Part of Oral Answers to Questions — Energy – in the House of Commons at 12:00 am on 11 November 1991.
If the hon. Gentleman gets something in a plain brown envelope, we can rely on him to issue a press release putting the worst possible complexion on the matter from the point of view of British coal. Those who seek to speak for British coal must recognise that they do the industry great damage by their Jeremiah, sour remarks. The advice that I am receiving from Rothchilds about the size of the coal industry is neither accepted or rejected by me. The size of the industry will be determined by the facts and will depend on the contracts that British Coal can obtain in the renegotiation of contracts with the generators which is due to start in April 1993.