect the usual fines given by magistrates in truancy prosecution cases. We think it important to have different levels of penalty. A parent who is prepared to acknowledge that their child's absence is unauthorised will be able to pay a lesser penalty than a parent who is not. We think that acknowledgement of wrongdoing is an important part of the process.
A lesser level for early payment is important, as we believe that it will underpin the administrative efficiency of the scheme. We want to minimise the burden on the local education authority responsible for its administration. It is important that no one will have to issue a penalty notice—they are simply part of the toolkit. Nor will a parent have to pay a notice. although they of course run the risk of prosecution if they do not. Courts must take into account the ability to pay.
The noble Baroness and, I hope, other Members of the Committee will have had the opportunity to look at the proposed draft regulations. In those we propose that, when a fixed penalty notice is applied, if it is paid within 14 days and if there is an agreement that an

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absence is unauthorised, the fine will be £25. If there were no agreement about the unauthorised absence, it would be £50. If payment were within 28 days in the first category, it would be £50, and in the second category £100. That is the level of fine about which we speak.
I have sought to answer the issue as comprehensively as I could, as I wanted to give the noble Baroness, Lady Sharp, the reassurances that she asked of me on how the provision would work, what the level would be and how it would be implemented. Her last request was to do with breach of Section 6 of the Human Rights Act. Because the provision will be dealt with in the way I have described, we are content that it complies with that section.
7.15 p.m.
Baroness Carnegy of Lour: In everything that the noble Baroness has said, she has not mentioned Wales, and I take it that the clause applies to Wales. To what extent have the Government consulted the Welsh Assembly on the matter? They are legislating for Wales, as is their duty. However, they are legislating in a way that deeply affects everything that happens in schools, and the Welsh Assembly has a very big responsibility for how schools operate.
The provisions will alter the relationship of the teaching staff of a school with parents and children other than those affected by the issue of a penalty notice. For the first time, teachers will be asked to operate the law of the land other than education policy in schools. Is the Welsh Assembly happy about that? It is a huge issue.
The noble Baroness, in consultation with her education colleague, is making a judgment that the provision will help schools. In England and Wales, some of the teaching authorities are worried about it, and so are some of the local authorities. The noble Baroness, Lady Sharp, has told us of many of their concerns; I had that brief, too, and was interested in it. However, I am specifically asking whether the Assembly is happy about the provision. To whom will the Bill delegate the authority to issue orders? Will it be the Assembly or the Secretary of State for Wales? Will the Welsh Assembly be free to have its own code of conduct to send guidance under the Bill?
Those are important points. I do not see a Member of the Committee based in Wales. I raise the issue simply because I am very interested in how devolution affects such measures. It is not enough that the Welsh Assembly knows about the provision. Has it agreed to such matters, and does it know how it will operate its devolved responsibilities?
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: I thank the noble Baroness for raising the Welsh banner as opposed to the Scottish one with which we are so familiar. She has raised an important point. Clause 70 deals with the extent to which the Bill will apply to Wales. Subsection (1) provides that:
"Parts 1 to 5, 7 and 8 extend to England and Wales only".
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However, there are no fixed penalty notices for Wales. Enabling provisions can be made available if the Welsh Assembly so wishes. At the moment. the fixed penalty notice provisions refer to England only, but there would in the normal way be consultations. If the Welsh Assembly wished those enabling provisions to be activated, I dare say that that could come about.
Baroness Carnegy of Lour: Where does it say that? I cannot spot it. Of course I saw the extent clause before I spoke, but where does it say that fixed penalties do not apply?
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: The provisions in relation to fixed penalty notices are covered in Clause 23(9). It states:
"The National Assembly for Wales may by order amend sections 444A and 444B of the Education Act 1996 … by removing the words "in England" in each place where they occur?
Baroness Carnegy of Lour: Is the Welsh Assembly absolutely happy about the Bill?
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: I have nothing before me to indicate that it is not so content. If I discover that I am in error, I will of course write to the noble Baroness.
Baroness Linklater of Butterstone: I support the amendment. As the Minister knows, we on these Benches are extremely unhappy about the extension of the role of head teachers and others. Their specific and central role is the education and welfare of children but they are to have as part as their "toolkit" powers that may lead the parents of those children down a path that takes them to court.
If there is non-payment of those fines, that is the ultimate route that they will take. Wide though the remit of head teachers and their staff is or could be, I fail to see how the exercise of that kind of power can do anything to promote good and harmonious relationships, which are so important for the education of the child, between parent and school. Such a power is punitive; it is potentially damaging and it does nothing to promote what is really central to the role of the teacher.
I am both the chairman and the founder of a school. I know that many others in the education world are deeply concerned that such powers should be part of a so-called "toolkit". I really hope that the Government will reconsider. We will certainly return to this matter at a later stage.
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: I hear what the noble Baroness says. The exercise of such powers is neither punitive nor damaging. It is voluntary. There is nothing within the Bill that compels any local authority or teacher to exercise those powers. I remind the Committee that it is not true that the imposition of the penalty notice inexorably leads down the path to criminalisation, because, at the moment, failure to send one's child to school is an offence the fixed penalty notices offer the parent an alternative to being

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found guilty of that criminal offence and an opportunity to rehabilitate and change if they so wish. If they do not wish to take that opportunity, the consequence for them and their child would be the old situation, where the only other course available is prosecution in the magistrates' court. That situation has prevailed for a very long time indeed.
It is important to regard the provision not as punitive or damaging, but as an opportunity to divert people away from the criminal proceedings path and keep them, on a voluntary basis, within an area where we can still work with them creatively. I honour what the noble Baroness has said, but her view is not shared by many.
Baroness Sharp of Guildford: I want to make two further comments on the issue. We have been discussing two issues. The first is whether fixed penalty notices are a good idea for truancy. The second is the question of who should be responsible for the expenditures, if they are imposed.
I have listened to the Minister. Like my noble friend Lady Linklater, I am still not convinced that fixed penalty notices are a good way of solving the problem. The Minister took offence at my suggestion that it was a way of parents buying themselves out of prosecution, but she did in fact explain that truancy is an offence and that parents will ultimately be prosecuted for it. Fixed penalties temporarily buy them out of it.
I am not sure that it is a sensible way forward in any sense. The Minister quoted the example of parents who had difficulty with getting their children to school on time. The imposition of a fixed penalty in those circumstances would be totally inappropriate, whereas the voluntary parenting contract might be.
We will return to the issue. We are not content with the answers that we have been given. We are not convinced that a large number of teachers are happy with the situation. Many have made clear to us their unhappiness at being placed in this position and it is important that we pursue it further. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendment No. 116 not moved.]
Clause 21 agreed to.
[Amendment No. 116A not moved.]
Clause 22 agreed to.
Clause 23 [Penalty notices for parents in cases of truancy]:
[Amendments Nos. 117 to 129 not moved.]
Clause 23 agreed to.
Clause 24 [Interpretation]:
[Amendments Nos. 130 and 131 not moved.]
Baroness Scotland of Asthalmoved Amendment No. 132:
Page 23, line 23, leave out subsection (2).
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 24, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 25 [Parenting contracts in respect of criminal conduct and anti-social behaviour]:
Dixon-Smithmoved Amendment No. 133:
Page 23, line 40, at end insert "or any statement by the youth offending team which it believes is appropriate for their side of a parenting contract"
The noble Lord said: With a little good fortune, we may deal with the amendment somewhat more rapidly. It is a short amendment and raises a small point.
The amendment addresses what or what should not be in a parenting contract. The issue is whether the Bill is inclusive or exclusive. The Bill states:
"A parenting contract is a document which contains … a statement by the parent that he agrees to comply with such requirements as may be specified in the document for such period as may be so specified, and … a statement by the youth offending team that it agrees to provide support to the parent for the purpose of complying with those requirements".
If that is all the Bill states, the question is whether the wording is sufficiently flexible to permit the kind of variations that will be needed, depending on circumstances, the type of person that one is dealing with, the type of offence and so on. Therefore, in Amendment No. 133 I seek simply to widen out that wording and enable the youth offending team to add words if it considers that that would be helpful.
I do not intend to devote any time to Amendment No. 134. We have discussed previously the question of "must" as opposed to "shall". It was perhaps careless of me and the Bill team not to ensure that all such amendments were put into one group. Therefore, I have nothing to say on that point. However, I believe that Amendment No. 133 is worth consideration. I beg to move.
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: I believe that Amendment No. 133 has the effect of allowing the youth offending team discretion to decide what it will agree to do as its part of a parenting contract, which need not include support. That would change the nature of the parenting contract, which is designed to provide parents with support to enable them to meet their responsibilities and thereby to improve the behaviour of their child.
If the intention of the amendment were that youth offending teams should be able to include additional material, as well as the statement that they agree to provide the support, then we would argue that it is not necessary. As the clause is currently drafted, it does not prevent the contract containing other statements by the youth offending team, provided, of course, that the parent signs up to the contract. I believe that that may meet the needs of the noble Lord. I am delighted that he will not be pressing Amendment No. 134, for which I thank him.
Lord Dixon-Smith: I am grateful. I believe that the noble Baroness has answered the point that I raised with regard to parenting contracts. Certainly, in the amendment I had no intention of making it possible

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for youth offending teams to get away with not providing support. It was simply intended to give them the opportunity to add words.
The Minister said that the wording of the Bill is not exclusive and that words can already be added. I am satisfied with that assurance. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendment No. 134 not moved.]
Clause 25 agreed to.
Lord Bassam of Brighton: I beg to move that the House do now resume. In moving the Motion, I suggest that the Committee stage begin again not before 8.33 p.m.
Moved accordingly, and, on Question, Motion agreed to.
House resumed.

Waterways
7.33 p.m.
Lord Corbett of Castle Valerose to ask Her Majesty's Government what they are doing to improve the regulation of the United Kingdom's rivers, canals and other inland waterways.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, I am grateful for this opportunity to argue the case for the appointment of a waterways regulator to oversee the management and operation of about 3,000 miles of navigable rivers, canals and marinas along our coast. Although most of the network is publicly owned, I believe that there is a lack of co-ordinated and coherent oversight.
About 10 million people make 160 million visits a year to the 2,000 miles of canals and rivers owned and operated on our behalf by British Waterways in England, Wales and Scotland. Millions more use and enjoy the 400 miles of rivers operated by the Environment Agency.
Forty years ago, most of our canals were in decay—the forgotten roads of the industrial revolution. Most of the inland waterway system was under threat of closure. I want to pay a special tribute here to the enthusiasts who were determined that our canals would not die and that they should be restored as part of a priceless environmental leisure and heritage asset. Without their direct action on some occasions, there is good evidence that much of the network would have been lost to the bulldozer.
Perhaps I may make immediately clear that I am not attacking British Waterways. I acknowledge and commend its programme of canal maintenance and improvement, as well as its impressive and continuing role in urban regeneration. For those of your Lordships who are unfamiliar with Birmingham's 42 miles of canals, perhaps I may issue an invitation to take a boat trip from Gas Street Basin in the heart of the city to see how adding a little water can achieve so much.
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That said, there are issues around what British Waterways, other operators and those who run coastal and river marinas charge for moorings, berths and licences. The complaint, especially in areas of high demand, is that boat owners are being fleeced, that complaints can lead to the loss of a berth or mooring and that there is no adequate appeal route. That is the nub of the case for a waterways regulator. although she or he would have other duties.
I am aware, for example, that British Waterways receives only about £14 million a year from licence and mooring fees. That income rose by about 7 per cent in the past year. But, as the annual report makes clear, average fees were put up by 6 per cent in April last year, and boat licence fees rose by 1.8 per cent in January last year and a further 3 per cent this year.
Out of an income of £192 million from government grants, third-party grants and business activities, including telecoms, water sales and property, the income from boat owners is small beer. But, with an estimated one-third of boat owners known to be on low incomes, there is an issue here. Of course, a senior citizens' boat card might help, and I hope that British Waterways will try to find ways to offer that, as is the case on the railways. However, again, there are wider issues.
The prices charged for moorings and berths by providers reflect demand in the area, location and facilities. But, in areas of high demand, it does mean that the market rate is often set by monopoly or near-monopoly providers. British Waterways is instructed in the 1999 government framework document to,
"maximise income … by charging the market rate".
As I said, it is often in a position to set that market rate, as are private operators in relation to coastal and river marinas.
Perhaps I may illustrate the point in this way. Tim Coghlan, Managing Director of Braunston Marina on the canal near Rugby, says that,
"for at least the last five years every single canal marina that has been sold … has been … acquired by British Waterways".
He claims that British Waterways has acquired 17 marinas, only two of which it has built, as well as Hull marina on the coast and others on rivers.
I can understand the commercial logic of that and welcome the decision by British Waterways to set up a separate company to run the marinas to avoid any charges of cross-subsidy from the government grant and to aid transparency in the way that it sets fees within the marinas. However, that raises the issue of a near-monopoly supplier into which a regulator could inquire, especially as I understand that the marina acquisitions by British Waterways faced no competition.
While a survey in which 5,000 canal boat owners were invited to take part by British Waterways in the 2002 season shows reasonable levels of satisfaction over upkeep, basic facilities, the provision of moorings, and so on—although I have to say that there is scope for the organisation to do far better and I am sure that it acknowledges that—there is a deal of discontent over charges.

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The Diglis Forum at Diglis Basin near Worcester claims that fees rose there by 11.7 per cent. A boat owner from Wembley tells me that mooring fees have increased by 30 per cent and adds:
"British Waterways is ultimately in control of overall charges. You put up your charges, and marinas increase their charges which in turn 'justifies' your charges being increased and so on".
It is put this way by a boat owner in Fareham:
"If I am not happy with the cost of electricity I can switch to a different supplier. Mooring my boat I have no option. British Waterways is the only choice if I wish to keep my boat where it is".
There are the same complaints about private marina operators, such as Marina Developments Limited (MDL). A boat owner from Paignton says,
"Marina Developments Limited (MDL) already have a virtual monopoly in Torbay berthing and it would appear that as a result, year on year, they have been able to increase rentals substantially in excess of inflation".
An owner with a boat in Woolverstone Marina on the river Orwell near Ipswich run by MDL, tells me,
"Over the years when there have been vacant berths, the prices have gone up to recoup their losses. When the marina is full … the prices go up. It would appear MDL have a 'licence to print money'".
My correspondent tells me that berth holders were given vouchers for 15 nights free of charge at any MDL marina. One berth holder went to an MDL marina in the Hamble and presented the vouchers as he was about to leave. He was told that had they known that vouchers were being used he would have been refused a berth when he arrived.
I have been told of boat owners in marinas operated by MDL who are afraid to complain of overcharging or inadequate facilities because of real fears and actual experiences that they would lose berths in areas of high demand, although MDL denies that. But the fact remains that many owners feel they are being priced out of the water and cite a survey carried out by Yachting magazine showing that prices across the Channel can be three or four times lower for comparable facilities. As Sarah Norbury, the then editor of Yachting Monthly told a Carlton West Country news programme,
"They're able to get away with it because there's no watchdog body, no marina watchdog, no fair rent Act for marinas so no checks or controls at all".
It is in no one's interests that boat owners who are customers of British Waterways, MDL or any other operator should feel aggrieved over levels of charges and the way in which they increase. That is why I think this comment from Michael Thompson, Secretary of the Sunderland Berth Holders and Mooring Association, makes the case for an independent waterways regulator.
"In this country just about everything from Water, Gas, Telecommunications, to the Prison Service have either a regulator or a review body to ensure that high standards are maintained, and the customer receives a value for money product. It is my personal belief Marinas should be inspected on a regular basis, and if proven that the current Marina Management fall short of the required standard they should lose the lease to administer the Marina. The lease should then be offered to other interested parties who will manage these marinas to the required standard".
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That is backed by Sue Burchett, who chairs the National Association of Boat Owners. She says:
"What is needed is an independent watchdog which can look at restrictive practices, monopoly pricing and unfairness wherever they arise across Britain's waterways. Utility companies, the Post Office, and railways have regulators, such as OFWAT which protect their customers' interests. What about an "OFCUT" for the waterways?"
Perhaps I should explain that in the parlance of the West Midlands we call the canals, "the cut".
I am aware that the Office of Fair Trading can investigate alleged abuse of market share, monopoly or allegations of excessive prices. But that is a large hammer to use and a difficult and time-consuming job and route. When the National Association of Boat Owners asked the OFT to look into complaints in March of this year that British Waterways' mooring prices were unfair, though sympathetic and saying it was not reaching a final conclusion, the OFT added:
"However, this does not appear to us to be a matter that is sufficiently promising to warrant the commitment of further resources by the office at this stage".
A waterways regulator would have one job: to try to see fair play and encourage transparency and better relations between boat owners and those who enjoy our waterways and those who operate them. For the OFT, this is one job among far too many. Similarly, British Waterways' ombudsman scheme, though I accept absolutely that he is independent, is, I believe, too narrowly complaint-focused.
I believe that the case for a waterways regulator is strong and compelling to ensure a proper balance between providers and users and an informed and independent oversight on all aspects of our inland waterways.
7.45 p.m.
Lord Livsey of Talgarth: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Corbett, for bringing this mat ter to the attention of the House. The noble Lord has an intimate knowledge of waterways. Being associated with the Birmingham conurbation, where there is a mass of waterways which serve the local population and visitors and where, as the noble Lord said, there are less well off people involved, he makes a powerful case for a waterways regulator.
I want to concentrate my remarks on different aspects from those referred to by the noble Lord, arid in particular on regulation; indeed, the debate is about regulation. I have looked up some of the existing regulations which apply to inland waterways and canals and the functions of the British Waterways board in relation to those. Many come under the Transport Act 1962. The Secretary of State, for example, can transfer to the board all or part of a navigation authority, which I find interesting. He can transfer assets; promote and oppose Bills and promote research and development. His powers relate to charging. Borrowing limits apply; loans and treasury guarantees can be obtained. His powers relate also to the classification of waterways and, indeed, transport duties on goods and passenger services on the canals.

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The acquisition of land can occur. There are statutory powers, for example, on limitations on the transfer of water, and carrying powers. British Waterways has wide-ranging powers. The question is whether it is using those powers in a responsible way and to best effect. Certainly, I approve of the fact that there is financial assistance, for example, for moving freight from road to inland waterways. That must be a constructive function. Indeed, I am certainly concerned about non-capital grants, which are available. Indeed, it is important in any schemes promoted by British Waterways that those are related to environmental benefit. If we go along that path, grants to move transport from roads to canals is a constructive step. Of course, that would require investment in freight wharves.
However, the issue in this debate, as the noble Lord, rightly raises, is one of mooring charges, marina operations and the companies involved in them. I shall not repeat what he has said. However, I take strong note of the fact that there are monopolies which do not appear to work in the public interest as far as concerns the users of canals. There seems to be inadequate control in that regard and the proposals of the noble Lord are of great interest.
My knowledge of the canal system, certainly in the area with which I am familiar, relates to the Brecon and Monmouth canal, which is excellent for leisure and tourism, particularly with the construction of a terminal at the new Brecon Theatre. The downside—there is a downside—is that there appears to be a good deal of water extraction from the River Usk. The amount of water flowing down the River Usk that is transferred into the canal causes environmental concern, to say the least. In our area we should like British Waterways to be able to extend that canal down to Newport. In Wales, we would also welcome investment in the Neath Canal, for it to join with Swansea and the operations of the Llangollen Canal.
The real black spot for us is the failure of British Waterways to develop the Montgomeryshire Canal to Newtown. People want its full restoration. We certainly want to know what the hold up is in developing that scheme. Is it the regulations, the lack of funds, or is it planning that is causing the problem? The Montgomeryshire Canal was an economic link, which must be restored to full working order. A good deal of money has already been spent on it.
The balance of environmental considerations with economic opportunities has not always been well balanced. The canal runs out near Newtown. Indeed, there is concern that the Countryside Council for Wales has had some influence so far as concerns SSSIs to the detriment of the development of the canal. I realise that this House does not have direct control over the activities of the Countryside Council for Wales. I hope the Minister will recognise that I acknowledge that. I am merely describing the situation.
I congratulate British Waterways on its document, Waterways for Wales, and on its commitment to sustainable development. But I cannot agree with
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British Waterways that it does not require or need more regulations; I believe it does. There is a clear need for regulations with regard to moorings and the letting of contracts to marina operators and with regard to the extraction of water from rivers.
The issue of leakages from canals needs far tighter regulation. I have had to deal with some fairly serious cases of water appearing in people's houses due to inadequate maintenance of canals. That I believe is due to a lack of funds and perhaps priorities being skewed in different directions. Certainly, householders have had great problems. That needs to be sorted out.
This debate is also about rivers. I am concerned about the sustainability of the river system and the serious pollution of rivers, whether from industry or agriculture. There is a need for more regulation. Of course in this respect the Environment Agency has responsibilities. Much of this ground was covered in the Water Bill. None the less, I believe that the sustaining of aquatic life, fisheries, bird life, the ecology of the river beds and the necessity of reviewing river navigations all need tightened-up regulations.
Water quality compliance in rivers is particularly important. Regulations, for example, to secure certain pH levels in rivers would be constructive. Priorities for conflict resolution between different river users is very important. For example, the rights of fishermen versus access for canoeists need sorting out. That is a big issue on some rivers, which perhaps could be sorted out by the allocation of time to different aspects.
We covered the territory of stages of main rivers and tributaries in the Water Bill. I do not wish to go over that. But tributary maintenance, specifically concerning flooding, is particularly important. Regulations for flood relief schemes would help. There is nothing better than to see a pristine clean river flowing through beautiful countryside. Sadly, that is not always the case, but the situation has improved greatly.
Finally, on inland waterways and lakes, there is a big issue, for example, on the usage of power boats and whether or not they should be allowed on some waters. They need to be subject to greater controls with possibly the ability to remove them. There is no doubt that investment for tourism, the economy and the environment is there, but that better regulation will assist and move it on further.
7.54 p.m.
Lord Bradshaw: My Lords, I, too, thank the noble Lord, Lord Corbett, for giving us the opportunity to debate the subject. Like the noble Lord, I reiterate that we are not out, as it were, to get British Waterways, which largely has done a good job, particularly in view of the limited funds made available to it over many years.
The use of boats for leisure is increasing very rapidly. As people get more time and as they live longer we can expect that use to continue to increase. What we seek tonight, as far as I can tell, is that marinas, whether on canals or on estuaries, should not be owned by people seeking to create monopolies or to

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charge monopoly prices. It is notable that British Waterways has been asked to charge "market prices". The Minister needs to make clear the difference between "market" and "monopoly" prices. That would make an extremely interesting subject for a thesis by some of my students. The definition between the two becomes very fine when the "market" price is pushed up, particularly when there is a shortage of supply.
We also want to make clear that boats are not owned simply by the idle rich. One can go into the Library and read Yachting World and see pictures of boats with scantily clad women draped about all over the place, but that I submit is not typical of the kind of people we are talking about. Many people struggle financially to keep a boat going and high mooring fees are a considerable barrier to increasing boat ownership.
While I am not necessarily in favour of a regulator, I am concerned about bodies such as Marina Developments Limited. It appears to be increasing its hold on scarce resources and extracting monopoly rents. There is a scarcity of space. That area needs attention. I ask the Minister in his summing-up to answer the question: if control of pricing cannot be exercised by the Office of Fair Trading, who is to exercise it in the absence either of a waterways regulator or by extending the powers of another regulator?
I am very familiar with the actions of the Office of Fair Trading in respect of the bus industry. Its actions have been too late. Often people have gone bankrupt before anything has been done. It is too slow. It takes months and months to get around to a subject. Often its rulings are quite perverse in that it makes rulings which are quite contrary to what the general public want. In the case of buses, the general public want cooperation in terms of co-ordination of ticketing and timetables that work. The Office of Fair Trading strikes down all these arrangements as being anti-competitive. But that is a very narrow view of what competition is expected to deliver. I believe that competition is supposed to deliver better service to the public, not a theoretical notion which is adopted by the Office of Fair Trading.
So I ask the Minister to address the issue. If the Office of Fair Trading is incompetent, are we going to abandon boat owners to the monopolist, or are we going to have some kind of regulation, as suggested by the noble Lord, Lord Corbett?
7.59 p.m.
Baroness Byford: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Corbett, for introducing this interesting debate. His speech slightly threw me because I had taken the subject in a broader sense. His Question asks the Government:
"what they are doing to improve the regulation of the United Kingdom's rivers, canals and other inland waterways".
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It does not specify mooring charges, although they are a real issue on which I am glad that he has enlarged. I hope that he will not be disappointed that I shall touch on it only briefly before moving to other matters appertaining to regulation.
I shall use my time to consider three issues. The first is that raised by the noble Lord, Lord Corbett, of setting charges, what is a monopoly, what is fair trade and what should be encouraged and what should not. I shall be interested to hear the Minister's response to that. Market pricing is seen as fair by some but not by others. Those setting those charges must obviously set them sensibly so that people can invest in their investment—if I can put it that way. I shall leave that question to the Minister.
I now turn directly to British Waterways. It is aware of some of the issues raised by the noble Lord, Lord Corbett—perhaps in common with others, I have received correspondence from it. It recognises that some customers have raised concerns about aspects of its process—dialogue and accountability in particular. I do not know whether the noble Lord has read it, but it produced a consultation document in July 2003, to which it is asking for responses by 17th October, and to which it will respond in turn in late November or December. So to an extent his point has already been taken up in that process. We ought to put that on record. It is aware that there is a need to ensure openness and accountability—it was criticised for their absence in the past. It is sometimes tempting to set up something new when what we already have may work but not be working well enough. I hope that we shall wait to see what happens before we jump to conclusions.
I turn to the suggestion that there should be an ombudsman scheme: that someone should be put forward to deal with the regulator. I understand that the Inland Waterways Association, which goes wider than British Waterways, is not in favour of that. Perhaps the Minister will explain why when he responds to the debate. I do not know—and it is an obvious question—what are the pros and cons of the suggestion. I should be interested to hear about that.
I then decided to consider the matter in a slightly wider context, because there other important issues to raise in the time I have been allotted, which I shall try not to overrun. The noble Lord, Lord Livsey, touched on them. To me, regulation is most necessary when we have flooding. It seems silly to talk about flooding when we are all so dry at the moment and wishing for rain and rain again, but flooding from our rivers and canals has become a fairly regular problem that has caused human misery and damage.
Following the most recent flooding disasters, there was talk of closer working between waterway authorities, local government and the Environment Agency. Was some formal regulation set up, or is it still an informal, ad hoc system? If so, who is the lead authority? We need to address that situation.
Is the Minister satisfied that when rain eventually comes, flooding will not occur as it did last time? He will remember that it is not clean water about which

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people get so anxious; it is used, dirty, sewage water that causes such distress. Was there any outcome—whether regulatory or not—to the whole question of insurance for those people who were struck not just once by floods of sewage and soil in their homes? Will he clarify that, because so far as I am aware, it has not been clarified?
I turn to another point touched on by the noble Lord, Lord Corbett. Birmingham is not far from Leicester. We have canals in the country areas near Leicester and some good ones in Leicester city. As in Birmingham, one exciting development, which the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, and I have discussed previously, has been the redevelopment of waste land around our canals; it is hugely important and brings life back to an inner city. The site that I mentioned then was a former scrap metal yard. It cost the government—we were in government then—about £7 million to purchase the site and about £8 million to clean it before we could do anything with it.
My question is slightly obtuse: does the Waterways Authority have any input into planning? If so, is there any spin-off concerning the water, or is that a totally separate issue? I am not sure: again, it comes down to regulation and where one buck ends and another responsibility takes over.
Other noble Lords have touched on the increase in leisure facilities. Is that not good? It is wonderful to see people enjoying not just walking or riding their bikes along the towpath but using longboats or sailing boats. A great interest in sailing has developed. I should like to raise the question of safety. I have a little place in Southwold in Suffolk. We have boats coming in and out: there is quite a busy, little, slightly informal marina. I know that the Southwold authorities were approached some years ago to find out whether they would allow a big marina to be established. Wisely, the burghers of Southwold said, "No, we like our marina as it is: slightly old-fashioned", and it has stayed that way.
However, one recent cause of death has been jet skiing. I do not know if that occurs on canals, but it certainly does around our coastal waters and on our inner waterways. Can the Minister tell us whether the Government have any regulatory systems in being, or whether, recognising the risk, they may be addressing that in future?
Again on regulation, can the Minister clarify for us tonight the role that runs between the Environment Agency, the inland drainage boards, the flood defence committees, the riparian owners, anglers—there are lots of them along our rivers—businesses, which the noble Lord rightly raised, and those who use our estuaries? They are all very important issues. Once or twice, when discussing such matters previously, we have found that the buck gets passed, and there is no clear definition of where responsibility lies, and how it is organised.
I shall now return to the Water Bill. The noble Lord, Lord Livsey, did not wish to go over ground covered previously; nor shall I. Since the Bill left the House,
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British Waterways has written to me—and, I suspect, my colleagues at the other end—raising some regulatory matters. I replied that it was a pity that it did not let us know about the matters when we were debating the Bill in the first place. However, the following points are important. The Minister may be aware of them.
British Waterways seeks clarification of the term "navigable rivers". It also asks what would happen if it were to provide for the transfer from,
"inland waters connected only to a water system or reservoir of the authority's",
to,
"the same water system or reservoir".
That raises very important issues.
The Bill uses the word "connected". Ministers have agreed that, as a basic principle, transfers from the supply reservoirs that are only connected to a navigation authority's water system shall not be licensable. In all earlier discussions between British Waterways and Defra, and in the consultation draft Bill, the word "connected" has been used. Will the Minister explain why the word "discharge" is now used and whether it has any different connotations?
If the Minister cannot answer my next point today, I am happy for him to write to me. Clause 8 substitutes a new regime for small abstractors. A consequential amendment is the repeal of Section 62(2)(a) of the Water Resources Act 1991 by Schedule 7, Part 1, paragraph 6 in the Bill. British Waterways states:
"The net effect is that there will be no control of small abstractors from the BW waters under water resource legislation. This could have a significant detrimental effect on BW's ability to fulfil its statutory navigation obligations, particularly in dry periods when the likelihood of such abstractions is at its highest".
It is a very relevant issue on which there will have to be regulations.
There are other issues, but I do not wish to go down that line. The points highlight the debates that we had during the passage of the Water Bill about where one jurisdiction starts and another one ends. Although, under the Bill, the Environment Agency is the body in total control—if my memory serves me correctly—there are outstanding issues that will no doubt be dealt with while the Bill is in another place. Perhaps it will be returned to us for approval, because such changes would alter the Bill as we debated it when it went through. However, those are all regulatory matters.
I am grateful to the noble Lord for raising his Question. I hope that he will forgive me for having made mine wider, but I think that tonight was an opportunity to do so. I know that the Minister will answer the noble Lord's specific problems, but, again. I thank him for raising the issue.
8.11 p.m.
Lord Whitty: My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lord Corbett for initiating the debate, which got wider as it went on. In view of the indications that I was given of the noble Lord's concerns, most of my remarks will relate to the regulation of charging. I will try to respond, now or in writing, to the other issues raised.

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My noble friend and the noble Lords, Lord Livsey and Lord Bradshaw, referred to the vital significance of our inland waterways network for regeneration, recreation and environmental purposes. They also referred to the exemplary role of British Waterways in delivering on all fronts over the past few years, including some aspects that present it with serious conflicts.
One of the few unadulterated pleasures of being a Minister—there are not all that many, apart from attendance in your Lordships' House—were the four years in which I was responsible for waterways. I had a very good relationship with British Waterways, the Environment Agency and the navigation authorities generally. It is the combination of meeting different objectives, bringing together economic and social regeneration, creating environmental benefit and providing leisure and heritage pleasure to hundreds of thousands of people that makes waterways particularly important.
There is a question about how the waterways are regulated. The noble Baroness is right in saying that there is a history of regulatory complexity as regards the number of people involved, and the terms of what regulations apply. Perhaps one day a government will be brave enough to look at the totality of waterways regulation and to bring it all together. The main themes and responsibilities are clear.
However, we are dealing with a very diverse situation. About three quarters of the national system of inland waterways is run by public sector hoards such as British Waterways, the Environment Agency and the Broads Authority.
Marinas are the responsibility of a wide variety of bodies in the private and voluntary sectors. My noble friend Lord Corbett of Castle Vale also extended that to coastal marinas which are not included in those figures.
Each navigation authority tends to calculate its mooring charges in a way that is appropriate to their location on a commercial basis. The noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, tempts me to move from what are market forces to what are monopoly forces. It is possible to move a boat, so market forces operate. On the other hand, if one were looking for a mooring for that night, it could be said to be a monopoly position. I do not think that that is the situation, but we must examine whether the regulations are appropriate. I recognise that there have been a number of complaints about mooring charges in British Waterways and others and in the private sector coastal marinas as well.
British Waterways have, as my noble friend pointed out, an instruction to charge commercial rates wherever they can and they have operated that policy, which is now a clearer policy. The Environment Agency has fewer actual moorings and I am not aware of whether they have been the subject of similar complaints—nor have the Broads—but there have been some complaints about private operators. I will return to the subject of coastal marinas later because they are dealt with by a different structure of legislation, which largely relates to ports and harbours.
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My noble friend called for a regulator—presumably similar to Ofgem. When we use a regulator—in the strict sense of the word—it tends to be in relation to privatised utilities. Waterways are run partly by a nationalised corporation (British Waterways), partly by an agency of government (the Environment Agency), partly by a different form of NDPB (the Broads, which is more or less a national park) and partly by the private sector. So it is actually quite difficult to see how the concept of Ofcom or Ofgem could apply in this area. In that sense the situation is not a monopoly nor is it what was once a total public responsibility.
As I said, British Waterways is charging commercial prices. I know that the claim is that it is using its dominant position in the market to charge those prices. However, it is also true that British Waterways needs to cover its costs. It receives a grant from the Government of roughly £60 million a year at the moment, mainly to deal with the backlog mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Livsey of Talgarth, which relates to underfunding for two to three decades, which it is gradually getting rid of. British Waterways says that it costs about £200 million to run and maintain the waterways. The contribution of moorings towards that cost is only 2 per cent of its total revenue. Boat licences are another 5 per cent—a total of £14 million. That is not a huge contribution, but it is reasonable that those who use the waterways on a consistent basis make some such contribution. In one sense, one could argue that the boat owners were quite substantially subsidised by both the Government and other users of the waterways.
Mooring charges vary considerably. In Birmingham, which my noble friend Lord Corbett knows very well, charges to moor a narrow boat can vary from around £700 a year to £1,200 for the glory of Birmingham. That is not a bad price for having a pied-á-terre in the middle of Birmingham. In London it costs a few bob more. Costs could go up to £4,000. However, even that is not bad for a mooring on the Thames or the inland waterways of the London area. We are talking about what are, broadly speaking, reasonable charges. Although there have been higher than usual increases recently, they have been in single figures. We are not talking about huge hikes in figures. The average increase in 2003 was 5.6 per cent., for example.
In terms of the monopoly position for British Waterways, it owns only around a quarter of the moorings on its own system, which could hardly be called a dominant market position. It is an important market operator but it is not right to say that British Waterways has artificially created market forces by increasing rents charged to private operators. In any case, the rents that private operators pay to British Waterways are only a small part of the private operators and marinas' costs—they do not directly affect their charges. Indeed, the rents can be revised only at five-yearly intervals. There is a not unreasonable system working, although it is clear that some people feel aggrieved by the levels and increase in charges.

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We do not tell British Waterways how to make its charges; that is a matter for the board. However, we expect it to charge in a way that is consistent with the benefits received, rather than charging what the market will bear. The framework agreement refers to commercial charges.
I think that the noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, said—or implied—that the Office of Fair Trading did not operate in that area. In fact, the OFT could intervene, and cases could be referred to it involving excessive or anti-competitive pricing in any market without a dedicated regulator. The OFT is the main port of call, and it has a powerful range of sanctions.
There is also the waterways ombudsman, who deals specifically with British Waterways. It is a slightly anomalous position, but it provides an appeal against maladministration by British Waterways only. The ombudsman can deal with complaints about the method of determining a market rate, about inadequate consultation and about the way in which new rates are introduced. So, there is an independent system.
There are concerns about how independent the ombudsman is. As the noble Baroness said, we are now engaging in a consultation on whether we should change the situation. The options are not as radical as creating a regulator, as my noble friend Lord Corbett of Castle Vale suggested. As the noble Baroness, Lady Byford, said, the main user group—the Inland Waterways Association—was not in favour of that, but it is in favour of a more effective appeals system, which is what we are consulting on. The closing date is 17th October. The views expressed in the debate and, even more so, those expressed in writing will be gratefully received by my right honourable friend Alun Michael, who is now in charge of waterways.
The proposals are to establish a more streamlined and responsive complaints procedure; create an enhanced role for the waterways ombudsman that is transparently independent from British Waterways and can meet the standards of independence set by the professional body, the British and Irish Ombudsman Association; set up a new national consultative framework, representing all significant groups and bodies with an interest in waterways; and improve procedures for consultation in line with the relevant Cabinet Office code of practice.
Having said all that, I must say that the British Waterways network and the private networks and marinas cost a significant amount to run, and somebody will always complain about the cost. However, the new procedures should, subject to the consultation, provide an enhanced method of ensuring fair play. There is also the fall-back of the OFT.
The coastal marinas—my noble friend Lord Corbett of Castle Vale referred to MDL—are subject to different sorts of legislation. Again, contrary to what, I think, the noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, implied, they are subject to OFT rules. People may choose to go into one harbour or marina or another. If they are looking for a short stay and it is late at night,
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Torbay may be the only place that they can go. It is important that such places are seen as commercial operators and not really part of the public sector, but they should operate reasonable procedures. The OFT can control unfair, excessive or anti-competitive practices, as it can on inland waterways.
There is a lot of regulation on waterways of all sorts, and some of it—outside of pricing—was touched on by the noble Baroness, Lady Byford. There is or is about to be reasonable control of abuse of the market position by British Waterways, other navigation authorities, marina operators and so forth.
Some non-pricing issues were raised. The noble Lord, Lord Livsey, referred to the Montgomeryshire Canal. I am straying into the territory of the Welsh authorities, who deal with British Waterways on that issue. I understand that they work with the local authorities and the restoration trust. There is a money issue and an environmental issue. It will cost tens of millions of pounds to restore the Montgomeryshire Canal. Some of that money will need to be raised outside British Waterways own resources; for example, a possible grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund, which has done so much to help improve waterways elsewhere in the system. In addition, there are some conflicts with other environmental considerations, which will need to be borne in mind.
The noble Baroness, Lady Byford, asked about the position as regards flood defence. Co-operation between the Environment Agency and British Waterways is very close, but the Environment Agency is the lead authority for flood defence on all rivers and is responsible for bringing all organisations together. Therefore, the Environment Agency works closely with British Waterways and other navigation authorities.
The noble Baroness also asked about the role of British Waterways in relation to planning. In many regeneration issues, the fact that British Waterways owns the land is the catalyst for a regeneration project. It is partners with the private sector and the local authority in dealing with that, but the whole package is subject to planning. British Waterways would be a statutory consultee in that planning process, as would the Environment Agency.
Slightly further off-beam, the noble Baroness, Lady Byford, referred to jet-skis. I am unaware of a significant problem on the canals, although they are probably banned in most canal situations. In estuary and coastal areas, there is a problem, but navigation, estuary and ports authorities can make their own bylaws in relation to jet-skis.
However, that is part of the wider problem of injuries and deaths. An awful lot of people are injured and drowned in our waterways system. Jurisdiction in that area is somewhat confused. Reverting back to my previous hat as health and safety Minister, the Health and Safety Executive undertook an assessment of all the different responsibilities for water safety within the country, for which it brought in a number of different authorities.

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I have spoken for as long as is allowed. There are a number of issues relating to the Water Bill, on which I shall write to the noble Baroness because it is conceivable that it will come back to us. There were rather specific references, which neither I nor my officials could immediately take on board tonight. Perhaps we can discuss at another time; I shall read the noble Baroness's speech in Hansard if I need any clarification. However, I undertake to answer her questions on the Water Bill in writing.
Subject to that, my thanks to my noble friend for raising the debate. I hope that he has been, at least to some degree, reassured. We all recognise the need to ensure that the waterways operate fairly for all users and all beneficiaries.
8.28 p.m.
Baroness Farrington of Ribbleton: My Lords, I beg to move that the House do now adjourn during pleasure until 8.33 p.m.—(Baroness Farrington of Ribbleten.)
Moved accordingly, and, on Question, Motion agreed to.
[The Sitting was suspended from 8.28 to 8.33 p.m.]

Anti-social Behaviour Bill
House again in Committee.
Clause 26 [Parenting orders in respect of criminal conduct and anti-social behaviour]:
[Amendments Nos. 135 and 136 not moved.]
Clause 26 agreed to.
Clause 27 [Parenting orders: supplemental]:
[Amendments Nos. 137 and 138 not moved.]
Clause 27 agreed to.
Clause 28 agreed to.
Clause 29 [Interpretation and consequential amendment]:
Baroness Scotland of Asthalmoved Amendment No. 139:
Page 25, line 21. leave out "27" and insert "28"
The noble Baroness said: The amendment extends the interpretation of various terms used in the clauses concerning parenting contracts and orders in respect of the criminal conduct and anti-social behaviour to include Clause 28, which concerns parenting orders appeals. This simply corrects an earlier drafting error that omitted to refer to the clause. It is a technical amendment. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
[Amendments Nos. 140 to 144 not moved.]
Clause 29, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 30 [Dispersal of groups and removal of persons under 16 to their place of residence]:
Baroness Walmsleymoved Amendment No. 145:
Page 26, line 7, leave out paragraph (a)
The noble Baroness said: In moving Amendment No. 145, I shall speak also to Amendments Nos. 148 and 158, which stand in my name. I support Amendment No. 159, which stands in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Massey of Darwin.
The Committee may remember from Second Reading in this House and from the proceedings in another place that we on these Benches object to the whole of Part 4. My noble friends and I will, in the main, address our arguments on that when we come to the clause stand part debates. For now, I seek to address by amendment some of the most objectionable details of the clauses in Part 4.
Amendment No. 145 seeks to amend Clause 30(1) by deleting paragraph (a) on the grounds that it is unnecessary, superfluous—if that is not tautology—and too widely drawn. If individuals within a particular locality have been intimidated or harassed, this should form the basis of conventional criminal proceedings. Sections 4 and 5 of the Public Order Act 1986 criminalise threatening, abusive or insulting words or behaviour, or disorderly behaviour. So the Government already have that tool.
As with the Sexual Offences Bill, this is another example of the Government bringing in new legislation in order to be seen to be doing something rather than making full use of the toolkit already in place. Subsection (1) should apply only when there is persistent and significant anti-social behaviour. This is already covered in paragraph (b).
Amendment No. 148 concerns the period during which an authorisation can be enforced. The Bill refers to a six-month period. We believe that, given the ease with which an authorisation can be issued, this brings a danger that designated areas will, to all intents and purposes, be subject to permanent authorisation notices—no go areas. This is neither appropriate nor does it show any confidence in these new laws having much effect. A six-week period, with the possibility of renewal, should provide sufficient time to try out these powers and to see whether they are successful or not in reducing the anti-social behaviour complained of in the locality.
Amendment No. 158 was suggested to us by the LGA, which is concerned that local authorities would only be consulted about a dispersal order and would not have to agree to it. Ensuring that a dispersal order came into force only with the agreement of the chief executive would ensure that enforcement action was complemented by a range of other actions to address the anti-social behaviour in the area. The Minister tells us that of course local authorities would be consulted, but it would be very helpful if it was on the face of the Bill that they had to agree to the action.
I have heard of a number of very creative ways in which local authorities are bringing groups of people together to understand each other and the effect of each other's behaviour. A number of noble Lords went

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to Camden recently and heard what the authority is doing there. Simply dispersing people is not enough, and authorities such as Camden know it. They know that they have a lot to offer in this process.
Local authorities have key joint responsibility for the planning and delivery of local crime reduction, together with the police service under the Crime and Disorder Act 1998. The principle of joint agreement is key to the spirit of this partnership working, so it is vital that full agreement is on the face of the Bill and not simply assumed.
Finally, I will not say much about the amendment of the noble Baroness, Lady Massey of Darwen, because I am quite sure she will address it very articulately in a few minutes. But I heartily agree with her reasons for wanting to include the local community, which I am sure must involve listening to children—always a good thing. I beg to move.
Lord Dixon-Smith: My Amendments Nos. 146 and 147 are also in this group. I think we should get them and all the amendments relevant to this group debated on the Floor of the House before we are much further forward.
I agree very much with the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, that people are failing to use the toolkit of the existing law. If that is the case, one cannot help but wonder if they will use this law. That is one of those great hypothetical questions to which there is no answer; I would not dream of asking the Minister for the answer, because I know perfectly well that she could not answer it either. We will find out only as time passes.
My two amendments are quite small. The first, which is very small indeed, would leave out "and" and insert "or". The Bill applies where a relevant officer has reasonable grounds for believing:

"(a) that any members of the public have been intimidated, harassed, alarmed or distressed as a result of the presence or behaviour of groups of two or more persons in public places … and,

(b) that anti-social behaviour is a significant and persistent problem in the relevant locality".

In a sense. we had this debate much earlier in the Bill's proceedings. The question is whether "and" is an appropriate word or whether "or" is. We think that "or" would be preferable if the Bill is to mean what it says. I accept that we are talking about a significant increase in the sanctions available.
A relevant officer has to be a senior officer—a superintendent or above—and must make his judgment in the light of all the circumstances, which he will know very well, including the surrounding police area. These are all points that the Minister made in a previous debate. I still think that such a person is capable of making an appropriate judgment. However, it may be asking too much of him to make such a judgment when the behaviour of groups of people causes difficulty for the public in an area and anti-social behaviour is also a significant and persistent problem. If one is elderly one may have to go out in the evening because one may have forgotten to
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do one's shopping during daylight, and the shops are now open till nine or ten or eleven o'clock at night. As we get older—and I am susceptible to this—we have lapses, and we may suddenly find that we are without something essential, either for our evening meal or perhaps for breakfast in the morning. If one is in that situation and there are groups of rowdy youngsters outside, it can be quite a nerve-bending experience to walk down to the local corner shop and back again. That is what this is all about.
I know that this is an anti-social behaviour Bill, but in this particular instance "and" is perhaps a little more than is necessary and "or" would be preferable.
Amendment No. 147 would remove the requirement for,
"a significant and persistent problem in the relevant locality".
in addition to intimidation. That is another way of stating the same thing. We do not see why anti-social behaviour should have to occur more than once before the police can do anything about it. If a policeman on the street sees anti-social behaviour building up, it is offensive even if it is the first time. They should not have to wait until it is a persistent problem in the area before it is considered offensive. It is offensive.
Those are the reasons why we tabled the amendments. I hope that the Government will consider them. I have no doubt that the Minister will give me a wonderfully lucid and plausible response, but whether she will satisfy me is another matter.
8.45 p.m.
The Lord Bishop of St Edmundsbury and Ipswich: support strongly the amendments and the general concern of the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley. There is clearly widespread concern about Part 4 of the Bill, which is echoed by a large number of organizations—exactly the list given by the noble Baroness, Lady Sharp, earlier. It might almost he called the "Sharp list", in referring to it in shorthand. It is a long and detailed list of people who work with children and families.
Those organisations make it quite clear that there is no question of condoning crime or disruptive behaviour or underestimating the effect that it has on other people. The crucial question is how anti-social behaviour is dealt with and prevented and how it is addressed when it occurs. This part of the Bill is crucial to that matter. It revisits the existing provisions to impose area-based child curfew notices, first introduced under Section 14 of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 and amended under the 2001 Act. The power has, apparently, never been used, which is an interesting comment on it, especially given that the provisions attempt to extend it.
The key point is that the power was brought in originally to protect children, not to restrict them. The new Bill reverses that and starts with the presumption that we view children as a problem rather than being in need of protection. That is a different approach, assumption and attitude.

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Paragraph 4 of the Explanatory Notes says:
"The Bill is designed to ensure that the police have the appropriate powers to deal with serious anti-social behaviour".
However, the clause goes way beyond that. This is a provision for a situation in which no crime has actually been committed—that is the point, is it not? In the light of that, Part 4 feels like an unnecessary extension of an existing power and introduces an unwelcome punitive element that will not help to deal with the root problem or the causes of anti-social behaviour. It also raises the question of human rights, in terms of the unnecessary intrusion on the liberty of an individual, to allow a constable to give orders to someone when there is no threat of crime or danger to safety. That question has clearly been raised as well. So there is a whole question about the presence of this part in the Bill.
Baroness Massey of Darwen: It is appropriate that I should speak now to Amendment No. 159 as it follows on from matters that have arisen in the debate. This amendment is in my name and the names of my noble friend Lady David, the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, and the noble Earl, Lord Listowel. I begin by thanking my noble friend the Minister for the prolific correspondence on issues raised at Second Reading and for her obvious concern to consult on the Bill. She has been most assiduous in that and it has been very useful.
I, too, have some problems with this clause, and no doubt there will he much discussion about it at a later date. I am particularly concerned about the police having the power to disperse groups of two or more young people and to remove young people under 16 who are unsupervised in public places from 9 p.m. to 6 a.m. to their place of residence. I think that the provision is full of problems, both practical and ethical. I do not condone crime or disturbance by young people, and I know that some communities have problems of serious misbehaviour among young people, as has been said already, but I believe that community problems are often best resolved by involving communities, including young people.
It is clear from numerous surveys that young people want recreational facilities where they can meet friends and enjoy themselves. We do not have enough such facilities. Surely we should develop more, so that young people do not have to hang around so much in public places, before we set punitive laws that may well add to and increase confrontation between the police and young people and local communities and young people.
The Home Office White Paper Respect and Responsibility—taking a stand against anti-social behaviour states:
"to tackle anti-social behaviour we must ensure that the community sets clear standards of behaviour",
and that,
"local people must be encouraged to win back their communities and encouraged by local and central Government to do so".
I think that that is the crux of the matter. Local child curfew notices under the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 were set out by the Government as a protective
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measure for children and young people and as a support to parents, as I think was hinted at by the right reverend Prelate. The measures here seem to view young people as a problem rather than as being in need of protection.
The Hamilton Child Safety Initiative concluded that the police cannot solve community problems alone. There has been a welcome commitment by the Government to listening to and involving young people. The Children and Young People's Unit document, Learning to Listen: core principles fir the involvement of children and young people, states that better outcomes for communities are encouraged by drawing on contributions to shape services.
Many children's organizations—I will not go into them all again—are seriously concerned about the new powers under Part 4 of the Bill. My amendment seeks to ensure that members of the local community, including young people and their families, are at least involved in the decision making about dispersing groups.
The Earl of Listowel: I rise to support Amendment No. 159, which was so eloquently spoken to by the noble Baroness, Lady Massey, and to which I have also put my name, and to second the concerns raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley. I am concerned that this proposal may inadvertently increase local tensions. Although I respect the reasons why the Government wish to introduce the provision and recognise the difficulties, I think that this is a constructive amendment. I remember attending weekly meetings at a hostel for 16 to 23 year-olds run by Centrepoint. At the weekly meetings the young people discussed the way in which the hostel was run. The hostel curfew was discussed and, as a result of that discussion, it was raised by one hour. The young people knew, however, that the curfew would be strictly applied and that if they breached it they would be in serious trouble. They accepted that because they had discussed the matter and had agreed to it.
I hope that the Government will regard the measure that we are discussing as a constructive amendment to their proposals. I look forward to the Minister's response. I hope that it will sugar a rather bitter pill.
Baroness Linklater of Butterstone: I, too, rise to support my noble friend and the group of amendments concerning the dispersal of groups and the associated conditions. That matter causes these Benches great concern, not to speak of the concern of many other bodies and organisations in this country whose knowledge, experience and expertise should not be ignored. I include here all the leading children's organisations, the Sharp list and legal opinion, particularly in relation to the Joint Committee on Human Rights, the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and the European Convention on Human Rights. I am no legal expert but it should surely give us pause for thought when such fundamental concerns about where this legislation might be taking us are being expressed, however well intentioned the motives behind the legislation might be.

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The issues which give greatest pause are that dispersal can take place if any member of the public is intimidated, harassed, alarmed or distressed merely as a result of the presence of two or more people, and that such a presence is merely likely to result in intimidation, harassment, alarm or distress. Nothing need have actually happened; the offence is simply to be there.
I refer particularly here to the legal opinion on the human rights status of the Bill which was sought from Anthony Jennings QC of Matrix Chambers. He describes the provisions in this clause as "breathtaking"—not an adjective commonly used by sober lawyers—and notes that even the Government concede that the clause involves potential breaches of Articles 5, 8, 10 and 11 of the ECHR. He describes a dispersal order under these circumstances as "a nationwide curfew" particularly on young people under 16 who are not under the effective control of a parent and asks how the presence of such a child can be categorised as "serious anti-social behaviour". At its extremes he asks, what about the teenager walking home from a violin lesson after 9 p.m. or the 15 year-old girl suspicious of someone in uniform asking her to come away with him? His conclusion is that,
"any infringement of a Convention right must not destroy the very essence of that right. No public interest can justify the destruction of the essence of a right".
The important thing is that the powers can be exercised although the child has done nothing wrong. Not only are these powers frighteningly—and this is my word—draconian, but carry in their wake the potential, as we have already discussed, for real trouble in the future in terms of damaged community relations, alienation of the young, racial tensions and all the features of our society which we must avoid if we are to achieve the positive social behaviour we all seek. We know and understand how young children can be caught up in and risk being involved in ASB simply by being around with, say, an older sibling but this is not the way to protect them.
Lord Bassam of Brighton: This is one of those points in the Bill where we have to begin to think of what I would generally wrap together as real world situations. I say that because all of those who have spoken in the debate so far are, like myself and the noble Baroness, Lady Scotland, motivated by the finest of intentions. We are ultimately trying to give some power back to the community. We all recognise that there is a problem. This part of the Bill tries to deal with that problem in what I would argue is a measured and proportionate way.
I have the greatest respect for the line of argument taken by the noble Baroness, Lady Linklater, on a concern for human rights. It comes not only from good intentions, but from the right sort of community sense and spirit. However, we also have to pay attention to the human rights of those who suffer harassment over time. As I listened, my mind was drawn back to the time when, as leader of my local authority, I was getting regular complaints from part of my ward. It
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was a very respectable part of Brighton as it happens—not a council estate—so no one need jump to conclusions about the character of the area that I represented.
Each and every night throughout much of one particularly long summer, congregations of young people on the streets undoubtedly caused distress and disturbance to those living in the neighbourhood. The best that the local police and I as a very active councillor—I took great interest in my ward—could offer was logging the activity, making a complaint to the environmental health team, which was concerned about noise nuisance, and advising residents to ensure that they informed their local community constable about what they thought might be public order breaches.
The issue was aired publicly and there were discussions with council staff and local police officers and at a very senior level within the division. However, all that did not provide that community with the protection or a tool in a toolkit that it could use to change the character of its streets in that neighbourhood. It is such situations that, in a sense, we are trying to grapple with in the Bill.
9 p.m.
Lord Thomas of Gresford: From what did the people living in the area want to be protected? Was it criminal offences, or simply youngsters in the street?
Lord Bassam of Brighton: They felt—one has to respect that the views came from constituents—that they were being harassed and threatened by the presence of a large number of people. The age band was fairly wide. They felt that the presence of those people together on the streets as I have described was likely to lead to criminal acts. The responses of the agencies involved were not able to provide them with something that they could use to assist them to reclaim their neighbourhood and their streets. That is an important consideration. I set that in the context of the debate, because it is a very important debate.
The group of amendments is curious. It includes amendments tabled by Liberal Democrat Members of the Committee that come from one direction, but also the amendment tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Dixon-Smith, that comes from another direction and deals with the and/or issue.
We have tried to strike a balance. Our strategy—the Bill and particularly these clauses—is part of wider government initiatives. We went over that issue at some length in our discussions and deliberations the other evening. The issue is not all about being punitive, but about being constructive as well. My noble friend Lady Scotland or I drew attention to the extensive range of government programmes that provide the sorts of recreational facilities referred to by the noble Baroness, Lady Massey. The provisions are therefore part of a broader constructive approach and they should not be seen in isolation.
Nor are we saying that there is a problem with young people. We recognise and understand that there are many young people with different lifestyles coming

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from different backgrounds. However, we must accept that sometimes young people—and I am a father of teenagers—can represent a problem to others. It is right to ensure that we have the powers to deal with the problem in a way that is sometimes community disciplinarian. That is at the core of some of our measures.
Having made those initial comments, I want to go through the points in turn. Amendment No. 145, moved by the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, seeks to delete the condition that members of the public in the area must have suffered intimidation, harassment, alarm or distress. In a sense, it is puzzling, but, in the context of the dislike coming from Members on the Liberal Democrat Front Bench, I understand why it has been moved.
Amendment No. 146 gives the senior officer the power to give an authorisation in areas where people have been intimidated, harassed, alarmed or distressed, or that anti-social behaviour is a significant and persistent problem. Amendment No. 147 seeks to take out the requirement that these powers can be exercised only in an area where anti-social behaviour is a significant and persistent problem. There, the noble Lord, Dixon-Smith, is trying to broaden the scope of the Bill's measures.
The Government believe that both conditions should apply as a firm test. These are targeted powers, aimed at areas where groups hang around and where anti-social behaviour is a particular problem. In short, we want this power to be targeted at areas where there are particular problems.
We have heard of concerns about individuals innocently going through an area and being swept up by the measures which are proposed. I would put the argument the other way round. The Government are concerned about the presence in some of our communities of those who want to stir up racial hatred and distress. I would argue that these measures could well be used in circumstances in which those groups are congregating in vulnerable communities—perhaps previously in places such as Oldham or Burnley which experienced that. The powers would be extremely useful in the toolkit of the local community concerned, the police or the local authority. I would ask noble Lords to think of the importance of these measures in that context, too.
Amendment No. 148 seeks to limit the duration of the authorisation to six weeks. It was argued most ably by the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, as ever, that it would be renewed. I take that point, but we believe that we have struck the right balance. That is why we believe that six months is appropriate. We want the local police to be able to use this power as part of a strategy for dealing with anti-social behaviour in their area. They need time for the strategy to work. They do not need the interruption of six-weekly renewals. They need to have a firm position—one that is understood and clearly acknowledged in the community.
We do not believe that the police need to have the power indefinitely, and that is why we believe that six months strikes the right balance between the two. We
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recognise that circumstances may change and that authorisation may no longer be appropriate. That is why Clause 31(6) makes provision for authorisation to be withdrawn.
Amendment No. 158 suggests that the police should seek the agreement of the local council before, ranting an authorisation. We agree that consultation with the local council is essential if the power is to be used as part of a local strategy for dealing with anti-social behaviour. But we have to take on board operational considerations. I believe that if the noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, or perhaps the noble Baroness, Lady Harris of Richmond, were in their places, they would reflect on that, too.
Local authorities and the police already work together closely in local crime and disorder reduction partnerships, and we expect consultation on authorising these powers to be part of that process. However, we believe that the police are the correct agency to lead this power and that they should be able to act if they consider that the powers are necessary to reclaim an area. That is what we are talking about. We are keen to ensure that bureaucracy related to the use of the power is kept to a minimum.
Amendment No. 159 seeks to ensure that the local community is consulted before an authorisation is granted. As I said a moment ago, consultation is at the heart of that. We agree that the local community should be involved in tackling anti-social behaviour in its area. My guess and surmise is that, as in the example that I gave and in other examples which I am sure we can all give, it will be the local community that comes forward and demands that the powers are exercised.
However, as a corollary to that, we would not necessarily want to extend the authorisation process by building in an obligation to consult the local community. But we shall ensure—this is where I believe that it is best put—that the code of practice, issued under Clause 34 of the Bill, gives advice on consultation with the local community. Indeed, we expect that the crime and disorder reduction partnerships, which include representatives from the police, the council and the local community, will want to engage with the community to determine whether there are areas in their locality where the use of the powers would be beneficial.
We agree that it is essential that local communities know that the powers are being used in their area. That is why Clause 31(3) ensures that publicity is given to an authorisation. We consider that clause to be very important. We want people to understand the import of exactly what we are trying to achieve with this piece of legislation and its value and importance in terms of enabling residents sometimes— no doubt in extreme circumstances—to reclaim their community. Ultimately, this is about giving power back to people in those communities so that they may have self-confidence and security. We consider those things to have primacy in this issue and in this debate.
Lord Thomas of Gresford: In my village of Gresford, the War Memorial Trust owns some 18 acres of land.

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We have a new sports hall, which is used for all kinds of community activities. We have two football pitches, a cricket pitch, tennis courts, a children's playground, two bowls greens and even somewhere to play billiards and snooker. We have the lot.
Across the road is the youth club. We, as the trustees, received a letter from someone who lives in the same street as the youth club. It said: "I am very concerned that when the youth club finishes, young people spill out and stand in the street next to my house. What we would like the trustees to do is to ensure that there is some way of getting them over to the sports facilities and making them play games and using the facilities that you are providing".
The trustees of the trust—there are approximately 30 of them—who represent the whole community, treated that request with some amusement. But that is what is behind this legislation. The Government are proposing that the police should start to manage people. I believe it was interesting that, in illustrating his point, the Minister referred to the posher part of Brighton, where the inhabitants were upset because young people were standing about in the street—
Lord Bassam of Brighton: Perhaps the noble Lord will give way briefly. I would not wish that description to take too much of a hold in this debate. I believe the residents of that particular part of Brighton would be amused at the description that the noble Lord used. My old ward was full of honest, hard-working folk, who had aspirations to improve, as we all do, and I am sure that they would be best recognised in those terms.
Lord Thomas of Gresford: Perhaps that could be corrected in the local newspaper: the Minister referred to "the not-so-posh" part of Brighton. The people who have aspirations, the social climbers of Brighton, to whom the Minister referred, were concerned at the people who were standing outside their house. He took the trouble to explain that this was not a housing estate. What he wants in the Bill is to have the police manage people so that they are moved from this area into the housing estates, no doubt from which they come.
When that is seen in these terms, we see the essential illiberality of these provisions. In this country we have always believed that it is an unwarranted intrusion upon people's liberty to move them on if they are not committing a criminal offence or if there is no imminent likelihood of a breach of the peace. We ask the police not to tell people where to go within our communities; we ask them to investigate and to prevent crime but not to push people about. That is at the heart of this part of the Bill. That is why we on these Benches oppose it so much.
9.15 p.m.
The Lord Bishop of Hereford: I find myself wanting to come to the rescue of the Minister and defend the Government on this particular matter. There is a danger of illiberality and autocratic oppressive action
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by the police. However, there is a real problem of antisocial behaviour, which is why I believe that the word "and" is necessary. It reduces the number of occasions which will qualify for this kind of drastic action. There has to be harassment, intimidation and alarm and distress caused and it has to be in the context of ongoing problems in that particular place, not just one group of exuberant young people on one occasion who are a bit of a nuisance, but serious problems against a background of ongoing irritation, oppression and unpleasantness for people who live or work in that place.
Therefore, I believe that the noble Lord, Lord Dixon-Smith, is wrong to want "and" replaced by "or". I want the "and" to remain. That will mean that these powers will be used less frequently. I also believe that there is a serious issue here. It is no good pretending that it will just go away if we are nice to people. There are occasions when this kind of behaviour has become really quite intimidating and unpleasant and we need legislation to deal with it.
The noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, says that we have provision for dealing with subsection (1)(a). We have, but that will be used in particular cases where appropriate. This is a new piece of legislation needed for a new situation which has arisen. I find myself wanting to support the Minister. Although I understand the purpose of the amendments, I believe they are misguided. The noble Baroness, Lady Massey, did not say who the people would be from the local community. I believe that that sort of provision is properly made in the code of practice. I support the Government on this issue.
Baroness Walmsley: I thank noble Lords from all parts of the House who supported my amendment, in particular the right reverend Prelate—not the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Hereford!
The Minister started off by saying that we are speaking of a situation that exists in the real world. I hope he does not suggest that those who support the amendments do not live in the real world. We have great concerns about the human rights of residents. However, we are concerned about their right to have public services which work in the long term. I am not just moving things away to be sorted out in the short term. The human rights of society are not enhanced when we undermine the rights of individual, young, impressionable people who have done nothing wrong; rather, that undermines their confidence in the law at a time when they are forming their impressions of the fairness of the law. In the long term that is not a good thing.
The Minister said that local people want power. What about the powers of persuasion? Many things are being done by creative local authorities working with members of the community, empowering them, and working with young people, not against them. I believe that the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, put his finger on the button when he spoke of getting the agreement of young people, which works in such situations.

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I thank the Minister for his comments on the issue of the length of time that a dispersal order should he put in place. I am afraid that I still believe that six weeks will concentrate the minds of those who need to address the underlying problems of young people with nothing to do gathering on street corners and intimidating other people. It may be a nuisance if they have to keep going back for a renewal, but perhaps it will be the kind of prod that makes them do something that will work in the long term.
On the local authority having to give agreement, agreement means accountability and ownership. The local authority actually represents local people. They voted for it. Therefore, if we want to give power back to the people, asking for the local authority's agreement is not unreasonable.
However, I thank the noble Lord for his comments. We shall take away and consider his remarks, but we may very well return to this issue later in the Bill. Meanwhile, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendments Nos. 146 to 148 not moved.]
Baroness Walmsleymoved Amendment No. 149:
Page 26, line 18, leave out ", or is likely to result,"
The noble Baroness said: In moving Amendment No. 149, I shall speak also to Amendments Nos. 150 and 153 in my name and support Amendment No. 155 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Dixon-Smith.
Amendment No. 149 is intended to ensure that the order to disperse is proportionate to the problem—a concern highlighted by the Joint Committee on Human Rights, as has been mentioned. We want to ensure that the power to disperse will be available only where it is clear that intimidation, harassment, alarm or distress has actually taken place, not just that someone thinks it might, as one or two noble Lords mentioned when dealing with the previous group. Therefore, this amendment removes the words "or is likely to result".
In its scrutiny of the Bill the JCHR commented that,
"the potential intrusion on private life and liberty is so extensive and the benefits in any case likely to be so speculative that it might be difficult to establish either in general or in specific cases that the powers granted under clause 29 of the Bill will or would be used only when it was proportionate to a pressing social need. A constable or community support officer who considers using these powers will be in a difficult position, without much guidance from the legislation as to when and how he or she should exercise them".
That does not sound like a vote of confidence. This really gets to the heart of our objection to this part of the Bill. And we are not alone; all the children's charities agree with us. It is not proportionate to remove someone from an area or take them home if they are simply there. If they are committing a crime while there, as I said earlier, there are already powers to deal with that.
Amendments Nos. 150 and 151 make the area for the authorisation much more specific than it is in the Bill. "Locality" can mean a very big area of land—a whole town centre. The present drafting makes it too easy for a constable to demand that a group leaves the
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whole of a locality, even if that is excessive. The area from which the group must disperse should he more clearly specified by the officer and this should appear on the face of the Bill.
Amendment No. 152 reduces the period of time for which a person is banned from returning to a specified area from 24 to eight hours. Given that the purpose is to disperse the group, it is not necessary to prevent a person coming back to the area the next day— 23.5 hours later. Eight hours is much more reasonable, especially given that these situations normally arise at night.
Amendment No. 153 reduces the period of banned time from the period from 9 p.m. to 6 a.m., which we believe to be excessive, to the period from I a.m. to 5 a.m. The current Bill would prevent young people from carrying out a paper round, which is surely to be encouraged as long as it is done safely.
I also support Amendment No. 155, of the noble Lord, Lord Dixon-Smith. It is not good enough to allow a police officer to take a child home even if he thinks he may come to a modicum of harm. The test should be any harm, not significant harm. The whole issue of taking children home also has human rights as well as child protection implications. I know that my noble friend Lady Linklater of Butterstone has great concerns about that. The police's approach to young children out in the street late at night should be from the point of view of child protection. Those are children at risk and the police should have the responsibility to treat them as such and work with other relevant agencies to ensure their welfare.
Although we understand the Minister's concern to catch potential offenders while they are young to divert them from the path that leads them into the criminal justice system, this part of the Bill has not been fully thought through. Perhaps the Minister would explain how the measure would fit into the system to protect children. I beg to move.
Lord Dixon-Smith: I tabled Amendments Nos. 154 to 156 and 160, which are grouped. Amendment No. 154, a simple little amendment on which I hope that the Government will at the least give assurances. would leave out "6" and insert "5". It was tabled for the simple reason that many young lads start their paper rounds between 5 and 6 a.m. As the Bill is drafted, even if they had no nefarious intent, technically a policeman could pack them off home. That is unreasonable. If the Government give me an absolute assurance that the police would never act against a boy with a sack of papers over his shoulder, I shall be content. However, I thought that I should make that significant point, which the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, also picked up.
Amendment No. 155 deals with the question of taking a child home when he may receive harm. Frankly, I find it appalling that a policeman might take a child home when he might receive any harm, but how do we define significant harm? I do not know what is significant harm. In my experience, from wherever you are standing, there is always someone

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who is worse off and someone who is better off than you. If significant harm is always something worse, it is a question of where you start from. That applies to health, age and everything else.
In this instance, the adjective is inappropriate. We are talking about a known risk—we can do nothing about an unknown risk. If there is a known risk that if taken home, the child will be liable to harm, the idea that the harm must be significant is a difficult concept. I should rather the word were removed.
Amendment No. 156 would insert the words:
"'relevant locality' means that area which the constable believes is reasonable bearing in mind the number of people and the circumstances".
The provision is all about designating areas with the agreement of local authorities. Later, we shall ask for the magistrates' courts also to be involved. But unless that designated area is small and tightly defined, the relevant area for the purposes of moving people on may be smaller than the designated area. There should be an element of discretion. Amendment No. 156 would provide that.
Amendment No. 160 is significant. Wherever action is taken to move people on, it is essential— I stress that—that it be recorded.
At the moment, that requirement is not in the Bill. Again, the Minister may assure me that the police would have to record that information in the normal course of duty. However, it is not required under the Bill. The Committee should require an answer to that issue. The idea that someone could move people on without the incident being recorded, with the result that nobody would know that it had happened, is intolerable. That applies particularly when dealing with persistent anti-social behaviour, as it is very important to know when such behaviour is persisting, and even more important to know when it is no longer a problem. That would be measured by the absence of records of the need for action.
These are small amendments, but they are significant. I hope that the Government will consider them favourably, or at least assure me that they will be covered properly in the normal course of police activity.
9.30 p.m.
Lord Bassam of Brighton: I shall deal with the amendments in this group, including the government amendment, Amendment No. 163. We have had a general debate on the issue, so I shall deal with the specifics.
Amendment No. 149 prevents a constable using the power if he has reasonable grounds for believing that the presence or behaviour of groups will result in members of the public being intimidated, harassed, alarmed or distressed. It is essential that a constable or community support officer has powers to prevent members of the public being affected in that way, and to prevent intimidation, harassment, alarm or distress occurring. I ask all Members of the Committee who have been involved in the debate to bear in mind that
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the powers are available only in areas where there has been a history of intimidation, harassment, alarm or distress, and a significant and persistent problem of anti-social behaviour. The two are linked, as the right reverend Prelate described correctly. It is a rigorous test, as it must be.
I wish to nail the issue of whether the legislation is intended to be used only against young people. There has been a whole current of suggestions from the Liberal Democrat Benches that that is the motivation for the legislation. It is not the primary, or only, motivation for introducing the clauses. I return to the example that I gave of street corners being overtaken by racists in some cities, and of powers such as these being proportionate to dealing with the problems that racists can cause in towns, cities and communities. The provision will be a very helpful tool in the fight against such racist activity. It is a matter on which Members of the Committee need to reflect.
The noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, tabled two amendments, Amendments Nos. 150 and 151, to clarify the terms of the direction. The Government agree with the noble Baroness that the constable or community support officer giving the direction will need to make clear the locality to which the direction applies. We also agree that the locality to which the direction applies should be linked to preventing intimidation, harassment, alarm or distress, and should not be unnecessarily large. That is why the constable or community support officer has the option of giving a direction that applies only to part of the relevant locality. Both issues will be covered further in the code of practice issued under Clause 34. That is very important because, in putting together the code of practice, we will wish to ensure that we get it right, and to listen to concerned voices, such as children's charities and local authorities.
The Government consider that a direction should be able to prevent a return to the locality for a period of up to 24 hours. The noble Baroness says that the period should be eight hours. The Government want to prevent groups merely reconvening a few hours later and continuing to cause the public harassment, alarm or distress of the sort that I described earlier. We believe that 24 hours strikes that balance. We hope that the chance of a further direction will deter people from gathering in areas where they cause problems for local communities in a very persistent and continued way.
The power to take children home will help the police to protect local communities from the alarm and distress groups of children can cause. It will also protect children and young people from the risks posed by being unaccompanied late at night, not least that they might themselves become involved in or become the victims of anti-social or criminal behaviour. It is worth remembering that it is young people who are most likely to be victims in those circumstances.
Amendment No. 153 seeks to limit severely the times during which this power may be used to a period from 1 a.m. to 5 a.m. There are severe risks with young

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people being out unaccompanied at such a late time. Most of us in your Lordships' House would be very concerned if teenagers from our families were out at that hour of the night. For the police not to have this power available for children out as late as 11 p.m. or midnight could put them at risk.
Amendment No. 154 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Dixon-Smith, seeks to limit the times during which this power may be used to a period from 9 p.m. to 5 a.m. This is the noble Lord's paper-round amendment. It made me think about when I had a paper round in my teens. I do not remember being up at 5 a.m. and my round included the local police constable's house. If he had seen me at that hour of the day, he would have reported me to my mother in a state of shock. This measure is not intended to catch young people delivering newspapers, and it is highly unlikely to be used in those circumstances. It is not what the measure is intended to catch, as I think the noble Lord in all truth and honesty knows.
Lord Dixon-Smith: I am sorry to intervene, but the problem is not so much 5 a.m., but 5.55 a.m., if we are to be pedantic about these things. The Minister is hedging on giving an assurance that the measure would not be used in this way. He said that he thought that it would not. I would have thought that he could be perfectly plain.
Lord Bassam of Brighton: Let us say that it is not our intention that the measure would be used in that way, and I think that the noble Lord understands that.
We could have a lengthy debate on when this power should be available to the police. We believe that the Bill as drafted strikes the right balance. I stress that this is a discretionary power. We recognise that young people, on occasion, have a legitimate reason to be out at night unsupervised. The police will have discretion to return home only those about whom they are concerned and who do not have a legitimate reason for being there.
As currently drafted, a police officer or CSO can take a child home if he has reasonable grounds to believe that the child would be,
"likely to suffer significant harm".
Amendment No. 155 moved by the noble Lord, Lord Dixon-Smith, amends this test to "likely to suffer harm". I understand that he wishes to be entirely accurate about the terminology and get something that is easily understood. However, the term "significant harm" is well understood and appears in legislation such as the Children Act 1989 and we see no advantage in amending it. A definition can be found in Section 46(1) of that Act, so it is understood in law already. I invite the noble Lord to check the reference because it may reassure him that the definition is well used.
Amendment No. 156 moved by the noble Lord defines "relevant locality" as the,
"area which the constable believes to be reasonable bearing in mind the number of people involved and the circumstances of the groups".
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The Government agree that the constable or community support officer on the ground must decide the precise area from which the group must disperse, provided that it is within a larger area authorised in advance by the superintendent. Clause 30(4) allows the constable or community support officer to disperse a group from part of the relevant locality. For example, the relevant locality could be a whole housing estate, and it would be for the constable or community support officer to decide the exact streets from which the groups must disperse. That makes sense; it does not help anybody if the area is too extensive. An operational decision must be made, and that decision is best left to the constable or community support officer in the circumstances.
Amendment No. 160 would ensure that an officer giving a direction records that direction. We agree with the principle that officers should record directions given. Such issues will be covered in the code of practice to be issued under Clause 34. We think that it is a matter of best practice and invite the noble Lord, Lord Dixon-Smith, to agree. In those circumstances, it would not be appropriate to make the amendment. The officers will want to ensure that good practice is understood and that people working throughout the criminal justice system understand the importance of recording and notifying all those involved.
Clause 35 extends the provisions in this part to the British Transport Police. Amendment No. 163, a government amendment, updates a cross-reference to the Railways and Transport Safety Act 2003.
I invite the noble Baroness not to press the amendment, in light of the explanation that I have given.
Baroness Walmsley: We accept that the Bill is not just about young people; the same arguments apply to the human right of anybody, of whatever age, not to be moved on by a policeman simply because they are there. Exactly the same things apply, no matter how old people are.
I thank the noble Lord for his comments on the subject of the relevant area or locality. We will examine the code of practice and come back to it, if we are still not happy about it, at a later stage.
The noble Lord said that, if the Bill did not specify a period of 24 hours, people prohibited from an area would go away for a few hours and come back again. We are proposing a period of eight hours: that is a long time to go down to the pub and have a few drinks before coming back to hang around and intimidate people. It will not happen; it will be the following morning by then.
We discussed the issue of taking children home. If a young child is out at midnight, he is at risk, and the appropriate agencies should be called. That is what it boils down to. I was interested in what the Minister said about the definition of significant harm in the Children Act 1989. We will examine it and, perhaps, come back to it at a later stage.

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Despite the Minister's attempts to satisfy us on those issues, we are still unhappy. Undoubtedly, we will come back to them at a later stage, but, for the moment, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendments Nos. 150 to 156 not moved.]
On Question, Whether Clause 30 shall stand part of the Bill?
9.45 p.m.
Baroness Walmsley: Clauses 30 to 36 inclusive should not stand part of the Bill. As I said, I am not alone in thinking that. Not only are my colleagues in your Lordships' House—note the galaxy of talent arrayed beside and behind me on these Benches—and in another place all behind me in that, but Liberty, Barnardo's and the list of bodies that my noble friend Lady Sharp of Guildford read out earlier are all opposed to the provisions of Part 4 because of the detrimental impact that they will have on children and communities. The JCHR believes the powers to take children home to be illegal under human rights law; the Association of Chief Police Officers does not want these powers either; and the Local Government Association has major concerns. That is a very wide range of constituencies.
On these Benches, we do not condone crime. Anyone who claims that we do, and campaigns against us on such an allegation, is not just lying, but is undertaking the worst kind of politics. Nor do we underestimate the impact that seriously disruptive behaviour can have on people's lives. We do not want to be soft on crime, but to be effective on crime in the long term. I think that that is what the public want too. People want measures that work. We believe that these measures will not work and could be damaging to young people and communities.
We are aware that many people's lives are made a misery by anti-social behaviour, which must be addressed. But for the sake of local residents, it must be addressed by effective measures. For the sake of young people, it must be addressed by measures that do not alienate and demonise them. However, the proposals on dispersal will simply increase local tension between those in positions of authority and young people and their families, as well as those who are harassed, without effectively tackling the root causes of anti-social behaviour. We urge the Government to reconsider their proposals and to consult with all members of the community. They must listen to children and young people about the most effective ways of reducing anti-social behaviour, while offering children and families the help that they need.
Young people need to understand how threatening they can be to old people. Moving them on just does not do that. If the legislation is passed, it could even lead to a three-month prison sentence for failure to comply. Most civilised countries in Western Europe would be horrified by such a proposal. Most young people behave well. Those who hang about on street
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corners do not want to be there. If asked why they are there, they will say that they are too broke to go to the cinema; or in the case of my home town, there is no cinema, and no bus to get to one. They may say that there is nowhere else to go to meet their mates: there is no youth club, no leisure centre—or just one that is closed or inadequate for their needs—and no coffee bar, with its funny Pyrex cups that are now becoming collector's items, like the ones in which I used to hang out during the 1960s. There is nothing.
Part 4 revisits existing provisions to impose area-based child curfew notices, first introduced under Section 14 of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998—a power which, to date, has not been used. This part of the Bill is an unnecessary extension of an existing unused and discredited power. We have been reminded today that local child curfew notices, under the Crime and Disorder Act, were framed by the Government as protective measures for children and young people and as a support to parents. The new measures in the Bill reverse the presumption; they view children and young people as primarily a problem rather than in need of protection.
Why? I believe that it is the easy option. Doing the job more creatively requires more thought, more partnership and more resources. The power of dispersal is an easy way to fail to tackle the problem and to move it somewhere else. These new powers on dispersal of groups do not include any requirement to consult the local community, including children, young people and their families. I hope that the Government will accept the amendment proposed by the noble Baroness, Lady Massey of Darwen.
The proposal removes power from the local community—a strange contradiction of the ethos of the White Paper statement that,
"to tackle anti-social behaviour we must ensure that the community sets clear standards of behaviour".
The Joint Committee on Human Rights highlighted major concerns. On removing children to their place of residence, the JCHR states:
"Despite the safeguards to which the Government refers, we are not satisfied that the measures in Clause 30(6) of the Bill are a proportionate response to a pressing social need, or that the safeguards provide assurance that the power would be used only where it is necessary and proportionate to do so to protect the child. We therefore conclude that there is a risk of incompatibility with ECHR Article 5 (right to liberty). 8 (right to respect for a private life) and 11 (freedom of association)".
Furthermore, the children's charities, for whom all noble Lords have great respect, have highlighted that the power to take children home would contravene Articles 15 and 31 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, which guarantee children freedom of association and the right to leisure, recreation and cultural activities.
Members on these Benches are concerned about the subjectivity of the powers, raising the possibility that they could be misused. Dispersal need not be on the basis that anti-social behaviour has occurred, but that the mere presence of a group is capable of resulting in alarm or distress in a member of the public. There are

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muscular young men in the gym where I exercise who are capable of causing alarm and distress to me, but I do not expect them to be moved on for my sake.
Although the dispersal should take place only in an area where anti-social behaviour has been a persistent problem, there is nothing to stop perfectly law-abiding people who happen to be in the area at the time, doing no one any harm, being targeted by an over-zealous police officer and moved along with the rest. They may have had nothing whatsoever to do with the previous offences that caused the area to be designated as one where persistent anti-social behaviour takes place. What kind of police state does it make us when it becomes a criminal offence to walk down the street?
We are also very concerned about the potential negative impact on local community relations. The Association of Chief Police Officers is concerned about the effect these powers might have on relations with ethnic minority communities. The street culture of young black people means that they are more likely than are young white people to gather on the street and therefore more likely to be targeted by these powers, potentially reopening tensions with the police that have been fading away in many areas due to hard work on the part of the police and co-operation from communities. It would be a great pity to destroy that work.
The Local Government Association believes that these proposals may simply displace problems from one area to another. It has pointed out that local authorities deliver key services such as youth offending teams, youth work, social services, education and highways. The intervention of these services will be necessary to achieve in the longer term a reduction in anti-social behaviour with the groups from the dispersed area, if the problem is not simply to be moved elsewhere. It is also important to ensure that decisions to invoke an order should be taken only where police commanders and local authorities are convinced that all alternative interventions have failed.
For young people, hanging around and showing off is normal behaviour. It does not mean that they are up to no good. Those that are can be dealt with under existing powers. The statute book is bulging with public order legislation. We need to build trust between young people and the police, not erode it through powers like this. The powers will also be ineffective. What is to stop a child taken home from coming out again as soon as the officer's back is turned? What is to stop members of a group that has been dispersed from going and causing trouble somewhere else? Unless you find out why they are there, explain to them how their presence makes others feel and give them something better to do, simply dispersing them is a terribly negative way of dealing with what we accept is a problem. But we need effective ways, not easy ways. I oppose the Question that Clause 30 should stand part of the Bill.
Lord Thomas of Gresford: I rise to support my noble friend in opposing this clause and this whole part of the Bill, which really is the "move along" part. I have been
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considering some of the comments made during the course of this debate. The Minister said that it is time to enter the world of reality, while the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Hereford referred to the fact that there are problems with anti-social behaviour in our cities. There are also problems in the countryside, even in the town of Hereford, as I know.
Following the line just taken by my noble friend, ample legislation is in place to deal with the situation where an offence has been committed or there is the likelihood of an offence taking place. The Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 and the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 would apply with drugs and drunkenness offences. The Public Order Act 1986 would deal with a likely breach of the peace. If an offence is being committed or is likely to be committed, the police have a role. The only effect of these provisions will be to permit the police, if they want to exercise these powers—and of course they never exercised their powers under the child curfew order which we debated at length in 1998—to move a group of people from one area to another.
It is said that we are not dealing only with young people; that other groups of people may fall into this category. I have been trying to think of some. It could include those who wish to demonstrate—not by marching; they would be excluded under subsection (5) providing they had permission—for example, outside a social security office or against a pedestrian crossing. In the course of doing so, some people may feel intimidated, harassed and so on. The provisions in the Bill will impinge on people's rights to do that.
There is racial tension in some areas, sometimes between ethnic groups and sometimes involving white racists and so on. Those kinds of public order issues can be dealt with by the existing legislation without the need for more.
In the face of the opposition to this part of the Bill which has been expressed by all the organisations to which my noble friend referred, and the clear decision of the Joint Committee on Human Rights that these provisions breach Articles 5, 8, 10 and 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights, why do the Government wish to persist? I invite them to withdraw this part of the Bill from the consideration of the House.
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: Many of these issues have already been debated in some detail. I shall try to be as "telegraphic" as the noble Lord, Lord Kingsland, would want me to be if he were in his place. The case against clause stand part was succinctly and elegantly put by the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Hereford.
I have become troubled by the theme running through a number of comments made in relation to Clause 30—that it is an attempt to alienate or demonise young people. Nothing could be further from the truth. I know it is proper that in Committee we should concentrate on each clause as it comes, but we cannot divorce the Bill and these provisions from the plethora of work that we are carrying out right

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across the piece to re-engage young people and to meet their needs in terms of education, social integration and activity after school. In that endeavour the Government are linking arms with civil society. We are involving the churches, non-governmental organisations, local authorities and all people of good will who have at their core the interests of young people and children.
The clause was not fashioned or targeted to bite solely on young people, but to bite on the people in a community who are responsible for the anti-social behaviour which adversely affects others and makes life intolerable for many. I therefore feel that it was absolutely correct for the right reverend Prelate to emphasise how important he feels that "and" is. I respectfully agree.
The combination of those factors means that it should be appropriately difficult to designate areas to which these provisions will apply. We are not talking about people going about their everyday business and being inappropriately dispersed; we are talking about an area which has been designated as an area of acute difficulty and concern for members of the community, where they are seeking relief. And they are entitled to it.
I join issue with the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, in relation to her comments about black young people. Can I reassure her that the people who are part of our black and minority ethnic community are just as passionate about anti-social behaviour and wish to find a means to bring about its cessation as are their white counterparts? I am sure the noble Baroness did not mean to cause offence, but I regret to tell her that some may, on reading her comments, take offence. I am sure, knowing the noble Baroness as I do, that no such offence was intended.
These are temperate provisions which we think give back to communities an ability to reclaim a sense of security. Of course I hear everything that the noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford, says about these matters. We are not turning this into a police state; there will be proper consultation with the local authorities and community groups. I remind noble Lords that in those areas where communities are plagued by anti-social behaviour, there is a hunger for relief—a hunger which we, as legislators, should seek properly to satisfy.
It is not an improper hunger. It is all very well for those of us who have the privilege of living in areas where we are not subjected to the daily harassment and indignity of not being able to go about our everyday business. Some people are terrified to go out of the door because they think they will be jostled and badly treated. There are estates where right-thinking people feel they cannot leave their front door in safety. Some areas have been reclaimed by the use of anti-social behaviour orders, and we aspire to reclaim more of them.
I have some comfort for the noble Lord, Lord Dixon-Smith, and his lonely boy doing a paper round. It is usual for the boy on his bicycle to be on
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his own. Unless he is riding tandem, these provisions will not apply to him because within this area, police and community support officers will have the power to disperse groups of two or more people. Tandem may become the modus operandi for paper boys in the future, but, to my knowledge, that does not appear to be the case yet.
The direction may also include a prohibition on returning to the area for up to 24 hours. We are not going to play ring-around-the-roses with these situations. Eight hours may not always be quite enough. If people are asked to disperse properly, we want them to do so and not come back, and 24 hours is not by any means an unreasonable period.
When the British crime survey of 2002–03 asked what people were most concerned about, 33 per cent of the respondents cited teenagers hanging around in the street as a very or fairly big problem in their area. I take on board everything that has been said about the need for young people to have safe places to play, proper activities and an alternative. I think on the last occasion on which we spoke about this, I gave the example of the experiment in Harrow. People who were complaining about young children took their dog and went to the park with the young children in question, so they were safe, and the problem was solved.
We need innovative, creative responses to social interaction. The work that we are doing in creating the National Criminal Justice Board, and the local criminal justice boards which will enable people to study local needs and think about diversion and alternatives, will, in addition to the improvements and the grants that we are giving, help us to do much.
There is no simple answer; there is no quick fix. We need the full panoply. We need to use every tool available to us to ensure that our communities are safe for young people. The noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, referred to the young people who have been dispersed. She will also know that younger young people are often the most frightened. The bullying that worries some of our very young children of tender years is often visited on them by their older brothers' and sisters' friends. We want to make life safe for all our children—the provisions do not relate only to those who want to behave badly and make life hell for everyone else. It is not only a measure for young people, but for everyone.
This is a very important part of the Bill. We are not dealing here with lawful picketing or any other lawful action. Members of the Committee can read what is said in Clause 30. It ensures that those who are picketing lawfully or participating in a lawful march are not caught by the power.
Clause 31 sets out further details about the process of making an authorisation, giving the police the authority to use the two powers. The authorisation must be in writing, signed by the relevant officer, specify the relevant locality, the grounds for authorisation and the period for which it is valid. There is nothing that says that it has to be for six

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months; that is the outer limit, and it can be reduced if it appears that the ill that most concerned everyone has passed away. The provision is a flexible tool.
It may be a flexible tool, but history has taught us that it is a tool that we need in our armoury. It is not illiberal; it is not against the human rights of the individual; it is trying to create a balance. As regards the Human Rights Act 1998, we have to balance the rights and liberties of one group with the rights and liberties of another. Sometimes those rights conflict and we have to strike a balance. We believe that the balance is about right, and I ask Members of Committee to consider that this is a proper part of the Bill and that the clauses should stand part of the Bill. I ask those on the Liberal Democrat Benches to think again, with a little charity, about what everyone is trying to do, and not to press this further.
The Lord Bishop of Hereford: Before the Minister finishes, could I press her on the matter of human rights? She says that she believes that the provisions are not incompatible. Is she prepared to say categorically that the Joint Committee is wrong in its statement on that issue? That is an area on which I feel concern, and I do not feel that we have had an entirely satisfactory response.
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: In our response to the committee's comments. we set out fully why we believe the provisions to he compatible. I know that it is getting late. I am quite happy to make the response available to the right reverent Prelate if he believes that that would be helpful, and to ensure that a copy is placed in the Library so that all have an opportunity to read it.
To respond properly to the comments made by the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, it would be right for me to go through each and every comment made by the committee. That would be the proper way to respond. However, I have tried to be more telegraphic because it is very difficult at this time of night to ensure that everyone absorbs what I say. Lawyers are always being accused of going on for ever and boring people with technicalities, and I do not want to be found equally guilty. What I have suggested may be the most efficacious way of dealing with the issue. If the right reverend Prelate would be content, I would be more than happy to write to him and to make the response available to everyone else.
Lord Dixon-Smith: If it would help the Minister, I am sure that I am right in saying that the Government's response to the Joint Committee on Human Rights is already available in the Printed Paper Office in the second report on the Bill.
Baroness Walmsley: I thank the Minister for her response. However, may I make a small correction to the very beginning of her remarks? I did not suggest that the Bill was an attempt to alienate and demonise young people. I meant to suggest that young people would be inadvertently alienated and demonised by the measures in the Bill. I am sure that it is not the
1018
Government's intention to alienate and demonise young people, but we think that that will be a consequence if these measures are passed into law.
The Minister talked about the efforts the Government are making to engage young people. Of course we welcome all that. However, it is not completely working, and that is why we have problems. We truly still do not think that these are the ways to do it—because of the unintended consequence of alienating and demonising young people to which I just referred. Of course also, we accept that this is not just about young people. I accept absolutely what the Minister said about younger children sometimes being intimidated by older ones. However, our arguments apply to people of any age.
I turn to the Minister's comments about what I said about black and Asian young people. Of course she is quite correct that there was no intention in my remarks to be offensive in any way. If my actual words are read, I am sure that that will be quite clear. There could be a different interpretation that the noble Baroness had in her head, but, if so, with respect, it was an incorrect one. My remarks were intended to protect young black and Asian people from being inappropriately targeted by the police if they have the powers in the Bill. I thought that I had made that quite clear. Stop-and-search powers cast a very long shadow.
The Minister spoke with the same passion that I feel about the need to provide conditions whereby people can live the peaceful life to which they have a right. I think that we both agree on that. Clearly we disagree about the methods that will be effective in achieving that. I was most interested to hear for a second time—I was not bored by it—the example of Harrow which the Minister mentioned. It is a very good example. However, it did not require the Bill to do it; QED, I think I should say.
On the question of human rights, it is not that I think that the Bill is against the human rights of individuals—it is the experts who think so. 1 t is the Joint Committee on Human Rights which says so. and it is very clear about it.
I thank the Minister for her courtesy in responding to me this evening. I fear that we will come back to these matters later in our consideration.
Clause 30 agreed to.
Clause 31 [Authorisations: supplemental]:
Lord Dixon-Smithmoved Amendment No. 157:
Page 27, line 17, at end insert ", and
(d) must be granted by a magistrates' court"
The noble Lord said: It is only a very short spell of months since we were busy revising the magistrates' courts into an all-singing, all-dancing, all-performing and wonderful social organisation. It struck us that it was a remarkable lacuna in the Bill that they were not to be consulted when these areas were to be designated. After all, in some ways, that sort of judgment is more appropriate to magistrates than it is to a local authority. We consult the local authority. but the magistrates are not involved—although, of course, they clearly would be involved if any court case

1019
subsequently arose as a result of all this. It is a simple little amendment which we thought worth exploring. Why in this particular instance have the magistracy been left out of this particular matter? There may be a good reason for it. If there is, I shall be very interested to hear it. I beg to move.
Baroness Walmsley: I support Amendment No. 157. I am sure that the Committee is quite tired of hearing from me tonight, so I shall be very brief. I think that it is wholly reasonable that a magistrates' court should be able to assess the need for an authorisation and grant it or not as it sees fit. There is a great danger that the police will be able to grant themselves far too much power. To put the magistrates' court into the balance is a suitable check and balance to prevent that.
10.15 p.m.
Lord Bassam of Brighton: As the noble Lord, Lord Dixon-Smith, explained, Amendment No. 157 seeks to move the granting of an authorisation from a senior police officer to a magistrate. This will make the process for granting an authorisation far more lengthy and bureaucratic, as well as costly. Cost is a very important consideration.
There are similar circumstances when the police can authorise powers to be used in a designated area without an application to the courts. One example, which I believe the noble Lord will appreciate, is the power to stop and search for offensive weapons under Section 60 of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994.
Of course, if someone is prosecuted for failure to comply with a direction, they will have the opportunity to challenge whether an authorisation was properly made in the course of their defence.
As the noble Lord said, it is a simple amendment but we believe that it is unnecessary and bureaucratic. We are also somewhat puzzled by the way in which the Conservative Party in the Commons wanted to remove the authorisation entirely. That seems somewhat at odds with the position which the noble Lord adopted in the Committee this evening. He may wish to reflect on that when he reads Hansard and considers whether the amendment is sensible. The noble Baroness expertly seconded, as it were, the noble Lord's move to strike out the provision we are discussing. I hope that the noble Lord will withdraw the amendment.
Lord Dixon-Smith: I am slightly amused by the noble Lord's sally against me because of a slight inconsistency between Members of this House and Members of another place. We are independent of them and we are able to take our own line across country. That is exactly what we have done. We thought that there was a case to answer. To be fair, the noble Lord has answered it. Whether I entirely agree with every word he said is another matter. As I say, we thought that there was a case to answer and I am grateful for the explanation. We shall study that response. In the mean time, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendments Nos. 158 and 159 not moved.]
Clause 31 agreed to.
Clause 32 [Powers under section 30: supplemental]:
[Amendment No. 160 not moved.]
Baroness Walmsleymoved Amendment No. 161:
Page 28, line 8, after "person" insert "unless they are under the age of 18"
The noble Baroness said: In moving Amendment No. 161, I wish to speak also to Amendment No. 162. These amendments are similar in a way to Amendments Nos. 11 and 12 to Part 2 which I moved last week. They are based on our obligation under the UNCRC to treat under-18s differently in the criminal justice system.
Because of the lateness of the hour I shall not repeat all the arguments I advanced last week. Suffice it to say that we believe that a three-month gaol sentence is excessive for a young person who is simply there in a place where an officer thinks he should not be. A fine is also inappropriate. Young people have little income so the fine should, if proportionate, be very small and therefore ineffective. If we must have these measures at all, at least let us have a community sentence which avoids dragging children into prisons and gives them an opportunity to do something useful for their community instead. I beg to move.
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: I say straight away that I share the noble Baroness's concern in tabling Amendments Nos. 161 and 162 that juveniles convicted of knowingly contravening a direction should not face a custodial sentence. I reassure her immediately that a custodial sentence is not an option for juveniles convicted of this offence.
Given the debate we had in relation to Clause 4 of this Bill, perhaps it would he helpful if I made clear that there is no need for the Bill to spell out all the available sentencing options open to a court. The options available to a court dealing with a criminal offence are set out in the Powers of Criminal Courts (Sentencing) Act 2000 (as amended). Options range, in hierarchical order, from imprisonment, community service orders, fines through to conditional and absolute discharges. The legislation creating the offence will spell out the maximum period of imprisonment and the maximum fine which can be imposed, but the sentencing court can of course impose a lesser penalty. The Bill sets the maximum penalty as three months' imprisonment and/or a fine not exceeding level 4 on the standard scale—that is to say £2,500 for an adult, £1,000 for 14 year-olds to 17 year-olds and £250 for 10 year-olds to 13 year-olds.
Detention and training orders, the juvenile equivalent of imprisonment, can be made for a minimum of four months. That means that where the maximum penalty of imprisonment which could be imposed is less than four months, as here, a detention and treatment order is not an option in relation to a juvenile offender. The court will be left with the options of a community sentence, a fine, a conditional discharge or an absolute discharge.

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In the light of that explanation, I hope that the noble Baroness will feel comforted, and I ask her not to press her amendment.
Baroness Walmsley: I am most grateful to the Minister for spelling the matter out so clearly, and for giving a clear reassurance from the Dispatch Box that custodial sentences will not be used for young people. I am sure that the children's organisations will be as reassured as I am. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendment No. 162 not moved.]
Clause 32 agreed to.
Clauses 33 and 34 agreed to.
Clause 35 [Authorisations by British Transport Police]:
Lord Bassam of Brightonmoved Amendment No. 163:
Page 29, line 22, leave out "30(1)(a)" and insert "31(1)(a)"
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 35, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 36 [Interpretation]:
Lord Dixon-Smithmoved Amendment No. 164:
Page 29, line 33, leave out from second "council" to end of line 34.
The noble Lord said: Amendments Nos. 164 and 165 are quite important. Amendment No. 164 would ensure that the police would consult both county and district councils, where both exist, in relation to consideration of dispersal orders. In two-tier local government areas, county councils deliver many key services such as youth offending teams, youth work, social services, education and highways. They are therefore heavily involved in the consequences of the orders, and of course in doing their best to prevent the need for those orders. It therefore seems entirely reasonable that, where two-tier government exists, county councils should be consulted. I hope that the Government will consider that very seriously.
One could argue that the Bill had been drafted in anticipation of our having regional government and unitary authorities across the country. However, there will be a considerable interregnum before that unhappy situation comes about. In the meantime, the county councils are entitled to be consulted as major providers of services in relation to the young people concerned.
Amendment No. 165 would extend the power to apply for an anti-social behaviour order to county councils. The Crime and Disorder Act 1998 created anti-social behaviour orders. In two-tier local government areas, the order then could be applied for only by district councils or the police service. Subsequent legislation has extended the power to the transport police and registered social landlords. We think it would be reasonable to extend the power to county councils in view of the relationship between county and district councils, and in view of the fact that county councils are heavily committed to service
1022
provision to try to prevent the problems and are, in many instances, considerable landlords, although they are not housing authorities and certainly not social housing landlords. It may be superseded by other structural legislation for local government, but we must deal with the structure as it is. Where there is two-tier government, the councils are entitled to have a voice and to act pari passu with district councils. I beg to move.
Baroness Walmsley: I support the noble Lord, Lord Dixon-Smith, but I have nothing to add to his eloquent remarks.
Lord Bassam of Brighton: I agree with the noble Lord that they are important amendments and their effect has been expertly described. Amendment No. 164 requires the police to consult both the county and district councils before granting authorisation for the use of dispersal powers. Amendment No. 165 seeks simply—I say "simply" in parenthesis—to add county councils to the list of relevant authorities which can apply for an anti-social behaviour order.
The Government recognise that county councils have an important role to play in tackling anti-social behaviour and that a number of counties are keen to be pro-active in that area. The amendments would, on the face of it, certainly assist county councils in fulfilling their role. However, we wish to be satisfied that the process involved would not be overly bureaucratic—I have expressed that concern before— or land local authorities and the police service with disproportionate and undue financial burdens. Cost is an important consideration.
Nevertheless, I am happy to give the propositions further thought and we will return to them at a later stage. We accept the points made by the noble Lord and the noble Baroness and wish to give their further consideration because they are important.
I am struck slightly by the irony that the noble Baroness can support the extension of ASBOs to county councils, but has argued against the clause in its entirety. I am sure that she can live with that—
Baroness Walmsley: I live in the real world. We on these Benches may not prevail in the end. Should that unfortunately be the case, we would wish to see the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Dixon-Smith, in the Bill.
Lord Bassam of Brighton: My mother used to say "having your cake and eating it". That sums up the position perfectly.
We are keen to give the matter further thought. We are grateful to the noble Baroness and the noble Lord for bringing forward the amendment, but we hope that they will not press it now.
Lord Dixon-Smith: I am genuinely grateful to the noble Lord for his response and for offering to give further consideration to the amendments. I was aware that there was a financial concern, although it must be

1023
a fairly small one in relation to county councils. That is neither here nor there. It is right that the matter should be examined. I know that my colleagues in local government hope that they will be able to demonstrate that the proposal would be cost-neutral. I look forward to hearing from the Minister again on Report, when I hope to see the amendments tabled in his name. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 36 agreed to.
Clause 37 [Anti-social behaviour orders]:
[Amendment No. 165 not moved.]
Clause 37 agreed to.
Clause 38 [Certain orders made on conviction of offences]:
10.30 p.m.
Baroness Linklater of Butterstonemoved Amendment No. 166:
Page 31, line 41, leave out from beginning to end of line 6 on page 32.
The noble Baroness said: I rise to propose Amendment No. 166 and to speak to Amendment No. 167, which, as Members of the Committee will have noticed, is virtually identical and extends the proposed deletion to Clause 38(4).
The amendment relates to the provision in the Bill which states that, where an ASBO—an anti-social behaviour order—has been imposed by the youth court, the automatic reporting restrictions which currently apply under Section 49 of the Children and Young Persons Act 1933 should be lifted. While the court retains the discretion to apply reporting restrictions in individual cases, the balance has been reversed from what currently obtains, where reporting is automatically restricted unless the court decides otherwise.
The intention of the clause is to make public the details of a young person who is subject to an ASBO, including his or her name, address and school, and so on. with a view to "naming and shaming", to use that unattractive phrase. Not only is the phrase unattractive but so is the motive. Children are rarely shamed into good social behaviour, and I know of no objective or convincing evidence that treating young people in this way and publishing their offence and subsequent order has the effect of deterring future offending behaviour.
I understand that the intention in the Bill is to reassure the community that action is being taken against such young people, and the public will be encouraged to make complaints and inform the police of breaches. But equally well it could increase fear of crime by heightening public awareness. Indeed, there is ample anecdotal evidence that it is more likely to have the detrimental effect of stigmatising the child within the community, impacting on the whole family, including younger siblings, whose vulnerability, as we have already discussed, should also be borne in mind, and impeding community relations—not to speak of
1024
the damaging effect on job prospects and lowered chances of going straight in the community, which is what we all want. There is also a strong possibility of the reverse result—of a kind of notoriety which bestows an anti-hero status on the young person. That, of course, is totally undesirable.
More importantly, Article 40(2) of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child asserts the child's right to privacy,
"at all stages of the proceedings".
That cannot be ignored. Further, Article 8 of the ECHR, concerning the right to a private life, is also relevant, as was demonstrated in the case of The Queen v. The Chief Constable of Essex Police, where the court found that,
"damage could be done to the claimant's family … and the need to safeguard children is particularly important".
As always—here, as often I do, I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Scotland—a balance must be struck. In this case, the potential damage to the family and children outweighs any perceived advantage from publicising the offenders' details in posters. I like to think that the Government could also take that view.
In short, the anonymity of children under 18 should be protected both in their interest and, equally importantly, in the interest of the community as well. unless there is a real issue of public safety. I hope that the Government will seriously reconsider this aspect of the process of the youth court in the interests of the community as well as of the offender, rather than pursue this negative and potentially damaging change. We must look to positive and constructive ways of reducing anti-social behaviour, and I believe that this is not one of them. I beg to move.
The Earl of Listowel: I speak to Amendment No. 167 in my name. I share the deep concern expressed by the noble Baroness, Lady Linklater, about this provision. I recognise the intention behind the Government's proposal, but I am concerned that removing these restrictions, as they propose to do, may be dangerous for children who are subject to anti-social behaviour orders, as the noble Baroness said, and may, as she also said, propel some of them into further criminal and anti-social behaviour.
I recognise the reasons why Her Majesty's Government, housing managers, local communities and many magistrates want to change the normal rules in the juvenile court for the particular circumstances in which an anti-social behaviour order is placed on a child following his conviction for a criminal offence.
However, the end we all seek should not eclipse our concern for the welfare of individual children. The children of whom we speak may, for instance, have smeared faeces in the face of a baby or have so terrorised elderly neighbours that such neighbours are afraid to leave the home or even to turn their lights on at night behind the curtains. They may have chased one parent around her car with a knife while her husband is protecting the children within that vehicle. They may also have grown up with little or no contact with their father. As an infant they may have been left

1025
in their room on their own, daily, for months on end, their mother returning only to scold them for crying. One or other of their parents may have been through a care system within which they experienced 50 or more placements in different foster homes or children's homes over three years before the age of 16 and have been left unable to act as an adequate parent as a consequence. Has enough research been done into the impact of publication of the child's name, address and photograph in the local press on that child and his family? Sometimes the children are as young as 14.
While it is not the intention of Her Majesty's Government to name and shame children, it may be that on some children the effect of social opprobrium will be to shock them into reforming their behaviour. Other children may feel that greater notoriety is an asset and may feel moved to worse behaviour still. Still others may, for various reasons, be moved to harm themselves or to attempt suicide. It may be that some are rejected from the family home as a consequence of publicity. An identified child's family may become the subject of intimidation by members of the local community. Younger siblings may be particularly vulnerable. Anti-social behaviour orders (ASBOs) were introduced about three years ago. 1 would be grateful to the Minister if she could make available to your Lordships the research showing that identifying children subject to ASBOs is safe. I have no doubt that Her Majesty's Government will have been carefully monitoring the impact this controversial measure has had on identified children and their families.
In that context it is especially worrying and, indeed, I think noble Lords may find it wholly unacceptable that some adult courts currently do not have access to good quality information on the family circumstances of a child before making this decision on whether to lift reporting restrictions. A principal legal officer of a magistrates' court has expressed her concern that the court relies for its advice simply on the child's solicitor. She points out that a solicitor is likely to have spoken to the child and parent only outside the family home. She states that not all solicitors are as diligent at inquiring into the family background as they need to be. In other proceedings dealing with vulnerable minors the courts have reports from social care professionals who have visited the child's home. Is the Minister aware of the concern that magistrates are not being adequately informed before making these momentous decisions? If so, what is being done to address that? I apologise to the Minister for not giving her notice of this question and I understand if she would prefer to write to me on this detailed point.
Given the lateness of the hour, I shall edit my speech. I respect the Minister's real desire to improve the quality of life for all of those living in sometimes our most deprived areas by sharing widely information on these children with their communities. However, how can we be expected to support the extension of these measures to juvenile courts when the current arrangements in the adult court appear most unsatisfactory? Surely. Her Majesty's Government should radically reform the procedures in the adult court before proceeding further and we should be
1026
provided with information to assure us that the identification of children—often very vulnerable and young—in the adult courts has been safe for these children and the families involved. 1 look forward to the Minister's response.
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: I say straightaway that I very much echo the concern just expressed about difficult situations in which children have developed into individuals who then exhibit anti-social behaviour to others. We know that often that is a direct result of the way that they have been nurtured—or rather, have not been nurtured—by others. That is a significant issue.
We are trying to remove an anomaly in the provision by bringing reporting restrictions for orders on conviction in the youth court into line with anti-social behaviour orders made in the magistrates' court. As the noble Baroness, Lady Linklater, so clearly said, anti-social behaviour orders made against juveniles in the magistrates' court at the moment are not subject to automatic reporting restrictions.
I can reassure the noble Baroness that the court will retain the discretion to apply reporting restrictions where it believes that to be appropriate; for example, in the interests of the rehabilitation of the child. If the noble Baroness looks at new subsection (9C)(b) in Clause 38(3), she will see that Section 39 of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998—the power to prohibit publication of certain matters—still applies. The noble Baroness will know that Section 39 of the Children and Young Persons Act 1933 provides:
"In relation to any proceedings in any court … the court may direct that … no newspaper report of the proceedings shall reveal the name, address, or school, or include particulars calculated to lead to the identification, of any child",
and,
"(b) no picture shall be published in any newspaper as being or including a picture of any child … except in so far (if at all) as may be permitted by the direction of the court".
That provision has been in being since 1933. precisely to protect children and to have the balance, but also to permit proper identification and publicity if that proves to be necessary. So, although we are lifting the provision in relation to anti-social behaviour orders in terms of the presumption, the court's ability to protect the child, if the court feels on the facts of that particular case that it is merited, is there and retained. We believe that that is very important.
We hope these anti-social behaviour orders will be relatively rare. The noble Baroness and the noble Earl will know that in many cases they have been most successful when the ringleader of any group has been targeted and dealt with. Many of the other young people who have gathered around that person either melt away or become more amenable to being dealt with. It is a matter of huge concern and distress that there are some young people who have been very damaged. They are very destructive, not only to themselves but to others. One way of trying to address that is to take different opportunities to try and change that behaviour.

1027
We know from our research and the Home Office review of ASBOs—the Home Office review of April 2002—that the opportunity to use publicity properly has on occasion been very useful in addressing these issues. For example, we know of one solicitor for Salford council, who considered that one of the most significant aspects of obtaining an anti-social behaviour order is the ability to publicise it. In one case a witness outreach team in Salford spoke to a resident living on an estate, who was troubled by anti-social behaviour and the perpetrators were a gang of youths.
They received press coverage when they were given anti-social behaviour orders. The residents said that the publicity prevented the youths from further intimidating the community, because the youths knew that if they breached the order, that breach would be reported, because everyone in the community was aware of the orders. That actually worked to help the children. So they are not to be used just to help the community. As I think that the noble Baroness and the noble Earl will both agree, doing that which will cause or help the children to change that behaviour is also beneficial to them—keeping not only the community but them safe.
We have also seen that in the wonderful work done in Slade Green in Kent. Before Slade Green was branded as a community safety action zone, only 22 per cent of the residents questioned said that they felt safe at night. Nine months later, 93 per cent of the residents questioned felt safe at night.
They had made judicious use of ASBOs that had been publicised in a way that was creative for the community. It is something of wonder that an area that felt totally unsafe, in which no one wanted to be housed, now has a waiting list. That community is feeling confident, but that is also creating an environment in which children who had previously engaged in very bad behaviour appear to be behaving better because the community has spoken with one voice.
I absolutely understand the concerns of the noble Baroness and the noble Earl, but we will have the security of knowing that the court will decide. I take the noble Earl's point about the importance of the courts having the information that they need to reach an informed decision on whether it is proper to make an order restricting publicity, but it has tended to be only in cases involving the extreme perpetrator that the tool of publicity has been used to try to curb behaviour. That has not stigmatised children inappropriately.
As the noble Baroness said, one tragedy is that for some such children that is not an issue for them; it is an issue for other people. We must try to reclaim them but, using the power that we have retained with the 1933 Act, we shall probably be able to do that.
10.45 p.m.
The Earl of Listowel: I thank the Minister for her reply. I shall read carefully the Home Office research to which she referred. I think that she may want to speak further, so I give way.
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: Just to say that if I find any further or other research that could help and/or answer more specifically the points made by the noble Earl, I shall certainly write to him and make copies of the letter available to all those who have participated in the Committee.
Baroness Linklater of Butterstone: I thank the Minister for that full, well-argued and thoughtful response. I am also grateful to the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, for his eloquent description of how families can be affected and sucked into situations in which there is great potential for damage.
I was well aware of what the noble Baroness reminded us: that under the new provision courts retain discretion to have reporting restrictions in place. That leaves me unclear why the position has been reversed at all. The noble Baroness has already demonstrated her awareness of the sensitivity of the situation; my case is that automatic restrictions should apply unless the court decides otherwise. Once again, it is a matter of balance.
I have listened to the debate with great interest; I shall read it with interest in Hansard. In the meantime, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendment No. 167 not moved.]
Clause 38 agreed to.
Clause 39 [Penalty notices for disorderly behaviour by young persons]:
Baroness Linklater of Butterstonemoved Amendment No. 168:
Page 32, line 29, leave out subsection (2).
The noble Baroness said: In moving the amendment, I shall speak also to Amendments Nos. 169 to 171. Given the lateness of the hour, perhaps I might suggest that the debate on these amendments and the debate on the Question whether Clause 39 shall stand part be rolled into one, if that meets with the Committee's approval.
Noble Lords: Yes.
Baroness Linklater of Butterstone: Thank you very much. The Bill extends the scope of fixed penalty notices for disorderly behaviour downwards to 16 and 17 year-olds, and so treats those young people as adults.
When the scheme was introduced for over 18s under the Criminal Justice and Police Act 2001, it was also to be piloted and evaluated in four force areas. As I understand it, that evaluation has not been completed or the outcomes assessed. It therefore seems overhasty to consider the extension before its initial effectiveness has been clarified. However, whatever

1029
the results of the pilots, the fact is that people in this age group are still not adults, even if they believe that they are. Amendment No. 168 seeks, therefore, to delete the subsection lowering the age to 16.
More worryingly, the Bill provides the power in Clause 39(3), by affirmative resolution procedure, to extend the age group still further to children as young as 10. Amendment No. 170, therefore, proposes that the subsection be firmly deleted—if a deletion can be even more firm the second time around—on the grounds that children of that age simply cannot understand the full consequences of accepting a fixed penalty notice, whatever the outcomes of the pilots for 16 and 17 year-olds. That extension should simply not be an option. An FPN should be issued only if the child gives informed consent. It is stretching credulity that children of that age have the capacity to understand what the consequences or relevance of a fixed penalty notice will he. Certainly, the police operational guidelines in the current piloting in relation to adults states:
"A penalty notice will not be appropriate where the suspect appears to be unable to understand what is being offered to them".
How much more likely is that to be true of young people, let alone 10 year-olds?
Furthermore, there are real risks of labelling such vulnerable children and opening the door wider to the possibilities of' further offending. It is not a device that enables positive social behaviour or ensures the sort of protection that such children actually need.
Amendment No. 171 is a logical extension for the protection of young people that they may be offered a fixed-penalty notice by a police officer only where the child is accompanied by an appropriate adult and additionally should also have the right to legal advice. Again, the notice may be issued only if the young person gives informed consent, as is consistent with code C of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 code of practice, which applies to under 17 year-olds. We believe that that should also apply to under 18 year-olds, as children aged 17 seem to have been missed out.
We are also unclear how a fixed penalty notice will impact on an ASBO and other court disposals on a child. I would be grateful if the Minister could illuminate that.
I wish now to oppose the Question that Clause 39 stand part of the Bill. I have already outlined our objections to Clause 39, and the extension of the fixed penalty notice to young people aged 16 and 17 for disorderly behaviour during the discussion of the amendments, so I shall not rehearse them. It is clear that the purpose of the adult fixed penalty notices scheme is to deal quickly and effectively with low-level anti-social and nuisance offending, to encourage community involvement and to cut down on the burden of administration, which uses up so much valuable police time. Those objectives are completely understandable, and we have no quarrel with them where adults are concerned.
However, we take issue with the fact that, in the interests of swift justice, the protections provided in law for children and young people have been
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sacrificed. It is not a sacrifice that we should even contemplate. We have already heard from my noble friend Lady Walmsley about how damaging, divisive and counter-productive are the clauses on the dispersal of groups. However, if we can stand back and ask why such groups are there and what is needed to remove their wish or need to be threatening or intimidating, we will find that dispersing and moving on people simply for being somewhere and for what they might do does not address any of the problems of anti-social behaviour. It merely displaces them along with the young people, which is the argument that we have been making about displacement. When the problem has gone up a notch and the police are contemplating fixed penalty notices, the problems begin to be compounded.
I know that the Minister is as committed as anyone to protecting the vulnerable—especially children—and to promoting harmony in our communities, and we share those aims. However, the major flaw in this part of the Bill is that the steps being proposed will achieve none of those objectives. Indeed, the danger is that, by widening the net of sanctions—I believe that we sometimes use the phrase "sanction creep"—to include younger people whose lives and lifestyles betray all sorts of inadequacies, the measures will increase the likelihood of them being drawn further into youth offending and the criminal justice system. We have been talking this evening about behaviour that is essentially not criminal—about being in a place where people are being intimidated—yet we this evening talk about youth justice and criminal justice. If we look back in Hansard, I am sure that we will find that the language has slipped. That is where the danger lies.
The very principle of blurring the boundaries between adults, young people and children immediately runs counter to the established codes of PACE—especially Code C—which are precisely designed to safeguard young people against early contact with the criminal law. Everything that we can do in that regard also safeguards the law-abiding majority in our communities. What is certain. as sure as night follows day, is that the younger the age at which those involved in anti-social behaviour become involved with youth offending, the more certain they are to reoffend, with all the consequences that flow from that. We override these sensible, existing legal precautions at our peril.
Furthermore, this group is already discriminated against in relation to financial and other benefits. Such young people are less likely than their less vulnerable peers to be in either school or work and will come under disproportionate pressure in comparison with adults when it comes to paying fixed penalties. Transferring the burden to parents raises the question of how the payment will be enforced and of what provisions will exist for looked-after children, who are the responsibility of the local authority. It increases the risk of children coming into care if the parents cannot or will not pay, and thus of spreading the criminalising net still further. Therefore, this proposal is especially

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inappropriate and discriminatory as a sanction and I hope that the Government will not pursue this line of attack.
There is a real danger of employing politically attractive strategies which are simple, speedy and visible in the hope that they will reassure the electorate that action is being taken, regardless of whether a problem has really been addressed or has simply been moved elsewhere. The Minister has already put her finger on the problem when she said that there is no quick fix in these situations. Dealing with many of the root problems of anti-social behaviour is anything but simple. They take time to resolve, which does not help those who want to see some immediate response and solution.
What works in this context is particularly dangerous if it takes place in a moral vacuum, as I tried to indicate in my comments on the dispersal of groups. Truly effective action must take account of the bigger picture and the long-term outcome. We have an increasing range of imaginative measures now being developed, born of increased co-operation and inter-agency working, with schools, the police, voluntary agencies, social services and the engaging of communities, as well as involving legal sanctions for the seriously criminal, which can produce real change.
I am really interested in some of the new initiatives—the new youth inclusion support panels. for example—and wonder to what extent the Government are seriously resourcing and implementing the necessary infrastructure to be sure that they have an impact. We have probation boards, criminal justice boards and a welter of agencies with changing names that confuse outsiders such as myself.
Having spent years as a magistrate, particularly as a children's panel member in Scotland, I know how crucial early interventions and decisions can be in determining the path of a vulnerable child's life. The involvement of community groups and diversion from criminal justice routes can he vital. The police and youth offending teams have their place in preventive and supportive work, but agencies with generic child welfare skills are key and must work alongside them. That would prevent the criminalising of children who had never committed an offence anyway. That is the heart of the matter.
I look forward to hearing and understanding more from the Minister on what concrete financial and practical plans there are in that regard. Good intentions are not enough. Above all—I return to the theme that we have all discussed this evening—we must consult those young people, as it is with them that the solutions lie. As I said, we cannot enforce respect or mutual care and understanding; people must experience it for themselves. We must find ways to give young people that experience. Whatever the root causes of the difficulties, whether they are caused by boredom, having nowhere to go or by real difficulties—learning difficulties, social or emotional difficulties, addiction, abuse or domestic violence— the clause will do nothing to change them. Hence our resistance to it. I beg to move.
11 p.m.
Lord Dixon-Smith: Amendment No. 169 overlaps with the amendments in the group. We are not part of the movement against the clause.
I have no difficulty with the idea of moving the age for fixed penalties down to 16. There is, after all, a proposal that the voting age be lowered to 16 under examination at present. Someone who might be entitled to vote at 16 should be prepared to pay a fixed penalty and to do some of the other things that come later in the Bill. I shall return to that argument.
The amendment is designed to deal with the problem of lowering the age further by order. I considered carefully the question of whether the Bill provided sufficient protection. The clause requires an order with the approval of both Houses of Parliament, and so it could be argued that that provides sufficient protection against rash action by a Minister. Then I considered the nature of the order procedure in this House, in parallel with the other place. We cannot propose amendments to orders or change them. We either approve them or, at a push, reject them. although, by custom and practice, it is rare for the House to do so.
Because of that procedure, the matter ought to be the subject of primary legislation. I cannot envisage a situation in which a Minister would propose something as radical as this in the short-term future, and it would be remarkable if it were not possible to introduce another Bill that covered the issue at some point in two, three, five, eight or 10 years' time. For that reason, I thought that it would be prudent to excise the relevant part of the clause. That is the reason for the amendment, and I hope that the Government will consider it valid.
The Earl of Listowel: I shall speak to Amendment No. 168. I am particularly concerned at the impact of fixed penalty notices on looked-after children. Briefly, before addressing that issue, I should like to turn back to tools, to which the Minister has referred throughout the proceedings. I recognise the feeling in many communities that something needs to be done, but it seems that nothing can be done. There need to be new tools to do that.
One must also remember the concern often raised about the rise in the number of prison inmates since 1992. While there has been a decline in crime since 1992, there has been a steady increase in the number of prison inmates and a sharp increase in the number of children in custody. Part of that is put down to the well-intentioned introduction of new tools, which, in some cases, have appeared to act as a means of widening the net to embrace children and adults who would not otherwise have been involved with the criminal justice system.
Secondly, I turn to the possible impact of fixed penalty notices on families. I remember visiting a hostel run by Centre Point. I saw two 16 or 17 year-old girls, who, as I understood it, had been pushed out of their family by their step-father. One must consider the impact of fixed penalty notices on families who may

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not be too happy to have their children in the family anymore. It does not just apply to this clause, hut to other clauses in which the fixed penalty notice is mentioned.
In North London, there is a mediation service for homeless children alone in London. It has a special residence where it provides mediation services for these children. Often, it finds that parents do not want their children back—possibly understandably on the part of the parents—once the mediation service has been introduced. That issue needs to be looked at carefully in terms of the impact of fixed penalty notices. The noble Lord, Lord Dixon-Smith, spoke of election. If we are considering lowering the age of electoral responsibility to 16 years-old, we should be thinking of giving more responsibility to 16 and 17 year-olds.
This is a difficult issue. The ultimate right for children is that they should be treated like children. We have a duty to protect them, as they are immature in some ways. I know that that flies in the face of much of what is said. It is a difficult balance, especially in changing times with changing responsibilities. However, we must hold on to the idea that children are immature and lack experience in many ways. What they say is not necessarily a panacea for world ills or for the truth. It may be useful to discuss their experiences with them because they are experts in their own experience. They know about their schools and their local environment. but they have limits on their experience and their maturity limits their judgment.
I am concerned about the impact on looked-after children, a point raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Linklater. Her Majesty's Government have already set a target to reduce the level of involvement of looked-after children with the criminal justice system. There is a danger that fixed penalty notices might work against that target. although I acknowledge that the early intervention that fixed penalty notices allow might be beneficial for some of these children. However, there are practical considerations which makes one think that fixed penalty notices might work to the detriment of looked-after children.
First, a looked-after child is perhaps most likely to put the fixed penalty notice in the bin once it has been given to him or her. He would then be liable perhaps to prosecution. If we were to exempt looked-after children from prosecution because of their special backgrounds, their sense that they were being treated differently from other children would be unhelpful. Yet, a successful prosecution or the involvement of the criminal justice system is also an undesirable outcome.
Secondly, a looked-after child may have difficulty in paying a £40 or an £80 fine, which I think is the kind of figure being discussed. Let us say that the child receives £8.50 per week pocket money. The local authority can take only two-thirds of that in penalty. It might take two months for a boy to save the £80 to pay his fine. By that time. will he have already defaulted? Will the local authority be expected to pay the fine up-front and for the boy then to repay the local authority, and
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will local authorities agree to this? Might such a financial punishment push the child towards crime or prostitution to pay the debt?
Those are some of the questions which must be resolved. I look forward to the Minister's reply. Perhaps a meeting with the Minister or her relevant officials between now and the Report stage to discuss the clause and how it will impact on looked-after children would be mutually beneficial.
11.15 p.m.
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: I say straightaway that I would be happy to make such an arrangement with the noble Earl, either with myself or with officials if my diary does not permit. I hope that I can take up immediately some of the points made by the noble Earl because he will know that parental liability would apply to a parent or guardian. Looked-after children fall into the category in which the local authority discharges that function while the child is in its care. We would expect the local authority officer to use this opportunity to discuss the child's behaviour with them.
I turn to a further point made by the noble Earl which was echoed by the noble Baroness. Lady Linklater. The expectation is that the child will usually be taken to the police station and an appropriate adult found. We believe that the police officer will be able to make a judgment regarding the ability of the child to understand the penalty notice when they stop that child in the street. In fact, it should have no impact on the anti-social behaviour order by a penalty notice.
Given that we have now merged the Question whether the clause should stand part, perhaps I should cover a few points. I take it that the comments I make on this amendment will directly impact on the comments that I shall not make in relation to the Question whether the clause should stand part.
The noble Baroness, Lady Linklater, resists the extension of the penalty notice for disorder to 16 and 17 year-olds. We believe that penalty notices for disorder have an important role to play in tackling anti-social behaviour among 16 and 17 year-olds As the noble Baroness pointed out, currently they apply only to those aged 18 and over. Pilots of the adult scheme have shown that most of the disorder offences involve alcohol-related anti-social behaviour in town centres on a Friday or Saturday night, behaviour which is often associated with 16 and 17 year-olds. An extension of the scheme would allow the police to impose an immediate sanction on anti-social behaviour which will act as a deterrent, but will not. leave the young person with a conviction. That is an issue which we think is quite important.
The noble Earl was right to refer to the sharp end: that is, those children who are seriously dysfunctional because of the way their history has fashioned them. We know also that other young children, with the exuberance of youth—perhaps they do not have the excuse of social deprivation—also indulge in loutish, violent, inappropriate and drunken behaviour. By the grace of God many of them grow out of it in due

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course. So fixed penalty notices for such young people, which can provide a short, sharp shock to bring them up on what they are doing, can be capable of being very effective.
We shall pilot the scheme first to see whether it could be usefully applied nation-wide. Further, it will encourage the police to take action in a beneficial way against anti-social behaviour in the streets which is not being dealt with at present.
I turn to Amendment No. 169, spoken to by the noble Lord, Lord Dixon-Smith, which would prevent the extension of fixed penalty notices for disorder to under 16 year-olds and would remove the power to impose parental liability for the payment. As I have just said, we believe that penalty notices for disorder could have an important role to play. Sadly—it is an extremely sad situation—children as young as 12 years old are engaged in disruptive behaviour that can be dealt with under the scheme, such as throwing stones at trains or being drunk on a public highway. It is a matter of real concern to us that younger and younger children seem to be abusing alcohol. The Association of Chief Police Officers has urged the Government to extend the scheme to juveniles. As I said, we intend to pilot the first scheme on 16 and 17 year-olds. We would seek the approval of Parliament by the affirmative resolution procedure should we wish to lower the age limit further.
I hear what the noble Lord says in relation to affirmative resolutions not generally being voted down. However, it is possible for that to be done. If either House were to feel strongly enough about the issue, it would be a way of expunging the order from the books—not least because in Committee in the other place there was a great deal of passion for immediately reducing the level to below the age of 16 because of the difficulties that have been experienced.
So that is a vehicle that we could use which, somewhat unusually, would be very effective in regard to this issue because the age limit could be lowered or not lowered. In other affirmative resolution procedures there are often attachments which make it more difficult. Not that I am suggesting for one moment that noble Lords should do that because, if the day comes, I may well be arguing with great vigour that it is something that we should do.
We believe that it is right for parents to take responsibility for their children's behaviour and that they should be expected to pay the penalty on their children's behalf. It is quite wrong that parents are allowing young children to misbehave on the streets, often late at night, and not doing anything about it.
Amendment No. 171 would ensure that where a juvenile is offered a penalty notice the child must be accompanied by an adult and have the right to legal advice. Experience of the adult pilots shows that most penalty notices for disorder are issued in the police station, as I have described.
However, to impose conditions more broadly would effectively restrict the police so that they would not be able to issue penalty notices for disorder on the street.
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This would deprive them of the ability to give an immediate and low-key penalty to a juvenile. It would also defeat one of the aims of the penalty notice scheme to deal quickly and effectively with anti-social behaviour on the streets.
The provision in subsection (11) of Amendment No. 171 is unnecessary as penalty notices can be appealed, and this appeal is taken through the courts. So there are safeguards there. Adequate protection is thereby already afforded to anyone who is issued with a penalty notice for disorder, including juveniles. So if the juvenile did not consent to the issue of a penalty notice, this could be raised properly through the courts.
As regards the clause stand part discussion, it is right that we should remember that we have piloted the other scheme in the four police areas across the country. As the noble Baroness said, the scheme targets low-level anti-social offending. Penalty notices can be issued to adults for 11 disorder offences, including being drunk and disorderly, Section 5 public order offences and throwing fireworks.
There was a lot of concern as to whether these fixed penalty notices would work. We have found—and we hope to be able to publish relatively soon the results of the first review—that they have been very successful and have targeted the kind of problems we want them to. Indeed, many of those who were sceptical about the scheme have been won over and now see it as a very effective method of going forward. We hope that it will be similarly effective with juveniles, particularly those aged 16.
I would gently remind the Committee that people are able to get married at 16—they have been able to do so for many years—with their parents' support. Some of the young people in this group are not only married but parents themselves. So we are not dealing with children of a quite tender age. Of course we believe—with a passion equal to that of the noble Baroness and the noble Earl—that they are still children and that they still need protection and observation. But we also still have to challenge them a little in relation to some of these issues, and the research that we have carried out so far suggests that this might be an appropriate way of doing so.
Baroness Linklater of Butterstone: I thank the noble Baroness for that very full and interesting reply. I thank, too, the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, for his very useful contribution and, of course, the noble Lord, Lord Dixon-Smith.
Voting and fixed penalty notices is like the comparison between apples and pears—I shall leave it at that for the time being. I am very interested to hear that the pilots have produced some results. They were not available to us, but we look forward to reading them because they obviously have a bearing on the pilots' further development and use. We look forward to following that up.
Despite the Minister's arguments, I remain entirely unconvinced about the lower age group going down from under 16 to as low as 10. The fact is that very

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young people become parents; 16-year-olds seem like very young children to me, but even if they are married, that has nothing whatever to do with their maturity, their need for protection and their dependency. If they are married and parents, the greater their needs and dependencies. It does not work the other way around. Our position is to continue to resist that provision strongly, if at all possible.
Given the lateness of the hour, I would just remind the noble Baroness that I am very interested in what concrete plans are in place to complement the kind of procedures that we have been discussing to enable young people and children to be kept out of the criminal justice system. I mentioned the YISPs in particular, but there may be others. I do not know whether the Minister wants to respond now or later.
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: I beg the noble Baroness's pardon. In fact, 1 have a big long list of the things that we have done, including Sure Start, children's fund and education. I cannot run through them all now, but 1 will write to the noble Baroness and give her as full a response as I am able. I apologise for not having done it in my rather rapid, short-fire response tonight.
The Earl of Listowel: Perhaps I might take this opportunity to raise one further point with the Minister. It was raised by the noble Baroness, but I am not sure that the Minister replied to it in her response. I refer to 16 and 17-year-olds not being in employment, education or training. They are poorer than their 19 or 20-year-old neighbours. I believe that we are unusual in that 16 and 17-year-olds receive less benefit than their European counterparts. I think that the Government do this because they are keen to see these young people in education, training or employment and do not wish to provide them with incentives to be outside employment. That is controversial, but there are two sides to the argument. It suggests that the fines for 16 and 17-year-olds should be lower to reflect their financial climate and gives further weight to the concern about how these young people will pay the fines.
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: Rather than dealing with that tonight, because we have draft regulations, perhaps I may also write to the noble Earl about those issues?
Baroness Liinklater of Butterstone: I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendments Nos. 169 to 171 not moved.]
Clause 39 agreed to.
Clause 40 agreed to.
Clause 41 [Extension of powers of community support officers etc.]:
Lord Dixon-Smithmoved Amendment No. 172:
Page 33. line 23, at end insert '', skateboard user, user of roller skates or in-line skates"
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The noble Lord said: This group of amendments seeks to modernise the Bill a little. The Bill gives powers for people to charge fixed penalties for those who inconsiderately ride their bicycles on pavements where pedestrians have right of way. That is a perfectly reasonable thing to do, but pavements are not the only places where bicycles are ridden without consideration. They can be ridden in parks and other places, in open spaces, in building courtyards and so on. Two of the amendments would simply remove the restriction that makes the penalty possible on footways alone.
The other two amendments are directed to widening the scope to deal with a modern phenomenon—that of skateboards and in-line roller skates—or roller blades—and roller skates themselves. These are all, on occasions, used somewhat to the danger of pedestrians using footways properly, but also in parks and so on. We believe that it would be reasonable to invite the Government to consider whether the fixed penalty should be extended to those particular uses if they are inconsiderately used in areas where the public are expecting to be able to walk in peace and safety. I beg to move.
Lord Bassam of Brighton: The Chief Whip is muttering that 1 ought to be very sympathetic to the amendments, and in spirit I certainly am. There are questions of practicality. however, and I shall deal with the amendments in turn.
Subsections (3) and (6) of Clause 41 give community support officers and accredited persons the power to stop cyclists so that they may issue a fixed penalty notice. That power is restricted to occasions when an offence of cycling on the footway is suspected. Amendments Nos. 173 and 176 would remove this restriction. The amendments would give community support officers and accredited persons the much wider power, which is currently available to police officers. Police have that wider power in order to enforce a number of cycling offences. I am sure that we all wish that they would do that rather more frequently sometimes.
Amendments Nos. 172 and 175 appear to be intended to create a new offence of skateboarding, roller skating or in-line skating on a footway. They are not in fact effective, if that is their purpose, as the amendments do not create the new offences. However, I shall deal with them as a matter of principle.
The amendments would also provide community support officers, accredited persons, and police officers with a power to stop individuals engaged in these activities. I understand the concerns behind the amendments. There is no doubt that skateboarders, in-line skaters and roller skaters can cause irritation to pedestrians in particular localities. They have irritated me from time to time. However, the amendments would move the legal use of skateboards and roller skates from footways to roadways. These devices are not designed for use in traffic—that is for sure— and displacing them on to roads would undoubtedly be

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dangerous for both skaters and other road users. Having seen people do exactly that, I know that they are highly dangerous.
In addition, there are already sufficient powers to make by-laws to deal with this kind of nuisance. Section 235 of the Local Government Act 1972 enables local authorities to enact by-laws in regard to use of skateboards, which can prohibit such activities in certain locations or regulate them throughout their district. There are already several local authorities that have made it an offence to skateboard or roller skate in designated areas, punishable by a fine on summary conviction.
The debate takes me back to the debates on the Police Reform Bill in the previous Session, which were dealt with by the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, and myself. It is not our intention in general to expand the powers of community support officers, unless there are very strong arguments for doing so. The noble Lord, Lord Dixon-Smith, and noble Lords on the Liberal Democrat Benches were very concerned about the range of powers and duties that would be available to community support officers. I think that at the time we were generally agreed that there had to be strong arguments for extending those powers. For those reasons, I question this particular approach. Nevertheless, as I said, I have not only personal sympathy but a more general sympathy for the proposal. I therefore suggest to the noble Lord that, at this stage, he should not press his amendments.
11.30 p.m.
Lord Dixon-Smith: I am grateful to the Minister for his response, and indeed for his sympathy—but there is an old saying about an ounce of health being worth a tonne of sympathy. It is not the use that we are concerned about; we are concerned about the inconsiderate use. There is that distinction. I think that I shall probably need to consider whether we want to bring this forward again, perhaps with slightly amended wording. Meanwhile I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment. by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendment No. 173 not moved.]
Baroness Linklater of Butterstonemoved Amendment No. 174:
Page 33, line 40, leave out subsections (5) to (7).
The noble Baroness said: The purpose of this amendment is to restrict the power to issue fixed penalty notices and stop vehicles to police officers and community support officers only. There is concern about public transparency, accountability and professional capability and about the piecemeal extension of police powers to civilian bodies not under the direct supervision of the police. Despite the offences covered being minor, the principle of extending police powers to non-police civilians is a concern. As the PACE codes of practice outline, the key principles of using stop powers and the danger of misuse is highlighted. We see the creation of second
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and third-tier policing, with increasingly obscure boundaries of accountability and professionalism, as very disturbing. I beg to move.
Lord Bassam of Brighton: As this amendment somewhat extends the previous debate, I shall just briefly go over the important points.
The purposes of subsections (5), (6) and (7) of this clause are to extend, in a focused and appropriate way, the powers available to persons accredited under the Police Reform Act 2002. The amendment would remove all of those provisions. The powers made available to accredited persons are the power to stop cycles—so that, as I said, accredited persons may assist in enforcing the offence of cycling on the pavement —and the power to issue certain penalty notices for disorder.
As with all the powers made available to accredited persons under the Police Reform Act 2002, there are a number of safeguards already in place to ensure that the powers are given only in appropriate circumstances. Chief officers will be responsible for ensuring that anybody given these powers is suitable and, more importantly, properly trained. As an additional safeguard, the clause allows the Secretary of State to determine which penalty notices for disorder should be exclusively for police and which are appropriate to be extended to community support officers and accredited persons.
Communities want lower level incidents of disorder dealt with quickly and effectively. Penalty notices for disorder provide a useful method for dealing with such offences. Extending this power to properly trained accredited persons will provide people already involved in community safety roles with the powers they need to take more effective action. Given the value of these powers, the way in which they have begun to work and the safeguards against their misuse, I suggest to the noble Baroness that it would be inappropriate for her to press the amendment.
Baroness Linklater of Butterstone: I thank the Minister for that reply. I am not entirely sure that I am totally convinced, but I shall read it with interest in Hansard. Meanwhile, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendments Nos. 175 and 176 not moved.]
Clause 41 agreed to.
Clause 42 [Report by local authority in certain cases where person remanded on bail]:
[Amendments Nos. 177 and 178 not moved.]
Clause 42 agreed to.
Clause 43 [Possession of air weapon or imitation firearm in public place]:
[Amendment No. 178A not moved.]
Clause 43 agreed to.
Clause 44 [Air weapons: age limits]:
Earl Attleemoved Amendment No. 179:
Page 36, line 9, leave out paragraph (a).
The noble Earl said: This amendment concerns air weapons and age limits in that regard. At present someone can use an air weapon without supervision from the moment it is bought but he or she must be over 14. The Bill would raise that age to 17. Our amendments seek to retain the status quo of 14. Amendment No. 180 would ensure that private property would remain an exception under Section 23 of the Firearms Act 1968. I beg to move.
Lord Moynihan: Finally, I rise to speak to the amendment standing in my name regarding Clause 44. Clause 44 of the Bill contains a subsection which, if passed, will make it illegal for young responsible shooters between the ages of 14 and 17 to carry air guns in public places without supervision. This removes a paragraph from the Firearms Act 1968 which allows young people to do this provided the gun is held in a securely fastened case. The sporting shooting community is opposing the clause because as it stands it will result in the exclusion of young people from shooting sports. Although what I have heard of the Bill this evening contains an important social remit and its intention to prevent the misuse of air guns is thoroughly laudable, this particular issue is of extreme concern to the entire sporting shooting community. If the clause is passed unamended, it will pose a significant impediment to the participation of young people in a range of shooting sports from informal target practice to competition shooting. It will hear down disproportionately on any young responsible sportsman or woman who has permission to shoot on local farmland. This is particularly the case with air guns as they arc the gun of choice for the majority of young people taking up the sport.
The clause is also inherently self-contradictory. Following pressure from the sporting shooting community, the Government amended the Anti-social Behaviour Bill to allow young sporting shooters to use air guns on private land without supervision. If the Bill does not receive further amendment, young shooters will be allowed to use their guns on private land without supervision, but will be in the conflicting position of having to be supervised when carrying those same guns in public.
Under current law young people considered responsible enough to shoot on private land unsupervised are also considered responsible enough to carry their air guns in public places, provided they are unloaded and in a securely fastened gun case. The British Shooting Sports Council would like to see that situation continue. Those involved in the sport of shooting from our Olympians to the Bisley champions of tomorrow and colleagues on these Benches share that view. The clause runs contrary to Labour's sports policy. Air guns are the gateway to responsible shooting sports for young people, from those for whom it is a weekend hobby to professional competitors such as 16 year-old Commonwealth Gold medallist, Charlotte Kerwood.
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Shooting sports often require significant physical exertion and provide a wide variety of health benefits for those who participate in them. By restricting young people's ability to practise these sports, the clause will also work against the DCMS target, as set out in Game Plan, to initiate,
"a major increase in participation in sport and physical activity, primarily because of the significant health benefits and to reduce the growing costs of inactivity".
The clause would limit the opportunities for shooting sports to uphold the Government's objectives and policy goals, and, through sports participation. achieve a wide array of policy goals relating to health and obesity reduction, education, crime reduction and social inclusion.
The clause contradicts Labour's manifesto commitment not to place further restrictions on the sport of shooting. The clause undermines the Government's policy on grassroots sports participation as it creates a disincentive to young people who are thinking of taking up the sport.
I am not the first to raise this issue in Parliament. The concern was raised at the Bill's Second Reading that an amendment to Clause 44 to deal with this issue could water down the Bill's provisions to combat the misuse of air weapons. In order to reassure the Committee that this is not the case I seek to outline briefly our response to three concerns. The first is the misuse of air guns. I quote the Minister in another place:
"Carrying air guns in a securely fastened case would riot prevent them being misused out of sight of a police officer on the way to the place of use".
1 would argue that a provision in Clause 43 would require everyone carrying a gun in public to provide good cause for their journey to law enforcement authorities. Under the terms of the amended clause, whether the gun is or is not in a securely fastened case, and whether a policeman or member of the public has witnessed any actual abuse or not, the police will be able to challenge anyone carrying any firearm, loaded or unloaded, covered or uncovered, and take immediate on-the-spot action to deal with that. Clause 43 creates an arrestable offence.
In cases where airguns have been misused in public places, there is no evidence—not a single case—to show that the people who perpetrate the crime use the current exemption as a loophole to avoid prosecution. Finally, as responsible members of the community, sporting shooters of all ages always carry their guns in a securely fastened case, and are therefore easily distinguishable from those who misuse airguns.
The second concern is the supervision of young people in sports. Again I quote the Minister in another place, who said:
"There is no 'strong reason' why young shooters should not be supervised. It is no different to the support given to young people by parents and coaches in relation to many other sports".
That response does not take into account the practicalities of shooting sports; moreover, it indicates that the Government's approach hears clown disproportionately on young sportsmen and women from socially excluded backgrounds.

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Shooting sports are often practised in rural areas where it is possible and preferable for young people to walk or cycle on their own to land where they have permission to shoot—for example, local woodland—often on an informal, solitary basis. Shooting sports are also often undertaken at unsociable hours. For example, a young person might be meeting a group of adults to go shooting at dawn. Not all training is carried out through organised sporting shooting events.
Moreover, it is not a legal requirement for adults to accompany young people to practice sessions in other sporting disciplines. As with other sports, therefore, it should be left to parents to judge when it is appropriate to allow young people to travel unsupervised to the location where they practise their sport. As a matter of principle, we believe that young sporting shooters should not be subjected to such a disadvantage, nor their activities unnecessarily restricted.
The third concern is about levels of police bureaucracy. It has been suggested that such an amendment would create further bureaucracy for law enforcement authorities. The highly respected British Shooting Sports Council would assert that, with correct and unambiguous guidance on the issue, the police would face no further bureaucracy than is suggested by the clause as it stands.
I believe that those arguments constitute a strong case, and I hope that Members of the Committee will agree with them.
Lord Addington: The case that the noble Lord, Lord Moynihan, has made is one in which a type of sport that we are encouraging is worried about its recruitment base. On certain occasions, I have incurred the wrath of the group of people under discussion by supporting the Government and previous governments on restrictions on firearms. They feel rather persecuted, but both this Government and the previous government said that people could be part of the airgun fraternity. Airguns are safer, with the man-killing potential of the weapons dramatically lower than the ones that they replaced.
Surely addressing some of the issues raised overall by the noble Lord's amendment would not hurt the Government terribly and not up the risk. Do the Government have any coherent thinking on the issue? Will they address the problem of how to get people involved in the sport at a young age? If people are to reach a highly competitive level, they have to start early. We are very wary of the idea of firearms of any description. However, unless we are to say that they cannot be used at all, people have to have a way in. What is the Government's thinking on the issue?
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: I thank Members of the Committee for raising the issue. The noble Earl, Lord Attlee, introduced it very succinctly, but it could not have been more elegantly or compellingly put on behalf of the fraternity than it was by the noble Lord,
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Lord Moynihan. However, I have to say that notwithstanding his elegance, there are some fundamental flaws in the argument.
There is no conflict in the Government's stance. As the noble Lord rightly said, the Government are four square behind the sportsmen and women of this country and have done much to support them and to enable them to participate and achieve at the highest level. I speak to reassure the noble Lord, Lord Addington, that the Government have listened keenly to what the sporting lobby has said. For that reason. there is a change in the proposals now put forward by the Government. They enable shooting to take place on private land. But there is no conflict, as the noble Lord, Lord Moynihan, sought to indicate, between the stance we have taken in relation to what happens in the private and public arenas. The two are quite separate and distinct.
Amendments Nos. 179, 181 and 182 go to the heart of Clause 44. They would retain the existing age limit of 14 for the possession of an air weapon. The Government believe that that it is important to raise the age limit to 17. Regrettably, there has been a steady rise in the instance of misuse of air weapons in recent years. In 2001–02, there were 12,340 offences involving the misuse of air weapons. That is a rise of 21 per cent. The new offence contained in Clause 43 will help to tackle this misuse by allowing the police to arrest people who are found to be carrying an air gun in public without good reason. But that is not the whole solution. Much anti-social behaviour relating to air weapons is caused by unsupervised young people —
11.45 p.m.
Lord Dixon-Smith: I hear the statistics with interest. Is it possible to divide the category "air weapons" between air weapons/handguns and air weapons/air rifles? I suspect that the problem is with handguns rather than air rifles, although I admit that there are some cases involving air rifles.
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: One of the important issues, as the noble Lord will know, is that regrettably those who misuse firearms tend to transfer from one source to another if one source is cut off. The noble Lord will know that it is relatively easy to adapt a shotgun with a shortened barrel to have exactly the same effect. The mechanism is identical, so it can be adapted to be as lethal as a handgun.
The noble Lord, Lord Addington, raised another issue. We had thought that air guns were a little safer than others. Regrettably, we arc learning that they are an increasing problem with which we must now deal.
Viscount Goschen: The Minister gave statistics about the increasing number of offences concerning air weapons. However, the argument is about young people and air guns. Can she separate the statistics that she provided to indicate those above 17 and those below 17?
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: I do not know whether the statistics are in that form. I shall inquire and if they

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are, I shall write to the noble Viscount and place a copy of my letter in the Library. We shall then be able to say whether there is a difference between the two.
Much anti-social behaviour involving air weapons is caused by unsupervised young people. As a further tool to tackle this problem, we believe that it is right to raise the age limit for owning or possessing air weapons. At present, anyone aged 14 or over can own an air weapon. Clause 44 will increase this age limit to 17.
For the purposes of completeness, I am informed that the statistics do not split the figure of 12,340 into handguns and rifles or by age. They are collected in terms of species of offence and are not broken down.
One effect of raising the age limit is that no one under 17 will be able to have an air gun in his possession unless supervised by someone aged 21 or over. We have listened to concerns from shooting organisations about how this would create difficulties for responsible young shooters who use their air weapons unsupervised for target shooting and for pest control on farms. The Government responded on Report in the other place by amending the clause to allow young people aged 14 to 16 to have air weapons unsupervised. provided they are on private premises and have the consent of the occupier.
As an extra safeguard, particularly with urban areas in mind, we have introduced an offence, punishable with a fine of up to £1,000, of firing a pellet beyond the premises. Amendment No. 180 in the name of the noble Lord. Lord Dixon-Smith, suggests an alternative form of this exception. However, it does not contain the safeguards of a minimum age and the offence of shooting beyond the boundary.
Amendment No. 179A in the names of the noble Lords, Lord Moynihan and Lord Dixon-Smith, would provide a further relaxation of the requirement for supervision. It would allow 14 to 16 year-olds to carry their air weapons unsupervised, provided they were secured in a gun cover and provided the young person was travelling directly to or from his club or another place where he could lawfully use the gun.
I fully understand why Amendment No. 179A has been tabled. I know that shooting organisations are concerned that requiring all young people under 17 to be supervised -when travelling with their guns would be impractical and would unduly hinder legitimate shooters. The Government have considered very carefully their concerns, but we are not persuaded that we should make this further exception. The greatest risk of air weapons being misused is likely to occur when they are being carried in public by young people. A gun cover would not prevent the weapon being
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taken out and misused. We feel strongly that the public must be protected against such misuse, and we remain of the view that adult supervision is necessary in those circumstances.
I heard what the noble Lord, Lord Moynihan, said about the activities of children. But many of those children are properly transported by and with their parents and/or other adults. We believe that Clause 44 provides a balanced control against the misuse of air weapons. It ensures that young people generally do not have unsupervised access to air weapons, while allowing a specific exception for responsible shooters. We believe that the balance is about right and that this would be the appropriate point to come to a proper rest.
Lord Moynihan: Sadly, I fundamentally disagree with the Government on this issue. However, this is not the hour to cover all the points and respond to them in depth, save to say that there has never been a single incident of an offence involving a member of a registered sports shooting club. In the light of that, and with the Minister's agreement, I ask her whether I may discuss the subject in detail with her officials with the intention of seeking common ground in advance of Report stage to see whether we can make progress on this issue.
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: I am more than happy to indicate that we would welcome such a dialogue. I am sure that arrangements can be made for the noble Lord to have that opportunity.
Lord Dixon-Smith: This has been a very good debate. I am hound to say that the response of the Minister is disappointing. But we shall consider whether we can draft these amendments in a different form which might satisfy some of the concerns that she exposed. In the mean time, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendments Nos. I 79A to 182A not moved.]
Clause 44 agreed to.
Clause 45 [Prohibition of certain air weapons]:
[Amendment No. 182E not moved.]
Lord Bassam of Brighton: I beg to move that the House do now resume.
Moved, accordingly, and. on Question, Motion agreed to.
House resumed.
House adjourned at five minutes before midnight.

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