Orders of the Day — Unemployment

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at 12:00 am on 24 July 1978.

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Photo of Mr Barney Hayhoe Mr Barney Hayhoe , Hounslow Brentford and Isleworth 12:00, 24 July 1978

If goods are being dumped I expect the Government to take fast action to prevent that. They have anti-dumping powers, but perhaps those powers need to be carefully looked at. I agree that there are great opportunities for our industry to provide the goods and services which must otherwise be imported.

There would be a great deal of extra employment if there were continuity of production in the car industry. The car industry could be producing many more units to meet demand at home and abroad. It is not doing so, and I imagine that the blame attaches to the union leaders and to many of the managers. I hope that the support which was demonstrated for the new management of British Leyland during our debates a short while ago will be recognised by the work force which will set about putting its house in order to produce the goods.

The extra jobs that we require can come only from the extra wealth which is created by our making more goods and providing more services of the right kind at the right price for export or to replace imports. There is no other way.

The damaging myth is circulated by some Labour Members and trade union leaders that when times are hard one should go slow to avoid working oneself out of a job. That is absolute nonsense. The only way to sustain many jobs is to achieve higher productivity and lower unit costs so that we retain a competitive position for our goods in world markets.

We all desire a shorter working week, working year or working life. We are certainly anxious to ensure that in their political activities Labour Members enjoy a shorter working life after the next General Election. In industry, however, this is not the time to make such changes if they make our industry less competitive. No doubt in due course across-the-board improvements will come, but at present a shorter working week for the same pay and producing the same goods would mean higher unit costs. If there is to be a productivity gain there will be no extra jobs. This, therefore, at present is a recipe for disaster one way or the other.

I followed an interesting debate on television on Sunday morning in which my right hon. Friend the Member for Lowestoft (Mr. Prior) took part. Mr. Hugh Scanlon was also featured on the programme, and while I disagreed with many of his comments on the shorter working week I felt that his views on shift working should be picked up. If we could use some of the machinery more intensively in ways that would help the work force and reduce unit costs there would be an all-round advantage. Mr. Scanlon's comments in that respect were of considerable importance.

My speech has taken longer than I intended, partly because of the many interventions from Labour Members. For more than 50 years our politics have been greatly influenced by national high unemployment in the inter-war years. Now once again we have high unemployment. The figures have not fallen below 1 million for more than three years, and the prospects are pretty grim. Thank God the poverty, misery and physical deprivation of that earlier period have gone, I hope for ever—