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4.16 pm
Mr. Richard Livsey (Brecon and Radnorshire): This St. David's day is at the dawn of a new century. I believe that it is a good time for Wales and a good time to be Welsh. Wales has a higher and more respected profile in spite of the down side in the press and the media. However, that does not apply to London taxi drivers. Yesterday, when I was discussing St. David's day with a taxi driver, I told him that I had seen daffodils in Gwent yesterday morning. He did not believe me and said, "No. You have to put your daffodil in a pot and keep it in a warm place to get it to flower on 1 March." I replied, "I am very sorry, but I saw them two hours ago." He still did not believe me. There is obviously a big gap in perception between London and Wales.
There are great problems in urban and rural Wales. The question is what we can do about them here in Westminster and whether we have the right legislature in the Assembly to conquer urban and rural deprivation in Wales. Although I did not agree with much of what the hon. Member for Rhondda (Mr. Rogers) said, he pinpointed many current difficulties.
The rural-urban divide is a big problem in Wales. I am sure that many right hon. and hon. Members will have read in today's Western Mail an article by Rhodri Clark about rural Wales being left in the cold. I believe that it should be compulsory reading for Ministers.
The rural areas need to be reconnected with the rest of Wales. As they have fewer parliamentary seats because of their sparse population, urban representatives dominate in the Welsh Assembly and here in Westminster.
Since the 1960s, under Governments of both colours, the county of Powys has lost most of its transport infrastructure, including a huge amount of its railway infrastructure, its health authority, its ambulance service, three county councils, its police service base, its fire service and the Development Board for Rural Wales; and it is about to lose its probation service. That has resulted in a huge loss of decision making within our communities and a huge watering down of services. I would not advise anyone to travel at night in Powys, as, should they be unfortunate enough to have an accident on the road, an ambulance could not be guaranteed to arrive within the
statutory response times in the hours between 12 midnight and 8 am. Five years ago, it was guaranteed that one would be picked up by emergency services within that time. There has been a serious decline in those services.
As hon. Members have said, there is a catastrophic crisis in farming. In the previous financial year, many farmers in my constituency earned 39p an hour. Currently, some of them are making no money whatsoever. Although I realise that that is a consequence of global markets and the pound's strength, something has to be done about it.
We have, thankfully, been successful in saving our community hospitals, owing largely to a massive campaign and a sympathetic decision--for which we are very grateful--by the previous Secretary of State for Wales, the right hon. Member for Cardiff, South and Penarth (Mr. Michael).
In my constituency alone, in the past 30 years, 30 rural schools have been closed. We have also had to run campaigns to prevent bank branches and post offices from closing. From all that, hon. Members will perhaps appreciate why we have had to fight a type of guerrilla warfare--against the big battalions of Government, bureaucracy and multinational companies. We now face the threat of at least half our rural post offices being closed because pensions and benefits will be paid directly into bank accounts. However, many poor rural people do not have bank accounts.
Mr. Wigley:
Does the hon. Gentleman accept that there is a crying need for greater resources for the health service and rural schools? Does not that need--with a Budget in two weeks--underline the need to ensure that we maintain current taxation levels, so that resources are available rather than given away in tax bribes?
Mr. Livsey:
I entirely agree with the right hon. Gentleman. The Liberal Democrats' policy is certainly not to cut tax by 1p, as will happen in the next Budget, but to spend that money on the national health service.
An announcement was made only yesterday on additional charges for using bank cash dispensers. However, in many parts of my constituency, there is only one bank's cash dispenser within a 20-mile radius. The decision to increase the charge might seem rational to someone at the bank's headquarters, in Cardiff or Birmingham, but it will spell disaster for local rural communities.
Our farming community, and what little manufacturing industry we have remaining, is threatened by global economics. Massive job losses are occurring in both sectors. We pay up to 5p a litre more for petrol and diesel. Although we have received a little money from central Government for rural bus services, those services range from few and far between to non-existent. New technology could provide some of the solutions, but some of the new technology infrastructure is inadequate and not up to modern standards.
A consequence of the massive decline in farming is that many of our young people have had to emigrate to find decent jobs. Those young people are replaced by others who come to our area to retire. Although it is not the retirees' fault that a consequence of the prices that they pay for houses is to put the local housing market out of
reach of our younger people, or that they put additional strains on social services and the NHS--I do not criticise them personally; I welcome them--that is still the consequence.
There is much that we can and will do to reverse the downward trend, but it cannot be tackled properly unless the whole of Wales is properly unified, with a far greater sense of purpose and leadership than has to date been displayed. The main vehicle for regeneration will undoubtedly come from the National Assembly for Wales and from more enlightened legislation from Westminster, combined with the vital input initiated by the European Union.
The decline of the south Wales valleys has been devastating. I am privileged to represent communities in a part of the upper Swansea valley--an old industrial area containing some of the finest people whom one could ever wish to meet. They have an immense community spirit. Recently, however, global economics has overtaken them.
Lucas SEI, for example, closed because of the uncompetitive pound and rock-bottom wage rates in Poland. The whole operation was spirited away by the multinational company to eastern Europe. We have been left to pick up the pieces, and we are fighting back. The Amman and Tawe Valley Partnership, the Welsh Development Agency and other agencies, with the local elected hon. Members, are doing their best, and we have managed to get a new employer into the Lucas factory. Currently, however, it is employing only one tenth of the previous number of employees.
Every valley, especially in the coalfield areas, has declined. One has only to visit those areas to see the devastation that has been created largely by 18 years of Tory rule, but which is not being helped by the Labour Government's adherence to a far too strong pound and their current refusal to enter the euro zone. Now, the problem for Wales is that the type of decline that the valleys has experienced is rapidly being mirrored in rural Wales, especially in the decline in farming.
The plight of farmers is really terrible. Previously, Wales's Labour party leaders spent much time addressing the issue of the unity of urban and rural Wales. It is time that we again addressed that issue. The interests of Wales, whether urban or rural, should be considered as one entity. However, if we are to address many of those issues, we shall have to make the National Assembly more effective.
It was not surprising to learn that, yesterday--even on St. David's day--the National Assembly was impotent to take decisions on even relatively small adjustments to secondary legislation. The matter began initially with--I think correct--statements that Wales should be a GM-free area. However, because of legal advice, the Assembly could not proceed as directly in achieving that objective as it should have liked to do.
We also learned yesterday that amendments to proposals for performance-related pay and conditions for teachers may not be within the Assembly's province, and that the Assembly's decision on the matter may be pre-empted, at Westminster, by the Secretary of State for Education and Employment. I do not know whether that is true, but it is what is alleged.
I well remember speaking on Third Reading of the Government of Wales Act 1998, and saying that although establishment of the Assembly was an excellent achievement, the nature of the Act would greatly test the
new Assembly Members. I said then that the Assembly would be known for what it could not do rather than for what it could do for Wales, and that that would be a very frustrating experience for all those who were involved. It gives me no pleasure now to acknowledge that my prediction has been proved true sooner than I had expected.
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