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Tag: 1979

  • Queen Elizabeth II – 1979 Christmas Broadcast

    Queen Elizabeth II – 1979 Christmas Broadcast

    The Christmas Broadcast made by HM Queen Elizabeth II on 25 December 1979.

    Every two years the Heads of Government of the Commonwealth countries meet together to discuss matters of mutual interest.

    This year they met in Africa and once again the meeting demonstrated the great value of personal contact and the desire of all the leaders to settle their differences in the friendly spirit of a family gathering.

    All 39 full members of the Commonwealth were represented there and, as always on these occasions, I greatly valued the opportunity of talks with them.

    One of the main objectives of Heads of Government is to make the world a better place for the next generation. 1979 has been the International Year of the Child and the Commonwealth has always stressed the importance of our young people: but this year people all over the world have been asked to give particular thought to the special needs of sick and handicapped children, to the hungry and homeless and to those in trouble or distress wherever they may be found.

    It is an unhappy coincidence that political and economic forces have made this an exceptionally difficult and tragic year for many families and children in several parts of the world – but particularly in South East Asia.

    The situation has created a desperately serious challenge and I am glad to know that so many people of the Commonwealth have responded with wonderful generosity and kindness. It seems that the greater the needs of children, the more people everywhere rise to the occasion.

    My daughter, as President of the Save the Children Fund, saw some of these volunteers looking after refugee children in the Far East. Nowhere is the voluntary effort more active than in charities and organisations devoted to helping children to survive the hazards to which they have been subjected.

    The Year of the Child has emphasised the value of this work, but we must not forget that every generation has to face the problems of childhood and the stresses of growing up, and, in due course, the responsibilities of parents and adults. If they are handicapped in themselves, or by their family or community, their problems are all the more difficult.

    Children are born with a mixed package of emotions, talents and handicaps, but without knowledge or experience. As they grow up they have to learn to live with their parents and families; and they have to adjust to school, including the discovery of leisure activities and learning to handle their relationships with their contemporaries and with strangers.

    Schools, charities and voluntary organisations and institutions can do a great deal to help, and I have admired their work in many parts of the world; but in the end each one of us has a primary and personal responsibility for our own children, for children entrusted to our care and for all the children in our own communities.

    At Christmas we give presents to each other. Let us also stop to think whether we are making enough effort to pass on our experience of life to our children. Today we celebrate the birth of the child who transformed history and gave us a great faith. Jesus said:

    “Suffer the little children to come unto me and forbid them not, for of such is the kingdom of God”.

    I wish you all a very happy Christmas.

  • David Trippier – 1979 Maiden Speech in the House of Commons

    Below is the text of the maiden speech made in the House of Commons by David Trippier, the then Conservative MP for Rossendale, on 21 May 1979.

    My first task is the very pleasant one of congratulating the hon. Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. McKelvey) on a speech which was both fluent and articulate—indeed, amusing—and I thought that it was quite profound. I have with him, on this occasion, a fellow feeling, as this is the first occasion on which we have both spoken in this House, and I think that it may well be the last occasion on which we shall have this in common. None the less, I congratulate him on a very successful speech.

    As many hon. Members are aware, my constituency of Rossendale has for some time been regarded as a barometer of political opinion, as it has been represented by no fewer than four different Members of Parliament over the last nine years. That is not only an indication of the importance of the seat to the two major political parties, but it is also an indication that my constituents are well aware of the importance which is attached to their opinions. In short, the seat is not only marginal or critical, but “intensive care”.

    The Rossendale valley is important for two other reasons. First, it is an attractive valley, and, although the area would be classed as primarily industrial, its industry does not detract from many of its aesthetic features, most notable of which are the hills and moorlands common to north-east Lancashire.

    Secondly, the industrial welfare of my constituents depends to a large extent on the success of two major industries—textiles and footwear. In the past, these industries have been responsible for the employment of a significant majority. Even today, they are responsible for the employment of 45 per cent. of the work force.

    All the Members of Parliament for Rossendale have represented the interests and concern of those industries in this House to the best of their ability. But I wish to pay a warm tribute to my immediate predecessor, Mr. Mike Noble, who made a significant contribution in this respect. His concern for the welfare of those industries could not have been more clearly demonstrated. I should like to assure the House that I intend to carry on the campaign which he and his predecessors so ably fought.

    Whereas these two industries experience quite different problems in certain areas, they have common difficulties in others. Both are subjected to unfair import competition and both are recipients of Government largesse through the medium of subsidies. 1 April this year was the final date for applications for temporary employment subsidy. That was replaced by the compensation for short-time working. This latter subsidy is by no means as effective as TES and has been claimed by comparatively few firms because it is so inappropriate to the present needs of industry in the valley. Only 16 per cent. of those who benefited from TES are in receipt of the compensation for short-time working.

    I am convinced, however, especially after my experiences over the last few weeks, and particularly during the election campaign, that until the economic climate improves and until these industries can enjoy stricter control of unfair import competition, existing or alternative subsidies must be maintained to preserve these essential British industries.

    I compliment the trade unions which represent the workers in these industries, which have acted in a very responsible way during a period of great transition for these industries since the last war.

    Whilst emphasising the need for employment subsidies, it is equally important for me to draw the attention of the House to the system of Government grants which have been made available to industry to encourage expansion. The vast majority of the money made available for this purpose is offered to those companies which wish to expand their existing premises, whereas little or no money is available for new plant and equipment.

    Although the idea is sound in principle, it rarely works in practice. In order to increase efficiency and thereby increase production in a very competitive world, it is vital that modern methods and modern machinery are used if we are not to fall further behind in the industrial league.

    To replace old and outdated machinery does not necessarily require more space, just as extensions to existing premises do not guarantee increased productivity. That is why I believe that in this complex chicken-and-egg situation it is much more important to ensure that what Government moneys are available for grants are used in the replacement of plant and machinery rather than in the expansion of premises. Nowhere is this so true as in Rossendale, where one frequently finds comparatively small textile and footwear firms operating in very large Victorian mills whose size was more appropriate to the labour-intensive firms of that era than to the more modern firms of today.

    On the other hand, modern machinery and methods improve output and productivity, and increased productivity means an increase in jobs. Only with a higher demand for a company’s products and a resultant increase in jobs does the company begin to think of extending existing premises.

    I spoke earlier of the unfair import competition which faces the textile and footwear industries. To a certain extent, the multi-fibre arrangement protects the textile industry, but, even so, I believe that the current restrictions imposed should be tightened when the MFA is renegotiated in 1981 and the bilaterals are renegotiated the following year.

    Already we have seen that certain countries have broken their quota levels, and I ask that the present Government give a firm undertaking that quota levels will not be exceeded in the future. At the same time, the present anti-dumping procedures are cumbersome and time-consuming, and they should be made much more effective.

    In the footwear industry, there is no binding international agreement to protect the industry. As a consequence, footwear manufacturers have to face increasing competition from South Korea, the Philippines, Brazil, India and the COMECON countries. I believe that it is essential that a new form of international agreement is introduced for the footwear industry—a multi-footwear arrangement, very much on the same lines as the MFA. It is essential to establish this agreement through the European Parliament as soon as possible, and certainly before Greece, Portugal and Spain are eventually admitted to the Community.

    I refer, finally, to a major problem which came to a head in my constituency during the recent election campaign. This concerns the sad plight of the working widows who are employed mainly in textiles and footwear in Rossendale but also in other industries. My right hon. Friends the Secretaries of State for Industry and for Employment are aware that the widow’s pension is grossly inadequate, and that many widows find it essential to supplement their pensions by going out to work. Their contribution to productivity is greatly appreciated by the industries which employ them, but the State chooses to penalise them by taxing them on every penny they earn. As the widow’s pension is £974 a year and is classed as earned income and as they are entitled to only a single person’s tax allowance of £985 a year, it naturally follows that all money earned by the widow in employment is subject to tax, which I think is unfair.

    I therefore appeal to my right hon. Friends seriously to consider the introduction of a widow’s tax allowance set at a higher level than the single person’s allowance although lower than the married man’s. The introduction of such an allowance would take account of the fact that a working widow has practically the same overheads as a married man, especially if she has a family at home, but is without the benefit of two incomes coming into that home. It would also be a clear indication on the part of this Government that our objective of restoring the incentive to work applies to widows as it does to everyone else in the land.

  • Stephen Dorrell – 1979 Maiden Speech in the House of Commons

    Below is the text of the maiden speech made by Stephen Dorrell, the then Conservative MP for Loughborough, in the House of Commons on 13 June 1979.

    I begin, Mr. Deputy Speaker, by thanking you and the House for the honour you do me by listening to me this evening. It is a particular honour, because as the youngest Member of this new House I think that it is perhaps remarkable that I should be called to speak in the debate on what is, I think by general consent, one of the most important Budget Statements the House has heard in recent years.

    My first and very pleasant duty is to congratulate the new hon. Member for Blackburn (Mr. Straw) on what I think every hon. Member will agree was a cogent and well-informed speech, and one that is fitting for the successor to Barbara Castle. He has a very difficult task to follow his predecessor. I should like to associate myself with the hon. Gentleman’s wishing her well as the leader of the Labour group in the European Parliament.

    Tradition is a great help to a newcomer in placing an ordered series of duties on him when he rises for the first time. My second duty, and again a pleasant duty, is to refer to my predecessor, Mr. John Cronin. He had represented the seat since 1955, a total of 24 uninterrupted years. During that time he built up a formidable reputation both in the House and in the constituency as a very able, very intelligent and very civilised man. His constituents who went to see him always found a sympathetic ear. He was always prepared to take up the case of people who needed help and to do everything he could to help them. He will always be remembered in the constituency for the kind way in which he dealt with his constituents and the effective way in which he took up their problems.

    Mr. Cronin will also always be remembered in the House for the wise counsel he gave in speeches, particularly on defence, a subject that interests him very much. Both the House and the Labour Party will be the poorer for his loss. I am sure that every hon. Member wishes him well. I certainly do.

    The third priority that tradition places on a new Member is that he should talk about his constituency. I should like to begin my comments about my constituency by remembering two other, relatively recent, predecessors. The first is the man who sat for Loughborough during the war, Lawrence Kimball, father of my hon. Friend the present Member for Gainsborough (Mr. Kimball). His predecessor was a man called Winterton, who Labour Members may be interested to hear sat as a Socialist.

    The constituency that I represent is a combination of urban and rural areas within the charmed triangle of the three great industrial towns of the East Midlands. It is almost equidistant between Nottingham, Leicester and Derby. The economy of the Loughborough town is based on a wide variety of small and vigorous companies in the engineering, pharmaceutical and textile knitwear industries. There is a very low level of unemployment. The population of the town is increasing and I believe that we can say that the economy of the Loughborough area is in a healthy state.

    In addition to industry, we have a new university of technology and a college of technology, so that in a sense education is a local industry.

    I should like to mention the 5,000 people of Asian origin who came to Loughborough during the 1960s and early 1970s as refugees from odious regimes, largely hi East Africa. They have integrated very well into the community, where they perform a valuable job. I believe that they are accepted as equal members of the community. We have a very good record of race relations in Loughborough and I very much hope that that will continue indefinitely.

    I suppose that “diversity” is the key word for the make-up of the constituency outside the town. It is made up of a series of towns and villages and a broad cross-section of interests. We have farmers and a large group of miners, because half the Leicestershire coalfield falls into the constituency. We also have the East Midlands airport

    Therefore, Mr. Deputy Speaker, I believe that when it comes to my suggesting that I have a particular constituency interest in speaking I shall have that argument at my disposal for a broad range of debates. The argument is nowhere more true than in talking about the Budget.

    I believe that I speak for the majority of my constituents when I welcome the basic thrust of the Budget. I believe that it will be welcomed throughout the community because it honours the basic priority that the Conservative Party put to the electorate at the general election—that we should, by reducing the deductions from the wage packet, increase the incentive for a man, first, to go to work, but, secondly, to do an extra hour’s overtime, to acquire an extra skill and to bring about that increase in productivity which is essential if our country is to be able to compete with our competitors elsewhere in the industrialised world, and particularly in Western Europe.

    The most dangerous fact for our economy, and the greatest danger that we face, is that the British worker on average produces less than comparable workers do in West Germany, France, Holland, Belgium and the other countries of the EEC. Until we can make it worth while for our workers to produce extra goods and bring our productivity up to those levels abroad, we cannot look for the standard of living that the people in those countries enjoy and which hon. Members on both sides of the House want to see for our own people.

    That is why I believe it is so important that the emphasis of the Budget is on reducing the burden of income tax, particularly the marginal rates. The incentive argument is at its strongest at the marginal rates, where it involves the decision as to whether one does an extra hour’s overtime or acquires a particular skill. That is where the incentive is at its greatest. If we can bring down the rates at the margin, the incentive is there to do that extra bit of work.

    No one on either side of the House likes the 3½ per cent. to 4 per cent. rise in the retail price index which my right hon. and learned Friend deems necessary to bring about that increase in incentive throughout the income tax structure. However, if we are to bring about the increase in productivity that I have been talking about, we have to give first priority to making that incentive available so that we can get the increased productivity and build a stronger industrial base.

    The Leader of the Opposition said yesterday that the Chancellor had taken a reckless gamble. I believe that in a sense my right hon. and learned Friend has taken a gamble—not a reckless one, but a calculated gamble. It is because these are in a sense high-risk policies, because my right hon. and learned Friend is taking a calculated risk, that it is perhaps now more important than ever that, in addition to honouring our pledge to reduce taxation, we should also honour our pledge to increase the role of the National Economic Development Council, so that trade union representatives and the representatives of all other interested parties are brought into discussion on the future state of the economy during the summer and before the next wage round begins.

    My hon. Friend the Member for Worthing (Mr. Higgins) said that any Government can have a wage policy. I think that he is right. The argument is not about whether one should have one. A Government have to decide on the wage levels of all the people who are their direct employees, and they also have a large say in the pay levels of their indirect employees. That, whatever one chooses to call it, is a wages policy. The only argument is whether one decides that policy by confrontation on the picket line or by discussion round the table.

    The latter is the role that we saw in Opposition for the NEDC—a table round which these things can be discussed in the context of a conflict which can to some extent be neutralised. I hope that our pledge in this respect will not be forgotten by the Government in forming their economic policy during the next three or four months. I recall in conclusion the words once used in very different circumstances—we shall never negotiate out of fear, but, likewise, we shall never fear to negotiate.

  • John Patten – 1979 Maiden Speech to the House of Commons

    Below is the text of the maiden speech made by John Patten, the then Conservative MP for Oxford, in the House of Commons on 24 July 1979.

    I am grateful to be called, though I am conscious that the time is never right to make one’s maiden speech and I know that this afternoon, when so many others wish to speak, that must be especially so. One of my noble predecessors as Member for Oxford, Viscount Valentia, clearly thought that the time was not right to make his maiden speech for a very long time. He took his seat in 1895 and uttered his first words in the House 11 years later in 1906. I decided that in my case 11 weeks or so is about the right length of time to leave it.

    I am honoured to have many noble predecessors in Oxford, and one, my noble Friend the Lord Chancellor, once described the city and constituency of Oxford as nothing but the Latin quarter of Cowley. There is more than a grain of truth in what my noble Friend said, for, great university though it contains, and a notable polytechnic, amidst an urban landscape that makes it one of the most beautiful cities not only in this country but in Western Europe, it depends for a great deal of its prosperity, not only in the city but in the region around, on the prosperity of the British Leyland plant at Cowley.

    I am extremely glad that in recent months—indeed, for about the past year—the people who work at the BL plant at Cowley have shown such splendid increases in productivity and splendid increases in the quality of the motor cars which they have been producing. At a meeting I had this morning with the chairman of British Leyland, Sir Michael Edwardes, he was pleased to make that point.

    My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Industry, in reply to a question after his statement last week on the future of the National Enterprise Board, said that he praised the management of BL for the changes in attitude that they had been able to bring about in that company. I am sure that my right hon. Friend will recognise also that those changes in attitude are possible only with the full-hearted co-operation of all who work at Cowley and at other BL plants, and I am glad to see that that has been as forthcoming as Government support has been forthcoming.

    If there is a financial burden on the Government and a practical burden on management, there also must be a strong moral burden on trade union leaders, in my constituency and elsewhere, to make sure that in a company such as BL—which has had more than its fair share of troubles—increases in productivity, changes in manning procedures and de-manning happen all the more easily.

    Both the university element of Oxford, the university, the polytechnic and the great teaching hospitals—the gown side—and the motor industry side—the town side—have been extremely fortunate in those who have represented them in the House. I wish to refer not only to my immediate predecessor but to his predecessor, my old friend and mentor Monty Woodhouse. He worked hard on behalf of Oxford, as did his successor, Mr. Evan Luard. Their epic battles for victory in Oxford in the general elections of the 1960s and 1970s may have resulted in something that sounded rather like a football score—Woodhouse three, Luard two. I should like to reassure Mr. Luard that, although he may have won fewer general election victories over the past 20 years than did Mr. Woodhouse, his services are greatly appreciated by all those in Oxford who were his constituents, including myself, over the past 10 to 15 years.

    Oxford has never been, and I hope that it will never be, an assisted area. In that sense, it is an extremely fortunate part of the country. It has never had any assisted area status, although I freely recognise that BL has had considerable direct Government assistance. Oxford has a low rate of unemployment compared to many of the constituencies represented by other hon. Members.

    Oxford is approximately in the middle of England, and that location allows me to look north and south rather more dispassionately than can some hon. Members on either side of the House. I shall restrict my remarks on regional policy to England, as I do not feel that I have the experience to comment on other parts of Britain.

    It is interesting to speculate on what might have happened to the regions and to regional development in England had the Special Areas (Development and Improvement) Act 1934, and the legislation that followed it, not taken place. The preamble to the 1934 Act—I am speaking only from memory—talks not only about economic development but about social improvement. It is critical to today’s debate that we look not only to economic development but also to social improvement.

    Looking back at that Act is a fairly gloomy experience, because the first schedule to it, which lists all those places in England and other parts of Britain which were to receive regional aid, demonstrates how clearly our regional policy over the past 45 years has failed. The present list of areas receiving assistance in one form or another from the Government is, with a few notable additions such as Merseyside, more or less the same.

    Therefore, whatever else we may say about our regional policy over the past half-century, it can hardly be said to have been especially successful in all its ramifications. If we stand back from it, we can see that we are dealing with a historic problem and we will have to use historic solutions to try to solve it. It would be hopeless to think that we could solve it in a very short time.

    Looking at the history and geography of England and the rest of the United Kingdom, we see that the sort of regional problems that we are dealing with have a historical inevitability all their own. Throughout the history of England, it has always been in the southern part of the country that the majority of people, for better or worse, have preferred to locate most of their economic activities, except for that brief period in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and the early twentieth century, when coal was king and the whole axis of development turned north-south.

    What we are discussing in the debate and trying to deal with in the Government’s regional policy is picking up the tabs from the legacy of that movement. If we stand back from the history of regional development, looking not at last year’s changes or at whether regional employment premium was put on or taken off or whatever but at the problem in its total historical and geographical context, that must be seen to be true.

    We shall, I think, see the northernmost regions of England, in particular, remaining in need of substantial assistance from Governments of whatever colour for a substantial time, just as they have needed it for most of the last half-century. Conscious as I am of the need in a maiden speech not to be controversial, I say at once that I do not thereby belittle for one moment the continuing economic, social and cultural benefits that flow from those regions. But we must take a long-term view of those most depressed areas, especially in the northern, north-eastern and north-western parts of England, while, I suggest, using an entirely different strategy for other parts of England—and, I dare say, other parts of the United Kingdom—which have less deep-seated economic and social problems. In the strategy that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Industry has begun to unveil, I can see a much more sensitive attitude towards and identification of the true nature of the problems and, therefore, of their solutions.

    I was delighted to hear my right hon. Friend in his introductory remarks point to the importance in regional policy of taking into account not only economic but social desiderata, just as the preamble to the 1934 Act had it. In that respect he is exactly right. He is only too well aware of the effects that changes in policy have upon the economy and the society of the regions that are affected. He has it exactly right in loading such help as is available on the regions that need it most. That is economically sensible and it strikes me as being extremely socially correct.

    That is the sort of attitude that we have learnt to expect from my right hon. Friend. I risk praising someone on the Government Front Bench in my maiden speech as I know that it will be the only time that I shall be able to do so without Labour Members shouting “Give him a job.”

    I believe that my right hon. Friend is a most compassionate man. The elements of regional policy that he is outlining are economically correct and socially compassionate. We need to look long and hard at the real problems of regions and regional development and not imagine that they will be solved merely by an endless amoeba-like growth of assisted areas.

    There are different problems in different parts of the country. There are the really depressed regions and other regions that have more disparate problems. I agree that assisted area strategy is economically and socially correct for the areas that have the deepest-set problems, but for other areas—for example, the areas from which the Government are withdrawing—I suggest that other types of aid under the Industry Act 1972 and other forms of Government assistance are much more applicable. It may be that we shall see regional policies taking off in two separate directions, each fitted to suit the problems more than some ideology or idea.

    The right hon. Member for Deptford (Mr. Silkin) concluded his remarks by quoting my right hon. Friend the Member for Lowestoft (Mr. Prior). In a recent speech my right hon. Friend said that we must not create two nations in the United Kingdom. I entirely agree with my right hon. Friend and with the right hon. Gentleman. It strikes me that the way of preventing the two-nation concept becoming not merely a threat but a reality is to load such help as we can offer from entirely limited national resources, in an economy which for the moment is growing but slowly, on the areas that need help the most.

  • Queen Elizabeth II – 1979 Queen’s Speech

    queenelizabethii

    Below is the text of the speech made by Queen Elizabeth II in the House of Lords on 15 May 1979.

    My Lords and Members of the House of Commons,

    I look forward with great pleasure to receiving the President of Kenya on a State Visit in June and to paying State Visits to Denmark this month and to Tanzania, Malawi, Botswana and Zambia in July. I also look forward to being present on the occasion of the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting in Lusaka at the beginning of August.

    My Government will take steps to improve the security of the nation and to strengthen our contribution to the North Atlantic Alliance on which our defences are based. They will immediately restore and thereafter maintain the pay of Servicemen at the levels of their civilian counterparts. They will maintain the effectiveness of Britain’s nuclear deterrent. At the same time they will work for greater stability in East/West relations.

    They welcome the fact that progress is being made towards real measures of arms control and intend to play their part in this work.

    My Government affirm their strong commitment to the European Community. They intend to play a full and constructive part in its further development and enlargement, and in the co-ordination of the foreign policies of member States. They will seek to make significant improvements in the operation of the Common Agricultural Policy in the interests both of the United Kingdom and of the Community as a whole, and they will work for an agreement on a Common Fisheries Policy which takes account of the need to conserve stocks and the interests of our fishermen. They will press for a fairer pattern of budgetary and resource transfers in the European Economic Community. They welcome the development of the European Monetary System and will consider afresh the question of the participation of the United Kingdom in its various aspects.

    My Government confirm their commitment to the Commonwealth and the United Nations. They will play an active part in the peaceful and just settlements of disputes between nations. My Ministers will have regard to the need for trade with, and aid to, the developing countries.

    Every effort will be made to end the conflict in Rhodesia and to bring about a lasting settlement based on the democratic wishes of the people of that country.

    My Government will fully cooperate in endeavours to achieve a just and comprehensive settlement in the Middle East and to bring peace to all the peoples of the region.

    Members of the House of Commons,

    Estimates for the public service will be laid before you.

    My Lords and Members of the House of Commons,

    My Government will give priority in economic policy to controlling inflation through the pursuit of firm monetary and fiscal policies. By reducing the burden of direct taxation and restricting the claims of the public sector on the nation’s resources they will start to restore incentives, encourage efficiency and create a climate in which commerce and industry can flourish. In this way they will lay a secure basis for investment, productivity and increased employment in all parts of the United Kingdom.

    My Government intend to achieve a fair balance between the rights and duties of the trade union movement. They will encourage responsible pay bargaining and the wider participation of the great majority of members in the affairs of their unions. Legislation will be brought before you to amend the law on picketing and the closed shop, and to provide for financial aid for postal ballots.

    My Government will publish proposals for more effective competition and fair pricing policies.

    Proposals will be brought forward to amend the Industry Act 1975 and to restrict the activities of the National Enterprise Board. Other proposals will reduce the extent of nationalised and State ownership and increase competition by providing offers of sale, including opportunities for employees to participate where appropriate.

    My Government will stimulate the development of small businesses on which the creation of new jobs so heavily depends. Means will be sought to reduce the administrative burdens which are placed upon them, and they will also benefit from My Government’s general policies on taxation, industrial relations and related employment legislation.

    Legislation will be introduced to amend company law.

    My Ministers will seek to secure that United Kingdom agriculture and the food-processing and distributive industries have an opportunity to compete on fair terms and to make their full contribution to the economy.

    In Northern Ireland, My Government will strive to restore peace and security and to promote the social and economic welfare of the Province. They will seek an acceptable way of restoring to the people of Northern Ireland more control over their own affairs.

    My Ministers will propose the repeal of the Scotland Act 1978, and all-Party discussions will be held about the devolution of power from Westminster. Measures will be introduced to make reforms to criminal procedure and criminal justice in Scotland.

    My Ministers will propose the repeal of the Wales Act 1978. They will give active support to the maintenance of the Welsh language and will seek an early start with Welsh broadcasting on the fourth television channel in Wales.

    My Government are committed to reinforcing respect for the law in all parts of the United Kingdom. They will give full support to the Police Service and will take steps to ensure that the law is enforced more effectively. They will support and improve the prison system and look forward to receiving the recommendations of the Committee of Inquiry into the Prison Services in the United Kingdom. Legislative proposals will be brought forward to strengthen the powers of the courts in England and Wales in relation to young offenders and juveniles.

    Members of the House of Commons will be given an opportunity to discuss and amend their procedures, particularly as they relate to their scrutiny of the work of Government.

    My Government will introduce measures on housing which will include provisions for local authority and new town tenants to have the right to buy their homes, a Tenants’ Charter for those who are local authority, new town and housing association tenants, and provisions to encourage short-term private lettings.

    Legislation will be introduced to promote greater efficiency in local government, including regulation of the activities of local authority direct labour organisations.

    The quality of education will be maintained and improved. Legislation will be introduced to remove the compulsion on local authorities in England and Wales to reorganise their schools on comprehensive lines; and their freedom to take up places at independent schools will be restored. Legislation will be introduced to ensure that parents’ wishes are taken into account in the choice of schools for their children and that there is a local appeals system; it will also make provision for assistance to less well-off parents whose children would benefit from attendance at certain non-maintained schools.

    My Government will continue to support the arts and will bring forward proposals to safeguard our national heritage of historic buildings and artistic treasures.

    Pensions, war pensions and other social security benefits will be increased in November, and legislation will be introduced to provide for the payment of a Christmas bonus to pensioners. Ways will be sought to simplify the operations of the social security system.

    My Ministers will work to improve the use of resources in the National Health Service and to simplify its administration. A Bill will be introduced to facilitate the wider use of private medical care.

    Measures will be introduced to amend the law on nationality and to make changes in the control of immigration.

    Proposals will be brought before you for the future of broadcasting. A Bill will be introduced to extend the life of the Independent Broadcasting Authority, which will be given responsibility (subject to strict safeguards) for the fourth television channel.

    A measure will be introduced to replace the provisions of Section 2 of the Official Secrets Act 1911 with provisions appropriate to the present time.

    A Bill will be brought forward to amend the law of contempt of court.

    My Ministers will take steps to improve the quality of the administration of justice and to promote reform of the general law.

    Other measures will be laid before you.

    My Lords and Members of the House of Commons,

    I pray that the blessing of Almighty God may rest upon your counsels.

  • William Waldegrave – 1979 Maiden Speech in the House of Commons

    Below is the text of the maiden speech made by William Waldegrave in the House of Commons on 24 October 1979.

    It seems to me to be bad luck for a maiden speaker to be followed by another maiden speaker, since in such circumstances he misses the opportunity of having paid to him those rounded tributes that years of experience in the House teach one to deploy. However, I am sure that other hon. Members will join with me in paying tribute to the hon. Member for Manchester, Central (Mr. Litherland), who has provided the Labour Party with a formidable new voice to succeed the attractive voice which preceded him, and which I always thought would have been more in order coming from the Conservative Front Bench than from the Labour Benches.

    My ancestor, Richard, had to be dragged to your Chair, Mr. Deputy Speaker, being the first so to be dragged, according to family tradition. My delay in finding the courage to speak to the House might have led you to believe that those nerves were inherited. I am particularly nervous about speaking to the House on one of those days of fierce and formidable debate, when although perhaps each side does not terrify the other much, perhaps both terrify the outside world a good deal. I promise that the enforced truce of my maiden speech will be only a brief interruption of the dialectic, which can then continue between those who say the cuts are essential to the economy and that, what is more, there have not been any, and those who say that the cuts are quite unacceptable and, what is more, were never accepted by them when they were making them.

    Into this brief period of truce, I would like, first, to insert my tribute to my predecessor, now Sir Robert Cooke. Many of those whom he served in Bristol, West for so many years perhaps did not know of the work that he did here for the House, but I have been left in no doubt about the affection and gratitude in which he is held by many hon. Members, and by those who work in the precincts of the Palace of Westminster, because of the work on the fabric of the House with which he had so much to do. The ghost of Sir Christopher Wren will, I am sure, forgive me if I borrow from the walls of St. Paul’s, and translate, his tribute to himself and apply it to Robin. Should any hon. Member be in the Library or the Committee Rooms, I suggest that he looks around him, and he will see Robin’s monument there.

    Bristol is too ancient and proud a city to need my tributes. It was once the second county borough in the land, until the march of time alleged that we had become a district council within Avon. We are a city with a tremendous history of contribution to the culture of the English-speaking world. We have a great radical tradition going back beyond Sir Stafford Cripps and Augustine Birrell to our key part in the history of Methodism and of the Society of Friends.

    We also have a fine Tory tradition. If the conflict has at times become a little heated—we burnt down most of the city and pursued the bishop over the rooftops in order to make a point or two about the 1831 Reform Bill—we have, none the less, normally managed to reconcile our differences and to demonstrate in a practical and sensible way a continuity of policy in the city’s administration. I am sure that the present exponent of our great radical tradition, the right hon. Member for Bristol, South-East (Mr. Benn), has no intention of treating my friend the present bishop in a similar way.

    Our Tory tradition has at its head Burke. Burke is perhaps over-quoted by hon. Members from Bristol, since his famous letter on the proper definition of the relationship between himself and Bristol was followed rather rapidly by his becoming the Member for Malton—a pocket borough in the gift of Lord Rockingham. More recently, in Oliver Stanley, we had a fine example of House of Commons skills. And in Walter Monckton we had a patient practitioner of the skills of negotiation and reconciliation in dealings between the Government and trade unions. Both those examples deserve study.

    Bristol, with its long history, shows in two particular respects how we can live with the future. First, Bristol is a successful multi-racial city. It has been multiracial successfully for many years, and has largely solved—or thinks it knows how to solve—the problems of being so. In achieving this, quietly and without fuss—although some problems remain—it perhaps has something to offer to others.

    Secondly, we can show from our origins as a commercial city how science and technology can serve the interests of the community. Bristol has unrivalled traditions in science and technology. It has a university whose chancellor, Dorothy Hodgkin, is Britain’s greatest living woman scientist, a polytechnic of outstanding excellence and first-class colleges and schools.

    We know we can live with the future and we intend to play a decisive part in its shaping. Strangely enough, our tolerance of immigrants is not unconnected with our scientific and technical skills. We played patron to an immigrant French engineer called Brunel. We bred and educated Paul Dirac—probably Britain’s greatest living theoretical scientist, whose father came from Switzerland.

    Mr. Deputy Speaker, this House is not perhaps at its best when it comes to limiting the growth of public expenditure. Disraeli, I think, said that everyone was more or less in favour of public spending cuts in the generality and no one was in favour of them in the particular. That is perhaps particularly true of hon. Members. I am already guilty myself, as I welcome the hints in today’s edition of The Daily Telegraph that the threat hanging over the BBC’s external services may be lifted.

    There can seldom have been a time when—putting aside the protection of special interests and the promotion of admirable causes to which individual hon. Members are dedicated—there has been a wider agreement on the necessity of holding down the growth in public expenditure. The last Government knew that it had to be done and started the process with considerable courage and effect. This Government enjoy the advantage of having a mandate to do what the last Government found themselves compelled to do. Indeed, there can seldom have been a Government elected with a clearer mandate, or a mandate so unpleasant to carry out.

    The truth is inescapable. Government spending of £70 billion a year cannot be financed without taxes so heavy that they begin to destroy the economy that pays them, without interest rates so high that new investment is impossible, or without catastrophic inflation—or perhaps all three. The old Keynesian formula of public expenditure as a way out of recession is of little relevance to this situation. It derived from a time when prices were actually falling and when the money supply was decreasing.

    But our commitment to the unpleasant job for which we were elected should never be allowed to become tinged with fanaticism. There is an essential place for spending by the State in wide areas of modern national life. That area is wider than was necessary 100 or even 50 years ago. It is essential that the Government have a philosophy which includes solid justification for positive action by the State, as well as negative abstention from action.

    The allegiance of citizens to the State does not derive from mere proximity. It will grow only if the State effectively does the modern version of the primordial just ruler’s proper job of protecting the weak and pulling down the over-mighty. Government is possible in a free society only if that allegiance between citizen and State is maintained. If that means spending on poverty, or on the mitigation of industrial failure or on anything else where a sensible judgment might be that the State can helpfully act, we should not be frightened of exercising our common sense by economic theory grown too big for its boots.

    Nor should we fall into the equally-ridiculous error of increasing expenditure by the State for its own sake in order to satisfy an opposite economic theory of even less intellectual interest. It is possible to do things because they are the right things to do on a particular occasion without any grand theoretical structure of justification.

    The authority of Government in a free society depends on the success with which it makes respectable, and then voices, a concept of common national good. In terms of this debate and this subject, that means showing the many people who are genuinely upset by cuts and postponements that they should accept them—although they are not inclined to do so—for the benefit of the common good. That means winning and retaining people’s trust. And that means saying, where it is true, that the present austerity means the loss or postponement of some good and valuable things. Not every saving can come from the elimination of waste or the cutting down of administration.

    There will, of course, be some exaggerated lobbying, and hon. Members on the Opposition Benches would be inhuman if they did not join in the uproar—and we know that they are by no means inhuman. But there will be some real losses, and if we deny that we will undermine the authority that we need to explain why the cuts are necessary in the first place. And more important even than that is the fact that to get people to accept unpleasant things now, in order that there will be benefits in the future, means reminding them of their membership of a common community—the nation—as well as of their rights as individuals, or as members of competing groups. That in turn entails occasionally talking in the now rather unfashionable language of national unity, as well as in more fashionable jargons.

    Having listened to many maiden speeches, I concluded that the House was so tolerant that it would put up with a good deal of teaching of right honourable grandmothers how to suck right honourable eggs. I have continued that tradition and I am grateful to the patience of the House for allowing me to do so.

  • John Major – 1979 Maiden Speech to the House of Commons

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    Below is the text of Mr Major’s maiden speech to the House of Commons, made on 13th June 1979.

    I am grateful to you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for calling me so rapidly after my return to the Chamber. I apologise to the House for my absence from the Chamber for part of the debate. I hope that hon. Members will accept my assurance that it was unavoidable for brief periods.

    It is now 23 years since I first sat in the Gallery and listened to the 1956 Budget debate. I confess that at that time I had hoped to take part in debates in the House but I did not imagine how long I should have to wait. At that time I did not imagine that I would have the privilege of representing such an ancient and famous constituency as Huntingdonshire, nor did I imagine that I should follow such a distinguished predecessor as Sir David Renton.

    Huntingdonshire is a remarkable constituency in many ways. It is an ancient constituency. It has returned Members to the House since the first Parliament of Simon de Montfort. It is proud of that tradition. It is proud because amongst its former Members was, for a brief period, Oliver Cromwell. He caused your predecessors, Mr. Deputy Speaker, more trouble than I anticipate causing, at least in my early days.

    Huntingdonshire also has a happy tradition that I shall encourage it to retain – of re-electing its Members time and time again. I enter no note of complacency but there seems to have been some doubt about motives on some occasions. I came across a letter from a discerning constituent in the eighteenth century who wrote to a friend of his Member of Parliament. He said: Of course we keep re-electing our Member. How else can we get rid of the fellow for six months at a time? That sentiment could not possibly apply to Sir David Renton.

    Many hon. Members will have known Sir David for many years. They will recognise that he was always elected on merit. He served his country, his constituents and his party – in that order – for one-third of a century and successfully fought 10 general elections. By any yardstick that is a remarkable record.

    In Huntingdonshire today Sir David is held, as he has been for many years, in great respect and is regarded with great affection. He will miss the House. I formed the impression that he loved the place. From what I have heard from right hon. and hon. Members from all parties, the House is also likely to miss his presence. I shall be satisfied if I am able to retain the affection of my constituents and colleagues as David retained it for 33 years.

    In his Budget Statement my right hon. and learned Friend said that he and his three predecessors framed their first Budgets in difficult circumstances. That is not surprising. It was largely because of mismanagement of the economy on many occasions and difficulties that arose that there was a change of Government at a general election and a new Chancellor had the opportunity to present a Budget.

    If we accept that thesis as being accurate, we can see immediately the consequences and importance of the first Budget of a Parliament – a Budget which claims to set, and I believe does set, the pattern for Budgets which will follow throughout the period of this Government – framed in the remarkably adverse, difficult and conflicting contradictory conditions facing my right hon. and learned Friend.

    I believe that public opinion requires four things of the Government in terms of economic management. It requires them to cut taxes, to curb inflation, to create new jobs and, as far as possible, to maintain satisfactory public services. But the simple truth is that although public opinion may require all those four things, with the best will in the world the Chancellor and his colleagues cannot possibly achieve them all at the same time. In order to create jobs and to maintain public services, it is necessary first to cut taxes and to curb inflation.

    My right hon. and learned Friend made a very bold start in that respect. Indeed, some Opposition Members would claim that his steps were rather too bold for comfort. The Leader of the Opposition said that it was a reckless Budget, but I suspect that if his party had permitted that kind of Budget to be introduced a year or two years ago, the right hon. Gentleman might have remained Prime Minister or at least have lost the election by a slightly less decisive margin.

    The Budget is in many ways bound to be controversial, as all Budgets are. I hope that it will not seem niggardly to make the point that the success of this Budget over a period will certainly depend upon the Government’s determination and success in restraining public expenditure. In the natural course of events, they are bound to face pressures within and outside the House to break with their cash limits and to increase the public sector borrowing requirement that they have set themselves.

    Indeed, if the tapes are correct – I am sure that they are on this occasion – Mr. McGahey of the National Union of Mineworkers has already said that he feels that the Budget will enable the unions to create conditions which will bring about a general election in 18 months or so. Whether or not he said that, I can only say that I should have more respect for that view if Mr. McGahey were to put his politics on the line and seek to get himself elected to this House to present that view here rather than at a safe distance from it.

    If we back away from the cash limits and the economic management that we have set ourselves, we shall face a distinct change in economic policy. Therefore, I was pleased to hear my right hon. Friend the Chief Secretary this afternoon reiterate that the Government’s commitment to spending cuts and to restraining the level of public expenditure generally was substantial and that the Government intend to keep to it.

    Whenever we talk about spending cuts there is bound to be a certain amount of uproar. It is never popular to cut services. But it seems that much of the uproar which is currently being engendered is to a large extent synthetic. However, seeing the hon. Member for Birmingham, Perry Bar (Mr. Rooker) in his place, I would exempt from that criticism those Opposition Members who sit below the Gangway. It seems that they are in opposition whomsoever is in Government. I doubt that their anger is at all synthetic. No doubt the right hon. Member for Leeds, East (Mr. Healey) would agree that they are continually in opposition.

    I think that the public spending cuts are acceptable. I agree that difficulties will certainly be faced, most notably in local government. I propose to deal with that matter later. The public expenditure cuts are tolerable, provided that they are seen to be fair. I think that they will be seen to be justified if they are successful in curbing inflation at a time when taxes have been reduced as well.

    Perhaps I may give an illustration of the equity that is necessary if we are to carry this policy through. In this respect I shall talk about the proposed reduction in the rate support grant. I am prepared to support a cut in the total level of rate support grant, but I think that it will be seen as unfair in some quarters if those local authorities which pruned expenditure in recent years are now to suffer disproportionately to fund those which overspent.

    Problems have arisen in Cambridgeshire in recent years because of the distribution of the total sum of rate support grant. Cambridgeshire and Huntingdonshire have the most rapidly increasing population of any part of the United Kingdom. That is substantially because Cambridgeshire, on the outskirts of Peterborough, and, in my constituency, St. Ives, St. Neots and many villages have encouraged and accepted overspill from the large cities to mitigate the problems there. But regrettably, having done that, they have found no amendment in the way that the rate support grant has been distributed and they now receive approximately 40 per cent. of the needs element which goes to the inner city areas.

    Having spent a great deal of my youth in Brixton, I accept that there are great problems in the inner city areas and that they need to be dealt with, but I trust that the Government will look at the maldistribution of the rate support grant, if not in time for the next distribution, at least in time for the distribution which will follow that.

    The most important aspects of the Chancellor’s Budget Statement, if one pitches one’s mind forward to the medium term, are those elements which we trust, and I believe, will lead to a growth in jobs. In Huntingdonshire and elsewhere, there is a desperate need not just for the maintenance of existing jobs but for the physical creation of new jobs to reduce unemployment and to take up the increasing numbers who are leaving school and will be seeking jobs for the first time.

    In my constituency, for the reasons that I mentioned, the population has doubled since 1966, but the number of jobs has not doubled or anything like it. In many villages, where some right hon. and hon. Members may think there are no problems, there are no local jobs for the youngsters who have grown up there and left school. There is no local employment for them. Because of the maldistribution of the rate support grant, there is an inadequate level of rural transport. Even if they were able to get to any of the main centres of population in order to travel to London to find employment, the cost would be so high that they would be unable to afford it at the level of salaries they could command.

    I appreciate that we can keep a problem at bay temporarily by throwing subsidies at it, but if we are to curb that problem in the medium term in my constituency and in many others, it requires the establishment of new companies and a great increase in the total number of jobs available. I believe that my right hon. and learned Friend yesterday introduced certain tax and other measures which, over two to three years, will create a climate in which jobs can be increased and begin to be formed. I wholly welcome those measures.

    If I may put a marker down for subsequent Budgets, I hope that my right hon. and learned Friend will as soon as possible consider some mitigation of the levels of capital transfer tax with the aim of ensuring that the many small firms and farms which provide so much employment in rural areas, and, in terms of small firms, in many city areas, are permitted to expand and not to be broken down because of the imposition of capital transfer tax between generations.

    The House has already accepted the principle of inflation-indexed personal allowances. I hope that it will also accept the principle that, in terms of capital transfer tax, it might be appropriate to tax land on its earning capacity rather than on the inflated capital value that has arisen in recent years partly because of institutional purchases and partly because of the cost of land in the European Economic Community.

    There are some social elements in my right hon. and learned Friend’s speech which I welcome and wish to touch on briefly. The cash amount of the increase in retirement pensions will be generally welcomed in this House. I should like to mention the plight of many people who are retired.

    Since it affects many of my constituents who are retired, I am delighted to see the abolition of dividend control and the reduction of the investment income surcharge, particularly the extent of the reduction that has been made. The surcharge has always been utterly indefensible, by any practical logic, in a society that wishes to encourage investment and needs investment to provide jobs. It is grossly unfair that those who were sufficiently prudent during their lifetime to save should find themselves punitively taxed for saving and investing, as every Chancellor of every party has asked them to do so many times in recent years. I believe my right hon. and learned Friend’s measures in this respect to be simple justice. They will be widely welcomed in my constituency and many others.

    Time after time in recent general elections, retirement pensioners in my constituency have said to me “Why on earth should we save? Why on earth should we invest? When we have saved and invested, our savings have been subjected to dividend control and we have then been punitively taxed on what was left.” I am delighted to see that that situation is to be changed.

    There is one other brief matter on which I should like to touch again making a point that I trust will be picked up some time later during this Parliament and that is that retirement pensioners simply cannot and do not understand, however it is explained to them, why it is that tax changes can be back-dated to the beginning of the tax year but that retirement pension increases cannot.

    I understand the sophisticated arguments that are frequently advanced for this, but the truth of the matter is that pensioners simply do not understand it, and they widely resent it. I hope that at some stage during the period of this Parliament it will be possible, if not to pay pension increases earlier, at least to ensure that when they are paid in November they are back-dated to the beginning of the tax year.

    I am grateful to the House, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for its traditional indulgence to a newcomer. I appreciate it, but I shall not expect it and I imagine that I shall not receive it on future occasions. Certainly with a background of politics in Brixton and Camden I am rather more used to a rowdy reception, and may perhaps feel happier with it in any event.

    In conclusion, I believe that in his Budget Statement yesterday my right hon. and learned Friend laid the foundations of a strategy for a wider and more profitable industrial and commercial base, provided that our policies are carried through for the period of this Parliament in the fashion that we expect. I hope that the Chancellor will continue his work and that he will find it possible – though it would certainly not be possible in this Parliament – to present as many Budgets as his predecessor did. As the years roll on I hope that he will be successful with those Budgets, and if he is I look forward to being in my place to support him.

  • Peter Robinson – 1979 Maiden Speech in the House of Commons

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    Below is the text of the maiden speech made by Peter Robinson in the House of Commons on 21 May 1979.

    As this is the first occasion on which I have addressed the House of Commons, I should like to thank the House for the great kindness shown to me in my first two weeks in this building. I should like to go further and thank hon. Members in all parts of the House for imparting to me their knowledge and experience.

    Although I and my colleagues will sit on the Government side of the House, we shall be doing so as a separate and independent group.

    I am told that in making a maiden speech one is expected to be non-controversial. Since I come from Belfast, East, the most important part of Northern Ireland, a country that is steeped in controversy, the House will understand my difficulty this evening. Indeed, I come from a party in which controversy has not been entirely unknown. My campaign was indeed controversial. Indeed, the policies I pursued were controversial, and therefore I face certain problems in making my maiden speech.

    Before I go any further, I should place on record the appreciation of the people of East Belfast for the outgoing Member, the right hon. William Craig. Mr. Craig has been a colleague of mine for many years, and although we differed on policy matters I can say with confidence that we always maintained our friendship. William Craig has always been a gentleman, and I greatly respect him.

    I shall be brief, and I shall do no more in this speech than nail my colours to the mast. Since I come from Northern Ireland, I shall do no other than speak of the most important matter in the eyes of the people of Northern Ireland, and that is the subject of security. I was pleased to see in the Gracious Speech a statement of the Government’s intention to restore peace and normality in my country. While that remains their policy, they will always have my full support and that of my party.

    Hon. Members will all be aware of the terrible tragedy of terrorism. I know that it has come close to many in this House who knew Airey Neave. Those of us in Northern Ireland who knew him, loved and respected him, will appreciate the great loss occasioned by his death. In Northern Ireland about 2,000 people have died, over 20,000 people have been maimed and mutilated, and millions of pounds worth of damage have been caused in senseless and savage terrorism.

    I ask the Government to adopt as their first priority the defence of the citizens of this part of the United Kingdom. I ask that they adopt the toughest security measures to put down terrorism in Northern Ireland. I may be stretching the idea of non-controversy too far if I suggest that the Government might even go as far as to bring in capital punishment for terrorist crimes.

    In Northern Ireland many of us are aware of the great difficulty faced by the security forces. I wish to place on record my appreciation of the great job which they undertake against the propaganda that is put out by the Provisional IRA and other terrorist groups. I know that many hon. Members will take the view that I am too young to advise this House, and that may be so. But, despite my tender years, I have walked behind many a hearse and have looked in many an open grave. I have held the hand of many who have lost loved ones as a result of the terrorist campaign. I have carried in my arms fatherless children of many of the victims of Ulster sorrows.

    Tonight, with all the force at my command, I call on the Government—because it is to this Government that my people look—to act with all speed and determination to solve the security problem in my country. On behalf of Ulster’s dead, I call on the Government to act. On behalf of Ulster’s living, I call on them to do it now. I ask them to stand up to terrorism in Northern Ireland and let my people live.

  • Michael Martin – 1979 Maiden Speech in the House of Commons

    Below is the text of the maiden speech made by Michael Martin in the House of Commons on 17th May 1979.

    It is a privilege to represent the Glasgow, Springburn constituency. I have lived in the constituency for more than 13 years, and before that I resided in the neighbouring constituency. Therefore, I know of the good work that my predecessor, Dick Buchanan, has done for the area. I was pleased to learn that he was held in high regard in the House. He had many fine qualities. I was always impressed by his willingness to give service to the community. As a young man he was a shop steward in the local railway workshop, and he fought for, and succeeded in getting, better conditions for his workmates. When he was city treasurer in the old Glasgow corporation he was responsible for many projects which are still of benefit to the people of Glasgow. I am sure that the House will join me in wishing him well in his retirement.

    At one time Springburn had a thriving railway industry which produced steam locomotives. In fact, Springburn made more than half the number of steam locomotives produced in the world. Many of them are still in use in Africa, India and South America. The industry not only employed thousands of skilled and semi-skilled workers but provided work for the smaller firms in the area. I am convinced that had the private railway companies ploughed their profits back into the industry Springburn would not have the unemployment problem that it has today. I hope the Government recognise the need to strengthen the Scottish Development Agency so that it can bring new industry to Glasgow and to places such as Springburn. My constituency needs industrial revitalisation to prevent its becoming an industrial graveyard.

    The constituency has various types of housing. In the Dennistoun district there is a mixture of private and local authority tenements. In Petershill we have the highest multi-storey dwellings in Europe—33 storeys high. In Germiston, Balornock and Barmulloch we have mainly council housing stock. The Cow-lairs area consists of private tenements, where many of the tenants are suffering from landlords and property owners who have neglected their properties and refused to carry out repairs for more than half a century.

    Recently an organisation known as Norman Properties operated in the area. Its activities were questionable, to say the least. Young couples, desperate for a house of their own, had to pay as much as £1,000, only to find that they had no legal rights when the local authority introduced compulsory purchase schemes. The good people of Cowlairs deserve better, but the private sector has failed them miserably.

    The only hope for the people in this area is for council house building to be speeded up and for encouragement to be given to community-based housing associations, which have an expertise in the modernisation of older tenemental properties. I hope that the Government do not intend to make cuts in the Housing 496 Corporation’s budget, because it does an excellent job in building up such organisations.

    Reference is made in the Queen’s Speech to the sale of council housing. It worries me considerably that the Government may feel that they are giving some sort of freedom to the sitting tenant. Have they considered what it will mean to the types of tenants whom I have just described? The sale of council housing will mean that the good-quality housing stock will go to the highest bidder and not to those in need. Have the Government considered the consequences of selling houses in a city such as Glasgow, which consists largely of tenemental properties? Who will ensure that the owner-occupier maintains his share of the council tenement? Who will ensure that the owner-occupier looks after the communal facilities, such as the back greens and the drying areas, or even the paths leading up to the tenements? Who will make sure that these communal facilities are looked after? I foresee many practical difficulties in the proposal to sell council housing.

    I should like to bring to the attention of the House the fact that less than a year ago every party on Glasgow district council called upon the Government to make Glasgow a special case. Glasgow has many problems, and it needs a massive injection of capital to revitalise the city and attract new industry. I hope that the new Government will give Glasgow such consideration.

  • Chris Patten – 1979 Maiden Speech in the House of Commons

    Below is the text of the maiden speech made by Chris Patten in the House of Commons on 14th June 1979.

    I am grateful to you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for calling me this evening. I am even more grateful to the electors of Bath for giving you the opportunity to do so.

    It is a custom that in getting off the mark in this House one should attempt to avoid controversy. That is a daunting challenge for most of us. I have heard and read a number of maiden speeches over the last two or three weeks and I must say that the word “controversial” seems to be defined in a fairly relaxed way. The first I heard in this House began with a colourful attack on the Iron Lady, whoever that may be, and went on to give some crisp advice to Chancellor Schmidt on how to run the West German economy, for which I am sure he was very grateful.

    I shall try to stay within “the meaning of the Act” and to avoid controversy. I begin therefore with the entirely uncontroversial remark that I have the honour of representing the most beautiful city in England. In doing so, I follow a notable servant of this House, Sir Edward Brown, who represented Bath for 15 years and previously worked at every level in the Conservative Party, ultimately becoming chairman of the national union, which is a slightly different body from the national executive of the Labour Party. He was a diligent Member of Parliament. He worked extremely conscientiously for his constituents. In a few weeks, I have already come across countless examples of his courtesy and consideration. He was a hard worker in this House where he chaired a number of Committees, and he spoke knowledgeably in the Conservative Party about trade union matters. I hope that I shall be able to match his service to the party and the country. In saying that, I am all too aware of the fact that Bath has been called the graveyard of ambition. If this is indeed the case, although I am sure that none of us would admit to any greater ambition than the chance of representing our constituency in this House, then, to mix metaphors, I cannot imagine anywhere better to hang up one’s boots.

    I shall not take hon. Members on a verbal guided tour of Bath. I am sure that they will excuse that. I would not want to deter any of them from visiting Bath, if they have not already done so. I would say quickly, in the hope that the chamber of commerce is listening, that if hon. Members come to Bath I should be grateful if they would stay in Bath rather than Bristol.

    Bath is not a museum piece. It is an extremely busy city, although not quite as busy as we would like following the rise in unemployment in the last few years. It depends a great deal for its prosperity on a number of fine engineering firms. It would not be an exaggeration to say that those firms and my constituency will depend a great deal for their future prosperity on this Budget.

    I suppose that one can easily over-estimate the impact on the economy of what my right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer once called, in a speech to which I shall return later, an “archaic ritual”. Nevertheless, our success in the future hangs very much on some of the decisions which the Chancellor announced on Tuesday. He had an unenviable job, first—and I must try to avoid controversy—because of a less than wholly satisfactory inheritance. Hearing so many speeches from the Opposition Front Bench, such as the speech of the right hon. Member for Leeds, East (Mr. Healey) yesterday, about the state of the economy on 2 May, I sympathise very much with the story of the late Lord Avon’s father who was once seen throwing the family barometer out of the front door into the pouring rain, shouting after it “Set fair, eh! Get out there and see for yourself.”

    We must also sympathise with the Chancellor since he has confronted in this Budget what he described at the beginning of his statement as the crisis of decline, which is no less real for having become recently the subject of increasingly fashionable discussion. If he is right—I think he probably is—that we are poised somewhere between relative and absolute decline, and if he is also right—again, I agree with him—that the decline is not irreversible, the burden on his shoulders these last few weeks has been considerable. One of the troubles is that many of us who agree with him about the seriousness of the present situation are reluctant, or have been reluctant, to accept some of the changes that are necessary to do anything about it. Like St. Augustine, we have all wanted to be virtuous but not quite yet. I plead guilty to that charge.

    But it is difficult, I should have thought, to make out an overwhelmingly convincing case for the status quo. If one is to change things, one has to start at some time and somewhere. I am sure that the Chancellor was right this week to take his courage, and ours, in both hands and plunge ahead.

    My right hon. and learned Friend identified correctly three main tasks. First, as the noble Lord Robbins once said, one can be agnostic about the precise effect or incentives of given rates of tax. But even most Labour Members, I believe, would agree that a 100 per cent. rate of tax would have a pretty serious effect on incentives. It is therefore not very sensible to argue that some slightly lower rate than 100 per cent. has no effect whatever.

    I was pleased that the Chancellor chose in his Budget Statement to place so much emphasis on restoring incentives right across the board. I should like to be able to turn to some of the arguments advanced by my pair, the hon. Member for Birkenhead (Mr. Field), about incentives. Alas, he is not here, and I have insufficient time, but I look forward with relish to returning to that topic on some future occasion.

    There is obviously some risk in making such a substantial shift from direct to indirect taxes when the underlying rate of inflation is increasing. I am sure, however, that the Chancellor was, on balance, justified in taking that risk. I am pleased that in doing so he has seen that pensioners are protected from the one-off increase in prices that will result from the rise in VAT. I hope that he will also encourage the Treasury to be as imaginative as possible in thinking about the impact on VAT on the performing arts, particularly the theatre.

    The second task for the Chancellor was to reduce the public sector borrowing requirement this year and in subsequent years. He has spoken in the past about the advantages of acting with “all deliberate speed.” It was perhaps a pity, but inevitable given the fact that the PSBR was much larger than anticipated, that he had to act so rapidly on public expenditure. One of the problems of acting so swiftly is that sometimes the cuts one makes in the short term discredit the important longer-term exercise of getting public expenditure under firm and lasting control. On the whole, the Government seem to have avoided that situation. I am grateful that what would have been a departmentally easy cut in the Department of the Environment has not been made in the programme—which is already hard-pressed—for conserving our historic heritage. I am grateful that that programme has not been cut.

    One easy cut, I suggest to my right hon. Friend is, the “pork barrel” scheme for reallocating civil servants’ jobs from one part of the country to another and particularly the eccentric, extravagant and, what I believe is the vogue word, “reckless” scheme for moving 800 or more jobs from Bath to Glasgow. I am pleased that the Minister of State, Civil Service Department told me in a written reply at the beginning of the week that that scheme is to be reviewed. I must tell him that I would find it very difficult to explain to my constituents why I had voted in favour of the Adjournment motion for the Summer Recess if that review had not been completed by the end of July.

    One other thing which I hope Ministers will remember in thinking about public expenditure is the speeches they made in Opposition about the importance of increasing parliamentary control over the Executive, about overhauling our antique budgetary procedures, about ending, in the words of my noble Friend Lord Cockfield, the divorce between Government spending plans and parliamentary control. In a very good speech to the LSE in 1977 on this subject, the Chancellor himself said: Whether as Ministers or as parliamentarians, it is we who are in charge. Only we can change the system. Quite so.

    I hope that the Government will show that they are as keen on those issues now as they were before the election and, for example, will give the proposals of the Procedure Committee a fair wind when they are debated next week.

    The third task that the Chancellor and his right hon. Friends have had to deal with is the establishment of a more balanced relationship between the trade union movement and the rest of society. In that context I was a little disappointed that there was not in the Budget more encouragement of ownership through profit-sharing schemes. I am also disappointed that we have not yet heard much about the Government’s thoughts on the improvement of bargaining structures.

    Obviously there is agreement on both sides of the House that the Budget will have some impact on the attitudes taken during the next pay round and the one after that. The CBI has put forward imaginative proposals for improving pay bargaining. It would be nice to have heard the Government’s thoughts on that, Perhaps we shall hear them later in the debate.

    If anyone else has any better ideas than the CBI about how to reconcile pay moderation and freedom, I am sure that we should be delighted to hear them. Among other things, we need some kind of forum where the major participants in the economy can sit down calmly to consider the implications for prosperity, as well as for unemployment and pay bargaining, of the Government’s fiscal and monetary policies. Those words were written by my right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor and by the Secretaries of State for Employment, Industry and Energy and the Paymaster General in a pamphlet called “The Right Approach to the Economy”, published a couple of years ago. They were absolutely right then and I think that they are right now.

    I was disappointed to see an article on the back page of the Financial Times this morning suggesting that Ministers are not thinking in that way any more. I imagine that that suggestion could only have been a jeu d’esprit by the labour editor of the Financial Times. I cannot imagine that it represented the Government’s real intentions.

    The Chancellor has set out in his Budget on a long and arduous road. None of us on the Government Benches believes in “hey presto” economic strategies or that one Budget can turn everything around. But we do believe that there are more sensible and less sensible ways of steering the economy. The Chancellor has started this week in a characteristically sensible way. I am sure that we all wish him at least as long in the job as his predecessor has had. Judging from his first Budget, whoever eventually succeeds him will have a much easier and more agreeable task than he has had this week.