The
Committee consisted of the following
Members:
Chairman:
Mr.
Martin Caton
†
Ainger,
Nick
(Carmarthen, West and South Pembrokeshire)
(Lab)
†
Baron,
Mr. John
(Billericay)
(Con)
Brennan,
Kevin
(Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Children, Schools
and
Families)
Bryant,
Chris
(Rhondda)
(Lab)
†
Clwyd,
Ann
(Cynon Valley)
(Lab)
†
Crabb,
Mr. Stephen
(Preseli Pembrokeshire)
(Con)
†
David,
Mr. Wayne
(Caerphilly)
(Lab)
Davies,
Mr. Dai
(Blaenau Gwent)
(Ind)
†
Davies,
David T.C.
(Monmouth)
(Con)
Flynn,
Paul
(Newport, West)
(Lab)
†
Francis,
Dr. Hywel
(Aberavon)
(Lab)
†
Gillan,
Mrs. Cheryl
(Chesham and Amersham)
(Con)
†
Griffith,
Nia
(Llanelli) (Lab)
†
Hain,
Mr. Peter
(Secretary of State for Work and
Pensions)
Hanson,
Mr. David
(Minister of State, Ministry of
Justice)
†
Havard,
Mr. Dai
(Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney)
(Lab)
Howells,
Dr. Kim
(Minister for the Middle
East)
†
Irranca-Davies,
Huw
(Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for
Wales)
James,
Mrs. Siân C.
(Swansea, East)
(Lab)
†
Jones,
Mr. David
(Clwyd, West)
(Con)
†
Llwyd,
Mr. Elfyn
(Meirionnydd Nant Conwy)
(PC)
†
Lucas,
Ian
(Wrexham)
(Lab)
Michael,
Alun
(Cardiff, South and Penarth)
(Lab/Co-op)
Moon,
Mrs. Madeleine
(Bridgend)
(Lab)
†
Morden,
Jessica
(Newport, East)
(Lab)
†
Morgan,
Julie
(Cardiff, North)
(Lab)
†
Murphy,
Mr. Paul
(Torfaen)
(Lab)
†
Öpik,
Lembit
(Montgomeryshire)
(LD)
†
Owen,
Albert
(Ynys Môn)
(Lab)
†
Price,
Adam
(Carmarthen, East and Dinefwr)
(PC)
†
Ruane,
Chris
(Vale of Clwyd)
(Lab)
Smith,
John
(Vale of Glamorgan)
(Lab)
†
Tami,
Mark
(Alyn and Deeside)
(Lab)
†
Touhig,
Mr. Don
(Islwyn)
(Lab/Co-op)
Williams,
Mr. Alan
(Swansea, West)
(Lab)
Williams,
Mrs. Betty
(Conwy)
(Lab)
†
Williams,
Hywel
(Caernarfon)
(PC)
†
Williams,
Mark
(Ceredigion)
(LD)
†
Williams,
Mr. Roger
(Brecon and Radnorshire)
(LD)
Willott,
Jenny
(Cardiff, Central)
(LD)
John Benger, Committee
Clerk
† attended the
Committee
Welsh
Grand
Committee
Wednesday 12
December
2007
(Morning)
[Mr.
Martin Caton
in the
Chair]
Government’s Legislative Programme
9
am
The
Chairman:
It might be helpful if I remind hon. Members
about the timing of our sittings. We have from now until 11.25 am. We
meet again at 2 o’clock and the debate on the motion will
continue until 4 pm.
Mrs.
Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham)
(Con): On a point of order, Mr. Caton. I seek
clarification. Last time we debated the Gracious Speech in the Welsh
Grand Committee, we had the opportunity to pose questions at the
beginning of the sitting. Why has the procedure changed so that we do
not have an opportunity to ask questions at the beginning of the
sitting?
The
Chairman:
It is certainly true that we have had questions.
We have even held Adjournment debates in Welsh Grand Committees. It is
not a matter for the Chair. I do not know whether the Secretary of
State has any comment to make. I assumed that matters had been arranged
through the usual channels. I shall certainly investigate if that would
be
helpful.
9.1
am
The
Secretary of State for Wales (Mr. Peter Hain):
I beg to move,
That
the Committee has considered the matter of the Government’s
Legislative Programme as outlined in the Queen’s Speech as it
relates to Wales and Public Expenditure in
Wales.
As for the
point of order, I understand that such matters are resolved usually
through the usual channels. It is open to the hon. Lady to advance any
particular proposition that she wishes. Sometimes there have been
questions; sometimes there have been Adjournment debates. Mostly, there
have not, but we are pretty relaxed about
it.
It is a pleasure
to serve under your chairmanship again, Mr. Caton. With the
help of the Queen’s Speech and the comprehensive spending
review, Wales is moving forward with confidence. The legislative powers
delivered in the Government of Wales Act 2006 are being put into action
with the Welsh Assembly Government able to progress policy more widely
and deeply than ever before. Against the backdrop of a flourishing
Welsh economy, political culture and identity, devolution is
strengthening the partnerships that bind the nations of the United
Kingdom.
The energies
of both Governments and legislatures in Westminster and Cardiff are now
focused on ensuring that the 2006 Act works as intended, to deliver
power to the Welsh Assembly and to broaden legislative authority where
appropriate on an incremental basis with each bid subject to
parliamentary approval. Both the Order in Council and framework power
processes are guided by those principles, and both are already
delivering.
In the
forthcoming Session, three Bills will contain new framework powers. The
Education and Skills Bill will transfer power to enable the Assembly to
regulate the inspection of education and training for those aged 16 and
under, and regulate and register the inspection of independent schools
in Wales. The Local Transport Bill supports the Government’s
strategy to tackle congestion and improve public transport, and the
framework power will allow the Assembly to legislate on road pricing in
explicitly limited circumstances. The Planning Bill will modernise and
improve the planning
system.
Mrs.
Gillan:
Can the Secretary of State tell me where in clause
109 of the Local Transport Bill there is an explicit limitation on the
powers to which he
referred?
Mr.
Hain:
I shall explain the purpose of the Bill and its
provisions to the hon. Lady. It provides a limited power for the Welsh
Assembly Government to impose limited congestion charges in relation
only to trunk roads. That does not imply a nationwide tolling system,
as she suggested at questions the other Wednesday. As I have said, if
the Welsh Assembly Government decide to proceed with the M4 relief
road, as it should given the congestion around the Brynglas tunnel and
the fact that the M4 from the Severn bridge is sometimes a moving car
park, I think that it should be given that power. That is a typical
example of how such a power would be used. I do not understand why she
is being so uppity about
matters.
Mrs.
Gillan:
I am not sure that I can be uppity, given my
current dose of flu, but I am grateful for the right hon.
Gentleman’s support for my interventions. I fail to see how he
can make such assertions. Obviously, he has not read clause 109. It
gives a general power to raise charges over all trunk roads in Wales.
It further hypothecates any money that is raised from those charges
specifically to transport matters. It does not refine or keep itself to
one limited scheme. Indeed, it creates a vehicle whereby a nationwide
road charging scheme could be introduced by the Welsh Assembly and
whereby that money could be put into ministerial cars, freeing up other
parts of the settlement.
Does the Secretary of State
truly believe what he is saying to me? Could he look at the clause and
arrange for it to be amended before it reaches the
House?
Mr.
Hain:
No, I will not arrange for that to be amended before
it reaches the House because this is an agreed policy between the two
Governments. There she is, at it again, seeking to undermine the
principle of devolution. That policy will allow the Assembly to tackle
congestion within Wales as it chooses, and to give businesses and
motorists in general the opportunity to travel more freely. It will
enable the Assembly, should it so choose—it is a matter for the
Assembly, not for us—to impose charges in respect of the M4
relief road. Does the hon. Lady support the relief road or not? Where
would she get the funding for it if she did support
it?
Chris
Ruane (Vale of Clwyd) (Lab): My right hon. Friend gives an
example from south Wales of the importance of tackling congestion. Can
I give an example from north Wales? The fastest growing area of the
country is between England and Wales: it is the Deeside hub. One of the
biggest barriers to future growth in that area is public transport. The
ring roads and roundabouts there are clogged, so we need public
transport
solutions.
Mr.
Hain:
I agree with my hon. Friend. I have sometimes found
myself stuck in traffic when going about ministerial business visiting
his constituency on precisely that stretch of the road. There are
serious problems there, yet the funding available is limited. The M6
toll has proved to be a huge success. It may be that the issue could be
addressed in the way that he has suggested. All we are doing is freeing
up the opportunity for the Welsh Assembly Government to pick up if they
decide that it is in the interests of the people of
Wales.
Lembit
Öpik (Montgomeryshire) (LD): If the Secretary of
State does get stuck in future, he can give me a call and I will fix
him up with an aircraft—I declare an interest.
We have heard about south Wales
and north Wales. The Secretary of State will be aware that there is a
strong case for improving road links, east and west, in mid-Wales too.
Is he cognisant of the case to create a semi-dual carriageway between
Shrewsbury and Aberystwyth to improve access to that part of the
country? There is no need for a dual carriageway all the way along but
some passing places would speed things up. Is he aware of the
frustrations that many of us feel about the further delays in
consideration of the Newtown bypass to achieve something like
that?
Mr.
Hain:
I welcome the hon. Gentleman’s support for
the position that the Government are taking, which is to allow the
Welsh Assembly Government to determine what is in the best interest of
Wales, including the areas of his constituency with which he is
concerned. I am well aware of the problems around Newtown and
elsewhere.
With
regard to flying, in a weak moment, I agreed to be flown in the hon.
Gentleman’s plane and it was very pleasurable. I do not wish to
libel her, but as I recall, the hon. Member for Cardiff, Central was
then working for the hon. Gentleman and she even supplied me with a
little whiskey from a cabin that he had in the plane. I made sure that
she did not give him any, or his flying would have been even
worse.
Mr.
Elfyn Llwyd (Meirionnydd Nant Conwy) (PC): I do not want
to interfere with this particular bit of Christmas bonhomie, but I
would caution the right hon. Gentleman against using a semi-dual
carriageway.
Mr.
Hain:
I would caution myself and agree with the hon.
Gentleman on that point.
The Local
Transport Bill supports the Government strategy to tackle congestion,
which is serious in various parts of Wales, and to improve public
transport. The framework power will allow the Assembly to legislate in
relation to road pricing in explicitly limited circumstances.
The Planning Bill will modernise
and improve the planning system, cutting down bureaucratic and lengthy
delays in the system. The Assembly will be given increased power over
local development plans and the Wales spatial
plan.
The additional
learning needs Order in Council has already been
before the Welsh Affairs and Lords Constitution Committees for
pre-legislative scrutiny, and the domiciliary care order has been
published for pre-legislative scrutiny by both Parliament and the
Assembly. Constructive negotiations are ongoing regarding orders on
environmental protection, vulnerable children, affordable housing and
the Welsh
language.
Mr.
Roger Williams (Brecon and Radnorshire) (LD): This is
quite a simple question. How long does the Secretary of State think the
first legislative competence order will take to come through this place
and be put into legislation in the
Assembly?
Mr.
Hain:
I cannot speak about how long it will take for that
to happen in the Assembly because it is a matter for the
Assembly’s business priorities as to when measures can be
enacted off the back of the order, once it has been cleared by
Parliament. If he is asking when the additional learning needs order
will be passed by Parliament, I think it will, ideally, be through in a
couple of months, certainly by spring. There is every prospect that the
domiciliary care order will be in a similar position.
As for the other orders,
discussions are continuing. We need to bear it in mind that that
process started rather later than it would have ideally in the cycle,
because we did not have an operating Welsh Assembly Government until
August, when a lot of people were on holiday. The drafting of those
orders, although they were pre-announced by the First Minister in May
or June has been slower in the cycle, at both ends, than it normally
would have been, but we are making a lot of a lot more progress already
than we would have done under the old
system.
Hywel
Williams (Caernarfon) (PC): Would the Secretary of State
like to comment on the apparent mismatch in timing between the
activities of the Assembly, with respect to LCOs, and the cycle of work
that the Welsh Affairs Committee
has?
Mr.
Hain:
I was going to come on to that point. I think that
the two Committees are looking at how best they can operate in a
sensible and productive fashion. I know that they have taken evidence
together, for example, on primary legislation. It may be that that is
what they want to do in future. That is not a matter for
me.
Apart from the
Conservatives, although I do not want to provoke the hon. Member for
Chesham and Amersham, given my sympathy for her predicament this
morning—
Mrs.
Gillan:
I have a
cold.
Mr.
Hain:
She has a cold—I was not
suggesting anything else. I was referring to the general predicament of
any Welsh spokesperson for the Conservative party, which is a very dire
one in any case but made worse by the cold. Apart from the
Conservatives, who have objected
in principle to those orders, both in the Select Committee and in other
forums in Parliament, everybody has agreed that we are making progress
in a sensible fashion, although we are all on a learning
curve.
Mrs.
Gillan:
I have to say that I really do not need the right
hon. Gentleman’s tea and sympathy at all. I
remind him that, in the Assembly elections, the
Conservative party polled the second largest number of votes in Wales,
and that we moved forward, while his party moved backwards. Can I ask
him not to put his head in the sand and try to play party politics with
that procedure? At every stage, we have been trying to improve
scrutiny. We take seriously our responsibilities here. We are neither
anti-devolution nor anti-Welsh. What we are is anti-poor practices in
this place, and he has used Wales as an experiment for legislative
procedure. It is appalling what is happening at the moment, and I ask
him to meet with me and Members from other parties to try to find a way
forward that does not put a strain on the Welsh Affairs Committee, but
results in something that is much more meaningful when it comes to
scrutiny. I urge the Secretary of State not to play party politics but
to talk constructively about where we could go with a procedure that is
clogging up the Select Committee and not performing for
Wales.
Mr.
Hain:
The proceedings and the conduct of the business of
the Welsh Affairs Committee are a matter for my hon. Friend the Member
for Aberavon and the other members of the Committee, not me. I am,
however, always open to constructive discussions and, while I do not
want to delay this Committee, I would like to point out that, whereas
every other party, including the Democratic Unionist party, voted for
the Government of Wales Bill, the only party that did not was the hon.
Lady’s party. The only party that continues to be obstructive is
the Conservative
party.
Lembit
Öpik:
Does not the Secretary of State find the hon.
Lady’s comments somewhat surprising, given that the hon. Member
for Monmouth has consistently made it clear what a dim opinion he has
of the Welsh Assembly and has given the strong impression that, were he
the Secretary of State for Wales, he would want to close it
down?
Mr.
Hain:
Indeed. I do not think the comments of the hon.
Members for Clwyd, West and for Preseli Pembrokeshire are supportive
either of the Assembly, but that is a problem for
them.
Mr.
David Jones (Clwyd, West) (Con): Could the Secretary of
State enlighten the Committee as to which comments he is referring
to?
Mr.
Hain:
I could quote loads of comments and I have done so
on numerous occasions, but I would like to make some
progress.
With both
the Order in Council and the framework power processes, it is possible
that, in this Session, the Welsh Assembly Government will be granted
the authority to pass legislation through measures in nine
areas—nine times more than before the 2006 Act, when, on average,
a single annual Welsh Bill would have been
passed.
The backbone
of both the new Order in Council and framework power mechanisms is and
will remain our commitment to devolve power where there is a purpose,
powers requested for a purpose and powers devolved for a
purpose—the purpose of improving the quality of life for the
people of Wales.
I
stand by what I have said previously: there will be no shortcuts, no
full primary powers by the back door and no compromise on the primacy
of Parliament and its right to scrutinise. Parliament is and remains
the sovereign body of the UK. It does not rubber stamp anything, a
point that I made to the Assembly when I gave my report as Secretary of
State on the Queen’s Speech two weeks ago.
Subject to demand, Public Bill
Committees for Bills with framework powers—and I am grateful for
the points put by my right hon. Friends the Members for Torfaen and for
Islwyn—will now include at least one Welsh Member and time will
be guaranteed to debate Welsh provisions. For Orders in Council, real
progress will be made only once UK Government clearance has been
agreed, since it is only then that parliamentary scrutiny can commence.
Any other approach is a departure from agreed procedure, and ultimately
counterproductive.
Mr.
Roger
Williams:
In the
past, Labour Members have almost been more unflattering about the
legislation and framework powers than those sitting on the Opposition
Benches. I can understand, therefore, why the right hon. Gentleman
would want one Member on the Public Bill Committee. Surely there must
be some political balance here to give opportunities to the other
parties to put their point of
view.
Mr.
Hain:
It is up to the hon. Gentleman to talk to his Whip
and it is up to the Conservatives to decide whether they will put Welsh
Members or other Members on those Committees. In any case, informal
forums within Parliament have already been established. The
Under-Secretary of State for Wales and Welsh Ministers have been up
here to talk to anybody. All Welsh MPs and peers have been
invited.
Mrs.
Gillan:
The right hon. Gentleman said that there will be
one Welsh Member on the Public Bill
Committee—
Mr.
Hain:
On the Labour
side.
Mrs.
Gillan:
Ah, on the Labour side. As Plaid is in government
with Labour in the National Assembly, would the Secretary of State
consider putting a Plaid Member on every Bill as well, because it must
be difficult, now that Plaid is in government with Labour in the
Assembly.
Mr.
Hain:
Actually, it is not difficult at all. We are not in
government with Plaid in Westminster and, frankly, I can never see that
happening. That is a matter for the usual channels.
Last week the affordable housing
order in Council was laid before the Assembly in
draft, without Wales Office clearance. Negotiations are ongoing with
the Welsh Assembly Government to assess the full implications of that
order and I am of course keen to see it proceed. However, let us be
clear that publication of an order without Whitehall clearance
contravenes agreed process and is not helpful to smooth
progress.
Albert
Owen (Ynys Môn) (Lab): As a supporter and one who
voted for the Government of Wales Act, one concern I have from the
Select Committee point of view is that we are awaiting Whitehall
clearance. Would the Secretary of State use his good offices to speak
with other Secretaries of State and to their Departments so that
additional resources are given to Welsh measures and so that they can
come speedily through the process? The logjam is in Whitehall between
other Departments which may not have the
expertise.
Mr.
Hain:
I think that the logjam is at both ends of the M4,
but I take my hon. Friend’s point. As. my hon. Friend the Member
for Aberavon has pointed out, the Select Committee has other business
and needs to be in a position to plan its business further ahead. As I
say, these problems are working their way through and we can resolve
them.
Hywel
Williams:
Will the Secretary of State give
way?
Mr.
Hain:
Yes, and then I need to make
progress.
Hywel
Williams:
Does not the Secretary of State accept that
Departments in Whitehall need to have a proper amount of time to
scrutinise orders coming from Cardiff—it is going to take some
time—and that it is the structure that is at fault in delaying
matters in Cardiff? Under the present structure, Departments up here
clearly have a proper role in looking at Assembly
suggestions.
Mr.
Hain:
Of course Departments have a proper role in
scrutinising and the hon. Gentleman is absolutely
right, but it does not follow that the problem is always in Whitehall.
As my hon. Friend the Minister will confirm, the Assembly, for good
reasons, is getting to grips with a new system and its officials and
Ministers are working that through. There is no problem about that. We
are already making more progress than under the old regime, and will
continue to do so. I am confident that the Welsh Affairs Committee, and
both our Governments—Parliament and the Assembly in its
legislative capacity—will be satisfied with the
outcome.
Mrs.
Gillan:
The Secretary of State is generous in giving way
and I am grateful. This is the last time I will intervene on this
point. If he agrees with me that the framework powers in the three main
Bills that he referred to need special scrutiny, will he ensure that a
guillotine motion is introduced, so that, for example, clause 109 would
have at least half an hour’s discussion within the Public Bill
Committee? Can he pursue that through the usual channels? The pattern
of legislation that has been set by this Government is that clauses at
the tail end of Bills are never discussed or referred to. Every member
of this Committee—Labour, Liberal, Plaid—would appreciate
it if some protection were given to that Welsh business, which would
ensure a specific discussion on the framework powers. We would be happy
to co-operate if he could arrange to have such time protected in the
Public Bill
Committees.
Mr.
Hain:
The hon. Lady makes an interesting suggestion, which
I will look into in a genuine spirit of bi-partisanship. My hon. Friend
the Member for Alyn and Deeside is the Welsh Whip and he will look
closely at that and talk to the usual channels. The intention, as I
have signalled, is to make sure that there is an opportunity for
scrutiny. The hon. Lady is right. We breeze past, as it were, some
clauses. There is no intention to do that. I am grateful to her and we
will certainly look at the issue. It is a matter for the usual
channels.
The
transfer of power will always be subject to the approval of both
Houses, and at every opportunity the Wales Office will aid and inform
Members of both Houses about the detail and progress of Wales-specific
legislation, to ensure full and proper scrutiny. I also want to make it
clear that any deliberate blocking of the will of the National Assembly
is not acceptable. I will support bids for legislative competence
wherever possible, where the parameters of such a bid can be clearly
identified. If we can establish that the scope of a bid lies firmly
within the remits of the 2006 Act settlement, we will work to ensure
its successful passage through Parliament and oppose anti-devolution
obstacles. The delay in what might otherwise have been quicker progress
of the orders is partly the result of the fact that they have been
drafted by Assembly officials to broaden their scope well beyond the
settlement agreed in the 2006 Act. There is therefore an iterative
process between our officials and their officials, and between our
Ministers and their Minsters to get it right before Parliament is
presented with a draft order. I am confident that that is within the
letter and the spirit of the 2006 Act.
In short, getting the order and
the Council process right requires careful attention, and we are all on
a legislative learning curve. On the one hand, we have devo-sceptics
who insist that Parliament must, in advance, dot every i and cross
every t of the Assembly’s forthcoming measures, and who insist
that every detail of future—perhaps even unforeseen—Welsh
Assembly Government policy be disclosed immediately, before
parliamentary consent to proceed is given. On the other hand, we have
ultra-devolutionists who view any scrutiny by Parliament or questions
by Whitehall as laced with malevolent intent to suppress the spirit of
devolution and the will of Wales. Both positions are wrong, and they
undermine the terms of the 2006
Act—[
Interruption.
] I see that the hon.
Member for Monmouth puts up his hand to that
crime.
A passionate
belief in devolution is not at all at odds with a
commitment to proper parliamentary process. We have a shared objective
in the successful implementation of the 2006 Act, which will rely on a
successful partnership between the Governments in Cardiff bay and
Westminster. Those who see Parliament as an obstacle or an
inconvenience flout the will of the Welsh people, who voted in 1997 for
a settlement that did not give the
Assembly full law-making powers. As I said in my speech to the National
Assembly two weeks ago, the relationship between our two Governments
and between the Assembly and Parliament needs to be mature, both now
and in future. As we proceed to make the new system work, there will
undoubtedly be bumps in the road. If we are to succeed, open and
constructive negotiation is necessary—we need co-operation
rather than competition; and patient partnership, not megaphone
diplomacy. Devolution will only progress if we cherish a partnership
based on mutual respect and recognition of our respective democratic
mandates and
accountability.
The
Queen’s Speech highlights the strength of our bond and the huge
benefits brought to Wales from its being a nation linked to, not
separated from, the rest of the Britain. The Queen’s Speech
contains wide-ranging Bills that directly affect Wales and its
future—they range from pensions, security, education and housing
to constitutional reform—and tackle the biggest issues facing us
today and
tomorrow.
Julie
Morgan (Cardiff, North) (Lab): On the issue of pensions,
will my right hon. Friend clarify the plight of the Allied Steel and
Wire workers in my constituency and does he have any news about when
the Young report will be published? Can we put an end to the misery of
those pensioners? I know that the Minister is sympathetic towards their
situation, but can he give us any news
today?
Mr.
Hain:
I am indeed sympathetic. My hon. Friend has
championed the cause of the ASW workers vigorously, as have other hon.
Friends and hon. Members on a cross-party basis. The plight of the
workers is a serious injustice. I have met many of them: some were only
a couple of months away from retirement when the company
collapsed—one, I recall, had served 35 years or so with the
company—and they found that they had been robbed of their
pensions. We are addressing that injustice. We have already provided
£8 billion of funding. We await the final Young report, but a
draft report has been published, so the direction of travel is clear.
We want to resolve the issue as soon as possible in a positive way, and
the Chancellor of the Exchequer and I are working with the Prime
Minister to do so. Frankly, the newspaper speculation is so far from
the truth that it is difficult to recognise it at
all.
Mrs.
Gillan:
Will the right hon. Gentleman give
way?
Mr.
Hain:
I should like to make progress.
The Climate Change Bill will
make Britain the first country in the world to introduce a legal
framework for reducing carbon emissions by setting reduction targets
for each five-year period up to 2050. The energy Bill will provide
greater incentives for the vital expansion of renewable energy
generation. The Pensions Bill will introduce mandatory employer
contributions, and it will set up a new scheme of low-cost personal
accounts, which will give millions of low to moderate earners without a
pension the opportunity to save in good-quality occupational pension
schemes.
Mark
Williams (Ceredigion) (LD): May I return to the issue of
energy generation? We are missing a bit of legislation, as there was no
marine Bill in the Queen’s Speech. It is important that Wales
has the opportunity to have a single spatial planning system. What news
can the Secretary of State give us about such a Bill, so that Wales can
make full use of the offshore potential of wind
generation?
Mr.
Hain:
Discussions both within Whitehall and with the Welsh
Assembly Government are under way. I agree with the
hon. Gentleman that the question of offshore energy, particularly
around the beautiful coastline of Ceredigion, is
important.
The breadth
of legislation affecting Wales is testimony to the importance of our
role, whatever our party, as Welsh Members of Parliament. It is crucial
that Welsh citizens have representatives in the House of Commons
voicing their concerns and fighting their corner. Every one of the 40
Welsh MPs helps Wales’s voice to be heard in Westminster and
ensures that Welsh voters count at Westminster. I simply do not
understand the Welsh politicians and Welsh chattering classes who argue
for fewer Welsh MPs, as that would only disfranchise Wales and harm
Welsh interests. Welsh Labour MPs helped to design and deliver the 2006
Act, and it every Welsh MP’s constituents will be affected by
the resultant Assembly measures. It is right that our role and voice is
protected, not diminished. We are central to the success of devolution,
and above all, to the success of
Wales.
I will also
fight the Conservative proposal of “English
votes for English laws”. The Leader of the Opposition may commit
himself to the Union—he did so, under pressure,
yesterday—but his policies would wreck it. A recent ICM survey
for The Sunday Telegraph shows that 69 per cent. of English
people want to preserve the historic Union. Some 62 per cent. of
English people say that their British identity is just as important as
their Englishness. English, Welsh and Scottish citizens are also
British, and are proud to be so. The Tories’ pandering to the
gallery on English nationalism, and their casual disregard for the
unity of Britain, are not only dangerous but wildly out of touch with
the interests of Welsh voters.
David
T.C. Davies (Monmouth) (Con): Does the
Minister
not realise that it was he and his Government who
opened a Pandora’s box when they created an Assembly in Wales
and a Parliament in Scotland, without answering the fundamental
question of what to do about England? The leader of the Conservative
party is quite rightly trying to preserve the Union by ensuring that
English nationalism does not get any stronger than it already is as a
result of the disgraceful one-sided constitutional settlement that was
imposed upon us by the Government.
Mr.
Hain:
That is a rewriting of history, as I am sure you
would agree, Mr. Caton, in another capacity. I do not know
whether the hon. Gentleman was still in short trousers at the time
point, but he may remember that 18 years of Redwooditis were visited on
the people of Wales, which led to a complete turnaround from the 4:1
anti-devolution vote in 1979 to a narrow win in 1997. It was the huge
unpopularity of the Conservative
governor-general rule from Whitehall by Members of Parliament who were
not even Welsh MPs that caused a big flowering of support for
devolution.
Ian
Lucas (Wrexham) (Lab): Does my right hon.
Friend agree that the important point is whether
Conservative MPs from Wales will support their castration by allowing
their voice to be removed on cross-border issues, thus preventing
themselves, for example, from asking questions about services supplied
to Welsh constituents from English hospitals? Does he share my great
concern that Opposition Members are appendages of an English
nationalist party, and not individuals from the Conservative and
Unionist party?
Mr.
Hain:
I could not have put it better myself, and I
completely agree with everything that my hon. Friend said. He and other
hon. Friends, particularly my colleagues representing north-east Wales,
together with other Welsh colleagues, have made very strong arguments
about cross-border services, and the fact that his constituents and
many others who access the neurosurgery service at Liverpool Walton
hospital want to retain that service. This is a very important point,
and I want to explore it further. The Assembly Member, Karen Sinclair,
has just produced a very interesting pamphlet—it is on the Wales
20:20 website, and I commend it to the Committee—that explains
in great detail how those services are linked, and how the Conservative
proposition to divide up and balkanise Parliament simply would not work
and would create a constitutional monstrosity. I want to explain why in
a little more
detail.
Chris
Ruane:
On the issue of English votes for English laws, the
right hon. and learned Member for Kensington and Chelsea (Sir Malcolm
Rifkind), the author of that proposal, said in the
Financial
Times on 4
July:
“This
proposal risks creating two classes of
MP.”
The leader of the
Conservative party, the right hon. Member for Witney (Mr.
Cameron), says the Rifkind plan does not create two classes of MP. Who
is
right?
Mr.
Hain:
I think that it is absolutely clear, as my hon.
Friend’s question implied, that the proposal will
create two classes of MP. Once we create second-class
Welsh MPs, which is the inevitable consequence of that policy, Welsh
voters who vote for us will feel second-class and will perhaps find the
nationalists’ arguments attractive. We therefore have a
situation in which the English nationalist Tory party is combining with
the Welsh nationalist Plaid Cymru in an attack on the unity
of
Britain.
Mr.
Jones:
What is the effect on support for the
Assembly’s work on cross-border issues of efforts by the Welsh
Minister for Health and Social Services to deprive north Wales patients
of access to the Walton centre at Fazakerly? She wishes to ship them by
ambulance to Cardiff or Swansea, purely to preserve her local
hospital.
Mr.
Hain:
That is a total slur on the Welsh Minister for
Health, who set up the James Steers review to look at the provision of
health services across Wales. The
voters of north Wales have benefited from those cross-border links, and
they will inevitably continue to benefit from a range of services, just
as—and my hon. Friend made my point for me—English voters
and residents have benefited from Welsh service provision. The
proposition to balkanise Parliament and divide English and Welsh MPs is
preposterous.
Ian
Lucas:
Does my right hon. Friend think that it would help
or hinder the constituents of the hon. Member for Clywd, West if he put
an Elastoplast over his mouth on this particular issue by agreeing to
English votes for English
laws?
Mr.
Hain:
My hon. Friend has pointed to the soft underbelly of
the Conservative argument, as Opposition Members are clearly extremely
insecure about the issue. They are worried almost to the point of
paranoia, given that their leader was forced to make a speech that
completely contradicted the reality of his policy. He said that he is
prepared to support the flag of the Union while proposing policies that
would dismantle the Union.
The Tories’ proposed
English Grand Committee is an English Parliament in all but name. Not
only would that put an end to the equality that currently runs through
the House of Commons but stable government would become a thing of the
past. Could an English Parliament with a different majority from that
of a UK Parliament control health policy if it did not also control
taxation policy? That is one question the Tories have to answer. The
Speaker would become politicised, and the practicalities of allocating
voting rights on specific measures in a Bill only to the MPs whose
constituencies are affected would complicate the parliamentary system
to the point of gridlock.
Where would it stop? Should
only London MPs vote on the Crossrail Bill, which will in fact have a
UK-wide impact, with cost implications for other budgets?
Constitutional instability on that scale would threaten the very
existence of the United Kingdom. It was Gladstone who said that
devising such a system
“passed the wit of
man”.
John Major who
referred to it as a “constitutional chaos”. Indeed, even
the architect of the scheme has recognised the damage that it would
cause. Speaking in the Financial Times in July 2006, the right
hon. and learned Member for Kensington and Chelsea said:
“This proposal risks
creating two classes of MP. It would be a constitutional
abortion.”
Legislation
cannot be routinely divided into purely English, Welsh or Scottish
categories because of the funding settlement for the devolved
Administrations. Legislation that impacts on medication in England, for
example, has cross-border funding and policy implications for Wales and
Scotland. Student finance is another example. To divide voting rights
as suggested would disfranchise swathes of UK constituents on either
side of any number of borders. Professor Vernon Bogdanor, Professor of
Government at Oxford university, said of the proposal:
“This initially
plausible idea would be as great a threat to the union as the
activities of Alex
Salmond.”
The leader of
the Conservative party is not only indulging in populist opportunism
but flirting with a
policy that is catastrophic for the future of the
United Kingdom. Labour is committed to a United Kingdom Parliament, in
which all MPs are equal. First and second-class MPs are a virtual
incitement to separatism.
David
T.C. Davies:
I am grateful to the Secretary of State for
giving way; he is generous on that point at least. Does he not realise
that what he is saying is inconsistent, as Wales and Scotland have
already been deemed capable by his colleagues in government of
determining their own health service? He has just said, however, that
he does not think English MPs are capable of determining their health
service. Does he not recall, since he mentioned Gladstone, that it was
Gladstone who tried to keep the Union with Ireland together by giving
Home Rule to the Irish, although he was defeated in that ambition? The
Secretary of State is trying to deny a form of home rule to the
English, which is far more likely to split up the Union than giving
them a say in issues such as health, education and transport, which
have already been devolved to Scotland, Wales and Northern
Ireland.
Mr.
Hain:
I have always taken the view—indeed, my party
supports the principle and it is a shame that the hon.
Gentleman’s party does not—that the answer to the problem
is to be found in the Prime Minister’s very sensible suggestion
for Select Committees representing English regions in Parliament and in
regional government in England. We did not manage to persuade the
people of the north-east that that was a sensible proposition—I
think that the model that was proposed did not have enough powers. It
should be revisited, and we are considering how to proceed.
The hon.
Gentleman’s party opposed regional government for England.
Whatever his view, he has returned to the position of having an English
Parliament. England would go its own way, as would Wales and Scotland,
which is what the Scottish National party and Plaid Cymru want. The
Queen’s Speech is a milestone for both Wales and for Britain.
This year was the first time that any Government has published a draft
legislative programme prior to the Queen’s Speech and launched a
nationwide consultation on its contents, enabling people in Wales to
have a full and active role in the development of the
Government’s policy programme.
Strong partnership between the
UK Government in Westminster and Cardiff has produced huge progress in
recent years. Wales has prospered, with today’s £14
billion budget from the Treasury representing a doubling of the budget
since 1997, and delivering record investment in public services. This
year, there is £5 billion for health in Wales, which is more
than £1,600 per person and more than double the allocation in
1996-97. An estimated 50,000 children have been taken out of poverty in
Wales since 1997 as a result of tax credits and increases in child
benefit. An estimated 40,000 pensioners in Wales have been lifted out
of poverty since 1997, and there are 1,700 more teachers and 5,700 more
school support staff than in 1998. Following the pre-Budget report and
the three-year comprehensive spending review settlement, by 2010-11 the
Wales budget will touch £16 billion—some 130 per cent.
higher in cash terms than the figure under the
Conservatives. Even though the settlement was tighter, we still found
£2 billion more for Wales over the next three years—a 2.4
per cent budget increase, better than the rest of the United Kingdom
average of 2.1 per cent, with Scotland at 1.8 per cent and Northern
Ireland at 1.7 per
cent.
Lembit
Öpik:
The Secretary of State
mentioned health funding and, in connection with something he said
earlier, he may be aware that there are concerns about the repatriation
of funds, making it more difficult for mid-Wales constituents and
citizens to access the facilities at, for example, the Royal Shrewsbury
hospital. Can he give me an assurance that in his conversations with
the relevant Ministers in the Welsh Assembly he will stress the
importance of those cross-border links, because the application of
health provision to my constituents is not a theoretical political
matter but a practical issue? My constituents are nervous that they
might not be able to access Gobowen hospital and Royal Shrewsbury
hospital.
Mr.
Hain:
The hon. Member makes a fair point which has been
made by my hon. Friends, particularly in north Wales, and I agree with
him. The new funding will help the Labour-led government in Cardiff to
deliver its objectives, tackle poverty and priorities areas for public
investment, and build the world-class Wales that we all want. The
Queen’s Speech and the pre-Budget report show that only Labour,
working in partnership in London and Cardiff, has a strong vision for
the future, as well as the policies to meet the challenges that it
presents.
The Wales-UK
partnership is not one-way, and the devolution
settlement is reciprocal by nature. UK Government policies are
delivered in Wales in partnership with the Welsh Assembly Government to
meet specific local needs. Labour’s vision for devolution within
the Union respects the different nations and their identities while
preserving the many benefits of being united. We find strength both in
our diversity and in our shared values. We will continue to champion
our vision for devolution within the Union, because there is a
dangerous and unpredictable alliance of parties whose policies would
result in the separation of the United Kingdom. That is not just a
policy difference—it is an ideological chasm that we will not
cross. A coalition for stable government implementing Labour manifesto
pledges in Wales is one thing, but a coalition of belief or ideology is
quite another. For us, separatism is not an option. We will not
compromise on devolution within the Union, as we are stronger together
and would be weaker apart. A confident, self-governing,
internationalist Wales, proud of our Welsh patriotism, but proud of our
Britishness too—that is Labour’s vision, and that is our
mission.
9.47
am
Mr.
Llwyd:
Mr Caton, I am not obsequious by nature, but I have
to say that having the pleasure and honour to serve under your able,
wise and tolerant chairmanship is one of the high points of Christmas
for many of us. On the other hand, that might not be the case—we
shall see.
The
Secretary of State spoke about funding under the comprehensive spending
review, but his figures were not accurate and I wish to correct them.
He referred to a 2.4 per cent. increase. The real figure is
1.8 per cent., because the baseline has been changed. There is therefore
£700 million less in the next three years than he
said.
Mr.
Roger Williams:
Such financial manipulations remind
me of the Home Secretary, who has failed to backdate pay awards for the
police in Wales. That has caused a great deal of consternation, and
their award is now only 1.9 per
cent.
Mr.
Llwyd:
As someone who takes an interest in home
affairs—and I must declare an interest, because my brother is a
serving police officer—I cannot understand a procedure whereby a
third party determines the increase and the Government declines to
accept its advice. The right hon. Member for Banff and Buchan
(Mr. Salmond) has been mentioned, and in Scotland, police
have been paid the full amount. In any event, 1.9 per cent. is not a
king’s ransom for the very dangerous job that the police do on
our behalf, day in, day out, so I agree entirely with the hon.
Gentleman.
Mr.
Hain:
If the position of the hon. Gentleman’s party
on the budget for Wales is as he describes it, why have Plaid Cymru
Members of the Welsh Assembly, along with the whole Assembly, welcomed
the settlement as a good
one?
Mr.
Llwyd:
I am not sure that they have done so. The right
hon. Gentleman knows something about Cabinet responsibility and he
knows well enough.—
[
Interruption.
]
If the right hon. Gentleman wants to discuss that issue, may I
remind him that he has said that the settlement for the Department for
Work and Pensions is tight, it will be grim for the next three years,
there will be cuts, it will be painful, and services will be
affected.
Mr.
Hain:
I agreed to that settlement, which was tough.
However, the settlement for Wales is not a cut; it is an increase of
£2 billion. I do not see how the hon. Gentleman can pass off as
a cut an increase welcomed by the Welsh Assembly Government, of which
his colleagues in Cardiff are
Members.
Mr.
Llwyd:
I have referred to the figures. I will not repeat
them, because other hon. Members wish to speak. However, that is on the
record. What the right hon. Gentleman said is not accurate, and that is
the end of
it.
Again,
the right hon. Gentleman said—[Interruption.] I did not
mean to be
offensive.
Mr.
Llwyd:
Well, I will be, if he likes! The right hon.
Gentleman said earlier that he was working on the pensions issue. I am
sure that we are all very pleased about that and wish him well.
However, I ask him to have a word with the Home Secretary about the
police settlement, because morale in the police service is at rock
bottom, just when we need it most. I leave that message with him, and I
feel sure that he will take it on board.
As with any old-fashioned Welsh
Minister, there will be three heads to my contribution, which will, as
everybody will pleased to hear, be fairly short. I was going to mention
the comprehensive spending review—the funding issue—and I
have touched on that. However, in this part of my contribution, I shall
make a plea directly to the Secretary of State for Wales, who is also
the Secretary of State for the Department for Work and Pensions. He
knows that I have asked for a meeting, which we are having in January,
to discuss the possible job cuts in Wales. That is a fairly
long-running thing, but not so long that the right hon. Gentleman could
not bring it to a
halt.
Looking at the
map of Wales, the job cuts fall largely, if not exclusively, within the
objective 1 area. It does not require a great deal of brain power to
work out that that will have a detrimental effect on gross value added,
which is in the mid-60s now in the objective 1 area, whereas in other
parts of Wales it is approaching 100. That disparity will get
worse—there is no doubt about it. Everybody knows that the
DWP-HMRC jobs are not hugely paid, but they are good, steady jobs. The
closure of the offices will take millions of pounds out of hard-pressed
local economies. I am urging the right hon. Gentleman to do something,
because he is the man in charge and he could stop it. He does not need
to speak with his Cabinet colleagues about drawing a halt or making
differences to this particular
situation.
I have a
letter from a senior person within the DWP-HMRC, which
reads:
“It is
with sadness and embarrassment that I, and my colleagues at the HMRC
office in Crown Building, Newport, have witnessed the publicity the
department has faced during the past week. Perhaps the real sadness,
however, is that not that one of us is surprised at what has
happened.
HMRC has
faced huge change over the last 7-8 years. The original structure of
the department was that each of the 300 or so offices was responsible
for a geographical area (in Newport’s case this was roughly
two-thirds of Gwent, with a Pontypool office having responsibility for
the rest of the county). Only the staff working in Newport could access
the records of those taxpayers for which Newport was responsible.
Security was therefore maintained by ensuring that no staff member was
able to view or amend a record they had ‘no business
need’ to access. Limited access, of course, means limited damage
should things go
wrong.
In 2000, we
moved to an ‘area management’ structure. The databases of
all offices in the UK were merged into larger units...In South
Wales, this meant that all of the taxpayers previous dealt with at the
Llanishen office were merged with those at Newport, Pontypool,
Pontypridd, Merthyr and Brecon. Staff working at any one of those sites
could access everything that South Wales area dealt with increasing the
records each of us could view by around
1,500%.”
The
letter details what is now happening on the
ground:
“As we
have seen all too clearly during the past week, this over-riding
objective to cut corners and save money can ultimately cost millions of
pounds to put right when things go wrong. It is not economy that HMRC
is achieving by its current obsession with staff cuts and office
closures. It is false
economy!
I am very
concerned, as are all of my colleagues, that there will be many more
instances of the type of HMRC blunder that was witnessed during the
past week if the rot is not stopped immediately. We already know of
other similar instances that have not reached the public domain or were
not as well publicised. Such blunders are becoming all too frequent.
This recent incident is merely the tip of the iceberg.
There are millions of items of
correspondence on hand which the department simply does not have the
resource to deal with. Large areas of work are neglected. Cost cutting
in IT produces unfit software with the result that hundreds of
thousands of incorrect penalty charges are sent to compliant taxpayers
each year for failing to submit forms that HMRC has already received.
This creates huge amounts of unnecessary, additional work because the
public has to contact us to put things right. It would be cheaper to
invest the money in software that works than to pay people to sort it
out afterwards. However, the ‘do it cheaply now but pay
expensively later’ policy is becoming all too commonplace in
HMRC.”
The
letter goes on to
state:
“I was
once quite proud to work for a well run, secure and efficient
government department. Unfortunately, the one that now employs
me:
1. Values cost cutting more
than customer service.
2. Is
consumed with the idea that bigger means
better.
3. Is desperate to lose
staff by any means and then cannot cope with the workload on the
reduced resources - employing Fixed Term Appointments to plug the gap
with no taxes experience and offering them very little
training.
4. Has spent millions
of pounds on private consultants whose working methods have produced
bigger backlogs than I have ever known in 22 years at
HMRC.
5. Ignores huge areas of
vital work, re-labelling it as ‘non-targeted’ and
therefore low priority. Work that would bring ten times the cost of
dealing with it in additional taxes to the Treasury if it were properly
resourced and
undertaken.”
That is from
a loyal member of the HMRC who says, with great regret, what she is
seeing on the
ground.
I urge the
right hon. Gentleman, in the spirit of co-operation, one hopes, to look
at the matter again, because he is in charge of both Wales and the DWP.
I remember visiting his predecessor in the DWP job some two years ago.
My hon. Friend the Member for Caernarfon and I put before the then
Secretary of State a plan of Wales. He looked with some amusement at
the map, and I showed him vast areas of what was effectively desert,
with no DWP outpost whatsoever. Then I showed him the version that
would prevail if and when his plans came to fruition. He was genuinely
taken aback, but, unfortunately, the whole thing has been further
steamrollered since then. I believe that the Secretary of State has the
interests of Wales at heart, and I hope that he will look at this
again.
Albert
Owen:
Hon. Members know that I am
consistently against the centralisation away from north-west Wales of
public services, particularly the Customs and Excise, but also health
care provision. The hon. Gentleman will be aware of proposals—I
am sure that he is taking notice—to centralise the North Wales
Medical Trust at either Bodelwyddan or Wrexham Maelor, which I am
against because jobs in the area would suffer. Is he aware that his
fellow leader in the Assembly favours that idea? There is
inconsistency, with Plaid Cymru in opposition saying one thing, but
Plaid Cymru in government welcoming
centralisation.
Mr.
Llwyd:
Welcoming what
exactly?
Albert
Owen:
I thought that the hon. Gentleman was not listening.
Welcoming the centralisation of trusts in Wales; moving resources from
north-west Wales at
Ysbyty Gwynedd, possibly to centralise them in either Maelor or
Bodelwyddan. The Plaid Cymru leader in Wales says that that is a good
thing and that it will happen
anyway.
Mr.
Llwyd:
That is an interesting point, and I thank the hon.
Gentleman for making
it.
Lembit
Öpik:
On tax offices, I agree with the hon.
Gentleman because of concerns expressed to me by tax office staff in
mid-Wales. Does he agree that it seems like a false economy, given that
the tax offices spread around Wales are often doing surplus work that
cannot be handled by the centralised offices? Does he suspect, like me,
that if this centralisation is forced through, not only does it
contradict the decentralisation policies of the Government, but it is
likely to be a fashion that will be reversed when we realise that
centralised offices simply cannot cope with the work that is currently
done on a localised
basis?
Mr.
Llwyd:
The hon. Gentleman is right. What is foreseen by
the Department for Work and Pensions is that in some outposts there
will be a hot-phone where the applicant will have to deal with these
matters over the telephone in a public place. The DWP deals, not
exclusively but very often, with the most vulnerable people in society.
Being vulnerable, one presumes that they are less able to express
themselves over the telephone. The possibility of home visits is always
thrown in, but if full-time offices are abandoned for full-time home
visits, it will cost a heck of a lot more than keeping that office
going.
The idea that
people who are vulnerable and at their wits’ end can access
these services by telephone is simply not working. I have had
experience in Meirionnydd of having to go up to Wrexham with applicants
to explain exactly what they were trying to do. The paperwork had been
lost for the second time, and people had not received any income at all
for four weeks. They were totally desperate and the staff contact point
was a telephone conversation with an unnamed person in the Wrexham
office. It is undermining the morale of the people in the offices and
the level of service that is
provided.
Mr.
Hain:
Clearly, that example is intolerable and needs to be
addressed. I will look very closely at what the hon. Gentleman has said
this morning. I will also draw what he has said about HMRC to the
attention of a Treasury Minister. It is a Treasury matter, and he has
put an argument that needs to be considered. I have also indicated that
I am happy to meet him on this
matter.
Mr.
Llwyd:
In which case, I am very grateful to the right hon.
Gentleman.
Mark
Williams:
To exemplify that point about vulnerable groups,
I will give the example of those with autistic spectrum disorders. The
very nature of autistic spectrum disorders means that a telephone
dialogue when people are seeking benefits or appointments presents real
difficulties. Some excellent work has been undertaken by Autism Cymru,
based in Aberystwyth,
which has had some dialogue with some DWP offices, but by no means all
of them, across Wales. That work needs to be encouraged, because there
is a lack of understanding about that issue across the
board.
Mr.
Llwyd:
I agree with the hon. Gentleman.
There is also the issue of the Welsh language. Many people—the
vast majority in the Porthmadog area—will make their
applications through the medium of Welsh, but I am not sure whether
they will be able to do so in future. My hon. Friend the Member for
Caernarfon represents Porthmadog, so perhaps he can tell
us.
Hywel
Williams:
In Porthmadog, people calling at the office
wanting a service through the medium of Welsh are advised to call in on
the Welsh-language hotline. They go away and phone in and the person
giving that face-to-face advice rushes to the back of the office and
answers the phone. That is an entirely intolerable situation. A
face-to-face service through the medium of Welsh is obviously
needed.
Mr.
Llwyd:
I agree with my hon. Friend. I live in hope that we
can have these matters adjusted. The Secretary of State for Wales has
said that he is prepared to meet
me.
Lembit
Öpik:
Before the hon. Gentleman moves away from the
DWP and related matters, is he aware of a pressing concern for those
claiming benefits in Wales, and in England, that they can only get the
payments due to them over Christmas on Christmas eve, which is a break
with precedent? I ask the Secretary of State, through the hon. Member
for Meirionnydd Nant Conwy, to look into that, because surely it is not
fair that benefits claimants only get their benefits for the Christmas
period on Christmas eve. One can see the inconvenience and distress
that that could
cause.
Mr.
Llwyd:
Evidently, I have been a useful conduit there and
am sure that the Secretary of State has heard what the hon. Member for
Montgomeryshire has said. Obviously, it is a matter of great concern,
and the hon. Gentleman is absolutely right to raise
it.
Mr.
Hain:
For the benefit of the Committee and for my hon.
Friends who have raised the issue with me—in particular, my hon.
Friend the Member for Llanelli—40 per cent. of benefit payments
will be paid on Friday 21 December. I have made sure that that will
happen and am looking at what is possible with regard to the rest.
However, I am afraid that that issue has arisen rather late in the day
and the DWP normally has had a policy of paying on the last possible
day before a bank holiday. In fact, payments have already been advanced
ahead of the time when they would be paid in a normal month, but I
understand the issues that the hon. Member for Montgomeryshire has
raised.
Mr.
Llwyd:
I am sure that the hon. Member for Montgomeryshire
has heard the Secretary of State’s response on that and hope
that there is time to deal with that problem. I will truncate what I
have to say on
this head, bearing in mind that the Secretary of State has said there
will be a meeting in January, but I want to stress one or two
points.
“Mapping Social
Exclusion In Wales”, which was prepared by the National
Assembly, shows that more than one in four people of working age are
deemed to be economically inactive: the highest level is in Merthyr,
with 35 per cent., followed by 34 per cent. in Blaenau Gwent. Central
valleys workers earn 73.3 per cent. of the EU average; 18.4 per cent.
of the Welsh population suffer from long-term illness or disability;
and 26 per cent. of 11-year-olds in Wales fail to reach expected
figures in core subjects—the figure is 32 per cent. in Blaenau
Gwent. The point that I am making is that those examples are within
that cohesion area, the objective area of west Wales and the
valleys.
We have had
many debates about whether objective 1 has succeeded, but we can all
adopt a modicum of common sense in that matter and see that the
disappearance of thousands of jobs will clearly have a deleterious
effect on those areas. As I have said, there will be a meeting in the
new year, and I hope that I will be able to give greater detail about
the potential damage that job loses could have in west Wales and the
valleys.
The other
point that I should make relates to the question of sustainability. For
staff who are retained and have not lost their jobs, typically the
intention would be for those in Porthmadog to drive to Bangor, which
takes almost an hour. What about the carbon issue involved in
relocating 50 or 60 staff who must travel 50 miles each way? Should the
Department not consider sustainability when looking at that? Obviously,
it is difficult in many of the areas within west Wales and the valleys
to access public transport and, therefore, it is inevitable that the
increased travel will mean a great deal more use of individual
cars.
Mr.
Don Touhig (Islwyn) (Lab/Co-op): Does the hon. Gentleman
agree that objective 1 funding should be used primarily to upskill the
people of Wales? We got support for objective 1 because our gross
national product was lower than that of the rest of the UK and the rest
of Europe. If it is used to fund infrastructure projects, such as town
centre bypasses and multi-storey car parks, we will have
failed.
Mr.
Llwyd:
I agree absolutely with the right
hon. Gentleman, and there is no doubt about what he has said. I would
much prefer to see jobs created and people upskilled and so on, which
remains the challenge in Wales, and it is reasonable to say that
unemployment in the average constituency is not huge at the moment.
Having said that, many who are in employment are in low-paid jobs, and
we need to upskill them as the right hon. Gentleman has said.
Upskilling our labour force is the target for us to aim for.
Demonstrably, some white elephant projects are not beneficial at all.
It is often argued that if the environment is improved, then the
economy improves too, but there is not always a read across there, and
in some cases it has dramatically failed. I will not name names, but I
accept what the right hon. Gentleman has said.
I conclude this part of my
submission by saying that the policy of closing DWP offices will
undoubtedly knock one of the poorest areas in the UK, let alone
Wales. That policy is in direct contrast and
opposition to the policies of the Welsh Assembly Government, who are
trying to close the prosperity gap within Wales. Hundreds of jobs and
millions of pounds of investment will undoubtedly be lost to local
economies as a result of those closures and the centralisation of
services. Unfortunately—this is supported by the
evidence—service to the Welsh public will further deteriorate as
a result of the announcements. The impact on the environment will be a
sharp and unacceptable rise in carbon emissions. All that is avoidable,
and I look forward to having a meeting with the Secretary of State in
mid-January, when I hope that changes can be
made.
In his opening
remarks, the Secretary of State referred to one or two Bills in the
Queen’s Speech. I will refer to one which concerns me—the
Planning Bill. Before I comment on that, I would like to quote the
Secretary of
State:
“I am a
passionate devolutionist and my ambition is to see the
Assembly’s wishes for greater powers fulfilled. Anything less
would be against the grain of devolution and the aims of the Government
of Wales Act.”—[Official Report, Welsh Grand
Committee, 13 December 2006; c.
16.]
I have no doubt that that
is a sincere statement of the way in which the Secretary of State views
things. The concern about the Planning Bill is that it runs directly
contrary to any notion of devolution. As we all know, its main purpose
is to establish an infrastructure planning commission which will
decide, develop and give consent for major infrastructure projects in
England and Wales. We do not yet know who will be on that commission,
but it does not really matter. It is an upward grasp of powers from the
local planning committees. The Secretary of State pointed out that the
smaller, everyday projects that planning committees deal with will be
streamlined, and perhaps it is time to look at that—the last
real planning shake up was in
’64.
In the
past, I have argued for a third-party right to appeal in some
circumstances, if certain hoops involving the locus and other such
matters can be overcome. That happens in Ireland, and other European
countries. It would not streamline matters, but it would enable local
voices to be heard in the procedure.
My concern, and that of my
party, is that we are now about to sweep away the democratic process
for large infrastructure projects. What kind of projects? They are to
do with energy. What kind of energy? They might involve nuclear
energy—I do not know—but they might include a large-scale
energy project over 50 MW. The Bill does not make it clear whether the
building regulations will go to the National Assembly for
Wales.
Albert
Owen:
The hon. Gentleman has made an important point about
the Planning Bill and energy. Is he aware that the leader of Plaid
Cymru in Wales, who is my constituency Assembly Member, is in favour of
a second nuclear power station at Wylfa? Is he in favour of that, and
is his
party?
Mr.
Llwyd:
It matters not. The Assembly Member for Ynys
Môn has made his decision, which is up to him. I put it to the
hon. Gentleman that he would have
much less of a problem if the Assembly Member for Ynys Môn were
to say “No, I would not be in favour of a second directorate on
Ynys Môn.” He knows as well as me that if Wylfa shuts
down, the smelter operation in Holyhead will close down, in which case
we would have a 10 to 16 per cent. decrease in the GVA of the people of
Ynys Môn. All credit to my friend from Ynys Môn for
putting the people of Ynys Môn first. Perhaps we should do that
more often in
politics.
Mrs.
Gillan:
For clarification, Plaid policy is totally against
nuclear power, and yet the hon. Gentleman is quite happy that a Plaid
representative is going his own way and not taking the party line. Is
that not absolute hypocrisy of the worst sort, and something that we
should be stamping out of
politics?
Mr.
Llwyd:
I have always taken the view that one’s
first duty is to one’s constituents. If the hon. Lady thinks
that she is going to get me to create a new story today by criticising
a friend of mine for doing what he thinks is right then she is
mistaken, because I am not going to do that. Is she saying that all
Conservative Members agreed with the National Assembly for Wales? Does
the hon. Lady not admit that there are serving hon. Members in
Westminster who want an end to the devolution process and a vote to get
rid of the National Assembly? That is
true.
Mrs.
Gillan:
That is not the
same.
Mr.
Llwyd:
How convenient that that is not the same.
There are concerns
about the Planning Bill, because we do not know whether there will be a
representative from Wales on the infrastructure planning commission,
who that representative is likely to be and so on. It would introduce a
single consent regime for a wide range of projects currently approved
under separate pieces of legislation. On the face of it, that may look
quite innocuous, but in certain circumstances it will override the
powers of the National Assembly for Wales. To that extent, it is
totally and utterly—since we are talking about
contradictions—at variance with the stated aim of the Secretary
of State and the Labour Government to ensure that there is a smooth
passage of the devolution
process.
I have
referred to a new procedure for planning appeals for the minor
applications, which may well be welcome. I have not looked at the
detail yet, but I hope to do so if I am fortunate enough to be on the
Committee. The current situation is that major infrastructure projects
are decided by the Secretary of State under eight different Acts. I am
concerned that at a stroke we are going to do away with the
answerability, accountability and local input on all those particular
applications. To that extent, the Bill is a bad Bill. I believe that,
certainly as far as the IPC is concerned, it should be resisted at all
costs.
Mr.
Roger Williams:
The hon. Gentleman has already pointed out
that power stations over 50 MW are at present determined by a Minister
in Westminster, and he has outlined the procedure that will come into
force if the Planning Bill becomes an Act. There were tripartite talks
between the Wales Office, the Welsh
Assembly Government and what was then the DTI with a view to
transferring those powers to the Welsh Assembly, but I think that the
Select Committee said that those discussions had died on the vine. Does
he think that it would be a good idea to resurrect those discussions,
because Wales, wanting to be a sustainable nation, should have those
powers to
itself?
Mr.
Llwyd:
I certainly do. I was in the Chamber when the hon.
Gentleman raised that point with the Minister, whose response was that
the matter is ongoing, whatever that may mean. I think that the hon.
Gentleman raised that issue on Monday. If the matter is ongoing,
clearly we can do something about it in the Bill, if ongoing means
anything at all—we shall see. The Bill is potentially insidious,
because it is undemocratic and anti-devolutionary. I hope that hon.
Members discuss it thoroughly in Committee and ensure that it is
changed at the very least.
In case people think that I am
all negative, I welcome the Housing and Regeneration Bill. At long last
there is recognition in Westminster of the need for affordable homes,
which we have argued for in this Committee for the past decade. I
welcome the Bill, as far as it goes, and I wish it
well.
Albert
Owen:
I, too, support the measures on affordable housing
in the Queen’s Speech. There is also a measure to create a new
Homes and Communities Agency. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that
something similar should be adopted in Wales to give a pan-Wales view
of affordable housing, so that developers do not pick out local
authorities that will perhaps build fewer affordable homes and so that
we can have best practice throughout
Wales?
Mr.
Llwyd:
Obviously, the hon. Gentleman and I recognise that
that is a matter for the National Assembly, but what he has said makes
good sense. There is no point in providing affordable houses, when,
strictly speaking, they could be put to better use elsewhere. A more
strategic look would be acceptable. After all is said and done, part of
the moneys being drawn down will be publicly funded in any event. The
hon. Gentleman is right that we should look at a spatial plan. I
understand that the National Assembly is looking at spatial plans,
which should include a requirement to assess the need for affordable
homes.
I urge right
hon. and hon. Members to consider this point. About two years ago, a
group of youngsters from my home village of Llanuwchllyn came to see me
because they were desperate to live in the village but there was no way
in which they could afford to do so. What could they do? It was agreed
that they should speak to the local community council. The local
community council urged them to draw up a questionnaire, which was then
taken around the village. The questionnaire showed that about 12
couples were on the brink of leaving the village, because there was
nowhere for them to live. Four couples wanted to get married, but they
could not do so because they did not have anywhere to
live.
That
was two years ago. The youngsters then approached, via the community
council, Gwynedd council, which gave them some spare land for
£5. That land was then
developed in association with the local housing association and with the
help of Gwynedd council and other agencies. Now the first phase of four
brand-new, sustainable homes has been built. There are two other phases
of four to come. Within two years, we are likely to have dealt with the
housing need in Llanuwchllyn.
I urge all hon. Members to
consider the point that councils have spare land. We persuaded the
Forestry Commission in Meirionnydd to give up its redundant land, so it
can be done. It requires work, but we have argued for some time that we
need a unit within the National Assembly to assist people who want such
developments by telling them where to look in each area and which
agencies to contact. That approach has worked fantastically well in my
home village; it is working in other places in Meirionnydd; and it can
work throughout Wales. I urge all right hon. and hon. Members to
consider that point, because there is a large amount of redundant land
around Wales that can be used for that important
purpose.
Lembit
Öpik:
I note that there was no mention in
either the hon. Gentleman’s speech or the
Minister’s speech of our agricultural communities and our
agricultural economy. Does he agree that to have a sustainable rural
community, we and the Government need to do all that we can to support
an agricultural industry that has really taken it in the neck in the
past six months? Does he share my hope that the Government take
seriously the problems that farmers are experiencing and find solutions
to
them?
Mr.
Llwyd:
I do not need any lessons from the hon. Gentleman
about the rural community. I live in a rural community full time, which
is slightly different from him. In addition, where in the
Queen’s Speech would he put an area of law that is already
devolved? Frankly, he should come here more
often.
10.25
am
Mr.
Paul Murphy (Torfaen) (Lab): May I first associate myself
with part of the speech that we have just heard from the hon. Member
for Meirionnydd Nant Conwy (Mr. Llwyd)? That was the part
about Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs offices. As the
Committee is aware, the last time that we met I raised the question of
Pontypool, and I am glad that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of
State will have another look and pass on my views to the Treasury,
which is responsible for the matter.
I have been trying to work out
whether or not I am a devo-sceptic and I have come to the conclusion
that I am not. In 1978, I was a devo-opponent, and in 1997 I voted for
devolution. My constituents agreed with me in 1978, but they did not
agree with me in 1997, because they voted against a Welsh Assembly on
both occasions. However, I would rather describe myself as a
devo-realist, in the sense that what is here is here. I am not all that
keen on a coalition in Cardiff, but we are where we are, and we have to
work in the current political climate for the benefit of the people
whom we represent, whether we are Members of Parliament, Assembly
Members or members of local authorities.
When I was
Secretary of State for Wales, it was my job to ensure a smooth
transition from the constitutional arrangements that we had before
devolution to where
we are today. However, devolution is not about divorce. It is about
partnership between our Government in Parliament, the Assembly in
government in Cardiff and our local authority colleagues in their
respective council chambers. Above all else, devolution must be about
improving the lives of the people whom we jointly represent, whether it
involves the health service, schools or something else.
I repeat the point that I have
made in previous meetings that any clamour for constitutional change
passes by my constituents. I have received two letters about the
constitutional arrangements in Wales in the past year, both of which
opposed them, but that is all that I have had. No one rings me up,
e-mails me, writes to me or stops me in the street about that issue,
but they do so regarding the issues that I have just mentioned, which
are the services that we are all pledged to improve.
We must take great care that we
do not become a little bit too obsessed with identity and nationhood. I
do not have to look in the mirror every quarter of an hour to remind
myself that I am a Welshman—I am, and I am proud of it. At the
same time, however, I know that what my constituents expect of me is an
improvement in their lives. I believe that the arrangement that we have
got, whereby our Assembly deals with certain issues in Cardiff and we
share responsibility with it here in Parliament, is a good arrangement
for improving our constituents’ lives.
I am particularly pleased about
my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State’s comments today
about the way in which this Parliament will
scrutinise legislation affecting devolution through so-called
legislative competence orders and the framework powers in various
Bills, which are, of course, in the Queen’s Speech.
I very much welcome the detail
that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State described to us today.
I welcome the fact that he will take certain issues even further and
examine those matters. It shows that, right across the political divide
in this Welsh Grand Committee, there is a belief that we can work
together to ensure that we examine these matters
properly.
I do not
believe for one second that we should be rubber-stamping LCOs or
legislation for devolution, because we would not be doing our job as
Members of this Parliament. We must scrutinise such matters properly
for the purpose of correctness, certainly, but also to establish
whether we think that there is a case to be made for the particular
powers, whatever they might be, to be devolved to the National
Assembly.
I think
that, overwhelmingly, most LCOs, when they come here, will be passed
without too much fuss. However, there may be occasions when things are
a bit more controversial, and I will cite two LCOs as examples. I think
that the LCO that deals with the ending of the sale of council houses
will produce controversy. For the past two decades in Wales, the fact
that houses have been sold by local authorities has meant that people
in Wales, by becoming home owners, have improved their
lot.
There
are areas of housing need that we must be careful about, and the hon.
Member for Meirionnydd Nant Conwy touched on one or two of those issues
today. However, a warning shot should be sent by those of us who
represent constituencies that have traditionally contained a large
proportion of council houses. In my constituency, Torfaen, because of
the new town development corporation, there was a larger proportion of
council houses as a percentage of housing stock than any other
constituency in Wales, much of which has now been sold. All our
constituencies face housing shortages, and we need to consider the
issue very carefully.
The other
issue, of course, is the Welsh language, responsibility for which is
shared between those of us in Westminster, where it is a reserve power,
and Members of the Welsh Assembly, who have a great interest in the
importance of the Welsh language. Historically, the issue has been
enormously controversial, and it has to be handled sensitively. Many
hon. Members who represent Welsh constituencies would be deeply
troubled if an extension to the Welsh Language Act 1993 disadvantaged
private companies, for example. We cannot afford for companies not to
come to Wales because of potentially prohibitive Welsh language
legislation We cannot afford to lose companies in Wales that might use
the excuse of Welsh language provisions to leave our Welsh
people.
Mrs.
Gillan:
Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that although
we want to preserve the language and the culture of Wales, we do not
want to allow non-tariff barriers to act as a disincentive to people
who want to bring their skills and come to work in Wales? There have
been reports in the media that people have been discouraged in their
work environment because they are less than fluent in the Welsh
language. That is a shame, because it could cut off Wales from a supply
of skilled workers coming into the country to help to support our
industries, which we
need.
Mr.
Murphy:
I agree with much of what the hon. Lady has said.
I represent a constituency that is one of the most anglicised in
Wales—I think that it is 98 per cent. English speaking. Yet
there is one Welsh language medium comprehensive school and two primary
schools where Welsh is taught exclusively, and all young people are
taught Welsh in the other schools, which I welcome. I also welcome the
consensus on the extension of the Welsh language in Wales. I would be
worried if such an extension had an adverse
effect.
Hywel
Williams:
I am concerned that the right hon. Gentleman and
the hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs. Gillan) have
raised the matter of jobs moving out of Wales because of the language
issue or, alternatively, of employers being discouraged from moving to
Wales because of worries about the language. Can the right hon.
Gentleman give actual examples of employers who have refused to come to
Wales because of such
fears?
Mr.
Murphy:
Of course I cannot, because the measure has not
been passed yet. I am referring to legislation that might be introduced
and simply saying, “Take care.” It is a measure for which
all Members of Parliament and Members of the Welsh Assembly and
councillors have responsibility. I am certainly not saying that
legislation on the Welsh language has been wrong—far from it. I
have just explained to the Committee that in my constituency there has
been a
flourishing improvement in the Welsh language in schools and elsewhere
for people who want to learn it, but we must take
care.
Mr.
Roger Williams:
The right hon. Gentleman has mentioned
legislation on the sale of council houses and the
Welsh language, which I accept are contentious issues. Surely, however,
the locus for decision-making must be in the Assembly, which is what
devolution is about. Our consideration will be whether the LCO is
compliant with the legislation that has already been enacted, rather
than what the Welsh Assembly will do with it. We can make those
representations in other
quarters.
Mr.
Murphy:
The Government of Wales Act 1998 is very finely
crafted. When I was in government before the legislation was
introduced, we took great interest in how it would be passed. The final
Act has given the House of Commons a power in respect of the extension
of powers to the National Assembly for Wales. It is not a
rubber-stamping power, but a power that must be exercised properly and
with proper scrutiny. In the Welsh language case, in particular, the
powers are shared, and it is not the case that the Assembly exclusively
has power with regard to the Welsh language, because this House of
Commons and this Parliament also have
power.
Mrs.
Gillan:
In order to help the right hon. Gentleman and the
hon. Member for Caernarfon, I was referring to a broadcast—I
think it was on Radio 4—where an individual working in Wales
asked for his voice to be disguised. If the hon. hon. Member for
Caernarfon were to ask the media unit in the House of Commons, it would
be able to get the broadcast for him. It is right to reflect those
concerns, because that is reasonable and in the best interests of
Wales.
Mr.
Murphy:
The hon. Lady has made a perfectly fair
point.
Mr.
Llwyd:
I heard that broadcast, and I was aghast. I could
not believe it. It involved a person agreeing to meet a journalist on a
dark night, down a country lane, in a van, because he was concerned
about his—oh my God, come on! It was not Baghdad or Basra; it
was Blaenau Gwent, or wherever. It was absolute nonsense from beginning
to end. If people could not see through that, then good heavens. The
point that I want to make to the right hon. Gentleman is this: I have a
huge regard for him, and I know he would not want his comments to be
misunderstood. He is a supporter of the Welsh language as much as I am.
Can I take him back to when we were discussing the Welsh Language Act
1993, many years ago, when people said “it is going to impact on
jobs”. Whatever legislation is introduced, there will have to be
a gradualist approach. Nobody would ever sanction making it difficult
for inward investment, whether they be small companies or large, and I
am sure it is not beyond the ken of all good-thinking men and women in
Wales to devise a scheme that does not penalise
anyone.
Mr.
Murphy:
It is a question of being able to support the
Welsh language in different ways wherever we live. In the hon. Member
for Meirionnydd Nant Conwy’s
area, for example, the approach to the Welsh tongue would be entirely
different from the area that I represent. It is a fair point that, in
Meirionnydd or other parts of Welsh-speaking Wales, the use of the
Welsh language in the private sector is probably beneficial to people,
but the situation will be different somewhere else. I am merely using
that example to make it clear that we will need properly to discuss and
scrutinise particular LCOs when they arrive in the House of Commons,
because we share those powers.
Mr.
Touhig:
My right hon. Friend and I are on the same
wavelength. Unlike the spokesman for the Liberal Democrats, the hon.
Member for Montgomeryshire, who is happy to rubber stamp anything that
comes from Cardiff, we will want to scrutinise LCOs line by line to
make sure that they are in the best interests of the people of Wales.
Does he agree with me that if we are to sustain and support the
language, then the one area where the language is strong in Wales is
education? Why is that? It is because people choose to send their
children to Welsh medium schools. Where the language is in difficulties
is where people try to compel others to use
it.
Mr.
Murphy:
I accept that entirely, which is why we have to
tread carefully in dealing with these issues. In the past, it has not
been a good story, because the issue became a political football. Now,
there is a general consensus, but we still need to take
care.
Mr.
Jones:
The right hon. Gentleman has referred to the need
to scrutinise the proposed legislation. Of course, at present the only
body conducting pre-legislative scrutiny is the Welsh Affairs
Committee. Does he feel that there is scope for widening
pre-legislative scrutiny to include more Welsh Members, or indeed other
Members of this
House?
Mr.
Murphy:
I do not want to go into detail on that issue. I
think that the Welsh Affairs Committee—under my hon. Friend the
Member for Aberavon’s able chairmanship—and the
equivalent Committee in the Assembly will do a very good job on
pre-legislative scrutiny. I agree with the hon. Gentleman that when
legislation has been through those processes and returns to the
structures in the House of Commons, we should be given a proper
opportunity to debate the issues, particularly when they are
controversial. The Secretary of State has rightly and wisely told us
today how we could deal with that.
The other issue that I want to
raise relates to public expenditure in Wales and the partnership in
Wales between councils, Assembly Members and ourselves. I believed that
one of the great aspects of devolution was the accessibility of
Ministers in an Assembly. When we had the old system
of two junior Ministers and a Secretary of State, the accessibility of
Ministers to local authorities and to people in Wales generally was,
inevitably, limited. One of the great changes is that with a locally
and regionally based Assembly in Cardiff, and Ministers from Wales in
Wales to deal with the issues, Ministers are more accessible. Therefore
the involvement of partners in government in Wales is more effective,
and it is about listening to those partners.
I am sure that other hon.
Members are troubled by the local government financial settlement.
Although I do not for one second think that the expenditure, or the
grant, that we give through Parliament to Wales should be mirrored
precisely in the Assembly—that is not what devolution is
about—I believe that Andrew Davies, who incidentally is a very
able Minister, should have another look at the financial settlement.
Compared with a 2.3 per cent. increase in Wales, in England there has
been, for example, a 3.6 per cent. increase in the south-west, a 4.4
per cent. increase in the west midlands, and a 4 per cent. increase in
the north-west, which makes the points about comparisons between
England and Wales quite
telling.
Albert
Owen:
My right hon. Friend has made an important point.
Although there has been an increase in the settlement from Westminster
to Cardiff bay, there is great disparity in the local government
settlement within Wales. The fault lies in the formula, which seems to
penalise some of the poorest county councils in Wales. For example, in
my area we have had a 1.1 per cent. rise this year, which is the lowest
ever, despite having an Assembly Member in the Assembly Government for
the first time. It is the formula that is at stake, and when a tight
settlement is in process, would it not be better equally to distribute
an increase across all Welsh
authorities?
Mr.
Murphy:
Yes, we do get that. In my constituency the
percentages are 2 per cent., 1.7 per cent. and 2.3 per cent. In fact,
the pay bill will increase by far more than the settlement itself. The
problem has always been whether the block grant should be absolutely
mirrored in Wales. The answer is no, because that is what devolution is
about. Everything that we have discussed involves working together for
the benefit of our people. It is difficult for Mr. and
Mrs. Jones in my constituency, or whatever Welsh
constituency it might be, to disentangle who is responsible for what
and who does what. All they know are the services that they eventually
receive, and because local government deals with some of the most
important services, such as education and social services, it is
important to get it right. I hope that Andrew Davies will consider the
issue again for the benefit of our constituents.
Wales is a small
place—just over 3 million people are represented jointly by all
of us—and it is important that we consider that. I end with
that, because I know that other hon. Members want to speak. The
constitutional parliamentary year ahead will be interesting for those
who represent Welsh constituencies, but I repeat that it is important
that we properly scrutinise legislation that affects Wales, because
that is what we were elected to
do.
10.43
am
Mrs.
Gillan:
I am privileged to follow the contribution by the
right hon. Member for Torfaen. He speaks in a measured fashion, and I
feel sure that in the future we will do business in the best interests
of Wales, as we have done in the past.
We should be grateful that we
have had this debate, not least because the Secretary of State has
found time away from his principal job to grace us with his
presence. It is interesting to note that at a time when Wales has more
and more politicians to represent it, its voice seems to be heard less.
For example, oral questions on the Floor of the House have now been
moved to once every five weeks. As I stated in a point of order at the
start of the debate, I was surprised to find that we will have no
opportunity to ask questions today for whatever reason. Lastly, it is
sad that the Government have ruled out any opportunity for us to ask
topical questions on matters that involve Wales. I hope that the
Secretary of State and his colleagues will look at that, because the
opportunity to introduce topical questions, as other Departments have
successfully done in other areas, is
important.
I am sad
that this debate was not held on an earlier date. It was scheduled for
a day when I believe that the Secretary of State was at the Dispatch
Box for the Department for Work and
Pensions—
Mr.
Hain:
The hon. Lady asked for the debate to be
postponed.
Mrs.
Gillan:
I did not ask for the debate to be moved. I asked
for it to be kept to the subject that had been discussed with me at an
earlier date. However, it is a shame that more timely space could not
be found in the
timetable.
Mr.
Hain:
It is a small point, but since it has been raised, I
was perfectly happy to do that. I understand that the hon. Lady was the
one who made the original approach through the usual channels, as a
result of which the debate was pulled. I was perfectly happy—it
was in my
diary.
Mrs.
Gillan:
I am afraid that the Secretary of State is
absolutely mistaken, because the usual channels asked for a debate on
the comprehensive spending review alone and, specifically, for the
Queen’s Speech to be taken out. I agreed, but when the motion
appeared on the Order Paper, the Queen’s Speech had been put in.
Furthermore, I am not sure how the right hon. Gentleman would manage to
be on the Floor of the House and in the Welsh Grand Committee at the
same time. I have made the record absolutely clear, once and for
all.
The
Secretary of State set the scene when he addressed
the Assembly last month, when he set out a rose-tinted view of Wales.
However, he failed to mention that in Wales since 1999 hospital waiting
lists have risen by nearly 40 per cent. and violent crime has increased
by 65 per cent. He failed to mention that this year, on the provisional
results, nearly 60 per cent. of Welsh pupils will not achieve a GCSE
grade C in English or Welsh, maths and science. He failed to mention
that under Labour, this year, more than 42,000 16 to 24-year-olds are
unemployed and more than 113,000 16 to 24-year-olds are economically
inactive. As we stand here today, throughout Wales more than 500,000
people are economically inactive or unemployed. The Secretary of State
may boast of a 130 per cent. increase in money going to
Wales, but he cannot boast about the results, given the
unemployment figures or the economically inactive people on the
register today.
The Secretary of State failed to
mention that the Welsh electorate are now becoming aware of where the
fault truly lies, as evidenced by his party’s defeat at the
ballot box in the Assembly elections. However, he was right when he
said that Wales is altogether a more self-confident nation. I agree: it
is self-confident enough to start rejecting Labour and to start
considering the possibility of change. His party’s electoral
failure, combined with its desperation to cling to power, has led to
the uncomfortable union of Labour with Plaid Cymru, the party he once
described as the enemy. It is against this background of the warring
tribes coupled in troubled partnership that we now have to view the
governance of Wales, the legislative programme and funding. We have
seen the evidence in Committee today.
Nowhere has
the unhappiness of that marriage of political convenience, and the
tension between Labour in Westminster and Plaid and Labour in Cardiff
bay, been more apparent than in the response to the comprehensive
spending review. The Secretary of State has said that public spending
in Wales leads the UK at 2.4 per cent. compared with the UK average of
2.1 per cent. Yet the Finance Minister in the Assembly has said that
Wales will receive only 1.8 per cent. We have already heard from the
right hon. Member for Torfaen about dissatisfaction with the settlement
at local government level. The First Minister said that Wales has the
best of both worlds, when he went on an adventure to Scotland, but the
Plaid leader has said that this is the worst financial settlement since
devolution.
Adam
Price (Carmarthen, East and Dinefwr) (PC): The settlement
is the worst since devolution, but it still does not compare to the
last year of Conservative rule, which delivered a cut in real terms to
the Wales Office
budget.
Mrs.
Gillan:
I do not want to remind the hon. Gentleman about
the way in which his party used to vote in the old days, but all I know
is that we are 10 years on and people are not
interested in history lessons. People are interested in what is
happening in their lives today, but what they see is politicians
squabbling over Wales. I hope that the hostilities between the odd
couple—for that is what they are—that now form the
Assembly Government will not leave Wales as the ultimate casualty. I
would like to illustrate that by moving on to the legislative
programme.
Labour in
Wales is now propped up by an opportunistic party that has never been
in office or faced up to the realities of government. The price of that
support is to be paid by pursuing policies that would have otherwise
been unpalatable or unaffordable, or by abandoning projects that could
have brought real benefits to Wales. The result is figures that do not
add up. We have only to look at yesterday’s Assembly debate on
the budget, which could explain the provisions that have suddenly
appeared in the Local Transport Bill that will enable the coalition to
raise taxes on Welsh drivers—provisions that were not in the
original draft Bill that went out for consultation. Those measures have
not been put before the Assembly, but were actually hammered out by the
Secretary of State and the Plaid Transport Minister in
Cardiff.
Is that the price Welsh drivers,
farmers, businesses and tourists must pay to plug the gap between
Plaid’s spending commitments and Labour’s vanity? In that
case, the mechanism to impose a national road pricing scheme, which has
been so roundly rejected in England, would be tried out in Wales, and
Wales would be the casualty. That would, however, not be the first
time, because we know that Wales has been used as an experiment for
council tax revaluation and rebanding, so it could easily be used as a
guinea pig on a national road pricing
scheme.
We
have also seen a casualty that has already been announced, the
electrification of the Wrexham to Bidston line, which has now been
shelved almost indefinitely. However, I am grateful to the Secretary of
State for agreeing to consider singling out those framework provisions
in the major pieces of legislation that are going through this House
and protecting those clauses for significant discussion and scrutiny in
Public Bill Committees. I hope when he looks at clause 109 of the Local
Transport Bill, he will see that the possibility I have raised is
absolutely for real. Hopefully, he will ask for the detail to be
inserted, so that it can be dedicated to specific
themes.
In
the same way as the impact on the Welsh people of the proposed
legislation has not been thought through, the same is true of other
aspects of the programme laid out in the Gracious Speech. The Planning
Bill looks attractive at first glance, as it appears to strengthen the
Assembly’s control over matters that could reasonably be carried
out under the current devolution settlement. However, closer
examination reveals that it gives the Assembly powers sucked up from
local authorities, which are closer to the people. It is a move that
will centralise power rather than devolving it. Furthermore, it
establishes an infrastructure planning commission, a quango which will
effectively be unsackable, unaccountable and unelected. The IPC will
have wide-ranging powers that will rob local communities of a voice
over issues of the utmost concern to
them.
It has been said
that that Bill will:
“remove the public’s
democratic rights to challenge projects at public
inquiries.”
Those are
not my words; they are the words of the National Trust, Friends of the
Earth, the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, Transport 2000
and, most importantly, the Campaign for the Protection of Rural Wales.
It is all very well paying lip service to devolution, but the reality
is that powers are being taken up and centralised, moving them further
away from the people.
Mr.
Roger Williams:
I share the hon. Lady’s concerns
about the Planning Bill. Does she agree that the only way in which
people can take action against that new quango would be through the
courts, which would be out of the reach of most people? The inability
of people actually to attend a public inquiry and put their views
forward would seem to be a real problem for people of low means who are
trying to contest a planning
application.
Mrs.
Gillan:
The hon. Gentleman might be right. It is possible
that that could be done only by judicial review, so
the measure could have even more implications. However, the Bill is
passing through this place, and we
do not know in what shape it will arrive at its final destination. I
urge the Secretary of State to consider the effect that it will have on
the people of Wales and their ability to have their voices
heard.
The Education
and Skills Bill looks reasonable from a Welsh perspective, and
certainly transferring powers on the regulation and inspection of the
education and training of 16-year-olds is probably welcome. However, it
also includes powers over independent schools, including registration.
One might consider that to be perfectly rational, until one examine the
policies of the party that shares Government in the Assembly. Plaid has
set its face against independent schools and has explicitly stated, in
one of its manifestos that it wants primary powers to stop that kind of
diversity in the education system.
Will the price of selling out
to Plaid be the raising of taxes, the removal of powers from local
government, the homogenising of our education system in Wales and being
the guinea pig for the rest of the UK? The framework powers in the
Bills before Parliament certainly indicate that the outcomes in each
case could impoverish rather than enrich the areas in question. I hope
that our scrutiny in this House and in another place will at least
highlight the issues and ensure that the implications of the
legislation are
aired.
The Secretary
of State is right to say that we have to consider the
LCOs and that the process has now started. I agree wholeheartedly with
some of his pronouncements on the procedures. As he said when he
addressed the Assembly, and as he repeated here
today:
“Parliament
cannot rubber-stamp or let anything through on the
nod.”
That is something
that every Member of Parliament here at Westminster understands as
their duty.
I
also agree with the Secretary of State that an
important principle is that Parliament and Whitehall Departments should
be allowed to probe the basis of legislative requests and that in doing
so they are not presented as “unreasonable” or
“obstructive”—those are the words that the
Secretary of State used in the Assembly. I ask him to remember those
words in his rhetoric and attitude towards the Conservative party,
which seeks to scrutinise and probe the powers that this Parliament is
being asked to move from here to the Assembly, often without the
advantage of the cosy consultation and collaboration enjoyed by him and
Assembly Ministers.
Of
course, legislating for Wales is not what it used to
be. We now have 13 ways in which legislation can be
introduced and brought into force, and the methodology is already
proving less than desirable and is certainly burdensome. I urge the
Secretary of State to reconsider the mechanism for pre-legislative
scrutiny of LCOs, whereby the Welsh Affairs Committee performs a
function that would possibly be better performed by a Public Bill
Committee. Will he agree to meet and discuss some of the improvements
to the process, which could yield the necessary scrutiny and avoid
drowning the Welsh Affairs Committee in work for which it was never
intended? That would be in the best interests of Wales. I know that
under the distinguished chairmanship of the hon. Member
for Aberavon, there have been concerns about how the Select Committee
can absorb the quantity of LCOs that will come
through.
We have only
just started with the LCOs, and while we will certainly subject every
transfer to the necessary scrutiny, I reaffirm that we will not be
opposing for the sake of gratuitous opposition, because that is not our
style. In supporting the current devolution settlement, it is our duty
to oppose poor legislation and poor draftsmanship, and we will do our
best to ensure that the people of Wales are not sold short because
Westminster Members have been bullied into being afraid to question
legislative instruments. I see few issues, for example, over the
proposed mental health reform LCO, and domestic fire safety could well
be a matter for local decision making. However, when it comes to the
additional learning needs LCO, we have sought to refine the instrument
to include greater clarity and precision, and it is wrong to represent
that investigation as being anti-devolution or
anti-Wales.
I
understand that three of the proposed LCOs are stuck in the Whitehall
pipeline. Will the Minister let us know where the affordable housing
LCO, the environmental protection and waste management LCO and the
vulnerable children LCO have got to? I understand from the Secretary of
State that part of the problem is that the drafting of these LCOs has
been too broad and that they would fall outside of the settlement. It
would be helpful to have some details on that, so that we can establish
changes to the timetable and the problems with those particular
LCOs.
Turning
from the dog’s breakfast that is the LCO legislative process to
the broader legislative programme, there are 20 other Bills that affect
Wales to different degrees, and I will mention just a few of them. The
Bill on the EU reform treaty will remind everyone that the Government
were elected on a manifesto promising a referendum on the EU
constitution. With the enthusiasm of the Secretary of State for
referendums, I am surprised that he will not join us in pressing for
this particular one. Could it be that, as with the referendum on
further law-making powers, the people will not be allowed a referendum
by this Government, until the Government know that they can win
it?
We will be working
closely with the Government to make our country as safe as possible,
and I therefore welcome the counter-terrorism Bill. We hope that we can
persuade the Government to take practical measures that will make our
borders safer, whether at Holyhead, Heathrow, Fishguard or Felixstowe.
Just as we expect the case to be made to Parliament on the transfer of
powers to the Assembly, we will not support any extension of detention
without trial, unless the Government can make a convincing case for
change.
Parts
of the legislative programme represent lost opportunities for Wales.
They will place impositions on local government and its ability to take
decisions locally and close to the people. For example, the energy Bill
will not even secure the future of our energy supplies and certainly
will not provide us with the long-awaited answer to the replacement of
Wylfa in the north.
The Regulatory Enforcement and
Sanctions Bill will create the local better regulation office, but that
body will also be able to direct local authorities on how to
go
about their business. Indeed, who will be able to give directions to the
local better regulation office? The answer is Welsh Ministers in the
Assembly.
The Dormant
Bank and Building Society Accounts Bill, which is designed to put money
in dormant accounts to good causes, has to be looked at closely, too.
Who will decide which good causes that money goes to? It will not be an
independent Big Lottery Fund, as we would imagine. In fact, this
measure will also give more powers to the Welsh Ministers who will
restrict the classes of organisation that can benefit from the
legislation.
Time
after time, the legislation transfers powers not closer to the people
and not closer to local authorities or independent bodies, but to
Ministers, who are gathering powers that were not envisaged in the
original settlement. None of the measures appears to give people more
control over their lives—they give Ministers more control over
people’s lives. There are no measures to strengthen society,
just measures to strengthen the
Government.
I am sure
that the Secretary of State will welcome the legislation on party
funding. I am sure that he, like me, wants to restore public trust,
which has been shattered by his party and its attitude towards the
reporting and recording of donations. While administrative errors are
always forgivable, using intermediaries systematically to evade
disclosure is utterly unacceptable, as I am sure that he will agree.
With that in mind, I hope that the Government will accept the need to
treat trade unions in the same way as all other
donors.
Albert
Owen:
The hon. Lady has mentioned trade unions. I argue
that that is one of the cleanest, most transparent ways to give money.
Everybody who has asked to do so fills in a form. That is not the case
when it comes to the Midlands Industrial Council and other bodies that
the Conservative party uses, which print such things every three to
four months and perhaps forget to put some names on
them.
Mrs.
Gillan:
I have to tell the hon. Gentleman that an analysis
has been conducted of the trade union sites, which are difficult to
navigate in many instances. Finding the way to the box to tick to
remove a contribution is difficult. When one has stopped a contribution
going automatically to the Labour party, I believe that no allowance is
made in dues to the union. The contribution is not reflected there,
because it still goes to the
union.
I want briefly
to mention the Climate Change Bill. Although we have welcomed it twice
before and welcome it now, it seeks to set targets for the next 15
years, before the committee on climate change will have had a chance to
report on the targets that it expects to be met. I therefore think that
it will be an imperfect piece of legislation, and I hope that the
Government will start to make their position on climate change much
clearer.
Finally, I
want to stand back for a moment and ask where in all the legislation is
a cohesive and coherent vision and leadership for Wales? The Secretary
of State spent an awful lot of time on Tory policy discussions in his
speech. He is clearly quite worried by our steady progress in Wales
because that is, indeed, what we are
making. The Labour Administration have given us a Secretary of State
with two jobs, and there are no prizes for guessing which one the Prime
Minister thinks is the most important. After all, if he sought to put
Wales on the map and on his agenda, I am sure that he would have found
time to visit it since he walked into No. 10, but that has not
happened. My right hon. Friend the Member for Witney (Mr.
Cameron), the leader of the Opposition, has just made his seventh visit
to Wales this year.
We
now have a process of legislating for Wales that is
so tortuous and lacking in transparency that the
Government could use it to pass competencies to the Welsh Assembly
Government to stockpile against an incoming Westminster Government of a
different complexion. That would not be honest or straightforward
government with the best interests of Wales at heart—it would be
the act of a Government prepared to go to devious lengths to pursue
their own naked political ambitions. There is nothing to dissuade me
from speculating in that fashion, because, after all, the Government
have not proved to be trustworthy or
competent.
This is the
Government who lost the personal details of almost half the population.
This is the Government who presided over the first run on a bank for
140 years and then spent £25 billion of taxpayers’ money
shoring it up, which is not something that they were willing to do
spontaneously for the pensioners of companies such as
ASW—I would welcome any solution that would take those men and
their families out of that misery. This is the Government who, through
their own incompetence in their own establishment, unleashed foot and
mouth disease on an already beleaguered farming community. This is the
Government who released thousands of criminals early to offend again.
And this is the Government whose party thought it acceptable to conceal
donations and to break a law that it had introduced. Wales deserves
better than that, and I am determined that my party will try to offer
the vision and leadership that now seems to have evaporated as the
Government lurch from crisis to
crisis.
I want to see
real devolution giving people more opportunity and power over their own
lives, helping to make families stronger, helping to make society more
responsible and helping to make our country safer and greener. I want a
strong Wales within a strong United Kingdom. When the Government do the
right thing, we will support them, but once again we have had a
Queen’s Speech that has failed to inspire. Sadly, the Government
have been more preoccupied with their own problems than solving those
of Wales.
I remind
members of the Committee that this is the first Queen’s Speech
from a new Prime Minister, and the first CSR from a new Chancellor. We
may well have expected a fresh start, but sadly we have more of the
same coupled with legislative experimentation that is designed to walk
the political tightrope that Labour’s failures have created for
itself. Does Wales not deserve
better?
11.7
am
Mr.
Touhig:
I welcome the opportunity to participate in
today’s debate. I am delighted that we are talking about
education, health and the economy—the real issues that concern
the people of Wales. Despite claims
to the contrary, I doubt whether many people in Islwyn or anywhere else
in Wales lose much sleep worrying about independence and separation.
That is an obsession of the nationalists, the BBC,
The
Western Mail and the chattering
classes.
Today’s
debate on the Queen’s Speech and the CSR gives us an opportunity
to explore how Parliament and the Assembly can work in partnership to
deliver better services to the people of Wales. The Queen’s
Speech sets out legislation that addresses the concerns, struggles,
hopes and aspirations of families in every part of Britain. I want a
Welsh Assembly that shares those aspirations—an Assembly that is
instrumental in delivering for hard-working families. However, I fear
that the progress that we achieved in the early days, when there was
real co-operation in the legislative process, to which my right hon.
Friend the Secretary of State referred, and when there was real
co-operation between the Government and the Assembly, is now at risk.
It was bound to
happen.
The
Assembly, with the malign influence of nationalist Ministers affecting
the political agenda, is now more narrowly focused and backward
looking. Indeed, the language used by some nationalist Ministers since
the “One Wales” document was signed is more separatist in
tone and quite deliberately anti-British. More than ever before, there
is a greater responsibility on the 40 Welsh Members of Parliament to
focus on the main bread-and-butter issues that concern those whom we
represent. When anyone challenges the legitimacy of our role, let us
remind them that more people in Wales voted for Members of Parliament
than all the Assembly Members and councillors put
together.
We must
therefore take the lead in building closer co-operation with the
Assembly and ensure that legislative proposals are scrutinised fully.
As part of that co-operation, any legislative competence order that is
presented to Parliament by the Assembly should be subject to stringent
line-by-line examination. On every occasion, we must ask a simple
question: how does the measure benefit the people of Wales? If we find
that the LCOs are of great benefit that is fine; if we do not, then we
send them back to Cardiff with the great big letters “NO”
stamped on them. I am encouraged by the discussions that my right hon.
Friend the Member for Torfaen and I have had with Secretary of State
about how we might use this place effectively to scrutinise the
legislation. I certainly look forward to taking part in that.
At present, three Bills in the
Queen’s Speech contain framework powers for Wales that, if
agreed by Parliament, would transfer further powers to the Assembly.
Orders in Council are also being taken through. The first such measure,
on additional learning skills, is already receiving pre-legislative
scrutiny; others, on housing and the Welsh language, will
follow.
I am troubled
that the Government announced £8 billion for innovative and
affordable housing in England, which will deliver 70,000 homes by 2010,
of which 45,000 will be social housing. In contrast, the nationalist
Housing Minister in the Assembly wants to stop people buying their own
council houses. If we want people to get their homes in Wales, we
should build more homes; we should not use the Assembly to put a block
on the aspirations of the people of Wales.
Mr.
Llwyd:
With respect, the right hon. Gentleman, for whom I
have a high regard, is making the Tory case.
Mrs.
Gillan:
It is not a Tory case.
Mr.
Llwyd:
Yes, the hon. Lady voted for it. Jocelyn Davies is
saying that we need to improve the number of social housing
opportunities, which will give an opportunity to councils who are hard
pressed and have not got social housing, to stop the right-to-buy. The
right hon. Gentleman is saying that that is denying people access to
social housing, while giving the possibility of buying a property. No
one wants to prevent people from owning their own home; but surely, we
have a priority to look after those more in need of social
housing.
Mr.
Touhig:
I was encouraged earlier by the
comments that the hon. Gentleman made about experiments in his own
village, which we should replicate throughout Wales. I have great
respect for him, but he has reverted to type now. His party is all
about stopping opportunities for people in Wales—it wants to
deny the Welsh people the chance to buy their own home. If he supports
that legislation, I hope that he will go back to his constituency and
tell the people there that he denies people the right to buy their own
home.
Adam
Price:
As someone who took part in the negotiations on the
“One Wales” document, I can say that that policy was
included at the behest of Labour party members. We agreed with it, but
it was a Labour party idea.
Mr.
Touhig:
Any proposal that diminishes the opportunity of
people in Wales to progress and gain their own homes is not acceptable.
From wherever a proposal is initiated in the House, we have a duty as
Members of Parliament to protect the interests of the people of Wales,
and I am sure that I will not be alone in doing that. I understand that
there has been no agreement with the Government on that LCO, which
shows how difficult things have become since we have involved the
nationalists in Government in Cardiff.
I have similar concerns about
the much talked of LCO on the Welsh language, which will discriminate
against English speaking Welsh men and women. I will not support a
measure that will deprive my Welsh constituents from getting jobs in
Wales because they do not speak Welsh. Such an LCO will prove
controversial, and no one should expect Parliament to rubber-stamp it,
as the Liberal Democrat spokesman appears quite happy to
do.
Mr.
Jones:
Will the hon. Gentleman give
way?
Mr.
Touhig:
I hope that the hon. Gentleman
will forgive me, but I am short of time and I want to make sure that
other hon. Members can take part in the debate.
Such
legislation cannot be rushed. That means slowing the
process and handling the proposed legislation that comes from the
Assembly in a considered way. If the hon. Member for Carmarthen, East
and Dinefwr had
been here earlier in the debate, I would perhaps listen a bit more to
his contribution, but he has been slipping in and out, as he often
does.
The Further
Education and Training Bill was considered by Parliament in May, and we
were told in a accompanying memorandum that the Assembly had not even
consulted interested parties, such as FE colleges and others, about
what it should do with the powers if they were given to it. My right
hon. Friend the Member for Torfaen and I argued that that put Wales at
a serious disadvantage, and we cannot allow that to happen again. We
were told that only after carrying out a consultation and settling its
views would the Assembly be able to produce coherent proposals on what
it would do with the powers. If ever there was a case of putting the
cart before the horse, that was one. In future, the Assembly should
ensure that it is fully consulted and has coherent plans in place
before requesting further powers. That would provide a better focus for
hon. Members to scrutinise Bills.
Thanks to the efforts
of my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, Wales has
enjoyed unprecedented economic stability, with employment at
historically high levels. Wales has contributed to a prosperous United
Kingdom, and I welcome the commitment in the Queen’s Speech to
invest in further training and skills. The key to our future economic
prosperity is the upskilling of our people. Giving people the skills
that they do not yet have, so that we can attract to Wales the jobs we
do not yet have, is an important development. Our future is dependent
not on constitutional tinkering, but on our ability to compete in a
global economy.
I am
delighted that the Government have made efforts to
revive the apprenticeship scheme from near extinction—it was
almost wiped out by the Tory party in the 1980s when it was in
government. The apprenticeship reform Bill will introduce
apprenticeships for 16 to 18-year-olds. Unfortunately, at the moment,
Wales will not benefit from the Bill, which is an absolute tragedy. I
hope that my Assembly colleagues will grasp the nettle and look at ways
of extending the measures in the Bill to Wales, so that everyone,
regardless of age, is entitled to an apprenticeship to retrain and
reskill throughout their working lives.
In the wider context, I believe
that the Government have an opportunity to look further at engaging
pupils in vocational subjects both at school and at an earlier age, and
we must concentrate on that. As I said in my intervention on the hon.
Member for Meirionnydd Nant Conwy, if we do not invest in upskilling
our people, we will be no further forward as far as the Welsh economy
and the prosperity of the Welsh people are concerned.
It is no secret that I am not a
fan of the “One Wales” document—I want to put that
point on the record, as I do not want to be misunderstood. Above all,
what disappoints me is that, rather than talking about how we can equip
the Welsh people to compete in the global economy, the document seems
more concerned with constitutional conventions and tinkering. As my
right hon. Friend the Member for Torfaen knows, no one in Blackwood
high street stops me and demands to know what we are doing about
getting more powers for the Welsh Assembly. The things that concern the
people of Wales are issues such as the economy, health, jobs and crime.
We should talk about connecting training and
skills to the benefit of business and industry, not about peripheral
matters such as conventions. All that document does is to further the
narrow, separatist agenda promoted by the nationalists—an agenda
that views the Severn bridge as a border crossing, whereas I see it as
a gateway for Welsh exports.
At the last Assembly elections
the people of Wales voted overwhelmingly for Labour, whatever the hon.
Member for Chesham and Amersham says, and that was reflected in the
number of seats that we won. We have 26 seats, while the nationalists
have 15 and the others even fewer. The people of Wales wanted a Labour
agenda, and that is what we must deliver. Therefore, it is the
responsibility of Labour Members of Parliament to work with Labour
Assembly Members to ensure that we deliver that Labour agenda. That is
the task that we have been given by the people of Wales, and we will
work closely with our colleagues in the Assembly to ensure that we do
that. The people of Wales will judge us on how we improve the quality
of their lives and look after their interests, not on whether or not we
sit in endless meetings talking about conventions and who should have
this or that power. That interests no one in
Wales.
11.19
am
Mr.
Roger Williams:
It is a pleasure to serve under
your chairmanship, Mr. Caton, and it is
always a pleasure to speak immediately after the right hon. Member for
Islwyn. We all know him as a good and passionate Welshman, and I am
sure that, when the runes are read, they will show that he is not
devosceptic either.
Mr.
Williams:
The right hon. Gentleman gives a good impression
of it, but perhaps that is to provide balance to the debate. We have
covered a lot of ground this morning, and it shows the value of having
the Welsh Grand Committee and the opportunity for Welsh MPs to raise
many issues.
I should
like to comment on one or two of the issues raised by the hon. Member
for Meirionnydd Nant Conwy regarding the closure of offices serving the
Welsh people, particularly in areas that possibly will not have any DWP
or HMRC offices. My hon. Friend the Member for Ceredigion has provided
me with some information that shows that, while the number of HMRC
senior civil servants in London has increased, there has been a
reduction of 7 per cent. across the UK in people employed in that vital
service. Indeed, Wales has lost 372 HMRC staff since 2005. Although the
Government champion small businesses, doing away with those local
offices does not allow small businesses to have the personal contact
that is vital, especially when they are being set up, to give them
confidence to engage with HMRC on tax issues, pay-as-you-earn and all
the complicated factors that make starting up a business so
difficult.
I, too,
think that it is a shame that we are holding this debate so long after
the Queen’s Speech—it is rather stale news. The
Queen’s Speech itself held no surprises, and that was not
surprising because we had already had the pre-legislative statement. It
shows something of the Government’s lack of energy and
enthusiasm that they could not surprise us at all. There was nothing in
the Queen’s Speech that had not been anticipated, but there were
a few issues that we wished had been in there, but were not.
The Queen’s
Speech contained three Bills with framework powers.
In our view, it could have contained far more. The Liberal Democrats
want to see the maximum amount of framework powers given to the
Assembly. Will the Minister tell me why it matters whether the current
Assembly Government request the power or not? If the powers created in
England are within the devolution settlement, why should not the
Assembly stockpile powers? Surely, a devolutionist would want to
achieve that. An example is the Education and Skills Bill. Why not
devolve the power to set the school leaving age for Wales to the Welsh
Assembly? My party does not agree with the idea of making education to
the age of 19 compulsory. We think that the language being used will
send out the wrong message to young people and risks turning them off
education. Surely, the power to set the school leaving age should rest
in Wales. How can that not be in the spirit of devolution? I am
surprised that the Government in Cardiff did not request that power, as
I understand that it was in the Plaid Cymru manifesto, but it did not
get into the “One Wales” document.
To reflect
for a moment on the way in which framework powers and LCOs have worked
so far, it is fair to say
that the new briefing sessions for MPs have been a useful tool, although
it is difficult to say much more, as we have debated the Planning Bill
only on Second Reading. Perhaps the Minister will tell us how he
envisages Welsh MPs being involved in Bills with framework powers at
the Committee stage. The Secretary of Sate made a commitment to having
one Welsh MP on each Public Bill Committee.
Mr.
Llwyd:
Welsh Labour
MP.
Mr.
Williams:
Indeed. The Minister will recognise, from the
way in which Committees are set up, how difficult it would be to have a
team looking at the English aspects of any legislation and include a
Welsh representative as well. Liberal Democrats wonder whether the
Minister could intervene to find out whether there is a resolution for
that difficulty.
It
will be impossible for Welsh MPs with an interest to be nominated to a
Public Bill Committee for some of the smaller parties. How does the
Minister suggest that Welsh MPs propose amendments to clauses on
framework powers if they wish to do so? Will hon. Members who do not
serve on the Public Bill Committee be allowed to speak to
amendments?
It
being twenty-five minutes past Eleven o’clock,
The Chairman
adjourned the Committee
without Question put, pursuant to the Standing
Order.
Adjourned
till this day at Two
o’clock.
