§ Considered in Committee; reported, without Amendment.
§ 1.24 p.m.
§ Mrs. Eirene White (Flint, East)I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
I am grateful to the Committee for accepting the Bill so readily. The Bill, which has come to us from another place, makes only one point of substance, but it will be very useful from the point of view of British newsreels. It has been found from experience that the Films Act, 1960, is unduly restrictive for newsreels.
We are specially anxious to get this short Bill passed today, because it will enable newsreels with British teams at the Tokyo Olympic Games, which come in the autumn, to rank as British films. As things stand at the moment, because they will be taking place outside the United Kingdom, the Commonwealth or the Republic of Ireland, although British athletes will be concerned, the newsreels would not rank as British newsreels even though taken by photographers sent out from this country.
The Bill means that in those circumstances, or any other circumstances where matters of great interest to this country may be taking place outside the bounds of the Commonwealth, and where our own nationals are concerned, and where the newsreel is photographed by persons normally employed in the United Kingdom, such newsreels shall rank for registration as British films, and shall enjoy the various benefits which that registration and the quota of films entail.
845 The Bill has been fully agreed by all the interests in the trade. The producers of other types of films, though they may be slightly adversely affected, have agreed that it is generally desirable. The trade unions are fully in support of it. I hope very much that it will find a place on the Statute Book.
§ 1.26 p.m.
§ The Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade (Mr. David Price)I should like to congratulate the hon. Lady the Member for Flint, East (Mrs. White) upon her initiative in bringing the Bill before us and to congratulate, also, the noble Lord, Lord Shepherd, who introduced it into another place. As the hon. Lady has told the House, this is a very modest Measure, but it is of importance.
I would just add to what the hon. Lady has said that, if any hon. Member thinks that this is giving too much encouragement to the showing of foreign sequencies, or giving foreign cameramen too much of an opportunity, the implementation of the proposals of the Bill will not result in newsreels of a predominantly foreign flavour qualifying as British, because under the new conditions for quarterly registration at least 50 per cent. of the photographs in a sequence would be taken in the Commonwealth or the Republic of Ireland, and furthermore, a further 25 per cent. of the photographs would have to be taken either within the Commonwealth or by a photographer regularly employed as a member of the United Kingdom staff of a British newsreel company who was a British subject or citizen of the Republic of Ireland.
As the hon. Lady has told us, there is some urgency about this Bill, quite apart from the general case for it, which I am sure that she and her colleagues on the Cinematograph Films Council have in mind. The present rule is unnecessarily restrictive. It is particularly vividly so with the prospect of the Olympic Games in October. There is, therefore, some urgency in it, but the Bill, if it is given its Third Reading, will take effect at the end of September, which will be in time for the Olympic Games.
Quite apart from this urgency, I believe that the general arguments which the hon. Lady has deployed, and which have been examined, as she has told us, by all sec-tons of the film industry, stand on their own merits, and I very much hope that 846 the House will accord the Bill its Third Reading.
§ Question put and agreed to.
§ Bill accordingly read the Third time and passed, without Amendment.