The Rt. Hon. Sir John Major KG CH

Tag: Northern Ireland Peace Process

  • Mr Major’s Doorstep Interview in Northern Ireland – 31 March 1994

    Below is the text of Mr Major’s doorstep interview held at Hillsborough Castle in Northern Ireland on Thursday 31st March 1994.

    PRIME MINISTER:

    I just want to say a word or two. I am delighted to be back here in Northern Ireland this morning. I have just had the opportunity over breakfast of a briefing on security and other matters with the Chief Constable, the GOC and the Secretary of State. I am quite satisfied that security cooperation is improving in Northern Ireland and the increasing effectiveness of the security forces. I am very pleased to have the opportunity of discussing that yet again, I look forward to coming back again and again to do so.

    QUESTION:

    The Taoiseach today described the statement from the IRA as a very small step, do you agree with that?

    PRIME MINISTER:

    I think the Taoiseach’s view and mine over the course that the IRA need to take is quite clear, we both made it clear repeatedly that they need to stop violence and they need to stop violence for good. We committed ourselves to that in the joint declaration, I have said it repeatedly since and so has the Taoiseach.

    QUESTION:

    What do you say however to the clergymen who attended to many of the bereaved and injured in the Shankhill Road who said everybody should build on those three days of ceasefire, what do you say to that?

    PRIME MINISTER:

    I said last night that I thought the three day ceasefire was a very cynical exercise. Let me tell you why I said that. What effectively the IRA are saying is that on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday they will decide not to attack people and not to kill people, on Friday, Saturday and Sunday they think they can go back to killing people. Well I do not think that is satisfactory, it is a cynical ploy, the only message we want to hear from them is that they have decided to give up violence for good. I am sure that clergyman and everybody else would wish to see them do that.

    QUESTION:

    Do you reject that move by the IRA?

    PRIME MINISTER:

    I have just said to you that I believe that it is a cynical exercise, I believe it is a self-serving and a cynical exercise. And there is absolutely no doubt what Sinn Fein and the IRA need to do, it has been spelt out perfectly clearly, I would like to see them enter the democratic process. The joint declaration opens the door for them to do precisely that, they know what needs to be done, it is perfectly clear, if they genuinely wish to play a democratic part in the future politics of Northern Ireland there is a road for them to do so, there is a route in which they can achieve that. They have thus so far failed to do so so I am simply not impressed by short term manoeuvres like this one.

    QUESTION:

    Is there not some danger of conflict between your government and the Irish government given Mr Reynolds’ guarded welcome for the ceasefire, are you on the same lines?

    PRIME MINISTER:

    Yes we are completely on the same lines, we are in very close contact, we have remained in very close touch, we both stand absolutely behind the principles that are in the joint declaration, we do now and we will in the future, there is no difference between the governments.

    QUESTION:

    Considering that your government spoke to Sinn Fein last year, is it not a bit hypocritical for you to turn down clarification at this vital stage?

    PRIME MINISTER:

    We responded to questions that we were asked by Sinn Fein last year, if I can correct the way you put the question. As far as clarification is concerned, the document stands on its own merits, it is perfectly clear to everybody else what it means, it is perfectly clear to Sinn Fein as well, what they are doing is to try and encourage the gullible to believe that there is some extra step to draw the government into negotiation which would lead them to behave differently. The fact is the gullible ought not to be deceived. At the moment the joint declaration is putting Sinn Fein under pressure, I intend to stand by the joint declaration and I hope everyone will keep up the pressure.

    QUESTION:

    Given that your government did talk to Sinn Fein last year wouldn’t it have been normal for people in Northern Ireland to expect that given the gesture which the IRA has made that you will make some approaches through the Secret Service or other bodies?

    PRIME MINISTER:

    Well as I indicated just a moment ago to the last questioner, we responded to questions put to us by the IRA last year and I do not think I could have made my position clearer about the three day ceasefire that they have now offered, that is not going to change the future of Northern Ireland, they can, they can stop the violence permanently and then in due course enter the constitutional talks. The question you should be asking is not what I propose to make of the three day ceasefire but why they will not take the offer that is on the table for them from the British Government and the Irish government to stop killing people permanently, to stop wrecking people’s lives permanently and to enter into a constitutional dialogue, that is the question that should be asked.

    QUESTION:

    Will there be any sort of crack-down if it is IRA business as usual after the ceasefire?

    PRIME MINISTER:

    The security cooperation that exists at the moment is very good, it is very good, it is very close, I cannot recall a time when it was better and perhaps more relevantly that is also the view of the people directly responsible for security. We are always looking for ways to see whether that can be improved and we will continue to do that.

  • Mr Major’s Speech to the Institute of Directors in Belfast – 30 March 1994

    Below is the text of Mr Major’s speech, made to the Institute of Directors at Culloden Hotel, Hollywood, County Down on Wednesday 30th March 1994.

    PRIME MINISTER:

    Mr Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen. It is just possible that some of you reading the newspapers may be surprised to see me here tonight. You really should not be. I have made many visits to Northern Ireland in the past, I intend to go on coming in the future and whenever possible I look forward to bringing Norma with me as well.

    And I will tell you why, because you touched on it just briefly a moment or so ago. Northern Ireland is in the centre of my political interest and I promise you tonight that is precisely where I intend that it will stay in the future. In those visits I have made here to the Province I have seen a great deal of what happens in this particular part of the world. I have seen aircraft made at Shorts in Belfast; tee-shirts by the million at the Fruit of the Loom in Londonderry, indeed my son stole mine before I had been home for 5 seconds; I have shopped in Coleraine and in Larne; I have sung carols in St George’s Church, Belfast; last summer I had the pleasure, as your guest, Mr Chairman, of visiting the Castleward Opera. And on those visits and on many other occasions in London I have met your church leaders, your political leaders, many leaders of community groups, and as I am doing this evening, leading businessmen and their wives and families.

    And above all, of course, I have had on these opportunities the good fortune to meet thousands of Northern Irish people from all walks of life. And on these occasions there have been two things that have particularly struck me: the first is the extraordinary warmth of Northern Ireland, in my experience, in their welcome and in their generosity, the people of Northern Ireland are second to none; and second, I have been invariably struck by how much is changing here and by how fast that change is occurring. The Northern Ireland of today is far removed from the images formed at a distance by many people, not just elsewhere in the United Kingdom, perhaps in many countries around the world. I would like to see far more people coming here to Northern Ireland to see precisely for themselves what is happening, to see the changes and to judge the opportunities that I believe are increasingly becoming apparent for the future.

    I wish to turn in a moment to economic matters and then perhaps a little to security matters. But I want first, with your indulgence, to say a word or two about a topic of the moment, to say a word or two about Europe.

    Throughout my time as Prime Minister the government has been taking a determined, a collective and a positive approach to Europe with clearly defined objectives. We intend to go on doing precisely that and if anyone is in any doubt of our course, I invite them to read again, if they have read it before, and for the first time if they have not, the article I wrote on holiday in Portugal last year that the Economist were kind enough to publish last September. That sets out our course.

    Much of the comment I hear these days about Europe is, to be frank, a crude parody of the real debate we should be having. Much of it is Euro-nonsense, the simplicities of Europhobia and Euro-enthusiasm frankly short change the public on a debate that is vital to our future. I am neither phobe nor enthusiast but I am a Euro-realist seeking to secure our success across the European continent. Neither am I prepared to bend policy either to appease the phobe or to appease the enthusiast. I will seek the policy that I believe to be right and they may follow me or not, as they choose. I wish to see Europe succeed and I wish that to happen because it is vital to the interests of the United Kingdom that it does, because for us there is no alternative to playing a strong part in Europe and there is no future in petty insularity.

    In an ideal world European problems would be decided through quiet, reasoned discussion. But that is not the way that Europe works and sadly at the moment it is not the way our domestic debate upon Europe is being conducted either. If you are to make progress in the European debate you must be prepared to fight very hard, you must fight for the best deal available to your interests and for your country. And of course in Europe we from the United Kingdom are just one of Twelve, we will not always get all that we want but we must carry on and step by step secure the changes that are of importance to us.

    And that is what in recent days we have been doing over Europe’s voting system, despite the grotesque misrepresentation of events that many people will have read and seen. I learned long ago that the world outside Westminster is very different from the rather feverish atmosphere within. But even so you may be understandably confused to find the arcane question of qualified majority voting causing such banner headlines.

    Let me say to you tonight, if we had decided, if the British government had decided to accept 27 as the blocking minority, there would have been outrage among many people and we would have been accused of not fighting for Britain’s interest. If we had blocked enlargement because we could not obtain 23 of the blocking minority, we would have thrown away a prime British foreign policy objective. And as it was, after tough negotiations, we secured enlargement and safeguards for Britain’s position. It was a fierce argument but at the end of that we did win agreement that the qualified majority voting system will be fundamentally reviewed at the 1996 intergovernmental conference.

    We did not win all that we wanted for the transitional period until then but we have secured a legally binding obligation to respect minority positions and to protect our own position. A negotiation, any negotiation, certainly a negotiation among twelve within Europe, that requires often concessions on all sides and on this occasion an acceptable deal has been struck. In the circumstances known to the Cabinet I believe it was right to accept that deal.

    And let me say tonight, I will go on striking deals for the United Kingdom if I think they are right, whatever the opposition to those deals may be. But a deal is only acceptable if it sticks and it is not acceptable to mis-use treaty provisions on health and safety to bring in social directives by the back door, it is not acceptable to try and circumvent the opt-out from the social chapter that I negotiated at the time of the Maastricht Treaty. We have discussed this matter with the Commission, they have given us assurances on this and they must keep to them scrupulously if confidence here is to be restored and our partners must respect both the letter and the spirit of the deal on majority voting.

    If this deal were not to be upheld then nobody should expect the United Kingdom to continue the normal process of Community business. A deal is a deal, if deals are not respected then normal business becomes impossible.

    But arguments over voting systems should not obscure the real progress that has been made: the establishment of a single market; the enlargement of the Union; the GATT deal, the biggest most important trade deal that the world has ever seen; steps to control the budget; reform of the Common Agricultural Policy; subsidiarity meaning 25 percent of Community legislation will either be repealed or reformed, by which I mean minimised; closer cooperation; foreign policy; and the fight against crime.

    All those are practical areas of constructive cooperation with our partners in Europe in recent years and we would not have made headway on any one of those issues if we had not argued very robustly for our point of view. We will continue to seek to build the sort of the Europe which is important I believe to you and important to me. Because it is by engaging all our efforts that we can promote that crucial, that critical positive view of a decentralised, deregulated, less bureaucratic, more competitive outward looking European Union, a Union that is friendly to business and better able to compete successfully with the United States and Asia.

    And there is no purpose with inside Europe in deciding that France can compete with Germany, can compete with Britain and can compete with Spain, the whole of Europe has to compete with Asia, with Japan and the United States and if it fails to do that then our livelihoods here in Northern Ireland and right the way across the European Union will be at risk. We seek a Union, a Union that makes a wider Europe of nation states, a Europe that works for the citizen, gives choice to the consumer and freedom to the traveller.

    It is of course this Europe, important to all of us, it is important to business in Northern Ireland and so of course is the state of the economy to which I would now like to turn. It was a long recession, a deep recession, a difficult recession within many parts of the United Kingdom it has left its scars. But for the last 7 successive quarters we have been back in growth across the United Kingdom and that has given us the strongest recovery of any of the large European economies. So far the growth has been modest and steady rather than spectacular. But even so, in many ways it has been stronger and more secure than the first phase of the long recovery after the recession at the beginning of the 1980s. In manufacturing, for example, we have seen a much faster recovery in production this time. Productivity reached an all time high in January and we have been sharpening a competitive edge by keeping a far better grip on costs than either Germany or Japan.

    But to realise their full potential, and unless we realise our full potential in a competitive world we will face difficulties in the decades ahead, but to realise their full potential all areas of the United Kingdom must improve their competitiveness. This morning I held a meeting of senior Ministers who are preparing a wide ranging White Paper on competitiveness, a White Paper of the sort we frankly have not seen for very many years. And we are looking at everything the government does, from one end of government to the other, to see what more we can do to help business in the United Kingdom win in world markets.

    It is a very wide ranging review. Take prices for example, they are now rising less than for a generation, that has enabled us to bring borrowing costs down which are now among the lowest in Europe. It helps us bring our wage costs under control, today we have less than half the wage inflation of the 1980s.

    And it has brought more industrial peace. These days of course we almost take that for granted, yet we are losing fewer days through strikes than at any time since records were first kept. And then of course one might take the jobs market. Unemployment remains far higher than any of us would wish, here in the Province and across the rest of the United Kingdom. But it is falling and it is falling at an earlier stage of the recovery than in the 1980s. In Northern Ireland it has come down by 6 percent over the last year and in the United Kingdom as a whole unemployment has dropped by well over 200,000 in the past year whilst across the rest of Europe it has still been rising, over 12 percent in France, over 20 percent in Spain, over 4 million unemployed in Germany, falling, thank goodness, in the United Kingdom.

    And yet within that broad picture how is Northern Ireland doing? As you will know, it is doing rather well. Over the past 5 years Northern Ireland has out-performed the national economy. In the last decade 74,000 extra jobs have been created here – a 13 percent increase. Output and employment fell less here than in most other regions during the recession of the early 1990s and with recovery output and employment grew more rapidly than elsewhere in the United Kingdom. I believe that this growth will be maintained.

    Well over half the companies here expect to expand in 1994. You are having increasing, in some cases dramatic, success in attracting inward investment. Last year was one of the best your industrial development has ever had, and over the past 6 years United States companies alone have invested nearly 600 million pounds here, promoting nearly 5,000 jobs. And they come here, not out of charity, not out of goodwill, they come here because Northern Ireland is a good place in which to do business, they come here to share in success and we must continue to encourage this. You have world reaching companies, both large and small: Shorts, now privatised; highly successful medium sized companies like Desmonds, Powerscreen and Moy Park. Your economic well being of course is vital, it is important in its own right, but it is I believe doubly important because of its impact on political development.

    In the past as you look down the long years of Irish history, hardship and economic injustice have played into the hands of extremists, the greater the prosperity of Northern Ireland, the better the prospects for peace. And that peace of course would bring still greater prosperity, it would bring a surge in business activity, in investment and in tourism, it would help us to relegate the bad times to the history books where I truly believe they now belong.

    So let me turn for a few moments to political change and to the Joint Declaration. I find it extraordinary that some people are prepared to claim that we are indifferent to Northern Ireland and that we are prepared to abandon our interest in Northern Ireland. Nothing could be further from the truth. We have said that the British government has: “no selfish strategic or economic interest in Northern Ireland.” That phrase ought not to be perverted by anyone. As I am sure you will appreciate, the critical word there is “selfish”.

    If the people of Northern Ireland were themselves democratically of their own free will to choose a different future for themselves in a united Ireland we would not stand in their way. We would not insist that for some strategic or economic reason Northern Ireland must remain in the United Kingdom. But the converse equally applies. For so long as the greater number of the people of Northern Ireland wish to be part of the United Kingdom the British government will uphold and support their right to be so. And that is of course precisely what we are doing and in saying that I do not just refer to the level of the government’s economic support.

    For me violence in the counties of Northern Ireland is as intolerable as similar violence would be in any of the British counties. I believe that an exceptional effort needs to be made to end terrorism and move towards peace in Northern Ireland. There can be no time limit to that effort, it must go on for how ever long it may take.

    We will spare no effort to oppose terrorism. The security forces have the resources, the leadership and the support that they need and they will continue to get it. They have also achieved a great many successes. We have worked steadily and effectively to improve cooperation with the Republic of Ireland on cross-border security. Security cooperation has never been closer or better or more effective than it is today although both governments are determined to make it yet more effective and the passage, for example, of the Irish Extradition Bill will be another significant step.

    But it is not just enough to oppose the men of violence at either extreme. We must do more than that, we must demonstrate clearly and unequivocally that terrorism has no future, we must minimise support for it both here and in other countries, we must build and maintain a popular and confident consensus for peace, we must show those who might be tempted to sympathise that there is no valid cause and no conceivable excuse for violence, we must show that political objectives can be pursued by peaceful and political means on the basis of consent. And above all, for all the people of Northern Ireland, we must show there is a just and a democratic path which enjoys the overwhelming support of the people of Northern Ireland.

    Mr Chairman, that was my aim in negotiating the Joint Declaration, it is a broad approach to Northern Ireland’s future which has received unprecedented backing, it has shown that the British and the Irish governments, leaders on both sides of the community and very large numbers of the people of Northern Ireland, and of the island as a whole, can subscribe to a single balanced set of principles.

    Perhaps inevitably the Joint Declaration has been misunderstood or in some cases misrepresented by one group or another. Supporters of each tradition would have liked it tilted a little more in their direction and that perhaps in its own may be a back-handed testimony to the balance we have struck in that document. But it does not say what the solution must be and it does not rule out any outcome in advance. What it does say is that the future of Northern Ireland is to be determined by agreement and by consent.

    Some have raised the fear that it creates new institutions. Mr Chairman, it does not. Some have said that it embodies the principle of joint authority, it does not. Some have said that it gives the veto on change, emphatically it does not. I have even been told that it undermines the consent principle and the constitutional guarantee, the truth is precisely the opposite, it reinforces the consent principle and the constitutional guarantee and it spells them out and it endorses them in the name of both governments. At one extreme it has been claimed that the Joint Declaration surrenders to IRA terrorism and would allow Sinn Fein to enter the political process without renouncing violence. It does no such thing. The British and the Irish governments have been categoric in saying that there must be a permanent end to violence before those who have supported it can begin to enter the political process.

    And of course at the opposite extreme is the complaint that the joint declaration does not contain enough for nationalists, but that is not a view upheld by democratic nationalists or by the Irish government or by the people of Ireland as a whole. Over 80 percent of the people of Ireland say they support the joint declaration and they want the IRA to end violence now and for good.

    The IRA have given no coherent response, they have continued their violence, they have boasted of their attacks and they have tried to confuse by talking simultaneously of a possible ceasefire. If the IRA think that either tactic will change the situation they are sadly mistaken. Temporary ceasefires are of course welcome for the peace of mind that they bring for a period but unless they become permanent and unless they become irrevocable they will not end the conflict. Sinn Fein cannot enter the political process until it has renounced violence for good and demonstrated that that is its policy. Sooner or later the Provisionals must come to appreciate that violence drives them up a blind alley. The only road that will take them forward is the road to democratic politics. The Joint Declaration stands and it shows exactly where the British and the Irish governments stand.

    It is not a moveable peg and it will not be amended and it will not be renegotiated, and it is against this background that we have pressed ahead with the three stranded talks process. I know that progress in that arena has at times seemed frustratingly slow, it has to be, it surely must have done to you as well. But I think that perhaps is inevitable in a process designed to embrace two governments and the political parties across the spectrum. But by building patiently we have built well, we have now established large areas of potential agreement, we have a solid basis for future progress and we wish to use the three stranded talks to establish a more accountable form of government within Northern Ireland and a more productive relationship between the north and the south as well as between the British and the Irish governments.

    Mr Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen. If I may quote Burke:

    “You can never plan the future by the past”. I look at Ireland not as an Irishman but as someone who looks on this island and these counties with some affection. For too long Ireland has been a prisoner of its past, too many coffins pay grizzly tribute to what that past has been. One cannot begin to understand Ireland without understanding its history. History, tradition, culture, are vital parts of all our lives but perhaps nowhere in the world are they more important than in the island of Ireland.

    Here in Northern Ireland things are changing, the economy has changed, it is open to the world as it has never been before, it is bringing in investment, it is sending out goods and services, it has brought very welcome change to your communities. And one need look, for example, no further than the remarkable improvement in Londonderry over the past decade or the new vigour in the industries and in Belfast. We can see that. Is it not surely time to look ahead politically as well as economically, to harness that deep desire that exists on both sides of the community for a more peaceful and a more prosperous life, to break away from a past of rigid confrontation and from the violence that has so savagely scarred the last quarter of a century.

    Mr Chairman, nothing that has happened in the past three months has undermined my belief that the overwhelming majority of the people of Northern Ireland wish to live in peace. We should not let temporary set-backs discourage us or deflect us. This is not just a task for the politicians, it is a task for everyone who has the best interests of Northern Ireland at heart. The leaders of this generation, be they churchmen, politicians, community workers, opinion formers, businessmen, the leaders must help build a better life for the next generation. No-one here in this room and no sensible person in Northern Ireland would wish to see the next generation inflicted with the scars and the sadnesses of the last 25 years. The groundwork to make sure that that has not happened has been laid, it is there, it must be cherished and it must be built upon. We must maintain our resolve to carry the process through until we reach a lasting political settlement and the wider prosperity that surely will follow.

    If I have an ambition for you and for me I would like people to look back at these early years in the 1990s, perhaps to look back from some years ahead, and say that at that time at the beginning of the 1990s the people of Ireland so demonstrated their concern for peace, so demonstrated their determination that the next generation would not suffer the privations that they have suffered, that they formed that massive constituency for peace that isolated and defeated those who would seek political ends through the gun and through the bullet. That is the opportunity that lies there for us now.

    I would say to the people of Northern Ireland, don’t ever expect it will happen overnight but it will happen and with your will and your determination you can play the central part in making it happen and I hope and believe in this generation that that is what we can achieve.

  • PMQT – 22 March 1994

    Below is the text of Prime Minister’s Question Time from 22nd March 1994.

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Engagements

    Q1. Mr. Connarty : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 22 March.

    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. Connarty : Has anyone brought to the attention of the Prime Minister the 71.5 per cent. return in the Electoral Reform Society ballot on water services carried out for Strathclyde? Does he agree with the 1,194,667 people who voted against the Government’s proposals for quangoing the water services in Scotland? Does he agree that this is a crushing humiliation, or could it be possible that the Prime Minister will see it as an opportunity to show that we have a listening Government and do the democratic thing and abandon his proposal immediately?

    The Prime Minister : Since Strathclyde wilfully misrepresented the Government’s proposals, I see nothing surprising in the result. The Opposition have continued to link the proposals with privatisation, even though it is perfectly clear that we are setting up public water authorities. They persist in scaremongering about disconnections, although we have no proposals to legalise disconnecting domestic water supplies for non-payment of bills.

    The question that the hon. Gentleman should have asked is how Strathclyde will explain to its council taxpayers the waste of £750,000.

    Mr. Brandreth : Will my right hon. Friend consider adding to his list of engagements [Interruption.]

    Madam Speaker : Order. The House must come to order.

    Mr. Brandreth : Will my right hon. Friend consider adding to his list of engagements a visit to the uniquely beautiful city of Chester, where he will find inward investment at record levels, and unemployment 6 per cent. lower than a year ago and 26 per cent. lower than six years ago? Does he agree that, in terms of inward investment to the European Community, the United Kingdom in general, and the city of Chester in particular, are now leading the way?

    The Prime Minister : I am certainly pleased to hear of the particular inward investment to Chester. There has been a dramatic amount of inward investment into every part of the United Kingdom over the last few years–Wales and Scotland have certainly received a great degree of inward investment. That is very largely connected with the fact that we have a very flexible economy and a very effective business tax system, we do not have too many social on-costs, and investment here is welcome.

    Mr. John Smith : Does the Prime Minister think it right that those who can afford to pay fuel bills in advance can avoid paying the new VAT charges on gas and electricity ?

    The Prime Minister : As the right hon. and learned Gentleman knows, it has long been the case that customers for a wide range of services can pay for them in advance. [Interruption.] There is nothing unusual about that. It has happened before every Budget that the right hon. and learned Gentleman can remember since he entered the House.

    Mr. John Smith : The Prime Minister does not even begin to understand the problem here. Does he not understand that it is deeply unfair that those who are better off can avoid a tax obligation which millions of others have to shoulder because they do not have the money to exploit the loophole that the Government have permitted?

    The Prime Minister : It is not a loophole, as the right hon. and learned Gentleman says ; it is a position that has applied for very many years. As far as people who are less well off are concerned, as the right hon. and learned Gentleman knows, we have provided help for them worth £2.5 billion over three years–more to pensioners, more to disabled people and more to single parents. The right hon. and learned Gentleman did not mention that all those people will get the money before the bills arrive. That is a prepayment that the right hon. and learned Gentleman forgot to mention.

    Mr. John Smith : Does the Prime Minister not understand that in those replies he has revealed the Tory attitude to tax in a nutshell– loopholes for the better off, and everyone else has to pay in full?

    The Prime Minister : What has been revealed is that the right hon. and learned Gentleman is up to his old tricks yet again, telling other people how to spend their own money. It boils down to the fact that the right hon. and learned Gentleman is a meddler in everything–in private sector pay, in company decisions and in how people pay their own bills. What he does not mention is the fact that electricity companies, for example, have announced next year’s prices and all of them have frozen the price or cut it. When did that ever happen under Labour Administrations?

    Dame Elaine Kellett-Bowman : Is my right hon. Friend aware that yesterday the Department of the Environment issued a section 13 notice, under the Local Government Act 1988, against the Lancashire county council for utterly failing efficiently to run its ground maintenance services under direct labour? Is that not one more reason why the citizens of Lancashire wish the Lancashire county council to be abolished?

    The Prime Minister : It is certainly a deeply inefficient council, but that is something it shares with Sheffield and many other Labour-run authorities.

    Mr. Ashdown : Are not the policies of the Government and of the Labour party towards the provision of nursery education for all now revealed to be exactly the same–that it will not happen until resources allow? Bearing in mind that it was the Prime Minister’s predecessor, when she was Education Secretary nearly a quarter of a century ago, who first formulated that policy, will the Prime Minister tell us when he thinks that that promise might be delivered–this year, next year, sometime or never?

    The Prime Minister : That was extremely well rehearsed, but, as the hon. Lady mentioned a second ago, if the right hon. Gentleman went to the Isle of Wight he would find no nursery education there, whereas if he went to Tory Westminster he would find universal nursery education.

    Mr. Bill Walker : Does my right hon. Friend agree that, under every Labour Government since the war, before every Budget there was massive spending in the shops to avoid the tax increases that always followed Labour Chancellors’ statements, especially during the period of purchase tax when that tax went up to 33 per cent?

    The Prime Minister : My hon. Friend is entirely right about that. There has always been prepurchase of goods before Budgets, especially Labour Budgets, for precisely that reason, but the Opposition have been out of government so long that they have lost touch not only with government but with reality.

     

    Q2. Mr. Winnick : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 22 March.

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

    Mr. Winnick : Is the Prime Minister at all surprised at the way in which the President of the Board of Trade is now constantly being talked up as his successor as leader? Should not the Prime Minister watch his back very carefully when the President of the Board of Trade says that he has no leadership ambition left? If the Prime Minister believes that, he will believe anything.

    The Prime Minister : What the hon. Gentleman points out is the enormous wealth of talent behind me supporting me.

    Mr.Wilkinson : In view of the latest terrorist outrages at Heathrow airport and, more recently, the shooting down of an Army Lynx helicopter at Crossmaglen, is not my right hon. Friend the Member for Lagan Valley (Mr. Molyneaux) right to say that the Downing street declaration has run its course? Is it not time to give primacy to the defeat of IRA terrorism, because political progress depends on progress on the security front?

    The Prime Minister : Two things run in parallel : first, the Downing street declaration; and, secondly, the continuing efforts to defeat terrorism and engage in the talks process. Security co-operation has improved and continues to improve. The welcome recent successes on both sides of the border are evidence of the intensive efforts by the security forces in both jurisdictions to combat terrorism. Both Governments are committed to close co-operation, which is currently at an all-time high. I assure my hon. Friend that we propose to build on that security co-operation in both the short and the long term. There should be room nowhere in the United Kingdom for terrorism, and we are determined to maintain our battle against it.

     

    Q3. Mr. Eric Clarke : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 22 March.

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

    Mr. Clarke : Is the Prime Minister aware that the Easter egg that he is giving to the British people is a tax rise equivalent to two weeks’ wages for every wage earner in the country?

    The Prime Minister : As the hon. Gentleman knows, and as I have conceded before, it has been necessary to increase taxes. I invite him also to condemn the large and unjustifiable council tax increases imposed by Labour councils.

     

    Q4. Mr. Thurnham : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 22 March.

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

    Mr. Thurnham : Does my hon. Friend agree that many people with disabilities make excellent employees? Will he ensure that the public sector plays its full part in employing the disabled and thus leads all other employers by example?

    The Prime Minister : I entirely agree with my hon. Friend. The civil service is steadily increasing the number of registered disabled people whom it employs. I am delighted that, as a proportion of its work force, it now employs slightly more than the percentage of registered disabled people in the work force as a whole. A number of Departments and agencies do significantly better than that. I share my hon. Friend’s desire to see progress made, but it is encouraging that the public sector is now doing better than the private sector.

    Mr. Radice : Which is more important to the Prime Minister–a blocking minority of 23 on qualified majority votes to the Council of Ministers, or an enlargement of the European Union?

    The Prime Minister : The hon. Gentleman states a choice which, had he ever negotiated in Europe, he would not have stated in that fashion. He is blind to both the short and long-term consequences of change to the qualified majority vote system. We are determined to negotiate in Brussels, and to fight Britain’s corner just as hard as every other nation would fight for itself. We will not be moved by phoney threats to delay enlargement. There is ample time to complete the enlargement process; if there is delay, it will be because certain other member states–two in particular–have taken an inflexible and doctrinaire line. We shall not do what the Labour party do, which is to say yes to everything that comes out of Europe, with no critical examination whatever. The Opposition would sign away our votes, our competitiveness and our money. The right hon. and learned Member for Monklands, East (Mr. Smith) is the man who likes to say yes in Europe–Monsieur Oui, the poodle of Brussels.

     

    Inward Investment (Northern Region)

    Q5. Mr. Bates : To ask the Prime Minister what assessment he has made of the impact of the social chapter on inward investment in the northern region ; and if he will make a statement.

    The Prime Minister : The northern region has an excellent record for attracting inward investment and creating jobs. Since 1985 the Northern Development Corporation has secured 36,000 jobs for the region. By piling on costs to business, the social chapter would destroy jobs in the northern region, as it would across the country.

    Mr. Bates : Is my right hon. Friend aware of the decision by Black and Decker to close its production plant in Limburg in Germany and move to Spennymoor in county Durham because of the excessive level of non-wage labour costs in Germany? Does that not clearly demonstrate that the best way to keep manufacturing jobs in the north-east is to keep Britain out of the social chapter?

    The Prime Minister : I entirely agree. What is clear when one looks across Europe is that the social on-costs of every country other than the United Kingdom are rendering those countries progressively uncompetitive with Japan, the United States and the Pacific basin. What the social chapter would mean is the loss of jobs in the United Kingdom. I very much welcome the news for the people of Spennymoor. The Durham plant has a very high and very well-deserved reputation for quality. Black and Decker knows that high costs destroy jobs and that, for that reason, Britain is the best place in the European Community in which to do business and in which to invest.

     

    Engagements

    Q6. Mr. Home Robertson : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 22 March.

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

    Mr. Home Robertson : As the Prime Minister once dismissed Strathclyde as a monstrosity, I welcome his conversion and the fact that the Government have now decided to keep the Strathclyde passenger transport authority so as to safeguard comprehensive concessionary travel for pensioners in Strathclyde. Why are not pensioners in other parts of Scotland being allowed the same safeguards? I appeal to the Prime Minister to consider that point and to ensure that pensioners in all parts of Scotland, including the east, are given equal rights.

    The Prime Minister : It is extremely unlikely that the hon. Gentleman would appeal to me in any circumstances. The view of Strathclyde that I hold is unaltered, as I indicated earlier with regard to the referendum, which was an expensive stunt. As to the second point, that is a matter for my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland.

  • PMQT – 15 March 1994

    Below is the text of Prime Minister’s Question Time from 15th March 1994.

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Engagements

    Q1. Ms Eagle : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 15 March.

    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.

    Ms Eagle : On top of all the tax increases that he will impose in April, how can the Prime Minister justify the new insurance premium tax, which will hit hardest those who live in areas of high crime, such as my constituency? Is not the truth that, while Labour is tough on crime and on the causes of crime, the right hon. Gentleman’s Government are tough just on the victims of crime?

    The Prime Minister : We seek to be tough on the people who perpetrate crime. I believe that that should be the ambition of every hon. Member. We have raised taxes for the reasons that I have previously set out in the House, and we have chosen to spread the load in the way that we think is most appropriate. Those are the measures that my right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor set out. If the hon. Lady opposes tax increases, I trust that she will indicate where she would cut expenditure.

    Mr. Dicks : In the light of the mortar attacks at Heathrow airport, which is in my constituency, will my right hon. Friend tell the IRA that there is no place for it at the peace table, and will he institute a shoot- to-kill policy in Northern Ireland to enable the security forces to eliminate all IRA terrorists in the Province?

    The Prime Minister : The attacks on Heathrow airport demonstrated once again the IRA’s callous disregard for the safety of ordinary members of the public and its disregard for the words that its own members utter from time to time. The whole House will regard the IRA’s action as totally despicable. It is certainly the case that it cannot bomb its way back to the negotiating table, either now or at any stage in the future. However, I am not sure that I can endorse the particular measure that my hon. Friend proposes.

    Mr. John Smith : Does the Prime Minister think it satisfactory that, in the space of a single year, the amount spent on cars by health service trusts has increased by 65 per cent. to a total of nearly £25 million?

    The Prime Minister : One of the purposes of health service trusts is to enable their managers– [Interruption.] If hon. Members listen, they will get their answer. One of the purposes of trusts is to enable managers, across the whole range of their activities, to determine how best to use the resources at their disposal. The growth in the number of trusts, the improvement in services and the rise in the number of patients treated demonstrate the trusts’ increasing success.

    Mr. John Smith : Perhaps we should test the situation by individual examples. Is the Prime Minister aware that the St. James’s University hospital trust has increased its car bill by more than 200 per cent. and that in the case of Kingston hospital the increase is 250 per cent? Is that the Government’s order of priorities? Does not the right hon. Gentleman realise that most people in the country want to see money spent on patients and not on cars?

    The Prime Minister : The overall priority, on which the right hon. and learned Gentleman would be best advised to concentrate, is whether more patients are being treated, either in individual hospitals or in hospitals in general. I cannot carry in my head the details of individual expenditure in every health authority, and neither can the right hon. and learned Gentleman. What I can say is that it is right to devolve responsibility rather than to centralise it, as he would do, and that it is right to take action administratively to increase and improve the patient service that is offered. More patients are being treated and they are being treated better, with a wider range of operations and treatment than ever before.

    Mr. John Smith : Does not the Prime Minister understand that hardly a day goes by without further evidence of waste and inefficiency in the health service, introduced as a result of the Government’s changes? Does not he appreciate that, whatever he can or cannot hold in his head, it is the daily experience of both patients and staff that the health service is being undermined by this gross misallocation of priorities?

    The Prime Minister : I do not recall the right hon. and learned Gentleman ever mentioning any of the inefficiencies in expenditure that occurred prior to these reforms. He was perfectly prepared to condone them at that stage ; we are trying to put them right. That is the reason for the changed management structure and devolvement of responsibility. The right hon. and learned Gentleman’s question shows that he remains an unreconstructed centralist and is unwilling to trust people with devolved responsibilities.

    Mr. Sykes : To turn to far more important matters, is my right hon. Friend aware of the widespread pleasure and relief in Scarborough, Whitby and other seaside resorts following the Government’s action yesterday to curb the rising tide of benefit hostels on our English coasts?

    The Prime Minister : It is certainly true that that is the case in Yorkshire, but the problem is in Blackpool, Bournemouth and many other parts of the country as well. My hon. Friend and many of my other hon. Friends have campaigned extremely hard to have it solved. I believe that the announcement made by my hon. Friend the Minister of State yesterday will be welcomed by hoteliers, residents and taxpayers who feel that they have been taken for a ride for too long. Not only will it prevent the problem spreading, but the licensing scheme that we are examining may also deal with the problem that currently exists.

     

    Q2. Mr. Alton : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 15 March.

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

    Mr. Alton : With only 3 per cent. of people north and south of the Irish border expressing any support for the pursuit of violence, does not the Prime Minister believe that this vindicates the patient approach that he has taken towards the pursuit of peace in Northern Ireland? In that context, does not he believe that he should raise with the Taoiseach the use of the political defence as a way of justifying murder and terrorism and as an argument against extradition in the Irish courts? Will he also consider the possibility of the creation of an interlocutor or mediator to pursue the course of peace in Northern Ireland?

    The Prime Minister : I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for the support that he has consistently given to our attempts to secure peace in Northern Ireland. I agree with him that the extradition arrangements need to be strengthened. That is why I welcome, in particular, the new Irish extradition Bill which will make the arrangements between our countries more logical and more straightforward.

    As I indicated a moment ago, on the hon. Gentleman’s first point there will be no negotiations with Sinn Fein before a permanent end to the IRA’s violence. I do not intend that we should be shifted from our present course. I believe that it has the overwhelming support of people in the island of Ireland and that it has huge support both in this country and abroad. The Taoiseach and I intend to press ahead with our talks in the hope that we will be able to find a peaceful future for Ireland.

     

    Q3. Dr. Liam Fox : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 15 March.

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

    Dr. Fox : Does my right hon. Friend agree that British interests in Europe have always been better represented by Conservatives than by socialists or Liberals? Will he assure the House that the protection of British interests in Europe will lie at the heart of our position in the current negotiations on the widening of Europe and on qualified majority voting?

    The Prime Minister : I do believe that it is important that this country plays a full part in the European community and exercises its influence both on behalf of the people in this country and on behalf of Europe as whole. We have sought for a long time to have enlargement, and we are very much in favour of it. The negotiations are very nearly complete. The present discussions between the Twelve are about the institutional changes that will accompany the enlargement. Like many other states, we attach importance to qualified majority voting, but I think that it is right to consider very carefully the effect on QMV of an increase in membership. What we need to ensure is that democratic legitimacy and the rights of minorities are sustained within the European Union. That is what my right hon. Friend will be seeking to do in his negotiations.

     

    Q4. Mr. Miller : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 15 March.

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

    Mr. Miller : Does the Prime Minister agree that the short-term policies of banks and financial institutions undermine the recovery of manufacturing companies such as Rover? Does that reflect a lack of confidence in his Government, or is it nothing to do with him?

    The Prime Minister : I think that the hon. Gentleman will see from most of the statistics now being produced that manufacturing industry is in fact recovering and it is recovering rather well. It is increasingly– [Interruption.] There is no point in the hon. Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston (Mr. Miller) waving his finger. If he will give me time, I shall get to his question if he can bear to be patient for a second. Banks are seeking to provide resources for appropriate lending. The question of lending to Rover is of course something that Rover pursues with its own bankers and not with anyone else. [Interruption.] It is interesting to see that the hon. Gentleman would have Government Ministers determine individual bank loans to individual companies. I am pleased to see another indication of the centralism that the right hon. and learned Gentleman was attempting to shrug off a moment ago.

     

    Q5. Mr. Roger Evans : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 15 March.

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

    Mr. Evans : Given the importance of the construction industry to the economy as a whole, does my right hon. Friend agree that the latest figures for private orders are excellent news for British firms and British jobs?

    The Prime Minister : Construction orders are now at a very high level ; higher than they have been for some years. New housing starts are still up and I trust that they will continue. Confidence is growing and a large part of this is, of course, related directly to the economic policies that enabled us to reduce interest rates–I am perfectly happy to accept responsibility for that.

     

    Q6. Mr. Simpson : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 15 March.

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

    Mr. Simpson : Is the Prime Minister aware that last year in Nottingham, 1,090 households faced repossession and that, in the same year, the city was allowed to build a grand total of only 12 houses for rent? Is there any practical advice and help that the Prime Minister is able to offer to the 99 per cent. of households caught in the terrible truth between his rhetoric and repossession, or is it yet another matter that is not of his concern?

    The Prime Minister : The hon. Gentleman will be pleased to know that, as the economy recovers and interest rates have fallen, the number of repossessions is also falling and falling quite distinctly. What of course is also necessary in providing rented accommodation is that local authorities, notably Labour local authorities, should fill up the property that they have and not leave large numbers of voids and empties in many parts of the country.

     

    Q7. Mr. Harry Greenway : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 15 March.

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

    Mr. Greenway : Does my right hon. Friend accept the need to reduce public borrowing? Is he aware that Ealing Conservative council has now repaid £75 million of the £158 million borrowed between 1986 and 1990 by the then Labour council, and that Birmingham, Hackney and Manchester have debts higher than many third world countries? [Interruption.] All Labour-controlled councils.

    Hon. Members : Name them.

    The Prime Minister : My hon. Friends are tempting me to name them, but I fear that it would take up the rest of today’s Question Time and all of Thursday’s. I congratulate Ealing on reducing its debt. However, my hon. Friend was being characteristically generous in naming only three Labour authorities. He could have named substantially more. I know that the Labour party has a lot to say to us from time to time about third world debt. It is about time that it did something about fourth-rate Labour authorities that build up debts as large as, if not larger than, third world debt itself.

  • PMQT – 10 March 1994

    Below is the text of Prime Minister’s Question Time from 10th March 1994.

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Engagements

    Q1. Mr. McFall : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 10 March.

    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.

    Mr. McFall : Now that the Minister for open government has given an entirely new meaning to the phrase, “lying in state”, does the Prime Minister agree that the democratic process is undermined if Ministers imply that concealing the truth from the House is acceptable? Does he accept that it is a lie that the former Prime Minister, Lord Callaghan, ever lied to this House? If so, will he apologise to the former distinguished Prime Minister for that slur?

    The Prime Minister : The hon. Gentleman may regret, on reflection, the way in which he phrased his question– [Interruption.] If hon. Members do not regret it, I believe that they should. The hon. Gentleman knows very well that it is not the case now, nor has it been in the past, that Ministers willingly mislead this House, and no one has suggested that that is the case.

     

    Q2. Mr. Patrick Thompson : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 10 March.

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

    Mr. Thompson : Bearing in mind the fact that, last night, the IRA launched yet another vicious terrorist attack endangering the lives of hundreds of innocent civilians, were not the Opposition, at exactly same time, voting against the very measure which our security forces need to combat this evil? Are not the Opposition soft on terrorism and soft on crime?

    The Prime Minister : I believe that the attack that was launched yesterday on Heathrow airport by the IRA will receive and deserve universal condemnation. It was an unjustifiable attack and will make no difference whatever to the search for peace in Northern Ireland. But I believe that it should lead to every part of this House uniting on firm action against terrorism.

    Mr. John Smith : With the issue of Ministers telling the truth now a matter of public debate, does the Prime Minister appreciate that what most undermines the credibility of his Administration is the blatant deception practised at the last election when the Conservative party promised to cut taxes? Since then, they have imposed the largest tax increase in Britain’s peacetime history.

    The Prime Minister : I shall turn directly to that point, but I must say that I am extremely surprised that the right hon. and learned Gentleman should pursue that matter on the day after a mortar attack at Heathrow and on the very day on which the Cabinet has been considering sending more troops to Bosnia to deal with an international problem. [Interruption.] I have made the point. The right hon. and learned Gentleman seems to think that these things do not matter. I think that people throughout the country will take a different view. [Interruption.]

    Madam Speaker : Order. The House must come to order.

    The Prime Minister : On the specific point raised by the right hon. and learned Gentleman, taxation rose precisely because we kept our promises to protect the elderly, the vulnerable and the sick through the long recession. The recession lasted longer than we or other forecasters had imagined, and in order to sustain policy and bring down interest rates it was necessary to close borrowing. That was a responsible attitude. It was the right attitude. If the right hon. and learned Gentleman understood the first thing about economics, he would support it, not attack it.

    Mr. John Smith : To come very directly to the point, does the Prime Minister deny that before the election he promised to cut taxes and he is now putting them up?

    The Prime Minister : I have made it perfectly clear to the right hon. and learned Gentleman why it was necessary to raise taxation, although we had hoped not to do so. If the right hon. and learned Gentleman wants to consider taxes, he might look at the more recent figures of council taxes which show clearly how much more expensive Labour authorities and Liberal authorities are than Conservative authorities. Perhaps the right hon. and learned Gentleman would comment on that.

    Mr. John Smith : Having regard to the Prime Minister’s feeble excuse for breaking his promise at the election, does he not remember telling the Los Angeles Times in his celebrated interview last year :

    “I said [to colleagues] the day after we won the election . . . Within the next 12 months the government will be the most unpopular we have seen for a long time.’”

    He went on to say, “I was staggeringly prescient.” Will the Prime Minister explain how he could know about the state of the economy the day after the election but not know before polling day?

    The Prime Minister : I shall go back further than that for the right hon. and learned Gentleman. I made it absolutely clear on the day that I became Chancellor of the Exchequer that we would take whatever action was necessary to restrain inflation and put the economy on secure and steady growth. We have done that, including maintaining monetary policy with interest rates at a high level right through the election, because it was in the interests of the British economy to do so. That is responsible government. I am sorry that the right hon. and learned Gentleman does not understand that.

     

    Q3. Lady Olga Maitland : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 10 March.

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

    Lady Olga Maitland : With the council elections approaching, does my right hon. Friend agree with me that what council tax payers want are efficient services at the lowest possible cost? Does he agree that it is the Conservative councils who deliver this, not the Labour councils and not the Liberal councils, such as the one that I have in Surrey?

    The Prime Minister : I not only agree with my hon. Friend ; it is what the statistics now becoming available on council tax charges show. At present, as my hon. Friend the Minister for Local Government and Planning announced yesterday, Conservative councils that have now declared their council taxes come out, on average, at £129 less than Labour councils and £73 less than Liberal councils. It is clear who costs one more in the shires–it is Labour. It is clear who costs one more in the mets–it is Labour. It is clear who costs one more in London–it is Labour. No matter where one looks, Labour councils and–so as not to disappoint the right hon. Member for Yeovil (Mr. Ashdown)–Liberal councils, cost one more.

     

    Q4. Mr. David Marshall : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 10 March.

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

    Mr. Marshall : Is the Prime Minister aware that his recent morale-boosting visit to Scotland has resulted in his party achieving a record low in the polls of 13 per cent? Does he appreciate why the Scots are once more uttering the refrain :

    “Will ye no’ come back again”

    and again, and again?

    The Prime Minister : As it happens, the hon. Gentleman is typically inaccurate. The data were before I visited Scotland.

     

    Ministerial Visits

    Q5. Sir Anthony Grant : To ask the Prime Minister if he will pay an official visit to the Imperial War museum at Duxford.

    The Prime Minister : I know from private visits what a magnificent place the Duxford museum is. I can well understand the pride of my right hon. Friend in having it in his constituency. I hope that I may be able to pay an official visit at some time in the future.

    Sir Anthony Grant : Will my right hon. Friend note that the United States air force flew from Duxford during the last war with much loss of life and, in particular, flew on the D-day operation? Will he give his support to the American air museum being created there, either by visiting Duxford or by inviting the Americans concerned to visit him? It would be extremely good for Anglo-American relations.

    The Prime Minister : I should like to visit Duxford again. I shall take an opportunity to do so and to look at the museum’s plans. My hon. Friend is entirely right about the significant contribution of the US air force to the D-day landings. We have a continual debt of gratitude to them. It is right that we should celebrate the 50th anniversary and remember the heroism of the troops and the sacrifices that they made so that we can enjoy the liberties that we exercise in the House.

     

    Health Issues

    Q6. Mr. Simon Hughes : To ask the Prime Minister what proportion of his time he devotes to health issues.

    The Prime Minister : A lot.

    Mr. Hughes : In that case, given that one of the most obvious implications of the Government’s policies for health services in London is that they plan to run down the hospital that the Prime Minister described as the flagship, and that the main building–a state of the art building costing £140 million–will never come into use, in all seriousness will the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State take a little extra time to listen to a proposal that keeps both Guy’s and St. Thomas’s as hospitals, saves the taxpayer money, reduces embarrassment and, above all, saves patients’ lives?

    The Prime Minister : The hon. Gentleman knows that the changes to the health service in London are long overdue; they have been long sought by many people. We have won support inside and outside the health service for tackling that particular problem, not least from Opposition Front-Bench spokesmen. As for the problems of Guy’s and St. Thomas’s, the hon. Gentleman will know that the clinicians at both hospitals believe that patient care will be improved by concentrating services on one site, not two. It is not just the Government’s view, but that of the doctors involved. Thanks to the determination to embrace change, the Guy’s and St Thomas’s trust will have a secure future and its buildings, old and new, will be used fully, effectively and appropriately in the best interests of patients, medical teaching and research.

     

    Engagements

    Q7. Mr. Sumberg : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 10 March.

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

    Mr. Sumberg : Is my right hon. Friend aware of the considerable concern in my constituency and throughout the country about the activities of television cable-laying companies? Pavements are uprooted, roads closed and businesses disrupted all with the objective of getting doubtful television programmes into our homes. Is it not time that we found a better way of organising these matters?

    The Prime Minister : I recognise the concerns of my hon. Friend. Of course it is important that all those with the right to undertake street works should keep disruption to a minimum. He will know that there are duties to do so written into the terms of the licence issued by the Department of Trade and Industry. My hon. Friend will also know that in those areas where cables are laid, about one quarter of all homes subsequently decide to participate in cable television. That has led to investment across the United Kingdom of well over £1 billion.

     

    Q8. Mr. Martyn Jones : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 10 March.

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

    Mr. Jones : Will the Prime Minister find time today to check on a transcript of the “Today” programme earlier this week, when his right hon. and learned Friend, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, suggested that he would not be Prime Minister after November, or after the autumn ? If that is the case, will he make sure that his right hon. and learned Friend is incorrect, as he is such a good asset to us in the Labour party?

    The Prime Minister : I seem to recall cheap questions like that before the previous election. I am still here and the Opposition are still there.

     

    Q9. Mr. Bellingham : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 10 March.

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

    Mr. Bellingham : Further to the question asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich, North (Mr. Thompson), does my right hon. Friend agree that the IRA-Sinn Fein must now be treated with complete contempt? Does he further agree that unless it signs the declaration tomorrow, it should forfeit its opportunity to be part of it?

    The Prime Minister : I think that every hon. Member of the House will have nothing but contempt for the IRA’s behaviour. With the attacks that it has made, both in Northern Ireland and at Heathrow yesterday, it has demonstrated again its disregard for human life and for opinion on both sides of the community. I believe that my hon. Friend misunderstands the long-term purpose and import of the declaration that I signed with the Taoiseach in December. It sets out a series of principles on which we hope and intend to try to build a permanent peace for Northern Ireland.

  • PMQT Written Answers – 7 March 1994

    Below is the text of the written answers relating to Prime Minister’s Question Time from 7th March 1994.

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Northern Ireland

    Mr. Frank Field : To ask the Prime Minister what assessment he has made of the main differences between the agreement between the hon. Member for Foyle (Mr. Hume) and Mr. Gerry Adams and the Downing Street declaration; and if he will make a statement.

    The Prime Minister : The Downing Street declaration was the result of work between the two Governments, which began when I first met Mr. Reynolds shortly after he became Taoiseach in February 1992. I have seen no document purporting to be an agreement between the hon. Member for Foyle (Mr. Hume) and Mr. Adams, save for their published statements.

     

    Quangos

    Mr. Redmond : To ask the Prime Minister if he will hold all paid members of Government quangos liable to surcharge in the same way as elected councillors.

    The Prime Minister : The Government have no powers to surcharge paid members of non-departmental public bodies in the same way as elected councillors and have no plans to seek such powers. Public bodies are already able to apply disciplinary sanctions, including seeking prosecutions where appropriate.

     

    Ministers

    Mr. Redmond : To ask the Prime Minister, pursuant to his answer of 14 February, Official Report, column 770, if he will list the five Cabinet Ministers who have served in the armed forces.

    The Prime Minister : My right hon. Friends the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, the President of the Board of Trade, the Lord Privy Seal and the Secretary of State for National Heritage, and my right hon. and learned Friend the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland have all done national service.

     

    Jewellery

    Mrs. Clwyd : To ask the Prime Minister, pursuant to his answer of 28 February to the hon. Member for Pendle (Mr. Prentice) Official Report, column 579, if he will list the items of jewellery on the official inventory of No. 10 Downing Street.

    The Prime Minister [holding answer 4 March 1994] : I refer the hon. Member to the reply I gave the hon. Member for Newham, North-West (Mr. Banks) on 3 March, Official Report, column 804.

  • PMQT – 1 March 1994

    Below is the text of Prime Minister’s Question Time from 1st March 1994. Tony Newton responded on behalf of John Major.

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Engagements

    Q1. Mr. Mudie : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 1 March.

    The Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons (Mr. Tony Newton) : I have been asked to reply.

    My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister is in the United States for a series of meetings, including some with President Clinton and the United Nations Secretary-General.

    Mr. Mudie : Is the Lord President aware that more than £1 billion of taxpayers’ money spent to persuade people to take out personal pensions ended up in the pockets of salesmen through commissions? Is he also aware that more than 300,000 men and women are losing benefit because of bad advice? Given that growing scandal, is not there a case for urgent Government action, or is this, once again, something for which the Government will take no responsibility?

    Mr. Newton : I do not regard the fact that some 5 million people have taken out personal pensions, which will significantly improve their prospects in retirement, as anything like a scandal. The hon. Gentleman will know that some of the advice that has been given is currently under examination, which is entirely right. I know of no reason to justify his accusation.

     

    Q2. Mr. Harry Greenway : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 1 March.

    Mr. Newton : I have been asked to reply.

    I refer my hon. Friend to the reply that I gave some moments ago.

    Mr. Greenway : Will my right hon. Friend join me in welcoming the obvious success of the Prime Minister’s visit to the United States? Does he recall that Sir Winston Churchill variously described the temperature of our special relationship with the United States as normal and blazing? What is the temperature now?

    Mr. Newton : I can best describe the relationship as very cordial indeed. It is a long-standing relationship based on shared interests, as has been confirmed at a joint press conference which my right hon. Friend and the President held within the past hour or so. Their discussions have covered a wide range of international issues, including Bosnia, Russia and the world economy. The President’s support for the joint declaration on Northern Ireland was particularly welcome. The visit is confirmation that we have a continuing, strong, all-round relationship with the United States.

    Mrs. Beckett : When the President of the Board of Trade has need of legal advice, to whom does the Leader of the House suggest he turns?

    Mr. Newton : My right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade has been advised, quite properly, by my right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General and made the position entirely clear in his evidence to the Scott inquiry yesterday.

    Mrs. Beckett : Is not the position of the Attorney-General as the Government’s chief legal adviser becoming increasingly untenable as Ministers seem to use him as a scapegoat to save their own skins?

    Mr. Newton : The concern of my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade was clearly an anxiety that people might misrepresent him in exactly the way that the right hon. Lady is now seeking to do. My right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General’s advice on public interest immunity has remained consistent and, of course, he is due to give evidence to the inquiry.

    Mrs. Beckett : Does not the Leader of the House realise that what sticks in the throat of the British public is that, having secretly sold arms to Saddam Hussein, which were used against British troops, Ministers were prepared to see innocent men go to gaol to cover up their conspiracy and that is what people cannot stomach?

    Mr. Newton : Let me remind the right hon. Lady what was written in a letter to The Times as long ago as 12 November 1992 :

    “Public interest immunity cannot be waived by either the prosecution or the Ministers. It was for the judge to decide whether the interests of justice in ensuring a fair trial for the defendants outweighed those considerations of public interests referred to in the certificates. There was no question of anyone attempting to suppress evidence”.

    That letter was written by counsel for one of the accused.

    Mrs. Peacock : Will my right hon. Friend join me in welcoming the Department of Health action on safari holidays for young offenders?

    Mr. Newton : Yes, indeed I shall. There is a widespread view that those overseas trips were inappropriate. We are all concerned to see effective, proper treatment and deterrents for young offenders and the statement this afternoon will help bring that about.

     

    Q3. Mr. Janner : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 1 March.

    Mr. Newton : I have been asked to reply.

    I refer the hon. and learned Gentleman to the answer I gave some moments ago.

    Mr. Janner : When the Prime Minister returns from his visit to the United States, will he be kind enough to look personally into the case of my constituent Paul Kenney, who did not return from his journey to Portugal, but was found dead on a beach? Will he please consult his colleague the Prime Minister of Portugal, who has not had the common decency to tell the parents, or me as their representative, why this lad died, how he died, whether he was murdered or why the parents could not find the body for a month? If the right hon. Gentleman agrees that it is the Government’s duty to look after ordinary citizens when they travel abroad, will he please start raising merry hell about this case?

    Mr. Newton : I am conscious of the hon. Gentleman’s understandable concern for his late constituent and I have of course looked at the Adjournment debate he had not long ago. I am happy to tell the hon. Gentleman that during his visit to Portugal on 24 and 25 February, my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary raised the case with the Portuguese Foreign Minister and I hope that that was helpful.

    Sir Roger Moate : Will my right hon. Friend and the Prime Minister, and the Foreign Secretary, personally do their utmost to ensure the success of the negotiations, which are at a critical point, on Norwegian entry into the European Community? Does my right hon. Friend agree that it would be quite outrageous if the unreasonable demand by the Spanish Government for a few thousand tonnes of Norwegian cod were to prevent the entry into the Community of one of our closest friends and a fine European country?

    Mr. Newton : My hon. Friend knows very well that it has been a prime objective of the British Government to bring about enlargement of the Community and the progress that has been made is one of our significant achievements over the past couple of years. On some reports I have seen today, progress has been rather greater so far in respect of Sweden and Finland ; apparently, there remains some way to go, but we shall wish to see negotiations with all four applicants successfully negotiated.

     

    Q4. Mr. Gunnell : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 1 March.

    Mr. Newton : I have been asked to reply.

    I refer the hon. Gentleman to the reply I gave some moments ago.

    Mr. Gunnell : The right hon. and noble Baroness Thatcher missed one Prime Minister’s Question Time in 12 ; the present Prime Minister has missed one in eight. Whatever the importance of the present visit, does not that frequent absence devalue his accountability to the House? Why is he more anxious to answer questions in Pittsburgh than in Parliament?

    Mr. Newton : I must say to the hon. Gentleman, whom I usually regard as among the more reasonable of those on the Opposition Benches, that I reject out of hand the suggestion that he has made. I think that my right hon. Friend’s achievement in various international negotiations both in Europe and on the wider scene are among the main achievements that he has put forward on behalf of the Government.

    Mr. Garnier : While my right hon. Friend is in the United States, will he be given an opportunity to tell the people, as opposed to the President of the United States, of the true nature, history and habits of the IRA?

    Mr. Newton : I have already referred to the very welcome support of the President for the joint declaration. I hope that that in itself will have an effect on some strands of opinion in the United States which may perhaps have failed to appreciate the true nature of the IRA.

     

    Q5. Mr. Mandelson : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 1 March.

    Mr. Newton : I have been asked to reply.

    I refer the hon. Gentleman to the reply I gave some moments ago.

    Mr. Mandelson : Does the Lord President of the Council agree that, with unemployment still up around the 3 million level, with many young and long-term unemployed in that number, jobs remain the biggest single issue facing the country? In the light of that, will the Lord President of the Council respond positively to the important initiative taken today by the Trades Union Congress to work in co-operation with all political parties on policies to get unemployment down?

    Mr. Newton : I welcome any kind of co-operation by the TUC or, indeed, anybody else, in the interests of maintaining the recovery from recession, which is the secure basis for the jobs that the hon. Gentleman wants to see. If I may say so, it will not be served by the Labour party’s support for a minimum wage, a 35-hour week and many new burdens on business.

     

    Q6. Lady Olga Maitland : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 1 March.

    Mr. Newton : I have been asked to reply.

    I refer my hon. Friend to the reply I gave some moments ago.

    Lady Olga Maitland : May I convey to my right hon. Friend the House’s full support for the Downing street declaration on Northern Ireland? Has my right hon. Friend been able to take note of the survey that took place over the weekend in the Irish Republic which showed that the vast majority of the people there call on the IRA-Sinn Fein to renounce violence?

    Mr. Newton : I do very much agree with my hon. Friend and am grateful for her words. As she knows, the Government are making every effort to seek peace in Northern Ireland. It is heartening to note that some 94 per cent. of people questioned in the Irish marketing survey agreed with calls on the IRA and Sinn Fein to renounce violence. I am sure that that corresponds with the overwhelming wish in this country and, indeed, many others. I hope that their leaders will take note.

     

    Q7. Mr. John Evans : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 1 March.

    Mr. Newton : I have been asked to reply.

    I refer the hon. Gentleman to the reply I gave some moments ago.

    Mr. Evans : Is the Lord President of the Council aware that if the highly efficient borough of St. Helens received the same level of revenue support grant as the boroughs of Wandsworth and Westminster it would not be required to charge its citizens one single penny in council tax? Does he feel that there might be a whiff of scandal and corruption in that?

    Mr. Newton : No, I do not.

    Mr. Fabricant : While condemning the appalling massacre in Hebron, does my right hon. Friend agree with me that that was the work of a lone madman and that, for the sake of the 300 million people who live in that area, it should not in any way impede the peace process?

    Mr. Newton : Like, I am sure, everyone on both sides of the House, I share the horror at the massacre of innocent Palestinians in Hebron on 25 February. I am sure that the whole House would once again want to send its condolences to those who were affected and their families. I accept entirely and agree with my hon. Friend that the massacre must not be allowed to jeopardise the peace process. The British Government will certainly do everything that they can to see that it does not.

     

    Q8. Mr. Jim Cunningham : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 1 March.

    Mr. Newton : I have been asked to reply.

    I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave some moments ago.

    Mr. Cunningham : Does the Lord President recall that, referring to the setting up of the Scott inquiry, the Prime Minister said that no restrictions would be placed on its terms of reference? Does the right hon. Gentleman realise that ex-employees of Matrix Churchill and their representatives have been denied the right to give evidence to the inquiry, and that Lord Justice Scott has said that he will consider the matter if the Government and the Prime Minister agree? What is the Lord President going to do about it?

    Mr. Newton : I think that it is generally true to say that the procedures of the inquiry are for Lord Justice Scott to consider and operate. Obviously, if there were perceived to be problems and if representations were made to the Government about difficulties that they could do something about, those difficulties would be considered extremely carefully.

     

    Q9. Mr. Riddick : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 1 March.

    Mr. Newton : I have been asked to reply.

    I refer my hon. Friend to the answer I gave some moments ago.

    Mr. Riddick : Is my right hon. Friend aware of any Government Department that hands out special green forms to job applicants who are related to politicians–forms that receive preferential treatment–and pink forms to everyone else? Is he aware that that disgraceful form of nepotism is being practised by Labour-controlled Monklands council? Will he join me in urging condemnation of the practice by the local Member of Parliament–the Leader of the Opposition, who has been strangely silent on the subject?

    Mr. Newton : My hon. Friend may feel surprised that his question has been reached. He has raised a very interesting point; I might speculate that the absence of the right hon. and learned Member for Monklands, East (Mr. Smith) arose from nervousness that the question might be reached.

  • Mr Major’s Comments on the US/UK Relationship – 1 March 1994

    Below is the text of Mr Major’s comments on the relationship between the United States and the United Kingdom, made during an interview given in Washington on Tuesday 1st March 1994.

    QUESTION:

    [Mr Major was asked about the relationship between the US and the UK].

    PRIME MINISTER:

    There is a very close relationship, it is a very hard-edged relationship. It is based on shared instincts, it is based on shared interests. There is a tendency for Britain and America to see international problems in the same way. Occasionally there are different points of emphasis and they are highlighted but overwhelmingly we tend to see the same sort of problems and seek the same solutions for them.

    QUESTION:

    [Mr Major was asked if he felt President Clinton regretted his decision to give Gerry Adams a visa].

    PRIME MINISTER:

    I think he has given us very strong support for the Joint Declaration and I don’t propose to traipse over old ground. What is important I think is the very strong support we have had from the United States for the Joint Declaration and for both the peace process and the talks process that we have established in Northern Ireland. Upon that, the President has been very resolute.

    QUESTION:

    [Mr Major was asked whether the President would give another visa to Gerry Adams].

    PRIME MINISTER:

    I am not going into the details of that. I think people saw what happened when he came, they saw what happened when he went back. The President would like to see some progress under the Joint Declaration.

    QUESTION:

    [Mr Major was asked if he had asked the United States to send more troops to Bosnia].

    PRIME MINISTER:

    We looked at what happens in the short-term and that is of course why we turned particularly to the problems of Sarajevo and decided to send a team there to examine what is needed to correct the obvious deficiencies in life there; there is very little water, very little electricity, very little proper health care, not sufficient, and we are sending teams there. I think these must be dealt with on an incremental basis. The first thing to do is to deal with the civil problems in Sarajevo and we spent some time discussing that and deciding how to proceed.

    QUESTION:

    [Mr Major was asked about Russian’s involvement in the Partnership for Peace].

    PRIME MINISTER:

    We very much want them to join Partnership for Peace, I discussed this with President Yeltsin. Clearly, Russia is a very large and very important country but Partnership for Peace will vary with individual countries so clearly there would be a special position for Russia, we very much want them to take part.

    QUESTION:

    [Mr Major was asked how the relationship with the US would change given Britain’s integration within the European Union].

    PRIME MINISTER:

    I would replace the word “integration” with the word “influence”. It is certainly true that it is helpful that we have a greater degree of influence in Europe. I believe we do have a greater degree of influence in Europe. What we are seeing is that so much of the European debate is now turning towards matters that we have regarded as important for some time. I think that is self-evidently so both in terms of social on-costs, the widening of the European Community and a number of other illustrations I could give.

    QUESTION:

    [Mr Major was asked about the Scott Inquiry].

    PRIME MINISTER:

    I am not going to anticipate the Scott Inquiry’s report. I set it up with very wide-ranging terms of reference, I told Lord Justice Scott if he found his terms of reference inadequate or found himself impeded he should say so and we would provide him with the assistance he needed. I think we must wait for his report. I have no judgements to make until then.

  • Mr Major’s Joint Doorstep Interview with President Clinton – 1 March 1994

    Below is the text of Mr Major’s joint doorstep interview with President Clinton, held in Washington on Tuesday 1st March 1994.

    PRESIDENT CLINTON:

    We’d like to just make a couple of brief remarks and then we’ll answer some questions.

    First of all, I want to again say how pleased I was at this visit that the Prime Minister made, we had a wonderful time yesterday in Pittsburgh and it turned out to be a pretty good idea that just sort of grew out of a conversation we had last summer in Tokyo, and I am glad that he came and I am glad we had a chance to go there and to do what was done there.

    We have had an opportunity to discuss, as you might imagine, a lot of issues, I might just mention a few. First of all, with regard to Bosnia, we are committed to continuing to work for a resolution of the crisis, we are encouraged by both the on-going negotiations between the Bosnian government and the Croats and the willingness of the Russians to work with us and others in trying to bring the Serbs into a final peace agreement. So we are quite hopeful about that.

    Secondly, I wanted to particularly emphasise the commitment that we share for strengthening and broadening NATO through the Partnership for Peace and to having tangible evidence of that partnership coming forward this summer.

    Thirdly, with regard to Northern Ireland I want to reaffirm the support of the United States for the joint declaration, for the process it envisions and for an end to the violence. I wish the Prime Minister and Prime Minister Reynolds well as they seek to carry this out.

    Let me just mention a couple of other things. You knew yesterday I think that we sent a joint message to Mr Mandela and Chief Butholezi, we are looking forward to their meeting today, we hope it will be successful and we want to strongly encourage all the parties in South Africa to responsibly participate in the election.

    The last thing I would like to say is that we join the United Kingdom in their position with regard to Hong Kong in supporting Governor Patten’s efforts to have a genuine long term strategy for economic and political success in Hong Kong and I have been very admiring of what he has done and what the Prime Minister has done.

    QUESTION:

    Are all your differences wiped out?

    PRESIDENT CLINTON:

    Well, let me give the Prime Minister a chance to make some remarks first.

    PRIME MINISTER:

    Can I firstly say how enjoyable this visit has been and thank the President for his hospitality and also the people of Pittsburgh, it was a memorable day and a memorable evening yesterday and I thoroughly enjoyed every moment of it.

    I do not want to add a great deal to what the President has had to say, perhaps a word or two about Bosnia in general and Sarajevo in particular. One of the things we have agreed over the last couple of days is to send a joint civil planning mission to Sarajevo, the ceasefire there is holding, that has been a very successful operation, I think it has been universally recognised as such, but the circumstances that exist within Sarajevo are still very serious, the utilities are not working, the electricity, the water, so we have agreed to send a joint civil planning mission there to have a look at what needs to be done and then to see to what extent we can contribute and can encourage other people to contribute to deal with the civil difficulties that are actually faced there in Sarajevo.

    The President mentioned the message we sent yesterday to Nelson Mandela and Chief Butholezi, they meet today at Yalundi and clearly that is an extremely important meeting, it is our wish that everyone participates in the South African elections, it is a remarkable event, the first multi-racial elections across South Africa, and we wish to see everyone take part. We very much hope as a result of the message and more relevantly perhaps the meeting between Mr Mandela and Chief Butholezi today that that will certainly happen.

    We spent some time discussing trade matters as well as foreign affairs. I think there are two areas of that that I would just briefly touch upon. We agreed that it would be desirable to see if we could bring forward the start date for implementation of the GATT agreement to 1 January 1995, we will need to consult with other people to see if that is practicable but if it is practicable clearly an agreement has been reached and the sooner that agreement can be implemented the better it will be.

    We spent some time also discussing open markets, we both share a wish to support the growing measure of opinion that exists in Japan, for example, for the further opening of Japanese markets, this is a matter of concern to the United States, it is a matter of concern throughout the European Union as well and we spent some time discussing that particular issue.

    There were one or two rather more technical issues we discussed, a replacement of CoCom, that old relic of the Cold War, that needs to be replaced, there are official discussions to do that and we spent some time just looking at that.

    Beyond that I think I would simply wish to endorse the points that the President made both about Bosnia and about Russia. I think there is no doubt that we see the problems of Bosnia very much in the same light, our policy is heading exactly in the same direction and I think we have had a very useful discussion on that particular issue. I do not think for the moment I wish to add any more.

    QUESTION:

    How would you describe your relationship now?

    PRIME MINISTER:

    I think it is a partnership of shared interests and shared instincts. If one looks at problems around the world overwhelmingly we are likely to take the same view of those, that has been the case in the past and is the case now, and I think it is those shared instincts and interests that actually underpin the long term relationship between the United Kingdom and the United States.

    PRESIDENT CLINTON:

    I agree with that, I think it is a great mistake to over-state the occasional disagreement and under-state the incredible depth and breadth of our shared interests and our shared values. It is still a profoundly important relationship I think to both countries and I also believe to the future of the world.

    QUESTION:

    Could you tell us a little bit, in this country today the Senate is beginning to pick up on budget amendments, what is your view on that and where do you think it is going?

    PRESIDENT CLINTON:

    I don’t know where it is going but I hope that it will not be passed because if it is passed it runs the risk of endangering our economic recovery by requiring excessive tax increases, of very damaging cuts in defence, our investments in technology and job training, in Medicare and social security. If it is disregarded, there is a provision in there to disregard it if 60 percent of both Houses want to do it, it amounts to turning the whole future of America over to 40 percent plus 1 of each House of Congress, in an intensely partisan atmosphere that is a recipe for total paralysis. Also, unlike all these state and local balance budget amendments, this one makes utterly no distinction between a long term investment and annual consumption. So for those reasons I hope it will not be adopted.

    Finally, we are proving you can bring the deficit down, the deficit is now going to be about half the percentage of our annual income that it was when I took office if this new budget is adopted, so we are going to keep bringing it down. I think the administration has credibility on cutting spending, we presented the first cuts in discretionary spending since 1969 in this budget. So I think we have got a record, I think we are on the right track and I think this remedy, while it is a very serious problem what has happened to the deficit, this remedy is the wrong one and I hope the Congress will reject it.

    QUESTION:

    You have agreed to send some civilians to help monitor the ceasefire and are you still adamant you will not send ground troops?

    PRESIDENT CLINTON:

    Our position has always been that we would prefer to help enforce an agreement if we could work out a peace agreement, that in the absence of the peace agreement we would confine our involvement to the support we are giving through NATO and our air power and to essentially the technical personnel who are there now and others who might be able to do that kind of work. That is still our position. But let me say that I think we have a terrific opportunity here to try to build on what happened in the situation involving Sarajevo, to try to keep the Russians involved in a very constructive leadership way and to try to work on these talks now under way here in Washington between the Bosnian government and the Croatians. To move to that kind of settlement, if we can get that, then I think all the responsible countries of the world have got to try to help to make it work.

    QUESTION:

    Could I ask the Prime Minister, has the President given you a promise about future conditions for the readmission of Gerry Adams? Will he have to renounce violence to get another visa to get into the United States?

    PRIME MINISTER:

    I think everyone has seen what has happened at the Ardfheis, I think the important issue is to look forward and see how we produce a solution to the Northern Ireland problem, I am not interested in looking back. And I think as one looks forward one only has to look at the very remarkable expression of opinion that we have seen over the last few days of support for the joint declaration. Now that joint declaration is there, it is now a living fact, it is a series of principles upon which we hope to base a solution to the problems that have bedevilled Northern Ireland for too long. Now that is the main issue that I want to address and those are the issues we have been discussing.

    QUESTION:

    Following on the progress that you have made in Bosnia, did you talk about any steps to end the fighting in other places beyond Sarajevo, perhaps extending the ultimatum to Tuzla or Srebrenica?

    PRESIDENT CLINTON:

    We feel pretty good about where things are in Srebrenica now, we think that the troop exchange will be able to occur between the Canadians and the Dutch and we are working on Tuzla, we do believe that we should keep working to fulfil the commitment that NATO made at its last meeting in January to try to see what can be done to open the Tuzla airport, but there are on-going negotiations there now. Again we have sought the involvement of the Russians in this regard and we think that there is a chance that we will be able to have some success in Tuzla, we discussed what our options are, I think you will see more about that in the days ahead.

    QUESTION:

    Are you concerned about the recent NATO air strikes that resulted in increased bombing of the Tuzla area, your message is that you are not going to tolerate violation of the No Fly Zone but how do you reinforce that?

    PRESIDENT CLINTON:

    Right now our authority, beyond what is going on in Sarajevo, is consigned to enforcing the No Fly Zone and we did that. But I want to say again what I said yesterday, it was based on the authority vested through the United Nations last April, it was something done in the course of business to do what we are required to do, that it should not be read in any way as a departure of strategy or tactics because of what is going on now generally. And I think it should only serve to make people want to resolve this more quickly, to go on with the negotiations now, that is what I am hopeful of.

    QUESTION:

    If there is the need for other bombing missions and the attacks step up on these other areas outside Sarajevo what can NATO do to prevent the spread of this violence?

    PRESIDENT CLINTON:

    Right now, I will say again, the authority we had with regard to artillery, that is on the ground attacks, is the authority to remove artillery from around the Sarajevo area, to create the safe zone, all other authorities related to stopping the war from spreading into the air, and we are talking about what we can do in Tuzla now, that is what you will see I hope unfolding in a very positive way over the next few days.

    PRIME MINISTER:

    I think what people have to realise is that what is developing is developing on a twin track, there is the track of seeking a political settlement and some progress has been made between the Muslims and the Croats here in Washington over the last couple of days. And then of course there is the second track of what is actually happening on the ground and I think one saw in Sarajevo a classic illustration of how an agreement can be reached on the ground that leads in due course to the corralling of weapons, so I think both those tracks will continue. But as far as the No Fly Zone is concerned, the incident that occurred yesterday, where I think it was entirely justifiable to shoot down the planes that were intruding in the No Fly Zone, could have happened at any stage in the last year, it certainly is not a departure from accepted policy, any time in the last 12 months that could have occurred.

    PRESIDENT CLINTON:

    Thank you very much.

    PRIME MINISTER:

    Thank you.

  • Mr Major’s Joint Press Conference with President Clinton – 28 February 1994

    Below is the text of Mr Major’s joint press conference with President Clinton, held in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on 28th February 1994.

    QUESTION:

    Mr. President, do you think granting a visa to Gerry Adams paid off in terms of progress toward peace in Northern Ireland?

    PRESIDENT CLINTON:

    It’s too soon to say. I’m supporting, very strongly supporting the initiative that Prime Minister Major and Prime Minister Reynolds have undertaken in the joint declaration. I hope it will. It’s too soon to say. I’m pulling for them.

    QUESTION:

    Mr. Prime Minister, you obviously saw it differently, or your government did, as far as Adams. — this weekend, Sinn Fein has not indicated any willingness to call for an end to the arms struggle. What is your reaction to that and what is the President’s reaction?

    PRIME MINISTER:

    Well, we both want the violence to cease. That’s what the joint declaration is about. It provides an opportunity for the violence to cease and for Sinn Fein to legitimately enter the constitutional talks. Now, I think that is a sensible way ahead. It’s a highway ahead that wasn’t there before. It is there now. And I think when you look at the opinion expressed by Irishmen right across the whole island of Ireland, by an overwhelming majority, they believe that that option should be taken. You have to wait and see whether it is.

    Thank you.

    QUESTION:

    Do you like that, Mr. President? [referring to the microphone]

    PRESIDENT CLINTON:

    I wish there were a hunting season on these. [Laughter].

    PRIME MINISTER:

    I’m going to wake up one morning and there will be one of those things on the pillow. [Laughter].

    QUESTION:

    And what will you say? [Laughter].

    PRESIDENT CLINTON:

    Whatever it is, it will be known to all of England. [Laughter]. That’s what I — I told the press once that there had been this raging debate for 12 years in America over the constitutional right to privacy and what it meant, whether we should keep it and what it should extend to, and all while, the boom mike had been abolishing it with no one noticing. [Laughter].