§ If any statement required to be furnished under this Act contains any matter which is false in any material particular to the knowledge of any person signing it, that person shall, on summary conviction, be liable to imprisonment with or without hard labour for a term not ex- 236 ceeding three months, or to a fine not exceeding twenty pounds, or to both such imprisonment and fine.
§ Mr. PRETYMANI beg to move, at the end of the Clause, to add the words,
Where a corporation is guilty of an offence under this Act every director, secretary, and officer of the corporation who is knowingly a party to the default shall be guilty of the like offence and liable to a like penalty.
§ Mr. JOYNSON-HICKSI do not think that the end of Clause (9) is the right place for this Amendment. My hon. Friend below me raised that point some time ago- 237 Clause (9) relates to penalties for false statements only. This really ought to have been put in, not as a new Sub-clause to the Clause we are discussing, but as a new Clause relating to penalties under the whole Act. You cannot put it in as an Amendment of this particular Clause.
§ Mr. PRETYMANPerhaps it would be better as a new Clause. Mr. Speaker suggested that it should be introduced as a Sub-clause and I did not perhaps appreciate exactly the effect of it, or that the operation would be limited to the previous words in Clause (9).
§ Mr. JOYNSON-HICKSOn a point of Order. It must be so. In this new Subclause we are discussing the penalties to be placed on corporations for any default they may make in the Act, whereas if you add this new Amendment to Clause (9) it is only relating to penalties for certain particular false statements, and has nothing to do with the penalties in Clause (7)—default in registration. I think it must be a new Clause applying to the penalties under the Act.
Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKERI do not think it need be put forward as a new Clause. It is rather a matter of correct drafting. It does not merely refer to the other words of the Clause, if it goes in as a separate Sub-section; but the marginal note will have to be altered. Its action need not be limited to any words in the first Sub-section. Perhaps, however, the Solicitor-General will give us his opinion on the matter.
§ Sir G. CAVEI was going to suggest exactly what you suggest. It is a mere point of drafting, and I hope the House will put the words in at this stage as we cannot go back to the new Clauses. We can in another place easily separate the two subjects.
Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKERAs the Solicitor-General said, we cannot go back to Clause (7), but we can put the words in as the first instead of the second Subsection of Clause (9).
§ Sir G. CAVEYes, I think that would even make it more clear.
§ Sir G. CAVEYes.
§ Mr. JOYNSON-HICKSI do not want to be persistent and I do not mind where 238 the Amendment conies in if my right hon. and learned Friend the Solicitor-General will continue his undertaking to separate the two in another place and not consider the matter to be finally dealt with.
§ Amendment agreed to.