The changes proposed originally by the Minister last July were estimated to bring about, in the course of a year or two, a reduction of about 5,000 jobs out of a labour force of 17,000 in Dundee, and perhaps a rather heavier reduction in the constituency of South Angus.

I do not think that the Minister was surprised by the intensity of the opposition that was aroused by these proposals. As a result of that opposition, from many different quarters, the Government were forced to retreat from their original proposals. They set up a working party to look into alternative methods of safeguarding employment in the United Kingdom jute industry, and as far as I know that working party is still carrying on its considerations. At the time when it was set up the then Minister of State, Board of Trade—the present Financial Secretary to the Treasury—said that if the inquiry did not produce satisfactory alternative arrangements a uniform percentage markup would be introduced in a year's time for the equated and excluded goods.

I do not want to bore the House with the technicalities of this proposition. Suffice it to say that in clue course it would have meant a substantial reduction of employment in the jute industry. This is the proposal which, on the Government's public statement last August, is presumably to be implemented this August. My immediate purpose in speaking on the Bill is to seek from the Government an unequivocal assurance that, in the light of the political developments of the last 12 months, they are retreating from this statement. I want an assurance from the Minister that whatever the working party finally reports no decision will be taken by the Government to reduce the level of protection for the jute industry until the people of Dundee and the whole country have had an opportunity to decide what kind of Government they want at the forthcoming General Election.

It is a very great consolation to many people in the Dundee area who are not remotely Labour supporters that there will be a General Election very shortly, and that, whatever they may think about it from other points of view, it is likely that a Labour Government will be elected in the autumn. It is because of this prospect that we are entitled to a clear statement from the Government that since the General Election has been postponed to the legal limit of the life of this Parliament they will not make any new changes in respect of the protection given to the jute industry until the election has taken place.

That is the main thing that I want to urge on the Government. I conclude by reminding the House that in Dundee at least there can be no doubt about the importance of the election decision to be taken in the autumn. It is clear beyond partisan political argument that the level of employment in the jute industry is at risk if a Conservative Government is—in the unlikely event—elected in the autumn.