Clause 1.—(RATING AREAS AND RATING AUTHORITIES.) (Hansard, 28 February 1967)

§ Mr. Graham Page
This is a Bill to consolidate certain enactments. It is not a Bill to consolidate with corrections and improvements. In this connection I think that I am in order in referring to a matter in the Clause which does not clearly state the existing law. The Joint Select Committee did not have the benefit in this case of a memorandum from the Lord Chancellor which would have stated Amendments which ought to be consolidated and embodied in a consolidation Measure. The Joint Select Committee had only the memorandum from the Government Department.
I apprehend that, when a Bill is only to consolidate the law on a particular subject, three types of Amendment are permitted and, if such types of Amendments are permitted, the removal of a whole Clause on the same basis must also be permitted. Therefore, in a debate on the Question, "That the Clause stand part of the Bill", one must be at liberty to oppose the Clause upon the same grounds as one could oppose an Amendment.
Those grounds are stated at page 553 of Erskine Mav as follows. First: An amendment to change the date on which the Bill is to come into operation… Secondly: An Amendment which would make the words of the bill express more clearly the law as it stands. Thirdly: 406 An Amendment which seeks to bring the Bill into conformity with the existing law, if the chairman is satisfied that the Bill, as drafted, would effect an alteration in the law. I want to question subsection (2) on the grounds that it could more clearly have expressed the law as it stands and also that it is not in conformity with the present law. The subsection purports to express the law as it is at present with regard to the power of the rating authority to levy rates but, as was admitted before the Select Committee, there is no such existing law stating that power. It was said in evidence by the Parliamentary draftsman—this is page 4 of the Minutes of Evidence before the Joint Committee— …there is no one single reasonably complete description of exactly what a rating authority's power to levy a rate means. Quite a bit of the meat of this subsection is at the moment tucked away in the definition of rate in the 1925 Act. in a context which was dealing not so much with what the rating authority has power to do as with what people other than rating authorities cannot do. He went on to explain the point in these words: I thought that this proposition really required stating in positive form and in a substantive provision rather than being tucked away in a definition. That is one illustration of what I mean by re-stating the law. In my submission, the words of the Clause as drafted do not express the law as it stands. It refers to the power to "make and levy rates". I refer in particular to the word "make". The expression "to make rates" seems to me to fail to express the function of the rating authority. To "assess" rates, perhaps, but not to "make" rates.
Moreover, there seems to be no justification in existing law for the last words of the subsection, applying the proceeds thereof to local purposes of a public nature. The words "of a public nature" are questionable as a statement of existing law when placed in juxtaposition with the word "local" in the earlier part of the phrase. In my submission, the existing law does not require the local purposes to be of a public nature, and it would have been better expressed as being of a "local nature" and left at that.
According to the rules of order, I am permitted to argue this point only on a narrow issue as to the expression of the 407 existing law. This is not a pedantic exercise in legal phraseology. It goes to the root of the matter of consolidation Bills. It is many times argued, in reference to consolidation Measures, that Parliament as recently as 1960, or whatever the year may be, has confirmed the existing law and that, so soon after such confirmation, we ought not to alter the law. But that argument frequently omits that the confirmation of the existing law has been by a consolidation Measure, and it is incumbent upon the House, therefore, to ensure that it is not falsely bound by some erroneous statement of the existing law.

§ The Chairman
I am sorry to interrupt the hon. Gentleman, but I must remind him—he has referred to the permitted scope of debate—that it has been ruled on several occasions that the scope of debate on consolidation Bills is extremely limited. The only argument permitted is on whether the law on the subject should be consolidated or not, and on the Question, "That the Clause stand part of the Bill," on each Clause all that is relevant is whether the law as stated in the Clause should be so consolidated.
The Committee has before it the Report of the Joint Committee, which has stated that the Bill as amended is pure consolidation and represents the existing law and there is no point to which the attention of Parliament should be drawn.

§ Mr. Page
With great respect, Sir Eric, it is clearly stated on page 553 of Erskine May that in the case of Bills which seek only to consolidate the law the House is at liberty at the Committee stage to propose Amendments which …would make the words of the bill express more clearly the law as it stands.

§ The Chairman
Order. There are no Amendments on the Notice Paper.

§ Mr. Page
Indeed, Sir Eric, but it was my submission when I opened that if one is permitted to amend a Bill the omission of a Clause must come under the same rules.

§ The Chairman
I do not think that that follows. It would have been open to the hon. Gentleman to have proposed an Amendment to 408 make the words of the Bill express more clearly the law as it stands. But there is no Amendment on the Notice Paper and, therefore, the only question is whether the Clause as drafted should stand part of the Bill.

§ Mr. Page
I am sorry to labour the point, but surely it is an Amendment to the Bill to argue that the Clause should not stand part, which is my argument at present? If I had put that Amendment on the Notice Paper it would no doubt not have been called because you, Sir Eric, put the Question, "That the Clause stand part of the Bill." I am addressing my remarks to the question whether the Clause, particularly in a subsection, expresses the law as it stand. I would have hoped that I was in order in dealing with it in that form rather than in putting a specific Amendment on the Notice Paper.

§ The Chairman
I think not. I think that it would be open to the hon. Gentleman to put down an Amendment designed to change the words of the Clause with a view to making the words of the Bill express more clearly the law as it stands. But in the absence of any such Amendment the only question before the Committee is whether the Clause should stand part of the Bill.

§ Mr. Page
I am in great difficulty here, Sir Eric, and I should like your guidance on how one argues whether a Clause should stand part of a Bill without questioning whether it is a statement of the existing law. I take it from the wording of Erskine May that on an Amendment one can examine whether the Bill states the existing law, and I would have thought that in arguing that a Clause should not stand part of the Bill one could argue on the same principle.

§ The Chairman
I am afraid not. It has been moved over and over again that on Second Reading debates all that can be argued is whether the law should be consolidated. It seems to me to follow from that that on the question whether each Clause should stand part of the Bill the only relevant debate in the absence of an Amendment is whether the law on the subject should be consolidated in that particular Clause.

§ Mr. Page
Having put the argument as far as this, I am left merely to say that Clause 1 should not stand part of the Bill. I am left in the position of not being able to explain why I say that it should not stand part, but that must necessarily be so according to your ruling, Sir Eric.