CLAUSE 72.—(Meaning of "hypothetical 1938 cost of construction.") (Hansard, 19 February 1948)

§ Mr. Turton
I beg to move, in page 43, line 24, to leave out "comparable houses and buildings," and to insert: houses and building affording comparable accommodation. The point of this Amendment and of this part of the Clause is that in compiling the 1938 erection costs, the Minister has to make allowance for those areas where erection costs are unduly high as a result of the circumstances of the country. In Committee we argued that in the hills where we build in stone the local authorities have to pay an extra £100 a house for building. It would be desirable to insert the words of the Amendment, and I hope the Minister will accept them because it will enable that due allowance to be made which I am sure the House wants to see.

§ Brigadier Prior-Palmer
I beg to second the Amendment.

§ Mr. Bevan
I think I indicated in Committee that I was ready to accept words which would convey this meaning, and I have pleasure in accepting the Amendment.

§ Mr. Walker-Smith
I beg to move, in line 29, at the end, to insert: (4) Any person or local authority who is or are aggrieved by any statement prepared by the Minister as aforesaid may, within twenty-one days from the date of the making of the said statement, appeal to the tribunal by which disputes fall to be determined under Section one of the Acquisition of Land (Assessment of Compensation) Act, 1919, and the tribunal may direct that the statement be amended as appears to them to be necessary to give effect to the contention of the appellant. This Amendment is concerned with the statement which the Minister is under obligation to prepare in accordance with the provisions of Subsection (2) of this Clause. It relates to the important question of the hypothetical 1938 cost of construction. As the House knows, this is the level of valuation of post-1918 local authority houses and small post-1918 dwellinghouses which are not local authority houses or flats or maisonettes. It is, therefore, of considerable importance that these statements should be as precisely compiled as possible, and should be subjected to any impartial or objective test possible, because these state- 1454 ments become under Subsection (4) of this Clause the basis whereby the valuation officer values the particular house.
As the Clause stands at present, the Minister prepares the statement embodying the specification, and the statement in relation to the specification, of the sum which is to be taken for the purpose of the Clause as the 1938 cost of constructing the house. This Amendment would provide an appeal against the statement thereby arrived at, and it is the purpose of this Amendment to provide an appeal to an expert and technical tribunal which would be able to adjudicate upon the technical question of the formulating of these important specifications. It is a safeguard against error or discrimination which I think will commend itself to the good sense of the House, and the feeling of hon. Members for equity and precision in these important matters.

§ Brigadier Prior-Palmer
I beg to second the Amendment.

§ Mr. Bevan
I am afraid I must resist this Amendment. Hon. Members who were Members of the Committee will recollect that we had some discussion about this point, and in order to meet some of the anxieties expressed then, I have now made it quite clear by Amendment that the local rating authority is first to be consulted as to what sites have been identified and as to what specifications have been made. In addition to that, I have also made provision that these specifications and the sites identified are to be open for local inspection. It would be entirely inconsistent with the whole scheme if a tribunal were imported into the machinery at this stage, because it would quarrel with the whole principle of direct responsibility to the House of Commons. We could not farm that out to any tribunal. These matters are purely factual, and if any information were needed it would be found.

§ Mr. Turton
Surely, the Minister is exercising a quasi-judicial function in this matter. There should be an appeal where a local authority or a person is aggrieved. That does not seem to be a big thing for which to ask. The Minister has said that consultation has already been provided for, but there is a great deal of difference between consultation and getting agreement. He may say that there has been consultation with the doctors, but he has 1455 not got agreement. In view of that parallel, I hope he will think about it again.

§ Mr. Bevan
I hope that the hon. Member will not import any feeling into the matter at this stage. We are getting on very amiably and if he will exercise a little restraint at this stage, we shall be able to finish our discussions as amiably as they have continued so far. If the Minister is exercising quasi-judicial functions, as he will in this matter, it is entirely inconsistent that the Minister should be appealed against to an outside body It is an extraordinary doctrine to lay down. One can have a tribunal when dealing merely with administration, but in a quasi-judicial matter to provide for appeal to an outside body is entirely wrong.

§ Mr. Turton
There is the parallel of the Pensions Appeal Act, where the appeal is to an outside body and there are many precedents.

§ Mr. Bevan
That is an appeal tribunal within the scheme. Here we have something entirely different.

§ Hr. Turton
No.

§ Mr. Bevan
It would not be incorporated as an integral part of the machinery. If we were going to have a tribunal of this sort there are other forms of appeal which it could exercise. To have a tribunal at this stage in the Bill would be a complete abnormality. In any case, protection has been given by the concessions which have been made, and I think hon. Members should be satisfied with them.

§ Lieut.-Colonel Elliot
I do not think the Minister fully appreciates the difficulty of the subject. He has fully interpreted the responsibility of the judge, of the Minister, but, after all, the Executive is continually gaining a position of greater and greater power and authority over the individual. Here the unhappy individual Is to be referred to one of the most hypothetical and tenuous things of which we could possibly conceive—the cost of a house in the year 1938, from which we are receding year after year. It becomes a matter of archaeological research as to what the cost of constructing such a house would be.

§ Mr. Bevan
If a particular house is identified, how can that be archaeological research? It is a matter of continuous record.

§ Lieut.-Colonel Elliot
The whole purpose of archaeological research is the preservation of continuous record—

§ Mr. Bevan
No.

§ Lieut.-Colonel Elliot
It is, to establish and preserve a continuous record. I do not think the right hon. Gentleman really appreciates the difficulty in which the subject will be placed. He will wish to check it and refer it to some form of arbiter. Even a judge is allowed arbiters when he sits in deliberation on difficult matters. This is a key Clause and deals with one of the main difficulties of this Bill. The Clause has for its rubric: Meaning of hypothetical 1938 cost of construction, and any of us who have to refer back to accounts of our own relating to constructions with which we are well acquainted are often taken aback by finding how widely they vary from those which are ruling at the time, and we find it necessary to check and recheck before we admit that those costs were expended. How much more unhappy will be the subject who has to check and recheck costs which the local authority expended on what the Minister said was an actual house but which has been laid down as: "comparable houses and buildings," or now, "houses and buildings of comparable accommodation."
I suggest to the Minister that he has not completely met the point here. It may be that the words of the Amendment are inappropriate, but there still remains the difficulty in which the subject will be in trying to establish his position against the powerful and inexorable machinery of the Executive. The House, in framing this statute, should always lean towards the position of the subject in every way and weight it against the Executive, even though it appears to the Executive to be an unreasonable demand which is being made. The Executive should yield to the desire of hon. Members certainly on this side of the House, and I believe in other parts of the House also, to make easier the position in which the ordinary man—and this affects all the ordinary men in the whole Kingdom—will be in dealing with this absolutely novel procedure. We are 1457 faced with a new valuation, sweeping away all the old valuations since the beginning of time, and we have this new proposal, the hypothetical cost of construction. There should be some form of additional safeguard here. The Minister would be well advised to give this matter a little further consideration.