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stock. Not a bit of it. The increase in rate support grant was used not to extend or even maintain services, but to keep down the rates. In 1975-76, when inflation was at 27 per cent., the Liberal party on the city council managed to introduce a 1 per cent. or 1p cut in the rates. What do hon. Members suppose would happen to services if inflation were running at 27 per cent. and revenue were cut by 1 per cent.? The answer is perfectly obvious--the services are held back or cut.For example, between 1974 and 1978 housing repairs and maintenance in the city of Liverpool were cut by £2.75 million. Grants to voluntary organisations were slashed. They were cut for the Childs Wooton adult education centre, which catered largely for the black population in Toxteth, and for the Vauxhall law centre. Liberals always tell us about community policies, but they cut the grant to the Neighbourhood Projects group in Liverpool. They closed the Croxteth Lodge old people's home, despite the fact that there was a long waiting list for such accommodation.
To find the money, they introduced a £4 charge for pensioners' bus passes. Funnily enough, in their propaganda the Liberals said that they did not do that. The "Focus" pamphlet that was pushed through people's doors in the Tuebrook ward in the late 1970s said : "Bus pass disgrace. Liberals were horrified when they heard of the proposal to reduce the Rates Increase by asking our Senior Citizens to pay for their Bus Passes."
They introduced the measure but were horrified. Another "Focus" leaflet that was pushed through people's doors stated :
"David Alton kicks £4 pass into touch. Moves were recently made to charge pensioners for their bus passes. David Alton was against this move and persuaded Councillors to drop the idea."
What it did not say was that the idea came from the Liberals on Liverpool city council.
Mr. Alton : I hope that we are not about to rerun our debates during the Liverpool, Edge Hill by-election, when the hon. Gentleman was my opponent. However, I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will agree that there are times when we disagree with policies within our own party. Surely he should congratulate me on having been successful on that occasion.
Mr. Wareing : I am glad that the hon. Gentleman was in a minority of one or two in his party. The fact is that his party introduced the idea, and the Labour party and even the Tory party opposed it.
Mr. Alton : Will the hon. Gentleman give way ?
Mr. Wareing : No, because I have a lot more to say first. We have heard about the drop in population in Liverpool and people have made snide comments about people leaving Liverpool because they want to get away from the Labour-run council. Merseyside has a population of 1.25 million people. Many people live outside the boundaries of Liverpool city and are part of the overspill population in places such as Kirkby, Knowsley and Crosby. Some live on the other side of the River Mersey. In almost all the great cities there is a movement away from the centre to the outskirts.
I am sorry that the Liberal Democrat party has sought to be party political about Liverpool. I am sure that if there were not a by-election in Liverpool, Walton, we should not have had this debate now and the Liberal
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Democrats would not have chosen the same subject. The Archbishop of Liverpool and the Bishop of Liverpool have written to"encourage all our fellow-citizens, who have the good of Liverpool and its people at heart to support the efforts of the City Council to put our house in order."
They also say :
"All political parties over the years have had a share in the long decline of Liverpool's prosperity."
I do not disagree with them. We have all had some responsibility. Why do we not have the humility to accept that there is responsibility on all our shoulders ? For God's sake, we must get away from the argument that it is one party's fault.
The housing problems in Liverpool did not start in the 1980s. On 10 August 1978, when a Labour Government were in power and a Liberal administration ran the city, an article in the Liverpool Echo said :
"Liverpool like a bomb zone' An all-party delegation of Glasgow District Councillors is shocked and Horrified' at Liverpool's council housing."
Who was chairman of Liverpool's housing committee at the time ? None other than the hon. Member for Liverpool, Mossley Hill (Mr. Alton). For goodness' sake, let us get away from the idea that the Liberal Democrats have no responsibility.
The hon. Member for Mossley Hill also talked about dismantling the municipal empire. Some 80,000 council houses were to be sold. That was referred to by Ian Craig in the Liverpool Echo as the "sale of the century". A stop was put to council house building in 1979. That was at a time when 16,000 people were on the housing waiting list and 13,000 other people were in inadquate housing in Liverpool. At that time, the Liberal council stopped building council houses. Most of those people were not rich ; they were relatively poor and some were very poor. The Liberals stopped building council houses although they built houses for sale. My hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Brightside (Mr. Blunkett) referred to that earlier. The low expenditure levels were used by the Secretary of State for the Environment to hold down the assistance given to Liverpool later. The Liberal Democrats' hypocrisy continues. Time and again on the city council, they voted with Militant Tendency. Last Wednesday, having voted for Labour's budget, the Liberal Democrats moved a motion negating its proper implementation. They proposed to restore 94 jobs in the housing administration at a cost of £1.25 million, but they did not say how that would be paid for. As a result of Government policies, the housing revenue account is now ring-fenced and cannot be subsidised out of the poll tax. The motion went through on a combined Liberal Democrat and Militant vote. That is the real reason why we had difficulty last week on Liverpool city council. The Tories must not think that all was marvellous during Conservative periods of office. I refer to the open letter to the right hon. Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (Mr. Heath), who was then Prime Minister, in the Liverpool Daily Post of 11 February 1972. The letter concerned conditions in Liverpool during the last year in which the Tories had control of the city council.
Mr. David Shaw (Dover) : They did not have control.
Mr. Wareing : Yes, they did. They were in the majority in 1972.
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Since 1979, £650 million has been cut from the revenue support grant to Liverpool. The housing investment programme is now far lower than the real value of HIP in 1979. The poll tax -capping threat is one of the immediate causes of the present budget crisis. The Secretary of State for the Environment has held the post before. When he talks about partnership, we must ask how much partnership we have had from the Tory Government. What on earth have we had? In 1981, the present Secretary of State came to Liverpool. Many people in Liverpool regard him rather more highly than they do the average Tory Minister, because he saw the city before and after the Toxteth riots. After the riots, he wrote a report for the Cabinet and because somebody said that it took a riot to get him to Toxteth, he entitled the report "It took a riot".Before one could say "Jack Robinson", the right hon. Member for Finchley (Mrs. Thatcher), the previous Prime Minister, arranged a meeting at which the right hon. and learned Member for Surrey, East (Sir G. Howe) was ordered to stop the report and to stop its implementation. The right hon. and learned Gentleman met the Secretary of State at a restaurant in Marsham street and "It took a riot" never saw the light of day. Instead, the right hon. and learned Member for Surrey, East advised the Prime Minister that they should manage the decline of Liverpool. He called for a "managed decline" of Liverpool.
It is wrong to say that no council in the Liverpool area was willing to do something. Merseyside county council was abolished by the Government because it had a Labour majority. Conservatives, Liberals and Labour members of the council opposed the abolition. The Merseyside chamber of commerce opposed the abolition. The bishop and the archbishop were opposed to the abolition. The Tory Government have been as extreme as the Hattons of this world. In the past 10 years, Liverpool has suffered from extremism. Thatcherite extremism and Hatton extremism are two sides of the same evil coin. Our city wants no more of it, and that will be the message from the people of Walton on 4 July.
I deplore the speeches made in the House last Friday by the hon. Member for Stroud (Mr. Knapman) and by the hon. Member for Salisbury (Mr. Key), the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Environment. How on earth can a Minister, using such prejudiced ideas and making such irrational statements, hold office? I have today written a letter of complaint to the Prime Minister because everyone in Liverpool--Tories, Socialists and Liberals--deplores what the Minister said. He simply regurgitated gossip. He is not fit to remain a Minister, and I have asked the Prime Minister to do what is right. It is disgraceful that a man who expresses such prejudices should be asked to adjudicate in a few days' time on Liverpool's bid. How can he be capable of reasoned thought about what Liverpool proposes when he holds such prejudices?
Some of us share the responsibility for believing some people on the left wing of the Labour party who said that they were democratic socialists. People in Liverpool have suffered as a result of Militant using Hatton as a recruiting sergeant for its cause. I shed no tears for the beginning of the end of the static security force and the intimidation and problems faced by Liverpool's people.
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Harry Rimmer was my agent when I was first elected in 1983. He is an honest, decent man, and the people who are trying to solve Liverpool's problems are genuine, good people. Heaven knows, they are courageous. They have more guts in their little fingers than the Under- Secretary of State for the Environment and the hon. Member for Stroud have in their entire being. The people of Liverpool are in the front line of the battle against extremism.Tories tell us that we should get rid of our extremists, but they should take action against the extremists who have determined their policies. The right hon. Members for Cirencester and Tewkesbury (Mr. Ridley) and for Finchley (Mrs. Thatcher), who is now earning her living from making speeches in the United States rather than in the House, are extremists.
Liverpool has had many achievements to its name over the past few years. I agreed with the first part of the speech by the hon. Member for Mossley Hill. However, the improvement at the port predates the abolition of the dock labour scheme. The Mersey barrage started life as an idea when I entered the county council and became chairman of the economic development committee. One of my first actions was to tell my officers that I wanted to see some action on the Dee barrage. They said that that could be difficult because two other county councils were involved. The result was the Mersey barrage. Liverpool is proud of itself and it disowns both Thatcherite and Hatton extremists. It has certainly got rid of the Thatcherite extremists because not a single Tory Member represents a Liverpool constituency--nor is there likely to be one. The Hatton period has gone for ever, as the people of Walton will demonstrate on 4 July. If the Tory candidate in Walton wants to save his deposit he must dissociate himself from the speech on Friday by the hon. Member for Salisbury.
6.33 pm
Sir Cyril Smith (Rochdale) : We have had some good speeches in an interesting debate, which was opened superbly by my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Mossley Hill (Mr. Alton), who for many years has been the only hon. Member in Liverpool fighting against Militant Tendency. I welcome the views of the hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Mr. Wareing), but it has taken him 20 years to come to them. He made a constructive speech, about which I shall shortly say more. My hon. Friend the Member for Mossley Hill, who lives in Liverpool, has been tabling motions and has been subjected to phone calls and all sorts of pressure. He has shown great courage in standing up for the people of Liverpool when people in the Labour party were not prepared to do so.
Mr. Hind : It is important to remember that Militant came to power in Liverpool council via the Labour party. In the autumn of 1985, the hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside (Mr. Blunkett) prepared a report dictating what should be done, but it has taken Labour six years to come to its senses and do anything about that. It is to the credit of other parties rather than Labour itself that Labour Members have been brought to their senses.
Sir Cyril Smith : There is a great deal in what the hon. Gentleman says.
Many of the quotes used by the hon. Member for West Derby were from the 1970s. When the Government turn
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on the official Opposition, Labour Members say that they have not been in power since 1979 and cannot be blamed for what is happening. However, in arguing against the Liberal Democrats, Labour Members have quoted what happened 19 or 20 years ago.I urge the hon. Member for Liverpool, Broadgreen (Mr. Fields) to play a full part in the Walton by-election. He will have problems about the part that he should play and deciding which candidate to support. Yesterday, in a television programme in which I took part, an Opposition Member said that any Labour Member who did not support the official Labour candidate would be expelled and dealt with by the national executive. The people of Broadgreen will have to look for another candidate if the hon. Member for Broadgreen does not avoid the cameras that are in place throughout Walton to photograph Labour people who are assisting the wrong candidates so that evidence can be produced at the right time. He will have to shove his leaflets through doors at midnight if he is to survive the pre-selection process.
I shall not say much about the speech by the hon. Member for Brightside, because there is not much to say about it. It was blurred, and was certainly not the best speech that he has made in the House. The same applies to the disappointing speech by the Secretary of State, much of which dealt with the past. He told us that Tories were marvellous, but failed to say that only Governments have the power to initiative legislation. He asked why we did not introduce legislation, but for years we have not been in a position to do that. His speech did not rise to the occasion.
My hon. Friend the Member for Altrincham and Sale delivered a superb, constructive and helpful speech. Undoubtedly, housing, the main point with which my hon. Friend dealt, is a major problem on Merseyside. Perhaps that will allow me to say a word on the vote that took place last Wednesday, about which there has been so much comment.
The first point that I must make clear is that the 94 jobs involved were not included in the budget agreed with the Liberal Democrat councillors on 10 March. The redundancies were added to the programme at a private meeting attended by five Labour Members, and the two Liberal Democrat members objected to them.
Are we seriously to be criticised for objecting to the fact that the 94 jobs that were to go included 15 bricklayers, 10 plasterers, 30 plumbers, 24 electricians and 15 painters, at a time when there are 5,000 empty houses in Liverpool, many of which are waiting for repairs? The solution dreamed up by the Labour party was the sacking of the 94 people employed to repair them, most of whom were skilled craftsmen. What sense is there in that?
It may then be said that that takes £1 million from the budget, but if one quarter of the empty houses in Liverpool were let as a result of the repairs being done, the council would be able to collect in rent the £1 million that would be needed to pay the craftsmen. So I believe that the Liberal Democrat councillors were right on Wednesday. That is why they were supported by the Conservative councillors and by four moderate councillors, as well as by the Militant Tendency.
The debate has shown the rottenness not only of Militant but of the voting system. I shall not make a long speech about proportional representation, but let me repeat what my hon. Friend the Member for Mossley Hill said earlier. In 1991, 56,000 people voted for the Liberal
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Democrats in Liverpool, and 52,000 voted for Labour. As with central Government, the council has been elected on a minority vote, and the consequence is plain for all to see.What is the consequence? Never mind 1970 or 1980, what about 1991? What about those kids--I gather in the constituency of the hon. Member for West Derby--
Mr. Wareing : Not in my constituency.
Sir Cyril Smith : All right, not in the hon. Gentleman's constituency, but in Liverpool, these kids were barred from school by glue being put on the gates. Six bully boys were outside trying to stop them going to school. What about the report in this morning's paper about a Labour councillor in Liverpool whose job and person were threatened and who had to lock herself in her office, simply because she voted with the moderate Labour group? All these things happened not in 1973 or 1983 but in 1991.
We want to know what the Labour group in Liverpool and the Labour party nationally are going to do. What will the trade union movement do? What action will trade union national officers take about situations in which people, under the guise of responsible trade unionists, can threaten people's jobs and try to stop children going to school by putting glue on gates?
Let me tell the House something else about 1991. It was not the Liberals who borrowed £800 million and are now paying interest charges to Japan, Switzerland and other countries. That was done by Labour councillors, while the national party sat and never said a flipping word to stop it. That is what is wrong with Liverpool today.
When hon. Members asked my hon. Friend the Member for Mossley Hill about housing, they said nothing, although the Secretary of State did, about the 35,000 houses in Liverpool that were repaired through general improvement grants while the Liberals had some influence in the city. It may be true that we built more houses for sale than for rent but we gave priority to sitting council tenants, and we paid removal expenses and solicitors fees. While it may be true that we did not build as many as we would have liked, it is equally true that, instead of demolishing houses, as your lot were constantly doing, we repaired them--35,000 of them.
Mr. Wareing : On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I am sure that you were not responsible for what the hon. Member for Rochdale (Sir C. Smith) was talking about. I wish that he would refer to real cases.
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Paul Dean) : I am sure that the hon. Member for Rochdale (Sir C. Smith) was not referring to me.
Sir C. Smith : I apologise, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I should have said "the hon. Member for West Derby". I realise that he is smarting because he never got over my hon. Friend the Member for Mossley Hill licking him in the by-election in Edge Hill.
There is rottenness in the city of Liverpool. The cancer is still eating away at it. We desperately need a new approach. If the Archbishop and the bishops and the people of the country are as concerned about the city as I believe they are, they should know that the average person in Liverpool is a good, decent, honest hard-working person, who is fed up to the back teeth. If parliamentary conventions did not preclude it, Iwould tell the House what was said to me when I knocked on the door of a house in Walton [ Hon. Members :-- "Go on."] I will go this
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far. The man who answered my knock told me that he had always voted Labour. I asked him. "What do you think about what is happening in Liverpool today?" and he said, "I'm something off." The word began with "P". Actually, it meant that as well. That is indicative of the attitude of the people of Liverpool : they want peace and progress. I hope that the archbishop, the bishops, the moderate Labour party, the Liberal Democrats, the Confederation of British Industry, the trade union leaders and many others in Liverpool can come together around a table to try to get a consensus of opinion on how to make progress. It behoves the Government to encourage that initiative and financially to induce it. That is the only way forward in the long term, as it is the only way that Militant will be defeated, as it deserves to be.6.48 pm
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Environment (Mr. Robert Key) : It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Rochdal(Sir C. Smith), not least because of his lightness of touch and depth of experience, which have added a dimension that would otherwise have been lacking in the debate. I found this a deeply depressing debate. It is not just that it has been an intrusion on private grief, on the squabble between the Liberal and Labour parties. It is far more important than that. We have seen exhibited tonight a deep malaise in the body politic of Liverpool.
It is my duty and privilege to spend a great deal of time with inner-city communities--communities which represent the rich multiplicity of culture, aspirations and frustrations. I meet many people who have street cred in their communities. They tell me that they know their communities, and they do. They tell me that they represent the views of their communities, and so they do, if sometimes partially. What most of those good people have in common is that they do not belong to political parties and they are not elected councillors. It is the tragedy of many of our inner cities and part of the tragedy of Liverpool.
In the many years during which I have been involved in politics, and long before I became a Member of this place--certainly when I was fighting the constituency of Holborn and St. Pancras, as it is now described, against the hon. Member who now represents that constituency--I have never been accused by anyone, as far as I am aware, of prejudice. I accept that I have been accused of many other things. That being so, I shall respond to some of the comments that were taken up in the debate last Friday. What a pity that it was such a thinly attended debate.
If anyone reads my speech in Hansard rather than relying on other sources, he or she might have taken a different view of my remarks. I have responded already to the hon. Member for Liverpool, Mossley Hill (Mr. Alton), but I remind hon. Members on both sides of the House of the words of a Liverpudlian who is living in Bournemouth, as reported in The Daily Mail. Apparently, he said :
"A hell of a lot more people would live in Liverpool if it hadn't been for the Militant council."
I accept that that is true. Someone else said :
"Liverpool is the Third World of England. Who wants to live in a place like that?"
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I believe that the person who said that is entirely wrong. I believe that Liverpool, like so many other great northern cities, has turned the corner. I agree strongly with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State that, when the history of the 1980s is written, it will be seen to be the decade of turning for Liverpool.It is our ambition in government, in partnership with responsible councils, to ensure, through education, training, jobs and quality of life that people do not want to leave our inner cities, and that those who have left them want to return, especially in the north of England. We hope that many others will be attracted to join us and others in building a bright new future for the ancient communities of the inner cities.
Mr. Wareing : How can the comments that the Minister made during a long speech last Friday help the aim of attracting more investment to Liverpool and more people to live in an extremely good city?
Mr. Key : As the hon. Gentleman says, my comments were made during a long and serious debate. I was drawing attention to the dismal failure of a council in Liverpool--what I am about to say has been borne out by a quote from the Daily Mail --which has led to people feeling that they were driven out of the city.
Dame Elaine Kellett-Bowman : I have read my hon. Friend's speech. He said categorically in column 639 that Liverpool is "still a great city". What is wrong with that?
Mr. Key : I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention. She is not such a partial observer as Opposition Members. I have not enjoyed the nauseous piety of the Liberal Democrats this afternoon and evening. I accept, of course, that the arguments advanced by the hon. Member for Mossley Hill reflect long experience of Liverpool, but I believe that the Liberal Democrats are a big part of the problem in the city. It is no good the hon. Member for Mossley Hill blaming everything on the Labour party when we remember the period when the Liberal party, as it then was, was in control of the city, when little happened for so long.
I welcome the words of Archbishop Worlock, Bishop Sheppard and Dr. Newton. I think that they expressed what was genuinely meant, and that the Churches in Liverpool are playing an extremely positive role in seeking to bring communities together. I hope that the people of Liverpool will respond to the words of the Church leaders. The hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside (Mr. Blunkett) said that Liverpool has been offered no help or hope and has received nothing but carping and baying criticism. He talked of the problem caused by lack of money. I wish to tackle some of the hon. Gentleman's allegations, but first, it must be said that if the Labour party is preparing for government, the hon. Gentleman's defence from the Opposition Front Bench demonstrated what we might expect from a Labour Administration. What a tragedy. It was the worst defence by an Opposition Front-Bench spokesman of the Labour party in opposition that I have witnessed.
The claim that Liverpool has been starved of resources is a bit thin. The city has received almost £2 billion of support in the past 13 years. During the same period Manchester has received £1.5 billion. That is a city with a
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slightly smaller population. Birmingham, with a population almost twice that of Liverpool's, has received support of about £3 billion over the same period. Proportionately, Liverpool has received a very good deal.My hon. Friend the Member for Altrincham and Sale (Sir F. Montgomery) made a remarkable speech, and I am grateful to him. He put into perspective many of Liverpool's problems. He was, however, partial in quoting Liverpool's problems. He failed to mention the arrears of rates, including business rates, which amount to £37 million. If we add community charge arrears, we reach a grand total of £65 million of arrears. That is entirely due to inefficiency. Think what the grand total of arrears could have achieved, if collected, in helping to regenerate Liverpool.
The hon. Member for Liverpool, Broadgreen (Mr. Fields) made a brave speech. It was the sort of speech that I heard when I was a parliamentary candidate and came to the House to listen to debates. I suppose that, 10 years ago, many speeches were made of the sort that the hon. Gentleman delivered today. I only hope that it falls on stony ground in Liverpool in coming years. I do not believe that the hon. Gentleman's approach is any longer appropriate, if it ever was, to the politics of a free society.
My hon. Friend the Member for Harrow, West (Mr. Hughes) took us down the harsh road of the reality of politics in Liverpool. I am grateful to him for his robust contribution. Rent arrears, which have been referred to by several hon. Members, increased the community charge by about £30. That is the consequence if rents are not efficiently collected.
Housing has featured prominently in the debate. I was pleased to hear that Liverpool city council's housing committee has agreed to the recommendations that appear in two reports. Its acceptance this morning of those recommendations gives us real hope for the future. First, it has agreed that the council's multi-storey tower blocks are potentially suitable for a housing action trust. Who would have thought two years ago that Liverpool would be talking about an HAT? A more detailed feasibility study that includes tenant consultation should now begin. Secondly, it has been agreed that a joint report on identifying the scope for disposal of empty council stock to housing associations and house builders should go forward to my hon. Friend the Minister for Housing and Planning. I understand that the city council and the chairman of the housing corporation will be processing this development. That is good news on the housing front. As my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State said, many of the achievements that we have seen in Liverpool are due almost entirely to the Government's policies. Liverpool is one of 15 authorities that have been invited to bid for City Challenge. It has sketched out its initial proposals to my right hon. Friend. My hon. Friend the Minister of State and I will be visiting Liverpool in the coming weeks to take that further.
The government of Liverpool is crucial to the future success of the city. It has been through a long period of decline, but that is coming to an end. The initiatives that were launched at the beginning of the 1980s by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State show how success can come to the city. For example, Albert dock attracts over 6 million visitors a year. There has been the creation of the Wavertree technology park and the developments round the Anglican cathedral, which I have seen for myself.
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Despite the successes, progress in rebuilding is not recognised by those outside Liverpool. The city has not yet been able to take advantage of the substantial investments that have been made by the Government.The people of Liverpool should look to their history. I tell them this : "You have a great history but you can also have a great future. Your city voted overwhelmingly Conservative in its heyday. What have you gained from years of socialist rule, whether it has been Liberal, Labour or Militant by name? What have you gained but depression and decline over all those years?" All that has gone wrong must be laid at the doors of successive Labour and Liberal administrations. In sharp contrast, so much of what has gone right has been generated by this Conservative Government. Labour is still in hock to the Militants. It is still the party of protest, not the party of government.
About once a quarter, the Leader of the Opposition stamps his foot. He then tells us that Liverpool is under control. Why should we believe him this time? His party in Liverpool has told us where it stands. The hon. Members for Broadgreen, Liverpool, Garston (Mr. Loyden) and for Liverpool, Riverside (Mr. Parry) are too busy to campaign for the official Labour candidate. They are totally united--solid for socialism, mummers for Militant.
The people of Liverpool are doing a good job. The teachers of Liverpool--
Mr. James Wallace (Orkney and Shetland) rose in his place and claimed to move, That the Question be now put.
Question, That the Question be now put, put and agreed to. Question put accordingly, That the original words stand part of the Question :--
The House divided : Ayes 18, Noes 210.
Division No. 185] [6.59 pm
AYES
Alton, David
Barnes, Mrs Rosie (Greenwich)
Beith, A. J.
Bellotti, David
Bruce, Malcolm (Gordon)
Carlile, Alex (Mont'g)
Carr, Michael
Fearn, Ronald
Howells, Geraint
Hughes, Simon (Southwark)
Kennedy, Charles
Maclennan, Robert
Michie, Mrs Ray (Arg'l & Bute)
Owen, Rt Hon Dr David
Smith, Sir Cyril (Rochdale)
Steel, Rt Hon Sir David
Taylor, Matthew (Truro)
Wigley, Dafydd
Tellers for the Ayes :
Mr. James Wallace and
Mr. Archy Kirkwood
NOES
Alexander, Richard
Alison, Rt Hon Michael
Allason, Rupert
Amess, David
Amos, Alan
Arbuthnot, James
Arnold, Jacques (Gravesham)
Arnold, Sir Thomas
Ashby, David
Aspinwall, Jack
Atkins, Robert
Baker, Rt Hon K. (Mole Valley)
Baker, Nicholas (Dorset N)
Baldry, Tony
Batiste, Spencer
Beaumont-Dark, Anthony
Benn, Rt Hon Tony
Bennett, Nicholas (Pembroke)
Benyon, W.
Bevan, David Gilroy
Blackburn, Dr John G.
Bonsor, Sir Nicholas
Boscawen, Hon Robert
Boswell, Tim
Bottomley, Peter
Bowden, Gerald (Dulwich)
Bowis, John
Braine, Rt Hon Sir Bernard
Brazier, Julian
Bright, Graham
Brown, Michael (Brigg & Cl't's)
Buck, Sir Antony
Budgen, Nicholas
Burt, Alistair
Butler, Chris
Carlisle, John, (Luton N)
Carlisle, Kenneth (Lincoln)
Carrington, Matthew
Carttiss, Michael
Chalker, Rt Hon Mrs Lynda
Channon, Rt Hon Paul
Chapman, Sydney
Clark, Rt Hon Alan (Plymouth)
Clark, Rt Hon Sir William
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