House of Commons Hansard Debates for 29 Jun 1992

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Industry Social Welfare Organisation, which has been in existence since 1947, has done a great deal of cultural work in mining communities but has also assisted mineworkers' families whose breadwinner has been injured.

For example, in my area of South Yorkshire, we have a paraplegic centre run by the social welfare organisation, which miners who have been crippled in the collieries can attend. At the same time, social workers do an enormous amount to support families who have reduced incomes since their breadwinners suffered an injury in the industry. Will the Minister consider a formula whereby the coal industry social welfare organisation may continue?

British Rail has vast amounts of land, much of which is farmed by tenant farmers, as is the case in my constituency. I hope that the Minister will be cautious and will ensure that land sales do not take place over the heads of the farmers or without any consultation. It is essential that such farmers are consulted and, if possible, given the opportunity to buy the land. Some of them--or their families--have farmed the land since 1947, and they should be given the opportunity to buy it rather than becoming tenant farmers of a landowner about whom they know little. I hope that the Minister will take that point on board.

The new clauses covering pensions are essential. I hope that the Minister will say that he is prepared to accept them to give pensioners in the mining communities the protection that they require.

Mr. Skinner : Last week the parliamentary miners' group went to visit the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry. I think that he is called "President", but one of our group decided to ask him how he wanted to be addressed. To be honest, he seemed a bit embarrassed, but they settled for "Hezza". I am not sure that he liked it, but he had to lump it. Ten of us met him in the new Department of Trade and Industry building, which is called Ashdown house. I do not know whether there is any political significance in that, but I should not want to be stuck in a building named after Paddy Backdown. It was interesting that we were only a few hundred yards from another building, 25 Victoria street, which the President of the Board of Trade used in the back end of 1990 to campaign to get rid of Thatcher. There were television cameras outside when the campaign was launched. I took a special interest in it and wondered what had happened to the building. It is blighted. Grilles have been put up, as happens when a property has gone down and been left empty for a long time.

I seriously believe that there is a big property scam. The DTI building at the bottom of Victoria street is being closed and is now part of the blight. I reckon that a property company will buy the lot and make a big fat killing. Where will the money come from ? It will probably come from the miners' or the railway workers' pension funds. That is how such companies get the finance. They get it out of pension fund money ; it is not their own money.

The Minister should come clean and give us a guarantee that nothing connected with the Department of Trade and Industry or with No. 25 Victoria street will go to line the pockets of any Tory Member who votes on the Bill. That could happen. Hon. Members are meant to declare a conflict of interest. As sure as night follows day, some Tory Members will go into the Lobby in the knowledge that the

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pension fund money belonging to men and women who have slogged their guts out all their lives will be used to fill their pockets and to help them to make a killing.

Mr. Jacques Arnold (Gravesham) rose --

Mr. Skinner : I have caught one.

Mr. Arnold : I am somewhat confused by the logic of the hon. Gentleman's argument. Was not Robert Maxwell a Labour Member ?

Mr. Skinner : As the hon. Gentleman has introduced the subject, I will tell him what Robert Maxwell was. Mr. Deputy Speaker has heard the question, so I must answer it. Robert Maxwell was a mate of Peter Walker's. Peter Walker was a Minister in the Tory Government from beginning to end. He served Thatcher loyally for 13 years. When he packed up, just before he finished as a Member of Parliament, he was one of the 19 ex-Cabinet Ministers who had 59 moonlighting jobs between them. His last moonlighting job before he finished as a Member of Parliament was to join Robert Maxwell and to launder money. He got £450,000 out of Maxwell--I am sorry, out of pensioners.

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Morris) : Order. I trust that the word "pensioners" came in. The hon. Gentleman knows the rules of the House. May we get back to the new clause, please?

Mr. Skinner : I brought in the word "pensioners" because it is relevant to the debate. What happened in the Maxwell pension fiddle in relation to Peter Walker, who took £450,000 out of the pockets of Mirror Group Newspapers pensioners and got a Mercedes car worth £50, 000, is relevant to the debate. Peter Walker should pay back the money. Every Tory Member should demand that the ex-Tory Cabinet Minister pays the money back into the pensioners' pockets. I am sure that you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, have constituents who were part of the mighty lobby a few weeks ago when the Maxwell pensioners pleaded for justice. I am sure that you agree that Peter Walker should put his hand in his back pocket and send the money back--[ Hon. Members :-- "Hear, hear!"] That is unanimous.

This debate is about considering whether such a pension fiddle could happen again. Many of my hon. Friends have mentioned that it is quite possible. The debate is about ensuring, if we can--we cannot be sure about Tories-- that all Labour Members are fully aware of what can happen with pension money.

It is not long since the miners had a meeting with British Coal about their pensions. British Coal said, "If we have a pensions holiday, we can get £435 million and British Coal will not have to pay any money until 2001." Our people in the National Union of Mineworkers said, "You are not going to do that. If you have any spare money, it should go to pay miners who have retired, and those who have been made redundant and thrown on the scrap heap. It should go to the widows of those miners who died choking with

pneumoconiosis. Give it to them." That would have meant an extra 16 per cent., which would not have broken the bank. Some pensioners get only £10 a week. My mother, before she went, used to get £10 a week after my dad died.

What has British Coal done? It has pocketed£435 million. How did it achieve that? It achieved it by its

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people voting for it, together with Prendergast, the representative of the Union of Democratic Mineworkers--the scab union. I use that phrase especially for those who might have doubts about the UDM. The other Sunday, I read in the business section of The Sunday Times --before it ran the Di story, because there is nothing in the second section other than that now--that Mr. Hanson, a well-known fan of Mrs. Thatcher and the Tory party who has now changed his allegiance to the present Prime Minister because it suits his pocket, has said that he will take Canary Wharf off the Government's hands and that he will take over the mining industry if he can use the £435 million from the pension fund. He could then buy the industry with the miners' own money--their deferred wages. That is clever. I want the Minister to tell us that that will not happen and that neither Hanson nor anybody else will use pension fund money to buy the remains of the coal mining industry.

6.15 pm

Let us imagine what would happen if the UDM decided to cash in. The UDM does not have enough money to buy the coal industry. Let us suppose that having voted to have the pension holiday, it is then able to use some of the money to get a stake in the privatised coal industry. That is a conflict of interests. The Minister has a duty to tell us that that will not happen in the industry. If it does, all the talk about Maxwell and the rest is meaningless.

We met the President of the Board of Trade. Like Cecil Parkinson, whom we met once, he was badly briefed. Two or three years ago, we asked Cecil Parkinson how he would privatise British Coal ; he did not know. He told the Tory party conference that the Government would privatise British Coal. What did that mean?

Mr. Deputy Speaker : Order. This is out of order in relation to the new clauses. Will the hon. Gentleman please get back to the pensioners?

Mr. Skinner : I do not want to teach grandmothers how to suck eggs, but I will tell you this, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Privatisation of the coal mining industry is wrapped up in all the amendments and new clauses. If you want me to find some labyrinthine way to get back to the new clause, Mr. Deputy Speaker, I will take the time necessary to do so, but I do not think that you want me to waste time.

Mr. Deputy Speaker : I do not mind how the hon. Gentleman gets back to the new clause ; I would like him to get back to it.

Mr. Skinner : The new clauses and the pension scheme are closely connected with the privatisation of the coal mining industry, Mr. Deputy Speaker. That is what the paving Bill is about. There are some clever people in the City, who are close to the Tory party and who are financing the Tory campaign, who have said, "We will help you to privatise the coal mining industry and we will use the pensioners' money to do it--we will pinch it out of the pockets of the widows and retired miners." Have you got it, Mr. Deputy Speaker? Are we on the ball? I think that we are. I ask the Minister for some clear answers to the questions put by me and by my hon. Friends.

The sell-off will be a sleazy affair because it is possible for the Minister to make statements here today, but then if the Bill becomes law to say, "The industry is privatised--it is none of my business." A private entrepreneur may get hold of the pension funds. The Minister can then say,

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"We were clean and pure until the industry was privatised ; now we have no contact with it--it is the owners' business."

I want an assurance from the Minister that even after privatisation the Government will ensure that coal, pensions and all other entitlements are kept secure, as they were after nationalisation in 1947. It is no good saying that we are going to change things now. Let us suppose that the industry is sold off twice, first to one body and then to another. That is quite conceivable. The Minister might say that the Government managed to safeguard the pension entitlements when they passed the industry over to the first purchaser, but if it is passed on again, those entitlements may be lost.

Mr. Redmond rose--

Mr. Skinner : I can see my hon. Friend straining at the leash, so I will give way to him.

Mr. Redmond : The House should be aware of the problems that have occurred following privatisation of other nationalised industries. Far from the El Dorado that we were promised after privatisation, there have been enormous problems and the public have had to pick up the bill. They are paying a terrible price for mistakes which have occurred in legislation. The privatisation of British Coal is a complicated business. Unless we get it spot on, people will make a killing from it and some people will die as a result of being ripped off by the City and as a result of mistakes made in this House.

Mr. Skinner : I was trying to point that out, but you were not too keen on me travelling down that road, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Suffice it to say that my hon. Friend is correct. The privatisation of British Coal is unlike any other privatisation. It is impossible to secure markets in an industry where one is battling against mother nature. That is why we subsidise farmers in Britain. They cannot produce food as cheaply as it can be produced in Mediterranean areas, in parts of the Common Market or elsewhere in countries with better climates. There must be a change of philosophy to secure the mining industry. Privatisation could mean the death knell of the British coal industry. Some Tory Members do not care about that, but many Opposition Members do.

Reference was made to finding the Maxwell money. En passant, I believe that if the Government want to find that money, they should do what they did in respect of the miners' money in 1984. They followed the miners' money to Luxembourg, Ireland and everywhere else. The Government found it in a few months. If they want to get the Maxwell pensioners' money back, they should act in that way. They should deal with the banks so that the Maxwell pensioners who do not have two halfpennies to rub together can get their money back. The Minister's job today is to give us a guarantee that if the industry is handed over, all the pension entitlements will be secure--not for 12 months, or two years, but way beyond the year 2000 so that everyone who receives a pension will continue to receive it.

The Minister for Energy (Mr. Tim Eggar) : Whatever hon. Members thought about what the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) had to say, they must agree that it was good entertainment.

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Mr Peter Snape (West Bromwich, East) : Your speech will not be.

Mr. Eggar : My speech will certainly not be as riveting as that of the hon. Member for Bolsover.

No matter what differences there may be between the Government and the Opposition in the House or the differences between us in Standing Committee, there was total agreement about the importance of the pension fund. It is critical to those who receive pensions. As the hon. Member for Bolsover said, many of those pensioners receive very small amounts. The pension fund is also important for the hundreds of thousands of people who will receive a pension in the future. It is also important for those who are still employed in the industry. The Government and the trustees of the present pension fund must decide how, given that the Government have decided to privatise the industry, those pension funds are to be allocated and how the Government's determination to safeguard the pensions and the pension funds can be implemented.

The hon. Member for Gordon (Mr. Bruce) raised an interesting point. He wanted to know whether it is appropriate, given that privatisation is going to happen, to section off parts of the pension fund relating to those people with entitlements who are still in the industry. I assume that he believes that, if that was the route to be followed, any sectioned-off amount would automatically reflect the proportion of any surplus or overall assets in the main fund. The hon. Member for Gordon wanted to know how those assets would be protected. The hon. Member for Bolsover made the same point in more colourful language. He wanted to know how those vital assets could be protected for the rights of the individuals who had paid at least a proportion of the total assets in the fund if the industry was sold on in future.

Those are very complex issues. The hon. Member for Midlothian (Mr. Clarke) recognised that the factors involve the ratio between the number of present contributors and apparent and future beneficiaries. Those factors are unique to the British Coal pension fund. Indeed, the fund is not simply unique in terms of the size of its assets. Those complex questions must be addressed very carefully. In response to the hon. Members for Midlothian, for Don Valley (Mr. Redmond) and for Makerfield (Mr. McCartney)--who made a particularly interesting speech with his expertise from the Select Committee on Social Services--I must state that we are determined to achieve a solution that is just and fair for all the different participants in the pension fund. We have said that we are going to safeguard pensioners' rights under the pension scheme, and will certainly stick by that undertaking.

I state quite specifically that there has never been and there will never be, so long as I stand at the Dispatch Box and am responsible for policy in the area, any rip-off by any potential purchaser of the coal industry of the accumulated assets under the pension funds. That would be totally inexcusable, and no member of the Government would put up with it.

Mr. Jimmy Hood (Clydesdale) : The Minister seemed to say that he was relying on the trustees of the miners' pension scheme to safeguard the interests of miners' pensions. Is the Minister aware that 50 per cent. of the trustees represent British Coal management, who are

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scheming at present for a management buy- out? There is evidence from the holiday that is costing £435 million of pensioners' money that the management are intent on using the money. I hope that the Minister will not tell us that he is relying on the good will of the trustees of the miners' pension scheme. I hope that the Government will provide the safeguards in black and white in legislation to safeguard miners' pensions.

Mr. Eggar : I have given an assurance to the House on behalf of the Government. Clearly, the trustees of the pension fund at the moment have a duty to the pensioners and to act in an appropriate way. The hon. Member for Midlothian is well aware of how that operates. I agree with the hon. Member for Midlothian that the pension fund has been well managed. It consistently performs at the top end of pension fund performance, and I have every hope that that will continue to be the case. However, it is unfair to the trustees of the pension fund to imply that any of them in any way at any time believes that giving the holiday to British Coal was a way of assisting them in a management or employee buy-out of the industry. That kind of rumour and slur simply do not help a very important and serious debate. We have heard much about the holiday for British Coal. No Opposition Member has mentioned that, on the previous valuation, there was a surplus of more than £1,400 million in the mineworkers' pension scheme, and £1,000 million of that went back to the beneficiaries in one form or another. It was not distributed solely for the purpose of giving a holiday to British Coal, and the House of Commons should recognise that.

6.30 pm

Mr. Dobson : How can the Minister expect miners to accept his assurances about the future of the pension scheme when they know of the assurances that Mr. Peter Walker gave when he was the Secretary of State for Energy before he went off to the other place? He assured the miners that there would be no change in the law governing the number of hours that may be worked underground, and no repeal of the Coal Mines Regulation Act 1908 without their agreement. However, the Government repealed that law without the miners' agreement. How can the Minister expect miners to accept an assurance on pensions when the Government have gone back on their previous assurances on safety?

Mr. Eggar : The hon. Gentleman's speeches in the House and at Barnsley were an absolute disgrace. He was deliberately and consciously, I suspect for reasons more to do with the shadow Cabinet elections than anything else, seeking to stir up concern and worry about pensions in the coalfield communities. We can do many things in the House and we can have many debates about the right way to privatise the industry and about the right way to protect pensioners, but the depths to which the hon. Gentleman is prepared to sink really disturb me.

We are talking about individuals--people who go to hon. Members' surgeries because they are worried about their pensions. The least we should offer them--we should be able to reassure them--is a sensible analysis of the options. The scaremongering and low-level tactics pursued by the hon. Gentleman are most disturbing and surprising from a member of the Opposition Front Bench, in particular.

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Mr. Dobson : The House of Commons is a place where laws are made. The least we can do to assure miners, railway workers and pensioners is to pass some laws to protect them, and not rely on feeble ministerial assurances from a Government who have already gone back on previous assurances affecting the self-same industry.

Mr. Eggar : I differ from the hon. Gentleman in that I am simply not prepared to play political football with people's pensions for political gain. The hon. Gentleman knows perfectly well that this is a paving Bill. He knows perfectly well that it is structured to enable British Coal and British Rail to get the necessary advice to enable them to prepare themselves for privatisation. He knows as well as other hon. Members that the time for detailed and legal consideration of matters relating to pensions and other matters relating to privatisation is when the House considers the main Bill, yet he goes around the country and repeats again today, and he will do it again-- [Interruption.] He is deliberately worrying individuals out there in the country. He is not even prepared to do so in anything resembling a balanced way. He knows perfectly well that he will have a chance to debate those matters when the Bill comes before the House. I simply do not understand how he can act so irresponsibly.

Mr. Madden : Opposition Members are concerned about the pension funds of two great industries and the people who serve those industries. Will the Minister answer a very simple question? When privatisation is proposed, will the pension funds be protected and safeguarded by legislation, bearing in mind that Ministers come and go, that their assurances are not worth the paper they are written on, and that one Government cannot commit another Government? Will the Minister give a clear and simple answer to the question put a few minutes ago by my hon. Friend the Member for Holborn and St. Pancras (Mr. Dobson)? Will the pension funds be safeguarded by legislation?

Mr. Eggar : I have said categorically, and I say again, that individuals' pension rights will be safeguarded. The mechanism that is used to achieve that end has not yet been decided upon. The hon. Member for Makerfield drew attention to the method that had been used for the electricity industry privatisation. That is one option ; there are a number of others. I say quite categorically that we are committed to safeguarding pensions, we will safeguard pensions, and we will use the most appropriate method to do just that.

Mr. Redmond : Obviously, the protection of pensions is a crucial point. When people such as Lord Hanson are whipping around the country ripping off, selling or disposing of assets, we can understand people's fear. British Coal and the Union of Democratic Mineworkers combined to vote for the free holiday period. If the Minister is suggesting--I hope he is not--that the present structure is to be maintained, I urge him to rethink. It would make pensioners extremely happy if there were a regulatory body purely and simply to look after pensioners' rights which could not utilise their funds in any way, shape or form. It is very important that the present structure--the UDM and the National Union of Mineworkers--will not be satisfactory if privatisation

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takes place. There has to be something else that takes the control of pensions from the industry but gives the lads and lasses protection.

Mr. Eggar : I understand the hon. Gentleman's points. It is just those factors that we need to consider and decide, taking into account the points that have been made by other hon. Gentlemen, so that we provide essential safeguarding in the most appropriate way. There are many factors that we have to take into account. Of course, whatever structure is finally decided, the pension funds will be covered by the normal legislation with regard to the safeguarding on monetary amounts, and that has always been the case.

Mr. Eric Clarke : Will the Minister give way?

Mr. Eggar : I shall give way one last time.

Mr. Clarke : When we privatise the industry, we may nationalise the funds. It worries me that the Treasury might have its eye on the assets of the funds. The Minister will guarantee to the people, "Yes, we will look after you ; yes, you will get your pension at this rate." The Minister said that there are other methods. Other methods can be other methods. I am very suspicious of that. I want an assurance that the benefits of the funds, investment and know-how go into the Treasury and not into people's pockets. They will be frozen and the benefits of the know-how and future surpluses created by that fund will go to the Treasury. That is not the road down which I want to go. I want a guarantee from the Government but I do not want people to pay a high price for it. One of the problems is that the Minister can give a guarantee from the Despatch Box but people will pay for it.

Mr. Eggar : I see the hon. Gentleman's point but, clearly, the method used must be considered. We must ensure that pensioners' rights are safeguarded in the most appropriate way.

Mr. Snape : Will the Minister give way?

Mr. Eggar : No.

Mr. Snape rose --

Mr. Deputy Speaker : Order. The hon. Gentleman can see that the Minister is not giving way.

Mr. McCartney : Will the Minister give way?

Mr. Deputy Speaker : Order. When it is clear that the Minister is not giving way, I should be grateful if hon. Members would take their seats.

Mr. McCartney : On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I persist in this matter because the Minister has mentioned me twice--I accept that he has not attacked me yet--and it would have been common courtesy to give way to me just for a moment.

Mr. Deputy Speaker : The hon. Gentleman is abusing the point of order system.

Mr. Snape : Will the Minister give way?

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Mr. Eggar : With due respect to the hon. Gentleman, I shall give way to the hon. Member for Makerfield and promise that, in due course, I shall attack him if that will do any good.

Mr. McCartney : Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Your persistence has paid off.

I suggest that the Minister reads a textbook entitled "Essential Guide to Pensions", page 188 of which says that the Government have a standard policy for pension funds in the event of privatisation. First, they close down the current fund so that new entrants have completely different benefits. They then remove the right to indexation and other benefits. That is not my view but was written by Sue Ward, who has just been appointed by the Secretary of State for Social Security on the committee to review pensions law and whether pensioners need better protection. So the Government's advisers say that the Government have a set pattern, which means that, in the long run, pensioners lose out through privatisation. Is the Minister prepared to read that book and learn from it?

Mr. Eggar : I have not read the book to which the hon. Gentleman refers. However, in his speech he elegantly drew attention to the fact that, in practice, the Government had adopted a number of different approaches to the pension funds in various privatisations. So the assertion that there is only one methodology does not stand up, even on the analysis in his speech.

Mr. Snape : Does the Minister accept that his allegations about my hon. Friend the Member for Holborn and St. Pancras (Mr. Dobson) scaremongering and his refusal to answer detailed questions on this complex matter are not helpful to the House? Does he recollect the exchanges in Standing Committee A on 18 June, when my hon. Friend the Member for Streatham (Mr. Hill) pointed out the case of a British Rail employee who moved from the publicly owned railways to the privately owned British Rail Engineering Ltd., then back to the publicly owned railway and saw his pension years reduced because of that move? The move was perfectly understandable and part of the promotion chain within that industry, but his pension years were reduced from 11 to three and a half purely because he had made that transfer. Given the fact that the Government want a multiplicity of railway operators, what guarantee can the Minister give now, not at some time in the future, that that will not happen after this wretched Bill has been enacted?

6.45 pm

Mr. Eggar : I am sure that the hon. Member for Makerfield will bear out the fact that the whole question of transfer rights--concerning a transfer from an existing pension fund to another pension fund and back again--affects the ultimate value of a pension. That effect operates whatever kind of pension fund it is. One of my hon. Friends has been trying to improve that problem in recent legislation. However, we shall consider those factors when we look at the structure relating to pension funds in the future.

Mr. McCartney : Will the Minister give way?

Mr. Eggar : No, I have been more than generous.

The hon. Members for Don Valley (Mr. Redmond) and for Barnsley, West and Penistone (Mr. Clapham) asked about social welfare arrangements. I shall give that matter

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careful consideration. It is a complicated subject and there are many different entitlements with many different historical antecedents. As several hon. Members have said, significant assests are associated with them.

If the hon. Member for Don Valley has particular constituency problems, I should be grateful if he would draw my attention to those. He also asked about concessionary fuel entitlements and the position of individuals in his constituency with pre-1947 rights. We are aware of that problem and will try to take account of it in ensuring that our pledge that concessionary fuel will be safeguarded is fully implemented.

We have had a useful debate, but this is not the appropriate Bill in which to have measures such as those suggested in the new clauses. We shall have a chance to return to the matter when we debate the main privatisation Bill later this Session.

Mr. Dobson : The Minister has accused me and, I suspect by implication, a number of my hon. Friends--[ Hon. Members : -- "Particularly you."]--oh, particularly me--of scaremongering about pensions. I wish that I had a publicity machine that could create the amount of concern that is felt about the future of pension schemes in the coalfield communities and those places where railway workers are employed. They are worried not because of what I have said but because of what they observe day in, day out, on television, what they hear on the radio and read in newspapers. No scaremongering is required by me to remind people of what happened to the Maxwell pensioners or the legions of pensioners suffering as a result of earlier privatisations so well listed by my hon. Friend the Member for Makerfield (Mr. McCartney).

People are bothered about City institutions getting their filthy hands on miners' and railway workers' pension funds and need no reminding about the scandal of BCCI or any other City scandals that have arisen in the past few years. The Government are responsible for those because they have not laid down satisfactory rules in advance, through laws passed in the House ; nor have they set up adequate schemes to regulate what happens in the City.

If any Tory Members believe that regulation of the City is adequate, they are even more empty-headed than they have seemed in previous debates. Surely no hon. Member believes that regulation of the City is adequate. Even the Secretary of State for Social Security--God help us--thinks that pensions legislation is inadequate and has promised that it will be changed.

If the Minister wants people to stop being scared about what will happen to their pensions as a result of coal and rail privatisation, there is a simple answer. He can accept the new clauses, or if he wants to change them in the House of Lords, he can table new clauses, formulated by his officials, which will provide the sense of security for which people are looking.

If the law is changed, people will be happier ; they will still not be entirely happy, however. The Minister has signally failed to reply to the points made in this debate about the adequacy of the advice that the Government are seeking or which the companies may seek. This Bill is mainly about the advice sought, and the Minister has said nothing about that. He still apparently believes it adequate to seek advice from an organisation such as Smith New Court, about which the Department's own inspectors have said :

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"They did not understand their responsibilities and they did not make any serious attempt to take proper legal advice."

Apparently the Minister is happy, too, with Ernst and Young, of which the Department's inspectors said :

"The auditors failed to carry out their responsibility as auditors".

They had no other responsibilities, but they did not carry out the ones they had.

Apparently the Minister is happy that the Government should seek advice, or that British Coal or British Rail should seek advice, from Price Waterhouse, about which the Department's inspectors--not scaremongering Dobson--had this to say :

"Their conduct as regards the non-executive directors and the incoming auditors is indefensible."

The Minister still proposes to give himself powers to appoint the indefensible to look after the interests of miners and miner pensioners, of railway workers and their pensioners. It is no good the Minister smiling in his bland way in the hope that all this will go away : it will not.

Miners and rail workers and millions of others think it wrong that Parliament, given the opportunity to protect some pensions, should fail to do so. My right hon. and hon. Friends and I will return to this issue over the next few years. We will continue to pursue the Government to ensure that we get justice for present and future pensioners of these two companies.

Tonight, the Minister has offered every assistance short of actual help. I must take him back to the principles of these pension funds. All provision of this sort is money put by for a rainy day--for the miners and their widows and orphans and for the railway workers and their widows and orphans. They do not save up the money for a rainy day for British Coal or for Intergalactic Property Theft plc or for whoever buys British Coal or gets some options on bits of British Rail. The money in the funds was put there to look after present and future pensioners. They are entitled to protection, and if the Government will not provide them with it, we are entitled to say, and they are entitled to believe, that their money is not safe. We do not think the money is safe. That is why the law needs to be changed, and no ministerial assurance will convince anyone to the contrary. We are a law-making Chamber, not a place for empty assurances. If the Minister wants to do something to end the disquiet among coalfield communities and railway workers and their pensioners, he has an easy answer : change the law.

Question put, That the clause be read a second time :

The Committee divided : Ayes 227, Noes 273.

Division No. 42] [6.55 pm

AYES

Adams, Mrs Irene

Ainsworth, Robert (Cov'try NE)

Allen, Graham

Alton, David

Anderson, Donald (Swansea E)

Anderson, Ms Janet (Ros'dale)

Ashdown, Rt Hon Paddy

Ashton, Joe

Austin-Walker, John

Barnes, Harry

Beith, Rt Hon A. J.

Bell, Stuart

Benn, Rt Hon Tony

Bennett, Andrew F.

Benton, Joe

Bermingham, Gerald

Berry, Roger

Betts, Clive

Blair, Tony

Blunkett, David

Boyce, Jimmy

Boyes, Roland

Bradley, Keith

Bray, Dr Jeremy

Brown, Gordon (Dunfermline E)

Brown, N. (N'c'tle upon Tyne E)

Bruce, Malcolm (Gordon)

Burden, Richard

Byers, Stephen

Caborn, Richard

Campbell, Ms Anne (C'bridge)

Campbell, Menzies (Fife NE)

Campbell, Ronald (Blyth V)

Campbell-Savours, D. N.

Canavan, Dennis

Cann, James

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