Sitting of 8 September 2004

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

    Northern Ireland Assembly
    Mr. Andrew Robathan: If he will reinstate the Northern Ireland Assembly without Sinn Fein in the light of the Independent Monitoring Commission report. [187641]
    Bob Spink: What recent representations he has received on re-establishing the Northern Ireland Assembly. [187642]
    Helen Jackson: What progress he has made towards restoring devolved government in Northern Ireland. [187646]
    The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Mr. Paul Murphy): The Independent Monitoring Commission's report emphasised the importance of participation by all sides of the community in the context of peaceful and democratic means. We are currently engaged in intensive political activity with the aim of restoring stable and inclusive partnership government in Northern Ireland. It is important to draw on the high degree of commitment among the Northern Ireland parties to bring about resumed devolution at an early stage. Recent meetings with all parties have given me confidence that the restoration to Northern Ireland of stable devolved government is within our grasp.
    Mr. Robathan: The Secretary of State talked about commitment, but he will know that is over six years since the Belfast agreement was made, and that Sinn Fein, as the Independent Monitoring Commission found out, remains responsible for paramilitary violence. When will the Government say that the peace process will go ahead but without those people, who are inextricably linked to terrorism, go about their murderous business making life hell for many people in Northern Ireland and have failed to give up their weapons as promised six years ago?
    Mr. Murphy: The hon. Gentleman will know that one of the two issues that we will discuss next week at Leeds castle in Kent is the decommissioning of weapons, which was part of the Good Friday agreement. He is right that in the past six years we have not had sufficient decommissioning from any of the paramilitary organisations in Northern Ireland. Secondly, the business of paramilitary activity, whether republican or loyalist, must be addressed. In particular, republican paramilitary activity, as my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister said only yesterday, must be addressed before we can restore devolution in Northern Ireland. However, I can tell the hon. Gentleman that next week we will make a very serious effort to try to resolve those difficulties, and I believe that it will be a moment of decision for the peace process in Northern Ireland.
    Bob Spink: But does the Secretary of State at least accept that all forms of violence and threats of violence, including punishment beatings and the retention of weapons, are quite incompatible with power sharing? Will he therefore state quite firmly that that will therefore result in the exclusion of Sinn Fein?
    Mr. Murphy: There is no point the hon. Gentleman saying "at least", as I have always agreed with that premise—and indeed the Government have always accepted—that there is no place in modern democratic society in Northern Ireland for paramilitary activity of any sort. He will be aware that paramilitary activity has been an issue in Northern Ireland for more than 30 years, and the Good Friday agreement made it clear that it had to stop. For various reasons, it has not stopped in the past six years, but it has certainly diminished. The ceasefire is now 10 years old and Northern Ireland is undoubtedly a better place, but the hon. Gentleman is right to bring to the attention of the House the importance of that central issue.
    Helen Jackson: Question 4, Mr. Speaker.
    Mr. Speaker: The hon. Lady's question has been grouped, and she need only ask a supplementary question.
    Helen Jackson: I am grateful, Mr. Speaker.
    I commend the Government and the Secretary of State on the patient way in which they have pursued the restoration of devolved government over the past few years and in the past month. Does my right hon. Friend not agree that it is that patience in making sure that all parties and sectors of the community in Northern Ireland are brought into politics that will ensure the successful reinstatement of devolution?
    Mr. Murphy: I am grateful to my hon. Friend. She knows, because she herself was deeply involved at the time of the creation of the Belfast agreement, that we cannot have a lasting accommodation or settlement in Northern Ireland unless it allows for proper power sharing between nationalism and unionism. That means that there must be proper North-South arrangements and a principle of consent, which was enshrined in the agreement. I am certain that every political party in

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    Northern Ireland that will be present in Leeds castle in Kent next week is serious about trying to make that breakthrough and ensure that that deal is made.
    Mr. Eddie McGrady: The Secretary of State will be aware of the statement from the Chief Constable of the Police Service of Northern Ireland last Thursday, in which he indicated that of the 25 major drug gangs in Northern Ireland, two thirds are run or organised by paramilitaries. Does he accept that much more damage is now being done to our community by drug trafficking, intimidation and other forms of protection rackets than by security-related matters? Will he take that on board at the inter-party talks—and indeed outside the talks—and address paramilitary activities which are not security-related but which are having a much greater impact on our community than those other matters?
    Mr. Murphy: My hon. Friend is right to bring to the House's attention the fact that many in paramilitary organisations are engaged in criminal activities, and that those activities have no place in Northern Ireland. They are a corrupting influence on society in Northern Ireland and they must stop—of course they must. I commend the work of the PSNI in dealing with those issues. My hon. Friend, who is a member of the Policing Board, is aware of those matters. He will also agree that next week the central issue of paramilitary activity in all its forms must be addressed if we are to move forward in the peace process.
    Mr. Peter Robinson: I know that the Secretary of State will not want to talk up the possibility that the talks next week may not succeed, but yesterday his right hon. Friend the Prime Minister touched on the fact that the Government must obviously consider what they would do in those circumstances. If the talks next week do not succeed because paramilitaries refuse to completely decommission their illegal weaponry and bring to a complete end their paramilitary and criminal activity, the Secretary of State would have only two options, other than collapsing the Assembly as a whole: to have an Assembly without an Executive, or to have an Executive without Sinn Fein. Is he considering those two options?
    Mr. Murphy: The Government will have to reflect at the end of next week if we do not achieve what we want to achieve, but, in the hon. Gentleman's words, we have the ingredients of a deal in front of us in Leeds castle next week. The Government are working not on the basis that we will fail next week, but on the basis that we will succeed. We will have to see what happens at the end of the talks. I repeat, though, that the talks next week are a crucial part of the process, a crucial phase and a point of decision, not a staging post in any further discussions.
    Mr. Michael Mates: But what is the point of going to Leeds castle to discuss decommissioning and the ending of paramilitary violence, since everybody knows that that is the precondition for any political progress? If the Secretary of State goes there without that precondition, is he not simply raising hopes, and in the end will he not disappoint more people than he serves?
    Mr. Murphy: The right hon. Gentleman is right to point to the importance of those issues before a deal can be achieved, but there are other issues, too, which we have been discussing in the past two weeks in Northern Ireland—for example, how the Assembly operates, the mechanisms of the Executive, its accountability to the Assembly, and issues such as human rights, equality and so on. Although the right hon. Gentleman is right to point to the principle that is so important in trying to ensure that we get a breakthrough—that is, the end of paramilitary activity, decommissioning, the stability of the institutions and the restoration of confidence—the details of those matters still have to be addressed. That is what we will be doing next week in Kent.
    Mr. Seamus Mallon: As the political entourage from Northern Ireland wends its way towards Leeds castle, will the Secretary of State make it clear that while we all welcome the worthy efforts of the Democratic Unionist party poachers to become the head gamekeepers, that Pauline conversion cannot be at the expense of the agreement or any of its institutions? Will the British Government and the Irish Government be the custodians of the Good Friday agreement and protect its integrity, and not on this occasion succumb to the shabby-deal syndrome that has bedevilled so many of these meetings?
    Mr. Murphy: I hope there will be no shabby deals. I am sure there will not be, but I can say to my hon. Friend that the fundamentals of that agreement to which we all signed up in 1998 are essential to any accommodation that we can ever achieve in Northern Ireland. I repeat them: there is the question of sharing power, the principle of consent, proper North-South arrangements and other matters. They must form the bedrock of any agreement, but every party that is going to the talks next week, including the DUP, is going on the basis that we want to try and make an arrangement and get a deal that will restore devolution in Northern Ireland.
    Mr. David Trimble: This autumn marks one year, which has been frittered away, since the Assembly election, and two years since the Prime Minister said in a speech at Belfast Harbour Office that we have reached a fork in the road. Does the Secretary of State agree that the Government will be left with no credibility if they are still hanging around that fork in the road after the talks at Leeds castle?
    Mr. Murphy: The year or two since we had to suspend devolution in Northern Ireland have, of course, been frustrating. No one wanted to suspend devolution, no one wants direct rule and every party in Northern Ireland wants the restoration of devolution. I think the right hon. Gentleman agrees that we have reached a stage at which we must make proper decisions, because we cannot allow the process to drift. We must address those central issues and reach the conclusion that we all want.
    Mr. David Lidington: May I first wish the Secretary of State well in next week's discussions? Whichever political party we come from, it is in all our interests that an enduring and just peace should be reached in Northern Ireland. The key to

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    political progress in Northern Ireland is surely that the republican movement, which has an electoral mandate that entitles it to participate in government, should not only use words to say that it wants violence to end but demonstrate through its actions that it renounces and breaks completely with paramilitary violence in all its forms and that it is prepared to offer evidence that that commitment is permanent rather than temporary.
    Mr. Murphy: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his kind remarks, and we all wish all the Northern Ireland parties well in their deliberations next week. He is right that words are important, but that they are not enough. He knows that since we last held such talks, the Independent Monitoring Commission has been established to examine such issues. It has an important role to play as, indeed, has the Decommissioning Commission, which is headed by General John de Chastelain.
    Mr. Lidington: Is not the logic of the Secretary of State's answer that the British Government should say—as the Republic of Ireland's Government already do—that a party that has failed to make clear its permanent separation from paramilitary violence cannot take part as of right in the government of any part of the island of Ireland?
    Mr. Murphy: That was part of the Good Friday agreement, by which Ministers had to sign up to codes of conduct and arrangements that meant that they would renounce violence in all its forms. Paramilitary activity, which must stop, has continued during the past year or so. The best deal for Northern Ireland will tackle paramilitary activity and allow all parties in Northern Ireland to take their rightful seats in the Assembly and the Executive.
    Lembit Öpik: Will the Minister confirm that all outstanding issues relating to the review of the agreement, such as designations and the lack of shared responsibility in the Executive, will be on the agenda during the Leeds castle talks next week to ensure the long-term sustainability of the Assembly, and that we will not face either unilateral agreements with one party or another or quick-fix solutions that do not take us forward?
    Mr. Murphy: The hon. Gentleman is right about quick-fix solutions, which no one wants. We have been busy over the past few weeks dealing with the issues that he rightly identifies. We cannot deal with every issue during the three days in Leeds castle, but we will certainly deal with the important issues.

    Peace Process
    Mr. Alistair Carmichael: If he will make a statement on the peace process. [187645]
    The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office (Mr. John Spellar): As my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State said in response to my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Hillsborough (Helen Jackson) and the hon. Members for Blaby (Mr. Robathan) and
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    for Castle Point (Bob Spink), we are engaged in intensive negotiations with a view to bringing about a complete and definitive end to paramilitary activity and the restoration of the devolved institutions on a stable and inclusive basis.
    Mr. Carmichael: Looking forward to the talks at Leeds castle next week, can the Minister assure the House that there are certain lines below which the Government will not go: in particular, that there will be no question of amnesties for those who are on the run until circumstances have been created whereby all those who feel unable to remain in Northern Ireland because of paramilitary threats are able to return to their homes; and further, that there will be no question of people being released or pardoned for crimes before a proper appearance in court?
    Mr. Spellar: The hon. Gentleman is right that the issues that he identifies are dependent upon acts of completion. As the Secretary of State said here today and the Prime Minister said yesterday, it must be absolutely clear that any party that wants to sit in Government is not connected in any shape or form with paramilitary activity and that all paramilitary activity ceases completely. That is what we are aiming to achieve next week, and those are the preconditions for the restoration of devolved Government and all the other objectives that we all desire.
    Mr. John Hume: Given that for the first time in history the people of Ireland as a whole, North and South, have overwhelmingly voted for the Good Friday agreement, the Minister will agree that paramilitary organisations can no longer claim, as they have always done, to be acting in the name of the people. Will the Minister tell all the political parties involved in the talks that it is now the duty of all true democrats to implement the will of the people, which means implementing all aspects of the Good Friday agreement and not trying to renegotiate it?
    Mr. Spellar: May I pay tribute to the part that the hon. Gentleman played in bringing about that agreement and, indeed, the much-improved situation in Northern Ireland? Although we still have further steps to go, we should remember that at the peak of the troubles 497 people were killed by paramilitary activity; last year it was nine, and this year, to date, it has been only three. That is three too many, but it is a major difference. The hon. Gentleman is right that the fundamentals of the Good Friday agreement are the basis on which the talks will take place next week. They provide the way forward that we hope to bring about at Leeds castle next week.
    Mr. Desmond Swayne: Does the Minister agree with the conclusion of the second report of the Independent Monitoring Commission that
    "Law enforcement…is far from normal"?
    In respect of the decision that will be taken tomorrow by the Chief Constable on the full-time reserve, will the Minister explain to the House how many officers will be available for operational duties in each district command unit?
    Mr. Spellar: In a sense, the hon. Gentleman answered his own question in the way that he framed it. As he said, the Chief Constable will announce his determination tomorrow. I am afraid that we, and he, will have to wait on that announcement.

    Genito-urinary Medicine Services
    Mrs. Iris Robinson: If he will make a statement on genito-urinary medicine services in the Province. [187647]
    The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Angela Smith): At present, genitourinary medicine services are delivered at four hospitals in Northern Ireland. The service has come under increased pressure, and work loads have doubled since 1995. I fully appreciate that waiting times for communicable diseases must be kept to a minimum and that patients should have access to a fast, effective sexual health service. To that end, a number of steps are being taken to address the current pressures.
    Mrs. Robinson: I thank the Minister for that reply. However, she will be aware that only four consultants in Northern Ireland specialise in genito-urinary medicine, yet the Royal College of Physicians recommends that there should be one consultant to every 120,000 people. It is a matter of grave concern that we have increasing waiting lists and that we are understaffed in this specialist field of medicine. Can the Minister indicate what is being done to attract doctors, particularly junior doctors, to it? Will she consider extending the outpost clinics to rural areas of Northern Ireland rather than concentrating the services at the Royal Victoria hospital?
    Angela Smith: The hon. Lady is right: we do have vacancies for consultants. May I tell her, though, that four specialist trainees are undergoing training and that that is sufficient for projected needs in Northern Ireland. The first of those trainees should be able to take up a specialist consultant's post in about a year's time.
    The hon. Lady is also right to consider the way in which we deliver services. We are addressing that issue in terms of prevention and treatment. We are aiming to provide a more holistic approach so that people can access services not only at hospitals but in community settings such as GP surgeries.
    Rev. Martin Smyth: The Under-Secretary referred to prevention. Although we welcome the work that has been done on treatment, does she agree that more needs to be done in sex education? Will she have a discussion with her colleague who deals with education to ascertain whether more funding can be provided to educate young people on tackling some of those problems in a world where there is so much pressure on them to experiment before they have an understanding of the issues?
    Angela Smith: The hon. Gentleman is correct that prevention is an important part of controlling sexually transmitted infections. I assure him that education plays an important part in the 35 recommendations that the
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    Department is currently considering. We are concentrating on that not only for the young but for the not-so-young.

    Royal Irish Regiment
    Mr. Gregory Campbell: What discussions he has had with the Secretary of State for Defence on the future of the home battalion of the Royal Irish Regiment. [187648]
    The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Mr. Ian Pearson): My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State discusses all relevant issues with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence in relation to the profile of the Army in Northern Ireland. The situation in respect of the Royal Irish home battalions has not changed since the statement that the Defence Secretary made on 10 June 2003.
    Mr. Campbell: Does the Under-Secretary accept that, when attacks such as the one that happened in the past three hours in a police station in Londonderry occur, it is essential that the Royal Irish Regiment is not only retained but used and deployed to protect police stations and Army installations in Northern Ireland?
    Mr. Pearson: I have received a report on the attack on the Strand Road police station. Obviously, the matter is being investigated and I utterly condemn the senseless violence involved. It will not stop us engaging in the talks; we need to move forward.
    I pay tribute to the Royal Irish Regiment, which has a distinguished history at home and abroad. As the hon. Gentleman rightly said, it continues to play a vital role. I stress that no decision has been made about the members of the armed forces who would be included in a permanent end-state garrison in Northern Ireland. We are currently recruiting new members to the home service battalions. [Interruption.]
    Mr. Speaker: Order. I ask the House to come to order—it is very noisy.
    Lady Hermon: The Under-Secretary rightly paid a warm tribute to the RIR and its predecessor, the Ulster Defence Regiment. In the continuing discussions about the RIR's future, what genuine, active consideration has been given to creating a fund for UDR widows and their families, akin to the police fund for RUC widows and their families?
    Mr. Pearson: The hon. Lady makes an important point. However, that is a matter for the Ministry of Defence, which is aware of the issue. I shall make arrangements for the Ministry to contact the hon. Lady.

    Parades Commission
    Mr Jeffrey M. Donaldson: What plans he has to review the (a) membership and (b) remit of the Parades Commisson; and if he will make a statement. [187649]
    The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Mr. Ian Pearson): The current members of the Parades Commission have been appointed to serve until the end of next year. I have been considering policy on future parades legislation and structures and I hope to be in a position to bring forward proposals later this year.
    Mr. Donaldson: Although we had a relatively quiet summer this year, the Under-Secretary knows that some of the Parades Commission's decisions have caused widespread concern in Northern Ireland. The commission made decisions that were sometimes unnecessary and resulted in appalling situations where there had been no potential for unrest. Far from increasing the remit of the Parades Commission, is it not time for the Government to review its role? Far from resolving the parades issue, the commission is part of the problem, not the solution.
    Mr. Pearson: I agree that we have had an overwhelmingly peaceful marching season. Out of nearly 2,200 parades, disturbances, which were mostly minor, happened at only 16. Upholding the rights of marchers and protesters is a difficult problem with which to grapple. The Parades Commission performs its duties in the most difficult circumstances and it needs everyone's full support.
    Clearly, we will reflect on the most recent marching season, but let us not get this out of proportion. The two recent marching seasons have been the most successful in most people's living memory. Great progress is being made in Northern Ireland. If we can make sensible reforms to parading legislation, we will clearly wish to do so, but let us not forget the progress that has been made.

    EU Enlargement (Agriculture)
    Mr. Bill O'Brien: If he will make a statement on the impact of the enlargement of the European Union on smaller family farms in Northern Ireland. [187650]
    The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Mr. Ian Pearson)There is expected to be little impact of enlargement on smaller family farms in Northern Ireland in the short to medium term. Competitive pressures from the new member states are forecast to increase only gradually, and, of course, enlargement brings the potential of new export opportunities for farms of all sizes.
    Mr. O'Brien: I appeal to my hon. Friend for greater consideration and assistance to be given to small family farms in Northern Ireland, particularly in relation to pensions and other benefits, which many people will enjoy, but which some of those small farmers will be denied. Will he give serious consideration to the impact on small farms of the enlargement of the European Community?
    Mr. Pearson:I appreciate my hon. Friend's comments. Farming is going through a major process of transformation, with the mid-term review of the common agricultural policy and issues such as enlargement. The Department is doing a lot to support farming families. We will continue to review that, and we will take on board my hon. Friend's comments.

  The Prime Minister was asked—
  PRIME MINISTER

    Engagements
    Mr. John Greenway: If he will list his official engagements for Wednesday 8 September.
    The Prime Minister (Mr. Tony Blair): Before listing my engagements, I know that the whole House will join me in sending our profound sympathy and condolences to the people of Beslan and Russia. I have spoken to President Putin, and expressed that on behalf of the British people. We share in Russia's grief in this dark hour for that country, and we mourn with the people of Beslan as they continue to bury their dead. The video released last night simply underlines the inhumanity of terrorists who can target and murder children. It is evil that was, until it happened, beyond the contemplation of anyone.
    The whole House will also join me in sending our condolences to the families of the three British soldiers who have lost their lives in Iraq since the House rose on 22 July. They were doing an extraordinary and heroic job, and we can be proud of them.
    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. Greenway: First, may I associate my Ryedale constituents with the sympathies that the Prime Minister expressed to the people of Beslan and to the families of British soldiers killed in Iraq during the recess?
    What possible justification can there be at this time for cutting infantry numbers by 6,500 and abolishing some of our finest regiments, such as the Prince of Wales's Own Regiment, the Duke of Wellington's Regiment and the Green Howards in Yorkshire? Does the Prime Minister not recognise that that regimental system, sustained and supported by local communities, sets the British Army apart from all others, particularly in the vital role of peacekeeping? Would not it be an act of extreme folly to lose those qualities in these uncertain times?
    The Prime Minister: I am sure that the hon. Gentleman appreciates that the amount of money that we are putting into defence is increasing, not decreasing. It is important that we use that money effectively in the future, and the plans put forward, which have the support of the chiefs of staff, allow us to make sure that we can carry out the duties that our armed forces do superbly around the world, and allow us to do that in a modern way. That is necessary, because some of the things that we require today were not required a few years ago. [Interruption.] I cannot refrain from pointing out to Opposition Members who are shouting at me that defence spending was cut substantially under the Conservative Government.
    Sir Stuart Bell: Building on the comments of my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, is it not a fact that to combat the lethal, dangerous and odious relationship between nationalism and fundamentalism, moderate opinion, both majority and minority, in our country and elsewhere, has joined together in attack and condemnation of these horrendous events?
    The Prime Minister: What is important, as I said to President Putin in our telephone call, is that we recognise that this extraordinary form of virulent and extreme terrorism is an evil that we all face and that we must confront together. I express my total solidarity with him and with the Russian people in doing so.
    Mr. Michael Howard: I join the Prime Minister in expressing our anguish and heartache at the terrible events in Beslan. We shall never forget the haunting images that have filled our television screens in the last few days. I also join him in expressing our deep regret at the continuing loss of life in Iraq, and in particular the loss of the three British servicemen to whom he referred.
    Do not these events show yet again that we must be resolute in our determination to defeat terrorism wherever it takes place and to protect the safety of people in our own country? Will the Prime Minister look again at the possibility—about which I wrote to him on Sunday—of appointing a single Minister to be responsible for homeland security, with nothing to think about and nothing to do apart from protecting our people from the threat of terrorism?
    The Prime Minister: I join the right hon. and learned Gentleman in, and concur wholeheartedly with, his remarks about the need to fight terrorism effectively abroad and here. It is not simply because it came from him that we have not accepted the proposal for a particular Minister to be in charge of homeland security; it is because we believe that the present arrangements under the Home Secretary work well. I should also say that we have someone who co-ordinates all our security measures across Government and we believe that that works well.
    Of course we do this on the basis of advice. If we were advised that there were better ways of dealing with the security situation, we would adopt them, but I actually think that our security forces are currently doing a very good job on behalf of this country. We believe that, given the joint terrorism action centre and the measures taken by the security co-ordinator, these procedures are as good as they can be.
    Mr. Howard: I understand the points that the Prime Minister has made, but it is of course for advisers to advise and for Ministers to decide. I ask him to continue to keep this question under review.
    Let me turn to other matters. Does the Prime Minister regret the resignation of his Secretary of State for Work and Pensions?
    The Prime Minister: Of course I do, because of the substantial contribution that my right hon. Friend made to reducing unemployment and providing help for the
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    poorest pensioners. One of the best things that he did was, of course, implementing the new deal, which has helped 1 million people into work. I hope that the right hon. and learned Gentleman will now withdraw the absurd proposal to scrap it.
    Mr. Howard: In that case, why would friends of the former Work and Pensions Secretary—whose departure the Prime Minister has just regretted so much—say that he was
    "sick and tired after three months of poison and briefing against him"?
    Who could possibly have been responsible for that?
    The Prime Minister: Why do we not actually debate the policy? Why do we not debate what we are doing? Let me just tell the right hon. and learned Gentleman what we have done on welfare reform: 700,000 children have been lifted out of poverty, 1.8 million pensioners have been lifted out of poverty and pension credit is helping pensioners by providing up to £1,000 a year. The new deal is giving us 1 million extra people in work and a 30 per cent. fall in new entry to incapacity benefit. That is a record of which my right hon. Friend and we can be proud. Name me a Conservative Government who ever achieved it.
    Mr. Howard: Why will the Prime Minister not break the habit of a lifetime and just answer the question for once? He apparently thinks that the membership of his Cabinet and the way in which he runs his Government are of no consequence. He thinks that they do not matter. Well, they matter to his party chairman, who complained last night about the
    "ill-discipline and briefing within the Westminster village",
    and they matter to his former Chief Whip, who knows a bit about the way in which this Government are run and who has attacked what he called
    "the style of government that allows ministers of the crown to be briefed against".
    Who is responsible for that style of government?
    The Prime Minister: The fact that the right hon. and learned Gentleman is prepared to start debating briefings in the press with me only indicates the utter absence of any policy proposals on his part. He has just published today his proposals on student finance. One would think that he might ask me about them; perhaps he is about to do that. Or perhaps it is because they actually treble the interest rate on student loans that he will not.
    I will tell the right hon. and learned Gentleman what the test of a Government is. It is not what appears in the newspapers every day, but this: 2 million extra jobs, the halving of unemployment, the introduction of the minimum wage, the lowest interest rates and inflation for 30 years and 2 million pensioners lifted out of poverty. I said this a moment or two ago, and I repeat it now. What Conservative Government of whom the right hon. and learned Gentleman was a member ever achieved an economic and social record like that?
    Mr. Howard: I will certainly respond to the Prime Minister's challenge on our proposals for student finance. I will tell him the difference between his

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    proposals and ours: Labour has broken its promise and scrapped free higher education; we will keep our promise and restore free higher education. This Government are giving more money to poorer students, but taking it straight back through student fees; we will have lower student debt and grants for poorer students. That is the difference between our policies and his.
    Is it not extraordinary that the Prime Minister simply refuses to answer for the way in which his Government are run? In the last few days, his former Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, his former Chief Whip and his current party chairman have all criticised his style of government. Will he now, at the Dispatch Box, accept responsibility for the style of government that they have so clearly condemned?
    The Prime Minister: I am glad that I lured the right hon. and learned Gentleman on to student finance, because I would like to talk a little about that. First, his policies have a gaping hole of £500 million in them, which will be withdrawn from universities. Secondly, he says that he would keep student grants for poorer students. Actually, we set that at £2,700. Perhaps he could just confirm that his grant is £1,500, which is a halving of our grant. Thirdly, he would not restore free higher education, because instead of students getting interest rates at the rate of inflation, a commercial rate of interest would be charged, so instead of interest being 3.5 per cent., it would be 8 per cent. That means that the amount that many people on average and lower incomes pay under student finance would treble—a typical Tory policy.
    As for the style of government, that is surely a matter of the record of the Government, and the record of this Government is one of which we can be and are proud.
    Mr. Howard:Is not the shambles of the way in which the Government are run one reason why they have so completely failed to deliver on their promises? As the Prime Minister's Pension Secretaries come and go, let me quote the words of his first Minister for Welfare Reform. The right hon. Member for Birkenhead (Mr. Field) yesterday said:
    "The big issue that ought to be worrying the whole of the Government because it's worrying voters, is that when Labour came to office we had one of the strongest pension provisions in Europe and now probably we have some of the weakest".
    Is that not the fact of the matter and the record of the Prime Minister's Government? Is the pensions crisis not down to the failure of his Government and is it not time that he stopped changing his Ministers and started changing his policies?
    The Prime Minister: No, I do not agree that we should change the policy, because it has delivered for pensioners, in real terms, £10 billion extra a year. It means that 2.5 million pensioner households benefit from the pension credit and the minimum income guarantee. It means free TV licences for the over-75s, a winter fuel payment of £200 a year, reduced VAT on fuel, restored free eye tests and now the pension protection fund, which will help people whose pensions are unfunded by their employers. All those things will help pensioners now and in future.
    But the right hon. and learned Gentleman's proposal on pensions is this: he wants to get rid of the state second pension. Let me spell out to the House what that means.
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    Twenty million people would lose out, including 15 million low-income households and 2.5 million carers. It is a disastrous policy. [Interruption.] Oh yes, we will remind people of this from now until election day. His other policy is that the pension credit, which helps 2.5 million people, will be phased out. If that is not the case, perhaps he will stand up at the Dispatch Box and tell us.
    Mr. Adrian Bailey: I associate myself and my constituents with my right hon. Friend's remarks about the tragic events in Beslan and the death of our servicemen in Iraq.
    Does my right hon. Friend agree that, ultimately, defeating Muslim terrorism in Iraq depends on the majority of peace-loving Iraqis having a stake in their own community? What assessment has he made of progress in restoring vital public services such as education and health, and other measures designed to improve the quality of life for the great majority of peace-loving Iraqis?
    The Prime Minister: What is happening in Iraq and in Afghanistan is vital to the fight against international terrorism. Essentially, in Afghanistan, 10 million people have registered to vote, despite people often being assassinated on the way to registering, and in Iraq we have a UN-blessed process that should lead to elections in January 2005. The terrorists in both those countries are trying to stop the electoral process and the reconstruction, because they know that if we manage to put Afghanistan and Iraq on their feet as stable democratic countries, that is the biggest blow that there can be to international terrorism. I assure my hon. Friend that we will stick with this and see it through, because it is in the interests not only of security in those countries but of global security.
    Mr. Charles Kennedy: May I entirely associate my right hon. and hon. Friends with the very proper expressions of sincere condolence to the citizens of Beslan and their families for the appalling atrocities that have been visited on them, and to the families and loved ones of the three British soldiers who have lost their lives in Iraq since we last convened here?
    Returning to domestic pensions policy, does the Prime Minister recognise the fact that the typical woman retiring today will draw a basic state pension of just £51, which is little more than half the full state pension level? When does he intend to introduce steps to overcome that continuing blatant discrimination against women in the operation of the pension system?
    The Prime Minister: The interaction of the state second pension, which I was talking about a moment ago, and the pension credit is designed precisely to ensure that we help people on the lowest incomes in particular. As the right hon. Gentleman has asked about pensions, I must say that I cannot agree with his proposal of yesterday, that single pensioners over 75 will get an extra £25 a week by abolishing the Department of Trade and Industry. He says that abolishing the DTI would bring in £8 billion immediately, but that is not the DTI's administration costs, it is the entire budget that it administers. Abolishing it would mean the whole of British science being cut by two thirds and all regional

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    selective assistance would cease. When we have this debate on pensions, we should at least have it on the basis of serious costed proposals.
    Mr. Kennedy: Over coming months we shall certainly have that debate and the ultimate test on the outcome will be decided by the electorate at the general election—but let us get back to the policy that we are living with, which is the Government's policy, which I asked about. The Prime Minister refers to pension credit, yet according to the Government's own figures published today, 2 million pensioners—two out of five of those eligible—are not receiving the means-tested benefits to which they are entitled. He should not be surprised by that, because we know that the Government, again according to their own figures, budget on the very assumption that there will not be that take-up. Surely, in a comparatively wealthy country such as ours, we could now afford, politically and economically, to offer our older citizens the genuine dignity and positive security that they deserve.
    The Prime Minister: Of course, everyone in the House would agree in principle with that, but the question is how we are to pay for it. We established the Pensions Commission last year under Adair Turner, which will publish its interim findings in October, precisely so that there can be a proper public debate about not only today's pensioners but future pensioners. There are real issues there and if we want to commit ourselves to funding even greater state provision for people who will become pensioners in future years, we must say how that will be paid for, and we must do so in a realistic way, from the taxpayer base that we have.
    I am sure that that will be a major issue over the coming months. When the interim report by Adair Turner's commission is published, we can at least see what the facts are and then what the real choices facing our country are.
    Mr. James Plaskitt: In Warwickshire, 35 antisocial behaviour orders have been issued to date—six in my constituency—and 30 more are under consideration. Does my right hon. Friend agree with Chief Superintendent Whitehouse in Leamington who tells me that ASBOs are now much easier to obtain and highly effective in dealing with some of our worst offenders?
    The Prime Minister: I think that ASBOs are far easier to obtain now, which is why somewhere in the region of 2,500 of them have been granted. As my hon. Friend would recognise, they are part of a wider range of measures on antisocial behaviour. On the basis of a visit I made to Harlow recently and other visits around the country, I think that antisocial behaviour legislation is now being used by local authorities and the police to make a real difference to antisocial behaviour. There is nothing that makes people in this country angrier than not using the new powers that have been given to the police and local authorities. I urge them to use those powers.
    Mrs. Annette L. Brooke: How much hope does the Prime Minister hold out for making progress on the agreed road map for peace in the middle east?
    The Prime Minister: Progress depends critically on two things: first, on an end to terrorism, or at least the best possible methods of achieving that end; secondly, on both sides being willing to negotiate the solution set out in the road map. I hope very much that we can return to the road map. We need to do that—it is vital. I mentioned Iraq and Afghanistan earlier as part of the front line in the war against terrorism, and it is also true to say that progress in the middle east would make an enormous difference to the ability to recruit people to international terrorism.
    Bob Russell: What about the wall?
    The Prime Minister: Liberal Democrat Members shout about the wall and about Israel. We have made our criticisms of that clear. However, it is also fair and right to point out that innocent Israeli citizens are being killed and maimed by terrorist acts. If we want a lasting solution, we have to stop the terrorism as well as urge Israel to negotiate.
    Anne Picking: I am sure that the whole House will welcome the Commission for Africa and congratulate the Prime Minister on setting it up. Does he agree that there is no better cause here at home than that of supporting fair trade? In my own community, sterling work is being done to support the cause and our local authority is planning to become a local authority fair trade council. Will he use his good offices to encourage other local authorities to do the same?
    The Prime Minister: I entirely agree with what my hon. Friend says and we support fair trade—about £500,000 goes to various promotions. Sales of fair trade products have risen by almost 50 per cent. in the last couple of years. I entirely agree that it is one important way in which people can show their commitment to those countries that desperately need fair trade to be extended.
    Andrew Selous: Does the Prime Minister believe that it is acceptable that some pensioners have to spend a third of their income in council tax?
    The Prime Minister: We would all like to see council tax come down, but it can do so only if councils decide to levy less council tax and if the central Government grant to local government is maintained. I have to point out to the hon. Gentleman that his party's policy is to freeze the grant given to local authorities, which would make a £4.5 billion shortfall in the money given to local authorities. That cannot help reduce council tax for pensioners or anyone else.
    David Winnick: Is my right hon. Friend aware that, if the reports that action will be taken within this fortnight to bring into law a hunting with dogs Bill are correct, it will be warmly

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    welcomed on this side of the House? Is it not totally unacceptable that the House of Lords should have some permanent veto on a measure that has been carried with such a large majority in the House of Commons? Hunting with dogs is a barbaric practice that should have been abolished years ago.
    The Prime Minister: I have said that we will find a way of resolving that issue and we will.

    Ministerial Visits
    Mr. Anthony Steen: If he will pay an official visit to Berry Pomeroy castle, Marldon, Devon.
    The Prime Minister: I have no current plans to do so.
    Mr. Steen: The Prime Minister knows that castles were built in the south of England to repel invaders, mostly from the continent. Increasing numbers of people in the west country feel that the freedoms for which they fought have been eroded by the European Union and that their homes are no longer their castles. Does he agree that we need an early referendum on the European constitution so that Britain can lead the way in that process, and not be the last country to enter it, after all the others have reached a decision?
    The Prime Minister: I am afraid that I do not agree with the hon. Gentleman over Europe, but that will not surprise him. However, I point out that the creation of the EU and our membership of it mean that the wars that used to divide our continent no longer do so. It is important that we weigh that in the balance when arguing about whether to be in favour of Europe. However, I will tell the House about Berry Pomeroy castle. I gather from its website that it is haunted£primarily by a blue lady called Margaret.

    Engagements
    Dr. Andrew Murrison: Does the Prime Minister agree that mobile phone masts should be subject to normal planning control? If so, when will he amend planning guidance so that local people have a proper say about where they are sited?
    The Prime Minister: As I have said on many occasions, our approach to this matter should be based on the science involved and the real safety issues. Of course people should be consulted about where masts are sited, but it is also important that we make the phone system work adequately.
    Jane Griffiths: Since the House rose on 22 July, we have all had reason to be proud of the achievements of Team GB in Athens. Will my right hon. Friend add his congratulations to my constituent Sarah Webb, who won a gold medal with her team mates in the women's Yngling sailing? Will he also congratulate everyone in Team GB, whether or not they were medal winners?
    The Prime Minister: I am happy to send my congratulations to Sarah Webb, to all those who won medals at the Olympic games and to all those who took part. They did superbly for Team GB, and I am sure that the whole House would want to send our best wishes and thanks.
    Bob Spink: Is the Prime Minister aware that children's hospice week begins on 18 September? Will he acknowledge the wonderful work done by the people in that service? Children's hospices in England get about 5 per cent. of their income from public funds, but the Little Haven hospice in my constituency receives less than 2 per cent. Does he accept that that is wrong? Will he accept responsibility for looking into the matter and not pass it on to the primary care trust?
    The Prime Minister: I pay tribute to the considerable work that the hon. Gentleman does in respect of the hospice movement. All of us would like greater funding to go to the hospices. An additional £48 million in funding has been made available over the next three years by the New Opportunities Fund and £15 million of that will go directly to children's hospices. We are always aware of the need to do more, and we will try to do more, but it is important to recognise that we have increased the funding significantly. We will increase it even more, as we can, although that has to be weighed in the balance with other health service priorities.
    Mr. Bob Blizzard: Is my right hon. Friend aware that, since a dispersal order was put in place in part of south Lowestoft in my constituency, the number of violent offences there has already fallen by 49 per cent? Will he join me in congratulating Chief Inspector Sydney and his team? Does not that show that, when local authorities use the measures contained in the Anti-social Behaviour Act 2003, which was introduced by this Government, they are effective in cracking down on crime and antisocial behaviour?
    The Prime Minister: I am happy to pass on my congratulations to the police in my hon. Friend's constituency, and to the others engaged in trying to deal with antisocial behaviour. There is increasing evidence from around the country that the powers can work if they are implemented. It is important for Members of Parliament, local authorities and the police to be aware that there are substantial additional powers that can be used, for example, to close down houses used for drug dealing. More than 20,000 fixed-penalty notices have been given up and down the country and other powers allow us to target very young children whose parents do not exercise proper parental responsibility.
    There are now a whole series of measures to deal with that and it simply requires imaginative use of them at local level. I am delighted that in my hon. Friend's constituency there is yet another example of how that can be done.
    Mr. Simon Thomas: Does the Prime Minister agree with the proposal from the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards that any Member—any Member—who lies or misleads the House should face investigation from the commissioner?
    The Prime Minister: I am sure that the commissioner for standards is right in saying that and I hope that no hon. Member lies to the House. That has always been the case; it should always be the case and, as far as I am aware, it is.
    Vera Baird: Will my right hon. Friend join me in congratulating the American company, Huntsman, on yesterday's announcement that it will build a £200 million polyethylene plant in my Redcar constituency? The deal was made possible by a £16.5 million grant from the Labour Government. Will my right hon. Friend continue his support for the Teesside chemical industry and does he agree that 120
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    long-term, skilled jobs for Redcar are a prize that would never have been achieved under the regional policies of the Conservative party?
    The Prime Minister: It is obviously fantastic news for the company and the employees because it safeguards almost 800 existing jobs on Teesside and adds more than 100 extra jobs. That is great news for the whole of Teesside. My hon. and learned Friend is absolutely right in saying that it was in part done with regional selective assistance of £16.5 million, and I would simply point out to the leader of the Liberal Democrats that, under his proposals, that money, too, would not have been available; throughout the country, there are massive regional selective assistance programmes that would be cut if their policy had its way.

Access to Literature (Visually-Impaired Children)
12.32 pm
Mrs. Annette L. Brooke: I beg to move,
That leave be given to bring in a Bill to make provision about accessible formats for printed works for visually-impaired children.
The Bill aims to build on the important changes brought about by the Copyright (Visually Impaired Persons) Act 2002. I congratulate the hon. Member for Dunfermline, West (Rachel Squire) and the noble Lord Morris of Manchester on the passage of that private Member's Bill on to the statute book.
However, visually impaired children still face problems in accessing literature. Children who are visually impaired or have other reading disabilities such as dyslexia are not getting the accessible information that they need to ensure that they have opportunities equal to their non-disabled peers, both in education and in leisure reading. Jacqueline Wilson, the popular children's author, has given her support to the Bill and, with many other famous authors, supports the important Right to Read campaign.
Access to literature for visually impaired children, who cannot read standard print text, is made possible through accessible formats such as large print, audio tape or Braille, or synthesized speech for children with a reading disability such as dyslexia.
Visual impairment in children is fortunately a low-incidence disability, with approximately 23,000 children between birth and 16 years of age in the UK affected. I recently met a family in my constituency with a baby born blind and they feel very isolated.
In addition, about 4 per cent. of the population are severely dyslexic. A further 6 per cent. have mild to moderate problems. Synthetic speech output or audiotape is often one of the only ways in which children with dyslexia can access literature.
The Department for Education and Skills states that funding is available for the provision of accessible information through the schools access initiative, which can be used for the production of materials to enable access to the curriculum for children with reading disabilities.
However, recent parliamentary questions have revealed that it is not clear nationally how much money is being spent on access to literature for children with reading disabilities via that initiative. Reports from teachers, support workers and the voluntary sector identify significant shortages.
I am delighted that I no longer hear of cases where children who are wheelchair users are prevented from attending their local schools and that funding is available for appropriate adaptations, but I am concerned about the adequacy of funding for visually impaired children. On making inquiries of the local authorities in my area, I discovered variations in policies. In one authority, any expenditure under £3,000 had to be financed by the schools from devolved funding. The threshold was higher in the two other local authorities.
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Despite the obligations laid on schools and local education authorities by the Special Educational Needs and Disability Act 2001, children are not getting the materials that they need or want in the format that they require. Textbooks can cost several thousand pounds to adapt into accessible formats, and specialist teachers spend many hours adapting textbooks for students in individual schools. I have learned of teachers in Dorset this summer spending much time producing "Romeo and Juliet" in large-print format. Currently, there is no national co-ordination of accessible information for schools, leading to duplication and resource wastage.
The Royal National Institute of the Blind's "Shaping the Future" campaign report, published in 2000, found that one in three blind and partially sighted pupils in mainstream secondary schools did not always get their school test and exam papers in their preferred format and that 25 per cent. of secondary pupils in mainstream schools said they did not usually get handouts in a format that they prefer. No major study similar to "Shaping the Future" has been undertaken since the introduction of the Special Educational Needs and Disability Act 2001. However, organisations such as the VI Forum—an e-mail group for teachers and support assistants working with blind and partially sighted children—regularly feature stories of pupils not getting the materials that they need to gain access to the curriculum.
The RNIB carried out an informal survey of teachers, asking them which key stage 3 and 4 textbooks they would like the charity to produce during the 2004–05 academic year. Seventeen subjects and 129 different texts by 22 different publishers were requested, but the RNIB has the capacity to produce only 10 publications in accessible formats. A teacher asked the RNIB to transcribe two music scores into Braille. To cover costs, an £800 charge had to be made for the work, but the teacher had a total annual budget of only £500 for four students.
The Right to Read Alliance has argued for some time that a constructive step would be to increase the schools access initiative budget and provide dedicated funding to support the national co-ordination of publishing in alternative formats and to commission centrally not only specialist books but those for which there would be a particularly high demand.
Given the relatively small number of blind and partially sighted children in the school population, too much financial responsibility has been put on schools. The problem is exacerbated by the diversity of materials that children need and the range of formats. My Bill therefore proposes that national co-ordination of accessible format materials be undertaken to avoid duplication and resource wastage.
A second problem is knowing what accessible information resources are available. Moves towards solving that problem have already taken place with the creation of Revealweb, supported and managed by the RNIB and the National Library for the Blind. That online database contains all the accessible format works available from the not-for-profit sector. It therefore allows anyone—parents and teachers—to search for

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where they could find an accessible format copy of a book that they need for a child. My Bill proposes that a similar initiative be established to include accessible format works produced commercially. That would enable the parents and teachers of children with reading disabilities to find out whether the books that they are looking for are already available in accessible formats.
There are still cases where a visually impaired child will not be able to access a newly published book at the same time as other children. One of the major barriers that not-for-profit agencies face in making accessible format copies of literature available at the same time as, or soon after, print versions are published is gaining access to the electronic files of the text. If a document has to be scanned and then formatted, months can be added to the time taken to produce accessible formats. Publishers and voluntary sector transcription agencies working together can build relationships based on trust, whereby early access to electronic versions of texts can be arranged. My Bill proposes an improvement to that situation.
The library and statistics information unit at Loughborough university conducted a survey of library authorities in 2000 and found that only 5 per cent. of library authorities had a written policy on services for blind and partially sighted people and that only 25 per cent. had a specific budget for those services.
It also conducted a survey of 600 blind and partially sighted people in 2001 that found that 50 per cent. had not used their public library in the last three years. The other 50 per cent. who had used libraries reported difficulties with using the services on offer. My Bill includes a modest proposal for library services.
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In addition to the measures contained in my Bill, I want to raise the issue of the VAT that is levied on the audio books that people with reading disabilities rely on to access literature. I hope that the Government will work at European level to secure a reduction of the VAT levied on audio books, bearing in mind that print works do not attract VAT.
In conclusion, a lack of accessible-format curriculum materials and books is having a profound effect on the opportunities available to children with reading disabilities. A number of solutions are needed to improve that situation and my Bill contains some simple proposals, including dedicated funding within the schools access initiative budget to ensure efficient co-ordination and production of accessible information; the establishment of a complete database of commercially available accessible-format works, to complement the Revealweb database; the establishment of a national repository for electronic versions of texts that have been published to facilitate the transition of works into accessible formats; and libraries to have written policies on services to blind and partially sighted people and allocate a budget for those services. I hope, therefore, that the House will support my Bill.
Question put and agreed to.
Bill ordered to be brought in by Mrs. Annette L. Brooke, Mr. David Heath, Sandra Gidley, Mr. Phil Willis, Brian White, Linda Perham. Rachel Squire. Mr. David Amess and Peter Bottomley.

ACCESS TO LITERATURE (VISUALLY-IMPAIRED CHILDREN)
Mrs. Annette L. Brooke accordingly presented a Bill to make provision about accessible formats for printed works for visually-impaired children: And the same was read the First time; and ordered to be read a Second time on Friday 15 October, and to be printed [Bill 149].
Opposition Day
[16TH ALLOTTED DAY]
Opposition Day

  Pensions Policy
  Mr. Speaker: We now come to the main business, and I have selected the amendment in the name of the Prime Minister.
  12.42 pm
  Mr. David Willetts: I beg to move,
  That this House regrets the Government's failure to tackle the pensions crisis; expresses concern that present and former employees of Turner & Newall and those in a similar position do not know what assistance, if any, they will get from either the Financial Assistance Scheme or the Pension Protection Fund; regrets the inadequacies of Government efforts to encourage people to build up retirement savings in funded pensions; condemns the spread of means-tested benefits; draws attention to the Government's recent failure to deliver benefits to pensioners competently; further regrets the Government's wider failure to reform the welfare system for older people; notes that the National Pensioners Convention is lobbying Parliament on 8th September; and calls for Government action to tackle the crisis in funded pensions and to ensure dignity and security in retirement for older people.
  I wish to draw the attention of the House to my interests, which appear in the Register of Members' Interests.
  I begin by bidding farewell to the previous Secretary of State, who is sadly not in his place. We will miss him. He was a decent and honourable man—[HON. MEMBERS: "He still is."] It is a pity that he will no longer serve on the Front Bench. Those Labour Members who shouted that he still is decent and honourable might like to reflect on why he was the victim of such a sustained campaign of spinning aimed at undermining his position as Secretary of State. He had to wake up every morning and read over his breakfast comments such as the following:
  "Mr. Blair is known to be looking for fresh thinking on the pensions crisis after warnings from Adair Turner, his pensions guru, on the seriousness of the situation."
  That is what The Guardian said. The Sun said:
  "Tony Blair is alarmed by the failure of successive ministers to grapple with the pension crisis."
  Back in July, as the Secretary of State set off for his summer holidays, he had to read:
  "Andrew Smith is set for the sack, according to ministerial sources, after failing to tackle the pensions crisis."
  We have had a Secretary of State brought down by spin and dissatisfaction at No. 10 with the quality of his performance in tackling the pension crisis.
  The right hon. Gentleman resigned two days ago, and we still do not have a Secretary of State to replace him. It is always good to see the Minister for Pensions, who is jovial and amiable—we always enjoy debating with him—but it would be convenient to have a Secretary of State here.
  As pensions are in crisis, as we are debating the subject and as the National Pensioners Convention is here, it is a slight oversight that we do not have a Secretary of State for Work and Pensions in the
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  Chamber. I do not know whether hon. Members here are candidates for the post, but I can see a very strong candidate on the Labour Benches.
  In the absence of the right hon. Gentleman, perhaps the best person to speak on behalf of the Government would have been the Chancellor of the Exchequer. After all, that important constitutional text, the Granita pact, set aside economic and social policy as a responsibility of the Chancellor, and he has been fighting a successful rearguard action over the past two days to keep it that way. He is the guy who is responsible for the £5 billion a year tax on our pension schemes that has wrought such havoc. He is the guy who is obsessed with introducing more and more complicated means-testing. It is a pity we do not have him here to defend the Government's policies.
  So we do not have the right hon. Gentleman and we do not have the Chancellor. Instead, what we have is a shambles, with a serious and growing crisis in our pensions.
  Mr. Andrew Miller: I accept that the country faces some serious problems as a result of people retiring now and those who are about to retire. Does the hon. Gentleman accept that part of the problem is the failure of the Pensions Act 1995 to solve the problems facing some occupational pension funds, contrary to what the House was told at the time?
  Mr. Willetts: The 1995 Act set in place a regime with the minimum funding requirement and regulation of pensions that was intended. It improved the security of our pensioners. I am afraid that the problem has arisen since 1997 when, among other things, the Government reduced the level of protection provided by the minimum funding requirement. Conservative Members, who have watched a £5 billion a year tax imposed on our pension funds and the reduction in the level of protection provided for the minimum funding requirement, are not going to hear the Labour party suddenly claim that it is all our fault.
  Mr. Peter Lilley: My hon. Friend will doubtless recall that the 1995 Act was introduced to deal with the crisis created by Robert Maxwell removing hundreds of millions of pounds from pension funds. The current crisis results from this Chancellor introducing the Robert Maxwell memorial tax, which removes £5 billion a year from pension funds.
  Mr. Willetts: My right hon. Friend puts the point with customary precision and honesty. That is exactly the case and it is good to have his authoritative intervention.
  Kali Mountford: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Willetts: I want to make a bit more progress, but it might be possible to hear from the hon. Lady in a moment.
  I want to remind the House of what has happened in the past 10 days. Last Monday—only nine days ago—hundreds of thousands of pensioners could not get the pensions to which they were entitled when they went to

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  their post office because an official of JP Morgan in New York pushed the button on the computer programme to stop all payments. That was why for several hours on Monday we all had constituents who were unable to get the pensions to which they were entitled. The House ought to receive a proper explanation from the Minister, which I hope we will hear in a moment, about what went wrong and why the new system, which is being imposed on many reluctant pensioners who would much rather carry on being paid through the order books with which they are familiar, has already crashed and caused such distress.
  Michael Fabricant: Does my hon. Friend think it despicable that just as the Secretary of State has been scapegoated by the Government, the Post Office was scapegoated by the Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, the hon. Member for Gravesham (Mr. Pond), on Radio 4. When he was asked what responsibility he would take, he said none. He said that the Post Office was at fault and the Government were not to blame, but was it not the Government who instituted that system in the first place?
  Mr. Willetts: As always, it is everyone else's fault, but never the Government's. The test of their performance on pensions is which is closing more rapidly—the post offices or the pension schemes. I never quite know which it is because they are both closing under this Government.
  Earlier this week, the main steel union, the Iron and Steel Trades Confederation Community union, confirmed that it will take Ministers to court for failing to protect its members' pension funds.
  I hope that we shall hear from the Minister about what was referred to in the press as the "unsatisfactory negotiations" with the Department that led the union to decide to take legal action.
  The latest figures show the scale of pension deficits in our leading companies. The top 100 companies alone have a deficit of £42 billion in their pension schemes with possibly another £20 billion on top of that to cover factors for which they have not allowed.
  Kali Mountford: Which of the Conservative party's policies should give us some sense of security about its ability to handle pensions? Would it be the pensions holiday, the cutting of the state earnings-related pension scheme without telling anyone or the mis-selling of pensions? Which of those policies should give us confidence?
  Mr. Willetts: I shall turn to our policies for tackling the pensions crisis. I am proud of those policies, and what is happening at the moment—the collapse of funded pensions and the spread of mass means-testing—shows that our policies are needed to get funded pensions going again in our country.
  We have had post offices failing to pay benefits, new figures on the state of the pension deficit, and we have seen the Pensions Bill staggering through the House of Lords. There have been new amendments, and clauses tabled and withdrawn. At the latest count, 360
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  Government amendments have been tabled in the Lords. We read that the Government are so desperate to get their Hunting Bill through that they are willing to contemplate abandoning the Pensions Bill in order to do so. I see the Minister shaking his head. If he can give a categorical assurance that the Government will not abandon the Pensions Bill in favour of their obsession with banning hunting, I would be very interested to hear it. [Interruption.] Does he wish to come to the Dispatch Box and give that assurance?
  The Minister for Pensions (Malcolm Wicks): The Government and our supporters in the House are absolutely determined to ensure that the Pensions Bill receives Royal Assent. I hope that hon. Members on both sides of the House will ensure that that is done so that, among other things, the protection fund will be up and running in April next year.
  Mr. Willetts: I guess that that was the Minister saying that he would not allow the Government's obsession with the Hunting Bill to get in his way. He is the Minister responsible for the Pensions Bill, and I should warn him that some of the briefing has affected him as well. On the BBC "News at Ten O'Clock" the night before last, the political editor said:
  "A senior source told me tonight that the Pensions Bill is still in a shambolic and chaotic state."
  That is what No. 10 is saying about the Minister's Bill. He had better watch out because at that rate, I do not think he will be the new Secretary of State.
  Mr. Peter Pike: I know that the hon. Gentleman is an expert on the subject of pensions but does he accept that many of the problems of shortfalls in funding would not have been created if companies had not had pensions holidays when the stock exchange and the market were in a different position a few years ago?
  Mr. Willetts: When the hon. Gentleman says "different position", he means everything was a lot better. That is what "different position" means. In that different position, under my party, when pensions had surpluses—those were the good old days—it is right that there were contributions holidays. Of course, there were also increases in benefits for members of pension schemes that went beyond what was necessary according to the terms of the pension or the law of this House. Everyone participated in the benefits of those pension surpluses.
  Mr. David Tredinnick: Will my hon. Friend explain why, if everything is so marvellous and the Government have done such a wonderful job, hundreds of pensioners have come to Westminster today—including some from Hinckley and Bosworth—to complain about the atrocious situation the Government have created?
  Mr. Willetts: Exactly. One of the reasons we have called the debate is to show that we care about the plight of millions of our pensioners. The Government cannot even field a Secretary of State to handle the subject. Our pension funds are in crisis, pensions are not being paid through post offices, and we had the latest figures on

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  pension credit this week as well. They showed that out of the 4.8 million pensioners eligible for the pension credit—as we know from a parliamentary answer from the Minister to me—3.1 million pensioners are claiming it. That means that 1.75 million pensioners eligible for the new means-tested benefit are still not receiving it. After next month, it will be impossible for them to claim the full backdated benefit from the introduction of the new pension credit. As we have always warned, the Minister has a massive problem of low take-up of his complicated means-tested benefits. No wonder the National Pensioners Convention, and just about every outside group, is pressing for the reversal of the pernicious spread of means-tested benefits.
  Sir Nicholas Winterton: My hon. Friend mentioned in passing the role of the right hon. Member for Birkenhead (Mr. Field). Am I right in saying that the right hon. Gentleman was struggling hard to produce the right results and was about to recommend the unthinkable? If his proposals had been taken into account by the Government and implemented, many of the problems we are facing today would not be with us.
  Mr. Willetts: My hon. Friend makes a very good point. Perhaps I could briefly remind the House of the cycle that we have been through. We have been told again this week in the briefing from No. 10 that the Government are about to get serious about reforming welfare and tackling the pensions crisis. We have been through this before. In fact, we have been through it several times. Before the 1997 election, it was stated:
  "Social security requires very bold thinking."
  The right hon. Member for Birkenhead (Mr. Field) was appointed as the Minister for Welfare Reform because
  "Mr. Blair saw welfare reform as crucial to his administration."
  Sadly, the right hon. Gentleman left the Government because they were not willing to embark on serious welfare reform.
  Mr. Frank Field: The hon. Gentleman has been speaking for almost 15 minutes. Is it not fair comment that both the major parties, looking back on their records, may well regret some of the things that they have done, but they never set out with the intent to arrive at the current position? The crucial matter in the debate is what both the major parties plan from now on. If I catch your eye, Mr. Speaker, I want to talk about the ideas that I advanced, which are ideas for the future. Before the hon. Gentleman sits down, will he give us a clear idea of where the Opposition stand on the matter? Although lots of pensioners are rightly here today, it is pensioners in the country who want to know where all three parties stand before they cast their votes at the next election. During the next election, for the first time ever, the majority of those turning up at the ballot boxes will be pensioners.
  Mr. Willetts: The right hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. As he knows, my party has been putting forward constructive proposals concerning the pensions crisis, how to reform the mess of state benefits for pensioners, and how to encourage more funded pensions saving over many years. We shall continue to do so, and I hope to touch on that in my remarks.
  730
  However, we are talking about a Government who do not even have a Secretary of State for Work and Pensions to explain their policies on a major crisis affecting our country. The Opposition are entitled to hold the Government to account for that. We have been told again this week not to worry, as the matter is about to be tackled, No. 10 is about to make it a priority and the Prime Minister will focus on it during the third term. To remind everyone, we were told that he was going to tackle it as part of his first term. When the right hon. Gentleman was a Minister, he was appointed to do precisely that.
  We were then told that the matter was to be the Government's priority in their second term. They have endlessly produced documents announcing that they are about to start tackling the pensions crisis because they are committed to doing so. We endlessly go through the same cycle, where Secretaries of State come and go, but the situation gets worse and worse. The right hon. Member for Edinburgh, Central (Mr. Darling) was Secretary of State for four years. During that time, an average of 50,000 members were affected by pension schemes being wound up every year. He produced Green Papers, and announced that
  "the time for talking and discussing is coming to an end. We now actually need to implement our programmes."
  He said that in July 1998.
  The Secretary of State who has just left office was there for two and half years. During his time, 60,000 people a year were affected by the winding up of pension schemes. He began the job announcing that he was insisting that reform of welfare was vital to Labour's second term. What has happened? The problem has got even worse. This week's briefing sets out the matter as a priority for the third term. That is not good enough. The Government have been in office for long enough to seriously tackle the crisis instead of making it worse. Millions of pensioners are trapped on means-tested benefits and many pensioners are not claiming the benefits to which they are entitled.
  Household saving was 10 per cent. of household income when we lost office, but it is now down to 6 per cent. Funded pensions are in crisis and many of our constituents are worried about the severe financial problems they face as a result of their pension schemes winding up. Tackling the pensions crisis would therefore be one of our priorities in government.
  Mr. Jonathan Djanogly: Is it not the case that many young people are dissuaded from taking up pensions because of the lack of incentives? Are we not putting ourselves in a position that will lead to our having a disaster on our hands in 20 years time?
  Mr. Willetts: Indeed, which is why I should like to turn to our policies for tackling the crisis. We have two central propositions. First, we must reverse the spread of means-tested benefits. We are heading for a situation in which more than half of pensioners will be dependent on means-tested benefits. There is widespread consensus among people who have thought seriously about the subject that we need to reverse the spread of means-testing. I could cite to the Minister for Pensions

  731
  comments by the charities, the National Association of Pension Funds and the savings industry, but I shall not do so. I shall simply refer him to what he once said:
  "No one of sound mind could advocate wholesale means-testing".
  Is not the pension credit, which is supposed to go to almost half of pensioners, an example of mass means-testing? Or is the Minister saying that the Chancellor is not of sound mind? Does he still stand by that view? If so, he can join the mainstream consensus, which favours reforming the mess of means-tested benefits for pensioners.
  We are committed to increasing the value of the basic state pension by linking it to earnings, not prices, thus reversing the spread of means-testing. We will not, contrary to what the Prime Minister said again in Prime Minister's questions today, abolish the pension credit. However, as the value of the basic state pension rises, fewer pensioners will need to claim the pension credit. That is the right way to implement reform, and that is what we will do.
  Mr. Steve Webb: As the hon. Gentleman knows, to some extent I support his analysis of the problem, but could he clarify something? His policy would link the pension credit to prices, not earnings. When challenged, he argued that the Government have not promised anything beyond this Parliament. However, if they promised to earnings-link the pension credit, would he do so as well, or would he price-link it?
  Mr. Willetts: If the Government said that they would increase the pension credit in the next Parliament by linking it to earnings, not prices—we are still waiting for a statement of their policy—once we had seen the figures and their modelling we would consider what we would do to the pension credit. We are certainly not obliged, however, to commit ourselves on the pension credit when we have not heard from Ministers. However, it would be interesting to hear the intentions of the Minister for Pensions on the pension credit in the next Parliament.
  The first thing that we must do is reverse the spread of means-tested benefits and reform benefits for pensioners. My hon. Friend the Member for Huntingdon (Mr. Djanogly), however, is right that that is only half the story. We must also restore incentives to save and offer people new incentives, so that if they put money into a reliable savings product there will be a clear reward. We therefore propose the introduction of a new lifetime savings account—there will be a contribution from the Government alongside the money that the individuals put in—with the aim of achieving a clear and vivid reward for saving.
  I do not know whether the Minister—who knows, he may become the Secretary of State—can signal in his speech that the Government will join the consensus, but I hope that he can. If he agrees that there is too much
  732
  means-testing and that the Government are going to do something about it, that would be welcomed by hon. Members from many parties.
  Ms Sally Keeble rose—
  Mr. Willetts: I hope that the Minister can say something about encouraging people to save more for their retirement, as that would also be welcome, but even if he cannot take those big strategic steps—after all, he does not even have a Secretary of State to consult—I hope that he can answer two specific questions about problems facing pension funds. First, however, I shall give way to the hon. Member for Northampton, North (Ms Keeble)
  Ms Keeble: What are the hon. Gentleman' proposals for the 86 per cent. of women who work but who do not make sufficient national insurance contributions to receive the state pension? As their earnings are low they are unlikely to be able to save enough to receive a funded pension of the type that he described.
  Mr. Willetts: Those women would benefit from the greater uprating in the basic state pension. At present, they do not benefit from the pension credit, as it is assumed that they have a full contribution record and receive the full state pension, even though many of them, as the hon. Lady rightly said, do not do so.
  Ms Keeble rose—
  Mr. Willetts: I will give way to the hon. Lady again—let us continue the pensions policy seminar.
  Ms Keeble: I want to press the hon. Gentleman on a point that I would make to the Minister for Pensions, but unfortunately I have to attend Committee. Eighty-six per cent. of women who work do not make sufficient contributions to qualify for a pension, so they do not benefit from the earnings link. Women's earnings are lower, so they do not make enough money to save. What will happen to those women pensioners?
  Mr. Willetts: I accept the hon. Lady's concern about women whose earnings are so low that do not receive any contributory state pension at all, but the proportion of such women is less than 80 per cent. Most women who work are earning enough to make contributions, so even though we would increase the basic state pension by linking it to earnings, we would not raise the lower earnings limit as we do not want to take away from women the opportunity to contribute to the basic state pension. I continue to study with great interest research by the TUC and the Fawcett Society on the problem, as I accept that there is a genuine grievance among women pensioners, many of whom were let down when they were not properly informed by the Inland Revenue in the past few years about the opportunity to contribute to the state pension through higher national insurance contributions.
  I wish to press the Minister for Pensions on two specific points. First, I am sure that many Members have constituents affected by the winding-up of pension schemes. Sadly, over the summer, we have followed the

  733
  problems at Turner and Newall, which could lead to a pension winding-up that would dwarf any previous winding-up.
  Mr. Adrian Flook: Dozens of Turner and Newall employees living in Taunton are affected by the collapse of the fund and appear to be trapped in a less well-off retirement. They have heard about a pot of money—I accept that it is only about £6,000 a pensioner—which is meant to help people like them, but I have been told that it will not. Is my hon. Friend as disappointed as my constituents and me by the Government's failure to act?
  Mr. Willetts: My hon. Friend is right to raise that issue, which I hope the Minister will address. I have a flimsy document, published a couple of weeks ago by the official Occupational Pensions Regulatory Authority, entitled "The Financial Assistance Scheme and completing scheme wind-ups". It is OPRA's first attempt to make sense of the Government's hurried announcement following pressure from us and their own Back Benchers for a financial assistance scheme. That flimsy document has an even thinner appendix entitled "Current information about the Financial Assistance Scheme", which includes a paragraph that states:
  "The Minister of State for Pensions, Malcolm Wicks"—
  he is still in post—
  "has explained that the Financial Assistance Scheme…is for those who have lost out because they worked for companies that have become insolvent and wound up their pension scheme underfunded before the Pension Protection Fund…is set up."
  The pension protection fund is due to be set up in May 2005, so the financial assistance scheme would cover everyone up to that date. However, at the bottom of the page another paragraph says:
  '"The current expectation is that the FAS will provide help for members of schemes which started to wind up between April 1997 and May 2004".
  If that statement, which contradicts the earlier paragraph, is true and the FAS only runs until May 2004, it is not OPRA's fault as it does not have the faintest idea of what Ministers are up to or what the Government are doing. Many people, perhaps including Turner and Newall employees, could suffer as there is a gap between the deadline for the FAS and the establishment of the pension protection fund.
  We cannot allow our constituents to live with such uncertainty any longer. The Minister ought to take the opportunity of this debate to give clear assurances that the financial assistance scheme will cover everybody affected by wind-ups until the pension protection fund comes into force.
  Tom Levitt rose—
  Mr. Patrick McLoughlin: I am grateful that my hon. Friend has used part of his speech to highlight the problems that a great number of our constituents will face. Would it not be a disgrace if the employees at Turner and Newall, who paid into a pension scheme in good faith, fall between the two schemes, as my hon. Friend described? Even though
  734
  there is no Secretary of State, should we not expect the Minister to make it clear that the Government will not allow that to happen?
  Mr. Willetts: My hon. Friend is right. I know that near his constituency, in High Peak—I see the hon. Member for High Peak (Tom Levitt) trying to intervene—in Chapel-en-le-Frith, many workers are affected. Workers in Lydney in the Forest of Dean are also affected. Those people are extremely concerned, so I hope we will hear from the Minister. As I have referred to his constituency, I shall happily take an intervention from the hon. Member for High Peak, although I hope that he is not present just because of the rather desperate e-mail sent round by the Minister's office to Labour Members, saying that it was very concerned about the pensions debate and that
  "it would be greatly appreciated if you were able to attend at least part of the debate, especially the beginning".
  I do not know whether that includes the Minister's speech. If the hon. Member for High Peak can assure us that he is not present in response to the e-mail, we might be interested in his intervention.
  Tom Levitt: I am happy to assure the hon. Gentleman and the House that I have not even seen the e-mail. I am here to represent my constituents, who have been mentioned by the hon. Gentleman and others. He and his hon. Friends should not go around giving the impression that the Turner and Newall scheme has collapsed. It has not. Talks are continuing between the trustees, the company's administrators, the trade unions and others to reach a resolution that will enable the company to fulfil the moral obligation that it undertook when it took on its employees who joined the scheme. That must be the primary aim of what is taking place now. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the more we speak about safety nets and about bailing out, the more likely it is that company schemes will fold in the knowledge that they will be bailed out in future? That is not the way to proceed.
  Mr. Willetts: That is a point that the hon. Gentleman might like to put to those on the Government Front Bench. It raises a rather fundamental question about his Government's strategy and the Minister might wish to comment on it. I very much hope that the scheme does not wind up. We are discussing elementary security and insurance for the workers at Turner and Newall if it does wind up in the course of this year. I repeat: I very much hope the Minister will respond to that in his speech. Even in the absence of a Secretary of State, that is the first issue on which we hope the Minister will respond.
  The second issue concerns the pension protection fund—the new insurance scheme coming into force next year. Here, I am afraid, the Minister is in danger of misleading many people who are led by him to expect, after the fund is in place, a degree of security in their pensions much greater than it can offer. Let me quote to the Minister his own words in the past few months about the scheme. He said, for example, on Channel 4 news on 21 July that
  "our pension protection fund when it comes in in April…will bring real guarantees to Britain's pensioners in final salary schemes"—
  real guarantees.

  735
  He said in the same programme that
  "existing pensioners in that company will get 100 per cent. of their pension, workers will get 90 per cent."
  I often meet the Minister in TV studios nowadays. We ought to meet more in the Chamber as well. He said on "Newsnight" the other week:
  "From April, we'll have a Pension Protection Fund. So if their schemes go bust, they won't be left with 30 per cent., they'll get 100 per cent. or 90 per cent., depending on whether they've retired or not."
  Everybody has been led by such remarks to believe that there is a guarantee of 100 per cent. or 90 per cent. of their pension, but may I put to the Minister the words of the person whom he has just appointed to chair the pension protection fund, Mr. Lawrence Churchill, who was asked about the belief that the fund will guarantee the pension? Mr. Churchill was asked whether the fund offers a guarantee. The Government-appointed chairman of the pension protection fund said:
  "No. 'Guarantee' is a very misleading and misunderstood word—a very dangerous word to use in financial services."
  When challenged about how the fund was supposed to pay all the benefits that were promised when it might not have the money to do so, he said:
  "We have been given specific powers to vary the levy to make sure our funding position is adequate and have been given powers to vary the liabilities so I do not see how that situation will arise."
  "Vary the liabilities" is technical language for changing the pension promise, so the chairman of the pension protection fund has specifically, in public, warned about the use of the word "guarantee", although the Minister has been using it. The chairman specifically said in public that one of his options is to cut the liabilities—to cut the value of the pension promise. If that is what he is saying in public, the Minister should make it clear now at the Dispatch Box that the pension protection fund is not a guarantee and that there is no way that he can promise that people will get 100 per cent. or 90 per cent. of the pension that has been promised.
  There are specific powers in the Bill for the chairman and managers of the scheme to cut the level of benefits way below 100 per cent. and 90 per cent., and the incoming chairman has made it clear that he will use those powers if necessary. In the light of that, I hope that the Minister will choose his words much more carefully in future than he has so far on this extremely important subject.
  I very much hope that we will have support for our motion from all parts of the House today, because it tackles a widespread concern. I believe that the majority of pensioners and the majority of people in this country want to see the reverse of means-tested benefits.
  Sir Nicholas Winterton: My hon. Friend has given a great deal of detail about where the Conservative party stands. Will he go further? Does he agree that the standard old age pension should be exempted from taxation for everyone? Will he go even further and say that the first £10,000 of occupational pension for people who have saved consistently throughout their working
  736
  lives should be taxed at a lower rate than the marginal rate of tax—at a rate of 20 per cent., rather than 40 per cent. as at present?
  Mr. Willetts: My hon. Friend tempts me. One of the many differences between the Opposition and the Government is that the debate on the Government Benches is about which taxes to put up and by how much, whereas the debate on the Conservative Benches is about which taxes we should cut and by how much. I am sure that my hon. Friend's proposal is one of the many imaginative proposals that the shadow Chancellor, our right hon. Friend the Member for West Dorset (Mr. Letwin), will be considering.
  1.18 pm
  The Minister for Pensions (Malcolm Wicks): I beg to move, To leave out from "House" to the end of the Question, and to add instead thereof:
  "supports the Government's strategy to enable people to save securely for their retirement and to promote retirement flexibility and informed choice; welcomes the Government's Pensions Bill and Pension Protection Fund, which will bring real security for over 10 million defined benefit pension scheme members if their employer becomes insolvent and their pension scheme winds up; further welcomes the £400 million Financial Assistance Scheme which will help people who have already lost out; believes that the Pensions Bill will enable many more people to save with confidence with a new proactive pensions regulator, measures to simplify pensions legislation and improved incentives to work past the state pension age; supports the pensions tax simplification proposals being taken forward in the Finance Act 2004, which will replace eight tax regimes with one simplified system; commends proposals in the Pensions Bill to allow individuals to defer their state pension and draw it as a lump sum; welcomes measures to enable people to make an informed choice in pension provision, including new pilots to provide information and advice in the workplace; condemns the inheritance of 1997, with the legacy of pension mis-selling and millions in poverty, whereby many were expected by the previous Government to live on under £69 a week; believes that the Opposition parties' policies will be unfair to the poorest pensioners, unaffordable and unsustainable; commends the Government's historic commitment to tackling pensioner poverty; and welcomes the extra £10 billion that the Government is spending on pensioners in 2004–05 compared with the 1997 system."
  First, I take this opportunity to pay tribute to the important work of our former Secretary of State, my right hon. Friend the Member for Oxford, East (Mr. Smith). He served the Government well as a champion of disability rights and as a creator of the new deal, and most recently by driving through the groundbreaking pension protection fund. I and my colleagues shall miss him as a friend in Government, and I hope that hon. Members will join me in thanking him for all his hard work and in wishing him well for the future and for the contributions that he will make in the future.
  I start by asking hon. Members to sit back for a moment and imagine a Britain where there are 2.7 million pensioners living in poverty; where the value of the basic state pension has been increased just once in 18 years; where many pensioners are expected to live on just £68.80 a week—and, as a result, some face a stark choice between eating and keeping warm in winter; where pound-for-pound withdrawal undermines the whole benefit system by showing that it sometimes pays not to have saved; where pensioners' benefit forms are 40 pages long; where confidence has been rocked by

  737
  pensions mis-selling; and where carers and people with long-term disabilities lose out on building up rights to the state pension.
  We have all lived in a Britain like that and we have all got constituents who have suffered in a Britain like that. What new Government could possibly fail to act? That was the Britain that the Labour Government inherited in 1997, and we could not sit back and preside over such an unjust mess.
  We are proud that we have cut absolute pensioner poverty by two thirds, lifting 1.8 million pensioners out of poverty; we are proud that about 20 million people gained from the introduction of state second pensions in April 2002, including 5 million carers and long-term disabled people; and we are proud that pension credit rewards those who have saved something for their retirement, but have missed out in the past because the system knocked such savings straight off their benefits.
  Annabelle Ewing: The Minister did not mention that after seven years of a Labour Government, one in four pensioners in Scotland still lives in poverty. Surely the Minister accepts that that is a disgrace. The way forward is to replace means-testing with a decent basic state pension.
  Malcolm Wicks: Although I might dispute the figures, I am proud of our achievements and am determined to achieve more in the future. I am not complacent about older people who face hardship and do not re-emphasise the legacy that we inherited simply to make comparisons with the previous Government. Although it is important to remember the context in which this Government have acted, 1997 is history and, thankfully, Britain has moved on.
  Mr. Mark Prisk: The Minister mentions the economic aspect of the pension credit, but what about its human aspect? Is he ashamed that the Government humiliate 70-year-olds by asking them to give personal details, such as the person with whom they live, to perfect strangers in order to pursue the misguided idea of more and more means-testing? Does he understand how humiliating that is for my constituents and others who, at that time in their life, should not have to do such a thing?
  Malcolm Wicks: I do not recognise that portrait. The income-testing of pension credit is a million miles away from old-fashioned means-testing. When I speak to elderly people—I may do that more often than the hon. Gentleman—and hear their experiences of claiming pension credit, which happens over the telephone or, where necessary, by a home visit, I hear nothing but praise for the system, which is a reaction also shown by our surveys. The hon. Gentleman should get out more and talk to older people instead of conspiring with others to present a portrait of pension credit that runs the risk of putting off people who need help.
  Conservative Members do not always appear to have moved on, which is why I felt the need to begin my remarks by referring to the 1997 legacy. As the Government have acted, Conservative Members have fought to oppose us. I agree with the hon. Member for Havant (Mr. Willetts) that it would have been nice to
  738
  achieve consensus—I do not agree with Sir Keith Joseph's remark that post-war consensus was a slippery slope to socialism and state control—and he is now a man of consensus who has, in that sense, moved on.
  On 8 June 2000, in the House of Commons, the hon. Member for Havant called the winter fuel payment "a gimmick" that the Conservative party would abolish. Well, the winter fuel payment is some gimmick: in the past financial year, winter fuel payments have helped 11.5 million pensioners in about 8 million households by providing £200 at the right time of year, just before Christmas. From last year, households containing someone over 80 years old have received £300. Does the hon. Gentleman still think that the winter fuel payment is a gimmick? I think that it provides important support for all pensioners at the right time of year by taking the fear and the sting out of the arrival of electricity and gas bills.
  Mr. Miller: Before my hon. Friend moves on from the 1997 legacy, does he agree that part of that legacy was the way in which the Pensions Act 1995 failed to meet commitments given to this House? Does he agree with me, my right hon. Friends the Members for Birkenhead (Mr. Field) and for Makerfield (Mr. McCartney) and others that people such as the H. H. Robertson workers must be considered sympathetically? Will he closely examine the file on his desk to make sure that those people who were let down by the 1995 Act are protected?
  Malcolm Wicks: My hon. Friend has done a great deal to campaign for that group of workers, and I pay tribute to him. Sadly, too many such examples exist and we must examine them carefully. I acknowledge my hon. Friend's remarks about the 1995 Act. I have never made too much of the matter myself because of the complexities of pensions legislation, but we are changing the legacy of the 1995 Act in the Pensions Bill, although I do not want to make a political point about that process.
  Mr. Willetts: I want to return to the winter fuel payment because the Minister has mentioned it before and I want to make the position clear. Four years ago, we proposed incorporating the winter fuel payment into a higher state pension, a process by which no pensioner would have lost. That led Labour candidates in the general election to tell pensioners that they would lose their winter fuel payment, without telling them that it would automatically go into their weekly pension payment. That is a typical example of Labour campaigning and we have learned our lesson. We do not propose to change the winter fuel payment in any way, and it will not even be incorporated into the basic state pension.
  Malcolm Wicks: To quote the late, great Roy Orbison, "Running scared"— [Interruption.] Hon. Members will see why I am not in the Department for Culture, Media and Sport. As a former Minister for Lifelong Learning, I am encouraged that the hon. Member for Havant has learned his lesson and that the so-called gimmick is now part of Tory strategy—some of us were finding it difficult to get to grips with Tory strategy, but it was only because he was speaking at the time.
  Mr. Tony McWalter: Before my hon. Friend took that amusing intervention, he said that he would not make political capital out of the 1995 Act. However, that Act opened a huge gap between those people in pension funds who were already pensioners and were entitled to the assets of the fund, and those who were not yet pensioners and were forced to take whatever leftovers from the table that their fund could provide. The Government have corrected that injustice and I hope that my hon. Friend is extremely proud of that achievement and will never go anywhere near the foul provisions of the 1995 Act.
  Malcolm Wicks: We have learned a great deal from the failings of part of the 1995 Act, not least that the minimum funding requirement was nothing of the kind. Much of the new Pensions Bill is about addressing those issues, and I have been suitably chastised for not attacking the Opposition.
  David Winnick: Will the Minister give way?
  Malcolm Wicks: I am happy to give way to the second ever Labour MP for Croydon, Central.
  David Winnick: Prior to 1997, when the Labour Government introduced the winter fuel allowance, the only scheme was the Tories' cold weather payments. In order to be eligible, people had to be on income support, and even then it had to freeze for seven consecutive days before some £8 was paid. Compare that with what we have done in office—the Tories should be thoroughly ashamed of themselves.
  Malcolm Wicks: Again, I would not be complacent because there is still a road to be travelled, but with the winter fuel payment, the home energy efficiency schemes in Scotland and Wales, and the Warm Front scheme in England we are starting to make serious inroads into the horror of the "old and cold" problem, as it has been called, and the problems of fuel poverty. Of course, I am very proud of that.
  Now that we have had some clarification of the Conservatives' view of the winter fuel payment, perhaps we can get some help on their view of pension credit. At first, Conservative Members said that they would scrap pension credit. Then they said that they would "reconsider it". [Interruption.] I do not know whether the hon. Member for Havant is denying that they would reconsider it. Then they said that they would keep it. But they continue to carp away at what they describe as an extension of means-testing and still pay no attention to the importance of helping the poorest pensioners; that is a key weakness of their strategy. Indeed, last year the then shadow Chancellor, who is now Leader of the Opposition, conceded that under the Tory plan presented by the shadow Secretary of State,
  "Those who are entitled to the pension credit and do claim…will not be better off"
  under the Tory plan. Perhaps the Opposition spokesman will want to justify that in the wind-ups. We, within an overall strategy on state pensions, want to
  740
  benefit most the poorest and the hard-pressed, who are often women and the older elderly, yet the Leader of the Opposition says, honestly and accurately:
  "Those who are entitled to the pension credit and do claim…will not be better off".
  How does the hon. Member for Havant justify that?
  Mr. Willetts rose—
  Malcolm Wicks: Perhaps he is about to reconsider.
  Mr. Willetts: Let me make this absolutely clear. First, there has never been any proposal to abolish the pension credit. We wanted an alternative approach—we were supported in that by the Liberal Democrats and the right hon. Member for Birkenhead (Mr. Field)—but we never said that the pension credit should be abolished. If the Minister has any evidence that we ever said that, I should be very interested to look at it, because it was never in my mind. We want to increase the value of the basic state pension so that fewer pensioners need to receive it. If one increases the basic state pension, it follows that nobody loses. This is a policy in which there are no losers and the gainers are the people who are not claiming the pension credit. The Minister talks about the problem of the poorest pensioners; the problem is that 1.7 million of them who are entitled to the pension credit are not claiming it. They will be the main beneficiaries of our policy: that is why it is better.
  Malcolm Wicks: The record will show that, by implication, the shadow Secretary of State agrees with the Leader of the Opposition—I suppose that that is what is one has to do in his position. Under his strategy, those who are entitled to pension credit and claim it will not be better off. That is inevitable, because if the strategy for four years or so is to raise the basic state pension in line with earnings, meanwhile only raising pension credit in line with prices, most of the resource will go to the better-off and less of it will go to the poorer. That is why, although the Shadow Secretary of State is in denial, I pay tribute to the Leader of the Opposition for understanding the unjust statistics that would be involved in the implementation of the Tory strategy.
  Mr. McLoughlin: The Minister keeps talking about helping the worst-off pensioners. Why then is the winter fuel allowance paid to everybody irrespective of their income?
  Malcolm Wicks: Because our pensions strategy, like all pensions strategies, seeks to strike the right balance between overall support for all pensioners and special support for the most hard-pressed, many of whom are women and the older elderly who do not have full national insurance contributions. Different Administrations will reach different judgments on that balance; I am presenting our judgment. The fact that older people—for physiological reasons and because they often live in the least energy-efficient homes—may suffer from the cold more than younger people is an added reason for the winter fuel payment.
  Mr. James Arbuthnot: I should like to credit the Minister with a genuine wish to help the poorest pensioners, but does he not accept, like the right hon. Member for Birkenhead (Mr. Field), that over a period of years that will inevitably be achieved at the expense of building up the long-term pension provision that this country had in 1997, of which we were able to be so proud and which we sadly no longer have?
  Malcolm Wicks: I hope to address those issues later. Obviously, I always take seriously the important contributions of my right hon. Friend the Member for Birkenhead (Mr. Field.). I look forward to his helpful comments: the wounds heal faster than one might think.
  Next month sees the first anniversary of pension credit payments. More than 3 million people in Great Britain now receive pension credit, two-thirds—2 million—of whom are women. What is more, more than 1.9 million households receive more money than before because of its introduction.
  In today's complex 21st century society, the role of Government in pensions has evolved considerably since Parliament first legislated—courtesy of the Liberals—to introduce the state pension. That was slightly less than 100 years ago. [Interruption.] The hon. Member for Havant says that the Liberal proposals of our friend Lloyd George were means-tested. In fact, as I have told the House before, they were subject to two tests—a test of means and a test of moral character. I may also have said that of Members currently on the Liberal Benches half would fail one test and half the other, although I am not sure who would be in which half.
  To meet the demographic challenges of an ageing population, Government policy needs to be affordable, sustainable and fair. The Government's approach has rightly targeted extra state support at those who need it most and encouraged private funded provision for those who can afford to save. That has enabled us to strike a fair balance between being fair to the poorest, fair to those who have saved, and fair between generations by not levying big tax rises on future generations. By contrast, the policies of the Conservative Opposition are unaffordable, unsustainable and unfair.
  Mr. Geoffrey Robinson: Will my hon. Friend give way?
  Malcolm Wicks: I will, but then I must make some progress in order to be fair to others.
  Mr. Robinson: I am sure that my hon. Friend will come to this point, and I was anxious not to interrupt his exposition, but I am grateful to him for giving way. We have been in correspondence regarding Turner and Newall and Federal Mogul, and I thank him for his constructive tone in that. While in no way wishing to make his difficult position more difficult, he must be aware that that matter affects the constituencies of many Members on both sides of the House and that there is great concern about it. If by some cruel accident of timing the pension were to find itself in limbo between the two schemes, it would be unthinkable to us, and ethically and politically impossible for the Government,
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  were the Government not to take action to ensure that a certain level of provision in line with the pension protection fund was forthcoming.
  Malcolm Wicks: I understand my hon. Friend's concern about that issue, to which I shall turn shortly. I certainly understand its importance.
  Conservative policies are unaffordable, as even on the basis of the party's own figures there would be a £500 million-a-year black hole by the end of a Tory Parliament. Does anyone really know where their money would come from? Last year at the Conservative party conference, the hon. Member for Havant said that he would abolish the
  "useless schemes and wasted money"
  of the new deal. He has been quite honest about that. Nearly 1 million people have found work through the new deals, yet the shadow Secretary of State would scrap them. They have been a major contributor to our ability to move back towards full employment and to abolish, among other things, long-term unemployment among young people.
  Conservative policies are unsustainable because the earnings link would cost £12 billion by 2020, rising to £69 billion by the middle of this century—2050. No party—certainly, no tax-cutting party—could ever deliver those funds. Moreover, their policies are unfair, because an in-built feature is that within around 20 years incomes for the poorest would drop from 21 per cent. of average earnings to 16 per cent. of average earnings. This Labour Government—indeed, only a Labour Government—have proved able to tackle pensioner poverty while ensuring that our policies are affordable, sustainable and fair.
  However, tackling pensioner poverty is only part of the story. Again, I would like to ask hon. Members to sit back for a moment and imagine. This time, I ask them to imagine a Britain where people lose their pensions when their company goes bust and leaves the pension scheme underfunded; a Britain where people are not saving enough for their retirement and individuals have lost confidence in the security of their pensions.
  We have seen that Britain all too recently. The challenges that face—[Interruption.] The challenge is not to harrumph but to take action. The challenges that face funded pension provision in this country are very real. However, the Government—and only a Labour Government—have acted to meet those challenges.
  I have met many of those who lost some or all of their pensions when their employer became insolvent. I have seen what it has done to their lives as I heard their quiet and dignified stories of shattered security and shattered dreams for the future. Sometimes their health gives way through stress, sometimes family life and marriages are affected. All those lives are changed for ever.
  However, I have also met people who do not face that risk. Members may remember Mr. Johnson. I first mentioned him on Second Reading of the Pensions Bill. He is 58, has worked for the same employer for 30 years and has contributed to his occupational pension throughout that time. When his employer went bust, Mr. Johnson knew that his pension was safe because he is an American and the US Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation meant that his pension savings had been protected for decades.

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  What Government could sit back and watch while hardworking Britons lost their pensions? Not this Government. While Opposition Members were busy declining to give the Pensions Bill a Second Reading—we shall remind them of that in the months until next spring or the following spring—the Government took pride in the fact that, through the Pensions Bill, we were making the pension protection fund a reality. It will bring genuine security and peace of mind to more than 10 million defined benefit pension scheme members. The Government, and only this Government, are building confidence that a pension promise made will be a pension promise honoured.
  I am afraid that there is more of the sorry tale of woeful resistance from Opposition Members. Some of those who had their accrued rights cut were employees who worked for solvent employers. When those employers wound up their defined benefit scheme underfunded, non-pensioner members could receive cash equivalent transfer values, which were too low to provide them with the pension that they expected at retirement.
  Again, the Government acted. We introduced the full buy-out regulations so that trustees can require solvent employers who want to wind up their pension scheme to buy out members' rights in full. However, as recently as July, the Leader of the Opposition prayed against the regulations. The Labour Government, and only the Labour Government, are building confidence that a pension promise made will be a pension promise honoured.
  Mr. Stephen Dorrell: The Minister passed over the passage in his speech that dealt with the pension protection fund. Will he tackle the question that my hon. Friend the Member for Havant asked: does the pension protection fund constitute a guarantee to members of funds whose employers find themselves in financial difficulties? Is there a guarantee or does the fund have the power to vary liabilities? if the latter, in what circumstances does the Minister believe that the fund may use the powers?
  Malcolm Wicks: Our firm intention, as the shadow Secretary of State rightly said, is that if a final salary scheme cannot fulfil its duties through the pension protection fund by taking in and investing the scheme's assets, which are often considerable, and through the levy, which we believe will average £20 a year per member—perhaps less than insuring a summer holiday—we shall have the funds to enable us to pay existing pensioners 100 per cent. and workers and scheme members 90 per cent.
  We have learned lessons from the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation in Washington. To raise the levy there, the PBGC needs to return to Congress. It is not for me to comment on American politics, but that is a more complex process. We, albeit with a cap, will enable the board of the pension protection fund—a board that is deliberately at arm's length from the Government; it is not a Department for Work and Pensions agency—to raise the levy if necessary.
  We have an in-extremis provision because in an extraordinary economic or business situation, in which perhaps several FTSE 100 companies went bust, there
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  might not be funds even after raising the levy. In that case, the board, with the Secretary of State's permission, could cut benefits. The right hon. Member for Charnwood (Mr. Dorrell) is right in that respect but such a provision would apply only in extremis. Calamities can happen in any economy, which would mean that specific things could not be done. However, we have set out the provision in the Pensions Bill and we have discussed it in Committee. We have costed the provision carefully and I am certain that, allowing for even a large company to go bust, we will fulfil our commitments. That is why I, as a lay person, use the term "guarantee."
  Mr. Dorrell: The Minister gave a long answer; the issue is complex and I want to crystallise his reply: the pension of the American worker to whom he referred is guaranteed, the British equivalent would not be.
  Malcolm Wicks: It is a different situation in the States. We have learned important lessons from the States but any reasonable person who examines the position and understands how to fund the provision, allowing for one big company to go bust from time to time, could use the term "guarantee". I believe that that is reasonable vocabulary. If a meteorite hits Britain, the provision obviously cannot be guaranteed. I am confident that, in 10 or 20 years, we shall look back and appreciate that the provision has been successful. I apologise to the right hon. Gentleman for giving a proper and detailed answer; I shall try to be shorter next time.
  Mr. Lilley: Does the Minister agree that, if a levy of around £20 per member of private pension funds, which are not guaranteed by the state, is to be made, it should be extended to members of public sector pension funds, which are guaranteed by the state, including hon. Members? In all fairness, we should not be exempt from making a contribution towards underwriting funds if members of private sector funds have to make such a contribution or have it made for them.
  Malcolm Wicks: The right hon. Gentleman is an expert in the matter, but with all due respect, I believe that that is more of a debating point than a substantive point. Clearly, the state ultimately stands behind most public sector pension schemes and we are making reforms to those schemes. For example, we believe that we should no longer have a position whereby one can draw a pension, albeit reduced, at the age of 50. We contend that, in future, that should not happen until the age of 55. That will be discussed with the professions and the unions. Several such developments are occurring. That is the way to tackle issues about funding in the public sector, not the way that the right hon. Gentleman described.
  Mr. Djanogly: The Minister is speculating about what may happen in the future. Can he extend his guarantee to those people who are already in such a predicament, for example, the members of the Samuel Jones scheme in my constituency? They are currently left in an insolvent scheme and are consequently suffering.
  Malcolm Wicks: Let me make some progress because I think that that would be helpful. In the previous

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  Opposition Day debate on the subject in February, Opposition Members attacked the Government again, on that occasion for not promising assistance to those for whom the pension protection fund was going to be too late. I puzzled about that. They declined to give the Pensions Bill a Second Reading and then wanted to make it retrospective. Nevertheless, my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, West (Kevin Brennan), with several other parliamentary colleagues, admirably led calls to act.
  The Government found £400 million without breaking any of their other spending commitments. When I presented that to the House on Report, I outlined a clear set of steps and a timetable for action. Earlier this summer, I spoke at the consultation event and we remain very much on course with the timetable. I am proud that the Government are introducing the financial assistance scheme. As for the hon. Member for Havant, he used warm words but did not even sign the early-day motion tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, West.
  I have been asked about the worrying situation at Federal Mogul or T and N—Turner and Newall. Obviously, we are aware of the terrible uncertainties faced by members of the T and N scheme. My colleagues in the Department have met a number of people connected with the scheme since July, including the trustees, the scheme lawyer and trade union representatives. In August, I met concerned Members of Parliament, including my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, West, who have an interest in the T and N scheme. I understand that discussions are still ongoing between Federal Mogul, the independent trustees and the administrators regarding the future of the UK pension scheme.
  On issues of this kind, may I make a plea that many such cases relating to solvency or insolvency have an extraordinary complexity. Often, a foreign company has an involvement. In the case of T and N, an added complexity is that it faces huge cases relating to asbestos, which has affected the whole future of that company. Let us avoid the knee-jerk questioning about whether we will definitely spend taxpayer's money on this group or that group. It is far more complex than that. We are not yet absolutely sure what will happen to that company or its pension scheme. It is an ongoing issue. I assure everyone in the House that we are keeping the issue carefully under review.
  We are on course with the steps that we are taking on the financial assistance scheme. We very much hope that the scheme will be in being by the spring of next year, and that payments will be made as soon as possible. The pensions challenge facing the Government, and Governments across the developed world, are very real. I make no attempt to hide that.
  Mr. Willetts: Setting aside the case of Turner and Newall, does the Minister accept that the financial assistance scheme needs to cover all people who lose out from wind-ups until the point at which the pension protection fund comes into force?
  Malcolm Wicks: We are acting for the future with the PPF, hence our determination that the Pensions Bill will be on the statute book. I hope that everyone in both
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  Houses will help us with that, and I think that they will. We are faced with more immediate situations, which require the establishment of the financial assistance scheme, with £400 million of the public's money—not because the public were at fault but because it was an important contribution. We have also said that we feel that the pension industry should make a contribution. I am still hopeful about that, and we are still in discussions about it.
  We are monitoring carefully any schemes that are now in difficulty. I am concerned about those affected. Given our track record of establishing the PPF and the assistance scheme, we have good intentions about trying to help people. I cannot, however, say more about particular schemes that are in different stages of wind-up.
  Through the Pensions Bill, we have taken great strides in bolstering security and confidence in funded pensions. Alongside the pension protection fund, the new flexible and proactive pensions regulator will further bolster security by tackling the risks to members' benefits, while enabling well-administered and secure schemes to continue without unnecessary regulatory burden. While the Pensions Bill is a cornerstone of the Government's reforms, it is only one step on the road to our goal of enabling people to save adequately and confidently for their retirement. Our programme of informed choice measures will empower individuals to take greater control of their retirement planning. Our age discrimination legislation—as well as the improved options for state pension deferral in the Pensions Bill—will open doors to greater opportunity for working longer, breaking the cliff-edge between work and retirement.
  I have spoken about the past—in particular, the legacy that this Government inherited on coming into office in 1997. I have spoken about the present and the action that this Government have taken, despite opposition along the way, to tackle the injustice of pensioner poverty and to bolster security and confidence in funded pensions. But what of the future?
  First, this Government have had the courage and vision to see the value of independent expertise. We look forward to the first report of the independent Pensions Commission sometime next month and a report from the employer taskforce by the end of the year. The findings of those reports will be of immense value in informing the way that our policies develop to meet the challenges that lie ahead.
  Finally, I would like hon. Members to imagine once more: a Britain where pensioner poverty is nothing more than an unpleasant chapter of history; where women no longer face disadvantage in the workplace or in saving for retirement; where the pension protection fund has been set up and is enabling people to look forward to the future with confidence; where individuals are empowered to take control of their retirement planning, and able to take informed decisions about how and when to save and work; and where everyone—employers, trade unions, Government and individuals—are working together to make the British pensions partnership the envy of the world.
  That is the consensus that I want. That is our vision. This Government are acting and will continue to act to make that vision a concrete reality.
  1.55 pm
  Mr. Steve Webb: May I begin by joining in the tributes that have been paid to the outgoing Secretary of State? All of us who worked with him, whether in government or in the House, never doubted for a moment his sincerity and commitment, and we wish him well in his future role, whatever that might be, in the House and beyond.
  The Liberal Democrats welcome this debate. No doubt when the former Secretary of State heard that we were announcing our pension proposals yesterday, he looked at them and thought, "There's the answer. No point in my carrying on." Very decently, the Conservatives have given us an opportunity to bring those proposals to the House at the earliest opportunity. We are therefore grateful to both the Government and the Opposition for setting us up in that way.
  I have no problem with the Conservative motion. It has been deliberately designed to focus on the analysis that we have in common, and I will ask my hon. Friends to support it in the Division later this afternoon. The opportunity to hear some of the Conservative proposals and to scrutinise them in a slightly more detailed manner has been fruitful. As I mentioned to the hon. Member for Havant (Mr. Willetts) in an intervention, he has a problem. Were the Government to make the pledge that I anticipate—to link the pension credit to earnings—his policy falls down one of two unacceptable routes. If he says, "If the Government are going to link the pension credit to earnings, we will do it as well"—
  Mr. Willetts: Could do.
  Mr. Webb: As the hon. Gentleman says from a sedentary position, he could do. He would then link the pension credit to earnings, and the pension to earnings, but the gap between the two, as he knows, is huge£25 a week at the moment. If both go up proportionately, that gap will never close. The chasm of savings disincentives, which he rightly describes, will therefore always be there.
  Mr. Willetts: It will get no worse.
  Mr. Webb: As he says, it will get no worse, but there will still be a substantial gap between the pension and the means test. All his rhetoric about incentives to save, his buy-one-get-one-free incentives, his lifetime savings account, and so on, will fall foul of the fact that people who do save will be penalised for doing so, because the chasm will remain.
  The hon. Gentleman's alternative strategy, which I anticipate him operating were he ever to have the chance to do so in government, would be to break the link between earnings and the pension credit. That is the only way to close the gap, and that is what he wants to do if the Government do so. Compared with what the Government would promise—an earnings link for the poor—he would offer a price link for the poor. While we agree that many poor people fail to claim, more than 2 million poor people still do claim. For a Conservative party to stand for election on the grounds that it will give less money to poor pensioners than the Government would have done is the wrong priority and unacceptable. Either he does less for the poor, or he fails
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  to tackle the savings incentive problem, if that is what the Government pledge. I therefore hope that the Government will pledge that, and I will be interested to know how the Conservatives will square that circle.
  Naturally, the principal concern must be the direction in which the Government are taking us. I was dismayed by the Minister's response today. We all enjoy his bloke-ish style, but when we are dealing with matters of precision and entitlement, and with people making choices about their financial future, we need more than just being a good bloke. To say, "I am a layman, and when I say 'guarantee', we all know what I mean," is just not on. People have made mistakes about their future pension provision on the strength of Government leaflets that tell them that their pensions are guaranteed. We have discovered that the guaranteed minimum pension is not guaranteed after all. For the Minister, not having learned the lessons of the last few years, to tell people, "Don't worry, your company pension is now guaranteed," when it turns out that it is not, is unacceptable.
  I hope that the Minister will take a message from this debate: however much he might like to be informal, people expect the Minister for Pensions to be the one person who is precise in his choice of language, so that they know where they stand.
  Mr. Willetts: The hon. Gentleman will be aware that there are two theories about why the Minister goes around saying this. One is that he does not understand what he is saying. That is ungenerous. The other is that he is being very clever, and that every time he says the pension is guaranteed it becomes more difficult for the Treasury ever to do anything other than pay 100 per cent., or 90 per cent. At some point in the future someone will go to the Treasury and say, "You must cough up to rescue the pension protection fund after everything I have been saying." I do not know which theory the hon. Gentleman endorses.
  Mr. Webb: Given a choice between whether the Minister is very stupid or very clever—[Laughter.] If it is a subtle negotiating ploy—and if it is, it is beyond me—it is a high-risk strategy. People are going to make decisions based on it, and if it does not turn out to be successful, other people will be vulnerable. That would worry me.
  I am also concerned about the Minister's response to the perfectly proper question asked by the hon. Member for Havant about the position of workers between the time when the priority order on wind-up changed and the time when the pension protection fund comes in. I gather that in the other place Baroness Hollis has started referring to that period as the "sandwich year". I accept that we cannot talk in great detail about individual schemes. It may well be that the Turner and Newall workers' pension fund will not be wound up, and obviously we all hope that that is the case. But workers of that sort, and many others, want to know where they stand.
  When the financial assistance scheme was presented to the House during the Report stage of the Pensions Bill, the Minister never said, "This will not apply to people from now on." If I am wrong I am happy to be corrected, but I am convinced that at no time during the

  749
  hours we talked about the issue were we told that the protection would not apply in future. I do not suppose that, when we voted just a few months ago, a single Labour Member thought that if a firm in his constituency went to the wall after the vote, there was a danger that it would not be covered by the hardship fund. I do not suppose that one of the Minister's colleagues was aware of that.
  And the Government have not even decided yet! The Bill will finish its progress through the House in a few weeks. When will the Government make up their mind? People need to know where they stand now. I find it extraordinary that the Minister says, "Well, we are still thinking about it." I think that that is totally unacceptable.
  When the financial assistance scheme was proposed, we were promised something else on which the Government are now backtracking. We were promised a three-yearly review, which was another sop to the Back Benches. "Yes, perhaps £400 million is not enough," we were told, "but do not worry—we will look at it again in three years." The workers who have been suffering as a result of wind-ups, who have had meetings with the DWP, have been told by officials that the three-yearly review was not about the amount of money in the scheme, but about how it was carved up. If in three years' time it is proved that there was not remotely enough money, the Government have made no undertaking to increase the amount.
  The basis on which the Minister's hon. Friends accepted his compromise is being undermined by the day. Four hundred million pounds was never enough. The promise was of a three-yearly review; but if the review does not examine the amount and the adequacy of that amount, what is the point of it?
  Mr. Dorrell: Varying the liability.
  Mr. Webb: Indeed.
  We have grave concerns about what is being done for the security of occupational scheme members, and also about where things are going with pension credit. As the hon. Member for Havant said, we are given new figures each month about how they are going. The most recent figures, which have just come out, show that pension credit is running out of steam. The most recent month was the worst month ever for new cases: just 33,000 people went on to pension credit, while 1.7 million are missing out on the money to which they are entitled. The Government are not even beginning to scratch the surface.
  Can the Minister confirm that every one of those 1.7 million who are missing out is, by definition, living below the poverty line—that every one is living below the minimum level that society considers adequate? If all those people are living below the poverty line, when the Minister talks about doing more for the poorest pensioners he should be concentrating on them. His policies are doing nothing to assist Britain's poorest pensioners. [Interruption.] They do not get the money. If they do not get the money, it is very hard to see how they benefit.
  The Minister talked of the past and the future. There are three possible futures. The Minister's strategy of mass means-testing does not just apply to the 50 per
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  cent. of all pensioners who are currently entitled to means-tested benefits; it is a projection that perhaps three quarters of all pensioners will be entitled to means-testing. This is the paucity of the Government's vision. Over seven years, the Government had a chance to establish a long-term vision of the sort of society in which they wanted older people to live. The vision that they have set before us is one of mass means-testing, in which three quarters of pensioners retire too poor to live on what they have accumulated, and have to go to the Government for a top-up. How can that be the vision that we want for the future?
  When the Prime Minister was quizzed by a journalist at his press conference yesterday—"What is your answer to the pensions crisis, Prime Minister?"—he began by talking about welfare to work and incapacity benefit. Then he suddenly realised that that was not the answer to the pensions crisis, and said, "Well, we have asked Adair Turner." Seven years in, the Prime Minister's best answer on the pensions crisis is, "Adair Turner will report next month with some analysis"—to which we all look forward—"and after the election he will tell us what his recommendations are. Then we might look at the pensions crisis." That was the Prime Minister's answer. If the Prime Minister does not know how things are going, what hope is there for pensioners?
  The Government do not seem to have a strategy for tackling the imminent crisis, but their long-term vision—their target—is the means-testing of three quarters of all pensioners. That is not a future that I want to see.
  Tom Levitt: Surely the hon. Gentleman accepts that when resources are finite, it is necessary to focus them on where they will produce most benefit in order to meet a target. That means focusing most help on the pensioners who are most in need. How can the hon. Gentleman justify the alternative philosophy—relieve poverty and make the poorest pensioners better off by giving more money even to the richest?
  Mr. Webb: I am slightly puzzled by what the hon. Gentleman has had to say. Perhaps he has not been listening. The poorest pensioners in the land today—this is a statement of fact—are those who are entitled to, and not claiming, pension credit: 1. 7 million of them. If the hon. Gentleman can tell me how putting extra money into pension credit helps any one of the poorest pensioners in the land, I should love to hear it. But clearly it does not: it does nothing at all for those people. The central plank of the Government's strategy does nothing for them. What does do something for a good many of them is using the basic state pension which they do all claim. We propose to focus on the older pensioners—those over 75—the majority of whom do not claim. We are focusing on the poorest pensioners by using age as an indicator.
  Tom Levitt: I acknowledge that some pensioners have a difficulty with claiming anything to which they are entitled. They need help. Surely the hon. Gentleman accepts that take-up levels for pension credit are far higher than they ever were for income support in the days when pension credit did not exist. I hope he will take this opportunity to pay tribute to those in my

  751
  constituency, in the Gamesley ward, who have ensured that 97 per cent. of all pensioners are claiming the benefits to which they are entitled.
  Mr. Webb: I suspect that the proportion of those entitled to pension credit who claim it is lower than it was under income support. I do not know why the hon. Gentleman mentioned that ward—perhaps there is a by-election—but what about the people whom he claims to represent who are not covered by this complicated system? He seems to think that just a few more advisers or another helpline will crack it, but it is endemic. It is systemic. It is part of the structure of these benefits that they have high non-take-up rates. Another advertising campaign or another leaflet will not solve the problem.
  The one thing that these people all claim is their pension. That is the only genuine—now I am going to use the word guarantee, and I mean guarantee. Putting the money in the pension guarantees that it will reach the people who are entitled to it.
  One blueprint, then, is mass means-testing. The second option, the Conservative alternative, has some threads in common with our proposal, and I have some sympathy with elements of it. Using the basis state pension as a mechanism is clearly better than using mass means-testing. My difference with the hon. Member for Havant is this. We know that, because of a decision made by the Conservatives 25 years ago, the basic state pension has declined dramatically relative to the earnings that it attempts to replace. Retirement pensions are about replacing what people used to earn; if a pension is becoming a smaller and smaller percentage of average earnings, it is doing less and less of a job. The hon. Gentleman's decision to re-link pensions to earnings at a pathetic level, making them useless, by definition freezes the pension at that percentage of average earnings. It does nothing to raise it to a better level.
  Therefore, for a long time to come under his proposals, large numbers of pensioners would still need to claim means-tested top-ups. I think that he proposed a figure of £7 by the end of the Parliament. That is a small step in the right direction, but the pensioners who lost the most from the Conservatives breaking the earnings link— they were perhaps 60 when Mrs. Thatcher, as she then was, broke the link—are now in their 80s and cannot wait for the hon. Gentleman to get round to bringing the pension up to a decent level. They will no longer be around then, and a figure of £7 by the end of the Parliament is no good for someone in their 80s who is getting a pathetic pension. That is why we want to concentrate on the "old" elderly as a first priority. That is my difference with the hon. Gentleman on how one improves the basic pension, which is a legitimate area of debate.
  Let me explain my second concern about the Conservative approach. The hon. Gentleman wants to encourage private savings, which is obviously a good thing. He talks about the lifetime savings account, which is still not terribly well defined. We do not know much about it, but we do know that it is an instant access savings account. People can take their money out any time they want, so if they get a big credit card bill or they want to go on a nice holiday—Conservative Members
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  might want to pay their children's school fees, for example—they just dip into the fund. An instant access savings account is apparently the solution to the pensions crisis and to the fact that not enough money will be ours, guaranteed, in 30 years' time.
  I do not follow the logic. The hon. Gentleman thinks that if people know that they can have their money, they will put it into the account. Well, they might, but they might also take it out, so I do not see how such an account would solve the problem.
  We are having a constructive debate, and I have a further query that the hon. Member for Eastbourne (Mr. Waterson) might be able to answer when he winds up. The hon. Member for Havant has this "buy one, get one free" notion, which is quite a good slogan. "Bogof" is the phrase he uses—at least, I think that is what he said. The idea is that the state matches savings pound for pound. However, given that he proposes no overall increase in taxation, that money must come from somewhere. Either he intends to take some of the pension tax relief to pay for his incentives—I do not think that he plans to change pension tax relief, unless there is something he has not told us—or to take some of the national insurance rebates. That sounds quite redistributive, but he has not been very up-front about who would lose. If one matches the savings of small savers and pays for that from somewhere else, one has to take money off someone, somewhere. The hon. Gentleman has been a bit coy about where that money would come from. I presume that it would come from higher earners, because they get the big rebates, but funnily enough we have not heard anything about that. There is a sense that we are getting a little more of a fleshed-out Conservative policy, but it is still extraordinarily vague. I hope that we will get more detail from him this side of the election.
  Kali Mountford: Before the hon. Gentleman moves off the funding of Tory policies, perhaps he would like to advise the House about the funding of his own. Given what he has just said about the rather light presentation made by the hon. Member for Havant, perhaps he would like to flesh out his own presentation.
  Mr. Webb: I am grateful to the hon. Lady for that invitation, because that is precisely what I was planning to do. We have taken the view that the fundamental problem for both today's pensioners and tomorrow's is sorting out the basic state pension. Sorting that out would deal with today's extremely poor, who do not claim the means test, but it would also deal with the incentive to save. If we get the pension clear of the means test, anyone who saves a pound would keep it, and it would be worth saving. Tackling the basic state pension is therefore a good answer for today's pensioners and for today's workers, who are tomorrow's pensioners.
  Mr. McWalter: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Webb: I should make progress as the debate is only short, but I will certainly deal with the point that has been raised.
  How do we tackle the basic state pension? We have argued that we need to start with the oldest pensioners. The pension has fallen so far for so long that we cannot

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  deal with the whole thing at a stroke, so we would start with the oldest pensioners, who the Minister said tend, on average, to be the poorer pensioners. I am glad that he agrees with us on that. For the over-75s, we propose to raise the basic state pension to the original level of the minimum income guarantee—£105—to link that to earnings and, critically, to pay it on the basis of citizenship, not according to the record of national insurance contributions.
  As my right hon. Friend the Member for Ross, Skye and Inverness, West (Mr. Kennedy) said when he challenged the Prime Minister today—the House will have noticed that he got no answer—women continue to be the poor relation on pensions. It is unacceptable that at the start of the 21st century, the typical woman—not an extreme, hypothetical case—retires on a basic state pension of just over £50 a week, even though the full pension is £80. How can that be acceptable? We do not think that it is. Society should stop saying that the work that women have done in the past—caring for children and elderly relatives, and doing fairly menial, meagrely paid part-time work—should not be rewarded. Rather, it should be properly recognised in the pension system. It is no good saying that it will all be sorted out in 50 years' time, which is the Government's schedule. They talk about the state second pension, but it will not be fully in place for 50 years. Those women need justice now, which is why we propose a citizenship basis for the pension.
  Once we have got the basic state pension structure in place—we want to extend it, but we would have to start with the over-75s—the question arises as to where the £2.7 billion, which would be the net cost in the first full year, rising to just over £3 billion by the end of a Parliament, would come from. My colleagues and I have been considering the entirety of what the Government do. As a whole, they spend some £500 billion on the entire range of activities. If neither of the principal Opposition parties can say that it would have a different priority in respect of 1 per cent. of what the Government do, we might as well all give up and go home. If we cannot say that 1 per cent. of what the Government do would be a lower priority for us, and that spending money on other things would be our higher priority, there is no difference between us. We have looked at what the Government do, and the Liberal Democrat shadow Chancellor, my hon. Friend the Member for Twickenham (Dr. Cable), will present a full and detailed breakdown of the £5 billion figure that we have identified.
  Let me give a concrete example. The Prime Minister was mistaken in what he said earlier. He suggested that the £8 billion that we referred to in respect of the Department of Trade and Industry was more than is spent on administration and that it applies to the whole DTI, but he did not understand that that figure is for the entire Parliament, not a single year. Our policy requires that a Parliament run for four years, so the sums add up perfectly well.
  Through the DTI, we spend hundreds of millions of pounds subsidising arms exports to dodgy regimes. The Government may think that a good thing; we think that there are bigger priorities. We would not cut the number of paperclips or bureaucrats, but we would cut one of the things that the Government do in order to free up money for something that they should do more of. We
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  have a list of such things, and that is the basis on which we could fund the first round of pension improvements in the short term.
  The citizens pension is the central and first element, and I will touch briefly on the company and private sectors. There is too little confidence in company pensions. Too many people have lost out, and they should be properly protected, as we discussed at the start. We want people to have to opt out of, rather than into, their company pensions. The hon. Member for Stalybridge and Hyde (James Purnell) suggested that, and we think it a good idea.
  On personal pensions, there is the idea that National Savings should run a personal pension scheme. It is a brand that people trust and it will not go bankrupt or fleece people with charges. There needs to be a way for people to save with confidence.
  Let me draw the threads together. A decent basic state pension would tackle pensioner poverty today and give people confidence to save. If they were clear of means-testing—the chasm whereby saving is not worth doing was created by the Government—the incentive to save would be restored. The state would be doing its bit, and the individual would be free to choose by how much to top up in old age, or how much they want to spend now. That seems the right combination. The future that the Government are offering is not one that most people would want to retire into. Our proposals would provide a much more positive future for the pensioners of today and tomorrow.
  Several hon. Members rose—
  Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. I remind right hon. and hon. Members that Mr. Speaker has imposed a 15-minute limit on all Back-Bench speeches.
  2.18 pm
  Mr. Frank Field: Like other contributors to the debate, I begin by paying tribute to my right hon. Friend the Member for Oxford, East (Mr. Smith), who was until very recently the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions. When I first entered the House and worked with Neil Kinnock, who became the Leader of the Opposition, he used to refer to a member of the Government as being 100 per cent. pure grease. I think that all of us in the House know that the former Secretary of State was 100 per cent. real decency. He was distinguished in his extraordinary ability to undersell his qualities, unlike most politicians who reach that rank. The Minister hinted that he hopes that we will see my right hon. Friend in many different roles in future, and I certainly underscore those comments.
  I hope that not only the Whip on the Treasury Bench but the Prime Minister, as he considers his reshuffle, will note the Minister's contribution in defending the Government's policies. Indeed, I hope that he will be more ambitious in his reshuffle than even the press are hinting at. There is now a galaxy of Ministers of State who would be real additions to the Cabinet as we face the next general election. My hon. Friend always says that he worries when I speak that I might be wounding him. Our friendship goes back a long way and I know

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  how deep his St. Sebastian complex is. I hope that nothing I say today or any other day will have the effect that he fears.
  We face a real crisis in our long-term pension provision, because in the past we could disguise the fact that our state retirement pension was inadequate because our occupational schemes were such a success. That crucial prop now looks less certain than at any time in the past 50 years. When the Prime Minister says that he is serious about long-term pension reform, I hope that he will read this debate and consider contributions from all parties in the House for the remoulding of what the consensus should be. Conservatives, Liberal Democrats and Labour Members have all spoken about the long-term reform that is needed in this new and uncomfortable situation. Sadly, it is no longer the case that most of our constituents will have adequate occupational pensions to make up for the inadequacies of the state provision. We need now to review our schemes root and branch.
  Part of the problem arises because the Chancellor has been so successful in helping the poorest pensioners now. No one in the House disagrees that the most urgent demand that the Government faced on coming to power in 1997 was to tackle the deepest poverty in our country, which was found generally speaking among pensioners, and as the Liberal Democrats rightly say, among the oldest pensioners in particular. However, the Government's policy is inadequate in that if we rely solely on a means-tested pension credit approach, we may help the poorest pensioners now but we begin to affect on an increasing scale the behaviour of the rest of our constituents. If about half the working population cannot save and know that they will make themselves better off if they blow all their savings on having a good time and rely on taxpayers when they retire, that not only spells a serious fiscal problem for the state but raises some fundamental questions about how we think free societies survive. I do not believe that a free society can survive in the long run if there is an increasing number of people in work whose standard of living is determined by one of the tax credits for those below working age, so that regardless of how long or hard they work or of whether they get a new job or qualifications, they face a marginal tax rate of 70 per cent.
  Mr. McWalter: Does not my right hon. Friend welcome the fact that if a pensioner has the full single pension of £80 and has saved to get an occupational pension of £20, the pension credit will top up their income to get beyond what they would have had if they had not saved in the first place?
  Mr. Field: I do, but it would have been much simpler to have disregarded the income in the first place; then we would not have had to have this hugely complicated scheme that we now suffer.
  Before that valuable intervention, I was trying to say that while we need to debate the details of policy, we should also have clear in our mind's eye how we think free societies survive and how our policies can contribute to that. I applaud the Government for wanting to help the poor in work and the poor in retirement, but that was never by itself an adequate
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  strategy, and it is certainly not adequate when it affects people's behaviour by making them better off claiming benefits than trying to improve their own lot.
  Some suggestions have been made today that are valuable in trying to build a long-term consensus on the next stage of pensions policy. I welcome unreservedly the Conservative Opposition's proposal to freeze the uprating of pension credit eligibility and divert the money. We will never free ourselves from an expanded means test net unless we are prepared to take such decisions. Similarly, I welcome the Liberal Democrat proposal of significantly increasing the retirement pension for the very oldest of our constituents. It is a form of selectivity that works, in contrast with all the difficulties encountered with means-testing. It is selective in going only to those of a certain age, but we know from all the published figures that they will tend to be among the very poorest in our communities. Some, thank goodness, will have adequate pensions, but they are a very small minority, and even if they began their retirement life with an adequate pension, once they are into their eighties, with only price inflation, the situation looks very different.
  The basic question concerns the state retirement pension itself. Unlike when the Government first came to office in 1997, we now have a consensus including everyone in the country—we wait only for the Government to join it—on the fact that no long-term pension reform can possibly get off the ground unless we make strides to increase significantly the first pension, which everybody claims.
  There are proposals for a pay-as-you-go scheme and others, with which I am associated and which I put to the Prime Minister before I resigned, for a universal protected pension combining pay-as-you-go with a funded scheme. As the Government and the Department for Work and Pensions know, and as No. 10 knows, we have asked the assistant Government actuary to recost those proposals. One of the excitements is whether we will get those recostings before the assistant Government actuary retires. Those details will be very important to the debate that I believe will evolve after Adair Turner makes his first report from the Pensions Commission. I hope that the Government will use the opportunity of that report to say that we have done very well in tackling the immediate poverty that pensioners now face but we have not yet turned to the longer run and laid the foundations for a reform that will command support not only in the House but—more importantly, because we come and go as Members of Parliament—among the electorate. The starting point must be proposals for significantly increasing what we used to call the state pension—a benefit that I hope will be called in the near future by another name.
  It is good fun to knock the Opposition for saying that they would freeze pension credit, but everyone who looks seriously at this question knows that at some stage someone must have the courage to freeze it before it gets even more out of hand.
  It is easy to poke fun at the Liberal Democrats for wanting to channel some of our existing resources to the oldest pensioners, but any serious person knows that that should be part of the new consensus.

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  Those two reforms alone will not deal with the pension crisis that people are lobbying us on today. We also have to tackle the most fundamental of the issues—the inadequacy of the state first pension that we all require. We did not have to face that problem in 1997 because the weakness of the state pension was covered by the generosity of a growing occupational pension scheme. That option is no longer open to us, and I hope that, long before the next election, the Government will lay proposals before the country making it clear what specifically they would do about this matter when we win our third term of office.
  2.30 pm
  Mr. Peter Lilley: The greatest domestic failure for which the Government will be remembered is having presided over the collapse of the British pension system. I pay tribute to the right hon. Member for Birkenhead (Mr. Field), who has just made a characteristically positive and objective contribution to the debate, for having done more than anyone to highlight the scale of that failure and the seriousness of the problem. He pointed out that, as my hon. Friend the Member for Havant (Mr. Willetts) said earlier, the incoming Labour Government inherited what was probably the strongest pension regime of any country in Europe. To meet our future pension liabilities, we had set aside and saved more money than not just any other European country, but all other European countries put together. Now, in the words of the right hon. Member for Birkenhead, that has been reduced to rubble.
  A series of Secretaries of State have shared responsibility for presiding over this collapse. Sadly, the right hon. Member for Birkenhead was not given the chance to implement his own constructive and imaginative ideas in an attempt to alleviate or avoid the problem. The outgoing Secretary of State is no more or less responsible than his predecessors for having presided over the deterioration and having failed to stem or remedy it. I would love to be able to congratulate him on being the only one who had accepted responsibility and resigned because of that failure, but, unfortunately, new Labour Ministers are reluctant to resign at all—and, when they do, they do not accept responsibility and attribute their resignation to something else. Nonetheless, I pay tribute to the former Secretary of State's good faith and integrity while in office, and he certainly should not have been subjected to the humiliating series of leaks of the last few weeks that attributed all the responsibility for the cumulative failure to him alone. Everyone knows that the real responsibility lies not just with him or his predecessors, but with the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who has effectively reduced the Department for Work and Pensions to a subordinate department of the Treasury. Each of the Secretaries of State can claim in defence that they were simply obeying orders.
  It is the Chancellor who was responsible for the two most damaging policy decisions that contributed to the weakening of our pensions regime. The first was the decision to introduce the pensions tax—the abolition of advance corporation tax credits, which effectively siphoned £5 billion from our pensions schemes every year. The second was the decision to extend means-testing. The pensions tax effectively cuts the yield on savings in pension funds by 25 per cent., and the
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  potential extension of means-testing to more than three quarters of all future pensioners withdraws 40 per cent. of the benefit from every extra pound of saving that they may have made.
  The combination of that 25 per cent. loss on yield and 40 per cent. loss on the benefit of extra savings is very significant. As a result, it is literally inadvisable to save. It would probably be illegal for any financial adviser to advise the bulk of the population to make any additional savings for their pensions, unless they are very rich indeed. No wonder that the savings ratio is this country has halved over the lifetime of the Government.
  There is another underlying problem that affects all developed countries, for which no one can blame the Government although they have aggravated it: people are living longer without working longer or saving more during their working lives. Any solution must either encourage or require people to save more or to work longer.
  I would like to believe—I stand at the libertarian end of the spectrum—that it is possible to encourage savings by increasing incentives, introducing better incentives or reducing disincentives. However, frankly, it would be bizarre to introduce a fresh set of incentives while retaining all the disincentives that I have just spelled out. It would be like running up a down escalator. We cannot remove the existing disincentive of means-testing if we rely on a purely voluntary system because many people will not volunteer to save enough and will retire without an adequate pension—and we will have to make provision for them, which will be means-tested. The disincentive of means-testing remains in the system: we cannot leave people destitute, even if they are destitute as a result of their failure to respond to generous incentives that would have made it worthwhile for them to save.
  I reluctantly came to the conclusion that it is essential to require everyone to contribute during their working lives towards a pension that will be sufficient to ensure that, when they reach retirement, they will not depend on means-tested benefits. We already compel people to contribute towards a state pension. Everyone in work has either to contribute to that or to make an equivalent contribution to a private pension system. We also have an element of compulsion in the tax system. We tax people—generally those who have worked hard and saved for themselves—in order to pay for the means-tested benefits for those who have not chosen to save enough, even though they could have done, to secure a decent pension for their old age. Rather than compelling the prudent to pay through taxes twice to support the imprudent, we should require everyone to make sufficient provision during their working lives for a pension in retirement so that they will not require means-tested benefits.
  Mr. Webb: The right hon. Gentleman advances an interesting case, which he has put to the House before, for compulsion. Will he clarify what he would do for the low earners who currently benefit from a highly redistributive basic pension and a very redistributive second state pension? How will those people who are able to contribute only a small amount of absolute cash secure a decent pension that is enough to live on?
  Mr. Lilley: My system is internally redistributive and is designed precisely to achieve that and to mirror some

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  of the redistribution that is inherent in the state pension. I propose that everyone will be required to be members of a pension fund. They will receive a flat-rate rebate paid into that fund from the national insurance fund sufficient to ensure that, over a working life, they will be part of a fund that is adequate to pay for a pension. Together with the basic state pension, it would ensure that they would not need to rely on means-tested benefits. The state would guarantee that minimum state pension so that if the fund fell short for whatever reason, the state would top up the pension to the guaranteed level, which is above the means-tested level.
  Of course, there would have to be provision to ensure prudent personal investment rules so that people did not take advantage of that guarantee.
  Mr. Douglas Hogg: I have a great deal of sympathy with what my right hon. Friend is saying. However, if he is going to make proposals that will lock people into compulsory saving schemes, does he not have to address the question of the consequence of inheritance tax on those savings? People will be locked into pension schemes and, in the absence of inheritance tax concessions, their descendants will not inherit the moneys compulsorily saved. Moreover, does he not agree that a second problem that must be addressed is the question of compulsory annuity?
  Mr. Lilley: Yes, although I think that my right hon. and learned Friend raises second-order issues. As I shall explain in a moment, I believe that people would have to use the money to ensure that they have a pension that keeps them clear of dependence on means-tested benefits. However, if they died before they retired and acquired an annuity for the rest of their lives, they would be able to transmit their savings to their heirs. Whether those savings would be liable to inheritance tax would be a matter for the Chancellor of the day but, as I say, that is a second-order issue that we do not need to address at this stage. At present, most people are not in a position to pass on savings, and their heirs are not in the happy position of receiving 100 per cent., or 60 per cent., of what is left.
  My proposals would have several key and valuable consequences. First, everyone in work would acquire a pension adequate to keep them above the means-testing level, and they would therefore be able to avoid means-testing when they left work. We would thus be able to allow the pensions credit system, and the means-testing associated with it, to wither away.
  Secondly, everyone would have greater incentives to save. Moreover, since they would have their own pension fund, they would find saving much easier. One of the greatest inhibitions against people making additional savings is that they do not have a pension fund. Setting one up is a major process for most people, even those who are financially sophisticated.
  The evidence from Australia in that respect is very encouraging. The introduction of mandatory superannuation schemes has led to the amount of voluntary saving doubling in size. People are required to save more, but their voluntary saving on top of that has doubled.
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  Thirdly, ownership of their own funds would give people more choice about when they retire. They would be free to retire whenever their fund could provide a sufficient basic pension that would mean that they would not depend on means-tested benefits. They would have a double incentive to work and save longer: every extra year worked would mean that people could contribute more to their funds, and that they would have a year less of retirement to finance. They would therefore be able to enjoy a better pension during retirement.
  The evidence is that people with money-purchase schemes work longer, whereas people with final-salary schemes tend to end work earlier. Where people have the double incentive to work and save longer, the evidence is that they respond.
  If we were to introduce such an incentive to get people to save and work longer, the only way for the Government to meet the sensible target that they have set—which is to increase the share of future pension liabilities that are met from savings from 40 per cent. to 60 per cent.—would be to require people to work longer. I challenge the Minister, or whoever winds up the debate, to tell us in what other way the Government could meet that objective.
  One overall benefit from my proposal would go much wider than the benefit that would accrue to future pensioners and the pension system. Above all, my approach would lead to the greatest transfer and extension of wealth to ordinary people to have occurred since the extension of home ownership and the right to buy. As a result, more people would have independence, self-respect, and power over their lives. They would have choice about savings and the timing of their retirement, and everyone would have a common interest in the prosperity of the economy in which their savings were invested and on which they would depend for enhanced benefits in the future.
  In the spirit of the two speakers who preceded me, I urge the House to look positively at my proposals, and to consider whether they should form part of a new consensus for us to work towards. That would enable us to overcome the enormous problems in respect of pensions that any future Government will inherit.
  2.46 pm
  Kali Mountford: In the interests of maintaining consensus across the House, I shall keep my comments brief. However, I want to say something about my right hon. Friend the Member for Oxford, East (Mr. Smith), as I do not think that the House can praise him too highly. My only quarrel with what the right hon. Member for Hitchin and Harpenden (Mr. Lilley) said is that he could have been a little more generous about my right hon. Friend, whose experience of Government is without equal. He is a man of great diligence and, as I found when I played a brief and modest role in the Department, a delight to work with. I cannot speak of him too highly.
  The right hon. Member for Hitchin and Harpenden made an interesting contribution to the debate. Much fresh thinking has been brought to the table today, but there are problems with all the proposals that we have heard. The debate began with some remarks about consensus and common thinking. The hope was

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  expressed that we could join together in dealing with the problems posed by an increasingly ageing population. However, those problems are not new, having been identified as far back as the 1980s. None of us can stand back and say, "It wasn't me, I wasn't there, I didn't do it." That would be wrong, as none of the problems under discussion is new to any of us. The solutions to those problems are not new either, although members of different parties approach the matter from different directions.
  The problem that pension schemes sometimes fold is also not new. Many people working in the textile mills in my constituency lost their jobs and pension entitlements way back in the 1980s. Thousands of textile jobs were lost when the mills closed, and thousands of people lost their pension entitlements as their pension schemes folded. What is the difference between what happened then and what is happening now?
  One difference is that the people who lost their jobs in the textile industry in my area were mainly women. It was believed that they were simply earning a little pin money for their families and that they did not make a great contribution to the economy. However, I must disabuse the House of that perception. Those women contributed hugely to the economy, earning some 5 per cent. of gross domestic product, a level that continues to this day. We cannot ignore the contribution made by those women, and neither can we say that our provision for future women pensioners could be covered by the suggestions made today.
  The women who did not make contributions because their pension schemes folded, or because they were ill advised about the choice of national insurance contribution, or because they had breaks in employment thanks to the natural progress of family life, could find themselves left out of any new solution that may be proposed. We need to look more imaginatively at how we can help them. Quite rightly, the second state pension has appropriate provisions, and it is good to have a Government who have looked at ways in which people who are carers in families can be deemed to have made contributions throughout their lives. In that way, they will be able to enjoy suitable pension provision in the future.
  Women who make a valuable contribution have been ignored in the past, so we should look further to see how the state second pension could benefit women and what else could be done. However, while making that modest request to the Government, it is right to recognise their groundbreaking move to include women in such pension schemes.
  We must also recognise the huge problem of pensioner poverty that faces us; simply to move on, with one fell swoop, as though all that happened before had never occurred, is to deny the past. As I went round my constituency in 1996 and 1997, I met people who were freezing in their homes. That does not happen any more. It is right that the debate has moved on to how to encourage saving and how to find people a better standard of living for the future. At least we have moved from the debate about how on earth we could provide for the very poorest. The hon. Member for Northavon (Mr. Webb) and I have held conversations of that type across the Chamber in the past. How do we define the very poorest? Is it the person who claims no benefit at all? Is it the person who relies only on state pension and
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  has not applied for any other benefit? Is it the person who is at least at minimum income guarantee level, or is it the person who could, but does not, claim pension credit? All those people are worthy of our consideration.
  One way not to deal with the problem is to decry all the opportunities for bringing families a better household income by simply saying that means-testing is a bad thing and that we should not target pensions. We have heard today how, at least in part, the Opposition parties would try to fund their schemes. To give the Liberal Democrats some credit, we have at least heard a fuller account of what they would like to do, but we have not heard a full enough account of how they would pay for it.
  We know that all Governments have to make choices—between one group of possible beneficiaries and another, one type of payment and another, or one type of service to the community and another. It is right to put all those things into the pot and consider them, but let us not pretend that unless there is some move on taxation and a promise to change other provisions, if we put extra provision in one place other services will not have to be cut. We should be clear about which they might be.
  We certainly know a lot about the problems that could arise from the Tories' proposals. They have no real pension proposals, but their overall social policy proposals cannot be funded except by cutting other services. We have heard half a story from the Liberal Democrats and I should like to hear the rest. What would happen to the Department of Trade and Industry? Which young people would, or would not, have opportunities in the future? To rob one generation to pay for another is not the right way forward. We will not encourage people to stay in employment, to earn their living and save properly by taking away the means for them to obtain employment. I should be wary of any cuts in the DTI budget without knowing precisely what they would be.
  We must also be careful not to discourage people from taking up the opportunities that could be available through the Pension Service. I want to say a few words about how marvellous the administration of that new department is. Staff from the service come to my constituency regularly to meet community groups. They do not simply sit behind a desk waiting for somebody to phone or turn up; they are proactive. They go into communities in rural areas such as mine and seek people out to advise them about what their benefits could be. They make it clear that those benefits are not a charitable donation or a Government handout to unworthy people who have not saved for their retirement or who have not worked and made proper contributions. There is a clear recognition of people as citizens. The service offered is a good one and people are surprised at how much benefit they can receive.
  David Taylor: I endorse the point my hon. Friend makes and pay tribute to the staff of the DWP at Loughborough, who are incredibly effective in North-West Leicestershire in targeting the sort of people to whom she refers. The proportion of take-up will increase significantly due to a sea change in attitudes.
  Kali Mountford: Absolutely; my hon. Friend is correct. The consensus that is growing—at least on the Labour Benches—will build opportunities for pensioners in all communities, whether or not their MP has recognised the brilliance of that service delivery. I recommend it to everyone.
  As time is short, I shall end on a happy note and repeat that the Pension Service is marvellous. I commend my hon. Friend the Minister for Pensions for his administration of that service and, in particular, my right hon. Friend the Member for Oxford, East for his vision for it in the future.
  2.55 pm
  Mr. Stephen Dorrell: I begin by declaring a personal interest. Like all MPs, I am a member of the final salary scheme of the House, but I am also a member of the final salary scheme of a private company of which I am a director and shareholder, and in that capacity I am involved in how to work through the pension funding crisis that is the main focus of the debate.
  One of the most attractive aspects of the House is that although we can have passionate arguments across the political divide, when people leave office we usually find something nice to say about them. It is not difficult in the case of the right hon. Member for Oxford, East (Mr. Smith) to recognise the obvious decency and humanity of the man, but that should not in any way detract us from recognising the central failure of the Government that was accurately described by my right hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin and Harpenden (Mr. Lilley).
  The Prime Minister has clearly noticed that failure, because the No. 10 briefing machine was in overdrive during August, making it clear that the pensions crisis was the responsibility of anyone in the Government but the Prime Minister. The main concern was to ensure that responsibility attached to the previous Secretary of State, seeing him, to a degree, as a surrogate for the Chancellor of the Exchequer. For the reasons to which my right hon. Friend referred, this developing crisis is indeed a key responsibility of the Chancellor.
  Let us understand the key elements in the background to the present pensions issue. My right hon. Friend rightly referred to the fact that until the end of the 1990s, under Governments of both political complexions, we had built up a system of co-funding of pension liabilities between the state and a growing private sector. That was healthy in principle, because it encouraged saving self-help, and was attractive in practice, because it meant that each new generation of retirees was able to look forward to better-funded retirement—better retirement benefits—than previous generations. That is not to detract from the fact that there was a continuing problem of pensioner poverty for those who had been retired for some time, but until 1997 we were able to point out that each new generation saw that problem decrease because benefits for new generations of retirees were on a continuously improving trend.
  Since 1997, we have seen that process go sharply into reverse. In July, Mercer estimated that, even after the considerable stock market recovery that has taken place, the FTSE 350 companies between them had a £64 billion deficit in their pension funds. According to the CBI earlier this year, all companies had a total deficit
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  of £100 billion in their pension funds. That means that those companies have made commitments of £100 billion to their former and current employees that they cannot finance.
  Against that background, it is no surprise that we have seen the majority of final salary schemes close to new members. Replacement schemes are less generous in the benefits they provide and there is a continuing and developing problem of how we deal with unfunded deficits when companies get into difficulties—as happens occasionally, hence the discussion earlier this afternoon about the pension protection fund and the way in which the Government's financial assistance proposals will work.
  I do not blame the Government entirely. It is clearly true that a number of other factors have been involved: declining investment returns and increased longevity, unmatched by increasing working lives, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin and Harpenden said. All those things are true and have contributed, but the Government cannot escape from the fact that it was their choice that imposed a £5 billion additional burden on pension schemes. If we apply the minimum funding requirement rules, for which my right hon. Friend was responsible when he was the Secretary of State, to express the net present value of the reduced contribution that the Government are making through dividend tax relief to those pension funds, we find that roughly £40 billion of the £100 billion deficit in today's pensions funds is the result of the Government's policy choice. So although the Government are not the sole author of the developing crisis, they are a very major contributory factor.
  My central point, therefore, is that against the background of a developing crisis, in which huge additional burdens have been put on employers and new generations of retirees face declining benefits into the future instead of improving benefits, the time has come—indeed, it has long since passed—when we urgently need a new approach to rebuild the public-private partnership strategy. The Government love to talk about partnership, but they inherited a partnership strategy—a co-funding strategy—in pensions that was broadly working. That is not to say that it did not need to be maintained and refined; of course, it did.
  We urgently need to rebuild the co-funding of pension liabilities that was the cornerstone of the policy pursued by my right hon. Friend when he was the Secretary of State. The rebuilding of that partnership requires individual employers and employees, the private sector and the state to play a part in rebuilding a new consensus. There has been a fair amount of talk this afternoon about the need for a new consensus, and I wholeheartedly endorse that, but it must be based on a move away from the mass means-testing of pensioner benefits.
  It is ironic that the Chancellor loves to talk about the need to give people incentives when they are in work—he loves to talk about welfare-to-work—but his policy has created the deep problem of disincentives for people to save. I listened with great respect to my right hon. Friend make the case that we cannot get out of the hole without compulsion. Like him. I am instinctively resistant to that case; but, like him, I suspect that, in the end, that will be an important part of the new consensus that must be built.

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  Finally, I urge on the House the proposition that all this is part of a much bigger issue. I strongly believe that the modern welfare state, given our constituents' expectations, is affordable only on the basis of co-payment. I have spoken in health debates, along with my right hon. Friend, and in education debates about the need to establish co-payment—individuals and the private sector contributing to the cost of those services—as the only basis on which the welfare state of the future can be built. Pensions funding is but a part of that issue, and the most serious charge against the Government on pensions is that they have allowed the co-funding, the partnership between the public and the private sector on which my right hon. Friend's policy was built, to crumble. In doing so, they have done no favours either to this or to future generations of pensioners. Furthermore, they have undermined the principle that is important way outside the pensions issue, but goes across the whole of the future planning of the welfare state.
  3.4 pm
  Mr. Tony McWalter: I will try not to use up my full time, to allow other hon. Members to take part.
  Like many other hon. Members, I very much want to commend the record of my right hon. Friend the Member for Oxford, East (Mr. Smith), who was not only a man of deep compassion and responsiveness to the concerns of Back-Bench Members, but was highly numerate—a virtue that is not always displayed in such debates, particularly by the Liberal Democrats.
  In the short time available to me, I want to concentrate on the fact that, in a pensions system, we look for justice and responsiveness to need. Reconciling those two things can be very difficult. Certainly, it is pretty easy to have a system that gives people incentives, thus rewarding those who have saved and worked hard all their lives. The best way to give an incentive is to do what the last Conservative Government did: to put people who have not managed to save and build up a strong pensions record on income support, which, I seem to recall, was about 50 quid a week. Of course, that was not the only taxpayers' contribution. People got some council tax benefit and, if appropriate, housing benefit and so on, but the reality was that they were forced to live on poverty incomes. Sure, that was a great incentive for people to fear those conditions and to save; but, as a result, large numbers of our citizens were in fear, want and in the cold.
  I speak with some passion because I recall the plight of my own parents—now, sadly, some years deceased. They died at a time when my earnings were relatively humble, and I was unable to help them from the condition of living on income support under a Conservative Government. I do not want to go back to those days. The Government saw that need, and we acted and sorted it out.
  I was at a lunch the other day with a woman of 82, who told me that she has never in her life been less concerned or worried about money. The result of our policies has raised her income from that derisory 50 quid to £105 a week. That is not a fortune; she has financial problems, of course. There are things that she would like to do—visit her grandchildren more often and so on—
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  that she finds hard to do on that money, but she has a degree of confidence and assuredness about that £105. The only thing that she did not want to do—other people do not want to do it either, but she bit the bullet and did it—was to ask for it. It is true that many people still will not ask for that money, but our system says that, if people do not have a full pensions contribution record, we will still ensure that they have the money to live on in some level of comfort and decency.
  The National Pensioners Convention, which is lobbying outside today, goes on and on about the basic pension. Well, the basic pension was no good for that 82-year-old woman; it was no good for my mother; and it was no good for people who worked hard all their lives because the pension system is contributory and, under the rules, they were regarded as non-contributors. The basic pension never addressed their concerns.
  I can think of a fairly old Labour solution: first, it says, "Money is no object," and, secondly, its asks, "Why not raise the basic pension to exactly the same level as the minimum income guarantee?" That is what the National Pensioners Convention leaflet says. It also says, "By the way, ignore the contributions principle, because that principle will still create a differential."
  That is a nice response to need and it would certainly simplify the system. I do not know whether the Liberal Democrats have quite reached that point. That policy is very old Labour in that it does not worry about the cost, but the crucial point is that it is grotesquely unjust. How would it distinguish between those who have worked hard to contribute all their lives and those who have not? For a working man to receive the full pension of £80 at 65, he has to have contributed for 44 years. I will not get the full pension myself, unless I do something about that. If someone starts work after 21—I did a post-graduate course and started full-time work after that age—they will not have a full pensions record. I may decide to make up those contributions, but under the old Labour policy that I have described, there would be no incentive for anyone to do so.
  Those people who paid for 44 years—or perhaps made additional contributions to build up their record—would get the same as everybody else. That is not fair, and that is why the Government introduced the pension credit. If people have savings, the Government will not rip them off, but give them credit for those savings. If people have additional pensions, the Government will give them additional money to recognise the contribution that they have made and the extent to which they are not claiming state benefits, such as council tax benefit.
  People need to ask for the means-tested benefits, but if they do so they will receive a sum that most pensioners feel is comfortable. If people have saved or made additional provision for themselves, that is taken into account. In that way, we try to combine responsiveness to need with justice. All the other solutions we have heard today are based on violating the principle of responsiveness to need. The Hitchin and Harpenden solution—I remember it well—was to lower the amount people received in income support to an appalling level to frighten them sick at the prospect of having to rely on it, and thus encourage them to save.
  Mr. Lilley: The hon. Gentleman is getting a little worked up and he seems to think that I was arguing for lower pensions. On the contrary, I argued for increased pensions for everybody with a redistributive element to ensure that even those on low earnings ended up with a better pension, above the means-tested level.
  Mr. McWalter: Is the right hon. Gentleman saying that he believes that the basic pension should be £105 for everybody? Or does he think that those who do not receive a full basic pension should be worse off than those who do? The Conservative party did not even understand the question about women who have worked hard all their lives but do not have a contributions record. My hon. Friend the Member for Northampton, South (Mr. Clarke) asked what the Conservatives would do for such women, but none of them seemed to understand or be able to respond to that question.
  We call the Government's policy responding to people's needs, but the Opposition call it means testing. If means testing sorts out poverty and gives people a decent quality of life—as well as rewarding people who have worked hard and saved all their lives—it is fair, just and responsive to need. I have heard nothing from the Opposition, or from my right hon. Friend the Member for Birkenhead (Mr. Field), that remotely begins to address the agenda that my right hon. Friend the Member for Oxford, East adopted—he did a very good job—in order to reconcile those principles.
  3.14 pm
  Mr. Roger Gale: I wish to move away briefly from the mainstream of the debate and concentrate on those words on the Order Paper about competence of delivery. I wish to introduce the Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, the hon. Member for Gravesham (Mr. Pond) who will shortly respond to the debate, to Mrs G. She is a real person who lives in Birchington in my constituency and who telephoned my office today. She is in her 70s and is very proud and independent. She has inoperable cataracts and suffers from tinnitus. She is on her last post office order book, and she represents thousands like her in this country. She has been told that she cannot have another book. She has also been told by Post Office staff that for reasons of confidentiality they cannot help her to access her money through her PIN number. She cannot read her PIN number because of her eyesight.
  The Government documents that Mrs G has received have simply told her that all the help she needs will be available. Her experience is that such help is not available. When she telephoned my office today she said that she had met an elderly gentleman in floods of tears in the post office because he could not access his money under the new system.
  The system that the Government are introducing is not ready and it is not working. It is being imposed on thousands of elderly people. I have no problem with its introduction from now on, but it should not be done retrospectively. It is being introduced in a manner that is unfeeling, uncaring, insensitive and causes distress.
  The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Mr. Chris Pond): I would like to assist both of the constituents the hon. Gentleman mentions by suggesting that he alerts them to the fact that those who cannot operate any form of account, including the Post Office card account, can be paid by cheque. We have ensured that there are no circumstances in which people who cannot operate an account will be left without their money. I hope that he will communicate that to his constituents quickly.
  Mr. Gale: Some people do not have accounts into which to pay cheques, so that does not help, unless the Minister is talking about a money order. There is a modest group of people for whom the present system does not work. Those people should be able to retain their order books for the rest of their lives. That would work. What is proposed at present is not working.
  3.17 pm
  Tom Levitt: About 100 years ago, a gentleman by the name of Frood developed a successful line of brake linings. The company became Ferodo, a name synonymous with brake linings. In turn, it became part of the Turner and Newall group and remained so for many years. Some 10 years ago, Ferodo—which is still known by that name in the High Peak—became part of the Federal Mogul group, an American-led consortium. To this day, of the 20-odd sites that Federal Mogul has across the UK, the one at Chapel-en-le-Frith is one of the most successful and profitable. Indeed, just a few years ago, it could boast a thousand employees. Although it does not have so many today, it is still—by some way—the largest private sector employer on a single site in my constituency.
  I do not need to remind the House that the Turner and Newall pension fund that Federal Mogul inherited is in considerable difficulty. However, it has not yet folded and talks continue on how best the company can meet its obligations to its work force, past and present and across the globe, not just in Chapel-en-le-Frith. Some 40,000 people in this country are members of the Turner and Newall pension fund. Only 10 per cent. currently work for Federal Mogul. Half of them are existing pensioners and the remainder are deferred pension holders, who have at some point made a contribution to the fund but have not yet started to draw their pensions.
  All those 40,000 people were led to believe throughout, no matter when they worked for the company, that in return for their contributions and those put in by the employers, there would be a pension when they came to retire.
  Until a little while ago, there was no reason to think that there was a problem, but in fact problems arose about three years ago when the American company Federal Mogul—not Ferodo or Turner and Newall—put itself into chapter 11 administration in the United States for reasons to do with protection against insurance claims on asbestos cases, as my hon. Friend the Minister said, and the company's situation in the United States. The reasons for going into administration had precious little to do with the way in which the company was operating in the United Kingdom.
  Nevertheless, even when the company went into administration, it was not flagged up that that could lead to a problem with the pension fund. Indeed, as far

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  as we know, that pension fund was muddling along, no better and no worse than any other, and people had a full expectation of receiving their pension. Indeed, a letter went out in July to all fund members from the trustees and the company's administrators to say that some issues had to be addressed. However, it was not until about three weeks later that a second letter went out saying that there was a crisis and that it was impossible to see how the pension fund could meet its obligations. Again, that is an interesting issue because no real problems were mentioned before.
  The problem is that the company has been in administration for three years and needs to come out of it. Its situation is not sustainable and it has been in administration for longer than originally anticipated. If I understand the rules correctly, the pension fund of a company in administration has to be performing at a higher level, more effectively and profitably, than the pension fund of a company that has not gone into administration if it is to make the leap out of administration. It is that required level of funding and performance that is causing all the problems.
  In response to the situation in Chapel-en-le-Frith, across High Peak and elsewhere, a local Conservative councillor in Chapel-en-le-Frith has started going around doing a passable impression of Mr. Frazer of "Dad's Army", taking a "We're all doomed" approach to solving the problem. That has done nothing other than generate panic, concern and unnecessary worry. We need all groups to work together to ensure that the company meets its obligations.
  Over the past few weeks, I have met fund members, corresponded with pensioners and deferred members, visited the site several times—I am going there again next week—and contacted other Members of Parliament. My hon. Friends the Members for Coventry, South (Mr. Cunningham) and for Coventry, North-West (Mr. Robinson) and I have established an all-party support group for pension fund members of Turner and Newall. As a group, we met my hon. Friend the Pensions Minister in the middle of August to ensure that he was fully acquainted with our concerns and those of our constituents. I assure the House that he was and that he takes the matter seriously, as he described earlier. Next week, our group has meetings with the trustees of the pension fund and the company's administrators to express the concerns, which I know from today's comments are shared by hon. Members on both sides of the House, about the future of that pension fund and the 40,000 people who are its members in one way or another.
  Mr. Nigel Waterson: I am listening carefully to the hon. Gentleman. From his discussions with Ministers, has he discovered whether the pension scheme will come under the terms of the financial assistance scheme if it goes into wind-up, which we all hope does not happen, between now and next April?
  Tom Levitt: As a group and as individual Members of Parliament we have made the case strongly to Ministers that for all sorts of reasons—short term, long term, political and personal—the pension fund should not be allowed to collapse in ruins. As I said in an intervention, it is principally the responsibility of the people who led
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  the fund members to believe that there would be a pension at the end, because they were partners in creating that pension, to ensure that those pensions are paid. To talk about finding them a convenient and easy way out, which allows them to throw their hands up in the air and say, "Well, in that case we wash our hands of the pension scheme and will rely on the Government to bail us out", would not be a responsible approach.
  I do not prejudge what will happen because I want the scheme to be rescued and, if at all possible, I want it to be rescued by those who were involved in making promises about the outcome of the scheme in the first place. Incidentally, those same people have awarded Federal Mogul a contributions holiday in 18 of the past 25 years. I do not know whether that was irresponsible or a result of complacency, based on the best possible financial advice, but I do know that when the pension fund trustees advised the company only a year ago that it should continue to make contributions, that advice was not heeded.
  Mr. McWalter: Is my hon. Friend aware that such situations are not usually the result of company profligacy or meanness, but the result of the 105 per cent. rule introduced by the Conservative party? It meant that companies were not allowed to have assets to cover liabilities above 105 per cent. That is the main reason why most companies had to give themselves contributions holidays.
  Tom Levitt: I understand that that may be the explanation and I would be interested to hear that confirmed for this specific case. However, the fund's investments were in stocks when stocks were falling, in gilts when gilts were not doing well and in bonds when they were not doing well. A report in the national press a few weeks ago said that because of a rising stock market and rising interest rates, typical pension funds this year are 25 per cent. better off than they were last year, but that does not apply to the Turner and Newall pension fund, which has not been sufficient for what is necessary to cover even normal expectations, let alone the worst-case scenario.
  Some money is on the table from the Federal Mogul company in America, but it is not sufficient. There were meetings in the middle of August and at the beginning of September, and there will be further meetings between the trustees, the administrators and the trade unions. The Transport and General Workers Union and Amicus in particular have done a thorough, responsible and effective job in keeping the issues going to set the basis for a settlement on the grounds that I mentioned.
  I wish those talks well. I understand that there are considerable assets in the company, and I am adamant that the first line of defence for those 40,000 members of the pension fund has got to be to ensure that this huge international company with significant assets throughout the world meets the moral obligations it had when it took on every single employee in the first place and agreed a deal under which a pension would be paid.
  3.29 pm
  Hywel Williams: I would like to ground the debate in the experience of my constituents, many of whom depend on Turner and Newall pensions.

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  There is a particularly acute circumstance in my constituency, in that people who used to work for Ferodo were persuaded to stay with the Turner and Newall scheme when the company was taken over by Friction Dynamics. Hon. Members on both sides of the House will be familiar with the long-running dispute at the Friction Dynamics plant at Caernarfon. It is particularly ironic and cruel that the workers at Friction Dynamics on strike—or locked out, if you will—for three years are now facing uncertainty, having won their industrial tribunal case, defeated the new employer, seen that company go into administration and been denied the compensation that they are due. I accept the point made by the hon. Member for High Peak (Tom Levitt) earlier that it is a question of uncertainty. I do not think that we are all doomed, and I do not want to contribute to such a picture.
  My constituents joined the Turner and Newall scheme. They had to do so, and there were advised that it was very safe. Many of them deferred their pensions when Friction Dynamics took over, and they are now ruing their loss. I understand that the current deficiency in the Turner and Newall scheme is £875 million, which puts the offer of £400 million to the initial scheme referred to by the Prime Minister earlier in some context.
  Tom Levitt: For the record, the figure the hon. Gentleman cited is the buy-out figure if the whole thing collapses. To keep the scheme running would involve significantly less than that, but it would still be a substantial figure, and more than the one currently on the table.
  Hywel Williams: I thank the hon. Gentleman for that point. I accept that a substantial amount of money would still be required. I have received correspondence from several constituents, including Mr. Gerald Parry, who led the workers during the lockout. I shall not name the others owing to the pressure of time, but they are all pressing the Government to work with the trade unions and the company to resolve the matter, to ensure that the company administrator and the independent trustee take full account of their long-term needs, and to ensure that funds are provided for the pension assistance scheme if necessary.
  I shall briefly quote another of my constituents, Mr. David Bartram of Y Groeslon. Perhaps this is the most significant thing I can add in my brief contribution. He says:
  "The current situation has shaken everyone's faith in the pension industries' abilities to deliver the promised long term benefits."
  That is a very significant statement, as it is indicative of the corrosion of people's faith in the system created by the whole affair. Significantly, he closes by saying:
  "If I were now starting my working career, I would be taking a very different view of the pension industries or looking for a job in government/local authority service."
  We do not want to encourage such attitudes in Caernarfon, where the public sector looms very large, and where there is a certain lack on entrepreneurship, or in the other objective 1 areas in Wales for that matter. My constituents are worried and concerned, and they are looking for help and reassurance.
  3.33 pm
  Mr. Ian Liddell-Grainger: I want to follow on where the hon. Member for High Peak (Tom Levitt) left off. There is a company in my constituency that used to be called Wellman, which became Turner and Newall, and ultimately Federal Mogul. Currently, 80 of my constituents are in the situation described by the hon. Gentleman as the company's ongoing situation.
  The hon. Gentleman was being almost kind about the level of deficit we could be facing if things go wrong. I have looked into the matter, and the shortfall world wide is just under £1 billion, of which the deficit in this country is £300 million. The initial discussions that Amicus has had have been absolutely first class—the hon. Gentleman is right about that. The company has already offered to pay £65 million, which is woefully inadequate at any level. About £29 million a year will be needed for the next eight years, which adds up to a total of £232 million, to sustain the current level of the scheme.
  Yet again, I urge the Minister to look at the problem, because unless the rules for the pension protection fund are changed, at least eighty of my constituents, and perhaps up to 400 people in my constituency and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Taunton (Mr. Flook), could be affected. I do not know exactly how many people who have taken earlier retirement or opted for other forms of retirement are involved, but I receive letters almost daily from individuals affected by the problem.
  Will the Minister look at the issue as a matter of urgency, because 40,000 people—an awfully high number—will be affected? The company said that it was moving from my constituency to Poland, but in fact it had already filed for bankruptcy under chapter 11, although it did not make that clear. Many employees were given leaving packages before the company moved, and were removed from the company scheme. People who took early retirement are not angry, but perturbed and concerned. There is, however, obviously concern among pensioners.
  Unusually for a Conservative MP, I represent an industrial town that is home to British Cellophane, Trig Engineering and many other multi-national or international companies. Many people wonder whether the current problem is the tip of the iceberg, as world wide there are a terrifying number of company wind-ups. I do not expect the Minister to give us an assurance now, but can he tell us in the next few months, or years if necessary, how many companies will be affected? Many people do not believe that their scheme is secure but, as has been argued eloquently by Members on both sides of the House, the Government cannot be blamed because the problem goes back many years. However, people would be grateful for an assurance that the Government will look at their schemes.
  In conclusion, I urge the Government to look at the protection fund, as that is extremely important to many people who worked in good faith for a company which has filed for chapter 11 in America and will ultimately fall into administration.
  3.37 pm
  Mr. Nigel Waterson: I am delighted to take part in this debate, and to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgwater (Mr. Liddell-Grainger), who spoke about the subject with passion and knowledge.
  It is difficult not to have considerable sympathy with the former Secretary of State, the right hon. Member for Oxford, East (Mr. Smith), and I join the Members who have queued up to pay him abundant plaudits today. On Monday morning, he woke up and faced a triple whammy. He was supposed to appear before the Work and Pensions Committee this morning, would meet the pensioners' lobby today, and speak in our debate this afternoon. No wonder he resigned. However, we do not need the resignation of the Secretary of State to tell us that the Government's policies on pensions are in deep trouble. Means-testing is set to rise inexorably, and only a couple of days ago, the latest figures on the pension credit showed that almost 2 million pensioners are still not receiving the benefits to which they are entitled. As we know, the Department itself assumes that 1.4 million pensioners will not claim pension credit even though they are entitled to it. No wonder a recent poll by Age Concern revealed that the majority of people who receive pension credit do not like it at all.
  The collapse of a savings culture was discussed eloquently by my right hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin and Harpenden (Mr. Lilley), and the problems of the computer crash and direct payments more generally were discussed by my hon. Friend the Member for North Thanet (Mr. Gale). Recent figures confirm that more than 1 million workers are working beyond the usual retirement age, which is another sign of the crisis in pensions. Importantly, my right hon. Friend the Member for Charnwood (Mr. Dorrell), discussed the need to rebuild co-funding to tackle the crisis. Demonstrators have come to Parliament today because they want a decent state pension, and support our policy of restoring the link between the state pension and earnings. I am pleased that in our debate the right hon. Member for Birkenhead (Mr. Field) supported that policy.
  There are therefore many problems, but every time Ministers think that the situation cannot get worse, it does.
  Just today it is revealed that the main steel union is pressing ahead with its court case against the Government over the inadequacy of their rescue package. On occupational pensions, the sad truth is that the Government's plans are fundamentally flawed and the PPF is likely to end up as a clumsy and unstable political creation that cannot deliver the guarantee of which Ministers have boasted.
  Ministers claim to have drawn lessons from the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation in America, but they are not starting off with a fully risk-based levy so that the PPF is properly funded and good schemes do not subsidise the bad. In the first few years there will be a flat-rate levy for the PPF. We believe that will make it financially vulnerable.
  As my hon. Friend the Member for Havant (Mr. Willetts) said in opening the debate, perhaps the most disturbing aspect of all this is the growing gap between the Government's spin on the lifeboat that it is creating
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  for individuals through the PPF, and the reality. As we heard, people who have not yet retired will get only 90 per cent. of their entitlement at best. Indeed, there is to be a cap on the compensation payable in each case. Also, the Government are diluting the indexation rules so pensioners will receive even less. As if all this were not enough, the Government are taking powers, as we heard, to cut benefits payable under the scheme if the resources are not available—a point that has clearly not been lost on the new chairman of the PPF and which was, in effect, conceded by the Minister during his speech. The PPF is very far from being a total guarantee.
  We, the CBI and the National Association of Pension Funds, among others, have been warning that the totality of the Government's proposals, including the ill-considered anti-avoidance provisions, may well have unintended consequences and deny decent pension security to future generations. With her typical delicacy, Christine Farnish of the NAPF said of the Department for Work and Pensions:
  "I think they are very challenged by the complexities of these issues."
  A recent survey by the Engineering Employers Federation shows that one in three employers might scrap their final salary schemes if the Bill goes through in its present form. That is on top of all the final salary schemes that have already closed under the Government.
  The Bill has been largely overshadowed by legitimate concerns about the 65,000 workers who have already lost substantial pension rights when their companies went bust and who will not receive any compensation from the PPF. We have always recognised that we cannot use the levy of the PPF retrospectively, but we have consistently argued for compensation to be provided through the use of so-called unclaimed assets. At the very last moment, when they were facing defeat in the Commons by a cross-party coalition, the Government cobbled together their rescue package, but details of that package are still in short supply. One aspect that has emerged is that there is to be no cash for the victims of solvent wind-ups. Once the Government deemed that workers who had lost out were deserving of help, what moral basis can there be to exclude those who were involved in wind-ups of solvent companies that still left them potentially destitute?
  More workers are continuing to become potential claimants on the £400 million before the PPF is up and running in April next year. It is already clear that £400 million will not be enough to go round. Assuming a pensioner lives for 20 years, it will provide less than £1 a day on average. Over the summer the Government promised to put more flesh on the bones of their financial assistance scheme, but what has begun to emerge is deeply disturbing. I have touched on the blatant unfairness with respect to solvent wind-ups, but there are other questions. Will compensation paid under the scheme be subject to tax and will it be means-tested? People need to know the answer to such questions. If further funds are not available from the pensions industry or industry more generally, do the Government intend to top up the £400 million if it proves inadequate? Will they reconsider the issue of unclaimed assets?
  As the hon. Member for High Peak (Tom Levitt) and others eloquently described, in the early summer massive problems came to light at Turner and Newall.

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  Forty thousand pensioners and future pensioners could be affected. The possible shortfall could be £875 million. I am meeting a delegation from Derbyshire tomorrow, including the Tory prospective candidate for High Peak, Mr. Andrew Bingham, who has been very energetic on the issue. I shall be interested to hear what he has to say.
  On the face of it, such a massive pensions failure could swamp the PPF, if it happens on its watch. In the short term, it demonstrates the inadequacy of the financial assistance scheme. It has been suggested that schemes that collapse between May this year and April next year, when the PPF is supposed to open its doors, will not benefit from the financial assistance scheme. The Government's briefing suggests that those people will be protected by the new priority order on wind-up, but all that does is change how the cake is divided up; it does not increase the size of the cake.
  Will those people risk falling between two stools? The Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, the hon. Member for Gravesham (Mr. Pond), should come clean about that matter, because the Minister for Pensions carefully avoided the question. Will the workers of a company such as Turner and Newall benefit from the financial assistance scheme—yes or no?
  Tom Levitt: I shall put the hon. Gentleman's question straight back to him: if he were in the Minister's shoes, would he find £875 million of taxpayers' money to bail out that scheme?
  Mr. Waterson: Unlike the Labour party, we have a policy. We would re-examine the use of unclaimed assets to compensate people, and I shall tell that to the delegation tomorrow.
  We currently have no Secretary of State—the Department is rudderless; everyone except Ministers agrees that the financial assistance scheme is inadequate; the Pensions Bill lurches from disaster to disaster; the PPF will not provide a full guarantee; and the pensions crisis deepens and worsens as Ministers come and go. In the past few days, we have finally learned just how much the Government really care about pensions. The Government have spun the idea that they are prepared to jettison their Pensions Bill in its entirety to allow the hunting Bill on to the statute book, which is designed to pacify their own Back Benchers. They should ask the workers at Turner and Newall whether they prefer a hunting Bill or a Pensions Bill—I can imagine the workers' answer.
  Under this Government, things are rarely as they seem on the surface. Perhaps it has finally dawned on those deep in the Department for Work and Pensions that their strategy is hopelessly flawed and that Ministers have been pursuing the wrong issues, in the wrong way and at the wrong time. Perhaps it is with quiet relief that they prepare to sacrifice the Pensions Bill and return to the drawing board, hoping that they can blame somebody else.
  Oscar Wilde described hunting as
  "the unspeakable in full pursuit of the uneatable."
  Under this Government, pensions policy has become the incompetent in pursuit of the unworkable.
  3.48 pm
  The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Mr. Chris Pond): This has been a good debate on a subject of great importance to all our constituents. We have heard contributions from two former Secretaries of State and a former Minister of State, and most hon. Members have paid tribute to the most recent Secretary of State, my right hon. Friend the Member for Oxford, East (Mr. Smith), with whom I had the privilege to work, and I can confirm that those tributes are well deserved.
  We have heard thoughtful and moving speeches from my hon. Friends the Members for Hemel Hempstead (Mr. McWalter), for Colne Valley (Kali Mountford) and for High Peak (Tom Levitt). My hon. Friend the Member for High Peak described the plight of his constituents who are affected by Turner and Newall's difficulties, as did the hon. Member for Caernarfon (Hywel Williams).
  I thank the Opposition for their generosity in using their parliamentary time on a subject that we are delighted to debate in the House, in the country and on the doorsteps in the months ahead. We are happy to debate it because, as my hon. Friend the Minister for Pensions told the House, we are proud of our record. This year, pensioner households will be £26 per week better off in real terms than they were when we took over, and the poorest pensioner households are £33 per week better off than they were under the Tory Government.
  We are proud that as a result of pension credit and the other measures we have taken there are now 1.8 million fewer pensioners living in poverty: poverty that not only disfigured their lives in their final years but was a scar on the nation; an injustice made worse during the years in which the Conservatives were in government.
  We are proud that we have boosted pensioner incomes by £10 billion a year, compared with the £10 billion that the Conservatives lifted from the pockets and purses of pensioners when they were in office.
  We are proud that it is a Labour Government who have brought forward measures to restore security and public confidence in pensions. We are doing that through our proposals in the Pensions Bill, to which Conservative Members declined to give a Second Reading, as we will continue to remind them, which sets up a pension protection fund giving protection to more than 10 million members of defined benefit schemes to ensure that the tragedy faced by thousands of people left with neither a job nor a pension should never happen again. We are doing it through the £400 million that my right hon. Friend the Member for Oxford, East, when he was Secretary of State, secured for the financial assistance scheme to help many of those who have already lost out.
  So we are very happy to debate these issues on the basis of our own record and our plans for the future, which, despite the demographic challenges outlined by my hon. Friend in his opening remarks, provide a firm foundation for secure retirement in the future. We are also happy to debate them because of the record and

  777
  plans of the Opposition parties, both of which would have pensioners believe that they will spend an extra £16 billion on their plans, given the chance. The question has to be: who will pay for it and how?
  The Tories would abolish the state second pension, which gives 20 million people the chance to build up a decent second pension for the first time. Five million of them are low earners, 2.5 million are carers, most of them are women, and 2.5 million are disabled people with broken work records. The Conservatives, if they had their way, would let pension credit, in the phrase of the hon. Member for Eastbourne (Mr. Waterson), "wither on the vine"; or, in the words of the hon. Member for Havant (Mr. Willetts), "die a natural death". I will look forward to seeing them on the doorsteps in the weeks and months ahead telling that to the 3 million pensioners who are each receiving, on average, £42 in pension credit. Perhaps those hon. Gentlemen would like to come with me to Kent to tell the pensioner in her 90s who was recently visited by the Pension Service to be told that she was entitled to £66.92 a week in pension credit, with a back payment of £2,678, that she will get no help at all from their plans for basic state pensions. If they would like to come with me, I will give them a lift.
  Around half of those entitled to pension credit are single women and more than a quarter are women aged over 80. Those are the people who would pay the price for Tory pension plans.
  We have heard certain right hon. and hon. Members allege that pension credit discourages people from making proper provision towards their pensions. I have to tell the House that the reality is quite the opposite. The purpose of the pension credit is to encourage people to make some provision for themselves. Indeed, the Financial Services Authority concludes:
  "The Pension Credit will mean that for most people, most of the time, it will pay to have saved".
  That is the very basis of our policy.
  I have said who will lose from the Opposition's plan to uprate basic state pensions in line with earnings.
  Now there's an idea, but I wonder who scrapped the earnings link in the first place. Who called such a policy "wild and uncosted"? Who called it, "not well targeted" and "not affordable"? Who said in January:
  "Breaking the earnings link in 1980 played a crucial role in this picture of British success … a triumphant success"?
  We all know that it was the hon. Member for Havant, who tries to persuade us and pensioners that he is a reformed character. He is going through a form of restorative justice, telling pensioners how sorry he is to have cut their pensions in the past. He is a reformed character, and so, apparently, is his current leader, who was in government throughout the period when pensioners' incomes were decimated.
  We are not daft and neither are millions of Britain's pensioners, many of whom are here today to lobby the House. The hon. Member for Eastbourne, who is sitting next to the hon. Member for Havant, let the cat out of
  778
  the bag when, in the presence of my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary with responsibilities for the disabled, he told the National Pensioners Convention:
  "I'm here for your votes".
  Nice try, but I am sure that members of the convention will see through such opportunism, as we do.
  The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Maria Eagle): They booed him.
  Mr. Pond: I fear that the hon. Gentleman was booed. The Opposition will be judged on their record, not the flannel that they produced today.
  I have respect for many of those who argue for reintroducing the earnings link, including many who lobbied the House today, but not the opportunists on the Opposition Benches. However, it would take 14 years for a basic pension that was uprated by earnings to reach the guaranteed level of pension credit. In that time, the poorest pensioners would gain nothing. Many of them do not have that time to spare. The earnings link is promised only for the first Parliament—perhaps four or five years—of a Tory Government.
  The Liberal Democrats also want to spend £16 billion on what they call a citizens pension. It would mean an extra £100 a month for those over 75, no questions asked. How will they pay for it? They intend to scrap the Department of Trade and Industry: out goes investment in world-class science and technology; out goes the £2 billion that the Government are investing in the post office network, and out goes the Department that administers the national minimum wage and protects the rights of working people and consumers. Of course, those plans, too, would do nothing for the poorest pensioners.
  Those are the plans of the Opposition for state pensions. They are opportunist, half-baked and barely half-believable. What are their plans for private and occupational pensions? Silence. They have none. They had nothing to offer today and they have nothing to offer for building security in the long term.
  Pensions are of vital concern to all our constituents, of all ages, and the debate has highlighted again the challenges that we face. Those challenges—the changing landscape of occupational pension provision, stock market pressures, and the demographics of increasing longevity—are very real. They have to be taken seriously and we must have the long-term plans to deal with them. We are prepared to have the courage to take on those difficult challenges: to rebuild confidence and security in occupational and private pensions; to ensure that we do not use the threat of poverty in retirement as the only incentive—as offered by Opposition parties—to save. We want to give people genuine incentives to save.
  Sir John Butterfill: Will the Under-Secretary give way?
  Mr. Pond: I cannot give way because I am short on time.

  779
  Conservative Members came to the House today with no substantive plans to provide security such as that which the pension protection fund and other provisions in the Pensions Bill offer. They declined to give that measure a Second Reading. Today, they argued against our proposals but offered nothing in their place. The House will see through the Opposition's cynical opportunism and so will pensioners.
  Question put, That the original words stand part of the Question:—
  The House divided: Ayes 191, Noes 310.

  Division No. 238]

  [3:59 pm

  AYES

  Ainsworth, Peter (E Surrey)

  Fallon, Michael

  Allan, Richard

  Field, Mark (Cities of London &

  Amess, David

  Westminster)

  Ancram, rh Michael

  Flight, Howard

  Arbuthnot, rh James

  Flook, Adrian

  Atkinson, David (Bour'mth E)

  Foster, Don (Bath)

  Bacon, Richard

  Francois, Mark

  Baker, Norman

  Gale, Roger (N Thanet)

  Baldry, Tony

  George, Andrew (St. Ives)

  Baron, John (Billericay)

  Gibb, Nick (Bognor Regis)

  Barrett, John

  Gidley, Sandra

  Boswell, Tim

  Gill, Parmjit Singh

  Bottomley, Peter (Worthing W)

  Goodman, Paul

  Bottomley, rh Virginia (SW

  Gray, James (N Wilts)

  Surrey)

  Grayling, Chris

  Brady, Graham

  Green, Damian (Ashford)

  Brake, Tom (Carshalton)

  Green, Matthew (Ludlow)

  Brazier, Julian

  Greenway, John

  Breed, Colin

  Grieve, Dominic

  Brooke, Mrs Annette L.

  Hague, rh William

  Browning, Mrs Angela

  Hammond, Philip

  Burns, Simon

  Hancock, Mike

  Burstow, Paul

  Hawkins, Nick

  Burt, Alistair

  Hayes, John (S Holland)

  Butterfill, Sir John

  Heald, Oliver

  Cable, Dr. Vincent

  Heath, David

  Calton, Mrs Patsy

  Heathcoat-Amory, rh David

  Cameron, David

  Hendry Charles

  Campbell, Gregory (E Lond'y)

  Hermon, Lady

  Campbell, rh Sir Menzies (NE

  Hoban, Mark (Fareham)

  Fife)

  Hogg, rh Douglas

  Carmichael, Alistair

  Holmes, Paul

  Cash, William

  Horam, John (Orpington)

  Chope, Christopher

  Howarth, Gerald (Aldershot)

  Clappison, James

  Jack, rh Michael

  Clarke, rh Kenneth (Rushcliffe)

  Jackson, Robert (Wantage)

  Clifton-Brown, Geoffrey

  Jenkin, Bernard

  Collins, Tim

  Jones, Nigel (Cheltenham)

  Conway, Derek

  Keetch, Paul

  Cormack, Sir Patrick

  Kennedy, rh Charles (Ross Skye &

  Cotter, Brian

  Inverness

  Cran, James (Beverley)

  Key, Robert (Salisbury)

  Curry, rh David

  Kirkwood, Sir Archy

  Davey, Edward (Kingston)

  Knight, rh Greg (E Yorkshire)

  Davies, Quentin (Grantham &

  Laing, Mrs Eleanor

  Stamford)

  Lamb, Norman

  Davis, rh David (Haltemprice &

  Lansley. Andrew

  Howden)

  Laws, David (Yeovil)

  Djanogly, Jonathan

  Leigh, Edward

  Donaldson, Jeffrey M.

  Letwin, rh Oliver

  Dorrell, rh Stephen

  Lewis, Dr. Julian (New Forest E)

  Doughty, Sue

  Liddell-Grainger, Ian

  Duncan, Alan (Rutland)

  Lidington, David

  Duncan, Peter (Galloway)

  Lilley, rh Peter

  Ewing, Annabelle

  Llwyd, Elfyn

  Fabricant, Michael

  Loughton, Tim

  780

  Luff, Peter (M-Worcs)

  Smyth, Rev. Martin (Belfast S)

  McIntosh, Miss Anne

  Soames, Nicholas

  Mackay, rh Andrew

  Spelman, Mrs Caroline

  McLoughlin, Patrick

  Spicer, Sir Michael

  Malins, Humfrey

  Spink, Bob (Castle Point)

  Maples, John

  Spring, Richard

  Mates, Michael

  Steen, Anthony

  Mawhinney, rh Sir Brian

  Streeter, Gary

  May, Mrs Theresa

  Stunell, Andrew

  Mercer, Patrick

  Swayne, Desmond

  Mitchell, Andrew (Sutton

  Syms, Robert

  Coldfield)

  Tapsell, Sir Peter

  Moore, Michael

  Taylor, Ian (Esher)

  Murrison, Dr. Andrew

  Taylor, John (Solihull)

  Norman, Archie

  Taylor, Sir Teddy

  Oaten, Mark (Winchester)

  Teather, Sarah

  O'Brien, Stephen (Eddisbury)

  Thomas, Simon (Ceredigion)

  Öpik, Lembit

  Thurso, John

  Osborne, George (Tatton)

  Tonge, Dr. Jenny

  Ottaway, Richard

  Trend, Michael

  Paice, James

  Trimble, rh David

  Paterson, Owen

  Turner, Andrew (Isle of Wight)

  Pickles, Eric

  Tyler, Paul (N Cornwall)

  Price, Adam (E Carmarthen &

  Tyrie, Andrew

  Dinefwr)

  Walter, Robert

  Prisk, Mark (Hertford)

  Waterson, Nigel

  Pugh, Dr. John

  Watkinson, Angela

  Randall, John

  Webb, Steve (Northavon)

  Redwood, rh John

  Weir, Michael

  Reid, Alan (Argyll & Bute)

  Whittingdale, John

  Rendel, David

  Wiggin, Bill

  Robathan, Andrew

  Wilkinson, John

  Robertson, Angus (Moray)

  Willetts, David

  Robertson, Hugh (Faversham &

  Williams, Hywel (Caernarfon)

  M-Kent)

  Willis, Phil

  Robertson, Laurence (Tewk'b'ry)

  Wilshire, David

  Robinson, Mrs Iris (Strangford)

  Winterton, Ann (Congleton)

  Ruffley, David

  Winterton, Sir Nicholas

  Russell, Bob (Colchester)

  (Macclesfield)

  Sanders, Adrian

  Wishart, Pete

  Selous, Andrew

  Yeo, Tim (S Suffolk)

  Shephard, rh Mrs Gillian

  Young, rh Sir George

  Shepherd, Richard

  Younger-Ross, Richard

  Simmonds, Mark

  Simpson, Keith (M-Norfolk)

  Tellers for the Ayes:

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

  Mr. Peter Atkinson and

  Kincardine)

  Gregory Barker

  NOES

  Adams, Irene (Paisley N)

  Blears, Ms Hazel

  Ainger, Nick

  Blizzard, Bob

  Ainsworth, Bob (Cov'try NE)

  Boateng, rh Paul

  Alexander, Douglas

  Borrow, David

  Allen, Graham

  Bradley, rh Keith (Withington)

  Anderson, Janet (Rossendale &

  Bradley, Peter (The Wrekin)

  Darwen)

  Bradshaw, Ben

  Atherton, Ms Candy

  Brown, rh Nicholas (Newcastle E

  Atkins, Charlotte

  Wallsend)

  Austin, John

  Brown, Russell (Dumfries)

  Bailey, Adrian

  Browne, Desmond

  Baird, Vera

  Buck, Ms Karen

  Banks, Tony

  Burden, Richard

  Barnes, Harry

  Byrne, Liam (B'ham Hodge H)

  Barron, rh Kevin

  Cairns, David

  Battle, John

  Campbell, Alan (Tynemouth)

  Bayley, Hugh

  Campbell, Mrs Anne (C'bridge)

  Beard, Nigel

  Campbell, Ronnie (Blyth V)

  Beckett, rh Margaret

  Caplin, Ivor

  Begg, Miss Anne

  Casale, Roger

  Bell, Sir Stuart

  Caton, Martin

  Bennett, Andrew

  Cawsey, Ian (Brigg)

  Benton, Joe (Bootle)

  Challen, Colin

  Berry, Roger

  Chapman, Ben (Wirral S)

  Best, Harold

  Chaytor, David

  Betts, Clive

  Clapham, Michael

  Blackman, Liz

  Clark, Mrs Helen (Peterborough)

  781

  Clark, Dr. Lynda (Edinburgh

  Hendrick, Mark

  Pentlands)

  Heppell, John

  Clark, Paul (Gillingham)

  Hesford, Stephen

  Clarke, rh Tom (Coatbridge &

  Hewitt, rh Ms Patricia

  Chryston)

  Heyes, David

  Clarke, Tony (Northampton S)

  Hodge, Margaret

  Clelland, David

  Hoon, rh Geoffrey

  Clwyd, Ann (Cynon V)

  Hope, Phil (Corby)

  Coffey, Ms Ann

  Hopkins, Kelvin

  Cohen, Harry

  Howarth, rh Alan (Newport E)

  Colman, Tony

  Howarth, George (Knowsley N &

  Cook, Frank (Stockton N)

  Sefton E)

  Cook, rh Robin (Livingston)

  Howells, Dr. Kim

  Corbyn, Jeremy

  Hughes, Beverley (Stretford &

  Corston, Jean

  Urmston)

  Cousins, Jim

  Humble, Mrs Joan

  Crausby, David

  Hurst, Alan (Braintree)

  Cruddas, Jon

  Hutton, rh John

  Cryer, John (Hornchurch)

  Iddon, Dr. Brian

  Cummings, John

  Ingram, rh Adam

  Cunningham, Jim (Coventry S)

  Jackson, Glenda (Hampstead &

  Cunningham, Tony (Workington)

  Highgate)

  Curtis-Thomas, Mrs Claire

  Jackson, Helen (Hillsborough)

  Dalyell, Tam

  Jamieson, David

  Davey, Valerie (Bristol W)

  Jenkins, Brian

  David, Wayne

  Johnson, Miss Melanie (Welwyn

  Davidson, Ian

  Hatfield)

  Davies, rh Denzil (Llanelli)

  Jones, Helen (Warrington N)

  Davies, Geraint (Croydon C)

  Jones, Jon Owen (Cardiff C)

  Dawson, Hilton

  Jones, Lynne (Selly Oak)

  Dean, Mrs Janet

  Jowell, rh Tessa

  Denham, rh John

  Joyce, Eric (Falkirk W)

  Dhanda, Parmjit

  Kaufman, rh Sir Gerald

  Dismore, Andrew

  Keeble, Ms Sally

  Dobbin, Jim (Heywood)

  Keen, Alan (Feltham)

  Dobson, rh Frank

  Keen, Ann (Brentford)

  Donohoe, Brian H.

  Kelly, Ruth (Bolton W)

  Doran, Frank

  Kennedy, Jane (Wavertree)

  Dowd, Jim (Lewisham W)

  Khabra, Piara S.

  Drew, David (Stroud)

  Kidney, David

  Drown, Ms Julia

  Kilfoyle, Peter

  Eagle, Angela (Wallasey)

  King, Ms Oona (Bethnal Green &

  Eagle, Maria (L'pool Garston)

  Bow)

  Edwards, Huw

  Knight, Jim (S Dorset)

  Efford, Clive

  Ladyman, Dr. Stephen

  Ellman, Mrs Louise

  Lammy, David

  Ennis, Jeff (Barnsley E)

  Laxton, Bob (Derby N)

  Farrelly, Paul

  Lazarowicz, Mark

  Field, rh Frank (Birkenhead)

  Lepper, David

  Fisher, Mark

  Leslie, Christopher

  Fitzsimons, Mrs Lorna

  Levitt, Tom (High Peak)

  Flint, Caroline

  Lewis, Ivan (Bury S)

  Follett, Barbara

  Lewis, Terry (Worsley)

  Foster, rh Derek

  Linton, Martin

  Foster, Michael (Worcester)

  Lloyd, Tony (Manchester C)

  Foster, Michael Jabez (Hastings

  Love, Andrew

  & Rye)

  Lucas, Ian (Wrexham)

  Foulkes, rh George

  Luke, Iain (Dundee E)

  Francis, Dr. Hywel

  McAvoy, Thomas

  Gapes, Mike (Ilford S)

  McCabe, Stephen

  George, rh Bruce (Walsall S)

  McDonagh, Siobhain

  Gerrard, Neil

  McDonnell, John

  Gibson, Dr. Ian

  McFall, rh John

  Gilroy, Linda

  McGrady, Eddie

  Godsiff, Roger

  McIsaac, Shona

  Goggins, Paul

  McKechin, Ann

  Griffiths, Jane (Reading E)

  Mckenna, Rosemary

  Griffiths, Win (Bridgend)

  McNamara, Kevin

  Grogan, John

  McNulty, Tony

  Hain, rh Peter

  MacShane, Denis

  Hall, Mike (Weaver Vale)

  Mactaggart, Fiona

  Hall, Patrick (Bedford)

  McWalter, Tony

  Hanson, David

  McWilliam, John

  Harman, rh Ms Harriet

  Mahmood, Khalid

  Harris, Tom (Glasgow Cathcart)

  Mahon, Mrs Alice

  Healey, John

  Mallaber, Judy

  782

  Mann, John (Bassetlaw)

  Shaw, Jonathan

  Marsden, Gordon (Blackpool S)

  Sheerman, Barry

  Martlew, Eric

  Sheridan, Jim

  Meacher, rh Michael

  Shipley, Ms Debra

  Merron, Gillian

  Short, rh Clare

  Michael, rh Alun

  Simpson, Alan (Nottingham S)

  Milburn, rh Alan

  Singh, Marsha

  Miliband, David

  Skinner, Dennis

  Miller, Andrew

  Smith, Angela (Basildon)

  Mitchell, Austin (Gt Grimsby)

  Smith, rh Chris (Islington S &

  Moffatt, Laura

  Finsbury)

  Moran, Margaret

  Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)

  Morgan, Julie

  Southworth, Helen

  Morley, Elliot

  Spellar, rh John

  Mountford, Kali

  Squire, Rachel

  Mudie, George

  Starkey, Dr. Phyllis

  Mullin, Chris

  Steinberg, Gerry

  Munn, Ms Meg

  Stewart, David (Inverness E &

  Murphy, rh Paul (Torfaen)

  Lochaber)

  Naysmith, Dr. Doug

  Stewart, Ian (Eccles)

  Norris, Dan (Wansdyke)

  Stinchcombe, Paul

  O'Brien, Bill (Normanton)

  Stoate, Dr. Howard

  O'Brien, Mike (N Warks)

  Strang, rh Dr. Gavin

  O'Neill, Martin

  Stringer, Graham

  Osborne, Sandra (Ayr)

  Sutcliffe, Gerry

  Perham, Linda

  Tami, Mark (Alyn)

  Picking, Anne

  Taylor, David (NW Leics)

  Pickthall, Colin

  Taylor, Dr. Richard (Wyre F)

  Pike, Peter (Burnley)

  Thomas, Gareth (Clwyd W)

  Plaskitt, James

  Thomas, Gareth (Harrow W)

  Pollard, Kerry

  Tipping, Paddy

  Pond, Chris (Gravesham)

  Todd, Mark (S Derbyshire)

  Pope, Greg (Hyndburn)

  Touhig, Don (Islwyn)

  Pound, Stephen

  Trickett, Jon

  Prentice, Ms Bridget (Lewisham

  Truswell, Paul

  E)

  Turner, Dennis (Wolverh'ton SE)

  Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)

  Turner, Dr. Desmond (Brighton

  Prescott, rh John

  Kemptown)

  Primarolo, rh Dawn

  Twigg, Derek (Halton)

  Prosser, Gwyn

  Twigg, Stephen (Enfield)

  Purchase, Ken

  Tynan, Bil (Hamilton S)

  Quin, rh Joyce

  Vis, Dr. Rudi

  Quinn, Lawrie

  Walley, Ms Joan

  Rammell, Bill

  Ward, Claire

  Rapson, Syd (Portsmouth N)

  Wareing, Robert N.

  Reed, Andy (Loughborough)

  Watson, Tom (W Bromwich E)

  Reid, rh Dr. John (Hamilton N &

  White, Brian

  Bellshill)

  Wicks, Malcolm

  Robinson, Geoffrey (Coventry

  Williams, Betty (Conwy)

  NW)

  Wills, Michael

  Roche, Mrs Barbara

  Winnick, David

  Rooney, Terry

  Winterton, Ms Rosie (Doncaster

  Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)

  C)

  Roy, Frank (Motherwell)

  Wood, Mike (Batley)

  Ruane, Chris

  Woolas, Phil

  Ruddock, Joan

  Worthington, Tony

  Russell, Ms Christine (City of

  Wright, David (Telford)

  Chester)

  Wright, Tony (Cannock)

  Salter, Martin

  Wyatt, Derek

  Sarwar, Mohammad

  Savidge, Malcolm

  Tellers for the Noes:

  Sawford, Phil

  Jim Fitzpatrick and

  Sedgemore, Brian

  Joan Ryan

  Question accordingly negatived.
  Question, That the proposed words be there added, put forthwith, pursuant to Standing Order No. 31 (Questions on amendments), and agreed to.
  MR DEPUTY SPEAKER forthwith declared the main Question, as amended, to be agreed to.
  Resolved,
  That this House supports the Government's strategy to enable people to save securely for their retirement and to promote retirement flexibility and informed choice; welcomes the Government's Pensions Bill and Pension Protection Fund, which

  783
  will bring real security for over 10 million defined benefit pension scheme members if their employer becomes insolvent and their pension scheme winds up; further welcomes the £400 million Financial Assistance Scheme which will help people who have already lost out; believes that the Pensions Bill will enable many more people to save with confidence with a new proactive pensions regulator, measures to simplify pensions legislation and improved incentives to work past the state pension age; supports the pensions tax simplification proposals being taken forward in the Finance Act 2004, which will replace eight tax regimes with one simplified system; commends proposals in the Pensions Bill to allow individuals to defer their state pension and draw it as a lump sum; welcomes measures to enable people to make an informed choice in pension provision, including new pilots to provide information and advice in the workplace; condemns the inheritance of 1997, with the legacy of pension mis-selling and millions in poverty, whereby many were expected by the previous Government to live on under £69 a week; believes that the Opposition parties' policies will be unfair to the poorest pensioners, unaffordable and unsustainable; commends the Government's historic commitment to tackling pensioner poverty; and welcomes the extra £10 billion that the Government is spending on pensioners in 2004–05 compared with the 1997 system.

  Hospital-Acquired Infection
  Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Alan Haselhurst): I remind the House that Mr. Speaker has placed a 10-minute limit on Back-Bench speeches in this debate and has selected the amendment in the name of the Prime Minister.
  4.16 pm
  Mr. Andrew Lansley: I beg to move,
  That this House notes with deep concern the increased levels of hospital-acquired infection and, in particular, that the incidence of methicillin resistant staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) has doubled since 1997; welcomes the report by the National Audit Office 'Improving Patient Care by Reducing the Risk of Hospital-Acquired Infection: a Progress Report' (HC 876); regrets the lack of timely action by the Government which this discloses, including higher bed occupancies and the resultant impact of Government waiting list targets on infection control measures, lack of surveillance data other than hospital-wide MRSA and post-discharge surveillance and isolation facilities, and lack of progress on a national infection control manual; is deeply concerned that recommendations for bed or ward closures by infection control teams have been refused; and calls on the Government now to act urgently to secure the action needed to reduce hospital-acquired infections.
  A week ago, the Health Minister, Lord Warner, announced what he described as the first national campaign to promote hand cleaning by health care staff. Well, 150 years on from Florence Nightingale's work in the Crimea, I think that we can fairly say that it was not the first such campaign—but what did it tell us about the Government's response to the crisis of hospital-acquired infection? Four and a half years ago, in its 42nd report in the 1999–2000 Session, the Public Accounts Committee made the following recommendation:
  "Hospital hygiene is crucial in preventing hospital-acquired infection including basic practice such as handwashing. We find it inexcusable that compliance with guidance on handwashing is so poor… We… look to"
  the NHS executive
  "to audit progress and report back to us by the end of 2001."
  Four and a half years later, the Department of Health announces a campaign. Only now is it showing, in this limited respect, the urgency and determination to achieve cleanliness and hygiene in our hospitals that have been urged on it not only by the PAC but by others.
  We do not know the extent of hospital-acquired infection and the costs that it imposes. That, too, the PAC asked for four and a half years ago—it was asked for but not achieved. What we do know is the human cost: several thousand lives needlessly lost and patients suffering weeks, even months, with their wounds failing to heal. Every Member of Parliament will know from constituents of the pain and distress that these infections cause. That is why we all want and expect the risk of hospital-acquired infection to be combated with all the energy and urgency that we can command, and why we in the Opposition brought the matter to the attention of the House immediately on its return.
  The National Audit Office report, four and a half years on, lays bare the failure to act or to achieve the progress called for by the PAC and, frankly, by so many others. In June 2000, my hon. Friend the Member for Woodspring (Dr. Fox) made exactly the same points here in the House.

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  I hope that we do not have a debate in which Opposition Members all say that the glass if half-empty and Government Members all say that the glass is half-full. The issue is too important for that and my contention is not that nothing has been done. NHS staff across the country are becoming more aware of the need for comprehensive infection-control measures. I and other hon. Members know that exemplary work is being done in many parts of the NHS so that patients see clean wards and can be confident of not contracting infections.
  Equally, however, some places are not clean and infections are endemic, sometimes even in high-risk areas. What is deeply disturbing and lies at the heart of the debate is the fact that, far from doing everything that they could to deliver safe care to patients, the Government have not done so. Worse, they have pursued their obsession with central targets, which have frustrated the achievement of effective infection-control procedures. The purpose of the Opposition motion and today's debate is to require of the Government the urgency of action demanded more than four years ago, but which has been so sadly lacking.
  The evidence is depressingly clear. In 2000, the Public Accounts Committee said that the NHS did not have a grip on the extent and costs of infection. It recommended that the nosocomial infection national surveillance scheme be developed and made mandatory. Ministers chose not to do so, as the National Audit Office report of July describes it. It says:
  "Instead of developing mandatory specialty specific surveillance of bloodstream, surgical site and urinary tract infections whose information would be fed back to clinicians to improve practice, the Department focussed on trust-wide surveillance of MRSA bacteraemias and other specific organisms, together with plans for mandatory reporting of orthopaedic surgical site infection."
  That is methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus in the bloodstream, rather than MRSA where surgical site infections are concerned. It continues:
  "This is a critical issue. Leadership and clinical responsibility is at the heart of infection control measures. Data which is not specialty specific is not leading to clinicians taking their responsibility for reducing infection, nor is it equipping patients with the key information about the incidence of infection in the wards to which they may be admitted for operations, especially if they are high-risk areas."
  Mr. Andrew Miller: I have taken a close personal interest in the issue that the hon. Gentleman raises, and I would counsel him to be very careful about the way in which he uses statistics in this matter. For example, a small specialty unit might have only a few patients, but they may all have come in from dozens of surrounding general hospitals. Such units are almost certain to be statistically high up in the league tables. It is a distortion of the efforts made to manage controls. I urge the hon. Gentleman to be extremely careful with the data.
  Mr. Lansley: I was not planning to elaborate on that, but the hon. Gentleman makes an extremely good point. The Public Accounts Committee report—I did not originate the proposal—in a sense suggests being much more careful with the data. Let me explain to the hon. Gentleman what is happening at the moment. The currently published MRSA rates measure incidence
  786
  rather than prevalence, so they do not tell us the likelihood of arriving at a hospital without infection and acquiring it while within that hospital or particular clinical department. We are told only about the total incidence of hospital-acquired infection—or, more particularly, MRSA bloodstream infections in the hospital.
  I know how important that is, because Addenbrooke's hospital in my constituency had the second-highest incidence of MRSA. A significant part of the problem was the extent to which the hospital was admitting patients from other clinical contexts, in which MRSA had been detected. The House will be aware of many instances in which hospitals have said that their data were influenced by the extent to which there is MRSA in nursing homes, and by the number of patients from those homes being admitted to hospital.
  I do not dispute that it is important to get statistics absolutely clear. We are raising this subject now in part because clinicians want the available data to be much more specialty specific and related to clinical departments. In that way, the data will not be obscured by information that is hospital-wide. Clinicians will then be able to act on the information that is under their control and to be judged accordingly by general practitioners and patients. That is an example of how patient choice will play a role.
  The Secretary of State for Health (Dr. John Reid): The hon. Gentleman speaks about the need for both testing and data to be specific and reliable. Does he understand, therefore, why we have chosen to test for MRSA infection in the bloodstream, but not in open wounds or in respiratory or urinary tracts? It is because, for good scientific reasons, the reliability of the data varies in each case. The incidence of MRSA infection in urinary or respiratory tracts is very low. We are not being negligent, but we are exercising judgment. The hon. Gentleman can query our judgment, or qualify it, but I assure him that we are not being lazy in this matter—there is no question but that we want to cover every eventuality. Our approach is based on the reliability of the scientific data that can be derived from the various forms of infection.
  Mr. Lansley: I am making the same point that was made by the National Audit Office. If the Government have specific reasons for departing from the recommendations made by the NAO and the Public Accounts Committee—that the mechanism in the nosocomial infection national surveillance service be continued—they have failed to make them clear. I accept the point made by the Secretary of State about MRSA infection of urinary and respiratory tracts, but it is possible, relevant, practical and desirable to undertake NINNS surveillance in respect of surgical site infections, and of some specialties.
  Indeed, the Government are proposing to undertake such surveillance in respect of orthopaedics in 2005. If that surveillance is relevant for orthopaedics, why is it not relevant for a range of surgical-site infections that have been part of the NINNS scheme?
  Dr. Reid: I did not say that such surveillance was irrelevant; I said that it was not as reliable. The hon. Gentleman is right to say that we are extending the

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  surveillance beyond the bloodstream tests, but my point was merely that when we started the surveillance, we chose a limited application because the data gathered in that way were more reliable. I do not need to point out to him that no data were collected over the entire 18 years of the previous Conservative Government. We have responded to the problem, but we have done so first in those areas where the data are more reliable so that we could get a picture as soon as possible. We are now about to extend the surveillance.
  I am interventing in the hon. Gentleman's speech because no party political points are involved. I am not trying to score points, and I know that he is not trying to do so either. My aim is merely to explain the scientific basis of the advice on which I am operating.
  Mr. Lansley: In the same spirit, the Secretary of State will accept that if some of what is considered to be good practice—for example, the screening of patients before admission to hospital for elective surgery, and post-discharge surveillance—were to be carried out in full, it is possible that the problem of the reliability of data could be dealt with. However, the point is to generate data on which people will act. In some circumstances, the best could be the enemy of the good. I put it to the Government that at the moment they are pursuing the best, rather than what is good.
  Clinical teams need to take responsibility for the matter. Indeed, the Government's amendment states that
  "mandatory MRSA surveillance raised the profile of infection control with senior managers".
  It did, but as the NAO said:
  "The main concerns of mandatory MRSA surveillance were that the denominator data was inappropriate as it was collected across the whole hospital, and as a result, clinical staff did not relate to it, and trust management considered it to be a problem for the infection control team rather than clinicians."
  The Secretary of State will recall that elsewhere the NAO found too often a tendency for people across the NHS to see the responsibility as one for the infection control team, or somebody else, rather than theirs. Taking responsibility and giving leadership is central to what we are trying to achieve.
  The Government amendment also talks of the advantage of imposing another Government target. As we know, targets set are not necessarily targets met. Even targets apparently met often have unfortunate consequences elsewhere. Nowhere is that more true than in the effect of Government waiting list targets on infection control. The NAO reported that 50 per cent. of trust senior management had difficulty in reconciling targets for in-patient waiting lists with the requirements for infection control. Ministers may say that by its nature that is difficult and that the job of management is to do difficult things. However, in response to the 2000 report, Ministers also said that by 2003–04 bed occupancy could be reduced to 82 per cent., yet the NAO found that 71 per cent. of trusts were operating at higher bed occupancy rates than that, averaging 89 per cent. and 91 per cent. for orthopaedic and vascular surgery respectively.
  Where those objectives come into conflict, patient safety must come first, so it is nothing less than an outrage that the infection control teams reported to the
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  NAO that 12 per cent. of them had requested bed or ward closures but had been refused. The situation is worse than that. I asked a trust chief executive if he had refused such a request. He said:
  "They know our situation so they won't ask."
  Only a few days ago, a consultant told me of an exchange in an internal hospital meeting when the infection control consultant said that MRSA and Norwalk had persisted because the trust had overridden advice to shut wards due to the need to achieve waiting list targets. The chief executive had agreed to that.
  What is the Secretary of State's response? Last week, he was asked on the BBC "South East Today" programme whether by having fewer targets—as we propose—staff would be free to ensure cleaner wards—[Interruption.] Yes, fewer targets; getting rid of central targets imposed on hospitals, including the in-patient waiting list, which we are talking about, and its deleterious effects on the NHS. In response to that question, the Secretary of State said:
  "I take the advice of the chief medical officer on this".
  Where is that advice? Does the Secretary of State propose publishing it? Will he undertake to publish it today?
  I looked in "Winning Ways", which the chief medical officer published last December. Of course, the Secretary of State published his own document in July. Is not it interesting that the Secretary of State, when pressed on a difficult issue, says that he takes the chief medical officer's advice, yet where there is an opportunity for him to push himself forward and take the initiative, he publishes his own document rather than letting the chief medical officer do it?
  I have looked at the two documents. If everything the Secretary of State does is based on the CMO's advice, why was so much that the CMO said only last December left out of the Secretary of State's document in July? He left out any reference to reducing infection—[Interruption.] From a sedentary position, the Secretary of State says it was additional. In fact, the document was described as a summary of action, so almost by definition it was not intended to be additional; it was a summation of what was being done. There was no reference to reducing infection risks from invasive procedures. There was no advice on the prudent use of antibiotics and no reference to including infection control in the curricula for undergraduate and postgraduate health professionals. The Secretary of State's document made no reference to the role of infection control teams.
  One wonders what was the value of the Secretary of State's additional document in July, other than simply to offset the fact that the NAO was publishing its report, which was so deeply critical of all that had been done. The Secretary of State hides behind the chief medical officer when the criticism hits home, but he has his own public relations view pushed forward when he wants. I have not spoken to the chief medical officer about this issue.
  Mr. Miller: Ah.
  Mr. Lansley: The hon. Gentleman perhaps suggests that I should have spoken to the chief medical officer. Indeed, one of the first things that I did when I was

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  appointed to the health team was to write to the CMO asking to have a conversation with him about such matters. I was denied that opportunity. I was informed that as the CMO is a civil servant, he would expect me to discuss policy issues with Ministers, so I shall do so. I cannot therefore say what the CMO advised the Secretary of State, which is why I ask the Secretary of State.
  My personal view is that the CMO would say that if, after the necessary risk assessment, an infection control team recommended a ward closure, the requirements of in-patient waiting list targets should not override that recommendation. If the position is otherwise, the Secretary of State and other Ministers have required that that should be so. Their overriding intention to pursue their misplaced in-patient waiting list structure over the interests of patient safety has led to the current problem. Such things have not been done on the CMO's advice, yet the Secretary of State told the BBC that all this was happening because of that advice. Perhaps the Secretary of State would like to tell the House what advice there was and whether he will publish it.
  Dr. John Reid: I am sure that the hon. Gentleman is making a point, but I must admit that I am a bit lost about what it is. Advisers advise Ministers. The chief medical officer advises the Government. We act on that advice. Sometimes, on the basis of the information and advice that we receive, we publish documents or take action publicly, for which we are responsible. Sometimes, we directly publish documents by the chief medial officer. When advice is put into the public domain, people can read it. When advice is given to Ministers on policy issues, it is a long-standing convention of some centuries in the House that it is not published. The hon. Gentleman may not like that, but this is hardly a unique case. I am not quite sure what point he is making.
  Mr. Lansley: The point is simple, and I will not detain the House too long. If the Secretary of State does not take responsibility for his own decisions but attributes them to the advice of the chief medical officer, the advice ought therefore to be in the public domain. I have searched the advice that is in the public domain and there is nothing to suggest that any chief executive who overrides an infection control team's recommendation to close a ward would be acting other than against the interests of patient safety and contrary to the clinical situation.
  Dr. Reid rose—
  Mr. Lansley: The Secretary of State must let me continue; otherwise time will go on and we will intrude on the time for Back Benchers.
  Dr. Reid rose—
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman is not giving way.
  Mr. Lansley: I must remind the Secretary of State that the motion refers to many other ways in which failings in action have been laid bare by the NAO report. I will not be able to detail them all, but I want to ensure that the House is aware of them.
  790
  On isolation facilities, the NAO report said:
  "In our original report, we found that isolation facilities in some NHS trusts had been significantly reduced and that many infection control teams believed that facilities for isolating patients were unsatisfactory … The Committee of Public Accounts specified that increased investment in isolation facilities was required. In 2001, the Department assured the Committee that the need for isolation facilities was being addressed. However in 2003, we found that while 56 per cent. of trusts had undertaken a risk assessment to determine the number and quality of isolation facilities in the last three years, only a quarter had obtained the required facilities."
  Will the Secretary of State tell us what steps the Government will now take to meet that recommendation, which has not been met in the past four and a half years?
  I shall mention post-discharge surveillance. The NAO report said that, four and a half years ago,
  "we identified between 50 and 70 per cent. of surgical wound infections occurred post discharge but that only a quarter of infection control teams were carrying out any post-discharge surveillance and that there had been no systematic evaluation of the reliability of different methods.
  The Department told the Committee that they had commissioned some research and expected to have the results in late 2000. The Committee recommended that these infections should be monitored through NINSS … We found that only 21 per cent. of infection control teams had carried out any post-discharge surveillance since our last report."
  Will the Secretary of State tell us what he will now do to ensure that post-discharge surveillance of surgical wound infections is carried out?
  The NAO report also stated:
  "In 2001, the Department commissioned a feasibility study to consider producing a National Infection Control Manual. However there has been little progress on this to date. Responses to our survey and in our workshop showed there was strong agreement on the value to NHS staff of a national manual that could be adapted for local and specialty use. Given the strong evidence of wide local variability in the use of existing guidelines, and significant reinvention of the wheel, there is a need for templates to facilitate local adaptation of national guidelines."
  The Government keep on publishing new documents and providing endless guidance, but NHS staff are looking for templates and a manual to enable those guidelines to be put into practice. Where is the manual? The Government have had four and a half years to produce one, but where is it?
  In the December document "Winning Ways", the chief medical officer said that
  "A rapid review process will be established to assess new procedures and products for which claims of effectiveness are made of their ability to prevent or control healthcare-associated infection."
  In a debate in July, my right hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin and Harpenden (Mr. Lilley) made specific reference to several new products and processes that have been offered to the NHS. He is not able to vouch for their effectiveness—nor am I—but that is why a rapid review process should be established. Ebiox is a non-alcohol cleansing product. NewGenn—which is close to Cambridge, so I have met the company staff and used their products—also makes non-alcohol hand cleansing products, which have been used in several NHS pilots. New synthetic antibacterial agents have been developed for the treatment of MRSA. Companies have produced targeted antibiotics and even coatings for walls and doors that—[Interruption.] The Secretary

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  of State appears to want to make two speeches, one of them from a sedentary position. I do not know whether those products will work, but many people want to know when the rapid review process will start, because there are means by which the NHS could more effectively combat infection that are not being adopted.
  Mr. Eric Pickles: I have a company in my constituency that makes a hand-washing machine that would facilitate infection control. Does my hon. Friend agree that part of the problem is that the commissioning process and the bureaucracy of the health service militates against decision making? The way in which the NHS operates has a dampening effect on innovation.
  Mr. Lansley: The NHS has historically been poor at introducing new products and processes. Sometimes that is to its advantage, because in America large amounts of money can be spent on new products and processes that are not necessarily effective or cost-effective. However, when we have a problem that is getting worse and that we have to tackle, the NHS should be able to assess the cost-effectiveness of attempts to do so. After all, we have the National Institute for Clinical Excellence, which leads the world in techniques for measuring clinical effectiveness and cost-effectiveness. The monopolistic nature of the NHS should not be a constraint on the adoption of innovative techniques. Indeed, it should be a means of disseminating such techniques more rapidly, but that is not happening in the area of infection control technology.
  I shall not go on because hon. Members on both sides of the House want to speak. Our motion is measured and accurate. It requires the Government to act urgently in the future because that was lacking in the past. In the circumstances, we are right to call for that. The information that clinical teams need and for which they will take responsibility must be provided. The power given to ward-based teams—ward sisters, matrons or whatever they are called—is not the issue; what is important is that they have effective control over hygiene, cleanliness and the environment for their patients. They must be able to act in line with contractual procedures that equip them to do so.
  We need patient choice to incentivise hospitals to meet patients clear and increasing demands for clean and safe hospitals. That is more effective than the targets that the Secretary of State talks about. We need to get rid of the targets and the constraints that prevent hospitals and NHS professionals from meeting the requirements of patient safety, which they so much want to do. We need the Health Protection Agency to pull a range of organisations and sources of guidance together to ensure that infection control measures are disseminated within the NHS rapidly. We need a rapid review process for new technologies and processes.
  My experience in different parts of the country over the summer showed me that patients are deeply concerned. As chance would have it, only yesterday a lady told me of the three months that she spent in hospital as a consequence of MRSA infection and the distress and pain that it caused her. Many other patients
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  are deeply distressed about the prospect of going into hospitals that they believe—rightly or wrongly— will put them at risk of acquiring an infection.
  Doctors and nurses across the country tell me that they know how to deliver infection-free environments and that they have experience of doing that. They know that they can do it if they are given the support and the freedom to deliver the requirements of patient safety without being contradicted by Government targets and bureaucracy. That is what is urgently required now, not after the general election. It is what we have called for and why we have tabled the motion. I urge hon. Members to support our motion and resist the Government's amendment, which contains no sense of the urgency for which we have called. I hope that hon. Members give the Government the same message that constituents and the public have given us over the summer—that this is an urgent requirement which needs to be reflected in Government action now.
  4.47 pm
  The Secretary of State for Health (Dr. John Reid): I beg to move, To leave out from "House" to the end of the Question, and to add instead thereof:
  "welcomes the Government's commitment to ensure that patients can have confidence that National Health Service hospitals are clean, safe environments with infection firmly under control; congratulates the Government on its action plans for reducing infection rates, 'Winning Ways' and 'Towards cleaner hospitals and lower rates of infection', which include the new target for a year-on-year reduction in MRSA, and the designation of directors of infection prevention and control to bring about local change; notes that the National Audit Office report concluded that the introduction in 2001 of mandatory MRSA surveillance raised the profile of infection control with senior managers; expects that the new target will act in a similar way, and deplores therefore the suggestion that the target be abolished; acknowledges that improving patient safety is a difficult medical issue that calls for the hard work and care that is the hallmark of NHS staff; welcomes therefore the 77,500 extra nurses and almost 19,400 extra doctors that have become a part of patient care since 1997; and therefore congratulates the Government on a comprehensive programme of investment and reform that has equipped the NHS to deliver improvements in patient safety, and to reduce hospital-acquired infections."
  Although we use these words often, I welcome the opportunity to discuss the subject and the Government's approach to reducing health care-acquired infections. The hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire (Mr. Lansley) gave a reasonably balanced speech, although at its centre was a mistake also made by the Leader of the Opposition, which is to imply, if not to state specifically, that hospital-acquired infections, especially MRSA, are the result of party political decisions of the Labour Government.
  It is important to get the matter in perspective. We should acknowledge the problem, but it has existed for many years—indeed decades. The Leader of the Opposition was ill advised to introduce party politics on a matter such as MRSA. The problem has existed under both parties in government. It has not just arisen overnight; it has been there for decades. I use those words advisedly—I notice that there is some opposition to them—because they are not mine; they are the words of the Conservative Health Minister, the hon. Member for Orpington (Mr. Horam), in Hansard on 19 March 1997, after 18 years of a Conservative Government. I have substituted "MRSA" for "E. coli" and "the Leader

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  of the Opposition" for "the hon. Member for Thurrock", who was advising the Government not to make the issue party political. People will notice that what was, in a set of objective circumstances, giving rise to a decades-long problem in the dying months of a Conservative Government, has suddenly become a new issue as a result of the Labour Government some seven years later.
  It is far too serious to treat the problem as a party political one, or to undermine it by exaggerating the novelty of the problem. The situation is serious enough without trying to imply that it is more serious than it is. In a sense, that undermines the credibility of the problem.
  The Government's approach to the matter sits in the context of our efforts to update and improve the NHS. It cannot be seen in isolation of them. Some of those efforts are criticised by the hon. Gentleman, but I remind the House of them. There is more capacity and more money being put into the NHS in a sustained way than ever before: an average of 7.6 per cent. growth in real terms during the past four years. That has helped to expand capacity and, compared with 1997, the figures speak for themselves. There are more staff than ever: 77,500 more nurses and 19,000 more doctors working in the NHS. Sixty-eight major new hospitals have been built, are under way or are planned. That point is relevant, and I shall return to it later.
  As a result—without in any way diminishing the deaths and misery caused by hospital-acquired infections—there are now 280,000 fewer people on the in-patient waiting list, compared with March 1997, and hardly anyone at all is waiting more than nine months for a hospital admission. More importantly, health outcomes for patients in general have improved. Premature deaths from cancer are down by more than 10 per cent., and coronary heart-related premature deaths are down by 23.4 per cent. Those are staggering changes. Out of fairness to NHS staff, let us remember that there are thousands of people alive today who would not have been had the NHS not introduced its reforms, and had we not introduced our improvements to the NHS. Staff have worked hard to achieve all that, so let us give them credit.
  That is the context within which we are facing the challenge of hospital-acquired infections, a major one by any standards, and specifically, MRSA. What is the objective position as regards hospital-acquired infections? Almost by definition, hospitals are places where infections are concentrated. That has always been the case; it is not a phenomenon restricted to the current time or Government. What is the volume of hospital-acquired infections? I notice that the hon. Gentleman made no reference to the volume of such infections in comparison either historically or internationally.
  Our estimates show that up to 9 per cent. of inpatients acquire an infection of some kind. They also show, as far back as we have reliable data, that that has not changed materially since 1980, not 1990. In 1980, the number of those infected stood at 9.2 per cent.; today, it is estimated to be 9 per cent. I shall go further. The advice I have is that, as far as we can make out, the total volume of hospital-acquired infections as a percentage has not substantially changed for the past 50 years.
  794
  What has changed within that overall total is the main type of bacteria or organisms that we have to deal with. Today, it is MRSA, but if one goes back to the 1950s, one finds it was staph aureus—the methicillin-sensitive organism. In the 1970s it was E. coli, in 1980 it was pseudomonas and in 1975 it was klebsiella. A mutation has occurred. As we have been successful in controlling some types of infections through antibiotics—and perhaps the overuse of them—others have grown to present the problems we have today.
  I do not wish in any way to diminish the seriousness of the problem, but I caution against historical exaggeration of such infections as a novel problem with which we have had never had to deal before and which is exclusive or enhanced under a Labour Government.
  Health care-acquired infections are not just a problem in this country. The estimated rate of infection here is 9 per cent., compared with 7 per cent.—admittedly, a lower figure—in the Netherlands, 8 per cent. in Spain and Denmark, and rates of 6 to 10 per cent. in France, and 5 to 10 per cent. in the United States. In giving those figures I do not wish to diminish in any way the scale of the problem. I want to make sure that we take it seriously by avoiding exaggeration. However—
  Mr. Lansley: I understand what the Secretary of State is saying, but he will accept that the incidence of MRSA in particular has risen dramatically since the mid-1990s. I entirely accept, however, a number of bacteria constitute MRSA and that they have developed over time. Indeed, I have corresponded with him about the need to prepare for the possibility, hopefully remote, of an outbreak of vancomycin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus. In the international context, we are lucky not to have experienced an outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome, but some countries have combated MRSA, as they did SARS, with a dramatic change of culture within their health care systems. For example, a Dutch strategy was based on the policy of search and destroy set out in "Winning Ways". Clearly, other countries with an increasing incidence of MRSA responded in completely different ways, and the Secretary of State must explain why that was not the case in Britain.
  Dr. Reid: I shall come on to that. We have set the record straight and got rid of the tabloidy misrepresentations of a novel problem in certain quarters. I am not saying that the hon. Gentleman was guilty of such behaviour today, although the Leader of the Opposition, in search of another bandwagon, jumped on that one without much success. We do not diminish the seriousness of the problem by putting it in the correct context, which helps us to identify the challenge facing us. However, as I was about to say before the hon. Gentleman intervened, it is true that MRSA infection has become more of a problem in the United Kingdom. It has replaced problems previously caused by E. coli and other organisms that I mentioned. There are complex reasons for that, including some unknown ones, but it is possible to identify a number of the interrelated causes.
  The hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire asked me to grapple with the reason why MRSA is more prevalent in the UK, even though the overall infection rate is lower here than in some countries. Part of the

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  answer is that the strains responsible for most infections in the UK are different from those in many other countries. [Interruption.] I do not know whether the hon. Member for Westbury (Dr. Murrison) is asking about strains of infection. He is much more qualified than I am, but I am advised that about 12 to 15 years ago, we witnessed the development of Thames strains—two particularly virulent forms of MRSA that are not common in other countries, but which are particularly well adapted to spread between patients compared with other strains.
  Mr. Paul Burstow: If I understood the Secretary of State correctly, he said that when one looks at the totality of health care-acquired infections and compares the UK's performance with that of other European countries the UK is doing better. If so, where is the evidence? As I understand it, the surveillance systems in place do not collect that information.
  Dr. Reid: Our figures are based on the data that is collected and the estimates. No country is compiling data in forensic detail on all aspects. I have given the hon. Gentleman our best estimate. The rate of hospital-acquired infections—the aggregate sum that he mentions—in England is 9 per cent. Twenty-four years ago it was 9.2 per cent., based on the same estimates but perhaps less data. Historically, therefore, as a global aggregate sum, the current rate is not out of kilter with what has been the case for 24 years. Indeed, I am told by my advisers, including some very well qualified advisers, that the rate has probably been of the order of 9 per cent. for the past 50 years. The comparable rate in the Netherlands is 7 per cent., 8 per cent. in Spain and Denmark, between 6 and 10 per cent. in France and between 5 and 10 per cent. in the United States. Those are the best estimates available to me.
  However, within those aggregate totals, it is true that we have a particular problem with MRSA, which we are attempting to face. In order to do so, we must understand why we have that problem. The first reason that I identified is that there are a number of strains under the generic name MRSA. At least two of those strains, which we used to call the Thames strains because they originated in this region, are particularly virulent in crossing from patient to patient. They are a different strain from those that occur in some other countries.
  A second objective fact is that we have a higher proportion of patients who are susceptible to infection than we had 20 or 30 years ago, because of the increasing number of elderly in our country, largely as a result of the success of the national health service in maintaining people for a longer period.
  Thirdly, infections are caused by a wide variety of micro-organisms, often bacteria from our own body. As the NHS undertakes increasingly complex and invasive medical procedures in vast numbers—remember, we are dealing with some 7.5 million treatments a year in our hospitals—and our patient population is increasingly susceptible because of age or immuno-suppression, it is perhaps not surprising that the rates of hospital-acquired infections are not decreasing.
  796
  From the complex battery of reasons, I have given three that are objective circumstances. That does not lessen the seriousness of the problem, but it begins to get us towards a mature debate on the causes so that we can address them. That is surely what the entire House wants.
  Linda Gilroy: Before my right hon. Friend moves on, can he tell me whether he has made any assessment of the extent to which the accuracy and transparency of our collection of data in this country is comparable with data collection in other countries, and whether that might be another factor in the differing rates?
  Dr. Reid: Yes, in general terms. In terms of international comparisons to date, we have done more than any other country to collect such data. In historical terms, I was about to say that we had done 100 per cent. more than the previous Government, but in fact we have done an infinitesimal percentage more than they did, since they did nothing at all about collecting such data. Does that mean that we have satisfactory and reliable data on detail and volume? No. I am not content with that.
  That is why, as the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire was kind enough to say, we started off with the most reliable indicator for the compilation of empirical data—the search and study of bacteria in the blood. For a host of technical reasons it is much easier to identify infections there than in a wound, because there might be a wound without bacteria, bacteria without a wound, or bacteria all round a wound, making it much harder to test. It is not as reliable for culturing as blood. For all those reasons, we did not start off with open wounds. We did not start off with respiratory or urinary infections either, because in both those cases the incidence of MRSA is much less.
  We started off by testing for bacteria in the blood, and, as the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire said, we are developing certain orthopaedic procedures.
  We take the problem seriously. Indeed, it is rare, if not unique, for a Secretary of State for Health publicly to declare that the issue is one of our great challenges. It is easy not to collect data, not to declare the problem and pretend, because the data have not been collected, that the problem does not exist. I took the opposite approach—I said that the first step in tackling the problem was openly to admit that we have a problem. We have had the problem for decades, but I think that I am the first Secretary of State for Health publicly to declare it as a major priority.
  The figures indicate how serious the problem is. Our surveillance shows that 7,600 known MRSA bacteraemia or blood stream infections currently exist. To put that in context, that is about one in 1,000 patients. Although we do not yet collect data from other areas, if we include the other main area of infection—surgical wound MRSA infections—the best estimate is that 23,000 incidents of infection have occurred, which is about 0.3 per cent. of patients or three in 1,000.
  That is, of course, three patients too many. Some hon. Members may know a loved one or friend who has suffered pain or lost their life because of such an infection, in which case 100 per cent. of that person's life

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  is lost. That is why we must take the matter seriously. I present the figures to put it in perspective, because some recent headlines have been so alarmist that they might discourage people from going to hospital to receive treatment for conditions that could kill them.
  I accept that we do not yet have enough data on the incidence of hospital-acquired infections, but, from the data that we have, we do not believe that such infections are increasing significantly. That is not my judgment—it is the judgment given to me by my advisers—but I take responsibility for accepting it. The base data on bloodstream infections show a slight increase of the order of 5 per cent., perhaps less, over the past three years. The problem is great and the incidence of infection has increased, so we should take the matter seriously—I shall come on to how we are taking it seriously—but the magnitude of the problem is not as alarming as some stories have claimed.
  Mr. Simon Burns: If I heard the Secretary of State rightly, he said that the increase was about 5 per cent. over the past three years. How does he square that judgment with the figures from his own Department and the Health Protection Agency published in July this year, which show that the increase for blood infections with MRSA was 3.6 per cent? If one adds cases of less severe infection, MRSA, and the total number of blood infections, the increase was just more than 9 per cent.
  Dr. Reid: The hon. Gentleman may have misheard me. I started with the aggregate volumes of hospital-acquired infections before going on to the specific subject, MRSA, which I admit is a problem area. The figure that I just gave is for MRSA.
  Mr. Burns: In order to ensure that we are speaking on the same basis, will the Secretary of State clarify that the increase was 5 per cent. over three years?
  Dr. Reid: I said just less than 5 per cent.
  Mr. Burns: How can that be squared with the Department of Health and Health Protection Agency figures, which show that for MRSA the year-on-year increase to July was 3.6 per cent.?
  Dr. Reid: The figures are wholly compatible, unless my arithmetic has gone completely mad. As 3.6 per cent. in one year is less than 5 per cent., it is entirely possible that the total was of the order of 5 per cent. over three years. It is not crucial whether the figure is 4 per cent. or 6 per cent.—I said that is of that order, because the figures are based on estimates. If the hon. Gentleman sees a contradiction, I am more than happy to check it and write to him.
  I accept that we do not yet have adequate data. One of the reasons why we do not have comparable figures going back to before 1997 is that comprehensive data have been collected only under this Government. Although we have had this problem for 50 years, with the same aggregate volume of hospital-acquired infections, previously no data were collected at all. We were not only the first Government but, to my knowledge, the first country anywhere in the world to introduce mandatory surveillance for MRSA
  798
  bloodstream infections. Although we may not have done everything as quickly as the Opposition would like, it is hardly fair to say that we have done nothing: we have led both at home and internationally.
  Not knowing the figures did not mean that there was nothing there—all the best estimates suggest that there was. The previous Government's laissez-faire approach meant that Parliament would not have been able to have such a debate, nor would the tabloids have been able to write the headlines. No one gave them the information to alert them to the seriousness of the problem because no one collected that information in the first place.
  Although we know that not all health care-associated infections can be prevented, this is an important patient safety issue on which we are determined to take action. Contrary to some of the advice that is being thrust upon us, there is no simple quick fix to preventing these infections. We need a multi-strand approach because the causal relationship between the factors is multifaceted. It is not just a matter of cleanliness—it also depends on the patient's age, the severity of their illness and the intrusiveness of some operations.
  The two most important risk factors in contracting an infection are the severity of the patient's illness and the use of devices such as catheters which provide an entry route for bacteria. Our action plans for reducing infection rates and addressing those two risk factors are set out in two publications: a public report by the chief medical officer called "Winning Ways"; and "Towards cleaner hospitals and lower rates of infection". Copies are available in the Library. Those were informed by the advice not only of the chief medical officer, but of the chief nursing officer, both of whom have played a vital role in giving me continuing advice on the implementation of our programme of action. It is the action of any responsible Government to ensure that sound, evidence-based policies are implemented.
  Although we take advice from everyone concerned, Ministers are ultimately responsible. Naturally, I therefore take responsibility for any actions that we have taken to combat the problem and any failings that people perceive in them.
  Mrs. Iris Robinson: The right hon. Gentleman will know that one way of creating public confidence in the set-up of hospitals is to ensure that instruments are properly sterilised. He may be aware of the recent disclosure in Northern Ireland whereby endoscopic instruments were found to have bodily fluids retained within them. As a result, many hundreds of people had to be recalled to have investigative procedures carried out to check that they did not have infections. It is important that NHS staff correctly follow procedures to ensure that instruments are properly sterilised, to give confidence to people in Northern Ireland.
  Dr. Reid: Yes, I am aware of the incident that the hon. Lady mentioned. We have tried to tackle the matter in several ways. At one stage, we tried to introduce disposable instruments, but they led to complications that resulted in injury, discomfort, pain and further problems. The hon. Lady is right that the instruments that are used constitute an important element of hygiene, especially since the treatments are becoming

  799
  increasingly intrusive as we find more treatments that, on the face of it, relieve pain, but are so intrusive that they create a further risk.
  I was trying to explain that we are considering a multifaceted problem. Other important risk factors include the age of the buildings and increasing antibiotic resistance. It is not simply a matter of cleanliness, which I shall tackle later. Any balanced and objective assessment would recognise that the age of our hospital buildings and the fact that people have perhaps overused antibiotics, leading to the mutation of organisms, which become more resistant, are important. Those reasons are not exclusively associated with a particular Government of a particular political persuasion.
  Buildings are part of a legacy that we inherited and we hope that the risks that they present will diminish, because we have the biggest building programme in NHS history. However, that cannot be completed overnight. We must also consider the design of buildings. Many countries have far more single rooms in hospitals, making isolation easy.
  Of course, cleanliness is also essential. Everyone makes that point. To be fair, the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire pointed out that we have known that since the time of Florence Nightingale, and perhaps even before then. Cleanliness is not less important nowadays, but, ironically, it and the standard of hygiene may have to be far greater, even though we have new hospitals, because the resistance of the bugs that we are trying to kill is much greater. Getting rid of them is not as simple as spreading a bit of Dettol or a few antibiotics around.
  Mrs. Angela Browning: I worked in theatre in the 1970s. In my experience and that of other friends and colleagues, who have been senior nurses—call us old bats if you like—the standard of cleanliness on the wards is not as good as it was years ago, because of procedures. To give one quick example, some nurses use their hands to open pedal bins and then deal with patients. We are not considering rocket science. We simply need discipline and good management of nursing and other staff, including doctors, on the wards. That has deteriorated and perhaps the greatest proponent of explaining the reason for that is Claire Rayner.
  Dr. Reid: I would not even begin to think of the hon. Lady as an old bat, a young bat or any sort of bat. Her comments are not batty—I agree with every word that she said.
  Let us consider other problems that might affect cleanliness. The age of hospitals matters. In the 1970s, some of our hospitals were 35 years younger. Hospital design matters, as does the fact that we have had long waiting lists, which we are trying to reduce. Staff shortages are important because people have less time. The points that the hon. Lady made about cleanliness also matter. As she said, it is not rocket science. That is why we are trying to introduce gel and the placing of such items at the foot of the bed. We are trying to emphasise to nurses, who are better trained than ever in many matters, that the basics are important.
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  I dare say that some people would write to me and say that the process of contracting out cleaners that the previous Conservative Government introduced opened the way for cheapness as a substitute for cleanliness. A host of reasons exists, but I do not believe that any of us are, at heart, interested in identifying them in a party political way. We are all trying to ensure that the practical measures, which the hon. Lady mentioned and which may help us to combat lack of cleanliness or hygiene are put in place.
  This morning, a meeting of NHS matrons took place on the subject. Yesterday, my right hon. Friend the Minister addressed NHS chief executives and told them that cleanliness was a huge priority. Cleanliness and hygiene are not extras in the NHS but the fundamental premise on which we treat patients.
  Therefore, cleanliness is essential, and we are working to improve both infection control and cleanliness, since even in the absence of clear evidence, common sense suggests that there is a link between the two. There is not statistical and scientific evidence to show that, but my intuition and common sense tell me, as the hon. Lady tells me from her experience, that there must be such a link.
  Such work is not always easy in an area in which, we believe—and the Opposition urge us to go further on this—that we should decentralise control. We are being asked to ensure the application of national standards of hygiene and cleanliness in a context in which we are decentralising power to the front line. That is not easy, but it is essential, and that is why we are doing it from the centre.
  If the hon. Lady wants us to set that as an objective, and to drive it with guidelines and targets, I am with her. Her Front Benchers are not. They want such an outcome to arise spontaneously, like something out of the "Book of Revelations", but I think that we should insist on a national standard of cleanliness in our hospitals. That is why we have set a new objective for the reduction of MRSA, which is the responsibility of every member of a hospital from the top down. We have strengthened the role of the Healthcare Commission in that area. We have introduced the National Patient Safety Agency "clean your hands" campaign—the non-rocket-science, basic practice, which the hon. Lady recommended. We have introduced a matron's charter to put matrons back in charge, and ward sisters more in charge, of what happens in wards. In addition, we are prepared to learn not only from best practice at home but abroad. We are therefore bringing in experts from other countries, which sometimes have a significantly lower rate of MRSA than this country. We are also trying to improve the design of hospitals. All of that is under way, in addition to introducing extra staff and resources.
  Mrs. Browning: I cannot let the Secretary of State get away with suggesting that I said that there should be targets. In the 1960s and 1970s, we did not need targets to maintain good practice on hospital wards. It was achieved through management, procedures and training. That does not require the setting of targets.
  Dr. Reid: I merely point out to the hon. Lady, with great respect—this in no way diminishes her

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  contribution to the national health service at that time—that the aggregate rate of hospital-acquired infections in the 1960s and 1970s was exactly the same as today, and perhaps higher, according to the advice that I am given. The problem is that, within that aggregate total, some of the bugs that we are fighting are more and more resistant, with dreadful consequences.
  Mr. Mark Francois: Like many other Members who have participated in the debate, I have had casework involving MRSA, so this issue is also important to me. In the event that an infection control team makes a formal recommendation to close a ward because of a serious infection on it, and there is a tension in the hospital management because that may affect waiting lists, should the advice of the infection control team take precedence and the ward be closed?
  Dr. Reid: I do not know the specific example to which the hon. Gentleman refers. If he asks me about general principle, clinical priorities and clinical need take precedence over everything else. That is the nature of the national health service. That is why the position on waiting times and waiting lists is determined by clinical need. That is why, on the four-hour target for accidents and emergencies, if a doctor says that a person should stay for more than four hours for clinical reasons, we allow that, and it is not counted. There should be no doubt about that. He will understand why I cannot comment on a specific example, the details of which I do not know. As a general guide, however, all of us in the House would agree with the proposition that clinical need should guide the actions of those who work in the national health service.
  We agree that more needs to be done. As the recent National Audit Office report recognises, however, our work has moved infection control up the NHS agenda with a priority that no previous Government have given to it. That is precisely why there is public debate on the issue at present. In July, we introduced the new objective—the new target—on which I know that Opposition Members do not agree, although God knows how we are supposed to get rid of MRSA by removing as an objective of the NHS the combating of MRSA. That seems a perverse logic, but it is the logic of their position.
  That will not improve patient safety; it will do the opposite. We know that having an objective, a target, according to which managers, staff and hospitals are judged when information is issued to the public, must ensure that the issue is given greater priority in the NHS and in hospitals. The National Audit Office report concluded that the introduction of mandatory MRSA surveillance raised the profile of infection control not just with staff on the wards, but with senior managers. We expect the new target to operate in a similar way.
  Let us briefly consider the alternatives that have been put to us. I have explained to the House that the aggregate number of infections is no greater than it has been for 50 years. The first misrepresentation of the position is the claim that it is much greater than it was; the second is that the problem is entirely due to the fact that we are treating more patients in the NHS more quickly. I remind the House that the awful length of the waiting lists with which we have to deal must make dealing with them a priority—and also that they are a legacy of neglect of the NHS.
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  We do run the NHS at a very high bed occupancy rate. That is because it is treating more patients and cutting waiting lists. Of course increased activity means that we need to work even harder to reduce the risk of infection, and that is what the NHS is doing.
  We believe that it is possible to be both clean and efficient. We believe that it is possible to achieve targets, and good infection control. The Opposition seem to be arguing—I am sorry if I have gained the wrong impression—that we should keep more people waiting longer to go into hospital, with all the distress, anguish and, no doubt, deaths that that may entail. They seem to suggest that making people wait longer than they should for treatment is, somehow, a logical, fair and effective way of combating the increase in MRSA and other hospital-acquired infections.
  Let me say to the Opposition that people should not be made to choose between lingering in pain and increasing the risk to their health by remaining on a waiting list, and going into hospital more quickly than is normal and incurring a risk of contracting MRSA. As I have said, we believe that it is possible to be clean and efficient, and we must ensure that that is achieved.
  We will be actively helping NHS staff to achieve the aims specified by the chief medical officer in "Winning Ways". The requirement for each trust to designate a director of infection prevention and control does not mean the creation of another bureaucrat, as the caricature suggests. No additional post is being established. What we are saying is that responsibility must be taken at the top, rather than trusts passing it down to the nurse at the bottom.
  We know that health care-associated infection is a vitally important subject—an issue of great public concern. We are tackling it. We will restore patients' confidence that NHS hospitals are clean, safe environments with infection firmly under control. Our approach is the same as it has been throughout. We are increasing capacity and reducing waiting times, and we are confident that clear objectives and a sustained management focus will achieve results.
  This is, however, a complex issue, which does not lend itself easily to populist, or popular, instant solutions. It is complex in medical terms, and it calls for the hard work and care that are the hallmark of NHS staff. It will only be solved by extra capacity and by newer hospitals, better design, more research into drugs, more nurses and shorter waiting lists. All those things are just as essential as the key issue raised by the hon. Member for Tiverton and Honiton (Mrs. Browning)—that of cleanliness and hygiene.
  The problem will not be solved by party-political rhetoric from the Opposition, from me, or from anyone else. I began with a long quotation from a Conservative, which I thought quite apposite and fairly balanced. Certainly the problem will not be tackled by the introduction of charges, a reduction in the number of doctors or the taking of money from the NHS. Nor will it be helped by a constant backdrop, or refrain, of criticism of NHS staff who are trying to perform a very difficult task—and, in my opinion, succeeding.
  That is why the Government will reject all those options and will continue to give the support, staff, money, capacity, resources, research and guidance on hygiene and cleanliness that is required to improve all

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  our hospitals. If we achieve a sustained reduction in hospital-acquired infections, that will be for the first time not only under this Government, but in 50 years. The project is therefore worthy of common support and effort across the House, and I thank the Opposition spokesman for giving us the opportunity to exchange ideas on constructive ways to tackle the problem.
  5.30 pm
  Mr. Paul Burstow: I, too, am grateful for this opportunity to debate a very important issue. As has been suggested, much of what we are referring to in respect of controlling infection and tackling MRSA and other infections in hospitals is not rocket science. It is basic, scrupulous attention to hygiene and cleanliness—basic good practice.
  Often bandied around in debates such as this, in the press and elsewhere, is a figure that has been around for quite a few years, and which was cited in the first National Audit Office report in 2000. Every year, the death toll arising from infections acquired in hospital is about 5,000. An additional 15,000 people may well die as a result of infections, but that figure is even less hard than the 5,000 figure. So since 1997, about 35,000 people have lost their lives as a result of infections that they picked up in hospital.
  The Secretary of State was right to rehearse the fact that this phenomenon did not commence on the first day of the Labour Government in May 1997; it has been with us for a long time. However, that is not an excuse or reason not to do more now to address a problem that many of our constituents still feel is not under control. The truth is that we do not know the scale of the problem. The Secretary of State gave various figures, many of which are based not on the mandatory systems of surveillance that I acknowledge the Government have introduced, but on estimates. I hope that, after the debate, he will place in the Library all the calculations and the basis for those estimates, so that we can consider the figures objectively and in the clear light of day. It would be useful to see precisely how some of them were arrived at.
  It is worth considering some of the research published over the last few years. I shall cite one or two examples, not least of research that was undertaken and published by the Public Health Laboratory Service, as was, in 1999. It found that patients who pick up health care-acquired infections in a hospital tend to stay in that hospital for about 2.9 times longer than a patient who does not suffer from such an infection. So those beds are being occupied by people who, had they not acquired an infection while in hospital, would not be occupying them. Those beds could be being used by other patients, so capacity is being wasted in the NHS because of poor practice. On average, the stay of a patient who has acquired an infection in hospital is an extra 14 days, according to the 1999 research. It also estimated the cost of the additional treatment required as in the region of £3,000 per patient. No wonder the NAO estimated the cost of hospital-acquired infections as being £1 billion.
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  In his response to the official Opposition's motion, the Secretary of State gave no indication of what the Government intend to do to address the NAO's criticism of the Government and the NHS for failing, since the NAO's first report in 2000, adequately to address the lack of an estimate of the cost of hospital-acquired infections. The figure in that report is still the only one that exists, and it would be useful to know whether work will be done on that.
  The Secretary of State said that at any one time, nine in every 100 patients are likely to have a hospital-acquired infection, but that information dates back to 1996; we have no up-to-date figures. Probably the most surprising figure—again, it comes from the 1999 PHLS research—is that, after factors such as age and diagnosis have been taken into account, a person who acquires an infection in hospital is 7.1 times more likely to die in hospital than someone who is not suffering from an infection.
  We must show that we are taking the issue seriously, without spreading alarm and despondency, but in a realistic way.
  The Secretary of State cited various figures, but we have no information on the actual number of deaths—the figure of 5,000 is based yet again on estimates. We do not have an accurate and reliable way of collecting the information, and the death certificates themselves do not include it. What plans do the Government have to commission the specific research that would be necessary to determine how much MRSA and other health care-acquired infections contribute to the likelihood of patients' dying and how many die annually? It would be useful to get a true fix on the problem.
  Dr. Phyllis Starkey: I am having slight difficulty in following the hon. Gentleman's point. Obviously, additional statistics can always be helpful, but surely we do not require statistics to demonstrate the common-sense point that a hospital-acquired infection can hardly be conducive to a patient's health and should therefore be avoided at all costs.
  Mr. Burstow: I do not think that there is any dissent anywhere in the Chamber from that self-evident point, but there is concern about the rising figures and the considerable number of people who die, and it would surely be sensible to ensure that we have sound, reliable data that can be used to reassure people that the NHS is a safe place to get treatment, as sometimes it is portrayed as far from that.
  The spotlight in these debates tends to focus on MRSA, but as the Secretary of State acknowledged, other bacteria can and do wreak havoc in our hospitals. The NAO rightly covered all the infections, and the motion, which frankly is a good summary of the NAO progress report from July, identifies a number of the criticisms but does not move the debate on much.
  The NAO report makes depressing reading. It found that progress by both the NHS and the Department of Health in getting to grips with the infections was patchy: there was some good progress by individual trusts, and the Government had made positive responses to some of the recommendations in the 2000 report, but the picture was not consistent. The Department has issued reams of

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  guidance to the NHS on the control of infection, and the chief medical officer, in "Winning Ways", said that the Healthcare Commission
  "will be asked to make infection control a key priority when assessing hospital performance".
  However, that does not mean that the commission will publish a national report on infection control and hospital infections. Indeed, there has been no national audit of compliance with infection control standards in the NHS and Health Ministers have confirmed in writing to me that the Government have no plans to undertake one.
  When I undertook my own survey of the NHS a couple of years ago to find out how trusts were doing in undertaking compliance with the guidance that had up to then been issued by the Department, I was passed a copy of an e-mail sent to press officers in NHS trusts by the Department's press office. It said:
  "Dear colleagues,
  You may wish to be aware that the following is the Department of Health's 'line to take' for our press office to respond to enquiries about completing this questionnaire survey. I would be grateful if you could let me know if you are dealing with any enquiries from your professional colleagues."
  It went on to say:
  "A Health Service Circular which set out a programme of action for the NHS on the management and control of Hospital Infection was sent to all hospitals in England in February 2000. A revised 'infection control' controls assurance standard, issued in October 2001 and national standards of cleanliness for the NHS, issued in April 2001, together cover many of the questions in Paul Burstow's survey. In addition, both the Patient Environment Action Team visits and the Commission for Health Improvement regular review visits assess hospitals against both standards and publish their reports.
  The Department is mindful that the NHS should not be overburdened by responding to requests for information"—
  I agree with that—
  "from a variety of sources".
  What really puzzled me was that, having asked written question after written question and having been told time and again that the information was not held within the Department, it was surely not unreasonable for an MP to try to seek the information at a more local level. The message seemed to be that ignorance was bliss.
  When "Winning Ways" was published last December, the chief medical officer provided a possible reason why the Department was not keen on my survey. What he had to say then was:
  "Despite the extent of the guidance issued to the NHS, such data as are available show that the degree of improvement has been small."
  Surely ensuring compliance with the guidance issued by the Department of Health over the last few years should be a matter of concern to Ministers. The Secretary of State says that the guidance is a key part of driving improvements forward from the centre, but how can the centre be confident that it is happening if it is not auditing compliance on the ground?
  The Secretary of State also talks about a target for reducing MRSA bloodstream infections. Quite apart from our arguments about the Government's obsession with targets and tick boxes, infection control professionals are expressing some serious concerns
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  about the Government's target. The Infection Control Nurses Association told me that the method of collecting data in connection with the target is seriously flawed because it fails to exclude patients who acquired their infections in the community—in care homes and elsewhere—or at other hospitals. It also compares infections acquired in a given year with the bed data for the previous year, which makes it hard to get a proper fix on whether or not performance is improving. If a trust already has a low infection rate, the target penalises it most unfairly—typical, perhaps, under this Government. The focus of the target is solely on one bacterium—MRSA—and it excludes all other organisms that can and do cause problems in the NHS.
  Other resistant bacteria also pose a threat, which is why it is important to have information about them. Currently, however, there is no requirement to undertake surveillance and report on those other infections. The matter has already been debated across the Dispatch Box, but it needs to be repeated. Back in 2000, the National Audit Office made some very important recommendations about the need for a clear picture—not just nationally or trust by trust, but in relation to specialties. As paragraph 3.3 of the NAO progress report of July this year states, there is
  "still a lack of robust information on the majority of infections at both local and national level. As a result it is still not possible to say whether there has been any tangible measurable progress."
  It went on to point out that its original recommendations had made it clear that there should be
  "specialty specific surveillance of bloodstream, surgical site and urinary tract infections"
  and that such information should be "fed back to clinicians".
  I heard what the Secretary of State had to say about the advice he was given about whether moving forward with mandatory surveillance should be the first priority, but I am puzzled that in the NAO progress report of July this year, the Department's concerns and the reasonings behind its introduction of mandatory surveillance across trusts were not rehearsed. That is most puzzling; there must have been discussions at official level. Perhaps when the Minister replies to the debate, he can explain why the Secretary of State's explanation offered today was not covered by the NAO in its progress report earlier this year.
  Paragraph 3.11 of the report continued:
  "The main concerns on mandatory MRSA surveillance were that the denominator data was inappropriate as it was collected across the whole hospital, and as a result, clinical staff did not relate to it, and trust management considered it to be a problem for the infection control team rather than clinicians."
  Surely that is the key theme: there must be a feedback loop to the clinicians so that they can identify where the problems are and start to make the necessary changes. At the moment, the system does not offer the information necessary to do so. That is why putting something along the lines of the NAO recommendations in place should surely be a priority for the Government. I have heard nothing yet about the degree of urgency that the Government attach to that.
  My survey produced at least anecdotal evidence that MRSA and other hospital-acquired infection patients are often treated on wards because of a lack of isolation facilities and staff. There are Government guidelines on

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  the management of patients with infections and they recommend the use of isolation facilities for certain infections.
  However, the guidance admits that the provision of isolation facilities and single rooms in NHS hospitals is sadly lacking. It states:
  "Experience has shown that many hospitals find the present allocation of isolation-single rooms inadequate to deal with the increasing numbers of infected and immunocompromised patients. Hospitals with 10 per cent. of their bed contingent as single rooms often find that this number is inadequate to cope with every infectious patients. Where this is the case, risk assessment is used to inform decisions regarding patients to nurse in single rooms."
  I asked some parliamentary questions to find out where the Government had got to with their programme of expanding the numbers of single rooms so that there was more scope for isolation. Ministers have stated that NHS trusts were individually responsible
  "for determining the level of provision of isolation and single rooms."—[Official Report, 19 September 2002; Vol. 390, c. 407W.]
  I was told that the Government circular relevant to this matter
  "required trusts to undertake a risk assessment to determine the appropriate provision of isolation facilities within each trust"—[Official Report, 2 February 2004; Vol. 417, c. 687W.]
  However, surely Ministers should not be in the dark about the progress being made in this matter, or about the level of front-line preparedness to deal with hospital infections. Surely, that knowledge is essential if they are to cope with threats such as severe acute respiratory syndrome. In his strategy for combating infections, the chief medical officer stated:
  "NHS trust chief executives will ensure that, over time, there is appropriate provision for isolation facilities within their healthcare facilities."
  I asked Health Ministers, in questions, how that was going. I was told:
  "As the creation of new isolation facilities is generally linked to local plans for rebuilding and refurbishment it is not feasible to set a national timetable. Over-time is not specifically defined but provides flexibility for chief executives to implement realistic, timed work programmes for isolation facilities."—[Official Report, 12 March 2004; Vol. 419, c. 1819W.]
  The Government talk about providing more isolation facilities, but they do not have a grip on what is going on on the ground.
  This is an important debate about the Government's record after seven years in office. The Secretary of State has told us that the estimates show that things have not got better, and that we still have a serious problem with infection. He has made it clear that the Government have not acted on all the recommendations in the NAO report. The case that he made on surveillance is not sufficient justification for not getting clinicians into the loop.
  Reference has been made in the debate to Florence Nightingale. However, this is not rocket science. It is a question of scrupulous attention to basic hygiene, such as hand washing. It is about effective screening, robust surveillance, and giving clinicians the information that they need to adapt, and to learn from mistakes. None of that is present in the Government's approach, and that
  808
  is why we must relearn the lessons that Florence Nightingale taught more than 140 years ago. In that way, we can start to reduce the death toll in the NHS.
  5.47 pm
  Dr. Phyllis Starkey: As has been noted already, the issue of hospital-acquired infection is an extremely important topic. However, the Opposition have attempted to skew the debate to make a narrow party-political point. They want to use hospital-acquired infections to support their proposition that we should get rid of targets in the NHS, and in particular those for waiting lists.
  I have never been asked by any constituent to get rid of targets for waiting lists. They are very keen on them, because they want waiting lists to be reduced, and they need the targets to make sure that that happens. However, the logic of the Opposition's approach is that, to reduce the incidence of hospital-acquired infections, we have only to reduce the number of people treated in hospital. It is indisputable that treating fewer people would reduce the rate of hospital-acquired infections, but the consequence is that more sick people would remain untreated and would ultimately die from their untreated conditions. The Opposition's position on this matter is therefore completely fallacious.
  A year or so ago, my own hospital, Milton Keynes general, had a serious problem with hospital-acquired infections. I would argue that that was because the hospital's bed-occupancy rate was incredibly high, mainly due to the fact that the hospital was too small for the population that it serves. That remains so, despite the large numbers of additional beds that have been provided as a result of funding by this Government.
  Primarily, the hospital is too small because for the 10 years before 1997, when the Conservatives were in charge, no extra beds were provided, despite the fact that the population was growing by between 2 and 3 per cent. every year. It was undercapacity that added to the problems contributing to the high rate of hospital-acquired infections, rather than our policy of at least trying to use existing capacity to the ultimate to treat patients, and encouraging hospitals to do that by publishing targets that they were supposed to meet for waiting lists.
  The second point in the Opposition argument was that the Government were not giving NHS staff enough freedom to take the measures necessary to deal with infection. I notice that the Opposition did not really produce any evidence for that claim—I have to say that their evidence is not strong. What they suggest is complete rubbish and, again, I cite examples from my hospital.
  About a month ago, the Secretary of State visited Milton Keynes general hospital and I was able to be there, too. One of the conversations that he held was with a senior nurse about the measures that staff had put in place to try to deal with the problem of hospital-acquired infections. The senior nurse had responsibility for co-ordinating the policy and he described all the steps that had been taken, which indeed are not rocket science but had been learned from experience elsewhere. The staff did not feel constrained in the slightest in taking the initiative to implement those measures, either by the Government's policies or by our waiting list targets.

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  It is complete rubbish for the Opposition to suggest that removal of targets would make staff freer to act. It would make no difference to their implementing sensible policies for disease control. However, removing targets would make a real difference to the number of patients who are treated, to the service provided to my constituents and to the pressure on everybody at the hospital to continue to drive up standards across the board.
  My final point is about the impression that the Opposition have tried to give that hospital-acquired infections are new and growing phenomena, and that they are somehow a consequence of the Government's policies on NHS targets. Hospital-acquired infections are not new. Indeed, I can give an anecdote from personal experience. As a very young child, which was several decades ago, I was in hospital for a considerable time and during my stay I acquired every childhood disease that one could catch in a small period of time. The advantage was that when I finally left hospital, cured of the orthopaedic condition for which I had gone in, I no longer had to worry about catching childhood diseases because I had natural immunity to every single one of them. I cite that merely as a truism that everybody knows: hospital-acquired diseases have always been a problem. In part, they are a problem because people in hospital are, by definition, not in the best of health. They are more susceptible to infection; many of them bring infection in with them and they are in an environment where infections, even with the best methods of control, are unfortunately more likely to be passed around than outside.
  These days, there is an additional problem. Because more people are being treated outside hospital in the community, hospital populations are more ill than they used to be, so that in itself is likely to mean that patients are more susceptible and that cross-infection is likely to be greater. Furthermore—a reason that has been ignored completely—there has been a rise in antibiotic resistance, especially multi-drug resistance, which does not only concern practice in the UK. Unfortunately, such resistances spread between countries. There is irresponsible practice in antibiotic use worldwide. Antibiotics have been used for conditions that were not serious enough to warrant them. In this country and elsewhere, they have been doled out by GPs, possibly due to untoward pressure from patients, to treat conditions where the patient should have been told to go home because the infection would clear up. Members of the public also use antibiotics irresponsibly when they do not finish the full course.
  The most extreme case of irresponsible public use of antibiotics, not in this country, is the well-known example in south-east Asia, where prostitutes treated themselves with low levels of penicillin, as a prophylactic, to try to protect themselves from sexually acquired infection. All that they managed to do was to turn themselves into incubators for drug-resistant venereal diseases, not only to the huge detriment of themselves, but to the enormous detriment of everyone else.
  Such practices have led to the unfortunate situation where an increasing number of infections are now resistant to all the common antibiotics. That is the really serious problem, which has led to added pressure on our hospitals and other health resources, so we must have
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  even higher standards of hospital hygiene than in the past to ensure that those problems do not get out of control. I very much regret the fact that the Opposition have used this very serious topic simply to make the party political point that they want to get rid of targets and waiting lists. That is a complete diversion from what we ought to be discussing, and they should be much more responsible on such issues in future.
  5.56 pm
  Mr. Simon Burns: A number of hon. Members and the Secretary of State have stressed the importance of cleanliness in the hospital environment in seeking to tackle the growing problems of MRSA in our hospitals. I certainly accept that that problem cannot and will not be eradicated overnight, but efforts naturally have to be made to ensure that more is done to minimise and reduce the incidence of the problem, and I believe that cleanliness in our hospitals is a key factor in achieving that.
  During my brief remarks, I should like to highlight my own hospital, Broomfield, which is part of the Mid Essex hospital trust. The hospital was the subject of an article in the British Medical Journal earlier this summer because it has managed in a relatively short time, using excellent practice, to eradicate infections completely on the one ward—I emphasise that it is one ward, not the whole hospital—where the problem was growing. I refer to the orthopaedic ward.
  In 1998, the orthopaedic unit was moved from a dedicated orthopaedic hospital to a district general hospital—Broomfield—and a dramatic increase in the incidence of patients on the elective ward who acquired MRSA was noted. In 1996, before the transfer, there were three new cases of MRSA on the elective ward. By the year 2000, after the transfer, the figure had increased to 29.
  Staff on the orthopaedic ward analysed the situation and came to the conclusion that the increase was associated with elective orthopaedic beds also being used indiscriminately by emergency patients. To test their conclusions, they started to follow the British Orthopaedic Association guidelines and separate elective from emergency work, introducing an MRSA-free zone. Strict admissions criteria were introduced for elective orthopaedics. No inter-hospital transfers were allowed. All patients due to have elective orthopaedic operations were screened at a pre-admission clinic, and any positive patients were given eradication therapy and admitted to one of the trauma wards for surgery, rather than to the elective ward. The practice of admitting day cases to the elective ward was stopped.
  In addition to the standard precautions, a strict code of dress was instituted so that nursing staff wore disposable aprons and gloves for each interaction with patients; alcohol hand rub was installed by every bed—and staff had to use it before and after every consultation; medical staff had to leave their jackets at the door to the ward and wore clean white coats that were washed regularly; and visitors were not allowed to sit on the beds.
  The results of those procedures were dramatic. In the year before ring-fencing, 417 lower limb arthroplasty operations were carried out; in the year after, there were 488—an increase of 17 per cent.—without any increase in theatre capacity or the number of beds.

  811
  But the total number of all infections in postoperative patients fell from 43—nine of which were MRSA—out of the 417 cases, to 15 out of the 488 cases, with no cases of MRSA.
  It must be emphasised that that achievement is confined to the orthopaedic ward, because there has been some confusion, to the detriment of the local hospital, about whether MRSA has been eradicated in all the wards. That is not the case. However, the example shows that if proper procedures are adopted and rigorously enacted, they can have a positive and dramatic effect on the problem. I congratulate the nurses, doctors and consultants, as well as the management of Broomfield hospital. They have introduced a positive procedure that should be studied by other hospitals in the NHS so that it can be emulated and copied to reduce the incidence of MRSA.
  6.1 pm
  Laura Moffatt: It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for West Chelmsford (Mr. Burns), who spoke of local experience in reducing the rate of hospital-acquired infection. I found it an inspiration to hear about the work that has been done, but the most interesting point was that the reduction was achieved when targets and the other pressures mentioned in the Opposition's motion were in place.
  Florence Nightingale is a personal hero to many of us, especially nurses such as myself. She has been quoted enormously in the debate. However, the issue is difficult and complex, and that is why it should never be used in a party political way. Florence Nightingale was indeed keen to ensure that cleanliness was at the heart of treating patients, but she was also keen to ensure that they had lots of visitors, so that their emotional and psychological wellbeing was properly cared for. Indeed, she believed that if patients wanted their pets to visit them, it should be allowed. She understood that patients' happiness was important when they were trying to recover from serious operations. That illustrates the difficulty that we face. It is not as straightforward as saying that everybody must wash their hands and everything will be fine. That is untrue, and it is a target that we cannot possibly achieve. It is wrong to try to give the impression that that is all that needs to be done.
  Many visitors bring hospital-acquired infections with them. Visitors bring their children and they hug and kiss their loved ones—thank goodness they do—but what should be done about that? It is a complex issue that cannot be addressed in the simplistic way that has been suggested today.
  I wish to talk about my experience of working as a nurse. I spent many years nursing patients who needed to be isolated, so I know the difficulties and pain that hospital-acquired infection causes to them. Nurses also suffer pain and anguish when such cases occur. They provide 80 per cent. of care and if they discover that a patient is infected they are desperately sad and unhappy about it. Nurses want to do something about the problem.
  The empowerment that is being delivered to nurses hands them the challenge of deciding how a ward should deal with an outbreak of a particular infection or ongoing outbreaks of infection.
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  Any hon. Member who is involved in nursing organisations or their local hospital will see some of the initiatives that are making a difference not only to how nurses deliver, but to the way in which they feel empowered to take their initiatives forward and deal with problems. It is my suspicion that many of the initiatives are nurse led. After all, as they are delivering most of the care, they see what is going on and can bring the whole team together. I stress that it is the whole team. There is little or no infection among those who are treated in the community, with the exception of those who have gone into the community with hospital-acquired infections. It is in hospitals that we need to be most worried. We need to ensure that nurses are at the heart of getting teams together. We need collective decision making, from the cleaner to the consultant, on how staff deal with the ward. That is how we will truly make an impact on hospital-acquired infection.
  A hospital trust close to me ensures that staff have time to sit down with the consultant on a weekly basis, in the protected lunch hour when patients eat their meals quietly without interruption—another Government initiative that is immensely welcome in hospitals. The cleaner can say to the consultant, "But I saw you move from one patient to another without washing your hands." It is difficult to empower someone like the cleaner, who is part of that team, to do that, but if that atmosphere and ethos runs through the team on the ward, that is how we can make an impact on infection.
  I was slightly worried to hear the derisory comments of the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire (Mr. Lansley). He made it seem as though hand washing was a new initiative and something that we could laugh at, but we are introducing a new ethos, which asks patients to be involved in the campaign. When did we ask patients before to challenge the staff around them and to participate in their own care to ensure that their treatment was of the highest quality? Why should not patients be able to say to a nurse, "I'm concerned that there was no hand washing between one patient and another"? Empowering our patients, staff and visitors is the way to tackle the problems.
  I see genuine improvements in hospitals. The pressures are different. I wish I could put on my rose-coloured spectacles. I started my training in 1970, when we did not collect figures on hospital-acquired infection, and honestly wish that I could go back to those days and pretend that such infection does not exist, but there is a new atmosphere—the pressure is on. We have to ensure that patients are properly treated. The way to do that is to fund our NHS properly so that we can use new devices and technologies, such as silver alloy urinary catheters, which reduce infection. The only way to make that happen is to sustain investment and develop our empowerment of nurses, especially in hospitals. That is how we will get genuine improvement on hospital-acquired infections.
  6.9 pm
  Mr. Archie Norman: As many hon. Members, including the Secretary of State and my hon. Friend the Member for South Cambridgeshire (Mr. Lansley), said the problem of hospital-acquired infection is not new. It is a decade-old struggle, which was temporarily masked by the advent of effective antibiotics. My father worked at Great

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  Ormond Street hospital before we had antibiotics. We can understand why an emphasis on nursing discipline, cleanliness and hygiene was imperative in those days. If patients acquired an infection, there was in many cases no way of treating them.
  However, the development of MRSA antibiotic-immune infections is new, as is the much greater intensity of utilisation of hospitals, particularly by higher-risk patients, which creates a higher-risk environment and therefore calls for an intensely greater emphasis on cleanliness and standards of hygiene. That is the challenge we face.
  We should not accept the development of MRSA, or the level of hospital-acquired infection—which has sat at about a level of 9 per cent.—as inevitable. There are hospitals with much lower levels of infection. BUPA reports, in a very different context, that occurrence of MRSA in its hospitals is negligible; I do not know whether that is true. As the Secretary of State has acknowledged, we know that there are differences, particularly in instances of MRSA as opposed to those of hospital-acquired infection. We have a high level of MRSA, but in Scandinavia and Holland the rate of MRSA infection is much lower as a percentage of total infections.
  Equally, there is a wide dispersion of outcomes among NHS trusts carrying out similar types of operation. That suggests that some are doing well, and some are doing less well. The trust in my constituency comes 19th out of 45 in terms of MRSA incidence. In other words, it has a high level of incidence. It is an old hospital that urgently needs rebuilding and—perhaps not coincidentally—has had serious problems with cleaning.
  There has been widespread recognition—and I think that the Secretary of State will acknowledge this—that Government and NHS initiatives on MRSA have produced patchy results. In some cases there has been evidence of effective results. My hon. Friend the Member for West Chelmsford (Mr. Burns) made a point about a hospital in Chelmsford, to which I shall return later.
  What does all of this tell us? Solutions are not just related to what can be done from the centre. I do not want to get into a debate about central targets. Clearly, the Government have to take initiatives, but they cannot just consist of poster campaigns and leaflets—we all acknowledge that. Fundamentally, it is a matter of getting back clinical management control of the ward environment. That means total control that can derive only from a level of culture and discipline from all those who work in the ward environment, which must run through the organisation from top to bottom.
  The struggle to contain MRSA cannot be entirely divorced from the question of how we manage hospitals and their leadership. The debate I have had with the Secretary of State in the past about the balance between central control and targets can become slightly vacuous, but the question is how much emphasis we place on creating the right level of leadership in our hospitals, and giving that leadership—the chief executives and clinical management—the time to create the culture and organisation we want in the wards. I believe that investment in quality local management, and giving it the time and wherewithal to apply the right critical judgments, is critical to making progress.
  814
  At the heart of the problem—this sounds simple but it is not—is a failure of cleaning, hygiene, discipline and training. It is in the culture of the people, and we should not forget that. In turn, those factors derive from the quality and motivation of chief executives. I ask the Secretary of State to think about how much time a chief executive in an NHS trust has to patrol the wards, acting as a leader on the ground, as opposed to sitting behind his or her desk dealing with administration of one kind or another.
  The problem is also concerned with the fragmentation of accountability for the ward environment, which we have debated before. The Government have sought to address it with the appointment of modern matrons, but we still have a far more fragmented control of the ward environment than we had 20, 30 or 40 years ago, when the ward sister was in absolute control, not only of cleaning but of admissions into the ward environment—I know that it would not be practical to do that today. In many cases, she would control whether doctors came on to the ward, and at what time they did so. That has all changed, and with it there has been a decline in the ethos of cleanliness because so many different people have uncontrolled access to the ward.
  The nature of nursing care has changed. Nurses increasingly regard themselves as specialist health care professionals and are less dedicated to total care and, in some cases, less inclined to regard themselves as responsible for hygiene and cleanliness. In many cases, they rely on unqualified nurses to do the job.
  I shall give a brief illustration of factors that lead to loss of control. We have talked about cleaning contractors. Sub-contracting can create a problem, but that depends on how it is managed. No one knows when cleaning will be required—it may be needed, for example, if there is an incident on the ward—but ward sisters should have the discretion to call for it whenever necessary. They must have absolute authority over when cleaning is required or when mess has to be cleared up. A system in which cleaning is determined by a rota, outsourced or is the responsibility of a modern matron on the other side of the hospital simply will not work.
  Hand washing facilities in many of our hospitals are woefully inadequate. Physically, they are in the wrong place. The hon. Member for Crawley (Laura Moffatt) mentioned doctors who moved from bed to bed without washing their hands, but in many cases hand washing facilities are 100 yds down the corridor. It is impractical to use them, so we must contemplate that design problem. Incidentally, they fall far short of the amenities in many other highly sensitive facilities. Most food manufacturing facilities, for example, have much better hygiene and access controls than our hospitals. Our hospitals are open buildings with free visitor access and no security. Visitors come to the ward and, in many cases, are not invited to wash their hands. They touch the patients and the facilities, then leave.
  Staff uniforms are another problem. Gone are the days of crisp, white, starched uniforms. Many staff go home in their uniform and return wearing it unwashed the next day. It is therefore not surprising that we have a problem, but substantial change is required to tackle it. A total change in culture and management is needed, but it will not be easy to effect. We need a change in attitude to the way in which the ward environment is controlled, who is allowed access and what they are

  815
  allowed to do while they are on the ward. There is a balance to be struck between change and the pressure to achieve targets on, for example, occupancy rates. On the ground, line managers should have the authority to make clinical judgments and should not be burdened with the weight of national targets by top management. I am not making a party political point—it is not a question of targets or no targets—but we must allow people to exercise discretion locally.
  In conclusion, I shall cite the article in the British Medical Journal mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for West Chelmsford. At Chelmsford, in a single, small location, there was a dramatic reduction in MRSA and the rate of hospital-acquired infections. At the same time, there was a 17 per cent. increase in the number of operations undertaken. Cost savings and increased productivity were achieved because infected patients were not occupying beds, so the experiment merits serious consideration. The article says:
  "Staff, patients, and visitors had to undergo a major change in culture in order to implement the changes. The senior medical and nursing staff acted as role models in the implementation of new policy, as described by Ching and Seto."
  In other words, improvements were achieved not just by guidelines or a new framework, but by a change of culture and policy and the creation of a completely controlled ward environment.
  6.18 pm
  Linda Gilroy: Hospital-acquired infection and MRSA are serious issues, and I am glad that we have had an opportunity to debate them. They are certainly important to my constituents in Plymouth.
  The problem is not new, as hon. Members have said. As well as being resistant to certain types of antibiotic, MRSA in particular has an intrinsic propensity to spread. Hospital-acquired infection, like many serious problems, has various causes, and there are many strands to its solution. It deserves our serious consideration, and is far too important an issue to become a political football. I pay tribute to the Government for their work in taking it seriously and some of their initiatives are listed at the beginning of "Winning Ways".
  It is an impressive list, even at that time, before our right hon. Friend the current Secretary of State took over, and includes circulars on management and control of infection and a controls assurance standard. In 2003 the National Institute for Clinical Excellence issued guidelines for the primary care and community care sector.
  "Winning Ways" reflects the deep-seated nature of the challenges. It analyses and sets out how to tackle infection at all levels, from establishing a culture of surveillance and investigation to achieving a sharper focus on high quality research, which is needed to underpin best practice in information sharing, monitoring and action. The hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam (Mr. Burstow), one of the Opposition spokespeople, said that we did not want rocket science—we wanted common sense. However, we need both. We need common sense, as I shall discuss in a moment, but we need rocket science to establish which common-sense solutions are working.
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  "Winning Ways" also sets out some aspects of hospital management and organisation for action, including the need to appoint a director of infection control. Peter Jenks has recently been appointed to that position in Plymouth Derriford Hospital Trust and is bringing a fresh impetus to the programme that our local hospital established. He described to me the open approach that the trust takes and some of the issues associated with achieving an open culture of reporting. That has considerable challenges attached to it.
  The outcome of an infection is a balance between the intrinsic virulence of the organism, the susceptibility of the host, and the skills and resources available to treat the infection. A benign infecting organism may kill a seriously ill 80-year-old and not so much as raise a fever in a fit adolescent. Likewise, a virulent pathogen is likely to be much more harmful to more vulnerable patients.
  I hope that the Minister of State, my right hon. Friend the Member for Barrow and Furness (Mr. Hutton), will agree that it is important for effective, active surveillance and investigation that the recording of these issues is of a high standard and that we are able to compare like with like. He will be aware of the concerns that Plymouth Derriford Hospital Trust has expressed about the recent publication of non-standardised data by the Office for National Statistics and the way in which that sparked some pretty ill-informed coverage in the national press.
  As part of the surveillance systems that have been put in place, all hospitals in England and Wales must report every time an MRSA is grown from the blood of a patient. This is the most accurate national MRSA data and provides a standardised basis on which to make fair comparisons. I hope that my right hon. Friends the Secretary of State and the Minister will do all they can to ensure good practice in the use of statistics to inform not only our debates in the House, but the action that needs to be taken in all our local hospitals.
  I turn now to what I know many of my constituents, whether they are patients, their relatives or people who work in the health service, as well as hon. Members consider to be a crucial aspect of bringing hospital infections under control. Although eight out of 10 Derriford patients rated care in the past year as excellent, patient perceptions of cleanliness remain much lower than I, they and the hospital would like. Through the Derriford cleanliness task force, matrons, members of the infection control team, the cleaning contractor, the unions and patient representatives are all engaged in tackling this key issue.
  As others have described, matrons and ward sisters will take more control over the cleanliness of their wards. They are encouraging domestic and housekeeping staff to be valued as key contributors to patient treatment and welfare. Matrons will have direct accountability for cleanliness standards. I understand, and my right hon. Friend may be able to confirm, that if all else fails, that includes the ability to withhold payment for cleaning services.
  People have rightly said that it is not appropriate for staff who clean toilets to serve meals. The tasks will now be separated in Plymouth Derriford and staff uniforms will identify staff who only serve food. Patients and visitors, as my hon. Friend the Member for Crawley

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  (Laura Moffatt) mentioned, will be encouraged to ask staff questions about cleanliness and report things that they are unhappy with.
  That is all good common sense, and it should never have been anything other than common practice. As the Secretary of State suggested, however, some in my constituency say that the fact that that was not the case stems from privatisation and fragmentation. That has been a particular issue at Derriford, as it has been at hospitals up and down the country.
  I hope that my right hon. Friend the Minister has seriously considered ending the two-tier work force in our hospitals sooner rather than later. I also hope that he is examining how contracts can specify outputs that guarantee a minimum quality. That would certainly solve many of the problems that we have experienced in Plymouth. Strong scientific evidence proving a link between cleanliness and health care-associated infections does not exist, but common sense suggests that every care should be taken to achieve the highest possible standards of cleanliness, and patient and public confidence demands that too.
  The debate has generated more light than heat, which is good and not something that the motion might have encouraged. The motion does not do justice to the depth and breadth of the problem and what is and what can be done. Much mention has been made of "Winning Ways". Playing on people's fears in the run-up to an election should have no place in anyone's strategy. If it occurs, we can expect the great British public to rumble it.
  6.26 pm
  Sir George Young: It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton (Linda Gilroy). I agree that the debate has been good, and my hon. Friend the Member for South Cambridgeshire (Mr. Lansley), who introduced it in his normal measured and rational way, set the right tone for a constructive exchange.
  Along with other hon. Members who have spoken, I am, of course, anxious that my constituents should not acquire an infection when they go into hospital. Some signs are already apparent that fear of MRSA is beginning to affect people's willingness to have operations. I want to approach the subject not from the point of view of a patient with the infection, but from the point of view of a firm in my constituency that may have a solution, and I shall develop an argument that my hon. Friend the Member for South Cambridgeshire touched on in his opening remarks.
  I welcome what the Government have been doing and the progress that we have heard about in this debate. I want briefly to share the frustrations that both the company in my constituency and I have had in communicating with the Government and their agencies, and gently contrast the rhetoric of urgency and of rapid reviews with the leisurely progress that has been made since last December.
  Bioquell is a firm based in my constituency. It is a quoted company with a market capitalisation of some £60 million, and it has invested heavily in research and development over the past five years. I have been round it, and I was impressed by the professionalism of the operation and the commitment of the staff. It has a long
  818
  record of developing bio-decontamination technology, and last year the US Government selected it for priority research into anthrax decontamination. In the health care sector, it secured contracts to bio-decontaminate three hospitals in Singapore during last year's severe acute respiratory syndrome outbreak. In July this year, it was awarded a contract by a French hospital to sterilise two intensive care units that were contaminated with a super-bug.
  Progress at home has been tougher. On 3 December last year, the chief medical officer published "Winning Ways" in which he indicated as part of action area seven that the Department would set up a rapid review process to
  "assess new procedures and products for which claims of effectiveness are made of their ability to prevent or control HAI".
  On 15 December, I wrote to both the CMO and Lord Warner asking for a meeting to follow up the results obtained by a research team led by Professor Gary French, who is one of the UK's foremost authorities in the area—he is professor of microbiology at King's college London and head of the department of infection at St. Thomas' hospital just over the river. In a nutshell, his research shows that the hospital environment is heavily contaminated with MRSA.
  In areas of the hospital where MRSA patients had been treated, 74 per cent. of swabs tested positive for MRSA.
  More surprisingly, in a so-called non-MRSA ward, 43 per cent. of the bed frames were positive for MRSA. St Thomas' is probably a good proxy for all the tertiary hospitals in the UK.
  Secondly, his research demonstrated that conventional cleaning does not work. In one experiment, 90 per cent. of 124 swabs were positive for MRSA before cleaning, but after cleaning the MRSA level reduced only to 66 per cent. The fact that conventional cleaning does not eradicate the superbug is highlighted elsewhere in scientific literature.
  Thirdly, in another experiment the use of new technology reduced the level of MRSA dramatically. Prior to the deployment of the technology, the research team found that 74 per cent. of swabs were positive for MRSA. Use of the technology reduced that to just 1 per cent. That technology, which basically uses hydrogen peroxide vapour with high kinetic energy to decontaminate a room, equipment or furniture has been developed by the firm in my constituency.
  The research that I have described was published in the "Journal of Hospital Infection" earlier this year, and it was referred to in the National Audit Office report. Lord Warner, to whom I wrote in December, neither agreed to my request for a meeting nor, indeed, answered my letter. Two months after I wrote, I got a reply from the chief medical officer that simply referred me to the rapid review process. However, that rapid review process was certainly not rapid. On May 24th, the CMO wrote to Bioquell to say that
  "unfortunately, it is taking longer than anticipated to establish the rapid review process to assess new procedures and products which make claims of effectiveness against HAI. We will let you know when this has been agreed but we hope to start the evaluation before the end of the year"—
  that is, one year after "Winning Ways" was announced.

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  That frustration is also reflected in the NAO report. One of its recommendations is that the Department should
  "As a matter of urgency, define how the rapid review process of new procedures and products is to be implemented, and how the findings will be promulgated so that they can be translated into practice at trust level with minimum delay."
  The rapid review process is now set up. It had its first meeting at the end of August, some nine months after "Winning Ways" was published. I hope that the Minister will agree on reflection that that is a disappointing response to a matter that we are told is urgent and right at the forefront of the Government's priorities.
  We have heard a lot about cleaning in this debate. Of course, common sense dictates that cleaning is important, and I welcome the emphasis that the Government are placing on that aspect. Cleaning is a necessary but not a sufficient condition, and the Government are in danger of misleading themselves if they believe that improved cleaning alone will combat MRSA and the superbug—it will not. I am sure that if any of us were about to be operated on we would like to be treated in a room, ward or operating theatre that had been sterilised as well as cleaned.
  There has been ground-breaking research in this country into superbug eradication, but the first hospital to put it into practice is in Paris. I hope that the Minister will understand that from the point of view of a company that genuinely believes that it has a contribution to make, the response is one that can lead only to frustration.
  I want to conclude on a broader but related point. The Government constantly promote the benefits of the knowledge-based economy and urge us all to adapt accordingly. As the hon. Member for Milton Keynes, South-West (Dr. Starkey) said, MRSA is a global problem that requires a knowledge-based solution. However, the Government should understand that in practice a British technology company has found it almost impossible to get any meaningful action from the Department of Health on testing and adopting its technology, although it clearly needs a domestic base to win export orders. The Department's document, "Towards Cleaner Hospitals and Lower Rates of Infection", which was published in July, says that it will
  "bring the best expertise from abroad to tackle the worst problems at home".
  But the best practice may already be in this country.
  If the Government are really determined to drive forward their agenda on MRSA, I urge them to deal with the rapid review process with more rapidity than they have so far been able to apply to it and to get on with introducing this technology, when it has been tested, into hospitals with the biggest MRSA problem, then, subject to satisfactory tests, rolling it out. I hope that the Minister will make some commitment to faster progress on that particular aspect than we have had so far.
  6.34 pm
  Dr. Andrew Murrison: The first maxim in medicine is that one should do no harm. That is important to bear in mind in the context of today's
  820
  debate. Our constituents go to hospital expecting to get better and many do not understand why they or their relatives get worse. Although we fully accept much of the data that have been exchanged across the Floor of the House, we must also accept that there is a problem of hospital-acquired infections, especially MRSA. We must therefore decide how we will improve matters for our constituents.
  I welcome the Secretary of State's comments that the issue is not party political. It is not our intention to make it so, and we accept at face value his welcome for today's debate as a non-political issue.
  There have been seven contributions from Back-Bench Members. They were all of high quality and constituted a genuine contribution to the general debate on such an important matter. The hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam (Mr. Burstow) did us all a great service by reminding us that much of the data on which we depend is somewhat dated. He made a good point about lack of surveillance of organisms and bugs other than MRSA. The headlines are full of MRSA, but we must remember that the majority of hospital infections have nothing to do with staphylococcus aureus or any related organism and are nevertheless important.
  The hon. Member for Milton Keynes, South-West (Dr. Starkey) encouraged us not to make the debate party political. Indeed, up to that point, it had not been. My hon. Friend the Member for West Chelmsford (Mr. Burns) made a series of good points, drawing on his experience at Broomfield hospital. He discussed sharing best practice, which must lie at the heart of our battle with infections.
  The hon. Member for Crawley (Laura Moffatt) made some useful remarks about nurse empowerment and developed them to include cleaner empowerment. I hope that I can agree with her in some of the comments that I intend to make shortly. My hon. Friend the Member for Tunbridge Wells (Mr. Norman) spoke about differentials and the reason for different results in different areas of the country and different sectors of health care when tackling hospital-acquired infections. We need to determine the reason for that and, again, spread best practice and learn where we can.
  The hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton (Linda Gilroy) suggested that our approach should be an amalgam of common sense and rocket science, a term that was repeated several times in the debate. My right hon. Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire (Sir George Young) made an extremely important point about the rapid review process of innovative products. The Secretary of State did not adequately cover that, so I hope that the Minister will say a little about it in his remarks.
  If we criticise the Government's outcomes, we cannot fault their capacity to launch and relaunch initiatives, guidelines and various circulars. At the last count, we had touched on 12 today. The latest that I can remember dealt with the provision of individual hand-washing facilities for hospital beds—a tub of cleanser for every bed. The target date for that is April next year. That shows poverty of ambition; we need such basic measures straight away—we cannot wait until April next year. Otherwise, the findings of the National Audit Office's recent report, which suggests that we lose 750 people through hospital-acquired infection, will continue to be

  821
  borne out. We cannot afford to let hundreds more patients die in the interim. The latest announcement is perhaps simply a repetition of that lack of ambition by Ministers to get on top of such a pressing problem. I revert to my initial maxim: that we should do no harm in our health service. That must be our first priority.
  On Friday, I had the great pleasure of touring a new primary care centre in my constituency, which happens to be an Army primary care facility. Above all, the one thing that struck me, other than its obvious newness and the enthusiasm of the staff, was the impressive number of hand-washing facilities. I am sure that that was due to the energy of the nursing sister in charge, and that she will do her level best to make sure that all her staff—cleaners, doctors, nurses, medics—use those facilities. Certainly, it is not rocket science, although there is rocket science in relation to innovations, some of which we heard about today from my right hon. Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire. Fundamentally, however, this issue is not rocket science.
  My constituent, Mrs. Burton of Warminster, who trained as a nurse several decades ago—I am sure that she will not mind my saying that—wrote to me that, sadly, she has recently become a patient in the hospital in which she trained. She gave me a 20-point list of improvements that might be made to standards in hospitals, about which she learned when she was a student nurse, and which, as a patient, she unfortunately observed were not being carried out today. I would be happy to send the Minister Mrs. Burton's list if he would be interested, and I am sure that it would be useful to him.
  Above all, Mrs. Burton was worried about leadership in the NHS. We have heard a lot about that, and we have rightly heard Florence Nightingale mentioned in that context. We have heard about nurse empowerment, and about the recruitment of matrons—3,000 since 1999—apparently with the power to withhold payments to contractors and departments in the NHS that are not cleaning to a satisfactory standard. When the Minister responds, I would be interested to know how many incidences there have been of payment being withheld by matrons as result of that empowerment.
  We must avoid the idea that cleanliness is somebody else's business. That has come across clearly this afternoon. Cleanliness needs to be woven into the fabric of the NHS. The NAO is rightly worried about the balkanisation of the issue—making it someone else's problem, whether the infection control team or the cleaners. I trained in the NHS, and I know full well that I was never given any instruction on hygiene during my years as a medical student. I dread to think how much infection I caused during that time. I know for a fact that, in those years, white coats were never taken from medical students for laundry. Basic measures, such as free laundry for white coats and uniforms, need to be considered. That may cost a bit of money, but as the National Audit Office points out, such infections cost us £1 billion a year, so there are savings to be made. We must not be afraid of investing money, perhaps to save some, if we want to reduce it to crude pounds, shillings and pence.
  Training is exceptionally important. I am pleased to hear that training has now improved, and that medical students and nurses are being trained to apply proper hygiene. That must be fundamental to what they do, and
  822
  it must go further than the ward. It is no good expecting nurses and doctors to put up with shoddy accommodation which is dirty and grimy. We need total quality management in hospitals—everything needs to be clean, including accommodation, which is often not the case. It is no good having "think clean" days, as Ministers seem to want, as in "Towards cleaner hospitals". That balkanises the problem, which the NAO is worried about. We need 365 clean days in a hospital year.
  I part company from those who identify cleaning and ancillary staff as being part of the problem. It is easy for the tabloids to do that. Cleaners often appear to be marginalised—they seem to be shadowy figures in the national health service, and are often not seen as part of the mainstream NHS team. I suspect, from the remarks of the hon. Member for Crawley, that she would probably agree with me on that. Those staff need to be led, managed and made to feel that they are part of the general hospital effort.
  It is no good expecting them to do their job effectively if people ignore them. It is no good saying to them, "You only shift dirt from one corner to another", if no one really takes an interest in what they are doing, and if they are not being managed properly. We hear a lot from the Government about empowering matrons, but we need to be assured that matrons and senior nursing staff have the capacity to lead and manage everyone and every activity on the ward if we are to control this problem. They must be able to lead and manage cleaners, doctors, everyone.
  We have talked about differentials. It is important to compare and contrast what happens in different parts of the country. We know that hospital-acquired infection rates, particularly MRSA rates, vary dramatically. We need to learn lessons from that. Why is it happening? It is clearly not happening just by chance. Why do other countries have a far better record than ours? We need to learn from that as well, and apply best practice.
  Different sectors of the health care system in this country produce different results. There may be many reasons for that. I suspect that Labour Members, in particular, will make the obvious suggestion that it has to do with resources. With respect, that would be the scoundrel's way out. Although it may have to do with resources, I am sure that it has a great deal more to do with management factors. We must be prepared to learn from that too, and decide why parts of our health care system outside the NHS appear to be doing better than the NHS in this respect. We need to establish, for example, why community hospitals seem to be doing very well. I suspect that some of that has to do with leadership. Perhaps leadership is rather better in community hospitals, owing to the sense of togetherness and teamwork, than it is in some of our larger establishments.
  The Secretary of State said he felt that things had been achieved over the past few years, and none of us suggest that it is all bad news. There are people working very hard in this field. Nevertheless, we clearly have a problem. MRSA was first detected in 1960, and declined to almost zero in the 1970s. It has obviously been better managed in the past, and it is our task to ensure that it is better managed in the future.
  6.47 pm
  The Minister of State, Department of Health (Mr. John Hutton): I congratulate all who have spoken in this short debate. They spoke with considerable passion and conviction. I am glad to say that we have all recognised the clear need to reduce the incidence of health care-acquired infections, especially MRSA: that, at least, is common ground.
  This is one of the most extraordinary debates in which I have had the pleasure of taking part. The background was intensely party-political. Last week the Leader of the Opposition made his attack on the Government's stewardship of the NHS, entirely focused on our record on hospital-acquired infections. We were blamed for the incidence of such infections because we had introduced a range of national targets for the NHS.
  One of the extraordinary aspects of the debate is that it rapidly lost most of that party-political dimension. The longer it continued, the more that happened. On one level this is very encouraging: it shows that we can have a mature, grown-up debate across the Chamber, which is very important. I shall pay tribute to a number of speakers shortly, but let me say first that on another level that aspect is disappointing, because I shall have to junk most of the speech that I had prepared. There we are; that is part and parcel of the life of a Minister, and I will receive no sympathy.
  Actually, I may have to inject just a little bit of party politics later—[Interruption]—but, obviously, in a mature and sensible way. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Sutton (Linda Gilroy)—and with the hon. Member for Westbury (Dr. Murrison) and his hon. Friend the Member for Tunbridge Wells (Mr. Norman)—that we should not treat this subject as a party-political football, and we have seen plenty of evidence today that that is not happening.
  The hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam (Mr. Burstow) spoke for 17 minutes in his customary style, without—I think—making a single positive suggestion about how we might deal with the problem.
  [Interruption.] Perhaps I missed it. I am afraid that when he started to read out the e-mails, I may not have given his speech the attention that I normally give. I found it slightly odd that he constantly complained that the Government are not being prescriptive enough and should be collecting more data. Having heard many of his previous contributions, I am not sure how that fits with his standard critique that we are being too prescriptive and collecting too much data.
  Tim Loughton: At least he was being consistent in that regard.
  Mr. Hutton: Indeed. My hon. Friend the Member for Milton Keynes, South-West (Dr. Starkey) brought a very sensible balance to our debate, particularly on the question of cutting waiting times and whether abandoning targets would make sense. She is of course right, and that theme underpinned many of the Opposition's contributions. The hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire (Mr. Lansley) found himself on rather lonely ground when he suggested that we should abandon waiting times targets. The hon. Member for West Chelmsford (Mr. Burns) made a very helpful contribution, pointing out that it is possible to make
  824
  progress in reducing incidents of MRSA infections in particular, while also making progress in reducing waiting times. In fact, that was very much the theme of the speech by the hon. Member for Tunbridge Wells.
  The hon. Member for West Chelmsford successfully anticipated my own speech, as he always does; it is deeply irritating when he does that. Perhaps he and I need to go into a quiet corner and discuss where we are on these issues. I was going to refer to the success of Broomfield hospital, which is an outstanding example of people on the ground dealing with this difficult issue at local level. There are capacity constraints in Chelmsford—the hon. Gentleman knows about the problem, and so do we—but as examples such as Broomfield hospital show, it is perfectly possible to raise awareness and promote best practice across the NHS. Such efforts are a tribute to the local NHS, and I am delighted to hear that the hon. Gentleman endorses the work of his constituents, who are making such a success of that policy.
  As the hon. Gentleman knows, on a much broader strategic level across the service, we have been trying to separate out more elective and emergency work. Our treatment centres will help to accelerate that trend, so, coupled with the approach adopted in Broomfield hospital, we are entitled to be optimistic about the future.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Crawley (Laura Moffatt) spoke, as she always does, with a great deal of common sense, borne out of her extensive nursing experience. I agree strongly—this was a theme of her speech and no one else's—that nurses have a critical role to play in tackling MRSA and other health care-acquired infections. She was right to highlight that aspect of the problem.
  I agreed with just about everything that the hon. Member for Tunbridge Wells said. That is a problem for me but probably not for him—a fact on which I need to reflect. He is right: performance is of course variable across the NHS, and there are indeed limits on what the centre can do. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and I, the chief medical officer and all my colleagues in the Department of Health do not actually treat patients. Our job, as always in these cases, is to establish the right direction and to invest in the quality of local leadership. Ultimately, that is where this problem needs properly to be located, as the hon. Gentleman rightly said.
  Mr. Lansley: Far be it from me to add anything to what my hon. Friend the Member for Tunbridge Wells (Mr. Norman) said, but surely one inference that can be drawn from his comments is that it is not central directives, guidelines and targets that deliver performance in the NHS, but leadership and local clinical teams. Indeed, Broomfield hospital is an excellent example of that. The initiative was specialty specific and on the elective orthopaedic ward; it was not hospital-wide or done on the basis of Government guidance.
  Mr. Hutton: The hon. Member for Tunbridge Wells will speak for himself; he is perfectly capable of saying what he intends to say in his contributions. I am simply saying that there is a sensible balance to be struck. In

  825
  fact, the hon. Gentleman rightly said that there should not be an argument concerning targets versus no targets. There is a proper place in the NHS for strategic targets, and that is what we have established. The Conservatives referred today to having fewer targets, yet the Leader of the Opposition has been talking about scrapping all targets. Perhaps—
  Mr. Lansley rose—
  Mr. Hutton: I shall not give way to the hon. Gentleman, who made a long speech. The hon. Member for Westbury was not interrupted, and I have one or two other points that I want to make.
  I also agreed with the description that was given of fragmented responsibilities for ward cleanliness. In terms of management and leadership, such fragmentation is not acceptable, yet as we know, it has happened. I do not want to inject an unnecessary element of party politics into the debate—I know that some of my hon. Friends want me to—but things started to go wrong when the Conservative Government introduced compulsory competitive tendering, thereby fracturing the responsibility of ward sisters and nurses for cleanliness on their wards.
  I do not want to dwell on that historical point, which we are now moving away from, but we are entitled to point out some of the inconsistencies.
  The hon. Gentleman rightly referred to another important issue: open wards. Open access to NHS wards is a problem, but none of us wants to lock down our hospitals and make them a prison where no one can see a patient until they come out. There has to be a balance. We have been saying to the service—the issue needs to be taken up locally—that we should be concerned not only about the cleanliness and hygiene standards that we operate but about how we share information with patients, their families and the public about the contribution that they, too, can make. I agree, however—this is probably the most important thing—that to get on top of this we will need a total change of culture, leadership and management in the service. Ministers have a responsibility to the House and the service, as well as to taxpayers, to set the tone for that change, which is very much what my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has been trying to do.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Sutton expressed support for the work that we are doing, for which I am grateful, and rightly stressed the need for accurate information and the importance of data on bloodstream infections.
  The right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire (Sir George Young) broadly welcomed the progress that we are making, for which I am grateful, but he raised some concerns about companies in his constituency. He did not ask me to meet him to discuss those concerns, but I will be happy to do so if he will find it helpful. He referred, as did others, to the rapid review process, which is now under way, and I am advised that the team of officials steering that work is now considering six products. His criticisms are not entirely unreasonable, but the most important thing is that the work has now started.
  We have covered a lot of ground in the debate, but here I am afraid I must part company with some Opposition Members—I cannot avoid it. In these
  826
  debates, we are entitled to compare and contrast what they say now with what they did in office. They had the opportunity to do something about this problem in the 18 years of their stewardship of the NHS, and what did they do? First, they refused to take any action to establish the scale of the problem, so none of us, in the House or outside, had any way of knowing how many cases of MRSA occurred in our hospitals. Collecting the right, information is an essential precondition for developing the appropriate responses, but they never did it.
  Then, the Conservatives forced hospitals to contract out their cleaning services to the private sector. Quality did not come into it: it was the lowest bidder who always won. CCT did not lead to an improvement in overall standards of hospital cleanliness—quite the opposite. They issued two pieces of policy guidance to the service and, interestingly, if hon. Members get the chance to read it, they will see that their advice is entirely consistent with the direction of travel that we have set. That is not an impression that anyone listening to the contribution of the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire today could reasonably have formed. There were, however, some important differences: there was no follow-up—they introduced no means of monitoring progress; and neither was there any effective accountability or any requirement to implement the guidance.
  The Conservatives' approach can best be summed up in this way: first, they turned a blind eye and denied that there was a problem; for ideological reasons, they then pursued actions that made it harder to get on top of the problem; and then they took no action at all to enforce their own guidance. They gave the matter no real priority, so very little changed.
  When it comes to dealing with the problems of MRSA and hospital-acquired infections, consistency and a credible track record are not the Opposition's strongest cards. In direct contrast, my right hon. Friend has made tackling MRSA a priority for the NHS, as has been acknowledged by the National Audit Office. We have introduced mandatory reporting, which the Opposition always declined to do. We have set out a clear programme of action that we expect every NHS organisation to take in order to—
  Mr. Patrick McLoughlin rose in his place and claimed to move, That the Question be now put.
  Question, That the Question be now put, put and agreed to.
  Question put accordingly, That the original words stand part of the Question:—
  The House divided: Ayes 190, Noes 307.

  Division No. 239]

  [6:59 pm

  AYES

  Ainsworth, Peter (E surrey)

  Baron, John (Billericay)

  Allan, Richard

  Beith, rh A. J.

  Amess, David

  Bellingham, Henry

  Ancram, rh Michael

  Bercow, John

  Arbuthnot, rh James

  Beresford, Sir Paul

  Atkinson, David (Bour'mth E)

  Blunt, Crispin

  Bacon, Richard

  Boswell, Tim

  Baldry, Tony

  Bottomley, Peter (Worthing W)

  Bottomley, rh Virginia (SW Surrey)

  827

  Brake, Tom (Carshalton)

  Keetch, Paul

  Brazier, Julian

  Kennedy, rh Charles (Ross Skye &

  Breed, Colin

  Inverness)

  Brooke, Mrs Annette L.

  Key, Robert (Salisbury)

  Browning, Mrs Angela

  Kirkbride, Miss Julie

  Burns, Simon

  Kirkwood, Sir Archy

  Burnside, David

  Knight, rh Greg (E Yorkshire)

  Burstow, Paul

  Laing, Mrs Eleanor

  Burt, Alistair

  Lamb, Norman

  Butterfill, Sir John

  Lansley, Andrew

  Cable, Dr. Vincent

  Laws, David (Yeovil)

  Calton, Mrs Patsy

  Leigh, Edward

  Cameron, David

  Letwin, rh Oliver

  Campbell, Gregory (E Lond'y)

  Lewis, Dr. Julian (New Forest E)

  Campbell, rh Sir Menzies (NE

  Liddell-Grainger, Ian

  Fife)

  Lidington, David

  Cash, William

  Lilley, rh Peter

  Clappison, James

  Llwyd, Elfyn

  Clarke, rh Kenneth (Rushcliffe)

  Loughton, Tim

  Clifton-Brown, Geoffrey

  Luff, Peter (M-Worcs)

  Collins, Tim

  McIntosh, Miss Anne

  Conway, Derek

  Mackay, rh Andrew

  Cormack, Sir Patrick

  Maclean, rh David

  Cotter, Brian

  McLoughlin, Patrick

  Cran, James (Beverley)

  Malins, Humfrey

  Curry, rh David

  Maples, John

  Davey, Edward (Kingston)

  Mates, Michael

  Davies, Quentin (Grantham &

  Maude, rh Francis

  Stamford)

  Mawhinney, rh Sir Brian

  Davis, rh David (Haltemprice &

  May, Mrs Theresa

  Howden)

  Mercer, Patrick

  Djanogly, Jonathan

  Mitchell, Andrew (Sutton

  Dodds, Nigel

  Coldfield)

  Dorrell, rh Stephen

  Moore, Michael

  Doughty, Sue

  Moss, Malcolm

  Duncan, Alan (Rutland)

  Murrison, Dr. Andrew

  Fabricant, Michael

  Norman, Archie

  Fallon, Michael

  Oaten, Mark (Winchester)

  Field, Mark (Cities of London &

  Öpik, Lembit

  Westminster)

  Osborne, George (Tatton)

  Flight, Howard

  Ottaway, Richard

  Flook, Adrian

  Paice, James

  Foster, Don (Bath)

  Paterson, Owen

  Francois, Mark

  Pickles, Eric

  Gale, Roger (N Thanet)

  Portillo, rh Michael

  George, Andrew (St. Ives)

  Price, Adam (E Carmarthen &

  Gibb, Nick (Bognor Regis)

  Dinefwr)

  Gidley, Sandra

  Prisk, Mark (Hertford)

  Gill, Parmjit Singh

  Pugh, Dr. John

  Goodman, Paul

  Randall, John

  Gray, James (N Wilts)

  Redwood, rh John

  Grayling, Chris

  Reid, Alan (Argyll & Bute)

  Green, Damian (Ashford)

  Rendel, David

  Green, Matthew (Ludlow)

  Robathan, Andrew

  Greenway, John

  Robertson, Hugh (Faversham &

  Grieve, Dominic

  M-Kent)

  Hammond, Philip

  Robertson, Laurence (Tewk'b'ry)

  Hancock, Mike

  Robinson, Mrs Iris (Strangford)

  Harris, Dr. Evan (Oxford W &

  Robinson, Peter (Belfast E)

  Abingdon)

  Ruffley, David

  Hawkins, Nick

  Russell, Bob (Colchester)

  Hayes, John (S Holland)

  Sanders, Adrian

  Heald, Oliver

  Selous, Andrew

  Heath, David

  Shephard, rh Mrs Gillian

  Heathcoat-Amory, rh David

  Shepherd, Richard

  Hendry, Charles

  Simmonds, Mark

  Hermon, Lady

  Simpson, Keith (M-Norfolk)

  Hoban, Mark (Fareham)

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

  Hogg, rh Douglas

  Kincardine)

  Holmes, Paul

  Soames, Nicholas

  Horam, John (Orpington)

  Spelman, Mrs Caroline

  Howarth, Gerald (Aldershot)

  Spicer, Sir Michael

  Jack, rh Michael

  Spink, Bob (Castle Point)

  Jackson, Robert (Wantage)

  Spring, Richard

  Jenkin, Bernard

  Steen, Anthony

  Jones, Nigel (Cheltenham)

  Streeter, Gary

  828

  Stunell, Andrew

  Waterson, Nigel

  Swayne, Desmond

  Watkinson, Angela

  Syms, Robert

  Webb, Steve (Northavon)

  Tapsell, Sir Peter

  Whittingdale, John

  Taylor, Ian (Esher)

  Wiggin, Bill

  Taylor, John (Solihull)

  Willetts, David

  Taylor, Matthew (Truro)

  Williams, Hywel (Caernarfon)

  Taylor, Sir Teddy

  Willis, Phil

  Thomas, Simon (Ceredigion)

  Wilshire, David

  Thurso, John

  Winterton, Ann (Congleton)

  Tonge, Dr. Jenny

  Winterton, Sir Nicholas

  Tredinnick, David

  (Macclesfield)

  Trend, Michael

  Young, rh Sir George

  Trimble, rh David

  Younger-Ross, Richard

  Turner, Andrew (Isle of Wight)

  Tyler, Paul (N Cornwall)

  Tellers for the Ayes:

  Tyrie, Andrew

  Mr. Peter Atkinson and

  Walter, Robert

  Gregory Barker

  NOES

  Adams, Irene (Paisley N)

  Clark, Dr. Lynda (Edinburgh

  Ainger, Nick

  Pentlands)

  Ainsworth, Bob (Cov'try NE)

  Clark, Paul (Gillingham)

  Alexander, Douglas

  Clarke, rh Tom (Coatbridge &

  Allen, Graham

  Chryston)

  Anderson, Janet (Rossendale &

  Clarke, Tony (Northampton S)

  Darwen)

  Clelland, David

  Atherton, Ms Candy

  Clwyd, Ann (Cynon V)

  Atkins, Charlotte

  Coaker, Vernon

  Austin, John

  Coffey, Ms Ann

  Bailey, Adrian

  Cohen, Harry

  Baird, Vera

  Colman, Tony

  Banks, Tony

  Cook, Frank (Stockton N)

  Barnes, Harry

  Cook, rh Robin (Livingston)

  Barron, rh Kevin

  Corbyn, Jeremy

  Battle, John

  Corston, Jean

  Bayley, Hugh

  Cousins, Jim

  Beard, Nigel

  Crausby, David

  Beckett, rh Margaret

  Cruddas, Jon

  Begg, Miss Anne

  Cryer, Ann (Keighley)

  Bell, Sir Stuart

  Cryer, John (Hornchurch)

  Bennett, Andrew

  Cummings, John

  Benton, Joe (Bootle)

  Cunningham, Jim (Coventry S)

  Berry, Roger

  Cunningham, Tony (Workington)

  Best, Harold

  Curtis-Thomas, Mrs Claire

  Betts, Clive

  Dalyell, Tam

  Blackman, Liz

  Davey, Valerie (Bristol W)

  Blears, Ms Hazel

  David, Wayne

  Blizzard, Bob

  Davidson, Ian

  Boateng, rh Paul

  Davies, rh Denzil (Llanelli)

  Borrow, David

  Davies, Geraint (Croydon C)

  Bradley, rh Keith (Withington)

  Dawson, Hilton

  Bradley, Peter (The Wrekin)

  Dean, Mrs Janet

  Bradshaw, Ben

  Denham, rh John

  Brown, rh Nicholas (Newcastle E

  Dhanda, Parmjit

  Wallsend)

  Dismore, Andrew

  Brown, Russell (Dumfries)

  Dobbin, Jim (Heywood)

  Browne, Desmond

  Dobson, rh Frank

  Bryant, Chris

  Donohoe, Brian H.

  Buck, Ms Karen

  Doran, Frank

  Burden, Richard

  Dowd, Jim (Lewisham W)

  Burnham, Andy

  Drew, David (Stroud)

  Byrne, Liam (B'ham Hodge H)

  Drown, Ms Julia

  Cairns, David

  Dunwoody, Mrs Gwyneth

  Campbell, Alan (Tynemouth)

  Eagle, Angela (Wallasey)

  Campbell, Mrs Anne (C'bridge)

  Eagle, Maria (L'pool Garston)

  Campbell, Ronnie (Blyth V)

  Edwards, Huw

  Casale, Roger

  Efford, Clive

  Caton, Martin

  Ellman, Mrs Louise

  Cawsey, Ian (Brigg)

  Ennis, Jeff (Barnsley E)

  Challen, Colin

  Farrelly, Paul

  Chapman, Ben (Wirral S)

  Field, rh Frank (Birkenhead)

  Chaytor, David

  Fisher, Mark

  Clapham, Michael

  Fitzsimons, Mrs Lorna

  Clark, Mrs Helen (Peterborough)

  Flint, Caroline

  Follett, Barbara

  829

  Foster, rh Derek

  McFall, rh John

  Foster, Michael (Worcester)

  McIsaac, Shona

  Foster, Michael Jabez (Hastings

  McKechin, Ann

  & Rye)

  McKenna, Rosemary

  Foulkes, rh George

  McNulty, Tony

  Francis, Dr. Hywel

  MacShane, Denis

  Gapes, Mike (Ilford S)

  Mactaggart, Fiona

  Gardiner, Barry

  McWilliam, John

  George, rh Bruce (Walsall S)

  Mahmood, Khalid

  Gibson, Dr. Ian

  Mahon, Mrs Alice

  Gilroy, Linda

  Mallaber, Judy

  Godsiff, Roger

  Mann, John (Bassetlaw)

  Griffiths, Jane (Reading E)

  Marsden, Gordon (Blackpool S)

  Griffiths, Win (Bridgend)

  Martlew, Eric

  Grogan, John

  Meacher, rh Michael

  Hain, rh Peter

  Merron, Gillian

  Hall, Mike (Weaver Vale)

  Miliband, David

  Hall, Patrick (Bedford)

  Miller, Andrew

  Hanson, David

  Mitchell, Austin (Gt Grimsby)

  Harman, rh Ms Harriet

  Moffatt, Laura

  Healey, John

  Mole, Chris

  Hendrick, Mark

  Morgan, Julie

  Hesford, Stephen

  Morley, Elliot

  Hewitt, rh Ms Patricia

  Mountford, Kali

  Heyes, David

  Mudie, George

  Hoon, rh Geoffrey

  Mullin, Chris

  Hopkins, Kelvin

  Munn, Ms Meg

  Howarth, rh Alan (Newport E)

  Murphy, Denis (Wansbeck)

  Howarth, George (Knowsley N &

  Murphy, rh Paul (Torfaen)

  Sefton E)

  Naysmith, Dr. Doug

  Howells, Dr. Kim

  Norris, Dan (Wansdyke)

  Hughes, Beverley (Stretford &

  O'Brien, Bill (Normanton)

  Urmston)

  O'Brien, Mike (N Warks)

  Humble, Mrs Joan

  O'Neill, Martin

  Hurst, Alan (Braintree)

  Pearson, Ian

  Hutton, rh John

  Perham, Linda

  Iddon, Dr. Brian

  Picking, Anne

  Ingram, rh Adam

  Pickthall, Colin

  Irranca-Davies, Huw

  Pike, Peter (Burnley)

  Jackson, Helen (Hillsborough)

  Plaskitt, James

  Jamieson, David

  Pollard, Kerry

  Jenkins, Brian

  Pope, Greg (Hyndburn)

  Johnson, Miss Melanie (Welwyn

  Pound, Stephen

  Hatfield)

  Prentice, Ms Bridget (Lewisham

  Jones, Helen (Warrington N)

  E)

  Jones, Jon Owen (Cardiff C)

  Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)

  Jones, Lynne (Selly Oak)

  Prescott, rh John

  Jowell, rh Tessa

  Primarolo, rh Dawn

  Joyce, Eric (Falkirk W)

  Prosser, Gwyn

  Keeble, Ms Sally

  Purchase, Ken

  Keen, Alan (Feltham)

  Quin, rh Joyce

  Keen, Ann (Brentford)

  Rammell, Bill

  Kennedy, Jane (Wavertree)

  Rapson, Syd (Portsmouth N)

  Khabra, Piara S.

  Reed, Andy (Loughborough)

  Kidney, David

  Reid, rh Dr. John (Hamilton N &

  King, Ms Oona (Bethnal Green &

  Bellshill)

  Bow)

  Robinson, Geoffrey (Coventry

  Knight Jim (S Dorset)

  NW)

  Ladyman, Dr. Stephen

  Roche, Mrs Barbara

  Laxton, Bob (Derby N)

  Rooney, Terry

  Lazarowicz, Mark

  Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)

  Lepper, David

  Roy, Frank (Motherwell)

  Leslie, Christopher

  Ruane, Chris

  Levitt, Tom (High Peak)

  Ruddock, Joan

  Lewis, Ivan (Bury S)

  Russell, Ms Christine (City of

  Lewis, Terry (Worsley)

  Chester)

  Linton, Martin

  Ryan, Joan (Enfield N)

  Lloyd, Tony (Manchester C)

  Salter, Martin

  Love, Andrew

  Sarwar, Mohammad

  Lucas, Ian (Wrexham)

  Savidge, Malcolm

  Luke, Iain (Dundee E)

  Sawford, Phil

  McAvoy, Thomas

  Sedgemore, Brian

  McCabe, Stephen

  Shaw, Jonathan

  McDonagh, Siobhain

  Sheridan, Jim

  McDonnell, John

  Shipley, Ms Debra

  MacDougall, John

  Short, rh Clare

  830

  Simon, Siôn (B'ham Erdington)

  Trickett, Jon

  Simpson, Alan (Nottingham S)

  Truswell, Paul

  Singh, Marsha

  Turner, Dennis (Wolverh'ton SE)

  Skinner, Dennis

  Turner, Dr. Desmond (Brighton

  Smith, Angela (Basildon)

  Kemptown)

  Smith, rh Chris (Islington S &

  Twigg, Derek (Halton)

  Finsbury)

  Twigg, Stephen (Enfield)

  Smith, Geraldine (Morecambe &

  Tynan, Bill (Hamilton S)

  Lunesdale)

  Vaz, Keith (Leicester E)

  Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)

  Vis, Dr. Rudi

  Soley, Clive

  Walley, Ms Joan

  Southworth, Helen

  Ward, Claire

  Spellar, rh John

  Wareing, Robert N.

  Squire, Rachel

  Watson, Tom (W Bromwich E)

  Starkey, Dr. Phyllis

  White, Brian

  Steinberg, Gerry

  Whitehead, Dr. Alan

  Stewart, Ian (Eccles)

  Wicks, Malcolm

  Stinchcombe, Paul

  Williams, rh Alan (Swansea W)

  Stoate, Dr. Howard

  Williams, Betty (Conwy)

  Strang, rh Dr. Gavin

  Willis, Michael

  Straw, rh Jack

  Winnick, David

  Stringer, Graham

  Winterton, Ms Rosie (Doncaster

  Sutcliffe, Gerry

  C)

  Tami, Mark (Alyn)

  Wood, Mike (Batley)

  Taylor, rh Ann (Dewsbury)

  Woolas, Phil

  Taylor, David (NW Leics)

  Worthington, Tony

  Taylor, Dr. Richard (Wyre F)

  Wright, David (Tefford)

  Thomas, Gareth (Clwyd W)

  Wright, Tony (Cannock)

  Thomas, Gareth (Harrow W)

  Wyatt, Derek

  Tipping, Paddy

  Todd, Mark (S Derbyshire)

  Tellers for the Noes:

  Touhig, Don (Islwyn)

  Margaret Moran and

  Mr. John Heppell

  Question accordingly negatived.
  Question, That the proposed words be there added, put forthwith, pursuant to Standing Order No. 31 (Questions on amendments):—
  The House divided: Ayes 291, Noes 177.

  Division No. 240]

  [7.15 pm

  AYES

  Adams, Irene (Paisley N)

  Brown, Russell (Dumfries)

  Ainger, Nick

  Browne, Desmond

  Ainswirth, Bob (Cov'try NE)

  Bryant, Chris

  Alexander, Douglas

  Buck, Ms Karen

  Allen, Graham

  Burden, Richard

  Anderson, Janet (Rossendale &

  Burnham, Andy

  Darwen)

  Byrne, Liam (B'ham Hodge H)

  Atherton, Ms Candy

  Cairns, David

  Atkins, Charlotte

  Campbell, Alan (Tynemouth)

  Austin, John

  Campbell, Mrs Anne (C'bridge)

  Bailey, Adrian

  Campbell, Ronnie (Blyth V)

  Baird, Vera

  Casale, Roger

  Banks, Tony

  Caton, Martin

  Barnes, Harry

  Cawsey, Ian (Brigg)

  Barron, rh Kevin

  Challen, Colin

  Battle, John

  Chapman, Ben (Wirral S)

  Beard, Nigel

  Chaytor, David

  Beckett, rh Margaret

  Clapham, Michael

  Begg, Miss Anne

  Clark, Mrs Helen (Peterborough)

  Bell, Sir Stuart

  Clark, Dr. Lynda (Edinburgh

  Bennett, Andrew

  Pentlands)

  Berry, Roger

  Clark, Paul (Gillingham)

  Betts, Clive

  Clarke, rh Tom (Coatbridge &

  Blackman, Liz

  Chryston)

  Blears, Ms Hazel

  Clarke, Tony (Northampton S)

  Blizzard, Bob

  Clelland, David

  Boateng, rh Paul

  Clwyd, Ann (Cynon V)

  Borrow, David

  Coaker, Vernon

  Bradley, rh Keith (Withington)

  Coffey, Ms Ann

  Bradley, Peter (The Wrekin)

  Cohen, Harry

  Bradshaw, Ben

  Colman, Tony

  Brown, rh Nicholas (Newcastle E

  Cook, Frank (Stockton N)

  Wallsend)

  Cook, rh Robin (Livingston)

  831

  Corston, Jean

  Jackson, Helen (Hillsborough)

  Cousins, Jim

  Jamieson, David

  Crausby, David

  Jenkins, Brain

  Cruddas, Jon

  Johnson, Miss Melanie (Welwyn

  Cryer, Ann (Keighley)

  Hatfield)

  Cryer, John (Hornchurch)

  Jones, Helen (Warrington N)

  Cummings, John

  Jones, Jon Owen (Cardiff C)

  Cunningham, Jim (Coventry S)

  Jones, Lynne (Selly Oak)

  Cunningham, Tony (Workington)

  Jowell, rh Tessa

  Curtis-Thomas, Mrs Claire

  Joyce, Eric (Falkirk W)

  Dalyell, Tam

  Keen, Alan (Feltham)

  Davey, Valerie (Bristol W)

  Keen, Ann (Brentford)

  David, Wayne

  Kennedy, Jane (Wavertree)

  Davidson, Ian

  Khabra, Piara S.

  Davies, rh Denzil (Llanelli)

  Kidney, David

  Davies, Geraint (Croydon C)

  King, Ms Oona (Bethnal Green &

  Dawson, Hilton

  Bow)

  Dean, Mrs Janet

  Knight, Jim (S Dorset)

  Denham, rh John

  Ladyman, Dr. Stephen

  Dhanda, Parmjit

  Laxton, Bob (Derby N)

  Dismore, Andrew

  Lazarowicz, Mark

  Dobbin, Jim (Heywood)

  Lepper, David

  Dobson, rh Frank

  Leslie, Christopher

  Donohoe, Brian H.

  Levitt, Tom (High Peak)

  Dowd, Jim (Lewisham W)

  Lewis, Ivan (Bury S)

  Drew, David (Stroud)

  Lewis, Terry (Worsley)

  Drown, Ms Julia

  Linton, Martin

  Eagle, Angela (Wallasey)

  Lloyd, Tony (Manchester C)

  Eagle, Maria (L'pool Garston)

  Love, Andrew

  Edwards, Huw

  Lucas, Ian (Wrexham)

  Efford, Clive

  Luke, Iain (Dundee E)

  Ellman, Mrs Louise

  McAvoy, Thomas

  Ennis, Jeff (Barnsley E)

  McCabe, Stephen

  Farrelly, Paul

  McDonagh, Siobhain

  Field, rh Frank (Birkenhead)

  McDonnell, John

  Fisher, Mark

  MacDougall, John

  Fitzsimons, Mrs Lorna

  McFall, rh John

  Flint, Caroline

  McIsaac, Shona

  Foster, rh Derek

  McKechin, Ann

  Foster, Michael (Worcester)

  McKenna, Rosemary

  Foster, Michael Jabez (Hastings &

  McNulty, Tony

  Rye)

  MacShane, Denis

  Foulkes, rh George

  Mactaggart, Fiona

  Francis, Dr. Hywel

  McWilliam, John

  Gapes, Mike (Ilford S)

  Mahmood, Khalid

  Gardiner, Barry

  Mahon, Mrs Alice

  George, rh Bruce (Walsall S)

  Mallaber, Judy

  Gibson, Dr. Ian

  Mann, John (Bassetlaw)

  Gilroy, Linda

  Marsden, Gordon, (Blackpool S)

  Godsiff, Roger

  Martlew, Eric

  Griffiths, Jane (Reading E)

  Meacher, rh Michael

  Griffiths, Win (Bridgend)

  Merron, Gillian

  Grogan, John

  Miller, Andrew

  Hain, rh Peter

  Moffatt, Laura

  Hall, Mike (Weaver Vale)

  Mole, Chris

  Hall, Patrick (Bedford)

  Morgan, Julie

  Hanson, David

  Morley, Elliot

  Harman, rh Ms Harriet

  Mountford, Kali

  Healey, John

  Mudie, George

  Hendrick, Mark

  Mullin, Chris

  Hewitt, rh Ms Patricia

  Munn, Ms Meg

  Heyes, David

  Murphy, Denis (Wansbeck)

  Hoon, rh Geoffrey

  Murphy, rh Paul (Torfaen)

  Hopkins, Kelvin

  Naysmith, Dr. Doug

  Howarth, rh Alan (Newport E)

  Norris, Dan (Wansdyke)

  Howarth, George (Knowsley N &

  O'Brien, Bill (Normanton)

  Sefton E)

  O'Brien, Mike (N Warks)

  Howells, Dr. Kim

  Pearson, Ian

  Hughes, Beverley (Stretford &

  Perham, Linda

  Urmston)

  Picking, Anne

  Humble, Mrs Joan

  Pickthall, Colin

  Hurst, Alan (Braintree)

  Pike, Peter (Burnley)

  Hutton, rh John

  Plaskitt, James

  Iddon, Dr. Brian

  Pollard, Kerry

  Ingram, rh Adam

  Pope, Greg (Hyndburn)

  Irranca-Davies, Huw

  Pound, Stephen

  832

  Prentice, Ms Bridget (Lewisham

  Stinchcombe, Paul

  E)

  Stoate, Dr. Howard

  Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)

  Strang, rh Dr. Gavin

  Prescott, rh John

  Stringer, Graham

  Primarolo, rh Dawn

  Sutcliffe, Gerry

  Prosser, Gwyn

  Tami, Mark (Alyn)

  Purchase, Ken

  Taylor, rh Ann (Dewsbury)

  Quin, rh Joyce

  Taylor, David (NW Leics)

  Rapson, Syd (Portsmouth N)

  Taylor, Dr. Richard (Wyre F)

  Reed, Andy (Loughborough)

  Thomas, Gareth (Clwyd W)

  Reid, rh Dr. John (Hamilton N &

  Thomas, Gareth (Harrow W)

  Bellshill)

  Tipping, Paddy

  Robinson, Geoffrey (Coventry

  Todd, Mark (S Derbyshire)

  NW)

  Touhig, Don (Islwyn)

  Roche, Mrs Barbara

  Trickett, Jon

  Rooney, Terry

  Truswell, Paul

  Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)

  Turner, Dennis (Wolverh'ton SE)

  Roy, Frank (Motherwell)

  Turner, Dr. Desmond (Brighton

  Ruane, Chris

  Kemptown)

  Russell, Ms Christine (City of

  Twigg, Derek (Halton)

  Chester)

  Twigg, Stephen (Enfield)

  Ryan, Joan (Enfield N)

  Tynan, Bill (Hamilton S)

  Salter, Martin

  Vaz, Keith (Leicester E)

  Sarwar, Mohammad

  Vis, Dr. Rudi

  Savidge, Malcolm

  Walley, Ms Joan

  Sawford, Phil

  Ward, Claire

  Sedgemore, Brian

  Wareing, Robert N.

  Shaw, Jonathan

  Watson, Tom (W Bromwich E)

  Sheridan, Jim

  White, Brian

  Shipley, Ms Debra

  Whitehead, Dr. Alan

  Simon, Siôn (B'ham Erdington)

  Wicks, Malcolm

  Simpson, Alan (Nottingham S)

  Williams, rh Alan (Swansea W)

  Singh, Marsha

  Williams, Betty (Conwy)

  Skinner, Dennis

  Wills, Michael

  Smith, Angela (Basildon)

  Winnick, David

  Smith, rh Chris (Islington S &

  Winterton, Ms Rosie (Doncaster

  Finsbury)

  C)

  Smith, Geraldine (Morecambe &

  Wood, Mike (Batley)

  Lunesdale)

  Woolas, Phil

  Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)

  Worthington, Tony

  Soley, Clive

  Wright, David (Telford)

  Southworth, Helen

  Wright, Tony (Cannock)

  Spellar, rh John

  Wyatt, Derek

  Squire, Rachel

  Starkey, Dr. Phyllis

  Tellers for the Ayes:

  Steinberg, Gerry

  Margaret Moran and

  Stewart, Ian (Eccles)

  Mr. John Heppell

  NOES

  Ainsworth, Peter (E Surrey)

  Butterfill, Sir John

  Allan, Richard

  Cable, Dr. Vincent

  Amess, David

  Calton, Mrs Patsy

  Ancram, rh Michael

  Cameron, David

  Arbuthnot, rh James

  Campbell, Gregory (E Lond'y)

  Atkinson, David (Bour'mth E)

  Campbell, rh Sir Menzies (NE

  Bacon, Richard

  Fife)

  Baldry, Tony

  Cash, William

  Baron, John (Billericay)

  Clappison, James

  Beith, rh A. J.

  Clarke, rh Kenneth (Rushcliffe)

  Bellingham, Henry

  Clifton-Brown, Geoffrey

  Bercow, John

  Collins, Tim

  Beresford, Sir Paul

  Conway, Derek

  Blunt Crispin

  Cormack, Sir Patrick

  Boswell, Tim

  Cotter, Brian

  Bottomley, Peter (Worthing W)

  Curry, rh David

  Bottomley, rh Virginia (SW

  Davey, Edward (Kingston)

  Surrey)

  Davies, Quentin (Grantham &

  Brake, Tom (Carshalton)

  Stamford)

  Brazier, Julian

  Davis, rh David (Haltemprice &

  Breed, Colin

  Howden)

  Brooke, Mrs Annette L.

  Djanogly, Jonathan

  Browning, Mrs Angela

  Dodds, Nigel

  Burns, Simon

  Dorrell, rh Stephen

  Burnside, David

  Doughty, Sue

  Burstow, Paul

  Fabricant, Michael

  Burt, Alistair

  Fallon, Michael

  833

  Field, Mark (Cities of London &

  Lidington, David

  Westminster)

  Lilley, rh Peter

  Flight, Howard

  Llwyd, Elfyn

  Flook, Adrian

  Loughton, Tim

  Foster, Don (Bath)

  Luff, Peter (M-Worcs)

  Francois, Mark

  McIntosh, Miss Anne

  Gale, Roger (N Thanet)

  Mackay, rh Andrew

  Garnier, Edward

  McLoughlin, Patrick

  George, Andrew (St. Ives)

  Malins, Humfrey

  Gibb, Nick (Bognor Regis)

  Maples, John

  Gidley, Sandra

  Mates, Michael

  Gill, Parmjit Singh

  Maude, rh Francis

  Goodman, Paul

  Mawhinney, rh Sir Brian

  Gray, James (N Wilts)

  Mercer, Patrick

  Grayling, Chris

  Mitchell, Andrew (Sutton

  Green, Damian (Ashford)

  Coldfield)

  Green, Matthew (Ludlow)

  Moore, Michael

  Greenway, John

  Moss, Malcolm

  Grieve, Dominic

  Murrison, Dr. Andrew

  Hammond, Philip

  Norman, Archie

  Hancock, Mike

  Oaten, Mark (Winchester)

  Hawkins, Nick

  Öpik, Lembit

  Hayes, John (S Holland)

  Osborne, George (Tatton)

  Heald, Oliver

  Ottaway, Richard

  Heath, David

  Paice, James

  Heathcoat-Amory, rh David

  Paterson, Owen

  Hendry, Charles

  Portillo, rh Michael

  Hermon, Lady

  Price, Adam (E Carmarthen &

  Hoban, Mark (Fareham)

  Dinefwr)

  Hogg, rh Douglas

  Prisk, Mark (Hertford)

  Holmes, Paul

  Pugh, Dr. John

  Horam, John (Orpington)

  Randall, John

  Jack, rh Michael

  Redwood, rh John

  Jackson, Robert (Wantage)

  Reid, Alan (Argyll & Bute)

  Jenkin, Bernard

  Rendel, David

  Jones, Nigel (Cheltenham)

  Robathan, Andrew

  Keetch, Paul

  Robertson, Hugh (Faversham &

  Key, Robert (Salisbury)

  M-Kent)

  Kirkbride, Miss Julie

  Robertson, Laurence (Tewk'b'ry)

  Kirkwood, Sir Archy

  Robinson, Mrs Iris (Strangford)

  Knight, rh Greg (E Yorkshire)

  Robinson, Peter (Belfast E)

  Laing, Mrs Eleanor

  Ruffley, David

  Lamb, Norman

  Russell, Bob (Colchester)

  Lansley, Andrew

  Sanders, Adrian

  Leigh, Edward

  Selous, Andrew

  Letwin, rh Oliver

  Shephard, rh Mrs Gillian

  Lewis, Dr. Julian (New Forest E)

  Shepherd, Richard

  Liddell-Grainger, Ian

  Simmonds, Mark

  834

  Simpson, Keith (M-Norfolk)

  Trend, Michael

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

  Turner, Andrew (Isle of Wight)

  Kincardine)

  Tyler, Paul (N Cornwall)

  Soames, Nicholas

  Tyrie, Andrew

  Spicer, Sir Michael

  Walter, Robert

  Spink, Bob (Castle Point)

  Waterson, Nigel

  Steen, Anthony

  Watkinson, Angela

  Streeter, Gary

  Webb, Steve (Northavon)

  Stunell, Andrew

  Whittingdale, John

  Swayne, Desmond

  Wiggin, Bill

  Syms, Robert

  Williams, Hywel (Caernarfon)

  Tapsell, Sir Peter

  Wilshire, David

  Taylor, Ian (Esher)

  Winterton, Ann (Congleton)

  Taylor, John (Solihull)

  Winterton, Sir Nicholas

  Taylor, Matthew (Truro)

  (Macclesfield)

  Taylor, Sir Teddy

  Young, rh Sir George

  Thomas, Simon (Ceredigion)

  Younger-Ross, Richard

  Thurso, John

  Tonge, Dr. Jenny

  Tellers for the Noes:

  Tredinnick, David

  Mr. Peter Atkinson and

  Gregory Barker

  Question accordingly agreed to.
  MR. DEPUTY SPEAKER forthwith declared the main Question, as amended, to be agreed to.
  Resolved,
  That this House welcomes the Government's commitment to ensure that patients can have confidence that National Health Service hospitals are clean, safe environments with infection firmly under control; congratulates the Government on its action plans for reducing infection rates, 'Winning Ways' and 'Towards cleaner hospitals and lower rates of infection', which include the new target for a year-on-year reduction in MRSA, and the designation of directors of infection prevention and control to bring about local change; notes that the National Audit Office report concluded that the introduction in 2001 of mandatory MRSA surveillance raised the profile of infection control with senior managers; expects that the new target will act in a similar way, and deplores therefore the suggestion that the target be abolished; acknowledges that improving patient safety is a difficult medical issue that calls for the hard work and care that is the hallmark of NHS staff; welcomes therefore the 77,500 extra nurses and almost 19,400 extra doctors that have become a part of patient care since 1997; and therefore congratulates the Government on a comprehensive programme of investment and reform that has equipped the NHS to deliver improvements in patient safety, and to reduce hospital-acquired infections.

  Point of Order
  Mr. James Gray: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. It is widely expected that a Bill to ban hunting will be announced in business questions tomorrow. However, an answer this afternoon to a written question from the hon. Member for Sherwood (Paddy Tipping), released in the Vote Office and the Library at 6.30 this evening, announces that any implementation of that Bill will be delayed by two years. That was the first official notification that the House had of the Government's intention, but anyone who read the Evening Standard at lunchtime will have seen such a delay announced on its front page. The news was also carried extensively on the BBC website. When we inquired of the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs parliamentary office why that was, it said that the report was perfectly accurate, but it could not understand why it had been reported.
  In such a matter, which involves the procedures of the House and the implementation of a Bill, it is extraordinary that the public are informed via the media six hours before shadow Ministers and other hon. Members of what the Government intend to do about implementing the Bill on hunting. What can be done—if anything—to protect the interests of the House in that regard
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: I understand the hon. Gentleman's concerns, and although I am not in a position to comment specifically on the matter that he raises, I can say that the whole House will know that Mr. Speaker strongly deprecates the release of such information to the press before it is put before the House and hon. Members. The hon. Gentleman's point has made that very clear, and it is now on the record.
  Mr. Douglas Hogg: Further to that point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. There is a further problem in that we will clearly have to consider the implication of the Parliament Act 1911, together with what has been said on many occasions about its use. Our problem is that with the Library closed it is difficult to get at the material that we require. At the moment then, people such as myself cannot do any original research, and it would be enormously helpful if the Library staff could be asked to prepare now a summary and copies of the debates associated with the Parliament Act in 1911, together with what material they can find relevant to the use of that Act on previous occasions.
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: I understand the right hon. and learned Gentleman's great concern about this matter. The Library in Derby Gate is open, and I am sure that the Library of the House will do its best to solve the problems that he has identified.

ADJOURNMENT (PARTY CONFERENCES)
Ordered,
That this House, at its rising on Thursday 16th September, do adjourn till Monday 11th October 2004.—[Mr. Heppell.]

ADJOURNMENT (PARTY CONFERENCES)

  Alderman Knight School
  Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Heppell.]
  7.31 pm
  Mr. Laurence Robertson: I am pleased to have secured this debate on the future of Alderman Knight school in my constituency. I am grateful to the Minister for being here to respond to the debate, and I am grateful to my hon. Friends the Members for Cotswold (Mr. Clifton-Brown) and for Witney (Mr. Cameron) for being here to support me in the debate.
  I have raised this matter many times in the House, but I make no apology for returning to it because the school faces closure. Alderman Knight is a special school, accommodating in the main children with moderate learning difficulties but also those with severe learning difficulties, behavioural difficulties and physical handicaps. Gloucestershire county council's cabinet has voted to close the school. There has been a bit of a kickback from the county's education scrutiny committee, but the cabinet and the Liberal Democrat and Labour-controlled council are determined to close the school. Their policy is to include all children with moderate learning difficulties, at least, in mainstream schools. I shall return to that point shortly.
  Whenever I have taken this matter up with Ministers—I also served on a Standing Committee considering a relevant Bill—I have been told that the legislation should not be seen as a green light for the wholesale closure of special schools. However, in Gloucestershire we have seen that programme being put into motion: Bownham Park, the special school at Stroud, has closed. I want to return to that matter, too. If the Government's policy is that their legislation should not lead to the wholesale closure of special schools, they really need to have a word with their friends on Gloucestershire county council, who are not interpreting it in that way.
  There are many reasons to keep special schools open. The Prime Minister's wife alluded to those reasons on 23 June, when she said to me that inclusion can be a very good idea, but we also need special schools. I am sure that she will not mind my quoting her. I would be the first to say that many pupils with special needs can be integrated into mainstream schools—many already are, and very successfully too—but that is not suitable for all children with special needs. For some, integration now can mean exclusion in later life.
  If we take what may seem an extreme example, although I do not think that it really is, and look at the prison population, we find that the majority of prisoners are illiterate.
  There is a link between poor education or the inability to learn and going wrong in later life.
  Mainstream schools will not be able to cope with a massive influx of pupils with special needs. The pupils at mainstream schools will be adversely affected by too many pupils with special needs going into those schools. Again, I make no apology for saying that. It is common sense. The children themselves could not cope with being in mainstream schools. That is my opinion. It is also the opinion of many other politicians, teachers, chairmen of governors, governors and parents. More importantly, it is the opinion of the children.

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  I shall read out three letters that I received from children who go to Alderman Knight school. Ben Waters writes:
  "I was at Alderman Knight School for seven years and I used to be very worried about lessons because I was bullied but when I came to Alderman Knight School in 1997 I was very nervous but over the years I became more confident. If I was at Mainstream I wouldn't of taken five GCSE's or I don't think I'd pass them I had a D in English, D in Food Tech, E in Art, E in Science and a G in Maths a lot of those lessons I thought I couldn't do but now I can."
  There is also a letter from Harriet Windsor-Clive who writes:
  "Alderman Knight is my favourite school. It helps me learn and I have good friends.
  I am sad for the younger ones because they will not have a lot more help. I feel very, very sad about my school closing and having to go to another school."
  Jake Rose, who is 11 years old, met the Prime Minister's wife. Jake is autistic. He writes:
  "I am happy at my school. My teachers help me to learn in a way I can understand. I feel safe at my school."
  That is very important. A number of those children have been down to the House of Commons today to make their protest.
  The education portfolio-holder at Gloucestershire county council says that children who are attending a special school now will be able to continue to go to a special school, even if it is not that special school. But if all the special schools are closed, how will that be possible? What about the officers? What are they saying? They say that their policy is to include children with special needs in mainstream schools, so we do not know what Gloucestershire county council is trying to achieve, other than the closure of special schools. The council does not seem to know which way it is going.
  I refer to the flawed process that the county council has undertaken. It has held various consultations with the public. Closure was not mentioned in the final consultation. It was indeed mentioned in an earlier consultation, but the option was rejected by those who were consulted, so unsurprisingly it was removed from the final consultation. However, the council decided that it wanted to go ahead with closure anyway. What on earth was the point of the consultations? How much did they cost the taxpayer of Gloucestershire? Could not that money have been better spent at, say, Alderman Knight school?
  When my hon. Friend the Member for Cotswold and I attended a meeting with the county council leaders on 2 July, we were given a briefing paper. My hon. Friend will remember it well. On that briefing paper there is no mention of the option of closing the school. What on earth is the county council doing? The right hand does not know what the left hand is doing.
  The council predetermined the policy before it went out to consultation. I understand that there are rules regarding councillors, who are not allowed to attend meetings if they have a prejudged view—if they have already made up their minds. That is in the code of conduct for councillors. Yet the county council can have a prejudged view to the extent that it can reject the consultation results if it does not like them. It has clearly said that it does not accept keeping the school open
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  because that is contrary to the council's policy. I have that in writing. If that is not prejudging the issue. I do not know what is.
  Mr. David Cameron: Will my hon. Friend take it from me, as the father of a severely disabled son who has just completed his second day at a special school, that for many of those children a special school is the only place outside home where they can obtain the love, care, attention and therapy that they need? Given the compelling story of what is happening in Gloucestershire, which is being repeated right across the country, does he agree that it is time for the Department for Education and Skills properly to investigate what councils are doing with special schools? Ministers keep saying that a closure policy does not exist, but closures seem to be repeated not only in Gloucestershire, but elsewhere.
  Mr. Robertson: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention. I know that he takes a deep interest in these matters. I entirely agree that the Government should examine what is going on up and down the country, because the wrong things are being done in the wrong way.
  Gloucestershire county council has consulted on merging schools without the prior consent of those schools, and it has failed to consult the children. The level of statementing in Gloucestershire is very low. The council has a duty to provide the education specified in a statement, so it is no wonder that it avoids statementing in the first place.
  Mr. Geoffrey Clifton-Brown: I am grateful to my hon. Friend and neighbour for giving way. Although the school is situated in his constituency, a number of my constituents go to it. Does he agree that Gloucestershire county council is not serving the people that it purports to represent? Denying parents and children the benefit of the school is a terrible thing to do, and those who will benefit from that school will be severely disadvantaged by the decision.
  Mr. Robertson: I am grateful to my hon. Friend, who makes a powerful point. It is not only people in my constituency and those with special needs who will suffer, but those who already attend mainstream schools, who will suffer because of the influx—that is not an insult to the children; it is a fact.
  The council has undertaken a flawed process. I want to make a serious point because I understand that the director of education, who has given councillors recommendations to close the school, may have been in breach of the county council's own guidance. She may have a non-financial interest, which she has not declared at various meetings, and she has not sought to distance herself from involvement in the matter. Both of those points are recommendations from the county council that she serves, and I ask the Minister to look into the matter. If required, I can provide more details that I choose not to make public.
  I also want to draw attention to the behaviour of the leader of the county council, Councillor Peter Clarke. In 1999, he assured me in front of a number of people that there was no intention to close special schools, but we

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  have seen the value of that promise. On 9 August, he wrote to the chairman of governors at Alderman Knight school. He said that the chairman had expressed "extreme views", but that is not true. He also said that a letter from the chairman, which was published in a local newspaper, could be construed as "agreeing to extreme measures" and possibly "incitement". That is not true—I have the letter that the chairman of governors wrote and to which Councillor Clarke referred.
  Councillor Clarke went on to say that he was taking the precaution of copying the letters to the county's legal officers, the chief constable and the editor of The Citizen, who allowed that "threat" to be published. There was no threat. What we have here is a man running scared and using legal offices paid for by the taxpayer to threaten and bully. Such behaviour is unacceptable.
  I referred earlier to the education scrutiny committee having kicked back the closure decision to the county. Councillor Clarke attended that meeting as an observer. On leaving the meeting, a number of people heard him say, "We are now going to rip apart the head teacher at Alderman Knight school in public."
  I believe that Councillor Clarke, who is a Labour councillor, has a lot to answer for, and I ask the Minister to look into that.
  For all those reasons, we are considering whether, if the closure goes through, there are grounds for a judicial review, because the process has been flawed. There are also attempts to try to prevent some of our councillors from participating in debates and voting by saying that because they have a prejudged view they are not allowed to do so. Yet the county council is apparently allowed to have a prejudged view.
  I have raised these issues before, and I am aware of the response that I am likely to get from the Minister—although he may surprise me. He will say that it is due to local decision making. However, he will know that if the county council does decide on closure and the school's organisation committee is not unanimous, the decision goes to the adjudicator. When Bownham Park at Stroud was closed, that decision did indeed go to the adjudicator, but he lived in Darlington, which is 225.1 miles away from Stroud, according to Multimap—I looked it up today. Can the Minister explain how that is local decision making and local democracy in action?
  A referendum is about to be held by Tewkesbury borough council—the Government have put that legislation in place—and we are going to raise a fighting fund to fight that referendum. I pay tribute to the chairman of governors, Dave Waters; the head, Ieuan Walsh, and his staff; Councillors Gordon Shurmer and Brian Calway; and the parents and pupils who have fought so hard to save the school. I assure the Minister and the county council that I will do everything in my power to save the school by legal and campaigning means. These children have very special needs. One can imagine the outcry if a Conservative Administration tried to close such a school.
  7.47 pm
  The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education and Skills (Mr. Stephen Twigg): I congratulate the hon. Member for Tewkesbury
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  (Mr. Robertson) on securing this important debate on the future of Alderman Knight school. I recognise the contributions and presence in the Chamber of colleagues on both sides of the House—my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud (Mr. Drew) and the hon. Members for Cotswold (Mr. Clifton-Brown) and for Witney (Mr. Cameron), who has taken up such issues in several forums in the House and outside.
  The hon. Member for Tewkesbury has taken several opportunities to raise the matter—I pay tribute to him for that—through parliamentary questions and debate in the House. This is clearly one of those opportunities. He raised two specific issues relating to the conduct of an officer and a councillor in Gloucestershire. I ask him to write to me with the full details on a confidential basis, and I will of course respond.
  There will always be debates about the pattern of school education, both special and mainstream, in localities. It is important that those debates respond to local needs and demands. Under arrangements introduced in the School Standards and Framework Act 1998, the consideration of proposals for establishing, altering or discontinuing maintained special schools are a matter for local decision making. I shall refer to those process issues again towards the end of my remarks. The decision-making structure to which the hon. Gentleman referred consists of the local education authority, a school organisation committee and an independent adjudicator to make decisions where local agreement is not possible. I appreciate the hon. Gentleman's point about the local adjudicator, but we have to have a system in which there is an ultimate decision maker, and if they were not an adjudicator, based wherever they may be based, the only alternative would be a Minister. That would be no more local than having the decision made by the adjudicator.
  Clearly, it is preferable for consensus to be reached locally, as is often the case with such matters. I hope that it will apply to the instance that we are considering. As the hon. Gentleman said, neither Ministers nor the Department for Education and Skills have the power to determine local education authorities' plans in that regard and I would argue that that is proper.
  The policy of encouraging the inclusion of children with special educational needs in mainstream schools is not new. The principle was established in the Education Act 1981 and the Education Acts 1993 and 1996 built upon it. Subsequently, the Special Educational Needs and Disability Act 2001 strengthened the right to a mainstream education for pupils with special educational needs and reinforced the Government's commitment to improving standards of achievement for all children with SEN so that they can fulfil their full potential.
  I want to emphasise that, from our point of view, inclusion is not simply about the sort of placement that children or their families are offered, but the quality of the educational experience and the extent to which children can learn, achieve and participate in the life of the school. In that context, we believe that special schools continue to have a role in the framework of inclusion, especially in providing education for pupils with severe and complex special educational needs, and working with and providing outreach support for mainstream schools. That is the basis for our policy as set out in the strategy entitled "Removing Barriers to Achievement."

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  For too long, we have had an either/or education system, whereby decisions made at one point in a child's development—either a special school or a mainstream school—stick for good. Yet what matters most is not location but the quality of the child's experience. We want not an either/or but a both/and system, whereby mainstream schools have the capacity to meet the needs of most children with SEN and special schools provide education directly for children with severe and complex needs, and, importantly, link much more closely with mainstream schools to share knowledge, expertise and pupils. In such a community of schools, it should be possible for children perhaps to start in special and move to mainstream provision and vice versa, or to move between the two according to their needs at different times.
  In other words, we want an inclusive system, whereby children with SEN have inclusive educational experiences and there is therefore greater social inclusion. We want to promote that through encouraging special schools to participate in federations, clusters and twinning arrangements. We are especially considering the opportunity that the "Building Schools for the Future" capital programme affords for bringing schools physically closer together.
  I want to put on record again that the Government continue fully to support special schools and that we envisage a continuing role for them in a continuum of inclusive education, catering for children with the most severe and complex needs and working more closely with mainstream schools to share expertise and to support all children in both settings. That support stems from the excellent work performed within the sector, such as outreach services to mainstream schools.
  We set up a working group to examine the contribution of special schools and I want to stress how much we welcome its report, which has taken the debate considerably further. I want the contribution of special schools to inclusion to be reflected clearly in the work of the SEN regional partnerships in spreading effective practice and promoting regional and local provision.
  Our strategy recognises that local authorities have a vital strategic role in planning a spectrum of provision to meet children's needs in their area. The strategy makes clear our view that authorities should take account of several considerations, one of which is that some children have such severe and complex needs that we will continue to require special provision for them.
  To emphasise that, my ministerial colleague who leads on those matters, Baroness Ashton, and Sir Jeremy Beecham of the Local Government Association, wrote recently to all LEAs setting out local and central Government's shared view of inclusion, and of the need for strategic planning for special school places. To follow that up, a number of conferences are being planned for the autumn. On supply and demand for special school places, the letter from Baroness Ashton and Sir Jeremy Beecham points out that special schools may need to be reorganised as we move to implement the SEN strategy, and in response to local demand. It will be important for elected members to provide clear leadership and to work with parents and the wider community to persuade them of the benefits of reorganisation, to allay concerns and to help them through the necessary period of transition.
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  There must be no question, however, of arbitrary decisions by LEAs to close special schools. The hon. Gentleman talked about wholesale closures, which is not the intention behind the strategy that I have set out. The LEA must go through a consultation process. He has commented on that process in his constituency this evening, reflecting his view and, I am sure, that of many of his constituents. It is important that that is a full and open consultation process, that the authority explains how interested parties can make their views known, and that it can demonstrate how it has taken into account the views expressed during consultation in reaching any subsequent decision as to the publication of proposals. Once the LEA has published its proposals, a two-month objection period will follow, during which anyone can submit formal objections to the authority. I understand that the proposals for Alderman Knight school will be published shortly.
  This evening, the hon. Gentleman has placed on record his concerns and those of his constituents, including a number of pupils at the school, and it is important that those are taken into account as the process moves forward. As he said in his speech, any formal objections must then be sent to the school organisation committee. The committee has a duty to give careful consideration to those proposals and to reach properly informed decisions, based on all the available evidence, including any objections received. If it is unable to reach a unanimous decision, the matter will at that point, as he said, pass to the independent adjudicator for a determination.
  I want to put on record that it is best for parents and others who have concerns to make their views known directly to the local education authority so that it can take them into account as it proceeds with formal consultation and the publication of statutory proposals. I realise that that response will be a surprise neither to the hon. Gentleman, in terms of the content, nor to those involved in the decision, on both sides of the discussion, at local level. I am simply setting out the long-standing policy in this regard that those matters are best determined at the local level.
  Both the hon. Gentleman and the hon. Member for Witney suggested that we consider again the pattern of what is happening. The fairest response that I can give to that this evening is that I will discuss the matter with my ministerial colleague, Baroness Ashton, who leads on these matters. What I have sought to do in my short time this evening is to set out the general approach of the Government and our view that special schools continue to have an important role to play in education. All of us, as constituency Members, will know of special schools in or close to our constituencies that provide an important education to significant numbers of children and young people. I recognise that Gloucestershire is confronting some difficult issues and has some difficult decisions to make.
  I hope that the hon. Gentleman, notwithstanding some of the concerns that he has set out, will feel that the process will at least allow those concerns to be fully reflected. Finally, I hope that today's debate in the House will contribute to that ongoing local discussion, consultation and decision making in Gloucestershire.
  Question put and agreed to.
  Adjourned accordingly at Eight o'clock.

Preamble
[MR. FRANK COOK in the Chair]

Nottingham, North (Regeneration)
Motion made, and Question proposed, That the sitting be now adjourned.—[Jim Fitzpatrick.]
9.30 am
Mr. Graham Allen: The first thing that I want to do is to pay tribute to all those involved in regeneration in Nottingham, North—we never want for effort and commitment from our community activists, full-time workers, councillors, Members of Parliament and Ministers. They and we are part of the answer, not part of the problem. I dedicate this debate to one of those selfless regenerators, Norman Allcock, the chief executive of Nottingham Business Venture, who, sadly, passed away on Friday. His sense of dedication and public service typified that of all those involved in regeneration in Nottingham. We will miss his experience and dedication.
My objective today is to draw on their and our experience, define the problems evident in the failure to regenerate Nottingham, North and come up with some possible ways ahead for the Minister and others to think about. I will hold an open discussion at the Crabtree community centre in my constituency from 10 am to 1 pm on Friday 3 December, to see whether we can take those suggestions forward, and I hope that the Minister will find time to pop along.
I have grouped the problems around some key themes, the first of which is low impact. However hard we have all tried, there is no doubt that, despite our efforts and years of generous funding, there is often little discernable impact on or sense of progress in the communities that we are trying to serve. That leads to cynicism and then distance between the regenerators and the community. Joined-up thinking must mean, above all, joining up with local people. Initiatives themselves need to join up.
Let me take housing as an example. Nottingham, North is a series of former council estates, unleavened by industry or recreation, brick-built semis described by one Home Office official as
"the most densely packed housing I've ever seen".
Residents in Nottingham, North make it clear that the quality of the environment and building out antisocial behaviour—"externals"—are at least as important as internals, such as the Government's decent homes standard, which means that 95 per cent. of spending goes into the internal appointment of houses. Unfortunately, implementing the decent homes standard is the key floor target imposed by central Government via our One City Partnership; it is the main string attached to housing funding. There used to be estate action funding, which allowed people to plan "externals" from year to year. Now we have a potpourri of different bits of funding. For many, the £5,000 per house that will come with the arm's length management organisations, welcome as it is, will not do it.
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Many identify the need for estate reconfiguration to provide security and social mix. However, there is no mechanism to do that systematically, so it can degenerate into speculative building on community assets such as parks and former school grounds, creating middle-class ghettos rather than integrated shared-ownership schemes. No one seems to know what regeneration is about any more.
What is the vision for the outer-city former council estates that feel so neglected? My constituents, with possibly the lowest educational attainment in the UK, have not read the Deputy Prime Minister's speeches, let alone examined websites or had access to them. More importantly, they do not have the feeling in their gut that all this is for them. Without people on the ground buying into a clear vision, priorities for regeneration funding are set by regeneration professionals and organisations with a vested interest. For example, a project might be funded by one type of funding and when that finishes, another source is targeted so that the project can continue. We rarely ask about the impact of a project on child road fatalities, teenage pregnancy or the reading skills of the under-fives, or of housing policy on antisocial behaviour.
One community worker told me that they had had a recent experience while action planning where it was possible to see professionals trying to put forward projects that they had an interest in rather than addressing local needs. In the urgency to show improvement we may be guilty of applying funds without fully understanding what we are trying to achieve and how.
The nature of some funding applications can be restrictive as it leaves little room for the flexibility to respond to, and grow with, acquired understanding. Outcomes have to be predicted, and we end up "bending" the monitoring and reporting to fit the funding rather than meeting a need. More local control over funding could enhance partnership and provide strategic and flexible responses, delivering regeneration that local people could see and feel, which would have a serious impact on key problems.
My second theme is the bypassing of local government. Many schemes seem to be designed to avoid giving locally elected councils the ability to spend money as they, rather than the centre or its appointees, see fit. That is partially because Whitehall, No. 10 and Ministers have less experience in local government than ever before; it is also due to past failings in local government. The Minister and I have debated the issue of independent local government, which should be able to decide for itself where its local share of the national income tax kitty should go. That is one end of the argument and is commonplace in most western democracies, but we are currently at the other extreme, where everything appears to be controlled by the centre.
All the "new localism" jargon cannot conceal the fact that the "one size almost fits all if you don't look too closely" model is in operation. That can only be ultimately resolved by constitutionally defining in writing the roles of central and local government. Until then, we will all continue to twist and wriggle around the issues, with regeneration being just one casualty of the lack of clarity.

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Despite that, the city council in Nottingham, on its own initiative and driven by two council leaders—Councillor Graham Chapman and Councillor Jon Collins—has developed nine area committees, of which three are in my constituency. They are council-led, multi-agency, and respond to the needs of two or three housing estates. Although resources are small, the early signs are good. At best, area committees are run less like council committees and are seen as a genuine forum for discussion and dialogue, although procedures in some still need to be more inclusive, informal and welcoming to the community. MPs, councillors and communities need to have genuine dialogue on the role of elected members as modern community leaders.
All nine area committee action plans are realistic and specific, and come together as one plan for the whole city. However, a lot of schemes or methods of working seem to be imposed on us by funding bodies such as the Greater Nottingham Partnership, the East Midlands Development Agency or the Learning and Skills Council, often late in the financial year when the struggle is to meet deadlines to spend money or to meet centrally set quotas. Even the pre-existing officers structure of the local council, if it is not given proper political direction, can arrest area committee development or obstruct regeneration: property professionals are the most obvious example of that.
If the Government wish to continue funding through a plethora of bodies, as a first step they could agree to fund only in support of the contents of agreed area action plans, echoing what Labour's founding fathers of planning aspired to in 1947 before bureaucracy overwhelmed town and country planning. Catching up with 1947 is not much of an ambition. Perhaps the vision needs to be not only independence for local councils, but a serious commitment in the manifestos of all parties to democratic structures at neighbourhood level, promoting the debate on what those democratic structures might be on the lower level. Come what may, helping local councils to get better without devising ever more Byzantine ways of bypassing them must be a key part of the regeneration answer that we all seek.
My next theme is confusion. I have yet to meet the Einstein who completely understands the multitude of bodies, even in Nottingham, North alone, that have direct and indirect connections with regeneration: all the funds, grants, and programmes, and all the initials and jargon. The commander of the city police tells me that he counted 36 different funding streams before he gave up. I spent the whole of last summer trying to come to terms with that and still do not feel confident about it, so how can one of my constituents grapple with it?
On structures, schemes overlap and reproduce rather than complement. Greater shared understanding would help to focus genuine partnership funding, planning and application. At the moment, too many partnerships are pulling in different directions on the same agenda. We need one integrated model that defines responsibilities and relationships between the people, local agencies and the big spenders of the Learning and Skills Council, the East Midlands Development Agency, the Government
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office for the east midlands and the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, as well as local government. We operate within an environment of vague awareness rather than understanding. A high-level agreement between partnerships contributing to a single shared strategy would help. As professionals, we can all get caught up in blaming the partnership that we least understand.
Millions of pounds could be redirected by reducing duplication and reinvesting in delivering a service—for example, returning park keepers, and localising street cleaners and youth workers to do a job with just one set of targets and performance measurement and one clear line of account that hard-wires straight back into the community.
Again, I have spent hours trying to track the labyrinthine lines of account for various funds and if I do not understand it, how can my average constituent? Despite the best efforts of the excellent, high-quality people involved, I am still not really clear about why the functions provided through local learning partnerships have a line of account through, I think, Greater Nottingham learning partnership, the Greater Nottingham Partnership, and the framework for regional employment and skills action, finishing at the East Midlands Development Agency. Can hon. Members follow that? For that one example there are dozens more.
At regional level, our Government office might well be better co-ordinated with the regional development agency were it to be united under effective regional government. It is a shame that, eight years after our 1997 victory, coherent regional government is still not even a prospect in my region; we suffer the consequences daily. What should localities expect of the regional level? A tour of my patch by the dynamic chair of the East Midlands Development Agency resulted in a welcome yet unsustained burst of activity, yet a local school that ambitiously engaged an international motor company in the provision of further education on its site feels let down and unsupported by the region and makes progress only by using personal networks, including my and other people's good offices, rather than such matters being delivered because the structure is right.
Similarly, at local level, do we want just one funding stream or one spending body that everyone understands and can go to? If so, which? Should the social spending of One City Partnership for Nottingham amalgamate with the economic spending in the Greater Nottingham Partnership, or should both be subsumed within the city council and its area committees or, perhaps, an all-encompassing regeneration board, partly or wholly owned by local government and the various agencies. If that were to be the case, should the city boundary itself be redrawn to encompass the real Nottingham—the wider Greater Nottingham? At community level, should Nottingham, North's three area committees and its three partnership arrangements consider unifying in some way that does not result in some financial forfeit or the loss of the experience of the very good people who work within those arrangements?
One of the advantages of preparing and researching a speech of this length is that it is an interesting learning curve. I discovered on Friday that the Government are

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to pilot some amalgamations of funding streams in their local area agreements. No doubt the Minister will talk about that at greater length. I do not wish to be unkind, but allowing one of those per region displays neither the urgency nor the radicalism needed. I am sure that the Minister will correct me if I have misrepresented the Government's view.
I am also conscious of the irony that to correct the structural problems—one of which is interference from the centre—I must provoke yet another intervention from the centre. Frankly, it requires the brute force of the centre to cut some of the Gordian knots that we locals can only pick away at unsuccessfully.
In planning and the confusion of planning, area coordinators, local councillors and others often feel that they cannot influence regeneration funding. They sometimes feel consulted only when someone else has taken the decisions. The recent action planning for our area committees for neighbourhood renewal funding was a welcome break from that. However, I understand that, in achieving that break, many enemies were made, both in city council departments and in external organisations, which assumed that they would get the resources that ultimately went to the localities through the area planning process.
One funding stream or spending body may be out of immediate reach, but shared understanding should not be. Perhaps the different models tend to generate professional competitiveness about funding and claims to success. A single, inclusive regeneration strategy could identify partners and responsibilities with far greater clarity and could identify shared priorities in themes such as education inclusion and crime reduction.
Unusually, Nottingham, North is also amenable to a constituency-based solution, as it encompasses seven homogeneous former council estates with identical problems from one end to the other. Not many Members of Parliament have that level of sameness in a constituency. Perhaps the situation lends itself to a constituency-based answer. In Nottingham, North we could have a local regeneration board to replace the Greater Nottingham Partnership, the One City Partnership, the local learning partnerships and so on. It could work with the East Midlands Development Agency, the Government office for the east midlands and the city council.
At constituency level, issues could be addressed estate by estate, feeding into the three area committees and the one strategy and bringing together multi-agency groups to link education, law and order, environment and culture for one area. They could be given a recognisable and accessible public face—perhaps, God forbid, even giving Members of Parliament a formal role.
All those ideas may reveal my lack of knowledge about the work of existing structures and groups and may offend some people. That is not my intention, but it is not in doubt that the system is not working for those it was created to serve.
My next theme is lack of local involvement. Regeneration is "done to" Nottingham, North partly because of weak community networks and partly because of professionals with their own, mostly well-intended, agendas—although some plunder regeneration budgets cynically to resource their
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organisation's spending plans. Notoriously, regeneration moneys do not stick but flow out of the community unless it deliberately grips and roots them.
Similarly, there is a need for consistency and long-term involvement of key staff. Constant moving on undermines organisational knowledge and the perception of a real personal commitment. Beat officer policing is a classic example. I was in Holland last week. There, a beat officer contracts to an area for a minimum of four years. Having fought to retain beat officers in my own constituency, at one point I had six vacancies out of 16 beat officer posts.
Area co-ordinators move on, as do housing officers, yet we expect constituents and the public somehow to keep a grip of all those movements and to make progress as well. The personnel and career structures of all our local organisations must take account of, and attack, that problem, and give local workers and community workers—I include beat officers, probation officers and others—the merit, prestige and recognition that they deserve, rather than putting them at the bottom of the pecking order, as often happens.
Even a measure such as changing Sure Start into children's centres undoes continuity and undermines the word of mouth so vital for that client group. That is not to mention the fog of initials and jargon that conceals regeneration from all but the in-crowd. Everyone knows the NHS, but instead of referring to the local health service, we have PCT. Hardly a soul on the ground in our constituencies knows what a PCT—primary care trust—is. Instead of parents knowing the class that their kids are in by how old they are, we have year 1 and year 2, key stage 1 and key stage 2. Thankfully, getting the LAC's or PCSO's MO on NIM is always straightforward.
All of that comes under the heading of social capital, or capacity building. Social capital is central to local ownership of problems and solutions; there is a need to integrate it into one agreed community strategy, and into the way in which agencies deliver services to increase resident ownership of services and outcomes. Social capital means giving people the capacity to work out their own answers—which includes tenants' associations and neighbourhood watches, as well as having a healthy infrastructure of political parties and community activism. When local forums cannot get enough people to set up a committee or to sign off a set of partnership trust accounts, when political parties do not have a viable branch network and when witnesses do not have a greater mass than criminals, we do not have social capital and we can say that regeneration is not succeeding.
The new deal for communities programme in Nottingham did not cover my constituency, but I am told that it demonstrated that we cannot pluck people out of the community and expect them to be fully fledged board members the next day. Leadership and commitment do not just fall from a Christmas tree. So how do we build local community capacity, to control and direct money meant for local regeneration? Rather than delivering a package of help that conforms to national norms, local capacity has to be built by enabling communities. Can we train local people in the skills and knowledge to lead regeneration themselves?

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There is no serious capacity programme in my area. By serious, I mean three things. The first relates to scale. We need enough people being trained and recruited to make an impact—a minimum of 20 a year. There are several existing models to which the Minister could refer for such schemes, including those in Sheffield and Coventry. Any such programme must be long term, not least because of Nottingham, North's position as an educational blackspot. We need efforts to be sustained if we are to build capacity. The second aspect is content. We must give people graduate-level thinking and analytical skills relating to all the domains of regeneration—health, education, employment, community safety, housing and the environment—coupled with project management skills locally. For example, we could link architects' departments at our local universities with local communities to help their design schemes. That would benefit students and local people alike.
Thirdly, we need follow-through. A programme must lead to appropriate-level jobs in the regeneration industry, and existing agencies should commit to employing graduates of the programme. The model is an apprenticeship programme. For example, local Sure Starts are already starting to use local mums to work in the new Sure Starts that are coming on stream now. Such a programme is not cheap. The jobs must pay a wage that includes child care and housing costs. However, that is cheaper than failed regeneration programmes. A similar model is being piloted by the new deal for communities, and it would be helpful if the Minister would consider such an approach for Nottingham, North.
My next theme is the need to communicate what is being done. Ordinary people in Nottingham, North do not have a clue what is being spent on regeneration, why or by whom. Current poor practice demonstrates the need to get the basic structure right before moving forward. If we tried to communicate to ordinary people what is being spent, why and by whom, I am sure that we would serve to confuse and disappoint. The way that people have to monitor and report their work for Government purposes does not lend itself to telling real people what is actually going on. I am talking about the target-led, jargonised reporting back that we insist that our professionals undertake—sometimes for good reasons. However, we should let the communities help to set the measures of success, and then they will be keener to monitor progress and able to understand what is going on in their name.
We are in a state in which professionals and volunteers do not know what is being spent, why or by whom. To try to explain this more widely would not achieve any clarity at present. We do not yet have a shared understanding of the players in the ball park and what positions they play, but more players are being introduced as we speak. We produce many lengthy documents and excuse ourselves by saying that that serves as communication. Let us stop turning out documents that we do not have time to read, and start communicating. An immediate aim should be to produce a structure that identifies and maps all those involved in regeneration, at different layers of authority, and their contribution. That could be shared and honed by e-mail. We should then seek to identify and formalise
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communication routes between those involved: for example, there could be a single meeting structure rather than duplicate meetings.
It would be useful to attempt honestly to review the current structure and be brave enough to admit where it is not helping, rather than to forge on without a clear strategy. In education, for example, what is the relationship between local learning partnerships and area committees, between the Greater Nottingham Partnership and the One City Partnership Nottingham, and between Connexions and Aimhigher and local schools? I hear reports of Greater Nottingham Partnership meetings and One City Partnership Nottingham meetings and I try to spot the difference. Responsibility is increasingly difficult to recognise.
So, who would be able to draw up a new structure? Perhaps the local conversation in December that I have initiated could be a starting point for review and responsibility allocation. If so, it would need to be attended by all those with authority to agree change or propose it to Ministers. If no one else will, I suppose I will organise an annual regeneration conference in Nottingham North, at which players will stocktake and make further concrete proposals for reform.
However, basic workable structures are not going to be produced by entrepreneurial MPs. They should be the conscious product of that fount of all funding and source of all schemes: the Government, who need to become sensitive enough to get the best out of the localities and authoritative enough to cleave through the sclerotic duplication and vested interest that they have allowed to develop.
My next theme is the withdrawal of public services from the front line. On the one hand, Government regeneration tries to build up localities, yet on the other hand, Government mainstream services flee the outer city. In Nottingham, North post offices close, probation offices have been relocated away from clients, and local further education sites are sold or invested in for non-locals. We had to fight to regain local policing. The health authority headquarters has moved out of our constituency—the last Nottingham-wide headquarters to leave Nottingham, North. The agendas are contradictory and appear self-defeating to local people.
At local level, decisions driven by central budget controls and officers who rarely venture into my constituency can also mean that social infrastructure is stripped out, aggravating long-term degeneration. For example, park keepers' jobs are done away with to save money, but park keepers are soon to be replaced by antisocial behaviour teams. Rent increases for local football teams and bowls clubs drive them out of existence so more has to be spent on removing graffiti sprayed by bored youths and providing extra care for elderly people who have been made more housebound. Bulwell youth club is now open only one night a week, but the saving is tiny compared with the cost of providing the neighbourhood wardens needed to help police youth dispersal orders in the area. Instead of being in youth clubs, kids are standing on street corners.
Yes, we need centrally based specialists in our cities, but cost-cutting has swung the pendulum too far. As far as logistically possible, we need to return to services that are based at the sub-city level so that we can reach

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appropriate agreements with service deliverers on the ground, such as the police and local authorities. We should then let the area committee measure performance and set targets.
Immense local efforts can be blown away by insensitive mainstream decisions. I put massive energy and hours into creating the post of an education champion for Nottingham, North and I do not begrudge any of that, but such initiatives can be dwarfed by a local further education college's decision to close one of its sites in an educationally deprived area or by a learning and skills council's decision to put millions of pounds into the only sixth-form college in my area, when there was no further education provision to attract local youngsters in addition to youngsters from outside.
I have spent three years trying to make FE provision on school sites a mainstream activity, and that is essential in Nottingham, North's circumstances. However, such initiatives do not fit with national norms, including the provision that one organisation should not receive 14–19 capital funding, so they are alien to the centralised target culture and tremendously difficult to achieve. Meanwhile, every June, we flush 1,000 kids out of school at 16.
Equally, and staying with education, all the Aimhighers and learning partnerships cannot hope to have an impact as long as the low "prior attainment" of Nottingham, North's 16-year-olds is not attacked by means of adequate disadvantage uplift funds. Currently, the distribution of those funds disincentivises local FE colleges from undertaking their educational mission. For all the talk of joined-up thinking, there is no question but that central and even local government mainstream policies often produce degeneration, not regeneration, and turn regeneration into an essentially remedial, rather than proactive, instrument.
My next theme is sustainable funding. Many excellent schemes have time-limited funding, resulting in employees spending much of their time trying to botch together new funding to keep themselves afloat, rather than doing the job required. Good projects often disappear when funding runs out. The problem is especially chronic in voluntary and community organisations, which will always be better than anyone else at reaching the most difficult client groups. As the patron of the Bulwell toy library, which gets toys to poorer families, I have kept our workers only by cobbling together bits of funding from—this is not the full list—the county council, the primary care trust, Sure Start, the single regeneration budget, the education action zone, the health action zone, Children in Need, the children's fund, the local network fund and the city council.
Of course, there will never be the resources to pick up everything supported by short-term funds within core budgets, but we must get better at identifying and learning from what has been done differently and at integrating the lessons into mainstream service delivery. We need far more effective evaluation and reporting on activity, and fewer free-standing, short-term initiatives running parallel to mainstream services. Any short-term projects must be designed honestly and planned as short-term projects, not designed in the hope that someone will come along to pick up the tab later. We need fewer high-profile, short-term initiatives launched
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out of No. 10 and the Departments, fewer bandwagons and fewer people trying to make their name. In their place, we need more local direction and involvement, and more consistency.
What makes a difference may not be fashionable, and it probably will not make a difference next week. Good, caring family support, parenting skills, child protection, long-term development work with young people, and putting the teaching of social behaviour alongside literacy and numeracy at the heart of the national curriculum should all be fundamental to local and national budgets, not the province of pilots, initiatives and one-offs.
In the broader context, inappropriate central government funding formulas dwarf the tiny amounts given in benign grants. For example, the funding formula in the NHS gives wealthy Rushcliffe in Nottinghamshire £8 million too much and the deprived city of Nottingham £7 million too little. That cannot be balanced by spending the odd few grand on smoking campaigns, healthy eating or photo opportunities for local MPs. As with many of the other themes that I have outlined, what is needed in sustainable funding is a lot more clarity and honesty about the rules and expectations. Even knowing where we are will produce the certainty and consensus that are regeneration's greatest allies.
My last theme is central skew. Central bright ideas, pet schemes and irrelevant targets for local circumstances often skew local priorities. Civil servants sometimes try to keep Ministers quiet by offering them their little schemes. The Under-Secretary of State for Education and Skills, my hon. Friend the Member for Bury, South (Mr. Lewis), for whom I have great respect, was as excited as I was about the concept of local learning communities—bringing granddad and grandma into the educational family. What the scheme boiled down to, however, was the estate in my constituency benefiting to the tune of a couple of thousand pounds. Local needs have to be squeezed into central criteria in order to qualify for largesse. Recently, our choice in Nottingham was not between trams and buses, but between trams and no trams. At the same time, local bus services for our immobile elderly communities were reduced.
How can we regenerate locally? I shuddered when the Prime Minister reacted to an increase in muggings with the street crime initiative, which sucked police officers out of my outer constituency to stand, at double time of course, on inner-city street corners and produced a massive rise in burglaries and car crime in Nottingham, North. There is little point in stating the intention to respond to local priorities but then cutting local government out of the equation and imposing centrally determined targets that may or may not relate to local needs. For example, focusing on five grade A to C GCSEs to the exclusion of all else promotes, in my patch, a tiny number of youngsters whose educational profile is like that of Ministers' families, but marginalises the majority of kids, who could be helped to get the "prior attainment" that I mentioned in order to better themselves in vocational training.
One example of the problem is the inability of the NHS to negotiate local health targets—in Sure Start work, healthy living centres, early intervention by district nursing, and health visiting for families that may

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become a problem in later years—because it spends so much time and community health resources helping hospitals to reach their national targets, but without having any extra money to do so.
Another pernicious example of central skew, via the targeting culture, is the difficulty in justifying pre-emption or preventive measures, where outcomes are hard to measure. For example, despite the low level of confidence in the criminal justice system in Nottinghamshire, its most popular face locally—the drug abuse resistance education programme—is unfunded by the centre because it catches no burglars. Programmes to get out into crime-ridden estates to explain witness support, crime prevention, and the role of the police and courts are subject to institutional pass-the-parcel, because reinforcing social behaviour cannot be bean-counted.
Schemes to get young offenders to do good works at the direct request of the community are regenerative at so many levels, but there are no brownie points there. In the target culture, no brownie points means no action if other priorities dictated from the centre have to be met. Capacity building, confidence building and regenerating in such a scoring system become difficult, if not impossible.
Regeneration in Nottingham, North is underachieving. It is being frustrated, but not by a lack of the right people. As I said, well-meaning, energetic, dedicated community workers, councillors and activists, and Ministers, Members of Parliament and others are involved. The problem does not lie there but in the profusion of schemes and programmes that are largely beyond the control or comprehension of local people. Although each of the programmes is well intentioned and many produce successful outcomes, taken together they give maximum scope for central Government and regeneration professionals to impose their objectives on local communities. Put simply, too many things are happening in Nottingham, North because someone had the money to make them happen, and too many things are not happening because the money, direction and structure are not there.
Making regeneration work will mean getting it right at the strategic, management and operational levels, then pushing forward local ownership and embedding it so that it is sustainable. That begins with trust—not treating Nottingham, North as some colonial outpost but trusting local people to define what regeneration means to them and training them, and enabling local structures, especially elected local government, to deliver it. Then we would be doing something worthy of the great people who work in regeneration at all levels in Nottingham, North and doing something for my constituents, who need and deserve better.
10.12 am
Matthew Green: May I begin by congratulating the hon. Member for Nottingham, North (Mr. Allen) on his excellent speech? He clearly outlined many of the problems faced in attempting regeneration in his constituency. Although his constituency provides excellent examples of the difficulties that are faced by Government, and the
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Government's failure to find solutions to them, the problems go far beyond Nottingham, North. It is tempting to come back after the recess and put the boot into the Government, but I do not intend to do that; nor do I think that the hon. Gentleman intended to do that. I sensed that his speech was made more in sorrow than in anger.
The problems are not necessarily of the Government's making. Some are long-term problems that have existed under many Governments. The difficulty for this Government is that they have not yet come up with solutions. Indeed, no Government have come up with effective solutions. The hon. Gentleman touched on many of the reasons why attempts at regeneration have not worked. I wish to draw on a few of his comments and offer some suggestions of my own. I welcome the positive new ideas that he put forward. I shall reiterate a couple of them and throw in a few more on top.
Clearly, housing is a major issue in Nottingham, North but, in terms of regeneration, it is also an issue in large parts of the country elsewhere. The hon. Gentleman was absolutely right to point out that antisocial behaviour is not being designed out of our communities. There is very little funding for that. As he said, all the money is being spent on the inside of the house rather than the outside. The Government's approach to antisocial behaviour is rather like sticking-plaster. They try to deal with problems afterwards, rather than come up with preventive measures such as designing out antisocial behaviour and providing funding for that. Draconian antisocial behaviour Bills are introduced to tackle the problem after it has arisen. That approach sums up too many of the Government's failures in regard to regeneration.
It is easy to see why this happens: young people causing problems make headlines in local papers, and Ministers come under pressure to deal with the situation. To be seen to be dealing with the situation means producing a Bill that says, "We are going to stamp down harder on this," because that gets the press back on to the other side and makes it look as though the Government are doing something. Frankly, many of the real long-term solutions do not attract that sort of publicity and do not get the headlines. Consequently, there is a great temptation when in government to adopt the easy, sticking-plaster approach. I can see why that happens, but it is a strong and brave Government who actually face up to the problem and put money into dealing with fundamental issues such as youth provision.
We have heard about the running-down—that is the best way of putting it—of youth provision in Nottingham, North, which has been mirrored in other parts of the country. Often, the only time that we have new youth provision is when the funds come from the Home Office in an attempt—again, rather like using sticking-plaster—to keep young people busy during the school holidays because that cuts crime. Why are we not increasing spending on youth provision in order to benefit young people, rather than simply the rest of the community, which seems to be the only reason why the funding is made available?
There are far too many central Government targets, which are the source of outputs. I know only too well that projects are made to fit the funding package, rather than the funding package being made available to suit

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the local project. Just to step outside Nottingham, North for a second, we saw that with the market towns initiative, which was led by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and the Countryside Agency, and originally involved social as well as economic outcomes. They ran out of money for it and, in the west midlands at least, it was taken over by Advantage West Midlands, which is, of course, funded by the Department of Trade and Industry. The DTI wants only economic outputs and jobs, which means that market towns initiative projects are possible only if they create jobs. The number of jobs that will be created has to be calculated in order to secure the funding. It is a centrally driven target for which boxes can be ticked all the way up and some kind of table can be filled in so that a Minister can stand up and say, "X is the figure that we arrived at." What that actually means, however, is that the projects do not fit on the ground. The Government's belief that they must run their initiatives in that way shows a failure of trust in local people and local bodies.
The hon. Member for Nottingham, North mentioned area committees of councils, and I am delighted that he did so as I am a great believer in them. They can be a very effective way of making progress and of involving the local community much more directly in council decisions. Councils that have set their heart against area committees should reconsider them, because they are a very good way of involving the community.
Too many organisations deal with regeneration, and they tend to encounter two problems in particular. One of the problems, as we saw with many of the area-based initiatives such as the new deal for communities, is a very high administration cost. The body dealing with a new initiative has to be set up afresh each time, which costs quite considerable sums of money. On average, about 10 per cent. of the total funds for the new deal for communities initiative was spent on administration. Instead of using existing structures such as the local council, a new layer of organisation is created, new people are recruited, and the body is disbanded after a couple of years.
Secondly, centrally driven projects have also had a problem with underspend. There has been quite significant underspend on some of these projects in the past few years because of the assumption that the money will filter through if a project is announced and a new tier is set up. Surprisingly, however, certainly in the first couple of years of most initiatives, the infrastructure is not in place and the money does not get through. All that happens is that the Treasury banks it and the Chancellor announces that he has more money to play with than he thought he had last year. What has happened, in fact, is that he has banked some of the underspend from many projects. That, of course, leads to cynicism, because people believe that something will happen when an announcement is made, but the money does not filter through and does not even get spent.
The hon. Member for Nottingham, North also raised the issue of regional government. He is absolutely right that we need an effective regional tier, but an effective regional tier must go further than the Government's proposals. There is a lot of sympathy among Ministers in the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister for enhancing regional government, but they are fighting other Departments that do not want to hand over some of
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their pet projects to regional government. The enthusiasm in the ODPM must win through; we need the Deputy Prime Minister to act like a Deputy Prime Minister, use some muscle against other Departments and win some projects for regional government. Regional development agencies need to come under regional government and not just sit alongside it. It is astounding that we aim to establish regional governments, but that the RDAs will only sit alongside them. The Learning and Skills Council, which is now regionalised, should also come under their remit.
I imagine that getting the Department of Trade and Industry and the Department for Education and Skills to agree to these things is rather difficult for the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister. That is one of the problems that the Government face, and it is why they are hitting brick walls on their route to regional government. If they saw fit to go for it wholeheartedly, they would win much more public support and would not have to back out in their push forward.
The hon. Member for Nottingham, North made an interesting suggestion about the role of MPs. I agree with him entirely. Unless I actively sought to involve myself in such matters, I would never become involved in them. All that would happen is that my constituents would complain to me about them. Yet, we are the people who are most easily accessible to the Government and who invented the schemes in the first place. The assumption is that MPs do not want to be involved, but many of us want to engage more formally with regeneration efforts in our constituencies, and it is a failing of the system that some of the people with the greatest access to resources and the most influence in an area are the least involved unless they set out to be so.
Too many projects last for just a short period. That is not a failing of this Government, but a failing of Governments for generations. A project is announced, it lasts for about three years, then it is scrapped or repackaged with a new name, and the money is announced as if it were new, fresh money when it is in fact the old money under a new name. Somehow that is seen as moving the process along. We heard the excellent example of Sure Start, which many have begun to understand as a label, but which is being replaced by children's centres. We see schemes repackaged and relabelled all the time. That may give the impression that Ministers are doing something, but it leads to confusion on the ground and a long-term lack of confidence in the Government's ability to deliver regeneration.
I will end on the issue of trusting local communities. If central Government really trusted local communities such as Nottingham, North, they would trust local councils. Successive Governments—not just this Government—have failed to trust local councils and have taken power away from them. As a result, some of the best people do not seek election to councils, because they cannot change things, and there is a downward spiral in the abilities of councillors—and perhaps even the officers, as some of the most capable go off to work for regional development agencies and quangos.
The Government put sticking-plaster over the problems and put money into improving the leadership skills of councillors, which is welcome, but they must turn things around by trusting councils to deliver. It is clear that the Government trust their own, rather than the local electorate's ability to pick individuals to run

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schemes. That is a damning indictment, because they are failing to trust not only local councils but local people. Local people know best what the problems are. They might not have the solutions, but they can elect the people to run the projects that will provide the solutions from elsewhere. The most damning example of the lack of trust is capping, and Nottingham is one local authority that has been capped. It has been told that it was just under £200,000 over budget, and it will now have to spend about £250,000 to re-bill to make that £180,000 saving. It is perhaps the worst recent example of how the Government do not trust the people of Nottingham to run their own affairs. If the Government had any sense, they would get off the backs of the people of Nottingham, give power back to them and let them run the schemes, providing the money through a source such as the council, which is probably best placed to understand local needs.
10.25 am
Mr. Robert Syms: I should first like to declare an interest as a director of a property company with interests in the building industry. It may not be relevant, but it is best to be certain these days.
I congratulate the hon. Member for Nottingham, North (Mr. Allen) on a comprehensive and wide-ranging speech. There is little that I can say to add to the hon. Gentleman's knowledge and passion in representing his constituents. He has done them a great service today. He raised a lot of important issues and, more importantly and unusually for a Member of Parliament, he has come forward with several solutions. That means that the Minister will have a more difficult job, in that if he has sufficient time—and I aim to give him that—he will have to respond to those ideas.
We all know the difficulties of regeneration and the long-term problems that many communities have faced. Recent trends have shown that many of our proud provincial cities have been undergoing a renaissance, especially in their centres, whether that involves coffee bars, wine bars, gentrification or new build. However, there is a problem with many of the large, peripheral estates, which feel that they are not at the centre of regeneration in communities. Nottingham, North is one example, as the hon. Gentleman has illustrated.
The hon. Gentleman set out a theme with which I wholly agree. Indeed, there was not much that I disagreed with in his speech. I thought "Thank God" when he mentioned regional government, because there was a difference between us on that topic. The problem is that there are lots of schemes—we all know that Governments love to make announcements about what they are doing—and lots of funding sources. The hon. Gentleman referred to the police officer mentioning 36 different funding schemes, and the situation is extremely complex, even for Members of Parliament and Front-Bench spokesmen, to understand. If the various Front Benchers did a knowledge test on regeneration schemes, I do not think that we would get many marks. The Minister may comment later about how experienced he is with the schemes.
I thank the hon. Member for Nottingham, North for giving me a copy of his speech before the debate. I had wondered what, in a debate that is so specific, one could
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pick up on, but thank God for the worldwide web, as www.nottinghamcvs.co.uk gave me a flavour of what is going on.
These are a few of the schemes having an impact in Nottingham: the single regeneration budget challenge fund round 2: the "Capturing the Dynamics" Greater Nottingham Partnership regeneration scheme; the SRB challenge fund round 3: the "Secure in the Meadows" GNP regeneration programme; the SRB challenge fund round 4: the "Lifelong Success" GNP regeneration programme; the SRB challenge fund round 5: the "Connecting Communities" GNP regeneration programme; and the SRB challenge fund round 6: another GNP regeneration programme. There is also: regional selective assistance; Sure Start north-west Nottingham; Nottingham education action zone; Nobel Road home zone; urban management areas; healthy living centres; Nottingham health action zone; the social action research project; the new deal for communities, which the hon. Gentleman was disappointed was not having an impact in his constituency; Nottingham links; the European Community objective 2 programme for the east midlands; the European social fund objective 3 programme; community safety/crime reduction; the "Phase Ten" regeneration scheme; Sure Start St. Ann's; and the communities against drugs initiative.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister: I think that's fantastic.
Mr. Syms:I would say to the Minister that there is common ground in this matter and that we all want to help and to do things better. However, if the system becomes so complex, and if those running the schemes have to spend most of their time looking for sources of money and trying to fit their programmes to the objectives that the Government have set, I can understand why local communities become slightly bewildered, and I am not sure that, on the ground, it achieves what it is supposed to.
The hon. Member for Nottingham, North made a good point about the conflict between the priorities of the Government and those of the community. We sometimes see that happening in local government, when performance indicators are set by national Government, whose indicators of what is important may not be important for local authorities. The authorities and their communities may have very different objectives. It would be interesting to know, when we are considering the schemes in Nottingham, how many of the people who work in regeneration live in the hon. Gentleman's constituency or, indeed, in Nottingham. If they do not, they might not be as plugged in to the community. The same is often true of senior officers in local authorities.
The hon. Gentleman has been a marvellous community advocate today. However, I believe that the Government should spend money on training people in such communities to put forward the objectives that they want. Quite often the people who represent those communities are not the most articulate, but given a little training and a bit of confidence, their ability to articulate their priorities would be far better.
Moreover, as we heard earlier in the debate, the fact that all the money comes from the centre skews priorities. Perhaps we should be considering

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endowments for the schemes, so that local schemes could have a bit of local money that they could contribute to projects or to match funding. That would be important in giving more independence to local regeneration schemes, and would make local people feel that they had a little bit of money to bring to the table, even if they were still relying predominantly on national funding.
I agree with the hon. Gentleman that one size does not fit all. There are different problems, and communities may have different priorities from those of the Government, so a more flexible and long-term approach is needed. The improvement of any of those communities will take place over a long cycle, so work will be needed to set the priorities under this Government, the next Government and probably the one after that. It is important that we find agreement on this issue across the political spectrum so that, when Governments change, things do not necessarily go topsy-turvy, with schemes being withdrawn or rapid changes taking place.
I thought that the hon. Gentleman was extremely deft when he talked about capping—
Mr. Allen: I did not talk about capping.
Mr. Syms: Well, the hon. Gentleman talked about the independence of local government, which I read to be about capping. He made the important point that the Government are focusing a great deal of initiative and money on that area, but that other Government policies—post office closures and the closure of probation offices, for example—also have an impact that could have the opposite effect on the community.
It is important to have a proud local authority—the Audit Commission said that Nottingham was a fair authority in terms of its performance—involved in what is going on in its communities. I was interested that the hon. Gentleman mentioned the area schemes that have been set up. I think that the hon. Member for Ludlow (Matthew Green) said that the Government's capping proposals have an impact only because they think that the authority has overspent by £180,000 and that the costs of re-billing, if that is what eventually happens, may be substantially in excess of that figure. The Government are sending out mixed messages, and should sort themselves out on this issue. As the hon. Gentleman mentioned, communication is very important.
Many important points have been made, to which I hope that the Minister will respond.
Matthew Green: Does the hon. Gentleman support the capping of Nottingham city council? I understand that the local Conservative group does. Given his comments, I would be intrigued to know.
Mr. Syms: No, I do not. I do not believe that the Government should cap. We are a broad and large party, and I see no conflict between my views in Westminster and those of local authority councillors. To presume that everyone must agree with everyone else in the Conservative party is a very "old politics" way of looking at things.
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The important point is that we have to work out what the cost of failure would be. If we consider family breakups, crime, and the impact that poor housing has on health, the cost of failure is unthinkable for the country and its communities. That means that we must do our best to turn those communities round, to build on what is best, and to give people the best opportunities that we can.
The general theme of the debate is that there are probably too many schemes, too many funding streams and too much complication. Simplification is needed—perhaps an audit of the schemes' effectiveness—in order to reduce the number of schemes and funding streams and to give more local flexibility.
10.35 am
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister: I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham, North (Mr. Allen) on securing the debate. I believe it is unique to have an Adjournment debate for an hour and a half on an individual constituency. My hon. Friend deserves great credit for having achieved that, and for taking the opportunity to act as an advocate for his constituents and to express their needs and concerns in his characteristically robust and analytical style, with his usual common-sense and plain-speaking approach. His constituents look to him to represent their interests in Parliament and he has done a good job of doing so this morning.
I will not necessarily agree with everything that my hon. Friend says; I hope to answer many of the points he raised because, like other hon. Members, he circulated copies of what he would say in advance. I will not respond to his speech blow by blow, but I will try to pick up some of his themes.
The debate has provided some good quality time to consider major issues, which affect not only Nottingham, North. As the hon. Member for Ludlow (Matthew Green) said, many of the issues that my hon. Friend raised apply in other parts of the country too, and we need to acknowledge that and to address those matters. The hon. Member for Ludlow mentioned the market towns initiative and issues that affect rural areas. Nottingham, North is, of course, largely urban and densely populated, but some of the issues affect urban and rural areas.
I shall address the concerns raised and talk about what the Government are doing to tackle the problems and issues in Nottingham, North. At the heart of my response is a theme that I want to emphasise, and it echoes my hon. Friend's theme: it is important to make progress, get improvement on the ground and support the funding streams mentioned in the debate and the sources of cash for areas such as Nottingham, North, but significant improvements can be made only if all the partners in those communities are willing to work together to resolve the deep-seated, long-term problems. By "partners" I mean not only the official bodies—the local authority, the police, the health authorities and so on—but the communities themselves, the tenants' and residents' representatives, the community workers, the volunteers and the many people who live and work in the constituency, those who grew up there, people of all ages who can work together as partners. There are

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complex problems and I was pleased that my hon. Friend paid tribute to all the people who contribute to helping to solve them.
My hon. Friend generously dedicated the debate to one of his constituents, Norman Allcock, who played a key role. That reflects the truism that regeneration and improvement are possible only if local people in local areas take part in the change and own it, and do not have change imposed from above. As my hon. Friend said, simply imposing change from above will not necessarily be sustained; it can achieve many things, but real, sustainable change comes when local people and their local authority work in partnership with regional and central Government.
As my hon. Friend said, too, many players are involved—local authorities, the police, the health service, Government Departments and many others. The challenge is finding a way to get the structures and the processes right to engage them effectively at local level. I am especially pleased that my hon. Friend mentioned his December meeting to bring all the partners in his constituency together, and to say, "Look, all of you have a role to play. All of you are doing things and playing your part. Can we do it better, by co-ordinating matters and working together?" I thank my hon. Friend for his invitation to attend. I cannot say yes or no—my diary secretary always goes crackers when I say yes to anybody immediately without checking that I can be there—but I will certainly consider it. If I cannot come, I can at least tell him that officials in my Department are keen to be involved with him on that initiative. I shall say more on this subject later, but there are concerns, certainly in the Government office, about how to join the various funding streams at a local level and how to get the right structures in place.
We have a close interest in ensuring that floor targets are delivered. The hon. Member for Ludlow made a point about the feeling that there is a top-down approach. The use of floor targets—that is to say that no part of the country should fall below a particular level of achievement or outcome for its residents—sounds like a top-down approach but is actually bottom-up. It actually means that nobody, no matter where they live or what local decisions are made, should suffer below a certain level. We should not allow people to fall through the holes in a floor to experience poverty, deprivation and disadvantage, and we need floor targets to prevent that. Of course we want people to do better than the floor targets, which is where local effort and partnership working comes in, but that minimum is set so that a local authority of any hue cannot abandon a community. No authority, whether it be a local police force or a health authority, should be able to walk away and say that it does not care. Authorities have to care, because there is a basic floor target.
We can debate how many floor targets we have and what they are, but the principle is not about a top-down approach; it is about a fundamental right to achievement and success for people across the country. I think that my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham, North would agree that that is the right way to proceed. The question is how to ensure that we have the right floor targets and that they can be built on as a trampoline for achievement and future progress.
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The hon. Member for Poole (Mr. Syms) listed, in his brief contribution, the many funding opportunities and resources going into Nottingham, North, which I had not done before. I think that he was being critical, but I suggest that instead of "University Challenge", a regeneration challenge would be an interesting game to play to see how those things work together. There are many sources, and we might need to consider how to resolve some of the complexities, but we should not take resources away from a constituency such as Nottingham, North. It is not an issue of cutting resources going into an area, but of managing them more effectively.
This has not been a party political debate but you will forgive me, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for pulling out the point that resources allocated to local government since 1997 have increased by 30 per cent. in real terms, compared with a 7 per cent. cut in resources during the four years of the previous Administration. Also, we have pledged to increase resources given to local government by about 2.7 per cent. a year in real terms over the next spending period—compared with a cash freeze. The people of Nottingham, North communities will be able to make their own choices, faced with the contrast of a history of growth and investment versus cuts, and pledges of growth and investment versus pledges of cuts. That is the only party political point that I shall make, but it is important given the criticisms that we have heard about how we deliver resources, structure and funding. The money must be provided for there to be criticism of how it is spent. Without the money, the people of Nottingham, North would be disadvantaged.
Mr. Deputy Speaker, can you confirm that the debate finishes at 11 o'clock? Is that the time scale we are working to? I want to make sure that I have got my timing right.
Mr. Deputy Speaker: That is an interesting point of order. It depends entirely on your actions.
Phil Hope: Indeed; it certainly cannot go beyond 11 o'clock.
Mr. Deputy Speaker: That is correct.
Phil Hope: Thank you very much. In that case I shall say a few things about funding.
We have heard about the various funding streams and a point was raised about mainstream funding and funding that has been project-based or time-limited. I am pleased to say that there has been an increase in mainstream funding to Nottingham city council, which feeds into services in the local area. For example, there have been significant mainstream increases in education and health funding. Also—this is a fundamental philosophical point—as well as providing more for everyone, as I have described, the Government want to provide a little more for those who need it most: they want to target help. That carries difficulties, as the hon. Member for Ludlow suggested. How should we deal with the plethora of schemes and the extra resources? However, the idea of what has, I think, been dubbed progressive universalism—more for everyone but even

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more for those who need it most—is an important part of our approach. The aim is that the areas in most need should receive extra while everyone benefits.
Matthew Green: The point is not that money should not be targeted, but that an existing structure, such as the local council, should deal with the targeted money—there need not be a new invention every time.
Phil Hope: The hon. Gentleman makes an excellent point. I shall be talking about an initiative that the Government are developing, called local area agreements; my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham, North referred to it and it is relevant to that point about how—when there are different initiatives for different problems—to get money into an area in a way that is developed in partnership between central and local government and the community.
I shall not go through all the figures, but we can say that more money has been going into the area. Money has been entering the area through different schemes and the question is how to organise things better, to improve targeting, delivery and local ownership.
Before I go into detail, I want to respond to my hon. Friend's discussion of the impact of the resources and of whether the plethora of schemes and the fact that the structures have not worked in some respects, and that we need more partnership—as I mentioned at the outset—amount to ineffectiveness. He may have under-emphasised some achievements in his constituency. Crime levels have fallen overall in Nottingham city, including volume car crime, burglary and robbery. There has been educational success in the hon. Gentleman's constituency, with Nottingham's GCSE attainment levels. I took his point about what indicators are used, but educational performance has improved. The GCSE figures show a rise of 3 per cent.
There are several relevant schemes including the city division's community safety officers fund, which is providing more money for police officers. My hon. Friend made a point about police officers being moved, and we are all concerned about that, but the new community support officers—we have announced our intention that if we are re-elected there will be more of them—are local people working with their communities, like neighbourhood wardens. They provide community support. The people know them and they do not get withdrawn to other work if there is a murder or other crime. They carry on working in their community. My hon. Friend's communities will know the benefit of that approach, which we have piloted and implemented. We are now implementing it in many more communities.
My hon. Friend was concerned about the rate of staying on in education post-16 in Nottingham, North. That is a problem in many constituencies. The importance of the education maintenance allowance, which is available to young people throughout the country, including those in his constituency, is that it provides people on the lowest incomes in the most disadvantaged areas—young people of 16 who are tempted to leave school, to turn their backs on education and all that it brings in personal self-development and to enter the world of work or, worse, the world of no work, no training and no future—with
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a financial incentive to stay on in post-16 education of various forms, to gain the benefits of continuing education. His constituents, and the young people in particular, will, I think, find that of great benefit.
My hon. Friend raised some key questions about structure and co-ordination. I accept his point that there have in the past been problems, when regeneration money has not been as well co-ordinated, targeted and used as it could have been. I want to stress two points in response. We have just issued a short publication called "The future of local government: Developing a 10 year vision", which places local government at the heart of local regeneration. It deals with the idea that the role of local government should include community leadership—taking on an empowering, facilitating and enabling role for communities, with the resources that are coming into an area through the local strategic partnership; the aim is to take that forward. We have a long way to go in setting up many of the structures that will back up that basic concept of the role of local government. My hon. Friend's speech today will play an important part in our thinking and the outcome of the review in December.
We had debates about the constitutional relationship between local and central Government. My hon. Friend will be pleased to know that as we develop our 10-year vision of how local government should be, while we may not be going all the way to have the constitutional settlement he describes, we wish to establish clarity about the roles and responsibilities at local, regional and central level—and indeed below local, at neighbourhood level. We also want to be clear about how these levels interrelate so that we avoid the difficulties that he described.
One initiative that we are currently discussing and will be piloting concerns local area agreements. Basically, a local area agreement is an arrangement between Government, the council and all the delivery partners in an area, bringing into play all those other areas such as the police, health and education. They will look at the national outcomes, the floor targets—the things that we want to see—and the local priorities and come up with an agreement about the funding that goes into that area under three major headings: children and young people spending, the safer and stronger community spend and the healthier communities and older people.
If we can reach an agreement about the money so that the communities are directly involved in channelling those resources we can come out of the silo mentality and get into an area mentality. That is very exciting. It is a fundamental change if we achieve it. We are running pilots because we need to ensure that all the inevitable wrinkles involved in such a change can be ironed out. If it is successful we will want to roll it out across the country.
Mr. Allen: I thank my hon. Friend the Minister for the positive way in which he has engaged in the debate this morning, as have the representatives of the other parties. It is a credit to the House. Could Nottingham, North itself be considered as a pilot for a local area agreement?
Phil Hope: Why am I not surprised by that intervention? I will take that bid away. It will go into the pot and we will look at it. We will be making decisions

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about that fairly soon. The important thing about these local area agreements is that the local authorities and all the local partners, through the local strategic partnership, will have fewer funding streams to deal with. All hon. Members spoke about different funding streams. The funding will all go into one area pot, thereby streamlining all the bureaucracy involved with those different funding schemes and the transactional costs. Bringing those partners together in that way to deal with real cash will strengthen the partnership.
This will not be a talking shop; this will be a real debate. That is critical. One of the key tasks for the partnership is to engage with the local communities in developing that local area agreement to ensure that the professionals in the various organisations relate directly to the communities that they serve. Importantly, the agreement offers a point of contact with Government. Only yesterday the Prime Minister called a meeting of front-line workers and managers to ask them what we can do to cut out unnecessary bureaucracy in their area of work in local authorities, the health services and the police. I was present at that meeting along with other Ministers. The local authorities' representatives saw local area agreements as a major innovation that they were keen to pursue.
There is a lot more that we can do to cut out unnecessary bureaucracy. We have done a lot already. We have reduced inspections by a third. If an authority is judged excellent under the inspection scheme, 90 per cent. of its inspections disappear. We have un-ring-fenced grants so that people can have local flexibility about how they spend that money. We have given local authorities freedom to borrow and to trade, to give them more flexibility to meet local priorities and needs.
We looked at all the area-based initiatives and funds that were available, and cut them by a half as a pre-runner to the local area agreements. We have heard loud and clear the problems and issues that my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham, North raised in many other forums and have already taken direct action on them. There is clearly more that we can do. The Prime Minister himself is directly involved in listening to frontline staff, workers and managers in organisations. We are taking many steps forward but there is more that we can do.
How right my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham, North is to say that we must do much more on community leadership and engagement. For some of the 88 most deprived areas, we have introduced the community empowerment fund, which is about developing community networks and building social capital. That is what the community chest and the community learning chest money is all about; it is deliberately targeted at areas where social capital has been most eroded and where most effort is needed to bring it through. There is also a plan for improving
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individual skills and knowledge; regeneration can come down to that, as well as to relationships between people in communities that need to be regenerated—in this case Nottingham. A scheme of regeneration apprentices is planned for that very purpose as part of the wider plan for Nottingham.
The first term of our Labour Government was about getting the economy right, getting people back to work, getting interest rates and mortgages down, and so on. The second term has been about reform of and investment in public services. The big challenge for the third term—this is my personal opinion—which we are addressing already, must concern the relationships between people in communities. Sustainable regeneration is not just about buildings, but about how people relate to one another. We must do a great deal more to build social capital, such as parenting skills and support for families—my hon. Friend knows my enthusiasm for that. We have got the hardware working, and decent homes are being built. However, the real challenge is what I call the software that binds communities together, which will tackle antisocial behaviour issues.
The hon. Member for Ludlow will forgive me, but I think that it is right that both happen at the same time. We must crack down hard on young people and others—much of the antisocial behaviour comes from adults, not young people, who are often the victims. At the same time, we must invest in educational maintenance allowances and youth schemes, for example, which engage young people in social and personal development and learning. It is both, not either/or. Our local communities expect that to happen
I have not mentioned the places project in Nottingham and would like to comment briefly on it. In recognition of such problems, the project was based on our need to map all the things going on, in relation to floor targets for example. Nottingham is one of the pilot areas where we have tried to map that activity. There was an interim report on that in July, from which some fo the ideas such as cutting bureaucracy and funding streams came. A further report is due in December, and the contribution that my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham, North has made this morning can feed into that.
We have had a good debate. I did not think that I would have enough to say, but there is so much more to add, and I have not covered everything that I prepared in order to respond to my hon. Friend. It has been a worthwhile debate, and I hope that I have outlined some of the key themes that we are taking forward. It is very important that we maintain both mainstream and additional funding. We must tackle the problems of overlap and the silo mentality, and in standing up for his constituents, my hon. Friend's efforts are helping us to do that. I wish him luck in his meeting in December and look forward to hearing the outcomes, which will take forward a much better quality of life for the people whom he represents.

Milton Keynes Local Plan (Interim Report)
10.59 am
Brian White: I applied for this debate back in April, just after the local inspector published the interim report. Having made the last application immediately before the recess, I had given up, so it is typical that this debate should come up now. I originally wanted to talk about the interim report to try to influence its outcome. However, the full report has been released in the past week without substantial change, so I want to highlight some of the issues that have come out of the process.
The process of creating local plans is a long one. Despite my efforts as chair of the Local Government's Association planning committee nearly a decade ago to speed it up, the procedure is still fairly long. Milton Keynes's local plan started in early 2000 and has been through a number of alterations. In addition, the Deputy Prime Minister has made an announcement about sustainable communities and there have been amendments to the regional plan—in our case RPG9.
Milton Keynes is subject to market forces, which will force us to have growth. Milton Keynes will grow, and the question is not "Will it grow?" but "How will it grow?" Will growth be planned or will it be subject to market forces and develop ad hoc? Will we learn the lessons that have made Milton Keynes successful? The key message that my hon. Friend the Member for Milton Keynes, South-West (Dr. Starkey) and I have been pushing and, which, I am pleased to say, the Government have accepted, is that any development must have the infrastructure to accompany it. I do not just mean roads. I should like to place on record my appreciation for the way in which the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, particularly Lord Rooker, has responded to the efforts of my hon. Friend and myself to put the case for Milton Keynes and to the local concerns that have been expressed.
It is also important to say how well conducted the local plan process has been, from the start, in 2000, right through to the inquiry. There has been openness, the involvement of local groups and the community, and accessibility. One can therefore imagine the concerns that were expressed when many of the policies in the local plan were challenged in the inspector's interim report. That should not have been a problem in itself, but a matter for debate. The problem was that that came the week before the examination in public of the regional plan was due to take place. That was done either to scupper or influence the regional plan, or, as the inspector put it, to "inform" it.
A number of issues give rise to concerns. There are social housing problems in Milton Keynes: tonight 1,500 families will be in temporary accommodation. I met a family at the weekend with a child with special needs. That family were third generation in Milton Keynes, but were unable to get housing and were living in a friend's house as it was being rebuilt simply because that was the only accommodation available. There is a crisis of affordable housing and a need for social housing in Milton Keynes, but the inspector's report does not address those issues. Indeed, the inspector challenged the plans that address them.
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The inspector addressed transport issues and we could have an entire debate about that. My hon. Friend and I have been pressing Ministers about the east-west rail link and on commuting into and out of Milton Keynes. I have also taken up the issue of a new canal to Bedford. There are real transport issues, but what does the inspector say about them? He says:
"The Council also produced a variety of calculations relating to viability. I attach relatively little weight to these calculations as they are based on many assumptions".
He then goes on to make his own assumptions, which counter a lot of the work done in various studies. One of my concerns about the report is that the inspector's assumptions are viewed as okay, but the council's work and the many studies that have been conducted are not.
An example of that is the removal of policy on areas of our attractive landscape, which was designed to protect rural villages so that people did not think that they had to re-fight the battle of the 1960s when Milton Keynes was first proposed. That policy reassured people, but it has been removed from the local plan. The inspector has therefore caused unnecessary fears that those villages will be overrun.
The downgrading of the standards for the linear parks has compromised Milton Keynes's flood defences. Energy concerns have been dismissed, yet Milton Keynes development corporation set the standard for many of the energy ratings. If we built new homes in Milton Keynes, we could create zero carbon requirements that would go a long way to tackling the climate change issues that the Prime Minister rightly identifies as one of the most important challenges that we face. So why does the local plan minimise the opportunities?
In the previous debate, we heard about designing for crime. Thames Valley police wanted to add a target related to the percentage of applications that meet safety by design standards. The inspector says:
"The Secure by Design standards go beyond what is appropriate for planning control."
An area called Stantonbury Park Farm in the north of the city is to be proposed for 500 houses. The school that serves that area is already full, and the inspector says:
"Stantonbury Campus…would be expected to accommodate pupils from a development on this…site",
but that it is already at capacity, and that the situation will
"get worse with the planned change in the age of transfer."
Some 55 children were not able to get into Stantonbury school this week because of that. The provision of secondary school places to serve that site and the area in general is likely to occur as the result of a long-term review. The inspector says:
"On this basis this land would contribute some 500 dwellings to the supply side of the housing land equation albeit likely that the site could not come forward until late in the plan period once the education issue has been resolved."
In other words, the planners create a problem then say to the local authority, "Get on and solve it." That is not particularly helpful.
Similarly in Wavendon, Walton high, which is the school that the Prime Minister visited along with the Chancellor in March, is already over-subscribed. Someone with two daughters who came to Milton

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Keynes found that one was accepted at the school and the other was not. There are 3,000 houses proposed for that area in the regional plan.
My major concern is the way in which the balance in Milton Keynes has been changed by the inspector's report. After a great deal of work, the local plan proposed certain areas, and I know that, in a moment, my hon. Friend the Member for Milton Keynes, South-West will want to raise an issue that affects her constituency. The local council, with local groups, proposed areas for development round the western flank of Milton Keynes, but the local planning inspector says:
"The area to the west is a distinctive 'natural area' with strong landscape features and attractive views. It is part of the Whaddon/Whaddon Chase ambience."
That is despite the fact that the other studies, including regional planning studies, say that the work favours westerly and south-westerly growth in Milton Keynes in preference to continuous major eastward expansion over the M1 motorway. However, the inspector simply says:
"I agree that the land to the east of Milton Keynes is suitable for long-term development as I consider that this area is much less sensitive in landscape terms than the Whaddon Valley…In reaching this conclusion I appreciate that the assessment by Landscape Design Associates ruled out the designation of the Whaddon Valley as an area of attractive landscape."
So, the inspector has removed the area of attractive landscape to the north of the city to protect the villages there, but when other villages cannot reach that standard, he still thinks that they are "sensitive". Such inconsistency in the inspector's report has led him to say:
"My view is that the Ml should not be seen as a long-term barrier to development."
When areas are owned by the great and good of Buckinghamshire, they are somehow sensitive, while the areas of the ordinary people of Milton Keynes are not. I appreciate that my hon. Friend the Member for Milton Keynes, South-West has argued strongly for the regeneration of Bletchley and Wolverton, and such a policy has a major impact on her position.
Dr. Phyllis Starkey: May I take this opportunity to say that I wholeheartedly concur with my hon. Friend's overall critique of the inspector? However, does my hon. Friend not agree that one particularly egregious part of the inspector's findings is that by removing the area known as 10.4, which he has just described, on the basis of recommendations primarily from a developer, he has increased pressure on area 11, which is owned by that same developer? That is a matter of huge concern to my constituents in Stony Stratford and Calverton.
Brian White: My hon. Friend makes a strong point. Which should take preference: developers' legitimate aspirations or the local community? The unfortunate timing of the inspector's report means that there has been no chance to debate such issues. Had we had the chance to do so in the run-up to the regional plan public examination, many of these concerns would not exist. However, because the examination took place the
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following week, the impression was given that the inspector was trying to influence—or as he put it, to "inform"—the examination in public.
If I believed in the conspiracy theory, it would lead me to question such issues. For instance, why do the great and good of Buckinghamshire seem to benefit when the ordinary people of Milton Keynes do not? Why, when considering their land interests, do certain developers benefit and others do not? Why were previous reports, such as the Milton Keynes in-field study, not considered and developed? Why, at the last minute and against its planners' advice, did the South East England regional assembly executive committee remove certain growth options and insert others into the assembly's planning policy for the area that my hon. Friend spoke of. These options went for examination in public.
Such matters give rise to a number of concerns, and those who subscribe to conspiracy theories will have noted them. I do not believe in the conspiracy theory. I believe in the cock-up theory, and those who try to conspire will still cock it up. However, it raises the possibility of those disappointed developers opening the process to judicial review, and that could raise further issues.
Since the interim report, the examination in public has reported. Luckily, it was not influenced by the local inspector's report. However, the local plan report and the regional plan are at odds. The question is how to resolve that. The Milton Keynes partnership committee has been established, and the recruitment of staff at English Partnerships for developing Milton Keynes is going ahead. The delivery of the Government's sustainable objectives rather than the developers' wishes is moving ahead. That is something that my hon. Friend and I have been pushing for.
The Deputy Prime Minister visited Milton Keynes only a few weeks ago. He said that people should learn the lesson of what has worked in Milton Keynes and recognise that the developers have to bring the community with them; we should remember that it is about developing communities and not just buildings. If it was down to what my right hon. Friend said, we would be fairly relaxed, but will the courts take note of what he said or will they consider the words of the inspector and the local plan? It is the conflict between them that concerns me.
Ministers will need to consider a number of questions when they come to consider the inspector's final report. The way in which the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister considers those issues will be critical to the development of the city. Particularly important is the relationship between the Milton Keynes partnership committee, English Partnerships and Milton Keynes council. Given their interrelationship, to whom will their officers be accountable, and which plans will they follow?
A number of applications have been made under section 7(1) of the New Towns Act 1946, the Act under which Milton Keynes was built and designed. The new partnership committee and the council both have planning powers; that is why the interrelationship between those bodies will be important, and the Department needs to give guidance on the matter. What will be the role of the Government office? How will departures from the local plan be dealt with?

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Caldecote in my constituency was built under a section 7(1) application, but part of the estate was left undeveloped. In 1995, the existing local plan designated part of that area as open space. In 2000, English Partnerships told the council that it wanted the promontory to be developed, as in the original plan. English Partnerships's brief, which is contrary to the local plan, is currently before Milton Keynes council development control committee; its decision is due at the end of the month.
I have asked the Government office to call in that decision, because the principle that we are discussing is important—whether precedence should be given to the local plan, the inspector's report on the local plan or the existing local plan. What happens if an application fits into the regeneration aspirations of central Milton Keynes but not into the inspector's report? Which should take precedence? We heard in the previous debate that one size does not fit all. That is why it is important to get the process right.
Milton Keynes has always been an innovative city. It is a can-do city, and it has delivered for its citizens. My concern is that the inspector's report creates a number of obstacles, and the Government's vision for a sustainable community in Milton Keynes and the south midlands is right and important. To ensure that it happens, Departments need to work together. We need cross-regional working. At the moment, there are Highways Agency proposals for dualling the A421 as far as junction 13, but Bedfordshire county council and Milton Keynes council have not done similar work on extending dualling from junction 13 to the Kingston roundabout in Milton Keynes. The Highways Agency is doing good work, supported by local people, and the dualling is absolutely right and necessary, but it is not being completed, because Government offices, agencies and local authorities have not got their acts together and are not working to the same time scale. The role played by the Government offices for the south-east, the east of England and the east midlands will therefore be crucial to delivery. However, there is a perception that the inspector's report has ignored Milton Keynes's success and the reasons for it.
Today is not the day to debate funding, although we could have several debates about it. However, my hon. Friend the Member for Milton Keynes, South-West and I have consistently reiterated to the Minister that the provision of infrastructure must go ahead at the same time as development. The Government have accepted that in principle, and, to his credit, Lord Rooker said so publicly in Milton Keynes. However, success will be determined by whether highly individual Departments and agencies, such as the Highways Agency, can co-ordinate their individual plans with the Milton Keynes partnership committee's plans and the south midlands plans. The local plan will be a key means of delivering that success, but if we do not get it right, the issues that arise could compromise the Government's aspirations. The inspector's report is not an auspicious start, because it has raised fears without providing solutions.
I do not expect the Minister to be able to answer my points today, nor do I want an instant remedy. However, Ministers will need seriously to address them when they come to consider the council's final report, because they raise several serious issues. The way in which the different agencies react will also be important.
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The local plan is the vehicle by which we can turn some people's fears into opportunities and ensure that my city remains the success that it is.
11.17 am
Paul Clark: At the outset, let me congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Milton Keynes, North-East (Brian White) on securing the debate. He has raised many issues and, at the heart of them, is the question of how we promote joined-up thinking and joined-up government at all levels—nationally, regionally and locally—to ensure that we deliver the communities for which he and my hon. Friend the Member for Milton Keynes, South-West (Dr. Starkey) have argued at every possible opportunity at ministerial and local level.
My hon. Friend the Member for Milton Keynes, North-East said that Milton Keynes was a can-do city, and he is right about the success that it has enjoyed. We want to celebrate that success and build for the next phase to ensure that we have sustainable communities in which people want to live and work.
Several of the detailed matters that my hon. Friend raised are for the local council to decide through planning processes. He has substantial expertise in that regard because, in a former life before he came to the House, he was chairman of the Milton Keynes planning committee. He will recognise that many of the decisions will be taken at the local level, rather than anywhere else.
It is worth while setting out to the Chamber the processes involved. Everyone should recognise that there are still substantial opportunities for public consultation. All sections of the community should be involved, not just key stakeholders. I am sure that my hon. Friend and other colleagues in the area will do their utmost to ensure that people take those opportunities.
Let me attach a Government health warning to what I have to say. I am constrained by the fact that the independent panel report following the public examination of the Milton Keynes and south midlands sub-regional strategies was published at the beginning of last month and my right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister is now considering his response to its recommendations. Although the contents of the report are public, no comments can be made on them at this stage. However, we expect to publish our response in October, and that will lead to a further round of public consultation.
Let me give the background to the Milton Keynes process. There are two key documents: the Milton Keynes local plan, which is the responsibility of the local authority, and the Milton Keynes and south midlands sub-regional strategy, which was jointly presented by the three regional assemblies to my right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister last year. Both are relevant to the debate. We recognise that there might have been some confusion due to their running concurrently, so I shall deal with them separately.
The first document, the local plan, was placed on deposit in October 2002 by Milton Keynes council. It covers the period up to 2011, and contains detailed policies about land use for specific areas of land.
Brian White: Does my hon. Friend appreciate that one of the difficulties is that the local plan covers the

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period up to 2011, the regional plan runs until 2016 and the sustainable communities plan covers 30 years? The interaction of the three is causing concern.
Paul Clark: Absolutely. I realise that that does not make things easy. It has become clear in Milton Keynes that in order to deliver the sustainable communities plan, we need to run the processes concurrently. Then we can achieve what I know my hon. Friend desires—joined-up thinking that will allow us to get it right for all who live there now and who will do so in the next 10, 20 or 30 years. The processes have to come together at some stage, and part of the difficulty relates to the concurrent running of the documents.
As hon. Members know, we have introduced changes to the planning system to speed up the process and increase its transparency. They will come into force at the end of the month. Yesterday, the Minister for Housing and Planning launched two new advice notes concerning spatial strategies and local development frameworks, precisely to enable communities to have greater and earlier involvement than they have had in the past.
Returning to the Milton Keynes plan, the inspector who conducted the inquiry into the local plan is due to submit his report to the council later this year, and the council will then, if necessary, advertise any modifications that it wants to make in light of it. Further consultation will then take place. My right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister was consulted on the draft local plan and commented on how it fitted with national policy guidelines. As my hon. Friend will know, it is the responsibility of the local authority and its elected officers to implement it.
I have already mentioned that we are changing the system to bring forward a better, more streamlined system. Many of us have been involved in local councils in the past and are well aware that housing and the demand for it—where it ends up and the levels of it—are invariably the most contentious issues. However, we have to deliver. As my hon. Friend has pointed out, some 1,500 will be sleeping rough tonight.
Brian White: They are in temporary accommodation.
Paul Clark: I am sorry. They will be sleeping in temporary accommodation tonight in Milton Keynes. I am aware that within the local authority stock there were only 140 voids—or there were at the end of April, according to the figures that I have—and I recognise the problems with that. I am sure that my hon. Friend, and my hon. Friend the Member for Milton Keynes, South-West have had many cases in their surgeries of people seeking accommodation. I know that they will recognise that we have to meet those demands, but in a sustainable way.
The plan identifies 36,700 additional homes in Milton Keynes in the plan period up to 2011. My hon. Friend the Member for Milton Keynes, North-East will
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recognise that the plan period runs from 1991 and that many of those homes were already built or had permission through the planning permission system to be built when the plan was being drawn up. Therefore, in reality, the additional number of homes being sought is about 6,800. That is largely to be achieved through developments in the centre of Milton Keynes. A development is being considered as part of the centre of Milton Keynes expansions that would include some 10,000 residents returning to the town centres, where we are seeing a major renaissance and revival.
The second document is the Milton Keynes and south midlands sub-regional strategy, which was submitted to the Government by the three regional assemblies in July 2003. Although the regional assemblies bring forward proposals for regional guidance, regional planning guidance—RPG—is approved and decided by my right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister. Those are to change regional spatial strategies under the new system. A proposal to alter regional guidance in such a way during the final stages of the local plan is unusual, as I have said, but it was made necessary for us to make sure that the implementation of the sustainable communities plan went ahead.
All the comments in the inspector's report will be dealt with by the council as the local planning authority. As far as the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister is concerned, we would get involved only in extreme circumstances. Many of the matters raised by my hon. Friend are matters of detail and would not have been discussed at the sub-regional examination whenever the inspector's report had come out. The interim report was put out to inform debate. A substantial number of opportunities are still available at different stages of the process for members of the public, Members of Parliament, key stakeholders and the community to be involved in the sub-regional strategy and the local plan process.
I want to comment on one or two points that have rightly been made. If we are to have sustainable communities, they are not only a matter of bricks and mortar, but a matter of the social infrastructure that binds those together into communities. My hon. Friends will be aware of the Deputy Prime Minister's personal commitment to seeing that happen, and of how much he puts into it. In fact, the underlying strategy of the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister is to create such sustainable communities.
The comments made about health and education provisions were absolutely right. The moneys given under the growth area fund, for example, include about £800,000 for studies into what is needed for health provision and so on to meet the expansions, and about £135,000 for a sustainable strategy in terms of education and training in skills. That work is under way.
In terms of the designing-out of crime features, the ODPM and the Home Office have worked closely—
Sitting suspended till Two o'clock.

Electricity Market (Scotland)
2 pm
Mr. Alex Salmond: It is a great pleasure to introduce the debate. I make no comment on the fact that the Minister for Energy, E-Commerce and Postal Services is not present; I understand that he is in China. He told me on the telephone the other day that he had been inspecting the great wall. If Ofgem, the subject of this debate, had been in charge, the great wall would never have been built. If Ofgem's plans proposals and theories go ahead, it will make it extremely difficult to exploit Scotland's renewable energy and electricity potential.
It is entirely suitable, and very welcome, that the Minister for Trade and Investment is present, as the debate is about whether there can be trade in electricity between the nations of Scotland and England.
This extremely serious matter is coming to a conclusion: in November we will know whether the proposals being made by the National Grid company will be accepted by the Ofgem board, and pursued. If the proposals in option B of the consultation exercise are carried through, there will not be a significant increase in the generation capacity of renewables in Scotland, and we will miss out on the renewables boom that so many of us hope for, exploiting Scotland's vast energy potential and allowing it to supply markets across the UK and perhaps further afield. I thought that all parties shared that desire.
I hope we can agree on the scale of the renewables potential. Scotland already has 1,200 MW of hydropower because of the vision of a Minister, Tom Johnstone, after the second world war. He pursued hydro schemes against a huge amount of official opposition and blockage by landlords and vested interests. He wanted to develop the project because he had a vision that the highlands and islands of Scotland, especially the highlands, could have a vast generating capacity, serving the whole of Scotland. No one would now argue that we do not welcome our 1,200 MW of installed hydro capacity; indeed, many would argue that there is scope and room for more.
There is a huge array of energy resources in Scotland, both traditional forms of energy generation and hydrocarbons, including Europe's finest and most technically efficient combined cycle gas station, which is in my constituency of Peterhead. The station has 73 per cent. technical efficiency, which shows that even hydrocarbon stations can be so technically efficient that they help the Government's targets in respect of energy balance and the greenhouse effect.
Scotland has substantial coal-fired stations and nuclear capacity, but many debates on the subject concentrate on what will happen in the renewables sector. According to the Risoe laboratory in Denmark, which has a long-established wind farm industry, Scotland has 25 per cent. not of the UK's wind capacity but of Europe's. The other Scottish Members present in the debate know that we are a windy nation, and sometimes our constituents suffer the consequences. None the less, 25 per cent. of Europe's potential wind capacity shows Scotland's enormous potential in that respect.
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Scotland also has 10 per cent. of our wave power capacity—at present, the only working commercial wave power station is on the island of Islay. Professor Ian Bryden of Robert Gordon university described the Pentland firth as the Saudi Arabia of tidal power. Let us start with the agreement that there is enormous potential for renewable energy in Scotland, which is the why the Government's 40 per cent. target for Scotland is higher than the target for south of the border.
It would therefore be a tragic missed opportunity if exploitation of that renewable energy were prevented by regulations and the arbitrary imposition of unfair and discriminatory charges. Yet that is exactly what might happen under the National Grid company's proposals, which are unfortunately being put forward because it is adopting charging policy based on theories conducted within Ofgem about how to decide the interest charges on a system. Let us be clear that we are not talking about charges for transporting electricity—we all accept that a transportation charge should be built into the transmission of electricity. We are talking about entry charges: what is paid per kilowatt to get electricity on to the national grid.
The absurdity of the proposals can be best shown by the following example. In the north of Scotland, option B under the National Grid company's proposals would be to charge generators £20 per kilowatt to get on to the grid. However, the good news, I suppose, is that someone who wants to put a wind farm on top of Big Ben would be paid a subsidy of £9 per kilowatt. So a wind farm up Big Ben brings a £9 subsidy, whereas a major offshore wind operation in the north of Scotland carries a £20 a kilowatt tax.
The theory behind the proposal is locational pricing. Basically, Ofgem wants power stations in the UK to be approximately configured to the population: they want the population to match the power stations, or vice versa. There are a couple of obvious difficulties with that for renewables and particularly for wind power. I do not think that the population of London wants a wind farm up Big Ben. Indeed, the population in many areas of the country is resisting wind farms anywhere. I do not think that the population of London would be particularly enthusiastic about any power station in the precincts of outer London. In many senses, it does not matter what subsidy Ofgem comes up with; it will not reflect the reality that there will not be many new power stations in central or outer London.
The other obvious difficulty is that if there was a wind farm up Big Ben, the wind required to keep that station operational blows about 30 per cent. of the time. A wind farm offshore—in the Moray firth, for example—would be up 50 per cent. of the time, because the Moray firth, and this may come as a surprise to the academics and to Ofgem, is somewhat windier than central London.
If only the economists and Ofgem could have had a tutorial from the late Member for Portarlington, David Ricardo, one of only two great English economists in history, the other being John Maynard Keynes. Some of us remember that David Ricardo developed a theory of comparative advantage, which states that one should produce things where it is technically best to do so in order to increase the wealth not only of that area, but of the international community. I am sure that the Minister in charge of international trade is absolutely up on the international trade theories of David Ricardo.

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Therefore, to increase the benefit under that theory to both Scotland and England, the right place to produce renewable energy, such as wind power, is where the wind blows most and where it is technically most efficient to produce that power. That would certainly benefit the economics of Scotland hut also the economics of England. Instead of creating obstacles, trying to prevent that happening, putting barriers in the way of that development, and trying to strangle at birth the development that we all hope for in wind and other forms of generation, Ofgem should be encouraging the development of renewable energy in the places of best comparative advantage.
Ofgem's latest press release was issued before this debate—they must have got wind of what I was going to say. Ofgem is in a state of some confusion. On the one hand, the press release repeatedly states that the proposals are those of the National Grid Company and that Ofgem has still to judge them when they are submitted. For example, I quote:
"The company"—
that is, the National Grid Company—
"will then submit final proposals to Ofgem for its approval at the end of September."
That is technically true, but it is under the Ofgem scheme and its theory of locational pricing that the National Grid Company has produced these ridiculous proposals.
It is not only me and other Scottish Members who are jumping up and down about the issue—if one looks at the exchanges at Scottish questions yesterday, it is fair to say that the Secretary of State for Scotland is also deeply concerned. I do not think that the former Energy Minister, the right hon. Member for Cunninghame, North (Mr. Wilson) would mind me saying that he is equally concerned about the implications. For many years, he had a vision of the north of Scotland being the powerhouse for renewable energies and—if I interpret his remarks in debate correctly—I believe that he is deeply frustrated at the prospect of an obstacle being placed in the way of that development. If it was just politicians talking about the matter, we might have to bow to the experience of the experts in Ofgem and the National Grid Company, but the very companies on which we will depend to develop the resources are saying the same as we are.
A week last Thursday, I attended a glittering dinner in Fyvie castle, which is not currently in my Banff and Buchan constituency, but will be shortly, although the event was not to celebrate that. It was to celebrate Talisman Energy's 10 years in the North sea. The dinner was addressed by the Minister for Energy, E-Commerce and Postal Services and by the First Minister of Scotland, both of whom celebrated the fact that one of the projects that Talisman is engaged in with Scottish and Southern Energy Group is the development of the Beatrice field in the Moray firth, which is potentially Europe's largest offshore wind farm.
It seems to me that offshore wind has many advantages over onshore wind. There will be nothing like the same environmental resistance that is experienced with onshore wind farms. Despite a relatively benign climate at present, Scotland has only
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200 MW of installed capacity in wind farms. If the Beatrice project comes to fruition, that single offshore project alone will generate 1,000 MW of power, which is five times the entire installed wind capacity onshore. That single project would meet some 20 per cent. of Scotland's entire electricity needs, and would be up and running for 50 per cent. of the time, as opposed to installations in even the best location for onshore wind, which would run for less time than that.
Let us agree that it would be marvellous to have the Beatrice project come to fruition—that was certainly the view of the Energy Minister. The Government, the European Commission and, to a minor extent, the Scottish Executive, have backed the demonstrator models that will go on to the Beatrice platform over the next year or two. There is funding for the research and for the demonstrator models, which will establish and prove the technology, but what does Talisman Energy say about the proposals that are currently being made by the National Grid Company? I shall read exactly what it says:
"It is bad news for us and for anyone producing renewable energy in remote parts of Scotland. The changes Ofgem is talking about are 50 per cent. to 60 per cent. higher than we thought. At the moment it is the biggest single threat we see and it could threaten the viability of the project."
The very company that is being celebrated by Ministers both for its huge success in 10 years in the North sea and for its vision in being one of the partners in that amazing project, which would put 200 wind farms into the Moray firth and generate a gigawatt—1,000 MW—of electricity says that the proposals from the National Grid Company and Ofgem are "the biggest single threat" to the viability of the entire project.
Moreover, it is not just Ofgem. I am sure that the Minister knows of the proposals relating to Scottish Power. I am considering legal action against the discrimination that is implicit in the proposals if they come to fruition; although in its area of generation the charges are less than they are in the north of Scotland, they are still discriminatory. Ian Marchant, the chief executive of Scottish and Southern Energy Group has said:
"Whilst Scottish generators account for 14 per cent. of total installed capacity they will pay all of the UK's generation and transmission charges. Yes, England and Wales will net pay nothing.
I can't believe this is true but my experts assure me it is. I have even double checked it."
The major generator in the north of Scotland is perfectly clear on the discrimination implicit in the charges.
One might of course say, "Well, that's MPs. They are up in arms and so are the major companies going ahead with the projects, but the MPs have a vested interest in getting development in their constituencies and the companies have a vested interest in not paying huge charges." However, I was impressed to receive this morning a message from Maf Smith—I was more impressed than I was by the Ofgem press release. Maf Smith is the chief operating officer of the Scottish renewables forum. He writes:
"Under BETTA Scottish generators will subsidise English and Welsh generators by £70 million per year."

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He adds:
"If you wanted to remove the £70m subsidy you would need to reduce the Scottish locational charges by at least £10/kW…The corresponding increase…in English-Welsh generation charges would be approx £1/kW. Thus a small increase in English-Welsh charges would allow significant drops in Scottish charges and make the system equitable."
It is Ofgem's view, and the Government will no doubt echo it, that all the huge increases, which are not denied, and the amazingly high charges in Scotland and, to some extent, the north of England are offset by the fact that under BETTA the interconnector will now be paid for by the entire system as opposed to the Scottish generators alone. There are two difficulties with that argument. First, it is not true. There will still be a net loss to Scottish generators—with respect to existing capacity; never mind what comes on stream in the future—of £6 million a year under option B of the National Grid Company. With, hopefully, increased generation in Scotland, that net loss will become greater. There will be more power stations paying those large charges. There is a moving target, and the figure is already net.
The second reason the argument is wrong is that the fact that the interconnector fell only on the Scottish generators was already a block to competition in the system. That is why more electricity is not being exported from Scotland to England and Wales now. The fact that that a system was created under the vision of the previous Energy Minister to remove the blockage in the system and allow proper competition across the generating capacity of the UK and to allow Scottish generators to sell more of their technically efficient energy into the UK market, is being used to justify unfair discriminatory charges on new power stations in Scotland. Surely the Energy Act 2004 was designed to remove the blockages to competition and allow the increase in generation capacity—not to institutionalise charges by introducing them in another way.
Things could not be graver. We do not know definitely that option B of the National Grid Company will go ahead or that Ofgem will accept it. Neither of the two options is good for Scottish generation, although option A, despite the fact that it still includes discriminatory charges, is slightly better. There is much informed comment in the industry, and the attitudes displayed in Ofgem's press releases would lead one to believe that that it is so thirled to the ridiculous theory of locational pricing that option B might well be the one to come forward.
If we can we want to get our retaliation in first. The Government will look ridiculous if on the one hand they help and stimulate the development of renewable energy, and set it hugely ambitious targets of 40 per cent. of generation in Scotland, while on the other hand Government agencies such as Ofgem prevent the realisation of the dream of Scotland as the renewable energy capital of Europe.
The stakes could not be higher. Not only will the Beatrice field development generate 1 GW of electricity, but the total investment costs of the project will be approximately £1 billion and it will generate, directly and indirectly, thousands of jobs—300 alone in the construction phase and many others in the long term. That is only one of potentially half a dozen major projects of such a scale across the variety of renewable energy resources.
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Not only are such new developments under threat of being strangled at birth by the ridiculous charges. Existing generation, the hydro power and the Peterhead power station are also threatened by the imposition of the charges. The Government say that they have given a 10-year protection for renewable energy—five years that then rolls on for another five years. That is true if we are talking about a small wind farm development up a hill somewhere. If it has a short payback period and can be up and running in nine months to a year, the protection might be effective. However, even if the Beatrice project demonstrators work perfectly and show that the project can come to fruition, it cannot be up and running until 2010 or 2011, and the payback period for the project is estimated at 15 years. Even in the best possible scenario, a major project such as Beatrice would have two, three or four years of protection before facing the full blast of paying £20 million tax just to get into the national grid.
What I hope to have demonstrated is that both arguments—first, Ofgem's claim that the charges on Scottish generators are offset by the removal of the interconnector charges, and secondly, the Government's argument about the 10-year protection for renewables—do not apply. The first is simply not true, and in any case, the balance would change over time, institutionalising unfairness in the system. On the second argument, although the provision might protect small-scale renewable projects in the 10-year horizon, it will not protect major projects such as the Beatrice field and the ones that the Government like to boast about their help for.
The stakes could not be higher. On the one hand, if we have a fair and equitable pricing regime to get into the electricity system, there could be billions of pounds of investment and thousands of jobs, particularly in the north of Scotland but all over Scotland as well. On the other hand, we could be undermining our existing capacity in the north of Scotland and strangling at birth the hope that we can become the renewables capital of Europe.
My final point takes me back to the former Member for Portarlington, David Ricardo. I repeat the point that producing renewables in the areas of technical efficiency and taking advantage of Scotland's range of amazing resources in wind, wave and tidal power is certainly a good thing for Scotland. However, it is also good for the rest of the UK and for Europe as a whole in making a more effective contribution to the protection that we all want to give to the environment. I appeal for consistency in Government policy and the removal of the unfair charges, and I hope that, as the Minister for Trade and Investment is now acquainted with the subject, David Ricardo will prevail and Ofgem will be defeated.
2.24 pm
Mr. Alan Reid: I congratulate the hon. Member for Banff and Buchan (Mr. Salmond) on introducing this important topic and his excellent explanation of what is a complicated matter.
Any proposal that involves higher connection charges for electricity generating stations that are far from centres of population is bound to discourage investment in renewable energy in the north and west of Scotland. Since much of the UK's potential resources for

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renewables are located there, it is difficult to see how the Government's renewable generation targets will be met if a connection charging system is introduced that discriminates against electricity generating stations that are located in the north or west of Scotland. There is protection in the Energy Act 2004 for renewable generators but, as the hon. Gentleman explained, the 10-year sunset clause will discourage investors because they will be worried that whichever Government are in power in 10 years might have a very different renewables policy and not be as kind to them as the current Government, who introduced the clause, might be.
As a result of land reform in Scotland, many more communities are buying the land on which they live and work; the island of Gigha in my constituency is one example. After years of rule by absentee landlords, the islanders bought their island, and one of the many schemes in which they are investing is a scheme to build three wind turbines to generate electricity for their own use and to sell the surplus to the grid. Schemes such as that one on Gigha will be adversely affected if a charging system is introduced that places higher connection charges on schemes on remote islands.
In addition, a Wavegen experimental station on the island of Islay is leading the world in research into generating electricity from wave power. Given the strength of the wind, waves and tides that we get in the north and west of Scotland, this is clearly an ideal part of the country for generating electricity from onshore wind, offshore wind, and wave and tidal power. We should not discourage that enormous potential by adopting any proposal that involves higher connection charges.
Both the Government and the Scottish Executive have policies of investing large amounts of money in the research and development of renewables, and the logical extension of that policy is surely fair connection charges. Once we have developed wave and tidal power to be commercially viable, we do not want to discourage the resultant schemes from going live. In summary, the north and west of Scotland have a tremendous role to play in allowing the Government's policy of greater renewables to be put into effect, and we should not adopt any policy that involves higher connection charges in that part of the country.
2.27 pm
Mr. Michael Weir: Having spoken on Second and Third Readings of the Energy Act 2004 and served on the Committee that considered it, I seem to be thinking about energy in my sleep these days.
It will come as no great surprise that I very much agree with what my hon. Friend the Member for Banff and Buchan (Mr. Salmond) said about transmission charges. I shall concentrate on a slightly different point in a moment, but I want to make another point about transmission charges before I move on. Section 185 of the 2004 Act states:
"The Secretary of State may make an order under this section if it appears to him…that a particular area of Great Britain is suitable as a location for the generation of electricity from renewable sources".
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That area is assumed to be the north of Scotland; any other area would be completely illogical. The point is that this is an area-based scheme, not a project-based scheme. Subsection (11) states:
"A scheme shall not be applied in relation to a time more than ten years after the commencement of this section."
Subsection (12) states:
"A scheme…shall not be applied for a period of more than five years; but…may be renewed…by a further order under this section for a period of no more than five years".
The effect is that there will be an area-based scheme for a maximum of 10 years, which means that only a scheme that was up and running when the area-based scheme was brought into being would get 10 years of benefit from the capping of the charges. Any scheme that was not up and running at that time would not get the benefit even of the 10 years, the five years, or whatever the length of the scheme would be. If the scheme in the Beatrice field, which my hon. Friend mentioned, was up and running when the area-based scheme was introduced, it might get 10 or so years' benefit. Another similar scheme a few years later would not get that 10 years' benefit, but it might get four or five years' benefit, depending on when it was up and running. So there is a disincentive to the scheme under section 185 for the future development of renewables. I make that point to back up what my hon. Friend said.
Section 184 relates to distribution charges as opposed to transmission charges. As hon. Members will know, distribution charges relate to the cost of distributing electricity to consumers, while transmission charges relate to accessing the national grid. That is important for the north of Scotland. When the then Energy Bill introduced BETTA, we were told that it would benefit Scottish consumers. In various debates during the passage of the Bill, I asked several Ministers what those benefits would be. Frankly, the best they were able to come up with was that consumers could benefit by switching to new suppliers. I find that argument unconvincing, because, in my experience, consumers benefit from switching only if they are high users or pay by direct debit, although even the savings for those who pay their existing supplier by direct debit are fairly minimal.
In any event, Ministers' arguments have been somewhat undermined by the substantial price increases announced by British Gas last week and by npower only this morning. Those of our constituents who do not have bank accounts or who pay by means of prepayment meters—I spoke about this issue at length in Committee and I do not propose to do so again—would not benefit from any switch in supplier, even if they could find one willing to take them on. Those with prepayment meters pay far more for their energy, although they tend to be less well off. The Library notes that accompanied the original Energy Bill put things very clearly:
"The tariff paid by domestic electricity consumers depends, in part, on the method of payment used. Broadly speaking there are three distinct options: standard credit"—
that is, payment by quarterly bills—
"direct debit and prepayment. Standard credit is, in effect, the default method of payment for most electricity consumers. Choosing to pay by direct debit confers a discount, while prepayment involves a surcharge."

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That means that those who are least well off and have to use prepayment meters pay most for their energy.
The issue is even more important in Scotland. Figures produced by Energywatch Scotland show that until 1997 electricity consumers paid less in Scotland than in England and Wales. Since then, however, people in Scotland have not seen electricity prices fall at the same rate as people in England and Wales, contrary to the Government's original argument for introducing BETTA. Since 1990, consumers in England and Wales who pay by standard credit have seen prices fall by 31.4 per cent. in real terms, while the figure in Scotland is about 20 per cent. The gap narrowed slightly in 2002 and 2003, but, strangely, it has widened for those who pay by direct debit and particularly for those with prepayment meters. Again, the system is penalising the least well off.
The Government's much trumpeted reduction of the number of households in fuel poverty has, according to Energywatch Scotland, largely been brought about by lower fuel prices, not Government action. Even so, as the regulatory impact assessment published with the Energy Bill showed, 13 per cent. of households in Scotland meet the Scottish Executive's definition of fuel poverty. However, it is important to note that the incidence of fuel poverty in the 16 local authorities that lie wholly or partly within the hydro area is approximately 4 per cent. above the Scottish average. In some areas, particularly island areas, the figure is much higher. The price increases announced by British Gas and npower may well reverse the declining trend in the number of households in fuel poverty, because prices will rise dramatically.
To return to my point about distribution charges, the Energy Act presents Scotland with a particular problem: hydro benefit. I urge those hon. Members who are not au fait with the history of hydro benefit to read the regulatory impact assessment, which contains an detailed and interesting account on page 119:
"Hydro Benefit has existed in various forms since 1943 when the North of Scotland Hydro-Electric Board…was created in order to electrify northern Scotland. More generally, the NoSHEB was established to help promote economic development in the Highlands and Islands, which had experienced relatively high unemployment and depopulation in the preceding decades."
The regulatory impact assessment also states:
"Given the abundance of hydro electricity in northern Scotland, Hydro Benefit was devised for social reasons as a means of ensuring that some of the advantages enjoyed by SHE",
which NoSHEB, as we knew it, became,
"through its ownership of cheap hydro generating assets could be used to offset some of the expense that its customers would otherwise bear through the relatively high costs of transporting electricity to and within the Highlands and Islands."
The assessment goes on to say that
"average distribution costs in North Scotland were easily the highest of any region in Great Britain—over 50 per cent. higher than the national average—in 2002/03 even after the reduction afforded by Hydro Benefit. The average cost in North Scotland without the subsidy would have been around 100 per cent. higher than the overall GB average, largely because of the large, sparsely populated terrain that must be wired to transport electricity to local consumers. Indeed, SHE served only 2 per cent. of all electricity customers by number (both domestic and non-domestic), yet had by far the highest system length per customer of any distribution area in Britain".
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Unfortunately, hydro benefit also came under threat from Ofgem, which seems to be the villain in this debate and the debate on the Energy Act 2004, although this time it cannot offload the problem on to the National Grid company. It was Ofgem that stuck the knife into Scottish consumers, by deciding that the hydro benefit was illegal under European law, despite the fact that the Monopolies and Mergers Commission had already conducted an investigation in 1995 and concluded that hydro benefit was in the public interest. That caused a great deal of controversy in the north of Scotland, as can be imagined.
It is fair to acknowledge that the Government reacted to that and introduced in the House of Lords what is now section 184 of the 2004 Act, which, as I have said, allows the Secretary of State to introduce a price cap and distribution charges in an area in Great Britain. Again, however, as with transmission charges, that area is not defined or is assumed to be the north of Scotland. The provision was widely welcomed in Scotland, but there are problems with it. The reduction in the replacement of hydro benefit is not guaranteed in the same way that hydro benefit was. Subsection (11) of section 184 provides that the scheme be reviewed three years after its introduction and at three-yearly intervals thereafter. It is also worth noting that the decision to introduce the scheme at all is at the Secretary of State's discretion. Presuming that it is introduced, however—I understand that Scottish Hydro-Electric has undertaken not to change charges until then—it will be for only three years. That is the only guarantee that consumers in the north of Scotland have for that benefit. They can have it for three years, but there could then be a fairly dramatic increase in prices.
I mentioned percentages earlier, but the situation should be put in context, with pounds, shillings and pence. Whatever happens to electricity prices over the next few decades, the reasons of geography that make electricity distribution much more expensive will not change. Distribution in the highlands and islands is now costed at £225 per customer, as compared with the next highest area, where the figure is £131. That is a substantial difference. If Ofgem were to use the same madcap economic theories as for transmission charge, and to go to locational charging, I dread to think what the charges would be for distribution to some of the island areas of Scotland.
Mr. Salmond: If Ofgem had been around in the immediate post-war period, two things would be certain: first, the hydro stations would never have been built and secondly, there would have been no benefit in their being built in the north of Scotland. Neither would have been allowed by Ofgem.
Mr. Weir: Given the history of the matter, my hon. Friend is correct. There might have been an attempt at hydro generation in the Thames—the Thames barrier might have looked rather different. I have to ask the Minister why there is such a short period for the benefit, and why is it to be reviewed at three-yearly intervals. Its mainstay, the geography of the highlands and islands, is not going to change. Distribution will always cost more in those areas than in the south of England or a more densely populated area.

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What is the reasoning behind the frequent reviews? They cause nothing but uncertainty to consumers and businesses in the north of Scotland and to the electricity generators, who face the double whammy of not knowing the future charges for either transmission or distribution. That could hurt consumers in remote and rural areas of Scotland very badly.
The combination of the ludicrous system of locational charging for transmission and opposition to the hydro benefit by Ofgem delivers a double whammy to the people of Scotland. An energy-rich nation faces higher energy costs and the sabotage of a huge renewable potential. That must not be allowed to happen.
2.41 pm
Mr. Alistair Carmichael: I add my congratulations to the hon. Member for Banff and Buchan (Mr. Salmond) both on having secured the debate and on the substance of his speech. There was very little in it with which I disagreed. I should also, as this is my first chance to do so on the record, congratulate him on having successfully reapplied for the leadership of his party. I have never been sure why he wanted it, and it remains to be seen whether he reflects on the best political advice that I have ever been given, which is to be careful what one wishes for. However, he has it, and I am sure that he will again be effective. I have also to thank him for his endorsement of one of my political and economic heroes, John Maynard Keynes.
Mr. Peter Duncan: Another one!
Mr. Carmichael: The hon. Member for Galloway and Upper Nithsdale (Mr. Duncan) expresses some surprise from a sedentary position. Perhaps he has seen the press reports that some on the fringes of my party have cast aspersions on the efficacy of Keynsian thinking. I am not one of them. John Maynard Keynes was a Liberal.
Mr. Salmond: I am sure that if he had been a Scot, he would have been in the Scottish National party.
Mr. Carmichael: It is idle to speculate on that. He was, rightly, a Liberal and it is difficult for many liberals to exist within today's SNP, but I take the hon. Gentleman's intervention in the spirit in which it was offered.
Much comment has been made about how Ofgem regulates the markets with whose regulation it is charged. The hon. Gentleman has already speculated that, had we had Ofgem at the time, we would not have seen the development of hydro energy in the post-war period, and would not have had the hydro benefits. It is true that the parts of those two crucial planks of Government policy not accounted for by Ofgem would be caught by state aid rules. The highly artificial way in which Ofgem seeks to regulate the market, driven in some ways by free market zeal, is exceptionally unhelpful.
All hon. Members who have spoken today have highlighted the tension at the heart of Government policy between the desire to promote markets as a
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mechanism for delivery and that for a particular social good, the promotion of renewable energies. Ofgem is a major potential barrier between the two.
It has always escaped me why Ofgem has an office in Millbank. On the basis that generation should be done where it is best done, surely regulation of markets is best done where generation is done, and there is precious little generation done on Millbank. If the staff were to get out of their office on Millbank and into the areas where electricity generation is important, they would see at the sharp end the impact of some of the things that they seem to regard as abstract.
Mr. Salmond: The hon. Gentleman is on to something, because Government policy, as I understand it, is to distribute public sector jobs across the country. That is the Government's locational theory of the civil service. Can the hon. Gentleman think of somewhere to which the new Ofgem's headquarters could be moved?
Mr. Carmichael: I can think of a number of places, Kirkwall and Lerwick being the most obvious. If, however, it were just a question of getting away from London, I have a particular ambition to get the Northern Lighthouse Board out of the offices on George street. It is ridiculous to have a lighthouse board based in George street in Edinburgh, so once I have achieved that, there will be a vacant building that Ofgem might be able to occupy. I fear, however, that we are straying a little from the main thrust of today's debate.
It has been said by all contributors that there is tremendous potential for the development of renewables, particularly in the highlands and islands. Two barriers to that make me pessimistic, however. First, we have been speaking long enough now about the notion of communities benefiting from having renewable generating facilities sited locally—principally, at present, wind farms. Everybody agrees that that is a good idea, but somehow it never seems to happen. The Government must now start to consider it seriously, and come forward with concrete schemes that will make such pious thoughts a reality.
Secondly, our local authorities must show greater strategic thinking in planning policy for wind farms. I perceive, particularly in the highlands and islands, a growing unease in many communities, a lot of which could be addressed with more strategic thinking in local authority planning policies. I know that that does not happen quickly or easily, but it is important none the less.
Mr. Peter Duncan: I hope that the hon. Gentleman is not suggesting that it is appropriate for local democracy for scrutiny of the proposals to be removed and replaced by central Government diktat.
Mr. Carmichael: No, absolutely not. I do not think that the hon. Gentleman has listened to a word that I said on that point. All that I said is that the local authorities, in constructing their planning policies, must have a greater strategic view of what is appropriate for their area. That is not at all the same as what the hon. Gentleman is suggesting, which is the withdrawal of powers from local government. In fairness to him, that was very much the hallmark of 18 years of Conservative

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Government so it is not in any way surprising that the hon. Gentleman should think along those lines, but I can assure him that my mind runs along very different lines.
The financial regime for the transmission of electricity, largely established by the Energy Act 1994, is extremely important, not least to my constituents. Communities in the northern isles face very significant economic challenges, and we see renewables as an important part of ensuring our long-term viability as communities. It was a particular pleasure for me during the recess just past to witness the opening of the European Marine Energy Centre—EMEC—in Stromness in my constituency. That is one point on which we have not dwelt sufficiently: we have used renewables today as a synonym for wind power, but there is a lot more to renewable energy than wind farms. The next phase, and the long-term contribution beyond wind farms, is the development of wave energy, to which other hon. Members have briefly referred, and tidal energy. Because of its predictability, tidal energy has the potential to contribute to the base load generation capacity, which will be of supreme importance if renewables are to play the part that we think that they can play.
Some time ago, an answer was provided to a question asked by the hon. Member for Salisbury (Mr. Key), in which the Department for Trade and Industry identified 40 sites of tidal streams that were suitable for the generation of electricity. 13 of them were in the Pentland firth or north of it, that is to say in my constituency. That will be the next opportunity. However, unless we get wind generation right and the framework correct, it will not happen because the infrastructure will not be there to ensure that the developments that will inevitably come from the peripheral, coastal and island communities are developed to their full potential. That is why this is a matter of supreme importance for the general renewables industry.
Just yesterday Shetlands island council agreed to a £150,000 funding package for a major community-owned wind farm project known as Viking Energy. It is therefore vital that renewable energy producers in the north of Scotland do not face punitive charges that threaten their future development. The hon. Member for Banff and Buchan referred to the charge of £22 per kilowatt that has been calculated as an example for mainland Scotland. He may not be aware that if one applies that same line of thinking to projects in Shetland it will be in the region of £70 per kilowatt. That is as good as saying that these projects will never happen. That is the real danger of the economics that are applied in a doctrinaire manner. The hon. Gentleman described it as discriminatory. My objection to the Ofgem thinking is that it is not discriminatory enough. I should like to see discrimination in favour of the development of renewables. I know why he used that term, and I do not take issue with it but I want to see the discrimination moving in another direction.
I am prepared to give the Government some credit for reaching where they have. I have been involved in this issue for some considerable time. I give the Minister for Energy, E-Commerce and Postal Services some credit for having stuck to his guns and to ensure that he has a power to cap excessive charges. I met him along with the chairman of Ofgem and the hon. Member for Western
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Isles (Mr. MacDonald) in February and it was apparent to me—I am fairly sure that the hon. Member for Western Isles would agree—that the Government were facing significant pressure from Ofgem to abandon a proposal that is now part of the Act and which would leave our energy producers to the vagaries of the market.
In their unceasing quest for cost-reflective pricing, Ofgem seem to be indifferent to the impact on Scotland's burgeoning renewables sector. Of course such an approach is a result of Ofgem viewing every policy decision from a narrow free-market economic standpoint. The real problem is that renewable generators are at present totally unaware of how Ofgem will meet the new requirement. That is critical in the run-up to the post-BETTA situation that will operate after April 2005. The Minister will be aware that Scottish Power and Scottish and Southern Energy currently charge flat rates. Reference has been made to the fact that there will effectively be a £9 subsidy in the south of England as opposed to the £22 charge. To my mind that is regulatory nonsense.
The Department of Trade and Industry has indicated that it will consult on a rebate or a cap on renewables in the highlands. When will this consultation take place? It is anticipated that it will occur this autumn but as far as I am aware that has not been confirmed. Could the Minister, either today or later in correspondence with his colleague, provide a clear timetable for consultation on the issue of a rebate or cap for peripheral locations? A cap or rebate will help individual schemes, but until we know the level we do not know what benefit it will be. What does the Minister envisage happening after this 10-year period elapses? The uncertainty that that generates is unhelpful in the extreme.
Finally, I turn to the analysis offered by Ofgem. It maintains that BETTA is broadly cost neutral and notes that generators in Scotland pay £92 million now in charges and will pay £90 million under BETTA. Although the figures used have an accurate basis, I would suggest that the analysis is simply wrong. The figures used relate to conventional generation, as in practice only conventional generation is traded via the interconnector with England. They do not account for the costs that renewables will face. Renewables are not currently traded over the border, so the costs proposed represent large increases for renewable generators of up to twice the current level.
As I understand it, the Government are also using Ofgem's analysis. However, Ofgem's analysis is irrelevant here, as it does not factor in charges that are faced by renewable generators. The Scottish renewables forum estimates that as a result of the new charges, Scottish generators will be subsidising English and Welsh generators by about £70 million a year. That is hardly the level playing field that BETTA is supposed to create. At best, it only preserves rather than removing any qualities.
Ofgem is right to want to introduce some cost reflectivity into charging, but it is wrong to make that the only consideration. A high cost reflectivity brings higher instability and also raises the costs of generation that cannot move. The wind and waves are where they are; one has to generate from them where one can find them, and that is in our peripheral areas.

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I urge the Minister to provide a clear signal to the national charging company about how it is to develop charges. Ofgem must adapt to fill its obligation under the Energy Act 2004 to ensure sustainability. That means that Scottish renewable power generators must not be priced out of the energy market.
2.57 pm
Mr. Peter Duncan: I share in the common congratulations to the hon. Member for Banff and Buchan (Mr. Salmond) on his timeous selection of this debate in our first week back after the summer recess. I suppose that a lot has changed over the last couple of months. For him to have shown such foresight over that period is truly remarkable.
Obviously this is an important and pertinent debate, but I greatly enjoyed—I thought it was one of the most important debates—the discussion about which party John Maynard Keynes would belong to. I thought that that was an instructive indication of the way in which Scottish politics is likely to head in the coming months and years. We look forward to that juncture. If there is any doubt remaining in the minds of hon. Members, I reassure them that he would not have best found himself in my party.
The market for electricity in Scotland is clearly different. It has been historically different—hon. Members have referred to the foresight of the hydro engineers in the past, but there is a different commercial field in Scotland. Research by the Scottish Energy Environment Foundation shows its importance: three out of the top 10 companies by turnover in Scotland are electricity utilities. That is clearly a different emphasis to the rest of England and Wales. The Scottish market is much more integrated and much less fragmented than that south of the border.
I reiterate the welcome made by my hon. Friends in the passage of the Energy Act; we look forward to the better provision of new opportunities for Scottish energy generators after the passage of the Act. I hope to provide considerable support for the substance of what the hon. Member for Banff and Buchan said. We will probably diverge in emphasis a bit later on, but it is always useful to start on common ground.
The hon. Gentleman has made an important and succinct summary of the case against discrimination in energy transmission. His opening remarks have shown how clearly existing Scottish generators will suffer if the proposal—option B, as it has been described—is allowed to go through. Locational pricing was originally an Ofgem concept. The National Grid Company has brought forward proposals to comply with that concept. Ofgem has to look long and hard at the way that it has taken this debate. It is not going to move forward an important sector of Scotland's economy and, on that basis, Ofgem will need to look long and hard at it before moving forward.
I want to provide the hon. Gentleman with support for his suggestion, which was reiterated by the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Carmichael), that wind projects should be located where they are most efficient and effective. There is clearly little point in creating a market that will encourage the creation of
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renewable projects in areas where they are least effective. That would be crazy, and it would not add anything to the wider debate on energy needs in Scotland or the GB market. I found little to quibble with in what the hon. Gentleman said on those two points.
I hope that Scottish consumers will see some improvement in the cost of electricity. Consumer prices have been attractively low in recent years, but that has provided a huge challenge for policy makers and companies in the energy sector. As the hon. Member for Angus (Mr. Weir) pointed out, the Scots have missed out relative to those in other parts of Britain on the benefits since deregulation. I read this morning that Energywatch has found that Scottish prices have increased by 10 per cent. since privatisation, whereas they have decreased by 5 per cent. in England and Wales. Clearly, that will not help in the wider selling of an effective market in Scotland. It has even been advocated that we switch to English or Welsh companies, a truly extraordinary remark for a Scot to make. Prices may have fallen in real terms, but we clearly have not shared in the benefits of privatisation. I was interested to hear that the National Audit Office has recommended that Ofgem should review the differences in consumer prices. I look forward to its response.
Much of the debate has focused on wind and renewable energy. That is inevitable, given that they tend to be the most peripherally located forms of generation. The Scottish Executive's target—it wants 40 per cent. of generation to be renewable by 2020—figures significantly in that debate. I understand that we are currently approaching the 12 per cent. mark. Scotland is rich in wind and wave resources, but I counsel hon. Members that my party does not necessarily share the common dash for wind. We see a place for it, but we see a place also for renewable energy and a balanced energy mix. We are hugely concerned at the unrestrained dash for wind energy in Scotland.
I sympathise entirely with the comments of the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland that we tend to focus on wind to the exclusion of other forms of renewable energy. I will share a personal anecdote. When researching the purchase of a solar panel for my house recently, I was interested to note that the technology had not moved on significantly since my father undertook a similar purchase in 1975. The photovoltaic sector has not made an incremental jump in those 25 or 30 years. However, although renewable energy has huge potential, I would not support those who wanted to focus exclusively on wind energy.
Mr. Salmond: I can see a community benefit in onshore wind power—it would be even better with community ownership—but if one power is to make a significant contribution to the renewables target, it must move offshore. The projects that I mentioned, some of which have caused much angst in Scotland, now contribute 200 MW. A single offshore project would produce five times as much energy.
Mr. Duncan: The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right about the considerable benefit to be gained by moving offshore. However, the issue is not entirely straightforward. I am reminded of a proposal approved for the Solway firth, adjacent to my constituency. I

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understand that it is not a long distance offshore, but some of the arguments are pertinent. A proposal was made for an area adjacent to a stretch of coastline that is a site of special scientific interest, one that is significant in the UK and Europe for environmental preservation. Although farmers were precluded from erecting a single turbine to support their own premises, approval was given in a relatively short time for 60 wind turbines to be built some six miles offshore. Such inconsistency does not endear the wider public to the planning process.
I ask the hon. Gentleman if he can reconcile a perceived inconsistency in what he said in his intervention. He said that Scotland had the potential to provide 25 per cent. of Europe's wind energy. He will be pleased to know that I listened to the opening debates in the Scottish Parliament yesterday. Unusually, the Official Report of the Scottish Parliament has not yet reached the website, so I have not been able to clarify the precise wording, but I understand that Nicola Sturgeon suggested that Scotland could be the source of 40 per cent. of Europe's wind energy. As I would not want to engender conflict at such an early stage between the hon. Member for Banff and Buchan and his deputy leader, vice leader or assistant leader, perhaps he would clarify the target figure.
Mr. Salmond: The figure of 25 per cent. is the available resource. The 40 per cent. figure is what is done with the available resources. For example, Scotland contributes about 90 per cent. of the UK's hydropower at present, but the available resource is only about 60 per cent. It is something that economists get to understand, and I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will catch up.
Mr. Duncan: I look forward to reading the Official Report when it is available to see how closely the wording reflects what the hon. Gentleman said.
Anger is mounting in Scotland as huge numbers of proposals come forward and there has been a step change in public opinion on the issue.
Mr. Alan Reid: The hon. Gentleman will recall that some time ago some of his colleagues in the Scottish Parliament called for a moratorium on all wind farm applications. Is that his party's policy?
Mr. Duncan: I can confirm that we have called for a moratorium on wind development in Scotland until the Scottish Executive can prove to us that that policy is worth pursuing. There is huge concern that we are embarking on a course to have 40 per cent. wind power that will put our stability at risk. I will come to that issue later.
Mr. Salmond: Does the moratorium include the Beatrice project? My constituents in Peterhead and people in other constituencies are extremely anxious that the Conservative party wants to deprive them of job opportunities.
Mr. Duncan: I assure the hon. Gentleman that we are looking forward anxiously to the Scottish Executive justifying the continued pursuance of wind power. There is a lack of accountable decision-making by the Scottish Executive.
The Minister for Trade and Investment: I agree with the hon. Member for Banff and Buchan (Mr. Salmond) that it is important that the Conservative party clarifies its position. It seems clear from what the hon. Member for Galloway and Upper Nithsdale (Mr. Duncan) said that the Conservative party is prepared to put jobs at risk in Scotland. He needs to clarify the matter.
Mr. Duncan: There is no confusion. Our policy is clear: we need a moratorium until such time as the Scottish Executive can come forward with a rational basis on which to support 40 per cent. of Scotland's power coming from renewable resources.
Long term, there is a change in the balance between nuclear power, which is being decommissioned, and wind power. That is playing Russian roulette with the energy mix. The market is about supply and demand. The security of supply should be one of our primary concerns.
Wind development across Scotland is scarring the landscape and we want the assurance that that can be justified by providing us with long-term, stable power supplies in Scotland.
Mr. Reid: What measures does the hon. Gentleman have to help the 300 employees at the wind turbine factory in Campbeltown who would lose their jobs as a result of his party's policies? What is his message to those employees?
Mr. Duncan: My message is clear: we are looking forward to the Scottish Executive's early justification for pursuing the 40 per cent. target. There will be question marks over the stability and security of supply in Scotland if that target is pursued. The Scottish Executive must produce that reassurance very quickly.
The market needs to supply electricity in a stable as well as a secure manner. In my constituency and in other parts of rural Scotland, there is great concern about unstable network supplies. The current measure of network stability is customer minutes lost, and the figure in my constituency is higher than the Scottish average, but investment in the rural network tends to be assessed on a Scotland-wide basis.
Mr. Carmichael: I appreciate what the hon. Gentleman says about wanting a moratorium pending justification of the target, but, as he reminded us, something like 12 per cent. of generation comes from renewables, against a target of 40 per cent. In those circumstances, does he not feel that calling for a total moratorium is somewhat disproportionate?
Mr. Duncan: No. It is reckless and irresponsible to propose a target when the Scottish Executive cannot justify it or provide a reassurance that Scotland's electricity generation will be stable and secure in the future.
To return to network stability, there is an imbalance in the assessment of customer minutes lost across Scotland, but that is not reflected in figures for the investment that is required to provide a secure and stable network in rural Scotland.

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To conclude, I agree that the price structure for supplying electricity needs to be fair and that generators should be located in areas where they are most effective and efficient. However, I question whether we need to pursue a policy that envisages a dash for gas and a dashfor wind, but does not provide a place for nuclear, which is a key part of a balanced energy mix.
3.12 pm
The Minister for Trade and Investment: It is a pleasure to reply to the debate. My right hon. Friend the Minister for Energy, E-Commerce and Postal Services is on a visit to China and has, I think, already apologised to the hon. Member for Banff and Buchan (Mr. Salmond) for not being here, although he has asked me to pass on his regards. In congratulating the hon. Gentleman on securing the debate, let me also congratulate him on his re-election as leader of the Scottish National party, although I should perhaps congratulate the Scottish National party on having elected him since he was obviously the most outstanding of those available. Only months ago, he was perhaps regarded as one of the politically dead, but—like me, to some extent—he is now an example of life occurring after death.
The hon. Gentleman made some strong, cogent arguments, but despite their substance, he overstated them at times and often missed some countervailing arguments about the benefits to the Scottish people. That said, he made some good points, which deserve a clear reply.
Throughout the debate, concern has been expressed about the impact of transmission charging on the Scottish electricity industry. It is right to raise such concerns, because the industry is crucial in Scotland, not only generating electricity, but supplying jobs. However, it is also important, as the hon. Member for Angus (Mr. Weir) said, to consider the benefits for the Scottish consumer. The Government are introducing the new BETTA system to benefit the Scottish consumer. For too long, Scottish consumers have had less choice than their counterparts in England and Wales. As a Government who believe that people should be able to have some element of choice, we think that that is unacceptable.
Overall, the BETTA package will deliver a better deal for the Scottish consumer by creating more competition and bringing down prices. The hon. Member for Angus wanted more information about that, and Ofgem estimates that, because of BETTA, the average domestic customer's bill in Scotland will be about £13 lower than it would be otherwise. The hon. Gentleman rightly referred to fuel poverty in Scotland, and it is a key issue for many families. However, the way in which the new regime operates should allow some of the problems of fuel poverty to begin to be addressed.
Mr. Weir: On what basis is that £13 calculated? We have heard today that the generators will face a massive increase in costs as a result of the transmission charges. Where does the Minister think that those costs will go, and what figure is taken into account in his calculations? Does he think that the companies will absorb the costs
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and reduce profit, or will they be passed on to the consumer? What figure is used in calculating that fall in the bill?
Mr. O'Brien: As I understand it, the figures are available in the statements that have been made by National Grid and Ofgem. The hon. Gentleman can find them too, but I will be happy to supply him with them.
Mr. Salmond: Why, we ask ourselves, can we not have the competition and its benefits without the discriminatory transmission charges?
Mr. O'Brien: Let me deal with the points one by one. My key point was that in putting his argument, which had some substance, the hon. Member for Banff and Buchan ignored the Scottish consumer. He was rightly concerned about the impact on the Scottish generators, as they are important employers, but he ignored the impact on consumers. His colleague the hon. Member for Angus did not, and it is important to look at the balance of the argument. As with everything, there are judgments to be made, and the overall judgment is that what we are doing will benefit the Scottish consumer. The figures that have come out will address some of the concerns about fuel poverty put forward by the hon. Member for Angus.
Mr. Salmond: My colleague and I operate as a team, which the Government should perhaps try, given the events of the last few days.
Talking of operating as a team, when my hon. Friend and I met Ofgem, I asked representatives three times whether they accorded to the Government's renewable target and three times they refused to answer. Can the Minister tell us whether in his opinion Ofgem operates to the Government's renewable target?
Mr. O'Brien: I shall come to renewables later. The hon. Gentleman is taking me away from the Scottish consumer—I understand why he is doing that, having ignored the consumer in his opening speech—and towards transmission charges and renewables. I want to deal with each of them in turn, and I shall now move on to transmission charges.
To claim that transmission charges under BETTA will rise for generators and that that will be bad overall for industry in Scotland is to distort the overall picture. There will be some difficult effects in certain areas, but overall the picture should be positive. It is not true that it will be bad for industry, and the hon. Gentleman's characterisation of the increase in transmission pricing is misleading. Let me say why.
The hon. Gentleman said in a press release on 5 September that charges will increase from £5.44 to £20.69, and he has referred to similar figures today. He has conveniently left out the fact that under the existing arrangements generators in the north of Scotland pay charges amounting to between £32 and £37 per kilowatt to sell their electricity into England and Wales. Those figures are based on figures that are publicly available in

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SHETL and National Grid's transmission charging statements. They are the real comparison for the new transmission charges.
Mr. Salmond rose—
Mr. O'Brien: I have given way twice, but let me finish my point, and I shall give way to the hon. Gentleman again.
We now have a different comparison from the one that the hon. Gentleman so eloquently made. Scotland is already a net exporter of electricity. Most new renewable projects will expect to export their electricity out of Scotland. It is wrong to claim that a reduction in charges from a potential £37 to £20.50 per kilowatt, which is the highest charge currently proposed—the hon. Gentleman got his figures wrong—is damaging to renewables. It is not.
Mr. Salmond rose—
Mr. Carmichael rose—
Mr. O'Brien: I promised to give way to the hon. Member for Banff and Buchan, but if he will bear with me until I have made my point, he may well want to respond. One example that he keeps giving is the Beatrice project. It is important, but it is at an embryonic stage of development and has some distance to go before transmission charges are even an issue. He is right that if it comes to fruition it will be a major employer. I share his concern about what the Conservatives are doing, and their damaging proposals, but to predict dire consequences at this stage for that project is alarmist and very premature.
Mr. Salmond: The Minister's colleague, the Energy Minister, was more enthusiastic about Beatrice a week last Thursday, but I have already dealt at some length with the matter that the Minister has raised—the question of interconnector charges. It may not be set out in that way in the Minister's speech, but what he was referring to are the interconnector charges. Even the Energy Minister argues that the effect is neutral between the interconnector charges and the new discriminatory charges. My point is that the change was sold to us as the removal of a major barrier to competition within the system. Even if the Energy Minister is right, and I doubt whether he is, how is it possible to justify removing from the system one barrier to the export of electricity while erecting a new one in this unfair and discriminatory way?
Mr. O'Brien: The hon. Gentleman seems to be making the point that if the consultation that is now going on produces a particular result, there may be difficult consequences. We say that the process of consultation is still under way. It is right that hon. Members should make their voices heard in that process. I know that many of my colleagues are concerned that Ofgem, the National Grid Company and Ministers should all listen to the points that are being made.
I listened with great care to the hon. Gentleman's points, which he put very well. However, there are too many "ifs" at this point. Let us see where we are at the
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end of the consultation period. We take the view that we need a system that to some extent reflects the overall charges caused by the costs of transmission. I hope that the outcome of the consultation will be a system that allows that.
Mr. Carmichael: I thank the Minister for giving way again; he is generous with his time.
We can argue indefinitely whether £22 is neutral in effect. No one would entertain the idea that the figure of £70 per kilowatt that is expected for access to the grid for projects in Shetland will be neutral. Is the Minister content that that figure should be imposed, with the result, effectively, that Shetland will be excluded from contributing its potential to the market in renewable energy?
Mr. O'Brien: Let us see where we are at the end of the consultation process and how the costings work out then. The potential contribution of Shetland and the whole of the northern part of Scotland is enormous. We need to ensure that we establish an energy policy that will realise that potential, for the benefit of all the people who use that electricity and power. That is part of the process of working our way through the arguments. We have taken the view that Ofgem should have a certain degree of independence, in order to be able to work through the arguments in a sensible and objective way. We have taken some powers to intervene if necessary. However, we have attempted to put in place a system that can allow all the issues to be considered in a way that is not seen to be at all politically biased and in which, to some extent, the substance of the real arguments is seen to be considered. We must allow that process to proceed.
The hon. Member for Banff and Buchan suggested that we were not enthusiastic about Beatrice and Talisman, so before I leave that issue I reiterate that the Department of Trade and Industry put £3 million into researching the project. The Department has strongly backed the scheme, so let there be no suggestion that £3 million is not greatly supportive—in my book, £3 million of taxpayers' money is considerably supportive.
Furthermore, BETTA provides many benefits for Scottish generation. There will be financially firm access to a Britain-wide market. Another important point is that under BETTA the cost of upgrading the Scottish transmission system will be spread across all British users. Without BETTA, the cost of that work would have to be recovered solely from the users of the Scottish transmission system. We would be talking about hundreds of millions of pounds falling just to Scotland, which would make charges rocket. The hon. Member for Banff and Buchan needs to consider for a moment what the situation would be like for Scottish generators if Scotland were independent, had its own market and was trying to export the majority of the electricity that it produces.
In addition, there would be a single, tangible set of rules under BETTA, replacing the vast variety of different rules we have now. It is better to have a straightforward system, which we are trying to put in place, than the complexities that the hon. Gentleman seems to prefer. Under that system generators would

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continue to face a number of different charges and the costs of upgrading the transmission system would be recovered solely from the small base of Scottish users, which is not right. That is why we want to put in place a better system. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman's aim is to inflict extra expense and extra bureaucracy on Scottish generators. That would surprise me, because I do not think that that is his aim, but that would be the outcome of the concerns that he has expressed if he does not get the balance right in the argument.
BETTA will also allow Scottish generators to provide services to the national grid, the transmission system operator, especially by providing balancing services. Those contracts can be lucrative and Scottish generators have not been in a position to realise the value from those services before. On a number of fronts, far from being bad for Scottish generators, the creation of the British market in fact provides a range of new and exciting opportunities for Scottish generators and will therefore develop the Scottish electricity industry.
We have heard some statements that I have concerns about, although we do not have time to deal with all of them. For the record, however, I should like to make it clear that the transmission charges are neither set nor capped by the Energy Act 2004. The Government, with Ofgem, consulted on the criteria to govern the transmission charging methodology. We very much support a methodology that is cost-reflective and promotes competition. We also concluded that National Grid should be asked to develop a methodology to meet those criteria. National Grid is still consulting on its methodology, and it would be for Ofgem to decide whether to approve it in the final instance. However, I note the valid point that the hon. Member for Banff and Buchan made about the nature of those proposing the methodology. That is something that we need to consider. I am sure that National Grid would be interested to receive the views of all hon. Members on the issue and I hope that they will be prepared to put those views forward.
Things are not yet finalised. We are still very much in the discussion phase and the Government are still listening to the points that hon. Members from Scotland are raising. We are concerned to ensure that Scotland realises its potential for energy generation and renewables, which we certainly back and want to be a success. Our main interest is to ensure that the Scottish consumer benefits, and when we look at the changes overall, we see that the Scottish consumer will indeed be the major beneficiary.

Asperger's Syndrome
3.30 pm
Mrs. Angela Browning: I am pleased to see the Under-Secretary of State for Health, the hon. Member for South Thanet (Dr. Ladyman) in his place in what is becoming an almost annual occasion, for which I make no apology. You will recall, Mr. Deputy Speaker, that I secured a debate on Asperger's syndrome on 10 September 2003 to discuss the impact on adults and adolescents who had been misdiagnosed by psychiatrists, particularly provincial psychiatrists, who confused their autistic behaviour with schizophrenia. They were the, to their detriment, treated as schizophrenics, with all the drugs that that treatment involves. Difficulties then arose in managing their lives, and damage was done.
To set the scene, I shall repeat something that I said at the beginning of my speech last year because it is still relevant to today's debate: very few provincial psychiatrists have been trained in either the diagnosis or the management of Asperger's syndrome; even fewer have gained the necessary experience in their working lives to be able to differentiate between a mental health condition and what many of us would regard as normal autistic behaviour, which sometimes even professional psychiatrists might well interpret as something quite different.
Very few psychiatrists in this country have the expertise to differentiate between autism and schizophrenia, and yet, day after day, people with Asperger's syndrome are admitted to mental health hospitals and are diagnosed and treated by people with that lack of experience. I want to build on that point this afternoon because it is still as much a problem today as it was when I raised the matter last year. Indeed, my hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury (Mr. Lidington), who is sitting next to me, told the House on 30 April of the tragic case of his constituent, Mr. Piers Bolduc, a young man with Asperger's syndrome who had been diagnosed quite mistakenly as schizophrenic and who had been in Broadmoor hospital for 10 years. As a result of my hon. Friend's intervention—I know that the Minister is familiar with this case—Piers was moved to the Hayes unit, which is a much more appropriate placement for him. With permission, I shall read part of a fax that his mother sent to me this morning when she saw that the debate was going to take place. She wrote:
"After one month there he is doing his laundry, helping on kitchen cleaning duties, hoovering, kicked a football about outside, played scrabble, monopoly and chess and has even made some design patterns on the computer…In Broadmoor he just shuffled from his windowless bedroom to the dayroom and tried to keep himself safe for ten years."
That sums up what can be done for adults with Asperger's syndrome when they are given the appropriate help, support and treatment, but it also signifies the desperate vulnerability of these people and the damage done to them when their condition is not recognised by medical professionals.
I singled out provincial psychiatrists, but I now want to discuss some of the other problems that psychiatrists acting in various areas of life are causing and that are

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affecting adults with Asperger's syndrome. This is not just a question of health. People with Asperger's syndrome get caught up in the court system and find themselves in prison. They also become involved in tribunals fighting for benefits or for appropriate packages of support. I particularly want to mention the case of Mr. X. It would not be appropriate to name him because his case is likely to come before the courts.
Mr. X is a married man with Asperger's syndrome who ran his own business and fell foul of the Court of Protection and other parts of our legal system. As a result, a psychiatrist attempted to pass an opinion on Asperger's syndrome without understanding the condition and without a working knowledge of the specialism. I advised the spouse of Mr. X to inquire about the background and qualifications of that psychiatrist who was appearing as an expert witness against him. When pressed, the psychiatrist withdrew because it became quite clear that he had no expertise in Asperger's syndrome at all, yet he was identified as someone who was available at huge remuneration to himself to appear as an expert witness in legal cases. That, too, gives cause for concern.
These are serious matters. These are life-changing circumstances that affect people with Asperger's syndrome. I particularly want to raise my concern about the medical professionals who put themselves forward in court cases as expert witnesses against the person with Asperger's, causing havoc to their lives and infringing their human rights. We have already a classic example of what happens when so-called medical experts put themselves forward as expert witnesses without the proper qualification and validity in the cases of Munchausen's syndrome with which the Minister will be familiar. This is an area in which he should be personally involved. He should talk to the health bodies to ensure that we do not have these people who quite clearly see a lucrative future for themselves, but a future that is bleak for the person against whom they speak.
Mr. David Lidington: Would my hon. Friend agree that not only is there a duty on the Minister to take action in order to prevent the sort of case she describes, but that the precedent of Munchausen's syndrome should stir the Government into carrying out a review of the cases of misdiagnosis which everyone agrees have taken place in recent years? There are still people who have suffered the same fate as my constituent Mr. Bolduc and are still in secure mental hospitals as a result of misdiagnosis and mistreatment.
Mrs. Browning: Indeed, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I do not want to repeat much of what I said last September. My hon. Friend has identified how we simply do not know how many cases of misdiagnosis there are. These cases are purely anecdotal at present, but as all those of us who take an interest in this subject have discovered, they are too frequent simply to be odd cases. Every odd case is bad enough in itself but there are just too many of them.
Liz Blackman rose—
Mrs. Browning: I give way to the chair of the all-party group on autism.
Liz Blackman: Alongside the recommendation that both hon. Members have made, would the hon. Lady
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not agree that we need more dialogue with the Royal College of Psychiatrists to ensure that expertise and capacity are properly increased during psychiatric training?
Mrs. Browning: I certainly agree. When the Minister replies, I hope that he will give us the assurances that we seek about his Department's involvement with the royal colleges to set out a blueprint for how we take this forward. We cannot leave this lying on the table any longer. That is why, for the second time in a year, I bring this subject to the attention of the Chamber. I would like to run through one or two of the issues that I have raised in the last year with the Minister, both in correspondence and written questions.
Two things are in the back of my mind. The first is the Mental Health Bill, which was published today and on whose scrutiny Committee I will serve. The second is the Mental Capacity Bill, which has had its First Reading and will proceed through the House. We are in the process of making changes to the way that people who lack capacity are represented. On the mental health front, it fills me with horror to think that we are still dealing with misdiagnosis, yet the Mental Health Bill will give professionals even more draconian powers to exert on people. I have no confidence that, uniformly throughout this country, there are psychiatrists who, as yet, can even differentiate between schizophrenia and Asperger's. How will they deal with personality disorder, another rather nebulous condition, which even the professionals admit is a spectrum?
I want to raise another issue with the Minister. In June, I tabled the following written question:
"To ask the Secretary of State for Health what assessment his Department has made of the appropriate qualifications and experience required of psychiatrists treating (a) in-patients and (b) out-patients who have an autistic spectrum disorder."
The Minister replied:
"None. This is a professional matter. It is the responsibility of the Royal College of Psychiatrists."
I know that officials draft such replies in all good faith, but the Minister has a detailed understanding and knowledge of autism. I put it to him that his Department should speak to the royal college, because such an assessment is desperately needed.
I tabled other questions on that same day and I am sure that they are in the Minister's folder. I apologise if I am becoming autistic in my behaviour, but I make no apologies for the fact that this is becoming an obsessive subject for me. I hope that he will see this as an opportunity to sort out my questions so as not to have to repeat his answers next year. I asked,
"what assessment his Department has made of the number of people with Asperger's syndrome who are misdiagnosed as schizophrenic."
Again, he replied:
"None. Where people have Asperger's syndrome or any other form of autistic spectrum disorder, it is important to distinguish behaviours due to their autism from any that might be attributable to a mental health problem".—[Official Report, 15 June 2004; Vol. 422, c. 892W.]
As I have already made clear in previous debates, like any other member of society, somebody with autism can develop a mental health problem—depression is a common problem. However, being misdiagnosed with

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schizophrenia is a very serious matter. I beg him to take another look at the issue. It should not be left to medical professionals. Direction is needed. There must be a strategy to deal with the problem; we cannot keep leaving it.
On the question of expert witnesses, I tabled a question to the Home Office asking
"what criteria are set for doctors and psychiatrists who offer themselves as expert witnesses on autistic spectrum disorders."
The Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, the hon. Member for Wythenshawe and Sale, East (Paul Goggins) sent me a long reply and I will not repeat all of it. However, he said:
"The decision whether or not to allow the evidence of an expert witness to be admitted rests with the court, which must be satisfied that the material comes within a recognized field of expertise and that the witness is indeed an expert in that field."—[Official Report, 18 June 2004; Vol. 422, c. 1157W.]
As it happened, in the case of Mr. X, it was not the court that made a judgment about the doctor's eligibility and qualification. Judgment was made because, out of the blue, I suggested to the wife that she make inquiries.
I have seen correspondence with the royal college and it is not satisfactory for somebody to self-nominate in such cases. That is a cross-departmental matter that needs to be examined carefully by all sections of Government. It should not be left to the old boy network—the Minister will know what I mean by that. A chum in the hospital should not be able to nominate or second someone to be an expert witness.
In this country, we have some very good, although too few, psychiatrists. It would be invidious to name them, but many here know who they are. They are excellent psychiatrists and experts in autism, particularly Asperger's syndrome. We cannot go on praying in aid that the syndrome is difficult to diagnose. However complex the case, it is difficult only if the person trying to diagnose an adult does not have a life's working experience and is unable to untangle those symptoms that might present as some form of mental health disorder but are in fact symptomatic of somebody with autism and not just mental illness. I must emphasise that autism is not a mental illness. In the case of Mr. X, a very concerning comment was made by a Lord Chancellor's visitor—a retired psychiatrist employed by the Court of Protection—who wrote an opinion stating that the person concerned suffered from mental disorder, namely Asperger's syndrome. Asperger's syndrome is not a mental disorder under the Mental Health Act 1983. It is critical that the matter be dealt with—not just left to the royal colleges—and that the Government take a hands-on approach with the royal colleges on some of the suggestions that I humbly made in my approach to the Minister last September.
For example, when psychiatrists in provincial hospitals, who genuinely do not have a working knowledge of Asperger's syndrome, are presented with either an in-patient or an out-patient, there is no reason why, as in other medical disciplines, they should not have an list of authorised people with expertise from whom to obtain a second opinion. They could, at least, pick up the phone and share the case with a recognised expert—such people are genuinely out there.
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However complex the case—some cases become very complex indeed when adults with Asperger's syndrome fall foul of the criminal justice system and of in-patient mental health services in the provinces—all that is required is a structure that obliges non-specialists to make contact with a specialist and to get a second opinion and guidance as to how to manage and treat the case. That is not unreasonable, and it should not require loads of money. I am not asking for a hike in the budget, or telling the Minister to go to the Chancellor to ask for umpteen more pounds for his Department; it can be achieved at minimal cost. That is why it is so sad that it is not being done. I hope that the Minister will give me the reassurances that I seek, because we have made no progress in the past year. I hope that all of us can work together before next September to make sure that I do not have to stand here again and repeat bits of this year's speech because no progress has been made.
3.47 pm
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health: The hon. Member for Tiverton and Honiton (Mrs. Browning) has again shown herself to be a true champion of people with Asperger's syndrome and autistic spectrum disorders. I pay tribute to her energy and will be very happy to come back to answer her annual Adjournment debates on the subject if for no other reason than that it will mean I have survived not only reshuffle week but the general election that might intervene between now and next September. The hon. Lady knows that I share her wish to improve the life experience of people with autistic spectrum disorders.
In recent years we have made significant progress. It might seem as though we have not made as much progress as the hon. Lady would wish in the area on which she has concentrated today, but she might find some messages of comfort later in my speech. A week today, with the national service framework for children, we will launch the next step in improving the life chances of autistic people. That will include an exemplar for autism, and I think she will find a great deal to be pleased about in that document. I am sure that the all-party group chaired by my hon. Friend the Member for Erewash (Liz Blackman) will find a great deal in it to be pleased about as well.
As the hon. Lady said, some aspects of service provision for people with higher-functioning forms of autism require a specific understanding of the conditions. We need to do all we can to ensure that those with responsibilities for service delivery have that understanding, and that it is shared outside the specialist health and social care services—across housing, employment, leisure, the police and the court services—as has been so eloquently pointed out.
Asperger's syndrome is a developmental disorder on the autistic spectrum, and there is wide variation in the social adaptation of people with the syndrome in adolescence and adulthood. As a result, it is often difficult to identify the best way of supporting each individual. Those who need health or social services sometimes find themselves less than ideally served by learning disability or mental health services; I recognise that they often fall between them. Next week's national service framework will have something to say about that aspect of the care system.

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This afternoon's debate is specifically about services for adults with Asperger's syndrome, and I fully acknowledge that those are not as well developed as I would like. It is clearly the responsibility of government, nationally and locally, to ensure that good, effective support services are in place. It is important that people with Asperger's and other forms of high-functioning autism should get their fair share of resources and services, according to need.
In her Adjournment debate last September on the mental health issues affecting people with Asperger's, the hon. Lady raised the issue of professional education in autism for psychiatrists. She has mentioned her concerns again today, with particular reference to provincial psychiatrists and others. She said that the matter needs leadership from the Department of Health. By instinct, I am a bossy boots, and I would be prepared to order people from the Department of Health about in all sorts of ways that are not fashionable these days. However, we have devolved responsibilities, and leave professional standards and training to the royal colleges. That does not mean to say that we do not talk to them, or that we do not express our concerns and engage in conversations with them. However, we do not do so in a Stalinistic way, or order them to take steps.
The matter is one for the Royal College of Psychiatrists, which recognises that psychiatrists in every area of psychiatry need specific training in autism, to raise their awareness of issues such as consent, capacity, mental health legislation, diagnosis and treatment. It also recognises that although psychiatrists should have such training, not all of them do at the moment. It is particularly conscious of the problems of overlapping diagnosis and misdiagnosis that the hon. Lady identified. I am pleased to be able to tell her that it has set up a working group to consider psychiatrist services for adolescents and adults with autistic spectrum disorders. The group's report is awaited, and I understand that it will include a discussion about the training of psychiatrists in that field.
That is not all that the Royal College of Psychiatrists has done to increase its members' awareness of autism: it has already made it a requirement that all trainee psychiatrists do six months of developmental psychiatry in either learning disability or child adolescent psychiatry before they can go on to higher level specialisation. That will ensure that they have at least some exposure to people on the autistic spectrum before becoming consultants. No doubt the hon. Lady will want to see more intensive exposure to autistic spectrum disorders than is currently the case, and I hope that the report being produced will take us there.
Mrs. Browning: The Minister will know that the diagnosis of an adult, as opposed to a child, is complex. We have seen a lot of progress in child diagnosis, but many more complex cases require someone who has a specialism and whose working life is dedicated to working with autism. I appreciate what he is saying, but only such long-term expertise allows people to get an accurate diagnosis. That is why I like my idea of referrals—I hope that the Minister will listen carefully to it again. People who specialise in coronary heart disease obtain, in many complex cases, a second opinion from
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an expert who concentrates on that aspect of the spectrum. I hope that the Minister will take that on board.
Dr. Ladyman: That is a very helpful suggestion, and I shall ensure that my officials consider it and pass it on to the Royal College for inclusion in its report.
The hon. Lady and the hon. Member for Aylesbury (Mr. Lidington) spoke about expert witnesses, and I am delighted that Piers Bolduck is now receiving the treatment that he should have got some time ago, and to hear from his mother that he is now thriving. Long may that continue. We are aware of the expert witness problem, and I freely admit that we became aware of it because of the issues of child pathology and Munchhausen syndrome. However, the hon. Lady and the hon. Gentleman may remember that just before the recess, my right hon. Friend the Minister for Children and I issued a written statement saying that we had asked the chief medical officer to set up a review group into expert witnesses, which would consider their training, selection and preparation for giving evidence in court. Although our primary focus in setting that up were the sad issues relating to children, it is intended to be a general review of expert witnesses. I shall ensure that the comments made in today's debate are passed on to the chief medical officer so that they can be taken into account in that review.
Although the hon. Lady may say that we have not made any progress since she raised the issue last September, I hope she will acknowledge that there has been some, although perhaps not so obvious as she would have liked. There is still a heck of a long way to go before the work is completed.
We have also been doing other work. Work has been completed on a project called "Green Light: How Good Are Your Mental Health Services for People with Learning Disabilities?", which was commissioned by the National Institute for Mental Health in England and the Valuing People support team. It is a guide to developing good services to meet the mental health needs of people with learning disabilities. Although people with a diagnosis of Asperger's syndrome do not always have a learning disability—or, at least, not what is traditionally understood by a learning disability—we ensured that that work addressed the importance of seeking an expert opinion when a person with mental health problems has any form of autistic spectrum disorder. If the hon. Lady is interested in following that up, the information can be found on the Valuing People support team's website.
In addition, the Department of Health has started some work for those with responsibility for developing more specialised tertiary services for people with a learning disability and a mental disorder. That work is being led by Professor Louis Appleby, the national director for mental health. Points made in this debate and in the recent Adjournment debates on Asperger's syndrome will be fed into that work, and a report on Asperger's is expected early next year.
The hon. Lady mentioned a couple of pieces of legislation that concerned her. I am delighted to hear that she will be on the pre-legislative scrutiny committee for the Mental Health Bill. That joint scrutiny committee has just been established and has been asked to present its report by the end of March 2005.

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It provides an important opportunity for stakeholders to have an input into developing an effective and fair piece of legislation.
The revised Mental Health Bill represents the first major overhaul of the legislation since the 1950s and is an integral part of the Government's wider strategy to improve mental health services for all, along with substantially increased investment and the reform of service development. It will be an important piece of work although no doubt controversial, and many debates will be had before it finally starts to make its way through Parliament. However, the committee will have the benefit of the hon. Lady's expertise from her interest in Asperger's.
The hon. Lady also mentioned the Mental Capacity Bill, which was introduced to Parliament on 17 June. It will help to bring about a cultural shift in the way in which we treat people who lack capacity, and will include provision for those with autistic spectrum disorders. The Bill sets out the key principles to be taken into consideration in making decisions for people who lack capacity. It starts from the presumption of capacity—everyone is assumed to have the capacity to make decisions—and places an obligation on the decision maker to take all practicable steps to help the person make a decision. It sets out a functional test of capacity—capacity must be assessed in relation to the decision to be taken. All decisions taken must be in the best interests of the person concerned, and the Bill sets out a checklist of factors to be considered in determining those best interests. It stipulates that the decision should involve the least restrictive action.
The Mental Capacity Bill will increase the expectation that decision makers such as clinicians should take into account the wishes, feelings and values of people who lack capacity. The Bill provides a new safeguard—the independent consultee—for people who are particularly vulnerable because they have no friends or relatives. The decision maker must consult the independent consultee about serious medical treatments and decisions about long-term care. However, I entirely accept the point made by the hon. Lady that experts who are involved in that process must be genuine experts. We must ensure that they have the training necessary to give proper advice to the courts and to the individuals concerned.
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. We were due to commence the final time-allocated topic for today's consideration at this point. However, as the Division bell is ringing, I propose to suspend the sitting for 15 minutes.
4 pm
Sitting suspended for a Division in the House.

Red Squirrels (North-East England)
4.12 pm
On resuming—
Joyce Quin: I very much welcome the opportunity to speak on a subject about which I have been concerned for a long time. It is one that I have raised previously in early-day motions and written and oral questions. It is the importance of ensuring the survival of the red squirrel, particularly in one of its few remaining bastions—the north-east of England.
For a number of reasons, I am glad that the Minister for the Environment and Agri-environment is to respond to the debate. I had the pleasure of working with him as a colleague in the former Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food. His commitment to the environment and conservation is widely known and hugely respected, and he has a deep knowledge of our countryside and its flora and fauna. He is also determined to honour our international obligations on environmental matters and biodiversity.
The north-east has the largest remaining populations of red squirrel in England. It is estimated that between 20,000 and 30,000 red squirrels remain in the country, three-quarters of which are to be found in Northumberland. The red squirrel is something of a regional icon; it is regarded with deep affection, and attempts to ensure its survival are hugely supported by the people of the area. I saw that at first hand this summer when I visited the National Trust property at Wallington Hall and saw how many people were observing them from the hides in the wildlife sanctuary—and how delighted people were to see them. Whenever I or other hon. Members raise the subject, we receive letters of support from many people in the region. I am grateful for that support.
The red squirrel is under considerable threat from grey squirrels, which are approaching the region from both directions—from further south in England and from further north. Squirrels from Edinburgh and the firth of Forth have now reached the borders of Scotland, and the situation is now becoming serious.
I should say from the outset that I am not calling for a solution along the lines of the dramatic policy launched by my hon. Friend the Minister for the Environment and Agri-environment when he announced the cull of the entire ruddy duck population in our country. I recognise that grey squirrels have their friends and, along with London residents, I enjoy the sight of them in St. James's park and elsewhere. However, it is the remorseless spread of the greys and their role in eradicating our native red squirrel that is the problem.
An article in Natural World this spring gave figures for the decline of the red squirrel over the past 50 years. Whereas in 1953, the grey squirrel occurred only in Kensington gardens and other parks in the London district, the red squirrel at that time was distributed throughout Britain. Today, however, the red squirrel is outnumbered 66:1 by 2 million grey squirrels.
The threat from the grey squirrel to the red is twofold. First, the greys tend to win hands down in any competition with the reds and therefore invade their

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habitats and take their food. Secondly, they also pose an undoubted health threat to the reds in exposing them to the parapox virus. Grey squirrels do not appear to be affected by the virus, but current thinking suggests that they carry and transmit it to reds. The way that transmission occurs is not well understood: it may be by direct contact between squirrels or by indirect contact via scent markings or saliva. However, what is certain is that red squirrels die within 15 days of contracting the virus, and there is no known cure or vaccination.
I know that the importance of finding effective strategies to ensure the survival of the red squirrel population in the north-east and elsewhere is accepted by my hon. Friend the Minister. I welcome the fact that there has been increasing Government recognition of the problem. In turn, that has led to increasing awareness of it in the minds of the general public and, importantly, in the minds of farmers, landowners, foresters and the people that we tend to describe as the "key stakeholders" in rural areas.
I pay particular tribute to the Northumberland Wildlife Trust, of which I have been a member for many years. Its campaigns in association with local businesses and environmental bodies, such as the "Red Alert" campaign begun in 1992, have been well received and have led to much more systematic recording of sightings of both red and grey squirrels, information that is vital in devising effective red squirrel conversation strategies and measures to control grey squirrels.
The Northumberland wildlife trust has a full-time red squirrel conservation officer, Louise Bessant, who is energetic and committed to her role. In co-operation with other bodies, the trust has a strategy of creating red squirrel reserves with adequate buffer zones around them as a way of limiting the spread of greys. At the same time, it has a strategy of creating and expanding habitats that seem more suited to the reds than the greys and that therefore give the reds the opportunity of winning ground in the intense competition with greys.
The trust's strategies are assisted in several ways by the efforts of the Forestry Commission, whose chairman Lord Clark of Windermere is very supportive both personally and professionally of the case for ensuring the survival of the red squirrel in both the north-east and Cumbria. Of course, we remember him well as a former Member of this House for a north-eastern constituency and as someone who took environmental issues with the utmost seriousness.
Modest amounts of money are available under the Forestry Commission's woodland grant scheme, which can assist in the purchase of grey squirrel traps and the planting of certain trees, such as birch and rowan, whose seeds do not provide enough energy to support grey squirrel populations but sustain the less voracious reds. I note that the hon. Member for Hexham (Mr. Atkinson) is in the Chamber. When he raised the issue of the red squirrel in an Adjournment debate a few years ago—I think in 1996—he mentioned that it would be desirable to have Forestry Commission grants. I am sure that he is pleased that those grants are at least having some impact, and are being applied for.
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Despite such valuable work, some of which is still in its early stages, the remorseless decline of the red squirrel continues. Looking at maps of red and grey squirrel distribution in the north-east over the past few years, one can see that the greys have now colonised large areas of County Durham, where they were not previously present, and have also appeared in areas north of the River Tyne. The remaining red squirrel areas are looking increasingly and alarmingly vulnerable.
I contend that more resources will need to be devoted if we are to have any opportunity to reverse the trend. Such resources could increase the success rate of controlling the greys in various ways and of enhancing the number of habitats that would be favourable to the reds.
I want specifically to consider the issue of public funding. In a written answer to me last year, my hon. Friend the Minister said that the Department, through English Nature, had spent about £125,000 over the past five years on red squirrel conservation. I am not sure how much of that was spent in the north-east, but only one of the main four projects was specifically targeted at what were described as priority woodlands in northern England.
On the other hand, it is my understanding from information supplied to me by the House of Commons Library that the estimated cost of the ruddy duck cull over five years is in the order of £5 million. However, I understand that the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs hopes that £2 million of that money will be obtainable from European sources. That prompts me to ask two questions of my hon. Friend. First, is it not possible for at least as much money to be spent on a strategy to ensure the survival of the red squirrel as is envisaged for the ruddy duck programme? Secondly, is it possible to obtain European funding for a red squirrel strategy?
I know that the European Union as a whole is keen to promote the goals of the biodiversity convention. Red squirrels are not only under threat in Britain; for example, grey squirrels are in the north of Italy and there are worries about how far they may spread, although it is certainly true that the situation here is particularly dramatic.
Overall, it seems to me that we are talking about relatively modest current levels of spending on red and grey squirrels. About £100,000 a year is spent on research dealing with the control of grey squirrels, and about £200,000 a year on targeted control of grey squirrels on land managed by Forest Enterprise, together with a proportion of the annual management grant spent in England. I am not quite sure what level that proportion is at, and if my hon. Friend has any figures, I would certainly be interested to hear them.
Apart from fairly modest levels of spending, we are otherwise relying on the overstretched resources of admittedly committed volunteers and some welcome private sector support, which I know has been obtained in recent years. Furthermore, in mentioning some of the useful initiatives supported by the Forestry Commission money, I am aware that the money is disbursed on a first come, first served basis and that the grants are speedily exhausted. Indeed, I understand that no more may be available under those

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programmes in this financial year. Will my hon. Friend the Minister tell me whether that is the case, and, if so, what is his Department's estimate of the unfulfilled demand for squirrel-related grants?
I understand that the annual management grant is a discretionary amount based on the size of the woodland, and that the woodland improvement grant can pay up to half the costs of purchasing grey squirrel traps. However, I am also told that many landowners with small wood lots on their land do not apply for the grants as the annual payment for which they would be eligible will not cover the full costs of employing a contractor. Does my hon. Friend accept that there may be a problem? If there is, how can such a disincentive to some landowners be overcome? I should be grateful for his consideration of that issue. What the Department is spending now is better than it was in the past. As I said, I welcome its interest in and support for the red squirrel, but more resources are necessary and would be welcome. I worry that if the resources are too modest, they may fail to achieve the goals.
I want to question the Minister about another aspect of the Department's strategy. In reply to my oral question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State said that
"the Government's emphasis has been to seek to protect the red squirrel by protecting the habitat where it is most likely to survive rather than to interfere in the habitat of the grey squirrel. There is no doubt, sadly, that grey squirrels have a considerable advantage in, for example, broadleaf woodland."—[Official Report, 3 April 2003; Vol. 402, c. 1062.]
That is true; the Northumberland Wildlife Trust and others believe that the most defendable territory for red squirrels is the conifer plantations. However, I would be unhappy if red squirrels in the north-east were confined to conifer habitats rather than to the more attractive broadleaved woodlands, especially beech and hazel woods, which are their traditional habitat and much more easily enjoyed by human beings. If public money is going to help to ensure the survival of the red squirrel, people should at least be able to see them easily in attractive surroundings.
Although conifers are planted much more sensibly now, the plantations are still large, monochrome, unvarying, geometric slabs of territory, sometimes constituting blots on the landscape of the Cheviots and other parts of the north-east. I am tempted to exempt Kielder forest from that statement, because recently the area has been successful in promoting public access, and its new plantings are greatly preferable to the traditional conifer plantations. Generally, conifer forests can have a displeasing visual effect. Some areas were planted primarily for commercial purposes and may be cut down for commercial reasons, which may disrupt the red squirrel population.
I hope that my hon. Friend will examine not just the minimalist approach of confining red squirrels to conifer plantations, but that he will also seek to prevent grey squirrels extending into those broadleaved areas that are currently occupied by the reds. That is the least we should expect. However, it would also be good to ensure that within the broader, wider areas of conifer-
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dominated zones, which are designated as red-squirrel priority areas, there are some broadleaved places for red squirrels and humans to enjoy.
Mr. Peter Atkinson: I thank the right hon. Lady for raising the matter and doing a valuable service to the red squirrel. I strongly agree with her that we do not want red squirrels to be isolated in pockets of conifers because many people in her constituency and in suburban parts of Newcastle appreciate seeing red squirrels in the woodlands around their houses. It would be a pity if they were to be lost.
Joyce Quin: I very much agree with the hon. Gentleman. I know of his long-standing interest in the issue.
It is important to continue research into the most effective ways of controlling the greys and in promoting the well-being and life chances of the reds. Perhaps my hon. Friend can refer to the research that is being done. The culling of grey squirrels to prevent their entering buffer zones is important, although it is resource-intensive and not cheap. None the less, I was interested to read how greys were eliminated from the Newborough forest in Anglesey; it is something that could be considered in some areas in the north-east that greys have begun to penetrate and to control. Work on ways of controlling the parapox virus and preventing it from killing yet more reds is also vital.
I hope that my hon. Friend can assure me that the Government are also working in co-operation with the Scottish Executive on the issue. Because the remaining bastions of the red squirrel in Cumbria and the north-east are adjacent to Scotland, effective joint working across national and local government boundaries is vital. All authorities, whether local, regional, national or UK-wide, need to be able to work together.
I could make other comments, but I am conscious of the time and the need to give the Minister time to respond. Despite the efforts of Government and the wildlife trusts, I believe that more needs to be done to respond to the public desire to save the red squirrel and to do enough to honour our commitments under international agreements such as the biodiversity convention. Certainly we can be in no position to preach to other countries where wildlife is under threat if we are not adequately protecting biodiversity within our own shores by ensuring the survival of a much-loved native species.
4.31 pm
The Minister for the Environment and Agri-environment: I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for Gateshead, East and Washington, West (Joyce Quin) on the detailed case that she put forward for an animal that is very important nationally, and particularly in the north-east and Kielder, which is, as she described, one of its strongholds in this country.
I know that hon. Members who are present, including my hon. Friend the Member for Workington (Tony Cunningham), have a great interest in the red squirrel in Cumbria. The hon. Member for Hexham (Mr. Atkinson) has also raised the issue in

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Adjournment debates. Although my hon. Friend always manages to produce an osprey for me when I go to Cumbria he does not always produce a red squirrel, but he does his best.
The issue that my right hon. Friend raised is a serious one: a native species is under severe threat. She raised detailed questions about the action that can be taken not only to protect our remnant populations but, we hope, to help them to recolonise. I take her point about conifer woods and she was right to give Anglesey as an example. It is a good instance of how, through the control of grey squirrels and through recolonisation projects, the red squirrel has recovered and has spread out of the conifer woods and back to broadleaved woods. I do not underestimate the difficulty of that, but it shows that action can be taken to achieve the objective—one that I share with my right hon. Friend.
As a personal aside, I wonder whether one approach would be to use forestry management grants. They have been used to remove some broadleaved areas to provide red squirrels with protection, as they survive better in conifer woods than in broadleaved woods where they compete with grey squirrels. However, I wonder whether it would be possible to create buffer zones of conifers for broadleaved woods with red squirrel populations. Those issues are worth exploring and I know that the Forestry Commission takes them seriously.
My right hon. Friend talked about the eradication of the grey squirrel. There is certainly a need to control grey squirrels, not least because of the damage that they do to forestry, but also because of the threat that they pose to our indigenous red squirrel. I must be honest with my right hon. Friend and say that the large-scale eradication of grey squirrels is probably not the answer. It would be costly, would not be likely to succeed and would divert large sums of money away from other activities and projects that might be more useful for red squirrel protection.
The comparison that my right hon. Friend drew with the ruddy duck is still etched on my memory, but the Government are not spending £5 million on ruddy duck eradication. The present project costs considerably less, but it is true that an application has been made to the European Union for a considerable sum of money. The issue in that case is that the ruddy duck is an introduced exotic in this country, but is spreading into Spain, where it is threatening the endangered white-headed ducks. It is therefore perfectly reasonable that there should be a European contribution to what is a European conservation issue. That is what we are taking up with the European Union.
However, we are not the only country to have a grey squirrel problem. Italy, too, has the same problem of the introduction of the species and its competition with the indigenous red squirrels. There is nothing in principle to prevent us from making an application to the European Union, perhaps for a joint project with the Italians. I will pass that idea on to my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, who has responsibility for fisheries and the countryside. He would have liked to be here today but he is in Committee. However, I welcome the opportunity to talk about red squirrels, in which I have had a long interest, shared with my right hon. Friend the Member for Gateshead, East and Washington, West, who is a good
322WH
friend and colleague from the days of MAFF, as she rightly stated. She has a long-standing interest in squirrel conservation.
We believe that the best way of contributing to the success of the red squirrel population is large-scale habitat management of forests. I can confirm that the current round of applications for planting grants has closed, including some for habitat management, although applications are due to open again in January. A number of contracts for dealing with the problem are continuing. The Forestry Commission is working with landowners in a partnership approach to provide advice and support on red squirrel management.
Other aspects are the management of buffer zones and the surveillance of grey squirrel movements. The Government work in a consortium involving different agencies including English Nature, the wildlife trusts and private landlords. There is also a great deal of interest from the public. The Forestry Commission chairs a steering group that oversees a project that has identified 20 areas in northern England where action to maintain red squirrels is most likely to be effective. That includes Northumberland and the Kielder area. Management plans have been prepared for those areas, which will also form the basis of a partnership project bid for heritage lottery funding to carry out some of the management activities there. That is another potential funding stream for red squirrel management.
A considerable amount of money is going into squirrel management at present. My right hon. Friend mentioned the £100,000 going into scientific research and development, particularly into contraception. She might be interested to know that a lot of work is being done on grey squirrel contraception control in the United States, where they are a problem. In New Zealand work is being done on contraceptive control in possums. We are sharing information and collaborating on those research projects, which helps to spread the considerable costs of a detailed scientific programme.
The Forestry Commission spends somewhere in the region of £115,000 in England on red squirrel management. Forestry research provides an additional £10,000 on various projects and the Government spend somewhere in the region of £100,000 on research. There are also specifically targeted grants to establish new woodlands to link fragmented woodlands, which have been used particularly in the case of the Isle of Wight. That scheme involved £127,000.
Those schemes are not all directed at the north-east in particular, but a lot of money is going into the national programme. I am not sure whether that also includes such things as support for project officers in the Forestry Commission, or project officers in some of the wildlife trusts that are funded to take forward biodiversity action programmes for red squirrels. DEFRA itself is a partner in the local biodiversity action programme in Northumberland, through the Rural Development Service. Of course, there are costs there that are absorbed within DEFRA that are not accounted for. All in all, a considerable amount of money is being spent on red squirrel conservation, but I accept that there is always an argument for more. The bid for the Heritage Lottery Fund and the potential for European funding may bring additional resources in. I would certainly welcome that.

323WH
Red squirrels are a priority for us in this country. I know how important they are in the north-east of England and in Cumbria. The red squirrels attract a great deal of attention, as my right hon. Friend says. I must make a correction. I said that the woodland grant scheme would be open in January. In fact, it will be April—the end of the year, in financial terms.
There have been a number of successes in relation to red squirrel conservation. The various projects around the country—not just in the north-east, but in places such as Anglesey and the Isle of Wight—add to the knowledge and experience of conservation management, which will be helpful in terms of translating that information.
324WH
My right hon. Friend has raised a number of important and serious points and I hope that I have answered her questions. I will be happy to provide her with more information, if she requires it. With people such as her, and many others, and the interest that they have expressed, I believe that the long-term future of the red squirrel is secure. However, we cannot be complacent and we recognise that we have a responsibility and a role to play as central Government, and that along with that there must be a partnership approach with the many organisations and individuals who are committed to the conservation of this wonderful animal.
Question put and agreed to.
Adjourned accordingly at nineteen minutes to Five o'clock.

PRIME MINISTER

  Freedom of Information
  Matthew Taylor
  To ask the Prime Minister (1) on what date he issued the direction to set up the Ministerial Committee on Freedom of Information (MISC 28); for what reasons he decided to set up this committee; and if he will place in the Library a copy of the direction setting up this committee; [186606]

  (2) how many times the Ministerial Committee on Freedom of Information (MISC 28) has met since it was set up; on what dates it has met; when it was set up; and whether the committee has discussed the issue of deciding what level of fees should be charged for requests under the Freedom of Information Act 2000. [186607]

  The Prime Minister
  It is established practice, as reflected in the Ministerial Code and under Exemption 2 of Part II of the Code of Practice on Access to Government Information, not to disclose information relating to the proceedings of the Cabinet and its committees.

  I announced the establishment of the Ministerial Committee on Freedom of Information (MISC28) to Parliament on Thursday 27 May 2004. The Committee was established to oversee the Government's strategy on Freedom of Information, particularly as Government Departments make final preparations for the full implementation of the Freedom of Information Act in 2005. Details of the membership and terms of reference of the Committee are available in the Libraries of both Houses and on the Cabinet Office website.

CONSTITUTIONAL AFFAIRS

  Public Records
  Lynne Jones
  To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Department for Constitutional Affairs pursuant to his answer of 22 July 2004,Official Report, column 535W, on public records, under what legal provision files that have passed the normal 30 years disclosure period laid down by the Public Record Act 1958 have been either closed or retained; how many of the closed files have been closed to protect personally sensitive information; for what categories of reason the remainder are closed; and what plans there are for the future publication of the retained files. [187622]

  Mr. Lammy
  Records may at present be kept closed to public access longer than 30 years under s5(1) of the Public Records Act or specifically to prevent a breach of good faith under s5(2). S3(4) allows for retention in Departments beyond the 30 year period. In all these cases the approval of the relevant Minister and the Lord Chancellor, who takes account of the views of his 1242W
  Advisory Council on National Records and Archives, is required. Variations of the 30 year closure period are authorised by an Instrument signed by the Lord Chancellor.

  The 1993 Open Government White Paper set out the criteria against which applications for extended closure have been assessed. Since 1993 76.9 per cent. of records which have been closed relate to personally sensitive information. The other criteria for extended closure are described in the White Paper.

  The Open Government White Paper of 1993 requires Departments to review retained records, and to consider whether actual damage would be caused by their release. These arrangements will continue.

  Information on Access to Public Records can be found on the National Archives website at: http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/recordsmanagement/advice/schedules.htm

CULTURE, MEDIA AND SPORT

  Metropolitan Police (Artefacts)
  Mr. Boris Johnson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport whether the closure on 14 July of the warehouse containing the Metropolitan Police Service's collection of artefacts is permanent; and if she will make a statement. [187475]

  Estelle Morris
  This a matter for the Metropolitan Police Authority. I understand that the closure is to allow staff time to carry out work needed to ensure compliance with the Freedom of Information Act when it comes into force on 1 January 2005.

  Conditions at the storage facility in which the collection and archives are held raise health and safety issues for staff and visitors. I understand the Metropolitan Police Service is committed to looking for a more suitable location for the artefacts and is exploring ways in which the collection can be displayed, without placing a burden on police funds.

  Shooting
  Kate Hoey
  To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport what discussions she has held with the London 2012 Olympics bid team on the venue for shooting events. [186934]

  Tessa Jowell
  London 2012 is responsible for selecting the venues for the bid to host the Olympic and Paralympic Games and announced on 16 January that Bisley would host the shooting events. Following the report from the IOC Working Group on 18 May which highlighted potential problems that may result from the number and geographical spread of venues, London 2012 have been considering alternative sites nearer to the Olympic Zone.

  A firm decision will be made for inclusion in the Candidate File that will be submitted to the IOC on 15 November 2004.

ELECTORAL COMMISSION

  Corporate Plan
  Mike Gapes
  To ask the hon. Member for Gosport, representing the Speaker's Committee on the Electoral Commission when the Electoral Commission's Corporate Plan for 2004–05 to 2008–09 was approved by the Speaker's Committee. [186592]

  Mr. Viggers
  The Electoral Commission's Corporate Plan for 2004–05 to 2008–09 was approved by the Speaker's Committee at its meeting on 14 July. The Plan was laid before the House by the Speaker, on behalf of the Speaker's Committee, on 22 July as House of Commons Paper No. 797, copies of which are now available in the Vote Office. I understand that the Electoral Commission has also sent copies to all Members.

CABINET OFFICE

  Absenteeism
  Mr. Liddell-Grainger
  To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office what the average number of working days lost per employee through illness was in his Department in each of the last five years; and what targets for days lost were set for each year. [186599]

  Mr. Alexander
  Information on working days lost per employee due to illness in the Cabinet Office is published each year in "Analysis of Sickness Absence in the Civil Service". The latest publication covers 2002 and is available in the Library of the House. The figures for 2003 are expected to be published in autumn 2004. Information for the available years requested are set out in the following table.

  Working days lost per employee

  1998

  6.2

  1999

  6.8

  2000

  4.6

  2001

  5.7

  2002

  4.8

  Cabinet Office targets for reducing levels of sickness absence cover three years as follows:

  Target for working days lost per employee

  2001

  6.4 days or less

  2003

  6.1 days or less

  2010

  5.1 days or less

  To further reduce short-term sickness absence, my right hon. Friend the Chancellor announced in the Spending Review an examination of the use of self-certification in the civil service.

  Mr. Liddell-Grainger
  To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office if he will withdraw payment for an initial period of absence from working through illness in the Civil Service and public sector; and if he will make a statement. [186537]
  1244W
  Mr. Alexander
  My right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer announced during the Spending Review on Monday 12 July 2004 that the Cabinet Secretary and I will consult on, and negotiate changes to the current arrangements for self-certifying absence in the civil service.

  In such circumstances it would not be appropriate for me to pre-empt this exercise by making changes to the way that payment is made for sickness absence.

  Although this review will encompass solely the civil service, it is hoped that any change made to the self-certification system will serve as an example of good practice for the wider public sector.

  Civil Contingencies
  Miss McIntosh
  To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office if he will make a statement on his Department's role in projects to be funded following the announcement relating to civil contingencies in the Spending Review. [186673]

  Mr. Alexander
  The Cabinet Office has lead responsibility within Government for local authorities' civil protection activities. It has secured a doubling of the Government's contribution to the cost of local authorities'civil protection work.

  The wider programme of increased investment in the counter-terrorism anti resilience area falls to a range of Government Departments, and will be overseen by the Home Secretary, who has overall responsibility for domestic security and resilience.

  Freedom of Information
  Matthew Taylor
  To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office what action he is taking in response to the comments made by the Parliamentary Ombudsman regarding delays by his Department in responding to complaints under the Code of Practice on Access to Government Information in her review of departmental performance against requirements of the Memorandum of Understanding published on 30 June; and if he will make a statement. [186611]

  Mr. Alexander
  The Government take any delays in responding to complaints under the Code of Practice on Access to Government Information seriously.

  The Government regret that delays do unavoidably occur in a minority of complex cases. However, the Ombudsman's review of the first nine months of the Memorandum of Understanding (September 2003 to May 2004) shows that in most cases the requirements of the Memorandum of Understanding were met.

  In all cases, Departments endeavour to ensure that the time limit of three weeks for Departments to respond to a "statement of complaint" from the Ombudsman is met. In accordance with the Memorandum of Understanding, Departments aim to enter into dialogue with the investigating officer should there be any difficulty in replying by the date set by the Ombudsman.

  PFI/PPP Contracts
  Matthew Taylor
  To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office how many contracts the Cabinet Office had with(a) Barclays, (b) the Royal Bank of Scotland, (c) UBS Warburg and (d) the Bank of Scotland for advice on private finance initiative and public private partnership contracts in each financial year since 2001–02; and what fees were paid in each case. [186612]

  Mr. Alexander
  The Department has not entered into any such contracts with any of these companies.

  Press Officers
  Mr. Cameron
  To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office how much was spent by his Office on press officers, broken down by grade, in(a) 1996–97 and (b) the last year for which figures are available. [185241]

  Mr. Alexander
  [holding answer 19 July 2004]: Financial and human resource information for periods, prior to, and including 1996–97 is not held on the Cabinet Office's current databases. Hence, information for 1996–97 could be provided in the manner requested only at disproportionate cost. However, information about the number of press officers working in Cabinet Office press office during this period is available in Appendix 11 to PASC—Sixth Report.

  Press office provides a service to the Minister for the Cabinet Office; Minister without Portfolio; Leader and Deputy Leader of the Commons; Leader of the Lords; Cabinet Secretary; Security and Intelligence Co-ordinator and the Permanent Secretary Government Communications. It is also responsible for supporting the Managing Director of the Cabinet Office and the Heads of Management Units in the Cabinet Office.

  The last year for which information is available is 2003–04. At January 2004 the Cabinet Office Press Office had the following press officer posts:

  a full-time head of news post—SCSI:

  two full-time chief press officer posts—G7;

  two full-time senior press officer posts—TIS3/SIO;

  a senior press officer—TIS3/SIO who spent 50 per cent. of her time on press office duties;

  three full-time press officers—TIS2/IO and B2.

  Some of these posts remained vacant for a large part of 2003–04. The total salary costs, including employer contributions and overtime, for the above posts in the 2003–04 financial year was £436,433.00. These figures are subject to final audit by the National Audit Office (NAO). In order to protect the privacy of the individuals concerned it would be inappropriate to break down the cost by grade.

ENVIRONMENT, FOOD AND RURAL AFFAIRS

  Metropolitan Police (Horse Dung)
  Norman Baker
  To ask the Secretary of State for Environment. Food and Rural Affairs (1) what the estimated amount in tonnes is of horse excrement deposited by police horses belonging to the London 1246W
  Metropolitan Police on public byways and spaces in London in the last year for which figures are available; [187289]

  (2) what the estimated cost to local authorities was of collecting excrement from police horses belonging to the London Metropolitan Police from public byways and spaces in the last year for which figures are available, broken down by local authority; [187290]

  (3) what (a) tonnage and (b) percentage of excrement produced by horses belonging to the Metropolitan Police was recycled in the form of manure or other compost in the last year for which figures are available; [187291]

  (4) what obligations there are on the Metropolitan Police to clean up excrement left by its horses on public byways and spaces in London. [187292]

  Alun Michael
  There are no figures available for the amount of horse manure excreted by horses belonging to the Metropolitan Police in London, the cost to local authorities for cleaning up horse excrement, nor for the amount of excrement that authorities have collected.

  The Metropolitan Police have no obligation to clear up horse excrement.

  Advertising
  Mr. Whittingdale
  To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs how much was spent by her Department on(a) advertising and (b) public relations consultants in (i) 1996–97 and (ii) in the latest year for which figures are available. [186014]

  Alun Michael
  The Department does not maintain separate records of its expenditure for advertising and promotional literature. The expenditure for publicity by Defra's Communications Directorate, includes marketing, advertising, publications, events, shows and direct mailings, and is recorded for the financial years since Defra's creation in June 2001 as follows:

  £ million

  2001–02

  6.6

  2002–03

  4.7

  2003–04

  2.5

  This includes communications on a wide range of matters, much of it necessary or beneficial to the public and the wide range of industries in which Defra has an interest, together with local government, voluntary organisations and other bodies.

  Figures on expenditure on public relations consultants by all sections of Defra are not held centrally and could be provided only at disproportionate cost. There has been no expenditure on public relations consultancy by the Defra's Communications Directorate since the Department was set up. Some firms which include public relations activities among the range of services they provide to clients have been employed by some sections of Defra, but not primarily for that purpose.

  Departmental Costs
  Richard Ottaway
  To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what the cost of running the Department's canteen facilities was in(a) 1996–97 and (b) the latest year for which figures are available. [184378]

  Alun Michael
  Defra came into being in June 2001. From information held centrally, the cost of running the Department's canteen facilities in financial year 2001–02 was £398,058 and in financial year 2003–04 the cost was £443,025.

  Richard Ottaway
  To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs how much was spent by her Department on public relations consultants in(a) 1996—97 and (b) in the last year for which figures are available. [184381]

  Alun Michael
  Defra was formed in June 2001. Figures on expenditure on public relations consultants by all sections of Defra are not held centrally and could be provided only at disproportionate cost. There has been no expenditure on public relations consultancy by the Defra's Communications Directorate since the Department was set up. Some firms which include public relations activities among the range of services they provide to clients have been employed by some sections of Defra, but not primarily for that purpose.

  Hunting
  Paddy Tipping
  To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if she will make a statement on the Hunting Bill. [188252]

  Alun Michael
  The Government intends to fulfil its manifesto commitment to enable Parliament to deal with the issue of hunting with dogs.

  Some opponents of hunting want this issue to be dealt with as a matter of great urgency, while supporters of hunting want nothing to change and many other people regard it as being less important than many other policies.

  The Government has made it clear that the issue does not have as high a priority as issues like jobs and schools and hospitals and transport, to name a few. But it is an issue that has absorbed an enormous amount of valuable Parliamentary time, over several years, and before the last election we acknowledged that it was time to enable Parliament to reach a conclusion.

  The Government has made efforts to find a constructive way forward, based on the evidence, through the Burns Committee Report and my own work which culminated in public hearings in Portcullis House in 2002. The proposals put to the House last year would have banned hunting except where a particular activity could be proved—to the satisfaction of an independent tribunal—to be necessary for pest control and to involve less suffering than available alternatives. The House decided by a substantial majority on a free vote to go further and require a complete ban apart from a few very restricted statutory exceptions.
  1248W
  The Other Place then considered the Bill but failed to return it to this House before the end of the Session last November. That was disappointing and the only way the Government can be sure to fulfil its manifesto commitment is now to reintroduce the Bill in the form it left this House last year. I am therefore giving notice of the Bill's re-introduction in this House.

  It will be a matter for this House to decide, but the Government believes that the provisions of the Parliament Acts will be available if an unaltered Bill is sent to the Other Place.

  In addition to the Bill, I shall ask the House to agree a motion to commence the Bill's provisions in relation to hunting, but not hare-coursing events, two years after its enactment. Special procedures exist under the Parliament Act 1911 for changes to be made if agreed to by both Houses. This period will give those involved in hunting more than adequate time to cease the activities which are to be banned, for humane arrangements like the dispersal or re-homing of dogs, and for re-focusing any business activities on alternatives like drag-hunting or disposal of fallen stock if they wish to do so.

  These welfare considerations do not apply to hare coursing events. Violence and intimidation associated with illegal coursing events is a real and pressing problem in many areas of the countryside today. We have received many representations asking us to take firm and speedy action to enable the police to tackle these associated evils. That can only be done if the nature of the relevant offences is changed from that of trespassing to the activity of hare-coursing itself, which is a clear provision of the Bill. There can be no justification for delaying further in giving the police the powers they need to crack down on the criminals involved. So the offences in the Bill banning hare-coursing events should continue to come into force three months after the Bill is passed.

  The Government has condemned threats of illegal action by some supporters of hunting and believes that most people involved are law-abiding people who are prepared to respect the will of Parliament. Extra time for implementation will make it even clearer that illegal actions and threats or intimidation are totally unjustified. If people wish to continue their opposition to legislation, they have the option of the ballot box through which to express their views.

  Animal welfare is also a major consideration for the Government—in terms of dogs and horses as well as the wild animals which are hunted. Dogs used for hunting are normally shot when they are no longer needed but the extra time for implementation will mean that there is even less reason for any suffering to be caused to them because of the ban. The RSPCA has offered to help with re-homing hounds—an offer for which I am very grateful—based on its experience of re-homing a considerable number of greyhounds each year. Drag-hunting offers alternative activities for those who have to give up hunting. And the horse industry in this country is buoyant, with increasing activity in a variety of leisure and sporting activities.
  1249W
  As has consistently been the case, right hon. and hon. Members on this side of the House will have a free vote on the Hunting Bill. That free vote will apply to Ministers and Whips as well as to back-benchers. While this legislation is not a Government priority, it is an issue on which hon. Members have expressed strong and consistent views over many years.

  My right hon. Friend the Leader of the House will address the handling of the Bill in the Business Statement.

  Marine Protection
  Richard Younger-Ross
  To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what research has been carried out on the cost of creating a series of marine parks around Great Britain. [186283]

  Mr. Bradshaw
  A meaningful assessment of the cost of creating a series of marine parks would depend on a variety of factors, including the number, scale and purpose of such areas, as well as the nature of any management, enforcement and monitoring.

TRADE AND INDUSTRY

  Intellectual Property Rights
  Mr. Oaten
  To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry how many and what type of intellectual property rights are owned by the Government. [187101]

  Mr. Ingram
  I have been asked to reply.

  Intellectual property rights in the UK comprise:
  statutory rights which are registered and granted through the Patent Office, comprising patents, registered trade marks, registered designs, plant breeders rights;
  statutory, but unregistered rights, such as copyright and unregistered design rights.

  In addition common law rights such as those relating to confidential information, trade secrets, and unregistered trademarks, and passing-off are often included within the wider definition of intellectual property.

  Government Departments currently hold just over 1,200 live patents, 600 live trademarks and 20 live registered designs around the world. There is no record of any plant breeders rights.

  The number of patents held has reduced considerably in recent times as a result of the establishment of QinetiQ Ltd. as a separate company. A substantial part of the Ministry of Defence's patent portfolio was vested in QinetiQ at its foundation.

  The figures given above exclude patents held by various national health bodies.

  No central records are held for copyright or unregistered designs, nor of common law rights. But all works (including computer software) made by Government servants are Crown Copyright, and the number of copyright materials held by Government Departments is, in consequence, immense.

INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT

  Equatorial Guinea
  Angus Robertson
  To ask the Secretary of State for International Development (1) if he will list the projects(a) initiated, (b) funded (i) partially and (ii) fully and (c) run by his Department since 1997 in Equatorial Guinea; and if he will make a statement; [187266]

  (2) how much (a) monetary aid and (b) aid in kind his Department has (i) pledged and (ii) delivered to Equatorial Guinea per annum since 1998; and if he will make a statement. [187265]

  Mr. Gareth Thomas
  DFID does not have a significant bilateral programme partnership with Equatorial Guinea, but does provide a Small Grants Scheme (SGS) fund co-ordinated at the British High Commission in Yaounde, Cameroon. This fund supports non-governmental and civil society organisation projects which are in line with DFID's development objectives.

  The Small Grants Scheme has funded eight such projects in Equatorial Guinea since 1997, with a combined value of £53,372. Two projects supported community health centres; four projects provided water and sanitation and one assisted livelihoods work in palm oil production. The SGS also supported the studies of two students from Equatorial Guinea.

  Of the official development assistance given to Equatorial Guinea through the European Community, the UK's share was £0.2 million in 1998, £0.1 million in 1999, £0.3 million in 2000, and £0.3 million in 2001. Figures for 2003–04 are currently unavailable.

  Angus Robertson
  To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what assessment his Department has made of the economic and political developments in Equatorial Guinea since 1998; and if he will make a statement. [187267]

  Mr. Gareth Thomas
  DFID has no significant development partnership with Equatorial Guinea and so makes no formal assessment of economic and political developments. However, DFID does support the EU Declaration of 17 June which states that the Government of Equatorial Guinea must adhere to democratic principles in an internationally accepted manner. HM Government continues to monitor the situation.

  Madrid International Plan of Action on Ageing
  Sandra Gidley
  To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what action he is taking to ensure that the Government fulfils the commitments it made in the Madrid International Plan of Action on Ageing. [186829]

  Mr. Gareth Thomas
  A fundamental aim of the International Plan of Action is the eradication of poverty. DFID's aim is also the elimination of poverty in poorer countries. A key objective of the Madrid International Plan of Action on Ageing is to ensure that issues relating to ageing are taken into account at all stages in both international and national development
  1251W
  plans and policies. DFID's policy is to support developing countries' own development agendas, known as Poverty Reduction Strategies (PRSs). DFID seeks to ensure that groups representing the interests of older people are included in PRS consultations.

  Older people are often among the poorest. The problems they face are therefore included in the policy analyses currently being carried out by DFID on chronic poverty and on social exclusion. DFID has also recently funded research at the Centre for Chronic Poverty and Development Policy at Manchester, in partnership with Help Age International, into older people living in poverty; at the University of Wales into migration of older people from South Asia and at Manchester University into non-contributory pensions and poverty prevention.

  The Action Plan advocates the active participation of older people in society and development. DFID's approach recognises the human rights of poor people, including older people and seeks to ensure that they are consulted on policies and decisions that affect them. This increases understanding of how they perceive their rights and of the obstacles they face in obtaining their entitlements.

  Examples of projects funded by DFID country programmes include support for the development of services for older people in the Kemerovo region of Russia and projects in the Overseas Territories of Montserrat and St. Helena to provide sheltered housing and other support for elderly people to live in the community.

  DFID also has a Programme Partnership Agreement with Help Age International (HAI), under which we are providing funding of £2.46 million to HAI over three years. The purpose is to influence the development of policies and practices that promote rights and opportunities for older people and to maximise their contribution to society. HAI's work includes support for setting up effective groups of older citizens in developing countries; strengthening them to monitor how their governments carry out their commitments to reduce the poverty of older people, including the Madrid International Plan of Action on Ageing; encouraging dialogue between governments, civil society and older people to ensure that effective policies and programmes are developed to reduce poverty among older people; disseminating information about ageing; raising awareness of the impact of HIV/AIDS on older people and supporting work to inform older people of their rights.

TRANSPORT

  A40/M40
  Mr. Lidington
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what guidance he has given to the Highways Agency on how to take account, in framing the A40/M40 management strategy, of(a) the environment impact of the motorway on people living in South Buckinghamshire and (b> Wycombe district council's air quality management strategy. [187370]
  1252W
  Mr. Jamieson
  The Highways Agency follows a consistent approach for all route management strategies whereby the problems and issues of a route are grouped under five main categories, one of which is environment. Issues such as noise and air quality are considered within this category.

  Wycombe district council's air quality management area is recorded in the M40/A40 draft route management strategy. Wycombe's air quality action plan includes a number of measures to improve air quality, two of which directly involve the Highways Agency. Layout changes to the Handy Cross junction are already in the targeted programme of improvements for the agency and the draft route management strategy contains possible options to reduce future traffic volumes on the M40.

  Mr. Lidington
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what estimate he has made of the number of people who live up to(a) 50 metres, (b) 100 metres, (c) 250 metres and (d) 500 metres from the M40 between junctions 3 and 6. [187372]

  Mr. Jamieson
  The Highways Agency do not hold figures for the n umber of people who live within 50, 100, 250 and 500 metres of the M40 between junctions 3 and 6.

  Mr. Lidington
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what estimate he has made of the accident rate per number of vehicles on the M40 between(a) junctions 3 and 4, (b) junctions 4 and 5 and (c) junctions 5 and 6. [187373]

  Mr. Jamieson
  The Highways Agency publishes accident rates per million vehicle kilometres travelled. On this basis the accident rates for the three sections of the M40 are as follows:

  Accident rate

  (a) Junctions 3 to 4

  0.129

  (b) Junction 4 to 5

  0.047

  (c) Junctions to 6

  0.125

  These rates have been calculated using accident data for the last five years.

  Mr. Lidington
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport how many accidents there have been in each of the last five years on the M40 between(a) junctions 3 and 4, (b) junctions 4 and 5 and (c) junctions 5 and 6. [187374]

  Mr. Jamieson
  For each of the last five years, the following injury accidents have been recorded on the M40.

  1999

  2000

  2001

  2002

  2003

  Junction 3 to 4

  Fatal

  3

  0

  0

  0

  0

  Serious

  7

  5

  7

  3

  6

  Slight

  21

  17

  25

  21

  19

  Junction 4 to 5

  Fatal

  0

  2

  0

  1

  0

  Serious

  4

  2

  3

  1

  4

  Slight

  17

  15

  21

  20

  10

  Junction 5 to 6

  Fatal

  0

  1

  0

  0

  0

  Serious

  3

  2

  2

  3

  2

  Slight

  11

  17

  10

  17

  16

  1253W
  Mr. Lidington
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what his latest estimate is of the average daily flow of traffic on the M40 between junctions 3 and 6. [187375]

  Mr. Jamieson
  The latest annual average daily traffic flows for each section of the M40 motorway between junctions 3 and 6 were collected in 2003 and are shown in the following the table:

  Motorway section

  Combined Northbound and Southbound traffic flows (vehicles)

  Junctions 3 to 4

  101,812

  Junctions 4 to 5

  93,036

  Junctions 5 to 6

  92,923

  Mr. Lidington
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport on how many occasions in each of the last five years traffic has been diverted off the M40 at Junction 5 or 6 to travel along the A40 through Stokenchurch. [187381]

  Mr. Jamieson
  For the five-year period in question, no formal diversions have been implemented by the Highways Agency that required traffic to be diverted off the M40 at Junction 5 or 6 to travel along the A40 through Stokenchurch.

  A65
  Mr. Battle
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what funds he has(a) been asked for and (b) agreed to provide for the A65 bus lane scheme. [186735]

  Dr. Howells
  Leeds city council initially asked for £20 million for this scheme, and my Department provisionally accepted it for funding at this cost in December 2001. Subsequently, a revised scheme costing £29 million, along with a lower cost alternative for £21 million, has been submitted which is currently being considered by my Department.

  Designated Accommodation
  Bob Spink
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport how many rooms are set aside for(a) the use of smokers, (b) worship, broken down by religion and (c) nursing mothers and pregnant women in each building and set of offices for which his Department is responsible. [187323]

  Mr. McNulty
  DfT central has a significant presence in nine buildings shown in the following table, which also shows the number of rooms available for smokers, prayer (non-denominational) or for the use of nursing mothers or pregnant women.

  Building

  Smoking room

  Prayer room

  Nursing mothers

  Great Minster House, London

  1

  1

  1

  Southside, London

  0

  0

  1 (first aid room)

  MAVIS Crowthorne

  0

  0

  1 (first aid room)

  Ashdown House Hastings1

  3

  1

  1 (first aid room)

  Air Accidents Investigation Branch, Farnborough

  1

  0

  0

  Marine Accident Investigation Branch, Southampton

  0

  0

  0

  Temple Quay, Bristol1

  1

  0

  1 (first aid room)

  Ashdown House Victoria, London

  1

  1

  1

  Portland House, London1

  0

  1

  1

  1 Facilities shared with other Goverma nt Departments (OGDs)

  Highways Agency
  Joyce Quin
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what the budget of the Highways Agency in the North East of England was in each of the last three years. [186430]

  Dr. Howells
  The budget of the Highways Agency in the North East of England in the last three years was £49.133 million for 2002–03, £52.323 million for 2003–04 and £49.588 million in 2004–05.

  London Gateway Port Harbour Empowerment Order
  Bob Spink
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport if he will delay his decision on the London Gateway Port Harbour Empowerment Order until he is satisfied that a reasonable compensation package has been offered to local fishermen; and if he will make a statement. [187591]

  Mr. Jamieson
  The inspector's report of the Public Inquiry held into the London Gateway proposals is with this Department for consideration as part of the statutory process. I understand that fisheries issues were raised at the inquiry and the Secretary of State will of course take into account all relevant considerations in reaching his decision.

  Rail Services (London)
  Mr. Yeo
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport over what length beyond the boundaries of the current Greater London Authority area he expects the Mayor of London to have jurisdiction for the railways. [186790]

  Mr. Darling
  "The Future of Rail" White Paper said that we will look at whether it is feasible to give the Mayor the right to specify and pay for services that provide additional capacity in London, and acknowledges that some of these services start or end their journeys outside London. However, the White Paper also made it clear that it would be essential to ensure that the rights and interests of rail passengers outside of London are protected, and will consult fully with the GLA and neighbouring regional and local bodies before reaching a conclusion on this proposal.

  Road Maintenance/Schemes
  Mr. Yeo
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport how many road maintenance schemes requiring completion are outstanding; and when he expects they will be completed. [186734]

  Mr. Darling
  Road maintenance is an ongoing activity for highway authorities, with new schemes starting or completing on time. The Department does not keep central records of what works are planned or are in progress other than for the Highways Agency. Other maintenance is a matter for individual highway authorities.

  John Thurso
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport whether the eight major schemes listed in the Highways Agency's business plan for 2004–05
  1255W
  scheduled to start in this financial year will proceed according to timetable following publication of The Future of Transport. [187540]

  Mr. Jamieson
  Five of the schemes listed in the Highways Agency's business plan—A 14 Rookery Crossroads grade separated junction, A249 Iwade-Queenborough Improvement, A47 Thorney Bypass, A5 Weeford-Fazeley Improvement and A63 Melton Grade Separated Junction—have already been given approval to start works in the current financial year. Decisions on the other three schemes will be taken shortly.

  Road Safety
  Mr. Sheerman
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport whether the use of speed limiters in lorries has been assessed to determine efficiency in preventing traffic accidents. [187404]

  Mr. Jamieson
  The accident involvement rate on motorways (per hundred million vehicle kms) fell from 6.4 for all HGVs in 1991 (before the mandatory fitting of speed limiters was introduced) to 4.3 in 2002—which is a 34 per cent. decrease. This is significant, particularly as traffic volume increased by 33 per cent. over the same period.

  The above figures include accidents involving currently non-speed limited HGVs between 3.5 and 7.5 tonnes. However, the reduction in accidents for exclusively speed limited vehicles may be even more significant. Almost all articulated HGVs are speed limited and the accident involvement rate for that class of vehicle fell from 6.7 in 1991 to 3.9 in 2002—a 42 per cent. decrease.

  Other contributing factors may also have influenced that decline but speed limiters have clearly played a part.

  Mr. Sheerman
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport how many lorries are fitted with speed limiters. [187405]

  Mr. Jamieson
  All goods vehicles over 7.5 tonnes are required to have speed limiters fitted. As at 31 December 2003 there were 276,000 such vehicles licensed.

  Mr. Sheerman
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport how many accidents involving lorries occurred during overtaking manoeuvres in each of the last 10 years; and how many of these involved lorries fitted with speed limiters. [187406]

  Mr. Jamieson
  The number of accidents occurring during overtaking manoeuvres involving HGVs on motorways for the last 10 years is set out as follows:

  Accidents

  Fatal

  Serious

  Slight

  All

  1994

  6

  34

  236

  276

  1995

  9

  25

  214

  248

  1996

  7

  38

  233

  278

  1997

  7

  37

  255

  299

  1998

  9

  29

  259

  297

  1999

  7

  40

  280

  327

  2000

  11

  38

  338

  387

  2001

  7

  28

  291

  326

  2002

  5

  35

  298

  338

  2003

  8

  42

  305

  355

  1256W
  Although it has been a requirement to fit speed limiters to vehicles over 7.5 tonnes since 1992, we have only been recording HGVs over 7.5 tonnes on our database as a separate category of vehicles since 1999. All of the accidents from 1999 onwards quoted above involved HGVs fitted with a speed limiter.

  The rise in the number of accidents involving HGVs can largely be attributed to the increase in traffic—indeed, the number of accidents involving all categories of vehicle has increased over the last 10 years. However, the accident rate per vehicle kilometres has changed little during the same time period and, in the case of HGVs, the accident rate per vehicle kilometres has actually fallen quite substantially since the introduction of speed limiters (a decrease of 34 per cent. between 1991 and 2002).

  Mr. Greg Knight
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport how mans people are employed by the Humberside Safety Camera Partnership. [186205]

  Mr. Jamieson
  The Humberside Safety Camera Partnership employs a complement of 49.6 full time equivalent posts. Eight of these posts are filled by police officers, the rest civilians.

  Mr. Greg Knight
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what steps he proposes to take to raise public awareness of the guidelines that are in place for Safety Camera Partnerships. [186206]

  Mr. Jamieson
  The Department for Transport website contains information on the rules of the safety camera programme on the deployment, signing and visibility of safety cameras, as does the website of the National Safety Camera Liaison, which provides information on Safety Camera Partnerships' activities. The Handbook of Rules and Guidelines for the next year's operation of the programme is currently being prepared. When it is issued, we will publicise it, and make it available through the Department's website.

  Mr. Greg Knight
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what measures he intends to implement to make Safety Camera Partnerships more responsive to complaints received from member s of the public. [186207]

  Mr. Jamieson
  Members of the public who have a complaint about an alleged offence caught on a safety camera can challenge it in a Magistrates Court. Partnerships are made up of police, local and magistrates courts authorities, each of which will have a complaint procedure. Partnerships consider, investigate and respond to complaints in line with those. Partnerships also pro vide extensive information on their activities, including information on camera sites, through their websites and local media.

  Transport Funding (Warrington)
  Helen Jones
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport how much Government funding has been allocated for transport improvements in Warrington in each of the past five years. [180082]

  Mr. McNulty
  [pursuant to my reply, 12 August 2004, Official Report, c. 699 W]: Funding for transport improvements allocated to Warrington in the last five years is as follows.
  1257W

  £ million

  Improvement

  Maintenance

  2004–05

  3.0

  2.9

  2003–04

  2.2

  2.8

  2002–03

  2.2

  2.5

  2001–02

  2.0

  2.4

  2000–01

  2.0

  2.4

DEPUTY PRIME MINISTER

  Domestic Violence
  Sandra Gidley
  To ask the Deputy Prime Minister pursuant to the answer of 23 June 2004,Official Report, column 1461W, on domestic violence, if he will list the radio stations, women's press and supermarkets where the helpline was advertised; and if he will list the sites of the washroom posters. [187072]

  Phil Hope
  The following list contains the radio stations, women's press and supermarkets where the helpline was advertised. A separate list of the washroom sites has been made available in the Library of the House.

  Radio:

  95.8 Capital FM (London)

  105.4 Leicester Sound FM

  Magic 105.4 FM (London)

  103.2 Power FM (Portsmouth/Southampton)

  96.4 FM BRMB (Birmingham)

  Century 100–102 (North East)

  100.7 Heart FM (W. Mids)

  Vibe 101 (Severn Estuary)

  Galaxy 102 (Manchester)

  Galaxy 102.2 (Birmingham)

  Heart 106.2 FM (London)

  Galaxy 105 (Yorkshire)

  106 Century FM (E. Mids)

  Vibe FM (East Anglia)

  105.4 Century FM (North West)

  Galaxy 105—106 (North East)

  Southern FM (Brighton/East Sussex)

  Total East Anglian Radio

  Total Beacon Radio (Wolverhampton)

  96 Trent FM/Classic Gold Gem (Notts)

  RAM FM/Classic Gold Gem (Derby)

  Mercia FM/Classic Gold 1359 (Coventry)

  GWR FM/Classic Gold (Brunei) (Bristol, Bath, Swindon)

  Essex FM

  Metro Radio/Magic 1152 (Newcastle)

  TFM/Magic 1170 (Middlesbrough)

  Key 103/Magic 1152 (Manchester)

  Radio City 96.7/Magic 1548 (Liverpool)

  97.4 Rock FM/Magic 999 (Preston)

  96.3 Radio Aire/Magic 828 (Leeds)

  Hallam FM/Magic AM (Sheffield)

  96.9 Viking FM/Magic 1161 (Hull)

  1258W
  Women's press:

  Cosmopolitan

  Family Circle

  She

  More

  Bella

  Best

  Chat

  Closer

  Heat

  Hello

  Now

  OK

  Real

  Take a Break

  That's Life

  Woman

  Woman's Own

  Mail on Sunday—You magazine

  M Celebs—Sunday Mirror Supplement

  Supermarkets:

  Sainsbury's

  Budgens

  Spa

  Nisa

  Lidl

  Wilkinson and Superdrug.

  Fraud/Theft
  Mr. Damian Green
  To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what estimate he has made of the cost of fraud to Government Offices of the Regions in each of the last five years. [186400]

  Phil Hope
  The cost of fraud to Government Offices for the Regions in the last five years has been £4,618.73.

  Mr. Damian Green
  To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what the equivalent monetary cost of theft to the Government Office of the Regions has been in each year since 1997. [186407]

  Phil Hope
  The equivalent monetary cost of theft from the Government Offices since 1997 is tabled as follows:

  £

  1997–98

  9,400

  1998–99

  0

  1999–2000

  653

  2000–01

  4,137

  2001–02

  30,000

  2002–03

  4000

  2003–04

  8,500

  2004 to date

  9,550

  Total (since 1997)

  66,240

  Homelessness
  Mr. Ruffley
  To ask the Deputy Prime Minister how many households were living in temporary accommodation in the Bury St. Edmunds constituency
  1259W
  in each year since 1997; and how many of those households included dependent children. [187203]

  Phil Hope
  Information is not collected at constituency level, only at local authority level. A summary of information reported by St. Edmundsbury district council about the number of homeless households in temporary accommodation as at 31 March of each year since 1997 is tabled as follows. The number of households in temporary accommodation containing dependent children or expectant mothers has only been collected since March 2002.

  Households in temporary accommodation1 arranged by St. Edmundshury district council, as at 31 March

  Total households

  Of which: with dependent children2

  1997

  29

  n/a

  1998

  26

  n/a

  1999

  28

  n/a

  2000

  31

  n/a

  2001

  36

  n/a

  2002

  22

  not reported

  2003

  16

  13

  2004

  36

  28

  1 Households in temporary accommodation arranged by the local authority pending inquiries, or after being accepted, under homelessness legislation.

  2 Includes an expectant mother. Data only collected since March 2002.

  Source:

  ODPM PIE homelessness returns (quarterly).

  Neighbourhood Schemes (Newcastle upon Tyne)
  Mr. Cousins
  To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what(a) street warden, (b) neighbourhood warden and (c) neighbourhood management schemes he has approved in the City of Newcastle upon Tyne; what the value of each was; what schemes have been rejected; and which schemes have been bid for but not yet determined. [186856]

  Phil Hope
  The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister funds one street warden scheme operating in the Byker Ward of Newcastle upon Tyne. The scheme has received 300,000 in ODPM funding, which started in 2001 and will end on 31 March 2005. There are no neighbourhood warden or neighbourhood management pathfinder schemes operating in Newcastle upon Tyne which are funded by the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister. No other schemes were rejected or bid for but not yet determined.

  Power Lines (Residential Properties)
  Mr. Greg Knight
  To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what guidance he has issued concerning the building of residential properties under or near power lines. [186155]

  Keith Hill
  The Government have not issued guidance concerning the building of residential properties near power lines.

  However, following the publication of the National Radiological Protection Board's (NRPB) new Electromagnetic Field (EMF) guidelines in March 2004 and the associated advice to Government, the
  1260W
  Government are committed to taking forward the issue of building near power lines in consultation with all the relevant stakeholder groups.

  Safer and Stronger Communities Fund
  Mr. Battle
  To ask the Deputy Prime Minister when he will outline his plans for a safer and stronger communities fund referred to in paragraph 5.32 of the 2004 Spending Review; whether it will cover Leeds, West; where it will be piloted; and if he will make a statement. [186782]

  Phil Hope
  The Safer and Stronger Communities Fund announced in the Spending Review 2004 will be put in place across England from April 2005. The fund will address the issues of high crime levels, anti-social behaviour and disorder and the frequent poor quality of public spaces, particularly in deprived areas.

  Guidance on how the fund will operate in practice will be issued later in the year. The administration of the fund will enhance local flexibility and help to reduce bureaucracy through the development of agreements based on the principles for the wider Local Area Agreements, which the Government will also be piloting next year.

  Supporting People Programme
  Mr. Battle
  To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what representations he has had from(a) local authorities, (b) caring organisations and (c) people with learning disabilities regarding the review of the Supporting People programme; and if he will make a statement. [186727]

  Phil Hope
  The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister receives representations about the Supporting People programme from a wide variety of stakeholders, including local authorities, MPs, provider organisations and people who receive housing related support, including those with learning disabilities. These representations cover a broad range of issues around the Supporting People programme, from invites to conferences to questions about the current and future workings of the programme following the Independent Review of the programme.

  The Independent Review was commissioned by the Government to look at value for money and the variation in dwelling costs and services across local authorities. The Review found wide variations in dwelling costs between authorities and that £1.8 billion is too much to pay for the legacy services. Following this report, the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister undertook a comprehensive programme of work on Supporting People programme to inform the Spending Review 2004. On this basis it was recently announced that the settlement for Supporting People is £1.72 billion in 2005–06 and around £1.7 billion in each of the following two years. T his is the first time that there has been a three-year settlement in the Supporting People programme. It will create stability for the programme and offer Administering Authorities and providers the opportunity to plan strategically and deliver good quality, value for money services over the next three years and beyond.

SOLICITOR-GENERAL

  Afghan Hijackers
  Mr. Prisk
  To ask the Solicitor-General what estimate he has made of the legal costs of the case concerning Afghan hijackers at Stansted airport since 2000. [185616]

  The Solicitor-General
  There have been both criminal proceedings and asylum proceedings arising from the hijack at Stansted airport. In relation to the two criminal trials relating to this matter the costs to the Crown Prosecution Service of Counsel's fees was £428,811.85. This does not include certain costs incurred, such as interpreters fees, as well as fixed costs of the CPS, such as staff. The cost to the Criminal Defence Service of these trials as at 21 July 2004 was £4.32 million.

  In relation to the asylum applications following the Stansted hijack, litigation services in relation to such claims are provided to the Home Secretary by the Treasury Solicitors Department. Their costs in relation to claims arising from the hijack are £106,109.41 as at 31 August 2004.

  The Legal Services Commission is unable to give a figure for the legal aid costs relating to these asylum claims. This is for two reasons. First, some of the legal aid paid in respect of these claims was covered by the controlled work contract where funding decisions are delegated to suppliers. Under those arrangements the Legal Services Commission does not maintain details about the legal aid funding of specific cases. Secondly, in respect of the legal aid funding not covered by the controlled work contracts, while in principle the Legal Services Commission will be in a position to state the legal aid costs, they are not in a position to provide final figures at this stage as they are still waiting for the individual solicitors to submit bills to them. Services Commission will be in a position to state the legal aid costs, they are not in a position to provide final figures at this stage as they are still waiting for the individual solicitors to submit bills to them.

SCOTLAND

  Departmental Buildings
  John Thurso
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland what the total floor space area of buildings owned or leased by his Department was in each year from 1997 to date. [186614]

  Mrs. McGuire
  The Scotland Office was established on 1 July 1999. The Office does not own any buildings. The total floor space area of buildings leased from 1 July 1999 to January 2004 was 3,653m2.

  In January 2004, the Scotland Office gave up accommodation in Glasgow which reduced the total floor space area to 2,850m2.

  Sustainable Development
  John Thurso
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland what parts of his Department's estate will not be covered by the commitments set out in the Framework for Sustainable Development on the Government Estate. [186585]
  1262W
  Mrs. McGuire
  The Scotland Office, in common with every part of the Government, is covered by all the commitments set out in the Framework for Sustainable Development on the Government Estate.

  John Thurso
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland what steps have been taken by his Department since publication of the Framework for Sustainable Development on the Government Estate to review arrangements for public reporting of sustainable development impacts. [186586]

  Mrs. McGuire
  The Scotland Office is working to ensure that its sustainable development impacts will be reported to the Department for Constitutional Affairs, which is committed to the public reporting of such impacts across its estate.

  John Thurso
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland what arrangements his Department has to report publicly on its key sustainable development impacts. [186588]

  Mrs. McGuire
  The Scotland Office will report its sustainable development impacts to the Department for Constitutional Affairs, which is committed to the public reporting of such impacts across its estate.

  John Thurso
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland what have been identified as the most significant sustainable development impacts in relation to the operation of his Department's estate. [186589]

  Mrs. McGuire
  The Department for Constitutional Affairs is currently reviewing sustainable development impacts across the whole of its estate, including the buildings occupied by the Scotland Office.

HOME DEPARTMENT

  Autistic People
  Mr. Wiggin
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what provisions are in place to increase awareness in the criminal justice system of the behaviour patterns of people who have communication-related disabilities, including autism and Asperger's Syndrome, in relation to policy on bringing charges for communication-related offences, with particular reference to(a) section 5 of the Public Order Act 1986 and (b) the offence of being drunk and disorderly. [186921]

  Ms Blears
  As regards the police, national training highlights the importance of communicating effectively and sensitively with people suffering from a mental disability (including autism).

  The aim is to ensure that officers develop awareness and an understanding of mental disorders and the importance of not making assumptions based on a person's behaviour.

  In West Mercia, I understand that training has been provided to key staff on Autism and Asperger's Syndrome Disorders (ASD), by Autism West Midlands. This covers strategies for working effectively with people suffering from ASD, paying particular attention to the implications for policing.
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  The Codes of Practice under the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 (PACE) provide guidance for custody officers on dealings with mentally vulnerable detainees and, other than in exceptional circumstances, an appropriate adult (someone experienced in dealing with mentally disordered or mentally vulnerable people) must be called whenever there is any doubt about a detainee's mental capacity

  If there is any concern that a person may be suffering from an underlying physical or mental illness, the police should act urgently in calling an appropriate health care professional for advice.

  As for decisions whether or not to bring charges, I understand that the Code for Crown Prosecutors specifically lists the desirability of diverting a defendant who is suffering from significant mental or physical ill health among the relevant considerations. However, this has to be balanced against the need to safeguard the general public. Each case has to be reviewed on its own facts by the Prosecutor applying the general principles laid down in the Code.

  In relation to offences under Section 5 of the Public Order Act 1986, Home Office Circular 17/2004 provides guidance to Chief Officers to inform local protocols between the police and health services on dealings with people who may have mental health problems, including learning disabilities.

  Community Support Officers
  Mr. Rosindell
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what proportion of community support officers recruited are(a) men and (b) women. [186766]

  Ms Blears
  In the most recent official figures published in September 2003, 64 per cent. of Community Support Officers (CSOs) were male and 36 per cent. female.

  Mr. Rosindell
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many community support officers are assigned, on average, to each police officer in(a) London and (b) England and Wales. [186905]

  Ms Blears
  Information about the numbers of Community Support Officers (CSOs) assigned to individual police officers is not held centrally. However, the most recent figures on police numbers released in May 2004 are(a) 30,619 police officers in the Metropolitan Police Service (MRS) and City of London forces and (b) 139,631 police officers in England and Wales. In the most recent figures released at the end of July 2004 there were (a) 1,791 CSOs in the MRS and (b) 3,943 CSOs in England and Wales.

  Domestic Violence
  Mr. Djanogly
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what plans there are to raise public awareness of female-on-male domestic violence. [185074]

  Paul Goggins
  [holding answer 19 July 2004]: The 2001 British Crime Survey's Inter-Personal Violence Module shows that one in four women and one in six men have suffered domestic violence at some point in their lives, though women form the overwhelming majority of those subject to the heaviest abuse in terms of frequency, range of violence and severity of injury. The Home Office information leaflet "You don't have to live in fear
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  of domestic violence" recognises that men can be victims of domestic violence and includes the 'Male Advice Line and Enquiry' run by Devon MALE. Devon MALE is a confidential service which specialises in domestic violence, offering advice and information, safety advice and emotional support via their adviceline. They also have a male outreach worker working in the Devon area.

  Drugs Workers
  Mrs. Gillan
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he permits the inclusion in contracts for providers of drugs services in England and Wales of provisions to exclude a specified drugs worker from the provider's premises. [181824]

  Miss Melanie Johnson
  I have been asked to reply.

  Individual contracts for providers of drug services are a matter for negotiation between local commissioners and providers.

  Essex Police
  Mr. Ivan Henderson
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what plans he has to increase the number of community support officers in Essex. [186316]

  Ms Blears
  [holding answer 7 September 2004]: Home Office officials wrote to all chief officers on 20 August inviting bids for a share of the £50 million which was announced in the Home Office Strategic Plan to kick-start the Neighbourhood Policing Fund. This will allow police forces to recruit additional Community Support Officers (CSOs) in this financial year and we expect that 5,500 will be in place by the end of March 2005. It will be for the chief constable of Essex and his police authority to decide how many extra CSOs they wish to bid for.

  The Government have set a target of 20,000 additional CSOs by the end of 2007–08 and further details of how we plan to achieve this will be published in time for the 2006–07 planning round.

  Hate Crime
  Mr. Woodward
  To risk the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many reported incidents of race hate crimes there hive been in(a) St. Helens and (b) England and Wales, broken down by region in each year since 1997; and what percentage (i) were brought to court and (ii) resulted in a successful prosecution in each case. [186901]

  Ms Blears
  The available information relates to the number of racist incidents in each police force area in England and Wales from 1996–97 to 2002–03. This information is contained in Table 3.1 of the Section 95 publication "Statistics on Race and the Criminal Justice System—2003", a copy of which is available in the Library and also on the Home Office website. Table 3.2 of the same publication gives the number of racially or religiously aggravated offences recorded by the police by
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  police force area for 2001–02 and 2002–03. Figures for earlier years are available in earlier versions of the Section 95 publication and on the website. Information on racist incidents is not available centrally for St. Helens.

  Number of defendants proceeded against at magistrates courts and found guilty at all courts for racially aggravated offences—England and Wales 1997 to 20021

  1997

  19982

  1999

  Court/region

  Proceeded against

  found guilty

  Proceeded against

  Found guilty

  Proceeded against

  Found guilty

  Magistrates court

  St. Helens3

  4—

  4—

  —

  —

  9

  3

  Region

  East

  4—

  4—

  2

  —

  230

  89

  East Midlands

  4—

  4—

  4

  1

  352

  123

  London

  4—

  4—

  44

  14

  1,523

  431

  North East

  4—

  4—

  1

  1

  109

  34

  North West

  4—

  4—

  15

  3

  451

  161

  south East

  4—

  4—

  2

  1

  248

  87

  South West

  4—

  4—

  1

  —

  153

  54

  West Midlands

  4—

  4—

  4

  2

  248

  74

  Yorkshire and the Humber

  4—

  4—

  2

  1

  229

  76

  Welsh

  4—

  4—

  8

  4

  272

  95

  England and Wales

  4—

  4—

  83

  27

  3,815

  1,224

  2000

  2001

  2002

  Court/region

  Proceeded against

  Found guilty

  Proceeded against

  Found guilty

  Proceeded against

  Found guilty

  Magistrates court

  St. Helens3

  16

  3

  9

  3

  7

  3

  Region

  East

  408

  153

  567

  170

  542

  200

  East Midlands

  621

  289

  621

  307

  692

  297

  London

  2,073

  686

  1,657

  557

  1,684

  611

  North East

  196

  78

  325

  137

  419

  167

  North West

  919

  354

  1,424

  532

  1,323

  527

  south East

  558

  225

  602

  261

  603

  260

  South West

  402

  137

  454

  170

  442

  195

  West Midlands

  954

  356

  1,444

  504

  1,392

  527

  Yorkshire and the Humber

  456

  168

  654

  237

  633

  269

  Welsh

  470

  170

  540

  207

  424

  187

  England and Wales

  7,057

  2,616

  8,288

  3,082

  8,154

  3,243

  1 These data are on the all offence basis.

  2 The Crime and Disorder Act 1988 introduced a series of new racially aggravated offences from 30 September 1988.

  3 Found guilty includes those offenders found guilty at St. Helens magistrates court and the Crown Court where St. Helens was the committing court.

  4 Not applicable.

  Passport Cheeks
  Mr. Gummer
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how long a wait for passengers to pass through passport checks at London Heathrow he determines as being compatible with the service standards of the Issuing Section Service. [185393]

  Mr. Browne
  I am not familiar with the Issuing Section Service to which the right hon. Member refers. However the UK Immigration Service is committed to clearing bona fide passengers with minimal delay, and has set standards for passenger processing times, which comply with the international standards. These standards, which are embedded in the UK Immigration Service's annual business objectives and are kept under regular review, are to clear:

  100 per cent. of non-EEA passengers at 45 minutes;
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  With regard to court proceedings, the available information relates to the number of defendants proceeded against for racially aggravated offences and is given in the table. The available data is from 1997 to 2002.

  90 per cent. of non-EEA passengers in 30 minutes;

  EEA passengers with minimal delay.

  The UK Immigration Service currently clear 99 per cent. of non-EEA passengers in less than 45 minutes, and 98 per cent. of non-EEA passengers in less than 30 minutes. Although there is no specific measurement of the time taken to process EEA passengers, close monitoring of passenger flows and effective deployment of staff ensure EEA passengers are cleared with minimal delay.

  The UK Immigration Service's performance is also measured independently against the British Airports Authority (BAA) quality of service standards, which includes queuing times. The Immigration Service continues to score well against this measure.

  Police Animals
  Mr. Oaten
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many(a) dogs and (b) horses are employed by each police force, broken down by species. [187219]

  Ms Blears
  There are 305 horses used by the police in England and Wales and 33 in Scotland.

  In England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, including the UKAEAC (UK Atomic Energy Authority Constabulary) there are approximately 2,200 dogs used by the police. These are predominately German Shepherd dogs. There are also Malinois (similar to a German Shepherd, but a little smaller, and a handful of Rottweilers. These are generally used for General Purpose and Non-Compliant Attack Dogs. The dogs that are used in connection with scent detection are generally Springer Spaniels and Labradors.

  Police Authorities
  Mr. Wiggin
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department when he next plans to meet with the heads of police authorities in the UK; and what he plans to discuss. [186819]

  Ms Blears
  My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary and I have frequent bilaterals with the Chairman of the Association of Police Authorities, as well as meeting individual chairs rather than heads of individual police authorities, and the discussions cover a very wide range of policing and crime reduction issues.

  Security Vetting
  Mrs. Iris Robinson
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what assessment will be made of vetting arrangements in(a) Northern Ireland and (b) Scotland in taking forward recommendations arising from the Bichard Inquiry. [186645]

  Ms Blears
  Representatives from the Northern Ireland Office and the Scottish Executive sit on the Bichard Implementation Programme Board and Working Groups, taking forward the programme to implement the Bichard Report's 31 recommendations.

  The work to enhance vetting procedures in the light of Sir Michael's recommendations will be considered by the Programme Board in the light of the full range of requirements, including those appertaining to Northern Ireland and Scotland.

  Mrs. Iris Robinson
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what steps will be taken to include relevant organisations and bodies in Northern Ireland in taking forward recommendations arising from the Bichard Inquiry, with particular reference to the Police Service of Northern Ireland. [186646]

  Ms Blears
  The Bichard Implementation Programme Board will oversee the work to implement all 31 of the Bichard report's recommendations. The President of the Association of Chief Police Officers has accepted an invitation to sit on the Board, convened by the Home Office as co-ordinating Department, and to liaise with Police Service of Northern Ireland on emerging issues and outcomes.
  1268W
  Representatives from the Northern Ireland Office participate in the Programme Board and its feeder Working Groups. This provides a firm link into issues which are specific to Northern Ireland and a connection to other relevant organisations.

  Special Constables (Northampton)
  Mr. Tony Clarke
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many special constables there are in Northampton; and how many there were in(a) 2001 and (b) 1997. [186518]

  Ms Blears
  Figures for the total number of special constables in Northamptonshire police force are contained in the annually published police service strength figures. The latest are contained in Home Office Statistical Bulletin 11/03 and are for the year ending 31 March 2003. They are shown, together with figures for 1997 and 2001. Figures for March 2004 will be published later this year.

  Number of special constables

  March 2003

  189

  March 2001

  188

  March 1997

  316

  There are no separate statistics published for the number of special constables in Basic Command Units.

FOREIGN AND COMMONWEALTH AFFAIRS

  Belarus
  Mr. Wiggin
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on democracy in Belarus. [186748]

  Mr. MacShane
  Belarus' record on human rights and democratisation is poor. In the past year numerous independent newspapers, NGOs and opposition parties have faced increased harassment, giving rise to concerns that the Belarusian Government is waging a campaign to stamp out any criticism prior to parliamentary elections in October.

  The Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe's (OSCE) Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) has condemned previous elections in Belarus for failing to meet OSCE commitments for democratic elections. The Belarusian authorities have so far refused to amend unsatisfactory electoral legislation. EU Heads of Missions in Minsk have already conveyed our concerns to the Belarusian Government. We welcome the recent invitation from the Government of Belarus to ODIHR to send an Election Observation Mission. The UK plans to contribute 10 per cent. of the short and long-term observers as well as the Head and Deputy Head of the mission.

  Cyprus
  Mr. Love
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs pursuant to the answer to the hon. Member for Tooting (Tom Cox) of 14 July
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  2004, Official Report, column 1184W, on Cyprus, what matters he discussed with members of the Government of Cyprus relating to the outcome of the referenda held earlier this year. [186988]

  Mr. MacShane
  My right hon. Friend and I have discussed with the Government of the Republic of Cyprus a variety of issues relating to the outcome of the referenda held earlier this year. These have focused on the future of the island, particularly now that Cyprus has joined the EU; and on how the EU might deliver on its commitment of 26 April to end the isolation of the Turkish Cypriots.

  EU Enlargement
  Keith Vaz
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on the effect of EU enlargement upon the UK-EU relationship. [186647]

  Old nomenclature (pre-2004)

  Activity based budgeting nomenclature (2004>)

  Recipient group

  Equality between men and women

  A-3037

  04 05 01

  European Women's Lobby

  A-3046

  04 05 03

  Women's organisations

  Education and Training

  A-3010

  25 02 01 01

  Historical archives of the European Union

  A-3011

  15 02 01 03

  European University Institute, Florence

  A-3012

  15 02 01 04

  European Law Academy (Trier)

  A-3013

  15 02 01 05

  European Institute of Public Administration (Maastricht)

  A-3014

  19 04 01

  European Inter-university Centre

  A-3017

  03 02 01

  Organisations for co-operation in the field of European Law

  A-3022

  15 02 01 06

  Study and research centre

  A-3027

  15 02 01 07

  International Centre for European Training

  A-3044

  15 02 01 08

  European Agency for Development in Special Needs Education

  Youth

  A-3023

  15 07 01 01

  European Youth Forum

  A-3029

  15 07 01 02

  Support for international non-governmental youth organisations

  Culture

  A-3015

  15 04 01 01

  European Bureau for Lesser-used Languages and Mercator

  A-3035

  15 04 01 02

  Preservation of Nazi concentration camps sites as historical memorials

  A-3042

  15 04 01 03

  Subsidy for cultural organisations advancing the idea of Europe

  Promoting European Civic Participation

  A-3016

  18 06 03

  Association of the Councils of State and Supreme Administrative Jurisdictions of the Union

  A-3020

  15 06 01 02

  "Our Europe" Association

  A-3021

  15 06 01 03

  Grants to European think tanks and organisations advancing the idea of Europe

  A-3024

  15 06 01 04

  Associations and federations of European interest

  A-3026

  15 06 01 05

  European think tanks

  A-3030

  18 03 01

  European Council on Refugees and Exiles

  A-3036

  15 06 01 06

  Support for the Jean Monnet House and the Robert Schuman House

  Promoting mutual understanding betwe EU and non-industrialised regions

  A-3031

  19 02 02

  Institutes specialising in relations between the European Union and third countries

  Organisations seeking A-30 bud get lines submit their bids directly to the Commission and are not required to send copies to member state governments. The Council can amend the funding proposed for each of the former A-30 budget lines during annual negotiations on the general budget of the European Communities.
  1270W
  Mr. MacShane
  Enlargement is one of the EU's greatest policy successes, spreading peace, prosperity and stability across the continent. This Government have consistently championed EU enlargement, demonstrating the constructive role we play at the heart of the EU. We will continue to work closely with all our EU partners, including the new member states, to sustain our influence within the enlarged EU.

  EU Funding
  Mr. Hayes
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will list(a) youth, (b) campaigning and (c) social groups that received EU monies in the last year for which statistics are available, under the A-30 budget lines; and if he will deposit the (i) audits and (ii) original bids in the Library. [187336]

  Mr. MacShane
  The groups that received money in 2004 under the budget lines formerly known as the A-30 budget lines were as follows:

  The European Court of Auditors (EGA) audits the EC Budget on an annual basis though its report will not include separate audits of each organisation receiving A-30 budget line funding. However, the ECA may decide to issue a special report on particular activities—a list of these reports is published at the back of the

  1271W
  ECA's latest annual report which has been placed in the Library of the House. Additionally, individual organisations may be required to publish annual accounts under their terms of establishment.

  EU Summit
  Keith Vaz
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what outcomes he hopes will be achieved at the EU summit on 29 October. [186787]

  Mr. MacShane
  I expect the EU Constitution to be signed by Heads of State and Government of EU member states.

  EU-US Economic Output
  Keith Vaz
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what forecasts he has received of the relative levels of economic output in the EU and the US in 2010. [186652]

  Mr. MacShane
  GDP per head in the EU has been persistently lower than that in the US in recent decades. This, allied with the significant demographic challenge that the EU will face in coming years, emphasises the need for significant structural reform if Europe is to close the gap with the US in output per capita.

  The Government's February progress report on European economic reform and recent submission to Mr. Wim Kok's Lisbon Mid-Term Review Group, highlight these challenges and set out the Government thinking on how Europe can successfully rise to those challenges.

  Copies of both Government papers are available in the Library of the House.

  European Constitutional Treaty
  Keith Vaz
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs which Minister will attend the signing ceremony of the European Constitutional Treaty on 29 October. [186649]

  Mr. MacShane
  I cannot confirm at this stage which Minister will attend.

  European Neighbourhood Policy
  Mr. Wiggin
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on the impact of the European Union's European Neighbourhood Packages on the UK's diplomatic relations with Russia. [186747]

  Mr. Rammell
  The UK strongly supports the EU's European Neighbourhood Policy, which offers partner countries closer co-operation in areas of mutual interest, in return for political and economic reform.

  The UK maintains close relations with Russia, including through the EU-Russia relationship. We have discussed the European Neighbourhood Policy with Russia and explained how we see it contributing to stability on Europe's eastern borders, which is in both our and Russia's interest.

  These packages complement the UK's bilateral relations with Russia.
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  Rev. Martin Smyth
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what his assessment is of the decision to exclude Belarus from the European Neighbourhood Policy; what steps the Government have taken since that decision was taken to end the isolation of Belarus from the European Union; and what steps the Government plan to take to address this situation. [186368]

  Mr. MacShane
  The UK wants Belarus to become a democratic, stable and increasingly prosperous partner for the enlarged EU, However, Belarus's continuing poor record on human rights and democracy is an obstacle to a closer relationship. We and EU partners have set out the steps that Belarus would need to take in return for ratification of a Partnership and Cooperation Agreement (PCA) and eventual full association with relevant regional EU initiatives, potentially including the European Neighbourhood Policy.

  While measures such as restrictions on ministerial contact with the regime remain in place, we do not believe in isolating the people of Belarus. We are doing all we can to bolster civil society and promote democracy, using bilateral programme funds disbursed through our embassy and working via multilateral institutions.

  The EU continues to support the people of Belarus in areas including addressing the consequences of the Chernobyl catastrophe, health education, environment, trans-border and regional co-operation, border management and independent media.

  Ferhat Kaya
  Mr. Battle
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what representations he has made to the Turkish authorities regarding the arrest and alleged torture of Ferhat Kaya. [186730]

  Mr. MacShane
  UK officials have raised the case of Mr. Kaya with the Turkish authorities on several occasions, most recently at a senior level at the last round of our Human Rights Dialogue with Turkey on 15 July in London. The trial of 11 police accused of beating and torturing Ferhat Kaya on 5 May began on 20 June after a doctor's report certified Mr. Kaya's injuries. Our Embassy in Ankara continues to monitor Mr. Kaya's situation.

  Former Soviet Bloc Countries
  Mr. Wiggin
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what research his Department has commissioned regarding the possibility of further former Soviet Bloc countries applying for membership of the European Union. [186738]

  Mr. MacShane
  No such research has been commissioned.

  Any European state may apply for EU membership in line with Article 49 of the Treaty on European Union.

  Israel
  Mr. Tony Clarke
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what recent
  1273W
  assessment he has made of the effects of the security barrier being built by the Government of Israel on Palestinian communities; what representations he has received from non-governmental organisations on the effects of the wall on their work in the occupied territories; and what representations he has made to Israel about minimising possible detrimental effects. [187070]

  Mr. Rammell
  We remain concerned about the negative impact of the barrier on communities near it. We note that the Israeli Supreme Court has ordered changes to the route of the barrier because of similar concerns.

  We receive regular representations on this subject from NGOs working in the Occupied Territories. In response, we encourage the Israeli Government both to consider more seriously the humanitarian impact of its actions there, and to give NGOs clear guidelines to help them maximise the effectiveness of their support for affected Palestinian communities.

  Dr. Tonge
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs when he expects to renegotiate the EU-Israeli Association Trade Agreement. [187464]

  Mr. MacShane
  We have no plans to renegotiate the trade elements of the EU-Israel Association Agreement.

  Lisbon Agenda
  Keith Vaz
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on the mid-term review of the Lisbon agenda in 2005. [186623]

  Mr. MacShane
  The Government set out their vision for a more focused, results-oriented Lisbon process in a paper submitted to Wim Kok, Chairman of the Lisbon Mid-Term Review Group chair and EU partners in June. The Government are pressing for:

  greater focus on economic prosperity as a key to social cohesion;

  increased accountability of national governments in delivering reform;

  better use of Community rules and instruments to deliver reform, including use of non-regulatory approaches, highlighting the role of the state aids rules and showing how Community spending can better be aligned with the Lisbon agenda; and

  key reforms needed to meet Lisbon targets, including reducing the regulatory burden on business, strengthening the Single Market, improving employment flexibility and opening up EU markets to the benefits of global trade.

  Copies of the Government's submission to the Lisbon Mid-Term Review will be made available in the Library of the House and can be accessed at: http://www.hmtreasury.gov.uk/media/9A9DB/Mid-term_review_of_the_Lisbon_strategy062004.pdf)

  Keith Vaz
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what measures he will take in order to achieve the targets of the Lisbon Agenda. [186651]

  Mr. MacShane
  The Government set out their priorities for European economic reform in their progress report in February. Copes are available in the Library of the House. Priorities are to:1274W

  promote effective EU regulation—reduce the burden on EU business and ensure that any new legislation encourages not stifles economic growth;

  strengthen the Single Market, with a more pro-active competition policy, further reform of the state aid rules, and by making the Single Market a reality for services as well as goods;

  to improve the functioning of Europe's labour markets to deliver more and better jobs, including through implementation of Mr. Wim Kok's Employment Taskforce recommendations;

  promote enterprise and innovation, including through new European Centres of Enterprise—local centres of excellence in enterprise policy;

  promote a successful conclusion to the Doha Trade round; and

  strengthen the transatlantic economic relationship, by tackling the barriers to trade and investment between the EU and the US.

  The Government continue to work closely with their partners to promote action on all of these priorities, including through the mid-term review of the Lisbon strategy, chaired by Mr. Wim Kok. We submitted our vision for a more focused, results-oriented Lisbon process to the Mid-Term Review Group in June (copies will be made available in the Library of the House and can be accessed at: http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/media/9A9DB/Mid-term_review_of_the_Lisbon_strategy062004.pdf)

  Moldova
  Mr. Pike
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what relationship the Government has with the Government of Moldova; and if he will make a statement. [187043]

  Mr. MacShane
  The UK enjoys a constructive relationship with Moldova and has a strong interest in its security and development. Since independence, Moldova has achieved progress on promoting human rights and democracy. However, we have concerns in some areas. We have stressed the importance of the parliamentary elections in early 2005 for the Government of Moldova to demonstrate its commitment to the values of democracy, rule of law and human rights.

  We remain concerned about the situation in Transnistria, and want to see negotiations on a political settlement brought to an early and successful conclusion. The EU continues to call on the two parties, in particular the Transnistrians, to negotiate constructively and in good faith.

  Together with our EU partners we will continue to raise any concerns we have with the Moldovan Government, bilaterally through our embassies in Chisinau, in multilateral fora and through public declarations.

  Mr. Pike
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what support his Department is giving to(a) the economic progress of Moldova and (b) the development of democracy there. [187044]

  Mr. MacShane
  The UK supports economic reform and democratic development in Moldova, including through EU programmes. Moldova is a priority country for the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP), launched by my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary
  1275W
  in spring 2002 as the Wider Europe initiative. The ENP offers the new neighbours of the enlarged EU greater integration, including deeper trade and economic relations, in return for economic and political reforms.

  Our embassy in Chisinau continues to support democratic development and good governance and will support several projects in the run up to elections in early 2005.

  In addition to Foreign and Commonwealth Office assistance, the Department for International Development's bilateral programme for Moldova contributed £8.4 million between 2000 and 2003. The planned programme contribution for 2004 is £2.3 million. The UK also supports the IMF, World Bank, and European Bank for Reconstruction and Development in their efforts to promote economic reform in Moldova.

  Since 1991, the EU has provided assistance to Moldova totalling Euros 253 million including technical assistance under the TACIS programme.

  Mr. Pike
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what representations he has received regarding the Russian forces based in Moldova. [187045]

  Mr. MacShane
  Several groups have raised their concerns about the dispute in Transnistria and the continuing presence of Russian forces in Moldova with my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary. The Government share these concerns. We want Russia to fulfil commitments made when signing the Adapted Conventional Forces in Europe (CFE) Treaty at the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe Summit in Istanbul in 1999. These commitments include the full withdrawal of arms and ammunition from Transnistria, or their destruction in situ, and the withdrawal of Russian forces. Together with NATO allies we have stated that:we can envisage ratification of the Adapted CFE Treaty only in the context of full compliance by all State Parties with agreed treaty limits and consistent with the commitments contained in the CFE Final Act.

  PFI/PPP
  Matthew Taylor
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs how many contracts his Department had with(a) Barclays Bank, (b) the Royal Bank of Scotland, (c) UBS Warburg and (d) the Bank of Scotland for advice on private finance initiative and public private partnership contracts in each financial year since 2001–02; and what fees were paid in each case. [186658]

  Mr. Rammell
  The Foreign and Commonwealth Office has had no contracts with Barclays Bank, the Royal Bank of Scotland, UBS Warburg and the Bank of Scotland for advice on private sector finance initiative and public private finance partnership contracts during the period specified.

  Qualified Majority Voting
  Mr. Heathcoat-Amory
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether the conditions of employment for union staff will be decided by qualified majority voting under the European constitution. [187033]

  Mr. MacShane
  The staff regulations and conditions of employment for officials of the European institutions are currently decided by qualified majority voting under articles 210, 247(8) and 283 of the treaty establishing the European Community. They will continue to be decided by qualified majority voting under articles III.306 and III.333 of the EU constitutional treaty.

  Mr. Heathcoat-Amory
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether the penalties available to the European Court of Justice will be decided by qualified majority voting under the European Constitution; and whether this represents a change from article 229 TEC. [187034]

  Mr. MacShane
  Article 229 of the treaty establishing the European Community has been reproduced in essentials in the new constitutional treaty as article III-268. The procedures for determining penalties will therefore remain as now: that is, they will depend on the legal base for the specific legal instrument under consideration.

  Serbia
  Mr. Salter
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what reports he has received on whether ethnic Albanians are being refused entry to Serbia; and if he will make a statement. [187518]

  Mr. MacShane
  We are not aware of any reports of the authorities in Serbia and Montenegro refusing to allow ethnic Albanians into the country if they have a valid passport.

  Sierra Leone
  Mr. Wiggin
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on the political climate in Sierra Leone. [186751]

  Mr. Mullin
  The UK continues to make a significant political, military and financial investment in Sierra Leone to tackle the root causes of the conflict and to ensure sustainable peace.

  Sierra Leone has now enjoyed over two years of peace under a democratically elected government. In May, the first local elections for 32 years took place. In the same month, the Special Court for Sierra Leone started its first trials to bring to justice those who bear the greatest responsibility for war crimes and atrocities committed during the conflict.

  Following extensive security sector reforms, UN peacekeepers expect to withdraw by the end of 2005.

  US Visa Requirements
  Mr. Bill O'Brien
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what recent representations he has made to the US Administration
  1277W
  on the changes requiring UK visitors to obtain a visa in person due to unavailability of biometric data passports; and if he will make a statement. [186422]

  Mr. Mullin
  We have had regular ministerial and official contacts with the US Administration and members of Congress about maintaining the UK's position within the US Visa Waiver Programme (VWP).

  The United States amended its border security legislation on 9 August, extending the deadline by one year to 26 October 2005 for countries in the VWP to introduce a biometric identifier in new passports. The non-availability of biometric passports would have no impact on visa requirements for British passport holders before that date.

  The UK's biometric passport programme, on which the Foreign and Commonwealth Office is working closely under the Home Office's lead, involves the introduction of cutting edge technology. It is important we get this right. Along with other VWP countries, the UK may need to approach the US for a further extension in the new year to allow adequate time for development and testing before UK biometric passports are issued.

  Venezuela
  Mr. Pike
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether he has had discussions over the last 36 months with the United States Administration regarding its position on unrest in Venezuela: and if he will make a statement. [186391]

  Mr. Rammell
  We are in regular contact with the US Administration at all levels and our discussions cover a variety of issues, including Venezuela.

  Mr. Pike
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what support the British Government offered to Venezuela following the referendum which elected President Chavez in December 1999; and if he will make a statement. [186392]

  Mr. Rammell
  President Chavez was elected to office in 1998 and re-elected in 2000. A referendum was held in December 1999, to approve a new constitution.

  We have consistently supported the democratic and constitutional process in Venezuela, particularly the agreement between the Venezuelan Government and opposition in May 2003, which called for a "peaceful, democratic, electoral and constitutional" outcome in Venezuela.

HEALTH

  Alzheimer's Disease
  Mr. Burns
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health (1) what proportion of Alzheimer's patients have access to acetylcholinesterase inhibitors on the NHS; [186432]

  (2) what progress he is making with plans for all Alzheimer's patients to have access to acetylcholinesterase inhibitors on the NHS; and when he expects access on the NHS to be available for all. [186434]

  Dr. Ladyman
  Information on the proportion of Alzheimer's patients having access to anti-dementia drugs is not available. In January 2001, the National Institute for Clinical Excellence recommended that the acetylcholinesterase inhibitors, donepezil (Aricept), rivastigmine (Exelon) and galantamine (Reminyl) should be made available on the national health service as one component of the management of those people with mild to moderate Alzheimer's disease.

  Care Homes
  Mr. Ruffley
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many(a) care homes and (b) care home places were available in Suffolk in each of the last six years run by (i) Suffolk county council and (ii) the voluntary independent and private sector in Suffolk. [187178]

  Dr. Ladyman
  The table shows the number of care homes and places run by the council and the voluntary and private sector in Suffolk as at 31 March for the years 1998 to 2001.

  Number of care homes and places available in Suffolk at 31 March 1998–2001

  Residential

  At 31 March

  Council staffed

  Independent sector

  Nursing1

  Total

  Number of homes2

  1998

  35

  220

  75

  330

  1999

  35

  215

  65

  315

  2000

  35

  215

  60

  310

  2001

  35

  215

  60

  305

  Number of places

  1998

  1,195

  3,490

  2,290

  6,975

  1999

  1,065

  3,320

  2,195

  6,580

  2000

  1,060

  3,365

  2,110

  6,535

  2001

  1,070

  3,395

  2,140

  6,605

  1 Includes places in general nursing homes, mental nursing homes and private hospitals and clinics.

  2 Dual registered homes are included under nursing homes.

  Note:

  Figures for residential care are for Suffolk council with social services responsibilities and for nursing care they are for Suffolk health authority.

  Figures may not add up due to rounding.

  1280W
  I understand front the Chair of the Commission for Social Care Inspection (CSCI) that figures for later years were collected by the National Care Standards Commission, and now CSCI, but comparable details are not available.

  Continuing Care
  Mr. Burns
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what the average time taken to(a) review and (b) determine appeals by people who believed that they had been wrongly charged for continuing care (i) was before 31 March and (ii) has been since 31 March. [186371]

  Dr. Ladyman
  It is expected that all retrospective review cases will be completed within two months of receipt of all the relevant documentation. I will be making a statement to the House on retrospective continuing care reviews in due course.

  Mr. Burns
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health (1) what proportion of continuing care cases for which a review was pending at the end of March had been completed by 31 July; [186433]

  (2) how many (a) families and (b) individuals have received compensation for wrongly-assessed continuing care; how many in each case are awaiting payment; and how much compensation has been paid so far. [186435]

  Dr. Ladyman
  In due course, I will make a statement to the House on the number of completed retrospective continuing care reviews and how many people have been granted recompense.

  Dentistry
  Mr. Baron
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health when he plans to publish an order under section 60 of the Health Act 1999 to amend the Dentists Act 1984 to introduce Clinical Dental Technicians and other Professions Complementary to Dentistry. [186591]

  Ms Rosie Winterton
  We issued a draft of an Order for consultation on 30 July which, with other amendments to the Dentists Act 1984 to modernise the regulation of dentistry, would give the General Dental Council powers to register additional classes of professional complementary to dentistry including dental nurses, dental technicians and clinical dental technicians. Comments on the draft are requested by 30 October and it will subsequently be laid before Parliament for debate under the affirmative procedure. Subject to approval, we expect the Order to come into force during 2005.

  Drug and Alcohol Programmes
  Mr. Drew
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health if he will take steps to ensure that places on drug and alcohol programmes are not disproportionately allocated to those convicted of criminal activity. [184232]

  Miss Melanie Johnson
  The National Treatment Agency is committed to ensuring that treatment services provide a quick and accessible service for all substance
  1281W
  misusers requiring treatment. Drug action teams have local responsibility for ensuring that treatment services are provided.

  The Government are committed to doubling the numbers of drug misusers in treatment by 2008 and improving access into treatment from both community and criminal justice routes.

  The Government are on track to meet this target. In 2002–03, there were 140,900 drug misusers in treatment.

  NHS Dentists
  Mr. Ruffley
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many NHS dentists there were in Suffolk in each of the last seven years. [187205]

  Dr. Ladyman
  The number of national health service dentists in Suffolk primary care trusts (PCTs) over the last seven years for which data are currently available is shown in the table.

  1997

  1998

  1999

  2000

  2001

  2002

  2003

  Central Suffolk PCT1

  22

  24

  26

  27

  24

  23

  24

  Suffolk Coastal PCT2

  29

  29

  33

  32

  30

  27

  27

  Suffolk West PCT3

  79

  78

  85

  86

  95

  106

  111

  1 Figures for Central Suffolk PCT are based on general dental service (GDS) contracts only. There are no personal dental service (PDS) dentists in this PCT area.

  2 Figures for Suffolk Coastal PCT are based on GDS contracts only. There are no PDS dentists in this PCT area.

  3 Figures are based on GDS and PDS contracts.

  Mr. Ruffley
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many(a) adults and (b) children were waiting to be registered with an NHS dentist in each primary care trust in Suffolk in each of the last seven years. [187207]

  Dr. Ladyman
  The information requested is not collected centrally.

  Prison Health Care
  Mrs. Gillan
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health if he will list the differences between the interventions that can be made by a general practitioner when dealing with a patient and a prison doctor when dealing with a prisoner. [187376]

  Dr. Ladyman
  It would not be practicable to attempt to do so. The Prison Service's standard, "Health Services for Prisoners", has as its overall objective to provide prisoners with access to the same range and quality of services as the general public receives from the national health service. The prison health team is leading and managing a programme of work to develop health services for prisoners till' t are in line with NHS practice. However, the reality of the prison environment means that it may not always be possible exactly to replicate in prisons every treatment intervention that is available in the community.

  Mrs. Gillan
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what rights a prisoner has to access needle exchange schemes in prison. [187377]
  1282W
  Dr. Ladyman
  There are no present plans to introduce needle exchange schemes in prisons, although the position is kept under review.

  Mrs. Gillan
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health in what circumstances a prison doctor may order(a) physical restraints and (b) detention of a prisoner in a special cell. [187378]

  Dr. Ladyman
  The Prison Service's standard, "Health Services for Prisoners", provides that treatment and emergency care of patients who withhold consent is to be managed in accordance with Prison Service Instruction 38/2002, "Guidance on Consent to Medical Treatment". The associated Prison Service Information and Practice Note 3/2002 sets out the requirements and procedures for dealing with prisoners when there are restraint and control implications alongside health needs.

  Prison Service Order 1600, "Use of Force", states that a prisoner may be placed in a special cell only on the prior authority of the governor or controller in charge of the establishment. If he/she cannot be contacted, the decision may be taken by the officer for the time being in charge of the establishment. A prison doctor must be notified as soon as possible and must examine the prisoner as soon as practicable for any clinical contraindications.

  Mrs. Gillan
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what rights a prisoner has to medical confidentiality. [187585]

  Dr. Ladyman
  The duty of confidentiality arising from the common law of confidentiality, professional obligations and contracts of employment owed by all healthcare professionals to their patients extends to people in prison. The Prison Service's standard, "Health Services for Prisoners", stipulates that medical information on prisoners must be managed in accordance with relevant legislation, principally the Data Protection Act 1998, and the National Health Service Code of Practice on confidentiality.

  Mrs. Gillan
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what right a homosexual prisoner has to(a) HIV tests and (b) access to condoms. [187586]

  Dr. Ladyman
  Prisoners have access to HIV-test counselling and where appropriate, testing in the same way as members of the public. Prison doctors have been advised that they should make condoms available to any prisoner, on application, if in their clinical judgment there is a risk of infection from HIV.

  Mrs. Gillan
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what right a prisoner has to see(a) a doctor, (b) a dentist, (c) a chiropodist, (d) a gynaecologist and (e) a specialist or surgeon. [187587]

  Dr. Ladyman
  The overall objective of the Prison Service's standard, "Health Services for Prisoners", is to provide prisoners with access to the same range and quality of services as the general public receives from the national health service. Establishments are required to develop needs-based health services in partnership with local primary care trusts and other NHS agencies which
  1283W
  deliver effective, evidence-based care to individual prisoners and the prison population as a whole. Each establishment must have a clear and observed policy statement about what primary care, dental and other specialist services are available to prisoners, and who is responsible for providing them.

  Renal Services
  Mr. Patrick Hall
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health whether he plans to publish a delivery plan for the first two modules of the Renal Services national framework published on 14 January. [187588]

  Ms Rosie Winterton
  Part one of the national service framework for renal services sets out the steps the national health service can take to support delivery of the standards and markers of good practice. A separate delivery strategy is therefore unnecessary as it is integral to the document.

  Mr. Patrick Hall
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health when he expects the third and fourth modules of the Renal Services national service framework on prevention and palliative care to be published. [187589]

  Ms Rosie Winterton
  Part two of the national service framework for Renal Services, covering prevention and end of life care, is in preparation and will be published in due course.

  Count of elective in-year admissions (waiting list and booked cases) and percentage changes by grouped waiting time, 1996–97 to 2002–03 PCT code (PCT of residence) = 5GT (Great Yarmouth), national health service hospitals, England

  Up to 3 months

  Percentage change (up to 3 months)

  More than 3 up to 6 months

  Percentage change (more than 3 up to 6 months)

  More than 6 up to 9 months)

  Percentage change (more than 6 up to 9 months(

  More than 9 up to 12 months)

  Percentage change (more than 9 up to 12 months)

  1996–97

  7.410

  —

  1,329

  —

  552

  —

  403

  —

  1997–98

  7,032

  –5.1

  1,271

  –4.4

  603

  9.2

  442

  9.7

  1998–99

  7,326

  4.2

  1,381

  8.7

  687

  13.9

  462

  4.5

  1999–2000

  7,337

  0.2

  1,355

  –1.9

  554

  –19.4

  240

  –48.1

  2000–01

  7,117

  –3.0

  1,224

  –9.7

  609

  9.9

  224

  –6.7

  2001–02

  5,403

  –24.1

  1,036

  –15.4

  548

  –10.0

  260

  16.1

  2002–03

  5,496

  1.7

  1,046

  1.0

  740

  35.0

  591

  127.3

  More than 12 months

  Percentage change (more than 12 months

  Not known

  Percentage change (not known)

  Elective in-year admissions

  Percentage change (elective in-year admissions)

  1996–97

  182

  —

  295

  —

  10,171

  —

  1997–98

  297

  63.2

  288

  –2.4

  9.933

  –2.3

  1998–99

  292

  –1.7

  132

  –54.2

  10,280

  3.5

  1999–2000

  169

  –42.1

  137

  3.8

  9,792

  –4.7

  2000–01

  233

  37.9

  156

  13.9

  9,563

  –2.3

  2001–02

  212

  –9.0

  42

  –73.1

  7,501

  –21.6

  2002–03

  294

  38.7

  44

  4.8

  8,211

  9.5

  Notes:

  1. An in-year admission is the first period of in-patient care under one consultant within one healthcare provider, excluding admissions beginning before 1 April at the start of the data year. Periods of care ongoing at the end of the data year (unfinished admission episodes) are included. Please note that admissions do not represent the number of in-patients, as a person may have more than one admission within the year.

  2. Figures have not been adjusted for shortfalls in data (i.e. the data are ungrossed).
  1284W
  Mr. Patrick Hall
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health who will have responsibility for monitoring the progress made by primary care trusts in implementing the five steps that need to be taken by 2006 which were outlined in the recently published first two modules of the Renal Services national service framework; and what action will be taken in the event that primary care trusts do not implement those five steps. [187590]

  Ms Rosie Winterton
  Primary care trusts are accountable to strategic health authorities for monitoring and managing progress against the national service framework (NSF) for renal services. Responsibility for assessing and reporting the performance of individual national health service bodies against national standards published in "National Standards, Local Action", including the adoption of best practice defined in NSFs, rests with the Healthcare Commission.

  Waiting Lists
  Mr. Anthony D. Wright
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many inpatients in Great Yarmouth had to wait more than(a) three, (b) six, (c) nine and (d) 12 months for treatment in each year since 1997; and what the percentage change in etch year was in each case. [186718]

  Dr. Ladyman
  The information requested for the residents of Great Yarmouth, Great Yarmouth Primary Care Trust (PCT), the latest data available, is shown in the table.
  1285W
  3. Time waited statistics from hospital episode statistics (HES) are not the same as the published waiting list statistics. HES provides counts and time waited for all patients admitted to hospital within a given period, whereas the published waiting list statistics count those waiting for treatment on a specific date and how long they have been on the waiting list. Also, HES calculates the time waited as the difference between the admission and decision to admit dates. Unlike published waiting list statistics, this is not adjusted for self-deferrals or periods of medical/social suspension.

  Source:

  HES, Department of Health.

  West Suffolk Hospitals NHS Trust
  Mr. Ruffley
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many(a) doctors, (b) nurses, (c) managers, (d) administrators and (e) midwives were employed by the West Suffolk Hospitals NHS Trust in each of the last seven years. [187201]

  Hospital, public health medicine and community health services (HCHS): medical and dental staff, and non-medical within West Suffolk Hospitals NHS Trust

  Number (headcount)

  As at 30 September each year

  1997

  1998

  1999

  2000

  2001

  2002

  2003

  Medical and dental staff

  173

  183

  177

  206

  208

  215

  240

  Non-medical staff

  1,911

  1,812

  2,060

  2,104

  2,271

  2,381

  2,833

  Of which:

  Professionally qualified clinical staff

  906

  846

  963

  993

  1,103

  1,175

  1,343

  Qualified nurses

  688

  612

  719

  728

  832

  860

  1,001

  Of which: midwives

  14

  12

  10

  9

  8

  91

  96

  Qualified scientific, technical and therapeutic (ST&T)

  218

  234

  244

  265

  271

  315

  342

  Support to clinical staff

  685

  666

  790

  765

  802

  834

  965

  Support to doctors and nurses

  630

  612

  735

  714

  737

  770

  888

  Support to ST&T

  55

  54

  55

  51

  65

  64

  77

  NHS infrastructure support

  320

  300

  307

  346

  366

  372

  525

  Central functions

  78

  87

  95

  99

  114

  112

  112

  Hotel property and estate staff

  196

  177

  178

  213

  217

  220

  368

  Managers and senior managers

  46

  36

  34

  34

  35

  40

  45

  Sources:

  Department of Health medical and dental workforce census.

  Department of Health non-medical workforce census.

  NHS hospital and community health services: Total Qualified Nursing, Midwifery and Health Visiting staff and Managers and Support staff employed by the West Suffolk Hospitals NHS Trust in each specified year

  Headcount

  1997

  1998

  1999

  2000

  2001

  2002

  2003

  Total

  1,911

  1,812

  2,060

  2,104

  2,271

  2,381

  2,833

  Professionally qualified clinical staff total

  906

  846

  963

  993

  1,103

  1,175

  1,343

  Qualified nurses

  688

  612

  719

  728

  832

  860

  1,001

  Of which:

  Midwives1

  14

  12

  10

  9

  8

  91

  96

  Qualified ST&T

  218

  234

  244

  265

  271

  315

  342

  Support to clinical staff Total

  685

  666

  790

  765

  802

  834

  965

  Support to doctors and nurses

  630

  612

  735

  714

  737

  770

  888

  Support to ST&T

  55

  54

  55

  51

  65

  64

  77

  NHS infrastructure support Total

  320

  300

  307

  346

  366

  372

  525

  Central functions

  78

  87

  95

  99

  114

  112

  112

  Hotel property and estate staff2

  196

  177

  178

  213

  217

  220

  368

  Managers and senior managers

  46

  36

  34

  34

  35

  40

  45

  1 Prior to the September 2002 census, midwives had previously been miscoded. Therefore, figures for 2002 and 2003 cannot be directly compared to earlier years.

  2 Between the 2002 and 2003 censuses some domestic services staff were transferred from external bodies to the direct employment of the Trust.

  Source:

  Department of Health non-medical workforce census.

  1286W
  Dr. Ladyman
  The numbers of doctors, nurses, managers, administrators and midwives employed by West Suffolk Hospitals National Health Service Trust in each of the last seven years are shown in the following tables.

  West Suffolk NHS Hospitals Trust
  Mr. Ruffley
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many operations were carried out by the West Suffolk NHS Hospitals Trust in each year since 1997. [187195]

  Dr. Ladyman
  The information is not held in the format requested. However, the number of finished consultant episodes (FCEs) for each year since 1997 for West Suffolk Hospitals National Health Service Trust is shown in the table.

  FCEs, 1996–97 to 2002–03—all operation count of FCEs (four character OPCS4 codes A01.0–X59.9), provider code = RGR (West Suffolk NHS Hospitals Trust), NHS hospitals, England

  FCEs

  1996–97

  22,282

  1997–98

  24,286

  1998–99

  27,336

  1999–2000

  28,068

  2000–01

  29,095

  2001–02

  29,085

  2002–03

  30.878

  Notes:

  1. A FCE is defined as a period of admitted patient care under one consultant within one healthcare provider. Please note that the figures do not represent the number of patients, as a person may have more than one episode of care within the year.

  2. All operations count of episodes: these figures represent a count of all FCE's where the procedure was mentioned in any of the 12 (four prior to 2002–03) operation fields in a HES record. A record is only included once in each count, even if an operation is mentioned in more than one operation field of the record.

  3. Figures have not been adjusted for shortfalls in data (i.e. the data are ungrossed).

  Source:

  Hospital episode statistics, Department of Health.

WORK AND PENSIONS

  Bereavement Grant
  Sandra Gidley
  To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what estimate he has made of the cost of providing a bereavement grant of £200 to surviving pensioner partners. [186566]

  Mr. Pond
  The information is in the table.

  Estimated costs of and gainers from payment of 200 bereavement grant to surviving pensioner partners, Great Britain, deaths in 2005–06

  Gainers (Thousand)

  Costs £million)

  Bereavement grant, no offsetting savings

  175

  35

  Bereavement grant, offset against funeral payments

  160

  32

  Notes:

  1. Estimated gainers to the nearest five thousand, costs to the nearest million pounds

  2. Numbers of widowed pensioners estimated from GAD projections for England and Wales. Number of cohabiting bereaved estimated from household survey information.

  3. Social Fund Funeral Payment information from Social Fund Policy, Budget and Management Information System. It is assumed that 60 per cent. of pensioner claims are with respect to deceased partners.
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  4. No impact on income related benefits has been estimated. If the amount of the grant was regarded as capital there would be some offsetting reduction in expenditure on these benefits.

  5. Take-up of entitlement is assumed to be 100 per cent.

  Pension Protection
  Mr. Webb
  To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions whether protected rights accrued qrior to April 1997 by members of a contracted out occupational pension scheme are underwritten by the Government in the event of a sponsoring employer becoming insolvent and unable to meet those rights; whether any shortfall in those rights will be met by the Pension Protection Fund from April 2005 onwards; and if he will make a statement. [187829]

  Malcolm Wicks
  The Government do not underwrite protected rights. However, unless an offence has been committed, when scheme winds-up it should have sufficient funds to pay the protected rights.

  The Pension Protection Fund is designed to protect members of defined benefit schemes and defined benefit elements of hybrid schemes. Only in the case of pension scheme fraud will the PPF consider compensating members of defined contribution schemes. Such protection has been provided by the Pensions Compensation Board since April 1997 and the PPF will assume this role when it is up and running in April 2005.

  Pensioner Benefits
  Mr. Webb
  To ask 1 he Secretary of State for Work and Pensions if he will estimate the cost of(a) raising the annual Christmas bonus to £79.60, (b) giving a winter fuel payment of £300 to every household with a member over 60 years and (c) giving a free television licence to every household with a member over 60 years. [187831]

  Malcolm Wicks
  The information is in the table.

  Proposal

  Estimated cost in 2004–05 £million)

  Raising the Christmas Bonus to £79.60

  1,010

  Giving a Winter Fuel Payment of £300 to every household with a member over 60 years

  860

  Giving a free television licence to every household with a member over 60 years

  710

  Notes:

  1. All figures relate to GB payments only, are in 2004–05 price terms and are rounded to the nearest 10 million.

  2. The Christmas Bonus is currently paid to people in receipt of a number of qualifying benefits, some of whom are of working age. These people are assumed to receive the Christmas Bonus at the new rate.

  3. Estimated costs for giving Winter Fuel Payments of £300 to every household with a member over 60 years are based on the 2003–04 Pensioner Household data set which is derived from the 2003–04 Winter Fuel Payment administrative data set.

  4. Estimated costs for free TV licences are based on the 2002–03 Family Resources and expenditure forecasts produced by the Department's Benefit and Forecasting Model Development Division.

  Pensioners (Tax Payments)
  Mr. Willetts
  To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how many pensioners paid(a) income tax and (b) council tax in the latest year for which figures are available. [187355]

  Ruth Kelly
  I have been asked to reply.

  The information requested falls within the responsibility of the National Statistician, who has been asked to reply.

  Letter from Len Cook to Mr. David Wi/lets, dated 8 September 2004:
  As National Statistician, I have been asked to reply to your recent Parliamentary Questions asking, for the latest year for which figures are available, for the total amount of (a) income tax and (b) council tax. paid by pensioners and the average tax per pensioner who paid each tax (187351), and how many pensioners paid each tax (187355).
  For estimates relating to income tax please see table 3.12 "Income and tax for individuals aged 65 and above, by region and country, 2001–02" on the Inland Revenue website: www.inlandrevenue.gov.uk/stats/income_distribution/table-312–2001 -02.pdf. The information in this table relates to individual taxpayers, not households, who are aged 65 and above. This table does not include female taxpaying pensioners aged between 60 and 65. It shows there were about 4.1 million pensioners taxpayers aged 65 or over in the UK in 2001–02, with income tax liability of £8.2 billion. This gives an average tax of about £2,000 per pensioner taxpayer (aged 65 or over).
  Estimates for council tax paid by pensioner households have been produced from the Office for National Statistics' analysis "The effects of taxes and benefits on household income" published on the National Statistics website on 6 May 2004 at: www.statistics.gov.uk/taxesbenefits
  The analysis includes measures of income inequality for households in the United Kingdom as a whole based on data from the Expenditure and Food Survey. This is a sample survey covering about 7,000 households in the UK and sample sizes for pensioner households are only sufficient to give very approximate estimates.
  Estimates for 2002–03 suggest that that single and couple pensioner households in GB paid about £3.6 billion in council tax net of benefits and discounts. The average council tax paid by the approximately five million pensioner households (single and couples) who paid council tax (i.e. their council tax was greater than zero) was about £700 per year. Council tax is not paid in Northern Ireland. Net council tax is defined as gross council tax less benefits and discounts, where a household reports taking up a council tax benefit entitlement.
  These estimates of numbers of pensioners and payments of council tax may not match population data or administrative payments data because of sample size and weighting issues, as well as possible inaccurate reporting by respondents.
  Pensioner households have been defined as those where the Household Reference Person is retired or unoccupied and aged 65 or more and male, or 60 years of age or more and female, and economically inactive.
  Detailed information on the definition of the Household Reference Person can be found in Appendix D of the document at the following address: http://www.statistics.gov.uk/downloads/theme_social/Family_Spending_2002–-03/Family_Spending_2002–03_revised.pdf

  Pensions
  Mr. Denham
  To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (1) what estimate he has made of the level of basic state pension and state second pension(a) on retirement and (b) at age 75 for a man with annual earnings of (i) £10,000, (ii) £20,000 and (iii) £30,000 over a 40-year working life; and what the projected level of the guarantee part of the pension credit would be, assuming current policies continue; [186436]

  (2) what estimate he has made of the state second pension accrual rate that would be necessary for the combined basic state pension and state second pension for a man with annual earnings of (a) £10,000, (b) £20,000 and (c) £30,000 over a 40-year working life to exceed the projected level of the guarantee part of the pension credit (i) on retirement and (ii) at age 75, assuming current policies continue; [186437]

  (3) what assessment he has made of the state second pension accrual rate that would be necessary for the combined basic state pension and state second pension for a man with annual earnings of (a) £10,000, (b) £20,000 and (c) £30,000 over a 40-year working life to exceed the projected level of the guarantee part of the pension credit (i) on retirement and (ii) at age 75, assuming that the retirement pension is uprated by the average of earnings and price inflation. [186958]

  Malcolm Wicks
  The information is provided in the tables.

  Table 1 shows the estimated amounts of basic state pension and state second pension that a single male with a 40-year working life, reaching state pension age in 2045 would receive.

  Table 1

  Annual earnings

  Total state pension (£)

  £10,000

  200

  £20,000

  220

  £30,000

  229

  Notes:

  1. Figures are weekly amounts in 2004–05 price terms and are rounded to the nearest £1. Totals may not sum due to rounding.

  2. The weekly level of guarantee credit when this individual reaches state pension age in 2045 is estimated at £236, and at £287 10 years later when the man would be 75. Actual pension credit entitlement depends on both state and private income, savings as well as household circumstances.

  3. Currently basic and additional state pension are uprated in line with a minimum of prices and therefore remain constant in real terms.

  4. Future policy on calculation and uprating of benefits is for future Parliaments to determine. For the purposes of these projections, it has been assumed that (except where stated) all elements of state pension are uprated in line with prices once in payment and the guarantee credit rises in line with average earnings. Long term assumptions are in line with those for Budget 2004.

  5. It is assumed that a man starts paying Class 1 national insurance contributions at age 25 following nine years without any credits and contributes for 40 years.

  6. An individual's earnings are assumed to rise in line with average long term earnings' growth and therefore increase in real terms.

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  Table 2 shows the underlying accrual rate of state second pension required for the basic and state second pension of a man with a 40-year working life

  Table 2

  Annual earnings in 2004

  £10,000

  £20,000

  £30,000

  Basic state pension

  Contributory pension above guarantee credit

  Required underlying rate of accrual in state second pension

  Increased in line with prices

  At state pension age (percentage)

  26.20

  22.50

  21.20

  At age 75 (percentage)

  34.70

  29.80

  28.10

  Increased by average of prices and earnings

  At state pension age

  Current

  Current

  Current

  At age 75 (percentage)

  26.30

  22.60

  21.20

  Notes:

  1. Where the current state second pension accrual rate is sufficient to ensure the combined value of basic state pension and state second pension exceeds the value of the guarantee credit, this has been denoted as "Current".

  2. The current underlying rate of accrual is 20 per cent. however state second pension is accrued at different rates for different bands of earnings. The rate shown here is the underlying rate that determines the rate in different bands. For example, the person earning £10,000 per year has an accrual rate in state second pension of 40 per cent., which is twice the underlying rate of 20 per cent.

  3. Future policy on calculation and uprating of benefits is for future Parliaments to determine. For the purposes of these projections, it has been assumed that (except where stated) all elements of state pension are uprated in line with prices once in payment and the guarantee credit rises in line with average earnings. Long term assumptions are in line with those for Budget 2004.

  4. It is assumed that a man starts paying Class 1 national insurance contributions at age 25 following nine years without any credits and contributes for 40 years.

  5. An individual's earnings are assumed to rise in line with average long term earnings' growth and therefore increase in real terms.

  Mr. Liddell-Grainger
  To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how many pensioners in Bridgwater(a) have been contacted about converting to direct payment, (b) are still to be contacted about converting to direct payment, (c) have not responded to the contact about converting to direct payment and (d) have chosen to open a Post Office Card Account. [186508]

  Mr. Pond
  We do not have the information in the format requested. This could be provided only at disproportionate cost.

  Key figures on the progress of conversion to Direct Payment are available in the Library updated every four weeks.

  Mr. Denham
  To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what assessment he has made of the additional cost of uprating the basic state pension by the average of prices and earnings inflation annually for the next 50 years(a) gross and (b) net of savings in means-tested benefits and direct taxes. [186957]

  Malcolm Wicks
  The information is provided in the table:

  £billion

  (a) Gross cost

  (b) Net cost

  2005–06

  0.3

  0.1

  2006–07

  0.7

  0.4

  2007–08

  1.0

  0.5

  2008–09

  1.3

  0.7

  2009–10

  1.7

  0.9

  2020–21

  6.3

  3.4

  2055–56

  32.7

  17.4

  1. Figures are costs for GB and Overseas in 2004–05 price terms, using the GDP deflator index, rounded to the nearest £100 million.

  2. For part (a), additional gross basic State Pension costs are estimated by the Government Actuary's Department and are consistent with Budget 2004 assumptions and use 2002 based population projections. Basic State Pension costs refer to the
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  reaching state pension age in 2045 to exceed the level of the guarantee credit, at state pension age and at age 75.

  additional costs after allowing for consequential changes to National Insurance Fund benefits and non-means tested vote benefits.

  3. For part (b), costs net of income related benefits (savings credit, guarantee credit, housing benefit and council tax benefit) and income tax are calculated using the Department's policy simulation model for 2005–06 and 2006–07. For illustrative purposes it is assumed that the proportion of savings calculated for the 2006–07 year is constant for subsequent years.

TREASURY

  EU Productivity
  Keith Vaz
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what action has been set by the EU as highest priority for new member states in generating rapid economic reform. [186788]

  Ruth Kelly
  The new member states have been integrated into the Broad Guidelines of the Economic Policies of the member states and the Community, for the period 2003–05 (BEPGs).

  The 2004 BEPG update highlighted country specific economic measures and priorities that each member state should undertake. Under "economic reforms to raise Europe's growth" potential, the Commission also suggested that the existing guidelines aiming at 'more and better jobs' and at 'increasing productivity and business dynamism' be implemented in a comprehensive and co-ordinated way by the new member states. Given the labour market situation is considerably worse in the new member states, the BEPGs recommend that policy efforts concentrate on a small number of priority areas that are likely to have the largest impact on labour market performances: ensuring that real wage developments reflect productivity growth; improving the financial incentives to work by reforming tax/benefit systems; improving skills and training, through the

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  provisions of lifelong learning facilities; and undertaking appropriate reforms of labour market regulations.

  The BEPGs also indicate that R and D diffusion and technology transfers will be as important as R and D investment in accelerating the transition towards higher value-added activities. Sustaining a high level of foreign direct investment is essential, as is an increased responsiveness of the education and training systems to the changing needs of the labour market.

  Bereavement Benefit
  Angela Watkinson
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what plans the Government has to carry forward into the new regime existing Inland Revenue rules allowing schemes to pay a bereavement benefit of up to £2,500 on the death of a pensioner at any age to cover funeral costs; and whether there will be transitional protection arrangements. [186729]

  Ruth Kelly
  Under the simplified tax rules for pensions, lump sum death benefits may normally only be paid where the member is under the age of 75 at death. This maintains the principle that pensions are to provide for retirement and not a means for passing capital through the generations.

  Number and percentage of children living in workless households1,2 UK regions, 1997 to 2004 (three months periods ending in May)5

  Region

  1997

  1998

  1999

  2000

  2001

  2002

  2003

  2004

  Percentage3

  North East

  23.3

  25.2

  25.3

  22.6

  22.0

  19.8

  24.9

  23.3

  North West

  22.4

  23.6

  22.6

  19.4

  19.1

  19.9

  20.1

  18.0

  in which:

  St. Helens LAD4

  39

  34

  20

  19

  14

  8

  23

  29

  Yorkshire and the Humber

  20.0

  20.4

  18.5

  18.7

  16.6

  20.9

  16.7

  15.8

  East Midlands

  16.3

  16.9

  14.8

  13.1

  15.6

  14.2

  16.0

  12.2

  West Midlands

  18.3

  17.9

  18.4

  17.0

  16.5

  17.9

  15.6

  14.3

  East of England

  14.2

  13.5

  12.8

  11.2

  10.1

  10.7

  10.7

  12.4

  London

  25.8

  26.5

  27.5

  24.7

  25.1

  26.4

  23.9

  25.7

  South East

  12.1

  10.9

  10.2

  9.8

  9.6

  11.0

  10.5

  10.0

  South West

  13.4

  13.3

  12.9

  11.1

  10.5

  11.1

  11.4

  11.1

  Wales

  21.8

  20.7

  21.2

  20.3

  21.6

  19.7

  17.5

  19.4

  Scotland

  19.3

  18.6

  17.6

  17.5

  16.1

  14.2

  16.0

  18.4

  Northern Ireland

  20.1

  19.8

  19.4

  21.1

  19.0

  20.5

  18.2

  20.5

  United Kingdom

  18.7

  18.7

  18.2

  16.8

  16.4

  17.1

  16.5

  16.4

  Thousand

  North East

  122

  132

  134

  117

  107

  94

  120

  103

  North West

  319

  335

  314

  271

  264

  277

  283

  245

  in which:

  St. Helens LAD4

  16

  12

  9

  5

  3

  1

  6

  7

  Yorkshire and the Humber

  201

  200

  182

  182

  156

  194

  157

  146

  East Midlands

  132

  138

  121

  103

  122

  115

  132

  96

  West Midlands

  196

  190

  191

  178

  173

  187

  153

  144

  East of England

  146

  141

  134

  116

  103

  113

  113

  128

  London

  356

  380

  400

  365

  369

  379

  342

  381

  South East

  182

  164

  157

  151

  149

  165

  149

  146

  South West

  119

  117

  118

  101

  95

  99

  95

  96

  Wales

  122

  118

  127

  120

  124

  114

  96

  108

  Scotland

  189

  181

  162

  158

  145

  123

  145

  155

  Northern Ireland

  87

  83

  76

  79

  74

  78

  72

  79

  United Kingdom

  2,171

  2,179

  2,116

  1,941

  1,879

  1,939

  1,857

  1,825

  1 Children refers to children under 16.

  2 Figures have not been adjusted for households with unknown economic activity status.
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  We have received representations from a small number of occupational pension schemes that pay a tax-free bereavement benefit of up to £2,500. We will be considering these representations carefully.

  Child Poverty
  Mr. Woodward
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what estimate the Government has made of(a) how many and (b) what percentage of children grew up in jobless households in (i) St. Helens and (ii) the UK, broken down by region, in each year since 1997. [186822]

  Ruth Kelly
  The information requested falls within the responsibility of the National Statistician, who has been asked to reply.

  Letter from Len Cook to Mr. Shaun Woodward, dated 8 September 2004:
  As National Statistician I have been asked to reply to your recent Parliamentary Question about children in workless households. (186822)
  The attached table gives the available estimates of the number and the percentage of children resident in workless households in St. Helens Local Authority District and each region of the UK, for the three months ending May of each year from 1997 to 2004.
  Estimates are taken from the Labour Force Survey (LFS). As with any sample survey, estimates from the LFS are subject to sampling error. Estimates for St. Helens Local Authority District are based on small sample sizes and are subject to a high level of sampling variability. In particular, year-to-year changes are likely to show considerable volatility.
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  3 Children living in workless households as a percentage of children living in all working-age households with known economic activity status.

  4 Estimates for St. Helens LAD are based on small sample sizes and are therefore subject to a high degree of sampling variability. They should be treated with caution.

  5 Not seasonally adjusted

  Source:

  ONS Labour Force Survey

  Civil Servants
  Matthew Taylor
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what the latest available figures are for the cost of(a) a Grade 5 civil servant and (b) a Grade 7 civil servant for his Department; and if he will make a statement. [187086]

  Ruth Kelly
  The Treasury's ranges F and E correspond to Grades 5 and 7 respectively. For a range F civil servant, the current average salary cost including London Allowances is £61,700, and the current average total staff cost including employer's NI and pension contributions is £78,700. For a range E civil servant, the current average salary cost including London Allowances is £42,200, and the current average total staff cost including employer's NI and pension contributions is £52,900.

  Matthew Taylor
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what the average length of service is for(a) a grade 5 civil servant and (b) a grade 7 civil servant in his Department; and if he will make a statement. [187091]

  Ruth Kelly
  In HM Treasury, the average length of Government service for a grade 5 civil servant is 16 years, and for a grade 7 civil servant is 10 years.

  Climate Change Levy
  Mr. Kidney
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what recent assessment he has made of the operation of the Climate Change Levy, with particular reference to its effect on the Government's waste hierarchy. [186984]

  John Healey
  The Government continually review the use of all economic instruments, including the Climate Change Levy, across a broad range of areas. The first stage of the "Review of Environmental and Health Effects of Waste Management" was published earlier this year, and the second stage will be published shortly. Together these reports will help inform policy development and the wider debate on waste management, including the case for using economic instruments.

  Designated Accommodation
  Bob Spink
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many rooms are set aside for(a) the use of smokers, (b) worship, broken down by religion, and (c) nursing mothers and pregnant women in each building and set of offices for which his Department is responsible. [187319]

  Ruth Kelly
  There are five dedicated smoking rooms and one prayer room in 1 Horse Guards Road. Nursing mothers and pregnant women have access to the suite of welfare facilities provided.

  Household Saving
  Mr. Liddell-Grainger
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what assessment he has made of the effect of the removal of advanced dividend tax credit on levels of household saving. [186542]

  Ruth Kelly
  I believe the hon. Gentleman is referring to the removal of payable tax credits on dividends. This was one element of a package of measures, including lower corporation tax rates and increased capital allowances, designed to encourage investment and economic growth. Therefore it would be misleading to assess the impact of one measure in isolation.

  Furthermore, the Government has introduced a number of measures to encourage saving since 1999, such as reducing the rate of tax on dividends from 20 per cent. to 10 per cent. for starting and basic rate taxpayers; introducing the lower rate of tax for savings of 10 per cent. and the Individual Savings Account. The ISA has been very successful, with around 15 million savers—one in three adults—subscribing around £140 billion into their ISAs since they came into effect in April 1999.

  Mr. Liddell-Grainger
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what assessment he has made of the effect of reducing the maximum investment limits on Individual Savings Accounts on household saving. [186543]

  Ruth Kelly
  ISAs form one part of the Governments approach to savings linking with policies such as the new Child Trust Fund, reductions in the tax on Capital Gains for business assets from 40 per cent. to 10 per cent. and radical simplification of pensions with a lifetime limit of £1.5m.

  A reduction from £7,000 to £5,000 a year may affect the allocation of savings between savings products for those currently investing more than £5,000 a year in an ISA. The overall effect on such savers behaviour is uncertain. We shall continue to keep the approach to savings policy under review.

  Household Waste (Charges)
  Mr. Kidney
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what assessment he has made of the fiscal implications of introducing variable charges for the collection of domestic household waste. [187277]

  John Healey
  The Strategy Unit report "Waste not, Want not" published in November 2002, recommended that local authorities that wish to take forward household incentive—including charging—schemes to help reduce waste volumes and increase recycling should be allowed to do so.

  In response, the Government undertook to carry out further work on household incentives before reaching a decision on whether to extend the powers of local authorities and introduce pilot schemes. This work—in consultation with the Local Government Association

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  and local authority practitioners—looks in particular at the practicalities of operating any such schemes, the benefits they could deliver and how potential disadvantages might be overcome.

  Inheritance Tax Act
  Mr. Boris Johnson
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how much(a) gross and (b) net revenue has been raised to date by the repeal under the Finance Act 1998 of section 26 of the Inheritance Tax Act 1984. [187474]

  Dawn Primarolo
  None. Section 26 was redundant following the removal of the monetary limit which originally applied to relief for charitable bequests under what is now s.23 of the Inheritance Tax Act 1984. A gift or bequest which could previously have been relieved under s.26 can now enjoy relief either under s.23 or under s.25 (gifts for national purposes).

  Iraq (Departmental Secondments)
  Mr. Cousins
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will list the secondments of staff of the Treasury and its agencies to the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq up to the transfer to the Iraqi Government; what their duties were in each case; and how many secondees continue to serve that government. [182105]

  Ruth Kelly
  Five Treasury officials were seconded to the Coalition Provisional Authority to support the formulation and execution of economic policy in Iraq. The Treasury officials mainly worked on budgetary issues, including preparation of the 2003 and 2004 Iraqi Budgets, execution of the budget, including payment of public sector salaries and pensions, and the new financial management law. They also worked on the Iraqi currency exchange.

  At present there are no Treasury secondees serving the Iraqi Government.

  Landfill Tax
  Mr. Kidney
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what assessment he has made of the implications of his Spending Review for the(a) speed and (b) quantum of future increases in the rate of landfill tax. [186985]

  John Healey
  The Chancellor makes decisions in the Spending Review based on a wide range of policy issues and considerations. The Government are committed to a waste management strategy which makes use of a range of policies, including spending, regulation and taxation. The standard rate of landfill tax is due to increase by £3/tonne next year and by at least £3/tonne in subsequent years on the way to a medium to long-term rate of £35/tonne. Any decisions about the rate of increases in the landfill tax will be made as part of the Budget process, taking account of all relevant policy measures and a range of social, environmental and economic factors.

  National Insurance Number
  Harry Cohen
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what uses of the national insurance number other than those connected with tax or benefits are authorised; whether he intends to make the national insurance number a general identifier under the Data Protection 1298W
  Act 1998; whether he seeks the views of the Information Commissioner when approving additional uses of the national insurance number; and if he will make a statement. [185952]

  Dawn Primarolo
  I refer to the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions response of 14 April 2003 to your previous question. Additions to the list of authorised users of the national insurance number for non-tax or benefit purposes since that date will be placed in the Library.

  Responsibility for authorising use of the national insurance number is held jointly by Inland Revenue and the Department of Work and Pensions who liaise with the Information Commissioner on data protection issues. We have no plans to register the national insurance number as a general identifier under the Data Protection Act 1998.

  Non-North Sea Corporation Tax Revenues
  Mr. Willetts
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what assumptions about the level of employer contributions to self-administered pension schemes informed his forecasts for non-North Sea corporation tax revenues in(a) 2004–05, (b) 2005–06, (c) 2006–07, (d) 2007–08 and (e) 2008–09 as set out in Table C9 of the Budget 2004 Red Book. [186784]

  Ruth Kelly
  The level of pension contributions in the economic forecast underlying the Budget 2004 non-North Sea corporation tax forecasts is circumscribed by the assumption made about the factor income shares of GDP. The assumption used is that in the medium-term, when GDP grows at the underlying trend rate, the factor shares of GDP are broadly constant. This assumption was re-examined by the National Audit Office for Budget 2004, and their conclusion was that it remained a reasonable one.

  Oil Exploration Expenditure Supplement
  Mr. Salmond
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer (1) if he will raise the oil exploration expenditure supplement; [187513]

  (2) what action he plans to take in response to increasing oil prices. [187511]

  John Healey
  The Government's focus since 3 June has been on OPEC and oil producers and their responsibilities to meet their own targets on sustainable oil prices. With the next meeting of OPEC Ministers now moved from July to September, and in light of the continuing uncertainty in the oil market, the Government announced on 20 July that it had decided to review the planned increase in fuel duty at the Pre-Budget Report.

  The Chancellor of the Exchequer will report back on this issue at the time of the Pre-Budget report. Other taxes, including the oil exploration expenditure supplement, will be kept under review by the Chancellor as part of the normal Budget cycle.

  Mr. Salmond
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what changes in revenues the Treasury expects as a result of rising oil prices. [187512]
  1299W
  John Healey
  I refer the hon. Gentleman to the answer I gave to the hon. Member for Waveney on 21 June (Official Report, 1205W).

  Older Workers
  Mr. Tony Clarke
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many people aged over 65 years have been in work in Northampton, South in each year since 1997. [186463]

  Ruth Kelly
  The information requested falls within the responsibility of the National Statistician, who has been asked to reply.

  Letter from Len Cook to Mr. Tony Clarke, dated 8 September 2004:
  As National Statistician, I have been asked to reply to your Parliamentary Question about employment. (186463)
  The attached table gives the available estimates of the number of people aged 65 and over in employment in the Northampton South Parliamentary Constituency for the twelve months ending February in 1997 and each year from 1999 to 2003. However, these estimates are subject to a higher degree of sampling and rounding error than usual, and for this reason the table also includes estimates for the East Midlands region.
  Estimates are taken from the Office for National Statistics Labour Force Survey (LFS). As with any sample survey, estimates from the LFS are subject to sampling variability.

  Estimated number of people aged 65 and over in employment, East Midlands region and Northampton South constituency, 12 months ending February of 1997 and of each year from 1999 to 2003

  Thousand

  Year1

  East Midlands

  Northampton, South2

  1997

  29

  1

  1999

  29

  1

  2000

  29

  0

  2001

  33

  2

  2002

  29

  1

  2003

  33

  2

  1 Data not available for 1998.

  2 Estimates are based on small sample sizes and are subject to a higher than usual degree of sampling variability. They should therefore be treated with caution.

  Source:

  ONS Labour Force Survey.

  PA Spiral Case
  Mr. Hancock
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what plans he has to create a structure to remedy the position in the case of the Names who were victims of fraud in the PA Spiral case (Thomas LJ in Sphere Drake v EIU and SCB); and if he will make a statement. [186574]

  Ruth Kelly
  It is understood that this particular matter is still before the courts and the Government does not comment on matters that are before the courts. There are existing remedies which victims of fraud can seek to obtain through the courts.

  Pensioners (Tax Payments)
  Mr. David Willetts
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what the total amount of(a) income and (b) council tax paid by pensioners was in the latest year for which figures are available; and what the average payment was per pensioner who pays each tax. [187351]
  1300W
  Ruth Kelly
  The information requested falls within the responsibility of the National Statistician, who has been asked to reply.

  Letter from Len Cook to Mr. Willets, dated 8 September 2004:
  As National Statistician, I have been asked to reply to your recent Parliamentary Questions asking, for the latest year for which figures are available, for the total amount of (a) income tax and (b) council tax. paid by pensioners and the average tax per pensioner who paid each tax (187351), and how many pensioners paid each tax (187355)
  For estimates relating to income tax please see table 3.12 "Income and tax for individuals aged 65 and above, by region and country, 2001–02" on the Inland Revenue website: www.inlandrevenue.gov.uk/stats/income_distribution/table-312-2001-02.pdf. The information in this table relates to individual taxpayers, not households, who are aged 65 and above. This table does not include female taxpaying pensioners aged between 60 and 65. It shows there were about 4.1 million pensioners taxpayers aged 65 or over in the UK in 2001–02, with income tax liability of £8.2 billion. This gives an average tax of about £2,000 per pensioner taxpayer (aged 65 or over).
  Estimates for council tax paid by pensioner households have been produced from the Office for National Statistics' analysis "The effects of taxes and benefits on household income" published on the National Statistics website on 6 May 2004 at: www.statistics.gov.uk/taxesbenefits
  The analysis includes measures of income inequality for households in the United Kingdom as a whole based on data from the Expenditure and Food Survey. This is a sample survey covering about 7.000 households in the UK and sample sizes for pensioner households are only sufficient to give very approximate estimates
  Estimates for 2002–03 suggest that that single and couple pensioner households in GB paid about £3.6 billion in council tax net of benefits and discounts. The average council tax paid by the approximately five million pensioner households (single and couples) who paid council tax (i.e. their council tax was greater than zero) was about £700 per year. Council tax is not paid in Northern Ireland. Net council tax is defined as gross council tax less benefits and discounts, where a household reports taking up a council tax benefit entitlement.
  These estimates of numbers of pensioners and payments of council tax may not match population data or administrative payments data because of sample size and weighting issues, as well as possible inaccurate reporting by respondents.
  Pensioner households have been defined as those where the Household Reference Person is retired or unoccupied and aged 65 or more and male, or 60 years of age or more and female, and economically inactive.
  Detailed information on the definition of the Household Reference Person can be found in Appendix D of the document at the following address:
  http://www.statistics.gov.uk/downloads/theme_social/Family_Spending_2002–03/Family_Spending_2002–03_revised.pdf

  Pensions (Tax Relief)
  Mr. Love
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer (1) what estimates he has made of the impact on public funds in tax relief of the introduction of the £1.4 million limit on pension savings; and if he will make a statement; [186635]

  (2) what estimates he has made of the cost to public funds in tax relief of introducing a limit on pension savings of (a) £1.3 million, (b) £1 million, (c) £750,000, (d) £500,000 and (e) an amount reflecting a pension just above benefit levels; and if he will make a statement. [186636]
  1301W
  Ruth Kelly
  Available estimates of the Exchequer cost of the introduction of the new simplified tax regime for pensions are contained in paragraph 48 of "Simplifying the taxation of pensions regulatory impact assessment", a copy of which is available in the Library of the House.

  The £1.5 million lifetime allowance to be introduced from April 2006 broadly replicates the maximum fund an individual can accrue under the current occupational pension rules. The exchequer impact of introducing a lower allowance would depend upon uncertain changes in the pensions savings of individuals at or approaching the lower lifetime allowance and any consequent changes to other parts of the new regime resulting from a lower allowance. Due to the uncertainty of estimating the size and direction of these behavioural effects no estimates are available.

  Population Register
  Harry Cohen
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what estimate he has made of the savings to public funds arising from(a) the implementation of the population register database by the Registrar General, (b) the proposed introduction of an identity card by the Home Office and (c) the data-sharing proposals of the Department for Constitutional Affairs. [185954]

  Ruth Kelly
  The potential cost savings from the Citizen Information Project are being developed. No decision has yet been taken as to whether or not the population register should proceed to implementation but we could expect benefits to arise both in the form of efficiency savings and in improved public services.

  There have been discussions between the Treasury and the Home Office on the implications of Identity Cards dating back to before the publication of the consultation paper on entitlement cards and identity fraud. However, the introduction of Identity Cards is a long-term undertaking, and discussions will continue. HM Treasury will continue to be involved with ongoing analysis.

  The DCA Legal Guidance on Public Sector Data Sharing sets out the legal and regulatory framework governing data sharing. The Government are not able to estimate savings to public funds that may result from the better understanding of this framework which has followed the publication of the Guidance.

  With-profits Fund Schemes
  Mr. Love
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer (1) what plans(a) he and (b) the Financial Services

  Percentages of people aged 50 to 65 who are unemployed1 or economically inactive2—UK regions, 1997–2004 (three-month periods ending in May)3

  percentage

  Region

  1997

  1998

  1999

  2000

  2001

  2002

  2003

  2004

  Unemployed1

  North East

  4

  4

  4

  4

  2

  3

  3

  3

  North West

  3

  2

  3

  3

  2

  2

  2

  1

  in which St. Helens LAD

  3

  2

  2

  4

  4

  4—

  4—

  4—

  Yorkshire and Humberside

  3

  3

  3

  2

  2

  2

  2

  2

  East Midlands

  3

  2

  2

  2

  2

  3

  2

  2

  1302W
  Authority has for further regulation of with-profits fund schemes offered by insurance companies; and if he will make a statement; [186628]

  (2) when the consultation by the Financial Services Authority on Treating With-Profits Customers Fairly, CP 207, will conclude; when the results will be published; and if he will make a statement: [186629]

  (3) what research has been undertaken into the impact on mutual insurers of the proposals contained in the consultation on Treating With-Profits Customers Fairly; and if he will make a statement. [186630]

  Ruth Kelly
  Insurance regulation is the responsibility of the Financial Services Authority (FSA).

  The FSA published Consultation Paper (CP) 04/14 on 19 August 2004 which provides feedback on CP 207 and makes revised proposals for further consultation. The FSA will continue to consult widely about its proposals, including among the mutual insurance sector. CP 04/14 specifically addresses a number of points made by firms within the mutual insurance sector in response to the first consultation.

  The FSA will continue to monitor the impact on firms and consumers of existing and future changes to with-profits regulation.

  Work Force Statistics
  Mr. Woodward
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what estimate the Government have made of the percentage of people aged 50 to 65 who were(a) registered as unemployed and (b) economically inactive in (i) St. Helens and (ii) the UK, broken down by region, in each year since 1997. [186940]

  Ruth Kelly
  The information requested falls within the responsibility of the National Statistician, who has been asked to reply.

  Letter from Len Cook to Mr. Shaun Woodward, dated 8 September 2004:
  As National Statistician, I have been asked to reply to your Parliamentary Question about unemployment and economic inactivity for people aged 50 to 65. (186940)
  The attached table gives estimates for the percentages of people aged 50 to 65 who are (a) unemployed and (b) economically inactive in the St. Helens Local Authority District and the UK by region for the three months ending in May of each year from 1997 to 2004.

  Estimates are taken from the Labour Force Survey (LFS). As with any sample survey, estimates from the LFS are subject to sampling variability. Estimates for UK regions and for St. Helens Local Authority District are based on small sample sizes and are subject to a high level of sampling variability. In particular, year- to-year changes are likely to show considerable volatility.
  1303W

  Percentages of people aged 50 to 65 who are unemployed1 or economically inactive2—UK regions, 1997–2004 (three-month periods ending in May)3

  percentage

  Region

  1997

  1998

  1999

  2000

  2001

  2002

  2003

  2004

  West Midlands

  3

  3

  3

  3

  2

  3

  2

  2

  Eastern

  3

  3

  2

  2

  2

  2

  2

  2

  London

  5

  4

  4

  4

  3

  3

  3

  3

  South East

  3

  2

  2

  2

  1

  2

  2

  2

  South West

  3

  3

  3

  2

  2

  2

  2

  2

  Wales

  2

  3

  3

  2

  1

  2

  2

  2

  Scotland

  4

  3

  3

  4

  3

  3

  2

  2

  Northern Ireland

  4

  4

  2

  3

  3

  2

  3

  2

  United Kingdom

  3.4

  2.8

  2.8

  2.6

  1.9

  2.2

  2.0

  1.9

  Economically inactive2

  North East

  50

  52

  51

  49

  47

  49

  47

  49

  North West

  45

  47

  44

  44

  43

  43

  39

  40

  in which St. Helens LAD

  54

  50

  49

  50

  46

  39

  51

  49

  Yorkshire and Humberside

  44

  42

  44

  40

  41

  40

  38

  37

  East Midlands

  38

  38

  39

  36

  37

  36

  35

  36

  West Midlands

  38

  38

  37

  39

  39

  37

  37

  37

  Eastern

  37

  33

  35

  34

  32

  32

  32

  31

  London

  38

  40

  38

  38

  37

  37

  37

  36

  South East

  34

  32

  31

  32

  32

  31

  31

  30

  South West

  35

  35

  34

  36

  36

  35

  35

  33

  Wales

  48

  49

  48

  48

  47

  47

  43

  42

  Scotland

  45

  45

  44

  44

  41

  42

  39

  38

  Northern Ireland

  48

  50

  48

  48

  49

  46

  43

  45

  United Kingdom

  40.4

  40.2

  39.6

  39.3

  38.5

  37.9

  36.6

  36.3

  1 Unemployed as a per cent. of total population aged 50 to 65.

  2 Economically inactive as a per cent. of total population aged 50 to 65.

  3 Not seasonally adjusted

  4 LFS sample included no cases on which an estimate could be based.

  Important Note:

  Estimates for UK regions and for St. Helens Local Authority District are based on small sample sizes and are subject to a high level of sampling variability. They should be treated with caution. In particular, year-to-year changes are likely to show considerable volatility, and should not be used is isolation from the estimates for a sequence of years.

  Source:

  ONS Labour Force Survey

DEFENCE

  AAC Dishforth
  Miss McIntosh
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will make a statement on the security review at AAC Dishforth. [186619]

  Mr. Ingram
  In March 2004, a security review was undertaken at AAC Dishforth. The final report has been produced and its recommendations are currently being considered, while we await the outcome of the Defence Airfield Review.

  Armoured Battlegroup Support Vehicle Programme
  Mr. Gerald Howarth
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will make a statement on the decision to halt the Armoured Battlegroup Support Vehicle programme. [186639]

  Mr. Ingram
  There has been no decision to halt the Armoured Battlegroup Support Vehicle (ABSV) programme. The project remains in its concept phase with all options under consideration.

  Civil Service Relocation
  Mr. Cousins
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what non-uniformed staff are employed by(a) his Department and (b) each of its agencies, broken
  1304W
  down by (i) region and (ii) country; what relocations are pending; and what contribution he plans to make to the implementation of the Lyons Review. [186847]

  Mr. Caplin
  The total number of full-time equivalent MOD civilian staff by region and country as at 1 July 2004, including staff employed by agencies and trading funds, is shown as follows:

  Number

  MOD total

  108,990

  England

  71,370

  London

  6,420

  South East

  17,110

  East

  7,660

  South West

  23,920

  West Midlands

  6,430

  East Midlands

  2,520

  Yorkshire and The Humber

  3,940

  North West

  2,870

  North East

  500

  Scotland

  7,160

  Wales

  4,170

  Northern Ireland

  3,450

  Elsewhere1

  22,840

  1 Comprised of MOD civilian staff located outside the UK and unallocated staff.

  1305W
  The number of full-time equivalent MOD civilian staff in each agency and trading fund in England,

  England

  London

  Sowth East

  East

  South West

  West Midlands

  East Midlands

  Yorks and Humber

  North West

  North East

  AFPA

  130

  —

  60

  —

  80

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  ATRA

  3,780

  40

  1,390

  110

  1,050

  130

  60

  980

  20

  —

  BFPO

  330

  250

  40

  20

  20

  10

  —

  —

  —

  —

  DASA

  180

  60

  10

  —

  110

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  DBA

  590

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  590

  —

  DCSA

  2,920

  280

  440

  510

  1,610

  60

  —

  10

  10

  —

  DDA

  150

  —

  70

  10

  20

  10

  —

  20

  —

  —

  DE

  2,020

  70

  470

  370

  370

  530

  60

  130

  10

  10

  DGIA

  790

  560

  70

  160

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  DISC

  150

  —

  —

  150

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  DMETA

  600

  90

  440

  10

  10

  40

  —

  10

  —

  —

  DPA

  3,570

  20

  100

  70

  3,160

  40

  10

  10

  150

  20

  DSDA

  3,330

  —

  1,190

  40

  440

  1,340

  10

  40

  270

  —

  DTMA

  280

  —

  150

  —

  —

  100

  —

  —

  20

  —

  DVA

  330

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  330

  —

  —

  DSA

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  DYRMS

  120

  —

  120

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  MSA

  260

  —

  30

  —

  220

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  MDP

  5,450

  590

  1,760

  630

  1,400

  290

  80

  530

  130

  40

  NRTA

  970

  20

  790

  —

  130

  10

  10

  —

  10

  10

  PPA

  790

  —

  —

  —

  440

  —

  —

  —

  350

  —

  QVS

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  TGDA

  2,020

  20

  360

  30

  150

  760

  450

  210

  30

  10

  SCE

  20

  —

  —

  —

  10

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  VA

  730

  —

  20

  —

  20

  —

  10

  10

  670

  —

  WSA

  3,540

  —

  700

  30

  2,790

  —

  —

  —

  10

  —

  ABRO

  1,680

  —

  —

  100

  620

  840

  —

  110

  —

  —

  DARA

  860

  —

  860

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  DSTL

  3,010

  690

  1,100

  —

  980

  220

  10

  —

  —

  —

  MET

  1,620

  10

  260

  40

  1,150

  30

  60

  30

  40

  —

  HYDRO

  910

  —

  —

  —

  910

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  Full-time equivalent is a measure of the size of the work force that takes account of the fact that some people work part-time.

  Figures have been individually rounded to the nearest 10, so may not sum to the totals shown.

  Total

  England

  Scotland

  Wales

  Northern Ireland

  Elsewhere

  AFPA

  160

  130

  30

  —

  —

  —

  ATRA

  4,020

  3,780

  60

  140

  10

  20

  BFPO

  350

  330

  10

  —

  —

  10

  DASA

  180

  180

  —

  —

  —

  —

  DBA

  600

  590

  —

  —

  —

  10

  DCSA

  3,200

  2,920

  100

  —

  —

  170

  DDA

  180

  150

  10

  —

  —

  10

  DE

  2,510

  2,020

  230

  30

  20

  220

  DGIA

  800

  790

  —

  —

  —

  20

  DISC

  150

  150

  —

  —

  —

  —

  DMETA

  610

  600

  —

  —

  —

  10

  DPA

  3,820

  3,570

  100

  10

  —

  150

  DSDA

  4,330

  3,330

  720

  250

  —

  30

  DTMA

  350

  280

  20

  —

  —

  60

  DVA

  330

  330

  —

  —

  —

  —

  DSA

  60

  —

  —

  —

  —

  50

  DYRMS

  120

  120

  —

  —

  —

  —

  MSA

  270

  260

  10

  —

  —

  —

  MDP

  6,920

  5,450

  1,290

  140

  —

  40

  NRTA

  1,010

  970

  20

  10

  20

  10

  PPA

  800

  790

  —

  —

  —

  10

  QVS

  70

  —

  70

  —

  —

  —

  TGDA

  2,250

  2,020

  50

  170

  —

  10

  SCE

  980

  20

  —

  —

  —

  960

  VA

  830

  730

  20

  10

  10

  70

  WSA

  4,800

  3,540

  900

  190

  —

  180

  1306W
  broken down by Government office region as at July 1 2004, is shown as follows:

  The number of full-time equivalent MOD civilian staff in each agency and trading Fund broken down by country as at 1 July 2004 is shown as follows:
  1307W

  Total

  England

  Scotland

  Wales

  Northern Ireland

  Elsewhere

  ABRO

  1,780

  1,680

  100

  —

  —

  —

  DARA

  3,620

  860

  290

  2,440

  —

  20

  DSTL

  3,160

  3,010

  —

  —

  —

  140

  MET

  1,830

  1,620

  120

  30

  20

  40

  HYDRO

  910

  910

  —

  —

  —

  —

  Key to tables:

  Armed Forces Personnel Administration Agency

  Duke of York's Royal Military School

  Army Training and Recruitment Agency

  Medical Supplies Agency

  British Forces Post Office

  Ministry of Defence Police and Guarding Agency

  Defence Analytical Services Agency

  Naval Recruiting and Training Agency

  Defence Bills Agency

  Pay and Personnel Agency

  Defence Communications Service Agency

  Queen Victoria School

  Defence Dental Agency

  RAF Training Group Defence Agency

  Defence Estates

  Service Children's Education

  Defence Geographical and Imagery Intelligence Agency

  Veterans Agency

  Defence Intelligence and Security Centre

  Warship Support Agency

  Defence Medical and Training Agency

  Army Base Repair Organisation

  Defence Procurement Agency

  Defence Aviation Repair Agency

  Defence Storage and Distribution Agency

  Defence Science and Tec hnology Laboratory

  Defence Transport and Movements Agency

  Meteorological Office

  Defence Vetting Agency

  UK Hydrographic Office

  Disposal Services Agency

  The Ministry of Defence keeps the size and location of its bases under constant review. Building on initial work that has been done to identify the MOD's core sites, the Department is undertaking further work to examine where estate rationalisation may be possible. This work is consistent with the Department's contribution to the Government's Independent Review of Public Sector Rationalisation—the "Lyons Review".

  On 21 July we announced a number of specific reviews. These were: a review of the Defence Logistics Organisation's locations; a review of Defence Airfields; and a review of Royal Marines Basing, each of which may result in the relocation of civilian personnel. In addition, a number of relocations relating to the RAF's review of Air Combat Service Units and other minor units were announced.

  The MOD submitted a significant package of relocation proposals to the Lyons Review, which would result in around 3,900 service and civilian personnel relocating out of London and the South East by 2010.

  The proposals consist of the closure of Woolwich Station in Greenwich, the closure of the Army Technical Foundation College (ATFC) at Arborfield, relocation of the Disposal Services Agency (DSA) to the West Country, collocation of Defence Medical Services Training Centre (DMSTC) facilities and rationalisation of the Defence Science and Technology Laboratories (DSTL).

  Defence Spending Review
  Miss McIntosh
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what assessment he has made of the implications of(a) the Defence Spending Review and (b) the proposals set out in his oral statement on future capabilities for defence on 21 July for (i) the Typhoon project and (ii) the Apache project; and if he will make a statement. [1186668]

  Mr. Ingram
  As my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence set out in his statement on 21 July 2004,Official Report, columns 343–70, Typhoon is an essential element of our plans to transform the armed forces for the 21st century. The aircraft is already
  1308W
  demonstrating excellent performance in service and we intend to place the order for the second tranche as soon as negotiations on price and performance have been successfully completed.

  The entry to service of the Attack helicopter represents an essential step in the Army's transition towards an increasingly manoeuvrist approach to warfare, and is thereore fully in line with the proposals in the Defence White Paper published in July, "Delivering Security in a Changing World". The Attack Helicopter will significantly improve our ability to engage land targets with precision and at range.

  Infantry
  Mr. Jenkins
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many infantry were employed by the British Army, broken down by rank, excluding vacancies according to the latest available statistics; and what projections for numbers of infantry were made for the Defence Review. [187008]

  Mr. Caplin
  The trained Infantry Strengths as at 1 July 2004 are as follows:

  Runk

  Trained

  Officers

  Lt Col

  360

  Lt Col (Special List)

  5

  Major

  1,020

  Captain

  1,025

  Lt

  495

  2Lt

  50

  Officer total

  2,955

  Other ranks

  WO1

  150

  WO2

  855

  SSGT

  955

  SGT

  1,825

  CPL

  3,615

  LCPL

  3,765

  PTE

  11,615

  Soldier total

  22,780

  Infantry trained strength total

  25,735

  Note:

  Totals have been rounded to the nearest five.

  1309W
  The manpower released from the reduction of four infantry battalions equates to approximately 2,500 posts, all of which will be reinvested back in to the Army. While a proportion of these will be reallocated back into the infantry itself to develop more robust and resilient establishments, others will be reinvested in the most heavily committed specialists such as logisticians, engineers, signallers and intelligence. Exact details in terms of the numbers allocated to each individual Arms and Service have yet to be fully worked through and finalised.

  Missiles
  Mr. Hancock
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what research he has(a) commissioned and (b) evaluated into the effectiveness of ship borne surface-to-surface missiles. [171863]

  Mr. Ingram
  The Harpoon anti-ship missile, fitted to Type 22 and Type 23 frigates, provides our current surface-to-surface ship borne missile capability. The Ministry of Defence regularly assesses the effectiveness of such weapons systems, through a combination of routine trials, research and analysis and as a normal part of our review of the equipment programme.

  In terms of potential future capabilities, the Department is currently conducting a balance of investment study into a range of possible land attack options. This includes consideration of the utility of ship

  Unit

  Date

  Location

  Interval (months)

  1 PARA

  May and August 2000 (2 short deployments)

  Sierra Leone

  9

  January to June 2001

  Northern Ireland

  4

  January to June 2003

  Iraq

  19

  2 PARA

  January to March 2002

  Afghanistan

  2

  September 2002 to March 2003

  Northern Ireland

  6

  December 2003 to April 2004

  Iraq

  8

  3 PARA

  January to June 2002

  Northern Ireland

  18

  January to June 2003

  Iraq

  7

  May 2004 to date

  Northern Ireland

  11

  7 Armoured Brigade

  May to November 2000

  Kosovo

  31

  May to November 2001

  Kosovo

  6

  January to June 2003

  Iraq

  13

  The details of those personnel classed as non-FE, as at 1 July 2004, are included as follows. Non-FE status signifies some form of temporary medical downgrading, although it should be noted that while an individual is considered to be medically downgraded, they may still be liable for deployment, depending on the reason for the downgrading, the nature and location of the deployment, and medical advice.

  Unit

  Non-FE total

  Establishment total

  Percentage of establishment

  1 Para

  45

  687

  7.3

  2 Para

  20

  687

  2.9

  3 Para

  50

  687

  7.2

  7 Armoured Brigade

  415

  6,575

  6.3

  Policies (Environmental Impact)
  Mr. Horam
  To ask the Secretar) of State for Defence how many new policy proposals or significant change 1310W
  borne surface-to-surface missiles on the Future Surface Combatant (FSC) and Type 45 Destroyers. The next stage of this study is expected to report this autumn.

  Operation Majestic Eagle
  Mr. Gerald Howarth
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many(a) ships and (b) personnel (i) were originally requested to take part and (ii) took part in Operation Majestic Eagle. [186643]

  Mr. Ingram
  The United States request to take part in Exercise Majestic Eagle did not specify a particular level of involvement. Because Majestic Eagle took place during the terminal stages of the Royal Navy's extensive AURORA 04 programme of exercises with US forces, United Kingdom participation was limited to HMS Invincible, which took part via satellite link while returning from AURORA 04.

  Operational Deployments
  Mr. Keetch
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what the last three operational deployments and the length between each has been for(a) 1 Para, (b) 2 Para, (c) 3 Para and (d) 7th Armoured Brigade; and how many personnel have been medically downgraded in each. [187127]

  Mr. Ingram
  Details of the last three operational deployments of each of the units, and the length between each of those deployments, are shown in the following table.

  in policy were produced in (a) 2002–03 and (b) 2003–04; how many of these were screened for their environmental impacts; and how many were the subject of separate environmental appraisals. [185097]

  Mr. Caplin
  The Ministry of Defence has produced the following new policy proposals and changes to policy in the periods 2002–03 and 2003–04:The Strategic Defence Review: A New Chapter (2002);
  Delivering Security in a Changing World (Defence White Paper, 2003); and
  Delivering Security in a Changing World: Future Capabilities (2004).

  These policies have not been screened for their environmental impacts or been subject to separate environmental appraisals.

  To address the requirements for policy level environmental appraisal the Department worked with Defra to trial the Integrated Policy Appraisal tool (IPA). The IPA tool has been integrated into

  1311W
  Regulatory Impact Assessment (RIA) and the Department is now taking forward environmental policy appraisal work in this context in order to meet policy appraisal commitments.

  The MOD continues to carry out sustainability appraisal and more detailed environmental assessments as a result of the implementation of strategic policy decisions, for example, those arising from the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) of the Strategic Defence Review (SDR), published in July 2000. This work is supported by the Ministry of Defence's, Sustainability Appraisal Handbook (2003), which underpins the Department's commitment to the environmental aspects of sustainable development as expressed in the Secretary of State's Policy Statement, July 2000.

  Rosyth Shipyard
  Mr. Gerald Howarth
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence whether his Department plans to contribute to the costs of running the Rosyth Shipyard. [186644]

  Mr. Ingram
  No, there are no plans for the Ministry of Defence to contribute to the costs of running Rosyth Dockyard. As with any company, Babcock Support Services Ltd., the owners of Rosyth Royal Dockyard, must recover their costs through their various income streams, in accordance with their contracts and with accounting conventions.

  Wind Farms (West Somerset)
  Mr. Liddell-Grainger
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what further consultations there have been on the positioning of wind farms near the helicopter base on the West Somerset coast. [186496]

  Mr. Caplin
  Consultations are in progress with the developer about the positioning of a wind farm near Hinkley Point Power Station. This has implications for the Klue Range at Kilve Bend.

  We are aware that our comments on the planning application need to be with West Somerset district council within 21 days of 17 August 2004.

NORTHERN IRELAND

  Terrorist Threat
  David Burnside
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what assessment he has made of the present(a) Republican and (b) Loyalist terrorist threat in the Province. [187651]

  Mr. Pearson
  Dissident republicans are a threat, although many of their activities have been thwarted, intercepted or nullified by the security forces. We remain concerned at the level of paramilitary activity and control exercised within communities by both Republican and Loyalist paramilitary organisations. The Independent Monitoring Commission will report again on this area next month.

  Security Situation
  Mr. Mackay
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement on the security situation in the Province. [187652]

  Mr. Pearson
  The security situation is relatively benign. While there was some regrettable violence at the Ardoyne the marching season has been largely peaceful and interface areas have also been fairly quiet.

  Dissident Republicans remain a threat and have been targeting members of the District Policing Partnerships and disrupting traffic by hoax devices, but their activities have for the most part been thwarted, intercepted or nullified by good policing operations.

  Ministerial Accountability
  Mr. Andrew Turner
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what mechanisms are in place to ensure the accountability of his Department's Ministers to electors in Northern Ireland. [187653]

  Mr. Paul Murphy
  We remain focused on our main aim of restoring devolved Government to Northern Ireland, on a stable and inclusive basis, with institutions accountable to local Ministers.

  Higher Education
  Mr. Hume
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many full-time undergraduate university students normally domiciled in Northern Ireland will be at university in the academic year 2004–05; and how many full-time undergraduate university places are available in Northern Ireland. [187654]

  Mr. Gardiner
  It is too early to say how many Northern Ireland domiciled students will take up full-time undergraduates places in 2004–05, the clearing process is not yet complete and data on student placements will not be available to the Department until late 2005. There are some 28,000 full-time undergraduate places planned for the university sector in Northern Ireland this year.

  Decommissioning
  David Taylor
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what recent assessment has been made of the(a) value and (b) effectiveness of the decommissioning process. [187655]

  Mr. Pearson
  In 1998 the Loyalist Volunteer Force carried out an act of decommissioning in Northern Ireland. The IRA have carried out three acts of decommissioning (2001, 2002 and 2003). In the latest act of decommissioning by the IRA (2003) the Independent International Commission on Decommissioning reported that the arms comprised light, medium and heavy ordnance and associated munitions. They included automatic weapons, ammunition, explosives and explosive material.

  These acts of decommissioning have put arms beyond use which otherwise could have been used in acts of terrorism. This is the start of a process that will ultimately result in all paramilitary weaponry being put beyond use and return Northern Ireland to a normal democratic society.

  Advisers/Consultants
  Bob Spink
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how much his Department and its agencies and non-departmental public bodies spent on external consultants and advisers in each of i:he last three years. [172435]

  Mr. Pearson
  The expenditure incurred by the Department, its agencies and non-departmental public bodies on external consultants and advisers in each of the last three years is as follows:

  Total Department, agencies and NDPBs

  Total (£)

  2001–02

  31,274,849

  2002–03

  35,267,313

  2003–04

  43,436,915

  Antiville Estate, Larne
  Mr. Beggs
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland when he plans to take a decision on the proposal by the Board of the Northern Ireland Housing Executive to demolish properties in the Antiville Estate in Larne. [187714]

  Mr. Spellar
  The Northern Ireland Housing Executive's proposals to demolish properties on the Antiville Estate were received by the Department for Social Development (DSD) on 30 July 2004. These are currently being considered in terms of their technical merit, value for money and their potential to achieve the regeneration objectives. I am aware that the proposals have generated a considerable amount of local concern and, in view of this, no decision will be taken until DSD has received assurances that local concerns have been addressed.

  Careers Strategy
  Mr. McGrady
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what progress has been made on the Careers Strategy following the recommendations contained in the Valuing Careers Strategy. [178240]

  Mr. Pearson
  "Valuing Carers" was published in April 2002 and contained 19 recommendations for providing a range of support services to carers.

  2002–03

  Competition

  Department

  Total costs (£)

  Deputy Chief Veterinary Officer SC/10/0:

  DARD

  15,809

  Director of Built Heritage SC/11/02

  DOE

  46,227

  Chief Executive DVTA SC/12/02

  DOE

  22,044

  Director of Secondary Care SC/14/02

  DHSSPS

  8,317

  Director of NI Bureau, Washington SC/2/03

  OFMDFM

  16,884

  Assistant Chief Inspector SC/3/02

  DE

  9,053

  Chief Executive and Registrar of Titles SC/4/02

  DFP

  14,471

  Public Expenditure Posts SC/4/03

  DFP

  18,777

  Assistant Crown Solicitor SC/5/03

  NIO

  11,284

  Deputy Director of Communications SC/6/02

  OFMDFM

  10,715

  Director of Professional Services SC/7/02

  DOE

  11,802

  Director of Development SC/8/02

  DRD

  26,254

  Director of Customer Services SC/9/02

  DRD

  27,531

  1314W
  An inter-departmental group, led by the Department of Health, Social Services and Public Safety, was tasked with taking forward the recommendations contained in "Valuing Carers", and their work has formed the basis of a draft Strategy for Carers. Departmental officials are currently drawing up the final draft of the Strategy, which will then be referred to the Under-Secretary, my hon. Friend the Member for Basildon (Angela Smith), for consideration and approval.

  Circuses
  Mrs. Iris Robinson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what authority local councils in Northern Ireland have to ban animal based circuses from their property. [187456]

  Angela Smith
  The Local Government (Miscellaneous Provisions) (Northern Ireland) Order 1985 requires places where circuses (and other types of public entertainment) are to be held to have entertainments licences. The licences are granted by district councils and are subject to certain terms, conditions and restrictions that councils may specify. Councils do not have powers under the 1985 Order to refuse entertainments licences in respect of places where circuses are to be held simply because they involve animals. However, like all landowners, councils can decide whether circuses, or other types of public entertainment, may be held on their properties.

  Civil Servants
  Mr. Dodds
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many recruitment exercises for Grade 5 civil servants have been undertaken in Northern Ireland in the last two years; who carried them out; and what the cost was in each case. [186020]

  Mr. Pearson
  In 2002–03, 13 competitions were run to fill vacancies at Grade 5 level. 12 competitions were run in 2003–04. All were carried out by the Recruitment Service of the Department of Finance and Personnel.

  The total cost (including notional staff costs, advertising and travel and subsistence charges) for each competition is listed in the following tables.

  During 2003–04 a generic Grade 5 level competition was begun to fill vacancies across the NICS. This was carried out by Price water house Coopers LLP on behalf of DFP. In accordance with Part 2, paragraph 13 of the Code of Practice on Access to Government Information (Third party's commercial confidences), it would be inappropriate to disclose the cost of this competition.
  1315W

  2003–04

  Competition

  Department

  Total costs (£)

  Head of Finance and EU Division SC/1/04

  DETI/DARD

  10,393

  Deputy Director, Construction and Advisory Division SC/10/03

  DFP

  9,543

  Chief Executive, BDS SC/11/03

  DFP

  13,653

  Director of Estates Development SC/13/03

  DHSSPS

  8,356

  Director of Business Development SC/16/03

  SSA

  8,488

  Director E-government SC/12/03

  OFMDFM

  21,390

  Head of Resource Allocation Division SC/17/03

  DE

  7,938

  Senior Economist SC/18/03

  DFP/DETI

  27,117

  Assistant Solicitor SC/8/03

  DFP

  8,735

  Deputy Director—Supplies and Services Division SC/9/03

  DFP

  7,933

  Head of Equal Opportunities and Appointments Division SC/3/04

  DFP

  23,104

  Director of Personnel, SSA SC/5/04

  DSD

  19,715

  Mr. Dodds
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many people have been appointed to a Grade 5 post in the Northern Ireland Civil Service in the past two years. [186021]

  Mr. Pearson
  23 appointments were made at Grade 5 level during 2002–03 and 11 appointments made during 2003–04.

  Civil Service
  Mrs. Iris Robinson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what recent action the Government have taken to resolve the Northern Ireland Civil Service dispute; and if he will make a statement. [187287]

  Mr. Pearson
  Intensive negotiations took place in July between officials from the Department of Finance and Personnel and trade union representatives. At these meetings officials emphasised that the 3.67 per cent. pay deal for 2003 had now been paid and was final, but that they were willing to explore all reasonable means of resolving the dispute. The trade union also met with the Secretary of State on 23 July. On 3 August management tabled two offers to the trade union—a 12-month offer worth 3.49 per cent. and a 16-month offer worth 4.65 per cent. Both offers were quickly rejected and further negotiations took place on 4, 11 and 13 August. Following these further negotiations two final offers were made to the trade union on 16 August that took account of the trade unions views—the previous 12 month offer worth 3.49 per cent. and a revised 16-month offer worth 4.65 per cent. The revised offer included an increase in rates of pay of 2 per cent. plus a non-consolidated payment of £150 for all staff. These offers are now being considered by the trade union.

  Staff in the Northern Ireland Office are subject to separate pay negotiations involving NIPSA in respect of Northern Ireland Civil Servants and PCS and FDA in respect of Home Civil Servants. All three unions remain in dispute in relation to the 2003 pay award, although only NIPSA has taken industrial action. Exploratory discussions have now taken place between NIO officials and each of the unions regarding pay increases for 2004, and the unions will be invited into formal negotiations in relation to 2004 pay once the NIO' s pay remit receives approval from the Treasury.

  Mr. McGrady
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will delay making appointments in recruitment competition SC/18/03 until the Northern 1316W
  Ireland Civil Service Commissioners have satisfied themselves as to the legality of the exclusion of Irish nationals from that competition. [186369]

  Mr. Pearson
  No. Competition SC/18/03, which is now closed, resulted in the appointment of one Grade 6.

  Consultation
  Mr. McGrady
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what costs were incurred during 2002–03 by each Northern Ireland Department, their agencies and non-departmental public bodies on consultation. [180988]

  Mr. Pearson
  The costs incurred during 2002–03 by each Northern Ireland Department, their agencies and non-departmental public bodies on consultation (i.e. external consultancy) were as follows:

  Total departments. agencies and NDPBs—2002/03

  £

  Department of Agriculture and Rural Development

  872,000

  Department of Culture, Arts and Leisure

  1,996,149

  Department of Education

  2,993,526

  Department of Employment and Learning

  435,103

  Department of Enterprise, Trade and Investment

  3,866,000

  Department of Finance and Personnel

  2,487,429

  Department of Health, Social Services and Public Safety

  1,198,754

  Department of the Environment

  1,719,891

  Department of Regional Development

  2,337,000

  Department of Social Development

  12,619,000

  Office of the First Minister and Deputy First Minister

  1,000,064

  Northern Ireland Office

  3,742,397

  Total

  35,267,313

  Mr. McGrady
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what costs were incurred during 2002–03 by each Northern Ireland Department, their agencies and non-departmental public bodies on consultation whose contracts were awarded under single tender. [180989]

  Mr. Pearson
  The following table shows the costs incurred during 2002–03 by the Northern Ireland Office, Northern Ireland Departments, their agencies and NDPBs on consultancy contracts awarded under single tender action.
  1317W

  £

  NI Departments

  Department

  Agencies

  NDPBs

  Total

  Northern Ireland Office

  519,967

  178,350

  1,859,707

  2,558,024

  Department of Agriculture and Rural Development

  62,182

  0

  20,782

  82,964

  Department of the Environment

  18,564

  200,384

  0

  218,948

  Department of Social Development

  37,685

  0

  0

  37,685

  Department of Regional Development

  104,165

  67,295

  0

  171,460

  Office of the First Minister and Deputy First Minister

  106,694

  0

  0

  106,694

  Department of Employment and Learning

  0

  0

  0

  0

  Department of Education

  800,438

  0

  0

  800,438

  Department of Health, Social Services and Public Safety

  238,812

  15,057

  13,102

  266,971

  Department of Enterprise, Trade and Investment

  104,434

  0

  348,723

  453,157

  Department of Culture, Arts and Leisure

  79,432

  744

  159,962

  240,138

  Department of Finance and Personnel

  467,340

  298,237

  0

  765,577

  Total

  2,539,713

  760,067

  2,402,276

  5,702,056

  Mr. McGrady
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what consultancy companies have been awarded contracts of over £10,000 by each Northern Ireland Department, their agencies and non-departmental public bodies, under single tender arrangements in 2002–03; and what the associated payments made to each of them were. [180990]

  Mr. Pearson
  The following table shows by Department, the consultants that were awarded contracts valued in excess of £10,000 under single tender action in 2002–03.

  As disclosure of individual contract values would breach conditions of contract the table shows the total value of contracts awarded by Departments including their agencies and NDPBs.

  £

  Department

  Consultant

  DHSSPS

  DFP

  DCAL

  DETI

  Deloitte and Touche

  —

  —

  Yes

  Yes

  Drivers Jonas

  —

  —

  Yes

  —

  Elite Training

  Yes

  —

  —

  —

  ES Consultancy

  Yes

  —

  —

  —

  Farrell Grant Sparks

  —

  —

  Yes

  —

  Gartner Group

  —

  —

  —

  Yes

  IT Force

  —

  —

  Yes

  —

  Kearney Communications

  —

  —

  —

  Yes

  KPMG

  Yes

  —

  —

  —

  McCready and Donnelly

  Yes

  —

  —

  —

  Milward Brown

  —

  —

  —

  Yes

  MSA Ferndale

  Yes

  —

  —

  —

  Nicholson Graham and Jones

  Yes

  —

  —

  —

  NIERC

  —

  —

  —

  Yes

  PA Consulting

  —

  Yes

  —

  —

  Partnership UK/OGC

  —

  Yes

  —

  —

  PricewaterhouseCoopers

  —

  —

  —

  Yes

  Queens University

  Yes

  —

  —

  —

  Richard H. Mackenzie

  —

  —

  Yes

  —

  University of Ulster

  Yes

  —

  —

  —

  Total value of contracts

  244,926

  69,888

  187,664

  345,938

  £

  Department

  Consultant

  DRD

  OFMDFM

  DEL

  DE

  BIC Systems

  —

  Yes

  —

  —

  MWM Associates

  Yes

  —

  —

  —

  Navigator Blue

  —

  Yes

  —

  —

  NICE

  —

  Yes

  —

  —

  ORC International

  Yes

  —

  —

  —

  University of Ulster

  Yes

  —

  —

  —

  Venture International

  —

  Yes

  —

  —

  Total value of contracts

  58,046

  159,024

  —

  —

  1318W

  £

  Department

  Consultant

  NIO

  DARD

  DOE

  DSD

  Anderson Spratt

  Yes

  —

  —

  —

  Arcominteractive

  Yes

  —

  —

  —

  ASE Consulting

  —

  —

  —

  Yes

  BDO Hayward

  Yes

  —

  —

  —

  Cap Gemini Ernst and Young

  Yes

  —

  —

  —

  Capita Business Services

  Yes

  —

  —

  —

  Deloitte and Touche

  Yes

  Yes

  —

  Yes

  Environmental Resource Management

  —

  —

  Yes

  —

  Helm Corporation

  Yes

  —

  —

  —

  ICS Computing

  Yes

  —

  —

  —

  Lead Project Management

  Yes

  —

  —

  —

  OMI Consulting

  —

  Yes

  —

  —

  PA Consulting

  Yes

  —

  Yes

  —

  Partnership UK/OGC

  Yes

  Yes

  —

  —

  PricewaterhouseCoopers

  Yes

  —

  Yes

  —

  Qi Consulting

  —

  —

  —

  Yes

  Queens University

  Yes

  —

  —

  —

  Stairway Transformation

  Yes

  —

  —

  —

  Sysco

  Yes

  —

  —

  —

  Total value of contracts

  2,535,738

  51,168

  183,826

  178,385

  Key:

  DHSSPS—Department of Health, Social Services and Public Safety

  DFP—Department of Finance and Personnel

  DCAL—Department of Culture, Arts and Leisure

  DETI—Department of Enterprise, Trade and Investment

  DRD—Department of Regional Development

  OFMDFM—Office of the First Minister and Deputy First Minister

  DEL—Department of Employment and Learning

  DE—Department of Education

  NIO—Northern Ireland Office

  DARD—Department of Agriculture and Rural Development

  DOE—Department of the Environment

  DSD—Department of Social Development

  Cosmetic Surgery
  Mrs. Iris Robinson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland whether practitioners performing cosmetic procedures in the Province outside the NHS have to be registered; and how such practitioners are regulated. [187452]

  Angela Smith
  Doctors must be registered with the General Medical Council to practise medicine in the UK, regardless of the area in which they work. Similarly nurses and allied health professionals must be registered with the statutory regulatory body for their professions, i.e. the Nursing and Midwifery Council and the Health
  1319W
  Professions Council respectively. Those bodies are responsible for the registration and regulation of their professions.

  Creative Writing
  Mr. Dodds
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what conditions of(a) copyright and (b) royalty payments are attached to grant aid awarded by the (i) Arts Council of Northern Ireland, (ii) Department of Culture, Arts and Leisure, (iii) Ultach Trust and (iv) Foras na Gaeilge for the publication of creative writing in the Irish language in Northern Ireland. [173186]

  Angela Smith
  The Arts Council of Northern Ireland does not attach conditions relating to(a) copyright or (b) royalty payments to any award. The Department of Culture, Arts and Leisure's funds in support of the arts in Northern Ireland are disbursed chiefly through the Arts Council of Northern Ireland and the Department has not made any funding directly available for the publication of creative writing in the Irish language.

  The Ultach Trust is a registered charitable trust. It is not directly funded by Northern Ireland Departments and it therefore would not be appropriate to disclose details of its expenditure. Foras na Gaeilge does not provide grant aid for the publication of creative writing in the Irish language in Northern Ireland.

  Cycle Paths
  Mr. Gregory Campbell
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how much public funding has been made available for the provision of cycle paths in Northern Ireland in each of the past five years; and how many miles of cycle paths have been provided in each of the past five years. [185153]

  Mr. Spellar
  The Chief Executive of Roads Service (Dr. Malcolm McKibbin) has been asked to write to the hon. Member in response to this question.

  Letter from Dr. Malcolm McKibbin to Mr. Gregory Campbell
  You recently asked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland a Parliamentary Question about how much public money has been made available for the provision of cycle paths in Northern Ireland in each of the last five years; and how many miles of cycle paths have been provided in each of the last five years. I have been asked to reply as part of the issue raised falls within my responsibility as Chief Executive of Roads Service.
  I can advise that in Northern Ireland the expenditure by Roads Service on the provision of cycle paths and the miles of cycle paths provided over this period is as follows:

  Year

  Expenditure £000

  Miles

  1999–00

  1,732

  20

  2000–01

  2,402

  20

  2001—02

  1,748

  20

  2002—03

  844

  16

  2003—04

  818

  19

  2004-051

  8201

  141

  1 Budget and target for the current financial year

  It should also be noted that other providers such as Sustrans, the Tourist Board, DARD, District Council, Sports Council for Northern Ireland, and some private developers also contribute very significantly to the mileage of cycle paths in Northern Ireland. As Roads Service does not hold the figures on cycle paths
  1320W
  provided by these organisations I have asked my officials to write to them to request that the necessary information is sent directly to you.

  Department of Health Assessment Framework
  Ms Shipley
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement on when the Department of Health, Social Services, and Public Safety will be implementing the Department of Health Assessment Framework in Northern Ireland. [183588]

  Angela Smith
  The Department of Health's performance assessment framework applies only to the NHS in England. Northern Ireland has its own system of integrated health and social care-the HPSS (Health and Personal Social Services). Under current arrangements, key service development priorities are set annually for the HPSS. Progress towards their achievement is formally managed and monitored by the Department, and work is now in hand to further develop the approach to HPSS performance assessment and reporting. While basing itself on the integrated nature of services in Northern Ireland, that work has been informed by the various performance assessment models that operate elsewhere in the UK.

  Departmental Age Policy
  Mr. Andrew Turner
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland whether(a) his Department and (b) agencies for which it is responsible (i) have a set retirement age which applies to all or most personnel and (ii) have a maximum age beyond which applications for employment will not be considered; and what the age is in each case. [186088]

  Mr. Pearson
  The compulsory age of retirement for all staff employed in the Northern Ireland Civil Service was raised to age 65 with effect from 4 October 2002. Staff who reach age 60 after that date have the option of remaining in post beyond age 60 and up to a maximum of 65.

  An application for employment from any candidate who has not reached age 65 is considered valid.

  Designated Accommodation
  Bob Spink
  To ask a e Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many rooms are set aside for(a) the use of smokers, (b) worship, broken down by religion and (c) nursing mothers and pregnant women in each building and set of offices for which his Department is responsible. [187309]

  Mr. Pearson
  The Northern Ireland Civil Service currently maintains 158 smoking rooms within the general office estate, but this will be discontinued from 1 January 2005. There are no rooms set aside for worship or for nursing mothers and pregnant women.

  Digital Hearing Aids
  Mrs. Iris Robinson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many individuals are awaiting digital hearing aids in the Province; and what the(a) average and (b) longest current waiting time is. [187398]

  Angela Smith
  The information requested is not available.

  Disability Grant Fund
  Jim Dobbin
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland whether the abolition of the Disability Grant Fund means test in Northern Ireland has resulted in a change in the length of waiting lists. [185193]

  Mr. Spellar
  With effect from 16 February 2004 we have exempted parents with disabled children from the means test that applies to Disabled Facilities Grant. While it is too early for a formal assessment of the saving in processing times in these cases, initial indications are that there will be no measurable impact on the waiting list for Disabled Facilities Grant.

  Educational Attainment
  Mrs. Iris Robinson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many pupils who achieved each grade in the 11-plus examination were from(a) integrated and (b) other primary schools in the Province in each of the last five years. [187451]

  Mr. Gardiner
  The information requested is as follows:

  (a) Integrated primary schools

  Number achieving curl grade in the transfer procedure

  A

  B1

  B2

  C1

  C2

  D

  Total number sitting

  1999–2000

  173

  34

  37

  31

  27

  88

  390

  2000–01

  170

  39

  27

  28

  34

  74

  372

  2001–02

  166

  38

  35

  40

  34

  115

  428

  2002–03

  158

  38

  38

  39

  37

  94

  404

  2003–04

  196

  41

  47

  37

  33

  108

  462

  (b) Other primary schools

  Number achieving each grade in the transfer procedure

  A

  B1

  B2

  Cl

  C2

  D

  Total number sitting

  1999–2000

  6,447

  1,381

  1,296

  1,424

  1,304

  5,343

  I7,195

  2000–01

  6,238

  1,276

  1,276

  1,426

  1,427

  5,023

  16,666

  2001–02

  6,329

  1,359

  1,271

  1,363

  1,371

  4,678

  16.371

  2002–03

  6,195

  1,284

  1,439

  1,285

  1,301

  4,598

  16,102

  2003–04

  5,968

  1,405

  1,300

  1,219

  1,197

  4,140

  15,229

  Fisheries Conservancy Board Vessel
  Mr. Beggs
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what training was provided to the operators of the Fisheries Conservancy Board vessel prior to the incidents that resulted in the current damage. [184833]

  Angela Smith
  Three members of the Fisheries Conservancy Board's staff have received training to the following standards:Royal Yachting Association/Maritime and Coastguard Agency Powerboat Advanced Certificate with commercial endorsement;
  Maritime Radio Operator Certificate of Competence (Short Range Certificate);
  Royal Yachting Association First Aid Course; and
  Certificate of Proficiency in Personal Survival Techniques on Board Ship.

  Gransha Road, Dundonald
  Mrs. Iris Robinson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what the position is in relation to the payment of compensation for motorists involved in the Gransha Road, Dundonald, road surfacing problems of two years ago; and when payments will be made to those whose vehicles were damaged. [187514]

  Mr. Spellar
  On 25 July 2002 routine surface dressing work was carried out on behalf of the Department at Gransha Road by its measured term contractor, Tullyraine Quarries Limited.

  On 29 July 2002 reports were received about the failure of the surface dressing and of a substantial number of vehicle damage claims caused by this failure.

  The failure was investigated by the Department and these investigations led to the Department referring all the Gransha Road vehicle damage claims, approximately 400, to the contractor, Tullyraine Quarries Limited, in accordance with proper legal and audit practice and procedure.

  The Department maintains its position that legal responsibility for the claims lie with its contractor, Tullyraine Quarries Limited. The contractor has not to date conceded responsibility and the claims remain outstanding.

  One of the motorists, who sustained vehicle damage on 29 July 2002, issued legal proceedings on 22 July 2003 against the Department, Tullyraine Quarries Limited and Lagan Bitumen Limited. Those proceedings in the County Court were however removed to the High Court on 30 January 2004. That ongoing court action is proceeding as a test case.

  The Department cannot comment any further as the legal issues are now subjudice.

  Health Promotion
  Mrs. Iris Robinson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how much was spent on the(a) promotion of health and (b) prevention of illness in Northern Ireland in each of the last 10 years. [187433]

  Angela Smith
  Work to promote health and prevent illness is carried out by Health and Social Services Trusts and also by other organisations such as the Health Promotion Agency, voluntary organisations and general practice. Table 1 shows Trust total expenditure for health promotion and prevention of disease, and Table 2 indicates the budget for other services. These figures are not available separately for health promotion and disease prevention and are provided from the earliest available dates.

  Table 1: Trust expenditure on health promotion and disease prevention services in Northern Ireland

  Year ended March

  £ million

  1996

  22.5

  1997

  24.6

  1998

  23.7

  1999

  25.0

  2000

  25.6

  2001

  27.7

  2002

  28.6

  2003

  33.2

  1323W

  Table 2: Budget for other health promotion and disease prevention services in Northern Ireland

  Year ended March

  £million

  2000

  30

  2001

  73

  2002

  133

  2003

  18.0

  2004

  21 8

  Note

  The funding for other services includes funds for the implementation of the Drugs and Alcohol Strategy, an element of which may also be included within Trust expenditure.

  HIV/AIDS
  Mrs. Iris Robinson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many newly diagnosed cases of HIV there have been in the province since 1 January. [187455]

  Angela Smith
  Provisional figures indicate there were 20 new HIV cases in Northern Ireland between 1 January and 30 June 2004.

  Mental Health
  Mrs. Iris Robinson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (1) if he will make a statement on progress in implementing the Mental Health Strategy Action Plan; [183026]

  (2) if he will make a statement on progress towards reducing the proportion of individuals susceptible to psychiatric disorders; [183017]

  Angela Smith
  The Promoting Mental Health Strategy and Action Plan was issued in January 2003. An Implementation Group has been established to oversee implementation of the Strategy. A range of preventative measures are being taken under the strategy including raising awareness and understanding of mental health issues, promoting coping skills, suicide awareness and outreach work with young people in areas of need. Action towards achieving the target to reduce the proportion of people with a potential psychiatric disorder is ongoing and progress will be measured through Health and Well-being Surveys.

  Motorsport
  Lady Hermon
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what funding has been made available for the development of motorsports in Northern Ireland in each of the past five years. [178520]

  Angela Smith
  The total amount of public funding i.e. exchequer and lottery, made available for the development of motorsports in Northern Ireland in each of the past five years by the Sports Council for Northern Ireland is as follows:

  Public funds1

  £

  1999–2000

  87,400

  2000–01

  66,461

  2001–02

  56,600

  2002—03

  144,924

  2003—04

  44,685

  Total

  400,070

  1 Includes Sports Council exchequer, Sports Council lottery.

  1324W

  Sports Council for Northern Ireland exchequer funding allocated to the 2 and 4 wheel Motorsport Steering Group

  £

  1999–2000

  0

  2000–01

  0

  2001–02

  0

  2002—03

  15,000

  2003—04

  200,000

  Total

  215,000

  In addition to this, both the Northern Ireland Events Company and the Northern Ireland Tourist Board have provided funding in each of the past five years, which has been used to assist with its development. The amounts made available are as follows:

  Public funds allocated by the Northern Ireland Events Company

  £

  1999–2000

  0

  2000–01

  0

  2001–02

  75,000

  2002—03

  104,679

  2003—04

  374,500

  Total

  554,179

  MRI Scanners
  Mrs. Iris Robinson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what assessment has been made of the implications of using mobile scanning facilities to increase the number of MRI scans conducted in the Province. [187437]

  Angela Smith
  Mobile scanners have been used by some HSS Trusts as a temporary measure to enhance provision while new MRI scanners, funded by the New Opportunities Fund at a cost of £6.4 million, are installed at the Ulster, Antrim, Craigavon and Belfast City Hospitals. Using mobile scanners has been found to be an effective way to alleviate waiting times for patients alongside the introduction of additional evening scanning sessions at some hospital sites.

  MRSA
  Andrew Mackinlay
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland whet her a voluntary reporting system by hospitals in Northern Ireland of MRSA cases is in place. [184777]

  Angela Smith
  In April 2002 the Department of Health, Social Services and Public Safety made it a mandatory requirement for acute Trusts to report MRSA bacteraemia rates. The data is collected, collated and analysed by the Communicable Disease Surveillance Centre. Northern Ireland (CDSC) and statistical reports for the first two years of operation are available from its website www.cdscni.org. A copy of this report has been placed in the House Library.

  Andrew Mackinlay
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland whether hospitals in Northern Ireland are required to destroy bed linen of MRSA sufferers after use; and if he will make a statement. [184789]
  1325W
  Angela Smith
  The UK-wide MRSA Control Guidelines for hospitals do not require bed linen to be destroyed. It should be bagged according to the hospital laundry policy and machine washed on a hot wash setting.

  National Institute for Clinical Excellence
  Mrs. Iris Robinson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what discussions have been held with representatives of the National Institute for Clinical Excellence regarding implementing NICE guidelines in Northern Ireland. [187436]

  Angela Smith
  Guidelines produced by the National Institute for Clinical Excellence (NICE) are only applicable to England and Wales. In line with a range of initiatives designed to improve the quality of health and social care services in Northern Ireland, I am at present considering how guidelines issued by NICE can best be used in the context of Northern Ireland's health and social services. Departmental officials have undertaken discussions with NICE in that regard.

  Parades Commission
  Mr. Dodds
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many members of the Parades Commission were on duty on(a) 12 and (b) 13 July. [186023]

  Mr. Pearson
  All of the Parades Commissioners were available on 12 and 13 July 2004. In addition senior members of the Secretariat, authorised officers and monitors were deployed at a number of parades across Northern Ireland.

  Physiotherapists
  Mrs. Iris Robinson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many whole-time equivalent physiotherapists are working within the NHS in the Province. [187440]

  Angela Smith
  Physiotherapists as at 30 June 2004 are as follows:

  Physiotherapists as at 30 June 20041

  Number

  Headcount

  790

  Whole-time equivalent

  653.63

  1 Bank staff who cover for staffing shortfalls and fluctuating workloads in order to maintain service delivery are not included in these figures.

  Mrs. Iris Robinson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what estimate he has made of the number of physiotherapists required in the Province over the next five years. [187441]

  Angela Smith
  A review of the physiotherapy workforce in May 2002 estimated that a 4 per cent. growth in the workforce, equivalent to 27 posts, would be required for service developments that have been agreed or are likely to be approved over the course of five years. In January 2004 an update of the original report indicated that the demand issues remained as identified. The position is being kept under review.

  Plastic Baton Rounds
  Mr. Gregory Campbell
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what progress has been made in establishing an alternative to the plastic baton round for use in quelling civil disturbances in Northern Ireland. [186488]

  Mr. Pearson
  The report of the Independent Commission on Policing for Northern Ireland recommended that "an immediate and substantial investment should be made in a research programme to find an acceptable, effective and less potentially lethal alternative to the Plastic Baton Round".

  In response, a Northern Ireland Office led steering group was set up. The fourth report of the steering group, published on 29 January this year, concluded that there was no commercially available product that met these criteria and that the focus should be on the development of two distinct new projectiles: the Attenuating Energy Projectile (AEP) and the Discriminating Irritant Projectile (DIP). Detailed research has concluded that both of these rounds represent a less potentially lethal alternative.

  The Government remains committed to developing an effective, less potentially lethal alternative and, as announced, it is hoped that the AEP will be ready for operational deployment before summer 2005. The Government are also committed to equipping the PSNI with a broader range of public order equipment that might reduce the need to resort to the use of this new projectile.

  The ACPO guidance on the use of baton rounds published on 8 December 2003 makes clear that baton rounds should only be used in a public order situation where other policing methods to restore or sustain public order have failed or must be unlikely to succeed, and where the use of the round is judged necessary to reduce a serious risk of loss of life or serious injury. It also states that baton rounds are designed to provide a less lethal option in dealing with threats of serious violence and provide an effective means by which individuals armed with petrol bombs or other weapons can be kept at a distance, contained or dispersed.

  Racism
  Mr. Dodds
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many people have moved house under the Special Purchase of Evacuated Dwellings Scheme in Northern Ireland where their move was due to racist intimidation in each year since 1997. [187412]

  Mr. Spellar
  The information requested is not readily available. However I will write to the hon. Gentleman when the figures have been compiled.

  Mr. Dodds
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many people have been allocated emergency homeless status by the Housing Executive in Northern Ireland because of racist intimidation in each year since 1997. [187413]
  1327W
  Mr. Spellar
  The information requested is not available prior to the 2001–02 year as the Housing Executive only began recording ethnic information from that time. For the last four financial years the information, including Irish Travellers, is as follows:

  Number

  2001–02

  3

  2002–03

  14

  2003–04

  14

  2004–05 (To 24 August 2004)

  5

  Royal Victoria Hospital, Belfast
  Mrs. Iris Robinson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement on staffing levels in the genito-urinary medicine department at the Royal Victoria Hospital, Belfast. [187435]

  Angela Smith
  In recognition of the future need in genito-urinary medicine specialist registrars have been recruited in each of the last three years.

  A report on "Sexually Transmitted Infections and Genito-urinary Medicine Services", produced by a subgroup of the Regional Advisory Committee on Communicable Disease Control, recommended a complement of five consultants against the current complement of 3.2 whole-time equivalent. The number presently in training stands at four, which is considered sufficient to meet that projected need.

  School Fruit
  Mrs. Iris Robinson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, pursuant to the answer of 20 January 2004,Official Report, column 1161W, on school fruit, whether the fresh fruit in schools scheme will be extended. [187438]

  Angela Smith
  The Department has secured funding to enable this pilot scheme to continue in 2004–05, and for the scheme to be extended within the Health Action Zone areas to enable some new ideas to be tested this year. A final evaluation of the pilot scheme will take place in 2004–05. The outcome of this, together with work being taken forward by Fit Futures, the Taskforce on Obesity in Children and Young People and the development of a new Food and Nutrition Strategy, will help inform future decisions about the scheme.

  Mrs. Iris Robinson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many children in the Province received free fruit at school in 2003–04. [187432]

  Angela Smith
  A pilot Fresh Fruit in Schools Scheme was launched in Northern Ireland in October 2002. In the academic year September 2003 to June 2004 it provided a free piece of fruit daily to 5,239 primary 1 and 2 children in 87 primary schools within Health Action Zone areas.

  Secondary Education
  Mrs. Iris Robinson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what assessment he has made of the level of support in the Province for academic selection in post-primary education. [187454]
  1328W
  Mr. Gardiner
  The responses to the consultation on the recommendations of the Burns Report showed a diversity of views on the issue of academic selection. Of the 16 per cent. of the population who responded to the household response forms, 64 per cent. were opposed to the abolition of academic selection, as were 37 per cent. of the schools that responded, the Governing Bodies Association, the Institute of Directors, Ulster Unionist Party and Democratic Unionist Party and the Secondary Heads Association. Those in favour of abolishing academic selection included 36 per cent. of the respondents to the household response forms, 73% of the schools that responded, the five education and library boards, the Council for Catholic Maintained Schools, the Social Democratic and Labour Party, Sinn Fein, the Progressive Unionist Party, the Women's Coalition, the Workers Party, the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission and the five main teachers' unions. There was conditional support for ending academic selection from the Northern Catholic Bishops, the Northern Ireland Council for the Curriculum, Examinations and Assessment, the Confederation of British Industry, and the Catholic Heads Association.

  The Costello Working Group took account of all the consultation responses and the Government have accepted that Group's recommendations that it is educationally unsound to select pupils and commit them to particular pathways at age 11 and also unsound to believe that the more able should follow only academic courses.

  Full details of the responses to the consultation are available on the Department of Education website: http:// www.deni.gov.uk/pprb/response_to_consultation.htm

  Smoking
  Mrs. Iris Robinson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what estimate he has made of the number of people who have stopped smoking in Northern Ireland in each of the last five years. [187446]

  Angela Smith
  Information on the number of people who have stopped smoking is not available for each of the last five years. However, an indication on the number of people who have stopped smoking in Northern Ireland is available from the Continuous Household Survey (CHS), which biennially includes questions about smoking. Estimates of the number of people who have stopped smoking in Northern Ireland are as follows:

  Estimate of number of people (aged 16 +) who stopped smoking

  1996–97

  16,500

  1998—99

  22,000

  2000—01

  24,000

  2002—03

  25,000

  Notes:

  1. The figures have been calculated using the percentage of respondents to the survey who stated that they had stopped smoking in the previous year. These percentages have been applied to the mid-year estimate population numbers to produce an estimated figure for the number of people in Northern Ireland who stopped smoking in the previous year.

  2. Figures are rounded to the nearest 500.

  Source:

  Continuous Household Survey.

  Spending Review
  Mr. Dodds
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what assessment he has made of the impact on civil service jobs in Northern Ireland of the Chancellor's statement on the 2004 Spending Review. [186049]

  Mr. Pearson
  I would refer the lion. Gentleman to the reply I gave the hon. Member for North Down on 20 July 2004,Official Report, columns 196–97W.

  Sports Funding
  Mr. Dodds
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how much Government funding has been allocated in Northern Ireland in each financial year since 2000 to(a) rugby, (b) hockey, (c) cricket and (d) Gaelic games. [186050]

  Angela Smith
  The following table provides details of Exchequer funding and Peace II funding provided by DCAL, DARD, DETI and DFP to rugby, hockey, cricket and Gaelic games for eac h financial year from 2000.

  £

  2000—01

  2001–02

  2002–03

  2003–04

  (a) Rugby1

  152,843

  157,551

  92,536

  127,723

  (b) Hockey

  27,464

  61,225

  54,902

  43,036

  (c) Cricket

  20,000

  22,000

  26,330

  59,179

  (d) Gaelic games1,2

  652,085

  381,333

  557,676

  134,793

  (e) Numerous sports3

  —

  —

  —

  58,434

  1 The figures shown for rugby and Gaelic games include funding allocated via the Safe Sports Ground Programme.

  2 Gaelic games includes Gaelic football, hurling and other Gaelic Athletic Association Games.

  3 DFP has also provided Peace II funding to projects including more than one of the listed sports and these are listed separately in the last row under "numerous sports".

  Travel Costs
  Dr. Cable
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what the travel costs were of civil servants in(a) his Department and (b) its related agencies in each year since 1997. [183901]

  Mr. Pearson
  One Northern (-eland Department is unable to provide information prior to 2000–01 as the information could be obtained only at disproportionate 1330W
  cost. The available figures show travel costs for (a) Northern Ireland Departments and the Northern Ireland Office and (b) for related agencies for each year since 1997 as:

  £

  Department

  Agencies

  Total

  1997–981

  6,993,705

  8,737,673

  15,731,378

  1998–991

  7,426,431

  8,814,552

  16,240,983

  1999–20001

  7,819,038

  8,950,484

  16,769,522

  2000–01

  10,535,869

  9,769,393

  20,305,262

  2001–02

  10,148,870

  9,584,372

  19,733,242

  2002–03

  10,130,032

  10,288,270

  20,418,302

  2003–04

  10,484,387

  10,659,851

  21,144,238

  1 Excludes Department of Finance and Personnel.

  Please note that the accounting system changes from a cash to resource basis in 2000–01.

  Young People (Special Needs)
  Mrs. Iris Robinson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what plans there are to improve(a) respite and (b) social activity provision for young people with special needs in (i) Larne, Carrick, Newtownabbey and Ballyclare and (ii) the rest of the Northern Board area. [187449]

  Angela Smith
  Homefirst Trust has established a team to manage the transition of young people to adult services using a community development approach to day care support services, which also includes social activities. Supported employment services for school leavers have been developed in Ballymoney, Antrim, Ballymena and Cookstown.

  Funding has been secured from the Big Lottery to appoint a Project Worker to develop mainstream social activities for children and young people with disabilities in leisure centres in Larne, Carrickfergus, Newtownabbey and Ballyclare. An evaluation of this project will inform future planning priorities.

  The Board is in the process of developing a family support strategy, which includes children with disabilities and their families. A wide-ranging consultation with parents, children and service providers has been completed. The strategy will identify gaps and shortfalls in services and will inform future planning priorities.

DEPUTY PRIME MINISTER

  Biodiversity and Geological Conservation
  The Minister for Housing and Planning (Keith Hill)
  I am announcing today the publication of a consultation draft of a new planning policy statement on biodiversity and geological conservation and a draft circular (published jointly with the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs) to accompany it. The draft of planning policy statement 9 (PPS9) sets out the Government's national planning policies for biodiversity and geological conservation. The accompanying draft circular provides administrative guidance on the application of the law relating to planning and nature conservation as it applies in England.

  It is intended that PPS9, together with the circular and future good practice guidance will, in due course replace planning policy guidance note 9 on nature conservation published in 1994. The draft PPS9, and its supporting documents meet the commitment set out in the planning Green Paper for shorter, more focused and policy rich statements of planning policy with separate advice on non-policy matters.

  The draft PPS takes account of legislative changes since 1994 that affect biodiversity and geological conservation, and reflects the commitments in the "Biodiversity Strategy for England", published in 2002. It has a clearer focus on the need to conserve, enhance and restore biological diversity.

  Consultation on the draft of PPS9 and the accompanying draft circular will run until 9 December 2004. Copies of the draft consultation papers have been made available in the Libraries of the House.

  Standards Board for England
  The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (Phil Hope)
  The Standards Board for England's annual report and accounts for 2003–04 have been placed in the Library of the House together with an annual review of the board's activities during the year.

  The report and accounts cover the second year of significant operations by the standards board for England. During the year ended 31 March 2004, 3566 allegations of misconduct had been referred to the Standards Board, an increase of about 20 per cent. compared with the previous year.

  The annual report highlights that the board is continuing to work in partnership with local government to promote and sustain the high standards of conduct, which are essential to public confidence in our local democracy.
  118WS

HEALTH

  Mental Health Bill
  The Minister of State, Department of Health (Ms Rosie Winterton)
  The Government have today published a Mental Health Bill. This Bill will be subject to pre-legislative scrutiny. A joint scrutiny committee has been established and has been asked to present its report by the end of March 2005.

  Mental health legislation sets out the circumstances in which a person can be treated for mental disorder without their consent and the safeguards they are entitled to. The vast majority of people with mental health problems do not need to be treated against their wishes but occasionally this is necessary, normally to protect themselves, but more occasionally to protect others.

  It has long been recognised that the current mental health legislation, the Mental Health Act 1983, needs to be updated, in line with the development of services and of human rights law to give a greater focus on patients? needs and wishes. In 1998, the Government set up an expert committee to advise on how mental health legislation should be shaped to reflect contemporary patterns of care and treatment and to support government policy. In 2002, following a Green and a White Paper, a draft Bill was published for consultation.

  Since then, the comments received on the 2002 draft have been considered in full and, following further work and meetings with stakeholders, a revised Bill has been produced. We have made changes to address the concerns expressed by stakeholders. The Bill brings the framework for the compulsory treatment of people with serious mental health disorders up to date.

  This Bill needs to be considered in the context of the wider Government strategy to improve mental health services. In 1998, the National Service Framework for mental health set out national standards for the care and treatment of adults with mental disorder. The NHS Plan announced, in 2000, substantial additional investment for mental health services. As a result of the National Service Framework and the additional investment, significant improvements have been made in mental health services. This is particularly the case in relation to community-based services, such as crisis resolution and assertive outreach teams. It is important that mental health legislation is now modernised.

  The Bill will provide important benefits. The Bill means that the small minority of people with mental health problems who need to be treated against their wishes, normally for their protection but occasionally to protect the public, will get the right treatment at the right time. This meets the needs of the individual patient and makes sure that the public is protected.

  The Bill ensures there is no compulsion without the provision of appropriate treatment. Safeguards for patients will be greatly strengthened with a choice of representative, access to advocacy and all use of compulsory treatment beyond 28 days having to be authorised by the new independent mental health tribunal or the courts. Under the Bill, patients who are ill and vulnerable will be able to get the treatment they need in the community, including non-dangerous mentally disordered offenders who may otherwise receive a prison sentence.
  119WS
  Legislation about compulsory treatment inevitably raises many difficult issues. There has already been much discussion about this proposed new legislation. Pre-legislative scrutiny will now allow further considered debate. We look forward to receiving the report of the scrutiny committee.

  Copies of the Bill and of the explanatory notes have been placed in the Library.

HOME DEPARTMENT

  Asylum Seekers
  The Minister for Citizenship and Immigration (Mr. Desmond Browne)
  The Government are firmly committed to ensuring that the country information material they produce to inform asylum decisions meets the highest standards.

  Accurate, objective and up to date country information is fundamental to a fair and effective asylum system. The independent advisory panel on country information (APCI) was set up to provide rigorous external scrutiny of country information material produced by the Home Office and make recommendations to help ensure that it is of the highest quality. The APCI has already shown itself to be working in a robust and forthright manner.

  While we are satisfied that the country information material produced by the Home Office is already of a good standard, we recognise that improvements can be made. We have responded swiftly and positively to issues raised by the APCI and announced earlier this year the introduction of a range of improvements in the way the material is produced and quality assured. The measures introduced were welcomed by the APCI and have resulted in a clear improvement in the quality and presentation of country information material.

  The panel rightly considers it essential that the Home Office's country information material should not only be objective in fact, but that it should also be perceived as being objective and have the confidence of all its users. The APCI was concerned that the country information would not be perceived as impartial while it was being produced by country information and policy unit (CIPU) which also has the function of advising on the development of country specific asylum policies. The APCI made a recommendation that the Home Office bring forward proposals to address this issue.

  We have given very careful consideration to the APCI's recommendation and I am announcing today that the current country information and country policy functions of the CIPU will be separated. In future, the production of country information material used by the Home Office will be undertaken by a country information unit dedicated solely to that function. The existing CIPU country policy function will be undertaken separately within the Immigration and Nationality Directorate. These changes, which directly reflect the APCI's thinking, will be put in place as soon as the necessary arrangements can be made.

  I am also announcing today that in future country reports will be produced and published at six-monthly intervals on the top 20 asylum generating countries (and other countries for which an operational need is identified) instead of the current top 35 countries. The
  120WS
  reduction in the number of country reports produced is consistent with the significant reduction in asylum intake. This step will enable the resources freed to be used to help assure the standard of the country information material produced, whilst ensuring that country reports are still produced on the main asylum generating countries. Country information material will continue to be produced on those countries which fall outside the top 20 in the way that is now done for countries which fall outside the top 35.

  Immigration Applications
  The Minister for Citizenship and Immigration (Mr. Desmond Browne)
  I am publishing today a consultation document setting out options for new fees for immigration applications. As part of the ongoing review of the immigration system, the Home Office has been reviewing the charges for a range of immigration services: leave to remain; leave to remain associated with an immigration employment document; the Highly Skilled Migrant Programme, the Sectors Based Scheme, and Travel Documents.

  We are seeking the views of the public, businesses, the education sector, legal representatives and our other stakeholders, regarding proposals to include the costs of non-asylum appeals and enforcement activity in the overall charge for an immigration application. We are also consulting on proposals to:
  introduce new payment methods for customers;
  introduce fees for applications for the transfer conditions of limited leave to a new passport or travel document; and
  introduce separate travel documents for children.

  We aim to implement new charges from 1 April 2005.

  We will be consulting on charges for work permits and for applications to the Seasonal Agricultural Workers Scheme later in the year.

  A partial regulatory impact assessment, which estimates the likely cost to business of increasing the fees for applications to the sectors based scheme and applications for leave to remain associated with an immigration employment document, is available by visiting www.homeoffice.gov.uk or www.direct.gov.uk, or by telephoning 0114 279 3422.

  An electronic version of the consultation document is available from 8 September on the Home Office website at: www.homeoffice.gov.uk. Hard copies of the consultation document will be available from 15 September, in the Libraries of both Houses or from the Charging Programme Office (telephone: 0151 235 8359).

  Interested parties are invited to submit their comments and views, by Wednesday 8 December 2004 to:
  Charging Programme Office, 3 Floor Cunard Building, Water Street, Liverpool, L2 OPP or by e-mail to: charging.consultation@homeoffice.gsi.gov.uk.

  All replies that are received will be made public unless the author explicitly requests that this should not happen.
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DEFENCE

  Defence Procurement Agency
  The Minister of State, Ministry of Defence (Mr. Adam Ingram)
  Six key targets have been set for the Chief Executive of the Defence Procurement Agency for the financial year 2004–2005.

  In a change to previous years, the first three key targets now apply to all projects over £20 million which have passed their main gate approval but not yet achieved in service date (ISD). Key targets 2 and 3 are consistent with the goals set in the Department's public service agreement (PSA) for major equipment projects, although for the key targets, all movement in most likely ISD and cost forecasts will be measured, rather than only that which is in excess of the approval. The fourth key target relates to improvements in DPA Customer satisfaction. A revised key target 5, comprising a basket of measures, replaces the previous straight measure in order to provide a better indication of DPA efficiency. There is a new sixth key target reflecting the importance which the Department attaches to delivery of assets to the front-line. The key targets are:

  Key Target 1: Key requirements Compliance

  Predicted achievement of customers' core requirements1 for projects: 97 per cent.

  Key Target 2: Average in-year in service date slippage

  Average in-year slippage of in service dates not to exceed 0.9 months

  Key Target 3: Average in-year cost growth

  Average in-year cost variation not to exceed 0.5 per cent.

  Key Target 4: Customer survey satisfaction rating

  Customer satisfaction rating of 72 per cent.

  Key Target 5: Achievement of planned efficiency measures i>2

  (i)

  Measured asset turnover in months by comparing assets delivered to total assets less current liabilities

  69.6

  (ii)

  Measures value of assets delivered as a multiple of operating cost

  10.7

  (iii)

  Measures value of assets added to the balance sheet as a multiple of operating cost.

  16.2

  1 Around 10 core requirements per projects are agreed between the DPA and MOD headquarters, defining the essential characteristics of the equipment/capability.

  2 Target levels differ from those in the published corporate business plan as they reflect start of year forecast data.

  Key Target 6: Asset deliveries

  Variance between planned and actual in-year asset deliveries not to exceed 15 per cent.

  Ministry of Defence Police and Guarding Agency
  The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence (Mr. Ivor Caplin)
  Key Targets have been set for the chief executive of the Ministry of Defence Police and Guarding Agency (MDPGA) for the financial year 2004;–05. This year the key targets focus on MDP and 122WS
  work is ongoing to establish an effective and joined up performance management system that will fully incorporate the MGS and MDP from next year.

  The targets are as follows:

  Key Target 1:
  By March 2005, as a means of providing greater public reassurance, ensure that no more than 25 per cent. of the duty time of dedicated patrol officers is expended on activities not directly related to patrol duties.

  Key Target 2:
  By 31 March 2005, as a means of reducing crime and protecting MOD property and interests, achieve a crime-solving rate of 50 per cent. for the investigation of primary crime.

  Key Target 3:

  By 31 March 2005, in order to delivery performance as defined in relevant establishment CSAs, ensure that the Agency fulfils at least 95 per cent. of its funded and agreed customer taskings.

  Key Target 4:
  By 31 March 2005, in order to maintain appropriate levels of security as defined in relevant MDP CSAs, seek to maintain and improve upon the average baseline Security Contribution Index score achieved in the previous quarter at each establishment contributing to the index system.

  Key Target 5:
  By 31 March 2005, within the overall recruitment of police staff, and as part of an overall programme to retain personnel levels, to have recruited at least 15 per cent. women and 4 per cent. from minority ethnic communities.

  Key Target 6:
  By 31 March 2005, excepting unforeseen operational commitments, and with the intention of providing cost effective policing and guarding, as well as maintaining an appropriate work life balance for personnel, reduce the amount of overtime worked by each officer to no more than eight hours worked per week averaged over a 17 week rolling period.

  Key Target 7:
  By 31 March 2005, in order to maintain a healthy and effective workforce and contribute to the achievement of other key targets, reduce the overall level of sickness lost within the Agency (except MGS personnel) by one hour per member of staff per month against the corresponding achievement in the previous year.

  Key Target 8:
  By 31 March 2005, to have provided a greater clarity as to the extent of fraud within the MOD and thereby to have raised the awareness, by engaging with, and encouraging the MOD community to provide intelligence, with a view to increasing the number of reported fraud cases.

  Deployment of RAF Harrier GR7s to Afghanistan
  The Secretary of State for Defence (Mr. Geoffrey Hoon)
  The United Kingdom has a long-standing commitment to help the people of Afghanistan to rebuild their country as a stable, secure and prosperous nation. That process is now approaching a vital stage. NATO is in the process of expanding the international security assistance force (ISAF) by creating more provincial reconstruction teams (PRTs). The coalition, meanwhile, continues to deploy PRTs of its own and to engage the remnants of the Taliban and its al-Qaeda supporters that reject all the Afghan people have achieved since 2001. Both the ISAF and the coalition provide essential support to the Afghan transitional
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  authority and to the United Nations' Assistance Mission Afghanistan as they prepare for the Afghan presidential elections which are due on 9 October 2004.

  These are important tasks and both the coalition and the ISAF merit our support. In response to a coalition request for the United Kingdom to provide a close air support capability to coalition forces operating in southern Afghanistan, I have agreed the deployment of six Royal Air Force Harrier GR7 aircraft to Kandahar, Afghanistan. The aircraft will be provided by No. 3 Squadron, Royal Air Force, and the deployment is planned to be for nine months. The first personnel from 53 Field Squadron (Airfield Support), Royal Engineers, and No. 3 Squadron have already deployed to Kandahar and the force should be operational by the end of this month. The deployment will reach a strength of some 315 personnel in its early stages but will eventually settle at a strength of about 230. The cost of the deployment is estimated to be some £35.5 million.

  This is our first deployment of combat aircraft to Afghanistan in the current campaign. While their principal role will be to support coalition forces, the aircraft will also be available to support the ISAF. NATO has identified three such tasks: close air support as ISAF expands into Western Afghanistan; an airborne intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) capability to support all ISAF forces, and; the provision of "air presence patrols" as part of the ISAF's support for the security of the Afghan presidential elections.

  The versatility of the Harriers, which will be equipped with laser-guided bombs, air to surface missiles and the joint reconnaissance pod, makes them an ideal asset to meet all these tasks. Deployment of these aircraft confirms our commitment to the NATO mission in Afghanistan, our support for the ISAF and our determination to help ensure the success of the international community's support for the Afghan electoral process. The Army and Royal Air Force personnel will provide a highly capable and credible force that will contribute to improving the security environment in the region. This is another clear sign of the UK's long term commitment to achieving a stable and secure Afghanistan.

  Naval Recruiting and Training Agency
  The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence (Mr. Ivor Caplin)
  In 1997 the initial and major phase of the transfer of support service activities to Flagship Training Ltd (Flagship), under partnership arrangements with the Naval Recruiting and Training Agency (NRTA), was agreed and subsequently implemented.

  I am pleased to inform the House that I have now agreed in principle to the next phase under this arrangement and the transfer of the provision of services which falls into two categories: harmonisation, and the integration of the nuclear department.

  This phase will enhance the support services already transferred, providing greater efficiencies and effectiveness across the five major training Establishments for the Royal Navy. There are potential total savings for the Naval Recruiting and Training Agency of approximately £6 million over the remainder of the contract period to 2011.
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  The anticipated number of posts to be transferred is 296 (273 civilian and 23 service) under harmonisation and 24 (20 civilian and 4 Service) in the nuclear department. The trades unions have been regularly informed of progress and the formal consultation process has begun. A copy of the consultative documents has been placed in the Library of the House.

  Training Group Defence Agency
  The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence (Mr. Ivor Caplin)
  The commander-in-chief, Royal Air Force personnel and training command has set the chief executive of the Training Group Defence Agency the following targets for financial year 2004–2005:

  Key Target 1A:

  Output—RAF Initial Flying Training

  To recruit and train the required number of Royal Air Force aircrew to the standards required for entry to operational conversion unit training and other specialist flying training courses.

  Fast-Jet Pilots

  42

  Multi-Engine Pilots

  48

  Rotary Wing Pilots

  46

  Fast-Jet Weapons Systems Operators

  28

  Multi-Engine Weapons Systems Operators

  9

  Non-Commissioned Aircrew

  103

  Total

  276

  Key Target 1B:

  Output—RAF Initial Ground Training

  To recruit and train the required number of Royal Air Force personnel to the standards required to undertake ground appointments.

  Officer Basic Specialist Training

  274

  Airman Basic Specialist Training

  2,166

  Total

  2,440

  Key Target 2A:

  Output—Defence Flying Training

  To train aircrew of the three services to standards for entry to the Royal Air Force and Royal Navy operational conversion unit training, the Defence Helicopter Flying School and other specialist flying training courses, as well as providing training places for international students.

  RAF

  560

  RN

  164

  Army

  305

  Tri-Service

  95

  International

  113

  Total

  1,237

  Key Target 2B:

  Output—Defence Ground Training

  To train personnel of the three services to the standards required to undertake ground appointments.
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  RAF

  17,763

  RN

  3,983

  Army

  6,766

  Total

  28,512

  To underpin the military effectiveness of the Royal Air Force by the timely provision of military personnel trained to the standards agreed with the agency's customers.

  Key Target 4:

  Cost Management

  To ensure that the necessary systems are in place to manage the business on an output-cost basis.

  Key Target 5:

  Efficiency

  To reduce the average per capita cost of training by improving first time and overall pass rates.

  First Time Pass Rate

  Overall Pass Rate

  Officers—Phase 1

  75%

  98%

  Officers—Phase 2

  90%

  97%

  Airmen—Phase 1

  75%

  90%

  Airmen—Phase 2

  80%

  90%

  (< 38 weeks)

  Airmen—Phase 2

  63%

  83%

  (> 38 weeks)

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SOLICITOR GENERAL

  Iraq: Prosecution of Trooper Williams
  The Solicitor-General (Ms Harriet Harman)
  My right hon. Friend the Attorney-General has made the following Ministerial Statement."As I indicated in my written statement to the House on 14 June, Official Report, Lords, columns WS 22–24, this case, which involves an alleged unlawful killing by shooting of an Iraqi citizen during the course of an arrest, was brought to my attention after charges were dismissed by the soldier's commanding officer. This meant the case could not be tried by court martial. I referred it to the CPS who asked the Metropolitan Police for assistance in collecting further evidence.
  I can confirm that today the Metropolitan Police, on the advice of the CPS, charged Trooper Williams with the murder of Hassan Said on 3 August 2003 in Ad Dayr Iraq. Trooper Williams has been kept in custody to appear at Bow Street magistrates court this afternoon.
  Trooper Williams is a member of 2nd Royal Tank Regiment."

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.

Lord Vallance of Tummel
Sir Iain David Thomas Vallance, Knight, having been created Baron Vallance of Tummel, of Tummel in Perth and Kinross, for life—Was, in his robes, introduced between the Lord Wallace of Saltaire and the Lord Phillips of Sudbury.
Baroness Chapman
Nicola Jane Chapman, having been created Baroness Chapman, of Leeds in the County of West Yorkshire, for life—Was, in her robes, introduced between the Baroness Masham of Ilton and the Baroness Dean of Thornton-le-Fylde.

Draft Animal Welfare Bill
2.49 p.m.
Lord Lucasasked the Leader of the House:
Why the draft Animal Welfare Bill is not being considered by a Joint Committee.
The Lord President of the Council (Baroness Amos): My Lords, this is uncharted territory, with few precedents and no rules. Decisions about which Bills receive pre-legislative scrutiny and the method of scrutiny are made on a case-by-case basis. This Session, we have published 11 Bills in draft—more than ever before—and four of them have gone to Joint Committees. The Animal Welfare Bill is being scrutinised by the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee of the House of Commons. We think the balance this year is about right.
Lord Lucas: My Lords, when it comes to matters that so touch on the essential function of this House and on matters where we have granted such great use of our powers in terms of carry-over and procedures, does not the Leader of the House think it appropriate that decisions on which draft Bills this House should participate in discussing should come before the House for approval, as do so many more minor matters? This seems to me to be so important.
Baroness Amos: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, will be aware that these matters are normally discussed through the usual channels, but, as I said in my initial Answer, this is somewhat uncharted territory. The usual channels in both Houses considered a set of proposals for pre-legislative scrutiny at the beginning of
558
the Session. However, this draft Bill was not on that list and, as the result of an oversight, the usual channels were not consulted. I have apologised for that. Noble Lords will be aware that the decision has been taken that the Bill will now be considered by the departmental committee in another place. There is much for us to learn here, and I shall take that learning away.
Lord Roper: My Lords, does the Lord President accept that the arrangements which are made at the beginning of the Session are relatively successful, although this House would prefer more pre-legislative scrutiny to be carried out by Joint Committees rather than by those of one House? Will it be possible to look again at the procedures for Bills which are not on the initial list but which come up during the Session in order that we do not have another incident like this one?
Baroness Amos: My Lords, I am well aware that the House would like more pre-legislative scrutiny by Joint Committees. However, there is an overall issue of resources. There are more House of Lords Committees than ever before. In its first report in May this year, the House of Lords Liaison Committee stated:
"While not wishing to exclude the possibility of establishing additional select committees where a compelling case can be made, we are unlikely in the foreseeable future to agree to an increase in overall committee activity".
There is a real issue of resources, but I take on board the point that, where appropriate, it would be helpful to have Joint Committees and to use the considerable expertise that exists in this House. I bear in mind the point made by the noble Lord that, although we have a meeting at the beginning of the Session, we should be aware that Bills do crop up during a Session and that the usual channels should be consulted.
Lord Strathclyde: My Lords, can the Leader of the House confirm that whatever decisions are made about pre-legislative scrutiny—I agree that it is desirable that there should be Joint Committees on pre-legislative scrutiny—nothing that happens in pre-legislative scrutiny should affect the ability of this House to give full scrutiny to legislation when it comes forward in due time?
Baroness Amos: My Lords, that is absolutely right. Even where a decision has been taken by the usual channels, a formal decision has to be taken by both Houses in regard to taking forward the nature of pre-legislative scrutiny.

Intestacy
2.53 p.m.
Lord Shutt of Greetland Lord Shutt of Greetland asked Her Majesty's Government:
When the intestacy provisions will be updated so that, when a death occurs and there is no will, a surviving spouse can, in the majority of cases, continue to live in the matrimonial home.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Constitutional Affairs (Lord Filkin): My Lords, on intestacy, a surviving spouse is entitled, where there are children, to the statutory legacy of £125,000 absolutely and a life interest in half the remainder. Where there are no children, the figure is £200,000 and half the remainder absolutely. The Government will consult this autumn on revising the current levels of the statutory legacy, and we will set out in the consultation paper our proposals for change.
Lord Shutt of Greetland: My Lords, I thank the Minister for his helpful response. I am delighted that consultation is to take place. Will the Government bear it in mind that the property that was worth £125,000 in 1993 is, on average, worth £300,000 in Yorkshire and £430,000 in central London, and that when 70 per cent of the population do not at present leave a will, there will now be considerable hardship in cases where a surviving spouse does not have the ability, by law, to remain living in the house? Will the noble Lord also consider the possibility of the figures arising from the consultation being indexed in the future? It has been 11 years since there was a change—indeed, there were only seven changes last century.
Lord Filkin: My Lords, the first two issues and many others will certainly be considered in the consultation paper on increasing the statutory levels. Indexation is an interesting issue and the Government will be reflecting on that as part of subsequent reviews. The priority, at this stage, is to look at the current statutory levels and see if, as I think is self-evident, they require adjustment upwards.

Jury Service Exclusion
2.55 p.m.
Lord Livsey of Talgarth Lord Livsey of Talgarth asked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether they will modify provisions in the Criminal Justice Act 2003 so that individuals in positions of key importance can be excluded from jury service.
The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Scotland of Asthal): No, my Lords. Jury service is a key civic duty which involves the community in the administration of justice. The changes we have made mean that one's occupation is no longer, in itself, grounds for not serving. That is why judges, Members of another place and of your Lordships' House, including Ministers, are expected to serve. By expanding the pool of potential jurors, we ensure that juries better reflect the communities from which they are drawn.
Lord Livsey of Talgarth: My Lords, perhaps I had better preface this question by saying that I have no direct legal interests or direct interest in the NHS. As the Minister fully appreciates, the impact on crucial
560
key services of the imperative in Schedule 33 to the Criminal Justice Act 2003 has resulted in the eligibility and appointment of jurors from key occupations in society. That includes barristers, solicitors, GPs and hospital consultants.
In one case, a single-handed GP had to close down her surgery for weeks; in another, a barrister was called for jury service in his own court's area; and, in another, a hospital consultant was appointed to a jury, with the resulting cancellation of operations. In another case, a judge was appointed to a jury. I do not know what the other jurors thought of that. The result is even longer waiting lists for the NHS and court cases. Will the Minister re-examine this matter? It has quite an impact on important aspects of society and services.
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: My Lords, I understand the concern that the noble Lord has raised. That is precisely why the officer has discretion, if someone cannot make a particular date, to postpone it. It can be postponed for any time during a 12-month period. The noble Lord is quite right. Lord Justice Dyson had the delight of serving on a jury during the summer, at a time convenient to him.
Lord Renton: My Lords, bearing in mind that many jury cases these days occupy many weeks of government time, can the noble Baroness assure us that a person who has heavy responsibilities to bear, apart from sitting on a jury, would be exempt?
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: My Lords, no one save Her Majesty is exempt from jury service. However, I can certainly assure the noble Lord that if there is an exceptionally good reason why a person cannot serve within the 12 months, that will be considered and information provided about it will be taken into account before a date is fixed. I hope that your Lordships will be grateful no longer to be excluded from this wonderful opportunity, bearing in mind that we are no longer in the company of lunatics and others.
Baroness Anelay of St Johns: My Lords, will the noble Baroness take this opportunity to join me in recognising the tremendous service that is done for and on behalf of all of us in the community by those who put jury service before their own convenience? Does she recall from her experience at the Bar the tremendous inconvenience that some people gladly suffer? Perhaps in the future many noble Lords will gladly suffer that inconvenience too.
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: My Lords, I agree with the noble Baroness absolutely and without any reservation whatever.
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords—
Lord Tordoff: My Lords—
Noble Lords: Cross Bench!
Lord Ackner: My Lords, is there not a risk that jury trial, which has been strongly emphasised in recent

561
days, is, to some extent, eroded by the presence of a judge on the jury? When it comes to the jury deciding who should be the chairman, clearly there is an obligation upon, I should have thought, the judge to admit what his occupation is. If the other members of the jury then say to the judge, "You know all about this. You can preside", they will be directed by a professional for the second time. They cannot be told, "Members of the jury, it is entirely a matter for you", because the judge is one of them. Is this not an indication that at least the judge, for the benefit of the administration of justice, should not be put on a jury?
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: My Lords, I hear what the noble and learned Lord is saying, but I regret to tell him that the esteem in which the profession was hitherto held is not quite what it was. The experience of our American brethren is that jurors are quite robust in exercising equality of arms on the jury and the judge does not necessarily have an undue influence. It has worked quite well.
Lord Tordoff: My Lords, is it not the case that, much as Members of your Lordship's House would wish to serve, many of us are over 70 and people are debarred from serving if they are over 70? May one hope that that will change?
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: My Lords, there is no indication at the moment that we are minded to change the rule in relation to 70. Some people think that after the age of 70 one should be given one's liberty.
Lord Skelmersdale: My Lords, will the Minister further explain one of her supplementary answers? How can a hospital consultant with the inevitable waiting list of patients find a time within 12 months convenient to them to serve on a jury?
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: My Lords, if the name comes out of the hat it is possible for dates to be fixed that are convenient to that consultant. If we are told well in advance, most of us have one or two weeks when we can make ourselves available to discharge our public duty. However, if a person can genuinely show that there is no period within the next 12 months when they could reasonably be expected to attend—for good and exceptional reasons—they can be excluded, but the presumption is that everyone, if called upon, should serve.
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, will the Minister tell us how many trials are delayed each year because of some objection to a particular person—a judge or otherwise?
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: My Lords, I cannot tell the noble Lord how many are delayed for that reason. I do not know whether the noble Lord means delayed through lack of a jury. I have no knowledge of any trial being delayed because there are not sufficient jury members to attend. However, I will investigate the matter and see if there are any such figures.
Viscount Bledisloe: My Lords, although jury service is obviously an important duty for a citizen, are there not several types of people, some of whom have already been mentioned, who perform services for the community that outweigh the value of jury service—perhaps, not to be controversial, the Prime Minister or distinguished consultants? The Minister pointed out that they can have their jury service postponed. Surely, the only consequence of that would be either that they do their jury service during their limited holiday or, at some stage, they are not available to do their operations. Should there not be some balancing when the other duties that they perform are of greater value to the community than jury service?
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: My Lords, as I have tried to make clear, the summoning officer has the discretion. If the person summoned can demonstrate that there is some exceptional reason why they should not serve, albeit during their holiday, I am sure that that would be listened to. However, I can reassure the House that my right honourable friend the Prime Minister is not exempt.
The Countess of Mar: My Lords, would those exceptional circumstances include someone who is the sole carer for a sick, elderly or disabled person and who has neither option nor holiday most of the time?
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: My Lords, I cannot specify, but I would have thought that all such considerations would be taken into account. That is why the summoning officer has been given a discretion. The provision has removed the bar that was absolute. It used to be said that the people not able to sit on the jury were those who were mad, bad or a Member of your Lordships' House.
Lord Clinton-Davis: My Lords, does my noble friend agree that there ought to be some sort of appeal? If the officer considering such a matter behaved aberrantly, should there not be a right of appeal?
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: My Lords, I hear what the noble Lord is saying, but to date there has been no indication that summoning officers have been so inhumane, unfeeling or lacking in discretion that they have inappropriately taken into account that which they should not have taken into account. So far, we think that it should be clear that everyone—other than Her Majesty—has a public duty which we will be called upon to exercise.
Baroness Kennedy of The Shaws: My Lords, does the Minister agree that comparing us with the United States in this area does not work? In the United States it is possible to challenge jurors. That is not possible here in the United Kingdom and certainly not in the jurisdiction of England and Wales. In the United States, challenges are made to those who come forward who are judges, especially in criminal trials.

563
Therefore, does the Minister agree that to compare us with or borrow from the United States may lead to unfair comparisons?
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: My Lords, I know that there is that distinction, but the noble Baroness will know that, on many occasions, a choice was made not to challenge a jury. We got rid of peremptory challenges quite a time ago. The noble Baroness will know that there was a big concern at the time that that would lead to injustice. We know that it has not. We are confident about those who are called. I have the utmost faith in the members of our judiciary that they will deport themselves appropriately. I do not think that the arrangement is likely to cause a great deal of difficulty. We have not seen any so far.
Lord McNally: My Lords, may I make it clear that if the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor turns up on any jury on which I am serving, he will not have my vote for chairman? That apart, will the Government hold their nerve? Surely, the reason for these reforms was the skill of the professional classes in avoiding jury service which was doing great damage to the system.
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: My Lords, the noble Lord makes a valid point indeed.
Noble Lords: Oh.
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: My Lords, I referred to the noble Lord's last point. I could not possibly agree with or comment upon his assertion in relation to my right honourable and learned friend the Lord Chancellor. I heard what was said from behind, but I am sure that the noble Lord, Lord McNally, would not seek the chairmanship or foremanship himself on any prospective jury. However, the noble Lord makes a valid point. Jurors are supposed to be a jury of one's peers, not simply a jury of those who are willing. We need a broad spectrum and representative number of people on our juries if we are to get a balanced and proper decision made.
Lord Thomas of Gresford: My Lords, the Minister refers to the discretion of the summoning officer; but she will know that in long cases, the judge frequently excuses people who have holidays that are booked, who are carers, who are proprietors of sole businesses, and so on. Is anything that she says today intended to interfere with that discretion?
Baroness Scotland of Asthal: My Lords, I do not think that it is intended to interfere with that discretion. What I am saying is that all those points should properly be put, under the new system, to the summoning officer, who would then exercise a discretion to exclude.

North East Regional Assembly: All-postal Ballot
3.10 p.m.
Baroness Hanham Baroness Hanham asked Her Majesty's Government:
Why, in light of the Electoral Commission's report of 27 August, they propose to proceed with an all-postal ballot in the referendum for the North East Regional Assembly.
The Minister of State, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (Lord Rooker): My Lords, it is in the light of the Electoral Commission's report as published on 27 August in relation to the North East Regional Assembly referendum that the Government are proceeding as planned.
Baroness Hanham: My Lords, does the Minister not agree that with the Electoral Commission's report, the Government have now comprehensively lost the argument about all-postal voting? Does he not agree that the one that will take place in the north-east can do so only on the basis that the Government bounced Parliament into a decision before the Electoral Commission was able to report on the all-postal pilots? Has the Minister noted the Electoral Commission's position that it can offer no reassurances that the ballot in the north-east will be risk-free? Does he not now wish that he had left untampered with the position of voting in this country?
Lord Rooker: My Lords, I can only draw the noble Baroness's attention, and that of the House, to the report of the Electoral Commission, published on 27 August, which I presume that she has read. The fifth paragraph of the report made the matter quite clear when it said:
"In relation to the North East referendum, our conclusion is that the referendum should proceed as an all-postal ballot without major changes to the process".
The Electoral Commission gave a series of other reasons why it believed the north-east referendum should proceed, including the fact that Parliament had approved the orders and that counting officers are currently making the necessary arrangements. It said that no evidence had been found,
"that an all-postal referendum in the North East would be unsafe in terms of fraud or malpractice".
The commission also said that:
"Voters and election professionals in the North East have substantial previous experience of all-postal ballots".
and that the,
"public is more positive about all-postal voting £hellip; in the North East".
That is the position. The Electoral Commission said that its conclusion was that what was planned for the north-east should proceed, and that is what is going to happen.
Baroness Maddock: My Lords, given that the ballot will be all-postal in the north-east referendum in the

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autumn, could the Minister ensure that there are sufficient drop-off points within rural Northumberland to ensure that people do not have to travel long distances? Noble Lords will know that I am married to the Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed. In that role, I drive him round every year on his surgery tour of his constituency. Last week, many people asked us whether we could get something done to ensure that people had the opportunity to drop off their postal vote in person and not travel too far.
Lord Rooker: My Lords, the short answer to the noble Baroness's question is, yes. I cannot give precise numbers, but those matters are being considered. The matter was raised on 22 July—that there will be sufficient drop-off points for people to place their ballot paper, which they have received by post, at an appropriate and convenient location.
Lord Renton of Mount Harry: My Lords, broadening the subject slightly, could the Minister tell noble Lords what, other than political considerations, are the criteria by which the Government decide on having referendums on regional assemblies in some parts of the country but not in others?
Lord Rooker: My Lords, I know that I shall get myself into trouble with the noble Lord for saying this, but a few weeks ago the powers that be in this place sent everyone a note that said that supplementary questions should be confined to the subject of the original Question. I have nothing to add to what I have already said.
Baroness Knight of Collingtree: My Lords, on the particular Question that the House is addressing, how concerned is the Minister about the clear allegations of fraud in Birmingham in particular—a place that he and I know well? Is that not something that has greatly concerned the people of Birmingham, because the proof seems to be very clear?
Lord Rooker: My Lords, I do not want to fall out with the noble Baroness either, but I quote again from the report of the Electoral Commission, to be found on its website. It says:
"To the Commission's knowledge, no allegations of electoral fraud made in the North East in relation to the June all-postal pilot scheme have led to formal prosecutions".
It is the most risk-free area of the country. I am not in a position—for the reasons that I have just given, notwithstanding the fact that I am not briefed on the issue—to speak about anything other than the northeast referendum.
In relation to the earlier question that I was asked, our intention is to have one drop-off point for every 50,000 voters, and more at the counting officer's discretion—so at least the constituencies would be covered.
Lord Goodhart: My Lords, taking into account the Electoral Commission's report, do the Government
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have any proposals to go forward with further all-postal pilots in the local elections next year, given among other things that that is a very possible date for the next general election?
Lord Rooker: My Lords, all that I can say on that matter is that at some time during the course of next week my right honourable friend Nick Raynsford will make a Statement in the other place in relation to the other two regions.
Lord Lawson of Blaby: My Lords, the Minister has just asserted that the north-east of England is the most risk-free area of the entire country. What is his evidence for that statement?
Lord Rooker: My Lords, as I have said, that matter is dealt with in the two-page report of the Electoral Commission on its website. That region has more experience, because there have been more postal pilots in the north-east region than any other region in the country. Bearing in mind that it is quite a small region in terms of percentage of population, the figure is quite high. As I have said, the commission's report states:
"To the Commission's knowledge, no allegations of electoral fraud made in the North East in relation to the June all-postal pilot scheme have led to formal prosecutions … The public is more positive about all-postal voting",
in that area.
With all the background and reasons given in the Electoral Commission's report, it also makes the point—I accept this—that Parliament had already approved the issue. However, the Government said that if there was opposition by the Electoral Commission, we would not proceed. That is what we meant; but it has turned out not to be the case with regard to the north-east.
Lord Clark of Windermere: My Lords, would my noble friend the Minister confirm to the House that the Electoral Commissioner has actually endorsed Parliament's decision to go ahead with an all-postal ballot for the referendums in the north-east?
Lord Rooker: My Lords, yes, that is precisely the point that is made in the Electoral Commission's report.
Lord Redesdale: My Lords, the Minister has already stated that it is up to the returning officer to allow one drop-off point for 50,000 people, but that more could be arranged. As parts of Northumberland are the most sparsely populated areas in England, could a geographically rather than numerically based drop-off point be arranged? Where I live, people could travel 30 miles to a drop-off point and still not meet that figure of 50,000.
Lord Rooker: My Lords, we have every confidence in the professional work of the counting officers to make an absolute success of this referendum and make sure that it is as convenient for people as possible. It is different from the June election, in that it is a

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referendum and therefore not about personalities or candidates. It is in everyone's interest that everyone has the right to participate, so everyone will get a postal ballot, and it will be ensured that the ballots are delivered and printed properly. We have every confidence that the counting officer will make available drop-off points for ballot papers at convenient locations in sparsely populated areas.
Baroness Hanham: My Lords, does the Minister agree that the Electoral Commission's key recommendation was that there should never again be an all-postal ballot in this country? Does he not agree that the Electoral Commission in its opening statement said that it was able to go along with the north-east all-postal ballot only because the Government had already had that passed through Parliament? It did not give a ringing endorsement of that ballot; it said that it could give no reassurances that the ballot would be safe. Does the Minister agree that that is against the background of the recommendation that there should never again be an all-postal ballot in this country.
Lord Rooker: My Lords, with due respect, if that was the issue that the noble Baroness wanted to raise, she should have asked that question. The Question she asked was specifically about the north-east, where there is going to be one referendum. There are no referendums planned elsewhere.
I do not want to mislead the noble Baroness on the commission's report, which is only two pages long. It made the point that:
"In relation to the North East referendum, our conclusion is that the referendum should proceed as an all-postal ballot without major changes to the process".
It then went on to say:
"In our view, it would be a far greater risk to the process if significant changes were to be made now than if the referendum were to continue as planned".
The document also states:
"Our judgment is also based on a number of additional factors that are specific to this referendum. These are as follows:".
The document listed some of the points that I made earlier; namely, Parliament had approved the order; counting officers are making the necessary arrangements; the form of the postal balloting for the referendum is different and an improvement on the piloted form in June; there is no evidence that an all-postal referendum in the north-east would be unsafe in terms of fraud and malpractice and the relevant voters have experience of all-postal ballots. All those reasons were given in the report to justify its conclusion that the referendum should proceed.
The Earl of Northesk: My Lords, will the Minister confirm that the Government have endorsed the findings of the Electoral Commission by withdrawing the regulations in respect of the other two areas?
Lord Rooker: My Lords, that cannot be the case because we did not move the regulations on 22 July, which, of course, was five weeks before the report was received and published.

Afghanistan: Harrier GR7s
3.21 p.m.
Lord Garden Lord Garden asked Her Majesty's Government:
What role they envisage for the six Harrier GR7s that are to be deployed in Afghanistan.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Ministry of Defence (Lord Bach): My Lords, the Harrier GR7s deploying to Afghanistan will provide, first, close air support both to coalition forces and to the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF); secondly, a reconnaissance capability to support ISAF; and, thirdly, air presence patrols as part of ISAF's support for the security of the Afghan elections.
Lord Garden: My Lords, I am most grateful to the Minister for that Answer. I am sure that we all wish the crews undertaking this task well at what is an important time in Afghanistan. Hamid Karzai and Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, the NATO Secretary-General, asked for more troops and more helicopters. Can the Minister tell us how many of those we have at the moment in Afghanistan supporting ISAF, and how he intends to increase them ahead of the election?
Lord Bach: My Lords, as I understand it, a number of other aircraft are already in Afghanistan. There are American aircraft and Dutch attack helicopters. We were also invited to provide some aircraft. As I understand it, there are two Lynx helicopters in Afghanistan at the present time. I do not think that anyone, least of all those in Afghanistan, could accuse the United Kingdom of not playing its absolutely full part in trying to bring that country back to freedom.
Lord Astor of Hever: My Lords, can the Minister confirm that this deployment will not delay the upgrading of the GR7s to the GR9 standard?
Lord Bach: Yes, my Lords.
Lord Craig of Radley: My Lords, will the Minister remind the House what reductions in the Harrier force, all types, are in prospect? Are those reductions additional to the withdrawal of fast jet aircraft announced by the MoD on 20 July, which included the whole of the Jaguar force?
Lord Bach: My Lords, no reductions were made to the Harrier force as a result of the recent White Paper.
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, will the Minister answer the question asked by my noble friend Lord Garden; namely, are we providing the necessary increase in forces for the elections?
Lord Bach: My Lords, as I believe noble Lords know, the position in Afghanistan generally is fragile. Both the coalition and NATO are doing everything that is within our power to make sure that that fragility

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does not break. That is why it is so important that the elections for the presidency of that country to be held on 9 October go ahead and are seen, as far as is possible, to be free and fair. As I understand it, all requests that have been made have been answered; certainly, the United Kingdom has done that.
Lord Tomlinson: My Lords, while it is right and proper that we are playing our full part through NATO in helping in the sad situation in Afghanistan, will my noble friend use his influence with other countries and other parts of government to make sure that we have a clear strategy for the destruction of the poppy harvest, which accounts for 30 per cent of the Afghan gross national product at the present time, as without that destruction there will be a continual fuelling of the warlords and a continuing financing of terrorism?
Lord Bach: My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend for raising that issue. He will know that our policy is to assist the Afghans in eliminating the cultivation of opium. Our country is the G8 nation with lead responsibility for assisting the Afghan Transitional Authority in countering the narcotics industry in its country. With other nations we are providing a range of support to the Transitional Authority. This includes helping to develop Afghanistan's own counter-narcotics capabilities and institutions, to reduce drug use in that country and assisting with its economic reconstruction to provide alternative livelihoods for poppy farmers.
Lord Redesdale: My Lords, I estimate very roughly that the six GR7s which are to be deployed will need ground crew of about 350 personnel. How many soldiers will be needed to protect that ground crew, or are they expected to protect themselves? Will the RAF Regiment be deployed in that role? Is its future still under threat?
Lord Bach: My Lords, the regiment's future is not under threat. I think that the noble Lord knows that. We are deploying temporarily 53 Field Squadron (Airfield Support) Royal Engineers, who are based at Waterbeach. They will carry out some minor work necessary to operate the Harriers from Kandahar airfield. Initially, we shall deploy some 315 members of the Army and the RAF altogether, but that should eventually settle at a detachment of about 230 personnel. Of course, the protection of all those troops will he of fundamental importance.
Lord Avebury: My Lords, while acknowledging that the United Kingdom has done more than any other member of NATO in making the security improvements that are necessary for a free and fair election, does the Minister really consider that, bearing in mind that the international NGOs have withdrawn almost entirely to Kabul with a few in Kandahar, the conditions exist where people can go to the polling stations confident that they will be safe? Does the
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Minister acknowledge that President Karzai has asked for many more troops on the ground than NATO has provided?
Lord Bach: My Lords, as the noble Lord knows, President Karzai made a public plea for additional forces at the Istanbul summit in June this year. The response has been two extra NATO battalions, one Spanish, one Italian, available for operations in and around Mazar-i-Sharif and Konduz respectively. A third US battalion will be held at high readiness in Europe for deployment if necessary. I have already mentioned that the Dutch have aircraft there including six F16s and a support tanker to mount air presence patrols. Our Harriers will also be able to assist. Individual PRTs have been temporarily reinforced. Coalition security assistance is less clear but will certainly include additional air sorties. Everyone knows that the elections will be difficult, but a huge amount of effort has gone into registration, a great deal of it successful.

Armed Forces (Pensions and Compensation) Bill
3.28 p.m.
Report received.
Clause 1 [Pension and compensation schemes: armed and reserve forces]:
Lord Morris of Manchester Lord Morris of Manchester moved Amendment No. 1:
Page 1, line 14, at end insert—
"( ) Any scheme established under subsection (2) must provide that there shall be no onus on any claimant under the scheme to prove the fulfilment of any conditions for a claim thereunder and that the benefit of any reasonable doubt shall be given to the claimant."
The noble Lord said: My Lords, I beg to move Amendment No. 1. In doing so, I will speak also to Amendment No. 15 which, like my first amendment, concerns the MoD's hugely important intention to shift the burden of doubt for benefits for service-related incapacity and bereavement away from the Secretary of State to the claimant. My amendment and the new clause have the backing of noble Lords in all parts of the House. They include three former Chiefs of the Defence Staff.
I have two interests to declare: as honorary parliamentary adviser over many years to the Royal British Legion and vice-president of the War Widows' Association. I speak also as the son of a war widow—orphaned when I was seven—and from personal experience of active service with Middle East Land Forces when Israel was still Palestine and British troops stood between rival terrorist groups that had little to learn from Al'Qaeda.
It well befits the importance of the issue addressed by my amendments that they are being debated first today. For the issue is one of profound significance for service personnel, as it is too for ex-service men and

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women, now in broken health, who were prepared to lay down their lives in our service, and the bereaved families of those who did so.
Nothing was more strikingly clear at Second Reading—and again in Committee—than the near consensual support for the purpose of this amendment and new clause. Nor could it have been made clearer that the ex-service community was at one in its support. Indeed, in this my 40th year in Parliament, I cannot readily recall that community ever being so totally united on any legislative issue as it is now in opposing the MoD's plan to switch the burden of proof from the Secretary of State to the claimant.
For 60 years that burden has rested not on the claimant to show that death, illness or injury was due to service, but firmly on the Secretary of State to disprove the case. All the claimant is required to do is raise a "reasonable doubt" for the claim to succeed. That this is the present war pensions scheme's distinguishing feature was made pikestaff plain by my noble friend when replying on 22 January to my Starred Question about the case of the late Major Ian Hill, following the coroner's landmark finding at the inquest into his death. "I can say", my noble friend told the House,
"that war widows pensions are paid when death is deemed to be due to service, and that the widow has to raise only a reasonable doubt for claims to succeed".—[Official Report, 22/1/04: col. 1138.]
This most important safeguard in the existing war pensions scheme was the core of my noble friend's justification of the handling of Major Hill's case and clearly, in his view, the scheme's crowning virtue.
Yet now the MoD plans to abandon that safeguard: to dump "reasonable doubt" and substitute a "balance of probabilities" as the test of entitlement, so relieving itself of the onus of proof.
The House of Commons Defence Committee describes that fundamental change of policy thus:
"Under the existing scheme, it is for the Secretary of State to show beyond reasonable doubt that Service has not played any part in causing or worsening the condition for which a claim is made. Under the new proposals, the standard of proof is changed to a 'balance of probabilities' with the onus of proof on the claimant to make the case".
The Royal British Legion has documented the very serious effects of that for incapacitated service personnel and widows alike. Taken together with the proposal to reduce to five years the time-limit for making a claim—which the MoD also now proposes—it will cut the number of successful claims by 60 per cent.
That finding was based on scrupulous analysis of the vast range of casework undertaken by the Legion, acting for claimants in 93 per cent of all represented appeals at tribunals for war pensions, and totalling some 4,000 cases in the past year alone. Most came to the Legion in respect of claims rejected by the Veterans Agency.
The Government's response was to cast doubt on the Legion's analysis, while doing nothing whatever to produce one of their own. Attempting to allay criticism of their negative stance, they told the House of Commons:
"We have now joined with the Royal British Legion to consider the methodology used".
That was not true. They did not join in discussion with the Legion. Even if they had, it was up to them to produce a valid statistical analysis of their own, based on data readily available to Ministers.
Even now, as was made plain to the Deputy Chief of the Defence Staff (Personnel) in a letter Brigadier Ian Townsend, secretary-general of the Legion, sent to him on 6 September, the MoD appears prepared to correspond and talk only about new forms of words for implementing and facilitating a different burden and standard of proof. It has not been prepared to consult about the clear commitment to protect the basic safeguard—now vouchsafed by a standard of proof based on "reasonable doubt"—on which the ex-service community insists.
The Legion's legal adviser has told my noble friend that there has been no meaningful discussion whatever. Official pretence that a dialogue has been maintained with the Legion is just not so and is lucidly disposed of in Brigadier Townsend's letter.
Meanwhile, the MoD still wastes time bogusly claiming that a "balance of probabilities" test is more modern and fairer than "reasonable doubt". In fact, as noble Lords pointed out at Second Reading, that test is as "old as the hills". It was indeed replaced, for good reason, by "reasonable doubt" when that much newer test was brought into the war pensions scheme in 1943. So what the Government now propose is to turn the clock back 60 years.
The "reasonable doubt" test acknowledges that service in the Armed Forces cannot be compared with other occupations. It is unique, involving unlimited liability to defend the interests of this country, and the present test recognises that uniqueness.
The scale of the difference between service in the Armed Forces and other employment, as the House of Commons Defence Committee has said, is that:
"Armed Forces personnel can be asked to die for their country, which makes compensation for injury an entirely different matter for them than for civilians.
"There can be no proper basis for comparing the Armed Forces Scheme…with schemes for other workers who simply are not exposed to anything remotely similar to the dangers and uncertainties of service factors".
Service personnel are sent to the four corners of the globe at a moment's notice. They have no conditions of employment. The environment in which they serve is not a workplace governed by the legislation that safeguards civilian workers. They have no trade unions, as have civil servants and the fire service, nor a federation as do the police. They have no rights to take action on pay, working conditions or anything else. Indeed, when civilian public sector workers exercise their industrial right to strike, the Armed Forces can be ordered to do their work.
So much for the continuing insistence of Ministers that ending the safeguard of "reasonable doubt" is justified because no clear distinction can be drawn between service in the Armed Forces and public sector civilian employment.
Since Committee, my noble friend has maintained his plea of "lack of resources" for the MoD's failure to produce its own statistical analysis of the effect of dumping "reasonable doubt" on the success rate of pension claims. He wrote on 22 July to the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Bramall—who had left no one in any doubt of his disquiet with that plea—to say that,
"an exercise of this sort would be costly",
without offering the merest guidance on the MoD's estimate of the cost of making one.
One unintended recipient of my noble friend's letter was the Royal British Legion, and I quote its reaction:
"Although it crudely misrepresents the Legion—subjecting us to totally unmerited criticism—the MoD did not copy Lord Bach's letter to us".
In a response to that letter, sent to noble Lords by Colonel Terry English, the Legion revealed that in fact the MoD had, after all, made an estimate of the financial effect of the change of policy on burden of proof, in very precise terms, at a meeting with it on 15 July—seven days before my noble friend's letter to the noble and gallant Lord.
Recalling the MoD's statement that the policy change was not about saving money, Colonel English writes:
"Yet at a meeting I attended at the Department, accompanied by the Legion's legal adviser, we were told by a senior official that, if the amendments tabled by Lord Morris of Manchester are accepted, it will cost the department £200 million."
He continues:
"Of course there is another way of stating that proposition, namely that if Lord Morris' amendments are not accepted, it will cost disabled ex-service men and women—and the dependants of those who lay down their lives—the same £200 million."
The disclosure of that figure—which has been confirmed to me both by Peter Knight, the Legion's legal adviser and its pensions officer, Tom House, who was also at the meeting on 15 July—has another deeply serious implication. It is that the MoD, while rejecting calls for it to undertake a statistical analysis of the effect of its proposal on grounds of cost, must in truth already have done one. Otherwise how could they have arrived at the figure of £200 million? Why could that figure not first have been given to this House when the subject of costs was raised at length by the noble and gallant Lords, Lord Bramall and Lord Craig, the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale, and others in Committee? And when was my noble friend first aware of the figure of £200 million?
It is the revelation of that figure of £200 million that gave the lie to any claim of meaningful consultation with the Legion on the department's policy on burden and standard of proof. After all, how can it be claimed that the department was consulting on the issue when it had already made a studiedly precise calculation of the outcome? Who wants to be "consulted" about a fait accompli? And had MoD officials any authority in talking to the Legion to alter the figure of £200 million?
Certainly none of us here can any longer be surprised by the depth of dismay felt in the ex-service community about official reaction to their concern over dumping the safeguard of "reasonable doubt" in deciding service-related incapacity and bereavement claims. Nor can there be any doubt where public opinion stands on a policy that prioritises saving on incapacitated ex-service men and women and bereaved families.
I conclude with a brief message from a noble Lord who cannot be here for this debate. It comes from my noble friend Lord Callaghan who, having been glad to hear of my amendment and new clause, wrote to say he would not support any change that could affect adversely the present arrangements about pensions in the Armed Forces. His short and moving letter is as eloquent a message of support as one could ever wish for in striving to keep faith with brave men and women who serve this country so well and, by so doing, ensure that right is done. I beg to move.
Lord Astor of Hever: My Lords, we, on these Benches support the amendment and the noble Lord, Lord Morris of Manchester, has made an excellent case for its acceptance. I am not sure that the MoD appreciates the depth of feeling felt by members of the ex-service community regarding this issue. As the noble Lord said, service in the Armed Forces cannot be compared with other occupations. It is unique, involving unlimited liability to the demands of the Crown in protecting this country's interests. The retention of "reasonable doubt" recognises that uniqueness.
Those serving in the Armed Forces are exposed to special risks to which others in the community, including civilian public sector workers, are not. Medical knowledge is far from perfect. The aetiology of many remedial conditions is unknown. The interaction of exposure to hazards and conditions faced by service personnel cannot always be proved by them, in an environment of active service, on a balance of probabilities. Do we expect this standard of proof of them?
This is not a question about a modern standard of proof, advancements in medical knowledge, improved record keeping or what is acceptable in a civil court. It is a question of whether noble Lords consider, as a change of fundamental policy, that the burden of proof should now swing in favour of the Secretary of State, to the detriment of the serviceman or woman.
3.45 p.m.
Lord Redesdale: My Lords, these Benches also support the amendment tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Morris of Manchester, especially the moving way that he presented his case. The issue, which was mentioned by many noble Lords at Second Reading, is that the proposal is seen as being cost-neutral—therefore there will be winners and losers. The £200 million that will be saved under the new burden

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of proof will go into some of the improvements in the scheme—and we support the scheme as it is set out because some aspects of it are valuable.
The question before us is whether the safeguards are sufficient considering the real problems faced by members of the Armed Forces, who put themselves in harm's way. That is a very different situation from many others who serve us in different areas of government. We have real concerns that the Government have perhaps gone too far on this issue, which is one that I hope the noble Lord, Lord Morris, will consider pressing this afternoon and give the other place a chance to look again at the amendment.
Lord Craig of Radley: My Lords, I support the amendment tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Morris, to which he spoke so admirably. It must be realised that the cost-neutral arrangement was not just Treasury-inspired, but also reflected a view taken within the Ministry of Defence itself. This is a rare opportunity to get the arrangements for Armed Forces pensions and compensation dealt with. They should be dealt with against the concept of best practice and not just cost neutrality. I do not support the concept of changing the burden of proof, as has been proposed, because it is right that the best practice for the Armed Forces, bearing in mind their special nature and the way in which they have been treated in the past, should be for the present arrangements to continue.
Lord Dean of Harptree: My Lords, perhaps I may declare an interest as a war pensioner and I had some involvement in these matters in the 1970s when I was a Minister for war pensions. There is a big difference between the Second World War and now—and the threats which the men and women of our Armed Forces have to face. During the Second World War we were dealing, for the most part, with disciplined enemies who wore uniform and who, for the most part, observed the conventions of war. As we all know, we are now dealing with a much more dangerous and ruthless enemy who pops up all over the place and has no concern whatever for decent human standards. That is the big difference and I should thank the noble Lord, Lord Morris, and my noble friend Lord Astor, who have made clear that this difference means that the men and women in our Armed Forces are now exposed to much greater dangers than they were in the Second World War. This is therefore not the time to make it more difficult for them or their families to claim compensation.
Why do men and women join the Armed Forces even today? There are a variety of reasons, but two are always dominant. The first is pride in belonging to the best Armed Forces in the world and the second is the desire to ensure that the honour and integrity of Britain is upheld wherever their services are needed. Alas, there will be casualties, as we all know. It is a sad fact, but it is true. At least we can give to those who are casualties and to their families the knowledge that they will receive fair compensation, effective benefits and, as the noble Lord, Lord Morris, states in his amendment,
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"the benefit of any reasonable doubt".
The Minister is a kind-hearted man and I am pleased to see him in his place. I hope that on this occasion his brief does not contain the word "Resist". He has heard from all parts of the House a powerful plea against making compensation more difficult to claim. I hope that the Minister will not disappoint us today.
Lord Ashley of Stoke: My Lords, the unacceptable proposals from the Government will constitute a serious blow to our Armed Service personnel and their families and I am hard-put to understand why the Government insist on them. It may well be that such proposals are part of a disturbing pattern.
Wherever and whenever British servicemen are stationed—the Balkans, Afghanistan, Iraq and other countries across the globe and during the First and Second World Wars—Ministers of successive governments always say that they are special people doing a special job and they pay tribute to their tenacity, skill and courage. However, when it comes to discussing payments for injuries and deaths incurred in those special circumstances, it is a different story—the service personnel are not quite so special.
In the early 1980s, I began campaigning in the House of Commons for nuclear test veterans. I received negative answer after negative answer from governments. Year after year they maintained their refusals. They also maintained the bitterness and sadness of nuclear test veterans who feel that they are entitled to payment. However, governments did not see them as special people requiring compensation. I have no doubt that Gulf War veterans feel exactly the same, despite the years of efforts to give them a proper, reasonable income. If these government proposals are agreed to, we will have a fresh batch of disturbed, frustrated, angry, saddened servicemen. Will governments never learn?
The Government's argument that the proposals will lead to a fairer system is unsustainable, especially in the light of the British Legion's case, as deployed admirably by my noble friend Lord Morris. Colonel English and his colleagues have put forward clear arguments in favour of rejecting the proposals and voting for my noble friend's amendment. If we come to criticise the British Legion, we are being misled. The British Legion is a very reputable, solid, responsible organisation not given to misleading forecasts. I hope that the Government will accept its case, as do many of us in this House.
The special circumstances of the Armed Forces do not change simply because the Government have taken a fancy to what they call "modern practice". The special circumstances are, by definition, special circumstances and they impose an obligation on government to pay special awards. That is the simple, basic case and any chance to shuffle these people in with the clerks, doctors and nurses is bound to fail and is unconvincing.
The Ministry of Defence is primarily concerned with tactics—tactics over a wide range. I suggest that the best tactic for the MoD today is gracefully to accept

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this amendment, thereby avoiding a great deal of trouble for itself and for the men and women involved. The bonus in that will be that justice will be seen to be done and the people who will feel the results of the decision will be the servicemen and servicewomen.
Viscount Slim: My Lords, in Committee, the Minister was kind enough to brief me in great detail on the problems surrounding this amendment which was bound to be put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Morris of Manchester. I am afraid I was not convinced by his kind and lengthy peroration and I support the noble Lord, Lord Morris, in his amendment.
Since then, I have spoken to a large number of ex-servicemen from the war and since. The first thing they say is, "Of course, they don't trust us, do they? They are putting these new rules in place because they think we're trying to swing the lead and get away with it".
Perhaps like me, noble Lords have spoken to the excellent people in Blackpool who handle the payments. They say that one or two people do swing the lead and get through. My personal view is that it is better to pay them something and not persecute those who are completely honest.
This is an unhappy step. I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale, who has studied it in great detail and has experience of it, was right in saying that of course the £200 million will be put to good use elsewhere. I have a nasty feeling that the Ministry of Defence will breathe a sigh of relief and say, "That's £200 million off the amount of money we have been told to cut this year".
I am therefore not convinced and I ask the Minister and the Government to think again. The amendments that have been tabled are not political; they are cross-party. They are trying to do good and remember those who have been forgotten over the years in pensions and payment. I believe that they make a good Bill. No one is complaining about what will happen to the soldiers, sailors and airmen of today. They will get a good deal. I am with the noble Lord, Lord Morris, on this issue and I urge the Government to think again.
Lord Corbett of Castle Vale: My Lords, it is both sad and wrong that the Government should proceed with this proposed change in the face of opposition from the Royal British Legion and all those on whose behalf it works. The fact is that the Government have failed to make their case. They have not convinced those at whom this new scheme is aimed that it is fair and just, as opposed to what is in place at present.
It is worse than that because, as my noble friend Lord Morris of Manchester said, undertakings were given in another place to work with the Royal British Legion. The Minister shakes his head. Does he want to say something?
4 p.m.
Lord Bach: My Lords, I do want to interrupt and of course I did not want to interrupt the mover of the amendment, who chose the words that he used. But I have to say that the very serious allegations made by
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my noble friend Lord Morris concerning the Ministry of Defence's behaviour in its dealings with the Royal British Legion are denied completely. I do not think that my noble friend, whose opinions I respect very much, should simply adopt what my noble friend Lord Morris of Manchester said on this matter. There is clearly a disagreement between the two parties about the way in which negotiations did or did not take place. But I think that he would be wrong and foolish to accept all that was said by my noble friend Lord Morris of Manchester. If he has other arguments, I suspect that they are more valuable than the ones concerning the Royal British Legion's attitude towards the Ministry of Defence at present.
Lord Corbett of Castle Vale: My Lords, I hear what my noble friend has to say, but it brings me back to the first point. It is certainly not the view of the Royal British Legion that the Ministry of Defence has dealt with it properly over this matter. The Ministry of Defence rejects the arguments put forward by the Royal British Legion on the back of its analysis that 60 per cent of claimants who would have succeeded under the present rules are likely to fail under the new ones. I recall from copies of correspondence that I have seen that undertakings were given in the House of Commons to try to investigate that matter jointly with the Royal British Legion. That has not been done. As my noble friend—
Lord Bach: My Lords, I am sorry to interrupt my noble friend again. It has not been done because the Royal British Legion cancelled the meeting at which it was due to be discussed. Since then, it has said in a letter that it has no intention of doing so. That is the reason it has not been done.
Lord Corbett of Castle Vale: My Lords, again, I hear what my noble friend says but that is a completely different argument from one used earlier where my noble friend himself said in a letter dated 22 July—unfortunately it does not say to whom it was sent; we shall assume that it was to the Royal British Legion—that,
"the MOD had not offered to do its own analysis to compare with that of the [Royal British Legion]".
It goes on to say that that was mainly because of a lack of resources. Which is it? Is it not worth doing or do we not have the money to do it? I do not think that my noble friend can have this both ways.
As I said, my main point is the one with which I started: the Royal British Legion has not been persuaded with regard to this part of the changes which the Government propose to make, and I think that it is very wrong of the Government to persist in this matter without trying harder to obtain such an agreement.
I also say to my noble friend that all of us in this House and this Parliament are very proud to pay proper tribute not simply to what we ask service personnel to do on our behalf around the world but to the way in which they carry out those responsibilities. The nub of the argument in favour of the amendrnent

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is that we should take the same pride in circumstances where the health of service personnel is impaired or their medical condition worsened by carrying out those duties as we do in the way in which we compensate them for what happens to their health when they respond to the requests and the responsibilities which we place upon them.
I say to my noble friend that I think that all the voices around this Chamber should give him reason—I put it no higher—to doubt the wisdom of the Government in persisting in their opposition to the amendment.
Baroness Dean of Thornton-le-Fylde: My Lords, I rise with some trepidation because I do not fully support the speeches made this afternoon—not least that of my noble friend Lord Morris. I have taken part in this Bill from the beginning and, like many Members of this House, I too have received enormous amounts of briefing from the Royal British Legion. The impression I have had is that the Royal British Legion has not been prepared to move on this issue.
We know that it is a difficult issue and I count myself among Members of this House who want the very best for our Armed Forces—not least this new pension scheme. The scheme will cost money but it will improve the lot of service personnel and their families enormously—far more than at present. We are always being told that there are packages, and the term "cost neutral" is one that rolls off the tongue of the Treasury very easily. It is not one that I accept, particularly in regard to the defence of this country and our Armed Forces.
But the difficulty that I have with the amendment—I do not know whether my noble friend Lord Morris will push it to a vote today—is that we have not yet heard what the Minister has to say. I am concerned if the Royal British Legion has cancelled a meeting, and I have not had explained to me how the figure of 60 per cent is arrived at.
With regard to the other part of the argument, I think that there is a case for having a standard burden of proof. The Armed Forces should be treated specially and they deserve our support in this House, but there are other emergency services in this country and people who are not in the Armed Forces who work in extremely dangerous conditions resulting in injuries and lifelong ill health.
Therefore, I am rather concerned about the amendment. If it is agreed to, I am concerned about its impact on the Armed Forces (Pensions and Compensation) Bill. I am not saying that one should trade one off against the other; that is not a proper way in which to conduct oneself. Nevertheless, I think that in these situations one has to listen, and we must each sometimes take on board the arguments that are being made. I am not sure that the Royal British Legion has
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been prepared to do that. It is an organisation for which I have great admiration but it is the organisation which represents ex-service personnel.
Baroness Park of Monmouth: My Lords, first, we must remember that the forces do not have a trade union; the Royal British Legion is their trade union. Secondly, I entirely take the point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Dean, about other people who have problems.
But the point is that the problems of the Armed Forces are much greater. First, they are exposed to things such as Gulf War illness. That is not a very common illness in this country and it has taken them a long time to be heard on that issue. Secondly, precisely because they have no union and no voice, the Armed Forces need to be spoken for much more loudly. All the other groups can be spoken for by their various supporters. We are basically their trade union and we must ensure that, if this situation remains, the onus of proof rests on the Secretary of State. I say that not least because I understand that if people are to prove the point themselves, they will not be eligible for legal aid. What kind of man will, with great difficulty, try to fight the Government on the issue of Gulf War illness? Where will he get the money to fund that? Why should he have to fund himself?
It seems to me to be absolutely simple: this is a special case. We and, above all, the Royal British Legion are their voice. Other possible cases should be dealt with in their own way, in their own time and by their own pressure groups. There should be no doubt about this: we should support the noble Lord, Lord Morris of Manchester.
Lord Bach: My Lords, I shall start by making a somewhat surprising statement and I shall actually mean it. I thank noble Lords for the excellent contributions that they have made and for the depth of feeling and passion with which they have spoken on this subject. I am particularly sorry to have interrupted my noble friend Lord Corbett and I am grateful to him for giving way to me twice. I believe it was important to make those points to him. I have listened very carefully to all that has been said.
I want to argue to your Lordships why it would be a serious error for the House to use its heart rather than its head and to vote for the amendment moved by my noble friend Lord Morris of Manchester. I start by noting that no single element of the new pension and compensation schemes can or should be considered in isolation. That is the danger of this amendment. The Bill provides for a comprehensive package of new pension and compensation arrangements suitable for today's Armed Forces. The arrangements include provisions that represent considerable improvements on the current schemes. Noble Lords will know what I am talking about when I mention very significantly improved widows' and widowers' pension benefits, increased death-in-service benefits at four times pay instead of the one-and-a-half at present—noble and gallant Lords and noble Lords have argued for that in

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this House for many years—provision for unmarried partners and better focus of compensation benefits on the more severely disabled.
Many of the provisions respond to concerns about the current arrangements that have been voiced over the years. But I stress that the two schemes can only proceed together. They support and complement each other in a balanced package—I am sorry to have to use that word—designed to meet the needs of Armed Forces personnel and their families in this century. Veterans' organisations want to see the package implemented as soon as possible because of the considerable improvement in benefits, and I venture to say that the Armed Forces want to see these schemes introduced as soon as possible because they are to their benefit. Certainly the Chiefs of Staff representing the Armed Forces support the schemes.
I have to tell the House that significant changes to any area affecting either the coherence or the affordability of the schemes would inevitably cause us to look again at the overall package and might mean that we are unable to progress with some or all of the features that it currently contains. What is on offer is an overall package that redistributes resources and that better meets our manning needs and employer responsibilities.
It is just not affordable to keep the best of the old and the best of the new. If the Bill were to fall the improvements would fall with it, improvements that are clearly highly valued by many within the ex-service community and, of course, by many noble Lords who have spoken in favour of the amendment. That is why this amendment about the burden and standard of proof is so significant. If it is carried, it will have severe implications for the rest of the Bill.
The Earl of Onslow: My Lords, is that not called moral blackmail?
Lord Bach: No, my Lords, it is not called moral blackmail, or a threat or anything like that. It is a fact of life and I have no doubt that Ministers from all governments, including that which the noble Earl was happy to support, have on occasions had to make speeches of this kind, saying to the House, when it was in a particular mood and had a particular view, that it should think very carefully before doing something that may have greater consequences than just the issue upon which it is voting. I hope that the noble Earl knows me better than to think that I would try to blackmail the House, either morally or in any other way.
The Earl of Onslow: My Lords, I was not accusing the monkey of that; I was accusing the organ grinder.
Lord Bach: My Lords, I am not sure I understand that, but I believe that is an even bigger insult. In fact, I am sure it is an even bigger insult.
Lord Hurd of Westwell: My Lords, the Minister used the phrase "a fact of life". It is not a fact of life. It is a fact of government policy and Parliament exists to control and, if necessary, to change policy.
4.15 p.m.
Lord Bach: My Lords, the noble Lord is right. It is perhaps a fact of political life. Perhaps we should settle for that phrase. I do not expect to convince or to convert noble Lords to my point of view on the basis of what I have said so far.
Turning to the issue of the burden of proof, since Grand Committee we have looked again at our position and, frankly, in a spirit of compromise we have offered the Royal British Legion a revised statement of our position which I had hoped would go some way to meeting its concerns that our proposals did not represent a fair balance of responsibilities between the claimant and the department. The Royal British Legion has now responded and, disappointingly, does not appear willing to change its position or to accept it as a basis for negotiation. I realise that the revised statement falls short of its full aspiration and, of course, I respect the fact that it must make its own judgment, as must noble Lords, on such key issues.
Lord Morris of Manchester: My Lords, will my noble friend say what costing is attached to the proposals—as he calls them—that were made to the Royal British Legion? What would have been their effect on the figure of £200 million?
Lord Bach: My Lords, if the noble Lord will give me a little space, in due course I shall deal with exactly that point in my speech. First, I want to take this opportunity to explain to noble Lords what we now propose. At the risk of giving a history lesson, I shall also show why the history of the burden of proof in the war pension scheme, while it has its place in that scheme, is not appropriate for a new scheme to be introduced in 2005.
Awards in both the war pension scheme and the new compensation scheme are made for claimed injuries and illnesses with a causal link to service. Decision making in both schemes involves consideration of the service and the medical facts of the case. Where an illness is claimed, that consideration is undertaken in light of contemporary medical understanding of its causes.
Critics of our proposals, not least my noble friend Lord Morris, have compared the new scheme with only the current war pension scheme. That is not a reasonable point of view. I remind noble Lords that a large part of the benefits paid under the current arrangements for death or injury due to service come from the Armed Forces pension scheme, which uses the same standard of proof, the same burden of proof, as we have proposed for the new scheme. In other respects the new scheme is more favourable to the claimant than the existing Armed Forces pension scheme; notably on time limits, where only conditions leading to medical discharge are currently eligible.
We have sought to replace current arrangements with something that ensures a fair outcome. That has resulted in arrangements that we believe give a genuine balance between the very wide gateway to eligibility of the war pension scheme—we believe too wide—and the unreasonably restrictive rule of the current Armed Forces pension scheme. Frankly, simply to standardise,

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as my noble friend did, on the war pension scheme and to ignore the rules under which we currently pay Armed Forces pension scheme benefits is not reasonable, nor would it be affordable. Critics of our proposals have to face that fact. They must recognise that the war pension scheme is only one part of the current arrangements and, for many of those seeking compensation, it is the smaller part of what they receive.
The proposed scheme is a new scheme which will differ from the war pension scheme in respect of the burden of proof. As noble Lords have heard, under the war pension scheme, the burden of proof for claims made within seven years of termination of service rests on the Secretary of State to establish beyond reasonable doubt that the injury, illness or death is not due to service.
Under the new scheme the standard of proof will be "balance of probabilities". Since Grand Committee, we have, as I have said, looked again at our definition of the burden of proof and have proposed to the Royal British Legion a revised statement of our approach. Under this approach, the merits of the claim will be decided on the basis of the evidence from all parties, including both the claimant and the department. This evidence will be weighed on an even balance rather than by giving extra weight to the evidence of one side, based on the position of the party putting it forward, whether that happens to be the claimant or the department. If the weight of evidence shows on balance of probabilities that the claim is substantiated, then of course it will succeed.
This new approach does not place the whole of the evidential burden on the claimant. The scheme rules will provide that the Secretary of State or, at appeal, the Pensions Appeal Tribunal will decide whether, on the basis of all the relevant evidence, it is more likely than not that the injury, illness or death is due to service. That evidence will include any supporting evidence provided by the claimant. It will also include the claimant's service and medical records and any additional evidence obtained by the Secretary of State.
We recognise that it would be unreasonable to ask the claimant to obtain evidence relating to his claim held in his official service records. The scheme rules will therefore impose a duty on the Secretary of State to obtain and make available to the claimant such evidence.
Any decision taken by the Secretary of State will be subject to an appeal to the PAT, which in turn will have regard to the entire body of evidence, whether provided by claimant or Secretary of State. This will place a responsibility on the Secretary of State to provide a credible response to any evidence submitted by the claimant.
It remains our strongly held view that a "beyond reasonable doubt" standard of proof is not appropriate to a no-fault scheme and is out of line with current good practice where evidence-based decisions are the norm. We are confident that the revised statement of approach on this issue will ensure a fair balance of responsibilities and our work has shown
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that no claim would fail where there was reasonable evidence that injury, ill-health or death was due to service.
Perhaps I may briefly talk about compensation culture. I do so for a reason—gently perhaps to chide the noble Lord, Lord Astor of Hever, who has made a telling speech in the debate. I have to say that I am somewhat surprised that there is such strong support from his Benches for this amendment as expressed so far—we of course have not been through the Lobby yet—given his own party's strong position with regard to the growing compensation culture. Frankly, it seems inconsistent to condemn the growing trend towards seeking compensation at every opportunity with one breath and then with the other to support the maintenance of a balance of a burden and standard of proof which would result in awards even though—and I shall be frank with the House—the likelihood is that service was not the cause of illness or injury.
Indeed, the noble Lord's colleagues in another place could not have made their position clearer, although they came to the same view as the noble Lord, Lord Astor—I must make absolutely clear that he is consistent with what was said. They made their views clear in their helpful contributions. For example, Mr Gerald Howarth said that we should get the balance right and should ensure that we simply do not pay out to undeserving people.
The shadow Secretary of State for Defence, the honourable Nicholas Soames, made the position clear at Second Reading. He said:
"We accept that the compensation scheme is in need of reform and we welcome the opportunity to re-examine the arrangements".
He made the point, as he was entitled to, that:
"Since the Government came to power in 1997 the amounts paid by the Ministry of Defence in compensation claims have risen by a staggering 50 per cent.—£34 million to £104 million. The war pensions and compensations scheme for the armed forces have always been generous and favourable towards the claimant, but"
and I ask noble Lords to bear this in mind—
"the increases in the last three years alone suggest that even the armed forces are no longer immune from the compensation culture".—[Official Report, Commons, 22/1/04: col. 1504.]
I give way.
Lord Redesdale: My Lords, rather than entering into what seems to be a slightly political attack from the Front Bench opposite, I want to ask about something that has been niggling me. Regarding compensation culture, the saving of £200 million would be for false claims which would fail on that basis. Is that where the £200 million will be saved over the, I believe, 10 years? Otherwise, we are talking about £200 million, as the noble Lord, Lord Morris of Manchester, said, coming from claims failing that would be accepted at the moment. So, is the Minister saying that we are now actually getting rid of unjustified compensation culture, or is it just a change in the rules which makes the standard higher?
Lord Bach: My Lords, I promise the noble Lord, as I told my noble friend, that I will come to the £200 million in due course and answer his questions.

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I am not making a political point here. We are all concerned about compensation culture. Perhaps I am gently chiding the noble Lord, Lord Astor of Hever, but I hope in a friendly spirit. This is not a political debate in that sense. But there is a point about compensation culture. Everyone, using common sense and being realistic, knows that the Armed Forces are not immune from compensation culture and that under the present arrangements it frankly is too easy for people to claim that they have received an injury or an illness during service, whereas everyone knows that they almost certainly did not. But, because of the burden, and particularly the standard of proof, that person succeeds in their claim. That is what we are trying to stop.
Lord Marsh: My Lords, I follow very clearly the point the Minister is making. The problem is that compensation culture, or lead-swinging as one noble Lord suggested, is rampant and vast in its implications, but it is primarily, I would have thought, at its best—and this is a fact we have to face—in the public sector; whether it is the police, local government or education. The examples where it is exploited are well known. Is there any suggestion that a similar burden of proof should be placed throughout the structure, as is being suggested in this case?
Lord Bach: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord. As I understand it, there is no similar burden of proof to the one found in the present war pension scheme, which we say is out of date and more prone to lead to a possible compensation culture. The noble Lord is right: it is not found elsewhere. I do not want to exaggerate the danger of this in the Armed Forces because I know, as everyone in this House knows, the immense standard of quality from top to bottom that we have in our Armed Forces.
But we must not hide our faces from reality, which is that if you do have a burden and standard of proof like this, it is a temptation, frankly, to claim under it rather than not to. There can be no doubt that it has been claimed under when it should not have been. That is the point that I ask noble Lords to consider and that I am trying to make.
I have provided to a number of noble Lords—those who came to the meeting that was advertised for lunchtime today—some kind of response to the points raised on this issue in the letter from the Royal British Legion. I know that I have gone on for quite a considerable time, but I think that noble Lords who propose and support the amendment realise that it is an important amendment. Let me say a little about the history, how it developed and why we say that the present burden of proof is no longer appropriate today.
The current burden of proof was introduced in December 1943 during the Second World War. During the early years of the war, the rules of entitlement were stringent, as they had been in the First World War, and the scheme only accepted injuries that were directly attributable to or aggravated to a material extent by service—and please note these words—"during the
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war". These rules required definite evidence in contemporary records or, where those were lacking, other definite evidence which would leave no doubt in the mind of the authorities that the disablement was due to war service. Noble Lords will immediately recognise how stringent those rules were, given the circumstances prevailing at the time.
4.30 p.m.
So, faced with a large number of claims from combat and problems with keeping and accessing records, it became difficult to apply the existing rules. Changes were therefore made to remove the onus from the claimant and to relax the previously strict evidential requirements, such that the administrative burden of establishing a claim could be reduced and thus speed up decisions. But, I remind the House, eligibility remained confined to disablement due to war service. Even when the case law expanded the definition of injury to include wounds or disease, very few claims for physical or mental illness succeeded, as the accepted medical understanding was that almost all diseases were a matter of constitution and that their very nature meant that they could not be caused by service.
In 1947, the scheme was further modified to allow claims seven years after the end of service, to cover those who had left the forces early in the war and might otherwise be unable to claim. It was not until 1949 that the war pensions scheme was changed to cover all service, not just war service. When the scheme covered only war service, which involved mostly physical injuries, the requirement to prove that service was not the cause was just not a significant issue. However, once non-war service was included, it was possible for awards to be made for conditions that were almost certainly due to non-service causes, but for which the department just could not demonstrate beyond reasonable doubt that service factors played no part.
The whole House will have sympathy for anyone suffering an illness, but I cannot agree—I invite the House to say that it cannot either—that to pay compensation for conditions that are very likely to be unconnected with service is, frankly, an appropriate use of taxpayers' money. Nor is it fair to those who really have a condition, illness or injury due to service. Such cases might, for example, include cases where ageing, constitution or lifestyle—for example, diet—are by far the most likely cause.
I hope that I do not have to tell the House that I of course recognise and support the argument that we should recognise the unique, special contribution made by the Armed Forces by having a generous compensation scheme for injury or illnesses caused by service. Independent review of our proposals demonstrates that they will deliver this. Frankly, it is important that we concentrate what resources we have on cases where service is the likely cause and, in particular, focus our provision on the seriously disabled. That is what we propose. At the same time, I want to make clear that the new scheme is not a cost-cutting exercise. Our best estimate is that its cost will be broadly the same as that of current arrangements.
Frankly, we cannot afford to improve benefits for the more severely disabled and maintain the current, generous burden of proof. I invite the House to say that we have made the right decision—as I said, it is the head, rather than the heart talking—to make better provision for the more severely disabled, but not to pay benefits in those cases where the illness, injury or death is unlikely to have been caused by service.
Before I sit down, let me turn briefly to the Royal British Legion's claim that 50 to 60 per cent of current war pensions claimants might fail if seeking compensation under the new scheme rules. Let me at once say that I am a huge admirer of the Royal British Legion. I ought to be: I declare an interest as an associate member of the Lutterworth and District British Legion and proud to be so. But I fear that that cannot stop me from saying what I am obliged to say: my colleague, the Minister for Veterans wrote to the Royal British Legion, setting out our view of its analysis.
First, we are clear that the sample used was not representative of the total spectrum of claims. To the extent that there is an issue, it appears to relate to the scheme time-limits for claims, rather than the standard and burden of proof. We think that the Royal British Legion concluded that current claims would have failed where they had been submitted more than five years after leaving service, because they would fail to meet the time limit for the new scheme. We think that that is a false, mistaken analysis. People will be made fully aware of the time limit and, in most cases, will be able to adjust the timing of their claims to meet it. I remind the House that a robust communication strategy is an integral part of the whole new scheme.
In a small number of cases, claimants will not be able to do that because their condition is late-onset or because injury or illness prevents them submitting a claim, but we have recognised that latter problem and the new scheme makes specific provision for late claims in such cases, so we are confident that time limits should not be the problem that the RBL fears that they will be.
In Grand Committee, it was suggested that if we did not accept the RBL's findings, we should at least look in detail at its analysis. We have taken that point on board and, in July, we offered to examine some of the cases used by the RBL to establish the basis on which, in its view, claimants might fail under the new scheme. I must tell the House that, unfortunately, the RBL has now declined our offer. Given that we have not been given visibility of its work, we must retain our concerns that its study did not provide a sound analysis of how past claims would fare under the new scheme.
The important thing is that the new scheme has been designed to admit all reasonable claims, including those which, for good reasons, fall outside the time limit. We believe that it will deliver a fair result, as was confirmed to the independent review carried out by the company Watson Wyatt.
The suggestion that it would cost disabled ex-servicemen and women £200 million, is, frankly, not true. The cost of the scheme will remain the same; there is no saving. We have put the money into improving benefits for the most severely disabled and to eligibility, as against the current rules for attributable benefits under the Armed Forces pension scheme. The £200 million reflects broad assessments of taking the standard and burden of proof into the new scheme; it does not cover how the new scheme would affect current claimants, but, as I said, we are confident that the 60 per cent figure cited is an overstatement.
We can see no reason why the use of the normal civil test of proof in the new scheme should disadvantage any service person whose injury or illness is caused by service. We will be monitoring the new scheme extremely closely. The Minister for Veterans, in particular, will be watching very closely to see how the new scheme works. We will look at any cases raised by the ex-service organisations, including, of course, the Royal British Legion, where it is thought that reasonable claims have failed.
It is important, in discussing the burden of proof, that we do not lose sight of the overall package that the Bill is designed to deliver. The new schemes will introduce provisions that represent considerable improvements on what is currently available. Some of those improvements were as a direct result of dialogue with the ex-service community, where it has shared its concerns and aspirations. Wherever possible, we have addressed its concerns and the final package has been welcomed by the majority of the community.
The two new schemes can only work and proceed together. They support and complement each other in a balanced package designed to meet the needs of Armed Forces personnel and their families today. If there were to be a significant change to any area of the proposals, we would have no choice but to look again at the overall package; and there is no guarantee that we could deliver the schemes in such circumstances.
I end by reminding noble Lords of two things. First, the chiefs of staff, on behalf of the Armed Forces, are in favour of our proposals. I submit that that should have some influence on this House. I very much hope that the House will reject the amendment, for the reasons that I have outlined. I apologise to the House for taking so long to respond to the amendment.
Lord Ackner: My Lords, before the noble Lord sits down, could he explain on whom the onus of proof lies in his proposals? I am not concerned with the standard. The claimant brings the claim: is the onus on him to establish the situation or is it on the MoD?
Lord Bach: My Lords, under the new scheme the onus would be on the claimant but obviously on the balance of probabilities.
Lord Morris of Manchester: My Lords, I am conscious that the House will want to see the debate concluded as soon as possible. In thanking all noble Lords who have taken part in the debate, I shall not be

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making any personal attacks. Meanwhile, I refute utterly the implication from across the House that my noble friend is a monkey.
It has been well said of him that my noble friend shows a personal commitment to helping the ex-service community. But, of course, Ministers are not always briefed to give their personal beliefs. Indeed, they do not always speak only for their departments—the Treasury is often involved.
In regard to what my noble friend has said about the Royal British Legion, I am sure that its officers will want urgently to consider the very serious allegations made against the Legion this afternoon. As at Second Reading and in Committee, my noble friend has found himself up against almost consensual support for the purpose of my amendments. My good and noble friend Lady Dean had some reservations, which I am sure she will want to discuss, with all her customary decency, with the Legion.
My intormation about what happened before, during and since their meeting at the MoD on 15 July comes from men of the highest probity. The standing in the ex-service community of Colonel English, of Tom House, its pensions officer, and of its legal adviser, Peter Knight, speaks for itself.
My noble friend referred to the letter sent by the Legion. It made abundantly clear that the Government wanted to talk about the form of words to do with the changing of the burden and standard of proof. It had already been made plain by Lieutenant-General Palmer, in his letter to the Legion, that there could be no question whatever of fundamental change in the Government's position. There has been no fundamental change, as my noble friend confirmed in his reply.
It was the revelation of the figure of £200 million that gave the lie to any claim of meaningful consultation with the Legion on the department's policy on burden and standard of proof. How can it possibly be claimed that they were consulting on the issue when they had already made a studiedly precise calculation of the outcome? Who wants to be "consulted" about a fait accompli?
The Minister has not made anything even approaching a case for regarding the Royal British Legion's position as unreasonable. There was long delay on the department's side in arranging talks. Everyone who has taken any part in these debates is aware of Ivor Caplin's letter of last December, and that he was asked by the Legion whether the MoD had carried out any analysis of its own. My noble friend, again this afternoon, has criticised the analysis carried out by the Legion—but it is the only analysis in town. Instead of negatively criticising the Legion's analysis, the Government should have carried out one of their own.
I am quite certain that many ex-service people outside this House will want to consider very carefully what has been said this afternoon and more especially the very serious allegations made against men of the highest standing and probity who serve the Royal British Legion.
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I see no difference at all in the Government's position on this issue. They are talking about a changed form of words; they are not talking about any basic change on matters of substance. I must, therefore, seek the opinion of the House.
4.47 p.m.
On Question, Whether the said amendment (No. 1) shall be agreed to?
Their Lordships divided: Contents, 183; Not-Contents, 128.

Division No. 1

CONTENTS

Ackner, L.

Gilmour of Craigmillar, L.

Addington, L.

Goodhart, L.

Alton of Liverpool, L.

Goschen, V.

Ampthill, L.

Greengross, B.

Arran, E.

Hanham, B.

Ashley of Stoke, L.

Hannay of Chiswick, L

Astor, V.

Harris of Richmond, B.

Astor of Hever, L.

Hayhoe, L.

Attlee, E.

Higgins, L.

Avebury, L.

Hodgson of Astley Abbotts, L.

Ballyedmond, L.

Holme of Cheltenham, L.

Barker, B.

Hooper, B.

Biffen, L.

Howard of Rising, L.

Blatch, B.

Howell of Guildford, L.

Bledisloe, V.

Hunt of Wirral, L.

Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury, B.

Hurd of Westwell, L.

Bowness, L.

Hylton, L.

Boyce, L.

Inge, L.

Bradshaw, L.

James of Holland Park, B.

Broers, L.

Jenkin of Roding, L.

Brooke of Sutton Mandeville, L.

Jopling, L.

Brookeborough, V.

Kalms, L.

Brougham and Vaux, L.

Kingsland, L.

Burnham, L.

Kirkham, L.

Byford, B.

Knight of Collingtree, B.

Caithness, E.

Laidlaw, L.

Campbell of Alloway, L.

Laird, L.

Carlisle of Bucklow, L.

Lane of Horsell, L.

Carnegy of Lour, B.

Lawson of Blaby, L.

Chalker of Wallasey, B.

Lester of Herne Hill, L.

Clement-Jones, L.

Lindsay, E.

Colwyn, L.

Livsey of Talgarth, L.

Cope of Berkeley, L.

Luke, L.

Cox, B.

Lyell, L.

Craig of Radley, L.

McColl of Dulwich, L.

Craigavon, V.

MacGregor of Pulham Market, L.

Crickhowell, L.

Dahrendorf, L.

Mackay of Clashfern, L.

Darcy de Knayth, B.

Mackie of Benshie, L.

Dean of Harptree, L.

MacLaurin of Knebworth, L.

Denham, L.

McNally, L.

Dholakia, L.

Maddock, B.

Dixon-Smith, L.

Mar, C.

Dykes, L.

Mar and Kellie, E.

Eccles of Moulton, B.

Marlesford, L.

Elles, B.

Marsh, L.

Elliott of Morpeth, L.

Masham of Ilton, B.

Elton, L.

Mayhew of Twysden, L.

Falkner of Margravine, B.

Miller of Chilthorne Domer, B.

Feldman, L.

Miller of Hendon, B.

Fookes, B.

Molyneaux of Killead, L.

Forsyth of Drumlean, L.

Montagu of Beaulieu, L.

Fraser of Carmyllie, L.

Montrose, D.

Freyberg, L. [Teller]

Morris of Manchester, L. [Teller]

Garden, L.

Mowbray and Stourton, L.

Gardner of Parkes, B.

Murton of Lindisfarne, L.

Geddes, L.

Naseby, L.

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Neuberger, B.

Scott of Needham Market, B.

Newton of Braintree, L.

Seccombe, B.

Noakes, B.

Selborne, E.

Northesk, E.

Selsdon, L.

Northover, B.

Sharman, L.

Norton of Louth, L.

Sharp of Guildford, B.

Oakeshott of Seagrove Bay, L.

Sharples, B.

O'Cathain, B.

Shutt of Greetland, L.

Onslow, E.

Skelmersdale, L.

Oppenheim-Barnes, B.

Slim, V.

Palmer, L.

Slynn of Hadley, L.

Park of Monmouth, B.

Smith of Clifton, L.

Patten, L.

Soulsby of Swaffham Prior, L.

Peel, E.

Stewartby, L.

Phillips of Sudbury, L.

Strathclyde, L.

Pilkington of Oxenford, L.

Swinfen, L.

Platt of Writtle, B.

Taverne, L.

Plumb, L.

Thomas of Gresford, L.

Quinton, L.

Thomas of Walliswood, B.

Rawlings, B.

Tombs, L.

Razzall, L.

Tordoff, L.

Reay, L.

Trenchard, V.

Redesdale, L.

Trumpington, B.

Rees, L.

Vincent of Coleshill, L.

Rennard, L.

Waddington, L.

Renton, L.

Wade of Chorlton, L.

Roberts of Conwy, L.

Walker of Worcester, L.

Roberts of Llandudno, L.

Wallace of Saltaire, L.

Rodgers of Quarry Bank, L.

Walmsley, B.

Rogan, L.

Walpole, L.

Roper, L.

Warnock, B.

Rotherwick, L.

Weatherill, L.

St John of Fawsley, L.

Williams of Crosby, B.

Sandberg, L.

Williamson of Horton, L.

Sandwich, E.

Windlesham, L.

NOT-CONTENTS

Acton, L.

Falkender, B.

Ahmed, L.

Farrington of Ribbleton, B.

Alli, L.

Faulkner of Worcester, L.

Amos, B. (Lord President of the Council)

Filkin, L.

Fyfe of Fairfield, L.

Andrews, B.

Gale, B.

Archer of Sandwell, L.

Gavron, L.

Ashton of Upholland, B.

Gibson of Market Rasen, B.

Bach, L.

Goldsmith, L.

Bassam of Brighton, L.

Gordon of Strathblane, L.

Berkeley, L.

Goudie, B.

Bernstein of Craigweil, L.

Gould of Brookwood, L.

Bhattacharyya, L.

Gould of Potternewton, B.

Blood, B.

Grabiner, L.

Boothroyd, B.

Grenfell, L.

Borrie, L.

Griffiths of Burry Port, L.

Brett, L.

Grocott, L.[Teller]

Brooke of Alverthorpe, L.

Harris of Haringey, L.

Brookman, L.

Harrison, L.

Brooks of Tremorfa, L.

Hart of Chilton, L.

Burlison, L.

Haskel, L.

Carter of Coles, L.

Haworth, L.

Clark of Windermere, L.

Hayman, B.

Clarke of Hampstead, L.

Hilton of Eggardon, B.

Cohen of Pimlico, B.

Hogg of Cumbernauld, L.

Crawley, B.

Hollis of Heigham, B.

Davies of Coity, L.

Howells of St. Davids, B.

Davies of Oldham, L. [Teller]

Howie of Troon, L.

Dean of Thornton-le-Fylde, B.

Hughes of Woodside, L.

Desai, L.

Hunt of Kings Heath, L.

Dixon, L.

Irvine of Lairg, L.

Drayson, L.

Jones, L.

Dubs, L.

Jordan, L.

Eatwell, L.

Judd, L.

Elder, L.

King of West Bromwich, L.

Evans of Temple Guiting, L.

Layard, L.

Falconer of Thoroton, L. (Lord Chancellor)

Lea of Crondall, L.

Levy, L.

592

Lofthouse of Pontefract, L.

Richard, L.

McCarthy, L.

Roll of Ipsden, L.

McDonagh, B.

Rosser, L.

McIntosh of Haringey, L.

Sainsbury of Turville, L.

McIntosh of Hudnall, B.

Scotland of Asthal, B.

MacKenzie of Culkein, L.

Sewel, L.

McKenzie of Luton, L.

Sheldon, L.

Mallalieu, B.

Simon, V.

Mason of Barnsley, L.

Snape, L.

Massey of Darwen, B.

Strabolgi, L.

Maxton, L.

Symons of Vernham Dean, B.

Merlyn-Rees, L.

Temple-Morris, L.

Mishcon, L.

Thornton, B.

Mitchell, L.

Tomlinson, L.

Morgan, L.

Triesman, L.

Morgan of Drefelin, B.

Truro, Bp.

Ouseley, L.

Truscott, L.

Patel of Blackburn, L.

Tunnicliffe, L.

Pendry, L.

Turner of Camden, B.

Pitkeathley, B.

Uddin, B.

Plant of Highfield, L.

Wall of New Barnet, B.

Prosser, B.

Warner, L.

Prys-Davies, L.

Warwick of Undercliffe, B.

Puttnam, L.

Wedderburn of Charlton, L.

Radice, L.

Whitaker, B.

Ramsay of Cartvale, B.

Whitty, L.

Rendell of Babergh, B.

Williams of Elvel, L.

Resolved in the affirmative, and amendment agreed to accordingly.
5 p.m.
Lord Astor of Hever Lord Astor of Hever moved Amendment No. 2:
Page 1, line 14, at end insert—
"( ) Any order to modify a scheme established under subsection (1) may not be made until a draft of the order has been laid before and approved by a resolution of each House of Parliament."
The noble Lord said: My Lords, Amendment No. 2 is a relatively straightforward amendment. We have seen details of the schemes going through by negative instrument. On the whole, they are satisfactory. However, there is still the capacity for subsequent modifications to be made without any parliamentary scrutiny. In theory, the Government could modify the whole scheme by changing from defined benefit to defined contribution. We argue that any modification should be by affirmative procedure. I look forward to some reassurance on that point from the Minister. I beg to move.
Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts: My Lords, this is familiar territory for those of us who were involved in Grand Committee. But, as my noble friend has pointed out, a fundamental change is proposed; namely, changing a defined benefit to a defined contribution. Amidst all the controversy in the country about pensions as a whole, it is the ending of defined benefit and final salary schemes that is causing so much concern. Therefore, to allow such a major change to take place with merely a negative statutory instrument must be unreasonable. It puts a coach and horses through what the Government propose in the Pensions Bill.
As I pointed out before, Security, Simplicity and Choice makes it clear that major changes—I refer the Minister to page 69, paragraphs 99 and 100—should

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be consulted on and proper consultation and agreement should be obtained. On page 68 there is a very helpful guide where the Government set out how they see changes could be made from defined benefit to defined contribution and the sorts of procedures that should be followed—none of which are provided for in the Bill as presently drafted.
In Grand Committee, the noble Baroness, Lady Crawley, resisted the proposal for an affirmative resolution. She said:
"To do so would…make it hard to administer and maintain the scheme. It would be difficult to introduce routine changes or amendments quickly".—[Official Report, 28/6/04; col. GCS.]
I do not believe that the proposals in Clause 1 contain routine powers; nor, indeed, is it a routine change. For the reasons that I have just explained, it is a fundamental change. Defined benefit to defined contribution is a very fundamental change indeed. As regards the noble Baroness's wish to be able to do that quickly, I have no wish to see those sorts of things introduced quickly. If changes that might cause concern, upset and resentment are to be accepted, they need to be carefully thought through and scrutinised.
On those grounds, I think that the noble Baroness was wrong in the assertion she made to the Grand Committee on 28 June. I hope that the Government have taken some time to think again and will listen to my noble friend's proposal.
Baroness Crawley: My Lords, I hope that I can give noble Lords the reassurance that they seek even while I am going to resist the amendment. The approach that we have proposed, whereby the detailed scheme rules are set out in statutory instruments subject to negative resolution, is appropriate and consistent with practice elsewhere in public service schemes. As noble Lords will know, that level of parliamentary scrutiny is greater than for the current Armed Forces pension scheme where the scheme rules are laid out in Parliament simply for information.
I note that the amendment is focused on subsequent modifications to the new schemes, allowing the schemes which have already been subject to consultation and considerable parliamentary oversight to be introduced through negative resolution. I am grateful to noble Lords for the recognition that this latest amendment gives to that process.
However, I should like to reassure noble Lords that the Ministry of Defence has never taken advantage of the lack of parliamentary scrutiny schemes in the past with respect to the current schemes. We have introduced beneficial changes, including the introduction of widower's pensions, post-retirement widows' benefits and entitlement to preserved pensions. We have not, and would not, seek to introduce significant changes without informing Parliament unless that was clearly beneficial to the scheme members or simply implementing wider government policy already considered by Parliament.
As I said, we have adopted that approach to be consistent with other public service schemes; namely, police, fire service, teachers, local government and the
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House of Commons. While service personnel do not have trade unions to negotiate with them on such issues—a point which noble Lords have raised—successive governments have recognised that the interests of service personnel are properly represented by the chain of command and, in particular, by the principal personnel officers.
That arrangement includes well proven systems to identify and explore the views of serving personnel across the age groups and ranks and has been found to work well. Further, we will continue to work closely with the ex-service community who have been closely engaged during the reviews of our pension and compensation schemes and who can be proud of the positive influence that they have had on the final schemes. In addition, the consultation requirements set out in the Pensions Bill will also apply to the Armed Forces pension scheme, which will place an obligation on us to consult members in specified circumstances.
Perhaps just as importantly, the Armed Forces Pay Review Body has agreed to provide independent validation of the new Armed Forces pension scheme. As noble Lords will be aware, the AFPRB is a well respected body, which I believe should offer the reassurance that the interests of our service personnel will be well looked after with respect to pensions, as well as pay and allowances.
On that basis, I do not consider that it is necessary for the statutory instruments which modify the schemes created under Clause 1 to receive this greater level of parliamentary scrutiny. I recognise from our Grand Committee debate on that issue that noble Lords do not wish to make the routine management of the scheme more difficult; that is what I mean when I talk about quickness and speed. But, as drafted, the amendment would make it hard to administer and maintain the scheme. It would be difficult to introduce routine amendments in an efficient fashion. They are often beneficial and simply provide compliance with wider legislative changes that have already been agreed by Parliament.
The amendment would inevitably delay implementation of beneficial change and would require Parliament to set aside substantial blocks of time on matters that do not generally merit that level of attention. No other public service scheme adopts that approach. We see no reason for the Armed Forces scheme to be treated differently from those other public service schemes.
The noble Lord, Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbots, referred to the possibility of a change of pension scheme from defined benefit to defined contribution. There are no plans to introduce a defined contribution scheme as part of the Armed Forces pension scheme that is due to go live next year. While subsection (1)(b) gives the flexibility to provide money purchase arrangements, should that be a desirable or necessary approach for future pension provision, were the department ever to consider that necessary in the future, of course we would ensure that Parliament was

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informed and that any consultation requirements were met. With that, I hope that the noble Lord will withdraw the amendment.
Lord Astor of Hever: My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lord Hodgson for his support. His point on defined benefit and defined contribution was well made, and I too agree that any changes need to be carefully thought through and not rushed.
I thank the noble Baroness for her reply. I realised that she would resist this amendment, although she has given the House some reassurance, in particular by saying that the Government would not make significant changes without notifying Parliament. I shall read her response carefully in Hansard, but in the mean time I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Lord Astor of Hever Lord Astor of Hever had given notice of his intention to move Amendment No. 3:
Page 1, line 14, at end insert—
"(2A) The Secretary of State may, by regulation, make provision for extra benefits to be provided for current members of the existing scheme during the transitional period.
(2B) For the purposes of subsection (2A), the transitional period is the time between the date of the new scheme coming into force for new servicemen and women and the date on which existing servicemen and women are given the opportunity to transfer."
The noble Lord said: My Lords, in speaking to Amendment No. 3 I shall speak also in support of Amendment No. 10, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Dean.
Lord Bach: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord for allowing me to intervene, which I do not think will entirely surprise him. I have already discussed this amendment with the noble Lord and with my noble friend Lady Dean. In Grand Committee we said that we hoped to give a definite and definitive answer on Report to the very proper issues that have been raised in this amendment. However, I am afraid that across government we do not yet have the final answer, which we hope will be satisfactory to both the noble Lord and my noble friend, addressing the particular issues raised. I wonder if the noble Lord would be kind enough not to press his amendment today, but perhaps table it again at Third Reading next week. At that point it is hoped that we can deal with this matter once and for all.
Baroness Dean of Thornton-le-Fylde: My Lords, my noble friend's remarks were not sprung on us and I warmly welcome his statement. I certainly support the content of Amendment No. 3 and perhaps the amendment we shall table next week will bring together the elements of both amendments. I look forward to the Minister's response at Third Reading and I hope that we shall be able to make progress on this small but very important point.
Lord Astor of Hever: My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Dean, for her comments. We should
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certainly discuss the form of an amendment to table at Third Reading next week. I also thank the Minister for his remarks. This amendment was designed to tease out further details on the transitional problem. We are happy that the Government see the need to address this and we look forward to returning to the issue at the next stage.
[Amendment No. 3 not moved.]
5.15 p.m.
Lord Redesdale Lord Redesdale moved Amendment No. 4:
Page 1, line 14, at end insert—
"( ) Any scheme established by order under this Act shall provide mechanisms to ensure that—

(a) personnel in the armed forces who have completed 35 years' service but are not retained in service after their 55th birthday for service reasons receive pension benefits which are based on 66.67% of final salary, and

(b) a death-in-service benefit of four times salary is paid to surviving spouses or dependents."

The noble Lord said: My Lords, I apologise to noble Lords, but I was surprised at being called to move Amendment No. 4—
Lord Bach: My Lords, I should apologise to the noble Lord. It is the fault of the government side. The noble Lord did not know that there was to be a kind of stately dance between the noble Lord, Lord Astor, my noble friend Lady Dean and myself on Amendment No. 3, which meant that it would not run its course today. We should have told him.
Lord Redesdale: My Lords, I still have to apologise for being caught outside the Chamber, gloating over the earlier victory.
Amendment No. 4 is probing in nature. I want to ask the Minister to consider whether there is a possibility that the terms and conditions of the scheme could be changed by regulation. In the light of the emphasis on good practice to be applied to different aspects of the Bill, would it be possible for service personnel in the future to earn 66.67 per cent of their final salary rather than the present slightly lower figure? It is impossible to achieve the maximum salary percentage that is available in the private sector. I beg to move.
Baroness Crawley: My Lords, I had hoped that this amendment would be probing in nature because the noble Lord knows that I will resist it. However, I hope that I can give him some reassurance and explain why we believe that the present proposals set out in the Bill will be of benefit to Armed Forces personnel.
Service personnel who serve up to the normal retirement age of 55 and have served 35 years under the new AFPS will receive pension benefits comparable to those available under the current pension scheme and, as the noble Lord knows, paid much earlier that in most other schemes. Their dependants' benefits will be significantly improved. Those service personnel who wish to improve their own pension benefits will have the opportunity to purchase additional voluntary contributions; the extended accrual period of 40 years

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will provide sufficient headroom for them to attain benefits up to the current Inland Revenue limits referred to by the noble Lord, should they wish to do so.
The new Armed Forces pension scheme is designed to be equitable, treating personnel on an equal basis regardless of whether we can offer them a full career. This amendment would benefit only a limited number of service personnel who serve a full career, as the majority will have left before the new early departure point—that of 18 years' service and a minimum age of 40. It would therefore be counter to equality of treatment on the basis of age and would, in effect, discriminate between officers and other ranks where equality of treatment has been one of the key principles behind the new scheme. It might also have the effect of discriminating between men and women because of the shorter length of service enjoyed by most women.
The alternative of offering an improved accrual rate throughout service would be expensive to implement—we could be talking about a figure of £70 million—and it was agreed that other measures such as improved dependants' benefits should have priority.
I turn to new paragraph (b) of the noble Lord's amendment. The improved death-in-service lump sum of four times pensionable pay is an important feature of the new pension scheme. However, as I have made clear elsewhere, this sort of detail is more appropriately covered in secondary legislation. Nor would the amendment be viable in its current form. Additional material would be required to cover definitions of qualifying salary, of spouses and of dependants. Moreover, the noble Lord will realise that, as drafted, this proposal would exclude unmarried partners and partners registered under the new Civil Partnership Bill.
As was made clear to the Opposition during consideration of this issue in the Commons, such broad principles are not in practice viable in primary legalisation without supporting detail.
I hope that my explanation is sufficient to satisfy the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale, that he need not press his amendment.
Lord Redesdale: My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness for that response. The purpose of the amendment was to deal with the issue of good practice, which is obviously one of the aspects that this scheme is trying to achieve. It would be wrong not to highlight the fact that, under the scheme, it would be extremely difficult to achieve the Inland Revenue limit. However, having taken into account the views expressed by the noble Baroness, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Lord Redesdale Lord Redesdale moved Amendment No 5:
Page 1, line 14, at end insert—
"(2A) The Secretary of State may by order establish schemes which award members of the armed forces expenses for—

(a) medical treatment,

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(b) surgical treatment,

(c) rehabilitative treatment, or

(d) aids and adaptations for disabled living.

(2B) Such schemes, as set out in subsection (2A) above, shall be provided to cover expenses that arise wholly or mainly as a result of disablement due to service in the armed forces and in so far as subsections (2A)(a) to (d) are not provided for, otherwise than on payment of a charge by the member, under legislation of the United Kingdom."
The noble Lord said: My Lords, in moving Amendment No. 5, I shall speak also to Amendment No. 6. If the noble Baroness is to reply, she will be happy to know that these are probing amendments. She will not immediately have to say that she is resisting them but will be able to give the reasons behind the stand that I am almost certain she will take.
Amendment No. 5 refers back to the amendments that I tabled in Grand Committee. At that stage, due to my inabilities in drafting, there was a slight confusion about the aims of the amendments I brought forward. Amendment No. 5 seeks to ascertain whether the areas referred to in subsection (2A)(a), (b), (c) and (d) of the amendment will be covered under the scheme set out in the Bill. There is concern that certain areas may not be covered by national health trusts. I hope that the Minister will say that it is envisaged that such areas will be covered, even if not by local NHS trusts.
Amendment No. 6 is also a probing amendment which relates to time limits and to deterioration. I said in Grand Committee that I would raise this issue again because I believe that one aspect of the Bill is based on the standard view of actuaries and the standard view of deterioration. Obviously a great many disabilities, such as amputations and loss of limbs, will react in certain ways, and it can be taken into account how such wounds will progress over time.
The Ministry of Defence has denied the existence of Gulf War Syndrome, but the American Government have now taken account of it. If at a future date the British Government and the MoD take Gulf War Syndrome into account as an illness, will the scheme be sufficiently flexible to deal with this syndrome and similar syndromes that may arise in future engagements? It is not my intention to press the amendment or to put the Government in a position where they have to say that they do accept it as an illness. We have asked far too many questions for me to believe that we will suddenly get an answer of that magnitude today.
The issue also has to be considered in the light of the present threat of chemical and biological agents which may be developed in areas we have not yet seen. The countermeasures to those agents are a cause of concern because, even after so many years of testing by the Government, we have so little understanding of them. The purpose of Amendment No. 6 is to elicit whether the scheme has the flexibility to deal with the variable conditions that may give rise to different levels of deterioration, which may be not only physical but mental in aspect. I beg to move.
Viscount Slim: My Lords, I hope it will be helpful if I mention that subsection (2A)(c) of Amendment No. 5

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refers to "rehabilitative treatment". In addition to the illnesses mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale, there is also the issue of the disability of "stress" and the rehabilitation required for that. Without wishing to be rude, I believe that an investigation would show that there is not a great deal of experience of combat stress within the National Health Service, but there is one combat stress outfit outside of it. To be counselled by someone who has not been in combat is not very clever. I merely put that as a passing, helpful suggestion to the Minister.
Baroness Crawley: My Lords, I thank noble Lords for their contributions. I should say in general terms to the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale, that we believe that the scheme has the breadth and flexibility he was seeking in some of the examples he gave about the future stresses and operations that our Armed Forces may find themselves engaged in.
Amendment No. 5 seeks to introduce into primary legislation for the new compensation scheme the power to make regulations equivalent to Article 26 of the Service Pensions Order, the law governing war pensions. The proposed text of Amendment No. 5 is closely based on that article. We recognise the need to continue the provision of care in this area. However, with much of the legislation regarding war pensions remaining largely as it was during the 1940s, Article 26 is a product of its time. It was introduced when there was no universal system of support from the welfare state, including the National Health Service. Article 26 is therefore an outdated provision. Its equivalent is not needed in a scheme for the 21st century, when we have the opportunities that the National Health Service provides.
Since 1948, Ministers in successive governments have maintained that the National Health Service should be the principal route for treatment of accepted disabilities. War pensioners receive priority in the NHS for treatment of any injury or illness that was caused by service. We are seeking to secure the same approach from the Department of Health for beneficiaries under the new Armed Forces compensation scheme.
I hope that that goes some way to answering the inquiry of the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale, in regard to what happens outside the facilities of the National Health Service. We want to secure the same approach with the Department of Health to ensure that war pensioners receive priority within the NHS for any injury or illness caused by service.
The cross-departmental veterans' initiative confirms our commitment to ex-service people. It is addressing improved delivery of services for veterans, working with other government departments and the service charities and is dedicated to providing excellent service to veterans.
Under the new scheme, there will be no statutory underpinning of charity arrangements. There is no reason why such arrangements should be provided for
600
in primary legislation. It would limit our ability to amend them as our understanding of the best way of caring for the conditions concerned evolves.
We understand that there are issues in relation to ex-service organisations such as Combat Stress. I should explain that "combat stress" is the name of an organisation as well as being something that many in our Armed Forces may feel. We recognise entirely the value of the work of Combat Stress and the department is in discussion with that charity and others to develop the most appropriate options for the future. I am aware that I said in July that we were in discussions. Having made inquiries of our civil servants, I understand that those discussions continued during the summer and were very active and very positive. They are designed to recognise the modern consensus in regard to the best approach to care in these areas.
I can reassure your Lordships that we see a continued major role for Combat Stress in the future, but we need to establish a way ahead that makes the best use of its valuable capabilities. That is why we are in discussion with Combat Stress at ministerial and official levels about how to take the work forward.
5.30 p.m.
I turn now to Amendment No. 6. Noble Lords will be aware that the new compensation scheme will normally make full and final awards. This reflects the position of current medical and scientific understanding, where the level of knowledge is such that the evolution of most conditions can be predicted with a high level of confidence. The initial award will therefore be designed to take account of the expected level of worsening associated with the claimed condition, and of the development of likely consequential conditions. This generous approach enables us to maximise the award from the outset and also allows the injured person to plan and move forward with his or her life.
There is a common view that injuries and illnesses are almost bound to get worse over time. Today, with the advances in modern medical management and the emphasis on rehabilitation, that is often not the case. However, there will still be conditions where significant potential deterioration can be expected. However, this will generally be predictable and definable. Our tariff-based awards will therefore be set at a level that will take account of normal levels of deterioration from the outset. Quite properly, the scheme will not take account of the effects of ageing, constitution or other post-service factors. I am sure that noble Lords would agree that this should not be the case.
However, as has been set out in the detailed framework documents, the new scheme will allow for exceptional review. By "exceptional" we mean a situation in which there has been a significant material change in people's condition above and beyond that which is already recognised in the original award.
We believe that it is reasonable to have a time limit for claims for deterioration, albeit a generous one that makes sensible allowance for any complications to

601
emerge, but which also protects the scheme from the risk of paying compensation for developments which are unrelated to service. An open-ended scheme would encourage an unnecessary cycle of repeated reviews and open the scheme up to claims for conditions caused by general ageing or by events unrelated to service.
The details of the provision will be set out in the scheme rules under a statutory instrument. It would not be appropriate to include this type of detail in the Bill. To do so would make it difficult to update the schemes, requiring, as it would, amendments to primary legislation.
The noble Lord, Lord Redesdale, spoke of Gulf War syndrome. I understand that the High Court will not rule on the existence of a Gulf War syndrome. It was very clear about this when it stated:
"This court is not in a position to express any views on the merits of the dispute as to whether, according to current medical research. Gulf War Syndrome is or is not a 'single disease entity'…It has not done so by this judgment".
I am afraid that I cannot give the noble Lord any more joy about that issue, but I hope that he feels that my response to his other points is enough to enable him to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Redesdale: My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness for her full replies to the amendments. She has given me satisfaction with regard to what I wanted from them. I was particularly pleased to hear that talks are taking place with Combat Stress. I know that many noble Lords are very keen that the excellent work done by that organisation over so many years should continue. On that basis, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendment No. 6 not moved.]
Lord Craig of Radley Lord Craig of Radley moved Amendment No. 7:
Page 1, line 16, at end insert—
"( ) The Secretary of State may by order provide for a widow (or widower)—

(a) in receipt of benefits based on existing armed forces pensions schemes, or

(b) whose spouse was in receipt of an armed forces pension,

to be eligible for benefits available in the new pensions scheme from the date of its commencement."
The noble and gallant Lord said: My Lords, Amendment No. 7 is grouped with Amendments Nos. 9 and 14.
In earlier discussions on the Bill, Ministers relied on three arguments to say, "Nyet, nyet, nyet" and resist amendments to it. The first argument, which we heard again this afternoon, is that this is a paving Bill and it is therefore not suitable to include on the face of the Bill details about new schemes. These fall to be dealt with by secondary legislation. It has also been argued that to amend the Bill in this way would be too expensive as all public sector workers' widows would have to be included and, anyway, the scheme has to be cost-neutral, so there is no scope for increases without deductions elsewhere.
My amendment is drawn up in such a way as to overcome the first argument, and I also wish to challenge the other two. I wrote about them to the Minister on 20 July, but so far I have not seen a response. The Royal British Legion is not alone in failing to get responses from the MoD over the summer period.
My amendment provides for secondary legislation to tackle the dreadful legacy issues, which have been well aired on previous occasions. The Minister is very familiar with them. The House will have a chance to hear more about them in the debate on other noble Lords' specific amendments.
The opportunity for primary legislation on Armed Forces pensions is rare. So this opportunity to make provision for changes that might be accepted in tackling the legacy issues should not be missed. It seemed to me sensible to include an amendment to enable the Secretary of State at a future time to correct by order aspects of the legacy issues that are most deplorably unfair. I hope that the Minister will at least concede that this is a reasonable approach. My amendment leaves the initiative to the Secretary of State.
One of the inequities galling to servicemen and women is the knowledge that so far as the parliamentary pension scheme is concerned, the widow of a Member of the House of Commons receives an unabated pension, regardless of when she married her late husband. Surely it is not unreasonable to expect similar treatment for the spouses of service personnel. To claim that the parliamentary scheme is contributory whereas that for the services is not is a distinction without a difference. Service pay is abated to contribute towards the service pension, and that is calculated on the abated pay, not the notional gross pay. So there is no generosity in that.
Former state monopolies, such as coal, electricity and telephones provide for a spouse's pension, regardless of the date of marriage. This seems to be the accepted norm for today's pension schemes. Indeed, the Government have accepted it in other areas. So those who have paid their way—and some took the opportunity to qualify for a half-rate widow's pension—still find that there are very significant differences involved. For example, if a woman had married her husband before he retired, instead of receiving £11,700 per annum when he died, she would be entitled to a pension of less than £1,900—a difference approaching £10,000 per year. Figures such as these, about which many individuals have written to me—and no doubt to many other noble Lords and Members of the other place—make distressing reading.
The services deserve to be treated as a special case, and not grouped together with all others in the public service. So the claim that the cost would be around £3 billion is ridiculously misleading. I recognise that making good what those have missed out on is not realistic, but it would give enormous relief and help to those who are now well into their senior citizenship, and so reducing in numbers as the years go by, to be

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brought into the new scheme. The costs of this are marginal, relative to the £2.6 billion cash expenditure on the present Armed Forces pension scheme.
I hope that the Minister will accept that an amendment such as this, suitable to a paving Bill, is sensible and that he will give it his full support. It provides a gateway for dealing with legacy issues without recourse to new primary legislation—an insuperable obstacle for such a topic. I hope that Amendments Nos. 9 and 14 will go through but if they do not, they could still be considered at a later date if Amendment No. 7 were accepted.
If the Minister does not support this amendment, I sense that there is great resistance and no real intention to do more than consider the problems of legacy issues, and this rare opportunity to put them right will have been stubbornly resisted. I beg to move.
Lord Astor of Hever: My Lords, this is an important group of amendments and the House is grateful to the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig, for raising the important issue covered by his Amendment No. 7. Our Amendment No. 9 deals with the issue of another disadvantaged group—widows and widowers—who will be left out in the cold should the Bill go forward unamended. I refer to the existing non-attributable widows and those who will inevitably be created between now and the introduction of the new scheme.
Should those widows attempt to build a new life by marrying or cohabiting at some time in the future, they will have to forfeit their widows' pensions. All other widows—existing, attributable or non-attributable and survivors of registered partnerships in the new scheme—will keep their pensions for life. Widows whose husbands died for service reasons are quite properly compensated for the loss of their spouses through the compensation arrangements and they also retain their pensions for life. But a widow whose husband's death was not caused by service reasons receives no compensation. Such widows are additionally penalised by having to surrender their pensions should they remarry.
In Grand Committee, I expressed my doubts about the validity of some of the costs being quoted to implement this amendment. The Minister quoted a figure of £500 million for past service. Since this amendment only proposes paying widows' pensions for life from 6 April 2005, there can be no past service costs. The amendment does not seek retrospective action, nor does it seek to restore the pensions of those widows who have already re-married. In addition, the Minister quoted annual costs of £14 million. However, the MoD quoted £8 million—almost half the Grand Committee figure—in a memorandum to the Defence Select Committee on legacy issues for the Armed Forces pension scheme on 18 December 2002. Which figure is correct—£14 million or £8 million?
On average, only about 300 widows are created each year. Who is to know what proportion of that small number will remarry? All existing widows already have pensions in issue. There can therefore be no
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upfront additional costs. What we are talking about is a speculative guess. If the Minister's figure of £14 million is correct, it represents a tiny proportion—0.005 per cent of the £2.5 billion annual expenditure on the Armed Forces pension scheme.
How can these costs be found from within the scheme? This House has yet to see details of the transition arrangements for those wishing to transfer from the old to the new scheme, but it has already been stated in the House of Commons Defence Committee hearings that the Treasury is keen to prevent individuals from making windfall gains. That could mean that limitations are placed on the options available to servicemen—a clear breach of the principle of cost neutrality—and would result in savings for the Crown. That money could easily pay for this amendment while preserving cost neutrality. It would also right a demonstrable injustice.
In Grand Committee, the Minister told the House that,
"there is no case for treating Armed Forces' non-attributable widows differently from other public service widows",—[Official Report, 5/7/2004; col. GC6l.]
but there is every justification for doing just that. The Armed Forces pension scheme is the only one in the public sector that draws a distinction between attributable and non-attributable widows. That makes the scheme different from all the others. There is therefore no justification for suggesting that this amendment would result in a requirement for read-across. Indeed historically, whenever improvements have been made in other public sector schemes, read-across has not been deemed necessary in the Armed Forces pension scheme.
This amendment seeks to resolve a long-standing injustice. The costs could be met from within the scheme, it is not retrospective and there need not be any read-across to the rest of the public sector. It is an issue on which the Government could easily concede.
Finally, I am also pleased to support Amendment No. 14 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Strange. We have reason to be proud of our servicemen. We acknowledge the demands that we place on them and the sacrifices that they are called to make, including laying down their lives for this country. When that happens, they leave widows—war widows who are also unique. I will leave the rest of the case to be made in an eloquent way by the noble Baroness, Lady Strange.
5.45 p.m.
Lord Boyce: My Lords, I apologise to the House for not being here to support the noble Lord, Lord Morris of Manchester, on Amendment No. 1, which is also in my name. I was unavoidably detained in an engagement with the Armed Forces. I was pleased to see that my eloquence was not actually required in the event.
I now wish to talk about Amendment No. 9 and this small and tightly defined group of people who are already in receipt of a pension. It is worth repeating what the noble Lord, Lord Astor of Hever, said. They

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are already in receipt of a pension and the point about no upfront costs is an important one to register. As to what future costs might be, it is impossible to define. I shall be interested to hear what the Minister says in response to the noble Lord, Lord Astor of Hever, about where the costs will come from. It is not certain that all the widows will remarry anyway, which makes the group smaller still.
The new scheme recognises the injustice of not allowing non-attributable widows and indeed partners to receive for life the pension that their spouses earned—and rightly so. The principle was recognised in 2000 with attributable widows and widowers being allowed to keep their pensions for life, including with retrospection. I seriously believe that if this amendment is not accepted, we will create a new group of disadvantaged and aggrieved people for relatively little saving. Surely the Minister can agree to this small amendment by being magnanimous, not to mention taking this moral step.
Baroness Strange: My Lords, I am very grateful to my noble friend the Minister for writing to me about this amendment, and also for the helpful meetings with him. We all agree that there is much to be welcomed in this Bill for the new generation of war widows—and how we all wish there need never be one. But there does seem to be some uncertainty about detail and that concerns me, and my association. Given the lack of detail, the Ministry of Defence should give assurances that no widow or child under the new regulations will be worse off than under the old scheme. We have not seen detailed worked-out examples.
Turning to my amendment, in the year 2000 the War Widows' Association was extremely pleased to secure for its younger members—the post-1973 widows—the right to remarry or cohabit without prejudice to their attributable Armed Forces family pension. That has meant a great deal to those post-1973 war widows who have now had some freedom to rebuild secure family units with some financial stability, although in fact comparatively few of them have actually done so. However, the older ladies—the pre-1973 war widows—do not have an attributable Armed Forces pension, and so do not have this freedom. And some of them do want to remarry. I had a letter from a lady of 86 who has remarried and consequently lost her pension. Age is no barrier to love.
Those lucky enough to have the opportunity of sharing their old age with someone else must choose between loneliness with a pension or happiness without a pension. It is true that on relinquishing their pension, some will qualify for other state benefits, which will cost the Government almost as much, but they will have to apply for these themselves, and people of this older generation do not like losing their dignity by applying for state handouts. This is a strong deterrent to sharing your life with someone else; but if there were someone else at home, it might prevent some unnecessary and expensive hospital admissions. This would therefore be a benefit to society in general.
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I believe that the Government think that it would be divisive to allow these ladies to keep their war widows pension. Why? As my noble friend Lord Morris of Manchester and my noble and gallant friend Lord Craig of Radley said, the services are a very special case. These war widows are tightly ring-fenced and clearly defined, and they are the only group in receipt of this award, so there would be no need to make a read-across. From April 2005, with the introduction of the new Armed Forces pension scheme, there would be no new war widows paid the war widows pension that we are talking about.
I also understand the principle of cost neutrality. Well, Minister, I have good news for you here: all these ladies are already in receipt of their pension, so no new money needs to be found. The only possible saving would be if a few old ladies sacrificed their pensions for marriage. Is it the Government's policy to claw back money from the most vulnerable groups in society, or indeed to penalise people for marrying? Surely not. Can the Minister tell us how many widows he estimates would be involved? We have tried, but we have been unable to get exact figures which distinguish whether the lady has remarried or whether the pension has ceased because she has died.
The Minister could also of course find further assurance for the future against charges of divisiveness and ageism were he to extend his generosity to the finite group of all pre-2005 widows. Beautiful though those ladies are, not many will have the chance of meeting another Mr Right, so even if some did remarry the saving would be minimal. There would of course be no cost. As we remember with such pride the dead of 60 years ago and those who have been killed in more recent conflicts, it is surely time also to remember their widows and all war widows whose husbands sacrificed their lives for us, and extend a loving, caring hand of friendship to them.
Baroness Dean of Thornton-le-Fylde: My Lords, I speak briefly in support of the three amendments. The noble and gallant Lord, Lord Boyce, in his most courteous way chided me about my stance and said that he did not believe that one could compare the Armed Forces with the other emergency services. I was comparing them—but about the burden of proof on the legal cases for injuries. Apart from that, I entirely agree with him, especially on this particular area.
I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Astor, that this is a very important part of the Bill. When our Armed Forces personnel go away on duty, they want to know that if anything happens to them while carrying out their duty to their country, their families will be looked after. If the Bill does not contain some of the measures that are in the three amendments, it will be a very much diminished Bill and not achieve what many of us want to see it achieve.
In conclusion, on Amendment No. 14, to which I have put my name, I could not say anything in addition or better than the noble Baroness, Lady Strange, who is also a friend. She put the case most eloquently—and

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I should not like to be in the Minister's position and have to refute the points that the noble Baroness is making.
Viscount Slim: My Lords, I support noble Lords on this amendment. In Committee, I asked the Minister and other members of the Government if they would consider carefully the state of the widows pre-1973, and the fact that all of them are living on one third of their husbands' pension. That is not a state of affairs that should be countenanced in this country today—particularly in view of the fact that, as the noble and gallant Lord said, the widows of Members in another place get the full amount.
The politest way in which I can put my remarks is that Parliament seems satisfied, in this day and age, for a section of our military widows to live on one third of their husbands' pensions. Those are widows whose husbands fought in the Korean and other wars, and it is—I am almost forced to use the word—wicked that Parliament should allow such a measure to be in place today.
That matter is slightly aside from the points made by the noble and gallant Lord. I support what has been said and I believe that the amendments are very important. Speaking as one who works almost entirely among veterans, in view of the concern that they have for widows—and the great work that the noble Baroness, Lady Strange, does for widows—I believe that there should be some initiative from the Government. I am not simply blaming this Government; I was just as curt to the previous administration on this matter, who were just as much to blame for this sort of thing as are the present Government.
Even if the Minister cannot agree somewhere, somehow, within the Ministry of Defence, somebody should put his mind to the problem. There might be a bit of a crack at the Members of the other place to think not only of themselves but of others. In my generation, we were taught as officers that, come the end of the day, one looked after the mules first, because they carried the heaviest load. One then looked after one's men—and then, if there was time, one looked after oneself. I must say that I find Members of another place rather good at looking after themselves first, and to hell with the rest of us.
Lord Morris of Manchester: My Lords, like my noble friend Lady Dean, I hold the noble Baroness, Lady Strange, in high admiration. I have the very good fortune to work with her in the War Widows' Association of Great Britain, of which she is president. She is extremely proud of its membership, as I am too as vice-president.
As my noble friend Lady Dean said, the noble Baroness has made a compelling case for the amendments. She speaks not only with commitment but also great authority in this policy area. I know that the Forces Pension Society has done a very great deal to sustain noble Lords who have been supporting the purpose of these amendments. I pay tribute to them as
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well. With regard specifically to Amendment No. 9, the important point to emphasise is that it is about ensuring equity all across the scheme. I hope very much that the Government will accept that there is very strong feeling in all parts of the House in support of these amendments, and that they will offer a positive response to them this evening.
6 p.m.
Lord Bach: My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords who have spoken to these three important amendments. The noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig, began to address the House in Russian, when he said nyet, nyet, nyet. For those noble Lords who understand basic Russian, as he and I do, he may be somewhat pleased to hear that my response is in the spirit of, "Nyet, nyet and da". For those who do not speak basic Russian, that means that the Government will make a concession on Amendment No. 14. I shall come to that in due course.
I turn first to Amendment No. 7. I apologise profusely to the noble and gallant Lord if his letter of 22 July has not been replied to. His letter of 19 July has been. I have checked, so far as I can while I am in the Chamber, and I am told that the officials know nothing of another letter of 22 July. I shall make inquiries immediately the Report stage ends and come back to the noble and gallant Lord. I am very sorry that the letter has not been replied to.
As regards Amendment No. 7, the new pension scheme has been designed to be broadly cost neutral. The cost of benefit improvements in some areas, such as those for widows and dependants, has been offset by a reduction in the value of benefits elsewhere, for example, the immediate pension.
Amendment No. 7 would enable the Secretary of State to provide current and future widows and widowers of current scheme members with the best of all possible worlds. If the widows and widowers of members were to be allowed to compare the benefits they receive under the current pension scheme with those under the new scheme, and to select accordingly, that would frankly increase the cost of the new scheme very significantly. It would be unreasonable to allow individuals to have a substantial improvement to their benefits when their spouse had either not accepted the balancing trade-offs in the new scheme when an active member of the current pension scheme or had never had the opportunity to do so as he or she had retired before the new scheme was introduced.
There is the further point that given the conditionality of the wording of Amendment No. 7, even if the amendment were passed there would be no immediate entitlement. Were a future government to decide to make such a change, they would not require the proposed change in primary legislation to do so. The value of the amendment is therefore unclear to us. On that basis I am afraid that I cannot agree the underlying objective of the amendment nor the need for it in terms of enabling a future government to make such a change.

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I turn to Amendment No. 9. I thank noble Lords who have spoken to the amendment. The noble and gallant Lord, Lord Boyce, spoke ironically of his eloquence not being needed as he was not present to speak to Amendment No. 1. Thank goodness he was not here; with his eloquence goodness knows what the result would have been. The noble and gallant Lord has spoken with great eloquence on the issue that we are discussing, not just today but at a social gathering that we both attended some time before the Summer Recess. However, in spite of what he said to me on that occasion, and in spite of the strong arguments that have been put today, I am afraid that I must resist Amendment No. 9. I shall try to explain why that is.
The proposed new Armed Forces pension scheme includes provision for non-attributable widows' and widowers' pensions to be paid for life. I stress that existing members can transfer to the new scheme if they wish to benefit from this provision. The new clause proposed here would extend this to current widows and widowers from April 2005, who are not provided for in the new scheme.
For the majority of public service schemes, non-attributable widows' and widowers' pensions still cease on re-marriage. This approach reflects to some extent the view of society at the time the schemes were established that wives could expect a level of financial security on remarriage so the pension of their deceased husband could safely be withdrawn. As with the Armed Forces current scheme, these pensions can be reinstated on second widowhood or divorce if the individual is otherwise financially worse off than when first in receipt of their Armed Forces pension. While we are able to make changes for the future under the new Armed Forces pension scheme, paid for by adjusting benefits elsewhere in the new scheme—that is something that I could have said with more certainty before the vote on Amendment No. 1 this afternoon— changing an arrangement for the current scheme would carry with it no offsetting saving. It would therefore be an expensive change, with retrospective effect, which together would make such a change unattractive to a government of any colour.
The debate in Grand Committee on this same amendment focused on the cost of such a change and the extent to which widows of Armed Forces personnel could be seen as a special case in this regard as compared to other public service employees. Since then I have written to a number of noble Lords and I think that I should place some of the comments that I made in those letters on the record. First, as regards cost, the one-off cost of £500 million for the Armed Forces cannot be avoided. It is a cost that would need to be paid even if payments were to be made from a future date. It reflects the relatively large numbers involved from the World War II and conscript era, and the way in which seemingly small numbers each year mount up. The overall cost of a concession would be even higher if there were to be, in addition, any backdating of payments. The figure of £500 million represents the past payments that the MoD would need to have made to the Treasury each year to buy this future widows' benefit for our members
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throughout their service. We have for many years paid annually the agreed costs of the benefits provided by the scheme through something called the accruing superannuation liability charge, but the costs of non-attributable pensions on remarriage have not been a part of that cost.
A number of noble Lords made the point at Grand Committee and today that, as the affected widows were already in receipt of pension payments, a concession would cost little. This is a highly seductive, but I argue incorrect, argument for the reasons that I have just tried to explain. While it is true that, if a widow were not to remarry we would continue to pay her pension for life, the assessed costs of the scheme on the basis of which the MoD pays the accrued superannuation liability charge takes into account the expectation that a certain proportion of non-attributable widows will remarry and thus lose their benefits. Thus a change to this policy would have a long-term impact on the costs of the scheme.
Affordability is placed in even sharper focus when the issue is looked at across the public services as a whole, which the Government consider is unavoidable. The fact that members of the Armed Forces are held in the highest regard by this House arid by all sections of the community is not in the end, I am afraid, a relevant argument in this context. The special circumstances of service life are, in my view, fully recognised in the high value benefits we are making available under the new pension and compensation schemes to the widow, widower or partner of a service person who dies of causes related to service, known in the jargon as an attributable death. These, exceptionally in the public services, will be paid for life.
I am aware of a further argument from some noble Lords that the pressures of service life justify different treatment for non-attributable Armed Forces widows; that is, where the spouse has died from causes unrelated to service. At the end of the day we cannot agree with that, nor, I am sure, would those affected elsewhere in the public service, for example, in the police force or in the fire brigades, who might reasonably argue that the pressures of their jobs can likewise put stresses and strains on an individual's health and well-being. They may be different stresses and different strains but they are still potentially very difficult to deal with. The Government do not believe that special treatment should be extended to circumstances where the pension relates to a death which is not due to service. In this case we could not in all fairness treat differently the widow of a service person and the widow of, say, a fireman, a policeman, a civil servant or a teacher. There is no basis for paying pensions for life in one case but not in the other, and if there is a basis it is not sufficient. No special case can be made for Armed Forces widows where a death is age-related or lifestyle-related, or due to a congenital susceptibility. The cost of making that concession for the public services as a whole is estimated at £3 billion, which noble Lords will understand is not currently affordable.

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In summary, even if the Armed Forces were to be treated on the issue as a special case, the MoD cost of changing the policy for the estimated 60,000 service widows and widowers affected is calculated by the Government Actuary to be £14 million a year—that answers the question of the noble Lord, Lord Astor—with a one-off cost for past service of some £500 million.
I come to a vexed question with a lot of feeling behind it. The noble Baroness, Lady Strange—I hope she will not mind me using her name in vain—argued strongly four years ago, in 2000, in debates on the then Child Support, Pensions and Social Security Bill, that attributable widows were different. The Government agreed and made exceptional change to the regulations to allow them to remarry or cohabit and keep their attributable widows' pensions. No such special case can be argued for extending that benefit to current AFPS members and those already bereaved.
I turn finally, and perhaps more happily, to Amendment No. 14, spoken to today by the noble Baroness, Lady Strange, and in Grand Committee by my noble friend Lady Dean. I shall resist the amendment as drafted, for reasons that I will explain, but I want to make it clear from the start that I am happy to support the intent behind it and will make proposals to noble Lords.
The proposed new clause seeks to amend war pension legislation to enable war widows' pensions to be paid for life for a specific group of widows and widowers. Article 42 of the service pensions order, which contains the rules of the war pensions scheme, provides that payment of war widows' pension ceases on remarriage or cohabitation. That rule applies equally to all war widows and widowers. My main argument against the change in the form in which it has been proposed is that the change might entail retrospection to benefit those who have already remarried or cohabited. Noble Lords will recognise the cost implications of such an extension, which would make the change wholly unaffordable.
Following eloquent presentation of the amendment both today and in Grand Committee, however, the Government have given very careful consideration to the issues behind it. As noble Lords will be aware, since October 2000—I have just referred to the matter—we have allowed widows and widowers under the Armed Forces pension scheme whose spouse died from causes related to service to keep their pensions on remarriage and cohabitation. In view of the exceptional position of war widows and the special needs of those whose spouses' service ended before major improvements were made to occupational benefits in 1973, we accept the argument for a change in that respect. It will apply only to future remarriages for widows and widowers whose service spouse left service or died before 1973. It would not be affordable to make the change retrospective for past remarriages.
As with the October 2000 change, the change will apply only to those who remarry or cohabit after the date of change. That means that it is not a retrospective
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concession. However, it means that those war widows who have already remarried will not benefit, although, should their position change and their pension be reinstated in future, the new rules would apply to them. I am happy to place on the record the Government's commitment to make that change for war widows. I suggest that we do it through an amendment of the service pensions order; there is no requirement to amend any primary legislation. I hope that the House will welcome that concession. The noble Baronesses, Lady Strange and Lady Dean, and many others, including the noble Lord, Lord Morris, have worked for it for a long time. I hope that they will accept credit for the part that they have played in changing our minds and achieving the concession.
6.15 p.m.
Lord Craig of Radley: My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who supported or spoke to Amendment No. 7. I suppose a nyet on my amendment has been balanced by a da for Amendment No. 14, and one da a day is better than nothing. However, I am left more than a little confused. Once again, we have had assertions that costs will be very significant, without any indication of cost. I do not find that acceptable. I hope that, when we return to the matter at Third Reading, it will not simply be said again that costs are very significant, as it is difficult to make any assessment of the real position when faced with that assertion.
I was interested when the Minister said that, for some of the issues on widows, primary legislation would not be required to help them, and that help could be given through secondary legislation. I shall read carefully what he said; I am not quite sure that I followed him clearly.
I am more than a little confused still about the £500 million. We have Sir Humphrey-speak here, dealing with internal bookkeeping between the Treasury and the Ministry of Defence, which does not seem to speak very highly for joined-up government. Again, I should like to read what the Minister said on that. I am delighted about Amendment No. 14, but I beg leave to withdraw Amendment No. 7.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts moved Amendment No. 8:
After Clause 4, insert the following new clause—

COMPLIANCE WITH CODES OF PRACTICE FROM THE PENSIONS REGULATOR
The Secretary of State shall ensure that the pension and compensation schemes for armed and reserve forces comply with the relevant provisions of codes of practice published by the Pensions Regulator."
The noble Lord said: My Lords, for those noble Lords who have not attended the Committee on the Pensions Bill or did not attend the Committee on this Bill, I should say that the Pensions Bill is a massive piece of work in two volumes. It establishes a Pensions Regulator who has four clear objectives; namely, to protect the benefits of occupational schemes, to protect the benefits of personal pension schemes, to reduce the risks of situations where payouts might

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have come from the Pension Protection Fund, and—last but by no means least—to promote an improved understanding of the good administration of work-based pension schemes.
Those functions have important relevance so far as the Armed Forces are concerned, although obviously not the third of them—the risk of a payout from the Pension Protection Fund—as the Armed Forces pension scheme is a government-backed scheme. The Pensions Bill is a framework Bill being discussed at length in the Moses Room in Grand Committee, and we await large chunks of guidance notes and regulations to fill in the gaps. They will have an important read-across to this Bill for the Armed Forces.
When I introduced a similar amendment in Grand Committee, the Minister rightly chided me by saying that not all the regulations and guidance notes produced by the Pensions Regulator would apply to the Armed Forces. In that sense, the new clause that I had tabled then was deficient. I have now retabled it to insert the words, "the relevant provisions", so that it applies only so far as matters that are of importance and relevance to the Armed Forces.
I do not want to weary the House with the very special position of the Armed Forces; we have tramped that ground a good many times. The problem is not simply the danger or the conditions of service, which may require servicemen to be away from their families. It is not simply the very different career structure, whereby people tend to retire much earlier than from civilian roles. It is not even that there are three very different services carrying out three very different roles. It is, as I think that the noble Baroness, Lady Dean, said at one of our meetings, that they are broken up into small groups of people who are spread far and wide—to the four corners of the globe, a phrase which the noble Lord, Lord Morris, used earlier this afternoon. So it is critical, given the nature and structure of the careers of members of the Armed Forces, that we ensure that pension practice for the Armed Forces will be of the highest standard and therefore complies with the standards that the Government think should be applied in the private sector.
The importance of the amendment can be tested under three yardsticks. First, we had an important discussion on Amendment No. 2, tabled by my noble friend Lord Astor of Hever, which the Government rejected, about the need for an affirmative resolution for major changes to pension funds. They said that they did not want that written on the face of the Bill but that they would simply consult.
The second matter is that there are several important legacy issues in place, particularly regarding the pensions trough. If the consequences of the actions being taken had previously been properly explained, the bitterness and damage might have been avoided or at least minimised. I have received a letter from someone affected by the pensions trough which alleges that there is evidence of a deliberate attempt to keep the consequences hidden. That is somewhat parallel
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with the current pension mis-selling scandal and the penalties now suffered by Equitable Life policy holders. What legacy issues are we creating today and what requirement is there to spell out the full implications of what is being proposed?
The third yardstick is the government Front Bench's repeated assertions that we should have no concerns about those omissions. The noble Baroness, Lady Crawley said:
"We shall be obliged to follow his",
—that is, the Pensions Regulator's—
"codes of practice".—[Official Report, 28/6/04; col. GC10.]
She repeated that in remarks earlier this afternoon.
Along with other noble Lords, I had a most helpful letter from the noble Lord, Lord Bach, dated 4 July in which he said:
"I recognise that there will be consultation requirements introduced in the Pensions Bill and these will apply to the Armed Forces Pension Scheme once they are introduced. It is our intention that we will comply with these consultation requirements although as yet they have not, I understand, been specified in detail".
I do not doubt the sincerity or integrity of the two Ministers, but Acts of Parliament last a long time and Ministers come and go. Governments also come and go. I see no reason why there should be any risk in making explicit the requirement for compliance in the Pensions Regulator's relevant provisions. The Government simply cannot legally impose a series of regulations on the private sector while not accepting formally and legally a similar provision for public sector pensions. I beg to move.
Lord Astor of Hever: My Lords, I support the amendment. My noble friend Lord Hodgson has argued his case comprehensively. Essentially it is an issue of best practice. If we are to have a new Pensions Regulator under the Pensions Bill to ensure minimum standards and requirements for occupational pensions in the private sector, why should we not put a duty on the Secretary of State to ensure that the new Armed Forces Pension Scheme must also comply? The Minister may assure us that there is no need to enforce a read-across from the private sector to the Armed Forces Pension Scheme because both will be working to the same best practice model. But that has not been the case in the past. Indeed, the Armed Forces Pension Scheme has fallen short of best practice elsewhere in the pensions industry. If the Bill were to state explicitly that there will be compliance with the new Pensions Regulator it would set many minds at rest.
Lord Redesdale: My Lords, I support the amendment. It was useful that the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson, was able to sit through the proceedings on both this Bill and the Pensions Bill, with its large amount of paperwork. It is also worth noting that best practice should spread across all sectors, public and private, because we only have to look back a couple of years to realise that Crown immunity—once one of the cornerstones that allowed death in service not to be

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covered by certain other aspects, which led to abuse—had to be abolished because it was seen as inequitable in today's society. The amendment contains much sense.
Baroness Crawley: My Lords, I thank noble Lords for their interventions, and the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts, has argued a characteristically robust case. He is amazingly cheerful, having sat through this Bill and the Pensions Bill. However, I have to tell him that I shall continue to resist his amendment.
The new Pensions Regulator will not be established until April 2005, subject to the passage of the necessary primary legislation. The regulator will issue codes of practice, some of which will be mandatory, to help pension fund trustees and other professionals understand how to comply with pensions legislation. I have noted and listened carefully to the noble Lord in his experienced observations regarding those who have fallen victim to certain pension regimes over the years and those who are bitter as a result of it. However, where the codes impact on the Armed Forces Pension Scheme, new and current, I can assure the House that the MoD will comply with their requirements. I see, still, no need to write such a requirement into primary legislation.
The various codes will provide pension schemes with the regulator's interpretation of pension law, thus assisting in improving compliance and encouraging best practice, as the noble Lord has said. Codes of practice enable legislation to be less prescriptive, while at the same time providing guidance and certainty for scheme professionals. This means that the regulatory approach is more flexible and scheme professionals will have more room to exercise their professional judgment in some areas of scheme administration. This approach responds directly to recommendations made by Alan Pickering in the Pickering report. I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson, will feel reassured enough to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts: My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Astor and the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale, for their support. I was not clear whether the noble Baroness was trying to use the fact that the Pensions Regulator was not to be established until 5 April next year as a fig leaf for the reason why it could not be included in this Bill. She started down that track and then her speaking notes veered away from it. Instead she followed the line that we had received assurances on the Floor of the House and in Grand Committee. I shall have a look at what Alan Pickering had to say—given that he is clearly a man of importance and relevance to this debate—and of course at what the noble Baroness had to say, and see where that takes us regarding Third Reading next week. Meanwhile, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendments Nos. 9 and 10 not moved.]
Lord Astor of Hever Lord Astor of Hever moved Amendment No. 11:
After Clause 5, insert the following new clause—

ARMED FORCES PAY REVIEW BODY
(1) The Armed Forces Pay Review Body ("the AFPRB") shall undertake quinquennial reviews to monitor and consult on the provisions of the armed forces pension and compensation schemes established under this Act.
(2) For the purposes of subsection (1), the AFPRB must employ specialist pension advisors.
(3) For the purposes of subsection (1), the AFPRB may take into account—

(a) any representations made to them on the workings of the schemes or on legacy issues;

(b) any other information which they think necessary.

(4) The conclusions of the review published by the AFPRB shall be submitted to the Secretary of State and laid by him before Parliament.
(5) The Secretary of State may, at his discretion, vary or accept any of the recommendations made by the AFPRB.
(6) For the purposes of subsection (5), the Secretary of State shall make a written statement to Parliament setting out—

(a) the recommendation,

(b) the AFPRB's reasons for making the recommendation,

(c) the Secretary of State's decision in relation to the recommendation, and

(d) the reason for his decision.

(7) A legacy issue shall be defined as an historical anomaly in provisions of armed forces pension schemes causing inequitable treatment of certain clearly defined groups."
The noble Lord said: My Lords, the amendment focuses on the role of the AFPRB in validating the new pension and compensation scheme established under the Bill. We had substantial debate in Committee on this matter. It was clear that noble Lords appreciated the concession in another place from the Government that the AFPRB should be given the remit of validating the scheme. We have been lucky enough to have in our midst the noble Baroness, Lady Dean, who has an unparalleled knowledge of the working and expertise of that excellent body. However, I share with the noble Baroness some concerns about the extent of the new remit for the AFPRB. For this reason, I have brought back a redrafted version of our Amendment No. 26.
First, it would reassure many of us if the role of the AFPRB in the pension scheme were explicitly placed on the face of the Bill. Our amendment would do just that. We would like more detail on how the AFPRB will assume its new role. For that reason, our amendment insists that the AFPRB employs specialist pensions advisers as set out in subsection (2). This is a vital provision. Other pension schemes have trustees. We cannot have trustees, so we are told, because there is no trust. Yet we feel there is a clear need for oversight—for governance, as it were—to make sure that the schemes are in line with best practice and meet the needs of our servicemen and women. This could be provided only by those who have extensive knowledge of the intricacies of the pension industry. Currently, the AFPRB has no such expert.
I have listened to the Minister's arguments and appreciate that it might not be appropriate for the AFPRB to oversee the old pension scheme as well. However, we believe that there is a need for the AFPRB to be open to representations from all who have comments on the workings of the schemes, including legacy issues.
I know that the Government are constrained by their own self-imposed cost neutrality straitjacket at the moment, but a future government might not be. If there were to be some spare money available, a consultation review of the AFPRB would be extremely useful in pointing out which legacy issues could perhaps be addressed. Above all, our amendment strives to guarantee that the AFPRB has qualified experts available to take on its new role of validating a pension scheme and that there is a transparent process in terms of its consultation and interaction with the Secretary of State if any proposal or recommendations are made. In this way, the AFPRB can be a vital safeguard for ensuring that our servicemen and women are adequately cared for and protected in terms of their pension rights and needs. I beg to move.
6.30 p.m.
Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts: My Lords, I support the amendment. I regard it as highly desirable, even essential, that if the Armed Forces Pay Review Body is to be charged with overseeing the Armed Forces' pensions generally, a formal framework should be established within which it can carry out its ditties.
We heard the Government's previous response that there was no need for this as service personnel were properly represented by the chain of command. Indeed, the noble Baroness used the phrase "chain of command" again today. I am afraid that this just will not wash. It is asking too much of a serving officer or an NCO to put forward and espouse what may be unpopular issues and views raised by junior colleagues. People may be putting their career on the line by doing so.
Without going back over ground we covered during the previous debate, there is a read-across to the private sector. As a trustee of a private sector pension fund, I would not accept that the only line of approach to me and my fellow trustees is through the line management of the company concerned. The dangers of doing so are obvious: the management shut or close off reasonable views put forward by more junior members of staff. That is why in the private sector there are employee member trustees, and it is quite right that there should be. If we cannot have employee member trustees, that is a role the AFPRB must fulfil and it needs explicit powers to do so effectively.
Finally, in Committee, the Minister and I discussed whether there were trustees for the Civil Service pension fund and he said that there were not. Of course he was right in fact but not entirely right in spirit. There is a joint consultative committee for the Civil Service pension scheme made up of unions and management. They are not trustees, but they are a consultative committee. I think that this is just what the amendment is seeking to parallel and I therefore hope that the Government will see that an important precedent already exists and that they will support it.
Lord Craig of Radley: My Lords, I support the amendment and I spoke to a similar amendment previously. However, during Second Reading I asked
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a question to which I did not receive an answer. The Armed Forces Pay Review Body is concerned with one star personnel and below, but I was not clear about how its remit would run for more senior officers.
Lord Bach: My Lords, I am grateful to noble Lords who have spoken to the amendment. It seeks to place the Armed Forces Pay Review Body's role in primary legislation and, frankly, to extend it beyond the remit announced on 30 April by my honourable friend the Veterans Minister, Mr Caplin. Noble Lords will recall the terms of that announcement.
Working alongside its current remit on pay, the AFPRB will undertake regular reviews of Armed Forces pension arrangements, comparing the pensions scheme arrangements with practice elsewhere in the economy and considering the extent to which they meet the recruitment and retention needs of the Armed Forces. It will publish its observations in an annual report and the Government will respond publicly.
Since Grand Committee, the Veterans Minister has written to Professor Greenaway, the AFPRB chairman, to seek to agree the detail of the external validation remit work. This follows discussions between my officials and the Office of Manpower Economics. The chairman will discuss the letter with other members of the AFPRB at its next meeting towards the end of the month. It would not be appropriate therefore to give further details today. However, it is reasonable to say that the work will cover the new pensions schemes and any variants, such as those for the full-time reserve service, together with the new early departure payment scheme. I am equally clear that the arrangements should not cover legacy issues for the AFPS, affecting those in receipt of pensions.
The concern of the review body is remuneration in the context of recruitment and retention of those currently serving. It operates through a system of comparability. Pension benefits of veterans are not a matter of recruitment and retention and it is difficult to see how they could be the subject of comparability with the terms paid to others who are currently employed in the UK economy. Any change to legacy issues must be a matter for political decision.
In terms of timing, we would expect that as currently planned the AFPRB would value pensions for its 2006 report in the context of that year's pay recommendations. We have proposed that this valuation should be confined to the current AFPS benefit, given that the membership of a new scheme will be small at that date. We will be at a very early stage in our implementation of the scheme. If something dramatic happens in the pensions field, however, provision is available to bring forward the review by agreement.
The next scheduled valuation would be for the 2011 report. We have proposed that unless there is evidence to suggest an earlier review, the first AFPRB validation of the AFPS should also be undertaken in 2010 for publication in 2011. The body's findings and observations on the scheme will be published in a

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supplement to the annual report, along with any associated reports commissioned by the body as part of its work. This will be in line with normal practice.
I see no need to include the review body's role in primary legislation. It has undertaken its role with respect to pay entirely satisfactorily for many years on the basis of a non-statutory remit. Other review bodies also operate on a non-statutory remit and I see no reason to depart from this arrangement for pensions. Indeed, it would be strange to have a different approach for the one review body. For those reasons, I must resist the amendment.
There was a question from the noble and gallant Lord to which I completely forgot to reply. When the AFPRB conducts its visits relating to remuneration, it speaks to service personnel of all ages and ranks and has free access to them. The Armed Forces are encouraged to share their views and concerns. Does that deal with the point that the noble and gallant Lord was making?
Lord Craig of Radley: My Lords, I do not wish to prolong the matter now but it strikes me that the Armed Forces Pay Review Body's remit is one star and below and we are talking about pensions for all service personnel. Can I leave it that the noble Lord will write to me?
Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts: My Lords, before the Minister finishes, can he answer one question? If we have a joint consultative committee for the Civil Service pension scheme, why do we not have one for the Armed Forces pension scheme? Is that not what we are trying to create here?
Lord Bach: My Lords, I think that the answer to the noble Lord's probing question is that it is because we have the Armed Forces Pay Review Body, which has proved itself, as it were, in battle for many a year and there is no need to alter it.
Lord Astor of Hever: My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Hodgson and the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig, for their support on this amendment. I also thank the Minister for his reply, which was very full and listed some very important points which I should like to consider. I should like to read Hansard very carefully before deciding what to do. In the mean time, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Schedule 1 [Amendments to Pensions Appeal Tribunals Act 1943]:
Lord Astor of Hever Lord Astor of Hever moved Amendment No. 12:
Page 7, line 46, at end insert"—

6CA COST OF APPEALS
(1) A party to an appeal under section 6A or 6C shall be entitled to be paid the costs of bringing or opposing such appeal.
(2) An application for costs payable to a person under this section shall be made in writing to the President of the Pension Appeal Tribunal within six weeks after the determination of the appeal or subsequent appeal, whichever is later.
(3) In determining the amount of such costs, the President shall assess those on the basis that would be applied to an assessment of costs of High Court proceedings."
The noble Lord said: My Lords, in moving Amendment No. 12, I shall speak also to Amendment No. 13. This amendment is intended to protect the existing rights of a dozen or so individuals whose cases each year are the subject of appeals, on a point of law, from a decision of the Pension Appeal Tribunal. As matters presently stand, an individual is entitled to paid legal representation where leave to appeal has been granted by the president either to the individual or to the Secretary of State.
The Government have been concerned about access to justice. Indeed, their most recent White Paper entitled Transforming Public Services: Complaints, Redress and Tribunals is concerned with that very issue. The amendment ensures that access to justice is retained on an equal footing.
The White Paper contemplates that individuals will not require representation on appeals on points of law. However, the individual is entitled to a level playing field. At a recent tribunal hearing—not an appeal on a point of law—the Secretary of State was represented by counsel instructed by the department's legal adviser, together with two senior representatives of the Veterans Agency. The claimant was represented by his father and a representative from the Royal British Legion.
In two other cases—both judicial reviews—the ministry abandoned its case involving the party who was legally represented and pursued the judicial review against the party who had taken no active part in the proceedings and who had no representation. Those are not the actions of a Government who wish to safeguard and protect the interests of individuals who are entitled to proper legal representation.
The Government are concerned about proportionality. In 2002, there were 2,372 appeals to the Pension Appeal Tribunal. Approximately a dozen gave rise to further appeals on points of law. That does not incur disproportionate legal costs and the Government now propose to take away the very sensible basis that has prevailed for ensuring proper and fair representation.
The Government have not adopted the proposal contained in the Leggatt report that there should be a grant of funds to the RBL for the purpose of ensuring that advice and representation can be provided. Rather, the Government's intention is to take away an existing right and benefit in order to save money and to swing the existing balance of representation away from the individual. I beg to move.
6.45 p.m.
Lord Redesdale: My Lords, I support Amendment No. 12, which is also in my name, because it goes back to some of the arguments that were raised on Amendment No. 1. A concern arises that, with the emphasis being on cost savings so that the benefits can be paid for, a certain stringent view on the amount of money that can be paid to claimants—many of them

621
justifiable claimants—will cause them not to be represented and therefore conceivably to have their cases dismissed. That will be unfair to many people who believe that the system will be working for them whereas in an adversarial system it appears that it may well be the case that there will be a different burden of proof with financial consequences if they fail to prove their case.
One issue that should not be forgotten at this point is that those who are trying to prove their case will have suffered some injury—physical or mental—and therefore deserve all the protection that can be given to them, even if that comes at a residual cost.
Lord Bach: My Lords, I am grateful to the two noble Lords who have spoken in this debate. I propose to resist the amendment. The debate on whether Schedule 1 shall stand part of the Bill will touch on many of the issues. Therefore, as I understand it, it is part and parcel of the same debate and I shall reply, if I may, to Amendment No. 13 as well.
Perhaps I may deal with the two situations to which the amendment concerning the cost of appeals would apply. I shall deal, first, with appeals from the Pension Appeal Tribunal to the Social Security Commissioners. A party appealing a decision of the Pension Appeal Tribunal will now go to the Social Security Commissioners. I should first note that most appeals before the commissioners are dealt with on paper without an oral hearing. I shall have more to say about that in a minute.
When a hearing is required, the Office of the Social Security and Child Support Commissioners will provide for the costs of those attending a hearing, such as those relating to travel and accommodation. With regard to legal costs, the Legal Services Commission provides a range of services to help claimants to prepare an appeal to the commissioners, subject to means and merits tests. For example, the Legal Help Scheme can provide up to £500 worth of advice from a solicitor. Of course, various advice agencies, such as the National Association of Citizens Advice Bureaux, provide advice for free.
That leaves the question of costs for legal representation. Outside of exceptional circumstances, legal aid is not available for legal representation in a tribunal hearing. That is because tribunal hearings are very different from a court. They are intended to operate without legal counsel. That applies equally to the department, which would not generally expect to have legal representation.
The new tribunal system is intended to be accessible and user-friendly. It is intended that people can bring their cases before a tribunal without the delay, cost and formality of a court proceeding. Commissioners are well used to unrepresented appellants and run hearings accordingly by asking questions of the parties and any attendant experts. I remind the House that the process is inquisitorial and removes the need for counsel—a need which is clearly present in the High Court.
There will, of course, be some rare occasions where it will be appropriate to fund legal counsel for a tribunal hearing. If necessary, representation before
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the commissioners may be publicly funded through an application for a grant of exceptional funding. That can be granted where an applicant meets the standard means and merits test and the matter is of a significant wider public interest, has overwhelming importance to the client or where representation is needed to ensure a fair hearing.
The second part of the amendment concerns appeals from the commissioners to the higher courts. Appeals to the Court of Appeal in England and Wales and Northern Ireland or the Court of Session in Scotland will fall under their existing cost and legal aid regimes. Our legal aid system recognises that appeals to a court require legal representation. A person before a court may qualify for full legal aid, subject to means and merit testing. That enables legal representation for persons unable to fund it for themselves. Of course, noble Lords will know that courts have the power to award costs as they see fit.
As the existing system already provides for full legal aid and award of costs when appropriate, I do not recognise the need for any changes. In short, the Bill modernises the appeal process to make it faster, cheaper and, most important of all, more accessible for claimants. Our justice system already provides for the reasonable costs of claimants, and tribunals are intended to operate without legal representation.
In my notes on the Schedule 1 debate, I repeated much of what I have already said, but I should make a couple of points about tribunals. Having two levels of tribunals, as we intend, provides a quicker, more user-friendly and more cost-effective service to the parties involved in comparison with the court system. Tribunals have a number of strengths in the consideration of administrative disputes.
First, on participation and funding—for example, in cases where a hearing is required—concerns have been expressed about "inequality of arms". I can assure noble Lords that the system is designed to avoid just that situation. It has to be remembered that the system is designed for lay and unrepresented appellants. The commissioners go out of their way to accommodate the parties and to explain the relevant matters of law.
In a hearing the presiding commissioners will investigate the issues, as I have said, in an inquisitorial manner, not relying on arguments of opposing counsel. The department would generally not expect to have legal representations at tribunal hearings. As I have said, there are rare occasions when it will be appropriate to fund legal counsel. If necessary, representation may be publicly funded through an application for a grant of exceptional funding.
Secondly, the tribunal system has special expertise. There is some misunderstanding about the Social Security Commissioners. They are extremely senior lawyers. The statutory qualification for their office is a 10-year general qualification or to be an advocate or a solicitor in Scotland of at least 10 years' standing. They offer considerable expertise in resolving appeals from the Pensions Appeal Tribunal. Many will have had previous experience in the Pensions Appeal Tribunal jurisdiction and it is they who will initially be

623
assigned to hear appeals from the PAT. To distinguish such appeals, we shall call them the "Pensions Appeal Commissioners" when hearing appeals from the PAT. Of course, I want to make it clear that there are not many of them compared with other general matters of social security.
The third point, which I believe I have already covered, is that the strength of a tribunal system is its accessibility; it can be much more accessible than the courts. But we have changed the system so that there is an appeal, for the first time, on a point of law from the commissioner to the Court of Appeal and, if necessary and with leave, to the House of Lords in its judicial capacity. In short, we believe that what we are suggesting in terms of access to justice for claimants will be well met by the new system that is being adopted.
Viscount Slim: My Lords, in Grand Committee I asked whether we could keep the rulings simple. The excellent exposition that the Minister gave was quite difficult to understand. Thinking of an elderly claimant or a claimant in the middle of Sierra Leone who is being transported back home, or whatever, we must keep the paperwork simple so that straightaway he can get his claim on the books.
Lord Bach: My Lords, I appreciate what the noble Viscount says, but the whole point of the tribunal system is that it is supposed to be in the language of the layman. I am afraid that that cannot always be said for the courts.
Lord Astor of Hever: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale, for his support. The cost of appeals is an issue of great concern to the Royal British Legion. I am grateful to the Minister for his very detailed reply on that issue and on the issue of tribunals. I shall consider the Minister's response carefully with the Royal British Legion before deciding what to do next. In the mean time, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendment No. 13 not moved.]
Baroness Strange Baroness Strange had given notice of her intention to move Amendment No. 14:
Before Clause 6, insert the following new clause—

PRE-1973 WAR WIDOWS' PENSIONS ON REMARRIAGE
(1) Article 42 of the Naval, Military and Air Forces etc (Disablement and Death) Service Pensions Order 1983 (S.I. 1983/ 883) is amended as follows.
(2) After Article (IA) there is inserted—
"Article 42(1) does not apply to a widow or widower of a member of the armed forces whose service terminated before 31st March 1973, and any pension or allowance paid to such a widow or widower (including a pension or supplementary pension paid under Article 29) shall continue whether or not the widow or widower marries or lives with another person as the spouse of that person.""
The noble Baroness said: My Lords, I thank my noble friend the Minister for his kind and generous words and all noble Lords who have spoken for me and for my ladies. I particularly want to thank my noble friends Lady Dean and Lord Astor for their magnificent support. I and all the war widows are deeply grateful. In view of the Minister's kind promises and assurances, and bearing in mind that we still have Third Reading next week, I shall not move the amendment.
[Amendment No. 14 not moved.]
Lord Morris of Manchester Lord Morris of Manchester had given notice of his intention to move Amendment No. 15:
Before Clause 6, insert the following new clause—

BURDEN OF PROOF IN CLAIMS FOR BENEFITS IN RESPECT OF DEATH OR DISABLEMENT
The power in respect of the provision concerning pensions and other grants for disablement and death due to service made pursuant to section 12(1) of the Social Security (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1977 (c. 5) (exercise by Order in Council of existing powers relating to benefits for death or disablement through service in the armed forces) may not on any occasion be exercised in any manner which would or might alter either the onus on any person of proof in respect of claims for entitlement to awards as provided for by Article 4(2) or the benefit of reasonable doubt as provided for by Article 5(4) of the Naval, Military and Air Forces etc. (Disablement and Death) Service Pension Order 1983 (S.I. 1983/883) as appropriate."
The noble Lord said: My Lords, by explanation of my intention not to move this amendment, and in courtesy to the House, it might be thought that my approach in tabling both amendments was one of belt and braces. Certainly the amendment that the House has already so emphatically approved this afternoon—Amendment No. 1—is a robust safeguard of the existing burden of proof; and as I do not wish to detain the House further this evening and can, if necessary, return to the issue at a later stage, the amendment is not moved.
[Amendment No. 15 not moved.]
Lord Redesdale Lord Redesdale moved Amendment No. 16:
After Clause 6, insert the following new clause"—

POST-RETIREMENT MARRIAGES
As of 6th April 2005 widows, widowers and surviving registered unmarried partners of all service personnel shall receive a full widows' forces family pension based on their spouses or partners length of service and final salary regardless of the date of marriage or registration."
The noble Lord said: My Lords, I wish to speak to Amendment No. 16 and to support Amendment No. 17 to which my name is attached. This is one of a number of legacy issues that we have discussed at some time at earlier stages of the Bill in relation to slightly different issues. I know that the Minister will say, in those immortal words, "I resist this most strenuously", and I know that were Ito press this amendment at this late stage of the day I would have no joy whatever. I intended considering pressing this amendment, but due to the lateness of the hour and the fact that our troops have all gone home, and I would not be able to gloat over the result, it is not appropriate for me to push this matter.
Although I am being slightly flippant, the issue is a serious one and it needs to be aired. It is also one to which we shall return at a later stage of the Bill as there are a large number of pensioner widowers who have found themselves in the very problematic position of marrying post-retirement. They could be married for a number of decades and when the partner who was a member of the services dies no provision is made for them. Therefore, such people find that they may not have simply a reduced pension, but no pension at all. The difficulty is that the person who was in the services made no provision for such a partner after he died. Therefore, such people become caught in the rather difficult position of not having been able to make provision in the past.
To introduce such legislation retrospectively would produce many of the problems that retrospection has in legislation. I know that the Minister would have difficulty with that. Amendments Nos. 15 and 16 put forward the concept of a pension being enacted from 6 April 2005. Amendment No. 17 plays with semantics and tries to make the pill less bitter to swallow for the Minister, although I know he will not swallow it anyway, which is unfortunate. However, it is important to note that there are a large number of mostly women who find themselves in this position. Many are in their 60s or 70s—although not necessarily of that age—and many find themselves in a difficult position.
At an earlier stage the Minister said that the Government would be looking at legacy issues. I very much hope that that is not just a form of words and that the Minister can think again. Of course this is some years after the constraints of the schemes to which the servicemen signed up and good practice now means that certain people are not caught by this situation. I beg to move.
7 p.m.
Lord Freyberg: My Lords, Amendment No. 17 in my name is along similar lines to that tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale. It differs in one crucial respect in that it imposes an added age restriction. I should like to explain the reasons for that and stress that those who stand to benefit from the amendment are elderly service widows and widowers in their 70s, 80s and 90s who feel let down that their spouse's years of service have not counted towards their pensions. I believe that it is the responsibility of government to right injustices inadvertently created by previous legislation, and that is certainly the case here.
At present, widows and widowers of pre-1978 post-retirement service marriages receive no service pension. In this they are at a severe disadvantage to their equivalents in other public services. That is because the majority of those who served in the Armed Forces at this time were obliged to retire at or around the age of 40, while the vast majority of those in other public services retired at 60. Thus, public servants who retired in the late 1970s with the requisite pensionable years of service were able to marry or remarry up to the age of 60 and pass on a widow's pension when they died. However, during the same period, of those who
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retired from the services, the majority had to have married by the age of 40 to be able to pass on their pension. In that respect the Armed Forces were uniquely disadvantaged.
In Grand Committee and in a subsequent letter to the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale, the Minister seemed to be under the impression that we are asking for special treatment for PRM widows. Not so; we are asking for a greater degree of parity. Is it so unreasonable for someone working in the Armed Forces to have equal rather than inferior employment rights to civil servants who never have to put their lives on the line for their country? It is worth remembering too that forces personnel have always been obliged to live for long periods in far-flung parts of the world, which puts strains on marriages not endured by those living at home and makes it harder to find marriage partners in the first place.
The reason for proposing 60 as the cut-off age for pre-1978 PRM widow's pensions is twofold. First, it would give service widows the same cut-off age as others in the public sector. Secondly, 60 is the limit for recall liability. By making the cut-off age the same as that for civil servants, the possibility of an expensive read-across is significantly reduced, something that I know concerns the Minister. Sixty is also the age limit for officers and other ranks to be called up for service even after retirement. Moreover, until 1973, when a large proportion of those we are discussing were serving, anyone who failed a recall could face severe consequences.
Prior to 1975, members of the Armed Forces had to serve for 22 years in the case of other ranks and 16 years for officers to qualify for pension rights at all. In the Minister's letter of 30 July 2004 to the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale, the Minister stated:
"Those with substantial periods of service who married after retiring would be the main beneficiaries [of the amendment], but it could not be argued that this group merited exceptional treatment as against other similarly affected pensioners in the UK".
That seems a bizarre assertion. Of course those with the greatest periods of service deserve to benefit most, while his statement that there are other groups of similarly affected pensioners in the UK is demonstrably false. The police and the fire service have the earlier-than-average retirement age of 55, but only the Armed Forces forcibly eject personnel at around the age of 40 and have long periods of service abroad. Furthermore, although the retirement age for officers is 55, only 5 per cent reach even that target.
I should like to address the Minister's assertion in Grand Committee in July that this amendment would cost £50 million. The Government have been unable to give a basis for this in spite of many requests over more than a decade for research into costs and the number of personnel involved. For example, earlier in the year, in another place there was a request for a breakdown of the £50 million calculation. No such breakdown has been forthcoming, nor has any effort apparently been made to calculate the number of personnel. In Grand Committee in this House, a series of sums greater than £50 million were announced and then corrected and

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revised down in a subsequent letter to the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale. In the absence of evidence on where the figures have come from, one can only assume that the actuaries' estimates are little more than guesswork. What one can say with certainty is that the cost of the amendment would be enclosed and diminishing, as well as just.
The widows and widowers are puzzled and angry that they are being financially penalised for marrying later in life, but no later than many in the Civil Service at this time who were then able to claim a widow's pension. The Labour Party recognised the justice of this cause when it supported an amendment on the subject in the House in 1995, led by the esteemed noble Baroness, Lady Hollis. The facts are the same 10 years on, and the costs involved have decreased. I hope that this Administration will do the decent thing and not turn their back on the injustice that they rightly perceived.
Lord Steel of Aikwood: My Lords, I rise briefly to support one or other of the amendments proposed by my noble friend Lord Redesdale and the noble Lord, Lord Freyberg. I do so simply because, to my surprise, I received a number of letters on the subject. I do not know why; I am not a pensions or defence expert.
In our democracy people wonder whether it is worth writing to Members of the House of Commons or the House of Lords. When they take the trouble to do so and not to send circulars, I think that one should pay some attention.
I want to take issue with my noble friend Lord Redesdale in suggesting that all the troops have gone home. I do not understand how he can say that sitting in front of our most gallant noble friend Lord Garden—a very distinguished trooper indeed—not to mention myself and my noble friend Lord Thomas, but we will take issue with him later.
I said I would briefly support the amendment because I understand we are not pressing the matter and hope to return to it on another occasion. I should like to quote from one of these letters which illustrates in a personal way exactly what the noble Lord, Lord Freyberg, said. I shall not give the name and address of the person but he is a retired squadron leader. He said:
"I served continuously in the Royal Air force from 1938 until 1971. I married in 1939 and my wife was with me throughout my Service and when I retired in 1971. She died in 1975, 4 years after I retired. I remarried in 1977. If my present wife is widowed she will not get any related widow's pension.
"Throughout my Royal Air Force Service my pay was adjusted at source … to pay for the Armed Forces Pension Scheme, which includes widow's benefits. Therefore, throughout my Service, I have 'bought' an entitlement for my widow to receive a pension irrespective of the date of my marriage. Since, by their very nature, my contributions can never be refunded, my widow's pension rights must always remain 'bought'".
That is a telling example and it is a matter of financial as well as general justice in comparison with others in other walks of life as the noble Lord said. I
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hope the Government will therefore give this serious thought before the issue comes before the House again.
Lord Craig of Radley: My Lords, I rise also very briefly to support the amendment. I have already drawn attention to the fact that the parliamentary pension scheme does not prevent the widow of an MP getting a pension regardless of when she marries her late husband. The Armed Forces are in a special category when it comes to pensions because of reserve commitments after retirement, much earlier retirement and, sadly, the greater likelihood of premature death. We should try to do something regarding pensions for post-retirement marriages.
Lord Bach: My Lords, I know the strength of feeling on this long-standing issue. I am surprised that we have had a debate about it today given that, as I understood it, the matter was to come before the House later in the Bill. But there has been a debate, so I am afraid that I must answer it. I do not resent answering it on the grounds that it is not a serious question—it is a very important question; I appreciate that. But if the amendment had been withdrawn straightaway, we could have had this debate and, if the noble Lord wanted to see it to a conclusion, we could have voted on it on the next occasion.
I resist both amendments, I am afraid. Post-retirement widows' pensions were introduced following government-wide changes in policy through the Social Security Pensions Act 1975. Provision was made in the current Armed Forces pension scheme for the payment of pensions to widows of service pensioners who married or remarried after retirement, but this change benefited only the widows of those giving service on or after 6 April 1978. Subsequent government policy changes to provide widowers with the same post-retirement provision were introduced later, but this change benefited only the widowers of those giving service on or after 1 October 1987.
Amendment No. 16, if carried, would have three effects. First, it would allow all service widows and widowers to qualify for a post-retirement widows' pension regardless of the date of their marriage. Secondly, it would increase the rate of post-retirement widows' pension for those widows and widowers who currently receive a post-retirement pension based on only that part of their spouse's service after the changes were made. Thirdly, it would improve the benefits of unmarried partners who currently receive benefits only if their partners are attributably killed in service—that is, their death is due to service.
Amendment No. 16, if carried, would not have the impact that the noble Lord who moved it intended that it should have. The principal underlying rationale was that the current position unfairly penalised those who might have been encouraged to delay marriage but then left after a relatively short period of service and therefore married after retirement. Many of those whom the measure is designed to benefit would have no entitlement to a pension, even if this change were carried. The overwhelming majority of the widows

629
affected would have spouses whose career in the Armed Forces pre-dated not only April 1978, when post-retirement widows' pensions were introduced, but also April 1975, when preserved pensions were introduced.
There was no legal requirement to preserve pension rights before that date for those who left before completing enough service to qualify for a pension—22 years for other ranks and 16 years for officers. This position was not unique to the Armed Forces and affected most other public service and private sector workers. Those with substantial periods of service who married after retiring would be the main beneficiaries, but it could not be argued that this group merited exceptional treatment as against other similarly affected pensioners in the United Kingdom.
As the noble Lord, Lord Freyberg, has said, the Government Actuary has estimated that there would be a one-off cost in the order of £50 million to extend post-retirement widows' and widowers' pensions to all current and deferred AFPS pensioners. The noble Lord asked for the figure to be broken down. I cannot do that at the Dispatch Box today but I shall ensure that the noble Lord is written to next week with an attempt at a breakdown—he was justified in asking that question. It will cost around £50 million. The cost would increase if unmarried partners were to be included, but it is difficult to estimate given the limited information on the number of partners who might be eligible. There would be no future annual cost.
I explained in Committee that there is no distinction between Armed Forces personnel and other public service employees with regard to the fact that the post-retirement widows' and widowers' pensions are available only to the spouses of those with service on or after a specific date. It has been the long-standing policy of successive governments that changes to improve the benefits from public service pension schemes should be implemented from a current date for future service only. To extend the post-retirement marriage concession only to survivors of service pensioners would therefore put pressure on all public service occupational schemes. Extending the provision to all public service occupational schemes would cost between £300 million and £500 million.
7.15 p.m.
Furthermore, as the noble Lord, Lord Redesdale, graciously acknowledged, the amendment would be in breach of the principle of retrospection, which has been followed by governments of all colours throughout the ages—and immediately denied by opposition parties when they get into government. I do not say that with any relish, but it is just the way it happens, I am afraid.
Amendment No. 17 would limit the benefit to those marrying before the service person's 60th birthday. It would still mean that there was a significant cost, both to the MoD and to other public service schemes, because we could not treat Armed Forces personnel differently on this issue, as I have attempted to explain.
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For those reasons, and with no joy in my heart, I resist the amendments, which were so ably moved. The noble Lord has said that he may return to the matter at a later stage. If he does, I hope that I will be in a position to speak on the amendment again. But I am afraid that I cannot give out any hope at all that our position will change; it would set an unfortunate precedent. The noble Lord says that the Government have made no concessions on legacy issues. I am afraid that I dispute that: our concession on Amendment No. 14 was on a legacy issue. The difference between Amendment No. 14 and this amendment is that the former is not retrospective.
Lord Redesdale: My Lords, I thank the Minister for his reply. I know that it is not an easy issue; nor is it a party-political issue on which points could be scored. The issue affects many people. I understand that Amendment No. 14 has very few cost implications, which is one of the guiding principles whereby it can be agreed, whereas the other legacy issues cannot be accepted. I wished the issue to be aired today. It was useful for people to put their points across because, if the issue will never be solved, that must be stated in the House without giving the impression that this or any government will change the situation without fundamental changes to the whole way in which pensions are looked at. I may return to the matter, but I thank the Minister for his reply. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Lord Freyberg Lord Freyberg had given notice of his intention to move Amendment No. 17:
After Clause 6, insert the following new clause"—

POST-RETIREMENT MARRIAGES
As of 6th April 2005 widows, widowers and surviving registered unmarried partners of all service personnel shall receive a full widows' forces family pension based on their spouses or partners length of service and final salary, provided tha t their marriage took place before the service personnel's 60th birthday."
The noble Lord said: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Steel, and the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig, for their kind words. This is a late hour at which to take the matter any further, so I shall not move the amendment.
[Amendment No. 17 not moved.]

Public Audit (Wales) Bill [H.L.]
7.19 p.m.
Lord Evans of Temple Guiting: My Lords, I beg to move that the Commons amendments be now considered.
Moved accordingly, and, on Question, Motion agreed to.

COMMONS AMENDMENTS
[The page and line references are to Bill 108, the Bill as first printed for the Commons.]
1 Clause 3, page 4, line 26, at end insert—
"(3A) In determining how to exercise his functions under this section, the Auditor General for Wales shall take into account the views of the Audit Committee as to the studies which he should undertake or promote under this section."
Lord Evans of Temple Guiting: My Lords, I beg to move that the House do agree with the Commons in their Amendment No. 1.
I start by saying a few brief words about the amendments before us. Nine amendments have been brought from another place. They are comparatively minor and technical in nature, and I shall deal with them in accordance with the Order Paper.
Before doing so, I would like again to thank the noble Lords and noble Baronesses who contributed so effectively to the debates on the Bill in its passage through this House. The fact that there are comparatively few amendments before us for consideration is a result of that constructive and robust scrutiny. It is a job well done, and I am grateful to everybody. I also warmly thank the Bill team, led by David Powell from the Welsh Assembly. They have been very helpful to me and very responsive to the many good points made during the various stages of the Bill's passage through the House.
Two of the amendments relate to Clause 54. I will deal with the detail of them along with the other amendments. On a wider front, however, I can confirm that detailed work is progressing on the order under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 that will amend Section 49 of the Audit Commission Act 1998 to ensure a general presumption in favour of disclosure. The Government still intend to bring the order before Parliament as soon as possible, certainly before the end of the year. That will in turn clear the way for Clause 54 of the Public Audit (Wales) Bill to be likewise amended.
Your Lordships will also be aware that the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Wales has announced in another place that the Government intend to repeal at the earliest legislative opportunity the sanction of imprisonment for failure to comply with the amended provisions of Section 49 and Clause 54. The sanction of a fine for unlawful disclosure will remain.
Commons Amendment No. 1 will require the Auditor General for Wales to take account of the views of the National Assembly Audit Committee in determining which studies to undertake or promote in the exercise of his functions under Clause 3. Sections 100 and 145 of the Government of Wales Act 1998, which relate to value-for-money examinations in respect of the National Assembly and Assembly-sponsored public bodies and NHS bodies in Wales respectively, require the Auditor General to take account of the committee's views. The amendment will bring Clause 3 into line with those provisions. In practice, the Auditor General would consult the Audit Committee on his proposals under Clause 3.
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During debate in another place, the difference in approach was remarked on. The Government undertook to consider that comment further, and the amendment is a fulfilment of that undertaking.
Moved, That the House do agree with the Commons in their Amendment No. 1.—(Lord Evans of Temple Gutting.)
Lord Roberts of Conwy: My Lords, we are all grateful to the Minister for his introductory remarks. He is certainly right in saying that the House has put a great deal of work into the Bill, and we welcome the measure. Among those who have played an important part in improving the Bill is my noble friend Lady Noakes, whom I am glad to see beside me on the Bench this evening.
The amendment provides a satisfactory way of involving the National Assembly Audit Committee in the selection of subjects for value-for-money studies within the ambit of the Assembly and its sponsored bodies. The amendment will ensure that there is proper communication on such matters between the Auditor General and the Assembly's Audit Committee. The last thing that we want to see is duplication of effort; we want to see liaison, understanding and co-operative effort, where they are required.
I am bound to say that the amendment was anticipated during proceedings in Standing Committee in the other place. We now see the fruition of that anticipation in the amendment, which we are happy to support.
Lord Thomas of Gresford: My Lords, the interesting aspect of the Bill for us is the fact that it emanated from the joint Liberal Democrat and Labour Government in the National Assembly for Wales. Consequently, we have always felt some ownership of the Bill, and we are delighted to see that it is being put into effect.
We were slightly chided by the Conservative spokesman in another place for not making amendments to the Bill. It is difficult to make amendments to one's own Bill, which is how we see it, particularly if we were not in the position of having the advice that was available to the Government. Consequently, we have approached the Bill, save for Clause 54, with good will. In any event, the Government have been greatly assisted in their consideration of the finer detail of the Bill by the formidable combination of the auditing experience of the noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, and the ministerial experience of the noble Lord, Lord Roberts of Conwy. I give them the palm for detailed scrutiny of the Bill.
With regard to Clause 54, we were always anxious that the criminal sanctions in the Bill, which applied only to reports made in respect of local government, should be removed. It seemed to us that that part of the Bill had come from alien sources, namely the Welsh Local Government Association. which at that time— happily, no longer—tended to be dominated by what I have described as the dinosaurs of the Labour Party in south Wales. Happily, since the previous elections,

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that is no longer quite the case. It managed to get its oar in and try to preserve for itself the criminal sanction relating to local government reports.
The solution, which was arrived at with considerable effort on the part of the Minister and Mr Touhig, to whom I also pay tribute, is not entirely satisfactory, but it is as good as we will get. At earlier stages of the Bill's passage, I said that we did not accept the principle that the criminal law in Wales must be the same as the criminal law in England. Every regulation that is passed by the National Assembly using its powers of secondary legislation that contains a sanction makes a difference between the two systems of criminal law. That principle must be recognised.
Given that the Government were not prepared to give way on the issue, I am happy that, in the unlikely event that anybody should seek to bring a criminal charge under Clause 54 as it is now drafted, they would undoubtedly fail, on the basis that an application would be made to stay such a prosecution on the ground of an abuse of process, having regard to the assurances that have been given not only by the noble Lord but by Mr Touhig in the other place. Consequently, I remove all hint of criticism. I accept gratefully the effort that has been put into the matter and the work that has emanated from all sides. I assure the Minister that we support the Bill, which we regard as being partly our own.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

COMMONS AMENDMENT
2 Clause 12, page 11, line 38, leave out paragraph (g) and insert—
"(g) a fire and rescue authority in Wales constituted by a scheme under section 2 of the Fire and Rescue Services Act 2004 or a scheme to which section 4 of that Act applies;"
Lord Evans of Temple Guiting: My Lords, I beg to move that the House do agree with the Commons in their Amendment No. 2. It would be appropriate to take Commons Amendments Nos. 2, 4 and 9 together.
The amendments relating to Clauses 12 and 46 and Schedule 1 take account of the provisions of the Fire and Rescue Services Act 2004, as they affect the Public Audit (Wales) Bill. The Fire and Rescue Services Act replaces fire authorities with fire and rescue authorities. The amendments will change the three relevant references in the Bill, at Clauses 12 and 46 and Schedule 1. The Fire and Rescue Services Act received Royal Assent on 22 July.
Moved, That the House do agree with the Commons in their Amendment No. 2.—(Lord Evans of Temple Guiting.)
7.30 p.m.
Lord Roberts of Conwy: My Lords, as the noble Lord said, these amendments are consequential on the enactment of the Fire and Rescue Services Act. They
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are wholly appropriate. They bring such authorities as may be formed within the scope of the Bill, which is right and proper. Therefore, we support them.
Lord Thomas of Gresford: My Lords, I agree and have nothing to add.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

COMMONS AMENDMENT
3 Clause 28, page 21, line 16, leave out "body" and insert "auditor"
Lord Evans of Temple Guiting: My Lords, I beg to move that the House do agree with the Commons in their Amendment No. 3. It would be appropriate to speak to Commons Amendments Nos. 3 and 7 together. They correct minor errors in Clauses 28 and 56. Clause 28(3)(b) enables a member of the public to obtain on payment of a reasonable sum a copy of a non-immediate public interest report prepared by an auditor, under Clause 22, in respect of an audited body's accounts. Clause 28(3)(b) states that a copy of the report should be supplied by the audited body. The reference should have been to the body's auditor.
Clause 56(2) should have said:
"The information that may be published under subsection (1)(a), (b) or (c)",
and not,
"subsection (1)(b), (c) or (d)",
as originally drafted. The exclusion should relate only to the information about public interest reports, not to information about contraventions of the accounts and audit regulations to be made under Clause 39.
Moved, That the House do agree with the Commons in their Amendment No. 3.—(Lord Evans of Temple Guiting.)
Lord Roberts of Conwy: My Lords, Amendment No. 3, which applies to Clause 28, is a distinct improvement. The duty of supplying a non-immediate report to a member of the public is quite properly taken away from the body reported on and given to the auditor who has produced the report. One can imagine such a body finding all kinds of excuses for not supplying a report that is critical of itself.
Amendment No. 7 applying to Clause 56, which would leave out subsection (1)(d), is a little more complex. As I understand it, it would prevent the Auditor General for Wales publishing information about a body that contravenes regulations made under Section 39. Those regulations made by the National Assembly relate, for the most part, to local government accounts.
We have been over that ground before. It is whistleblower territory. A person who contravenes such regulations may find himself or herself committing an offence. In such circumstances, which may be sub judice or close to sub judice, it may be sensible not to encourage the Auditor General to publish information about a contravention. That is my understanding of the effect of leaving out Clause

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56(1)(d). It is an understandable position for the Government to take. We do not intend to make a big issue of it.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

COMMONS AMENDMENT
4 Clause 46, page 30, line 39, leave out paragraph (e) and insert—
"(e) a fire and rescue authority in Wales constituted by a scheme under section 2 of the Fire and Rescue Services Act 2004 or a scheme to which section 4 of that Act applies."
Lord Evans of Temple Guiting: My Lords, I beg to move that the House do agree with the Commons in their Amendment No. 4. I have spoken to this amendment with Amendment No. 2.
Moved accordingly, and, on Question, Motion agreed to.

COMMONS AMENDMENTS
5 Clause 54, page 35, line 25, leave out "145B or"
6 Page 35, line 39, leave out "145B(3) or"
Lord Evans of Temple Guiting: My Lords, I beg to move that the House do agree with the Commons in their Amendments Nos. 5 and 6. Commons Amendments Nos. 5 and 6 relate to Clause 54. They remove information obtained during a value-for-money study undertaken at the request of an education body from the restriction on the disclosure of information currently provided for in Clause 54.
The Government have striven to achieve consistency in the treatment of Section 49 of the Audit Commission Act 1998 and Clause 54. Clause 54 would apply the restriction on disclosure of information to value-for-money studies undertaken at the request of education bodies under the proposed Section 145B of the Government of Wales Act, provided for in Clause 4 of the Bill.
Studies in respect of such education bodies are not covered by Section 49 of the Audit Commission Act 1998. The amendments bring the provisions into line. As the studies are at a body's request, the release of information will be governed by the normal laws of confidentiality and the terms of agreement between the parties. These Commons amendments limit the scope of Clause 54 and bring it into line with Section 49 of the Audit Commission Act.
Moved, That the House do agree with the Commons in their Amendments Nos. 5 and 6.—(Lord Evans of Temple Guiting.)
Lord Roberts of Conwy: My Lords, from the start this has been the most contentious clause in the entire Bill. I think that we all believe it is right that it should be a matter of contention. There are elements in the clause that even this Government have now found to be obnoxious. I shall not deepen their hurt but accept that they are trying their best to right the wrongs without causing too much fuss. There is however continuing cause for concern.
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With regard to these specific amendments relating to value-for-money studies undertaken at the request of educational bodies, the Government take the view that because the bodies have requested the studies, the rules of confidentiality and restriction on disclosure should apply even though the bodies concerned are substantially financed from the public purse.
The Government's view has a certain validity: they rightly wish to encourage educational bodies to seek such independent studies if they believe they need them and will benefit from them. Part of that encouragement is the non-disclosure of possible adverse outcomes. Of course, under the Bill, the situation is further complicated because such educational bodies are not covered by Section 49 of the Audit Commission Act, as the noble Lord has said and as the Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Mr Don Touhig, said in Standing Committee.
The Government seek consistency between what they now propose and that Act. Of course, we must remember that, ultimately, we shall have translucency rather than transparency. If there is something wrong in an educational institution that has sought one of these studies some will be entitled to know about whatever is wrong, but the great British public will not know necessarily.
However, I am the first to appreciate the Government's position. They require consistency between this Bill and the Audit Commission Act. It is important because of the changes that the Government have repeatedly promised to bring about in both pieces of legislation to bring them into line with the Freedom of Information Act. In short, as I understand it, the presumption against disclosure in Section 49 of the Audit Commission Act will become a presumption in favour of revelation before the end of this year. That presumption will be effected by an order under Section 75 of the Freedom of Information Act.
As we have heard, the Government have already announced in the other place that they have decided to drop the imprisonment sanction against disclosure, which is certainly welcome. We trust, of course, that they will also abide by the rest of the commitments that they have made to Parliament. We are the first to acknowledge that this is a complex area and that the Government have made every effort to eliminate that complexity and secure consistency between this Bill and the Audit Commission Act.
Lord Thomas of Gresford: My Lords, I have said all that I wanted to say in general about Clause 45, but perhaps I may repeat something that was pointed out on many occasions by the noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, during the course of this Bill through this House; that is, that it is a shame that the opportunity was not taken here to put forward best practice so that the Bill could become the template for what will happen in England in due course. As it is, this Bill has been made to comply with an Act of Parliament which the Government admit is unsatisfactory and

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inconsistent with the Freedom of Information Act. Machinery has already been put into the Bill which will amend it in a matter of months.
The Government should accept the possibility that in Wales we can show the way in legislation. We can provide a guide to the way future English legislation should go on these topics. Given that, I hope that when other Welsh legislation comes before Parliament, we do not always seek to comply with out-of-date English statutes.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

COMMONS AMENDMENT
7 Clause 56, page 36, line 42, leave out "(1)(b), (c) or (d)" and insert "(1)(a), (b) or (c)"
Lord Evans of Temple Guiting: My Lords, I beg to move that the House do agree with the Commons in their Amendment No. 7. I spoke to this amendment with Amendment No. 3.
Moved accordingly, and, on Question, Motion agreed to.

COMMONS AMENDMENT
8 Clause 75, page 42, line 18, leave out subsection (2)
Lord Evans of Temple Guiting: My Lords, I beg to move that the House do agree with the Commons in their Amendment No. 8. This Commons amendment removes the privilege amendment which was inserted in the Bill in this House at Third Reading. A money resolution was passed immediately after the Second Reading of the Bill in another place on 17 June.
Moved, That the House do agree with the Commons in their Amendment No. 8.—(Lord Evans of Temple Gutting.)
Lord Roberts of Conwy: My Lords, any layman looking at what is proposed by this amendment would be very surprised to find that Clause 75(2) is in the Bill at all. It states quite clearly that:
"Nothing in this Act shall impose any charge on the people or on public funds or vary the amount or incidence of or otherwise alter any such charge in any manner, or affect the assessment, levying, administration or application of any money raised by any such charge".
It was obvious from the beginning that this Bill would cost money for various bodies and, ultimately, for the council tax payer. I seem to recollect that the Explanatory Notes acknowledged that and stated that costs of some £985,000 had been identified since the introduction of the Bill.
As the noble Lord has pointed out, this was a privilege amendment which it is conventional to insert into a Bill in the other place before authority has been given by that place for the expenditure of money. However, if more costs have been identified further to those I have mentioned, perhaps the noble Lord would share that information with us. It would be a fitting
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end to our proceedings on this Welsh audit Bill if we were given such additional information on the costs as may be available.
Lord Evans of Temple Guiting: My Lords, it is worth putting on the record what this amendment does. It is a formality and a well established procedure, being an example of what is known as a privilege amendment. It is introduced before a Bill leaves this House and goes to another place in acknowledgment of the convention that all money resolutions are passed in another place permitting public expenditure on matters provided for in legislation. As I have said, a money resolution was passed immediately after the Second Reading of the Bill on 17 June.
The noble Lord, Lord Roberts, is absolutely correct to point out that we have anticipated the set-up costs of the Wales Audit Office to be around £985,000. This has already been reported to both Houses of Parliament. The amount will be met by the budget of the National Assembly for Wales. As regards future costs, the Auditor General for Wales is currently working on his administrative budget for the first year of the body's operation. This will shortly be considered by the Assembly Audit Committee.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

COMMONS AMENDMENT
9 Schedule 1, page 43, leave out line 11 and insert—
(d) a fire and rescue authority in Wales constituted by a scheme under section 2 of the Fire and Rescue Services Act 2004 or a scheme to which section 4 of that Act applies."
Lord Evans of Temple Guiting: My Lords, I beg to move that the House do agree with the Commons in their Amendment No. 9. I spoke to this amendment with Amendment No. 2. Before I sit down, I should like to thank all noble Lords for being enormously helpful during the passage of the Bill through this House.
Moved, That the House do agree with the Commons in their Amendment No. 9.— (Lord Evans of Temple Guiting.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

Employment Relations Bill
7.47 p.m.
Read a third time.
Lord Triesman Lord Triesman moved Amendment No. 1:
After Clause 5, insert the following new clause—

CIRCUMSTANCES IN WHICH THE CAC MUST ARRANGE A BALLOT
(1) In paragraph 22(4) of Schedule Al to the 1992 Act (qualifying conditions requiring the CAC to hold a ballot of workers in bargaining unit), for paragraph (b) substitute—
"(b) the CAC has evidence, which it considers to be credible, from a significant number of the union members within the bargaining unit that they do not want the union (or unions) to conduct collective bargaining on their behalf;".
(2) In paragraph 87(4) of that Schedule (qualifying conditions requiring the CAC to hold a ballot of workers in new bargaining unit), for paragraph (b) substitute—
"(b) the CAC has evidence, which it considers to be credible, from a significant number of the union members within the new bargaining unit that they do not want the union (or unions) to conduct collective bargaining on their behalf;"."
The noble Lord said: My Lords, Amendment No. 1 deals with an issue we discussed in Grand Committee in response to an amendment tabled by my noble friend Lord Lea of Crondall. At the time I indicated that we would give further consideration to the matter he had raised and, in response, he was good enough to withdraw his amendment.
The issue concerns the circumstances in which the CAC must order a ballot of the relevant workforce to assess whether they want a union to bargain on their behalf, even though the union has more than half of the workers in membership.
Currently, the CAC must apply three criteria when assessing this issue. These are listed in paragraph 22(4) of the recognition procedure in cases where a non-recognised union is applying for recognition. The same criteria are also listed in paragraph 87(4) of the procedure which concerns changes to bargaining units following a CAC award of recognition. Our amendment changes both paragraphs in identical ways. For simplicity, I shall confine my remarks to the changes to paragraph 22(4), which is a part of the procedure that comes into play more frequently as it deals with the central case of a union seeking recognition.
The first and third criteria in paragraph 22(4) give the CAC some discretion to assess the evidence put before it and judge whether a ballot should be held. That is not the case in relation to the second criterion.
According to the second criterion, a ballot must be held if a,
"significant number of union members in the bargaining unit inform the CAC that they do not want the union or unions to conduct collective bargaining on their behalf".
The wording emphasises the quantity and not the quality of the information that has been provided to the CAC. This has created a problem in cases where the CAC has received such communications from "a significant number" of union members, but there were grounds to believe that the union members were pressurised into sending those communications. In other words, there was evidence that questioned whether union members genuinely did not want the union to negotiate on their behalf which the CAC could not take into account. In Grand Committee, I drew attention to one particular case—Brian Hewitt Construction Limited and the Iron and Steel Trades Confederation—where this issue had arisen in practice.
The amendment therefore changes the wording of the second criterion to provide extra discretion to the CAC when applying it. It does so by requiring the CAC to consider whether there is "credible" evidence that a "significant number of union members" do not want the union to undertake bargaining on their
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behalf. The amendment therefore adds a necessary qualitative dimension to the way in which the second criterion is expressed.
I am sure that CAC panels, whose members are most certainly experts in industrial relations, will be able to apply the criterion fairly and sensibly. Amendment No. 1 would improve the statutory procedure by removing an unhelpful rigidity within it.
I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Lea for drawing this matter to our attention at each stage. I commend the amendment to the House. I beg to move.
Lord Lea of Crondall: My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend for bringing forward the amendment. As he indicated, there are other examples of where this issue has presented a difficulty in addition to the case he has specifically cited.
Perhaps I may take the opportunity to check whether I have understood how this will work in practice. Let me take the case of letters from union members stating that they do not want the union to negotiate on their behalf, but these are letters which the CAC concludes the employer asked the workers to send—indeed, the employer may have helped draft the letters. How does the Minister envisage the panel would deal with those letters? How would it assess whether they represented credible evidence?
Lord Triesman: My Lords, the panel is required to assess whether the evidence is such as to lead it to believe that the workers do not want the union recognised. It will judge this on the arguments and the information put before it by the parties—that is, by the employer and the union—or submitted directly to it by individual workers.
Of course, each case will be different, at least to some extent, and will need to be judged on its merits. But, as a general rule, the amendment would enable CAC panels to disregard or place much less weight on evidence where employers have placed pressure on the workers to sign such letters. In deciding the question of credibility, the panel could take account of overt threats and inducements as well as more subtle forms of undue influence.
By the same token, we do not think that the involvement of the employer in facilitating the production of letters should of itself mean that the evidence lacks credibility. Throughout the procedure we would expect unions and employers to gather evidence in support of their position and to help others present evidence. So we do not object to employers providing information to the workers involved about the CAC's timetable or about the way in which they might express their views to the CAC. The key issue is whether such endeavours have distorted the true view of the union members concerned.
Lord Lea of Crondall: My Lords, I thank my noble friend for that clarification. Now that it is on the record, I trust that the Minister can also confirm that

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the CAC's attention will also be drawn to what he has said in this exchange to assist its understanding of the intention of the amendment.
Lord Triesman: My Lords, I know that the CAC has followed the consideration of the Bill in both Houses and that it regularly receives the official reports in Hansard. I hope and expect that my explanation is helpful to the CAC and all those involved in this area.
Baroness Miller of Hendon: My Lords, the amendment and the explanation given by the noble Lord appear to give the CAC the ability to take a more flexible and less prescriptive view. We certainly support the amendment.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 9 [Unfair practices in relation to recognition ballots):
Lord Triesman Lord Triesman moved Amendment No. 2:
Page 11, line 36, leave out "anything" and insert "to pay money or give money's worth"
The noble Lord said: My Lords, this large group contains various amendments which relate to the clauses of the Bill concerning unfair practices during recognition and derecognition ballots. In fact, despite their number, the amendments concern only three issues, two of which are technical in nature. But one relates to the more significant issue concerning the definition of an unfair "offer" to workers in the bargaining unit. This issue was raised in Grand Committee and I propose to deal with it first before briefly discussing the two technical issues towards the conclusion of my remarks.
Let me start by moving Amendment No. 2 and speaking also to Amendments Nos. 3 to 8, 46 and 48. As noble Lords will recall, Clauses 9 and 12 insert various new paragraphs into the statutory recognition procedure. New paragraph 27A sets out a number of unfair practices during recognition ballots, and new paragraph 119A defines unfair practices during derecognition ballots. Amendments Nos. 2, 3 and 4 amend new paragraph 27A, and Amendments Nos. 6, 7 and 8 amend new paragraph 119A. These two sets of amendments are virtually identical and for simplicity I will confine my remarks to the amendments to Clause 9 to avoid any repetition.
As I said, new paragraph 27A defines various unfair practices. The first of these concerns the bribing of workers by either the employer or the union in exchange for their vote. Sub-paragraph (2)(a) refers to this unacceptable practice as offering,
"anything … in return for the worker's agreement to vote in a particular way or to abstain from voting".
Unions and, to a degree, employers have expressed concern at this wording which they, in my view understandably, consider to be too broad. In particular, they fear that it might interfere with normal campaigning activity.
In Grand Committee, I indicated that we would reconsider the wording at this point. We have concluded that the use of the word "anything" is too broad. At the least, it might encourage a party to make
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a speculative complaint to the CAC about standard campaigning activities. Amendment No. 2 therefore removes the word from the definition. In its place, the amendment substitutes references to the offering of "money" and the giving of "money's worth". The wording is therefore more precise.
The term "money's worth" is new to employment law, but it appears frequently in other areas of the law and has been relatively straightforward to interpret in those other settings. It basically covers the provision of goods or services or other things which have a monetary value. In our context, the offers of improved benefits in kind—such as a better company car or subsidised healthcare—would be covered. The term would also cover the offering of extra holidays or other forms of paid time off. Such offers constitute "money's worth" because the worker receives money for not working.
In re-examining the definition of an unfair offer in sub-paragraph (2)(a), we noticed that we had not covered all the ways in which a party could bribe members of the relevant workforce. In particular, it did not cover situations in which a party offered money if the outcome of the ballot went a particular way. Of course, such offers would be intended to influence voting behaviour. But they are not limited only to those who agree to vote in a particular way, or not to vote at all; the reward is given to all, regardless of their actual voting behaviours, as long as the outcome of the ballot goes in the desired direction.
We feel that there is a potential for parties to make offers of this type and to distort the balloting process. Amendments Nos. 3 and 4 address the potential loophole by establishing a new unfair practice of making "outcome specific" offers to pay money or give money's worth which are contingent on the outcome of the ballot, as declared by the CAC.
In defining this new unfair practice we have taken care to make sure that normal campaigning activity is not inadvertently caught. We were cautioned many times during the earlier debates about this potential problem. It can be expected that both the employer and the union will make statements about what they think will occur if recognition is awarded or not. The union may well say that pay and conditions will improve as a result of collective bargaining. Equally, the employer might assert that the business would he more profitable without collective bargaining and therefore pay will be higher and jobs more secure if recognition is not awarded.
It is conceivable that some statements about the consequences of life after recognition could constitute "offers" to the workers involved. Amendment No. 4 therefore makes it clear that an offer which is conditional on anything which is done or occurs as a result of the CAC declaration does not constitute an outcome-specific offer.
As I have already indicated, Amendments Nos. 6, 7 and 8 apply the same changes to the treatment of offers made during derecognition ballots. Amendments Nos. 46 and 48 to Schedule 1 to the Bill are consequential.
Let me deal with the two sets of technical changes we are making. Amendments Nos. 5 and 9 replace certain references in new Clauses 9 and 12 to the holding of a ballot. Throughout the recognition procedure, we have used references to ballots being held as meaning the conclusion of the ballot. As drafted, the use of "held" in new paragraphs 27B(2)(b) and 119B(2)(b) potentially has a broader meaning, and we think that it could cause confusion. To ensure consistency across the recognition schedule, we have substituted new wording at these points.
Finally, Amendments Nos. 10, 11, 47 and 49 change some imprecise and outdated wording about the way in which certain CAC orders can be enforced as an order of the county court. The current wording is deficient. Scotland does not have any county courts and the reference to the order having been "recorded" at the court has no clear meaning in modern court procedures. We have therefore substituted clearer wording and added a reference to the Scottish legal process. The amendments also clearly indicate who is entitled to take such action.
Amendment No. 42 in Schedule 1 updates similarly outdated wording used in another part of trade union law—namely, Section 82 of the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992. This section relates to the enforcement of certain orders made by the certification officer.
This group of amendments mainly fulfils a commitment that we made in Grand Committee to look again at the definition of particular unfair practices in making offers. We believe that the new wording has much less scope to cut across normal campaigning activity while covering a wider range of offers. I therefore commend the amendments to the House and the technical improvements they contain. I apologise for the number of amendments, but it is as well to get the whole process right. I beg to move.
8 p.m.
Baroness Turner of Camden: My Lords, during the course of discussions on the Bill, my noble friends and I raised the possibility that the present wording of a party offering anything to a worker entitled to vote could be interpreted to cover unions campaigning when they campaign for recognition and seek to set out their agenda for looking after workers, should they join the union or vote for recognition.
I thank my noble friends on the Front Bench because I feel that they have met the concerns that we voiced in Grand Committee and afterwards. These amendments improve the Bill.
Baroness Miller of Hendon: My Lords, we do not oppose any of the modifications that the noble Lord, Lord Triesman, outlined. In fact, we welcome the clarification and better wording proposed.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Lord Triesman Lord Triesman moved Amendments Nos. 3 to 5:
Page 11, line 38, at end insert—
"(aa) makes an outcome-specific offer to a worker entitled to vote in the ballot,"
Page 12, line 4, at end insert—
"( ) For the purposes of sub-paragraph (2)(aa) an "outcome-specific offer" is an offer to pay money or give money's worth which—

(a) is conditional on the issuing by the CAC of a declaration that—

(i) the union is (or unions are) recognised as entitled to conduct collective bargaining on behalf of the bargaining unit, or

(ii) the union is (or unions are) not entitled to be so recognised, and

(b) is not conditional on anything which is done or occurs as a result of the declaration in question."

Page 12, line 18, leave out from "if" to end of line 19 and insert "votes may be cast in the ballot on more than one day, the last of those days."
On Question, amendments agreed to.
Clause 12 [Unfair practices in relation to derecognition ballots]:
Lord Triesman Lord Triesman moved Amendments Nos. 6 to 11:
Page 15, line 43, leave out "anything" and insert "to pay money or give money's worth"
Page 15, line 45, at end insert—
"(aa) makes an outcome-specific offer to a worker entitled to vote in the ballot,"
Page 16, line 13, at end insert—
"(2A) For the purposes of sub-paragraph (2)(aa) an "outcome-specific offer" is an offer to pay money or give money's worth which—

(a) is conditional on—

(i) the issuing by the CAC of a declaration that the bargaining arrangements are to cease to have effect, or

(ii) the refusal by the CAC of an application under paragraph 106, 107 or 112, and

(b) is not conditional on anything which is done or occurs as a result of that declaration or, as the case may be, of that refusal."

Page 16, line 27, leave out from "if' to end of line 28 and insert "votes may be cast in the ballot on more than one day, the last of those days."
Page 19, leave out lines 14 to 16.
Page 19, line 20, at end insert—
"1191 (1) This paragraph applies if—

(a) a ballot has been arranged in consequence of an application under paragraph 112,

(b) the CAC has given the employer an order under paragraph 119(1), 119C(3) or 119H(4), and

(c) the ballot for the purposes of which the order was made (or any other ballot for the purposes of which it has effect) has not been held.

(2) The applicant worker (or each of the applicant workers) and the union (or each of the unions) is entitled to enforce obedience to the order.
(3) The order may be enforced—

(a) in England and Wales, in the same way as an order of the county court;

(b) in Scotland, in the same way as an order of the sheriff."

On Question, amendments agreed to.
Clause 21 [Information about employees to be balloted on industrial action]:
Baroness Turner of Camden Baroness Turner of Camden moved Amendment No. 12:
Page 26, line 27, leave out "at which the employees concerned work" and insert "of the employees concerned"
The noble Baroness said: My Lords, I suppose that I should have raised this matter at an earlier stage of the Bill's proceedings. However, it became apparent to me only when I received a copy of the Bill as amended on Report. Under the Bill as it stands, a union must notify an employer of not only the categories of workers who are to be balloted about dispute action but also the workplaces at which the employees concerned work. I think that notification of categories ought really to be sufficient, but in present circumstances, workplaces may be widely distributed. An employee may work at one at a particular time and then at another. Some workplaces may in fact have few people working there at a given time. With very few workers, it rather nullifies the provision that the employer does not have to be told the names of those concerned. With a small number of employees at some workplaces, he would not need to be told. The union may not know where everyone is at a given time. If mistakes are made, that could lead to challenges and further difficulties.
I think that the Government must have had some idea that there were problems because of the provision in proposed subsection (2I)(b) of Clause 21(4) concerning,
"the premises with which his employment has the closest connection".
I still think that that could lead to problems.
A union calling an official dispute already has a number of hurdles to surmount to ensure that the action remains within the law and that members are entitled to the limited protection afforded by the law. This workplace requirement adds to the difficulties. Our amendment highlights these in the hope that the Government will agree that this needs to be looked at, even at this very late stage. We wanted very much to highlight the difficulties that we think it could present. I beg to move.
Lord McCarthy: My Lords, we fully admit that this amendment should have been raised before. Indeed, what we are trying to get the Government to consider affects both Clauses 21 and 24. It is all about the kind of information that a union has to provide an employer. Under Clause 21 it has to provide information about a ballot; under Clause 24, we assume that the ballot has been held, there has been a majority and now there will be a strike. It has to give the same kind of information under Clause 24 as under Clause 21.
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I am not blaming the Minister, but in introducing these changes he said a number of things quite fast. Until one read what he said on Report in Hansard, it was not quite clear. He said that the changes being included here would improve the wording. We are not sure that they do. He said that they would remove the confusion but we do not think that they do. He said that they were technical but, when you think about it, they are much more than technical. We are in fact extending quite significantly—and we have done this since 1992 and 1993 when the measure was introduced by the previous government—the kind of information that the union has to provide in a potential industrial dispute.
We must think about that, because it was said at the time, as many noble Lords will remember, that it is very important that certain types of information should not be given. For example, we should not make the union tell the employer who the workers are. That was admitted at the time and I am not suggesting that we are doing that. It was said that there had to be a balance. In other words, the things that go on the forms that are sent to an employer help him or her. If those things are of a certain type they may not help the union. That is why we said that the names of the workers involved should not be included.
However, I am not at all certain that an employer could not work out who the workers were, because we have to declare all the workplaces involved, the number of workers and the categories of work. It might be quite easy in certain circumstances to work out who was likely to be involved in the industrial action. You might say, "Well you'll find out when it starts so what's the difference?" However, if one knows a fortnight or three weeks in advance that a union is planning industrial action that is not quite the same, is it?
Moreover, I am not saying that employers should not be allowed to do such things, but the employer might say, "The problem is really in workshop four, because hardly anybody is coming out anywhere else. But it is critical because 200 or 300 people are involved and they are all coming out. They all voted in favour. That is the place where we have to divert the work. It is no good sending any work to them because there will not be anybody there to do it". Or he might say, "This is where we have to get the supervisors to do the work". Different information is being given to the employer and one would not expect the employer to do anything other than make the best use of it. We might be creating serious problems for a union organising a strike.
Finally, the union might be inaccurate. That is dealt with in the Bill, I know. However, if the union were inaccurate and put down the wrong names, included people who had moved somewhere else or thought that all it had to do was send a check-off return of people who had their money taken out through DORCAS— deduction at source—that might very well be out of date or inaccurate and might not include all the people involved in the dispute. Technically, the return could be inaccurate. If it were inaccurate and if an employer were bloody-minded enough and alleged that it was inaccurate, the employer could get some kind of interim injunction to prevent the action.

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I am not criticising an employer who does such things. If they are allowed by the law they should be done. But we have to provide a balance. We have to find something that is fair and equitable to both sides. This measure is creeping forward. I ask the Government, even at this late stage, to think about whether all these words, clauses and conditions are strictly necessary. I support the amendment.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Trade and Industry (Lord Sainsbury of Turville): My Lords, my noble friend raised some interesting questions, but they do not relate to what can fairly be described as a technical amendment. The amendment proposes that we leave out,
"workplaces at which the employees concerned work"
and insert,
"workplaces of the employees concerned",
which is a fairly technical point. The amendment relates to the terminology used in the pre-industrial action ballot notices to describe the workplaces of those involved. It has the effect of reversing one of the technical amendments that were tabled by the Government on Report.
At Report we stated that our purpose in referring to the,
"workplaces at which the employees work",
was to ensure consistency and clarity across various provisions in trade union law. New subsection (2I) of Section 226A, which Clause 21 would insert, defines the meaning of "workplace" in this context and clarifies the position of a person who works from several premises.
Let me assure my noble friends that the amendments in this area that were accepted at Report were designed entirely to ensure the consistency and clarity mentioned. They were not intended to narrow the scope of the provisions, but to improve the way in which they deal with the position of workers working at or from more than one set of premises. I do not believe that they have any effects with which my noble friends would not agree. In our view, there would be potential for unnecessary confusion to arise if different constructions were used to describe "workplaces". The courts might be tempted to infer that some difference in meaning was intended between,
"workplaces at which the employees concerned work",
and,
"workplaces of the employees concerned",
simply because those different formulations had been used.
My noble friend Lady Turner raised the question of peripatetic workers, or people who work in more than one place. The union would, as she said, normally need to indicate the premises with which the employer's employment had the closest connection. Of course, the information given by the union is required to be as accurate only as is reasonably practicable, in the light of the information available to it. It follows that if there was inadequate information available about the premises
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with which a peripatetic employee's employment had the closest connection, a failure to include information in the notice would not result in any breach of the clause's requirement. Clause 21 does not extend the information which the union should supply.
I hope those explanations satisfy my noble friends, and I urge my noble friend to withdraw the amendment.
Baroness Turner of Camden: My Lords, I thank my noble friend the Minister for that explanation. I fully agree that we should perhaps have raised this matter on Report, when the whole issue of workplaces was before the House. As I explained, I did not do so until I looked at the Bill as amended on Report; then the problem arising from workplaces immediately became apparent to me. However, I am grateful to my noble friend the Minister for his assurance that the union must produce information only as reasonably accurately as it can be expected to do so. In other words, there is a certain cover for a union not being able to produce information because of the spread of the workplaces, and so on. Of course, we shall have to see how that works out in practice. I hope that our fears are not justified, and I am grateful for the assurances that have been given, which now appear on the record. In the circumstances, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 25 [Dismissal where employees taking protected industrial action locked out]:
Lord McCarthy Lord McCarthy moved Amendment No. 13:
Page 29, line 42, leave out "eight" and insert "twelve"
The noble Lord said: My Lords, we have a quite unique position here, which we are very pleased about. This is really an amalgamated amendment; those who saw the previous amendments will know that we tabled an amendment in precisely the same words, only to find when the list came out that the Government had tabled an amendment in precisely the same words as us. I have been in this House for almost 30 years, and I have never known the Government and Back Benchers to table identical amendments. At least it means that the amendment is likely to go through. We are very pleased about that.
The point is that we have tried to get this amendment into other Bills; we tried to get it into this Bill, and we tabled it in Committee and on Report. The Minister gave very good arguments for his point of view, which I shall not go through because it would not be fair. The fact is that the Government have agreed with us, but I cannot give them 10 out of 10.
What are we doing with this amendment? We are extending the period in which there is protected industrial action, in our sense. I say in our sense because one is not protected—one can be dismissed. If one was dismissed one might get compensation, but one will not get reinstatement. So it is not a proper right, but a right not to be dismissed without compensation. That is what it is.
The period is going to be extended from eight weeks to 12 weeks. Some people said, when we tabled the amendment before—I believe they were members of

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the Opposition, but perhaps it was in another place—that such a measure would foster a great deal of industrial action. The Government in reply said that it would not, because there were only three or four strikes that lasted eight weeks last year, and that there would not be a lot more that lasted 12 weeks. That is right: people go on strike, and in my experience as an arbitrator or mediator of 30 years or so, if they do not get something in the first fortnight, they had better go back to work, because they are not going to win. Nevertheless, some of them do; some of them feel that they have to protest; some of them feel that they are defending the position of people who have been dismissed. That is what they do.
I fully accept that this Government have done quite a lot to improve on that condition and make the eight weeks a real eight weeks; that has been their defence so far. Now they are making the period 12 weeks. However, there is something that they are not doing—and we must say this, because we say it every time, and all of a sudden the Government do something, so we must go back and say it again. What workers are entitled to, and what workers have in virtually every other European country, is an indefinite right to strike—because in that case, one does not break the contract, one suspends the contract. In virtually every other European country you suspend the contract. That constitutes a right to strike. That means that you cannot he dismissed and if you were dismissed you would be reinstated. That is a proper right to strike. However, we do not have that in this country. The measure does not result in a vast number of strikes in Switzerland, Germany or France because people go back to work. They go back to work because they are losing money. We are not suggesting that they should be paid. They go hack to work because in most cases they know that if they cannot get somewhere in a short period of time, they had better go back to work. That is a right, or it should be a right, but it is not. Therefore, I am afraid that I cannot give the Government 10 out of 10.
When I was at school we were marked for effort and achievement. I give the Government two for effort but I cannot give them more than one for achievement. They have to do better. However, they have done well tonight and I am very pleased to move this amendment. I beg to move.
Baroness Miller of Hendon: My Lords, unlike the noble Lord, Lord McCarthy, I have never been a teacher. Therefore, I would not dream of giving the Government marks out of 10. However, in the meeting that we had with the noble Lord, Lord Triesman, he certainly satisfied me that the amendments were perfectly acceptable. We therefore obviously accept them.
Lord Triesman: My Lords, I wish to speak to Amendment No. 13 and to Amendment No. 43 to the schedule. I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Miller, for her kindness in responding to what we have attempted to do. I appreciate how hard it will have been for the noble Lord, Lord McCarthy, to have waited 30 years
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for a first, but I would have hoped that, having achieved one, he might have accorded us more than one or two out of 10. I always thought in the days when I taught in universities that when you had exactly the same words as on the examiners' guide script, 10 out of 10 was about right. That was the basis on which I always worked.
As my noble friends have explained. the aim of this amendment is to extend the basic period of protection against unfair dismissal for employees taking lawfully organised official industrial action from eight to 12 weeks. The amendment itself increases the protected period accordingly.
We have debated the protections for those taking part in industrial action many times both during our consideration of this Bill and in the passage of the Employment Relations Act 1999. Trade unions have called for an indefinite protection for workers taking part in lawful action. My noble friends have pointed out that several European countries have laws which ensure workers cannot be sacked at all for taking industrial action. The noble Lord, Lord McCarthy, made the point that there is not an explicit right to strike in UK law. I do not think that there is a need for such an explicit right. Our law is very clear: it provides the necessary freedoms to take industrial action as it stands. In particular, Section 236 of the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992 ensures that no court can compel a person to work. The Government take the position that it is necessary to put a time limit on the period during which it is automatically unfair to dismiss someone taking protected legal industrial action. We need to balance the legitimate interests of the employer with those of the union members.
However, we have taken note of the very strong views that have been expressed by trade unions and others on this point. On reflection, we consider that a modest extension of the protected period would address their concerns adequately. Of course, most industrial action is shortlived. The existing eight-week period covers the bulk of industrial action. Estimates by the Office for National Statistics indicate that 93 per cent of stoppages last fewer than eight weeks. The corresponding figure for industrial action lasting fewer than 12 weeks is 96.5 per cent. So we are really talking about a tiny number. Stoppages are themselves at an all time low since records started 84 years ago, in 1920. In 2003, there were just 133 stoppages.
Our review of the Employment Relations Act 1999 noted that industrial action remained relatively low in the UK since the eight-week period of protection was introduced. In fact, stoppages have been going down to an all time low. The extension to 12 weeks will not adversely affect the amount of strike activity. It may give valuable additional time on occasions for parties to resolve disputes amicably before the potential sanction of dismissal becomes available to the employer.
We have listened to the views on all sides, and believe that the Government should lend our support to the amendment and the amendment grouped with

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it. We do not believe that it will adversely affect employers or the climate of industrial relations, so I strongly commend it to the House. I thank the Opposition for their attitude to it.
Baroness Turner of Camden: My Lords, I welcome the amendment. As has been said, it is the same as an amendment that my noble friends and I tabled at an earlier stage of the Bill. The unions welcome the change. It is progress, so I thank my noble friends for the acceptance of the case that we made.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 28 [Inducements relating to union membership or activities]:
Lord McCarthy Lord McCarthy moved Amendment No. 14:
Page 31, line 42, leave out "sole or main"
The noble Lord said: My Lords, we are coming back now to our old friend "sole or main". We do not apologise for that. We are coming back to our old friend the Wilson-Palmer judgment, and we do not apologise for that. We accept that the Government have gone a long way in trying to come to terms with the Wilson-Palmer judgment. It is difficult in the sense that we get decisions out of the international courts, but they do not always give us the precise words that we should put in our statutes in order to comply with what they want us to do. Therefore, there is an area in which the Government have to work it out for themselves, which is what they have done.
In our opinion, and in that of all kinds of authorities—I trotted them out last time that we debated the matter, so I shall not do so tonight—there are two ways in which the Government have not yet fully complied with the Wilson-Palmer judgment. The second—the provision of appropriate rights for the trade unions involved—will be dealt with by my noble friend on the next amendment. I am talking not about that, but about our old friend "sole or main".
The Government have said that there must not be discrimination or inducement short of dismissal if the "sole or main purpose" is to discriminate. We say that the provision should simply say "purpose", not "sole or main purpose", for several reasons. The most important reason is that it is unenforceable, in practice. Once one says "sole or main", the employer can say, "That wasn't my main purpose; it was just a passing purpose. It is true that as a result of this, people do not have collective bargaining rights and cannot have grievances any more. It is true that a lot of people dropped out of the union, but that's incidental. My main purpose was to improve industrial relations or some other thing". There is nothing in the provision to say what that other thing should be. Making the provision unenforceable is not what the court wanted the Government to do.
The employer could do many things if the provision did not say "sole or main", but simply "purpose", which is what we want. The argument of the Government against our attempt to take "sole or main" out of the Bill, if I understand it so far, is that it would unfairly restrict the ability of British employers
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to maintain and improve their efficiency. We never get examples of what British employers will not be able to do if the Bill says "purpose", not "sole or main purpose". I would like to know.
Suppose an employer wants to promote someone because he thinks that they are a better performer than someone else. So long as he does not discriminate—so long as it cannot be shown at a tribunal that the only people whom he promotes are non-unionists—what is the problem? It is only if he has the nefarious purpose of an undercover desire to discriminate against trade unionists that he cannot do what he wants to do.
Suppose he wants to give plus payments based on performance. Suppose he wants to rejig the joint valuation scheme. No one is preventing him from doing that—you could do that in unionised and non-unionised places of work. There is no reason why certain aspects of the relationship between the employer and the individual worker should not be subject to collective bargaining—and many agreements have that provision. Collective bargaining does not count for everything anywhere. So I can see no reason, if the amendment was accepted. that it would prevent in any way a British employer keeping his organisation up to date. But, it would do something to prevent some discrimination. Therefore we ask the Government to consider the matter again. I beg to move.
8.30 p.m.
Baroness Turner of Camden: My Lords, we return to this issue because it is an important part of the Bill. Part 3 is about inducements to workers made by employers to make them abandon union representation. As it stands, the Bill would allow an employer to plead that offering inducements to abandon union membership or activities or the right to be represented was not his sole or main purpose. The words "sole or main" give the employer a loophole to construct all kinds of other reasons, once challenged at a tribunal. The Select Committee on Human Rights has already drawn attention to the problems that this matter could raise and the Government have been inclined to agree that, in any event, the whole issue should be kept under review.
The Third Reading presents a last chance, as I see it, to try to get the wording right—and by that I mean, beyond challenge, because I do not believe that it is beyond challenge now. What is wrong with having wording that simply refers to the "purpose" of the employer, as suggested by my noble friend in moving the amendment? I hope that my noble friends on the Front Bench will reconsider their attitude, because the matter is important.
Baroness Miller of Hendon: My Lords, the noble Baroness and the noble Lord have pursued this amendment throughout the passage of the Bill. The reasons why it cannot be accepted that have been given previously are still valid. They are reasons with which I entirely agree. It would be too rigid and too prescriptive. It would mean that there could be no deviation whatever, for whatever cogent reason there

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may be for an individual employer and employee to vary a collective agreement made with the union, or for that matter, for an individual firm, or branch to enter into a separate agreement with all of its employees, varying a collective agreement affecting a whole ind ustry.
I have the greatest respect, admiration and, indeed, affection for the noble Baroness. But her attitude to the immutability of a collective agreement reminds me of the Ruhaiyat of Omar Khayyam:
"The moving finger writes; and, having writ, moves on: nor all thy piety nor wit shall lure it back to cancel half a line, nor all thy tears wash out a word of it".
Collective agreements are not written by the moving finger of fate nor are they set in concrete. There will undoubtedly be occasions when employers and employees may find it necessary and reasonable to enter into arrangements that vary from some collective agreement.
In a free society there is no reason whatever why they should not be allowed to do so. There is no reason why they should be bound by a rigid regime based on the principle that the union knows what is best for individual workers or for their employers.
I am not going to cite specific examples, but your Lordships will be aware of instances where strict adherence to demarcation lines have resulted in industrial disputes and even inter-union disputes—in one set of cases contributing to the demise of the ship-building industry. It may be necessary to depart from a collective agreement to allow for more flexible working, either as to hours worked or flexibility over the tasks to be performed.
If the amendment is carried it would mean that there could be no variation from a collective agreement, however valid, however necessary and however urgent the need. I also have strong personal reasons for supporting the wording as it now appears in the Bill. Perhaps my one and only historical claim to legislative fame is, or was, Section 17(4) of the 1999 Act, which specifically permitted variations from collective agreements under clear and strict conditions.
Those conditions expressly prohibited variations which might inhibit a worker from being a member of a union, or from supporting a recognition vote, or from participating in union activities. In that respect, I had anticipated by some five years the decision of the European Court of Human Rights in the cases of Wilson and Palmer.
This amendment was designated by the TUC as "the Miller amendment" when it immediately demanded its repeal. It will in fact be removed from the statute book when this Bill is passed, the section never having been brought into effect by the Government.
Throughout the passage of this Bill, and particularly when I reintroduced the Miller amendment in Grand Committee, the Government have insisted that the provision to which they had solemnly bound themselves in a compromise agreement made with me at the beginning is that it would be covered by the
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inclusion of "sole or main", which they say means that some variations from a collective agreement can be definitely permitted.
I want to quote the words of the noble Lord, Lord Sainsbury, in response to my amendment. He said:
"To motivate employees, all sorts of performance pay systems are in force…We have no desire to restrict employer freedoms in this area, as long as their actions are driven by the right business motives. We believe, however, that the existing wording of these clauses, including Clause 28, already provides the necessary safeguards and flexibilities".—[Official Report, 15/6/04; col. GC148.]
I promised the Minister that I would carefully consider his remarks, as I always do, and in fact during the Recess I had a very useful meeting with the noble Lord, Lord Triesman, and subsequently some discussions with officials at the DTI. I have again been reassured that the use of the words "sole or main" in the Bill absolutely ensures that bona fide agreements between employers and employees varying collective agreements are still permitted as long as they are for genuine business motives and do not inhibit a worker's rights to belong to a union or to engage in its activities. I have also been assured by the noble Lord, Lord Triesman, that the Government have had their opinion confirmed by counsel.
Finally, I have been promised that the Minister, when he replies to the debate, will confirm the Government's and counsel's interpretation of the legal position as well as their attitude stated in Grand Committee. I look forward to hearing the Minister repeat his rejection of this amendment and re-assertion of the principles of freedom of negotiation that I had previously established with the Government in the 1999 Act.
Lord Sainsbury of Turville: My Lords, I shall speak to Amendments Nos. 14, 17, 22, 23, 24 and 26. These amendments remove the various references in Clause 28 to the "sole or main" purpose of the employer making offers. We discussed the same or very similar amendments both in Grand Committee and on Report. This is therefore well-trodden ground and, in responding to these amendments, I will need to repeat points I made at those earlier stages in the Bill's passage.
The words "sole or main" are an essential component of the regime we are seeking to construct. They are necessary to ensure that employers have some flexibility in setting their reward systems. The noble Lord, Lord McCarthy, asked for examples of what we meant and then proceeded to give some good ones. The noble Baroness, Lady Miller, gave some more.
Why do we not agree to the proposal? We do not consider that employers should be prevented from making offers for justifiable business purposes just because a by-product is that a worker accepting the offer will not or will cease to have some of his terms determined under a collective agreement. That would, I fear, be the effect of these amendments.
I assure the noble Baroness that our proposals would retain the freedom of employers to pay workers more than the amount set in collective agreements in

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recognition of the extra contribution they make to the business. As I said in Grand Committee, we want to allow employers to reward success and keep hold of key staff. Often collective agreements give considerable scope for such additional payments to be made to key workers. However, in cases where they do not, our proposals will ensure that offers of additional payments which represent a departure from the collectively agreed amount would be lawful where the sole or main purpose of the offer was not to undermine the collective agreement to reward the workers involved.
That has been our deliberate policy intention from the outset in devising our response to the Wilson and Palmer judgment. Indeed, we made our intentions clear in this matter over a year ago when the initial findings of the review of the 1999 Act were published. As ever, the legal draftsmen have carefully carried out our wishes in this respect: necessary pay flexibility will be retained.
My noble friends consider that the sole or main test will allow employers who are ill-intentioned to evade the law. We do not share that view as tribunals are expert at making the kind of judgments required and can distinguish between true and fabricated accounts by employers of their underlying purpose. That is what they do every day in unfair dismissal cases. To assist the tribunals, we have placed the burden on the employer to demonstrate what was the sole or main purpose of his actions.
We believe that our proposal is compatible with the Wilson and Palmer judgment and fully respects the human rights of trade unionists. The Joint Committee on Human Rights has considered the matter in some detail and it accepts that there is a case for retaining the sole or main purpose test.
As we confirmed on Report, the Minister with responsibility for employment relations, Gerry Sutcliffe, has also written to the Joint Committee confirming that the Government will monitor the operation of these provisions when they come into force. Therefore, we shall monitor the provisions to make certain that they act in the way that we want. In the light of that explanation, the Government cannot accept the amendment and, once again, I ask my noble friend to withdraw it.
Lord McCarthy: My Lords, what surprises one most is the a priori certainty that the people who oppose the amendment have in the face of what is basically an empirical question. I am perfectly prepared to take the empirical test, and in effect that is what the Joint Committee is saying. If, in the next two or three years, we have a spate of cases before tribunals in which workers allege that they have been discriminated against and the tribunals say, "Well, sole or main; we haven't proved that", surely that would be evidence.
The Minister says that he is certain that if we pass this provision as it is and if our amendment is not accepted, it will be perfectly all right. I cannot prove that it will not be perfectly all right, and so there is an
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empirical proof. If workers go to a tribunal, they may think that it is all useless, but ultimately we should have some information as to whether it is true that tribunals can distinguish. Perhaps I may say to the Minister that it is not saying much to state that tribunals distinguish other things. They sometimes do it very badly, and we have evidence of that.
Therefore, we are not automatically satisfied with the distinctions that tribunals make and we do not know how this measure will work out. In a few years' time, an empirical investigation somewhere will tell us whether this sole or main test is worth the paper that it is written on. I am saying that we should give the workers the benefit of the doubt. I say that because I am never told—I have not been told tonight—what the improvements in efficiency and effectiveness are that will raise productivity, which cannot be done unless trade unions are discriminated against. If you want variations, you can negotiate them. Collective agreements are not monoliths. Of course, you can negotiate them or you can give people things because they are meritorious and efficient so long as you do not do so with a discriminatory purpose in order to drive them out of a union. That is all.
The Government say, "Oh, it will be all right because the tribunals will be able to tell". We say, "We don't think so", and so we say that we should wait and see. In the mean time, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
8.45 p.m.
Lord Triesman Lord Triesman moved Amendment No. 15:
Page 32, line 26, after "worker" insert "or former worker"
The noble Lord said: My Lords, this group of amendments makes two specific sets of changes to the clauses of the Bill that implement the European Court's judgment in the cases of Wilson and Palmer. The first set of amendments deals with an issue raised by the Joint Committee on Human Rights about members of non-recognised unions. The second set deals with the definition of a worker for the purposes of the new rights and the existing protections against detriment. I shall deal with them in turn.
The Joint Committee on Human Rights has drawn attention to the fact that new Section 145B provides rights to the members of recognised unions only. They consider that, in cases where a union is seeking recognition, new Section 145B needs to provide comparable protections to ensure that members have the right not to be offered inducements by the employer for the purpose of securing that their terms will not be determined by collective agreement in the future. In Grand Committee we gave an undertaking to look closely at the point.
Having looked at the arguments put forward and consulted with stakeholders, we have concluded that the Committee's analysis is correct. We had previously considered that the statutory recognition procedure would provide sufficient protection in these circumstances, and deter employers from making offers of this type. However, as the JCHR has pointed

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out, the statutory procedure has many stages within it and does not provide a speedy remedy. And, of course, it does not apply to all sizes of employer.
My noble friend Lord Sainsbury also mentioned in Grand Committee that extending the protections in Section 145B might create inter-union difficulties where a non-recognised union could use the new right as a lever to challenge or inconvenience an established union which was already recognised. We have examined that possibility very carefully. We have concluded that union rivalry, although much diminished in today's climate of industrial relations, can still surface from time to time. However, although we think it conceivable that an employer might make offers of this kind to the members of a rival non-recognised union, we do not think this is likely to occur in practice. If it did, we do not think the members should be without the protection given by the clause; an employer has a number of ways in which he can resist granting recognition rights to a rival unrecognised union and he should not attempt to do so by offering inducements to its members.
Finally we do not think, having further considered the matter, that there are any circumstances in which it is realistic to envisage an unrecognised union being able to make use of the protections as a lever to challenge the position of a recognised union. So, to ensure our compliance with the ECHR judgment, we believe that the scope of new Section 145B can safely be extended without threatening the stability of industrial relations.
The amendments will work in this way. Currently, Section 145B applies to a worker who is a member of an independent trade union which is recognised. Amendment No. 16 includes workers of a union which is seeking to be recognised, thus ensuring that those workers are protected. Amendment No. 18 accordingly expands the "prohibited result" provided for in Section 145B(2) to ensure that inducements made with the sole or main purpose of preventing individuals from having their terms of employment agreed by collective bargaining in the future are also covered. Amendment No. 25 makes a consequential change to new Section 145D(4) which sets out a number of matters which the tribunal must take into account when assessing the employer's sole or main purpose.
I shall describe the second set of amendments briefly. It concerns the definition of a worker for the purposes of Sections 145A to 145E, and for the purposes of the existing Sections 146 to 150 of the 1992 Act.
The facts of the Wilson and Palmer cases concerned the position of employees who were union members. However, the court's reasoning would equally apply to other categories of worker in employment. Clauses 28 and 29 of the Bill therefore apply both the new rights regarding offers and the related existing rights within Section 146 of the 1992 Act to the broader group of worker.
We have, however, noticed a technical flaw in the result produced by the new provisions. The definition of worker, which is given in Section 296 of the 1992
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Act, covers people seeking work and, unlike the definition of employee, is not limited solely to those who are in, or have been in employment. It was never our intention that the protections should extend to those seeking work. Their trade union rights are contained in Section 137 of the 1992 Act. It would create confusion and uncertainty if we created overlapping rights for that particular group of people within different parts of trade union law.
So, to avoid such confusion and ensure that the rights are confined to the target group, these amendments secure that the definition of "worker" is adjusted so as not to apply to those seeking work.
These amendments implement a recommendation of the Joint Committee on Human Rights. They make technical changes to ensure that the Bill fits more smoothly into the substantial body of existing trade union law. I am sorry about the complexity of them but I do commend them to the House. I beg to move.
Baroness Turner of Camden: My Lords, as my noble friend has said, the issue of unrecognised unions was raised by a number of noble Lords during previous discussion of the Bill. We were concerned that the protections did not at that time extend to members of unions seeking recognition. That has now been remedied in these amendments and I am very grateful for it.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Lord Triesman Lord Triesman moved Amendment No. 16:
Page 32, line 31, after "recognised" insert ", or seeking to be recognised,"
On Question, amendment agreed to.
[Amendment No. 17 not moved.]
Lord Triesman Lord Triesman moved Amendments Nos. 18 and 19:
Page 32, line 39, leave out "no longer" and insert "not (or will no longer)"
Page 33, line 1, after "worker" insert "or former worker"
On Question, amendments agreed to.
Baroness Turner of Camden Baroness Turner of Camden moved Amendment No. 20:
Page 33, line 3, at end insert—
"( ) An independent trade union may present a complaint to an employment tribunal on the grounds that an employer has made an offer or offers to a member or members of that union in contravention of this section.
( ) If the tribunal finds the complaint well-founded, it may make a declaration to that effect."
The noble Baroness said: My Lords, noble Lords will recall that one of our complaints during an earlier debate on the Bill was that although a remedy existed for an individual employee offered an inducement to abandon union membership or representation, no remedy was offered to the union, although its rights had also been breached by the employer's activity. Indeed, the Joint Committee on Human Rights also drew attention to the fact that in these activities the union's rights would also have been breached.
During earlier discussions we sought to write into the Bill a remedy for a union so affected, but the Government were not disposed to accept it. We slightly reworded our original amendment and I think that we have made the situation a bit clearer. The amendment provides:
"An independent trade union may present a complaint to an employment tribunal on the grounds that an employer has made an offer or offers to a member or members of that union in contravention of this section",
and,
"If the tribunal finds the complaint well-founded, it may make a declaration to that effect".
It seemed to us a reasonable way in which to offer some sort of remedy to the union.
The Government have said in previous discussions that the amendment was not necessary because the union had other means of enforcing its rights. I do not think that that will meet the situation. It is not clear from the Bill because the Bill deals specifically with inducements offered to get people to abandon union representation. It is necessary to set out in this Bill a remedy for the union whose rights have been breached by the activities of the employer. I beg to move.
Lord McCarthy: My Lords, this is the issue on which the Joint Committee was most specific. It said that the unions should have rights and that these rights were specified in the judgment of the court. There is no debate about this at all. The Government have helped to do something, as my noble friend just said, to implement a bit more of the judgment, but they have not got there yet, and certainly not on this one. Indeed, when we discussed this on Report, the Minister said that that was true. You are right, he said, that is what the Joint Committee said. So he submits that he is out of step with the Joint Committee.
I want to read what he then said because I want to ask what he has done about it. He said:
"This is in fact a far-reaching idea which runs counter to the way all other individual employment rights are currently enforced".
So far, we are not coming to terms with what the Joint Committee said. So I would like to ask what that means. I have asked several noble lawyers this and they cannot tell me what it means to say that to give a union a right in front of an industrial tribunal because its members have been wronged would be counter to the way all other individual employment rights are currently enforced. But all other individual employment rights are not of this kind. What problem would there be—especially since that is what the Joint Committee says and what the Wilson and Palmer judgment says? What would be the difficulty?
He continued:
"it requires very close consideration indeed. We are therefore seeking the views of key stakeholders"—
I thought that we might get a definition of stakeholders. I have never yet seen a definition of stakeholders, but perhaps the Minister will give us one tonight—
"both employer bodies and unions"—
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so that is what they are, really—
"before finalising our position".
But which unions? All the unions in the TUC? All unions that say that they have had this problem? He said:
"For example, just yesterday my colleague Gerry Sutcliffe met a delegation from the NUJ that included Mr Dave Wilson of Wilson and Palmer".
So there is a bit of research going on here. That is good.
"These consultations will be completed by Third Reading".
But we have not heard about them.
"In the light of the ongoing consultations on both issues, I ask my noble friends to withdraw their amendments".—[Official Report, 8/7/04: col. 938.]
The Government ought to tell us what has happened with all that talk to all those stakeholders. Have they found ways in which the judgment does not say what I think it says but what the Minister told me it says? Have they found ways in which enforcing the judgment would run counter to the way that individual employment rights are currently enforced? I should be very interested to know what Mr Dave Wilson of Wilson and Palmer thinks of it all so far. I support the amendment.
Lord Triesman: My Lords, this amendment deals with whether the union should have a right to seek a remedy in its own name. As has been pointed out, that is one of the issues raised by the Joint Committee on Human Rights. We indeed discussed the point in Grand Committee and on Report. In response, we said that the Government would look closely at the points raised by the JCHR and return to the matter on Third Reading.
Consultations have taken place with key stakeholders. The DTI has consulted the TUC, the CBI, the EEF and the NUJ, including Mr Wilson, and I know that others have also written and made their views known. I do not intend, nor would the House expect me, to comment on the views of some individual members in unions, other than to say that their views were considered in some detail.
I can respond to the amendment and come back, as we promised that we would, with our considered view. It is a difficult issue. I know that my noble friends and the trade unions hold strong convictions on this subject. However, on balance, we believe that the Bill should be left as it is. As a result, we resist the amendment. There are several reasons for that attitude and I think that, in view of what has been said, I should go through them.
At the moment, the clauses are constructed in a way that provides rights to individual union members. The rights are then enforced in the normal way by those individuals complaining to an employment tribunal. The construction of the new rights therefore follows the established pattern which, by and large, has worked satisfactorily. We therefore do not want to move away from that tried and tested approach by creating an entirely new enforcement mechanism for unions to complain independently.
9 p.m.
My noble friends have said that the terms of the European Court's judgment in the Wilson and Palmer case require us to establish this new remedy for unions. They quoted from the judgment at some length on Report. However, we have considered this matter carefully, in the light of all the representations and arguments made to us and the Joint Committee's comments. We do not think that it follows that we need to create a separate union remedy in our domestic law simply because the European Court refers to the rights of unions under Article 11 of the European convention. The Article 11 rights of the union can be adequately safeguarded by assigning rights to union members under our domestic law and providing remedies for those members to enforce their rights. In other words, we remain strongly of the view that we are adequately protecting the Article 11 rights of the union, as the judgment requires, by providing a right for union members to complain about breaches of their own rights.
I think that the Joint Committee on Human Rights saw the strength of that argument. It expressed concern, however, about the protections available to the union where none of its members was prepared to make a complaint. This is largely a practical issue. Of course, neither the Government nor unions can force union members to make complaints; that is quite rightly a matter for them as individuals. However, it is normal practice in such situations for unions to advise and assist their members in making complaints and in providing free of charge the legal advice and services that they may need. I have seen that over many years in practice. There are also strong statutory protections against the victimisation of workers who make complaints to tribunals about infringement of statutory rights. I am therefore confident that individuals would complain if significant breaches of their trade union rights arose in practice.
I understand that my noble friends take a different view and feel that union members might well be intimidated by their employers and therefore unwilling to complain to a tribunal. However, if that issue is really a problem in practice, it will not disappear by providing a separate remedy for unions. To progress their own cases, unions will need the active support and participation of those very members in providing evidence. If they are so intimidated by their employers as to prevent them from making complaints in their own name, it is highly unlikely that they will lend their support to the union in bringing its complaint. Anyone who has operated in the practical world of trade unions when trying to remedy such issues will know the truth of that.
We have tabled further amendments for Third Reading which extend the new protections to union members seeking recognition. We are satisfied that with these further amendments the Wilson and Palmer judgment will be given full effect through the provisions in the Bill. I know that my comments will disappoint my noble friends, but the Government are satisfied that their proposed approach to enforcing these rights is robust and compatible with our
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obligations under the European convention. In that light, I ask my noble friend to withdraw her amendment.
Baroness Turner of Camden: My Lords, I thank the Minister for his comprehensive response, although he will not be surprised to know that we find it rather disappointing. He acknowledged that unions would be disappointed because their view is that they should have a right that should be enforced within the context of the Bill. I am disappointed because reliance on individual rights does not always produce justice; it is often difficult for individuals to stand up and be counted and to have their case taken forward. That applies in other legislation, including equal rights legislation, where one must find individuals to take forward a case. It is not always easy to do that. That is one of the reasons why unions, my noble friends and I wanted written into the legislation a protection of union rights. That proposal was supported by the Joint Committee on Human Rights, which recommended that there should be a remedy for unions and that it should be written into the Bill.
One can only hope that, when the legislation is in place, it will be possible for the protection to which the Minister refers to be fully operative, and for individuals to be protected. That is really what we are talking about. If you give unions the right to take cases forward, you are protecting individuals, who do not have to stand up to be counted and run the risk of being intimidated by their employer. There is no point in proceeding any further with the matter at this stage. I am disappointed: I had hoped that there would be a change of view as a result of the consultations that I knew were taking place. In the circumstances, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Lord Triesman Lord Triesman moved Amendment No. 21:
Page 33, line 9, leave out "worker" and insert "complainant"
On Question, amendment agreed to.
[Amendments Nos. 22 to 24 not moved.]
Lord Triesman Lord Triesman moved Amendment No. 25:
Page 33, line 32, at end insert—
"( ) that when the offers were made the employer did not wish to enter into arrangements proposed by the union for collective bargaining,"
On Question, amendment agreed to.
[Amendment No. 26 not moved.]
Lord Triesman Lord Triesman moved Amendments Nos. 27 and 28:
Page 34, line 30, at end insert—
"(2A) In sections 145A to 145E
"worker" means an individual who works, or normally works, as mentioned in paragraphs (a) to (c) of section 296(1), and
"employer" means—

(a) in relation to a worker, the person for whom he works;

(b) in relation to a former worker, the person for whom he worked."

Page 34, line 31, leave out "worker" and insert "person"
[LORD TRIESMAN]
On Question, amendments agreed to.
Clause 29 [Extension of protection against detriment for union membership etc.]:
Lord Triesman Lord Triesman moved Amendments Nos. 29 to 31:
Page 34, line 38, leave out ", (3) and (5)" and insert "and (3)"
Page 35, line 2, at end insert—
"( ) In subsection (5), for "An employee" substitute "A worker or former worker"."
Page 35, line 10, leave out subsection (7) and insert—
"( ) In section 151 of the 1992 Act (interpretation of sections 146 to 150 and supplementary provision), after subsection (1A) (which is inserted by section 30) insert—
"(1B) In sections 146 to 150—
"worker" means an individual who works, or normally works, as mentioned in paragraphs (a) to (c) of section 296(1), and
"employer" means—

(a) in relation to a worker, the person for whom he works;

(b) in relation to a former worker, the person for whom he worked."

( ) In subsection (2) of that section, for "an employee" substitute "a person"."
On Question, amendments agreed to.
Clause 32 [Exclusion or expulsion from trade union attributable to conduct]:
The Deputy Speaker (Lord Geddes): My Lords, before I call Amendment No. 32, I should advise the House that, if it is agreed to, I will not be able to call Amendment No. 33, due to pre-emption.
Lord Triesman Lord Triesman moved Amendment No. 32:
Page 37, line 40, leave out from "of" to "it" in line 43 and insert "conduct of the complainant which was contrary to—

(a) a rule of the union, or

(b) an objective of the union,"

The noble Lord said: My Lords, Clause 32 gives employment tribunals greater discretion to decide the amount of a compensatory award in cases in which an exclusion or expulsion was unlawful because it was mainly attributable to membership of a political party. It disapplies the current minimum award where there were other subsidiary reasons for the union's decision that concerned conduct that was contrary to the union's rules.
During the passage of the Bill, we have discussed the need to ensure that the statute places reasonable obligations on individuals to act in accordance with widely available and accessible information on the union's policies and positions. That is why we refer to the union's rules in the current wording of the clause. However, it must be said that union rule books vary. Some explicitly refer to the union's opposition to racist attitudes or conduct, while others specify only a few proscribed behaviours and leave it to other union documents to set out the union's position on such matters. It is often in such documents that a union's objectives on equality are made known to union members and others.
We recognise, therefore, that there are justifiable concerns about the adequacy of relying only on rule books to ascertain the union's position on equality issues. As a result, we gave commitments in Grand Committee to look again at the area. We have worked closely with the TUC to devise alternative wording that meets the needs of unions and our requirement for transparency, and I am pleased to be able move Amendments Nos. 32 and 34 to meet that need.
I shall say a word about how the amendments will work. In combination, the amendments disapply the minimum award, where the subsidiary conduct is contrary to the union's rules or contrary to the union's objectives, provided that it was reasonably practicable for the person concerned to have ascertained the objectives in question. Because we think that more information about a union's objectives is likely to be available to union members than non-members, the requirements are cast differently for those different groups.
The amendments give the degree of transparency that we have been aiming for and improve the practical implementation of the clause. They satisfy the TUC's concerns on this point, and I hope that noble Lords in all parts of the House will accept them.
The Deputy Speaker referred to the amendment tabled by my noble friend Lady Turner of Camden. She seeks to achieve a similar result by broadening the test that disapplies the minimum award by adding subsidiary behaviour that is contrary to the stated objectives of the union. As was mentioned in Grand Committee and on Report, the fact that something is stated does not necessarily mean that it is sufficiently accessible to the relevant individuals and therefore capable of influencing their conduct. Our fear is that the wording of the amendment would give rise to unnecessary legal debate before the tribunals. The Government have tabled amendments on the matter that meet all the concerns, and, in that light, I invite my noble friend to withdraw her amendment.
In summary, one of the tremendous strengths of the discussions in all parts of this House was the desire to ensure that racist conduct does not afflict unions any more than any other institutions in our society. That has been one of the guiding and driving principles. I thank noble Lords on all sides for their absolute determination to ensure that that happened. I beg to move.
Lord McCarthy: My Lords, we have withdrawn our amendment because the Minister made some very effective points when we last discussed this issue. Now our amendment is not suitable. However, I am not sure about the Government's amendment. I understand that the TUC thinks that it is probably better than the previous one, which it believes was subject to the kind of difficulties of interpretation that the Minister mentioned in the House.
The words,
"reasonably practicable for that objective to be ascertained"

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worry me. I do not know who has to ascertain the objective. There are the two conditions that have to be accepted in order for a person to be rightfully expelled. New subsection (1D) of Amendment No. 34 states:
"A declaration by virtue of subsection (1B)(b) shall not be made unless the union shows that, at the time of the conduct of the complainant which was contrary to the objective…it was reasonably practicable for that objective to be ascertained".
Does that mean that the tribunal believes that the objective can be ascertained? "Ascertained" is a funny word. Does it mean that the union should say that it has ascertained it? I do not understand why a statement that someone is anti-racist or if members are caught in racist activities or if they express racist statements of various kinds indicates that the objective can be ascertained. The amendment does not refer to evidence: it refers to "ascertained". I am asking very nicely, late at night, for the Minister to tell me what ascertained means and whether it could be improved on and made clear on going back to the other place.
Lord Triesman: My Lords, in circumstances where an individual's subsidiary behaviour is considered by an employment tribunal, without question it will have the expertise to determine what information was generally accessible by looking at the union's statements and documentation at the time of the exclusion or expulsion and taking account of availability and whether there was any reasonable impediment to someone seeing that material. Perhaps I may say that employment tribunals do that routinely when they consider the general platform of equality and discrimination, in particular when it is said that the union might have been the body that discriminated. That is part of their expertise in looking across the evidence. The evidence is always looked at in very considerable detail.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
The Deputy Speaker: My Lords, as already advised to the House, since Amendment No. 32 has been agreed to, I cannot call Amendment No. 33 due to pre-emption.
Lord Triesman Lord Triesman moved Amendment No. 34:
Page 37, line 43, at end insert—
"(1C) For the purposes of subsection (1B), it is immaterial whether the complainant was a member of the union at the time of the conduct contrary to the rule or objective.
(1D) A declaration by virtue of subsection (1B)(b) shall not be made unless the union shows that, at the time of the conduct of the complainant which was contrary to the objective in question, it was reasonably practicable for that objective to be ascertained—

(a) if the complainant was not at that time a member of the union, by a member of the general public, and

(b) if he was at that time a member of the union, by a member of the union."

On Question, amendment agreed to.
Lord Triesman Lord Triesman moved Amendment No. 35:
After Clause 43, insert the following new clause—

ENFORCEMENT NOTICES
(1) Section 19 of the National Minimum Wage Act 1998 (c. 39) (enforcement notices) is amended as follows.
(2) After subsection (2B) insert—
"(2C) Where an enforcement notice imposes a requirement under subsection (2) above, the amount specified in the notice as the sum due to the worker under section 17 above need not include any sum so due to him in respect of any very recent pay reference period (although the amount so specified may include any such sum).
(2D) In subsection (2C) above a "very recent" pay reference period means a pay reference period ending less than 3 months before the date on which the notice is served."
(3) In subsection (3) for "The same" substitute "An".
(4) Nothing in this section affects section 19 of the National Minimum Wage Act 1998 (c. 39) as it has effect for the purposes of the Agricultural Wages (Scotland) Act 1949 (c. 30)."
The noble Lord said: My Lords, in speaking to Amendment No. 35, I shall speak also to Amendments Nos. 36 to 41. This is a short package of further amendments that make detailed improvements to the existing procedures for enforcing the minimum wage. Amendment No. 35 makes it clear that while enforcement notices relating to the arrears due must cover all pay periods up to three months before the date of the notice, they need not cover more recent periods. This is helpful because in most cases it is impractical for notices to cover pay periods running right up to the date of their issue.
Amendment No. 36 has the effect that if a replacement enforcement notice is served on an employer that incorrectly covers any new workers who were not covered by the first notice, it is treated as a replacement notice that attracts the automatic consequences set out in new Section 22A(3) of the National Minimum Wage Act 1998, as inserted by Clause 44(1) of this Bill. In particular, it will not be possible to issue any penalty notice following on from the first enforcement notice, and any penalty notice served in respect of the first notice will cease to have effect. The overall effect is to deter compliance officers from issuing incorrect notices in this way.
Amendment No. 37 makes it clear that when a replacement notice is issued in respect of a first notice that makes use of all or nearly all of the six-year limitation period—the period for which arrears may be recovered—the replacement notice runs back from the date when the first enforcement notice was issued and not the date of issue of the replacement notice. The amendment avoids the unsatisfactory position that would result if the replacement notice could not go as far back as the first notice.
Amendment No. 38 makes it clear that the replacement notice may be appealed against if it covers a pay reference period ending more than six years before the notice is served.
Amendment No. 39 has the effect that the new provisions allowing for the withdrawal and replacement of enforcement and penalty notices will apply to the enforcement of the agricultural minimum wage in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, as well as the national minimum wage.
Amendments Nos. 40 and 41 are tidying amendments to reflect the fact that we have incorporated the present Clause 45 of the Bill into new Amendment No. 35. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 44 [Withdrawal and replacement of notices]:
Lord Triesman Lord Triesman moved Amendments Nos. 36 to 39:
Page 48, line 11, at end insert—
"( ) If the new enforcement notice contravenes subsection (3)—

(a) the case shall be treated as falling within paragraph (b) (or, if none of the workers included in the old enforcement notice is included in the new enforcement notice, paragraph (a)) of section 19(6); and

(b) the new enforcement notice is not to be treated for the purposes of sections 22A(2), 22C(1) and 22D(1) as served in accordance with this section."

Page 48, line 17, at end insert—
"( ) Subsection (4) is subject to section 19(2B) to (2D) as they apply in relation to the new enforcement notice; but section 19(2B) applies in relation to that notice as if the reference to 6 years before the date on which the notice is served were a reference to 6 years before the date on which the old notice was served."
Page 51, line 35, leave out from "paragraph" to end of line 36 and insert "(c)—

(a) in sub-paragraph (ii), for "incorrect;" substitute "too great; or"; and

(b) after that sub-paragraph insert—

"(iii) that the notice contravenes subsection (2B) above;"."
Page 51, line 46, at end insert—
"( ) In each of—

(a) section 3A(2)(c) of the Agricultural Wages Act 1948 (c. 47), and

(b) Article 8A(2)(c) of the Agricultural Wages (Regulation) (Northern Ireland) Order 1977 (S.I. 1977/2151 (N.I.22)),

(enforcement of agricultural wages legislation in England and Wales and Northern Ireland respectively), for "22" substitute "22F"."
On Question, amendments agreed to.
Clause 45 [Enforcement notices relating to more than one worker]:
Lord Triesman Lord Triesman moved Amendment No. 40:
Leave out Clause 45.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 57 [Corresponding provision for Northern Ireland]:
Lord Triesman Lord Triesman moved Amendment No. 41:
Page 60, line 24, leave out "45" and insert "44"
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Schedule 1 [Minor and consequential amendments]:
Lord Triesman Lord Triesman moved Amendments Nos. 42 to 48:
Page 62, line 25, at end insert—
"In section 82 of the 1992 Act (rules as to a union's political fund), for subsection (4) substitute—
"(4A) Where an order has been made under this section, any person who is a member of the union and was a member at the time it was made is entitled to enforce obedience to the order as if he had made the complaint on which it was made.
(4B) An order made by the Certification Officer under this section may be enforced—

(a) in England and Wales, in the same way as an order of the county court;

(b) in Scotland, in the same way as an order of the sheriff."

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In section 103 of the 1992 Act (complaints as regards passing of resolution on amalgamation or transfer of engagements), in subsection (8), for "application" substitute "complaint"."
Page 63, line 13, at end insert—
"In section 229(4) of the 1992 Act (statement which must appear on voting paper in ballot for industrial action), for "eight" substitute "twelve"."
Page 64, line 10, leave out ""68(11)" substitute "68(4)"" and insert ""section 68(11)" substitute "sections 68(4), 145F(2A) and 151(1B)""
Page 65, line 35, at end insert—
"( ) In paragraph 119 (remedial orders) omit sub-paragraph (3)."
Page 66, line 6, after "paragraphs" insert "119A(2A)(a)(ii),"
Page 66, line 10, leave out "119(3)(a) and 119H(1)" and insert "119H(1) and 119I(1)(a)"
Page 66, line 12, after "paragraphs" insert "119A(2A)(a)(ii),"
On Question, amendments agreed to.
Schedule 2 [Repeals]:
Lord Triesman Lord Triesman moved Amendment No. 49:
Page 69, line 48, after "113(2)(a)" insert ", 119(3)"
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Lord Triesman: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill do now pass. I thank all noble Lords for their participation, including the Bill team.
Moved accordingly, and, on Question, Bill passed, and returned to the Commons with amendments.

TSE (England) (Amendment) Regulations 2004
9.17 p.m.
Baroness Byford Baroness Byford rose to move, That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty praying that the regulations, laid before the House on 18 June, be annulled (S.I. 2004/1518) [15th Report from the Merits Committee].
The noble Baroness said: My Lords, the regulations will have a great impact on farmers who breed sheep or keep goats. Concerns have been expressed to me over the scientific certainty, or lack of it, on which the regulations are based.
In its response to Defra's consultation on the implementation of the new EU-wide controls on scrapie-affected farms, the National Sheep Association has stated:
"The National Sheep Association welcomes the opportunity to respond to the [Defra] consultation on the implementation of EU-wide controls on scrapie-affected farms".
The NSA is the leading specialist representative organisation for the United Kingdom sheep sector. Its members come from those involved with every pedigree sheep bred in this country; indeed, from all the sheep breed societies. As the pedigree sector has been the one most affected by the various regulations concerned with the eradication of scrapie so far, we feel that this makes the NSA response particularly significant in the development of the resulting policy. This is in addition to a majority of members of the commercial sheep sector. We can therefore say with

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confidence that our views are truly representative of the entire UK sheep sector. I am sure that the Minister will wish to congratulate the NSA on the work it has done to date in the eradication of scrapie.
The NSA appreciates the fact that Defra is consulting on how best to implement the new EU regulation and not the regulation itself. However, it feels that it is important to reiterate that it has grave concerns over the EU regulation that Defra is being obliged to implement. The NSA feels that it is an ill-conceived regulation, in general, with measures and provisions that are draconian in nature and totally disproportionate to the scale of the issue to be dealt with.
Indeed, the regulation is best described by the commonly used phrase "bad law" and, as such, it runs the risk of being regarded as a step too far by the many sectors of the sheep industry that may be affected by its introduction, as outlined in the consultation. The National Sheep Association feels particularly strongly about the measures proposed under the restrictions section. The proposals as outlined are very severe and, for some businesses which are reliant on the sale of store and breeding sheep, it may be that their imposition will result in the collapse of such businesses. In addition, the proposals could seriously affect the asset value of a farm should the farmer wish to sell his property while under restriction.
However, as previously stated, the National Sheep Association appreciates that Defra is obliged to implement the regulation given that it has been agreed within the EU and, as such, cannot legally be ignored. On this point, the NSA will be constructive in its response, as I am sure the Minister will acknowledge that it has been in the past. But this is set against the backdrop of its concerns over the regulation itself.
With this in mind, it is worth mentioning that it is not strictly correct for Defra to say—as it does in the letter sent out with the consultation document—that key industry representatives are content with the proposals. As the NSA, for one, most definitely is not, I ask the Minister to comment on who Defra is referring to as "key industry representatives" if they do not include the National Sheep Association.
When the Merits of Statutory Instruments Committee looked at the regulations it raised two specific points, on which it wrote to Margaret Beckett, the Secretary of State for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. Under the heading "Adequacy of measures proposed", paragraph 2 of the letter states:
"While the committee accepted the need to ensure implementation of European requirements, we were concerned to establish whether the Regulations and the controls introduced by them are an adequate response to the scale of the problem, given that scrapie has occurred for so many years and so widely in sheep in this country. We would be grateful if you could comment on your assessment of the scale of the occurrence of scrapie in sheep in this country, and on how quickly and effectively the approach being followed in the Regulations will succeed in eliminating the risks posed by scrapie".
The letter then goes on to refer to one or two other matters that I should like to highlight. It pointed out that the RIA of 17 June stated that 20 responses were received to Defra's consultation on the partial RIA and that,
"most thought that Option 2 as set out in the RIA was the best approach; and that a number of concerns were raised about the EU regulation which DEFRA continued to pursue with the European Commission".
The letter continues:
"In addition, your Department provided us with a copy of DEFRA's summary of responses to the consultation exercise. We were struck by the difference in tone, if not the substance, of that summary from the statement in the RIA".
The summary referred to a universal feeling that the regulation is draconian and disproportionate in its effect compared with the risk with which it deals. It acknowledges that the science on which it is based is questioned. It states that,
"the introduction of the compulsory [scheme] is resented"
The chairman of the committee said that it felt that the RIA statement on the consultation responses appeared to understate significantly the strength of concern among respondents.
I shall not read the rest of the letter, but it is important that your Lordships are aware of the serious concerns felt in the farming community.
In her response, Margaret Beckett stated that they realised that most scrapie cases are not reported so that the scale of the problem is significantly larger than the 230 cases confirmed in sheep in England in 2003. If this is the case, how many flocks does the department estimate to be infected, or is this still a totally unknown number?
In 1999, SEAC recommended the introduction of a breeding programme to eradicate scrapie from the sheep population in view of the theoretical possibility that sheep could have contracted BSE which was being masked by scrapie. How many projects have begun since 1999 to prove this theoretical possibility, how much has that cost to date and, more importantly, has any evidence been established to confirm this possible theory?
Will the Minister accept that the longer this theoretical possibility continues to be unproven, it is reasonable to conclude that a link is not established. In that case, should we really be approving a regulation which has measures and provisions that are draconian in nature and disproportionate?
This morning the Prime Minister again reinforced his Government's commitment to legislating on the basis of scientific proof. But these regulations are based on scientific uncertainty. Can the Minister explain the discrepancy? Furthermore, when the regulations were considered at drafting stage, were these issues raised, and did Her Majesty's Government agree with the drafting?
I understand that over the past few years, Defra has carried out a large survey of sheep testing. This year, for the first time, the number of animals tested has decreased from 60,000 a year to 10,000. Can the Minister tell me why?
Does the Minister recognise the success of the voluntary scheme established under the voluntary scrapie flocks scheme, which has more than 100 applications already? Does she care that these restrictive regulations may well result in a fall in the number of scrapie cases reported? I understand that the Government will monitor the situation closely and if they find that reporting decreases significantly, they will take it up with the European Commission. Over what time period will that monitoring take place? What response do the Government expect from the commission?
I raise these concerns because this will be very costly for the Government. I noticed that in yesterday's Hansard, a Written Answer in response to my noble friend Lord Marlesford showed that bovine TB has cost the taxpayer some £38 million this year alone. These are huge figures and we need to be very sure of our ground when we are committing ourselves to additional costs. At the moment, we have no idea what the costs might be. What is the estimated cost of slaughter and how much will the implementation, controls and monitoring cost? Is the true cost proportional to the risk when one considers that the Government refuse to ban smoking? That is not a light, throwaway question. It puts into context the whole question of this regulation. I beg to move.
Moved, That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty praying that the regulations, laid before the House on 18 June, be annulled (S.I. 2004/1518) [15th Report from the Merits Committee].—(Baroness Byford.)
The Countess of Mar: My Lords, I am very sorry that the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, is not able to be with us tonight and I hope that we shall soon hear him in good voice before the House. I am sure that I carry the wishes of other noble Lords when I say that.
I am sure that the Minister and other noble Lords taking part in this debate will recall my objections to the TSE (England) Regulations 2002, which we debated in May 2002. They will not be surprised that I am very grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Byford, for allowing me to return to the fray this evening. I declare my interest as the wife of a sheep and goat farmer. As well as being a goat cheesemaker, I take an active part in our livestock management.
I was astonished to read in the regulations that goats are to be dealt with far more harshly than sheep. In the Explanatory Memorandum is the statement:
"Goats are also susceptible to scrapie and scientific advice is that goat herds would also pose a public health risk if BSE were to be found in sheep".
May I ask the Minister exactly what is the scientific evidence upon which this scientific advice is based? Who is providing the scientific advice upon which these statements are made? Poor old goats—with no specific genotypes and little information available, it seems easier to kill them all. What an odd approach. Was it dreamt up because scrapie is so much rarer in goats than sheep, so slaughter should eliminate the
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disease, or was it that, because it is so rare, the possibility that a whole herd would have to be despatched is remote? I would hope that it is the latter.
It has already been noted that the incidence of scrapie in the sheep flock is probably under-reported. I suspect that this is simply because it is accepted that sheep out on the moors and hills die from a number of causes. Their carcasses are often eaten by foxes and other scavengers before the shepherd finds them. It is the nature of modern shepherding that the flocks are not constantly watched over. Such is the relationship of most of the goat keepers that I know with their animals that a vet would be called to attend any really sick animal. Three reported cases in eight years is likely to be an accurate reflection of the incidence in the national goat herd. It would also appear to indicate that the goat to goat transmission rate is low. If this is the case, what on earth would be achieved by slaughtering the whole herd?
Although I recognise that the Minister will say that this amendment to the 2002 regulations is to provide,
"powers for the enforcement of EU legislation introducing controls on farms that have had a confirmed case of scrapie",
it still seems extraordinary that all the plans and regulations relating to TSEs and particularly to scrapie are based upon an hypothesis that has become an assumption that it is a rogue isoform of PrP that causes TSEs.
Humans have lived with scrapie for at least 250 years and there has been no evidence that scrapie has ever been transmitted to humans, although I accept that absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. The conclusion that a single strain of the agent which causes BSE is more easily transmissible between species than previously known strains and may therefore be present in sheep still remains unsupported by critical scientific evidence.
I will repeat my concerns that, by requiring the slaughter of sheep of particular genotypes we will be depleting the gene pool in our sheep flock. We may well be laying the animals open to epidemics of TSEs other than those of which we have current knowledge, or, worse still, to some other highly infectious diseases to which the national flock is at present resistant. Why are not the sensible measures already in force sufficient? We are already required to minimise the routine spread of these not particularly infectious agents.
I note that the Explanatory Memorandum to this regulation frequently uses the terms "TSE resistant" and "resistant genotypes". Unless and until there is an adequately comprehensive list of the TSE strains tested and it can be shown that they can survive passage between animals, these terms are not appropriate. When the real molecular nature of the agent that causes TSEs is known, it may be possible to employ these terms.
Should we not be dealing with facts rather than the assumptions? I may be criticised for suggesting that we fly in the face of the precautionary principle in this instance, when I have fought long and hard for it to be exercised in the case of exposure of humans to toxic

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chemicals. I would respond by saying that there is a clear correlation between, for example, organophosphate exposure and ill health, while there is not one between naturally occurring BSE in sheep and goats and variant CJD in humans. I would argue that there is a place for proportionality.
The statement that TSEs are caused by a so-called "rogue protein"—a misshapen version of a host protein known as PrP—has never been proven. The infective PrP has never been synthesised de novo. There is, I understand, substantial evidence to show that this protein becomes misshapen by infection, rather than that it is the cause of the infection, with the causal molecule not proven. That means that the majority of the current laboratory work is uncertain in its direct relevance to the infective nature of TSEs.
There has been very little research to establish the reason why BSE was able to infect some humans across the species barrier from cattle. We need to know whether the pressure was exerted by the massive scale of the human exposure to infected beef products during the BSE epidemic or whether the cattle strain of BSE, dose for dose, is more easily transmitted to humans than current strains of scrapie or other TSEs. If the former is the case, the risk is well controlled. It is only if the latter is correct that the rigorous precautionary principles now being implemented are needed, as there is a much more serious risk when there is no species barrier, such as in human blood transfusion. May I ask the Minister whether it is the Government's intention that such research should be conducted? if she says no, then I would suggest that we should leave our sheep and goats to get on with their lives and save the taxpayer a small fortune.
I note that the Commission Regulation (EC) No. 1915/2003 requires thorough cleaning and disinfection of all animal housing on the premises following destocking and before restocking. In view of the fact that we know that total destruction of the infected material in a hospital setting is almost impossible, will the Minister please tell the House how effective disinfection of rambling farm buildings will be achieved? What about grazing land upon which infected animals may have defecated or left foetal remains? What advice has she received on these matters?
It really is time that we seriously questioned the quality of scientific advice that Ministers are receiving. I have said this from time to time over a great many years. We are repeatedly told that the scientific committees are independent. Experience has taught me that it might be true that they are independent of government but, I would suggest, they are not independent of Whitehall or some of the other organisations with whom the mandarins have close association. Too often, busy experts from fields unconnected with the subject under consideration have been expected to make recommendations which are outside their competence. It is not their fault; they do their best within their limitations. Unfortunately, I believe that this system has led to an intellectual corruption of science.
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TSE, and particularly BSE, research has been corrupted by the publicity that has been generated, first by those dreadful pictures of Daisy the cow, and then the discovery that humans could suffer from a similar awful disease. Instead of going to the centres of existing knowledge—to the people who had some understanding of the subject after working for years on scrapie—the MAFF and Defra career civil servants, through the funding agencies and the advisory committees, diverted research funding to organisations that subsequently proved their incompetence very publicly.
Progress has consistently been hindered by what I can only describe as wild goose chases. Government departments should not control basic scientific research, especially when it is in the vanguard of scientific progress. Perhaps it would be better if they were to admit that they did not know the answers and make a point of finding a scientist who does, or at least has the expertise to do so.
Will the Minister kindly tell the House what means are used to test the competence of the expert advice that Ministers receive? May I suggest, as it seems unlikely that anyone in government will take an executive decision to review the quality of scientific advice offered to all Ministers, that there should be a committee set up to discuss the matter? Defra is very good at setting up committees and discussing matters. It does not get anywhere but it does discuss them.
At the risk of being boringly repetitive the facts are that there is no historical evidence of BSE in sheep. There is no current evidence of BSE in sheep. If sheep ever were infected from eating feed contaminated by BSE-infected meat and bone meal taken out of the food chain before any current commercial sheep were born, the possibility of ever finding BSE in sheep must surely be diminishing rather than increasing. What are we doing implementing this regulation?
Lord Livsey of Talgarth: My Lords, it is a privilege to take part in this debate. I was brought up on a farm with a decent sized sheep flock and I had a sheep flock of my own at one stage. Therefore, I know quite a bit about the subject.
The noble Baroness, Lady Byford, rightly drew the House's attention to the views of the National Sheep Association. Therefore, I shall not squander parliamentary time by repeating what has been said regarding the views of the NSA. However, I should like to mention a few issues which I consider should be drawn to the attention of the House. The deep knowledge of the noble Countess, Lady Mar, on the subject must be respected.
The first page of the statutory instrument makes very clear that it incorporates the protection of public health. As the noble Countess, Lady Mar, said, at the present time there is no proven scientific link between TSE and scrapie on the one hand and BSE on the other. The spectre of the debate, if you like, which is unproven scientifically, is a link to human health.
I refer also to the whole issue of animal health. It is important to define the two matters as the regulations will have an impact on animal health. Indeed, in that

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respect the science is proven as regards scrapie. Indeed, farmers are co-operating with the Government to eliminate scrapie in the United Kingdom. That is quite right as the disease must be eliminated. That is a highly desirable thing to do.
On the other hand, as the NSA has pointed out, there are huge practical difficulties with the regulations. The problem as I see it is that the objective of protecting human health should not obscure the other of improving animal health and eliminating scrapie. That is where the complication arises.
I am pleased to see that the Government have taken on board the principle of appeals which has been incorporated in the regulations. I tabled an amendment to the Prayer to annul the 2002 regulations moved by the noble Countess, Lady Mar, which made three specific points. The first was,
"to give an undertaking that the period of time in which a veterinary inspector issuing a notice of intended slaughter shall permit representations to the Secretary of State shall be no less than seven days".
That particular aspect of my amendment was not accepted but amended by the Government and included in a measure that incorporated the rest of my amendment, which was,
"to consider bringing in further regulations setting up an independent appeals adjudicator nominated by the British Veterinary Association".
Will that occur? There appear to be some doubts within the farming community that the matter will be unilaterally decided by state vets, and not decided by independently nominated vets. I would like some assurance on that matter.
My amendment asked, thirdly,
"to keep the regulations under review in the light of scientific and technological developments relating to TSE".
We have had plenty of those so far, such as the genotyping of rams in particular in the national flock, and the impact of that on pedigree flocks.
I want to refer to the problems of the hill areas. The regulations deal with England, and there are many hefted hill flocks dependent on the drafting out of ewes in the autumn, as well as the drafting out of store lambs. If there is one case identified in a flock, that could prevent the marketing of store stock and, indeed, cull ewes as well. That would have an enormously serious impact on the economics of hill farming in the north of England and the south-west, to name but two areas. I would like to know the Minister's thoughts on that.
One other problem is the genotyping of rams. We are all aiming for ARR/ARR genotypes, which are the top range and will ensure that scrapie is not spread. In some breeds and places, those rams are in short supply, and simple supply-and-demand economics dictate that the price of the rams is sometimes extremely high. What is the Government's view on assisting the industry to ensure that that does not excessively penalise small producers, who really cannot afford to purchase some of those rams at present?
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Of course, derogation is accepted in principle by many members of the farming community. Compensation is still questioned very much by the sheep industry, and the independent valuation of sheep raises a question on commercial flocks of whether the market value is the appropriate one. Professional expertise ought to be brought in to adjudicate. Those are a few of the points that I would like to draw to the attention of the House.
Baroness Farrington of Ribbleton: My Lords, I am sure that everyone who has taken part will want to join the noble Countess, Lady Mar, in hoping that my noble friend Lord Whitty is well, in good voice, and able to join us very soon indeed.
I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Byford, for raising the issue. We recognise that there are concerns about the TSE (England)(Amendment) Regulations, as expressed in today's debate. We need to remember that the regulations only provide powers for us to enforce the EU measures. All noble Lords with an interest in the area have recognised that. The EU law is directly applicable and already forms part of our law, and we are required by that EU law to provide proper enforcement of EU measures. If the regulations were to be annulled, we would be in an uncertain situation, in that the EU legislation would not be fully workable or enforceable.
As all noble Lords have recognised, scrapie is a very serious disease. The noble Lord, Lord Livsey, drew attention not only to the human health issues but to the importance of eradicating the disease on grounds of animal welfare and to prevent animal suffering. It is important that we have the powers to take action in flocks where the disease is confirmed. That way we can eradicate scrapie and prevent its spread to other farms and its introduction from infected farms.
I note the point that the noble Countess, Lady Mar, raised about disinfection following an outbreak and we will be issuing guidance to farmers on how to do that. I have no doubt that she will wish to offer views in advance of that. Taking action in this way, as the noble Countess recognised, is in line with advice from the European Commission's scientific experts. The Scientific Steering Committee, now the European Food Standards Agency, and the Spongiform Encephalopathy Advisory Committee (SEAC) have expressed support. The action is also supported by the Food Standards Agency—as both the noble Countess and the noble Lord, Lord Livsey, recognised.
All of us, including the Government, recognise that there is a theoretical risk that BSE is present in the national sheep flock and is masked by scrapie, so we need to take action on public health grounds. Noble Lords have raised questions regarding whether that is a wise course of action. I believe that it will have public

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support, particularly when we remember that there were examples of sheep being fed the very feedstuffs that led to problems regarding BSE in cattle.
The Countess of Mar: My Lords, perhaps I may interrupt the noble Baroness. Does she recall the beef on the bone regulations and how seriously the public took those?
Baroness Farrington of Ribbleton: My Lords, I recollect all the issues in relation to BSE. I also recollect that there were examples where the Government were challenged for going too far in protecting the public. I also recognise that major concerns remain that the Government of the day did not go far enough quickly enough. The Government have to take action on the best advice from the Food Standards Agency.
We share the concerns of noble Lords regarding the impact of some of the more onerous aspects of the EU measures, particularly on the reporting of scrapie. We have raised our concerns about the movement restrictions with the Commission. It has proposed some limited amendments which have now been agreed but the Commission has been reluctant to go further. Regarding the sales of semi-resistant breeding rams, referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Livsey, in a slightly different context, the Commission believes that these genotypes might have clinical scrapie and should not be sold from scrapie- affected flocks to other flocks, which would contribute to the shortage to which the noble Lord, Lord Livsey, referred. We believe that the risk of spreading disease from semi-resistant animals is very small and that it is more important to maintain the reporting of disease.
However, I can assure noble Lords, particularly the noble Baroness, Lady Byford, that officials will keep a close eye on the impact of the regulations. If we find that they lead to a decline in the reporting of scrapie we will take the matter up with the European Commission and seek further amendments to the EU legislation.
I also assure noble Lords that we plan to operate the measures in a sensible and proportionate way and we recognise that the measures will be difficult in a number of respects. Derogations from certain provisions are available as allowed under the EU regulations for rare breeds or other breeds with low levels of resistance. Flocks that will have particular difficulty in finding replacement animals may apply for a time-limited derogation to bring on unknown genotypes until 1 January 2006. If there are further points that the noble Lord, Lord Livsey, wishes to raise in that context, I shall write to him if there is further information. Farmers will be compensated for animals which have to be killed and destroyed and cannot go into the food chain.
The noble Lord, Lord Livsey, asked about compensation rates. The regulations set out the rates and provide for compensation based on an independent valuation if the farmer wishes to arrange this. It has to be recognised that taking action in
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scrapie-affected flocks alone will not eradicate scrapie. I accept the point which noble Lords have made in this respect.
Our policy involves a wider approach to deal with scrapie involving measures to increase the level of genetic resistance to it in the sheep flock by breeding resistance under the national scrapie plan. Noble Lords had generally welcomed that, although I recognise that the noble Countess, Lady Mar, raised concerns. A number of schemes have been introduced under the national scrapie plan, on which we are now consulting. It is supported by the organisations representative of the sheep industry and that plan is a good example of the benefits of partnership working.
I am pleased about the high level of uptake under the national scrapie plan, with more than 1 million sheep now genotyped. I am pleased that the plan is having a positive impact in increasing the resistant genotypes and reducing susceptible genotypes in member flocks. This is spreading resistance throughout the national flock.
In response to points raised by noble Lords, we will do all we can to ensure that we implement these measures as flexibly as possible, taking the action necessary to eradicate the disease in herds and flocks. We are working on the appeals procedure which will involve the appointment of an independent person, possibly an industry representative. We are currently looking at that.
I have dealt with the issue of cleansing. The time period is a factor in that. I understand the most risky time is when the ewes are lambing. It is then most likely to be passed to other members of the flock. We will work with the farming community to ensure that in the cleansing we do all we can to have regard to that aspect. I will write to noble Lords with details of research that is being planned in this area.
The noble Countess raised the issue of goats. We hope to meet goat industry representatives soon to consider whether there are any practical management arrangements on the farm which can be applied to lessen the risk of goats coming into contact with sheep. We are still faced with the differences between goats and sheep.
We are funding a four-year, £1.6 million research project to investigate the potential impact of breeding for resistance on economically important production traits. There are a number of anecdotal reports suggesting that there is a link. As the noble Baroness said, there has never been a detailed scientific study. The researchers are currently collecting data from a number of research flocks on depletion of the gene pool. Major breeds, as well as rare and traditional breeds, will be included. The cost is estimated at £8 million in the first year of the compulsory scheme and I have referred to the scientific advice.
I note that in this and a number of other areas the noble Countess is not satisfied that the government advice gives the answer it should give on all occasions. We are grateful for the NSA's constructive comments and we work closely with it to implement that national

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scrapie plan. We will continue to do so. The reference to key industry representatives was not meant to imply that the NSA was content.
Baroness Byford: My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness for giving way. I raised that issue, not the noble Countess, Lady Mar, although I am not trying to point-score. My question was: if the reference was not to the National Sheep Association, which is the key player in the industry, who did it refer to?
Baroness Farrington of Ribbleton: My Lords, obviously a variety of organisations are involved and we were referring to the whole area of work on the National Scrapie Plan, including that of the NSA. We accept that people in the industry have expressed very strong concerns.
I was asked about the approach of the Government. We supported the underlying principle of the EU regulations. Obviously, as I said, we expressed concern about some of the details of implementation of the policy and we have sought and obtained a degree of derogation.
The final question asked by the noble Baroness, Lady Byford, was how many flocks are estimated to be affected. The Government estimate that the prevalence of infection in Great Britain as a whole is about 0.3 per cent.
I hope that I have satisfied the noble Baroness, Lady Byford, as well as I am able. I shall read through all the detailed questions that I have been asked tonight and shall write with answers to all noble Lords who have taken part in the debate. I hope that the noble Baroness will not pursue her prayer against the regulations.
Baroness Byford: My Lords, I thank the Minister and join all Members in wishing the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, a speedy recovery because we miss him. We are pleased to see the noble Baroness in her place but we do miss the noble Lord.
I find these occasions slightly difficult because there are obviously questions that the Minister cannot answer. I know that there is a convention that one should not keep asking the same questions but we have to clarify some of these matters. So far as I am concerned, the most crucial point that the Minister has not answered is how many research programmes carried out since 1999 have been totally ignored and whether any of them has found even one connection between scrapie and BSE. My answer to that—the noble Countess, Lady Mar, is shaking her head; I am sure that she is right—is none. If the answer is "none", the Government should at least be honest.
Baroness Farrington of Ribbleton: My Lords, I apologise. I thought I had made it clear that it remains a theoretical risk. In answer to the noble Countess, Lady Mar, I made it plain that the Food Standards
680
Agency believes that the theoretical risk is strong enough for the Government not only to take it seriously but to act on it.
Baroness Byford: My Lords, I thank the Minister for that. Indeed, they are right to take it seriously, but 1999 was some five years ago and I ask how long one can keep working on a theoretical risk. Earlier, I was trying to say that the longer a theoretical risk keeps going and no evidence is found, ultimately, surely one has to question whether there is a risk at all.
We have covered many points tonight. I do not wish to detain the House further but I think that there is unfinished business. I know that the Minister is always very courteous and perhaps she would be kind enough to look carefully at the comments made by noble Lords from all sides of the House. There are real areas of concern and also some practical issues. At this stage, I beg leave to withdraw the Motion.
Motion, by leave, withdrawn.

Christmas Day (Trading) Bill
10.3 p.m.
Lord Davies of Coity: My Lords, despite the lateness of the hour, which of course is beyond my control, I beg to move that the House do now resolve itself into Committee on this Bill.
Moved, That the House do now resolve itself into Committee.—(Lord Davies of Coity.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House in Committee accordingly.
[The DEPUTY CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES (Lord Geddes) in the Chair.]
Clause 1 agreed to.
Lord Evans of Temple Guiting Lord Evans of Temple Guiting moved Amendment No. 1:
After Clause 1, insert the following new clause—

PROHIBITION OF LOADING AND UNLOADING AT LARGE SHOPS BEFORE 9 A.M. ON CHRISTMAS DAY
(1) Where a shop which is prohibited by section 1 from opening on Christmas Day is located in a loading control area, the occupier of the shop must not load or unload, or permit any other person to load or unload, goods from a vehicle at the shop before 9 a.m. on Christmas Day in connection with the trade or business carried on in the shop, unless the loading or unloading is carried on—

(a) with the consent of the local authority for the area in which the shop is situated, granted in accordance with this section, and

(b) in accordance with any conditions subject to which that consent is granted.

(2) The provisions of paragraphs 3 to 8 of Schedule 3 to the 1994 Act shall apply in relation to consent under subsection (1) as they apply in relation to consent under that Schedule, but as if—

(a) the reference in paragraph 6(1) to Sunday were a reference to Christmas Day, and

(b) the reference in paragraph 7(a) to an offence under paragraph 9 of that Schedule were a reference to an offence under subsection (3).

(3) A person who contravenes subsection (1) is liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding level 3 on the standard scale.
(4) In this section, "loading control area" means any area designated by a local authority as a loading control area in accordance with section 2 of the 1994 Act."
The noble Lord said: In moving Amendment No. 1, I shall speak also to Amendments Nos. 2 to 6 inclusive.
Those who were present during the Second Reading of this Bill may recall that I signalled the Government's intention to table an amendment relating to loading and unloading before nine o'clock at the premises of large shops on Christmas Day. This undertaking was made by the Minister in charge of the Bill in another place and was the result of concurrence between the Bill's sponsor, the Government and the Opposition on the merit of the proposed amendment.
The amendment would simply prohibit loading and unloading before 9 a.m. on Christmas Day in areas designated loading control areas by the local authority. This is for the principal purpose of ensuring that Christmas morning does not become a noisy affair for residents in the locality. Those areas designated as such will be the same as on a Sunday (under Section 2 of the Sunday (Trading) Act 1994).
In the last reading of this Bill my noble friend Lord Davies of Coity expressed some reservation as to the need for such an amendment and it was clear that part of this unease about the proposal was a genuine fear that the Bill might not be successful. On this latter point I am thankful that we have been able to arrive at an agreement with all parties in this House to enable this amendment to be made, while ensuring that the Bill is not endangered through lack of parliamentary time. I think this is a further reflection of the popularity and desirability of the Bill and a shared wish to have it in place for this Christmas.
On the former point, I recall that my noble friend had made some limited inquiries about the extent of the use of the current provision under Section 2 of the Sunday (Trading) Act, the main finding being that a minority of local authorities used this power in practice. The Department of Trade and Industry has also made inquiries about how extensively this provision in the 1994 Act is used, and the research produced some interesting findings. Whereas these inquiries endorsed those of my noble friend Lord Davies of Coity, they also confirmed that all of the respondents believed that inclusion of such a measure in this Bill is a good and sensible idea. There are two points that should be made here which give weight to the argument for the adoption of the proposed amendment and these are as follows.
First, it has been established in both this House and in another place that this Bill is largely pre-emptive in the sense that it puts in place a prohibition which, given the nature of market forces, is necessary to avert what could otherwise he a foregone conclusion—the en masse opening of large shops. Similarly, while it
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may be true that most large shops do not currently load or unload on Christmas Day before nine o'clock (or on Sunday), this does not preclude the possibility of that practice changing.
Secondly, the differences between Sunday and Christmas Day are important to emphasise here for the reason that such a power to prohibit loading and unloading may be more appropriate in the context of Christmas Day than in the context of a Sunday. Whereas Sunday is followed by Monday—an ordinary consumer shopping day—Christmas Day is followed by Boxing Day on which only a minimal observation would reveal the ubiquity of signs advertising sales. It is clear to see that the preparation for the busy sales period starting on Boxing Day would be more extensive than that of preparing for a Monday.
It is for these reasons, and for the reason that this amendment is in the spirit of the Bill's intentions, that I urge the Committee to accept this and the other supporting amendments. I beg to move.
Lord Davies of Coity: My Lords, as my noble friend the Minister has confirmed, at Second Reading I said that I had no objection in principle to this amendment. My concern was that we would have run out of parliamentary time. I am now assured that, with the maximum co-operation, that will not happen.
Since Second Reading I have met with my noble friend Lord Evans, I have had discussions with my noble friend the Government Chief Whip, I have had a brief discussion with the noble Lord, Lord Cope, the Opposition Chief Whip and a very brief discussion with the noble Lord, Lord Roper, Chief Whip of the Liberal Democrats, and I believe that they have been extremely fruitful.
This morning I had a brief word with the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Portsmouth, who certainly supports the Bill, as expressed in his speech at Second Reading. He has no objection to the amendment. Further, I have had a telephone conversation with the right honourable Eric Forth, the Member in the other place who tabled this amendment in the first place. I have been assured by him that although the timetable is very tight, this Bill will not suffer obstruction in the other place and will therefore become law in time for Christmas this year. On that basis, I urge your Lordships to support the amendment.
The Lord Bishop of Worcester: I rise as a member of the Ethical Investment Advisory Group within the Church of England, which has consistently pressed for this Bill, and which has engaged in vigorous dialogue with some shops that have shown a tendency towards opening on Christmas Day. I am very glad for the introduction of this amendment.
I simply add to what the Minister has already said, that Christmas morning has a very particular quality about it, which makes its guarding a matter of some importance to us all. So I join with noble Lords who have already spoken in hoping that the amendment will pass and that the Bill will speedily become law.
Lord Cope of Berkeley: I support the amendment. I just want to build a little on what the Minister said. To my knowledge this is the first time that we have been able to amend a Private Member's Bill from the Commons in this way. The other place has altered its arrangements, and in particular the last day on which it habitually takes Private Members' Bills, to allow this to happen. This is a rare example of the other place altering its procedures for the convenience of your Lordships. That matter is to be welcomed in principle as is the detail of the amendment.
Lord Roper: I rise not to speak on the substance of the amendment, although I believe, irrespective of what one thinks about the substance of the Bill, that these amendments improve it. Although I am told that turkeys do not vote for an early Christmas, I shall certainly not oppose this particular amendment.
Like the noble Lord, Lord Cope, I wanted to refer to the fact that we have, following the principle of comity between the Houses, been able to reach an agreement whereby it is possible for this House to consider amendments to Private Members' Bills at a late stage. This is a way in which we can ensure that this sort of legislation is improved, or at least made as good as it can be by discussion in this House as well, and that this in itself does not kill Bills and prevent them becoming law. That is a very important step forward in the legislative process. I am pleased that this is one of the first occasions when we have been able to take advantage of these new provisions.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 2 [Enforcement]:
Lord Evans of Temple Guiting Lord Evans of Temple Guiting moved Amendments Nos. 2 to 4:
Page 1, line 24, leave out "section 1" and insert "sections 1 and (Prohibition of loading and unloading at large shops before 9 a.m. on Christmas Day)"
Page 2, line 10, leave out "section 1" and insert "sections 1 and (Prohibition of loading and unloading at large shops before 9 a.m. on Christmas Day)"
Page 2, line 13, leave out "offence under section 1" and insert "offences under sections 1 and (Prohibition of loading and unloading at large shops before 9 a.m. on Christmas Day)"
On Question, amendments agreed to.
Clause 2, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 3 [Consequential amendments]:
Lord Evans of Temple Guiting Lord Evans of Temple Guiting moved Amendment No. 5:
Leave out Clause 3 and insert the following new Clause—

CONSEQUENTIAL AMENDMENTS
(1) The 1994 Act is amended as follows.
(2) In Schedule 1 (restrictions on Sunday opening of large shops)—

(a) in sub-paragraph (4) of paragraph 2, omit "or Christmas Day", and

(b) after that sub-paragraph insert—

"(5) Nothing in this paragraph applies where the Sunday is Christmas Day (the opening of large shops on Christmas Day being prohibited by section 1 of the Christmas Day (Trading) Act 2004).".
(3) In Schedule 3 (loading and unloading at large shops on Sunday morning), after paragraph 9 insert—

Christmas Day
10 Paragraph 2 does not apply where the Sunday is Christmas Day (loading and unloading at large shops on Christmas Day being regulated by section (Prohibition of loading and unloading at large shops before 9 a.m. on Christmas Day) of the Christmas Day (Trading) Act 2004).""
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 3, as amended, agreed to.
Clauses 4 and 5 agreed to.
In the Title:
Lord Evans of Temple Guiting Lord Evans of Temple Guiting moved Amendment No. 6:
At end insert "and to restrict the loading or unloading of goods at such shops on Christmas Day"
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Title, as amended, agreed to.
House resumed: Bill reported with amendments.
House adjourned at a quarter past ten o'clock.

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  Standards Board for England: Annual Report and Accounts 2003–04
  The Minister of State, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (Lord Rooker)
  My honourable friend the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State has made the following Written Ministerial Statement.

  The Standards Board for England's annual report and accounts for 2003–04 have been placed in the Library of the House together with an annual review of the board's activities during the year.

  The report and accounts cover the second year of significant operations by the Standards Board for England. During the year ended 31 March 2004, 3,566 allegations of misconduct had been referred to the Standards Board, an increase of about 20 per cent compared with the previous year.

  The annual report highlights that the board is continuing to work in partnership with local government to promote and sustain the high standards of conduct, which are essential to public confidence in our local democracy.

  Mental Health Bill: Pre-legislative Scrutiny
  The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health (Lord Warner)
  My honourable friend the Minister of State, Department of Health has made the following Written Ministerial Statement today.

  The Government have today published a Mental Health Bill. This Bill will be subject to pre-legislative scrutiny. A joint scrutiny committee has been established and has been asked to present its report by the end of March 2005.

  Mental health legislation sets out the circumstances in which a person can be treated for mental disorder without their consent and the safeguards they are entitled to. The vast majority of people with mental health problems do not need to be treated against their wishes but occasionally this is necessary, normally to protect themselves, but more occasionally to protect others.

  It has long been recognised that the current mental health legislation, the Mental Health Act 1983, needs to be updated in line with the development of services
  WS 90
  and of human rights law to give a greater focus on patients' needs and wishes. In 1998, the Government set up an expert committee to advise on how mental health legislation should be shaped to reflect contemporary patterns of care and treatment and to support government policy. In 2002, following a Green and a White Paper, a draft Bill was published for consultation.

  Since then, the comments received on the 2002 draft have been considered in full and, following further work and meetings with stakeholders, a revised Bill has been produced. We have made changes to address the concerns expressed by stakeholders. The Bill brings the framework for the compulsory treatment of people with serious mental health disorders up to date.

  This Bill needs to be considered in the context of the wider government strategy to improve mental health services. In 1998, the National Service Framework for Mental Health set out national standards for the care and treatment of adults with mental disorder. The NHS Plan announced, in 2000, substantial additional investment for mental health services. As a result of the national service framework and the additional investment, significant improvements have been made in mental health services. This is particularly the case in relation to community-based services, such as crisis resolution and assertive outreach teams. It is important that mental health legislation is now modernised.

  The Bill will provide important benefits. The Bill means that the small minority of people with mental health problems who need to be treated against their wishes, normally for their protection but occasionally to protect the public, will get the right treatment at the right time. This meets the needs of the individual patient and makes sure that the public are protected.

  The Bill ensures there is no compulsion without the provision of appropriate treatment. Safeguards for patients will be greatly strengthened with a choice of representative, access to advocacy and all use of compulsory treatment beyond 28 days having to be authorised by the new independent mental health tribunal or the courts. Under the Bill, patients who are ill and vulnerable will be able to get the treatment they need in the community, including non-dangerous mentally disordered offenders who may otherwise receive a prison sentence.

  Legislation about compulsory treatment inevitably raises many difficult issues. There has already been much discussion about this proposed new legislation. Pre-legislative scrutiny will now allow further considered debate. We look forward to receiving the report of the scrutiny committee.

  Copies of the Bill and of the Explanatory Notes have been placed in the Library.