Clause 1.—(EXTENSION OF SCOPE OF WHITE FISH SUBSIDY, AND POWER TO INCREASE LIMIT ON SUBSIDIES.)

HC Deb 13 February 1961 vol 634 cc1081-198

Motion made, and Question proposed, That the Clause stand part of the Bill.

10.20 p.m.

Mr. George Brown (Belper)

Before we go any further with this discussion, while the Leader of the House is still with us, will you permit me, Sir Norman, to ask the right hon. Gentleman what the Government's intentions are on this Bill? It is a Bill of tremendous importance, raising important issues and dealing with large sums of public money. The hour is already late and we want to know whether it is the intention of the Leader of the House and of the Government to push the Bill through whatever the time may be. On the other hand, does the right hon. Gentleman not think that it would be a good thing if we took a Bill as important as this at a rather more convenient hour, when the public's attention could be focused on our proceedings?

The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. R. A. Butler)

The right hon. Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown) will remember that we had further Government business in the shape of a major Bill which we decided not to take tonight. In view of the arrangement of business, we decided to take this Bill through its Committee stage. That is our intention. I suggest that we try to make progress, making constructive criticisms, because normally the Bill would not have been expected to be very controversial. It is the sort of Bill which it would have been not unreasonable to have taken at this hour, and I think that we should see what progress we make and try to make as much progress as we can.

Mr. Hector Hughes (Aberdeen, North)

Does the Leader of the House recollect that on former occasions when fishery Bills have come before the House at a late hour there have been protests from both sides of the House that fishing should be treated as the Cinderella of industries and saying that there was no reason why such Bills should not be taken at an earlier hour? On Second Reading, I made the point and the Minister concerned promised that the remaining stages of the Bill would be taken at an earlier hour. This practice is becoming too much of a habit, and it is an insult to a great industry that its interests should be debated always late at night. I therefore ask the Leader of the House to make other arrangements so that the Bill can be discussed adequately in the daytime and not late at night.

Mr. Harold Lever (Manchester, Cheetham)

On a point of order. In the light of what has occurred today and in view of the protracted nature of the debate which we have just had, would it be in order, Sir Norman, for someone to move to report Progress?

The Temporary Chairman (Sir Norman Hulbert)

That is a hypothetical question as no one has yet moved that Motion.

Mr. Lever

I beg to move, That the Chairman do report Progress and ask leave to sit again.

The Temporary Chairman

I am not prepared to accept that Motion.

Mr. Harold Wilson (Huyton)

Before we proceed to the substance of this important Bill, upon which many of my hon. Friends will have important contributions to make, may I ask if the Leader of the House is really satisfied about what he is asking the House to do?

The Temporary Chairman

I have said that I will not accept the Motion to report Progress. Therefore, any discussion of this nature is quite irregular. The Question is, That the Clause stand part of the Bill.

Mr. James H. Hoy (Edinburgh, Leith)

Before we proceed with the Clause, perhaps we may have an explanation regarding the Amendment. As a result of discussions we had when we were debating the Financial Resolution we decided to place an Amendment on the Order Paper. Are we to understand that it is not being called?

The Temporary Chairman

The Amendment is out of order.

Mr. Hoy

May we ask why it is out of order?

The Temporary Chairman

I can certainly tell the hon. Member why. It is outside the terms of the Money Resolution.

Mr. Hector Hughes

I am a supporter of the Amendment—

The Temporary Chairman

Order. The hon. and learned Member may or may not support the Amendment, but I have ruled it out of order, because it is outside the terms of the Money Resolution.

Mr. E. G. Willis (Edinburgh, East)

Can you help the Committee, Sir Norman? When the Money Resolution was before the House we had a long discussion about this. At what stage in the proceedings of the Bill can we amend the figure of £3 million?

The Temporary Chairman

The simple answer to the hon. Member is that he cannot amend the Money Resolution.

Mr. Hector Hughes

This works a very great injustice to people who are interested in the Bill. It is unjust that they should not receive any notice until the last moment that the Amendment is out of order. In my respectful submission, the Amendment is not out of order—

The Temporary Chairman

Order. I must inform the hon. and learned Member that I have given my Ruling. The Amendment is out of order because it is outside the terms of the Money Resolution.

Mr. Douglas Jay (Battersea, North)

As you have allowed the Leader of the House to make a short statement with regard to the Bill, Sir Norman, is it in order for me to address a question to the Leader of the House following his statement?

The Temporary Chairman

Does the right hon. Gentleman desire to question my Ruling by asking such a question of the Leader of the House?

Mr. Jay

No, Sir. I wish to follow your Ruling by asking the Leader of the House to elucidate his statement a little further.

The Temporary Chairman

We cannot have an irregular discussion. I have said that I will not accept the Motion to report Progress.

Mr. Hoy

This is an important change in the fishing industry, as the Minister will no doubt agree. So far, the industry has not paid subsidies of any kind to distant water trawlers. Because of the state of the industry, and as a result of the Report of the Fleck Committee, this extension of subsidies has been incorporated in the Bill. We shall have to watch very closely how it works, because changes will take place in the available fishing grounds, and we have not yet reached an agreement with Iceland as to the position in which our trawlers will be. I wonder whether the distant water fleet will be able to find grounds. I know that the Minister will argue that it is because of these difficulties that the Government have decided to extend the fishing subsidies in this way. That is within the scope of the Clause.

Some people, however, think that the subsidies might have been deferred for some time, and there are many others who think that they should be given for only a limited period, until such time as the distant water fleet completes the whole scheme of reorganisation as a result of the changes that are to take place, over which the industry has no control, in that certain new vessels will replace existing ones. We might be involved in considerable expenditure which will be essential for the well-being of that section of the British fishing fleet.

10.30 p.m.

Because of that, during discussion on the Money Resolution I asked the Minister to withdraw it. He was asking this Committee of the whole House to which the Bill has been referred to discuss freely and fully what the financial provisions might be, but we have not freedom to discuss them because the Minister insisted on presenting us with a Money Resolution which binds us to a sum not exceeding £3 million. The case might arise in which, because of certain plans, a sum even greater than that may be necessary to meet our needs. We wanted the Minister to leave the Committee free to make suggestions about how that position might be met, but unfortunately we cannot do that tonight because the Money Resolution was so tightly drawn that we have not any right as a Committee to make any suggestions to the Government.

In presenting that argument we thought we were giving the Minister freedom which he was denying himself and also asking that we should retain the right of the House of Commons to make suggestions, but that has gone by the board. I say to the Minister once more that I could not understand the argument he put before the House in one of his many interventions at that stage. The Minister, in reply to representations by my hon. Friends and myself, said: He should realise that this is not a once-for-all £3 million. When the Bill is enacted, if he thinks the £3 million is insufficient he can recommend the Government to come back wth another Order, which is within their power under the Bill."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 31st January, 1961; Vol. 633, c. 911.]

That is exactly what we were complaining about; we had no power to do that. We could suggest that there was not sufficient money, but there was no power left for this Committee to do anything about it. All we could hope to do was by some overwhelming case to make it obvious to the Minister that he would have to bring in another Money Resolution. As a result of the Resolution being so tightly drawn, the Minister is in the position that if proposals are made by the industry and approved by the Government entailing £3½ million, the Minister will have to come to the House with two orders, one for £3 million and one for £½ million. It seems absurd that neither the House nor the Minister has the right to meet such a situation.

I am bound to recall what was said by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kettering (Mr. Mitchison), who outlined the duty of the Government. We believe that by drawing the Resolution so tightly the Minister has deprived us of our right. On behalf of my hon. and right hon. Friends, I make a strong protest to the Minister about the financial provisions in the Bill and the Financial Resolution.

10.35 p.m.

Mr. E. G. Willis (Edinburgh, East)

I associate myself with the protest which has been made by my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, Leith (Mr. Hoy). We pursued this matter on the Money Resolution, without much satisfaction, and because we had little satisfaction it is impossible for us to amend the Clause to enable us to discuss certain points in connection with it. I hope that some of my hon. Friend's questions will be answered by one of the Ministers present. I do not know which will reply, but, in addition to the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food we have with us, I am delighted to say, the Secretary of State for Scotland. I hope that both Ministers are well briefed for a long session.

The Clause contains an important departure in the principle of paying subsidies. For the first time in the history of the country we propose to pay subsidies to the distant water fleet. This is a departure and not a continuation of something which has been going on for years. We ought, therefore, to discuss it.

I made some comments on Second Reading, some of which I wish to repeat, not only to express my point of view but also to get some answers. The Government are guilty of a bit of sharp practice. They have jumped the gun. They are giving effect to one of the important recommendations of the Fleck Committee before we have had a chance to discuss the Fleck Committee's Report. Surely the House should have discussed the various aspects of that Report, and the Minister should have stated what he intends to do as a result of it, before this Clause was introduced asking us to put into operation one of the most important recommendations of the Committee.

It is difficult to dissociate the debate from the Fleck Committee's Report, because the argument whether we should give the subsidy at present is bound up with that Report. According to the Fleck Committee, we can expect no diminution in fish landings but we can expect a diminution in the size of the fishing fleet. As I said on Second Reading, before we agree to the subsidy the Minister should tell us what he expects the size of the distant water fleet to be when the Fleck Committee's proposals are put into operation. We are discussing a subject when we have not full information about it. We are discussing granting a new subsidy to part of a fishing fleet when we do not know its future size. That is like asking for a blank cheque. Unless we examine this procedure we are not doing our job.

10.45 p.m.

There was a minority Report by George Middleton against the granting of a subsidy to the distant water fleet. He said that many men in this section of the industry had gone about the country boasting of the profits they were making. I have not the Report with me, but that was the purport of his observations. He said that we should think carefully before we extended the subsidy to this section of the fleet, because many people in it were not in need of a subsidy.

What will be the result of this action? We are now for the first time extending a subsidy to this section of the fishing fleet. This will enable it to be modernised and make it possible for it to adapt itself to the new conditions in which it will have to operate. We shall make it more efficient and more capable of obtaining its catch, bringing it to these shores and marketing it.

If we are to do that with no knowledge of the future size of the fleet, given the general background of the Report, namely that there is to be a slight overall reduction in the size of the fishing fleet, this section will benefit at the expense of the inshore fleet. I pointed this out on Second Reading, and as a Scottish Member of Parliament I think this is particularly important for Scotland. Over 50 per cent. of the catch in Scotland is landed by inshore fishermen. Scottish Members of Parliament must watch this, because it is something of a threat to the inshore fishing fleet. [An HON. MEMBER: "No."] Perhaps the hon. Member will take part in the debate and enlighten me. I am willing to be enlightened, because I am not an authority on this. If the fishing fleet as a whole is to be reduced in size and we are now setting about making this section more able to fish efficiently in the future, the remainder of the fleet will suffer a disadvantage.

Mr. John Hall (Wycombe)

Is it not the fact that the inshore fishing fleets on the whole obtain quality fish, whereas the distant water trawlers go after cod and coarser fish of that kind? They do not compete with one another.

Mr. Willis

That may be so, but it does not answer my question.

Mr. H. Lever

Is it not a fact that, though the inshore fleets, seeking as they do quality fish, compared with the rather coarser fish sought by the distant water fleet, do not compete with the distant water fleet in the market sense, they do compete for Labour and for crews? I do not pretend to have expertise, and it would help the Committee if some of the experts helped the more innocent members of the Committee as the debate proceeds.

Mr. Willis

My hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Cheetham (Mr. H. Lever) has pointed out some of the problems we should discuss before we pass the Clause.

Mr. Thomas Steele (Dunbartonshire, West)

My hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, East (Mr. Willis) should point out to the Committee that we recognise that the inshore fishing fleet catches fish of quality, but the quantity comes from the distant water fleet.

10.45 p.m.

Mr. Willis

Certainly. In England, the great bulk of the catch comes from the distant water fleet. In Scotland, that is not the case, and I am anxious to insure the position of the Scottish inshore fleets. It is very important. Most of the ports round Fife and up the East Coast and down the West Coast of Scotland are in this category, and we cannot now afford to see anything happening that will lessen the employment possibilities of the industry. That is particularly true of the Highlands and Islands, which we are currently discussing in connection with another Bill. It is one of the problems of Scotland. We have seen fishing ports completely die there in the last ten or fifteen years—

The Temporary Chairman

The hon. Member is wandering rather far from the Clause.

Mr. R. T. Paget (Northampton)

With respect, Sir Norman, we are dealing with a Clause that, in effect, subsidies the deep water fishing at the expense of the inshore fishing. [HON. MEMBERS: "No."] Oh, yes. [Interruption.] It certainly seems to me that 'the effect is that if more is given to the distant water fleet the amount available for the inshore fishing fleet may be less—and probably will be less—in total. That, of course, must have an effect on the inshore fishing ports. It therefore seems to me that the effect on those ports must be not good.

The Temporary Chairman

A good deal of what the hon. and learned Gentleman says would be in order, but on this Clause it is not in order to discuss the merits of the inshore fishing.

Mr. A. Woodburn (Clackmannan and East Stirlingshire)

Further to that point of order, Sir Norman. Is it not the case the Government have laid down a financial policy that puts ceilings on expenditure? For instance, they tell us that the National Health Service expenditure must not rise because that would deplete other expenditure—

The Temporary Chairman

Order. I am sure the right hon. Gentleman appreciates that there is nothing about the National Health Service in the Bill or the Clause.

Mr. Woodburn

I was using that as an analogy. If that is the Government's financial policy there would be something in the point raised by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Northampton (Mr. Paget). If there is a ceiling, and if one expenditure goes up the chances are that the other will go down in order to maintain the ceiling—

The Temporary Chairman

I must remind the right hon. Gentleman that there is nothing about a ceiling in the Clause we are now discussing.

Mr. H. Lever

On a point of order, Sir Norman. I understood you to rule that anything relating to inshore fishing would be out of order on this Clause—

Mr. Tom Driberg (Barking)

No, he did not say that.

Mr. Lever

I thought that that was the effect. If so, Sir Norman, I submit that when we have a Clause which, for the first time, allows a subsidy to longdistance fishing it surely makes it relevant to discuss the effects of that on inshore and middle water fishing.

The Temporary Chairman

The Ruling I gave on the Clause is that it is not in order to discuss the merits of inshore fishing.

Mr. Jay

What the Clause does is to extend the scope of the white fish subsidy. It seems to me that the effect is to extend it beyond ships not exceeding 140 feet in length; that is to say, the larger vessels. In that case, surely we are extending the subsidy to at least other than to inshore fleets. It surely follows from that that it is contradictory; that it may have a deleterious effect on the inshore fishing. Surely, therefore, my hon. Friend is in order to argue that we must have reference to the inshore fishing.

Mr. Driberg

And, with great respect, Sir Norman, the Clause also says that this power shall be exercisable irrespective of the size of the vessel or of the nature of the voyage

The Temporary Chairman

I have also read the Clause, and what I have tried to tell the Committee on two or three occasions is that it is not in order to discuss on this Clause the merits or demerits of inshore fishing.

Mr. Steele

Further to that point of order, Sir Norman. Is it not quite clear that what the Bill does is to extend the subsidy to ships of a particular size, irrespective of where they are fishing? In the Explanatory Memorandum appear the words in respect of fish caught (whether within those waters or not)". The indication is that it extends the powers the Government have already, only it extends them to ships or a larger size. Therefore, I submit that it opens a discussion of whether the giving of this extra power to the Government will mean that there will be for inshore fishing a diminution of subsidy. I think that this should be argued. Indeed, the hon. Member for Banff (Sir W. Duthie) raised this very matter on Second Reading and asked for assurances from the Minister.

Mr. Hector Hughes

Further to that point of order, Sir Norman. My hon. Friend has called in aid the Explanatory Memorandum. We need not call in aid the Explanatory Memorandum. We have only to look at Clause 1 (1) to see that the words are—leaving out the unnecessary parts The power … to pay grants … shall be exericisable irrespective of the size of the vessel or of the nature of the voyage". Surely, that is extended enough to justify the reference made to the matter by my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, East (Mr. Willis).

Mr. Frederick Willey (Sunderland, North)

Further to that point of order, Sir Norman. It would surely be in order to go this far. The Clause extends subsidy to the long distance vessels. The long distance vessels fish in competition with the inshore vessels and the middle water fleets. If that is so, and this is a new subsidy, it must be in order to discuss the merits of the middle water and inshore boats the fishing of which will be prejudiced by the fact that the subsidy is to be extended to the long distance ships.

The Temporary Chairman

It is in order to discuss inshore fishing only in relation to the subsidy.

Mr. Willis

That is what we are doing, Sir Norman.

The Temporary Chairman

I said earlier, and I repeat now, that it is not in order to discuss the general merits or demerits of inshore fishing.

Mr. A. R. Wise (Rugby)

On a point of order, Sir Norman. Many of us on this side of the Committee are enjoying and are interested in the speech of the hon. Member for Edinburgh, East (Mr. Willis). Could you appeal to his own side to leave him alone to make it?

The Temporary Chairman

I think that the hon. Member should now be allowed to continue.

Mr. Paget

With respect, Sir Norman, these bogus points of order which are raised should incur some censure, even if they come from the Government side. We have just heard from the hon. Member for Rugby which is quite patently a bogus point of order. The hon. Gentleman himself must have known, as everyone else knew, that it was not a point of order.

The Temporary Chairman

I condemn bogus points of order whatever their source.

Mr. Driberg

On a point of order, Sir Norman. With great respect, would you be good enough to explain, for the guidance of the Committee, how it is possible to discuss the share in a subsidy which one considers should legitimately be allocated to inshore fishing without impinging to some extent on the respective merits of inshore and distant fishing?

The Temporary Chairman

I told the hon. Member that he was not in order because it was not in the Clause.

Mr. James Callaghan (Cardiff, South-East)

May I follow that up, Sir Norman? I think we are all anxious to make progress, and we are very sorry that some hon. Members should be detained in order that their Chief Whip may be taught a lesson. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh".] Hon. Members will hear more about it as the night wears on. The point I wish to address to you, Sir Norman, is very simple. What some of us fear, knowing this Government, is that in due course, after this increase in subsidy has been given, another Chancellor of the Exchequer will come along and cut it down.

If we accept this Clause, including the deep water boats of over 140 feet, it is bound to affect the subsidy that can be applied to the inshore and middle water fleets. That being so, it is surely open to us to argue that it is a mistake to extend the subsidy beyond the inshore and middle water fishing fleets because of the effect it may have when the Chancellor of the Exchequer wants to cut it down.

I think that my hon. Friend the Member for Barking (Mr. Driberg) was on a good point. How can we argue the effect of the subsidy on these two fleets which at the present time receive it without arguing the merits of those fleets we think should be entitled to receive it, as against vessels of over 140 feet which the Government propose should be included?

Mr. Driberg

While welcoming my hon. Friend's support, I am not here to teach any Chief Whip a lesson. I would not be so presumptuous. I am here out of a deep, sincere, and gluttonous interest in fish.

Mr. Willis

I must thank you, Sir Norman, for your guidance. Some time ago, when I was busily touring around the Highlands of Scotland, I was dealing with the merits or demerits of inshore fishing. I was saying that we have to ask ourselves what effect this additional subsidy is going to have on the other parts of the fishing fleets. That is a legitimate question to ask in deciding whether or no we are to pass this Clause.

I had previously pointed out the very difficult position that the Government have placed us in by taking one of the main recommendations of the Fleck Committee out of context, asking us to pass it without telling us what their attitude is towards the rest. As a result of that—and we heard nothing about this on Second Reading—we have no idea what the future pattern of our fishing fleets is going to be. We have no idea whether they will be changed, and if they are to be changed we ought to know what the changes are likely to be before we pass this subsidy. Precisely because of this I raise the matter now, not because I want to keep the Government up—I like my bed as well as anyone else in the House.

I raised this on Second Reading, but I had no answer. To me as a Scottish Member it is a very important matter indeed. I am, therefore, exercising my right, and what I feel to be my duty, of raising the matter again in Committee, to try to give the Secretary of State for Scotland, whom I see busily gathering information from the Box, an opportunity to give us some assurances. The English Minister does not know about Scotland.

This fear was not confined to me alone on Second Reading. It was expressed by the hon. Baronet the Member for Fife, East (Sir J. Henderson-Stewart). I think the hon. Lady the Member for Aberdeen, South (Lady Tweedsmuir) also had some fears about this and spoke about the enormous expense of building some of the ships proposed to be built in connection with the distant water fleets and the proposals of the Fleck Committee. So the anxiety about this and the desire for some information and knowledge about this Clause and the effects of the Clause were expressed on both sides of the House. Therefore, I think we are entitled to have some answer, and a fairly full answer, before we pass this Clause.

11.0 p.m.

I have almost finished, and there are only a couple of things I should like to ask. We have not been able, owing to the procedure against which we protested, to ask many questions or to try to amend this figure of £3 million. What I should like now is to have the Minister of Agriculture tell us what exactly is the rate of subsidies running at the present time under Section 5 of the White Fish and Herring Industries Act, 1953, and Section 3 "of the said Act of 1957".

I ask because I think we ought to know at what rate the subsidies are being paid and what is the rate of payment. We cannot judge whether £3 million is sufficient or insufficient unless we know what is the rate at which the subsidies are being paid. I think the Government ought to have sufficient statistical information to give us an idea of the amounts which are being paid out, and also what are the sums expected to be paid. What is the rate of payment expected to be in connection with the extension of the subsidies to the distant water fleets? I think we ought to have that information before we proceed with this Bill. I should also like to know the length which this Bill is supposed to last. I understand it is a temporary or carrying over Bill. What the Government have in mind, I am not quite certain. I think we ought to have some information along these lines before we pass the Bill.

Mr. H. Lever

It is with some diffidence that I rise to speak on this subject—[HON. MEMBERS: "Why?"]—because there are no notorious—[HON. MEMBERS: "Go on."]—fishing grounds in my own constituency. There is, of course, the Manchester Ship Canal, which covers peacefully the distance between my constituency and the City of Liverpool. Unfortunately, it had not occurred to me that, with the exhausting and fundamental matters we were discussing earlier today, the Government seriously intended to proceed with any further business of this kind. I must confess, therefore, that I gave the Bill close attention only near to the hour of 10 o'clock when my right hon. and hon. Friends told me that it was in fact, difficult though it was to believe, the Government's intention to proceed with this Bill.

I ought to say at once that there' is no sort of vindictive attitude on my part towards the Government Chief Whip. I have the highest opinion in general of him. Indeed, just after he was exalted to his present office my secretary wrote to him upon a matter affecting Surtax—having seen his office—

The Temporary Chairman

There is nothing about the Chief Whip or Surtax in this Clause.

Mr. Paget

On a point of order. How on earth can the Chair or anybody else tell whether this has anything to do with this Clause till we know what the right hon. Gentleman's reply was? The right hon. Gentleman's reply may have been precisely about the size of the trawler which he hoped to have a subsidy on.

Mr. Lever

In fairness to the Chair, and without wishing in any way to decry the very helpful intervention of my hon. and learned Friend, I think it would be dishonest of me to suggest that the reply related in any way whatsoever to the herring or white fish industries—

Mr. Charles Loughlin (Gloucestershire, West)

It was a red herring.

Mr. Lever

—because the reply was to inform my secretary that he had nothing to do with financial affairs at all; but nevertheless he went to considerable trouble to give information about the office which he holds at the Treasury and that it does not require the occupant to be familiar with financial affairs—except, perhaps, those of the treasury of his party.

There is another matter which I think is not improper, though I cannot pretend that it relates strictly to the white fish industry. I am under an obligation to the Minister who is in charge of the Bill because recently, under a certain amount of perhaps improper pressure, he conveyed to me a valuable document which is very much treasured in my house at present.

The Temporary Chairman

The hon. Member must really come to the Motion or I cannot permit him to continue.

Mr. Lever

I thought, Sir Norman, that you would permit an introductory allusion to the Bill before I got down to the Bill itself.

The first thing that the Government cannot avoid by seeking to take the Bill at this untimely moment when the Committee is preoccupied with other fundamental House of Commons matters emerges from Clause 1, namely, that this is yet another example of Government miscalculation on a massive scale. We cannot ignore the history of this matter. In 1953, the then Mr. James Stuart, who is now a member of another place, assured the House when we were discussing the original Act that whatever might be the requirements of inshore fishing and middle water fishing, long distance fishing could be left safely to private capital. In the poetic language for which he was noted, he said there was an abundance of capital which would be keeping these distant-water ships setting out bravely for the distant waters.

It was another case, with what was then said about ships of over 70 feet in length, of "Tory freedom works. Leave it to private capital." That was the Government's song in 1953, but they are singing a different song now. It was then said, "Let us subsidise the inshore fleets and the middle water fleets, but the distant water fleets need cause us no concern. There is abundant capital. The hammers are busy, the engineers are occupied, and the ships that are being equipped for the expeditions to the far and distant romantic waters to take huge catches of fish can be left to private capital." And these huge catches constitute the main supply of what we might call the fish of the man in the street. The doctrines of laissez-jaire were to be applied to this fleet.

One thing that must be rubbed in tonight is that all that bombastic pretence has collapsed in the face of the realities of the situation. What started as a modest subsidy for a few small vessels hanging about our shores it is now sought to expand to a vast extent to distant-water fleets which we were assured seven or eight years ago could be left to private enterprise. This is a sad and early collapse from the proud words of the then Mr. James Stuart to the Government's present confessions. This is a point on Clause 1 which completely exposes the Government's failure.

There is another matter which touches the real heart of the Clause. How can it be said that boats under 70 feet will be subsidised and those over 70 feet will not be subsidised? The House might have observed, though I confess that I did not address my mind to it in 1953, that the whole thing is an artificial fixing on a particular length of boat on which a subsidy can be obtained. Why 70 feet? Why not 65 or 60 feet?

Mr. J. M. L. Prior (Lowestoft)

The hon. Member might like to know that it is not 70 feet but 140 feet. I would like to put him right, as other hon. Members may be getting into difficulties trying to follow the debate.

Mr. Steele

The hon. Member for Lowestoft (Mr. Prior) does not realise that my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Cheetham (Mr. H. Lever) is fishing only in the middle waters at present and has still to reach the distant waters.

Mr. Patrick Wall (Haltemprice)

The hon. Member for Manchester, Cheetham (Mr. H. Lever) may be fishing in the middle waters, but he has not yet got to the small island of Iceland, nor to the Faroes and Norway, who have extended their fishing limits and thus given rise to the need for the Bill.

Mr. Lever

I want to put the anxieties of hon. Members to rest. I shall be dealing with Iceland and with any other subject which you, Sir Norman, permit me to discuss and which is of interest to hon. Members on either side of the Committee, or on both, both before and after the Minister has spoken, because it is not for nothing that the House of Commons enjoys the right of hon. Members making more than one speech in Committee. It is done to be of the maximum assistance in ensuring that legislation receives careful scrutiny.

I am sorry that my mind is statistical in expression. The hon. Member for Lowestoft (Mr. Prior) is perfectly correct in saying that the subsidy was paid for boats up to 140 feet in length; but what the Minister of Agriculture had in mind in framing the original scheme, although it was not expressly stated, was to benefit boats of between 70 feet and 140 feet in length. He was not much concerned to subsidise boats of less than 70 feet in length.

At all events, so far as I can recollect, his speech at that time did not seem excessively enthusiastic about boats of less than 70 feet. He rather felt, I think, that they had had their best years and that they were boats which were more effective in the pre-First World War years and the post-First World War years and not the post-Second World War years. Certainly he did not feel that they had any great prospects in the post-Second World War years and he thought, therefore, that the beneficiaries of the subsidies should be those with boats of between 70 feet and 140 feet.

But that is an extremely artificial distinction, because some of the most energetic and successful of the inshore fishermen are those with smaller boats of less than 70 feet in length. I cannot see why it was then thought fit to make the subsidy apply in respect of a strict measurement of that kind of limit.

I have not had a great deal of experience of fishing, but I have some experience of sailing in boats of different sizes, usually skippered by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Northampton (Mr. Paget). I do not feel that it has very much relevance to the length of boat, but whenever my hon. and learned Friend takes me out, whether it is a 70-foot boat or one rather shorter or one rather longer—

Mr. Julian Snow (Lichfield and Tamworth)

Will my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Cheetham (Mr. H. Lever) curtail his remarks about being taken out by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Northampton (Mr. Paget), because I have suffered, too.

Mr. Lever

All I can say is that, in the course of my sailing, I have seen a good many boats of different sizes and I think the original distinction artificial. I would have been predisposed to lend a sympathetic ear to a more flexible interpretation of the problem of encouraging fishing of all kinds—

Mr. Driberg

It is extremely flexible now. That is one of the purposes of the Clause. Has my hon. Friend reread it since he began to speak?

Mr. Lever

This is flexibility run mad. This is carrying flexibility—

Mr. Ross

When we realise that the word "exercisable" is spelt one way in subsection (1) and a different way in subsection (2)—what more flexibility can my hon. Friend ask for?

Mr. Lever

I am sure that differences in spelling and pronunciation will appear in my speech. But it is not flexibility to increase a limit of 140 feet to no limit at all. That would admit the "Queen Mary" to subsidy. It goes to distant waters—

Mr. Wise

It got it.

11.15 p.m.

Mr. Lever

The hon. Member says that the "Queen Mary" got a subsidy. I hope it will not get one under the Bill. Under the original Act it could not have got a subsidy, but under the Bill, if the "Queen Mary" were converted to fishing there is no reason why she should not have a subsidy. It seems to be extraordinary suddenly to leap from a limit of 140 feet in length—which for years seemed to the Government to be a satisfactory maximum—to a totally unrestricted length. That is carrying the principle of flexibility much too far.

My mind goes back, with a certain amount of nostalgia, to a previous Minister of Agriculture—although I have nothing against the present Minister—Sir James Stuart, as he then was.

Mr. Willis

My hon. Friend must not do this injustice to Scotland. He was the Secretary of State for Scotland.

Mr. Lever

He was the Secretary of State for Scotland; Sir James Dugdale was then the Minister of Agriculture. Sir James Stuart, for whom my affection is in no wise diminished by reason of the fact that I momentarily got his office misplaced, assured the House, when it was dealing with the original Measure upon which this legislation is based, that this subsidy would not affect boats that went fishing for the coelacanth. I trust that I have pronounced the name of that fish correctly, as the House is in a pernickety mood tonight. The coelacanth is neither a white fish nor a herring. It has been said to be in the nature of a missing link. The coelacanth is a fish which inhabits more distant waters than those habitually fished by boats of under 70 feet in length.

The difference between the powers which the Government enjoy and those which they are now seeking is, so to say, highlighted by the fact that under their present powers we could not hunt the coelacanth—[Laughter.] I must apologise to the House for my repeated mispronunciations of that unfortunate fish's name, as I am just recovering from a very bad bout—

Mr. Steele

I recognise that my hon. Friend is at the moment in some difficulty. After all he has said, I hope he will repeat it, because I am not aware whether it is a fish or a place to which he is referring. I understood that at some point in his speech my hon. Friend was going to arrive at Iceland. I was wondering if he had reached those distant waters.

Mr. Lever

I am coming to Iceland, but the coelacanth inhabits warmer waters. I apologise to the House for being momentarily inaudible, because the repeated pronunciation of that fish's name on top of a week's severe cold was a little too much for me.

The power which the Government now seek is virtually unlimited. They wish to subsidise any fishing vessel of any length which is going for any fish of any kind at any time. I hope the Minister will tell us why, when his predecessor in 1953 attached fairly considerable importance to the limited nature of the power he was seeking, he suddenly wants this change. If, in 1953, the Minister thought it right that the Government should not subsidise the kind of vessels that could fish for coelacanth, why should the present Minister ask for power to give such a subsidy? Will the Minister say whether the policy of the Government in relation to the coelacanth has changed? I should gladly give way to the right hon. Gentleman if he has some enlightenment to give the Committee. The Committee is entitled to know whether over the years there has been some drastic rethinking by the Government on the whole matter.

Not only do we see the exposure of the idle boasts about Tory freedom working on boats over 140 ft. in length, but that laissez faire capitalism was useless to boats under 40 ft. an length. That was common ground on (both sides and was conceded by the Government of the day. We have now had it clearly revealed that this form of laissez faire capitalism does not work on the longer boats at all. What are the Government going to do about it? Are they to say, "Here we have fishermen, some of the sturdiest, most useful and creative members of the community, engaged in an industry which is the victim of the peculiar economic and financial system possessed by this country, are we going to do something about it?"

I am glad to see the noble Lord the Member for Dorset, South (Viscount Hinchingbrooke) coming to his place. I am sure I shall have his warm, and I hope, sustained support for this argument. Do the Government say, "Here are creative, independent-minded people fighting in the teeth of the elements, going out in the stormy seas, risking all damages to bring home a little honest food for their dependants and dear ones"? Do the Government say, "We believe in our hearts in this economic system known as laissez faire capitalism, but it does not work for such of these fine men who work on boats of under 40 fit. in that length", that they sincerely thought it would work for the longer boats and not for the shorter boats and the fine men in them? Are we to create conditions by which these fine men on the shorter boats will be freed from the anxiety of being the chronic victims of a disorderly House, which we had in 1953 and which in some respects we still have today?

Did they take steps to make a viable, independent industry and try to think out what was required? I do not think they even had a Fleck Committee sitting at that time. There must be a halt called to the process by which every time the Government have a problem they send it to Sir Alexander Fleck. There are Fleck Reports on about eleven different subjects. I would not mind so much if the Government took account of those Reports, but apparently the Government do not; they reach for a subsidy. In the olden days there was a famous saying that a well-known Minister went to a civil servant for guidance and said, "What are we to do about this?" and the civil servant said, "I am afraid, Minister, we shall have to apply our majority to this question". That is what the Government are always doing. They are applying their majority and not their brains. We have no sort of working out what is required for an industry.

I yield to none in my admiration and support of these sturdy, independent men on boats of 40 ft. in length and less, but real support means giving them an opportunity to earn their livelihood. We shall not do that if we pauperise them. That is where, perhaps, the noble Lord will be anxious to intervene. The remedy is not to pauperise them by making them the recipients of a State subsidy. That solves nothing. It merely evades the necessity for thought, which is what the Government did in 1953 when they deceived themselves into believing that they had to subsidise only boats under 140 ft. They subsidised them, and instead of hurrying to work out a programme which would put those fishermen in a position to earn their living in competition with fishermen who were without a subsidy, they sat back and did nothing.

The Fleck Committee was then appointed. The Government looked casually at the Committee's Report. Afraid that they would be pressed to take some action, and instead of thinking out co-ordinated action to make the industry viable, both for boats under 140 ft. and for boats over 140 ft., they rushed in with a further subsidy. It is a reflex action by the Government, when in trouble, to milk the unfortunate taxpayer. They do not think out a policy which would create a sturdy industry for these fine men, the near, middle water and distant water fishermen; they throw subsidies about. There is little wonder that they make savage inroads into the social services of the ordinary man in the street to pay for the extravagance with which they buy time when they fail to think.

This is not new for the Tory Party or Tory Government. It has happened before. I give the Minister the warning that he should take note of what happened with the film industry. Precisely the same thing happened. The film industry could not earn its living in the world—an exact parallel with the fishermen sailing boats under 140 ft. I said that the remedy was to make the film industry viable. "No", said the Government; "that would involve thinking, which is repugnant to the Conservative Government, is too much of a strain and is calculated to produce breakdown in the Conservative Government. We will not think. We will subsidise." They subsidised the film industry. This is an exact parallel; just as the subsidy started with boats under 140 ft., so the Government said that the film industry subsidy was temporary and over a restricted area. In the same way the 1953 Act brought in this unhealthy element of subsidy.

Mr. Anthony Crosland (Grimsby)

My hon. Friend does not know what he is talking about.

Mr. Lever

My hon. Friend is obviously not following the argument. It is an exact parallel. The industry would have collapsed. Dr. King, is it in order for me, in the middle of my speech, to move to report Progress?

The Temporary Chairman (Dr. Horace King)

I can assure the hon. Member that, much as he might like to do so. it would not be in order.

Mr. Lever

I understood that it was in order for any hon. Member to move to report Progress at any time, and therefore it seemed appropriate to do so in the middle of my speech. But I accept that Ruling and I shall have to sail on.

Mr. Callaghan

On a point of order. Is it in order for an hon. Member to raise a point of order in the middle of his own speech?

The Temporary Chairman

It is in order for an hon. Member to raise a point of order at any time.

Mr. Lever

If my hon. Friend will be patient he will learn many things. The machinery of the House of Commons is designed to provide the maximum assistance to hon. Members, to the House, and to the legislation being considered.

I return to the warning. What has happened with the film industry—

11.30 p.m.

The Temporary Chairman

Order. I think the hon. Gentleman has made the parallel with the film industry sufficiently. I hope that he will get back to the Clause.

Mr. Lever

I will refer to the film industry no more, beyond saying this. It stands out as a fairly ghastly warning of the permanence of these matters. They have extended the subsidy first introduced longitudinally. I have no doubt that they will extend it laterally in some manner if they get the Clause. The Government have failed in their duty to consider what ought to be done to make a viable industry.

What I dislike so much about the speech of the Minister on Second Reading, which I have studied with care, is this passage: So Clause 1 (1) will enable arrangements for operating subsidies to apply in future to the distant water as well as to other sections of the industry. The point I want to put to the House is that as far as the distant water section of the industry is concerned we are dealing with the situation practically. In the Bill we are dealing with an immediate issue. At the same time, it is quite clear that much thought has to be given to the longer term issues, but the proposals in the Bill will enable us to carry things along until we are ready to put the wider issues before the House. I never saw such a greater collection of incomprehensible bromides compounded in a few lines. What on earth does the right hon. Gentleman mean? As far as I understand, he means that he wants the Clause so as to have power to do something in case he feels like doing it later. He does not say that he has made up his mind. I ask hon. Members to notice the expression: the proposals in the Bill will enable us to carry things along until we are ready to put the wider issues before the House."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 31st January, 1961; Vol. 633, c. 797.] What does that mean? How does it carry things along to have some greater unspecified power on longer boats than he had under the 1953 and 1957 Acts? Perhaps the Minister will explain that when he replies.

It is quite clear that what the Minister is saying is that he has not thought out what he is going to do and he wants the power. It is a sort of diners' club approach. He wants to get power from the House of Commons, as he hopes, by an unscrutinised passage of the Bill, and then he will make up his mind what he will do about it.

Much attention has been paid to Iceland. I shall not shirk the question. I want to make it quite plain that my sympathies are with the Grimsby and other fishermen who sail with great courage and great zeal and in water which is even worse than that which is favoured by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Northampton (Mr. Paget).

Mr. Wall

The hon. Gentleman will recall that Hull is the largest fishing port, so he will no doubt include Hull fishermen.

Mr. Lever

I can say with deep sincerity and without any kind of reservation that I am mindful of the human tragedy of some of the finest men of both nations. They went out in unenviable weather. I can by no stretch of my imagination fully appreciate their lot. I can only compare the ordeals they suffered with my own experiences, those of my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Northampton and those of the hon. Member for Macclesfield (Sir A. V. Harvey) and multiply them by 50 or 100.

Having seen the photographs of the tempestuous seas, the icy weather and the extreme dangers to which the fishing fleets exposed themselves, I must admire the courage, hardihood and singleness of purpose which animated those intrepid fishermen and those men of the Royal Navy who were doing their duty protecting, or seeking to protect, the lawful avocations of English fishermen—and Scottish fishermen, for aught I know. I do not want to say one word which seems to be critical or lacking in sympathy for the English point of view or the Scottish point of view on that matter.

Personally, I grew up on the three-mile limit. Perhaps I never gave it enough thought; perhaps none of us ever gave enough thought to the three-mile limit and whether it should be extended. Perhaps none of us have really thought enough about it and have taken it too much for granted. In our early life it seemed to us to be sacrosanct, and nobody seemed likely to arrive who would or could question it. But our fishermen found it questioned in a way that endangered their lives and their livelihood—

The Temporary Chairman

Order. The hon. Gentleman may have interesting things to say about the problem of the Iceland fisheries, but they are not in order on this Clause.

Mr. Lever

With respect, Dr. King, without at all wanting to demur, or cause any sort of question on your Ruling, I think that had you been here in the earlier part of the debate you would have seen that the whole of this Clause relates to extending the power to subsidise the longer boats—and by the "longer" boats is really meant, in the end, the longer-distance boats. It is not a question of subsidising longer boats for the shorter distances but of subsidising the longer boats for the longer distance. That might involve the whole Icelandic question, and that I am not alone or eccentric in so supposing—

The Temporary Chairman

I am grateful to the hon. Member for explaining his point of view. This may obviously affect the boats of the fishing fleet there—it is a question of subsidy to them, as he pointed out in the earlier part of his speech—but it would not be in order to discuss other ways of dealing with the problem of the Iceland fishermen.

Mr. Driberg

Further to that point of order, Dr. King. With great respect, would it not be in order to say that one opposed the extension of these subsidies because one considered that the whole of this difficulty had arisen through the Government's mishandling of the Icelandic dispute?

The Temporary Chairman

That would be perfectly in order.

Mr. Snow

I wanted to catch your eye, Dr. King, to enlarge on the problems that arise from the Icelandic dispute. With the greatest respect, if your Ruling stands, may I point out that the nature of the voyage, which is not restricted, is included in the Clause, and whereas there might be objections to subsidies in respect of voyages which might incur action by Iceland, is it not a matter to raise on the Clause?

The Temporary Chairman

If there were, arising from the Clause—I cannot imagine that there should be—subsidies in respect of a dispute with Iceland, perhaps we could discuss them.

Several Hon. Members rose —

The Temporary Chairman

I am dealing with one point of order. Mr. Snow—if he wants to speak further.

Mr. Snow

No, Dr. King, I accept that.

Mr. Willey

On Second Reading, the Minister gave as one reason for extending the subsidy the difficulty suffered by these boats as a consequence of the Icelandic dispute. Will is not, therefore, be in order to discuss whether this is a consequence of that dispute, or whether the subsidy will help towards a settlement of that dispute?

The Temporary Chairman

It would be in order to discuss whether the subsidy would help towards a settlement of that dispute—it would be in order on Second Reading to discuss the whole Icelandic dispute—but it will not be in order in this case to discuss at length other means of settling the dispute.

Mr. Willis

Dr. King, surely discussion of the Icelandic fishing limits would be in order. The subsidy is being extended to the distant-water fleet because of the difficulties that have arisen. The Government are still negotiating in this matter, so is it not in order to discuss the possible results of the negotiations when we are now asked to vote money to compensate fishermen for the hardships they are suffering as a result of this dispute?

The Temporary Chairman

The time for doing that was on Second Reading of the Bill. This present debate, as the hon. Member must know, is on what is in the Clause.

Mr. Willis

Further to that point of order, Dr. King. It is surely not possible to discuss what is in the Clause without asking why it is in and whether it should be in. When we ask these questions, we are inevitably brought up against the fact that one of the reasons for this provision is the Icelandic fishing dispute.

The Temporary Chairman

I have allowed the hon. Member to make passing references to that kind of matter, but it would not be in order to discuss in detail other ways of means of dealing with the dispute.

Mr. Paget

May we have this quite clear, Dr. King? It is precisely this Clause which brings in the Icelandic question. This is the Clause which extends the subsidy to the Icelandic vessels because they are the ones over 140 feet in length. The Government say that they want to extend it to the Icelandic ships because they are suffering from the effects of a dispute with Iceland. Surely, we are entitled to say, when discussing this Clause, that that ought to come out because the Icelandic dispute may be settled before this ever emerges, and the dispute ought to be settled before this ever comes in. The question whether it is right to bring in a permanent subsidy power like this for a temporary difficulty which ought not to have arisen and which can be dealt with arises precisely on this Clause which brings in the Icelandic ships.

The Temporary Chairman

I have already ruled in answer to the hon. Member for Barking (Mr. Driberg) that it would be in order to say that one is opposed to the Clause and the provisions contained in it for certain reasons. It would not be in order, in the opinion of the Chair, to discuss in detail the Icelandic dispute.

Mr. Lever

I readily bow to your Ruling, Dr. King. In other words, I take it that it would obviously be out of order to bring in the whole Icelandic dispute, but, following your words—of which I took careful not—I may oppose the Clause on the ground of the Government's mishandling of the Icelandic dispute. But one cannot accuse the Government of mishandling the dispute without giving chapter and verse, to some extent. Naturally, one will not go into it with the closeness of detail that a foreign affairs debate would call for, but I do not think one can merely, as it were, throw it out as an empty generalisation.

Mr. Driberg

It would be very unfair.

Mr. Lever

I agree. It would be unfair to the Government and to the Committee.

Mr. Driberg

Where is the Lord Privy Seal?

Mr. Lever

It is significant that it is not some tortuous eccentricity of mine which alleges that there is relevance in the Icelandic dispute in this matter. As I was developing my case on the Clause earlier, before you arrived in the Chair, Dr. King, several hon. Members both on this side of the Committee and on that requested that I should deal with the effect of the Icelandic dispute on the Clause and the extension of the Government's 'power to subsidise.

Sir Arthur Vere Harvey (Macclesfield)

I think the hon. Member is being too modest in his references to his own ability as a helmsman, but I would suggest that he could improve his knowledge of distant fishing by asking his hon. Friend the Member for Grimsby (Mr. Crosland) to arrange for him to be taken on a voyage in an Icelandic fishing trawler. I will gladly pair with him for 21 days.

Mr. Lever

I am grateful to the hon. Member for that proposal, which seems to be a much more constructive one than many which have come for that side of the Committee.

The Government have not shown great skill in dealing with the Icelandic dispute. They seem to have taken the view—I confess that I myself have taken the same view—that the three-mile limit was the three-mile limit, that it was something sacred, beyond the reach of argument, that the Icelandic Government's attempts to extend their jurisdiction were beneath contempt, and all that was wanted was a couple of naval frigates—I hope I shall be corrected if that is not the right vessel—for the Icelandic lesser breed to be brought to heel.

It is probably fortunate in view of your Ruling, Dr. King, that I am not pretending to be an expert on the Icelandic Government, and I do not want to say anything unfair about it. But I am not a great admirer of that Government's behaviour in regard to the fishing industry. Iceland is, of course, a small country, and one does not expect the sagacity or the patience that one demands from Governments in our own country. But one cannot help feeling that they are pawns in the cold war.

11.45 p.m.

Hon. Members

Prawns.

Mr. Lever

One cannot help feeling that they are forced into actions, situations and attitudes which, perhaps, would not be theirs if they were free from pressure for other quarters. Even the stupidities of the present Government here would not have landed us in this impasse but for the fact that there is the cold war. These pressures tend to accumulate irritations, whereas otherwise there might be a more emollient background for discussion.

In these circumstances, I want to know what are the Government's intentions with the subsidy. Is it only intended as another gambit in the cold war game? If I may borrow the analogy from the chess room, is it intended as a temporary gambit against the stern attitude on the three-mile limit or twelve-mile limit, or is it intended as a permanent feature of our economic life that the Government are to sit with discretionary power to subsidise boats over 140 feet? The Committee might take a different attitude if they got some assurance as to the time for this extension of the Government's power.

The Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. Christopher Soames)

1963.

Mr. Lever

Is that the firm intention of the Government—no more subsidies after 1963?

Mr. Soames

This Bill goes on until 1963. Fresh legislation would then be required.

Mr. Lever

The Minister does me an injustice. I apologise that I was not able to give the Bill much time and scrutiny. I had not dreamt for a moment that the Government woud proceed with it tonight. It was only at five minutes before ten o'clock this evening that I was able to give it my attention, but the Minister does me an injustice if he thinks I do not know that the power of the Bill would expire in 1963. That is not my point. I wanted some assurance as to the Government's intentions. The Minister must have something in the back of his mind as to what is to be done with the industry. Does he feel that in 1963 this power will be enough, or does he think he will come here again in 1963 and ask for more money and perhaps an extension of some form?

Mr. Driberg

1963 would give them just time to give a much more generous subsidy before the next General Election—if the fishing constituencies are marginal, and I suppose some of them are.

Mr. Lever

I must confess I am not always ready to attribute a bad motive to the Government. I never impute dishonesty to this Government when stupidity would be sufficient explanation.

We are entitled to know whether the Government intend to go on with this sort of thing. One would have to be skilful to be in order, but it would be interesting to consider to what degree the whole Bill could be thought of—not by me but by others—in the nature of electioneering. The Government are here enlarging their powers of subsidy by this Clause. When a Government enlarge their powers of subsidy I do not for a moment suppose, as I said, that the Minister is corrupt or that the Government are corrupt.

Mr. Driberg

On a point of order. My hon. Friend has a foot out on the Gangway.

Mr. Lever

There are, of course, those who will impute to the Government corruption. There are those who will say that the Government are enlarging their power to corrupt the citizens. First they had power to corrupt the motor industry; then they had power to corrupt the steel industry—

Mr. Driberg

Colville's.

Mr. Lever

—and now they are going to corrupt the fishermen. This is a matter which causes very considerable rancour and ill feeling in the country, if it is thought that this House is giving to the Government powers to enlarge their patronage here, there and everywhere. I emphasise again that it is not my personal belief that this Clause will in fact be used by the Government for a corrupt purpose, but the fact that I think that this is not the explanation of the Clause does not alter the concern I feel that the public may think it is—

An Hon. Member

And the noble Lord.

Mr. Lever

—and the noble Lord the Member for Dorset, South. The noble Lord has done great service in my opinion.

Mr. Steele

We are very interested in what my hon. Friend has to say, and most of his remarks ought to have been heard by the Secretary of State for Scotland, who has only just come into the House. I think, therefore, that perhaps it may be advisable for my hon. Friend to repeat what he has said.

The Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. John Maclay)

Perhaps the hon. Member will allow me to interrupt the interruption by which he is being interrupted. I have been out of the House for only a very short time indeed. I have been in all evening.

Mr. Ross

But missed the most important part of it.

Mr. Steele

I am sure my hon. Friend will forgive me if I accept the right hon. Gentleman's apology.

Mr. Maclay

It was not an apology. It was a statement of fact.

Mr. Lever

As a matter of fact, I think it only right that I should say that I observed that for the greater part of the debate the Secretary of State for Scotland was listening—as I thought.

carefully; and I hope he was listening with an open mind to the argument being pressed upon the Government.

It is a matter worth commenting upon that we have this odd Department, the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries and Food, dealing with these affairs. It might have been supposed it would have been the Secretary of State for Scotland, because most of the Scots Members share the supposition that the greater part of the fishing industry is situated in ports in Scotland. It is not the case. I think Grimsby, Hull, and the many other English ports greatly outnumber the Scottish, and I think one—

Mr. Steele

We do not claim that we have the important ports judged by size. We believe that south of the Border there are a few fishing ports of great importance by that standard, but we have the quality [HON. MEMBERS: "No."] We have the quality fish and we have the quality fishermen, and of course we do believe that we provide the best fish.

Mr. Lever

At all events, I am quite clear in my mind that there is no justification for treating this matter in a regional way. One would have thought this to be a matter to be treated as a national matter, and primarily the concern of the Minister of Agriculture, rather than the Secretary of State for Scotland. I hope there are no regional pressures involved in this, in having this Clause extended in this way.

However, the point I want to make finally on the Icelandic question is: would the Government's attitude to the Clause be different if they saw a prospect of coming to an amicable solution of our difficulties with the Icelandic Government? That is a matter about which I hope the Minister will tell us in the course of his reply. What does he think are the prospects of finally eliminating these frictions between our fishermen and the Icelandic Government? Surely what would be better than increasing the subsidies would be to hear good news that the Government had come to some friendly, peaceful and amiable arrangement with the Icelandic Government. I hope the Minister will tell us a little about that when he replies.

Of course, this whole question of the intent behind this Clause is of a rather aggressive character in relation to the fishing industry. The Committee is entitled to know more before it passes the Clause. How will it affect the E.F.T.A. countries and the Common Market? I suppose there is a point beyond which the Government's most ardent supporters cannot bear to have their ill-thought legislation pressed to its logical conclusion or driven home to them. I warn the Government that they will find increasing difficulties as time goes on in persuading their followers to act in a harmonious manner if they go on with this kind of legislation without realising the consequences. They will find their own supporters, as it were, deserting them in disgust as the consequences of what they are doing become more evident. Is the intention of the Clause harmonious with our E.F.T.A. purposes? Will it prejudice them? What will the Norwegians say about the Clause?

Mr. H. Wilson

I am sure that my hon. Friend will realise that he cannot go into this fully without recognising the G.A.T.T. questions that bear on this matter of subsidies. It is impossible to obtain a clear answer on the E.F.T.A. question without going into the G.A.T.T. question at the same time.

Mr. Lever

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend. I was going to move from Iceland to E.F.T.A., from E.F.T.A. to the Common Market and via the Common Market to the International Monetary Fund. The Committee is entitled to know the logical consequences of the Clause before it is passed. We do not want the people to suppose for one moment that we are rubber stamps.

Mr. Wall

The hon. Member will remember that he promised to give us his views about Norway and the Faroes.

Mr. Lever

I am coming to the question of Norway and the Faroes and to ask for a little more information. I do not need the permission of the Committee to speak again, though I would not like to speak against its wishes. But I hope that when the Minister comes to address the Committee a little later we shall have the advantage and stimulus of his reply. I hope that he will deal in greater detail with Norway and the Faroes.

I am happy to say that the Government appear to have made a common-sense and reasonable approach to the Faroes and to have reached a reasonable agreement about what should be done in reflation to that region. It is mot clear that they have dealt with problems which may arise with the Norwegian Government and fishermen. I do not want to go back to the Icelandic question, but it was a point worth making about the question that some of these disputes and rancorous hatreds would have been settled before if practical men had been brought in some times—men who do the dirty work.

Mr. G. Brown

Like the Patronage Secretary.

Mr. Lever

Instead of the theatrical gestures of Government spokesmen, it would have been 'better if we had had the leaders of the Icelandic and British industries in to discuss the question. I am not so keen on bringing in the Foreign Office, especially having regard to the Foreign Secretary. I stay with no disrespect to the noble Lord that noble Lords do not go down too well with the Icelandic Government. It seems to me that we should take this matter on that working basis between the two countries—not on the Government level but on the practical level of the fishermen themselves.

Mr. Soames indicated dissent.

Mr. Lever

The Minister shakes his head—

Mr. G. Brown

Reflex action.

Mr. Lever

—but all Governments think that they know best, even Conservative Governments which preach—

Sir A. V. Harvey

On a point of order. The hon. Member for Manchester, Cheetham (Mr. H. Lever) seems to be having some difficulty with his trousers. Could you adjourn the Committee for a few minutes, Dr. King, to enable him to make himself more comfortable?

12 p.m.

Mr. Lever

I will try not to distress the hon. Member more on that account for the rest of my address. I want an assurance, and I think that the Com- mittee is entitled to an assurance, that the effects of the Clause on our position with E.F.T.A. have been considered.

I now come to the effects of the Clause and the atitude behind it on the Common Market. We are told that the Government are anxious to enter the Common Market and that, but for the obstreperousness of the French and matters of that kind and our duty to the Commonwealth, they would be willing to do so. I want an assurance from the Minister that the Clause and its purpose are consistent with the repeated statements which we have had from the Government about their intentions in relation to the Common Market. I am a not unsympathetic critic of the Government's atitude to the Common Market, but I am the last person to want to plunge in, and the Committee should be very careful before it creates a lobby in this country, as it were, a pressure point upon the Government, which would mean that we were hampered in our negotiations upon the terms on which we would enter the Common Market.

Those on this side of the Committee who take my view—and I think that that is most of us—while wanting the Government to be constructive in relation to the Common Market, will not bring pressure upon them which would damage their negotiating power. At the same time, when we see a Clause like this we are entitled to ask whether the purposes behind it are consistent with the repeated assurances—I am very glad to see a representative of the Treasury here—of the anxieties of the British Government to play their full part on reasonable terms in the political and economic unity of Europe. In other words, is the Clause consistent with genuine belief in the political and economic unity of Europe, or it is hostile to those purposes? Is it in accord with the repeated statements which we read about it?

Anxious as I am to help fishermen in boats over 140 feet in length, it will be readily seen that that is puny in contrast with the larger purposes which necessarily must animate us all in this difficult era of the country's history in relation to the economic, political and strategic future of Europe and the consequences of any added irritant injected into the situation between ourselves and the Six of the Common Market.

The Committee should have a care and is entitled to a reassurance which I for one will readily accept, if given. I will readily accept the Minister's word and I do not even ask for long explanations—

Mr. G. R. Mitchison (Kettering)

Has my hon. Friend considered the position in relation to Finland, which is half in and half out of this Market and which is a great consumer of fish?

Mr. Lever

I confess that, for the reason which my hon. and learned Friend would have heard had he been here at the beginning—the humility with which I approach this subject—I have not yet had an opportunity of giving this subject the study which it should have.

Mr. Mitchison

I have heard every word and I have listened with rapt attention to every word my hon. Friend has uttered this evening.

Mr. H. Wilson

The rather perfunctory way in which my hon. Friend has dealt with this subject suggests to me—and I put this to him in order that he can make it good before he gets to the major part of his speech—that when he referred just now—no doubt without having given proper thought to the matter—to the unity of Europe, he was speaking in the context of Western Europe. He must have realised that when he was speaking of the unity of Europe he was entering on to a much wider subject—East-West trade. Is he not aware that trade with the Soviet Union in fish and fish products is a very ancient trade which has declined considerably in recent years? I hope that before he gets—[HON. MEMBERS: "Red herrings?"]—not entirely herrings; I negotiated fairly fully with Mikoyan—into full swing, he will say a few words on that subject.

Mr. Lever

I will come back shortly to the point made by my right hon. Friend, but first, as a matter of courtesy, I must apologise to my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kettering (Mr. Mitchison) in supposing that he had missed any part of my speech.

Implicit in everything I have said is my conscious desire to learn about something rather than any intention to be dogmatic in my approach. I assure the House of my deep humility. I have admitted from the outset that I know very little about the fishing industry. There was once an hon. Member of this House of whom it was said that he never knew what he thought about any subject until he had spoken on it. For him, every speech was in the nature of a long voyage of self-discovery. I suppose the same applies to me. I am learning as I go along, especially in view of the very helpful and constructive nature of most of the interventions. In some respects this is not a party political matter, and I am glad to say that some hon. Members opposite have not scrupled to make their contributions towards my speech, in their own way.

I am very grateful to my right hon. Friend, whose encyclopaedic knowledge of this subject I cannot hope to match. I am sure that as the debate goes on the point he has made will be taken up. I remember well when he did so much, in the uncertain post-war days, to restore the trade between this country and the Soviet Union. Who knows what a contribution he made towards the easing of political tension. Bad as things are now, they might have been worse. Bad as are conditions in the fishing industry they might have been worse, but for the intervention of my right hon. Friend and the great zeal with which he conducted the negotiations, in very delicate political circumstances, to restore the trade we had traditionally carried on with the Soviet Union.

My right hon. Friend has raised a very important and wider point, on which I shall dwell very briefly because I do not want to detain the House. I know that many other hon. Members wish to speak, and I am anxious to compress my thoughts into a reasonable space. On the question of E.F.T.A. and the Six, I want to make it plain that the West's economic and political strength is vital for our salvation. We must recognise how vital is the unity of Western life and of the Western world, economically and politically, and we should not pass any Clause readily which we think will damage those purposes.

On the other hand, we must make it quite plain that we are living in a nuclear age. We will have to ensure world unity if mankind is not to perish, and we can look upon these other unities only as steps to the greater unity of the world. We must live in peace with each other, and even when we are turning our thoughts to relatively humble legislation of this kind it is not improper to relate the following criteria to each Clause: does this Clause contribute to this country's hopes in E.F.T.A.? Does this Clause jeopardise the possibilities of this country's contribution to the Common Market and to the political and economic unification of Europe? Finally, we must not be slow to say, does this Clause jeopardise, risk, obstruct the possibilities of the peace of the entire world? These criteria are the only criteria which can mean anything in today's conditions. How does this Clause stand up to them?

Mr. Cyril Bence (Dunbartonshire, East)

How does my hon. Friend think it does?

Mr. Lever

I am personally worried about it.

Mr. Steele

I hope and trust that my hon. Friend will bear in mind that, although this Clause applies particularly to this world and he is thinking of it in terms of this world, we know that this last week something of great importance has transpired and that a Sputnik is on its way to Venus.

The Temporary Chairman

The debate has ranged rather wide, but I think Sputniks and Venus are outside the scope of the Motion, "That the Clause stand part of the Bill".

Mr. Lever

We cannot look at any Clause in the legislation we pass in isolation from the great issues of our time. We must measure it against the needs of our time. That is why, whereas on the one hand we want to know, are these subsidies desirable—

Mr. Steele

On a point of order, Dr. King, I raised what I thought a very important matter to which I hoped my hon. Friend would reply. Clause 1 says: irrespective of the size of the vessel or of the nature of the voyage;". While I appreciate that it applies to vessels not exceeding 140 ft.—

Mr. G. Brown

Over 140 ft. and up to anything.

Mr. Steele

I wanted to draw your attention, Dr. King, to the nature of the words in the Clause and to what might apply in this connection.

The Temporary Chairman

Order. The words may be as widely drawn as the hon. Members suggests, but I think it more than unlikely that any of the ships referred to in this Clause will either travel through space or catch any fish on such a journey.

Mr. Lever

I am one of the last, as you know, Dr. King, to challenge your Ruling, but so often that view has been expressed and falsified in a relatively short time. Who would have thought that a few years ago that at this day and age man would be hurtling vast satellites into outer space? Ten years ago a Chairman of Committees might have ruled that out of order as a truly unreal concept, but one never knows what is possible in these days when the imagination has been beggared by the fabulous achievements of man, which unfortunately man has not always learned to harness to his advantage but sometimes to his damage and destruction. Of course the Clause refers to vessels and places no limit on time and space, but I do not pretend for a moment that I am equipped to consider these aspects—at any rate at the moment.

12.15 a.m.

I want an assurance from the Government that these wider purposes are not damaged by the Clause. I should have spared the Committee so much consideration of these matters but for the fact that it appears that on Second Reading they had not occurred to the Government. I see no mention of them in the Minister's Second Reading speech. Apparently he has no conception of the necessity to put this in the context of the wider needs of the nation. He appears to be operating in blinkered fashion, narrowly concentrating on the need to subsidise slightly longer boats over slightly longer distances catching slightly different kinds of fish. One can infer from his Second Reading speech that all that is in his mind, but there is no sign in that speech that the wider issues, with which I have dealt, were in his mind when the legislation was framed, and it would be helpful and not a little reassuring if the Committee could feel that the Government have in mind bigger considerations than the more immediate, extemporised solution of temporary problems of the industry.

I should like an assurance, too, on the general preparatory studies which have been made. Have the Government studied the effects of the subsidy so far on the smaller boats? As I have said, I am not very enthusiastic about subsidies in general. The way to solve the problem is to create an industry which can stand on its own feet, for there must be something wrong with an industry which cannot. Subsidies should be used temporarily, as a shield, while one repairs the adverse conditions which have given rise to the need for them. One should subsidise in order to end subsidies. We talk cynically about wars to end war, but there is no reason to be cynical about subsidies to end the need for subsidies, and I hope that the Government are thinking in those terms.

There is doubt about that, because we have heard nothing from the Government about the effect so far of the subsidies on boats up to 140 feet. Have they produced the advantages which we were led to expect when the subsidy was introduced in 1953? Not a word have we heard to tell us whether it has been beneficial or harmful—and I do not know which. The Minister could cut short this part of my speech if he assured us that he is well satisfied with the results of the subsidy on the smaller boats. That would be a prima facie case that similar advantages would flow if the subsidy were extended to boats over 140 feet. But all the evidence suggests that the Government have not even applied this elementary test of logic.

The first question the Minister should have asked himself when requested to extend the subsidy is, "What has been the impact on the smaller boats? Before I extend the subsidy, is all well with the smaller boats? Are the building arrangements for smaller boats improving? Are their numbers increasing? How many are there? "Does the Minister know, or will he find out in time to tell us? One of the Ministers responsible for the 1953 legislation was concerned that there were not enough of the smaller boats. Are there enough of the smaller boats? Is the Minister wise to extend the subsidy to the larger boats if there is still a shortage of the smaller boats? Has the Minister made any inquiries about this? Are there some ancillary matters about which we have heard nothing?

There is the question of the effect of the subsidy on all the other industries which link up with the herring fishing industry. Has the effect of the subsidy on the herring fishing industry been such that there are better and more modern herring meal factories for surplus herring? Will the Minister tell us something about that when he replies? Before he asks us to extend the subsidy, he should tell us whether the old subsidy had a stimulating and invigorating effect upon some of the ancillary industries catering for the smaller boats. In other words, what is the condition of the herring meal industry, which I understand makes fertiliser out of surplus herring which are not saleable for human consumption?

In spite of the great campaign which many hon. Members have always conducted on behalf of herring—by now it is well known to most people that it is one of the most nutritious fish and one of the best buys in the shops—there are apparently seasonal fluctuations in the market and some times there are more herring than there are customers. [Laughter.] There are at all times of the year more herring than there are customers. I meant that more herring come into the shops than can find a ready market. The Government buy all the herring, subsidise them and encourage the purchase of them to turn them into fertiliser and cattle food. It must be of some consequence to us to know, in deciding whether to extend the subsidy, how the Government's ambitions were fulfilled as regards the earlier subsidy. Is all well with the herring industry? I should like to know what progress has been made with the smaller boats.

One or two other things still worry me. For example, there is the question of subsidising the building of one of the larger boats. I do not think that this was considered carefully enough when the smaller boats were dealt with, but perhaps the House of Commons felt that there was not so much to fear when the power related only to smaller boats. When dealing with larger boats, which avowedly will be capable of sailing almost anywhere, what I am now about to raise is very pertinent.

Mr. Soames

I hate to interrupt the hon. Gentleman's most interesting dissertation on subsidies for the longer boats, but in the study he gave to the Bill in those few short minutes before ten o'clock he did not hoist in the fact that this is not in any way a subsidy for building boats. It is that to which he is addressing himself at the moment.

Mr. Lever

The Clause allows a subsidy in respect of larger boats—not the building of them, but the operation of them. When the operation of a boat is subsidised, the building of it must indirectly be subsidised. We can test that simply. Let us suppose that the Government put a subsidy on the user of Rolls Royce cars.

Mr. H. Wilson

They do.

Mr. Lever

It would be idle to say that would not be a subsidy for the building of Rolls Royce cars.

Mr. Paget

Clause 1 (1) of the White Fish and Herring Industries Act, 1953, provides: Subject to the provisions of this and the next following section, the White Fish Authority may, in accordance with a scheme made by the Ministers with the approval of the Treasury after consultation with the Authority, make to persons engaged or proposing to become engaged in the white fish industry in Great Britain grants in respect of expenditure incurred— (a) in the acquisition of new fishing vessels… This simply extends that provision in respect of the 140 ft. boats to the longer ones. I therefore find the right hon. Gentleman's interjection very surprising indeed. If the acquisition of a new fishing vessel is not a subsidy on building, what is it?

Mr. Soames

I was referring to the Clause which I thought was before the Committee. Clause 1, which provides for these subsidies for white fish, has nothing in any way to do with the grants or loans for the building of vessels. It is purely a subsidy for operating them.

Mr. Willey

On a point of order, Sir William. I have been trying to follow the discussion, but I am now thoroughly at a loss to understand the purpose of the Clause. May I suggest that one of the Law Officers might assist us in our deliberations. It really will not do for the right hon. Gentleman to advise us on what are, after all, legal matters.

The Deputy-Chairman (Major Sir William Anstruther-Gray)

The question of the Law Officers is not a matter for me to deal with.

Mr. H. Wilson

Is not it clear, Sir William, that my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Cheetham (Mr. H. Lever) has shown a far greater knowledge of the purpose of the Bill than has the Minister himself. Since other of my right hon. and hon. Friends are bound to put questions to the Minister—who, patently, does not know the answers—would it not be appropriate for the Minister to ask leave of the Committee now—[HON. MEMBERS: "Report progress."] No, I was not intending to do that on this occasion.

I would not do such a discourtesy to my hon. Friend as to do that in the middle of his speech—after all, he has hardly got started—but would not the Minister say that when my hon. Friend has got to the end of his speech—and, if my hon. Friend is not exactly at the beginning of the end of it, he may well be towards the end of the beginning—he proposes to move to report Progress and ask leave to sit again. He could then take the opportunity to study the Bill properly, so that when we next discuss it he could give an authoritative answer to the question of its purpose?

Mr. Soames

I think that the hon. and learned Member for Northampton (Mr. Paget) has got it wrong. He was referring to Section 1 of the White Fish and Herring Industries Act, 1953, but if he looks at Clause 1 of this Bill—which is the one we are discussing—he will see that it says: The power conferred by section five of the White Fish and Herring Industries Act.. I think that that is where—

Mr. Mitchison

On a point of order, Sir William. Is not the right hon. Gentleman suggesting that for the past quarter of an hour the discussion has been out of order, and is not that a criticism of the Chair which should be made, if at all, by raising a point of order?

The Deputy-Chairman

No, I do not accept that as a point of order. Mr. Soames.

Mr. Soames

This really arises out of my efforts to get on terms, so to speak, with the hon. Member for Manchester, Cheetham (Mr. H. Lever) in his interesting discussion. The Clause refers—as I think that the hon. and learned Gentleman will agree if he looks at it—to the power conferred by Section 5 of that Act. Section 5 says: With a view to promoting the landing in the United Kingdom of a continuous and plentiful supply of white fish.. The Clause refers to an operating subsidy, and not to a building one.

Mr. Paget

With great respect, I think that the right hon. Gentleman is wrong about this. Section 1 of the Act says: Subject to the provisions of this and the next following section, the White Fish Authority may. make a scheme. Now, by subsection (1), that scheme may include a subsidisation of the building, and we are still within the scheme, and then—and this is what the right hon. Gentleman does not seem to have observed—when we get to Section 5 we are dealing with the same scheme. Under Section 5, that scheme shall take into consideration the purpose of the continuous supply of fish. The Section reads: With a view to promoting the landing in the United Kingdom of a continuous and plentiful supply of white fish, the appropriate Minister may, in accordance with a scheme made by the Ministers with the approval of the Treasury, make grants to the owners and charterers of vessels engaged in catching such fish. That is all within the scheme of Section 1. The next two subsections give rise to some difficulty. If I have the advantage of catching the eye of the Chair, perhaps at a later stage, I shall wish to go through this parent Act because it has reached a condition when it is extremely difficult to follow it. I wonder whether it would be for the convenience of the Committee if I were to read subsection (2). It is quite interesting, but it has been repealed by the 1957 Act. I do not know whether we are discussing here Section 5 as incorporated in the 1957 Act or in its original form. These are further difficulties. The subsidy for building certainly seems to be included.

12.30 a.m.

Mr. Lever

I am very grateful to my hon. and learned Friend. This is a substantial point, and it will affect the argument. I hope that the Minister will not ignore it. On Second Reading, the Minister boasted of the amount of new ships which had been brought into being as a result of the subsidies. He cannot have it both ways. Either this does or does not permit him to subsidise the building of new ships.

I confess that I have not studied the 1953 Act, and I am grateful to my han. and learned Friend for his assistance, as I am sure the whole Committee is. He has pointed to what may well be a great blunder on the part of the Minister. If I may choose an analogy which may be palatable and instructive to the Minister, it is no good trying to play bridge always without any system. Sometimes one must play with a system. The Minister thinks he is playing at the Portland Club instead of addressing himself to this serious economic problem. He should have the advice of one of the learned members of the Government such as the Attorney-General. It is unfair to the Minister. I do not want to take advantage of him. I have legal friends to advise me. While I concentrate on the economic, political and strategic aspects of tine Clause, my hon. and learned Friend the Member four Northampton dan give his undivided attention to the legal aspects off the Clause. The Minister has to listen intently to my argument, and he has not the legal advice which he should have at his elbow on the legal matters. I think he has made a very serious error here.

Mr. H. Wilson

Lest there be any danger that my hon. Friend should be inhibited or restricted in any way by the advice that the Minister has given to the Committee, I ought to point out that on Second Reading the Minister said these words: I turn now to our second reason for bringing forward the Bill. As hon. Members know, the Government have helped in the construction of new vessels for the inshore, near and middle water fleets, by loans and grants administered through the White Fish Authority. In the last couple of years, more new vessels have been ordered than ever before and they have taken less time to build. This is encouraging, but it means that as the rate of new building has increased so the calls for loans and grants have speeded up."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 31st January, 1961; Vol. 633, c. 797–8.] It is quite impossible to discuss the matter without referring to fat aspect.

Mr. Soames

That, of course, refers to Clause 2, not Clause 1, which we are as present discussing.

Mr. Wilson

Surely, the Minister himself made it plain that the reason for the Bill was that he needed the operating subsidy because of the increase in new building. Clause 1 is about the operating subsidy.

Mr. Lever

I am sure the Minister is very ill advised to make legal quibbles without adequate professional experience in such matters.

Mr. Willis

On a point of order. We were advised by the Minister. He intervened to advise us on the law. It seems that he wrongly advised the Committee on this point. I should like to know where we stand, because if I intervene later in our discussion I do not want to repeat myself on the following Clause. We should get it clear whether or not the effect of this Clause can, in turn, affect shipbuilding, a matter in which I am particularly interested.

Mr. Soames

I would not like to be out of order by talking about Clause 2 or by going too far away from the subject before the Committee. Clause 1 refers to operating subsidies to ships and extends the power of the Government to pay operating subsidies beyond the near and middle water fleets to the distant water fleet. It extends it to the longer ships, as the hon. Member for Manchester, Cheetham (Mr. Lever) said. It does not in any way seek power to pay any form of grant, loan or subsidy towards building ships.

Mr. Lever

I do not think the Minister was wise to interrupt my argument at that point, even if he was right. I gather he is saying that operational subsidies are only affected by Clause 1 and that pre-operational subsidies, as it were, are affected by Clause 2. Clause 2 gives power to subsidise the building, and Clause 1 affects the power to subsidise the operation.

Mr. Soames

We have not got to Clause 2 yet. Clause 1 is to extend it to the distant water fleet. When we get to Clause 2 the hon. Member will then be aware that it does not refer to what he has called the longer boats.

Mr. Lever

It is plain that the whole purpose of the scheme results in a subsidy to those operating longer ships. It is idle for the Minister to escape the logical consequence of the Clause. If the Clause does not mean that it does not mean anything, and the whole of our purpose tonight in trying to secure the passage of this legislation will be frustrated. We shall have laboured in vain. If the Bill has any meaning it surely means that we are subsidising the owners of longer boats, whereas in the past we have contended ourselves with shorter boats.

The Committee did not worry unduly when we were subsidising smaller boats because they have a restricted radius. But here we are dealing with boats with an infinite range, able to sail to any waters, irrespective of the size of the vessel or nature of the voyage, to the most remote ports. A totally different standard must be applied in considering whether we can unconditionally leave to the Government the power to subsidise boats of that character. In other words, whereas the Committee, perhaps unwisely, did not consider this in relation to the shorter boats, we are obliged now to consider the question of the financial consequences of this subsidy in relation to the longer boats.

Mr. Callaghan

Is my hon. Friend going to give us his views on the Report of the Fleck Committee on this subject? We have not heard from the Minister on that. My hon. Friend will remember that the majority of that Committee said there should be a smaller subsidy on the longer boats than on the shorter boats. We have had no indication from the Government whether the subsidy on the longer boats will be the same or less than that on the shorter boats. We should have an answer from the Government, and I hope my hon. Friend will pursue this matter.

Mr. Lever

We know that the boats are going to be longer. We do not know whether the subsidy is going to be shorter or longer.

Mr. Bence

Voyages will be longer.

Mr. Lever

We are dealing now with a kind of boat which can sail almost uninhibitedly to the most remote parts of the world, and the question arises, which did not arise, perhaps, though this is questionable, with the smaller boats, and it arises from this Clause. The Committee must ask itself what guarantees we have, having subsidised one of these longer boats, that the longer boat, subsidised out of public funds in this country, serving the purposes intended by the House when it provided these millions of subsidy, will continue to serve the country. We can subsidise a rowingboat on the Serpentine with reasonable confidence that it will stay in the service of British citizens. We know that the boat has a limited range. We can decide to subsidise rowingboats, I should have thought, without bothering ourselves unduly, though in theory they can be flown to remote parts of the world. But we know not only that these boats can go to those remote parts of the world but that the Clause envisages these boats going without restriction anywhere in the world.

Mr. Walter Monslow (Barrow-in-Furness)

My hon. Friend talks about sailing and about rowingboats, and there are motor boats Does the Clause apply to all kinds?

Mr. Lever

There is no statement in the Bill itself, as far as I know, restricting the nature of the vessel. All that is clear is that these vessels have unlimited range.

Mr. Steele

The Clause does deal specifically with giving subsidies particularly for modernisation, and there are a lot of questions to be asked of the Minister about that matter.

Mr. Lever

I want to be careful, because that may very well be better discussed on Clause 2. I am not the Chairman, and I do not want to inhibit my hon. Friend, who will, doubtless, have his say on this subject.

Mr. H. Wilson

Yes, but while my hon. Friend is on this point, and since my hon. Friend is talking about the very great capacity of these boats which can go long distances, would he address himself to the very real point, on which I have heard him speak on other occasions though in a different context—and it is a very serious point: that however far afield a vessel itself may go, it is a very real possibility that the owners of the company receiving the subsidy supplied by State money may decide to uproot themselves because of their dislike of the level of taxation in this country and establish themselves in Bermuda or somewhere else? What safeguards have we that the money's worth paid out from the public purse in this way will not go entirely beyond the jurisdiction of the taxpayers of this country?

Mr. Lever

I am very deeply obliged to my right hon. Friend, because this is the kind of anxiety which I am anxious to highlight in this debate and which I doubt very much whether the Government have given much thought to. Can the Minister tell us what safeguards there are about these boats of unlimited range and probably of unlimited purpose? Can we know what safeguards are being provided by the Government about these large boats, on which substantial sums of public money are going to be spent, in one form or another. I care not whether it is pre-operational or post-operational subsidy.

Mr. Wilson

Or operational.

Mr. Lever

Or operational. I should like to know what assurance the taxpayers of this country will have that these subsidised boats of unlimited range, power, size and purpose are going to remain at the service of the herring and white fish industries. After all, we know, that after two years of great lucrative activity on behalf of the herring and white fish industries they can go off—oh! smuggling cigarettes between Spain and Tangier. What are the Government going to do about it? Are we to subsidise with public money the smuggling trade between Tangier and Spain? Are we to see boats which have been brought into being and kept in being for a period with public funds engaged in all kinds of nefarious purposes throughout the world? Is this what the Government intend? If it does not so intend, what safeguards are there against it?

12.45 a.m.

I will come later to the part made by my right hon. Friend, but he will forgive my saying that my anxieties about the political damage resulting from these activities is even greater than my anxiety about loss of revenue. There are so many other ways in which the Government cast away public revenue by inadequate taxation laws that perhaps it might be unfair to single out this for special attention.

Mr. H. Wilson

I was not trying to suggest that there was any loss of taxation, because I am sure that I should be ruled out of order on the question of alternative forms of taxation. I was asking my hon. Friend to address himself to the point that there might be a waste of Government money which will be expended under the Clause by the fact that when it is handed over to the owners of some vessels the owners might take themselves out of British nationality for the purpose of registration of their companies.

Mr. Lever

I misunderstood my right hon. Friend. He was thinking about loss. I was thinking more narrowly, more practicably and perhaps more in line with the possibilities—

Mr. Driberg

This is an ungracious and unworthy thought, with due respect. There is no body of men more patriotic than the fishermen of England and Scotland.

Mr. Bence

That is all very well, but the fishermen do not get the subsidies.

Mr. Driberg

Owners cannot move their ships unless they have their crews with them.

Mr. Lever

It is all very well for my hon. Friend to say that. Fishermen are not briefed, as it were. There is no Committee stage for fishermen. They cannot discuss line by line, Clause by Clause, when they are at sea. They go on board ship to an unknown destination. In the words of the Clause they go on a voyage of any nature in a vessel of any size. They are not to know for what purpose. It may be for the purpose of transferring the boat outside jurisdiction, or for fishing. How is any sailor to know where he is sailing in this vessel of unlimited size? The boat may be going to Zanzibar in search of the coelacanth. It was previously expected that the fish would be limited to herring and white fish. It is now clear that any kind of fish—

Mr. Wilson

Scampi.

Mr. Lever

It is clear that any kind of fish comes within the ambit.

Mr. Wilson

On a point of order. I unwisely mentioned scampi. Can the Chair say whether scampi, which is not a fish but a crustacean, would come within the ambit of the Clause?

Mr. Lever

It would depend on the construction of the Clause. It is clear that any kind of fish are within the purposes of the Clause and it is clear that we cannot rely on fishermen to know the purpose of these unrestricted vessels. They cannot know whether they are engaged on a legitimate expedition in search of fish of one sort or another or in travelling as a subsidised vessel carrying the congealed loan of many humble English citizens, in the form of tax, outside the jurisdiction, either to engage in the nefarious transactions to which I have referred or in fishing for other countries. We may be indirectly subsidising the fishing of other nations.

Hon. Members opposite seem confident, but there was a great hullabaloo when the Labour Government was in office about foreigners coming here and getting free teeth and spectacles through the Health Service, and everybody thought it terrible. I was not all that enthusiastic about subsidising the medical treatment of foreigners who had contributed nothing to the taxes of this country, but if by analogy it is horrifying to hon. Members opposite and many citizens that foreigners should benefit from the Health Service—

Mr. Raymond Gower (Barry)

The hon. Member has no evidence that small ships are used in nefarious practices, so why on earth should slightly larger ships?

Mr. Lever

Those of us who, in a candid spirit of impartiality, make our modest contributions in an attempt to enlighten fellow Members on a difficult problem are bound to be discouraged when, after addressing the Committee with some clarity on this very point, as I would modestly claim, find an hon. Member who reveals that the point has not gone home. In expounding this argument as to the distinction between the present position and what it will be if, in our discretion, we pass the Clause, I could not spell out the matter more simply if I were addressing a kindergarten class.

I am always concerned to treat the Committee with great respect. No doubt hon. Members are tired after bending their minds to very important subjects fundamentally affecting the House of Commons. If hon. Members were frank and forgot party political matters of a cheap sort, they would admit that they were heartily sick of the Government's nonsensical idea that, exhausted by those considerations of non-party matters, hon. Members should be forced to consider this detailed financial, economic and nautical subject at this late hour. I know that I carry many hon. Members with me in resenting that. It is for that reason I make my argument as simple as I can and not from any disrespect to the Committee. I will try briefly to recapitulate.

It is one thing to subsidise a rowing boat, which may be on the Serpentine and which is not likely, when subsidised, to go overseas and rebuke us, as it were, by engaging in nefarious activities, so that what was subsidised would reflect discredit on the House of Commons—[Interruption.] Hon. Members know perfectly well that reference to Venus was ruled out of order by an earlier occupant of the Chair. I do not wish to be defiant or disrespectful to the Chair. There is all the difference between subsidising a small boat and subsidising a big boat. The hon. Member's contention is bad. He showed precisely the feckless thinking which is responsible for the Bill in its present form. It is a great giveaway of the heedlessness of the Government and that is precisely the basis of my anxiety. I fear that the Government are thinking on lines similar to those followed by the hon. Member for Barry (Mr. Gower).

The Government are saying that they did not have any trouble subsidising the smaller boats—there was no rum running or tobacco running and no movement out to foreign fishing fleets—and therefore they would probably get away with subsidising the larger boats. But there is all the difference between a small boat being towed, or obtrusively conveyed into a foreign port of distant location, and a larger boat prepared for any eventuality and any distance of travel.

Mr. Wise

Will the hon. Gentleman withdraw his aspersions about the masters and crews and his suggestion that they would be involved in, or be likely to indulge in, any of these activities?

Mr. Lever

It is all very well to say that, but I am being asked to provide public money to subsidise a class of boats and we are at least entitled to know what safeguards exist to ensure that the boats will not be involved in purposes other than those for which the subsidy was intended. It is not a boat being built in the ordinary way; it is a boat being built—

Mr. Wise

Would not the fact that it is manned by honest men be a reasonable safeguard?

Mr. Lever

The hon. Member asks whether the fact that the boat is manned by honest men be a sufficient safeguard.

Mr. Loughlin

There is the classical example of a Seine net fishing vessel being taken by its skipper right across the world—the case of the "Girl Pat". Might not that happen again?

Mr. Lever

To prove the extreme mobility of these smaller boats is rather against my argument. These extreme cases are not to be taken as normal.

Mr. George Jeger (Goole)

With the discussions going on at present between our Government and the Icelandic Government, so far unresolved, fishing limits may, in the course of those discussions, be set in such a way as to work against us. In the case of fishing boats over 140 feet in length might it not be that they will no longer be able to go to distant waters, since those waters will be denied to them? Will not we then have a number of subsidised vessels with no water in which to fish?

Further, might it not then be that the owners of those vessels and their crews—honest fishermen—finding themselves without a livelihood, will seek to dispose of them, subsidised as they have been under the Clause? Has my hon Friend considered that we might then find ourselves in a difficult position, with a number of honest men with vessels they cannot use on their lawful occasions and which they may be forced to dispose of at give-away prices because the prospective purchasers know they have been purchased with the aid of a Government subsidy?

We would then be subsidising foreign fishermen, who would disport themselves in distant waters that we should be using, with vessels bearing subsidies provided by the Government.

Mr. Lever

That was one contingency I found extremely disquieting. I thank my hon. Friend for pinpointing it. The hon. Member for Rugby (Mr. Wise) asked whether the fact that these vessels are manned by honest men is not enough. He is extraordinarily naive. I pointed out that the honest men on board have not the faintest notion why they are going to distant waters.

Mr. Wise

They cannot be as stupid as that.

Mr. Lever

The hon. Member says they cannot be as stupid as that, but one has only to be in the House for a short time—[Laughter.] I am not referring to hon. Members opposite; but nobody can be in this House for many years without having the boundless stupidity of mankind brought to one's notice.

Furthermore, these men are not stupid. They go on board not to cerebrate, or make calculations about the purpose of the owners, or to speculate upon the ultimate consequences of their arrival at a distant port. They may be told to sail to Zanzibar, assuming Zanzibar to be a port—a point about which I am a little vague at the moment—[An HON. MEMBER: "It is a port".] I am told that it is a port, but if my informant be incorrect and it is not a port, then they may be told to sail to the nearest port to Zanzibar.

1.0 a.m.

If they refused to obey orders on the ground that they would like some reassurance about the purposes for which the boat was being sailed—subject to the correction of my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Northampton, who has been good enough to intervene on some of the legal points I have raised—I am sure few would challenge that if they refused to obey orders on the ground.that some hon. Member of the Conservative Party said they were to be relied upon as honest men to see that Government subsidies were not consumed wrongly, it would be a poor consolation for a poor fisherman before the assize court that his learned counsel pleaded emotionally that that point was made by a Conservative back bencher in the Committee stage on the White Fish and Herring Industries Bill. As I 'understand the position, I am afraid it would be of little help to the fisherman to pray in aid the intervention of the hon. Member that he would make sure of the purposes of his master.

It is all very well saying that these fears are far-fetched, and I agree that one should not approach these problems with an excessive air of suspicion and over-anxiety. On the other hand, we have to lace the facts of life, and it is a fact that there are cigarette smugglers and boats engaging in unlawful operations. We know that a vessel engaged on lawful operations, the "Santa Maria," was seized. One of these ships might be seized by sympathisers with those on this side of the Committee as a protest against the leaders of the Conservative Party.

I want to know from the Minister if he has given any thought to this problem and what assurance he can give the Committee that the boats we are subsidising will stay in use for the purposes for which we are subsidising them. The Minister tells us that the Bill gives him power only until 1963 and it is conceivable that it will not be renewed in 1964 or 1965. An unsubsidised English or Scottish fisherman will find it bitter indeed if, sailing his post-1963, unsubsidised, long ship he is in competition at the same port with a foreign fisherman running a subsidised, long ship Which he acquired from a British fisherman.

What bitter irony that would be for an English skipper. There is no doubt that that is a possibility under the Bill as it stands. An English fisherman could find himself in his unsubsidised ship landing his hard-won catch and paying wages to a British crew side by side in a berth with what originally was a subsidised British boat paid for by the British taxpayers and now competing with him for a livelihood at this dangerous, difficult and hard working profession of seafaring.

These are the sort of anxieities which pass through my mind which I and the Committee are entitled to know are being examined. The point has been reached at which it would be convenient as far as I am concerned, although I have not he sitated to allow anyone who thought he had a point to make to intervene, it is quite conceivable that the Minister might want to report Progress and want time to reflect on some of the legal interpretations he has given.

The Minister has shown a certain open-mindedness. It is lamentable that no Law Officer is here to guide him, and he may want to consult a Law Officer. If it is not immodest of me to say so, I may have raised matters which he wishes to study. He would feel happier when addressing the Committee if he were firmly grounded on the Law Officers' advice—or perhaps he would like to consult the Foreign Secretary, the Minister of Defence and the Prime Minister on some of the points which I have made on the effects of the Clause.

I will sum up briefly. The Clause is an admission that Tory Freedom does not work. Sir James Stuart's expectation in 1953 has been confounded. His confident expectation that laissez-faire capital would be enough to solve the problem of the shorter boats has not been realised. He was wrong, and the Government propose to extend to the longer boats the same subsidies as had to be given to rescue the shorter boats. The Clause is a confession of failure and an admission that the longer boats cannot work un-subsidised, either. It is right to emphasise that all the Government's expectations in this respect have been confounded.

Mr. Loughlin

I am sorry to intervene at this stage, but I am becoming slightly confused by my hon. Friend's statements. He said that the subsidy for the deep water vessels, or long boats, as he called them, will be the same as that for the inshore fishermen.

Mr. Lever

I did not say that. I said it was doubtful whether the longer boats would get larger subsidies than the shorter boats—or whether the shorter boats would get a smaller subsidy. Nor did I say that both would attract the same subsidy. I do not know, and I ask the Minister, with a little more confidence, to enlighten us; I am happier when he speaks about the political aspects of the Bill than when he speaks about the legal aspects.

It is undeniable that the Bill is a confession of failure and a statement that the longer boats also require subsidy. It means that laissez faire, unsubsidised, normal economic considerations will presumably fail. If it does not mean that, why are we asked to subsidise the longer boats when for all these years the subsidy has been applicable only to the smaller boats? We do not know what the subsidy will be or how the Government will apply it, but they have no confidence that boats over 140 feet will be a viable economic proposition within our present system and under this Government unless they are subsidised. The Bill is a confession of failure and a promise not of a remedy but of a further subsidy.

It would have been heartening if the Government had been frank with us and said that it was clear that the industry was not viable and could not earn a good living without Government intervention. It would have been heartening if the Government had then said to us, "We must temporarily help the industry in this way. We, the Government, are alert and alive to find out why the longer boats, which presumably in the past were viable and profitable units, are now in need of a subsidy."

It is odd that the Government come here as if no explanation is required. It could be that we have had seven years of Tory rule. [HON. MEMBERS: "Iceland."] Why are the longer boats unprofitable because of the Icelandic dispute? Are we to solve that type of problem by tackling the causes of the unprofitability, or are we to solve it when it arises by subsidy? We started with subsidy for small boats. We end with subsidy for boats of any size. Where will it all end? It has spread from industry to industry. As soon as an industry cannot make an easy assured profit, the Government, in their anxiety to show that the Tory system works, doles out a subsidy—with very little thought about it either. So gradually the Government patronage extends from industry to industry.

I object to it. We want some assurances about this ever-spreading net of Government subsidy. The Clause extends the patronage power of the Government. I have exonerated the Government of any deliberate corrupt motive in the Clause. I do not think that the Clause is deliberately intended to corrupt ambition at present. But many unthinking people, ready to believe evil of others, will assume that that is the Government's intention and that it is not for nothing that the Government are enlarging their powers of patronage. Those who fear corruption understandably do so in an atmosphere of that kind, especially when they see the kind of thing which is approved of and justified by the Government, an example of which we witnessed today with the Government quite happily carrying legislation without three-quarters of the Committee having heard the Question being put. When a Government are responsible for such actions, it is bound to lead to a great deal of suspicion when they enlarge their power of patronage.

I do not charge the Minister with corruption. I think that he intends well for the longer boats and those who fish in them. He means well. The only trouble is, as has been proved so often, that mere good wishes for a section of the population are not enough. Carefully thought out plans, free from vice and corruption, or the possibility of vice and corruption, are required. The Minister may go. He may be replaced by another Minister.

Mr. Paget

He may be replaced by the Patronage Secretary.

Mr. Lever

He may indeed. The Government may go. We have moved from the days when the Patronage Secretary was content merely to decide who was to wear coronets. He has now a rather more vaunting ambition and likes to have a part on the wider stage.

The Deputy-Chairman

I find it very difficult to connect the hon. Member's remarks now with the Question, "That the Clause stand part of the Bill."

Mr. Lever

Sir William, you did not have the benefit of hearing this part of my argument. If you had listened to this part of my argument, the relevance of my words would have been more readily appreciated. I was stressing that this is another example of Government patronage. The Government have patronage. They have power to subsidise. Previously, they only had power to subsidise the owners of the 140 foot boats. Anybody with a larger or longer boat at that time could not hope to get Government patronage, but that will not be the case if we pass this Clause. If we pass the Clause, there can be long queues of proprietors of longer boats anxious for Government patronage.

The Government know that they will possess that power, and the Minister did not dispute that point in our discussion. And it is not irrelevant to my complaint that it extends Government patronage to notice that the present distributor of Government patronage, the Patronage Secretary, seems to be very ill-attuned to what we regard as the ordinary democratic rights in this House. Whereas we would not worry so much about the Clause extending Government patronage in this way if we had a Patronage Secretary in whom we had some confidence, we are surely entitled to argue that our anxieties are aggravated and enlarged by the monstrous behaviour of the fount of Government patronage to whom this patronage is being added.

I do not want to stray from the rules in order to seek to relate the behaviour of the Patronage Secretary today and the other day to this Clause, but it does relate to this Clause, because there is patronage there. There, although absent from his place, is the fount of Government patronage. This side has no reason to have confidence in the Patronage Secretary, and has no reason to desire to extend that patronage, as the Clause proposes, to the proprietors of longer boats—

Sir A. Vere Harvey

The hon. Gentleman has clearly shown that he is sympathetic to the industry and has referred to Iceland and how the dispute with that country has affected the boats that are longer than 140 ft., but can he say what he would do, if he was responsible, to help those longer boats?

Mr. Lever

Knowing that the hon. Gentleman's interventions have always been constructive, I am sure that he is not seeking to make me clash with the Chair. I want to adhere very strictly to the Question now before the Committee. If the hon. Gentleman consults me outside the Chamber I shall be very happy to discuss that with him, but I am now confined to discussing what the Clause intends to do. I fear that I cannot; unless I were to stray outside the rules of order, give him my policy for the fishing industry—

Sir A. V. Harvey

Try.

Mr. Lever

The hon. Gentleman says "Try," but one of the most disagreeable habits of the Committees seems to be that of sailing near the wind with the Chair—a nautical expression not altogether inappropriate to this subject. I can assure the hon. Gentleman that in the 15 years I have been in the House while I may not always have seen eye to eye with my Whips, and while I have not always troubled the House with my presence, it has yet been my honest endeavour always to respect the Chair and to support it in its activities.

It seems to me that there is no ingenuity more displaced than that used to seek to side-step the rules of the House. After all, those rules are intended to protect the very wide debate which we enjoy at all stages of our legislation. Wide as that is, one would not wish to widen it by—to use another nautical expression—going a little over the line now and then, and sailing too close to the wind. If the hon. Member wishes to know my policy on this and other subjects, I hope he will make his interventions on those occasions when the rules of order permit me to do justice to the question.

Returning to the subject of patronage, I am sure that the House of Commons as a whole objects to gifts of patronage, especially when they can be construed by some people as having been done with corrupt intention—an intention which, each time I raise the matter, I never impute to the Government. But honesty, like justice, must not merely be there; it must be manifestly seen to be there. It is no good the Government being pure as lilies if they look corrupt and besmirched with evil intent. It would be very ill advised for the Government to add yet another industry to the list of industries in which they have given patronage without giving some satisfactory assurances.

There is another matter which affects the honour of our country. The vessels which we are subsidising may travel to the most remote parts of the world. What safeguards shall we have that the subsidy given for one purpose will not be filched and used for another purpose? What a sad thing it would be if these subsidised long vessels could be seen in all parts of the globe, in all kinds of activities, reputable and disreputable, plying their trade, half financed by the British taxpayer, some perhaps smuggling rum and cigarettes from Tangier to Spain, some competing with British fishermen and perhaps sailing into British ports—engaged in all manner of other activities, creditable or discreditable. It is much to be deplored that we should be asked to pass unthinkingly a subsidy for such purposes when our intention is to help the simple fishermen of Britain and—I do not want to take too narrow a view—the proprietors.

The average fishing boat proprietor could not be called an aggressive imperialist capitalist beast. He is a fisherman himself, deeply interested in the work of his men and often sharing in the rough life and dangers of their calling. I do not want to raise any party political point here about the difference between the proprietor who receives the subsidy and the worker who receives only his wage, but it would be a depressing thought, and one which would redound very much to our discredit as a House of Commons, if we sent out these hard pressed men in this difficult and dangerous industry with our help and, in a few years, the same subsidised vessels were being sent all over the world operating for purposes, nefarious or even respectable, which were never in the mind of the House at all at the time when it passed the subsidies. That must not be permitted, and I think the Minister owes it to the Committee to say that we shall be safeguarded against that kind of thing.

Finally, I come to the long-term problem. Are the Government proposing to do something permanent for the benefit of the industry? Are we to be fobbed off in 1963 with a similar ill-thought-out scheme? What are the Government going to do about the Fleck Report? Have they considered the implications of that Report? [Interruption.] I am told I have not read the Report, but I am not supporting this legislation. I am not the Minister of Agriculture or the Secretary of State for Scotland. I want to know what is to be done for the industry in the long term. Must it look to the future as a pauperised industry, subjected to the humiliations we have seen the film industry go through? Every year that industry's affairs are scrutinised before the public dole is handed out. That is what this Clause does. It provides a dole. I do beg the Minister—

Mr. H. Wilson

I do not know whether my hon. Friend recalls, as many of us do with pleasure, how on the film industry he addressed a short speech of about three hours on 20th November, 1953—it was continued the following Tuesday. I am sure he does not want to get out of order, but some of the points he made on that occasion are highly relevant to this Clause.

Mr. Lever

The right hon. Gentleman reminds me of an agreeable occasion when we passed a day together in the House discussing the affairs of the Film Finance Corporation. It is of practical relevance here.

Mr. Wilson

My hon. Friend would not wish me to mislead the Committee. The discussion was in the nature of a dialogue, with me waiting to wind up. Perhaps he would consider withdrawing the word "discussing".

Mr. Lever

"Monologue" might be more appropriate. I was then incensed by the inadequate scrutiny given.

The Temporary Chairman (Dr. King)

We are not now concerned with the debate to which the hon. Member is referring.

Mr. Lever

I was making a passing reference only. My right hon. Friend the Member for Huyton (Mr. Wilson) forced a few nostalgic words from my lips. They were not intended to be out of order or of any protracted character. I was content with a passing reference to the film industry which was pauperised in the same way as under this Clause.

The Temporary Chairman

The hon. Member made that passing nostalgic reference the last time I was in the Chair

Mr. Lever

Unfortunately, the matter was brought again to my attention by my right hon. Friend. I will not allude further to it. I can only beg the Government, who have many discreditable matters on their conscience, at any rate not to let these people down. We are dealing here with people who are, and I do not intend a pun, the salt of the earth. Anyone who has sought to combat the ruthless and tempestuous seas, as I have, even by way of sport, must realise the hazardous nature of their calling, and the qualities of courage, endurance and simple fearlessness required of them. We cannot forget these folk who, in peace and war, render this service.

It would be a poor service to them if we were to leave the Minister to pass this Bill in an atmosphere of complacency, without any thought for the long term basis on which they may operate permanently and profitably. I beg the Minister to give this some consideration.

Mr. Roy Mason (Barnsley)

I may be able to help my hon. Friend here. Already in his most brilliant and probing speech he seems to have rendered the Secretary of State for Scotland to a stickleback running along the Front Bench all evening, and the Minister of Agriculture into something of a Dover sole, flattened to some extent. Could my hon. Friend explain to the Committee particularly the political design of Clause 1? Here there can be assistance to an industry which is to be reviewed again in 1963, just prior, as we understand, to the next General Election, an industry carried on in places where some hon. Members opposite have marginal seats.

1.30 a.m.

The Temporary Chairman

If the hon. Member did take up the suggestion of his hon. Friend he would be making a point which he has already made some hours ago.

Mr. Wilson

Is it in order for my hon. Friend to liken the Secretary of State for Scotland to a stickleback?

Mr. Loughlin

Unfair to the sticklebacks.

Mr. Wilson

Many of us have sticklebacks in our constituencies.

The Temporary Chairman

I hope that the Committee will get back to the Clause.

Mr. Lever

I have not likened any Member to a stickleback. I hope I have treated every Member with courtesy. If in the course of this somewhat extended examination of the Clause—[HON. MEMBERS: "Go on."]—I have not always expressed myself as felicitously as I might have done if the debate had come at an earlier hour, the blame must lie on the Patronage Secretary—[HON. MEMBERS: "Where is he?"]—who insists on forcing us to discuss this problem after an exhausting day on matters fundamental to the House.

To conclude my peroration, as it were. I do not want to deal with the point which has been raised by my hon. Friend because, Dr. King, you have said I should be out of order if I were to do so, and I wish not to be out of order. I want to conclude my peroration by saying this. It may seem only a small thing, this question of subsidy extension to long boats, but I feel it is not a small matter. It is one which can affect other and bigger things.

I do not want to repeat my arguments, but I should like the Minister to give an assurance that he is seeing the Clause in the larger setting of European and world affairs. I hope he has asked himself, is this consistent with our policy with E.F.T.A.? How is it going to affect our relations with E.F.T.A. on which the Government have given us every ground for optimism. It is no fault of ours: our optimism is not to be blamed on our own temperaments. The blame must be placed, surely, upon the Government. Their every action, every line they write, every Clause they seek to have passed, all relate to E.F.T.A. I hope they will not disappoint the hopes which they themselves have excited. How does this Clause stand in relation to E.F.T.A.? We have not been told, and we are entitled to know. We want to know, is this Clause consistent with the Government's repeated statements in relation to the Common Market?

The Temporary Chairman

Again I would point out to the hon. Member that he asked this question at some length previously.

Mr. Lever

I was not seeking to traverse that ground again, but seeking only to bring my speech to as graceful an end as possible by a brief recapitulation of the main heads of my thought.

I come to a conclusion now with this final thought. Not only our hopes of the Common Market, but our high hopes of a peaceful world depend upon the Government attuning their economic policy and all the details of it to the requirements of the modern world, and I beg the Government to keep these great considerations in mind when they invite the Committee to pass this Clause.

Mr. Soames

Had there been members of the fishing industry able to view the scene of this Committee, they might well have thought that all of a sudden the Opposition had come to take a very keen interest in their affairs. They might well have thought that, from the sight of the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition and the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown) on (the Front Bench opposite when these matters were being discussed, and, indeed, from the opening speech of the hon. Member for Edinburgh, Leith (Mr. Hoy), who asked some questions that were eminently apposite to the Question, "That the Clause stand part of the Bill".

The hon. Member asked whether reference to a sum of £3 million in the Clause binds us to that figure. But, as will be seen on careful reading of the Clause, and as was talked about at some length on Second Reading, it is of course £3 million at any one time. It enables the Government to lay an Order before the House asking for up to £3 million at any one time until 1963.

If the hypothetical members of the fishing industry whom I have mentioned, particularly those representing the distant water fleet, had sat on to hear the hon. Member for Edinburgh, East (Mr. Willis), knowing that, as I remember well, he sat through Second Reading and made a contribution to that debate, I doubt whether at that point these people would have thought there was all that seriousness in the remarks made about the Clause.

The hon. Member asked whether the Government were not jumping the gun, as was his expression, in giving effect to the recommendations of the Fleck Committee. He knows well that the Bill—and I said this on Second Reading—was framed before the Fleck Committee reported. The Bill is not the child of consideration of the Fleck Committee's Report. The Bill extends the payment of operating subsidies. I repeat that it has nothing whatever to do with grants or loans to build vessels. It has to do with the extension of the operating subsidy to the distant water fleet. Once we had subscribed to the Canadian—United States formula at the second Geneva Conference it was inevitable. It was the greatest pity that we did not get the necessary majority there. We failed, as the hon. Member will remember, by one vote. But that having happened, and being inevitable that it would be followed by a number of bilateral agreements between various countries, the distant water fleet was possibly going to lose much of its traditional fishing waters and some form of subsidy would probably be necessary at some time for that fleet.

We are not jumping the gun on the Fleck Committee. The Committee reported before Christmas. Its Report was sent out to interested parties within the industry with a request for their comments. I hope that fairly soon we shall be receiving them. Then they will receive full consideration from the Government as to what we should do about the long-term questions of the fishing industry as a Whole.

Mr. Jeger

Will the right hon. Gentleman give a guarantee that when we consider the proposals arising out of the Fleck Report we do not do so at this hour of the night—or morning?

Mr. Soames

I could not give any guarantee about what arrangements will be made to discuss matters before the House. I do not know whether the hon. Member was present, but the Second Reading of the Bill was given a whole day—from half past three to ten o'clock, when we also discussed the Fleck Report.

However, if my mythical friend from the fishing industry had been here when the hon. Member for Cardiff, South-East (Mr. Callaghan) intervened, any feeling he might have had that the Opposition had a genuine interest in the fishing industry would have been immediately dispelled when the hon. Member told us that the object of this great attendance and this long debate was in order to teach the Chief Whip a lesson. The fishing industry will draw its own conclusions from that.

Mr. Driberg

The right hon. Gentleman may remember that I immediately repudiated that so far as I was concerned, saying that I would not be so presumptuous about it.

Mr. Soames

It would seem that the new-found unity of hon. Members opposite has not lasted very long.

Mr. Callaghan

I hope to make some contribution on this subject at a later stage, which will reveal that I have a very close interest in the matter, as well as a desire that the Patronage Secretary and his followers should be visited with the consequences of their folly last week.

Mr. Soames

So be it. That is the hon. Gentleman's view on this debate on the Question, "That the Clause stand part of the Bill."

The hon. Member for Manchester, Cheetham (Mr. H. Lever) made what was at times a delightful and at times a witty after-dinner speech. It was reminiscent of other speeches made by the hon. Member, and he could not help treading on old ground when he mentioned the film industry, a subject on which he once spoke at some length. He showed us that he had not lost his touch for this type of speech, although as he went on I thought that he did not need to remind us all that often of the fact that he had not given the subject the consideration which he himself thought it deserved.

The hon. Member raised three import, ant matters. He asked first whether the Clause had been studied in the wider context, to which the answer is yes. The Clause will not have any ill-effects on the Government's overall foreign policy. He than asked whether 'the subsidies were to be paid to all sorts of people. He conjured up visions of people scattered around the world grabbing the taxpayers' money through subsidies for these vessels.

The subsidies are paid only in respect of British registered fishing vessels and in respect of voyages made to catch white fish which are landed in the United Kingdom. That is the main answer to his charge. It showed that in fact he had not given the subject the attention which he freely admitted it deserved when he thought that there might be a danger of this patronage being extended to people who might use it for nefarious purposes. He admitted that that was not the Government's intention, but be thought that it might still be the result. I would like to reassure the hon. Gentleman about that.

1.45 a.m

The Clause will be implemented by an Order. It is not an end in itself. It enables the Government to lay an Order later, and when it is laid the hon. Member wild see the detail with which it is drawn up. That will be later in the year. There already is an example of what has been done, not for the distant water fleet, which was then not permissible, but for the near and middle water fleets. It is Statutory Instrument No. 1298. The White Fish Subsidy (United Kingdom) Scheme, 1960. This White Fish Subsidy Scheme came into operation on 1st August, 1960, for twelve months, and it is only for British-registered vessels landing fish in this country. In order to make the position quite clear in the hon. Member's mind, and to assure,him that these provisions could not be used for nefarious purposes, I will read out to him paragraph 17, which goes further than just talking about fish. It says: No grants shall be payable (a) in respect of fish (other than wings of ray and skate, skinned dogfish, and monkfish tails) landed without heads or tails or from which any portion of the head or tail has been removed…

The hon. Member will probably be satisfied from that that the regulations are closely drawn. He need have no fear on that score.

Mr. Thomas Fraser (Hamilton)

I listened carefully to all that was said in the Second Reading debate, and I clearly recollect the Minister's saying that in view of the Icelandic waters being closed to those vessels which are not to get the subsidy under the Clause it would be necessary to look for new fishing grounds, and perhaps to offer a subsidy in respect of other fish not covered by subsidy hitherto. Does not he recollect that he said those things in that debate?

Mr. Soames

The hon. Member is putting words into my mouth. I did not say "because of Icelandic waters being closed". I said that we had made agreements with the Faroes and Norway, and that the tendency was towards the extension of the limit to twelve males. That section of our fleet which fishes in those waters is using its traditional fishing grounds. I was not specifying the area off Iceland. We have every hope that we shall be able to reach agreement with Iceland over this matter. I was talking about the general 'theme and the direction in, which these matters we're going. We want to put ourselves into a posion whereby we can, if necessary, include in a subsequent order the distant water fleet.

As to the fish which attract subsidy—white fish is any fish found in the sea except for herring, salmon, migratory trout and shellfish—so the many varieties of fish mentioned by the hon. Member would come within that description.

I do not believe that any case has been made out by the Opposition; nor do I believe that there is any feeling among hon. Members opposite that the Clause should not stand part of the Bill. I think it is a reasonable Clause, with good purposes, and I hope that, after the considerable discussion we have had, the Committee will soon decide that the Clause should stand part of the Bill.

Mr. Paget

The right hon. Gentleman said he was assured that this does not affect our wider interests. This is a production subsidy. Do we take it from the right hon. Gentleman that it has been through the G.A.T.T. and has been approved by the G.A.T.T.?

Mr. Soames

This is an extension which could come without having to go to the G.A.T.T. on an established principle of operating a subsidy for our fish ing fleet. It is we ourselves who have chosen to limit it to distant water fishing and hitherto near water fishing. This is an extension to distant water fishing and in no way runs counter to the G.A.T.T.

Mr. Paget

Surely the extension of any production subsidy has to be approved by the G.A.T.T.? If this has any meaning at all it is an extension of a production subsidy.

Mr. Willey

We are obliged to the right hon. Gentleman for his interim reply. We cannot accept this as disposing of discussion on Clause 1; it is quite inadequate to the debate we have had so far.

I was a little disturbed when the right hon. Gentleman was apparently explaining that this legislation was paving the way to an Order, because we know quite well what the word "paving" would have meant if the Patronage Secretary had been here. It would have provoked him to move the Closure. It will not do to legislate in this slipshod way and to say that this is merely paving. We are discussing the principles of the legislation. Take the point about the £3 million. The right hon. Gentleman has repeated what he said on Second Reading. I remind the Committee of what he said: I am not saying that we will come with a figure of £3 million. We might come with a lower figure. If we came with a lower figure, the hon. Gentleman could advise us to come for more. Equally, if the hon. Member thought that £3 million was too much he could advise us so. He should realise that this is not a once-for-all £3 million. When the Bill is enacted, if he thinks the £3 million is insufficient he can recommend the Government to come back with another Order, which is within their power under the Bill."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 31st January, 1961; Vol. 633, c. 910–11.] We cannot legislate like that. We are entitled to know what the Government have in mind. I have raised this repeatedly in debates when we have been discussing subsidies. It is not good enough for the Government to say, "We want more money. We do not know how much. It might be £3 million, it might be less or more. We have not the slightest idea." The Government ought to have an idea. We cannot proceed with this Clause until we get a proper answer on that. I am not bringing into issue the principle of this subsidy, but I have always said on these and on agricultural subsidies that this is not an open-ended subsidy. The case has to be made and to be put in figures.

Let us see whether we can find the reason for the Bill The right hon. Gentleman intervened to advise us on the law. I know quite well why the Attorney-General is not here. The Attorney-General dare not be here on a fishing debate because he knows what the industry thinks of his performance at the Conference.

Mr. G. Brown

He would not be of any help to the Minister if he were here.

Mr. Willey

We have every sympathy with the Minister of Labour in the difficulties he faced at Geneva, but everyone knew that he was put in an impossible position by the Attorney-General. That is not merely my opinion, but the opinion of everyone the right hon. Gentleman cares to consult in the industry. I can appreciate the difficulties he has had in explaining the law. For the moment we have to rest and I have not the slightest anxiety in resting—on the advice of my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Northampton (Mr. Paget). If the right hon. Gentleman does not rest on that advice as I do, he should send for one of the Law Officers.

The difficulty about this legislation is that we get legislation by reference all the time. Here we get partial reference. Just as this is slipshod legislation, this is a slipshod way of legislating. The Clause ought to set out clearly what is its effect. It ought not to refer back but have written in the Clause the provisions of the earlier legislation on which it relies.

I want to touch on shipbuilding. The Minister said that this is an operating and not a building subsidy, but an operating subsidy, too, is relevant to whether an owner orders a new vessel. If I had an operating subsidy for a car it would influence me in deciding whether to purchase a new car.

One day last week I met an influential man in the shipbuilding industry who said to me, surprisingly, "I hope that you are giving enthusiastic support for the White Fish and Herring Industries Bill." Thus, the shipbuilders are concerned about the Bill; they think that it affects them both as an operating subsidy and as a grant. Frankly, that makes me think twice about the Bill. I represent a shipbuilding constituency. We are not likely to build vessels which will take advantage of this Bill—at least, we hope not, although we have been reduced to a state in which we built only a couple of colliers one year. But when Parliament gives such a subsidy as this, we should know what its purpose is.

The shipbuilding industry is faced with great difficulties, and at two points in the Government's programme aid is being given to it indirectly. Aid is being given for the Cunarders through the shipping company, and apparently it is being given here to the shipbuilder of the fishing vessel through the fishing industry. I am not altogether convinced that this is the best way of giving a subsidy if it is meant to aid such an industry.

In our debates on the aid given to the white fish and herring industries, there has been repeated reference to the aid which is given, in turn, to the shipbuilding industry. If we are giving this subsidy in this way we ought to have a very clear idea of our purpose in giving it and be sure that it achieves that purpose.

I will look a little further. The Minister said that the Clause was not the result of the consideration of the Fleck Committee, but I wonder whether he is justified in bringing it forward in view of that Committee. I gather that his argument is, "We intended to do this anyway. The Fleck Report appeared, but we were in train with the legislation and we proceeded with it." I doubt whether that is wise. Having received the Report, I think that the Government should have said, "We will consider it and see whether we ought now to take the steps which we had intended to take."

I want to make two references to the Fleck Committee's Report which affect the Clause. The majority of the Fleck Committee have definite views on subsidies. Does the Minister share those views? He ought to tell us before we part from the Clause whether he shares the views of the majority of the Fleck Committee.

The majority view of the Fleck Committee was this: … the fleet as a whole is unlikely to attain economic operation at its present level and with its present structure, but … with the modernisation of its vessels and the rationalisa- tion of its structure—including an increasingly close connecton between the catching and the processing and distributive sides of the industry—there is reasonable hope of its future prosperity.

2.0 a.m.

That takes a very broad view of the industry? Does the right hon. Gentleman share it? What he is doing is in line with the Fleck Committee. Taking that view, the Committee then says that it regards such a scheme generally as being terminable, but meanwhile the assistance has got to be paid to the whole of the industry and not devoted to one or other sections of it. This is a vital matter affecting the whole industry. What has surprised me is that sufficient attention has not been paid to the industry as a whole.

When the present subsidy was given to two sections of the industry, it was given for the express purpose of preserving those two sections. That was why it was not given to the distant water fleet. When I was a junior Minister I was asked to give advice about this. I was asked whether the then subsidies and the present subsidies would mean cheaper fish. I said, "Of course not. If you want cheaper fish, give the subsidy to the long distance boats. They will get the cheaper fish, but they will knock out the inshore and middle water fleets."

Are the Government taking that view? I do not think that it is good enough for the right hon. Gentleman merely to say that this is not the child of the consideration of the Fleck Committee. I want to know whether he has considered the general purpose of the Fleck Committee Report. Has he abandoned the idea that the inshore and middle water fleets should be preserved in the strategic interest of the country and also because we have regard to the social consequences of not affording them a particular support—incidentally, support against the distant water fleet?

I am also impressed by the fact that Mr. Middleton, for whom many of us have a great regard, published his own reservation upon the Fleck Committee's views affecting the distant water fleet. I want to refer briefly to his reservation regarding subsidy to distant water vessels, because that is what we are discussing. Mr. Middleton said: As the Report indicates the distant water fleet have to date been excluded from the receipt of subsidies, but it is now recommended that a subsidy should be paid to trawler owners because of the advent of circumstances inimical to their operations.

Just as I object to no definition when we ask about the £3 million, so I object to no definition when we ask questions about the distant water fleet. Mr. Middleton says that the Fleck Committee envisages a fairly substantial subsidy. The Committee should realise that a fairly substantial subsidy for the distant water fleet will have a very adverse effect on both the inshore and middle water fleets.

Mr. Middleton goes on to say in his reservation: Whether to subsidise or not to subsidise, the duration of the subsidy and the amount of subsidy that should be paid has constituted the burden of the Committee's deliberations during its latter meetings. It would not be uncharitable to state that, in the minds of most members of the Committee, the criterion which governs the attraction of a subsidy by any section of the fishing fleet should be efficiency and the pursuit of efficiency.

Again, I ask the Government whether this is their criterion.

Again, this is a matter which affects the balance between the three fleets. Says Mr. Middleton: That efficiency is of paramount importance in the development towards a viable industry seems axiomatic, but precisely how is this desirable condition in the fishing industry to be measured? What is the yardstick, or test, to be applied? The answer it seems is profitability.

I want to digress here—I shall return to Mr. Middleton in a moment or two. "The answer seems to be profitability," That means that the burden on the Government is to tell the Committee that there has been such a fall in profitability in the distant-water fleet that they are asking for an extension of the subsidy to include that fleet. Where is the evidence? All I have before me are the Reports of the White Fish Authority, and I cannot see any such evidence. I can see the fall in profitability but, heavens above, where are we getting to? The moment there is a fall in profitability there has to be Government aid and subsidy.

If we return to the Report we find that The total value of the distant-water catch fell to £22 million or by a little less than 1 per cent. The average value per hundredweight rose to 60s. 0d. as compared with 58s. 11d. in 1958, and the quantity which remained unsold at or above the minimum price and was used for fish meal was 9,400 tons, compared with 6,800 tons in 1958.

Those figures do not, on the face of it, show any dramatic fall in profitability. We expect some swing—and I will come to the cost of this in a moment—in profitability, but surely we have not reached the stage where anybody in business expects stability or an increase in profitability, but must come to the Government for subsidy if his business shows some less profit than in the previous year.

I have a very great respect—and say so at once in case I am considered to be critical—for the men who work in the distant water fleet—

Mr. Prior

Before the hon. Gentleman leaves that point, does he say quite definitely that he is against a subsidy for the distant water fleet? That is the gist of what he has been saying.

Mr. Willey

I am not saying anything of the sort. I say that the onus is on the Government to prove the case. I want to challenge the hon. Gentleman. Is he aware of any representations from the distant-watermen to Her Majesty's Government asking for a subsidy?

Mr. Prior

Yes, I think it has been complained for some time that the distant water section has been getting into trouble over the Iceland fishing, and has been asking the Government to consider a subsidy.

Mr. Willey

I will come to Iceland in a moment. If that be the case, the facts ought to be before us, but I am not aware of that. I am aware of the distant water fleet saying, quite properly, that they have been prejudiced by what has happened in Icelandic and other waters, but as far as I know no case has been publicly established that there has been such a fall in profitability that there is a patent case for an immediate subsidy.

I mention one other thing by way of an aside. This is not the first time that the distant water fleet has been in difficulties. We had the restrictive agreement about tying up vessels. In fact there have been very few vessels tied up over the last 12 months, so that really indicates no more than that this is a matter to be discussed and, on the face of it, there is no patent, obvious case. While I have a very great respect and admiration for the men who work in these vessels, I know also, as many people do, that they do make very good wages. I would not for a moment quarrel with the idea that they do not earn them. But, again, I have no evidence that those earnings have dramatically fallen in the past 12 months.

Mr. Prior

If the hon. Gentleman says that the need for the Bill and the Clause is not justified, as regards the distant water fleet, by the present demands of the British Trawlers' Federation for a subsidy, I presume that he takes the view that the subsidy is not necessary, the need has not been proved, and it is not something which he will support when the Question is put.

Mr. G. Brown

Before my hon. Friend answers that, will he just consider something which I thought I heard him say a few moments ago when referring to the earnings of trawler hands? I thought I heard him say—and I fear for him lest the Recording Angel also should have heard him—that he would not quarrel with the idea that they do not earn them.

Mr. Willey

I am much obliged to my right hon. Friend. This is what happens when we are obliged to discuss important matters at this hour of the morning. What I meant was the reverse, of course. No one would quarrel with the men on these vessels earning large wages. Of all people following an arduous trade or occupation, they merit our respect. They run risks, they suffer the rigours of the sea, and, in my view, they are entitled to a high rate of earnings.

Sir A. V. Harvey

It is well known that the skipper and mate receive a percentage of the realisation of the catch, but the deck hands usually average only about £25 a week. I think that they earn every penny of that for the job they do.

Mr. Willey

I do not think the hon. Gentleman is very well informed, with respect. He will have an opportunity of giving us the benefit of his experience.

I do not for a moment suggest that these are people making outrageous wages. They work hard, they run risks, and they are justified—

Mr. Loughlin

And long hours. When we think of wages, we must remember that that is total pay, and very often the fishermen work long hours not only during the voyage but at a stretch. They may easily work 72 hours all round with about an hour's snatch, as they call it, for a break. We ought to relate the pay of fishermen to the number of hours they work. I look forward to the day when we have in the fishing industry something like a 72-hour week. It would be a godsend to fishermen.

Mr. Willey

I am much obliged for these interventions because they have. made my purpose abundantly clear.

The two points I was making seem to have been misunderstood. Any subsidy—certainly, to quote the words of Mr. Middleton, a fairly substantial subsidy—to the distant water fleet is bound to affect the fortunes of the other two sections of the industry. What are the Government's plans? Behind the Fleck Report is rationalisation. Rationalisation by subsidisation is about the worst possible form one could select.

2.15 a.m.

All I am asking is, what is the purpose of the Government? What do they intend to be the future of the inshore and middle water fleets?

The other point I was making, and I return to it because apparently I was not fully understood, was that I am not quarrelling in principle with this subsidy, I am saying that there is an obligation on the Government to prove their case. Here we get the same old story. We do not know what the case is, and I was led a little to one side by saying that, as far as I know, and it has not been challenged, the industry, through the men or the owners, have not applied for an extension of the subsidy.

To return to Mr. Middleton, he stated: Can any justification or rational argument be advanced for the payment of subsidy to some of the larger companies with interests in fishing and the processing of fish and other,foods? In a recent press interview the managing director of one such company disclosed that about half his company's turnover of £3½ million comes from their 67 trawlers fishing off Iceland, Newfoundland and the Barents Sea. Moreover," he said, "The Iceland troubles did not put us to any extra expense in the year to September 30th, but it was a wonderful fishing season and, but for the troubles, we should have caught a lot more and our profits would have been considerably higher. I know that the view taken by the members of the Committee is that the proceeds from what happens to fish after it is landed are not relevant to the fishing subsidies, which are concerned only with the economics of the catching operations. Surely, by the same token or line of reasoning, the railway industry and the coal industry should be much more appropriate subjects to qualify for Government subventions. I am not averse to the payment of subsidies to the fishing industry nor would I offer opposition to the payment of subsidies to other industries where circumstances warranted such payment and the need for sound development was evident. However, the recommendation to subsidise the distant water operators, and in doing so to include those firms who are not only prospering in the industry but proudly boasting about it, runs contrary to the whole idea underlying the provision of financial aid to any industry which is being helped towards a viable future.

The comments I make on what Mr. Middleton says are these. I have made the point of what is a viable industry. Are we concerned with fall in profitability, which can well be expected, or are we concerned with such a fall that it might affect the operation of the industry as a whole? As far as I am aware, this part of the industry is still viable. The second point is that behind the general approach of the Fleck Committee is the idea that the various parts of this industry must be approached together, and that it is only in this way that one can make it viable.

Here, says Mr. Middleton, is part of the industry which has put itself into that position. But, says the majority of the Fleck Committee, if the industry was in that position it would not need a subsidy. Why should we give the subsidy to the very people who, by the argument which is the basis of the Committee, do not need it? If we once give them a subsidy, it will be difficult to take it away from them.

Sir A. V. Harvey

The Labour Government's subsidies to farmers were not limited to small farmers. They were paid to farmers with 10,000 acres.

Mr. Willey

It seems to me that the hon. Gentleman is suffering in the way I was, apparently, about twenty minutes ago. He is not really alive to the argument. I want to carry him with me. I know he is endeavouring to follow me as best he can.

The point here is that there is a definition one can follow. Here Mr. Middleton is referring to some of the larger companies with interests in fishing and the processing of fish and other foods. All I am saying is that this is a matter capable of definition. Suppose there were large farmers who, perhaps, were also millers. One could define them as millers. If there are fishermen who are also processing fish and other foods one can describe them as processors. One can exclude processors from the subsidy. This is not a matter which has been touched upon by the Government at all. It is common knowledge that most of the longdistance men have now gone into processing. So by this definition, if the Government followed the trend of the Fleck Committee Report, if they paid any heed to Mr. Middleton, there would be no case for subsidy either on the long or short term view. So I ask the Government again, why are they proposing to give subsidy in these cases where, whether one takes the Fleck Committee majority view or Mr. Middleton's view, there would be no case for the subsidy at the end of whatever period the Government were to decide should be the terminal time?

Mr. Prior

If, as the hon. Member now says, all the long-distance men are also processors and, therefore, should not be subsidised, he is once more making the point that no long-distance trawler owners should have subsidy.

Mr. Willey

I will be quite explicit. I agree with Mr. Middleton, that the firm he quotes ought not to receive a subsidy. Does the hon. Gentleman quarrel with that?

Mr. Prior

No. It was not the point.

Mr. Willey

I am saying that as far as the illustration quoted by Mr. Middleton goes, I do not think the subsidy is justified in that instance. I gather the hon. Gentleman agrees with me.

Mr. Prior

I certainly do not agree with you at all. I was finding out what your view is. It seems to me your view is that the long-distance trawlers should not have subsidy. Once we have got that straight perhaps we can get on.

Mr. Willey

I am mot interested in the view of the Chair. I was interested in, the view of the hon. Member. He keeps interrupting me. I want him to follow consistently the line of argument. I should like to know where his questions are leading. That is all. I said quite explicitly—he, can differ if he wishes—that in the illustration quoted by Mr. Middleton there is no case whatever for subsidy. That is Mr. Middleton's view. That is my view, and, I think, the view of most people in the Committee.

Now I will go one stage further. As far as my knowledge goes, I do not think there is a case for giving subsidy to distant waiter fleet owners who are also processors. I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman, who has a constituency interest in this, would challenge that. If the Government challenge that they ought to produce facts in evidence.

Now I want to turn to the further argument about Iceland, but before I reach Iceland I want to deal with E.F.T.A. My hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Cheetham (Mr. H. Lever) asked a number of pertinent questions about ETTA. We have had no reply. I wild say what my quarrel with the Government about E.F.T.A. is. They get hamfisted negotiations and at the end of the day the taxpayer pays. That is what we had about pigs. I do mot want to pursue the matter of pigs. I merely call it in aid by way of 'illustration because every hon. Mem-bar opposite is embanrassed by the mention of them.

Behind E.F.T.A. is the agreement about frozen Metis. The right hon. Gentleman knows it, but did not mention that the industry is worried about frozen Norwegian fillets. He did mot say a word about it. I cannot think why. We have a basic industry which is threatened by the Government's giving way quite unnecessarily. Then a respectable time afterwards there is a subsidy. This is the dilemma which the Government face. The money goes down the drain because an assurance has been given to other E.F.T.A. countries that we wild not resort to subsidies to destroy the effect of the agreement. Therefore this money is thrown away by way of a sop. This is the worst sort of nationalisation—by subsidy—if the Government agree to a trade agreement which is pre-judicial to an industry and then say, "We will keep you quiet by doling out public funds", knowing that, because of the agreement, the subsidy cannot be effective as a means of making a threat. This is why we should have liked a reply about E.F.T.A. I hope that we shall have a reply which will answer the charge that I have made against the Government.

What worries us about Iceland is that this is throwing up the sponge. The right hon. Gentleman wriggles and squirms about Iceland but he gave as justification for payment of the subsidy the failure of our negotiations with Iceland. What does that say to Iceland? It says, "You have won the day, because we are now going to subsidise the loss inflicted on us." It will be interpreted in that way not only by Iceland but by other countries that are affected.

If there were any prospect of the Government winning through on this they would not have introduced a Measure of this kind to offer a subsidy to cover the losses which our fishermen are suffering through the Iceland restrictions. I cannot think of anything worse, but this is the sort of policy that we get from this slipshod, ramshackle Government. We have got ourselves into a very difficult situation through the Attorney-General's blundering. I sympathise with the Minister of Labour. He had no chance at Geneva. Here, instead of a promise of a satisfactory solution at the end of the day, we get acceptance again. Just as in the case of the E.F.T.A. frozen fillets we abandon the chance of getting a satisfactory solution and we decide through the subsidies to cover the industry against this loss.

2.30 a.m.

There are many other points which I should like to raise on the Clause but I do not want to rush matters. I think that I have raised sufficient points to evoke a further reply from the Government. It is disappointing that so far we have had no serious attempt by the Government to give an explanation of something which demands publicly in Committee an explanation before we can agree to make this further provision.

This has been a temporary subsidy temporarily extended time after time. The amount has been quantified and then, within a few years, has been extended when it has been found to be inadequate. That is not the way in which to deal with an industry. Right hon. and hon. Members opposite make fun of planning, but this is the cost when there is no planning. All three sections of the fishing industry should be viable by now, but after this vast expenditure of public money over the years, we are told only that the industry must be rationalised. That is not good enough. I ask the Government to think again and to give us a more satisfactory reply to the debate before we leave this Clause.

Mr. Callaghan

I beg to move, That the Chairman do report Progress and ask leave to sit again.

I would not claim that the sitting has been unduly long. I well remember that in the days of the Labour Government the then Opposition forced a sitting that lasted for 31 hours. There is no reason why hon. Members who have embarked on this debate should feel that there is any undue length about our proceedings.

However, it is quite clear from other things which have happened that it is time that the Government made a statement about their intentions. A number of Ministers have been missing for a long time. The Leader of the House told us earlier this evening that we should be more diligent in our Parliamentary duties, but I have not seen him here since ten o'clock. Had he been here, he could have seen whether we were diligent in our Parliamentary duties.

The Chief Whip, or Patronage Secretary, as he is called, has not been seen in the Chamber since the Division at ten o'clock. Perhaps his absence is to be preferred to his presence in view of earlier events. Now that the Leader of the House has come in, I repeat that he will want to know that his shaft of this evening went home. We do not wish to disappoint him about our diligence in attending to our Parliamentary duties.

However, until his recent incursion, the strength of the Ministerial Bench has been singularly lacking. The Civil Lord has not been present, although there have been several observations about the 12-mile limit with which the Navy is vitally concerned. The Attorney-General, who made the complete botch which resulted in our losing any advantage we might have obtained from the international negotiations, has kept well away from the Chamber. No one has seen him.

On the other hand, the Minister of Agriculture made a cursory reply and did not deal with the problems left by the Attorney-General, and it would have been better if we had been able to question him direct. We have not seen the Lord Privy Seal. The international complications which have arisen over the 12-mile limit and the negotiations with Iceland merit his attendance.

Finally, there has been no sign of the President of the Board of Trade, or the Minister of State, Board of Trade. In the wide-ranging speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester Cheetham (Mr. H. Lever), there was a pregnant passage about negotiations in connection with the Six and the Seven and our position in E.F.T.A. The Minister of Agriculture did not deal with any of those problems. I do not blame him for that. It is not that he was not capable, but that he was not briefed. These issues have clearly been of concern to the Committee during the long debate we have had. I would, therefore, like this opportunity of seeing what the Government and the Leader of the House have to say about the position in which we find ourselves.

It is clear that many hon Members wish to continue the debate. On the other hand, the Government benches have been in some disarray. The hon. Member for Lowestoft (Mr. Prior), despite his lively interventions, is getting more and more hoarse, and will not have a voice left at all if he goes on much longer. Other Members on the Government benches are extremely somnolent. We have arrived at a position where the Government could consider calling it a day and letting us have another go at the Clause tomorow. We have our speeches, and are ready to deliver them now, if the occasion should demand, but after we have finished with Clause 1 there will be Clause 2. and that Clause provides for the extension of the subsidy from £20 million to £25 million per annum.

I should not be surprised if, at that stage, the hon. Member for Kidderminster (Mr. Nabarro) and the hon. Member for Dorset, South (Viscount Hinchingbrooke) took an interest in the proceedings. They are not hon. Members who will allow to pass lightly a proposed extension of the spending of public money on subsidies of this sort. If they do their duty they will want to know the Minister's explanation of these subsidies, and it will foe no use his turning round and saying, in a perfunctory way, "We are giving our subsidies to allow people to build longer boats, of over 140 feet in length". The question will then be asked—and the Minister has not been prepared to answer it this evening—" What is your policy in relation to the size and shape of the fishing industry? "

My hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey) asked what the Minister had to say about the Fleck Report. As far as I can make out, the Minister's answer is that the Government have only just received it. They received it only in December, so they are not in a position to tell us anything about it; all they want us to do is to vote the money. Anybody who reads that Report—and I have had a good opportunity of doing so during the last few hours—can see that the voting of the money is dependent upon a number of other considerations, such as the size and shape of the industry; the nature of the industry; the setting up of an authority which would have the responsibility for organising the industry, and the re-organisation of dock facilities. All these questions are raised in the Fleck Report. The voting of money is only one of them, but even in connection with that the Minister has not been able to give us any answer to the questions we have asked.

The right hon. Gentleman is expressing no opinion whether the operational subsidy for distant water vessels should be as big as, larger than, or smaller than the subsidy which at present exists for the middle and inshore fishing fleets. This is an important question of principle for the Committee should decide, but we have not had a word from the Minister about it. In his pursuance of economies I hope that the Leader of the House will remember that a majority of the Fleck Committee was in favour of smaller subsidies being paid to the distant water trawlers. From the little that the Minister said we could only deduce that he was in favour of the same amount of subsidy being paid to the distant water vessels. Is that his policy? We have not really been told yet.

I hope that I have indicated, first, that there are many loose ends for the Government to tie up before they present to us their conclusions. Secondly, Government Members do not look as though they want to go on with the Bill, judging by the somnolent appearance of some of them. Thirdly, although the Leader of the House thought he could smuggle the Bill through after ten o'clock and get it through in half an hour—a venture which has singularly failed—because he is having a lot of discussion on it, and there will be more discussion yet. In those circumstances it would be far better for him to think again about the tactics the Government propose to take in connection with the Bill and give us an indication now of what they intend to do.

The Deputy-Chairman

I am prepared to accept the Motion moved by the hon. Member.

Mr. Soames

I suggest that the Committee should not agree to the Motion as yet. We have had from before half-past ten until after half-past two—four hours—an interesting debate and have gone over a wide ground. This is obviously a subject which is close to the hearts of many hon. Members opposite. They have taken a great interest, all of a sudden, in the Bill. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] They have admitted that it is a sudden interest. Having got thus far, I should have thought it reasonable to go a little farther, to take to fruition our discussions and see whether we cannot get a great deal further with the Bill. It would seem a great pity to break off at this junction when, obviously, there are many hon. Members who would like to see the Bill make further progress. I suggest that we continue our discussions and see how we get on.

Mr. Driberg

I hope very much that the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the House will reconsider what the Minister has just said. I think that it would be more sensible from his point of view, as well as that of the whole Committee, that we should sit again on another day.

I also urge it from the point of view of people we do not always consider as much as we should, the staff of the House, the HANSARD reporters and other servants and officers of the House. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] I am sorry that hon. Members opposite should think this a contemptible consideration. I know that they do not care very much about the staff of the House, but some of us on this side of the Committee do. We know that they have to stay up late, quite rightly, in the service of this House—waiters, messengers and all sorts of staff. It is a little inconsiderate to them that the right hon. Gentleman should insist on going on sitting at this unreasonable hour which, as has been pointed out, has been forced upon us by the arrogance and ineptitude of the Patronage Secretary.

There is a new President, a new, young and vigorous President, of the United States of America. He, I am glad to say, is beginning to take the initiative in foreign affairs which the present British Government have shown themselves totally incapable of taking.

The Deputy-Chairman

Order. I find it difficult to relate the hon. Member's remarks to the Question of reporting Progress.

Mr. Driberg

With great respect, I shall make it much easier for you, Sir William, by saying that I hope that within the next few weeks, or even days, the new President of the United States may be taking a new initiative which will help to take Iceland out of the cold war and help to solve the Icelandic dispute, which is the background to and real cause of the subsidies rendered necessary in this Bill and this Clause.

2.45 a.m.

I therefore suggest that it would be better not to sit again tomorrow, but to sit again and complete this passage of the Bill—which, of course, we all want to assist as best we can and to improve as best we can—in a few weeks' time, not necessarily tomorrow but when the new President has had time to develop further the initiatives he has shown so hopefully in other fields of foreign affairs. Then, if we sat again on another day, there would be time for a full attendance, not only of other back bench Members opposite, but of all those Ministers who have been so noticeably absent tonight who should have been here and who were identified by my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, South-East (Mr. Callaghan) when moving this Motion.

The Foreign Office, as usual, is the chief villain of this drama. It is quite disgraceful that the Lord Privy Seal has not bothered to look in once during the debate, which arises entirely out of an international dispute. Some of the other Ministers whom my hon. Friend mentioned have looked in occasionally. The Leader of the House has favoured us again. The Patronage Secretary has been absent most of the night, although it is entirely his fault that we are here at this time of the morning when we should have finished our discussions long ago. [Interruption.]

I gather from his attitude that the nerves and the morale of the hon. Member for St. Ives (Mr. G. R. Howard) are breaking down. The fact that the morale of hon. Members opposite is breaking down and their nerve is going is one of the reasons why we should report Progress.

I do not think that he is here, but I should have liked to see the Chairman of the Kitchen Committee, for I have a few observations to make on the way in which fish is cooked in this Palace.

A few minutes ago the Minister said that the subject of the Bill was very close to the hearts of many of my hon. Friends. That was true. I do not think that he meant it ironically; I certainly hope that he did not. Certainly, it has been very close to my heart for many years. For some years I represented a partly maritime constituency on the coast of Essex, and during those years I frequently raised in the House the difficulties and problems of the sprat fishermen of Tollesbury. They have always come within the ambit of the white fish industry, as defined by the Minister. I should have liked a fuller opportunity of developing an argument against concentrating the subsidy too greatly on long-distance fishing, perhaps to the neglect of those smaller and struggling fishermen who have had many ups and downs over the last few years and who deserve the consideration of the Minister and the House.

There is a great deal which could be said on Clause 2, which cannot conveniently be taken at this rather unreasonable hour of the morning, because it deals with loans for the acquisition and modernisation of fishing vessels, and when we consider modernisation we have to consider all sorts of aspects, such as refrigeration and, most important, the conditions of the crews and the crews' quarters—what sort of living conditions the men on these ships have, particularly when they spend some time at sea. Possibly even the interior decoration of their quarters would be in order on that Clause. Another matter which, unfortunately, one has to consider in what has been called the nuclear age is whether all these vessels in the course of being modernised are equipped with all the necessary devices for testing fish for excessive radioactivity which may result if there is a renewal of the testing of nuclear weapons or anything of that kind.

All these matters should be discussed at a time when hon. Gentlemen opposite are in full possession of their senses, because they are not now, as one can see only too well. The best argument for the Motion to report Progress is that it is moved out of sheer human decency and pity for the Government and their supporters. One remembers Disraeli's famous phrase about "a range of exhausted volcanoes". This morning they are a range of exhausted molehills.

Mr. George Lawson (Motherwell)

I have no pity for Government supporters, but I am concerned about the manner in which the Bill, and Clause 1 in particular, affects Scotland. The implications of the Clause upon Scotland have not been discussed this evening. We have heard no word about them, apart from an interjection by the Secretary of State for Scotland. I doubt very much if he has given any thought to the implications of the Clause upon Scotland.

Much has been said about the possible effects of, in effect, subsidising the distant water boats. They are the large boats which need not necessarily fish in distant waters. They might also come into near waters to fish.

The Deputy-Chairman

I am not clear how the hon. Member is relating his remarks to the Question, "That the Chairman do report Progress and ask leave to sit again."

Mr. Lawson

I mention the implications of the Clause upon Scotland to show that those implications are very serious and might very largely destroy the inshore fishing industry in Scotland.

Under the circumstances, the Secretary of State for Scotland, who should have the interests of Scotland primarily at heart, should have been prepared to support us in the plea that more time be given so that we can have a more adequate discussion.

Subsidising deep water boats—the long distance and large boats—will mean the strengthening of those boats vis-a-vis the smaller boats which work inshore and in the middle waters. Over the years the process of destroying inshore fishing has been synonymous with the growth of the larger boats. My hon. Friends will know of thriving fishing villages which were destroyed because of the growth of the modern type of fishing, which meant a larger boat with a different type of net.

The larger boats, concentrated for a period on Granton, or Newhaven, or Aberdeen, in many ways reduced almost to the point of elimination the inshore fishing around the coast of Fife. On Second Reading, the hon. Member for Fife, East (Sir J. Henderson-Stewart), expressed alarm at the possible implications of the Bill. He is not here tonight to repeat those implications. Inshore fishing from places such as Musselburgh, round the East coast and right up and down the West coast—areas which were thriving at one time—was progressively reduced in terms of effective fishing ability because of the growth of the trawler, with the trawl net, and then motor fishing.

The Bill is merely an extension of this. The large boats, which went into deeper and deeper waters, developed new methods of fishing and handling fish. At one time the fish was always landed with gut, because the boats went out overnight or for two nights and fish were landed with full stomachs. Then we have the process of shore-gutting the fish, and a further stage when the fish is filleted—

The Deputy-Chairman

Order. Surely this is going a long way from the Question now before the Committee.

Mr. Lawson

If I may say so, Sir William, it only shows how vast and far-reaching are the implications of this Measure, how difficult it will be for us to discuss them fully, and to take into account—I do not say just the inshore fishing of Scotland, but the Aberdeen, Newhaven and Granton fishing. I am sure that my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, Leith (Mr. Hoy) will bear me out here.

Just as the little inshore boat of the past was overwhelmed in many ways by the larger boat, so the still larger boat and the still longer-distance boat is overwhelming the Aberdeen, Granton and Newhaven fishing. It is all a process, in which there are implications that might destroy the whole Scottish fishing industry. Yet we have had no sign that the Secretary of State has even begun to appreciate that point. A long-distance boat will not be based on Aberdeen once the scheme is properly working. Aberdeen will be squeezed out, and so will Granton and Newhaven. The concentration will be at Grimsby and Hull, where the large market is found.

The growth of the radio technique of advising ships at what market to land the catch that morning, those ships can come in anywhere very quickly, flood the market, and thereby destroy it for the boats fishing locally. They can then shift to another market hundreds of miles away, perhaps—having been warned by radio—flood that one, and again destroy the small boats' markets. It is, perhaps, rationalised fishing, but it destroys local fishing—and not only the inshore but the middle-distance fishing—that cannot compete—

Mr. Prior

If the hon. Gentleman would look at the speech made on Second Reading by his hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, Leith (Mr. Hoy) he could save the Committee and himself a lot of time.

Mr. Lawson

I cannot just follow that remark. Are my arguments valid? They are valid for Scotland. I have watched this process—not, I agree, within the last ten years, but before that I watched it very closely and saw how this sort of thing was developing. I could see how, unless they were given special treatment, the smaller boats could not stand up to the development going on—and that, quite apart from subsidies.

As far as I can see, the only value of the subsidy is that it enables this part of the industry to survive—if we consider that to be a good thing—when otherwise it would not be able to. That can only be said in terms of the inshore and middle-distance waters—

Sir Douglas Glover (Ormskirk)

On a point of order, Sir William. Is not the hon. Member's speech convincing the Committee of the urgency of the matter—of getting the business and the Bill through? Is he not making the point that every day that goes by makes the situation of these fishermen the more desperate? From what I have heard, we should carry on with the Bill.

Mr. Lawson

My point is that the effects of the Bill will be further to concentrate the shipbuilding industry on the Grimsby and Hull areas and not on the Leith and Aberdeen areas. For a short time, it might work out—a few boats may be assisted—but it is in the South that this concentration will take place, and not in the North. As far as I can see, the subsidies envisaged are limitless—

The Deputy-Chairman

The hon. Member is making a very wide Second Reading speech. He is not entitled to do that on the Question before the Committee.

3.0 a.m.

Mr. Lawson

I return to the point, Sir William. In the Clause we have been discussing, powers are given to embark on schemes not merely for the inshore and middle distance fishing industry but for long-distance fishing. Powers are given to make grants of up to £3 million addition to the grants we were to have already. There is a limit to the amount of money to be paid at any time, but there is no limit to the number of times, as I read it.

These Measures have serious implications for the entire fishing industry of Scotland. We have not heard a Minister speak for Scotland. It does not seem that the Secretary of State has given any thought to the implications of what is proposed. He should have more time to go into the matter. At this hour of the morning we have no chance to go into the matter properly, I suggest, although, if we do continue, I should certainly hope to catch your eye in order that I may be able to deploy my argument on what is, in my view, a matter of very serious import to my country.

Moreover, I should hope that the Secretary of State for Scotland would rise to his feet and say that he has considered it and he can show where I am wrong in my fears, if I am wrong. At this point, however, I submit that this is a subject which demands that he takes the matter back and spend a little time thinking about the effects on Scotland.

Mr. Michael Foot (Ebbw Vale)

I support the Motion, if on grounds somewhat different from those advanced by my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, South-East (Mr. Callaghan) in moving it. My hon. Friend said that we had lacked the assistance of the Attorney-General. To be quite candid, I do not base my attitude on that ground. Perhaps, during the five years I have been absent from the House, she Attorney-General has worked differently from the manner he used to adopt when I was here previously. I confess that I cannot recall any occasion when I was in the House, some years ago, when the business was assisted by the Attorney-General. I cannot altogether agree with my hon. Friend in that ground of his argument.

On all other aspects of the matter, I think that my hon. Friend was on strong ground, and the Minister of Agriculture did not devote any real attention to it when he replied. It seems to be assumed by some hon. Members opposite—notably by the hon. Member who left in a somewhat apoplectic state a few minutes ago—that there is some difficulty about taking this business at a later date. Although it may be necessary to do something fairly urgently about the fishing industry, we do not have to do it this week. There is plenty of other business which the Government have proposed for this week which we should like to see postponed, and it would be quite possible to continue this debate on Wednesday, for instance. We could then have a debate during the daytime.

In our view, the business proposed for Wednesday will be of no service to the nation. We regard it as extremely damaging, since it is proposed to impose about £50 million extra taxation on the British people. We do not think that that Bill should be put through, and, if we have to choose, this Bill is a better one than that. We should not have embarked on this business at ten o'clock. Indeed, at ten o'clock it was put to the Government that, after the House had had a long debate on two very important and, in the words of the Leader of the House, solemn subjects, subjects to important that all other business had to be postponed to make way for them, this Bill should not be taken in this way. To take such a matter and try to push it through at three or four o'clock in the morning is not the proper way to run the proceedings of the Committee.

Another reason was provided by the Minister, when he spoke on the Motion, which further substantiated the case, if further substantiation were needed, for continuing the debate later. The Minister said that some of us had discovered a sudden interest in this topic. If that were true, the longer the time we had to discover more, the better.

I acknowledge that the Minister has sat here patiently throughout the debate. The Leader of the House does not know, because he has just arrived. Every hon. Member who has been here will agree that the debate took an entirely different turn from that which anyone had expected when we set out at ten o'clock. This was chiefly because of the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Cheetham (Mr. H. Lever). All those who heard him will agree that it was one of the most remarkable, if not the most remarkable, speech that they have ever heard in the House.

My hon. Friend opened up much wider vistas than the Minister had prepared himself to deal with. Many of the matters my hon. Friend raised so bowled over the Minister that he did not even mention them in his short reply. I do not think that even the officials at the Official Box could supply the Minister with the information, because they were bowled over, too. I dare say that the Ministry of Agriculture was closed, and no doubt they were battering on the door trying to get the information. From the Minister's speech it was evident that they did not get any information, even if they did manage to get into the Ministry. Therefore, if we carried on the debate at a later stage the Minister would be able to come fortified with the answers.

There was another implication in what was said by the Minister which he will wish to withdraw. He seemed to suggest that there was something improper or, at least, curious, in hon. Members who had never shown a deep interest in the white fish industry displaying it on this occasion. I have never had any great interest before, but I shall have in the future. I wish that some of the industries in my constituency could get subsidies on this scale. I wish that the coal industry could be subsidised in this manner. It has to pay for coal to be imported into this country. Miners living—

The Deputy-Chairman

Order. The hon. Member is tending to get rather too wide.

Mr. Foot

I was misled by the Minister who, in his reply on this Motion, had cast aspersions on some of us, who, he said, had shown a sudden interest in this matter.

I believe that all those hon. Gentlemen who had come ill-equipped to the debate on the Bill and the subject of it, all my hon. Friends who had come to that debate, too, will be all the better equipped to engage in debate upon it when we continue discussion upon it, whether we continue the discussion tonight or later. I hope that many more hon. Gentlemen will become interested in the matter. We shall have a Report stage of the Bill some time. Not tonight. It would be disgraceful if the Government tried to force that through tonight.

A few nights ago the House was plunged into great difficulties because of the enforcement of the Closure at a time when the Government were imposing £50 million more of taxation and refused to have a proper discussion of that. Now, under the Bill, large-scale subsidies are being distributed by the Government, and some of us who come from parts of the country where we are not much interested in white fish—except eating it—wish to examine the matter very much more closely, to see where the money is going.

It is a shocking fact that under Clause 1 of the Bill, which we much prefer to discuss at a different time, when many more Members could participate in the debate, money is to go to firms which have been distributing bigger dividends in the past year. Some of the firms which operate long-distance vessels have been increasing their dividends in the past twelve months. They will get more money under the Bill. Some of us come from constituencies where there are no subsidies at all, but where there are industries which are vilified and denounced by hon. Gentlemen opposite because some years they make a loss. There is no help from the Exchequer for them. But for this fishing industry money is easily provided.

For all these reasons, and a variety of others which, I have no doubt, my hon. Friends will adduce, I say it would be much more simple for the Government to put off this business. They are making again the same mistake they have been making ever since that night a few nights ago, when they embarked upon this programme. There have been five or six occasions when, if the Government had wanted, if they had shown magnanimity, they could have extricated themselves from plenty of difficulties. They could have done it that night when the row was first started. They could have done it the day after when there was discussion on what was to happen about it. They could have done it earlier today.

We could have started our debate on the Bill at four o'clock today had the Leader of the House accepted that Motion moved by my right hon. Friend the Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown). They would not have lost anything. The Leader of the House could have said that though he did not agree with everything my right hon. Friend had said he did not want to keep on the Minutes something the House did not all agree with. That would have been the graceful thing to have done, and that debate would have taken much less time, and we could have started on the Bill at 4.30 or 5 p.m.—

Mr. H. Lever

In a much better atmosphere.

Mr. Foot

—in a much better atmosphere and at a time which would have enabled my hon. Friend the Member for Cheetham to have developed his case fully.

The Leader of the House missed that opportunity. The next chance was at ten o'clock. It would have been much more graceful to have said, "We have had two very important debates and I think that we should now allow ourselves time, and we will come back to the Bill in a much better spirit in a day or two." They had another opportunity twenty minutes or half an hour ago when my hon. Friend moved to report Progress. They could easily have said then, "Well, we have had a long debate. Let us put off the proceedings for a while." The Minister could have got some credit for that.

3.15 a.m.

But the Government will not get any credit for it now. They are just losing more lime, making the hon. Gentleman who left in such a disgruntled mood a few minutes ago even more disgruntled. No doubt other hon. Members opposite will become even more disgruntled later. What does the Leader of the House think he gains? Why is he so sore about this? Why did he allow such an appalling thing to happen? Why does he not attempt to extricate right hon. Members on his own Front Bench? He cannot do it with such grace and magnanimity now, but he still ought to extricate them. Will he say that we shall go on until seven o'clock in the morning and then raise his hon. Friends out of their beds and force the Closure then? If he does, they will not be very cheerful about it.

Right hon. Gentlemen opposite have slipped up and made mistakes. Everybody makes a mistake. When the Leader of the House and the Chief Whip combine to make another mistake they had better admit it. They want to go home just as much as we do. [An HON. MEMBER: "Then go home."] We are not the people who are imposing this. We are enjoying it. But we think that there are more important duties to be discharged in the House of Commons than sheer enjoyment. Hon. Members are not sent here to enjoy themselves. They are sent to discharge their duties to their constituents and they should try to do it at a better time of day.

Instead, we have this orgy of self-indulgence from hon. Members opposite.

Why do they not bring their wits to bear to try to get some sense out of their own Front Bench? If the occupants of the Treasury Bench go on behaving like this they will get deeper and deeper into the mire. It will happen time and time again. Hon. Members opposite must learn that although they have a majority they cannot use that giant's strength like a giant. They had better learn that, and the sooner they learn it the sooner they will bring the enjoyment of hon. Members to an end. Perhaps they do not want to go to bed and enjoy themselves. Perhaps they have different forms of enjoyment. The Government should apply their minds to how to get on with Government business. They must start thinking about it instead of bashing their heads against one brick wall and another, which is what they have been doing for the past few days.

Mr. R. A. Butler

The siren voice of the hon. Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. Foot) is seldom heard at so early an hour in the morning and I am sure that we welcome him back for the purpose which he so much enjoys in making a speech of that kind.

The situation is perfectly clear. It was perfectly reasonable to attempt to get the White Fish and Herring Industries Bill through the Committee stage when we put it on the Order Paper. The hon. Member for Cardiff, South-East (Mr. Callaghan), whom I heard when I came in to hear the Minister answering earlier, used language which clearly indicated the object of all this exercise, which is that we should be visited with the result of our follies of last week. That has been the object of the exercise going on in all this debate. [HON. MEMBERS: "No."]

That will be known outside in the country, and the country will have to judge whether they think it right for the party opposite to hold up a Bill with which they fundamentally agree in the interests of the fishing industry simply to show spite to the Government. That is precisely what has been happening with all the familiar technique and with the skill at filibustering of the hon. Member for Manchester, Cheetham (Mr. H. Lever), part of whose oration I heard, which has been seldom equalled in our annals and, as a tour de force, is much to be admired.

Many of the interventions have been related to the subject and the subject has been more in evidence than is the case in most filibustering. Many constructive ideas have been put forward, as I have noticed in the course of the evening while intermittently listening to the debate.

Nevertheless, the object of the exercise is as I stated, and as stated by the hon. Member for Cardiff, South-East. In that case, it is not for the Government to give way to that sort of thing. No self-respecting Government could do so. We cannot give way purely to pressure from the hon. Member and his hon. Friends. That is not the path of proper government, nor the way to put through business.

The hon. Member for Ebbw Vale spoke of the path of wisdom if I had accepted the Motion moved earlier today by the right hon. Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown). The matter was debated and we reached a different conclusion. I do not now want to go over that debate, but I sincerely believe that the right hon. Gentleman's speech was one of the best that he has made in the House. The case was sincerely made and we disagreed with it for reasons of equal sincerity. We could not avoid that business and we could not avoid what the right hon. Gentleman found to be the very distressing business relating to the Chairman of Ways and Means. We were perfectly reasonable in then trying to get the Committee stage of the Bill.

I see no alternative but to proceed and try to get the business through. I therefore ask the Committee to be reasonable and now to return to Clause 1 and give those hon. Members who want to discuss its merits and demerits, including Scottish Members, a chance to do so. Clause 1 was discussed for approximately four hours—from approximately 10.25 p.m. to approximately 2.30 a.m. I would like the Committee to return to it so that hon. Members can put their arguments about it. There must be a little give and take even in the midst of an exercise designed solely to embarrass the Government, without regard for the fishing industry, which is what we should be considering.

I appeal to the hon. Member for Cardiff, South-East, therefore, to with- draw his Motion and allow us to get back to Clause 1. That is a perfectly sincere and reasonable thing to do. Continued discussion of this Motion is a waste of time when we ought to be proceeding with the Bill. I therefore ask hon. Members, in as reasoned a way as I can, to revert to Clause 1 and attempt to reach a decision on it. It is no good thinking that this business can be neglected. It is Government business dealing with the fishing industry and we have to proceed with it.

Mr. G. Brown

Despite the kindly words which the right hon. Gentleman used about me, and for which I am grateful, I am bound to say that, as a whole, his was as ungracious a speech as I have heard him make in a long time.

The right hon. Gentleman said that more of the speeches and topics were related to the issues raised by the Bill than he normally heard. He said that many constructive comments had been made. He cannot say that, on the one hand, and smuggle in a reference to filibustering and spite and not treating the fishing industry properly, on the other. Not even the right hon. Gentleman can have it both ways.

The right hon. Gentleman is responsible for taking this business at ten o'clock. If there is any question of spite—his word, not mine—if there is any question of trying to embarrass the other side—his words, not mine—then the decisions were taken by him and not by us. He set out to make us pay for the time we had used between 3.30 and 10 p.m. on the other matters. He set out to show us that the Government would nevertheless get their business and that he would embarrass us by keeping us here through the night to get it.

Mr. Butler

So far was that from my thoughts and those of the Government that we deliberately abandoned the Crown Estate Bill, which was our main Government business for today. We thought that it would be unfair to take it, because it would take half a day We had no intimation that this Bill would take a long time until we heard rumours that hon. Members opposite would go all out to oppose it. We thought this was a reasonable proposition, and we thought it reasonable to postpone the Crown Estate Bill.

Mr. Brown

The decision, nevertheless, to put the Bill down for discussion, and go on with it, was the right hon. Gentleman's, and not ours.

Mr. Butler

The idea of taking it was announced last Thursday. We received no Opposition objection, and we did not know there was any likelihood of there being Opposition objection to taking it at that time.

Mr. Brown

It is advancing a new principle to say that when Government business is announced we have to tell them whether it is an issue that we take seriously. It is the Government's business to know which Bills are important. This Bill had a considerable debate on Second Reading. It did not have a formal Second Reading, and it was clear that it was an important Measure. The right hon. Gentleman is trying to spin on a sixpence when he seeks to put the responsibility on us for his own misjudgment.

Just after ten o'clock I asked the right hon. Gentleman what his intentions were. It will be within the recollection of the Committee that I received the shortest possible answer. I got no invitation to have a discussion of the matter. I received no evidence of any interest on the part of the right hon. Gentleman. All the Leader of the House said was that we had better get on and see what we could do. He then left the Chamber, and we did not see him again until the Motion to report Progress was moved. The right hon. Gentleman is being graceless about this matter. He admitted that all we have done is to raise issues relevant to the Clause.

I suppose that the word "filibuster" must be a Parliamentary word, or the Chair would have stopped the right hon. Gentleman from using it, but leaving that aside, the fact is that he first conceded that we were discussing the Bill and then contradicted himself by using the word "filibuster". It seems to be getting precious near a reflection on the Chair to allege that a debate which has gone on as long as this one has been a filibuster. I must make it clear that we feel that we are being treated with scant respect.

We think that the business of the House is being treated with scant respect. I fear that right hon. Gentlemen opposite have come to rely on our being co-operative and letting things go. It is that which has stopped. The Bill has been, is being, and will be subjected to the detailed discussion and examination that a Bill of this magnitude deserves. It raises the limit for the expenditure of public money very considerably. It increases the hand-out of subsidies in a notable fashion. It is not right that we should let it go through without detailed examination.

I submit that it is improper to try to force through that kind of discussion at one, two, three, four or five o'clock in the morning, when the chances of publicity for what we are saying have gone. One reason for discussing things in the House is so that our constituents and others affected may know what we are talking about. What else do hon. Members think that Parliament is for? Does the right hon. and learned Member the Member for Chertsey (Sir L. Heald), an ex-Attorney General, think that Parliament is a private club run for our benefit? We discuss things here in the name of and on behalf of our constituents and those affected. One of their rights is not only to have us here, but to know what we are discussing and what we are saying about it.

3.30 a.m.

For the Leader of the House to say to us, as he has, "Either you discuss this through the night when, inevitably, there will be less opportunity for people to know what you are saying about it, or you will let it go through without any discussion at all at ten o'clock" is a quite improper equation to put before the Committee. It is a quite improper consideration for him to advance. He got very near to shedding crocodile tears for the industry when he talked about the importance of the Bill to the industry and implied that, somehow, by keeping this discussion going as we have been doing with the constructive suggestions he mentioned and the constructive considerations addressed to the Bill which he mentioned, we were being unfriendly or treating this great industry less than properly. That I simply reject and throw straight back at him. There is not the slightest evidence of our doing that. We believe this is a great industry. I spent four and a half years of my ministerial life dealing with it and I know it as much as any hon. Member opposite.

Mr. Prior

I am sure that the right hon. Member has not a greater regard for this industry than any hon. Member on this side of the Committee.

Mr. Brown

The hon. Member is suffering from the lateness of the hour. I said that I had as great a regard as any hon. Member opposite for it—so I have—and I was addressing myself to the allegation that we were not showing a regard for the industry. Our desire, in examining the Bill, is to pay our tribute to, and do our duty by, the industry. I still feel that it would be better not to go on with the debate tonight. I thought that I detected in the remarks of the Leader of the House the hint of a proposal which had not emerged before. I thought I detected in his frequent references to Clause 1 a very considerable move from his previous answer to me, which was, "Nothing doing", or the Minister's answer to my hon. Friend about an hour ago, when he certainly said, "Nothing doing at all". I do not know whether the right hon. Gentleman wants to make his position any more specific. We are not letting the Bill go without detailed examination. If we have to do it through the night we shall do it. We think that it would be very much better for our constituents and for the industry for it to be done at an appropriate time, for it to be done in the afternoon.

We certainly think that the Government will not gain a single thing in this way. In terms of time and business they will not gain. This confirms what I said the other night when I observed that I had been here for fifteen years and seen very powerful Governments of hon. Members from both sides of the House, with powerful majorities, but that no Government I have seen have been powerful enough, whatever their majority—

Mr. Anthony Kershaw (Stroud)

Is it in order for the right hon. Member so continuously throughout the day to threaten to hold up the business of the House?

The Deputy-Chairman

I do not think that anything has been said by the right hon. Gentleman which was out of order.

Mr. Butler

What assurance can we on this side of the Committee have that if we stop the proceedings and adjourn them there will not be the same exhibition as we have had tonight and the same opposition to the Bill—simply postponed to another occasion? If the the right hon. Gentleman could give an assurance on that, it might help.

Mr. Brown

It would help if the Leader of the House stopped making that kind of offensive remark. On the previous occasion, when he seemed to suggest a face-saving way out, with grace and dignity, for the Government and ourselves, he had to wrap it up with a lot about filibustering. This time he wraps it up with a reference to an exhibition. We think that we are making no exhibition. We shall examine the Bill, and I can give no undertaking that it will not be closely examined at whatever time of the day it is brought before us.

The Leader of the House is much older in the House than I am. He has seen such a situation as this many times before. If he cannot deduce certain conclusions from that, he is not the man I think he is. I repeat—the Government would lose nothing by recognising that this is not the time to try to drive the Bill through the Committee. We are certainly not willing that the Motion should be withdrawn unless the Leader of the House is prepared to go a good deal further.

Mr. Butler

The right hon. Gentleman's concluding remarks were a very reasonable attempt to indicate that if the Bill is taken on another occasion it will be treated more reasonably than it is being treated now. I thank him for making that observation. I think that we should get back to Clause 1. We can then make progress with it, and we shall see where we are and what it is reasonable to do and what is a reasonable way of making progress.

Mr. Ross

I wish to deal with the matter not on the fishing aspects but on Parliamentary grounds. It is 3.40 a m. The Secretary of State for Scotland has to appear in Scottish Grand Committee at 10.30 a.m. to conduct the Crofters (Scotland) Bill, which is a very important Bill. He may be quite happy about that, but I hope that he and the Leader of the House appreciate that my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, Leith (Mr. Hoy), who is conducting affairs from our Front Bench on the Scottish aspect of this Bill, is Chairman of the Scottish Grand Committee and will have to be in his place there at 10.30 a.m. Does the Leader of the House think it right to continue this morning for an indefinite period, bearing in mind the responsibility that the Secretary of State for Scotland and my hon. Friend have to carry out? The Leader of the House has spoken about the great strain on Chairmen. We have not even entered into the Scottish aspects of this Clause.

The Minister talked a lot about certain interests, but I cannot remember any long speeches on this subject from him before he became a Minister. He should cast his mind back to the fact that the Money Resolution on the Bill gave rise to considerable comment as to what we should be able to discuss. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman appreciates that there is still much to be done on the Bill and that for Parliamentary reasons it is not right to discuss a Bill of such importance and a Clause of such importance at this hour. It would be far better to give us an indication of when he thinks the Committee should rise, bearing in mind the duties we have in Committee in a few hours' time.

Mr. Paget

The Leader of the House has stated that we have been using the Bill as an instrument to express our resentment at the way we as a minority have been treated by a majority earlier today and last week. I do not agree with that, but even if it be so it is no injury to the Bill or to any of the beneficiaries of the Bill, since nobody has suggested anywhere that this is a Bill whose passage is needed urgently, The Explanatory and Financial Memorandum states that the purposes of the Bill are to extend the powers of Ministers to make schemes for the payment of white fish subsidy so as to enable subsidy to be paid in respect of distant water vessels … Nobody has suggested that there is any scheme in existence to put forward now. The same applies to the other objectives set out.

This is merely to provide some compensation for what may happen in the Icelandic negotiations. They have not happened yet. Therefore, we can all agree that from the point of view of the Bill it does not matter in the least whether we get it this week or next or the week after that.

As for the right hon. Gentleman's question whether this will go quicker at a later time, speaking from where I am I can speak only for myself, but I cannot help feeling that the length of time which one takes is always in inverse proportion to the efficiency with which one's mind works. When one is tired one is apt to take very much longer than when one comes to a subject fresh.

For instance, I have the task of considering the legal aspects of the Bill. If I have to do this tonight, I shall have to think out the propositions aloud and go through the four Acts and Five Orders concerned. I could not undertake to do that in much under two hours. On the other hand, if I am given the opportunity to deal with it and examine the Acts in private instead of here before the Committee, I think that I could undertake to reduce my conclusions from two hours to a few minutes.

3.45 a.m.

The right hon. Gentleman has asked the Committee what would be the effect of accepting the situation now. I can only speak for myself, but I can tell him the sort of effect it would have in regard to the time I think that it would have on my contribution. If discussion of Clause 1 is postponed, and there is good will on both sides to get through with it, it will not make the slightest difference whether that Clause has been dealt with tonight or not. Frankly, I think that if the Government have learned anything tonight it is that we have quite enough skill on this side to keep the argument going on any of the three remaining Clauses just as long as we want. We are not unskilful. I would therefore suggest to the Leader of the House that if he meets us on this point I very much doubt whether he will be disappointed at the result later.

In the same way as I believe that if, earlier in the day, he had said to us, "I do not agree with you, but since there has been a misunderstanding we will do that bit of business over again," that business would have been taken next, and the other very unhappy business would not have come on at all, because there would not have been the occasion, and this would all have been disposed of long ago. I hope that the Leader of the House will feel that at this point he can meet us. Speaking for myself, I can say that there will be very much better feeling if he does.

Mr. G. Brown

It will not have escaped the notice of the Leader of the House and other hon. Members that there have been some consultations over here. If the Leader of the House felt able to make it clear that if we went off this Motion and allowed the discussion on Clause 1 to be completed—I cannot say how long that will take; some of my hon. Friends say that they have points to make—he would then be willing to adjourn the Committee at that point and take the rest of the Bill and the Order following it on the Order Paper at some other time, I would feel it improper to ask hon. Members to stay here after that just for the sake of continuing this argument at this time. But we do not feel that up to the moment we have had a clear indication from the right hon. Gentleman that that was his intention.

Mr. R. A. Butler

I think that the interchanges between the right hon. Gentleman and myself have had results, and I would suggest that that is the solution tonight, namely, that by the right hon. Gentleman withdrawing his Motion we get back to Clause 1, and when we have obtained Clause 1 I would move to report Progress.

I would make two other observations. I would postpone the Eggs (Protection of Guarantees) (Amendment) Order that is now on the Order Paper. I would also like to say that, for the sake of the industry, we must have this Bill by Easter. I only say that to show that it is a serious matter for the industry. It has to go to another place, so there will be some necessity to hurry this business, although giving a proper opportunity for people to discuss what they want. Lastly, I hope that honour is saved on both sides. We have accepted the right hon. Gentleman's challenge, and I hope that we have responded with humanity.

Mr. Callaghan

This is my Motion, and I therefore propose to intimate that it will be my desire to withdraw it. In doing so, I should like to comment on certain of the right hon. Gentleman's observations.

First, hon. Members opposite have taunted us with not knowing how to fight a battle. After this long-drawn battle has been fought, I hope that they will be a little less free in their comments in future. Although I do not doubt the tenacity, vigour and spirit of the Government, I assure them that, if necessary, we can summon up some reserves of energy that will enable us to fight an equally good battle. We can give quite a good account of ourselves. I hope that it will not be suggested that we do not know how to fight a Parliamentary battle. The Leader of the House has been here longer than I have, but I can well remember fighting my own Front Bench on occasions between 1945 and 1950. Although our weapons may have become a little rusty, we can polish them and have them ready if we are to be challenged in the way we have been in the last few months.

There are some serious points to be made on Clause 1 and some serious discussion must be had on it. I do not wish to detain the Committee further. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Motion.

Motion, by leave, withdrawn.

Mr. Loughlin

Some hon. Members opposite have suggested that some of us have little knowledge of the fishing industry, but they have shown little eagerness to take part in the debate. If they have the knowledge of the industry which they claim, they ought to place that knowledge before the Committee. I now sit for the constituency of Gloucestershire, West, but before entering the House of Commons I had twenty-five years' association with the fishing industry.

If I thought that the subsidies proposed were likely to be used in the industry as a whole, I should have the greatest pleasure in giving my full and absolute support to Clause 1. I should take the same view if I thought that the application of the subsidy would be assessed on the basis which the Government themselves apply in considering other subsidies.

Recently, the whole emphasis of the Government's case has been that we ought to pay subsidies only in cases of need and not as a general rule in certain of our social services, not as of right to the individual but only where need is shown. If that is the principle they wish to adopt in the Health Service, they ought to apply it also to subsidies to industries. I should like to think that the subsidy for deep water vessels would be used to improve workers' conditions in the industry. I accept that, under the poundage system, certain of the crews will derive a measure of benefit from it.

If I thought the subsidy was to be used to decasualise the industry, or to introduce reasonable working conditions for the crews, I would give it my wholehearted support. But it will not do anything of the sort. The inshore vessels are a completely different proposition. To a large degree the vessels are operated by the crews alone, and they have had extreme difficulties in maintaining economic stability, and will have even more difficulty if the subsidy is extended to deep water vessels, where one is not dealing with impoverished fishermen struggling to maintain one small boat. The greater part of these recurring subsidies will go to the trawler owners, who are not impoverished in any way.

The Government argue in most fields of subsidy that it is essential to see that the money is spent on the basis of need. This will increasingly be the case in the policies enunciated by the intelligentsia of the Conservative Party, for the Bow Group documents, whether on education—

The Temporary Chairman (Dr. Horace King)

The hon. Member is now going a little wide.

Mr. Loughlin

I submit that it is essential when dealing with subsidies to apply the same principle. My point is that if the Government contend that subsidies in the social services shall be on the basis of need, that should also apply to industry—the white fish industry or any other. There is still as much right to ensure that the taxpayers' money is not put into the pockets of people who do not need subsidies.

The trawler owners are growing so big that it is almost a monopoly in some ports, from the trawling to the inland retailing. Yet this is where the greater bulk of the money is going. We do not yet know how much money it is proposed to give to the fishing industry under the Bill.

4.0 a.m.

The Clause says that the Order-making power shall be exercisable from time to time but no such increase shall exceed three million pounds.

What does "time to time" mean? The Secretary of State for Scotland cannot tell us. In his speech on Second Reading he made it perfectly clear that The Ball does not determine the actual rates of subsidy, which will be embodied in a statutory scheme submitted for the approval of the House … "—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 31st January, 1961; Vol. 633. c. 902.]

The Minister cannot tell us how much in total will be the amount of subsidy under the Bill.

When the Government have a Bill by which they seek to spend public money they should give this Committee and the country as a whole some indication of the total amount that they propose to spend. I thought the Secretary of State was going to give us some information on this point. I am willing to sit down if he can, because it will save a lot of time. Can he tell us how much, in total, the Bill will cost the taxpayer? If he cannot, the Minister ought to take the Bill back till he and the Secretary of State for Scotland can tell what it will cost. The Government are not prepared to ask for a blank cheque for giving subsidies to old-age pensioners or to subsidise council houses, but they produce this Bill without indicating how much subsidy they will give to an industry which does not need it and which is not impoverished.

Many trawler owners are paying increased dividends. This is private enterprise. The Minister said he wanted the Bill because trawler owners, in view of the Icelandic dispute, were likely to have to find fresh fishing grounds. If private enterprise trawler owners want or have to find fresh fishing grounds, why do they not go and do it? They cannot have it both ways. They cannot have private enterprise and, at the same time, say that the Government should supply the money necessary, and which should be produced by the initiative said to be inherent in private enterprise.

The Government have not said they want to extend the subsidy to deepwater vessels. They cannot say even now.

Mr. Maclay

The hon. Member said that if I got up and explained it might save a great deal of time. I have been waiting here a long time hoping to get a word in edgeways I have not succeeded yet. If the hon. Member would like to bring his interesting speech to a close, I will try to help him. because that is what he wanted" me to do.

Mr. Loughlin

I will develop my speech in my own way. If the right hon. Gentleman wants to intervene he has only to nod and I will sit down.

Mr. Maclay

I want to be clear about what the hon. Member wants me to do. I was only anxious to help. If I might now make a short speech I will deal with the points that are worrying him. If not, I think I will let him develop his speech in his own way.

Mr. Loughlin

The right Gentleman thinks nothing of the sort. I asked for information some time ago. When I mentioned the right hon. Gentleman it was when I asked about the total amount of subsidies that he anticipated the Government would want to authorise under the Clause. That was ten minutes ago. Perhaps the hour is such that the right hon. Gentleman is still asleep.

If the right hon. Gentleman will listen I will put the question and he can intervene if he wishes. Why do the Government want to extend the subsidies to the deep water vessels? That question has not yet been answered. The Government cannot expect the Committee to pass a Clause of this kind which gives unlimted subsidies to an industry which does not need them without the Government advancing the grounds for doing so.

I believe in international trade. When we give subsidies of this character to deep water vessels and to trawler owners who do not need them anyway, what are we going to do to influence the British Trawlers' Federation to get their members to have their ships built in British yards? It is right and fair that we should ask them to do so. The shipbuilding industry is in the doldrums.

Grimsby is having its deep water fleet built up in Germany. Week after week we find that while British shipyards are without work, Grimsby certainly, and perhaps other ports, are having ships built in Germany to come back to this country as part of the fleet. Now we propose to give them a subsidy for doing this. The Committee ought to know a great deal more of what is in the Government's mind before we pass the Clause.

Mr. Lawson

The near and middle water boats have shown that they require subsidies. Indeed, it is largely because they have received subsidies that they have survived. The Scottish fishing industry is mostly based on the inshore and middle distance fishing and little distant water fishing is undertaken from Scotland.

If the Bill goes through, there is a danger that the big boats, already possessing advantages over the smaller boats, will have even greater advantages. The bigger boats are already concentrated around Hull and Grimsby and although in the strict economic sense that might be sensible—because of the concentration of markets—if the smaller boats are ousted, the consequences for the Scottish industry will be serious.

Areas such as those represented by my hon. Friend the Member for the Western Isles (Mr. Malcolm MacMillan), the hon. Member for Banff (Sir W. Duthie) and the hon. Lady the Member for Aberdeen, South (Lady Tweedsmuir) will be seriously affected. Aberdeen already has disadvantages. It may be nearer to the distant water areas than the other fishing ports, but it is further from the markets where the bulk of the fish is sold.

The Clause gives power for schemes to be established, but nothing is said about the nature of the schemes or about the operations of the big distant water boats. The Minister will have power to make grants of up to £3 million in addition to existing grants, but there is no limit on the number of grants or how often the total of £3 million may be reached.

There could be a situation in which the most efficient section of the fishing fleet was made more efficient, the not so efficient, the part now labouring under a handicap, finding its difficulties even greater. Nor is there any provision about where the distant water fleet is to fish. The boats could come very close to the shore and make periodic raids into the inshore or middle wafer grounds and bring havoc to those parts of the industry.

The outcome of the scheme may be to give help to that part of the industry which formerly required none while increasing the disadvantages of its weaker neighbours, increasing the advantages of the modern trawlers based on Hull and Grimsby which can be advised about the best markets for their cargoes.

4.15 a.m.

The industry should also eventually become more honest in what it sells, and in the names it gives the products it sells. It should not sell monkfish under false names, which it regularly does. It should not sell megrim as lemon sole, or whiting as haddock, or saith as cod, or rock cod. I want to see people getting what they ask for, and getting standards of freshness and quality that they expect, which a large section of the industry does not give them. I am not talking merely about the people in the ships; I am talking about the whole industry. Many things must be done to put the industry on its feet.

At this stage I am concerned as to how the Bill will affect the weaker part of the industry, based upon the near and middle waters. This Measure seems to be so shaped that it cannot but add greatly to the competitive strength of that part which is already much more efficient than the other parts. Since this concerns Scotland more than any other part of the United Kingdom—and if my fears are realised the whole industry in Scotland could be destroyed—unless we can see that the Secretary of State is giving some thought to this matter, and can show how Aberdeen and Leith will stand up, we will not feel that he is looking after the interests of Scotland.

Lady Tweedsmuir (Aberdeen, South)

I shall not detain the Committee for many minutes, but as my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland is to reply I cannot resist asking him one question. He will be aware that the fishing fleet in Aberdeen is now allowed by the White Fish Authority only two trips per year to the Icelandic fishing grounds, because the near and middle water fleets are receiving subsidies while the long distance boats are not. Since the Clause will allow a further subsidy to the long-distance vessels I should be grateful if my right hon. Friend can say what instructions will be given to the White Fish Authority about removing the limitation on Aberdeen boats. If the subsidies are given universally it is surely only fair that Aberdeen boats should have the freedom to fish wherever they wish.

I understand the subsidy for longdistance boats to be given for the purpose of encouraging them to find more distant fishing grounds. Many boats equipped from Hull can now go as far as Greenland, and I hope the Secretary of State will see that definite encouragement is given to Scottish boats to go further afield. If we are to seek a Western European agreement on these fishing limits it is obvious that a 12-mile limit may well be fixed, and that would seriously affect the Port of Aberdeen and Scotland generally. If the Scottish fleet is to be pushed from the Faroese grounds, provided there is a Western European agreement, it is only fair that they should have a chance to go further afield. I should be grateful if my right hon. Friend could answer that point.

Mr. Hoy

Little did I think when I arrived off the train at eight o'clock yesterday morning and came to the House that I would still be here at half-past four this morning. Little did I think when I started speaking at half-past ten last night that we would still be here at this time.

My hon. Friend the Member for Motherwell (Mr. Hamilton) raised the question of the middle-water and inshore fleet. I also raised that matter and do not want to go into it again, except to say that if the fishing grounds are to go on contracting and it is obvious that the available grounds will be over-fished, it will be difficult for all sections of the industry and might well mean a considerable part of the industry going out of existence. As I pointed out on Second Reading, that has happened in my constituency where two firms have been taken over by a firm of shipbuilders in Aberdeen. One sees that danger. It affects Scotland perhaps more than other parts of the country. It would not have an effect on Grimsby and Hull where distant water fleets are concentrated, and a large part of the Lowestoft fleet.

What we have to keep clear in our minds, despite all that has been said during the night, is that the industry is of first-class importance to Britain. Let it not be forgotten that just as it is said that many other people are entitled to a livelihood out of it, so are those engaged in the inshore side of the industry entitled to consideration as the other sections. We often pay lip-service to the people in the industry, but it is not a bad thing when war is not with us that we should say something similar in peace time. I hope that as a result of the changes to be made conditions will be improved for the men in the industry. As I said on Second Reading, I hope that there will be an expansion of the pensions scheme which is shortly to come into operation on Humberside which for the first time will give pensions to 7,000 men in the industry. That will be a tremendous improvement. Just as we hope for an efficient industry, the men engaged in it will measure its efficiency by the rewards they get from it.

I agree that if the distant water fleet is to be denied fishing grounds new ones will have to be found and certain compensations will have to be paid. That is the reason for this part of the Bill. I only hope that we shall try to look after our own shipbuilding industry. I think of Aberdeen, where without this type of building, we would be in a difficult plight. It is perhaps not too much to expect that consideration will be given to our own yards when orders are placed. That is all I want to say at this late hour of the night, or morning. I hope the Secretary of State will have something to say in reply to the points which have been made, and particularly about the position in Scotland.

Mr. Maclay

The hon. Member for Edinburgh, Leith (Mr. Hoy) and I were the subject of solicitude from other hon. Members, but it was clear from the speech of the hon. Member, as I hope it will be clear from mine, that we are content to do our duty.

The point made by the hon. Member for Gloucestershire, West (Mr. Loughlin) was, why did we want to give a subsidy to deep water vessels? He also asked, why did we want to help owners who were making good money anyway? The short answer to the question, why do we want to help deep water vessels, is that this was discussed fully on Second Reading and, if he wants detail, perhaps he will look at the OFFICIAL REPORT of that debate. I should add that if he has followed what has been going on through all the international negotiations about fishing limits he will know that it would be an extraordinarily improvident Government which did not take powers to do what was necessary as things developed.

At this stage of some of the discussions taking place with foreign nations it would be extremely unhelpful to the very people the hon. Member wants to help, the men who are sailing in these ships, to ask me to go into too much detail of what might come out of the discussions. There are times when, in the interests of those we want to help, it is wise not to go into too much detail when discussions are going on.

Mr. Loughlin

What does that mean?

Mr. Maclay

There have been two lots of discussions at Geneva and various things have been heard about fisheries limits. It is clear that a situation could arise, from things which have already happened, which would make it extremely desirable to be able to give certain advantages to these ships which they do not now possess.

Even if the hon. Member were correct in feeling that there was no case for helping some owners—and I do not accept that for one moment—he should remember that the Bill covers many other people than the large owners; it covers those who own and sail in the ships. It affects not only the big companies.

Mr. Loughlin

If we are dealing with deep water vessels we are dealing with the trawler owners. If the right hon. Gentleman is making the case that we are also dealing with fishermen who own their own vessels, will he tell us the percentage of vessels owned by their crews?

Mr. Maclay

I was referring not particularly to the deep water boats but to the wider range.

Mr. Loughlin

I was dealing with deep water vessels. I was dealing with this Clause.

Mr. Maclay

The Clause includes a number of other things. If the hon. Member was dealing only with deep water vessels, he may be right in his statement, because I do not know the percentage for which he asks. The Bill also affects people who own boats and sail in them.

The hon. Member for Motherwell (Mr. Lawson) raised an important point when he asked whether extending the subsidy to deep water boats would damage the inshore fishing industry and its boats, which are so important in the Scottish fishing scene. The hon. Member for Leith will bear me out when I say that some of the middle water boat owners are extremely concerned lest there are too many inshore boats, which are making things more difficult for them. One reason is that the inshore boats bring in fresh fish of the highest quality.

I can set the hon. Member's fears at rest, as far as that is possible and as far as one can forecast the future of fisheries, by saying that there will always be a very good market for the fresh fish which only the inshore or near water boats can bring in. The quantity comes from the distant waters and the quality from the inshore waters. I have often heard it said that there are too many seine netters and that they are doing damage to the middle water boats.

The hon. Member for Leith made some comments on ship building. I entirely agree with him, and I hope that it will prove possible to place these orders with British yards. He knows that that has nearly always been done by British owners in the past, or by others who wanted fishing boats built, where delivery dates made it possible, but it must not be forgotten that one reason why orders were placed abroad by people who had never done this in their history before was that they could not get delivery dates when the yards were overpressed. As that position disappears it will be improbable, if the price is right, that they will ever place orders abroad.

I hope that within the limits of what one can reasonably do at this hour I have met some of the important points which have been raised and that in the circumstances the Committee will now be prepared to let us have Clause 1.

4.30 a.m.

Mr. Loughlin

I must tie the Minister down on this point. It is no good him just standing up and waffling. This is an enabling Bill. It will enable the Government to extend the subsidy to the larger vessels. The larger vessels envisaged in the Dill are deep water vessels. What does the right hon. Gentleman mean when he says that we are dealing with other things? The Explanatory and Financial Memorandum clearly says that it is an enabling Bill. The Government have powers for the inshore fishermen and the middle water vessels. Precisely what other issues does the right hon. Gentleman say are involved than an extension of the subsidy to the larger vessels Which are, in the main, deep water vessels?

Mr. Maclay

I agree with the hon. Gentleman. That is one of the things inherent in the Bill. This is to extend the subsidy to distant water boats. Clause 1 (2) has its own place in the scheme of things in seeing that the money is enough for everybody concerned. Both the hon. Gentleman and I are right in this case. He is right that the Clause deals with distant water boats. I am right in saying that the Clause also covers the whole range of fishing, because it increases the money available. The hon. Gentleman will find that it is all right and that for once we are in complete agreement.

Original Question put and agreed to.

Clause ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Mr. Maclay

We have made some interesting progress in the last half an hour or so, Sir William. In the circumstances, I beg to move, That the Chairman do report Progress and ask leave to sit again.

Question put and agreed to.

Committee report Progress; to sit again this day.