It is not very often that I disagree with my hon. Friend the Member for Wansbeck (Ian Lavery), but I want to start by agreeing with the Minister, who was right to say that we should not have had to be here tonight. This issue should have been resolved no later than when the previous Government were in office and probably much earlier than that. As my hon. Friend the Member for North
Durham (Mr Jones) has said, this has been known about since at least 1965. We should have done something about it. Lots of us had meeting after meeting with the previous Prime Minister and others in the previous Government as we tried to find a way forward. I believe that he was genuine in his approach but that he was badly advised by civil servants and special advisers who were frightened that the cost would escalate. As a result, we did not take the action we should have taken.