HC Deb 21 July 1954 vol 530 c1493

Lords Amendment: In page 22, line 3, leave out from "before," to end of line 4, and insert: the commencement of this Act.

The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Commander T. D. Galbraith)

I beg to move, "That this House doth agree with the Lords in the said Amendment."

The purpose of the Amendment is to remove an anomaly that was pointed out by the hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser) during the Report stage of the Bill in this House. He then drew attention to the fact that as the Clause stood it exempted from the Rent Acts tenancies held from a housing association registered under the Industrial and Provident Societies Act, 1893, if the tenancies were of houses provided by the association before 13th November, 1953; while Clause 27, which should be read in conjunction with Clause 25, exempted from the Rent Acts any houses erected by the Association after the commencement of this Measure. That would result in a hiatus, as the hon. Member pointed out.

Mr. Fraser

As the Government appreciate, the Opposition were not happy about the principle of the Clause in the first place. But now that principle is accepted by Parliament, this seems to be a very proper Amendment and I am grateful to the Government for making it.