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Lembit Öpik: If the right hon. Gentleman bothered to read our manifesto commitments, he would know that we would invest that money now in the development of those young people, through early years investment and so on. Our criticism—this is a political difference on which voters can decide—is that the child trust fund is a gimmick. We need to invest money now rather than create longer-term trust funds
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that have no bearing on the child's development until they get their hands on the money when they are much older.
Mr. Hain: I am delighted that I have provoked the hon. Gentleman to describe child trust funds as a gimmick. I warn him that we shall make sure that every voter—especially every young family—knows that the Liberal Democrats regard that money, which will go especially to youngsters from low-income backgrounds, as a gimmick. Presumably they regard the doubling of the amount from the public sector at age seven to be a double gimmick.
The point about this innovatory and pioneering policy is that it will enable youngsters to have a combination of public sector money and investment through relatives and parents and to build up an asset during their lives. When they reach 18, even youngsters from deprived backgrounds will have an asset with which to start adult life. It could be a considerable asset by that age. It is interesting that the Liberal Democrats will take that money away from them and deny future generations that opportunity. The measure will help to build savings and wealth for every child in the country. I invite every party here to declare their support for it. I assume that Plaid Cymru and the Conservatives support it.
Mr. Bill Wiggin (Leominster) (Con): No.
Mr. Hain: Ah, here we have another baby-theft operation, from the Conservatives. What about Plaid Cymru. Do they support it?
Mr. Llwyd: We voted for it.
Mr. Hain: Ah, they voted for it. Excellent. So the Opposition are split for once.
Productivity and enterprise will also be promoted. The small firms loan guarantee will be simplified, reducing red tape for businesses and helping 304 firms in Wales. Legislation to remove tax uncertainty for research involving spin-off companies of university and public sector research establishments will potentially benefit the 13 higher education and research institutions in Wales. It is very important that we have the opportunity for even greater synergy between university high-technology research departments and companies that are spun off from them, which go on to become successful enterprises in the wider economy in Wales.
Mr. Jon Owen Jones: Does the money invested in research in Wales depend on maintaining the Department of Trade and Industry, in whose budget most of the research money is provided, or would it be imperilled if the entire DTI budget were to be axed?
Mr. Hain: My hon. Friend, as always, puts his finger on the central point. Opposition parties, and the Liberal Democrats in particular, have some questions to answer. Their policy of abolishing the Department of Trade and Industry would include abolishing its science budget. The Conservatives have made similar promises, if not to abolish the DTI, then to cut it considerably. Under Labour the DTI has been transformed from a Department that was essentially geared to subsidising nationalised industries to one that sponsors innovation at the front line of scientific
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research and technological advance. The Liberal Democrats and the Conservatives seem completely oblivious to its dynamic, enterprising thrust as they plan to demolish or dismantle it.
Mr. Wiggin: The Secretary of State is having a lovely time making up Tory policy. Perhaps he should stick to the Queen's Speech.
Mr. Hain: As the hon. Gentleman invites me to comment on Tory policy, which was not originally in my speech, I invite him to explain to the people of Wales how the £35 billion worth of cuts promised by the shadow Chancellor, which were enthusiastically endorsed by the shadow Cabinet—the hon. Gentleman is not in the shadow Cabinet, but I assume that he backs the policy—would have a devastating impact on Wales. Those cuts would result in massive cuts in the number of nurses, police officers and teachers and would mean that council tax would go sky high. All the innovation and success that has been developed in Wales in nearly eight years of Labour government would be completely swept aside, and we would return to the misery of the Tory years in the 1980s and 1990s.
Mr. Wiggin: I can see that the Secretary of State is deeply worried, but he is wrong to worry because the budget for the Welsh Assembly—the block grant—will not be touched by any changes in funding.
Mr. Hain: A lot of things are not in the Welsh block, such as policing, the Ministry of Defence, which has a lot of work in Wales, transport and the Department of Trade and Industry. It is useful to have all this on the record; is the hon. Gentleman saying that he has a unique exemption for Wales from the shadow Chancellor's £35 billion worth of cuts and that Wales will be completely immune to those cuts?
Mr. Wiggin: The block grant is immune.
Mr. Hain: So, supposing the Tories won a general election next year, to pick a year at random, there would, in the first two years of a Tory Government, be cuts worth £20 billion to £35 billion from which Wales would be exempt, and the spending plans for Wales would continue to rise as set by our Labour Government. Is that right? That is interesting, because the more one looks at the Tory draft Budget and their plans for cuts, the more they fall apart. The more one subjects the plans to scrutiny, the more the Tories run away from them; the shadow Secretary of State has started to sprint away from them in the past few minutes.
The new deal continues to be a success story that helps more than 70,000 people in Wales into work. It is important not to abolish that successful employment programme, as the Liberal Democrats and Conservatives wish to do, but to strengthen and extend it. It is interesting that this Tory-Lib Dem coalition has embarked on a policy to destroy the hopes of lone parents, people with disabilities, people of long-term unemployment, and unemployed youth—a problem that has virtually disappeared under the Labour Government because of the new deal. They want to axe a vital programme that gives much opportunity and hope to people across Britain,
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particularly in Wales where we have such a dreadful history of high unemployment. We will continue to ensure that the new deal helps people to get the dignity and opportunity that work and extra skills can bring.
Adam Price (East Carmarthen and Dinefwr) (PC): There is also a new deal for the self-employed, which we strongly support. Will the Secretary of State comment on the fall in the number of self-employed people in Wales, which is down 27,000 on this time last year? Has he had time to consider what might be the underlying reasons for that significant fall?
Mr. Hain: I will certainly look into it. In recent years, there has been a rise in self-employment and some of the best records across Britain. I need to check the hon. Gentleman's figures—I always need to check his figures, although he is a diligent researcher—but they come against a backdrop of rising employment and still large numbers of vacancies. That is the success story that we have created.
I welcome the announcement by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the roll-out of the pathways to work pilot, which has been hugely successful in the Bridgend-Rhondda-Cynon Taf district, with more than 1,100 people being helped and supported off incapacity benefits and into work. New pilots in Swansea bay, Merthyr Tydfil and Ebbw Vale will build on that success.
The Government have achieved a tremendous amount in Wales in the past seven and a half years: claimant-count unemployment is down 50 per cent., crime is down 30 per cent., and we have more than 800 new police officers, 1,600 new teachers, 350 more doctors, and 5,000 more nurses.
Mr. Wiggin: The right hon. Gentleman is talking about nurses. Can he explain why there are still 500 places awaiting nurses in Wales?
Mr. Hain: We continue to seek to recruit nurses. However, one of the legacies that we faced was a massive cut in training places under the Conservative Government. We have opened more courses and made more provision for nursing training in Wales, but that takes time to feed through. That explains the hon. Gentleman's point. I invite him to keep intervening, because every time he does, he gives me an open goal through which to shoot at the Conservative party's policies.
Objective 1 status has been secured for west Wales and the valleys, and more than £900 million has been committed to 1,250 new projects. We are not complacent. We are determined to tackle the big challenges that Wales still faces: increasing further economic activity rates, regenerating deprived communities, improving vocational and technical skills, radically improving child care, creating sustainable pensions, and guaranteeing security in all our communities However, with record levels of employment, world-class industries, a vibrant cultural and sporting life, improved educational attainment and an outstanding environment, who can say that Wales has not changed for the better in the past seven to eight years?
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Over the coming year, through implementing our extensive legislative programme and following the course set out in the pre-budget report, we will move another step closer to realising our vision of a truly world-class Wales.
10.2 am
Lembit Öpik: I very much enjoyed listening to the Secretary of State creating policy for Opposition parties. He has some experience of Liberal policies, but that was a long time ago. The Liberal Democrats have moved on, and he needs to update his position. Nor am I surprised that he mentions the Liberal Democrats in Wales so often; he must recognise that the primary threat to the continuing governance of the country by the Labour party comes from the Liberal Democrats, and I can forgive him for that. However, the expectations that he generates are rather wide of the mark compared with what we would actually do.
Before I go through the detail of the Secretary of State's speech, I have to say that my hon. Friend the Member for Brecon and Radnorshire (Mr. Williams) sends his apologies for now. He was called into a meeting with Lord Whitty, which it would not have been seemly for him to leave, and he will be with us later.
The Secretary of State raised the spectre of a Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition. He obviously cast his mind back four years to the prediction of a major national newspaper that I would preside over such a coalition in 2023, ably supported by the hon. Member for Mid-Worcestershire (Mr. Luff). However, that is 19 years away. I am not alone in thinking that the true coalition now seems to be between new Labour and old Conservatives. As I look at a legislative programme that focuses on security and opportunity for all, it seems, particularly on security, that there is relatively little between the thinking of the Conservatives and that of the Labour party.
Nevertheless, let me start with the positives. As the right hon. Gentleman said, the Queen's Speech included the Transport (Wales) Bill and the Public Services Ombudsman (Wales) Bill. The latter seeks to merge the local government commissioner, the health service commissioner and the Welsh administration ombudsman into one devolved body, the public services ombudsman. The three posts are already held by one person, but primary legislation is required to formalise that. We support that formalisation; it is a sensible Bill.
Similarly, the Transport (Wales) Bill makes sense. We supported the proposals of the draft Bill and are likely to support much of the Bill that will come before us. Since it was published, the Government have published their own proposals to abolish the Strategic Rail Authority, and we recognise that the final published Bill is bound to reflect that change.
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