Termination of Existing Arrangements

Part of Clause 1 – in the House of Commons at 8:30 pm on 10 December 1986.

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Photo of Dr John Marek Dr John Marek , Wrexham 8:30, 10 December 1986

I apologise to my hon. Friend. In this House, the man includes the woman, and the woman includes the man.

Any reasonable man or woman in the street would think that clause 1 runs counter to the spirit of the ILO conventions, and perhaps to the letter of the law and to conventions that the United Kingdom has signed in times past. I shall be interested to hear what the Secretary of State has to say. I hope that he will answer some of our points honestly and that he will not do what some Ministers do, in shifting the argument sideways and producing statistics that do not meet the criticisms made.

I hope that he will not try to acquit himself like that, but that he will be honest and will tell us if some of our arguments have merit.