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11.42 am

Mr. Nigel Waterson (Eastbourne): I am delighted to have the opportunity to participate in this timely debate--as we heard earlier, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry is leaving this very day for Singapore and the World Trade Organisation summit.

Like other hon. Members, I was amused by the hon. Member for Middlesbrough (Mr. Bell) brandishing the Conservative research department's brief on trade and inward investment. Such briefs from both main parties have an alarming habit of getting into the public domain. I hope that, instead of simply brandishing the document at the Dispatch Box, the hon. Gentleman will have the opportunity to read it, as he clearly has not done so. Had he read the document, his speech would have reflected some of the pearls of wisdom embedded in it. Perhaps on his way back to Middlesbrough he will manage to read it.

I have been glancing through the document and have to say that it is excellent. No Conservative Member should feel at all abashed about reiterating some of the points, statistics and quotations to be found in it. It sets out the Government's success in the sphere of trade and inward investment. Before I move on, I should like to spare a thought and some sympathy for the poor Labour

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researcher who might have sat down earlier this week, looking at an empty computer screen with the unenviable task of drafting the Labour party's brief for this debate. Sadly, that document has not found its way into my hands--perhaps it never appeared at all. In any event, I have great sympathy for the Labour researcher faced with that Herculean task.

We are debating a great British success story--trade and inward investment. Britain is nothing if not a trading nation. That has been true throughout our history. We are the fifth largest importer and exporter of goods and services in the entire world. Especially under the Conservative Government, Britain has been firmly committed to free trade. The aim is global free trade by 2020. The WTO summit in Singapore will be an opportunity to give the process a welcome boost. We wish my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State all the very best and every success in his endeavours in Singapore.

British industry and British business have proved time and again that, given a clear run and less interference from Government, they can compete with anyone anywhere in the world. Much of today's debate has rightly turned on the fact that a Labour Government would fetter and obstruct the ability of our business men and women to compete in world markets.

On inward investment, I want to read out one quotation that sums up our position. It is from Kumar Bhattacharyya--I hope that I am pronouncing his name correctly and do it justice--who is professor of manufacturing systems at Warwick university. [Interruption.] I hope that hon. Members will listen because it is a quotation from a dispassionate academic commentator on Britain's economic success. In what is colourful language for an academic, he says:

"Britain is becoming Europe's Pacific Rim. The industrial-relations framework, the cultural and linguistic environment, economic deregulation, and political stability have changed the face of British manufacturing".

Mr. MacShane: Would the hon. Gentleman cite the present Conservative party as an example of political stability?

Mr. Waterson: I assure the hon. Gentleman that I expect this party to be in power not only after the next election, but in 2020, so that we can usher in the millennium of global free trade, which, I am sure, we all heartily desire. I may not be here to see it with him--although Sir Charles Taylor, one of my esteemed predecessors, represented Eastbourne for 39 years, I do not expect to serve quite so long. By 2020 a successor will possibly have taken my place but will, I hope, be making a similar speech from the Government Benches.

I shall reiterate one or two of the statistics mentioned by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State. Britain attracts one third of all inward investment in the European Union and more than 50 per cent. of Korean and Taiwanese investment. Those statistics deserve repetition--

Mrs. Barbara Roche (Hornsey and Wood Green): They certainly do.

Mr. Waterson: Let us consider some recent inward investment successes. We have already heard some of

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them and far more of them than I would be permitted to recite now are set out in the brief. We have heard about the LG Newport project, which will create 6,100 jobs as a result of £1.7 billion investment. That is amazing investment in the production of semiconductors. The Jaguar project at Castle Bromwich will create up to 1,300 new jobs. We have already heard about Honda in Swindon, where £330 million has been invested in a car plant--[Interruption.]

Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. Hon. Members making sedentary comments, which, as I have already made known, I deplore, may find it rather difficult to catch my eye when they want to make a speech.

Mr. Tim Smith: On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. As reference has been made to the excellent document on trade and inward investment, published by the Conservative research department, would it be possible, for the benefit of hon. Members who are not present, to have the entire text printed in Hansard as an appendix to the debate?

Madam Deputy Speaker: The hon. Gentleman well knows that that is not a point of order. Nor can it be carried out.

Mr. Waterson: I endorse the sentiments of my hon. Friend's remarks. It would certainly be of enormous assistance if in future such briefs were made available not only to my hon. Friends but to Opposition Members. If the Opposition have a brief at all, it is clearly a pretty inadequate document.

I was referring to Honda, and I should like to cite one final example. IBM in Winchester is expecting to create 1,200 new jobs. Such developments are exciting. I notice that when those announcements are made, Opposition Members are very quick to go on the media to take their share of the glory for such successes. That seems particularly hypocritical when one considers what effects their policies would have on such trade and inward investment were they ever to have any control over the running of it.

The effect that a national minimum wage would have on hotels and the tourism industry is a particular concern in my constituency. We have already heard a great deal about the reasons why business men from the far east, France and elsewhere are deciding to move manufacturing and other operations to the United Kingdom. The Opposition are rightly defensive on the subject. They are certainly very unwilling to give us a firm commitment on a figure for a national minimum wage.

The crucial point about the social chapter, which is often misrepresented by Opposition Members, is that decisions can be made to extend its effect by qualified majority voting. That is extremely important, especially to business men who might be considering inward investment in this country.

One of the issues that the right hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook) has raised in recent speeches is what he calls the European social model. It appears to mean intervention, but we might hear a little more about what it means in the winding-up speech of the hon. Member for Hornsey and Wood Green (Mrs. Roche). It seems to mean interference in the freedom of

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companies to operate in this country and elsewhere and the introduction of that social dimension into the WTO, for example, as the hon. Member for Middlesbrough clearly spelled out earlier--all credit to him for doing so.

Opposition Members do not seem to realise that precisely such burdens add non-wage costs to the costs of employing people in places such as Germany and elsewhere, and are forcing companies to relocate across national borders. At the moment, we are a major beneficiary of that process, precisely because we reject the social chapter and such interference. That is rightly why the Government take such a strong line on the working time directive.

The conclusion of the White Paper, "Free Trade and Foreign Policy: a Global Vision", under the heading "Raising the United Kingdom's Game", describes how competitiveness depends on many factors. To pick just one, the document's penultimate paragraph says:

"education, learning and the right skills are a key part of the process."

I think that hon. Members on both sides of the House will agree with that. The White Paper continues:

"Government and business share a responsibility with individuals to ensure that education and training equal the best anywhere."

Anyone who has been to places such as Singapore will know of the extremely impressive level of training and education that applies in the far east.

Only the other day, I was privileged to be present in my constituency at the launching of the Bell project. It is a partnership for lifelong learning between Bishop Bell school, Langney county primary school and Eastbourne college of arts and technology. Working with local business, they will provide a seamless educational experience almost from cradle to grave for people in my constituency. Such a process is extremely important and I shall be writing to my colleagues in the Department for Education and Employment about it. It encourages the skills and education that will make this country at least as competitive in the future as it is now.

I refer now to how inward investment affects my constituency. Contrary to popular belief, Eastbourne has a thriving light industrial and service industry sector. We are constantly looking to attract new companies, whether from abroad or otherwise. There are some major world-beating companies in my constituency--Anglo-Dutch Meats, Nobo, Goldwell and Edwards High Vacuum, to name but a few. The latter in particular is very successful at exporting to Japan. I know that those companies are all looking for a lead from the Government and the sort of encouragement that we heard from my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and will hear from my hon. Friend the Minister for Small Business, Industry and Energy later.

I should like to make a particular plea on transport infrastructure. It is no good at all having everything else in place--the lack of a social chapter, no minimum wage, and so on--without being able to say to companies that they can easily get raw materials into their plants and get finished products out again. We have a major problem in Sussex with a lack of decent roads. I have raised the matter with my hon. Friends in the Department of Transport and hope that my hon. Friend the Minister will take the point away from this debate.

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This debate really concerns whether one is to continue with success, which is encouraged and supported by the Government, who are firmly and genuinely committed to free trade and do not just pay lip service to it like Opposition Members, or whether one looks to the Labour party, which is obviously committed to introducing new social burdens on employers, which would increase unemployment and undermine competitiveness. At the end of the day, it is a matter of new Labour, new burdens on business.

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