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Mr. Dobson: That is not what I said.
Mr. Gummer: The hon. Gentleman says that he did not say that. I shall give way to him if he promises to tell me how much extra money he would have spent if he had been in government today.
Ms Armstrong: The Conservatives never did that in 1978.
Mr. Gummer: How much extra money does the hon. Gentleman believe councils ought to have?
Mr. Dobson: I said that the council tax increases have been knowingly brought about by the Government.
They know that, and it is no use them trying to blame Labour councils or anybody else--the Government are responsible for the council tax increases.
Mr. Gummer: I have given the hon. Gentleman a chance after his long speech to give the figure, but he has still not done so. That makes incredible any claim that he makes that not enough money has been given. Unless he can say how much he would give, he is not credible and no sensible person will be able to take what he says seriously. Even if they have not heard his speech, they could not take him seriously.
Mr. Robert G. Hughes: My right hon. Friend, who was concentrating on the hon. Member for Holborn and St. Pancras (Mr. Dobson), may not have noticed the hon. Gentleman's deputy, the hon. Member for North-West Durham (Ms Armstrong), screeching that we did not tell people in 1978 how much we would spend. May I suggest to my right hon. Friend that the hon. Lady is wrong? We made clear at the time that we would not be spending a single penny more, and that councils would have to use their money better. Labour is trying to bribe people into believing that they would get more money.
Mr. Gummer: If it were in power, Labour would either provide more money--in which case it would have to take the money from somewhere else or push up all taxation significantly--or it would not, in which case it is misleading its own members in councils around the country.
Mr. Clive Betts (Sheffield, Attercliffe): Will the Secretary of State give way?
Mr. Gummer: I will in a moment, but I want to get through this part of my speech. It is important that the House listens carefully to what I am suggesting.
The Leader of the Opposition says that education is Labour's number one priority. Yet all around the country, Labour councillors are busy diverting the extra money that they have been given or have been allowed to spend from education into other areas. Having been allowed to spend the money, Labour councillors are spending it on the things that they want, and not on education that the public want. The Leader of the Opposition says one thing, but Labour councillors do another.
Sir Peter Fry (Wellingborough):
Will my right hon. Friend give way?
Mr. Gummer:
I shall give way to the hon. Member for Sheffield, Attercliffe (Mr. Betts) first, but I will come back to my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough (Sir P. Fry) later.
Mr. Betts:
Will the Secretary of State move from his imaginary figures to the real ones in the Government's own Red Book? The Chief Secretary admitted to the Treasury Select Committee that council taxes would rise by about 8 per cent. as a result of the Government's own policies because the Government were cutting grants and
Mr. Gummer:
I can confirm that the Labour party--in the presence of Sir Jeremy Beecham--suggested that council taxes would go up on average by 10 per cent. In fact, they have gone up on average by just over 6 per cent. The difference between the figures is very clear, and the increase does not tally with any of the figures given by the hon. Gentleman.
Sir Peter Fry:
Will my right hon. Friend accept confirmation from Northamptonshire of the points that he is making? After making many representations to the Government, the council obtained a 6 per cent. increase in the amount of moneys available to be paid to school governors for the year just started. But the Labour-controlled Northamptonshire county council--after screaming for months about teachers losing their jobs and increasing class sizes--has not passed all the money on and has kept back something like £2 million.
Mr. Gummer:
I agree with my hon. Friend, but he is extremely lucky. In Labour and Liberal-controlled Suffolk, the local council could have spent £11.5 million but is spending £8.5 million. It has written one of the longest letters ever by a local authority to its head teachers and governors to explain why instead of spending the money on education--because it is spending the money, of course--it is spending it on things that it thinks are more important. The Leader of the Opposition--supported by the Liberal Democrats--talks about education as his great priority. Yet Labour councils around the country are not spending the money on education.
It costs someone living under a Labour council--whether it is this year, last year or the year before--50 per cent. more than someone living under a Conservative council. The Government do not set council tax bills--the local authorities do. Nobody forced Labour and Liberal Democrat councils to increase their council tax bills, and to increase them by more than Conservative councils. Nobody forced them to reduce services--they have chosen to do so. Why? Because they failed to use the methods by which they could get better value for money.
Mr. William O'Brien (Normanton):
Will the Secretary of State give way?
Mr. Gummer:
I will in a moment. I want to explain the methods so that the hon. Gentleman can take them back to Wakefield--a council that I am sure would like to know them.
For all the various budgets proposed by Labour councils--those are enormous in many cases--an alternative is proposed. Labour-controlled Birmingham--mentioned by the hon. Member for Holborn and St. Pancras--increased its band D council tax by £76. But the Conservatives' shadow budget proposed a zero increase. There is no need for the council tax
to go up in Birmingham. The council tax could remain at the same level, and services could be improved by Birmingham being run more efficiently. The fault in Birmingham lies neither with the people nor with the Government, but with the Labour council. The tax increase of £76 is a Labour tax increase. One pays more and gets less under Labour.
The hon. Member for Holborn and St. Pancras had the effrontery to talk about Labour's education policy in Birmingham. But the Labour party had a putsch on its leadership in Birmingham because it had not spent the money on education, and had spent it on the very things for which the hon. Gentleman was lauding the council.
Mr. Dobson:
Does the right hon. Gentleman believe that it was or was not right for the city of Birmingham to build the international convention centre?
Mr. Gummer:
I am referring to comments by Councillor Theresa Stewart who, in seeking a change of policy, suggested that the priorities of Birmingham city council had been wrong and that the money ought to have been spent elsewhere. I stand by that. My point is not whether this or that particular decision was right, but that the Labour party in Birmingham is deeply divided about what should have been done. The Conservatives have offered a way in which Birmingham could have no rise in council tax under the Government's grant system. Birmingham's tax is therefore a Labour tax.
Enfield is putting up its tax, while the Conservatives would be able to cut £20 of band D council tax. In Kent, the Conservatives have proposed a council tax rise of 2.9 per cent., but the Labour and Liberal Democrat council had to put it up by 5.6 per cent. In all those places, the Conservatives have said what they would spend. They have given the figures, and are prepared to stand by them. The Labour party is a disgrace because it will not give any figures. It is afraid to do so. Labour could either give figures that show that it is fiscally sensible--in doing so, it would deny the hon. Member for Holborn and St. Pancras' whole case--or figures that would clearly demonstrate that Labour is the raising-tax and lowering-service party that we all know it to be.
Mr. William O'Brien:
I appreciate the opportunity to intervene in the Secretary of State's speech. If Wakefield had the same rate support grant distribution as Westminster, we could spend a further £600 per head on secondary school education. I am using the same performance indicator figures to which the Secretary of State referred. What does the Secretary of State say to those figures?
Mr. Gummer:
Why does the hon. Gentleman not do himself better than that? Why does he not compare Westminster and Wakefield under a Labour Government? He would make even better figures for himself. The Labour Government were even more helpful to Westminster proportionately. Or why does he not look at Tower Hamlets? Why does he not say to himself, "If only we had the money that Tower Hamlets has."? Then he would discover that he could spend even more money per secondary school pupil. The hon. Gentleman knows perfectly well that the figures that come out of the system are entirely independent.
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