Westminster Hall Sitting of 19 May 2004

Preamble
[MR. FRANK COOK in the Chair]

Sessional Orders
Motion made, and Question proposed, That the sitting be now adjourned.—[Derek Twigg.]
9.30 am
Sir George Young: Mr. Deputy Speaker, let me begin by thanking Mr. Speaker for selecting for debate this morning the subject of the Government's response to the Procedure Committee's report on Sessional Orders and resolutions. As of now, there is no response, despite the fact that it is six months to the day since the Procedure Committee published its report, on November 19. The Government have agreed to reply to Select Committee reports within two months of publication, and a longer delay of up to six months may be permitted with the acquiescence of the Committee concerned. There has been no such acquiescence in this case—on the contrary, the Chairman of that Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield (Sir Nicholas Winterton), whom I am delighted to see here today, myself and others have insistently and courteously prodded the Government for action during those six months, so far without result. I hope to flush the Government out during the course of this debate, and I am delighted to see the Deputy Leader of the House in his place. I understand that a reply may be published imminently. If it is, I propose to take some credit for that—
The Deputy Leader of the House of Commons (Mr. Phil Woolas): I intend to give the right hon. Gentleman some.
Sir George Young: I am delighted to hear that some credit is on its way, and I am sure that adequate time will be allowed for the ministerial response to this debate so that no short cuts can be taken with that tribute.
When my hon. Friend the Member for North-East Hertfordshire (Mr. Heald), the shadow Leader of the House, asked about a response on 6 May, no hint of any forthcoming response was given. The announcement on 12 May that this debate was to take place might have acted as something as a catalyst.
Although it is six months since the Procedure Committee reported, it is nearly three years since the problem in Parliament square, which the Committee investigated, manifested itself. That problem is, in the words of the Select Committee:
"the appearance of long-standing and visually unattractive demonstrations and the disruption of work in Members' and staff offices by noise from loudhailers used by demonstrators."
What I am after this morning is a balanced solution: a solution that respects an individual's right to protest—we are basically talking about one individual protesting—but also respects the rights of everyone else to appreciate and enjoy one of the most historic sites in the world, the rights of those who work in the vicinity to
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do so without constant disruption and harassment, and the rights of all who work in or visit the Palace not to have our security compromised. I will return to those three issues in a moment. One of my constituents has summarised the issue in two sentences:
"Parliament requires me to apply for planning permission for a satellite dish, which no one else can see. Yet Parliament ignores this desecration of a World Heritage site on its doorstep."
Nearly three years ago, in June 2001, Mr. Brian Haw, now 55, erected the familiar structures opposite the gates in New Palace Yard. He began by camping on the grass in Parliament square, but was moved on by the Greater London authority, which manages it. He has camped outside ever since, sleeping on the pavement under a plastic sheet, accompanied by an unsightly accumulation of placards, flags and hoardings, and assaulting the eardrums of anyone within range—audible graffiti on the walls of Parliament publicising his mini-shantytown. This is not a conventional demonstration of the type that we know, accept and sometimes enjoy, but an unacceptable visual and audible intrusion that risks becoming permanent. We can all make the distinction between a one-off demonstration that is here for a day and is targeted and disciplined—like those of the Countryside Alliance—and a permanent encampment with constant high-volume slogans and abuse. Mr. Haw is entitled to protest in the same way as anyone else, and in a free country there are many opportunities to do so. What is taking place is the exploitation of a legal loophole that a Select Committee has recommended should be closed, and on which the Government have so far failed to act.
The legal position is complex, but is well set out in the report. The pavement immediately opposite Carriage Gates is the responsibility of Westminster city council. The grass in the middle belongs to the Queen and is looked after by the GLA, whose policy it is not to allow demonstrations there. Mr. Haw is, as I have said, primarily on the pavement, not the grass. The Highways Act 1980 provides that the wilful obstruction of the highway without lawful authority or excuse constitutes a criminal offence and empowers the council to seek an injunction to prevent highway obstruction. When Westminster city council sought an injunction in October 2002 in the High Court to restrain Mr. Haw from obstructing the pavement, the Court found that a wilful obstruction of the highway was established; however, Mr. Justice Gray refused the injunction, referring to the European convention on human rights and freedom of expression and the fact that the pavement was lightly used. The Court concluded that the obstruction caused is not unreasonable—a decision with which I disagree.
The patience of many of us began to fray and in June 2003, the hon. Member for North-East Derbyshire (Mr. Barnes), a mild and tolerant man if ever there was one, tabled an early-day motion saying that the protest constituted harassment, with MPs and Commons staff having to put up with
"an unacceptable degree of loud hailer noise and sloganising."
Sir John Butterfill: My staff and I and many other Members occupy offices in No. 1 Parliament street. On many occasions, the noise that is generated makes it impossible for us to continue our work. On a number of occasions when I have been

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studying complex papers, I have been forced to abandon my office and come over to the Library in order to get the peace and quiet necessary to do the work that is essential to my job as a Member of Parliament. Members of my staff, and other Members and their staff, have been equally compromised.
Sir George Young: I am grateful to my hon. Friend, who occupies No. 1 Parliament street and is much closer to the noise than I am in Portcullis House. I take very seriously the difficulties that he and his staff have encountered.
In July last year, the Procedure Committee carried out its inquiry. It addressed sensitively the issue of Parliament square and produced a balanced and unanimous report. Its Chairman, my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield, is in his place, but may have to attend a sitting of the Modernisation Committee shortly. The Procedure Committee heard not only from those who supported the protest, but from the Serjeant at Arms, the Clerk of the House, and the Metropolitan police. I quote the key sentence of the report, in paragraph 22:
"We therefore recommend that the Government should introduce appropriate legislation to prohibit long-term demonstrations and to ensure that the laws about access are adequate and enforceable."
On the related issue of noise, the Committee recommended that the Government should consider legislation if existing legislation was inadequate. I believe that the past six months have shown that it is. It is those recommendations that I seek to promote in this morning's debate.
Of course the Committee gave weight to the right to protest. It heard evidence from the hon. Member for Islington, North (Jeremy Corbyn). It knew of the judgment in the Westminster city council case, which referred to the European convention on human rights, but the Committee's view, with which I strongly concur, was that such factors did not and could not justify what is happening in Parliament square. One Labour Member sitting on the Committee referred in the oral evidence to
"an incredibly unsightly display of what can only be described as rags and flags along the pavement outside Parliament Square."
The Archdeacon of Westminster protested about what is happening, referring to a "refined form of squalor" that
"defaces the symbolic heart of our capital".
Even the Mayor of London—no stranger to demonstrations—stated that his
"vision for the Square states that Parliament should be a symbolic and dignified place at the heart of government. Rallies and demonstrations on the square are not therefore considered appropriate due to the disruption that they will cause to both Parliament and to surrounding traffic systems."
What a paradox that a demonstration that even Ken Livingstone finds inappropriate should be tolerated by Parliament.
We know that Mr. Speaker shares the concern. The Procedure Committee report states:
"Mr Speaker has for some time been concerned about the use of Parliament Square for unsightly and occasionally disruptive demonstrations."
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Giving evidence, the Serjeant at Arms said that the demonstration:
"causes me great concern on security grounds".
He added that it
"could provide cover for someone more malicious than Mr Haw."
In her evidence to the Committee, the Minister for Crime Reduction, Policing and Community Safety said:
"I can see that perhaps there is a gap in the law that needs to be filled".
She went on to say:
"Our view is that if we need to legislate then that is what we will do … So if there is a case for clarifying our law and perhaps some new powers as well, then certainly we would not be reluctant to take that forward".
Finally, she said:
"I think the particular issue raised by the Commissioner around noise is something which is increasingly becoming a difficulty for us because it can veer from something which is a legitimate noise and protest—a chant of some kind—into something which is absolutely intolerable and does interfere with the running of the House."
Sir Nicholas Winterton: My right hon. Friend does House a great service in securing this debate. I refer to recommendation No. 6 in the Procedure Committee's report, in which we say:
"We believe that legislation on demonstrations is the only way to ensure that the police have adequate powers to achieve the result intended by the Sessional Order. Without such legislation, the Sessional Order is misleading; with such legislation, it would be unnecessary."
Having briefly studied the Government's response, which I picked up from the board only today, I found that they agree with the Committee's recommendation; unfortunately, the Government do not indicate that they will take any action to put the matter right. Does my right hon. Friend not accept that with the Speaker, the Clerk of the House, the Serjeant at Arms and the Metropolitan Police Commissioner all agreeing that action needs to be taken, the Government's decision is unfortunate?
Sir George Young: I am grateful to my hon. Friend, who has had sight of a document that I have not seen. If he is right, I see a whole new series of business questions looming until we get some final action from the Government. If that is the Government's response, I find it deeply disappointing.
I have briefly summarised the key findings of the report and I wish to return to the three issues that I mentioned at the beginning: noise, security and visual intrusion. On noise, I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Bournemouth, West (Sir John Butterfill) for his intervention.The Birmingham Post, which has on the whole been moderately sympathetic to Mr. Haw, put it well on 22 November last year:
"To understand, one needs to imagine a man with a very loud megaphone standing outside an office, shouting the same slogan at those inside repeatedly. For hours at a time. Every day. Week after week, month, after month."
My office is located on the other side of Portcullis House, so I do not hear Mr. Haw, but those with offices facing on to New Palace Yard and within Parliament do. Members and staff find the noise distracting: it makes meetings difficult and it interferes with the work of the

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House. I agree with those who say that it constitutes harassment. The Press Gallery is particularly affected by the noise.
If one's neighbour behaved in that way at home, I am sure that there would be grounds for legal action, but as the Minister for Crime Reduction, Policing and Community Safety appeared to concede, a loophole apparently permits it in the centre of London. The police told the Committee:
"There is not specific legislation which refers to loudhailers."
Since the report was published, the Serjeant at Arms has followed up the noise issue diligently with the Metropolitan Police Commissioner He has referred to the problem,
"which on a nightly basis provides a nuisance which distracts Members, disturbs meetings and affects, by its volume and frequency, the processes of Parliament."
The police, however, appear powerless to stop the nuisance. I hope that the Minister will agree when he replies that the noise is an unacceptable intrusion, and that steps will be taken to stop it.
On security, I referred to the concerns of the Serjeant at Arms and the evidence that he gave. The flags and the placards are right opposite the gates into New Palace Yard. Anyone could hide behind that cover and pick us off as we arrive at or leave the House. Those on a bicycle are especially vulnerable—particularly perhaps after giving this speech. The security services have to search the site three times a day, but arguably that is not enough. Given the security precautions being taken inside and outside the House, it seems absurd to leave that potential cover intact.
There is also visual intrusion. We are talking about one of the most historic sites in the world. We have the House of Parliament, Westminster Abbey, Whitehall, Parliament square, the Churchill statue and the Guildhall, but the eye and the ear of the visitor is drawn away from those attractions towards the unsightly cacophony in the middle. We simply do not have the balance right. No other democracy would tolerate this shantytown in the middle of the capital for three years. There is no history of protest at that location—unlike at Hyde Park Corner. There is a loophole in the law. An abuse that has gone on too long risks becoming established and durable.
Mr. Haw is well advised by Messrs. Bindmans, and the police had to return all his props after they removed them. I see from a press cutting from 15 May that by the end of Monday last week,
"Brian was back, and so were his placards and loud hailer (which he had by now turned up to maximum)."
If we need legislation to sort the matter out, so be it. The organisation Liberty asserts:
"If this legislation is passed, it could potentially endanger the rights of every single person in this country."
That is an absurd exaggeration. A Liberal Democrat MP has proposed "constant watering" to make demonstration impossible, but I do not think that that is the best solution.
In the period that has elapsed since publication of the report, I and other hon. Members have asked the Government courteously about progress. I have to say, however, that I feel that we have been strung along by the Leader of the House. It is worth spending a few
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minutes explaining the steps that have been taken, which show why my patience eventually ran out and I applied for this debate when, to be frank, I would rather be debating other matters.
The report was published on 19 November. On 26 November, the first of many requests for progress on it was made. In his statement at the beginning of the Session, Mr. Speaker said of the report:
"I hope that it will receive the attention that it deserves, and that the House will be given the opportunity to take a decision on the Committee's recommendations."—[Official Report, 26 November 2003; Vol. 415, c. 1.]
On 27 November, my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield and I raised the matter at business questions. I was told that the matter
"needs to be resolved sooner rather than later."—[Official Report, 27 November 2003; Vol. 415, c. 134.]
I tried again on 18 December, asking the Leader of the House
"How late can 'soon' be, before 'sooner' becomes 'later'?"
He replied:
"I shall seek to address the matter as soon as I can."—[Official Report, 18 December 2003; Vol. 415, c. 1738.]
On 8 January, I had another go. I was told:
"The matter needs to be addressed and we are considering it. We will seek to address it as soon as possible in the way that he describes."—[Official Report, 8 January 2004; Vol. 416, c. 409.]
On 29 January, my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield had another go at business questions. He was told:
"We will try to have a debate and bring a resolution of the matter to the House as soon as we can."—[Official Report, 29 January 2004; Vol. 417, c. 396.]
On 11 March, my hon. Friend tried again, saying that there was little point in producing such reports unless they were reported. He was told:
"I hope to be able to give the hon. Gentleman some welcome news in the not-too-distant future."—[Official Report, 11 March 2004; Vol. 418, c. 1664.]
Our hopes rose briefly when we received that response, so on 25 March, I tried again, referring to the unsightly cacophony in Parliament square and asking what was going on. The Leader of the House referred to Mr. Speaker's interest in the matter and said:
"The position remains that we will have a debate and a decision as soon as I am able to arrange it."—[Official Report, 25 March 2004; Vol. 419, c. 1065.]
On 29 April, I had another go. I was told that the Leader of the House was "on the case" and
"We will see how it goes and I hope to report back to the right hon. Gentleman when I can."—[Official Report, 29 April 2004; Vol. 420, c. 1009.]
Finally, on 6 May, the shadow Leader of the House, my hon. Friend the Member for North-East Hertfordshire, asked for action and a timetable. He received the rather brusque response:
"I have already made it clear that we will respond when we are ready to respond, and in a sensible fashion."—[Official Report, 6 May 2004; Vol. 420, c. 1494.]
I hope that the Deputy Leader of the House understands that, given the prevarication and lack of any progress, I have sought to escalate the matter by

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having this debate. There has been an inexcusable paralysis, which I hope he will say is shortly to be resolved.
9.48 am
Sir Nicholas Winterton: I did not intend to speak, but I have been present since the beginning of the debate and I should like to thank the Leader of the House for now producing a Government response. In his covering letter to me, to which I think I am entitled to refer even though the response has yet to be reported to my Committee, the right hon. Gentleman says:
"I am pleased to enclose a copy of the Government's response to your Committee's Third Report of Session 2002–3 Sessional Orders and Resolutions".
As my right hon. Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire (Sir George Young) said, we and others, including the shadow Leader of the House, have time and again requested the Government's response at business questions on the Floor of the House. The Leader of the House writes:
"Once again, please accept my apologies for not responding to the report before now. As I have said during Business Questions, I must emphasise that no discourtesy is intended to your Committee. Nor is the delay an indication that the matter has not been given very careful consideration at the highest level."
It is appropriate to say in today's debate that we are grateful to the Leader of the House for the response, however belated, and that we are reassured that the matter has been considered at the highest level of Government.
The matter is of great importance to Members of the House, and I am pleased that a member of my Committee, the hon. Member for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine (Sir Robert Smith), is in his place. My hon. Friend the Member for Bournemouth, West (Sir John Butterfill), who occupies an office in No. 1 Parliament street, intervened a minute ago to say that his work is frequently interrupted by unacceptable levels of noise. Staff undertaking important work on behalf of their Members of Parliament are similarly inconvenienced. Surely that is not right.
Mr. Speaker has expressed deep concern about the current situation. The Serjeant at Arms, who is responsible for security and other matters in the House, the Clerk of the House and the Metropolitan Police Commissioner all support that concern and have urged that action be taken. On behalf of many Members and staff of the House and, in particular, on behalf of my Committee, I must say that although we are pleased to have got the response—I do not intend to go into its detail on this occasion for obvious reasons—and although the Government apparently accept and agree with every recommendation in our report, it is disappointing that there is no specific indication of action on the new legislation that is necessary to curb what is happening.
My right hon. Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire has done a great service to the House, and it is no coincidence that we have received the Government's response on the very day of his debate in Westminster Hall. However, I hope that in advance of
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any debate on the Floor of the House and bearing in mind what has been said today, the Government will understand that tubers, staff of the House and those who serve the House, such as the Serjeant at Arms and the police, believe that legislation is necessary. However, although I have read the Government's response only briefly, I cannot see any specific commitment to introduce legislation to remove the abuses to which my right hon. Friend has referred. That is the one unsatisfactory aspect of the response. I put that marker down.
The Minister knows that I might have to leave early, although I am tempted to stay throughout the debate. However, I am a member of the Modernisation Committee, which is chaired by the Leader of the House—to whom the Minister is responsible—and that Committee is meeting in the Palace of Westminster. As such, I should be there, but as Chairman of the Procedure Committee, it was appropriate to spend some time here to highlight my Committee's concerns.
The hon. Member for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine may take a slightly different view from me—I am happy that he can do so—but I hope that he will assure the House that ours was a unanimous report and we believe that legislation is necessary.
Sir John Butterfill: Although my hon. Friend says that legislation is necessary, it seems to me that some existing legislation has not been adequately enforced. Some of the wording on the placards is racist—it is certainly anti-Semitic: one of the placards equates Judaism with Nazism. The wording of the anti-American propaganda is so strong that I understand the police were forced to restrain some American tourists from attacking the gentlemen concerned and tearing down the placards. They only narrowly prevented a serious breach of the peace. There is existing legislation that might be used, even before the Government bring in new legislation.
Sir Nicholas Winterton: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention. He has gone into rather greater detail about what is happening on Parliament square than I have done. It was not my intention to do so. However, I entirely endorse his view: some of the placards are provocative and could be considered racist. They have caused a number of people severe offence. I have not referred to the fact that Parliament square is extremely important from the heritage point of view. To an extent, my hon. Friend's intervention indirectly relates to that. The demonstration is an abuse of an important part of London.
I was talking about the hon. Member for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine who is a member of the Procedure Committee and makes a major and positive contribution to all its work. I suspect that he will refer, as did my right hon. Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire, to the important ability of citizens of our country to demonstrate and to express their political views and concerns. I was grateful to my right hon. Friend for saying that the report that the Procedure Committee produced last November was worded sensitively.
The Committee greatly appreciates the importance of people in this country being able to express their views to Parliament by way of well managed and responsible

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demonstrations. In a way, there is no better way to do that than in the close proximity of Parliament, so that Members who are coming and going can witness the concerns that are felt by certain groups and individuals. However, the demonstrating should be carried out responsibly: it should not cause offence, inconvenience or nuisance to people who work in Parliament and the surrounding areas, nor should it affect the traffic in our capital city. We took evidence from a range of views, including from the hon. Member for Islington, North (Jeremy Corbyn). Even he, if my memory serves me correctly, appreciated that demonstrations should be responsible and should not create inconvenience and nuisance. I await with interest the views that may well be expressed by the hon. Member for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine. I hope that he will add his voice to the Committee's expressions of concern.
I should like to express my gratitude on behalf of the Committee to all those who came and gave evidence. They included the Sergeant at Arms, the Clerks, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner and one of his colleagues, and Members of this House, who all had a variety of views. In particular, we were grateful to the Minister for Crime Reduction, Policing and Community Safety, who gave valuable evidence, some of which was quoted by my right hon. Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire. She accepted that legislation would be required to put right what is happening, but that it should not prevent people from legitimately demonstrating and expressing their views to Parliament. Through the Deputy Leader of the House, I thank the hon. Lady for her evidence.
My final words are for the Leader of the House. Although I accept that the Government will review whether existing law, to which my hon. Friend the Member for Bournemouth, West referred, is being used fully to control the situation on Parliament square, I am concerned that the review has not taken place in the six months that have elapsed between the publication of the report and the Government's response. There has been adequate time to conduct such a review. However, I do not want to be ungracious, so on behalf of the Committee I thank the Leader of the House and the Government for their response. I hope that the review of existing law and of what new legislation needs to be introduced will be dealt with urgently, and that it will have been completed by the time that the Government find time—hopefully in the near future—for a debate on the matter in the main Chamber.
10.2 am
Sir Robert Smith: I congratulate the right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire (Sir George Young) on securing this debate. He may have wanted to raise many other issues, but by bringing this up he has finally prompted a response from the Government. Only last week we were debating the Procedure Committee report on estimates. On that day I was bemoaning the lack of response to two other reports, but as I spoke a letter was arriving from the Leader of the House in response to the report on debates. The Procedure Committee meets this
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afternoon. No doubt we will have a chance to consider the Government's response on this issue, so we cannot debate it now.
Sir Nicholas Winterton: As the hon. Gentleman knows, this afternoon the Procedure Committee is hearing evidence from the Leader of the House and the Minister who is responding to this debate on another important inquiry that we are undertaking into programming. We shall have an opportunity for the odd comment to the Leader of the House about the content of this debate.
Sir Robert Smith: I thank the Chairman of the Committee for highlighting that prospect. We do not always give away our questions to witnesses before they appear before us, but I am sure that they could have guessed that there was a chance that that topic might come up.
The right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire set out much of the history and the problems confronting the House and the Government in trying to deal with what is before us. This debate is on the Government's response to the whole report, but the rest of the report is uncontroversial and was prompted by the fact that hon. Members feel increasingly disconnected from the arcane words used to open our Sessions of Parliament. The Sessional Orders were becoming a bit of an embarrassment to the House and we were trying to find a way of improving them. In considering that, we looked at the substance of the more important aspects surrounding access to the House and the demonstration on the pavement of Parliament square. Many people felt that when the Speaker "commanded" the Metropolitan Police to do this, that and the other on our behalf, those words had force, but it turns out that although the police are happy to acknowledge that requirement, they do not feel that they have the powers to implement it. Therefore, in paragraph 24 of our report we point out that it may be necessary to consider the law in terms of maintaining access to this Parliament at a time of major demonstrations when there is difficulty getting Members in and out to vote, take part in debates and keep democracy functioning.
Until 1986, none of that would have been an issue, as the Tumultuous Petitioning Act 1661 prevented anyone from getting near the precinct of Westminster. That Act was repealed with the recognition in more modern times that people should be able to get closer to those who had been elected to represent them. In that context, another member of the Select Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Torridge and West Devon (Mr. Burnett), made an important point. When he joined the Marines, his father said to him, "You have not joined to shoot people but to be shot at." My hon. Friend pointed out that those who are elected to Parliament must accept that messages will be brought to them by people who are unhappy about they way in which Members carry out their functions, and that demonstrations are part and parcel of the life of an MP. It is slightly different for the people who work for us in our offices and for the people who work to make the House function. They are in a less public position and are probably more entitled to convenience in their life than are Members. Members have to develop a thick skin and accept the disruption that comes with demonstrations.

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As the right hon. Gentleman said in opening the debate, there is no history of a right to demonstrate. In fact, there is a history of not being allowed to demonstrate. The pavement has become a legal loophole, but that did not begin with the current occupant. A pig lived there for some time at the height of the crash in the pig farming industry. I suppose that the security situation was not quite the same then. The pig endeared itself to many people, and there was a great deal of enthusiasm for it for a time.
Mrs. Angela Browning: For the record, the pig was changed frequently. It was not always the same pig.
Sir Robert Smith: It might have been a different pig, but it was the same pigsty.
It is important to be flexible in allowing people to bring messages to Parliament. A pragmatic approach has evolved across from Downing street. People get their message to the Prime Minister but no one is able to monopolise that part of the pavement. People who are concerned about protecting the right to demonstrate must recognise that it is not right for one person to monopolise demonstration. That must be an important part of the Government's consideration of how the law operates, because one person taking a site excludes others from using it and bringing their message to Parliament. Demonstrations cannot be of a permanent nature.
As the Chairman said, the Select Committee made a unanimous recommendation. Like all Select Committee reports, this one is carefully worded. It refers to "appropriate legislation". The Government must come to grips with that and not produce sledgehammer legislation that would make any means of demonstration throughout the country impossible because of the way in which the legislation might be interpreted, but finesse a solution to the permanent demonstration on our doorstep that prevents other people from demonstrating and voicing other concerns.
The second half of the recommendation found at paragraph 22 is about noise and nuisance. Everyone seems to accept that existing legislation does not provide a means of preventing noise intrusion. It is debilitating to the people who work in the offices constantly to be harangued with the monotonous, regular tones of the same message again and again. I wonder whether bylaws to be introduced in London might apply to this situation. Unfortunately, that new noise control legislation, which will include a power to confiscate noisy equipment if it causes a nuisance, will probably apply to residences only, but it is an interesting solution that could be worth exploring. There could well be a problem in that this case involves a pavement and not someone's residence, and much of the legislation has not been drafted in a way that would affect the behaviour of someone who is, in effect, in permanent residence. It is, therefore, important to control the noise of such an intrusion in the area.
I repeat that, if a demonstration is going to get its voice across, it will often contain an element of noise. That reflects the enthusiasm of the demonstrators to
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make their point and to be heard, although my own experience in Aberdeen many years ago, at the height of the financial cuts facing the university, was that one of the most powerful demonstrations organised by the university was a silent march through the city. That seemed to have far more impact, and we noticed far more people on the pavement turning and looking. Noise can be a barrier to the message and drive people into switching off and turning away. Noise is not necessarily a benefit to a demonstration but it would be somewhat draconian to say that no noise can be produced by demonstrations.
Sir Nicholas Winterton: It would be wrong if our concentration were focused on Mr. Haw only. It is fair to say that there have been other demonstrators with other causes. Only last night, there was a group of Palestinians outside, again using loudhailers. I accept that they have a just cause that they seek to bring to the attention of the United Kingdom Parliament.
So, the issue is not just Mr. Haw, but I think that the hon. Gentleman is making a very good point. We need to consider the issue sensitively. Legislation is necessary but it must be appropriate to the use of the area and how long it can be used for one form of demonstration. The Government must also deal with the noise nuisance, using either new or existing legislation.
Sir Robert Smith: One other thought that we explored partly was whether, in any way, the simple solution of transferring ownership of the pavement back to the Queen would solve the problem overnight. Obviously, the jurisdiction and legislation that would then apply would be that of the Greater London authority. If the pavement is not being used, can the council decide that it wants to close it? There are longer-term plans for the whole of Parliament square, but I do not think that we can wait for it to be rebuilt to tackle the concerns.
In conclusion, the Government's response means that, when we come to the next Sessional Orders, we have something for the Speaker to say to the House that is more focused and appropriate to the times that we live in and that can achieve the goals that the House wishes to see achieved when those Sessional Orders are made. I urge the Government to consider the matter carefully. They have had six months to consider the recommendations and I urge them to enlighten the House on how they plan to tackle the concern. That concern has reached a point where people expect a solution.
10.13 am
Mrs. Angela Browning: I am standing in for the shadow Leader of the House, my hon. Friend the Member for North-East Hertfordshire (Mr. Heald). I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire (Sir George Young) on bringing the subject to the attention of the Chamber and on his persistence during the past six months in seeking an answer from the Government to the important report of the Procedure Committee.
Although there are few of us in the Chamber, I think that it has been a high-quality debate and I will try not to detract from that. Those who have spoken all have a clear knowledge of the report. My hon. Friend the

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Member for Macclesfield (Sir Nicholas Winterton) is the Chairman of the Procedure Committee, and the hon. Member for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine (Sir Robert Smith) a member, but the situation that we have been discussing concerns many Members of the House, including laypersons such as I, and a formidable array of people have been involved in seeking a solution.
I find it extraordinary that it has taken the Government so long to give their response, although we are delighted to hear that it is now available to the Procedure Committee. When there has been time to consider what the Government propose to do—I hope that it includes introducing the necessary legislation—I trust that it will be discussed by the whole House, as many hon. Members will want to contribute to the debate. We should take my right hon. Friend's opening words as a steer. He is seeking a balanced solution, because we all recognise the freedoms that democracy brings us. More than anywhere else in the country, people are entitled to come to the House of Commons, where their Members of Parliament are working, and the heart of our democracy, to make their views known. However, the encampment on the pavement opposite the House causes great problems.
My right hon. Friend divided the problems into three categories: noise, security and visual intrusion. In respect of visual intrusion, the encampment is a sad and shabby sight in a place where many tourists come expecting to see London at its best. On security, I had not realised that it was necessary, even now, for regular security checks of that site to be made. The fact that those checks are carried out must indicate that the security services believe that it presents a risk, although I do not know how it is evaluated. Given the other matters that we discuss in the House and the measures that we are taking to try to make the building as secure as possible, the fact that the site is just across the road from us should ensure that it is taken very seriously indeed.
We are all familiar with the noise. Anyone arriving on foot through the barrier at Carriage Gates has sympathy with the police officers on duty there, because they get the full blast of the noise. I do not know whether the people who use the megaphone realise it, or, if they do, whether they care, but even from Carriage Gates, you cannot hear what they are saying or what their message may be. It is disturbing that people who are on duty at the gates for several hours have to put up with that deafening noise. As other hon. Members have made clear, it is not something that would be tolerated in any other circumstances. On behalf of the Conservative Opposition, and especially of my hon. Friend the shadow Leader of the House, let me say that we support my right hon. Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire in urging that a balanced solution be found, and that the three categories he mentioned—noise, security and visual intrusion—be addressed.
The hon. Member for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine mentioned a demonstration that he went on years ago. All hon. Members have probably been on demonstrations at one time or another, but I must have led a very sheltered life, because I did not go on a demonstration when I was younger. However, I have
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been on several in middle age, and I have taken to it like a duck to water. I feel I am catching up on part of my youth.
Sir Nicholas Winterton: I intervene to give an example, which I have already given to the Procedure Committee, of a demonstration in which I participated. Members of all political parties, trade unionists from the textile industry and I all took part in more than one very large demonstration. We assembled in Hyde park and came as close to Parliament as we were allowed to in those days, which was the Tate gallery. Today, things are very different. Through my hon. Friend, I say to the Minister that, in those days, no one took exception to the fact that we could not come right into Parliament square. The demonstration was impressive: it was ordered and responsible. Perhaps we should consider going back to those good old traditional standards.
Mrs. Browning: Since then, the House has passed legislation covering the control of marches through the capital, the rules on how they are conducted and what the police allow. They are now much more controlled and I hope that everyone believes that the balance is correct in that people have the right to march and demonstrate in the capital but must do so within certain parameters. Those of us who have taken part—I am pleased to say that I have—know that we can make our point known. People have the opportunity to speak, to gather and to get their point across without, causing the sort of noise abuse that is occurring at Carriage Gates.
I urge the Minister, when he responds to this debate, to give us not only a flavour of the Government's response to an important Committee report, but an indication of the sort of timetable to which the Government are working—a point on which he has been pressed before. Simply to put the response into the public domain without following it through will cause even more business questions on the subject to be asked in the main Chamber.
10.21 am
The Deputy Leader of the House of Commons (Mr. Phil Woolas): I thank right hon. and hon. Members for contributing to this debate. I appreciate in particular the presence of the hon. Member for Macclesfield (Sir Nicholas Winterton), Chairman of the Procedure Committee and I am aware of the time pressures that he is under this morning. I shall change the order of my speaking notes to give him the meat that he is looking for before discussing the details.
I shall start with a few personal comments, as one who has been on more demonstrations than a Rank Xerox salesman. On many occasions, I demonstrated to lobby the hon. Gentleman about student issues and other matters. He was right to say that, until 1986, bearing a placard was not allowed within a mile of the precinct of the Palace of Westminster on this side of the river. On the other side, one could come as far as County hall or Westminster bridge, but anyone who attempted to take their protest or demonstration further was told by the police superintendent that they would be charged with treason. The Public Order Act 1986 changed that and gave more discretion to police commanders to ensure public order. That was the response to what was seen as unacceptable behaviour by some protestors when some of the anarchist groups caused a problem.

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The Government agree with the sentiment that the hon. Gentleman and others have expressed that protest and demonstration, which everyone accepts is a basic and important right in our democracy, should take place reasonably. When I was stopped from crossing Westminster bridge, I came and had a cup of tea and talked about the points that I wanted to raise. I remember being very disappointed by the response, but I was pleased that I had been able to put my point of view. That was important. What is happening across the road is of a different order. It is not a protest to get a message across to Parliament. It is something else entirely.
I am grateful to the right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire (Sir George Young) for introducing this debate. It is a normal courtesy to congratulate the hon. Member who secures a debate, and it would be churlish and wrong if I did not say that his securing this debate has had an effect on the Government in terms of obtaining the long-awaited response to the report and getting it on the record. I am grateful that the right hon. Gentleman has helped us to achieve that. In his letter to the Chairman of the Committee, the Leader of the House of Commons stated:
"I must emphasise that no discourtesy is intended to your Committee. Nor is the delay an indication that the matter is not been given careful consideration at the highest level."
It is precisely because we needed to consult widely across Government Departments on an issue that might seem trivial, but is, in fact, important.
Sir Nicholas Winterton: I remind that Minister that I quoted verbatim the letter from the Leader of the House, to whom I paid full tribute for his courteous apology and for stating that the delay had indicated that the matter had been given
"careful consideration at the highest level"
of Government.
Mr. Woolas: I fully recognise that, and wanted to emphasise the point to endorse what the hon. Gentleman said. Actually, I owe the House an apology: because we wanted to make the Government response available to the Committee before this debate—we thought that it was proper to inform the Committee beforehand—and because the response is the property of the Committee, not of the Government, the right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire and other hon. Members taking part in the debate have inadvertently been put in a difficult position. They have not had the chance to read the response in full; perhaps they have had only a cursory glance at it. That was not intended as a discourtesy: quite the opposite, in fact. I want to flush out the issues and have a full debate, which is why I repeat the commitment made by my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House to debate the matter on the Floor of the House at the earliest opportunity.
On the face of it, the subject that we are discussing might seem small to the public and to hon. Members. A single protester with a few placards is more suggestive of "Citizen Smith", the infamous 1980s sitcom, than of the rights of UK citizens of a democracy to protest at their Parliament. However, it is symbolic of a very important
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matter. The central difficulty that the Government are resolving is that other problems often spring up as a result of legislating to solve a particular problem. We must resolve the problem, and that may involve legislation, in a way that neither ignores the principles on which there is unanimity in the House, nor causes the Metropolitan police problems, which none of us wants to do.
I am grateful for the manner in which this debate has been conducted. The right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire said that he had incessantly and consistently raised the issue. He has: it is the first item on the agenda of our weekly meetings to discuss business questions. and I have a filing cabinet full of documents relating to the matter. I hope that it is taken as it is intended when I say that the process shows the real value of our Select Committees and of this Westminster Hall debate. It is an interim debate; it would have been difficult at this juncture to secure a debate on the Floor of the House, although there will be one in future.
To return to the letter from my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House to the Chairman of the Committee, I re-emphasise that we apologise to the Committee and to the House for the delay in the Government's response. I am well aware that it has been six months since the Committee reported and, as has been said, the matter has been raised with my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House regularly in business questions and in correspondence. The Speaker has made clear his strong views on the matter and his impatience to see the Government's response. I wish to put on the record the fact that no discourtesy to the Committee was intended; nor was the delay, as the letter states, an indication that the subject was not being taken seriously.
I shall skip some of the uncontentious recommendations in the report for now, but I shall return to them if I have time. It will not surprise right hon. and hon. Members to learn that the Government support the principles set out in those recommendations. If I have the time I shall respond to them.
The debate has focused on the Sessional Order on the Metropolitan police, which orders the Metropolitan Police Commissioner to keep the streets around the Palace of Westminster "free and open" so that Members can freely pass to and from the House, and to prevent disorder and annoyance in the area. The Committee finds the Sessional Order misleading and ineffective, since it does not confer any additional powers on the police, and the police lack the powers to enforce it.
The Government accept the Committee's recommendation that the Government should introduce legislation for two separate purposes: first, to prohibit long-term demonstrations in Parliament square and, secondly, to ensure that the laws about access are adequate and enforceable. Those are indeed separate issues. The long-term demonstration in Parliament square, however much of a nuisance it is, does not impede access to the House. The hon. Member for Tiverton and Honiton (Mrs. Browning) referred to that, as did the hon. Member for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine (Sir Robert Smith). Occasional marches or temporary mass demonstrations can prohibit access to the House, and right hon. and hon. Members will be aware of examples of that.

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It will come as no surprise to Members to learn that it is the latter recommendation that the, Government have considered long and hard. It is not a trivial matter. It creates a dilemma at the heart of our democracy. On the one hand, it is essential to our democracy that Members are able to get to Parliament to represent their constituents and express the democratic will of the people. On the other hand, the right to demonstrate peacefully is one of the most cherished of our democratic freedoms. When those two factors are in conflict, as can be the case in Parliament square, it is difficult to determine the appropriate balance.
I acknowledge freely that the Government have hesitated to intervene, which is testimony to the importance that we attach to the right of citizens to demonstrate their views, however uncomfortable that may be to the Government. Nevertheless, in recognition of the strong views on the matter held in Parliament, not least by the Speaker, and elsewhere—as the right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire has pointed out, it is not only in Parliament that such opinions have been expressed—the Government have agreed to consult on the appropriate level of police powers to deal with such demonstrations. That is covered in our response.
The Home Office will issue a consultation paper shortly and the Government will give careful consideration to the views expressed in response to it. I take the liberty of referring Members to the specific recommendations. The consultation exercise that we propose will be on the development of police powers, which might involve legislation. As I say, our aim is to ensure that legislation designed to solve one particular problem while adhering to the general principles that I have outlined does not result in another problem. Although I do not want to deflect from our determination to pursue that strategy, there may be other ways in which to deal with the problem during the interim period.
The Committee considered the use of loudhailers in Parliament square and recommended that the appropriate authorities explore fully the possibility of using existing legislation to control the use of loudhailers and other amplification equipment. Failing that, it recommended that the Government should consider legislation on the subject. Again, it will not surprise right hon. and hon. Members to hear that the Government accept that that is a sensible recommendation. I shall go into detail about the particular powers in respect of loudhailers if Members want me to. The difficulties that are faced by the Metropolitan Police Commissioner relate to the specific purposes and intent of the use of loudhailers under both Westminster byelaws and section 62 of the Control of Pollution Act 1974, which governs the use of loudhailers in the street. The essential point is, in layperson's terms, that the police do not believe that existing byelaws and laws give them the power to stop an individual in such circumstances. Again, that matter will be covered in the consultation as we move forward.
The Committee considers that until new legislation comes into force, the House should continue to pass the Sessional Order on the Metropolitan police in the modified form, removing the references to Westminster Hall, because it is now firmly part of the parliamentary estate. Such an order will serve as a reminder and
"act as a marker that it expects Members' access to Parliament to be maintained as far as the existing law allows."
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That is a sensible way forward.
Sir George Young: Before the Minister leaves this point, I should like to ask him a question. On 8 July last year, the Minister for Crime Reduction, Policing and Community Safety mentioned that existing legislation on loudhailers might not be satisfactory. It is a little disappointing to hear that the Government are planning to consult only now, 10 months after they knew that there was a problem. Has the Home Office taken any action in the intervening period?
Mr. Woolas: The right hon. Gentleman's question strikes at the heart of the dilemma. Although the problem has been known for some time, if one pursues a course of legislation to solve it, other problems may arise. To amplify that point, I note that the Procedure Committee report recommends that the authorities make full use of existing legislation to deal with loudhailers before considering new legislation. Since giving evidence to that Committee, the police have started to use the City of Westminster byelaw that makes it an offence punishable by a level 2 fine to cause or permit to be made any loud or continuous noise by operating an amplifier or similar instrument after being warned to desist by a constable. Although the byelaw has been successful in preventing some demonstrations using loudhailers, the more persistent groups of protestors have simply passed the loudhailer among themselves, which forces the police to warn each protestor in turn. The byelaw therefore does not adequately cover situations in which there is more than one protestor.
The changes to the definition of assembly might prevent the use of loudhailers by putting a condition on the assembly, for example limiting its duration. However, the police would still have to prove that someone outside Parliament using a loudhailer is seriously disrupting the life of the community or intimidating MPs. The provision would therefore not help the police to deal with a lone loudhailer user. It is believed that that provision is not contravened by the protest that is causing the problem. Some hon. Members will disagree with that interpretation; all that I can do is reassure the House that the option has been considered, but, as hon. Members know, a prosecution has to have a good chance of success to make it a wise course of action.
Sir Robert Smith: Has the Minister received any briefing on the role of environmental health departments in noise pollution prevention? Local authorities are being given new powers so that if individuals play music too loudly or make too much noise in their own house, their equipment can be taken from them. I am not sure whether that new legislation could be interpreted to work for the situation outside Parliament.
Mr. Woolas: The hon. Gentleman made that point in his opening remarks. I can tell him only my understanding at this stage. If I am wrong, I will write to him, but I understand that that legislation refers to communities and neighbours and would not cover the circumstances of Parliament square.
We had hoped that legislation that has been on the statute book for 30 years—section 62 of the Control of Pollution Act 1974, which governs the use of loudhailers

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in the streets and prohibits their use between 9 pm and 8 am—would apply. I am sure that if I were to check Hansard, I would find, first, that the hon. Member for Macclesfield took part in the debate on that legislation, and secondly that that Parliament's intention in passing the 1974 Act was to prohibit that sort of noise nuisance during the night. There would have been no cognisance of the fact that, 30 years on, people would abuse the legislation and cause a real nuisance to those who work in this precinct.
The nuisance affects the press in the Palace of Westminster in particular. The offices in No. 1 Parliament street have been mentioned as being particularly affected by the noise, and the staff who work there all the time are probably more affected than MPs who come over to the Chamber or the Library. However, the noise also has a great effect on the gentleman and ladies of the press, whose offices face the loudhailer and who are often in the Palace for many hours into the evening and start work very early in the morning. Irrespective of what may be written in the newspapers, I know that their strong personal view is that Government action should be taken. I am between a very big rock and a very hard place, which is why I was delighted to see the Government response.
Sir Nicholas Winterton: With his last remarks, the Minister gives me the opportunity to ask a further question. I am disappointed that there are no specific proposals in the Government response to deal with the problem, but would like clarification regarding the period of consultation. How long will the consultation take? Will there be a specific period of consultation, after which the Government will consider the findings and introduce legislation? As the Minister has indicated, most people are hoping for legislation to correct the current abuse.
Mr. Woolas: I thank the hon. Gentleman for his question, which I had anticipated. I am sorry that I am not able to give him the specific details that he requires. However, I can say two helpful things. First, the proper procedure for the Government to follow is to begin by the response to the Committee's report, which is now with the Committee and represents the collective view of the Government. That having been done, it is important that the House debates the matter. Having had six months to deliberate our response to the Procedure Committee's report, progress on the consultation on the legislation could be expected to be swift. I am sorry that I cannot go further than that.
So far, I have tried to cover the areas covered by recommendations 7 and 8, relating to the demonstrations in Parliament square. I shall now move on to the other recommendations, and invite interventions.
Sir George Young: Will the Minister place on the record his statement that he finds the present position unacceptable?
Mr. Woolas: Oh yes, I will put my own view on the record. As someone who holds the right to demonstrate particularly close to my heart, having taken part in
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demonstrations on many issues over many years, sometimes effectively, sometimes less so, I do not believe that what we see across the road falls within the definition of a reasonable demonstration. It certainly does not fall within the definition of an effective demonstration, and it is counter-productive to the causes that that gentleman in question wishes to support.
I hope that the Mayor of London's working group on world-class squares—a strange title, referring to the wonderful squares in London—may provide a way forward for the problem in Parliament square. The shantytown across the road is a scar on one of the most beautiful architectural and heritage sites in the world, let alone the United Kingdom.
I am conscious that people who take a contrary view will say that we are using a sledgehammer to crack a nut. However, one cannot say that there is in this country anything other than a proper and adequate right to demonstrate peacefully. It is one of our great traditions. The marches of the Peterloo universal suffrage campaign started from my village of Lees, near Oldham. If I were to say anything other than that, I would be out of my office with my P45 looking for a job.
Mrs. Browning: Will the Minister focus on the clear security aspect to the site across the road? However helpful the Mayor of London's plans for the square may be, we should not wait for them in order to deal with security. The Minister has already described his position as being between a rock and a hard place, but that is his job and he knows that—that is what the red box gives him. I hope that he will not wait for third parties, such as the Mayor of London, to come up with a solution, and lose sight of the security risk.
Mr. Woolas: That is a perfectly reasonable point. I hope that I did not imply that we were looking for somebody to get us off the hook. We are not, and we have laid out our strategy. The hon. Lady referred to security, and the Government's general policy, in line with the previous Government's, is to take advice from the security services. If their risk assessment states that action is required in respect of the demonstration, it becomes our view. The charges laid against the demonstrator, which were subject to court proceedings yesterday, originally resulted from that very concern about security.
Sir Nicholas Winterton: That indicates that the Government should deal with the whole matter as a matter of urgency. It is no overstatement to say that we are spending millions of pounds to prevent any incident within the Palace of Westminster—the glass screen being but one such measure. If there is, as the police admit quite readily, a security risk on the other side of the road, should not the Government examine the situation as a matter of real urgency?
Mr. Woolas: The hon. Gentleman affirms the point made by the hon. Member for Tiverton and Honiton, but there is a slight difference between the situation under discussion and the situation within the precincts of Parliament. I recognise that he has supported the measures taken and I am grateful to him for that. There are two pertinent points about the demonstration

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outside. First, the assessment of that risk is that it is not permanent: banners might conceal something from time to time, and that assessment has led to the police and the security services judging it right to intervene from time to time. The second point, which is more difficult, is that one would have to be sure that any police action—which would, no doubt, be subject to a challenge in the courts from solicitors minded to support such an action—would be successful. Otherwise, one would worsen the situation and cause even greater expense to the taxpayer. We all want to avoid that.
Many questions have been asked and I sense that hon. Members think that they have got all the answers that they are going to get, even if they are not satisfied with them. However, there are many other important recommendations in the report. There are three Sessional Orders and three resolutions—helpfully set out on page 3 of the report. The Procedure Committee deals first with those on elections, witnesses and votes and proceedings. The Committee found that they were obsolete or unnecessary, saying that:
"The Resolution about bribery and the provision for Members to withdraw during any debate on any dispute on their return are obsolete and misleading, as responsibility for election offences and disputes now belongs to the courts, not to the House".
According to the Committee, the provision about double returns—two Members returned for the same seat, which I am told used to happen frequently, although in the modern world it seems strange—
"relates to an event which cannot now take place".
The report continues:
"the provision about Members returned from more than one place (which last happened in 1910) is unlikely ever to be needed, but could be dealt with once and for all…"
and
"the Order for the printing of the Votes and Proceedings… is unnecessary…and the provision that the Speaker should peruse them before they are printed"—
that means the formal daily minutes of the House, the Order of Business and the journals—
"is not normally carried out".
According to the report,
"the Resolutions against tampering with witnesses and giving false evidence have some value as statements of intent, but they do not add anything to the House's powers to deal with contempts or (in the case of tampering with witnesses or the giving of false evidence on oath) the statutory powers."
It is recommended that those orders and resolutions be discontinued. That is a sensible recommendation.
The Committee recommends that, once and for all,
"the House should decide, by agreeing to this Report, that all Members who are returned for two or more places in any part of the United Kingdom should choose for which of the places they will serve, within one week after it appears that there is no question about their election for that place."
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That seems a sensible recommendation. The Committee notes that
"The survival of the Sessional Orders…may reflect a desire by the House to begin the Session with a reminder of matters which it considers important… "
but says that
"they should be replaced by a statement of the duties and responsibilities of Members,"
and of the House's historic claims to privilege. That, of course, means freedom of speech and freedom from legal challenge. It seems appropriate to mark the beginning of the session with a reminder of matters of importance by the Speaker. The report suggests that the Committee on Standards and Privileges—the Chairman of which is present—may wish to recommend a suitable form of words.
The Committee considered the Outlawries Bill, which is
"for the more effectual preventing clandestine Outlawries".
For the benefit of Members, the House of Commons Library has an interesting general factsheet explaining the background to the Outlawries Bill. In that document, I discovered the intersection between the modernisation wing of Parliament and the traditionalists. The intentions of the Outlawries Bill are agreeable to Labour Members, who are perhaps more radical than others in desiring swifter change. The Bill achieves its goal while being implemented in a very traditional way. As it takes only a few seconds to read out at the beginning of each Session, it is sensible not to mess with it—in the Lancastrian phrase, "If it ain't bust, don't fix it." I am told that the practice dates from at least 1558 and was referred to by Sir Thomas Meres in 1676 during a debate on this subject in which he said:
"Though forms seem but little things, yet they are of great consequence."
Those are wise words in relation to this debate.
The Procedure Committee then addresses the Sessional Orders on the Metropolitan Police. I hope that the House accepts that I have covered that matter in detail. I look forward to the debate in the House and to pursuing the matter in a sensible and consensual way. I hope that the two important principles to which I referred, of protecting the rights to demonstrate and protecting the privileges of this House, can be adhered to.
I thank the Procedure Committee again for its report. I emphasise my regret about the delay in the publication of the Government response, but I hope that hon. Members will accept that it signals the importance that the Government attach to the issues that the Committee raised.
10.57 am
Sitting suspended.

Special Schools
11 am
Mr. David Cameron: I am delighted to have this opportunity to talk about a very important subject. There are many who are more expert: I am a beginner, but an interested one. My comments will be based on my constituency and personal experiences. My constituency experience comes from visiting special schools and from talking to parents, teachers and pupils. My personal experience comes from being the proud father of a profoundly disabled child who will soon start his schooling. I probably see this issue from the perspective of a parent of a child at the most disabled end of the spectrum. That affects my perspective and it is right to put that on the record. Maybe it is no bad thing. Children like mine are among the most vulnerable and needy in society. It is important that they get the right sort of services.
Let me rather illogically start with my tentative conclusions. My concerns are as follows. First, the policy of inclusion, while right in principle for most children, is wrong in practice for some children. Some local education authorities are possibly over zealous in their pursuit of inclusion. Some pray in aid Government policy and at times completely overstate it. As a result there is a danger that we could lose forever some very good special schools that do an excellent job with children who have a range of very complex needs. As another consequence, some mainstream schools are struggling to cope with children with these very complex needs. That can have a serious knock-on effect not only on those children but on the education of other children. From what I have seen and heard, I would say that there is a real danger that the pendulum is swinging too far in favour of inclusion.
I should like to say a little bit about the special schools in and near my constituency. Springfield school in Witney works with children from the age of two to 16 with complex learning difficulties. It operates both on its own site and at different mainstream school sites across west Oxfordshire. The main school is in a brand new building in the middle of a new mainstream primary school. This is an excellent concept as they can share facilities and do things together as well as be separate when they need to be. I urge the Minister to come to look at it when he is passing Witney. It is a good concept with the best of inclusion and the best of special status at the same time.
The Ormerod school, based in Headington, also has a site at the Marlborough school in Woodstock in my constituency. It caters for pupils with a wide range of physical disabilities who usually have associated learning and communication difficulties as well. Penhurst school in Chipping Norton, operated by National Children's Homes, is a residential school for the most profoundly disabled children of all. Woodeaton and Iffley Mead, just outside my constituency, are both state schools but provide residential education for children with moderate learning difficulties and a range of behavioural problems. Some of the children may have been badly abused at home.
The Mulberry Bush school in Standlake in my constituency is not part of the state sector but takes children from state schools around the country who
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have emotional and behavioural difficulties, including some children who have been extremely disruptive and violent. The school's aim is to reintegrate them into the state sector, on which it has an excellent record. I have been impressed by what all these schools do and the value that they add. I should also mention the Fitzwarren school in Wantage. My hon. Friend the Member for Wantage (Mr. Jackson) and our candidate there, Edward Vaizey, are campaigning hard for it to have a secure future.
I should say two things straight away. First, what I am going to say does not apply equally to every school. As I have pointed out, they care for children with different needs. But there are some common themes. Most of the schools have experienced the same thing. They are well aware of children who would benefit from places and they often know parents who want their children to attend, but the message from the local education authority is often to question why their rolls are falling. Secondly, I accept that real progress has been made in the way in which we deal with special needs in this country. LEAs and mainstream schools are putting more resources towards them and the subject area is rightfully receiving more and more attention.
As I have said, inclusion is right for many children. There are strong lobbies in favour of it: many of them contacted me before this debate. But it cannot be right for all children. As the parent of one such child I know how maddening it is to be told by the LEA that its policy is to include all children in mainstream settings. If the child has, for example, chronic epilepsy and cannot walk, sit up or move in any way, it is pretty obvious that they must be cared for in a special environment. That is just common sense.
Let me run through a list of the concerns that have been expressed, so that the Minister can give a reasoned and careful reply. First, there are concerns linked to the most recent piece of legislation on the issue, the Special Educational Needs and Disability Act 2001. The concern is that the Act sets up a bias in favour of mainstream schools, which can mean that parents are not even advised about special schools. The Act states:
"If a statement is maintained…for the child, he must be educated in a mainstream school unless that is incompatible with…the wishes of his parent, or…the provision of efficient education for other children."
I accept that the Act does not say, "Don't tell parents about special schools and what is available". However, the message that some LEAs have received seems to be that they cannot give advice about special schools, but can advise only towards mainstream.
One head teacher at a special school told me that she knew of parents with children aged six, seven and eight and who were in mainstream schools, but who simply had not heard about the existence of her school. Knowing what those parents and their children had missed out on, she believed that the situation was "criminal". What matters, surely, is what is right for each child. Does the Minister think that a more common-sense statement and approach needs to be set out more clearly in the legislation? In one form or another, the schools in my constituency have said the same sort of thing to me. Each such school, whether it dealt with children with emotional and behavioural difficulties, or profound or moderate learning

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difficulties, or whether it was state-controlled or voluntary, said that access to them is being artificially restricted.
I asked one head which of three explanations best portrayed what was happening. I asked whether inclusion was being pursued too dogmatically, whether special schools were expensive, thereby creating an unwillingness to send children there, or whether bureaucratic delays were holding up the system. She said that the answer was a combination of all three. The Minister needs to realise that.
The second concern is that the application process for entering such schools has in many cases become incredibly complex. The process of assessments, panels, reassessments and decision-making timetables can be truly horrendous. Of course one must get the decision right. However, there are times—I stray into my own experience now—when the only people who are not listened to are the parents, who know the child's needs better than anyone, and the special school, which has spent a lifetime identifying and coping with incredibly complex needs. Logic and common sense say that the parents and the school should be at the heart of the process.
As I have said, the problem is due partly to the complex bureaucracy that has been established. As a senior education officer from Oxfordshire county council put it to me in a letter:
"Falling rolls in some special school nurseries have resulted, in part, from relatively recent compliance with the law on statements and assessments. In the past children have been admitted without statement or even assessment, sometimes without the agreement of an officer".
His letter continued:
"There should be no need for most children at this age to have a statement and indeed statutory assessment may be premature and meaningless, wasting valuable resources and possibly delaying intervention".
It is the possible delay in intervention that can be so damaging.
The Mulberry Bush school has put its concern about the delay very starkly. As the head explained:
"The children we work with need recognition that their emotional immaturity and behaviour needs addressing before they can start to learn".
As he rather neatly put the matter:
"inclusion only makes sense if the child feels genuinely included."
Those at the Mulberry Bush school feel that aspects of the inclusion model have slowed down placements at their school. As the school explained in an e-mail to me,
"for many children the policy of inclusion is a disaster. Time is spent trying to get them to co-operate in situations which they can't manage. So, for both financial and government policy reasons the LEAs leave them in mainstream for longer than they should. When it becomes all too obvious that the child can't cope they then send them off to the Mulberry Bush more damaged. It is far better for us to start the therapy when they are say 6, than later—increasingly we get them aged 9 or 10. We can't keep them after they are 12, and so we have far too short time with them."
The aim of the Mulberry Bush school is to get children back into mainstream schools. The point that those at the school make clearly is that it is good if they can do that early.
It is vital that we get things right. As I explained, Woodeaton school is a residential school for children with moderate learning difficulties and a range of behavioural issues. A constituent of mine who works
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there wrote to me and explained that there is a trend of
"integrating moderate learning difficulty children into mainstream education, but the majority of our children are not just MLD: they have complex needs and would not cope in mainstream. Some of our children who are in residence would either be in care, on the streets or in trouble with the Police."
The Minister must understand that there is a danger of an alliance between educationists who are very committed to inclusion on ideological grounds, and accountants, who want to save money. My concern is that some of the schools will close as a result.
My next concern is about how well mainstream schools are coping. Again, that is vital. If we put children who cannot cope with mainstream schools into such schools, they will suffer and so will the other children at the school. The mainstream schools system cannot always provide the facilities—such as adapted accommodation, specialist teachers and equipment, and multi-disciplinary professional support—that are suitable for every child's needs. I am sure that the Minister will have found, as I have, that what is striking about visiting a special school is that all the therapy—speech therapy, language therapy, physiotherapy, and hydrotherapy swimming pools—is available in situ. All the medical interventions that the children need can take place at the school, so there is a disadvantage when the children begin to be spread right across the system.
Mencap's position on the practical difficulties with mainstreaming special needs children is as follows:
"Often, there is either not enough learning support or the school adopts a 'velcro' approach whereby staff work solely and permanently with a pupil with special educational needs. Getting the right balance between providing support and enabling real inclusion is vital if parents are to trust the mainstream system.
The lack of health support in mainstream schools presents another major barrier for those pupils with a learning disability with additional health needs. They are often excluded because staff are either not trained in health procedures or are reluctant to administer medicine, which leaves many children at risk."
A final concern is that as special schools find the number of children on their rolls falling they may also find that they have to cater for a lot of children with very different needs. For example, at Springfield school they are currently able to separate the very active children with profound and multiple learning difficulties, who may have autism or other conditions that can make children quite hyperactive, from those who are confined to wheelchairs, who may have cerebral palsy and who cannot really move. As a parent of a child with very bad cerebral palsy, I have to say that one of the greatest worries is their safety. Of course, parents want their children to go to school and to have all those benefits, but they really worry whether they will be safe with other children racing around. That is an important concern.
In a nutshell, what I am saying to the Minister is that inclusion and integration are not the same thing. We all want children with disabilities to be included in broader society. Of course, we want that. However, that does not always mean that they can be integrated into every part of it. In fact, by trying to integrate them, we may actually exclude them. We may find that if special schools are not available, some children will not be able to go to school at all. They will be excluded completely because they will have to stay at home. That is my major concern.

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In conclusion, I am asking the Minister to do a number of things. Because local education authorities seem to take such a lead from the Government on this issue and pray in aid what they believe Government policy to be, this is one of the rare areas—he will be pleased to hear this—where what he says is almost as important as what he does. I hope that he will be able to say what a good job special schools do and that the Government value their work and do not want to see a further programme of closures. I hope that he will accept that inclusion is not right for every child and that he and his Department will consider whether LEAs are interpreting the law too narrowly and being overzealous in their approach. I hope that we will have opportunities for him to report to the House regularly about this very important matter.
11.14 am
The Minister for School Standards (Mr. David Miliband): I congratulate the hon. Member for Witney (Mr. Cameron) not only on securing the debate, but on the insight, passion and thoughtfulness with which he presented the issues. He started with his conclusion and I am happy not just to start with my conclusion, but to agree with his—although I might put it slightly differently. His conclusion was that it is wrong to believe that inclusion in mainstream school is right for every child. I agree with that, but would put it differently. Special schools are right for some children. I am happy to put that positively and in an affirming way that recognises the special role of special schools.
I cannot match the personal experience that the hon. Gentleman brings to the debate, but I can, at least, report my constituency experience of a special school for three to 19-year-olds, and special schools that I have visited around the country. I endorse his point about special schools throughout the country doing fantastic work. That is true of Bamburgh school in my constituency.
I should like to add a point that the hon. Gentleman did not have time to dwell on, but which is important. The special schools sector has pioneered educational innovations that are relevant to the mainstream sector. Let us think about how qualified teachers can now work with classroom assistants, how that is being developed in the mainstream sector and how it is greeted in some quarters as a revolutionary change. That has always happened in more than 1,000 special schools around the country. It is important to recognise that the educational practice of the special schools sector has something to teach the rest of the system, as well as offering the right education for its pupils.
I am delighted to hear that my words may have some impact or effect. I hope that that does not go to my head. I welcome the chance to put on the record not just my views, but those of the Government, because it is important that people understand the Government's view of an appropriate special educational needs strategy, that they are clear what we mean by inclusion and that they understand our vision for the special school sector, which we believe can be a resource for pupils in those schools, for the wider system, and for those pupils with special needs who are studying in or are located in mainstream schools.
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I am sure that the hon. Gentleman knows about the special educational needs strategy that was published by the Government last February, which suggested how local and national action could deliver long-term improvement. It focused on raising expectations for the educational achievement of youngsters with special needs, those with increasingly complex special needs, and perhaps those that are recognised as complex, as well as some new needs. It talked about enabling parents to feel confident that schools, whether they are mainstream or special schools, can meet the needs of those pupils. We will deal later with which schools children go to. It is fair to say that that strategy, which was led by my colleague Baroness Ashton of Upholland, who takes responsibility in this area, was widely welcomed, whether people are parents, or teachers, of children in the mainstream or special school sectors.
The strategy concentrates on four areas. First, there is a need to intervene early to ensure that children with special needs receive the support that they need from the earliest possible date. That speaks to the hon. Gentleman's use of the example of the age of six. Our view is that children should start at the appropriate point, and if that is earlier than six, it might be better.
Secondly, the strategy focused on the barriers to learning and educational progress that are faced by children with special needs. I was struck by what the hon. Gentleman said about issues of safety and security in school. Thirdly, it is important to ensure that schools have high expectations for children with special educational needs. I think that I am right in saying that a quarter of young people with special needs in primary schools reach level 4 at age 11. Perhaps I could write to the hon. Gentleman if I am wrong. It is important that there are high expectations for all pupils and that the achievement of every pupil is recognised, whatever level they reach, as long as they are fulfilling their potential. Level 4 may not be possible for some youngsters—level 1, 2 or 3 may be an achievement for them—but we should aim high for all of them and celebrate what they achieve.
The third aspect of the strategy was to try to deliver greater co-ordination and collaboration between schools across the special school and mainstream divide. To review the overall situation, 3 per cent. of pupils have a statement of special educational needs—about 245,000 young people. Another 14 per cent. have a recognised special need without a statement—about 1.2 million young people. It is our belief—as well as educational practice for a long time—that there are strong educational grounds for educating many children and young people with special needs and/or disabilities with their peers in mainstream schools. The vast majority of children with special needs are educated in the mainstream sector.
For some pupils a special school is the right base for their education. About 87,000 pupils with special needs are in maintained special schools, the funding for which amounts to some £1.5 billion. However, my thinking about inclusion is that the Government should have a responsibility to ensure that every child, whatever their circumstances, hay the opportunity to fulfil their educational potential, to access the educational resources of the nation and to be included in the educational goals of the country and the educational provisions made by the country. Education is about

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more than a type of placement for children and young people; it is about an aspiration and about the quality of the educational experience that they enjoy. There are numerous examples of good practice, but I have to agree that there are also examples where practice does not meet the aspirations and we have to try to do something about that.
Inclusive practice and the capacity of mainstream schools to cater for children with special needs are important. The strategy flagged up three areas. First, we have a duty to support mainstream schools through the inclusion development programme, which would bring together education, health, social care and the voluntary sector to help schools meet the glowing demands from pupils with autistic spectrum disorder; behaviour, emotional and social difficulties; speech, language and communication difficulties; and moderate learning difficulties.
I was in Hartlepool two weeks ago, at Kingsley primary school, which specialises in educating and supporting children with autism in the mainstream sector. Its staff talk to other children about what autism is, so that they understand the pupils who are in their class, and work with the parents of the autistic children to ensure that they succeed in school. It was very impressive to see.
Secondly, it is important to make sure that practical tools and materials are available for schools and local authorities for disabled pupils, and we are working with the Disability Rights Commission on that. Thirdly, school leadership has to be armed with the information and ideas to ensure that a mainstream school can meet special needs and we are working with the national college for school leadership to achieve that.
I want to dwell on the role of special schools, which have a special role in our system, and in many ways have led the way in educational reform. We cannot say it enough—we are strongly committed to supporting the role of special schools in our education system. They have a critical role to play in the overall spectrum of provision for pupils with special needs. As the hon. Gentleman said, they have a role to play in educating those children with the most severe and complex needs, but they also share their expertise with mainstream schools, which have the bulk of special needs pupils in their care.
There is a balance to be struck—or perhaps an integration to be achieved—between special and mainstream school provisions. It is important to ensure that both sectors work in close collaboration. There is value in distinctive special school provision, but there is also value in the resources, insights and expertise of the special schools being shared across the divide. Breaking down the divisions is an important aspect of policy—we want not only to celebrate the role of special schools but to share their insights. We hope to do that in five ways, all of which speak to the issues raised by the hon. Gentleman.
First, staff movement across the special school and mainstream school environment is important. Crossing the divide for employment or training purposes can help both sectors.
Secondly, we want to encourage pupil movement across the sectors by using annual reviews of statements to consider the scope for dual placement or transition
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between the mainstream and special sectors. Pupils' needs can and do change over time, and the special and mainstream sectors might be right for them at different points in their careers.
Thirdly, we want to encourage more special schools to participate in cluster and twining arrangements with mainstream counterparts.
Fourthly, we want to encourage greater participation by special schools in programmes such as the specialist schools programme and the leading edge partnership programmes. The latter is designed to spread best educational practice across the system.
Fifthly, and importantly, we want to ensure that the capital funding strategy, which is now a significant part of the departmental spend—it includes the building schools for the future programme, which focuses on the secondary sector—helps to bring special and mainstream schools closer together. I have not visited the development in Witney, but the hon. Gentleman may be interested to know that on the site of the Ealing academy—a through-to-19 academy being set up in west London—there will be a special school to facilitate the distinct provision and collaboration that I mentioned.
Those five aspects of policy and our commitment to special schools as a distinct sector make clear the important role that we think such schools can play in the system.
The hon. Gentleman asked whether there was a danger that the pendulum might swing the other way—almost as if one fashion were replacing another—if we did not take care to ensure that, as we sought to improve things, we do not lose the best. I thought about that image as he spoke, and I hope that it is not overly optimistic to say that neither we nor those involved in the debate about provision for pupils with special educational needs are slaves to the fashion that he described.
Mr. Cameron: I can give the Minister an example of a local education authority whose policy is to include all children in mainstream schools. It may have misunderstood Government policy and may, for reasons of political correctness or money, be being overzealous, but I hope that the Minister takes seriously the issue of whether some local education authorities are swinging the pendulum too far, because children will suffer as a result.
Mr. Miliband: I was about to come to that point. Of course, the owners or governors of the pendulum do not simply reside in Sanctuary Buildings, and there must be real collaboration on this aspect of policy between central and local government.
The hon. Gentleman raised important points about how the assessment systems work, about communication between central and local government and about the quality and variability of provision in different parts of the country. All three issues are the subject of monitoring by not only the Department but Ofsted, which inspects provision by local authorities and schools. I can assure the hon. Gentleman that we are committed to working with local government and to respecting its constitutional position as the co-ordinator and commissioner of local provision. Provision is best

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arranged at local level, building on local history, tradition and expertise. However, our starting point must be the quality of the offer to pupils and parents, and we must ensure that it meets their diverse needs.
If the hon. Gentleman wants me to take up particular examples, I will, of course, be happy to do so, but I understood him to be making the more general point that there are communication, auditing and monitoring issues about which we must be zealous. I can assure him that we did not produce the strategy simply so that it could sit on a shelf—we want to work with colleagues in local government to make it happen.
Sitting suspended until Two o'clock.

Probation
2 pm
Jane Griffiths: I am pleased to have succeeded in securing the debate, which I applied for following a lobby by staff who work in the probation service and live in my constituency. That lobby was held only last week, so I am pleasantly surprised to have succeeded so quickly.
In January, my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary published the report "Reducing Crime—Changing Lives", which is designed to modernise and reform correctional services. That report is the Government's response to a report, by Patrick Carter published at the same time. The consequences of the report for the probation services in Reading caused my constituents to visit me, and thereby me to seek the debate.
In 2001, the Government set up a national body to manage the probation service. There are also local boards, which cover the devolved, local management of the service. The boards were established on the same boundaries as those of police authority and magistrates court areas. That meant that in the local service there was an amalgamation of the Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire services to form the Thames Valley service.
At the time, the amalgamation was said to be a three to five-year process. That relates to the first concern that staff raised with me. Having just gone through one reorganisation, as well as all the stress and difficulty that that causes, they were understandably concerned about being plunged into another so soon. What evaluation or monitoring of the effectiveness of the previous reorganisation was carried out before the new changes were proposed? Is the further reorganisation even an admission that the previous one failed? Certainly, in the Thames valley, that is not the evidence provided by the staff's performance. I shall give a few examples.
Despite an increase in the target number of drug treatment and testing orders and what the staff describe as the complexities of drug funding in the Thames valley, they have met the target. The target for contact with victims has been exceeded throughout the past two years. The service has exceeded the target set for basic skills for the second half of the year. Nearly 450 offenders have successfully completed an accredited programme in the Thames valley—double last year's number and significantly more than the target set for the service. The service is on track to meet the target of a positive proposal in 90 per cent. of pre-sentence reports on black defendants, which is an important indicator to ensure that black defendants receive as good a service as their white counterparts. That has been of quite serious concern over the years.
Enhanced community punishment has been implemented on time and is on target to meet the number of starts required this year. The latest figures on enforcement within 10 days—for March—were the best achieved, including 100 per cent. for community rehabilitation orders, 93 per cent. for community punishment orders, 75 per cent. for community punishment and rehabilitation orders and 100 per cent. for rehabilitation. That improving performance has seen the Thames Valley service rise up the national performance table in the past year, from 32nd to 29th to

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26th to 24th. The staff and I are hopeful and confident of further progress up the performance table. That seems to be evidence that the previous reorganisation is beginning to bear fruit in Reading.
The concern about the need for another reorganisation so soon after the previous one feeds into a further concern. What is the rush? The changes were announced in January, but the national set-up is supposed to be in place by June, with the local set-up in place by next year. The preferred model for the structure of the National Offender Management Service was published only last week, on 10 May, and is open for consultation until Friday 11 June—a rather short period. How does the rush to establish NOMS sit with the statement made by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister on 29 January at the summit on public services convened by The Guardian? He said that
"policy first and explanation later is not the way to do things, and this was the problem with the way the debate on university finance happened. Some MPs felt that university finance measures were sprung on them with too little explanation and too sparse a tilling of the ground of debate and argument about the nature of the problem."
Lembit Öpik: I very much agree with what the hon. Lady says. Is she aware that the proposals to replace local probation boards in Wales with one all-Wales board have caused similar concerns? Does she agree that one of the great anxieties is what happens to jobs? Those who are pushing the reorganisation need to ensure that the spread of jobs continues and thereby ensures the delivery of criminal justice services throughout Wales, including rural areas. She represents a largely urban constituency, but it sounds as though the same problems are arising everywhere.
Jane Griffiths: I suspect that the hon. Gentleman's point is relevant everywhere in England and Wales. My constituency, unlike his, is urban and densely populated. Jobs are an issue, whether that means recruitment and retention, which is a problem in the Reading area, or the scarcity of jobs in parts of his constituency.
How will the Home Office avoid the mistakes made with the establishment of the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service? The Chair of the Lord Chancellor's Department Committee said:
"The committee found that many of these problems stem from serious failings in the establishment and management of the new service. Too little time was allowed for its establishment, leaving the organisation at a disadvantage from the start. Once established, CAFCASS failed to make proper use of the preparatory work that had been done, compounding the difficulties."
Incidentally, I note that an issue of the staff magazine, "Metamorphosis", referring to the changes, states that the legislative timetable prevents a protracted consultation period on the overall shape of the National Offender Management Service. Will a Bill be needed to make the proposed changes to the structure of those services, or can they be achieved through secondary legislation?
That is important, because it feeds into another concern of the staff in Reading, who are worried that changes to the service have been introduced but have
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not been subject to parliamentary scrutiny. If a Bill is needed to introduce the changes, it will be subject to parliamentary scrutiny and those anxieties will be addressed. However, if such legislation is required, what is the position of people being appointed to posts in the new structure? I would be grateful if the Minister cleared that point up.
What legislative timetable is there for the structure? If it needs primary legislation, will appointments be made before a Bill completes its parliamentary process? Can the service realistically take shape if that does not happen?
Staff who talked to me are concerned about there being another reorganisation so soon, as they are just bedding down the previous one. They are worried about the speed with which the changes are being introduced and concerned that to date the changes have not had parliamentary scrutiny. I would be grateful if the Minister also addressed those concerns.
I spoke earlier about the progress the probation service is making in the Thames valley in some areas covered by the service in Reading. That is not unusual for a complex town such as Reading, which hosts a wide variety of activities. In the Home Secretary's response to the Carter report, the yardstick for success is identified thus:
"Clear integration of effort, spreading of best practice, and coherent management".
The Government's response states that they will
"put the individual management of offenders at the centre of a single system rather than falling in the gap between two different services."
A member of staff in the probation service in Reading asked me this:
"If there is a value in a single, coherent service to deal with prisoners, why is the same logic not applicable to offenders in the community, where they pose the real risk of reoffending, and why is the probation service to be broken up between purchasers and providers?"
That brings me to another concern raised by the staff: splitting up the service into purchasers and providers. I was a councillor in the 1980s and 1990s and I experienced compulsory competitive tendering. under which we were forced to split the council into purchaser and provider. Staff working in the public service were forced to compete against other contractors. Again, that was for competition, which we were told would lead to efficiency, yet on the election of a Labour Government in 1997 we rightly repealed the legislation.
Councils have now put back together the service management with the people employed to provide the service and, in most cases, have found it more efficient. Similarly in the 1990s, a purchaser-provider split was introduced in the health service to provide greater efficiency through competition, and on their election the Labour Government removed it.
The example that staff mentioned to me was the split introduced in the railways. They do not want to become the Railtrack and Jarvis of the criminal justice system. Although we are not taking the railway system back into public ownership as such, although I wish we were, we have moved to reduce the number of organisations and groups playing a part in it. The staff are concerned that the split is a move towards the privatisation of the service. That is again reminiscent of local government in

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the 1990s, where rather than hear talk of privatisation of local government services, we heard other euphemisms used. In this case, the word is "contestability".
Probation service staff have seen the consequences in the Prison Service. Again, this is familiar from local government in the 1990s. Any profits and savings are made as a result of worsening the pay and conditions of staff working in the service. Prison officer pay is 24.6 to 32.4 per cent. lower in the private sector than in the public, while a Prison Service pension is 10.5 to 13.5 per cent. more valuable than pensions available to those in the private sector. The Prison Service offers 5 to 28 per cent. more leave than the private sector. The fact that few firms are involved in tendering has limited competition, at times leaving just one company bidding.
Staff have also seen the consequences of putting the ancillary services at hostels out to tender. A constituent told me one story that strikes me as highlighting madness. Previously, when a light bulb in a hostel blew, one of the staff went to a convenience store with 58p from the petty cash, bought a new light bulb and put it in. Now, I am told, when a light bulb needs replacing in the Reading hostel, someone in south Wales gets in a van and drives to Reading to do it. If that is true, we must do something about it. Why, when we have moved to remove that split in other services and when we prefer to have people working together for the best service and efficiency, are we introducing such a division in the criminal justice system?
My next point has been debated in the House before. In fact, I was the first MP since 1997, and perhaps before that, to raise in the House of Commons the problems facing public service workers in the south-east as a result of the high cost of living and, in particular, the cost of housing. The probation service in Reading has been no different from the other public services in the town; staffing has always been a problem. There were packages in place to help to recruit and retain staff, but they were lost—unintentionally, I am sure—in the last reorganisation, which introduced the move to the Thames Valley service. Staff also feel that the situation was worsened by the removal by the then Home Secretary in 1996 of the added value of a local training route at Reading university. That had allowed access to local training for local people for the first time.
The result is that the Reading service runs on a staffing level of about two thirds. The impact of that for risk management of the most dangerous offenders, along with the other important jobs carried out by the service, is obvious. Local staff feel that any difficulty in providing coherent services to prisoners relates much more to the fundamental national shortage of probation staff than to the structure of the service. In many cases, there are no staff available until within weeks of a prisoner's release.
The Reading service has 120 unallocated resettlement cases and it views that as a result of lack of staffing. It rightly feels that the skills of probation officers are in demand. They can move elsewhere in the country and receive the same pay, so staff frequently move on to other things or other places—perhaps to rural Wales, who knows? As an example of that process, 12 out of 17 officers in the Reading office were new to the team.
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Imagine the consequences for the work of the office of having two thirds of the staff with less than a year's experience.
I am pleased to have secured the debate so soon after the lobby of Parliament, and to have had the chance to raise the concerns brought to me by the staff who work in the probation service in Reading. I have asked a number of questions of the Minister about what is happening. I know from yesterday's sitting that he responds positively to matters raised in Adjournment debates. I hope he can do so today.
Several hon. Members rose—
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Frank Cook): Order. We have about 44 minutes left in which to accommodate six contributions from the Floor. We must start the first of the three winding-up speeches 30 minutes before conclusion, as these who are familiar with proceedings in this Chamber will know. I ask hon. Members to bear those constraints in mind when making their contributions and when accepting or responding to interventions. I call Mr. Burns.
2.17 pm
Mr. Simon Burns: Thank you, Mr. Cook.
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. When sanctioning proceedings in this Chamber, the House determined that occupants of the Chair should be addressed as Deputy Speaker.
Mr. Burns: Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I shall certainly keep to your ruling, because I understand that many hon. Members want to speak.
I begin by congratulating the hon. Member for Reading, East (Jane Griffiths) on securing this timely debate, particularly as it comes so shortly after the lobby, during which I had the privilege of meeting several of my constituents who work for the Essex probation service. I am sure that the Essex service is not unique in this country in that it is a first-rate service. I know that it looks after the interests of my constituents and others in the county of Essex. In 17 years as a Member of Parliament, I have never received a single complaint about the seamless service that it provides in the county, which I believe is reflected elsewhere in the country.
The Government's document "Reducing Crime—Changing Lives" lists many achievements of the probation service an increase in the literacy programme, greater enforcement of community orders, the timely recall of offenders to custody where the rules have been broken, the effective roll-out of drug treatment and testing orders, and so on. For that reason, I find it incomprehensible that the Government want—yet again—to bring in more changes after a relatively short period, and in this case bring in radical changes that will completely transform the whole concept and edifice of the service.
I note with interest the comment, which has already been alluded to, made by the Prime Minister in January.

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I agree with him on this point, and he rightly said that
"policy first and explanation later is not the way to do things, and this was the problem with the way the debate on university finance happened."
We are experiencing the same problem in relation to the probation service. The service is working very well and it provides a seamless service, but the Government want to tear it all up, go back to the drawing board and introduce a new system with the Prison Service. I find that unbelievable.
In light of the Prime Minister's comments and Government rhetoric over the past seven years, I find it extraordinary that there has also been no consultation whatever on the issue. If the Government thought that the system was not working, but everyone else believed it was and experience showed it was, one would have thought that at least there would have been consultation on the best practical changes that could be made—if they were warranted at all, let alone on such a scale.
I only hope that this is not a crude, cost-cutting exercise to save the Treasury money, and I trust that the Minister will address that point. It would be unforgivable if the Government were to cause so much damage to the existing regime and service simply to gain filthy lucre for the Treasury coffers.
Why has there been no consultation? I would have thought that its absence means that there has been a failure to conform to the Cabinet Office code of practice on written consultation, which, if the Minister is unaware of it, recommends that consultation should take place with key stakeholders before decisions are made and that there should be a standard 12-week consultation process. That has been totally ignored in this case, and I would like to know why.
The hon. Member for Reading, East raised the question of parliamentary scrutiny. It would seem that the proposals are being rammed through from start to finish in little more than six months, and that there will be no proper scrutiny in the House as well as no way to debate the proposals in detail when one might seek to amend, improve or, if it were the will or the House, reject them outright. That seems odd, and I would like to know why there is to be no adequate parliamentary scrutiny, save for Members raising the issue in Back-Bench debates here, or perhaps in another place.
Mrs. Cheryl Gillan: Does my hon. Friend agree that it is also rather peculiar that the measures have been rushed through so rapidly when there is the potential for legislation on the probation service? If it transpires that the changes require legislation, are we not putting the cart before the horse? There is experimentation with the entire probation service and Prison Service before the legislation has been discussed or scrutinised in this place. Is that not incompetent government?
Mr. Burns: I wholeheartedly agree with my hon. Friend. It certainly seems that the Government are putting the cart before the horse. I was going to say that I find it peculiar that the Government are behaving in that way, but frankly, nothing that the Government do surprises me at all.
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It is also interesting to read the comments made by the Home Secretary when he launched this whizzy new scheme in January:
"I am not interested in reform for reform's sake".
That is the most extraordinary statement, because it is apparent to me and many other people who have examined these cockeyed proposals that that simply is what he is undertaking: reform for reform's sake, with little justification whatever.
If one analyses the probation service's performance in England in the last year for which figures are available 2002—one will find that its record is fairly good. It supervised 117,000 people on a criminal case load, and a further 78,000 on pre and post-jail supervision; some 60 per cent. of those on community orders completed their sentences successfully; 18 per cent. of orders were breached because of new offences; a further 10 per cent. of people failed to comply with the conditions of their order; and another 8 per cent. of orders were terminated due to good progress. The statistics also show that 90 per cent. of those placed on licence or parole completed their period of supervision successfully. I will not go through the entire list of achievements, but it shows how the probation service has carried out its duties efficiently and effectively.
I will not claim—I suspect that no one in this Chamber would—that everything is fine and that there is no scope for considering, or indeed need to do so, ways of making improvements and necessary changes that would make the performance and the service even better. However, my basic point is that I do not agree with the wholesale tearing up of the existing regime, merging it and bringing in a new system in little more than six months with no scrutiny or consultation with those directly affected. Those people are worried. They are also fearful for their job security and about whether the service is going to be subject to—to use that extraordinary new word—"contestability", which I think is a polite term for potential privatisation.
All those factors are causing confusion. They are demoralising members of the probation service and making their job more difficult. That is wrong. I would like the Government to extend the time scale that they have set, so that they can consult the probation service and other interested parties, and, in the light of those consultations, be prepared to make changes to what they seek to do.
I am not confident that the Government are prepared to do that, but I see that the Minister is listening intently, so I hope that in winding up the debate he gives consideration to the concerns raised by hon. Members and shows he is prepared to go away with an open mind and have a long, hard think about what his Government and Department are proposing. I think that the proposals are wrong and that they will do more harm than good.
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Mr. Neil Gerrard: I will try to be brief, because I had the opportunity to speak in a debate on the National Offender Management Service not long ago. Many things have moved on since then, however, and I hope that the Minister will be able to address them.

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Last week, I was involved, with about 1,200 probation officers from throughout the country, in a lobby of Parliament. After the last debate that we had on NOMS, I received letters from probation officers throughout the country, echoing many of the concerns that had been raised. Something that came across to me clearly in speaking to probation officers last week was a degree of demoralisation. People feel extremely insecure about their future, and there is a danger that we will lose experienced staff who have been in the service for a long time.
It is difficult to think how the probation service will be able to recruit, train and retain staff if it is going to be a year until the final arrangements are in place. The degree of uncertainty is a serious problem. Change is happening at national and regional level, but many people have little clear idea where it is going.
I tabled an early-day motion on the subject, which has received more than 100 signatures from across the House. That shows the concern that many Members feel about what is happening. I suspect that many people who signed that early-day motion did so because they believe that they need to know more, and there has not been enough discussion of the changes in Parliament.
I shall concentrate most of my remarks on the latest Home Office paper, issued by Martin Narey on 10 May, which asked for responses by 11 June. The paper talks about being driven by the legislative timetable, but—I am sure that the Minister will correct me if I am wrong—my understanding is that there is no need for legislation on reorganising service delivery. If the Home Office wanted to change the structures of the probation service and the Prison Service, or to put them together, it would not need legislation to do so.
Legislation is required to deal with some of the management structures, such as probation boards. The abolition of probation boards will be one of the key features of any future legislation; I am not clear what else might be included. We do not necessarily need legislation to deal with some of the structures on the ground.
The implication of what is happening is that by the time we get to debate a Bill, which may be later this year, with a Second Reading in the new Session of Parliament, in November or December, we will have reached a point at which, whatever has happened to the structures on the ground, the regional management structures will already be in place. People will have been appointed as regional offender managers and someone will have been appointed as the national offender manager. We will have a management structure that does not fit with what has been happening, and Parliament will be presented with a fait accompli. I suspect that many Members of this House will not be too pleased about that. Whatever they feel about the Bill, they will be being asked to endorse something that has effectively already happened.
The paper asks for responses to quite a number of questions, and some of those raise even more questions. The structure shows a purchaser-provider split. The whole of the Prison Service is in the provider part, but a 70–30 split is proposed for current probation officers. Roughly 70 per cent. would go into the purchaser side,
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and about 30 per cent. would be on the provider side, although the purchaser side as it stands would include things such as human resources, finance and back-office support. I have seen comments suggesting that people in those parts of the service, at least, have no guarantees that they will remain on the purchaser side for ever.
I can certainly see the worries for people who think that they may end up on the provider side. Who will they compete with, and on what terms? Might we not even end up with competition between some of the people on that side, who all now work in the public service? For instance, some of the people who are now in the Prison Service might want to put in bids to do what is currently regarded as probation service work.
One of the things that I learnt from dealing with compulsory competitive tendering—and in this case, we are dealing with something much more complex and difficult than a local authority converting to CCT—is that the exercise of drawing up specifications and writing contracts is not neutral. The terms and conditions in contracts, and the specifications, have an enormous effect on who can bid for those contracts and win them. The areas covered, the geographical areas and the size of the contract can all have an enormous impact on who can win the contract. There is also the question of whether the contract is written in a way that makes it possible for in-house staff to bid and successfully win it.
People have been asked for views about the liaison arrangements below the regional tier, how work is carried out with local authorities, and the structures that currently exist. Questions about what should be happening at local and regional level should be answered in the paper, not asked.
We all accept that more needs to be done, although much progress has been made in the probation service. I ask the Minister to think again about the pace of what is happening, the level of consultation, the worries of staff, and parliamentary scrutiny.
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Mr. Elfyn Llwyd: The hon. Member for Reading, East (Jane Griffiths), whom I congratulate on securing time for this important debate, referred to contestability. The process is, of course, privatisation by other means. One must ask, for example: who will be the probation officers' employer in the long term? What will probation officers be called—"punishment officers"? What safeguards will there be to protect their terms and conditions? We already face a severe recruitment crisis: more people are leaving than joining the service, and there are 1,000 vacancies. What impact will that have?
There is no doubt that the service is currently underfunded, under-resourced and, as we know, was ordered to give back 2 per cent. of its budget to the central directorate last year. It must pay its fines when targets are missed from an ever decreasing budget. For example, 37 services paid £4.3 million in fines for missed targets last year. That is not a criticism of those at the coal face; there are simply too few people doing too much work with too few resources. Some pretty ridiculous targets are now being imposed on the service. The work load has increased by 30 per cent. in the last 10 years. Probation officers no longer have time to rehabilitate people, and in many cases, supervision is an administrative process of getting people to sign a book.

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This will be the end of the probation service as we know it. The ties with communities, which have always been recognised as essential to a successful probation service, are going. Local probation boards play a key role in representing local communities, particularly ethnic minority groups. The proposed regional and central structure would jeopardise such contact—and it certainly does not appear to be in line with what the Prime Minister said at a recent summit on public services organised by The Guardian:
"Our strategy for continuous improvements through giving power to people involves greater choice, greater voice and more personalised services. But there is one more key element. As you will know, public services are a partnership. Parents are key partners in the education of their children. The co-operation of local communities is vital in tackling crime and anti-social behaviour."
Under the new arrangement, there will be 10 regional offender managers, purchasing prison places and community supervision from a range of public, private and voluntary providers. It is difficult to envisage how that would work in practice. Many tasks undertaken by the probation service, such as public protection panels, are multi-agency, and could not be the subject of tendering and competition.
The National Association of Probation Officers—I am pleased to say that I took part in its lobby last week—is firmly of the view that such privatisation will be disastrous. Individuals will be forced to compete for their own jobs if it is felt that they are under-achieving against a recently imposed target.
Private sector involvement in the probation service has not been very successful hitherto. In 2002, the national probation directorate privatised hostel facilities, including cooks, cleaners and maintenance staff. The contract was awarded to Morrisons and costs rose subsequently by an average of 62 per cent. In 2003, the directorate decided to privatise the management and maintenance of probation premises, which led to an immediate rise in costs of 35 per cent. Both privatised projects have been characterised by a fall in service standards, and staff in hostels have reported a catalogue of problems, including numerous complaints about standards in kitchens.
I shall cite some examples. A Brighton hostel was forced to call in environmental health officers because of the state of the kitchen. There had been no full-time cook for a long time, and when one was eventually supplied, there was no food, so the area manager, who is based in Peterborough, had to buy food at a local supermarket and deliver it to the hostel. In a hostel in Sheffield, there was no regular cleaner for 12 weeks. A London hostel needed a boiler switching on, and Morrisons sent a carpenter from Portsmouth. In contrast, one of the Sheffield hostels needed its roof mending and a boiler man was sent. A call-out from a hostel in Newcastle resulted in a contractor travelling from Chester to mend a broken toilet. If all that were not so serious, it would be an absolute farce.
In principle, the National Association of Probation Officers believes that profits should not be made from the administration of incarceration or of the justice process, and I entirely agree. NAPO believes that there is an overwhelming case for keeping the service public, and I fully support that. The Government's own document, "Reducing Crime—Changing Lives", which
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has already been referred to, praises many of the achievements of the service. I shall not go through them all, because they have already been mentioned. Indeed, I shall now draw my remarks to a close, because of the number of hon. Members who wish to speak—but I will finish by saying something that has been said many times before, in various Chambers and various debates, which I believe is germane to this debate: "If it ain't broke, why fix it?"
2.40 pm
Mrs. Helen Clark: This is the third time that I have spoken recently on this subject. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Reading, East (Jane Griffiths) on securing the debate. As has become clear today, there is a great deal of cross-party concern about the Government's proposals, the way in which they have been introduced, their likely effects on the management of offenders and on the morale, pay and conditions of service of staff in the Prison Service and probation service.
I am glad to have this further opportunity to speak on the matter, and I hope that the Government are listening. The National Offender Management Service proposals should not have had to be debated in Adjournment debates. They should have been given proper parliamentary time and scrutiny. NOMS will take over the employment of thousands of people and will also take over a large part of the criminal justice system. One would expect that parliamentary debate on such a matter should depend on more than a tombola or lucky draw.
In the Adjournment debate on this matter in March, the Minister promised inclusiveness for staff delivering the new service. He said:
"I want staff representation on the board."
He added:
"There will be full negotiation with the relevant trade unions and staff if there are to be any changes to staff's terms and conditions."
He also reassured those concerned about the speed of implementation by saying:
"It will take at least five years from the implementation of the national offender management service on 1 June for the new system to be fully operational."—[Official Report, Westminster Hall, 17 March 2004; Vol. 419, c. 92–3WH.]
As I said last week at the rally organised excellently by the National Association of Probation Officers, it is better for there to be some representation and consultation than none at all, better to have the promise of negotiation than to have none, and better for there to be a slow implementation than an unrealistically rapid one. However, we should not be starting from that point. It is the wrong way round: there should have been full consultation first. The consultation is not about whether the new organisation is a good idea, or whether the structure is likely to be able to deliver. It is about implementation of decisions that have already been taken. These changes will occur on top of earlier changes that have barely settled in.
I should like to know how much of the next five years will be spent in sorting out the inevitable mistakes and muddles. That is not just pessimism, bad-mouthing or mealy-mouthing; my view is based on experience of another ill-thought-out, hastily introduced, over-

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centralised system of which I have had much experience in my Peterborough constituency. That system was also introduced by the Home Office, and hon. Members will not be surprised when I say that I am referring to the National Asylum Support Service.
NASS is operated from Whitehall, has no regional structure, let alone front-line staff and, for the first two years of its life, it had inadequate resources. Its introduction caused huge problems for local authorities and voluntary organisations in the areas to which asylum seekers were allocated and much hardship and misery for the individuals themselves.
I had to introduce two Adjournment debates before we began to achieve any recognition of the reality of the situation on the ground—on the front line where people work or attempt to access the service. It therefore makes me especially sad and angry that we seem to be going down exactly the same road with NOMS. There has been a similar reaction in haste and, sadly, there will probably be similar repenting at leisure.
In the earlier debate, examples were cited by hon. Members of other new organisations and services that were set up without adequate consultation and planning and that have also run into serious difficulties. Reference was made to the Criminal Records Bureau, and the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service. The question must be asked: why are changes being introduced in this way?
I believe that we all share the avowed aims of the NOMS reorganisation, which is to reduce reoffending. However, to paraphrase the Minister in the earlier debate, unless it is done correctly, it will simply involve rearranging the furniture. Certainly it will not be done correctly without adequate resourcing.
All the concerns mentioned so far would be enough without those raised by the proposed privatisation. I will not go over ground covered by other hon. Members but I certainly agree with the comments made in the earlier debate by my hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell). He said that
"profits should not be made from incarcerating people"
I also share his concerns about the effects on probation hostels, particularly given the high proportion of sex offenders in such hostels. He said that
"we are worried that a market is being introduced, and it is difficult to envisage how it will work. Many tasks undertaken by the services are already multi-agency—for example, public protection panels".—[Official Report, Westminster Hall, 17 March 2004; Vol. 419, c. 80–1WH.]
Only yesterday, I was here in this Chamber debating the issue of sex offenders in such hostels. I was extremely heartened by the Minister's response. Surely if public confidence is to be maintained in the service, it must be retained in the public sector. The tasks undertaken by MAPPs should not be the subject of tendering and competition. Yesterday, the Minister said that he had noted the concerns expressed by my hon. Friend the Member for Reading, East and by me about the connection between sex offenders in probation hostels and the proposed National Offender Management Service and was looking forward to further discussions about the wider issues. My remarks today have been necessarily brief, but I hope that the Minister will be able to include those matters in his response.
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Mr. Hilton Dawson: I will aim to keep to six minutes. I am grateful for the chance to take part in this debate and I compliment my hon. Friend the Member for Reading, East (Jane Griffiths) on the way she has supported her constituents. She has plainly done that very well. I also wish to support my constituents today, and not just because they are constituents. A number of probation officers whom I have met are ex-colleagues. One or two are friends. I have told those friends—and I say to some hon. Friends today—that a great many of the proposals in "Reducing Crime—Changing Lives" are excellent and should be followed through.
We clearly have a long way to go in the management of offenders in this country. We have a severe problem with the large number of people incarcerated in prison. The figure was 74,000 in December. There is also a huge recidivism rate. We have real problems with the coordination of services between prison custody and the community. We need to manage successfully some very dangerous, difficult and troubled people in the community if we are to keep our communities safe. There are growing pressures on the services. It is a positive step to aim to join up the Prison Service with the community service.
I disagree with the Government over many aspects of youth justice policy, but I am pleased with the developments that have been made over the sentencing of adults. Innovations such as custody minus and custody plus will be extremely helpful. Drug treatment and testing orders are vital and need to be developed further. Drug treatment is another very important aspect of work that needs to be integrated between the Prison Service and the community service. We also must ensure that people in prison who need help with improving basic skills, housing, mentoring and employment get co-ordinated support when they go back into the community.
Multi-agency public protection has already been mentioned. Again that is a crucial area, and I know that you have a personal interest in the subject, Mr. Deputy Speaker. We must recognise that the treatment of sex offenders is a crucial child protection issue. We need a network of treatment centres across the country and effective liaison with health agencies to deal with sex offending. We must view protection from sex offenders as vital public health and public protection matters. There are huge issues to be addressed, arid they can be addressed only in an integrated way.
I have no real qualms about what other people have referred to as privatisation. This is not about privatisation. I approve of the commissioning structure that has been put in place and the regional structure that is being established. They should result in services being developed in local communities that meet the needs of those communities.
Mrs. Gillan: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Dawson: No, I am sorry. I would love to debate the matter further but I just do not have time.
My constituents have raised legitimate concerns about resources and the ethos of the probation service, which must be developed. The probation service needs

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to change, but its ethos is being lost within the ethos of the larger Prison Service, which certainly needs to change as well. A great deal of work has been done to develop the national probation service, and people are concerned that the effort that has gone into that may be lost. There are huge concerns about bureaucracy and legitimate concerns about the pay and conditions of staff. I regret to say to my hon. Friend the Minister that the light bulb nonsense occurs in Lancaster as well; that is not simply an apocryphal tale.
My hon. Friend the Minister and the Government must involve the dedicated, experienced staff in the process of change far more effectively than at present. They should be allowed to inform and enrich the process. By building on what is in "Reducing Crime—Changing Lives" and with the full involvement of the people on the ground who know what they are doing, we can have a much better service that really addresses the serious issues.
2.53 pm
Julie Morgan: Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for calling me to speak. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Reading, East (Jane Griffiths) on obtaining this debate. I, too, have had the opportunity recently to speak twice on the proposals, and this is a chance to raise again some questions that have not yet been answered. I hope that they will be answered to allay the anxiety of the vast number of probation officers who came to Westminster last week to attend the rally in Methodist central hall. There is a mood of depression among probation officers because their future is so uncertain.
My hon. Friend mentioned the fact that the reorganisation is taking place so soon after a previous one. Does my hon. Friend the Minister consider the 2001 reorganisation a mistake? I do not believe that there has been any evaluation of it.
My second concern is over local accountability. Unlike my hon. Friend the Member for Lancaster and Wyre (Mr. Dawson), I have grave concerns about the reorganisation and the proposed structure. I was a member of the South Glamorgan probation committee. I know how many people from the community were involved when I was on that committee and that the South Wales board brings local accountability to the service in the area. It is particularly good—this has already been mentioned—at ensuring that ethnic minority voices are heard on it, which is a major part of delivering a criminal justice system.
I understand that Wales will be one of 10 regions, and I assume that one board will cover Wales. Will the Minister give more details about the position in Wales? I would be concerned if there were no smaller bodies providing local accountability. If we are to get rid of local probation boards, as is implied, how will one probation board covering the whole of Wales link into the different communities represented throughout Wales? There are specific issues relating to rural communities, Welsh-speaking communities and urban areas, such as my constituency. How will one board address those issues? Will there be structures below that board in which local people can be involved? It is important to hear answers to those questions.
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Social services departments are managed at a local level, as are links with employees and housing departments—it is important for offenders to get good supported accommodation. How will those local links be developed? Some links have been built up over many years and it is important to ensure that the offender is dealt with in their community, because that is where they will live. Even if an offender receives a prison sentence, they will eventually end up in their local community. It is essential that structures enable work to happen in and with that community.
One aim of the reorganisation is to reduce the prison population, and I completely agree with that. There are many people in prison who should not be there. My hon. Friend the Member for Lancaster and Wyre said that the prison population is 75,000 and rising rapidly. I am concerned that the number of women in prison is rising enormously, because that means misery for families. According to a recent statistic, only 5 per cent. of children whose mother goes to prison stay in their own home. Issues of inappropriate sentencing must be tackled. We should tackle the huge size of the prison population through sentencing policy; that is the way to reduce prison numbers. In particular, we must tackle the issue of female offenders, and I am pleased that some probation programmes are designed particularly for them.
Will the Minister give us more information on the introduction of contestability? Staff in the service who have approached me are concerned that contestability may apply to accredited programmes, such as drink-driving programmes, sex offender programmes and the thinking skills programmes, which are running well in the South Wales and Gwent probation services. Drug treatment and testing orders are effective and above the Home Office targets.
Another concern among probation officers is that low-risk offenders may come under contestability. In the probation service, low-risk offenders can be transferred between probation officers, dependent on the qualifications of the officers. More experienced officers can take on low-risk offenders who become a higher risk. How could we deal with that under contestability?
Concern has also been expressed that resettlement units could be open to contestability. Some of my constituents work in the neighbouring Gwent probation service and they tell me it is meeting 100 per cent. of the Home Office resettlement targets. Staff work from the time of the custodial sentence until release—working closely with the Prison Service, taking part in reviews in prison and considering treatment programmes. They believe that they are effective in protecting the public when the offender is released, and they often deal with high-risk offenders. Probation officers are very concerned about the work they do, which is already of such a high standard in parts of the country, but the way in which the proposed reorganisation has been handled so far has caused them to be undermined—they have not been part of the debate or the proposals.
I hope that we can move forward and that my hon. Friend the Minister gives us some reassurance that the good work in the probation service will not be undermined, but can be part of the forward programme. I hope also that we tackle the real, hard problem of prison overcrowding and other issues as soon as we can.
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Mr. David Heath: I congratulate the hon. Member for Reading, East (Jane Griffiths) on securing the debate. As has been pointed out, it has similarities with the 17 March debate, which was initiated by the hon. Member for Walthamstow (Mr. Gerrard). Many of the same cast are present, and you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, were in the Chair. It is tempting, therefore, simply to refer people to the speeches made then, as little has changed.
The Minister said:
"Ten minutes is not a long time in which to respond to all the questions that have been asked…I will write to all hon. Members who have participated in today's debate." —
I have not received a letter yet, but he is an assiduous Minister, so I am sure that one is on the way to answer the points that were raised. If 10 minutes is not a long time in which to answer questions, nine minutes is probably not a long time in which to ask them, so we must rely on the postal service eventually coming up with some answers.
Since that debate, there has been the mass lobby of Parliament by probation officers, which was effective. It sometimes felt like a mass lobby by Members of Parliament, too, given the number from all parties who went across to Methodist central hall to show solidarity and express views. It was right that we did that.
The problem faced by many of us is that, as so often with the Government, they ask some of the right questions and come to some of the right conclusions, but implement the conclusions so cack-handedly that they upset the very people who asked for those things in the first instance. Any sensible person would want integration of management of offenders between probation services and the Prison Service. Any sensible person would seek to reduce our overcrowded prison population and to remove the inconsistencies in the management of offenders. However, I have referred before to the constant revolution in the Home Office. I fear that the Claudio Ranieri of the Home Office, who has to tinker with everything and take off his best players just as they are about to score a goal, has struck again—a potential crisis is developing when we should have a success.
Let us be clear: we have a crisis in the probation service now and a problem with the funding now. The hon. Member for Meirionnydd Nant Conwy (Mr. Llwyd) referred to the point on the fines system that I think I made in the previous debate. What nonsense it is to introduce a target system that reduces the effectiveness of the service one is trying to improve.
First, let us deal with the crisis in the probation service. Secondly, let us not try to airbrush the probation service out of existence or out of history. The probation service is one of the achievements of the first great radical Government of the 20th century, led by Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman. I shall stick up for Sir Henry and his achievements, because the Probation of Offenders Act 1907 created something of enormous value. When I read that we are no longer to have probation officers, but will have public sector
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intervention staff, my heart drops. We had a public service intervention in the main Chamber earlier today. That is not what we are looking for; we are looking for good, experienced and professional probation officers, doing their job effectively.
Mrs. Gillan: I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman has noticed that we now have a director of public service interventions, which shortens to DIPSI.
Mr. Heath: The hon. Lady knows that acronyms are proliferating in this area, and people are now calling probation service officers "GNOMES". That does no one any good, so let us have a bit of dignity and common sense.
We have a process of change that is remarkable only for its rapidity. As has already been pointed out, we have had two reviews—"A New Choreography" followed by "Metamorphosis". I have said this before and will say it again, but my memory of O-level biology is sound, and metamorphosis usually starts with something fairly ugly turning into something fairly beautiful. In this case, there is a great concern that something rather beautiful—the probation service—may turn into something rather ugly. We must prevent that from happening.
There is also a lot of open-endedness and uncertainty. The Minister can still not respond to questions put to him, either in debate or as written questions, with anything other than, "It has not yet been decided." So much has not been decided, but the whole process is proceeding at pace. I say "at pace"; some institutional and organisational changes are happening at pace, but in the 17 March debate he said:
"It will take at lease five years from the implementation…on 1 June for the new system to be fully operational." —[Official Report, Westminster Hall, 17 March 2004; Vol. 419, c. 90–92WH.]
What does that mean? How can we change to a new organisational system when operability will not be effective for another five yeas? Where is, to use a cant phrase, the road map for the transition? Was that not developed before the Government went ahead with the changes? It seems not, because change is proceeding without direction, and that worries me.
We also have the issue of contestability. There must be someone in the Government, probably in the Cabinet Office or No. 10, who searches the dictionary of synonyms for different words for privatisation. Every now and again, they must come up with a new one and run into the office, jumping with joy, to say that they have found another way to persuade Labour Back Benchers that what the Government are doing is not privatisation by another name, but a completely different process. However, that is what contestability and the purchaser-provider split is all about, and we know the effects that privatisation has on public services. Sometimes there are elements of benefit, but more often than not it simply creates people who run around trying to produce contracts that do not work and effectively hands over public services to the private sector with no advantage to service operation.
Mr. Dawson: The probation service has a fine history of working with voluntary organisations. Will contestability not cement that and allow better and more innovative developments from voluntary organisations?
Mr. Heath: If it did, I would be happy, but if that is happening already, why do we need a new system to cement it? I am sorry, but I do not understand the hon. Gentleman's argument.
I want the Minister to respond to this point, because he did not in the previous debate. What is this nonsense about the regional basis? We have it in his written answer that the supervision of offenders
"is best managed at regional level where effective links can be forged and joint strategies developed with complementary services including police, health, education and employment."—[Official Report, 9 February 2004; Vol. 417, c. 1269W.]
However, our police service is operating on the basis of police authority areas, our education service is operating on the basis of local education authority areas and our health service is operating on the basis of primary care trust areas. None operates on a regional basis, so where is the advantage in forging joint strategies within a regional structure to which none of the complementary services works? The Minister needs to explain what he means.
We need a debate on the proposals. They are far too serious to be discussed in Back-Bench debates or responses to statements. They are a serious issue for the management of offenders. There should be two objectives: to reduce reoffending and to protect the public. My concern about the proposals and how they have been introduced is that there is a real danger of losing the professionalism, enthusiasm, commitment and unique skills of probation officers, which many of us believe to be extraordinarily valuable in our communities. It would be a tragedy if all that were thrown away to pursue—too quickly and without direction—a process of change for its own sake. There can be a sensible objective and strategy, but the Government have not yet produced that.
3.10 pm
Mrs. Cheryl Gillan: I start by congratulating the hon. Member for Reading, East (Jane Griffiths) on securing the debate. It gives us an opportunity, once again, to spend a little time considering what are gargantuan proposals to change the probation service, the Prison Service and the way in which they operate. I also congratulate the Minister, because he is, at least, staying in his post, and has been in it for longer than the average prisons Minister. I hope that we get continuity at ministerial level, so that he can deal with the problems.
There is a unique point about this debate and the last one: almost all the speeches—irrespective of the political platform of the Members giving them—have been interchangeable, so I make a serious request to the Minister to listen hard to what we are all saying. There is a theme running through every presentation that has been made to him—whether informal or formal in the form of an Adjournment debate—and it points in one direction: stop, think and slow down.
The lobby that stimulated the debate was one that we all participated in. I was delighted to be invited to speak from the platform, because I think that I became one of
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the first Conservative MPs to speak to such a meeting for about 20 years—I believe since Willie Whitelaw last addressed one. As somebody close to the Minister said, I was conscious of my position in history. I was also pleased to share a platform with Tony Benn. It is unusual for him and me to see eye to eye, but that again shows, as I hope the Minister understands, that there is a meeting of minds among those on the other side of the fence to him.
I was also delighted when members of Buckinghamshire probation service came up to lobby me. Despite speaking at the lobby, they came into the House of Commons and, in a meeting room below Westminster Hall, I listened at first hand to their concerns, and concerns there are. To introduce the National Offender Management Service with such indecent haste is, I believe, causing concern, whether in the Prison Service, the judiciary, the voluntary sector or the myriad other organisations that are involved in this complex part of our life in this country.
Indeed, the 10 regions, as well as the managers who are in the process of being recruited, are, structurally, causing concern among the people who will have to operate in them. The hon. Member for Lancaster and Wyre (Mr. Dawson) would not let me intervene when he was discussing the local nature of the probation service. I cannot see why 10 regions are better than 42 boards. It seems to me that that means taking the service further from the community, rather than bringing it closer, which is what he argued for.
That phenomenal change will affect thousands of prison officers and myriad voluntary organisations, as well as the private companies that run some prisons. It will affect more than 75,000 prisoners whom the Minister has incarcerated, leave alone the 18,000 probation staff and—give or take 10,000 or 20,000—the 250,000 people who go through the probation service every year. We are talking about not a small constituency, but a very large one.
The budget for that organisation is enormous—it will be some £3 billion—and one man, Martin Narey, will handle it all. He has been put in place and appointed, although I do not believe that there was any contestability for that post. I will let the Minister intervene to correct me if it was advertised, but I do not believe it was. Some appointment mechanism was used and Mr. Narey will be in charge of £3 billion of taxpayers' money being spent on an area that is of great importance to every citizen of this country because it involves public protection. This is about protecting my constituents and those of every Member from criminals.
I am very worried that we have someone in place to run a £3 billion budget who has not been recruited in the same way as the managers of the 10 regions. Their positions have been advertised—put out to competitive tender. I ask the Minister to clarify at some stage the qualifications and expertise that Mr. Narey brings to managing an enormous £3 billion budget.
There is only a very short time in which to raise important issues, and the way in which the National Offender Management Service has been implemented is undermining morale tremendously. The latest letter from Mr. Narey contributes to that. The Minister knows about the 7 May letter, which requires responses

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by 11 June—a point to which other speakers have alluded. I read it quite carefully and there are points that I would like him to address. The document says:
"Martin Narey, the Chief Executive of NOMS will be accountable to Ministers for reducing re-offending and delivering other agreed outcomes from NOMS, including the preservation of security, order, control and decency in all prisons."
"Including" and "delivering other outcomes" lead me to form the impression that Mr. Narey has other targets already set by the Minister, so I would like him to set those out, over and above reducing re-offending and preserving security, order, control and decency.
Mr. Narey, the document continues,
"will also ensure that there is increased contestability in the provision of correctional services."
One of his aims and objectives is without doubt to ensure that there is much more contestability. How much more? In what areas? When will contestability kick in? Can we have more explanation of the language in the document?
The document goes on:
"The Chief Executive will also be responsible for raising the public profile and reputation of NOMS".
We do not need to raise its public profile much higher for the simple reason that everybody is worried stiff about what will happen to NOMS. As far as protecting its reputation goes, that has already been damaged, and I want to know the Minister's proposals to ensure that we restore the reputations of our first-class probation service and Prison Service, which are rapidly going downhill.
The next paragraph of the document says:
"Within the Service there will be a National Offender Manager…reporting directly to the Chief Executive, who will be responsible for the target to reduce re-offending and have control of the total budget for managing offenders."
Exactly how much of the £3 billion budget will the national offender manager be responsible for, or is responsibility for the budget in fact passing from Mr. Narey down to the national offender manager?
Some responses to the questions in the consultation paper are ridiculously short, which shows just what chaos the Minister is in. The questions address not only the fact that the Government do not know what to call the organisation—public sector interventions are not the DIPSI to which I referred in my intervention on the hon. Member for Somerton and Frome (Mr. Heath). More frighteningly, the consultation asks:
"Does the model provide a rational and cost effective means of delivering the NOMS reforms while reducing bureaucracy?"
As the Minister is introducing NOMS on 1 June, the Department should have discussed, examined and consulted on that already.
The lack of consultation, the shortness of time and the urgency with which the paper was sent out are all indicators of chaos, and uncertainty is felt across the board. This is a very serious matter because the public must have confidence in the Home Office, but it is fast ebbing away. Articles in the newspapers have reflected that feeling in the probation service.The Guardian article to which the hon. Member for Meirionnydd Nant Conwy (Mr. Llwyd) referred was headed, "Staff use one word to describe the service: 'Chaos'".
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I appeal to the Minister to consider the timing and to rethink the passage of the proposals. It is obvious from the covering letter that legislation is expected, because Mr. Narey said that he was working to a legislative timetable. That means that the Minister is pushing him for short deadlines because he knows that measures on changes to the probation service are proposed.
I ask the Minister to come clean now. Tell us when the legislation is coming and when we will have the opportunity to discuss it, or say that there will be a rethink or even pilot studies in one or two areas, rather than bringing in the proposals across the country and creating more chaos.
3.21 pm
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Paul Goggins): I join other hon. Members in congratulating my hon. Friend the Member for Reading, East (Jane Griffiths) on securing the debate. This is another valuable opportunity to underline the important work undertaken by the probation service and to update the House on our progress towards implementing the National Offender Management Service.
We have heard an impressive mixture of passion, well-informed opinion and experience this afternoon. I do not want to try the patience of the hon. Member for Somerton and Frome (Mr. Heath), but I apologise for not writing to him after the last debate. If, as I suspect, I will need to write to hon. Members after this debate, I shall ensure that everyone's questions are answered fully.
Yesterday, we debated the role of approved hostels and discussed the success of the multi-agency public protection panels in assessing and minimising the risks posed by violent and sexual offenders. Probation staff are central to our strategies for crime reduction and public protection. Rather than making cuts to the budgets of the correctional services, this year the Government will spend some £900 million more in real terms on correctional services than in 1997. That is helping—
Mr. Burns: Is that prisons?
Paul Goggins: In response to that sedentary intervention, the total for all correctional services—prisons and probation—is £900 million more in real terms, leading to the employment of an additional 5,000 staff in the probation service compared with 1997.
Despite that increased investment, and the dedicated hard work and professionalism of probation staff, far too many offenders continue to be sent to prison for short periods in circumstances where a community sentence would be much more appropriate and effective. However, the reduction in reoffending rates is not what it should be for the £3.5 billion that we spent on correctional services in the current year. We need to do better.
A single National Offender Management Service is needed to ensure better links between those providing services and to help to rebalance the system so that those who commit the most serious crimes are in prison while less serious offenders are dealt with in the community.

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Probation has done much already to build up the credibility of community sentences through a range of new programmes and an increasingly rigorous approach to enforcement, of which my hon. Friend the Member for Reading, East gave evidence from her constituency. Almost from a standing start, 9,000 drug treatment and testing orders were delivered last year, and we expect that 13,000 will be given out this year. The intensive control-and-change programme, piloted in 11 areas, will be extended further this year, leading to a full roll-out across the country.
Probation is an expanding service that plans to recruit a further 2,600 staff in the next two years to help to build up the capacity to respond to the new sentences in the Criminal Justice Act 2003. It is worth pointing out that Patrick Carter estimates in his careful analysis of correctional services that, if we rebalance the system, we will be dealing with 240,000 people under supervision in the community by the end of the decade. That is 60,000 more than are currently managed, So there will be no shortage of business.
I am able to set out with some confidence in this Chamber the details of the Government's past investment and their intentions for the future. However, like hon. Members who have participated in the debate, I also visit local probation areas—indeed, I have done so across the country in recent months—and am aware of the financial pressures on the service. As I meet the staff, I see the difference that they make. It is absolutely essential that we keep up the momentum of the improvements they are making.
As a result of those visits, I contacted Martin Narey, chief executive of NOMS, who was appointed to his new job by the Home Secretary. He was previously commissioner for corrections and has effectively managed the £2.5 billion Prison Service budget. I asked him to review the correctional services budget to determine what additional help could be found, and I am pleased to announce this afternoon measures that will give immediate additional financial help to the service, particularly front-line staff.
I am announcing an extra £16.1 million for front-line services in the current financial year There will be an additional 1 per cent. for all areas and an average increase of 1.5 per cent. for the metropolitan areas, in effect restoring part of the metropolitan allowance that had been removed. Provided an action plan is produced
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that can deliver the service improvements that are still needed, the London probation area will receive an extra £2.3 million.
Mr. Burns: Will the Minister give way?
Paul Goggins: I must make progress. I need to say a few things before I move on to questions that have been asked.
The increase will be in addition to the £1.3 million share of the extra metropolitan allowance—enough to clear the outstanding deficit for the year. I want to make it clear that that offer to London is a "something for something" settlement.
Mrs. Gillan: Will the Minister confirm that last year the Treasury clawed back £10.2 million from the budgets and that 37 areas missed their targets and were fined £4.3 million? He is giving back what he took away.
Paul Goggins: I ask the hon. Lady and other hon. Members to take this absolutely at face value. I have listened to descriptions of the pressures on probation staff as I have gone around the country and I am responding by announcing a package worth an additional £16.1 million. I hope that it will be seen as another indication of how the Government invest in rather than reduce support for the probation service. The debate will finish shortly, so I must make progress.
The Government are keen to continue communication and debate with hon. Members and with the staff and trade unions. So far, there have been seven regional events on the development of NOMS, which were attended by 1,500 front-line staff. We will continue to make such sessions available. I hope that all who represent work force interests and whom I have invited on to the National Offender Management Board take their place on it. All the responses so far have been positive. That, too, will help communications.
I could comment on many other points, but let me say that the consultation document has gone out. It is in the Library, and I am glad that hon. Members have taken the opportunity to study it. The closing date was set for 11 June, and it would be helpful if replies were submitted by then, if possible, but I make it clear that if any interested party wants to make a contribution but is not able to do so by that date, we will listen to and include in the formal consultation any contribution made up to the end of June.
It is vital that we listen; I am committed to that. I say again to my hon. Friend the Member for Reading, East and to other hon. Members that if there is a need for legislation, there will of course be the normal full parliamentary scrutiny. If there is a change in the organisational structure and we remove local area boards, primary legislation will be needed.

Teenage Pregnancy
3.30 pm
Mr. Andrew Love: This debate follows a Westminster Hall debate on teenage pregnancy in July 2003, at which my hon. Friend the Minister was present. At that time I brought to the Minister's attention increasing levels of teenage pregnancy in areas such as my outer London constituency of Edmonton. It is a critical matter, as we are daily reminded of the terrible cycle of poverty trickling down the generations, and of the fact that many young women become pregnant between the ages of 14 and 18, often failing as a result, to reach their full potential.
There is a young girl in my constituency, aged 18, living on the 10th floor of a tower block with her baby daughter who has special needs and requires weekly treatment at Great Ormond Street hospital for sick children. She previously had a baby who died. She finds budgeting difficult and has often been in serious debt. She requires support with life skills and the care of her baby, and needs bereavement support to deal with her depression.
Another young woman is aged 17 and lives with her grandparents and extended family. Her mother has a long-standing history of drug and alcohol abuse. That young woman is expecting a child and is determined to provide for that child what her mother could not give her.
How do we persuade such teenagers to heed warnings about under-age sex and the dangers of unplanned pregnancy? It is not an easy issue to tackle, but we must find new and creative solutions, however difficult it may be. That is especially true where unplanned pregnancy is still increasing, as it is in many parts of London. The 1999 social exclusion unit report on teenage pregnancy, describing the scale of the problem, reported that
"there are nearly 90,000 conceptions a year to teenagers; around 7,700 to girls under 16 and 2,200 to girls 14 or under. Roughly three-fifths of conceptions—56,000—result in live births. Although more than two thirds of under 16s do not have sex and most teenage girls reach their twenties without getting pregnant, the UK has teenage birth rates which are twice as high as in Germany, three times as high as in France and six times as high as in the Netherlands."
Although rates are higher in the USA and other comparable countries, the UK now stands out as having the highest rate of teenage births in Europe.
The social exclusion unit report also identified poverty as a contributory factor. It states that
"the risk of becoming a teenage mother is almost ten times higher for a girl whose family is in social class V…than those in social class I".
In 2004, according to the Association of London Government, almost 40 per cent. of children in inner London schools are eligible for free school meals—that is a strong indicator of poverty—compared with about 16 per cent. nationally. More than 25 per cent. of London's children live in a household where no one works, compared with 18 per cent. in the UK as a whole.
A 2004 Institute for Social and Economic Research report on teenage childbearing found that teen birth significantly increases the probability that when a woman is 30 her partner—if she has one—will have no
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education beyond the age of 16, and will be unemployed. The report argues that having a teen birth substantially reduces the probability that the woman will be a home owner at the age of 30. Depressingly, the same report found that daughters of teen mothers are more likely to become teen mothers themselves. It grimly concluded i hat the children of teen mothers have reduced chances of success in education and employment.
The campaigns officer for the Young Women's Christian Association told me that teenage pregnancy is strongly associated with educational underachievement, with having been in local authority care and with not being in education, training or work at the age of 16. In London, teenage pregnancy has soared above the national average, with the 2000 and 2002 figures showing a 40 per cent. increase in outer London boroughs such as mine in Enfield. That is why I am here today. One Enfield doctor dealt with 85 more teenage pregnancies in 2003 than in 2001. Locally, those figures have sparked deep concern. This week, the House of Commons Library was able to tell me that the Enfield rate has increased from 42 per 1,000 of the female population aged between 15 and 17 in 1998, to 56 per 1,000 in 2002. As a result, Enfield has gone from being the 98th highest local authority to the 33rd highest in the 148 authorities in England tested during that period.
Other London boroughs have also seen an increase in their rates. However, it is important to note that the under-18 conceptions across England and Wales have fallen in recent years, and continued to fall in 2002. Sadly, those improvements are not shared in my part of London.
I recognise that reducing teenage pregnancy remains a Government priority, and I welcome early signs that Government efforts to reduce teenage pregnancy rates are working, including a 10 per cent. reduction in conception rates in under-18s and an 11 per cent. reduction in under-17s. I also welcome the Minister's commitment to reducing teen births, and, more importantly, the report "Every child matters", which provides a vision of how to help every child and young person fulfil their potential. That is critically important. The Government's commitment to halving child poverty by 2010 will do much, I hope, to reduce teen birth rates. For young women in my constituency desperate to escape an environment of low expectations and life chances, such commitments cannot come soon enough.
Enfield's young people desperately need more education on sex and relationship issues. I know that because I have met young people throughout Enfield and in Haringey next door. They told me how valuable creative, accessible and young people-friendly advice services on relationships and sex can be. When I visited Exposure magazine—written for and by young people—I was told:
"experts and statisticians never include in their charts, graphs and formulas that young people are not bound by sense, logic and reason. We can choose for ourselves something we know is harmful and stupid just because we can. Young women who know about sex and contraception, get pregnant because, fully aware of the possible consequences, they are prepared to take a risk."
Jasneth, who is 18 and expecting her second child, said:
"I know about sex and all them things but sometimes you use a condom and sometimes you don't. That's just the way it is."

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It is a truism to say that young people are extremely hard to reach. They demand a much more sophisticated message on safe sex education—perhaps more so in London and inner-city areas than anywhere else. I would like to hear the Minister's comments on that.
Services such as the 4YP bus in Enfield reach out to find young people—mostly young men under 18, who are often the hardest to reach in a community—and work extremely hard to educate people with a safe sex message. Relationship education however is only one important element among many in reducing teenage pregnancy rates. London boroughs are crying out for a much more focused leadership from the primary care teams with local authority support to help drive the numbers down. Responding to a written parliamentary question in November last year, the Minister commented that much had been
"achieved through targeted work in deprived localities with high numbers of conceptions by…the allocation of funding to teenage pregnancy partnerships".—[Official Report, 3 November 2003; Vol. 412, c. 453W.]
I endorse that view. However, I draw the Minister's attention to a recent conversation I had with representatives from my local teenage pregnancy unit who told me that funding for the teen parents support programmes could run out in a few months and that a lower bid for neighbourhood renewal funding had been submitted. To put it mildly, the future is uncertain. Even if the attempt to secure funding is successful, that funding will only take the team through to 2006.
On behalf of Enfield's teenage pregnancy unit, I seek an assurance that its funding will be secure, and confirmation that it will be safeguarded beyond 2006. That would allow the team to develop longer-term solutions to Enfield's problems. Along with the primary care team and the local authority, it should be able to plan and think further ahead, instead of permanently living from hand to mouth and focusing on survival rather than strategy.
There is also a case to be made for boosting teenage pregnancy co-ordination in London, given that the record in the capital is so grim compared with other parts of the country. The Minister will be aware that although the Association of London Government is working closely with a research team from the straight talking project, who take virtual babies into schools, it does not have a full-time policy officer looking into the incidence of teen pregnancy in London, or indeed someone taking a pan-London approach. Nor does the Greater London authority, or the Mayor of London. Will the Minister consider developing the existing London co-ordinator role to provide, in particular, better help for those boroughs in which the incidence of teen pregnancy is especially high, so that local teams can seek improved guidance and support, and achieve best practice?
At a recent pan-London conference, the capital's teen pregnancy units suggested looking at improving IT systems and the collection of data generally, because at present accurate information cannot be guaranteed on a regular basis.
I have one more request: can we consider boosting best practice pilot projects so that kids can visit advice units regularly? That would be significant in helping to lock in young people's attention and focus when it
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comes to safe sex issues. More research is urgently needed to understand fully why rates are increasing in Enfield and other parts of London, and there is the particular issue of providing culturally appropriate sex and relationship education to young asylum seekers. Can the Department help to fund that sort of research?
Following my previous Westminster Hall debate, the Minister facilitated a London regional teenage pregnancy seminar in November at London university. The seminar provided an opportunity for all London co-ordinators to discuss the needs of pregnant asylum seekers and the service needs of the group. Debbie Young from Enfield produced a full report for the national teenage pregnancy unit, which highlighted issues and included recommendations from the conference. So far there has been no feedback and no details have been received on how the Department will take that agenda forward. Can the Minister indicate when feedback might be forthcoming and what the next steps will be in relation to meeting the needs of pregnant asylum seekers in London?
The Refugee Council told me this week that it is anxious for the experiences and needs of asylum seekers and refugees to be reflected in teenage pregnancy strategies. It said:
"There needs to be a greater understanding by policymakers and healthcare professionals of pregnant asylum seekers who may have been made pregnant following rape. The Government should actively consider what support could be provided for teenage asylum seeking mothers during labour and in particular consideration should be given to the provision of interpreters where the mother cannot speak English. Health workers also need to be trained to be aware of the needs of teenage asylum seekers".
Will the Minister comment on that?
Appropriate sex education is more crucial than ever, particularly in areas such as London where teen pregnancy is above the national average. I accept that abstaining will be the right choice for some young people. However, I do not accept that US-style chastity tour groups, which invite our young people to take a pledge of abstinence until marriage, are always the most sensible or coherent way of educating our young people on sex. The acid test must be their effectiveness in reducing unwanted pregnancy. The Family Planning Association told me this week that the Health Development Agency in its 2003 review found no strong evidence for the effectiveness of abstinence-based interventions. One study even found evidence that abstinence-only approaches had the opposite effect.
I welcome the two-year experiment by 104 schools in the United Kingdom that have pioneered an education scheme called added power and understanding in sex education, which, despite much tabloid flak, is a fairly conservative programme aimed at combating stereotypes that may lead teenagers to believe that early sex is something they have to engage in. Recent press reports have indicated some success and I am interested to hear the Minister's reaction to the APAUSE programme, and the benefits of such a programme in areas such as Enfield or throughout London.
Tackling the issue coherently is crucial to ensure that the vicious cycle of teenage mothers having daughters who, in turn, become teenage mothers is broken once and for all. As the Institute for Social and Economic Research report already referred to commented:
"daughters of teen mothers are more likely to become teen mothers themselves and children born to young mothers are, on average, less successful than children of other mothers."

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That is not acceptable in Enfield, or anywhere else in the UK, in the 21st century. We have to work harder, in a more coherent way to ensure that young people from all backgrounds have every opportunity to achieve their full potential.
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Frank Cook): Very briefly, Angela Watkinson.
3.46 pm
Angela Watkinson: I am grateful to the hon. Member for Edmonton (Mr. Love) for allowing me the time to make a brief contribution to the debate. Although I share his concern about teenage pregnancy, I believe that the style and content of advice on sexual health to minors is contributing to the rising numbers of unplanned teenage pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases such as chlamydia. That was brought into the spotlight last week, when we learned of a 14-year-old child who had been advised and helped to have an abortion without the knowledge of her parents. Nowhere in the reporting did I see mention of the fact that sex with a 14-year-old is illegal. The decision was made by a young health adviser that this 14-year-old child could make a rational decision in frightening circumstances. How was the competence of the adviser assessed, bearing in mind that the adviser would not have to deal with the outcome of her own advice? It was disgraceful to exclude from that decision-making process the very person who has the most direct responsibility for a child's welfare, her mother, who is now helping that child to recover from that trauma and who knows what a long-term task that might be.
Children are being force-fed information on sex masquerading as education without being given the strategies and socially acceptable boundaries to cope with it. Some 400 girls under 16 have been given hormone implants that make them infertile for three years without their parents' knowledge, and a further 2,500 have had injections to make them infertile for three months. This drastic action might help to prevent unwanted pregnancy but the cost could be more diseases and promiscuity. This is condoning sex at that age rather than trying to prevent it.
The FPA recommends the provision of nonjudgmental information on sex to primary school pupils without any of the firm personal or social guidelines that have stood the test of time such as fidelity and commitment. I am happy to report that the head teachers, governors and parents in my schools are far too sensible to make use of the graphically illustrated FPA pamphlet designed for 9 to 11-year-olds. The organisation receives £420,000 of taxpayers' money every year to run a sexual health helpline. Such information overkill, together with the easy availability of contraception, has led to a rise of 30 per cent. in sexually transmitted diseases and the highest rate of teenage pregnancies in Europe.
School children by their very nature are emotionally and physically immature. They cannot be expected to cope with the endless value-free, morally neutral information in a sensible and mature way. In particular, teenage girls cannot cope with the end of their own
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childhood, suspended education, pregnancy, childbirth and the responsibility of caring for a baby 24 hours a day without a great deal of moral, practical and financial support. The recognition of the importance of marriage, which so often seems to be overlooked, should be contained in the Department for Education and Skills guidance, as should the discouragement of precocious sexual activity and warnings about the possible outcomes of ignoring this advice. Children deserve to be protected from making unwise decisions, and I recommend to hon. Members the Youth Enquiry Service leaflet "Sex: Yes, No or Maybe", which is full of unexpected, common-sense advice.
3.50 pm
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education and Skills (Mr. Stephen Twigg): I shall take this opportunity to respond primarily to my hon. Friend the Member for Edmonton (Mr. Love), who is a fellow Enfield Member of Parliament. I shall also briefly respond to the contribution by the hon. Member for Upminster (Angela Watkinson). I shall not be tempted to go into some of the broader issues that she raised, although I shall touch on them in responding to my hon. Friend. I would certainly dispute the suggestion that what we are seeking to promote is value free and morally neutral.
What has been described as the Brunts case, after the school in Mansfield, is clearly very sensitive. None of us would have wanted to end up in the position that we ended with there. As I am sure that my hon. Friend is aware, there is guidance on confidentiality and the appropriate procedures to follow. Although it is hard for me to comment on the detail of the case—partly because I am not aware of the immediate implications—it is fair and, indeed, important to say that any health professional who is working in a school, including a school nurse, does so within the same legal framework as they would anywhere else. If a young person requests confidentiality, their request will be respected, unless there are serious child protection issues. Within that framework, there is no obligation to inform teachers or parents.
Of course, health professionals in cases involving a young teenage girl would always try to persuade her to discuss the pregnancy with her parents, and experience tells us that it is very unusual for a young person not to agree to do so. If, as appears to have happened in this instance, she does not agree and is adamant that she does not want her parents to be informed, the health professional must make a professional judgment about that young person's competence. That is a very difficult and sensitive judgment to make, but my understanding of the case is that that the professional made just such a judgment. I also understand that the police are questioning the father, and I could go into further detail, but I shall not. However, I wanted, to give the hon. Lady a response.
I want to update hon. Members on the progress that has been made since the previous debate, which my hon. Friend initiated in July 2003. As he said, our strategy on teenage pregnancy seeks to do several things. It seeks to provide information and advice so that young people have the knowledge and skills that they need to make informed choices. It also seeks to improve access to confidential advice services in young-people-centred

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locations and to support measures to remove the barriers that prevent teenage parents and their children from achieving their full potential.
The key lesson that we are learning is that there is no one-size-fits-all solution to the challenge that we face. I shall not repeat what my hon. Friend said about the context of poverty, but it appears overwhelming when we compare the chances of becoming pregnant among teenagers from poor families and richer ones.
My hon. Friend made an important point about educational achievement and access to education, and a significant part of our teenage pregnancy strategy addresses the reasons why young people, including young women, leave education and are not motivated by it at a very young age. School and college reform for 14 to 19-year-olds is important not only for educational and economic reasons but to address social challenges such as teenage pregnancy.
Our national awareness campaign and policies to strengthen sex and relationship education seek to tackle the issues of which my hon. Friend reminded us. Clearly, prevention is critical, which is why I agree with him about the central role that sex and relationship education must play in reducing conception rates. That is why we are committed to delivering the best possible sex and relationship education through personal, social and health education in our schools and why we recognise that a lot more needs to be done if teachers are to feel that they have the confidence and support to deliver. For example, we are looking at how we can train more teachers and community nurses so that they are properly qualified in this area. Last year, more than 600 additional teachers took part in the certification programme in personal, social and health education, and there is funding for up to 3,000 teachers this year. We are also launching a linked programme for community nurses, which was piloted last year. The evaluation of the pilot was positive and we are trying to build on that. We have asked the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority to develop materials that will clarify our expectations about the standards of teaching that we expect and the ways in which schools can better assess the knowledge and skills that young people gain through their sex and relationships education.
Evidence shows that young people are likely to have sex later and are more likely to use contraception if their parents talk openly with them about sex and relationships. Survey evidence shows that parents recognise the value of greater openness in such discussions with their children. An important element in the progression of the children's and young people's agenda will be addressing sex and relationships education. There are many programmes, including the time to talk initiative delivered through Parentline Plus,
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which gives information to parents who might be unsure about the best way to engage their children in discussion.
Sadly, experience shows that there will always be some young people who will become pregnant. That is why we need to focus on the support that we can give those young people, some of whom my hon. Friend powerfully described in the opening part of his speech. We must see what can be done through programmes such as the Sure Start Plus pilot, through the role of Connexions personal advisers and through the support that we can give to cover child care costs for teenage parents.
I finish by addressing the challenges that my hon. Friend put to me. If we compare 2002 with 1998, there has been a welcome 9.4 per cent. fall nationally. However, in certain parts of London, including the borough of Enfield, the trend is completely the opposite. We must look at why something works in some places but not in others. During the forthcoming months we will examine in more detail those areas in which the rates have gone up and down significantly to identify the particular factors that have led to those results and to use that information to inform the future direction of local strategies. It is critical to have a clear evaluation of what is working, what is not, and what factors lead to geographical differences in results.
With specific reference to my borough, I echo my hon. Friend's comments about the 4YP bus initiative and the Exposure magazine in Haringey. He is right to highlight the crucial role of the primary care trust in providing a solution. I assure him that I will consider the various specific issues that he raised, especially those about future funding, because we want to ensure that programmes are sustainable. I am advised that the teenage pregnancy partnership board for Enfield is trying to tackle the issues, but I will come back to him with a response.
My hon. Friend also asked about developing the London co-ordinator role, and we will consider that in the broader context of what must be done in London. He mentioned the conference held in November as a consequence of his debate last July. I understand that a report has been commissioned and is due to be published later this year. I will write to him setting out exactly what the programme is for that and when and how we will publish the report.
This is Every child matters an important area of work. My hon. Friend talked about the Green Paper. If we are to ensure that every child matters and that we give the best possible start in life to children and young people from all backgrounds and communities, we must crack this problem. We have started to do that on a national level, but lessons must be learned from areas that have reduced teenage pregnancy for those where the rate is still increasing. The work is underway but there is a much more to learn to get things right for the future.

Environmental Policy (Economic Instruments)
4 pm
Norman Baker: I am very pleased to have secured this short debate on what I regard as an important concept.
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Frank Cook): Order.
Norman Baker: You want me to put my jacket on, Mr. Deputy Speaker. It is very warm in here. Perhaps we should try to amend House of Commons procedures as well as address environmental matters in this debate.
I am also pleased that the Minister is present; I recognise that he understands these matters and I was impressed by a parliamentary answer that he provided for me on 26 January, when he set out in three pages what he and his Department had been doing about them. I am glad, too, that my hon. Friend the Member for Twickenham (Dr. Cable) is present; he is the Liberal Democrat shadow Chancellor, and he takes these matters seriously. I hope that we can move towards a cross-party consensus on this important issue.
Sir David King, the Government's chief scientific adviser, said that climate change is the most significant threat that we are facing, more so even than terrorism. That underlines how important it is that all Departments and all sectors of society pull together to tackle it. As a Chinese proverb advises, if we carry on going down the road that we appear to have chosen there is a very real danger that we might end up where we are heading. That should be avoided if at all possible. A business-as-usual approach will not work in dealing with climate change. A change in behaviour is required.
I am a great believer in trying to persuade people to change behaviour rather than forcing them to do so, if that is at all possible. There is a role for particular bans—on highly dangerous chemicals, for example—and for regulation, but there is also a role for economic instruments. They can be both more palatable and more effective on occasions. We should work with the grain of human behaviour; I know that the Minister understands that. If the economic indicators are right and if externalities are properly costed in, it should be cheaper to do the right thing rather than the wrong thing.
I will begin by asking the Minister about GDP. Economic growth is not the only measure of economic success, let alone happiness. He may have seen a MORI opinion poll that strikingly demonstrated that since 1973 GDP has increased in real terms by about 70 per cent. whereas life satisfaction has not increased at all; it has stayed exactly where it was in 1973. That demonstrates that the superficial link that some may perceive between economic growth and life satisfaction—or happiness, in layman's terms—simply does not exist.
It is a fact that a lot of growth damages the environment and undermines sustainable development. The Minister may know that Jonathan Porritt, the chair of the Government's Sustainable Development Commission, has called for an index of sustainable economic welfare. What are the Government doing to develop an alternative to GDP in order to build in
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sustainability and to ensure that the problems that I have referred to can be countered—particularly the problem that sudden growth can be detrimental to the environment and sustainable development?
There is no question but that using economic incentives or disincentives can work. That is clear from, for example, the differential introduced by the previous Conservative Government on unleaded petrol, which led to a marked shift in behaviour in a short period with people moving from leaded to unleaded petrol. Society and successive Governments have not capitalised on that as much as they might have done.
We appear to raise a lower percentage of our tax income from environmental taxation than many other countries. I refer the Minister to a written answer given by the Minister for the Environment on 6 January 2004 at column 256W. That answer states that 2.85 per cent. of our taxation income came from environmental taxation. That is a lower proportion than in many countries. Even Turkey has a figure of 3.79 per cent., and for the Netherlands it is 3.65 per cent., for Austria 3.01 per cent., and for Denmark 4.7 per cent. That is disappointing, and I would have hoped that the Minister and his colleagues would have done more to advance the idea that taxation, while not increasing as an overall take, can be shifted away from useful things such as employment on to things we do not want such as pollution. I suggest to the Minister that there is scope for doing that. My second question for the Minister is: do the Government agree that a higher percentage of tax should be related to environmental outcomes and objectives and would he consider setting a target as Sweden does to raise taxation in that way?
I come now to some specifics and suggest to the Minister that there are areas where we have failed as a society—I am trying to be non-political here—and where Governments could have done more to ensure the environmental outcomes that they want by means of economic instruments. Waste is a matter that I raised with the Minister briefly at Treasury questions last week, and I have a chance to expand on that now. I said that we all sign up to the Government's waste hierarchy—minimisation, reuse, recycling and then on to incineration and landfill, the two options that are officially classified by the European Union as waste disposal techniques—but that the economic incentives that are in place prejudice the delivery of that hierarchy.
It is still quite cheap to landfill. Although the Government are increasing the landfill tax and I welcome that, it is still an attractive option for many businesses, individuals and councils. There is no tax on incineration, despite the fact that it has been downgraded in the hierarchy by the EU and is now officially a disposal technique. There is a requirement in the EU landfill directive to move away from landfill quite quickly, but unless we have real incentives in place for minimisation, reuse and recycling, councils will inevitably move towards a chain of incinerators throughout the country. It is more attractive financially and it is easier.
The Government should consider variable charging for waste collection, for example. The strategy unit in its report "Waste not, want not" recommended that, but the Government subsequently said that although they did not oppose the strategy unit's recommendation more work needed to be carried out in conjunction with

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the Local Government Association before any pilot schemes could be considered. That was some time ago. We have heard very little about it since then. Could the Minister tell us where we are on variable charging?
The LGA appears to have reached the conclusion that nothing will happen for the foreseeable future. Councillor Kay Twitchen, the chair of the waste and environmental management executive of the LGA, said:
"We are disappointed that the Government appears to have decided that direct charging will not be piloted in the current Parliament."
Can the Minister clarify whether that is the case?
Variable charging would have given a direct incentive to householders to minimise the amount of waste that they throw away. It could encourage them to use reusable rather than disposable nappies. DEFRA has given that considerable attention. The previous Minister for the Environment considered it a priority. Up to 4 per cent. of the waste stream comes from disposable nappies, but there is no incentive for individuals not to use them if they can simply throw them away and have them taken to the dump. There is no relation between what they pay and the volume or weight of what they throw away.
Does the Minister have any proposals for a plastic bag tax? He will know that the previous Minister for the Environment recommended it, and the indications from Ireland appear to be that it is successful. I accept that a life-cycle analysis has to be carried out to demonstrate whether there is genuinely an environmental benefit. I suspect that there is, but I am happy to be proved wrong on that. Nevertheless, gigantic numbers of plastic bags are being used in this country. According to a report I compiled recently, the six major supermarkets alone use 17 billion plastic bags a year. That is enough to cover England within three years and that is without the other plastic bags from the other multiples and other users. There is an issue there that the Government need to address.
Transport is an area where the Government have not managed to use economic instruments at all well to deliver their objectives. When they came to power in 1997 they wanted to see a reduction in car use for reasons relating to the environment and social inclusion, and a fair means of making air users pay their way. They also wanted there to be a move towards public transport for social and environmental reasons, but that simply has not happened.
All that the airlines have done is introduce the air passenger duty, which is not an environmental tax. It bears no relation to the number of passengers on a plane, or to the plane's carbon emissions. Does the Minister agree that it would be sensible to replace that duty with something that relates to a duty on each aircraft—freight as well as passenger—so that airlines have an incentive to fill up their planes rather than run them half empty as they sometimes do? Does he also agree that it would be sensible to boost regional airports by deregulating controls and the income of airport operators? Such a move would lead to an increase in landing charges in the south-east, which are already among the lowest in the world.
The Government could do more, but their policy appears to be to wait to see whether the environmental impact of airlines could be dealt with through an
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emissions trading scheme at European Union level in 2008 and beyond. I happen to be in favour of an emissions trading scheme, and I recognise the good work that the Government have done on emissions trading in other areas. However, what is plan B if that emissions trading scheme does not happen? We need alternatives, but we do not appear to have them.
The Government's surface transport arrangements have also disappointed me and many others. The Minister is facing calls for a cut in fuel duty, which the Prime Minister faced again today in the Chamber. In the past 30 years, the cost of motoring has gone down by 5.2 per cent. in real terms, the cost of travelling by train has risen by 84.3 per cent. in real terms, and the cost of travelling by bus has risen by 70.6 per cent. I would have preferred the Prime Minister to quote those figures earlier today, and to show that those who are worried about the cost of motoring have actually had it very good in the past 30 years. Bus and train users should be the ones who are moaning. A more defensible historical position, not to mention a more defensible environmental position, would be very welcome from the Government. I do not want the Government to be bulldozed into cutting fuel duty, which would be inappropriate given the historical perspective that I described.
Since the Government came to power in 1997, the cost of travelling by car has fallen by 4.8 per cent., the cost of travelling by train has risen by 3 per cent., and the cost of travelling by bus has risen by 8.2 per cent. Economic indicators show that the Government have clearly failed to address transport in general. A big road-building programme is still going on, but an answer from the Department for Transport to me yesterday indicated that Labour has managed to build less than one mile of railway a year since it came to power. Clearly, there are no incentives to bring about a sustainable transport policy.
I accept that the Government introduced a climate change levy, and I say hooray to that as they have recognised to some extent the need to tax emissions. That is, however, an inflexible tax. It does not deliver as much as it might, and it is not as clean as a carbon tax would be. It is perfectly possible to move towards a carbon tax, but in an answer to me on 8 January, the Minister explained that he did not want to do so, mainly because he did not want to affect domestic energy users. I am conscious of the impact of energy costs on the poor, but the Government could deal with that through the social security system, the warm front initiative or other measures that they claim to have going, rather than excluding that whole sector from the carbon tax. The poor should be included.
When the Minister replies, will he say something about the private finance initiative and public procurement? PFI contracts in the private and public sectors seem to fail to take account of environmental consequences. What is the Minister doing to ensure that PFI contracts in the public sector reflect good environmental performance? I am not sure that that is being done. What is he doing to ensure that public procurement also reflects good environmental standards? The Government are the largest procurement agency in the country. In the EU, 16 per cent. of procurement is funded from the public purse. We therefore need to ensure that the Government lead.

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If they do so, the private sector will follow. The Government can provide such a real lead, but so far they have shown themselves to have a blind spot on the matter.
Lastly, I should point out to the Minister the cost of doing nothing. It is not simply greenies who are saying how good it would be to improve the environment. The cost of doing nothing is substantial, and the parliamentary answers that I have received from Ministers—copies of which I can give the Minister if he wishes—demonstrate that there is an annual cost of at least £65 billion from not doing the right thing for the environment. That arises from the costs of congestion, flooding, water leakage, agricultural impacts, energy waste, nuclear liabilities, and so on. It is in the Treasury's interest to get this right, as it is in the pole position to lead. The Minister understands the issues, and if the Treasury took the lead even more than at present, we could have not simply a better economy in this country, but far better contributions toward our fight on climate change.
4.15 pm
The Economic Secretary to the Treasury (John Healey): I begin by congratulating the hon. Member for Lewes (Norman Baker) on securing this debate and on the measured way in which he has introduced it, although perhaps it is less of a debate and more of an extended Question Time. Rather than reading from the script and notes that I prepared earlier, I shall do my best to deal with the range of points and direct questions that he put to me. I pay tribute to him and his active interest in such issues, not just in terms of his Front-Bench responsibilities, but as a Back Bencher. I was pleased to be invited to the all-party parliamentary environment group last week, which he chairs, and was honoured to be the guest at its recent luncheon.
The hon. Gentleman is right about the seriousness of the problems that we face with the environment, the role of the market and the case for policy interventions where there are failures of the market or where its operation has serious environmental consequences. He is right, too, that our record since 1997 demonstrates that economic incentive and instruments can work in achieving environmental aims. He attributed the policy of the change in duty on leaded petrol to the previous Government. I am not so certain about that, but I should say that since 1997, we have made very direct and effective use of marginal differences in duty rates, in order to transform the market for fuel to ultra-low sulphur diesel and petrol.
From 1 September this year, there will be a 0.5p per litre differential in favour of sulphur-free fuels. Having worked with the industry, and recognising all the work that the industry has put in over the last couple of years to prepare for that, we expect that that will lead to an almost universal overnight switch to sulphur-free diesel, and that in a few months' time—definitely by the end of the year—there will be a universal switch to sulphur-free petrol. That is a good example of the use of an economic policy or instrument driving behavioural change to achieve environmental ends.
I turn to the series of questions that the hon. Gentleman put to me. On the alternative measure of growth, the most productive area here is not looking for
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an alternative to the policies for growth, but ensuring that in preparing economic policies—particularly those to support the growing, stable economy that we have put in place since 1997—environmental concerns play a mainstream part in that process. I shall explain how that is formally built in to the way that the Treasury has dealt with such issues since 1997.
The question of taxation and the environment is an interesting point that is capable of being debated for a longer time than we have available. However, it is not sensible simply to focus on the proportion of GDP, or the total sums, taken by environmental taxes. First, it does not include all environmental taxes, particularly tax incentives such as enhanced capital allowances, our new scheme for energy efficiency among private landlords, and VAT reductions. Secondly, if environmental taxes are effective, we have to expect the revenue from them to decline over time. Thirdly, some of the most significant environmental tax reforms have been about restructuring existing taxes, rather than introducing new ones, and have included graduated VAT, changes to the company car tax and, to some extent, the proposals on company van taxation in the current Finance Bill. Those have either been broadly neutral in revenue terms or have led to a reduction in Government revenues, although it is misleading to interpret that as not supporting environmental objectives or succeeding in having an environmental impact.
I turn now to waste and the question of incineration. I noted the hon. Gentleman's welcome for the landfill tax and the projected increase in its rates, particularly from next year onwards. Part of the purpose in making that decision and signalling it early was to help drive the diversion away from landfill and to encourage the market to think more about reuse and reduction of waste. Currently, less than 10 per cent. of municipal waste is incinerated while almost 16 per cent. is recycled or composted. The rate of increase in recycling is far greater than the rate of increase in incineration, which suggests that the mechanisms that we have in place, far from incentivising the incineration that the hon. Gentleman mentioned, are having the impact on recycling and local authority targets that we seek.
The hon. Gentleman will be aware of the study that the Government recently published into the health and environmental impacts of waste management methods. He will know that it is essentially a review of the scientific base and that a second report is due shortly to assess the economic impact of policy measures. I hope that that will give us a better base and sense of proportion for the policy debates that we need to have to ensure the best future mix of policy instruments required to deal with the waste management challenges and targets.
The hon. Gentleman's point about aviation and the EU emissions trading scheme was put to me last week at his all-party parliamentary group lunch. As I said then, we believe that the aviation industry should be included in the second stage of the scheme. We have started working hard to achieve that end and have identified it as one of the priorities for the UK presidency of the EU in the second half of 2005. As I confirmed to the lunch and as can be seen from the Budget and pre-Budget documentation and in the aviation White Paper, we are continuing work on whether any short-term measures

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are necessary to try to make the aviation industry pay its way for the environmental costs that it brings and improve its environmental performance.
On motoring, I noted that the hon. Gentleman's argument was essentially in favour of raising fuel duties further. He mentioned public procurement, and I was at Customs house this morning, as the Minister responsible for Customs, to take the keys of the first of 42 dual-fuel petrol-electric Hondas, of which Customs was taking delivery. That is a significant step in greening the car fleet and a good example of how public procurement can have environmental objectives and how a concern for the environment can become part of mainstream Government procurement decisions.
More broadly, there is probably no difference between the hon. Gentleman and me. The quality of the environment affects everybody's quality of life and we all have a responsibility to safeguard the environment for our children and future generations, and for the country as a whole. To meet that obligation, the Government have the clear aim of improving the quality of the environment, both now and in future, as part of the wider strategy of achieving sustainable development.
The term sustainable development is often used, but it is rarely properly defined. For me, it means meeting four objectives at the same time—social progress and recognising everyone's needs; effective protection of the environment; the prudent use of natural resources; and the maintenance of high and stable levels of economic growth and employment.
Delivering sustainable development is obviously a cross-Government task. However, it is a core feature of economic policy, and it is a goal to which the Treasury is formally and publicly committed Indeed, one of our departmental objectives is
"to protect and improve the environment by using instruments that will deliver efficient and sustainable outcomes, through evidence-based policies."
In other words, we will be using policies that the hon. Gentleman described as going with the grain of the market.
The Government believe that markets provide the best means of allocating an economy's resources. However, many markets are subject to imperfections and failures, and that is particularly true for environmental matters. Markets fail when the private returns that an individual or a firm receives for carrying out a particular activity are at odds with the benefits for society as a whole. That means that environmental objectives can sometimes be achieved only through society acting collectively rather than by people acting individually. Indeed, the hon. Gentleman ended by stressing the cost of doing nothing.
Evidence of the nature of market failure may mean that we have to use a range of policy instruments, including economic instruments, and the Government
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are committed to using such a range of policy levers to pursue environmental objectives when appropriate. In some cases that may be done through taxation, in others through trading schemes; it could also be done through tax credits or public spending. In some cases, it may be done by regulation or through voluntary agreements; and in many cases they will be supported by information publicity campaigns.
Norman Baker: I am grateful to the Minister for answering my questions and responding positively; it does not always happen. Will he say how the Government view the widening gap between transport costs? Motoring is getting cheaper, even now, and the cost of using trains and buses is increasing. Not only is that bad for the environment, but it is bad for the Government's social inclusion policy. What will the Government do about that; or is it a matter for market forces, and outside the Government's control?
John Healey: It is absolutely not only for market forces. I listed the range of policy interventions at our disposal, and the hon. Gentleman did not mention the huge investment in public transport that has been made under this Government. One cannot get a full, clear and accurate picture to support such a contention unless one takes those sorts of factors into account.
In many ways, the UK is now rightly regarded as a world leader in the development of economic instruments for the achievement of environmental objectives. For instance, we had the first economy-wide emissions trading scheme, and our climate change levy broke new ground, as did our aggregates levy and the sustainability fund associated with it.
There is more to come. The landfill allowance trading scheme is to be brought in next year; and the EU emissions trading scheme is due to start in January 2005. However, the Government continue to believe that in certain situations, where specific behaviour changes are required, voluntary agreements should also play a part.
When necessary, we have demonstrated that we are willing to go through extensive processes to ensure that we get our policies right—or at least get the best possible balance between the competing interests that inevitably come into play. In our policy making, including on the environment, we will always consider the wider implications for businesses, communities and other stakeholders, and we will continue to consult widely.
We will continue to work at the local and the international level to improve awareness of the environmental challenges faced by the world, and we remain determined to help drive the commitment needed to face those challenges together.
Question put and agreed to.
Adjourned accordingly at half-past Four o'clock.