I am grateful to the hon. Member for Rotherham (Mr. Crowther) for raising this important subject. He has tirelessly put the views of the National Licensed Victuallers Association to the Government during the course of these discussions and changes.

The hon. Gentleman suggests that the orders have failed, but the main order, to break the tie, is not yet in effect, so it is premature to say that the proposal has failed to introduce competition. We must wait and see what its impact is before making that judgment.

To review the position before this judgment can be made would be far from helpful. It would create a great deal of additional uncertainty for tenants, customers and all in the brewing industry. Perhaps, on reflection, the hon. Gentleman will agree that that could make matters worse. It would certainly encourage the brewers to look again at their commercial strategy. The hon. Gentleman was critical of the way they had done that as a result of the orders while the review was under way. It would be wrong to encourage such a move before it is possible to form a view on how the orders have worked out in practice.

I am grateful that the hon. Gentleman pointed out that the closure of pubs, which was a common feature of the industry before the orders were thought of, has nothing to do with the Government's policy or the MMC inquiry.

If a pub is closed, that is a commercial judgment by the publican and the brewer depending on the relationship between them. It is usually by the brewer. That commercial judgment is made on the basis of the pub and its location. Hundreds of pubs closed before the orders and, unfortunately, some pubs are closing now. Closing a pub does not help a brewer to comply with the important brewing order; it is essential that the House understands that, as many hon. Members have problems involving pubs, and they need to answer that point, which shows that the brewing order is not the cause of the pub closure.

The hon. Member for Rotherham made some interesting points about independent arbitration. The Secretary of State and I have worked hard in discussions with the brewers to get improvements in the way in which they treat their tenants. One of the important points was to get the offer of independent arbitration where all else has failed. I will certainly consider the points that the hon. Gentleman made when I read Hansard and consider the ways in which it may be possible to dilute or circumvent the effect of independent arbitration in the way that the hon. Gentleman suggested.

The Government are committed to pursuing a vigorous competition policy in the brewing industry and elsewhere. We will continue to look closely at mergers in the brewing industry which fall for consideration under the fair trading legislation. Although the Monopolies and Mergers Commission report did not think that concentration in brewing was a problem, the authorities do not wish to see undue erosion of competition in brewing, and that will obviously inform our assessments and judgments in future transactions.

There has been little change in the combined market share of the six national brewers owning more than 2,000 pubs since February 1989. The increase in concentration of the big four, to which the hon. Gentleman referred, is entirely due to the Grant Met-Courage pubs-for-breweries deal. Those transactions were considered fully by the MMC. The number of pubs freed from ties as a result of the undertakings required by the Secretary of State will be much greater than would have been required under the orders. It was the tie which the MMC thought created all the problems. That explains the judgment in that case.

I do not accept that recent acquisitions of regional brewers and closures of breweries are the result of the beer orders. Regional brewers are not affected directly by them. The industry has long been characterised by mergers between brewers, closures of breweries and sales of public houses. The decisions of regional brewers such as Boddingtons and Greenalls to cease brewing were commercial ones taken by the managements of those companies and they were not forced on them by any of the Government's measures.

An important way of encouraging vigorous competition in the brewing industry is to give regional brewers the chance to expand. The beer orders do just that. Regional brewers have opportunities to acquire further premises from the national brewers, and they can sell their beers to a greater number of "free outlets" after November 1992. Regional brewers such as Morlands, Greene King and Wolverhampton and Dudley have already seized the opportunity to expand their estates.

The guest beer provision also provides opportunities. The Publican on 17 June reported: the guest ale tidal wave is swelling, as many national tenants prepare to take a non-brewery tied beer". The Morning Advertiser of 24 September reported on an in-depth survey that it had carried out into the effects of the guest beer provision. This found that some 40 per cent. of the tenanted pubs of the national brewers were now offering guest beers. That figure could well increase significantly. The survey found that Wadworths, Youngs, Fullers, Marstons and Adnams among the regionals had all done particularly well from the provision, accounting together for nearly 30 per cent. of the guest beer market.

Several new micro-brewers have sprung up. The Morning Advertiser of 30 October reported the story of Jim Botur, who spent his redundancy money from Matthew Brown on starting his own independent brewery. He said: We have received a lot of support from both free trade customers and tenants who are now able to stock a guest beer in their pubs. We were confident that the new Beer Orders would give us the opportunity we needed. The hon. Gentleman referred to recent increases in the price of beer which, I agree, have been large. As the brewers do not have to comply with the main measure of the orders until 1 November 1992, it is too soon to judge what impact the orders will have on prices. I notice that the steepest price rises in past years have been in pubs tied to the national brewers. The beer orders target precisely those brewers, by ordering a reduction in their tied estates by 11,000 outlets. Customers will have more choice of outlet and beer. They can shop around if some prices rise too far. We have asked the Director General of Fair Trading to review the orders in late 1993, when their effectiveness can be properly assessed.