It gives me great pleasure to follow the speech of the hon. Member for Bristol, West (Mr. Waldegrave). We have already done a little work together on Finniston and its outcome. I liked the point that he made about the generalist. The truth is that the harsh disciplines of science and technology are just as good for making a man eventually a generalist as the study of ancient Greek. One of the great generalists of all times was Leonardo da Vinci. He was an amazingly ingenious engineer and a clever scientist—also a man with all-round culture. As the hon. Member for Bristol, West said, if there is now this gulf betwen cultures it did not always exist.

I should declare my interest. I am by training and experience a chartered engineer and a fellow of two of the institutions much concerned in this matter. My union, the Electrical Power Engineers Association, now part of the EMA federation, has also taken a close interest and been very active.

I am grateful to the Under-Secretary of State for referring to the part that I have played in pressing the need for an inquiry into the engineering profession. In July 1976 I wrote a memorandum to the then Prime Minister, my right hon. Friend the Member for Heyton (Sir H. Wilson). He looked on it favourably and passed it to the then Secretary of State for Industry—my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Varley). My right hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield had to contend with much opposition on the matter. He had to override his officials who were lukewarm about an inquiry and who did not think that it was necessary. Officials always feel that they know better than Ministers.

My right hon. Friend stuck to his beliefs, and the inquiry was duly appointed under the expert chairmanship of Sir Monty Finniston. I remain sad that there was also opposition to the inquiry by the Council of Engineering Institutions. I recall that with sadness, because its earlier opposition to an inquiry has taken much from the force of its criticisms since the Finniston committee reported. It is perhaps unfairly charged with being obstructionist from the beginning.

Why was there an adverse reaction from part of the engineering industry when the Government proposed to take a close look at it? Doctors and medical people generally do not feel that way. They like to put themselves in the public eye. When an inquiry was proposed into the legal profession the lawyers were in favour of it. They felt "If you cannot beat them, join them." The early reaction of the CEI is curious to many people, but I think that I understand it, because there has always been a state of mind among those in professional engineering that craves for status and prestige but feels that it can be brought about without what is loosely called "politics ". I presume that by "politics" they mean governments, Ministers and Members of Parliament. But the suggestion of the CEI for the appointment of the Finniston-proposed engineering authority by the Privy Council overlooks the fact that the Lord President of the Council is a member of the Administration of the day. So it is a distinction without a difference. If there are many Members of Parliament who do not know a lot about engineering, there are, I fear, many professional engineers who do not know a lot about parliamentary government.

Since the publication of the Finniston report it has become the fashion here and there, to say that the causes of British industrial decline should be sought elsewhere than in the deficiencies of engineers. In the bloody-mindedness of trade unionists or, I suppose, people with the long weekend habits of directors, that is part of popular mythology, whether or not it is accurate. However, that sort of argument is irrelevant to the Finniston inquiry.

The inquiry was not looking for a single cause of poor industrial performance, and it is wrong therefore, to charge it with finding a single cause. It is rather like the theologian who was arguing with the philosopher. The theologian accused the philospher of looking in a dark room for a black cat that was not there. The philosopher replied "Yes, I know, but you have found it." The Finniston committee has not found the black cat—the single cause—because it does not exist.

The Finniston committee carried out its instructions; the terms of reference are listed in the report under four headings. They can be summarised as identifying specific questions relating to the contribution of engineers and engineering to the efficiency and effectiveness of our British manufacturing problems. It has identified one uncomfortable truth. While our best engineers can equal any in the world, there are far too few, and the general run of modern engineers—especially the younger men—are not well-qualified by today's international standards. They are not well-qualified compared with, say, engineers in France, Germany, the United States and probably the Soviet Union.

There is a shortage of first class recruits to the engineering profession. Numbers alone are not sufficient. The graduate entry system, as practised at present—I am not, of course, against engineering graduation—has proved to be inferior in many ways in producing competent engineers, compared to the old higher national certificate method. I have some knowledge of that method, because I was trained by it. It was a harsh system, under which an engineering apprentice or student rose at 6 o'clock in the morning and was at the works by 7 o'clock. He worked throughout the day, with a break for lunch. He finished at about 5 o'clock, went to the technical college or polytechnic, and studied until about 10 o'clock at night, week in and week out during the winter for five years.

It was a hard system, and not one to which we wish to return. History has now passed it by. But it had the advantage that for five years when a would-be engineer was working, learning and training, industry became the whole world to him. It was around him and on top of him, and he could not escape it.

In recent years, the engineering degree or qualification has often moved away from industry. In many universities industry is seen rather as one sees an object through the wrong end of a telescope. It is seen as something rather small. An engineering degree has become one of many degrees that a student can take. In my view, the Robbins report is much to blame for that, with degrees for all. Looking back at it, it was not necessarily the best of reports.

Since the war we have moved away from the solidity and earthiness of the old mixed work and study, training for the majority of engineers. Men who hold high positions successfully in, for instance, manufacturing industry, the electricity supply industry and the Post Office, whose minds are broad and big, were trained by that old system. But we moved away from it—rightly, of course—without achieving the quality and depth of degree engineering that is now taken for granted in countries that are in competition with us.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Swansea, West (Mr. Williams) and I have both visited Japan. We know that to get to the top in Japanese industry it is preferable to be an engineer. To get to the top in British industry it is preferable to be an accountant, a lawyer, a merchant banker, or a diplomat.

No wonder, therefore, that British engineers of the younger generation do not have the esteem or the comparative cash rewards of their foreign counterparts. Nor can they hope to achieve the high positions in society, in government and in administration that they can on the Continent.

With regard to diplomats, J asked the Prime Minister about the functions of the permanent secretary in the Department of Energy; and whether experience in diplomacy and oriental languages is a necessary or desirable qualification for this post. The right hon. Lady, after explaining the functions of the post, made the suggestion, rather lamely, that if the new permanent secretary could speak Arabic it would be useful in negotiating oil contracts. I then made the point that, with all respect to the talents of the gentleman appointed, Sir Donald Maitland, there had been, surely, a special opportunity here to appoint as head of a Department someone whose mind had been sharpened by the harsh disciplines of science and engineering. I asked Why do we go on supposing that to know everything about nothing in particular is a good thing? The right hon. Lady made an ingenious reply to that, as one would expect, but she concluded her answer with an interesting sentence. She said : With regard to choosing an engineer or a scientist as head of that Department, there are, I am afraid, very few candidates available."—[Official Report, 20 May 1980; Vol. 985, c. 245.] That in itself is something of an explanation of the failings of our society, and strengthens Finniston's criticism of the present system.

I recall that when I was Chairman of the former Select Committee on Science and Technology we had before us a very eminent civil servant who was questioned about the number of scientists and engineers available. The Minister may remember the incident, because he served on the Committee when I was Chairman of it. We asked a question about the number of scientific and technically qualified people available in relation to the particular subject. The answer was that there were so many scientists. I asked how many engineers there were, to which the senior civil servant replied that they were always included under the same title.

This is the extraordinary attitude that is prevalent in quarters in which people should know better. Obviously, engineering uses science to an enormous extent, but engineering, as a human activity, predated science. Indeed, in some ways it is an art as well as a science; sometimes it is an instinct. Not to recognise in this country that high-quality professional engineering exists in its own right, in some ways as an end in itself and in other ways as a stepping stone to the highest positions in industry and government, is to turn our minds and our thoughts away from the real world.

I do not accept every suggestion made in the Finniston report, which is an enormous document. I am not too keen on calling chartered engineers "registered engineers" in future. I think that the term "chartered engineer" is well understood. After all, we talk of chartered accountants, chartered surveyors, and so on. The public understand something about these terms. I should have thought "registered" would be a change for the worse.

It was not the business of the Finniston committee to look at technician engineering, but that is very important. The statistics show that in these days the ratio of chartered engineers—professional engineers—to technician engineers is moving against the technician engineer, for some curious reason. It should be moving in the other direction, because chartered engineers often require the support of a team of technician engineers in order to work effectively.

I know that the Finniston committee was not asked to look at the position of the technician engineer, but I should have thought that the rather elaborate threefold structure proposed was unnecessary. If we were to refer in the future, as we did in the past, to chartered engineers and technician engineers, I think that the position would be better understood.

Although the report is rightly in favour of a statutory register—that is the whole foundation of the proposal, and something that we must have—it has not recommended licensing as such. This matter will have to be looked at for the future. Under the register it may be necessary to have licensing for particular responsibilities—for example, where there are large industrial plants at which explosions can occur, and also in the case of nuclear power stations, great chemical plants, oil rigs, and so on. There is a case for having registered engineers— chartered engineers, as I prefer to call them—licensed to carry out that kind of task and to accept that kind of responsibility.

I add my plea to the pleas made by right hon. and hon. Members on both sides of the House that the debate should not be simply another review of the Finniston report. It is proper for us today to ask for the Government's intentions. If they cannot give them today, they must give them very soon. Consultation has gone on quite long enough. Action should now take the stage. The TUC, the CBI and the Engineering Employers' Federation all support the essential Finniston.

Among the engineering institutions, apart from the CEI, there are differences. The Institution of Electrical Engineers has played a valiant part and a very open-minded and progressive part from the beginning. It is in favour of the Finniston recommendations being carried through in their essentials. That means the setting up of the proposed authority. I should have preferred to see a "council ". The hon. Member for Bristol, West said that he would prefer to have an authority. He has connections with the GEC, so I suppose there would be some confusion, if a lesser body were to be set up after the GEC was already in existence.

The appointments to the authority should be made by the Secretary of State for Industry. The exact composition of the authority is now open for discussion. The profession, of course, wants a considerable number of professional engineers or representatives of institutions to be on the authority. I would be rather against the institutions, as such, being represented directly. It is far better that the Minister should use his judgment in making the appointments.

There can be many variations in the mix. It is not really critical. As I have said, we need action. I do not believe that the professional institutions have either the authority or the will to act on a voluntary basis to achieve the aims of Finniston. There is nothing static about professional institutions—or there should not be—because life is changing all the time. New institutions spring up as they are needed. There are many examples. Some old institutions are probably not quite as necessary as they were in the past. There is, understandably, a vested interest, and they sometimes go on beyond what should be their natural life.

In an earlier intervention I made the point that if the institutions had become what they were originally intended to be, namely, learned societies, they would be likely to respond quite naturally to changes in technology, to respond to new skills and ideas coming forward, and to new discoveries being made. They are not in a position to do on an amateur basis what the Government should do. There is no reason why there should not be a special levy towards the cost. However, it would be foolish to quibble about the cost when faced by the risks if we fail to act.

As the Under-Secretary said, the climate of opinion is favourable to action. If we lose the opportunity to make this great human gift to the industrial needs of our country, we may not be given such an opportunity again.