Part of the debate – in the House of Commons am 12:00 am ar 21 Rhagfyr 1973.
Perhaps I may respond first to the last remark made by the hon. Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Meacher). I appreciate that the Government commissioned the report. We would not have done so had we not realised the problems of the North-West.
However, it is misleading of the hon. Gentleman to say that the North-West Region is the worst off in the country. He chose certain items which were tested in the strategy and said that in these respects the North-West was bottom of the league table or, at any rate, near the bottom. I shall come back to that again. I say only that to take a number of matters in which one region is worse off than others, even though there may be a considerable number especially, as in this case, does not service to the region when they are grouped together and given publicity in the Press to show that the North-West Region is the worst off in the country. I shall come back in a moment to why I deny the value of that sort of analysis, and I shall try to give some figures about it.
I compliment the hon. Member for Oldham, West on bringing to the attention of the House the two documents, the Oldham Study and the Strategic Plan for the North-West. However, I must disappoint him with regard to the second and the series of questions which he put to me on it.
A few prints of the Strategic Plan for the North-West were commissioned so that those whose comments we especially desired should have copies. I fear that the document itself, which is a massive one, needs very careful study. At this stage however, it is a discussion document, and it was only a few days ago that I directed that a copy of it be provided to right hon. and hon. Members with constituencies in the North-West, the report being their particular concern.
On a discussion document which still has to be considered by all the local authorities concerned and others and from whom the Government will look for comments which they will then consider in great detail and very carefully, I am unable at this stage to give Government decisions. It would be wrong for me to do so before hearing the comments of those who are interested in it, taking all those into account and giving them careful study.
This has been the practice in the preparation of regional strategies throughout the country. The previous Government set in hand the Regional Study for the South-East. They did it by getting together the Economic Planning Council for the South-East and the Standing Conference of Local Planning Authorities in the South-East. My right hon. Friend who is now Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, who was then Secretary of State for the Environment, approved that Regional Study for the South-East after fully considering it, and after discussing it with all the authorities concerned.
Because of the success of that document we decided that each region should proceed with a regional strategy. The West Midlands was already dealing with a strategy for that area by means of the local planning authorities. But what I was eager to do was to get the regional economic planning council together with the standing conference of local planning authorities for a region to sponsor an expert team. That was what was done in the North-West Region.
I recollect well the meeting when this study was commissioned. It was a meeting held at Wigan between the Standing Conference of Local Planning Authorities and the North-West Economic Planning Council, and the Secretary of State took the chair. We set this in motion and it has been successful in producing a document for study, for discussion, for consultation and finally for decision as a framework for future planning in the area.
If we could have proceeded neatly and in order, it was my hope that we could have regional stategies for each region, that we could then proceed to have structure plans drawn by the counties and that we could then proceed to local plans drawn by the districts. But things cannot be done in that nice, neat order, otherwise we should take generations to complete them. Many studies have to go on concurrently. When we decide upon the regional strategy as a result of this report, the structure plans will have a framework in which to fit.
I say again that this is at the moment a consultation document, and I do not propose to give any Government decisions upon it.
I return for a few months to the Oldham Study, to compare the two documents. The Oldham Study was one of three studies—Sunderland and Rother-ham were the other two—set up in an effort to obtain guidelines on which to redevelop, to revitalise, our cities, which are often dependent on obsolescent industries. Where the industries on which a town has relied are changing and becoming obsolescent, new industries need to be attracted there. We wanted to see the right way to manage those towns and to attract the right kind of industry and to work out the change in the pattern—industrial, commercial and social—within the town.
We set up the study of these three towns so that this should be, not merely an academic study, but a study on the ground in real towns of real problems. The three reports are of very great value. I hope that we shall be consolidating our thoughts on these by means of a seminar of all those interested one weekend in the near future, to see how we can progress on the matters we can learn from the studies.
The hon. Gentleman mentioned one or two points which were brought out by the Oldham Study. Each of these studies has brought out different aspects of the same problem. The problem is how to get a total approach to all the problems of a town—not merely physical planning, but the social, educational and employment aspects. We want to get a total approach to planning and management by local government in respect of those problems.
The Oldham Study and the North-West Regional Strategy call attention to the financial side of matters—the grants made by the central Government. The hon. Gentleman put some questions to me about the distribution of the rate support grant. I assure him that he was urging a willing horse, or knocking on an open door. In the formula for distribution of the rate support grant for 1974–75 we have already taken into account many of the matters which appear in these studies. The hon. Gentleman will find, if he refers to the present formula for distribution, which has been published in one way or the other in discussions with local authorities, that our great problem in working out the formula for 1974–75 has been that it has given such a lot to what might be called the deprived cities—the cities which need redevelopment so much—that it has put the whole distribution out of balance for the counties and we have had to feed in other formulae to get the spread a little more even.
The whole object of the new formula was to make exactly the sort of provision for which the hon. Gentleman was asking and which the Oldham Study and the North-West Regional Strategy called for. They both asked that we should give consideration to the towns which suffer most because of the derelict state of the town centres, due generally to a change in the industries there.
Oldham is the best example because, with changes in the textile industry, it has been left with many unused mills which clearly cannot be used for any other type of industry. As the hon. Gentleman said, the only thing to do is to get rid of them and redevelop. Considerable assistance has been provided by the central Government for coping with that sort of development by means of capital grants, and the new distribution of the rate support grant will be of great advantage.
The distribution of the rate support grant is not the only way in which these cities can be helped, and it was wrong of the hon. Gentleman to give the impression that very little help has been given to the North-West. The area has had considerable help from the Government in the last few years. The figures which the hon. Gentleman chose to give from the North-West Regional Strategy were based in some cases on a 1966 census and in other cases on 1971.
Since then, there have been significant developments. Because the North-West got off the mark quickly with Operation Eyesore, it derived greater benefit from it than any other region in the country. I am speaking from memory, but I think I am right in saying that the North-West had more than one-quarter of the total finance laid out on Operation Eyesore.
The North-West has benefited enormously from the 75 per cent. improvement grant over the last few years and will continue to benefit in future, even though that 75 per cent. in general over the country will return to 50 per cent. because we are now to concentrate on properties and dwellings where improvements are so necessary—in the twilight parts of the greater cities. By concentrating on that rather than giving 75 per cent. improvement grants right across development areas, we shall serve the public much better.
I think I am again right in saying that more general improvement areas have been set up in the North-West than in any other region. It has benefited accordingly. In March 1972 intermediate area status was granted to parts of the North-West, and that was later extended throughout the area. The whole region became eligible for development grants for building, and it took advantage of them. Selective financial assistance under the Industry Act was also made available for modernisation schemes where previously loans and grants had been limited to schemes providing additional employment. Again the North-West was an area which particularly needed that kind of assistance, and it has taken advantage of the offers.
While recognising the need to modernise the industrial structure of the North-West, we have devolved a considerable amount of authority to the regions so that decisions can be made there quickly for those who want the help which they can get from selective assistance. The process of modernising industrial buildings is necessarily long, and there is still much to be done in the North-West. Nevertheless, our policies of national growth and regional aids have created the confidence necessary to industry to invest.
If we look at the fall in unemployment in the region, we see that there was a drop from 147,000—5·2 per cent.—in April 1972 to 82,000—2·9 per cent.—in November 1973. That was a fall of about 44 per cent. in unemployment.