House of Commons Hansard Debates for 6 Jul 1993

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Points of Order

3.30 pm

Mr. Derek Enright (Hemsworth) : On a point of order, Madam Speaker. You will recall that a few weeks ago, the new Minister of State for the Armed Forces, to whom I have given notice of my intention to raise this point, proclaimed at the Dispatch Box his concern for the welfare of the serving men and women of this country. As a result, I wrote to the Secretary of State for Defence about my constituent, Brian Marshall, from south Kirby, who is suffering from what is known as desert fever. That gentleman has lost two stone in weight and is having difficulty climbing stairs--

Madam Speaker : Order. Will the hon. Member come to the point of order for me?

Mr. Enright : Having written to the right hon. Gentleman about the matter, I was astonished last evening to hear the Minister of State declare on television that he had received no representations about people suffering from desert fever. I suggest that that is unacceptable behaviour- -

Madam Speaker : Order. I am sure that the hon. Member appreciates that I shall not allow a debate on the matter. It is not an issue for me. He must take it up with the Minister concerned. I cannot adjudicate on the accuracy of what is said in the course of television programmes--

The Minister of State for the Armed Forces (Mr. Jeremy Hanley) rose--

Madam Speaker : --and that is the end of that.

Mr. Robert Maclennan (Caithness and Sutherland) : On a point of order, Madam Speaker. The House will know that there has been a serious incursion into the precincts of Buckingham palace and an evident lack of security, with no fewer than 17 people within the curtilage. The Home Secretary is at present the police authority for London, and is responsible for the protection of Her Majesty. I am wondering, Madam Speaker, whether you have received a request for a statement to be made about the matter to the House and, if not, whether the Home Secretary, having heard this exchange, will lose no opportunity to come forward and explain what steps have been taken.

Madam Speaker : I have not received a communication from a Minister seeking to make a statement. The occupants of the Treasury Bench will have heard what the hon. Gentleman said.

Mr. Hanley rose--

Madam Speaker : Do I understand that the hon. Member for Halifax (Mrs. Mahon) is rising?

Mrs. Alice Mahon (Halifax) : Yes, on a point of order, Madam Speaker. You correctly pointed out to the hon. Member for Castle Point (Dr. Spink) that he was out of order. May I ask you to point out to him also that we in the Labour party refer to one member, one vote, and not one man, one vote?

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Madam Speaker : I understand the point that the hon. Lady is putting to me. When I was a Back Bencher, I used to get very annoyed when speakers referred all the time to "hon. Gentlemen".

Mr. Hanley rose --

Madam Speaker : Order. I have dealt with the point of order about which I think the Minister is seeking to rise. I must deal with Ministers and Back Benchers in exactly the same way. Having dealt with the point of order, it is now a question between the hon. Member for Hemsworth (Mr. Enright) and the Minister. They must resolve it between them. It is not a matter for the Chair.

Mr. Patrick Cormack (Staffordshire, South) : Reverting to the point of order raised by the hon. Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Mr. Maclennan), when Princess Anne was apprehended by a madman in Pall Mall, the Home Secretary gave a statement that very day. I am sure that the House would wish to know precisely what has happened at Buckingham Palace today.

Madam Speaker : I am sure that those on the Government Front Bench have noted the wishes of the House.

Mr. Hugh Dykes (Harrow, East) : I hope that you, Madam Speaker, will allow me to make my point, and forgive me if it appears to return to a previous point. As the hon. Member for Hemsworth (Mr. Enright) did not begin with a proper point of order, how can it be fair for the Minister to be prevented from giving an answer?

Madam Speaker : I have to deal with so many bogus points of order in this place--I have hardly heard a genuine point of order in the past six months.

Mr. Harry Barnes (Derbyshire, North-East) : How long should it take for an answer to be given in Hansard after a question is posed? On 3 December, my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull, North (Mr. McNamara) asked for information to be provided from the Northern Ireland Office about people who had been killed due to paramilitary violence, and the sites of the killings. I asked a similar but wider question of the Prime Minister on 7 June and requested information about those killed by paramilitary violence in Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

The information forthcoming in both instances was, "This material will be supplied in the Library in due course." The "due course" seems to be a tremendous amount of time. It might be appropriate for us to follow up those questions today, the day on which John Matthews has been released. He had faced a false charge involving the London taxi bombs. The City of Derry is celebrating the fact that today that false accusation has not been carried through. We need information about who has been correctly convicted.

Madam Speaker : It is a matter for the Minister, and I suggest that, if the hon. Gentleman tables a further question, he might be able to obtain the information that he now seeks.

Mr. Graham Riddick (Colne Valley) : I apologise for raising this point, Madam Speaker, but you have always been terribly fair. When someone has raised a bogus point of order or tried to score a point at another hon. Member's expense, you have always been fair and allowed the subject

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of the point of order to respond, if only briefly. I wonder whether you might consider allowing my hon. Friend the Minister to do that.

Madam Speaker : The hon. Gentleman has not been following my habits in the past year. Once I have dealt with a point of order, even if it is a bogus one, that is the end of it. I will not allow exchanges on bogus points of order to continue across the Chamber.

STATUTORY INSTRUMENTS, &c.

Motion made, and Question put forthwith pursuant to Standing Order No. 101(3) (Standing Committees on Statutory Instruments, &c.).

Terrorism

That the draft Suppression of Terrorism Act 1978 (Application of Provisions) (India) Order 1993 be referred to a Standing Committee on Statutory Instruments, &c.-- [Mr. Andrew Mitchell.]

Question agreed to.

NORTHERN IRELAND COMMITTEE

Motion made, and Question put forthwith, pursuant to Standing Order No. 99(2) (Matter relating exclusively to Northern Ireland).

Statutory Rules

That the Thirty-Fourth Report from the Examiner of Statutory Rules, being a Matter relating exclusively to Northern Ireland, be referred to the Northern Ireland Committee for its consideration.-- [Mr. Andrew Mitchell.]

Question agreed to.

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Births and Deaths Registration (Amendment)

3.37 pm

Mr. Gyles Brandreth (City of Chester) : I beg to move,

That leave be given to bring in a Bill to amend the Births and Deaths Registration Act 1953 in relation to the place of registration of deaths in England and Wales.

The Bill would amend the Births and Deaths Registration Act 1953 to enable deaths to be registered in any district in England and Wales, not simply, as at present, in the district where the death occurred.

One might have thought that a death could be registered with any recognised registrar, but that is not so, as I discovered from an elderly constituent of mine, a lady in her 70s, living in Chester, whose 95-year-old mother died in a nursing home in Kent. To register the death, my constituent, the only surviving relative, was obliged to travel hundreds of miles, at considerable expense and inconvenience, at a time of great personal sadness, to complete a bureaucratic formality which could equally well have been undertaken in Chester.

The lady's case may be unusual, but is by no means unique. The National Consumer Council has alerted me to a comparable case in which a daughter had to register her mother's death in Ely, because the nursing home in which the lady's mother died fell within the Ely district, although the nursing home was closer to Cambridge, where the funeral was to take place, while the bereaved daughter lived in Worcester.

The registrar would not have welcomed registration of the death either by the proprietor of the nursing home or by the undertaker, so one afternoon the daughter travelled from Worcester to Ely for that purpose, only to discover, when she got there, that the registrar's office was open for business from 9 am until noon only, and on just three days a week.

While it is obviously gratifying for the good people of East Anglia to feel that the rate of mortality in Ely is such that it justifies a week of only nine hours on the part of the registrar, it is clearly absurd, and in truth unnecessary, for people already having to cope with the trauma of bereavement, perhaps involved in the making of funeral arrangements, and possibly elderly themselves, to have this additional administrative burden thrust upon them.

In the age of the telephone and the fax, it must make sense to introduce a system whereby a death can be registered in any district in any part of the country, thus relieving bereaved people of the difficulty and the expense of travelling to the district where the death occurred. It must make sense.

Indeed, as we can see, it does make sense, which is why a benevolent Government made such a proposal in the White Paper on registration back in January 1990, with a promise of legislation at "an early opportunity". Three and a half years later, that early opportunity has still failed to present itself, which is where I and my Bill step in.

Having been a Member of the House for only about 15 months, I pride myself on still being loosely in touch with reality. Unjust as it may seem to Members of Parliament, there are in the real world some who look on our proceedings with a mixture of scorn and incredulity. They partially understand our role in the constituency as that odd amalgam of citizens advice bureau, untrained Relate counsellor, housing officer, doormat, punchbag

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and inveterate function attender with an insatiable appetite for finger food and raffle tickets. But to many of them our purpose at Westminster is less clear. This weekend, one of my constituents said to me, "What do you MPs do?" Before I had a chance to offer a dignified reply, he went on, "Whatever it is, I wish you would do less of it."

I believe in less legislation, less regulation and less bureaucracy, and in the validity of William Blake's dictum that he who would do good must do it by minute particulars. My Bill is a very modest measure. It is not significant. It is not spectacular. It is not even controversial. It will not make a noise, but to a few people it might make a difference. That is why I commend it to the House.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill ordered to be brought in by Mr. Gyles Brandreth, Mr. Joseph Ashton, Mr. Peter Butler, Mr. Sebastian Coe, Mrs. Teresa Gorman, Ms Glenda Jackson, Mrs. Angela Knight and Mr. John Sykes.

Births and Deaths Registration (Amendment)

Mr. Gyles Brandreth accordingly presented a Bill to amend the Births and Deaths Registration Act 1953 in relation to the place of registration of deaths in England and Wales : And the same was read the First time ; and ordered to be read a Second time upon Friday 16 July, and to be printed. [Bill 233.]

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Orders of the Day

European Parliamentary Elections Bill

Considered in Committee.

[ Mr. Michael Morris

in the Chair ]

Clause 1

Increase in number of representatives to the European Parliament 3.44 pm

Mrs. Margaret Ewing (Moray) : I beg to move amendment No. 1, in page 1, line 10, leave out 71' and insert 70'.

The Chairman of Ways and Means (Mr. Michael Morris) : With this it will be convenient also to discuss the following amendments : No. 2, in page 1, line 10, after "71" ' insert--

(ba

(in paragraph (b) (Scotland) for "8" there shall be substituted "9".'.) No. 9, in page 1, line 10, at end insert--

(bb

(in paragraph (b) (Scotland) for "8" there shall be substituted "9" ; and '.) No. 3, in page 1, line 16, leave out "71" ' and insert "70".'.

No. 4, in page 1, line 16, after "71" ' insert--

(ba

(in paragraph (b) (Scotland) for "8" there shall be substituted "9".'.) No. 12, in page 1, line 16, at end insert--

(bb

(in paragraph (b) (Scotland) for "8" there shall be substituted "9".'.) No. 5, in clause 2, page 1, line 20, after England', insert Scotland'.

No. 6, in clause 2, page 2, line 1, after England' insert Scotland'.

Mrs. Ewing : It is strange that my amendment should be the lead amendment in this group. I am grateful to the members of other parties who have associated themselves with my amendment. I had thought that I might speak from the Opposition Dispatch Box, but Labour Members might not have found my company especially agreeable. From time to time we do not find each other's company agreeable, but today we are agreed on the serious principle of Scotland's representation within the European Community.

Mr. Graham Allen (Nottingham, North) : In the spirit adopted by the hon. Lady, we congratulate her on doing such a fine job of hijacking the Opposition's amendment by tabling her amendment before we managed to table ours.

Mrs. Ewing : The hon. Gentleman should congratulate my research officer, who did a great deal of work on the issue, although I recognise that other hon. Members have been working along the same lines. Within the procedures of the House, the way the cookie crumbles very much dictates who has the key amendment.

We are having difficulties with the allocation of the additional seats in the European Parliament. The principle of increased membership was agreed at the Edinburgh

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summit last December, yet it is not until the hot, sticky days of July that we are considering the implications and knock-on effects of that decision.

There were earlier opportunities to consider the matter and to have discussions between the various parties in the House. Instead, we are considering the issue in an air of panic, because the Government have introduced the Bill without giving the House a full opportunity to explore all its aspects.

The Government should not always base their arguments on the niceties of numbers. Last week, we all received from the Home Secretary various details about the number of and comparisons between the seats in Scotland, Wales and England. Northern Ireland is exempt, because it has proportional representation.

The niceties of numbers are not in the spirit of the Community. The Home Secretary's comments during our debate last Wednesday--in particular, those reported in column 984 of Hansard --show that he was using a British state argument rather than looking at the Community as a whole. If we are to enter into the spirit of the Community, any additional representation should not be seen as just a numerical gain : it should properly reflect the various peoples of the Community.

Those on the Treasury Bench suffer from the delusion that Britain is a nation. It is not ; it is a state that combines three natural nation communities--Scotland, England and Wales. Underpinning the philosophy of the European Community is the idea that the smaller nations should not be penalised because of size, and that they should be recognised as equal partners. My contention today is that Scotland should be recognised as an equal partner, and that it should have additional seats.

I have long pursued that argument with various Government representatives. I wrote to the Foreign Secretary on 14 January, subsequent to the Edinburgh summit, asking how decisions would be made on the allocation of the six additional seats. He responded : "We are now looking at how to allocate the six new seats as between the different parts of the United Kingdom. This distribution will eventually have to be enacted in legislation. The Scots, but also others, will be watching carefully to see that this is fairly done." We are seeking a very careful distribution of these seats. I go back to the idea that there should be equality within the communities. I have brought with me a copy of the autobiography of Garret Fitzgerald, who was, at the time of the original direct elections to the European Parliament, the Taoiseach of the Republic of Ireland. He talks in this book, "All in a Life", about Ireland's role within the European Community and the negotiations on the initial allocation of seats for direct election to the European Parliament.

I want to read this paragraph into the record of the House of Commons, because I believe that we should all be aware of the arguments that were used by the then Government. I do not think that it will be enough for the Minister to respond by saying that it was then a Labour Government. The principles that underpin these comments should be looked at :

"Callaghan and Crosland came to us to say that they were going to propose 82 seats for the larger countries, which would enable them to give an extra seat to Northern Ireland as well as an extra seat to Scotland and Wales, bringing these to 10 and five seats respectively. We told them we would go along with this. In the end, at Giscard d'Estaing's urging in a top-of-the- table huddle, Callaghan said he would settle for 81 seats by dropping an extra seat claimed for England.

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So it was agreed, but in the event, interestingly enough, Scotland and Wales never got their extra seats. Although the need to make greater provision for Scotland and Wales had been the basis of the British argument for more seats, it was to England that the additional seats were allocated. Scotland's proposed 10 was reduced to eight and Wales's five became four, whilst England got 66 instead of the 63 implicit in what Callaghan and Crosland had said to us." That is the record of the initial arguments about the allocation of directly elected seats to the European Parliament. I could argue, of course, that Scotland, being comparable to Denmark, with roughly the same population, should automatically have 16 seats. I recognise that that can be achieved only when Scotland is an independent nation--when we, too, will be allowed to participate in the Council of Ministers, to have our opportunity, not to be the tartan waitress at a European summit in Edinburgh, but to be the host country and to have, in our own right, the position of chief in the commission. The argument for Scotland to have an additional seat is increasingly important. The Community is changing very rapidly. It has already been said quite clearly that, with the accession of additional members, the Community institutions will have to change. The Maastricht treaty makes it quite clear that the Parliament will acquire additional powers, and I for one welcome that.

I have no particular neurosis about this place being the mother of Parliaments and the seat of all democracy. I believe that the future for Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and England lies within the European Community. I want to move towards consensus politics within the Community.

Because the institutions are going to change, the influence of each voice will be particularly important. I know that the Minister, along with colleagues in the Cabinet, is very aware of the importance that has recently been attached to the argument for structural funds. Indeed, the Leader of the House referred to this in his capacity as substitute for the Prime Minister during Prime Minister's questions today.

The Parliament in Europe had a great deal of influence in persuading the Commission that the whole of the Highlands and Islands enterprise unit should be included within objective 1. A great deal of work was undertaken by the member of the European Parliament for the Highlands and Islands--and I must declare an interest because of the family relationship.

That Parliament voted by 277 votes to 27 in favour of the whole of the Highlands and Islands enterprise area being included within objective 1 status. If one MEP, exerting that influence, can achieve that result, surely Scotland should be entitled to additional representation.

I notice that the hon. Member for Aberdeen, South (Mr. Robertson) is laughing. He should recognise that part of the victory was achieved because his party did not care to send a Scottish Office representative to the negotiations. Perhaps we should learn from that. Perhaps, when the Department of Trade and Industry represents Scotland's interests, we achieve the results that we want.

Mr. Brian Wilson (Cunninghame, North) : Let me endorse what the hon. Lady has said about the role of her mother-in-law, the MEP for Highlands and Islands, who fought very hard on this issue. I am sure that the hon. Lady will also recognise the role of my colleagues Hugh MacMahon, MEP for Strathclyde, West,and Henry McCubbin, MEP for North-East Scotland, and also that

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of the socialist group, which gave its backing to the same proposals. If ever there was a team effort on behalf of a Scottish interest, that was surely it. I am sure that Liberal MEPs were also involved.

Mrs. Ewing : I am not trying to claim all the credit for the MEP for Highlands and Islands. There was a great deal of cross-party co-operation, and Labour and Liberal Democrat Members of Parliament have joined me in various representations. There was also the influence of Highland regional council, the various local enterprise companies and the district councils, all of which were very much involved.

My point is that there was an opportunity, through the influence of an MEP, to persuade the Commission to recognise that its original idea that there should be exclusions from objective 1 status in the highlands and islands area was an example of how political life can operate within the European Community. We want that spirit of community to be pursued, and we want additional representation for Scotland in that regard.

Dr. Norman A. Godman (Greenock and Port Glasgow) : I readily accept the argument that this is a Parliament within a multinational state. The hon. Lady is referring to the European Parliament, which again is a Parliament in a multinational state. She has referred to the powers given to the European Parliament by article 189b of the Maastricht treaty ; would she like the powers of that Parliament to be extended to enable it, say, to initiate European Community-wide legislation?

Mrs. Ewing : I certainly believe that the European Parliament has a major role to play in the development of economic and social policy. Progress must be made slowly and on the basis of consensus. That is why I am keen for Scotland to be an equal partner in this development.

I think that hon. Members from all parties will agree that we want to avoid the imposition of an ideology by one or two countries of the Community. We should reach a consensus through mutual discussion and agreement in terms of initiating programmes, but the initiation process, in many ways, should now be transferred from this place to the European Parliament. I believe that the development of the Community is of critical importance, not just to Scotland and the other constituent parts of the United Kingdom, but to the international community as a whole. I look forward to these developments.

Dr. Godman : I am grateful to the hon. Lady for her concise answer. An expansion of the legislative powers of the European Parliament must surely lead to a diminution of the powers of the national legislatures. What does she feel about that shift in the distribution of legislative powers between the European Parliament and the national Parliament?

Mrs. Ewing : The hon. Gentleman and I both sit on the Select Committee on European Legislation. I would not describe this as a national Parliament ; I would describe it as a multinational state Parliament. I would like Scotland to have a national Parliament, and then, according to the Helsinki agreement definition of sovereignty, we will have to decide how much of our national power we wish to pool for the greater good of the Community. That is how I envisage the Community developing. I am sure that the

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hon. Member for Greenock and Port Glasgow (Dr. Godman) also noticed, during our various visits to European Community countries, that the vast majority of the politicians we met showed the same flexibility of approach. The pooling of sovereignty is the key to the Community's development.

On the subject of the additional seat, it was argued last week on Second Reading that I advised the Government that the size of the Highlands and Islands constituency should be taken into account, and that an additional seat for Scotland would have an impact upon the Highlands and Islands. I was not arguing that case. I was arguing that, when the Boundary Commission considers the distribution of seats, it should take into account the geography of the constituent parts of the United Kingdom. I believe that the Highlands and Islands constituency would wish to remain very much as it is, and I would bear no grudges if an additional seat were granted elsewhere in Scotland.

4 pm

I was arguing very clearly, with the support of other hon. Members, that the Highlands and Islands constituency has the land mass of Belgium, stretching for about 350 miles from north to south, and that representing it is a major task. The Member of the European Parliament for the Highlands and Islands willingly accepts the present situation, as I am sure would any subsequent Members, although I do not anticipate a change for a considerable number of years.

Mr. James Wallace (Orkney and Shetland) : I am grateful to the hon. Member for giving way, and I endorse much that she says about the highlands and islands. Does she also accept that, if the Bill is passed in the form that the Government wish, giving five seats to England, three seats in Scotland will have higher electorates than the average English electorate ; North-East Scotland, with an electorate of 576,776 ; Mid-Scotland and Fife, with an electorate of 544,649 ; and Lothian, with an electorate of 522,020? Therefore, three of Scotland's eight seats will have larger electorates than the average now given to England by the Government.

Mrs. Ewing : The hon. Gentleman has a valid argument, which reaffirms those made last week on Second Reading : that numbers cannot be the sole criterion on which we base the allocation of seats. Full account must be taken of geography, but we must also take into account the valuable arguments of the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Wallace).

Mr. Tony Marlow (Northampton, North) : They were not valuable arguments at all. They were absolute nonsense, statistically speaking. If some seats in Scotland have more constituents than the average in England, some seats in England will also have more than the average number of constituents for England.

Mrs. Ewing : The hon. Gentleman misses the point about the principles of the Community. He is quite willing to be seen as a European sceptic who does not believe in the Community. We have argued that Scotland should be compared with Denmark, which has 16 seats in the European Parliament, that Wales should be compared with Eire, which has 15 seats, and that England could be

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compared with whichever country it wishes to be compared with, and have seats in its own right in the European Parliament.

That is a Community issue. It is not an argument about the debates between internal political parties in the House of Commons or in the United Kingdom.

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