§ If it appears to the Board that it is desirable to extend the provisions of this Part of this Act to workmen in any trade other than an insured trade the Board may, with the consent of the Treasury, make, in manner hereinafter provided, a special order extending this Part of this Act to such workmen either without modification or subject to such modifications as may be contained in the order, and on any such order being made this Part of this Act shall, subject to the modifications (if any) contained in the order, apply as if the trade mentioned in the order were an insured trade and as if the rates and periods of benefit mentioned in the Order were the rates and periods of benefits provided by this Part of this Act in respect of such trade:
§ Provided that no such order shall be made which would, in the opinion of the Treasury, increase the contribution to the Unemployment Fund out of moneys provided by Parliament to a sum exceeding one million pounds a year before the 1944 expiration of three years from the making of the order.
Mr. WORTHINGTON-EVANSI beg to move to leave out the words, "with the consent of the Treasury, make, in manner hereinafter provided, a special order extending," and to insert instead thereof the words, "by Provisional Order extend."
This Clause gives power to the Board of Trade to extend the provisions of the Act to other trades either without modification or subject to such modifications as may be contained in the Order. This is the very widest power I imagine which has ever been suggested should be given to a Government Department. It is not only to extend the Clauses of this Bill to other trades, but it is to modify in the Order the provisions of the Bill. A very similar provision to this was inserted originally in the Trade Boards Bill. It provided that
The Board of Trade might make a Provisional Order applying this Act to any specified trade to which it does not apply at the time if they are satisfied," etc.Then the Board of Trade were to submit for confirmation to Parliament any Provisional Order made by them, and so on. That was amended in Committee, and the Act as it actually passed was thatThe Board of Trade may make a Provisional Order applying this Act to any specified trade," etc.,and there were provisions put in applying the ordinary provisions regarding Provisional Orders. That would have the effect of not allowing the Board of Trade by its own Order, even by an Order made under Schedule 9 of this Bill, to extend the Act to other trades, but it would bring the extension before Parliament in exactly the same way as they are now called upon to confirm or otherwise a Provisional Order. I hope the Government will accept this. I cannot imagine the Government could have supposed when they put in this Clause that any Committee of the House would be willing to give such wide powers to a Government department, not even to the Board of Trade. I hope the President of the Board of Trade will see his way to accept this Amendment.
§ Sir J. SIMONThe Amendment that has just been moved raises the question: what is the proper sanction for us to require before the extension to other trades takes place under Clause 77 of the Bill? I submit to the Committee before they can judge that question fairly they must have some regard to what is the power 1945 which Clause 77 seeks to exercise. At first sight it might look as though Clause 77 had a very wide operation, such as naturally called for the criticism of the hon. Gentleman who has moved this Amendment; but I think it will be found on examination that the scope of Clause 77 at its maximum is comparatively limited. In the first place, will the Committee be good enough to observe there is at the end of the Clause a proviso that the extension which the Clause contemplates can never take place unless the Treasury are satisfied that even with the extension the total contributions out of monies provided by Parliament will not exceed £1,000,000? That does not mean the extra contributions should be £1,000,000, but that any extra contributions added to the contributions already authorised by the Bill should not exceed £1,000,000.
§ Sir A. GRIFFITH-BOSCAWENWhat do you estimate that at?
§ Sir J. SIMONThe hon. Member very naturally asks at what I estimate the contributions from public funds under the Bill as it stands. Until one knows the answer one cannot judge the possible operation of this Bill. The contribution from the Treasury is estimated at something between £700,000 and £800,000. It is in round figures £750,000, so that the maximum operation of Clause 77 would be such as would involve the addition to the contribution of something about a quarter of a million of money. That is the first limitation. May I point out the second? The second limitation which Clause 77 prescribes is the very stringent limitation involved in our Special Order procedure. Hon. Members who merely turn to the schedule to see what the Special Order procedure is have not before them to the full extent the checks which that Special Order procedure prescribe. The hon. Member for Hexham (Mr. Holt) pointed out just now that, apart from all the conditions of the Schedule, you have also to satisfy the condition in Clause 78 itself. Each House of Parliament has to have an independent opportunity for thirty days during which it is in Session of objecting to the proposed Order, and, if they object to that proposed Order, it cannot be made. It really is not accurate to say it is an extension which could take place without Parliamentary sanction. It is, indeed, Parliamentary sanction of a rather stringent order, because either one of the Houses 1946 of Parliament can put its unrestricted and absolute veto upon the whole thing without the consent of the other.
May I point out the distinction which in our view exists between this proposal and the Trade Boards Act which my hon. Friend used as his precedent in making his Amendment? The Trade Boards Act is designed to deal with a limited and exceptional area, and what I may call diseased trades. It is not designed to deal with a problem which affects industry as a whole. It picks out certain special diseased trades and deals with them, and to go and provide by some form of special order that you may extend the Trade Boards Act, which is to deal with this special and limited area to any and every trade in the country, would, indeed, be making an addition very much bigger than that to which you would be adding it. Our case is really very different. I would ask the Committee to observe this: The question will arise as to what trade is within and what trade is without our Bill. It may be—no human ingenuity can prevent it—that the true view on some border-line case will be that a branch of industry from the practical and industrial point of view is really closely knitted up with one of the industries in the Bill, but it may be decided by the umpire, and quite rightly owing to the technicality of the matter, to lie just on the wrong side of the line. Everybody knows Acts of Parliament do not work out to cover the precise area which common-sense afterwards sees to be reasonable. If it hereafter turns out there is some area of that sort limited, as it necessarily must be by the conditions of the Clause, then this procedure which the Clause prescribes is adequate for the purpose.
Let the Committee realise what, extremely elaborate precautions are to be taken. The Board of Trade are first of all to give public notice they contemplate holding a public inquiry to raise the question whether this additional area should be covered. They are to receive representations from anybody who cares to make them, whether employers, workmen, or the general public. They are to modify their proposal in accordance with those representations, and they are then to hold a public inquiry. At that public inquiry the different interests concerned are to have the fullest opportunity of being heard. It is to take place in the light of day, with every opportunity for public discussion, and, when it is over, what is to happen? 1947 The Board of Trade has not to say: "Now we make the order, and there is an end of it." On the contrary, we propose, to introduce by an Amendment a provision that, if the person holding the public inquiry reports the extension 'is undesirable, it shall be beyond the power of the Board of Trade to go any further. Not only so, but we even say the order which the Board of Trade make and which the public enquiry authorises and approves after full discussion is to be laid upon the Table of each House of Parliament in Session for thirty days, and that either House of Parliament is to have the opportunity by Resolution of negativing the Order. Is that in the circumstances an inadequate proceeding? Is it not on the whole a fair thing we should do rather than take the only real alternative, which is that we should in effect go in for new legislation, because provisional orders in some form or other are new legislation. In that case you would not only have the people who criticse your proposal as going too far, but you would also have the people who criticise it and say it ought to go further, with the result we should have every kind of person coming forward and trying to get into the vehicle which we designed only to carry a particular and it may be a pressing need. I submit to the Committee that in the circumstances our proposal is not an unfair one. It does give a reasonable opportunity to the House to keep control of this measure, and in any case it is strictly limited by the condition of finance imposed in the proviso. I ask the Committee to say our provision is adequate.
§ Sir A. GRIFFITH-BOSCAWENI should like to say one or two words in reply to the Solicitor-General because we are dealing here with one of the most important things in the Bill. It cannot be denied this is really new legislation. It does not matter how you do it; it is legislation. You pick out certain trades in the Bill where you think unemployment frequently occurs, and you make an experiment with them. You then take powers under this Clause to extend it. It is quite true, as the Solicitor-General says, they are limited powers. You are limited by finance. You have 25 per cent. margin even on the figures given us. £750,000 will be required under the Bill, compared with the one million which is the limit under this 1948 Clause. That is a 25 per cent. margin, and it means that under this Clause you can include other trades.
§ Sir J. SIMONNot unless the Treasury consents.
§ Sir A. GRIFFITH-BOSCAWENI agree that that is another Government Department. In addition to that, as my hon. Friend pointed out, you can do it with modifications; in other words, the conditions under which you apply this Bill to these other trades may be entirely different from the conditions contained in this Clause. It cannot be denied that this is a form of legislation which is being undertaken by a Government Department. The Solicitor-General says, "Look at the Procedure by Special Order! Don't you see that Parliament has a voice, because under the Special Order it has to lie on the Table for a certain time, and then an Address may be presented by either House, and if the Address is presented and carried then the Government cannot proceed with the extension." But let me point this out to the Committee, and it is a very important fact, that by an Address moved against a Special Order all you can get is a Second Reading Debate, and you merely approve the proposal or reject it. You cannot consider it in detail. It does not go into Committee; there is no Committee stage at all.
But under a Provisional Order the whole matter may be gone into thoroughly. I suggest that the modifications which are specially put in this Clause ought to be worked out in Committee. I could conceive that the Government might extend the Bill by Special Order to some trade with modifications. There might be no objection to extending the Bill to the trade, but there might be very big objections to the modifications. These objections ought to be argued out in the House of Commons, or in a Standing Committee. I have had a good deal of experience on this matter. For five years I was a Charity Commissioner. I had to bring forward a great many schemes, many of which had to lie on the Table of the House. Very often an Address was moved for their rejection, and I know of one occasion when an Address was carried against me, where, if I had had it in my power to modify the scheme, that Address would not have been carried, and the modification might have been accepted.
§ Mr. DENMANMay I point out to the hon. Member there is already a provision that either House can object to any part of the Order.
§ Sir A. GRIFFITH-BOSCAWENI agree that that is so. But to take out any part in a single Address moved in the House of Commons is very different from going thoroughly into the matter in detail. What is the objection to the Amendment? My hon. Friend does not wish to take away from the Government or from Parliament, or from the House, the power to extend the Bill in any way. All he suggests is a Provisional Order Bill. What is the objection to that? A Provisional Order Bill is a very old form of procedure; it is one that works exceedingly well, and, as my hon. Friend has already pointed out, it has been adopted with regard to the Trade Boards Act. The Solicitor-General tried to draw some distinction between the trades selected and the manner of selection in regard to the Trade Boards Act, and the method of selection in this case. He said that the Trade Boards Act simply applied to certain classes of diseased trades. It kept out certain diseased trades, and would not allow any addition being made to them without the explicit sanction of Parliament in a Provisional Order Bill. But that is precisely what you are doing in this Bill. You are picking out certain diseased trades that suffer not from sweating, as the trades under the Trade Boards Bill, but which suffer from constant and periodic unemployment. After you have had a little experience in the working of the Bill, you will find other trades that are diseased in a somewhat similar manner, and, therefore, to say that we should do to them just as we do in the case of sweated trades, when you think others should be added to them, it is only right and proper to go through the full machinery of a Provisional Order Bill, so as to apply exactly the same process in adding the trade that suffers from the disease of unemployment to which this Bill is intended to apply.
I cannot say that the Solicitor-General has been successful in showing why there should be no difference in the procedure under this Bill under the Trade Boards Act. I am bound to say from experience of the Trade Boards Act, I think it is right it should not be added to, without that thorough examination which you get by means of a Provisional Order Bill. For these reasons, I hope the Government will 1950 see their way to meet my hon. Friend. There is no question of principle involved. We are all anxious to make this Bill workable. Remember you are imposing a very heavy burden upon both employers and workmen, and if you consider the matter from their point of view, I am certain that both employers and workmen in a trade that is going to be added will want the matter thoroughly thrashed out in Parliament before they are included. I trust the Government will meet us in this, and, if they do, I can assure them that any further objections we have to this Clause will entirely disappear.
§ Mr. BAIRDI cannot understand the reason for hurrying this matter forward. Why should we proceed with haste in regard to the application of this Bill to trades which are not going to be originally included? Surely every word my hon. Friend has said with regard to the desire of both employers and workmen to have the matter thoroughly thrashed out before they are brought within the scope of this Bill is reasonable. I do not associate myself with what has been said on a previous occasion with regard to this question of insurance being entrusted to an "inferior" official. There are senior officials, and there are subordinate officials. I think the term "inferior official" should not have been used, and I feel sure it was not intended to be used in a depreciatory sense. By not accepting this Amendment, however, it seems to me that you are throwing upon an official duties which should be performed by Parliament, and which Parliament would discharge not in that cursory manner which may be the case if the Order has simply to lie on the Table. We want this to be performed thoroughly in the manner provided for by the Amendment to the schedule put down in the name of my hon. Friend.
There is another point; not only did the Solicitor-General seem to indicate haste, but his remarks seemed also typical of the reckless attitude of die Government in matters of finance. He said that, after all, they had a quarter of a million sterling in hand. They may have a quarter of a million in hand, and that is one-third of what they are now going to expend. Apply that to the position of employers and workmen. The Bill, taking it in round numbers, will affect 2,400,000 men, and that will be £1 per head of contributions from employers and workmen. One third of that is £800,000. 1951 You have it in your power, according to your own showing, to impose a burden on the industry of £800,000, without taking the necessary safeguards which will be supplied if Parliament is more thoroughly consulted. But that does not seem to me to be a way of helping a diseased trade, and there may be a condition of things where the remedy proposed by the Government would be no remedy at all, but would turn the diseased trade into a deceased trade. It is necessary, therefore, that fuller opportunity should be given to those engaged in the trade than is given by this Clause, as it now stands, for making their position thoroughly well known. I will refer, if I may, to the proposal which will be included in the Bill if the Amendment of my hon. Friend were accepted. It is, that if while the Bill confirming any such order is pending in either House of Parliament a petition is presented against any order contained in it, the Bill so far as it relates to such order shall be referred to a Select Committee of either House or to a joint Committee of the two Houses, and power shall be given to the Commissioner to appear and oppose as in the case of a private Bill. That seems to me to be a necessary and reasonable provision, and not one that will be vexatiously used by people who have no reasonable objection. But if there are any who feel anxiety on the question of the inclusion of the trade, they ought to have a right to come up to London and make their views known to the House. I hope that the Government will reconsider their decision, and endeavour to meet the views in this respect.
§ The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the BOARD of TRADE (Mr. J. M. Robertson)I would point out to the hon. Member who spoke last that there is a very vital difference between the description of trades coming under the category of sweated trades and trades suffering from unemployment. Hon. Members have lumped the two classes together, using the expression employed by the Solicitor-General of "diseased trades." The use of that expression on both sides has tended to obscure the vital difference between the two classes of trades. Many people think that unemployment insurance should be in time extended to all trades, and no one would contemplate that as an evil thing, but to treat all trades as sweated trades is clearly the antithesis of that. The disease in the case of a 1952 sweated trade is one which, in an industrial way, discredits that trade. It is not a discredit to any trade to suffer from unemployment, and therefore, while one would naturally deprecate any facility for extending a measure which stigmatises a trade as a sweated trade, that is no argument for in the same way deprecating facility for extension of a measure to trades which suffer from unemployment, as the fact that the trade suffers from unemployment involves no stigma whatever. Naturally we contemplate in time extending this unemployment insurance to all trades, so that the extension provided for in this Clause is not undesirable. In the case of the other Act it may be.
With regard to what was said by the hon. Member who spoke last about it being desirable we should not be in a hurry, I think he will agree with me that in Parliament, whatever one may want to do, one has always to be in a hurry if anything is to be done at all. Of course, the hon. Member may desire a lowering of the whole pace of legislation, and wish to promote the leisurely deliberation of such measures as these, but I am afraid his colleague will hardly agree with him, nor is his hope likely to be realised even if the administration is changed. I do not think any very strong argument has been put forward against the method proposed in the Bill. One Amendment the Government has put down has met the difficulty which was felt by the hon. Member for Hexham, and I think it has practically removed the main grounds of apprehension.
Mr. HAMILTON BENNI should like to tell the Government there is a very strong feeling in the country, and amongst many classes of people, with reference to this matter, because they fear they may be included in this portion of the Bill without having a chance of bringing their case before Parliament. I think a great deal of the opposition which is felt to this part of the Bill would be removed if the Government would meet us in regard to the Amendment.
§ Sir E. CORNWALLTo me, it is clearly desirable that these provisions should be extended in the future to other trades, and that the amount of benefit should also be added to. On the point before the Committee, I have little doubt. I am always jealous of the tremendous power Parliament is continually giving to Government Departments. 1953 I am not a lover of handing over to Government Departments powers upon powers as we are doing now. Take the Board of Trade in regard to this matter. What an enormous responsibility it is to them to have to decide what trades this Bill should be extended to. As to the provision in the Bill that it should lie upon the table of the House for thirty days, really, Mr Chairman, is there anything in that? That to my mind has no real value. It might just as well be out of the Bill. In my opinion it gives absolute power to the Board of Trade because to lie upon the table for thirty days during the Session of Parliament practically makes it impossible for the House of Commons to have any control whatever. We had an instance the other day. It does not follow that because we are in favour of the principle of this Bill and the principle of this Clause we are to go blind in a matter of this kind. We had an instance the other day of a Scotch matter. That was some question that had to lie upon the Table for thirty days of the Session. Well, it was found that it was put down on a certain day when Parliament had gone into recess and not prorogued, and when it came on it was out of date.
Of course, it was impossible for the House of Commons to take any effective step in regard to this important matter. If the Government Department cares to make it impossible for the House of Commons to deal with it, it can. Of course, when we are legislating we always see the heads of a Government Department here. We see the President of the Board of Trade or the Home Secretary, as the case may be, here in Committee, but the legislation that we pass giving powers to Government Departments is going on every day. I maintain that it is not inadvisable for the Board of Trade to proceed by Provisional Order. The Local Government Board proceed by Provisional Order, and many of their administrative Acts are done by Provisional Order; many go through without Parliament intervening, for Provisional Orders of the Local Government Board go to Committees upstairs because there is opposition to them. Therefore Parliament has an opportunity by evidence, and by hearing all parties, of going fully into the consideration of the various questions that arise. I can see that in the future, in the extension of powers under this Clause, it may be to the great advantage of all concerned, to the great advantage of Parliament, to the great advantage of the work- 1954 men and to the great advantage of the employers, that a Committee upstairs at the end of seven years might consider the best means of extending to trades and the methods of extending to trades. A Committee upstairs under a provisional order might report in favour of a useful Amendment of the Act itself. What we are doing here now is handing the whole powers of extending to trades to a Department in the Board of Trade.
I am growing tired of this everlasting adding of powers on powers to a Government Department. It really is becoming very serious, and some day it will come home to us in a very powerful manner. While I want the extension to trades and the extension of amounts, I do want to keep more control in the hands of Parliament, and to have an opportunity of dealing with these matters, not necessarily in the leisurely way that has been suggested. I realise, as the Under-Secretary for the Board of Trade says, that you cannot take up all these questions in Parliament and go through them when Sessions are full of Bills and treat them in a leisurely fashion. But there are means of dealing with matters of this kind, as I have already said, in the way the Local Government Board does, through Provisional Orders, without taking up the main time of Parliament. They could go to Committees upstairs—
§ Mr. J. M. ROBERTSONThat is dangerous.
§ Sir E. CORNWALLMy hon. Friend says it is dangerous. Why is it dangerous? It seems to me that Parliament thus keeps its control. I hope the Board of Trade will not be too anxious. They will be pressed by their Department, and their officials will say: "If we have to do this work, the less we are trammelled by Parliament the better." Well, I think the President of the Board of Trade should let Parliament keep a little more control under these provisions than is provided for in the Bill.
§ Mr. GOLDSTONEI think this Grand Committee on behalf of Parliament is scrutinising this measure in the hope of settling the principle of insuring against unemployment. If we are going to settle it in this Grand Committee, why should we postpone the settlement of it to a Private Bill Committee? which will be microscopic compared to this Committee. I see in the Amendment suggestions for delay in applying the principle to other 1955 trades. May I correct an expression which has come from the other side with respect to how this part of the Bill is regarded in the country. I find, as far as the workmen I meet are concerned, less enthusiasm for Part I. than for Part II. It is Part II. that they are concerned about. It is Part II. they desire to see passed. It is not that they desire to come here to make any appeal for its application to their trade, rather is it in respect of the miners with whom I have spoken on the matter, an urgent question, "Why are you not at this stage applying this Bill to our trade." Therefore, as this Amendment is in my opinion a suggestion of delay, I am going to vote against it. If delay is desired I commend the Opposition to read the third line of this part of the Clause, "May, with the consent of the Treasury." You may take it. there will be sufficient delay there, because there is going to be a charge upon the Treasury whenever it is extended to other trades. You will have to secure Treasury approval, and you will have to secure the approval of the House of Commons itself before the expenditure can be sanctioned for applying this to other trades. I strongly support the procedure as at present outlined.
§ Sir J. SIMONThis is an important matter, and I can assure hon. Members who have taken part in criticising the Clause, that it is not with any desire to burk proper inquiry or proper Parliamentary control that we have put this proposal down. We have put it down because we believe that on the whole it is the right way of dealing with this important matter. The hon. Member for Bethnal Green made a very incisive speech, as he always does, but he really in that speech hardly did justice to the arguments in favour of the present proposal. The present proposal is not that the Board of Trade or some subordinate official of the Board of Trade should some fine morning write out an order, and thereupon the thing could be done. That has not the slightest resemblance to what we propose. If I may make a personal reference, I would state at this point that I have had in the course of my profession to attend inquiries started by the Home Office such as this Special Order procedure involves. I have attended before Private Bill Committees, and I say that it is an impossible proposition to lay down that an inquiry such as this Special Order Procedure involves, does not give at least as 1956 full an opportunity for ventilating different points of view as a Private Bill Committee.
§ Sir E. CORNWALLNot so public.
§ Sir J. SIMONNot so public the hon. Gentleman says. I do not know where he gets his ideas from. If he will look at the record of an inquiry held at the Home Office as to whether or not the bringing of trucks on lines outside factories should be included amongst the regulations for dangerous trades, and if he will look at the record of the inquiry at Caxton Hall as to proper regulations for the safety of men engaged in docks; if he will consider those records and consider the proceedings at other inquiries dealing with trades, he will see that these inquiries are as public as the proceedings of a Select Committee consisting of perhaps four persons in one of the Committee Rooms of the House of Commons. May I point out further that really the private Bill procedure is not appropriate to this class of case. You are proposing to include, it may be, a branch of industry. What is to happen if the workmen desire to make their representations in the matter? They have got their representatives in Parliament, it is true. They have got the right of coming through their trade union representatives to one of these inquiries, but I have never heard of a Select Committee in which, instead of counsel appearing, there was to be a trade union secretary appearing and conducting the case. What you are really doing by this proposed change is to substitute procedure by Private Bill Committee, which is really not appropriate, for an inquiry which is at least to be deliberate, and which moreover is subject to a Parliamentary check which is far from being the farce the hon. Member described it to be. I do not know whether he stayed up late the other night. If he did, he will know that so far from this procedure being a farce, the House of Commons did actually stop an Order made by the Home Office under this very procedure. It was going to extend a Factory Act rule in a direction which was thought improper. It was done by the representatives of those who spoke on behalf of the workpeople. It is impossible to say that this procedure is a farce. As to the limitation of the Clause, when the Clause says "that the Special Order may extend the Act with modifications," what is intended there is not some reconstitution of 1957 the structure of the Act. I appreciate hon. Members may be anxious about that. All that is intended is that there might be cases in which the modifications would involve modifications of the rates or contributions, or modifications in the rates and periods of benefit. That is all that is intended.
§ Sir J. SIMONI think the words are larger. I think the hon. Gentleman is right, and, when we come to it, I propose that we should put in words to show that the words are strictly limited to these very matters.
§ Mr. HOLTI will explain to the Committee why I was induced to change my attitude on this subject. A certain amount of negotiations in connection with this Bill had taken place with the various Government departments, and the Board of Trade went a considerable way to remove objections which my friends and I entertained, by agreeing that the public inquiry should be final. That makes a very great difference. The Board of Trade are not in a position to treat it as of no importance. This is a considerable concession. I still think on the whole it is better to bargain with a master of legions when you get the chance. The concession takes the sting out of the original proposal. Although on the balance I incline to procedure by Provisional Order, yet there are arguments in favour of Special Orders. One horrible suggestion was thrown out, that the period of thirty days might include a time during which Parliament was in Session, but might adjourn. Surely that is not intended.
§ Sir J. SIMONIt is not possible. It says thirty days during the Session of Parliament.
§ Sir J. SIMONI certainly do not so understand it, but I will inquire at the Table, and if I find that it is so I am quite ready to say that these thirty days are to be days during which the House is effectively sitting.
§ Mr. HOLTIt is a very good thing to have this point cleared up. I understand that there is a definite pledge that it shall be thirty days during which the House is effectively sitting. That shows that the 1958 Board of Trade are willing to meet us. I hope that the Board of Trade will give a further undertaking that the person who holds the inquiry shall be an impartial person, that he shall not be a person who is a servant of a public department, or a person drawing an annual salary from a Government Department. I understand the Government are not unwilling to state that he should be a person independent of the department in a sense of not being a regular salaried official of the department.
§ Mr. HOLTIn these circumstances I think the Board of Trade have gone a very long way to meet our objections, and I think we might fairly let them have the Clause with the Amendments as proposed.
Mr. WORTHINGTON-EVANSI must confess that I am not satisfied with what the Government has done. The hon. Member for Hexham (Mr. Holt) has had these private conversations with the Government, and appears to have settled that the public inquiry is to be final. That amounts only to this: that the Board of Trade are not to proceed notwithstanding that the officer they have appointed has reported against them. That is thank you for nothing. I do not see how the Board of Trade could have proceeded if the result of their own official's inquiry had been to report against the scheme.
Mr. WORTHINGTON-EVANSPerhaps I ought not to have said that they could not possibly do it, but I ought to have said that they could not with decency do it. What this amounts to is that the hon. Member is satisfied because one person has had the evidence before him and has reported in favour of the extension. But he is not satisfied, and other Members who have spoken say they are not satisfied, with Private Bill procedure, which would at least bring the matter before three or four members of the House of Commons in Committee, and subsequently before the House itself. It was suggested by one hon. Member that it was obvious that we were not desirous of extending insurance against unemployment to other trades. So far as I am concerned that is not at all a true statement of my wishes. I want to extend unemployment insurance to other trades, and I do not want any unnecessary delay, but I want 1959 first to ascertain whether it can be successfully done, whether those engaged in the trade want it done, whether the workmen on the one hand and the employers on the other, who have to pay the contributions under it, want it, and whether it will not cause unemployment by extending it. I think myself that Private Bill procedure is infinitely better than the course proposed by the Government and I am sorry that I shall have to ask the Committee to divide.
§ Mr. BIGLANDOne hon. Member opposite intimated that from what he had heard that there were a certain class of workman who were anxious to be included, I suppose, at the end of the seven years. The question before the Committee is with whom shall the decision rest if the colliers and the agricultural labourers want to participate in the £250,000. The question is, shall the decision be left to the Board, as would be the case if the Bill is left as it stands. If the Amendment is passed we in Parliament shall have some
| Division No. 9.] | AYES. | |
| Barnes, Mr. | Holt, Mr. | Palmer, Mr. |
| Brady, Mr. | Jones, Mr. Haydn | Price, Mr. |
| Burke, Mr. E. Haviland- | Jones, Mr. William | Primrose, Mr. |
| Buxton, Mr. Sydney | Joyce, Mr. | Robertson, Mr. John |
| Cornwall, Sir Edwin | Kelly, Mr. | Roch, Mr. Walter |
| Davies, Mr. Ellis | Leach, Mr. | Scanlan, Mr. |
| Denman, Mr. | M'Callum, Mr. | Smith, Mr. Albert |
| Goldstone, Mr. | Mond, Sir Alfred | Solicitor-General, Mr. |
| Hackett, Mr. | Murray, Captain | Ward, Mr. John |
| Harmsworth, Mr. Cecil | Norman, Sir Henry | Webb, Mr. |
| Harvey, Mr. Thomas Edmund | Nugent, Sir Walter | Williams, Mr. Penry |
| Hayden, Mr. | Nuttall, Mr. | Wilson, Mr. Tyson |
| NOES. | ||
| Baird, Mr. | Boscawen, Sir Arthur Griffith- | Ingleby, Mr. |
| Baldwin, Mr. | Goldman, Mr. | Stewart, Mr. Gershom |
| Benn, Mr. Hamilton | Grant, Mr. | Worthington-Evans, Mr. |
| Bigland, Mr. | Horner, Mr. |
Mr. WORTHINGTON-EVANSI beg to move to leave out the words, "either without modification or subject to such modifications as may be contained in the Order."
§ Sir J. SIMONMay I just indicate what the changes would be if the Government proposals in the Clause are accepted, and I think my hon. Friend will withdraw the Amendment. Each proposal that we make is in the direction of limiting the wide powers which the Clause gives; we are not expanding it in any way. There will be three changes which we shall seek to propose. The first is after the word "modifications," where I shall move to insert words which will limit the modifications, to "modifications of rates of con-
§ voice in the decision whether the colliery business or the agricultural labourer or any other industry applies to participate under this Bill. I should like to hear from the Government as to whether that would be so, whether the final decision would rest entirely with the Board of Trade under the Bill as it now stands or whether in Parliament we should have the final decision as to which of the contending parties should participate in the £250,000 which would be available for the Treasury.
§ Sir E. CORNWALLAfter the promise of the Government to alter the words in regard to the Session I am not able to vote against the Clause. Of course I am not against the Clause. I only wanted to carry the Government with me. I am in favour of the Clause and shall vote for it.
§ Question put, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Clause."
§ The Committee divided: Ayes, 36; Noes, 11.
§ tributions," so that you cannot alter the structure of the Bill. In lines twenty-nine and thirty, we shall put in similar words, consequential, to limit the extent to which the order can vary the scheme of the Bill, and finally, in line thirty-two, we should ask to leave out the word "which" in order to insert an expression which would carry out what my hon. Friend (Mr. Holt) referred to, viz., that if the enquiry ends in a report unfavourable to the proposal, the Board of Trade are to have no power of going on.
Mr. WORTHINGTON-EVANSI am afraid I cannot withdraw unless the Solicitor-General can meet us a little further. I understand the scope of his Amendment is that the modifications may be made only 1961 with regard to contributions and benefits; but the modifications with regard to contributions may go to the whole root of the Bill. The present construction of the Bill is this: that the contributions shall be made, one-third by the workman, and one-third by the employer, and that the State should contribute one-third of the total. If you give power to modify contributions generally, you may give power to make it a non-contributory scheme. I want to keep the same proportion of contribution, because, to my mind, that is the only protection there is.
§ Sir J. SIMONThere is on the Paper, in the name of the President of the Board of Trade, an Amendment to insert at the end of the Clause, "the rates of contribution mentioned in the Order shall not exceed the rates specified in the Eighth Schedule to this Act, and shall be imposed equally as between employers and workmen."
§ Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
§ Amendments made: After the word "modifications" ["or subject to such modifications "] insert the words, "of rates of contribution or rates or period of benefit."
§ After the word "rates" ["and as if the rates and period"] insert the words, "of contribution and the rates."
§ After the word "rates" ["where the rates and period of benefit"] insert the words, "of contribution and the rates."
§ Leave out the word "which" ["provided that no such Order shall be made, which would"], and insert instead thereof the words, "if a person holding the inquiry reports that the Order should not be made, or if the Order."
§ At the end of the Clause add the words, "and that the rates of contribution mentioned in the Order shall not exceed the rates specified in the Eighth Schedule to this Act, and shall be imposed equally as between employers and workmen."—[Mr. Buxton.]
§ Question proposed, "That the Clause, as amended, stand part of the Bill."
§ Sir A. GRIFFITH-BOSCAWENI do not propose to divide the Committee, but in view of the fact that the Government have not accepted the Amendment of my hon. Friend (Mr. Worthington-Evans) I protest against this method of giving to 1962 a Government Department wide powers of legislation—that is what it comes to—by the process of Special Order. It is a precedent which should not be followed, and the matter might have been very well met if the Government had seen fit to accept the plan of provision order.
§ Question put, and agreed to.