Mr. BraithwaiteI beg to move, in page 4, line 30, to leave out subsection (4).
This is what is generally described as a Privilege Amendment. Hon. Members will be well aware that this Bill comes to us from another place, and on the Report stage their Lordships inserted this subsection to demonstrate their financial rectitude and that they were not in any way interfering with money matters nor impingeing on the privileges of this House. Now that we have reached this subsection we should like to delete it.
§ Mr. BennI should like to intervene very briefly, because it seems of some constitutional importance that when this Bill was introduced in another place this meaningless subsection was inserted to satisfy certain constitutional requirements in the relations between the two Houses.
It is not only this subsection which is remote from direct public control. Here is, in fact, the controller of the hon. Gentleman and the right hon. Gentleman sitting on the Front Bench over there. In negotiating on this Bill, we are not dealing with the real master in transport matters at all. He is tucked away in another place, beyond our reach. Therefore, it seems to me we should register a protest against the fact that the overlord dealing with the important question of transport should be beyond the reach of the House.
§ Amendment agreed to.
§ Clause, as amended, was ordered to stand part of the Bill.