Mr Ian Stewart: The single-rate VAT that we introduced was widely accepted as an improvement in the system. The 8 per cent. rate and the extra luxury rate, which were introduced in 1974 as one of the cheap attempts to buy electoral votes in October 1974, are the root of all the problems. I had not intended to make a party-political point about that matter but, as the hon. Gentleman has raised it, I hope...
Mr Ian Stewart: I believe that Imperial Chemical Industries has estimated the cost to be over £500,000 a year and that Unilever has estimated the cost to be £300,000 a year—just to comply with the rules of the Price Code and to process their applications. Yet more perverse than this in many ways is the effect of the whole range of laws and regulations which any business these days must face. I must,...
Mr Ian Stewart: We shall have to say to them, "Let them eat paper". They might be able to satisfy their appetites that way. Where does all this lead us and the many companies that are so harassed by this paper work? I quote from the chairman's report of a medium-sized power company in the Midlands: In … recent years, we have been subjected to increasing control by burgeoning official bodies wielding wide...
Mr Ian Stewart: I do not have the basis before me, but I shall be glad to communicate it to the Minister if I can before 7 p.m., or whatever the relevant time may be. Unfortunately, I do not have a battery of civil servants at my elbow who can run backwards and forwards with notes to keep me briefed. The smaller companies in this country are a great source of invention. They have good industrial relations....
Mr Ian Stewart: I have no doubt that if companies felt that there might be some benefit from or relevance to the information that they were providing they would be only too happy to provide it. The cumulative effect of all this is becoming disastrous.
Mr Ian Stewart: That is probably true, and that is a helpful intervention. Some of the information collected by the statistical department is used for the Government's economic forecasts, and I should have thought that that made the case without any more being said for some reduction in the provision of information. Morale in small businesses is low, and it has been lowered partly by this unnecessary burden...
Mr Ian Stewart: Will the Under-Secretary of State accept that what the hon. Member for Harlow (Mr. Newens) has said applies equally to Luton and that the whole question of the smaller airports in the Home Counties needs to be reconsidered in the light of the great population increase in recent years and the unexpected increase in air traffic? These airports would not have been situated where they are had...
Mr Ian Stewart: I welcome the opportunity to take part in this debate about the Commission documents, brief though it is. I shall not follow the argument of the hon. Member for Thornaby (Mr. Wrigglesworth), not because I do not want to discuss the interesting points he raised, flowing from the White Paper, but because I hope we shall have an opportunity to debate that before long and I think it is better to...
Mr Ian Stewart: I accept your comments, Mr. Speaker, and shall return to the central point. I was endeavouring to make the general point that these directives and papers relate to the integration of banking within the Community and that, therefore, the degree to which people move between banks in member States will be eased by these directives and other developments. That is relevant to our banking system...
Mr Ian Stewart: How on earth will the right hon. Gentleman reduce the reserve currency function of sterling?
Mr Ian Stewart: I hope that even at this hour, and after the speeches from the two Front Benches, I do not need to apologise for returning to Amendment No. 50, of which I was one of the original sponsors. [Interruption.]
Mr Ian Stewart: I do not wish to recapitulate many of the arguments which have been put forward very thoroughly in the past seven or eight hours, but there are a number of important issues that have not been adequately put in this connection. It is difficult to separate in our minds, and certainly in the speeches we have heard, the party political and constitutional attitudes of individual Members. I do not...
Mr Ian Stewart: The hon. Gentleman has been an assiduous attender at our debates and he may have diffculty in following all the arguments. I apologise if he has had difficulty, following my speech. Public tolerance of any system of government depends on whether it is regarded as fair and meeting practical needs. I have been suggesting that there is a considerable division between electoral opinion in...
Mr Ian Stewart: Does the right hon. Gentleman accept that the rate of inflation is related to exchange rates? Does he agree with the Financial Secretary that the exchange rate is being dictated by the level of overseas demand or otherwise for sterling rather than by the policy of the Bank of England? Will he ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer to state clearly to the Governor of the Bank of England at their...
Mr Ian Stewart: Will the Minister clear up one point which appears to present a conflict between what he said and what is in the Explanatory Memorandum? It says that the present limit is £12,200 million, to be increased to £25,000 million. Earlier the Minister mentioned the figure of £18,200 million and drawings of £17,000 million. Will he relate these last figures to those in the Bill?
Mr Ian Stewart: I start by adding my congratulations to my hon. Friend the Member for Hertfordshire, South (Mr. Parkinson), who, in his first appearance at the Dispatch Box with these responsibilities, achieved the notable feat of making a relevant, thorough and interesting speech, which is not easy on such a Bill. As my hon. Friend the Member for Gosport (Mr. Viggers) said, this is three Bills in one and I...
Mr Ian Stewart: I support the important new clause. At the heart of all our considerations of the relationship between this country and the International Monetary Fund is our experience in the recent past and the way in which the Government have had to have access to the facilities of the fund in order to cope with our economic problems. As the rôle of the IMF has become more important in the world...
Mr Ian Stewart: I hope that you will not be disappointed, Mr. Deputy Speaker, if I refer to New Clause 2. In passing, however, I should like to say that I found the discussion about UNCTAD and the common fund of great interest, although I did not come here briefed to take part. Perhaps I may be permitted a personal comment on it nevertheless as we seem to have turned our attention it it. I think that there...
Mr Ian Stewart: I said and meant current account. Usually, in my experience, movements on capital account respond more than anything to movements on current account. It is not usually difficult for a country with a sound current account balance to obtain proper funding for any temporary deficit on capital account. The factor at which the IMF must continue to look is the ability of a country to pay its way on...
Mr Ian Stewart: Is the hon. Gentleman seriously maintaining that the fall in the value of sterling in 1976 was the result of economic policies between 1971 and 1973?
