Commons Sitting of 10 April 1963

Preamble
The House met at half-past Two o'clock
PRAYERS
[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]
PRIVATE BUSINESS
  SUNDERLAND CORPORATION BILL [Lords]
  As amended, considered; to be read the Third time.
ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS
  ROYAL NAVY

    Assistant Naval Attaché, Oslo
    Commander Keransasked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty when it is intended to reappoint a British Naval Attaché at Oslo.
    The Civil Lord of the Admiralty (Mr, C. Ian Orr-Ewing): We are discussing with the other Departments concerned the possibility of appointing an Assistant Naval Attaché to Oslo as an alternative.
    Commander Kerans: Would not my hon. Friend agree it is high time that the Treasury reconsidered this,
    issue, bearing in mind that the Norwegian Navy is rebuilding? Is not this a great opportunity to get some of these orders for the North-East Coast at an early date? I hope that my hon. Friend will advise the Treasury to rethink this matter out again.
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: I am aware of those facts. Oslo is not without naval representation, for we have a vice-admiral, a captain, four commanders and eight junior officers at the N.A.T.O. headquarters in that city.

    Replenishment Ships (Tenders)
    Commander Keransasked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty what consideration he is giving to the placing of the proposed Admiralty orders for replenishment ships to yards on Tees-side, in
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    view of the present high level of unemployment in the area.
    Mr. C. Ian Orr-Ewing: Tenders for the two new Fleet replenishment ships were invited in February. These ships are designed to full warship standard and this did not make it possible for us to invite tenders from firms on Tees-side. Three firms of the warship group on the North-East Coast were invited to tender.
    Commander Kerans: I hope that my hon. Friend will reconsider this issue, bearing in mind that Furness and Withy, although outside my constituency, is very close indeed to it. Will my hon. Friend consider this issue as a special case, bearing in mind that we have surplus labour at the Hartlepools from Grays & Grays (Tees), which is now facing a difficult time?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: I am well aware of the very considerable difficulties of the shipbuilding industry in the North-East. This is a matter not only for the Admiralty but also for my right hon. Friend the Minister of Transport.

    Rosyth Dockyard (Nuclear Submarines)
    Mr. W. Hamiltonasked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty the estimated number of new jobs which will be created in the Rosyth Dockyard, consequent on the implementation of the recent decision to refit nuclear submarines there.
    Mr. C. Ian Orr-Ewing: I would refer the hon. Member to the replies which I gave on the 15th March and 3rd April to the hon. Members for Dunfermline Burghs (Dr. A. Thompson) and for Edinburgh, East (Mr. Willis).
    Mr. Hamilton: I think that it is said that this project will create 400 jobs. Is the hon. Gentleman aware that, in so far as the project is part of the nonsensical idea of an independent British nuclear deterrent, the Labour Party would be utterly opposed to it, but that, in so far as it is part of the general nuclear programme for constructive purposes, we would welcome the establishment of this kind of nuclear project in Scotland?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: No doubt the House of Commons and the country in general will note the hon. Gentleman's views.

    Surface Vessels (Guided Missiles)
    Commander Courtneyasked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty (1) what weapons, apart from carrier-borne aircraft, are available for surface action by cruisers, destroyers and escorts of the Royal Navy as a counter to the surface-to-surface guided-missile systems fitted in the Kynda, Krupny, Kildin, Osa and Komar classes of Soviet warships;
    (2) whether a guided missile system for use against surface vessels is under development for the Royal Navy; and if he will make a statement.
    Mr. C. Ian Orr-Ewing: In our view, the best answer to this threat is the carrier-borne aircraft, bearing in mind that seaborne aircraft can be employed in many other offensive and defensive rôles.
    Commander Courtney: Is my hon. Friend aware of the serious situation which could arise if surface forces of the Royal Navy were faced by missile-armed Soviet surface forces in the absence of carrier-borne aircraft?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: My noble Friend the First Lord and I are very well aware of that fact. I am sorry that my hon. and gallant Friend is out of breath. He must have run all the way from the Savoy Hotel.
    Mr. Cronin: I appreciate the hon. Gentleman's point about the efficacy of carrier-borne aircraft, but is it not the case that they cannot operate in thick weather? Can the hon. Gentleman say why it is that cruisers and destroyers of the Royal Navy are so much behind equivalent vessels in the Russian Navy in their armament?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: If the hon. Gentleman would like to spend a day at sea in thick weather he would see that our all-weather aircraft can operate under the most extraordinarily difficult conditions. [HON. MEMBERS: "He has been".] Perhaps on that occasion the weather was not as thick as it can be. I concede that the Russians have specialised in missiles and we have not. We must bear in mind that the Russians have never had any aircraft carriers in their Navy.
    Commander Courtney: Owing to the unsatisfactory nature of the Minister's
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    reply, I beg to give notice that I shall seek to raise the matter on the Adjournment.

    Widows' Pensions
    Dr. Kingasked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty the amount of pension now received by the widow of a leading rating who was pensioned after maximum service and died in August, 1950; and how much it would be if he had been pensioned and died this year, assuming in the first case that the widow is 65 and in the second case 45 years old.
    Mr. C. Ian Orr-Ewing: The widow of a leading rating who was pensioned and died prior to 31st August. 1950, receives no naval pension.
    The widow of a leading rating who had been pensioned and died this year would receive 22s. a week. This is based on 22 years which is the normal maximum service for a leading rating. The ages given in the question have no significance in the award of naval pensions to widows. These naval pensions do not debar her from drawing ordinary civilian benefits.
    Dr. King: Does the Minister think that what he has told us reflects a just state of affairs? Is he aware that, while the ex-Service associations appreciate what the Government have done to step up Service pensions, they cannot he happy as long as this unjust anomaly remains between the widow of the older rating and the widow who benefits by the present system? Will he seriously consider whether he can provide fair and equal widows' pensions for the widows of older ratings?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: I am sure that the hon. Member, who is very fair in these matters, will understand that it is not a matter for a single Service but is really a matter for all State pensioners, both civil servants and uniformed pensioners. It is, therefore, a matter which goes rather wider than merely the Admiralty alone.
    Mr. Willis: Will the hon. Gentleman discuss this matter with the other Service Departments so that it might be raised with the Treasury?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: Yes, certainly, these matters are discussed inter-Service-wise. It is, however, a matter which goes a good deal wider than merely the Service Departments. It includes civil servants also.

    Shipyards, North-East
    Mr. Milneasked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty the value of orders placed with North-East shipyards during 1962; and what is the estimated expenditure for 1963.
    Mr. C. Ian Orr-Ewing: None for the calendar year ending 31st December, 1962, but they secured the orders worth nearly £10 million for the three fast replenishment tankers placed in February this year.
    In addition to these three new tankers, there are under construction or on order in North-East shipyards two 6,000 ton guided missile destroyers, two frigates and a tanker.
    Mr. Milne: Does the hon. Gentleman appreciate that I am breathless, not because of running from the Savoy, but because of the Answer which he has given to the Question? Will he remember that while we are appreciative of these orders in the North-East, there are also small yards as well as large yards and that many of the small yards arc in development districts? Will he pay attention to this matter?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: Yes, I certainly am well aware of the difficulties in the area. The total value of the ships which I listed in my reply is something like £47 million. There is, therefore, a substantial amount of naval work in the area.
    Mr. P. Williams: Would my hon. Friend welcome support from certain members of the Labour Party for an independent British defence policy?
    Mr. Milneasked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty the value of ship-repairing work placed with North-East shipyards during 1962; and what is the estimated expenditure for 1963.
    Mr. C. Ian Orr-Ewing: During 1962 contract ship-repair work amounted to £6 million of which £780,000 was placed with North-East shipyards.
    As far as possible ship-repair work is normally carried out in the Royal Dockyards and we shall continue this practice during 1963. Repair work which we place to contract during the year will in most cases be by competitive tender and the North-East shipyards will be given the opportunity to bid for suitable orders.

    International Indian Ocean Expedition
    Mr. Hector Hughesasked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty if the international fleet of exploratory research vessels, including the £800,000 oceanographic research vessel built in Aberdeen, now exploring the southern oceans are equipped with the new type of 10-ton undersea research vehicles capable of reaching depths of 6,000 feet with a range of 20 miles and endurance of 24 hours; and what results have so far been achieved by this exploratory research expedition.
    Mr. C. Ian Orr-Ewing: None of the ships taking part in the International Indian Ocean Expedition is so equipped and, so far as I am aware, no such vessel is yet in use.
    The expedition is not yet in full operation and its research programme will not be completed until 1964.
    Mr. Hughes: In view of the international character of this expedition, its unusual character and its great expense, will the Minister say what arrangements he has made for periodical reports to this House of the progress of the expedition?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: We must, I think, await the full findings of the expedition. If, however, the House were sufficiently interested, perhaps, the hon. and learned Member would put down a Question in, say, six months' time, when I should be happy to answer it.
    Mr. Hughes: Will the Minister bear in mind that this is an unusual expedition with regard both to its expense and its scientific character? Will he bear this in mind with a view to making periodical reports to this House?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: Yes, I will bear it in mind. Even in the preliminary results, Her Majesty's survey ships have helped to define the Carlsberg Ridge and have obtained gravimetric observations in the area which are extremely important.

    Anti-Submarine Techniques
    Mr. Willisasked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty what proportion of Vote 4 of the Navy Estimates for 1963–64 is to be spent on anti-submarine techniques.
    Mr. C. Ian Orr-Ewing: It is not the practice to specify the proportion of effort as between separate fields of research and development connected with naval warfare; but I can assure the hon. Member that the effort on antisubmarine techniques is considerable.
    Mr. Willis: Can the hon. Gentleman say, first, whether these figures include anything in connection with the research work at La Spezia; and, secondly, in view of the urgency of getting a new break-through in anti-submarine techniques, whether he is satisfied that sufficient is being spent?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: As far as I recall, the work at La Spezia comes under N.A.T.O. auspices and, therefore, would appear not on Naval Votes but under Ministry of Defence Votes. In reply to the second point, it is true that we have been devoting more and more of our research development effort to this vitally important aspect. It would be unwise to give facts and figures, because to do so would be to tell a potential enemy and give him warning, which might be up to ten years of warning, of just how much effort we are devoting in this direction. I assure the hon. Member that the Board of Admiralty takes this matter seriously.
    Commander Courtney: Would not my hon. Friend agree that the most skilled anti-submarine techniques are quite useless without an adequate number of ships to operate these techniques in view of the very large number of potential enemy vessels with which we are faced? Is it not deplorable, therefore, that the hunter-killer submarine programme has been cut back?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: Yes, of course, one needs ships—and, incidentally, submarines—to operate these anti-submarine techniques. It is equally important to give them adequate practice and operational practice with our allies, an aspect to which we are devoting a great deal of attention.

    Hunter-Killer Submarine Programme
    Mr. Willisasked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty what will be the extent of the delay in the hunter-killer submarine programme brought about by the Polaris programme.
    Mr. C. Ian Orr-Ewing: There will be no interference with the construction of Oberon hunter-killer submarines. There will be a hiatus in the programme of nuclear hunter-killer submarines which will mean that in the short term we may lose three boats, as compared with our planned rate of build-up. How soon this hiatus could be made good must depend on a number of factors, especially (a) the number of building streams employed on Polaris submarines; (b) whether Her Majesty's Government decided to have four Polaris submarines or five; (c) how fast Her Majesty's Government decided to make good the arrears of hunter-killers. But in broad terms the gap could be closed and the programme of nuclear hunter-killer overhauled by a date somewhere between 1972 and 1975.
    Mr. Willis: Does not that Answer make complete nonsense of what the Minister of Defence told the House about this programme? As the hon. and gallant Member for Harrow, East (Commander Courtney) has just said, is it not deplorable that we have to stop this programme, which is extremely urgent in our anti-submarine preparations, to carry on with Polaris?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: My right hon. Friend the Minister of Defence said, I believe, that in the long term there would not be any interference. I tried to make clear in my reply that it was perfectly possible by between 1972 and 1975, if the Government of the day so willed, to make up the gap or the hiatus which will exist.
    Commander Courtney: In his reply, my hon. Friend mentioned the Oberon class of hunter-killer submarine for, I believe, the first time in this House. Is he aware that this class of submarine has an underwater speed which is, perhaps, slightly over half that of the nuclear submarines which it is designed to hunt and kill?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: I am equally aware that the vast threat which is now coming from the U.S.S.R. is, at this date, mainly in conventional submarines. I am also aware that not only this country, but Commonwealth countries—Australia in particular is buying Oberon submarines from us—have great faith that the Oberon submarine has a very useful and economic rôle to play for a considerable time to come.

    Research and Development Contracts (Working Party's Recommendations)
    Mr. Reynoldsasked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty what changes in the financial and contractual procedures in relation to research and development contracts have been made as a result of the recommendations made by the working party appointed in May, 1960.
    Mr. C. Ian Orr-Ewing: The working party reported in December, 1962. Decisions on the recommendations have not been taken yet by the Board of Admiralty. I hope, however, that we shall conclude our consideration very shortly and I will then write to the hon. Member.
    Mr. Reynolds: In view of the suggestions made in the Report of the Auditor-General which led to the setting up of the working party, which was set up three years ago, may we have an assurance from the hon. Gentleman that things will really move a bit faster in this matter, because large sums of money are involved and it is essential to do something to try to cut down possible excess of expenditure on various aspects of the work?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: I agree. Equally, however, I think that the hon. Member would agree that the control of research and development is an immensely complicated problem. We have twenty-two research and development establishments in which over 7,000 people are employed and total annual expenditure amounts to £26 million. The matter must, therefore, be seen in perspective. It is an extremely intricate problem to solve.
    Mr. Emrys Hughes: As yesterday the Prime Minister said that the Government were hesitating about the expenditure of £90 million for a Scottish power station, is it not time the Admiralty considered this huge, astronomical expenditure on something which is likely to be obsolete and not so useful as a power station?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: I feel that most of the country would think that the defence of our country was the greatest necessity of all.
    Mr. Emrys Hughes: In view of the unsatisfactory nature of the reply, I give notice that I will raise this matter on the Adjournment.

    Meritorious Service Medal
    Commander Purseyasked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty what is the present annuity and the annual allocation of money for the Meritorious Service Medal for Royal Marine other ranks and naval ratings, respectively; what is the number of Royal Marine and Royal Navy holders of this medal, respectively; and what allocation would be required to pay the annuity to all holders of the medal when pensioned.
    Mr. C. Ian Orr-Ewing: Ten pounds, which, after adding various pension increases, amounts to an average of just over £20. The annual allocation of money is £400. This is for Royal Marine other ranks only, naval ratings not being eligible for an annuity. The total number of medal holders now alive is not known, but there are 236 Royal Marine other ranks eligible for the annuity. Payment of the annuity to all these would require a total sum of about £4,800 a year, including pension increases.
    Commander Pursey: With Navy Estimates at over £400 million, why does not the Civil Lord increase the allocation for this medal and pay all these old sweats the petty sum of six pennies per day with their pension in the same way as with the Distinguished Conduct Medal? Why are naval petty officers who served with the Army under the same conditions during World War I in France and others awarded the medal for their meritorious war service not paid the annuity in the same way as the Army and the Royal Marines? Why award a Meritorious Service Medal for which Queen Victoria provided an annuity of £20 to petty officers for war service with the Army if they are then to be the only ones denied this paltry annuity of £10?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: I think the hon. and gallant Gentleman will know that it would not be just for the Royal Marines, but the Army would, of course, have to be given the same annuity, and this would cost £95,000. I also think it is right to say that this is a nice medal and many people who win it like to have it for the value of the medal and not for the annuity. I think it is not a bad arrangement.
    Commander Purseyasked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty how many Royal Marine and Royal Navy holders of the Meritorious Service Medal were awarded the annuity in the last five years; what was the average age in each Service; in which years World War 1 and World War 2 lists are likely to be completed; and when the last of the present holders of the medal is likely to receive his annuity.
    Mr. C. Ian Orr-Ewing: The answers to the first two parts are four Royal Marine holders and 77 years respectively. No Royal Navy personnel are eligible. Awards of this medal were not confined to war time, and the names of holders who satisfy the conditions for annuity are on a common list. As new grants depend on vacancies arising, I am unable to give a specific answer to the last part of the Question.
    Commander Pursey: Why has the annuity for the Victoria Cross been increased from £10 to £100 if, according to what the hon. Gentleman said in reply to my previous Question, the value of the medal is more important than the annuity? When this medal was introduced, the annuity was double the value of that of the Victoria Cross. Why should these old sweats, after 22 years' service, have to wait another 30 or 40 years for this paltry annuity of 3s. 6d. a week? After a long race of life against death with the odds against winning, is not the payment at the age of nearly 80 more of a death benefit than an annuity, as few men draw the annuity for any length of time?
    Captain Orr: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker.
    Commander Pursey: There is no point of order, because I am now sitting down.
    Mr. Speaker: Does the hon. and gallant Member for Down, South (Captain Orr) rise to a point of order?
    Captain Orr: I was merely going to ask, Mr. Speaker, whether, as the supplementary question contains a number of figures, it could be circulated in the OFFICIAL REPORT.
    Mr. Speaker: I am afraid that I have lost count. I could not deal with that.
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: I note the point of view expressed by the hon. and gallant Member for Kingston upon Hull, East (Commander Pursey).

    "Green Ranger" (Loss)
    Mr. Haymanasked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty whether he will make a statement on the loss of the "Green Ranger" off the North Devon coast last winter.
    Mr. C. Ian Orr-Ewing: "Green Ranger" left Plymouth in tow in light seas and fair weather on the 15th November but had to seek shelter in a heavy ground swell north of Clovelly during the afternoon of the following day and anchored there that evening. Difficulty in weighing anchor delayed until next morning the attempt to reach Lundy Island for shelter. During this time the wind increased, finally to force 9. Assistance was called during the afternoon but the tow parted and the ship drove hard ashore near Hartland Point in the evening. The runner crew was taken off by breeches buoy at 0300 the following morning, 18th November.
    In subsequent gales the ship broke in two and is a total loss—she will be offered for sale as she lies in the near future.
    Mr. Hayman: Will the Civil Lord take into account that many people will think that the Admiralty was grossly incompetent in permitting this vessel to be taken in tow round Land's End at a time when she could, as after all she did, meet a gale of either force 9 or force 10? Will he and his right hon. Friend take into account that there is no harbour and no breakwater at Clovelly, and that the men who manned the beach lifeboat risked their lives to succour the men concerned? Will he also take into account that on that very same day there was an accident with another beach lifeboat at Seaham and nine lives were lost? Is it not time we spent some money on safeguarding our seamen instead of wasting hundreds of millions on Polaris missiles which may never be used?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: I do not think the hon. Gentleman is quite fair to suggest that this was a naval responsibility. The vessel was under tow by a commercial firm. I have been under considerable pressure to place just this kind of repair work in South Wales shipyards, and one of those shipyards won this tender, which included the towing of the vessel from

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    Plymouth to South Wales. The weather forecast at the time was reasonable, but in this case it was not completely accurate.

    Bahamas Cays (Patrols)
    Mr. Croninasked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty if he will make a statement on action taken by the Royal Navy to prevent British territory from being used as a base for hostilities against Cuba; and what consultations have taken place with appropriate United States authorities with regard to such preventive actions.
    Mr. Dribergasked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty if he will make a statement on recent incidents in the Bahamas, in which Royal Marines have been involved, arising out of the activities of anti-Castro Cuban émigrés.
    Mr. C. Ian Orr-Ewing: Because the reply is somewhat lengthy I will circulate it in the OFFICIAL REPORT.
    Briefly the Senior Naval Officer West Indies has arranged for patrols of the Bahamas Cays over the last six weeks in consultation with the Governor of the Bahamas and the United States Administration and local co-operation with the United States Coastguard Service.
    Mr. Cronin: While I appreciate that there are considerable difficulties and that it is necessary to patrol hundreds of islands, in view of the grave diplomatic issues involved will the hon. Gentleman ensure that the utmost vigilance is maintained?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: Yes, Sir; I will. The hon. Gentleman is very fair in saying that this is a difficult problem. There are also 88,000 sq. miles of sea to be patrolled. Consequently, it is not easy to find these very small boats.
    Mr. Driberg: Can the hon. Gentleman say whether it is correct, as has been reported, that in one case a number of these émigrés were captured and were then allowed to retain the weapons which they had illegally in their possession?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: I will look into that question. I do not think it is one for me. I think it is a matter for the Attorney-General of the Bahamas to go into.
    Mr. Driberg: They were captured by the Royal Marines.
    Mr. Rankin: With regard to Question No. 19, does the hon. Gentleman realise that personnel are being recruited and trained for these hostilities on United States territory? Will he take that point up also with the appropriate authorities?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: I do not accept that as a statement of fact, and if I did, I should not be responsible for it.
    Following is the reply:
    In consultation with the Governor of the Bahamas, the Senior Naval Officer West Indies has arranged for patrols of the Bahamas Cays over the last six weeks. There has been full consultation with the United States Administration, and local co-operation with the United States Coastguard Service.
    During searches in early March, a small schooner and a quantity of arms were seized. On 31st March, H.M.S. "Londonderry" arrived off Norman Cay and conveyed 17 men, who had been arrested by Bahamian police, to Nassau. Their launch was towed to Nassau by a crew from H.M.S. "Londonderry".
    On 5th April a Royal Marine party, operating with Army and police officers, searched William Island. Two armed men were arrested, and a further party of five men escaped in a fast dinghy and were subsequently apprehended by a United States Coastguard cutter. Dumps of arms, food and fuel were discovered on William Island. In addition, nine Cuban exiles were captured on Andres Island and were transferred to H.M.S "Londonderry".

    Borneo (Piracy)
    Mr. Croninasked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty if he will make a statement on the progress made by the Royal Navy on the suppression of piracy off the North coast of Borneo and in the adjacent waters.
    Mr. C. Ian Orr-Ewing: Her Majesty's ships are continuing to undertake frequent anti-piracy patrols in co-operation with the local authorities in British North Borneo. These patrols have contributed to a marked reduction in the number of incidents reported in the area, involving either piracy on the high seas or armed raids by bandits attacking coastal villages from the sea. Her Majesty's ships will persevere with their efforts to suppress such lawlessness on the high seas and in the territorial seas of British North Borneo.
    Mr. Cronin: Is it not the case that piracy still flourishes off the coast of Borneo? Is it not highly unsatisfactory

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    that scenes reminiscent of the days of Henry Morgan should take place in waters over which the Royal Navy is responsible?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: This is no new problem to that area. Piracy has been in existence in the China Sea for very much longer than I have been at the Admiralty. But we will look at this matter.

    Electrical Officers (Recruitment)
    Miss Vickersasked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty what measures are being taken to improve the recruiting of electrical officers to the Royal Navy.
    Mr. C. Ian Orr-Ewing: We have just introduced more attractive conditions for short-service and medium-service commissions. There will be a greater variety of commissions available; a five-year short-service commission which can be extended up to ten years and a sixteen-year pensionable commission. In addition the upper age limit for entry has been raised.
    Miss Vickers: Does my hon. Friend think that the new conditions will attract people from industry? What is the lower age, and is there any marriage bar to entry?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: There is no marriage bar to entry. The age limit has been raised from 36 to 39 and we seek to attract people from industry, to whom we give seven years' credit for suitable civilian experience and up to one year in addition for professional qualifications. This is a considerable incentive.

    Scientific Service Staff (Scotland)
    Mr. Lawsonasked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty how many of the 7,140 staff employed in the Royal Naval Scientific Service on 1st April, 1963, were employed in Scotland; and whether the proportion is likely to increase in the near future.
    Mr. C. Ian Orr-Ewing: The number employed on 1st April, 1963, was 552. No significant increase is foreseen in the near future.
    Mr. Lawson: In view of the very well-known inventive and mechanical genius of the Scottish people, does not the hon.
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    Gentleman think that the Royal Navy is depriving itself of most valuable manpower? Will he ensure that the number of research workers in Scotland is vastly multiplied by the next time we ask a Question such as this?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: I cannot promise to do that, though as a Scot, albeit a Sassenach by habitation, I appreciate the hon. Gentleman's comments. There is a great deal of engineering skill in Scotland and there are three important research establishments which contribute to our research and development effort in a vary well worth while way.

    Research and Development Contracts (Scotland)
    Mr. Rossasked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty how much of the £18,832,100 provided in the 1963–64 Navy Estimates, Vote 4, Subhead B, for other expenditure on research and development, will be spent in Scotland; and whether this figure is likely to increase in the future.
    Mr. C. Ian Orr-Ewing: Approximately £3·1 million. No significant increase is expected in the future.
    Mr. Ross: How much was spent at the establishment to which the former torpedo experimental station at Greenock was transferred?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: If the hon. Gentleman is referring to the work transferred to Portland, I cannot answer him without notice. In any case, I doubt if it would be wise to give an idea to our potential enemies of exactly how much we are spending in each of our research establishments.
    Mr. Millanasked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty how much of the £15,681,900 provided in the 1963–64 Navy Estimates for research and development contracts will be spent in Scotland; and how this figure compares with that for each of the last five years.
    Mr. C. Ian Orr-Ewing: It is estimated that approximately £2·9 million, which will be about 18 per cent. of the total expenditure on research and development contracts in 1963–64, will be spent in Scotland. With one exception, this sum is higher than in any of the past five years.
    Mr. Milan: What special steps are taken by the hon. Gentleman's Department to attract this kind of contract to areas of high unemployment? Is a continuing effort made?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: As the hon. Gentleman knows, if we have a massive contract—a repetitive contract—there are special provisions far directing a proportion, up to 25 per cent., to development districts, But, apart from that, in giving out tenders, we have to look after the taxpayers' interests and the need of the Navy for prompt delivery.

    Stores and Equipment Purchases (Scotland)
    Mr. Gourlayasked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty what proportion of the £5,947,000 provided in the 1963–64 Navy Estimates for the purchase of certain naval stores and equipment will be spent in Scotland; and in particular how much of the £1,215,000 for motor transport will be spent in Scotland.
    Mr. C. Ian Orr-Ewing: There will be very little expenditure in Scotland for motor transport. This apart I would expect the proportion of this subhead to be spent in Scotland to be at about the same level as it was in 1961–62—about 16 per cent.
    Mr. Gourlay: Does not the hon. Gentleman appreciate that 16 per cent, is a very low proportion of the amount of money which should be spent in Scotland? In considering the amount to be spent on motor transport, will the hon. Gentleman re-examine the position with a view to giving a greater proportion to Scottish factories?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: I understand that ray right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade has stated that the motor factories in Scotland are not yet in full production, but we will take account of the merits of their products when we consider the next tenders.
    Mr. G. Thomas: What proportion is to be spent in Wales? Will the hon. Gentleman bear in mind that I should like the same answers about Wales as he has given to all these Questions about Scotland?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: I will bear that in mind. l will even answer Questions if
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    the hon. Gentleman likes to put them down.
    Mr. Smallasked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty how much of the £32,899,000 provided in the 1963–64 Navy Estimates for the purchase of electrical and electronic stores and equipment will be spent in Scotland; and whether it is his policy to increase such expenditure in areas of high unemployment.
    Mr. Benceasked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty how much of the £18,431,000 provided in the 1963–64 Navy Estimates for the purchase of general stores will be spent in Scotland; and whether he will indicate the nature of these stores, showing which are purchased in Scotland.
    Mr. C. Ian Orr-Ewing: All Scottish firms which are capable of supplying the various stores we want will be invited to tender but the contracts will be awarded on the merits of price and delivery offered.
    Mr. Small: I thank the hon. Gentleman for that reply, but may I ask him to do his best to extend opportunity for electronic equipment to be supplied by Scotland, since 60 per cent. of the science graduates in Scotland come to England after university training?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: We will certainly bear this in mind. I think that I am right in saying that between 8 and 10 per cent. of our electronics expenditure goes to Scotland.
    Mr. Mellish: Will the hon. Gentleman take note that Northern Ireland has certain claims, although none of the Ulster Unionist Members opposite seem to be interested?
    Mr. McMaster rose—
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: I will take note of what the hon. Member who sits for Bermondsey (Mr. Mellish) says.

    Polaris Submarines (Operational Base)
    Mr. Stodartasked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty when he will announce where an operating base will be constructed for the Polaris submarines.
    Miss Vickersasked the Civil Lord of the Admiralty whether he will consider

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    making Devonport the operational base for Polaris submarines.
    Mr. C. Ian Orr-Ewing: I am not yet able to make a statement but we hope to do so soon after the Easter Recess.
    Mr. Stodart: While operational considerations in this matter are obviously of paramount importance, may I ask my hon. Friend to continue to appreciate the advantages which Scotland has to offer, particularly in view of the Answers he has given, which show that the Admiralty appreciates the importance of Scotland?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: Yes, I am aware of these facts. But, as my hon. Friend says, it is speed which is of paramount importance, together with the operational advantages which we have to take into serious consideration.
    Miss Vickers: In considering this, will my hon. Friend remember the service given by the dockyard at Devonport during the last 300 years? Will he ensure that the present level of employment there is maintained? If it cannot be an operational base for these submarines, will he see that the aircraft carriers, for which this port is eminently suitable, are sent there? Frigates could also be based there, and there is the possibility of building further ships so that the dockyard can be kept fully employed.
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: I will certainly bear that point in mind.
    Mr. Manuel: Will the Polaris submarines, when they arrive—if ever—be put under the control of N.A.T.O.? If they are, will N.A.T.O. decide on the operational base or will this be a unilateral decision?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: The hon. Gentleman is not right in his assumptions. We are making plans at the present time about these submarines. If there are talks at a higher level on an international agreement concerning them, that is another matter. At present the Admiralty must get ahead with plans for the operational base.
    Mr. S. Silverman: Before complying with the request of the hon. Lady the Member for Plymouth, Devonport (Miss Vickers) to make Devonport an operational base for Polaris submarines, what
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    steps would the hon. Gentleman take to ascertain whether the inhabitants of Devonport desired it?
    Mr. Orr-Ewing: I am sure that the inhabitants desire to remain part of a free country, I am sure that they will wish to make their contribution to defence.

  BRITISH ARMY

    Royal Ordnance Factories
    Mr. Whitlockasked the Secretary of State for War if it is still the policy of Her Majesty's Government to regard the Royal Ordnance factories as a vital strategic reserve and as a preferred source for certain equipment.
    The Under-Secretary of State for War (Mr. James Ramsden): There is no change in our policy towards the Royal Ordnance factories.
    Mr. Whitlock: While I am very glad to have the Minister's assurance, may I ask how he can reconcile that statement with the fact that in the Nottingham factory shop after shop has been closed and more than 400 men are threatened with redundancy? Cannot he make some renewed effort to ensure that these 400 skilled men are retained?
    Mr. Ramsden: The hon. Gentleman knows the circumstances under which this redundancy arose. I am afraid that it arose out of an order not going to the Royal Ordnance factory which we expected would go there. Because of the disparity in costs, the preferred-source policy, as he knows, cannot apply.
    Mr. Tapsell: Is my hon. Friend in a position to give a categorical assurance that it is not the intention to close the Royal Ordnance factory at Nottingham?
    Mr. Ramsden: We are, as I think my hon. Friend knows, conducting a review of the capacity in the weapons and engineering group, and I am not yet ready to make a statement.
    Mr. Whitlockasked the Secretary of State for War if during the past year contracts have been placed with private enterprise for work which the Royal Ordnance factories are equipped to undertake and for which they have not been asked to tender.
    Mr. Ramsden: Yes, Sir.
    Mr. Whitlock: As the hon. Gentleman says in a recent letter that the Royal Ordnance factory at Nottingham is at a disadvantage in competing with industry because all its labour force is highly skilled, and it is not given the design and development experience, will he say what kind of jobs Nottingham is likely to get, except short-run production, which is extremely costly, and which private enterprise does not want?
    Mr. Ramsden: As the hon. Gentleman knows, Nottingham is heavily engaged on a substantial programme of gun manufacture. The Question asks whether orders have gone outside the Royal Ordnance factories for which they had not had an opportunity to tender. These mostly relate to ammunition components which are in a different field from that in which the hon. Gentleman is interested.
    Mr. Tapsell: Is my hon. Friend aware that there is particular concern at Nottingham Royal Ordnance factory because it feels that it is not getting a chance to do design work for which it is well-equipped; for instance, in regard to a recent mobile anti-tank gun which it is felt could have come to it but which did not?
    Mr. Ramsden: I take note of what my hon. Friend has said. The question of what work goes into Royal Ordnance factories has always been subject to the design rights, as they are called, of the parent firm.
    Lieut.-Colonel Cordeauxasked the Secretary of State for War what orders have been placed in foreign countries during the past six months for armaments which the Royal Ordnance factories in this country are also equipped to make.
    Mr. Ramsden: None, Sir.
    Lieut.-Colonel Cordeaux: Would not my hon. Friend agree that if such orders have not been recently placed they are about to be for about £550,000 worth of anti-tank guns from Sweden and £10 million of orders from the U.S.A. for 175 mm. guns? If that is so, in view of those orders being placed and of the recent orders that have been placed with
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    private firms, would he not agree that all these orders are of a type which could be carried out by the Royal Ordnance factories in this country? Whatever the reasons may be for the placing of these orders, would he not agree that, when they take place at the same time as the staff of the Royal Ordnance factory in Nottingham is being cut by 30 per cent., it must create the impression there that the factory is on the way out—[HON. MEMBERS: "Speech."]—and, in spite of what he has said to my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham, West (Mr. Tapsell), cannot he say something to allay these fears?
    Mr. Ramsden: I fully understand the uncertainty which the recent redundancies have created at the factory, but I cannot add to what I have said in reply to my hon. Friend about the review of what is to happen. In reply to the first part of my hon. and gallant Friend's supplementary question, our research and development effort cannot be deployed in a wide enough field to cover every possible Army requirement. The reason that these weapons have been ordered from abroad is that there are no British designs from which the weapons could be built, so we have to go abroad in order to get the Army the equipment which it needs.
    Mr. Mayhewasked the Secretary of State for War if the Royal Ordnance Factory, Woolwich, is still a preferred source for the production of conventional weapons; and if he will set up an independent committee of inquiry into the fairness and efficiency of present methods of tendering by Royal Ordnance factories.
    The Secretary of State for War (Mr. John Profumo): Yes. Sir, and the Royal Ordnance Factory, Woolwich, receives its due share of such Royal Ordnance factory production orders as it is equipped to undertake.
    I do not consider that an independent committee of inquiry into the methods of tendering by the Royal Ordnance factories is required at present. The problem that must be decided first is the scale of Royal Ordnance factory capacity that needs to be retained. I am at present examining this very important and involved question and before taking a final decision I have asked Sir Eric Mensforth, the Chairman of Firth Brown Tools Ltd.

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    and Westland Aircraft Ltd., to give me his views on the outcome of this examination.
    Mr. Mayhew: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware of the great concern in Woolwich about this subject? Can he say why, if the Arsenal remains a preferred source in the production of conventional weapons, the Minister constantly gives these orders to private enterprise?
    Mr. Profumo: It is not true that we constantly give these orders to private enterprise. The hon. Member, with other hon. Members interested in the subject, will know that in this case we bent over backwards to try to pursue the preferred-source policy, but there was such a discrepancy in the tenders that we were unable to do so. It is for that reason that we are having an inquiry and I hope that when Sir Eric Mensforth reports to me we shall be in a clearer position.
    Mr. Mayhew: The Minister will accept that he is himself responsible for the efficiency and competitiveness of Woolwich Arsenal?
    Mr. Profumo: Certainly.

    Scottish Infantry Record Office
    Miss Harvie Andersonasked the Secretary of State for War why it is proposed to move the Scottish Infantry Record Office out of Scotland.
    Mr. Ramsden: The amalgamation of the Perth Record Office with that at York where there is new specially designed accommodation and new punched card machines will produce very substantial economies. I regret therefore that my right hon. Friend has had to decide to close the Record Office at Perth.
    Miss Anderson: Is my hon. Friend aware of the bad effect on morale that this will have and that it will be regarded as removing yet another part of the independence of the Scottish regiments? Will he not look again to the alternative, which was put up and looked upon favourably about two years ago, that at least some of the work should be maintained in Scotland?
    Mr. Ramsden: We are confident that the Scottish infantry regiments will get from the office at York every bit as good
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    a service as they have had from Perth. Many Scottish units are already administered with regard to their records outside Scotland at the moment. I am afraid that, for reasons of economy which I have mentioned, it is impossible to reconsider this decision.
    The Earl of Dalkeith: While I appreciate some of the reasons given by my hon. Friend, I wonder whether he could make his answer still more convincing by letting us have some figures of the economy that will be effected as a result of this change?
    Mr. Ramsden: The estimated economy is about £40,000 in a full year.
    Mr. Manuel: Does not the hon. Gentleman, in making this decision, consider that the Records Office could have been just as suitable at Perth as in the English location that he has now given to the combined operation, and can he say whether his right hon. Friend has the figures of the actual numbers which will be removed from Scotland to York as a result of this transaction?
    Mr. Ramsden: We considered that, but what weighed with us was the fact that the volume of work and the number of staff employed in York were more than three times that of the Perth office, and new accommodation to house staff and machines had recently been specially built for the Records Office in York. The effect on employment, I am glad to say, although any effect is regrettable, will be comparatively slight.

    Sentry Box, St. James's Palace
    Mr. Liptonasked the Secretary of State for War if he will investigate the circumstances, of which details have been supplied by the hon. Member for Brixton, in which a model was permitted by the military authorities to use a sentry box outside St. James's Palace for a fashion display; and if he will make a statement.
    Mr. Ramsden: The photographer who used this sentry box as background for a fashion advertisement did not ask to be allowed to do so. The box is in a public street and it would be difficult to stop members of the public being photographed against it when the sentry is away from it.
    Mr. Lipton: Why is the Under-Secretary answering this Question

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    instead of the Secretary of State for War, who knows more about these things? Will the Under-Secretary say whether this kind of thing really helps to preserve the dignity of the Services?
    Mr. Ramsden: I think that I might answer both parts of that supplementary question by asking why the hon. Gentleman is asking it at all.
    Mr. Shinwell: Would the Minister give this further consideration? Has it occurred to him that St. James's Palace would look very much more attractive if we replaced the soldier in the sentry box by the model?

    Apprentice Training School, Woolwich
    Sir J. Pitmanasked the Secretary of State for War (1) what consultations he had before deciding to discontinue the Apprentice Training School at Woolwich;
    (2) what plans he has for utilising the valuable specialist equipment and experienced staff for training craftsmen at the Apprentice School, Woolwich, at a time when school leavers are more than usually numerous and the needs for such training are great.
    Mr. Profumo: I am in consultation with my right hon. Friend the Minister of Labour to see whether we can arrange for the Apprentice Training Shop to be used by non-Government apprentices. I would like in this way to be able to make use in some measure of the staff and facilities of the workshop. There are however practical difficulties—for example, questions of security arise because the shop is in the middle of a defence establishment—but we shall of course do our best to overcome these.
    Sir J. Pitman: While greatly welcoming that decision, may I ask my right hon. Friend whether he will consult also with his right hon. Friend the Minister of Education? One of the finest technical colleges in the country is there, and colleges of further education in the adjoining areas are very good indeed. Would my right hon. Friend consult the Minister of Education to see if he might supplement the work that is being done there?
    Mr. Profumo: Certainly, Sir. I want, however, to make it clear that I have not discontinued the apprentice training school. I have simply decided to suspend the normal intake for one year.
    Mr. Reynolds: While I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman can solve the security problem, may I ask whether he would agree to pass on the means of solving it to the First Lord of the Admiralty who seems to be having difficulty in solving a similar problem at Greenwich?
    Mr. Profumo: All these problems are very difficult, and if I can solve them it will be only because the security aspect is not too big.

    Retired Pay
    Mr. Lubbockasked the Secretary of State for War what was the maximum retired pay received by a lieutenant-colonel who retired in 1935; and what is the comparative purchasing power of the amount he now receives, assuming that he is now 77 years old.
    Mr. Ramsden: The maximum retired pay received by a lieutenant-colonel who retired in 1935 was £543 a year. With pensions increases he would now be receiving £877 a year. The comparative purchasing power of £877, in relation to the cost of living in 1935, is £331.
    Mr. Lubbock: Does not this indicate that these officers have not only failed to participate in the increase in the standard of living enjoyed by the rest of the community, but have dropped behind?
    Mr. Ramsden: The hon. Member moved certain Amendments in this sense during the Committee stage of the recent Bill, but, at the suggestion of my hon. Friend the Financial Secretary to the Treasury, the Committee rejected them. I do not think that we can take that debate any further today.
    Mr. Paget: Are we not at some time to do something about this gross injustice to a lot of old men who have given valuable service? Are we not to adopt the honest policy of the same retirement pension for the same service, which is the only decent way to do it?
    Mr. Ramsden: What this boils down to is the amount of the national resources afforded by the taxpayer which the Government think it right to allot to these various charges. Within the limit of what is thought to be proper and what is available, I believe that our method of successive pensions increase Measures is the proper way of dealing with the situation.
    Dame Irene Ward: Why does not my hon. Friend just give the straight answer that the Minister of Defence and the Chief Secretary to the Treasury are having an examination of this, whole matter? Why does not the Army stand up for its own people? If it had done so a little earlier, we would not be in this position today. That is my view of the subject.
    Mr. Paget rose—
    Dame Irene Ward: May I have an answer?
    Mr. Ramsden: With every respect to my hon. Friend, I think that she is oversimplifying the situation.
    Mr. Paget: When the hon. Gentleman speaks of continued increases of pensions, does he not appreciate that that does not affect these old gentlemen who gave their services a long time ago, since when money has depreciated? Cannot we allocate something to honesty, which is what it comes to?
    Dame Irene Ward: Go on—be honest.
    Mr. Ramsden: There must be a limit to the amount of resources which can be allocated to these Service and other pensions, and judgment has to be made as to the proper way of doing it. I think that the present policy is the best that can be done.

    Surplus Unused Motor Cars
    Mr. Watkinsasked the Secretary of State for War what action he is taking to dispose of surplus unused Service motor cars; whether, such cars are being made available to other Government Departments; and what are the arrangements for such purchases.
    Mr. Ramsden: The War Department has no surplus unused motor cars. We buy cars for Service use each year.

    1st Battalion, Scots Guards (Pirbright)
    Mr. Dribergasked the Secretary of State for War if he will now make a detailed statement on the recent discontent in the 1st Battalion, Scots Guards, at Pirbright; what were the guardsmen's grievances; and what action has been taken.
    Mr. Pagetasked the Secretary of State for War if he will make a statement with regard to the investigation ordered by him of the Pirbright mutiny.
    Mr. Profumo: A very thorough examination has been made into the circumstances leading to this incident.
    The complaints made by the men, though numerous. were for the most part individually trivial. They concerned the internal affairs of the unit, and whilst I do not propose to give details, they have been very carefully considered and action is being taken on any which have proved justified.
    As I have already said, the battalion is at low strength and the examination has shown that, apart from guard duties, it was trying to do too much. The local amenities are not entirely satisfactory and the normal channels for dealing with complaints were not always being used.
    Nevertheless, the incident should never have occurred but for a loss of contact between some of the officers and their men, and I am afraid that there can be no doubt that there were failures in administration and man management in the unit. In addition to other necessary measures, certain changes in the personnel of the battalion have been made.
    Mr. Driberg: While thanking the right hon. Gentleman for that very candid reply, may I ask him whether, when he says that the usual channels for complaints were "not being used", he means that they were being blocked at some point and, if so, where? Secondly, when he says that the complaints were "individually trivial", does he not realise that a very large number of individually trivial complaints can accumulate into something quite big? Is it, therefore, broadly his conclusion that there is, or was, too much "bull" in this battalion and that there ought to be less of it?
    Mr. Profumo: There are channels for complaints to officers in every unit and, of course, there were in this, and officers are bound to deal with these complaints. In some cases these channels were fiat being used properly and in some cases protests were not being properly investigated. But I do not think that there is any need for me to add anything further to the rather full Answer I have given, which shows the failure in man management.
    Mr. Paget: Is there not some method of finding out trouble of this sort before a mutiny takes place? A mutiny is not a very good precedent as a method of drawing attention to grievances and getting them remedied.
    Mr. Profumo: I must challenge the hon. and learned Member's use of the word "mutiny". This was not a mutiny. Nobody was charged with mutiny, or with attempted mutiny, or with incitement to mutiny. There were grievances and a number of guardsmen went absent without leave, some for less than twenty-four hours, but then came back of their own accord. There is no question of there having been a mutiny.
    Mr. A. Royle: Will my right hon. Friend reconsider the burden of public duties carried out by the Household Brigade in London? Does he feel that this burden was in any way responsible for some of the troubles with this battalion of Scots Guards at Pirbright?
    Mr. Profumo: I do not think that that was one of the problems which was responsible, because the battalion, as I have said earlier, was capable, although at low strength, of carrying out public duties if not pushed too far in other directions. It could have called on London District for assistance if the commanding officer or the lieut.-colonel had felt that necessary. There is a later Question about public duties.
    Mr. Paget: Will the right hon. Gentleman tell us when collective refusal of duty ceased to be a mutiny?
    Mr. Profumo: The hon. and learned Gentleman is perhaps more versed in the law than I and I can only tell him that there was no question of mutiny or incitement to mutiny. The commanding officer, or lieut.-colonel, when speaking to the men pointed out that there
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    was a narrow line between what might develop into some form of mutiny as compared with what happened in this case.
    Mr. Hastings: Would not my right hon. Friend agree that the record of this regiment is without peer in the British Army and that the best thing that can be done now is to leave it alone to put its affairs straight?
    Mr. Profumo: I agree, and I think that everybody would wish to do the same. It is our job to see that the commanding officer is given every sort of help and that the battalion builds up its strength.

HOUSE OF COMMONS PROCEDURE
Sir W. Robson Brown45. Sir W. Robson Brown asked the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster whether he will move to appoint a new Select Committee on Procedure with wide terms of reference, to consider, in particular, whether time can be saved by the removal of detailed business from the Floor of the House and whether all-party committees could usefully he appointed to examine and report upon matters of economic, industrial, technical and scientific importance.
The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (Mr. Iain Macleod): I will certainly consider this. But I think first we should await the Report of the present Select Committee on Procedure on the Finance Bill. This may be available tomorrow.
Sir G. Nicholson: Is my right hon. Friend aware that there will be particularly intense opposition to any idea that the House should surrender its duties as the watchdog over finance by sending any Finance Bills to Committees, and that any idea such as that contained in the Question runs entirely contrary to British Parliamentary tradition? I hope that he is aware of it.
Mr. Macleod: With respect to my hon. Friend, he should not get too indignant before he reads the Report.
Sir W. Robson Brown: Will my right hon. Friend take note of the fact that, quite apart from what the present Select Committee reports, the great majority of

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the House and the country will be very glad if the Government will take an initiative in this matter and appoint a new Select Committee to consider these new terms?
Mr. Macleod: Among other matters to be considered, quite apart from whether these points should be referred to a Select Committee, is whether it should be a new Select Committee or the Select Committee on Procedure which the House has already set up. I do not think that we can reasonably examine these matters until we have had tomorrow's Report.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE
Mr. H. Wilson: May I ask the Leader of the House to state the business of the House for the week after the Recess?
The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (Mr. Iain Macleod): Yes, Sir. The business for the first week after the Recess will be as follows—
TUESDAY, 23RD APRIL.—Second Reading of the Water Resources Bill [Lords], and Committee stage of the Money Resolution.
Remaining stages of the Town and Country Planning Bill.
WEDNESDAY, 24TH APRIL.—Remaining stages of the Local Government (Financial Provisions) (Scotland) Bill.
Second Reading of the Local Employment Bill, and Committee stage of the Money Resolution.
THURSDAY, 25TH APRIL.—Second Reading of the Remuneration of Teachers Bill, and Committee stage of the Money Resolution.
Consideration of Lords Amendments to the Agriculture (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill.
FRIDAY, 26TH APRIL.—Private Members' Motions.
MONDAY, 29TH APRIL.—The proposed business will be: Debate on the British Railways Board's Plan for the Reshaping of the Railways.
TUESDAY 30TH APRIL.—Supply [14th Allotted Day]: Committee, which it is proposed should be taken formally to allow the debate on the railways to be concluded.
Mr. H. Wilson: I take it the right hon. Gentleman understands that if we debate the Beeching Report many of us will want to discuss not merely the narrow parts of the Report itself, but the wider aspects of transport and the considerations of transport policy which has brought about this Report?
Mr. Macleod: Yes, Sir. I think that that is well understood.
Dame Irene Ward: May I ask my right hon. Friend whether the Minister of Housing and Local Government will be making a statement on the Parliamentary controversy which took place last week, or whether Motions Nos. 117, 119 and 120 will end the matter?
[That this House deplores the action of the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Housing and Local Government in requesting the hon. Member for Blackburn to withdraw a Question on turnstiles from the Order Paper on his written undertaking that he would inform her in advance when he was ready to make a statement so that she could table her Question again, in failing to honour that undertaking, in making his statement instead in reply to the hon. Member for Tynemouth and in inviting the hon. Member for Belfast, West, to introduce a Private Member's Bill to implement the policy for which the hon. Member for Blackburn had previously pressed in a Bill for which Her Majesty's Government had refused to give facilities, and calls on the Prime Minister to ensure that an apology is made to the hon. Member for Blackburn for the dishonouring of the pledge made to her.]
[That this House reaffirms the right of individual Members to put Questions on the Order Paper and to withdraw or transfer them within the rules of order.]
[That this House regrets that the hon. Member for Blackburn did not ascertain, before making allegations to the contrary, that the hon. Member for Tynemouth had exercised her right to seek information from the Minister of Housing and Local Government on the matter of turnstiles in which she had interested herself for the National Council of Women without any request from any Minister.]
Mr. Macleod: It was my right hon. Friend's intention to make a statement

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to the House on that matter, and he had so drafted it, but it was not possible for the hon. Lady the Member for Blackburn (Mrs. Castle), who is very much concerned in this, to be present that afternoon, so, naturally, my right hon. Friend did not make the statement but wrote to the hon. Member for Blackburn instead.
Mr. Healey: Can the right hon. Gentleman find an early opportunity for the House to discuss the White Paper on the Polaris sales agreement, which will make this country wholly dependent on the United States for its deterrent for many years to come?
Mr. Macleod: Without entering into the polemics of that, clearly there is not an opportunity immediately after the Recess.
Sir G. Nicholson: I hope that my right hon. Friend will not think that I am introducing a trivial note, but will he change his phraseology in future and not refer to "Supply, which it is proposed should be taken formally"? Will he make it clear that it is open to any hon. Member to debate Supply, and that it cannot be proposed and disposed of just like that? Could my right hon. Friend perhaps say that he hopes that it will be taken formally?
Mr. Macleod: I should like to use a slightly different form of words; but am grateful to my hon. Friend, and I agree with him. Perhaps the form of words that could be used is, "if the House agrees, it might be taken formally", or something like that, which would make it clear, as one always does, that one preserves the rights of hon. Members.
Mr. G. Thomas: In view of the statement made in West Cardiff on Friday last by the Prime Minister, and which I saw in the Press, concerning the establishment of a Welsh Office, can the Leader of the House say whether we are to have an opportunity soon to discuss this question in detail?
Mr. Macleod: There will be the usual opportunity later, of course, to discuss Welsh affairs.
Mr. Lawson: Is the Leader of the House aware that in the Scottish Standing Committee, which is dealing with very difficult and complicated legislation, we
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are deprived of the services of the Lord Advocate and the Solicitor-General for Scotland, and that we meet without any senior Minister of the Crown being present? Will the right hon. Gentleman look into this question to see whether we can at least sometimes have the Secretary of State for Scotland present at our Committee so that we can get some authoritative advice on the legislation with which we are dealing?
Mr. Macleod: The hon. Gentleman knows that the question of Law Officers for Scotland is a problem for both sides of the House. [Laughter.] Of course it is. It has often been discussed, but, with respect, the point made by the hon. Gentleman does not arise out of the business that I have announced.
Mr. McMaster: Besides Welsh and Scottish affairs, can my right hon. Friend find an early opportunity to discuss the high rate of unemployment in Northern Ireland?
Mr. Macleod: I have no favouritism in this matter. I shall give exactly the same answer—certainly, some time.
Mr. Snow: Referring to the debate on the Beeching Report, since it is apparently not within Dr. Beeching's terms of reference to examine future transport requirements, for example, in the case of the Midlands overspill scheme, will the Minister of Housing and Local Govermnent be in attendance during the debate?
Mr. Macleod: This debate is some time ahead. We have not yet drawn up the list of speakers for the Government, but I shall take note of the point made by the hon. Gentleman.
Mr. Ross: Bearing in mind the fact that the business for the week when we return includes a meeting of the Scottish Standing Committee, which is dealing with criminal justice, will the right hon. Gentleman remind the Prime Minister that he promised us that in the absence of the Law Officers matters relating to the law would be dealt with by the Secretary of State for Scotland? Would not it be a good idea if the Secretary of State for Scotland attended the Committee occasionally?
Mr. Macleod: The point is taken, but, with respect, I am dealing with the business on the Floor of the House.
Mr. Bowles: My right hon. Friend may not have drawn up the list of Government speakers for the Beeching debate, but has he drawn up the Motion, and, if so, on what is it based?
Mr. Macleod: We have not yet tabled a Motion. The debate will probably arise on a Government Motion, and it would not be surprising if there were an Amendment to it.
Sir A. V. Harvey: Prior to the debate on the Beaching proposals, will my right hon. Friend arrange with the Minister of Transport for the British Transport Commission to disclose traffic figures on the lines it is proposed to close? It is difficult to assess and debate this matter unless this information is given. Will my right hon. Friend look into this point?
Mr. Macleod: I shall certainly discuss that point with my right hon. Friend.
Mr. Willis: The right hon. Gentleman. will remember that about three or four weeks ago he promised me that he would have a word with the Secretary of State for Scotland about making an announcement on the Floor of the House concerning the future development of Scotland. Can we take it that we are now at long last to hear from the Secretary of State for Scotland, or are we not?
Mr. Macleod: The hon. Gentleman can certainly take it that I carried out my undertaking to discuss that point with my right hon. Friend.
Mr. Manuel: The recommendations of Dr. Beeching and the debate that we are to have have terrific implications for Scotland. The Secretary of State for Scotland has been making speeches on the basis of this Report. Will the Leader of the House ensure that the Secretary of State for Scotland is one of the speakers during the debate on the Report, so that he may deal with what will happen in Scotland if these recommendations are carried out?
Mr. Macleod: That point has been put to me before. We shall bear that in mind when we consider the question of Government speakers.
Mr. Emrys Hughes: When does the Leader of the House propose to make
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a statement on the future activities of Dr. Beeching? Is he proposing to lend him to the Ministry of Defence to cut down expenditure there?
Mr. Temple: In view of the fact that my right hon. Friend has announced the Second Reading of the Water Resources Bill, will he say whether he can find time for a debate on the Bledisloe Committee's Report on salmon and fresh water fisheries, as this Report is very much concerned with matters which will be discussed on the Water Resources
Mr. Macleod: This is a matter in which a number of hon. Members have a considerable interest, but during the period of business which I have announced, and with which the House is immediately concerned, I cannot see such a possibility.
Mr. Hector Hughes: Has the Leader of the House failed to realise that the Criminal Justice (Scotland) Bill is very important and will be a very imperfect piece of legislation unless he makes an effort to have in attendance at the Scottish Grand Committee either a Law Officer who represents Scotland or the Secretary of State for Scotland? Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that in replying to my hon. Friends he has not given any promise to secure the attendance of Ministers in order to effect this very important piece of legislation? Will he reconsider that matter and try to see that a responsible Minister is in attendance at the Scottish Grand Committee?
Mr. Macleod: Of course this is an important matter. I do not pretend that it is not. But it is not a matter that concerns business on the Floor of the House. The points which hon. Members have put to me I will, of course, take note of and discuss with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State.
Sir J. Duncan: Does my right hon. Friend recall that a few weeks ago I raised the point about the absence of Law Officers from the House and asked my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister whether he would seek co-operation from right hon. Gentlemen opposite? Has there been any co-operation?

BILL PRESENTED
  LOCAL EMPLOYMENT
  Bill to make further provision for the payment of grants under the Local Employment Act 1960 towards the cost of machinery, plant and buildings required by undertakings in development districts, and to enable the Board to fulfil certain agreements in localities which have ceased to be development districts, presented by Mr. Erroll; supported by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Mr. John Hare, Mr. Michael Noble, Sir Keith Joseph, and Mr. David Price; read the First time; to be read a Second time tomorrow and to be printed. [Bill 97.]
ORDERS OF THE DAY

  WAYS AND MEANS [3rd April]
  Resolutions reported;
  [For particulars of Resolutions, see OFFICIAL REPORT, 3rd April, 1963; Vol. 675, c. 495–504.]
  Question, That this House doth agree with the Committee in the said Resolution, put forthwith on each Resolution, pursuant to Standing Order No. 86 (Ways and Means Motions and Resolutions).
  First to Twenty-eighth Resolutions agreed to.

  FINANCE (EXCHEQUER ADVANCES)
  Resolution reported;
  That, for the purposes of any Act of the present Session relating to finance, it is expedient to authorise such increases in the sums which, under section 42 of the Finance Act 1956, are authorised or required to be issued out of the Consolidated Fund, raised by borrowing, or paid into the Exchequer, as may be attributable to any provision of the said Act of the present Session continuing the power to make advances under that section (subject to the limits for the time being in force on the borrowing powers of the bodies to which such advances may be made), imposing or providing for the imposition of new aggregate limits on the amount of advances under the said section 42 and repealing section 78 of the Finance Act 1960.
  Resolution agreed to.

  WAYS AND MEANS [9th April]
  Resolution reported;
  WAYS AND MEANS [9th April]

    AMENDMENT OF THE LAW
    That it is expedient to amend the law with respect to the national debt and the public revenue and to make further provision in connection with finance, so, however, that this Resolution shall not extend to making amendments of the enactments relating to purchase tax so as to give relief from tax, other than amendments making the same provision for chargeable goods of whatever description or for all goods to which any of the several rates of tax at present applies.
    Resolution read a Second time.
    Question, That this House doth agree with the Committee in the said Resolution, put forthwith, pursuant to Standing Order No. 86 (Ways and Means Motions and Resolutions), and agreed to.
    Bill ordered to be brought in upon the said Resolution and upon the other

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    Resolutions reported from the Committee of Ways and Means and the Resolution reported from the Committee on Finance (Exchequer Advances) and agreed to this day, by the Chairman of Ways and Means, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Mr. Boyd-Carpenter, Mr. Edward du Cann, and Mr. Anthony Barber.

    FINANCE
    Bill to grant certain duties, to alter other duties, and to amend the law relating to the National Debt and the Public Revenue, and to make further provision in connection with Finance, presented accordingly and read the First time; to be read a Second time tomorrow and to be printed. [Bill 99.]

    CHIEF ENAHORO
    Order read for resuming adjourned debate on Amendment to Question [26th March].
    That this House regrets the action of Her Majesty's Government in refusing political asylum to Chief Enahoro.—[Mr. G. Brown.]
    Which Amendment was, to leave out from "House" to the end of the Question and to add instead thereof:
    "mindful of Great Britain's tradition of granting political asylum here to persons who might otherwise he exposed to unjust or oppressive treatment in their own country, is confident of the fair and impartial administration of justice in Nigeria and upholds the decision of the Secretary of State for the Home Department to return Chief Enahoro to stand his trial there".—[Mr. H. Brooke.]
    Question again proposed, That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question.
    3.50 p.m.
    The Prime Minister (Mr. Harold Macmillan): This is a resumption of the debate which was adjourned on 26th March. In the rather complicated course of the discussions on this issue, three separate questions have emerged.
    There is, first, the legal point—the meaning and effect of the second charge against Chief Enahoro. This was raised, very properly, if I may say so, by the right hon. Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown), when it was brought to his notice. It was certainly his duty to bring it to the attention of the House. It was equally proper far my hon. and
    1288
    learned Friend the Attorney-General to be unwilling to commit himself to a definite opinion without consideration.
    The second broad group of arguments resolves itself into the question, in effect: have we confidence in the Nigerian Government? Whatever may be the law, whatever may be the protestations of the Nigerian Government, are we content to send this man back on this charge?
    The third question which has arisen, and which, I think, interests many, if not all, hon. Members, is the nature of a political offence, the traditional right of asylum which was given in this country over many years and even generations to foreign refugees and the effect of the Fugitive Offenders Act operating within the old Empire and now operating within the new Commonwealth.
    On the question of the legal points, there is, I think, now no doubt. There were two separate points. There was the point raised in the course of the debate by the right hon. Member for Belper. This is now agreed to be a bad point by all concerned. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] I understood that the general view was that that was a bad point. I do not mean a bad point in the sense that it was a wrong point. I mean that it would not hold water. I understand that that view is shared by all the lawyers.
    Then there was another point of a similar kind, perhaps even mare refined, which was brought to my hon. and learned Friend's attention a little later. On this, he gave his opinion yesterday with equal firmness as on the first point. I do not think that anyone now seriously questions that in giving that view the Law Officers have rightly advised the Government on this issue. I think that it is fair to say—and I believe that the right hon. and learned Member for Newport (Sir F. Soskice) and his colleagues will agree—that in raising these legal points they were not bringing a charge of a sort of Machiavellian plot by the Nigerian Government. I heard no insinuation that the Nigerian Government subtly inserted this particular form of charge with the intention of claiming a death penalty, as it were by stealth.
    Indeed, it would have been rather foolish of them to do so, as they know that this very interpretation has already been rejected by the Nigerian courts. That governs Nigerian legal practice. It would

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    have been the depth of duplicity to do so, because if one sets out three charges, the first carrying a maximum of life imprisonment, the second seven years and the third two years, then to put one in the middle, intending it in a kind of obscure, hidden way to be possible of carrying the death penalty, would be dishonest, dishonourable and, indeed, a monstrous thing to do.
    Right hon. Gentlemen opposite quite rightly treated this aspect as a legal subject. As far as I know, and as far as the law is concerned on this point, there is no doubt that the capital sentence cannot now, it is clear, be attached or passed in connection with the second charge.
    I should tell the House that the Home Secretary received this morning from Chief Enahoro's solicitors a request that Her Majesty should be advised to refer to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council the question whether Chief Enahoro is liable to the death penalty under the charges which he faces. The Government do not think that such a reference is either necessary or appropriate in the circumstances. The advice given by the Attorney-General is clear on both points. On the second point, which was raised later, his view coincides with the view taken by the Nigerian High Court when it was put before it.
    I ought now to make a reference to the assurance which I personally gave in intervening when the House last had this matter before it. This assurance was very clear, and I repeated it several times, although in different words. What I said, in effect, was this: if the point raised by the right hon. Member for Belper should prove to be valid, then the Government would not return Chief Enahoro unless the Nigerian Government gave an undertaking that Charge 2 would be withdrawn and that no new charge would be substituted for it which might carry the death penalty. That is perfectly clear. If it were not proved to be valid or if it appeared to us not to be valid, then, of course, my assurance did not apply. It was that contingency.
    Since, as I say, it has been generally accepted that the legal points, very properly raised, are proved to be without validity, there is nothing for me on which to press the Nigerian Government as a result of my assurance to the House on
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    that day. However, while the legal question was in doubt, I naturally entered into communication with the Nigerian Government, and so, immediately after the debate and before I heard the Attorney-General's final opinion, I caused an approach to be made through the High Commissioner in Lagos, who discussed with the Nigerian Prime Minister and his colleagues the situation which had arisen.
    Lord Head explained that, in view of the assurances I had given to the House, I wished to be quite sure that Charge 2 did not carry the death penalty or, alternatively, if it could be construed to do so, that it would be withdrawn and that no other charge attracting the death penalty would be put in its place.
    In reply, the Nigerian Government made it clear that they were most reluctant to give such assurances—and for these reasons: first, in their view it was obvious that Charge 2 did not carry the death penalty. This was the view of their professional advisers, in whom they had great confidence, and this had been publicly confirmed by the ruling of their court. This, indeed, confirmed the information on the character of the charges which had been given to us by the Nigerian High Commissioner in London.
    The Nigerian Prime Minister and his colleagues therefore felt—and I must say that I have great sympathy with them—that to ask for a further assurance implied a lack of confidence in the impartiality of the Nigerian courts or in the good faith of the Nigerian Government.
    Happily, the need for any further undertakings has been removed by the opinion given by the Law Officers and, I believe, not seriously challenged—that the point, however right it was to raise it, is not effective and is invalid.
    Mr. George Brown: When Lord Head put this to the Prime Minister of Nigeria, and was given the reply that the Nigerian Government took the view that the death penalty did not apply, did Lord Head ask why, in that case, the Senior Crown Counsel included a statement to the contrary in the affidavit?
    The Prime Minister: The whole question of the affidavit has clearly been shown to be absolutely irrelevant to the position of what the law means. If that

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    is to be raised again, the Attorney-General can explain it in the legal formula which is appropriate to it. It has no bearing on it.
    I have dealt with the legal question which was raised in the previous debate.
    Mr. Frank Bowles: The Prime Minister keeps talking about the Government of Nigeria prosecuting. The Government in this country do not prosecute. Is it not for the Attorney-General, or the Director of Public Prosecutions? Is it the Government there who institute prosecutions?
    The Prime Minister: I am glad that that intervention has been made, because it is one of the points which they put to us, that they followed our procedure. Although, in these very special cases, they might be asked to give an assurance, it was actually, as the hon. Member for Nuneaton (Mr. Bowles) very properly said, a matter for the Attorney-General, who, I understand, is a very distinguished lawyer.
    I have dealt with the legal question and I turn to the second question which was in our minds in the previous debate before the legal point arose—a fundamental question, not a legal question: have we confidence in the Nigerian Government? Or, to put another way, have we such lack of confidence that we fear that while getting this man back on one charge they would present another which would carry a capital punishment? Of course, this is theoretically possible. It is even practically possible for any Government under an extradition treaty, any foreign Government under any extradition treaty, or any Government of the Commonwealth operating under this Act, to commit a breach of faith. It is possible.
    It is even possible that such a Government, having got a man back on one charge, should not put him on trial at all, but keep him permanently immured. It is even possible that they might do something worse—condemn him without trial. This may be true of any Government to whom extradition treaties or the Fugitive Offenders Act apply. Once a man has left the jurisdiction of this country we have no longer any physical control over him, but what we have to decide here is not whether it is
    1292
    theoretically possible, but, can we concede that it is within the bounds of reasonable possibility? First, it would mean that we regarded that Government as of such a character that we could have no faith in them at all—that it had become a tyranny of one man or one party, or because, in addition to the abandonment of constitutional and parliamentary machinery, it had abandoned any freedom for the individual under the law.
    Of course, if we thought that, then these legal points would be of no importance—none at all. The assurances I gave on them would be of no importance. Both the courts and the Home Secretary ought to have rejected this application under the terms of the Act. They should have reached a conclusion that the man would not have a fair trial. They should have held the view—I quote the words of the Act—that
    "To return him in all the circumstances would be unjust, or oppressive, or too severe a punishment."
    I do not believe that with all the interest that this case has very properly excited anyone has wished to make an attack of this kind on the integrity of Nigerian justice, or on the honour of the Nigerian Government. Both of them command our respect.
    Mr. R. T. Paget: Why does the Prime Minister suggest that it would be improbable, on behalf of the Nigerian Government, having obtained the return of this man on one charge, to prefer another charge? When we obtain the return of somebody here by extradition proceedings we frequently prefer another charge and different charges. When magistrates commit a man for trial different charges are frequently preferred.
    The Prime Minister: In an extradition treaty that is exactly what we do not do. We have made complaints of other Governments that they have done it and we have objected to a breach of the spirit of the treaty. It would be a very dishonourable thing to do to set up these three charges and then not to try the man at all, or to shoot or hang him. That would be an act of a tyrannical Government and it would be a very wrong thing to do.

    1293
    I must say a word about the responsibility placed on the Home Secretary. He has to make in these matters decisions which are difficult and sometimes painful, but they are actually quasi-judicial decisions and they put a very heavy responsibility upon him. They are not Government decisions; they are his own decisions. They come into the political field only when, as in this case, what amounts to a Motion of censure is put forward in the House against the Home Secretary for the way in which he has discharged his duty.
    While I think, and trust, that this is an exceptional case, we should all be sorry to see a situation arise in which the jurisdiction functions of the Home Secretary were transferred from a decision of the responsible Minister to a trial by the House of Commons. The House of Commons has a perfect right to complain, criticise, and if it wishes, censure. At the same time, the Minister is responsible for the decision and I have to remind the House what he has to do. First, he has to consider what the courts have said. The courts, including the magistrates' court, have to decide whether there is "a strong or probable presumption" that the accused committed the offence with which he is charged.
    Where application is made to the superior courts, as it has been here, they have not merely to decide the question of fact—whether it was reasonable for the magistrate on the evidence before him to find that there was a strong or probable presumption of guilt. They have also to consider other and very important matters. They have to consider whether, having regard to all the circumstances, it would be—to quote from the Act—
    "unjust, or repressive, or too severe a punishment to return the fugitive".
    There are many other things they would take into account of any evidence put before them as to whether the accused is likely to have a fair trial. That is the first barrier or safeguard, as I would call it, in the Act.
    Mr. Sydney Silverman: Is not the real difficulty here that everybody acknowledges that the character of the offences charged was in itself political and that in the extradition treaty, agreement or Act the courts would give effect to that and that they would not consider the charge, or a fair trial, or the
    1294
    kind of penalty at all, whereas under the Fugitive Offenders Act the courts are precluded from giving any effect to what is the relevant consideration?
    The Prime Minister: I was coming to that part in a later passage of what I have to say. They have a right and, I repeat, an important duty, to say: would it be unjust, or would it be oppressive or too severe a punishment? That is their duty. That is the first safeguard and, in considering that, they are entitled to consider all the circumstances, the character of the Government, the situation in that country, and so forth.
    The Home Secretary acts as a kind of second barrier, or safeguard. Even if the courts take the view that we are not justified in refusing an application for the return of a fugitive in a particular case the Home Secretary cannot, unless he thinks it just, order his return. In reaching that decision, apart from the guidance which he gets from the courts, he must take into account other matters which were perhaps not before the courts, but which are relevant to the broader issue.
    I can well imagine situations—I will be very frank with the House—in which the Home Secretary might feel it unjust. I can think of them. If, for instance, he felt that the Government and judicial system of the country concerned had fallen altogether away from the standards which we regard as the essential conditions of a free society, or from the proper administration of justice, or from the independence of the judicial system, then he would be right to refuse consent on the ground that it would not be just.
    On the other hand, if he refused consent on such a ground where there is no other question of fact or law which is an obstacle to the man's return, then it is, in effect, to pass such a judgment against the Government of the country making the application. It is this point that I wish particularly to stress and all that it implies.
    I now come to the third point. Perhaps the hon. Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman) will bear with me for not having answered immediately his intervention. It is the point: is the Fugitive Offenders Act out of date because it was passed in 1881? Is it inconsistent with what many people feel about political asylum?

    1295
    Is it really right that political asylum, which through a very long period has been afforded here to foreign rebels against tyrannical rule, should be refused to citizens of the Commonwealth? What ground is there for this distinction between a refugee from the Czar in the nineteenth century, or from the present Russian Administration in the twentieth century, or from the Iron Curtain countries, and refugees from the Commonwealth? That is the point which, I think, has worried hon. Members and to which I should like to give a little attention.
    We have a very long tradition that we give refuge to a political offender. We have interpreted that word rather widely—not merely an agitator, or an inconvenient and irritating propagandist, but even to men who have been driven to acts of rebellion, sometimes on grounds of repressed minorities—I can think of many cases in the nineteenth century; so can other hon. Members—and sometimes on grounds of a general protest against a tyrannical or undemocratic form of government. That is a very long tradition, but it has never applied to countries within our Empire or within our Commonwealth. Some people think that it ought to, perhaps, but it does not.
    Under the present law, there is no doubt whatever that the claim of the Nigerian Government for the return of this man is sound, and to refuse it could only be based upon a judgment that they have fallen away from the kind of standards which the countries of the Empire tried to follow and were able to follow when this law was passed. Nigeria is a country which has scrupulously observed both the letter and the spirit of the institutions which we bequeathed to her. Her judiciary is independent of the Executive. Her courts command respect not only in that country, but in our country.
    The Chief Justice of Nigeria has recently been made a member of the Privy Council in order that he may be invited to serve on the Judicial Committee. This was widely welcomed in Nigeria, not merely as a recognition of the Chief Justice's eminence as a lawyer but as a tribute to the way in which justice is administered in the courts under his jurisdiction.
    Moreover, it is against a Government of this character that Chief Enahoro and
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    his leaders and other associates are accused of subversion and an attempt to overthrow the regime by armed revolt and an attempt to overthrow the regime by force. These are the alleged charges. Happily in spite of bitter political quarrels over many generations sometimes even reaching points of violence it has been so long since this country has had any experience of a movement against the Constitution itself that we are apt to forget what a terrible thing it is to a country and how serious may be the consequences. Broadly speaking it is more than 300 years in England and over 200 years in Scotland since there has been any serious attack on the Constitution itself.
    This so-called political offence is not a light one. It is no mere agitation and the making of seditious speeches that we are accustomed to hear and do not always take very seriously. The alleged crimes if they are true are very serious, and especially serious against a country newly established, with only a very short background of its independent life and honestly striving to carry out the traditions of a free society.
    Nevertheless, in view of the fact that some of the Commonwealth countries have passed laws which have the effect of depriving the United Kingdom of the right to make use of this Act, although not, I believe, denouncing it for themselves, there is certainly a strong case for discussing with our partners in the Commonwealth to what extent it would be desirable for this law to be reviewed. Indeed, I think that it would be right for us to initiate such discussions, but that is very different from an arbitrary denunciation on our part.
    What I would resent, and what, I think, the House would resent, is the suggestion that the Fugitive Offenders Act was quite all right when the Empire consisted of three or four countries of British or European descent, together with the Colonial Territories administered by British officials, but that somehow or other it has become quite unsuitable to the conditions of the new Commonwealth. That, I think, is an offensive suggestion, based upon a rather arrogant sense of our superiority.
    What the Home Secretary has a right, and, indeed, a duty, to do under the law is to satisfy himself that the return

    1297
    would be just, and in making that decision he has a right and a duty to take all circumstances into account. He has not the right by his decision to abrogate the law.
    I think that I have dealt with the three major questions which have caused anxiety, and natural anxiety, to hon. Members on both sides of the House. Today, the only question is this: is the House going to censure the Home Secretary for carrying out his duty in strict accordance with the terms of the law and alter full consideration of what the courts have decided and the matters brought to his attention? Although he is satisfied that the Chief will get a fair trial, a just trial, on the charges, is he to refuse to return him merely because, by some, the Fugitive Offenders Act is said to be obsolete or obsolescent?
    I have heard it argued that it is wrong that a foreigner should be treated better in our courts than a Commonwealth subject or citizen. The fact is that this law applies equally to any fugitive from one Commonwealth country to another, irrespective of his nationality, and this law discriminates not against Commonwealth citizens but in favour of Commonwealth countries. That was its purpose. It was believed, I think rightly, that they ought to have confidence in each other and that they were part of a system in which they had special obligations one to the other.
    Nevertheless, to balance the rights given to the Commonwealth countries under this Act, the safeguards—the two safeguards, the courts and then the Home Secretary—that I have referred to were introduced, and they are fully operative. I cannot believe that the Home Secretary can be censured for carrying out honourably and conscientiously the duty placed upon him by Parliament.
    Are we then, by implication, at any rate, to censure—and I would almost say "insult"—the Nigerian Government? Are we to say that we have no confidence in the integrity of that Government, or in their Law Officers, or in their courts? Are we to declare that we doubt their good faith? Are we to say that we fear that they would commit what would be really the discreditable, and indeed, monstrous, act of getting him back on one charge and then putting him on trial on another? If that is the
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    message which is to go out from this House it would be, in my view, a disastrous day for the whole life and future of the modern Commonwealth for which we have worked and done so much.
    4.18 p.m.
    Mr. George Brown: I feel that the Prime Minister cannot have made many hon. Members happy about large parts of the speech that he has just delivered. [HON. MEMBERS: "Nonsense."] Large parts of it were very dangerous doctrine indeed. The Prime Minister went very near, as hon. Members will see if they read carefully what he said, to identifying which members of the Commonwealth he regards as trustworthy in this respect—[HON. MEMBERS: "Nonsense."]—and which he does not.
    The right hon. Gentleman made it very clear that certain conditions, in his view, are met in Nigeria, and that, therefore, we can happily return a fugitive offender to them. But, using that gravity and slow mode of speech that he uses when he wants to impress the House that he is being very grave, he went on to say that he could well imagine—and he was talking about the Commonwealth—nations in the Commonwealth where that would not exist.
    I suggest that hon. Members opposite are jeering without really thinking. The point is that it will be exceedingly difficult for this House ever to refuse to return a fugitive offender in the light of what the Prime Minister has said this afternoon, The right hon. Gentleman has himself recognised—and he actually said this—that any refusal to return a fugitive offender within the Commonwealth will be to convict the governmental and judicial system of the other country of not matching up to these requirements.
    The day we say that about one of the fellow members of the Commonwealth there will be the very disastrous results to which the right hon. Gentleman referred towards the end of his speech. That is why it has been the case from this side of the House that these considerations should not be introduced. We have already refused to return people to Cyprus. Presumably, therefore, the Prime Minister is committed to the view that the Government of Archbishop Makarios and Mr. Kutchuk does not measure up to the requirements which

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    Nigeria does. By his own speech this must be the case, for this must be the corollary to what the right hon. Gentleman said.
    It would have been far better had this debate not been taken on to that dangerous course by the Prime Minister. It is not necessary to our purpose to reflect or animadvert on the legal or Parliamentary system in Nigeria. I have made it clear from the beginning, when speaking from this Box, that I did not wish to do so, that I had no desire to do so, and that even if it were part of the case—which it is not—it is totally irrelevant. Thus, I say that it would have been better had we kept the discussion the way it was, even if the decision is to send the man back in this case. Let us be clear that this part of the argument should have nothing to do with the discussion if we wish to keep ourselves free in other cases perhaps to take a different decision.
    Mr. Stanley R. McMaster: Is the right hon. Gentleman suggesting that he would skate over this in order to deceive the House?
    Mr. Brown: I think that a representative in this House of Northern Ireland had better go very carefully. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] If we had to be satisfied that the Parliamentary system in Northern Ireland was operating in accordance with the precedent set down there, it would take a lot of satisfying. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] However, we are not discussing that aspect today. We are discussing Nigeria and not Northern Ireland.
    Hon. Members: Oh.
    Mr. James Callaghan: Hon. Members opposite should not protest too much.
    Mr. Brown: What we are discussing today, in the submission of my right hon. and hon. Friends—and, I would have thought, quite a number of hon. Members opposite who are prepared to approach this as impartially as one can—is the culmination of an appalling record of muddle on the part of the Government, of shuffling and of inadequacy when it came to knowing or being able to explain the basis on which they took their decision. Worse than that is the degree of interference that seems to have gone on.
    1300
    The Prime Minister referred to what he had put to the Jamaican Prime Minister. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] I should, of course, have said "the Nigerian Prime Minister", and I beg the pardon of the House. [HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear."] There must be something the matter with hon. Members opposite when they make so much noise about a little point like that. Let us not consider this as the real measure of what has happened in regard to Nigeria. One of the things hon. Members opposite should ask themselves is whether the operations of the Commonwealth Relations Office and the British High Commissioner in all this have not been far beyond what was permissible.
    Lord Head, our High Commissioner—to whom the Prime Minister referred—gave a Press conference in Ibadan, the details of which were published in West Africa on 6th April. The report stated:
    "Lord Head is known to feel strongly on the case. At a Press conference in Ibadan last week he said that all that had happened was that certain of Enahoro's supporters had succeeded in lobbying certain Members of Parliament on his behalf."
    As a description by our High Commissioner in Nigeria of Parliamentary processes in this country I would have thought that a very miserable business indeed—and a very doubtful operation on the part of the High Commissioner of this country acting in that capacity.
    What we have now achieved is, I think, more ill-will in Nigeria over the way in which this has been handled and the pressures applied to them, and the remarks of Ministers, than if Ministers had acted in accordance with the position had the Extradition Act applied here in the first place. I believe that there would have been less resentment than at present exists in Jamaica—[HON. MEMBERS: "Wrong."] I mean, of course, Nigeria—if that had been done in the first place.
    In his speech the Prime Minister dealt, first, with what he called the "legal point". Let us, if we can, get this clear. Although this point turns on an argument about the legal meanings or construction of a Statute, there is, of course, more than a legal point if, by that, one means a narrow and relatively unimportant point. The whole question of what penalties apply is relevant and exceedingly important and the points I raised

    1301
    the other night—and which subsequently came out in discussion between my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Newport (Sir F. Soskice) and the Law Officers—still remain germane to the decision we must take today.
    I do not agree with the Prime Minister's description of the situation now. It is perfectly true that what is called "the second point"—that is, the question whether the relevance of the penalty provided under Section 37(2) of the Nigerian Code, which is death—is a stronger point than whether the same penalty under Section 37(1) applies to the charge under Section 516. That emerged, but no one has agreed with the Law Officer, except the Law Officer himself, that there is no doubt at all about the first point—Section 37 (1)—and certainly no one has agreed with his view that the penalty provided under Section 37(2) is not in question.
    It remains our view that the hon. and learned Gentleman the Attorney-General is quite likely wrong on the second point. Certainly, there is doubt on this point. The Prime Minister has not answered this today, nor has any other Minister, and we must remember that a tremendously important question needs to be answered: why, in the affidavit which was sworn by the Senior Crown Counsel of Nigeria, which was attested by the Federal Minister of Justice of Nigeria, in his capacity as Federal Minister, did that affidavit specifically draw the magistrate's attention to the fact that another penalty, other than that provided under Section 516, was, in fact, available and that the other penalty was death? It is no use saying that they have not asked about this; it is no use saying that it does not arise, for it must arise. The magistrate took the original decision to return this man on the basis of the evidence put before him.
    The Prime Minister said that the affidavit was irrelevant, but it cannot be. The affidavit was a sworn and vital part of the evidence on which the magistrate took his decision. If, therefore, it is said by the Attorney-General—and, of course, it must follow from his own decision—that the affidavit was wrong in a material fact that must affect the proceedings in the court. On the other hand, if it is held that the affidavit was not wrong, it remains true that
    1302
    it was the view of the Crown Counsel and the view of the Federal Minister of Justice that another penalty, namely, death, was open for imposition by those trying this case.
    Whether or not the Attorney-General is right or wrong in his opinion, it is in fact, so far, the opinion of the Attorney-General of Her Majesty's Government. It is pretty clear from the affidavit that the opinion of the Federal Minister of Justice in Nigeria and the opinion of the Crown Counsel were the other way round—and these are the Nigerian ministerial officials laying the information on which action is taken.
    They are not, however, the only people. It is significant that when dealing with this matter yesterday the Attorney-General quoted Section 516 without reference to the exemption where provision for another penalty is made elsewhere. The hon. and learned Gentleman left that out, and it is a rather extraordinary thing to have left out since the whole argument turns on it. Not only was it the prosecution's view that another penalty was open, not only is it the view of my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Newport even now, that under Section 37(2) another penalty is open, but it is the view of everyone else in Nigeria.
    I have here, the Official Report of the speeches made on this subject in the Nigerian House, in which, quite clearly, it is the view of the Opposition spokesmen there that the death penalty applies. The Report contains a very clear statement by the Opposition Chief Whip, speaking in that House—column 240 of the Official Report of Debates there for 1st April—if hon. Members would wish to see it. So the Opposition there takes the same view.
    I have received, as no doubt have other hon. Members, a lengthy memorandum from the leading defence counsel at the treason trial now proceeding over there. The whole purpose of that memorandum is to set out his view, as leading counsel for the defence, that the death penalty is applicable—not that it will be imposed, but that it is applicable. We therefore have the defence counsel saying so, we have the Opposition there saying so, we have a Minister saying so, and we have the Crown Counsel saying so. Frankly, the only person not saying so is our

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    Attorney-General, and we are bound to take into account this extraordinary division of opinion.
    The Prime Minister may prefer the opinion of his own Attorney-General to that of everyone else, but I must put it to him that if everyone else takes the other view there must at least be some doubt about it, and if there is some doubt about it the Prime Minister's assurances to us the other night are not met merely by referring to the Attorney-General's view as something that has to carry. There is a remaining doubt about it, and no one else is at all as sure as the Prime Minister proclaims himself and his hon. and learned Friend to be.
    There remains, too, the doubt about whether this charge can be redrawn. The Prime Minister made much of the fact that it would be odd to make the No. 2 charge on a warrant containing three charges the one that carried the higher penalty; I believe he actually said that it would be rather dishonourable and monstrous to slip it in in that way. But suppose that when this man goes back that charge is redrawn and is made the first charge, as it easily could be—there can be no assurance for this House so long as the matter is in as much doubt as it is.
    The Attorney-General said yesterday, and the Prime Minister repeated it today, that we did not need to go on discussing whether the penalty was that provided under Section 37(2) because it had been decisively rejected by the Nigerian courts—let the House note the language "decisively rejected by the Nigerian courts." He used the plural—the Attorney-General used the word "courts" yesterday, and that is important, because a bit of the doubt I have about this is caused by the imprecision of the Attorney-General's language on a matter that needs to be tremendously precise [HON. MEMBERS: "What about your own?"] The Attorney-General carries responsibility that I do not carry, which makes it much more important. At the moment, a man's life and liberty is in his hands. I might be forgiven a little imprecision, but the hon. and learned Gentleman cannot be if his right hon. Friend the Home Secretary is to exercise this responsibility on his advice.
    1304
    I asked yesterday that we should be told before today, or by today, what the case was that had been settled in the Nigerian courts, so that we could see its relevance. We have had no further information from the Government, but last night I asked the Attorney-General's office to what he was referring. I was told that he was referring to the Awowolo case, now proceeding. We have made such check as we can, and what appears to have happened is the following.
    At the conclusion, I think, of the prosecution's case—but, at any rate, at some stage in the case—a submission was made by one of the counsel representing one or other of these men that, in view of what had been said, and of the nature of the charge and the fact that it might attract a penalty under Section 37(2), the trial was being wrongly conducted because there was no jury present as required by the Code for a capital charge.
    That submission was over-ruled by the trial judge, who sits alone, and I therefore presume that the trial is proceeding. But that decision is appealable in the Nigerian Supreme Court, and to say that the Nigerian courts have decisively rejected something which, at the moment, is merely the over-ruling by the trial judge of a submission by counsel goes far beyond any meaning that those words could be made to bear.
    It is not as decisive as that, it is not as settled as that. Therefore, to say, as the Attorney-General said yesterday, that we do not need to concern ourselves with this case because this point is settled is, in my view, misleading the House—whether he did it deliberately or accidentally. Therefore, that uncertainty, that dubiety remains, and I must say frankly that in the light of that doubt we cannot accept either the Attorney-General yesterday or the Prime Minister today as having effectively disposed of the real kernel of the matters that we raised under this head the other day. On that ground alone, I believe that the exercise by the Home Secretary of his discretion to return this man is, if not censurable, as the Prime Minister said, something that we should certainly do all we can to persuade him not to continue with.
    That is on the legal side, but the legal side is not alone for consideration. I turn to other considerations which we

    1305
    must frankly face. One consideration to which the Prime Minister did not address himself—we do not complain of that, but it does remain—is that which the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Thirsk and Malton (Mr. Turton) raised again yesterday, and which I raised when we first debated this case on the Consolidated Fund (No. 2) Bill, and which must still be resolved.
    I refer to what the Home Secretary calls a "misunderstanding", on the basis of which, alone, this man got here. I must put it to the Prime Minister that there is here involved a matter of British honour quite as deep as any honour in our relations with Nigeria. The fact that one man is concerned rather than a whole Commonwealth territory does not, in my view, alter it at all.
    In the place in which this man was before coming to this country there was no risk of his being sent back to Nigeria to face this political trial. Before he came here, friends of his, acting very properly on his behalf, saw officials of the Home Office to discover whether he would be safe from arrest, and subsequent deportation, if he came here.
    I have seen the people concerned. I have copies of statements from them, which no doubt other hon. Members have also seen, about what took place at the meeting. It is absolutely clear that they believed, when that meeting was finished, that they had received an assurance that he would not be proceeded against in this way were he to come here. It is absolutely clear that he came here only because he had received this assurance.
    The Home Secretary says that his official did not, in fact, give that assurance. The man's friend is adamant that he did. The Home Secretary says that another official in his Department was mentioned as somebody who might be consulted. Mr. Enahoro's friend is adamant that there was only the merest passing reference to that official and at no time was he told to see him in order to receive the assurance from him.
    It would be a real tragedy if we were to send to Nigeria to stand trial for a political offence, for which life imprisonment or seven years or this disputed death penalty is available, a man who would not be here but for a misunderstanding between the Home Office and his repre-
    1306
    sentatives about what the position would be if he came here.
    I repeat that our honour is involved here. This does not involve us in a breach of faith with Nigeria. We could obviously put this right by saying what the Home Secretary said in the House, when he called it a genuine misunderstanding. The right hon. Gentleman was not suggesting that it was deliberately misunderstood, or that the argument was made up subsequently. We could put ourselves right by letting Chief Enahoro return to where he was before he came here. Let him go back to Eire where he was and let the situation then start from there. We should then be able to say that we are not involved in a breach of faith with the man, and we could not be accused of a breach of faith with Nigeria, because he would not be properly here at all.
    Although this was raised with the Home Secretary on the occasion of the very first debate, and this is the third or fourth time that, in one way or another, we have returned to it, this has still not been cleared up. We could not, in honour to ourselves, deport this man under the Fugitive Offenders Act in the light of that misunderstanding remaining uncleared. On that ground, quite apart from the legal ground, I would regard our failure to insist upon the Home Secretary changing his mind as a grave dereliction of our duty, and I would regard the Government's failure to change their mind as a grave dereliction of their duty.
    The other issue has been the major issue of our traditional approach to these matters of political asylum, or, rather, political freedom from extradition in political cases. I thought that the Prime Minister today was qualifying the whole basis of this. He may well believe it should be qualified. What he said certainly amounted to a qualification of it.
    The Prime Minister indicated dissent.
    Mr. Brown: I cannot see, as the right hon. Gentleman appears to see, the capacity in 1963, which is totally different from 1881, to make a difference in the requirements which we need from fully independent sovereign members of the Commonwealth and those we need from other Governments elsewhere.

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    We have never required to pass, nor does the Extradition Act require us to pass, judgment on other Governments or judiciaries in lands from which political offenders have come. It is no part of the Act. The Government may be the friendliest and most democratic and may have the best of all judicial systems. All we and the courts are asked to do is to discover whether or not a crime, be it murder or anything else, is a political crime. Once that is discovered, the man is safe under our law and traditions from extradition. He does not necessarily have asylum here, but he is safe from being extradited.
    I do not see how the House can permit the Prime Minister to enter into this extensive qualification of this today by a distinction between friendly and good Governments and unfriendly and bad Governments. If the Prime Minister's view of the situation is to hold the field today, then, clearly, the Extradition Act should be amended to come into line with it. If the Act should not be amended, then the Prime Minister's defence of the Fugitive Offenders Act ought not to stand up. I agree with the Prime Minister that we are well overdue for an amendment of the Fugitive Offenders Act.
    I do not dispute the fact that, whatever other people have done who have acted arbitrarily and unilaterally, we ought to have discussions with the Commonwealth before we decide to amend the Act. But if we are to do that—and I interpreted the Prime Minister to say that we were to do it—it is tremendously important that in the interim we do not act in a way in which we would not be able to act once that amendment has gone through.
    This man has been here a long time. He has been in prison now for four or five months. There seems to me to be no reason why we should hurriedly deport him to Nigeria at the very moment when not only public opinion clearly thinks that the Act should be amended, but when we are about to enter into discussions to amend it. If the House will permit me, I should like to read a letter which I received from Chief Enahoro. It is as follows:
    "I have been following closely the newspaper and parliamentary reports on my case and I would like to say how grateful I am for the great interest and concern which so
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    many people are taking in my plight. I think that it has been clearly shown that no one now believes that the Fugitive Offenders Act, 1881, is appropriate to the Commonwealth as it exists today.
    I appear to be a victim of circumstances in that, in the first place, legislation has failed to keep pace with changing conditions in regard to a fundamental right and that, secondly, I would not even have considered entering the country but for the most unfortunate misunderstanding which arose regarding my safety to come and go as a result of the three telephone conversations which my friend had with the Home Office.
    The Home Secretary has stated that the offences of treasonable felony and conspiracy for which I am charged under Nigerian law do not carry the death penalty. Nevertheless, the Affidavit sworn by Joseph Diekola Ogundere, Acting Senior Crown Counsel in the Federal Ministry of Justice, filed in the Court here on behalf of the Nigerian Government in support of the Warrant contains the following words."
    Then he quotes what we have been saying about Section 37(1).
    Hon. Members: Not so fast.
    Mr. Brown: I am sorry.
    The letter continues:
    "It follows from this that the Ministry of Justice were under the impression when drafting this Affidavit that they were dealing with a capital offence but even, however, if the Home Secretary's interpretation of Nigerian law is correct, I am advised that there is nothing in law to prevent the Nigerian Government's amending the charges after I am returned so that I have to face a treason charge.
    May I, finally, suggest that having been here in prison for the past four months there is no cause for my being returned as a matter of urgency now and that I may reasonably be permitted to remain in the United Kingdom pending negotiations between the United Kingdom Government and its Commonwealth partners to amend the Fugitive Offenders Act."
    I have put up the proposal that the man should be allowed to return to Eire, where he would have been but for a misunderstanding. I have put this up as one way for the Government. If that is not acceptable to them, I propose that he should be allowed to remain here while discussions proceed about the amendment that we might make to the Act.
    I make this proposal all the more firmly and strongly for another reason. The Prime Minister told us, I think, that a request has recently been received from Chief Enahoro's solicitors asking that a special reference of this disputed matter of the death penalty be made to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council.

    1309
    The Prime Minister said that this is not necessary because the Attorney-General's view is so clear. I thought that that was putting rather more weight upon the Attorney-General's view than most people would accept. However, since the matter is in doubt, since there are all these different views about it, it seems to me that a reference to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council would be very much in order.
    There is an additional interesting point in this connection. It could be of some significance. I am told that the Federal Chief Justice of Nigeria, Sir Adetokunbo Ademola, who, my friends in the law tell me, is a most distinguished jurist and lawyer, is to come here next term to sit as the first African judge of all time as a member of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council. We welcome this. It will be a very historic occasion when he does. Would it not also be a very suitable occasion on which to make this special reference to the Judicial Committee which will include then the Chief Justice of Nigeria as a member?
    I put it very strongly that it is open to the Government to delay the return of this man, to continue discussions with the Commonwealth on amending the Act—which may then alter the whole situation—and, in any case, in the meantime, to arrange for the opinion of the Judicial Committee to clear up the very important point of doubt which is still there.
    Sir Cyril Osborne: Would the right hon. Gentleman accept its decision?
    Mr. Brown: Yes, certainly. I regard the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council as having a measure of dignity and authority which I am not wholly prepared to accord to the Attorney-General. There is all the difference in the world between the highest judicial decision and an ex parte statement by a retained lawyer.
    To conclude, there are, clearly, many grounds on which we can avoid doing something which many people, whatever their views of the legal merits, regard as very distasteful indeed. There are many grounds which do not involve us in conflict with Nigeria. It is interesting that a paper which was founded by Dr. Azikwe—I am not clear whether he is still associated with it—the West African
    1310
    Pilot, actually concluded a recent editorial by saying that the British can hold Enahoro but they do not need to insult Nigeria. That is very true. We can hold Enahoro. Even people like those associated with that paper recognise this in Nigeria. The question is how to do it on a basis which does not insult or offend Nigeria.
    The reason I ventured to take issue with the Prime Minister was that I thought that he was putting the matter on to a ground in which offence and insults were inevitable. I believe that this is not necessary at all. There are several courses of action, any one of which could be taken, any one of which would avoid deporting this man to face this trial and would avoid our breaking faith with our undertakings, or assumed undertakings.
    I urge very strongly on the House, partisan feelings aside, that we should best consult our traditions and what we would hope will be our future practices by urging the Government tonight to take one or other of those courses. For this reason, I ask the House to reject the Amendment.
    4.54 p.m.
    Sir Edwin Leather: I enter the debate with some trepidation, treading upon ground which, hitherto, has largely been held by the lawyers. So far, we have been concerned mainly with two points: first, the question of justice and liberty for an individual, of which all Members of the House are traditionally jealous and scrupulously careful; second, the legal technicalities of the various clauses and charges and the pregnant argument as to whether the death penalty is or is not involved. I do not wish to get involved in these legal technicalities because, like the right hon. Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown), I am not legally qualified, and I suspect that, if I were drawn on to that ground, I should end up as addle-pated as the right hon. Gentleman is about it.
    The right hon. Gentleman pointed to my hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General and said that a man's life and liberty were in his hands. This is unquestionably true, but it is true also that a great political principle is in the hands of this House. I am very concerned about this great political principle which entails the whole question of the relationship between member countries of the Commonwealth.

    1311
    So far as he apportioned blame for any damage to our relationships with Nigeria, the right hon. Gentleman endeavoured to make quite clear that he thought that the whole blame rested on Her Majesty's Government. He went out of his way to assure us that he did not reflect on the good faith or competence of the Nigerian judiciary. I accept his assurance, of course, as, I am sure, we all do in the House; but the right hon. Gentleman and those who think like him must face the unpleasant fact that the Nigerians do not accept it. Our relationship with Nigeria has already been strained to an intolerable degree by the fact that the Home Secretary's decision was not carried out without question by the House.
    My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister referred to the Nigerian judiciary. I think that this is the first time in our controversy here that this subject has been mentioned at all. There is no doubt that the impression given in the country is that at least somebody in this House has cast reflections on the Nigerian judiciary, and there is no argument at all but that this is what many Nigerians think.
    As I understand, on any charge on which Chief Enahoro could be arraigned before the court in Lagos, the decision, whatever it was, would be appealable to the Nigerian Supreme Court. The right hon. Member for Belper made great play of the idea of referring the question on appeal to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council. He took the view that, if we did that, the Nigerians would not be offended.
    This is completely contrary to all the information which I have. I think that they would be mortally offended and would very quickly come back at us and say, "If this man were convicted in our own courts, he could then appeal to the Privy Council. You are suggesting that we, as a Government or as a judiciary, would in some way interfere with his right to do so". The very fact that we took that course would be, in my view, the gravest reflection on the Nigerian judiciary. I am quite certain that the people of Nigerian not only would take it so, but have already taken it so.
    I believe—I should be very surprised if I were contradicted by the right hon.
    1312
    Gentleman—that the Supreme Court of Nigeria contains not only justices of the greatest eminence at the Bar but expatriate justices. I cannot readily think of any other country in the world which has carried objectivity, in its desire to preserve impartiality and integrity, to this extent. There is, I believe, at least one—if not more—British justices who sits as a member of the Supreme Court of Nigeria.
    The Nigerians have every right to say. "We have bent over backwards to show our integrity, and now you question it." All the protests by the right hon. Member for Belper—[Interruption.] I have accepted that the right hon. Gentleman says that he does not question it; I accept it. The Nigerians do not accept it. Their Press and the statements of Members in their Parliament have made this abundantly clear.
    This is significant, and hon. Members opposite ought to face it. It is not only Nigerian Government supporters who are most indignant with the Government and with this House of Commons for what we have done. It is members of the Action Group themselves who are indignant with us. It is members of Chief Enahoro's party who are extremely angry with us because, they say, we have denigrated the integrity of the Nigerian Government and of its judiciary.
    Mr. John Stonehouse: Name them.
    Sir E. Leather: This is something which the hon. Member can read. He can look it up for himself. He pretends to be extremely well informed on African matters. He does not have to be told. These things are in the Press every day of the week.
    Mr. William Yates: This is a major charge between two important legislatures. When my hon. Friend comes forward with a statement like that, I should be grateful if he could refer me to the column in the Nigerian HANSARD.
    Sir E. Leather: I shall be happy to do so if my hon. Friend likes to see me afterwards. I can say that I would like notice of the question. [HON. MEMBERS: "Withdraw."] I do not withdraw the statement. The right hon. Member for Belper has the HANSARD with him. Perhaps he would oblige by passing it up to my hon. Friend.
    Mr. G. Brown: What I am looking at is, again, the speech of the Opposition Chief Whip, in columns 239 and 240 of the Nigerian HANSARD of 1st April, in which he goes out of his way to defend the attitude taken in this House by those hon. Members who are opposing the deportation of Mr. Enahoro. He said that
    "in the House of Commons, Members"—
    that is, us and those who support us—
    "took great pains to find out the facts surrounding Tony's case. They contacted the Nigerian High Commissioner in London; they interviewed Chief Enahoro in Brixton Prison; they studied the charges preferred against him and they read the record…".
    He goes on to say:
    "You can accuse Britain of anything but not blindness to their own rights. The British people have a greater interest today than any other country in the world in the continued stability, peace and good government of Nigeria."
    He goes on, in another column, to say how "wonderful" he finds us because we are taking the line of opposing the deportation.
    Sir E. Leather: That, of course, is perfectly true—[HON. MEMBERS: "Withdraw."] No, I will not withdraw. That is perfectly true, but the right hon. Gentleman knows that that is only one speech. He took one sentence from a leader in the West African Pilot. I have not equipped myself with that newspaper, but the right hon. Gentleman knows perfectly well the general line adopted by that paper and by many other Members of Parliament in Nigeria, that they are indignant and that they regard what we have done as a grave denigration of the integrity of their Government and judiciary. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] Hon. Members opposite cannot, by protesting, alter the fact that that is what people in Nigeria think.
    I am making only this one political point, which seems to me to be of tremendous importance, that if we continue to stall and prevaricate, if we adopt any of the courses which the right hon. Member for Belper has endeavoured to urge upon us, we will exacerbate relationships with Nigeria to a most dangerous degree and do irreparable harm to Commonwealth relations. If the right hon. Gentleman and his hon. Friends press the Motion of censure against the Home Secretary, there is no doubt that however hard they try, or however sincere they may be, this will
    1314
    be interpreted throughout Africa as a vote of censure against Nigeria.
    Mr. Hugh Delargy: May I ask the hon. Member a question? I have followed him with as much care as I am capable. Is his case simply that because relations between this country and Nigeria are strained, because many Nigerians are upset and, possibly, feel insulted, we must for these reasons, send this man back? Is not this the old doctrine that one man must die for the people whether he be innocent or guilty?
    Sir E. Leather: No, certaintly not. I said that I wanted to speak briefly on one point. My right hon. Friend and Leader, the Prime Minister, made the case extremely effectively. I have underlined what I believe to be a fundamental political point, which the party opposite ignores at its peril.
    5.5 p.m.
    Mr. Emlyn Hooson: A vital question of principle which arises in our debate is in danger of being clouded over by rather partisan feelings on both sides. The Prime Minister posed the question of whether we have confidence in the Government of Nigeria. That is an entirely irrelevant consideration to the debate.
    Surely, this difficult situation has arisen because in 1870 we passed an Extradition Act which governed the relationship of our countries with countries which we regarded as equals. Then, in 1881, we passed a Fugitive Offenders Act, which governs our relations in these matters with countries which were then under our dominion. The problem which has arisen in this case has arisen because countries have come of age and achieved independence without, as far as I am aware, anybody noticing the great distinction of principle between the two Acts.
    I start from the basis that traditionally we in our country have been a sanctuary to the politically oppressed. I take issue with the Prime Minister when he says that we have afforded asylum to those who have fled from political tyranny. Surely that has not been the basis of the right of asylum which has been granted here to those who have fled their own country. It has not been a question of whether they were fleeing from tyranny but of whether they were coming

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    here to get relief from what they considered to be political oppression in their own country; even if they fled from a democracy such as the United States of America. I believe I am right in saying that our first extradition treaty with a political exception proviso was with the United States and not with a country that was subject to tyrannical rule.
    We should approach this problem, surely, on the basis that our traditions demand of us that in dealing with countries equal to ourselves we have always recognised the principle that people who flee from those countries have the right of political sanctuary here—at least, the right mot to be extradited—and generally the Home Secretary has afforded the right of asylum.
    I make no apology for referring directly to the relevant Sections in the Extradition Act, 1870, because there seems to be considerable misapprehension in this House about what exactly are the rights of a man who comes to this country seeking political sanctuary and who is fleeing, as it were, for political reasons from his own country. Section 3(1) of the Extradition Act states:
    "A fugitive criminal shall not be surrendered if the offence in respect of which his surrender is demanded is one of a political character".
    That is a mandatory requirement. No discretion is allowed. If the offence for which he is sought to be extradited is of a political character, that is an end to it. He cannot be extradited.
    Section 3(1) goes on to state:
    "or if he prove to the satisfaction of the police magistrate or the court before whom he is brought on habeas corpus, or to the Secretary of State, that the requisition for his surrender has in fact been made with a view to try or punish him for an offence of a political character".
    Thus, the second provision is that even if it is sought to extradite him on a charge of, say, murder, forgery, assault or anything of that kind, if he can satisfy the magistrate or the Home Secretary that the motive behind it is of a political character, that again is sufficient to protect him from extradition.
    Furthermore, the most elaborate precautions were afforded in the relevant proviso to Section 7 of the Act, which states:
    "If the Secretary of State is of opinion that the offence is one of a political character, he
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    may, if he thinks fit, refuse to send any such order, and may also at any time order a fugitive criminal accused or convicted of such offence to be discharged from custody."
    There is another provision governing how this evidence can be brought before a magistrate.
    Therefore, it can clearly be seen that when this country was passing the Act which governs our relationship with countries which we regarded as our equals we thought that if a person fled from his country for political reasons he could not be extradited for a political offence or if he satisfied the magistrate that the real motive for extradition proceedings was political. As I say, this principle is what has governed our relationship with equal countries.
    I remind hon. Members that in 1877 a Royal Commission was set up to consider the whole question of extradition. It sat under the chairmanship of the Lord Chief Justice of those days. In its report it recommended certain limitations on this political escape clause in the Extradition Act, but Parliament never accepted those suggested limitations.
    I wish to quote a decision of the Queen's Bench Division in the case of In re Meunier, decided in 1894, in which Mr. Justice Cave defined what was meant by a political offence. He said:
    "It appears to me that, in order to constitute an offence of a political character, there must be two or more parties in the State, each seeking to impose the Government of their own choice on the other, and that, if the offence is committed by one side or the other in pursuance of that object, it is a political offence, otherwise not."
    Nothing is said about political offences in the Fugitive Offenders Act, 1881, and the reason for that is simple—because that Act was passed at a time when substantially the government of all our overseas territories was controlled from this country.
    Sir Hugh Lucas-Tooth: I think that the hon. and learned Member is inaccurate. The Fugitive Offenders Act expressly refers to treason.
    Mr. Hooson: I think that Section 9 refers to treason, but there is no reference as such to political offences. I will come to the reference to treason in a moment.
    Surely it was inconceivable in 1881 that what amounted to a political offence in

    1317
    a Colony could be other than a political offence here. That is the basis of the Act and the reason why no mention is made in it of political offences. But we were not then dealing with equal partners. The Government of Nigeria did not enter into an agreement with us about this Act. This was an Act passed to govern our relationship with the Colonies and other dependent territories. Under Section 6 of that Act, which is the relevant Section for the Home Secretary's consideration, after the court processes have been gone through under the provisions of the Act, a completely unfettered discretion is left with the Home Secretary if he thinks it just not to authorise the return of the fugitive.
    I wish to say a few words about Section 10 of the Fugitive Offenders Act, which was considered by the House of Lords last year in the case of Zacharia v. the Republic of Cyprus. Under Section 10 of the Act, to which reference was made by the Prime Minister, a court, if it believes that it would be
    "unjust or oppressive or too severe a punishment to return the fugitive either at all or until the expiration of a certain period",
    may order that he shall not be returned.
    I refer to this decision in the House of Lords simply to make this point. The House of Lords had to interpret the word "unjust" in a judicial manner. "Unjust" in this context surely means unjust according to law. The House of Lords is not entitled to consider the political implications. It has to interpret the Act, and it can only do that by looking at the words in the Act. Lord Devlin, in particular, in his speech in the House of Lords—I am sure that the Home Secretary has already seen this—drew a distinction between what the court could consider under the provisions of Section 10 when considering the word "unjust" and what the Home Secretary is entitled to consider under the provisions of Section 6.
    Under Section 6, the Home Secretary has a duty to exercise his discretion whether or not the offence for which the return of the fugitive is required is political. Even if the alleged charge were murder or forgery, the Home Secretary would still have to exercise his discretion and, in so doing, certainly would have to consider the matters which he adumbrated in the House the other day, such as
    1318
    whether the man concerned would have a fair trial in the country which sought his extradition or whether evidence would be properly obtained. He would have to consider all those matters in any event whether or not the offence for which the return of the fugitive was required was political. Surely the difference in this case is that the return of Chief Enahoro is required for a political reason. There is no doubt that treason is a political offence, and, even if it were not clearly so, the motives for requiring his return are political.
    I submit to the Home Secretary that, unfortunately, in this case a situation has arisen because no one anticipated or foresaw that circumstances had so changed since the passing of the 1881 Act. Our Colonies have grown up and have grown to maturity and have now reached full independence. Surely they are now in a position to be regarded and treated as equals. In those circumstances, why should the law applying between ourselves and Nigeria be different from the law applying between ourselves and the United States on extradition matters? Surely this is one matter which the Home Secretary should consider in the exercise of his discretion under Section 6.
    Mr. David Renton: The hon. and learned Member has based his whole argument, as I understand it, on the assumption that at the time that the Fugitive Offenders Act was passed all of Her Majesty's Dominions and Colonies were governed from London. In fact, Canada was already independent by then, and there were several self-governing Colonies and provinces by then. Surely the hon. and learned Gentleman's assumption is not correct and, therefore, his argument must fall to the ground.
    Mr. Hooson: What I said was that substantially our overseas territories were governed from here. I think that I am right historically in saying that Canada was the only country which had self-government at that time.
    Mr. Paget: Even in the case of Canada, the Governor-General was then appointed by the Government of this country on the advice of the Prime Minister here, and he had the prerogative of mercy concerning Canada. So that even Canada was not completely independent.
    Mr. Hooson: I am obliged for that intervention.
    It seems to me that the Home Secretary, in exercising his discretion in this case, has considered all the matters which would be relevant even if this had not been a political offence. What he has not satisfied the House about—certainly he has not satisfied me about this—is that he has also taken into consideration the vital fact that this is a political offence and that, since it is a political offence and Nigeria is an equal member of the Commonwealth, as entirely independent, is permitted to go its own way and to decide its own future and to impose its own laws, the right hon. Gentleman should have undoubtedly exercised his discretion in favour of Chief Enahoro—on that ground alone.
    It would be quite monstrous at this stage to return Chief Enahoro for trial on a political offence. Much has been said of the injured feelings of people in Nigeria who, perhaps, have read our newspapers and seen extracts from speeches which might have given offence. Surely this is a risk which the Government should have foreseen when the request for the return of Chief Enahoro was first made. It should at that stage have been made clear discreetly by the Home Secretary that he would not exercise his discretion in favour of the Nigerian Government, not because of the particular facts of this case, but because of the general principle that we in this country do not return a political fugitive to an independent State. Why should there be this distinction between countries which have very much more in common with us and countries which are sometimes alien to us? For example, why is it that a man who comes from the United States of America is in a far more favourable position regarding extradition than a Commonwealth citizen from Nigeria?
    Surely the damage which has been done in the public relations between ourselves and Nigeria stems largely from the way in which this matter has been handled by the Government. That must follow, of course, when the quality of the law, the standard of administration of justice in Nigeria, have been called into question in the Press, if not in this House. That is much to be regretted, but I do not think that it is relevant to our present considerations. Neverthe-
    1320
    less, it has happened. Why has it happened? Because the Government have taken the course which they have taken when there was a simple, easy way out in accordance with a principle. It is the principle that we in this country never agree to extradition for a political offence to an independent country.
    I believe that even at this stage the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary should reconsider the matter and make the most difficult but greatest political acknowledgement that any politician can make, and that is to say that he was wrong and that he did, in fact, exercise his discretion wrongly. It is not too late to retrieve the position.
    5.22 p.m.
    Mr. David Renton: I am sure that the House has listened with interest to the hon. and learned Member for Montgomery (Mr. Hooson), but I must say, speaking for myself, although I was greatly interested by what he said, that I find myself in disagreement with a very great deal of it. I will in the course of my remarks endeavour to pick up some of the points which the hon. Gentleman made, especially about extradition, because, with respect to the right hon. Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown) and to hon. and right hon. Members of the Opposition who have spoken on previous occasions about this matter, I think that there is very great confusion in their minds about extradition based on the Act of 1870 and action taken under the Fugitive Offenders Act of 1881.
    In my opinion, the law is right and has stood the test of time well and is wholly applicable in principle to the not very greatly changed circumstances to which the hon. and learned Gentleman referred, which I will explain further later. I say that the law is right and still applicable. I say that the law has been rightly explained and interpreted by the Law Officers and by the Government in relation to this case, and I say that the Home Secretary's decision is not only right but, in my opinion, inevitable in the circumstances which we now have.
    The right hon. Member for Belper accused my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister of having come very near to saying something! What the right hon. Gentleman said that the Prime Minister

    1321
    had come very near to saying was that there were members of the Commonwealth which could be trusted and those which could not. The Fugitive Offenders Act of 1881 was, rightly or wrongly, based on the assumption that there were certain Protectorates and Colonial Territories which had reached a standard in the administration of justice that could be accepted and that there were others which had not.
    Owing to the immense variety of political institutions within the Commonwealth, the tremendous variety of legal systems, some of them even tribal, and also the great variations in the degree of control exercised by Whitehall, it was necessary to have a provision in the Fugitive Offenders Act which enabled the Home Secretary when exercising his discretion under the Act to be selective and to decide whether, if an offender were returned, he would receive justice or not.
    Mr. Paget: Surely that is plainly wrong. The Fugitive Offenders Act does not only apply to this end. It applies to the Protectorates or to whatever is considered in their relation to us. That discretion contained in the Act has nothing whatever to do with competence in the courts. If the offence was relatively trivial or the man was ill, or a number of other things like that which quite often arise, it is not in proportion to take him half-way round the world.
    Mr. Renton: The hon. and learned Gentleman will no doubt have the opportunity of developing that theme if he catches your eye, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, but in view of Section 6 of the 1881 Act I do not see how he can hold that view.
    The Fugitive Offenders Act was always intended to be a matter of common convenience within, formerly, the Empire and now the Commonwealth, a way in which the countries and territories of the Empire and then the Commonwealth could bring to justice people who had found their way to each other's shores. The common interest in bringing people to justice is, I should have thought, just as strong now as it was then.
    The Extradition Acts have an entirely different foundation. The original one was a prelude to a series of treaties between this country and foreign countries which, within the limits of those
    1322
    treaties, also enabled the countries which were parties to them to bring offenders to justice. The fundamental difference, and it is a very important difference, between the Extradition Acts and the Fugitive Offenders Act is that the Extradition Acts expressly excluded political crimes and the Fugitive Offenders Act did not. Mot only did the Fugitive Offenders Act have no exception in favour of political crimes, but it expressly referred to the offence of treason as an offence to which the Act applies.
    Although I know that the Government have taken a more generous view in this case, I think that, on the strict interpretation of the Act, if a charge of treason had been pursued against Chief Enahoro the Government would legally have been perfectly justified under the Fugitive Offenders Act in sending him to Nigeria for trial.
    The right hon. Member for Belper in seeming to suggest that all countries and territories of the Commonwealth must be trusted or none of them seemed to be inferring that we ought to trust all of them. If all of them are to be trusted, I should have thought it followed that subject to other considerations, which I agree arise, Chief Enahoro could safely be sent to Nigeria. But if no territory is to be trusted and if we are to assume that in all cases we have got to look to the merits of the case ourselves and never let the local courts decide, then I should have thought that the whole movement towards self-government, in other words, the whole of the policy of "the wind of change", must be regarded as a deception and a sham. I am sure that the Opposition did not intend that and, therefore, we have to consider the other factors which, in my opinion, are much less important than those I have already mentioned.
    On the facts of the case, a great deal of reliance has been placed by the right hon. Member for Belper upon the original affidavit which was produced in support of the application to our courts. But surely that affidavit, important though all affidavits are or should be, must be regarded as having been superseded by assurances by the Nigerian Government, and if we have faith, as we are entitled to have, in the Nigerian Government, then these assurances must be accepted.
    Mr. David Weitzman: Would the right horn, and learned Gentleman agree that there is no assurance whatever that if this man is returned to Nigeria the charge against him will not be amended or a second one added to involve the death penalty?
    Mr. Renton: Far be it from me to add to the reply which the Prime Minister gave to that very point. I should have thought that the Prime Minister's reply was really an end of the matter.
    Mr. John Strachey: Perhaps I misheard him, but I understood that the Prime Minister's reply was that the Nigerian Government did not desire to give assurances—perhaps rightly. So I am astonished to hear the right hon. and learned Gentleman saying that the Nigerian Government gave assurances. It was a main part of the Prime Minister's argument that they did not.
    Mr. Renton: The right hon. Gentleman can place what interpretation he likes upon the Prime Minister's reply. It will be in HANSARD for him to see. I understood it clearly to be to the effect that there is not the slightest need to ask the Nigerian Government for assurances; that we have had our discussions with the Nigerian Government and they have given those assurances for which they were asked; and that there is no need to press them further on this matter. I should have thought that was a perfectly sound and sensible attitude to adopt in this case.
    Mr. Bowles rose—
    Mr. Renton: I have given way a very great deal. I trust that the hon. Gentleman will allow me to proceed. He will realise that I do not wish to take up too much of the time of the House.
    I have just one final point. The hon. and learned Member for Montgomery, if I understood rightly, suggested that we should now rewrite the 1881 Act, and the right hon. Member for Belper said that the Home Secretary should defer a decision in this case until we had done so. I have already attempted to give my answer to the hon. and learned Gentleman; namely, that in my opinion the 1881 Act, although originally produced in somewhat different circumstances from
    1324
    the present, is essentially sound in principle in its application to the circumstances of today because it is based now, as it was then, on a common interest on the part of members of the Commonwealth in bringing offenders to justice. It surely is significant that at the time when the Statute of Westminster was written and at the times when we were giving self-government to the various Colonies which have achieved that status since the war, there was, so far as I know, no suggestion that the Fugitive Offenders Act, 1881. should be rewritten.
    I would add that if it were to be rewritten and if it were to be made effective, it would have to be in very much the terms in which it is now. I know that hon. Members opposite say, "We should write into it a right of political asylum". But that, again, brings to mind the confusion which I think there has been between the Extradition Acts and the Fugitive Offenders Act. The right of political asylum is certainly one of which this country always has been very proud, but it has not been without its limitations.
    Mr. Hooson: On the argument that we have a common interest with Nigeria in the return of a fugitive, would not the right hon. and learned Gentleman also agree that on the basis of that argument we equally have a common interest in the return of a fugitive to the United States of America, which is one of our allies? If the right hon. and learned Gentleman's argument is well founded, does not that make nonsense of the provision in the Extradition Act that people should not be extradited for a political offence?
    Mr. Renton: The hon. and learned Gentleman almost tempts me to reminisce on the subject of Captain Galvao. I myself had to answer Questions on this subject on the Floor of the House. The hon. and learned Gentleman may care to turn up those answers. It is a fact that the right of asylum may to some extent have been further modified—I have mentioned already that it has had its limitations—when we enter into defensive alliances, at least to the extent that—[Interruption.]—I made this absolutely plain at the time—at least to the extent that we would not allow this country to be used as a base for a revolution against a fellow-member of

    1325
    a defensive alliance. However, this is a very great digression from the case of Chief Enahoro, and I do not propose to pursue it any further.
    Mr. S. Silverman: Had not the right hon. and learned Gentleman better be a little careful in what he is now saying? He held high office in the Home Office for many years. Is he not in danger of spilling some official beans? Does he subscribe to the doctrine that political asylum applies only to one's enemies and not to one's friends, and applies only where the country which is seeking to bring a man back is a non-democratic country?
    Mr. Renton: I know the hon. Gentleman too well. I have crossed swords with him too often. I shall content myself with saying that I have said nothing today that adds one word to what I said when he used to question me across the Floor of the House on this very subject. He can turn up those questions and answers in HANSARD.
    In conclusion, I would, with great humility and, I hope, without sounding pompous, make a plea for Commonwealth solidarity in this matter. We shall not advance the great cause of the Commonwealth and of giving independence to countries which we think are fit for it, a course which hon. Gentlemen opposite have always boasted they supported, by making somewhat niggling and legalistic points which prevent the normal pursuit of justice as between members of the Commonwealth. I do not think that, if we attempted to amend the Fugitive Offenders Act in the way that has been suggested, we should be advancing the cause of Commonwealth justice. But one thing is abundantly plain, and that is that the Home Secretary has made a decision which is completely within the letter of that law and within the spirit of Commonwealth co-operation.
    5.38 p.m.
    Mr. Eric Fletcher: I am sure that the right hon. and learned Member for Huntingdonshire (Mr. Renton) will forgive me if I do not embark on a long examination of the circumstances in which the Fugitive Offenders Act was passed and whether or not conditions have now changed sufficiently,
    1326
    as I think, and as I believe a great many other hon. Members think, to require some amendment of the Act. I would prefer to confine my remarks to what I think is the quite short, simple, acid test of this question, which is as follows.
    Under the Act as it stands—let us forget for a moment that it is due for overhaul and, perhaps, modification—the Home Secretary has to decide the simple question whether or not it is just to send this man back to Nigeria. It seems to me that in coming to a decision on that simple question the House is still left in considerable doubt about one matter, namely, whether the Home Secretary, in exercising his discretion, did or did not consider that the man might be exposed to the death penalty. There is still confusion about that because, on 1st March, the Home Secretary said:
    "Let me add, because there have been misconceptions and misstatements about this, that there is no question of Chief Enahoro being sent back to stand trial for his life."
    Later, he said:
    "I have already explained that the charges he faces do not involve the death penalty."—[OFFICAIL REPORT, 21st March, 1963; Vol. 674, c. 601–3.]
    The right hon. Gentleman may have considered it or not, but at that time he thought that there was no possibility of the death penalty being involved. Then we had a debate late at night on 26th March, on a Motion of censure. It then became apparent to the House that there might be the possibility of the Chief being exposed to the death penalty. Accordingly, the Prime Minister intervened. Twice he said that there could be no possible question of Chief Enahoro being returned to Nigeria if there was any question of the death penalty being enforceable by the Nigerian courts. The Prime Minister stated that in column 1285 on 26th March.
    The Prime Minister gave a categorical assurance that if there was any charge against the Chief in respect of which the death penalty was involved, he could not possibly be returned, and the whole House accepted that assurance. The debate was then adjourned in circumstances in which, I am sure, if that assurance had not been given, the Government would in all likelihood have been defeated on a vote of confidence.

    1327
    The question I ask myself is, what on earth has that to do with the question of justice in Nigeria? There is nothing whatever in the Fugitive Offenders Act which makes any discrimination as regards the penalty, whether it be death or anything else. The Government have stated, through the Prime Minister, that it would not have been just to send this man back to Nigeria if he had been exposed to the death penalty. But the only basis on which the Prime Minister, the Home Secretary or the Attorney-General could say that and ask us to accept it—which we did—was on the basis that if death were the penalty, or if there were any risk of the penalty of death, then there was doubt about the Chief getting justice, for it is only if there is doubt about justice that the Home Secretary can exercise his discretion not to send a man back but to grant him asylum.
    If one is considering embarrassment to the Government of Nigeria, or doubt about the integrity of the Nigerian courts, it matters not what the penalty is. One cannot argue that the Nigerian courts will administer justice provided they do not have to exercise the death penalty but that there is doubt about their capacity to administer justice if they are able to exercise the death penalty. Surely the case is that the British Government have stated, as the Attorney-General and the Prime Minister quite rightly stated, that if there were a question of the death penalty being involved it would be manifestly wrong, under the terms of the Fugitive Offenders Act, to send this man back. This being so, the Home Secretary surely has no possible reason for rejecting the conclusion, nor can it be just, not to send the Chief back even if the death penalty is not involved.
    Precisely the same reasoning ought to apply, whether there is doubt about the death penalty or not, to penalties less than capital. In applying the test as to what is just—to try to assess what the Nigerian courts are likely to do and whether they can possibly be influenced or not in a case involving treason and, therefore, the right of asylum—the penalty is irrelevant. There is nothing in the Fugitive Offenders Act which says that the Home Secretary can grant asylum to a man if he is in danger of his life but cannot grant it if all that is at risk is his liberty.
    1328
    On the contrary, every statement made by the Home Secretary and the Attorney-General in enunciating this classical doctrine of asylum has made it clear again and again that the doctrine, whether under one Act or another, is that asylum is granted, for cherished and respected reasons which have arisen over the centuries, to a man if he appears to be in danger of life or liberty on political grounds or grounds or religion or race.
    It really is bedevilling the question to maintain that there is a vital distinction depending upon whether or not the capital penalty is a possibility. It is recognised by the Government that if the possibility of the capital penalty were involved it would be wrong to send the Chief back. There may be some doubt about whether the death penalty is involved, although the Attorney-General does not think that there is. Other people think that there is doubt, however.
    The Nigerian Government have been asked for certain assurances. Whether or not they have given them does not seem to me to mater. I assert that the Government, through the Prime Minister and with the assent of the Home Secretary and the Attorney-General, have recognised that were the death penalty involved it would not be just to send this man back. They could only come to that conclusion if in these circumstances there were some reason for doubting the complete integrity and impartiality of the Nigerian courts. This assumption having been made with the assent of this House, whatever embarrassment it may cause the Nigerain Government is irrelevant because, in all matters of extradition, we decide on matters of justice but never on the question of embarrassment to a foreign country or even a Commonwealth country. The consideration of embarrassment to another country is always inherent in any question involving the right of asylum.
    Therefore, it is surely as plain as a pikestaff that, once it has been recognised that were the death penalty involved it would not be just to send this man back, precisely the same reasoning must apply if the case involves a penalty less than death, for if one does not accept that corollary one is writing into the Act something which is not there. The only relevant consideration is the question: is it just to send him back? If it is not

    1329
    just in one set of circumstances, because a certain penalty is involved, it is not just in another set of circumstances involving another penalty.
    The Home Secretary and the Government have reduced this case to a state of complete muddle and confusion. For all the reasons I have given, and for those given by my right hon. Friend the Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown), there should be no possible doubt that the only reasonable, the only sensible, the only just thing to do is to grant this man political asylum.
    I do not think that we can pay attention to the argument about the effect this would have in Nigeria. Any damage that might have been done is irrelevant. But if damage can be done it has been done already. What greater damage can be done in this case than the recognition that the House has already made that if the death penalty were involved there would be no question of sending Chief Enahoro back? That having been the consensus in the House, surely we should not worry any longer about that aspect.
    I would in conclusion add one thing because I see the hon. Member for Hendon, South (Sir H. Lucas-Tooth) in his place. I thought that his letter to The Times yesterday was a real masterpiece of absurdity. It seemed to me to reduce this argument to an absolute absurdity to say that the whole existence of the Commonwealth depended upon sending this man back to Nigeria, and that if we did not do so we should have broken the last real link that holds the Commonwealth together. I cannot believe that the hon. Member or anybody believes that.
    Surely the ties of the Commonwealth are founded in conceptions of justice, and I think that we should expect the nations of the Commonwealth to have complete regard to the common law doctrine of asylum. I am convinced that no harm whatever would be done to the vital interests of the Commonwealth by granting this man the liberty and the right of asylum to which he is clearly entitled, and, equally, I think that unless this House condemns the action of the Home Secretary it would be betraying some of the highest ideals and traditions of this country.
    5.51 p.m.
    Sir Hugh Lucas-Tooth: This case is a complicated one and raises almost as many issues as the days on which we have debated them. I want to be brief and not to try to cover every issue. I will, of course, mention the one just referred to by the hon. Member for Islington, East (Mr. Fletcher). I personally regret the assumption which was made in the Opposition Motion, or, perhaps I should say, implied in the Opposition Motion, that this case has been or can be dealt with on a basis of political asylum. To my mind, that is altogether the wrong criterion to apply, but it is, of course, the only criterion on which we can vote, because it is the issue which is before us.
    I am not saying that the Home Secretary should never have regard to political considerations in dealing with cases falling under the Fugitive Offenders Act. There are certain cases where the Home Secretary in his discretion should have regard, indeed must have regard, to political considerations. It may well be that cases can arise where political considerations will give rise to prejudices of a kind which will prevent a fair trial, and so on. If he has any reason to think that the trial will be unfair, or that any oppressive result can happen, then I quite agree that political considerations are relevant, and, indeed, may easily be paramount. He has to consider each case on its merits.
    The Motion that we are discussing, that is to say, the Motion moved by the right hon. Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown), really states a quite general proposition. In effect, the Motion says that Chief Enahoro ought not to be sent back to Nigeria because the offences charged against him are political offences. In other words, simply on the general ground that whenever we get a political offence charged, the law ought not to be allowed to operate. The right hon. Member for Belper, in his speech on 21st March, stated the Opposition's case very clearly. He said:
    "There is no valid reason why, in 1963, we should apply a different test in the case of Commonwealth citizens from that which we apply in the cases of citizens from elsewhere. Summed up in one sentence, that is the case."
    He went on to say:
    "Why should we argue a totally different case if it happens to be a member of the

    1331
    Commonwealth from that which we argue about a French, or Spanish, or Russian, or any other citizen?"—[OFFICIAL REPORT. 21st March, 1963; Vol. 674, c. 583.]
    That is the case which we are now engaged in debating.
    My remarks will be directed to that particular issue which is, I believe, the most relevant. Ought we to treat a fugitive from a Commonwealth country in a way different from that in which we treat a fugitive from a foreign country? Put in another way, I think that the question can be fairly stated: ought the law to treat British subjects and aliens alike? If we put the question in that way, I think that everyone in the House will answer it immediately and in the negative. We answered this very question last year when we had the Commonwealth Immigrants Bill before the House, and hon. Members on both sides rightly said that we must treat British subjects from the Commonwealth differently from aliens.
    Mr. Strachey: The hon. Member said that we should all unhesitatingly say "no" to the proposition that we should treat them alike, but should we not also, and even more unhesitatingly, answer "no" to the proposition that we should treat Commonwealth citizens worse.
    Sir H. Lucas-Tooth: That is exactly the point to which I propose to direct my remarks.
    British subjects are not, of course, treated as being the same as aliens in our law. British subjects, for instance, have still far greater freedom of access to the United Kingdom than aliens. They have far better rights to remain in it. British subjects can become Members of this House. There are many public offices which can be held by British subjects and not by aliens. The status of being a British subject carries very important rights indeed. That status is based on the principle of belief, that is to say, the loyalty which each one of us owes to the Crown, as head of the Commonwealth.
    The duty of allegiance applies equally to all British subjects, whether they live in this country, whether they live in one of the Commonwealth countries which is not a republic, or whether they live in one of the republics which is now a member of the Commonwealth.
    1332
    This is not merely a personal matter. It is a duty to respect the institutions constituted under the Crown and not to seek to overthrow them by violence. It is a duty binding on every British subject in every part of the Commonwealth. Those are the duties affecting all British subjects, and the duties and the rights of British subjects are inseparable. We cannot have one without the other. That is the reply to the right hon. Member for Dundee, West (Mr. Strachey). If we do something to diminish the duties, then to that extent we shall lessen these rights.
    The combination of duties and rights is the peculiar mark of a British subject. It is that which constitutes the British Commonwealth of Nations. If we remove the obligations, the removal of the rights will follow very shortly afterwards. It always has been so. Hon. Members opposite would be the very first to argue that where we have duties and rights combined and we seek to remove the duties, then the rights will not long remain. If we remove the duties of allegiance, the only duties affecting British subjects, we shall not be long before we see the rights following them.
    Mr. Fletcher: The hon. Member referred to the Commonwealth Immigrants Act, by which we considerably reduced the rights of British subjects without affecting their duties or the validity of the Commonwealth.
    Sir H. Lucas-Tooth: Everybody in the House had grave misgivings about what we were then doing just because it would begin to undermine the very principle which I have mentioned. In fact, we did it only because we had to deal with a matter of urgency—and temporary urgency. We carefully inserted into the Bill that it was not to be a permanent Measure, but it was urgently needed for a particular practical reason.
    What is being argued by the Motion and by the hon. Member for Islington, East is that no British subject ought to have any higher obligation than an alien. He is arguing for the total removal of all these obligations.
    Mr. Fletcher: I am arguing for the modification of the Fugitive Offenders Act to bring it into accord with modern conditions, and I am saying that it would

    1333
    be a much less radical alteration of the position of British subjects than was the Comonwealth Immigrants Act.
    Sir H. Lucas-Tooth: I could not agree more strongly with the hon. Member. That was precisely what my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister announced this afternoon that he intended to put in hand. But what the hon. Member said is something quite different. He said that we start from the premise that we ought to strike out treason and political offences from the content of that Act. I say that if we strike these out, then we strike out the whole basis of allegiance, and if we strike out the whole basis of allegiance then very shortly afterwards the rights which attach to the duties of allegiance will disappear. I think that that would be entirely wrong and that it is a course which no one in the House wishes us to take.
    I am not arguing the particular question of Chief Enahoro. I am arguing the larger question which is raised in the proposal before the House. I am saying that the basis for that proposal is entirely wrong and that for that reason, if for no other, I would vote against the Opposition Motion. When we come to the particular case, having regard to the facts disclosed and to the arguments on the other issues, I am completely content that the Government have followed the right lines, and I shall have no hesitation in supporting them on the Amendment in the Lobby.
    6.4 p.m.
    Mr. A. Fenner Brockway: One of the best things which can be said about the House of Commons is that when the liberties of a man are concerned, all of us will give earnest and serious consideration to his case. That is true about hon. Members opposite as it is true about hon. Members on this side of the House. If one looks at the records of the proceedings of the House over the last 200 years, one finds that some of the most impressive debates which have taken place in this assembly have been on the liberty of only one individual.
    Another striking fact, if one looks at these debates in Parliamentary history, is how often opinions have changed according to the arguments in the debate. I will make a particular appeal
    1334
    to the Home Secretary, even at this late hour, not to close his mind to other proposals for a solution to the very difficult issue in his hands. The fact that Parliament has spent three days in discussing this issue indicates the gravity in which it is held in each party.
    I want to say at once that I differ from some of the speeches which have been made from this side of the House during the three days of our debates. I do not believe that Chief Enahoro is or ever was in danger of the death penalty. The discussions which have taken place about the interpretations of the law do not seem to me to meet the fact that not one of us who knows the membership of the Nigerian Government, who knows the man in Nigeria who is now the Attorney-General, and who knows the spirit in which he has approached this problem, can believe that Chief Enahoro would have suffered the death penalty.
    The unfortunate impression has grown within Nigeria that the attitude of those of us who oppose this deportation is one of regarding their State as second-class and inferior—that we know everything and that we can judge better than they can judge. I want to emphasise quite as emphatically as with my former point that, far from taking that view, I regard the Nigerian Government as one of the most outstanding Governments in the whole Continent of Africa in their tolerance, their patience and their fairness.
    Before the events which arose in the Western Region last year, nearly everyone in the House regarded the Government of Nigeria as a model. We recognised the statesmanship which was shown by its leaders, those from the Eastern and Western Regions, who might have had their own independence much earlier than independence was granted for the whole of Nigeria and who quite deliberately said, "We will postpone our own independence in order to secure the unity of the Federation." All this, and the way in which there has been formed in Nigeria a coalition Government of one of the most radical parties with the Conservative Party of the North, shows an attitude of the mind which is completely different from any picture given in this House that that Government is authoritarian, totalitarian or tyrannical. That

    1335
    should be said emphatically from these benches.
    Thirdly, I do not believe that we have any right to make the decision tonight because of any suspicion of the independence and impartiality of the judiciary in Nigeria. It is one of the remarkable facts of Africa that even when there has been tyranny in a country the judiciary, and particularly the higher ranges of it, has shown its independence and impartiality. This was true of Kenya even during the worst months of Mau Mau. It was even true of the Republic of South Africa until the Government there began to pack the judiciary with their nominees. This is emphatically true of Nigeria. If anyone tonight suggested that we ought to reach a decision on the ground that justice would not be extended by the courts of Nigeria, he would be unaware of what is happening in Nigeria, and unaware of the character of those who are responsible for its judiciary.
    Having said that, I acknowledge that there are differences between the African States and this country. In African countries political offences are regarded with much more gravity than they are regarded here, and the punishment for them may be more severe. They are new nations which are being built up from diverse racial elements and diverse religious elements. In those circumstances, if someone resists the emergence of nationhood, there is the danger that he may be regarded as a traitor to the aims of that nation. Because of this, a different attitude is adopted towards political offences from that which we adopt. We differ from them, but we ought to understand their situation. We criticise, as many of us have done in the case of Ghana and the United Arab Republic, but we understand. This ought not to mean, however, that we are prepared to sacrifice our stand for political liberties in any way.
    The hon. Member for Hendon, South (Sir H. Lucas-Tooth) built up a picture of the Commonwealth on the basis that all its subjects show an allegiance to the Crown, and that that allegiance requires the Governments of the Commonwealth to have a closely integrated legal association which means that if a subject in one territory earns the displeasure of the Government there, and leaves the country for another part of
    1336
    the Commonwealth, the Government of the country to which he goes would be required to deport him to his own country.
    Sir H. Lucas-Tooth: The hon. Gentleman has somewhat overstated what I said or suggested. The person concerned would have to commit an offence to bring himself within the Fugitive Offenders Act, and that would be a pretty serious offence.
    Mr. Brockway: I shall amend what I said. Instead of saying "displeasure", I shall say "commits an act which is regarded as an offence" by the Government of the country in which he lives.
    I should despair of the future of the Commonwealth if it were dependent on that theory. This Commonwealth in which we believe must be based on a concept of liberty and democracy. It cannot possibly be based on the principle that a member of the Commonwealth who commits a political offence can be sent back to a country in the Commonwealth, while an alien who is not a member of the Commonwealth has the right to remain here.
    Sir H. Lucas-Tooth: The hon. Gentleman is inaccurate, because the Fugitive Offenders Act applies both to British subjects and to aliens. It applies to those who, either by virtue of being British subjects or as residents owe allegiance.
    Mr. Brockway: I am entirely accurate. The difference between the two Acts is that if a person is an alien refugee in this country he can claim the right to political asylum.
    Sir H. Lucas-Tooth rose—
    Mr. Brockway: I shall not give way again. I have done so continually, and I claim that I am correct in what I am saying.
    The difference between the two Acts is that an alien who comes to this country as a political refugee need not be sent back to his country, whereas a Commonwealth subject who comes here after committing what is regarded as a political offence is in a worse position than an alien and is more likely to be returned to his country.
    The hon. Member for Hendon, South, has held high office in the Home Office.

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    I believe that he is a learned gentleman—[Laughter.] You interrupted me, and you are now laughing about it.
    Mr. Speaker: Order. We must address our observations to the Chair. I was not interrupting the hon. Member.
    Mr. Brockway: Mr. Speaker, I would be the last Member to suggest that you would interrupt or laugh on an occasion like this, and I apologise.
    I return to the argument which I was putting and which, I thought, was gaining the consideration of a large proportion of hon. Members before I was interrupted. I was arguing that although the African countries have a different attitude to political offences, this country ought to stand firmly by its historical record of granting political asylum.
    Sir Godfrey Nicholson: May I ask the hon. Gentleman—
    Mr. Brockway: No, the hon. Gentleman may not. Mr. Speaker, you have only just come into the Chamber. I have given way again and again, and my argument has been interrupted many times. I think that I have been reasonable in giving way on so many occasions, and I do not propose to do so again.
    I come back to my argument. I was saying that the African countries regard political offences more seriously than we do, and they therefore demand that those who take refuge here should be returned to them. While we understand their attitude, I believe that we must cling dearly and firmly to our record of granting political asylum. We must remember the contribution which this country is making to the pattern of human society. One of the biggest contributions which this country has made in that respect is the hospitality which it has given to political refugees from other countries.
    I am glad that the Home Secretary has come into the Chamber, because I wish to make a particular appeal to him. He may remember that one of the last debates of this kind in this House was over the case of a Spanish stowaway called Joaquim Perez-Selles. A member of the Government with, if I may say so, a longer standing in the House than the right hon. Gentleman, first decided that Perez-Selles must be returned to Spain. But under the influence of the contributions during the debate he came
    1338
    to another conclusion, and agreed that this man should be allowed to go to a country other than Spain, where he would have suffered imprisonment.
    I wish to make a very earnest appeal to the Home Secretary tonight to repeat that concession in a generous spirit such as was exhibited by the then Home Secretary. There are greater grounds for such a concession now than there were on that occasion. Chief Enahoro did not come here from Nigeria, but from Ireland. Whatever the explanation may be, the right hon. Gentleman will not doubt for one moment that Enahoro and his friends believe that an assurance had been given that Enahoro could stay here without being imprisoned.
    Under those circumstances, I beg the right hon. Gentleman not to insist that Chief Enahoro should be sent back to Nigeria and that this debate should result in the same decision as did the last debate. Instead of going to Nigeria, Chief Enahoro should be allowed to return to the country from which he came. I find it difficult to believe that the right hon. Gentleman can resist an appeal of this kind, and if he will agree to it—I think that it represents the opinion of hon. Members on both sides of the House—we might avoid the conflict which otherwise will occur at the end of this debate.
    6.14 p.m.
    Mr. Dudley Smith: I wish to add my voice to the eloquent plea of the hon. Member for Eton and Slough (Mr. Brockway). I hope it is possible, even at this late stage, that the Home Secretary may feel able to consider it.
    I think that we have a good Government, a progressive and an enlightened Government. It is a Government which I support on nearly every issue. But I am completely sincere when I say that regarding Chief Enahoro I think the Government are grieviously wrong. I do not intend to repeat the arguments which I adduced when I was fortunate enough to be called to speak in the last debate on this subject. But I think there are a number of issues still unanswered even after this second debate and that it would be worth while to delve into them.
    At the outset I must indicate the reason for my personal interest in this case since the general interest in it has heightened after the one and a half

    1339
    debates that we have now had. Several people have approached me and asked, "Why are you taking such an interest in the case of Chief Enahoro?" For the benefit of those who did not hear the last speech I made on this subject, I must make clear that Chief Enahoro is by way of being a temporary constituent of mine. He was arrested in Chiswick while in a flat belonging to some of my constituents, and they approached me on his behalf. Enahoro himself appealed to me, and as a result of this approach I felt it my duty to look into the case on his behalf. I have gone through a considerable amount of evidence, and as a result of what I have seen and heard I believe, frankly, that he has an excellent case for being allowed to remain here.
    I wish, first, to go into the question of the death penalty. I understood right from the start of my inquiries that the death penalty was involved. Enahoro's solicitors assured me that the capital offence was there, even after the statement yesterday by the Attorney-General. Enahoro himself believes that he would face a capital charge if returned to Nigeria. He told me so when I saw him in Brixton Prison. I call in aid the leading article in today's issue of the Daily Telegraph which states:
    "We now have the Attorney-General's opinion that Chief Enahoro, if returned to Nigeria, would not face the death penalty. This opinion is backed with a wealth of arguments which would in other circumstances be pretty well conclusive. Against it, however, must be set the fact that the affidavit in which Nigeria's Crown Counsel applied for Chief Enahoro's return to Nigeria specifically says that the charges do carry the death penalty; it says it twice, indeed. The Attorney-General may well be right in law, the Crown Counsel mistaken. But (there seems to be at the very least an element of doubt, of which Chief Enahoro should surely receive the benefit."
    In addition to that evidence there are a considerable number of people, besides other hon. Members, who feel that he does face the death penalty. These are politicians in the Nigerian Assembly—we have heard them quoted by the right hon. Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown)—and also some legal luminaries in Nigeria. Only last week we received a reasoned argument from the leading defence counsel at the trial, which I quoted to the Home Secretary in a
    1340
    supplementary question. Mr. O. A. Akintoye disagrees with the Attorney-General. In his view, Enahoro is charged on the second count with conspiracy to commit treason and not conspiracy to commit treasonable felony. He says:
    "A careful reading of the count and section 37(1) of the Criminal Code reveals that the draftsmen of the count had his eyes and mind on conspiracy to commit treason."
    In view of some of the allegations and comments, I should have thought that there is a real doubt about this Nigerian not facing a death penalty, and that it would be fair, in the circumstances, to give him the benefit of that reasonable doubt which must remain in the minds of so many people.
    I am not a barrister and therefore 1 often hesitate to tangle with hon. Members who are barristers when they speak in this House. But why on earth was the question of the death penalty ever mentioned in the affidavit if it had no relevance whatever? To me that seems incomprehensible. If my hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General is going to speak again—I do not know whether he is—he may be able to deal with this point. In its leading article this morning the Guardian takes up the point. It states:
    "In his view "—
    that is the view of the Attorney-General—
    "the two paragraphs referring to the death penalty had been included only to show the penalty for the principal felony, not the penalty for the lesser offence of conspiracy. He implied that these paragraphs were necessary in order to demonstrate that the offence was sufficiently serious for the Fugitive Offenders Act to apply to it. Yet if he is correct in stating that the maximum relative penalty is seven years, then there was no need for these two paragraphs in the affidavit. The charge was already serious enough to come under the Act."
    Later in the article it states—this is, perhaps, the most relevant point of all: "Two weeks ago the Prime Minister said that Chief Enahoro would not be extradited unless it was clear 'beyond peradventure' that the death penalty did not apply. The doubt remains."
    I feel that that doubt does remain.
    Irrespective of that I should like to make a submission to the House on other issues in defence of Chief Enahoro. I cannot stress too strongly—I think that the Home Secretary will appreciate this point—that the right hon. Gentleman has

    1341
    absolute discretion in a case of this sort. What decision he arrives at is entirely a matter for him. My right hon. Friend is perfectly able to resist the persuasion of people like myself, and of others who feel that the Chief should go back. It is misleading to bring in the question of whether a government will be offended, or whether a government is friendly or is an antagonistic government. The whole case rests in the individual. I also think that my right hon. Friend is not bound to deport anybody under the Fugitive Offenders Act, and that, perhaps unwittingly, he has given the impression that he is bound to do so, particularly in this case.
    Why should my right hon. Friend exercise his discretion in favour of this Nigerian? First, I think because Enahoro came to this country, as we have heard today, under a misapprehension. It was a regrettable misapprehension. We have heard it gone into in detail today, but undoubtedly this man thought—and three specific telephone calls were made on his behalf by a very responsible person—that if he came to this country, he would be safe and would be granted asylum.
    He knew very well what charges were to be levelled against him in his own country and he realised that he had to get out before he was caught. He went first to Ghana, then on to Dublin and finally to this country. As there was this very grave misunderstanding—and one accepts the assurance given by the Home Office that it was a misunderstanding—the Home Secretary should exercise his discretion in Enahoro's favour.
    I should have thought that in a case of this sort it was extremely relevant to take into account the circumstances of the people involved. The man who did this inquiry on behalf of Enahoro is a perfectly responsible citizen and a man of some standing in the business world. Enahoro himself is not some illiterate, spear-carrying savage but a completely Westernised Nigerian and well educated, as was revealed by the letter read out today by the right hon. Member for Belper. He has been to this country many times and has been here on official visits. He has two sons being educated in this country and they are going on to Marlborough School, one not unknown
    1342
    to my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary. He also belongs to a well-known London area golf club and is a man who obviously would not have come to this country unless he had been absolutely satisfied in his own mind that he would be given political asylum.
    Secondly, I base my appeal for the discretion of the Home Secretary on the fact that the Fugitive Offenders Act is admitted by most people today to be out of date. We all more or less agree that it was passed in a colonial era, but times have changed very significantly. As a result, whichever way one looks at it and whatever is said by my hon. Friend the Member for Hendon, South (Sir H. Lucas-Tooth), if Enahoro is sent back he will be receiving treatment less fair than a foreigner would get in the same circumstances. Surely that is wrong. Surely if we believe in the cause of the Commonwealth—and I certainly do and I am sure that everybody in the House does—Commonwealth citizens in times of trouble should be entitled to exactly the same consideration as a foreigner would receive in comparable circumstances. I do not think that it flows from that that there is discrimination against Governments in the Fugitive Offenders Act.
    Thirdly, I base my appeal to the Home Secretary for his discretion, even at this late stage, on the fact that political asylum is likely to be granted in cases of this sort when the Fugitive Offenders Act is altered. After our debates, it looks very likely that the Act will be changed. It would surely be very tragic indeed if this were the last case to be decided before that change took place, a case which has aroused tremendous interest and a good deal of passion on both sides of the House and one in which there is considerable merit in the case for the defence.
    Nevertheless, despite those three appeals which I make to the Home Secretary, the main argument overall must be that the Home Secretary should exercise his discretion, because by any count Enahoro is a political offender. It has been said—and it has been said in the House and I have heard it said outside the House—that the evidence presented against him involves bombs and guns and military training and efforts to bring about a coup d'état in his country; to

    1343
    overthrow the constitution by unconstitutional means.
    I must say quite honestly that although those allegations are perfectly fair so far as I know, they are strongly contested by Enahoro and his legal advisers. It is not for me to challenge the authenticity of the evidence which has been presented in the treason trial in Nigeria, but I say perfectly sincerely that it is not unknown for evidence to be rigged in political trials in various parts of the world, and we have always to bear that in mind.
    I accept that assurance of the Government that the Nigerian judiciary is first class and scrupulous, but what can a judiciary do if evidence happens to be tailored to the needs of the prosecution, even if it appears to be perfectly legitimate when it comes before the court? Fair trials do not always begin and end in court. There is the question of how the evidence is obtained and how it is presented, and the whole question of whether it is subject to cross-examination. Certainly some very disturbing evidence has come to this country to those of us who are interested in this case. It may be that three-quarters of it is not true, but if only a title of it is true, that would make the case for Chief Enahoro.
    So far as I can trace, a number of allegations which have been made by some of the accused have not been rebutted. There is also the question of a man named Ceulman, an interrogator of Dutch Afrikaans extraction, against whom the most serious allegations have been made. So far as I know, this individual has never been called in the treason trial.
    I referred to this the last time I spoke on the subject and my right hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton (Mr. Turton) went into some of the details. While I was speaking, my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary interrupted me and said:
    "I could say a good deal about certain matters which my right hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton (Mr. Turton) read out, but those matters are sub judice in Nigeria and we must be careful what we say. I think that all of us must be careful in reaching judgments on matters which are now before the Nigerian courts for judgment there."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 21st March. 1963; Vol. 674, c. 641–2.]
    1344
    I thought that was fair and I did not pursue the matter in the course of the debate, but if the matter is sub judice there, could we not wait until the trials are over before sending Enahoro back, so that we can better study the evidence presented and look into the allegations—and I put it no higher than saying that they are allegations—about some of the evidence presented in this case?
    The evidence which I have read certainly leaves doubt in my mind, and I know that it leaves doubt in the minds of some of my hon. Friends who are very worried about this case. I know that the Home Secretary has read this evidence and I shall be very surprised if he says that it does not leave doubt in his mind. It may be wrong and it may be inconclusive, but there seems to be an element of truth in it.
    Those who are for sending Enahoro back to Nigeria use the very compelling argument that we must trust the Commonwealth and that if we do not let it stand on its own two feet, the Commonwealth in general and Nigeria in particular will be gravely insulted over this case. Some of my hon. Friends have even gone so far as to say that those of us who are concerned are doing irreparable damage to the Commonwealth by fighting the case of Chief Enahoro.
    May I say that is that I do not see it in the same light. Nigeria may well be angry about this issue and in some respects she is entitled to be angry about it, but I am sure that she will not leave the Commonwealth if we do not send Enahoro back. I am sure from some of the speeches which have been made in the Nigerian House of Assembly that that is the thought furthest from the minds of many of the people taking part in the Government there. I say again that this is a political matter and should be treated as such. Political trials of a comprehensive nature should always be regarded with the gravest of suspicions, whether they are in or out of the Commonwealth and without taking into account the nature of the country concerned.
    I am well aware that by my stand I have displeased the Government. I have displeased the Whips. I have displeased even some of my constituents who have asked why I should rush about and worry so much about the affairs

    1345
    of a man who is not even English and who is concerned with a country which does not particularly affect us. I must say that I am unrepentant and still not convinced by the arguments produced against me in this matter. It gives me no pleasure whatever to say that today, for the first time in my political career, I shall be forced to vote against the Government, but I feel that at least I owe this to Chief Enahoro as a gesture of my good faith in conducting his case for him.
    It may be misguided, because people can make mistakes and time may prove me wrong, but I think that I am doing the just and humane thing for Enahoro in taking up his cause, and I think that exactly the same applies to those of my hon. Friends who have worked very assiduously on his behalf. He came to us for assistance in his hour of trouble and I am only too sorry that there are signs, which we have seen today, that we have failed him. But at least we have achieved this—that when he gets back he will get fairer and better treatment than might have been the case if this had not become such a grave issue in this country.
    Finally, and I stress this above everything else, I am convinced that there is here a great and strong issue. It is the principle that the individual, however famous or however obscure, must always be regarded as more important where life and liberty are concerned than all the expediencies of Governments and all the nuances of diplomacy. The individual is greater than the State, and that must always be the case. The principle of political asylum is a great and cherished principle and one which it is vital we should preserve in this country. It appears that tonight we are to throw it overboard. All I can say is that I hope we do not live to regret it.
    6.40 p.m.
    Mr. R. T. Paget: We have just heard a very fine and a very eloquent speech. Over forty other hon. Members on the other side of the House signed the same Motion as the hon. Member for Brentford and Chiwick (Mr. D. Smith). If they had his courage, they could still save Chief Enahoro and, in the process of so doing, they could do much to restore the waning-reputation of this House. They would not bring about the resignation of the Government. Whatever
    1346
    else happens, the Government will not resign. Perhaps some Members on the Government side will still have the courage to do that. It is within their power.
    I agree with the hon. Member that Nigeria has reason to be offended with us. We could have said to Nigeria, "In 1881, when this Act was passed, it was passed upon the basis of a common subjection to what was then the British Empire. Treason as described in the 1881 Act was a common offence against that common authority. These are no longer the circumstances, now that we have free and independent nations. It has never been our custom to return those charged with political offences to other free and independent nations.
    "Therefore, we cannot exercise the discretion under this Act in that sense. It has been contrary to our universal custom. We recognise your freedom. We recognise your independence. We treat you as we would treat our old friends and kinsmen and our allies. We treat you as we would treat the great American Republic. We treat you as we would treat the French Republic. We treat you as we would treat any other free and independent nation, because that is our custom". If we had said that, Nigeria could not have taken offence.
    Instead of that, we did a most peculiar thing. We took up a half-way house. We said, "We will return you this man as long as we are satisfied that, if we do so, his life will not be in danger". That seems to me to be a profoundly offensive thing to say to the Nigerians. We say to them, "We are not treating you as a free and independent and equal country. We have not that sort of confidence in your courts. We are prepared to allow you to deal with a minor offence which does not carry the death penalty, but we do not think that you are fit to deal with a matter if it is capital". If the Nigerians take exception to that, I can agree with them, for, after all, the offence of treason is capital here as it is in Nigeria.
    As that undertaking was given, and given by the Prime Minister, it is one which we have to examine. If Chief Enahoro is returned to Nigeria, is he in danger of a capital charge? My answer to that without any hesitation whatever is, "Yes, he is in danger of a capital

    1347
    charge". I will not go into the argument with the Attorney-General as to whether this is so on Charge 2. The hon. and learned Gentleman may be right or he may be wrong. Some lawyers have taken one view, and some lawyers have taken the other. What I am saying is that, if the Chief is returned to Nigeria, the Nigerian Government can, and can quite properly, prefer a capital charge. The Prime Minister said in his speech that to say that they would get him back on one charge and then prefer another would be a gross insult to the Nigerian courts and that it is something which no civilised nation would do.
    I say this to the learned Attorney-General. It is something which we do. It is something which we have done. It is something which we do regularly. When we obtain people, both under this Act and by extradition proceedings, the charges which we prefer before the jury are, I will go so far as to say, generally different charges from those on which the man is obtained.
    The procedure is this. First, charges are laid and a warrant is sworn. That warrant is the basis of the extradition proceedings. The man is then brought back here. There is the preliminary hearing before the magistrates. That hearing begins on the charges in the warrant. At that time additional evidence may be obtained and other charges may be preferred. At the end of the magisterial proceedings, counsel in charge of the prosecution—it may be the Attorney-General—considers the evidence and then he drafts the indictment. The indictment may, and quite often does, contain charges which are quite different from the ones originally preferred. That is the normal process of our law.
    Extradition cases very often concern financial frauds of great complexity. It is very often absconding financiers who are returned. Nearly always, in those cases, by the time it comes to drafting the indictment the indictment is materially different from the charges originally preferred.
    The Attorney-General (Sir John Hobson): The position is that under extradition treaties there is an obligation on each side, both the returning side and the other side, not to prefer additional charges. It may be that some technical
    1348
    alteration is made in the form of the indictment, but it is a treaty obligation on this country, if it obtains the return of a fugitive, only to prefer the charges for which his return is obtained.
    Conversely, we do not return anyone under an extradition treaty to another country unless that country, by its treaty, is responsible for seeing that only those charges are preferred and that the person returned has the opportunity of leaving the country before further charges are made.
    Mr. Paget: I was coming to that point in a moment.
    This applies only to charges which are not extraditable. The treaties contain the provision, and our undertaking is that, if we obtain a man back on charges for offences which are extraditable, we will not prefer charges which are not extraditable and not within the treaty. In fact, the charges are normally and regularly changed. There have been cases in which protests have been entered because charges which were not extraditable have been preferred when we have handed people into extradition. The learned Attorney-General will be familiar with the cases. So long as the charges are extraditable, different charges can be preferred.
    But we are not here dealing with the Extradition Act. We are, in fact, dealing with the Act of 1881 in which there is not even a reservation as to non-extraditable offences. Under the Act of 1881 there is nothing at all to prevent the presentation of any charges, whether or not they are included in the Act. Why should there be? The answer is that the basis of the 1881 Act was precisely that this is a common subjection; that this was the British Empire and a common authority with which we were dealing.
    So, unlike the extradition position which is limited to non-extraditable offences, there is no limitation at all under that Act. Both we and the Nigerian Government can prefer any charge which is justified by the evidence. If the evidence which has been presented—and I am not at this point saying whether or not it is true—is accepted, it quite certainly does support a capital charge of treason. This undertaking having been given, it is hypocritical to say that this man does not run the risk of a capital charge if he is returned, for, of course, he does.

    1349
    The next point of great importance is the Prime Minister's request to the Nigerian Government for assurances either that the second count—or the second charge, because it is not a count—would be withdrawn if it were a capital one, and that no further charge carrying the death penalty would be presented. That was a grossly improper thing to do. To ask for those assurances was indeed grossly improper and the Nigerian Government are overwhelmingly right in refusing to do so.
    I will put this from the other point of view. Suppose one of the other members of the Commonwealth were to say to us, "If we return this man", who, perhaps, is charged with capital murder or treason, "we want an assurance from you, first, that the judge will not pass the sentence called for by the law, or, secondly, that the Home Secretary, in pursuance of his own judicial and absolute discretion, will exercise that discretion by ordering a reprieve; or that the Attorney General, in pursuance of his judicial discretion, will no: prefer charges involving the death penalty, even if the evidence would support those charges".
    Any Government which gave those assurances would demonstrate quite clearly that the judiciary and those who exercise judicial discretion are subject to the Executive. To give such assurances would be to give an assurance that our judiciary is not independent.
    The Attorney-General: The hon. and learned Member will perhaps be aware that, under our Treaty with Israel, Israel is not prepared to return to this country any person who would be on a capital charge. It therefore requires a certificate from the Director of Public Prosecutions that the charge is not capital. This is clearly the procedure.
    Mr. Paget: What has that got to do with this case? There are many extradition treaties which contain many charges which are not extraditable. I am discussing, where a capital charge is extraditable, the question of the Executive giving assurances by which the judiciary and those who exercise it are bound.
    If there is any doubt as to the judicial discretion involved in withdrawing a charge or in not presenting one, I would remind the House of the Campbell case, on which the first Labour Government
    1350
    fell. It fell precisely because the then Attorney-General in the Labour Government, Sir Patrick Hastings, was accused of having exercised his discretion to withdraw a charge for political reasons. Sir Robert Home, speaking on the censure Motion which overthrew that Labour Government, said in this connection:
    "I was saying that if the administration of the law should become subject to any considerations of political expediency then justice, as we have known it in this country for centuries, would disappear. Civilised communities can only enjoy full liberty if the political executive is excluded from interference with the mechanism of the administration of justice. It is for that reason that the very salutary rule has been observed in this country that the Attorney-General, in forming his opinion on matters of prosecution, is entirely free from any political influence whatsoever."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 8th October, 1924; Vol. 177, c. 581.]
    These were precisely the assurances for which we were asking the Nigerian Government.
    The rôle of the Home Secretary in these proceedings has been a sorry one. He has on a number of occasions misled and deceived the House. [HON. MEMBERS: "No."] I hear hon. Members opposite saying "No", but let us consider what the right hon. Gentleman has said. On the 21st of last month he said:
    "This is a grave matter. It deserves the most thorough and responsible thought that I am capable of giving to it."
    He went on:
    "I do not recollect any application having been made for bail."
    There have been three applications, to the magistrates' court and to the divisional court. The right hon. Gentleman then said:
    "… there is no question of Chief Enahoro being sent back to stand trial for his life."— [OFFICIAL REPORT, 21st March, 1963; Vol. 674, c. 593–4, 601.]
    At that point the Nigerian Government's affidavit supporting the warrant for Enahoro's arrest, signed by the acting senior counsel for Nigeria, the Federal Attorney-General and the Minister of Justice, stated flatly that the second charge against him carried the death penalty.
    The liability to the death penalty at that point was mentioned and accepted in the magistrates' court, in the divisional court and in the Appeals Committee of the House of Lords. At that point the one dissenting voice that subsequently emerged, the voice of the Attorney-General, had not been heard. Indeed,

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    it was a week or a fortnight after this that the Attorney-General told us that he had not had time to consider the matter. At that point, at which there was unanimity of opinion everywhere that this man was on a capital charge, the Home Secretary said in the House the words I have just quoted, that is,
    "… there is no question of Chief Enahoro being sent back to stand trial for his life."
    Later replying to a Question asked by my hon. Friend the Member for New-castle-under-Lyme (Mr. Swingler), the Home Secretary said:
    "The hon. Gentleman is completely misinformed about the content of this affidavit. There is no reference … to the death penalty being a penalty for any of the charges on which Chief Enahoro's return was sought."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 4th April, 1963; Vol. 675, c. 625.]
    I shall not read the affidavit again. Everyone, of course, agrees that it was in the affidavit in the clearest of terms.
    Finally, the right hon. Gentleman said:
    "The information I have given to the House is strictly correct."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 26th March, 1963; Vol. 674, c. 1278.]
    Really! That is his performance in guiding the House.
    We now come to the question of this decision. It is a judicial decision—a discretion; a discretion as personal, as judicial, as the discretion with regard to the recommendation of mercy on a capital charge. The Prime Minister tells us, "We have decided that Chief Enahoro is to return." Who is "we"?
    I refer again to something said by Sir Robert Home in the debate to which I have referred, when Mr. Ramsay Mac-Donald was Prime Minister. Mr. Ramsay MacDonald had used the words "as to what did or did not influence us," and Sir Robert Home said:
    "I do not know whether the Cabinet did arrive at a decision or not, but these remarks suggest that they did, and, if that is so, you have just that improper interference on the part of the political executive with the decision of the Attorney-General which at the beginning I deprecated in the interests of 'the proper administration of the law."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 8th October, 1924; Vol. 177, c. 591.]
    And here we have what is, quite plainly, a Home Secretary deciding what "we" have decided, and what he is told to decide—told, primarily, by the strongest man in a weak Cabinet, the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations.
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    In an article written a short time ago, my hon. Friend the Member for Coventry, East (Mr. Crossman) pointed out power had passed from the Cabinet and had become personal to the Prime Minister. When one has autocracy—and we are reaching the point where we have Prime-Ministerial autocracy—and particularly when that autocracy begins to get doddery, one has the most evil of political phenomena—the "creature". That is, the man who is there not for his abilities, not for his eloquence, not for his administrative capacity—but for his obedience. That is, the man who is there because he can be relied upon to do any task, however unpleasant, only that he be commanded to do so—the sort of position of Louis XI's barber, Olivier le Dain.
    That is the honourable office held by this Home Secretary in this Government. He has disgraced his office, and he has disgraced the Parliamentary system. This is a shoddy and disgraceful story.
    7.3 p.m.
    Sir Peter Agnew: This is the third debate that we have had on this subject. The two previous debates have, to some extent, revealed more sense of drama, almost of excitement, but I think that it is true to say that on this, the third and possibly final day, a sense of sheer gravity has been paramount. I do not want to go over too much of the old ground and, not being a lawyer, I do not want to enter into any of the purely legal arguments that my hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General has presented, on which hon. and right hon. Gentlemen of the same profession have remarked and with which they have not always agreed. At the same time, if we look at the legal position, I find myself, as an ordinary Member of the House, doing the unaccustomed task of reading an affidavit.
    I am not used to reading affidavits, but I must say that this particular affidavit, in spite of its title, was written in fairly plain English and, rightly or wrongly, I construed it as a deposition or statement made by the Senior Crown Counsel in Nigeria that Chief Enahoro, the subject of all these discussions, is arraigned on a charge that can carry the death penalty if he is proved guilty. I see that my hon. and learned Friend shakes his head again.

    1353
    One thing that I can say with certainty is that if the Chief were to be tried in this country I would have every faith in the words and opinions uttered by my hon. and learned Friend, but that is not the case. This opinion has bean given under Nigerian law, in Nigeria, and if Her Majesty's Government persist in their determination to deport Chief Enahoro to Nigeria he will pass from the power and the counsel and influence of the British administration of law into the power and control of Nigerian law as administered by the Nigerian judicial department.
    In that connection, it is right to note that if the Senior Crown Counsel swore that affidavit, as he did, he swore it before the Minister of Justice, that is to say, the executive head of the administrative side of the judicial department in Nigeria. It is therefore right to point out that our own Attorney-General takes a view different from that of the Attorney-Genera] in the country where the man, if he is sent back, will be tried. That point has to be taken into account in this debate.
    It can be said, I think, with the high authority of the Home Secretary himself, that the Fugitive Offenders Act is now regarded as obsolete to the extent that it urgently needs revision, although, of course, these debates have not been appropriate for discussing the exact type of revision required. My memory goes back to the time when I first came to this House just before the passing of the Statute of Westminster. Up to that time, most of our Commonwealth countries, and certainly a country of the status that Nigeria has today, would not have been able to pass laws of their own that were repugnant to anything we do here, and that Statute was intended to accord to the Dominions, as it was then fashionable to call them, the absolute status of sovereign nations. I believe that in failing, as we have failed over all these years, to look again at the Fugitive Offenders Act we have unwittingly left a relic of the old Imperial system that is utterly inappropriate for dealing with the kind of case we now have before us.
    The fact has been that in a sense, perhaps a technical one, although I do not think that Chief Enahoro today would take it as technical only, the sovereign status created by the Statute of Westminster has been incomplete in that small
    1354
    detail in preserving an out-of-date piece of machinery for use in cases such as these. But we are faced with the position that the Fugitive Offenders Act is still the law of the land and the Home Secretary has his duty to do as he sees it.
    It is undeniable, however, as others in the debate have shown, that not only in the case of the legal position, to which I have already referred, but also in the circumstances surrounding the whole of what is going on in Nigeria today, a doubt is held whether in the atmosphere of that young, progressive and anxiously democratic country the climate can be such as to give the kind of trial in the full atmosphere which would prevail if the trial were taking place in this country.
    Sir G. Nicholson: Most unworthy.
    Sir P. Agnew: My hon. Friend says that that observation is most unworthy. My reply would be that if when this matter was first raised in the House my right hon. Friend had announced that in the case of one independent Commonwealth country, namely, Cyprus, the Act had already been breached by decision of Her Majesty's Government, and that in this case again he proposed to do what would amount to breaching the Act and not send Chief Enahoro back, I venture to suppose—although it is a bold thing to do—that perhaps not one hon. Member on either side of the House would have stood up to suggest that another course be taken.
    Mr. Norman Pannell: Is my hon. Friend aware that in June, 1961, the Cypriot Government refused to extradite one Andreas Afamis required in this country in connection with inquiries into the murder of Arthur Lee on the ground that their Constitution did not permit extradition? Surely, in view of that, the Home Secretary was entitled to use his discretion when they applied for extradition.
    Sir P. Agnew: I must say to my hon. Friend that I do not believe in the doctrine of tit for tat.
    I do not wish to detain the House, but I should like to say a few words about my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary. I feel convinced that his approach throughout this gloomy matter has been one of absolute integrity and devotion to duty, which he always shows.

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    I believe, however, that he has been the victim of an unfortunate obscurity as to the legal position at the outset, which permitted Her Majesty's Government, in a sense, to change their ground and rest it on the liability to the death penalty, as they themselves now see it.
    This has placed the Home Secretary, admittedly, in a difficult position. He now finds himself as a one-man court of appeal, and not only in the case of Chief Enahoro. He is placed with the duty and the power, as it were, to have to pass judgment upon the suitability, efficacy and fairness of the judicial system of, it may be, any and all the countries of the Commonwealth. I do not envy my right hon. Friend his task of drawing up a list of the sheep and the goats. It would be well-nigh impossible to do that.
    I ask him, even at this very late hour, to review the decision which he seems to have taken and to say to himself that if there can be, as I believe, still a residue of doubt upon this whole matter, then the consideration of the life of one man is a higher one than the prestige of any Government.
    7.15 p.m.
    Mr. John Strachey: We are debating again in a remarkable series of debates, as surely every hon. Member will agree, a case in which I think the impulse of every one of us is to do the generous and humane thing by the man whose fate we may be deciding tonight. I doubt whether even those who have firmly made up their minds that the Government would be right in sending Chief Enahoro back to Nigeria do not feel deep regret at the decision which, no doubt quite sincerely, they have taken.
    After all, if there were no other considerations—which there are—this would be a simple case, looked at from a human point of view, of a man who came here four months ago on what has been admitted on all hands, and has not been challenged today, a tragic misunderstanding—I put it no higher—with the Home Office, and who has lain in gaol for that period. His offence—and no one challenges it—is a political offence. It may be a very grave one, if it is proved, but there is no doubt that it is a political offence. He may—and I put it no higher
    1356
    —be at risk to his life if he is sent back. Surely, the impulse of every one of us must be to deplore this and, indeed, to demand that the Home Secretary should reverse the decision which we understand he will announce tonight.
    I put aside the consideration which, if I may say so, was rather crudely advanced in the course of the debate that we must send him back simply because to do anything else would undoubtedly offend the Nigerian Government. Relationships with Nigeria and the feelings of the Nigerian Government are very important, but they cannot be decisive for us in deciding this issue. That really would be an abomination. Even if a Commonwealth Government as important and estimable as that of Nigeria is bound to misunderstand our actions, the House must make up its mind to do what it thinks right and do its utmost to explain its actions and make the Government concerned understand.
    I join my hon. Friend the Member for Eton and Slough (Mr. Brockway) in every word that he said in expressing confidence in the Nigerian Government. I would remind the House again that, as it happens, I am one of the few Members of the House who attended the trial of Chief Awolowo in Lagos which, as it were, is the master trial in this matter. I, too, was greatly impressed by Nigerian justice. If we still strongly urge the course of mercy on the Home Secretary, as we see it, it is not in the least because we doubt those legal proceedings in Nigeria.
    I want to come to the story of the action of the Government in recent weeks as it has emerged from the Prime Minister's speech today. The right hon. Gentleman made a most powerful speech. He was warmly applauded from his side of the House, but, if I may say so with respect, I do not think that every hon. Member opposite quite followed what the story was which the Prime Minister had to tell us. The right hon. Gentleman reminded us, absolutely frankly, that he had given us a most binding and strict pledge that Chief Enahoro was not to be sent back to Nigeria unless he could get full assurances from the Nigerian Government that the Chief would not be at risk of death. Next, the right hon. Gentleman told us that he inquired—no doubt, the

    1357
    Government did it through the High Commissioner—whether Chief Enahoro was or might be charged with an offence which carried the death penalty. As has already been emphasised by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Northampton (Mr. Paget), the Nigerian Government at once refused to give an assurance on this, very understandably and very rightly, I think, because it was an assurance which it was almost impossible for them to give.
    What was the next thing? After that, the Prime Minister received an assurance from the Attorney-General, the British Attorney-General in this Government, that in his opinion Chief Enahoro is not in any way in jeopardy on a charge carrying the death penalty if he goes back to Nigeria. The Attorney-General has said that today.
    Mr. Paget: With respect, he said that he is not on these charges.
    Mr. Strachey: He has certainly implied—he will correct me if I am wrong—that Chief Enahoro, if he is sent back, is not in jeopardy of the death penalty, and that, therefore, the Prime Minister's pledge is satisfied.
    The Prime Minister tells us that, having received that opinion from the Attorney-General, there is no need even to make any further inquiries of the Nigerian Government. But if this is so, if the opinion of the Attorney-General here satisfies the Prime Minister, why did he make the inquiries of the Nigerian Government at all in the first place? The course of action which he has adopted has, I suggest, the most disastrous consequences because it has given the very maximum offence in Nigeria, but it has produced no assurances whatever from the Nigerian Government, and now, once again, we have had to fall back entirely on the ipse dixit of the Attorney-General. Frankly, that is not satisfactory to us. The hon. and learned Gentleman is, no doubt, very learned in the law, but others take a different view and there remains in my lay mind at least a very real element of doubt as to whether the Chief is or is not in jeopardy of death if returned to Nigeria.
    Here one has to speak as a layman. Many hon. and learned Members have spoken in the debate, but the laity, even in a law court, has a part to play.
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    Laymen, after all, play the part of the jury, and that part is rather important sometimes. If as a lay juryman I had to make up my mind, with the evidence which has been put before me by hon. and learned Members, I should say that I was by no means sure that Chief Enahoro was not in peril of death if sent back.
    The Attorney-General sweeps away the whole business of the affidavit very easily and lightly. But what is it all about? As I have endeavoured to understand it, the affidavit appears to make clear that, in the opinion of the prosecuting authorities in Nigeria at least, under one of the charges Chief Enahoro is in jeopardy of the death penalty, by reference to two provisions of Nigerian law read together. I think that I ought to take the House through those provisions very briefly again.
    Section 516 reads:
    "Any person who conspires with another to commit any felony, or to do any act in any part of the world which if done in Nigeria would be a felony, and which is an offence under the laws in force in the place where it is proposed to be done, is guilty of a felony, and is liable,"—
    these are the material words—
    "if no other punishment is provided, to imprisonment for seven years …"
    I turn to the now famous Section 37(2) which reads:
    "Any person conspiring with any person, either within or without Nigeria, to levy war against the Sovereign with intent to cause such levying of war as would be treason if committed by one of Her Majesty's subjects, is guilty of treason, and is liable to the punishment of death …"
    I do not pretend to be a learned lawyer who can tell the House with clarity that I am sure that that means that Chief Enahoro is in peril of his life, but I have heard nothing which convinces me that he is not. I put it to the Home Secretary and the Government that we want a better opinion, with all respect, than that of the Attorney-General on this issue.
    I repeat the suggestion made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown). It is perfectly open to the Government to make a reference of this matter to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council and obtain its opinion on this one issue: is Chief Enahoro, or is he not, in peril of the capital penalty if he is returned to Nigeria? If that is

    1359
    not done, there is nothing which the Attorney-General can say which makes us feel that if he is now returned he will not be returned in direct breach of the Prime Minister's pledge. We feel this very strongly.
    Now, the second issue, the less humanly exciting and dramatic one but, in the long run, perhaps, the more important issue, the question of the Fugitive Offenders Act and its amendment. Here again I found some difficulty in following the Prime Minister's speech because he seemed to say two things. He indicated quite strongly that he thought that it was now time to begin negotiations with other members of the Commonwealth for the amendment of the Fugitive Offenders Act. But he went on, in almost the whole of the rest of that passage in his speech, to argue strongly, as far as I could see, against amending the Act and for continuing the very great difference between our treatment of Commonwealth citizens and of foreigners in this respect, because he went on to discriminate very clearly among the members of the Commonwealth. In the words of the hon. Member for Worcestershire, South (Sir P. Agnew), he seemed to divide the members of the Commonwealth into sheep and goats, to some of which we should quite readily return political offenders and to some of which we should not.
    My right hon. Friend the Member for Belper remarked, very acutely I thought, that the Prime Minister came very near to naming which countries of the Commonwealth he thought were, as it were, the sheep and which were the goats. I remind the House that, although the Prime Minister did not go so far as actually to name them, at an earlier stage of the debate the Attorney-General did particularise and discriminate between members of the Commonwealth, to some of which he thought it would be oppressive to return political offenders and to others of which it would not.
    I think that I should read his words. He was arguing in reply to myself:
    "The right hon. Member for Dundee, West, and, I think, also the hon. Member for Huddersfield, West, drew the attention of the House to legislation in Southern Rhodesia. There are other countries—I think Ghana was mentioned—in which there is a right of detention without trial … those are, are they not, exactly the sort of considerations which
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    the Home Secretary ought to bear in mind when he is considering whether he should exercise the power to return a person who is a fugitive from justice?"—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 21st March, 1963; Vol. 674, c. 670]
    I find this the most horrifying doctrine.
    The Attorney-General, in a flight of oratory, in another passage of his speech, said that if we amended the Fugitive Offenders Act so that we made it parallel and analogous to the Extradition Act we might not be able to extradite terrible criminals to other members of the Commonwealth. He went so far as to say that that might be interpreted as though we were saying, "Nevertheless, we will never return a person who has ever committed a political offence of any nature, although it might bring down the Commonwealth and lead to the triumph of Communism".
    I suggest that the doctrine which we are now hearing from the Treasury Bench is much more likely to bring down the Commonwealth. We shall damage the Commonwealth if we say to one Government, "You are a good Commonwealth Government and we shall return political offenders to you", but say to another Government, "You are a bad Commonwealth Government and we shall not return political offenders to you." Surely the Attorney-General, the Home Secretary and the Prime Minister must see that this is an impossible doctrine. I imagine that the Prime Minister does see it. Otherwise he would not have indicated that he is contemplating amendment of the Fugitive Offenders Act. That is the whole point of amending it.
    The Prime Minister said that it was rather arrogant of us to take the view that the Act needed amendment. But why is he initiating discussions to amend it if that is his view? Surely, for the sake of the stability and well-being of the Commonwealth, there must be a clear-cut rule for the Government to follow which enables them not to discriminate between one member of the Commonwealth and another, and that rule can be no other than the familiar rule of the Extradition Act—that the Government concerned have no right to claim extradition of a person for a political offence.
    That does not mean, as the Attorney-General pointed out, that we should automatically give asylum to every individual.

    1361
    The person concerned may be sent somewhere else. He may be deported like any other alien. But it means that we do not have to send back a political offender simply because his political offence occurred in a Commonwealth country and not in a foreign country. That is what we are arguing with the Government.
    I put it to the hon. Member for Hendon, South (Sir H. Lucas-Tooth) that we are facing the realities of the Commonwealth. I followed the hon. Gentleman's argument about allegiance. I take it that he means allegiance to the Crown. But much of the Commonwealth does not owe allegiance to the Crown. By far the biggest part of the Commonwealth. India, is a republic. Therefore, it is impossible to have a sort of pretence Commonwealth in which all these things are true. We are here talking about large independent Governments, and it is no criticism of them to say that their judiciary is not on a higher level than that of great, independent and highly developed countries.
    It is absurd to pretend that all the countries of the Commonwealth—Southern Rhodesia, for example—have better laws and better judicial systems than the United States, Holland. France and other developed countries. That is carrying things much too far. We must admit that they are on all fours with other States of the world—neither better nor worse—and we must treat them as such.
    The Commonwealth connection is different. It is very hard to define it and to put it into words, and it is a tender plant. But I am sure that if we pretend that it is something other than it really is we do it harm and not good. Therefore, those of us who are profoundly concerned for the future of the Commonwealth—and I think that that applies to all hon. Members; it certainly applies to hon. Members on this side—are worried that these debates may have done harm. But that is not our fault. We think that the trouble lies in the extreme mishandling of the situation by the Government and the extraordinary sequence of events which they have gone through by consulting and then dropping consultation with the Nigerian Government.
    The only way to preserve the Commonwealth is to do justice as we see it
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    and to do the right and humane thing. We therefore ask the Home Secretary to do two things, as he can do under Section 6 of the Fugitive Offenders Act: first, to tell us clearly and definitely that the Fugitive Offenders Act will be amended, because it is producing intolerable results in the present-day world; and, secondly, pending that Amendment, to use his power of discretion, which is in black and white, and say that in all the circumstances, and while that amendment is being made, it would not be just to return Chief Enahoro to Nigeria.
    7.37 p.m.
    The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Henry Brooke): I hope that the House will give me leave to speak again, because it is a decision of mine which is under dispute—not a decision of the Government nor a decision of anybody else, but my personal decision. I have listened to this debate with care such as I have seldom exercised in listening to any other debate in this House—for obvious reasons. It has been a debate of a very high order.
    I think that the speech which I admired most for its courage was one with which I did not agree, that of my hon. Friend the Member for Brentford and Chiswick (Mr. D. Smith). He has set a magnificent Parliamentary example by the loyalty with which he has served Chief Enahoro, who is not a constituent of his but who happened to be in his constituency. In view of the loyalty which my hon. Friend has shown tonight, I for one will not charge him with disloyalty in any other direction.
    It would be right for me to say a few words about the position of the Home Secretary. In the working of the Fugitive Offenders Act, the Home Secretary does not come into the matter until all the court proceedings are past and' over. He has no cognisance officially of the matter until then. Only then does he have to consider it and to decide whether or not he thinks it just—those are the words of the Act—to send the person back to the Commonwealth country where he has been charged with an offence. It is his decision and no one else's. No one else can take the decision for him, despite the totally unfounded allegations of the hon. and learned Member for Northampton (Mr. Paget), who thought fit to charge me with political weakness.

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    This is a grave responsibility for the Home Secretary. It is a heart-searching responsibility. This is a decision which I have to take on grounds not of sentiment, advantage, political benefit or political effect, but of justice alone. It must be a fearless decision.
    The fact that a person may be liable to the death penalty is not, under the Act, a conclusive reason for refusing to return him. I entirely agree with what the hon. Member for Islington, East (Mr. Fletcher) said on that. The case might be one of a man who is alleged to have murdered his wife or child in a country where the punishment for murder was death. But Chief Enahoro is not being called back to stand his trial on a capital charge. That is what I have believed throughout, and it was not challenged in the House when I stated it on 21st March. That is certainly what the British courts believed. That is what my hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General has confirmed. While I will not go over his statement to the House yesterday, I should say a word about the particular point that seems to have been puzzling some hon. Members, that is how there came to be any mention of the death penalty in the affidavit.
    My right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General explained this yesterday. Hon. Members will find it in columns 1103–4 of HANSARD. Let me, however, go over it once again. A person cannot be returned under the Fugitive Offenders Act unless the offence with which he is charged is punishable with imprisonment for twelve months or more.
    It was necessary to show in the affidavit that the offence of conspiracy to commit a felony was serious enough to fall within the Fugitive Offenders Act: that is to say, that it carried a sentence of not less than one year's imprisonment. For this reason, because of the way in which Section 516 is drafted, it was essential to show in the affidavit that the sentence for the principal felony, with which Chief Enahoro is not charged, is not less than one year's imprisonment, because if it had been less than one year the sentence for conspiracy to commit that felony would also have been less than one year's imprisonment. Quite clearly, the offender referred to in paragraph 7 of the affidavit is a person convicted of committing the principal
    1364
    felony mentioned in the count and not a person convicted of conspiracy to commit that felony but without actually committing it.
    I add that the prosecuting authorities in Nigeria could not possibly think that Count 2 carries the death penalty as they have allowed the trial of Chief Awolowo, who is the leader of the alleged conspiracy, to continue before a judge alone, who has no power to try an offence that is punishable with death.
    The right hon. Member for Belper and the right hon. Member for Dundee, West (Mr. Strachey) suggested that the right course for the Government would be to have the case examined by the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council. As my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister said, I received a request this morning from Chief Enahoro's solicitors that Her Majesty should be advised to refer to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council the question whether Chief Enahoro was liable to the death penalty under the charges which he faces. For the reasons given to the House by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister at the beginning of this debate, the Government do not think that such a reference is either necessary or appropriate in the circumstances of the present case.
    It is significant that the possibility of Enahoro facing a capital charge was never mentioned in the Divisional Court before the Lord Chief Justice and yet it would have been very pertinent to the case, which learned counsel on his behalf was seeking to establish, that it would be too severe a punishment to return him to Nigeria. It was never mentioned before the Appeal Committee of the House of Lords. It was never mentioned even in the petition which Chief Enahoro himself sent to me after all the court proceedings were finished, when he listed the reasons why I should not decide to send him back. There was no mention then of liability to a capital charge.
    If I doubted whether a man would receive justice from the courts of the other country, or supposing I thought that even though he was acquitted he was liable to be oppressively treated, most certainly I would not think it just to send him back.
    Reference was made to the Cyprus case. There was even a suggestion by my hon. Friend the Member for

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    Worcestershire, South (Sir P. Agnew) that the decision in that case involved a breach of the Act. There was no breach of the Act, nor was there any suggestion or insinuation of doubt as to the justice of the Cypriot courts. The reason for the decision not to send those two men back was that if they went back, there was good cause to think that they would be in danger of assassination in Cyprus by a gang who were their enemies. It was nothing whatever to do with the integrity of justice in Cyprus.
    At the beginning of his speech, the right hon. Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown) criticised my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister for, as he insinuated, implicitly casting aspersions on a Commonwealth country. The right hon. Member then went on himself to cast totally baseless aspersions on the Government of Northern Ireland.
    The Fugitive Offenders Act gives the Home Secretary full and unfettered discretion to do whichever he thinks just, to send the man back or to refuse to do so and to release him. When a person has been charged with serious offences and our own British courts have decided that there is a strong or probable presumption of guilt—those are the words of the Act—and when they have also found, as the High Court under the Lord Chief Justice found in this case, that it would not be oppressive, it would not be unjust and it would not be too severe a punishment to send him back, clearly the Home Secretary could not take a different view unless he had reasons of strong substance for doing so. It is, however, open to me to do so if there are compelling reasons.
    My duty is to take into account not only what was said before the courts, but everything else which seems to me to be relevant. I have seen hon. and right hon. Members from both sides of the House who have come to talk to me about the case. I have gone into everything they have put before me. I have paid particular regard to the representations of my hon. Friend the Member for Brentford and Chiswick, who has made Chief Enahoro's case his own. I investigated with the utmost care the allegation that the representative of Chief Enahoro had been misled by an official of the Home Office.
    I will not go over that again, because the facts as I know them to be were set
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    out in my earlier speech and anybody can read them. It is, I fear, the case that there was a misunderstanding by the representative of Chief Enahoro, and it had serious consequences, but I am quite satisfied that no one in the Home Office was to blame for that.
    What I cannot do is to escape my responsibility by arguing that the offences with which Chief Enahoro is charged are political offences and outside the intentions of the Act, because the Act makes crystal clear that political offences are within it. It mentions not only treason but a number of other offences. It is clear beyond question that it covers political offences.
    The other day, the right hon. Member for Belper urged that time and events had amended the Act and that if it was being rewritten now political offences would be excluded. Therefore, he argued that when the charge is a political one I ought ipso facto to decide that it is unjust to return a man. Surely, however, a Minister must treat an Act as it stands and not as it might stand if the words were altered. That must be all the more true of an Act which confers rights and obligations, not on us alone, but on other Commonwealth countries equally. If the Act is to be remoulded, it must be remoulded after consultation with other Commonwealth countries who are affected by it just as closely as we are. We cannot rewrite the reciprocal provisions in an Act unilaterally.
    What would we in this country think if a person charged with a treasonable offence here in Britain had been found in, say, Australia or Nigeria and we called upon the authorities there to surrender him and then the Australian or Nigerian Government replied that time had amended the Fugitive Offenders Act so that they did not consider that it should any longer apply to political offences and, therefore, they would refuse to send the man back to stand his trial for a treasonable offence in Britain? I know what public opinion here would say if that argument were used.
    Mr. Stonehouse: Before the right hon. Gentleman leaves that point, would he not agree that Ghana and India have already amended the Act?
    Mr. Brooke: I am perfectly aware that certain countries have taken action. Nevertheless, the argument I am developing to the House stands unshaken.
    It makes no difference what the nationality of the fugitive may be under either the Fugitive Offenders Act or the Extradition Act. The man may be British, he may be Belgian, he may be a citizen of the Commonwealth, or he may be a citizen of Costa Rica. Neither Act draws any distinction whatever between Commonwealth citizens and aliens. What does make a difference is whether it is a Commonwealth country or a foreign country in which the offence is alleged to have been committed, because the Fugitive Offenders Act applies to the former and the Extradition Act to the latter.
    My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has said today that we shall set on foot discussions with other Commonwealth Governments on the question to what extent it would be desirable for the Fugitive Offenders Act to be reviewed. It may be a lengthy process. We must seek to achieve Commonwealth agreement, because we certainly could not get on without any Act at all for the return of fugitive offenders.
    Whether or not changes are desirable in this Act, I for my part hope that we may always aim at maintaining some closer method of co-operation between Governments of the Commonwealth than may be right in the case of foreign Governments. That, without any doubt at all, is the reason why we have two different Acts now and have had them different for so many years.
    But I must come back to where my responsibility lies under the law as it now stands. If I believed that the courts in the other country were unreliable or unjust, I would not think it right to return a man. But I have no ground whatever for fearing any such thing in Chief Enahoro's case, and I say that after having taken into account all the various representations which have—very sincerely indeed, I know—been put forward on his behalf. I come to that conclusion.
    The justice of Chief Enahoro's trial will depend on the competence of the Nigerian courts, on their integrity and
    1368
    on their independence, and in all these respects I have complete confidence in the Nigerian judicial system as regards both the court of trial and the court of appeal. I should hold just the same opinion if the further right of appeal to the Privy Council in London did not exist. It is for the courts in Nigeria, not for us, and certainly not for me, to judge the admissibility and the reliability of all the evidence put before them.
    If I thought that a man, even though acquitted in the courts, was liable to be oppressively treated afterwards by the Executive there, I would not return him; but I do not believe that of Nigeria. If I thought there was any other reason why, on balance, it would not be just to return a man whose return was asked for under the Act, I would not return him. But I have gone to great pains to consider every point put before me by Chief Enahoro or on his behalf. I have considered them all with the utmost care and thoroughness.
    Having done all that, I can come to no other conclusion than that I think it is just for him to stand his trial before a court of law. And when a Home Secretary has reached such a decision—a decision that is hardest of all for him—I trust that the House of Commons will accept that he has put aside all prejudices and partial affections and has reached it honestly and fearlessly.
    Mr. Stonehouse: The Prime Minister is reported in column 1286 of the OFFICIAL REPORT for 26th March as stating that a definite undertaking would be required from the Nigerian authorities that no charge would be brought against Chief Enahoro. Can the right hon. Gentleman say whether that undertaking has yet been received from the Nigerian authorities?
    Mr. Brooke: What the Prime Minister said, and he made it perfectly clear in his speech this afternoon, was that if Charge 2 were found to carry the death penalty—
    Mr. Paget: That is not what the right hon. Gentleman said.
    Mr. Brooke: —he would ask for an assurance that that charge would be withdrawn and that no alternative charge carrying the death penalty would be put in its stead. It has, in fact, been

    1369
    established that Charge 2 does not carry the death penalty, and so the question does not arise.
    Mr. Stonehouse: Before the Home Secretary resumes his seat, may we clear up this most important point? We understand that Charge 2 has been withdrawn. But is it clear that the Nigerian authorities have given a definite undertaking that no other charge will be preferred in any circumstances? That was the
    assurance to which the Prime Minister referred.
    Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Sir Robert Grimston): I think that we must now come to a decision.
    Question put, That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question:—
    The House divided: Ayes 218, Noes 274.

    Division No. 94.]

    AYES

    [7.57 p.m.

    Abse, Leo

    Grey, Charles

    Milne, Edward

    Ainsley, William

    Griffiths, David (Rother Valley)

    Mitchison, G. R.

    Albu, Austen

    Griffiths, W. (Exchange)

    Monslow, Walter

    Allaun, Frank (Salford, E.)

    Grimond, Rt. Hon. J.

    Moody, A. S.

    Allen, Scholefield (Crewe)

    Gunter, Ray

    Morris, John

    Awbery, Stan (Bristol Central)

    Hale, Leslie (Oldham W.)

    Moyle, Arthur

    Baird, John

    Hamilton, William (West Fife)

    Mulley, Frederick

    Beaney, Alan

    Hannan, William

    Neal, Harold

    Bellenger, Rt. Hon. F. J.

    Harper, Joseph

    Noel-Baker, Rt.Hn.Philip (Derby,S.)

    Bence, Cyril

    Hart, Mrs. Judith

    O'Malley, B. R.

    Bennett, J. (Glasgow, Bridgeton)

    Hayman, F. H.

    Oram, A. E.

    Benson, Sir George

    Healey, Denis

    Oswald, Thomas

    Blackburn, F.

    Henderson,Rt.Hn.Arthur (RwlyRegls)

    Owen, Will

    Blyton, William

    Herbison, Miss Margaret

    Padley, W. E.

    Boardman, H.

    Hill, J. (Midlothian)

    Paget, R. T.

    Bottomley, Rt. Hon. A. G.

    Hilton, A. V.

    Pannoll, Charles (Leeds, W.)

    Bowden, Rt. Hn. H. W.(Leics, S.W.)

    Hohman, Percy

    Parker, John

    Bowles. Frank

    Hooson, H. E.

    Parkin, B. T.

    Boyden, James

    Houghton, Douglas

    Pavitt, Laurence

    Braddock, Mrs. E. M.

    Howell, Charles A. (Perry Barr)

    Peart, Frederick

    Bray, Or. Jeremy

    Howell, Denis (Small Heath)

    Pentland, Norman

    Brockway, A. Fenner

    Hoy, James H.

    Plummer, Sir Leslie

    Broughton, Dr. A. D. D.

    Hughes, Cledwyn (Anglesey)

    Popplewell, Ernest

    Brown, Rt. Hon. George (Belper)

    Hughes, Emrys (S. Ayrshire)

    Prentice, R. E.

    Butler, Herbert (Hackney, C.)

    Hughes, Hector (Aberdeen, N.)

    Price, J. T. (Westhoughton)

    Butler, Mrs. Joyce (Wood Green)

    Hunter, A. E.

    Probert, Arthur

    Callaghan, James

    Hynd, H. (Accrington)

    Proctor, W, T.

    Carmichael, Neil

    Hynd, John (Attercliffe)

    Pursey, Cmdr. Harry

    Castle, Mrs. Barbara

    Irvine, A. J. (Edge Hill)

    Rankin, John

    Chapman, Donald

    Janner, Sir Barnett

    Redhead, E. C.

    Cliffe, Michael

    Jay, Rt. Hon. Douglas

    Reid, William

    Collick, Percy

    Jeger, George

    Reynolds, G. W.

    Corbet, Mrs. Freda

    Jenkins, Roy (Stechford)

    Rhodes, H.

    Cordeaux, Lt.-Col. J. K.

    Jones, Dan (Burnley)

    Roberts, Albert (Normanton)

    Craddock, George (Bradford, S.)

    Robertson, John (Paisley)

    Cronin, John

    Jones, Elwyn (West Ham, S.)

    Robinson, Kenneth, (St.Pancras,N.)

    Crosland, Anthony

    Kelley, Richard

    Rodgers, W. T. (Stockton)

    Crossman, R. H. S.

    King, Dr. Horace

    Rogers, G. H. R. (Kensington, N.)

    Cullen, Mrs. Alice

    Lawson, George

    Ross, William

    Dalyell, Tam

    Ledger, Ron

    Shinwell, Rt. Hon. E.

    Darling, George

    Lee, Frederick (Newton)

    Short, Edward

    Davies, G. Elfed (Rhondda, E.)

    Lee, Miss Jennie (Cannock)

    Silverman, Julius (Aston)

    Davies, Harold (Leek)

    Lever, L. M. (Ardwick)

    Silverman, Sydney (Nelson)

    Davies, S. O. (Merthyr)

    Lewis, Arthur (West Ham, N.)

    Skeffington, Arthur

    Delargy, Hugh

    Lipton, Marcus

    Slater, Joseph (Sedgefield)

    Dempsey, James

    Loughlin, Charles

    Small, William

    Diamond, John

    Lubbock, Eric

    Smith, Dudley (Br'ntf'd & Chiswick)

    Dodds, Norman

    Mabon, Dr. J. Dickson

    Smith, Ellis (Stoke, S.)

    Donnelly, Desmond

    McBride, N.

    Snow, Julian

    Driberg, Tom

    MacColl, James

    Sorensen, R. W.

    Ede, Rt. Hon. C.

    MacDermot, Niall

    Soskice, Rt. Hon. Sir Frank

    Edelman, Maurice

    McInnes, James

    Steele, Thomas

    Edwards, Walter (Stepney)

    McKay, John (Wallsend)

    Stewart, Michael (Fulham)

    Fernyhough, E.

    Mackie, John (Enfield, East)

    Stonehouse, John

    Finch, Harold

    McLeavy, Frank

    Stones, William

    Fitch, Alan

    MacMillan, Malcolm (Western Isles)

    Strachey, Rt. Hon. John

    Fletcher, Eric

    MacPherson, Malcolm (Stirling)

    Strauss, Rt. Hn. G. R. (Vauxhall)

    Foot, Michael (Ebbw Vale)

    Mallalieu, J.P.W.(Huddersfield, E.)

    Swain, Thomas

    Forman, J. C.

    Manuel, Archie

    Swingler, Stephen

    Fraser, Thomas (Hamilton)

    Marsh, Richard

    Taverns, D.

    Galpern, Sir Myer

    Mason, Roy

    Taylor, Bernard (Mansfield)

    Ginsburg, David

    Mayhew, Christopher

    Thomas, George (Cardiff, W.)

    Gordon Walker, Rt. Hon. P. C.

    Mellish, R. J.

    Thompson, Dr. Alan (Dunfermline)

    Gourlay, Harry

    Mendelson, J. J.

    Thomson, G. M. (Dundee, E.)

    Greenwood, Anthony

    Millan, Bruce

    Thorpe, Jeremy

    Tomney, Frank

    Wilkins, W. A.

    Winterbottom, R. E.

    Wainwright, Edwin

    Willey, Frederick

    Woodburn, Rt. Hon. A.

    Warbey, William

    Williams, D. J. (Neath)

    Woof, Robert

    Watkins, Tudor

    Williams, LI. (Abertillery)

    Wyatt, Woodrow

    Weitzman, David

    Williams, W. R. (Openshaw)

    Yates, Victor (Ladywood)

    Wells, William (Walsall, N.)

    Williams, W. T. (Warrington)

    Zilliacus, K.

    White, Mrs. Eirene

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

    Whitlock, William

    Wilson, Rt. Hon. Harold (Huyton)

    TELLERS FOR THE AYES:

    Mr. Irving and Mr. Ifor Davies

    NOES

    Aitken, W. T.

    Errington, Sir Eric

    Lucas-Tooth, Sir Hugh

    Allan, Robert (Paddington, S.)

    Erroll Rt. Hon. F. J.

    McAdden, Sir Stephen

    Allason, James

    Farr, John

    MacArthur, Ian

    Amery, Rt. Hon. Julian

    Fisher, Nigel

    McLaren, Martin

    Arbuthnot, John

    Fletcher-Cooke, Charles

    McLaughlin, Mrs. Patricia

    Ashton, Sir Hubert

    Fraser, Rt.Hn.Hugh (Stafford&Stone)

    Maclay, Rt. Hon. John

    Atkins, Humphrey

    Fraser, Ian (Plymouth, Sutton)

    Maclean,Sir Fitzroy (Bute&N.Ayrs)

    Awdry, Daniel (Chippenham)

    Freeth, Denzil

    Macleod, Rt. Hn. Iain (Enfield, W.)

    Balniel, Lord

    Galbraith, Hon. T. G. D.

    McMaster, Stanley R.

    Barber, Anthony

    Gammans, Lady

    Macmlllan,Rt.Hn.Harold (Bromley)

    Barlow, Sir John

    Gardner, Edward

    Macmillan, Maurice (Halifax)

    Barter, John

    Gibson-Watt, David

    Macpherson.Rt.Hn. Niall (Dumfries)

    Batsford, Brian

    Gilmour, Sir John (East Fife)

    Maddan, Martin

    Baxter, Sir Beverley (Southgate)

    Glyn, Sir Richard (Dorset, N.)

    Maitland, Sir John

    Beamish, Col. Sir Tufton

    Godber, J. B.

    Marples, Rt. Hon. Ernest

    Bennett, F. M. (Torquay)

    Goodhart, Philip

    Mathew, Robert (Honiton)

    Bennett, Dr. Reginald (Cos & Fhm)

    Goodhew, Victor

    Matthews, Gordon (Meriden)

    Berkeley, Humphry

    Gough, Frederick

    Maudling, Rt. Hon. Reginald

    Bevins, Rt. Hon. Reginald

    Gower, Raymond

    Mawby, Ray

    Bingham, R. M,

    Grant-Ferris, R.

    Maxwell-Hyslop, R. J.

    Birch, Rt. Hon. Nigel

    Green, Alan

    Maydon, Lt.-Cmdr. S. L. C.

    Bishop, F. P.

    Gresham Cooke, R.

    Mills, Stratton

    Black, Sir Cyril

    Grosvenor, Lt.-Col. R. G.

    Miscampbell, Norman

    Bossom, Hon. Clive

    Gurden, Harold

    Montgomery, Fergus

    Bourne-Arton, A.

    Hamilton, Michael (Wellingborough)

    More, Jasper (Ludlow)

    Box, Donald

    Hare, Rt. Hon. John

    Morrison, John

    Boyd-Carpenter, Rt. Hon. John

    Harrison, Brian (Maldon)

    Mott-Radclyffe, Sir Charles

    Boyle, Rt. Hon. Sir Edward

    Harrison, Col. Sir Harwood (Eye)

    Nabarro, Sir Gerald

    Braine, Bernard

    Harvey, Sir Arthur Vere (Macclesf'd)

    Neave, Airey

    Brewis, John

    Harvie Anderson, Miss

    Nicholson, Sir Godfrey

    Bromley-Davenport,Lt.-Col. Sir Walter

    Hastings, Stephen

    Noble, Rt. Hon. Michael

    Brooke, Rt. Hon. Henry

    Hay, John

    Nugent, Rt. Hon. Sir Richard

    Brown, Alan (Tottenham)

    Heald, Rt. Hon. Sir Lionel

    Oakshott, Sir Hendrie

    Bryan, Paul

    Heath, Rt. Hon. Edward

    Orr, Capt. L. P. S.

    Buck, Antony

    Henderson, John (Cathcart)

    Orr-Ewing, C. Ian

    Bullard, Denys

    Hendry, Forbes

    Osborn, John (Hallam)

    Bullus, Wing Commander Eric

    Hiley, Joseph

    Osborne, Sir Cyril (Louth)

    Butler, Rt.Hn.R.A. (Saffron Walden)

    Hill, Dr. Rt. Hon. Charles (Luton)

    Page, Graham (Crosby)

    Campbell, Cordon (Moray & Nairn)

    Hill, J. E. B. (S. Norfolk)

    Page, John (Harrow, West)

    Carr, Compton (Barons Court)

    Hirst, Geoffrey

    Panned, Norman (Kirkdale)

    Cary, Sir Robert

    Hobson, Sir John

    Partridge, E.

    Channon, H. P. G.

    Hope, Rt. Hon, Lord John

    Pearson, Frank (Clitheroe)

    Chataway, Christopher

    Hopkins, Alan

    Peel, John

    Clark, Henry (Antrim, N.)

    Hornby, R. P.

    Percival, Ian

    Clark, William (Nottingham, S.)

    Howard, Hon. C. R. (St. Ives)

    Peyton, John

    Cleaver, Leonard

    Howard, John (Southampton, Test)

    Pickthorn, Sir Kenneth

    Cole, Norman

    Hughes Hallett, Vice-Admiral John

    Pilkington, Sir Richard

    Cooke, Robert

    Hughes-Young, Michael

    Pitt, Dame Edith

    Cooper, A. E.

    Hulbert, Sir Norman

    Powell, Rt. Hon. J. Enoch

    Corfield, F. V.

    Iremonger, T. L.

    Price, David (Eastleigh)

    Costain, A. P.

    Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)

    Price, H. A. (Lewisham, W.)

    Coulson, Michael

    James, David

    Prior, J. M. L.

    Courtney, Cdr. Anthony

    Jennings, J. C.

    Prior-Palmer, Brig, Sir Otho

    Craddock, Sir Beresford (Spelthorne)

    Johnson, Eric (Blackley)

    Profumo, Rt. Hon. John

    Critchley, Julian

    Johnson Smith, Geoffrey

    Proudfood, Wilfred

    Crowder, F. P.

    Jones, Arthur (Northants, S.)

    Pym, Francis

    Cunningham, Knox

    Jones, Rt. Hn. Aubrey (Hall Green)

    Ramsden, James

    Curran, Charles

    Currie, G. B. H.

    Joseph, Rt. Hon. Sir Keith

    Rawlinson, Sir Peter

    Dalkeith, Earl of

    Kaberry, Sir Donald

    Redmayne, Rt. Hon. Martin

    Dance, James

    Kerans, Cdr. J. S.

    Rees, Hugh

    d'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Sir Henry

    Kerr, Sir Hamilton

    Rees-Davies, W, R.

    Deedes, Rt. Hon. W. F.

    Kershaw, Anthony

    Renton, Rt. Hon. David

    de Ferranti, Basil

    Kirk, Peter

    Ridley, Hon. Nicholas

    Donaldson, Cmdr. C. E. M.

    Leather, Sir Edwin

    Ridsdale, Julian

    Doughty, Charles

    Leburn, Gilmour

    Rippon, Rt. Hon. Geoffrey

    Drayson, G. B.

    Lindsay, Sir Martin

    Robertson, Sir D. (C'thn's & S'th'ld)

    du Cann, Edward

    Linstead, Sir Hugh

    Roots, William

    Duncan, Sir James

    Litchfield, Capt, John

    Ropner, Col. Sir Leonard

    Eden, John

    Lloyd,Rt.Hn.Geoffrey (Sut'nC'dfield)

    Royle, Anthony (Richmond, Surrey)

    Elliot, Capt. Walter (Carshalton)

    Lloyd, Rt. Hon. Selwyn (Wirral)

    Russell, Ronald

    Elliott,R.W.(Nwcastle-upon-Tyne,N.)

    Longbottom, Charles

    St. Clair, M.

    Emery, Peter

    Loveys, Walter H.

    Sandys, Rt. Hon. Duncan

    Emmet. Hon. Mrs. Evelyn

    Lucas, Sir Jocelyn

    Scott-Hopkins, James

    1372

    1373

    Seymour, Leslie

    Taylor, Frank (M'ch'st'r, Moss Side)

    Walker-Smith, Rt. Hon. Sir Derek

    Sharples, Richard

    Temple, John M.

    Wall, Patrick

    Shaw, M.

    Thatcher, Mrs. Margaret

    Ward, Dame Irene

    Shepherd, William

    Thomas, Peter (Conway)

    Watkinson, Rt. Hon. Harold

    Skeet, T. H. H.

    Thompson, Sir Kenneth (Walton)

    Webster, David

    Smithers, Peter

    Thompson, Sir Richard (Croydon, S.)

    Wells, John (Maidstone)

    Smyth, Rt. Hon. Brig. Sir John

    Thorneycroft, Rt. Hon. Peter

    Whitelaw, William

    Soames, Rt. Hon. Christopher

    Thornton-Kemsley, Sir Colin

    Williams, Dudley (Exeter)

    Spearman, Sir Alexander

    Tilney, John (Wavertree)

    Wills, Sir Gerald (Bridgwater)

    Speir, Rupert

    Touche, Rt. Hon. Sir Gordon

    Wilson, Geoffrey (Truro)

    Stevens, Geoffrey

    Turner, Colin

    Wise, A. R.

    Steward, Harold (Stockport, S.)

    Tweedsmuir, Lady

    Wood, Rt. Hon. Richard

    Stodart, J. A.

    van Straubenzee, W. R.

    Woodhouse, C. M.

    Stoddart-Scott, Col. Sir Malcolm

    Vane, W. M. F.

    Woodnutt, Mark

    Storey, Sir Samuel

    Vaughan-Morgan, Rt. Hon. Sir John

    Woollam, John

    Studholme, Sir Henry

    Vickers, Miss Joan

    Worsley, Marcus

    Summers, Sir Spencer

    Wakefield, Sir Wavell

    Tapsell, Peter

    Walder, David

    TELLERS FOR THE NOES:

    Taylor, Sir Charles (Eastbourne)

    Walker, Peter

    Mr. Chichester-Clark and

    Mr. Finlay.

    Question put, That the proposed words be there added:—
    The House divided: Ayes 270. Noes 214.

    Division No. 95.]

    AYES

    [8.7 p.m.

    Aitken, W. T.

    Curran, Charles

    Hobson, Sir John

    Alien, Robert (Paddington, S.)

    Currie, G. B. H.

    Hope, Rt. Hon. Lord John

    Allason, James

    Dalkeith, Earl of

    Hopkins, Alan

    Amery, Rt. Hon. Julian

    Dance, James

    Hornby, R. P.

    Arbuthnot, John

    d'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Sir Henry

    Howard, Hon. G. R. (St. Ives)

    Ashton, Sir Hubert

    Deedes, Rt. Hon. W. F.

    Howard, John (Southampton, Test)

    Atkins, Humphrey

    de Ferranti, Basil

    Hughes Hallett, Vice-Admiral John

    Awdry, Daniel (Chippenham)

    Donaldson, Cmdr. C. E. M.

    Hughes-Young, Michael

    Balniel, Lord

    Doughty, Charles

    Hulbert, Sir Norman

    Barber, Anthony

    Drayson, G. B.

    Iremonger, T. L.

    Barlow, Sir John

    du Cann, Edward

    Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)

    Barter, John

    Duncan, Sir James

    James, David

    Batsford, Brian

    Eden, John

    Jennings, J. C.

    Baxter, Sir Beverley (Southgate)

    Elliot, Capt. Walter (Carshalton)

    Johnson, Eric (Blackley)

    Beamish, Col. Sir Tufton

    Elliott,R.W.(Nwc'tle-upon-Tyne,N.)

    Johnson Smith, Geoffrey

    Bennett, F. M. (Torquay)

    Emery, Peter

    Jones, Arthur (Northants, S.)

    Bennett, Dr. Reginald (Gos & Fhm)

    Emmet, Hon. Mrs. Evelyn

    Jones, Rt. Hn. Aubrey (Hall Green)

    Berkeley, Humphry

    Errington, Sir Eric

    Joseph, Rt. Hon. Sir Keith

    Bevins, Rt. Hon. Reginald

    Erroll, Rt. Hon. F. J.

    Kaberry, Sir Donald

    Bingham, R. M.

    Farr, John

    Kerans, Cdr. J. S.

    Birch, Rt. Hon. Nigel

    Fisher, Nigel

    Kerr, Sir Hamilton

    Bishop, F. P.

    Fraser,Rt.Hn.Hugh(Stafford&stone)

    Kershaw, Anthony

    Black, Sir Cyril

    Fraser, Ian (Plymouth, Sutton)

    Kirk, Peter

    Bossom, Hon. Clive

    Freeth, Denzil

    Leather, Sir Edwin

    Bourne-Arton, A.

    Galbraith, Hon. T. G. D.

    Leburn, Gilmour

    Box, Donald

    Gammans, Lady

    Lindsay, Sir Martin

    Boyd-Carpenter, Rt. Hon. John

    Gardner Edward

    Linstead, Sir Hugh

    Boyle, Rt. Hon. Sir Edward

    Gibson-Watt, David

    Litchfield, Capt. John

    Braine, Bernard

    Gilmour, sir John (East Fife)

    Lloyd, Rt.Hn.Geoffrey (Sut'nC'dfield)

    Brewis, John

    Glyn, Sir Richard (Dorset, N.)

    Lloyd, Rt. Hon. Selwyn (Wirral)

    Bromley-Davenport,Lt.-Col.Sir Walter

    Godber, J. B.

    Longbottom, Charles

    Brooke, Rt. Hon. Henry

    Good hart, Philip

    Loveys, Walter H.

    Brown, Alan (Tottenham)

    Goodhew, Victor

    Lucas, Sir Jocelyn

    Bryan, Paul

    Gough, Frederick

    Lucas-Tooth, Sir Hugh

    Buck, Antony

    Bullard, Denys

    Gower, Raymond

    McAdden, Sir Stephen

    Bullus, Wing Commander Eric

    Grant-Ferris, R.

    MacArthur, Ian

    Butler,Rt.Hn.R. A. (Saffron Walden)

    Green, Alan

    McLaren, Martin

    Campbell, Cordon (Moray & Nairn)

    Gresham Cooke, R.

    McLaughlin, Mrs. Patricia

    Carr, Compton (Barons Court)

    Grosvenor, Lt.-Col. R. G.

    Maclay, Rt. Hon. John

    Cary, Sir Robert

    Gurden, Harold

    Maclean, SirFitzroy(Bute&N.Ayrs)

    Channon, H. P. G.

    Hamilton, Michael (Wellingborough)

    Macleod, Rt. Hn. lain (Enfield, W.)

    Chataway, Christopher

    Hare, Rt. Hon. John

    McMaster, Stanley R.

    Clark, Henry (Antrim, N.)

    Harrison, Brian (Maldon)

    Macmillan,Rt.Hn.Harold(Bromley)

    Clark, William (Nottingham, S.)

    Harrison, Col. Sir Harwood (Eye)

    Macmillan, Maurice (Halifax)

    Cleaver, Leonard

    Harvey, Sir Arthur Vere(Macclesf'd)

    Macpherson,Rt.Hn.Niall(Dumfries)

    Cole, Norman

    Harvie Anderson, Miss

    Maddan, Martin

    Cooke, Robert

    Hastings, Stephen

    Maitland, Sir John

    Cooper, A. E.

    Hay, John

    Marples, Rt. Hon. Ernest

    Corfield, F. V.

    Heald, Rt. Hon. Sir Lionel

    Mathew, Robert (Honiton)

    Costain, A. P.

    Heath, Rt. Hon. Edward

    Matthews, Gordon (Meriden)

    Coulson, Michael

    Henderson, John (Cathcart)

    Maudling, Rt. Hon. Reginald

    Courtney, Cdr. Anthony

    Hendry, Forbes

    Mawby, Ray

    Craddock, Sir Beresford(Spelthorne)

    Hiley, Joseph

    Maxwell-Hyslop, R. J.

    Critchley, Julian

    Hill, Dr. Rt. Hon. Charles (Luton)

    Maydon, Lt.-Cmdr. S. L. C.

    Crowder, F. P.

    Hill, J. E. B. (S. Norfolk)

    Mills, Stratton

    Cunningham, Knox

    Hirst, Geoffrey

    Miscampbell, Norman

    Montgomery, Fergus

    Rees, Hugh

    Thatcher, Mrs. Margaret

    More, Jasper (Ludlow)

    Rees-Davies, W. R.

    Thomas, Peter (Conway)

    Morrison, John

    Renton, Rt. Hon. David

    Thompson, Sir Kenneth (Walton)

    Mott-Radclyffe, Sir Charles

    Ridley, Hon. Nicholas

    Thompson, Sir Richard(Croydon, S.)

    Nabarro, Sir Gerald

    Ridsdale, Julian

    Thorneycroft, Rt. Hon. Peter

    Neave, Airey

    Rippon, Rt. Hon. Geoffrey

    Thornton- Kemsley, Sir Colin

    Nicholson, Sir Godfrey

    Robertson, Sir D.(C'thn's & S'th'ld)

    Tilney, John (Wavertree)

    Noble, Rt. Hon. Michael

    Roots, William

    Touche, Rt. Hon. Sir Gordon

    Nugent, Rt. Hon. Sir Richard

    Ropner, Col. Sir Leonard

    Turner, Colin

    Oakshott, Sir Hendrie

    Royle, Anthony (Richmond, Surrey)

    Tweedsmuir, Lady

    Orr, Capt. L. p. S.

    Russell, Ronald

    van straubenzee, W. R.

    Orr-Ewing, C. Ian

    St. Clair, M.

    Vane, W. M. F.

    Osborn, John (Hallam)

    Sandys, Rt. Hon. Duncan

    Vaughan-Morgan, Rt. Hon. Sir John

    Osborne, Sir Cyril (Louth)

    Scott-Hopkins, James

    vickers, Miss Joan

    Page, John (Harrow, West)

    Seymour, Leslie

    Wakefield, Sir Wavell

    Page, Graham (Crosby)

    Sharples, Richard

    Walder, David

    Pannell, Norman (Kirkdale)

    Shaw, M.

    Walker, Peter

    Partridge, E.

    Shepherd, William

    Walker-Smith, Rt. Hon. Sir Derek

    Pearson, Frank (Clitheroe)

    Sheet, T. H. H.

    Wall, Patrick

    Peel, John

    Smithers, Peter

    Ward, Dame Irene

    Percival, Ian

    Smyth, Rt. Hon. Brig. Sir John

    Webster, David

    Peyton, John

    Soames, Rt. Hon. Christopher

    Wells, John (Maidstone)

    Pickthorn, Sir Kenneth

    Spearman, Sir Alexander

    Whitelaw, William

    Pilkington, Sir Richard

    Speir, Rupert

    Williams, Dudley (Exeter)

    Pitt, Dame Edith

    Stevens, Geoffrey

    Wills, Sir Gerald (Bridgwater)

    Powell, Rt. Hon. J. Enoch

    Steward, Harold (Stockport, S.)

    Wilson, Geoffrey (Truro)

    Price, David (Eastleigh)

    Stodart, J. A.

    Wise, A. R.

    Price, H. A. (Lewisham, w.)

    Stoddart-Scott, Col. Sir Malcolm

    Wood, Rt. Hon. Richard

    Prior, J. M. L.

    Storey, Sir Samuel

    Woodhouse, C. M

    Prior-Palmer, Brig. Sir Otho

    Studholme, Sir Henry

    Woodnutt, Mark

    Profumo, Rt. Hon. John

    Summers, Sir Spencer

    Worsley, Marcus

    Pym, Francis

    Tapsell, Peter

    Ramsden, James

    Taylor, Sir Charles (Eastbourne)

    TELLERS FOR THE AYES:

    Rawlinson, Sir Peter

    Taylor, Frank (M'ch'st'r, Moss Side)

    Mr. Chichester-Clark and

    Redmayne, Rt. Hon. Martin

    Temple, John M.

    Mr. Finlay.

    NOES

    Abse, Leo

    Diamond, John

    Hynd, H. (Accrington)

    Ainsley, William

    Dodds, Norman

    Hynd, John (Attercliffe)

    Albu, Austen

    Donnelly, Desmond

    Irvine, A. J. (Edge Hill)

    Allaun Frank (Salford, E.)

    Driberg, Tom

    Janner, Sir Barnett

    Allen, Scholefield (Crewe)

    Ede, Rt. Hon. C.

    Jay, Rt. Hon. Douglas

    Awbery, Stan (Bristol Central)

    Edelman, Maurice

    Jeger, George

    Baird, John

    Edwards, Walter (Stepney)

    Jenkins, Roy (Stechford)

    Beaney, Alan

    Fernyhough, E,

    Jones, Dan (Burnley)

    Bellenger, Rt. Hon. F. J.

    Finch, Harold

    Jones, Elwyn (West Ham, S.)

    Bence, Cyril

    Fitch, Alan

    Kelley, Richard

    Bennett, J. (Glasgow, Bridgeton)

    Fletcher, Eric

    King, Dr. Horace

    Benson, Sir George

    Foot, Michael (Ebbw Vale)

    Lawson, George

    Blackburn, F.

    Forman, J. C.

    Ledger, Ron

    Blyton, William

    Fraser, Thomas (Hamilton)

    Lee, Frederick (Newton)

    Boardman, H.

    Galpern, Sir Myer

    Lee, Miss Jennie (Cannock)

    Bottomley, Rt. Hon. A. C.

    Ginsburg, David

    Lever, L. M. (Ardwick)

    Bowden, Rt. Hn. H. W.(Leics,S.W.)

    Gordon Walker, Rt. Hon. P. C.

    Lewis, Arthur (West Ham, N.)

    Bowles, Frank

    Gourlay, Harry

    Lipton, Marcus

    Boyden, James

    Greenwood, Anthony

    Loughlin, Charles

    Braddock, Mrs. E. M.

    Grey, Charles

    Lubbock, Eric

    Bray, Dr. Jeremy

    Griffiths, David (Rother Valley)

    Mabon, Dr. J Dickson

    Brockway, A. Fenner

    Griffiths, W. (Exchange)

    McBride, N.

    Broughton, Dr. A. D. D.

    Grimond, Rt. Hon. J.

    MacColl, James

    Brown, Rt. Hon. George (Belper)

    Gunter, Ray

    MacDermot, Niall

    Butler, Herbert (Hackney, C.)

    Hale, Leslie (Oldham, W.)

    Mclnnes, James

    Butler, Mrs. Joyce (Wood Green)

    Hamilton, William (West Fife)

    McKay, John (Wallsend)

    Callaghan, James

    Hannan, William

    Mackie, John (Enfield, East)

    Carmichael, Neil

    Harper, Joseph

    McLeavy, Frank

    Castle, Mrs. Barbara

    Hart, Mrs. Judith

    MacMillan, Malcolm (Western Isles)

    Chapman, Donald

    Hayman, F. H.

    MacPherson, Malcolm (Stirling)

    Cliffe, Michael

    Healey, Denis

    Mallalieu, J.P.W. (Huddersfield, E.)

    Collick, Percy

    Henderson, Rt.Hn.Arthur(RwlyRegis)

    Manuel, Archie

    Corbet, Mrs. Freda

    Herbison, Miss Margaret

    Marsh, Richard

    Cordeaux, Lt.-Col. J. K.

    Hill, J. (Midlothian)

    Mason, Roy

    Craddock, George (Bradford, S.)

    Mayhew, Christopher

    Cronin, John

    Hilton, A. V.

    Mellish, R. J.

    Crosland, Anthony

    Holman, Percy

    Mendelson, J. J.

    Crossman, R. H. S.

    Hooson, H. E.

    Millan, Bruce

    Cullen, Mrs. Alice

    Houghton, Dougias

    Milne, Edward

    Dalyell, Tam

    Howell, Charles A. (Perry Barr)

    Mitchison, G. R.

    Darling, George

    Howell, Denis (Small Heath)

    Monslow, Walter

    Davies, G. Elfed (Rhondda, E.)

    Hoy, James H.

    Moody, A. S.

    Davies, Harold (Leek)

    Hughes, Cledwyn (Anglesey)

    Morris, John

    Davies, S. O. (Merthyr)

    Hughes, Emrys (S. Ayshire)

    Moyle, Arthur

    Delargy, Hugh

    Hughes, Hector (Aberdeen, N.)

    Mulley, Frederick

    Dempsey, James

    Hunter, A. E.

    Neal, Harold

    1376

    1377

    Noel-Baker,Rt.Hn.Philip(Derby, S.)

    Rodgers, W. T. (Stockton)

    Thorpe, Jeremy

    O'Malley, B. R.

    Rogers, G. H. R. (Kensington, N.)

    Tomney, Frank

    Oram, A. E.

    Rose, William

    Wainwright, Edwin

    Oswald, Thomas

    Shinwell, Rt. Hon. E.

    Warbey, William

    Owen, Will

    Short, Edward

    Watkins, Tudor

    Padley, W. E.

    Silverman, Julius (Aston)

    Weltzman, David

    Paget, R. T.

    Silverman, Sydney (Nelson)

    Wells, William (Walsall, N.)

    Pannell, Charles (Leeds, W.)

    Skeffington, Arthur

    White, Mrs. Eirene

    Parker, John

    Slater, Joseph (Sedgefield)

    Whitlock, William

    Parkin, B. T.

    Small, William

    Wilkins, W. A.

    Pavitt, Laurence

    Smith, Dudley (Br'ntf'd & Chiswick)

    Willey, Frederick

    Peart, Frederick

    Smith, Ellis (Stoke, S.)

    Williams, D, J. (Neath)

    Pentland, Norman

    Snow, Julian

    Williams, LI. (Abertillery)

    Plummer, Sir Leslie

    Sorensen, R. W.

    Williams, W. R. (Openshaw)

    Popplewell, Ernest

    Soskice, Rt. Hon. Sir Frank

    Williams, W. T. (Warrington)

    Prentice, R. E.

    Steele, Thomas

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

    Price, J. T. (Westhoughton)

    Stewart, Michael (Fulham)

    Wilson, Rt. Hon. Harold (Huyton)

    Probert, Arthur

    Stonehouse, John

    Winterbottom, R. E.

    Proctor, W. T.

    Stones, William

    Woodburn, Rt. Hon. A.

    Pursey, Cmdr. Harry

    Strachey, Rt. Hon. John

    Woof, Robert

    Redhead, E. C,

    Strauss, Rt. Hon. G. R. (Vauxhall)

    Wyatt, Woodrow

    Reid, William

    Swain, Thomas

    Yates, Victor (Ladywood)

    Reynolds, G. W.

    Swingler, Stephen

    Zilliacus, K.

    Rhodes, H.

    Taverne, D.

    Roberts, Albert (Normanton)

    Taylor, Bernard (Mansfield)

    TELLERS FOR THE NOES:

    Robertson, John (Paisley)

    Thomas, George (Cardiff, W.)

    Mr. Irving and Mr. Ifor Davies.

    Robinson, Kenneth (St. Pancras, N.)

    Thompson, Dr. Alan (Dunfermline)

    Main Question, as amended, put and agreed to.
    Resolved,
    That this House, mindful of Great Britain's tradition of granting political asylum here to persons who might otherwise be exposed to unjust or oppressive treatment in their own country, is confident of the fair and impartial administration of justice in Nigeria and upholds the decision of the Secretary of State for the Home Department to return Chief Enahoro to stand his trial there.

    FORT WILLIAM PULP AND PAPER MILLS BILL
    Order for Second Reading read.
    8.17 p.m.
    The Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade (Mr. David Price): I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.
    As my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade explained last Thursday in the Committee of Ways and Means, the purpose of this Bill is to empower the Board of Trade to lend up to £10 million to Wiggins Teape and Company Limited for the construction of a pulp mill and a paper mill near Fort William. The Bill lays down certain conditions for this loan and empowers the Board of Trade to negotiate the other conditions with the company.
    Wiggins Teape and Company Limited is one of the three largest paper companies in Britain, owning over 30 mills and factories in this country and with subsidiaries all over the world. The Fort
    1378
    William project is the culmination of a number of years of planning by the firm and by the Forestry Commission.
    The undertaking will be a large-scale fully integrated mill, the only one of its kind in Britain, going right through from the wood to the finished paper. It will draw its supplies of softwood from the Scottish forests to a radius of over 100 miles from Fort William. By taking advantage of the Scottish timber in this way the mill should be well placed to compete with producers in forest countries which operate fully integrated mills based on large supplies of indigenous timber.
    The construction of the mill will be in two stages. The construction of the first stage will begin immediately and is planned to come into production by the end of 1965. It will consist of a pulp mill producing about 80,000 tons a year of bleached chemical pulp and one paper machine using half of this pulp for the production of medium-weight papers.
    At this stage, the remaining output of pulp will be sold within the Wiggins Teape group and to other paper producers. For the second stage, which should be reached sometime in 1968, the company will install a second paper machine which should come into production in 1970 and which will then effectively absorb the second half of the pulp mill's output. The whole project is estimated to cost about £19 million to bring into production, inevitably there must be a slight speculative element in the forecasting of costs towards the end of the period, depending upon our success as a nation in maintaining the current values

    1379
    of our money. But the commitment of public money is not open-ended.
    The process which will be used is the very modern Stora process which has been developed in recent years by a Swedish firm. It is used in two large Swedish mills and in a new Canadian mill, and is just being installed in a French mill. It has a number of advantages over the so-called Kraft process normally used in pulp mills; for example, high yield, adaptability to all species of timber, full recovery of the chemicals for reuse and absence of air pollution. The latter feature is particularly important in that it should ensure that the mill is a "good neighbour".
    In full production the pulp mill will use about 12 million hoppus feet of timber a year. If there is any hon. Member who does not know what a hoppus foot is, I will explain that it is a measure of timber. In the vernacular, one could say that it squares the circle and that one hoppus foot is 1·273 cubic ft. Four million hoppus feet will be imported hardwood and 8 million will be Scottish softwood, most of it from the Highland development area. It is planned to bring most of the imported hardwood direct by sea, up Loch Linnhe to the mill where a jetty will be built. Practically all the chemicals needed for the mills will be available in Britain; the main digestion chemical will be sodium sulphite. Much of the pulping equipment will have to be bought abroad, but the paper machines and most other equipment for the paper mill will be bought in this country, and so will the boilers. The total cost of buying the Stora machinery is estimated at £2 million, but everything else will be bought in this country.
    A modern pulp and paper mill is not a major employer of labour in relation to its capital cost. This mill will employ about 750 people to start with, rising to about 1,200 by the early seventies. But the undertaking will create in the forest and in the transport of the timber even more jobs than those created in the mill. Fort William itself is not a district where there is heavy unemployment but these jobs will be filled very largely from development districts in Scotland and especially from the Highlands.
    Furthermore, this project will undoubtedly bring additional employment
    1380
    to the area in the fields of commerce and of personal and community services. It is impossible accurately to quantify the further employment which is likely thus to arise. When one considers what the annual wage and salary bill for 1,200 employees may amount to—say, £2 million—one gets some idea of the multiplier effect of this project upon the economy of this area of the Highlands.
    When Wiggins Teape and Company approached the Government with a request for a loan for this project we decided that a thorough investigation of the project was necessary. With the full co-operation of the company, the Board of Trade's accountants have made a detailed study of the capital cost of the project and of the estimates of costs of production, level of demand, prices and profits. On the basis of their report the Government are satisfied that the commercial prospects are good. As my right hon. Friend told the Committee of Ways and Means last week, there are strong economic arguments in favour of an up-to-date and fully integrated pulp and paper mill in this country.
    The Fort William site has been chosen as being the best possible. The timber is immediately available and supplies coming forward will increase steadily over the next few years as the mill becomes established and gradually builds up to full production. Rail facilities are there—[Laughter.] Wait for it—although the project includes building new facilities at Crianlarich for handling timber. Crianlarich will be used as a railhead for the collection of timber from the forests of Argyll and Perthshire. To help the flow of material to the mill, the Forestry Commission will accelerate its programme for the construction and improvement of the forest roads within the area of supply.
    There is the necessary supply of fresh water, which is an extremely important factor in the siting of a mill of this sort, and facilities for disposing of the effluent. There is a good deep-water anchorage. As for sales prospects, there has been a steady upward trend in consumption of all types of paper planned to be produced at Fort William and all market forecasters indicate that this upward trend will continue. Estimates indicate that this mill's output should be fully competitive in costs with imported paper. The Government are satisfied, therefore, that,

    1381
    regarded purely as an industrial enterprise, this project is soundly based.
    I have confined myself to the industrial and commercial aspects, but these are not [he only consideration, of course. The jobs created in the mill, in the forests and in transportation will draw back to this district labour which it has been losing. It will be the source of new economic activity which the Highlands need. The Forestry Commission `s operations and those of private forests in the Highlands will benefit greatly from the new demand created by this project. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland, who is to wind up the debate, will be speaking more fully of these.
    Mr. Malcolm MacMillan: On the subject of labour and employment, in view of their interest and the substantial help which they are giving to this firm, are the Government to lay down any sort of conditions about the firm employing labour from the Highlands area itself as far as is possible? This has been done in other cases. Is it being done in this?
    Mr. Price: I cannot give the hon. Member a categorical assurance on that, but the firm intends to employ labour from the Highlands. It will be appreciated that a number of skilled technicians will have to be employed and may have to come from elsewhere, but, so far as possible, labour will come from the immediate district.
    However, it is obvious from the numbers involved, and from the ancillary employment which will arise, that it will also have to come from a good deal further afield than the immediate Fort William area. I understand that the firm is already receiving applications from natives of that part of the Highlands who wish to get jobs because they would like to return to the Highlands, which is something which the House will welcome.
    Mr. Archie Manuel: I agree that this is very important, but is any proportion of the loan, or grant, being devoted to augmenting the provision of houses in that area? The local authority concerned is a small one, and obviously could not do the job off its own bat. Will the firm help in this aspect of the project?
    Mr. Price: I understand that the firm has come to terms with the Inverness-shire County Council. My right hon. Friend would rather give the details himself, because he will go into the wider implications for the social infrastructure of the area consequential on this project.
    I turn now to the reasons why, commercially interesting as this project is, it is necessary for special Government help to be given to finance it, and, in particular, why this is being done by special legislation instead of through the medium of the Local Employment Act. As my right hon. Friend explained last week, this is a big project; it is a new type of venture, never before undertaken in the United Kingdom, which can be carried out only on a substantial scale.
    To operate economically a pulp mill must be large and, though this is not one of the largest size as pulp mills go, it nevertheless requires a major investment of capital. As will be seen from what I have said about the timetable of this project, it also takes a long time to bring it into full production. The pulp mill and the first paper machine at Fart William will not be fully in production before 1966. We are hoping that it will start at the end of 1965, and during the early months of 1966 gradually build up to full production. The project is novel. The time needed to get it started is inevitably lengthy, and it requires a lot of capital.
    The Board of Trade's accountants have examined the position very carefully and have been satisfied that, given the level of the company's resources and of its other commitments, it could not finance this very large undertaking without some Government help. We are clear that in the light of the commercial prospects of the undertaking and of the more general contribution it will make to the Highlands, it is right that this help should be given.
    Mr. William Hamilton: Can the hon. Gentleman tell the House in greater detail than the President of the Board of Trade did why the project is not being financed under the Local Employment Act? The motor car industry investments in Scotland are on a comparable scale, and yet they were so financed.
    Mr. Price: The hon. Gentleman anticipates me by about 200 words.

    1383
    I was proposing to develop that further. We are satisfied that the Local Employment Act is not the appropriate instrument for this purpose. In determining how to exercise its powers under that Act, the Board of Trade is required to have regard to the relationship between the financial assistance that is required from public funds by any particular project, and the number of jobs likely to be provided by it.
    We can all do the simple arithmetic. The Bill asks for £10 million. The number of people who will be directly employed at the end of the project is 1,200. That gives a figure of just over £8,000 of public money per job. The point about some of the other big projects is that, although they are big capital ventures, they are more labour intensive than this project in relation to the total cash outlay.
    This is the major reason why this could not be financed under the Local Employment Act, and I assure the House that even given the amendments to the Local Employment Act which were forecast by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and in respect of which the necessary legislation will be introduced, the amount of money that would be available to the company would be substantially less, in fact by about a factor of five, than the financial assistance which we are proposing the company should have if the House gives us the Bill.
    Dr. J. Dickson Mabon: The hon. Gentleman having made that clear, will he also make clear why this is the only firm involved? He said earlier that this firm had applied for this project. I assume that no other firm applied so there must be reasons, either economic or technological, why Wiggins Teape applied for the project.
    Mr. Price: If the House wishes, I would be happy to go back a little over the history of the project. As Scottish Members know, this has been discussed in the Press in Scotland for quite a long time. It is known that Wiggins Teape looked into this project a long time ago.
    Mr. George Lawson: How long ago?
    Mr. Price: Over ten years ago. The firm did not reckon, at that stage of
    1384
    forestry development, that the timber was available on a sufficient scale. The project was then re-examined and it was shown that a small-scale mill which was originally talked about would not be economic. This is one of many cases in modern production where one does not go up on a smooth curve, but in a stepped curve, doubling and quadrupling the sort of economic minimum that is reckoned can be worked—
    Mr. Manuel: Like I.C.I.
    Mr. Price: The hon. Gentleman has the point.
    Originally, other paper companies were involved in this matter. But they withdrew when it became clear that the amount of timber available would be sufficient only to maintain a medium-sized pulp mill if it were to be integrated with the production of paper and board, and also that the types of paper to be manufactured in the paper mill were attractive principally to the firm which has gone ahead. The types were in the middle ranges of paper, carbon paper and ordinary white paper. The company concerned was most interested in producing this range of paper and the other companies dropped out because it did not appear to them that there was room for them all from a technical and commercial point of view.
    Given this situation, and given what, in our view, are the special social features of this project, we decided that the proper course was to ask the House to consider this an exceptional case justifying special legislation.
    Mr. Emrys Hughes: The hon. Gentleman has referred to an exceptional case. Does he know anything about certain negotiations and the prospect of a similar mill in the south of Scotland?
    Mr. Price: Rumours have reached me. But I do not think that they are particularly relevant to the argument which I am deploying tonight. We have no objection to firms within development districts—presumably they would get local authority planning permission—putting up paper mills, if they think that those mills would be successful. But this case has particular and very special features.
    Coming to the Bill itself, the total amount of public money which we are

    1385
    seeking authority to lend is £10 million. We are not seeking lending powers beyond the end of 1972. In fact, the intention is that up to £8 million will be lent for the first stage of the project. That is for a pulp mill and the first of the two paper mills. This amount will be lent during the next two to three years. The remaining £2 million is intended for the second stage of the project, whose construction is expected to begin in 1968. It will, however, be lent only if, at that time, the Board of Trade is satisfied that the company needs further Government money to complete the project in the light of its financial position.
    The Bill goes on to provide that the rate of interest is to be 5½ per cent. But it empowers the Board of Trade to make grants to the company in respect of interest falling due up to the end of 1966. That is up to the end of the period of the build-up of the first stage of the project. Our purpose is to make the £8 million to be lent for the first stage of the project free of interest during the years of construction and running in. The reason for empowering the Board to make grants in respect of interest, instead of simply providing in the Bill that there should be an interest-free period, is that the waiver of interest is, of course, equivalent to giving a subsidy of the amount of the interest that otherwise would be paid.
    It was thought right that this subsidy element should be quite clearly disclosed in the Bill. There will, of course, be no actual payment of interest by the company, and balancing payments of grant by the Board of Trade, during this period. Only bookkeeping transactions will be necessary. But the effect will be that the subsidy element will be clearly disclosed to Parliament in the Estimates. The actual amount of grant needed will depend on the exact timing of the company's drawings on the loan. The figure of £1,300,000 in the Bill is a long-stop. The actual figure may well be considerably lower.
    The Bill goes on to provide that the other terms of the loan may be negotiated between the Board of Trade and the company and that the resulting agreements will be laid before both Houses of Parliament. Thus, at a later stage, the House will be fully informed on all the detailed
    1386
    aspects of the loan. Clearly, it is not possible for any agreements to be made before the Bill has become law. But the terms of the loan have been discussed with the company and I think that it would be useful if I indicated to the House the broad lines of agreement which seem likely to emerge.
    It seems likely that the repayment of the loan will begin at the end of 1968 and will take place over ten years on an annuity basis—that is to say, there will be ten equal annual payments including repayment of both capital and interest. This method is familiar as the normal way of repaying a house mortgage. While this is still under discussion it seems likely that the amount of the loan will be secured by a fixed charge on the Fort William premises themselves and that the Board of Trade will take a debenture on Wiggins Teape and Company.
    There is one other point with which I should like to deal. During the course of the Budget debate last week it was suggested by the hon. Member for Cardiff, South-East (Mr. Callaghan) that this was another illustration of the way in which private enterprise was failing to do the job in the Highlands, and that since the Government are intervening to lend money for the project they should take a share in the equity. [HON. MEMBERS: "Why not?"] I do not at all agree that private enterprise is failing to do this job. On the contrary, I think that what I have said earlier makes it clear that this is an extremely enterprising and forward-looking undertaking.
    For special reasons which I have explained, it is not within the firm's resources to finance this very large mill entirely unaided over the considerable period which must elapse before it is earning. But the fact that the Government feel themselves justified in making a comparatively short-term loan is not, in our view, any ground for seeking to play a permanent part in the company's affairs, which cover a very much wider field than the Fort William mill.
    Mr. Cyril Bence: May I ask whether this company has made any attempt to go into the market for the money?
    Mr. Price: We were quite satisfied that the company would not have been able to raise the necessary money.

    1387
    I hope that I may have persuaded hon. Members opposite to my way of thinking on this issue, but, even if I have not, I feel sure that both sides will agree that this project is worthy of our support, first, because it pioneers a fully integrated, large-scale and competitive pulp and paper mill in Great Britain, and, secondly, because it brings to the Highlands what we trust will be a new and permanent centre of prosperity of a substantial order. Tonight, we are not merely legislating about a pulp mill and a paper mill. We are bringing new opportunities to the Highlands.
    For many generations now some of the best sons of the Highlands have had to leave their homes to earn their living. The flow of brains, courage and ability from the Highlands has been the Highlands' loss, but it has also been Britain's gain. One can go further and say that it has been the world's gain.
    I like to think that in approving the Bill tonight we in this House are doing something material to pay back that debt which the remainder of Britain owes the Highlands. As the son of a Highland officer, I am honoured to propose that the Bill be given a Second Reading.
    8.44 p.m.
    Mr. William Ross: There is no doubt that the establishment in Scotland of the first integrated pulp and paper mill has already received a resounding welcome in Scotland, and that welcome will be echoed from this side of the House as well as from hon. Members opposite. There are three reasons for that. The first is that it will be using our indigenous resources of timber, resources which have been built up and husbanded over 40 years and longer by the Forestry Commission and State forests, and by private woodland owners, too—with, of course, generous support from the Treasury. If the Minister doubts me, he will find proof in the Estimates—at the moment £1¼ million a year.
    I remember a debate of four years ago in which the view was expressed very forcibly by my hon. Friends that there was a certain measure of urgency about what we were to do with our timber. In other words, we grow timber to use and to sell. I remember the Secretary of State for Scotland, at a time when he
    1388
    made more speeches than he makes today, making this point in the Scottish Grand Committee. It was said that we required to secure markets for the increased output of both thinnings and mature timber.
    There is the very serious matter of the fall in population in the Highlands and all the forestry areas. It seems to go with forestry that forestry has come in after the men have gone. To see industry now creeping back to the Highlands should be welcomed by every Scot in the House. We have, at tremendous expense, a point which I shall discuss later, a new growth point. We hope that it will not end with the pulp and paper mill. We hope that it will go on. I hope that other industrialists will note that certain people are not worried about the relative distance from what they consider to be their markets.
    It will also have an effect upon local wages outside the pulp mill. It is shocking to realise that the basic wage in forestry for the people who do the original and hard part of the work in Scotland at the moment is about 172s. a week. As the Secretary of State knows, the rents of these workers are very much higher than many other rents in the area, certainly higher than those of agricultural workers. The right hon. Gentleman mentioned this point before he was converted to the idea that the salvation for Scotland lies in raising the rents.
    While our immediate congratulations are due to the Chancellor on his sensible decision and prudent expenditure, there are others who merit our thanks. The last few generations of Forestry Commissioners toiled on despite the set-backs they experienced in 1932, when the Tory Government of the day decided to cut back on expenditure. It did not matter what kind of expenditure is was. Millions upon millions of young plants were burned. We could have done with that timber today. The Secretary of State will find this fact set out in the Forestry Commission Report of 1932.
    There was a very considerable loss, certainly at national need, during the war. We should recollect the decision taken in 1943 greatly to expand over a long period the build-up not only of reserves but of resources of timber so that near the end to the extent of one-third of the timber we of this century we should be self-sufficient

    1389
    require. One man who deserves considerable credit for this is an ex-Secretary of State for Scotland, Tom Johnston. He not only continued this work but he also made possible by his concentration on building up the power supplies of the Highlands through the Hydro-Electric Board the fact that we are able to have this mill. We could not have a pulp mill without the power which will come from the Hydro-Electric Board.
    All those who sneer at nationalised industries, including the Glasgow Herald, which has talked about the unbusinesslike ramifications of nationalisation, should remember that it is nationalised power which will make this possible. It is the nationalised Forestry Commission and the over-subsidised private owner. More thanks are also due to Dr. Beeching, who has laid aside his preoccupations with profitability and said that this line will stay.
    It is worth considering what would have happened had Dr. Beeching been in his job a year earlier? We have public enterprise in the raw materials, the power, the haulage of the goods and in the financing of it. When we suggest that there might also be a certain measure of public responsibility in the control of it we are told, "Oh no". Where is the Liberal Party tonight? What about its ideas on co-ownership? It is only a fortnight ago that we had another bit of nationalisation in the transport industry of the Orkneys; but I must not get out of order in pursuing that matter. Nevertheless, I think that the Leader of the Liberal Party might have graced us with his presence.
    In this case Dr. Beeching has spared the line, so that the woodmen can get on and they need not spare the trees. I hope that the Secretary of State appreciates that because we got this response on this railway line we are able to achieve this changed location of industry. He will, therefore, equally appreciate the relevance of the question put to him by my hon. Friend the Member for South Ayrshire (Mr. Emrys Hughes), because I do not think that this will be the last of these special Measures. I certainly hope it will not.
    In this connection, I believe that the Town Council of Girvan has been doing a bit of visiting and pressure grouping about what we hope will go to the
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    south-west of Scotland, perhaps to Girvan. I am sure that the hon. Member for Galloway (Mr. Brewis) will wish to put forward some ideas, particularly about the railways there—that is, if he can persuade the Minister of Transport to put the axe on Dr. Beeching in relation to the line in that part of the world. Hon. Members generally should consider the effects of Dr. Beeching's present and, perhaps, future plans for the whole of Britain because I know that other hon. Members have constituency interests in other pulp mills in other parts of the country. For this reason we should not be entirely denuded of the possibilities of getting the goods to the necessary places because of the lack of transport.
    Having handed out the prizes I trust that I will not be accused of churlishness if I look the gift horse in the mouth. We should remember that this is an expensive gift we are making. We all want it done and it will be done; but should it be done in this way? It is certainly not the only way it might have been done. The firm could have built it themelves. I believe that it has 47 subsidiaries, mills all over Britain, some of them in Aberdeen. The company has mills all over the world—in Pakistan, Rhodesia and elsewhere—and has an authorised capital of £25 million. I am sure that the company could have raised the money in the City, although it would probably not have got as reasonable a deal as it has got from the Government.
    However, the firm decided not to do it that way—probably because it realised that the Government were anxious to rehabilitate the area and to secure a growth point there. Failing that, was there any real reason why we could not have gone into partnership with the firm? It is a realistic and reasonable company. This is obvious if one reads the brochure it sent to hon. Members. That document stated:
    "It will, at least for one corner of a neglected land, dam the steady wastage of manpower to the south and overseas".
    Thus we realise that it is a realistic and progressive company—and that it knows the Government for what they are. That "one corner of a neglected land" is, of course, the land over which this Government have had full dominion for the past eleven years.

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    We might well have gone into partnership. I am perfectly sure that a Labour Government would not have ignored the advantages of this company's sales organisation and industrial know-how, but I do not think that our financial conditions and terms would have been exactly the same. I am sure that this country might have accepted partnership. Was that even considered? We are entitled to know.
    Everyone is enthusiastic about this being the right thing to do, but let us remember that, as the hon. Gentleman has said, there were four starters but only one was left by the end of the race. Suppose there had been none—what would the Secretary of State have done then? This is where we differ from the party opposite. We say that in such a case there must be public enterprise, as there is in every other aspect of this project. We could have gone the whole way in public enterprise.
    This project is so important for Scotland, and for this part of Scotland in particular. That is our whole argument in relation to bring industry to Scotland and giving the neglected land, as Wiggins Teape describes Scotland, valuable help. The State contribution is £10 million, and there is to be this £1¼ million to cover the interim period to 1967. This may be a novel project, but it is not a novel Bill—it is familiar. The Cunard Measure was exactly the same, and I hope that Scotland will fare a little better out of this Measure than we did out of that last one, of exactly the same kind. There was a grant of £18 million to Cunard, made up, once again, of one part loan and one part to cover interest charges. I sincerely hope that we shall do better this time.
    The Parliamentary Secretary is quite right in saying that the cost per job rules out the Local Employment Act, but that is just one of the other weaknesses of that Act—that in order to do a necessary job we have to come constantly to Parliament for special legislation. I hope that he learns that lesson. And when he is worried about costs per job, let him remember his last decision in regard to Kilmarnock, when he wrote me a really delightful letter which stated:
    "Our advice was that in view of the relatively high present rate of unemployment in
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    the Kilmarnock area the company would be likely to obtain most if not all of its workers, from the Kilmarnock group of Employment Exchange areas. This being so we have no powers to accept an application."
    We have too high a rate of unemployment in the area, so we cannot get help, not of £10 million but of barely £10,000. However, we have not to judge this enterprise by the cost per job but by what it does to this area and to other areas.
    Let us appreciate that this mill will probably denude still further many parts of that very Highland area. Do not let us under-estimate the task of getting an extra thousand people, perhaps 2,000 people, into the Fort William area. It means that certain other parts of the Highlands will be further denuded and the Secretary of State will have a greater problem than ever before. Much of the labour will be in forests far from Fort William, but we must not close our eyes to the still further need for industry—indeed, industries based still on the products of our forests—in these other areas far from Fort William. If the hon. Gentleman thinks that the public investment stops at £10 million he is quite wrong—it only starts there.
    Let us not minimise the difficulties. The Scotsman carried this comment from Dr. Frankel, the chairman of the new company:
    "More work will need to be done on the roads. Getting them into shape will cost as much as the mill itself."
    Mr. T. Y. Gibson, who is also connected with the firm and is also on one of the advisory committees to the Forestry Commission and, therefore, is not entirely ignorant of the position, said:
    "Unless there is a new approach to the road making, I do not know how we are to get the timber into the mill."
    Who will pay for the road making? It will not be Wiggins Teape. The local authorities will pay for the public highways and the Forestry Commission will pay for the forest roads.
    A community of an additional 1,000 to 2,000 people cannot suddenly be built out of nothing. This will mean tremendous expenditure by the local authority. The Secretary of State for Scotland nipped round that one quickly by giving it to the Scottish Special Housing Association. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will nip round the rent question as well. There will be tremendous

    1393
    local expenditure on the roads, housing and schools, and the regional hospital board will have to spend on hospital services.
    This is all the more reason why we should have an element of responsible partnership, because the prosperity of the whole area will depend on this one firm. A decision by the firm can cause blight. My hon. Friend the Member for the Western Isles (Mr. Malcolm MacMillan) knows that there was one firm which was to have established a large-scale industry in the Highlands. It failed. The Economic Secretary to the Treasury told us the other night that one reason why the Government did not take equity shares in this venture was that there was an element of risk. If there is an element of risk, it is blight. This makes it all the more desirable that there should be a partnership, and parliamentary responsibility, not for day-to-day management but on questions of policy.
    I should have liked to have seen this great enterprise placed under a Highlands development authority. If the Secretary of State does not accept the need for such an authority today, he or some other Secretary of State will eventually accept it. This is the proper approach to the planning of the whole area. This is a pilot scheme which is important not only to the area but to the whole of Scotland. It is not the first scheme that we have had for the Highlands. It is slightly novel only in that it has come about 200 years after the last one.
    This is not the first London company which has taken an interest in the Highlands. It was in 1719 that the Governor and Company of Undertakers for Raising the Thames Water in York Buildings, whatever they were, decided to purchase forfeited estates in the Highlands. One of the estates leased was the Abernethy pine forest of Sir James Grant of Grant. The company set up sawmills and an iron foundry. It had 125 working horses dragging trees to the banks of the Spey. The trees were floated downstream to establish an industry. It has taken 200 years to do anything like it again.
    I sincerely hope that this venture will be the success that it deserves, and which this part of the country certainly needs. Let us not minimise the difficulties nor maximise them, but let us appreciate that apart from the prosperity which the
    1394
    scheme can bring to the area there is, above all, a lesson in it for other pans of Scotland. I hope that the Secretary of State for Scotland, who has shown his interest and his knowledge of this subject in the past, will not stop and be satisfied with this. The forest areas of the south and south-west of Scotland, too, will require a mill, be it a pulp mill or a paper mill.
    I sincerely hope that, in giving a welcome to this Bill, we can look forward to the next one very soon.
    9.5 p.m.
    Mr. Simon Wingfield Digby: The hon. Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. Ross) has spoken a little of the needs of forestry, and I am very glad that he has. He said that there was a lesson in the Bill for other parts of Scotland. My theme will be that there is a lesson in it for other parts of the United Kingdom, too. My reason for intervening in the debate is that I regard the Bill as in some ways a forerunner of what we hope will happen in other places. Indeed, I wish that the Long Title had been a little wider in its terms.
    Fort William is a long way from Dorset, rather too far for Dorset to draw any benefit from this new scheme, but I should be the very last to begrudge the Highlands any financial benefit. I have spent too much of my life there and seen its needs too plainly to feel otherwise. However, I should like to think that we can regard this scheme in a wider context and see what lesson there is in it for other areas of the United Kingdom. My hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary spoke a great deal about the Local Employment Act, and, of course, it is very important at present, but there are many rural areas in the United Kingdom which could well do with a new industry of this kind.
    The hon. Member for Kilmarnock dealt at some length with the principle of giving a loan to this firm and having an element of subsidy. I personally approach anything of that kind with some caution. I do not pretend to understand exactly what is proposed in the Bill and how big the element of subsidy will be. However, in any case, I am very glad that someone has been found to establish a big mill of this kind in a part of the United Kingdom, and a part which needs it very badly indeed.

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    I am very glad that the railroad to Mallaig has been saved. It is, I suppose, really the "Iron Road to the Isles". I only wish that someone would come to my constituency and stave off Dr. Beeching for a few years.
    The Bill is of great interest to areas such as mine where the forests are, perhaps, less concentrated than they are in Scotland. It is important, particularly, because of the growing problem of forestry output in this country. There is a very large public commitment in forestry and there is a considerable private one. The thinnings are coming along very fast, and the problem of marketing is real.
    It is often forgotten that the United Kingdom has the lowest forest area of all the countries of Western Europe and that we now import 90 per cent. of our timber requirements. The hon. Member for Kilmarnock talked of a day when we should have to import only one-third of our requirements. I wish that that day were very much nearer than it is.
    Mr. Ross: Two-thirds.
    Mr. Wingfield Digby: Two-thirds—I am sorry. One striking fact is that the vast imports of foreign timber which we make do not always redound to the advantage of our own exports. We have an unfavourable trade balance, so far as one can determine it, with the four countries which send us most timber, Canada, Sweden, Finland and Russia. We certainly have an unfavourable balance of visible trade with three out of the four. With Canada we have an unfavourable balance already of £154 million. With Finland it is £33 million. With Russia it is £26 million. So it cannot be said that we derive advantage for our own industries by taking these prodigious imports of their timber.
    Some of the imports come in the form of raw timber, but more and more are coming in finished products. The E.F.T.A. Agreement will probably make this problem worse. Therefore, the disposal of our own forest production is of economic advantage, a fact which has not been mentioned very much this evening. These four countries alone send us imports of timber worth £141 million, which is a considerable sum at a time when we are always considering our balance of payments.
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    Woodland output in this country has grown and is growing. The Forestry Commission is planting about 60,000 acres a year and people with private woodlands have planted no less than 345,000 acres since 1946. At present, prices are low and many of the traditional outlets for forest products are no longer open or are diminishing. I think specially of railway wagons in respect of which the demand for second-rate oak is going down very rapidly. The demand for pitprops is declining. The National Coal Board is a rather tough bargainer when it comes to buying home-grown timber for that purpose. The demand for sleepers is declining.
    Mr. Bence: Good old Beeching.
    Mr. John Brewis: Is my hon. Friend aware that nothing but Scottish timber is used in coal mines in Scotland?
    Mr. Digby: I am delighted to hear it. I only wish that that were the case in the whole United Kingdom.
    There are other ways in which this timber will be valuable, because the need for timber in Europe as a whole is increasing. It is estimated that there will be too little timber in Europe for the needs of Europe as a whole in about ten or twenty years' time.
    Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Sir Robert Grimston): Order. I am sorry to interrupt the hon. Gentleman, but I think that he is beginning to stray a little far from the Fort William pulp and paper mill. Perhaps he could indicate how what he is saying is related to the Bill.
    Mr. Digby: I apologise, Mr. Deputy-Speaker. I am trying to show the need to find an outlet for this timber. This mill will find an outlet for a very large amount of timber in the north of England. But in other parts of England the outlet is less secure, and there will be a surplus of this timber unless we are careful.
    Mr. Ross: With all respect to the hon. Gentleman, Fort William and Scotland are not in the north of England.
    Mr. Digby: I beg the hon. Gentleman's pardon.
    Some areas like the Fort William area are suited to a really large mill like a paper mill. Some years ago Canadian experts reported on the use of timber for

    1397
    pulp mills and hardboard mills. Their two excellent reports made clear that a very large forest area was needed in order to establish a pulp mill of the kind we are discussing. My contention is that there are also grounds for establishing more hardboard and chipboard mills. Some of these are in existence already. Hon. Members saw one at Brandon, in East Anglia, not very long ago and were impressed by it. In order to get more of these mills established, help and interest are necessary from the Board of Trade and the Government, and that is why I welcome their action today.
    I do not know the details of this particular scheme, but I believe that it is a step in the right direction. I only wish that the Bill took rather wider powers and did not relate to a single place and a single firm.
    9.14 p.m.
    Mr. A. Woodburn: My hon. Friend the Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. Ross) delicately pointed out to the Secretary of State for Scotland and to the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade that they must not be satisfied in thinking that they have done everything necessary for the development of industry in Scotland.
    I propose not to follow my hon. Friend's hints, but to turn to the rather broader aspect of this problem and to consider what this mill means to Scotland. I welcome it unreservedly, for the reason that I am very glad that the Government have at last done something to show that what they do for the Colonies and for Malta can be done for Scotland: in other words, that the Government are prepared to put money into Scotland to stimulate private enterprise.
    We have always taken the view that we are not against private enterprise doing the job in the Highlands. Tonight, in fact, the Secretary of State, the President of the Board of Trade and myself agreed to a development area being established in the Highlands for the very purpose of inducing private enterprise to come there. We have always taken the view that the simplest way of getting development is to start with private enterprise. If private enterprise does not come in—and it has not done so very much until now—we have taken the view that public instruments such as the
    1398
    Forestry Commission and the Hydro-Electric Board should be used to stimulate industry in the Highlands. If all these fail, the State itself has a duty to maintain the population in that part of the country by putting industry there.
    I quite agree that to find a ready-made agency such as the firm in question to go into the Highlands is the simplest way, because it has its marketing arrangements, the scheme fits in with its already-established business and this is the quickest and simplest way of getting it done.
    I cannot work up any passion about an interest rate of 5½ per cent. being easy money. If I had had to borrow the money to build my house at 5½ per cent., I would have felt that I was being "sweated", even by the local authority. We take exception to these high rates of interest, because they are one of the handicaps against anybody starting business in the Highlands or anywhere else.
    My hon. Friend the Member for Kilmarnock forgets, I am sure, that we are partners in this industry. If it makes profits, the Chancellor will take 50 per cent. of them. Therefore, if it makes profits, we shall share in them. This firm is nationalised, but does not know it. Nowadays, the distinction between private and public enterprise is a great deal of nonsense. Hon. Members opposite should give up all the humbug which they talk about private and public enterprise. Today, the country is a mixed economy, as the late "Nye" Bevan called it. It is working as a mixed economy and the State has a share not only in the financing, but in the profitability of every firm in the country.
    There is no reason why we should not get a bigger share, but I am quite willing to be generous to get firms into the Highlands. I am quite willing that the Government should spend a little more money on them and a little less on Cunard aircraft and other enterprises which are not necessary. No objection is raised when this kind of thing is done down here in this part of Britain. We can allow the Government to be a little generous, and even extravagant, if they are bringing industry into the Highlands.
    That is tremendously important. In the past, when the trees left the Highlands, the people left the Highlands. When we were the Government, after the war, we

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    were convincd that the one way to get the population back to the Highlands was to bring back trees to the Highlands. When we start planting a forest such as the Forest of Ae, we establish a village for the workers who will plant the trees. By the time the trees are 20 years old, the families of the foresters in the village are growing up and work is already waiting for them in the thinning of the forests twenty years after their fathers have planted them. A forest automatically creates work for generation after generation. This is one of the most hopeful things ever to have happened to the Highlands. If we can go on planting trees, we will make it possible for more and more people to live in the Highlands.
    It is true that this project will involve roads. I have no worry whatever about who will pay for the roads. I was pleased that the hydro-electric people came in and had to build roads. I will be quite pleased if the Forestry Corn-mission has to build roads. So long as the Highlands get roads, we will get arteries on which the Highlands can live. If the new project brings roads, we will welcome them. Somebody will have to pay for them, and I hope that it will be the Government, through the local authorities, rather than leave it to everybody else.
    One of the advantages of Fort William is that it does not altogether depend upon roads, because trees can be brought by sea. A great number of them, as well as the hardboard, will be brought in. If there is any failure in our own timber, it is almost as easy to bring timber from Newfoundland to Fort William as from Ross-shire or even Ayrshire. Therefore, this is a very good place for such a mill. It need never run short of timber because timber can come by sea, as some is already destined to come. I hope that the project will be a great success and will carry the prospect of a greater development of forestry.
    The Labour Government, after the war, were so convinced of the importance of forestry that a programme of fifty years' planting was established for the Forestry Commission and private woodlanders. Here again, there is a combination of the community and private woodlanders. I pay tribute to
    1400
    private woodlanders. Most of our knowledge of the science of forestry arises from the fact that in the past rich men made a plaything of growing forests; they loved trees and experimented with them in the Highlands for generations.
    As my hon. Friend said, these people are very generously treated by the State to encourage them to continue with tree development, but it is a very important contribution to the general realm of forestry. We sell them the seeds and also the trees. The Forestry Commission grows the plants and sells them to private woodlanders, who thus become agents for the growing of forests.
    Mr. Brewis: Would it not be fair to say that Wiggins Teape also brought to the project 200 years of experience of paper-making, which was very valuable?
    Mr. Woodburn: The hon. Gentleman is taking a ready-made instrument instead of having to establish it and gain experience. It is very useful, and one does not want to throw away skill and enterprise. If we were doing it ourselves, we should still have to bring in people with experience and skill. Whatever may be the agency—a nationalised board or a firm—it is a matter of convenience and not of principle. All the contest about nationalisation is the biggest bogy that eve' afflicted British politics. I wish that we would stop it and get on with the common sense of the business and help to develop Scotland.
    Mr. Manuel: My right hon. Friend is talking to hon. Members opposite.
    Mr. Woodburn: They have humbugged themselves and everybody else for a generation. Every General Election has been fought on this nonsense. A former Secretary of State for Scotland started nationalising shipping just after he had won a General Election by opposing nationalisation.
    One or two problems arise about which I want to ask questions. Reference has been made to sawdust, a very great byproduct. One of our problems during the war was to discover what we could do with sawdust. The Germans devised a process to combine it with certain byproducts—nitrate, I think—from munitions manufacture and turned it into a

    1401
    food for animals. I do not know whether such experiments will be conducted in Scotland, but it is important to get the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research to go into the problem of what we can do with the sawdust. I should like to know whether it is capable of being used in the pulp mill, or, as it is sawdust, has the fibre been destroyed so that it can serve no useful purpose in the mill? This is a problem which should be tackled.
    The Parliamentary Secretary said that we should get plenty of fresh water. But how long will it be fresh after the mill has been established? Some of my hon. Friends and I live on rivers where the salmon have been completely wiped out by the pollution from paper and other mills. Is the whole of Loch Linnhe to be polluted? What will happen?
    Mr. D. Price: I can give the right hon. Gentleman an assurance on this point. This is one of the advantages of the new Stora process as against the Kraft process. The Kraft process gives a great deal of effluent and air pollution. I shall be happy to write to the right hon. Gentleman about the slightly more technical details which I feel it would not be appropriate to give here. I can assure him that the local objections which arose when the idea of a paper mill was first broached have been satisfied, and I understand that even the fish in Loch Linnhe are reasonably content about the project.
    Mr. Woodburn: If we could get the German process we might convert it into food production.
    Is all the quality timber to be eaten up by this mill? There is beautiful quality timber there. One of my projects was to establish a Remploy factory at Cannich, in the middle of a huge area of forest, to produce furniture. Could we not approach Sir Isaac Wolfson, or someone else who has a good market for furniture, to see whether he would take a furniture factory to this area?
    This project is only a growth point and we want it to grow still further. This will be a centre from which other industries could spread out, using the timber of the forest. Certainly, quality timber could be used for furniture and other products. I believe that larch is used for bobbins in mills and there are certain side products of timber.
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    Then there is the possibility of developing industries for women. If one is to have a population of men working in this factory one must provide industries for the women. I had an arrangement—[HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] I think that most men have—which I thought would come to success. This was with the Wilton carpet firm, for these carpets are capable of being made domestically. This is an area where there are sheep as well and, certainly, carpet manufacture would be a good ancillary industry. A man in Drumnadrochit developed a Celtic pattern and I understood that it could have been a success.
    Perhaps the people of the Highlands will develop a passion for the factory hooter, which they have never had before. An Indian maharajah once saw a crowd rushing along the street to the sound of a whistle. He thought that this was magical, for he had great difficulty in getting people to work in the morning. It seemed to him that all one had to do in this country to get them to work was to blow a whistle. People in the Highlands, however, have never experienced that whistle. Now that they are to get it, will they like it? They are now to enjoy what we call modern civilisation. Up to now, they have been content to hunt, fish and shoot even though this did not give them much of a living. But perhaps modern machines and factory life will draw them, and in that case the women should have a share in the prosperity.
    I welcome this project. Like my hon. Friend the Member for Kilmarnock, I hope that the Secretary of State and the President of the Board of Trade will not feel too satisfied and will not grow weary of well doing. I hope that they will not think that the job is finished with this project. This is just a swallow which I hope will herald a little more summer for the Highlands instead of the wintry blasts from the Government and industry that the Highlands have experienced in the past. Perhaps here will grow a nucleus which will act as a magnet to attract other industries to it. I wish it every success.
    9.30 p.m.
    Mr. W. M. F. Vane: My hon. Friend the Member for Dorset, South (Mr. Wingfield Digby) has spoken of this as being an enterprise that will

    1403
    clearly be of great advantage to this area. My hon. Friend has spoken, too, about it being not just a local issue, even though the Title of the Bill leads us to believe this. This is a very important national decision. I think that we in the House of Commons this evening ought to try to see it in its true proportion.
    Large sums of money are involved, and that, in itself, had cast doubts on the long-term soundness of the future of the timber industry in this area and beyond. Furthermore, there are important policy decisions here concerning the whale of the United Kingdom, not just Scotland, which we should consider, because, of course, the House of Commons has its duties. I think that we are entitled to know more about, and have full answers to, a number of questions, some of which hon. Members opposite have asked the Secretary of State, before we leave the Bill this evening.
    In broad terms, what I think that we would all like to know is what is the policy for the utilisation of home-grown timber in the United Kingdom, which will increase rapidly in quantity every year, and which is already in far too great a volume 'to be absorbed by many existing rural industries.
    Secondly, what are the full commitments under the Bill? The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Clackmannan and East Stirlingshire (Mr. Woodburn) has already spoken about the possibilities of a large outlay on roads. As we are considering large sums even in the initial stage, I think that we ought to think beyond that, because the costs of nearly everything—not just 10, Downing Street—in the end turn out to be very much larger than the estimates first represent. Then we have the secondary development to consider. Perhaps the roads are the biggest item, but there will be housing commitments, and, what I think is the most important of all, what precedents are we here setting, because the problem within 100 miles of Fort William is not unique to that district.
    The problem repeats itself to a large extent in other parts of the country. Here I think that I should declare my interest according to tradition. An hon. Member referred to the fact, and I think that it
    1404
    is well-known, that I have been interested in timber problems. I am a woodland owner and, at one time, I was a member of the Forestry Commission Utilisation Committee—and a good Committee it was, although on too small a scale to deal adequately with this very large commercial problem now facing it. I am also a small shareholder in Wiggins, Teape. I did not buy the shares when this Bill was proposed. I have had them for a very long time. [An HON. MEMBER: "Have you sold them."] I have not sold them. Although I am not a Scotsman, I may stand to gain some small things from this project if it is successful, that is to say, if it reduces the competition in the north of England for the Scottish timber now flooding over the Border, dumped timber as we call it, because there cannot be found a sufficient outlet for it in Scotland.
    I hope that my right hon. Friend will tell us tonight what is the Government's policy for the home-timber industry which, I think, it is admitted on both sides of the House is not in too good a state. Every Government in turn since the war has hedged upon this point. They have talked about planting. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Stirlingshire did so today. All the emphasis has been on planting and very little attention has been given to what would happen at the end of the day—and the day was not such a long one. My right hon. Friend the Minister of Agriculture has done more, I think, than any other Minister since the war on this commercial side. There was a conference of timber interests in his Department not long ago, but that ought to have happened thirty years ago and we would by now have been a long way further ahead than we are.
    Only the other day the impression was being given that we in the forestry world ought, like farmers and fishermen, to be thinking much more about the marketing side of the industry than has been the case to date. However, unlike farmers and fishermen, there was no money to help any of these schemes or enterprises. But, suddenly, £10 million is written into a Bill and we are asked to approve it.
    Why is there this lack of interest in the marketing of timber? I think that all are to blame, private foresters and

    1405
    the timber trade. If I may use the word, the infrastructure of the timber industry is probably very short of working capital. The Forestry Commission has used its great influence to date almost entirely in the growing of trees. I stand behind no one in my admiration of the technical and silvicultural achievements of the Forestry Commission, but the organisation of the commercial and salesman side is a long way behind a normal commercial undertaking with a capital of about £180 milion, a long way behind what Unilever or Shell, for instance, would think necessary to deal with such big business. Hence we have the present situation, and it is not limited to Fort William and the neighbourhood.
    I exempt the present heads of the Forestry Commission from any charge which may be read into my sentences. I know that they are working hard to make up for lost time, but meanwhile there is a lot of unsaleable timber on their hands and on the hands of private woodland owners, or the Government would not otherwise be coming along and suggesting that we should approve the expenditure of about £10 million on one project.
    In a certain sense, whatever great advantages it will bring to this neighbourhood, the Bill is a rescue operation rather than part of a properly considered policy. Nor does it fit in entirely with my right hon. Friend's Answers to recent Questions, particularly from my hon. Friend the Member for Rye (Mr. Godman Irvine), who is not here at the moment but to whom it was suggested that the setback in the market for timber was only temporary or short-term. If the set-back is only temporary or short-term, is it really necessary for us to start joint financing of a scheme in the Highlands on this scale? It looks as though the setback is more serious than it was represented to be the other day.
    Those who follow these things will have noticed how in the last year approaches for help by different sections of the industry in various projects, modest help, too, have been turned down. The Timber Merchants Co-operative—and the word "co-operative" is magic in this connection—wanted a very small sum of money, between £5,000 and £10,000 a year for three years, to try to educate
    1406
    merchants and consumers about the qualities of our home-grown timber.
    The right hon. Member for East Stirlingshire (Mr. Woodburn) will be interested in this, because the furniture trade looks automatically to supplies from overseas, and the good oak such as we have around us here panelling this Chamber is used in the trade only for work of this very high quality. The normal Ministry of Works type of desk is mostly made of Japanese oak or some such equivalent. However, the suggestion that there should be some help with the sort of work which the right hon. Gentleman had in mind was turned down on the ground that it did not have the support of a sufficiently large section of the trade, although it had the support of most of the trade, and because it was not usual for Government aid to be given to middle men or processors. It is strange having had those reasons that out of the blue £10 million should be provided for one firm of processors.
    Mr. Bruce Millan: I am very interested in the arguments of the hon. Member for Westmorland (Mr. Vane) in this respect, but was he not the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture at the lime? What did he do about it when he was there?
    Mr. Vane: I took a lot of interest in this subject, but the hon. Member does not understand the constitutional relationship between the Forestry Commission and the Minister of Agriculture. I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend for doing something which none of his predecessors had done. In any event, surely the House of Commons is the place where hon. Members are expected to say what they think about issues which come before them for discussion. Here we have something quite inconsistent with what has happened before, and I hope that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland will be able to give us something of a broader picture as well as answering the more local questions.
    It must not be thought that pulp is the one and only outlet needed in the marketing of softwood timber. There are many others. Nor must it be thought that Fort William is the one and only area where this problem arises. Can we be told what the position would be if a similar case were put to the Government for the

    1407
    North-East of Scotland, where the circumstances are similar, and in the South-West where there is an area of timber which could be deemed appropriate to some such development?
    The north of England is better prepared, but Devon could claim that from the timber marketing point of view it was the worst area in England, and possibly in the United Kingdom. Are we to understand that, if we give the Bill a Second Reading we are committed to spending about £10 million to £12 million every time another area can represent a similar case? If so, I think that we ought to have this cleared up.
    It is no good talking about this as a first step. We ought to judge this most important proposal against the broad background of policy decisions. If my right hon. Friend is not able to tell us tonight what these policy decisions are. I hope that he or his hon. Friend will be able to do so before we part with this Bill and it goes to another place, because it is putting things in the wrong order to present us with this Bill without our knowing the broad lines of policy. This should have been done in the reverse order. I say that without any criticism of this project. I think that this has been presented to us in the wrong order, and I am sure that there are other hon. Members who feel the same as I do in this regard.
    9.40 p.m.
    Mr. Malcolm MacMillan: I think that most hon. Members on this side of the House have a great deal of sympathy with the point of view of the hon. Member for Westmorland (Mr. Vane). Certainly, many of the questions which he asked will help to shorten our speeches.
    When my right hon. Friend the Member for Clackmannan and East Stirlingshire (Mr. Woodburn) was speaking, I was reminded of a story of the Korean war, when an American officer met an aged Korean who had had all his clothes blown away in the heat of battle. The American asked this old Korean, "How does it feel to be liberated?" The Korean replied, "I can only say that we are like a blade of grass which does not care very much whether it is eaten by a horse or by a cow".
    1408
    When it comes to the choice of employment being provided by private enterprise, or public enterprise, my right hon. Friend seems to be driven to very much the same conclusion. If people are desperate enough for jobs, and there is no other prospect of them being provided, they will grab the first prospect that comes along and hail it with the enthusiasm displayed for the Bill by my right hon. Friend.
    My right hon. Friend had, of course, some reservations about this project, just as I have, and as I am sure that even the Secretary of State for Scotland has. But people suffering from job hunger are rather uncritical on the amount of expenditure per job created. On the other hand, here is something happening in the Highlands which has not even faintly looked like happening for a long time past. We had almost given up hope of any sort of relatively large-scale employment projects coming to the Highland areas.
    I am glad and I welcome this project for the employment it will provide, for the relief from the desperate need for employment it will bring, and for the better standards it will, I hope, provide for at least a few thousand people out of the 100,000 and more in Scotland who are still looking for jobs. The total number of jobs estimated to be provided by this project is not large against a background of the present figure of around 120,000 to 130,000 unemployed in Scotland, but in the Highland areas it will make a big contribution to an extremely difficult situation.
    When I say that, I add that we must aim at keeping the natural and proper distribution of population in the Highlands by the proper distribution of industry, and not permit gross over-centralisation. This project, as one part of a wider pattern of Highland industrial development, is welcome; but it is only the beginning and not the end of such things. As the hon. Member for Westmorland said, there are other areas, like the Scottish North-East, with great forestry resources, and there will still be difficulties in that area even in supplying Fort William with timber, because one comes up against difficult and costly transport problems. So we in the North-West in spite of our own difficulties would wish to be a little unselfish and ask more for the North-East and also

    1409
    than that it should be used merely to supply material for a project of this kind in the Fort William scheme.
    I hops that Fort William will recruit in and from the Highlands population as much as possible. On the other hand, we must bear in mind the importance of not attracting populations away from other areas wholesale. The Secretary of State may smile at this, and it may sound contrary. But he knows that dilemma; and we must be sure that we shall not wholly denude areas which, because of their own lack of industrial development, have been losing population so rapidly that they are reaching the point of no return. The right hon. Gentleman must, therefore, do a lot of other things in a lot of other places very soon if the Fort William project is not to drain other outlying communities in such a way as to cause much harm.
    Mr. Vane: The hon. Gentleman should bear in mind that there are other paper-making ventures in different parts of the country which may feel that this affects their business.
    Mr. MacMillan: I quite understand that. I must put in this reservation. That there is sometimes the selfish point of view as well. In areas where there is little unemployment, it is possible to find people who will object immediately when there is a sudden drawing on the labour force in their area locally or by other areas. I came up against this in connection with another less creative development project, the proposed South Uist rocket range project, which eventually collapsed. There were some local employers who objected that local labour would be in great demand for the range, and the reason they gave was it would mean that wages would be forced up by Government employment and competition for workers. But still there is a case for the North-East and, as the hon. Gentleman has said, for the South-West of Scotland as well.
    This has been a most interesting debate so far—perhaps I had better be modest and underline the words "so far". The essential long-term work here has been done by responsible public planning. Planting is planning and when we plant we are planning long term. It is a thirty, forty, fifty or sixty years'
    1410
    job—a job spread over generations before anything more than the first results in thinnings are discernible. Fundamentally afforestation, it has been a State undertaking and there is no getting away from that.
    I should like the Secretary of State to tell us more about what was mentioned by the hon. Member for Westmoreland when he spoke of the difficulties about disposing surpluses, existing internal surplus. Our difficulty in connection with the supply of timber in two world wars taught us something rather different from that problem. In the First World War about 4 per cent. or 5 per cent.— possibly 6 per cent.—of the total requirements of the country were provided from our own domestic supplies. Immediately after the war the Acland Committee was set up and everyone was enthusiastic about big scale afforestation. Then the economy axe fell in 1931–32 and there was a recession in planting and reafforestation. In the middle of the last war, in 1943, we went into another planting timber supply panic when we realised that we could again supply from our domestic resources only about 4 per cent. of the war-time timber needs. The rest had to run the blockade. A 30-year scheme was put into operation, and we have good reason to be grateful that it was.
    I wish to ask the Secretary of State whether he is satisfied that this Fort William project will meet all or most of its requirements from domestic supplies? Are we not to import, and to what extent from, say, Scandinavia? In passing, may I ask whether, if the Ministry of Works is using Japanese timber, as the hon. Member opposite has said, for desks, the Ministry of Labour does the same creating less home jobs than it might? Perhaps the Ministries could set an example. What will be the position regarding imparts for Fort William and to what extent is the Minister satisfied that suitable timber will be available from Scottish and United Kingdom sources?
    I wish to ask the Secretary of State another question which is vital to the Fort William area and (the North-West. What is to be the position regarding transportation of timber from, say, around Kintail and that area? I have no doubt that the hon. Member for

    1411
    Ross and Cromarty (Mr. John MacLeod) will have that question very much in mind. It is in the county which we both represent.
    This will be a big question. We want to know exactly what the effect of the Beeching policy will be in that area upon railways and therefore in the new burden cast upon the inadequate single-track roads. The Secretary of State has gone so often on record recently with the assurance that it is only over his dead body that anybody will close the Highland railways before the roads and other services are suitable to meet the requirements, that I hardly dare ask him to underline it again tonight. I take it from what he said that no question can possibly arise, with his agreement at any rate, of the closing of railway lines in our north-western part of Scotland until an adequate service by road has been provided. In other words, the roads and the services must be provided before any railways are closed down. Not that I agree with any closure in that area.
    Once the mill has been built we shall have a fairly heavy weight of traffic, additional to the present traffic upon the roads almost right up to Kyle of Lochalsh. This is now to serve and be part of a developing timber-using and supply area, and if this project means as much as the Minister said it did, and as everyone is convinced it ought to mean, the railways and roads and the transport question will take on far more importance even than they have now. I therefore urge the Minister to give urgent priority to retaining the North Western railway line as well as the rail route to Fort William and Mallaig. Quite apart from the route to Fort William, the rail line from Kyle will be in many ways as important, and I hope that the Secretary of State has this very much in mind.
    The point was well made by my hon. Friend the Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. Ross) that Government spending on this project in direct assistance to the firm is only the beginning of the public expenditure. Local authorities will be responsible for putting in the public services such as new and improved roads, water supplies and other services. In addition, the housing problem will only partly be solved by the housing association, which cannot solve it all. The Hydro-Electric
    1412
    Board will be called upon to make a contribution by making supply extensions in various directions, because additional electricity supplies will be needed for many purposes.
    I hope that in his enthusiasm for this project, which with certain reservations we share, the Secretary of State has had regard to forest conservancy considerations, which are extremely important. We cannot chop down forests all over the place without care, without expecting detrimental results from these activities. There are many lessons from history in every continent along these lines—the creation of great dust bowls and deserts, for example. We cannot knock forests down and expect there to have no effect. We must have regard to the whole ecological cycle and background and implications. Within that, we must adopt a very careful conservancy policy, bearing in mind the long-term effects and needs. There must therefore be a substantial and early stepping up of afforestation and planting programmes at the same time as we speed up deforestation.
    I should like to think of the Bill as the act of Governmental charity it has been called by some; but it is nothing of the kind. The trees happen to be there in the Highlands. They do not happen to be somewhere else. We therefore have to develop in this area. In the same way, the water power is in the Highlands and we must develop the hydro-electricity industry there. This applies to many other things.
    We welcome the Bill, with the reservations which I have mentioned. I am sure that the Secretary of State agrees that this is only the first word and the first step, and not the last word and the last step in industrialisation, along appropriate lines, in the Highlands and Islands of Scotland for which we have waited so long.
    The use of timber by-products could also be made a highly important source of employment, but I hope that any employment which is created will be under factory conditions and fully insurable conditions for the workers concerned. We want no more outworkers uncovered for unemployment and industrial injury insurance. We want people who are fully insured and fully covered by wages agreements and standards of employment no less than those in the industrial areas throughout the country.
    9.55 p.m.
    Mr. John MacLeod: I am very pleased to follow the hon. Member for the Western Isles (Mr. Malcolm MacMillan), who represents the other half of my county of Ross-shire. I agree with much of what he said. As a Member for a Highland constituency, I am naturally, very excited that this pulp mill is to be built in the Highlands. It is one of the most exciting things that has happened to us since, perhaps, the Hydro-Electric Board was established in the Highland area. I have been talking about this scheme for twelve years.
    At one time I tried to get a pulp mill in the Invergordon area. The experts then assured me that it was probably better to have it, if it could be established, at Fort William. I am now glad that it has come to Fort William, because it will have implications far wider than the immediate area of Fort William.
    It is on these implications that I should like to dwell for a little tonight. They were dealt with fairly extensively by my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade and by the hon. Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. Ross). As the hon. Members for Kilmarnock and the Western Isles said, we do not want to see all the labour taken away from areas of large population, but the only answer I can give—I have always said this—is that it is far better to stop the people somewhere on the fringe of the Highland area itself than to see them drift right down to the South, as they have been doing for years.
    My hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary said that the company had been receiving letters from emigrants who want to come back to the region. This influx should certainly help. Other Highlanders who have gone abroad may want to come back. My own forebears went away from the Highlands because there was no work for them. I feel this very deeply. It is very encouraging to hear that the firm has received letters from people who want to return to the area.
    This project will certainly be a very good investment on the Government's part, because it will help to stimulate other industries in the area. The right hon. Member for Clackmannan and East Stirlingshire (Mr. Woodburn) spoke of uses to which wood could be put. He mentioned furniture.
    1414
    One hopes that this will help to encourage other industries in the area to make use of timber. I hope that the company will use as many materials and as much equipment as possible which are produced, not in this country, but in Scotland, because after all we hope that this will benefit Scotland.
    The hon. Member for the Western Isles asked the Minister from what area this home-grown timber will come. Will it come from the whole of Scotland; or will it be necessary to go out of Scotland into the north of England to get supplies?
    As we know, the Forestry Commission and private owners will now have an outlet for their timber. I hope that this will encourage some people in the areas of the Highlands where it is questionable whether agricultural land is productive. I hope, taking the long-term view, that it will encourage some of these people to plant on land where it is questionable whether fanning is productive. As the hon. Member for Kilmarnock said, this is a natural, indigenous raw material.
    It being Ten o'clock, the debate stood adjourned.
    Proceedings on the Fort William Pulp and Paper Mills Bill exempted, at this day's Sitting, from the provisions of Standing Order No. 1 (Sittings of the House).—[Mr. Noble.]
    Question again proposed, That the Bill be now read a Second time.
    Mr. MacLeod: There is no doubt that the lack of railways would disrupt the transport and communications of the area. This aspect of communications, particularly roads, was mentioned by the hon. Member for the Western Isles. My right hon. Friend has also said that more forestry roads must be built to bring out the timber.
    I hope that there will be more coordination with the local authorities when the placing of roads is considered before they are built, not only for forest roads but also for those needed by the hydro-electricity boards. There has not been this co-ordination in the past and if it were to exist greater use could be made of these roads by the local inhabitants.
    I hope that my right hon. Friend will also consider the bridge at Fort William over the River Lochie and whether it

    1415
    will be adequate to take the weight of the transport across it. I hope, therefore, that the new bridge will be sanctioned immediately. Bridges lead me to sea communications, which was mentioned by the right hon. Member for East Stirlingshire. In this respect, the hon. Member for the Western Isles represents a seafaring area and he will agree that it is hoped that we will be able to develop more of our sea communications.
    I hope that my right hon. Friend has looked into these questions—and I have discussed them with my friends in the north of Scotland—because I wonder whether it would be possible to build some small piers along the Western seaboard, from where the maximum amount of timber will emanate It might be possible for the timber to be transported from the higher ground to these small piers and harbours. I suggest that it might be possible to have a modern type of "puffer" which could call in at the small piers and thereby save a great deal of expenditure on new roads. These "puffers" could be used for other purposes, including the development of lime deposits, bringing lime back to the more remote areas from where the timber is coming; and that would help the farming land, which lacks lime.
    All this represents an exciting and intriguing development if the possible events are followed through to their logical conclusion. We hope that greater use will be made of the Caledonian Canal to bring more supplies from Invergordon and the Black Isle and Moray Firth areas, and I hope that the Secretary of State will say something about this when he replies to the debate.
    It is interesting to note that Wiggins Teape and Company has entered into a 20-year contract with British Railways. I wonder whether the mill would have been built there had the railway been closed. I hope that the Secretary of State will take note of this fact and remember how important railways are north of Inverness. I hope that he will see that the railways are not closed until we have proved that we cannot get the industries we want in the area and we have tackled the problem of adequate alternative transport.
    A further practical question is the supply of electricity. The Minister has
    1416
    said that at some future date there will be an extension of the mill for the addition of another machine, and that will mean further use of electricity. I know that in Ross-shire, at least on paper, two projects have recently been put forward, but there still remains the vexed question of the Nevis scheme. I hope that the Minister will announce that there is to be a public inquiry into this scheme, without any more nonsense about holding up the electricity supplies that will be needed in that area.
    I have no doubt that this project will be of great benefit to the North. We all hope that it will lead to further development there. What must be remembered is that in the North we are no longer remote. One hon. Member spoke about the far North, but the Highlands are not remote. Nowhere in Great Britain is any longer remote. If we can go to Canada and America in six hours it is nonsense to talk about the Highlands being remote.
    I hope that business executives will note that they can get to Wick, Orkney, or Shetland in an hour or an hour and a half; that they can go to their parties in London and the South, if they want to, at the end of a hard day's work, and still manage their businesses in the North. With their increasing supplies of electricity, and by other means, the Highlands can and will play their part in the national interest.
    10.7 p.m.
    Mr. Archie Manuel: I welcome the interest shown tonight by English hon. Members, and I extend an invitation to them to attend more of our Scottish debates, as this debate essentially is. We do not have enough of them—we are too insular. I should like to see more hon. Members getting together to try to get the best from debates, representing the views of their own areas, and telling us their opinions about any aspect of a Scottish Bill. We do the same with United Kingdom Bills and English Bills.
    I warmly welcome this Measure, which will have a rich, rejuvenating influence over a very wide area, stretching west of Fort William and north-east to the areas mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for the Western Isles (Mr. Malcolm MacMillan). The Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade spoke of a

    1417
    radius of 100 miles. I do not know whether that means that we shall be getting timber from Dumfries, which is about that distance away, but we shall be out at sea in every other direction.
    This is a project that undoubtedly catches the imagination. I know the area particularly well—better than any hon. Member now present. I was brought up in it. I fish there occasionally. I climb hills there—some of them have fences around them that I am not supposed to go through, but I go through, because I have always been against the idea of fences being put up to keep deer in and people out.
    I can remember in my younger school days seeing fairly extensive areas covered with fine timber, first reaching maturity and then very often going past it and being blown down by the strong gales we have in the West. It was a scene of chaos and confusion, and there was a great deal more trouble in getting the timber out of the forest than there would have been if the forestry had been properly regulated.
    I do not think that I can pay tribute to any woodland owner. After receiving money from the timber merchant, who took the timber from Arisaig and other stations on the Mallaig line and then floated it to Glasgow, the owner took no steps to replant the area properly. I started as a forestry worker as a youngster and my father was employed in the industry. Therefore I know something about it. There was a great lack of planting in the areas once the money had been taken out by the lairds and woodland owners. I would not pay the tribute which my right hon. Friend the Member for Clackmannan and East Stirlingshire (Mr. Woodburn) paid to them in this connection.
    The consequence was that the Forestry Commission had to do the job. It has done it very well, but it has been curbed and crabbed in its activities and its programme is behind schedule. I do not know what views the Secretary of State for Scotland holds on this subject or whether he intends to obtain more capital from the Treasury to keep the planting abreast of the times. The Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade mentioned that a million tons of timber were imported into the country and 8 million were home-grown, or some such figures of that kind.
    The Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. Michael Noble): The figures mentioned were 8 million hoppus feet homegrown, and 4 million hoppus feet imported.
    Mr. Manuel: How long will this continue? Will there be a greater percentage of imported timber in future? Thinnings have not been used economically in the more inaccessible areas. I have asked Questions about this, but I have had no satisfactory answers and I do not know what is happening to them.
    I hope to say something about the transport problems involved in this project when we come to debate Dr. Beeching's Report, but I wanted to men-lion a matter which was touched upon by my hon. Friend the Member for the Western Isles in connection with the public money which will be spent, quite apart from what is to come from the taxpayer in the shape of the £10 million loan and the interest-free percentage over the first three years. Undoubtedly a great deal of public money will be spent in the area on providing houses. It will not be easy to find sites, and when sites are found building will be much more expensive than it is in the South. There are no brickworks there and building components will have to be brought in over long distances. I hope the Secretary of State will recognise that it is not enough to say that the Scottish Special Housing Association will undertake this work. He must not put too great a financial yoke around the necks of the county council or the borough council as such. The rents of the S.S.H.A. houses will be very high indeed in that area.
    Wiggins Teape is receiving substantial help. In my view, if the Government are providing more than half the capital outlay and public money is to be used to pay the interest on the loan over the first three years, the Government ought to have representation on the board and have something to do with policy. This is the way it ought to have been done. I warmly welcome this venture at Fort William, but it is monstrous that, if this company had dropped out along with the other three which were in the bidding at the beginning, this project would not have gone on because of the ideology of the Government. It is monstrous to condemn an area to decay, neglect and further depopulation because of their views.

    1419
    Now, a few words about the forestry workers themselves. I know quite a number of the workers in the forestry areas of Inverness and Argyllshire itself. It is fairly young timber in parts of Argyllshire, fairly young plantings, but it is interesting to think of the young plantings down at Lochshielside where there is not even a road. There is MacBrayne's little vessel serving the 21 miles of the loch between Glenfinnan and Acharacle, but there are no roads at all. There will be much more public expenditure necessary than the £10 million, and this will fall on the local authorities to a great extent.
    I want the Secretary of State to bear this in mind and to remember, also, that far more workers will be required in the actual forest areas for the extraction of thinnings and getting out the matured timber. There must be an augmented forest labour force, and, if the wages in the factory areas are to be fairly high compared with the £8 or £9 a week of the forestry worker, the Secretary of State will have to pay careful attention to this social aspect of the matter. The forestry workers will have to be paid a sufficient wage to meet the rents of the houses which are to be built in the forest areas for the augmented labour force which will be required.
    I know of several places where very great mistakes of policy have been made in the provision of houses for forestry workers. I have in mind an area at Loch Doilet on Lochshielside where there is no road, no connection with anywhere, and no social amenities, but where the Government have provided 15 or 20 forest houses and expect people to live in them. It would have been far better to put these 15 or 20 houses at Acharacle, Strontian or Salen, three villages round there, where forestry vehicles travel each day to take the part-time workers to and fro.
    Mr. J. Grimond: The hon. Gentleman is stressing the importance of good communications. The Forestry Commission has, in fact, done this in some places and done it successfully.
    Mr. Manuel: It is not for me to try to find fault where things have been done correctly. I am finding fault where, in the heart of the forest, 15 or 20 houses have been set down with no amenities
    1420
    at all, not even a road, where life is very difficult for the womenfolk and where the proper education of children is a great problem. The best thing to do is to build houses, when a small number of them is required in cases like this, added to one of the villages which are accessible to the forest area. If this had been done, there would have been a more contented labour force and there would not have been so many changes in it. Families would have been much more contented.
    One of the best aspects of the scheme is that is will put a stop, to some extent, to the number of school leavers who are leaving the Highlands. There is not much employment in Argyllshire to which school leavers can go. The job opportunities just do not exist. This scheme can provide the job opportunities and the focal point for people who are at present migrating to Glasgow and further South to remain in the Highlands. I warmly welcome this new industrial enterprise, but I am sorry that the Government have not taken a stake in it and have not made sure of having a say in policy because of the financial help which they are giving to this firm.
    10.21 p.m.
    Sir Colin Thornton-Kemsley: There were very disquieting rumours about last autumn that this eagerly awaited project was not, after all, to materialise. I am sure that Scotland owes a great deal to the Government, and, particularly, to the Secretary of State for Scotland for making it possible.
    The need for this project is emphasised dramatically if we consider the increase in United Kingdom plantings of trees during the post-war period. Figures were published in The Times earlier this year in a remarkable article by Captain A. L. P. F. Wallace of Candacraig. He showed that in the ten years 1940–49 the average number of plantings per annum was 27,000. In 1950–59, the average had increased to 83,000 and from 1960 to 1962 it had increased to 93,000. That means that there will be a greatly increased output of thinnings in the years ahead, for which there is a steadily contracting market.
    I should, as others have done, declare an interest in the growing of trees. Although we may not be able to send them as far afield as Fort William the whole market for thinnings will improve.

    1421
    The difficulty in Scotland in recent years has been that the National Coal Board, because of its policy of pit closures, and because of mechanisation at the coal face, has had a very small requirement for pit wood. The 250,000 tons a year of Scottish softwood which the mills will require will have a considerable impact on the forestry industry in North and West Scotland.
    The hon. Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. Ross) spoke about the contribution which public enterprise would be making to the establishment of the pulp mill. That is true, but it is also true that private enterprise is making a considerable contribution. The British Aluminium Company will supply process water, carried through three miles of pipelines, from the tail race of the Lochaber hydro-electric scheme, which it owns.
    I was talking not long ago to Mr. Gordon Chalmers, the commissioner of the British Aluminium Company, which owns 170,000 acres in the immediate vicinity of the proposed pulp mills which the company acquired to control the water catchment areas for the hydroelectric operation of its factories. The company has a 20-year forestry programmes which will involve the planting of about 300 acres of trees a year, with a 60-year rotation. Mr. Gordon Chalmers told me that with the coming of the pulp mill at Fort William, it will be possible to reduce the rotation to forty years. This will have a considerable effect on the aim, which we are all trying to reach in Scotland, of achieving the target of 5 million acres of afforested land which was set by the Government of the day in 1945.
    Not only in that way will the economy of the Highlands receive a useful "shot" in the arm. It is undoubtedly true that the increased planting of shelters could increase the inherent capacity of our
    1422
    hills to produce mutton and hardy store cattle for finishing on the lower ground. If more use were made of the Highlands as a reservoir of high-quality stores, less of the more valuable lower ground would be required for followers and more would be available for fatteners.
    I should like to make a suggestion. I hope that my right hon. Friend will be able to persuade the company—he has every right to ask it to heed his suggestions—to appoint a consultative committee, composed of representatives of the Forestry Commission, the Scottish Woodlands Owners' Association and the Home Timber Merchants' Association of Scotland, which could be called together when required to consult the Board about questions of supplies, prices, and so on, so that there may be broad agreement among the producers and merchants of timber throughout Scotland and the policy of the Board may be interpreted to and understood by them. With this two-way channel of ideas, the Board could receive greater acceptance among its suppliers and the merchants who will bring much of the timber to its doors.
    There are many things that I should like to have said, but I do not want to take up the time of the House at this late hour. My hon. Friend the Member for Westmorland (Mr. Vane) was, however, possibly more critical than anyone else on this side of the House about certain provisions of the Bill, which he described as a rescue operation rather than part of a considered policy. It is true that it is not part of a considered policy in the sense of a forestry policy, of which my hon. Friend was speaking. I doubt very much whether the Government introduced the Bill as part of a coherent forestry policy. I am, however, certain that it is a highly important part of a considered policy for creating employment in Scotland and for stemming the drift from the Highlands.
    10.30 p.m.
    Mr. William Hannan: I agree with the hon. Member for North Angus and Mearns (Sir C. Thornton-Kemsley); no one would accuse the present Government of having any considered policy, particularly on forestry.
    I welcome the proposals in the Bill, with, of course, much the same reservations as some of my hon. Friends. Those of us who have been speaking and asking Questions about forestry since before the Secretary of State for Scotland became a Minister have been watching with great trepidation the progress of the talks and the prospect two or three times that nothing would come of them. Whatever the Government's intentions are, it has certainly taken them a long time to come to firm conclusions about it, and now they have done so, I believe they have done it in the wrong way.
    The Minister said that the company would be using the most up-to-date methods, as are employed in Sweden and France. This is to be welcomed. But in the very important process of the formation of the company they have fallen short of the modern methods which are employed in other countries.
    When I returned from Finland in 1954 and spoke in the House about forestry, I said how pleasing it would be if small pulp or saw mills could be set up in the north of Scotland. The Secretary of State has one, if not two, in his constituency. But at the moment Finland has a project to establish a mill in Lapland which will create 400 jobs. Besides those jobs in the mill, it is estimated that a further 3,000 jobs will be created in forestry and ancillary work.
    The point about finance is that it is the Government in Finland who have done this. The Government have representatives on the board. The mill is State-owned. But we have had 10 years' delay, and now the Government have acted at last for very much the reason put forward by the hon. Member for Westmorland (Mr. Vane)—as a rescue operation to create industry, making a virtue out of necessity. This may sound churlish, but the production of timber in Scotland is such that it is helping
    1424
    to create difficulties south of the Border, and so the mill project is being throttled.
    There are one or two points on which I should like some information from the Secretary of State. Am I not right in thinking that a pulp mill of this kind would provide an excellent opportunity for developments in connection with not only paper and paper bags but cellulose and fibreglass—things of which Scotland has been short? I am not technically-minded in these matters, but I think it important to ask for information about them.
    There is a second problem. What steps are the Government taking to guard against an increase in land prices which may develop in and around this area? There is never a honey pot but the bees are not so far away. I hesitate to go on using the insect analogy in case I am misunderstood, like one of my late right hon. Friends, but there is a certain well defined course which individuals so minded can take in an area like this.
    The whole project is very desirable. This is something for which many of us have wanted for this area for a very long time. Out of this will come the building of roads and other services. This means, apart from the advance of £10 million, that there will have to be further subsidies for the provision of roads by local authorities. Public enterprise will provide all the facilities and all the benefits but will get no return. That is completely wrong.
    It is silly to carry on the argument about private enterprise v. public enterprise in this context, but what is wrong with a partnership between the two? The Government have missed a great opportunity by indulging in this academic exercise, which will bring no satisfaction to the people who are unemployed; only the provision of jobs will do that. I hope that the Secretary of State will try to answer these important questions about the developments likely to arise out of this very welcome project.
    10.37 p.m.
    Mr. Robert Cooke: I shall not detain the House long at this late hour but, at the invitation of an hon. Member opposite, as an English Member I should like to add a few words. I shall not ask my right hon. Friend any questions. I am fully confident of his ability both to deal with questions and

    1425
    get on with the job. He has been in this House a much shorter time than I, and he is a good example of the young men of promise my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has been choosing to place in high office in Government,, and I wish him well.
    As a Member for Bristol, a city noted for printing and other uses of paper, I want to say how much I value this Measure. I do not take any gloomy view, unlike some hon. Members opposite, about this project. If we can manage to produce paper in this country from homegrown trees to sheets of paper and the printed column, that is a good thing from any point of view.
    We have an unemployment problem in the South-West, although we do not say so much about it as hon. Members from other areas say about their problems. But we are anxious to help anywhere, and we shall be delighted to use some of the products of this factory.
    I am delighted to disagree with the hon. Member for Glasgow, Maryhill (Mr. Hannan), who said that some of these products would be difficult to produce and that perhaps we did not have the technical "know-how". When I was in Virginia they assured me that they have a process from which they can make paper out of any tree of whatever size, shape or colour. I hope that we shall be able to do that too. I hope that nothing will hinder the foundation of the factory and that we shall see an ever-increasing flow of paper from it. As an English Member, I would like to place an advance order for enough paper from which to print 55,000 copies of my election address as soon as possible.
    10.40 p.m.
    Mr. Tam Dalyell: On the principle involved here, there is a deep gulf between the Secretary of State and myself, but the subject I want to raises tonight is of a non-doctrinaire nature. It is the subject of financial accountability.
    The Parliamentary Secretary said that this was a novel project, and we all hope that in some form or another it will be repeated, but would not the right hon. Gentleman agree that if this sort of project is to be repeated it must not only be above board but be seen by everyone to be above board, because even if
    1426
    nothing goes wrong there are likely to be suspicions and all sorts of rumours?
    I see some of the right hon. Gentleman's advisers smiling, but I wonder whether they would smile if they had on their hands not the case of Wiggins Teape, which is a few hundred years old and a highly respectable firm, but the case, which is sub judice at the moment, of Baileys (Malta) Ltd.? The terms there were not entirely different, but let us leave that with the charitable thought that there may have been some misunderstanding.
    Once one accepts that there are anxieties about the situation which has been created by the Malta firm to which I have referred, it is not fair to assume that at some future date there may be worries if we continue the sort of organisation that is proposed here? I ask the right hon. Gentleman what form of responsibility is to be taken on by the accounting officer. Will he give full details annually to the Public Accounts Committee?
    My hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow, Maryhill (Mr. Hannan) raised the question of the social capital involved, as indeed did my hon. Friend the Member for Central Ayrshire (Mr. Manuel). Perhaps the right hon, Gentleman will remember that when the B.M.C. factory was constructed at Bathgate the social expenditure by the West Lothian County Council far exceeded the expectations of the right hon. Gentleman, and certainly exceeded the expectations of the county council.
    I end by giving the Bill a welcome on behalf of people who might in the future be hit by the introduction of this project, the paper workers of West Lothian. Although they appreciate that they may be affected by this proposal, they are glad that this project has come to our country.
    10.43 p.m.
    Dr. J. Dickson Mabon: I shall be very brief. My hon. Friends have welcomed the Bill, and I join them in doing so.
    I shall not underline the point which has been made about joint public and private enterprise. I think that the point has been taken. We have had many examples in Scotland, the details of which are not clear. For example, we do not

    1427
    know how much the Treasury has spent on the Rootes project. We do not know all the complications of the B.M.C. factory, the strip mill at Ravenscraig, or the graving dock on the Clyde. All these are out of the same stable as this pulp mill, and it is interesting to think that these are all the result of "Conservatocialism". This is not a conversion to Socialism, but in these days of high taxation and therefore, so Conservatives tell me, shortage of capital, this is an enormous sum. At least, this is sometimes the argument that I heard when we were in power, and therefore the Treasury has had to be the recourse of this money.
    The right hon. Gentleman deserves to be congratulated on bringing in this Bill. I only hope that he brings in more Bills like it, but as my hon. Friend the Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. Ross) said, there is an Act on the Statute Book which foundered in Parliament's intention because the company concerned could not fulfil the obligations imposed on it and did not wish commercially to pursue the matter any further. I refer to the North Atlantic Shipping Act.
    My hon. Friend the Member for Kilmarnock also asked what would happen if the company either did not apply, or, subsequent to the passage of the Bill, changed its mind. This is a very interesting point, which I hope the right hon. Gentleman will bear in mind.
    In the first place, he has done something useful in the Bill and, secondly, he has adopted an anti-Beeching attitude in relation to this part of the country which I hope he will pursue in relation to other parts. But thirdly, a new broom may be willing to sweep a little more cleanly at St. Andrew's House and to look at the constitution of the Scottish Development Department, because possibly in its recruitment of officers and staff lies an alternative to the prospect of this future Act becoming null and void if the firm did not pursue it to its logical end.
    I accept that the right hon. Gentleman cannot be expected to urge on the Government a Royal Commission to go into the question of the recruitment and qualifications of the Civil Service, but he should look at the question of the kind of men being recruited by the Scottish
    1428
    Development Department or the kind of men who will be recruited by it, because it is my firm belief that under either party in the next ten or twenty years we shall have to adopt some kind of public enterprise, using the Civil Service, whether men of business recruited at large salaries to do the job for the State or men brought up within the Civil Service to be able to carry out a commercial function as officers of this country.
    I realise that this is anathema to the former Secretary of State, but his day is over in this respect. It is now the turn of the present Secretary of State and, I think, the turn of the newer Conservatives to try to face up to the prospects which may lie before them. I do not think that they have much of a future, but if they have a future at all they should prepare themselves for it. If we are to rely on our admirable Civil Service to carry out the wishes of Parliament and to exercise the instruments of Government as they should be exercised, it is inevitable that we shall have a Civil Service which has a training in industry. My hon. Friend the Member for Kilmarnock posed the problem of what would have happened if the company had not applied and what would happen if this future Act became null and void because the company did not pursue it. In considering this the right hon. Gentleman, I suggest, must not be doctrinaire and must not push such suggestions as I have made aside. He should leave the matter as open as possible. I believe that in the Scottish Development Department we have a Department which, with a sum of money of its own, independent of the Board of Trade, would be able to develop Scotland as it ought to be developed if it were staffed in the way to equip it for the future area of public enterprise which lies before it.
    10.48 p.m.
    The Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. Michael Noble): The evening is wearing on and I know that some hon. Members on both sides of the House are wondering about their trains. I will try to do justice to the very interesting debate in which so many people have spoken, both from Scotland and from England, and at the same time to be reasonably brief.

    1429
    In recent years in the Highlands most of the projects which we welcomed have been largely constructional—hydro schemes, roads, piers, N.A.T.O. facilities and depots. We welcomed them, but we realised that once the work had finished there were very few jobs left behind. To this extent this new project at Fort William is of tremendous importance.
    If I may give the House a rough breakdown of the jobs which are estimated to arise as it develops, hon. Members will see what I mean. By the end of this year, with luck, we should be employing about 660 people in the area. Next year perhaps the total will reach about 1,800 and the year after that it should be up to about 2,400. Then it will remain steady for a year or two until Phase 2 comes into operation, and the total number of jobs created by the operation will probably reach about 3,500. In this respect it is a very valuable gain to long-term Highland development. As the hon. Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. Ross) said, the chance of industries thriving in the Highlands depends, at least to some extent, on whether they are using local resources. We have industries of all sorts in the Highlands, but where local resources are being used the chances of their continuing to be a success are that much greater.
    The credit for launching this project rests with Wiggins, Teape and with the Government of the day, but its success is due, as I freely admit, to all my predecessors for the last thirty-five years, and particularly, as the hon. Member for Kilmarnock said, to Mr. Tom Johnston, who took such an interest in forestry, and to my immediate predecessor, my right hon. Friend the Member for Renfrew, West (Mr. Maclay), who carried out a lot of the preliminary investigations and talks with Wiggins Teape.
    I should like also to join in the especial welcome for the Bill which will be extended by the forestry workers in the countryside round about. I know them very well, as does the hon. Member for Central Ayrshire (Mr. Manuel). Working on forestry is not always the most exciting task, and trees grow comparatively slowly. If someone knows that the work he is doing is producing trees which are not going to disappear abroad but will go back into the Highlands to create more work, it is an encouragement to him, and
    1430
    we owe these men and the Forestry Commission a word of thanks for providing the possibility of the scheme.
    Mr. Bence: I appreciate the point that the workers in the forestry industry will be very happy to find their product going into this mill. However, as Wiggins Teape will be a monopoly consumer of the Commission's products, there must be a price factor. It is a monopoly consumer of the thinnings. How will the price factor be fixed? Will it be dependent upon the world price of timber? Will Wiggins Teape be free to buy a world product on a world market from a cheaper source?
    Mr. Noble: No. The hon. Gentleman may not know this, but I think that my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade said that Wiggins Teape has made a long-term contract with the Forestry Commission to buy its timber and it will be at world prices. The incentive to the forestry people is there, because the market is there in front of them.
    The hon. Member for Kilmarnock raised many points. Most of them were interesting ones. I do not want to introduce any tone of controversy on the tricky subject of rents. It is true, as the hon. Gentleman said, that the rents of forestry workers are higher than the rents of agricultural workers, who in most cases have service houses. It is also true that they are a great deal higher than the rents in many large industrial centres where the wages are a great deal better. This point could be looked at from both directions.
    The hon. Member also said that the availability of hydro power was one of the prerequisites of this scheme. We ought to get the fact right. Extremely important as the Hydro-Electric Board's activities in the whole area of the Highlands have been and will be for many of the ancillary things which will grow round this enterprise, in point of fact Wiggins Teape is producing all its own hydro power.
    There is no dogma in the Scottish Office. We believe that public enterprise and private enterprise are right. After all, they have been combined in the growing of timber. They have been combined in manufacturing with Wiggins Teape. Hon. Members have pointed to the Highlands and Islands shipping

    1431
    services, which show that, though there may be some dogma on one side of the House or the other, there is certainly no visible sign of dogma in the Scottish Office.
    Mr. John MacLeod: Can my right hon. Friend say where the company will get the hydro power from which to produce the electricity it will use?
    Mr. Noble: The company will produce thermal power itself as part of the process in the mill.
    The hon. Member for Kilmarnock then said that the Highlands were a neglected land and he used for his quotation a paper put out by Wiggins Teape. Interesting and exciting though this project is, it is fair to record that there has been an even bigger development in the Highlands since the Government came to power—at Dounreay—and we should not forget this just because it happens to be further up the map near the right-hand corner.
    I was asked to speculate as to what might have happened had the company dropped out and the last of the "little nigger boys" had gone. It has been suggested by various hon. Members opposite that the Government should then have stepped in and run a paper mill themselves. Personally, I should be extremely scared of doing that. In my limited experience, Governments are tremendous users of papers, circulars and so on. I do not think, to be honest, that they would be very efficient makers of paper. I shudder to think, if profits were going down, that the Government might decide that the only way to maintain them was to use more paper.
    There is a serious point which the hon. Member for Kilmarnock made— as did his hon. Friend the Member for the Western Isles (Mr. Malcolm MacMillan)—about the problem of denuding the Highlands by "pulling" too many people into Fort William. This must always be a worry, but I do not think that hon. Members should become over-obsessed by it, because the whole of this project, by its nature, needs the combination of the growing areas for the timber and the people who are extracting and handling it, right down to the mill where it is processed.
    1432
    So the nature of the Industry seems to avoid the greatest dangers of too much concentration. Nevertheless, we will certainly watch this point.
    Several hon. Members spoke of the tremendous social expenditure which this mill will bring in its train. I accept this, but I honestly feel that the House must realise that if one goes in for development on a big scale, one must have the social expenditure to match it. That is as true in the Highlands at Fort William as it is at Linwood, Bathgate or any other place. It is desirable and it must be faced. One cannot claim that this is a hidden, extra thing because it is at Fort William. The same happens in any industrial area; and the Highlands have the right to do it, too.
    It should not be thought that, because we are achieving the pulp mill, I now believe that everything is fine in the area for the rest of time. There are other projects and, as the House knows, I shall do my best to help them in any way I can and to get them to Scotland.
    My hon. Friend the Member for Dorset, West (Mr. Wingfield Digby) shortly and simply put a few points. I am glad that already there is some help from England and that the money going to the Highlands is not grudged. My hon. Friend raised the problem of the growing output of timber and how it was to be used. He contrasted it with the growth of timber imports. The importance of this mill is that it will use a great deal of the surplus which goes across the Border to England. This point worried my hon. Friend the Member for Westmorland (Mr. Vane), but the mill will stop some of the surplus from adding to his problems.
    The right hon. Member for East Stirlingshire (Mr. Woodburn)—who apologised because he had to leave—paid a very sensible tribute to the private owners of woodlands, and knew a good deal of what they were contributing. He asked one or two questions, which I will look into and let him know about, on the problems of sawdust and of quality timber. Big sawmills will almost certainly be set up in conjunction with this enterprise, and even if one cannot use the sawdust one will use the waste wood resulting. He said that the Highlands are not used to the whistle, but at least they have one at Kinlochleven; and that is

    1433
    not far away from Fort William. We cannot discuss the arrangements for women of which he told us, but there will be at least 200 women employed in the factory itself and, of course, an enormous number of extra women will come in on all the ancillary services.
    I should like to deal in great detail with what was said by my hon. Friend the Member for Westmorland, but I think that I should be very largely out of order if I did so. But I do feel that to describe this as a "rescue operation" is completely unfair. For once, this has come in at exactly the right time. Eight or nine years ago, Wiggins Teape investigated whether it was a possible project—and it was not, because there was not enough timber. There now is enough timber, and although, to begin with, as has been said, only two-thirds of it will be home grown and the rest will come from abroad, in a few years' time it will be entirely home grown, and that seems to me to be an excellent and correct plan.
    In considering this Bill, I do not think that we should worry too much about whether we are committed to accepting extra Bills for another £10 million if similar schemes come forward. If similar schemes do come forward, I believe that, if they are good schemes and viable schemes, the House would want the Government to bring in Bills, if necessary, to promote such development.
    The hon. Member for the Western Isles said that the project was rather expensive in terms of money for jobs. That is true if we take just the jobs in the mill, but a great deal will flow from it. I hope that at least some of the wages will go to the buying of the excellent tweed made in the hon. Gentleman's constituency.
    He also referred to planting in other areas, and this is very important. For the past ten or fifteen years, it is not easy, or it has not been easy, to persuade private owners, farmers and others to plant timber, partly because it is a very expensive operation and partly because, until there was a mill there to use it, there was no possible market for the timber if they grew it. That is an important aspect of this mill. It will encourage the planting of timber on a much wider scale and by a much wider range of people than in the past.
    1434
    The hon. Member also asked about the quantities of imported and of homegrown timber. As was said earlier, to begin with, 8 million hoppus feet will be home-grown softwoods and 4 million imported hardwoods, I think that the firm itself hopes to find some suitable hardwoods at home, but later, as the mill develops, the whole 12 million hoppus feet will be home-grown timber. I will certainly look very carefully at the problem of rail and roads in Kintail and other parts of the Highlands. This is a very difficult problem.
    I am perfectly certain that the conservancy problems that will arise will be watched, and we have the Nature Conservancy to give advice to myself or to my successors. I am confident, too, that the standards of employment to which he referred will be good. Wiggins Teape is a first-class employer, and this is important for the district.
    My hon. Friend the Member for Ross and Cromarty (Mr. John MacLeod) was very generous in welcoming this mill at Fort William. When the Mill was rather "wandering" round the Highlands, my hon. Friend and I, and others, all hoped that it might settle in our constituencies. I think it is very nice of him to be so generous about it arriving there.
    I think the point that the hon. Member for the Western Isles made about small people coming into forestry is a very good one. I should like to be forthcoming on the co-ordination of hydro roads and forestry roads, but I do not think that I should deal with that matter off the cuff because, if I did, I should run into difficulties about road safety, and so on, as some of the forestry roads are suitable for an experienced driver and a Land Rover but not for a tourist in a family saloon.
    The bridge over the Lochy at Fort William is a bottleneck and that and other road problems we shall have to deal with as quickly as possible. I have always believed that one could do a lot with sea transport for the mill and I know that the Forestry Commission and Wiggins, Teape are looking at this problem.
    The hon. Member for Central Ayrshire, who was interested in this part of Scotland, which I too know well, has an interest not only in forestry but in fishing. He raised two or three points. I think that he was a little unkind in some

    1435
    of the things he said about forestry villages, though the point in general is a good one. I think the hon. Gentleman was also a little unkind in what he said about private owners who do not always plant. I know that some owners have been better than others, but I believe that the present figure of 93,000 acres a year is being planted in the ratio of 55,000 acres by the Forestry Commission and 38,000 acres by private owners. That is not too bad a balance.
    My hon. Friend the Member for North Angus and Mearns (Sir C. Thornton-Kemsley) spoke about the reduction in the rotation of timber, and this is extremely important. Views have been changing fairly fast on this subject, even before the pulp mill came to fruition. I think that the extra rotation will give us a great deal of timber. I should like to discuss with Dr. Frankel the point about the consultative committee because that might be useful.
    The hon. Member for Glasgow, Mary-hill (Mr. Hannan) has been to Finland, as I have, and seen the small sawmills, two of which we now have in Argyll. I am quite certain that some of these will develop elsewhere. I should not like to answer the hon. Gentleman's point about cellulose and fibreglass because I do not know whether the process is suitable for this mill, but I will rind out.
    The hon. Member for West Lothian (Mr. Dalyell) asked about control. I do not think that he would want me to delve into the control problem at this time of night, but the immediate answer is that all the facts and figures will be dealt with by the accounting officer. They will be in the Board of Trade Vote, in the annual Estimates, and will in that way be available to the House.
    Mr. Dalyell: Will all the accounts be subject to the general scrutiny of the Comptroller and Auditor General?
    Mr. Noble: I think they would be.
    Mr. Dalyell: Can the right hon. Gentleman check this?
    Mr. Noble: I can find out about this and let the hon. Gentleman know.
    The social expenditure which he asked about by the West Lothian County Council is certainly a big thing. Inverness County Council is quite ready and eager to help in the supporting develop-
    1436
    ment for its own benefit, as it knows that it will be in the long run.
    The hon. Member for Greenock (Dr. Dickson Mabon) warned us about Cunards. I do not believe from the discussions which I have had that there is the least likelihood of Wiggins Teape pulling out of this operation. The company has shown tremendous determination to get into the operation and is very anxious to get started immediately and quickly.
    I am not quite certain that I can agree with the hon. Member about trying to change the whole nature of my Scottish Development Department. If I had to bring in people suitable for top management jobs in all the industries in which we might be interested in Scotland, I should have a very funny Development Department before long.
    We have had an interesting debate and the Bill has been welcomed. I welcome it for four main reasons. In the first place, it gives considerable employment this year in an area which needs it. Secondly, we have a steady build-up for the next three or four years. Thirdly, I believe that it will be an encouragement to other industries to come to Fort William and round about and will encourage industrialists of other sorts to think that the Highlands are not an impossible place in which to develop. Fourthly, and perhaps most important of all, I think that it will play a most significant part in the psychological effect it will have in the Highlands where people will think something really important has come which will provide lasting employment there. I recommend the Bill to the House.
    Question put and agreed to.
    Bill accordingly read a Second time.
    Bill committed to a Standing Committee pursuant to Standing Order No. 38 (Committal of Bills).

    FORT WILLIAM PULP AND PAPER MILLS [MONEY]
    [Queen's Recommendation signified]
    Considered in Committee under Standing Order No. 84 (Money Committees).
    [Sir ROBERT GRIMSTON in the Chair]
    Resolved,
    That, for the purposes of any Act of the present Session to authorise the Board of Trade to make advances to Wiggins, Teape & Co.

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    Limited in connection with the construction and equipment of pulp and paper mills in the neighbourhood of Fort William, and to make grants to that company in respect of interest on such advances, it is expedient to authorise the provision out of moneys provided by Parliament—

    (a) of sums not exceeding £10 million in all to be advanced by the Board of Trade to the said company by way of loan;

    (b) of sums not exceeding £1·3 million in all required by the Board of Trade for making grants to the said company in respect of the company's liability for interest accruing before 1st January, 1967, on sums advanced by way of loan under the said Act;

    and the payment into the Exchequer of sums received by the Board of Trade by way of interest on or repayment of such advances by way of loan.—[Mr. Noble.]
    Resolution to be reported.
    Report to be received Tomorrow.

    POLICE PENSIONS
    Police Pensions (Amendment) (No. 2) Regulations 1963 [draft laid before the House, 19th March], approved.—[Mr. Wood house.]

    CHAROLAIS CATTLE (IMPORT)
    Motion made, and Question proposed That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Finlay]
    11.13 p.m.
    Mr. John Mackie: I rise to plead that the Minister of Agriculture should reverse a decision which he made a few years ago not to allow the breeding in this country of pure Charolais cattle, the French breed of which he allowed an importation of bulls in 1961. I propose to be brief because I have promised to leave the hon. Member for Hereford (Mr. Gibson-Watt) a few minutes to take part in the debate, but I should like to give a short history of this importation.
    In 1957 many farmers who were anxious to improve the crossing of cattle, particularly dairy cattle, in this country felt that this French breed would help. They made private applications to import them, but these were turned down. Then the Milk Marketing Board took an interest in the matter and the Ministry was forced to take notice of the applications. At about the same time as publicity was given to the Milk Marketing
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    Board, the old breed societies, particularly the Shorthorn, Hereford and Angus, began to realise that this was a competition which they would like to fight. I do not blame them for trying to fight this competition—everybody tries to fight competition—but I feel that they fought it in an unfair way.
    The Minister's predecessor, in my opinion, lacked sufficient political courage to take a decision himself, and so he appointed a Committee to give him information which, I think, he had before him all the time. There was this delay caused by the appointment of the Terrington Committee, which ultimately recommended the importation of Charolais bulls, which recommendation the Minister accepted, but the Committee refused to recommend the importation of females at the same time so that the breed could be established in this country.
    I wish to persuade the present Minister that he can no longer shelter behind the Terrington Report. A lot of the opposition was based on the possibility of disease being introduced. This question has now been settled. We have in this country a veterinary service and a quarantine service which can give absolute certainty that no disease will enter when the animals are imported. It has been settled also in another way. Since the applications by individuals to have cattle imported, the Minister has allowed other cattle from Europe to come in, Danish Reds and Dutch Friesians. One lot of Dutch Friesians developed the disease leptospirosis. When the Charolais bulls came in and they took this disease in the quarantine station, there was a chorus of protest. I have in my hand the middle page of the Farmers Weekly, with headlines about "Charolais Shock. Minister receives Protests", and so on. There were calls to send them back to France, and what not.
    Two months ago, when the Friesian animal took the same disease, there was one small paragraph in the Farmers Weekly and the Minister receive no protests whatever. This simply goes to show that it was not the disease problem at all which worried the old breed societies. It was just that they were scared of the competition. I feel that that is proved by the fact that they have not protested when these other breeds have come in.

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    The next fact that shows that the Terrington Report is now quite out of date is that people have changed their minds. Scotland, which, of course, is the home of many breeds, though not of Herefords, created a considerable amount of difficulty against the suggestion that the Charolais breed should be started in this country. When the bulls were allowed in, the Secretary of State for Scotland was persuaded not to allow any into Scotland. Then there was a report in the Farmers Weekly.
    "Angry Scots seek Canadian Bulls".
    They wanted to go to Canada for bulls. More recently, there was the heading,
    "Scots call again for Charolais Bulls".
    They have changed their minds since the bulls came into this country, whereas earlier they protested as the others did.
    Moreover, many breeders who gave evidence to the Terrington Committee against the importation are now using Charolais semen. They told the Committee that the importation would destroy cattle breeding in this country, but some of them were the first to use the semen when the Charolais animals came here. One gentleman, who is a personal friend of mine, was chairman of the Shorthorn Society. When I was speaking in another hon. Member's constituency recently—not on a political subject—he tried to persuade me that Silver Galloways were the best breed to cross with Charolais cattle. Yet he had given evidence against the importation of Charolais.
    If any further evidence were needed, it would be this. An ex-chairman of the Shorthorn Society, who went to France for the Highland Agricultural Society and reported to the Terrington Committee views dead against the importation of Charolais from the start, is now a member of the Charolais Society of Great Britain. This gentleman is a personal friend of mine. He has now seen the error of his ways; he must have done so before joining the Society. But we want to use this man's skills. He is one of the best breeders of cattle in Great Britain. We want his skills to develop the breed so that we can export the cattle all over the world, because there is a demand. It is obvious from what I have said that the Minister
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    must no longer use the Terrington Report. In any event, when have Ministers sheltered behind Reports as much as the Minister has sheltered behind this one? Government Reports are usually pigeonholed and not used.
    Why do we want to breed these cattle, and what is the reason why I consider that we should not wait until the Minister finishes the experiments which are being carried out, and which will take eighteen months to finish, to see what these cattle can do? I will deal with the second of these points first. There is ample evidence for the Minister. If he does not have it, I have it and can give it to him.
    I should like to give the House a few figures. I have details of an experiment extending over eleven years, conducted not by any particular breed society, but by the Texas Agricultural Experimental Station, involving a large number of cattle. This experiment shows that the Charolais and Charolais crosses have an average daily weight gain of 2·8 1b. No doubt, the hon. Member for Hereford will be pleased to know that the next best is the Hereford, with a daily weight gain of 2·4 lb. Down the list with a daily weight gain of 2·2 lb. come the Angus and the Shorthorn. That is a considerable difference in daily weight gains.
    I have some Canadian figures also, which show daily weight gains of up to 3·1 lb. In case, however, anyone replies, "That is all very well, but what about the cutting-out figures", which are the important ones, I have had figures prepared showing a difference above the lowest figure of the other breeds of 22·8 dollars in return and killing out, which, at an exchange rate of 2·83 dollars to the £, represents a difference of something like £8 in favour of the Charolais cattle killed out.
    I can quote one of the country's best authorities who went to the Argentine to see the crosses. It will be apparent that I am quoting from all over the world—Alberta and Vancouver, in Canada, Texas and the Argentine—from countries whose climates are either comparable to or worse than ours. From the Argentine, Professor Cooper has quoted figures showing that at an average weaning age of eight months, the Charolais crosses had an advantage of

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    1½cwt. over the Herefords and other breeds and an average daily weight gain of 3 lb. These figures are impressive. I have other figures showing that the Charolais have weight gains of 3·05 lb. and returns of 26 dollars above other breeds on sale.
    I should like to call attention to the figures for the calves now being born in this country. I have gone around collecting various figures and I find anything up to liveweight gains of 3 lb. in the first three months of the life of the calves in this country. A big breeder with fifty of them averaged gains of 2·52 lb. at less than 100 days. I am sorry to tread on the toes of the hon. Member for Hereford, but that same man has a batch of almost the same number of Hereford X Friesians, the figure for which is just under 2 lb., as against the 2·52 lb. for the Charolais. This shows the difference. I could go on quoting figures.
    Some time ago, the Parliamentary Secretary tried to persuade me that South Devons might be the answer, so I wrote to that society and got particulars, from which I was horrified to find that the highest figure which that breed could produce was about 1·5 lb. in one experiment and 1·85 lb. in another, coming nowhere near the figures of the Charolais. These figures for Charolais are really impressive and attention should be paid to them.
    What do the farmers think now that they have tried these cattle and since the first cross calves arrived? I have investigated the numbers of inseminations to find out what success there has been and whether there has been difficulty in calving. I find from Aberdeen, the home of one of the breed societies, that during the last three months, over the first seven months when Charolais bulls have been made available, there has been an 80 per cent. increase in inseminations. In another case in England, the area of which I was asked not to quote, the increase was actually double during the last three months since the first calves arrived. So there is proof that the Minister does not need to wait any longer. All the proof is in front of him that this breed is worth a trial.
    Why do we want pure breeding in this country? It is because we want pro-
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    gress. There is no other word to use. I have heard the argument that there are too many breeds in the country already. But that is a measure of the fact that not one of them is the right one. It is the same with pigs. We have too many pig breeds. The import of Landrace pigs has almost solved that problem; and I think that the import of Charolais cattle will solve the cattle breed problem. There is certainly room here for the Charolais breed.
    Another reason is that there is a world demand for the cattle. This country has a name for breeding pure cattle second to none. As I said, I want to use the skills of the ordinary breeders. I am not a breeder of cattle; I am more of an arable farmer. But I mentioned my friend, and I want to use his skill to improve these cattle in order to get trade all over the world, I have been in Canada and the United States, and the demand is tremendous there. My brother, just back from New Zealand, says that they are dying for this semen or these bulls there. But the Minister will not allow the export. Ireland has gone to the length of getting American Charolais, and is beating us to it. So I could go on.
    There was a letter in the Economist from the hon. Member for Hereford speaking about the need to increase exports of cattle. He wants us to export the cattle that the world wants. The world wants this type of cattle more than any other. I suggest that he thinks about this.
    The Minister must agree that we have lost six years. We could have bought the cattle in 1957. The Minister may say another year or two does not matter. But that is what is wrong with this country. It is always later than we think. We ought to be getting on with the job.
    I wish to quote the Secretary of State for Scotland. I told him I would do so, but he said he had to leave. He told the Scottish National Farmers' Union:
    "In our thinking about the future we must be ready to question traditional practices and attitudes."
    I should like to think that he is not holding this development up in any way. I want to question the old breed societies about the old breeds not being the right ones for the country, and point out that the

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    new one is not something from back of the Himalayas or a cross between a dromedary and a yak but a breed established in France and used all over the world. But one would think it was some curious breed of which we were scared.
    I appeal to the Minister. I appeal on behalf of our Canadian friends for one thing. Their importation was in 1933–37, and they have cross bred and had no fresh blood. They want us to help them. Why should we not help our friends in the Commonwealth? It is harmless to give them semen. Yet the Minister has refused it. I appeal on their behalf and for the sake of exports from our country. We would like Charolais direct from France if the Minister would allow it but would be content to import Canadian cattle. I appeal to the Parliamentary Secretary to ensure that his right hon. Friend takes note of what I have said. He will never regret altering his decision. Even if we have wasted six years, let us start now and not waste more time.
    11.29 p.m.
    Mr. David Gibson-Watt: I am glad to be able to say a few words in this debate. It seems to have been somewhat of a Scottish evening. The main difference between the hon. Member for Enfield, East (Mr. Mackie) and myself is that my folk left Scotland 200 years ago while he still has one foot north of the Border.
    I am going to hit him pretty hard. I make no excuse. I just warn him before I start. On 30th January last year I raised this question on the Adjournment, and the debate was answered by my hon. Friend the Member for Westmorland (Mr. Vane), and it was also contributed to by the hon. Member for Enfield, East. I make no bones about the fact that I was one of those opposed to the importation of these cattle from the start. I want to explain why.
    I find it odd that the hon. Member should raise this matter tonight in an effort to get the Minister to allow the Charolais breed to be brought into the country more quickly than at present planned. Everyone knows his interest in the matter, although one can hardly call it a constituency interest. It is an interest he shares with friends of his, and I think it a little odd that an hon. Member should ask the Minister to make something go
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    quicker so that a certain body of people can thereby do a great deal better out of it. I say that quite straight to him. I hope that he will understand me.
    Mr. Mackie: The fact is that the hon. Member and his friends are trying to prevent me doing so in order that they can have the thing to themselves.
    Mr. Gibson-Watt: That is not the point.
    Mr. Mackie: It is.
    Mr. Gibson-Watt: The hon. Member refers to my friends. I represent a constituency which has the largest breed of cattle anywhere in the world, and I am proud of it. But the hon. Member is not making a constituency point. It is, rather, a personal point on something out of which he and his friends, the Charolais Society, might make a very good thing. If I say that he is rather like Oliver Twist in asking the Minister for more, then he will understand what I want to say.
    At the Perth sales this year I found a great number of his agricultural friends saying that the hon. Member would have better used his ability in boosting the export of our own cattle instead of asking the Minister to hurry up this experiment.
    Perhaps the most important question is one I raised last year in the Adjournment debate when I said that I had visions of unnecessary cruelty being caused by using large, heavy animals with animals which were very small behind.
    That was with particular regard to the crossing on Ayrshire cattle, and I asked what results there had been in this respect and what had happened in the experiment. There had been disturbing reports. The hon. Member was rash enough to quote from the Farmers Weekly. I shall quote from it also, from this week's edition. A letter from a reader said:
    "Seven of my Ayrshire cows have calved to Charolais bulls and to date I have only had one calving without complications. Except for that one calf all the animals have had varying damage to the pelvis."
    I will miss out a great number of other paragraphs and come to the last which says:
    " Of the seven calves born only three were born alive and two died shortly after."
    This is an important point. I ask my hon. Friend to comment on that report. As his Ministry is in charge of the

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    experiment he must know a great deal more about it than one person writing to the Farmers Weekly. Those who concentrate only on the liveweight gains are not seeing the whole picture. We must not be blind to the problem of cruelty to animals. We must watch that very carefully.
    When the Minister initiated this experiment and opened the London Quarantine Station to let these animals in, he said it was the intention to improve the crossing of dairy breeds. He said that he would not hurry to introduce the breed itself. I hope that my hon. Friend will confirm that assurance.
    One of the Charolais colleagues of the hon. Member for Enfield, East, Mr. Wheaton-Smith, broke the law with regard to the importation of Charolais semen. Can we be told where he is at the moment, whether he is still abroad or whether he has come back to this country? Perhaps the debate tonight may have had something to do with him, and I think that the history of the Charolais importation has been somewhat chequered by events of this sort.
    To sum up, I ask my hon. Friend to recognise the cruelty factor, to carry out the tests to their logical conclusion, to give our breeds an adequate chance to compete, and not to be rushed into giving way. I quote my hon. Friend the Member for Westmorland who wound up the debate last year, and, quoting St. Paul, said:
    "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good."
    11.35 p.m.
    The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. James Scott-Hopkins): I am grateful to the hon. Member for Enfield, East (Mr. Mackie) for raising this topic tonight. I have not much time in which to answer the points made by the hon. Gentleman and by my hon. Friend the Member for Hereford (Mr. Gibson-Watt).
    I am glad that the hon. Gentleman said during his speech that the peg on which he wished to hang the hat of this debate was is Question about the importation of Friesian cattle from Holland, one of which reacted to the test for leptospirosis. There is no division of opinion about the need for effective safeguards over the health of livestock, and these are written
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    into the Diseases of Animals Act, 1950, which imposes a general ban upon imports of cattle from all sources outside the British Isles other than Canada, for which there are special arrangements.
    My right hon. Friend may make orders permitting importations from other countries, but we seek to minimise the use of these powers in order to reduce the number of occasions on which our animal health is at risk. The importation of Dutch Friesian cattle this year was the first for over twelve years, and they were allowed in because we were satisfied that it would continue the process of breed improvement which previous importations had brought about. The importation was organised by the British Friesian Cattle Society.
    One heifer reacted to a leptospirosis test and was returned to Holland, but the remainder were kept in quarantine for a further twenty-eight days. At the end of that time, after further tests, they were given a clean bill of health and went elsewhere throughout the country.
    The hon. Gentleman made the point in his Question to the House, and in his speech tonight, that this reaction caused little concern compared with the outcry which arose when some of the Charolais bulls showed a similar reaction during their stay in quarantine. When the bulls were brought into this country, there was tremendous public interest. The public were interested in everything that hap-pended, and when three of them reacted to the leptospirosis test this was a matter of tremendous public interest, and the fact was reported in the Press. There was not a public outcry, but there was certainly great interest in what happened. This is why the matter received such wide publicity.
    There have been no repercussions during the fourteen months since they left their quarantine. The Charolais experience therefore demonstrated the efficacy of the safeguards that we took, and it was natural that the Friesian reaction should cause less fuss.
    The hon. Gentleman made the plea that we could safely bring in numbers of Charolais females from France with the object of establishing the breed here. He makes the point that things have changed since my right hon. Friend's original decision. It is true that there is nothing

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    to stop us bringing in cattle from France, if the veterinary requirements are satisfied, but this is not the dominant factor.
    I take the point about cruelty made by my hon. Friend. There have been about 60,000 inseminations, but I have no details of the amount of difficulty that there has been in calving. I understand that there have been one or two isolated cases of difficulty, particularly with the small breeds like the Ayrshires, but I shall look into the matter and let my hon. Friend know the position.
    These bulls were brought here for the purpose of experimental cross-breeding, and it will be at least another eighteen months before the results of this crossbreeding can be fully assessed. This can be done only on the butcher's slab, which is the ultimate test.
    The hon. Member for Enfield, East now says that he is bringing forward new evidence about the Charolais breed. He is bringing forward evidence of lightweight gain and killing-out percentages, but he quoted dollars, which made his argument a little confusing. All this is new evidence, and obviously we must study it very closely.
    The object of our own trials is to see how Charolais crosses perform in this country when produced by females of our breeds and reared in our climate. I think that the hon. Member recognises the importance of this. On the last occasion that we debated the subject he asked, "How can we test our cattle in France in a totally different climate?"
    If I understand him correctly, he is now asking us to make a fresh approach to the subject and to appraise the Charolais breed itself on the basis of the new evidence and data available from the various countries concerned with a view to its establishment here as a pure breed on its merits. He has made out a fair case on the evidence, but I have not that evidence at my command. I am willing to examine it for its authenticity and applicability.
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    Whatever the outcome of such an examination—and obviously I cannot now forecast its outcome—the earliest practical date for an importation would be late in 1964 because of the vaccination problems in France. We shall also know a great deal more by that time about the outcome of our cross-breeding trials. I feel sure that there would be general agreement that if we are to establish the breed here it must be from the best possible available stock. This minimum timetable leaves my right hon. Friend time for consideration. We, will study the evidence which the hon. Member has presented and form a view in good time on whether there would be justification for an earlier decision or whether the Government should await the final results of the current cross-breeding trials being carried out with our existing breeds.
    The hon. Member spoke about importation of cattle from Canada. This is a very complex matter, and there are regulations which cover it. I hope that he realises that these regulations mean that only pure-bred cattle can be brought into this country for breeding. Only if they conform to our standards are they allowed in.
    I have no information on the point which my hon. Friend made about a gentleman whom he mentioned, but I will look into that matter.
    I hope that the hon. Member for Enfield, East will give me the evidence which he has so that we can study it closely and make up our minds on it. We have time to do so because of the timetable. We have time to evaluate it, and if it proves satisfactory we shall decide whether the Government should not delay their decision or whether we should continue to the end of the current tests in order to make certain of our assessments at the end of the day.
    Question put and agreed to.
    Adjourned accordingly at seventeen minutes to Twelve o'clock.