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Finance (No. 2) Bill

I have a wide range of speeches and points to respond to. The right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire (Sir George Young) accused me of taking him seriously, and criticised me for it. We had an interesting debate about the distinction between Schlumpeter’s and Schumacher’s views on the concept of ““small is beautiful””. The hon. Member for Ludlow (Mr. Dunne) chided me for not understanding the real world, having just admitted in his declaration of interest that he runs an unreal company. It would be interesting to find out what that means in practice. There have been several other references to the past, and I am happy to explain the position. Conservative Members might have heard of a writer called Geoffrey Trease, who wrote a series of books about Bannermere, a fictional lake in the Lake District. The hero of the books goes to Oxford university, the first of anybody in his family to do so. When he gets there he joins all the political societies so that he can go to hear all the speeches at all the political clubs. I did the same. I joined the Labour, Liberal and Conservative clubs and went to hear very many speeches. I heard the then Chancellor of the Exchequer discuss the economy and the then Trade and Industry Minister discuss industry and housing. That was very interesting, as both of them left the Government within months.