§ 32. Mr. MossTo ask the President of the Board of Trade what assessment he has made of the new map for objective 5b areas in England.
§ Mr. HeseltineI consider it to be generally very satisfactory. The Government negotiated a trebling of England's objective 5(b) coverage, to 1.7 million people.
I am particularly pleased that the Government secured designation of the whole of Cornwall. Newly eligible areas include large parts of Devon, parts of Somerset, Suffolk, Norfolk, Cambridgeshire, Staffordshire, Derbyshire and Lancashire, and large parts of Lincolnshire, North Yorkshire, Northumberland and Cumbria. New areas in Shropshire and Hereford and Worcester now complement those retained in rural Wales and a new area in Clwyd.