HC Deb 22 January 1954 vol 522 cc1416-28

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. T. G. D. Galbraith.]

3.57 p.m.

Sir David Robertson (Caithness and Sutherland)

I wish to raise the question of the appropriation of the Rifle Hall in Wick, the county town of Caithness, by the Caithness Territorial Association. It may well be that you have some recollection, Mr. Speaker, of that hall from your association with Caithness in another day. It is the principal public hall there. I think it might facilitate the understanding of the House if I quote from a Question which I asked the Secretary of State for War on 7th July last. I asked my right hon. Friend: if he is aware of the agreement reached at a meeting in Wick in January, when the Under-Secretary of State and the General Officer Commanding in Scotland met representatives of the Territorial Forces Association, the Provost and Town Clerk of Wick and the hon. Member for Caithness and Sutherland, for the partial use, by the people of Wick, of the Rifle Hall which they built and paid for; why it has not been carried out; and what steps he intends to take to honour the agreement. The Secretary of State replied: Yes, Sir. I was informed by my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State that there had been difficulties and he went personally to Wick to try to settle them. This he hoped had been achieved, but since the meeting I understand that the local Territorial and Auxiliary Forces Association state that there was some misapprehension. I am trying to sort it out. I asked the following supplementary question: Will my right hon. Friend expedite this, because it is six months since this meeting took place and it is not right that the people who bought and paid for this hall for joint use by themselves and the military should be totally excluded from it. That did not happen in two world wars. Why should it happen in peace? The Secretary of State answered: I can assure my hon. Friend that I am trying to sort it out but it is difficult to get things sorted out quickly when there is something of a deadlock locally.—[OFFICIAL REPORT. 7th July, 1953; Vol. 517, cc. 1023–4.] The history in regard to this matter is that about 1890 the volunteer movement in Caithness was flourishing, recruits were coming in, and a bigger hall was needed. Three very enterprising officers, with a fine spirit of public enterprise, decided to raise money to build a new hall in order to meet the needs of the people for a public hall. It was felt that that was the only way in which to get the money as they did not want a Government grant. They secured a suitable plot of land in the centre of the town and called a public meeting to announce their plans and it was clearly laid down in the newspapers of that time that the Rifle Hall was to be—

It being Four o'Clock, the Motion for the Adjournment of the House lapsed, without Question put.

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now adjourn."—[Mr. T. G. D. Galbraith.]

Sir D. Robertson

It was laid down at the preliminary meetings when arrangements were made for raising the money that the hall would be for the joint use of the local Volunteer companies of the First Sutherland Volunteers. There were two of them. The people of Wick, who were in such need of a public hall, responded, as they always do. They made donations and the women worked extraordinarily hard. A sum of £ 1,200, which was a tremendous amount of money in 1890, was raised to build the hall.

Shortly afterwards the two surviving officers of the three who set out on this excellent plan entered into a deed, called in Scottish law a "Disposition," whereby they conveyed the land and the hall built on it to themselves as the sole partners in a firm, or un-incorporated company, called the Rifle Drill Hall Company. They made no disclosure of this to the public. The people have been told that it would be their hall and that if ever the two companies were disbanded or wound up the hall would revert to Wick Town Council as the representatives of the people.

No disclosure of this step was made in the newspapers. That was appropriation of ownership by the War Office, which continues to this day. The people knew nothing about it and I suppose that the situation did not worry them as long as they had reasonable use of the hall, which they had right down to 1951, when an announcement was made that the Territorial Association would require the exclusive use of the hall for the training of a platoon of Seaforth Highlanders. Subsequently, the Army Boy Cadets were brought in and the Sea Cadets, of all people, for training. Later still, the Home Guard, not an effective battalion but simply a cadre, were brought there.

One cannot but feel that this was a deliberate attempt to increase the numbers who used the hall so that people could not complain. No one in my constituency would ever come between the military and any training, but feeling has been running high for a very long time. People feel that this is a deliberate and unnecessary obstruction by the military of the need of the public for a hall where they can hold concerts, dances and functions of all kinds, including political meetings.

It may interest the House if I quote from a letter which was addressed to the Town Clerk of Wick by Major David Sutherland who is one of the trustees. When the original trustees died, other trustees were appointed. They were always distinguished ex-officers of the Seaforth Highlanders, Volunteers or the Territorial Regiment, and they might be also members of the Territorial Association. They in turn let the hall to the Territorial Association.

Major Sutherland wrote: I was in Wick from 1908 to 1938 and from 1908 to 1927 I was an officer of the 5th Seaforth Highlanders and after the death of Colonel Buik I was appointed a trustee of the hall. During that time we had no trouble as to the training of the local company being interfered with by the letting of the upper hall to local bodies for concerts, public meetings, operas, dances, etc. If I remember rightly, Captain Milligan acted as secretary-treasurer of the hall and let both the large and small hall without interfering with drills, etc., although the Wick Company was then about 200 men instead of the present merely 30 or 40, so how we could let the halls then and they cannot allow it now, beats me. In the big hall we put in a fine pitch pine floor to improve dancing facilities, we put an emergency fire exit at the west end of the hall and neither did we neglect the interests of the troops who had their smoking and card rooms, their headquarters room, their armoury and store room and instructor's house on the ground floor. If I remember rightly in those days Army headquarters paid a yearly sum of £90 for the use of the hall for drill and other purposes, the rest of the upkeep of the hall was paid for by charges for concerts, political meetings, dances, operas, etc., etc. For several years operas such as 'The Mikado' and 'The Pirates of Penzance' were shown in the big hall for three or four nights in succession and late in 1925 and 1926 we had musical festivals with judges such as the late Sir Hugh Roberton. That was an unsolicited letter to the Town Clerk. There is another written to me by the gentleman who was editor of the "John o'Groat Journal" for about 50 years, who is still living in Wick. He writes: The Rifle Hall. Wick Although I am retired I still continue to take an interest in all local and general affairs, much as usual. If there is anyone remaining in Wick well acquainted with the circumstances in connection with the erection of the Rifle Hall I think I can claim to be that person. The Hall was erected primarily for public use"— primarily for public use— and for use by the Volunteers.…(That is why it was called the Rifle Hall.) It was so used for many years, and the public had the use of it for many years whenever required for meetings and entertainments of.all kinds. I took a personal interest in the three-days' public bazaar which was held in it to raise funds for the cost of its erection, and I reported each day's proceedings, as can still be seen in the files of the John o'Groat Journal. I was therefore familiar with the circumstances of its erection.… If at any time some 'agreement' was made to the effect that its use henceforth was to be under control of the military, the public could not have been fully informed of this, and I should think that any such agreement would have been ultra vires on the part of those who arranged it. My whole contention is that the use of the hall should be available to the public now as it was for many years without any question. That is the situation relating to the erection and the acquisition or seizure of the hall and its denial to the public of Wick since 1951.

The Town Clerk recently interviewed two members of the Territorial infantry platoon. Here is what one of them said: They were very lucky if they could muster 15 men per night"— in a large hall that could seat several hundred people for concerts or political meetings— Usually only 12 turned up. They only reed the hall itself on very rare occasions"— he meant the public hall; they use the lesser hall— for target practice the targets being set below the stage and that there was no reason why they should not do all of it at the drome. He believed in fact that there would be an increase in strength if they went to the drome as there would be a better canteen there. The second member of the Association stated that they met on Mondays and Thursdays— Occasionally they used the main hall for 10 minutes at the most and went downstairs to play ping-pong. This is the reason why this hall has been denied to the public of the largest town north of Inverness. I have been dealing with this matter for 18 months in an attempt to keep it from coming before the House. So has my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for War. I am sorry that he has to defend the action of the military in this case because he has tried to be most helpful and I believe that his views run along the same lines as mine. He flew up to Wick with General Barber, the General Officer Commanding in Scotland in January to meet members of the Territorial Force Association.

Thereafter he met the Provost of Wick, the Town Clerk and myself. He told us that a settlement would be reached if we agreed to the use of the hall on two days a week. The military only use it from Monday to Friday inclusive. They do not use it on Saturday or Sunday, which meant they were giving up one day, as on Saturday it would be available. The Provost and the Town Clerk did not think it was a sufficiently generous settlement, but, on reflection, they agreed to accept it.

That same night I attended a public meeting in Wick which had been arranged a long time previously and I opened my remarks by dealing with this matter. I referred to it as a common-sense settlement between two parties of public spirited people accentuated by good will. I went out of my way to say that there was no victory on either side, and I said that at a time when feeling was running very high in the town of Wick over the seizure of this hall.

The visit of the Under-Secretary of State and the General Officer Commanding in Scotland was greatly appreciated by the people of Wick, by the Town Council and by myself. There is not the slightest doubt that the Under-Secretary of State for War thought he had entered into a proper and a fair agreement. He wrote to me on 14th January: I think it is wise to send you the enclosed notes I have drawn out in the form of an appendix to show what I believe to be the basis of an arrangement to which everybody agrees —to which everybody agrees. You may want to send this on to the Provost and/or the Town Clerk, and therefore I am sending it to you and have not sent it direct to them. A similar appendix has been sent direct to Scottish Command. The appendix contained the following Clauses. The problem therefore resolves itself into how the main hall can be made available on say, two nights a week for the use of the townspeople. It is at present not available for two reasons: (a) because the training programme has been drafted in such a way as to require the main hall on five evenings out of the week, and (b)on the sixth evening it is of no value to the townspeople because access to the ladies' lavatories and cloakroom is prevented by the Home Guard storage needs. The Association and the military authorities concerned are prepared to adjust their training programme in such a way as to make the main hall available on two nights during the week, one of which will be a Saturday. There can be no dispute that the Undersecretary of State genuinely believed he bad entered into a proper and binding agreement—as we did.

He wrote to me on 29th January: Scottish Command have been instructed to take the necessary action in conjunction with the Territorial Association. They will be able to arrange with their architect to draw up the plans and we can then see exactly what needs to be done. I very much hope that, if all goes well, we shall be able to make a start in this in the financial year 1953–54. That refers to some minor structural alterations.

Unfortunately my hon. Friend was taken seriously ill about that time and be was out of action for quite a period. I did not press the matter, although my constituents were pressing me. They were wondering what was happening, and why in the summer of last year an agreement entered into the previous January had not been fulfilled.

This Territorial Association is also responsible for the training of a Territorial artillery battery. They do not train them in this hall. They take them out to the aerodrome, not 10 minutes' walk from the centre of the town, and there this battery, with their heavy guns, are trained. I imagine there are many more men in the battery than in the platoon of infantry. Any reasonable man would say, "Why do you not take the infantry out to the aerodrome and train them there on the greensward and the runways?" During the war this aerodrome accommodated 3,000 fighting airmen. They lived there and were trained there. But what is good enough for the artillery does not seem to be right for the infantry. The Sea Cadets have a perfectly good hall of their own. There would be no difficulty in getting a hall for the boy cadets. One of the schoolrooms would do.

This is the military at its worst. We all know how the military invariably take far more than they should when requisitioning properties or land. But this is in peace-time, and not in war. I maintain that it is wholly wrong. At the last General Election I, and I suppose other candidates, had to go to a wooden shack, which let in the rain, for the eve of the poll meeting in the chief county town. Many people were unable to get into the hall. There were many more outside, while I suppose that this hall remained unused. At the previous General Election in 1950 I had to go to a cinema which was wholly unsuitable for a public meeting. What is much more important than that is that this ancient centre of civilisation, this the largest town north of Inverness, has a hall which the people bought with their own savings and which they cannot use. Some of the men worked for nothing. Mastermasons and other craftsmen gave materials at less than cost, and we are now told that the military must have the hall while the aerodrome is lying idle and unused.

The ownership of this hall is wrong. The military are not entitled to own it. If there had been a disclosure of what they did there would have been a public outcry. I do not dispute that there may be some legal quirk whereby the people cannot obtain possession now; but that would not matter at all to the people at Wick if they could get reasonable use of the hall. They are only too anxious that the military should have every facility for training men and boys. I dislike intensely having to criticise any part of the Armed Forces of Britain. I have much too high a regard for them, but I should lose my self-respect if I did not ventilate this matter today.

It is wrong that the Under-Secretary and the general officer commanding in Scotland should enter into this agreement and that nothing should happen because the local Territorial Association, supported by the officer commanding the 51st Division, have dug their heels in and said, "Oh, no. We will not agree; we admit that we did agree when you were here, but there has been a misunderstanding." It seems to me that the Under-Secretary of State and his right hon. Friend and General Barber should oppose this instead of saying, "They have changed their mind, and that is that." It would be much more fitting if they said that these men are more concerned about winning this fight than they are about the training of Territorials.

I challenge them to send up any independent soldier of experience and standing to view the situation as it exists in Wick today. I am certain that he would say, "Get out of this ancient hall into the fresh air." Wars are not fought in halls. Like so many others, I served in the First World War and I was never in a hall from the day I joined the Army until the day I left. I was trained in the open air by day and night. That is where all soldiers should be trained. I hope that my hon. Friend will be able to tell the House that this very great wrong will be put right without further delay.

4.19 p.m.

The Under-Secretary of State for War (Mr. J. R. H. Hutchison)

In the course of voluminous correspondence, my hon. Friend the Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Sir D. Robertson) warned me that if this matter reached the Floor of the House he would go into action with all his biggest guns. There is no more alarming prospect than that. I know no more doughty fighter and, indeed, no more successful fighter for his constituency than my hon. Friend. But I do not think that he has in fact used his heaviest guns today. Consequently, to a certain extent, I am left intact to be able to answer the criticisms and questions that he put, so far as time allows me.

I am not surprised that there is a rather empty House to hear this story of a hall almost on the confines of the United Kingdom. My hon. Friend and I are left to perform a duet; but a duet to be effective should have some harmony in it. I am afraid that towards the end of his remarks the harmony starts to disappear, but the harmony does at least say that the War Office are anxious to help in this matter.

The War Office and I have considerable sympathy for the attitude and arguments of my hon. Friend and the town council, and there is no attitude less attractive than that of a dog-in-the-manger. I can assure my hon. Friend that that is not what is behind this story. I have to remember what the first duty of the War Office is, why I am here and why the hall is there. The hall is there to provide for the efficiency and well-being of the Forces of this country. It is with that in mind that we have to make arrangements and it is with that in mind that we make the offer which I shall state.

Following the well-known military procedure of reconnoitring on the spot, I decided to see the place for myself. So I picked up my Wick papers— with apologies to Dickens—and made my way up to the scene of operations. It is a long way to Wick and it is no simple matter getting there, but it is a much simpler matter to get to Wick than to find a solution to the problem, and the nearer I got to the famous Rifle Hall the more intractable did I find the problem. I have considerable sympathy with my hon. Friend if all his problems are as thorny as this one and the partisans as determined as the ones in this case; he must have a very difficult time indeed.

My hon. Friend spoke about a meeting at which I was helped by the G.O.C-in-C. Scottish Command, the chairman of the Territorial Association, the acting secretary and a representative of the trustees. A very material point is that there is in the hall a miniature rifle range, for that is what makes it so important for us to keep the hall.

We gave the problem considerable thought and examined the hall. I considered that I had reached a conclusion—I heard no dissentient voice—which might form the basis of an agreement on the lines which my hon. Friend read out. But apparently I was under a misapprehension. When the matter came to be considered in detail the military experts responsible for the training and welfare of the units in Wick informed me that it was not possible adequately to carry out the training if they were limited to the use of the hall on only four nights a week.

In my position, I must pay a great deal of attention to the opinion of experts on the spot. I was rather abashed by this change of front, and I asked for the situation to be re-examined. A senior officer concerned with the Territorial Army at the War Office went to Wick, re-examined the matter and came to the same conclusion. The use of the hall was withdrawn not in 1951, as my hon. Friend said, but in 1950. Since then our commitments have increased. The Home Guard has been formed, and the numbers belonging to the company—not platoon—of Seaforth Highlanders and cadets have grown.

One of the solutions which was offered to me then and has been offered now is that we could remove from the hall and train out on the airfield. That suggestion has two or three disadvantages. First, we should be on the airfield on a tenure of one month; secondly, on mobilisation, the airfield might be required for other purposes and would not be available to us; and, thirdly, even 10 minutes' walk on a wet and blustery night tends to discourage recruiting.

On the legal side of this matter, there is absolutely no doubt. The question of the use of this hall was submitted to counsel's opinion in 1947, and the legal authorities were again consulted in 1952, and both authorities declared that the prior claim and use of this hall was intended to be given, and still should be given, to military purposes. My hon. Friend has talked about the availability of the hall as if the public were totally excluded. That is not so, and it will not be so after I have finished speaking today.

At the time of the Election, I am informed, the hall was made available and was used by all three political parties, and it was also offered to the town at the time of the Coronation, but no use was made of it. So there have been occasions upon which, even after 1950, the hall has either been made use of or has been offered to the town, and I want to make that point quite clear.

What, then, can we do? I would sum up the situation by saying that the Territorial Association are prepared to make the hall available on Saturday nights, subject to the following provisions, first, that the town council will make a reasonable payment for the use of the hall on these occasions and, secondly, that this right may be withdrawn by the Association after giving reasonable notice Beyond that, in the present circumstances. I am unable to go.

Circumstances alter cases, and I dare say that, in the future, something more may be able to bed one, but we cannot, in the face of all these responsibilities for the training and efficiency of the Seaforth Highlanders, the Home Guard and cadets, ignore the advice given us, and take the risk of having an untrained unit or sub-unit in that part of the country by making over the hall to the people of Wick and denying it to the military, whose needs it was intended to serve. It is vitally necessary to their training, efficiency and well-being.

Sir D. Robertson

How is it that the artillery, who are even more numerous can manage to do this 10 minutes' walk in the wind and the rain? Do they get transport? I imagine that they get a lorry. Why cannot the infantrymen be taken there in the same way?

Mr. Hutchison

I cannot answer as to whether artillerymen are carried in lorries or not, but the training of artillery requires different facilities, different areas and different subjects to the training of the infantryman, and I dare say that, if there was a representative of the gunners present, he would say that he would much prefer, were it possible, to be trained in the Rifle Hall, but the circumstances of their training are so different that it cannot be carried out in the way my hon Friend suggests.

Sir Herbert Williams (Croydon, East)

I have no interest in this debate, and I have only been to Wick once in my life and that was about 15 years ago, but I think there was a great deal lacking in the Minister's reply about the use of this hall. There is no particular evidence that the hall is effectively used on five days of the week, and, even if it is, I think it would be very useful if the Minister would provide my hon. Friend with the details of its use.

Mr. Hutchison

It is perfectly simple. On five days of the week, the hall is required either for lectures or cinema shows on military subjects, but mainly for the miniature rifle range, because there is nowhere else where they can do their shooting. There is an average attendance of 15 to 18 on five nights of the week.

Question put, and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at Twenty-nine Minutes past Four o'Clock.