§ Mrs. Wiseasked the Secretary of State for Industry if the chairman of the Co-operative Development Agency is to be a full-time or part-time job; and what salary is proposed.
Mr. Alan WilliamsThe working group on a Co-operative Development Agency, whose majority recommendations we accepted as the basis for the proposals now before Parliament, suggested that the chairman should make the chairmanship of the Agency his main, but not necessarily his only, business. Paragraph 8 of the schedule to the Co-operative Development Agency Bill provides that the salary should be determined with the approval of the Minister for the Civil Service. Consultations are currently in progress and I will let the House know the outcome as soon as a decision has been reached.
§ Mrs. Wiseasked the Secretary of State for Industry what qualifications and attributes he will be seeking when appointing the chairman of the Co-operative Development Agency.
Mr. Alan WilliamsWe shall be seeking a chairman whose experience and personal qualities make him the most suitable person for the job. The appointee will need to have all the characteristics of a good chairman, and to contribute to the range of experience of the Agency's membership as a whole. As the working group said in paragraph 37 of its report, (Cmnd 6972) the chairman must be someone acceptable to the co-operative movement
346Wunder Sections 7 and 8 of the Industry Act 1972 as follows:
as a whole, command its confidence and be capable of engaging the attention of Ministers and their Departments.
§ Mrs. Wiseasked the Secretary of State for Industry what method of selection is proposed for the chairman of the Co-operative Development Agency; and if nominations will be invited from co-operative organisations by public advertisement.
Mr. Alan WilliamsIn selecting the chairman of the Agency, and indeed the other members of the board, my right hon. Friend intends to proceed as envisaged in paragraph 35 of the report of the Working Group on a Co-operative Development Agency (Cmnd 6972) that we have accepted as the foundation on which the Agency will be built. The Co-operative Development Agency Bill currently before the House stipulates that the chairman and other members of the Agency shall be appointed by the Secretary of State after consultation with persons appearing to him to represent the interests of the co-operative movement. It follows that this is the method my right hon. Friend shall use.