CLAUSE 25.—(Duty not to delay sale or importation of goods.) (Hansard, 5 December 1946)

§ Lieut.-Commander Braithwaite
I beg to move, in page 18, line 9, to leave out sub-paragraph (i).
It is impossible in practice to say what is a delay that is unreasonable, having regard to the ordinary course of trade. "Unreasonable" is an extraordinarily wide word. Nobody knows what it means. It may mean anything, and may be capable of any one of a hundred different explanations. I invite the Solicitor-General to give us one of them.

§ The Solicitor-General
The question as to what is an unreasonable delay is one which has to be determined by reference to the circumstances. All I can say with regard to that is that no powers will be exercised except in a clear case Supposing the range of trade practice extended to sales over a period of six months. If anybody delayed for three or five years. 625 that would obviously be an unreasonable period of time. What will be looked for is something which cannot be justified on any ordinary common sense view of trade practice.

§ Lieut.-Commander Braithwaite
I am very glad to hear the Solicitor-General say that. Here is another example where his bite is far worse than his bark. The wording in the Bill is more severe than the hon. and learned Gentleman's words. I feel that this sort of thing ought to be amended on the Report stage.

§ Mr. Stanley
I should like to say a word —[Laughter]. If hon. Gentlemen opposite think this very amusing we are perfectly ready to continue it for a very long time, not this evening, because we have not the opportunity; but on Monday we shall be quite content to provide hon. Members with free, gratis amusement till any hour of the morning they like. We do not regard this as very amusing. We think it is a very serious subject, and it may be that the haste with which we are passing through these Amendments in order to try to leave the field clear on Monday for the very important statement of the Chancellor is not giving a proper impression of the seriousness with which we regard it. I regard this as one of the worst examples we have come across in the whole Bill, because in all the other instances, however unreasonable it may be, the man does know that he has been made a criminal. He knows he is a criminal when he takes his gold pencil abroad and he knows he is a criminal when he allows anybody to postpone the payment of his debt for a week, but here he has no idea. He may find afterwards that what he considered perfectly reasonable the Treasury considers unreasonable, and that therefore he has committed a crime for which he is entitled to be prosecuted. He may be taken before the courts, and the Treasury will have to prove that it is unreasonable. That being so, I do not know whether it is possible to devise something which would give a little more certainty to the minds of people in this position and enable them to know before and not after the act whether what they arc doing is infringing one of these provisions. I am not asking the right hon. Gentleman for that at this stage, but if he would consider the point, about which I feel very strongly, to see whether any greater precision could be given by the 626 time we get to the Report stage, it would give a great deal of relief to me and my hon. Friends.

§ Mr. Dalton
I will look at it. I do not want to prolong discussion now because we are cooperating to try to make an arrangement which will meet the general wish of the Committee. I will certainly look at it, but my advice at the moment is that this is not a harsh situation into which to place a man, because it has got to be proved in a court of law. Very often the complaint has been that the courts are nor sufficiently brought in and that the Treasury may make an arbitrary decision. That is not so in this case, and in fact a case may be dismissed with costs against the Treasury. However, I will look at it. I say this by way of safeguarding my own position so that I shall not be charged with breach of faith if I cannot make a change. I will look at it open-mindedly to see if something can be done to meet the apprehensions of the right hon. Gentleman.

§ Lieut.-Commander Braithwaite
In view of the right hon. Gentleman's undertaking that he will re-examine this, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

§ Mr. J. Foster
I beg to move, in page 18, line 13, after "made," to insert "substantially."
This Amendment raises more or less the same point as the previous one. I hope that when the Chancellor is considering the point he has just mentioned, he will also look into the substance of this Amendment to see whether it will be possible to introduce the word "substantially," so that a man who does something which is intended to ensure that payment of an account shall be made in a manner slightly different from the manner specified in his application, shall not have committed an offence. For instance, if a man makes application to the Treasury for leave to export goods and get payment from a foreign country, specifying 90 days' bills on London, and wants to change the method of payment by having an irrevocable letter of credit, it would be unreasonable for that to be considered an offence and also, if he were made to go to the Treasury for every slight alteration. If the word "substantially" is put in the Bill, that is a thing 627 which a court of law could judge perfectly well. Would the Chancellor look at that when he is considering the other point?

§ Mr. Dalton
Yes, I will, but here I have legal advice which up to the moment is that this Amendment would introduce an element of doubt into the interpretation of the Clause, and that, it is felt by those who advise me, would be undesirable. However, I will look into it and see whether there is any means by which the particular case instanced could be met.

§ Mr. Foster
I appreciate that, and in the circumstances I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment. However, I would ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer to consider whether, if unreasonability is in doubt, probably substantiality does not arise.