The Rt. Hon. Sir John Major KG CH

Category: 1996

  • PMQT Written Answers – 20 February 1996

    Below is the text of the written answers relating to Prime Minister’s Question Time from 20th February 1996.

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Engagements

    Sir Peter Tapsell: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 20 February.

    Mr. Harry Greenway: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 20 February.

    The Prime Minister: This morning I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in the House I shall be having further meetings later today.

     

    Defence Exports

    Mr. Llew Smith: To ask the Prime Minister if he will change Her Majesty’s Government’s policy of not commenting on detailed matters concerning individual defence exports.

    The Prime Minister [holding answer 16 February 1996]: I refer the hon. Member to the statement made in the House by my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade on 15 February 1996, Official Report, columns 1139-44.

     

    Honours Nominations

    Mr. Harris: To ask the Prime Minister how many nominations for honours have been received in the latest six month period for which figures are available compared with the last six months before the increased publicity was given to the system for public nomination.

    The Prime Minister: In the last six months of 1995, 4,316 nominations were received. Statistics for the period leading up to my statement in March 1993 were not kept.

     

    Departmental Running Costs

    Mr. Andrew Smith: To ask the Prime Minister what were in each year from 1979 to 1994, in real terms, (a) the running costs of his private offices, separately identifying expenditure on staff and (b) the running costs of the Department.

    The Prime Minister [holding answer 15 February 1996]: Information on expenditure by my office is not available on a consistent basis for the years between 1979-80 and 1985-86. Expenditure since 1986-87, at 1994-95 prices is as follows:

    £ million

    Total expenditure Staff costs Other costs

    1986-87 7.471 2.514 4.957

    1987-88 7.744 2.520 5.224

    1988-89 8.780 2.551 6.229

    1989-90 9.603 2.703 6.900

    1990-91 9.536 2.386 7.150

    1991-92 9.454 2.488 6.966

    1992-93 10.344 3.043 7.301

    1993-94 9.395 3.331 6.064

    1994-95 [1] 7.671 3.217 4.454

    Information on the running costs of the Cabinet Office is given in the annual report of the “Cabinet Office, Privy Council Office and Parliament”, a copy of which is available in the Library of the House.

    (1) In 1994-95 spending of £0.718 million on communications was transferred from No.10 budget to the Cabinet Office.

  • PMQT – 20 February 1996

    Below is the text of Prime Minister’s Question Time from 20th February 1996.

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Engagements

    Q1. Mr. Martyn Jones: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 20 February.

    The Prime Minister (Mr. John Major): This morning, I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in the House, I shall be having further meetings later today.

    Mr. Jones: Does Prime Minister accept Sir Richard Scott’s judgement that the Attorney-General was personally at fault? Given the collapse in public confidence in him, is it not time that the right hon. Gentleman started referring to him as unassailable?

    The Prime Minister: I have to say that I believe that the Attorney-General acted perfectly properly throughout this whole affair.

    “How the narrative of fairness can be fabricated into an indictment of the Attorney-General, I fail to follow.”

    Mr. Mackinlay: It is because he is an awful lawyer.

    The Prime Minister: I am sorry to hear what the hon. Member for Thurrock (Mr. Mackinlay) below the Gangway says because I was quoting the defence counsel at the Matrix Churchill trial.

    Mr. Matthew Banks: On a different point, does my right hon. Friend recall the dark days of nationalised industries when they cost the taxpayer £50 million a week? Is he able to contrast that with the position now where, in the private sector, they contribute £50 million to the national coffers? Is that not about five new schools a week? Is that not something that the Labour party simply has not grasped?

    The Prime Minister: I agree with my hon. Friend about the advantages of private ownership over public ownership. We have seen this in a wide range of areas over many years. I have no doubt that, wherever appropriate, things are better handled in the private sector and should be in the private sector rather than in the public sector. That is so in terms both of the experience that we have of the way in which the private sector operates and of the general demand to make this country competitive, with the lowest possible tax regime consistent with that.

    Mr. Blair: Does the Prime Minister agree with the specific finding of Scott that Ministers agreed to the sale of non-lethal weapons to Iraq, and agreed not to inform Parliament and the public, and that that failure was deliberate and in breach of their duty of ministerial accountability? Does he agree with those specific findings of Scott or not?

    The Prime Minister: If the right hon. Gentleman takes time to read the whole of Sir Richard Scott’s report, he will see that Sir Richard accepts that Ministers regarded not that there was not a change of the guidelines but that there was an interpretation of the guidelines against changing circumstances. Sir Richard accepts explicitly that Ministers regarded the relaxed interpretation

    “as being a justifiable use of the flexibility believed to be inherent in the Guidelines.”

    [Interruption.] I am sorry that hon. Members are laughing. That is Sir Richard’s view and I agree with him on that point.

    Mr. Blair: The point that I am asking the right hon. Gentleman about comes before that about whether the guidelines were changed; it is whether he is prepared to accept the specific findings in D4.42 of the Scott report that Ministers agreed to the sale of non-lethal weapons to Iraq, that they agreed specifically not to tell Parliament, and that that agreement in Sir Richard’s words was “deliberate” and in breach of their duty of ministerial accountability. Rather than the general, will he answer that specific? Will he tell us whether he agrees with that paragraph of the report–yes or no?

    The Prime Minister: What Sir Richard says is that the reason for the decision not to inform Parliament was because of a concern that to do so

    “might be detrimental to British trading interests”–

    that is to say, jobs. That is a direct quotation from what Sir Richard had to say.

    Mr. Blair: That is simply not the case. Sir Richard gives specifically the reason why Ministers did not tell Parliament and the public. He said:

    “the overriding and determinative reason was a fear of strong public opposition”.

    That is a quite different matter. [Interruption.] Does not the matter go to the very heart of parliamentary democracy? On virtually every page of the report there are details of answers that are inaccurate, untrue, misleading. Is no one going to take responsibility for that? Have no Conservative Members got the courage? Does none of them want to hold Ministers to account? If the Prime Minister cannot answer and say whether he agrees with the paragraph–it is his report, which he set up, on which he spent money–the Conservative party and the Conservative Government will remain knee deep in dishonour.

    The Prime Minister: On the question of defence exports, let me remind the right hon. Gentleman–he may not like it–of what the right hon. Member for Bethnal Green and Stepney (Mr. Shore) said when he was a Minister. That spokesman for a Labour Government said:

    “It has been the policy of successive Governments not to reveal information on the supply of arms to individual countries.”–[Official Report, 10 June 1974; Vol. 874, c. 396-97.]

    Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that that was the Labour Government’s position? He huffs and puffs with false indignation. If he had a shred of honesty himself, he would admit that the two central charges levied at the Government repeatedly by the hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook) and his hon. Friends have been found to be untrue and should be withdrawn.

    Sir Michael Marshall: Does my right hon. Friend agree that in an increasingly competitive and turbulent world, this or indeed any Government must take great care in the way in which they balance national interest and the promotion of British exports? Is it not clear that my right hon. Friend the Chief Secretary and my right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General are honourable Members and that they should be given some degree of trust and flexibility, as the Labour party would give its Ministers if it were in government? The right hon. Member for Sedgefield (Mr. Blair) should have a care.

    The Prime Minister: I think that there are some substantive points, which tend to get lost amidst these exchanges, and I shall tell the House what the important ones are. We did not export lethal weapons to Iraq, unlike many other countries. No British troops in Kuwait faced British weapons, and our guidelines for the export of defence equipment to Iran and Iraq were at least as strict as, and probably stricter than, those of any other country. That is the reality that the British nation needs to understand, and that the Opposition seek to hide.

    Mr. Ashdown: Can the Prime Minister think of any other organisation in Britain, except perhaps British Gas, in which senior executives who had been criticised by an independent inquiry in the terms in which his Ministers have been criticised by Scott would be allowed by the boss to hang on to their jobs?

    The Prime Minister: Again, the right hon. Gentleman resorts to partial understanding. Whether that is a tactic or whether the right hon. Gentleman really understands only partially, is something that neither I nor the House has ever been able fully to understand. If the right hon. Gentleman reads the whole report, he will realise that the central charges levied, the charges that required me to set up the report so that they could be impartially examined and laid to rest, have been impartially examined, and have been laid to rest.

    Mr. Peter Ainsworth: Did my right hon. Friend see the report in The Sunday Telegraph this week about the relative competitiveness of British industry? It was entitled, “Britain advances, Germany retreats”. Does my right hon. Friend agree that our vital interests lie in free trade, free markets, free enterprise policies and freedom from the social chapter and from the other Euro-meddling so beloved by the Labour party?

    The Prime Minister: I am entirely happy to agree with my hon. Friend about the economic circumstances that we now face, as a result of the difficult and often unpopular decisions that we have taken to put the British economy on an even keel. We now have the best platform for sustained prosperity, and for sustained growth with low inflation, that we have seen for many years. Nobody doubts that, except those who are professionally inclined to wish to doubt it, because it conflicts with their interests–and they sit on the Opposition Benches.

     

    Q2. Mr. Alan W. Williams: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 20 February.

    The Prime Minister: I refer the hon. Gentleman to the reply I gave some moments ago.

    Mr. Williams: Does the Prime Minister agree with Sir Richard Scott that the Chief Secretary to the Treasury again and again, in letter after letter to hon. Members, misled Parliament about the arms sale policy to Iraq, and consistently failed to discharge his duty of ministerial accountability to Parliament?

    The Prime Minister: No; I have made the point before, and I shall reiterate, that I do not believe that my right hon. Friend deliberately misled Parliament. [Hon. Members: “Oh!”] I do not believe that. The requirement to inform Parliament is clearly set out in “Questions of Procedure for Ministers”–and the reason why the House knows that is that I arranged for its open publication for the first time. Unlike previous Governments, who were asked to publish it by their own backbenchers, I published it without being asked. Previous Governments were asked, and declined to publish.

    Mr. Butcher: Does my right hon. Friend agree that, as well as having the fullest support of the British people, both in Ulster and on the mainland, in pursuing the peace initiative, he also has the widespread support of the British people both in Ulster and on the mainland in vigorously pursuing those who wish to damage the civil liberties of the people of London and elsewhere, through a bombing campaign? Does he further agree that those who wish to damage the civil liberties of our people should not be too surprised if their own civil liberties are damaged in the pursuit of justice?

    The Prime Minister: We are determined to maintain law and order and democratic principles and we shall continue to seek and hunt down those responsible for the recent attacks. We give the highest priority to the security of citizens on the mainland and in Northern Ireland. Each of the three bombs in the past 10 days or so has been the act of men callously unconcerned about the death or injury of innocent people–perhaps people who have had no connection whatsoever with the ancient feuds and disputes of Northern Ireland. I do not believe that they either deserve or will receive sympathy and understanding from any decent citizen, either here or in Ulster.

     

    Q3. Mr. Foulkes: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 20 February.

    The Prime Minister: I refer the hon. Gentleman to the reply I gave a few moments ago.

    Mr. Foulkes: Does the Prime Minister agree that, since the Chief Secretary has repeatedly given inaccurate and misleading information to Parliament and to the public, he is the ideal man to present the Tory party’s tax plans at the next election?

    The Prime Minister: The hon. Gentleman may be interested to know that my right hon. Friend will be presenting tax plans from this Dispatch Box after the election also.

     

    EU Unemployment

    Q4. Sir Teddy Taylor: To ask the Prime Minister if he will raise at the next meeting of the European Council the level of unemployment in the EU.

    The Prime Minister: I shall take every opportunity to protect the United Kingdom’s flexible labour market and falling unemployment against the damaging effects of the social chapter. No other significant European country has an unemployment rate lower than ours.

    Sir Teddy Taylor: As high unemployment is becoming a tragic nightmare on the continent of Europe– by comparison with the UK, where unemployment has been falling consistently–will the Prime Minister do all in his power to persuade his colleagues in Europe to abandon illogical policies such as fixed exchange rates, which are simply a recipe for job destruction?

    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend is quite right about the relative levels of unemployment. While unemployment fell here last week to a five-year low, in most similar large European countries it is either growing or remaining static at a much higher level than here in the United Kingdom. As the president of the European Monetary Institute said just the other day, other member states should use the United Kingdom as their economic model. I am delighted to have his support–that is what I have been saying to my colleagues on the European Council for several years now.

  • PMQT Written Answers – 19 February 1996

    Below is the text of the written answers relating to Prime Minister’s Question Time from 19th February 1996.

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Advertising

    Mr. Redmond: To ask the Prime Minister what is the annual cost of the Government’s advertising budget for each of the last five years.

    The Prime Minister: There is no central advertising budget. This is a matter for individual Departments.

     

    Out-of-school Activities

    Mr. Alex Carlile: To ask the Prime Minister if he will make it his policy that every Government Department should produce proposals to ensure that the public and private sectors are able to encourage and, where necessary, provide a wide range of out-of-school activities for 10 to 16-year-olds; and if he will make a statement.

    The Prime Minister: The public and private sectors are already free to encourage or provide out-of-school activities and schools are free to use them, or not, as they wish.

     

    Public Records

    Mr. Llew Smith: To ask the Prime Minister what plans he has to review the Public Records Acts 1958 and 1967 in regard to the selection of material for retention and release.

    The Prime Minister: The Government have no such plans as their policy on the release or withholding of records under the provision of the Public Records Acts was reviewed in 1992-93. The results of that review were published as chapter 9 of the White Paper on open government, July 1993 (Cm 2290).

     

    Scott Inquiry

    Mr. Llew Smith: To ask the Prime Minister what is his policy towards the correction of answers given to Parliament where civil servants responsible for drafting or Ministers or former Ministers told the Scott inquiry that they were inaccurate.

    The Prime Minister [holding answer 16 February 1996]: If the answers to any parliamentary questions require correction, they are corrected.

  • Mr Major’s Comments on the Scott Report – 16 February 1996

    Below is the text of Mr Major’s comments on the Scott Report, made on the 16th February 1996.

    PRIME MINISTER:

    I think Sir Richard has done a very thorough, very competent job and I am very grateful to him. It has taken three years of work and I think people can now see the outcome. I thought it was very important that Sir Richard examined these matters because the charges that were laid, that the Government were seeking to arm Saddam Hussein and that Government Ministers had conspired to send innocent men to jail, were very serious indeed. I thought the only way that they could be comprehensively examined and people would realise that they were untrue was to have the sort of examination Sir Richard has carried out so I am immensely grateful to him for it.

    I think you need to look at the whole context of the report. What was the report about? The report was about whether innocent men were going to be sent to jail by conspiracy and whether Saddam Hussein was being armed by the British Government. Those were the charges, those frankly were the smears with which Robin Cook and others have run with consistently over the last three years. They are comprehensively dismissed and I don’t think you can overlook the fact that that was what the report was about. They have gone. There is no doubt that didn’t happen. I am delighted at the outcome. I believed that that would be the outcome because I know William Waldegrave very well. It never occurred to me for a second that these charges would be true and it was important to me that the British nation realised that and now they do.

    I think there are lessons to learn from Sir Richard’s report. It is very comprehensive. It has shown up some shortcomings and mistakes and I shall take these very seriously.

    When I invited Sir Richard to set his own terms of reference I did so knowingly. I did so knowing he would look at it very carefully and he might throw up things that needed to be amended and needed to be changed, and he has in some respects and we will examine these very carefully. Some we have already put into operation and others we are examining. All of them will be examined with very great care. The dissemination of intelligence material for example. Clearly it would have been better if that had been better disseminated. That is an illustration of it. Indeed the fact that there are something like 100,000 pieces of intelligence to be looked at in a short period is a mitigating circumstance but there is more to be done. So there are things to be learned from the report.

  • PMQT Written Answers – 15 February 1996

    Below is the text of the written answers relating to Prime Minister’s Question Time from 15th February 1996.

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Engagements

    Mr. Harry Greenway: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 15 February.

    Sir Peter Tapsell: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 15 February.

    The Prime Minister: This morning, I presided at a meeting of the Cabinet and had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in the House, I shall be having further meetings later today.

     

    Council of Ministers

    Mr. Steen: To ask the Prime Minister how many directives have been passed through the Council of Ministers in each of last five years.

    The Prime Minister [holding answer 14 February 1996]: The Commission’s most up-to-date figures for the number of Council directives in the last five years are:

    1991: 68

    1992: 93

    1993: 66

    1994: 49

    1995: 31

     

    Ghazanfer Ali

    Mr. Madden: To ask the Prime Minister if he will call for a further report into the case of Ghazanfer Ali who is detained in prison in Mirpur city in Azad Kashmir; and if he will make a statement.

    The Prime Minister: I understand that Mr. Ali, a Pakistani national, has now been formally charged with murder and the illegal possession of arms and that he is making regular appearances in court. The next hearing are scheduled for 24 and 29 February. My right hon. and learned Friend the Foreign Secretary will continue to monitor his case on humanitarian grounds.

  • PMQT – 15 February 1996

    Below is the text of Prime Minister’s Question Time from 15th February 1996.

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Engagements

    Q1. Mrs. Mahon: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 15 February.

    The Prime Minister (Mr. John Major): This morning, I presided at a meeting of the Cabinet and had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in the House, I shall be having further meetings later today.

    Mrs. Mahon: Will the Prime Minister tell the House how long it took him to read the Scott report?

    The Prime Minister: I am a very rapid reader.

    Mr. Dunn: Does my right hon. Friend agree that the destruction of the hereditary principle in the House of Lords is but a short distance from the destruction of the hereditary monarchy?

    The Prime Minister: I am surprised at the hostility of the Labour party to the hereditary principle, for this reason: when the Government were defeated in a vote last week, we were defeated by the votes of hereditary peers. As it happens, one of the Labour frontbench remarked to the House, “the people have spoken”.

    Mr. Blair: In retrospect, does the Prime Minister believe that the Scott report would have been better handled if it had been released in the way in which Sir Richard Scott requested? Does he have any regrets about the extraordinary disparity of treatment given, on the one hand, to Ministers and the Conservative machine and, on the other, to Members of Parliament, Opposition spokesmen and civil servants–a disparity about to be exemplified by the shambles at 3.30 pm?

    The Prime Minister: Nothing has been given to the Conservative machine–the right hon. Gentleman should withdraw that remark. Sir Richard wrote–I think to you, Madam Speaker–on 31 January to say:

    “Subject to the imposition of strict conditions on access (which Mr. Cook is prepared to observe), I view his request sympathetically.”

    We permitted access at 12 o’clock. I am surprised to hear the right hon. Gentleman disagree. The arrangements are exactly those offered to the shadow Home Secretary when we published the Learmont report. We even offered him sandwiches. Not only did he not describe the arrangements as “outrageous and insulting” but, when he made his statement, he said:

    “I thank the Secretary of State for his courtesy in arranging for me to see the report earlier than is usual.”–[Official Report, 16 October 1995; Vol. 264, c. 33.]

    I look forward to similar thanks from the shadow Foreign Secretary later.

    Mr. Ian Bruce: Does my right hon. Friend believe that British Telecom’s doubling of the amount that is spent on building the information super-highway by people other than BT is the Government’s competition policy in action, or does he believe that it would be better to sign a sweetheart deal just with BT to have the information super-highway built more quickly?

    The Prime Minister: The information super-highway has been in the process of being built for some years. The sweetheart deal that was entered into–apparently by the right hon. Member for Sedgefield (Mr. Blair)–seems to have come badly unstuck since its initial publicity.

     

    Q2. Mr. Hoon: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 15 February.

    The Prime Minister: I refer the hon. Gentleman to the reply that I gave some moments ago.

    Mr. Hoon: Will the Prime Minister tell the House how many of his Ministers who had early access to the Scott report have since been confined in a secure room, have had their mobile phones confiscated, have had all their messages brought to them by civil servants and have been escorted throughout by officials who are present for their convenience and security?

    The Prime Minister: The hon. Gentleman heard what I said to the right hon. Member for Sedgefield a few moments ago. The hon. Gentleman is overacting outrageously on this issue. I shall tell the House why Labour Members are behaving in this fashion. The right hon. Gentleman did not want to sign a form promising secrecy and decided to attack the Government for asking him to do so. He then discovered that the requirement to sign the form was not that of the Government but that of Sir Richard Scott and that all Ministers, including me, have signed it. To save face, the Opposition went into sulks and denounced the whole arrangement.

    Mr. Brooke: Does my right hon. Friend share the following view expressed in today’s The Times:

    “Kenneth Clarke, the Chancellor, was yesterday presented with a golden economic scenario of low inflation and falling unemployment.”?

    The Prime Minister: Yes, I agree with the comment. That economic scenario has resulted from the sustained policies that the Government have followed for some time. We now have the lowest sustained level of inflation for 50 years, which today has fallen to below 3 per cent; the lowest mortgage rates for 30 years; the lowest basic rate of tax for 50 years; more foreign investment than any other nation in Europe; and we export more per person than Japan and the United States.

    The right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull, East (Mr. Prescott), in his usual heckling form, talked about taxes. Let him tell us about the new taxes that the Labour party plans: the windfall tax, the tartan tax, the training tax and the social chapter tax on jobs. The right hon. Gentleman should realise that the Labour party is the taxing party– it is in opposition now and that is where it will stay.

     

    Q3. Mr. McFall: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 15 February.

    The Prime Minister: I refer the hon. Member to the reply that I gave some moments ago.

    Mr. McFall: Why has it been necessary for the Government to prepare a shorthand version of the Scott report for distribution to Conservative Members and to the media? Would it not have been preferable to allow people to make up their own minds, based on Sir Richard Scott’s key conclusions and not on the Government’s version of events?

    The Prime Minister: That is rich coming from the hon. Gentleman. Most Labour Members made up their minds about this issue three years ago–long before Sir Richard started his report. If the hon. Gentleman wishes, I shall read to him a large selection of quotations from Labour frontbenchers that show that they had made up their minds before Sir Richard Scott started his investigation.

    I set up the inquiry so that we could find out precisely what happened and so that the matter could be investigated independently and publicly. It was investigated under the conditions that Sir Richard Scott wanted. I was determined that the report be published and debated by the House, as it has been. The hon. Gentleman will see the outcome shortly.

     

    Q4. Mr. Hawkins: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 15 February.

    The Prime Minister: I refer my hon. Friend to the answer I gave some moments ago.

    Mr. Hawkins: Will my right hon. Friend confirm that more than 7,000 head teachers are members of the Secondary Heads Association? Is he aware that that association has described Labour’s education policy as naive? Is it not typical of the Opposition’s arrogance that they have now said that those 7,000 hard-working headteachers should go to the bottom of the class for not doing their homework?

    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend characteristically understates what was said by the secondary heads. What they actually said was:

    “The document is an uncomfortable combination of the naive and the messianic”,

    that they find

    “little evidence in the document of thought in detail or research”

    and that they regret

    “the absence of recognition of valuable initiatives already in place”–

    put in place by this Government.

    We have learnt over the months that Labour’s education spokesman has a tough job. Teachers openly criticise his policy and shadow Cabinet Members openly contradict it–but now that they know what makes a good school, I am sure that they will be able to improve their education policy.

    Mr. Radice: In April 1994, the Prime Minister wrote to me to say that, if Ministers fail to give accurate and truthful information to the House of Commons, they should relinquish their positions. Is that still the case?

    The Prime Minister: I have said before that, if I judge Ministers to have knowingly misled the House, they cannot stay. That remains my position.

     

    Q5. Mr. Butler: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 15 February.

    The Prime Minister: I refer my hon. Friend to the answer I gave some moments ago.

    Mr. Butler: Will my right hon. Friend join me in rejecting the insulting suggestion made last night by the Leader of the Opposition–that when old-age pensioners want a treat, they should steal it? Is he aware that shoplifting costs every household in the country £90 a year? Does he agree that the idea that shoplifters from certain groups should not be prosecuted is yet another example of Labour saying one thing and wanting to do quite another?

    The Prime Minister: Shoplifting is certainly a serious crime. It causes a great deal of loss for small and large shopkeepers. If the right hon. Member for Sedgefield did indeed describe it as my hon. Friend suggests he did, I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will withdraw those remarks. They certainly cannot reflect his settled consideration.

     

    Q6. Mr. Keith Hill: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 15 February.

    The Prime Minister: I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave some moments ago.

    Mr. Hill: As the Prime Minister has had a full eight days to read the Scott report, and as I have only eight minutes, would he care to advise me which of the 1,800 pages I should find the most interesting?

    The Prime Minister: I hope that the hon. Gentleman will accept from me that, in addition to examining the report so that I and others can be answerable to this House, there have been some other things to do. The hon. Gentleman has 11 days now to consider the report. I hope that he will contribute to the debate in the House then–on the basis of fact, not of sneers, smears and innuendo of the sort that we have heard for three years.

     

    Q7. Mr. Nicholas Winterton: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 15 February.

    The Prime Minister: I refer my hon. Friend to the answer I gave some moments ago.

    Mr. Winterton: Does my right hon. Friend accept that we have the most encouraging set of economic indicators that this country has had in modern history? Will he further accept, although he knows that I have had concerns in the past about aspects of the health service reforms, that the private health sector is now so popular and so instrumental in playing a role in the health service that my socialist opponent at the next election works for it?

    The Prime Minister: I am truly shocked at that example of how Labour does not always do what it says. I hope that we will not find it in other elements of the Labour party.

     

    Q8. Mr. Gordon Prentice: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 15 February.

    The Prime Minister: I refer the hon. Gentleman to the reply I gave some moments ago.

    Mr. Prentice: Did Lord Justice Scott not make it quite clear that all hon. Members should receive his report at the same time? Is it not almost a contempt of court that backbenchers such as me have no time at all to absorb his important report and that we will find it impossible to quiz the President of the Board of Trade intelligently on its conclusions?

    The Prime Minister: The hon. Gentleman should really come off this silly line that he and his hon. Friends–[Interruption.]–this silly line that he and his hon. Friends are concerting. The hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr. Sheerman), who is having hysteria, would be better advised to look at the precedent, to see what happened to the shadow Home Secretary, and to see what he said a few days later.

    Hon. Members have tried every trick to prejudice the reception of the Scott report. I suggest that they would be very wise to wait for just a few minutes to see what is in the Scott report. They can then deal with the reality of it on the basis of knowledge, and not on the basis of the smears that they have been putting around for the past three years.

  • PMQT Written Answers – 14 February 1996

    Below is the text of the written answers relating to Prime Minister’s Question Time from 14th February 1996.

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Deregulation

    Mr. Steen: To ask the Prime Minister, pursuant to his written answer of 6 November, Official Report, column 546, if he will place in the Library copies of the 1,000 regulations identified for repeal; and which of these had been repealed by 1 December 1995.

    The Prime Minister: The 1,000 regulations due for repeal or amendment are identified individually by the responsible Departments and no comprehensive central list is held. However, we achieved our target of repealing or amending over 500 regulations by the end of last year. Examples included the simplification of the food temperature control regulations which will save business about £40 million a year with no diminution in food safety; removal of restrictions on Sunday trading and allowing shops to stay open later in the evenings if they so wish; and reform of the Trustee Investments Act 1961 which will result in savings to charities of up to £450 million a year by giving them greater investment flexibility. New measures are under consideration.

     

    Scott Inquiry

    Mr. Robin Cook: To ask the Prime Minister on how many occasions since 1 January 1995 (a) he and (b) officials in the Cabinet Office have had contact with Lord Howe concerning his correspondence with the Scott inquiry.

    The Prime Minister [holding answer 12 February 1996]: Lord Howe, like other witnesses to the Scott inquiry, has had contacts with officials in the Cabinet Office from time to time. I have had no such contacts with him.

    Mr. Llew Smith: To ask the Prime Minister what arrangements have been made for civil servants whose actions are discussed by Lord Justice Scott to receive copies of his report before its official publication on 15 February.

    The Prime Minister: Pursuant to my answer of Tuesday 13 February, Official Report, columns 506-7, it has subsequently been agreed with the inquiry that all individuals who, from earlier drafts submitted to them, have reason to believe they may be criticised in the report should have access to those sections of the report relevant to them shortly before publication, but only in controlled circumstances.

  • PMQT Written Answers – 13 February 1996

    Below is the text of the written answers relating to Prime Minister’s Question Time from 13th February 1996.

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Departmental Publications

    Dr. Wright: To ask the Prime Minister which of his Department’s administrative manuals and internal guidance are now made public; and which remain private.

    The Prime Minister: For these purposes my office is part of the Cabinet Office. I refer the hon. Member to the reply given by my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary, Office of Public Service, on 12 February 1996.

     

    Scott Inquiry

    Mr. Llew Smith: To ask the Prime Minister what was the final date on which (a) a Minister and (b) a civil servant delivered information to Lord Justice Scott for his inquiry.

    The Prime Minister: The Government have been in correspondence with Sir Richard Scott’s team throughout the period of the inquiry. The Cabinet Office was last asked to provide documents and information to the inquiry on 22 January.

    Mr. Smith: To ask the Prime Minister what arrangements have been made for civil servants whose actions are discussed by Lord Justice Scott to receive copies of his report before its official publications on 15 February.

    The Prime Minister: The Government are in discussion with the inquiry about this.

    Mr. Smith: To ask the Prime Minister how many pages of evidence were provided by his office to the Scott inquiry.

    The Prime Minister: My office and the Cabinet Office have provided 6,197 pages of evidence to the Scott inquiry. This figure does not include correspondence between my office or the Cabinet Office and the inquiry or evidence supplied to the inquiry by individual witnesses.

    Mr. Robin Cook: To ask the Prime Minister if he (a) has discussed and (b) has authorised his Ministers to discuss media presentation of the Scott inquiry report with (i) newspaper proprietors, (ii) newspaper editors and (iii) governors of the BBC.

    The Prime Minister [holding answer 6 February 1996]: The arrangements agreed by the Government with Sir Richard Scott do not permit anyone outside Government to have access to the report before publication, nor to have the contents of the report disclosed to them. I have made it clear that those arrangements must be adhered to. The only exception at present agreed is that the spokesmen of the leading Opposition parties should have access to the report some hours before publication in accordance with the precedents for weighty reports of this nature. The preparation of the Government’s response to the report has been and will be conducted in accordance with those arrangements. Any changes would be made only after consultation with Sir Richard Scott.

     

    Higher Education Institutions

    Mr. Bryan Davies: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list each occasion on which he has visited (a) a British university, and (b) another institution of higher education in each of the last five years; and what was the purpose of the visit in each case.

    The Prime Minister: I have visited a range of education establishments and discussed a variety of issues over the past five years.

     

    Engagements

    Mr. Harry Greenway: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 13 February.

    Sir Peter Tapsell: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 13 February.

    The Prime Minister: This morning I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in the House, I shall be having further meetings later today.

     

    Munitions Dumping

    Mr. Donohoe: To ask the Prime Minister which Government Department has responsibility for responding to accidents caused by the dumping of munitions in the Beaufort’s dyke area.

    The Prime Minister: The response to any particular incident would, in the first instance, be a matter for the relevant emergency services. Any associated departmental responsibility would be determined by the circumstances of the particular incident.

  • PMQT – 13 February 1996

    Below is the text of Prime Minister’s Question Time from 13th February 1996.

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Engagements

    Q1. Mr. Turner: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 13 February.

    The Prime Minister (Mr. John Major): This morning, I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in the House, I shall be having further meetings later today.

    Mr. Turner: Will the Prime Minister accept from me that the national health service is holding together at this moment only because of the dedication and good will of its professional staff? In Wolverhampton, beds and wards have been closed, staff have been made redundant, and accident and emergency services have been closed dozens and dozens of times in recent months. May I assure the Prime Minister that the good people of Wolverhampton do not regard the health service as safe in his hands?

    The Prime Minister: I am surprised that the hon. Gentleman chooses this day of all days to make that old charge. As was announced yesterday, the number of patients facing waiting times in excess of one year has fallen yet again. There are now only 20,000 people waiting more than 12 months. Five years ago, the figure was 187,000. People are getting treated quicker, better and more comprehensively at all levels in the health service than ever before. It is about time that Opposition Members–I do not mean only the hon. Gentleman–realised the tremendous advances made in the health service by doctors, nurses and administrators in the treatment of people from one end of this country to the other.

    Sir Giles Shaw: Is my right hon. Friend aware, from The Mail on Sunday, that the hon. Member for Dundee, East (Mr. McAllion) was persuaded to vote against the new clause IV relationship on the ground that it was only a change of words?

    Hon. Members: Oh.

    Madam Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman must ask the Prime Minister a question on a matter for which he has responsibility.

    Sir Giles Shaw: Does my right hon. Friend agree that the change in words with which the hon. Member for Dundee, East disagreed was typical–[Hon. Members: “Order.”] Does my right hon. Friend agree that a change in words often disguises a change in meaning?

    The Prime Minister: I do not regard the hon. Member for Dundee, East as the only voice of the Labour party, but I am sure that my hon. Friend is correct: we are increasingly learning that we get a different Labour policy depending on which Labour Member writes it.

    Mr. Blair: Will the Prime Minister agree to the request that has been made by Members of Parliament on both sides of the House–and now, very strongly, by Sir Richard Scott–that the Scott report be published at 2.30pm rather than 3.30pm on Thursday? Members of Parliament will then have an opportunity to study the report before commenting on it.

    The Prime Minister: The right hon. Gentleman knows that that is not the way in which the Government, or our predecessors, have conducted business in the House. The proposed arrangements are in line with the usual practice of publishing a report and making it available to hon. Members at the same time. The Government have arranged for there to be a debate, in Government time, 10 days after the publication of the report. Hon. Members will therefore have time to absorb and to understand the report and will be able to speak to it with knowledge rather than with ignorance–which is what Labour Members have done for the past three years. There will be a full and open debate on the report.

    Mr. Blair: The Prime Minister has relied on precedent. I suggest that a report containing 1,800 pages and of this complexity is almost without precedent. Ministers having a report for eight days before anyone else is also without precedent. The campaign to discredit the judge who conducted the inquiry–before the report has been published–is also without precedent. Will the Prime Minister reconsider the request? The refusal to allow Members of Parliament this facility, on the day that the report is published, effectively disables them and prevents them from holding the Executive to account and discharging their duty both to Parliament and to the country.

    The Prime Minister: The right hon. Gentleman is quite mistaken, and he knows that. The Government will answer questions about the Scott report on the day that it is published, and we will debate it when all hon. Members have had time to study it. The right hon. Gentleman referred to a campaign to discredit the report before it is published. That campaign has come from the the hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook) and the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull, East (Mr. Prescott), the deputy leader of the Labour party. Without a single scruple, time and time again, the Labour party has made it clear what it believes will be the outcome of a report that has only just been concluded. If anyone has prejudged the report, it is not the Government but the right hon. Gentleman and his colleagues–and the right hon. Gentleman knows that to be the case.

    Mr. Blair: Does not what the Prime Minister has just said–in a ridiculous attempt to blame Opposition Members–underline why we should have the Scott report early, so that people can comment on it? In the interests of proper parliamentary democracy, will not the Prime Minister reconsider hon. Members’ request, especially as it is backed by the inquiry judge?

    The Prime Minister: As for the Government having had the report, the right hon. Gentleman knows that the House will expect my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade to be at the Dispatch Box to answer questions, quite properly, put by the House when the report is published. That is why the Government have the report in advance. The right hon. Gentleman knows that that has been the position under both Conservative and Labour Governments for as far back as he may care to remember. He is trying to twist public opinion before the report is published, just as his hon. Friends have done for the past three years. The report will soon be published, and Labour Members will have to consider the issue on the basis of fact.

    Dr. Hampson: Is my right hon. Friend aware that the privatised utilities are such a good investment that, while slagging off British Gas and Yorkshire Water, a group of Labour councils in West Yorkshire–notably Leeds, led by the hon. Member for Hemsworth (Mr. Trickett)–were investing £170 million of their pensioners’ money in those companies? Is that not a classic case of saying one thing and doing another?

    The Prime Minister: I congratulate the unions on making a successful investment. I live in hope that the day will yet come when the Opposition recognise that, if they talk about the virtues of the market, they ought to support private ownership, not attack it on every conceivable occasion as they have been doing.

    Mr. Ashdown: Leaving aside for a moment the interests of the House, will the Prime Minister at least consider the interests of his civil servants? How can it be right that Ministers, who can defend themselves in public, have eight days in which to read this 1,800-page report and prepare their defences, while civil servants who are criticised may not get even six hours?

    The Prime Minister: Let me explain what has been agreed, so that I can remove the misunderstanding from the right hon. Gentleman’s mind. At present, the report has been made available only to Ministers or civil servants who need to see it in order to help to prepare the Government’s response to questions in the House–[Interruption.]

    Madam Speaker: Order. The House must come to order and listen to the answers.

    The Prime Minister: That is the fact of the matter. Other Ministers and former Ministers and civil servants have not had access to the report. That is how the matter has been dealt with; it is an entirely proper way to deal with the report–we have dealt with it entirely properly.

    Mr. Bill Walker: Will my right hon. Friend confirm that he has no plans to introduce a parliament in Edinburgh? It would leave Westminster Scottish Members with very little to do, because most of their business would be devolved; so they would become part-time, and should probably be paid part-time. They would also avoid paying the tartan tax, because they would be based in London.

    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend makes a sound point. The advocates of a Scottish Parliament among the Labour party who live in London would not themselves have to pay the extra tax that would be levied on everyone else living in Scotland. I can certainly confirm that we have no plans for such an assembly, or for such a tartan tax, or to allow Scottish Members to vote on matters in Scotland on which English Members cannot vote, and then to permit Scottish Members to come to the House and vote on similar matters for England, Wales and Northern Ireland. I can also confirm to my hon. Friend that, were anyone to introduce such plans, that would be the most blatant gerrymandering of the constitution that we have ever seen.

     

    Royal Docks

    Q2. Mr. Spearing: To ask the Prime Minister when he next plans to visit the royal docks.

    The Prime Minister: I have at present no plans to do so.

    Mr. Spearing: When the Prime Minister does visit the royal docks, will he also visit the adjacent Silvertown fire station, whose crews joined their colleagues in Millwall on the Isle of Dogs at the tragic incident on Friday? Does he know that crews at both stations, not to mention the inhabitants of Docklands, face the prospect of having the two appliances at each station reduced to one? Does he recall that his name appeared at the top of a successful motion at 10 o’clock last night, calling on local authorities to exercise their freedoms responsibly? If he were charged with denying them those freedoms, because of the policies of the Government towards the public services, what would he say?

    The Prime Minister: Of course the hon. Gentleman is right to say that we require councils to exercise their freedoms and opportunities responsibly, but there must also be fallback powers for when that does not happen:

    “we believe there must be fall-back powers to enable central government, in extreme circumstances, to protect council tax and business rate payers”.

    Mr. Spearing indicated dissent.

    The Prime Minister: I was quoting a Labour policy document, so I am sorry to see that the hon. Gentleman disagrees with it.

    When looking at the royal docks area, the hon. Gentleman might also like to look at the dramatic improvements there: the 5,000 new homes and the 2 million sq ft of commercial property. The whole area has been revolutionised by policies that we have followed but many of his colleagues have opposed.

     

    Economic Indicators (Lichfield)

    Q3. Mr. Fabricant: To ask the Prime Minister what recent analysis he has made of economic indicators and their effect on Lichfield; and if he will make a statement.

    The Prime Minister: Lichfield has benefited fully from the Government’s policies, which have given this country the lowest mortgage rates for 30 years, the lowest basic rate of tax for 50 years and the longest period of low inflation for 50 years. Unemployment in my hon. Friend’s constituency has now fallen by some 40 per cent. from its peak.

    Mr. Fabricant: Is my right hon. Friend aware that Lichfield is not only a beautiful cathedral town but a centre for light industry? Is he further aware that people in Lichfield will be heartened by the report in The Times today which showed that the average net take-home pay of production workers in France, Italy and Germany is now less than that in the United Kingdom? Is that not because we have consistently refused to enter into an agreement on the social chapter? Does my right hon. Friend agree that, under a Labour Government, workers would suffer, because the Labour party’s idea of negotiating in Europe is rather like the Trustee Savings bank–it is the party that likes to say yes?

    The Prime Minister: They certainly were very startling figures to set out what net take-home pay will purchase, which was the basis on which they were done. That stands in stark contrast to the claims of a sweatshop economy about which we so often hear from the Labour party. It is no coincidence that those figures were achieved. Business is attracted by flexible working practice and low cost–precisely the benefits that would be wrecked by the social chapter as it is and by the social chapter as it would be if any Government were to sign up to it in this country. This Government will not.

  • PMQT Written Answers – 12 February 1996

    Below is the text of the written answers relating to Prime Minister’s Question Time from 12th February 1996.

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Scott Inquiry

    Mr. Peter Bottomley: To ask the Prime Minister if he will ask Lord Justice Scott to disclose the names of journalists to be briefed and the dates of briefings in relation to the forthcoming report and the progress of the inquiry.

    The Prime Minister: I have no plans to do so.

     

    Rail Privatisation (Directorships)

    Mr. MacShane: To ask the Prime Minister what guidance he is giving retiring members or former members of his Administration or hon. Members in respect of their accepting directorships in privatised rail companies.

    The Prime Minister: From the start of the current session of Parliament, Ministers who leave office will be expected to ask the independent advisory committee on business appointments about any appointment outside Government which they wish to take up within two years.

     

    Senior Salaries Review Body

    Mr. Chris Davies: To ask the Prime Minister what is the average of the pay increases recommended by the Senior Salaries Review Body in the past year.

    The Prime Minister: I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave to the hon. Member for Uxbridge (Sir M. Shersby) on 8 February, Official Report, columns 294-96.