THIRD SCHEDULE.—(Constitution of the Admission Committee.) (Hansard, 17 April 1931)

Mr. WINTERTON
On a point of Order. May I call your attention, Sir, to the fact that we have now reached the Third Schedule and that there are some very essential drafting words to be put in? Obviously, you cannot have a Schedule covering the whole of the Institution of Municipal and County Engineers, and the whole of the Society of Engineers, and of the Chartered Surveyors Institution, and so on. The Amendment of my hon. Friend would put that right. May I ask whether his purely drafting Amendment is accepted by the promoters?

Lieut.-Colonel MOORE
It seemed obvious.

§ Mr. SPEAKER
I am afraid that I cannot go back.

§ Lieut.-Colonel FREMANTLE
I beg to move, in line 11, at the end, to add the words: and four by the Faculty of Architects and Surveyors. The Admission Committee consists of 12 members, of whom four are to be nominated by the Royal Institute of British Architects, and four by the Incorporated Association of Architects and Surveyors. It does not say who the other four are to be. The Bill as it came to us from another place included the words: and four by the Faculty of Architects and Surveyors. 556 In Committee the hon. Member for Loughborough (Mr. Winterton) moved that those words should be deleted, and they were struck out, but I think that was done without proper consideration, because the hon. Member put forward as one of his main arguments that the Faculty had no published list of its members, although I have one here in my hand, and he also put forward other points with which I need not deal in detail now. This Faculty includes more than 1,000 members and is a solid body; it is recognised in the constitution of the council in the First Schedule, and therefore I think there is every reason for restoring it to the Third Schedule. I believe the hon. and gallant Member who is promoting the Bill is in favour of the restitution of its name, and so, also, are the Royal Institute of British Architects.

§ Lieut.-Colonel Sir A. LAMBERT WARD
I beg to second the Amendment.

Mr. WINTERTON
I made some statements in Committee regarding the Faculty of Architects and Surveyors which I desire to modify at any rate, because they were made on imperfect information, and I ask the indulgence of the House while I explain what I did say and in what particulars I was incorrect. I said, in opposing the inclusion of this body, that we had made some inquiries to discover what this body really represented and had been unable to find any evidence whatever as to its members or to discover any list of its members. I asked the Committee to note that there was no public information available as to the society, as to its membership, or as to the constitution of its membership, and there was no evidence that it possessed any code of professional conduct or that it charged any professional fees. Later I am reported as having said: As far as we have been able to discover, the Secretary of this association is the Secretary of the National Association of Auctioneers, House Agents, Rating Surveyors and Valuers, and these two bodies, the Faculty of Architects and Surveyors and the one I have just mentioned, seem to be a kind of twin association."—[OFFICIAL REPORT (Standing Committee A), col. 231, 31st March, 1931.] There is a modicum of truth in my statement, but it is incomplete, and in some particulars incorrect, and I want to make it clear that I was misled, though I made the statement in perfect good faith. I learn that there is a list of members of 557 the faculty and that it does publish a report, with a copy of which it has favoured me. It is true that it is a private list of members, and, therefore, I was correct in saying that there is no public information about it. It is not correct, apparently, that the secretary of the Faculty and the secretary of the Association of Auctioneers, House Agents and Rating Surveyors and Valuers is the same person. What is correct is that they both have the same telephone number and both apparently occupy the same suite of offices. It is also true that the secretary of one of the associations is one of the three members of the executive committee of the Faculty of Architects. So it was in the use of the word "secretary" rather than in the spirit of what I said that I was misleading. I have no desire to do any injustice to any association. These are points which may seem small to us in this House, but I do not wish to affect prejudicially the standing of any architectural association.
Coming to the Amendment, I cannot see that there is any reason why, of the 12 added members, we should give four to the Faculty of Architects. Look at the figures which have been quoted to us. We have had from the hon. Member for Walsall (Mr. McShane) a very generous estimate of the membership of the Royal Institute of British Architects; he has put it at 7,000. The other association which has been named, and which also gets four members, has a membership of 2,000 or so. Surely the remaining four seats ought not to go to an organisation which, I think, has only 1,000 members. The idea of the Amendment which the promoters of the Bill accepted was that there should be a certain amount of elasticity in order that other architects might be added—unattached architects might find a place on this particular body. Therefore, I hope the House will not accept this Amendment, especially as the hon. and gallant Member has himself pointed out that this body has representation elsewhere.

Lieut.-Colonel MOORE
I hope the Mover of this Amendment will modify it. It would be unfair to give such a large share of representation to so small a body. So far as I can ascertain, while there are about 1,300 members of this Faculty there are probably among them some 200 qualified architects, and it 558 would not be fair to give four members to represent 7,000 qualified architects who are members of the Royal Institute of British Architects and an equal number to represent 200 architects here. I am willing that the Faculty should be represented, but I think one member would be adequate, and I understand from the secretary of the Faculty that he would be satisfied with that representation.

§ Mr. McSHANE
I desire to associate myself with the opposition to the Amendment as it stands. I regret that any bad relationship should have come between those who were obviously friends at one time; I regret to see quarrels anywhere. I have here a circular issued by the body on behalf of whom the hon. and gallant Member is moving his Amendment, and one paragraph in that circular states: All practitioners should be attached to a recognised centre, so that, whatever registration provisions are introduced, they may obtain protection. For example, the N.A.A. appears in the draft of the Architects Registration Bill, 1928, presented by the Registration Committee of the R.I.B.A., by virtue of which the N.A.A. will be represented on the Admission Committee of the Bill if the Bill is approved by Parliament in the form in which it is to be submitted. Oh, I am sorry; that quotation refers to the other side of the medal. I entirely agree with the criticism that to give a representation of four to an organisation which is just growing and has not reached a large membership would be entirely unfair, and I hope the Mover will not press the Amendment.

§ Lieut.-Colonel FREMANTLE
May I save trouble by asking if my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Ayr (Lieut.-Colonel Moore) will move as an Amendment to my Amendment that they should be given one member instead of four? I would accept that.

Lieut.-Colonel MOORE
I beg to move, as an Amendment to the proposed Amendment, to leave out the word "four," and to insert instead thereof the word "one."

§ Sir R. GOWER
I beg to second the Amendment to the proposed Amendment.

§ Mr. McSHANE
I am exceedingly sorry that Clause 7 was not deleted. I feel sure that those who voted for the retention of that Clause will regret the course which they have taken. I feel positive that, while the Bill will confer the principle of registration on a vast body of people, the public, and particularly those who come from very poor homes, will not get the opportunities which they would have had if Clause 7 had been left out. I am glad that the architects are now to have the same right of registration which I claim for myself. The point I have mentioned is the fatal flaw in the Bill.

§ Lieut.-Colonel FREMANTLE
I have not taken any part in opposing this Bill, because so many of my hon. Friends are in favour of it, and many of my constituents. I think that the Royal Institute of British Architects have made a mistake in requiring registration, and my view is that the State makes a mistake in registering any body unless it is necessary from the point of view of life and death. It was for that reason that medical registration was required, and special privileges of this kind should not be conferred unless they deal with matters of life and death. This Bill attempts to standardise something which cannot be standardised, and it is not in the interests of the public to take action of this kind.

Mr. WINTERTON
I would like to assure the House that those of us who have been critical of this Measure have had only one object in view, and that is the protection of the interests of the public, and to keep the door as wide open as possible to every working-class boy and girl to enter this honourable profession. I hope that when this Measure reaches another place certain small inadvertencies with which we have not been able to deal to-day on account of Mr. Speaker's Ruling may be corrected. This Measure is by no means perfect. Under its provisions a man may appeal against being taken off the register, but there is no provision by which he can appeal when anybody refuses to put him on the register, and I hope the necessary steps will be taken to remedy that defect.
560 I should like to take the opportunity of congratulating the hon. and gallant Member for Ayr Boroughs (Lieut.-Colonel Moore) on the successful carrying through of this very difficult and complicated Measure. Some of us have fought the Bill very strenuously both upstairs and in the House to-day, but I should like to testify to the uniform courtesy of the hon. and gallant Member in his conduct of the Measure. We have not all the same temperament, but I would like to say to the society which has promoted this Bill it is fine to have the strength of a giant, but it is merciful not to use a giant's strength. I hope that the Bill will lead to the building up of a very honourable profession, and I trust they will realise that they have a great prerogative, and that they will always be open to creative ideas from whatever source they may come.