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Mr. Neil Hamilton (Tatton): On the basis of the infantile response of Opposition Members this afternoon, if that behaviour is typical, is my right hon. Friend aware that many English Members of Parliament will welcome the opportunity for the Scottish Grand Committee to sit in Scotland as often as possible?
For those of us who represent constituencies which strongly support the Union with Scotland, I should like to reiterate the point that was made by my hon. Friend the Member for St. Ives (Mr. Harris). We are prepared to continue to put up with the over-representation of Scotland in this House, and with the favourable financial treatment that Scotland receives from the British taxpayer, on the basis of proposals which strengthen the Union, but we would not be willing to put up with that if constitutional proposals such as those proposed by the hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. Robertson), which weakened the Union and moved it towards separation, were brought before the House.
Mr. Forsyth:
I am not sure that I agree with my hon. Friend's use of the phrase "put up". This is a Union. We are a United Kingdom, and we are a Conservative Unionist party. Scotland gets a good deal out of the Union, and England gets a good deal out of the Union. The Union is greater than the sum of its parts, and it works.
Opposition Members are prepared--for their own narrow party political ends, because they want to have an entrenched socialist majority in Scotland--to gerrymander our constitution, to put Scotland's vital services at risk, and to play straight into the hands of the nationalists. When the electorate discover that, the Opposition will find that their lead in the polls will tumble.
Mr. Dennis Canavan (Falkirk, West):
If the Secretary of State really believes in people power, does he recognise the sovereign right of the people of Scotland to decide what system of government is best for them, instead of being constantly told what is best for them by a puppet of a discredited Tory regime?
Mr. Forsyth:
Apart from the last part of the hon. Gentleman's question, I agree with what he says. If Scotland wanted to become independent, it could become independent. What is not possible is to vote for the ragbag of ill-thought-out proposals that is the Scottish Constitutional Convention, which would result in independence, because divisions would be created between Scotland and England and because damage
Mr. Peter Luff (Worcester):
Before anyone comes forward with more radical constitutional proposals--a sensible package has been announced today--does my right hon. Friend agree that they would do well to reflect on the fact that public expenditure in Scotland is some 20 per cent. higher than it is in England? Does he understand that, as an English Member of Parliament, I am very happy to justify that to my constituents as an investment in the Union, but that I could no longer do so in any conscience if there was a Scottish Parliament with Scottish tax-raising powers of its own?
Mr. Forsyth:
I am grateful to my hon. Friend. People must realise that the future of the Union is a matter for everyone in the Union. It is not just a matter for Scotland. What is so devastatingly damaging about the proposals of the hon. Member for Hamilton is that they take no account whatsoever of the interests of those from south of the Border. The hon. Gentleman is proposing that Scottish Members of Parliament will come down here with no say in health, education, agriculture or any of the other matters which concern our constituents for the simple purpose of keeping in office a Labour Government by voting on those matters which are in England.
That is an intolerable position, on which the hon. Member for Linlithgow (Mr. Dalyell), when he was the Member for West Lothian, asked his question. After six years of deliberation, the Scottish Constitutional Convention and the hon. Member for Hamilton still cannot answer the West Lothian question. Labour Members want to have their cake and eat it--they cannot have it.
Mr. Alex Salmond (Banff and Buchan):
May I return the Secretary of State to his statement? I suppose that any concession--however weak and belated--must be welcomed. But I must say to the Secretary of State that, if this is it after all the build-up, it is not opposition that he is risking today, but ridicule.
Will the right hon. Gentleman confirm that, under his proposals, the absolute Westminster veto over Scottish business remains? If what the Secretary of State is proposing had been in operation during the poll tax debate, would the proposals have gone to the Scottish Grand Committee? If the Scottish Grand Committee had come up with an inconvenient vote on the poll tax, would it have been overruled in this Chamber? Would the Secretary of State have defended his pet project through these processes?
The Secretary of State has sidestepped the question of nursery vouchers so far, but he told us in his statement that Scottish Members could decide on the future of deer. Can he explain to the people of Scotland in a simple
phrase why Scottish Members should be trusted with the future of red deer but not with the future of Scottish children?
Mr. Forsyth:
I said no such thing. Legislation is a matter for this House and this Parliament. The proposals which I put forward allow for scrutiny and debate on matters affecting Scotland in Scotland and involving Ministers. [Interruption.] The hon. Member for Banff and Buchan (Mr. Salmond) has a perfectly honest and responsible position--he wishes Scotland to leave the United Kingdom and become independent. In those circumstances, he would find that he was £8.6 billion short of the money he needed to run Scotland, and the Scottish people would be greatly damaged as a result.
But in those circumstances, a Scottish Parliament would be able to decide on legislation in Scotland. That it is the nationalist position. It is not my position. The position of Unionists is that this is the sovereign House. The hon. Member for Hamilton has got himself into a dreadful tangle, because he has been so worried about the way in which the Scottish National party has been rising in the polls.
Mrs. Margaret Ewing (Moray):
What about the poll tax?
Mr. Forsyth:
The hon. Lady is getting excited about the poll tax. Does the hon. Member for Banff and Buchan remember that the great objection of Labour Members to the poll tax was that we were introducing a tax in Scotland a year ahead of England? But Labour plans to have a tartan tax for Scotland, which, year after year, the Scots will have to pay and the English will not. For sheer brass neck, that takes the biscuit.
Mr. John Home Robertson (East Lothian):
After the poll tax and everything else that has been imposed on Scotland in the past 16 years, surely the Secretary of State cannot expect to smother the Scottish constitutional issue in a welter of amendments to Standing Orders in Committees. Does he accept that a Committee is, by definition, a subordinate body? Does he also accept that, under his proposals, it would be open to him and his successors to continue to impose legislation and decisions on the Scottish budget as has always been the case? If he is really serious about addressing the Scottish constitutional issue, why does he not take his seat in the Scottish Constitutional Convention tomorrow, as a representative of a small and dwindling, but nevertheless significant, Scottish minority?
Mr. Forsyth:
The hon. Gentleman asks me to take a seat in the Scottish Constitutional Convention. I am told that tomorrow the members of the convention will say that they have reached an agreement.
The hon. Member for Hamilton says that we might have the office of Secretary of State, and that we would keep 72 Scottish Members of Parliament. The hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Wallace), who speaks for the Liberal Democrats on the matter, says that we would have to reduce the number of Members of Parliament, and that the office of Secretary of State would disappear. If they cannot even agree on fundamentals such as those, the convention sounds like no place to be. It has wasted six and a half years, and has still not come up with an answer to the question which the hon. Member for Linlithgow asked.
The hon. Member for East Lothian (Mr. Home Robertson) may not like being a part of the United Kingdom, and he may not like having this House as a sovereign body. If he feels like that, he should join the Scottish National party, and stop pretending to be a Unionist.
Mr. Calum Macdonald (Western Isles):
Does the Secretary of State recognise that nobody objects to him and his colleagues having ideas or plans about education vouchers, local government or the poll tax? What is objected to--following our experience in the past 16 years--is that the right hon. Gentleman is able to impose these policies upon the people of Scotland against the wishes of the majority of the people of Scotland and against the wishes of the majority of Scottish Members of Parliament. Does he not acknowledge that that raises a democratic question about the way in which the House works, which his proposals do nothing whatsoever to address?
"Major Scottish disappointments on the international sporting stage could be a thing of the past under a devolved Parliament".
It seems that there is no end to the benefits. If that is true, it may well be that the Scottish people will be tempted.
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