PROVISION OF CREDIT FOR GAMING (Hansard, 18 October 1968)

§ Mr. Elystan Morgan
I beg to move, That this House doth agree with the Lords in the said Amendment.
749 Subsection (2) allows cheques to be accepted to obtain cash or tokens to be used in gaming, provided they are not post-dated. Subsection (3) provides that such a cheque must be presented for payment or collection on the day it is paid, or not more than four banking days later, or such longer period as may be prescribed. The Amendment requires the cheque to be presented not more than two banking days after it is paid, and it also removes the power to prescribe a longer period.
I appreciate that Amendment will bring the Bill back to its original state. It was amended in Committee, but if the Amendment now before the House is accepted the four-day period will be altered to the original position, and the power to vary the period by Regulation will be omitted.
The reason why we are insisting on the prompt presentation of cheques is to prevent them being held by a club in agreement with the player and so constitute a form of concealed credit, which the Clause otherwise prohibits absolutely. I am sure that hon. Gentlemen opposite appreciate that it was strongly argued in the other place that four days was too long a period because it would be likely to allow the abuse which we wish to prevent. One banking day would be sufficient, but this would be unreasonable and would bear more heavily on clubs than is necessary. It was therefore decided to allow two days' grace, and to remove the power to allow a longer period. I commend the Amendment to the House.

§ Mr. Mark Carlisle (Runcorn)
I regard the Amendment as somewhat extraordinary. I think it should be pointed out to the Home Office that this is a fantastic change-round on its part. As the hon. Gentleman said, the Bill started with a provision that a cheque must be presented for payment within two days. That led to a substantial volume of criticism by the interests concerned who said that, for various reasons, two days did not seem a wholly adequate period, that errors could occur, and it was suggested that four days was a reasonable time in which to allow them to present cheques for payment.
What surprises me most is that the Amendment has been brought in despite an extremely short debate on the Amendment 750 which I moved in Committee to delete two days and insert four days. My speech in Committee covered about half a column of HANSARD, and must, therefore, have taken between 30 seconds and a minute to make. It was replied to by the Secretary of State for the Home Department in these words: I should like to ask for the tolerance and goodwill of the Committee in making my maiden speech, and I should like it to be in this form: I have great pleasure in accepting the Amendment."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Standing Committee B, 19th March 1968, c. 273.] Having accepted the argument without any debate, we now find—although I have sympathy with the argument about blackmail I find it unconvincing—that the House is being invited to accept an even more stringent proposal than the original one, and without any adequate explanation for the change.
I do not propose to force the matter to a Division, but I regard it as unfortunate that, after matters of importance were put to the Home Office by the trade interests concerned and were accepted as being important and sensible, we now find that the Government have changed their minds without, apparently, any adequate reason for doing so.

Dr. Bennett
I am not prepared to comment on the vacillation shown by this volte-face, but I might perhaps draw the attention of the House to the fact that new circumstances have arisen which I do not think have been taken into account.
The Amendment says that a cheque shall be presented not more than two banking days later … With our present postal service, which was debated so interestingly last night just before 11 o'clock, it will take much longer than two days for letters to get to the bank. Does "cause the cheque to be delivered to a bank" mean that it should be received by the bank, or will proof of posting be adequate, and if it gets lost in the mail will the credit which accrues therefrom be regarded as an act of God, or an act of the Postmaster-General?

§ Mr. Elystan Morgan
Perhaps I might have the leave of the House to reply.
I am sure that the hon. Member for Gosport and Fareham (Dr. Bennett) knows as well as I do exactly at what 751 point in time a cheque is presented, and that there can be no two ways about it. The Government need not apologise too much in this connection. They are entitled to change their mind. It has been quoted often in this House that consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, and the Government are facing in exactly the same direction now as they were when the Bill was first presented.

§ Mr. Buck
Can the Minister say why it was thought necessary by the Amendment to remove flexibility—the right to make regulations to alter the time limit?

§ Mr. Morgan
I was coming to that point. On the question of the two days' limit, I am sure that the House agrees that on balance it is better than four days, and that there is a great danger of abuse in that if the limit is increased to four days it could bring about a situation of concealed credit. Only in exceptional circumstances could there be banking days on which banks are not open—situations of international crisis, which happily do not occur very often.
If they did occur I doubt whether it would be possible for the House to pass regulations in the short time allowed in any case. The removal of the provision for flexibility that appeared in the letter of the Bill does not change the situation in practice.