Orders of the Day — Budget Resolutions and Economic Situation

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at 12:00 am on 12 April 1978.

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Mr. Margolis:

, the chairman of Monseigneur Grills, is reported in TimeOut to have said that he sees himself as the George Ward of the catering industry. I do not want to see the hotel and catering industry suffering in the same way and being the object of daily disputes on television as Grunwick has been. But that is what we shall see. We shall see disputes such as the one in Claridges spreading elsewhere. There has already been an indication on the tapes of the Press Association that the dispute will spread. How long do we have to wait before this industry is put on to a proper footing, one under which these disputes will be eradicated so that we can have an industry of which we can be proud?

I very much welcome this Budget. It has a number of aspects that I regard as highly desirable. It is not an electioneering Budget. I ask the Chancellor in future to consider the use of financial measures as a carrot or a stick to induce this industry—many aspects about which we can be satisfied and many about which we can rightly be nauseated—to improve. If by dangling a carrot or waving a stick we help bring about this change, this will be greatly to the benefit of the community as a whole as well as to the industry.