House of Commons Hansard Debates for 27 May 1993

Mr. Norris : I am grateful to my right hon. and learned Friend for that information. Let us not dwell on that rather sad aspect of the debate, but let us concentrate on the substantive issue.

I should set in context what the consultation exercise is all about. Five objectives lie behind the new proposals. First, they are designed to revise and update the current restrictions to take into account the types of aircraft that are flying today--or, if I may say so, tonight--and to encourage airlines to choose the quietest possible types of aircraft for their operations. That is the most important principle. My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Putney is right, of course, that there is no such thing as a silent aircraft, but he was generous enough to acknowledge that technical progress has been made. It is therefore obviously important that, whatever regulations might be appropriate in the future, we should take into account that technical progress.

It is also important to bear in mind that the need for the consultation exercise stems from the fact that, unless new restrictions are in place, the existing ones will lapse at the end of the summer season--technically, on 24 October. It is therefore important that that exercise should take place.

The second purpose of the new proposals is to introduce common principles for arrangements for night restrictions at the three major London airports. The third objective is to honour our commitment in the 1985 White Paper, "Airports Policy", to establish further night restrictions at Stansted. The fourth important objective is to continue to protect local communities from excessive aircraft noise levels at night. The fifth objective is to ensure that the competitive influences affecting United Kingdom airports and airlines and the wider employment and economic implications are taken into account. That is the background to the consultation exercise. My colleagues who are present are experienced Members of the House and I am sure that they will understand what I am about to say. The underlying objective must be to try to strike a reasonable balance between the needs of the commercial operators at Heathrow and the needs and concerns of those who live around the airport and who are anxious about its operations.

Let us be in no doubt that Heathrow is a major national asset. It continues to be the largest international airport in the world. In the past 12 months it has catered for more than 45 million passengers. Perhaps more importantly, it serves as the workplace for some 50,000 people directly and for at least 20,000 others indirectly in terms of facilitating passenger, freight and postal services. I believe that not only hon. Members but the vast majority of people, not just in London but in the United Kingdom, accept that Heathrow is of immense strategic importance to the nation. Against that has to be balanced the needs of the local community and the need to protect it from the excesses of night flying beyond the limit of that which is tolerable.

My hon. Friend the Member for Ealing, North started with the correct observation that noise is a pollutant. It is as much a pollutant as any pollutant. The purpose of the

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proposals is to encourage quieter aircraft, and that encourages those aircraft that are more fuel efficient and produce less particulant emission. Therefore, there is that incidental benefit to be derived from a better night noise regime.

Mr. Jessel : No one questions the tremendous importance of Heathrow to Britain, to our national economy, to trade, industry, tourism and to London's position in the world. All of that is practically self-evident. But why cannot the work of the large number of people whose employment depends upon it be concentrated, as far as possible, by day and not at all by night?

Mr. Norris : I was about to come to that precise point, which is obviously germane to the debate. Let us start with the

straightforward proposition that I believe my hon. Friends will accept, which is that the vast majority of flights take place during day-time hours. We are talking very much about flights on the margin. The new proposed definition of night time runs from 11 pm until 7 am and the new quota system from 11.30 pm to 6 am.

The purpose of that--the difference between the definition of night time and the quota regime--is to allow a buffer during which no noisy aircraft can be scheduled and therefore eliminate the risk that aircraft which would otherwise be scheduled close to the point at which the night quota regime came into effect might, for operational reasons, stray into the night quota regime, thus vitiating the purpose of having a quota regime in place. That is a sensible move. Harmonisation on the question of hours makes a great deal of sense. I am clear that we should be sure that those movements which are allowed to operate at night are justified in terms of their strategic and economic importance to Heathrow. My hon. Friend makes the perfectly fair point that we should apply some fairly stringent tests to any proposals for night flying.

I am mindful of the comments of my right hon. Friend the Member for Chertsey and Walton on sleep research. I appreciate that neither he nor others in the House may have treated that work with the seriousness that it deserves. The research has been carried out by teams led by Professor Jim Horne from Loughborough university and others from Manchester Metropolitan University and the University of Southampton under the overall direction of Dr. John Ollerhead of the Civil Aviation Authority's department of safety, environment and engineering. It is a creditable piece of research into a most difficult subject.

My hon. Friend the Member for Twickenham is right. One may wake up in the middle of the night because, as in my hon. Friend's case, one is suffering from dyspepsia. My other right hon. and hon. Friends may do so because, as they are all distinguished chaps, they are worried about the possibility of the telephone ringing the next morning--particularly on a day such as this- -or of it not ringing, which might cause even more sleeplessness. Whatever the reason, it is difficult to get back to sleep, and in those circumstances even so-called quiet aircraft can be an absolute bane. I spend my week in central London, as do most right hon. and hon. Members, so I have some experience of night aircraft noise, although I cannot claim that it is particularly upsetting.

Mr. Harry Greenway : It is an important part of our case that some people are such light sleepers that they

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wake up at the slightest sound, be it aircraft noise or anything else. We cannot put the whole of west London on sleeping pills.

Mr. Norris : I believe that my hon. Friend is supporting me. If I am wrong, I apologise--but it would be characteristic of him, as a generous hon. Friend, to be supportive.

Some people are extremely light sleepers and almost anything will wake them, but it would be unreasonable to take measures to control such an important activity as international flights into our major airport on the basis that every person in this city must be guaranteed uninterrupted slumber. I look forward to the day when every resident of the metropolis enjoys an uninterrupted night's slumber, but I doubt that I shall live to see it.

It is important not to confuse annoyance with disburbance. We all get annoyed at different things. The research had the serious purpose of distinguishing between annoyance and disturbance. There is a threshold at which a person is awoken from his or her normal sleep pattern. When that level of noise is reached, we are in important territory that is quite different from the sort of background noise that is part of every major city.

My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Putney represents a most attractive part of London, but it is not immune from other noises--if only that associated with the festivities and general merrymaking that my right hon. and learned Friend has done so much to promote in his years as Putney's Member of Parliament.

I will conclude with a serious point. I know that my right hon. and hon. Friends accept that it is a question of striking the right balance. I make it clear that the proposal is not something new in terms of permitting night flying but relates to extending the controls over night flying which currently exist to protect residents. It is perfectly open to right hon. and hon. Members to complain that that control is currently not sufficiently stringent. I undertake to bear their comments in mind very carefully--but the Government, in acting responsibly, must bear in mind the balance of advantage which must lie between Heathrow's promotion as a vital part of our economic, tourism and business infrastructure and the rights and needs of local residents.

My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Transport is most concerned about the representations that he received. I will certainly study them closely to ensure that proper weight is placed on all the arguments that my right hon. and hon. Friends adduced. They have left me in no doubt about the importance that they attach to the issue. Let us hope that, when the new arrangements are finalised, we shall strike the desired balance, benefiting all interested parties--enabling Heathrow to take its rightful place as the world's premier international airport, and allowing our constituents to enjoy a reasonable night's sleep.

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Fire Service

12.29 pm

Ms Kate Hoey (Vauxhall) : I am grateful for this timely opportunity to raise important issues relating to the fire service.

No doubt the Minister was among the many Members of Parliament approached yesterday by a large lobby organised by the Fire Brigades Union and attended by many firefighters and ambulance and emergency rescue staff. I am grateful to him for representing the Minister of State, Earl Ferrers. He and I are much more used to corresponding regularly on immigration matters : I would guess that he receives more letters and representations from Members of Parliament than any other member of the Government. I am glad that he has been able to drag himself away from pressing matters in his office ; no doubt they are even more pressing than usual this morning.

I wish to concentrate largely on the turmoil surrounding the threat to the firefighters' pay review formula, agreed after the damaging strike of 1977. However, I shall also press the Minister on some of the technical issues that I raised in an Adjournment debate on the emergency services in London some 18 months ago. I hope that he will be able to demonstrate that some progress has been made, although I must admit to a certain scepticism which I hope that he will be able to overturn.

The 1977 fire service strike evokes in all of us powerful memories of service men and women providing a vital emergency service, and of "green goddesses" on the streets of our towns and cities. The current dispute has brought us lively television footage of that period, dubbed with assurances that, if necessary, the Army fire tenders will be taken out of their mothballs and made ready for action. The 1977 dispute was resolved by the adoption of a nationally agreed pay formula : that complex formula, based on the upper quarter of the average manual worker's pay, was agreed fully by the employers and union negotiators. It had the tacit support of the Government of the day, and has remained in place ever since. It has cross- party support in fire authorities up and down the country ; indeed, the Home Office working party report produced in 1990 and signed by Earl Ferrers went further by explicitly recognising that the fire service and the public had been well served by the formula.

Since 1977, the pay year has run from November to November, following shortly after the annual publication of the Government's new earnings survey. For each of the past 15 years, the annual pay round has been settled amicably and speedily by application of the formula. I understand that industrial relations involving pay in this vital public service have remained second to none. Surely the Minister agrees that the morale of members of a service that is called routinely to deal with life-threatening situations is of paramount and obvious importance.

Last year, the formula resulted in a pay rise of about 4.9 per cent., which is readily comparable to the increases paid to other sectors. In fact, that comparability is built into the formula. I hope the Minister will accept that, because the formula is--by definition--time-lagged by a year, any pay freeze imposed by the Government will affect firefighters' pay twice over. Should the pay freeze be lifted next year

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and the formula reintroduced, firefighters will still receive a rise of only 1.5 per cent. or less, as it will be based on current public sector pay round settlements.

Where a comparable worker may have received, say, a 5 per cent. rise last year, 1.5 per cent. this year and--who knows?--3.5 per cent. next year, a firefighter will have received approximately 4.9 per cent. last year, 1.5 per cent. this year and 1.5 per cent. again next year. With the reimposition of the lagged formula, they will therefore be hit twice. Cannot the Minister accept that the easy and fair way out is simply to leave the pay formula in place and therefore let firefighters make their contribution to the Government's pay squeeze next year rather than this year? I shall not trouble to ask the Minister whether the Government plan to impose a pay freeze next year, as we have not yet managed to get a straight answer from his Cabinet colleagues, but perhaps I should try to seek an unguarded response from him as by the time the debate is over his new boss may feel differently about pay freezes than his present boss, who will be responsible for them. I hope that, if the new Chancellor has learnt anything from his responsibility as Home Secretary, it will be the dedicated and valuable work of firefighters.

Are the Government seriously prepared to jeopardise the smooth running of this emergency service just to force down an independently worked out pay settlement from an expected level of between 2.5 and 3 per cent.? All this is being done merely so that the Government can impose their collective muscle on workers a year earlier than would otherwise happen automatically.

I shall not allow the Minister off the hook lightly with a bland assurance that it is not for the Government to intervene in the independent pay negotiations between employer and employee. The Minister seeks to give a straight answer to a straight question, and I hope that he will continue that habit this afternoon.

We all know perfectly well that the imposition of a 1.5 per cent. limit to the pay element of the standard spending assessment completely ties the hands of employers. A refusal fully to fund the independent pay formula rise in the SSA is effectively an edict from the Home Office that the formula must be abandoned.

That attack on the pay formula has already damaged morale. The damage must be placed in the context of the increasing demands that are being placed each year on an already overstretched service. Calls rose by 64 per cent. in the 1980s, but staffing rose by only 2.5 per cent. Without digressing too far, I say only that, for whatever reason and doubtless against the advice of fire inspectors, the House is a firefighters' nightmare. As a royal palace, and so exempt from health and safety regulations, it is a terrible accident waiting to happen.

Up and down the country, fire stations are being closed for reasons more to do with making cuts than with efficiently continuing the service assessed as being needed. In places, minimum standards of fire cover are arguably no longer being maintained. For example, the 890-bed Norwich hospital, formerly served at first call by three fire engines and a high-rise ladder, now looks set to be downgraded to be covered by only one fire engine.

I understand that the Public Accounts Committee found our record for fire deaths per head of population to be the worst of any of our partner countries in the

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European Community. That appalling slip in such a critical league table is evidence that Britain has lost its place as a world leader in fire service cover, not because of a lack of commitment, courage or innovation by firefighters and fire authorities, but simply because of a lack of cash.

I invite the Minister to tell me what progress has been made since I last raised certain issues in late 1991. I have given the Minister prior notice of my questions and I hope that he will be able to respond. First, what progress does he envisage making towards the adoption of the urban C risk category, tailored to the specific needs of a modern inner city? Secondly, will he make the welcome announcement of an exemption from the SSA of the increased revenue spending required by unavoidable pension liabilities? That would recognise the fact that the services provided in, for example, London may otherwise be cut by £2 million in real terms to cope with the 6 per cent. rise in pension costs for former officers.

Thirdly, when will the Government get around to amending the Fire Services Act 1947, which restricts the fire service's duties to firefighting? We all accept that firefighters have so many other essential calls on their time, as I outlined earlier. At this point, I pay tribute to the firefighters in Northern Ireland, especially in light of the recent terrible bombings in Belfast, Portadown and Magherafelt. Anyone who saw the firefighters being interviewed would also want to pay tribute to their dedication in dealing with the many difficulties they face. They often work in the areas in which they live and have to deal with incidents which greatly affect their part of the community.

I also applaud the region's Fire Brigades Union, which is able to bring together people from both sides of the community to fight the terrible atrocities. I of course pay tribute to firefighters in the rest of the United Kingdom, especially in view of the recent increase in terrorism. I hope that the Minister will join me in paying that tribute to them, not only for their commitment to saving property and life and for their dedication, but for the respect that they have accorded to the pay formula.

In 1991, the service received more than 1 million calls. The incidents involved the loss of 861 lives, including those of two firefighters. Insurance costs for the damage involved exceeded £1 billion. Over and above the individual misery, it is estimated that the cash cost of treating a child with severe burns can be more than £200,000. Does not the Minister realise that the contrived savings which the Government are trying to make cost more in cash and human suffering than we should be prepared to pay? Our firefighters deserve more. They have the full support of the people of this country, but they need the full support of the Government.

12.43 pm

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Charles Wardle) : With the leave of the House, I shall speak again. As the House may be aware, I spoke earlier and shall be seeking leave to speak yet again before the day is over.

I thank the hon. Member for Vauxhall (Ms Hoey) for her opening remarks. I must also point out that it is not for me to speculate on any rumours that may be flying around the Westminster and Whitehall grapevine about changes

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in ministerial responsibility, but before the day is through we shall no doubt learn whether her assessment of the situation is correct.

I shall try to address some of the points that the hon. Lady raised, but it gives me considerable pleasure to be able to respond to a debate on a subject which the hon. Lady has addressed before, and I know that she takes considerable interest in the work of the fire service. Hon. Members will know that the fire service is not a subject on which I normally address the House, but it is well respected in the community.

A few weeks ago, my right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary addressed a meeting of the Chief and Assistant Chief Fire Officers' Association and made some remarks about the fire service. It was a private meeting and his speech was not widely reported, but it would not be inappropriate to repeat to the House what he said on that occasion. He said :

"It goes without saying that the Government, like the general public, has a high regard for what the fire service does and the professionalism and bravery which we associate almost as a matter of course with the men and women in it : in particular when they undertake fire fighting duties or expose themselves to danger in other kinds of emergency. They, and you, do a good job of which we can feel justifiably proud.".

I should like to take this opportunity to endorse the remarks of my right hon. and learned Friend and the praise offered by the hon. Lady. I should like to add my endorsement to what she said about the fire fighting services in Northern Ireland.

The fire service also has a good productivity record, as the Fire Brigades Union has not been slow to point out. In the period between 1980 and 1991, the number of fire calls attended by the fire service increased by 23 per cent., the number of false alarms to which the fire service has to respond increased by 109 per cent. and the number of special service calls, which include road accidents and a whole range of other non-fire situations, as the hon. Lady suggested, increased by no less than 128 per cent. All that was achieved with an increase of only 2.5 per cent. in the numbers of personnel. It is a powerful and eloquent statement of the achievements in productivity. There are, of course, reasons why the fire service has been able to achieve those apparent increases in productivity. The primary reason is that the disposition of fire service resources throughout the country is determined according to nationally recommended standards of fire cover which are determined by the risk presented by each part of the country. In other words, the same number of fire appliances may be needed in an area where there are two calls or 10 calls a day, but even if that is so, the work load on the firefighters has obviously increased during the period ; we acknowledge that. The fire service is local authority service financed by central and local government, and, like other public services, it cannot be immune from change or from the need to ensure that it delivers its services in a most efficient and cost-effective way. My right hon. and learned Friend has made it clear on several occasions that he does not intend to recommend that standards of fire cover should be reduced, but that does not exempt the fire service from the need to examine itself and to consider, like all public services, whether the service which it delivers is being delivered in the most cost-effective manner and to the greatest benefit of the community at large.

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HM inspectors of fire service who advise the Secretary of State on matters of efficiency of the fire service are very conscious when they inspect brigades of the need to ensure that brigades are delivering their services efficiently and economically.

There are a number of current issues of concern to members of the fire service which I should like to mention in responding to the hon. Lady. She mentioned pay and pensions, and I shall respond to both those subjects, but there are other issues too, and it would be helpful to touch on one or two of them to make sure that the Government have absolutely no hidden agenda for the fire service. One example is the effect of the current review on the organisation of local government in England and Wales on the fire service. There are fears that the reorganisation of local government areas will lead to wholesale reorganisation of the fire service in England and Wales.

My right hon. and learned Friend has made it clear that he does not consider that the current review of local government is a suitable vehicle for any general reorganisation of the fire service in England, and he has made it clear to the Local Government Commission that he does not expect local government reorganisation to lead to any fragmentation of the fire service.

If some of the existing counties are broken up, it may be necessary to resort to combination schemes to maintain the size of existing fire brigades, and there may be one or two cases in which some further reorganisation is necessary because of significant changes in the structure of local government in particular areas. But apart from that, we see no good case for reviewing the organisation of the fire service in England until the process of local government reorganisation is complete and the building blocks of the new local authority structure are clear. The position in Wales is slightly different, but I do not think that it would be helpful for me to reiterate the arguments set out in the White Paper on Welsh local government reorganisation, with which I know that the House will be familiar.

I know that the level of finance available for the fire service is a matter of concern to chief officers and to elected members of the fire authorities both in the metropolitan areas and in the counties. But public expenditure is under pressure, and the fire service cannot expect to be exempted from that pressure. We know that, in some county areas, expenditure on the fire service has in some places exceeded the fire service element of the standard spending assessment. However, I think that we can say that there were fairly realistic settlements in 1991-92 and 1992-93, which helped to narrow the gap.

In the current financial year, fire authorities have been provided with an overall increase of 3.1 per cent. over last year, a reflection of what can be afforded by central Government, and an amount in line with the increase in the support for local authority expenditure generally. There are pressures on the financing of the fire service, but they are no greater than those being experienced by other local or central government services.

The hon. Lady raised the subject of fire service pay. Hon. Members will know that the Government have decided that there should be a limit on public sector pay in the current pay round and that pay rises for those working in central and local government--and indeed for hon. Members-- should be contained within a maximum of 1.5 per cent. We have told all public sector employers that we expect them to have regard to that maximum in reaching

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any settlements in the current pay round, and funding for all services, including the fire service, has been determined on that basis for the current financial year.

For the past 15 years, fire service pay has been determined according to a formula contained in an agings.

The Fire Brigades Union has asked my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Rushcliffe (Mr. Clarke) to give an assurance that its pay agreement will be honoured. I can only repeat to the House what my right hon. and learned Friend said to the union when its representatives came to see him on 17 March. If the Government's pay policy is to be applied fairly, there can be no case for making an exception for firefighters, any more than for police officers, doctors, nurses, or any other category of personnel.

Ms Hoey : The Minister says that everyone should be treated fairly, but does he not agree that, in a sense, the members of the Fire Brigades Union would not be being treated fairly, because they would suffer doubly? If we return to the national agreement next year--presumably the Government would like that to happen--again, firefighters will not be in the same position as everyone else.

Mr. Wardle : As the hon. Lady said, that is because of the timing of the pay round. I shall deal with timing in a moment.

It is not the Home Secretary who determines fire service pay : the pay agreement is a matter between the firefighters and their employers. As the hon. Lady said, the next fire service pay settlement will be in November. The employers have wisely said that it is too early at this stage to say whether the firefighters' pay formula will produce a figure higher or lower than 1.5 per cent. in the current pay round. The House would not expect me to speculate on what may not be the effect of applying the pay formula in 1994. The Government have said that the objective of the 1.5 per cent. limit on public sector pay will be defeated if there is a series of catching-up settlements next year. How that will impact on the fire service in 1994 or, indeed, on any other public service can at this stage be no more than a matter for speculation. The hon. Lady talked about straight speaking. I shall not enter into such speculation. For the fire service to be considering industrial action now on the application of its pay formula in 1994 is both premature and irresponsible. It is quite unrealistic to expect local authority employers to commit themselves to pay levels in 1994 when no decisions have been taken on the level of public sector funding for any central or local government services for the next financial year.

In my view, the union is asking for an impossible commitment from fire authority employers. It is plainly stirring up its members, for what must be political motives, to convince them that they are being singled out, unfairly treated or compared unfairly with other public sector employees. That simply is not the case.

I hope that the union does not resort to industrial action, of which there has been some talk. Firefighters are well paid. It is quite right that they should be well paid for

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the job that they do. I hope that their sense of responsibility will remain with them if they are asked to consider industrial action at some point in the coming months.

The hon. Lady mentioned fire service pensions. There is increasing pressure on the fire authorities caused by fire service pension liabilities. The fire service pension scheme, for which my right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary is responsible, is not ungenerous, because it recognises, as if should, that the physical demands of firefighting will not permit firefighters to serve as long as is the case in some other professions, and that there are risks of injury or even death for which the scheme must provide. The firefighters' pension scheme is very similar to the pensions scheme for the police and the problems associated with the increasing pressures on the scheme are very similar.

We have no immediate plans to examine or to revise the firefighters' pension scheme. The scheme for the police will undoubtedly have been looked at in the course of the current review of police responsibilities and rewards which is being carried out by Sir Patrick Sheehy. The Sheehy inquiry is not looking at fire service pensions, but we shall need to look at any recommendations that Sheehy makes on police pensions if it appears that those recommendations, if accepted, could also be relevant to the fire service. At this stage, it would be wrong to speculate on whether there will be any such recommendations, what they will be and whether they will be relevant to the fire service scheme. We shall have to wait and see.

The hon. Lady mentioned special services, and also asked whether the Fire Services Act 1947 might be amended so that fire authorities have a duty to respond to special service calls. At present, they may at their discretion respond to such calls and they may charge the recipient for doing so, but they have no duty to respond to calls other than fire calls. We have no proposals to change the statutory basis on which special services are provided.

The hon. Lady also referred to the urban C risk category and to a new definition for that. The Association of Metropolitan Authorities has put to the Home Office proposals for the division of the existing C fire risk category into urban C and rural C, with enhanced initial responses in terms of weight and speed of attack. The proposals arise from concern about loss of life and injuries in property fires in areas of C risk, taken together with the fact that the national fire cover standards recommend an initial attendance of only one appliance at fires in areas of C risk.

We have, of course, given careful consideration to the proposal, and we have looked at both the incidence of injuries and fatalities in fires in areas of C risk and the actual practices of fire brigades in responding to fires in those areas. The association's proposal would entail substantial additional resources for the fire services in England and Wales. Fire cover standards were reviewed in 1985 by the joint committee on standards of fire cover, and we have no proposals to conduct any further review.

I know that the Fire Brigades Union has also attempted to link the issue of pay with closure or downgrading of fire stations. Let me make it absolutely clear that a fire authority wishing to close or downgrade a fire station must seek the approval of my right hon. and learned Friend. It is his practice to grant approval only when he is satisfied that national fire cover standards will be maintained. The national standards were agreed in the Central Fire

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Brigades Advisory Council, on which fire authorities and fire service employees are represented. However tight the pressures this year, all authorities in England and Wales have been able to set budgets that allow them to comply with the national standards. I have been able to speak on only some aspects of the fire service in this debate, but I am grateful to the hon. Lady for raising the subject. We regard the fire service highly, and we wish to see it maintained as an effective and professional organisation.

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Immigration Services (Prestwick Airport)

1 pm

Mr. Phil Gallie (Ayr) : Thank you for allowing me to raise this subject today, Madam Deputy Speaker. I am pleased to say that much has happened since I first sought to initiate the debate. There has been a considerable amount of contact between immigration department officials, senior officials and the management at Prestwick airport and that has been paralleled by my discussions with my hon. Friend the Minister. I thank my hon. Friend for agreeing to reply to the debate. Having listened to his comments in a previous debate, I congratulate him both on his productivity and on his efficiency : I understand that this is the third debate to which he has replied today.

I should also like to thank my hon. Friend at this early stage for his recognition of the serious implications of the incident at Prestwick last week--a recognition of the importance of commitments made and which, it has to be said, failed at the first time of asking.

The incident to which I refer occurred last Thursday,20 May. An aircraft carrying 180 passengers--customers--from the United States was diverted to Prestwick airport. It was two hours before immigration officials dealt with the first passenger. It took immigration officials one and a half hours to get from Glasgow to Prestwick whereas others who were advised of the diversion arrived in just over 40 minutes. Clearly, something was seriously wrong.

A doctor who had crossed the Atlantic for a 9 o'clock meeting in Glasgow was clearing immigration at Prestwick at that time--despite special arrangements made some time before, which failed to be recognised by staff in the Glasgow immigration office. The whole thing was a shambles. Those visitors to Scotland were not only inconvenienced but disillusioned. Business men were delayed and all concerned regarded the incident as a bad advertisement.

To understand the incident, we must review the history of Prestwick airport. Before March 1990, Prestwick had gateway status : it was the gateway to Scotland from across the Atlantic, and from the United States and Canada in particular. At that time, there was a monopoly, albeit a monopoly that was in the ownership of the British Airports Authority, which also held monopolies over other central belt airports--at Glasgow and Edinburgh. Before March 1990 there was considerable passenger throughput at Prestwick and a full customs and immigration service was in operation.

On 6 March 1990, the then Secretary of State for Transport, Lord Parkinson, who visited my constituency last week and was warmly welcomed, announced the inevitable : an end to Prestwick's gateway status following a court judgment in a case brought by Air 2000 in May 1989. The then Secretary of State suggested that that action was taken because competition must be allowed to flourish. I approved of that. But that competitiveness has depended to a degree on Government services and on Government regulations to which I shall refer later. At the time of that announcement, the then Transport Secretary said that Prestwick had to be allowed to compete fairly. As I have said, the BAA already owned Glasgow and Edinburgh airports. Inevitably with common ownership, there had to be rationalisation. Prestwick did lose out in the short term with respect to passenger transport as expected. It lost out with regard to

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transatlantic scheduled flights and charters. I believe that that might well be only in the short term and I believe that the charter operators realise that.

To be fair, the BAA recognised the freight potential of Prestwick, but it did not maximise the opportunities. I am pleased to say that the circumstances changed again in April 1992 when Prestwick international airport, under the ownership of PIK Holdings Ltd., took over. That company was a combination of individuals involved in local and international business and local authority and enterprise company activities.

Since then, that company has enthusiastically and determinedly taken steps to boost freight business in particular and to make inroads into passenger transport. In the latter case, there has been some success with services established to Jersey and to Viga in the former USSR. There are only glimmers of prospects for the future. The good news is that the airport is in profit, although it has been stunted given the excellent facilities that currently exist. Those facilities are enhanced by unusually good weather conditions. Prestwick is always open when other nearby airports are closed. For whatever reason, fog does not settle over Prestwick airport and that is a very important consideration. It gives Prestwick a major status as a diversion airport. That means that the airport must man all its services to cope at short notice with diversions.

On Thursday 20 May, PIK certainly coped admirably, but with one exception. As I said earlier, it took one hour and 30 minutes for immigration personnel to get on site at Prestwick. In February of this year, the full- time presence of immigration services at Prestwick was withdrawn. In February and March, I received assurances from my hon. Friend the Minister and from my right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary that all would be well when diversions occurred and that immigration services would be on site within the hour.

The following points were pledged. First, that scheduled and charter flights would be covered. I have no complaints about that particular aspect. Secondly, that business and general air traffic passengers could be dealt with by remote. To date, I cannot complain about that.

However, we then come to diversion flights which, I was assured, would receive top priority treatment with immigration officers on site within the hour ; an early morning call by an immigration officer on a daily basis to confirm that there were no diversions liable at the transatlantic peak arrival period of 7 am ; and that a remote information transfer system, dependent on electronic mail and fax facilities, would ensure specific passenger needs would be met as they arose.

On 20 May every category failed the test. On learning of that early in the morning of 21 May, I contacted the Home Office and I pay tribute to the Home Office civil servant who responded most positively. On Monday and Tuesday, I had meetings with my hon. Friend the Minister. At the same time in Prestwick, senior officials met the airport management. I express my gratitude to my hon. Friend the Minister for his extremely positive interest and response. A mutually satisfactory agreement has been reached. While it perhaps falls short of a full day time immigration service 365 days per year--which would be ideal but not sound in economic terms--it is not justified, given current passenger usage.

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We have reached agreement on the methods by which the needs of the airport can be met to cover diversions. It will ensure a daily presence at the critical times and that is most important. It goes further in an innovative and imaginative way with regard to the use of personnel from Customs and Excise for clearing general traffic at the airport. That says a lot for the co-operation between Government Departments and the flexibility and attitudes of staff at Prestwick for whom I have the highest regard.

While eagerly awaiting my hon. Friend the Minister's comments on these issues, I take this opportunity to seek his much-appreciated support and assistance. In that regard, I refer to freight use at Prestwick airport. In Scotland, the key industry is the electronics industry. Major companies from across the international scene participate in the silica glen, as it is known. IBM, Digital, Compaq, Motorola and Prestwick Circuits are just a few. They have a key requirement for international trade. They must get components in quickly and on schedule and get added-value products out. That means jobs in Scotland and a boost to Scotland's economy and--as part of the Union--the United Kingdom economy. It is not simply value for the companies but provides such services for the nation.

Prestwick has the opportunity to play a vital role in the European Community and beyond. Currently, we lose opportunities because of restrictive rules set by the United Kingdom Government. I am aware that major international electronic companies scratch their heads when they realise that freight liners flying into Prestwick can deliver components but cannot pick up products to distribute elsewhere, even though it is on the aircraft's run. There is something wrong with that. Of course, I am referring to the issue of fifth freedom rights.

I would be obliged if my hon. Friend will pass on my comments to our mutually right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Transport and suggest that he have a chat with the United States Transport Secretary, Frederico Fena, about a true open-skies policy in the United Kingdom, the United States and beyond. Such a policy should be imposed on Prestwick for advantage in the longer term. If the United Kingdom and the United States take that step, other nations will follow. That would be of great advantage to the United Kingdom manufacturers, United Kingdom airlines and, most importantly, Prestwick airport.

If my hon. Friend passes on those thoughts, he will be a true friend of Prestwick. He has certainly advanced the interests of Prestwick in the past few days. Recently, Prestwick has been boosted by the Government's actions and, to some degree, local authority actions. There have been moves to upgrade access to Prestwick with regard to the A77 and M8 links and the M77 projections for the future. Moves are being made which could well result in a rail halt at Prestwick and trunk road status for the A70, improving access to Prestwick still further.

There is an innovative idea to provide combined air and rail tickets for those who use Prestwick airport. I understand that the idea is unique in the world. We do not want Government regulation which stops such good ideas being used to Prestwick's advantage. I remind my hon. Friend again that fifth freedom rights and an end to current restrictions would certainly give Prestwick and the United Kingdom trade a great boost.

The message that I hope to hear from my hon. Friend the Minister is a clear statement which all airlines can sign

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on to that Prestwick is open for business-- quality business--and that there will be no future delays as a result of Government agency problems. Sadly, when I leave the Chamber today I will fly back to Glasgow. I shall be happy to return to Scotland, but I look forward to the day when I can fly from London to Prestwick airport. I look forward to my hon. Friend's words.

1.16 pm

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Charles Wardle) : With the leave of the House, I shall speak fothe third time in today's debates. I begin by congratulating my hon. Friend on raising this important subject today. I thank him for his strong and articulate advocacy of the interests of Prestwick airport and his general constituency interests. In the past year or so he has represented his constituency interests on several occasions in the most powerful and constructive fashion.

I thank my hon. Friend for his remarks about the immigration service and officials in the Home Department. I accept entirely his constructive criticism of the event which he outlined, which I shall deal with in a moment. Before I do so, I remind the House that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Transport will have noted carefully what my hon. Friend has had to say.

It may be helpful if I first explain the background to the decision to withdraw the permanent immigration service presence from Prestwick airport and provide immigration control coverage for that airport from Glasgow airport instead. Over the years, in particular since Glasgow airport was opened to transatlantic flights, there has been a decline in the volume of traffic at Prestwick.

As my hon. Friend reminded me, the management of Prestwick airport has many plans to increase the traffic at Prestwick, but in recent years the volume has declined. For example, in 1988 more than 162,000 passengers arrived at Prestwick. Last year that number was just fewer than 10,000, of which more than 7,000 were European Community nationals. For some time, the only traffic has been business or military, apart from the occasional diversion of scheduled flights from other airports, which my hon. Friend described. Hardly any of the passengers on those flights need extensive examination under the terms of the Immigration Act 1988.

The immigration service had run down staff levels at Prestwick over a period, but the point was reached at which the three immigration officers and one chief immigration officer who remained were spending little time on passenger work. The immigration service has a duty to provide its customers with an efficient service, but also a responsibility, of which I am mindful, to employ its resources in the most efficient manner.

The levels of passenger traffic simply did not justify the retention of a permanent immigration presence at Prestwick, at least for the time being. PIK's traffic forecasts did not point to any significant increase in the immediate future. The immigration service could not justify the retention of four staff to deal with what amounted to one arriving and two embarking on commercial services a week.

The decision was therefore taken earlier this year, as my hon. Friend reminded the House, to transfer the four officers to the immigration office at Glasgow airport, which carries out a greater volume and range of

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