Mr Frederick Gough: Like the hon. Member for Orpington (Mr. Lubbock), I am very grateful to my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for The Hartlepools (Commander Kerans) for raising this point. I fully appreciate and understand his feeling for his own constituents. I want to raise a matter of principle. I shall not go into the technical details raised by the hon. Member for Orpington. I feel that there is a very...
Mr Frederick Gough: I am rather surprised at what my hon. Friend has just said. If a Minister has powers and never uses them, what is the use of them?
Mr Frederick Gough: Before my hon. Friend concludes, will he allow me to say that, in my opinion, his reply is derisory and insulting. I remember well that my hon. Friend, when he was sitting as a private Member for Yeovil, used to battle for his own constituents and their gloves. I tell my hon. Friend now that the gloves are off, and I am not prepared to accept his reply tonight. He has said nothing about the...
Mr Frederick Gough: asked the Minister of Transport if he will now authorise a pedestrian crossing in North Street, Midhurst.
Mr Frederick Gough: Is my hon. and gallant Friend aware that that Answer will give a great deal of displeasure to the people of Midhurst? Will he confirm that he has already received a petition signed by hundreds of local people asking for this pedestrian crossing, bearing in mind that the main street of Midhurst is a main thoroughfare between London and the coast and that in summer it is very dangerous? Will...
Mr Frederick Gough: On a point of order. In view of the very unsatisfactory nature of my hon. and gallant Friend's reply, I beg leave to give notice that I shall raise the matter at the first opportunity.
Mr Frederick Gough: asked the President of the Board of Trade if a date has not been agreed for the proposed visit to this country of the Chinese Vice-President of Foreign Trade.
Mr Frederick Gough: Will my hon. Friend bear in mind that desirable though any trade treaty may be, it should be based on a sound foundation? Before this visit takes place, will he put to the Chinese Government the claims of the pensioners and shareholders of the Shanghai Waterworks Company? This claim has been put forward for ten or fifteen years but has never been considered or met by the Chinese Government....
Mr Frederick Gough: Will my hon. Friend then also show the delegation some British moral achievements in that when we have obligations we carry them out?
Mr Frederick Gough: I am glad of the opportunity to speak for the purpose of the record. I would not like people to think that I bad either just come straight into the Chamber, because as the Committee knows I have been sitting here diligently the whole time, or, secondly, that I was asleep. I was wide awake, but the point earlier was that the hon. Member for Sowerby (Mr. Houghton) had been trying very hard to...
Mr Frederick Gough: The hon. Member for Sowerby referred to the interesting debate last Friday week on the Widows' Pensions Bill introduced by the Member for Brixton (Mr. Lipton). I spoke very much in favour of that Measure although I did not like the Bill itself and I asked my right hon. Friend if he would look into the matter. I trust my right hon. Friend. I think that he is looking into it. Therefore, in view...
Mr Frederick Gough: My hon. Friend the Member for Bournemouth, West (Mr. Eden) and I are engaged in the same business. We are both pension consultants. I came to listen to what he had to say and would not have continued the discussion on this point had it not been for the interruptions of hon. Members opposite. For the benefit of hon. Members opposite, may I say that what my hon. Friend proposes would be of very...
Mr Frederick Gough: I remind myself that just over 50 years ago my mother was widowed when she was just under 40 and she was left with two small boys. One of them still survives today. Therefore, I know what I am talking about when I speak of the struggle that a widow has to make to live and bring up her children. My mother was the widow of an Indian Army colonel, so that in a sense she was better off than many...
Mr Frederick Gough: I should not like it to be thought that I am against the Bill. I should not like it to be thought that I do not want these benefits to be increased. I certainly do. However, I feel that, if we were to allow the Bill to go through, there might be an excuse—I do not say that this applies to my right hon. Friend, but it might apply to the bureaucracy to which someone referred—for saying that...
Mr Frederick Gough: asked the Minister of Transport whether he will amend the parking meter regulations to provide facilities for motorists to obtain small change in neighbourhoods where parking meters are installed.
Mr Frederick Gough: I thank my right hon. Friend for that reply, but is he aware that there is a growing number of people who, when wanting to park their cars but finding that they have no sixpences, have, after going away for just three minutes to get change, returned to find themselves—to use a colloquial expression—"shopped"? This has happened to me. Is it really fair, because of the lack of elasticity in...
Mr Frederick Gough: With the greatest respect to my right hon. Friend, I did put this case to the City of Westminster, which was good enough to tell me that mine was an innocent case. The point I put to my right hon. Friend is that there are many simple people who cannot put their case to the authority. Will he look at the matter again? It is very hard on people with small means if, when they have just parked...
Mr Frederick Gough: asked the Minister of Housing and Local Government and Minister for Welsh Affairs if he will now make a statement about the future of Blackbushe Aerodrome.
Mr Frederick Gough: Does my hon. Friend appreciate that this appeal dates back to last March, that many months have gone by, and that the uncertainty is causing a great deal of hardship to those who wish to develop Blackbushe as a civilian aerodrome? Can he give an assurance that an answer will be given in the reasonably near future?
Mr Frederick Gough: I must make my position clear. There is a very bad habit in which we all indulge—I more than many—of going through the Division Lobby without having the foggiest idea of what we are voting about. In this case I have been here from the word "go". I have heard every word said by the right hon. Member for Battersea, North (Mr. Jay) and by my hon. Friend the Economic Secretary. I have...
