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Column 231
House of Commons
Friday 9 November 1990
The House met at half-past Nine o'clock
PRAYERS
[Mr. Speaker-- in the Chair ]
BILL PRESENTED
Disability Living Allowance and Disability Working Allowance
Mr. Secretary Newton, supported by Mr. Secretary Rifkind, Mr. Secretary Brooke, Mr. Secretary Howard, Mr. Secretary Hunt, Mr. Secretary Waldegrave, Mr. Francis Maude, Mr. Nicholas Scott and Mrs. Gillian Shephard, presented (under Standing Order No. 48 (Procedure upon Bills whose main object is to create a charge upon the public revenue)) a Bill to introduce as social security benefits disability living allowance and disability working allowance ; and for connected purposes : And the same was read the first time ; and ordered to be read a Second time on Monday 12 November and to be printed. [Bill 9.]
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Orders of the Day
Debate on the Address
[Third Day]
Order read for resuming adjourned debate on Question[7 November],
That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, as follows : Most Gracious Sovereign,
We, Your Majesty's most dutiful and loyal subjects, The Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, in Parliament assembled, beg leave to offer our humble thanks to Your Majesty for the Gracious Speech which Your Majesty has addressed to both Houses of Parliament.-- [Mr. Younger.]
Question again proposed.
Industry and Transport Mr. Speaker : Before I propose the Question again, I must tell the House that many hon. Members have sought to take part in today's debate and therefore I propose to put a 10-minute limit on speeches between 11.30 and 1 o'clock. If those who are called before that time are relatively brief, it may be possible to relax it.
9.36 am
The Secretary of State for Trade and Industry and President of the Board of Trade (Mr. Peter Lilley) : Although Friday is not the most crowded day in the House, in my experience it is a day when those hon. Members who attend are among the most perspicacious, assiduous and discriminating. [Hon. Members :-- "Hear, hear."] So Friday debates are occasions for greater frankness and concentration on the key issues than is perhaps possible on some other days of the week. The Gracious Speech makes it clear that the key issue facing the world economy is the success or failure of the Uruguay round. The world economy is clearly slowing down, and the normal trade cycle is exacerbated by the Gulf crisis and higher oil prices. So what the world needs, above all, is a non-inflationary stimulus, and only a successful GATT round could provide that.
Lower tariffs and the removal of barriers to trade would simultaneously put downward pressure on prices and encourage increased trade and activity. So the failure of the Community to table any offer on agriculture by the agreed date threatened to derail the whole Uruguay round. That would have had incalculable consequences for world prosperity.
We must all feel relieved that Farm and Trade Ministers averted disaster when they finally reached agreement on Tuesday. That outcome owes much to the insistence of the Prime Minister and the Foreign Secretary that Heads of Government should consider the matter at Rome, and to the tenacious insistence in Brussels by my right hon. and hon. Friends the Agriculture and Trade Ministers that the matter be pursued to a successful conclusion.
Dr. Dafydd Elis Thomas (Meirionnydd Nant Conwy) : I will be able to reduce my speech by at least five minutes if I obtain an adequate response now. What about the
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consequences of a 30 per cent. reduction in agricultural incomes? When will the Government make their views known on the consequences of that?Mr. Lilley : My right hon. Friend the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food has already made it clear that that 30 per cent. is related to the position in 1986 and hence includes many of the changes that have already been made. So the effect on farm incomes is by no means a 30 per cent. reduction in the present level of support. It has also become clear over the years that agricultural support, both in the Community and in other countries, rarely finds its way unltimately into farmers' pockets. It finds its way into the increased costs that farmers incur and they should not fear that a reduction in subsidies will necessarily result in a corresponding reduction in their incomes. However, to some extent it will result in the reduction of their costs, to the great benefit of consumers and agriculture, particularly in this country, which has the most efficient agriculture in Europe.
We have jumped the hurdle of the agreement, in Brussels, but there are plenty more hurdles to jump before we can bring the round to a successful conclusion. Not only our Common Market partners but our friends in north America, the Cairns group, the newly industralised countries and the less developed countries will all have to be ready to compromise.
I have held meetings during the past two or three months with innumerable Trade Ministers. They all recognise Britain's pivotal role in bringing about agreement, first at Punta del Este, then in Brussels and in the remaining negotiations. We have taken that constructive lead, not least because Britain is one of the great trading nations of the world so we stand to gain most from a successful round or lose most, if, heaven forfend, the world sinks back into protectionism, trade wars and beggar-my- neighbour policies.
We are not motivated simply by self-interest. The Government believe passionately in free trade, which is the guarantor of prosperity, binds nations together and is the ultimate foundation stone of peace. Much the same philosophy lies behind the single European market. That is why it is Britain's number one priority on the Community agenda. It was originally a British idea. The programme was drawn up by a British Commissioner, and the vision behind the single market is closely related to the policies that the Government have pursued with success in the United Kingdom.
I am glad to say that the Community is making good progress on the single market front. Some two thirds of the legislative programme is now agreed. Perhaps the most concrete example of how seriously this country takes the single market and European Community commitments generally is its record in implementing single market measures. Our record is better than any of our partners, except Denmark. We shall continue to press our partners to liberalise outstanding sectors such as life assurance and investment services, implement agreed directives and enforce directives that they have already implemented.
In view of the events of the past 12 years, it is perhaps unwise of holders of my office to look too far ahead, but that caveat apart, I confidently look forward to chairing the Internal Market Council when it presides over the successful completion of the single market in the second
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half of 1992. What is more, I am confident that, when I do so, I shall have the wholehearted backing of the Conservative party for the principles that underlie both the GATT round and the single market. Those principles are exactly in tune with the Government's belief in open markets, unsubsidised competition and free trade. But those principles are completely alien to the policies and beliefs of the Labour party. I have never heard a Member of the Labour party call for abolishing subsidies, scrapping protection, encouraging competition, freeing markets or liberalising trade. Whereas the Conservative Government have had their foot on the accelerator for GATT and the single market, Labour would be forever applying the brakes.We have been eager to promote free trade, deregulation and unsubsidised competition in international trade because we have seen its benefits domestically. The simple fact is that during the 1960s, when, to a greater or lesser degree, we pursued policies that the Opposition believe in, the United Kingdom had the slowest growing economy in western Europe. During the 1970s, the United Kingdom still had the slowest growing economy in western Europe. But during the 1980s, thanks to our policies, Britain has been in the vanguard of growth ; our output has grown faster than that of France, Italy and Germany.
The hon. Member for Dunfermline, East (Mr. Brown) is always lecturing other people on the dangers of short- termism, but when it comes to economic performance, he is a short-termist of the worst kind. He ignores the long- term performance of a whole decade or the prospects for the decade to come, and focuses on the short-term outlook over the next few months.
Of course, there are short-term issues.
Mr. Robert Hughes (Aberdeen, North) : Surely there can be no greater example of short-termism from the Conservative Government than the remit that they gave British Steel to buy cheap and sell dear and stop manufacturing, which yesterday led to 1,200 job losses and the closure of the Clydesdale steel works. Those people who are to be unemployed face not short-term but long-term unemployment.
Mr. Lilley : That is manifest nonsense. British Steel has been put in the hands of the private sector to work for the long-term benefit of this country, its employees and its shareholders. It is not for us to second-guess the commercial decisions it takes. I would be interested to hear from the Labour party whether it proposes to renationalise it, direct its actions and break the European Commission rules that prevent subsidies and intervention or whether it has any policy on the issue. The fact is that it does not.
Mr. Gordon Brown (Dunfermline, East) : Will the Secretary of State confirm that the Secretary of State for Scotland set out the Government's policy towards British Steel in Scotland a few months ago, which was to persuade British Steel to reconsider its decision to close the Ravenscraig strip mill and pressure it with a view to reversing it? Will he name one thing that he has done in the past five months to implement that policy?
Mr. Lilley : I endorse entirely the words and actions of my right hon. and learned Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland. He is not going to breach the rules of the Euopean Community. Is the hon. Member for Dunfermline, East going to do so? When the hon. Member
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for Dunfermline, East spelt out his five- point plan for Scottish steel, four of its items were contrary to the European Community rules and a fifth was to set up a committee.I shall return to the short term, which so obsesses the hon. Member for Dunfermline, East. I promise to be frank and consider the problems that we face. The central problem facing the country is inflation. I spend a great deal of time visiting businesses, meeting and talking to business people. Virtually all of them agree that inflation is the supreme enemy. It destroys savings, undermines investment, prevents planning and destroys jobs. Get inflation down, and other problems become far easier to tackle ; but to prescribe a cure, we must first understand the cause of the recent resurgence of inflation.
For that, we must look back to the crash in the world capital markets in October 1987, which was unprecedented, except for the crash of 1929, which was followed by the slump of the 1930s. We were determined to prevent a recurrence of that pattern, so we reduced interest rates, relaxed monetary policy and encouraged expansion. With the benefit of hindsight, we acknowledge that that was a mistake.
Mr. John Prescott (Kingston upon Hull, East) : That was before the election.
Mr. Lilley : It was after the election. The hon. Member's sense of time is as mistaken as most of his other ideas.
The economy in 1987 was not, as it seemed, faltering but growing strongly, and the stock market crash was no more than a technical correction. Nineteen eighty-eight, far from being a year of recession, turned out to be the year of strongest growth in nine successive years of growth. We got it wrong, but the Labour party urged us to get it wrong in spades. Some months after the crash in 1987, the right hon. and learned Member for Monklands, East (Mr. Smith) was still urging us to relax even more. He said :
"Now is the time for cuts in interest rates to stimulate the economy Now is the time for a programme of well-planned public investment to mobilise the unused capacity There is no economic constraint on such action."
With the benefit of hindsight, we know that monetary relaxation which we were urged to do in greater measure, triggered strong consumer spending, which, fuelled by mortgage borrowing and a simultaneous boom in investment, meant that there was too much money chasing too few goods. That is the age- old recipe for inflation.
Mr. Gordon Brown : If the Government were wrong to relax interest rates at the beginning of 1989, were they not also wrong to give away £6 billion in tax cuts in the Budget? Is that not one of the major reasons why we face our current problems?
Mr. Lilley : Once again, the hon. Gentleman is absolutely wrong. The Budget to which he refers increased the surplus. In case he does not understand these things, let me explain that, in the 1988 Budget, the Government took out of the economy in taxes £14 billion more than they spent. That represented not a relaxation but the tightest fiscal policy that this country has ever had.
We are now at the most difficult point in the process of getting inflation down. Monetary relaxation triggered inflation and monetary tightness is its cure. Higher interest rates encourage saving and discourage borrowing. That slows spending, which in turn curbs price rises.
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I repeat that we are at the most difficult point in the process. Interest rates are still high, although my right hon. Friend the Chancellor has been able to cut them by one point. Demand has begun to slow, and although inflation has not yet responded to weaker demand, it will respond. All outside forecasters agree with my right hon. Friend the Chancellor that inflation is set to fall rapidly next year. When inflation falls, my right hon. Friend will be able to reduce interest rates, and non-inflationary growth will resume. Yesterday, the hon. Member for Dunfermline, East disputed that, although, given his track record in forecasting, that fills me with confidence. The House will recall that, in October 1986, the hon. Gentleman wrote in The Guardian :"In 1990 around 3.12 million of us will still be unemployed ... the Government simply cannot reduce unemployment by present economic policies."
The hon. Gentleman said that that could prove to be an underestimate. In fact, unemployment has fallen in 43 of the subsequent 48 months. In 1984, the hon. Gentleman did even worse, when he told us that there was no evidence that economic recovery was in sight. When he made those remarks, we were already three years into the longest period of sustained economic growth since the war. Economic policies are more important than economic forecasts. Before the Opposition criticise the present slow-down in demand, they must answer a simple question : do they know of any method of reducing inflation, successfully tried in any country, that does not involve a slow- down in demand? To coin a phrase, the Opposition had better either "put up or shut up".
At a time of slack demand, industry is still chalking up some impressive achievements.
Mr. Lilley : Coming from the hon. Gentleman, that is a compliment indeed, because he knows something about it.
Manufactured exports in the last quarter were up 8 per cent. on the previous year, whereas imports have not grown during that period. For the second year running, our manufactured goods have increased their share of world markets. That is a tribute to industry's competitiveness. Despite high interest rates, the number of businesses has increased by about 70,000 over the past year, after taking account of closures, mergers and companies ceasing to trade. There are now nearly 400,000 more businesses in Britain than there were when we came to power in 1979. That is a tribute to the climate of enterprise that we have created.
The number of industrial disputes in the past year has been the lowest for 50 years. That is a tribute to our trade union reforms, which the Labour party has opposed so vehemently.
Business investment is at a record level and, even allowing for the cyclical movement predicted by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor, investment next year will be 50 per cent. higher than when the Opposition left office. That is a tribute to the vast improvement in industry's profitability under this Government.
Industry is right to take the long-term view and continue to invest in its future because, once the short-term problem of inflation is licked, the prospects for British industry in the 1990s will be even better than in the 1980s.
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The 1980s saw manufacturing industry improve its productivity faster in Britain than in any other major country--faster even than in Japan. That has set the basis for a substantial expansion of our manufacturing base in the 1990s.The motor industry is a notable example. Having fallen below 1 million cars a year, output is now set to pass 2 million cars a year during this decade. Three major Japanese firms have chosen to base their European operations here in Britain. Does anyone imagine that they would have come here if Labour had been in power? How splendid it is that Nissan will soon be exporting British-built cars back to Japan. In addition, Rover--back in the private sector--is a company transformed. Its Longbridge plant is now producing more cars than at any time in its history and Jaguar is planning to treble capacity. Vauxhall is exporting from Ellesmere Port for the first time in 15 years. Before too long, Britain should be exporting more cars than it imports.
Other major developments bode well for the future. The completion of the channel tunnel will give an enormous stimulus to trade and travel during the remainder of the decade. It has done that even during its construction. About 75 per cent. of the orders at this end of the tunnel and 50 per cent. overall have been won by British firms. The whole enterprise is one of the most massive engineering achievements ever, and I am sure that the whole House will wish to pay tribute to all those involved in the work culminating in the successful link-up last week.
Ms. Marjorie Mowlam (Redcar) : What about the work force?
Mr. Lilley : Of course I include the work force.
I now wish to refer to research and development. A rather cynical history master once told me that, even if one is totally baffled by an exam question, one was assured of being awarded one mark out of 10 if one wrote one's name on the paper, copied out the question and added the words, "This is a very important issue". On research and development, the hon. Member for Dunfermline, East does not seem to have got much further than that, although we must award him his mark for recognising that it is an important issue. He gets no marks, however, for his blind faith that what is needed is more taxpayers' money. The amount of research and development carried out by business is a function of industry's profitability. Over the past five years, business spending on research and development has risen by nearly 50 per cent. as profitability has been restored.
Nevertheless, the Government have a positive role to play in stimulating research and development. Britain has been phenomenally successful in academic science. Our scientists have won more Nobel prizes than those of any other major country except the United States. We have won more than Germany, three times as many as France and 13 times as many as Japan. Yet until recently, we have been conspicuously unsuccessful in exploiting that wealth of scientific talent for industrial purposes.
Our failure to do so has certainly not been due to inadequate funding by the Government. We spend nearly £3 billion a year on civil research and development--more, relative to our gross domestic product, than Japan and the
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United States. The real problem has been the divorce of industry from the scientific community. We have had to bring them together. When we came to power, only two universities had industrial or science parks.Ms. Joyce Quin (Gateshead, East) : Oh.
Mr. Lilley : It seems that the hon. Lady does not even know what industrial and science parks are. Now, 38 universities have them, and many of them have already been immensely successful in converting scientific ideas into new products and businesses. Nineteen more are planned, and I am investigating the scope for more such facilities, to be attached to polytechnics and Government research
establishments. In addition, I shall shortly announce details of some new programmes to help small and medium-sized businesses to exploit our scientific talent.
The successful enterprise initiative is to be extended for a final three years, and I shall be spelling out the details in a parliamentary answer today. I reaffirm our commitment to privatise the British Technology Group, which has a proven track record in the commercial exploitation of our scientific discoveries.
Mr. Gordon Brown : I want the House to be clear about the Government's privatisation plan. Does the right hon. Gentleman recall the pamphlet that he wrote last November, in which he stated his view that the Post Office should be returned to the private sector?
Mr. Lilley : Would the hon. Gentleman care to read my words?
Mr. Brown : The right hon. Gentleman wrote :
"That would still leave in the state sector the Post Office. The presumption in every case must be that they should be restored to the private sector unless there are good reasons for retaining them in the public sector."
Is that still the right hon. Gentleman's view? Will the Post Office remain in the public sector?
Mr. Lilley : Those are exactly the words to which I would adhere. The right hon. and learned Member for Monklands, East yesterday criticised the planned budget for the Department of Trade and Industry, which he thought reflected a cut in support for innovation. I am afraid that the right hon. and learned Gentleman did not understand the figures, although that is perfectly understandable, as they were complex and as he had little time to study them before the Autumn Statement. The biggest single change in the Department's budget as between this year and next is in the external financing position of the Post Office. This year, the Post Office has been absorbing taxpayers' funds. Next year, it is expected to pay a dividend to the taxpayer. That means a net turnround of £100 million to the taxpayer's advantage.
The second greatest change is in launch aid. The net figure is set to go negative next year, but that is because levy payments from successful past launches are set to exceed even the £80 million of additional launch aid in the budget. What a contrast with the budget of the industrial Department under Labour. It poured out money by the billion, but the cash did not go on research and development : it went to meet the massive losses of
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nationalised industries. None of it came back to the taxpayer. That Department backed failure, but we back success.Opposition Members have displayed a commendable interest in the Government's European policy, and it is only courteous that we should reciprocate. I heard nothing of substance in the reply of the Leader of the Opposition to the Gracious Speech so I turned to his recent interview on the "Today" programme. Clearly, there must be a statement of Labour policy somewhere in the transcript, but I found it as difficult to decipher as Linear B, so I shall have to call on the help of members of the Opposition Front Bench Trade and Industry team, who I assume are more familiar than I am with their policy and their leader's involved style.
Perhaps I could ask the hon. Member for Dunfermline, East some simple questions. First, is the Labour party in favour of an independent European central bank? Or do they not know? [ Hon. Members-- : "Come on."]
Mr. Prescott : Is it in the script to shout "Come on"?
Mr. Lilley : No, it is spontaneous. Why does not the hon. Member for Dunfermline, East respond? Is it simply that he does not know?
Mr. Gordon Brown : We have made our views very clear.
Mr. Lilley : Would it be correct to say that the Labour party is in favour of an independent central bank?
Mr. Brown : I am not taking any lectures from the right hon. Gentleman.
Mr. Lilley : The Leader of the Opposition was unequivocal on the point. It was almost the only clear and precise statement in his interview. He said :
"There cannot be an independent bank."
Secondly, is the Labour party in favour of the Government policy of a hard ecu? Here is an opportunity for the hon. Gentleman to clarify the position, which he says is already very clear. He has not been unforthcoming in venturing his views so far, but he is now strangely reluctant to rise from the Bench. We do not know. The House is left unsure of whether the Labour party is in favour of a hard ecu.
The Leader of the Opposition criticised the hard ecu as wholly beyond the realms of practicality because it would be so successful that it would sweep the board, everyone would use it and it would become the single currency. That was a strange argument from him. He seemed to go on to argue that he was in favour of a single currency. He made his view clear in the interview but then reports began to appear in the newspapers that his office had said that "Neil had not intended to say that." In the memorable word of President Nixon's press secretary, his words were "inoperative". Which statement was right--what he said on the "Today" programme or that with which his office briefed the newspapers? The Labour party has the opportunity here and now to make its position clear, but Labour Members are too confused to do so.
Mr. Tony Favell (Stockport) : Is it not an absolute disgrace that a party which wants to form the Government of this country does not have the guts to tell the British people whether or not it wants to conserve the self-governing status of the nation? Do we not expect to
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hear from the Labour party today in clear and concise terms where it stands? Does my right hon. Friend agree that, if it cannot, it is not fit to govern the country?Mr. Lilley : My hon. Friend is absolutely right. It is a disgrace, but it is no great surprise. The shilly-shallying of the Labour party is exactly in tune with its history. It opposed membership of the Common Market. It favoured renegotiation--although it was unsuccessful in campaigning on that basis. It stood on a manifesto commitment to withdraw from the EEC in 1983. In 1987, it promised to take actions which were incompatible with the treaty of Rome and would force withdrawal. Subsequently, it has said that it is the most enthusiastic European party in the House. It has left the position wholly unclear, and its present flirtation with Euro-rhetoric will be just as unconvincing to the electorate as its past manoeuvres.
Mr. Gordon Brown : The position was not unclear yesterday.
Mr. Lilley : If the hon. Gentleman suggests that I have shilly- shallyed over Europe he is wrong.
Yesterday, my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer made his Autumn Statement to the House. He demonstrated that the finances of the country are in better shape than those of America, Germany, France or any major country except Japan. He showed that inflation will fall sharply next year pointing the way to lower interest rates. He demonstrated that growth will resume before long at a fair lick. Despite a tight overall settlement, he found funds for higher spending on health, education and transport.
We can look forward to the next decade with confidence, as long as we pursue the sound policies which transformed the economy in the past decade and which are further strengthened by the policies outlined in the Gracious Speech.
10.5 am
Mr. Gordon Brown (Dunfermline, East) : Perhaps it is not surprising that the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry spoke for half an hour but failed even to mention the words Bradford and Bootle. I well understand his reticence. In the early hours of this morning-- [Interruption.] Conservative Members might listen--we saw an electoral humiliation visited on the Conservative party as a direct result of the mistaken policies of an out-of-touch Prime Minister in a failed, divided, and now discredited Government.
The message from Bootle and Bradford is clear : while the Prime Minister may contrive to win an election victory within the narrow compass of the Conservative parliamentary party, consisting of 369 rather frightened men and women, she cannot win the only election that really matters--the one that will deliver the verdict of the British people.
Mr. Jacques Arnold (Gravesham) : Will the hon. Gentleman explain how winning 5 per cent. of the vote at Eastbourne proves that the Labour party is going anywhere?
Mr. Brown : If the hon. Gentleman looks at what has happened around the country during the past two years he will find that in by-elections, local elections, European elections and opinion polls, the Labour party has not only increased but deepened its support. The hon. Gentleman
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might reflect on the results in Bootle and Bradford. The Conservative party managed to obtain 6 per cent. of the vote in Bootle and 17 per cent. in Bradford--a seat which they previously held. The hon. Gentleman is the last person who should mention Eastbourne, which was a devastating defeat for the Conservative Government.The reason why the country is passing that verdict is clear. Yesterday more than 1,000 jobs were lost in Scotland. Today as many jobs will be lost around the country. This week three small businesses have gone bankrupt every hour. A job is lost in manufacturing every two minutes. Many small businesses are experiencing not a soft or even a hard landing, but a crash landing. Worst of all, as the autumn statement revealed, the Government's only strategy for the future is to seek a repetition of the mistakes of the past.
The autumn statement made it clear, but the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry did not mention, that manufacturing output is predicted to fall in 1991. Business investment is predicted to fall even further--by 2.5 per cent. Next year, inflation, which the Government said was their flagship policy, and which they promised to bring down to zero, will still be higher, taking the underlying rate--The Government's favoured indicator- -than the European average. If the Conservative party will not listen to us or to the electorate, will it listen to the voice of business throughout the country? The chairman of the Building Employers Federation said only the other day :
"I can see no early prospect of recovery".
The chairman of the Engineering Employers Federation said : "The prospect is for a substantial further reduction in the total employment in engineering"--
not in 1990 or 1991, but "in 1992." Mr. John Harris, chairman of the National Federation of Self Employed and Small Businesses said : "Industry has been asked to swallow a cocktail of disasters." At the CBI conference, Mr. Ron Lander said :
"We are living on borrowed time."
At the same conference, Mr. Roland Long said :
"Inflation is not an act of God It is caused by economic mismanagement."
If the Secretary of State were doing his job properly, he would be addressing the concerns expressed in every sector of industry about the state of industry as a result of the high interest rate policy of his Government. My final quote comes from Mr. Richard Pickard, a small shopkeeper from Grantham who owns a shop not far from that in which the Prime Minister was brought up. He said :
"Any other management team in such a mess would get the sack. I voted for them but now I cannot wait to get them out."
No wonder that the Foreign Secretary made a telling comment only a few days ago when he said on "The World At One" :
"What we need is a period of competence."
I hesitate to say anything that will add to the Government's problems and difficulties, but it is only right that Conservative Back-Bench Members, who may not be aware of these things, should hear me say something about at least one of the business closures that have been such a casualty of the recent recession. This business is close to the heart of many Conservative Members. An interesting little company, centrally placed, well-endowed, with
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