House of Commons Hansard Debates for 7 Dec 1990

Mr. Peter Bottomley : Did the convention consider the number of Scottish Members of Parliament who ought to come here from Scotland if these arrangements came to pass?

Mrs. Michie : That has been discussed. We believe that that will be a matter for decision here. However, it would be no problem for my party. Without doubt the number of Scottish Members of Parliament who would have seats in this place would be reduced. That would be good. I certainly would not accept that Scottish Members could not vote on the Manchester Sewers Bill, or whatever, or that English Members could not vote on Scottish matters. I foresee us looking after our domestic affairs but sending representatives to this Parliament, which I hope will evolve into a federal parliament, and voting on United Kingdom affairs. We are quite happy about that.

Mr. Bottomley : Do the Liberal Democrats believe that the numbers in Scotland should come down to reflect the electorate in England and Wales? The Act of Union gives extra seats to the Scots. Would her party support a disproportionately large electorate for Scottish Members because they would not have to concern themselves with English and Welsh legislation?

Mrs. Michie : The hon. Gentleman is asking for much detail on the reform of boundaries, and so on. The land mass of Scotland is equal to half that of England and Wales. I do not want the Scots to try to dominate this Parliament. What a difference it would make to hon. Members if Scottish matters were discussed in Edinburgh. They would have plenty of time to go for dinner or could go home earlier because the Scots would not be making a fuss and going on about legislation all the time. I would look for and welcome such a change in the procedures of the House.

It disturbs me that we cannot get through to Conservative Members what we are saying. The Minister

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is probably an anglo-Scot. I know that he went to Merchiston Castle school in Edinburgh, which is a very good school. He should have some understanding of the aspirations of the Scottish people. Why do the Government welcome the freedom attained by eastern European countries and the Balkan states but refuse Scotland the right to govern herself while remaining a partner in the United Kingdom? The Government may say, "We do not want you as a partner", but then they should say so. Liberal Democrats say that we should like to remain a partner in the United Kingdom. Hon. Members should not be so dismissive. They should look closely at the scene in Scotland. They might not know what is going on there, but they should think deeply about what is likely to happen unless they respond.

The Prime Minister said that he would listen, and he spoke of people having pride and dignity. He and his Government should understand that the demand of the Scottish people will not go away. It is extraordinary that a country such as Scotland, which has its own legal and education systems, does not have its own legislative forum. Its position must be unique in the western world. We want the space to grow and to develop our own talents and to decide our own destiny and political future while remaining a useful and equal partner in the United Kingdom. I do not think that that is too much to ask.

11.43 am

Mr. Tony Favell (Stockport) : The hon. Member for Argyll and Bute (Mrs. Michie) mentioned the possibility of a devolved Parliament in Scotland. As an onlooker, it occurs to me that, 300 years after the Act of Union in 1707, a devolved Parliament would inevitably lead to tensions and, ultimately, to a separation of our two countries, which would be a tragedy. We have been through so much together. We are inter-married, we have conquered empires together, have defeated dictators together, have a single currency and live within almost a single island. Tensions would inevitably arise. Give politicians a talking shop and, as we have seen with the European Parliament, they soon want power. If Scotland wants to go down that road, that is for her to decide, but that is how it would inevitably end.

Mrs. Ray Michie : The hon. Gentleman says that it is inevitable that Scotland would seek total separation from the rest of the United Kingdom, but that is to deny what happens around the world, particularly the western world. All the successful economies are based on a federal system of government and devolved power to the nation states or provinces. They all work successfully. The Scottish people do not want to cut their links with the United Kingdom, but I warn Conservative Members that unless they are prepared to listen they may be pushed down that road.

Mr. Favell : I disagree with the hon. Lady, although I hear what she says.

I am grateful for the opportunity to speak this morning because I wish to pay tribute to a most remarkable lady--my right hon. Friend the Member for Finchley (Mrs. Thatcher). I met her only once, albeit briefly, before I was elected, to have the normal candidate's photograph taken. In 1979, when I was learning all about socialism, I fought the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner). Something

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that gave me a few extra votes against the monumental pile of votes that are cast for the hon. Gentleman was that I had a photograph taken with my right hon. Friend.

Mr. Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) : There was another interesting development in that campaign. The hon. Gentleman lived at a place called Skinner's hall and the Liberal candidate lived at Skinner's street. They could not get away from the idea that they were fighting Skinner. I remember the photograph with the right hon. Member for Finchley (Mrs. Thatcher). I do not think that it helped at all in my mining constituency. I look forward to the next general election and the hon. Gentleman sticking up a photograph of the right hon. Member for Finchley in Stockport and losing his seat.

Mr. Favell : That is unlikely to happen, but it is nice to see the hon. Member for Bolsover at the Dispatch Box. I have enormous respect for him. Like my right hon. Friend the Member for Finchley, he knows his mind and he is not afraid to speak it, unlike many Labour Members, and no more so than the right hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton (Mr. Kaufman), who tried to pretend that his party is united on Europe, knowing very well that behind him it is split virtually 50 : 50.

The second time that I met my right hon. Friend the Member for Finchley was in the summer following my election in 1983 when, as with many new Members, we were invited to No. 10 with our wives. My hon. Friend the Member for Basildon (Mr. Amess), who introduced the motion so ably, is nodding. It was a swelteringly hot day. My wife, Susan, and I were greeted by my right hon. Friend and Denis Thatcher. After about an hour, all the men were standing in a certain way because it was so hot and the ladies were dabbing their brows. My wife said to me, "Just look at that woman." The Prime Minister looked as though she had just walked straight out of the shower, despite her having had a busy day. There was not a bead of perspiration, unlike everyone else in the room. My wife said, "That is will power." She has certainly had will power ever since and especially in the past few weeks. She has shown extraordinary will power, and I know that Opposition Members respect her for that.

When we went to No. 10 Downing street, my right hon. Friend showed us the Cabinet room. My right hon. Friend the Leader of the House is the only Member present today who has served in the Cabinet room. My right hon. Friend the Member for Finchley showed us the great oval table and the places where various members of the Cabinet sat. She said, "This is where I sit", and we all dutifully looked at the place. She then said, "Behind me is a portrait of Robert Walpole. He was Prime Minister for 21 years. Now there's a thought." She has not made her 21 years as Prime Minister, but she has made eleven and a half years. I have no doubt that we shall stay in power for 21 years--until the turn of the century--thanks to the way in which she dealt with the leadership battle last week. Several of my hon. Friends have touched on that point.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Finchley was elected leader of the party in 1975. I make no apology for the fact that I am a Yorkshire man who represents a seat on the other side of the Pennines. Yorkshire men were doing very well in 1975. Harold Wilson, who was born in Huddersfield, was leading the country. Geoffrey Boycott was born in Yorkshire. If only he had been born in

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Lancashire, things might have been very different for Yorkshire cricket. Then there was Arthur Scargill who was also born in Yorkshire. They were three great pillars of the establishment. Unfortunately, my right hon. Friend the Member for Finchley could not do much about Geoffrey Boycott and Yorkshire cricket has not recovered, but she has certainly done something about the two other men. In the 1970s, Lord Wilson of Rievaulx said that Labour was the natural party of government. When I was campaigning furiously against the hon. Member for Bolsover, people said that socialism was inevitable, that it was spreading throughout the world and that there was no way in which the trend could be reversed. But my right hon. Friend has reversed the trend, not only here but throughout eastern Europe and elsewhere.

Arthur Scargill was riding high at that time because he had just brought down the Government of my right hon. Friend the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (Mr. Heath). Arthur Scargill thought that he was unassailable ; and he tried again in 1984-85 during the miners' strike. There were many faint hearts throughout the country and in industry ; there were even a few faint hearts among Conservative Members. My right hon. Friend the Member for Finchley defeated Arthur Scargill through her will power. He had to be defeated because he thought that force could overcome the democratically elected Government.

I was one of the few Conservative Members who went to see the picketing at Orgreave. it was an extraordinary experience. Watching the scene on the television in the warmth of one's home, one could not appreciate what was happening. A pall of evil hung over that place. There were 2,000 policemen and 4,000 others, many of whom were not miners. The troublemakers were trying to destroy democracy in this country. It was a remarkable period in our history and no one but my right hon. Friend could have achieved that victory. It was a victory not for our party or for the Government, but for democracy.

Mr. Skinner : Will the hon. Gentleman bear in mind that during the 1972 and 1974 strikes Arthur Scargill was not the leader of the National Union of Mineworkers? It is true that he played a part in Yorkshire.

If the hon. Gentleman wants to sum up the legacy of the past 11 years during which his right hon. Friend the Member for Finchley (Mrs. Thatcher) was Prime Minister, he should consider this maxim. The former Prime Minister has been stabbed in the back by her own people and has been turned out in the night like a wounded dog. Arthur Scargill is still in office.

Mr. Favell : Arthur Scargill is not even a member of the council of the Trades Union Congress because he does not have enough members for him to be able to demand a position there. He is a wounded dog with no power.

Mr. Skinner : The right hon. Member for Finchley has gone.

Mr. Favell : Her memory and her achievements live on. She will go down in history as the greatest peacetime Prime Minister this country has ever seen. Arthur Scargill will go down in history as a miserable and abject failure.

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When my right hon. Friend the Member for Finchley became Prime Minister in 1979, it seemed that the decline of Britain was inevitable. She arrested it by one simple action : she put trust in the people. She trusted them to buy and to run their own homes. The Labour party said that council house tenants could not be trusted to look after their own houses.

My right hon. Friend insisted that industry took responsibility for industry. She made it clear that the days of subsidies, of bailing out companies and of debacles such as Upper Clyde Shipbuilders were over. She trusted industry to run its own affairs. Before the hon. Member for Bolsover intervenes, I must say that it is a pity that we have not done the same with the farmers. If we had done so, we should not have had the debacle in the negotiations on the general agreement on tariffs and trade over the past two or three days. My right hon. Friend also put trust in trade union members to run the trade unions. We no longer see trade union leaders parade as the great leaders of our nation.

My right hon. Friend has privatised our nationalised industries. Even as recently as last year, when water was being privatised, people said that it was impossible. However, my right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford (Mr. Tebbit) pointed out that a survey showed that only 2 million people were in favour of water privatisation, but that 5 million of them applied for shares. As my hon. Friend the Member for Esher (Mr. Taylor) said, there are more shareholders in this country than there are trade union leaders.

Mr. Tony Banks : Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Favell : I will give way in a moment.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Huntingdon (Mr. Major) has said that he wants an open society--a society of equal opportunity in which everyone has a chance. The foundations for that society have been firmly laid by my right hon. Friend the Member for Finchley. Her memory will live on, and we should all be grateful to her for all that she has achieved for this country.

11.56 am

Mr. Tony Banks (Newham, North-West) : I did not realise that the hon. Member for Stockport (Mr. Favell) had finished--I thought that he was giving way to me. In fact, he has given way, but on a slightly more permanent basis than I had thought. I had intended to ask him about the transformation to a share-owning democracy that he believed that the blessed right hon. Member for Finchley (Mrs. Thatcher) had achieved, but I now have the opportunity to speak for myself. It is not surprising that many people have applied for shares in electricity, because the shares have been undervalued. People will be able to make a lot of money very quickly. I do not think that that is a good deal. If one offers people buckets of money, one should not be too surprised if they grab them with both hands. That is what happens if the Government undersell the assets--people will obviously realise that they can make a lot of money.

The hon. Member for Stockport implied that people were dedicated to a share -owning democracy, but the statistics show that the vast majority of the increased number of shareholders--there has certainly been an increase--own shares in only one company. That does not seem to represent the ideal of the share-owning

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democracy. Most of the people inovlved in the privatisation shares get in and get out as fast as they can, making as much money as they can at the expense of the rest of us. I do not regard privatisation as handing the assets to the people. In fact, it means taking the assets away from all the people and handing them over to a smaller number of the people at the expense of the great majority. Few people in my constituency or my borough have been able to take the opportunity to make money from undervalued assets. Under the Government, the percentage of shares owned by the institutions has increased while the percentage owned by individual shareholders has gone down.

The Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons (Mr. John MacGregor) : The logic of the hon. Gentleman's position is to seek massive renationalisation. Is that what he wants?

Mr. Banks : You, Madam Deputy Speaker, will know--as few others do-- that I have recently been elevated to the Front Bench. I understand that certain responsibilities come with aspirations to high office, but I have my own personal views and I shall express them--having made it quite clear, in case the leader of my party is listening or reads Hansard, that they are not the views of the Labour party as a whole. I would certainly renationalise--in most cases, without compensation. Involvement in capitalism may bring gains, but one has to accept that fingers can get burnt. Some people will have been able to make a fast buck, but others must accept that a risk is involved. The Leader of the House asked me my opinion and I have given it. I stress once again that it is my own view and not that of my party. Personally, I would renationalise every one of the public assets that have been so shamefully sold off.

Mr. Peter Bottomley : I accept that we are hearing the hon. Gentleman's own views and not those of his party. An employee who takes shares in his business may sell them at a profit or he may keep them as a mark of his long-term commitment to his firm. Would the hon. Gentleman take shares back without compensation in the latter case? Would he apply his policy to the shareholders, owners and employees of National Freight and to the 80 per cent. of Thames Water employees who have shares in that company?

Mr. Banks : Once again, I emphasise that I am expressing my own opinions and not my party's policies. I am talking hypothetically because it is unlikely that I shall ever be leader of my party or persuade it to accept my views. One would have to approach each of the privatised assets somewhat differently, just as one would have to approach shareholders differently. In certain cases, compensation would have to be paid. If a Labour Government pursued such policies, it would probably be right for that Government to repurchase shares. Share prices go down as well as up, and when things go wrong in an industry the shares can be purchased cheaply. In respect of an individual whose only source of income was shares --perhaps the proverbial widow in Wolverhampton who owns a small number of shares--one would expect decent compensation to be paid. The hon. Gentleman involved me in an interesting discussion although, as we are talking so hypothetically, I wonder whether it is worth my taking the time of the House.

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Mr. Favell : The hon. Gentleman is refreshingly frank. Perhaps he will be similarly frank about the number of his colleagues in the Labour party who would support his views on renationalisation without compensation, as I am sure that the electorate would like to know whether that view is likely to prevail after the general election.

Mr. Banks : I am, indeed, refreshingly frank--that is probably why, in party-political terms, I am such a lousy politician. One of the things that I dislike about party politics is that one so often has to subordinate one's personal opinions to a policy with which one does not agree so as to present a united front. I believe in speaking my mind, even though what I say may not convey a great deal to anyone and even though I usually say it at great expense to myself. The answer to the hon. Gentleman's question is that those who share my views are a minority in the Labour party, confined to the campaign group. As I said recently, the campaign group and the left of the Labour party have not been doing very well. I was recently appointed official stretcher-bearer when the campaign group decided that it needed such an office. The hon. Gentleman will certainly not get any comforting statistics from me to suggest that I am expressing the opinions of the vast majority of people in the parliamentary Labour party, because I am not--I remain very much in the minority. Having been totally diverted from what I intended to say, I return to the motion tabled by the hon. Member for Basildon (Mr. Amess). I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on his luck in the ballot and apologise to him for having missed the first part of his speech, especially as I understand that it was the most interesting part. The terms of the motion are suitably sycophantic--so much so that I have submitted the whole text of his motion to Private Eye for consideration for the award of the order of the brown nose. I am convinced that I shall win the £10 prize--if I do, I will go halves with the hon. Gentleman.

The hon. Gentleman has been steadfast in his support for the previous Prime Minister. When the right hon. Member for Finchley had become as popular as the bubonic plague in the rest of the country and in her own party, the hon. Gentleman was like the boy who stood on the burning deck--prepared to be consumed in the flames to stand by his right hon. Friend in her difficulties. I commend the hon. Gentleman for his steadfastness. His support for the right hon. Lady has never wavered. In the end, he found himself in the minority, although I take his point about the votes because the Conservative party never got round to holding a third ballot. It is fortunate that the Conservative party can change its rules so readily--when it comes to standards and practices, there is nothing that the Tories will not change at the drop of a hat. Although the hon. Gentleman was prepared to stand by the right hon. Member for Finchley, however, many others in his party were ready to dump the pilot overboard and did just that.

Mr. Peter Bottomley : It occurs to me that the resignation of my hon. Friend the Member for Stockport (Mr. Favell) as Parliamentary Private Secretary to the then Chancellor may have started the whole process as that was what got us to concentrate on Europe.

Mr. Banks : Never before has anyone deserted at such a critical time, and with such a perverse effect on his own career--if the hon. Member for Stockport (Mr. Favell) had held his courage just a little longer he might have been

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PPS to the new Prime Minister. But that is politics for you, Madam Deputy Speaker. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will have the chance to climb a little further up the greasy pole than I have in due course, or perhaps he and I are both losers.

Before we allow Conservative Members to confer a sainthood on the right hon. Member for Finchley and erect a shrine to her, we should examine the reasons why the Tory party dumped her, because that is what it did. The Conservatives dumped her because it was generally considered in the party-- certainly in the parliamentary party--that the Tories stood no chance of winning the next election if they kept her. If they had thought that they could win the next general election with her, they would have stuck with her. Nothing concentrates hon. Members' minds more than the thought of losing their seats, and enough Conservative Members in marginal seats were convinced that they would lose those seats at the election, so the right hon. Lady had to go.

Mr. Wilshire : That sounds like an explanation of why the Labour party is considering ditching its leader.

Mr. Banks : Even if there were a desire to dump the leader of the Labour party--I assure the hon. Gentleman that there is not--we could not change our rules. We are unlike the Conservative party in that respect. The leader of the party is elected with the support of all wings of our movement, the majority of Members of the parliamentary party and the majority of delegates at conference, which means the trade unions as well as constituency activists. There is, in any case, no desire to dump my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition--why on earth should we want to do that? My right hon. Friend forced the former Prime Minister to resign by cornering her. It would be absurd to contemplate moving against our leader. The difference is that we know that we are going to win with our leader, but Conservative Members knew that they were going to lose with theirs. That is why they dumped her.

Mr. Peter Bottomley : For the benefit of those who do not know all the Labour party rules, is not the real reason why there cannot be an effective contest for the leadership of the Labour party the fact that it takes six months for the process to work? There has to be a special conference and all the rest of it. I do not want to trespass out of order, but this point comes within the terms of the motion. Is it not also the case that in 1983, when the present Leader of the Opposition was chosen to lead his party, 203 Labour Members voted--101 against the right hon. Gentleman and 102 for him? I admit that that is a majority, but it is nothing like so good a majority as my right hon. Friend the Member for Finchley (Mrs. Thatcher) had a few weeks ago.

Mr. Banks : Yes, but in 1983 my right hon. Friend the Member for Islwyn (Mr. Kinnock) was not the party leader. He was one of the candidates. The Conservative party dumped its leader who had been there for 12 or 15 years--I cannot remember exactly how long, but it seemed like a lifetime to me and to many people in this country. The right hon. Member for Finchley led her party to three victories. The hon. Member for Basildon made that point because he is one of her staunchest devotees--so

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staunch that in his speech he was prepared to try to rekindle her image for us as a wonderful person who made a great contribution. If that is so, why did Conservative Members dump her? All the accolades from the hon. Member for Basildon cannot camouflage the fact that she was dumped as a successful leader of the party. Conservative Members know that what counts in politics is not what one has achieved in the past but what one will achieve in the future. Conservative Members knew that they could not win an election with the right hon. Member for Finchley and her policies, so they dumped her.

Mr. John Marshall (Hendon, South) : Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Banks : I will give way to the hon. Gentleman. He has only just joined us, but I am sure that he has something useful to say.

Mr. John Marshall : Does the hon. Gentleman not accept that many people in the Labour party would like to dump the Leader of the Opposition, who has achieved very little and will achieve even less in future?

Mr. Banks : It was my own fault for giving way to someone who had literally just walked into the Chamber. Had the hon. Gentleman come in just a couple of minutes earlier, he could have joined in the discussion on that very subject. Perhaps I should send him a specially annotated copy of Hansard on Monday so that we can have a private discussion about it elsewhere.

Another reason why the right hon. Member for Finchley was dumped is that she had become arrogant, autocratic and out of touch with real people. She was surrounded by people who were giving her the advice that she wanted to hear.

One of the symbols of the right hon. Lady's lack of contact with reality was the erection of those preposterous iron gates--the Nicolae Ceausescu memorial gates--at the end of Downing street. I am glad that my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition has made it clear that when he becomes Prime Minister those gates will go. They are a symbol of the division between the right hon. Member for Finchley and the people of this country-- she was so popular that she was not allowed to walk on the streets of London because she was an incitement to public disorder.

Mrs. Gorman : The hon. Gentleman is aware that those gates were erected because of the brave stand of my right hon. Friend the Member for Finchley (Mrs. Thatcher) against the IRA and its determination to try to kill her as it nearly did during the party conference in Brighton. It ill becomes the hon. Gentleman to make such remarks about such a brave and courageous woman.

Mr. Banks : The hon. Lady makes what she thinks is a good point. The gates have been there for just 18 months, but the former Prime Minister had been there for 10 years. I am not averse to all the protection in the world being provided for our political leaders, including those of the Conservative party. I have no desire to see anything unpleasant happen to them, but there are other ways of providing security. Those gates are ornamental--the place looks like Buckingham Palace. I thought that they were going to have the changing of the guards outside those gates. The right hon. Member for Finchley had delusions of grandeur and those gates are an obvious symbol of that.

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Mrs. Gorman : The hon. Gentleman is aware that the IRA has stooped to the point of sending suicide cars down roads to explode outside buildings, killing people who had been tied into the seats to deliver the bombs. The gates to which the hon. Gentleman referred are an attempt to protect the Prime Minister against such dastardly methods.

Mr. Banks : I have just said that security must be provided. Lamentably and regrettably, in 1990 security for the Prime Minister and leading Members of the Government has to be of an order which we had hoped never to see in this country. I am not arguing about the security angle, but I believe that the monstrosity at the end of Downing street says more about the delusions of grandeur of the right hon. Member for Finchley than about the need for security. I have a few other things to say about the right hon. Member for Finchley. If the hon. Member for Billericay (Mrs. Gorman) finds what I have just said unacceptable, she will find it horrendous when I really get my teeth into the former Prime Minister. The hon. Member for Basildon said that he hoped that the right hon. Member for Finchley would make a political contribution. Of course, she immediately threatened to do that when she said that she would remain as a back-seat driver. Perhaps it has been misinterpreted, but, if it was, it was also misinterpreted by the new Prime Minister who did not appear over-impressed with such a view.

For the sake of it, and for what it is worth, I can tell the House that I believe that the new Prime Minister, who wants to change a number of policies, will find it necessary to clear the decks as fast as he can. I also do not believe that the right hon. Member for Finchley will come into the Chamber very often, although she may sit here as a spectre. The more the hon. Member for Basildon and others table motions like the one that we are debating today, the more the leader of his party will be aware of her. There is only one way in which the new Prime Minister can deal with that-- and with the baggage that she has left him, which he and many other Conservative Members want to dump. That includes the poll tax. The Government must also put more money into the national health service and into education. They can do all that only by calling a general election. I am absolutely confident that we shall have a general election in the spring as the new Prime Minister tries to clear the decks. I hope that we will have one then, because we shall win.

Mr. Wilshire : While I profoundly disagree with the hon. Gentleman, I have a great deal of respect for the amount of hard work that he puts in. Therefore, I am sure that he will have taken the trouble to read the speech in which the reference to the back-seat driver was made. The hon. Gentleman will be aware that the comment was quoted out of context. The point is that, although my right hon. Friend the Member for Finchley (Mrs. Thatcher) was leaving the Government, she would be available to advise the Americans and President Bush, particularly as they deal with the Gulf crisis. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman was aware of that context.

Mr. Banks : I cannot believe that President Bush will turn to the right hon. Member of Finchley for advice.

Mr. John Marshall : He certainly would not turn to the hon. Gentleman.

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Mr. Banks : Of course he would not, because I would not give him the kind of advice that he would want to hear. Also I am not the Prime Minister and am never likely to be.

Ms. Harman : Oh!

Mr. Banks : I am sorry if it comes as a nasty blow to my hon. Friend the Member for Peckham (Ms. Harman) to hear me announce that I shall never be Prime Minister, but I recall the fate of various hon. Members who claimed that they would be Prime Minister. I remember Kilroy-Silk walking in and saying that he would be Prime Minister, and look what happened to him--that Kilroy programme is a fate worse than death. More recently, someone else marked it out on the back of a card but ended up as a stalking horse and is now back where he started in the Cabinet as Secretary of State for the Environment. So perhaps history proves that I am more likely to succeed if I say that I am not going to be Prime Minister than if I say that I am. I also happen to be a realist, and I know that there is no chance of it happening.

Perhaps the right hon. Member for Finchley's remark was misinterpreted and I have misinterpreted it again, but that is life. The right hon. Lady will no doubt be writing her memoirs. I look forward to them being remaindered at W. H. Smith very rapidly. She will pass quickly into history, as so many ex-Prime Ministers have. Conservative Members must realise that charisma in politics is usually attached to the office and rarely to the person. Like other ex-Prime Ministers whom I shall not mention, the right hon. Lady will quickly pass into history and become yesterday's woman. There will be an afterlife, as the hon. Member for Basildon has said, but I doubt whether we shall hear a great deal about her after the next election. For all her tenacity and determination, I have always believed the right hon. Lady to be fairly dull and unimaginative--someone who did not give much thought to what was going on. Nevertheless, she had many attributes. She was perfectly equipped as a party politician because she had a great deal of low cunning- -not enough to allow her to survive, but she had a lot of grim determination and resoluteness. In terms of intellectual and theoretical ability in politics, however, she had but little of that--which is one reason why in the end so many other European leaders were able to run rings around her. [Hon. Members : "Oh!"] Yes--one judges a politician not by what a politician says, but by what a politician does. The impact of a politician on history is seen only when one takes a step away from the time when the politician was active. I remember hearing the Prime Minister say many times, "Never, never, never," at the Dispatch Box, and then go to Europe and give way because they out-manoeuvered her. History was not on her side.

Mr. John Marshall rose--

Mr. Banks : I shall give way to the hon. Gentleman. Perhaps he will make the debate a little more informed.

Mr. Marshall : I listened with interest to the comment that other European leaders managed to run rings around my right hon. Friend the Member for Finchley (Mrs. Thatcher). Will the hon. Gentleman admit that the dramatic changes which took place in respect of the common agricultural policy would not have taken place without the single-minded determination and constancy of purpose of the then British Prime Minister, who forced the

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leaders of other European countries to cut farm output? Does the right hon. Gentleman think that the French agreed to milk quotas in a sense of good spirit? Was it not because our then Prime Minister forced them to do so?

Mr. Banks : The right hon. Lady obviously would have had some success with some administrative changes. I am not saying that she was a complete vacuum and that no one took any notice of her. I am talking of the big idea. The right hon. Lady was not able to grasp the big idea. In the end, Europe was her political graveyard because she could not grasp what was going on in Europe. When we talk about all the changes in Europe, we do not have to give any accolades to the right hon. Lady. She just happened to be there at the time. For what she did, developments could have been hindered. She acknowledged that she could do business with Mr. Gorbachev, which is likely to be the most memorable thing that the right hon. Lady ever said. When the history of this most exciting period is written, Mr. Gorbachev's contribution to politics--not the right hon. Lady's--will be seen as the seminal version, the one that changed the history of the world. The right hon. Lady was not intellectually up to that. She had no imagination and no grasp of what was going on. She saw the world from a street corner in Grantham. That was her contribution to wider world politics. The hon. Member for Basildon may not like what I say about her, but I am convinced that her part in history will be a fairly small footnote.

There are not many monuments to Thatcherism, although there are some visible ones not very far from this place. The empty county hall is a monument to Thatcherism. A little further down the river, the ruined Battersea power station is another. The monstrosity of Canary wharf is another visible monument to Thatcherism. There has been no real social or economic revolution in this country in the past eleven and a half years. Things have changed, but they usually changed for the worse rather than for the better. People tend to be more selfish these days--and more violent-- and society is certainly far more divided than it was when the right hon. Lady was elected.

The hon. Member for Basildon talked about the economic miracle that we have lived through. You must excuse me, Madam Deputy Speaker, but I must have been asleep as I have not noticed any economic miracle. Constituents in my area of Newham, which the hon. Member for Basildon knows well, may be excused for questioning whether there has been an economic miracle. What kind of economic miracle leaves us with the largest balance of payments deficit in manufacturing trade in our history? What kind of economic miracle leaves us with the highest inflation rate and the highest interest rates in Europe? There is something interesting about that as well.

The new Prime Minister--I hope that I am not misquoting him, as I have been accused of misquoting his predecessor--said that he thought that interest rates would come down when Chelsea wins the championship. The right hon. Gentleman and I are Chelsea supporters and we know that Chelsea has been playing very well recently, but we are well adrift in the league--about 16 points behind Liverpool and Arsenal--so, unless we have legislation to remove those points from the top two teams and to make it illegal for any team to beat Chelsea during

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the rest of the season, I doubt whether interest rates will come down. If I were asked what I most wanted--if I were pushed into one of my franker moments--I would say that I would prefer to see Chelsea with the championship rather than see interest rates come down. No doubt, for saying that, I will get many letters from irate shopkeepers, business people and others who do not support Chelsea. If an economic miracle has taken place, why do we look so sick in comparison with the rest of Europe on the indices that I have mentioned? We also still have one of the highest unemployment rates in Europe. That has been camouflaged by 40 changes in the method of calculation. One of the more intellectual members of the parliamentary Labour party, my hon. Friend the Member for Durham, North (Mr. Radice), has just arrived from Chester-le-Street. He will be able to tell me whether I have got it wrong. We have had about 40 changes in the way in which unemployment rates in this country are calculated, so it is no wonder that the Government have been able to camouflage a very worrying underlying real employment rate in this country.

In terms of the social successes of Thatcherism in the past eleven and a half years, a new book entitled "Poverty--The Facts", by Carey Oppenheim of the Child Poverty Action Group, states :

"In 1987 over 10 million people, nearly one fifth of the population of Britain were living in poverty measured by either of the most common definitions. In 1979 4.9 million people, nearly one tenth of the population in Britain, were living in poverty defined as income below 50 per cent. average. Between 1979 and 1987 the richest one fifth of society saw their share of total household income after taxes and cash benefits rise from 40 per cent. to 45 per cent. The poorest saw theirs fall from 6.1 per cent. to 5.1 per cent. For the first time since the second world war, the poorest half of the population have found that their share of total income is dropping." The division between the richest and the poorest is now at its widest since 1886. Whatever Thatcherism may have done for the richest and most powerful in our society, it has done very little for the people whom I represent and for those whom my party primarily represents. It has done very little for those who need support or help. It has done very little for the poorest in our society. They are the people who are delighted to see the end of the right hon. Member for Finchley, and they are the people who will take some comfort from the cover of Private Eye , which I cannot show because we are not allowed to use visual aids, but which states : " Rejoice, rejoice'--the lady has gone".

Opposition Members are rejoicing--not only for the poorest in our society, but for everyone in society. The quicker we now move to a Labour victory, the quicker we can do something to redress all the injustices of eleven and a half years of Thatcherism, and the better it will be for all of us.

12.29 pm

The Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons (Mr. John MacGregor) : I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Basildon (Mr. Amess) not only on choosing this subject, but on the way in which he introduced his motion. He claimed only modest ambitions for himself, but he made an entertaining speech with effective and telling points on which I intend to elaborate later. However, before I address the motion, I should like to say a few words about the speech of the hon. Member for Peckham (Ms. Harman), who raised some important

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points and spoke about them with great passion. I very much agree that we need more women in Parliament. As the hon. Lady correctly recognised, the working hours of Parliament are not the only obstacle to achieving that but I shall not elaborate on all the others because that would take up time that I should like to devote to other things. However, I very much share the hon. Lady's view and hope that more women from all parties will enter the House in future elections. I am always keen for the House to work more effectively. The hon. Lady raised one interesting example when she said that we could save about £250,000 of taxpayers' money if we did not have quite so many late night sittings. One of the modest changes that we have made this Session is to reduce the number of questions to the Prime Minister that appear on the Order Paper which has, to my astonishment, had the devastating effect of saving £750,000 of taxpayers' money--just from that simple change. I hope that the hon. Lady will join me if I manage to find other ways in which we can save taxpayers' money which do not affect the effectiveness of the working of the House because I am trying to achieve the same objective.

I am willing to consider any proposals about changing our procedures. That is on my agenda, and I shall be considering not only how we should proceed but the way in which we should gather in various ideas about changing our working procedures. Although I shall not go into detail about those systems today, I should like to make three points that are relevant to the debate about hours. First, as I have said, the Government are always endeavouring to have a more efficient House of Commons. However, it is often the Opposition or Back Benchers who seek to extend the number of hours that the House works each day. I make no complaint about that because it is one of the weapons that is available to an Opposition and to Back Benchers. However, as I said yesterday, we need the co-operation of all Members if we are to make any changes work and if those changes themselves are not to be exploited. Although times have moved on, we must remember what happened in 1967 as a result of the reforms and we must ensure that we do not end up with reforms that do not reduce but actually add to the working hours of the Chamber. I must stress that we need the co-operation of all hon. Members. I have looked at the report of the last Select Committee on Procedure that considered late-night sittings. The hon. Lady knows that that concluded that there was not a great deal to be done.

My second point follows on from the first and relates to trying to get statutory instruments considered upstairs in Committee and at different times of the day from when we normally consider them now, which is after 10 pm. That is a fruitful way of trying to reduce the number of late-night sittings. As the hon. Lady will know because this information was given in answer to one of her own questions, last Session we had fewer sittings after midnight than in the previous Session--60 compared with 77. I hope to continue to improve on that record. One way of doing that is to increase the number of statutory instruments that are considered elsewhere, as we are currently trying to do by setting up a number of European Community Standing Committees. I hope that the hon. Lady and her colleagues will support every action that we take to do that and that they will resist the temptation, which we discovered in

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others in the exchanges yesterday, of filling up with other things the time that is freed by considering statutory instruments elsewhere.

Mr. Giles Radice (Durham, North) : It might be useful if the right hon. Gentleman looked at the report of the 1977-78 Select Committee on Procedure which, I believe, was the last report to produce some constructive ideas about how the House could sit more sensible hours.

Mr. MacGregor : I am prepared to look at all constructive ideas. But some ideas that look right in theory may not work in practice, unless we get the co-operation of hon. Members. That is why I put particular emphasis on the European Community Standing Committee point.

I am anxious to remove the myth--which I know the hon. Member for Peckham does not hold but which is held by some people outside the House when we talk about changing our working hours from 2.30 to, say, 9 to 5--that hon. Members do not start working until 2.30. We acknowledge that a large number of hon. Members--and Ministers, working in their Departments and elsewhere- -start early in the morning and work through the morning.

Therein lies a problem facing many people who want to come to this place, and not only women. I refer not only to the hours in the House but to the increased burden on hon. Members, particularly those whose constituencies are well away from Westminster. The result is that the entire weekend is usually taken up working on parliamentary business as well as other matters. The pressures of the outside world and of new developments--not least the implications of European legislation and increasing demands from constituents, who increasingly look to their hon. Members for solutions to whatever problems they have--make our work load intensive. That should be on the record to reassure the outside world that we work in the mornings and to show that, even if we were able to change our hours in the Chamber, problems would still exist for women with families wishing to come here.

Ms. Harman : The right hon. Gentleman will be aware that the Department of Employment and other Departments are encouraging a change in the pattern of employment, away from the traditional 40-plus hours a week. We are also witnessing a change in career structures, showing that the concept of getting ahead by doing more hours than everybody else is not sensible. The right hon. Gentleman has given examples of how we are not in control of our own destinies and of how, whatever hours we work, we shall still be overwhelmed. The problem is that we have a male pattern of career advance with a pace being set with which women will never be able to compete. We need to be in control of our own destinies, to set our own hours and to do more sharing of work. Perhaps we need more Ministers and more delegated responsibilities in Departments, instead of having the inevitable empire-building and the person at the top saying, "I am absolutely overwhelmed. I must work 24 hours a day, seven days a week or I cannot do my job properly. Am I not marvellous?" It is time that we changed all that. May we have thinking from the right hon. Gentleman along a radical new direction?

Mr. MacGregor : I do not want to prolong that aspect of the debate, which is peripheral to the main debate today. I said that it is on my agenda to look at the whole

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question and that I am willing to hear any suggestions. I accept that there are more flexible working patterns to respond to the needs of modern society in most forms of employment. Looking particularly at the demographic downturn, it will be incumbent on most employers to become even more flexible if they are to get the work force they require.

But there is a difficulty in that context in considering the working patterns of hon. Members. We must consider not only the working arrangements that we apply to ourselves but the demands that are legitimately made on us by our constituents and others. If we could stop the flow of correspondence coming to us, we might make some difference, but that is not within our control.

Mr. Tony Banks : We do not often have the privilege on a Friday of the presence of the Leader of the House--we welcome him here--and of being able to put arguments to him. If he is prepared to look at those matters, will he, having referred to the flow of correspondence, consider the resources that are available to hon. Members? It is a crazy system by which, despite our varying work loads, every hon. Member is given more or less the same resources. I am not trying to prove anything by working seven days a week. It seems that the harder I work, the more work I get and the harder I have to work. It is a treadmill and I would like to get off it. I look at my past and at photographs of myself. Seven years ago I had youthful, boyish features. Look at me now. Oh, it was a picture of Dorian Gray. If I had more resources, I might be able to cut down my hours and deal more efficiently with my work load.

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