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Sir Nicholas Winterton (Macclesfield): The Leader of the House, as a Cabinet Minister, chairs an important Select Committee: the Modernisation Committee. I—one of the 49 per cent. of the main Opposition party who are not members of a shadow team—chair the Procedure Committee. Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman will indicate why he believes that that is so.
What thought is the right hon. Gentleman giving to the revised hours of the House, because he is aware that important Select Committees are finding it difficult to meet when the House is not meeting or when important debates are taking place in the Chamber? I refer particularly to the fact that both the Procedure Committee and the Modernisation Committee meet on the same afternoon. Is it not possible to make a better arrangement, whereby hon. Members who are interested in what goes on in the Chamber can also fully participate in the important work of Select Committees?
Mr. Hain: The hon. Gentleman does important work on behalf of the Procedure Committee. I well understand his point and I have it in mind to discuss it with him and other hon. Members.
I cannot understand why the hon. Gentleman is not on the Front Bench, because he is most certainly not one of those whom The Guardian reported as being certifiably insane. On the contrary, he ought to be a rising star in the Conservative party, and his long experience on the Back Benches would add extra weight and extra credibility, which is badly needed on the new Tory Front Bench.
Keith Vaz (Leicester, East): May we have an urgent debate on the availability on the national health service of the Prevenar vaccine, which, as my right hon. Friend
will know, is used to treat pneumococcal meningitis in children? I have been sent details of case of a two-year-old child who died because he did not receive the vaccine, which is readily available in America and Europe, but not in this country. May we have an urgent debate on this matter so that we can put that right?
Mr. Hain: That is obviously a very serious incident, and I understand why my hon. Friend raises it. I am sure that those responsible in the Government will want to take careful account of it, particularly as he raises it on the Floor of the House.
Mr. Adrian Flook (Taunton): The Leader of the House may not be aware of the impending havoc in university admissions that is forecast for October 2005 because of the Government's proposals to introduce top-up fees. Many current year 12 or lower sixth form students who may have been expected to finish their A-levels in June 2005 and take a gap year will not take that gap year, which will create a logjam in October 2005. The Government have written to me saying that they have no plan to introduce any special arrangement to resolve that problem. Does he not think that the House should debate the Government's intransigence on this matter?
Mr. Hain: The Secretary of State for Education and Skills is well aware of the issue that the hon. Gentleman raises, but may I ask whether he supports the policy, advocated by those on the Conservative Front Bench, of depriving up to 100,000 students of the chance to get a university education?
Mr. Hain: The hon. Gentleman does support that policy, so he would deprive many potential students in his and every other constituency of the chance to go to university. That is the issue that he should be concerned about, and he should back the Government's policy of expanding university education and preventing universities from getting into precisely the kind of financial mess that they were in when we inherited our dreadful legacy in 1997.
Jim Knight (South Dorset): The Leader of the House will be aware that Royal Mail announced today that it was back in profit, which is good news, but that is an unfortunate coincidence for me as it coincides with a notice from Royal Mail saying that seven of the 16 post offices in Weymouth are due for closure. Will the Leader of the House agree to allow us to debate the closure of sub-post offices in areas such as mine, especially as it appears that sub-postmasters and sub-postmistresses have already been asked to sign a contract agreeing to the closures even before the consultation has begun? All hon. Members are concerned about the elderly, the infirm and the immobile being able to gain access to local post offices when so many are closing in places such as Weymouth.
Mr. Hain: I very much sympathise with my hon. Friend's expression of concern. If those closures occur
in his constituency, it would undoubtedly be a real problem, not just for him and the House, but for his constituents. As I have said before, there has been a long-term trend under the previous Government and under us of local post offices being unable to survive in today's consumer climate, in which people make different choices. I very much regret that because, for example, in my own village, Resolven in the Neath valley, we have a local post office that is a centre of the community. It is important that as many local post offices as possible survive, and the Government are working to achieve that.
Mr. Andrew Mitchell: Following the disgraceful but not untypical failure of the Prime Minister yesterday to answer questions about the cost of running the Government and the recently published figures that show that the cost of running government has increased by a massive 50 per cent. since 1997, may we have a whole-day debate in Government time that draws on past, as well as present, examples of waste and inefficiencies under Labour Governments?
Mr. Hain: One of the wastes and inefficiencies under this Labour Government has been the huge taxpayer subsidy to the Conservative party. Over the past year, the Conservatives have received more in subsidy than they have raised in private donations. They have received £4 million of taxpayers' support, and have raised £3.5 million from private donations. That is an absolutely outrageous waste of public money, which ought to be addressed.
Mr. Heald: Would you take the Short money?
Mr. Hain: Indeed, I am happy to support that. Political parties in trouble ought to get all the help they can.
On the overall staff figures in the civil service, is the hon. Gentleman saying that, for example, the 4,000 extra staff recruited to tackle the problem of asylum seeking, which the leader of the Conservative party bequeathed to us from his time as Home Secretary—[Hon. Members: "Rubbish."] Asylum policy was a real mess. We have had to recruit more people to combat that problem; as a result, the number of asylum applications is decreasing and the problem is being tackled seriously. Some 3,000 people have been recruited to organise the new deal, which has offered job opportunities to about 800,000 people. Is he saying that those people should be given the sack?
The truth is that we are addressing efficiency in the civil service. As a result of the Lyons review, which we set up, we are also ensuring that 20,000 jobs are shifted from London to the rest of the country—so there is a better opportunity to disperse civil service jobs. The hon. Gentleman should be asking those questions, rather than the spurious ones that he asked.
Mr. Alan Meale (Mansfield): Will the Leader of the House consider allowing time to debate the excellent work done by trading standards officers throughout the length and breadth of Britain, especially as we are approaching the festive season? As part of that debate,
perhaps we might also consider the problem of junk mail, which is already pouring through people's letterboxes all over the United Kingdom.
Mr. Hain: I guess that in the coming months more junk mail will pour through people's letterboxes from the new leader of the Conservative party. I am sure that it will go straight into the bin, along with the rest of the junk mail.
Trading standards officers do a valuable job, and I commend my hon. Friend for drawing the House's attention to that and for allowing us to support the work that they do.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Sylvia Heal): Dr. Julian Brazier.
Mr. Julian Brazier (Canterbury): Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. I am not a doctor, but I am flattered that you should think so.
May I press the Leader of the House for an early debate on the closure of so many local jobcentres? In Kent alone we are faced with the loss of three, including the essential one on Whitstable high street. Those centres are vital to many of the most vulnerable people in our communities—not only youngsters who may otherwise get into trouble but many disabled older people. Will the Leader of the House also look at the disgraceful way in which money is being put into posts for full-time public sector officials to work with the disabled in areas where voluntary organisations such as the Shaw trust are working far more cost-effectively than any public sector body?
Mr. Hain: Obviously, we want a balance between the excellent work of voluntary groups such as the Shaw trust and Government support provided through public subsidy for officials to help take that work forward. Unless this is one of the candidates for the 20 per cent. Conservative cuts—
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