David Mundell
MP for Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale · Conservative · United Kingdom
“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dr Allin-Khan. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Gillingham and Rainham (Naushabah Khan), not just for her thoughtful contribution but for securing this debate. It is so important that we take every opportunity we can to shine a light on this conflict.”
“Member for Oxford East (Anneliese Dodds). I am sure that the new Minister, whom I welcome to her post, will do likewise. Nevertheless, as I said, Sudan remains chronically under-reported.”
“I absolutely agree. I—and the Minister, I am sure—would like the Quad that was established to be more effective in relation to the involvement of the United States and neighbouring countries, with those neighbouring countries playing a positive role rather than supporting the protagonists in the conflict. As the right hon.”
“As UN Security Council penholder, the UK has a distinct moral and diplomatic duty to lead these negotiations at the upcoming UN General Assembly and press relentlessly for a humanitarian truce, a permanent ceasefire, robust civilian protection, civic engagement and unhindered aid access.”
“I recognise that the Minister and her colleagues in the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office must navigate delicate regional dynamics, but the Government must not shy away from forcefully challenging the covert actions of some of our Gulf allies in Sudan, both publicly and in private diplomacy.”
“We saw the horrific realities of the crisis just two weeks ago with the totally unacceptable attack on a World Food Programme convoy in Kordofan. Civilian personnel were injured and lifesaving aid was destroyed.”
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“Indeed. The point that the hon. Gentleman makes is to some extent valid. I sought to keep the Bill as open for discussion as I could. The subject of Northern Ireland notes does not come within the title. I am hoping for a positive response from the Government, with the benefit of their vast resource of draftsmen to assist in taking the Bill forward so that it does not create other difficulties in what we have already identified as a very complicated area.”
“My hon. Friend might be interested to note that although the First Minister of Scotland says that he shares the view that Scottish notes should be accepted in the rest of the United Kingdom, he is firmly of the view that they should not be accepted in Scotland; he is keen to see the introduction of the euro.”
“On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. It appears that the Minister will not accept my intervention so that it will not appear on the record that I was challenging her for talking my Bill out.”
“Will the Secretary of State admit that on the basis of the warnings from the International Monetary Fund and the Fraser of Allander Institute, his Labour Government have led Scotland not just into recession but to the brink of becoming the worst hit part of the worst hit country in the developed world? Does he agree that at such a time, Scotland does not need a do nothing Secretary of State? It needs him to bring the UK and Scottish Governments together to combat this recession. Can he tell Parliament how many times the Prime Minister has met the First Minister to discuss the recession? How many times has he himself done so?”
“I think we can take it that the answer to the question about the number of meetings between the Prime Minister and the First Minister to discuss the recession is none. The people of Scotland will find it deeply disappointing that there has been so little, and such acrimonious, dialogue between their Prime Minister, Secretary of State and First Minister in the face of such a serious crisis. I say to the Secretary of State that under a Conservative Government things would be very different, because Scotland’s interests would be put first. Perhaps the Secretary of State can tell us: is it that the Prime Minister has been so busy saving the world that he has not had time to save Scotland, or that he simply puts partisan political interests ahead of Scottish business interests?”
“We share the Secretary of State’s welcome for the Calman commission. Does he note the contrast between the application and thoroughness of the interim Calman report and the so-called national conversation, which appears to be little more than a taxpayer-funded blog site for insomniac nationalists? Does he share my disappointment not only with the content but with the tone of the First Minister’s response to the interim report? Will he therefore use his best endeavours to persuade the First Minister that now is the time to show that he is a man not a mouse—to use the First Minister’s own analogy—by abandoning the national conversation, which does not have the support of the Scottish Parliament, and by engaging, as many in the Scottish Government wish to do, in the Calman process?”
“Reference has already been made to the Scottish Council for Development and Industry report, but does the Secretary of State recognise that not only the business community but every other objective analysis suggests that if there are no new nuclear power stations in Scotland, the lights will go out? Can he offer any hope, not only on the security of energy supply in Scotland but on the economic benefits that the new nuclear development offers to constituencies such as my own, or does he share the nuclear industry’s pessimistic view that, because of the actions of the Scottish Parliament, there is no prospect of new nuclear development in Scotland in the foreseeable future?”
“As the South West of Scotland Transport Partnership says in its regional transport strategy, there ought to be a “balanced stopping pattern”, and as the Scottish Government have said, it should accommodate early morning direct services to Glasgow and Edinburgh. I am sure that the Minister and his colleagues receive many complaints about train delays and cancellations, but I am also sure that he will agree that for Lockerbie station users to have to wait 10 years for early morning direct services to Edinburgh and Glasgow, and to have 40 per cent. of their daytime services cancelled permanently, is totally unacceptable. Tonight, I hope that he will take the opportunity to put that right.”
“That approach is to the detriment of all who live in communities such as Lockerbie, which are served by small stations, and I am sure that it is done partly to achieve competitiveness against London to Glasgow domestic flights. However, in trying to do so, the Government sacrifice the needs of areas such as Lockerbie, where people do not have the choice of local domestic flights—that is, unless Carlisle airport is reopened. And for any Department for Transport officials who are listening, I fully support its reopening. Lockerbie station users are not making excessive demands on the Department.”
“Indeed, plenty of other trains pass through Lockerbie station, and they would allow for the creation of a coherent and bespoke timetable if the will was there to do so. Again, let us hear from the Minister why such a measure seems to be impossible. It seems to me that Lockerbie is being discriminated against because it is on the west coast main line. Everyone welcomes the west coast main line upgrades, the faster trains and the shorter journey times, but the Department seems to have become obsessed with the importance of cutting journey times between major cities, and it looks to do so by cutting out intermediate stations rather than solely through track upgrades.”
“The 18.47 direct service to London Euston has also been removed, and the last services from Glasgow and Edinburgh are around 20.10, which makes it impossible for people to attend evening events—the theatre or other cultural activities—in Glasgow and Edinburgh and return to Lockerbie. What I and my constituents find particularly difficult to understand is that several services that have been cut still pass through Lockerbie, such as the 07.19, 08.20, 10.20, 11.20 and 12.20 services from Birmingham and the 12.52 from Edinburgh. They are all examples of services that, although cut from the Lockerbie timetable, still pass through the station, and I look forward to receiving the Minister’s explanation. I cannot think of one.”
“After the new timetable is introduced in December, it is proposed that only nine northbound services will stop at Lockerbie, four for Glasgow and five for Edinburgh. A 40 per cent. cut in services hardly represents an attempt to achieve the modal shift to rail, which is one of the Government’s buzz phrases. Let us look at some specific examples. From the afternoon to the evening, there is an eight-hour gap between the 12.30 service to Glasgow and the proposed 20.44 service to Glasgow. From the morning to the afternoon, there is a four-and-a-half hour gap between the proposed 09.56 service to Edinburgh and the 14.30 service to Edinburgh.”
“Their views have been ignored and their interests marginalised, and I am calling on the Minister to undertake to right those wrongs and to deliver those desperately needed, direct early morning services as soon as is practicable, and for once to put the interests of Lockerbie station users and the economy of the south of Scotland before the agendas and interests of bureaucrats, train operating companies and the wider rail industry. The strength of feeling about the failure to deliver the early morning services is exacerbated by the effective butchering of the existing timetable throughout the day. At present, some 15 northbound services stop at Lockerbie, eight for Glasgow and seven for Edinburgh.”
“They have come at the bottom of the pecking order, marginalised to suit other interests, whether freight or TransPennine’s own agenda. As I have said, I do not have any criticism of the services that TransPennine Express provides from Lockerbie, but let us have no more pretence that it is doing so for the convenience of Lockerbie station users or to provide the station with a balanced and logical pattern of services. Similarly, a DFT proposal for a morning Lockerbie to Glasgow service, arriving in Glasgow at 08.42, albeit with a change at Carstairs, has been dropped. The earliest that Lockerbie passengers, after the introduction of the new timetable, will arrive in Glasgow is 09.09—11 minutes later than at present. It is no wonder my constituents feel let down and simply ignored by the DFT.”
“Member for Glasgow, South, earlier this year, and it seemed at the time that there would be a Lockerbie service arriving in Edinburgh at 08.32 from this December. Out of the blue, in the early summer, that proposal was pulled. The reason given to me was that the proposed First TransPennine Express 09.11 Edinburgh to Manchester airport service, which was to be formed from the new 08.32 arrival, could not be pathed through the border by Network Rail because of various long-standing and time-sensitive freight commitments. First TransPennine Express was unwilling to keep its train in Edinburgh until a 09.56 departure slot was available, and so, once again, the interests of Lockerbie station users were compromised.”
“This addition would provide significant benefits such as increased frequency and would in turn open up the route as a commutable journey that would improve the economic growth of both Lockerbie and the surrounding areas and for Edinburgh itself.” Those views seem to have found favour, and at a meeting of the Lockerbie rail liaison group held in the town on 19 November 2007 at which I was present, presentations were given by both Virgin Trains and First TransPennine Express, with the impression being created that those early morning services would finally be provided with the support of the Department for Transport. That impression was reinforced in discussions I had with the then Minister, the hon.”
“In his letter of 7 November, Stewart Stevenson MSP states: “Although Scottish Ministers are unable to intervene in the detail of the current franchise arrangements between the DfT and First TransPennine Express, we can see the economic benefits of enhancing the cross border connection by providing an additional early morning, direct service to Lockerbie.”
“This would place the region on a par with other areas of Scotland actively promoting this sort of long distance connectivity as a means to retain key workers in local communities.” In non-binding advice to UK Ministers in October 2006 as part of the west coast main line franchising process, Scottish Ministers—then part of a Labour-Liberal Democrat Administration—recognised the importance of Lockerbie as a regional railhead for south-west Scotland, and stated their desire that the Lockerbie service should permit a journey to both Glasgow and Edinburgh, arriving no later than 08.40 and departing between 17.00 and 18.00. The current Scottish Government led by the Scottish National party share that view, so there is no party political element to this cause.”
“In its regional transport strategy 2008 document, the South West of Scotland Transport Partnership rightly identifies the fact that such services are “critical to allow commuters and others to travel regularly to Scotland’s economic core.”
“However, there should never have been a need for a change there in the first place. It was another example of the interests of Lockerbie station users being compromised and, disappointingly, of Virgin not being totally transparent in its dealings with me and other local stakeholders when proposing that service, which it originally pitched as the much sought-after early morning service to Edinburgh. Specifically on that issue, as I have said, on numerous occasions over the past 10 years a direct early morning service to Edinburgh has been promised but never delivered. There is widespread recognition of the economic benefit of such a service, as indeed there is of a service to Glasgow, particularly in an area that has some of the lowest wages in the United Kingdom and suffers from a constant drain of young people to urban areas.”
“After all, as I hope the Minister will appreciate, it is not practical for my constituents to jump in their cars and drive to the next station north, given that it is some 48 miles away. It is the longest section of railway line in Great Britain without an intermediate station. I am not proud that my constituency can boast that statistic, but the arguments for reopening the Beattock and Symington stations along the route are for another day. Naturally, it is also welcome that the first proposed new service of the day, the 08.15 from Lockerbie to Edinburgh, does not require a stop at Carstairs. Even my constituent, the hon. Member for Lanark and Hamilton, East (Mr. Hood), would concede that Carstairs station is not an attractive prospect on a cold and wet Scottish winter morning.”
“My son and I recently used that service, which is operated by First TransPennine Express, and it was excellent. Indeed, services to the south generally allow people relatively straightforward connections to most destinations in England and Wales. That is despite the many unwelcome changes to direct services brought about by the break up of the previous cross-country franchise, operated by Virgin Trains. I was extremely unhappy about those changes at the time, as I believed that they would adversely affect services at Lockerbie, and that has proved to be the case. However, whatever the issues about services to the south, I return to the point that it is services to Edinburgh and Glasgow that are of most concern to my constituents.”
“It is not a coherent set of services, designed to meet the needs of station users, and their oft-expressed wish for commuter services, shopping services and evening leisure services to Glasgow and Edinburgh. Instead, it is a random set of services, designed, one suspects, to tick rail industry boxes, with little thought for the customer. It is no wonder that my constituents feel that Lockerbie is a forgotten station, caught in a no-man’s-land between Scottish Government and UK Government responsibilities, with nobody actually focusing on the needs of Lockerbie station users. It would be churlish to suggest that there are no improvements to services in the new timetable, which is to be introduced in December. The services to Manchester airport and central Manchester are to be welcomed.”
“To reiterate, all the Lockerbie services are provided under a franchise arrangement over which Scottish Ministers have no direct control. That does not mean that they have no influence. As Stewart Stevenson points out in his letter to me of 7 November, Ministers in the Scottish Government are able to provide non-binding advice to the UK Government on such cross-border services. I will return to the advice that was given. I am sure the Minister will appreciate that my constituents find the complexity of the arrangements unsatisfactory. They believe that that contributes to their needs not being given the priority that they deserve. What better example is there than the new timetable for Lockerbie station?”
“Some will wonder why the services to a station in Scotland are being debated on the Floor of the House, when transport is a matter devolved to the Scottish Parliament, but not, I am sure, the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, the hon. Member for Gillingham (Paul Clark). He will be familiar with the provisions of the Scotland Act 1998, which mean that cross-border services remain the responsibility of the Department for Transport. Lockerbie is in a unique position: although the station is within the ScotRail franchise, currently operated by First ScotRail, no services operated by First ScotRail stop there. The station is manned by ScotRail staff, and I want to use this opportunity to pay tribute to their professionalism and dedication, which is much appreciated by all my constituents who use the station.”
“Harris). I have also raised them with Scottish Ministers, most recently at a meeting with Scotland’s Transport Minister Stewart Stevenson on 28 October. Indeed, as far back as 20 June 1999, I sponsored one of the first Members’ debates held in the Scottish Parliament—they are the equivalent of Adjournment debates in this House—in which the issue at the very heart of tonight’s debate, a direct early morning service between Lockerbie and Edinburgh, was raised. Nearly 10 years on, no such service has been delivered. I contend that the introduction of the new timetable on 15 December will lead to the package of services at Lockerbie, especially between Glasgow and Edinburgh, being significantly reduced. That is totally unacceptable to me and my constituents.”
“I am pleased to have the opportunity to raise my constituents’ concerns about services, or the lack of them, at Lockerbie station. I have to say at the outset that I am extremely disappointed that after one long battle at Lockerbie station was won—with the provision of a state-of-the-art footbridge to allow disabled access to the southbound platform, following a 10-year campaign that was so ably led by Wyn Deamer of the Annandale and Eskdale Coalition for the Disabled—those who use the services at Lockerbie station or who are concerned about the economy of the south of Scotland appear no closer to a resolution of the equally long battle to ensure that the train services operated from the station meet local needs. These are issues that I have raised with the Minister’s predecessors, most recently the hon. Member for Glasgow, South (Mr.”
“In that vein, I share the Secretary of State’s views about the irresponsibility of the First Minister’s comments on the “arc of prosperity”, but does the Secretary of State agree that the Prime Minister was equally irresponsible to claim that boom and bust had been abolished? Did that not contribute to the devastating effect of the credit crunch on the Scottish banks?”
“I begin by welcoming the right hon. Gentleman to his new role. It is particularly welcome on the Conservative Benches that there is once again a stand-alone Secretary of State for Scotland. Scotland’s interests cannot be adequately represented in the Cabinet along with those of the armed forces or any other nation or region of the United Kingdom. May I also welcome the Under-Secretary of State for Scotland, and briefly pay tribute to the two predecessors at the Department? The right hon. Member for Kilmarnock and Loudoun (Des Browne) played a pivotal role in the establishment of the Calman commission, which will benefit all the people of Scotland. The hon. Member for Inverclyde (David Cairns) lost his job for speaking the truth, and he is not the first Member of this House to have done so.”
“I welcome the meeting that the Secretary of State had last week with Scottish business leaders and trade unions. Is it planned that such meetings will be held regularly? Did he use the opportunity to ask Scottish businesses whether they would be better served by the Government borrowing to pay for increased spending on unemployment benefit, which is what his party wants to do, or by our taking the immediate practical steps on VAT and national insurance for small businesses that the Leader of the Opposition set out in his visit to Glenrothes?”
“May I associate myself with the comments about David Marshall? I should also say that although I fully accept the reasons why the Secretary of State is not present, today is a clear example of why the role of Secretary of State for Defence should not be combined with other responsibilities. The Minister will be aware that most of the Commonwealth games will be concentrated in the Glasgow, East constituency, where 47 per cent. of people are economically inactive and more than half do not have a single qualification to their name. Does he recognise that Glasgow, East has reached that sorry state after 11 years of Labour central Government and decades of Labour local government? And will he explain to the House, if not to Mr. Salmond, why the Prime Minister refuses even to visit the constituency after attempting to impose—”
“The Minister sounds just like the Prime Minister, and that is not intended to be a compliment. The Minister takes the people of Glasgow for fools; he talks about the past when they are interested in the future. So perhaps he will explain why his party is not campaigning on issues such as economic regeneration after the Commonwealth games. Instead, its campaign, now that it has finally started, is solely about the survival of the Prime Minister.”
“The Treasury, no doubt in consultation with the Justice Secretary, has said, along with several legal experts, that a tax that is set and collected on a Scotland-wide basis would not be sufficiently local to remain within the powers devolved to the Scottish Parliament. Does the Secretary of State thus intend to make a formal legal assessment of the competence of the Scottish Government’s proposals, or does he propose to leave it to aggrieved taxpayers to test them in the courts?”
“I thank the Secretary of State. He might be aware that Professor Alan Page, a professor of public law at the university of Dundee, has said of the SNP’s proposed local income tax: “It is inevitable that the matter would end up in the courts; it is unavoidable…The question of legality will cast a long shadow over the proposal until it is settled one way or another.” As the guardian of the devolution settlement, does the Secretary of State not believe that he has a responsibility to help to settle the matter?”
“In the last year for which we have data, HMRC managed to get more tax credit payments wrong than right. Make no mistake: this is not just a situation that ties up civil servants in recalculating payments. It is not even just a situation that has led to the loss of £5 billion in public funds through overpayment, fraud and error, although it has certainly done that. Most gravely, it is a situation that has seen many of Britain’s poorest families facing the prospect of repayment demands, and many others scared off even applying for tax credits, in case they receive such demands further down the line. That should alarm the Government.”
“Secondly, Government action should focus more on addressing the root causes of poverty, such as educational failure, family breakdown, indebtedness, drug abuse and crime, rather than merely addressing its symptoms. Thirdly, the Government have trusted communities and people too little. I should like to see central, devolved and local government supporting voluntary and community groups in their efforts to end poverty, even if that means giving up some control. As the hon. Lady said, the Government’s flagship policy was their tax credit system. That system, designed by the current Prime Minister and his boffins at the Treasury, is one of byzantine complexity. It is so complicated that even Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs, the Government body responsible for administering the system, does not understand it.”
“It is clearly agreed throughout the House that addressing child poverty in Scotland should be a priority for any Government, but although I recognise that the Minister feels passionately about the subject, and that by and large the United Kingdom Government are expending a great deal of effort, I believe that the Government’s approach is flawed. They have placed too much faith in what simply spending more money on a problem can do. The cocktail of mega-money and micro-management has been characteristic of Labour’s approach in most areas of social policy, and in child poverty as in other areas the results have been mixed. I believe that three changes are required. First, the tax and benefits system should be simplified, and the disincentives to work that are built into it should be removed.”
“of children in Scotland—or some 250,000 children—are living in poverty. Those children have a low standard of living and are unable to access many of the leisure, sports and cultural opportunities available to others, and they are also at increased risk of educational failure, ill health and being unable to move into work when the time comes. They in turn are likely to bring up their children in poverty. Indeed, the most probable explanation for an adult being in poverty is that he or she was born in poverty, rather than their having suffered a mid-life catastrophe.”
“The Minister also referred to an important document—“Making British Poverty History”—that has been published and launched by my right hon. Friend the. Member for Witney (Mr. Cameron). I shall be referring to it, as it is relevant to this debate, and I shall also say more about the report on Glasgow by my right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Mr. Duncan Smith) that was part of his “Breakthrough Britain” series for the Centre for Social Justice. I was very pleased that the Glasgow report was well received, especially by the leader of Glasgow city council. Obviously, I am not about to agree with the Minister’s interpretation of the past but, given that today’s debate is to focus on the future, I will agree with her that it is not acceptable for the latest figures to show that 23 per cent.”
“On this occasion, I agree with the Minister that it is essential that the UK and Scottish Governments work together on these matters. We should not focus on our political and constitutional differences, as our key objective is to reduce child poverty. I also noted what the Minister said about local government. It is very important that the Department for Work and Pensions works closely and directly with local government in Scotland. Representatives of Scottish local government made it clear to the Committee that, since the devolved settlement and for no particular reason, the relationship between the DWP and Scottish local government was not as direct as it had been. I hope that that matter will be addressed.”
“I found the Committee’s various visits and evidence-taking sessions to be extremely useful. I am a little surprised that the hon. Member for Dundee, West (Mr. McGovern) is not present today, as I expected him to use this opportunity to campaign, as he always does, for a new railway station in Dundee. I was disappointed that the Committee was not able to visit my constituency. I know that that was not deliberate, but we did not focus as much as perhaps we should have done on communities such as Rigside and Kelloholm. They are essentially urban communities in a rural location, and suffer from some very specific difficulties that are not the traditional and often discussed problems associated with rural poverty. I have noted the response from the Scotland Office and the Scottish Government to the Scottish Affairs Committee report.”
“I very much welcome having a debate on the Floor of the House that focuses on Scotland. Perhaps such debates should take place more often, and not only when elections are being held in England. Ironically, the most recent debate here to focus on Scotland was held when the debacle that was the Scottish elections took place nearly a year ago. I hope that, like me, Ministers will use what influence they have to bring matters affecting Scotland to the Floor of the House. I welcome the report from the Scottish Affairs Committee, and want to take this opportunity to pay my respects to our Chairman, the hon. Member for Glasgow, Central (Mr. Sarwar). He has provided wise chairmanship, and shown a willingness to allow members of all parties and with all points of view to make those views known during our sittings.”
“As the hon. Lady knows, Opposition Members have made it very clear that they would retain the tax credit system but would make it work effectively.”
“It is very clear how the system could be made to work more effectively. It is about giving people the right amount of money to which they are entitled. It is about dealing with bureaucracy. It is about not clawing back money from people who can ill afford it. It is all very well for Labour Members to jest about the topic, but they have had 10 years to get the system right, and they have failed to do so.”
“I remind the House that as well as being one of the principal weapons in the Government’s anti-poverty armoury, tax credit is likely to be one of the key routes through which the Government attempt to provide compensation—or so they say—for their abolition of the 10p tax rate. Given such a low take-up, it is hardly surprising that the report on child poverty by the Scottish Affairs Committee features the constant refrain that the tax and benefits system needs to be simplified. That is what the Conservatives have said almost since the moment that the Prime Minister, as Chancellor, took control of it, and I hope that we are now beginning to see a consensus.”
“If the hon. Gentleman had been listening to my speech, he would have heard that it is our party’s policy to get people’s tax credits right the first time. I said that many people had been discouraged from applying for tax credits because of errors in administration, but, as the House must know by now, many more people who were eligible were deterred from going near the scheme in the first place, for the reasons that we have just been discussing. The same complexity that makes the scheme difficult to administer also makes it difficult to access. Take-up of working tax credit by people without children is only 22 per cent.”
“Our position is that where people have identified that they are being overpaid tax credits, they should have the ability to pay the money back. As the hon. Lady knows, they do not have that ability at the moment.”
“The sad state of affairs even led the Scottish Affairs Committee to ponder whether increasing the level of the old-fashioned universal child benefit might be the only way in which the Government would be capable of getting help to those who need it most. What is the point of having such a complex and expensive system of targeting support as the tax credit system if the bullseye of that target is left untouched?”
“At its most serious, the complexity of the system has allowed all the Government’s initiatives to pass many of the most seriously impoverished families completely by. There is real concern that many are unaware that they might be eligible for some of the plethora of different types of benefit on offer, or may not have the confidence to complete a complicated means-testing process. It has been stated that “Current policies are having no effect on the very poorest children and their families”. Those are not my words; they are those of Save the Children’s severe child poverty report of last year.”
“As I have made clear to the House, we believe that the tax credits system should be sorted out. The hon. Gentleman’s party has had the time to sort out the system, but it has failed to do so: a Conservative Government will do it. Given the number of times that the words “simplify”, “simplification” and “simpler” appear in the Red Book, I do not think that the Government are listening to what is said about the tax and benefits system. I was going to say that “simple” appears to be the new buzzword, replacing “prudence”—although I admit that it would be grossly unfair to use that term to describe the Prime Minister. I suppose people now realise that it was equally inaccurate to describe him as prudent.”