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Mr. Rhodri Morgan (Cardiff, West): The hon. Gentleman, as hon. Member for Ribble Valley, will be aware of how important defence procurement is in overall public expenditure. His constituency probably receives more public expenditure in defence procurement per head than any other constituency in the western world. He has made himself known for lobbying for more public expenditure for Ribble Valley and for his constituents who work at British Aerospace factories in the Preston area. I think that he will accept those points. Does he
accept that--if we add defence procurement to domestic public expenditure--Wales receives 5.1 per cent. of identifiable UK public expenditure, whereas it has 5.0 per cent. of the population? Will he comment on those figures and relate them to the argument that he has been making?
Mr. Evans: No, because the Barnett formula was created to ensure that there was a needs formula to protect the needs of the Welsh people and the Scottish people. Since the Government's devolution proposals have come to light with the referendums, a can of worms has been opened, and English people and English Members of Parliament are asking why so much money is going to Wales and to Scotland and not to their own areas. Such a debate is bound to ensue. If there is a review of the Barnett formula, we do not know what the outcome might be, because we have no guarantees. We do know, however, that hon. Members will fight hard to ensure that they win as much money as possible for their own areas, based on the needs of those areas.
Mr. Hain: Will the hon. Gentleman confirm that his understanding of the Barnett formula is that it is needs-based? Is that what he is saying?
Mr. Evans: Population is used as a basis of determining need. In Committee, we will ensure that the needs basis will be continued into the future--something of which there is no guarantee. The Secretary of State is not dealing with the matter in the Bill, although he is doing so in the explanatory and financial memorandum--which, as he knows, has no status. One of the fears of the people of Wales is that, if there is a review, there could be a review downwards. What will happen then?
Mr. Hain: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way, and I am sorry to detain the House, but that is sheer gibberish. He does not understand the Barnett formula, and I urge him to study it. As he is talking about needs, I should point out that Wales's GDP is 18 per cent. less than the English average. GDP in south-east England, which he mentioned, is 14 per cent. above the English average. If there were a genuinely needs-based assessment of resource distribution in Great Britain, Wales would do very well in it.
Mr. Evans: I am very pleased that that reassures the Under-Secretary of State for Wales. I assure him that a can of worms has been opened. Has he considered the demands that will be made by the politicians who will be elected to the London assembly? They will demand a big slice of the cake. Whereas Labour and other alliance Members think only of how large their slice of the cake will be, Conservative Members fight to ensure that the cake becomes larger, so that everyone can have a greater slice of it.
Part of Labour Members' problem is their inability to answer the question of what will happen if the RSG settlement is top-sliced. We have 22 local authorities in Wales, and we have already seen--thanks to last week's announcement--a 12 per cent. council tax increase. The people of Wales will look back rather nostalgically at such increases if there is top slicing of the RSG, because the resulting shortage will be made up in only one way--in ever higher council taxes.
I should hate to fail to deal in my speech with the role of the Secretary of State. We already know that the current incumbent of that office moves in mysterious ways, but what will he do after the assembly is established? The Bill states only that he will transfer his powers to the assembly--
Mr. Evans:
Yes, most of his powers.
The Secretary of State will also be able to visit and speak in the assembly. But who will speak for Wales? Will it be the assembly's First Secretary, or will it be the Secretary of State--the First Secretary's secretary? If the new leader of the assembly is Russell Goodway, relations just might be strained. If it were the hon. Member for Blaenau Gwent (Mr. Smith), I predict that there would be some friction. Problems would result also if the position were held by many other people. As the botched job on siting the assembly has shown, embarrassment and stalemate are a likely result.
The House must probe more carefully who will do what in the assembly's operation and ascertain more carefully its relationship with Europe. Matters that are so important that they must receive careful scrutiny include the assembly's visiting rights to important meetings of the Council of Ministers, the Secretary of State's residual powers over money, and the role of the new regional committees.
All we know about the regional committees is that they will be established in north Wales and in other areas. If such a device is supposed to calm the people of north Wales, heaven help them. The south Wales-dominated assembly will draw up the boundaries; it will determine how it is advised by the committee; and it may then ignore that advice. The committees sound like a sop, and Conservative Members will press for greater clarification in Committee.
What about clause 47, which deals in
Conservative Members will be looking for assurances on the £500-million question: what type of loan will it be? Will it be a recipe for the assembly to borrow on the never-never to fund its raison d'etre, buying instant popularity that will disappear in a flash as the bill lands on people's mats? We still hear concerns expressed by businesses in Wales, which are represented by the Confederation of British Industry, the North Wales Business Club and the Federation of Wales Small Businesses.
Another strong aspect of the Union from which people have benefited is the Welsh Development Agency's achievement in attracting inward investment. The fact is that 20 per cent. of all UK inward investment goes to Wales. Will Wales and the battle to channel inward projects through the President of the Board of Trade be disadvantaged by her new concordat? How will we control nationalist fervour for increased regionalisation in the United Kingdom, breaking the bond that unites us?
The assembly's merits will have to be sold to a rightly suspicious and sceptical public. Will the assembly help Welsh farmers in their crisis? No. Will it stop the £1,000 fee for students--which has resulted in an estimated9 per cent. drop in student numbers attending university next year? No. Will the assembly safeguard a single inward investment project, reduce class sizes or put an extra bobby on the beat? No, no and no.
Conservative Members have genuine fears about the experiment, as do three out of four Welsh voters. We have a right to voice our concerns and fears, because, after all, it is our country, too. Britain has become a melting pot, in which the English, Scots, Welsh and Northern Irish live in each other's pocket. Each of us is proud of our culture, but we are respectful of the differences that help to make Britain great. We must resist and fight anything that throws away what we have achieved or damages the cement that bonds us together.
Mr. Ted Rowlands (Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney):
I tell the hon. Member for Ribble Valley (Mr. Evans) that anyone with a sense of the history of this century should be impressed by the amazing role, function and achievements of the Conservative and Unionist party. Because of those achievements, I should have thought that, from that Dispatch Box, the House would have heard expressed a huge amount of humility about the way in which that party has reduced a great institution to the rump it has become over the past 18 years.
The Conservative and Unionist party is no longer a party of the Union. It does not have one seat representing a Welsh or a Scottish constituency. How can it possibly claim still to be the Conservative and Unionist party? The Conservative party--a great traditional unionist party--has managed its affairs in such a way that it has been driven out of two of the three parts of the Union. I should have thought that, if nothing else, there should have come from the hon. Member for Ribble Valley at the Dispatch Box a sense of humility, a degree of modesty and a realisation that, wherever we stand and whatever criticisms we might make of the Bill--I intend to make one or two myself--the Conservatives were totally rejected at the last election in Wales and Scotland.
Mr. Laurence Robertson (Tewkesbury):
In view of the hon. Gentleman's remarks about the Conservatives' lack of representation in Wales and Scotland and our ability to be the party of the Union in those areas, is he saying that the Labour party is the party of the Union in Northern Ireland? If so, which party in Northern Ireland represents its views most closely?
"equality of opportunity for all people"?
It is fine to pay lip service to that goal, but, as our reasoned amendment states, Conservative Members are not satisfied that the assembly will provide an opportunity for all the people of Wales to be properly represented and protected.
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