The Rt. Hon. Sir John Major KG CH

Tag: Prisons

  • Sir John Major’s Article in the Sunday Times on Prison Reform – 18 May 2025

    The article written by Sir John Major on prison reform, published in the Sunday Times on 18 May 2025.

    Our prisons are in crisis. They are overcrowded, violent and failing to rehabilitate offenders. Last July, the government was compelled to announce the emergency release of prisoners because the prison population was about to exceed the number of prison places. The consequence of not taking action would have been the collapse of the justice system.

    However, notwithstanding these measures, the Ministry of Justice revealed last week that, by November, it is expected there will be no more space for adult male offenders. We cannot go on like this.

    This state of affairs has been caused by a prison population that has grown beyond any expectation over recent decades, and that growth is forecast to continue.

    Early in my political career, I was a parliamentary private secretary at the Home Office, and I recall the then home secretary, Willie Whitelaw, being apoplectic upon learning that the prison population had exceeded 40,000. Today, it is over 88,000. By 2029, it is forecast to reach 100,000.

    This is not, contrary to the claims that one might hear from some sources, the consequence of a surge in violent crime. During my own time in office, violent crime began to fall, and has continued to fall ever since — even if this reality remains widely unrecognised.

    Protecting the public from violent crime is a key responsibility of any government and, in such cases, stern sentences must continue to be delivered. But we should beware that excessive zeal to be “tough on crime” does not lead us into unwise policy.

    We are told that “prison works”, and, where it holds the worst of criminals in custody, it does. But I do not believe our justice system — or our society — is well served if it also imprisons those who could be better punished by non-custodial sentences.

    We need a reset. In the next few days, the independent sentencing review will report. I am delighted that this Labour government had the good sense and maturity to ask a former Conservative justice secretary, David Gauke, to chair the review, and I hope he will take the opportunity to be radical in his recommendations.

    We should start with those who currently receive short custodial sentences. Too many prisoners are sentenced to short-term imprisonment, when other sentences would be more effective.

    Prison means the loss of liberty, but for the prisoner it often means much more besides. Very often it means the loss of their job, their home and their relationships.

    This does not bode well for when they are released: both common sense and empirical evidence suggests that prisoners who have lost those stabilising influences are more likely return to crime. That is in no one’s interest — and certainly not the public at large.

    There are alternatives. We should make much greater use of community sentencing. That means ensuring that the probation service is given the resources to make it capable of monitoring offenders and enforcing sanctions.

    We could be far more creative when it comes to punishing low-level offenders. Their freedoms could be curtailed in a variety of other ways. I offer the thoughts that passports could be confiscated, and driving bans and curfews could be expanded. Technology, including electronic tagging, can assist with all of this.

    Properly resourcing this part of the criminal justice system — far cheaper than having such offenders imprisoned — would give judges and magistrates an alternative option to that of imposing short sentences.

    Very often — although I concede not always — low-level criminality is a consequence of mental illness or addiction to drink or drugs. In these cases, if we are serious about stopping reoffending, the better response must surely be treatment rather than imprisonment.

    This is especially relevant to female prisoners. There are currently about 3,600 women in prison — overwhelmingly for non-violent offences, and for short periods of time. Many are vulnerable: addicts, mentally ill, or — in a distressing number of cases — themselves the victims of trauma and abuse.

    Many are also mothers, for whom imprisonment will have a significant impact not only on them but on their children. We are all equal under the law, but common sense and practicality suggests we should look very carefully at community sentence alternatives before vulnerable women offenders are sent to prison.

    Given the scale of the prison capacity crisis, I do not believe the issue will be resolved by addressing only those on short sentences. Ultimately, nearly all prisoners will be released and, when that occurs, it is in the public interest for them to be prepared for a life outside jail.

    Those prisoners who abide by the rules and show a determination to turn their lives around should be encouraged. By enabling such prisoners to earn the privilege of being released earlier than would otherwise be the case, we would be aiding rehabilitation, improving discipline within prisons and easing the pressures on capacity.

    I am fully aware that any proposal that means any offender spends less time in prison — or does not go to prison at all — will be accused of being “soft on crime”. It was ever thus.

    But if we are serious about reducing crime, we must take steps to reduce reoffending. We cannot continue to focus solely on punishment; we need to focus equally on rehabilitation.

    Necessity demands reform. Bold measures are required if we are to avoid a situation in which our prisons are full, and our criminal justice system becomes incapable of functioning.

    But if this review proposes a new direction — with an entirely new focus on addressing the causes of crime, the prevention of reoffending, and resisting the temptation to see prison as the only answer — there is hope that we can move to a more humane and effective criminal justice system. That would correct a longstanding flaw in our criminal justice system and be of benefit to us all.

    Such an approach requires entirely new thinking and an acceptance of the realities we now face. I do hope this review will be brave in its recommendations and, if so, will receive the support it deserves from the government — and the public as a whole.

  • Sir John Major’s Prison Reform Trust Speech – 9 May 2023

    The text of the speech made by Sir John Major at the Prison Reform Trust event held at the Old Bailey in London on 9 May 2023.

    It’s a great privilege to be here this evening – and in such historic surroundings.  

    I’d like to thank Alistair King for making it possible – and Edward Garnier for encouraging me to enlarge publicly upon what I have said privately.

    Edward – apart from his legal and political career – is a Trustee of the Prison Reform Trust, now Chaired by James Timpson, whose actions match his family’s long concern for prisoner welfare.

    The Trust itself, until recently under the guidance of Peter Dawson and now, Pia Sinha has worked for reform with the same persistence as those early campaigners – John Howard and Elizabeth Fry.

    I would like this evening, to add a few thoughts of my own.

    One of the virtues of age is having the time to reflect on what you have left undone with – no doubt – some regrets along the way.  It is such reflections that have brought us together this evening.

    I am conscious that, where I criticise, many of the problems are long standing and I, together with predecessors and successors, must each take our share of the blame.

    Let me begin with some reassuring news.  Violent crime has been falling for nearly 30 years – although the extent of public interest when some horrific crime occurs makes this a deeply held secret for many people.

    Despite this long downward trend, legislators have been far more active in framing policy to punish crime than in action to minimise the cause of it.

    Many citizens who have faced ‒ or fear facing ‒ serious or violent crime strongly approve.  They are clear that they ‒ and their families ‒ are safer if criminals are taken out of society.  And, in one sense, they are entirely right.

    And yet this instinctive ‒ very human ‒ response ignores the obverse of punishment, which must be rehabilitation.

    Stern sentences for violent crimes are necessary, and the instinct to protect the public is laudable ‒ but we should beware that excessive zeal to be tough on crime does not lead us into unwise policy.

    We are told “prison works” and – to the extent it holds the worst of criminals in custody, it does – but I do not believe our justice system is well served if it also imprisons those who could better be punished by non-custodial sentences.

    Even to use the word “rehabilitation” is taken by many as code for being “soft” on crime;  for being gullible;  a “do-gooder” who cares more for the villain than the victim.

    I certainly do not intend it in that sense.  Indeed – as I shall argue shortly – I believe such an interpretation ignores the public interest.  

    When society sends people to prison we are, in reality, “shutting the door after the horse has bolted”:  the crime has been committed.  

    Retribution follows:  but, upon release, it is surely in the wider interest of everyone that the crime is never repeated.

    That is the purpose of rehabilitation ‒ together with turning around the life of the released prisoner.

    If we wish to live under a penal code of which we can be proud, then we must not only punish, but act to reform and re-educate offenders.  

    I don’t claim that is easy.  But I do say that it is sound policy to reduce the risk of re-offending upon release.

    We send people to prison ‒ most of them, deservedly, but some not.  Either which way, to prison they go.  And, to many, that is the end of the matter.  Justice is done and the victim has closure.

    But ‒ future victims do not  have closure if the prisoner re-offends.  Prison is at its best when it rehabilitates, and, at its worst if – instead of providing a route out of crime, it provides an education into it.  

    PRISONERS/EDUCATION:

    It is instructive to consider the overwhelming characteristics of adults committed to prison:  

    • nearly two-thirds of them have used Class A drugs;
    • many are illiterate, or innumerate, or both;  
    • almost half have no educational or vocational qualifications whatsoever;
    • the intellectual assessment of many prisoners equates to that of a primary school pupil.  

    Two-fifths of those in prison were either expelled or excluded from school;  three fifths were frequent truants;  many were taken into care as a child;  or observed violence in the home;  or suffered abuse;  sometimes even all of the above.

    All of this is a truly wretched preparation for adult life.

    We cannot be ignorant of the fact that failures in the early years of life are a serious driver towards crime, and anti-social behaviour.  

    There is education and training in prison, but its availability ‒ and value ‒ is mixed.  After the (Sally) Coates review in 2016 improvements were expected.  

    Yet, seven years on they have not materialised.  

    There are reasons.

    Poor education contracts;  lack of funding;  unsavoury prison conditions;  and – of course – the impact of Covid, have all stood in the way.  As has over-crowding, and the resultant churn of prisoners being moved from prison to prison.  

    If we wish to attack the causes of crime, better education – in and out of prison – is an essential component.

    PRISON POPULATION:

    Forty years ago, when Willie Whitelaw was Home Secretary, I was a humble Parliamentary Private Secretary to the two Ministers of State, Tim Renton and Patrick Mayhew.  

    They were shocked ‒ Willie was apoplectic actually ‒ when the prison population reached 40,000.  Today, it is more than double that.  

    A range of reasons contribute:

    • our national population has grown;  
    • indeterminate sentences boosted prisoner numbers;  
    • as has legislation increasing terms of imprisonment for many crimes;  and
    • a greater range of misdemeanours may lead to prison.

    Comparisons with overseas do not reflect well on our penal policy.

    The UK has the highest imprisonment rates in Western Europe ‒ and yet I find it hard to believe we British are uniquely criminal.

    So ‒ were our predecessors unduly lenient in sentencing ‒ or are we unduly harsh?

    And why ‒ since our prisons are heavily over-crowded ‒ have suspended sentences been declining?

    In the year to June 2022, 43,000 people were sentenced to a term in prison.  Of these, less than two in every five had committed a violent offence.  

    Was prison the correct (or fair) sentence for all the 26,000 non-violent offenders?  Some, perhaps … but all?  I am not sure that it was.

    The punishment of prison is to lose liberty, but the prisoner may lose much else besides:  their job, their home, their relationships.

    That is a high cost ‒ not only for the prisoner, but for society as a whole.  The full costs may not be justified.

    We might be wise to be more selective.

    When prisoners have served their punishment we don’t wish them to be so alienated that ‒ through spleen or necessity ‒ they return to crime.  That is in no one’s interest ‒ and especially not the public at large.

    Many prisoners ‒ far too many, I believe ‒ are sentenced to short-term imprisonment when other sentences would be preferable.  In some cases, care and medical attention are called for rather than prison.

    Should the mentally ill be imprisoned, or should they be treated in secure wings of mental hospitals?  Surely the latter.

    More radically, should non-violent mentally ill prisoners even be the responsibility of the Justice Department:  would not the Department of Health be more appropriate?

    I appreciate such a move would not be welcomed by the Health Department, but the Government’s responsibility is to provide the most effective and humane punishment.  

    Imprisoning people who may be incapable of self-control is simply wrong.  They require care, not incarceration.  

    Of course, mentally ill prisoners who are dangerous or violent must be held securely to protect the public, but they, too, require care as well as custody.

    Moreover, should low-level drug offenders ‒ street dealers for example ‒ who are highly likely to be of limited intelligence as well as being addicts themselves – be sentenced to prison, or given an appropriate community sentence?

    To be blunt ‒ my suspicion is that many short sentences are pointless and that a non-custodial sentence would be more effective and, perhaps, more fair.

    WOMEN:

    There are over 3,300 women in prison in England and Wales.  More than half will serve less than six months.  No doubt some are irredeemable, but I suspect most are not.  

    Over two-thirds of women sent to prison have committed a non-violent crime:  at present more are imprisoned for theft alone than for criminal damage, arson, drug offences, possession of weapons, robbery or sexual offences.  

    I do question whether prison for many of these women does not cause more problems than it solves.  

    Some have mental problems, or histories of trauma or abuse.  Some 50 babies a year are born to women in prison, and reports suggest women in prison are seven times more likely to suffer still birth.  

    That statistic alone should make us question present policy:  whatever the mother may have done, the baby is innocent.

    I accept – male or female – we are all equal under the Law, but commonsense and practicality suggests we should look very carefully at community sentence alternatives, before sending vulnerable women offenders to prison.  

    THE PRISON ESTATE:

    Reports by HM Inspectors on the state of our prisons do not make for happy reading.  Time after time, the conditions of prisons are found to be unsatisfactory.  In some they are intolerable.

    Many of the old Victorian prisons ‒ Wandsworth, Pentonville, Norwich, among others ‒ were built to hold one prisoner per cell.

    150 years later, these cells may hold two – or even three – prisoners, sleeping on bunk beds and essentially ‒ forgive my putting it this way – living in a lavatory.

    To have inmates held in worse conditions than in Victorian times is an indictment of policy that is hard to ignore.

    Last year, 301 prisoners died in custody ‒ 74 of them by their own hand.  This rate of suicide is six times higher than among the general population.  

    Many suicides are within the early days of custody.  It is hard to escape the conclusion that the sheer shock of imprisonment ‒ which, I reiterate, may be for a non-violent crime ‒ is a principal cause of the desperation that leads to self-destruction.

    Self-harm in prison has risen by two and a half times over the last decade ‒ most notably by women, but there is also a significant rise in the incidence of male self-harming.  I would like to know ‒ why?

    I would suggest that prisoners who kill or maim themselves are people in despair – not hardened villains.  

    Of course, the Government knows all this.

    In 2015, the Government announced a new prison reform programme to build nine new prisons – and committed £1.3 billion to create 10,000 new prison places by 2020.

    This well-meaning plan ‒ let me put it kindly ‒ faltered.  

    The Public Accounts Committee reported that, despite these pledges, only 206 new places were delivered with 3,500 places still underway.  

    Meanwhile, prisoners continued to be held in unsafe and over-crowded conditions.

    A revised plan followed in 2019 ‒ also to create a further 10,000 places.

    This was updated in 2020 when £4 billion was allocated to deliver a total of not 10,000 but 18,000 places ‒ in England and Wales – by the middle of this decade.  

    The plans included the expansion of four prisons;  the completion of building at two more;  and refurbishment of the Prison Estate.

    Last month, a Parliamentary Question revealed that only 3,100 of that 18,000 target had yet been provided, and only one new prison had been opened in Wellingborough – although I believe a second, Fosse Way, is due to open this year.

    Progress?  Yes.  But 2025 is only two years away, and there is still a very long way to go to turn what was promised into reality.

    Prison staffing is an allied and deep-rooted problem.

    The turnover of staff is a ruinous 15% a year – which delivers its own message about the job’s lack of appeal, and the toll it must take.  

    Despite efforts to attract people to become prison officers, there are over 700 fewer officers than there were 12 months ago, and front line staff are 11% below the staffing level of 2010.  

    This does not suggest a modern prison service is anywhere near delivery.

    REMAND:

    It is said that “Justice delayed is Justice denied”.

    And yet, the congestion in our Courts does delay justice.

    Consider the remand system.

    Remand may be used for accused people before their trial, or those convicted and awaiting a formal sentence for their offence.  Within that bland reality lie many complexities, and some injustices.

    At present ‒ partly as a result of Covid delays ‒ the number of people on remand is at its highest level for decades:  around 14,500.  

    Typically, two-thirds are awaiting trial, while the remainder are awaiting sentence after conviction.

    Of those awaiting trial, one in two are subsequently imprisoned – even though accused of non-violent offences.  

    Although individual circumstances will differ, I do not believe the case can be made that they should all be jailed.

    My belief is reinforced when I learn that – at their trials – one in ten remand prisoners are judged to be innocent of any crime, and a yet higher number are convicted – but sentenced only to a non-custodial sentence.  

    The need for reform seems evident.

    Other factors reinforce that judgement.

    Nearly one-third of remand prisoners are held longer than six months before trial, and an unlucky 5% for over two years.  That is over 700 remand prisoners held for over two years, before quite possibly being found to be innocent.  

    They not only lose their liberty but their reputation and their income too, which may well also punish their families.  This cannot be acceptable.

    Nor is it the fact that, last year over one-third of suicides in custody were by people on remand.  I do not think we can be proud of that.

    PAROLE BOARD:

    Parole for prisoners found guilty of serious and violent crimes is inevitably contentious.  

    In practice, the Parole Board deals only with a minority of prisoners ‒ less than 10% ‒ and decisions “for” or “against” their release or transfer to an “open” prison can be complex and controversial.  

    Thirty years ago, a House of Commons Select Committee advised that “release should be an entirely judicial decision ‒ independent of the Executive”.

    Although this was initially resisted, Parliament did subsequently accept that principle and ‒ in my view ‒ rightly so.

    Prisoners also gained the right to present their case for parole to the Board.  This ended years of parole decisions taken in secret as a result of evidence that was never challenged.  

    That was an approach which honoured neither democracy nor equity, and was a blot on our system.

    The present more open system does ensure that decisions are taken after a proper presentation of arguments.  This seems to have been effective.

    One quarter of those considered for release by the Parole Board were successful.  Of those, only 1 in every 200 prisoners released re-offended within the next three years. 

    This would suggest that the Parole Board is not a bunch of gullible “softies”.

    Over the years, the Parole Board has evolved from its modest beginnings in the 1960s:  with only a handful of Board members, no hearings to consider evidence, and with the final decision being taken by the Home Secretary.

    Today, the Board ‒ nominally at least ‒ is independent of Government, and has amassed years of experience and expertise, enabling a level playing field for decisions upon release, without the hype and pressure that would be bound to accompany political involvement.

    In the thousands of decisions to be made each year, there is no way that Ministers could possibly match the experience and knowledge of the 350 Parole Board Members.  

    It is therefore surprising ‒ and worrying ‒ that, over the last year, recommendations by the Parole Board to transfer prisoners to an “open” prison have suddenly, and sharply, been rejected by the Justice Secretary.  

    In 2021-22 – 94% of the Parole Board recommendations were accepted but, thereafter, that fell to 11%.  

    It is hard to believe that does not result from an unannounced change of policy that is instituting a harsher regime.

    VICTIMS AND PRISONERS’ BILL:

    The victims of crime have long needed more support than they receive, and there are elements of the proposed Victims and Prisoners’ Bill that are eminently sensible – and long overdue.

    As I understand it, the Bill was originally intended to cover the interest of victims only, and the prisoners’ element is a late addition.  

    I believe this addition is a political misjudgement that may put much needed reforms at risk, and will come to that in a moment.

    I welcome the proposal to enshrine the Victims’ Code in Law, which should ensure that greater support is delivered.  

    But, if theory is to become reality, funding will be needed for specialist support and, thus far, there is no evidence that this will be provided. 

    I can only hope the Justice Secretary has secured agreement for funding from the Treasury, or the Bill will fail to meet its purpose.

    I understand that the former Justice Secretary sought the power to veto decisions made by what is allegedly the independent Parole Board, to release prisoners convicted of serious crimes.  

    The problem with this is that I do not see how (or why) the Justice Secretary would be able to reach a more just decision than the Parole Board.  

    Any single Government Minister – however able or well-meaning – would be far more vulnerable to public campaigns and, under pressure, to make a harsher decision to appease them.   This is a very slippery slope.

    I do not think that any politician should have that power, and I hope the new Justice Secretary will reconsider or – if he does not – that Parliament will deny it.

    IPPs:

    There is one area of the penal code that is over-ripe for action to correct legitimate grievance. 

    Until 2003, the only indeterminate sentence available to Judges was a life sentence, which was only for the gravest of offences.

    But, that year, the Government introduced a new concept:  that of indeterminate imprisonment for public protection – so-called IPPs.  It was intended for people considered “dangerous”, but whose offence did not justify a life sentence.  

    It passes a minimum tariff but offers no stated maximum.  Release could only be authorised by the Parole Board.

    It seems that this scheme went wrong from the outset.  It was applied far more widely than expected (or intended), with lower level offenders receiving this harsh sentence.  

    The number of IPP cases far outstripped expectations, and amendments to the legislation were approved by Parliament in 2008.

    But shortcomings remained, and the power to issue IPP sentences was abolished in 2012.

    But – and it is a BIG “but”:  when it was abolished, no action was taken to determine a just ‒ and definitive ‒ sentence for the prisoners already serving for an indeterminate time.  

    This was an extraordinary omission, which remains the case eleven years after abolition.  

    Nearly 3,000 offenders, still imprisoned – including those who have never been released and those recalled back to custody – were sentenced to a minimum term of imprisonment, but not a maximum.

    They are all serving sentences that have extended years beyond their minimum tariff and – without Ministerial action – may never end.

    This is soul destroying for prisoners and their families, and is emphatically not justice.  

    I believe that, without any further delay, justice should be served by Government agreement to the Justice Committee’s recommendation of a re-sentencing exercise – backed by the establishment of an expert committee to guide on the practicalities – for everyone still serving an IPP sentence.

    * * * * *

    I was brought up to believe that we, in Britain had one of – if not the – most just and civilised penal codes in the world.  Some of what I have learned in preparing this speech has truly shaken that belief.  

    People who commit crimes have deservedly forfeited much but ‒ in our country ‒ not, I hope, the right to be treated fairly. 

    There are many good causes that attract support, and hundreds of thousands of activists plead the case they most care about.

    But it is not so easy, or attractive, to plead for people who have committed crimes, and are responsible for their own misfortune.  They do not so easily attract sympathy.  

    Nor, very often, is it politically comfortable for “active” politicians to plead for convicted criminals.  In the rough and tumble of politics, compassion and consideration can too easily be derided as “soft” or “weak” – terms which can define as well as defame.  

    It has ever been thus.

    In many ways, it is odd to plead for a more empathetic penal code on the site of Newgate – one of the most notorious prisons in our long national history.  

    But views evolve.

    In pre-Christian days, prisons were not a place of lengthy incarceration but merely of safe custody until a more savage sentence than loss of liberty could be carried out.  Those days, thankfully, have gone.

    In Saxon times, prison was occasionally used as a means of punishment and – by the 13th Century – to facilitate a sentence of life imprisonment imposed by the Church, which was unable to pass a harsher punishment.  

    It was when offenders defaulted in payment of a forfeit to the Crown that prison became a convenient inducement to pay ‒ and then became of wider use as a punishment.

    I have argued that its use needs to evolve further if it is to become a better instrument to deliver justice and reduce crime.

    So, let me summarise my concerns:

    • We over-use prison and under value alternative sentences;
    • too many vulnerable people ‒ including the mentally-ill – are jailed;
    • education and rehabilitation in prison is inadequate;
    • much of the Prison Estate is out of date and unsuitable;
    • too many accused are remanded in prison pre-trial;
    • the Justice Secretary should not remove powers from the Parole Board;
    • IPP prisoners should be re-sentenced.

    These practices, these problems have grown up over many governments.

    In my layman’s view, it is time they were addressed – and put right.

  • PMQT – 16 January 1996

    Below is the text of Prime Minister’s Question Time from 16th January 1996.

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Engagements

    Q1. Mr. Skinner: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 16 January.

    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. Skinner: How on earth can the Prime Minister justify sacking 3,000 prison officers at a time when his Home Secretary has forecast that the prison population will increase, and what will he do with 3,000 extra pairs of handcuffs? Is he going to use them on Lady Thatcher and the bastards in the Cabinet?

    The Prime Minister: My right hon. and learned Friend is seeking to ensure that we receive from the Prison Service the efficiency that both we and taxpayers have a right to expect from the Prison Service. The hon. Gentleman may not be concerned about efficiency for taxpayers’ money, but we are.

    Mr. Trotter: Did not the Saudi Government prove to be stable and sound allies in the Gulf war? Is it not in the interests of Britain that the Saudis should continue to have a stable Government, and has not Mr. Al-Masari abused his position as a guest in this country? Do not the thousands of people whose jobs he puts at risk, especially in the north of England, feel that he is very fortunate to be offered a home on a Caribbean island, rather than being sent back to where he came from?

    The Prime Minister: As my hon. Friend will know, the United Kingdom has a long and honourable tradition of protecting and helping people who seek asylum, but if people abuse that hospitality, we should not ignore that. The stability of the Saudi Arabian Government is a matter of importance throughout the Gulf and for stability more generally, and we should not give comfort to people who seek to undermine it.

    Mr. Blair: Can the Prime Minister tell us why the Minister for Social Security and Disabled People has been reprimanded for writing his letter to The Times?

    The Prime Minister: I set out my views on that issue last week and they have not changed.

    Mr. Blair: What we would like to know is: has the Minister been reprimanded, yes or no?

    The Prime Minister: Matters in my Government are for me and not you.

    Mr. Blair: To which I can only say, looking at the Government, thank goodness.

    So the Prime Minister cannot tell us. He cannot make up his mind whether he has reprimanded the Minister or not. He cannot make up his mind, presumably, whether he agrees with the Minister, or whether he agrees with Lady Thatcher. Is it any wonder, when the Prime Minister cannot even answer simple questions about his own Government, that the country despairs of weak leadership and a divided Government?

    The Prime Minister: While we are on the subject of being clear about views, perhaps the right hon. Gentleman could tell us whether he would renationalise British Rail to please his party, or leave it alone to give his slogan some substance. Let him tell us some more. Would he abolish the grant-maintained schools that he voted against, or would he let parents enjoy the choice that he talks about? Would he tax more successful people to please his left wing, or does he believe that success should be rewarded? Can he make up his mind about any of those examples, and a dozen more that I can give him–or does he not know the answer?

    Sir Norman Fowler: Will my right hon. Friend take this opportunity to congratulate Land Rover on the major new overseas order that was announced this morning, on its continuing success in the overseas market and, above all, on the design of its new military ambulance?

    The Prime Minister: Land Rover is an excellent company with a long and honourable record, and I am delighted to congratulate it.

     

    Q2. Ms Glenda Jackson: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 16 January.

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

    Ms Jackson: If, as the Prime Minister claims, his policies have created strong economic growth, why are the appalling 500,000 job losses in the construction industry due–according to the Building Employers Confederation–to rise by a further 22,000? Where will those workers look for jobs, and where will thousands of homeless families look for homes?

    The Prime Minister: Let me remind the hon. Lady of some of the economic circumstances–including the fall in unemployment–that now pertain in this country. No significantly sized country in western Europe has as much of its population in work; none of the major European countries has unemployment as low as ours; none of them has seen unemployment fall for over two years; and none of them can combine that with the lowest inflation levels for 50 years, the lowest mortgage rates for 30 years, the lowest basic rate of tax for 50 years and the best prospects that we have seen for many years.

    Mr. Marlow: Are more murders, muggings and mindless acts of violence carried out by adolescents now, or were there more in the days when corporal punishment was available both in schools and to the courts? If the answer is now, can we have corporal punishment back? I am sure that many people are concerned about the state of our streets and cities.

    The Prime Minister: I do not have the figures immediately to hand, but I can tell my hon. Friend, if he wishes to exercise arguments of that sort, that if he went back far enough and extended his thoughts to capital as well as corporal punishment, he would find that the number of murders committed many years ago when capital punishment applied was far larger than it is now. I am not sure that I draw the conclusion that was implicit in my hon. Friend’s question.

     

    Q3. Mr. Jon Owen Jones: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 16 January.

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

    Mr. Jones: Will the Prime Minister confirm that the average age of a member of the Conservative party is now 62, that there are no more than 5,000 members of the Young Conservatives and that the Young Conservatives’ conference had to be cancelled this year owing to lack of interest? Will he tell us why young people in Britain have lost all interest in the Conservative party, and want nothing to do with it?

    The Prime Minister: The answers to the hon. Gentleman’s three questions are no, no and no; so the last part of what he said does not apply.

     

    Q4. Lady Olga Maitland: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 16 January.

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

    Lady Olga Maitland: Does my right hon. Friend agree that the way to give people a stake in society is to allow them to own their homes, to own shares, to have their own pension schemes and, above all, to pay low taxes? Does he agree that that contrasts sharply with the Labour party’s vision of a stakeholding society, which would place burdens on business men and, indeed, bring back vested interests in Labour’s old friends?

    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend is right in what she says. There has been some discussion recently about the term “stakeholder society” or “stakeholder economy”. The Leader of the Opposition now tells us that it is a slogan, and the hon. Member for Brent, East (Mr. Livingstone) tells us that he has not the faintest idea what it means. But we know and have been practising what it means for the past 16 years. It means giving people a direct, personal interest in what happens–lower taxes, more home ownership, more personal pensions– exercised by the holders themselves, not exercised by other people allegedly on their behalf.

     

    Q5. Mr. Pickthall: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 16 January.

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

    Mr. Pickthall: Will the Prime Minister look into the case of my elderly constituent, Teresa Stewart, who was referred to Fazackerly hospital by her GP? She arrived there at 4 o’clock in the afternoon but was not seen by a hospital doctor until 10 o’clock that evening. Thereafter, she remained on a trolley until noon the next day. Does not her case, and the hundreds of others up and down the country, demonstrate yet again that the national health service is not safe in the Tories’ hands?

    The Prime Minister: Of course I will look into the individual case that the hon. Gentleman raises and I will ask my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health to respond to him. But the hon. Gentleman should realise that, with a service the size of the national health service, he will from time to time find matters of concern. There are now something over 8.5 million patients treated in total each year. The hon. Gentleman might care to consider how much lower that number was when last his party was in government.

    Mr. Day: Will my right hon. Friend take this opportunity to reassure the House that he will not follow the example of the Leader of the Opposition in seeming to imply to the nation that he has rejected everything he has ever believed? Will he also give an assurance that he will never, as Prime Minister and leader of our party, give the impression that he has accepted totally the philosophy of the party that he has fought all his political life? Will he assure Conservative Members of that so that we will not have a similar fear to that of many Labour Members–that the leader of the Labour party is about to cross the Floor and join us?

    The Prime Minister: I can certainly give my hon. Friend the assurance he seeks. The Leader of the Opposition seems to base the prospects for his future on the belief that he has always been wrong.

     

    Q6. Mr. Khabra: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 16 January.

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

    Mr. Khabra: Does the Prime Minister have any new policies to end the recession in the housing market?

    The Prime Minister: If the hon. Gentleman looks, he will see that house prices have risen throughout the past five months. That is a very welcome trend. [Interruption.] The right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull, East (Mr. Prescott) seems neither to understand nor to hear anything that is said to him. I repeat the point–house prices have risen throughout the past five months. That is a welcome development, and I hope and expect to see it continue.

    Mr. Legg: Has my right hon. Friend found time to read the latest book by the Labour guru, Will Hutton, especially the chapter entitled “Stakeholder Capitalism”? If my right hon. Friend has read that chapter, does he agree that Labour’s vision of stakeholder capitalism owes more to the failed corporatism of the 1970s than to anything happening in Singapore today? Does he have any plans to introduce stakeholder trade unions, which would enjoy extra powers and rights?

    The Prime Minister: The distinction between the Government and the Opposition on this matter is that we believe people should have a personal interest, personally owned, in the country. The Opposition seem to believe– if the idea is more than just a slogan, although that is not clear–in a corporatist approach in which special interest groups operate on behalf of the public at large, as the shadow Secretary of State for Transport said just the other day. The Leader of the Opposition, desperately trying to put flesh on his slogan, has failed to do so and has reaffirmed me in my belief that all he is concerned about is the readmission of a corporatist Britain of the sort we rejected in the 1980s and will not have back in the 1990s.

     

    Q7. Mr. Miller: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 16 January.

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

    Mr. Miller: We are always on the look-out for fresh ideas from the Prime Minister. [Hon. Members: “Oh!”] So is his own party. What new plans does he have to increase investment in the British economy?

    The Prime Minister: The hon. Gentleman is certainly right, in that the Opposition have sought, rather inadequately, to borrow many of our ideas–just as they have sought, without real conviction, to ditch their own.

    Investment is rising, which is why this country has a higher growth rate than elsewhere in Europe. It is why unemployment is falling; it is why the economy is in better shape at the moment than it has been for many years–and in better shape than the economy of anywhere else in western Europe.

  • PMQT – 19 October 1995

    Below is the text of Prime Minister’s Question Time from 19th October 1995.

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Lichfield (Anniversaries)

    Q1. Mr. Fabricant: To ask the Prime Minister when he plans to visit the celebrations of the 800th anniversary of the completion of the present cathedral and the 500th anniversary of the King Edward VI school being held this year in the city of Lichfield.

    The Prime Minister (Mr. John Major): I warmly congratulate the citizens of Lichfield on these anniversaries. Unfortunately, I shall not on this occasion be able to visit during them.

    Mr. Fabricant: If my right hon. Friend is able to visit next year, not only could he join in the celebrations of the 801st anniversary of the cathedral but he could see our brand new anti-crime closed circuit television system in the centre of Lichfield and use the opportunity to speak to the people of the city of Lichfield, who will tell him that what we need is not do-gooders but more people like our Home Secretary, who are tough on crime and robust on punishment.

    The Prime Minister: My right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary richly deserves and gets my full support in his fight against crime. It is a fight in which he has engaged with great success without a great deal of support from Opposition Members. Closed circuit television has had a dramatic effect in catching criminals and deterring crime, and over the next three years we anticipate installing a further 10,000 new cameras up and down the country.

     

    Engagements

    Q2. Mr. Clapham: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 19 October.

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

    Mr. Clapham: Despite the Government’s obsession with privatisation over the past 16 years, will the Prime Minister share the view of Dame Vera Lynn, the people of Dover and the Labour party and ensure that Dover and its white cliffs remain British for ever?

    The Prime Minister: The hon. Gentleman makes a compelling case and, as we look at plans ahead, I shall certainly bear it in mind.

    Mr. French: Is my right hon. Friend aware that the official solicitor is reported to have done a deal whereby the so-called memoirs of my late constituent, Mr. Fred West, are to be sold for £1 million? Does my right hon. Friend not find such a deal extremely distasteful? But, if it is to go ahead, does he agree that that sum should go not to members of the West family but to the families of the alleged victims?

    The Prime Minister: When I saw some of the earlier reports on this matter in the media, there was an implication that the Government were involved in the sale of the rights to Mr. West’s papers. That is, of course, emphatically not the case. The official solicitor who has made the sale is a lawyer independent of Government and he has made that decision on his judgment of what is right for the estate. Personally, I share my hon. Friend’s feelings about this matter.

    Mr. Blair: Can we have clear answers now to the two points of fact at the heart of the dispute between the Home Secretary and Mr. Lewis? At the meeting of 10 January, first, did the Home Secretary say that the governor of Parkhurst prison should be suspended–a disciplinary matter–rather than merely transferred to other duties, and, secondly, was it the Home Secretary, not Mr. Lewis, who demanded that any action taken be taken that day immediately so that he could announce it to the House of Commons?

    The Prime Minister: My right hon. and learned Friend will deal with these matters in detail this afternoon. But let me say further to the right hon. Gentleman that the leading questions that he put to me on Tuesday in an attempt to discredit my right hon. and learned Friend were wrong. I have now had the documentary evidence examined which shows conclusively that the decision to move the governor of Parkhurst prison was the director general’s. My right hon. and learned Friend will be releasing that evidence later today. I hope, therefore, that before the Leader of the Opposition repeats unjust allegations, before he states new unjust allegations, he will withdraw the old unjust allegations and apologise for them. [Interruption.]

    Dr. Spink: The right hon. Gentleman should withdraw his false questions.

    Madam Speaker: Order. Dr. Spink will come to order.

    Mr. Blair: We certainly do not withdraw those allegations and we shall make them good during the debate. What is more, I note that the Prime Minister did not answer either of the two points that I put to him. Let me make this clear to Conservative Members. This is not just Mr. Lewis’s word against that of the Home Secretary, although let me point out that he was the senior civil servant. The Government appointed Mr. Lewis and renewed his contract. May I tell the Prime Minister– [Interruption.]

    Madam Speaker: Order. This is Question Time and we are to have a debate on the matter in a short time.

    Mr. Blair: May I remind the Prime Minister that those now lined up against the Home Secretary on this issue are the chairman of the board of visitors of Parkhurst, the chairman of the Association of Members of Boards of Visitors, the chief inspector of prisons– [Interruption.]

    Madam Speaker: Order. This is Question Time and I insist that questions are put to the Prime Minister for reply.

    Mr. Blair: Will the Prime Minister now release Philippa Drew, John Marriott and other civil servants connected with this matter from their obligations of confidentiality on this limited issue so that they can give their version of events and we can see who is telling the truth?

    The Prime Minister: The right hon. Gentleman is very reckless with his facts and very fancy-free with his allegations. He was wrong on Tuesday and the House will notice that he did not apologise for his error. My right hon. and learned Friend will deal with all these matters this afternoon and I have every confidence that he will reveal Labour’s smears for what they are. I have one further point for the right hon. Gentleman. The right hon. Gentleman is keen to lecture people on moral responsibility. Perhaps he should reflect that a high moral tone is inconsistent with peddling allegations that he knows are untrue.

    Mr. Blair: If the Prime Minister says that they are untrue, will he allow those civil servants who know the truth directly to give evidence as to their version of events? Now, yes or no to that question?

    The Prime Minister: I made the point in my first answer that my right hon. and learned Friend will be releasing the evidence this afternoon about the decision on Parkhurst prison. As to the other matters, my right hon. and learned Friend will make the matter crystal clear this afternoon. If the right hon. Gentleman wishes to retain any credibility in the country, he should acknowledge that he is wrong and apologise for unjust allegations.

    Mr. Waterson: Has my right hon. Friend had an opportunity during his busy week to consider the findings of the European Court, which has said that positive discrimination in employment is unlawful? Will he confirm that the full facilities of the Equal Opportunities Commission will be made available for the right hon. Member for Copeland (Dr. Cunningham)?

    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend makes an extremely intriguing point, and also touches on elections elsewhere that have been of interest to the House in the past day or so. I have no doubt that the departure of the right hon. Member for Copeland (Dr. Cunningham) and the arrival of the right hon. Member for Derby, South (Mrs. Beckett) constitute a case of constructive dismissal and destructive appointment.

    Mr. Ashdown: With the Home Secretary now facing his eighth appearance before the courts, how does the Prime Minister justify a policy of “two strikes and you’re out” for a criminal? The Home Secretary has had seven strikes against him, and he is still in.

    The Prime Minister: I think that the right hon. Gentleman ought to understand that there is strong support in the country for the law and order policies of my right hon. and learned Friend. Time after time, my right hon. and learned Friend and his predecessors have set out strong anti-criminal measures; time after time, the right hon. Gentleman and the Leader of the Opposition have voted for the soft option. They voted against raising the maximum sentences for serious crimes: they are against that. They were against giving the Attorney-General the right of appeal against lenient sentences: they want lenient sentences. They were against strengthening police powers to stop and search criminals, against giving the police more powers to deal with disorder on the streets and against making parents more responsible for their children. They do not like it, but that is their record on crime. The only message that the Liberal and Labour parties send to criminals is that they would be soft on them.

    Mr. Wilshire: Turning to Northern Ireland, may I ask my right hon. Friend to confirm that it remains the Government’s policy to exclude from all-party talks all those who retain guns and explosives?

    The Prime Minister: I can confirm that there has been absolutely no change in the Government’s position. That will be clear to anyone who studies the full text of the remarks made the other day by my right hon. and learned Friend the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland.

     

    Q3. Mr. Mullin: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 19 October.

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

    Mr. Mullin: Does the Prime Minister recall the occasion on which a man was found in the Queen’s bedroom? Does he also recall–[Interruption.]

    Madam Speaker: Order. We have a very full day today. Come on, get on with it.

    Mr. Mullin: Does the Prime Minister also recall that the then Home Secretary, Lord Whitelaw–who I think we can all agree was a gentleman of the old school–immediately offered his resignation? Was Lord Whitelaw wrong? Should he have said that it was an operational matter, and none of his business?

    The Prime Minister: If the hon. Gentleman were familiar with the framework document under which Mr. Lewis was working, he would see the clear distinction between policy and operational matters.

     

    Q4. Mr. Butler: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 19 October.

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

    Mr. Butler: Is my right hon. Friend aware that grant-maintained schools are proving more and more popular with parents–so much so that a school in the constituency of the Leader of the Opposition is now balloting for grant-maintained status?

    The Prime Minister: I did not know that, but I congratulate the parents of Sedgefield on considering it, and I very much hope that they will vote in favour. I hope that, if they do, the Labour leader will have the chance to tell his constituents about the benefits of grant-maintained schools, which he so obviously values. When he does so, perhaps he can explain why Labour’s education policy is to enjoy those advantages–quite rightly–for its own children, but to deprive other people’s children of the same opportunity.

     

    Q5. Miss Hoey: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 19 October.

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

    Miss Hoey: Does the Prime Minister share my concern at the failure of training and enterprise councils across the country to meet their targets for special needs? Does he realise that, in the meantime, projects such as Roots and Shoots in Kennington in my constituency are facing closure from underfunding, despite having a wonderful success rate in terms of employment? What action will he take on that?

    The Prime Minister: I am grateful to the hon. Lady for giving me notice of the detailed question that she proposed to ask. I understand that she had a useful meeting this morning with the Under-Secretary of State for Education and Employment, my hon. Friend the Member for Cambridgeshire, South-East (Mr. Paice). I understand that Roots and Shoots has signed a contract with the Central London TEC. My hon. Friend has made it clear that the TEC is willing to discuss the terms of the contract and the costs involved by Roots and Shoots in an effort to ensure that provision is continued. As I am sure the hon. Lady is also aware, my hon. Friend has written to every TEC to urge it to pass on the substantial premium that the Government pay to special needs training. My hon. Friend will of course pursue that vigorously.

  • PMQT – 17 October 1995

    Below is the text of Prime Minister’s Question Time from 17th October 1995.

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Engagements

    Q1. Mr. Anthony Coombs: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 17 October.

    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. Coombs: Even in the light of the recent record fall in reported crime, is my right hon. Friend aware of the great welcome that there will be throughout the country for the additional 5,000 police officers approved last week? Does my right hon. Friend agree that, irrespective of what the Lord Chief Justice might say, long prison sentences which become short as a result of automatic remission undermine people’s sense of justice and do not act as a sufficient deterrent to the criminal?

    The Prime Minister: I entirely agree with my hon. Friend. I entirely support my right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary’s strategy to fight crime. The threat of a long prison sentence deters criminals from committing crime. That is not just my view and that of the Home Secretary. That is the view of the police as well. I welcome the fall in crime over the past two and a half years, but we wish to see it fall a good deal further. That is what lay behind our announcements last week.

    Mr. Blair: The Prime Minister will know that the Home Secretary has denied any involvement in the operational matters of the Prison Service, including the Parkhurst breakout. Can he therefore confirm the following facts: that, so far from this being true, the Home Secretary personally told Mr. Lewis that the governor of Parkhurst prison should be suspended immediately; that when Mr. Lewis objected as it was an operational matter, the Home Secretary threatened to instruct him to do it; that when Mr. Lewis further objected, the Home Secretary told the operational director of the Prison Service by fax that he would announce it in the House of Commons that day and duly did announce it in his statement to the House? Is that true or is it false?

    The Prime Minister: The Home Secretary is responsible to Parliament for the actions of the Home Office and for the actions of the governor. He appointed Mr. Lewis to run the Prison Service. The criticisms over the past few days by the Learmont report have been directed at the director of prisons and not at my right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary. I believe that the Home Secretary has acted entirely properly throughout this affair.

    Mr. Blair: I am afraid that the Prime Minister has not answered the factual question. The Home Secretary is sitting a couple of places along. The Prime Minister can ask him whether it is true now. I put certain specific facts in relation to the pressure on Mr. Lewis in respect of the removal of the governor of Parkhurst. Are those facts true or are they false?

    The Prime Minister: I have made it entirely clear to the right hon. Gentleman that I have no doubt that whatever action my right hon. and learned Friend took was entirely proper and within his remit as Home Secretary answerable to this House.

    Mr. Blair: If the facts are true, it was not within his remit as it was an operational matter. That is precisely the issue. Is the Prime Minister aware of the fact that Mr. Lewis has also said this morning that the Home Secretary personally interfered in prison visits, in searches and in disciplinary awards and that there has been greater political interference than at any point in time in the service history? Is it not the case that we do not have a Government governing the country? We have a group of Ministers who will play games with these issues, who take credit when things are going right and refuse to take credit when things are going wrong. That is not a responsible Government for Britain.

    The Prime Minister: We noticed the careful lead-up to the pre- prepared soundbite, as we do each Tuesday and Thursday. My right hon. and learned Friend discharges properly his responsibilities to this House and this country. Were he not to do so, the Leader of the Opposition would say, “Why does the Home Secretary not take an interest in matters that are relevant to the good conduct of the prison service?” But he is not responsible for the day-to-day management of the Prison Service. He is responsible to this House and answerable to this House, and he must take actions in the interests of the Prison Service. That is what my right hon. and learned Friend has done, and he has my full support in having done it.

    Mr. Alexander: Has my right hon. Friend had time to study the proposal that British Telecom should be able to wire up schools to the super-highway in return for carrying television signals? Is he aware that that would run contrary to the well-settled framework for those matters, and would be to the considerable advantage of British Telecom and the considerable disadvantage of the cable companies which have invested a great deal in the procedure so far?

    The Prime Minister: Yes, I am aware of that. Many schools are already being cabled up for precisely those advantages. If the Opposition, who occasionally like to claim credit for the information super-highway, were to examine what was happening–if they took their heads out of the sand and put them in the holes in the road–they would see that it was already being built.

     

    Q2. Mr. Menzies Campbell: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 17 October.

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

    Mr. Campbell: Which has done more damage to the Government: the irresponsibility of the Defence Secretary last week or the Home Secretary’s unwillingness to accept responsibility this week?

    The Prime Minister: My right hon. Friend the Defence Secretary was expressing the fears of many people, not just in the United Kingdom but throughout Europe, about the more ambitious federalist plans for the future of the European Union. If the hon. and learned Gentleman is saying that his party’s policy is that the British armed forces should be commanded by qualified majority vote elsewhere, let him say so.

    Mr. Dunn: Conservatives welcome the decision to expand the assisted places scheme. Will my right hon. Friend compare our policies of maximising parental choice with those of the Opposition, which would destroy the city technology colleges, grammar schools, the assisted places scheme and grant- maintained schools in the interests of equality, justice and social engineering?

    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend is entirely right. We seek excellence in education and choice for all parents in the interests of their children. I very much regret that the Opposition–except perhaps the hon. Member for Stratford-on-Avon (Mr. Howarth)–oppose the assisted places scheme.

     

    Q3. Mr. Kirkwood: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 17 October.

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

    Mr. Kirkwood: Does the Prime Minister share the fear that has been expressed that the privatisation of Her Majesty’s Stationery Office later this afternoon will lead to commercial motives overriding the public interest in making official information more freely available to the general public, as it is in other countries? Does the Prime Minister acknowledge that it is clearly in a privatised HMSO’s interest to resist free electronic access to Government publications protected by Government copyright? How does that square with the Government’s commitment to a freedom of information policy and to extending the information technology revolution to the rest of the country?

    The Prime Minister: As the hon. Gentleman will know, my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster is answering a question later on this afternoon. I do not wish comment in detail on the substance of his question but I can assure the hon. Gentleman that my right hon. Friend will ensure that the needs of Parliament and other customers are satisfied for openness, for improved access to information technology, for value for money, for flexibility and for security of supply. The record of privatisation over recent years is that it has improved, not damaged, service.

    Mr. Garnier: My right hon. Friend will have heard this morning of another terrorist bombing in Paris. Will he use this opportunity today to reaffirm his Government’s policy on border controls and to make sure that they are never loosened so that terrorists may not get easy access to this country?

    The Prime Minister: I am happy to confirm the Government’s policy on border controls. We need those border controls. We intend to keep them, and they are not negotiable.

     

    Q4. Mr. Michael: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 17 October.

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

    Mr. Michael: Can we now hear it straight from the Prime Minister: just how bad do things have to get at the Home Office to require a ministerial resignation?

    The Prime Minister: I suggest that the hon. Gentleman reads the Learmont report, and after he has done so he will be better informed and he will know that the criticisms were directed not at my right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary but at the Prison Service. My right hon. and learned Friend acted properly in those circumstances.

    Mr. Marlow: Given that a report has been issued today by the Labour party–the blueprint for the dismemberment of the United Kingdom–could my right hon. Friend tell the House how it could be possible if there were a Parliament in Scotland, that a party with a majority in the United Kingdom but not in the majority in England could govern England?

    The Prime Minister: I have not yet had the opportunity to consider the document that has been published today but I am certainly aware that one was scheduled to be published today and I am aware of the policies of the Liberal Democrats and the Labour party on the subject of devolution in Scotland. There is no doubt whatsoever that those policies, if carried out as at present intended, would have a very damaging effect on the United Kingdom. [Interruption.] Although the leader of the Labour party shouts something at me across the Dispatch Box, it was he who referred to the tartan tax–an extra £6 a week, which he seems to think is an accountancy detail.

     

    Q5. Ms Quin: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 17 October.

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

    Ms Quin: Given the widespread public concern expressed over the summer, will the Prime Minister take the opportunity, particularly before the Commonwealth conference next month, of condemning the French nuclear tests in the south Pacific?

    The Prime Minister: No, I will not.

    Mr. Michael Brown: The Prime Minister spoke with the Home Secretary last week in the Winter Gardens at Blackpool where the subject of closed circuit televisions to deal with law and order was raised. Is he aware that in Cleethorpes we have a Winter Gardens, but we do not yet have closed circuit television. The Minister of State was unable to accede to my request earlier this year. Can my right hon. Friend assure me and the people of Cleethorpes that this time round Cleethorpes will be considered for closed circuit television in the high street and on the sea front where we have a problem with the youths and yobs who cause such distress to our retired people in Cleethorpes?

    The Prime Minister: I can assure my hon. Friend that there will be provision for a further 10,000 such closed circuit television cameras over the next three years and I have no doubt, as we consider where those should be, that my hon. Friend may from time to time mention the particular concerns of Cleethorpes.

     

    Q6. Mrs. Clwyd: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 17 October.

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

    Mrs. Clwyd: Is the Prime Minister aware that there have been angry reactions throughout the country to reports that overseas aid is to be cut by 12 per cent. over two years? Does he not care that such cuts would have a catastrophic effect on some of the poorest and most vulnerable people in the world? Is he aware that 79 per cent. of the British people find such cuts repugnant when they will be used for tax cuts in the run-up to the general election?

    The Prime Minister: As the hon. Lady knows, at something more than £2.2 billion, we have the fifth largest overseas aid programme in the world. It is not only one of the largest aid programmes in the world but, as the hon. Lady herself has acknowledged in the past, one of the best. I assure the hon. Lady that, after my right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor’s Budget, we shall continue to have a highly effective aid programme.

    Mr. Duncan Smith: Does my right hon. Friend agree that the concept of fundholding is right at the core of the success of our reforms in the health service? Has he noticed that doctors who are fundholders have, in the past two days, roundly attacked Labour’s proposals for the sham that they are and have said that they will destroy the very success that we have created? Will my right hon. Friend now take this opportunity to reaffirm our commitment to fundholding status and to point out the disastrous concept of Labour policy?

    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend is entirely right. The report by the GPs sets out what we have said consistently about fundholding–that our reforms are benefiting patients and delivering to them the service that they deserve. If the Labour party seriously intended to turn the clock back and to abolish fundholding, it would create chaos and confusion, and would damage the service for patients. The fact of the matter is that Labour is more concerned about political gestures than about care for the patient, and that has always been the case.

  • PMQT – 22 November 1994

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

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Engagements

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

    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. Hutton: Does the Prime Minister agree with the deputy chairman of the Conservative party that huge salary rises for the directors of privatised companies cause real public offence? What action is he going to take to stop these abuses?

    The Prime Minister: As the hon. Gentleman will have heard me say on many occasions in the past, I do not agree with excessive and unjustifiable salary increases. I have made that perfectly clear, but for companies within the private sector that must be a matter for their shareholders and not for the Government.

     

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

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

    Mr. Bellingham: Will the Prime Minister confirm that he will press ahead with extending choice in education? While welcoming the Opposition’s recent conversion to league tables, does he agree that the Opposition’s plans to abolish grant-maintained schools and assisted places means that they can never be trusted on education because they are still wedded to the failed policies of the 1970s?

    The Prime Minister: I believe that the performance tables have been a huge success. Anyone who looked at any of the national newspapers today would see the enormous interest in them. They are printed in many cases in full and I think that parents are very glad to have the information. I very much welcome the belated recognition by the Opposition that they are now in favour of performance tables. I regret that they opposed them for so long. I also regret the fact that they continue to oppose grant-maintained schools and the assisted places scheme and I look forward to yet a further U-turn in their education policy to adopt them in due course.

    Mr. Blair: Yesterday the President of the Board of Trade justified the grotesque increase of £200,000 to the chief of British Gas. Will the Prime Minister now join me in condemning it unequivocally?

    The Prime Minister: I indicated to the right hon. Gentleman’s hon. Friend just a few moments ago that I did not approve of excessive increases. I also made the point that in the private sector that was a matter for the shareholders of the company, not a matter for the Government themselves but, since the right hon. Gentleman asks for my view, I have made it clear.

    Mr. Blair: As a matter of fact, the right hon. Gentleman did not condemn the particular increase. Will he not understand that people want him to speak, not only for the shareholders but for the millions of British people who feel disgust and outrage at this excess and greed? Why will he not act to give the regulator the power to put a stop to this kind of abuse so that the privatised utilities, which are monopoly services that the public have no choice but to use, are managed as proper public services, run in the public interest?

    The Prime Minister: If the right hon. Gentleman is concerned about the monopoly aspect, presumably he will support the Gas Bill, which will introduce competition, later this Session. In the light of what he has just said, I look forward to his support for that. As for condemning the increase, I suggest that he looks again at what I have said on many occasions over the past few years. I fear that the right hon. Gentleman misunderstands the regulator’s position. The prices charged by utilities are legitimately a matter for the regulators but, as in all companies, boardroom pay is a matter for the shareholders. The sooner Opposition Members understand that, the better.

    Mr. McLoughlin: During his busy day, will my right hon. Friend consider the pay increase of about 200 per cent. for a person who is about to join the Commission gravy train? When that appointment was made, was it because the former Leader of the Opposition was the only candidate that the Opposition could put forward, or was there a shortage of candidates for the post, making such a pay increase necessary?

    The Prime Minister: The right hon. Gentleman to whom my hon. Friend refers is to be a Commissioner, and as such he will represent the United Kingdom. I think that he will do that fairly and honestly in the future, and I do not therefore have any criticism of his appointment.

    Mr. Ashdown: Why does not the Prime Minister see the 75 per cent. pay increase for the head of British Gas for what it is–a metaphorical V-sign to all the customers whose prices he has increased, to the employees whose jobs he has cut and to the Prime Minister’s begging and pleading for restraint? Is a weak whimper and a “Nothing to do with me, guv,” the best that the Prime Minister can do?

    The Prime Minister: The right hon. Gentleman, as usual, exercises before the House his customary ignorance of the way in which the private sector works. I have made it absolutely clear what I think about that rise, but what the right hon. Gentleman–and, no doubt, the right hon. Member for Sedgefield (Mr. Blair)–wants is a quasi-pay policy for some executives in the private sector. That, effectively, is what the right hon. Gentleman is asking for. The right way to deal with the matter is for the shareholders who own the company to take the action that they consider right.

    Mr. Budgen: In view of my right hon. Friend’s statement that the successful passage of the European Communities (Finance) Bill is a matter of confidence, will he confirm that he has discussed the Dissolution with the monarch? Will he further confirm that the monarch has told him that in the event of his asking for a Dissolution, it will be granted?

    The Prime Minister: As my hon. Friend, who has been here for a long time, should know, neither I nor any other Prime Minister is likely to discuss any conversation that he or she may or may not have had with Her Majesty the Queen.

     

    Q3. Mrs. Clwyd: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 22 November.

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

    Mrs. Clwyd: Has the Prime Minister anything to add to the Maples memorandum, which says that the Government have broken their promises and let down the electors, and that they are out of touch, stupid and blind?

    The Prime Minister: I am tempted to quote from the memorandum by the hon. Member for Durham, North (Mr. Radice), who had some very crisp things to say about the Labour party–but no doubt the hon. Lady would find that unfortunate. [Interruption.] Yes, I have something to add. I add that, with growth at more than 4 per cent., inflation at 2 per cent., unemployment falling and exports growing at record levels, the hon. Lady would be most unwise to assume what may happen in future.

     

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

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

    Mr. Alexander: Will my right hon. Friend commend to the House the statement by my right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary over the weekend that there would no longer be an automatic right of temporary release for prisoners serving sentences? Does my right hon. Friend agree that, when a judge sentences someone to a term of imprisonment, the public do not expect to find that person taken out to dinner by prison officers and do not expect to find another person cycling through the community two years into a rape conviction, and that a sentence of imprisonment must mean just that?

    The Prime Minister: I very much welcome what my right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary said last week. It is the latest in a long list of measures, crowned by the introduction of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994, to protect the public and to punish the criminal — [Interruption.] I am sorry that the hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours) seems unwilling to punish the criminal. That is not what I should have expected of him. We should certainly clamp down on any examples of abuse of home leave or temporary release. That is precisely what my right hon. and learned Friend has said he proposes to do. In that he will, I believe, have the overwhelming support of people throughout the country.

    Mr. Dalyell: Are the Government’s certainties hitherto about Libyan responsibility for the Lockerbie crime in any way dented by what President Mubarak said to the Prime Minister yesterday or, indeed, by the film of Mr. Alan Francovitch, a copy of which was delivered to Downing street on Sunday and which, I gather, the right hon. Gentleman has looked at?

    The Prime Minister: None of the evidence I have had and none of the conversations I have had dent in the slightest the position that I have set out before the House on many occasions.

     

    Q5. Mr. Nicholas Winterton: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 22 November.

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

    Mr. Winterton: Although I fervently hope that the Chancellor of the Exchequer in his Budget next week will give the necessary boost to manufacturing industry by introducing 100 per cent. capital allowances, will my right hon. Friend join me in welcoming the fact that unemployment is down by half a million, that inflation is at an all-time 27-year low and that growth in this country is currently at 4 per cent.? Will he ensure that that information forms part of a highly confidential Conservative central office memorandum so that the press and the Conservative yobs can give it the attention it deserves?

    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend makes his point in his usual crisp manner. It is the case that the economy is doing extremely well, as my hon. Friend has set out. I hope that more people will begin to observe that as month succeeds month. There is no doubt that added to the list that my hon. Friend so accurately mentioned a moment ago are the facts that unemployment is falling and has been falling for around 20 months, that unemployment is lower here than in any other major country in western Europe and that unemployment is continuing to fall here while it is rising in many other countries. The economic opportunities that exist at the moment are extremely good and I have no doubt that they will get better.

     

    Cyprus

    Q6. Mr. Cox: To ask the Prime Minister when he last met the President of Cyprus; and what issues were discussed.

    The Prime Minister: I last met the President of Cyprus, Mr. Clerides, in October 1993 at the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting. We discussed Commonwealth matters and the state of the intercommunal discussions on Cyprus. I shall meet the President again in January on his next visit to London.

    Mr. Cox: I note that reply. Is the Prime Minister, aware, however, of the scathing criticisms that the Secretary-General of the United Nations has recently made about Mr. Denktash and his total unwillingness to enter any meaningful discussions on Cyprus? As this country is one of the guarantor powers, when will the Prime Minister himself become actively involved in Cyprus affairs in the hope of promoting a settlement that both Mr. Denktash and his friends and supporters in Ankara will be expected to honour?

    The Prime Minister: I am, of course, aware of the report to which the hon. Gentleman refers, but I continue to believe that the main focus of our effort should be to support the United Nations Secretary-General’s mission. He has made some progress. The Security Council called for further effort on confidence-building measures in June, as the hon. Gentleman will know, and for a process of consultation. That latter aspect has been given effect by means of face-to-face talks between the two community leaders. I hope that those will continue. We will do all that we can to persuade both sides to continue talking, but until and unless they are themselves prepared to reach an agreement, it is difficult to see how one can be imposed.

     

    Engagements

    Q7. Mr. Jenkin: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 22 November.

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

    Mr. Jenkin: Will my right hon. Friend keep telling everyone about the low inflation, the falling unemployment and the strong growth? Will he also explain that we have achieved that by establishing an extremely successful economic framework and that, as night follows day, Labour would wreck it?

    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend is entirely right, both in the scenario that he sets out and in the charge that he lays about such economic policy as the Labour party has yet divulged. There is no doubt that the present circumstance has come about because of a consistency of policy for some time designed to get inflation down. We made it clear in 1990 that getting inflation down to a low level had a very important, central part to play in economic management and we have achieved it. The Labour party achieved record high inflation. We are achieving record low inflation.

  • Mr Major’s Speech to the 1994 Conservative Party Conference – 14 October 1994

    Below is the text of Mr Major’s speech to the 1994 Conservative Party Conference on 14th October 1994.

    PRIME MINISTER:

    Mr. President, the political landscape has changed in the last few years, and it’s changed again in the last few months. The language of politics is now Conservative language. With every speech and every copied aspiration, the Labour Party finally admit how wrong they have been for so long, and how right we have been.

    So forget the hype. It’s we who’ve changed the whole thrust of politics and moved it in our direction. We have won the battle of ideas, and it is an astonishing triumph.

    When the Labour Party consider what has happened, they may realise what they’ve done, because what they’ve done is to study our instincts and our attitudes and then go away and market test them. And when they’ve done that they’ve discovered what we told them long ago: that they are the hopes and dreams of the typical Briton. It’s a huge compliment to this party and we should accept it gratefully.

    But it’s one thing for the Labour Party to commit grand larceny on our language. It’s one thing for them to say what market research has told them that people would like to hear. But it’s quite another to deliver it. They have some hard questions to answer.

    If you talk of full employment, then you should say what you mean. And then you should explain how that could possibly square with the minimum wage and the Social Chapter, which sound comforting but are deadly to jobs. And if you talk of low tax and low spending, does that mean supporting Tory tax cuts and Tory expenditure reductions? As to that we shall see before the writ of this parliament is run.

    If you preach about community, then you shouldn’t grow politically fat on the politics of envy – and didn’t Blackpool reek of it last week? And if you’re going to attack over-mighty government and bureaucracy, then you shouldn’t promise Scottish and Welsh parliaments with more bureaucrats and more taxation.

    And if you do, you should answer the question: Will Scottish Members of Parliament be permitted to vote on matters in England that English Members of Parliament would not be permitted to vote on in Scotland? And if Labour plan a Scottish Parliament, will they plan also to reduce the number of Scottish MPs in the House of Commons at Westminster, or will they gerrymander the Commons to boost their own political chances?

    Mr. President, these are deep waters. So let Labour be the party of devolution. We are the party of Union, the party of the United Kingdom.

    Mr. President, I’ve relished this debate. These are great issues, but they are our issues, this is our ground, and upon this there is a battle to be fought that this party will undoubtedly win. So I have this advice for you: don’t waste time on the past – it’s gone. Out there, up and down the country, people are concerned about the future, not the past. That is where the political debate should be, and that is where I intend to take it in the months and years ahead.

    In politics, if you expect the unbelievable, then you’ll never be surprised. It is probable that at the next election, the government and the alternative government will both be talking Tory language. But there is a difference: only one will mean it. Buying Tory policies from Labour is like buying the Rolex on the street corner. It may bear the name, but you know that it isn’t real. Our task is to promote the real thing, and expose the counterfeit. We hear talk of a new Labour Party. A new Labour Party. These aren’t people without a past, lovable little extra-terrestrials beamed down for the duration.

    Mr. President, since 1979, we’ve beaten the old Labour Party, the very old Labour Party, the redesigned Labour Party and the new model Labour Party. And as for this new, “biologically improved” Labour Party, it may wash blander, but I would give it a shelf life of under three years.

    Mr. President, at Blackpool, Labour filched two of the principles on which we fought the last general election: opportunity and responsibility. But wasn’t it interesting that they left out two others: personal choice and private ownership. They’re vital to us.

    So socialism may be a bit out in Islington just now, but Conservatism isn’t off my agenda. As they so often invent what we think, let me tell them clearly what we stand for: we believe in free markets, we believe in private ownership. It doesn’t go against the grain for us to say so. It’s not a new Conservatism that we’ve just discovered, it’s one of the oldest principles of our party and we believe in it passionately.

    And because we’ve believed in it, millions of families up and down the land now have savings of their own: Granny bonds, TESSAs, PEPs, the hundreds of billions of pounds in the banks and building societies. It is our philosophy that has given people that choice and that security. That is the message that we must carry forward. Our opponents present ownership as if it was something selfish, self-centred, perhaps even greedy. Some people are all of these things, but most are not. People who have earned well, people who have saved, people who have inherited the fruits of a parent’s lifetime’s work are not the “undeserving rich”.

    No, Mr. Brown, they are deserving workers. How does Clause IV put it – “by hand or by brain”. So let me hammer the point home ever more clearly: we are the party of savings, of ownership, of property, of personal independence. We offer people choice: the liberty to grow, and yes, the liberty to make their own mistakes. We admire success in life, and we will never, never, never resent it in other people.

    We try to remove government from the everyday lives of people. We believe that every family should be entitled to enrich their own private corner of life, and then pass it on to their children without over-mighty taxation. That, Mr. President, is what Conservatism is about, and there is only one party in this land that truly believes it.

    Mr. President, I know when people hear the word “economy”, the spirits droop. They think they’re in for a lecture on the PSBR, GDP, and all the rest of it. Well, you’re normally right, but not today. I just want to say today that the word “economy” should lift the spirits and not depress them, because the great cries of lasting growth with low inflation, which we have sought for the whole of my adult lifetime, is now within our grasp. Whisper it gently, but we are now doing well as a country.

    For most people, it isn’t their everyday experience, not yet. But it will be, and I’ll tell you why. Britain is making more, selling more, exporting more. This time we have built a recovery to last, built on firm foundations, on export and investment. Month after month after month, exports from Britain have broken the record set the month before, and they did so again just last week.

    These islands of ours are exporting cameras to Japan – you did hear me right, cameras to Japan; computers to Germany; cars to America; clothing to Hong Kong, and Cosmetics to France. We know what we were told. We were told unemployment would go on rising to five million. It’s been falling for the best part of two years, and Michael Portillo announced another fall earlier this week.

    We were told we wouldn’t get interest rates down, but we have; that we couldn’t hit low inflation, but we have. These are the very things that bring security, make jobs safe, improve living standards and strengthen this country’s influence right across the world.

    What is the prize that lies ahead? Let me tell you what it could be. In 1954, in Blackpool, “Rab” Butler was speaking to this conference. Suddenly he said something quite extraordinary. He said that living standards could double in this country in 25 years. People scoffed, but he was right. For the country as a whole they did double in 25 years.

    So let us have the courage to look forward once again. If we are able to keep inflation down, as we must, and control public spending, as we must, what does that mean for our people? It means stronger growth, improving the services we care about – education, health, the police service; it means more money in people’s pockets and more free choice for those people.

    Britain has changed. It may not have been noticed but it has changed. Not for 30 years has this economy grown so much faster than prices. So let us bang the drum and say so. It’s time to put the marker down, but as Ken Clarke told you yesterday, we need to stick at it, and for this reason neither Ken nor I, ever again, want to go through the boom-bust cycle that causes so much pain and so many lost hopes for so many people up and down this country.

    And that is why in some ways we are a bit puritanical. That’s why we are so determined to control public spending, improve competitiveness, cut regulation, and let private enterprise build public wealth. That’s why we’ll be prudent about what we spend, cut taxes where we can, and above all build up the long-term health and strength of our industry and of our economy.

    Mr. President, it’s time for this country to set our sights high again. What “Rab” Butler saw was prophetic and positive. Let me echo it today. Because of what has been achieved, with the right determination, with the right policies, we have the chance once again to double our living standards in the next 25 years, and that is something that everyone in this country can feel good about and feel good today.

    Mr. President, I want to talk about education. How many people in this world are fulfilled, really fulfilled? How many do the jobs that they might do? How many have had their minds stretched and extended? “Not enough” is the answer. Not as many by hundreds of thousands as should have. That’s why education matters so much to me. I’m just burned enough to know a little about that. I left my chance late, so I did a lot of my schooling while off for a year with a shattered leg, in the company of Trollope, and Jane Austen, and Adam Smith, and a lot of dull but terribly useful books on banking. Better companions one never had, until now.

    But I was lucky. Not everyone is. It’s my personal ambition that everyone should have the same chance to rise to the top on merit. Never mind where they come from, what their parents income is, what their religion is, or what their colour is. These are irrelevant, and please God they will always remain irrelevant to the people of this country. What matters to me is that they have the same chance.

    Good schools can be a lifeline out of poverty, the ladder to a better life. That’s what our changes are all about: the curriculum, the testing, the league tables, the inspection, the new parental choice, the challenge to the old council school monopoly, the emphasis on better vocational education, and the creation of new universities. Mr. President, it is not reform for its’ own sake, it is reform to deliver higher standards for all our children.

    Bad teaching fails children. They may get through if they come from families with a social edge, a sophisticated home and the good books that go with it, but bad schooling falls most heavily on pupils who have none of these things – children from homes without a book in the house, from blaring day-long television homes.

    Mr. President, we are a national party, and these children are as much our responsibilities as are the higher climbers. If the school ladder’s all abstract theory and holds out no rungs of letters, facts and numbers, who loses? The children lose. The people who need our protection lose. The people easily defeated lose. The people who live at the bottom of the heap who deserve a chance to get off it lose, and it’s just plain wrong.

    And that is why I want teaching in the weaker schools to be levered up, because if it is, someone will get off the bottom of the heap, and if it isn’t that is where they will stay, probably for the rest of their lives. I will never accept that. I’ve no time for those who are complacent and oppose improvement, and all too often they are the high priests of the politically correct.

    They are the people who can afford the good things in life, who chortle away about our emphasis on basic standards and the three ‘R’s, and then move to a different catchment area, with better schools for their own children. They’re people who have in their own homes the books that they say other people’s children aren’t up to reading. They are the people I cannot take, the kind of people who have clambered up the ladder and then seem ever ready to kick it away from other people.

    Education’s there to lift the eyes, broaden the horizon, distinguish between the great and the trite, the right and the wrong. It’s there to unlock the gate to a better life, and by and large teachers deliver this. They have a hell of a job, but they can make the difference for children between apathy and despair, and seeing the remote but inviting light upwards and out.

    Teachers that do their work well, for heaven’s sake, teachers that do their work well, are the prime route out of the class trap. I care enough about teachers to give bad teachers a bad time, and I care about children enough to oppose sloppy, experimental teaching that ignores common sense.

    Up and down the country, dedicated teachers have worked hard to put our reforms in place. They haven’t always liked every aspect of them; so we’ve listened. Sometimes they have been right and we have changed our minds. Many teachers feel there’s been too much paperwork. I agree with them, and there still is.

    That’s why we’ve been working with them on slimming down the National Curriculum. We’ve now finished that job, and it’s been dramatically cut, and we’re now out to reduce much of the other paperwork that schools have to deal with. Teachers should be marking homework, they shouldn’t be doing it, and we’re determined that is how it will be. After the curriculum changes of recent years, teachers deserve stability, to be able to get on with their jobs without any more upheavals. So today I promise them this: there will be no further significant changes for the next five years.

    And there’s another area in which we must give teachers our full support. I’m disturbed by some of the stories I hear – too many stories to ignore – about violent attacks on teachers and false allegations against them. The teachers’ unions are concerned about these issues and so are we. In this area, the unions deserve our support and the unions will get our support. But education involves fun as well as facts. Schools are friendlier, less forbidding places than once they used to be, and I think that’s good. But they seem to have lost something. I don’t regard sport, especially team sport, as a trivial add-on to education. It’s part of the British instinct, it’s part of our character. Sport is fun, and it deserves a proper place in the lives of all our children.

    Of course it can’t supersede Maths and English, though how I longed for it to do so when I was at school! But it must take its proper place alongside them. We are therefore changing the National Curriculum to put competitive games back at the heart of school life. Sport will be played by children in every school, from five to sixteen, and more time must be devoted to team games. Many schools already offer at least two hours a week for sport and physical education. That should be the minimum, and I hope schools will offer more.

    Schools should establish links with local clubs and national sports bodies to help do this. They must open up their facilities outside school hours, and harness the willing help that I know is out there. There are sports coaches, parents and other volunteers by the hundreds and hundreds and hundreds who will willingly come in outside school hours to help our youngsters have a better grounding in sport, and all it means, for the rest of their lives. So while we’re about it, I don’t want councils selling off school playing fields they may need. I want those playing fields kept, and I want those playing fields used.

    Mr. President, there are many views about nursery education. My view is quite clear: I am in favour of it. The picture’s improving. Over half our three and four-year-olds go to nursery school. Nine out of ten have been to a playgroup or nursery school before they’re five. I think it’s time to accelerate this trend. So I’ve asked Gillian Shepherd to work up proposals to provide places for all four-year-olds whose parents wish them to take it up.

    This is a long-term proposal, but we intend that this new provision will begin to come on-stream during the lifetime of this parliament. This won’t be an easy exercise. We must consult parents and practitioners to get it right, because any additional publically-funded provision must be of high quality, it must promote diversity and parental choice, and it must be carefully targeted in a way that expands and does not crowd out the private and voluntary provision that we have at present.

    Since we are making a lasting change to pre-school opportunities, we will have to phase in the introduction of this extra provision, but what I am doing today is giving you a cast-iron commitment that it will happen, and I’m giving you that commitment now so that Gill Shephard can start consulting on it next week.

    Mr. President, I intend now to dispose of one of the most insidious lies in British politics. In life, some of our deepest convictions are formed by experience. Book-learning is vital, but life-learning runs deeper. When I was a boy, my father was elderly and sick, and my mother was frail. Their life wasn’t comfortable; they needed treatment regularly. They got it from the National Health Service. They had no money to pay, but they weren’t asked for any. I saw then, not only how well they were treated by the National Health Service, but the security of mind it gave them to know that it would always be available. I have never forgotten it.

    Now let me tell you a later story. Two weeks ago when Boris Yeltsin was at Chequers, we went for a walk. There was some comment afterwards that I was using a walking-stick. Naturally if I was using a walking-stick there must be an ulterior motive – was this my bid for the rural vote? Well, no, actually. I was using a walking-stick because I injured my leg badly in a car accident thirty years ago. For a while, that many years ago, I thought I might use it. It was saved by treatment on the National Health Service. I have never forgotten that either.

    Against that background, is it likely that I would damage the National Health Service or privatise it? Believing as I do that the greatest nightmare for millions is that one day, however prosperous they are today, that one day they may be old, sick, poor and uncared for, is it likely that I would take away from them the security of mind that was of such value to my parents? Mr. President, I can tell you, not while I live and breathe would I take that away.

    Let me say something else about the Health Service: It is the National Health Service, it doesn’t belong to any one political party. The Labour Party, even today, take credit for setting up the NHS. I wouldn’t take that away from them – it’s one of the few bits of their past they don’t currently seem willing to repudiate. But who has been in government for most of the fifty years since the Health Service was established? We have. It is we, the Conservative Party, who have been in government for most of those fifty years. It is we, the Conservative Party, who have cherished the National Health Service, and built it up year after year after year after year. Mr. President, it’s our Service too.

    But there is one difference between us and Labour. We don’t use it as a political football for party ends. Mr. President, we just build it up. I wonder how many of you know how many huge new hospital projects have been built since 1980 – you know, that period during which it’s said we have been running the National Health Service down? How many? None? Five? Ten? Twenty? A hundred? More than that? Surely not. In fact yes. The actual figure is over seven hundred big projects, each costing more than a million pounds and some of them many tens of millions for the one project.

    And I’m not talking about car parks and offices, I’m talking about patient facilities – new hospitals, operating theatres, pharmacies, maternity units and the like – all within the National Health Service, seven hundred of them since 1980, and I saw the latest bulletin here today: a new day surgery unit in the Royal Bournemouth Hospital just down the road. But there’s more. Consider it, perhaps, as it is: one multi-million pound National Health Service project every eight days the Conservative Party have been in government, throughout its fifteen years. That’s not words, it’s reality, and go out and tell it because it’s our Service too. So I have a message for Labour’s Health Spokesman, “Junket” Blunkett.

    Mr. President, when I became Prime Minister, I asked for a fresh look at the criminal justice system: the way we prevent crime, the way we police our streets, and the way we punish the criminal, and I did so because I felt that concern had shifted too much towards the criminal and too far from the victim. Why is there so much crime? The cheap, thought-free answer is to blame the so-called “acquisitive 80s”, but that’s just party political posturing; the roots are deeper than that. It is a long-term trend: sadly too many people feel less respect for their neighbours and for their neighbours property than once they did. And yes, I believe we have fostered too easy, too casual a response to crime by too great a tolerance of crime over many years.

    There have been too many voices excusing crime, explaining crime, and justifying crime. We think that’s wrong. That’s why we’ve increased penalties for rape, violence against children, firearms offences, drug-related crime and crimes committed on bail. And so that we can not be said by our opponents to have ignored what our opponents call our “friends in the city”, let me say we have also increased sentences for financial crime.

    For a whole range of crimes, then, we have toughened sentences, and judges are now using them. For the first time in years, a rising proportion of convicted criminals are being sent to prison. I take no pleasure in that, but everyone has the chance to stay within the law, and that is the point. If we are to change the climate against crime, then the offender and the offender’s chums must know they will not be able to swagger out of court, untouched, immune and boasting about getting off scot-free.

    I believe such firmness is right, and I believe it is necessary. Prison should be decent, but it should be spartan. No-one wants to alienate and harden attitudes, but prison is there to punish and not to pander. I fear that is not always the case, and where it is not, Michael [Howard] and I are agreed, it will have to change. But don’t let us fool ourselves. Punishment alone will not do the trick. We have to change attitudes, improve policing, and support the innovative methods of Chief Constables. We are now developing much more targeted approaches to crime – new approaches; we’re investing in more effective crime prevention.

    We must make streets safe for the law-abiding and dangerous for the criminal, and that is why we’re putting yet more money into closed-circuit television. It’s been a huge success, not only in big cities like Newcastle, but in smaller places like King’s Lynn as well. We’re going after drug dealers and drug trafficking, putting together the most comprehensive campaign against drug use ever launched in this country, and we will be announcing the details of this next week.

    And we are putting modern science at the disposal of the police. As Michael Howard told you yesterday, we’re giving them wider powers to take DNA samples from people they suspect of crime, and that will help target sex offenders against women and children, and as a result help make this country just a little bit safer for millions and millions of people. The powers in the Criminal Justice Bill are needed, and I can tell conference this: we will never be deterred by the disgraceful riots like those we saw in London last weekend. And the sooner the Labour leadership disowns those Labour MPs involved in organising and speaking at this event, the sooner we may be prepared to take seriously some of their strictures on crime.

    And I can tell you how I feel about that episode: I think there’s something profoundly sick with people who organise a demonstration which turns into a riot, and then criticize and attack the police who are only there to protect the public from the results of that riot. Mr. President, we hear enough bad news about crime. Let me tell you some good news. In Manchester crime fell by 12% in the last year; by 12% too in my own county of Cambridgeshire; in North Wales by 10%. What does that tell us? Not to relax, never. It doesn’t tell us to be complacent. But it does tell us we can fight back successfully. If you can target burglary and cut it in London and Warwickshire then you can do it elsewhere. Mr. President, it will take a national effort to beat crime, it will take time, and it must involve everyone, but we are determined to succeed and we have made a beginning.

    Many of the changes I’ve been talking about have come about in the last year or so, and I believe that people who have spent that time criticising my good colleague Michael Howard would have been far better off supporting him during that year.

    Mr. President, a generation ago it was said that Britain had lost an empire but not yet found a role. It may or may not have been true then, but it surely isn’t true today, because economically and militarily Britain remains in the top league – a member of the permanent five of the United Nations, a leading member of NATO, of the European Union, and of a Commonwealth that covers one-third of all the people on earth, a member of the Group of Seven of the worlds’ most powerful economies and one of only five significant nuclear powers in the world, and we have too as a priceless asset, perhaps the finest professional armed forces anywhere.

    That is Britain today, stripped of the masking-tape so often placed above it. So let’s recognise what we are, look with confidence at the new world, and go out and put our own distinctive British mark on it. The changes taking place around the world are truly awesome. I’m not sentimental about them – I know how fragile they are. Two months ago I was in Warsaw, where the first bombs fell in 1939, fifty years on from the heroic uprising in the Warsaw ghetto. It was good to be there. That August evening, we met in a free Poland, whose President was Lech Walesa, a shipyard worker who helped to change history. And taking his hand in friendship were the leaders of a democratic Russia and a united Germany. Poland’s past enemies were there as friends; hope had flowered and the world had changed.

    A month later I flew to Berlin, where allied forces were leaving after half a century. That day, our troops marched away from Berlin with that professionalism and that patience which is the special preserve of the British soldier. For nearly fifty years, they had stood guard for peace and freedom at the gates of Berlin; now they were no longer needed; the world had changed. Three weeks ago, I was in South Africa. When Harold Macmillan spoke there of the “wind of change”, it was to an all-white audience and a South Africa that was soon to leave the Commonwealth. But I spoke to a parliament freely elected by all South Africans, and that great country is back in the Commonwealth, back where it belongs.

    And what a tribute that is, to the statesmanship and the vision of Nelson Mandela and F.W. De Klerk. Finally, Mr. President, I flew from South Africa back to Chequers. There Boris Yeltzin was my guest, and the President of Russia and the British Prime Minister shared a country house weekend, a walk in the English countryside, and a pint of beer in a British pub. Four snapshots of change, historic days, when the impossible becomes not just possible but an everyday reality. Now the cold war is over, but while the threat was there, there were appeasers and accomodaters in plenty – but not in our party. We can say it with pride: We never heard their voices in this hall.

    As in the past, so in the future. Whatever uncertainties may lie ahead, this nation can trust that instinct for security that is a defining characteristic of the Conservative Party. Mr. President, the challenge now is to catch the tide of events that have flown in recent years so very strongly in our favour, to draw the nations of eastern Europe – historic, vivid nation states: Poland, Hungary, the Czech lands, and others – back into the European camera, to make democratic Russia an ally and not a threat, to help the democracies in the third world escape the excessive debt that cripples their development – and time after time it has been British initiatives that have led the way in achieving this, to use our age-old links with Africa to help prepare that troubled continent for a better future.

    These are historic roles; historic roles for which Britain and the Conservative Party are marked out by history and by experience. We will use that experience. We will use it also to carve out the right position for Britain in the right sort of Europe. There are extraordinary enthusiasms – hopes, fears, apprehensions – on both sides of the European argument, but I made our general position clear with my speech at Leiden. I believe it carries with it the overwhelming majority of this country, and that is the basis on which I will negotiate in 1996.

    And if I am not satisfied, I will do as I have done in the past: I will just say “No” to changes that will harm Britain. But I hope I will be able to secure an agreement that we can accept, for that is in the best interests of Britain. Across the world, the last four years have been turbulent. The years ahead may well be turbulent as well. We will be cautious, pragmatic and safe, but the world remains uncertain and unstable. If anything the end of the cold war has made regional wars more likely and not less likely. We cannot safely assume that it will be a safe world. Only this week we have seen how quickly a crisis can blow up in the Middle East, but who better to send there and act for Britain than Douglas Hurd, our own Foreign Secretary.

    Mr. President, we have interests the world over. Isolationism is a luxury that Britain cannot afford, and there is a growing need for regional peace deals – we are very good at them; the defence of British interests does not always lie on British soil. So we will continue to play a leading role, as we have always done, through the United Nations.

    Mr. President, the main point’s clear: while we have Conservative government, Britain will have a sure and stable defence, the best equipment, the best weapons, the best trained troops that we are able to provide. Last week showed again how distinctive that position of ours truly is. In opposition it doesn’t matter that Labour voted to scrap Trident – in Government it would. In opposition it doesn’t matter that the first place Labour would look for cuts would be another defence review – in Government it would.

    So let me mark out the clear ground, so that no-one serving our country in uniform is in any doubt. Three months ago, we confirmed our frontline would have an extra three thousand troops, and placed five thousand million pounds worth of orders and tenders for modern and effective equipment for the army, the navy and the air force. That, Mr. President, made implicit what I will now make explicit: the big upheavals in our armed forces are over. They deserve the best from us and they will get it.

    Let me say something about Northern Ireland, and the momentous events through which we are living. For the past 25 years, Northern Ireland has faced the daily horror of murder and brutality, kneecapping and beatings, organised racketeering and viciousness to fund terrorism for political ends. No morning has dawned that might not contain an atrocity: a father who didn’t return home, a woman or child indiscriminately bombed, a policeman or soldier killed by a hidden sniper. That evil has spread, from time to time, to mainland Britain: the Brighton Bomb, ten years ago this very day, that some of you will be remembering so vividly and so painfully. We still miss those who were lost and think of those who were injured. It was intended to murder a cabinet, but it ended up hardening the resolve of an indomitable Prime Minister.

    We remember the murders of Airey Neave and of Ian Gow, the bombs in the city and at Downing Street, the agony of Warrington, and the heart-rending memories of Tim Parry and Johnathan Ball who will never know the future that should have been theirs. What did those two little boys ever know of political disputes? In all this time, these long twenty-five years, the extraordinary people of Northern Ireland have carried on with their lives. Northern Ireland is part of the United Kingdom. All the people of Northern Ireland need to know that a search for a solution to their problems is right at the top of the British government’s agenda, and I solemnly give them that promise.

    We have made progress. It was the Downing Street Declaration that set out the principles that will continue to guide us. It helped isolate the IRA and push them to their ceasefire. As Jim Molyneaux put it, “It was significant”, he said, “when the IRA started to murder pensioners, children, mothers and fathers and so it was bound to be significant when they stopped. The most significant part of all has been the victory of ordinary people over the terrorists”, and how right Jim Molyneaux was.

    And yesterday, yesterday the loyalist paramilitaries announced that they too were stopping violence. Another victory for ordinary people, brave people, in Northern Ireland. Today, for the first time in a quarter of a century, the people of Ulster have woken up to peace. Our determination must be to make that peace permanent. To fasten down what is unfolding needs clear reasoning and cold calculation. Many people will urge me to hurry. I understand their enthusiasm. I will not tarry one day longer than I judge is necessary. But I will take it in my own time. The responsibility for Northern Ireland is the responsibility of the British Government.

    I am used to being urged to hurry. I have had such advice daily since the Downing Street declaration. But if I had listened, we would not today where we are, with the guns stilled and the bombs stopped and Northern Ireland on its way to a better future. So other people can call for speed if they wish, but I must ask the hard questions and I must make the right judgements at the right time, and to the best of my ability, I will. Things are changing; the profile of street security has lessened on military advice, men and women are no longer searched when they enter hotels and large stores; but let me give this assurance: for as long as is necessary, as many policemen and troops as are necessary will stay on duty in Northern Ireland to protect all the people of Northern Ireland.

    We have made a beginning, but not yet an end. Every day that violence is absent brings more hope. Progress may not be easy, there will be setbacks, there may be disappointments – people who are suspicious, who block progress. All this probably lies ahead. But there is, I am sure, a way through. If you will something, you can make it happen, and the will for peace in Northern Ireland is very strong. So Paddy Mayhew and his team, who have done so well, will press ahead with the political talks with the constitutional parties. We intend to complete a framework document with the Irish Government.

    We hope to restore local accountability and local democracy to Northern Ireland; to seek an agreement, an agreement that is acceptable to the people of Northern Ireland, and we shall test their view in a referendum as a cast-iron safeguard of our intentions. I know the size of the task ahead. I’ve no illusions about its difficulty, or the past record of many of the people with whom we are dealing. But we cannot let history freeze us into inaction. There is a chance, a window for peace. We will enter it if we can do so with honour and with consent.

    In the words of the old testament, which is common to both traditions in Northern Ireland, “There is a time to love and a time to hate, a time of war and a time of peace.” The people of Northern Ireland are sick of war. It is for them that we must build a time of peace.

    Mr. President, it’s a cliche’ today that every leader must have “the vision thing”. We’re told he must map out, in dramatic form, new direction. I don’t disparage “the vision thing”, but alongside “the vision thing” I must tell you I remain rather attached to “the action thing”, to “the practical thing”, to the “how on earth do you deliver these promises thing”. By all means listen to a politician when he tells you what he plans, but ask him too “How will you do it?”. Take it from me, the devil, the very devil, can be in the detail.

    I don’t disparage the mapping of direction, or sometimes, new direction. I hope I’ve sketched out some today, but I must tell you, there is sometimes merit in the old direction. Change for the sake of change should never appeal to any Conservative. In a world sometimes of bewildering change, this party must stand for continuity and stability, for home and for health. And we must build this for the long term, for our children and for our grand-children. It is the young people out there, it is they who will make the world in which we grow old. They will make the decisions. They may decide in their time to strike out along new pathways, but it is for us in our time to build for them a stronger foundation so they may have that choice.

    And today my message to you is that Britain is growing stronger: we are beginning to see the fruit of all the things we’ve battled and striven for throughout these difficult last four years. You know, running the country isn’t like walking down the road. You have to hold fast to your core beliefs, whatever the short-term pressures may be; see the right things through to their finish, whatever the risks may be. To govern is to be engaged in a hundred themes, a thousand roots, and the everyday visions, sometimes conflicting, of literally millions upon millions of people. No windy rhetoric, no facile phrases, no pious cliche’, no shallow simplification, no mock-honest, mock-familiar adman speak, can conceal or should be permitted to conceal the infinite complexity of government.

    Take care nobody tries to conceal that from you. Take care not to confuse travesty with truth. Never assume that because an idea is easily communicated that it must be right. Take care not to confuse oratory with practical concern. Look for the achievements of government not always in bold plans or crude conflicts, but sometimes in mended fences too, and sometimes in the accretion of small steps whose pattern takes time to become clear.

    In this difficult world, our interests are daily at stake. The time is ripe for grown-up politics. The glib phrases, the soundbites, the ritual conflicts, all these may be the daily stuff of life for the upper 1,000 in politics, but to fifty million other people in this country they are utterly irrelevant and my interests must be with them.

    It is said that actions speak louder than words. I hope so, for in the end, and when it comes to a choice I shall bend my energies always to work, not talk. My trade has never been in adjectives; I shall be patient. I shall be realistic. I shall ask for patience and realism in others, and I promise you this: I shall put my trust in results. Thank you.

  • PMQT Written Answers – 30 April 1991

    Below is the text of the written answers relating to Prime Minister’s Question Time from 30th April 1991.

    PRIME MINISTER:

    Prisoners (Visits)

    Mr. Alton : To ask the Prime Minister if he will co-ordinate policy on the allocation of prisoners so that persons convicted in either England and Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland may serve their sentences at a convenient establishment for regular visits from their families.
    The Prime Minister : The allocation of prisoners in England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland is a matter for the respective prison authorities. Nearness to home is one of the factors which is taken into account, along with other matters, in deciding a prisoner’s allocation. There is provision in the Criminal Justice Act 1961 for the transfer of prisoners between United Kingdom jurisdictions.

    Engagements

    Mr. Soames : To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for 30 April.
    The Prime Minister : This morning I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in this House, I shall be having further meetings later today.

    Advertising

    Mr. Dobson : To ask the Prime Minister if he will give separate figures for the spending by the Prime Minister’s office on (a) television advertising, (b) radio advertising, (c) newspaper advertising and (d) other promotional material in 1979-80 and in each following year; and what are his latest estimates for 1990-91 and budgets for 1991-92.
    The Prime Minister : My office has incurred no expenditure on advertising or promotional material, and there are no plans for any such expenditure in 1991-92.
    Mr. Dobson : To ask the Prime Minister if he will give separate figures for the spending by the Cabinet Office on (a) television advertising, (b) radio advertising, (c) newspaper advertising and (d) other promotional material in 1979-80 and in each following year; and what are his latest estimates for 1990-91 and budgets for 1991-92.
    The Prime Minister : The Cabinet Office has not incurred and does not expect to incur any expenditure on promotional advertising on television, radio or in newspapers in the years 1979-92.

    Information on other promotional material is not available for the years 1979 to 1987. Expenditure on such material from 1987-88 was :

    |£
    ———————-
    1987-88 |19,306
    1988-89 |9,500
    1989-90 |14,833
    The estimate for
    1990-91 is £1,000.

    The Cabinet Office does not expect to incur any expenditure on other promotional material in 1991-92.

    Matrix Churchill

    Mr. Terry Davis : To ask the Prime Minister if he will name the Government Department to which a Crown servant calling himself Balson and visiting the offices of Matrix Churchill in Coventry at 11.15 am on 24 April 1989, 3.51 pm on 11 September 1989, 3.10 pm on 27 October 1989, 9.35 am on 1 December 1989, 9.35 am on 26 March 1990, 9.35 am on 20 April 1990 and 1.17 pm on 26 April 1990 was attached between 1 April 1989 and 30 April 1990; what was his grade; and what were his official responsibilities.
    The Prime Minister : I refer the hon. Member to the reply given to him today by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Trade and industry.

    Arms Trade

    Mr. Dalyell : To ask the Prime Minister which proposals he has to allow international advance warning of arms’ build-up by a particular country.
    The Prime Minister [holding reply 29 April 1991] : On 8 April I proposed the establishment of a United Nations register of arms sales to enable the international community to monitor and control any excessive build-up of arms by a particular country. The proposal was endorsed by our European partners. We are now pursuing it in discussions with the other permanent members of the Security Council and the United Nations secretariat.