I am grateful for the opportunity to raise the subject of Hampton Court green in my constituency. This has long been a beautiful, cherished and treasured public open space. It is valued by visitors, passers by and residents within my constituency at Hampton Court, Hampton Wick, Hampton Hill, Hampton and surrounding areas. My hon. Friend the Member for Esher (Mr. Taylor), whose East Molesey constituents nearby enjoy the use of Hampton Court green, asks to be associated with my remarks.

Hampton Court green is a royal property which is now the responsibility of the Department of the Environment, exercised through its Historic Royal Palaces Agency. There is an increasing tendency to use the green for parking. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has received a petition from local residents, which reads as follows: We the undersigned local residents and members of the public note with deep concern the decision of the Hampton Court administrators to use The Hampton Court green for car parking in connection with commercial ventures at Hampton Court Palace. This use is fast becoming an established practice—with the subsequent deprivation of the local residents and the public at large of the free enjoyment of this long established unspoilt open green space.We wish to express our grave fears that, in the absence of any specific assurance to the contrary, the Palace administrators tend increasingly to view The Green as merely an adjunct to Hampton Court Palace with minimal regard to its intrinsic value as a local amenity which enhances this beautiful historic area.We consider that such use is not necessary for the efficient and successful management of Hampton Court Palace which is an important local amenity as well as a national institution.We therefore call on you to take urgent steps to build into the present policies and terms of reference clear and unmistakeable safeguards to define the permanent status of The Green as an area of public recreation and enjoyment and to prohibit its use at any time for car parking. I must declare an interest. For the past 22 years, I have lived on the edge of Hampton Court green. But the fact that I live there does not mean that my neighbours, who are also my constituents and who also live there, should expect any greater or less a service from me as their Member of Parliament in the protection of their environment than any other constituents—for example, if somebody decided to park cars all over Twickenham green. I know that that point will be understood by the House and accepted by the Department of the Environment.

Government policy is to protect open space, whether in urban or rural areas. That includes greens, village greens and commons. The protection of open space does not just mean keeping buildings off them. It also means upholding their character and keeping them open and free from clutter of any kind. In upholding that Government policy, the Government should set an example to local authorities where the Government themselves own parks, open spaces, commons or greens.

At Hampton Court green this task has been delegated to the Historic Royal Palaces Agency, but the agency is clearly responsible to Parliament, as set out in its own annual review for 1990–91, which states on page 6: The Secretary of State for the Environment is accountable to Parliament for the agency's policy, operations and resources. There is no doubt whatever that the Government are answerable to Parliament for the management of the green.

Furthermore, the question of parking on the green cannot, by any stretch of the imagination, be said to be merely a matter of day-to-day administrative detail. Whether or not the green is used for parking on a major scale is basic to the whole character and existence of the green.

I estimate that in the spring and summer of 1990 Hampton Court green was covered with car parking, fairs and their paraphernalia for more than 40 days. That is far too much. My constituents do not accept it; nor do the constituents of my hon. Friend the Member for Esher. I do not accept it. It makes a deep inroad into the character of the green, it is in conflict with Government policy, and it ought to be drastically curtailed. The problem is that the Historic Palaces Agency also manages Hampton Court palace. This palace is a great national treasure and a vital part of our national heritage.

I am aware, Mr. Speaker, that a member of your family is a distinguished real tennis player on Henry VIII's historic court there, that you go to Hampton Court from time to time and that you therefore recognise the great value of Hampton Court palace. The agency has been asked to increase the revenue of the palace and to decrease its enormous running losses. They are exceedingly heavy, due to the fact that Hampton Court palace is a very big and very old building. The agency has also been given responsibility for Hampton Court green.

Therein lies the difficulty. The green would have been better protected if, like the adjacent Bushey park, it had remained, like the other royal parks, under the royal parks bailiff. As it is, the agency and the palace administration seem to view the green as a satellite to the palace that can be used and even sacrificed in the interests of the palace.

Unlike other village greens, it has neither the protection of any local authority, as common land, nor the protection of the Department of the Environment, through its royal parks department. When the agency was established it seems to have been given no clear or specific instructions about the protection of the green. Either instructions of that kind should now be given to the agency or the green should be removed from the responsibility of the Historic Royal Palaces Agency and put under the protection of some other part of the Department of the Environment so that its character as a green can be preserved.

What has angered local residents is that since the agency was set up two or three years ago the green has been used as a public car park for up to 2,000 cars when commercial events to do with the palace have been staged. In July 1990 and July 1991 there were five-day flower shows in Hampton Court park, also known as Home park, Hampton Court, on the Kingston side of the palace. The description "flower show" is a little misleading. It was only about one third to do with flowers, while the other two thirds were devoted to the sale of other bits and pieces connected with gardening.

Only 5,000 cars were parked in Home park where there is room—out of sight behind walls and closer to the site of the flower show—for very many more cars, provided that the parking is well organised, which this year it was not. The congestion had a severe impact. The parking, as well as the traffic, needlessly damaged the environment of the people who live in the area and who suffered from it.

In June this year, parking was allowed all over the green for the quincentenary of the birth of King Henry VIII in 1491. Again, the cars should have been parked in Home park. I hope that the Minister will confirm that that was a one-off episode for the green.

Fairs, however, are traditional, time-honoured and accepted. One expects fairs to take place on greens. That is quite different from using Hampton Court green as a car park for an event being held in a different place. Each year, there are three traditional fairs on the bank holiday Mondays at Easter, Whitsun and the end of August. Each time, the green is covered with fair paraphernalia and clobber for 10 or 11 days. Fairs are allowed to bring all that in on the Monday before, be open for five days from the Friday until the following Tuesday of the bank holiday weekend, and have to move off on the Wednesday.

Whatever has been allowed in the past, that is far too long. I ask my hon. Friend the Minister to request the Historic Royal Palaces Agency to impose a far stricter timetable on the fair proprietors, and then to see it enforced. Although the Historic Royal Palaces Agency sounds like an independent body such as a quango or nationalised board, it is not. It consists of civil servants in the Department of the Environment, to whom certain work has been delegated.

Next, the so-called craft fair each September is in no sense a traditional fair. There are no roundabouts, no big wheels, no dodgems, no Punch and Judy shows and no skittles. It is a relatively recent addition. It consists of shops on the green. It is not right that a public open space—a village green—should be used to set up shops, whether in parades or tents, and then to excuse it by calling it a "fair". If it continues—I hope that it will not—I hope that it will be most tightly controlled and that controls will be applied and enforced as to the number of days it is open, the number of days on which equipment can stay on the green, the volume of piped music and of announcements, and that shopkeepers setting up shops on the green should not be allowed to park their vehicles on the green at all—certainly not in the chaotic manner which took place this year under the chestnut trees, to the damage of the environment and close to houses where people live.

I remind my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State of the name of his Department. I want him to tell me exactly what the Department of the Environment intends to do to protect the environment of Hampton Court green.

Finally, before I sit down, may I be allowed to wish you, Mr. Speaker, and Mrs. Weatherill a very happy Christmas and thank you for all that you do for us all.