Mr John Jones: I have not agreed with everything the hon. Gentleman has said up to now.
Mr John Jones: And a good job.
Mr John Jones: The hon. Gentleman is saying that the company pays so much taxation out of £8 million. I say that that is a good job done by those people and by their dynamism and that of the workpeople. It is a good job for the State.
Mr John Jones: The hon. Member for Walsall, South (Sir H. d'Avigdor-Goldsmid) is well versed in high finance. I happen to be a very humble chap well versed in making steel and all that goes therewith. When history is written the story of the denationalisation now being conducted by the Government will prove to be one of the most sordid stories ever written about politics. Many of my colleagues are...
Mr John Jones: We had to bring in an Act to buy something which originally belonged to the people. We still have the conviction on this side of the House that we should nationalise steel. What is wrong with that? People are entitled to their political convictions. I do not blame the Tories for wanting to denationalise steel and skim the cream off the milk. Some people might ask why the Tories do not go...
Mr John Jones: The hon. Member for Harborough (Mr. Farr) wants to know if it is in order for facts which he does not like to be mentioned in the House of Commons. Without copper there is no brass, and without brass there is no steel. "Brass" is another commodity. I never got any "brass" unless I made some steel. I sometimes got damned few coppers when I was out of work. I shall now return to the fiddle...
Mr John Jones: I should like to tell the hon. Gentleman that in the works in which I am employed the savings of the steel workers are the highest in the north-east of Great Britain. They already have every opportunity they wish to invest in a prosperous State, and are encouraged to do so.
Mr John Jones: The hon. Member will be aware that I myself at the Dispatch Box opposite years ago, and ever since, have talked about our need to use oxygen induction. I have advocated its use for fourteen years. Now we are beginning to think about it.
Mr John Jones: No.
Mr John Jones: I took part in the production of that steel, though I want no credit for it, since the sons and daughters of those of us who were then in the steel industry are now doing a bigger job. What I said was that there was not enough capacity at that time to provide sufficient steel to meet the full-employment programme.
Mr John Jones: The hon. Member should go to Brightside.
Mr John Jones: My hon. Friend knows that prices are fixed in a way which allows the least efficient and the most decadent in the steel industry to make a profit. This enables the most modern and highly efficient to make large profits.
Mr John Jones: We have listened with great care to the argument that prices prove the efficiency of the industry. Is not the hon. Member telling the House that, despite the stories of what would happen under nationalisation, after a period of nationalisation the prices, and therefore the efficiency, were as good as, or better than, ever?
Mr John Jones: It is already doing that.
Mr John Jones: The hon. Gentleman has charged me with using words that I did not use at all. I never said "Share up." What I suggested was that the God-given ore should be used for the benefit of the people to whom He gave it.
Mr John Jones: I make the further statement that in one of the most modern works in this country the interest charge placed on money borrowed is higher per ton of steel produced than it is in the most decadent works in Britain.
Mr John Jones: The "fiddles" again.
Mr John Jones: Cream off the milk.
Mr John Jones: At the right cost.
Mr John Jones: My argument was based on what comes out of the land—iron ore. I said nothing about farmers. They can well speak for themselves.
