FILMS BILL

HC Deb 21 October 1966 vol 734 cc579-611

Order for Second Reading read.

11.5 a.m.

The Minister of State, Board of Trade (Mr. Roy Mason)

I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.

The purpose of the Bill is to prolong for another three years the life of the existing legislation governing the support accorded the British film industry. The three props of this support are the screen quota, the levy imposed on receipts from exhibition, which is distributed to the film producers, and financial assistance through the operations of the National Film Finance Corporation.

The screen quota is the oldest form of support for British film production and ensures that a prescribed proportion of the films shown in cinemas in Great Britain are British. Dating from the Cinematograph Films Act of 1927, it has been in operation for nearly 40 years and in its early years played an important role in restoring British film production from the low ebb to which it had declined.

The legislation governing the screen quota has been reviewed from time to time and was re-enacted and amplified in 1938, and again on two occasion since the war. The present legislation is contained in the Films Acts 1960 and 1964.

Since the war two new support measures have been introduced. The first was the establishment in 1949 of the National Film Finance Corporation to make loans to be employed in financing film production and distribution. Its lending powers were initially for a period of five years and have been extended on two occasions since. The relevant legislation is the Cinematograph Film Production (Special Loans) Acts 1949 to 1957. The second is the levy, which was intro- duced as a voluntary scheme in 1950, and was made statutory by the Cinematograph Films Act 1957. Under this scheme a levy is imposed on exhibitors and the proceeds are distributed to makers of British films, so augmenting their earnings in Great Britain.

All of the relevant legislation expires at varying dates in 1967, and the present Bill is designed to prolong its life for another three years subject to one or two minor amendments to which I will come in a moment.

It may be asked why, since the expiry of the legislation is now close at hand, the Government have not already conducted their review of films policy and legislation and why we are not today in a position to put long-term proposals before the House. The answer is that, in September, 1964, the previous Government referred to the Monopolies Commission the supply in Great Britain of films for exhibition in cinemas, and that we decided to postpone our review of films legislation until it could be carried out in the light of the Commission's findings.

It would, obviously, not have been sensible to take any major decisions on films policy until the Commission's Report had been received and considered. The Report has now been received and my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade hopes to arrange for it to be laid before the House and published by the end of this month. The present Bill is a holding operation, designed to preserve the present arrangements for long enough, and no longer, to enable the Government to carry out a full-scale review of films policy and legislation.

My right hon. Friend consulted the Cinematograph Films Council and both sides of the industry bout the future of the screen quota and the levy. A large majority recommended that the right course would be to continue the relevant legislation for a limited period in order to enable the Government to consider the findings of the Commission before taking the necessary long-term decisions.

I now turn to the detailed provisions of the Bill. Clause 1 extends until the end of 1970 the period during which the Board of Trade, with Treasury approval, may make advances up to £6 million to the National Film Finance Corporation, and during which the Corporation may make loans to film producers or distributors. This Clause also extends the period during which the Corporation may borrow up to £2 million from private sources.

I know that the Corporation, in common with everyone else, has found it very difficult in recent months to raise money from private sources. But it is not unreasonable to suppose that when our economy gets on to a firmer footing as a result of the measures taken by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer, these difficulties will diminish and, I hope, finally disappear. It is important that when the present financial stringency has eased, the Corporation should be enabled to raise funds from non-Government sources. The provisions, therefore, of Clause 1 will extend until the end of 1970 the necessary authority for that to be done.

Clause 2 extends up to the end of 1970 the powers of the Board of Trade to give effect to arrangements for the transfer of the Corporation's assets and liabilities to a British company providing finance for film production, and postpones until after the end of 1970 exercise of the powers to dissolve the Corporation. In other words, it simply prolongs the provisions of Sections 12 and 13 of the 1957 Act.

Clause 2(b) of the Bill will have the effect of transferring to the Board of Trade the power to include incidental provisions in any dissolution Order, and of transferring to the Board of Trade, with Treasury approval, the power to vary a dissolution Order.

Clause 3 extends the provision for the imposition of a levy on exhibitors for three further periods of 52 weeks, that is until October, 1970. Again, this Clause continues the present provisions without any change. Among those provisions is one requiring that the regulations governing the collection of the levy shall be so framed that its yield shall not exceed £5 million in any 52-week period. A suggestion was made that this limit should be raised or removed altogether.

My right hon. Friend consulted the Cinematograph Films Council on the matter, and its advice was that the statutory limit on levy yield should remain unchanged. Strong arguments were advanced on both sides and, whatever may be said for or against the proposal, I think that it will be generally admitted that it was a controversial one. We decided, therefore, that as such it was unsuitable for inclusion in the present Bill. The forthcoming review of films legislation will, of course, offer an opportunity for the full deployment of the arguments for and against the proposal.

Clause 4 provides for the continuance until the end of 1970 of the operation of the screen quota provisions. So far, the effect of the Bill is to continue things as they are under present legislation.

I now come to the minor amendments to which I referred at the opening of my speech. The first of these concerns the limit of exemption from the quota requirements of the law. This is a change that could have been made by Statutory Instrument, subject to affirmative Resolution of each House of Parliament. It seemed, however, convenient and likely to save Parliamentary time to include this former amendment in the present Bill.

At present, cinemas whose weekly average takings are less than £125 exclusive of levy payments are exempt from the quota requirements of the Films Act, 1960. My right hon. Friend consulted the Cinematograph Films Council on this matter and the Council recommended that in view of increases in costs and prices since 1960 when the present limit was fixed, there should be an increase in the exemption limit to £150. Clause 5 prescribes this as the new limit. The effect of an increase to this figure would be to make about 500 cinemas eligible for exemption as compared with about 400 at present. An increase of this kind will provide some measure of relief to cinemas in unfavourable situations which have difficulty in fulfilling their quota requirements, and I hope that the House will approve of this small concession.

The second amendment which the present Bill proposes is contained in Clause 6. It relates to the maximum fee payable on registration as a British quota film of a film made in accordance with an international co-production agreement. Section 19 of the Films Act, 1960, enables provision to be made by Order in Council under which films made in accordance with the terms of an international film co-production agreement may become eligible for registration as British films. One such agreement, with France, was concluded in September, 1965. No co-production film has yet been registered but two projects have been approved by the Board of Trade and by the authorities in France.

At present, the maximum fee payable on application for registration of a film is fixed by the Films Act, 1960, at eight guineas; the actual fee, prescribed by regulation, is six guineas. By virtue of Section 44 of the 1960 Act, the Board of Trade, with the consent of the Treasury, is required to prescribe fees which will secure, as nearly as may be, that the aggregate amount produced will be equal to the amount of the expenses incurred in the carrying out of the Act. The fee at present in operation is enough for this purpose in so far as registration of normal British films is concerned, but it is totally inadequate in relation to a film made in accordance with an international co-production agreement.

Reference to the annex to the Franco-British co-production agreement will show that to be eligible for registration as a British film, a co-production film must satisfy a large number of detailed requirements. The privilege of registration as a British quota film, with its attendant levy benefits, is not to be lightly conferred and rigorous examination of the details of each project is necessary. Final approval must be given by the authorities of both countries acting jointly, so that close consultation with the authorities in the partner country is required.

The procedure necessary inevitably involves a considerable amount of administrative work, and our estimate is that a maximum fee of £450 would be appropriate, and this is the figure included in Clause 6 of the Bill. The intention is that the actual fee should be prescribed by Regulation as soon as the necessary powers exist. I cannot at present say what the appropriate figure will be, but, on the basis of our experience so far, I hope that it will be possible to cover administrative expenses at a figure some way below the maximum proposed in the present Bill.

These, then, are the provisions of the Bill. This is a holding operation, and, except for the minor amendments which I have described, nothing more. It is an essential Measure, because without it the whole apparatus of support for the film industry would have disappeared by the end of next year. The various measures of support will be the subject of much debate and discussion in the next year or two, and in the meantime it is clearly desirable to continue the present arrangements.

I hope that the Bill will commend itself to the House as a Measure necessary to enable the whole of our films legislation to be reviewed in the light of the Report of the Monopolies Commission.

11.18 a.m.

Mr. F. V. Corfield (Gloucestershire, South)

I do not think this Bill involves any great clash of principle between the two sides of the House. The hon. Gentleman the Minister of State, Board of Trade, was kind enough before this debate to add somewhat to the Explanatory Memorandum printed at the front of the Bill, and for that I am grateful.

I am very glad that the Government are proposing a really thorough review of this legislation because I feel bound to say that when I came to study its background I did not find it exactly straightforward. I had hoped, when I discovered that the 1960 Act was a consolidation Measure, that if I read that Act I should be in possession of all the legislative provisions which were relevant, but this was an entirely false hope because, as the Bill before us makes clear, we have to refer in the first place to the 1949 Act and then later to the 1957 Act; and in some respects even in the 1960 Act the provisions are not altogether clear unless one goes back to the 1938 Act. For that reason alone I should have thought that there was a strong case for comprehensive consolidation bringing in the new ideas which, no doubt, the Government will develop in the course of their review.

The other factor which I found rather confusing was the multiplicity of statutory bodies which are involved in this industry. First of all, we have the Cinematograph Films Council and the provisions setting it up, which occur now in the 1960 consolidation Act, though I am not sure what their actual historical origin is. I think that they are somewhat older than that. Then we have the National Film Finance Corporation, which stems from the 1949 Act, and the British Film Fund Agency, which stems from the 1957 Act.

The two latter bodies are both involved in the distribution of financial aid in one form or another—in the one case, I understand, by grants and in the other case by loans, but basically assisting the making of British films—and it would seem, therefore, to the layman at least that there is bound to be a good deal of overlapping and that this is a function which could be performed by a single body.

After all these years—the hon. Gentleman pointed out that the quota system started in 1957—there is, clearly, a case for review as to whether it is any longer necessary to protect the British film industry in this way, and, if it is, whether this is the right way to do it. We on this side and, I think, the House as a whole welcome the attempts to obtain the co-operation of French and Italian producers which the hon. Gentleman mentioned. However, I find it difficult, having read the somewhat complex provisions with regard to registration in the 1960 Act, to see how it can conceivably be possible to spend £450 on the procedures for registration of a film produced in partnership with the French, the Italians or anyone else. Reading those provisions, I felt that practically all the information required for registration could readily be obtained by means of a statutory declaration from the people responsible for making the film, and I cannot see why it should be possible to involve oneself in expenditure of that sort. However, I accept from the hon. Gentleman that this is really a safeguard, a maximum target, and that at the end of the day the cost of registration to the film producers and those concerned in the industry will be what it, in fact, costs.

I cannot believe that the process of registration, the object of which, as I understand it, is purely to ensure that a film is a genuine British film or, in the other case, a genuine Anglo-French or Anglo-Italian film really involves expenditure of that sort. I quite see the temptation to find it necessary to go over to Paris to ensure that everything is done properly, and so on, but I do not believe that it is really necessary, and I hope that every effort will be made to keep the registration fee somewhere near what has been charged in the past in relation to purely British films.

I press upon the Government that, when they feel that their review is nearing completion, they should publish their conclusions in the form of a White Paper well in advance of any legislation. This is not a subject on which there is very wide expertise either in the House or in the country because the film industry, as I see it, is in many respects unique, having many factors affecting it which do not affect industry generally. I hope, therefore, that we shall have ample opportunity to study any proposed provisions and take advice from interested sections of the industry and so on before there is any question of legislation.

Perhaps, if the ideas of the Leader of the House for televising proceedings in this Chamber are carried forward apace, by that time there may be more widespread interest among hon. Members in the production of films. Whether that will be a good thing or not I am not prepared to say. But, on a matter of this sort, it will be an enormous help if we have ample opportunity to study the proposals before legislation is produced.

With those few words, I am glad to assure the House that we on this side do not in any way wish to oppose the Bill, which seems to us to represent a perfectly sensible arrangement pending the outcome of a review which, I entirely agree, would have been largely abortive if embarked upon before the Report of the Monopolies Commission became available.

11.25 a.m.

Mr. Hugh Jenkins (Putney)

It may be that the reason why the House is so ill attended this morning is that hon. Members recognise that, as my hon. Friend the Minister of State said, this is really a holding operation which preserves the status quo. Nevertheless, hon. Members may ask themselves the question which I have asked myself: why is it necessary? The legislation which we are here prolonging lasts until the end of next year. I understand that the Report of the Monopolies Commission has been received by my hon. Friend and is likely to be published in the very near future.

If the Report of the Commission were to be made available during the coming month or not later than the following month, there would be time for Government consideration of the whole position, for publication even of a White Paper in the early part of next year and for the introduction of legislation either before the end of the summer Recess or, certainly, during the autumn. For my part, therefore, I think it not impossible for the Government, if they were minded so to do, to introduce legislation bringing about the considerable changes which are necessary if we are to preserve a genuinely British film industry, and do it without this holding legislation.

However, there may be technical reasons behind it which have escaped me, and I accept that the Bill now before us, apart from the changes to which my hon. Friend referred, with which most of us would agree and regard as non-controversial in so far as they are minor, is not contentious and it does give us a better and longer opportunity to ensure that, when changes are introduced into the industry, they will be the sort of changes which will be generally acceptable and, more important, generally beneficial.

I see my hon. Friend the Minister of State making notes, and I take it that he will hope in due course to have opportunity to reply to the debate—which looks like being a short one—and I hope that he will then be able to assure us that it will not at any stage be said that, because this extending legislation has been introduced, the Government will be in any way inhibited from making substantial alterations if, in the light of their own review and of the recommendations of the Monopolies Commission, it seems desirable to do so. It might be said that, even though the Commission had recommended such and such, and even though the Government's review showed that it was desirable to make some changes, as we had only just introduced some films legislation we could not go through the whole business of fresh legislation again.

I hope that my hon. Friend will tell us that no one will say that and confirm that this is purely an extending Bill, the intention being that, when the Monopolies Commission reports, as I hope it will, that there exists a monopoly of distribution in the industry and that this monopoly must be broken, nothing will inhibit the Government from introducing fresh legislation, even during the course of this Session, if they feel it desirable to do so and if the circumstances appear to warrant it.

While we are waiting for the Monopolies Commission to report—and we all hope that that Report, when it comes, will make proposals for the recovery of an independent British film industry—we recognise that this Bill merely preserves an American industry on location in England. This is what we have now. The independent British film, not only made in Britain but financed from British sources, is not yet as dead as the dodo, but it is approaching extinction.

The Bill does nothing to remedy this situation. It does nothing because it provides no money, and what is needed to resurrect a genuinely British film industry is some genuine British money.

It might be thought that the Bill means that the Government are authorising a new £8 million loan. If it were we should probably have heard something from the Opposition. But it is appreciated on that side, as on this, that no new money is forthcoming. All the Bill does is to continue to authorise the National Film Finance Corporation to go on doing what it is already doing. No new sources of revenue are provided, and since the Corporation has virtually exhausted its existing sources of revenue, this means precisely nothing. All that the Bill is doing is keeping the Corporation in being as a sort of penurious zombie dependent on remittances from days gone by which are probably not more than enough to pay the staff's wages.

So let us not be under any misapprehension about the matter, We are not doing anything here to inject the necessary financial life into the British film industry. What we are doing is to preserve apparatus with which, if we so decide, at some future date we can inject that life into it. It is very necessary and desirable to do this, but let us not be under any illusion that we are now doing it. The time was when the Corporation financed a large number of genuinely British films. However, the tap is trickling only very slowly now. It has spent most of what it had to spend, and I expect that, like everyone else, it is waiting for the Report of the Monopolies Commission. We are in a hiatus.

Will the Commission recommend the establishment of a third circuit and the breaking up of the American-dominated twin monopoly which preserves the present prosperity of the British film industry? Make no mistake: the industry is prosperous. We are not complaining that the industry is in any financial doldrums. It exists now on a substantial input of American money. But what is alarming is that the industry is now almost entirely dependent on American money, and if at any time that money should be withdrawn the situation would be grave indeed.

Will the Commission recommend that the Eady money which is collected within British box-offices shall stop being siphoned away to Hollywood? How much of the Eady money, the fund originally developed to subsidise the British film industry, finds it way to Hollywood? I suspect about 80 per cent. I think that what is happening is that the money originally intended for the preservation of an independent British industry has, owing to large-scale American investment, which from one point of view is a good thing, become a subisdy for that investment in our country. This is a very odd situation which I am sure was not contemplated on either side of the House when the Eady system was introduced. But it is no longer a subsidy or support for British investors in films. It has become a means whereby money is siphoned away to American investors.

I should like to know—I hope that the Monopolies Commission will tell us, because nobody else has—what percentage is now finding its way out of this country. I think, as I have already said, that probably nearly all of it does. If the Minister thinks that it is not true to say that nearly all of the Eady money is going to Hollywood, I should like him to say so today.

I do not think anybody wants to drive the Americans away. As I have said, they are the source of the present prosperity of the industry. But there ought to be some differentiation and some diversion of funds into British-financed films, if only to give the Americans a permanent base in Britain so that they can be sure of having somewhere to run away from and perhaps somewhere to come back to when the circumstances change. We ought to have something of our own which we can recognise as permanently our own and which we can preserve as our own and which we can keep as a permanent source of a British industry, but we are in danger of losing this because our industry is so much American financed.

Why do not the Government take back British Lion into public ownership? It has been hanging around in an uncomfortable limbo for a long time. The right solution to the problem would be to recover the public interest in that corporation. How can we ever hope to recover financial or any other independence in films or anything else if the capital of our industry and its ultimate direction are continually to be found from sources outside our own shores? It is a very serious dilemma that we find ourselves in at this time in our history, and the dilemma is not confined to the film industry.

Is it not the case that this development of external financing of British industry, welcome though it is in some respects, means that the direction of our financial affairs and thus of our economic affairs more and more slips not only from British control but also from Government control? Is it not, therefore, the case that the elected Government of our country more and more become creatures subject to ideas and considerations that are remote from the propositions on which they were elected to office? If this can happen, as I think the evidence shows it is happening, in the film industry, if the product has characteristics which are no longer essentially British characteristics, I think that the logic of it, and not only for films, should make all of us on both sides think very deeply. We must in films as elsewhere find our own sources of investment from our own resources if we are to retain the reality of power and not just the political forms of power in our own hands.

The Bill does nothing to end the present situation, nothing to recover the independence of the British film industry. I hope that before it returns to this House the Monopolies Commission will have reported. If the Government should discover from that Report that it is desirable to make very substantial amendments to the Bill, I think that the House might reasonably be prepared to look at that even to the point of taking an instruction, if necessary, to amend the short title of the Bill to enable the Government to make substantial amendments which would be out of order and impossible under the present short title.

I hope that this will not be excluded—amendments which would be designed to find a source of revenue and a medium of exhibition for the film which is not just an efficient, technically smooth and plushy essay in the never-never-land where sadism leaves no scars and where smart words and nasty actions emit the authentic aroma of the North American nightmare.

This country is today degenerating into the 51st State without any of the privileges and advantages of the other 50. When one can no longer distinguish whether a film has been made in Hollywood, New York or London and when the source of the finance is the same in all three cases, one may have a prosperous film industry, but what else that is worth while will one have left?

I would think that the undesirable nature of the present situation and the urgency of a cure may be illustrated in the advice of the British Film Producers Association. The Association is the voice of the twin monopoly and advocates its policy. Indeed, the two are almost indistinguishable. Not unnaturally, the Association recommends continuation of the present situation, not merely for the time covered by the Bill but in perpetuity. In the note that it was kind enough to give us before the debate, the Association states: While the Bill as drafted does not call into question the method of distributing the British Films Fund, this opportunity is taken to record a substantial majority view amongst British film producers that the present method of relating payments from the Fund to the distributors' gross of the benefiting films (which in turn is proportional to the box-office takings) has stood the test of time and should not be materially altered: in particular there should be no limit on what any film can draw. In other words, the monopolists are saying, "Our snouts are firmly in the trough and we do not want those starveling piglets outside in as well." The small independents are to be left out. The monopolists have had the bulk of the levy up to now for their products and they want that situation to go on. That is not unnatural. This is an organisation which has been getting the bulk of the subsidy and syphoning it back to America in many cases.

If we examine the proportion of the Eady levy, which covers short films, we find that the sum is about £250,000 and that the vast bulk of its goes to three groups. It is these groups which show short films on the two major circuits. The great difficulty of the independent British short film maker is to get a showing. He can travel all over the world and collect awards in various festivals, but, nevertheless, his greatest difficulty is to show his film to the people of his own country.

The main problem here is that the money is going to too few sources. There are basically three of them—the Rank Organisation's "Look at Life", the Associated British Picture Corporation's "Pathé Pictorial" and the Harold Bain Travelogues, distributed by United Artists, which seem to have an especially beneficent entry, no doubt on the basis of pure friendship. The money is distributed, in fact, to the short films which are accepted for showing and these are dominated by the monopoly. It is therefore not unnatural that the British Film Producers Association should want the present situation to continue.

But the situation is very unhealthy from the point of view of the industry as a whole because, like the independent British feature film industry, the British short film industry is also getting into a "pretty pass". The number of short films registered with the Board of Trade has been going down rapidly. In 1950, over 300 were registered, while in 1965—the latest figure I have—it was down to about 100. That is a serious drop in British short film production. It means that the independent British short film industry, like the independent British feature film industry, is in grave danger of extinction in a situation of general prosperity. It is an unusual and alarming situation.

I have referred to the grasp or writ of the twin monopoly over the industry. When one realises that about 40 per cent. of the total number of cinema seats in this country are within monopoly control of these two bodies, one can see that the control is very considerable indeed, the more so when one also learns that these seats are, generally speaking, those which are best situated from the population point of view. The control is therefore much greater than the actual figures reveal. Not only do the monopolies have 40 per cent. of the seats but they have the best seats in the best places. Their cinemas are well situated in centres of population, particularly in London.

Is a change desirable? One change that is desirable is a change in the distribution of the Eady levy. I want to illustrate what is done in Western Germany as an example of what we might do here. Instead of merely distributing the money on a box office basis, we might decide to set up an organisation such as the West Germans have. This is a body of critics and others who see films and determine whether they have merit. They divide the films into categories. One cannot get a showing for a short film in Western Germany unless it is categorised as "worthy" or "very worthy".

The latest figures I have available are those for 1964. Altogether, 18 British short films were passed and shown in West Germany. One was categorised as "very worthy"—in that year, no other films were so categorised—17 were categorised as "worthy" and 13 failed. These latter failed to get a showing.

The proposition of the British Film Producers Association that the only thing which counts is the box office cannot stand up in practice. In 1965, British short films did very well indeed. For example, they won three prizes in the Venice Documentary Film Festival and three at the Leipzig Festival. They also won a prize at the International Industrial Film Festival.

But these films are not seen in Britain. If I named them, they would be unfamiliar to hon. Members. Not one of these prize winning films has been seen by British cinema audiences. Instead, they get "Look at Life" and "Pathé Pictorial"—not unworthy productions but rather dull. These prize winning films are productions that people would like to see, but the distribution monopoly simply puts on its own films and does not give the public an opportunity to see them. Indeed, the only chance seems to be on television late at night sometimes.

The situation of the animated section of the British film industry is worse. Mr John Halas, Chairman of the Animation Group, says: During the last two years our films have won, among other prizes the Grand Prix at the Annecy Film Festival in France, several first prizes at Venice, Moscow, Oberhausen, Cannes, Karlovy Vary, and Locarno and they have been nominated for Oscars in Hollywood … Following our successes at these festivals are the international world-wide successes in actual business. A great many of our films are distributed in cinemas in the U.S.A., France, Japan, Russia, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary and many other countries … But these films which are famous throughout the world are not seen in their own country of origin. If anyone thinks that, in these days, we can be regarded as having a healthy and genuinely independent British film industry regardless of the state of prosperity in the industry generally, this is not supported by further examination.

The Bill preserves the present situation, which has many features other than those on which I have touched which cause some disquiet. Is the designation, for example, of what constitutes a genuinely British film the right designation? Is it right that Eady money should be distributed on equal terms to a film which is financed through British sources and one wholly financed from outside, even if both are made in this country?

Those are questions which must exercise our minds, because if we are content to say that we do not mind whether we have a British film industry so long as we have an international film industry functioning on British shores, we are making a very serious statement, because internationalism cannot be preserved by these means. There is a genuine flavour about a genuinely British film and if this flavour is lost, not only will we in this country have lost something which is valuable to us, but the world, too, will have lost something. In this sphere of public entertainment and public distribution of enjoyment what we want is a multiplicity of national characteristics. That is the sort of internationalism which we want in this sphere and not a dead mid-Atlantic product the source of which is unrecognisable and which is distributed in this country as a British film and in the United States of America as an American film, nobody knowing which it is.

I am not saying that no such films as that should be made. What I am saying is that within the situation in which such films will continue to be made, we must take especial steps to ensure that our own genuinely home British product continues to be produced.

11.52 a.m.

Sir Stephen McAdden (Southend, East)

As it is my lifelong ambition never to incur your displeasure, Mr. Speaker, I will not follow the hon. Member for Putney (Mr. Hugh Jenkins) too far into the detailed story which he has given to us of the situation in the film industry as a whole. I will say only that I am gratified to find that he is an opponent of monopolies and I hope that I shall have his constant support whenever the creation of a monopoly, be it private or public, is mooted in the House.

I am also glad to find that he is a champion of the British way of life, anxious that we should not have an imported version of culture in this country. I hope that I may also have his support in the opposition frequently raised in the House, without much support, to try to stop the flood of obscenity and pornography which comes into the country thereby corrupting some of the culture of our people.

Beyond that I want to keep myself strictly to the rules of order and to say that I am also gratified that the hon. Member feels that it is important that we should have British capital to help to finance the British film industry and not be so dependent on American capital for the maintenance of the industry. I hope that he will urge on his right hon. Friends the importance of so moulding our taxation policy that it is possible for people to have funds at their disposal with which to finance this industry. I look forward to having his support on various Amendments, which I am sure will be suggested to any future proposed legislation, to ease the burden of taxation on the people of this country.

Mr. Hugh Jenkins

The hon. Gentleman will forgive me if I observe that it seems to have been found possible to find money without much difficulty to finance I.C.I. recently.

Sir S. McAdden

I am glad that that has been so, but that does not affect the fact that it is still difficult to finance the film industry, possibly because it is more chancy than LCI., which is a tribute to the efficiency of I.C.I. and no reflection on the British film industry, which, as the hon. Gentleman rightly said, has certain difficulties and problems, particularly concerning the small producer trying to secure exhibition on major circuits.

I did not intend to say those things at all. I wanted to relate my remarks directly to Clause 1(a), which seeks to prolong until the end of 1970 the period during which the National Film Finance Corporation may make loans, and then to refer to Clause 1, which deals with the making of loans to be employed in financing the production or distribution of cinematograph films.

This is a matter which is worrying me and I would like an assurance that no loans will be made for the purpose of taking a film of the proceedings of the House. It would look dreadful if it were seen that on a Friday morning, when this important Bill is being discussed, that even the most fervent zealots for morning sittings of the House are not present to discuss this Bill on what is a normal Parliamentary day. Even the hon. Member opposite who is the Chairman of the Select Committee considering Parliamentary reform has not turned up this morning—I know that he went home last night.

It is a pity that those who are so anxious that Parliament should function efficiently do not bother to turn up on Friday mornings and take part in these discussions. The result of that is that you, Mr. Speaker, and the staff of the House, have to be detained while a non-contentious matter is discussed; and you may be detained less long if I sit down, which I now propose to do.

11.56 a.m.

Dr. David Kerr (Wandsworth, Central)

In which case perhaps I can immediately take up the point made by the hon. Member for Southend, East (Sir S. McAdden) on the recommendations of the Select Committee on Procedure and merely observe that of course the Select Committee took into account that morning sittings were, like Friday mornings, likely to be badly attended. We examined that. The hon. Gentleman referred to this as an important Bill and I thought I detected a trace of irony in his voice. It is an important Bill.

Sir S. McAdden

I said that it was important because the Government have provided the whole of this Friday for its discussion. I am surprised that there are not more hon. Members present to consider it.

Dr. Kerr

I endorse what the hon. Gentleman has said. It is an important Bill and it is much to be welcomed that it is receiving the support of both sides of the House. But even so its importance is under-estimated, even though the hon. Member and I agree that it is important.

It is a matter of great regret to me that the speakers we have heard today—and I do not exclude my hon. Friend the Member for Putney (Mr. Hugh Jenkins)—have failed to convey that we are talking about a magic world, an exciting world, true, a world of shadows, but a world which preserves in ice the history and the modes of our time; and this is something which history has never been able to do before. Let us suppose that we could have had a film industry at the time of Waterloo. We could have preserved on ice all the various aspects of those times, as we are now doing in our own time.

There is another curious aspect of the discussion this morning. Hon. Members have been talking all the time in terms of the film industry as seen through the eyes of the exhibitors, these chaps who are in such difficulties and whose trade over the last 10 years has diminished by about 60 per cent. The startling fact is that despite that, last year no fewer than 334 million attendances were paid for at Britain's cinemas.

Even if those attendances were undertaken only by people who were so keen on the cinema that they all went once a week, that would still mean 7 million individuals in Britain were keen on cinema-going and on the assumption that people go less frequently than once a week, it is quite clear that the habit of going to the cinema still remains a very important cultural activity of the ordinary British population. It is time that we started looking at the industry's problems through the eyes of the people who make use of it, the consumers.

There has been one other important omission from the discussion. My hon. Friend the Member for Putney mentioned—as who does not in this context?—the need for a third circuit. Nobody seems to wake up to the fact that we have a third circuit which is doing much more business than all the rest of the cinemas combined. I refer, of course, to television, which has taken the audience for films out of the cinemas and put it in the comfort of its own back parlours.

This is the third circuit which is already there. It is the outlet for films of an enormous variety. The first point that we have to bear in mind when looking at these modest proposals to extend the present situation is whether they form a piece of holding legislation. The tragedy is that this is not the truth. Nothing is holding the situation in the British film industry; it is sliding slowly and tragically into greater disaster.

I do not mean that the catastrophe is round the corner, because the paradox is that the studios are busy. At present, in our country there are some of the greatest names in the film direction and production, names like Chaplin, Truffaut and Antonioni John Frankenheimer. These people are working in Britain now. This does not sound like an industry on the verge of disaster, but my hon. Friend the Member for Putney very wisely reminded us that the original purpose of the legislation which this Bill now seeks to extend was to defend a British industry assailed by competition, which it did not have the resources to meet.

This is precisely the situation today. Legislation which we extend by this Bill does not, as was originally intended, give the resources which the British film industry needs. We have heard that the so-called Eady money—the British Film Fund Agency money collected by a levy on exhibitors—is not being devoted to help finance British films with a British flavour. I am sorry to sound so chauvinistic, but if there is any cultural sense in a film industry it is the way in which it can interpret the life and times and moods of a country in which the films are made.

I do not agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Putney when he talked about American film companies being on location in Britain. If it were as simple as that, it would be an easy target. It is not so simple. It is that we are making British films with a sufficient degree of American flavour to make them acceptable in the richer United States market. We are making British films with the aid of American capital for distribution on a world basis, because English is increasingly spoken in many other countries besides England and America.

This is what is wrong with what passes for British films today. I do not know whether "Modesty Blaise" is an example of good British culture. I know that I enjoyed it. If we talk about monopolies I wonder what monopoly would have set out to create "Modesty Blaise." It is proving to be a box-office success, as is" Goldfinger." I could not tell whether that was made in America or Britain, but I do know that both countries consumed it voraciously. But we are paying for it to the tune of £500,000 of the levy against production costs of £1.4 million.

In other words, British exhibitors, British cinemagoers, provided out of their pockets, not out of risk capital, not out of shareholders' contributions to a company, but out of a form of tax, more than a third of the production costs of "Gold-finger". This is not a situation which makes sense of the legislation we are extending here.

The two objectives to which we should set our minds firmly are the need to ensure a properly financed, stable and adventurous film industry and, secondly, although it is not second by very much, we need to ensure a constant improvement in the quality of British films. This so called piece of holding legislation does nothing to hold an already sliding situation. The hon. Gentleman the Member for Gloucestershire, South (Mr. Corfield) displayed something of which I am sure we are all guilty, but he displayed it—I say this with all the respect that I can muster—in greater measure. This is the difficulty of grasping the enormously complex structure of the film industry, particularly its interwoven warp and woof of structure. He asked for a White Paper. It will be one of the fattest White Papers ever published by this House.

I would commend to him a little book called "A Competitive Cinema" published by the Institute of Economic Affairs. I am sad to think that its authors were members of the Bow Group. Their examination of the industry is a very thorough-going one. Their conclusions would not run counter to the Bill before us, but I feel that I must quote one of the remarks made in the introduction. The authors say" The film industry is too important to be left to free-for-all manoeuvring, haphazard disintegration and last minute ministerial panaceas. I do not understand, if the Monopolies Commission's Report is so near to publication, why we need to have this legislation to extend previous legislation, which in any case has another six months to run. A short and easy Measure like this would go through the House like a dose of salts. It does not take very long. If we are as near, as is said, to having an examination, for the House to debate in the near future as thoroughly as we may the whole of the problems of the film industry, it seems a pity to introduce legislation of this sort.

My hon. Friend the Member for Putney was wrong in one respect. The legislation does not expire at the end of 1967. Some of it expires in March, 1967. I am a little chary of this. I have suggested that the situation in the British film industry is a paradoxical one. We have some first-class craftsmen but a diminishing industry. There are fewer films on the floor than there were at this time last year. The proportion of those films capitalised by American resources is higher than it was last year. One of the reasons is that the National Film Finance Corporation exists to provide resources for films to be made, unlike the levy, which is an award for films which make a good showing at the box office. The National Film Finance Corporation did not have the money to provide for an increasing number of British films.

The result has been, according to my information, that the N.F.F.C. has had to deny money to 12 British projects, some of them I believe the kind of middle budget films which alone can provide the sort of British cultural endeavour that we need. I am sure there are many hon. Members who would agree with this. To pursue the paradox a little further, we have been talking about the necessity for exports. It is a remarkable fact that 50 per cent. of the earnings of the films today are export earnings. This brings to light the rôle which television plays in the film-making world.

Week after week we are subjected to these old and cracked films from which the dust has not been blown before they are projected into our back parlours. Why do we not have more films specifically made for television, but none the worse for that? They could be made for repeated showing and suitable for the cinema, able to win prizes and to earn money. We have had some examples in the last year or two. There were some of the rather imaginative films of Philip Saville on B.B.C. television and the achievements of Peter Watkins' film "The War Game," which never achieved a showing on television, but has now been seen by so many people that it would not matter if it were shown. This has won prizes overseas and these films are made by the British film industry. Let us not forget this. They were not made in television studios but film studios, and this is what we are talking about.

The problem which remains with us is how to put the industry on a firm financial basis. We have already lost that battle very largely because our finance houses have got out of the habit of providing high risk money for film making. How can we raise the quality of films? Certainly there is a grave need to change the Eady regulations. It is a matter of great regret to me that some perhaps faltering step was not taken in tabling the Bill to change the kind of background against which the British Film Fund Agency established its regulations.

Those regulations were made in 1957. Is it possible for the House to accept that they still apply in a world which has not by any means remained unchanged in the last 10 years but in which the film industry has changed radically? Do not we need a new set of regulations to govern the Eady Levy? For instance, the levy regulations might exclude from the collection of the levy any performance of a quality film. My hon. Friend the Member for Putney referred only to Germany, but it is remarkable that throughout Europe—in France, Italy, Spain, Den- mark, and so on—every film-making country has some system of quality award. Only Britain, with a fine tradition of film making, lacks any kind of quality award to encourage the return of, shall we say, the golden age of the Ealing comedy—fine British films made in the early 1950s such as "Whiskey Galore" and the "Tichfield Thunderbolt". We do not have films like that any more; they are not making them any more. The reason is that encouragement to do so is lacking.

Why is it not possible to use the Eady levy to encourage cinemas to show art films which are not commercial films? It would be only a small contribution; it would be nominal. It would not revolutionise the film industry. But it would demonstrate the Government's attitude, and that is important. Not only cinema-goers but those in the film industry and some of the independent producers will note what we say today.

There are other ways in which we might assist the encouragement of British quality films, particularly the sort of medium budget films to which I have referred.

Before leaving the question of the levy, may I say that one thing which is a matter of great regret to me, and, I believe, to some of my hon. Friends, is the fact that the Minister has not taken the opportunity in the Bill to establish the principle of revealing what happens to the levy money. The Report of the British Film Fund Agency does not tell us exactly where the money goes, which films benefit from it and precisely to what extent. This is something which we need to know. We are abysmally ignorant of far too much concerning this complex and, in my view, very important industry.

Certainly we need to find new ways of financing the National Film Fund Agency, and we have not done that in the Bill. When people talk about holding legislation, I must ask precisely what it is that we are holding. We are holding a slippery fish, in my view, and it is getting out of our hands.

Apart from the question of prizes, there is the matter of Government responsibility. This is not the moment to discuss it, but I am increasingly concerned about the division of Government responsibility for the fate of our films. On the one hand, the Joint Under-Secretary of State, Department of Education and Science is doing wonders in the art film world through the assistance which she has offered the British Film Institute and the consequential development of National Film Theatre activity in the provinces. A mere £250,000 allocated to the National Film Theatre is changing the face of British film exhibition. The consequences for people's taste will be immeasurable. This tiny measure is a great potential stimulus to the making and showing of British quality films. It is a pity that the film industry should remain the responsibility of the Board of Trade. Changes are taking place, and I think that the Bill fails to take note of that fact.

I wish to ask the Minister two questions. As he pointed out, Clause 3 of the Bill extends the collection of the levy until October, 1970. What is not clear is how the money which is collected will be disbursed. What machinery will there be for the disposal of the levy, which cannot be divided among film makers until it has been collected? If the machinery comes to an end, as the Bill, by implication, would ensure, I should like the Minister to explain the principle for dividing the levy in 1971.

The second question which is relevant to all our thinking on British films is this. Provision is made in the Bill for increasing box office takings to a level which would protect, according to my hon. Friend, another 500 cinemas and would exempt them from levy collection. I should like to know what proportion of exempted cinemas exceed the statutory quota of British films exhibited. Obviously this will play some part in our thinking. If all exempted cinemas show nothing but Japanese pornography, I assume that their takings will increase sufficiently to make sure that they are not exempt next year. But if they are showing nothing but British films, or a high proportion of British films, this speaks loudly of the relationship between the British film industry and the exhibitors.

The hon. Member for Southend, East had some rib-nudging remarks to make about the poor attendance in the House on Fridays. We are used to this. It is always a little diminishing to speak to an echoing House. But what we say is not confined to the audience in this Chamber. I am enormously encouraged by the work done by my right hon. Friend the Joint Under-Secretary of State, Department of Education and Science. She has displayed a grasp of the problems of the art film and the hunger for the display of this kind of film throughout the country.

Only last week the British Film Institute opened a new kind of film theatre in Norwich, where there was a film club membership of 120. The establishment of a National Film Theatre in Norwich produced a membership of 1,600 and queues for the first performance. This is the quality of the cinema to which testimony has been paid by people in every country.

We cannot afford to allow the British film industry to continue its slow but recognisable slide into disrepute and disrepair. We need it badly, and I am sorry that, in welcoming at least a refusal to allow the N.F.F.C. and the levy to disappear, I have to express the saddest regret that we have not seized the opportunity to go a little bit further.

12.18 p.m.

Mr. Roy Mason

This has been a very interesting and useful debate. Points have been made which undoubtedly will contribute greatly to the general review of films legislation and policy which the Government propose to undertake in the light of the Monopolies Commission Report. I am sorry that I cannot give the exact date for the publication of the Report, but I expect that it will be by the end of the month. It would be wrong to take any decisions in advance of the consideration of the Report.

The Bill simply preserves things as they are, contrary to what my hon. Friend the Member for Wandsworth, Central (Dr. David Kerr) says, and so enables the taking of decisions to be deferred until the review undertaken with the benefit of the outcome of the Monopolies Commission's investigation can be completed. In this review we intend to go thoroughly into all aspects of the industry. The various measures of Government support dealt with in the Bill have been in operation for a good many years—the quota since 1927, the N.F.F.C. since 1949 and the levy on a voluntary basis since 1950 and in statutory form since 1957.

It is time, therefore, to take a searching look at these matters and to consider how far these measures of support, in their present or in modified form, are in present-day conditions appropriate. My hon. Friend the Member for Putney (Mr. Hugh Jenkins) asked why it should be done now. First, it is necessary to fit this Bill into the legislative timetable. Secondly, we could not by March, 1967, complete the review of the industry, especially when we have to take into consideration the outcome of the Monopolies Commission's Report. It is essential to get this Bill on to the Statute Book well before March, 1967. My hon. Friend the Member for Wandsworth, Central (Dr. David Kerr) asked about what will happen to the distribution of the levy after 1970. By that time we hope that the major legislation will have been prepared and introduced, and consequently this fear should not arise.

Questions were asked about the future of the National Film Finance Corporation. My hon. Friend the Member for Putney, particularly, talked about the American presence in the British film industry. I will try to answer the questions as I gradually develop my theme of the industry.

There are many difficult problems to consider, and I do not think that it is necessary for us to take too gloomy a view. It is true that in the five years 1961 to 1965 inclusive the annual average of registrations of British films fell to 72 compared with an average for the previous five years of 85. But when we find that during the same ten years admissions fell from over 1,100 million in 1956 to about 325 million in 1965, we see that British production has kept up remarkably well in the face of a tremendous fall in admissions. Moreover, present-day films are often on a larger scale than their predecessors.

Many of the new spectaculars are British films—made on location or in large studios employing British talent and using to the full our studio floor skills. This is a credit to the industry's fight back, and it is pleasing that the industry should be so fully employing British actors and the skilled personnel within the studios. A number of these films have been wholly or mainly American financed. These include "Thunderball", "Khartoum", "Tom Jones", "Lawrence of Arabia", "Help", "Alfie", "The Spy who came in from the Cold" and "Those Magnificent Men in their Flying Machines".

Other successful films have been financed by British interests. Here one can name "Othello", The St. Trinian's Films, the "Carry On" series and "Cul de Sac". I do not think that we should be too despondent and I do not think that the little cloud of gloom should be exaggerated out of all proportion.

The industry also makes a valuable contribution to the country's export earnings. It was pleasant to hear comments on this by my hon. Friend the Member for Wandsworth, Central, but I urge it to do yet more. In assessing the value of an industry to this country, an important factor to be borne in mind is the contribution which it makes towards solving our balance-of-payments problems. I am well aware of the competition which has to be faced by anyone trying to start or to expand overseas distribution of cinema films, but I hope that the industry will continue, whether by individual or by co-operative effort, to strive to get more of its films shown in cinemas abroad.

Film making has always been an expensive business and the ever-present problem is now to make receipts measure up to costs. One way, and it is obviously a sensible way, is to try to increase receipts and to attract more people to the cinema, and the industry is doing this all the time. I believe that at the moment the industry is conducting a special large-scale operation for this purpose. It has been reported that five trade associations—the two producers' associations, the two exhibitors' associations and the renters' society—are getting together to consider how best to arrest the continued fall in admissions and closing of cinemas. This has been christened "Operation Uptake". It is understood that new methods of publicity will be considered and that there will be a full exchange of ideas throughout the industry.

But another, and potentially equally effective, way is to bring about a reduction in costs. Management and labour in the film industry must consider seriously and unceasingly whether moves designed to eliminate wasteful practices and to improve efficiency would not make a substantial contribution towards solving some of the industry's problems. Of course, every film is a one-off article. All films are different. Nevertheless, problems of efficient use of equipment and labour arise at all stages. The film industry has from time to time been accused of extravagance and waste.

Whatever the truth of this, there is no room in this country at present for extravagance or waste of any kind and the film industry's future will depend in no small measure on the extent to which it succeeds in eliminating any element of inefficient management or out-dated working practices and manning schedules which may at present be hindering its operations. The fact that artistic and entertainment considerations play so prominent a part in film making does not mean that the industry can afford to neglect the more hum-drum need to make the most efficient use of its manpower and equipment.

I know that there are ambitious modernisation plans in hand at two of our major British studios. At Pine-wood, which I visited recently, two of the most advanced stages in the film production world were opened in June of this year. They are made with dual-purpose facilities for feature and television production and incorporate advanced ideas, for example electronic control, which are likely to set a new standard in film production techniques for many years ahead. A £1 million expansion at Elstree is also, we understand, almost completed, and this will include new stages and ancillary blocks.

One of the main purposes of the Government's review of films policy and legislation is to consider the N.F.F.C.'s future. Yesterday the Corporation issued a statement, and there is comment in the Press today, which no doubt excited my hon. Friends to raise this matter particularly in their remarks. It is true that the Corporation's original resources have been greatly diminished as a result of the losses, amounting to abount £4½ million, which it has incurred during its existence. During the present period of financial stringency, the Corporation is unable to increase the level of its loans. I know that this is a disappointment to the Corporation and to potential borrowers. We have intervened to ensure that the Corporation's bank overdraft is not cut below its existing level and we have readvanced to the Corporation money—about £120,000—repaid in respect of special preference dividends from British Lion.

Yesterday, the Corporation issued a statement saying that for the time being it is unable to entertain further applications for loans. We shall keep in close touch with the Corporation, and I hope that its present difficulties will not last for long. The Government are confident that as a result of the measures taken there will be a steady improvement in the economic situation. In the meantime, it would not be reasonable to expect that the credit squeeze would have no effect on the film industry. The Bill prolongs the authorisation given by earlier legislation to the Corporation to borrow up to £2 million from private sources.

It is obviously desirable to put the Corporation in a position where it can borrow as soon as economic conditions improve and money is more freely available. For the moment, we hope that it will bear with its financial difficulties so that a fresh appraisal can be made following the publication of the Monopolies Commission's Report and the bettering of the economic situation.

At least half the films qualifying for British quota are financed by United Kingdom subsidiaries of the six big American distributors. Moreover, since these include large and expensive films, the proportion of total investment in British film production for which the Americans are responsible is well over half.

The fear is expressed that genuine British productions will be smothered and there is anxiety lest the Americans should transfer their activities back to Hollywood. I would only say to my hon. Friends that this is a fear which should not be exaggerated. "Genuine British production" has never been defined to everyone's satisfaction. Whatever it may mean to some people, the fact is that the Americans financed "Lawrence of Arabia", "Becket", "Tom Jones", "The Knack", "Alfie", "Born Free", "A Hard Day's Night" and "Help". These are all obviously British in origin and illustrate a blossoming rather than a smothering of British ideas and talent on the screen.|

The Americans have been willing to take risks and the bringing together of American money and experience and British talent has been highly successful. The United Kingdom has become one of the main centres of film production in the world. As my hon. Friend the Member for Wandsworth, Central said, in 1966 many of the world's most famous directors made films here. They include Antonioni, Chaplin, Kubrick and Truffaut. Why deplore it?

In a speech to the International Alliance of Theatre Stage Employees' convention, in Detroit last July, Mr. Jack Valenti, President of the Motion Picture Association of America, whom my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade had the pleasure of meeting during his recent meeting to this country, referred to higher costs as a factor in driving production away from the United States. There is a message here for us, too.

There will continue to be room for substantial film production here, in the United States, and in other major film-producing countries, but we shall retain our place only if we, too, look to this question of costs. To talk about a partnership rather than dominance by the Americans would be more in keeping with the present situation; and indeed, as the signs for the future of the film industry at present present themselves to me, our aim should be to encourage British finance without frightening away American finance.

I noticed that during a debate in another place on 2nd February my noble Friend Lord Willis referred to the film "Lawrence of Arabia". There could not, he said, be a more British film than that——

Mr. Speaker

Was the noble Lord speaking on behalf of the Government?

Mr. Mason

No. He was making a contribution on behalf of the Government, and he made reference——

Mr. Speaker

Order. It is not in order to quote a noble Lord unless he was speaking on behalf of the Government.

Mr. Mason

I apologise, Mr. Speaker. Reference was made in another place about a film called "Lawrence of Arabia" and it was suggested during the course of the debate that it was an American film. Then it was mentioned that this film had a British subject, a British script, a British star, a British director and British technicians. It was in fact mainly financed by the Americans. "Lawrence of Arabia" was registered as a British quota film and qualified for payments from the levy fund.

I mention this to rectify what could have been a serious misunderstanding in the other place. When it came to light in December, 1963, that the film had been entered in the Mexican film festival as an American film the Films Branch of the Board of Trade took up the matter with Columbia Picture Corporation which financed the production and held the distribution rights. The explanation given was that Columbia had intended to import the film into Mexico on an American import licence but had not wished to enter it for the festival.

Under pressure from the authorities they had eventually agreed to make a copy available and the festival organisers had mistakenly listed it as an American film. The film shown included a credit title showing that Shepperton Studios, England, were used. The mistake was corrected, and the British Ambassador received, on behalf of the makers, the award made to it as a British film.

The key sentence during my remarks in winding up this debate, and dealing with American participation in British film production, the key phrase which should be ringing through the industry, is that American participation in British film production, without deterring American interests, at the same time encourages British financed British film production; and, during the course of our review after the Monopolies Commission has reported, very serious consideration will have to be given to that—how to maintain British financed British film production while at the same time not deterring American financial interests here.

Although I have ranged wide in my summing up I thought it necessary that the House should be a little more informed on the Government's views on the present situation of the industry. It is not a bad picture: the studios are busy; and the industry can justifiably claim that it has won for this country the distinction of being one of the main centres of film production in the world. When going about the industry and talking to film industrialists and even to colleagues of mine in the House I have had a sense of a whisper of gloom as though a storm were about to break and the heavens about to fall on the industry—when, in fact, hardly a cloud is in sight.

The Bill before us is a small holding operation which, I hope, the House will now accept as a necessary Measure which will in no way prejudice the longer-term decisions.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read a Second time.

Bill committed to a Standing Committee pursuant to Standing Order No. 40 (Committal of Bills).