PRIME MINISTER
Engagements
Q1. Mr. Redmond
To ask the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for Thursday 8 March.
The Prime Minister (Mrs. Margaret Thatcher)
This morning I presided at a meeting of the Cabinet and had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. After my duties in the House I shall depart for a visit to Scotland.
Mr. Redmond
Bearing in mind the decision of the Doncaster health authority, the community health council and a recent MORI poll which showed that the people are opposed to Doncaster royal infirmary and the Montagu hospital opting out of the Health Service, for the sake of democracy will the Prime Minister support a local referendum before that decision is implemented?
[column 999]The Prime Minister
No hospitals are opting out of the National Health Service. They are being given the chance to become self-governing and, therefore, to have far more say in decisions about the resources available and much better management, much closer to the consultants and nurses. Many people will want it that way. The hon. Gentleman should see how the system works; I think that he will find that many self-governing hospitals operate far better than those which do not choose that path.
Mr. Devlin
Will my right hon. Friend confirm that Militant violence has no part to play in the fixing of the community charge in our town halls?
The Prime Minister
I gladly confirm what my hon. Friend says. Any violent or intimidatory demonstrations—organised, I understand from an excellent article in The Times today, by the Militant Left—are the negation of democracy. People should pursue their protests peacefully and in accordance with the democratic process. It is quite wrong for hon. Members to suggest that people should disobey the law by not paying their community charge.
Mr. Kinnock
First, I agree with everything that the Prime Minister has just said, as I have made clear for a long time. Will the Prime Minister say why her Government think that it would
“not be in the public interest”
to use their powers to seek the disqualification of the proven liars who now head the House of Fraser?
The Prime Minister
My right hon. Friend Nicholas Ridleythe Secretary of State for Trade and Industry answered a question—[Interruption.]—or rather, made a statement yesterday in which he answered many of those questions in detail. I have read fully the replies that he made. The prosecution is a matter for the prosecuting authorities and the other powers are a matter for the regulatory authorities. The quasi-judicial decision is a matter for my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry; he has made it and answered to the House.
Mr. Kinnock
Does the Prime Minister agree with the Financial Times that in the Harrods case
“the real issue … is public confidence in the business and financial system” ?
If the Government will not use their power to disqualify directors who have been shown to be guilty of deliberate and persistent dishonesty, in what circumstances will she ever take action?
The Prime Minister
As I have said, that is a quasi-judicial decision for my right hon. Friend Nicholas Ridleythe Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, and I refer the right hon. Gentleman to the reply that my right hon. Friend gave yesterday. He said:
“I have considered the matter carefully and have concluded that it would not be in the public interest to seek such an order in this case. Those who read the report can make their own assessment of the conduct of those involved. The provisions of that Act are intended not as a punishment, but as a protection for the public. I can add nothing further to that.” —[Official Report, 7 March 1990; Vol. 168, c. 875.]
My right hon. Friend gave many detailed replies, some of which I have read, and some of which were technical. I rest my reply upon his.
Mr. Kinnock
The Prime Minister has still not answered the questions from both sides of the House about why the Secretary of State did not use the powers that he so clearly has. The Government have the powers to act. By their [column 1000]inaction, they are contradicting the public interest in the honest conduct of business in Britain. Is not that an open invitation to others, who could employ the same dishonesty as that shown by the directors of Harrods? Why do the Government so favour those who are very guilty when they happen to be very rich?
The Prime Minister
As the right hon. Gentleman knows, if there were any fraudulent offences, they would be matters for the prosecuting authorities. Any question on that would therefore lie with my right hon. and learned Friend Sir Patrick Mayhewthe Attorney-General. As my right hon. Friend Nicholas Ridleythe Secretary of State for Trade and Industry said yesterday, he has answered the questions about the report in full, and I must rest upon them.
I have not, however, answered the right hon. Gentleman's first comment, that he agreed with me fully about condemning Militant—[Interruption.]
Mr. Speaker
Order.
The Prime Minister
Will the right hon. Gentleman also condemn the 28 Labour Members who are urging that people should not pay their community charge?
Mr. Barry Porter
rose—[Interruption.]
Mr. Speaker
Order. I have called the hon. Member for Wirral, South (Mr. Porter).
Mr. Faulds
It is an abuse.
Mr. Speaker
Order. The hon. Gentleman must contain himself.
Mr. Porter
Does my right hon. Friend accept that a gentleman came to my surgery the other day who advanced some mild reservations about one or two details about the implementation of the community charge? What concerned him was that he could not understand the alternative, and I was unable to give him that information. I wonder whether my right hon. Friend has any information from Walworth road which might lead her——
Mr. Speaker
Order. The Prime Minister has no responsibility for what happens in Walworth road.
Q2. Mr. Roy Hughes
To ask the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for Thursday 8 March.
The Prime Minister
I refer the hon. Gentleman to the reply that I gave some moments ago.
Mr. Hughes
Has the Prime Minister's attention been called to the cost of collecting the poll tax compared with the cost of collecting the rates? In Wales, for example, the cost will rocket from £9 million to more than £25 million. All the additional bureaucracy, new equipment and even new buildings will have to be paid for by the community chargepayer. In the circumstances, is not it sheer hypocrisy for the Government to lecture our local authorities on financial stringency and cost cutting?
The Prime Minister
If more people pay community charge than were paying rates—which is part of the object of the exercise, as 17 million people were not paying rates and many of them will pay the community charge—it will cost more to collect, but nothing like so much as it would to collect both a roof tax and a local income tax.
[column 1001]Q3. Mr. Andrew Mitchell
To ask the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for Thursday 8 March.
The Prime Minister
I refer my hon. Friend to the reply that I gave some moments ago.
Mr. Mitchell
Will my right hon. Friend utterly condemn the disgraceful and dangerous scenes that we have witnessed in various council chambers across the country, orchestrated by various Left-wing groups and encouraged by those Labour Members who decline to obey the law by threatening to withhold payment of their community charge? Will my right hon. Friend also——
Mr. Speaker
Order. One question, please. It is not fair on others.
The Prime Minister
Yes, I utterly condemn the violent scenes which seem to have been organised by the Militant tendency. They show precisely the same violence as we have seen before at Grunwick, in the coal strike and at Wapping, and they are the negation of democracy. We also condemn anyone, especially an hon. Member, who chooses to disobey the law by refusing to pay his community charge. That is totally wrong and means that Opposition Members obey the law only if they make it, not when another Government do. That is undemocratic.
Q4. Mr. Orme
To ask the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for Thursday 8 March.
The Prime Minister
I refer the right hon. Gentleman to the reply that I gave some moments ago.
Mr. Orme
The Prime Minister will be aware that today is international women's day, which is being celebrated throughout the world. In this country, however, millions of women are suffering from the Conservative Government's economic policies? Will the Prime Minister now take steps to help many of those women by increasing child benefit immediately?
The Prime Minister
No, but I am happy to remind the right hon. Gentleman, as it is international women's day, that thanks to the previous Chancellor of the Exchequer, my right hon. Friend the Member for Blaby (Mr. Lawson)—women will, for the first time, be taxed separately which will be a great advantage. I must also add how grateful we are that our small number of Heads of Government have been added to by another woman Head of Government, in Nicaragua.
Q5. Sir Hugh Rossi
To ask the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for Thursday 8 March.
The Prime Minister
I refer my hon. Friend to the reply that I gave some moments ago.
Sir Hugh Rossi
In view of the criticisms levelled against the United Kingdom at The Hague yesterday in relation to [column 1002]the proposals to cease the dumping of industrial waste, albeit non-toxic, by 1992, and of treated sewage sludge by 1998, will my right hon. Friend tell the House what proportion of pollution of the North sea is due to those current practices and what proportion is due to the emission of untreated waste of every kind into the rivers Elbe, Weser, Rhine, Moselle and Schelde?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend, who knows a great deal about these matters, knows that trace elements contained in sewage sludge account for only 1 per cent. of the total North sea load. The great amount of contamination in the North sea comes from the rivers that he mentioned. The Rhine, the Meuse and the Elbe deposit about 65 per cent. of contaminants into the North sea, which is more than three times the whole of that deposited by our own rivers. My hon. Friend mentioned sewage sludge being dumped in the North sea. That will have to be replaced by burning it on land and we shall require planning permission for about 10 incinerators to comply with our undertaking.
Mr. Speaker
Mr. Ashdown.
Hon. Members
No.
Mr. Ashdown
Does the Prime Minister—[Interruption.]
Mr. Speaker
Order. I called Mr. Ashdown, who is the leader of the second largest Opposition party.
Mr. Ashdown
Does the Prime Minister realise how welcome was her statement over the weekend that she would reconsider some aspects of the poll tax? In that process, will she think again about the advantages of a local income tax, which would be fairer, more efficient and simpler? Does not that enjoy exactly the same level of accountability for local government as that to which she must answer nationally? Does she appreciate that if she will show an open mind on that, she will give hope to many who will suffer under the poll tax?
The Prime Minister
What I said at the weekend repeated what Chris Pattenthe Secretary of State for the Environment had said in a debate in the House—that if there was any fresh evidence, he would look again at the calculation of the standard spending assessment. That was the undertaking that I repeated at the weekend.
As for a local income tax, that would be just about the most unpopular and bureaucratic way of raising money for local authorities. I think that the right hon. Gentleman will find that when the community charge has been working, it will be realised that it is the best way of collecting money for local authorities, bearing in mind that one in four people will have a rebate and that there is also transitional relief, all expenditure on which will be met by the taxpayer.