Mr Maurice Macmillan: It is borne by the unemployed in either case. The hon. and learned Member for Kettering (Mr. Mitchison) had a rather curious method of solving the problem. He was rightly concerned with the level of unemployment in his constituency and proposed to compensate for the failure of private industry there by public enterprise, which I imagine in this con- text meant starting shoe factories. The...
Mr Maurice Macmillan: I apologise to the hon. and learned Gentleman if the juxtaposition of the two things led me to attribute to them a cause and effect relationship which was not there. It still does not alter my case that if there is not a demand for the goods, no amount of public enterprise can sell them except at subsidised rates.
Mr Maurice Macmillan: I will come to that in a moment. The ownership of industry in this context is irrelevant. I do not say that this problem does not apply to private enterprise. Of course it does. I merely say that the ownership of industry is irrelevant to this problem. If the calculations go wrong, the ownership of the equity must add to the taxpayer's burden one way or the other. I regard this as a...
Mr Maurice Macmillan: That there is growing interest, at least outside the House, in the matters raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham, South (Mr. W. Clark) is shown by the growing support for the work of organisations such as the Wider Share Ownership Council, with which I am associated and with which my hon. Friend the Economic Secretary is familiar. The work of this council has shown that a great...
Mr Maurice Macmillan: Perhaps we could have got a clearer definition in time. I would not wish to misrepresent what the hon. Member for Cardiff, South-East said. The hon. Gentleman would probably agree that this is the time for a fiscal policy, put forward by the Government, to accept all the implications of the affluent society. It is not easy. My hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham, South has indicated a...
Mr Maurice Macmillan: It is by no means always that I agree with the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Grimond), the Leader of the Liberal Party, but we must all be pleased to know that whatever the attitude of the Liberals in the past, they have come round to the side of those who would impose conditions on our entry into the Common Market. I congratulate the right hon. Gentleman on the enthusiasm...
Mr Maurice Macmillan: I have no doubt that, despite the objections of the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman), this country is taking far more than its fair share of the surplus production of cotton goods from Asia, and I have no doubt that so long as we remain outside the Common Market there is no hope whatever of getting any European help in dealing with this problem. But it is a problem which is...
Mr Maurice Macmillan: I do not want to weary the Committee with repetitive argument, although it is remarkably difficult not to do so considering how frequently we have had to repeat our arguments without making much impression on the Treasury. I support especially the new Clause of my right hon. Friend the Member for Sutton Coldfield (Mr. G. Lloyd)—Relief on savings policies—because it has at least some hope...
Mr Maurice Macmillan: My first and very pleasing duty is to add my congratulations to the hon. Member for Pontefract (Mr. Harper). I do so with all the more pleasure as a Yorkshire Member. My constituency also makes sweets. I hope that Pontefract will soon emulate the export record of Halifax in that respect. There are several points one has in common with a fellow Yorkshire Member, but there is one big...
Mr Maurice Macmillan: The hon. Gentleman is making my point for me. I say that it is fairly simple to do that in one's own business, but that it is not so easy to do it in someone else's business. It is exactly my point that the small businessman—or the big businessman—can build up his business and, in effect, make a tax-free saving because, in effect, the money invested in the business comes from reserves and...
Mr Maurice Macmillan: This is one of the most interesting debates in which it has been my good fortune to take part. May I for once refer a lot to the arguments which hon. Members from both sides of the House have put forward yesterday and today. If it will not embarrass him, I should like to start by congratulating the hon. Member for Leeds, West (Mr. C. Pannell) both on his robust commonsense and for the very...
Mr Maurice Macmillan: I should like to congratulate, although I cannot agree with him, my right hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton (Mr. Turton), on his most sincere and impressive speech. He quoted various statements which Commonwealth leaders had made. Although statements to the contrary effect were produced by the hon. Member for Leeds, West, I think it perhaps natural that at this juncture the...
Mr Maurice Macmillan: None of that alters the point I was trying to make. It merely emphasises that in the words of the Rome Treaty and in the ideas of the Commission, a thought, a proposal, is an act. It is not an act as I mean it. Their sort of "act" can be carried into effect only by the Governments of the Member States concerned. No one else has the power or the authority to do so. If hon. and right hon....
Mr Maurice Macmillan: No. If the right hon. Gentleman will allow me, I specifically said that it would not be a disaster, but would make things very much harder.
Mr Maurice Macmillan: I hope that the hon. Member for Deptford (Sir L. Plummer) will forgive me if I do not follow him behind the Iron Curtain; nor will I take up with the hon. Member for Sheffield, Attercliffe (Mr. J. Hynd) his mention of the war, though if I remember rightly there was during the war an ingenious method by which staff officers who were engaged in planning the invasion could communicate with one...
Mr Maurice Macmillan: The point I was trying to make is that if the Chancellor directly freezes wages in the public sector and does not take steps to prevent the private sector being able to pay higher wages, the private sector will entice labour away from the public sector and my right hon. and learned Friend will have achieved nothing. There a-re several other measures which must be taken together, but I do not...
Mr Maurice Macmillan: I never said, "Let us forget the past". I merely said that the attempt by hon. Members opposite and some hon. Members on this side of the Committee to apply the lessons of the past precisely to the future and to imagine that those conditions still existed would lead to disaster, because, although we could learn from the past, those were not the conditions which we were now facing.
Mr Maurice Macmillan: I am about to see the record.
Mr Maurice Macmillan: I support the Amendment. I apologise to the Committee and to the Chair for not having heard the whole of the debate, but I assure hon. and right hon. Members that this will not lead me either to repetitive argument or to detaining the Committee for long. I have no expert knowledge of the building society movement, and in view of what has been already said, perhaps I ought to add that I have...
Mr Maurice Macmillan: Perhaps, having complained at the Chancellor's policies before, I may be allowed to congratulate him tonight, not only on his courage in presenting the measures he has put before us, but upon the determination for the future as shown in his speech and the confidence with which he approached the great problems which confront us. May I welcome the threats—if that is not too strong a word for...