The Rt. Hon. Sir John Major KG CH

Tag: Scottish Conservative Party Conference

Mr Major’s Speech at the 1996 Scottish Conservative Party Conference – 11 May 1996

Below is the text of Mr Major’s speech at the 1996 Scottish Conservative Party Conference, held on 11th May 1996.

PRIME MINISTER:

I want to touch first on two issues of great concern.

When last I came to Scotland, I went to Dunblane. The events there were a horror, almost unimaginable – a mad act that robbed innocent children of a happy future.

Michael Forsyth and Michael Howard have already announced an amnesty on illegal guns to gather them in.

Lord Cullen – one of Scotland’s most senior judges – is to advise us on what further action is needed.

Should legislation be necessary – and it may well be – I can promise you we will move speedily. We have already set aside time in the Parliamentary programme for this purpose.

I intend that we will do all we can to ensure such a crime cannot happen again.

Secondly, beef.

The European ban on beef has caused frustration and anger.

Not just amongst farmers, but amongst everyone.

Certainly here in Scotland, as Scottish beef is a by-word for quality.

The ban is totally unjustified. It’s the result of panic, not science. And it must be removed.

The ban turned a problem into a crisis, not just in Britain, but across Europe where beef markets have also been hit.

Next week, the first steps towards lifting the ban are going to be discussed in Europe. I hope that progress will be made.

For the ban was introduced by the Commission. And it is the Commission that has now unanimously recommended a partial lifting of the ban.

Against that background, our European partners must understand the level of resentment that will be created if they fly in the face of scientific arguments and the Commission’s recommendations and continue to damage our beef industry.

But let us be frank. Even when the ban has been lifted, we will need to rebuild consumer confidence to regain our markets. We need to make the case for quality again and again.

Many beef herds have never had a case of BSE. So, while we aim to get the ban totally lifted, we’ll also be pressing to get rapid exemption for specialist beef herds.

Such a move across the UK will particularly benefit Scotland, and the premium, grass-fed beef herds for which Scotland is rightly famous.

We’re already consulting on proposals to get mature, prime beef from these herds back on the market in Britain.

But to regain our markets around the world, we must – in our own interest – look at any sensible proposals to speed up the already rapid decline of BSE throughout the UK.

I met with the Scottish NFU this morning, and heard from them first hand of the fears and anxieties of their members. I promise you this – we will stand by this industry.

We have already committed huge resources. In addition to that, I am confident that we can deliver significant extra help for beef producers within this year’s European farm settlement. And, to help the exporters, we’ve agreed to pay more money to those whose stocks were destroyed or devalued in the initial crisis.

I pay tribute to the leadership which the NFU has given over this difficult period, and to the effective and influential role they have played.

We’ve made a start in tackling this crisis but we need to remove the threat of BSE once and for all. British beef is the best in the world.

It’s good to be back in Scotland and to find you in such good spirits.

So am I.

I always enjoy coming to Scotland. Not least because you always doctor my water in a most agreeable way.

We’re now within a year of the next General Election.

And, when it comes – next year, I expect – we Conservatives are going to win that election – by working together, north and south of the border.

It’s a good Tory word, “together” – and especially so here in Scotland.

It emphasises that ours is a United Kingdom.

And we’re the Conservative and Unionist Party.

We believe in working together, north and south.

And, so long as there’s a Conservative Government, that’s how it will remain.

Some people say to me – why? Surely, if Scotland breaks away, England will save on public spending and can have lower taxes? And surely, it’ll be easier to win elections without the SNP, Labour and Liberal MPs from Scotland?

True. But the United Kingdom as a whole would suffer. And so would Scotland.

And we Conservatives put the United Kingdom first, even though it’s not to our Party advantage. That’s not the way Labour behave. Their devolution plans put the interests of the Labour Party first. We put the country first. And that’s the difference.

For months, Michael Forsyth and his team have been taking the argument to Labour, exposing their flawed plans.

Showing how they would wreck Scotland.

Showing how the devolutionists are laying a false prospectus before the Scottish people.

I have a message for you Michael. The battle you’re fighting for Scotland is as important as any that has been fought before.

Fight hard. Punch hard. Punch often.

And you’ll have from me all the support you need.

When I became Prime Minister I spoke of a classless society.

Many scoffed that this had happened without my noticing it.

Others said it was a preposterous and even undesirable aim.

Well, there have been remarkable changes in British society over the last 50 years. Indeed, I’m a beneficiary of them.

But don’t tell me that a child brought up in deprived circumstances – and given an inadequate education – has the same prospects as one from a more prosperous background with a good education.

There are many who achieve good results from bad beginnings. But one of our principal risks as a Government – and as a Party – is to ensure that fewer and fewer of our children have those bad beginnings. And that’s what our education reforms are about.

We don’t believe that people in difficulties always have only themselves to blame. Don’t forget I’ve been poor and unemployed. And I know that our Party has done more than any other to relieve poverty and to finance the National Health Service and social security.

It was practical compassionate Conservatism that marks me a Tory and millions like me.

And it’s values like that that have underpinned the last 17 years of Conservative Government.

17 years.

Some people on the cocktail and chattering circuit think it’s time for a change. As though Government were a game of street cricket with everyone having a bat in turn. But what sort of change?

Labour wouldn’t bring to Britain the sort of changes we’ve brought.

Taxpayers. Cuts for everyone. The lowest basic rate for 50 years. Change that?

Homeowners. Lowest mortgage rates for 30 years. Gas, telephone bills falling. Change that?

Workers. More of our people in work than any major country in Europe. Change that?

Savers. TESSAs and PEPs flourishing. Scotland is thrifty. It saves. And now it has a 20p rate of tax on savings – a new low. Change that?

Businessmen. The longest period of low inflation for almost 50 years. Why change that?

Parents. More choice than ever before. We shouldn’t change that – and Labour agree.

Not only do they agree, they welcome our change and take advantage of it.

You don’t believe me. Check with the Blairs. Ask Harriet Harman.

Pupils. More going on to higher education than ever before.

Patients. More being treated than ever before.

The changes we’re brought about are changes for the better.

Thanks to them, Britain is the best performing economy in Europe. The world’s leading companies are pouring in investment and jobs.

Britain, with her unique heritage of trading links, and a mother tongue that’s the world’s common language, is winning new markets around the globe.

Today, Britain stands on the threshold of a new era of opportunity and prosperity as a global trading nation. A small island that’s an international success.

Of course, there’s much we have to do. But look what we’ve done.

Take our schools, for instance.

We inherited a system that had become a secret garden, overgrown with so-called progressive theories.

Today, children are taught the basics. Labour called that a “fanatical doctrine”.

We’re going to make sure that children are regularly tested. Labour said tests “encourage a climate of failure”.

Exam results are published. Labour called that “political propaganda”.

Schools can now govern themselves. Labour said that was “wrong”.

Wrong? It’s precisely the kind of education parents want. That’s not wrong. It’s just commonsense.

The same goes for crime. We’re been turning back the tide of political correctness that excused the criminal and forgot the victim. It meant once again taking on the so-called progressive establishment that dominates Labour thinking.

Well, we took them on.

For example, we increased the maximum penalty for cruelty to children. For dealing in drugs. We gave the police new powers to stop and search suspects.

And right the way down the line, Labour opposed almost every change.

If Labour had won their arguments, dangerous criminals who are in prison today would be out – walking the streets.

So, change? Change back to that? Surely that would be folly.

Some of the changes we’ve made have been painful. They’ve hurt people. And they have hurt us politically in by-elections and local elections.

But although it hurt, it worked.

And when we look around us we can see life getting better and our country becoming more prosperous.

So when people talk of change, ask them “What kind of change do you prefer?”

“Higher inflation? Lower taxes? More jobs? Tougher laws under the Tories?”

That’s the kind of change you and I want. And it’s the only way to meet the challenge of the future. A change to Labour would be a change all right – a change for the worse. Don’t let it happen.

Mr Chairman, before these changes, British companies and British businesses were fighting just to keep their heads above water. Now they are fighting to lead the field.

And that’s especially true in Scotland.

Which place in the UK do you think has gained most from our reforms of the last 17 years?

Seen living standards grow by over a third?

Grown faster than the rest of the United Kingdom over the last five years?

Exports 40 per cent more per worker than the United Kingdom average?

Brought unemployment down to its lowest rate for almost fifteen years?

You’re right: that country is Scotland.

Could this remarkable success story have happened without the Union?

It’s out of the question.

Labour or the Scot Nats would never have given Scotland the changes she needed. Instead of sunrise industries we’d have had sunset industries, propped up by subsidy, but doomed to disappear. The only question was when.

Our way has delivered the private investment that’s the key to Scotland’s success.

In one year alone, almost 100 projects brought Scotland over one billion pounds worth of planned investment, creating or protecting over 12,000 jobs.

International companies – like Motorola, NEC, BT – they’re all investing in Scotland.

And they’ll continue to do so as long as they’re sure Scotland will stay in the United Kingdom and income tax will not rise above those in England.

But, if either of these things do happen, they won’t. They’ll go elsewhere.

That’s the choice for Scotland.

One of the reasons they come here is that a Conservative Government has built an economy that encourages investors by controlling expenditure and keeping inflation down. That’s meant we’ve been able to cut interest rates and keep taxes low.

Again – yes, it hurts. But it has worked. It’s making life better. Don’t throw it away.

Enterprise has many elements. But high among them is something that goes right to the heart of running the country – and dips into the pocket of every family in the land. Tax.

Tax is always a battlefield between the parties because we have different instincts.

We believe in low tax because it stimulates initiative and enterprise, fosters personal independence, and helps the country create enough wealth to help those in need. So we cut taxes when we can. But, as Ken Clarke said yesterday, when, and only when, it’s sensible to do so.

Labour’s instincts are different. They increase spending.

So, as Roy Hattersley put it, “Labour now has a clear choice. It can either be the party of higher taxation and proud of it, or the party of higher taxes which it is ashamed to describe, afraid to admit and incapable of calculating with any accuracy. It cannot be the low taxation party”.

For once, he’s right. People will have a clear choice, a party whose instinct is for less tax, or a party whose instinct is for more tax.

That’s why our opponents don’t like talking about their tax plans.

But there’s no honest reason why Labour shouldn’t come clean about them. Britain’s books are open.

After all, I’m perfectly happy to talk about our tax plans. They’re quite simple.

We’ll cut taxes whenever we safely can.

Labour are the exact opposite. Believe it or not, I’m told there are actually people who say Labour are addicted to the politics of envy and want taxes for that reason. And New Labour too. Shocking isn’t it?

Be that as it may, one thing is certain. Whatever Labour say for public consumption, people know from past experience they’d be worse off under Labour.

Tory scare tactics, the spin doctors who rule Labour till say. Is it?

For example, any family with a sixteen to eighteen year old child who is in education had better watch out. Under Labour, their child benefits could disappear.

Let’s call it a Teenage Tax – a tax increase of up to £560 a year for families whose children are 16 or over and at college. For some families, that’s the same as an increase of 5p on income tax.

Under Labour, anyone who earns more than Clare Short would be easy pickings for the taxman. Clare’s salary is about £35,000. Many people would love to earn that much. But thanks to Labour’s ThirtySomething Tax, they’d be worse off.

There are other taxes lurking.

And, of course, anyone living here in Scotland would be hit by the Tartan Tax. But if they don’t need it, let them reject it now.

Think how it would damage Scotland to pay more tax than the rest of the country. Who’d be hit most? Not those on high incomes, those on low ones. Someone earning, say, £76,000 a year would see his tax bill rise by 9%. At the same time, someone on £12,000 would see it rise by 14%.

And this from a Labour Party that has the nerve to talk about ‘fair tax’.

Before the last election, Labour published their plans. They said they’d increase spending, so naturally Labour would raise taxes to pay for it.

The New, unscrupulous, Labour Party are different. Whenever Mr Brown threatens honesty on taxes, Mr Blair contradicts him. And Mr Prescott tries to keep up, but doesn’t quite know what’s going on. Well, I can tell you what’s going on.

Labour still want to spend more of your money, that’s what’s going on. They can’t kick the habit – it’s a sort of reflex action. So they’d tax more. They always have. They always will. And nothing is going to change them.

I sometimes wonder what on earth Labour stand for these days.

Their leadership is trying to shed all its history, philosophy and creed with one contemptuous shrug and replace it with – what? A burning desire for office.

But a lust for power is not, and never has been, a qualification for being entrusted with it.

But it’s not just taxpayers who’d be worse off.

Parents would be deprived of a choice of school for their children.

Patients would see hospitals turned upside down as Labour tried to turn back the clock.

Shareholders in privatised companies would find their shares threatened.

But don’t just look at what Labour would do to our reforms. Don’t just think about how Labour would hit the pockets of the people. The real danger is to the very fabric of Britain itself.

By their own admission, Labour say that they’d bring in the most extensive package of constitutional reform our nation has seen.

Mr Chairman, this constitution of ours has run like a thread through this land for centuries. It’s been our backbone and our heritage. And without so much as a qualm, Labour would cut it in two.

I wonder sometimes if they have any idea what their plans would mean?

Labour would change our United Kingdom for good. Or rather, not for good. Palpably, flagrantly for the worse.

If we were to let Labour tear this ancient island of ours apart, it could well be impossible to put it together again.

Labour has tried the devolution gambit before.

And now they’re at it again. A Scottish Parliament here, a Welsh Assembly there, regional assemblies heaven knows where. Will they never learn? What a way to mark the Millennium by tearing up the United Kingdom.

Mr Chairman, this fiddling by Labour is a wild and dangerous game. No one can say where it would end.

No-one can answer the questions it raises.

No-one, least of all Labour – can tell how such totally irresponsible and disruptive plans would affect this nation and the real concerns of all its people.

Would it help the Scots if they paid more tax?

Do the Welsh think a talking shop would improve their lives?

And when was the last time you heard people saying, “What Britain needs is more politicians in regional assemblies”?

And all this would be just the tip of the iceberg.

Proportional representation. No government ever able to take decisions without backroom deals.

A Bill of Rights.

Elected mayors – to do what, for heaven’s sake?

A whole raft of constitutional doodling. That’s Labour’s irrelevant manifesto.

Would it mean more jobs? Yes, for bureaucrats and politicians.

More investment? Well, no actually – probably less.

More prosperity? No. Just more taxes.

Would Britain’s voice carry more weight in the council chambers of Europe if we divided her into three? No, much less.

Mr Chairman, the changes Labour plan, no matter how slickly packaged and presented by their media gurus, would destroy in years what has been built up in centuries.

Nor are the dangers Labour post restricted only to devolution. Their European policy is demeaning and disastrous.

Now, I fully understand that the European issue raises the most passionate feelings. Who, in this country, would know that better than me? It’s a central issue of our time. But that shouldn’t distract us from a cool, dispassionate assessment of what is truly in our nation’s long-term interests – and what is not? That is my guiding principle. Getting the balance right for Britain now and in the years to come is the key to our approach to Europe.

Yes, Britain must be a part of Europe, and a partner of Europe. But a Europe of nations, not a united states of Europe. Not a federal Europe. When people say “Let’s have a referendum on whether we want a federal Europe”, I say “why?”

Because, Mr Chairman, there’s no need. Once again, I make this pledge. While I am Prime Minister, if others should opt for such a Europe, then Britain will not be part of it. We don’t need a referendum to know that we don’t want a centralised Europe.

But let no one doubt that Labour would accept such a Europe. Already they’re committed to sign up to the Social Chapter. To give more powers to the European Parliament. To re-negotiate our rebate. To undermine our veto.

So on both counts – what Labour would do to Britain at home and what Labour would do to Britain abroad – the whole future of this nation is at stake.

Mr Chairman, come the election, the future we’ll be fighting for is a Conservative future.

One where everyone feels that they belong.

Where all our people, no matter what their background, have a chance to realise their dreams.

To go to a good school, university, get a job, have a home of their own.

To do what they think is best for themselves, their families, their children.

To enjoy more of what they’ve earned and saved.

These are the building blocks of the future.

They’re what drive the people of our country.

A people independent of spirit, proud of their past. Who look to a future of enterprise encouraged and work rewarded.

Who want to protect the freedom and responsibilities of the family against the intrusions of the state.

Who believe in the rule of law.

And who love our country.

Mr Chairman, at the last election, when I said I would fight to protect the United Kingdom, I was accused of wrapping myself in the Union Jack. It was meant as an insult. But I didn’t take it as such.

You don’t have to dislike other nations to be proud of ours and I am proud of ours. I never feel more comfortable than in defending our nationhood and our unity as a Kingdom.

The Union Jack in the flag of this United Kingdom – and we Conservatives, by nature a kindly Party, need to be ruthless, remorseless and relentless in defence of that Kingdom, as we always have been when that unity has been under threat.

It is so once again today. Labour’s slick world of the soundbite and the over-simplified solution to problems of immense complexity has nothing to offer to bind this nation together. The superficiality of their policies – many of them disingenuous and ill-thought out – is breathtaking. What’s more, they bear little or no relation to the reality of government.

When you walk through the door of Number Ten, reality walks in with you. Reality on a world scale. Over the years a Conservative Government has faced that reality and learnt how to handle it. So let me give you, here in Scotland today, this assurance.

We Conservatives have the confidence and the tradition and, yes, the experience to guide us as we take our nation forward, out of this troubled century and into the next.

That’s why we’re going to win the next election.

Why we deserve to win that election.

At stake is more than just our achievements. More than just the strongest economy we’ve seen for decades.

This election will decide the very future of the United Kingdom itself.

The future of our Parliament, our Union, our Country.

It’s a fight for our Nation’s Future.

And it’s a fight we’ll win.

May 11, 1996
Mr Major’s Speech to 1995 Scottish Conservative Conference – 12 May 1995

Below is the text of Mr Major’s speech to the Scottish Conservative and Unionist Association Annual Conference at the Royal Concert Hall in Glasgow on Friday 12th May 1995.

PRIME MINISTER:

Let me turn first to those Conservative councillors who lost their seats in Scotland last month and in England and Wales last week.

From my time as a councillor, I know how bitter defeat feels. I know the disappointment when a good local record is swept aside by national politics.

So let me say to them: you served local people ably and well. You served local democracy well. Your defeats were none of your doing. And I am proud of what you achieved.

There are two things we can do after such a defeat. We can grumble and be disillusioned.

Or we can fight back.

We can work to make sure that the councils our opponents won this spring come back to us at the first opportunity.

So we will keep an eagle eye on them.

We shall set up a “Council Watch” to see how they keep their promises. To see how they spend your money. To see how they put your council tax up.

We must put disappointment aside. Go out into local communities. Work. Work. Work. Begin now to prepare for the next elections. And when they come we will take back those councils, each and every one of them.

Politics is in a strange mood at the moment.

Curiously this is partly because we have won the battle of ideas and forced Labour to deny some of their ancient prejudices.

We’ve won the battle for an enterprise economy.

For individual choice. For consumer power.

We’ve defeated the old socialist ideas of state control and public ownership.

Of course, Labour still hanker for them in private. But in public they’ve been forced to claim that they disown all the values they once believed in.

All gone. The Socialist cupboard, we are told, is bare after the most comprehensive philosophical wipe out in British political history.

Well, I am a bit suspicious about that. Some changes, yes.

But if Labour could shed so easily the values they held for so long, how deep is their commitment to values they’ve lifted from us likely to be?

I’ll tell you. As deep as electoral convenience needs it to be. Labour know that the electorate wants Tory values. So they have an extraordinary election cry.

“We were wrong all the time. The Conservatives were right. But trust us to behave ourselves in future. Oh, and by the way, please don’t ask us about policies.”

We’re very generous hearted, we British, We always forgive sinners who repent and Labour is benefiting from that at the moment. But we’re also discriminating and I think people will ask “if they were wrong before, why should we believe they’ll be right in future?”

It’s a good question – and we’ll go on asking it.

The extraordinary thing about our Party is that, after 16 years in government, it is still fizzing with ideas.

In this week alone we have announced measures to:

– cut electricity bills

– make our Post Office more competitive

– and crack down on drugs

And before, the Commons rises for the summer we will:

– publish a Housing While Paper

– launch a major new national volunteering programme

– invite the first private Sector bids to run British Rail services

– announce a fares policy to help commuters

– publish a second Competitiveness White Paper

– consult widely on ID Cards

– and announce a bold expansion of nursery education.

We already have a range of ideas which will keep us moving forward for years.

But it is right for us now to discuss with you, the bedrock of our Party, what you want to see in the next Manifesto.

A Manifesto grown from our grassroots, as we build the next phase of Conservatism.

I came from the grassroots of the Party.

I know the wealth of talent and experience our supporters have to offer.

So I will be the first leader in our Party’s history to give every member in every constituency an historic opportunity.

An invitation to help shape the policies of the future.

I have already set up Policy Groups on more than 30 policy areas, chaired by senior Ministers, and including representatives of all parts of the Party. Their first reports will reach me by the end of June.

Now it is right to unveil the next stage of this unprecedented exercise in consultation.

From this summer to next spring there will be a series of discussions across the party and across the country.

Each discussion will be around the Five Themes set out last month:

– how to secure economic prosperity

– how to improve further opportunity and choice for everyone

– how to improve decent, commonsense values in law and order

– how to deliver first-class public services

– And how to build pride in the nation.

These discussions will be detailed and genuine. They will take place on an agenda which will be shaped by the work of the relevant Policy Groups.

I want Conservatives up and down the country to take part in this.

CPC groups – as ever – will form the core of policy discussion at constituency level. But we intend to involve as many party members as possible.

These discussions will be followed by Conferences here in Scotland, Wales and across England, where we can bring these ideas together.

The developing agenda – not detailed Manifesto points – will begin to be unveiled at next year’s Central Council Meeting in Harrogate.

I will play an active role in leading this process, together with all my colleagues.

The Conservative Party has always listened to the people.

That is why we were the first party to support the Right to Buy.

The first to introduce Trade Union democracy. The first to give parents the right to know about their children’s schools.

So we will begin this massive consultation exercise within our party, and then will broaden it to engage and enthuse the public as a whole.

So I am going to go out and about. To meet you, to talk to you and to listen to you.

To build a People’s Policy to bridge the gap between the doorsteps of Britain and the Corridors of Power.

I’m going to share with you the hopes I have for this country of ours. The problems we face. The opportunities we have. I’m going to talk about the long-term as well as the short-term.

And when we’ve reached a policy conclusion, I’m going to ask the nation for a majority sufficient to put it into operation.

I believe that the commonsense of Conservatives up and down the land is the best guarantee that we will enter the 21st century with the right policies for our nation’s future.

Let me turn to two or three of the five themes. First, policies to spread economic prosperity and security.

People feel secure when:

– their jobs are secure

– their living standards grow steadily year after year

– and they can be confident that their children will have a better future. I know of no-one who doesn’t want that.

But it doesn’t happen by magic.

If we’re really determined to build security and prosperity for all – as I am – then we must continue to build an enterprise economy. And to get that we must take the tough decisions to create it.

Sometimes they’ll be unpopular. Because it means resisting the clamour of every interest group for higher spending.

It means clamping down on inflation, however loud the protests. And it means cutting state borrowing, whatever the moans.

We’ve been doing that. And it is the right thing to do – and to do what is right, however, difficult, is not a bad creed for politics.

And, as a result, we can now look forward to the best and most prolonged period of economic recovery for decades.

This is no ordinary recovery. What we may be seeing – provided we can carry it fully through – is the reawakening of Britain as a growing economic power.

And before our critics scoff let me give them some examples.

When we came to office, Scotland was the home of dying industries, poor productivity and mass trade union power. Frankly, it was an economic mess.

Today Scotland is in the forefront of new technologies. Scotland makes more than a third of all the personal computers manufactured across Europe and over half of all Europe’s cash machines.

Scotland is attracting inward investment from companies in Germany, Japan, the United States and across the globe.

They are attracted here by the enterprise culture built by the Tories, the corporate tax structures, designed by the Tories, and our lack of the Social Chapter insisted on by the Tories.

Since 1980 Scotland has seen self-employment increase by two-thirds.

For the first time in decades, the United Kingdom is increasing its market share of exports.

And we are now paying our way in the world.

For years we looked enviously at the industrial competitiveness of Japan. So we attracted their investment. Now Japanese companies based in Britain are exporting their products from here back to Japan.

And now, just think about this. Today, when you put visible and invisible trade together, the UK is in surplus with Japan.

How many of us ever thought we would see that happen again? That transformation is remarkable.

And it’s been achieved by implementing the Conservative agenda of reducing burdens on business. Cutting back the power of shop stewards.

Getting Whitehall off the backs of our companies. Lowering corporate taxes. Resisting unnecessary regulations from Brussels.

And above all, by setting free the talent and skill of individuals right across this country. No serious observer can doubt these changes.

And yet the country had better be warned: every aspect of this transformation would be reversed in one term of Labour government.

We were told that by changing Clause IV Labour showed they were reformed: they no longer believed in nationalisation. At last, they were a modern party.

But what have they spent the last fourteen days doing?

Pledging themselves to reverse rail privatisation – even though it will produce lower rail fares.

Promising to end compulsory competitive tendering – even though it has saved council taxpayers hundreds of millions of pounds.

Threatening new controls on privatised companies – even though their increased efficiency has produced a much better deal for consumers.

And trying to block the privatisation of the nuclear industry – even though it will cut electricity bills right across the country.

What this shows is that there is still a yawning credibility gap between what Labour says and what Labour does.

Do real Labour honestly worry about the profitability of our companies at ward meetings in Govan and Monklands?

Do they agonise about the “insecurities” of the middle classes in Constituency Labour Parties in Tayside?

Do delegates at Labour Conferences rack their brains to propose new policies to help private enterprise?

Of course not. You only have to ask the questions to know the answer.

If they were really serious they’d stop supporting the Social Chapter.

They’d drop their ideas to force employers to recognise trade unions.

They’d abandon their commitment to a minimum wage.

They won’t, of course. Because their commitment to the market is skin-deep. Were they to be in government, their Party would resurrect the calls for Socialism.

Daily our warnings are being proved right.

We always said the minimum wage would be damaging to jobs. And this week has proved it

First the CBI made it clear that they believe that any minimum wage would destroy jobs, drive away investment and cripple our companies.

And now we learn of a huge row within the Shadow Cabinet.

John Prescott attacked Gordon Brown’s figures on the minimum wage.

Gordon Brown attacked John Prescott. So in the end, decisive New Labour could only agree not to publish a figure at all.

Let me help them out of their dilemma. A minimum wage would cost hundreds of thousands of jobs and hurt most those who are most vulnerable.

And that is why we believe it is wrong.

This little cameo creeping out from behind the mask shows how utterly unfit for office Labour still are.

They have ideas aplenty on how to make companies less competitive but none on how to help them win.

That is why, next time as last time, the economy will be an area where we will win – and win well.

I want to say a word or two about crime.

We’ve always stood for decent commonsense values and for strong law and order.

We’ve always stood by the police.

Our first thought has always been for the victim.

And we’ve always believed in tough action against crime, And we’ve backed up our views with votes in the House of Commons.

The battle against crime is constant. It’s never easy. It has to be fought consistently over years.

Tougher penalties. New crime prevention measures. More powers for the police. That’s what we have been doing.

The statistics show that crime in Scotland is falling. Good – but not good enough.

So we have introduced measures which will have a significant effect on the fight against criminality.

We are introducing a national DNA database to harness the advances of science against the criminal.

This may prove to be the biggest breakthrough in the detection of crime since the invention of fingerprinting.

From now on, those who break the law had better know that the best techniques of modern technology will be used to track them down.

Just one drop of blood or tissue or hair at a crime scene could be enough to identify and catch a criminal.

We have set up a national fingerprint register.

And in the next few weeks a national database of criminal records will go live to provide a valuable new weapon against convicted and persistent criminals.

From now on, if someone is arrested in Glasgow the police will be able to know immediately whether they have also been committing crimes in London.

And our new Criminal Justice Bill in Scotland will give the courts and the police a wider range of powers than ever before to catch, charge and convict criminals.

All these changes are designed to make our country safer and put more thugs behind bars.

But we have fought this battle alone without Opposition support. Where have Labour been as we have waged this war?

When we strengthened police powers to stop and search criminals, were Labour tough on criminals? No, they voted against.

When we gave the police new powers to deal with riots, were Labour tough on rioters? No, they voted against.

When we ensured that all prisoners serve at least half their sentences in prison, were Labour tough on prisoners? No, they voted against.

And when we passed laws to fight terrorists who bomb and maim the innocent, were Labour tough on terrorists?

Hazard a guess.

No, they voted against.

But most revealing of all, how did Mr Blair describe Michael Howard’s 27 measures to fight crime?

Measures to crack down on young offenders. Measures to tackle bail bandits. Measures to stop professional crooks running rings round the courts. Measures called for by the police for years.

Mr Blair called them “gimmicks”. Gimmicks.

Well, I don’t call them gimmicks.

The view I take of crime is quite straightforward. We are engaged in a war against the criminal.

In that cause we should put the rights of the public first and the rights of criminals second.

Most people are perfectly able to distinguish right from wrong.

If people break the law, they should not be excused.

They should not be pampered.

They should be punished.

That is what that people of this country expect. That is what this Party expects.

That is what I believe.

And that is what our policies will deliver.

Let me just say a few words about policy on Europe. Britain’s future depends on us getting that right.

The European Community gives our companies the biggest home market in the world.

It has brought peace to countries which had fought for centuries.

And it can increase the influence and prosperity of all the countries within it. It has many virtues.

So I want Europe to succeed.

But not at any price.

And not at the expense of the nation-state.

I am keen to co-operate with our European partners. But I will not deliver Britain to a federalist future.

At Maastricht I negotiated long and hard for two key opt-outs against total opposition from our partners.

Both were vital for our national interests. I secured them.

I removed Britain from the Social Chapter – making this country a haven for foreign investment, and giving our companies a crucial edge over their competitors.

And I reserved for us the absolute right to take our own decision, in our own time, about whether we join a single currency or whether we stand aside.

There has been some speculation in recent days about what will happen to those opt-outs at the next Inter-Governmental Conference.

So let me tell you.

Those opt-outs will stay. They are permanent.

And they are not negotiable.

In any discussion about Europe’s future, I will always consider Britain’s interests before I decide,

That is what this country expects. And that is what this party will deliver. Pride in the Nation is a phrase with a particular meaning here in Scotland.

We have a deep instinct as Conservatives. We care passionately about the nations of the United Kingdom. Our feelings are emotional as well as intellectual.

There is no other political party in the world whose history is so deeply bound up with the identity of one particular country.

You couldn’t translate the Conservative and Unionist Party to any other country. Yet for 300 years, it has given voice to the people of a United Kingdom.

I am proud of our Party. Of its history. Of its record. It has built Britain’s influence in the world.

It has defended our institutions and our freedoms from threats without and within.

It has worked unceasingly to spread decent values of democracy and push back the darkness of totalitarianism.

In a rough, tough world, Britain has a high profile – at the UN, in the G7, in NATO and in Europe.

We have real influence as we approach the 21st century.

So it would be a disaster if we of all nations imploded into nationalist divisions of our own.

Labour’s devolution policy is a shambles. With one speech last year, I forced a U-turn on regional assemblies in England. Since then, Ian Lang and I have asked a series of simple but important questions of Labour’s leaders about their ideas.

Questions like how much would it cost? They don’t know. What would happen to the Scottish Office? Difficult one, that. And what is their answer to the West Lothian Question?

Mr Blair said that “The answer to the West Lothian Question is the answer that we’ve always given”.

Unfortunately for him, they’ve never given an answer.

In that at least it’s consistent with the rest of Labour’s Scottish policy. There are lots of questions, but rather fewer answers.

Labour’s approach to devolution is as elusive as the Loch Ness Monster but a good deal more dangerous.

Nessie brings jobs to Scotland. Devolution would drive them away.

So, why do Labour support devolution? It’s a good question.

Not because they really care about the constitution of Scotland. If they did care, they would have found answers to these basic questions.

Not because they think it make Scotland more prosperous, they are tartan taxers. They accept that it would put Scottish taxes up – and they know that the Scottish business community think it would drive away investment.

No, the simple reason why Labour support devolution is just to lure votes away from the Scottish Nationalists.

Yes, they are ready to play with the very survival of our United Kingdom for party political advantage.

It is the most cynical policy of modern times.

There could be no clearer demonstration of the difference between parties which talk about convictions and values – and those who live them.

I scorn such cynicism. And I will never take any lectures from people such as these on the importance of principle in politics.

And what of the Scottish Nationalists themselves?

At least they have thought their policy through. It would be profoundly bad for Scotland but it is thought through.

They admit that if you fiddle with the powers of the United Kingdom Parliament you will ultimately destroy the unity of the United Kingdom itself.

The SNP aren’t Tartan heroes. They should be seen for what they are.

They are socialists. They are unilateralists. And they are politically extreme.

Their message is a contradiction of all Scotland really stands for. A denial of its historic role. Inward looking and introverted.

They thrive on negative resentment, the culture of criticism. They kick traditional institutions just to feel good. It’s a dangerous game to play.

The SNP’s approach boils down to one phrase. Socialism in one country.

It has never worked. It can never work. And our task is to make sure that it is never tried.

Scotland would pay a high price for independence.

Taxes here would soar and soar again.

Independence would be an unpriced menu.

But I do not rest my opposition to independence solely on that.

For Scottish independence would hurt not only Scotland, but the rest of the United Kingdom as well.

All of us – Scots, English, Welsh and Northern Irish – would find ourselves citizens of a lesser county, with a smaller voice in the world, and with less chance to influence our future.

So we are and will remain the Conservative and Unionist Party. We believe in the Union and in Scotland’s place in it.

I believe the Union is in the lifeblood of our party and our nation. It’s our duty to stand up and defend it. We won’t shirk that duty.

So long as I have heart and voice I will defend the Union against all who would weaken it.

In the interests of all our country some causes are bigger than the transitory rancour of politics. And this is one.

Those who would seek to marginalise Scotland must be defeated. And with the help of those in this hall they will be.

May 12, 1995
Mr Major’s Speech to Scottish Conservative Party Conference – 13 May 1994

Below is the text of Mr Major’s speech to the Scottish Conservative Party Conference in Inverness on 13th May 1994.

PRIME MINISTER:

Today of all days I want to talk not of partisan politics, but of our country and its prospects.

There are occasions when it is right to turn aside from the clamour of political differences.

Yesterday, this conference adjourned to mark its respect for one of our country’s political leaders. An opponent, yes. A gifted and an honourable opponent. Undoubtedly. But a partner, too. A partner in that mission which is central to politics. The guest to build a stronger democracy, a better country, a richer life for all.

All of us here are people to whom our families matter deeply. John Smith was a family man. And our thoughts and prayers go out, above all, to his family in their grief – in a time of loss for which no words suffice, and into which no-one should seek to intrude.

The reaction to John’s death tells us much about our country. It showed the priceless asset of the essential decency of the British. We can weep for a good man – even an opponent – because we recognise his qualities.

This reminds us that there are things higher than politics and, across all divisions, common bonds of humanity that unite us all.

I liked John Smith. The nation saw us set up in artificial confrontation twice a week in the House of Commons. That was part of our political process – and I make no complaint of that.

But people did not see behind the scenes. There is friendship in politics, there is decency, there are private relationships across all Parties, there is principle and there is respect and understanding for the beliefs and the convictions of others. What a shame it is that that becomes apparent so rarely.

Mr President, I must confess to you that I often have little taste for the politics of point-scoring or for the belittling of others. I have none today. I care passionately for what I believe in. But I don’t care passionately for damning what other people believe in. If we could attack the policies of others, but respect their motives, then politics would have a fresher feel than it does today.

Let us be truthful with ourselves. Across all Europe there is a lower regard for politics than I can ever remember. And, as democrats, we should worry about that.

Politics isn’t just about power. As you grow more experienced you see the limits on the power of action, limits set by the need to persuade others and carry them with you. Limits set by the capacity of our country to create the wealth and resources needed to fulfil our ambitions.

No, it isn’t just about power. It’s about ideals. Hopes. Ambitions.

In politics you never lose the ideals of youth. You always travel in hope. And you never forget your long-term principles.

There are twists and turns, moments of exhilaration and achievement, and times, too, of disappointment and despair. But you pick yourself up, take on the next task, and go on forward. Because you always have a long-term aim in view.

Mr President, I sometimes wish that side of politics was more evident. I know politicians of all Parties. And they are not the cynical, power-hungry, self-servers that fiction so often portrays. There is such a thing as public service in this country. And our politicians generally subscribe to it.

Too often our politics is rooted in old battles, not new opportunities.

Of course we differ greatly in our philosophy; in our beliefs as to how to do the best for Britain. But sometimes, too, we share a common purpose.

The War-time coalition and the Labour and Conservative Governments that followed all worked to strengthen the welfare state, develop the Health Service, put in place the modern system of education that Rab Butler had worked to create, and which culminated in his great Education Act of 1944.

The achievement of Conservatism in the present generation has been to redress the balance between the state and the individual. To extend choice and ownership, to build the right climate for industrial growth and expansion, to set the ambitions, the hopes, and the capacity of every family free.

I don’t believe those achievements either will ever be challenged or changed. We have created a special British cocktail of free enterprise, tempered with social justice. A wider ownership of homes, shares and pensions than almost any nation in Europe, but a free health service which those overseas envy and admire.

That will never change. When my parents were old and unwell and without any money, they were well treated. It made an abiding impression on me that they had the security and comfort of mind to know that. While I am Prime Minister, that will never change.

All of us in politics – national or local – have our role to play. Whether we are players on the stage, or supporters in the wings, or commentators in the front of house, we all have our responsibilities.

Sometimes I feel – and I don’t only mean in the reporting of politics – that there is too much knocking, too much carping, too much sneering. Too much setting up of Aunt Sally against Aunt Sally.

Being negative can be an addictive drug. It’s easy. Because we all know how easy it is to do something, if you don’t have to do it yourself. But like any drug it corrodes and destroys the body in which it exists. And one body it runs the risk of corrupting is the body politic of the nation itself.

If politicians fight – in Party and across Party – like ferrets in a sack on every issue, is it surprising if the public turns away?

Let’s not be negative here today. Let’s be positive. And look at what’s happened in Britain in the last two years alone, and at our prospects for the future.

We have achieved an impressive revival from recession – well ahead of the rest of Europe.

We have the lowest inflation and interest rates for a generation.

We have growth in the UK – twice as high as anywhere in Europe, and set to continue next year.

We have public services forced by the Citizen’s Charter to tailor their performance to the needs of the public and to raise their standards year by year.

We have a National Health Service, in which local doctors have more say than ever, and in which we are treating more patients than ever before – and treating them better.

We have set reforms in place to raise standards in our schools and to improve the quality of training for young people.

One third of our young people are now going on to university.

And crime is now falling in Scotland and throughout the UK.

That is the reality of what’s happening.

Mr President, I have not come here to hide the challenges we still face. On the back of a world-wide recession Government is a tough business everywhere. We often have to do things that seem perverse today because we believe they will be right tomorrow.

Our job is to look long-term, plan long-term, achieve long- term. Set a framework for lasting prosperity. To ensure we don’t go through such difficulties again.

Some people may not like some of the action we’ve had to take – but our duty is to make the right choices for Britain’s future. It isn’t our job to do things to court short-term popularity, if they have a long-term cost.

Obligations are painful things. So are difficult decisions. But often they are necessary for the sake of future generations. So that their prospects are not just as good, but better than ours.

But that is what we’re in Government for.

“The elevation of the condition of the people”. That’s how Disraeli once put it.

“The elevation of the condition of the people” – Mr President, that is why I am a Conservative – why we are all Conservatives. And why this party must always frame its policies, not by the yardstick of ideology, but by how closely they touch the everyday lives of the people.

We mustn’t live in a world of theory. Our theatre must not be the academic clique or the Party caucus. Our theatre is the home, the family, the business, the voluntary group. That is the world from which Conservatism grows.

Our Party is at its strongest wherever it strikes a chord with the commonsense of the British people. When Conservative canvassers came to my door in Lambeth all those years ago they spoke a language I and the people I knew could readily understand.

The things they cared about were the things we all care about – how to get on in life, how to take our own decisions, how to acquire new skills, save money, own a home and leave a better start for our children and grandchildren than we ever had ourselves.

Even to the dependent Conservatism spoke the language of independence. Even to the insecure it offered security.

It did then. And it must today. Somehow we must break through the artificial frenzy that so often masquerades as political debate and focus attention once more on the essential concerns of the people we represent. That, I believe, is what people want and what our political system needs.

The Conservative agenda

Last autumn I spoke of a malaise that I saw creeping across our country. A cloud of unease and uncertainty in the face of constant challenges to the standards that people hold dear.

I said that our first duty was to dispel that anxiety, answer the worries people have, and draw deep at the well of commonsense instinct as we did.

I set out there my programme for the rest of this Parliament.

First, to see through – come what may – our policies for a strong stable economy. That we are doing – through low inflation, low interest rates and falling unemployment.

It is easy to write off now the importance of the fight against inflation. That is a mistake that I will never allow this Government to make.

I know from experience what inflation does. What it is like at the end of the week if you’re not sure you’re going to have enough money left over to pay the bills. I grew up in a hard part of London. We shared the house with all sorts of odd characters. Inflation wasn’t our only problem – but it was one of the worst. I know what it is like at the sharp end, what it’s like to struggle on fixed incomes. And so long as I am Prime Minister containing inflation will continue to be a cornerstone of our policy and a touchstone of its success.

The second goal I set in Blackpool was to bring about a seachange in our approach to crime. Shift the balance in criminal policy decisively against the villain after a generation of liberal ideas. Put punishment back on the agenda. Reject forever the fatal idea that crime can ever be excused.

If you don’t give young people guidelines and rules you are not helping them. Children who start with a small offence and are not brought up short will commit a bigger offence and then a bigger one, and, before you know it, they’re into serious crime. It is no good if when a young criminal gets caught all he gets is a slap on the wrist and sent on his way.

We have embarked on a shift in policy on crime, not to turn back the clock – of course not, Dickensian attitudes have no relevance today – but to turn up the heat on the criminal. I make not a shred of apology for that. The British people are heartily sick of the apologists for crime. And the crackdown that’s needed has only begun.

The third target I have set for the ‘90s is to raise standards in our schools. Without that Britain will not be able to compete in the world. We need to sweep aside the progressive dogma that has done so much damage. Extend parents’ choice. Insist on the basics. Make sure we get the best results for every child. And see that those results are reported, and, what is equally essential, tested.

Mr President, I simply do not understand opposition to testing. I sent my children to school to learn – so do all parents. You can’t just wrap children in cottonwool. Life itself is a test – and you have to prepare them for it. Compete is what children do naturally. Just put four small children together and see what they do. They see who can run fastest or jump highest. So we will be introducing more competitive games and we will stick to our guns on testing.

Mr President, in the last six months we have taken huge strides in carrying forward the agenda I set out in Blackpool. Inflation is right down. We have the biggest crime-fighting bill for years before Parliament. And, through teacher training reform, we are putting the last pieces into the mosaic of education reform.

That is the road this country must follow – and that is the road down which I and this Party will lead.

Mr President, the mandate we won from over 14 million people was a mandate which runs for 5 years. We are not yet half way through – and I intend to complete it. And then I shall say:

“Judge me on my whole term of office. All of it. You can’t judge a house when only the foundations are laid”.

A changing world

If we are to achieve our social objectives we must have strong economic foundations on which to build.

There are new and ever greater demands on our resources. But there’s only one way to create the wealth that we need. Through business success.

We have to lift our eyes from the short-term headlines. Look to the long-term. The world is changing faster than ever before. Just look at the changes there have been.

Operations that 15 years ago were unheard of now happen almost every day. Young people today have opportunities that our parents’ generation wouldn’t have dreamed of. In future it will not be enough to learn just one skill at 16 and do the same thing all through a lifetime.

People are living longer than ever before. More people are going into higher education than ever before. Those are all good changes, changes we’ve worked for, changes we want, changes that are making people’s lives better.

But they all have a cost. We need to pay for them. But we don’t want high taxation. So the challenge for us is to make our economy as competitive as possible, so that we can generate the wealth that we need for the improvements we wish to bring about.

For today we face a world more competitive than ever before. Not just from America and Japan but from new countries in the Far East, once our captive markets, now our active competitors.

We must look forward to the world in which our children will live. In the 21st century we’re going to have a world dominated by Japan, the United States and China. The European Community has a choice to make – will it be with those players or will it not?

The importance of Europe

I hope it will be, but it is not certain unless Europe follows the right policies. I would give Europe this warning. Unless it makes the right choices about policy today – unless it adopts free market policies – and believes in them – Europe won’t be up there in the next century with the US, Japan and China. It will slide behind.

That is why Britain must play its full part in Europe. Not just for our own sake, but for Europe’s too.

Nearly 200 years ago William Pitt said Britain “has saved herself by her exertions, and will, as I trust, save Europe by her example.”

I know that the issue of Europe runs deep in British politics. It touches emotions more profoundly than routine political differences. It raises concerns and fears that are too often played on too readily. For too long Europe has been the poison in the well of British politics.

Here, too, far too many people present the European debate in fundamentalist terms.

People are “for it” or “against it”.

We “must do this” or “mustn’t do that”.

Everyone, to paraphrase Gilbert & Sullivan, is either “a little Eurosceptic” or “a little Europhile”.

This approach misses the real debate. The real debate must be about how we make Europe a success; how to make sure it raises enthusiasm, not resentment; how to make sure it raises the quality of our life and is not seen as threatening the nature of our life.

What we are talking about in the debate on Europe is our national interest. Our jobs. Our future. And yet far too many people on both sides of the argument miss this wider point. They focus on narrow arguments as though we were fighting a holy war.

So let us remember the fundamental economic realities.

British business depends on Europe. Well over half of what we export, we export to Europe.

We need a place in European Community if we are to continue to attract inward investors to Britain.

And we need influence in Europe, if we are to make sure that our businesses have the right conditions in which to trade.

Europe is absolutely fundamental to this country’s national interest. We cannot turn our backs on that. It would be the ultimate abdication, a supreme folly. Limit our horizons and we limit our future. A little country in a lost world.

I am a Euro realist. I look at Britain’s interests with a cold and clear eye. Britain has a special place in the world. Alone of all nations we live and move in three distinct circles – NATO, the Commonwealth, and the European Community. Each and everyone is a shaping factor in our long-term foreign policy and our own national interest.

We have a special feeling about America. We are intimately bound up with its history, language and culture. I am one- quarter American. My father lived in America for a number of years. But Americans are realists, too. They want a good relationship with Britain. But, today, one of the main reasons they do is because Britain is in Europe. If Britain’s commitment to Europe was in question, have no doubt – the Americans would look elsewhere for their closest allies – to Germany or to France. They are no more dreamy-eyed about international relations than we are.

Diplomacy is a calculation of where long-term advantage lies. And, for Britain, that advantage is in Europe.

Mr President, I don’t accept the argument that a British government, fully involved in Europe, cannot win the battle to shape and mould the future of Europe.

Who says we can’t win the argument against centralism in Europe? We can and we must.

Conservative Governments won on the rebate.

Won on the Single Market.

Won on subsidiarity.

And we are winning on deregulation.

Britain should be confident in Europe.

One final point. I don’t believe the prevailing orthodoxy that if you disagree with current fashionable opinions in Europe that you are anti-European.

That is not true. The good European does not rush like Pavlov’s dog to every European fancy.

He judges what is right for Europe. What will attract the support of the people of Europe. What will retain their liberties – their traditions. And then he fights for it – and that is what we will do.

Why Conservative?

Mr President, for the moment the world of politics pauses.

But in a short while the people of this country will be called, with the rest of Europe, to take up the work of democracy again. And in the European elections we shall put our case to the country on the kind of Europe we want to build.

You know what I believe in.

I want to see a wider Europe, which spreads the protective mantle of peace, security and prosperity to the troubled countries of the East.

I want to see an open Europe in which the weight of bureaucracy and regulation is reduced, and we embrace wholeheartedly the goal of a great single market open for business, competition and trade.

And I want to see a people’s Europe. One that is not the remote preserve of a circle of planners. But a Community that addresses the concerns of ordinary people – and never seeks to interfere where it does not need.

Our guiding lights are the principles of free trade, free enterprise and free association.

Our aim is still to build closer co-operation between a growing number of nations.

But we shall stand always for individual choice.

Cherish always national diversity.

And never deviate for one instant from defence of Britain’s own national interest.

Our vision remains as it ever has been – a strong Britain in a strong Europe. That vision is supported by all but a handful of the people in these islands.

Conclusion

Mr President, I am proud of what Conservative Governments have achieved for our country. And I am full of hope and confidence in what this country still can and will achieve.

Over the last 15 years we have helped change Britain.

When I entered Parliament Britain faced real and visible threats.

Our economy was ravaged by inflation.

Our industrial strength was sapped by trade union power.

Our country was threatened by the armed might of the Communist bloc.

Together we have seen that great external threat dissolve.

And we have seen many of our internal problems so successfully resolved that many have forgotten the dragons that once stalked the land.

Of course, in the modern world, new challenges constantly arise. And the pace of invention lays new opportunities and new ambitions in our path.

But it is all too easy to forget how remarkably the face of our country has changed for the better.

Today, a child growing up in Scotland is twice as likely to go to university, twice as likely to become a homeowner, and has far better job prospects. Not jobs in declining state owned industries, but jobs in growing industries – profitable businesses with better pay and better working conditions than we’ve ever known before.

So whenever the storm blows, remember the successes we’ve had – and why we had them.

We had them because, even when the going was toughest, we stuck to our last, stuck to our guns; we kept cool and we kept faith.

Throughout all the ups and downs of the last 15 years – and together we’ve seen a few of them both – fashionable opinion has carped and criticised.

I know many of you were with me in Edinburgh two years ago at that great rally in our General election campaign.

We didn’t bow then to fashionable opinion. We took it on, shook it by the scruff of the neck, and turned it on its head.

That Election was about something more profound than many before it. About the very structure and fabric of the nation state our ancestors fought to create. People saw clearly two great threats to our Kingdom – the siren songs of separation at home and surrender abroad.

It was here in Scotland that we drew the line in the sand. We declared that we could not – we would not – whatever the cost, whatever the risk – compromise our deepest core beliefs, and put our nation at risk.

We stand – by gut instinct – in defence of the ancient Union between four great nations. For one strong, united country whose voice is heard and respected abroad, as four small nations – however proud – could never be.

The values we care about are the values that generation after generation in this country have lived for and lived by. I believe that Britain needs those values now, more than ever before.

So, when the work of politics begins again, let us go out and campaign positively for what we believe in – with pride in our principles, confidence in our future, and faith in our country, the United Kingdom – that unique and special country – that means so much to us all.

May 13, 1994
Mr Major’s Speech to the Scottish Conservative Party Conference – 14 May 1993

Below is the text of Mr Major’s speech to the 1993 Scottish Conservative Party Conference, held on 14th May 1993 in Edinburgh.

PRIME MINISTER:

Mr President, I’ve not come to this conference to talk just about Scotland. I’ve come to the Conservative and Unionist Party to talk about the whole of the United Kingdom. I hear you had some singing as well as some talking this week: the Secretary of State sang to you; Lord Sanderson sang to you, and this evening there’s a band in this hall – but you’re spared, I promise you. The last time we met was before the General Election. Do you remember? The Conservative Party? No chance, they said. Scotland? You’ll be wiped out, they said. The Union? A lost cause, they said. How wrong they were. Mr President, we stuck to our guns; we stood by our principles; we saw it through, and against all the wise men’s odds we won when the votes were counted. Aberdeen South from Labour. Kincardine from the Liberals. We won seats in Scotland and we won power right across Britain, thanks to you, the work that you did, the leadership that you gave here in Scotland. We proved faint hearts wrong. I’d like to say tonight how much we owe to Russell Sanderson, for on one worked harder than him to bring about victory. He’s been a tower of strength in Scottish politics for almost as long as any of us can remember. A very trusted friend, and a very wise owl, indeed. Russell, we owe you a very great deal and we’ll miss you. But bless you for all you’ve done. But we’re fortunate in Scotland: in Micky Hurst we have a worthy successor. A tough campaigner, a fighter, an old friend: just the man we need in 1993. A very welcome appointment. I offer my best wishes for the future.

At the Election our opponents got quite a lot of things disastrously wrong. One of them of course was Galloway and Upper Nidsdale. How confident they were! It was all in the bag: they were measuring the office for curtains for a new Nationalist Member of Parliament. But they don’t need that office, and it was curtains of a different sort for the SNP. And, today, you can fit all the SNP Members of Parliament into a telephone box. Appropriate, really. The number they required was unobtainable and they had trouble getting through. They should have asked: I would have told them. Ian Lang’s a good operator and he reversed their charges. lan, you’re leading a renaissance of Conservatism in Scotland. It started with the General Election. It went on at the District Council elections. It’ll continue right the way through this Parliament. And I will tell you the next target for lan’s winning team: more Conservative gains in next year’s European elections.

So, Mr President, we Conservatives know all about fight-backs, and today, once more, we’re coming out fighting: fighting for what we believe in. Mr President, we are not going to change our objectives. We are going to do what the Conservative Party has always done: the right thing at the right time for our country. That is the way to carry the British people with us. This is a five-year Parliament. Last week, at the end of the first year we had a serious setback. There’s no point in fudging the issues. The local election results across England and Wales were bad: worse than we thought they’d be; and, so, too, was the by-election at Newbury. We shouldn’t ignore that, but neither should we over-react to that. We’ve been here, before, you and I. And this time there are four years to the next Election. Four years to take through our programme of modernising Britain and building up its strengths. We don’t have a large majority, at present, so we cannot always grandly sail ahead oblivious to all. We may have to tack a little here, manoeuvre a little there. That’s politics. We can’t ignore the Parliamentary arithmetic. That would be plain stupid. But we cannot, and will not hold back from our objectives. So don’t expect a bland, Parliamentary programme: there’ll be red meat aplenty, and don’t expect us to shrink from controversial decisions because we won’t do that in the year ahead.

We won’t be Nationalists, Liberal, Labour by imitating them – pale pink and poisonous as they are. I mean, of course, the policies. We are Conservatives. We must think like Conservatives. We must act like Conservatives. And we’ll win by carrying out policies that are distinctively Conservative. Conservatives are rooted deep in every part of the country. Draw on that strength.

Let’s tackle first the problems people fear most: inflation, unemployment, crime, but there are other reasons why people look to the Conservative Party: for strong and modern industry; for better public services; for lower income tax; getting the state off people’s backs; wider ownership of homes, of shares, of pensions. A solid, sound schooling for the young, and yes, devolution, Conservative devolution: devolution of choice to every family throughout the United Kingdom. Mr President, that’s the modern Tory agenda. My agenda, your agenda, the agenda we will win on right the way through this Parliament. And I’ll you how we’ll do it: by remembering who we serve and what we stand for. By seeing the right policies through. Mr President, we’re at a turning point after a time of great difficulty for our country. We have had a war; a recession; a tough General Election; and international events have crowded and during this time there have been three matters that have dominated my concern. The first was to get inflation down and keep it down. That is the only way to bring down unemployment and create jobs. We forget too easily the fear and uncertainty of rising prices. The second was to put our country where it can play a leading role in shaping European policy. We must shape it and not be shaped by it. I don’t want to see Britain sidelined and dragged along behind the ambitions of others.

And the third concerns the very future of the United Kingdom: a threat too little recognised before the last General Election. We had to waken our fellow countrymen to the scale of the danger and then face it down. Mr President, cutting inflation has meant hardship for many people. They want to know why and they deserve to know why, so let me explain. For many, the 1980s was a time of prosperity: Conservative governments brought home ownership within reach of millions who’d never expected to enjoy it. We all became too confident. We took our eye off the ball. We allowed inflation to creep back. People who’d worked hard, who’d borrowed money to start businesses or buy houses were caught up in it. Inflation had to be brought back under control. We had to do it. Left unchecked, it would have threatened everything that we had worked so hard to create. Doing that meant higher interest rates, higher unemployment, it lead to bankruptcies and home repossessions. I would have given all I had to avoid it, but if we hadn’t done it, people would have suffered all those things and we would still have had the inflation. That is the heart of the matter. All our hopes for the future depended upon the conquest of inflation. It was a huge responsibility and a huge challenge. It took determination. It took skill. It took guts, and Norman Lamont has shown he has all three in the difficult months through which he has come.

But curbing inflation is only the first, the first, but indispensable step to recovery and growth. Since the General Election the fight for recovery has gone on, but people’s patience, even British patience is not unlimited. They have been hurt out there, they are reacting, and although we can see that recovery is underway, it isn’t obvious in the pay packet, it isn’t obvious in the Job Centre – not yet, but it will be. Mr President, the recovery has started. It is soundly based. Inflation is under control and we are going to keep it that way. No more boom and no more bust. We’re going for steady, non-inflationary growth. The British people have earned it and this Government are going to deliver it.

Mr President, the second issue I faced when I became Prime Minister was a troubled relationship with our partners in Europe. Let’s be frank: we have an ambivalent attitude to the European Community: as a nation we don’t love Europe. We’re too British: too Scottish, English, Welsh, Irish for that. But we know its importance to us. We know our prosperity depends upon it. We, in this Party, want more cooperation in Europe between freely trading sovereign states. That’s what we’ve been fighting for these last two years. The kind that has led to hundreds of millions of pounds of inward investment pouring into Scotland: nearly one hundred thousand jobs depend upon that. And Britain’s hard, economic self-interest depends on having influence in Europe; on winning arguments in Europe; on building alliances in a Europe we can live with and be comfortable with. Mr President, you cannot build such a Europe if you denounce it daily; mis-represent it hourly; and poke suspiciously at it by the minute.

It’s easy to play ‘John Bull’ in a china shop: attractive even. There is popularity to be gained by it, but it is not in our long-term interests as a nation to do that. If we cut ourselves adrift from the mainstream arguments about Europe, we would soon be sidelined, and five years from now the bitter, hardest of that short-term policy would be found in collapsing exports; in collapsing prospects; in collapsing companies, and in growing unemployment queues from one end of the United Kingdom to the other. There are great issues at stake: open Europe markets are vital for Britain; inward investment is vital for Britain. I am out to win both. I will do nothing that will put them at risk; I will do everything I can that will help to make Britain grow. Some of you may feel that we’ve heard rather a lot about principled opposition to Europe. I want to hear more in the future about principled support for Europe. Those, like me, who want Britain in the centre of European debate are not crying out for a federal state; not seeking to end a thousand years of British history; not seeking to undermine the essential individuality of our island. We are seeking a wider Europe, a Europe with less bureaucracy and without federalism. I know of no Conservative Member of Parliament who cannot support that sort of Europe, and I believe that vision is shared by almost everyone in this country and in this party. So let us put the arguments behind us – better to battle together, better for Britain, better for our Party and better for our future.

The final great issue that faced us when I took office was the very maintenance of a United Kingdom. No other Party but the Conservative Party was going to fight for it, and I was determined, come what may, that we should. Some said the strategy was crazy, but you in the Party in Scotland, you never had any doubts. The Union was our great cause, and I spoke about the Union in every meeting I went to from the Tamar to the Tay. England needs Scotland, every bit as much as Scotland needs England. The United Kingdom is united, today, for one reason above all because the Conservative and Unionist Party won the last General Election. Mr President, we chose to put the Union right at the heart of our Election campaign. We spoke of the historic choice that faced our nation between a united and prosperous Britain, a force for good in the world, or the path to separatism, the path to disintegration and insularity. And we spoke about the Union, about our long history and achievements together, we spoke from the heart. We said the right thing at the right time for our country. It was instinctive and it was heartfelt, and the people responded. Mr President, for me, that was perhaps the sweetest victory of all in April of last year.

But, now, now we must build on that victory. The separatist tide was turned but it’s not yet beaten. And that’s why Ian Lang’s proposals to bring the Union alive are so important: the will improve Government in Scotland; they will give Scottish people a stronger say. They mean change, yes, but we are changing to preserve the Union, and let me make this prediction: some time in the future we will look back at the last Election and say this: that was the moment of greatest danger to the Union, and that was the moment the Scottish people spoke up for it and saved it.

Mr President, on these great issues we’re now winning through. It would have been easy to give up but we didn’t. And we won’t give up on our reforms in health, education, railways and public services; despite difficulties and setbacks, we intend to carry them forward. We had no intention of giving up – give over, I would say to those who think we might give up. Mr President, I know that some people say from time to time we’ve spent the whole year talking about Maastricht. Sometimes it feels like that to me, as well, but the truth is, we haven’t. During this last twelve months we put a series of radical, reforming Bills to Parliament: the Housing Bill, an Asylum Bill, a Lotteries Bill, an Education Bill, an Employment Bill – all key Conservative measures, all solid Tory objectives, and all in the first session of Parliament.

That’s what Conservative governments are for: to extend choice to parents, to extend freedoms to trade union members, to give new rights to tenants, more opportunities to people to own their own homes, more chance for parents to know how their children are doing at school, and that is what we have been doing in the past year. And not a lot of people know that, but it is a massive programme of reform that we have carried through Parliament in the last twelve months. Mr President, these policies are building choice in every city, in every town and every village. Choice is power. We are taking choice away from Government and giving power back to the people. That is where power belongs. I want to see minimum control by Whitehall and maximum choice for every family. All this has been rolling forward: radical changes, far-reaching changes, stretching out and reaching forward to the year 2000. Mr President, there are ancient echoes in all of us that whisper: we’ve done enough. We should now opt for the quiet life. It sounds tempting. But if you start down that road, you soon bump up against a hard fact, and it’s this: unless we face up to change, change will overwhelm us. Year by year, all around the world, the pace of discovery quickens. We cannot just stop the world and get off. Mr President, it’s when the Conservative Party is on the side of reform that we win. That’s when we prosper. We Conservatives must have the confidence to go forward; confidence to test the market; confidence to trust the people: that is our duty, that is our strength, and that is our programme.

So, let us keep our eyes on the bigger picture; on the key challenges of the next four years. And let me share with you some of my own priorities and the direction in which we must go. I’ve spoken already about some of the key themes, but there are other fundamental issues that demand to be heard. We must build a stronger, manufacturing base. We must take regulation off industry’s back – large industry and small industry. We must make public services truly serve the people’s needs. And we must provide the best possible education in all our schools. And, Mr President, critical to millions of people in this country, we must win the war against crime.

It is upon these issues that we will take our stand. They will dominate our thinking and our law-making, so expect action on deregulation, expect action on education, and expect action on law and order right at the very heart of what we do. Ken Clarke’s package, yesterday, was just an instalment, so we will have a full programme and a busy autumn. Mr President, unless British industry is competitive abroad, Britain will be weak at home. We have to get the basics right for business: inflation, interest rates, tax, they’re all uniquely favourable to British industry today. Exporters haven’t seen a combination like that for very nearly forty years. The signs are right. Manufacturing output is up; investment is up; productivity is up: excellent signs, every one. Retail sales; construction orders; car sales – all of them are up – all very good signs. And Scotland – Scotland is leading the way: another very good sign, not least with whisky exports – Scotland’s liquid gold: rivers and rivers of scotch pouring down foreign throats. And not only foreign throats! I cannot tell you how much I’ve been looking forward to this part of the speech. That’s the way to get overseas businessmen to sign. And look at that – Ian Lang smiling, as well! That’s another sign: a Scottish sign, a marvellous sign, an Auld Lang sign! I know, Mr President, the joke was awful, but the whisky was great.

And the future looks good: we’ve turned the corner. But for British industry the challenge is still enormous. For them to succeed they need a workforce with skills and with imagination. It’s they who’ll carve out success for Britain. So our children must be taught the skills they need. That’s why we need the basics at the very beginning of schooling. It’s why we need good, vocational education. Why we need proper information on how children are doing. And, yes, Mr President, that’s why we need tests in schools, as well. Mr President, we might as well face the truth, only quality will win in today’s world. As a small boy, I grew up like many of you, I suspect, looking at a map covered in pink with a huge British Empire spanning the world. Like many people I’m nostalgic about that. I wish the world was still a captive market for British exports, but it isn’t. And it’s no good our dreaming that it is and pretending that things haven’t changed. Our businessmen have to operate in the most competitive world we’ve ever seen, and so we must give those businessmen every bit of help that we can. And that’s why this Government must be, and I promise you it will be, right out there in the thick of the fight, right out there alongside British industry – manufacturing matters. And, Mr President, wherever I travel around the world I’ll tell you what I want to find. I want to find goods with that magic label, ‘Made in Britain’, all around the world. We’re going to win in the export markets of the world, and to those who said that Scotland can’t play its part in that, I say: this is James Watt country, Baird country, McLaren country, Bell country – doers. Doers who took destiny by the scruff of the neck and changed it. And it’s the country of Adam Smith, the arch priest of enterprise and choice. So, I make you this promise, here in Scotland, and where better, we’re not going to let tin-pot regulators who can’t see beyond their office door tie down the genius of a nation.

Mr President, choice: choice is central to Conservatism, It is its very heart. Without choice there is no freedom. Without choice there is no achievement. It is a basic fact of human nature. When people choose of their own free-will, they become committed. They don’t just stick to the contract. They give that little bit extra. They become inventive. They make things happen. That’s the spirit we want, and not least in our public services. And, so, since the Election, look what has happened in some public services. In Scotland’s health service: not just the seventeen new trusts, but much more besides. Look what Scotland’s hospitals are achieving: better patient care; shorter waiting times; tough targets exceeded. That is the power of choice at work, today, in Scotland. And when others abroad were beginning to write about re-inventing government, we, in Britain, were putting it into practice. That is what the Citizen’s Charter is all about. The most far-reaching programme for raising standards in public service ever seen. Some said it was irrelevant. The cocktails grenadiers sniped and sneered, but then they don’t rely on public services. But millions and millions of British people do. And what has happened in these last two years? Real changes – real changes enhancing real lives, the time taken to deal with pension claims cut by a third; every hospital eliminating waiting lists of two years or more; ninety-five percent of Scotland’s parents now getting their children into their first-choice primary school, and every parent in Britain receiving an annual report on their child’s progress in schools. Some people always took such things for granted, but not everyone. And now the Charter’s opening out old narrow privilege. It’s making first-rate service a natural expectation of everyone. So here’s a slogan for Whitehall: competition reaches the parts of the civil service that memoranda cannot reach! We are changing the age-old practices of the public sector: making pay relate to how good they are, not how long they’ve been doing the job; giving the private sector the chance to compete. Mr President, we are still only at the beginning. Over time, there will be no part of the public service that will not be touched by these changes: from the dustman at your door, right up to the office of the Cabinet Secretary himself. And, I daresay, he’ll soon be asking my Private Secretary precisely what I mean by that. I’ll be very surprised if he doesn’t!

Mr President, I want now to turn to another matter of huge concern. And let me say this right at the outset: I refuse to accept there is nothing to do about crime, and I’m not going to turn my back on what I know is a growing worry for millions of people. The great majority of decent British people know it’s the duty of everyone to uphold the law: no ‘ifs’, no ‘buts’. But I’m afraid there are a far too many who do ‘if’ and ‘but’. Who do criticise the police. Who do devote their energies to explaining crime and justifying it. And there are those who boost the self-esteem of young criminals by giving them the chance to swagger on television and radio. To them I would say: just think. Just think, then stop, That way you can play a part in this country’s fight against crime. Mr President, I don’t underestimate the challenge. There is a huge battle ahead, and it involves all of us. If we fail to teach children the difference between right and wrong, we are fostering crime. If we turn away or close the curtains, we are helping crime. If know what others have done and don’t say ‘no’ but say nothing, we are aiding crime. The police and Government, we will do all we can, but we cannot do it all. We are on the side of the public, but we need the help of the public. Society may not be to blame for crime, but it can certainly play its part in clearing it off our streets. I’ve been encouraged by the recent figures in Scotland showing a downturn in many types of crime. But Peter Fraser made it clear to you this afternoon, that we are far from complacent. We are putting more police on the beat. We are clamping down on late-night drinking, and we are reviewing Scotland’s criminal justice system to see how it can be improved further. Many of you will have been here at this conference all day, so let me say this, to ‘Judy of Edinburgh’ who spoke so eloquently and so bravely in this debate this afternoon, I heard what you said in that remarkable speech. Not only did I hear what you said, I got the message, and so have the whole Cabinet. Judy, you didn’t just speak for yourself. I believe you spoke for the whole country in what you said this afternoon.

South of the border, we’ve been busy, too. There are too many young criminals offending and re-offending, and laughing while they do it. So, we’re giving the police and courts the powers they need to deal with them. There are too many people who’ve been committing new crimes while out on bail, so we’re going to crack down on them, as well. They will face stiffer sentences and, in my judgment, quite right too. And on too many occasions we’ve seen pedestrians killed by drunken or dangerous drivers, so we’ll be doubling the maximum sentence for them. And we’re removing artificial restrictions on the English and Welsh courts. They’ve resulted in some absurd sentences recently, and they’ve prevented magistrates from giving people with long criminal records the punishment that fits their crime. Mr President, that is wrong. I am not having policy driven by the size of the prison population. I am having policy driven by the safety of the population at large. And another thing, Mr President, we want our police to use their time as efficiently as they can. We want to help them do the job they want to do: beating crime. We don’t train, and equip and pay our police filling out forms. I don’t want policemen fighting paper on their desks: I want them fighting crime on the streets.

Mr President, we are in the midst of a decade that will see greater change than any decade, even the most venerable person in this hall will have lived through. Change is accelerating, not just in this country, but in countries all around the world: inventions we’ve never dreamed of; social and other problems we’ve never yet faced lie not very far ahead of us. If ever there was a time when governments had to take a long view rather than a short view, you and I, today, are living through that time. We cannot afford just to cast our eyes on the problems of tomorrow, next week, or even next year. We have to stop and think and plan; and often take decisions that may seem strange, today, but are geared at the problems or the opportunities that we can see five or ten years ahead. It seems a long way away, the next millennium. It isn’t. It’s eighty months away. We need to start preparing for it now; thinking for it now; planning for it now; putting our industry and our nation in a position to compete for it in the most competitive world we’ve ever seen, Those are the matters that crowd on in governments, on Ministers, quite apart from the day-to-day problems that one reads about day-to-day in the morning newspapers and watches day-to-day on television.

We need to stand back sometimes and re-assess where we are, where we’ve come from and where we need to be. I joined the Conservative Party, above all, for one reason: because I believed it had the clearest philosophy and the clearest instinctive ‘feel’ for the ambitions and hopes and dreams of individual people of any political party in this country; and it had a history that was unique. No other political party in any part of Europe, in any part of the world, has served so long, so well, so often in government for its nation.

We are a remarkable political party: the most formidable fighting force when roused that western politics has ever seen. We have had our good days and our bad days; our highs and our lows; our opportunities and our difficulties, but it is in that unity, that philosophical unity of belief, that instinctive feel for what our nation is and what it wants that Conservatives draw their greatest strengths. It is at times of difficulties that they go back to those ancient instincts, draw out that strength again, and prepare for the years ahead. We’re a party that thinks beyond one generation. We can afford to do so. We were governing this nation long before the Labour party was ever a nightmare in anyone’s mind. And we’ll be governing it long after they’re dead and gone as a political party, provided – provided we maintain that instinctive connection with the cares, the concerns, the hopes and the aspirations of the British nation. That is the genius of our party. That is the genius, I suspect, that drew all of those, however we may have thought of it, in this great party, and kept us here through the years,

So, let us put aside temporary problems and temporary difficulties. Let us keep our eye on the far distance as well as the near future. Let us plan not just for what we’ll be doing tomorrow or next year, but for the sort of society we want our children and our grandchildren to grow up in. That is what I ask this party of ours to do, both today and in the future. So, at the moment, after recent difficulties, we are fighting back at this conference. Fighting back for our ideals, fighting for what we believe in. Fighting for what brought us in to the party and what will keep us bound in this party, even in the most difficult of days. We have been through tough times, tough for this party, more important, perhaps, tough for millions of people across the land. But at the last General Election those millions of people supported us: fourteen and a half million more votes than any political party had ever received at any Election in this country, and they did so because we set out simply and clearly what we stood for and what we were doing. We set out where we were going and why we wanted to go. And from one end of the country to another they listened. We touched a chord in their instincts. They trusted us to do what was right for Britain and to see it through.

Mr President, that is what Conservatism is about – your Conservatism, my Conservatism – to offer a fuller life; to stand up for Britain; to keep our United Kingdom whole and strong. Today, I sought to spell out where we stand and what our policies are. Our ambitions are, as they ever were, the ambitions of millions: to build a prosperous Britain. A Britain which sends its goods to every part of the world; a Britain where people feel safe on our streets, and secure in their homes. A United Kingdom, where effort is rewarded, where choice is ‘king’ and where everyone has the chance to succeed. Mr President, that’s the Britain that I want, and that is the Britain that we are fighting to build, and I invite you all to join me in that fight.

May 14, 1993
Mr Major’s Speech to 1991 Scottish Conservative Party Conference – 10 May 1991

Below is the text of Mr Major’s speech made to the 1991 Scottish Conservative Party Conference on 10th May 1991 in Perth.

PRIME MINISTER:

It’s wonderful to be back in Scotland for my fourth visit since I became prime minister. And each time I come I am struck by the growing confidence of our party. We are right to be confident. So is Scotland. There are five Scots in my Cabinet shaping policy – for all the UK, with my old friend Ian Lang making sure the Scottish dimension is always considered.

He has a powerful team at the Scottish Office. Allen Stewart once defeated me by one vote for a local council candidacy over twenty years ago. I often wonder what would have happened if I had won.

And in the party machine, Russell Sanderson and Micky Hirst are revolutionising our prospects as we look forward to Conservative gains at the next election.

Today I want to share with you some important news – of a new White Paper we will be publishing to improve public service, of help for a hard pressed region of Scotland, of our initiative to tackle the international trade in arms. And a meeting that will make Scotland the focus of world attention.

But before I address these policies to enhance our future, I want to turn for a moment to something that could threaten it – Labour’s policy fiasco on tax and spending. We have always said Labour do not add up. This week they have proved that in spectacular fashion.

People want to know a party’s promises, of course. But they also want to know how they will be delivered; how they will be paid for; and – crucially – who will do the paying.

After this week we know who will do the paying for Labour’s promises. Every single taxpayer will. It was kind of Mr Kinnock to warn us he wouldn’t make any tax cuts. We never supposed he would. It’s not your taxes he’ll cut. It’s your income.

This week he promised 20 billion of extra public spending which, he said would be paid for by economic growth. But existing spending plans already rely on growth in our economy. You can’t spend the same money twice. So his 20 billion would have to be paid for either by higher borrowing or higher tax. 10p on the basic rate of tax. Of course, it would be phased over a full parliament. So that is the cost of Mr Kinnock. 2p a year on the basic rate of tax every year for 5 years to take the basic rate even above the 33p we inherited in 1979.

It is a breath-taking lunacy. And this from the man who promised 14 out of 15 tax payers would not be worse off under his plans.

You work harder. Good. You pay more.

You put more into your job. Bad luck. You take less home for your family.

What folly!

That is no way to encourage people to work harder. It is a way to encourage people to work abroad. And when our doctors, dentists, surgeons and scientists take their talents abroad Labour will be surprised. But who will be the poorer? The whole country will be poorer. They always are under Labour.

So don’t be misled by the red rose ad-men. I know from personal experience how deep is the difference between Labour’s policies and ours. When I was young and living in an inner city, labour canvassers used to come to our door. They were confident and cocky. They assumed I would vote Labour because of where I lived. But they never said how their policies would help me make the best of my life or how they would help me reach a position where I could help others.

They just assumed I would go on living exactly as I did then. That was my role in life. And I should stay there. They talked about my rights. They talked about what they would do for me. But never about my opportunities or my obligations.

That is the enduring face of Labour. Never to ask what people, given the encouragement and opportunity can do for others or for themselves. Just what the state might do. Always with someone else paying the taxes. To block out hopes and ambitions and to disparage success. That is the real failure of socialism.

So when people say there’s no difference between us and Labour, tell them some of the differences.

We back the consumer through our citizens’ charter plans; they line up behind the trade union providers.

Our aim is lower taxes for all; they reject lower taxes and plan to put them up.

Our pledge is more home ownership; theirs more council homes.

We offer personal pensions to millions of families – pensions they own; they want dependence on the state and attack personal provision.

We promote more savings and investment; they plan to tax savings and so damage investment.

We help more families to own shares they want the state to have more.

We give more say to parents in running their schools; they would go back to council control – ‘on day one’, Labour’s Education spokesman boasts. Their top priority. To take parent’s freedom away. ‘on day one’. I tell you. If parents understand that message there will never again be a ‘day one’ for Labour.

So Mr Chairman, there is a giant gulf between our parties. That gulf is seen in many policies. But in essence it is that we trust people and they don’t.

One thing is clear. Labour have peaked. Roy Hattersley knows that. He now warns he will retire if Labour don’t win. Well there’s a threat. Vote Labour to keep Roy Hattersley in politics. It’s not the worst reason I can think of for voting Labour. But, it’s far from compelling.

As always, it is our party that has the new ideas. About good public services at low public cost. About raising standards in schools and hospitals. About leaving more money in the pay packet and about ownership for all. The issues that we put first are the issues that matter to Britain.

People build success

Mr Chairman, it is now evident that we are getting inflation down. And provided we keep it down our prospects are bright. The opportunities immense. I want to see those opportunities spread as widely as we can. To see more people with homes, shares and pensions of their own. More people with skills. More ways into independence and less ties to dependence. More say for every family in their children’s future. More chance to save to make that future secure.

In our party we know that it is not the state that builds the success of a nation. It is the citizen that builds the success of the state. What we in Britain must do is encourage success at every level. And recognise it when it happens. I don’t want a country in which anyone should be led to feel: ‘I can’t do that; that’s for other people’. I want to see an end to the bystander mentality – the view that problems are something for someone else to deal with, and that success is something you see on television. No-one should settle for less than they can achieve. The credo is simple. If you think you can do it, you can do it. So start to do it – and don’t delay.

Winning hearts and minds

We must take our Party’s appeal into every village and home in Scotland. Our door must be open to everyone. And we must open their doors to our ideas. And that means understanding the doubts and fears of many who traditionally vote Labour.

We have always stressed the dangers of Labour’s far left. And rightly so. Their neglect of defence; their attacks on the police; and their contempt for the law. And never suppose that those elements in the Labour Party have ceased to exist.

But the vast majority of those who have supported the Labour Party do not share those extremist views. They have their ideals. As we do. They want a better future for their children. As we do. We need to show them, through performance and persuasion, that it is the Conservative way that offers independence, choice, and better living standards.

And if you want to test the strength of our vision there is nowhere better than Scotland.

Scotland’s revival

Ten years ago Scotland stood on the fringes of Europe’s economy. Its industries outdated, its infrastructure and cities run down. So we took the Whitehall controls off Scotland’s economy. Output today is more than 10 per cent higher than it was in 1979. All due to the work of those in the offices and on the shop floor. At 4.6 per cent a year over 12 years, the rise in productivity in Scotland has been among the fastest in Europe.

No longer is Scotland dependent on a few declining industrial sectors. On steel, shipbuilding, coal. New industries have grown, high tech industries. Service firms alongside the manufacturing base. Who would have expected in 1979 the rate of expansion of services? Services now account for two in every three jobs in Scotland. 23 billion of value-added in 1989.

And look at the astonishing growth of the electronics industry – a fivefold increase in output since 1979. Who would have guessed then that within just twelve years, one in ten of all the personal computers built in the world would be made in Scotland?

We took the tax burden off personal success. And Scotland responded – with a surge of innovation and effort. There are five companies in Scotland today for every three in 1980. And the number of self-employed is up by more than half.

No one ever needed persuading of the attractiveness of Scotland, the quality of its people or of its environment. Whenever I come here I am struck by how within a few minutes of any airport or station I am in beautiful countryside.

But for too long the outdated face of Scottish industry turned opportunity away. Now, people and businesses are voting for Scotland with their cash. And with their feet. In 1989, 10,000 people moved here from the rest of the UK and from abroad. Since 1981 foreign companies have invested 4 billion in Scotland, creating or safeguarding a planned 80,000 jobs.

These achievements reflect Mrs Thatcher’s determination to get business and industry here and throughout the United Kingdom back on its feet. And her success in doing so.

Lanarkshire

But I recognise that, for all the progress since 1979, some parts of Scotland have managed these changes less easily than others. Lanarkshire is one. At Ravenscraig, and elsewhere in Lanarkshire, British Steel has already announced a number of job losses. That has come as unwelcome news to all who live and work in the area. And I am well aware these are by no means the first job losses in Lanarkshire.

Allan Stewart will shortly receive the report from the working party we set up to examine the problems of the area and see how they can best be overcome. Ian Lang and I will study that report carefully and speedily.

There will be no delay. We will take the necessary steps to help Lanarkshire become, once again, an area that will be attractive to new investment and new jobs.

But even before we see the report there is some preliminary work we can put in hand. Today – before we have seen the report – we are making a further 15 million available now to Scottish enterprise to enhance work on site clearance and to ‘green’ over the worst areas of industrial dereliction. For I want to see Lanarkshire as a thriving, successful part of the Scottish economy. I believe the extra resources I have announced today – together with the other support for Lanarkshire already committed – will be a further step towards bringing about that resurgence.

Labour’s tax on skills

Whatever we do, when it comes to regeneration, what areas like Lanarkshire need, will be men and women of energy, skill and vision. Good managers, trained professionals, skilled workers. They are the people who will build new businesses and create new jobs. And we need them here – not abroad.

Only one thing could discourage people like that – a Labour Government. They plan a special tax on the hardest-working and most skilled people. 72 a month extra national insurance stopped from the pay of a family doctor in Dundee, and a secondary head teacher in Glasgow. A quarter of a million Scottish workers and their families, would be caught in Labour’s trap – before we even begin to consider their tax increases.

Those people already pay nearly 1650 a year in national insurance. But that’s not enough for Labour. 1650? Labour would spend that in less than one hour on a new state-led body. A typical Labour proposal. The men from the ministry picking winners in technology – the boomerang that won’t come back, the aircraft too heavy to fly, the computer that could make Labour’s policy plans add up. Labour picking winners? They would have a better chance in sporting life. Yet it is to fund quangos like that – 71 of them – that Labour now want to attack the most enterprising people in our country with a new tax on skills.

Many of Scotland’s top business managers would be facing bills of 250 a month and more. Why should they stay in Scotland when Labour’s new policy would drive them abroad? Such a policy would be a disaster. Indeed, for Labour, it is a disaster. Publishing it was the beginning of the end of their prospects of power.

Economic revival

The industrial changes of the ‘80s have helped Scotland resist the present world recession better than most other parts of Britain. Things may seem difficult. Unemployment is rising. I regret that. I know what it means to the people and families involved.

But there are still far more people in Scotland with jobs than when we came to power. Britain’s unemployment levels remain below the EC average. But I know also that this is not much comfort to those looking for jobs who want them. What is of comfort is that we are winning the battle against the cause of the problem – inflation. That we have put in place policies to prevent it. And that our policies will mean more jobs in Scotland as Britain grows again. More secure jobs. In modern industries. For this generation and the next.

If we are to grow again strongly, we need to get inflation down. That we are doing. Eighteen months ago we took tough action against price rises. I knew it wouldn’t be popular. I knew it might not be ‘electorally convenient’. But I also knew it was right.

As a result inflation is now tumbling in Britain when it is climbing elsewhere. It will tumble further throughout this year. Scottish families and Scottish business will benefit from that.

It is not just inflation that we have in retreat. A few months ago we led Britain into the ERM. Since then we have made five cuts in interest rates. Yet the pound is as strong in Germany now as it was when we joined. Five cuts in interest rates. And the costs of mortgages falling as well. It is high time some of those who opposed entry into the ERM recognised the benefits it has brought.

Local government

There is another way in which we must help both people and business in Scotland. By improving the quality of local services. Reducing the costs of local government. And, where necessary, intervening through tougher capping powers to block excessive spending.

I believe local residents must have more choice. Parents should have the right we gave them to choose the right school for their children, and have more say in how it is managed. Families should have more choice over the homes in which they live. This Party gave Scottish people the right to buy. Now we are going further by giving a new group of tenants the chance to buy their homes with our rents-into-mortgages scheme. Older people. Those on lower incomes. Single parents. They found right-to-buy difficult. Rents-into-mortgages is exactly for them. The response has been huge. Two weeks after the new scheme’s launch, 20,000 people had expressed their interest. People who thought that they would never be able to own a home. People who thought they would be renting for the rest of their lives. Now they will have something that is theirs; something they can leave for their children in the future.

We are also extending choice into the future shape of local Government itself. There will be many different ideas – perhaps even a return to the old city corporations. But few will favour keeping artificial and impersonal regions like Lothian or Strathclyde. You can be certain. If people’s views, point to the scrapping of any authority, the next Conservative government will act to abolish it.

Citizen’s charter

I am determined to give power back to the people who use public services. I intend to help them secure improvements in quality. That is what our new citizens’ charter programme will work to achieve.

The charter’s principles are already in action. When we privatised British Telecom we insisted on competition and tough regulation. And compensation too, when standards weren’t met. The results were dramatic. Then, a quarter of callboxes were unusable; now it is just one in twenty. Then, under three-quarters of line cuts were repaired in two days. Now it is over 96%. But we should do better still. So we are bringing in more competition to help the consumer. As a direct result there will be a cash cut in BT charges this autumn. Then take gas. There, too, we set up a regulatory regime. But the system was not tough enough. So this month OFGAS has acted. If inflation falls as we expect, gas charges next year will actually be cut. When did that last happen? Did it ever happen when gas was in state hands? It will now. And, again, the public will gain.

Ian Lang has told you how he will develop the Citizen’s Charter in Scotland. Already, some forward-thinking services have brought in the kind of reforms I want to see throughout the public sector. In the health service; in Scottish homes; and in education. They must go far further.

We will be developing our charter programme throughout the summer. Make no mistake. I intend it to bite. And to do so in the interests of parents, pupils, passengers and patients alike. This summer we will be publishing a white paper which offers the citizen nothing less than a revolution in the way public services are delivered. It will be the most comprehensive quality initiative ever launched. New and tougher standards of service will be set. We will introduce a wide range of mechanisms to ensure they are met, to the citizen’s satisfaction. But it should also point the way to new pride and purpose for those who work in public services. They too believe in a job well done.

We do not fall into the trap of supposing that better service must always and everywhere mean spending more. That is Labour’s expensive fallacy – peddled by those who would rather take the money than deliver the service. We never forget it is the citizen’s money government uses; and it is the citizen to whom the public sector must be accountable for every penny it spends.

The whole public sector will be expected to commit itself to this process. Whitehall, the new Next Steps agencies, local Government, public services, and nationalised industries. And I will keep it under the closest scrutiny as it does. There must no longer be any hiding place for sloppy standards, lame excuses and attitudes that patronise the public. Our programme has four main strands – more competition, privatisation and contracting out, to ensure that complacent services are shaken up; new approaches to pay and budgeting which mean that good performance is rewarded and low standards penalised; a complete review of all the mechanisms for helping the public to get the standards they deserve – truly independent inspectorates, tough auditing, ombudsmen and effective complaints procedures; and insistence on the publication of detailed targets for performance and how nearly those targets are achieved. Services and their users must know where they stand. And, where possible, as the new electricity companies have already found, we intend to look for ways of direct compensation to the public when standards fall far below what the public should be entitled to expect.

For each public service we will select the most effective means of delivering the best. For each service the techniques will be different. But the citizen’s charter will have just one common aim – achieving the highest possible standards of performance for those who rely on public services in this country. Once complete, it will be the most comprehensive of its kind in Europe.

Health

No-one should doubt our commitment to good services at every level, including the NHS. I believe in the health service. My family and I use it. We will go on doing so. Because I have confidence in the NHS and admiration for what it achieves. It is well over forty years since the health service was formed. And everyone knows how dramatically it has grown. But hang on. For most of that time Britain has had Conservative governments. So who do the government’s critics imagine has been pouring resources into the NHS over that time? Nearly 33,000 million a year, four times as much in 1979. Treatments unheard of in the 1970s routine today. Health spending in Scotland some 24% above the UK average. It wasn’t Labour that achieved all that. They weren’t in Government. We were.

And what of this? At every recent election Labour promised a 3% real annual growth in NHS spending. They never got near that in office. Just 1.5% a year between 1974 and 1979. Nurses’ pay cut by 21%. The hospital building programme slashed by a third. A very modest performance. Indeed shameful. The more so when measured against their own immoderate boasts.

Yet while they’ve blustered, we have delivered. Spending is up, year after year after year. 3.1% a year over twelve years. And levels of patient treatment up as well. Our performance has gone far beyond Labour’s promises.

And the fact is that if Mr Kinnock’s 2+% growth formula had been applied this year, the NHS would have had 500 million less than it has had from us. 500 million? That would have meant 500,000 fewer patients treated in hospitals, according to the Labour leader’s official plan. It must be one of the biggest own-goals in British political history. Yet more evidence that Labour doesn’t and can’t add up.

There is just one more thing I want to say about the health service. I do not accept that there cannot be change in the NHS. I do not accept that every pound in nearly 33,000 million cannot be better spent. Our reforms are about achieving better patient care – and better patient care alone. We will see them through.

European Council

I want Scotland to play a leading role in international affairs. Our place in the world begins in Europe. As I said recently, it lies ‘at the heart of Europe’ . I believe that Scotland’s experience is essential to that. I was delighted that Glasgow made such an impact as Europe’s city of culture for 1990. Next year I want to put Edinburgh, like Glasgow, at the centre of European events.

Edinburgh is already the European Community’s fourth largest financial management centre. And it is moving up the world league close on Chicago’s heels. But a historic capital like Edinburgh should be a diplomatic centre as well. I can tell this conference today that when a Conservative Government chairs the European Council in 1992, we will bring the European council, and the summit meeting of European leaders, to Scotland. I want it to be in Edinburgh that Europe signals the final completion of the single market, on which so many countries have laboured for so long.

Scottish Assembly

But I don’t just want Britain to be in Europe. I want Britain to be a leader in Europe. That means being confident and secure as a people as well. I believe passionately that our country must stay united. The United Kingdom draws together, in partnership, the traditions of four proud nations. We have much to give each other. Much to learn from each other. The Scots have always played a great part in the government of Britain, and always will. I know there is sometimes a feeling – not just in Scotland, but in Wales and England too – that Westminster can be too remote. I believe that government should be – must be – more receptive to the aspirations of people throughout the united Kingdom.

But I do not believe those aspirations would be met by the creation of a further tax-raising body in Scotland; by more Government and more taxes that would disadvantage this part of the island. I don’t want industry and investment to be driven out of Scotland by the highest level of tax in Britain, destroying jobs and smashing hopes. Nine out of ten of Scotland’s business leaders oppose the kind of revenue-raising Assembly the convention proposed, and surely we must listen to that warning.

Ever since the union of the crowns of Scotland and England in 1603, it has been as a United Kingdom that we have made our incomparable mark on the history of the world. And in this century it was as a British people that we fought in two world wars. And, more recently, as part of the British armed forces, that so many young men and women from Scotland went to the Gulf to throw Saddam Hussein out of Kuwait. I was proud to meet them when I visited our forces in the Gulf, and proud, too, last weekend that it was here in Scotland that Britain gave thanks for what they had achieved.

Britain in the world

At that service there were readings by children from differing traditions – Christian, Muslim and Jew. All Scottish children. It was very moving. They spoke of common thankfulness and a prayer for peace. It is a peace that for the sake of all our children we must buttress with new safeguards.

Britain did not sell arms to Iraq. Others did. Saddam Hussein built up his supplies until he had twice as many tanks as Britain and France put together. That is why I have called for a register at the United Nations of all conventional arms sales. I can tell you today that I have asked our representative in New York to press this issue as a high priority. And let me also give more details today of what I want this register to do. It needs to require countries selling arms to declare what they sell, to whom they sell them and in what quantity. I shall be working for that register to be agreed this year.

Achieving agreement on a register will be an ambitious objective. But we are getting used to breaking new ground. For example, the safe haven for the Kurds in the north of Iraq. And the United Nations special commission, which in the coming weeks and including British scientists, will search out and destroy the weapons of mass destruction still held by Saddam Hussein after the war. Both those ideas were without precedent. Both were British proposals. A Conservative Government s proposals.

Today, at this conference, I can give the country two further assurances:

First, Britain will veto any UN resolution designed to weaken the sanctions regime we have set in place, for so long as Saddam Hussein remains in power;

Second, that we shall ensure, by whatever means it takes, that Iraq can never again build a capacity to threaten her neighbours with nuclear, chemical or biological weapons.

Conclusion

Mr Chairman, we have come a long way together these last seven months. Do you remember what the critics were saying last autumn? They said that our government was finished. We were 16 per cent behind in the opinion polls in the UK as a whole, 33 points behind in Scotland. Well, seven months on we have silenced those critics. Now we are ahead in the polls overall, and we have increased our support by a third in Scotland.

Last autumn we were facing a world recession. Now we are on the road to recovery. Then inflation was rising. Now it is plummeting. Then mortgage rates were locked at a high level. Now they are coming down and poised to fall further. Then disputes over local government finance seemed insoluble. Now they are solved.

And I have not even mentioned our progress in Europe, or our help for the Kurds. That is not bad for just seven months work.

So we should be confident about our party’s future. And, what is more important, we can be confident about the future of Scotland as well.

This party has the right vision for Britain’s future. Our priorities are to care for those who can’t, to encourage those who can, and to make our country a better place to live in for everyone.

And that message must ring out from this conference. Our Party in Scotland – the Conservative Party – is on the way back. We are not talking any more about holding on in Scotland. We are talking about regaining seats in Scotland from Labour, Liberal and Nationalists, too. And we will not be easily satisfied. Not satisfied at all, until we have what once we had – a majority of seats in Scotland, safe and secure in the Conservative interest. Nothing less will do. And with your support, whenever the election comes, we will begin that work.

May 10, 1991