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7.17 pm
Mr. Newton: With no discourtesy intended towards the House, I do not think that I need to sum up at length. I regret that material was introduced into the debate which is not very relevant to it, and that it has been used to recycle allegations that--as we now know--have been denied by one of those named. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister commented on the material at Prime Minister's Question Time on 23 July.
However, given the fact that what was said was said, I must say that the suggestion that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister is--I think that I remember the phrase used by the hon. Member for Newport, West (Mr. Flynn)--"prostituting his office" is an absurd allegation to be made under the privilege of the House, and that it is bordering on the disgraceful.
In quieter terms, I shall deal with the debate in general. I very much agree with what the hon. Member for Dewsbury (Mrs. Taylor) has said on every subject other than the one that I have just mentioned. I am grateful to her and to other hon. Members for their kind words about my chairmanship. I reciprocate those words, and endorse the compliment paid by my hon. Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire (Sir D. Mitchell) to the hon. Member for Dewsbury on the part that she played in our deliberations.
I agreed with the comments by the hon. Member for Dewsbury on what was said by my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley (Mr. Waller). I think that, if he examines paragraphs 63(d) and 63(e) of the report--to one of which I have already referred--he will find that we have dealt with the anxieties that he expressed, which are the anxieties that were expressed last November. I think that we have dealt with those anxieties successfully in this code, and that he will find that his mind can be put at ease.
Equally, I must tell my hon. Friend the Member for Eltham that, unless I am misremembering the 25 per cent. rule, which he regards as somehow a slip backwards, it is basically exactly the same rule as already exists. There has been no change in that respect, but there has been a change in the nature of the on-going relationships of the Labour party under what was known as the Hastings agreement. Clearly, that is a matter for the Labour party, not for me.
Our approach has indeed been consensual, because I also agree with the hon. Member for Dewsbury that my hon. Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire, and, to some extent, my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley--had he been here, the same could be said of my hon. Friend the Member for Chislehurst (Sir R. Sims)--expressed reservations about what the House did last year. However, the job of the Committee that I now chair has been to give practical guidance on interpreting and implementing decisions.
I think that the House should now--
Mr. Newton:
No, I shall not give way.
I hope that the whole House will acknowledge the need for us to examine the rules and consider the Committee's work, and agree that we must collectively try to make the rules work to the benefit of the reputation of this place, about which we all care a great deal.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Geoffrey Lofthouse):
I must advise the House that Madam Speaker has placed a 10-minute limit on Back-Bench speeches in this debate.
The Minister for Railways and Roads (Mr. John Watts):
I beg to move,
The TWA has replaced private Bills as the means by which new railways, tramways and certain other works projects are authorised. It gives Parliament a continuing and important role in relation to schemes of national significance by requiring Parliament to consider and vote on the principle of such schemes.
The purpose of this debate is to enable the House to decide whether the Central Railway application should go forward for more detailed consideration at a public inquiry and, possibly, to the eventual making of the order authorising its implementation.
The motion before the House seeks approval of the proposals. I should perhaps explain why the motion is one to approve the project. I considered whether it should be a "take note" motion which could be amended by hon. Members who wished either to amend or oppose it. I concluded that it is only by proposing a motion to approve the project that a conclusive outcome could be assured at the end of a single debate.
If the House rejects the motion, the scheme is effectively dead as the order could not be made. If the House passes the resolution, the project will be considered in another place. Only if the application is approved in both Houses can it proceed to more detailed examination at a public inquiry.
The House will wish to bear it in mind that Parliament's endorsement of the principle of the project would be bound to carry weight with the inquiry inspector in making a recommendation.
Mr. Harry Greenway (Ealing, North):
My intervention will be brief as I realise that it is a short debate. Is not it clear--if not, will my hon. Friend the Minister make it clear--that we cannot adopt the desirable aspects of the project, which include freight coming off the roads and on to rail, which is something that we all want, while at the same time rejecting the awful aspects:
Mr. Watts:
I think that my hon. Friend will find that I deal with that matter a little later in my speech.
As I was saying, endorsement of the principle by the House would weigh with the inquiry inspector and, indeed, might weigh with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State in deciding whether to make the order. It would not necessarily mean that the order would be made. The Secretary of State could still decide, having taken into account the inspector's report, that the application should be turned down. This is no different from the Secretary of State's statutory position under general planning and highways legislation.
I turn now to the specific application before us. Central Railway's objective is to establish an independent railway connecting the midlands, London and the channel tunnel. The proposed alignment is described broadly in the motion. The railway would use standard track gauge but, unlike existing railways in this country, would have greater clearances to enable lorries and double stack containers to be transported.
The main service to be offered would be frequent shuttle trains carrying lorry trailers between freight terminals located near motorway junctions. Central Railway says that the project has been planned to maximise the use of former or existing railway lines. Where new track is necessary, it would be mostly adjoining existing lines.
That this House approves the Third Report of the Committee on Standards and Privileges, House of Commons Paper No. 604, and in particular--
(a) approves the Code of Conduct prepared pursuant to the Resolution of the House of 19th July 1995,
(c) authorises the Committee on Standards and Privileges to make such minor amendments to the Guide to the Rules as appear to it to be justified by experience or necessarily reflect decisions of the House; and to report such amended versions of the Guide to the House.7.20 pm
That this House, pursuant to section 9(4) of the Transport and Works Act 1992, approves the following proposals, contained in an application for an Order submitted under section 6 of that Act by Central Railway plc on 20th May 1996 and entitled The Central Railway Order, for the construction and operation of a railway between Leicester and the Channel Tunnel via Rugby on a dismantled railway alignment to link with the existing Chiltern line through Buckinghamshire to near Olympia in London, from where a new railway would be constructed in a tunnel under the Thames to Streatham, where it would run beside the existing Brighton line to south of Coulsdon, then under the North Downs close to the M23 and then beside the existing railway to Tonbridge, Ashford and Folkestone; and for the construction and use of freight terminal sites at the M1/M6 junction and next to the M25 and M40 in Buckinghamshire.
As this is the first time that the procedure under section 9 of the Transport and Works Act 1992--or TWA for short--has been used, I should perhaps explain briefly some of the background to and purpose of this debate.
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