House of Commons Hansard Debates for 5 Nov 1992

Mr. Deputy Speaker : Order. The hon. Gentleman should not be quoting from speeches made in the other place other than those of Ministers.

Mr. Wilson : I need not pursue the point. Lord Houghton of Sowerby, with his tremendous experience in this area and as a former holder of the position held by the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, recognised the fundamental nature of the Bill and was deeply offended by it. Moreover, he was deeply offended by the fact that a Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, which I understand

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is historically a non-political position in terms of controversial legislation, should be putting such a measure through.

I find it offensive that a deception should be practised on Parliament by a Minister telling us that something as basic as this is a modest technical measure, a poor little thing of a Bill. It is not. I might accept it if it came from the used-car wing of the Conservative party, because they have no understanding of history or historical precedent within the civil service or of traditions that go back 100 or 150 years, but I do not believe for one moment that the toff wing, represented by the Chancellor, suffers from any such delusions. If he does not suffer from such delusions, what he told the House was an intended deception.

Mr. Waldegrave : That is a little bit out of order and I hope that the hon. Gentleman will withdraw it. We can have a perfectly legitimate argument about this, but no one is attempting to deceive anyone else.

Mr. Deputy Speaker : Order. I hope that, on reflection, the hon. Gentleman will wish to withdraw that.

Mr. Wilson : I shall, with pleasure, withdraw it. I hope that the Minister and you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, will find it acceptable if I say that to call it a poor little thing and a modest technical measure is a misrepresentation of the Bill. It is neither of those things.

What problem does the Bill seek to address? Is there some great wave of corruption in the civil service or some terrible ill within it that needs something as drastic and fundamental as this? The Earl Howe told us quite the contrary. He said that there is no political jobbery and that the Civil Service Commissioners ensure that appointments are won on merit. He reassures us about all the standards of the civil service in which all of us would want to believe. Therefore, there is no problem of that nature for the Bill to address.

The problem is to match the "next steps" agency with administrative devolution. Again, none of my hon. Friends finds a great problem with that concept. As my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich, South (Mr. Garrett) and others have clearly said, not only do we not oppose fundamentally, but we have had much involvement with and responsibility for, the concept of the devolution of the civil service into agencies and to the whole "next steps" programme. To achieve administrative devolution, which is what is nominally intended, there is no need to break up the national civil service. We do not have to destroy Whitley council terms of pay and conditions. The reasons for doing that are to fragment, compartmentalise, isolate and break down the civil service into free-standing businesses--the phrase used in the other place--and we know what the next step is from that accomplishment.

The next step is precisely what is happening now at the DVLA in Swansea. Let us not be disingenuous about it. Written on the face of the Bill are the precise consequences that can flow from what is in the measure. It cannot privatise, it cannot contractorise and it cannot of itself produce market testing. But as my hon. Friend the Member for Dundee, East (Mr. McAllion) and others rightly pointed out, the Bill is a necessary part of the jigsaw. It is the forerunner of various other measures and the sort of thing that is now happening in Swansea.

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Let us examine the Swansea situation. In my experience, relatively limited though it is, I have never seen a document such as the one before us about Swansea. We are used to treachery, to thousands of jobs just being cast aside and to the hidden agendas that result in closure announcements. But the concept of a man who is responsible for the employment of 4,600 people sitting down and putting pencil to paper in such terms is monstrous.

Let us first define the problem that calls for such a draconian solution for the DVLA in Swansea. Above the name and a not very striking photograph of Mr. Stephen Curtis we are told of the success of 1991-92 by the public sector DVLA :

"We broke new ground by winning the contract to licence small ships against fierce competition from the private sector",

he claims. In a tribute, he goes on :

"Meeting our customers' needs could not be achieved without the committed efforts of our staff."

They should put that on the walls as a testimonial to their efforts and as an interesting commentary on Mr. Curtis's concept of loyalty. The document is required reading for this debate and to know what underlies the legislation. Mr. Curtis was then charged with the task of setting out the future framework for the DVLA. It is done with astonishing crudity, even if it was not meant for other eyes. The idea that anyone in that position could write such material and not believe that, even at levels of senior management, people would make sure that it reached the public domain is as naive as it is contemptuous of the people who work in that establishment. Having outlined the virtues or joys of contractorisation--one of which is that it does not need legislation, as opposed to privatisation--Mr. Curtis concludes :

"It would therefore be necessary to make most staff at DVLA redundant."

He goes on to give the costs of doing that and adds :

"In addition to these costs, the Swansea buildings would be likely to become a white elephant."

Mr. Donald Anderson : My hon. Friend might care to ask how a man who so lightly penned such a document, envisaging the destruction of 3,000 jobs, could hope to retain the loyalty of the work force.

Mr. Wilson : My hon. Friend's question is rhetorical. The views of the work force are probably unprintable. I shall not try to describe them.

Mr. Curtis goes on to find that there remains a role for Government, the Secretary of State will be pleased to hear. That role is to pay indemnity money to the contractors for the costs that they would incur in making 3,000-odd people redundant.

Mr. Rod Richards (Clwyd, North-West) : Has the hon. Gentleman ever visited the DVLA in Swansea? I come from the area and recall the time when it was the DVLC under a previous Labour Government. In those days, the carpets were stripped out every two years and new carpets put in when they were not needed. The building was decorated when that was not needed. Does the hon. Gentleman know--

Mr. Deputy Speaker : Order. Interventions should be brief and to the point. They should not be speeches.

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Mr. Wilson : I am sorry that we did not hear the end of the story. I am sure that it was good news for the carpet manufacturing industry in its day. The account that the chief executive gave in his foreword to this year's annual report scarcely squares with the horror stories detailed by the hon. Gentleman. I must admit that I have not visited the DVLA, but I am delighted that the hon. Gentleman, who is obviously deeply concerned about those matters, has managed to visit the debate at 9.30 at night. With his interest and awareness, he must have known of the topicality of the Swansea issue, which has been discussed by hon. Members throughout the debate.

The Government are to engage in indemnity for redundancy costs under the programme envisaged by the chief executive of that agency. At this point, we come to the Secretary of State's role as Minister with responsibility for open government. Mr. Curtis, chief executive of the DVLA, has strong views on open government. He says : "For the present, while we are considering the issues there is little we could say to unions and staff that would be helpful. Uncertainty is a strong stimulant to unease and industrial action. Also"--

this is classic-- "given the close links between unions at DVLC and local MPs, it would be likely to lead to Parliamentary Questions and requests to meet Ministers."

Mr. Donald Anderson : Let there be no doubt that there are close links. There must be if we are to guard our people against wishes of people like that chief executive and the dangers that will flow from Government policies.

Mr. Wilson : Again, I am grateful to my hon. Friend.

Mr. Curtis therefore recommended that the whole exercise should remain confidential. Were it not for some public spirited public servant ensuring that the document did not remain confidential, nobody in the DVLA, the House, the media or south Wales--certainly not the Secretary of State for Wales--would have had any idea what was going on.

The Minister must comment tonight not only on the content of that document, the fate of 3,000 people in Swansea and the whole concept of regional policy as opposed to the privatisation programme. He must comment again on the attitude underlined in the document and the contempt for any apology, for open government or for consultation with those affected. That is what is at stake in the document and the Minister should say tonight, without further consultation or messing about, that the uncertainty for those people and their families' lives and for the south Wales economy should be ended now. The document should be consigned to exactly where it belongs-- the bin--and Mr. Curtis should be sent along to put it there in person. The document is supremely arrogant, written by a man who believes that he is licensed to make such proposals. That is the direct link between the Bill and that document. If those freestanding businesses are established, with the power to negotiate wages and conditions of staff down to the last jot and tittle, and if, as the hon. Member for Upper Bann (Mr. Trimble) so rightly said, they are entitled to discriminate on a regional basis to achieve the lowest common denominator of wages, we are entitled to believe that they will also have the powers mentioned in the document to close down, strip bare, asset-strip, privatise, and flog off to their friends in the private sector. That is the document's significance in the context of the Bill.

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It is not a purely Welsh matter, although it is obviously mainly a Welsh issue, and a deeply important one. I shall not take the time of the House by reading the list of other jobs affected. However, jobs are affected in smaller but significant numbers as follows : 44 in Birmingham, 47 in Chelmsford, 150 in London, 46 in Manchester and about 100 in Scotland. Many other Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency centres throughout the country will be affected. In all those places the duplicity of the chief executive of the DVLA towards his own staff has implications and ramifications.

There have been some good contributions to the debate and some illuminating ones--not least from the hon. Member for Colchester, North (Mr. Jenkin). He informed us that in a previous parliamentary foray he had been the Tory candidate in Glasgow, Central. It must be a relief for him to have ended up in Colchester, North, where there are 35,213 Tory votes, which must provide a contrast with his last electoral outing.

He was able to be frank on the subject. He said, in a self-effacing way, that we should not be bashful and that the legislation was about privatisation. Of course, the legislation is a move towards privatisation. I read in "Dod" that the hon. Gentleman is indeed as precocious as he sounds--it says that he was born in 1959 and was president of the Cambridge Union in 1962. He has been progressing ever since, via Glasgow, Central.

The hon. Member for Dudley, West (Dr. Blackburn) made an interesting speech. He rightly said that it was not a technical Bill, but contained something much more substantial. He said that if it meant interfering in the wages, conditions and the reasonable expectations of civil servants, he would object to it. That is to his credit.

I strongly agree with the hon. Member for Upper Bann on both regional pay rates and the treatment of Northern Ireland in the legislation. As a Member with a Scottish constituency, I often take exception to the way that Scottish business is treated in the House, but we are well treated compared with the way in which Northern Ireland legislation is handled, which is a disgrace. As there is a separate Northern Ireland civil service and separate legislation, for the issue to be lumped in a clause in the Bill without any opportunity to debate it is wrong. That is no way to treat the jobs, careers and structure of government in Northern Ireland.

We shall oppose the Bill, although not tonight, as we shall give the Government the opportunity to answer some of our objections to it. We shall work on it in Committee and explore not merely what is on the face of the Bill, but what underlies it. If no improvements have been made by Third Reading, we shall oppose it.

I think it fair to ask the Minister to deal specifically, firmly and in plain language with the points raised about Swansea. That is a fair request in the light of the importance of the subject in today's deliberations. On top of everything else that is happening in this country, the idea of holding the axe over the heads of such a large number of people in a part of the country that has suffered so much economic recession, depression and loss of jobs is intolerable. The document is in the public domain and the Minister has the opportunity tonight to say that it has, and will have, no standing in Government eyes.

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9.38 pm

The Parliamentary Secretary, Office of Public Service and Science (Mr. Robert Jackson) : It is not often that the House has the opportunity to debate the civil service, and today we have had a vigorous and wide-ranging debate. On behalf of the Government, I am grateful for that, and I shall try to respond as briefly as possible to the wide range of issues raised by colleagues.

It has emerged clearly from the debate that there is common ground on our commitment to an effective and efficient civil service. We all believe that to be of great importance. We all stand on the constitutional ground--the need for a professional civil service serving all Governments with the same dedication. That is fundamental to the British system of administration, and experience of other countries and other times shows that we cannot take it for granted. The Government, like all parties in the House, are wholly committed to continuing that tradition. I welcome the words of my hon. Friends the Members for Surrey, East (Mr. Ainsworth) and for Dudley, West (Dr. Blackburn) in support of that commitment and I congratulate them both on their excellent speeches.

We cannot and must not be complacent about the civil service, however. It employs a great many people and costs a lot of money. That is a simple matter of fact, not a criticism. Provision for the civil service in 1992-93 was about £19.4 billion. It is the duty of the Government and this House--through, for instance, the Public Accounts Committee, and I see the hon. Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill (Mr. Davis) in his place--to ensure that we get the best possible value for money from this expenditure and the best possible quality of service for our constituents who use the services provided by the public service.

I should like to take this opportunity, since I have been given the information, to answer the question posed by my hon. Friend the Member for Brentford and Isleworth (Mr. Deva) about forms. His question was perhaps rhetorical, but I have the answer : the total number of forms in the main Departments in 1989 was 86,982. That sounds an awful lot, but there was a reduction of 36,004 between 1982 and 1989, so a great deal has been achieved. Nevertheless, we are still an active and perhaps sometimes intrusive organisation. The Government have a clear agenda for the public service. There is certainly no hidden agenda for public service reform. The Chancellor of the Duchy gave a full explanation of the Bill in his speech. The Government are just as open on other matters--on our view of "next steps", on the citizens charter, on market testing, and on contracting out. It is the worst-hidden agenda in history. The Opposition may not like some of the ideas that we propose, but they are being broadcast loud and clear.

Some reference was made to my right hon. Friend's speech to The Sunday Times conference. It offered a clear exposition of the Government's policy, but the Bill has nothing to do with privatisation or contracting out. It is about delegation within the public service, not outside it. It builds on the great success of the "next steps" initiative, which has enjoyed welcome bipartisan support.

I was delighted, as was the whole House, to learn of the claim to authorship of the "next steps" concept by the hon. Member for Norwich, South (Mr. Garrett). He certainly seems to have used the language before anyone else. We have had good reports from the Treasury and Civil Service

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Select Committee. In addition, I should like to quote the words of the Leader of the Opposition, delivered when he was shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer. I am grateful to the hon. Members for Cunninghame, North (Mr. Wilson) and for Glasgow, Govan (Mr. Davidson) for reinforcing what the right hon. and learned Gentleman said at that time. He said that it is

"obviously very much in the public interest that"

the delivery of public services

"is carried out with the greatest efficiency and effectiveness". Next comes an important sentence, the truth of which I am glad that the hon. Member for Govan acknowledged again today :

"It should certainly be our priority to ensure that services are run in the interests of consumers and that any injection of public resources results in a commensurate improvement in the service to the customer".

That stress on the importance of the customer is fundamental, and it is good to hear that it is common ground.

In the same speech, the Leader of the Opposition talked about continuing with "next steps" :

"I do not think there would be merit in a new Government seeking to uproot all the plants in the garden and then expect them to grow well"--

so the Opposition endorse the "next steps" agency concept. I think that the House recognises the limited scope of this Bill. It was explicitly affirmed by the hon. Member for Norwich, South, who has told me that he could not stay for the wind-up speeches. He speaks with great experience of these matters, and this is indeed a Bill of limited scope, as was recognised in the other place. Our position on market testing and contracting out is controversial, but it is accepted that this Bill is a technical measure with no direct impact on such policies. I hope and believe that good management is not a partisan issue.

The hon. Members for Redcar (Ms. Mowlam), for Warrington, North (Mr. Hoyle) and for Truro (Mr. Taylor) spoke about consultation with staff on the Bill. They exaggerated the importance of what did or did not happen. However, in retrospect we regret that we did not discuss the Bill more fully with staff before it was introduced in the other place. In mitigation, may I say that we have always seen the Bill as highly technical and limited, although I think that in retrospect we underestimated the scope for misunderstanding.

I emphasise that strong steps have been taken and that we have frequent and exhaustive consultation on the matter. There have been detailed written replies to twenty-two questions asked by the unions. There were two long, late-night meetings in the interval between Second Reading and Committee in the other place, and another high-level meeting in the interval between Committee and Report. We have provided additional written information to the unions, a further meeting is planned on 13 November, and officials have responded to every point raised by the unions, which have recognised and appreciated the steps that we have taken.

Before dealing with larger questions about pay discretions and accountability, I should like to deal with the matter of the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency. We all respect the constituency concern of the hon. Member for Swansea, East (Mr. Anderson) and it was appropriate that he should raise the matter. I repeat what my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Duchy said--that all possible options for the future of the DVLA have to be examined

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as a normal part of reviewing its framework document, which expires in April 1993. The trade unions will be invited to give their views on the matter. It is worth bearing in mind--this is perhaps a new point--that a similar process was undertaken before the DVLA became an agency and the current framework document, with all that it implies, was agreed. No decision has been taken ; consultation will, of course, take place before any decisions are made ; and local employment conditions will naturally be a relevant consideration in reaching decisions.

Mr. Donald Anderson : This is not an academic exercise because in the document the chief executive advocates, in effect, the closure of the centre with the loss of about 3,000 jobs. To avoid uncertainty and anxiety, will the Minister give a clear undertaking that the chief executive's conclusion will not be implemented and that those jobs will remain at the centre in Swansea?

Mr. Jackson : It is appropriate for the Government and the agency to look at all the possible options for its future. Any anxiety and distress is attributable to those who leaked the document. It is perfectly appropriate for such matters to be considered and it is right that they should be considered confidentially until it is appropriate for people to be consulted about the proposals.

Mr. Wilson : It is rather sad that the Minister blames the people who leaked the document rather than the person who wrote it. Has he any comment about the person who wrote it and, more particularly, about the terms in which it was written? Will he address the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Swansea East (Mr. Anderson) that the document is not a neutral appraisal but contains a degree of advocacy, that it is deeply disturbing and that it casts a shadow over the jobs? Does the Minister feel any responsibility to give any reassurance to the thousands of families in south Wales who are deeply worried?

Mr. Jackson : It is appropriate that there should be a careful look at all possible options for the future of the DVLA and other organisations. I repeat assurances that my right hon. Friend and I have given, that no decisions have yet been taken, that consultations will take place before any decisions are made, and that local employment will be a relevant consideration in reaching decisions.

Dr. Kim Howells : Does the Minister understand that those of us on the Public Accounts Committee understand that the new London police computer will be programmed in either the Philippines or Indonesia because it is much cheaper to do it that way? We are not debating options, but the removal of huge sections of civil service work to countries where there is cheap labour. That is not just a qualitative but a quantitative change in the amount of available work.

Mr. Jackson : I must press on. I cannot comment on what the hon. Gentleman has said, because I am not informed about it, but I feel that he should bear in mind the importance of achieving a balance between value for the taxpayer's money and the effectiveness of the service.

The hon. Member for Upper Bann (Mr. Trimble) raised a point about the use of the negative resolution procedure. The orders in question will be used as a technical and enabling measure, like the Bill itself. In itself, the procedure will have no direct effect on the terms and conditions of staff. The principles will be discussed fully

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during the Bill's passage, and the orders must conform to the powers contained in the Bill. The operation of all delegations which take place in Northern Ireland will be subject to consultation with the relevant staff interests.

Pay discretions have been a central issue, raised by the hon. Member for Dundee, East (Mr. McAllion), for Norwich, South, for Warrington, North and for Redcar. All of them supposed that the Bill would make a difference to the pay and conditions of staff. Let me tell them--and the hon. Member for Hodge Hill, who spoke especially strongly--that the Bill is not needed to implement discretions on pay, a number of which are already in place. What it allows is the formal delegation of authority to determine pay.

It has long been Government policy to give Departments and agencies more responsibility for pay when that is cost-effective. My hon. Friends the Members for Colchester, North (Mr. Jenkin) and for Surrey, East were especially strong on that point, and stated the underlying philosophy very well. The Bill will not affect the rate at which the process takes place.

The hon. Member for Warrington, North was wrong in what he said about the position of the trade unions under the new arrangements. All the new long- term pay agreements that are concluded with the civil service unions contain provisions for consultation and negotiation on the introduction of alternative pay arrangements, and those arrangements will continue under delegation.

Mr. Hoyle : Will the Minister give way?

Mr. Jackson : I will, but I am running out of time.

Mr. Hoyle : I interrupt the Minister only because he referred to something that I said. Is he now saying that the conditions negotiated centrally under Whitley will continue?

Mr. Jackson : I am saying that national agreements will continue in force, but some of those agreements already provide for local negotiations between the agency chief executives and the trade unions. Many terms and conditions are not subject to national agreements at all. That has long been the case, and I think that it must be right to ensure that the details of pay and conditions fit the needs of what have been described as businesses--that is, I think, appropriate language for what are often very business-like organisations--and enable them to deliver services effectively to users, while providing value for money.

Staff are already aware at all times of who settles terms and conditions. That is already done with discretions, and it will be the same with delegations. At national level, we shall inform the unions of proposed delegations and give them an opportunity to comment ; at local level, we shall consult departmental trade unions on the use of any delegated power to change terms and conditions. Nothing in the Bill will directly affect the terms and conditions of civil servants. Delegating has no effect on the legal rights of staff or, indeed, on the normal processes of consultation. This is a Bill that enables, not a Bill that determines.

Let me deal briefly with the issue of market testing which, although it is not directly raised by the Bill, has been raised by a number of hon. Members. Market testing is outside the scope of the Bill, but we do not see it as an ogre sent to destroy the civil service, as some Opposition

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Members seem to--at least, that is what their language implied. It is part of the Government's duty to ensure that the citizen and the taxpayer receive the best value for money, and the highest quality of service. That need not be a partisan point, and I am sorry that it has to an extent become one today.

I quote from a speech made by Councillor Jeremy Beecham, the Labour leader of Newcastle city council. This is what he said about the experience of market testing and compulsory competitive tendering in local government :

"The purchaser-provider split and the development of service level agreements between the provider of central services within authorities and client departments have caused a re-examination of performance, with generally beneficial results."

He said in the same speech :

"Local government has to recognise that the public is not intrinsically interested in who is providing a service but in what kind of service they receive."

Those are very wise words from the leader of Newcastle city council. They are in the spirit of what was said by the Leader of the Opposition in his Royal Institute of Public Administration lecture about the importance of always maintaining a clear eye on the consumer-customer perspective. Those points were well made by those people and also by my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester, North. The question of accountability has been an important theme in this debate. It was raised especially by the hon. Members for Redcar, for Norwich, South, for Swansea, East (Mr. Anderson) and for Upper Bann. I think that the hon. Member for Redcar slightly misunderstood the position. For the "next steps" agencies there are two channels of accountability. First, there is the channel of the agency chief executive to the Minister and, through the Minister, to the House of Commons. I have direct personal experience of that from my previous job in the Department of Employment, where I was the Minister responsible for the Employment Service. I very often met hon. Members from all parts of the House to talk about the business of the Employment Service and to exercise that parliamentary accountability for the activities of the service. The other channel is that of the accounting officer--where appropriate, the agency chief executive--to the Public Accounts Committee.

The hon. Lady seemed to think--perhaps I misunderstood her--that the effect of these developments is that only the latter channel remains. That is not correct ; both channels will remain. On the broad issue of accountability, I believe--I speak with some personal experience in this--that the "next steps" agency programme will help to enhance accountability. That point was well recognised by the hon. Member for Truro, speaking from the Liberal Benches.

The hon. Member for Norwich, South evoked--but did not, I think, support-- the old monolithic concept of the civil service : the idea of a uniform, unified organisation

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employing hundreds of thousands, possibly millions, of people all on the same pay and conditions arrangements, with strong central control driven on the one hand by the Treasury and on the other by the idea of the accountability of Ministers to Parliament for everything, including, in Bevan's words, the fall of the bedpan in the hospital.

We are bringing forward a new concept of public service which I think is generally supported. The hon. Member for Truro was speaking in that sense. That concept recognises the diverse nature of the many functions--the many businesses--which exist within the civil service, breaking those down into functional units, delegating responsibility as close as possible to the customer and enabling relocation to take place. That point was raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Dudley, West, and the hon. Member for Govan. Delegation, to answer the latter's specific point, tends to lead to relocation. Delegation of responsibilities, bringing things closer to the public and then setting the relationship between the centre and the agencies within the terms of a contract, a framework agreement, monitoring, annual reports to Parliament, I believe will in practice strengthen the accountability to the House of those institutions and organisations in the civil service.

The hon. Member for Truro raised a point about the boundary between policy matters and operational matters and I want to take up the specific details of what he said. There has been some debate about whether the shift from the monolithic concept to the devolved concept constitutes the break up of the civil service. Many hon. Members stressed this point. To pick up the phrase used by the hon. Member for Norwich, South, I do not believe that the civil service identity depends upon uniformity of pay and conditions across the whole of the service. The hon. Member for Truro said some sensible things about that. The hon. Member for Swansea, East, on the contrary, used some rather over-heated language. It is not merely a uniform set of terms and conditions of service which defines the civil service. The civil service is bound together by the nature of its work in support of the Government of the day and by professional and behavioural standards and duties which derive from the nature of its business as a Crown service. Nothing in the Bill detracts from that fact. The guiding principle is ministerial accountability to Parliament, and that remains. We shall, of course, publish details of delegation for the benefit of the House.

We have had a useful debate, which has afforded us a rare opportunity to consider the future of the civil service. I hope that there will be further opportunities. The Bill is a technical enabling measure and, although there may continue to be differences of opinion about the broad question of the future of the civil service, I believe that there is, and should continue to be, common ground as regards the details of the Bill.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read a Second time, and committed to a Standing Committee pursuant to Standing Order No. 61 (Committal of Bills).

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Unemployment (Jarrow)

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.-- [Mr. Robert G. Hughes.]

10 pm

Mr. Don Dixon (Jarrow) : I am grateful for this opportunity to draw the attention of the House to the intolerably high unemployment in my constituency, which is getting worse daily.

I was born and bred in Jarrow and have lived there all my life, and I am proud to represent that constituency. As I said in my maiden speech in 1979, Jarrow is a proud constituency, populated by honest, hard-working people : miners, not millionaires ; shipbuilders, not shipowners ; builders, not bankers ; and engineers, not racketeers. It is 56 years almost to the day since 200 proud men and Ellen Wilkinson, our then Member of Parliament, left Jarrow to go on their historic crusade to London demanding the right to work. I was born--and later educated at an elementary school--within 200 yd of the start of that march. Those men marched to London not for an extra slice of bread or bowl of soup but for the right to work and the dignity of a pay packet. If one good thing has come of the savage cuts in the mining industry, it is that it has focused the nation's attention on the plight of the unemployed--as the Jarrow march did in 1936.

The town of Jarrow was destroyed. Ellen Wilkinson wrote a book entitled "The town that was murdered". Such is the scourge of unemployment in Britain that people throughout the country could write similar books about their own communities. Month after month, we hear of increases in the unemployment figures, and it makes my blood boil when Ministers shed crocodile tears at the Dispatch Box. I speak with some knowledge about unemployment. I have been unemployed on numerous occasions. I have had to stand in a queue at Victoria road, Hebburn, and sign the book with a one and a half inch pencil tied to a 2 ft piece of string so that no one could steal it. I have known the indignity of being on the dole, and I get very annoyed when I hear statements from the now discredited Chancellor of the Exchequer to the effect that unemployment is "a price worth paying". The Government just do not know how unemployed people feel. They do not know what misery they are causing.

Since 1979, the last pit in my constituency has closed. The last coking works have closed at Monkton and Hebburn. The last steelworks has closed in Jarrow. The last shipyard and ship repair yard has closed, and on the site of the shipyard where my hon. Friend the Member for St. Helens, North (Mr. Evans) and I were chairman and secretary of the shop stewards committee there is now a housing estate. The biggest dry dock on the east coast of England--Palmers dock in Hebburn--lies dormant.

Many of the miners in my constituency who have finished work at Boldon colliery and Monkton coking works have transferred to Westoe and Wearmouth, where the pits are now threatened with closure.

Mr. John Cummings (Easington) : Is my hon. Friend aware that, for all the assurances given by the President of the Board of Trade to the House and for all the evidence given to the Select Committee by the chairman of British Coal, British Coal is today dismantling the winding apparatus at the colliery where the coal-raising shaft for

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Vane Tempest is situated? By subterfuge and deceit, it is working towards the inevitable closure of Vane Tempest and the sacking of 900 workers, many of whom no doubt come from my hon. Friend's constituency.

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