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  • Ray Powell – 1985 Speech on Garw Colliery

    Below is the text of the speech made by Ray Powell, the then Labour MP for Ogmore, in the House of Commons on 10 December 1985.

    With the proceedings of the House having continued until a late hour, and petitions then having been presented, I wondered whether we would ever reach this point. I should have liked to raise this Adjournment a week ago, because in the intervening time certain developments have occurred in the Garw valley and at the Garw colliery, where the men, by a majority decision, have agreed to the colliery closing without going through the new review procedure.

    The last debate of this type that I conducted with the Minister was about the St. John’s colliery in Maesteg in my constituency. That was on 23 April last, when the Minister pointed out that he had been born in Wales, in Glyn Ceiriog near Llangollen in north Wales. North Wales is not all that different from south Wales, with the exception of the accent. The Minister will appreciate that it is still necessary for me to put on record, on behalf of the community of the Garw valley and the constituents of Ogmore, the main objections to the conditions that applied to the St. John’s lodge members regarding the restriction on the retention of the colliery.

    The Minister will recall that when I was fighting for the St. John’s colliery, which had a work force of 840, he promised to ensure that the matter went to the new review procedure. I am pleased to say that eventually he carried out that promise, and I thank him for that. Nevertheless, the colliery closed, and it may interest the Minister to know that the director of the coal board in south Wales sent me a letter the day after the miners in Maesteg had taken their decision to permit the colliery to close without going through the new review procedure.

    A number of collieries have closed in my constituency, but never before have I received a letter so quickly from the director as I did on this occasion. It was more instant than instant coffee. The closure was agreed by the men at 4 o’clock in the afternoon, and the director was able to get a communication to me by the following day.

    In Ogmore there have been a number of closures since 1979, including the Caerau, Coegnant and St. John’s colliery in the Llynfir valley, the Wyndham Western colliery in the Ogmore valley and the Ffaldau colliery in the Garw valley. Now, the very last colliery left in the Ogwr borough area, the Garw colliery, is to go. These closures have caused the loss of 2,900 jobs in the mining industry in my constituency since 1979. Indeed, the Garw valley —the No. 4 area of the south Wales coalfield —once supported 12 productive pits.

    I compliment the lodge committee and the work force, who were given a raw deal by the NCB. They were asked to prepare a plan to break even, which had to be operative by March 1986. They were told that from the one coal face in operation they had to produce 7,500 tonnes a week rather than the existing 4,350 tonnes. They prepared a plan last week, and I have with me maps, drawings, estimates and figures that were presented to the NCB in Cardiff, with the backing of the south Wales NUM officials. Mr. Cliff Davies refused to accept that plan, rejected it totally and said that it did not comply with the NCB’s criteria. Why was that criterion used for pits in Wales when it was not used in other NCB areas?

    When the NCB announced its new Strategy for Coal, which wiped out the Plan for Coal, the key factor was production at a price that the market would bear. The NCB says that this means producing at a cost of less than £42 per tonne. Of the 156 pits, approximately 110 cannot meet that criterion, but more significant is the picture in the areas where the NCB is helping the breakaway union to reduce NUM influence.

    Equally significant is the fact that the officials of the breakaway union have not commented on the NCB strategy of drawing a line at £42 per tonne production cost —a policy that will be devastating for NUM members in Nottingham, south Derbyshire, Leicestershire and the midlands.

    I have with me a list of collieries showing production costs per tonne for the last six months under the NCB’s criteria, and this is relevant to the collieries that have closed in the Ogmore constituency in the last 12 months.

    The production cost per tonne at Mansfield was £65·10; at Rufford, £58·02; at Silverhill, £55·29; at Pye Hill, £57·92; at Babbington, £57·01; at Hucknall, £56·32; at Newstead, £53·42; at Cadley Hill, £87·55; at Donisthorpe/ Measham, £70·87; at Wolstanton, £66·73 and at Holditch, £58·68. Yet the Garw colliery was producing coal at £53·65 a tonne and the south Wales NCB decided that the colliery had to close.

    Are the collieries that I have mentioned, which are producing coal at high cost, protected against that criterion because they are encouraging the UDM in those areas? It is important for miners in south Wales to know that. I have not gone into detail about collieries that produce coal at much more than £42 per tonne —I was using them only as a comparison with the Garw colliery.

    I should like to pay tribute to the Garw lodge officials —Mr. John Jones, the chairman, Mr. Berwen Howells, the secretary and Eirfyl Jones, the vice-chairman —for the way in which they have conducted the negotiations, and on their loyalty to the work force. They have consulted the work force in these negotiations, as they did during the 12-month miners’ strike. I would like to pay tribute also to the community of the Garw valley, which gives unstintingly to the miners and assisted them in all possible ways during their fight to retain their collieries.

    In a previous debate on the St. John’s colliery, I told the Minister that most miners in my constituency were not Scargill supporters, but that they were on strike because they believed that it was the only way in which to fight the battle to retain their collieries, their jobs and their families’, friends’and communities future. The predictions made by the NUM in the 12-month strike are coming true in Wales, especially in my constituency.

    The work force of 600 in the Garw valley has been transferred from the pits that have closed in the past six or seven years. Some 400 mining gipsies will again be without work when the colliery closes. They will look for other pits but, in the south Wales coalfield, they are being closed, slowly but surely. There are very few jobs for young people. The youngest person at the Garw colliery is 23, and no young person has been employed in the pit in the No. 4 area for the past six years.

    The plan that I mentioned earlier would have been able to develop massive reserves which the NCB agrees exist in the Rhondda Fach and Rhondda Fawr seams. The plans were based on the cheapest possible means of developing ​ those seams. It would have taken two years to get to the main seams and cost £7 million, but the plans were rejected utterly, with little thought for miners in the Garw valley.

    As it is the last in the area, would it be possible to mothball the colliery? It could be used as a tourist attraction as the Garw, Ogmore and Llynfir valleys lend themselves to the tourist industry. It could also be used some time in the future as access to an abundance of coal in seams that are acknowledged by the NCB and others to be readily available. What would it cost to maintain a colliery such as Garw so that it might be used in future? I appreciate that there might be problems with gases from other collieries, but could the Minister consider it? If he cannot give me an answer tonight, perhaps he will reply later.

    I would like to be able to say that we will give something to people at Garw. The work force and the community have suffered as a result of 100 years of despoliation by owners and the NCB. I ask the Minister to consider the feasibility of preservation and not to seal off those vast reserves of coal, which are a national asset.

    Having referred to the pressure on the work force of Garw colliery and the reason why they accepted the decision, I shall quote just two paragraphs from a memorandum written by area director Cliff Davies to the manager of the St. John’s colliery on 11 November. He said:

    “I am becoming increasingly concerned that men who wish to take voluntary redundancy at St. John’s Colliery will be caught by the DHSS and RMPS rules and will suffer severe financial penalties. As you are aware, unless the men are off our books by 2nd January, 1986, the penalties will be triggered. The time available to us to process such redundancies is fast running out.

    The same concern applies to men who are awaiting redundancy at collieries to which St. John’s men will transfer. If we delay much longer, these men too will be caught by the DHSS and RMPS rules.”

    That meant that if the miners were not prepared to accept redundancy by 2 January 1986 —and the same criterion applies to miners at the Garw colliery —they would lose substantial sums of money and face 12 months loss of unemployment benefit. As they had already lost 12 months work without any pay at all, that would not have been a matter of great concern to them if there were any future for the colliery or the miners working there, but they have been browbeaten by all and sundry and especially by the Government and MacGregor and their understudies in the industry. That is why the miners took a majority decision to agree to closure.

    That valley, in which 8,000 people reside, is full of trees and spoilt only by the NCB tips. The only employment in the area is with Offrex Rexel, which has a predominantly female work force of 500 at Llangeinor, Sweetex which employs 40 women part time and Flextank, which has a mainly male labour force of 200.

    My constituents therefore ask or special consideration and the restoration of special development status to the area. The NCB should reinstate the area to its past beauty, make it safe, ensure that subsidence problems are resolved and prepare sites for factory development. The Government should give special consideration to the loss of £250,000 in rates to the local authority as a result of just two pit closures.

    The loss of jobs is of even greater significance in an area of such high unemployment. In the Maesteg area, male unemployment was 24 per cent. before the St. John’s colliery closure. It has now escalated to nearly 40 per ​ cent., with further increases due to washery closures. The same will apply to the Garw colliery and the Ogmore valley.

    My last point is equally important. What I said in the debate on 23 April about the effects on the community needs to be repeated today. The Minister replied:

    “The hon. Gentleman has mentioned the Margam project several times in the House and blamed the Government for not bringing it forward fast enough. The board has now received planning permission from West Glamorgan county council to build a colliery at Margam, which would employ about 650 people. However, the board has yet to make a final decision on whether to proceed with the project. If it decides to proceed, the next step will be to refer it to the Secretary of State.” —[Official Report, 23 April 1985; Vol. 77, c. 853.]

    In an article published in the Western Mail on 24 April 1985, the reporter, David Lewis, said that Mr. Philip Weekes, who was then the South Wales NCB area director, had announced that the NCB was to develop the Margam mine. I should like to know why this project that was promised by Mr. Weekes is not yet in being. I hope that the Under-Secretary of State for Energy will press the NCB to develop this mine. I understand that it contains the best coking coal in the world and that acid rain is less likely to be a potential hazard.

    Finally, I attended yesterday in the House a coalfield communities campaign reception. The campaign is supported by 69 of the 100 local authorities in coalfield areas, including my authority, the Ogwr borough council. I hope that the Under-Secretary of State will look at the document that was presented yesterday by the coalfield communities campaign to a number of hon. Members and consider its arguments about the decline in communities as a result of colliery closures.

  • Conal Gregory – 1985 Speech on Dangerous Imported Goods

    Below is the text of the speech made by Conal Gregory, the then Conservative MP for York, in the House of Commons on 9 December 1985.

    With 13 shopping days left before Christmas this is a timely occasion to debate the importation of consumer goods, many of which are dangerous. Each year about 7,000 people in Great Britain die in home accidents—more than are killed on the roads. An estimated 3 million sustain injuries which require medical attention. This is too high a toll in human suffering and cost to the community. A proportion originates directly through the use of dangerous imported consumer goods.

    I appreciate that the consumer has certain safeguards through regulations under two statutes. The Consumer Protection Act 1961 imposes safety requirements on prescribed goods and or requires that they be accompanied by specific warnings or instructions. Examples are the Toy (Safety) Regulations 1974/1367, which require that toys shall not have sharp edges or spikes and that there is no possibility of children swallowing glass eyes from a toy’s face; the Pencils and Graphic Instruments (Safety) Regulations 1974/226 which require that pencils and paint on pencils should not contain more than a certain amount of lead; and the Babies’ Dummies (Safety) Regulations 1978/836 which set safety standards.

    Under the Consumer Safety Act 1978 goods can be required to conform to certain standards and persons can be prohibited from supplying goods which are not considered to be safe or which do not meet certain safety requirements.

    Two examples of appropriate legislation under the Act are the Novelties (Safety) Regulations 1980/958 and the Novelties (Safety) (Amendment) Regulations 1985/128, which prohibit persons from supplying balloon kits containing benzene, tear gas capsules, and so on, and the Food Imitations (Safety) Regulations 1985/99 which prohibit persons from supplying toys, erasers, and so on, which look like food, smell like food or flowers, or taste like food.

    I appreciate that prohibition orders have been introduced under the 1978 Act, such as the Toy Water Snakes (Safety) Order and the Expanding Novelties (Safety) Order, but they cease to have effect after 12 months unless the Government seek to renew them.

    There is worrying evidence concerning a Japanese novelty known a “Grobots”, “Grobugs” or “Grobeasts” which grow from about one and a half inches long—up to 200 times their size in water. They have become the subject of after dinner conversation in some households. However, if accidentally swallowed by a child, such a toy could cause a serious throat or stomach obstruction requiring surgery.

    A prohibition notice was placed on the importing company on 21 November. That was not exactly speedy, since it was almost a fortnight after the first newspaper report was published.

    That action illustrates the inadequacy of the present arrangements. It closes the door after the horse has bolted. It has not stopped the dangerous product entering the country. It has not stopped its distribution among the trade, or its retail sale. It does not prevent another company from ​ importing the product. If the Expanding Novelties (Safety) Order had been renewed, none of this need have occurred and children would not have been placed at risk

    The penalties are inadequate. Contravention is an offence punishable by a fine up to a maximum of £2,000 and up to three months’ imprisonment. Surely £20,000 or more would be more realistic, taking into account trade profits and the risk to which children are exposed.

    The Department can ban a product, but its name can be quickly changed. It can ban by compositional structure, but analysis takes time. It can also give a general warning. Indeed, the Association of Toy, Stationery and Fancy Goods Wholesalers is operating a code of conduct—a dangerous toys early warning service—for its members and retail customers. Its members and local trading standards departments are notified about toys which are found or thought likely to be dangerous. It immediately informs its members who advise the retail shops. This is admirable, but it lacks legal sanction and—to judge by the way that defective goods enter the United Kingdom before Christmas—it is inadequate.

    I place on record my thanks—which will be echoed throughout the House—to the Yorkshire Post for its investigatory campaign into unsafe imports. It has done a public service by highlighting such dangerous products as illegal toys, cheap, second-hand tyres and household goods.

    I will give some examples; of imported consumer goods on sale, starting with toys. There are bicycles, the front forks of which collapse; a soft toy, filled with small pieces of foam rubber, split and the pieces of foam created a hazard to a child; a mobile telephone with jagged edges on its metal bell; wooden toys with excessive lead in the paint with which they were coloured; a plastic gun, the plastic bullets from which shot through the air with excessive force; a toy crow, the face of which was held on with nails; a zig-zag toy with a sharp spring which trapped the fingers; a cloth doll found to contain a broken machine needle in its head; a teddy bear in a cage with a high lead and chromium content; water snakes from Taiwan which contained contaminated water; dolls with spikes in their heads. I have seen one, the head of which easily came off to reveal a nasty four-inch spike; and a drumming teddy bear from China with loose eyes, sharp edges and a high lead content.

    Toys are not alone, even if they are more topical. Other dangerous consumer goods which the United Kingdom has imported include curling brushes from Hong Kong with poor wiring which made them electrically unsafe; an electrical amplifier from Taiwan which was electrically unsafe; hammers, drills and saw blades from the far east which shattered when used; cosmetics from Taiwan which contained excessive levels of heavy metal; a Rinko Pool filter of Japanese origin which was electrically unsafe and caused one death last year; medical first-aid kits from India which should have contained sterile dressings but were found to be contaminated; a car jack from Taiwan, an estimated 35,000 of which were sold in the United Kingdom, collapsed on a user causing hand injuries, rightly highlighted by the Consumers’ Association. Indeed, that organisation in its current issue of Which? magazine records how two children died through such dangerous imports. In one case, a three-year-old died after swallowing and choking on the wheels of a toy lorry kit ​ from inside a chocolate egg. In another, a nine-month-old baby girl was strangled last Christmas in the elastic of a cot toy.

    A relatively new safety standard for toys has been introduced by the British Standards Institution. It covers the mechanical and physical properties of all types of toys for children up to 14 years old and specific requirements for small toys for children under three years of age. While producers of goods complying with BSI standards attach kite and safety marks to their products, foreign manufacturers and importers do not have to comply with that code.

    In recent days a product named “Snow Flakes” has been brought to my attention. I showed it to the Minister just before the debate began. It is an aerosol container which allows a pine-scented spray to give the appearance of snowflakes. It is dangerous and should immediately be banned because not only is the container inflammable but anything it sprays becomes inflammable. Will I wait another fortnight, until after Christmas, before hearing good news about that? I hope not.

    Yesterday the Mail on Sunday illustrated a toy racing car powered by a live hamster, a form of cruelty which is almost inconceivable. I am pleased to learn that this American product was totally withdrawn from sale this morning.
    I have shown that there is real concern about the range and potential danger of many consumer goods. Nobody wants to be a killjoy at Christmas, but it is clear that the festivities of some will be marred by injury caused by unsafe goods.

    What can be done? The Government explored the possibility in their White Paper on the safety of goods published in July 1984, yet its recommendations have not been put into legislative form. I had hoped that it would be foreshadowed in the Gracious Speech, but it was significantly omitted, although I appreciated the pressure on the business timetable.

    I have, as a result, sponsored an early-day motion, which has the support of 110 right hon. and hon. Members from all parties, this Adjournment debate and a private Member’s Bill. I hope the Minister will say that he will support that measure.

    Surely, the cardinal switch that we should make to protect the consumers is to place the legal responsibility on the importer. He should have the duty of care. We should expect an importer to check the safety of goods before placing an order. For example, an importer of goods with a potentially high lead content should send one off for a laboratory analysis and that evidence should be presented to the Customs and Excise on entry of the goods. The Customs and Excise officer should be able to pass confidential information on to the trading standards officers. Enforcement staff should be able to seize and control dangerous goods.

    I welcome the EEC draft directive on product liability, and the proposal relating to toys in particular. I hope that the Government will take the lead in Europe in this sector. We need to stop dangerous imports from reaching the shops. It is unrealistic to have to wait until a complaint is made following the use of the products. By that time, the goods have been passed through the country. The point of entry is the correct stage to stop these goods, and I hope ​ that this course of action commends itself to my hon. and learned Friend, and that, notwithstanding the pressure on Government time, he will support my endeavours.

  • Denzil Davies – 1985 Speech on the Strategic Defence Initiative

    Below is the text of the speech made by Denzil Davies, the then Shadow Secretary of State for Defence, on 9 December 1985.

    We deplore the agreement which the Secretary of State so hastily signed on Friday with Mr. Caspar Weinberger. We deplore it because it gives total Government endorsement not only to the details of star wars but to the principle and strategy behind star wars. We believe that that project will again escalate the arms race by initiating another quest for nuclear superiority, that it will make the attainment of arms control agreements more difficult and that it has been imposed on NATO without notice—I challenge the right hon. Gentleman to say whether he had notice of President Reagan’s speech setting out the star wars project—consultation or discussion. The project has been trenchantly criticised by the Foreign Secretary and those criticisms have never been answered in the House by Ministers. The agreement has been brought forward without any discussion, debate or endorsement by the House of Commons.

    Is the Secretary of State aware that he was duped on Friday by the Americans? Mr. Caspar Weinberger got everything he wanted—British endorsement of star wars. Perhaps even more importantly, he got endorsement of star wars by one of the major NATO nations, and no doubt that will have consequences. Mr. Weinberger gave nothing at all in return to the right hon. Gentleman. He did not even give the crumbs of commerce because he had no authority, power or guarantee from the United States Congress to do so.

    What has happened to the $1·5 billion which we have been told in the press would come to British industry? How many contracts and how much money shall we get because of the agreement? Will the agreement be endorsed and ratified by the United States Congress?

    What miserable returns have come to British companies from that other office which the right hon. Gentleman’s predecessor set up in Washington to try to get contracts for the Trident programme? Will the paltry sums that the right hon. Gentleman will get under this agreement be even less than those we received in relation to Trident? Is it not a fact that there will be a brain drain of British technologists and physicists to the United States because the security implications will be such that those scientists, as General Abrahamson said, will, have to work for American research teams in California and Texas?

    Will the right hon. Gentleman at least tell the House that he is prepared to deposit this miserable agreement in the Library so that hon. Members can judge its context and then debate the matter in the House?

    The agreement represents a substantial erosion of independence for British defence and foreign policy. The right hon. Gentleman talks about setting up offices, but his Department and the Foreign Office are rapidly becoming the outer offices of the Pentagon and the White House.

  • Michael Heseltine – 1985 Statement on the Strategic Defence Initiative

    Below is the text of the statement made by Michael Heseltine, the then Secretary of State for Defence, in the House of Commons on 9 December 1985.

    With permission, Mr. Speaker, I should like to make a statement on British participation in the United States strategic defence initiative research programme.

    The Government’s policy towards the strategic defence initiative remains firmly based on the four points agreed between the Prime Minister and President Reagan at Camp David in December 1984: that the Western aim is not to achieve superiority but to maintain balance taking account of Soviet developments; that SDI-related deployment would, in view of treaty obligations, have to be a matter for negotiation; that the aim is to enhance, and not to undermine, deterrence; and that East-West negotiation should aim to achieve security with reduced levels of offensive weapons on both sides.

    It was in that context that, at Camp David, the Prime Minister told President Reagan of her firm conviction that the SDI research programme should go ahead as a prudent hedge against Soviet activities in the same field.

    Earlier this year, the United States invited her NATO and certain other allies to participate in the SDI research programme. Following that invitation, we have engaged in detailed discussions with the United States Government on the nature and scope of the research which could sensibly be undertaken by United Kingdom firms and institutions.

    Those complex discussions have now been completed and agreement has been reached on an information exchange programme, on the areas where British companies and institutions have expertise which might form part of the United States-funded SDI research programme, and on the mechanisms to facilitate that cooperation.

    The confidential memorandum of understanding reached between the two Governments safeguards British interests in relation to the ownership of intellectual property rights and technology transfer, and provides for consultative and review mechanisms in support of the aims of the memorandum.

    The SDI research programme goes to the heart of the future defence technologies. Participation will enhance our ability to sustain an effective British research capability in areas of high technology relevant to both defence and civil programmes.

    Now that agreement has been reached on the memorandum, British companies, universities and research institutions have the opportunity to compete on a clearly defined basis for the research contracts which are on offer from the United State Government, as well as to participate in an information exchange programme on a fully reciprocal basis for the mutual benefit of the United Kingdom and the United States.

    To act as a focal point for British participation, and to liaise with the United States SDI participation office, I am establishing immediately within the Ministry of Defence an SDI participation office with representation from other interested Departments. That office will work in the closest concert with British firms and institutions interested in such participation.

    This agreement opens for Britain research possibilities which we could not afford on our own in technologies that ​ will be at the centre of tomorrow’s world. It will bring jobs that would otherwise be created abroad, and I commend it to the House.

  • Simon Hughes – 1985 Speech on Young People and Violent Crime

    Below is the text of the speech made by Simon Hughes, the then Liberal MP for Southwark and Bermondsey, in the House of Commons on 6 December 1985.

    The opportunity to debate these matters arises because the hon. Member for Wealden (Sir G. Johnson Smith), who introduced the debate, believes that issues are involved that merit other than a knee-jerk response. When discussing violence by young people, it is often easy to use clichés that suggest that there is an instant remedy to the problem. The Home Office knows as well as any other Department of State that, in spite of the endeavours of British Governments and those of other countries, and of many agencies outside the Government, it remains necessary to explore the issues carefully and to be careful about suggesting that there can be instant solutions. Many Governments and many agencies have tried and are trying to deal with the enormously complex reasons and practices that make up the violence among our young generation.

    I shall cite three examples from my personal experience, which are three microcosms of the problem. These experiences are based in London and they all relate to matters that have arisen over the past few years. The first is a common example. It is the complete despair of parents who have never committed offences and who have done all that they can to instil a code of morality in their children. They despair when they see their children being violent, often week after week. When their children leave junior school and enter senior school, they see them being violent at home, violent with friends and violent with neighbours and others, apart from being verbally violent and violent towards those for whom they have no affection and with whom they have no affinity. These parents wring their hands and fear that they must be to blame for their children’s behaviour.

    In most such cases, it would be wrong to say that the parents are to blame. Parents in that position will have done all within their knowledge and power, and in the general parental upbringing that they have practised they will have done a good job by objective standards. A particular family that I have in mind could have been accused of over-indulging the children. However, there was no excuse or explanation in that over-indulgence for the way in which at least one of the children behaved regularly. As a youth worker, I would find myself standing between a carving knife held by the youngster and the parent, with the youngster wanting to lunge the knife into the parent because of something that the parent had done or said. I would find myself trying to disarm the youngster when, for example, he was holding, prior to throwing, a milk bottle to smash into others who were not very far away.

    The second example is an occasion when, as a practising lawyer before being elected to this place, I was reading my newspaper on the train as I travelled to a court at Oxford. I read that a youngster whom I knew had been arrested for the alleged murder of a girl whom I knew. The incident had happened in Peckham. It came as a shock to me to read their names in a national daily newspaper.

    When I returned that evening, I met the group of whom the lad was a member. I discussed with the members of the group what their view would be if it were proved, as eventually it was, that the young man, who was a member of the youth club of which I was a leader, had killed his girlfriend. I asked them what they thought would happen to him if he were convicted of the girl’s murder. His friends, who had been with him the week before, said that ​ if he had killed someone he should be hanged. They had no more sympathy for someone who overstepped the bounds that they regarded as sacrosanct because he was their friend than for anyone else, even though they were equally prone to violence and any one of them might have been the person who committed the violence. Indeed, one of them was much more likely, in my estimation, to behave in that way than the person who actually had.

    Thirdly, there is a rather more general example of the way in which the prevalence of violence in many areas reflects upon people’s daily lives. On 19 December there will be a local authority by-election in Southwark. It will take place in the Peckham constituency, not in mine. It would be a by-election in the Liddle ward, comprising some of the estates that have been reported in the national press recently as being among the worst in London, such as Gloucester Grove, North Peckham, Camden and others.

    The reality of life for political parties reflects the reality of life on these estates. Party supporters will not canvass at night. They are unwilling, however bold they may be, and however able they are to go out with others, to knock on people’s doors at night. They are afraid for their own physical safety. In other words, they are afraid of violence, primarily at the hands of young people. Secondly, they are afraid that they will be seeking to induce people to open their doors, which would be unfair on them. Those behind the doors do not normally open their doors after dark, because they expect violent things to happen. That is common, and not the exception. This third example confronts us with the seriousness of the issue with which we are seeking to deal.

    Fortunately, the level of violent crime, as a proportion of all crimes perpetrated by young people, is very low. There is a mass of crime involving offences against property, and a lesser amount, thank God, involving offences against people. We must distinguish between the two groups of crime. In a way, one can regard offences involving property—for example, stealing a video or breaking in and taking money—as understandable. It is difficult to extend that understanding to crimes against the person. We can understand youngsters wanting to meet their daily needs by acquiring possessions that they do not have. That is much easier to understand than the feeling that they might have to attack an old person who may have little money or possessions on him. We must put into perspective the proportion of violent criminality, while recognising that it occupies the largest part of the public’s perception because it is more serious, more threatening and more menacing than crime involving property.

    My second general proposition is that we must be careful not to generalise. The causes of violent crime are especially difficult to determine and often arise for different reasons, even when perpetrated successively by the same individual. The reason for a 16-year-old taking part in a violent assault on a police officer at a football match, or on the way to or from that match, might be very different from the reason for that person behaving violently in another social context a few days or weeks later. We must examine each event and try to diagnose the factors that go to explain it.

    The hon. Member for Wealden was right to say that there are many factors, both near and remote, which are accumulating influences, not all of which are understood by the youngster at the receiving end. One primary influence is the family. There are many more small families nowadays. Families tend to live for much longer ​ in small units. We may often find one parent and one child, or one parent and two children, living together. Family units were much larger not all that long ago, and the influence of others, such as grandparents or other older relatives, used to be much greater. In many families there are fewer restraining and inhibiting factors than there used to be. There are fewer people to agree on and present a common code of morality.

    I have in mind a wonderful family, the members of which are my friends. There are 13 children; it goes almost without saying that the parents are Irish and Roman Catholics. The members of the family act as the best possible check upon one another. Although they suffered from great deprivation in a general sense, in terms of income, finance and housing when they were young, they had enormous family solidarity. They can provide support for one another; they can entertain one another; they can go out with one another; they can occupy one another and discipline one another; they can take on responsibility for one another when the mother or father are at work or when the older children are not present. They have a general interest which sustains them. That is often to be found in large families, although there is often an odd person out in a large family who feels that he or she must react adversely to the family’s general interest.

    In general terms, the different general pattern of present family life explains why the mechanisms that families produce are much less effective. The fewer the people who comprise the family, the greater the pressure will be. In a single-parent family—let us assume that the lone parent remains at home and is physically unable to deal with a growing adolescent—the parent may well find it impossibly wearing to keep on seeking to exercise control, and eventually will give in. The youngster will find it unappealing to stay all the time in the company of the single parent. He will go out and become more and more removed from the parent’s control.

    A second factor is that, by virtue of society’s development, previously commonly held values have become less commonly held for all sorts of reasons—hinges in demography, more people moving around, changes in community life, the breakdown of communities and the mixing of different national and racial groups. It means that young people find it more difficult to establish the key values, search though they may, and be taught as well as they might. That makes the judgment of values difficult. One of the things that saddens me about Britain is that we do not have clear definitions of values. It has something to do with not having a written constitution, but it is not completely explained by that. Because our fundamental principles have always been unwritten, it is much harder to discover what they are. I have asked youngsters in this country what they regard as the fundamental values and principles. It is more difficult to obtain clear answers from our youngsters than from those in France, Sweden, the United States or even the Soviet Union. Elsewhere they have clearer statements of the principles of civic duty and responsibility.

    The third general factor which I suggest often has an influence on young people is the lack of opportunity arid the feeling of alienation that can build up. The best example of that that I can cite is the failure of people to behave rationally if they have inadequate verbal skills. If one is able adequately to express oneself verbally, one needs less recourse to physical methods of expression. If someone is frustrated because he or she cannot win an ​ argument and compete on the same terms as the other person, such a person resorts, as people do in even the best educated circles, to other methods.
    Marriages often start on the road to breakdown when someone ceases to argue verbally and starts to argue physically. The man often exerts his strength over the woman. A pattern of violence is much easier to establish once the threshold into violence is first crossed.

    A youngster, who is not a fool, was arrested near to where I live. I know him. He can usually express himself quite well. He was taken to Tower Bridge magistrates court. He came near to being given a custodial sentence for an assault on a policeman. The youngster had been stopped and questioning began. It developed by him reacting when the policeman sought to arrest him. That lad, who is now in his 20s and settled with a good job, regularly went around carrying a knife. He felt that when he came into conflict with authority he would be less able to cope verbally than other people. That was vividly exemplified in the magistrates court.

    I remember thinking, as that lad stood in the dock wearing a leather jacket, looking like he always looked—in some ways surly and anti-authoritarian—that a similarly aged youngster who had had the benefit of an Eton education—to take a trite example, but I hope a helpful one—might have been able to explain how he had lapsed from normal behaviour. He would probably have got off with a much lighter sentence because of his ability to explain his behaviour and relate in a way understood by the person in authority. We can blame a great deal on television, which, although it teaches verbal skills in the sense that it exposes people to a range of views, does not allow the same communication because it feeds in always without giving anyone the chance to feed back. Whereas in past generations matters of dispute were a dialogue, they are now often a monologue to which people are not trained to respond other than simplistically. Many offences of violence are spontaneous. We should be aware that people become caught up in a series of events and react quickly and unthinkingly.

    Many offences are induced by other factors. Alcohol is clearly one factor. I applaud the Minister and his colleagues for a little belatedly but none the less honestly seeking to deal with the drugs problem. It sometimes causes us to pay less attention to the alcohol problem, which is responsible for more violent crime than drugs. The Sporting Events (Control of Alcohol etc.) Act, enacted last Session, and possibly the drugs Bill proposed for this Session, will deal with these factors, but we must be aware that these pressures have been most harmful.

    Another factor is the peer pressure, which suddenly induces someone who may never have committed an offence to behave like his peers when that appears to be the thing to do. The difference between a youngster and an older person is that normally youngsters do not think things through in the same way as older people. They do not have the skill to see where behaviour will lead them. The natural checks and balances that may, for example, inhibit us more than others from drinking and driving—the consequences for us are greater and include public vilification and greater inconvenience—do not work in the same way for someone who does not have a driving licence and who does not think through the social disadvantages of behaving in such a way.

    There is a danger that youngsters seeking to be violent are seeking instant gratification. We all do it, and it is nearly always illusory. Stealing, robbing and acquiring other people’s property is instant gratification. It is soon spent, passed on or no longer exists. The simple excitement of behaving energetically when life is boring and when often no energy is consumed by someone hanging around all the time explains why someone can get carried away by the excitement of the moment. Those are often single episodes.
    A friend of mine is a senior worker at an assessment centre for young people in south London. I was seeking his advice and general comments this morning.

    He told me that he has someone in the centre who has been sentenced to three years’ youth custody for an attack on an old man. It was an attack that went wrong and became a robbery. Someone with a clean record fell to the unjustifiable temptation of wanting to steal. He then behaved much more violently. There may have been a reaction or he may not have anticipated that the old man would not immediately give up the money. The offence became much more serious. He now regrets it, but it is too late.

    Some violent crime can be explained by child abuse. Child abuse is reflected when the child becomes an adult. There was a debate in the House on the subject last week. Happily, our society is becoming more aware of the massive problem of child abuse. It is normally committed, not by strangers, but by family and close friends. This may be a topical week to say that we must alert the agencies of protection, such as social services, to ensure that they do the best job—in difficult circumstances, as we all accept. There is a great danger that the abused child will become the abusing parent. That is increasingly becoming the case. The child who is not given adequate parental care and teaching becomes an even more inadequate parent. I have seen that happen regularly as will many other hon. Members. It is depressing, because most children of inadequate parents end up in care and have a greater prospect of becoming inadequate parents themselves.

    Some violent behaviour stems from genetic disorders and psychiatric illness, but that applies only to the minority of cases, and so we have to grapple with the social reasons for the majority of acts of violence and their consequences.
    I have been driven to three general conclusions. First, in our education we must seek to deal with most comprehensively with the need to establish that violence, particularly against others, is the most objectionable form of activity.

    We are right to criticise massive frauds in the City, automobile crime and theft from property. But there is a fundamental difference between those crimes and crimes of violence which affect the dignity and integrity of human beings. Those who commit crimes of violence—in particular, young people—must be shown that violence is an unacceptable form of behaviour in any circumstances. Once they are permitted to be violent in the classroom or at home, violence becomes the norm, and that is very dangerous for society.

    Therefore, the education process must establish that violence is unacceptable, and youth workers, teachers and others must involve themselves in that process.

    Teaching is very hard work in the difficult areas in our society, and teachers’ efforts must be backed with ​ additional social tuition facilities, so that good patterns of behaviour can be established, enabling people to renounce violence in their personal life.

    There are three hon. Members in the Chamber this morning who, only a week ago, had personal experience of the second phenomenon that I am about to describe. The hon. Member for Hammersmith (Mr. Soley), the hon. Member for Putney (Mr. Mellor) and I were present at an International Youth Year parliament at the premises of the International Maritime Organisation on the other side of the river. I shall not go into the merits of the afternoon’s controversial events, but they demonstrated that it is very difficult to establish in young people the principle of tolerant debate and understanding of others.

    There is no easy explanation of the phenomenon of intolerance. We have to teach respect for other people’s views, otherwise we shall find that we have lost the conventional ways of engaging in the normal social processes. When the norms are broken, violence of language leads to violent behaviour and intolerance of the individual, which is unacceptable however loathsome his views may be. Intolerance is now increasingly common, and we must learn to teach young people how to deal with it and how to renounce it.

    Mr. Clive Soley (Hammersmith)

    I agree with what the hon. Gentleman is saying and I remember well the incident that he describes. However, I ask him to recall that this sort of violence is nothing new in society. It was taking place when I was young and long before that, and it is not unusual. The important question is how we cope with it.

    Mr. Hughes

    That is right.

    Sir Geoffrey Johnson Smith

    Many of us have noticed that intolerance of other points of view in our universities seems to have grown in recent years.

    Mr. Hughes

    I am afraid that it is a problem that goes well beyond the category of young people. We have a duty, above all in this place, to teach by example. Many people cite this very building as a bad example to young people. It may be in part an excuse, but none the less we must be conscious of it, as must all people in public life. We cannot make the case that we would like to make if we do not subscribe to good standards in our own practice. As the hon. Member for Hammersmith said, there has always been intolerance in society in varying degrees.

    My third conclusion is that violence often arises from the feeling that the other side does not understand. The tragedy of Britain today is that we are increasingly a society in which there appear to be two nations. There are places in Britain which in general terms can be defined as the more deprived areas, where people believe—often rightly, although not always—that they are not understood and valued equally.

    If black youngsters know that statistically they are less likely than white youngsters to get employment, and have the feeling that they are not understood and that not enough is being done for them, they may think that the only way to be noticed is to assert their point of view, whatever the consequences for themselves. They are willing to challenge authority because that brings attention to them. All youngsters want attention. That is very important for them in establishing their identity. We must not allow them to feel discounted and discarded.

    At a time of high unemployment, and when public sector expenditure is being restrained, we have a duty to ​ ensure that our resources are directed towards overcoming the feeling of alienation and powerlessness which sometimes, when added to all the other adverse factors, prompts people, often in groups, to react violently. There will be other debates about how best to deal with the problem of violence, but the Government should always be seeking ways of giving youngsters less cause to feel that they are not being noticed and that the only way to he noticed is to be violent. We must also help them, as I have said, through the education process and other agencies in society, so that we can begin to resolve some of the problems, although ultimately they can be resolved only individually by every young person coming to the conclusion that he or she must renounce violence because it is fundamentally wrong.

  • Geoffrey Johnson-Smith – 1985 Speech on Young People and Violent Crime

    Below is the text of the speech made by Geoffrey Johnson-Smith, the then Conservative MP for Wealden, in the House of Commons on 6 December 1985.

    I beg to move,

    That this House views with great concern the problem of violent crime committed by the young; notes the important influence which parents, the schools and the media can have in their formative years; and calls upon the Government to lead a renewed and vigorous effort to develop in our young people an increased sense of responsibility and awareness of the interests of their fellow citizens, and to encourage their more active participation in their communities.

    The motion has a broad canvas, and yet in the context of violence by young people it may be thought to be drawn too narrowly because it does not invite the House to consider the influence of unemployment, poor housing conditions or badly planned, inhuman and congested housing estates. That is not because I do not consider that any or all of those problems have no consequence whatever, but because I know that the House has addressed itself recently to their effects.

    My purpose today is to call attention to those influences where the individual, by his own actions and example, can help to reduce the chances of young people committing acts of violence. I hope that my motion will enable us to concentrate on those more personal influences where people have a constructive role.

    The growth of violence in our society has aroused great concern on both sides of the House. The figures for crimes of violence against the person—homicide, attempted murder and serious wounding—have nearly doubled in the past 10 years. What has caused most anxiety has been the level of violence among young people. There is no way of knowing how much violent crime young people commit. All we have are the figures of those cautioned or found guilty in the courts. The figures for 1974 show that 49,879 were found guilty or cautioned for crimes of violence. By 1985 that figure had risen to 68,500.

    Of course, there are more young people today than 10 years ago, reflecting the baby boom of the 1960s. Nevertheless—this is what is so disturbing about the figures—the proportion of young people found guilty or cautioned for crimes of violence is higher. Most surprising of all, the biggest increase is among the 14 to 17 age group.

    It is easy to seek scapegoats, but we are all involved in our society and the tasks of parenthood and teaching have become even more demanding. There is no one reason, but I believe that I shall carry the House with me when I say that the causes lie in the fact that we live in a country in transition, not only industrially and economically but socially and morally.

    We talk of a return to Victorian values—discipline, hard work, voluntary service, a pride and involvement in the community, patriotism and a respect for law and order. All those we associate with the Victorian era. But it was also a time, so well described by Dickens, of grinding poverty, exploitation, hunger, human misery, harsh authoritarianism and moral hypocrisy.

    The strides that we have made since then have shown that we have grasped the threads of humanism. Our social and welfare legislation of the 20th century ushered in a kinder and more tolerant society, greater respect for the individual and his desire for personal fulfilment and freedom of choice, and, I believe, a system of justice that has been shorn of much of its harshness.

    However, over the past decades, and even longer, with those improvements have come a decline in moral values and discipline, less respect for our institutions and the rule of law, and a desire among some sections of the community for instant and selfish gratification—to be achieved, if necessary, by force. We have also had to contend with the effects of the second world war—the second world war this century—which may have had some effect on the problem.

    To a large extent, the old rules have gone and the power of the Church has diminished, as has some of our traditional tolerance. We do not appear to know how or with what to replace them. We do not know how to reconcile the need for an orderly society with our need for a wider freedom or how to have discipline and regulation without unfeeling authoritarianism. Perhaps that is why parents and teachers find it so difficult to discharge their duties and why so many children, growing up in an unsure and ill-defined framework of rules and regulations, regard them as arbitrary and too dependent on whim.
    Therefore, the ties of family have become weaker, families are smaller and fewer families have had the experience of their Victorian ancestors where the older children first learnt the art of rearing children by looking after their younger brothers and sisters.

    Many families have moved away from their roots. Indeed, hon. Members will remember our debates about the effects on families of moving to new towns—known as the new town blues. Families were separated from their grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins, who, when the family lived within a nuclear unit, often lent a hand. Of course, we are all familiar with the growth of one-parent families, the problems that that causes, and the destructive effect on children.

    Faced with all those difficulties, it is not surprising that there are parents—especially the poor and the less well-educated, those with criminal records or those living in the poorer areas in our inner cities—who, not surprisingly, have lost confidence in their ability to discharge their responsibilities, especially to their adolescent children.

    My following remarks will be addressed to ways in which we can strengthen the family. The findings of an investigation known as “Delinquency: its roots, careers and prospects” provide some hope. The first step is to help people in poverty. It is better to spend money supporting those families than to spend even larger sums employing social workers after the damage has been done. I hope that that is what the reform of our welfare services, promised by the Government, will achieve. In addition, a whole raft of measures, from day nursery provision, parental guidance centres and, not least, opportunities to inculcate into deprived children a different sense of values, should be pursued.

    I believe that that means paying more attention in schools to the problems of the troublesome child. The earlier that is done, the better the chances of success. It means giving them an opportunity to achieve at school, even if it is not academic achievement. I sometimes think that the emphasis placed on academic achievement, at the expense of simply achievement, can do more damage to the psychology of children than anything else that happens during school hours.

    The influence of the teacher cannot be emphasised too strongly. I accept that teachers quite rightly say that it is not for them to take on the role of parents. Teachers have a great many responsibilities. However, they also say that ​ schools are not just examination factories and that education should be concerned with turning out good citizens. All the more reason why our schools in areas of high criminal activity should play a greater role in combating juvenile delinquency.

    I urge my hon. Friend the Minister and his Department to call upon my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education and Science to encourage the growth of pastoral care. The earlier that the emotional problems of the child are observed and treated, the better the chance that that child will not turn to crime.

    I am not simply espousing theory; research has been carried out, and experience has been gained. What we need is action, and something more. The decline in religious teaching and worship in our schools is leading to a moral vacuum. If people do not go to church, where else can our youngsters expect to develop a sense of what is morally right? Should it be in the home? Yes, of course, where that is possible, but it should always happen in school. Did not that great headmaster Dr. Thomas Arnold say about schools:

    “What we must look for here is first, religious and moral principle, second gentlemanly conduct and third intellectual ability.”?

    The phrase “gentlemanly conduct” may sound a little old-fashioned these days, but perhaps such conduct leads to less violence—does it not?

    Can the media, especially television as it is the most powerful medium of communication, play a more active role? A recent report by 15 teachers—with no axe to grind, and the BBC and IBA knew all about it—said:

    “It became clear in the course of discussions with producers and others working for the BBC and ITV companies that there was little agreement among them about the wider educational influence and possibilities of television. Producers often assumed that any discussion of the educational role of the programmes was an attempt to press them into taking a more didactic stance in their productions … It is not possible to separate the responsibilities to educate and to entertain into such self-contained boxes. Yet it seems that programme makers often do so. As a consequence they fail to recognise or act upon the conflict and continuity between the duties to educate and to entertain. It is this failure to link the two that causes concern to teachers, parents and others.”

    Many people find it strange that so much television is preoccupied with violence. It is estimated that young people aged between nine and 14 years of age spend an average of 23 hours a week watching television, sometimes far into the night. What a waste. Just think what could happen if some of them spent 23 hours practising a musical instrument; they would learn to play it and would achieve something of lasting benefit.

    Be that as it may, those youngsters watch television and there is violence on television. I accept that it would be inconceivable to have television without violence, for television must reflect the world as it is rather than as some of us would like it to be or therein lies the road to censorship. However, I ask parents to remember that there is such a thing as the on-off switch. It is their responsibility not to allow their children to watch late-night movies.

    We often praise the system of broadcasting for its quality. Indeed, its products have earned world-wide admiration. Therefore, it is only fair to say that the same people who lead that industry with considerable skill, imagination and integrity are the very same people who must make very difficult judgments about what is suitable ​ for a wide-ranging audience. They must bear in mind the well-researched fact that individuals vary considerably in their perceptions of violence.

    Only recently, a senior research officer of the IBA said about people’s perceptions:

    “The more closely a fictional setting approaches or resembles everyday life and the more graphic the portrayal of pain and suffering, the greater should be the care we take over the decision of whether such a portrayal should be shown and whether a programme that contains it should be transmitted.”

    It is precisely because the broadcasting authorities are perceived by Mrs. Mary Whitehouse and others to, have neglected that fact that has led to demands for censorship and more effective controls over the showing of violence on television.

    Such people are bitterly offended and, to judge from some of the examples that they put before us, that is not surprising. In my view, the critics have a point, and the origins of it stem from technological innovation as well as criticisms of personal judgment. Many of today’s programmes which contain violence are made in real life settings because the new lightweight cameras are very portable and require little, and at times no, additional lighting, so that they can be taken to locations where the acting has a reality that is difficult to simulate in a studio.

    For the unsophisticated and undeveloped mind—the juvenile mind—it can be difficult to separate what is real from what is not. It is not surprising that such developments have made possible the new television phenomenon known as the docudrama, where fact and fiction meet, and it can even deceive the sophisticated adult.

    It is argued by responsible people inside and outside broadcasting that there is no causal proof of a link between violence on the screen and violence on the street. Looking at the research, it is difficult for a layman such as myself to know where the balance of the argument lies because research by responsible researchers can point either way. Much depends on the methodology and, as a layman, I find it hard to make a judgment as to who wins that argument.

    It is clear, however, that over the years more and more research findings have concluded that the frequent viewing of television can influence some people to commit violent crime and that repeated exposure to television violence increases the chances that a spectator will act violently. Even some of those who deny a causative effect admit that television can have a reinforcement influence.

    One of the most interesting pieces of research was done in the early 1970s by William Belson. His report, “Television violence in the adolescent boy,” contained the principal finding that there was strong evidence to support the view that long-term exposure to television violence increased substantially the extent to which London boys engaged in acts of serious violence.

    That finding does not stand alone. Many others, here and in the United States, support that opinion. The most recent study, conducted by the National Institute of Mental Health in America, reported in 1982 that

    “the consensus among most of the research community is that violence does lead to aggressive behaviour by children and teenagers who watch the programmes.”

    That concern is shared by exalted people such as Lord Lane, the Lord Chief Justice. It could be argued that in this area his opinion should carry no more weight than that of ordinary mortals. He is an expert on the law, but that does not make him an expert on research into behavioural ​ attitudes and responses.

    Nevertheless, I should have thought that Lord Lane would be a cautious man when giving opinions on such an issue. He was reported in July of this year as saying that violence in films and on television, including in news reports, had contributed to an alarming increase in the nastiness of crime. He went on to say that it was

    “now accepted as common form that once you have your victim on the ground, you kick him, preferably on the stomach or on the head, where the blows are likely to do maximum injury.”

    Lord Scarman, in his report on the Brixton disorders, saw the broadcasting medium as bearing some responsibility for the escalation of violence. A former colleague of ours, Eric Moonman, who conducted interviews among the people of Toxteth, wrote:

    “The influence of television on their responses to the situation could not be doubted. TV made it look easy. They knew what kind of thing to do.”

    The BBC and IBA are statutory bodies and among their duties is the duty to listen to and heed public opinion. Indeed, both organisations claim that they do so. The IBA has a code of conduct which it was statutorily compelled to compile. It is a lengthy, detailed document which was drawn up with great care. One paragraph referring to the portrayal of violence states:

    “There is portrayed violence which is potentially so disturbing that it might be psychologically harmful, particularly for young or emotionally insecure viewers.”

    Every producer must have regard to that comment.

    The BBC has no code, but it has its own guidelines, and they too are lengthy, well constructed and the consequence of a great deal of thought. They include the passage:

    “a consensus of research suggests that de-sensitisation can result from an excess of violence and the amount and treatment of violence needs to be carefully examined all the time.”

    To judge from comments that are being made, it is possible that the public and the broadcasting organisations are getting our of step, in which case it would be helpful for the BBC and IBA to explain in greater detail to the public their policy towards violence. They might provide examples of when they think it appropriate to apply the code or guidelines to producers and when not to apply it. They could say whether they are contemplating revising their practices and, if not, why not. They might also tell the public about research that they carry out into the effects of their programmes.

    There is another reason why it would be in the interests of British broadcasting to set a lead and take the public into its confidence. We are on the brink of an expansion in the number of television channels we can receive. Not all of even the English language programmes will be in British ownership or transmitted by British companies. There is a distinct risk that more will not mean better, that more will not lead to more choice, and that standards will fall. Standards cannot always be upheld by popular choice in the market place. As with many things in life, the people may not have a will to uphold decent and fair standards. We need the institutional framework.

    Britain has a reputation for creating authorities by which, as in the broadcasting world, regulation can coexist with freedom of expression. Our broadcasting organisations will continue to carry influence abroad and help to shape international regulation and a decent framework only if they are seen to observe higher standards at home, and in that respect I look to the Government to give their every assistance, for their sake and for that of our children.

  • Theresa May – 2019 Statement at the G20 Summit in Japan

    Below is the text of the statement made by Theresa May, the Prime Minister, in Osaka, Japan, on 29 June 2019.

    I would firstly like to thank Prime Minister Abe both for hosting this summit and for his friendship over the past three years. I have no doubt that the strong relationship between the UK and Japan will continue to grow in the years ahead.

    I firmly believe in the importance of international cooperation and compromise. In Osaka this week we have worked hard to bridge differences between G20 countries on some of the biggest challenges our nations face.

    That has not been easy but we have made progress. I continue to believe that we are stronger when we work together.

    Genuine collaboration and dialogue are particularly critical now as we confront serious threats to global stability.

    The UK has never been afraid to stand up for the global rules that underpin our values and our way of life.

    Over the past two days, leaders have discussed some of the most pressing challenges facing our nations.

    In recent months we have heard hundreds of thousands of young people urge us – their leaders – to act on climate change before it’s too late.

    I am proud that the UK has now enshrined in law our world-leading net zero commitment to reduce emissions. And I have called on other countries to raise their ambition and embrace this target.

    As we have set out in Osaka, the UK remains committed to the global rules-based trade system and to trade that is fair as well as free.

    And we believe that all nations must be encouraged to uphold these rules and to open their markets if we are to build economies that truly work for everyone.

    The UK has consistently called for further and faster progress to reclaim the internet from those who want to destroy our values and our way of life. This means stronger action on the misuse of live-streaming to stop terrorists from broadcasting their atrocities in real time.

    And I am pleased that all G20 leaders have agreed a joint statement that commits us to doing more – in partnership with industry – to protect our citizens from the spread of vile terrorist propaganda online.

    With tensions rising in the Gulf we must all stand together. Escalation is in no-one’s interest. We need engagement on all sides to find a diplomatic solution to the current situation and to counter Iran’s destabilising activity.

    At the same time, the UK will continue to work with our JCPoA partners to do all we can keep the Iran nuclear deal in place. We believe the deal makes the world safer and I want to see Iran uphold its obligations.

    More broadly in the Middle East I have discussed with UN Secretary-General Guterres and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman the need to continue to make progress in the UN-led peace process in Yemen towards a political solution that is the only way to end the conflict.

    Yesterday I told President Putin that there can only be a normalisation of our bilateral relationship if Russia stops the pattern of irresponsible activity that threatens the UK and its allies – such as the use of a deadly nerve agent on the streets of Salisbury.

    We remain open to a different relationship, but for that to happen the Russian government must choose a different path.

    This is my final G20 Summit as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.

    We have always understood that our success as a nation is tied to our collaboration with other countries and the relationships we build.

    And I have no doubt that Britain will retain the same strong spirit of international cooperation and compromise that has long characterised our engagement with the rest of world.

    Because this is the only way that we can protect and promote our interests and ensure the prosperity and security of our citizens for years to come.

  • Jeremy Hunt – 2019 Statement on 22nd Anniversary of Hong Kong Handover

    Below is the text of the statement made by Jeremy Hunt, the Foreign Secretary, on 30 June 2019.

    Recent protests in Hong Kong make it even more important on the anniversary of the handover to reiterate that the UK Government’s commitment to the Sino-British Joint Declaration is unwavering. It is a legally-binding treaty and remains as valid today as it did when it was signed and ratified over thirty years ago.

    It is imperative that Hong Kong’s high degree of autonomy, and the rights and freedoms of the Hong Kong people, are fully respected in line with the Joint Declaration and the Hong Kong Basic Law. We have made our position on this clear to the Chinese Government, both publicly and in private, and will continue to do so.

    Hong Kong remains one of the most thriving, exciting, dynamic cities in the world. It retains its distinctive identity, both within China and internationally. We remain committed to strengthening our rich and wide-ranging relationship with Hong Kong. Tens of thousands of Hong Kong students study in the UK every year. Hundreds of thousands of British citizens are resident in Hong Kong, as well as a significant number of British National (Overseas) Passport holders. We will continue to work together as partners in support of global free trade, and will continue to develop our bilateral trade links with Hong Kong.

    We will continue to closely monitor events in Hong Kong. We strongly believe that upholding ‘One Country, Two Systems’ is the best way to ensure Hong Kong continues to play a vital role for China, and to continue its role and reputation as a global financial and trading centre for the rest of the world.

  • Margaret Thatcher – 1985 Statement on European Council in Luxembourg

    Below is the text of the statement made by Margaret Thatcher, the then Prime Minister, in the House of Commons on 5 December 1985.

    With permission, Mr. Speaker, I shall make a statement about the European Council held in Luxembourg on 2 and 3 December. My right hon. and learned Friend the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs accompanied me to this meeting. I have arranged for the conclusions of the Council to be put in the Library of the House.

    The European Council reached agreement in five main areas. The first was the completion of the Community’s internal market. This has been an important United Kingdom objective for a long time, with the strong support of British industry and business. The target of completing the Common Market by 1992 will be established in the treaty, and we agreed that there should be greater use of majority voting on a number of treaty articles dealing with goods and services. But unanimity will be retained for all decisions on taxation. The free movement of persons and the rights and interests of employees.

    We also retain the right to take national action where required to protect public, animal and plant health.

    The United Kingdom’s position and the position of this Parliament are thus properly protected on such vital questions as frontier controls in relation to terrorism, crime, drugs and immigration from outside the Community; and on essential controls in health—for example, on rabies. The Luxembourg compromise, whereby a member state can invoke a very important national interest to prevent a decision being taken, is unaffected.

    Secondly, the European Council agreed that the treaty should be brought up to date by new articles on technology, environment and the regional fund. Action has hitherto been taken in these areas on the basis of the general article in the treaty. The new articles will provide a more precise basis for action in these areas in future. Unanimity will be preserved for all-important decisions.

    Thirdly, we agreed on procedural changes to improve consultation with the European Assembly. There will be better arrangements to enable the Council to take account of amendments to Community legislation suggested by the Assembly. But in all cases the last word on such legislation will rest with the Council. There will be no transfer of power on these matters from this House to the Assembly.

    Fourthly, on monetary co-operation between member states, an amendment to the treaty was agreed which describes what has already been achieved in the Community framework, without entering into new commitments.
    Finally, agreement was reached on a separate treaty of co-operation in foreign policy on the basis of the draft presented last summer by the United Kingdom. This formalises existing arrangements for consultation among the Ten on foreign policy matters and looks to a steadily closer co-operation.

    The European Council’s decisions on all these matters remain subject to general reservations from Italy and Denmark. The proposed amendments to the treaty will go forward only if these reserves are lifted. The United Kingdom has reserved its position on the voting arrangements in a proposed new treaty article on working ​ conditions. We insist that unanimity be preserved, in view of the risks that this article might be used to impose unfair burdens on our small and medium-sized business.

    The European Council also discussed the economic and social situation and confirmed existing economic policies designed to reduce inflation and encourage sustained growth. On deregulation, the Commission gave an undertaking that in future all new proposals would be accompanied by an assessment of the effects on business and job creation; that the most important existing regulations would be re-examined to simplify them and to reduce the burden on industry; and that there should be a regular procedure for monitoring progress towards this objective. The United Kingdom’s initiative earlier this year has thus been formally adopted.

    In my statement in this House following the last European Council in June, I made it clear that we would have been ready then to take the steps necessary to complete the internal market, to improve decision taking, to formalise foreign policy co-operation and to improve procedures for consultation with the European Assembly.

    Those objectives are now embodied in the conclusions of the Luxembourg European Council together with some tidying up of the treaty to reflect the Community’s development. The amendments to the treaty have to be approved by each sovereign Parliament and accordingly will be submitted to this House.

    I believe that the conclusions on completing the Common Market and reducing the burden of regulations will be of long-term benefit to British firms selling their goods and services in the European Community. Together with the arrangements to reduce the scale of Britain’s budgetary contribution agreed last year, they will be an important step towards enabling this country to realise more fully the benefits of our membership of the European Community.

  • John Major – 1985 Speech on Heating Bills

    Below is the text of the speech made by John Major, the then Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Security, in the House of Commons on 4 December 1985.

    The hon. Member for Dundee, East (Mr. Wilson) has pursued the issue of heating in all its aspects for some time, and I congratulate him on his persistence. I hope that he will understand if I cannot congratulate him wholeheartedly on everything that he said. It is not so much what the hon. Gentleman said as what he did not say.

    An acknowledgement of what the Government have done to help with heating bills would have been welcome. By any yardstick, the Government’s contribution has been substantial, whether in terms of summer or winter bills. It is appropriate to put that on the record.

    The hon. Gentleman did not mention that the Government have committed many billions of pounds to social security and have kept major benefit rates ahead of rising prices since 1979. This includes considerable help to the least well off for day-to-day expenses, including ​ heating, through substantial increases in supplementary benefit rates. These rates rose by 6 per cent. over and above the rise in prices between 1979 and 1984, and they were raised again a few days ago. More specifically, there was no acknowledgement of the substantial sum of £400 million spent last year on heating additions. The money was directed primarily to pensioners on supplementary benefit, to the sick, to the disabled and to some other special groups. That is a substantial record. The hon. Gentleman did not acknowledge that that substantial amount was £140 million more in real terms than had been spent by any previous Government on heating additions. This substantial Government record is not inclusive of all that has been achieved. I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman, when presenting his case, was not able to make specific acknowledgement of this record.

    Mr. Wilson

    I do not wish to deter the hon. Gentleman from answering the principal case, but does he think that the Government have done enough, considering the rising trend of deaths from hypothermia and the misery that many elderly people face in their homes?

    Mr. Major

    I shall deal with that issue in the course of my speech.

    The principle of weekly help with all living expenses, plus extra weekly help for those with special needs, is one that we plan to retain under the proposed reforms that will see the light of day in the White Paper shortly. I stress this because the hon. Gentleman clearly feels that, by changing the present complex system of heating additions, we are ending assistance with heating costs. That is not the position.

    The income support scheme which we propose in our Green Paper in June will provide a better basis for regular weekly help for claimants. There will be basic personal allowances for normal living expenses, including fuel costs. There will be weekly premium payments for families, pensioners, the sick, the disabled and for lone parents. The premiums will be given in recognition of the fact that these groups face special pressures, not least with the cost of extra heating.

    The fact that we shall not call the premiums “heating additions” does not mean that they do not exist, that the cash is not in the claimants’ pockets and that it cannot be used towards fuel costs. We expect that these resources will be used to go towards fuel costs and that income support, for a variety of reasons, will be a simpler and more effective means of help than the present complex system which has many defects, some of which the hon. Gentleman honestly outlined.

    I do not disparage the substantial help given through heating additions, though their structure results in an uneasy alliance between automatic entitlement for pensioners on supplementary benefit and others and the complex rules about details of claimants’ health problems. The present regulations are quite mind-boggling in their complexity. The advantages which we believe will accrue from the income support scheme include the fact that we will avoid complexity and most important, the intrusive questioning that takes place before an entitlement can be determined. I believe that the hon. Gentleman will concede that that will be a substantial improvement on the ​ present position. I emphasise strongly that help will continue to be given to these groups through the special premia that we propose.

    The hon. Gentleman spoke about high summer fuel bills, and I recognise that there are particular difficulties when bills are higher than usual. However, the problem must be put in context. Social security collectively costs many billions of pounds. It helps millions with their living expenses, and our aim is to ensure that that happens as effectively and simply as possible. Surely no one can dispute that over the years the system has become far too complicated and that that is not in the interests of claimants who receive assistance or those who run the system. It is clear that it is of no help to anyone. However, we shall make no progress in producing the right sort of rational, modern and helpful system that directs and targets help to where it is most needed if we try to tailor the weekly income that is provided for millions by introducing variations that are based on weather conditions, time of year or locality, for example.

    Most people plan on the basis that they will spend less one week and more the next, and we should give social security claimants the credit of recognising that they do likewise. We shall continue to provide a level of weekly income that takes account of the recurring extra pressures that are faced by groups such as pensioners. That must be a more sensible and efficient way of providing help than increasing heating additions in the winter, decreasing them in the summer and increasing them again in the summer if the weather proves to be especially bad, as the hon. Gentleman has said it was during this summer.

    The hon. Gentleman referred to the length of the heating season, and I understand the arguments that he has advanced. I have already explained that the help that we provide is geared to people’s needs year in and year out and not to providing higher levels of help at certain times of year. He implied that the heating season is generally longer in the colder parts of Great Britain than elsewhere. That followed on to a matter which he has raised before and on which he has some depth of knowledge, which is his idea of a cold climate allowance. That means, effectively, variable rates of weekly benefit depending on which part of the country someone lives.

    I recognise the hon. Gentleman’s interest in this subject, and he knows that my colleagues have discussed it with him in the past. There are real difficulties. Ministers in previous Governments have seen strong arguments against any deviation from the principle of national benefit levels and I am bound to say that we can see the same arguments against them. Apart from heating, there are many regional price variations. It would be possible to make a similar case based on variations in transport or food costs, for example. There is a variety of other variable prices in different parts of the country and I have no doubt that others could point to variations that have an acute effect on the persons with whom they are concerned.

    If we were in the business of trying to take a detailed and comprehensive account of all the variations, the task of setting and changing all the benefit rates each year would become impossibly complicated. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will acknowledge that that is so when he has time for reflection. There is evidence that there is little variation between the amount spent on average on fuel by those who live in different parts of Britain. That remains true at all income levels throughout the United Kingdom.

    I share the hon. Gentleman’s concern about hypothermia. Each winter we hear distressing accounts of old people —perhaps proud and independent people who are entitled to help but who for various reasons do not seek it, or who face difficulties in obtaining it —who suffer from the cold. I understand the problems and care about it as much as the hon. Gentleman. However, it is not reasonable to portray the Government —I think that the hon. Gentleman began to move in this direction when he remarked about help for farmers and not for those in need of heating additions —as uncaring and aloof from the problem of hypothermia.

    Mr. Wilson

    They are.

    Mr. Donald Stewart (Western Isles)

    That is right.

    Mr. Major

    I reject that charge absolutely. They would do well to recall, before they make it, that it was a Conservative Administration in 1979 that introduced automatic heating additions for the first time for older supplementary pensioner householders.

    Mr. Wilson

    It is not enough.

    Mr. Major

    If he thinks that that initial move was not enough, the hon. Gentleman may recall that subsequently we extended the number automatically entitled to heating additions so that as of today about 1·5 million supplementary pensioners over 65 get extra help with their heating of between £2·20 and £1–45 per week. When he makes remarks about help for cattle and not for people, he overlooks that substantial amount of assistance that was introduced, and is being given, by this Government. He might also bear in mind that nine out of every 10 supplementary pensioners now get heating additions, compared with only six or seven out of every 10 in 1978.

    The hon. Gentleman also dealt with the exceptionally severe weather payments and some of the difficulties they cause. That payment is often confused with the cold climate allowance, but there is an important difference which may be understood in the House but not outside. Those payments are one-off payments to claimants in any part of the country if they have used more fuel than planned because of a period of exceptionally severe weather. The payments have always been a tiny part of the overall help with heating costs for the least well off.

    The winter before last the chief adjudication officer, who advises local adjudication officers on the interpretation of the law, introduced a new system for determining when the regulation was satisfied. That system was based on temperature data provided by the Meteorological Office, collected from 17 weather stations throughout the country. The system was first fully tested earlier this year. As the hon. Gentleman will recall, there were some criticisms of the way in which it worked. I put that in the mildest form that is appropriate.

    In the first place there were complaints from Scotland and from some parts of England and Wales where payments were not made. Secondly, the system was very complicated to understand. I recall that my hon. Friend the Minister for Social Security himself described it as a pretty weird and wonderful construction. Thirdly, the amount of help delivered under the system was relatively modest, about £10 on average. We now know that the administrative cost of the scheme was very high indeed in proportion to the help given. We estimate that last winter it cost over £1 million administratively to pay out £1·7 ​ million in benefit. Clearly that was not satisfactory. In view of the difficulties we undertook to review the provision.

    In the meantime, the chief adjudication officer arranged for a test case to be heard by the social security commissioners to clarify whether his guidance properly reflected existing law. Their decision, which was issued recently, was that the system used last winter was not a satisfactory method for deciding claims. They held in effect that local adjudication officers should use their own judgement in deciding, on the facts of each individual case presented to them, whether there had been a period of exceptionally severe weather and how much extra the claimant had spent as a result.

    The chief adjudication officer is now issuing new guidance to local adjudication officers in the light of the commissioners’ decision, so we shall no longer have the system of trigger points and degree day percentages which caused so much bewilderment last winter. None the less, local adjudication officers may still have to face substantial difficulty in determining whether exceptionally severe weather payments should be made. For example, they will have to decide whether the weather is exceptionally or abnormally severe. Interpretation of those terms is difficult. They will have to decide whether there has been a period of exceptionally severe weather, although there is no set definition of “period” and it may in theory be as little as a single day.
    The local adjudication officers will also have to establish both what the claimants’ normal fuel expenditure is and how much extra is spent as a result.

    Mr. Wilson

    Is the Minister saying that in departing from the previous system of trigger points and so forth the temperature to be used as a criterion in each area will be a local one rather than a national one? In other words, will it still be possible for people in the south to get benefits under the severe weather scheme while people further north will not get them if their average temperature is much colder?

    Mr. Major

    I was about to make that point, though we shall have to wait for the guidance of the chief adjudication officer, which we shall have very shortly. There is a substantial probability that payments may still ‘vary between different parts of Britain in an unacceptable fashion. I stress that point because some hon. Members may have overlooked it. The commissioners, in their recent decision, held that the weather must be exceptional for the place in question.

    A number of other factors will need to be considered, one of which is the commissioners’ ruling that “exceptionally severe” also means exceptional for the time of year. I have no wish to belittle the difficulties outlined by the hon. Member for Dundee, East, that high summer heating bills can cause. The issue is whether ad hoc, finely calculated payments towards specific bills are the best ‘way to help. I wonder if the social security budget and social security staff are best employed making adjustment for exceptionally rainy summers, exceptionally chilly springs, exceptionally misty autumns, and so on. Surely it is better to concentrate on delivering the correct level of weekly income efficiently to those in need.

    We are therefore continuing to consider this provision very carefully in the light of the commissioners’ decision and the chief adjudication officer’s impending guidance. ​ We shall be looking at the effects of that guidance, both in terms of the way in which it seeks to provide extra help with fuel bills and its practical implications. In the meantime, the guidance is being issued so that staff will be able to handle any claims being made.

    I hope —though my expectations are not high —that I may have persuaded the hon. Member for Dundee, East that the Government are anxious to help the least well off ​with their heating problems. The Government are genuinely concerned about the matter and, regardless of whether I have convinced the hon. Gentleman, we shall continue to offer substantial assistance, although it may not be in the ways that the hon. Gentleman suggested in his remarks today.