§ Mr. PeytonI beg to move Amendment No. 39, in page 4, line 17, leave out subsection (2).
Mr. Deputy SpeakerAmendment No. 42, in page 5, line 10, leave out paragraph (a), is consequential upon Amendment No. 39 and can be discussed with it.
§ Mr. PeytonI agree that that will be a convenient course.
My motives here are purely exploratory. Ministers must accept that the Bill confers wide powers upon them. At the moment the Government's pay roll is considerably extended. Some of us take the view that the economy has been largely put in jeopardy by the Government's unwillingness to observe any discipline at all when it comes to their own expenditure. We do not take a very good view of seeing this glib little provision in a Bill like this. The subsection reads:
The Minister may pay to or in respect of the members of an Advisory Committee appointed under this section such remuneration or allowances as he may with the consent of the Treasury determine.There is the end of Parliamentary control. It is just a blanket authority to the Minister and to the Treasury to pay what they think proper.I should like to know a good deal more about it. I accept that there must be some form of allowances for any committee so that members may meet their expenses. On the other hand, one presumes that a good number of the people invited to serve on the Advisory Committee would be so affected by Surtax that any increased remuneration would hardly be worth the having.
I am far from happy about an authority of this kind being given to Ministers. What do the Government regard as a proper limit to pay to members of the Advisory Committee? Ministers will not accept this for a moment, but we on this side take strong objection to the increase in the Government's payroll, 479 their constantly increasing patronage, and their power of appointment. This is the State waxing great. If we do not wish to check it at every point, at least we wish to examine it at every point with great care.
§ 8.45 p.m.
§ Mr. NottI think that we are all in favour of the Advisory Committe, but what will be the procedure when the Minister comes to appoint the members? Nowadays, one finds, almost invariably, the same names cropping up again and again in the membership of various committees. There are certain pluralists in the business world who adorn too many boards and who are, therefore, quite incapable of properly carrying out any of their non-executive functions. There are also a good many of these so-called pluralists on Government advisory committees of one kind or another. They cannot be there for the allowances which Ministers grant. Presumably, they are there because they are patriotic-minded gentlemen keen to give a hand on the various committees which are at work.
Is there a system within the Government and the Civil Service for spreading the net more widely? I am not looking for a job on any advisory committee, but I want to know whether there is a method whereby the net could be spread more widely so that younger people—
Mr. Deputy SpeakerOrder. The Amendment relates only to the payment of members of the Advisory Committee. It does not relate to the constitution or membership of such a Committee.
§ Mr. NottCertainly, Mr. Deputy Speaker. When the Minister comes to pay allowances to these gentlemen, will he bear in mind that it would greatly strengthen the Advisory Committee if the net could be spread more widely, bringing in younger people and more people in business and commercial activities which so far have not provided members in receipt of allowances of this nature? As I say, one sees the same names cropping up again and again. There is a good deal of unexploited potential, if only the Treasury or the Minister could both lengthen and broaden the list.
§ Dr. BrayThe hon. Member for St. Ives (Mr. Nott) is on a very good point. 480 I thought for a moment that he was constituting a new form of Chiltern Hundreds for which to apply, because he would not be able to sit in the House if he were to have an office of profit under the Crown.
The question of how people are chosen for the many public rôles that must be filled nowadays is important, and I should be misleading the House if I suggested that anyone regards the present machinery and methods as wholly satisfactory. The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right to say that it would be splendid if we could have a way of identifying the up-and-coming young men before they become too heavily laden and could give them experience in particular public rôles. That is possibly a matter that will come up as a subsidiary question following the work of the Fulton Committee. Meanwhile, I assure the hon. Gentleman that one very effective channel of communication is through hon. Members, many of whom are in touch with a very wide range of activities and from whom Ministers are always glad to hear about people of ability who may offer a particular service to the nation.
The danger to which the hon. Member for Yeovil (Mr. Peyton) referred concerning the power of patronage of the State is very real. He preceded me in a job—that of Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Power—in which we dispensed more patronage than anybody other than the Prime Minister in terms of part-time appointments to the nationalised boards. I must confess that I was not unhappy to lay down that responsibility.
However, I think that in this case there is little danger that the Advisory Committee would constitute a sort of extension of the power of patronage of the Crown. The cost here will not be great. The Financial Memorandum published with the Bill referred to a sum of about £15,000, but I would add to that the proviso that that depends on whether or not the members of the Committee accept a fee or simply accept payment of their expenses arising directly from their work on the Committee. It is right that the Minister should pay the members of the Committee. We shall not invariably have people who are very high in the Surtax bracket and are, therefore, unaffected by the time they spend on the Committee's work. But the expenses will certainly not be great. The intention is to have a small and expert 481 Committee, and not to occupy the full time, or anything like it, of its members.
I hope that in view of those explanations the hon. Gentleman will not press the Amendment, or that if he does the House will reject it.
§ Mr. HigginsWill the hon. Gentleman clarify one point? He said "the Committee". Am I wrong in thinking that there may be a number of such Committees?
§ Mr. HigginsI had thought that we could have an Advisory Committee concerned with different boards. I am glad to have the right hon. Gentleman's clarification on that point. Therefore, I am now right in saying that there is only one Advisory Committee, and the sum total of the £15,000 would be concerned with the payments and allowances of that Committee.
§ Mr. PeytonWhilst I accept with some reluctance what the Parliamentary Secretary says, and should not seek to divide the House on the issue, I ask him and the Government to digest this fact. He said that there were only a very few people involved, that it was quite a small organisation costing £15,000 a year. That is not the point. All the time there are constant accretions to the vast machinery of government, and I do not find all my anxieties set at rest. But, to show what a peaceful character I am, I shall not seek to divide the House, and I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.
§ Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
§ Mr. PeytonI beg to move Amendment No. 40, in page 4, line 22, to leave out 'not more than eight'.
I move this Amendment simply for the purpose of inquiry. Unless the Government are very unhelpful, I would not wish to divide the House upon it. We want to know what strength the Government have in mind as being the optimum for the Advisory Committee. I would not want the Government to have too wide a discretion. I can see—although this is a rather foreign point of view for me—some danger in having too small a committee of experts, all of whom might come from the N.R.D.C. or the I.R.C., 482 both of which are really Government creatures.
It is important that such an Advisory Committee as this should consist at least 50 per cent. of genuinely outside elements—people far removed from the Government machine or any of its creatures. My purpose is to find out the Government's intention. When the Government ask for this sort of power, they must be prepared to spell out their intention.
§ Mr. HigginsI am sure that my hon. Friend the Member for Yeovil (Mr. Peyton) was right to put down this probing Amendment and ask the Government to make clear their intention with regard to the composition of the Advisory Committee. We have consistently stressed that we regard the Committee's rôle as important and, indeed, hoped that it would get greater powers than proposed in the Bill. But we are really not clear why the Minister feels it necessary to have an upper limit to the number of members of the Committee. It seems unnecessary to impose this sort of limit. If he did not wish to appoint more than a certain number, surely he would be free not to appoint them.
The point put by my hon. Friend—it was not raised, significantly, in Standing Committee—is the composition of the Advisory Committee within the limits the Government seek to set. Is it the case that it could consist entirely of members appointed from the N.R.D.C. and the I.R.C.? If that is so, it seems a little undesirable. They would, as my hon. Friend has said, effectively be creatures of the Government. The purpose of an advisory committee is to give an impartial advisory opinion, which is rather difficult for those who hold posts in other Government organisations. While it is probably unnecessary to amend the Bill to specify that the numbers shall be open-ended and to specify the composition, I hope the Government will indicate why they think an upper limit is necessary in the first place and, secondly, their intention with regard to the composition of the Committee. A balanced committee with perhaps only a minority of membership from the N.R.D.C. and the I.R.C. might be a better arrangement.
§ Dr. BrayThe intention of having an upper limit is to make it abundantly clear that this shall be a small and expert 483 committee and not a large general consultative committee, in which one would have trouble in representing many different kinds of interest and many different types of occupation. The terms of the Bill as now drafted result from an Amendment made in Committee to meet the spirit of points put by hon. Members opposite and certainly to deal with the question of having outsiders on the Committee. It was and remains the intention to have outsiders on it. I would not like it to be thought that any doubt was being cast on the independence and judgment of people from the N.R.D.C. and the I.R.C. It is often extremely useful to have people with experience of one part of the public sector advising on another part. A notable example is that the Chairman of the Electricity Council is now the Chairman of the Edwards Committee.
Having members from the I.R.C. and the N.R.D.C. is highly desirable, for it enables those bodies to co-operate with the Government in the effective implementation of the Bill. Their work as members of the Advisory Committee and their membership of the boards of I.R.C. and N.R.D.C. respectively and their knowing about the work done by those Corporations on any specific investigations which they are asked to undertake under the Bill will clearly be of advantage to the Government, which will have an Advisory Committee bringing closely together these three possible directions of effort, each having rather different functions.
I hope that hon. Members will feel that the move which the Government made in Committee effectively meets their point and that, as the Bill now stands, we shall be able to meet their objectives.
§ Amendment negatived.
§ 9.0 p.m.
§ Mr. PeytonI beg to move Amendment 41, in page 4, line 40, leave out paragraph (c).
I want to know what is the justification for giving these Corporations either the power or the duty to undertake, at the request of or on behalf of a competent authority, any negotiations with a view to making an industrial investment scheme, or any administrative functions of that authority under such a scheme. What equips these creatures—the Nat 484 ional Research Development Corporation, for instance—to undertake negotiations of that kind? Why should they do so? What are their qualifications? I find it hard to accept the necessity for a provision of this kind.
The whole of the Bill seems to be the result of someone having scratched his head hard and asking himself, "Is there anything else which we can include as we perpetrate this nasty piece of legislation? We know that we are faced by an exceedingly innocent and unsuspicious Opposition, but even a Tory Opposition will not accept this sort of thing to Kingdom come and their suspicions must eventually be stirred and they will start asking questions". And so everyone available in Whitehall and all these so-called competent authorities have been paraded and instructed to think of any sort of provision which seems to have been left out and which might possibly or usefully or conceivably be put in.
What are the reasons for this? I know, Mr. Speaker, that you would look upon me with some disapproval if I sought to return to Clause 2 at length and I shall not do so, but I remind the House that Clause 2 is a good example of the inclusion of a ragbag of powers very generally and going down to the particular
without prejudice to the generality of the foregoingwhich is an expression which always awakens my interest.It could be that the Government will be able to satisfy me about this, but I rather doubt it. If I were engaged in an operation of this kind I cannot think of anything more unlikely than that I should invite the National Research Development Corporation, much as I respect it, to engage on my behalf in the making of an industrial investment scheme. The mere name of a research and development body—what an inconceivable thing to put upon it the duty of negotiating a scheme of that kind, which I imagine is envisaged under this Bill. Not only does it undertake negotiations, but the administrative functions of the authority under such a scheme. Again, with great respect to the N.R.D.C.—and I am not being sarcastic—is it really competent to undertake any of the administrative functions under the scheme?
485 What about the Industrial Reorganisation Corporation? I remember the Minister at the time announcing the names of the members of the Corporation. He did it with tremendous pride. It sounded like a list of battle honours—all these great men whom the Government had captured or wooed from private industry in order to help them with their fell schemes.
I have always had a great deal of sympathy, particularly recently, for Sir Frank Kearton, the Chairman of the Industrial Reorganisation Corporation, because he must be suffering from schizophrenia. Wearing his own hat as Chairman of Courtaulds, he is castigated and chastised by the Government as a possible monopolist, having gathered through his company too much of the rayon market. On the other hand, when he is in charge of the I.R.C. he is urged, and is under pressure, to create monopolies. One would expect any man's health to suffer from such a conflict, even when he has the knowledge that it has been put upon him by an asinine Government.
I find this objectionable, and I hope that my hon. Friend the Member for Worthing (Mr. Higgins), for whom I have great respect, will be the first to support me in voting for the Amendment. Unless the Parliamentary Secretary can produce an answer, the cleverness, veracity and magnificence of which is something which even my optimism does not lead me to expect I shall receive, I will surely vote for this Amendment because I find this provision objectionable and obnoxious.
§ Mr. SmallI want to ask the Government to resist this Amendment. I entered the debate because the hon. Member for Yeovil (Mr. Peyton), in his interesting appreciation of men who render public service, referred to them as "creatures". Would he like me to allege that he is a creature of the Tory Party? The opportunity of having a very good education—
§ Mr. PeytonThe hon. Gentleman has misunderstood me. I would not use such a derogatory term unless I fully intended to be derogatory of the person I was talking about. When I used the word "creatures" I referred to organisations and not to the people concerned, for whom I, like the hon. Member, have the 486 greatest possible respect. If I am in any way guilty of having confused the House, I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for having enabled me to put it right. I certainly meant no disrespect whatever to those who serve on both these Corporations, many of whom I know, and for almost all of whom I have the highest respect.
§ Mr. SmallI accept the modified use of the word "creature".
I should think that the people who serve these institutions are as competent as anybody. I have found no criticism in the market place of the mergers of know-how, knowledge and experience which have taken place among these people in assisting Governments in coming to a conclusion. I have in mind particularly the services of Sir Ronald Grierson. I am sure that men of quality of this kind serve the Government well. I hope that we shall not continuously have these derogatory remarks made about people and institutions who serve the best interests of the Government.
Mergers such as that between Leyland and the British Motor Corporation ensure that we have a British-based motor industry capable of competing with motor industries in the rest of the world—Volkswagen, Renault and others. Whenever it is humanly possible, we should ensure, by Government assistance, that such industries remain British-based in concept. The same is true of the aircraft and shipbuilding industries. We should not have to buy off the shelf some other country's products and be held to ransom in the market place. I have the greatest admiration of the job done by the N.R.D.C. and the I.R.C., which is based on a national rather than commercial concept.
§ Dr. BrayI remind hon. Members that it is the "National Research Development Corporation" and not the "National Research and Development Corporation". It is concerned not merely with research in the abstract but with its application for hard commercial reasons and, therefore, has a great deal of experience of commercial judgments which need to be made in industry.
The N.R.D.C. has a great deal to offer concerning matters involving technological production or marketing, perhaps, in advanced technology. Likewise, the I.R.C. 487 has a great deal of ability and is accumulating a body of experience concerning matters of company structure, rationalisation, mergers, and so on, which will be very valuable to the Advisory Committee.
Hon. Members opposite constantly press us to seek advice from people in industry and to act on it. They urge us to bring in people with wide experience and to emulate some hon. Members opposite who are on 30 or 40 boards of directors at the same time. They are less than fair to themselves and their own persuasive powers if they do not expect us to take the point and to secure the right degree of co-ordination and cross-membership of important official bodies. I accept the point of hon. Members opposite about bringing in outside people, but to leave out the N.R.D.C. or I.R.C. from the sort of rôle set out in the Bill would be a great mistake.
§ 9.15 p.m.
§ Mr. HigginsThe hon. Gentleman seems to have misunderstood either the Amendment, or the purpose of the Clause. The purpose of the Amendment is to delete paragraph (c). This will ensure that the Corporations do not have the power to undertake this kind of negotiation, not that the Advisory Committee will not have it. The hon. Gentleman's remarks seemed to be adressed to the proposition that the Advisory Committee should not have this power.
§ Dr. BrayThe Advisory Committee will not have a professional staff in the way that the N.R.D.C. and the I.R.C. will have. Where these two Corporations have been asked to advise on a question, they may be in a strong position to conduct subsequent negotiations in either of their respective spheres. I take the point made by the hon. Gentleman. It is not as members of the Advisory Committee. It is to undertake at the request, and on behalf, of a competent authority any negotiations which arise from the Bill as a result of the membership of these Corporations and the particular abilities of the staff of these Corporations, and indeed possibly arising from the work that they have done in the area involved.
Micro-electronics is an area which raises questions both of company relationship and of advanced technology, but it is nevertheless primarily a production 488 problem, and it is conceivable that, for example, the N.R.D.C. may be a useful body to exercise the wider functions which are made available to Ministers under the Bill, going beyond the powers which the N.R.D.C. has under its own responsibility. I think that this takes the point made by the hon. Member for Worthing. It is a different function from merely advising by the Advisory Committee, but it is nevertheless a valuable function.
§ Mr. HigginsI must pursue the hon. Gentleman's answer, because I do not think that it is satisfactory. The Government are taking power under subsection (5)(c) so that the Corporations, that is to say, the I.R.C. and the N.R.D.C., shall have power to negotiate. It is not a question of the Advisory Committee doing so. It is a question of the Corporations having this power.
That is what the Government are suggesting should be done. If that is so, it surely is open to some of the objections raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Yeovil (Mr. Peyton). In Committee we debated at some length the question of which body would be most likely to have the expertise necessary to evaluate any Government proposal or any proposal for investing Government money in an enterprise. We discussed the technical ability of various bodies, the extent to which it would be desirable for the thing to be centralised in some way, and so on. It is undesirable that the Government should suggest that the Corporations should have delegated to them the powers which would normally be exercised by the responsible authority.
This is an important task. It is not a question of giving advice but of taking decisions, because if this power is delegated to one of the Corporations, the decision which that Corporation takes in the course of negotiations must be binding. It may be that the Corporation will always come back to the responsible authority and ask, "Should I do this? Should I do that?". If that is so, there is no point in having a middle man in the exercise. He may have some advice to give, but there is no point in having him conducting negotiations.
On the other hand, if the opposite case applies, if the Corporation concerned is to have power to take irrevocable decisions, or decisions which are binding on 489 the responsible authority and the Government, if not on the House of Commons, this again will be an unfortunate situation, because, as my hon. Friend the Member for Yeovil said, it is not only a question of the technical competence of the Corporations, but the membership of them.
Some of the representatives serving on them have other interests. While one can say that these people will try as hard as they can to divest themselves of these interests when serving on the Corporation, it is not given, except in acute case of schizophrenia—I use the word in the technical sense—for people to acquire information in one occupation which is not at the back of their minds in other occupations. There will, therefore, be instances when members of a corporation are able to negotiate in one case but when it would be totally wrong for them to negotiate in another.
Sir Donald Stokes was mentioned. It might be undesirable that he should negotiate a scheme which is seeking to put Government money into, say, the textile industry, but there will be other instances when it would be highly desirable that he should be a negotiator. For this reason it is reasonable to ask why the Government Department concerned, the responsible authority, should not itself always take the negotiations on its shoulders. It could do so with advice and, bearing in mind that technical assistance it can receive from, for example I.R.C. and the N.R.D.C., there seems no reason why these negotiations should not be undertaken by a Government Department rather than by one of these corporations.
Most of the considerations are, to a greater or lesser extent, of a political type. If the industrial investment scheme in question is to be negotiated not by the responsible authority but under power delegated to one of the corporations, then the corporation in question will need to take into account in the course of the negotiations—because this is relevant to the terms it considers—the considerations set out in Clause 2(1), which are whether it will create or expand productive capacity, promote technological improvements and whether it is to the benefit of the United King 490 dom as a whole. These considerations are all relevant to the negotiations.
However, one cannot accept that the I.R.C. or the N.R.D.C. are competent in such negotiations to determine whether something is in the interests of the United Kingdom economy. Certainly I would not feel that they are competent to decide such matters. That being so, we are back to where we started—that either they will take decisions which they are not competent to take or they will be excluded from participating in negotiations. The alternative is that they will be constantly referring matters back to the responsible authority.
In the absence of a better explanation from the Minister, it is obvious that my hon. Friends are on to a good point. The powers of delegation which the Government are seeking in Clause 5(5,c) obviously need much more consideration, and I hope that, on reflection, the Minister will feel that they are not necessary for the purposes of the Bill and that they should be abandoned at this stage.
§ Dr. BrayI appreciate that there is little chance of my persuading hon. Gentleman opposite, but I wish to make it perfectly clear on the three questions that have been asked exactly what is the view of the Government, if that view has not already been made completely clear.
The first question was about the competence of these bodies. We would not regard them as the right bodies to deal with questions of major national policy where wider judgments were required. On the other hand, we would regard them as competent to do particular negotiations in certain spheres.
To answer the second question, about a possible conflict of interest, this problem arises time and again in the daily work of the City of London, to mention only one part of the country, but already the problem has well understood methods of being dealt with in the existing operations of the I.R.C., and these have involved, for example, the British Motor Corporation and the Leyland Motor Company, of which Sir Donald Stokes was the chairman. In these cases such members of the corporation concerned do not take any part in the negotiations, and this is clearly understood. On the other hand, the very background 491 of experience which makes him an interested party also makes him a valuable member of the corporation when it is dealing with other matters.
In the third question, of constant reference back, this is a question of getting proper relationships and proper terms of reference on any matters which these corporations may be asked to carry out, and this would be clearly laid down in advance.
§ Mr. PeytonI realise the Parliamentary Secretary is doing his best, but I still feel uneasy. I have no disrespect whatever for the individuals concerned in either of these bodies. I hope that the hon. Member for Glasgow, Scotstoun (Mr. Small) will accept without qualification that I used the word "creature" in
§ a slightly pejorative sense, but I did not mean it to apply to individuals. I am applying it to the constant multiplication of Government organisations, which I do not like. It will muddle the functions of everybody. I doubt whether it will produce the clarity which the Government want in wishing upon these two bodies not only the duty of conducting negotiations, but that of taking over administrative functions as well without further definition. That is what bothers me most. I hope my hon. Friends will agree with me and go into the Lobby against it.
§ Question put, That the Amendment be made:—
§ The House divided: Ayes 140 Noes 209.
493| Division No. 107.] | AYES | [9.28 p.m. |
| Alison, Michael (Barkston Ash) | Goodhart, Philip | Nicholls, Sir Harmar |
| Astor, John | Goodhew, Victor | Noble, Rt. Hn. Michael |
| Awdry, Daniel | Gower, Raymond | Nott, John |
| Baker, K. W. (Acton) | Grant, Anthony | Onslow, Cranley |
| Baker, W. H. K. | Grant-Ferris, R. | Orr, Capt. L. P. S. |
| Beamish, Col. Sir Tufton | Gresham Cooke, R. | Osborn, John (Hallam) |
| Bell, Ronald | Hall-Davis, A. G. F. | Percival, Ian |
| Bennett, Sir Frederic (Torquay) | Harrison, Brian (Maldon) | Peyton, John |
| Birch, Rt. Hn. Nigel | Harrison, Cot. Sir Harwood (Eye) | Pink, R. Bonner |
| Black, Sir Cyril | Harvey, Sir Arthur Vere | Powell, Rt. Hn. J. Enoch |
| Blaker, Peter | Hastings, Stephen | Price, David (Eastleigh) |
| Boardman, Tom | Hawkins, Paul | Pym, Francis |
| Boyd-Carpenter, Rt. Hn. John | Heald, Rt. Hn. Sir Lionel | Quennell, Miss J. M. |
| Brewis, John | Higgins, Terence L. | Ramsden, Rt. Hn. James |
| Brinton, Sir Tatton | Hiley, Joseph | Rhys Williams, Sir Brandon |
| Bromley-Davenport, Lt. -Col. Sir Walter | Hill, J. E. B. | Rossi, Hugh (Hornsey) |
| Brown, Sir Edward (Bath) | Hogg, Rt. Hn. Quintin | Royle, Anthony |
| Bryan, Paul | Holland, Philip | Russell, Sir Ronald |
| Buchanan-Smith, Alick (Angus, N & M) | Hordern, Peter | Scott, Nicholas |
| Buck, Antony (Colchester) | Hornby, Richard | Scott-Hopkins, James |
| Campbell, Gordon | Howell, David (Guildford) | Sharples, Richard |
| Carr, Rt. Hn. Robert | Hunt, John | Sinclair, Sir George |
| Channon, H. P. G. | Hutchison, Michael Clark | Stainton, Keith |
| Chichester-Clark, R. | Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye) | Stoddart-Scott, Col. Sir M. (Ripon) |
| Corfield, F. V. | Jenkin, Patrick (Woodford) | Taylor, Frank (Moss Side) |
| Costain, A. P. | Jopling, Michael | Temple, John M. |
| Craddock, Sir Beresford (Spelthorne) | Kershaw, Anthony | Thatcher, Mrs. Margaret |
| Crouch, David | King, Evelyn (Dorset, S.) | Turton, Rt. Hn. R. H. |
| Crowder, F. P. | Kirk, Peter | van Straubenzee, W. R. |
| Dalkeith, Earl of | Knight, Mrs. Jill | Vaughan-Morgan, Rt. Hn. Sir John |
| Dance, James | Lane, David | Walker, Peter (Worcester) |
| Dean, Paul (Somerset, N.) | Langford-Holt, Sir John | Ward, Dame Irene |
| Deedes, Rt. Hn. W. F. (Ashford) | MacArthur, Ian | Weatherill, Bernard |
| Digby, Simon Wingfield | Maclean, Sir Fitzroy | Webster, David |
| Doughty, Charles | McMaster, Stanley | Wells, John (Maidstone) |
| Eden, Sir John | Maddan, Martin | Whitelaw, Rt. Hn. William |
| Elliot, Capt. Walter (Carshalton) | Maginnis, John E. | Williams, W. D. (Dudley) |
| Elliott, R. W (N'c'tle-upon-Tyne, N.) | Mawby, Ray | Wills, Sir Gerald (Bridgwater) |
| Emery, Peter | Maydon, Lt.-Cmdr. S. L. C. | Wilson, Geoffrey (Truro) |
| Eyre, Reginald | Mills, Peter (Torrington) | Wolrige-Gordon, Patrick |
| Farr, John | Mills, Stratton (Belfast, N.) | Worsley, Marcus |
| Fisher, Nigel | Mitchell, David (Basingstoke) | Wright, Esmond |
| Fletcher-Cooke, Charles | Montgomery, Fergus | Wylie, N. R. |
| Fortescue, Tim | More, Jasper | Younger, Hn. George |
| Foster, Sir John | Munro-Lucas-Tooth, Sir Hugh | |
| Gibson-Watt, David | Murton, Oscar | TELLERS FOR THE AYES: |
| Gilmour, Sir John (Fife, E.) | Nabarro, Sir Gerald | Mr. Hector Monro and |
| Godber, Rt. Hn. J. B. | Neave, Airey | Mr. Timothy Kitson. |
| NOES | ||
| Abse, Leo | Hamilton, James (Bothwell) | Morris, Alfred (Wythenshawe) |
| Allaun, Frank (Salford, E.) | Hamling, William | Morris, Charles R. (Openshaw) |
| Alldritt, Walter | Harper, Joseph | Morris, John (Aberavon) |
| Allen, Scholefield | Harrison, Walter (Wakefield) | Moyle, Roland |
| Anderson, Donald | Haseldine, Norman | Newens, Stan |
| Archer, Peter | Hattersley, Roy | Noel-Baker, Francis (Swindon) |
| Atkins, Ronald (Preston, N.) | Hazell, Bert | Ogden, Eric |
| Atkinson, Norman (Tottenham) | Heffer, Eric S. | O'Malley, Brian |
| Bagier, Gordon A. T. | Henig, Stanley | Orme, Stanley |
| Barnett, Joel | Herbison, Rt. Hn. Margaret | Oswald, Thomas |
| Baxter, William | Hooley, Frank | Owen, Will (Morpeth) |
| Bence, Cyril | Hooson, Emlyn | Page, Derek (King's Lynn) |
| Benn, Rt. Hn. Anthony Wedgwood | Horner, John | Palmer, Arthur |
| Bennett, James (G'gow, Bridgeton) | Houghton, Rt. Hn. Douglas | Pannell, Rt. Hn. Charles |
| Binns, John | Howarth, Harry (Wellingborough) | Park, Trevor |
| Bishop, E. S. | Howarth, Robert (Bolton, E.) | Parkyn, Brian (Bedford) |
| Blenkinsop, Arthur | Hoy, James | Pavitt, Laurence |
| Booth, Albert | Huckfield, Leslie | Pearson, Arthur (Pontypridd) |
| Boyden, James | Hughes, Hector (Aberdeen, N.) | Pentland, Norman |
| Bray, Dr. Jeremy | Hughes, Roy (Newport) | Perry, George H. (Nottingham, s.) |
| Brooks, Edwin | Hunter, Adam | Price, Thomas (Westhoughton) |
| Broughton, Dr. A. D. D. | Hynd, John | Price, William (Rugby) |
| Buchan, Norman | Irvine, Sir Arthur | Probert, Arthur |
| Buchanan, Richard (G'gow, Sp'burn) | Jackson, Colin (B'h'se & Spenb'gh) | Rankin, John |
| Carmichael, Neil | Jackson, Peter M. (High Peak) | Rees, Merlyn |
| Carter-Jones, Lewis | Jenkins, Hugh (Putney) | Roberts, Albert (Normanton) |
| Chapman, Donald | Johnson, James (K'ston-on-Hull, W.) | Robertson, John (Paisley) |
| Coleman, Donald | Johnston, Russell (Inverness) | Rose, Paul |
| Concannon, J. D. | Jones, Dan (Burnley) | Ross, Rt. Hn. William |
| Conlan, Bernard | Jones, J. Idwal (Wrexham) | Ryan, John |
| Crawshaw, Richard | Jones, T. Alec (Rhondda, West) | Sheldon, Robert |
| Crossman, Rt. Hn. Richard | Kelley, Richard | Shore, Rt. Hn. Peter (Stepney) |
| Cullen, Mrs. Alice | Kerr, Dr. David (W'worth, Central) | Short, Mrs. Renée (W'hampton, N. E.) |
| Davidson, Arthur (Accrington) | Lawson, George | Silkin, Rt. Hn. John (Deptford) |
| Davidson, James(Aberdeenshire, W.) | Leadbitter, Ted | Silverman, Julius (Aston) |
| Davies, Dr. Ernest (Stretford) | Ledger, Ron | Slater, Joseph |
| Davies, G. Elfed (Rhondda, E.) | Lee, Rt. Hn. Frederick (Newton) | Small, William |
| Delargy, Hugh | Lee, John (Reading) | Spriggs, Leslie |
| Dell, Edmund | Lewis, Ron (Carlisle) | Steel, David (Roxburgh) |
| Dempsey, James | Loughlin, Charles | Steele, Thomas (Dunbartonshire, W.) |
| Dewar, Donald | Lubbock, Eric | Stewart, Rt. Hn. Michael |
| Dickens, James | Lyon, Alexander W. (York) | Stonehouse, John |
| Dobson, Ray | Lyons, Edward (Bradford, E.) | Swain, Thomas |
| Doig, Peter | Mabon, Dr. J. Dickson | Swingler, Stephen |
| Dunn, James A. | McBride, Neil | Symonds, J. B. |
| Dunwoody, Mrs. Gwyneth (Exeter) | McCann, John | Tinn, James |
| Eadie, Alex | MacColl, James | Tuck, Raphael |
| Edwards, Rt. Hn. Ness (Caerphilly) | Macdonald, A. H. | Urwin, T. W. |
| Edwards, Robert (Bilston) | McGuire, Michael | Wainwright, Edwin (Dearne Valley) |
| Edwards, William (Merioneth) | Mackenzie, Gregor (Rutherglen) | Wainwright, Richard (Colne Valley) |
| Ellis, John | Maclennan, Robert | Walker, Harold (Doncaster) |
| Ennals, David | McMillan, Tom (Glasgow, C.) | Wallace, George |
| Ensor, David | MacPherson, Malcolm | Watkins, David (Consett) |
| Faulds, Andrew | Mahon, Peter (Preston, S.) | Watkins, Tudor (Brecon & Radnor) |
| Fernyhough, E. | Mahon, Simon (Bootle) | Wellbeloved, James |
| Fletcher, Raymond (Ilkeston) | Mallalieu, E. L. (Brigg) | Wells, William (Walsall, N.) |
| Fletcher, Ted (Darlington) | Manuel, Archie | Whitaker, Ben |
| Foley, Maurice | Mapp, Charles | Whitlock, William |
| Foot, Michael (Ebbw Vale) | Marks, Kenneth | Wilkins, W. A. |
| Ford, Ben | Marquand, David | Willey, Rt. Hn. Frederick |
| Fowler, Gerry | Marsh, Rt. Hn. Richard | Williams, Clifford (Abertillery) |
| Freeson, Reginald | Mason, Rt. Hn. Roy | Williams, W. T. (Warrington) |
| Galpern, Sir Myer | Maxwell, Robert | Willis, Rt. Hn. George |
| Gardner, Tony | Mayhew, Christopher | Winstanley, Dr. M. P. |
| Garrett, W. E. | Mendelson, J. J. | Woodburn, Rt. Hn. A. |
| Gourlay, Harry | Millan, Bruce | Woof, Robert |
| Gregory, Arnold | Miller, Dr. M. S. | Yates, Victor |
| Grey, Charles (Durham) | Milne, Edward (Blyth) | |
| Griffiths, David (Rother Valley) | Mitchell, R. C. (S 'th' pton, Test) | TELLERS FOR THE NOES: |
| Griffiths, Will (Exchange) | Moonman, Eric | Mr. Ioan L. Evans and |
| Grimond, Rt. Hn. J. | Morgan, Elystan (Cardiganshire) | Mr. Eric G. Varley. |