PROVISION OF GOODS, FACILITIES AND SERVICES

HC Deb 09 July 1968 vol 768 cc273-320

Sir D. Renton

I beg to move Amendment No. 3, in page 1, line 14, leave out 'any goods' and insert 'the'.

Mr. Speaker

With this Amendment, I have suggested that we take the following Amendments.

Amendment No. 4, in page 1, line 14 after 'services', insert 'referred to in the following subsection'.

Amendment No. 11, in page 2, line 5 leave out 'instruction or training'.

Amendment No. 12, in line 8, leave out 'business, profession or trade or'.

Sir D. Renton

Amendment No. 3 is a paving Amendment to the three that you have mentioned, Mr. Speaker. I should mention that Amendment No. 7, in page 1, leave out lines 21 and 22 and insert: 'Without prejudice to the foregoing subsection, it shall be unlawful to practice discrimination as there described in the provision of the following facilities and services:' which is an important drafting Amendment which has been selected for discussion on its own, is also essential to these Amendments, and I should be glad if that fact could borne in mind.

The purpose of the Amendments taken together is to limit the scope of the Bill to what may, by any stretch of the imagination, be called desirable to ensure racial harmony, and to prevent the Bill from remaining so wide in its application that it would frustrate its own purpose or, to use the current jargon, be counter-productive.

The British people are about the most tolerant in the world. In spite of well-known stresses in some areas and in spite of aggressive attitudes, alas, on the part of extremist minorities, there is a high degree of racial harmony in this country, for which we can be thankful. Legislation is not the only way to achieve racial harmony. Other ways can be more effective—by good will, good example, "good cricket", and even indifferent cricket—than any kind of statutory investigation. Although legislation can help in certain ways, it can do more harm than good if it is cast too wide as this Clause is cast.

The Clause governs the whole Bill. When legislating we should confine ourselves to what may be helpful. We should avoid casting our net so wide that the legislation is unacceptable to the community at large and so wide that it is virtually unenforceable. This general declaratory Clause, Clause 2, has already been eloquently criticised by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for St. Marylebone (Mr. Hogg) both on Second Reading and in Committee. The Clause applies to the provision of any goods, facilities or services". As an example it refers to the services of any business, profession or trade". To legislate in such wide terms is to assume, and to assume quite wrongly, that there is likely to be widespread discrimination. In fact, that is not likely to be the case. Besides being unnecessary and possibly dangerous to do so, it is uncomplimentary to all the people of this country, immigrants as well as the indigenous people. Inevitably, although paradoxically, it may limit the freedom which many of them hoped to enjoy when they came here.

I put forward these Amendments to overcome, I hope to a reasonable and modest extent, that great defect of principle. Especially is this done by Amendment No. 12 which would eliminate the words "business, profession or trade". It is far too sweeping to include every business, profession or trade. It is not necessary and it is certainly unenforceable. By leaving out the words "instruction or training" the word "education" would be left in. It is arguable that even that is not necessary because public authorities are not allowed to discriminate in education and there is no evidence that there is discrimination in education.

The words "instruction or training" cover all kinds of small operators, including those who give driving lessons, dancing lessons and judo lessons, and advertise them to the public. Very often instruction or training involve rather close personal relationships. The need for preventing discrimination in this part of the field has never been put forward, so far as I know, in any of the inquiries concerned. The Street Report is silent on this. I suggest that we are best without it.

I accept the need for some extension of the present scope of legislation. The House will note that even if my Amendments were accepted the Bill would still be cast in very wide terms. I need not read the whole of subsection (2), but, leaving out the words "instruction or training" and the words "business, profession or trade" would still leave in a vast range of activities. By any stretch of the imagination it is hard to see that the legislation should go any further than it would if the Amendments were accepted.

These Amendments, taken together, would mean that subsection (1) would be limited by the terms of subsection (2). Surely that is right. By having a general declaratory provision in subsection (1) and then giving examples of it in subsection (2), we are creating a legislative monstrosity and giving the Race Relations Board and the courts an extremely difficult task of interpretation. In my opinion, this is the most important matter we shall discuss today. Both the Home Secretary and the Under-Secretary have shown laudable open-mindedness about many of the lesser defects of the Bill to which we drew attention in Committee.

I hope that the Under-Secretary will either say that he accepts these Amendments or that he will consider them with a view to amending the Bill in another place. Alas, in these days we often hear of the gulf between Parliament and people. On these Amendments the Government have a chance of preventing that gulf getting wider. Incidentally—I hope this will appeal to the hon. Gentleman—he also has a chance of bringing the two sides of the House closer together.

Mr. Heffer

I urge my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary not to accept these Amendments. I am sure he will not do so because, if they were accepted, in essence the Bill would be emasculated. The right hon. and learned Member for Huntingdon (Sir D. Renton) is going much too far. He will agree that I showed laudable open-mindedness in Committee in the same way as did my hon. Friend on the Front Bench, but I cannot relate that open-mindedness to these Amendments.

An example was given of the services of someone training a person to drive. Why should an immigrant not have the right to call upon all those who do the service of teaching people to drive? Why should an immigrant not have the services of any business, profession or trade? It seems perfectly logical that any immigrant should have these services available to him as much as to any other citizen.

I believe that every open-minded hon. Member agrees that inevitably there are problems. No one is trying to force on to the general public something which they do not want, but if these Amendments were accepted we would be working in reverse. Some citizens who came from other countries would be excluded from the services of professions and trades which other citizens are able to get, by the mere fact that they were born in this country. I agree that this Clause is one of the most important in the Bill. Because of its importance I ask my hon. Friend not to accept any of these Amendments, but to resist them to the utmost.

6.30 p.m.

Dr. M. S. Miller (Glasgow, Kelvingrove)

I counsel my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State to resist the Amendments. We have had a clear indication from the right hon. and learned Member for Huntingdonshire (Sir D. Renton) that there is a big gulf in respect of not only what he was referring to but the Bill's aim, which is the complete elimination of discrimination. If we take out of the Bill certain aspects and points which are of vital importance to it, it becomes emasculated and no longer serves its purpose.

Often the members of the public look not for conscious bridging of gulfs, as was suggested by the right hon. and learned Member for Huntingdonshire, but a bold approach and a clear indication of willingness by a governing body to take certain steps to make them clear. If we were to remove from the Clause the words which the right hon. and learned Gentleman suggested should be removed, it would have the effect of making it obvious not only to the immigrant community but to the host community, the indigenous population, that we were not serious about what we are attempting to do.

For example, to remove the words "instruction or training" would be very dangerous. The removal of the words "business, profession or trade" would take out of the Bill many of the essential points in the minds of hon. Members on this side of the House when the Bill's concept was agreed to on Second Reading and in Committee. Many hon. Members on this side would strenuously oppose any attempt to take these words out of the Bill.

Mr. Grieve

I give my wholehearted support to the Amendment because the Clause, as it stands, will present the courts with an extraordinarily difficult problem of interpretation. It would have been very much better if subsection (2) had not appeared in it at all. What will happen when a judicial interpretation has to be put on the Clause? There is a well known principle of the interpretation of statutes to be found in any text book which is in the form of a Latin tag—expresso unius est exclusio alterius. The mere fact of citing a number of examples of what comes within the purpose of the Clause is likely to make judicial interpretation of it difficult. My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Huntingdonshire (Sir D. Renton) seeks to do away with that difficulty.

There are hon. Members on both sides of the House who see merit in this legislation and, whether they see merit in it or not, who desire that once it is on the Statute book it should be feasible legislation which is not just a derision but is enforceable, because it is appalling to put on the Statute Book legislation which cannot be properly interpreted and which, to a large extent, cannot be enforced. The Amendment is a distinct improvement on the Bill.

I turn to the second limb of the Amendments which involves omitting the words "instruction or training" and "business, profession or trade". Again, I give my right hon. and learned Friend my support, although I think that this is a much less important aspect of the Amendments than the first. When it comes to "instruction and training" and the carrying on of a "business, profession or trade", the ordinary commercial considerations which guide ordinary commercial enterprises will prevail. It is most unlikely that people, however racialist they may be, who run, for instance, driving instruction concerns or carry on various businesses, professions or trades in this country, which is supposed to be a nation of shopkeepers, will allow any prejudice which they may have to override their ordinary commercial and business interests. For that reason, I support the second limb of the Amendments.

Mr. Heffer

If the right hon. and learned Member for Huntingdonshire (Sir D. Renton) was not certain about the question of limitation, he should have tabled an Amendment to eliminate subsection (2).

Mr. Speaker

Order. We cannot discuss Amendments which an hon. Member thinks should have been moved.

Mr. Heffer

The hon. and learned Member for Solihull (Mr. Grieve) was supporting his colleague's argument. If the Opposition are concerned about the question of limitation, they should have proposed the elimination of subsection (2). With the elimination of these words, there would be a further limitation.

Mr. Grieve

I may be out of order if I reply to the hon. Gentleman, but, in my view, the Clause would have been better without subsection (2).

Sir Spencer Summers (Aylesbury)

I was not present during the earlier stages of the Bill, but I have made it my business to read the report of the whole of the Committee proceedings. I regret that I am unable to support the Amendments.

I can go along with the proposition that if the Bill were drawn too wide or was too severe it would not attract the cooperation of the public which we would all wish to attract. In so far as the Amendment seeks to limit the Bill's scope, I think that it is misconceived. I can understand the case for the small operator being eliminated, but we are not concerned with him. We are concerned with services listed among the examples which it is suggested shall be subject to the provisions of the Bill. I cannot help thinking that the prejudice of some professional and business people will override their commercial considerations.

I am no lawyer, but I can understand the view that the way in which this matter is dealt with, with a preamble and a list of examples, is complete nonsense. Perhaps one does not have to be a lawyer to realise that it is presented in a stupid form. I do not in the least wish to defend the form in which the proposition is put forward in the Bill or to criticise the attempts made to put it in a more intelligent, more palatable form. All that I wish to do is to record my concern at what appears to be the other additional outcome of the Amendment, namely, to limit the Bill's scope. I cannot see my way to supporting the Amendment.

Mr. Ennals

In moving the Amendment, the right hon. and learned Member for Huntingdonshire (Sir D. Renton) said that, if I were to accept it, it would contribute to bringing the House closer together. I am grateful for the speech of the hon. Member for Aylesbury (Sir S. Summers), which proved that that was not entirely so.

In Committee, my right hon. Friend and I sought to be open-minded, as the right hon. and learned Gentleman was kind enough to say, in trying to improve the Bill as we went along. I think that that is what we did. On this occasion, I have little doubt that acceptance of the Amendment would do serious damage to the Bill. It would substantially limit its scope and seriously impair its effectiveness.

I agree that this is one of the most important parts of the Bill, and the present debate is one of our important debates. One of the defects of the 1965 Act, apart from omitting provisions against discrimination in employment and housing, was that its definition of public place was too narrow. On the Second Reading of the Bill in 1965, I said precisely that and urged that it be extended to include credit facilities, banking, insurance and so on. I am glad that the present Bill does that.

It would be wrong, having now recognised some of the weaknesses in the corresponding Section of the 1965 Act, were we intentionally to limit the Bill once again.

Sir D. Renton

On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. I think that the hon. Gentleman has failed to realise that the Amendment dealing with banking facilities has not been selected.

Mr. Ennals

But the point I make is sound none the less. The 1965 Act was much too limited in terms of services and facilities. The intention is that this Bill should be broader. It has deliberately been drawn widely.

In reply to the criticism about listing examples;, I assure the House that these examples are not exclusive. I am sure that no court would have any difficulty in recognising that. Neither is this form in any way exceptional. There are other pieces of legislation in which examples are given.

Mr. Speaker

Order. We are not debating the Clause. The hon. Gentleman must come to the Amendments.

Mr. Ennals

The Amendments would limit the field in which discrimination would be a civil offence, but, more than that, they would limit the field in which the good offices of the Race Relations Board and the conciliation committees could help to bring about conciliation and help to remove situations of discrimination. For example, the reference to shops would be omitted. The shop is a most important form of service, and in it all sections of the community are entitled to receive equal and fair treatment. I see no reason why we should exclude shops.

Next, instruction and training. Equal opportunities for apprenticeship and industrial training are essential if we are to avoid creating a section of second-class citizens with few skills to offer to industry. We must consider here, not just for this year but for the years to come, the situation which the words in the Clause would cover. In our schools today, there are about 185,000 boys and girls, either immigrants or the sons and daughters of immigrants—coloured "kids"—who will be coming on to the labour market and going forward as young Britons entitled to all the services available to any other section of society, regardless of colour. A vital aspect of this situation is that they should have equal opportunities in industrial training and apprenticeship so that they will not be second-class citizens as they seek to work their way up the industrial ladder.

Mr. Orme

I agree very much with what my hon. Friend has said about industrial training. One of the problems in the United States is that the exclusion of the negro community from many of the artisan and skilled jobs has been one of the results of the divisions existing there which the Americans are now trying to overcome within their own society.

Mr. Ennals

I agree with everything my hon. Friend says and, equally, with what was said by the hon. Member for Aylesbury about business, professional and trading facilities. The point is not that people should have opportunities at the lower levels of industry. They should have opportunities in all sectors of industrial and commercial activity. This applies no less to insurance and credit facilities, in regard to which there is a good deal of evidence of discrimination which, I am sure, all right hon. and hon. Members would wish to remove.

Professor Street, Mr. Geoffrey Bindman and Mr. Geoffrey Howe, Q.C., a former Member of the House, said in their Report that they were in favour of extending the field of facilities, recommending that the Bill should cover all places…offering accommodation, goods, services or facilities to the public. Nothing in the part of the Clause to which the Amendments are directed would in any way undermine the right of anyone involved to make a normal commercial judgment, Whether in insurance, credit, housing, lodging houses or any of the matters covered by the Bill. In motor insurance, for example, it would be appropriate to require a recent immigrant, whatever his race or colour, to pay a higher premium when his inexperience might be a factor affecting the risk. Equally, linguistic shortcomings might be factors to be taken into consideration. What the Clause provides is that colour and race should not themselves be determining factors in all the fields which are open to other sections of the general public.

The Bill is about equality, neither more nor less. Once we start defining narrow areas to be covered by it, we might give the impression that it was perfectly all right to discriminate in those fields which the House had removed from the Bill, and, equally, we should remove the opportunity for the Race Relations Board and the conciliation committees to bring about conciliation in situations where discrimination now exists.

I assure my hon. Friends that I shall resist the Amendments.

6.45 p.m.

Mr. Hogg

I hope that the Undersecretary of State has not spoken his last word on this matter. We all want to approach it in an objective way. I am quite sure that, when the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Heffer) says that that is what he did in Committee, he says no more than the truth. Disconcertingly, I often found myself able not only to agree with what the hon. Gentleman said but to support him with my vote in Divisions—disconcertingly, because I had never thought, until we had our experience in Committee together, that I should find myself so often in agreement with him on both the tone and the content of what he said. But one can be pleased as well as disconcerted, so I hope that the hon. Gentleman will not take it amiss that I confess to a certain surprise.

I do not, however, agree with the hon. Member for Walton on this matter, and neither do I altogether agree with the Under-Secretary of State. Although it is unnecessary to do so, I remind the House that I am caught by this Clause, as are all members of my profession. I do not mind that. I do not mind it for a particular reason. If the Amendments were adopted, they would eliminate my being caught by the Clause because they would omit the professions from the list under discussion. I am strictly in order, therefore, in referring to this matter.

It is important that we have the point clear. The professions in this country do not discriminate. A member of my profession who discriminates on the ground of race, or of religion or ethnic origin, for that matter, commits a breach of professional etiquette. I should be sorry if anything done in this Bill cast doubt upon that honourable duty not to discriminate which we all undertake. We do not discriminate. Furthermore, it should be said—

Dr. Miller rose—

Mr. Hogg

I shall give way in a moment or two, but I wish to finish this point. Let us suppose that an hon. Member introduced a Bill against corruption and in it he put a Clause forbidding judges to take bribes. I can understand some judges being offended by such a Clause, not because they want to take bribes but because they object to the suggestion that they need a Clause telling them not to. I do not need a Clause to tell me that I must not discriminate, nor does a doctor, nor does a priest.

Dr. Miller rose—

Mr. Hogg

I shall give way, but the hon. Gentleman must contain himself for a moment. We shall discriminate neither more nor less, and we shall not discriminate at all, whether or not the Clause is passed. But some of us slightly object to the suggestion that we need legislation to tell us that we must not do so.

In the past six weeks I have received about 50 offensive letters complaining that I appeared for 11 Pakistanis. Where the correspondents were good enough to give their name and address, which was by no means always, I replied proudly that I belong to a profession like that of the doctor and priest which does not discriminate on grounds of religion, race or colour. Why do we need a Clause for that when I am bound by the honour of my profession?

Dr. Miller

I am grateful to the right hon. and learned Gentleman for giving way. I always listen to him very attentively, and I am not in the slightest disconcerted by often agreeing with him, but I dispute his contention that all professions do not discriminate. I cannot answer for the right hon. and learned Gentleman's profession, but I can say something about my own. It is obvious to me that there exist and always have existed all kinds of discriminatory practices in the medical profession.

Mr. Hogg

I cannot speak for the medical profession, but the hon. Gentleman absolutely appals me. I decline to believe without strong evidence that a doctor faced with a sick patient would say that he would not treat him because he is a Roman Catholic, a Jew or a Pakistani. It seems to me utterly repugnant that he should do so. I decline to believe that it is necessary to insert Clauses in Bills to make a doctor, lawyer, priest or member of any other profession—an architect or an accountant, for example—do what I believe every honourable man and every honourable member of one of the learned professions would do without compulsion.

Dr. Miller

That is not the kind of discrimination I meant. It is not the only kind of discrimination that exists. There are many other forms of discrimination in the provision of services. It might well be that a doctor who has in his power the ability to provide a particular service to a coloured person could discriminate against him.

Mr. Hogg

The kind of discrimination we are talking about in discussing the Amendment, which is the only discrimination with which I can be concerned at present, or I should get into trouble, is precisely the discrimination I was talking about and not the kind of discrimination the hon. Gentleman wished to talk about. I am appalled, and I do not believe that the great professions of this country discriminate or require legislation to prevent it.

I have always complained, and I complain now, that the Clause, unamended by my right hon. and learned Friend's Amendments, makes no distinction between cases where discrimination carries its own financial penalty and those where, as I have always conceded, though not to the entire satisfaction of my hon. Friends, discrimination can have its own internal dynamic. I have always conceded that in the latter example there is a case for legislation, but in the former case I consider legislation unnecessary.

I agreed with the Under-Secretary of State when he said that he wanted shops covered by the Clause. We have had several examples in our discussions already of how difficult it is to be absolutely sure with these referential Amendments exactly where we should get if an Amendment were carried. I understand that a shop is a place to which the public have access. It has always been so held, as far as I know. Therefore, it would be caught by the Clause, whether or not the Amendment were carried. I agree that on that ground a shop qua shop should be inside the Clause.

I have always thought, as I said in Committee, that one cannot deal with industrial apprenticeships and instructional training on a discriminatory basis, and if we are to deal with employment at all—and I have conceded that that is right—we must include some form of instructional training. If and in so far as my right hon. and learned Friend's Amendment would cut out industrial apprentice- ship or training, I would agree that it went a great deal too far.

But that leaves me with a residue of cases where ordinary competition in an industrial society between small businesses will impose a penalty on discrimination and tend to eliminate it. I regard legislation here as unnecessary, and the Under-Secretary of State regards it as an important part of the Bill. That is a point of difference between us. I do not think that we need to try to impute motives at one another or to start getting excited about it. We are all entitled to take an objective view, and I have tried to do so.

I was much reassured, although I am not sure that I accept the legal advice the hon. Gentleman has received, to hear from him that his legal advice is that the normal commercial judgment of an insurer would not be impaired even if the Amendment were rejected. However, as he knows from the long discussions we had in Committee, that was not the view I should have formed unaided by Government legal advice.

I absolutely accept that the shop must be in the Bill, and I absolutely accept from the hon. Gentleman that industrial apprenticeship and industrial training cannot be excluded, so long as we deal with employment, which I am happy to do.

But on the two narrow points that I have mentioned—that our great professions do not require legislation, and that there are a large number of businesses where discrimination carries its own economic penalty and legislation is unnecessary—we should have a division of opinion in the House.

Mr. Ennals

I was glad to hear what the right hon. and learned Member for St. Marylebone (Mr. Hogg) said about apprenticeship and industrial training. On the question of shops, I think that my reading of Amendment No. 3, which would have removed "goods", might certainly have left in question whether shops were included.

The right hon. and learned Gentleman was perhaps a little over-sensitive on his main point. I am not here to argue whether certain professions practise discrimination. The right hon. and learned Gentleman says that the legal profession does not, and I have no reason to believe otherwise. My hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow, Kelvingrove (Dr. Miller) said that there are certain examples in the medical profession. I do not know whether that is true. It would be an impossible situation if the Government produced a list of the groups which discriminated and those which did not, and said that we need not include those which did not practise discrimination and that we must include those which did. We are saying that all the facilities should be open to people regardless of race and colour.

If it is true that certain professions do not discriminate, even though they are covered by the Bill, they will not be bitten by the Bill. To argue that because they are pure they should be excluded is an argument we cannot accept. It is best that the definition should be drawn as widely as it can be. That is what the Government have sought to do, and therefore the Clause will catch any who discriminate, which is as it should be.

Sir D. Renton

I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment. We have had a very valuable discussion, and we respect the views we have heard from both sides of the House. If it be the fact that industrial apprenticeship and training needs to be specially covered, I suggest that the Government should have it specially covered and not let the broad phrase "training and instruction" apply to all kinds of small operators, where it may not be appropriate.

On the question of shops, the Government themselves left out the word "goods" in subsection (2). Therefore, I think that the point that the Under-Sec-retary made against me was not quite right. But if shops need to be covered, let them be covered, instead of the incredibly wide words that we have: any business, profession or trade". I am prepared to leave it to the hon. Gentleman to consider these points. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment, but I still tell him that if he wishes the Bill to be acceptable and enforceable it would be well worth considering the wide scope of Clause 2.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

7.0 p.m.

Mr. Speaker

We come to Amendment 5, with which I suggest we take the following Amendments:

Amendment No. 14, in Clause 3, page 2, line 14, leave out from beginning to 'him' and insert— 'or deliberately omitting to employ'. Amendment No. 15, in line 18, leave out 'neglecting' and insert 'deliberately omitting'.

Amendment No. 17, in Clause 4, page 2, line 39, leave out 'neglecting' and insert' deliberately omitting'.

Amendment No. 18, in page 3, line 2, leave out' neglecting' and insert' deliberately omitting'.

Amendment No. 20, in Clause 5, page 3, line 16, leave out 'neglecting' and insert 'deliberately omitting'.

Amendment No. 22, in line 20, after 'by', insert 'deliberately'.

Mr. Ennals

I beg to move, Amendment No. 5, in page 1, line 16, leave out 'neglecting' and insert 'deliberately omitting'.

The Amendments listed here deal with a question which was considerably debated in Standing Committee—the use of the word "neglecting" in relation to the providing of goods, services or facilities, including other facilities listed in Clauses 2, 3, 4 and 5.

In discussion in Committee, the hon. and learned Member for Buckinghamshire, South (Mr. Ronald Bell) questioned whether the word "neglecting" was the right one. I gave an assurance and undertook to consider whether we could find another word which would make clear that "neglecting" would not include mere omission or forgetfulness. The Amendment gives effect to this undertaking.

It also meets the point of the right hon. and learned Gentleman that the word "neglecting" cannot refer to any deliberate act because a deliberate act is not an act of neglect. I hope he will feel that the words "deliberately omitting" cover both points. Incidentally, the words will also cover the undertaking given by my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Housing and Local Government that the question of "tactical discrimination" in the field of housing was covered.

We hope that "deliberately omitting" will cover all the points which raised some concern in Committee.

Mr. Hogg

I think that this is an improvement, and I thank the Under-Sec-retary for taking notice of what was said to him in Committee.

Amendment agreed to.

Mr. Hogg

I beg to move Amendment No. 6, in page 1, line 19, leave out 'normally' and insert 'in like circumstances'.

We had an undertaking from the Government to consider this matter. An hon. Friend of mine referred to it in an earlier discussion. I do not know what is meant by "normally". As the hon. Member for Cheadle (Dr. Winstanley) said, I should rather object to being called in some ways an abnormal person, but I understand what I mean by "like circumstances". Although what is "like circumstances" may be difficult to apply in practice, the meaning of the phrase is at least clear.

In Committee the Under-Secretary said that he would look at this again. I know him well enough to know that he has looked at it again, but he has turned me down flat, and I want to know the reason why he has turned me down flat.

Mr. Ennals

We seriously looked at the point made by the right hon. and learned Gentleman, but we had to reject it for the same reasons as I gave him in Standing Committee.

Although the wording "in like circumstances" might be thought to be more appropriate for insurance and credit transactions, the use of that qualification could, as I sought to explain in Committee, provide a loophole in that it would allow insurance companies to treat certain sections of the public differently from other sections. It might be that they would treat Pakistanis in the same way as they would treat other Pakistanis, or West Indians in the same way as they would treat other West Indians.

The term "normal" could be spelt out. We could write a longer Clause which would define what "normally" means. Whether it would be helpful, I should have thought that the intention was clear—that in normal circumstances like treatment would be offered and like facilities would be given. I am afraid that when we looked at the points made by the right hon. and learned Gentleman we felt that the term "in like circumstances" would not suit and that the term "normally" would be effectively understood.

Mr. Hogg

I cannot pretend that I am wholly satisfied with that explanation, but if I were to divide the House on it, I think I should incur the just displeasure of one and all. So, though wholly dissatisfied, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Mr. Hogg

I beg to move Amendment No. 7, in page 1, leave out lines 21 and 22 and insert: 'Without prejudice to the foregoing subsection, it shall be unlawful to practice discrimination as there described in the provision of the following facilities and services:'. This Amendment is rather like the last one, except that I have rather more conviction behind it. I had some undertaking—I cannot recall the terms—from the Under-Secreary or one of his colleagues in Committee.

I agree with my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Solihull (Mr. Grieve) when he rather jumped the gun in an earlier discussion and said that the words of subsection (2) are a nonsense. I think he said "a monstrosity". Although the expression "a monstrosity" is strong language, I think that "a nonsense" is not too strong a phrase to use of the form in which the draftsmen have chosen to cast this subsection.

There are two ways in which one can cast one's net wide as a matter of legal draftsmanship. At least, I have always supposed that there were only two ways. One can use words with the widest possible application. For instance, when we give independence to a country, we give is legislature power for the "peace, order and good government" of the country, and that is held to cover anything that the legislature can possibly do. Sometimes when the wide words need amplification or need at the periphery the removal of doubt, one uses the wide words in one's legislation and then adds the expression "services"—or whatever it may be—"shall include", and then one states the places to which the public have access in order to leave no manner of doubt about it.

One way of doing that is to add after or in the course of one's wide words specific things specifically enumerated, a series of individual cases, and then to add the words "or any other" and so on, in order to complete the large class that one wishes to denominate. That seems to me to be the traditional draftsmanship to which those whose duty it is to write and understand Acts of Parliament are accustomed. But for some reason which I have never understood and which has never been explained properly to us either in Committee or now, the Government have chosen to eschew the traditional methods of draftsmanship and to introduce a totally new method of their own. They use wide words, and then they say, "The following are examples of the wide words". If the examples are not intended to be exclusive or limitative in any way—and this at any rate I understand is not the intention of the Government—but the words are themselves wide enough to embrace the examples, I cannot think what useful purpose they serve.

Mr. W. R. Rees-Davies (Isle of Thanet)

In my right hon. and learned Friend's great experience, has he seen this form of words before?

Mr. Hogg

I never have. I have corresponded with the Home Secretary about this and he has told me that there are precedents but has not said what they are. I have never seen precedents for these words. If, on the other hand, these words are not intended to be limitative but to remove any possible doubt, I cannot think why the Home Secretary does not use something like the form of words in the Amendment, which clearly, at any rate, has the merit of following traditional custom which, even in these permissive and radical days, has some advantage if one wants other people to understand what one means by human language. After all, we cannot all be Humpty Dumpties in a matter of language. We cannot just make words mean what we want them to mean and expect judges to understand what we want them to do.

I do not think that it is particularly part of my task on this Bill to supplement the labours of the Parliamentary draftsmen or even to assist the Government to improve their own Bill except where matters of principle and policy are involved. But I was so perplexed in Committee as to why they had done this extraordinary thing that, when I discovered that they were sticking to it on Report, I thought it worthwhile to ask for a more lucid explanation of what they think they are about.

Mr. Ennals

Happily, as the right hon. and learned Gentleman has said, there is no matter of principle or policy involved here, except for one small point. If we were to accept the Amendment, it would limit the facilities and services to those which are listed in the Clause as it stands. [HON. MEMBERS: "NO."] That certainly is a possibility.

Mr. Hogg

Surely I must be right about this. My Amendment says: Without prejudice to the foregoing subsection… Surely, therefore, it does not limit.

Mr. Ennals

The right hon. and learned Gentleman is quite right. I ask his forgiveness. The subsection as it stands sets out a list of examples of what is meant by facilities and services for the purpose of subsection (1). This approach has been suggested as fairly novel, but it is not entirely new since there is something on these lines in Section 2(2) and (4) of the Occupiers' Liability Act, 1957, introduced when the right hon. and learned Gentleman himself was a member of the Government.

This was also suggested as a means of handling the problem by the authors of the Street Report. The fact that it is novel does not mean that it is wrong. It is a useful method of explaining subsection (1). It was realised early on that it would be impossible to provide an exhaustive list of facilities and services. Without subsection (2), subsection (1) would be much more difficult to understand, and we would not have had this debate if we had not sought to indicate the sort of services which are covered. But there is no reason why such an example could be read as limited, and it is simply a matter of draftsmanship—whether it be the work of the Parliamentary draftsmen or that of the right hon. and learned Gentleman. I suggest that there is no significant point of issue here, and I hope that he will not press the Amendment.

7.15 p.m.

Mr. Angus Maude (Stratford-on-Avon)

Like my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for St. Marylebone (Mr. Hogg), I find it difficult to see why the Government want to take this line, because it is an unusual course and it is not the logical course. It is all very well for the Under-Secretary of State to say that this a useful way of illustrating the principles he is trying to put into the subsection, but the Statute Book is not the place to give useful examples of principles one is trying to illustrate. They should go into the explanatory memoranda, White Papers or handbooks for the guidance of those who are going to have to carry out the law. That is where we put useful examples of principles. We do not enshrine them in legislation.

Surely legislation must state in the clearest possible terms for the courts to interpret exactly what we are including and exactly what we are excluding. There is no question of putting in useful examples, and it would be ultimately for the great benefit of clarity and administration if the hon. Gentleman were to use the form of words suggested in the Amendment and leave his useful examples for proper publication.

Sir D. Walker-Smith

The Undersecretary of State has not told us any reason for pursuing his novel form of words. Nor has he given any convincing reason for rejecting the conventional form of words suggested in the Amendment. Both are designed to secure the same objective, but there can be no doubt that the words of the Amendment achieve it whereas, despite what the hon. Gentleman has said, there must be doubt as to whether his words achieve it because they are virtually untried and they are in danger of the difficulty which my right hon. and learned Friend pointed out on another Amendment—that, owing to the rule of construction, the expression of the one implies the exclusion of the other.

The hon. Gentleman has produced one precedent, a somewhat tenuous one. I do not suppose that any of us has the provisions of the Occupiers' Liability Act, 1957, exactly in our minds. But we must have gone 600 or 700 years without finding it necessary to use this form of words. We have used it once in this not very important or fundamental Statute and have never used it again for the next 11 years. That seems the extent of the precedent and authority on which the hon. Gentleman relies and it is a tenuous base for a novel concept which appears to do no good and may, in fact, achieve some harm.

Would not the hon. Gentleman think it prudent, after consultation with the Law Officers—who do not seem to be favouring us with their advice and assistance at the moment but, no doubt, are readily at hand—to consider amending this provision in another place?

Mr. Rees-Davies

I have the Occupiers' Liability Act, 1957, here and I say categorically that this form of words is a complete nonsense. There is no precedent for it in the law. I say that categorically and I shall be very surprised if I am stated in any sense to be wrong. Section 2(2) of the 1957 Act states: The common duty of care is a duty to take such care as in all the circumstances of the case is reasonable to see that the visitor will be reasonably safe in using the premises for the purposes for which he is invited or permitted by the occupier to be there. That lays down categorically a standard of duty applicable to the Act, but it cannot possibly be relevant to the brief given to the Under-Secretary of State on this Bill.

The Under-Secretary also referred to Section 2(4) of that Act, which merely says: In determining whether the occupier of premises has discharged the common duty of care to a visitor, regard is to be had to all the circumstances… and the circumstances are then set out. That is the common duty of care subject to the relevant circumstances to be applied under that Act, and I therefore repeat that it can in no sense be used as a precedent here.

It is singularly unfortunate that these words should be used, because once a precedent is obtained, it is carried on in future Acts. Here it is said that the following are "examples" and the word which is the monstrosity is the word "examples" which has never been used in Parliamentary language hitherto— …examples of the facilities and services mentioned —and some are set out.

It is the duty of the courts to construe the general intention of Parliament, and if Parliament makes a general statement that the Bill is to cover all the professions, all the trades and all the services mentioned earlier, if it is set out so widely, Parliament gives very wide powers which shall not be taken away. But if we seek to impose some form of circular, which is all this wording is, giving examples and particulars of some of the cases which will be applicable, Parliament will make a nonsense of itself and a nonsense of the authority of the courts.

I invite the Government to withdraw this wording and at least to give us a firm undertaking that it will be discussed in another place when the lawyers there on that occasion I am perfectly certain will back, for once at any rate, what I say.

Mr. Ennals

As has already been said, no question of principle or policy is here involved. I give the assurance that I will discuss with the Law Officers whether there would be any further advantage in what the right hon. and learned Gentleman has proposed. I give no assurance about what will happen in another place, but certainly I will look at the matter.

Mr. Hogg

I do not want to be unkind. On that assurance, not quite adequate, but certainly more forthcoming than the Under-Secretary's first speech, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Mr. Hogg

I beg to move Amendment No. 9, in page 2, line 2, after 'establishment', insert: 'with sleeping accommodation for more than 10 persons'.

Mr. Speaker

With this I have suggested that we should discuss Amendment No. 13, in page 2, line 9, at end insert: (3) During the two years beginning with the commencement of this Act, this section shall not apply to any hotel, boarding house or other similar establishment with sleeping accommodation for less than 10 persons, unless the establishment is an hotel within the meaning of the Hotel Proprietors Act 1956 or would be such an hotel apart from such discrimination as is described in subsection 1 of this section.

Mr. Hogg

I want to move this Amendment almost formally because several of my hon. Friends wish to speak on its merits. I suggested a rather similar Amendment in Committee and thought, no doubt wrongly—because the Home Secretary has been very honourable about discharging his obligations—that I had received an undertaking that something would be given to me on Report. In the circumstances in which I drafted my original Amendment, I did not have time to consult those who knew the situation better than I did about the appropriate limitation for the exemption figure which I selected, and I agreed that it was too high, as several hon. Members on either side of the Committee pointed out to me. For that reason I was at fault. I originally chose the exemption limit of 20, which the Undersecretary said was too high, a view which was the consensus of the Committee.

However, I understood the Government to agree to give me something on Report and, as far as I can see, they have given me nothing. I have therefore moved this Amendment which exactly halves the figure which I first thought of. All exemption limits must have some kind of element of the arbitrary about them, and I am not in the least wedded to any particular figure. However, I feel that the Government ought to have given us something.

The essence of the purpose behind the Amendment is as follows. I have always conceded and I concede, whatever my draftsmanship may occasionally achieve, that the common inn is bound not to discriminate. It is bound not to discriminate at common law and I have no complaint that it should be caught into the Statute, now that the Statute is seeking to catch up with the common law.

But a different series of considerations applies to private boarding houses, some of which cater for very small groups of people, sometimes groups of people emanating from particular sources. Some cater for particular religious communities. Some of my hon. Friends who represent constituencies by the seaside, which I do not have the honour to do, have constituents who feel strongly about this issue. The provision of temporary accommodation of this kind is not well dealt with in the accommodation provisions, to which we shall come later. The provision of temporary accommodation requires separate treatment which this Amendment and its consort, Amendment No. 13, attempts to give it.

However, there is one consideration which is relevant to this Amendment and to the later discussion. I have always conceded that when dealing with mass factors and large operators, managements must be expected to conform with the law as laid down by the Bill. Large managements can easily do so, because they can switch employees or guests from one position to another; they cart find room in unusual places and can exercise the ordinary business of management if for any reason the persons for whom they are catering do not get on with one another.

But with very small operators, very small employers, very small landlords, or very small boarding house keepers, there may be human situations which, whether reprehensible or not—and they sometimes arise through nobody's fault—drive the very small management to exercise what must in the end often be an arbitrary judgment. For the small management when it has to operate in this way, perhaps very much against its will, to be subjected to the elaborate process of the Bill is likely to be oppressive. I leave it to my hon. Friends who are better qualified than I to give examples. However, because I got some kind of undertaking which I do not think has been fulfilled, I move the Amendment.

Sir D. Walker-Smith

I support what has been said so well by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for St. Marylebone (Mr. Hogg). "Boarding house" is a very wide term of which there is no statutory definition and it follows that if there is no quantitative restriction expressed, as would be the effect of the Amendment, the Clause will apply to all boarding houses, including those run on a very small family basis.

For more than 100 years, ever since Mrs. Dancy sued a Mrs. Richardson in 1854 for loss of her baggage in a boarding house, the law of England has distinguished between the position of a boarding house on the one hand and hotels on the other hand to which the full innkeeper's liability attaches. In that case one can see the sort of characteristics of a boarding house in that Mrs. Dancy had the use of sitting room, drawing and dining rooms in common with others, her own bedroom, her board and—and now we depart from topicality —the attendance of the servants, among whom were a butler and page who, when required, went errands for the guests and carried their luggage to and from their rooms when they arrived and departed, all of which she got, incidentally, for a sum of between£2 and£3 a week, which gives a rather nostalgic impression today.

7.30 p.m.

The basic distinction in law between boarding houses and hotels is now enshrined in the Statute referred to in Amendment No. 13, the Hotel Proprietors Act, 1956. That Act confines innkeepers' liability to establishments …held out by the proprietor as offering food, drink and, if so required, sleeping accommodation, without special contract, to any traveller with some qualifications…". The essence of the distinction is the words "without special contract" and "to any traveller". There is, in the case of boarding houses, a special contract and an implied selectivity which derives therefrom. That is obviously because of the more personal, intimate and generally smaller nature of the undertaking.

The Oxford Dictionary gives the meaning of "board" as: to be supplied with food or food and lodging at a fixed price, to live with a family as one of its members for a stipulated charge. It is clear that the character of these small boarding houses is very different from that of an hotel, as is their position in law. I submit that the same principle as preserves boarding houses from full innkeepers' liability should preserve them from the full rigour of the law in this respect. That does not derogate from the intention of the Bill, but would avoid the imposition of complication and difficulty in respect of these very small establishments.

Mr. David Winnick (Croydon, South)

As these boarding houses, in the main, are in seaside areas offering inexpensive accommodation for people staying for a week or a fortnight, is there not a danger that, if they are to be excluded, the poorer types of person will be penalised, because they may be discriminated against as a result of the colour of their skin? They would only be able to go to an hotel, which they could not afford.

Sir D. Walker-Smith

That is not the case. Under the Amendment it will be only the very small boarding houes to which this will apply. It is more relevant in the context of the permanent or quasi-permanent accommodation, than to the sort of accommodation the hon. Member has in mind.

Mr. John Hynd (Sheffield, Attercliffe)

I do not rise to oppose or support the Amendment, but to question as to whether the Amendment meets the situation in the way envisaged by its movers. I should like the Minister to consider a case which occurred in my own constituency. In a private house where I was for some time a guest, there lived a man who was a training engineer at one of the pits, his wife and his mother of 90. His mother used to sit in the stone-flagged kitchen, reading—with the aid of her spectacles—for most of the day.

An Indian mining engineering student arrived in the village, found some difficulty in getting accommodation, and my host, who was very non-racialist in his attitude, invited him warmly to come and live in his house, which the Indian did. He was a very cultured gentleman, and everything went on swimmingly—everyone was very happy about the Indian. As he was to be here for some time he brought his wife over from India. His wife was a charming lady, as many Indian ladies are, who wore a sari and had the habit of wandering about the house without any shoes.

She insisted upon cooking the food for her husband to which he had been accustomed in India, which gave rise to odours to which the normal inhabitants of the house were not accustomed, and to which the old lady strongly objected. Furthermore, the old lady was from time to time very startled when what appeared to be a ghostly figure, making no noise, moved past her when she was reading. Eventually they had to ask this Indian to look for further accommodation. Under the Clause as it stands I would have thought that the owner of this house, who acted with the highest possible non-racial motives, would be subject to a penalty, not because he acted because of racialism, but simply because of the impossibility of these two different groups of habits, odours and customs mingling.

I do not think that the Amendment meets this point. It is an intimate problem which arises in this context, and I raise it in order that the Minister can tell us how he would consider such a problem could be met without bringing within the Act someone who is behaving with the very highest possible motives in mind, and who cannot under any conditions be regarded as being a racialist.

Mr. Costain

As my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for St. Marylebone (Mr. Hogg) said, this is a matter which affects seaside constituences very much, and in particular the small seaside boarding house. The hon. Member for Croydon, South (Mr. Winnick) raised a point that, if the Amendment were accepted, cheaper accommodation would not be available to certain people. I think that he is exaggerating. The small boarding houses at seaside resorts are usually run by husband and wife or by a widow. They feel that in their own accommodation, which is really a large private house, they must be entitled to have some ability to select guests.

I will quote a case, not in my constituency, but of which I know, of a couple who came back from Kenya, having had one of their children murdered by their own servant during the Mau Mau riots. As a result they cannot bear to have anyone from Africa in the house with their remaining child. Who can blame them? However much they want to, they cannot do it, because it brings back all the memories. Unless we accept this Amendment, these people would have to give up their business, and I am sure that no one wants to see this happen. These are the sort of cases which the Amendment would help.

Mr. Evelyn King

I rise also as a representative of a seaside constituency, although I am not particularly influenced in what I am about to say by that fact. My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for St. Marylebone (Mr. Hogg) drew a legal distinction between an hotel and what we may call a rooming house. There is a practical distinction too. If one owns an hotel, one presumably has one's doors open, anyone can go into it—and many of us do to buy a drink—and then go out again. I concede that such a public place must be open to everyone and that discrimination in such a place should cease.

When we come to what I will call a rooming house;for want of a better word, one finds the situation where the front door is closed and, where, to get in, one has to knock or ring a bell. I should have thought that that was the definition of a private house. When I say "private house" I do not use the conventional phrase. I emphasise the adjective. If that phrase has any meaning at all, it must mean that it is the one area in one's life which is private, which is one's own, and about which one has absolute discretion as to whom one invites inside. That is a principle worth establishing.

What this Bill is saying to a landlady, and I will put it as fairly as I can, is that if someone seeks to come to her house, a person of her own nationality, she has absolute discretion to accept that person or to reject him. If that person does not suit her, she has an absolute right to say that he should make other arrangements. If the Bill becomes law, and if an immigrant seeks admission to that private house, where people probably take private meals together and almost certainly use of the bathroom and the lavatory is shared, that absolute discretion is removed, and there will be an obligation on the landlady to take someone whom she might wish to reject.

I draw attention to another example which is almost as important. A person may take in a lodger who, after he has been admitted, does not fit in with the close establishment living together. Perhaps he is noisy and does not get on with the other guests. Such a landlady must in the course of nature sometimes wish to reject such a person, but, because he is coloured, the likelihood of a complaint being made clearly puts her in a very difficult position, because one will not always be able to satisfy the Race Relations Board or the court.

The majority of people who run this sort of house are middle-aged women, someone may even argue, and, though I should resent it I will accept it for the sake of argument, that they are stupid women. Because they are elderly and have been brought up in a different tradition—perhaps they are widows of petty officers in the Navy or of warrant officers in the Army—they may be nervous. But because they are nervous, we cannot disregard their nerves. In the majority of cases, there is no difficulty and such people as the hon. Member for Croydon, South (Mr. Winnick) has in mind will be willingly received. In the odd case that will not be so.

I should speak on this matter with less certainty if it were the fact within the Bill that an immigrant having a complaint to make to the Race Relations Board had himself to make and sign it. That is not the case. In Committee, I moved an Amendment to make it the case. Any immigrant organisation, or any organisation or body, could go to landladies and other places and make a complaint when there was none. It is fair to add that there are about 1,000 organisations devoted to the problems of race. Many of them are highly responsible and are doing excellent work and have the blessing of every hon. Member. It is fair to add, however, that there is a small proportion—perhaps devoted to the Black Power movement—cf troublemakers, and a Clause of this sort is an invitation to them to do more harm than good. If I thought for a moment that this Clause would ease the problems we seek to ease, I should be in favour of it. Because I sense a danger that it may arouse resentment and may cause a row between a landlady and a lodger which gets in the newspapers and may damage the very cause which hon. Members have at heart, I urge that the Amendment, or something like it, should be accepted.

7.45 p.m.

Mr. Alexander W. Lyon

I intervene only because my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Attercliffe (Mr. John Hynd) raised a case which goes to the root of the misconception which is being aired on the benches opposite, namely, the fact that an owner of a house felt it necessary to expel an Indian lady who had lived in the house for some time because her habits were such that she could not easily get on with the other boarders might bring the case within the Bill.

It is true that the Indian lady might complain to the Race Relations Board. But I cannot believe that the Board, after the very preliminary investigation which would be necessary, would take the matter further when it realised that the discrimination was not on the ground of colour or race, but simply because this lady, by reason of her habits, could not get on with the other lodgers.

Mr. Evelyn King

I concede that the Board would behave reasonably. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman would concede that, if a landlady were threatened that if she did not do this or that she would be taken before the Race Relations Board and would finally be landed in court, that would be a very intimidating threat.

Mr. Lyon

The answer to that lies in the way in which the Board carries out the tasks assigned to it under the Bill. Gradually it will build up the measure of good will necessary to show that it takes a sensible view of disputes like that. There is nothing unlawful under the Bill in doing what the landlord of the house to which my hon. Friend the Member for Attercliffe referred was doing. It is not unlawful to discriminate against people because they cook in a particular way or because they are the sore thumb in a closely knit community. If people cannot get on, it is possible to discriminate. But it is not right to discriminate against people as a group, and that is where the error is creeping in to this discussion.

That is the error which the dockers who came to support the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Powell) made when they stood outside the House and cursed the Nigerian High Commissioner and Sir Learie Constan-tine as they came into the House because they disliked coloured people who were neghbours or workers in their area. Their conception was that because a man is black he is the same. That is the abhorrent part of racial discrimination.

With the greatest respect to those hon. Members who represent landladies in seaside resorts, it is no answer to their concern to say that because they have had unpleasant experiences with one coloured man they should be entitled to exclude all others. The hon. Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Mr. Costain) referred to the Mau Mau murders. Is it to be said that the Moors murders were so abhorrent to most of us that landladies should exclude all white men from their establishments? Of course not. We would not dream of making such a stupid assertion. Should we go on to say that, because in a particular part of Africa at a particular point in the development of that area, and because of the activities of a particular section of the coloured people living in Kenya where the Mau Mau incidents took place, we in this country should be able to discriminate against coloured people from that locality ad infinitum? I cannot accept that we should.

I concede that there will be occasions when landladies will feel grave concern about taking in coloured people, but I hope that the conciliation part of the Bill will help to explain to them why it is desirable that they should do so and that after the Race Relations Board and the conciliation committees have done their work they will be prepared to take in reasonable, honest, sober guests who happen to be coloured and that thereby we shall achieve the integration which we all honourably desire.

Sir S. Summers

I have considerable sympathy with the notions underlying the Amendment, but I hope that before we dispose of it a little more will be said to help us in deciding where to draw the line. My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for St. Marylebone (Mr. Hogg) made it clear that he was primarily concerned that there should be an area below which the Bill would not apply, but that he was not particularly concerned about whether 10 was the magic figure or whether some other figure should be preferred.

An incident was brought to my notice only two days ago concerning a highly educated West Indian couple who were lunching with a friend of mine. They were, incidentally, both independently employed in responsible positions by a public authority. In the course of conversation they disclosed that in previous years they had had such difficulty in finding accommodation of the character about which we are speaking that they thought it would be necessary to take their next holiday in a tent.

Here is a situation which cannot be ignored. Neither can we ignore the feelings of those who have a small private house in which they legitimately claim that considerations should be allowed to prevail for themselves which do not apply even to the small hotels. Where, therefore, do we draw the line?

I hope that before we conclude this debate, somebody with a great deal more experience than I have of these matters will say that I am right in thinking that probably eight or six would not be more likely to exclude the small private house with which we are primarily concerned without, at the same time, damaging the holiday prospects of such a couple as I have referred to.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Housing and Local Government (Mr. James MacColl)

I should like to respond to the invitation to try to put before the House some of the points at issue. Although we are at odds, there is not nearly as much difference between us as the right hon. and learned Member for St. Marylebone (Mr. Hogg) implied. I would not like him to think that we have not studied carefully what he and his hon. Friends and hon. Members on this side said in Committee about this matter. The difference, however, is partly a matter of drafting.

The right hon. and learned Member dismissed Clause 7 as not being the essence of the problem. Clause 7 deals with this problem because it is the exception Clause to Clause 2 as well as to Clause 5. That is clear from subsection (1). Subsection (3) of Clause 7 defines "residential accommodation" in a wide way to cover a hotel, boarding house or other similar establishment". The main argument about where we should draw the line arises on the Amendments to Clause 7 and I would get into difficulty with Mr. Deputy Speaker if I dealt with the detail of that now. That, however, is our answer to the point which has been made.

The main difference between us is not, I suspect, so much in terms of the numbers of people involved as to whether it is 10, 8 or 6. The difference is the test of the exception for the sharing of accommodation. It is clear from Clause 7 that one of the criteria is that there should be shared accommodation.

The best place to distinguish the intimate personal relationship such as my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Attercliffe (Mr. John Hynd) referred to of people moving in and out of shared facilities from the person who has a cutoff apartment and no direct contact with the people living in the accommodation is on Clause 7. That is why we have not put down anything to Clause 2. In our view, that would be the wrong place for an exception.

The answer to the query by my hon. Friend the Member for Attercliffe about the Indian lady is that if she were living as close as that—just one or two people sharing the kitchen with the nice, kind couple—there would be exemption under Clause 7 from the provisions of the Bill.

I would make this comment about the tragic case concerning the victim of Mau Mau. I would not challenge the intimate and personal nature of that sort of experience. If, however, an Indian or an African immigrant knocked at the door and was refused accommodation, perhaps brusquely and bitterly, is it better to say there must be no kind of attempt to get them to see each other's point of view or is it better to say that a conciliation officer should call, see them both, and say to the African, "I am sure that you will understand this special difficulty. You can understand what these people feel like", and try to bring them together, but not necessarily to live in the same house but to understand their points of view. That is why the Bill is called a Race Relations Bill, because it deals with attempts to improve people's race relations.

Mr. John Lee (Reading)

Is my hon. Friend resisting the Amendment?

Mr. MacColl

What I said about the Amendment being in the wrong place from a drafting viewpoint was intended to mean that it would be unwise to put it where it is proposed.

Mr. Rees-Davies

I am extremely sorry that although the Home Secretary rather intimated that he would not do so, the Joint Parliamentary Secretary has spoken to this matter before he has had the opportunity, either in Committee or on the Floor of the House, to hear this matter fully put for the first time.

My hon. Friends who have spoken to some aspects of the matter have covered certain important aspects, but I venture to point out a number of things which have never been mentioned, either upstairs or on the Floor of the House, which go both to the important question of the original drafting of the Clause and to the position which obtains in the practice of the class of accommodation in question. I am sure that the Minister will be kind enough to pay heed to these matters which have been culled from experience of having to consider the question through a number of associations and organisations which have not hitherto had the opportunity of any expression.

In Committee upstairs, my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for St. Marylebone (Mr. Hogg) probed this matter with his usual delightful phraseology. He asked the Home Secretary, who was then present, Could he give us a little more indication as to what it is that he will consider favourably? Can he say what is in his mind that he will consider favourably? At the moment we have no indication at all. The Home Secretary replied: Because this is a sensitive area…I do not think that I should go into figures at this moment. All I say is that I think that, having listened to the arguments, there is a case for something more than before. None has been given today. There is a case, in my view, for something very much less than 20. The right hon. Gentleman will have to see where we pitch on this", which cannot mean anything else than "where we will pitch mathematically". All of us ought to consider it seriously, and I ought not to produce numbers, like a juggler out of a hat on this. To this my right hon. and learned Friend replied: In the light of that rather obscure and Delphic utterance, to which…I shall hold the right hon. Gentleman as strictly as the obscurity of his words permits…".—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Standing Committee B, 14th May, 1968;c. 159.] My right hon. and learned Friend has again nobly risen to the occasion and put the case.

I want to put a case which has not been put by anybody. First, let us look at the words set out in the Bill. It has not been looked at carefully enough. It states that accommodation in a hotel, boarding house or other similar establishment shall be the subject of discrimination proceedings at large. The first question which has to be considered by a conciliation committee or by the courts is what is meant by "other similar establishments". If that is construed ejusdem generis, as the courts may contrue it but not necessarily will construe it, it will mean something which is ejusdem generis with a boarding house.

8.0 p.m.

Let me tell hon. Gentlemen, as they have not considered this at all yet, that there is a third category of accommodation in this country which is extremely common and growing, and that is paying-guest accommodation, which is not truly boarding-house accommodation. If hon. Gentlemen will look at their trade union papers they will see that it is common these days to have a particular type of guest house accommodation which is for trade union members only. In the Isle of Thanet we have had some difficulties and at one time I had to write to the father of one of the present Ministers, Mr. Morgan Phillips, because discrimination was shown in boarding houses in the Isle of Thanet, in that they were being reserved for trade union members of the Labour Party only. This hurt the feelings of other ladies in my constituency. They felt that they, too, should be able to entertain members of the Labour Party in my constituency. Therefore, I had to turn my hat round and try to persuade Mr. Morgan Phillips to take a wider view and not to permit discrimination. True to his proper Socialist convictions, he agreed with me that there should be no discrimination.

In point of fact there is discrimination. There are certain boarding houses or guest houses, namely always with fewer than 10 bedrooms but not always—not accommodation for 10 persons but 10 bedrooms—which are Jewish, and they are kept open to enable people who are Jews to be able to come to stay. They seldom, if ever, accept other people. There are those which provide for Roman Catholics. There are those which have a firm arrangement by which they take five or six couples from old-age pensioner establishments in Birmingham or Manchester, and their affiliated branches, at certain times of the year. We have an arrangement in the Isle of Thanet, for example, whereby old-age pensioners have off-season special rates and have almost exclusive control of one or more houses, usually small ones.

I see nothing wrong in discrimination in this sense, because I am assuming that there are certain cases where discrimination is the very thing which that type of accommodation seeks. I want the House to realise what has not yet been the subject of any discussion, that they will be going into a hornet's nest if they imagine that the Bill as it is at the moment is either explicit or provides for what I would call the private class of case where accommodation is limited to a class of people, namely those whom it is wished to serve.

Mr. James Dempsey (Coatbridge and Airdrie)

I am interested in the hon. Gentleman's argument. Will he say whether Conservative clubs discriminate against persons because they do not hold Conservative views?

Mr. Rees-Davies

They do not, in fact. In the main, Conservatives have their own clubs in different parts of the country with limited accommodation and, from my knowledge of Conservative clubs, they are rather better at snooker than anything else.

Mr. Richard

I am sure the hon. Gentleman will agree that being a Conservative or a Socialist is not a matter of …colour, race or ethnic or national origin". In all the instances he has cited the discrimination is not caught by the Bill. Of course, Conservatives are entitled to discriminate against Socialists. If the hon. Gentleman will look at Clause 1 of the Bill which, as I have said, I do not like, he will see that what is caught is not the man who discriminates against Socialists; it is not the man who discriminates in favour of old-age pensioners, nor a person discriminating in favour of anyone coming from Birmingham or Scotland. It is discrimination on the ground of colour, race or ethnic origin. Does not the hon. Gentleman think that his argument has gone?

Mr. Rees-Davies

I certainly do not. In the first place, I mentioned the Jewish race which is covered by it. The discrimination arises in this way. If a coloured person wishes to stay in a boarding house and he is not a member of the trade union or whatever it is, none the less, if it is a smaller establishment, he is entitled to stay. The difficulty of the argument is this. If one discriminates de facto against either Jewish persons or coloured persons, if one discriminates in the manner which is indicated in the original Clause 1, that is to say either on the ground of colour, race or ethnic or national origins, one is caught.

Mr. Richard

Is the hon. Gentleman saying that one is perfectly entitled to discriminate against a black Conservative on a purported ground, namely, that he is a Conservative, but not on the ground that he is black?

Mr. Rees-Davies

I dare say one can try to do that, but I have no doubt that, in practice, one would have to tell that to the marines.

If I may now continue with the argument, although there was very wide discussion in Committee upstairs, there is one topic which was not the subject of full discussion upstairs and that is the position which arises with regard to hotels, boarding houses and other similar establishments. Under the wording "smaller establishments", if it is only to cover boarding houses and it is to exclude—and I think it is meant to exclude—the really small type of establishment, with only about 8 to 10 persons, then I think it ought to be clarified, and in the event this Amendment would clarify it along the lines that the Government undertook so to do. They undertook so to do in Clause 2, not in Clause 7, as I have indicated from col. 159.

Mr. Richard indicated dissent.

Mr. Rees-Davies

The hon. Member for Barons Court (Mr. Richard) indicates his dissent, but if he will look at col. 159 of the proceedings in Committee of 14th May, he will see that the Home Secretary was quite specific in his undertaking to give a figure after discussion which would be applicable. I submit that the figure that has been inserted is a minimum one of 10 persons. That is the sort of case where an establishment with a man and his wife running it, which is two persons, and possibly a couple of children, making four, would have three or perhaps four bedrooms for paying guest letting. I deliberately use the term "paying guests" rather than a boarding house.

The genuine boarding house nowadays, although it has a different liability at law from a hotel, none the less holds itself out to accept everybody, and it has the limitations that I have mentioned of certain classes only about particular times of the year, when it may refuse to have anybody other than a particular class, and that may include ethnic origin; it may wish to have Irish, Welsh, Jewish; it may wish to have Sassenachs; it may wish to have international hockey players.

It has also been overlooked that there has been a tradition in relation to different classes of coloured people which is very much the same as the tradition in relation to different classes of white people. With the utmost respect, if the band of dockers who came to the House the other day had then diverted their attention to Claridges and asked for accommodation, I suspect that they probably would have been turned down. On the other hand, we found in the Isle of Thanet that the Americans when they were based at Manston used to insist that their own coloured population went to Ramsgate, the N.C.O.s went to Margate and the officers went to Broadstairs. It has worked out extremely well. That is the situation, and, when one gets to the realities of life in small paying-guest establishments, it is idle to say that there is no discrimination. I am not trying to argue that it does not exist. I am arguing that it is one of the facts of life. It is manifest that it exists.

I go much further, because it is an act of policy by many small establishments which have only three or four double bedrooms, can afford to be choosy and have only a limited season of four or five months, to seek to get the bookings of a specific class of persons whom they find suit each other. In Broadstairs, we get a very good type of middle class persons coming from the Midlands and the North. They include a number of hon. Members opposite and their families who are regular visitors and whom we accept as being suitable for that class of accommodation. They attend regularly, and we find them admirable. It is well known that Margate is extremely popular as a conference place for the Labour Party.

However, there are some establishments in different parts of my constituency who would say, "We do not accept coloured persons, not because we dislike them, not because we have any personal axe to grind against them, but simply because our clientele happens to be of a different nature". They like to meet people with whom they can converse and make friends in their own premises. If they were satisfied that a coloured person who was coming was a friend of the other people, I am sure that that person would be acceptable. But I do not want to see people forced into a position which will affect their businesses in the way that it undoubtedly will if this Clause covers that class of case, as I think that it does. If it does, it will cause trouble in exactly the way that my hon. Friend the Member for Dorset, South (Mr. Evelyn King) has indicated, not because a coloured person will lay a complaint but because one of those awful informers who are permitted and encouraged under the Bill will inform and cause trouble. Such people will inform not because the case will be passed and accepted by the Race Relations Board, because probably it will not in the outcome, but because it is a good way of getting some dirty, rotten publicity at the expense of the boarding house keeper.

8.15 p.m.

Mr. John Lee

In spite of the hon. Gentleman's ingenious arguments, is he not missing the whole point of the Bill? He is saying that we must make concession after concession to the less pleasant aspects of human nature. If this Amendment is allowed in its present form, that is exactly what will happen.

Mr. Rees-Davies

With respect, I think that the hon. Member for Reading (Mr. John Lee) is in cloud-cuckooland. If he goes on holiday with or in the hope of meeting a group of friends in a small paying guest establishment in which there are only three other bedrooms, one bathroom and one lavatory, does he really think that his wife and family will want to share accommodation if in the outcome he finds staying there a black Zambian of the lower class and a Polynesian—[HON. MEMBERS: "Shame."] Do not say "Shame" and such tosh. For once, let us have a little honesty on these matters. The fact is that the hon. Gentleman will want to mix with his friends. It so happens that I can say these things because I have a great many friends from all parts of the world who are themselves coloured. If I went with one of my friends to a similar establishment, do hon. Members imagine that he would want to find there someone of a totally different type, character, class and everything else, any more than I would? That is quite unrealistic, and it is what I cavil at in this part of the Bill.

I have tried to bring into the open some of the further arguments which my right hon. Friend hinted at when he gave us the opportunity to indicate these aspects of this important matter. As I see it, on Clause 2, if the Bill is to work, it is essential to lay down in real terms either by clarification or by proviso what is meant by the words "other similar establishment", whether it is done here or in another place. If it is decided that it will not be defined as such—and I can see that it is very difficult—there should be an exclusion along the lines suggested by my right hon. Friend in terms of numbers to indicate that the small paying guest establishment is not included within the class.

That is one aspect. If it is not to be done on Clause 2, it will be necessary later to have much more fundamental exemptions in Clause 7. Ft is all very well for hon. Members to try and argue, as did the hon. Member for Barons Court (Mr. Richard) by way of intervention, that certain classes such as trade unions and others can discriminate. But that is only drawing it on ethnic grounds. Where there is a whole practice of deliberate discrimination in the running of small establishments, if one wants to make the Bill an effective instrument, it would be more easy and satisfactory to exclude all this aspect.

It is an understood fact that a hotel as such must not and cannot discriminate as a matter of ordinary common law. It owes its duty to the public at large and in that sense it is covered, although in practice we all know that certain types of person, not in relation to their colour or ethnic origin but in relation to their habits and practices, may be excluded from certain restaurants and hotels. As I indicated to the hon. Gentleman just now, that can be dressed up so easily as being discrimination on the grounds of race and colour.

That is the practical side of it. It is because we are concerned with the practical aspects that I hope that the matter will be looked at carefully and that the Home Secretary will carry out the undertaking given to my right hon. Friend in Committee upstairs.

Mr. Richard

I am grateful to the hon. Member for the Isle of Thanet (Mr. Rees-Davies) for making that speech because it revealed more clearly than anything I have heard so far or have read in the Press how little many people have understood the Bill. The hon. Gentleman could not have read the Bill properly and made that speech.

It is clear from Clause 1 exactly what is caught by the Bill. What is made unlawful is discrimination on the grounds of colour, race or ethnic or national origins. If in his constituency he has a cosy little boarding house being run by one of these mythical widows about whom we hear so much from hon. Gentlemen opposite, and if she desires to publish in her brochure, "Only upper"—or it could be "medium" or "lower"—"class people need apply", she is entitled to do so. I disapprove of her going further—I trust that the hon. Gentleman takes the same view—and turning away a man whose skin happens to be black. That action is caught by the Bill. Being a lawyer —the hon. Member for the Isle of Thanet will know what I mean by that—the hon. Gentleman should read the Bill again and not make such a speech until he has done so.

Mr. Grieve

The House should be grateful for the breath of fresh air and common sense which my hon. Friend the Member for the Isle of Thanet (Mr. Rees-Davies) introduced. In contrast, the reply of the hon. Member for Barons Court (Mr. Richard) showed how much, in their anxiety, which I respect, to improve race relations, he and those who think like him ignore the realities of the situation in which this legislation is being introduced.

The hon. Member for York (Mr. Alexander W. Lyon) referred to a seaside landlady who, for good and legitimate reasons, turned away a person of a different ethnic origin or colour from herself. He said that when the matter was brought to the attention of the Race Relations Board, everything would be put right, so that the landlady would have no cause for complaint or alarm. That ignores the character and often the education of many of those who run small boarding houses and similar establishments. Many of them are scared out of their wits at the mere sight of a document, and the thought of being taken before a board or court fills them with fear.

The authors of the Street Report, when considering the possible exemptions to the legislation which they advocated, suggested the application of the principle of personal, intimate proximity. It is against that test that one must consider restricting the number of boarders to 10 in this type of boarding establishment. We should be doing a grave disservice to the cause of race relations if we tried to import legislative sanctions into the ordinary private home of the individual.

I agree with the Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Housing that it is not easy to see where the line should be drawn. In Committee I tabled an Amendment suggesting that the figure should be 20, although I held no special briefs for that number. That it should be drawn at ten or a little over goes absolutely against common sense, because that figure brings us into the realm of those who are not providing facilities on a large scale. These people are merely supplementing their incomes by taking people into their ordinary private homes. It is from the zone of the private home that this legislation should be excluded and I pray in aid the principle on which the authors of the Street Report made their proposals and suggest that the Government act in the same way.

Another reason why we should be careful to exclude legislative sanctions in this realm is because of the type of person who runs this type of establishment. The hon. Member for Barons Court referred to the "mythical widow". If anything showed the lack of common sense which he and his like are bringing to this problem, the sneer inherent in that expression revealed it. The great bulk of small boarding houses are run by widows who are augmenting their incomes. If there is one class of the community of whom we in this House should take care it is the widow, and I am not ashamed of saying so.

Dr. Winstanley

So that I understand precisely what is in the hon. and learned Gentleman's mind, would he comment on this example: if a widow—a real one and not a mythical one—running an intimate establishment takes in eight students, would he regard it as reason- able if she said that she would not take in a Pakistani student as one of the eight?

Mr. Grieve

What I regard as reasonable is that that widow should have complete and absolute control over whom she wishes to have under her own roof. That principle is enshrined in every freedom we respect, and to the extent that this legislation is cutting in and reducing that freedom, I am against it.

Mr. Hogg

I can speak again only by leave of the House, but I hope that if I promise to be reasonably short I may have that leave.

The only difference of principle between me and the Under-Secretary is a rather curious one, but I think that we on this side are probably right on that solitary difference. The Under-Secretary shook me at first by suggesting, and it may well turn out to be true, that whilst he would agree that there should be an exemption limit—whether for reasons of principle or whether for reasons of convenience does not matter—it was already adequately dealt with under Clause 7 rather than under this Clause. He said—and I thought that it was a very truthful remark, and I agree with it—that though we are at difference about this matter, the difference is not as much as people might think. We are at difference about it, and I think that we are now in a position to come to a conclusion by way of a Division—without, I hope, much ill feeling on either side.

I would only add that the debate has ranged rather more widely than that between the two Front Benches, and I have been very glad of the way in which it has developed, because it has ventilated a certain amount of feeling. But I would, on the whole, side in this matter with my hon. Friends. Obviously, when dealing with very small operators in this field we have to draw some kind of a line somewhere between convenience and individual liberty on the one hand and principle and dislike of discrimination on the other.

Perhaps when we discuss the next Amendment—and certainly on Third Reading—we will be able to go into that matter in a little more detail with profit to all of us, but whilst I am speaking simply on the question of boarding houses in the kind of situation that has been developed I would only say this. There is only one freedom ever worth having by anybody, and that is the freedom to do wrong. I hasten to change my language to something which is more theologically acceptable, and say freedom to do what other people think is wrong, because if one only does what other people think is right one is not free at all.

I would therefore say to hon. Members opposite who have tended to get a little excitable about this Amendment and, in particular, a little excitable about my hon., gallant but not always very theological Friend the Member for the Isle of Thanet (Mr. Rees-Davies), that he

was theologically more correct than they were.

One must, in the end, distinguish between what is morally reprehensible and what creates important social consequences. What creates important social consequences is something about which Parliament ought to legislate. What is morally reprehensible but does not so create, is something we should ignore. Therefore, I shall advise my hon. Friends, for one reason or another, to join me in dividing on the Amendment.

Question put, That the Amendment be made: —

The House divided: Ayes 151, Noes 234.

Division No. 271.]	AYES	[8.30 p.m.
Alison, Michael (Barkston Ash)	Gresham Cooke, R.	Onslow, Crantey
Astor, John	Grieve, Percy	Osborn, John (Hatlam)
Atkins, Humphrey (M't'n & M'd'n)	Griffiths, Eldon (Bury St. Edmunds)	Osborne, Sir Cyril (Louth)
Awdry, Daniel	Gurden, Harold	Page, Graham (Crosby)
Baker, Kenneth (Acton)	Hall, John (Wycombe)	Pearson, Sir Frank (Clitheroe)
Baker, W. H. K. (Banff)	Hall-Davis, A. G. F.	Peel, John
Bennett, Sir Frederic (Torquay)	Harris, Frederic (Croydon, N.W.)	Percival, Ian
Biffen, John	Harrison, Brian (Maldon)	Pounder, Rafton
Biggs-Davison, John	Harrison, Col. Sir Harwood (Eye)	Powell, Rt. Hn. J. Enoch
Birch, Rt. Hn. Nigel	Heald, Rt. Hn. Sir Lionel	Pym, Fancis
Black, Sir Cyril	Heath, Rt. Hn. Edward	Quennell, Miss J. M.
Boardman, Tom (Leicester, S.W.)	Higglns, Terence L.	Rees-Davies, W. R.
Body, Richard	Hogg, Rt. Hn. Quintin	Renton, Rt. Hn. Sir David
Bossom, Sir Clive	Holland, Philip	Rhys Williams, Sir Brandon
Brewis, John	Hordern, Peter	Ridley, Hn. Nicholas
Brinton, Sir Tatton	Hornby, Richard	Ridsdale, Julian
Bryan, Paul	Howell, David (Guildford)	Rodgers, Sir John (Sevenoaks)
Buck, Antony (Colchester)	Hutchison, Michael Clark	Royle, Anthony
Bullus, Sir Eric	Iremonger, T. L.	Russell, Sir Ronald
Burden, F. A.	Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)	Sandys, Rt. Hn. D.
Campbell, B. (Oldham, West)	Jenkin, Patrick (Woodford)	Scott-Hopkins, James
Campbell, Gordon (Moray & Nairn)	Jennings, J. C. (Burton)	Sharpies, Richard
Carlisle, Mark	Jones, Arthur (Northants, S.)	Silvester, Frederick
Chichester-Clark, R.	Joseph, Rt. Hn. Sir Keith	Smith, Dudley (W'wick &L'mington)
Cordle, John	King, Evelyn (Dorset, S.)	Speed, Keith
Corfield, F. V.	Kirk, Peter	Stainton, Keith
Costain, A. P.	Kitson, Timothy	Summers, Sir Spencer
Craddock, Sir Beresford (Spelthorne)	Knight, Mrs. Jill	Taylor, Sir Charles (Eastbourne)
Crosthwaite-Eyre, Sir Oliver	Langford-Holt, Sir John	Temple, John M.
Crouch, David	Legge-Bourke, Sir Harry	Thatcher, Mrs. Margaret
Currie, G. B. H.	Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)	Turton, Rt. Hn. R. H.
Dance, James	Lloyd, Ian (P'tsm'th, Langstone)	van Straubenzee, W. R.
Dean, Paul (Somerset, N.)	McAdden, 8ir Stephen	Vaughan-Morgan, Rt. Hn. Sir John
Deedes, Rt. Hn. W. F. (Ashford)	Maclean, Sir Fitzroy	Vickers, Dame Joan
Digby, Simon Wingfield	Macleod, Rt. Hn. lain	Walker, Peter (Worcester)
Dodds-Parker, Douglas	Maddan, Martin	Walker-Smith, Rt. Hn. Sir Derek
Drayson, G. B.	Maginnis, John E.	ward, Dame Irene
Elliot, Capt. Walter (Carshalton)	Marten, Neil	Wells, John (Maidstone)
Elliott.R.W. (N'c'tle-upon-Tyne,N.)	Maude, Angus	Whitelaw, Rt. Hn. William
Emery, Peter	Maydon, Lt.-Cmdr. S. L. C	Williams, Donald (Dudley)
Errington, Sir Eric	Mills, Stratton (Belfast, N.)	wills, Sir Gerald (Bridgwater)
Eyre, Reginald	Mortro, Hector	Wilson, Geoffrey (Truro)
Fletcher-Cooke, Charles	Montgomery, Fergus	Wolrige-Gordon, Patrick
Fortescue, Tim	Morrison, Charles (Devizes)	Wood, Rt Hn Richard
Galbraith, Hn. T. G.	Mott-Radcryffe, Sir Charles	Woodnutt, Mark
Gibson-Watt, David	Munro-Lucas-Tooth, Sir Hugh	Worsley, Marcus
Glover, Sir Douglas	Murton, Oscar	Younger, Hn. George
Goodhart, Philip	Nabarro, Sir Cerald
Goodhew, Victor	Neave, Airey	TELLERS FOR THE AYES:
Cower, Raymond	NichollS, Sir Harmar	Mr. Jasper More and
Grant, Anthony	Noble, Rt. Hn. Michael	Mr. Bernard Weatherill.
Grant-Ferris, R.	Nott, John
NOES
Abse, Leo	Freeson, Reginald	Miller, Dr. M. S.
Allaun, Frank (Salford, E.)	Galpern, Sir Myer	Milne, Edward (Blyth)
Alldritt, Walter	Gardner, Tony	Mitchell, R. C. (S'th'pton, Test)
Anderson, Donald	Ginsburg, David	Molloy, William
Archer, Peter	Gordon Walker, Rt. Hn. P. C.	Morgan, Elystan (Cardiganshire)
Armstrong, Ernest	Gregory, Arnold	Morris, Alfred (Wythenshawe)
Atkins, Ronald (Preston, N.)	Grey, Charles (Durham)	Morris, Charles R. (Openshaw)
Atkinson, Norman (Tottenham)	Griffiths, David (Rother Valley)	Morris, John (Aberavon)
Bacon, Rt. Hn. Alice	Griffiths, Rt. Hn. James (Llanelly)	Moyle, Roland
Bagier, Gordon A. T.	Griffiths, Will (Exchange)	Murray, Albert
Barnes, Michael	Hamilton, James (Botthwell)	Neal, Harold
Barnett, Joel	Hamling, William	Newens, Stan
Baxter, William	Harman, William	Ogden, Eric
Beaney, Alan	Harper, Joseph	Orbach, Maurice
Bence, Cyril	Harrison, Walter (Wakefield)	Orme, Stanley
Bennett, James (G'gow, Bridgeton)	Haseldine, Norman	Oswald, Thomas
Besell, Peter	Hattersley, Roy	Owen, will (Morpeth)
Bidwell, Sydney	Hazell, Bert	Paget, R. T.
Blackburn, F.	Heffer, Eric S.	Palmer, Arthur
Blenkinsop, Arthur	Henig, Stanley	Pannell, Rt. Hn. Charles
Boardman, H. (Leigh)	Hilton, W. S.	Park, Trevor
Booth Albert	Hooley, Frank	Parkyn, Brian (Bedford)
Boston, Terence	Horner, John	Pavitt, Laurence
Bottomley, Rt. Hn. Arthur	Houghton, Rt. Hn. Douglas	Pearson, Arthur (Pontypridd)
Boyden, James	Howell, Denis (Small Heath)	Pentland, Norman
Braddock, Mrs. E. M.	Howie, W.	Price, Thomas (Westhoughton)
Bray, Dr. Jeremy	Hoy, James	Randall, Harry
Brown, Rt. Hn. George (Belper)	Huckfield, Leslie	Rankin, John
Brown, Hugh D. (G'gow, Provan)	Hughes, Rt. Hn. Cledwyn (Anglesey)	Rhodes, Geoffrey
Buchan, Norman	Hughes, Emrys (Ayrshire, S.)	Richard, Ivor
Buchanan, Richard (G'gow, Sp'burn)	Hughes, Roy (Newport)	Roberts, Albert (Normanton)
Butler, Herbert (Hackney, C.)	Hunter, Adam	Robertson, John (Paisley)
Callaghan, Rt. Hn. James	Hynd, John	Robinson, Rt. Hn. Kenneth(St.P'c'as)
Cant, R. B.	Janner, Sir Barnett	Robinson, W. O. J. (Walth'stow,E.)
Carmichael, Neil	Jeger,Mrs.Lena(H'b'n &St.P'cras,S.)	Rogers, George (Kensington, N.)
Chapman, Donald	Jenkins, Hugh (Putney)	Rose, Paul
Coleman, Donald	Jenkins, Rt. Hn. Roy (Stechlord)	Ross, Rt. Hn. William
Concannon, J. D.	Johnson, James (K'ston-on-Hull, W.)	Shaw, Arnold (llford, S.)
Conlan, Bernard	Johnston, Russell (Inverness)	Sheldon, Robert
Corbet, Mrs. Freda	Jones, Rt. Hn. Sir Elwyn(W.Ham,S.)	Shore, Rt. Hn. Peter (Stepney)
Crosland, Rt. Hn. Anthony	Jones, J. Idwal (Wrexham)	Short,Rt.Hn.Edward(N'c'tle-u-Tyne)
Crossman, Rt. Hn. Richard	Judd, Frank	Short, Mrs. Renée(W'hampton,N.E.)
Cullen, Mrs. Alice	Kelley, Richard	Silkin, Rt. Hn. John (Deptford)
Dalyed, Tarn	Kenyon, Clifford	Silverman, Julius
Darling, Rt. Hn. George	Kerr, Dr. David (W'worth, Central)	Skeffington, Arthur
Davidson, Arthur (Accrlngton)	Lawson, George	Slater, Joseph
Davidson, James(Aberdeenshire,W.)	Ledger, Ron	Small, William
Davies, G. Elfed (Rhondda, E.)	Lee, Rt. Hn. Frederick (Newton)	Spriggs, Leslie
Davies, Harold (Leek)	Lee, John (Reading)	Steel, David (Roxburgh)
Davies, Ifor (Gower)	Lestor, Miss Joan	Steele, Thomas (Dunbartonshire, W.)
Davies, S. 0. (Merythr)	Lewis, Arthur (W. Ham, N.)	Stonehouse, Rt. Hn. John
Dell, Edmund	Lewis, Ron (Carlisle)	Swain, Thomas
Dempsey, James	Lomas, Kenneth	Taverne, Dick
Dewar, Donald	Luard, Evan	Thomson, Rt. Hn. George
Diamond, Rt. Hn. John	Lubbock, Eric	Thornton, Ernest
Dickens, James	Lyon, Alexander W. (York)	Urwin, T. W.
Dobson, Ray	Lyons, Edward (Bradford, E.)	Varley, Eric G.
Doig, Peter	Mabon, Dr. J. Dickson	Wainwright, Edwin (Dearne Valley)
Dunn, James A.	McBride, Neil	Wainwright, Richard (Colne Valley)
Dunnett, Jack.	MacColl, James	Walden, Brian (All Saints)
Dunwoody, Mrs. Gwyneth (Exeter)	Macdonald, A. H.	Walker, Harold (Doncaster)
Dunwoody, Dr. John (F'th &C'b'e)	McGuire, Michael	Watkins, David (Consett)
Eadie, Alex	McKay, Mrs. Margaret	Weitzman, David
Edelman, Maurice	Mackenzie, Alasdair(Ross & Crom'ty)	Wellbeloved, James
Edwards, William (Merioneth)	Mackenzie, Gregor (Rutherglen)	Whitaker, Ben
Ellis. John	Mackintosh, John P.	White, Mrs. Eirene
Ennals, David	Maclennan, Robert	Whitlock, William
Evans, Albert (Islington, S.W.)	McMillan, Tom (Glasgow, C.)	Wilkins, W. A.
Evans, Gwynfor (C'marthen)	McNamara, J. Kevin	Willey, Rt. Hn. Frederick
Faulds, Andrew	Mahon, Peter (Preston, S.)	Williams, Alan Lee (Hornchurch)
Fernyhough, E.	Mahon, Simon (Bootle)	Williams, Clifford (Abertitlery)
Fitch, Alan (Wigan)	Mallalieu,J.P.W.(HudderSfield,E.)	Wilson, William (Coventry, S.)
Fletcher, Raymond (Ilketton)	Manuel, Archie	Winnick, David
Fletcher, Ted (Darlington)	Marquand, David	Winstanley, Dr. M. P.
Foot, Rt. Hn. Sir Dingle (Ipswich)	Mason, Rt. Hn. Roy	Yates, Victor
Foot, Michael (Ebbw Vale)	Maxwell, Robert
Ford, Ben	Mendelson, J. J.	TELLERS FOR THE NOES:
Forrester, John	Mlkardo, Ian	Mr. John McCann and
Fraier, John (Norwood)	Millan, Bruce	Mr. loan L. Evans.