CLAUSE 3.—(Construction.) (Hansard, 10 June 1910)

§ Lord HUGH CECIL
I beg to move to leave out the Clause. This is a Clause which frequently occurs in Acts of Parliament, but which always adds to the complexity of the Act. It is a Clause referring to another Act of Parliament, and stating that this Act shall be construed with the principal Act. I have been under considerable difficulty in understanding the Bill now before the House for consideration. It refers constantly to the principal Act, and that makes it exceedingly difficult to follow the nature of its provisions. It was some time before I realised what was the fund out of which the money is to be raised, a point which has just been before the House. It is also very important to know exactly who are the Police Authority. If you read the Bill you will find it has jurisdiction of the most extensive kind. I have, therefore, put down this Motion in order that the promoters should have an opportunity of explaining exactly what this Bill in connection with the principal Act does.
It is, as far as I can understand, a Bill merely to increase somewhat the pensions, allowances, and gratuities granted to constables in the police force, but there are provisions which are not quite clear. Clause 10, for example, specifies the cases in which a pension or an allowance becomes liable to be forfeited wholly or in part and permanently or temporarily, and the purport of it is not perfectly clear. In Clause 11 the references to the principal Act are incessant, and the effect of the Clause is not at all clear unless you have the principal Act in your hand. The principal Act itself has been the subject of some rather obscure Amendments by the Statute Law Revision Committee, and the Acts passed consequent on that Com- 939 mittee's Report. These Amendments, by cutting out words which were necessary for its intelligent comprehension, have reduced the clauses to complete obscurity. I therefore hope the promoters will not object to giving us some account of the general purpose of the principal Act taken in conjunction with this amending Act, so that we may judge what is really the effect of the Act without going to the trouble of trying to construe the two together, which to the lay mind means devoting oneself to an impossible task. I do not know whether it would be possible, but it would be convenient, if clauses in other Acts referred to were printed as an appendix to the Bill. If that were done, the difficulty would be met. The promoters, no doubt, are familiar with their Bill and will be able to explain the difficult points which arise.

§ Sir F. BANBURY
I shall have much pleasure in seconding the Amendment. I very strongly object to legislation by reference. It is scarcely excusable, I think, in the case of a Government Department, and in the case of a private Member's Bill it is still less excusable. Nowadays, if private Member's Bills pass, they have to do so after eleven o'clock, when the vast majority of Members have not the opportunity of discussing them or of knowing anything about them. The only opportunity they have is to read the Bill, and if in addition to reading the Bill they have to read all sorts of other Acts of Parliament, the result is that a large number of Members are asked after eleven o'clock to pass a Bill they do not understand. We ought at least to be able to understand what we are legislating about, and I hope the hon. Member for Dumbartonshire (Mr. Dundas White) will toe able to respond to the appeal of my Noble Friend. That is one of the reasons which induced me to support the Amendment, and I think it is a sufficient reason, but there is another reason. I really do not see any object in this particular Clause. It says the Police (Scotland) Act, 1890, is hereinafter referred to as the principal Act. Everybody knows that the Act before this was the principal Act. At the very commencement it says it is a Bill to amend the Police (Scotland) Act, 1890. Why, therefore, repeat the Act of 1890 as the principal Act later on in a clause all to itself? My Noble Friend says it would be a good thing if the whole of the clauses of other 940 Acts referred to were printed in the Bill. I do not know whether he has read the Act of 1890?

§ Lord HUGH CECIL
My suggestion was that they should be printed and added as a sort of appendix corresponding to the Memorandum.

§ Sir F. BANBURY
It would be a very long Memorandum. There are something like thirty or forty clauses in this Act. I read all these private Bills and my Noble Friend does not, and I do not wish, in addition to reading all the private Bills, to have to read anything else to which they may possibly refer. Therefore, although I disagree with that suggestion of my Noble Friend, I have much pleasure in seconding his Amendment.

Mr. DUNDAS WHITE
I hope the Noble Lord will not press the Amendment.

§ Lord HUGH CECIL
My object is to give an opportunity for explanation.

Mr. DUNDAS WHITE
As regards the particular form of words adopted, I think the Noble Lord will recognise that it is the general form in these cases.

§ Sir F. BANBURY
But the fact that a thing has once been done in this House is not a good reason for always following the precedent. Nobody enforces that idea more strongly than hon. Members opposite.

Mr. DUNDAS WHITE
But this form has obtained for many years even among the party opposite as regards "legislation by reference." I do not think that the observations of the hon. Baronet apply except in one case in this Bill. They may apply later on to a reference in Clause 12, but that I think is the only case. I hope the House will not accept this Amendment.

§ Lord HUGH CECIL
What I was anxious for was for the hon. Member to show what will be the effect of the words "shall be construed as one with the principal Act." As I understand it, the two Acts are to be read together as though they were one Act. I want to get at the general effect of the application of the two Acts taken together. The House ought to know what it is doing. The hon. Member, I believe, had no opportunity of making a speech on the Second Beading of the Bill, and, therefore, the majority of Members are in the same position as I was yesterday until I looked into the provisions and tried 941 to find out how they would work together. I wanted the hon. Member to explain the Pension Fund. What fund is it out of which this money is to be paid? As I understand it, the construction of the principal Act depends on the clause we are now discussing.

§ Mr. SPEAKER
I do not think that that matter can be gone into to-day. The Noble Lord must construe it for himself. He would not be bound by the construction put upon it by any other hon. Member. Hon. Members will construe the clauses along with each other, and each hon. Member must construe them as well as he can for himself.

§ Lord HUGH CECIL
Surely it is reasonable for the House to know before it makes a Pension Fund apply, which Fund is going to be made to apply.

Sir HENRY DALZIEL
The Noble Lord complained of the lack of opportunity for asking information on the Second Reading stage, but he had full opportunity of getting the information on the Committee upstairs.

§ Lord HUGH CECIL
I was not on that Committee.

Sir HENRY DALZIEL
I thought the Noble Lord was. At any rate, all the Members for Scotland interested in this Bill had full opportunity of discussing it upstairs, and so far as I remember this Clause was never challenged in any way. I appeal to the Noble Lord not to press this Motion. The Committee are rather proud of the fact that they passed this Bill through in about two hours without a division and almost without a single word of comment. If the hon. Baronet had been there it might have taken two and a quarter hours, but not more, for I am sure he would have been impressed with the business-like character of the Committee. I would appeal to the House that this is a small matter of Scottish opinion on which the decision of a practically Scottish Committee should be predominant. I hope that the new interest which the Noble Lord is taking in Scottish affairs will be helpful, but on this occasion I think he may fairly leave the Scottish Members to deal with the point. I wonder if the Noble Lord has any interest in another Bill which is coming on to-day, or are we to take it he is only anxious to see justice done to Scotland?