The Rt. Hon. Sir John Major KG CH

Tag: Unemployment

  • PMQT – 19 November 1996

    Below is the text of Prime Minister’s Question Time from 19th November 1996.

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Engagements

    Q1. Mrs. Ann Winterton: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 19 November.

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

    Mrs. Winterton: Will my right hon. Friend confirm that the low level of unemployment in my constituency, Congleton, which has fallen by a further 7.5 per cent. over the past year, would immediately be put in jeopardy if the minimum wage, the 48-hour working week and the social chapter were implemented?

    The Prime Minister: I am delighted to hear of the fall in unemployment in my hon. Friend’s constituency, and I am delighted that that fall is mirrored in the constituencies of hon. Members right across the House. It is certainly the case that, were extra impositions such as those mentioned by my hon. Friend to be placed on employers, they would stop the fall in unemployment and send it returning upwards. That is not what we want, which is why we shall not accept the social chapter or such impositions.

    Mr. Blair: Why has the Prime Minister not yet made good the promise given two years ago to eliminate mixed-sex wards in our hospitals?

    The Prime Minister: We are seeking to make progress as soon as we can on every aspect of improvement in the health service. We have given priority to other matters. That has brought the waiting list down, widened the number of operations that have been offered and improved the quality of care. As we can, we shall move on the other issue.

    Mr. Blair: My point is that the Government made a specific promise two years ago that that issue would be a priority. Is not what is needed a proper programme that is led and co-ordinated by Government with the health authorities and national health service trusts, and the setting of a specified timetable to eliminate those wards, which cause enormous indignity, and distress people? The Government would thereby keep the promise that was made two years ago.

    The Prime Minister: The right hon. Gentleman seems to be advocating–I agree with him–a properly managed examination of what could be done to improve the service across the health service. I agree with that. It is one of the reasons why we have focused on management. Management has been concentrating on getting more people treated. More people have been treated, and management will continue to move to improve that, and to improve the quality, dignity and privacy of service, as we announced.

    Mr. Blair: I find it extraordinary that the Government are spending £1.5 billion more on administration–

    Mr. Devlin: He is out of order: he must ask a question.

    Madam Speaker: Order. I need no lessons from the hon. Member for Stockton, South (Mr. Devlin).

    Mr. Blair: Might I point out to the Prime Minister that there are 20,000 more senior managers and that £1.5 billion extra is spent on administration? Is it beyond the collective wit of the Government and the health administrators to deal with that problem? It is a question not just of money, but of political will. My point is very simple: did not the Prime Minister promise two years ago to deal with the problem? Why has he not delivered? If he does not deliver on that promise, why should anyone believe his promises about the national health service?

    The Prime Minister: If I had said at the last election that we would treat as many new patients as we are now, the right hon. Gentleman would not have believed me. If I had said at the last election that we would deliver extra resources, he would not have believed me. He and his colleagues claimed that we would privatise the health service. We said that we would not, and we have not. I hope that he accepts that that is the case now, and that it will not occur in the future. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will acknowledge that fact.

     

    Q2. Mr. Riddick: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 19 November.

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

    Mr. Riddick: Is my right hon. Friend aware that unemployment in my constituency has fallen by 640– 22 per cent.–since the beginning of the year? Is not a reason for that good news the fact that the United Kingdom has a stable industrial climate with few strikes, except in the public sector? Is it not true that only a Conservative Government can be relied upon to do anything about that problem because the Labour party, with its strong links to the unions, is still the strikers’ friend? [Interruption.]

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

    The Prime Minister: There seems to be some support on the Opposition Benches for Labour’s support of the strikes–I hope that everyone noticed it.

    I have no doubt that one of the reasons why we are attracting more foreign investment than any other country is our success in restoring industrial stability in the private sector. The number of strikes today is one twenty-fifth of the level that it was when we came to government in 1979. I believe that people deserve the same protection against strikes in the public sector that they increasingly enjoy elsewhere. If Opposition Members do not agree, I suggest that they ask businesses whose post was not delivered and travellers who could not get to work because of strikes in those sectors.

    Mr. Hume: Given the Government’s praiseworthy efforts to promote agreement among the political parties in Northern Ireland, will the Prime Minister explain why the Minister responsible for education in Northern Ireland, the right hon. Member for Devizes (Mr. Ancram), proposes to reduce the number of education boards–which are the most highly respected cross-community bodies in Northern Ireland–from five to three? During the consultation process, every Member of Parliament from Northern Ireland, the leaders of all political parties, all Church leaders and all local authorities disagreed with the right hon. Gentleman. Why are the Government ignoring the unanimous wish of the people of Northern Ireland in relation to education?

    The Prime Minister: I do not believe that that is the position with my right hon. Friend, but I shall examine the details of the hon. Gentleman’s claims and then write to him. I would be very surprised if my right hon. Friend did not have an extremely good reason for any decision he may have taken.

    Mr. Beggs: On a point of order, Madam Speaker.

    Madam Speaker: Points of order come after questions, private notice questions and statements.

    Mr. Bernard Jenkin: Is my right hon. Friend aware that the average household electricity bill in the eastern area is £272, while in France it is £366 and in Germany it is £394? Does that not demonstrate the success of electricity privatisation? Is not a sign of its success the fact that the Opposition wish to impose a windfall profits tax on the industry and put it at risk?

    The Prime Minister: The comparative prices that my hon. Friend quotes are a striking tribute to the success of privatisation over the past 18 years. I am delighted to see them. I very much hope that we shall keep those prices down. My hon. Friend is entirely right: a windfall tax would force prices up for consumers, and at an unknown amount, because we do not yet know precisely who will be subject to the windfall tax or what the levy would be on companies and thence on consumers.

     

    Q3. Ms Roseanna Cunningham: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 19 November.

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

    Ms Cunningham: With regard to yesterday’s meeting in Brussels, and the beef ban, is the Prime Minister aware that the National Farmers Union for Scotland is openly accusing the Government of straightforward prevarication in their refusal to proceed with the selective cattle cull, and that that gives rise to a very real apprehension that the Government are simply trying to stoke anti-European feeling in advance of an election and, indeed, to sacrifice the farmers? Why does he continue to set his face against a phased lifting of the ban, which would be of immediate benefit to Scotland and Northern Ireland?

    The Prime Minister: The hon. Lady is perhaps not aware of all the things that are going on in Brussels and the discussions that we are having, or she certainly would not have asked her question in that fashion.

    Mr. Waterson: Can my right hon. Friend give some reassurance to pensioners in my constituency who are worried that the so-called flexible decade of retirement will mean massive increases in public spending and taxes or a severe cut in the state retirement pension?

    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend is right to say that the plans proposed by the Opposition, in which a flexible decade of retirement would enable some people to retire early, would mean a massive increase in public expenditure, which they have said that they would not provide, or a significant cut in the basic rate of pension. I suggest that they come clean on precisely what they propose.

     

    Q4. Mr. Mullin: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 19 November.

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

    Mr. Mullin: Is it still the Prime Minister’s position that there is a moral case for cutting taxation? If so, can he explain the moral case for promising to cut taxation before an election and for increasing it as soon as the election is over?

    The Prime Minister: Yes, I do believe in cutting taxation, and I look forward to the hon. Gentleman’s support when it is appropriate to cut taxation again in the future. The hon. Gentleman seems to think that by cutting taxation we are giving money back to people. I would say that by cutting taxation we are taking less of people’s own money.

     

    Q5. Mr. Atkins: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 19 November.

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

    Mr. Atkins: Is my right hon. Friend aware of the independent auditor’s report, published yesterday, of the criminal and corrupt activities of Labour councillors on Labour-controlled Preston borough council who have lost or mislaid millions of pounds of Preston taxpayers’ money in recent years? Does he agree that that is the real example of sleaze and corruption in public life which should be rooted out? Is not that further example of Labour mismanagement of local authorities damning proof of what will happen if Labour ever controls our country?

    The Prime Minister: I do not think that the character of any party becomes clear until it is in power. [Interruption.] Those are not my words; they are the words of the right hon. Member for Sedgefield (Mr. Blair). In local government, Labour is in power, and in power it has a habit of pouring taxpayers’ money down the drain and running up debts. Right across the country, where there are Labour councils one can see that “If you vote red, you live in the red.”

     

    Q6. Ms Hodge: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 19 November.

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

    Madam Speaker: Order. The House must come to order. It is difficult to hear.

    Ms Hodge: Will the Prime Minister think again about his crass and insensitive reply to the question put to him by my right hon. Friend the Member for Sedgefield (Mr. Blair)? Does he appreciate that the issue of mixed-sex wards is of particular importance to women? Does he know that 50 per cent. of women who are admitted to psychiatric hospitals have a history of sexual abuse? Will he give us a date when he will meet the promise that he gave two years ago? If not, how can we believe that the NHS is safe in the Government’s hands?

    The Prime Minister: The right hon. Member for Sedgefield (Mr. Blair) and the hon. Lady spend Question Time after Question Time painting a picture of the NHS that does not exist for those who use it. During our 18 years in office, we have continually put more resources into the NHS, widened the services available to it, ensured that more operations are carried out and cut waiting times. That is a record that no previous Government have been able to match. If the hon. Lady remembers, it was under the previous Labour Government that waiting lists went up, hospitals were closed and the NHS practically came to a full stop.

  • PMQT – 14 November 1996

    Below is the text of Prime Minister’s Question Time from 14th November 1996.

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Engagements

    Q1. Sir Sydney Chapman: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 14 November.

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

    Sir Sydney Chapman: Does my right hon. Friend accept that the drop of more than 40,000 in the latest monthly unemployment count–which, I understand, is the largest monthly decrease for two years–illustrates yet again the success of the Government’s policies in promoting job creation? Does he agree that if United Kingdom employers had additional costs inflicted on them by the EU, that would put in jeopardy the downward trend in unemployment in our country, which has been going on for three years and stands in stark contrast with many other EU countries?

    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend is entirely right, both about the welcome trend in unemployment and about the fact that unemployment is falling here in a way that cannot be seen anywhere else in the continent of Europe. That is not unrelated to the fact that we have avoided the burdens on business that so many of our partners have accepted. Of course, those burdens would have been accepted by the Opposition.

    Mr. Blair: Does the Prime Minister agree that today’s inflation rise, together with the sharp rise in long-term interest rates, should set the warning lights flashing? How does he square that with the promise that he made just a few months ago that he would meet his inflation target by the end of this year?

    The Prime Minister: I am afraid that the right hon. Gentleman is mistaken. I know that the retail prices index figures are complex, but I think that he has failed to understand the impact of this morning’s figures. I will explain to him what has happened, and he can then explain it to his Back Benchers. The figures are calculated year on year, and there was a quite exceptional one-month fall last October. That means that the 12-month year-on-year figure looks artificially high. I can reassure the right hon. Gentleman that that will correct itself over the months ahead and that we expect to meet our target.

    Mr. Blair: I do not think that we have ever heard a more ridiculous excuse for a rise in inflation figures. If the inflation figures were so good, why did interest rates have to go up? They went up because of the worry about inflation. Have we not heard it all before? We heard it all before the previous election and we heard it all before 1987, when the Government said that an economic miracle was under way. Will the Prime Minister answer these specific questions? On interest rates and inflation, will he confirm that Britain is now 11th out of 15 in Europe? Do any of our main competitors outside Europe have as high interest rates or inflation as Britain?

    The Prime Minister: I begin to suspect that the right hon. Gentleman truly does not understand; he is not being perverse–he genuinely does not understand. I will explain the position to him gently and easily. My right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor raised interest rates to prevent inflation from rising, not as a result of existing inflation. To hear lectures on inflation from the right hon. Gentleman, when the lowest inflation achieved by his party in government was 7.5 per cent. and millions remember when it was 27 per cent., and when the inflation figure today is a statistical aberration because of a dramatic fall last year, only illustrates the fact that the Labour party is totally incapable not only of running the economy but even of understanding it.

    Mr. Blair rose–[Interruption.]

    Madam Speaker: Order.

    Mr. Blair: The House will have noticed that the Prime Minister did not dispute that we were 11th out of 15 for interest rates and inflation. If he disputes it, let him come to the Dispatch Box and say that the figure is wrong. The House will listen to him when he rises to his feet and tells us that 11th out of 15 is wrong. The simple fact, as on every other matter, is that when he said that he would cut taxes, he raised them, when he said–[Interruption.] Conservative Members do not like this because it is the truth. [Hon. Members: “More.”] They want more, so let us give them more–[Interruption.]

    Madam Speaker: Order. This barracking must stop. Other hon. Members have questions on the Order Paper and I want to call them.

    Mr. Blair: Let the Prime Minister dispute any of the following facts. He said before the general election that he would cut tax, and he raised it. Does he dispute that? He said that he would eliminate public borrowing, and he doubled public sector debt. Does he dispute that? He said that he would lick inflation, and it has risen. Does he dispute that? If he does not dispute any of those facts, or the fact that we are 11th out of 15 for interest rates and inflation, why should anyone believe a word that he says on the economy?

    The Prime Minister: I had fondly suspected today that the right hon. Gentleman might have broken with tradition and mentioned the fall in unemployment, which his party is supposed to care about–[Hon. Members: “Answer.”] I will tell the right hon. Gentleman that the October inflation figures were the fourth best that we have known in October since the war. It is ridiculous for him to talk to us about taxation and to proceed as he did today, when the deputy leader of his party has said that Labour

    “shouldn’t follow the Government down the road of cutting the basic rate of tax”

    and that under Labour there would certainly be higher tax. I see hon. Members nodding in agreement. The right hon. Gentleman criticises us about tax while his party advocates higher tax. He cannot stomach the fact that the British economy is in better shape than any Labour Government have ever achieved and that he could not match the condition that it is in. He will do everything that he can to pursue grievance politics and damage the British economy in his own interest.

     

    Q2. Mr. Booth: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 14 November.

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

    Mr. Booth: Will my right hon. Friend assure the House that at the European intergovernmental conference he will block any proposal further to erode our right of veto? Is he fully aware that signing the social chapter is not only expensive in itself but would render Britain powerless to avoid becoming uncompetitive as Europe introduces more and more imposts? The Labour party will never understand that, which is one of the reasons why we shall win the next general election.

    The Prime Minister: I can certainly and willingly give my hon. Friend the assurance that he seeks. The social chapter is a pipeline bulging with potential new burdens on business, all of which would cost jobs in the United Kingdom. As an illustration of the damage that a Labour Government would undoubtedly do, perhaps at some stage today the right hon. Member for Sedgefield (Mr. Blair) would like to condemn the Labour Member of the European Parliament for Durham, who called on the Commission to take action against the United Kingdom including

    “seeking unlimited fines against the UK Government”.

    I want to know whether that is Labour policy or whether the right hon. Gentleman will disown him.

    Mr. Ashdown: Did the Prime Minister see the warning from Coopers and Lybrand yesterday that if we continue as we have so far the Government will be technically bankrupt by the end of next year? [Interruption.] That is what it said. The Prime Minister obviously has not read it. Let me put it to him like this: if a council had done what the Government have done and doubled its debt in six years, doubled the level of borrowing to which it had said that it would adhere two years ago and then, to win an election next year, cut its taxes to make things worse, would he regard that as responsible?

    The Prime Minister: What the right hon. Gentleman said about the nation being bankrupt is just bizarre–it is just off the wall. If this is a bankrupt nation, why are all those overseas nations and overseas investors, both in Europe and beyond, investing in what he says is a bankrupt nation? I suggest that he looks at what is going on in Britain and stops taking advice from his economic advisers, who clearly know nothing about everything.

    Mr. Whittingdale: Is my right hon. Friend aware that this week marks the first anniversary of the death of my constituent, Leah Betts, who died as a result of taking a single Ecstasy tablet? Will he join me in paying tribute to Leah’s parents, who have worked tirelessly to ensure that other young people learn the lesson of Leah’s death? Will he confirm that the Government will give every support to the Bill to be introduced by my hon. Friend the Member for Milton Keynes, South-West (Mr. Legg), which will ensure that night clubs whose managers do not take proper action to stop drug trading will be swiftly and permanently closed?

    The Prime Minister: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising that matter. I met Mr. and Mrs. Betts some time ago and I think that the whole country remembers the tragedy that they had to endure and the courage with which they endured it. I certainly undertake to do all that I can to curb the menace of drugs and I will look most carefully at the private Member’s Bill that is to be introduced. If it is at all possible to give full support to that Bill, as I anticipate that it will be, then we shall certainly do so.

     

    Q3. Mr. Pike: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 14 November.

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

    Mr. Pike: The Prime Minister will accept that there is still a major crisis over bovine spongiform encephalopathy. Does he accept that there has been enough dithering over the introduction of the selective cull scheme that was agreed at Florence? Will he give us a date for implementation of the scheme and say when we shall start to see an end to the problem?

    The Prime Minister: I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman was here yesterday or, indeed, when I answered those questions from the right hon. Member for Sedgefield. Since the hon. Gentleman is asking precisely the same question, I am tempted to refer him to the answer I gave some time ago. The reality is that we are pursuing with the Commission proposals for relaxing the ban on the United Kingdom and the export restrictions on animals from certified herds and on those that are qualified under the beef assurance scheme. Those discussions are going on at the moment.

     

    Q4. Mr. Robathan: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 14 November.

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

    Mr. Robathan: The whole House will welcome the Government’s decision in principle to support international action to prevent humanitarian catastrophe in central Africa. Will my right hon. Friend ensure that if British troops are sent to Zaire they will go with carefully considered and clear objectives, very precise instructions and a properly determined chain of command?

    The Prime Minister: I suspect that I speak for the whole House in expressing extreme concern at the situation in eastern Zaire. I believe that everyone is acutely conscious of the refugees’ plight and of the literally hundreds upon hundreds of thousands of people who will undoubtedly face death in the next few weeks unless urgent action is taken.

    My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence will be making a statement in a few moments. I believe that if western Governments have the capacity to help, there is a strong moral obligation upon us to help. We have considered very carefully how we can best provide that help and in principle we are prepared to provide troops for a multinational force.

    I have to say to the House, however, that the situation on the ground is complex and difficult, the terrain is tough, there is inadequate infrastructure and at this stage there is no clear ceasefire. So before sending British troops, or deciding upon the precise numbers, we need to be absolutely clear about what they are being asked to do in detail and the conditions in which they will operate. We also need to look very carefully at the particular circumstances that they will face. A reconnaissance team will be travelling to the region today to do that, and I hope that we shall be able to reach a firm decision before too long as to what troops are to go.

     

    Q5. Mr. Campbell-Savours: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 14 November.

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

    Mr. Campbell-Savours: May I enter a last-minute plea that the Prime Minister reconsider his decision about a free vote for Conservative Members of Parliament next week on the banning of guns? Why cannot those hon. Members be allowed to exercise their own consciences and decide for themselves how to vote on an issue that the public regard as extremely important?

    The Prime Minister: We ought not to forget precisely what the legislation is about: the controls that we place on legally held firearms and the right of law-abiding citizens to use them responsibly. That seems to be a matter on which it is right for the Government to take a decision, as the House expected before the Cullen report was presented to it, and we have done so. Firearms legislation has not traditionally been considered on a free vote in the House and we are not inviting the House to do so on this occasion.

  • Mr Major’s Doorstep Interview – 13 November 1996

    Below is the text of Mr Major’s doorstep interview on Wednesday 13th November 1996.

    QUESTION:

    [Mr Major was asked whether he thought unemployment would fall]

    PRIME MINISTER:

    Unemployment has been falling steadily now for about three years, the monthly falls are erratic, last month was a very large fall, this month is a very large fall. Can’t guarantee falls of that sort every month, but that the trend is going down and is going to continue to go down over the months ahead, I don’t think it [indistinct].

    QUESTION:

    [Mr Major was asked whether he thought that the Working Time Directive would ruin it all?]

    PRIME MINISTER:

    Well it would damage it, course it would, if you put more costs upon unemployment then you are going to damage that capacity to employ people. The real damage with the Working Time Directive and the other Directives that would come the same way if we didn’t oppose them now, is that they would put particular burdens upon the small and medium size firms who are creating decent jobs. Let us be clear where these jobs come from, it is not the ICIs and EECs pushing the bulk [indistinct] of employment it is the small medium size firms, those are the ones that will suffer particularly with extra burdens on business.

    QUESTION:

    [Mr Major was asked whether he thought 2 million unemployment was too high, given how unacceptable that would have been in 1979]

    PRIME MINISTER:

    Well you can trust that you can put the worst interpretation on things, in Germany there are 4 million unemployed and it is rising, it went up 40,000 this month. In France there are over 3 million unemployed, there is not another nation in Europe given the economic scene that has been right across the world, in the last few years, that has got unemployment down to the level it has been. Our unemployment is not just below the rest of Europe it is considerably below the rest of Europe. Where theirs are stuck, our unemployment levels are falling, and not just in some areas, right across the country as a whole, and a particular dent in long-term unemployment. That is very good news indeed, and it has been going on for three years.

    QUESTION:

    [Mr Major was asked if the state of the economy would be good news for the election prospects in the months ahead]

    PRIME MINISTER:

    Well we have been concerned to get people back to work for 3 years, this is what policies are about. This is why we are trying to create the right sort of environment in which there is growth in the economy which we now have. Faster growth anywhere in Europe, and that growth in the economy is producing more jobs.

    Firstly because of the climate and secondly because it is more competitive to established businesses in this country than anywhere else nearby. And thirdly because we have fewer burdens on business and they are more likely to employ people rather than find a way of avoiding employing people and putting money into sometimes costly and ineffective capital expenditure. Now all that is very good news for a Government that wants people back at work, that is what we wish to see.

    QUESTION:

    [Mr Major was asked about the Working Time Directive]

    PRIME MINISTER:

    Well I think that many people in the Trade Union movement, I don’t know whether this applies to Mr Monks and Mr Bickerstaff, but I think many people in the Trade Union movement see Europe as a way of returning many of the outmoded practices that we have managed to get rid of in the last 17 years. Now that is not an attractive prospect for the British workers, and I think it is the British workers and British competitiveness that we have to look at.

  • PMQT – 12 November 1996

    Below is the text of Prime Minister’s Question Time from 12th November 1996.

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Engagements

    Q1. Mr. Janner: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 12 November.

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

    Mr. Janner: Why is the Prime Minister so determined that people who work in this country should have no statutory minimum holiday rights, while also having no statutory maximum working hours, meaning that they can be forced to work more than 48 hours a week contrary to their wishes? Is not that an unjust, unreasonable and typically Tory policy, going against even their own alleged policy of supporting family rights?

    The Prime Minister: I shall tell the hon. and learned Gentleman crisply; Britain wants good jobs, not worthless directives.

     

    Q2. Mr. Hawkins: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 12 November.

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

    Mr. Hawkins: Does my right hon. Friend agree that there is a huge contrast between yesterday’s excellent news of British Aerospace’s success in winning the large Hawk order from Australia, which will guarantee British jobs, and the dismay felt by many British businesses at today’s news of the adverse European ruling on the 48-hour week? Will he reassure British business that he will do all that he can to resist that Euro-measure, which will undermine the competitive edge of British business and is an adverse decision by a political court?

    The Prime Minister: Australia’s selection of British Aerospace to supply Hawks is the latest illustration of the keen competitiveness of British industry generally and the British aerospace industry in particular.

    I think that not only will today’s European Court of Justice ruling damage the prospects of job creation, should it not be reversed; it has disappointed British business men, as they have made clear repeatedly this morning at the Confederation of British Industry. The position is unacceptable. We cannot agree that our competitiveness should be undermined in this way. Were we to do so, it would clearly be the thin end of the wedge–to judge from what the European Commissioner has said this morning. I have made it clear to the President of the Commission that I shall insist on changes at the intergovernmental conference to ensure that the social protocol will never again be undermined by the presentation of social measures, falsely, under the guise of health and safety.

    Mr. Blair: Will the Prime Minister now answer the question asked by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Leicester, West (Mr. Janner)? Quite apart from Europe, why is he so opposed to a law that says that people are perfectly free to work more than 48 hours a week, but cannot be compelled to, and gives them minimum holiday entitlements? Is he going to fight the next election on the basis of, “vote Tory for no right to a holiday”?

    The Prime Minister: Yet again, the right hon. Gentleman is in danger of missing the point. Unemployment is falling as we become more competitive. The directive could reverse that trend and similar directives could push unemployment up, instead of it continuing to fall. I am not prepared to accept that. I want jobs, not directives. I want Britain to continue to create jobs and unemployment to continue to fall. I do not want to place more burdens on business so that unemployment either remains stuck at a very high level or rises from that very high level as it has in other European countries. Competitiveness will create jobs. I want people to be in work. Presumably, the right hon. Gentleman is prepared to keep them out of work.

    Mr. Blair: Perhaps the Prime Minister can tell us of a successful company in Britain that does not give its work force a holiday.

    Hon. Members: Exactly.

    Madam Speaker: Order. Stop shouting and barracking, for goodness’ sake. I want to hear the questions and the answers.

    Mr. Blair: If the directive is so dreadful, why did the Minister not vote against it when he had the chance to do so? May we be clear about the Government’s position at the intergovernmental conference? Will the Prime Minister confirm that his position is this: all member states must agree at the outset of the conference that no progress will be made on any change proposed by any country in respect of any issue until the directive is reversed? Is that his position?

    The Prime Minister: If the right hon. Gentleman’s first point was correct, why do we need the directive? He made precisely the Government’s point. Such directives pile burdens on business and they are bound to undermine our economic success. Their damage to the fruits of our economic success will affect the extra resources that we are providing to the health service, as my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health will set out in a White Paper tomorrow. They will damage the provision of opportunity for all four-year-olds to have nursery education, as my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education and Employment will set out tomorrow. I am not prepared to allow the product of years of good, sound economic management to be undermined by regulation from Brussels. I shall tell the right hon. Gentleman precisely what the position is at the intergovernmental conference: it is exactly the same as it was on the social chapter at Maastricht. I shall not accept what has been determined by the court today and, at the end of the intergovernmental conference, I shall demand that change or there will be no end to the intergovernmental conference.

    Mr. Blair: So it will be at the end of the intergovernmental conference–which will, conveniently, be after the election. We can hear escape routes being planned already. Is it not back to beef when, five months on, the Government have not even got the gelatine ban lifted? It is the same old pattern. They seize on an issue, they talk tough, they alienate everybody and then they cave in. May I suggest that the law that gives people the right to a minimum holiday is not the issue upon which to launch beef war mark 2?

    The Prime Minister: Saving British jobs is the issue upon which to draw the line. The right hon. Gentleman may be prepared to live in an area of high unemployment. Unemployment in Britain is falling–I want it to come down much further–but prescriptive directives from Brussels will stop that. We shall seek treaty change, without which there will be no conclusion to the intergovernmental conference. I shall not accept the nonsense that the right hon. Gentleman has been talking about the directive without understanding its impact on British companies. I have written today to the President of the Commission to make clear that we are tabling our proposals for a change in the treaty, and we shall expect that change to be agreed.

     

    Q3. Mr. Luff: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 12 November.

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

    Mr. Luff: In the light of the demolition by the Confederation of British Industry of the case for a so-called windfall tax on the privatised utilities, will my right hon. Friend take this opportunity to reassure the House that he will not make it his policy to impose such a tax? Does he agree that the effect of such a tax on the prices of shares held by trade unions and other pension funds would, in fact, be a tax on pensioners–to say nothing about the disastrous effects on consumers through higher prices?

    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend is of course right. A windfall tax would hit consumers; it would hit shareholders; it would hit employees. It is a tax not on utilities but on jobs, pensions and people’s utility bills. The shadow Chancellor either cannot or still will not tell the House which privatised companies would pay, how much they would pay and how he would stop investment and customers being hit. If he wants professional advice as to what such a tax might mean, perhaps he might go home and seek it. He ought to tell the House exactly what he proposes. His silence means that the only thing that we know for sure is that Labour would put up taxes and is keeping quiet about just how much the increase would be.

     

    Q4. Sir David Steel: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 12 November.

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

    Sir David Steel: May I refer the right hon. Gentleman back to the negotiations that took place over the European directive? If he looks at Hansard, he will find that, on 7 July 1992, the Secretary of State for Education and Employment boasted to the House that

    “the United Kingdom secured all its key objectives, in particular the right for employees to work for more than 48 hours a week if they choose to do so.”–[Official Report, 7 July 1992; Vol. 211, c. 175.]

    In a word, she said, “We have won.” Was she not right? If they won, why are they going to war over something that they did not even vote against?

    The Prime Minister: My right hon. Friend did get significant exclusions–that is true–but the directive is damaging. We made it clear from the outset that we would seek a change in the European Court and that we would then seek to have the directive’s impact reversed. The right hon. Gentleman should realise two things. First, this is a damaging directive. Secondly, if we were to accept this directive under that treaty head, it would be but the first of many others, as was implicitly made clear by the European Commissioner this morning. I am concerned to ensure that we protect our jobs and our competitiveness. All over Europe–[Interruption.] Hon. Members do not like it. There are 18 million unemployed people across Europe. Elsewhere in Europe, they are staying unemployed; here, they are getting back into work. That is why we will not accept such legislation.

    Mr. Lamont: Surely the real issue is not whether what the Leader of the Opposition says is right or wrong or whether the working time directive is right or wrong, but whether the matter ought to be decided in Brussels or by the elected Government of this country. What is the point in holding elections if the elected Government cannot carry out the policies on which they were elected?

    The Prime Minister: I have no objection at all to businesses and their employees reaching whatever agreement they wish on working hours. That is entirely right in a properly functioning competitive economy. Like my right hon. Friend, what I object to in principle is working conditions being dictated from Brussels when they should be determined here, in this House. Other European countries can accept that if they wish, but they cannot then complain if businesses relocate from the rest of Europe to here as a result–like the 1,200 that Le Figaro reported last week have relocated from France to here. As Le Figaro said:

    “Why stay in France if conditions for entrepreneurs are better in Britain?”

    I do not want that said of Britain. That is why we are determined to keep the right measures to create jobs for our citizens in the future.

     

    Q5. Mr. Rooney: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 12 November.

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

    Mr. Rooney: Will the Prime Minister tell the House why he favours a free vote on caning but not on gun control?

    The Prime Minister: If the hon. Gentleman thinks the question of gun control is appropriate for a free vote, I do not agree with him. [Hon. Members: “Why?”] The Government considered the Cullen report, we made a judgment on the right way to implement it and we propose to stand by that judgment, lay it before the House of Commons and invite it to support us.

     

    Q6. Mr. Alexander: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 12 November.

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

    Mr. Alexander: May I draw my right hon. Friend’s attention to the by-election result on Thursday to Newark and Sherwood district council? The Conservative candidate, Mr. Bryan Richardson, took the seat from Labour with a swing of 5.8 per cent. May I put it to my right hon. Friend that results such as that are far more typical of support in the country than the public opinion polls, and that if we continue with sensible policies my right hon. Friend is on course for a record fifth Conservative victory?

    The Prime Minister: I congratulate Mr. Richardson on his win, although I am assured by the Under-Secretary of State for Social Security, my hon. Friend, the Member for Gedling (Mr. Mitchell), that we have taken seats with even larger swings elsewhere in Nottinghamshire in the past two or three weeks. What we are seeing, if I may put it this way, is Conservatives coming home.

  • PMQT – 7 November 1996

    Below is the text of Prime Minister’s Question Time from 7th November 1996. Michael Heseltine responded on behalf of John Major.

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Engagements

    Q1. Mr. Garnier: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 7 November.

    The Deputy Prime Minister (Mr. Michael Heseltine): I have been asked to reply.

    This morning, my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister presided at a meeting of the Cabinet and had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. My right hon. Friend has now departed for Bordeaux to attend the Anglo-French summit.

    Mr. Garnier: May I commiserate with my right hon. Friend on the damage recently caused to his property by a gang of criminal thugs, which included two Labour councillors? Will he take this opportunity to contrast the Government’s record on law and order with the pathetic performance of the smarmy army on the Opposition Benches? That smarmy army has not even criticised, let alone disciplined, those two Labour councillors.

    The Deputy Prime Minister: I am grateful to my hon. and learned Friend. I must say that, when I looked out of my window, it seemed like old times–the winter of discontent, with the Labour party on the streets; the mobs of the 1980s, with the Labour party on the streets; and then, in the 1990s, Labour councillors on people’s private property, causing damage and disruption: and the characteristic of all three? Not a word of protest from the parliamentary Labour party. Labour Members talk about being tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime, but they do not even have the energy to walk through the Lobbies when we are fighting crime.

    Mr. Prescott: Can the Deputy Prime Minister tell the House why, 50 years ago this week, the Tories voted against the creation of the national health service?

    The Deputy Prime Minister: The right hon. Gentleman will know that, after 50 years, the health service has been administered and supported by Tory Governments for longer than by Labour Governments. Because of that, we have made it one of the best health services in the world.

    Mr. Prescott: Does the Deputy Prime Minister not understand–[Interruption.]

    Madam Speaker: Order.

    Mr. Prescott: Does the Deputy Prime Minister not understand that the people simply do not believe the Tories on health? Does he not remember that, before the last election, the Prime Minister promised to cut taxes year on year? They went up year on year. Now the same Prime Minister is promising to increase health spending year on year. Is that not like the tax promise? Should not all Tory pre-election promises carry a Government health warning?

    The Deputy Prime Minister: The right hon. Gentleman will know that, under this Government, health expenditure has gone up every year. If he really cares about the health service, why will he not, on behalf of his party, now give a commitment to match our pledge to increase, year on year, real-terms expenditure on the health service?

    Mr. Prescott: The Deputy Prime Minister fails to understand that our national health service, set up by a Labour Government 50 years ago, was the greatest peacetime achievement of any Government this century. Is not the simple truth this: the British people know that the only way to safeguard our health service for the next 50 years is to elect a Labour Government, and the sooner the better?

    The Deputy Prime Minister: The British people know that the Labour party will not give the pledge that the Conservatives have already given. After all, we hear all about windfall taxes. If they are so profitable and so available, why cannot windfall taxes finance the health service? The reason is, of course, that there is not an easy killing of a windfall tax any more than there is a genuine commitment from Labour to the health service.

    Mr. Pickles: Is my right hon. Friend aware that, in a seminar in my constituency, the chief economist for the National Westminster bank predicted that small businesses would be particularly vulnerable to a minimum wage? He warned that a minimum wage would cost thousands of jobs in Essex. Will my right hon. Friend give an assurance that the Government will never introduce a minimum wage?

    The Deputy Prime Minister: Any fool knows that a minimum wage costs jobs. After all, the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull, East (Mr. Prescott), the shadow leader of the Labour party, has already said so.

    Mr. Prescott: Don’t get too excited.

    The Deputy Prime Minister: I am always excited by the right hon. Gentleman. The whole House is excited by him. He is an exciting person. Never has someone been so wrong, so often, on so many subjects.

     

    Q2. Mr. Gunnell: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 7 November.

    The Deputy Prime Minister: I have been asked to reply.

    I refer the hon. Gentleman to the reply I gave some moments ago, before my observations about the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull, East.

    Mr. Gunnell: Will the Deputy Prime Minister join me in welcoming the support given by players of Leeds United, of Leeds rugby league club and of Yorkshire county cricket club to the urgent appeal for funds by Leeds general infirmary for essential equipment, which, it says, it cannot afford because of the national health service funding level? Is it not an absolute scandal that, after 17 years of this Government, that hospital, having closed 40 beds only last month, is forced to beg to survive?

    The Deputy Prime Minister: I would overwhelmingly support anyone who sought to raise funds for charitable purposes for the health service. One of the most exciting additional supports to health funding in Britain has come from the idea of my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister to ensure that part of lottery proceeds go to charities in Britain. [Interruption.] I am sorry that Opposition Members are prepared to sneer at charitable giving in Britain. I realise that they would rather tax people into a position where charity was compulsory, as opposed to relying on people’s natural instinct to give, but I cannot believe that the purpose of such a generous decision by the various players to whom the hon. Gentleman has referred is designed to turn the health service into a party political matter.

     

    Q3. Mr. Ian Bruce: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 7 November.

    The Deputy Prime Minister: I have been asked to reply.

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

    Mr. Bruce: Will my right hon. Friend have a chance to speak to the Prime Minister while he is in France preparing for the summit and get him to bring back a few souvenirs for Opposition Members? I have in mind in particular some recent issues of Le Figaro newspaper, which extolled the virtues of what had happened to French companies that had come to the United Kingdom to invest in British firms, highlighting particularly the low cost base here and the stable, growing economy.

    The Deputy Prime Minister: My hon. Friend is right to draw to the attention of the House the remarkable article in Le Figaro. Indeed, my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister drew my attention to it earlier today. The House will be pleased to know that copies of the article are on their way to this country. For the benefit of many Labour Members, translations will be freely available.

     

    Q4. Mr. Bayley: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 7 November.

    The Deputy Prime Minister: I have been asked to reply.

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

    Mr. Bayley: Will the right hon. Gentleman remind the House of the new rules that were introduced to curb the abuse by former Conservative Ministers such as Peter Walker and Norman Tebbit, who left the Government and moved to the boardrooms of companies that they privatised while in office? Does he agree that it is an absolute disgrace that the Minister who privatised London’s buses–the hon. Member for Epping Forest (Mr. Norris)–has moved from his boudoir at the Department of Transport to the profitable and sweet embrace of Capital City Bus?

    The Deputy Prime Minister: The House will want to take that question extremely seriously because a most serious allegation has been made against my hon. Friend the Member for Epping Forest (Mr. Norris). My hon. Friend has not accepted any job with Capital City Bus or any other company. He has consulted the advisory committee on business appointments and, of course, he will follow any advice that that committee gives.

    I want to stand back from the regrettable nature of the question asked by the hon. Member for York (Mr. Bayley) and say that the only reason why no Labour ex-Ministers are in a similar position is that there have been no Labour ex-Ministers in recent memory. However, when there were Labour ex-Ministers, what was Lord Marsh doing–[Hon. Members: “He was a Tory.”] When he was at the Dispatch Box, he was a Labour Minister. He only became a Tory when he realised that we were right and he was wrong. What have Labour Members to say about Edmund Dell, who became head of Guinness? What do they have to say about Lord Varley, the former Energy Secretary? What about Lord Barnett, who is on the boards of a raft of different companies? It is one rule for them and one rule for everybody else–hypocrisy from start to finish.

     

    Q5. Mr. Jessel: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 7 November.

    The Deputy Prime Minister: I have been asked to reply.

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

    Mr. Jessel: As next year will be the 50th anniversary of the independence of India, and as relations between India and Britain have never been better, do the Government intend to supplement the Queen’s visit to India, the visit of our Prime Minister to India as guest of honour on Republic Day and my right hon. Friend’s visit to India to launch the Indo-British partnership initiative, with events in this country to mark the jubilee? Will he bear in mind that a large proportion of Indian people who are resident in Britain are natural supporters of the enterprise economy?

    The Deputy Prime Minister: My hon. Friend has left out of his list the distinguished role that he has played for 25 years as an officer and chairman of the all-party Indo-British group. He will be pleased to know that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has invited my noble Friend Lord Cranborne to chair the group to determine how we can progress with such an important anniversary.

    Mr. Janner: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the Government have rejected the recommendation of the Employment Committee that, in the unemployment statistics, the Government should include details of the 12 categories excluded from those figures? In those circumstances, does he recognise that the true number of unemployed is not just over 2 million, but nearer 4 million, and that the Government’s present figures are a complete sham and a fiddle?

    The Deputy Prime Minister: I seem to remember the hon. and learned Gentleman producing reports saying that 100,000 jobs would go in the aftermath of the closure of the mines. Unemployment has fallen every month since.

     

    Q6. Mr. Lidington: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 7 November.

    The Deputy Prime Minister: I have been asked to reply.

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

    Mr. Lidington: Has my right hon. Friend seen recent reports that about 40 per cent. of those leaving the jobless register are now setting up as self-employed to provide work not only for themselves but for other people? Does he agree that that augurs well for the present and future competitiveness of the country, enabling us to look forward to levels of unemployment continuing to fall in my constituency and throughout the nation?

    The Deputy Prime Minister: I am grateful to my hon. Friend, who is, of course, right. We have the highest proportion of our population at work of any major European country. The forecasts are that our position will continue to improve. I am delighted to recognise the announcement this morning by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education and Employment of a significant extension of project work to concentrate particularly on those who have been unemployed for more than two years.

     

    Q7. Mr. Michael: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 7 November.

    The Deputy Prime Minister: I have been asked to reply.

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

    Mr. Michael: Has the Deputy Prime Minister seen advertisements for articles such as the Vindicator knife and the Rambo short sword? Does he agree that it would be a good idea to make it illegal to advertise or offer for sale such weapons in a manner that appears to condone or encourage violence?

    The Deputy Prime Minister: As the whole House knows, my right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary is in discussions with Labour and Liberal Democrat Members, but those discussions have not led to a simplistic definition that would have enabled the law to be changed. In other words, my right hon. and learned Friend was correct to say that this is a complex matter to which a satisfactory legal outcome has not so far been found. The whole House will be glad of my right hon. and learned Friend’s announcement yesterday about strengthening police powers of stop and search, particularly of those people who are likely to be carrying knives.

  • Mr Major’s Commons Speech on the 1996 Queen’s Speech Debate – 23 October 1996

    Below is the text of Mr Major’s Commons speech during the 1996 Debate on the Queen’s Speech on 23rd October 1996.

    PRIME MINISTER:

    The Prime Minister (Mr. John Major) The right hon. Member for Sedgefield (Mr. Blair) has already generously paid tribute to the hon. Members who have died during the past year. We shall all miss David Lightbown and Terry Patchett. Perhaps on behalf of everyone in the House, I can not only say that, but thank them for their long service, both for their constituents and for their country, in this place.

    I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for Sutton Coldfield (Sir N. Fowler) and my hon. Friend the Member for Isle of Wight (Mr. Field) on their excellent speeches proposing and seconding the Loyal Address. My right hon. Friend was the Secretary of State when I first joined the old Department of Health and Social Security. I learned speedily that he had both a generous disposition and a very precise mind. Over early morning interviews, often at short notice, on obscure but controversial social security matters, he was always especially generous and insisted that I took all of them. He was Secretary of State for six years before the sheer weight of work in that combined Department led to health and social security, rightly, becoming separate Departments.

    More recently, my right hon. Friend joined me throughout the last general election campaign. His role was absolutely invaluable, but it did have one drawback: whenever we were together, people threw eggs at him. I had no idea how controversial he was. When he shouted, “Duck,” I thought that it was a warning, but it was not – it was the type of egg. As I told the House, he had a very precise mind.

    My right hon. Friend reminded us that he pioneered the practice of leaving to spend more time with his family. After the general election, I invited him to become chairman of the Conservative party. To avoid any dispute, I should like to make it clear that that was expressly not at the request of his family. He is a distinguished journalist and we cannot say that of many. These days, he is chairman of a newspaper group and he will know the old saying: “Never argue with a man who buys his ink by the gallon.” I do not, and I congratulate him on his speech.

    My hon. Friend the Member for Isle of Wight also spoke extremely well. I was delighted – in some ways relieved – to see him in his place, as he has a poor reputation for time-keeping and tends to arrive for any function at the last moment. On one occasion, I am told, he left to join his wife on the Isle of Wight ferry as it left the dock. Breaking into a sprint, he leapt dramatically over open water and landed on the moving deck. As he did so, he turned around to see his wife on the quay. As he was late, she had got off. Undaunted, he leapt back ashore with the fastest recorded U-turn in political history.

    Apart from his political career, my hon. Friend once owned a large share in one of Britain’s largest funeral director companies. It is often said of politicians that they will always let you down in the end. In my hon. Friend’s 22 case, that might often have been literally true. Today, my hon. Friend let no one down, and I warmly congratulate him.

    There were two light-hearted speeches to begin, and rather a brazen speech to follow. The leader of the Labour party sought to draw Britain’s ills forward with sweeping generalisations about the state of our society.

    Mr. Keith Mans (Wyre) Will my right hon. Friend give way?

    The Prime Minister Of course, but a little later.

    Of course I agree with the right hon. Member for Sedgefield that there are many problems to be solved. Some of them, concerned with education and crime, are dealt with specifically in this legislative programme. However, we must examine reality, not what the right hon. Gentleman had to say.

    With more people finding work, regional differences in unemployment are declining. Strikes are at their lowest levels since records began. More young people than ever before are gaining qualifications in full-time education and training. More people than ever before own their homes and have a share in a capital-owning democracy. There is new hope and investment in inner cities. Charitable giving is the largest we have seen at any stage in our history. Voluntary work is at record levels, with more than half the population engaged in it. We have created one of the most mobile societies in Europe, giving people the opportunity to better themselves through their own efforts.

    There is far more that is good in our society than is bad. We should be glad of that, not take every opportunity to run our society down – as the right hon. Gentleman does. Of course we face challenges, but our job as politicians is to find practical solutions, often to complex problems. To over-simplify matters, as the right hon. Gentleman did, is to deceive and not to engage with the real problems with which politicians have to deal.

    Any politician should be cautious about cloaking himself in righteousness. I do not know how the right hon. Gentleman can disclaim, as he has just done, any responsibility by the Labour party for faults in this society when his Labour party has, over the years, consistently championed every fashionable, politically correct cause that has undermined our traditional way of life, and has opposed every measure that we have taken to correct the balance.

    It was Labour that banned competitive sport in schools. It was Labour that undermined traditional approaches and sponsored every anti-establishment pressure group that it could possibly find. It was Labour that opposed measures to restore standards in schools through tests and league tables. It was Labour that opposed the freedom of grant-maintained schools and has opposed every measure that we put forward to tackle crime. Labour has also opposed common-sense measures to deal with benefit fraud. I do not think that I am inclined to accept sanctimonious lectures from the Leader of the Opposition.

    There was much that the Labour leader did not get around to mentioning. The right hon. Gentleman did not mention the longest run of low inflation for a generation or that unemployment is at a five-and-a-half-year low. He did not mention that mortgages are at their lowest for 30 years. The right hon. Gentleman was not only selective and wrong about our record, but equally evasive and misleading about his policies. There was no mention in the right hon. Gentleman’s speech of taking child benefit away from parents of children aged between 16 and 18. There was no mention of the windfall tax that would jack up household bills and destroy the dividends of millions of people. There was no mention of the additional tax just for the privilege of living in Scotland – nothing about that, or about how the right hon. Gentleman’s policies would destroy jobs.

    When the Leader of the Opposition fleshes out his policies with detail, we might listen with some interest to the right hon. Gentleman’s critique of our detailed policies.

    Mr. Geoffrey Hoon (Ashfield) On the subject of consistency, does the Prime Minister recall supporting in 1990 the Government’s White Paper on minimum determinate sentences, which stated that such an approach would result in more acquittals by juries, and in more guilty men and women going free? Is that not precisely Government policy now?

    The Prime Minister I shall come quite specifically to that point in a little while, and the hon. Gentleman will get his answer then.

    The leader of the Labour party ignored the fact that our economy is now the most competitive in Europe, with exports at record levels, business investment rising and more inward investment than any other country in Europe. Last week, Vauxhall announced plans for a huge new investment at Ellesmere Port – 200 new jobs. In August, it was Chiyoda Europe at Bexhill – 600 jobs; in July, LG in Newport – 6,000 jobs; Lite on Tech in Lanarkshire – 1,000 jobs; and Hyundai in Dunfermline – 2,000 jobs.

    Mr. Gordon Brown (Dunfermline, East) indicated assent.

    The Prime Minister The shadow Chancellor nods his head in agreement. How lucky the right hon. Gentleman is that those business men listened to our record and not to his gloomy prognosis for our country. What we have seen – and what foreign businesses have noticed – is a complete transformation of this nation’s economic prospects.

    Mr. Mans Would my right hon. Friend care to comment on a statement made by the right hon. Member for Sedgefield that the last Labour Government spent more in real terms on the national health service? I have checked with the House of Commons Library. At today’s prices, in 1978–79 a total of £23.3 billion was spent on the NHS. In the last financial year, the present Government spent £39.7 billion. Will my right hon. Friend give the right hon. Member for Sedgefield the opportunity to correct that mistake?

    The Prime Minister That was not, of course, the only inaccuracy in the right hon. Gentleman’s speech. If he would like to withdraw that statement, I shall give way to him so that he can do so immediately.

    Well, there we are – the inaccuracy must lie on the record in the right hon. Gentleman’s name. As I have said, it was not the only inaccuracy in the litany of misery with which he regaled the House.

    Mr. Paul Flynn (Newport, West) The Korean semiconductor jobs are very welcome in my constituency, but does the Prime Minister realise that they will be located just two fields away from where British semiconductor jobs were located two years ago? Can the Prime Minister explain why the British semiconductor jobs relocated to a country that has both the minimum wage and the social chapter?

    The Prime Minister If the hon. Gentleman looks at the drift of investment, he will see that there is more coming here than to the rest of Europe combined. It is coming here because of our economic framework, our tax framework, the fact that we do not have a minimum wage, the fact that we do not have a social chapter and the fact that we have less expensive on-costs for employment than any other nation in Europe. If the hon. Gentleman talked to the other European Heads of Government, he would find that they know that and if they could get out of the position that they are in, many of them would wish to do so. The hon. Gentleman cannot argue with the inward investment figures that we have seen.

    Our programme will build on the economic success and it will do so in a way that will widen both opportunity and choice.

    Mr. Simon Hughes (Southwark and Bermondsey) Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

    The Prime Minister I shall give way to the hon. Gentleman in a few moments.

    Our programme will encourage personal responsibility. It will increase parental choice over schools, and also patients’ choices from their doctors. It will give the police new powers to catch criminals and the courts new means to deal with them. It will reform civil law. It has measures to combat fraud in the social security system. It will protect our heritage, our environment and our rural communities. It will provide a legal framework for decommissioning weapons in Northern Ireland. By any yardstick, that is a meaty Queen’s Speech, and we intend to carry the programme through in the period between now and the election.

    In addition, my right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer will unveil his fourth Budget next month. It will be a prudent Budget: if we can safely cut taxes we will, but if we cannot we will not. I repeat – if we cannot, we will not. Either way, we have a responsibility to spend taxpayers’ money wisely.

    That is why we will act against benefit fraud. The measures that we have already taken will save £1.5 billion a year, but we intend to save more. Every bit of fraud robs the taxpayer and deprives the genuinely needy of help, and I am surprised that the Opposition Chief Whip scoffs at the thought of cracking down on benefit fraud. We will see where the Opposition are and how keen they are when we come to vote on the distinct measures to deal with the problems.

    Dr. John Reid (Motherwell, North) Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

    The Prime Minister In a moment – a queue is forming. I know that the Opposition have produced a long list of interventions that they propose to put to me, as someone generously left them on the photocopier. If hon. Members could just shout out the numbers, it would make life much easier. The paper is headed, “Interventions on Major”, and I can look forward to questions on Europe, the economy, education, beef, crime, health and other matters. I look forward to finding out whether hon. Members can remember them after the training that they have undoubtedly had from the right hon. Member for Sedgefield.

    Mr. Simon Hughes rose –

    The Prime Minister I do not think that the questions were handed to the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes).

    Mr. Hughes May I ask the Prime Minister a question of which I have not given him notice? It is a common allegation about the Tory party that it looks after its own first. The Prime Minister has the safest Tory seat in the country, with low unemployment and low crime. My seat has the lowest Tory vote in England, with high unemployment and high crime. Why did the Queen’s speech say nothing about achieving a significant reduction in unemployment in areas such as mine?

    On the day when a national commission of inquiry into the prevention of child abuse recommended that we need a national register of offenders against children, why did the Queen’s Speech fail to mention the register of paedophiles, when all parties in the House would assist the Government in passing it quickly into legislation?

    The Prime Minister I will return to the hon. Gentleman’s second point in a moment. On the first point, as the hon. Gentleman knows, unemployment has now been falling across every part of the United Kingdom throughout the past 30 months, and there is every indication that that will continue. A fall in unemployment is created by the right economic circumstances, a growing economy, low inflation and the lowest possible interest rates. It cannot be done simply by expenditure measures, as we have learnt often enough in the period since the second world war.

    That is why I have said that the Budget will be prudent. It will be prudent to ensure continuing growth because in my judgment that is the best way to get the hon. Gentleman’s constituents back to work. I wish to see that for social and other reasons, and we shall continue to follow policies which try to put as many people as possible back into proper employment. By proper employment I do not mean artificially created jobs, but genuine jobs with genuine prospects for a long-term future. That is the policy that we have been following, and I agree with the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey about the importance of that.

    Before I was interrupted, I was dealing with benefit fraud. We propose to take further measures to deal with that. Those measures will include fines and in severe cases prison sentences for those who deceive in order to obtain benefits fraudulently. We intend to adopt new measures to detect fraud. If the Inland Revenue knows that someone is working, the benefit offices should know also if that person tries to sign on, and in future they will.

    We want to ensure that local councils are cracking down hard on housing benefit fraud. Some do, but others are less successful. We intend to set up a fraud inspectorate to make sure that they are doing all they can and to impose financial sanctions if they are not.

    We intend to reform the compensation recovery scheme. Millions of pounds are paid out to accident victims each year to cover them before compensation is paid. That is right and proper and no one objects to it. However, when a settlement is reached, it is also right that the benefit element should be repaid to the taxpayer, so we will make two important changes. The compensation that accident victims receive for pain and suffering will remain protected, but we shall make sure that the taxpayer does not lose by requiring a refund of benefits paid out for circumstances subsequently covered by the insurance compensation.

    Our legislative programme will also ensure that rural communities share in the benefits of economic success. We intend to give more power to local parish councils to run their own crime prevention schemes or to set up community transport schemes – more responsibility and more power at the most local level.

    We intend to help small village shops and post offices, which face difficulties as shopping patterns change. Our Bill will reduce their rates bill by at least 50 per cent. and give councils the discretion to waive up to the remaining 50 per cent.

    Let me return to health. The right hon. Member for Sedgefield said a few minutes ago that he would like to see health at the centre of the general election campaign. At the last general election campaign, the Labour party put health, in the form of Jennifer’s ear, right at the centre for three successive days, and we received the largest vote that any political party has ever received at a general election. In this legislative programme, we intend to take action to improve primary health care.

    Mr. William O’Brien (Normanton) Will the Prime Minister consider the situation in which a hospital trust is penalised financially for treating too many patients? That happened to the Pinderfields hospital in my constituency. Will he ensure that that does not happen again?

    The Prime Minister I shall certainly examine that situation. I note that the hon. Gentleman supports trusts because they are treating more patients. I am delighted that he sees how successful they are.

    The main contact with the health service is through the general practitioner. Over recent years, the service provided by GPs has already improved significantly in most parts of the country, not least thanks to the development of fundholding. The more we can improve the care given by the GP, the more we can relieve the pressure which otherwise would fall on hospitals.

    It is far more convenient for patients if they can get their care locally instead of having to travel in some cases to distant hospitals. If patients need physiotherapy or chiropody, for example, why should not their GPs provide it if they wish to do so? If local communities can benefit from a local clinic offering cataract treatment, why should they not have it? I know of no good reason, and we propose to introduce legislation to make that possible.

    Mr. Richard Burden (Birmingham, Northfield) Will the Prime Minister give way?

    The Prime Minister I should like to make a little progress.

    I believe that parents have a right to a bigger role in their children’s education. Giving choice to parents is right in itself and it will help to raise standards.

    Mr. David Blunkett (Sheffield, Brightside) What choice is there?

    The Prime Minister If the hon. Gentleman had his way, there would be no choice whatever: no choice as to where children go to school, no choice as to what sort of school they go to, no choice as to whether parents could see the school’s results and no choice as to how the tests would be carried out at that school. The hon. Gentleman would prefer education to be a secret garden for himself and the professionals, with no information for the parents.

    We have provided greater information and greater resources. Our education Bill will raise standards by extending choice. Where parents want more selection, they will have the opportunity for more selection in the Bill. I make that point to the hon. Member for Bath (Mr. Foster), the Liberal education spokesman, who clearly did not know it at lunchtime on television.

    Where parents want more grammar schools, they will have more grammar schools, and where they want grant-maintained schools to expand, they will. It is called choice. We Conservatives believe in choice, and we intend to deliver it.

    Mr. D. N. Campbell-Savours (Workington) Will the Prime Minister give way?

    The Prime Minister The hon. Gentleman must allow me to make some progress.

    We intend to give schools new powers to improve discipline, by allowing new sanctions against unruly pupils and by encouraging parents to take more responsibility for their children’s behaviour.

    Mr. Blunkett indicated dissent.

    The Prime Minister I see that the hon. Gentleman opposes action to help with discipline in schools. I hope that the teachers’ unions will note the position that he is taking.

    For every pupil in the land, we now spend half as much again, over and above inflation, as in 1979. But spending alone does not deliver higher standards. Lambeth – a Labour education authority – spends more per secondary pupil than any other authority in the country, but it is in the bottom five for performance. Islington’s performance is the worst in the country, although only a handful of authorities spend more per pupil. Buckinghamshire – a Tory authority – is one of the 10 best performing authorities, despite below average spending on pupils. So adequate resources are important, but they are not the only ingredient for good education.

    Mr. Blunkett Tell that to the parents.

    The Prime Minister Some of the parents have noted it for themselves. Some parents have moved their children from high-spending Islington schools to lower-spending others. I suggest that the hon. Gentleman speaks to parents in the Labour party before he walks into that again.

    If education, education, education is a Labour passion, why does Labour not improve education at a local level now? The hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside (Mr. Blunkett) said that Labour controls the education authorities, so why are they not taking the action that they think necessary now? What action do they take? Absolutely none. Instead, we see parents moving their children out of education authorities such as Southwark and Islington and running away from inefficient and incompetent Labour education authorities. The hon. Gentleman is right about one thing: parents know. They know that in too many education authorities the only standards that Labour knows are low standards and double standards. If there are problems in society, the right hon. Member for Sedgefield might look at poorly performing Labour education authorities as one of the roots.

    I come now to our proposals on law and order. The right hon. Member for Sedgefield had much to say about that. He seems to know everything about crime except how to reduce it. Labour demonstrates its commitment to action on crime just so long as that action is not something that the Conservative Government are proposing.

    The right hon. Gentleman made an offer at the Dispatch Box which I take to be genuine. Both he and the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey spoke of the private Members’ legislation on paedophiles and stalking.

    Mr. Campbell-Savours They are not private Members’ Bills.

    The Prime Minister Will the hon. Gentleman let me continue? Both Bills are in the course of being drafted. Drafting approval was given some time ago. They have never been in the Queen’s Speech. They were intended to be private Members’ Bills because we judged that the House would pass them speedily. [Interruption.]

    Madam Speaker Order.

    The Prime Minister The right hon. Member for Sedgefield today offered the House his unequivocal support for a speedy passage through the House for those Bills as Government Bills. The hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey, the Liberal spokesman, offered precisely the same deal. I accept that deal. We were determined to put the Bills through. We shall now get them through, and I hope that Opposition Members will facilitate their speedy passage.

    If Opposition Members are concerned about crime, I hope that they will give us the same support on the other crime-tackling Bills in our programme. I hope that they will not eat up time on those two Bills to try to wreck the other Bills tackling crime that we have brought forward. I am prepared to accept that the right hon. Member for Sedgefield spoke in good faith. Since there is no dispute in the House as to the merits of the Bills on paedophiles and on stalking, let us bring them forward as soon as they are drafted and pass them speedily as Government Bills. I undertake that we shall do that.

    Mr. A. J. Beith (Berwick-upon-Tweed) I do not know whether the Prime Minister has ever tried to take a private Member’s Bill through the House. I am not sure that he has. Will he confirm that the first date on which either Bill could be considered – [Interruption.]

    Madam Speaker Order. The right hon. Gentleman has a perfect right to put a question. I know what hon. Members are all saying. Wait for the answer.

    Mr. Beith Will the Prime Minister confirm that, if the Bills were presented as private Member’s Bills, those Ministers who have said in the past two days that that procedure would afford them a quicker passage were not telling the truth, and that only if Government time is available for those Bills will they be able to get through the House before the general election?

    The Prime Minister To be fair to the right hon. Gentleman, I do not think that he can have taken in what I just said. I said that, in view of the unequivocal offer of support from the Leader of the Opposition and the Opposition spokesman, we would bring the Bills forward as separate Government Bills. I shall rely on the Opposition retaining the pledges that they have given. If the measures had been in the crime Bill, which was another option, it would have taken a long time to get them through and they would no doubt have been under consistent attack, for I suspect that much of the crime Bill will be attacked by the Opposition. Now that will not happen on these measures, and I look to the right hon. Gentleman to sustain the support that the right hon. Member for Yeovil (Mr. Ashdown) has offered to the House.

    Mr. Blair Let me respond to the Prime Minister and say that I am absolutely delighted that he intends to present Bills containing those measures. The offer that he has just accepted is the offer that my hon. Friend the Member for Blackburn (Mr. Straw) made to the Home Secretary and which was rejected yesterday. Nevertheless, we are delighted: it shows the country what we can achieve even in opposition.

    The Prime Minister On certain matters we have always sought to accommodate the Opposition. We have sought, of course, to accommodate the Opposition in relation to delaying Lord Cullen’s report. There are matters on which cross-party support is welcome and will be accepted. Now that we have had a clear statement on the Floor of the House, I am happy to accept it, and we will now go ahead.

    Let me turn –

    Mr. Simon Hughes Will the Prime Minister give way?

    The Prime Minister I think that I have taken enough interventions. [Interruption.]

    Madam Speaker Order. The hon. Member must resume his seat and not talk across the Floor of the House.

    The Prime Minister I should like to make a little progress now. I have taken a number of interventions.

    Mr. Harry Cohen (Leyton) Will the Prime Minister give way?

    The Prime Minister If the hon. Gentleman will forgive me, I should like to make a little progress. I have given way to Opposition Members on a number of occasions. I want to turn to other matters relating to crime.

    I think that it is a matter of common consent across the House that criminal gangs respect no county or national borders. National and international crime requires a nationally organised system to combat it. So we intend to legislate for a national crime squad, bringing together the existing regional crime squads into a single body to attack serious crime. I believe that that also deserves strong support across the House.

    I want now to turn to sentencing. If the public see a fraudster sentenced to five years in prison, they are rightly angry to see him released after serving about half his sentence. Sentences served should match more closely sentences passed. I am sure that the public agree with that, and we intend to provide for it. We also propose to change some of the sentences. We have already increased sentences for serious crimes such as drug trafficking and attempted rape. We will now go further and propose automatic life sentences for anyone convicted of a second serious violent or sexual offence. We intend also to introduce minimum sentences for serious offenders such as persistent house burglars and drug dealers.

    We are also looking at new ways to prevent juvenile crime. We intend to publish a green paper setting out some new ideas for consultation within a very short time. Last week, my right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary and my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland set out the Government’s proposals for firearms control, following Lord Cullen’s inquiry into the tragedy of Dunblane. I know that there are differences in the House on the proposal, but I also know that the overwhelming belief is that the new legislation should be enacted as speedily as possible. That is why we have reached a collective view, as we were invited to do, and we intend to put it before the House in the usual way. The House will then make its judgment.

    Mr. Dennis Canavan (Falkirk, West) Under the Government’s proposals, as many as 40,000 handguns would still be legally circulating in Britain. How on earth can the Prime Minister justify that in the aftermath of the Dunblane massacre?

    The Prime Minister We undertook a very careful examination of Lord Cullen’s report and, as the hon. Gentleman knows, we have gone farther than Lord Cullen recommended. I rather share the view of the hon. Member for Hartlepool (Mr. Mandelson), who was quoted earlier, that many people ‘will still be able to own handguns but they must be kept safely under lock and key at properly run centres.’ The hon. Gentleman took that view, and so, I believe, did the official Labour party until very shortly before the statement was made in the House. I believe that that is the right way to deal with it, but the House will be able to make its own judgment. We shall bring forward our proposals – [Interruption.] We shall bring forward a Bill in the usual way, as I said a moment ago. We have formed a judgment as to what is right, and we shall invite the House and the Conservative party to support that.

    Miss Kate Hoey (Vauxhall) rose –

    Mr. David Winnick (Walsall, North) rose –

    Mr. Blair rose –

    The Prime Minister I give way to the right hon. Member for Sedgefield.

    Mr. Blair I believe that the Prime Minister rightly changed his judgment earlier on a different matter. Will he now reconsider his judgment on this matter and, on this aspect, about which he is right that there may be different views on both sides of the House, allow a free vote so that the House can make up its mind on that basis?

    The Prime Minister With respect to the right hon. Gentleman, we had already provided drafting advice for those Bills. We did not change our mind. I have accepted the right hon. Gentleman’s word that he will facilitate the speedy passage of this measure through the House. That is obviously better than a private Member’s Bill. It is not a change of mind. We have made our judgment on what we believe to be the right response to Lord Cullen, and I have just set it out.

    We propose also to reform civil law.

    Miss Hoey rose –

    Mr. Winnick rose –

    The Prime Minister If hon. Members will forgive me, I wish to make progress.

    Too many people in this country have found their right to justice too often barred by costly and lengthy procedures. If a pensioner is in dispute with a garage about a car repair bill, or a home owner with a builder, they should not expect a huge legal bill for resolving the matter. Our legal system should encourage such disputes to be resolved speedily. With that in mind, we intend to implement Lord Woolf’s recommendations for a simplified set of rules in our civil courts – a system of fast-track procedures to encourage settlements and cut costs.

    We also intend to act to preserve and improve physical heritage. We intend to introduce a Bill to allow lottery funds to be used to widen access to heritage in many ways. I will not now set them out to the House, but the objective is to ensure that more people can be enriched by enjoying our heritage.

    We also propose to introduce measures to enact Lord Donaldson’s report following the Braer incident some time ago. Our measures will create wider powers to inspect suspect ships, enforce exclusion zones around accident sites and make those responsible for accidents bear more of the cost.

    I wish now briefly to turn to Northern Ireland. Earlier this year, the House passed legislation to allow elections in Northern Ireland as the basis for multi-party talks. That process brought great hope. No one, I think, imagined rapid breakthroughs. This is a democratic process, and I think that we all expected that it would grind along exceedingly slowly.

    The IRA and Sinn Fein do not accept that democratic process. They are trying to impose their own terms on the talks. They have not been ready to renounce violence. That is plainly incompatible with joining the talks. They have excluded themselves by their return to violence: it is not us, not the British Government, not the Irish Government, not the other parties in Northern Ireland – it is their own fault that they are excluded from the talks, and no one else’s. But the talks will continue without them.

    The IRA and Sinn Fein should be under no illusion that they can join the process until they have demonstrated real commitment to democratic and non-violent methods. So even if a new ceasefire is declared, there will have to be more than soft words to convince the Government and, I believe, the House that it does not represent another tactical device, to be abandoned at any convenient moment.

    For our part, we intend to go on improving the process of government in Northern Ireland. We will consult on how to develop the Northern Ireland Grand Committee to enable greater scrutiny of legislative proposals, Government policy and Ministers. We also intend to introduce a Bill to allow the decommissioning of terrorist weapons. To encourage the removal of those weapons from the streets, we will ask the House to agree that forensic evidence should not be sought from them.

    But let me be clear: there can be no general amnesty for terrorist crimes and there will be none. I cannot look into the minds of the terrorists and predict what they will do, but I know that the road to a settlement will not be easy. We shall do all in our power to promote a lasting peace and to protect the community from their actions. That is our promise, and I both hope for and expect the House’s full support in that endeavour.

    Mr. Robert McCartney (North Down) rose –

    The Prime Minister If the hon. and learned Gentleman will forgive me, I will not give way.

    I should like to move towards a position where we can announce in future a two-year legislative programme and, so far as possible, publish draft Bills and consult on the second year’s Bills before they are introduced.

    Several hon. Members rose –

    Madam Speaker Order. The Prime Minister has indicated that he is not willing to give way. Hon. Members will please resume their seats.

    The Prime Minister That will take time to bring about, but I think that it is a worthwhile reform which will deliver better legislation. We have begun to move in that direction this year, with two draft Bills set out in the Gracious Speech. In future years, I anticipate steadily increasing the number of draft Bills brought before the House.

    Our legislative programme is a clear and practical set of measures to promote our aim of wider opportunity for all. We believe in choice, in personal responsibility and in opportunity. That thread has run through the past 17 years of Conservative Government. It runs through the current legislative programme in front of us and it will run through our plans and our programmes for the next Parliament also. It is what our programme will achieve this year, and I commend it to the House.

  • PMQT – 16 July 1996

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

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Engagements

    Q1. Mrs. Jane Kennedy: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 16 July.

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

    Mrs. Kennedy: Today marks the launch of the Gun Control Network by the families of the victims of Hungerford and Dunblane. Will the Prime Minister acknowledge the strength of the case against the private ownership of handguns? Will he accept that such a measure to ban them would receive the support of the overwhelming majority of the British people?

    The Prime Minister: I am, of course, aware of the strength of feeling on this issue and of the recent petition calling for strengthened control over firearms. As the hon. Lady knows, the Government have been careful to consult the Opposition parties on this issue from the outset, and I am delighted that, thus far, we have received their firm support for the way in which we are proceeding. Since 1979, we have strengthened firearms controls. As soon as we receive the report from Lord Cullen, we will consider it with great care. I am happy to reiterate to the House that, in the event it is needed, we have preserved a legislative slot to take any action that is required.

     

    Q2. Mrs. Lait: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 16 July.

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

    Mrs. Lait: In the light of the great news that Lite-On and LG are bringing thousands of new jobs to Scotland and Wales, does my right hon. Friend agree that breaking up the United Kingdom, creating an extra tier of regional government, surrounding it all in bureaucracy and making the Scots pay more tax is likely to scare away potential new investors? Is this not new Labour being new danger?

    The Prime Minister: I am delighted to welcome these substantial new investments to Scotland and Wales. They are the latest of a large number of inward investments that we have seen not only in Scotland and Wales but in other parts of the United Kingdom. I certainly hope that we shall get more. They are coming here predominantly because of the economic environment–[Interruption.]–because this country is an economic success story–[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley (Mr. Foulkes) is chuntering in the back row. He seems to forget that they have been coming here for 15 years under Conservative policies, because we have created a combination of lower inflation, lower taxes and lower costs. That is attractive not just to companies in this country but to world investors seeking the right country in which to place their money. I am delighted that they place it here. It would be a tragedy if policies were followed that would prevent them from doing so in future.

    Mr. Blair: Does the Prime Minister recall promising the country at the previous general election that he would balance the budget? How does he square that with today’s further disastrous borrowing figures which show that, leaving aside privatisation moneys, the Government’s overdraft this year is running at a higher level than at the same time last year?

    The Prime Minister: If the right hon. Gentleman would look carefully at today’s borrowing figures, he would see that they are entirely consistent with the economic forecast and that they confirm the excellent state of the economy–sustainable growth, low inflation and falling Government borrowing. As for comparatives, since 1979, average borrowing as a proportion of gross domestic product has been just under one half as much as under the previous Labour Government.

    Mr. Blair: Perhaps the Prime Minister will just confirm that this Conservative Government have received more in North sea oil revenues and from privatising the nation’s assets than the borrowing requirement under the last Labour Government. That is what his Government have had. Is it not also a fact that, under his prime ministership, the public debt has doubled? Will he confirm this statistic and answer this question directly: is it not the case that, as a result of his Government’s borrowing policies, every family in this country now pays £1,000 a year in tax, not for better services in respect of health, education and law and order but just to service the debt that he has created? Is that right or is it wrong?

    The Prime Minister: The right hon. Gentleman is completely misleading the House. He knows what resources have been spent in recent years. I will tell him where they have gone–they have gone on health, education, defence and public services. The right hon. Gentleman is the man who says that he wants to keep taxes down, yet he wants to put public expenditure up. The reality is that, whereas he may play games in opposition, we have to deal with the realities of producing a successful economy, as we have done in recent years and as we will do in the years to come.

    Mr. Blair: Not a single one of those figures did the Prime Minister dispute–£1,000 a year in tax just to service the debt. Let me tell the Prime Minister that, if he wants to have a better balance in public spending, why not tackle the problems of long-term unemployment which have put up the bills for people in this country? Is it not the truth–[Interruption.] That is the party that has spent on welfare and unemployment but lowered spending on investment for the country’s future. Will the Prime Minister confirm that, if an ordinary member of the public had run an overdraft as large as this, he would have been told that his time was up and his home should be repossessed? Is that not the fate so richly deserved by this Government and this Prime Minister?

    The Prime Minister: Dear, oh dear. If the right hon. Gentleman wants to talk about success in dealing with unemployment, perhaps he would care to acknowledge that we have the lowest rate of unemployment of any significant nation in western Europe; that unemployment has been falling for three years, which it has not been doing anywhere else; that every single Labour Government we have ever been cursed with have increased unemployment dramatically; that he has policies that would increase the costs of employers, which would create unemployment; and that one of his unions is asking for a minimum wage of £6.03 an hour, which would cost an enormous amount in unemployment.

    While the right hon. Gentleman is concerned about economic performance, let me mention the things that he neglected to mention: the lowest level of inflation for 50 years; the lowest mortgage rates for 30 years–[Hon. Members: “More.”]–four years of falling unemployment and increasing employment–[Hon. Members: “More.”]–the lowest rate of basic tax for 50 years–[Hon. Members: “More.”]–disposable income rising way above inflation–[Hon. Members: “More.”]–No. 1 in Europe for investment–[Hon. Members: “More.”]–in the interests of other questioners, I shall stop there, but there is far more to the success of the Government’s policies.

     

    Q3. Mr. Amess: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 16 July.

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

    Mr. Amess: Does my right hon. Friend agree that no responsible Prime Minister would weaken Britain’s veto in Europe by giving Brussels more powers to determine matters that should be voted on and discussed in the House? Does not new Labour wish to surrender Britain’s veto in Europe? Does not new, phoney Labour mean new, real danger for residents in Basildon, Southend and the whole country?

    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend should not suggest that the dangers from those policies are in only Basildon and Southend. They are in every constituency around the land. He is quite right.

    The Government are not prepared to see our veto eroded, as the Labour party apparently is. On issues of national and constitutional significance, any Government should be prepared to protect British interests, if necessary by using the veto and saying no. I regret that the Opposition are committed to undermining the veto. If they say that they are never going to be isolated in Europe, what they are saying is that they would never use the veto whether it was in this country’s interests or not. They would follow the line determined by our European partners. That is their policy out of their own mouths, and upon that let them be judged.

    Mr. Ashdown: But Britain’s national debt has doubled since the Prime Minister took office. Britain’s annual debt has doubled against what the Prime Minister said that it would be two years ago. Is the Prime Minister prepared to confirm the words of his own Chancellor of the Exchequer in spring this year when he said that, when public borrowing was around £30 billion a year, tax cuts were irresponsible?

    The Prime Minister: As to the Budget, the right hon. Gentleman will have to wait and see. It is some months away. We will deal prudently, as we have always done, with that aspect.

    I seem to remember the right hon. Gentleman’s party supporting the largest public borrowing that we have ever seen at any stage in this country. Under this Government, the economy has gone from strength to strength to strength. If the right hon. Gentleman is concerned about public borrowing, as I am, I invite him and the leader of the Labour party to support the Government in the public expenditure decisions that we will have to take in the forthcoming public expenditure round. We will judge by their words whether they support the decisions that we will take in the public spending round. If they support restraint, it will be the first time that they have done so.

    Sir John Gorst: In view of the industrial relations unrest in the Post Office, will my right hon. Friend give consideration not merely to the suspension of the monopoly but to the application of a law of contract to all parties in the Post Office?

    The Prime Minister: I thoroughly agree with my hon. Friend about the likely dangers of a Post Office strike. As he knows, my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade is giving consideration to suspension of the monopoly, and I shall certainly consider my hon. Friend’s further point.

     

    Q4. Mr. Hall: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 16 July.

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

    Mr. Hall: The Prime Minister will be aware that last year’s tax revenue fell short by a staggering £7 billion. Likewise, last year’s public sector borrowing requirement was £10 billion greater than forecast 16 months previously. Does he agree that, if a managing director in the private sector made such an overestimate of a company’s income and plunged it into such huge debt, he would be sacked? What is the Prime Minister going to do about it?

    The Prime Minister: The hon. Gentleman knows very well the degrees of difficulty in determining tax revenue. Of course, his way of determining tax revenue would be to support his leader in increasing taxes, with the large range of extra taxes that the Labour party is already planning. He might as well admit it.

     

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

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

    Mr. Brazier: In considering the very sad events in Ulster and welcoming the deployment of extra troops there, I should like to ask whether my right hon. Friend agrees that the overwhelming priority must be the restoration of security, which must involve whatever resources and legal powers the security forces require.

    The Prime Minister: Self-evidently, the overwhelming need is to restore normal law and order to the Province so that problems are solved by dialogue and not by violence and confrontation. We must continue to do whatever we can to ensure that the bomb in Enniskillen–whoever turns out to be responsible for it–does not relaunch the cycle of violence that has so scarred life in Northern Ireland in recent years. I particularly welcome the restraint that has been shown by loyalist groups and I very much hope that they will continue to show that restraint in future. The security forces have our full support. They will continue to have our full support in the Province and in the rest of the United Kingdom.

     

    Q6. Mrs. Roche: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 16 July.

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

    Mrs. Roche: Given that 21 Conservative Back Benchers have signed an early-day motion expressing serious concern about the sale of Ministry of Defence homes and that one of them described it as a half-baked scheme, deeply upsetting to service families, how do the Prime Minister and the Government justify the sale and the £900 million a year rent bill to the British public?

    The Prime Minister: The hon. Lady is mistaken in what she says and in her judgment. The service chiefs support the sale. They have recognised and said publicly that it will raise £1.5 billion in public revenue. The Labour party has said a great deal about public borrowing. Will they vote against the £1.5 billion that the sale will bring into the public revenue and cut borrowing, or will it be another occasion when the leader of the Labour party says one thing and votes in a quite different way?

  • PMQT – 9 July 1996

    Below is the text of Prime Minister’s Question Time from 9th July 1996.

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Engagements

    Q1. Mr. Donald Anderson: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 9 July.

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

    Mr. Anderson: Does the Prime Minister agree that one part of the historic greatness of President Mandela is that he is prepared to forgive and forget the collusion of the Tory Government at the time of apartheid because he knew that, in his struggle against an evil system, he had the overwhelming support of the British people?

    The Prime Minister: President Mandela is a very welcome guest to the United Kingdom as President of the Republic of South Africa and I look forward to my talks with him tomorrow. I enjoyed my visit to South Africa and our discussions then, and I have no doubt that the President will be given a warm and friendly reception in this country by everyone he meets.

    Mr. Bellingham: Is the Prime Minister aware that the headmaster of the London Oratory school in Fulham–a school well known for its ability to attract the brightest pupils from all over London–recently said that, if Labour won the election, he would consider taking his school private? What advice does the Prime Minister have for parents of children at the school, apart from the obvious advice to vote Conservative?

    The Prime Minister: All parents at every school will be concerned about the quality of education in their school, and I am sure that that also applies to the London Oratory.

    Mr. Blair: Given the Chancellor’s admission today that there will be an extra £12 billion of borrowing this year and next–double last year’s forecast–what is the Prime Minister’s explanation for the appalling state of the public’s finances?

    The Prime Minister: I find the right hon. Gentleman’s question astonishing. If he had read the economic forecasts this morning, he would have read of better economic prospects in this country than in any country across the European Union, and better economic prospects than we have known for many years. Those prospects could not have been obtained other than by following the policies that we have followed in recent years.

    Mr. Blair: When the Prime Minister reads out his list of statistics, perhaps he will also confirm that Britain has a higher inflation rate than many of its main competitors–it has higher interest rates than France, Germany, the United States or Japan–and that it is the only country anywhere in the European Union, apart from Spain, to be running a trade deficit, despite the 20 per cent. devaluation of the pound. Will the Prime Minister confirm that he promised that he would cut public sector debt, but that it has doubled under his stewardship of the public finances, and that we now spend £25 billion a year servicing that debt–more than on law and order and more than on defence?

    The Prime Minister: I think that everyone in the House will wonder why, on every conceivable occasion, the right hon. Gentleman wants to run down the country’s performance. I shall tell him what is happening: we have the lowest levels of inflation for 50 years–an achievement never remotely matched by any Labour Government–the lowest mortgage rates for 30 years, four years of falling unemployment and growing employment, and the lowest basic rate of tax for 50 years. Furthermore, the debt ratio is lower than it was in 1979–unlike in France, Germany and every other G7 country. That is the impact of the Government’s policies since 1979, and it is unmatched by anything that the Labour party ever remotely achieved in office.

    Mr. Blair: Madam Speaker, he does not deny a single fact that was put to him: that his forecasts have been wrong or that job creation and employment growth over the past 10 years have been lower in Britain than in any of the 10 main world economies. No Government–Labour or Conservative–have ever had £120 billion in North sea oil and squandered it or sold off every asset that the public owned and blown the money. Is it not true that, having promised that he would cut tax, he raised it; and having promised that he would cut borrowing, he raised it? Is not the lesson that, just as the Tories are untrustworthy and incompetent over tax, they are untrustworthy and incompetent over the state of the nation’s finances?

    The Prime Minister: I note–as will people here and abroad–the way in which, on every conceivable occasion, the Leader of the Opposition tries to sell this country short. I remind him that the economy is in the fifth successive year of sustainable growth. Since the last election, we have enjoyed the strongest recovery of any major European country.

    As for forecasts, the right hon. Gentleman sits next to the shadow Chancellor: the man who cannot say whether interest rates are too high or too low, or whether inflation is too high or too low, and who famously predicted in 1992 that unemployment would go up month after month after month. Since that time, unemployment has fallen month after month after month. The right hon. Gentleman should stop living in a world of his own and see that this country is leading Europe economically and regaining its place among the strong economic and industrial nations of the world.

    Sir Irvine Patnick: As my right hon. Friend will be aware, in Sheffield yesterday a Yorkshire and Humberside regional assembly was set up. Does my right hon. Friend agree that the role of councils is to look after local interests and not to set up offices in Brussels or create regional assemblies?

    The Prime Minister: I see no justification for regional assemblies and more bureaucracy. That may be the policy of the Labour party, but it is neither the wish of the electorate nor the policy of the Government.

    Mr. Ashdown: The day after it appears that ethnic cleansing has come once again to Northern Ireland, will the Prime Minister emphasise to all he sees that those who wish to widen conflict only serve the purposes of the IRA and help those who wish to revert to violence rather than peace?

    The Prime Minister: I hope that the whole House will join me in condemning the scenes of violence that we have observed across Northern Ireland in the past couple of days. They are indefensible. The search for peace in Northern Ireland will not be assisted by such behaviour, but it could well be put back. In my judgment, that is emphatically not the wish of the people of Northern Ireland. At the moment, we need dialogue to ensure that we can move forward from the present situation, which is doing nothing but causing misery, hardship and damage. We need that dialogue speedily so that a resolution can be reached without delay.

    Dame Elaine Kellett-Bowman: Will my right hon. Friend join me in congratulating the police, the Inland Revenue, Customs and Excise and the Benefits Agency in Lancaster on a combined operation which has netted tens of thousands, if not millions, of pounds in fraudulent benefit claims? Those people are now saving the taxpayer huge sums that can be devoted to proper causes.

    The Prime Minister: I willingly congratulate those involved in that development. Perhaps I might add the name of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Social Security, who has put in place the most comprehensive anti-fraud devices in the social security system that we have had at any stage.

     

    Q2. Mr. McKelvey: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 9 July.

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

    Mr. McKelvey: Can the Prime Minister explain to the House why this country is up to its neck in debt? The national debt is £320 billion and the public sector borrowing requirement is £30 million, yet the same team can turn the Tory party debt of £17 million two years ago into a £20 million profit this year. Where did they get the money, and will they publish their accounts?

    The Prime Minister: The hon. Gentleman talks about the same team. Since I became Prime Minister, the national debt has averaged 44 per cent. of gross domestic product. Under the previous Labour Government, it was 62 per cent. of GDP.

     

    European Union

    Q3. Sir Teddy Taylor: To ask the Prime Minister if he will raise at the next meeting of the European Council the Union’s relations with those west European states which decided not to join the Union.

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

    Sir Teddy Taylor: As the remaining three nations outside the EU have very low unemployment–around 4 per cent. compared with the tragic and growing unemployment of around 20 million within the European Union, largely as a result of lunatic Brussels policies–will the Prime Minister, who has, happily, excluded Britain from some of the Euro-mess to the advantage of the nation and its people, ask the European Union at the intergovernmental conference to have another think about the future, especially in view of the nightmare of unemployment being created within the European Union which no one seems to want to talk about?

    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend is right about unemployment across the European Union, which is more than 18 million. There is no doubt that the primary responsibility of Governments across Europe is to try to create the conditions in which unemployment can fall and new jobs can be created. As my hon. Friend knows, I have always argued that the way in which to reduce unemployment in Europe is through the supply-side policies we have followed in this country, which are aimed at increasing the ability of companies to compete and to create new jobs.

    Figures that will be published later today will show comprehensively that Britain is continuing to attract record inward investment. I very much welcome that, and it has helped to create many jobs. As my hon. Friend says, it would be utterly wrong to attempt to impose any kind of European social model, adding extra costs to employers and, as a direct result of that, condemning more people in Europe to remain unemployed. That is the wrong way in which to get people back to work.

    Several hon. Members rose–

    Madam Speaker: Order. I remind hon. Members that this is a closed question. I call Mr. Stott.

    Mr. Stott: Will the Prime Minister tell the House whether he believes that one of Her Majesty’s loyal chief constables had the right–

    Madam Speaker: Order. I warned the hon. Gentleman, who should have read the Order Paper, that this was a closed question.

    Mr. Spearing: Norway was one of the countries that recently chose not to join the European Union. Is the Prime Minister aware that most of the top politicians, financiers and industrialists said that there would be dire consequences for Norway if it did not join? Does he agree that most of the indicators have shown that, far from being disadvantageous, it has been in Norway’s interest not to join? In view of that fact, what credit can we give most of the top politicians, financiers and industrialists in this country who are urging us to join economic and monetary union?

    The Prime Minister: The hon. Gentleman is comparing two separate things: first, whether Norway should join the European Union and, secondly, a particular subsequent development that may or may not take place in the European Union. If he sought the views of those in the United Kingdom who trade with Europe, he would find that surveys of leading business men have consistently shown that more than 90 per cent. favour membership of the European Union and do not see the European Union simply as a trading area. Each country must make its own judgments. Norway made its judgment, and we must respect that judgment, but it would be intolerable for the United Kingdom to be outside the European Union, in practice affected by its legislation but unable to have any say in framing it.

     

    Engagements

    Q4. Mr. Nigel Evans: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 9 July.

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

    Mr. Evans: My right hon. Friend will know of the importance of defence manufacturing in the north-west. Does he agree that–as thousands of employees in the industry await the contract for the replacement of maritime reconnaissance aircraft, among others–if we took the road to ruin and cut defence expenditure by £4.5 billion, as suggested by the Labour party, our action would devastate the industry in the north-west and cost thousands of skilled manufacturing jobs? Is this not yet another example of new Labour, new danger?

    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend makes his case very persuasively. Another £4.5 billion off defence–which is what the shadow Chancellor would like–would indeed have dramatic effects on the capacity of the armed forces to undertake their role. As for contracts, as I am sure my hon. Friend is aware, a decision will be announced as soon as we have completed our assessment of the bids for the replacement of various pieces of equipment that are now due for replacement. I hope that we shall be able to make announcements before too long, but a wide range of factors remain to be considered.

     

    Q5. Mr. Bill Michie: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 9 July.

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

    Mr. Michie: Will the Prime Minister join me–along with, in particular, my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, South-East (Mr. Turner)–in sending heartfelt concern to the families of those who were injured during the dreadful attack on the Wolverhampton school? Will he assure the House that he will do everything possible to give our children the protection that they richly deserve?

    The Prime Minister: The whole House will have been appalled by the incident at St. Luke’s school, and I have no doubt that everyone in the House and beyond will wish to send sympathy to the victims of that attack and hopes for their speedy recovery. The hon. Gentleman’s sentiments will be shared not only by the Government but by everyone in the House, and I shall ensure that they are carried into effect.

  • PMQT – 4 July 1996

    Below is the text of Prime Minister’s Question Time from 4th July 1996.

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Engagements

    Q1. Mr. Skinner: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 4 July.

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

    Mr. Skinner: Is the Minister aware that, in the next two or three days, Members of Parliament and Ministers will be voting to set a new and increased national minimum wage for Members of Parliament and Ministers? If it is good enough for them, why can we not have a national minimum wage for everyone else? If those increases go beyond the pay barrier, will the Government give a guarantee that workers, including nurses and others, and pensioners will all receive the same?

    The Prime Minister: I am not at all sure that the hon. Gentleman carried every Opposition Member with him with that particular remark.

    The point about a minimum wage, of course, is the impact that it would have on the capacity to employ people. That is the point that we have repeatedly made. That is one of the reasons why unemployment is falling in this country, whereas it is rising in other countries. We intend to continue to see a downward trend in unemployment, which is why we do not favour the policies that the hon. Gentleman advocates.

    As for the report that will be published this afternoon, let me say first to the hon. Gentleman that it is worth remembering precisely why the review was set up. It was for two reasons essentially: first, it was necessary to devise a new formula for determining Members’ pay as the old one had broken down and, secondly, 300 Members of the House, of whom 200 were Labour Members, had called for such a review–not the hon. Gentleman, I concede that–in a motion before the House.

    Following the consultation that I have had with leaders of other political parties, it is clear that they do not wish to express a view and that they believe that it is a matter for the House as a whole to decide. The Cabinet decided this morning to offer the House an opportunity to vote for the recommendations as they stood, but the Government will be recommending and also voting for restraint.

    Mr. Elletson: Does my right hon. Friend agree that defence exports earn this country billions of pounds every year and guarantee thousands of jobs in Lancashire and elsewhere? Is it not, therefore, an absolute disgrace that Labour Members now oppose the sale of British defence equipment to Indonesia, Malaysia, Saudi Arabia and, some of them, even to the world’s largest democracy, India? Does not that show that workers in the defence industry face a real danger from the Labour party?

    The Prime Minister: Defence is a very important industry in this country and one that plays a very important part in our economy, both in export earnings and, of course, in job provision in many parts of the country–the north-west, the west country and many parts of the home counties as well–so it is extremely important. My hon. Friend is right to draw attention to the policies of the Labour party. It is also right for the House to note that the further defence review promised by the Labour party promises to cut sufficient from the funds to ensure that there would be no money at all for the Royal Navy.

    Mr. Blair: Are this morning’s newspaper reports correct that the selective slaughter scheme for beef is now to amount to 120,000 cows, which is a higher figure than previously thought, and that an additional £100 million, £200 million or possibly more will have to be paid in compensation on top of the £2 billion that the Prime Minister has already mentioned? Are those reports correct?

    The Prime Minister: It is not possible to be entirely clear precisely how many animals will be slaughtered. What is clear is what was set out in the 30-months-plus scheme, with which I think the right hon. Gentleman is familiar. Beyond that, we are asked from time to time to make estimates of precisely what the figures are, and an estimate of about 120,000 is the best that we can make–that figure has been around for some considerable time. The cost is the cost that we have set out on previous occasions.

    Mr. Blair: I think it is clear that the number is to be greater than originally anticipated. When the Prime Minister made his statement to the House earlier, he suggested that the reports of additional slaughter schemes were incorrect. Will he confirm whether, as a result of the Florence summit and the statement from the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food last night, the 1989 to 1990 cohort is to be included in the selective slaughter scheme, which will increase the number of cows involved? Last night, the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food apparently said that it would take six to nine months for the scheme to be implemented. Does the Prime Minister still hold to November of this year as the date by which the ban will be completely lifted?

    The Prime Minister: Yes; on the information we have, we still hold to the dates that we set out, but, as I said at the time, those dates depend on our meeting the requirements, which I previously set before the House and which we believe we can meet in the time scale that I set out. Long before I went to Florence, there was a lot of discussion about the 1989 to 1990 cohort involving both my right hon. and learned Friend the Minister of Agriculture and me. There is a distinction between the compulsory slaughter and the voluntary scheme that exists for the 1989 to 1990 cohort–it has to be voluntary, because there is no means of determining precisely which animals would qualify for it.

    Mr. Blair: With due respect to the Prime Minister, the Agriculture Minister had said that the 1989 to 1990 cohort was not to be included and it is now clear that it is. The Agriculture Minister now says that the lifting of the ban may or may not take place at the end of the year. As more details emerge, is it not clear that the costs will be greater, the number of cattle slaughtered will be higher and the time scale will be longer–those prices are all to be paid by the British people?

    The Prime Minister: The right hon. Gentleman seems to have lost sight of the two fundamental reasons why the policy is necessary. The first is to ensure public health–a point that has not crossed his lips at any stage of the questions that he has bothered to ask me on the subject. The second reason is to ensure that the British beef industry will be able to recover and recapture the markets around the world for prime British beef. That is the point at stake: the livelihoods of 650,000 people. It would be helpful if, for once, instead of the pedantry that we have heard from the right hon. Gentleman, he acknowledged, first, the need to deal with the matter in the interests of the beef industry and, secondly, the need to deal with it in the interests of public health.

    Mr. Butcher: Will my right hon. Friend give an assurance that he will never introduce a policy which, as the price of a sell-out to Scottish nationalism, would bring in the compulsory dismemberment of England into regions? That latter policy would be purely to justify the continued presence of Scottish Members of Parliament in the House. Does my right hon. Friend further agree that such a policy would set in trend a series of developments that would be bad for the cohesion of England, bad for Scotland and bad for a Union that has served our people so well?

    The Prime Minister: I believe that my hon. Friend speaks for millions of people in every part of the United Kingdom. [Interruption.] The dangers that arise from the Opposition’s policies are self-evident and many people are beginning to see them. [Interruption.] Why are the significant questions not answered? If Scotland has its own Parliament, why should there be continued over-representation of Scottish Members in the House? What about the position of hon. Members who represent Scotland? If they determine some issues in a Scottish Parliament, by what logic or equity should they vote for those matters as far as they affect England, Wales and Northern Ireland? If the Labour party has no interest in introducing new taxes, as the right hon. Member for Sedgefield (Mr. Blair) says, why is he having a referendum to try to approve them in Scotland?

     

    Q2. Mr. David Marshall: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 4 July.

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

    Mr. Marshall: Does the Prime Minister fully realise how much the Labour party in Scotland looks forward to his visit? Will he today, or at the Scottish Grand Committee meeting in Dumfries tomorrow, answer my question, which his deputy dodged last Thursday? Why is it all right to offer Northern Ireland devolution, with a Secretary of State in the United Kingdom Cabinet and no reduction in the number of Members of Parliament at Westminster, while denying the same to the people of Scotland? How does he justify treating the two countries so differently?

    The Prime Minister: How does the hon. Gentleman justify tax raising in Scotland and not in Wales? That is the distinction to which the hon. Gentleman must bend his mind. If he cares to read the speech that I made a week ago–I shall send him a copy–he will see in detail a series of reasons why there is a clear distinction between Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. The hon. Gentleman had better bend his mind to his own policy: why a tax-raising power in Scotland but a non-tax-raising assembly in Wales? What has he got against the Scots, and why not not he trust the Welsh?

     

    Q3. Mr. Amess: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 4 July.

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

    Mr. Amess: Will my right hon. Friend reconfirm his commitment to the assisted places scheme and to doubling it? Does he agree that, if the scheme were abolished, those children would still have to be educated in the state system, thus producing a small net saving? Does not that simple piece of arithmetic demolish the shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer’s policy to abolish the scheme and spend the money in the primary sector?

    The Prime Minister: I fear that some of the figures issued by the shadow Chancellor this morning are shown to be wholly wrong, even on cursory examination. It was already clear before today that the windfall tax is unravelling before the Opposition’s eyes, and it certainly could not pay for the new pledges that they make. Sadly, the shadow Chancellor seems to have got his sums wrong. He has inflated the amount that he hopes to raise by forgetting to include the cost of sending the children who were in assisted places schemes back to the state sector. It can be seen simply from a cursory glance at the Opposition’s new plans that the sums do not add up. The new Labour party’s policies mean new taxes: taxes in Scotland; taxes on people with children aged between 16 and 18 who would lose child benefit; taxes for living in London; and taxes on jobs, with the social chapter and a minimum wage. That is what is offered by the Labour party. No wonder we talk of new dangers.

    Mr. Hoon: The Prime Minister has rightly condemned those who oppose the rule of law and those who fail to follow the courts’ decisions. Will he unequivocally condemn Governments who refuse to implement, or threaten to refuse to implement, the European Court of Justice’s decisions?

    The Prime Minister: The hon. Gentleman knows that this Government implement the regulations. Where we think they are wrong–in some cases we do–we shall raise the matter at the intergovernmental conference to change the underlying European Community law. I am glad that the hon. Gentleman is so keen on ensuring that the law is obeyed. I hope that, in the interests of providing good, strong law enforcement, he will now apologise for the number of occasions on which he and his colleagues voted against law enforcement measures introduced by the Government.

     

    Q4. Sir Peter Tapsell: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 4 July.

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

    Sir Peter Tapsell: Is my right hon. Friend aware that, in my Lincolnshire constituency, those who work in the seaside resorts and on the land are in the habit of working far more than 48 hours a week during the summer, although often less in the winter? If the Brussels Commission is to impose its directive limiting the number of working hours to 48 hours a week with effect from 23 November, will that not seriously reduce the standard of living of many of my constituents? If the European Court of Justice seeks to overturn that part of the social chapter from which we have opted out, will my right hon. Friend take steps to reassert it?

    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend has neatly picked up the point to which I alluded in response to the previous question, which was asked by the hon. Member for Ashfield (Mr. Hoon). I share my hon. Friend’s concern on behalf of his constituents.

    The European Court has not yet given its final judgment on our challenge to the working time directive–although the Advocate General’s opinion was not encouraging. If we lose in that judgment, we shall seek treaty change at the intergovernmental conference to ensure that the social protocol is not undermined by presenting social measures in the guise of health and safety.

    I reached an agreement on ensuring that we were not covered by that at Maastricht, and I intend that that agreement shall be kept. Our colleagues in Europe need not expect that we will reach further agreements at the next intergovernmental conference unless, at that conference, they are prepared to restore the agreement that I reached at Maastricht. It specifically deals with the matter referred to by my hon. Friend.

    Mr. Salmond: The Prime Minister is coming to Dumfries tomorrow to speak at the Burns supper and to celebrate the bicentennial of Scotland’s national bard. Is he aware that the lines that he has twice quoted in the House from “The Dumfries Volunteers” were written when Burns was under investigation by the Government of one of his predecessors for sedition as a radical and a Scottish nationalist? Will the Prime Minister demonstrate his knowledge of all things Scottish–stretching from stones to poems–and remind the House of the first two lines of Burns’ most famous poem “Tam o’Shanter”?

    The Prime Minister: I have no intention of regaling the House with poetry. I enjoyed listening to “Tam o’Shanter” last time I attended a Burns supper–and, with a bit of luck, I will hear it again tomorrow night. Rabbie Burns had a varied political career during his lifetime. As the hon. Gentleman would know, Burns’ political career was varied as to where he gave his affections–and they were not affections that the hon. Gentleman would follow.

  • PMQT Written Answers – 27 June 1996

    Below is the text of the written answers relating to Prime Minister’s Question Time from 27th June 1996.

    PRIME MINISTER:

     

    Engagements

    Mr. Harry Greenway: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 27 June.

    Sir Peter Tapsell: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 27 June.

    Mr. John Evans: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 27 June.

    The Deputy Prime Minister: I have been asked to reply.

    My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister is attending the G7 summit in Lyon.

     

    Unemployment (European Union)

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

    The Prime Minister: Unemployment was one of the issues discussed at the European Council in Florence. The European Council confirmed the priority attached to tackling unemployment and agreed to carry forward the strategy agreed at the Essen European Council in December 1994, which recognised the primacy of action by member states and recommended a number of lines of action reflecting this Government’s approach.

     

    Parliamentary Delegation (OSCE)

    Mr. Duncan: To ask the Prime Minister what changes he has made to the United Kingdom delegation to the parliamentary assembly of the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe.

    The Prime Minister: The hon. Member for Inverness, Nairn and Lochaber (Sir Russell Johnston) has been named as a substitute for the Liberal Democrat party.