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Mine is one of the three constituencies in the London borough of Lewisham. All three are now represented by Labour Members, supported by an important and efficient Labour council. From Blackheath to Grove Park and the Downham estate, the area is overwhelmingly residential, with little manufacturing industry : the main employers are local government and the health service.Therefore, most people have to commute to work using the dilapidated, rundown and often unreliable Network SouthEast or have to sit in the congestion and pollution of London traffic. Great hopes lay with the extension of the docklands light railway, but now even that is bathed in uncertainty.
The people of east Lewisham have a community spirit. They want better quality services, not just for themselves but for their neighbours and those less fortunate than themselves. That is why they voted Labour. There is a history of rebellion against Government injustice. That is shown by the first rejection of the poll poll tax by Wat Tyler and John Ball on Blackheath. We also have our modern heroes : the community spirit was particularly apparent to the nation in the welcome given to Terry Waite.
In the last election, the people of east Lewisham expressed their dissent with Government policies in a more conventional way than that of 1381. One of the many reasons for that dissent, apart from the transport policies, was the level of unemployment and the poor prospect of training, particularly for young people. It is that upon which I wish to concentrate.
Unemployment in east Lewisham rose last year by a staggering 87 per cent. Long-term unemployment rose particularly steeply. Tragically for our young people, in whom I have a special interest as a careers teacher, there were 247 people chasing every job vacancy. It was the unemployment black spot of London. Only last month, on the Government's own figures, there were only 34 vacancies in the jobcentre and 17 in the local careers office. What hopes does that give to young people ready to play their part in the local community? What hope do the Government give to the three out of four young people in east Lewisham who have participated in Government training schemes and find, three months after completing them, that they are no closer to having a job? There was nothing in yesterday's Queen's Speech that touched their lives.
Why will not the Government consider that quality training with a guaranteed job will build us a work force that can compete with anything that our competitors can do? Why do they not see that giving people the skills to work removes the alienation and brings positive results that benefit not just the individual but society and the economy as a whole?
I want to speak briefly about a project in east Lewisham that is in desperate need of help. The local Rathbone Society has been training and supporting 50 local people with special educational needs. It has had the total backing of the provider agencies such as the Spastics Society and has trained people to work in retailing and care so that organisations such as the local council and Tesco have returned to it again and again to take on more of its trainees. It was funded through the training and enterprising council, although the money was paid directly to the national society.
On Friday 10 April this year--I make no comment about the significance of that date--it was closed down.
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Now, the 30 people who currently need the particular support given by their dedicated trainers are left with no idea of whether their training will be completed or whether there will be jobs for them to go to. Yesterday the Prime Minister said that he wanted to create a country in which everyone may realise their aspirations to rise as far and as fast as they can"if they have the will and the skills to do so"-- [Official Report], 6 May 1992 ; Vol 207, c. 73]
Those young people have the will and their trainers have given them the skills. The real test of the Prime Minister's fine words will be whether the Government will give them the opportunity.
5.14 pm
Mr. David Porter (Waveney) : I would not wish to be the only Member not to congratulate you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, on your new post, and I do so most wholeheartedly.
I am glad to have heard the remarks of the hon. Member for Birkenhead (Mr. Field), who spoke so earnestly and from his heart. His remarks may have surprised some people, but not me. I have learnt to respect him for his work in chairing the Select Committee on Social Security during the last Parliament. I still favour the targeting of benefits, but I accept his point and I hope that we can open a broad debate on that issue in the House on another day. Like the hon. Member for Birkenhead, I also wish to refer to Maxwell. On behalf of Conservative Members, I thank the hon. Member for Lewisham, East (Mrs. Prentice) for the tribute she paid to Colin Moynihan. Now that she is here, I wish her well on behalf of all her constituents. I still remember my maiden speech nearly five years ago. I felt that I had got off to a fairly good start, but about halfway through it suddenly hit me that I was talking in the House of Commons and then it was not so good. At least I did not have the misfortune of someone in the House of Lords who is reputed to have dreamt that he was speaking in the House of Lords and then woke up to find that he was.
Mention has been made of the historic nature of this fourth term of Conservative Government--1826 and all that. That is very interesting for historians, statisticians and psephologists, but for me the more interesting feature is the challenge and opportunity that the fourth term presents. It is a challenge and opportunity for those of us who came here in 1987 because we already feel that in this Parliament there is a new sense of listening and learning and a determination to get it right. I hope that that will be reflected in the Bill to enforce the Maastricht treaty.
There is also challenge and opportunity in my constituency of Waveney, which is the forgotten slice of north Suffolk. It is the most easterly point of the British Isles and 120 miles from London. On a bad day, on the road or on a train, it might as well be 10 times that. Only when British Rail is no longer in the queue at the public trough, together with schools, hospitals and pensions, will it receive the investment that it needs. Therefore, I am pleased about the prospects for railways held out in the Queen's Speech. For tourists, who are vital to our local economy, the relative isolation is part of the area's charm. However, those who live in such a rapidly growing area and work offshore or in fishing, farming, food processing, construction or the professions, know that it is an area where, even in the late 1980s, we still had higher than the
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average unemployment in East Anglia. A programme built on steady growth, low inflation and, as the Prime Minister said yesterday, creating the wealth to spend on welfare is welcome, and I believe that such a programme will deliver its promises.Whenever a recovery occurs, there is always a delay between improving demand and employers feeling able to take on more staff. In the eastern part of East Anglia that economic fact has to be added to the reality of a changing economic base in Lowestoft and in the large rural hinterland. It has been suggested by some pundits that the English countryside is already rather urban. That is because the social outlook and values of local residents are no longer so different from those of townspeople and because basic services such as water, power and telecommunications are generally universally available. That may be so in some senses, but in East Anglia we naturally and properly have a view that we are different from elsewhwere and, within East Anglia itself, differences happily abound.
In public spending, the provision of public services, all Government policies, the policies of the Rural Development Commission, the training and enterprise councils, the enterprise agencies and the local authorities there needs to be a rural dimension. I hope that we can deal with that issue in another debate. I felt it right to set down a marker since East Anglia is not only the bread basket of Britain but the engine for growth and the hub of the wheel of northern Europe.
We need to address the small business sector which, just as in the 1980s, is still the great hope for economic growth. Perhaps the Government would look at their definition of a small business. Businesses with one or two people are small as are businesses with 15 or 50 employees. However, they are all lumped together in Government statistics, and that is not always helpful.
In new businesses in East Anglia--according to VAT
registration--there was a net gain of 18,000, or 34 per cent., between 1980 and 1990. Research at the Warwick business school suggests that about 40 per cent. of all new firms will have a short lifespan and that about 56 per cent. of firms will remain small but will exist for many years. That leaves just 4 per cent. of new firms that will be the key to long-term job creation.
The Government policy of the right balanced economic climate and regulations has to suit 100 per cent. of new firms--not to mention all the firms that already exist. That will be the challenge for this Parliament. It is especially vital for Waveney and other parts of Suffolk and Norfolk that the Government get the climate for growth right and make sure that the balance of regulations is fair. The broad title for today's debate is "Public expenditure". As has already been hinted, on both sides of the House our first instinctive tendency is to measure the success of a project, idea or programme by how much is spent on it, as my right hon. Friend the Chief Secretary said at the beginning of the debate. Money is the criterion. "How much?" demand Opposition Members as soon as a statement on a new scheme is made. "Too much," may be the response of at least some of my hon. Friends. The amount of public expenditure seems to be the macho benchmark these days.
We all know that that money has to be earned before it can be spent, and the package in the Queen's Speech about firm financial policies, balancing the budget, reducing taxes when prudent, supplying market mechanisms and
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incentives, and improving the working of the economy is not only welcome--it is plain common sense. Without that package, the promises about the aid programme to developing countries, and about improvements to public services, the health service, community care, pensions, schools and our environment, would all count for nothing. One sentence in the Queen's Speech reads :"My Government will continue to improve and modernise the social security system with sustained emphasis on those groups with the greatest need."
As economic recovery gathers pace, and as steady growth means that there is more room for flexibility in public expenditure, let us do more than keep faith with pensioners, which has long been our manifesto pledge. Yes, let us focus on targeting help on the elderly with low incomes, and let us direct efforts to the very elderly and the elderly sick and disabled. Yes, let us not lose sight of the needs of those in nursing and residential care or facing that prospect. But let us not neglect that group of people, now retired, who belong to the age group who gave the best years of their lives, their young adulthood, to the war effort, and who, through no fault of their own, could not take advantage of an occupational pension scheme. Because of their own efforts, many of those people are just above the benefit line, and, having worked hard and served selflessly, they now feel betrayed. I urge the Government to keep targeting, and to keep honing the arrows of spending that they aim, so that that group can be helped specifically, as appropriate.
The Maxwell saga has already been mentioned. I urge the Government to make an early statement in response to the report of the Select Committee on Social Security on the plight of all the pensioners robbed by Maxwell. That means the existing and future pensioners of all Maxwell companies, including British International Helicopters, which is now in administration in my constituency. Why cannot the good offices of Government be used urgently to co-ordinate the information and the rescue efforts so that no Maxwell victim suffers further anguish? Many Maxwell pensioners are now in such an urgent plight that it presents a danger to the whole pension-owning democracy, and cries out for urgent action. Will the new Select Committee have to draft a new pensions Bill, or will the Government do it--and do it quickly?
There are other omissions from the Queen's Speech. I know that the speech cannot contain everything, and that the catch-all phrase "Other measures will be laid before you."
may cover those omissions, but what about training? The education Bill and the employment Bill will not deal with training. Is it not time at least for a White Paper on training needs, leading to a form of statutory deal for the physically handicapped, the blind, the deaf and others, such as the mentally handicapped and--as a separate group--the mentally ill? Those people represent a huge and talented seam of national assets, which is not always allowed to realise its full and rewarding potential.
What about Sunday trading? We expect the European Court, by the end of this year, to settle how British law should be shaped or scrapped as we seem no longer able to determine that for ourselves. Surely we can this Session reform the Shops Act 1950 in line with the proposals of REST--Recreation, Entertainment, Social and Family Travel.
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Why is there no pledge to update the sea defence laws? Another winter will come and go and the present ad hoc arrangements, with no coherent coastal protection or river flooding strategy, will stay in place. We who live in coastal areas will have to cross our fingers yet again. Will the Government respond urgently to the report of the Select Committee on the Environment on coastal zone planning? Most people are disappointed at the delays in setting up the environment agency. I hope that that still remains a firm commitment. I trust that the appropriate Bill will be in the next Queen's Speech. I suppose that it makes sense to wait long enough to take account of the decisions made at next month's earth summit, so perhaps that is the reason for the delay.If the pundits are right in saying that home ownership is reaching a ceiling, should we not be doing more than the Queen's Speech suggests to broaden the renting of homes?
I hope that I have offered my criticisms in a constructive manner. I am happy to welcome the thrust of the Queen's Speech and to play my part in implementing it, and in helping us to meet the challenges and opportunities as a group and as a Parliament. I welcome the chance that it gives me to continue to put and keep Waveney on the map, before either the Boundary Commission or the North sea sweeps it away.
5.25 pm
Ms. Hilary Armstrong (Durham, North-West) : Thank you for calling me, Mr. Deputy Speaker. It is a great pleasure to see you in the Chair. I am not sure what it says about the office of Speaker and the role of the Deputy Speakers that both our Speaker and one of our Deputy Speakers now come from Yorkshire. Perhaps it means that this seat of government is beginning to recognise that north of Watford there is not only life, but sense, too--and common sense. The future talent of this Chamber should be drawn much more from the North. The debate on the Queen's Speech is one occasion on which we are allowed to be more parochial than usual. My commitment to the North and my parochialism will emerge later in my speech.
I was interested to hear the speech of the hon. Member for Waveney (Mr. Porter). He was the first Conservative in the debate on the Queen's Speech that I have heard acknowledge that there are issues which the Government have to think about, which emerged clearly during the election campaign, and that there are problems that the Government have not tackled, which were not broached in the Queen's Speech.
Many of us were disappointed by the Queen's Speech because it was so lacklustre, and did not take the situation of the country as it is and try to work with it. I do not quite share the forward thinking that my hon. Friend the Member for Birkenhead (Mr. Field) betrayed today, but it is important that hon. Members on both sides of the House begin to recognise more fully and honestly the position of many people in this country, and our responsibility to tackle it. Neither side should be complacent about where we are now. The Government must be cautious about triumphalism based on the results of the election. There are many lessons for all of us to think about.
The nation is very far from being at ease with itself. Some of us come from even further north than Yorkshire. In fact, some of us look upon Yorkshire people as really
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midlanders. In the north, the Labour party has its highest vote for many years. Yet again, the Labour vote in the northern region, as in every English region, increased. Our vote in the north is now more than 50 per cent.Any Government who are honest in saying that they want a nation at ease with itself must not neglect the aspirations and wishes of people who voted in that way. It is important to consider the make-up of the north. My area and the constituencies around it are now represented exclusively by Labour Members. The changes in that area have been overwhelming. There has been a shift. The traditional industries, such as mining, steel and shipbuilding, have gone. There are virtually no jobs in those areas now. Yet the people are voting Labour in greater numbers than at any time under this Government. The people did not say that they wanted to get rid of public expenditure altogether. The Government need to take account of the lessons about the use of public expenditure learned in recent years in the northern region. The Prime Minister paid his first visit to the north during the election campaign, but unfortunately he missed the essence of what we have been trying to do in the north. We accept the world as it is, and we have tried to use public expenditure to fuel and encourage private sector expenditure so that we work together to ensure a future and opportunity for people living in the region. That is why Nissan is in the region. Local authorities and trade unions work hard with central Government and with the private sector to give that opportunity.
That is why we have the Northern Development Company. It is not a central Government initiative ; it is an initiative born of the aspirations of trade unionists, of local authorities and of the private sector. They wanted a development agency that recognised the changing nature of the north and the fact that there needed to be that partnership and a determination to overcome. Once those organisations in the north had got themselves together and worked out where they were going, we asked the Government for support. Last year, the agency was given the European prize as the best development agency.
We have tried to use diminishing public expenditure to draw in the private sector and thus to get the best from both. It is still true that the private sector is very wary of investing in the north, because it knows that it still takes enormous risks and because the recession has meant that, in recent years, more economic development has begun to be difficult.
Unemployment has again started to rise drastically. When unemployment rises in the north, it does not do so from a zero per cent. or 2 per cent. base ; it rises from a high base. In areas such as Consett, we are approaching 20 per cent. male unemployment. Despite all the amazing things that have been done in that town, there is again significant male unemployment. We know that we need a partnership approach to be able to unlock that problem.
In this debate on public expenditure, I plead with the Government to change their ideological view which, unfortunately, we could detect in the Queen's Speech yesterday and in the Chief Secretary's speech today "Public expenditure bad, private enterprise good." Our experience in the north is that we need a partnership, that we need not to be ideological about either side, but to use expenditure from the public and private sectors as effectively as possible. I turn to child care, in which the Government, because they have turned their backs on public expenditure, have
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missed opportunities, which means that private enterprise is not growing as it should. In recent years, I have talked to employer after employer. They say, "Yes, we recognise that child care is important and that we should open up opportunities for our employees--especially women, but also some of our male employees." Employers want to introduce child care, but they say, "We are not child care experts and we do not want to find that we have to do it ourselves, because we know that it needs a skilled and careful application."Employers were pleased by the Labour party's proposal for partnership development. We said that we would use public sector funds to draw in employers' funds and to raise money from employees who could afford to contribute. By using public funds most effectively, the Government would then be able to ensure that women were able to maintain their career paths and so continue to pay taxes. An independent report which came out just before the election demonstrated that, if that approach was taken, child care would be paid for within 10 years by the increased contribution in individual taxes of people who were involved.
As a result of the dogmatic approach that things must be achieved by the free market, we have lost the opportunity to open up the individual choices that some families wish to make about their pattern of family life which would enable their children to have access to quality child care. The Government's dogmatic approach has moved them away from opening up those opportunities.
There is another area in which the Government, because of dogma, are reducing choice rather than opening it up. I often wonder whether the Government have the same understanding of the word "choice" as I do. The Queen's Speech contained a commitment to a Bill
"to extend choice and diversity in education."
I think that the Government mean that more children will have access to the private sector of education and that there will be more opting out of the state sector. That will not bring choice to the majority ; it will reduce choice for the majority. It will give choice to the providers.
Other hon. Members have said that the Government are not interested in providers. In education, it is precisely what they are interested in. They want to emasculate local democratic decisions about the future schooling of children. By doing that, they will introduce not diversity, but division. That division will condemn groups of our young children and our adults to less opportunity and less choice in getting a quality education service. More than anything else, it will deny choice to communities and to the nation. It will reduce the overall quality of education.
If we are to lift groups out of poverty and to enable the poorest in our society to progress, they must be involved in education in a way that none of us has recognised in the past. Those people have to see education as a central part of their families, of their communities and of their individual lives. Only when the Government are prepared to draw away the veils of dogma will they begin to take hold of what real equality of opportunity for our youngest children and for our young adults will mean.
The people in my constituency who at present have to go to the neighbourhood school cannot afford to go to another school. Unless we ensure that the neighbourhood school, the village school and the small town school have no choice but to offer the very best opportunities in education, we shall offer those people not only no choice, but no future.
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I urge the Government to recognise some of the lessons from the election that we are having to recognise. The Government must think their way through what we are getting in terms of a divided society and of a group of people who feel that they have no hope and no future in this society. The Government must recognise that, and they must work to ensure that they think about those people's futures. They must work with us to unlock opportunity for those who at the moment have no hope, very little aspiration and very little belief that the Government care about them at all.5.39 pm
Mrs. Barbara Roche (Hornsey and Wood Green) : Thank you very much, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for calling me. May I congratulate you on your appointment?
I am extremely honoured to represent the constituency of Hornsey and Wood Green. It is one of the largest constituencies in population terms in London, and it is a collection of north London villages. It is an extremely beautiful constituency, with a great deal of open space, but it also has many inner-city areas and many residential areas.
I pay tribute to my predecessor, Sir Hugh Rossi, who held the seat of Hornsey and Wood Green for more than 26 years. He was widely recognised as an excellent constituency Member. It is the convention that, in one's maiden speech, one pays tribute to one's predecessor of whatever political complexion. In my case, it is no formal tribute. I have great admiration for the work of Hugh Rossi. He was an excellent Member of Parliament, and I look forward to following in his footsteps. He was well known in the House for his work as Chairman of the Environment Select Committee, and environmental matters are extremely important in the constituency.
Joyce Butler was the Member of Parliament for the Wood Green part of Hornsey and Wood Green, again for a long period--more than 24 years. Sadly, she died at the end of last year. She had a reputation second to none for making green issues a priority long before they became fashionable not only in the House but elsewhere.
My constituents feel passsionately about the preservation of their open space. There was a campaign to save Parkland walk from proposals to put a motorway through it. Local groups are working vigorously along the Archway road, to make sure that local homes are restored after more than 20 years of environmental blight. In my constituency we are also tackling the pilot scheme for red routes--a scheme which has led to business failure in a constituency in which nearly 8,000 people are out of work. The scheme has added to local unemployment and to the deterioration of the area.
I share the feeling of many people in my constituency who want Alexandra park to be preserved as an open resource not only for us in north London but for everybody in London who wishes to use and admire that lovely park. I also shared the sadness of many people in my constituency that the right hon. Member for Henley (Mr. Heseltine) as Secretary of State for the Environment did not list Alexandra palace, which is not only a symbol of Hornsey and Wood Green but the place where broadcasting began in this country.
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Hornsey and Wood Green is an area of many active community groups. Another of my predecessors was Lady Gammans. It was said of Lady Gammans that she could not hear the tinkle of teacups in Hornsey without being present. I hope to follow her example.When I talk about Hornsey and Wood Green, it would be wrong not to mention the richness of the constituency and its benefit from the variety of community groups. We are very privileged to have a very big Cypriot community. That community, although it is integrated into the country, and of course its hopes and aspirations for its children are centred on many of the issues that are discussed in the House, is also concerned with what is happening in the beautiful country of Cyprus--a country that is still cruelly divided, and a country which looks at barriers coming down in the rest of the world and in Europe, but which sadly still remains divided. I hope during my career in the House to add to efforts to bring about a just solution to the problems of that beautiful place and to the uniting of that country. I was extremely interested to read in the House Magazine that, as a new Member, I am one of about 9 per cent. who are members of the Bar. I shall not dwell at length on the many virtues of members of the Bar, because some hon. Members would wish me to do so. Suffice it to say that when I have been welcomed to the House by my colleagues, I have noticed a tendency to count their fingers after the warm handshaking.
I noted that the Queen's Speech emphasises crime and law and order. That is a subject in which I am naturally extremely interested. My constituency in the past has seen a 16 per cent. increase in crime over the past year. Many of those crimes are street robberies and burglaries which go to the heart of living in our great city--crimes which make it difficult for people to go out at night, attacks on women and vulnerable people, and attacks on our black and ethnic minority communities.
Our local council and the police have had a good relationship in combating crime. There have been joint sessions between local councils, the police and myself on the issue. However, the issue goes beyond the police and the local authority. It needs proper support from central Government and resources. Yes, we need more police officers on the beat. Yes, we need better community policing. If we are to have the new initiatives that the Metropolitan police plan to introduce, we need state funding, support and extra resources. We also need a legal system that is prepared to bring about that change. We need to make sure that the royal commission brings forward proposals to restore the emphasis on measures to make sure that our judiciary and legal profession truly represent the people of this country and that they reflect our modern society. I hope that the Lord Chief Justice can follow the excellent example of Madam Speaker and dispense with the wearing of wigs. I know to my cost that wigs are extremely uncomfortable and hot, particularly in the summer months.
I hope to be able to make a contribution to matters which are of interest to my constituents and to the wider community. It is only by getting the legal system right that we can truly make sure that we have the democratic society that the country needs and that I hope to be able to help to achieve on behalf of my constituents in Hornsey and Wood Green.
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5.48 pmMr. Malcolm Chisholm (Edinburgh, Leith) : Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for calling me at such an early stage.
There are many things that I could say about Ron Brown, my predecessor, but I shall confine myself to saying that he knew the importance of class politics, when deceiving or joking voices prattle on about a classless society. He was, of course, officially the hon. Member for Edinburgh, Leith, a conjunction of places that might cause some horror among the present residents of Leith, and certainly would have done in years gone by.
Seventy-two years ago, Leith was a completely different town from Edinburgh. At that time, a Bill was introduced to make the two boroughs into one. The opposition to that Bill was led by the father of the right hon. Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Benn), the then Liberal Member of Parliament for Leith, Captain William Benn. He made many wise remarks in a remarkable speech in the House on 8 June 1920--none of them so wise, however, as his decision five years later to resign his seat and join the Labour party, something which I would recommend to right hon. and hon. Members in the present Liberal party if they were here.
Two remarks in that speech connect particularly with current problems. Captain Benn pointed out in 1920 that the whole breath and life of Leith was industrial. He also said that it should not be assumed that, because two places were contiguous, the interests of the smaller community would be best served by joining both under one administration. The latter remark about Leith then reminds me of Scotland now. It is crying out for more control over its own affairs. Of course, the Conservative party used to fulminate against centralising socialism but now presides over the most centralised state in Europe. We on this side of the House are the decentralisers. We are the democrats. It is because we are decentralisers and democrats that we demand a multi-option referendum now on the constitutional future of Scotland.
To say that the whole breath and life of Leith is industrial was true in 1920, true in 1979, but hardly true today. In the past 13 years, manufacturing employment in Scotland has fallen by 37 per cent. and by an even higher percentage within Leith. The result of that in my constituency today is the appalling percentage of unemployed people : 20 per cent. of the economically active population in Leith. That is the highest percentage in Scotland and it is the official figure, without the many fiddles of the past 13 years.
Just as there was nothing in the Queen's Speech about bringing democracy to Scotland, so there was nothing about bringing jobs to Leith. That stark, horrifying reality of unemployment is the background to everything that I support or oppose in the House. In particular, I will support only economic policies which make massive inroads into those unemployment figures and the human misery that lies behind them.
Today's debate is about public expenditure, and I want to talk about three areas of public expenditure which I know are important to thousands of people in Leith--housing, health and child care. In the four weeks that I have been a Member of Parliament, I have been inundated at surgeries and on the telephone with requests about housing. People are desperate for homes, yet public expenditure by the Scottish Office on housing has been cut more than any other area of expenditure since 1979. I am
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angry, but hardly surprised, that there was nothing in the Queen's Speech about building more homes. That would make it just too relevant to the problems of ordinary people.On health, the people of Leith have been deprived of various services in the past few years at their two main local
hospitals--Leith hospital and the Western General hospital. Now they face the certainty of opt-outs. With the 1993 Scottish opt-outs stitched up before the election and many more pencilled in for 1994, that means a health service based on need, but unfortunately, it is the need to generate income rather than the needs of patients. The people of Leith care passionately about the health service. I can assure the Government that they will fight for the return of services such as the accident and emergency department at the Western General and for the retention of their hospitals under full NHS control.
Public expenditure on housing and health are areas of public expenditure which have traditionally suffered during the past 13 years. Child care is a relatively new area, but hundreds of people in Leith--mainly women--are telling me that it must now be given proper recognition. It has been my privilege in the past year to be a member of the Greater Pilton child care action group, which is drawing up plans for a child care centre within Leith constituency, as well as raising the issue in a more general way.
Child care is at the heart of the political agenda in Leith. First, it is necessary for the relief of poverty. Unemployment is the biggest single cause of poverty. Hundreds of people--mainly women--cannot work because there is no free or affordable child care. Secondly, without child care, equal opportunities are meaningless. Child care is essential for sexual equality. Class politics, or any other kind of politics, is no good unless it practises and promotes sexual equality.
Thirdly, child care is necessary for the revival of the economy in a high- wage, high-tech direction--the only direction worth going in. It would pay for itself in a short time. That fundamental point has been the subject of at least two recent books and requires a speech to itself on another occasion.
I was told last week that there would be something about child care in the Queen's Speech. Once again, I was disappointed, but not surprised. The prospects for child care under the Conservative Government cannot be good, because the Government have shown so little concern in the past 13 years for the relief of poverty, the pursuit of sexual equality or the modernisation of the economy. However, I remind the Government of the recent European Commission recommendation on child care which talked of publicly funded child care for people in employment or training. I shall remind the Government of it again in the weeks ahead.
Leith wants jobs and homes. It wants child care and health care based on need. It wants democracy to help it to achieve that. It has never wanted Tory Members of Parliament or Tory priorities. Leith's motto is "Persevere". I should like to end with thanks to the people of Leith for sending me here, and a pledge to persevere until their priorities have won the day.
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5.57 pmMr. David Ashby (Leicestershire, North-West) : I am privileged to follow two very interesting maiden speeches.
I listened with great interest to the speech of the hon. Member for Hornsey and Wood Green (Mrs. Roche). She made a most eloquent reference to her predecessor, Sir Hugh Rossi, whom we all remember as a most distinguished Member of this House who had a great love of, and a great interest in, the environment and who cared greatly for the environment, as we know from his chairmanship of the Select Committee. I came into greatest contact with him in his role as chairman of the British-Italian all-party committee. I hope that the hon. Lady will join that committee and will continue that interest in the British-Italian group. It is one of the most thriving groups. It has always taken a great interest in that country and done its utmost to renew friendships and keep friendships going.
I was interested to hear that the hon. Member for Hornsey and Wood Green shares my professional background. It seems that Hornsey and Wood Green likes lawyers. Sir Hugh was a lawyer. If she continues as she began today, she will make a great mark on the House. She made a most eloquent speech, and I congratulate her most heartily on it. The hon. Member for Edinburgh, Leith (Mr. Chisholm) made a rather more controversial speech--
Mr. Frank Field : He has just taken his speech out of the Chamber.
Mr. Ashby : In that case, I shall leave my remarks on his speech until he returns.
I wish to raise five matters. Two of them deal directly with the economy and businesses, and with Bills to be presented to the House. The Leasehold Reform Bill will not affect businesses, but it should. It will deal only with private property, the long leases of which are coming to an end and where people have an interest in that property. However, a much bigger and, in terms of the economy, more important problem should be dealt with-- business property.
In the past 30 or 40 years most local authorities--county councils and district councils--have done a great deal to bring businesses into their areas by creating business parks and pump-priming their areas. They have had the necessary roads laid, helped with the planning and assembly, and sold off plots of land, invariably on long leases which may vary in length from 30 or 40 years to 90 years in exceptional cases. Most such leases last for 30 to 50 years. In north-west Leicestershire we have several such business parks.
As a result, the biggest owners of business premises in this country are local authorities. They own vast acreages and billions of pounds worth of property, and their ownership is continuously increasing. Local authorities will soon have an excessive grip on business. Indeed, we may have already reached that stage. We are grateful for what local authorities have done, and I have no quarrel with them ; it has been magnificent for the economy, especially for local economies and businesses. But if one considers the overall economic state of the country, that ownership makes no sense. It is simply not good for the country that so much of its wealth is nationalised- -and whether it is in local or Government hands, it is a form of nationalisation. Factories, shops and business premises
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throughout the country are effectively nationalised. Their control is nationalised not in a long-term but rather in a short-term sense. Businesses that started 30 years ago have built themselves up and flourished. They have invested in factories and other buildings to benefit the economy and are now reaching the end of their leasehold interests. Their buildings are a wasted asset. What happens when the leases run out? Will the benevolent local authority say that, as the business is benefiting the local area, it will increase the length of the lease so that the business can continue? I wish that that were so, but invariably it is not.When it comes to renewing leases, local authorities will drive the hardest bargain of all. They are Shylocks and very strong in the business sense. They have control because they hold the majority of the business land in the area. They have a stranglehold on business and will double or treble ground rents. That is not good news for businesses, especially when they are suffering from the effects of the recession.
If that were the only story, my complaint would not be so important, but the problem is even greater because local authorities are now demanding a piece of the action--a percentage of the profits as part of the extension of the lease. That is extremely bad news and simply not the way for local authorities to behave.
Local authorities should not own property. They can own their council offices and remain in one or two traditional areas, but they should not be in the property business, owning vast business parks. They should develop business parks, help the infrastructure and see that the properties are rented out at the beginning. Thereafter, they should sell the business parks, either offering them first to businesses within the business park or selling them to a pension fund. The money could then be recycled and invested in other land, and the local authorities could go back to pump- priming further expansion within the area.
I have not heard this serious problem raised in the House before. The problem will grow if it is not tackled firmly. The position of businesses in leasehold property differs little from that of people who own long, declining leases on their homes. When we tackle the leasehold ownership of housing, we should also consider the leasehold ownership of factories, factory sites and land.
The reform of local government will no doubt form part of other Bills to be laid before Parliament. Consultation is now taking place, but I believe firmly that this will be our last opportunity to reform local government, and we must get it right this time. I shall no doubt have an opportunity to make a speech when the relevant Bill is introduced, but we must now reflect on the form that it will take. Our problem with local government has always been that the structures are too rigid. We have county councils, district councils and parish councils. We put the present form of local government into operation in 1974, but we found that it did not work and had to get rid of the metropolitan structures such as the Greater London council. As a former member of the GLC, I could see then that it did not work and I was wholly in favour of its abolition. If we are not careful, we shall put a similar rigid structure in its place which will not work either. The beauty of local government as it evolved, and before we started to interfere too much with it, was that it found its
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own way forward without too much central interference. If we are to have successful reform, we shall have to return to that.The right structure for local government is to be found in the district authorities, which should be allowed to find their own structure for various services. They should be free to make contracts with other districts--for example, to form an education committee. The same district council should have the opportunity to work with a quite different one, which might specialise in welfare services. That would give them flexibility and freedom. If, at the end of five years, a district council is dissatisfied with working with another authority on welfare service issues, it should be able to break the contract and form a new one with another authority. Such flexibility is essential if we are to reform local government, and achieving that flexibility requires keeping to the smallest units.
Also absent from the Queen's Speech was a reference to the reform of shopping hours. I know that we are awaiting a decision on that from Europe, but reform is urgently needed. The law has been flouted, which is not good.
Action from the centre is urgently needed to allow us the freedom to shop on a Sunday ; we must not give in to those with narrow minds. At the same time, an element of choice must be given to shop workers so that they have the right to say, "No, I will not work on a Sunday." Shop workers should have the full protection of the law, and polls have reflected that opinion.
I think that the most recent polls, have shown that about 68 per cent. of those questioned were in favour of fewer restrictions on Sunday trading, and 93 per cent. believe that shop workers should enjoy the legal right to say no to Sunday working without suffering as a consequence. That is the form of change that is needed for Sunday trading. It is urgently required in this Session.
We cannot wait long for that legislation, as the law is looking like an ass. There is enormous pressure on local authorities, which have to prosecute when there has been a contravention of the law, but the contraventions are so numerous that the authorities' departments and the courts are unable to cope. Larger businesses are flouting the law quite openly, which is not good for this country. We must put the law right, and we must do so in this Parliament. Some recent cases have brought into disrepute the way in which our laws are policed and presented in court. There is much concern about that, and a loss of confidence in our legal system. We must address the issue in this Parliament forcefully, strongly and urgently.
The cases in which the Court of Appeal has allowed an appeal fall into two categories. The first includes those cases in which mistakes--I use that word advisedly--have been made at the policing stage, and there have also been failures and corruption in policing. Secondly, mistakes have been made on appeal and even in the courts. We must consider all those issues.
The Government have faced up to many of the problems relating to police evidence and the way in which it is presented in court. They have taken a number of important steps to ensure that any apparent gaps are closed. That has been done by the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 and by the amendments to that Act in subsequent criminal justice legislation. All such measures have been welcomed by those who practise law--by those who work at the Bar, solicitors and the judiciary generally.
However, despite those provisions, there are examples of the police, believing that someone is guilty, tailoring the
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