House of Commons Hansard Debates for 25 Mar 1993

Mr. Stephen Milligan (Eastleigh) : May I add my congratulations on my right hon. Friend's statement? I notice that it received a near- unanimous welcome among Conservative Members. It struck a balance between the

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interests of preserving coal miners' jobs at a time of high unemployment and developing a real market which is in the interests of other industries. Does my right hon. Friend agree that it is hypocritical of the Opposition to accuse the Government of rigging the market when it is their policy to keep every pit open, regardless of the economics and even if the coal has been exhausted? What would be the likely cost in terms of jobs in other industries and the likely bill to the taxpayer if we adopted the foolish policies of the Opposition?

Mr. Heseltine : My hon. Friend is right. The Labour party is talking the language of opposition. It never talked that way when in government, when it closed pit after pit--and Opposition Members know it.

Mr. Eric Clarke : May I put the record straight? I have fought the pit closures imposed by all Governments, including the Labour Government. I am here today to say the same as I told the Labour Government in the past.

I am disappointed. This has been a wasted opportunity to maintain a viable coal industry and the freedom to have cheap indigenous fuel. I must tell the right hon. Gentleman that many bitter people back home will not even be disappointed, because they are cynical enough to realise that he is going to sell them out. How can the Secretary of State claim to have negotiated? The Government own 100 per cent. of the coal industry and 40 per cent. of the electricity industry, yet they cannot do a deal. The right hon. Gentleman must be some Minister.

Mr. Heseltine : The hon. Gentleman illustrates the dilemma. I do not dispute his sincerity in fighting for pit after pit. The real test, however, is whether his colleagues, if they were sitting on the Treasury Bench and had to confront the decisions that I face, would have acted any differently. They did not--and the hon. Gentleman's remarks clearly show that, although he fought, he always lost.

Mr. Raymond S. Robertson (Aberdeen, South) : Is my right hon. Friend aware that he has today allayed the deep fears of tens of thousands of workers in the North sea oil and gas industries who know all too well that, had the Labour party had its way, the miners' subsidy would be their redundancy notice? Does he accept that I care just as passionately about the jobs in my constituency as Opposition Members care about the jobs in theirs? Just as it is unacceptable for them to tell their constituents to prepare for redundancy, it is unacceptable for me to go to mine and say the same?

Mr. Heseltine : There is no more eloquent case than the one that my hon. Friend has paraded. That is the dilemma. My hon. Friend represents a constituency at the heart of one of Britain's great industries. Am I to subsidise and keep going the pits, the effect of which will be to keep jobs in the pits which will be denied to the North sea oil industry? That is the choice ; there is no escape from it. I therefore agree with my hon. Friend.

Ms Joan Walley (Stoke-on-Trent, North) : The right hon. Gentleman is the President of the Board of Trade. He has had 14 years to produce a coherent energy strategy, but none has been forthcoming. Why has not the right hon. Gentleman mentioned what is to happen to the 10 pits earmarked for closure? How can he pretend that the contracting procedure is nothing to do

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with him? He is the President. We need a proper energy policy. We do not want coal imports coming into our ports. We want a coherent opencast policy. What am I to tell constituents when they hear the results of this statement ?

Mr. Heseltine : I think that I can help the House, because I have with me the "Plan for Coal" published in 1974-- [Interruption.] This was the heyday of national planning ; it was all about prediction-- [Interruption.] I know that the Labour party does not want to listen, even though Opposition Members keep harking back to how they would have done things differently--forgetting what they actually did. So I shall tell them what they did. They published the "Plan for Coal". This is what it said-- [Interruption.]

Madam Speaker : Order.

Mr. Heseltine : On second thoughts, I will forbear. There is a debate on Monday.

Mrs. Jacqui Lait (Hastings and Rye) : My right hon. Friend referred to special measures to help the large energy users. Has he any estimate of the number of jobs that would be lost in steel and chemicals if they were not recipients of energy at internationally competitive prices?

My right hon. Friend referred to the nuclear review. Can he give us an estimate of whether we can expect it this year?

As there is 14 per cent. unemployment in my constituency, can my right hon. Friend assure me that we will have a statement on the assisted areas map before we rise for the Easter recess--

Madam Speaker : Order. That last question is totally out of order. It should be addressed to the Leader of the House--if ever we get to business questions.

Mr. Heseltine : I can assure you, Madam Speaker, that I share your ambition to get to business questions.

My hon. Friend raises an important point about the large industrial users. They are a tough lot. They will tell me what they think potential job losses are. I have to stand back a little before accepting their forecasts hook, line and sinker, but I accept that there is a case. I intend to examine it in the way that I have described. My hon. Friend was right to bring it to my attention.

Mr. Harry Barnes (Derbyshire, North-East) : Today we have witnessed a performance by the Secretary of State and he has promised us another on Monday. It was silly, knockabout, political stuff when what we needed was an act of statesmanship. That is what my constituents, many of whom are miners, want for their future. The Opposition, the Liberal Democrats, the Nationalists and the Unionists should unite in opposition to the White Paper measures, and we hope that those in the Conservative party who say that they are rebels will join us.

Madam Speaker : Order. Ask a question, please.

Mr. Barnes : If we unite against the proposals successfully, will the Secretary of State resign?

Mr. Heseltine : My job is always at the disposal of the Prime Minister.

Mr. Keith Mans (Wyre) : Will my right hon. Friend look again at the £95 million levy paid to EdF each year, with

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a view to stopping this money being paid to the French until they make it clear that it is being used to pay for the decommissioning of their nuclear power stations, not to subsidise their operating costs?

Mr. Heseltine : Complex discussions about all these matters are being held with EdF, so I ask my hon. Friend not to draw me too far on that one. The discussions have moved in a positive way and I will continue to hold such discussions--I hope, with the new French Government.

Mr. Chris Mullin (Sunderland, South) : Is the President of the Board of Trade aware that I have constituents working in four of the pits on his original hit list and that they will not be under any illusions as a result of the statement? We have heard the nonsense about care and maintenance before when the right hon. Gentleman's Department came for our shipyards. There is now a large, deserted hole in the ground where the shipyards used to be. Everyone knows that, to understand why we are in the current situation, we need go back no further in history than to the moment of electricity privatisation. Would it be in order for the right hon. Gentleman to say a small "Sorry" for that folly for which we are all now paying the price?

Mr. Heseltine : I am sure that the hon. Gentleman would wish me to convey his message to the 5,000 new job holders that I announced this afternoon.

Mr. Alan Williams (Swansea, West) : During the past week, the Government have tried to justify VAT on fuel in terms of energy efficiency. In that context, what sense does it make to be burning large quantities of our gas resources in power stations with 40 per cent. efficiency, when that gas could be used in our homes and factories with 80 per cent. to 90 per cent. efficiency? Is not today's statement a frittering away of our gas resources? Does not it sound the death knell of the coal industry which we will desperately need in the longer term?

Mr. Heseltine : That argument was carefully explored by the Select Committee and the hon. Gentleman will find that it did not accept his analysis. However, I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will recall that the Labour party and the whole House are committed to achieving our environmental targets. We cannot achieve those targets without taking decisions about constraints on energy use.

Mr. Gerald Bermingham (St. Helens, South) : Will the right hon. Gentleman give me a little assistance? I represent a constituency which had two coal mines, at Bold and Sutton Manor, which have both now closed. The employees of those mines went to Parkside in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for St. Helens, North (Mr. Evans) which is now about to close. In other words, the mining fraternity has nowhere to go in St. Helens. Can the right hon. Gentleman tell me, so that I can tell them, what he is going to do for areas like St. Helens which have lost a whole industry?

Mr. Heseltine : What we did for Shotton, for Corby and for the whole of the south Wales mining industry. We will provide an opportunity for new investment, new jobs and diversity of hope and the opportunity to spread employment in a range of new industries that will cope with the market of tomorrow.

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Mr. Boyce : Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the people in the mining industry, in engineering and in all the other industries that will lose workers as a result of the plan are not the slightest bit interested in what happened 15, 20 or 40 years ago? They are interested in what will happen in the next six months. Is the right hon. Gentleman further aware that his squalid attempt to link the report of the Department of Trade and Industry with the report of the Select Committee, to which, after all, the Government referred the matter, fools no one? If he is serious about the Select Committee recommendations, why will not he follow the recommendation to return the 10 pits to coaling and go immediately into the review procedure? Or does the right hon. Gentleman not have the guts to do that?

Mr. Heseltine : I realise that it may be necessary for the hon. Gentleman to say those things. Of course the people who face the uncertainties and who may lose their jobs are not interested in what happened five weeks ago, let alone five or 15 years ago. That is not the real issue for the House. The issue is whether we should tell those people the truth and the truth was as clear and as truthful for the Labour party when it was in government as it is for me. I can no more save the industry artificially than the Labour party could when it was in Government. However, now that Labour is in opposition, it tries to pretend that that is not the case. If there has been a time when Labour refused to close pits because it had some magic way of saving them, I would listen to Labour Members. The Labour party has forgotten what it did.

Mr. Terry Lewis (Worsley) : The right hon. Gentleman will accept from me that it would be grotesque in the extreme if Parkside pit, in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for St. Helens, North (Mr. Evans), was closed while, at the same time, British Coal was allowed to opencast what is essentially a huge area of green belt in my constituency and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Leigh (Mr. Cunliffe) in the not too distant future.

The right hon. Gentleman's contribution on opencast was a little disingenuous. He talked about 17,000 people being employed in the industry. In most opencast sites that I am aware of, there is also a downside. Many industrialists and businesses go out of business as a result of the intrusion of opencast in their areas. In addition, areas with hugh opencast sites discourage inward investment. There are two sides to the story and I urge the right hon. Gentleman to take that into account.

The figures to which the right hon. Gentleman referred do not bear any relationship, in terms of tonnage, to the information given by British Coal to the Select Committee.

Mr. Heseltine : The information that I gave to the House was the information that I received from British Coal. Naturally, British Coal will read what the hon. Gentleman has said. However, with regard to opencast, I hope that the hon. Gentleman heard my words because, frankly, they were almost indistinguishable from the comments that he made.

Mr. Mike O'Brien (Warwickshire, North) : Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that up to 20,000 people in north Warwickshire face the threat of opencast and that 587 miners at Daw Mill pit face redundancy? If he really wanted to save miners' jobs, should he not have accepted

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the Select Committee's plan virtually to halve the production of opencast by giving local people a veto--the right to say no to opencast?

Mr. Heseltine : The hon. Gentleman knows that we cannot just say that local people have the right to say no. There is no way of measuring how to judge the right of an individual to make such a decision, over a particular period or in which representative forum. We therefore have a planning regime. Hon Members will want to consider the new planning regime that my right hon. and learned Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment published this afternoon.

Sir Peter Emery (Honiton) : Having sat through all the questions this afternoon, may I ask my right hon. Friend whether he will accept the point made by the right hon. Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Benn), as I was the respective Minister before him? When the cable under the channel was first considered, it was to be introduced to bring electricity into this country for peak shaving purposes. Will my right hon. Friend also emphasise the fact that every Minister since Alf Robens has tried to present at the Dispatch Box a way in which the coal industry could save itself? That dates back decades. In my judgment, no Minister has tried, from the Dispatch Box, to put together a better package to assist the coal industry than my right hon. Friend has today.

Mr. Heseltine : Since I have been a Member of this place, I have been aware of my right hon. Friend's deep interest in and knowledge of the industry. I deeply appreciate what he said. We have done our best to respond to the work, which I have praised, of the Select Committee. We have tried to recognise that, in the end, it is about competitiveness and marketplaces, as the Select Committee indicated. We have given British Coal the best chance that we prudently think that we can, within the constraints of public expenditure, to go out and win a place in that marketplace. I cannot do more than urge hon. Members to encourage their constituents to recognise that there is a huge opportunity here, which is not to be disparaged or undermined by the language that Opposition Members have used to describe it.

Mr. Martin O'Neill (Clackmannan) : May I remind the right hon. Gentleman that, on 21 October, he said that he

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would examine the ways and means to increase the use of coal? However, paragraph 31 of the report states that the increase in stocks, which I realise are not the right hon. Gentleman's responsibility as the good winter has been a major contributory factor, has resulted in the need for a reduction in coal output. He said that he cannot guarantee supplementary sales. Does he accept that the Minister for Energy, sitting next to him, has already indicated that there will be a 2 per cent. drop in coal output this year as a consequence of the imposition of VAT?

In all these matters, the statement today is a testament of failure. The right hon. Gentleman said that the coal industry, and anyone else who can do so, will have the opportunity to find new markets. No Opposition Member is impressed by the failure, after five and a half months of hand-wringing, to provide any new or substantial markets for coal.

Will the right hon. Gentleman tell us how many people will be made redundant as a consequence of the announcement? We know that six collieries will be placed on care and maintenance and that Maltby will go into development. Development work is not carried out by British Coal employees but by contractors. Will he say what will be the net effect on jobs at those seven collieries of the development work which is to be carried out?

A number of people are not prepared to be impressed by the failure that the right hon. Gentleman has announced or by his soft-soaping and avoidance of giving us the serious figures of the unemployment which will follow as a consequence of today's statement.

Mr. Heseltine : There has been an immensely depressing response from the Opposition. If the House were considering today a review by the Government, it would at least be understandable if it were criticised by Her Majesty's Opposition, but when an all-party Select Committe has crawled over every conceivable opportunity--and I have accepted the bulk of its recommendations--it is lamentable that the Opposition are now trying to wriggle away from what was an agreed all-party report. It undermines the credibility of the Select Committee procedures of the House.

I hope that the Opposition will not mislead their constituents into thinking that there is nothing in the opportunities of the sort that I have provided.

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Business of the House

5.31 pm

The Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons (Mr. Tony Newton) : With permission, Madam Speaker, I shouldlike to make a statement about the business for next week. Monday-- 29 March---- Proceedings on the Consolidated Fund (No. 3) Bill.

Motion to approve the White Paper entitled "Prospects for Coal : Conclusions of the Government's Coal Review".

Tuesday-- 30 March----European Communities (Amendment) Bill : Progress in Committee--19th day.

Wednesday-- 31 March----Until seven o'clock, motions on the Legal Aid Regulations. Details will be given in the Official Report. Motion to take note of EC document No. 4608/93 relating to the common agricultural policy.

Thursday-- 1 April----Motion for the Easter Adjournment, followed by debates on the Adjournment.

Friday-- 2 April----Debates on the Adjournment.

The House will also wish to know that European Standing Committees will meet on Wednesday 31 March at 10.30 am to consider European Community documents as follows :

Committee A'

Documant No. 4439/93 relating to guaranteed prices for cane sugar. Committee B'

Document No. 9910/92 on co-operation with developing countries over demography and family planning.

[Wednesday 31 March :

Legal Aid Regulations

1. Civil Legal Aid (Financial Conditions and Contributions) (Scotland) Regulations 1993.

2. Advice and Assistance (Financial Conditions) (Scotland) Regulations 1993.

3. Advice and Assistance (Scotland) (Prospective Cost) Amendment Regulations 1993.

4. Advice and Assistance (Assistance by Way of Representation) (Scotland) Amendment Regulations 1993.

5. Legal Aid (Scotland) Act 1986 Amendment Regulations 1993. 6. The Civil Legal Aid (General) (Amendment) Regulations 1993 (S.I. 565)

7. Civil Legal Aid (Assessment of Resources) (Amendment) Regulations 1993. (S.I. 788)

8. Legal Aid in Criminal and Care Proceedings (General) (Amendment) Regulations 1993. (S.I. 789)

9. Legal Advice and Assistance (Amendment) Regulations 1993. (S.I. 790).]

Mrs. Margaret Beckett (Derby, South) : Does the Leader of the House recall that the Opposition have repeatedly asked for a statement on the coal industry, which the House has been promised from the early part of this year ? We consider that it is an outrage that the statement should be left so late that the House has only between now and Monday to consider the White Paper and the options that the Government have put before the House. Will the right hon. Gentleman confirm that amendments to the Government's motion must be tabled tomorrow to be in order ? When do the Government expect to have the motion ready so that we can scrutinise and amend it ?

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As it is inevitable that there will be less than 24 hours for hon. Members to consider what amendments they may wish to table, may I suggest to the right hon. Gentleman, with all the force at my command, that it is the duty of the Leader of the House and his colleagues to table a business motion--which it is only within their power to table-- to allow Madam Speaker to consider selecting more than one amendment for debate and Division ? That is the only way that we can be certain that hon. Members will have the chance, in the brief period open to them, to draft their amendments and to acquaint themselves with the range of options that might be considered by the House. As the President of the Board of Trade made such a feature of his approval of the Select Committee's report, I am sure that the Lord President will find it easy to accept such a request as, in effect, this is the only way in which we can be sure of a Division on that report.

Secondly, in view of what has been said in the House about stock-taking on the developments in Scotland--the way in which Scottish business will in future be handled I ask the right hon. Gentleman to find Government time for a debate in which we can follow up the statement and consider its implications.

Will the Leader of the House give serious consideration to early-day motion 1596 ?

[That this House notes that the Standing Committee on Regional Affairs has not met since 26th July 1978 ; finds it inconsistent that there is a forum for English regions within the European Community but not one within Parliament ; and calls upon the Lord President of the Council to refer appropriate matters to the Standing Committee on Regional Affairs, as provided by S.O. No. 100.]

It draws attention to the potential existence of a Committee of the English regions. There is considerable support from the Opposition side--and I suspect from the Government side--for the reinstatement of the Standing Committee on Regional Affairs, which has not sat since 1978. I ask the right hon. Gentleman to consider that.

Will the Leader of the House tell us when it is likely that we will have another Opposition day, and when he will be in a position to tell us the business of the House for the week after the Easter recess ?

Mr. Newton : Taking first the right hon. Lady's remarks about the coal statement and intended debate, I hope that she will acknowledge that the statement on which my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade has just completed answering questions reflected a huge amount of work in a very complex area, and it understandably took more time than I suspect even he would have wished. The work needed to be done thoroughly, and it was right that he should make a statement in the House before the Easter recess. If that has meant a little less time than the right hon. Lady would have liked between the White Paper and the debate--I am sure that the House would have wished to have had that debate before the recess- -I think that that is preferable to not being able to proceed before the Easter recess. We are now proposing, in the light of today's statement, to have the debate on Monday.

I hope that the motion will be tabled tonight in order to ease the problem to which the right hon. Lady referred. I will undertake to reflect on the other points she made, but that is very much without commitment and there will be discussions through the usual channels. As to the Select Committee report, it is clear that the interrelationship between my right hon. Friend the

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President of the Board of Trade's statement, the White Paper and the Select Committee report, and what my right hon. Friend said about it--subject to your judgment, Madam Speaker, at the time--means that reference to the content of the Select Committee's report would be bound to be in order in the course of the debate.

As to the right hon. Lady's request about Supply days and Scottish stock- taking, it is manifest that I cannot undertake to find time for either before Easter, but I will consider what possibilities there may be afterwards, particularly in respect of her understandable request for some Supply day time.

Mr. Harry Greenway (Ealing, North) : I ask my right hon. Friend, for the second time, to find time next week to debate early-day motion 1222, which has been signed by hon. Members on both sides of the House.

[That this House deplores the growing number of vicious and mutilating attacks upon horses ; notes the appalling suffering this causes to the dumb animals in question ; and calls upon all who have a responsibility for or care about the welfare of horses and other animals to spare no effort to stamp out this sick and evil practice forthwith.]

Attacks on horses are increasing and are now happening from Yorkshire to Land's End. Horses are being killed, maimed, and brutally assaulted, including an attack yesterday on a racehorse that had its tongue cut out. These attacks are causing much concern all over the country and great distress to animal lovers and others.

Mr. Newton : Again, I am conscious of the persistent and proper interest that my hon. Friend has taken in the matter. I noticed another report of an horrific incident in the newspaper either this morning or yesterday--after last night, I am having a little difficulty in distinguishing between the two. I note my hon. Friend's request, but I cannot add to what I said in response to him last week.

Ms Liz Lynne (Rochdale) : When can we expect an announcement about assisted area status? It is particularly important for the people of Rochdale who already have assisted area status, the loss of which would make it difficult to attract new businesses. Will the Leader of the House make time for a debate on that subject next week as a matter of urgency?

Mr. Newton : Again, that is a subject about which I have been asked several times in recent weeks when I have referred to the review to which the hon. Lady herself referred. Clearly, the Government are in no way anxious to delay the outcome on those important matters, but they, too, demand careful consideration. I regret that at present I cannot give the hon. Lady a clear indication about timing, let alone about the timing of a debate.

Sir Roger Moate (Faversham) : Will my right hon. Friend find some way whereby the House can consider early-day motion 1489, on worldwide unitary taxation?

[That this House deeply regrets the continuing delay in resolving the use, by the State of California, of worldwide unitary tax ; and calls upon Her Majesty's Government to implement the retaliatory provisions in section 812 of the Income and Corporation Taxes Act 1988, if the issue has not been satisfactorily resolved by 31st December 1993.]

The matter is of such importance that it was initiated by leading Members of most parties in the House and has been signed by no fewer than 210 Members from all parts of the House. There is a general understanding that, if

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anything goes wrong, there could be grave consequences for British companies in the United States, for American corporations trading in the United Kingdom and for international tax treaties. Can we get the message through to the United States Administration that we must have President Clinton's support if things go seriously wrong in this important respect?

Mr. Newton : I am aware of the importance of the matter and my hon. Friend is right to say that the continued imposition of worldwide unitary taxation on United Kingdom-owned companies in California has been of great concern to hon. Members on both sides of the House for many years. My hon. Friend will well know that my right hon. Friends the Prime Minister, the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Foreign Secretary have all, within the recent past, impressed on their opposite numbers and others in the United States Administration the importance of an early solution to the problem.

I cannot at this moment promise a specific debate, but it occurs to me that the House is likely to spend some time in the not too distant future discussing the Finance Bill, and my hon. Friend's ingenuity will probably permit him to work out a way of raising the matter in the course of those proceedings.

Mr. Peter Kilfoyle (Liverpool, Walton) : Will the Leader of the House answer the question put by my right hon. Friend the Member for Derby, South (Mrs. Beckett) about early-day motion 1596 on the Standing Committee for the Regions?

Mr. Newton : I was conscious, even as I sat down, that there was something that the right hon. Member for Derby, South (Mrs. Beckett) had said of which I had failed to make a note and had therefore missed in responding to her. I promise the hon. Gentleman and the right hon. Lady that that was not a deliberate attempt at evasion. However, I am afraid that they may find rather less than satisfactory my reply, which is that I am not persuaded at the moment that there is a sufficiently strong case for bringing back into use this procedure which, as the right hon. Lady said, it has not been found necessary to use since 1978. I do not rule it out, but at the moment I am not persuaded.

Mr. Patrick Thompson (Norwich, North) : Bearing in mind that it is just over a year since the report of the Select Committee on Sittings of the House was ordered to be printed, and that that Committee, under the chairmanship of my right hon. Friend the Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Mr. Jopling), made excellent suggestions on the timetabling of Government legislation and other matters, some of us are disappointed that we cannot make progress or have a debate on the matter. Can my right hon. Friend assure me that we will be able to make some progress at the earliest possible time?

Mr. Newton : I can certainly assure my hon. Friend that I have in no way forgotten or ceased to be concerned to make progress in the direction suggested by the report. He will know also that there is, as I have said several times in recent weeks, continuing interchange in the usual channels on the matter, but it has not yet been possible to make as much progress as I would like. In case it is the most recent events of parliamentary proceedings that are in my hon.

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