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Points of Order
Mr. Cynog Dafis (Ceredigion and Pembroke, North): On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Bearing in mind the grave and rapidly shifting situation at Milford Haven and the accumulating evidence that there has been a failure to deploy resources sufficiently and to do so competently, have you received a request to make a statement from the Secretary of State for Transport tonight, bearing it in mind that I have asked the Leader of the House for such a statement now?
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Morris): I confirm to the hon. Gentleman that I have had no request for a statement on any subject.
Mr. Nick Ainger (Pembroke): Further to that point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker.
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Is it on a new issue?
Mr. Ainger: It is on the same issue.
Mr. Deputy Speaker: In that case, I have already made it clear that I have had no request for any statement.
Glasgow (Finances)
Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.--[Mr. Knapman.]
10.15 pm
Mr. Michael J. Martin (Glasgow, Springburn): Through you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, I should like to thank Madam Speaker for giving me the opportunity to have this debate. I should also like to thank the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Scotland who is to reply to the debate, and my hon. Friends the Members for Glasgow, Maryhill (Mrs. Fyfe), for Glasgow, Shettleston (Mr. Marshall), for Strathkelvin and Bearsden(Mr. Galbraith), for Glasgow, Garscadden (Mr. Dewar) and for Greenock and Port Glasgow (Dr. Godman) for their presence and support. I know that the wife of my hon. Friend the Member for Greenock and Port Glasgow, Trish, is a councillor for the city of Glasgow, and that she will be able to watch this debate through the medium of television.
I should also like to thank Mr. John Brown of the public relations department of the new city of Glasgow authority. He is a brother of my hon. Friend the Member for Dunfermline, East (Mr. Brown), and he has been extremely helpful in giving me the information that I require for the debate. [Interruption.] He gave that information in a professional capacity.
I note that the Secretary of State for Scotland is present. Given such large cuts in the finances of the city of Glasgow, it is only right and fitting that he should meet the leader of Glasgow district council, Councillor Bob Gould, at this time of severe crisis. He should also meet Councillor John Young, the Conservative leader on the city council. Opposition Members do not share his politics, but we know that he has always had a deep concern for the city of Glasgow, where he was born and bred.
Given the cuts of £43 million, it is only right and fitting that a meeting between the Secretary of State and those councillors should take place. The Secretary of State is on record as saying that he wants to get out and meet the people. He said that was why he wanted the Scottish Grand Committee to meet all over Scotland. Given the current crisis in Glasgow, he should meet Councillor Gould, along with Councillor Young.
It is worth noting that the Secretary of State for Wales recently got £15.9 million for the Principality. That money was an extra allocation, and was not part of its original funding formula. The Minister may say that the equivalent money for Scotland was accounted for in the formula that the Government negotiated with the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities. That cannot be the case, however, because the Welsh formula did not allow for that extra £15.9 million. If that amount of money can be given to Wales, why not to Scotland?
Those cuts of £43 million will mean the loss of 2,000 jobs in a city where the average unemployment rate is 12 per cent. In parts of my constituency and others, the unemployment rate is absolutely horrendous. At one time, the railway workshops offered employment to my local community, but most people now look to local government for employment. The 2,000 lost jobs are important ones, such as home helps--the very ones that should be increased. We should be looking after our elderly men and women who served us when fascism was
at its height. They gave six years of their lives to fight for democracy so that we can be here, yet we are denying them the care that they need in their later years of life.
Schools are being closed that are important to give children in areas of high unemployment and deprivation a chance to get out and make a life for themselves. We are losing sports centres at a time when Conservative Members say that they are worried about the drugs situation. Drugs are a problem in Glasgow, and if we lose sports centres, more and more of our young boys and girls will be put on to the street, and they will be easy prey for the people from whom we are trying to protect them.
We are to lose residential homes. We are also to lose museums. In every service, from social work to education, we are to have closures and loss of services. In education, £12 million will be cut from the budget, which will mean that the price of school meals will go up. Twelve community education centres in the city of Glasgow will close. Three to five secondary schools and 16 primary schools are likely to close.
In Argyllshire, two residential homes that have excellent facilities to get young people out into the countryside to give them the outdoor activities they need will be lost. That will be a loss for the city of Glasgow. It will also mean that employment opportunities will be lost in the rural community of Argyll.
When we had the old slums in our city, it was always said that there was one place that the people could always go free of charge--our parks. We have some of the finest parks anywhere in the world. Kelvingrove park is almost identical to St. James's park across the road from here. It is an excellent place, where people from Maryhill, Anderston--where I was brought up--Woodside and Partick can go. University students enjoy the parks. Boating ponds will also close. They are places where people can take their children and enjoy a day out.
Ruchill, in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Maryhill, is to lose a bowling green. Shettleston will lose its sports centre. On roads, I am sure that the Automobile Association and the Royal Automobile Club will be deeply concerned that maintenance will be cut by £2.4 million in our city.
Social work is of great concern to all of us. I know that it is of concern to Conservative Members, because many of them have dedicated their parliamentary lives to talking about the handicapped and those in need of social work.
Glasgow's social work budget is to be cut by £9.1 million. That will mean that homes for the elderly will close, at a time when our aging population is increasing. Logic tells us that we need more homes for the elderly, yet the Government are telling our local authority, which has excellent social work homes, to cut its budget.
Many visitors to Glasgow have said that the social work homes in the city are something of which our citizens can be proud. Day centres for the handicapped will close. Mothers who have handicapped children use them to get some respite and to give their young children the chance of a decent education. They give children an opportunity to do something meaningful, and help them in their training and to develop their minds. Spending on nursing homes will be vastly reduced, and there will be a delay in filling social work vacancies.
Museums and art galleries are to lose £1.3 million.
Mrs. Maria Fyfe (Glasgow, Maryhill):
Amid all the other cuts, the social services department is contemplating making cuts of more than £9 million. Where does the Minister expect Glasgow to make alternative savings?
Mr. Martin:
I hope that the Minister will tell us what he thinks Glasgow should do. If he does, when the Secretary of State meets Councillors Gould and Young, at least they will have a chance to rebut the case that the Minister makes tonight.
Museums and art galleries are to lose £1.3 million. Haggs castle, the famous museum, is to close; Pollok house, with its famous Burrell collection, will be able to open for only six months each year. Mr. Burrell, who gave a fantastic legacy to our city, must be turning in his grave.
When I was a councillor on the old Glasgow corporation, along with some of my hon. Friends, we spent days on end ensuring that we stuck to the terms of Mr. Burrell's legacy: he left instructions relating to his famous collection. Finally, we were able to house the collection at Pollok house--but it will not help tourism for Pollok house to be open for only six months of the year. People come to see it from all over the world.
Indeed, there is a possibility that all our famous museums--museums to which many of our parents took us--will close for one day each week. The famous Dixon halls, Govan town hall and the Couper Institute must all close, and I do not know where the voluntary organisations that use them will go. The capital programme is to be cut, and there is to be a £30 million cut in the housing budget.
The Conservative party tells us time and again that we are not the friends of the private sector--that we do not care about small business men and private companies. Glasgow's record in ensuring that building companies, large and small, secure work for their employees is second to none; it is the Government who will put not only council employees but private sector workers on the dole. When I was a member of the council, for every council employee, two private employees--two outside contractors--had jobs on the rates and the city treasury. I do not know what the formula is now, but many people in the private sector, including many builders who used to support the Tory party, will be knocking on the Minister's door.
The council tax could rise by between 36 per cent. and 40 per cent. I have never known such an increase in my city: indeed, I have never known such an increase in any city. The Minister who is to reply to the debate said that there was no need to meet councillors in Glasgow, although the council tax may rise from £676 to £944.
I feel that what I have said tonight is enough to make the Minister consider the possibility that he is wrong. If he continues to pursue the current Scottish Office line, Glasgow will suffer. Glasgow has a first-class history, and its administration has a reputation throughout the country for not being what Conservative Members sometimes describe as the lunatic left. Indeed, it is anything but that: it is the most responsible council in the country, and Strathclyde had an excellent reputation for working with the Government and with Europe.
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