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Mr. Skinner : If the hon. Gentleman satisfies you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, if you want to buy it, that is okay by me. All that I am saying is that my hon. Friend must expose the private Bill procedure. Somebody has to do it. Somebody has to stop this evil practice. It has nothing to do with Parliament. We should not be debating these things at all. It is high time that they were dealt with properly under local authority planning procedures. The local communities should be able to play a part--
Mr. Deputy Speaker : Order. I shall begin to forget who has the floor. Mr. Cryer.
Mr. Cryer : My hon. Friend makes some useful and cogent points. On the matter of dissident Members of Parliament, we are in agreement. Dissident Members of Parliament are those who challenge the received ideas about which my hon. Friend has been talking. One of these received ideas is that Members of Parliament may have jobs outside. We are full-time Members of Parliament, and that is a matter that could be taken to heart by many Tory Members.
To pursue the question of the information which has been provided, I have not yet finished commenting on the engineers' report. The hon. Member for Honiton said that this is a Committee point, but Opposed Private Bill Committees are not like Standing Committees where questions are argued, amendments are tabled and hon. Members can demand reports. The proceedings are conducted by lawyers who receive expensive fees for presenting a case. Happily, I have never been on an Opposed Private Bill Committee and I do not wish to serve on one, I hasten to add. Hon. Members who have served on them tell me that they get a strong impression that the lawyers are paid by the hour and spin things out.
Mr. Cryer : My hon. Friend says that they are paid by the word. There is not much opportunity for hon. Members to sift through engineering reports. The engineers' report is pivotal to the Bill, but the Committee stage will be conducted on the basis of submissions, so there will not be an opportunity for detailed examination. Questions may be asked, but the procedure is based on the
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position of the petitioners. Hon. Members do not undertake the examination. I do not agree with the hon. Member for Honiton that the procedure is satisfactory.In paragraph 9 of the promoters' statement--
Mr. Skinner rose --
Mr. Cryer : I shall proceed with the question of the five petitioners after this intervention.
Mr. Skinner : My hon. Friend has talked about the Opposed Private Bill Committee procedure and said that it is not like other Committee stages. He talked about lawyers making pocketfuls of money. There is another serious consideration. My hon. Friend should explain at length what the Bill is about. An Opposed Private Bill Committee is composed of two hon. Members from the Government side and two from the Opposition side. The chances are that there will be a Tory Chairman who will have a casting vote, so there will be three votes against two. A recent private Bill, the Associated British Ports Bill, was in Committee for some 20 days. Throughout the proceedings the Chairman cast his vote against every amendment. My hon. Friend is well versed in those matters. He knows what happens when a Bill is not amended in Committee. There is no Report stage on the Floor of the House and it goes through like a dose of Epsom salts. The hon. Member for Honiton talked about a Committee point, but my hon. Friend will not get a chance to raise it in Committee. My hon. Friend cannot serve on the Opposed Private Bill Committee because he has already played a part in the proceedings. Therefore, he cannot speak in Committee. If the Bill is not amended, because the hon. Member for Honiton's Tory Friends defeat every amendment, there will be no Report stage and the Bill will go straight to Third Reading when it comes back to the House. It is an evil system. My hon. Friend would do well to spell it out.
Mr. Cryer : I am grateful to my hon. Friend who has, as usual, made a cogent, relevant and emphatic intervention. I well remember the Associated British Ports Bill. Unfortunately, there were no amendments to the Bill, so it went straight through. As I recall it, it was on that Bill that the promoters, P and O, arranged a champagne supper to keep Tory Members here.
Mr. Skinner : My hon. Friend is a stickler for the truth, so I want to put him right. Yes, there are usually champagne parties organised to keep Tory Members here to vote the legislation through at the appropriate time, be it 10 o'clock, 11 o'clock or midnight. The champagne party to which my hon. Friend refers was on the Felixstowe Dock and Railway Bill, whose aim was to put money into the pockets of those who wanted a port system on the other coast.
Mr. Deputy Speaker : Order. We are straying miles away from the Bill before the House.
Mr. Skinner : I appreciate that--
Mr. Skinner : People are bound to get excited sometimes
Mr. Deputy Speaker : Order. That is quite enough for an intervention.
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Mr. Cryer : My hon. Friend has made another relevant and cogent point. He is correct. That champagne party was not arranged for the Associated British Ports Bill ; it was for the Felixstowe Dock and Railway Bill. My hon. Friend is pointing to the fact that the Government have used the private Bill procedure to get legislation through and we have been inundated with private Bills, so much so that Associated British Ports, Felixstowe and champagne parties blur into one another. The hon. Member for Honiton has made it clear that there are no champagne suppers for this Bill. I suspect that that is why there will not be too many hon. Members here this evening. I was about to deal with paragraph 9 of the promoters' statement. The hon. Member for Honiton explained that there were five petitioners. He said that fishermen have withdrawn their petition because they have had a legal, binding assurance. I should like to know what a legal, binding assurance is. An assurance does not normally vary legal weight. If something has legal validity, there has to be a means of applying it. Have the fishermen entered into a legal agreement with the company? Will there be a breach of contract if the company fails to honour its commitment?
An assurance is not a guarantee. It is just a claim that people will do their best. They give an assurance that something will be all right but that assurance does not provide the sanction of court action, which I should have thought was necessary to ensure that the fishermen had a guarantee, not just for the next five years, but for as long as fishing is to go on in the area. There should be a restrictive covenant on the building of the marina and a means of enforcing the covenant.
As the marina has not been built, I should like to know what provisions will be made. When the hon. Member for Honiton sums up, I should like him to tell us what he means by legal, binding assurance'. I do not want the fishermen of Exmouth to be sold short. I am concerned about them.
Mr. Prescott : I refer my hon. Friend to the note that we have been given on behalf of the promoters. In it they say :
"the dock walls are unsafe, and could collapse if heavy machinery or vehicles are used at the dockside."
The hon. Member for Honiton (Sir P. Emery) made the point that agreement had been reached with the fishermen who originally were not to continue their activities at the dock. We are all pleased to hear about the agreement. The hon. Gentleman also said that there would be refrigeration work ; one assumes that heavy vehicles and machinery will have to be used in that work. There seems to be a conflict. If the fishermen are to continue their commercial activity, presumably lifting machinery and heavy vehicles will be necessary. That seems to be in conflict with the whole point of the debate--that the walls are unsafe for any commercial activity.
Mr. Cryer : I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising an important point. I was coming to it in a moment. Of course, there will be the refrigeration facility that the hon. Member for Honiton mentioned. There may be a restrictive covenant on the land on which the refrigeration facility is to be built to ensure access from the estuary and from the land. There must be some guarantee for the future. My hon. Friend is right in his more general point on paragraph 8 of the promoters' statement. If a refrigeration facility is to be provided, heavy plant and equipment will be needed on the dock to provide it. There must be lifting machinery to move the fish from the boats
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on to the dockside and into the refrigeration plant, and the refrigeration plant must be substantial. All that must mean building, machinery and heavy vehicles on the dockside. My hon. Friend is right to point to the discrepancy.The engineering report is crucial. It is curious that, just when the planning application was rejected and it was decided that a marina was the way forward, a report was produced which matched the case and helped to support the argument that it would cost millions of pounds to retain the dock facilities and that something else should be established.
That type of procedure helps to convince, among others, trade unionists. When workers are presented with a claim that there is a report and they do not see it, they should always double-check. The lesson for trade unionists is, always check what the employer puts forward. They may have been told that a report has been produced showing that the docks cannot work again because it would cost too much to make them work. The report being so pivotal to the argument, its absence makes me doubt the validity of the company presenting the matter to us. It shows contempt for our procedures and for Parliament.
Mr. Prescott : The more I listen to my hon. Friend and the valid points he is making, the more I am reminded of a further contradiction, which the hon. Member for Honiton (Sir P. Emery) might wish to clarify. Its seems curious that an examination was undertaken which led to the conclusion that the dock walls might collapse. The company made an application in the mid-1980s to the East Devon district council to modernise the docks so that they could deal with even bigger vessels, plus the construction of some riverside facilities. Surely engineering work must have preceded that application and should have revealed problems with the sea walls. To find those problems being revealed now is a little coincidental.
Mr. Cryer : I agree with my hon. Friend. It is curious that the undertaking of the report, although not its publication, should have assisted the company in presenting its argument. My hon. Friend is right to say that applying for planning permission involves submitting documents about what will be done and where. That should have involved a detailed examination of the circumstances in which the docks would be built. That, in turn, should have brought to light the condition of the dock walls. Apparently, it was overlooked. One is bound to question the competence of the company in going ahead with a planning application to seek consent, having apparently overlooked a serious engineering defect, yet that defect suddenly comes to light two years later, when it is thought that a marina would be a better alternative. That calls into question the bona fides of the company in bringing the matter to Parliament without providing us with the information we need.
Unsatisfactory though the private Bill procedure may be, when we have discussed other Bills, the promoters have taken the trouble to circulate us with information and deposit plans in the Private Bill Office. No such efforts have been made in this case.
Mr. Skinner : Promoters of private Bills of this type do not always provide the necessary information and plans. We had a similar problem recently, when the promoters of the Redbridge London Borough Council Bill did not even
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provide a map. This place is treated with contempt because the Tories, having a majority of 150, say, "We will use the private Bill procedure. We will not need every Tory Member to back it. Only perhaps 200 Members will be needed, including 100 for the closure motion."We now know why the Tory Whip, the hon. Member for Watford (Mr. Garel- Jones), came into the Chamber while my hon. Friend the Member for Bradford, South (Mr. Cryer) was speaking. That Whip, an important member of the royal household, must have asked the hon. Member for Honiton (Sir P. Emery), "When will you want me?" He was saying, in other words, "Under the private Bill procedure, forget about free votes and voting according to conscience. When do you want me? When shall I bring the troops in to bring debate to an end?"
That is how the system works, and it is high time we did something about it. Let us stop this farce by which people give the impression that a matter is being brought to Parliament and is being dealt with by us, with every word
Mr. Deputy Speaker Order. That is long enough for an intervention.
Mr. Cryer : Again, my hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover makes a cogent, important and relevant point. I noticed the oleaginous figure of the Tory Whip, the hon. Member for Watford (Mr. Garel-Jones), enter the Chamber. As my hon. Friend says, he is organising matters. We do not have the report of which I have spoken, because somebody has told the promoters, "Don't bother with the report. It could be a bit controversial. Different interpretations could be put on it and it might be said that dock work could proceed at Exmouth. But don't worry. All is organised. We have told the lads that they will be needed at 10 o'clock. They will come in then and vote." That is why the Whip came into the Chamber. Every now and then he comes in to check how things are going.
So my hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover hit the nail on the head. This scrutiny is a facade and a formality. The Tories are using their majority as an elective dictatorship, a phrase used by Lord Hailsham when the last Labour Government had a tiny majority, if not a minority.
Mr. Skinner : We had a majority of one--Stonehouse--and we could not find him.
Mr. Cryer : Even though we did not have a majority, Lord Hailsham called us an elective dictatorship. Now that the Conservatives have a majority of 150 over Labour, the noble Lord says nothing. Private Bills are supposed to have a separate path in Parliament. They are supposed to go through on a free vote, with independent scrutiny. It would be appalling if the Government used the private Bill procedure to impose their wishes on Parliament in contravention of tradition. But that is what they are doing, and the public outside are appalled. That is why they gave a massive thumbs down to the Tories at Mid-Staffordshire and why at the next general election the Tories will be run out of office.
The five petitions deposited against the Bill are detailed in clause 9. I have dealt with the position of the fishermen, and I look forward to the comments of the hon. Member for Honiton relating to so-called legally binding assurances that the marina will be open to fishermen in difficulties. The hon. Member for Honiton seemed to
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qualify the circumstances in which it would be open to fishermen in trouble. I should have thought that human compassion would have provided that guarantee, but a company that is seeking to convert a dock into a marina cannot be assumed always to have human compassion at the forefront of its thoughts.My hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull, East spoke about the loss to Exeter of £168,000 a year in dues, due to it as the navigation and river conservation authority. I should have thought that £168,000 in dues suggests a fair amount of traffic. The hon. Member for Honiton said that arrangements are being made by the company to allow the petition of Exeter local authority to be withdrawn. My hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull, East then asked him what the present position was. He could not say, because a committee of Exeter council has yet to meet to discuss the position on the closure of the docks and loss of fees.
[Interruption.] If the hon. Gentleman wishes to correct me, he should intervene.
Sir Peter Emery : I just wish to make certain that the hon. Gentleman understands the position. A recommendation has been made by a committee of Exeter council which has to go forward for confirmation. That will happen on 2 April. But the council is agreed that the petition should be withdrawn. I am simply giving the facts. That is the position with the Labour-controlled Exeter council.
Mr. Cryer : I wanted to confirm that position. Of course, the hon. Gentleman will realise that one of the glories of democratic procedures is that one is never sure of the outcome. We cannot guarantee the position at this stage, but we can expect a certain decision to be made. None the less, my argument is that Parliament should know that decision before it considers the Bill. It is an outrage that we are considering the Bill when committees have yet to meet and decisions have yet to be made. We cannot know the decisions, because the timing is wrong.
Mr. Prescott : The hon. Member for Honiton has put one construction on events, which is not a complete construction. He says that it is a Labour-controlled authority. That is true. I hope that many more areas, including Honiton, will be Labour come the next election. I chose to speak to Exeter council. It was maintaining an objection to the Bill. It was told that, as East Devon district council had withdrawn the stipulation that the Bill was a first condition before it could agree to any commercial activity on the dock, all that was now required was best endeavours. The legal advice secured by the company was that it did not need the Bill.
Exeter city council was faced with either coming to a deal and obtaining compensation--I believe of the order of £70,000 for one year but it would be left with the bill after that--or proceeding with a legal action against the company. The cost would then fall on the ratepayers. We know that, when anyone goes through the courts to obtain an agreement, it is highly expensive. The agreement arrived at left Exeter with little choice once East Devon district council took its decision.
Mr. Cryer : It sounds as if the agreement is force majeure. It is blackmail, which I shall come to later. It sounds as if Exeter council has virtually been blackmailed into accepting the decision. It is all linked up with these best endeavours--the phrase used to cover the fact that it
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was just conceivable that the Bill would not slide through the House like a dose of salts. That is an unscrupulous attitude. It makes our procedure simply a facade. Either we have power or we do not. It must be made absolutely clear. Either we are dealing with the granting of powers to close the dock or we are not. If the Bill is superfluous to requirements, it means that there is some skulduggery at work.Sir Peter Emery rose --
Mr. Skinner : Let skulduggery speak.
Mr. Deputy Speaker : Does the hon. Member for Honiton wish to intervene? Sir Peter Emery : It was just that I heard certain comments which obviously did not reach you, Mr. Deputy Speaker. May I remind the hon. Gentleman of what I read to the House earlier? It is not a matter of best endeavours. The letter from East Devon district council said :
"I can confirm that the Council's Planning Committee has given planning permission for the redevelopment of the Exmouth docks for a marina, together with the associated residential development, subject to formal closure of the docks by the necessary legal process". That is not a matter of best endeavours. It refers to the Bill currently before Parliament. I read that letter to the House an hour ago. I am sorry if I was not clear, but that was the letter dated 23 March 1990 and signed by the chief executive.
Mr. Cryer : I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for interjecting. The problem is that a statement has been provided by the promoters for Members of Parliament. It says :
"The council is, however, concerned to ensure that the docks will be permanently closed to commercial traffic and, as part of the planning process, is requiring the Company to do its best to procure the enactment of the Bill, which would guarantee that the docks may be so closed."
That is a statement in support of the Bill. I assume that we must take it at face value. It is the basis of at least part of the debate. The hon. Member for Honiton is saying in effect that that statement is otiose and irrelevant because the local authority has said specifically that it requires consent to close the dock from a private Bill process in the House.
Why on earth was a supplementary statement not issued by the promoters, based on the information that the sponsor has given to the House tonight? We are bound to question the whole nature of the statement. What other parts are not quite right? For example, the statement said :
"Consulting engineers have reported that certain of the dock walls are unsafe, and could collapse if heavy machinery or vehicles are used at the dockside."
Will we receive another statement that says, "That is not quite right because we have had a letter from the company that says that the dock walls could be unsafe, but we are not quite sure"? We cannot ignore phrases in the promoters' statement. We must challenge and examine them. The hon. Gentleman is within his rights to say that the local authority has put a different emphasis on it. We must inevitably put a question mark where we have two conflicting statements from the same source, both of which apparently seek to promote the Bill. The hon. Member for Honiton will at least agree that it is confusing.
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Sir Peter Emery : I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman is confused ; he is usually too intelligent to fall into that trap. Best endeavours are being made to put the Bill through the House. That is normal and proper phraseology. If the hon. Gentleman considers it inadequate, I went further, to find out what it really meant to East Devon district council. I see no conflict in best endeavours being used. That is what I am doing. I am doing it not for the company but for my constituents. Therefore, I am making absolutely clear what East Devon district council says. Surely that is the information that the hon. Gentleman wants ; it gives him the assurance he requires.
Mr. Cryer : There is clearly a gap here. The promoters could have used words such as "the local authority requires the company to procure the enactment of the Bill." The qualifying phrase, "to do its best" is not needed. If I examine the words carefully, it is because for years I have been a member of the Select and Joint Committees on Statutory Instruments. Words have importance in the delegated powers that Ministers use when issuing rules and orders.
Very often the careless use of words gives rise to court actions. That is why I examine words scrupulously. It is confusing for the promotors to use words in one way and then for a different emphasis to be provided by the Bill's sponsor, the hon. Member for Honiton. We should avoid such confusion, as we need the case to be clear and unambiguous, especially when so much information is not provided to hon. Members, but we are expected to make a judgment.
Mr. Prescott : This point is vital. I pushed the Exeter authority on why it changed its position. It is clear that something material changed in order for it to withdraw its objections. It was not simply that it would receive compensation of £70,000.
I talked to the legal advisers of the authority, who made it clear that things had changed with regard to the East Devon council. I was told that section 52 of a certain planning agreement was important to East Devon council, as it laid down that no more commercial development and housing would be developed on the dock should any plan be proposed. That was a proper concern, and the council wanted to be satisfied about that requirement. Just a couple of weeks ago, however, things changed, and we are now talking about best endeavours.
The information supplied by the promoters relates not only to best endeavours but to the company's ability to procure the Bill "which would guarantee that the docks may be so closed". How often have we debated the words "may" or "should"? They are at the heart of our legislative process. There is no doubt about what the promoters mean, as that is consistent with what I was told at Exeter. That information, however, seems to contradict what the hon. Member for Honiton has described as the position of East Devon council.
Mr. Cryer : My hon. Friend has thrown some light on a confusing position. We have not yet received a satisfactory answer. The promoters speak of actions that
"guarantee that the docks may be so closed."
We insert the word "shall" in primary legislation if we want something to be mandatory. We are now supposed to be dealing with such a mandatory decision, since we are not talking about a casual alternative to be available at
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some stage in the future when the company so wishes. The company has made an application to close the docks permanently after the temporary closure which it brought rapidly and arbitrarily to the port of Exmouth.We are right to question what lies behind this Bill. It is not an inexpensive procedure to come to the House. Why are the promoters not saying that the company shall procure the closure powers? Why are they hedging it? It must be costing them thousands of pounds to come here to do all the preparatory work. Promoting private Bills is an expensive procedure, not a casual hobby. Why should people undergo such a procedure when they do not appear to be convinced of the need to undertake it in the first place?
If the information in the promoters' statement had been widely circulated in the area earlier, there might have been more petitioners. Five petitions alone have been deposited. I have already mentioned the fishermen, and I do not believe that the guarantees that they have received are satisfactory. We have already spoken about Exeter losing £168,000 per annum in dues. It is clear that there is some money connected with the dock, and it is not entirely without trade. The dock handled about half a million tonnes of goods a year, so it has had some traffic, which is important to remember. Mrs. Susan Winters feels that her livelihood has been taken from her, and she is perfectly entitled to petition. Mr. Stephen Lytton, a former assistant pilot, wants a settlement. It is argued that he cannot be given a settlement different from other employees, as the redundancy terms have already been agreed and the company cannot go beyond them. The Committee stage of the Bill would enable Mr. Stephen Lytton to present his case, but if he is unemployed, how will he be able to afford to get down to London? I do not know the financial position of Mrs. Susan Winters, but she must come down to London to make her case.
Most of the petitioners want to employ a brief, but they do not come cheap. They are much more expensive than people who do useful jobs, such as engineers, social workers, nurses or firemen. They cost a great deal more-- we are talking about fees of hundreds of pounds a day for a lawyer.
Mr. Skinner : It could cost thousands of pounds.
Mr. Cryer : My hon. Friend is right, because if one employs a barrister one must also have a solicitor.
All the lawyers on the Tory Benches--they are not here now, of course, as they are resting after their activities in court, having picked up thousands of pounds in fees--will go into the Lobby after the recess to vote for the continuation of the duopoly between solicitors and barristers. Those self-same lawyers went through the Lobby to attack the trade unions because they claim that they do not like a closed shop. However, they will merrily vote to continue their own closed shop, and seem to be able to satisfy their consciences in so doing.
The people who have made petitions against the Bill will face a considerable expense in coming down here to represent their case. That is unfair.
Mr. Skinner : It is an ill wind that blows no one any good. My hon. Friend has already pointed out that only five petitioners have come forward because the scheme was not well advertised down there. This "Howard's Way" scam has been spread around the harbour and the docks.
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Given that the Bill might now receive some publicity in the Devonshire press, there is a slim chance that more petitioners will come forward. They might be able to get together to come down to the Committee to petition.My hon. Friend has performed a useful service tonight, because we are now depending on the local press--no doubt some of them are hostile to the scheme--to use some of my hon. Friend's comments to get the mass army of non-poll tax payers from Devon, who are against the "Howard's Way" scam, to come to Parliament to petition in greater numbers.
Mr. Cryer : I hope that that is the effect of the debate, because it would be a great pity if people living in Exmouth who wish to oppose the Bill lost the opportunity because of a shortage of money. My hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover is right : by emphasising the circumstances, we are hopefully providing those people with a public service.
There was an interesting exchange earlier, when the hon. Member for Honiton talked about a complaint that he had had concerning the dock's activities. Because of the research carried out by my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull, East, it turned out that some of the complaints arose because the dock company was not doing very much, for example, to suppress the dust caused by its activities. Is it possible that the same dock company that produced the report--which was so convenient, but which was not sent to hon. Members or published--was not doing very much, because it wanted to create as much strife and nuisance as possible, so that people would say, "For goodness' sake, close the port down, if you can't cover the dust or make the thing more quiet and effective"? That is a real possibility : certainly it has been done before to achieve the desired result.
As for the benefits for Exmouth, I am all in favour of benefits for all parts of the United Kingdom, but we must know who the benefits are for. Will they be for the company--the owners of which we do not know--or for the ordinary working men and women of Exmouth and their families? Will this be simply a device for converting land that has a use to the community and to the nation as a dock to an area where land values can start to soar?
The company directors may feel that grain is not a profitable activity, and decide to go into land. They will sit in their detached houses in the better part of Exmouth--or wherever they live--and watch the price of the land rise, without doing anything.
That is not uncommon. In many areas, local entrepreneurs have established factories making useful products such as lathes, milling machines and diesel engines--there is a long history of it ; I can name the companies involved--but their sons decide that they do not like soiling their hands with industry. They then sell out--especially if the factory has an enhanced land value--buy a farm in Sussex and live the life of a country gent. That is not unknown. However, such family businesses--which are much hailed by the Conservatives--may have no sons to carry on the trade, and the daughters may not want to do so. Therefore, they sell up and start another life that they regard as superior to the values that form the basis of employment prospects in our country.
Mr. Skinner : Is my hon. Friend saying that closing down the docks and releasing land is perhaps only partly about building a marina? Is the marina a disguise, enabling the land to increase in price and the owners to sell it off for
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yuppie houses? If there was a marina, perhaps it would be only a relatively small one that would not take up all the land, and a big killing could be made by selling that land. Is my hon. Friend's interpretation that there is money to be made out of the price of the land, and that the marina is just a hook to hang it on?Mr. Cryer : That is an interesting development of my thoughts. We are dealing with people who abandon useful activities that benefit the community and the nation. Those activities include providing employment, importing and exporting goods and maintaining the traditions of expertise and handling that have been built up over the years, with sons following their fathers into the docks and maintaining their expertise and knowledge. When all that is swept to one side by people who think only of making money, and not of maintaining a facility that is of great utility and benefit to the community, anything is possible.
The marina may be a sprat to catch a mackerel, and companies may have realised that they have to convince the local authority--even a Tory- controlled one--that they will bring a definite benefit. Therefore, they say "What about a yuppie marina?" There are only a few houses round about-- not too many. There are problems with the marina, so they decide to make that tiny, fill in the rest of the land and develop it as a huge housing estate with enormously enhanced land values. I raise those matters simply to point out that we do not have the necessary information to make the sort of informed judgment that we should.
Interestingly, there was an affirmation of the importance of maintaining and developing traditions. Mr. Steven Spielberg, the noted film maker, spends millions of pounds making films which have attracted a substantial following. He invests a lot of money making them. When the closure of Elstree studios was being discussed, I asked Steven Spielberg why he came to this country to make films ; after all, Hollywood is the repository of great traditions and expertise which have been built up over the years, provide a large part of television viewing and have a worldwide reputation. He said that it was because the craftsmanship in the United Kingdom at Elstree and Pinewood was better.
Steven Spielberg did not come here because of the dollar-sterling ratio, but because of skill and tradition. The crews in British studios contain an age range because the older members carry on and hand over the expertise to the younger members and the level of experience is maintained. In Hollywood the older members simply leave for other jobs and the average age of camera crews, set dressers and prop builders is much younger.
Mr. Skinner : My hon. Friend has a real feel for the subject, does he not?
Mr. Cryer : The answer is yes.
Every job is important, quite apart from the glamorous nature of film and television, although not all of them are given the degree of importance and emphasis that they deserve. However, the same sort of expertise and tradition is necessary to enable them to carry on. There is a real question mark over the pattern of employment available in the area.
The hon. Member for Honiton quoted from paragraph 10 of the promoters' statement which said that new job opportunities would be created. However, he did not say how many, which is crucial. Will they be equivalent to the
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number of people who worked in the docks--or will there be more or less? What sort of jobs will they be? Will they be in the leisure and tourist industries much beloved of the Government?The invisible earnings about which the Government so often boast are becoming invisible because there is a deficit in invisible trade. Will the jobs created be in tourism? That sector of employment is badly organised, generally poorly paid and does not have the sort of career development of many other occupations. We have gained our position as a nation, not through subservient jobs such as waiting on tables, but through jobs which added value to materials such as steel and wood.
Mr. Prescott : What is wrong with waiting on tables?
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