SCOTTISH DEVELOPMENT AGENCY (No. 2) BILL [Lords]

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at 12:00 am on 25 June 1975.

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Photo of Mr Frank McElhone Mr Frank McElhone , Glasgow Queen's Park 12:00, 25 June 1975

I did not mention £25 million a year. The hon. Member for Glasgow, Cathcart (Mr. Taylor) will have to do better than that. I shall give him another chance, but not just now. Anyone who has followed the progress of the planning team, the study which went into that report, and the work of the officers of the Scottish Development Department who were members of that team will understand the embryo stage of the Bill.

We welcome the Bill because for too long the economy of Scotland, and especially in the west of that country, has been badly mixed. Too often many of out brightest and youngest people have had to travel south to obtain jobs suitable for their skills, taking their families with them. That represents a tremendous loss to Scotland over generations. However, I was delighted to hear my right hon. Friend say that there had been a net inflow of 7,000 people over the past year. That is a tremendous boost to the people of Scotland, where there is always a genuine fear that the brightest and youngest people take their skills abroad. With the establishment of the departments in Scotland and with oil coming on stream, a new, prosperous era is starting in Scotland. We are seeing the opening of a new chapter of economic history in Scotland.

I shall confine my remarks to Clause 8 of the Bill, which deals with derelict land. A tremendous boost will be provided by the moving of 6,000 defence jobs to Glasgow. Paragraph 14 of the consultative document says that the aim, as with the derelict land programme, is to recognise the special and massive task which needs to be undertaken, especially in Glasgow. The consultative document also indicates the special needs of Glasgow.

According to The Sunday Times of 8th June 1975, Baillie Dick Dynes, the leader of the Glasgow District Council Labour Group, said: We do have this very severe problem of multiple deprivation. I think that is a sad fact which is well recognised.

I was disturbed to read in the Scotsman today that Civil Servants fear move to Glasgow. The article says that Mr. Duncan Makie, who represents the Society of Civil Servants, said that he did not disguise the fact that many civil servants did not want to go to Glasgow. He went on to express reservations about housing and many other aspects of life in the city.

Speaking with a degree of bias, I must say that anyone who lives and works in Glasgow does not want to move. It is a warm-hearted city. It compares favourably with other parts of the United Kingdom. However, the most difficult job is to attract people in the first instance. In the past there was an example of this in the case of the Post Office Savings Bank. We tempted people from London. When those people saw what Glasgow had to offer, they did not want to return to London.

We must recognise that the housing and other urban problems with which we are confronted today cannot be tackled overnight. I pleaded in my statements in the Press and on television for £50 million a year over 10 years. That figure is negotiable. I do not expect to see that sum being provided by the Treasury tomorrow morning. However, we are ready to put the case to the Treasury. The will exists in the city of Glasgow, but the resources with which the local authority can tackle the problem are not there.

Why do I emphasise that? Let us be honest. Civil servants in the Ministry of Defence are fighting a rearguard action not to come to Glasgow. They have threatened industrial action. They are not due to come to Glasgow until at least 1978–79. Therefore I welcome Clause 8, which will allow money to be made available to cure the urban dereliction which is prevalent in Glasgow.

Clause 8(3) states: the agency may dispose of the land free of charge to a local authority. That is welcome. That provision can be used under the New Towns (Scotland) Act 1968 for open spaces as well as for industrial and housing development. I hope that Clause 8 will remain unscathed in Committee. Glasgow and Clydeside suffer from urban deprivation and slums. Such conditions have prevailed in the west of Scotland for far too long as a result of economic factors.

We realise that the solution to our problems will not be found in the and nationalism which is purveyed by members of the Scottish National Party. The solution will be found with increasing investment in the economy of Scotland and high productivity. With high investment and high productivity are to be found the high wages which are necessary to increase and sustain the standard of living which the people of Scotland should enjoy in the 1970s.

I am depressed with the report of the Department of the Environment which says that 115 of the 121 worst areas of Britain are to be found in Scotland, especially on Clydeside. We are not proud of that. Much of the blame for that lies with those who supported the Conservative Opposition decade after decade.

Let us be practical. I have no wish to go into Scottish economic and industrial history in detail. We must accept that homes with outside toilets were slums from the moment they were built. We have a long history of bad health, deprivation, bad housing and lack of educational facilities, which were tied up with the bad economic factors and high unemployment which prevailed in the west of Scotland.

I take issue with my hon. Friend the Member for Dundee, West on his comparison of the unemployment figures for Glasgow and Dundee. I think that he misunderstands the position. Glasgow has had a population of 1 million people but the population figure has fallen to 750,000. It is not overcrowded. Many people have been decanted to new towns. People come into Glasgow to work from Lanarkshire, Renfrewshire and Ayrshire. Glasgow has to be considered in a different context from Dundee. I am concerned about the unemployment in Dundee just as much as I am concerned about unemployment in Glasgow or anywhere else in the United Kingdom.

Hon. Members who represent the Scottish National Party do not solve Scotland's economic problems by making speeches and waving flags at Bannockburn. If Robert the Bruce could hear the "tartan Tory" speeches made by members of the SNP he would say, as many electors will say in the next General Election, that if we are to have Tories in power we may as well have the real ones.

It is true that many of the most able people leave the shores of Scotland to find employment. I do not wish my son, or anyone else's son, to be the next president of the Caledonian Society in Ottawa, Melbourne or anywhere else. The hon. Member for the Western Isles (Mr. Stewart) can testify that that has been the fate of many of our young people.

The Labour Government in nine months have done more to provide job opportunities than have any Government in our history. I admit that many of the job opportunities are coming to Glasgow because Glasgow is the fulcrum of the industrial West. We have to accept that we must attract civil servants to Glasgow, but we cannot direct labour and I hope that we shall never do that. We have to induce people to come. The knocking campaign against Glasgow which has been pursued through the media, especially in television programmes in recent years, has made people reluctant to come to Glasgow.

Glasgow has the Scottish Opera, the Scottish National Orchestra and the best art collection outside London. It has some of the best schools and good housing. We have much to offer. The image of a certain part of Glasgow that exists in some people's minds is applied to the whole of Glasgow.

I welcome the substantial investment in Scottish industry which is made available by the Bill and I also welcome the provisions which enable derelict land to be cleared for new industry. What worries me and many of my hon. Friends is the proliferation of industrial promotional agencies. They have all done a good job in the past, although they have limitations, but the fragmentation of promotional agencies does not help. If an industrialist, because of competing pressures, cannot make up his mind which part of Scotland to come to, he will go elsewhere. I am glad that the Scottish Development Agency, although it does not replace the promotional agencies, will at least draw them together and make them more effective in bringing jobs and job opportunities to Scotland.

We must accept that cross-border companies and multinational companies must in time have separate Scottish company registration. Such a provision would have made the Bill more efficient. Comments have been made about the inefficiency of nationalised industries. I am prepared to say that they have not been as accountable as they should have been, but we hope to correct that by the Industrial Democracy Bill.

I ask the Minister to ensure that there is adequate monitoring of aid to companies. There have been one or two examples of monitoring not being adequate. Plessey in the Vale of Leven obtained machinery at a low price and attempted to take it south. Only the vigilance of the work force prevented that scandal. It has been reported to me by a prominent trade union that Chrysler has shifted machine tools to Spain and South America and caused the production of new models to be jeopardised, especially at Linwood.