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Most Gracious Sovereign,
We, Your Majesty's most dutiful and loyal subjects, the Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, in Parliament assembled, beg leave to offer our humble thanks to Your Majesty for the Gracious Speech which Your Majesty has addressed to both Houses of Parliament.
EUROPEAN COMMUNITY DOCUMENTS
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael J. Martin): With permission, I shall put together the motions relating to European Community documents.
Motion made, and Question put forthwith, pursuant to Standing Order No. 119(9) (European Standing Committees),
That this House takes note of European Community Document No. 9597/98, two draft Council Regulations establishing agrimonetary arrangements and the transitional arrangements to be applied under the Common Agricultural Policy with a view to the introduction of the euro; and supports the Government's intention to support the proposals which simplify the current agrimonetary arrangements by moving to a system which more closely reflects market realities, reducing the costs to taxpayers, consumers and businesses, and also the scope for distortions of competition whilst respecting UK international obligations without discriminating against those Member States not participating in the euro.
That this House takes note of European Community Document No. 9690/98, the European Court of Auditors Special Report No. 7/98 on the European Development Aid Programme for South Africa (1986-1996) and its recommendations to the Commission; and supports the Government's position that these recommendations are practical and sensible and that the Government will work with Member States and other partners in all European Community
1 Dec 1998 : Column 788development assistance programmes, and particularly in detailed arrangements to succeed the present EPRD in South Africa, after 1999, to ensure that these recommendations are fully implemented.--[Mr. Pope.]
Question agreed to.
Bus Service (York)
10.40 pm
Miss Anne McIntosh (Vale of York): With permission, I shall present a petition from the residents of Wheatfield lane in the city of York area of the Vale of York. The petition has 200 signatures--petitioners who are residents of Wheatfield lane and who are deeply concerned by the withdrawal of the local bus service operated by First York for a number of years. They are especially concerned that the service is not fitting in with the Government's promise to improve public transport.
It gives me great pleasure to present the petition of the residents to the House of Commons. The petition states:
The Petition of the residents of Wheatfield Lane,
To lie upon the Table.
Declares that we are concerned at the decision to alter the Wigginton, Haxby, York bus service so that it no longer serves Wheatfield Lane, thus inconveniencing many residents, the elderly in particular.
The Petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urge the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions to require increased services and better standards from bus operators.
All the petitioners remain faithfully yours.
Bootlegging
10.41 pm
Mrs. Jacqui Lait (Beckenham): On the day that tobacco duties rise and we look forward to an increase in duty on alcohol--which will reduce revenues to the Treasury, undermine the rule of law and subvert the health policies of reducing the consumption of tobacco and of alcohol--it is a great honour to present to the House of Commons the petition of 1,000 signatures from Independent Retail News, store owners and customers. The petition reads:
- Declares that the bootlegging of hand-rolling tobacco, cigarettes and alcohol has reached crisis levels.
Honest shop owners are being driven out of business by bootleggers, who are also robbing the Exchequer of £1 billion per year.
The Petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons should urge the Chancellor of the Exchequer to work with HM Customs and Excise in taking further measures to ensure the relevant legislation prohibiting this illegal trade is vigorously enforced.
And the petitioners remain, etc.
Gas Supply (Consumer Protection)
Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.--[Mr. Pope.]
10.42 pm
Mr. Ken Purchase (Wolverhampton, North-East): I am pleased to have the opportunity to bring to the attention of the House what I believe to be a denial of justice for my constituent--Mr. Neil Bailey, from the Wednesfield area of my constituency--by an arm of British Gas known as British Gas Trading, post-privatisation and subsequent reorganisation.
Mr. Bailey became an innocent victim following the digging up of the pavement outside his home by Transco, to repair gas pipes. Transco is another former part of British Gas. It carried out the work and, on completion, the Transco engineer knocked on the door of my constituent's house and asked that he may be allowed into the garage to bleed the system of air, after putting the gas supply back on.
Unfortunately, my constituent's wife, Mrs. Bailey, was unable to give access to the engineer: the meter was located in the garage, to which she did not have access while her husband was away at his work in Birmingham. She was unable to convince the engineer that she had no access, and, in the end, telephoned for Mr. Bailey to leave his work in Birmingham to come to Wolverhampton to allow the engineer into the garage.
I should explain that Mrs. Bailey has a bone disease, which makes life very difficult for her, as well as arthritis and a heart condition, for which she will shortly undergo a double bypass operation.
On Mr. Bailey's return, he not only gave access to the engineer, but loaned him the tools necessary to do the job. He also explained how the engineer might find the person next door to gain access to his premises.
A short while later, when Mr. Bailey was about to return to work, the engineer came up the path again and asked if he could have access once more, through the garage, to the meters. My constituent explained that there was a secure door, which would require a little work, and that in any event it was now time for him to go back to Birmingham and resume his work. He could not put up with further delays.
When Mr. Bailey came home, late in the afternoon, he was met by three people. One was a policeman; the others were from the gas companies. The policeman had a warrant to search the premises, on the ground that Mr. Bailey was suspected of stealing gas from British Gas Trading. It was alleged that he put in and took out a second meter according to the time of arrival of the quarterly bill, this gaining access to gas that he should not have had. That was alleged by the Transco man, who said that he had seen the meter earlier.
A thorough search of the premises was carried out by the police officer and the gas company employees, who--surprise, surprise--found no sign of another meter. End of story, the House may think, perhaps rounded off by an apology; but no--the gas meter was removed, and Mr. Bailey was arrested, taken to the police station and charged with stealing gas.
The forensic examination found nothing wrong, and the Crown Prosecution Service decided not to prosecute by reason of insufficient evidence, there being only the word of the Transco engineer.
End of story now, the House may think. Again, an apology would have helped--but no: British Gas Trading decided that Mr. Bailey was guilty, and told him that it calculated that he had stolen gas from it to the value of £189. To be reconnected, he would need to repay that amount, as well as paying a reconnection charge of £39.
Hon. Members can imagine the exasperation felt by my constituent. He had been arrested, charged and taken to a police station; no evidence had been found. The Crown Prosecution Service had said, "Don't take it any further," but British Gas Trading decided to charge him, try him and find him guilty, without any evidence worth talking about.
This has been going on for nearly 12 months. The incident happened in January. Hon. Members should bear in mind the great distress caused to my constituent and his disabled wife.
Mr. Bailey engaged a solicitor to take on the case, but with no success. The gas company simply cited its decision, and justified it under its powers to protect its revenue. I do not oppose such powers; it is right and proper for the industry to be able to protect its revenue. I merely ask it do so in a proper and sensible way, by referring as fully as possible to evidence that it may have.
My own correspondence on the matter has produced no better result. I have written, on behalf of Mr. Bailey, to every big noise in each of the companies--Transco, Centrica, British Gas Home Energy, British Gas Trading and the Gas Consumers Council--to no avail. The defence of the gas companies was repeated like a mantra, ad nauseam, by the chairmen and their understrappers. I believe that the chairmen should take the blame for not responding to a reasoned and sensible series of letters from a Member of Parliament, and should have taken it on themselves to investigate the matter properly and thoroughly. They knew all the circumstances; they were left in no doubt of the position. None the less, they chose merely to repeat the mantra, "We have the powers; we will protect our revenue."
My constituent has two killer pieces of evidence on his side. First, he has retained all his gas bills for the 20 years during which he has lived in the house--gas bills relating to when the meter was first read, stating "zero, zero, zero". He also has his rates bill, his water bill, his electricity bill and all the household bills that so many of us always manage to mislay somewhere or other. He is the perfect book-keeper. They show a consistency in the use of gas over the years, and the gas companies in a better light in the past four years, when the increase in gas bills has been relatively stable because of the falling gas price. The gas companies knew he had all those bills. I believe that the Gas Consumers Council saw the bills.
When my constituent said to me, "I have all my bills," I said, "I am sure you do. I believe you." He was not satisfied that I believed him. The next week, he brought the gas bills to my surgery for me to see, so he was determined to show me that everything that he had was above board and available for any one to inspect any time they wanted.
The second piece of killer evidence is that the chap who has been reading my constituent's gas meter all these years lives a few doors away. He said to my constituent in the local social club, "I have seen your meter over all the years. I can swear on oath that that is the gas meter that has always been there."
Bearing in mind that my constituent had perhaps up to half an hour to change his gas meter on the first call, and perhaps another half an hour when he returned from work, it stretches credibility to believe that he would change the gas meter, but, there we are, the chap who has been reading the meter for years lives close by. He and my constituent socialise anyway, meeting occasionally in the local social club. He would say under oath that this is the meter that he has always been used to reading.
The gas authorities know both those things, but even that has not moved British Gas Trading--that is, hon. Members will be pleased know, until my Adjournment debate was announced. I am sure that it is an absolute and total coincidence that an offer has now been made--an offer that, frankly, is almost as bad as the initial problems that British Gas Trading has caused for my constituent.
The offer calls for my constituent to make a deposit of £250, which is more than it would have cost him to have the thing reconnected, but of course he would have been accused of being guilty had he met those unjust and unjustified bills. I assure the authorities that he will not settle for that. He needs to have the thing settled properly: to have an apology, with the whole thing reconnected without any further charges.
Much of this has been caused by the nature of the organisation and the apparent continual reorganisation that it has been undergoing. There has also been an element of stubbornness not to recognise that this was a matter that could have been resolved by someone visiting my constituent, looking at the evidence and understanding that, almost certainly, when the Transco engineer looked at the meter, there was a haze: a simple, honourable mistake, none the less compounded in the engineer's mind by the fact that my constituent, having left Birmingham and arrived in Wolverhampton, then wanted to return to his work--that was reasonable and fair in the circumstances--and did not want to open the garage the second time.
Ofgas has powers to intervene, but they are not sufficient. My constituent and his disabled wife could say, "Please investigate my case," but, in the meantime, his gas would remain unreconnected; it would probably be unreconnected well past Christmas while investigations took place. Indeed, it may be a difficult case to investigate, but the whole raft of difficulties could have been resolved by an early intervention.
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