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3 Apr 2003 : Column 1127—continued
Mr. Adrian Flook (Taunton): I have been listening closely to my hon. Friend's contribution. He has mentioned the Liberal Democrats in Southend, and particularly the leader of the Liberal Democrats. Will he tell the House which way the Liberal Democrat leader might have been inclined to vote had he been at the committee meeting where he was not allowed to be?
Mr. Amess: I suspect that he had not been anticipating that the matter would come before the council before the local elections. I anticipate that because all the other councils were keeping their mouths shut, there would have been a whisper during the election campaign that the Conservatives were in favour of St. Lawrence church being demolished. Of course, he has been caught out.
Mr. Bercow : Far be it from me to diminish or trivialise the significance of the important point that my hon. Friend has just made. May I put it to my hon. Friend
through you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, that serious though it is if a Liberal Democrat councillor gets caught out, the House should be conscious that in some areas, including the Aylesbury Vale district council area, the Liberals appear to have failed even to find candidates to contest seats in a matter of a week's time?
Mr. Amess: I am being tempted in this season of good will as we move to the Easter recess to go in for Liberal bashing. Much as my hon. Friends tempt me, I am content for Hansard to be the true record of the points that we have shared. I hope that the Minister, in spite of what he has heard already, with which I entirely agree, will have a word with the Civil Aviation Authority to reconsider its decision in as much as St. Lawrence church will stay where it is. At the same time, we still want Southend airport to operate.
I do not know whether my hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point pinched my speech, but he mentioned pharmacists. My next two points are about pharmacists and post offices. Almost every Member is now rising at the end of our proceedings to present petitions on these two issues, and I am no exception in that. The petition that I have presented talks about the Office of Fair Trading having recommended the Government proposals that would allow unrestricted opening of pharmacies able to dispense NHS prescriptions. It tells its customers that these proposals, if accepted, would mean that many local pharmacists would struggle to survive and that the services that pharmacies currently offer would be at risk. Worse still, they might go out of business.
Pharmacists point out also that instead of prescriptions being a walk away as they may be now, often local residents would have to get their prescriptions dispensed at a supermarket pharmacy at an out-of-town shopping centre.
I am a member of the Health Select Committee. I suppose that this is a jibe at the Minister, but the new arrangements for the times that we sit and conduct ourselves in the House are clearly not working. They are an absolute disaster. I know that the Minister is one of the greatest enthusiasts of the new arrangements, but I must tell him that many of his hon. Friends who called themselves modernisers are quietly saying, "What a disaster this is. Can we do something about it?" By stealth, we are already doing something about it on Wednesdays because we certainly no longer sit until 7 pm. However, we need to do something about sitting times on Tuesdays.
This morning, I was chairing a Standing Committee. At the same time, I wanted to be present at the Health Select Committee, which was taking evidence on the Office of Fair Trading report into the control of entry regulations and retail pharmacy services in the United Kingdom. To me, that was an important matter. There were expert witnesses from the OFT and independent pharmacists. There was even a representative of ASDA. Given the new sitting arrangements, it is impossible for me to chair a Standing Committee and attend a meeting of the Health Select Committee to do the job that I very much want to do. I enjoy being on the Health Select Committee.
There are many other examples of modernisation not working. It is not a case of Members of Parliament being lazy—it is simply that the new arrangements mean,
particularly for the Opposition, who are depleted in numbers, that we are unable to fulfil our duties, serve on Committee or attend meetings. I hope that in his winding-up speech the Minister will tell us whether there are any plans for the House to have another vote on the matter. I know that the issue is sensitive because the right hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook), who was keen on the proposals, is no longer Leader of the House. However, I assure the Minister that many of his colleagues believe that the changes have been a disaster.
Bob Spink: Does my hon. Friend think that the Minister should consider bringing forward the review of our hours from the end of the Parliament to the end of this Session because many Members are starting to demand that?
Mr. Amess: I am told that the only way that we can get the Government to have a rethink is to get an early-day motion signed by Members of Parliament who were in favour of the changes but are not any more. I do not know how brave and bold these modernising Members of Parliament are, but I hope that the Minister will take seriously the examples that I have just shared with the House which demonstrate that there is a frequent clash in our duties.
As for local pharmacists, the Government, we are told, intend to respond or give us an idea of what they will do in July, but the issue is causing great upset, particularly to my constituents. Out of 659 constituencies, my constituency ranks 30th in the number of senior citizens. I go to 100th birthday celebrations practically every day, and one lady in my constituency who is nearly 110 lives in her bungalow on her own. If you want a long life come and live in Southend. The local pharmacist is fundamental to my senior citizens' way of life. In the same breath, I want to express concern about what is happening to our post offices. Hon. Members will have been invited to a reception this afternoon organised by the Communication Workers Union, who have told us:
- "the Government has taken the decision to pay pension and benefit payments directly into bank accounts rather than recipients collecting cash at the Post Office. The consequences of the public moving over to the Banking system and transacting their business elsewhere could result in up to 40 per cent. of Post Office business"—
- "being lost. This in turn could have serious consequences for our members' jobs and livelihoods. However it is still possible for benefit and pension recipients to collect their cash at the Post Office via the Post Office Card Account."
I represent an urban area and am disturbed by what is happening to our post offices. According to the House of Commons Library, there are 19 urban post offices in my constituency. I have already received letters telling me that three of them are going to close. I know that this is a modernising Government, but I am sick to death of the term "modernising". I represent an awful lot of senior citizens, and they do not really want to be modernised—they like toddling down to the post office, having a conversation and collecting their money. The Government may say, "For goodness' sake, the last thing that you want to do is carry cash around with
you," but that is a condemnation of their policies on law and order. There is no doubt that the closure of urban post offices is worrying a huge number of our constituents, and I hope that the Government will rethink the issue.My next point relates to single-handed GPs. I hope to catch your eye, Mr. Deputy Speaker, to present a petition on the matter. Our local newspaper, the Leigh Times, recently published a comment column headed, "GP vacancies is dismal news for Southend". It stated that
- "a recent British Medical Association (BMA) survey showed that 10.42 per cent. of the GP vacancies in Southend had been vacant for three months . . . In only five other areas was the vacancy rates higher."
- "The survey showed, though, that vacancy rates among British GPs are rapidly increasing—which means that the remaining GPs are struggling to cope with the needs of well over a million extra patients."
I note that my hon. Friend the Member for Rutland and Melton (Mr. Duncan) had an exchange with the Prime Minister on 3 July last year, in which the Prime Minister said:
- "There has been a move over time away from single-handed practices so as to improve the quality of care that people receive."—[Official Report, 3 July 2002; Vol. 388, c. 219.]
The House will be relieved to know that I have only two final points to gabble through. I have been inundated recently with letters from constituents about their financial affairs. They are not writing to tell me that they have so much money that they would like to give me some of it. They are writing to tell me that their investments are not giving them a wonderful return. A couple who invested with Aberdeen Asset Managers Ltd., said that when the company claimed that the returns were so high, they would normally have been suspicious and not touched the organisation with a barge pole. They go on to say:
- "However, at the time Aberdeen were considered to be one of the most reputable of the Investment Management Companies."
Then there is the dreadful situation of Equitable Life, which so many hon. Members have mentioned in the House. I have one pensioner who writes:
- "I am an Equitable Life pensioner and am horrified at the way the affairs of this society have been handled over the years, with the result that my pension is continually decreasing."
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