Upper Clyde Shipbuilders

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at 12:00 am on 2 August 1971.

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Looking back over the years of U.C.S., and with the benefit of hindsight, I have no doubt in my own mind that it would have been better if the previous Government had taken the whole industry into public ownership at the time we launched our programme. We should have re-equipped and rationalised and swept aside the old owners. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] Well, why did the Government appoint Lord Robens to the Advisory Group? It is a fact that he was the man who did exactly to the coal mines what I am saying we might well have done to the British shipbuilding industry. It is astonishing to me that Lord Robens, who has had experience with the Coal Board, should have allowed his name to go forward in signing the Advisory Group's Report.