House of Commons Hansard Debates for 18 Jun 1991

Mr. Skinner : Does my hon. Friend know that such is the state of affairs at present with those 62 hon. Members and their friends who are members of Lloyd's that they are now staked out outside Lloyd's having avocado soup? There is now an avocado soup kitchen there.

Mr. Deputy Speaker : Order. I am sure that the hon. Member for Clydesdale (Mr. Hood) will not be tempted from the straight and narrow.

Mr. Hood : I thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, because I have not had my dinner tonight and the thought of going down to Lloyd's to have a plate of avocado soup was quite appealing.

Mr. Eadie : I am grateful to my hon. Friend for giving way because this point is pertinent to what he was saying about people being asked to do certain jobs in relation to the promotion of the Bill. May I remind my hon. Friend that the sponsor, who is speaking on behalf of the companies, does not even live in the constituency concerned, yet he has the audacity to stand up in the House and criticise other hon. Members who make comments and who do not live in the constituency either?

Mr. Hood : I share my hon. Friend's concern about that matter. However, I want to be pragmatic and fair and I recognise that the choice of sponsor is entirely a matter for the promoters. Perhaps they observed what happened during the passage of previous Killingholme legislation and thought that they should go somewhere else because the performance of their sponsor then certainly did not impress me and it might not have impressed them. Perhaps the promoters will look for some improvement. I do not know whether they will obtain any improvement from the hon. Gentleman but I am sure that that is for reasons better known to the hon. Gentleman.

Mr. Knapman : What precisely is the hon. Gentleman's objection to the Bill?

Mr. Hood : I shall cover that, with the permission of Mr. Deputy Speaker, as I proceed with my speech. As I come towards the end of my speech, if the hon. Gentleman feels that I have not covered some of the matters that he would like me to cover, I hope that he will feel free to jump up.

Mr. Patchett : Could it be that a recent Bill and its sponsor in the House were assisted by unoffical whipping?

Mr. Hood : The expression "unofficial whipping" has some strange connotations. I do not know what unofficial whipping means to Conservative Members, but I am sure that many things which do not do the House credit take place in all its proceedings, not only on the Bill to which my hon. Friend refers. My experience since I became a Member suggests that such things happen often.

The hon. Member for Stroud says that the Bill is about putting pipes in and out and putting water in and out. That is a bit simplistic. The reason why the Coalfield

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Communities Campaign objected to the Bill was that it had seen the effects that implementation of the Killingholme power station proposals would have on the coal industry and especially the coal communities. The hon. Member for Stroud referred to 1,000 jobs. A conservative--it is a word which does not jump out of my mouth too quickly- -estimate of the effect of the gas-fired power station is that it would cause the loss of 5,000 jobs. That is 5,000 mining jobs. The multiplier effect of that loss of jobs on the mining communities would mean that teachers, doctors, nurses, engineers, salesmen, van drivers, lorry drivers, and bus drivers would lose their jobs. The list goes on and on. We are not merely talking about water in and out and pipes in and out. The Bill would have serious consequences.

Mr. Eadie : My hon. Friend was talking about consequences. Some considerable time ago I read a general analysis of the Bill. It said that the area that would be most affected by job losses was the Nottingham area. Does my hon. Friend have any knowledge of that?

Mr. Hood : I thank my hon. Friend for the opportunity to remind the House, for hon. Members who need reminding, that before I came to this place I was a miner for 23 years, 19 of which I spent in the Nottinghamshire coalfield. I was a coal face engineer. I have many happy memories of that time. I was also a local councillor. We did not have such good fortune then. It was a hung council when I was a member of it. There has been a massive swing to Labour since and we now have a Labour council.

Mr. Andy Stewart (Sherwood) : It is because the hon. Gentleman is no longer there.

Mr. Hood : The hon. Member for Sherwood (Mr. Stewart) argues, rightly or wrongly, that my departure may have enhanced Labour's prospects. I am told affectionately by my former colleagues that it might be better if I were down there, but I leave them to what they are doing.

For 19 years I worked in the coal industry in Nottinghamshire. I am aware, and the hon. Member for Sherwood will be aware, of the employment consequences for the Nottinghamshire coalfield and his constituency of a proposal such as the Killingholme power station. Most of the coal in the Nottinghamshire coalfield is steam coal for power stations. The pit where I worked, Ollerton colliery, was 70 per cent. steam coal. My hon. Friend the Member for Ashfield (Mr. Haynes) worked at the Clipstone pit, which was about 80 per cent. steam coal. That is the story of the Nottinghamshire coalfield. The people at such pits will be those most affected by the Bill.

The hon. Member for Stroud chose not to talk about lagoons. As a miner and an engineer, I have some experience of lagoons. I imagine that lagoons may be developed in this operation to provide coolants. There are some advantages to creating lagoons ; I state that clearly. But there are some environmental disadvantages to lagoons. In a previous debate the hon. Member for Littleborough and Saddleworth (Mr. Dickens) enlightened us about the biocides in the process. All of us environmental experts could be forgiven for scratching our heads when he talks about biocides. Biocides are a chemical for killing all living matter. They kill insects.

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What about the animals who are in and out of the water? There will be an effect on the environment and on animal and insect life.

Mr. Geoffrey Dickens (Littleborough and Saddleworth) : As the hon. Gentleman rightly said, biocides are additives which are put into the water to help remove barnacles, mussels, and algae and so on. The most commonly used biocide is chloride which is proved beyond all measure to be safe and is extensively used. The hon. Gentleman need not get excited about the word biocide. It is a straightforward chemical expression which explains the safety of what PowerGen and National Power seek to do.

Mr. Hood : I am tempted to have a discussion about the safety of chlorides. I have heard many sad stories about the misuse and effects of chlorides in certain circumstances. If one tried to drink water in certain parts of this country, one would not be so comforted by the hon. Gentleman's assurances.

Mr. Skinner : For example, ME sufferers.

Mr. Hood : That and several other illnesses can be ascribed to pollution from chemicals and pesticides. People in Britain and in other countries are just coming to terms with the problems created by so-called good additives which are supposed to make things better. My experience is certainly that such additives are not as good as they are said to be, and that it is a great deal better if they are not added at all in many cases. The need to use chemicals is one small example of the problems that will be caused by the creation of a lagoon. It is sad that the hon. Member for Stroud did not address the matter.

We are told that gas generation will be cleaner, less polluting and more environmentally friendly. As a Scottish Member of Parliament from a mining background and as the chairman of the energy committee of Labour Scottish Members, I know that we hope soon to have the good news that Monktonhall colliery will be reopened. I will put power generated by Monktonhall coal, Longannet coal or any other Scottish coal against any power generated by gas.

Mr. Hugo Summerson (Walthamstow) : Will the hon. Gentleman tell the House the average thermal efficiency of a coal-fired power station and the average thermal efficiency of a combined cycle gas turbine power station?

Mr. Hood : The advantage might be 35 or even 50 per cent., but that is not the end of the argument when comparing gas with any other fuel. As my hon. Friend the Member for Rother Valley (Mr. Barron) rightly said, we must consider the life expectancy of gas supplies. Only a few years ago we were talking about relying on the Soviet Union to pipe gas to the United Kingdom after the year 2000. Our reserves of coal run into hundreds of years, whereas our gas reserves will last 20 or 30 years. In terms of efficiency, therefore, coal is a better bet than other forms of fuel, including oil and gas.

Mr. Eadie : The question of pollution has cropped up at every stage of the Bill. My hon. Friend said that we expect an announcement this week about the opening of Monktonhall colliery in my constituency. Leaving aside the pollution issue, has my hon. Friend read the reports this week of likely forthcoming increases in the price of

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gas? Considering that we have so much coal available, we should not be denying to our children and grandchildren their coal inheritance.

Mr. Hood : My hon. Friend's intervention reminds me of a conversation I had recently with the divisional commander of my local police force. I was trying to discuss a constituency issue, but we discussed my problem for two minutes and spent the next 10 minutes talking about a problem he had. He wanted to move with his wife into a little rural village in which I live. He complained that natural gas was not piped there and that most of the local people were relying on coal or bottled gas to run their central heating systems. It was clear from our conversation that many people who had gone over to gas were returning to coal, because of the way in which gas prices had escalated, so my hon. Friend the Member for Midlothian (Mr. Eadie) makes a telling point.

Mr. Geoffrey Lofthouse (Pontefract and Castleford) : I urge my hon. Friend to concentrate on the way in which all this use of gas represents a shocking waste of coal, remembering that coal will have a greater domestic market in the long term. In other words, we are using gas now as a replacement for coal without facing the fact that eventually the gas will run out and we will have to rely on coal. If we are not careful, there will be no coal on which to rely. Does my hon. Friend agree that there are better uses of gas, other than feeding it into power stations, bearing in mind that the Secretary of State recently told the Energy Select Committee that the capacity of all power stations built in the coming 10 years will rely on gas? Does he agree that that represents a shocking waste of coal?

Mr. Deputy Speaker : Order. We cannot now have a debate on the merits of coal verses gas. I appreciate that the hon. Member for Clydesdale (Mr. Hood) is being tempted by his hon. Friends to go into that matter, but I am sure that he will return to the subject of the Third Reading of the Bill.

Mr. Eadie : On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I hope you will agree that, as the Bill makes various claims about the environmental use of gas in relation to pollution, it is in order for us to challenge that statement, bearing in mind that other sources of fuel may be less polluting. The promoters of the Bill are responsible for bringing the question of the environment into the debate. I hope that we shall be allowed to challenge their views on that subject.

Mr. Deputy Speaker : It could be relevant, but it is not relevant on Third Reading to have a general debate on the merits of coal versus gas, and I felt that we were heading for such a debate. That would not be in order at this stage of the Bill.

Mr. Patchett : Further to that point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Given that gas turbine generating involves the energy industry, I trust that my hon. Friends and I will be permitted to compare, and express concern about, the effects of the implementation of the Bill on the energy industry as a whole. If so, how can we ignore alternative fuels and the effects of their use?

Mr. Deputy Speaker : Let us get on.

Mr. Hood : I accept your ruling, Mr. Deputy Speaker, and I humbly apologise to you for not congratulating you on the honour bestowed on you in the Queen's birthday

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honours list. Perhaps I may turn this into a genuine grovelling apology by pointing out that you are one of my favourite occupants of the Chair, as you were in the Chair when I made my maiden speech. I have always appreciated the good guidance you gave me then, which has stood me in good stead ever since.

I shall not be tempted by the interventions of my hon. Friends to debate the merits of gas versus oil or any other fuel, except to say that I can never forget the remark made by the Earl of Stockton, commenting on the actions of the former Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for Finchley (Mrs. Thatcher), to the effect that she was selling the family silver. I fear that that is analogous with what is happening to the coal industry in relation to gas, nuclear generation and the rest. We are giving away our natural heritage by closing down pits. We are certainly giving away our ability to be self sufficient in energy.

Mr. Cryer : Before my hon. Friend departs from the question of the difference between gas and coal and the relative merits of different fuels, may I ask him to remind us of the devastating effects on communities resulting from the sort of proposals that are before the House tonight? Reference has been made to the loss of perhaps 1,000 jobs. Is it not a fact that communities are devastated by pit closures? Such villages are often geographically isolated, being around pits. The introduction of gas burning resulting from the Bill will bring further pressures, not only on employment generally but on the communities centres around pits. I suggest that my hon. Friend deals with that aspect because, if he does not put it on the record, Conservative Members are likely to say that the issue has been forgotten about by Labour Members.

Mr. Hood : I assure my hon. Friend that that matter will never be forgotten by us. People used to believe that when a pit closed only the immediate mining community was affected. While that may be true of small communities, the effect of the Bill, in enabling gas generation on a large scale, will be enormous in whole coalfield communities. For example, the effects in South Yorkshire will be devastating, not only in terms of miners' jobs but on school teachers, doctors, nurses and the whole community.

Mr. Ronnie Campbell (Blyth Valley) : Is my hon. Friend aware that Blyth power station, in the constituency of our hon. Friend the Member for Wansbeck (Mr. Thompson), has just announced 260 redundancies because of a reduction of electricity generation there? Does my hon. Friend agree that it does not make sense to cut capacity there and build other stations when the power station at Blyth was modernised only seven or eight years ago?

Mr. Hood : I am tempted to go into that issue in great detail, in response to my hon. Friend's important intervention, but I am sure that many of my hon. Friends who wish to take part in the debate will want to talk about similar situations affecting their constituencies. For example, my hon. Friend the Member for Midlothian will agree that, whereas in our part of the world we have coal-fired power stations ticking over, Torness nuclear power station has turned out to be the enormous white elephant that we forecast it would be. In other words, there are many instances of the example given by my hon. Friend the Member for Blyth Valley (Mr. Campbell).

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I remind the House that the new chairman of British Coal was appointed to do a specific job. His wages were increased from £98,000 to £220,000-odd. A week after his wage increase, my hon. Friend the Member for Midlothian asked the Prime Minister to comment on that increase, to which the right hon. Gentleman simply said that he must be worth the money. The new British Coal chairman has been brought in to run the industry down.

Mr. Eadie : Although the Prime Minister mentioned that the chairman was worth that salary, my hon. Friend failed to mention that he receives three times the salary of the Prime Minister.

Mr. Hood : My hon. Friend makes a fair point, but perhaps that says more about the Prime Minister's opinion of himself than about his opinion of British Coal's new chairman. Only last week, that chairman warned the Government that if they do not stop the obscenity of running down the domestic coal industry and importing coal, there will be no long-term power generating contracts, and then it will prove impossible to privatise the coal industry. I find it objectionable that he should speak in such terms.

Mr. Deputy Speaker : Order. This is not the time for a debate on the coal industry.

Mr. Hood : Thank you for your guidance, Mr. Deputy Speaker. We cannot kid ourselves that this is just a wee Bill about water going in and out of a power station. It will enable a power station to come into being that will destroy jobs and communities. For that reason, I cannot support the Bill, and I hope that the House will not do so.

8.30 pm

Mr. Geoffrey Dickens (Littleborough and Saddleworth) : Just before you took the Chair, Mr. Deputy Speaker, it was said of me that I have a scriptwriter. I must explain what happened. The remark was made on a previous occasion, by an Opposition Member who is not present this evening, that I am an expert. All right hon. and hon. Members know that I am of an extremely modest disposition. I denied that I was an expert, and said that I had simply done my homework.

You may also be interested to know, Mr. Deputy Speaker, that before you took the Chair--and we are delighted to see you in the Chair--there were 20 contributions to the debate, not including many points of order before it began. It has, therefore, been a wide-ranging debate of great interest.

I begin by pointing out that the Killingholme Generating Stations (Ancillary Powers) Bill is promoted by National Power plc and PowerGen plc, which are the successor companies to the Central Electricity Generating Board. To meet the requirements for the supply of electricity, each of the two companies--and this deals with a point of order raised earlier--is in the process of constructing a gas turbine generating station at Killingholme, for which my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has already given the necessary consent.

In operating each of those generating stations, quantities of water will be required for cooling purposes. The most convenient, economical, and environmentally

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friendly method of obtaining that water will be to extract it from, and subsequently to discharge it into, the River Humber.

The Bill's main purpose, of which we should not lose sight, is to authorise the construction of intakes, outfalls, and pipes in the River Humber for cooling purposes. The authority of Parliament for the construction of those works is required in order to overcome the provisions of section 6 of the Humber Conservancy Act 1905, about which we heard an eloquent contribution from the Bill's promoter, my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud (Mr. Knapman). That old Act prohibits works

"beyond or riverward of the river lines"--

Mr. Barron : --"prescribed by local legislation."

Mr. Dickens : Absolutely. I am reading this preamble, but my speech will get much more exciting.

Mr. Michael Brown : The hon. Member for Rother Valley (Mr. Barron) must be my hon. Friend's speech writer.

Mr. Dickens : Yes ; he planted it on me.

The Bill passed through all its stages in another place, and this evening we give it the Third Reading that is so vital to the companies that are promoting the Bill, their work forces, and all the contractors working on- site at the two power stations. They number many people in the Humberside region.

I turn to the nitty gritty of the Bill. Many hon. Members have lost sight of the Bill's narrow definition. It seeks permission to place works in the Humber estuary--not to make abstractions from or discharges to the river. Licences would be required from the National Rivers Authority under the Water Act 1989 and the Water Resources Act 1963 for abstraction or discharges. The NRA is empowered to license discharges into waterways, and will maintain a check on licensed emissions throughout the length of agreements.

The abstractions and discharges required for cooling will be on a significantly smaller scale that those already taking place at coastal and estuarine major power station sites. Cooling is required at power stations to condense steam that has been exhausted from steam turbines at low pressures. That cooling may be direct or indirect.

For direct cooling, water is abstracted from the source of cooling water, passed through condensers, and then returned to the source of the water. For indirect cooling, the water passing through the condensers is cooled by air using giant cooling towers, and the same water is then recirculated. Only the water that has evaporated in the cooling towers and the small quantity of purge water is required to be replaced. Purge water is water taken from a recirculating cooling system--

Mr. Barron : --

"and returned to the river in order to control the concentration of materials in the water."--[ Official Report, 27 February 1991 ; Vol. 186, c. 1042.]

Mr. Dickens : The hon. Gentleman has a copy of my speech.

Mr. Hood : It has already appeared in Hansard.

Mr. John Carlisle (Luton, North) : On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I understood that it was a convention of the House that speeches are not to be read. However, if my hon. Friend is to read his speech, perhaps

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he will direct us to where we may obtain a copy of it. Rather earlier, my hon. Friend promised us something better, and perhaps you should rule, Mr. Deputy Speaker, on whether we should all have a copy of his speech so that we may enjoy it all the more.

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Harold Walker) : I have no knowledge of what the hon. Member for Littleborough and Saddleworth (Mr. Dickens) has before him. Hon. Members are entitled to refresh their memories by the use of notes.

Mr. Dickens : I would be less than honest if I did not say that, if the two power stations and their piping that we are debating tonight were coal fired, there would be no debate. Labour has made great play of being the party for the environment, particularly in respect of power station emissions. My party says that it would like to cut emission levels by the year 2005, but Labour is on record as wanting to achieve that aim by 2000. However, we are here presented with two power stations that will be so environmentally friendly that there will be no enormous lorries making coal deliveries to the site ; no mounds of ash building up around the plant ; and no great sulphur emissions into the atmosphere. If Opposition Members want me to go on the attack, I will throw my notes away--[H on. Members :-- "Yes, do."]

Mr. Hood : I ask the hon. Member to throw his notes away, because he is much more enjoyable when he is not reading out such nonsense from the Second Reading debate. If someone knocked on the hon. Gentleman's door tomorrow and said, "I am a friendly person, but I want to sack you. I want to put you on the dole. You will be thrown out of your house because you will be unable to afford the mortgage. They will probably have to close down the school because people will have to move away", would the hon. Gentleman accept such a person as a friend?

Mr. Dickens : Would I accept him as a friend? PowerGen and National Power have made a commercial board room decision which they think will satisfy all consumers and their shareholders. They feel that a gas turbine is the most sensible way forward. The decision was made in the interests of keeping the lights in the north-east burning, keeping industry in the north -east running, and ensuring a friendly environment for the people of Humberside, particularly Grimsby. I hope that the Grimsby Evening Telegraph takes note of my words. Some people have asked why I have taken particular interest in the Bill. My constituency is nowhere near the north-east, so perhaps, on this Third Reading, I should explain. I realise that the generation of electricity is a national problem. The new National Grid Company is a carrier of electricity, so if there is a surplus in the north- east and the weather is colder in the north-west that I represent electricity could be sent from the two power stations to my constituency. Therefore, every hon. Member has a great interest in the two power stations.

Mr. Hood : I am pleased to see that the hon. Gentleman took my advice and is now ad libbing. I do not live near the north-east either, but we are discussing pollution-free and

environmentally-friendly generation. Two pits in Scotland put coal into an organic power station. The coal produced in that complex is so low in sulphur that sulphur must be added at the power station in order to burn the

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coal. By expanding the Scottish coalfield, as we suggest, and doubling the interconnector between Scotland and England, we could pump electricity down the wire which would be far more

environmentally friendly without the consequences of those two power stations, which will generate electricity by gas.

Mr. Dickens : The House will be very interested to hear what stage those power stations have reached, which is the purpose of the Bill. The 900 MW Killingholme combined cycle gas turbine station is taking shape fast. Moreover, the work force at the south Humberside site now numbers about 1,000 and is growing each day. About 60 per cent. of the structural steelwork for gas turbine buildings is erected and work is starting on the third floor control room. There is so much to see on the site that it is difficult to describe the massive changes that have taken place in the past few months. The two main turbine slabs, each measuring 450 cu m, are in place. All major excavation work is completed, including that for the site's cooling towers.

I am sure that hon. Members are sitting on the edge of their seats waiting for this information. Cooling water pipe work is being installed. Some 400 m of 1.5 m diameter glass-reinforced plastic pipework is involved, as well as a total of some 1.5 km of 700 mm pipework.

Mr. James Pawsey (Rugby and Kenilworth) : I thank my hon. Friend for the extremely courteous way in which he allows me to intervene in his speech. Will he say a word about the manufacturers of the turbine generators? Are they produced in this country and, if so, is there not a good chance that they were produced in my constituency of Rugby by GEC? Does he agree that, if my supposition is correct--

Mr. Deputy Speaker : Order. None of that has much to do with the Bill.

Mr. Pawsey : With the utmost respect, Mr. Deputy Speaker, it may be relevant to the amount of water being consumed, which will then go through the pipe into the Humber. As you will know, Mr. Deputy Speaker, from your experience in those matters, some generating sets use more water than others. The ones produced in my constituency are extremely water efficient.

Mr. Dickens : You are quite right, Mr. Deputy Speaker. My hon. Friend has been mischievous. I confess that I am not sure which gas turbines these are, but they would be produced under licence. The ones that threaten my hon. Friend's constituency--if I can call it that--are produced by General Electric in America. The sponsor, John Brown of Glasgow, is the main person against whom he is leading the campaign. My hon. Friend must not spring such questions on me.

Mr. Eadie : The hon. Gentleman is a member of the Select Committee on Energy. When the Committee was discussing gas turbines and who would profit from them, does not the hon. Gentleman recollect that it was said that most of the work would go to Germany?

Mr. Dickens : I am not sure to which companies the hon. Gentleman refers. I freely confess that I can take in all that information but sometimes have difficulty in recalling it. That is why I am not Prime Minister. I have

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notes on my desk that would give the answer, so perhaps I shall drop the hon. Gentleman a line. We seem to have heard that song before.

A total of 115,000 cu m of excavative material is on site for use in later landscaping. I am sure that the House would wish to know that it is in two mounds--one measuring 130 m by 180 m in area and 5 m high. More than 500 cast-in-situ, reinforced concrete piles have been placed at an average length of 20 m. Work started at the site in February last year. The first unit is planned to begin generation next October. Initial site preparation and contractor mobilisation were achieved on time, despite the usual frustrations of the weather. The programme will be on time and within costs. That is all good news. Delivery of the first gas turbine is set for the end of October.

Therefore, it is fair to say that Killingholme teams have been pioneers in the United Kingdom for that new plant configuration, for a significantly different contract strategy, and for the changed specification format. There is little doubt that the Killingholme specification is being and will continue to be used as the model for the CCGT stations to be built during the next decade.

The spec has needed regular improvement and updating. The lessons learned have been passed on to other project teams. The PowerGen green site tombstone is also now in place and landscaping work undertaken towards the end of last year is now beginning to look most attractive. The final landscaping scheme to be implemented, once construction is complete, has been approved, in principle, by the local Glanford borough council.-- [Interruption.] My hon. Friend the Member for Stroud says that he wants me to continue for another hour.

Mr. Eric Illsley (Barnsley, Central) : I gather from the activity on the Conservative Benches that the hon. Member for Littleborough and Saddlesworth (Mr. Dickens) will resume his seat in the not-too-distant future. Before he does so, may I take him back to his comments on Second Reading in relation to the biocides ? He eloquently explained how the chemicals would be added to the water and how they would then be returned to the river after transmission through the appropriate pipework. The hon. Gentleman has not mentioned that aspect this evening. Will he explain more fully to us the strengths of the biocides and what effect they will have on the river ?

Mr. Dickens : It would be very unfair on other hon. Members who wish to speak for me to go into such detail. As the hon. Gentleman will be accompanying me to Germany, Sweden and Denmark next week, I shall be able to tell him all about it on the aircraft.

I believe that the coal mining fraternity has fought its corner very hard. Let us suppose, however, that there was an equal body of support for nuclear energy, oil-fired power stations, windmills or solar power. It would be narrow-minded and spiteful of their opponents to try to deprive National Power and PowerGen of the facility to install pipes for cooling purposes simply because they did not approve of the form of electricity generation that had been chosen.

The coal industry's only salvation is the current high level of productivity, in comparison with that of the dark days following the year- long miners' strike led by Arthur Scargill. The men at the coal face are responding

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brilliantly. The industry's future lies in its own hands : if it continues in its present vein, it will always have a major role to play.

None of those considerations, however, should send hon. Members through the Lobby to vote against the insertion of pipes in the estuary. I understand why one or two hon. Members should take that line--they are the ones who fight the coal industry's corner so bitterly--but I am surprised that the Opposition as a whole should do so.

Mr. Barron : That is not true.

Mr. Dickens : Does that mean that the Opposition will not vote tonight? That is splendid news. In that case, we should listen to what the hon. Gentleman has to say.

8.51 pm

Mr. Terry Patchett (Barnsley, East) : I do not think that any hon. Member would argue with me if I said that I do not ask for much time to speak on the Floor of the House. Having read the Bill, however, I felt slightly puzzled and rather disturbed : I feared that the procedures of the House were being misused.

The Bill includes the words

"whereas it is expedient that each of the two companies"-- that is, National Power and PowerGen--

"should be empowered to acquire lands".

I did not think that the House was here to accommodate outside interests in connection with a matter of expediency ; I am a bit concerned about the wording of that clause.

Another part of the Bill states :

"In the construction of the National Power works or the PowerGen works, as the case may be, the appropriate company may deviate laterally from the lines or situations thereof shown on the deposited plans".

What powers does the Bill give the two companies? I am worried by the use of the word "expedient", and by the Government's lenient attitude towards sticking to what was initially provided. This is a private Bill ; who will exercise control? The Bill seems to provide for a free-for-all.

The Bill also states :

"The appropriate company may use, appropriate and dispose of the materials from time to time dredged by them from the river". That means that any such material can be deposited anywhere, on land or at sea. A later part of the clause starts to ring bells with me, however. It states :

"nor shall such materials be deposited on the foreshore or bed of the river without the consent of A. B. Ports."

It continues :

"Nothing in this section shall authorise any interference with any subaqueous cable belonging to or used by British Telecommunications plc."

All those companies have reason to be grateful to the Government. Why do the same names constantly crop up in private Bill procedure? It occurs to me that the Government have a hidden agenda, involving tacit approval of the misuse of private Bill procedure. I am talking about unofficial whipping. I do not know what the Government's arrangements are for the whipping of the business that follows this, but I would lay even money on its being a fair whip, so that Conservative Members can return to consider whether to vote on the Bill. We saw the same arrangements operating for the Associated British Ports (No. 2) Bill ; I find it insidious and offensive.

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