PARLIAMENT No. 2 BILL

HC Deb 19 March 1969 vol 780 cc383-458

Again considered in Committee [Progress, 18th March]

[Mr. HARRY GOURLAY in the Chair]

10.0 a.m.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter

On a point of order. It will be within your recollection, Mr. Gourlay, because I think you were in the Chair yesterday on that occasion that, as reported in c. 252 of the OFFICIAL REPORT for 18th March, the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for Social Services undertook to send a message to another place to request another place to grant permission for a document already in our Library to be cleared of a condition of confidentiality. The right hon. Gentleman, as reported, at c. 253, indicated that that document might be relevant to our discussions. May I ask, through you, whether such a message has been sent to another place and, if so, what response has been received?

The Deputy Chairman (Mr. Harry Gourlay)

This is a matter entirely out-with the discretion of the Chair.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter

I appreciate that, Mr. Gourlay, but may I, through you, ask whichever Minister regards himself as responsible for our proceedings at the moment to indicate whether a promise given by a senior Minister to take action has been kept, and whether a response has resulted from his action? With respect, Mr. Gourlay, it is intolerable to ask the Committee to go on when action which a Minister promised to take to help the Committee has apparently not been taken and the promise ignored. I must ask, through you, that we have some answer from the Government before we proceed.

Mr. Hugh Fraser

Further to that point of order. Not only should we like an indication from the Government that they will fulfil their pledge, but it is important to point out that the document is no longer available in the Library. I tried to obtain it yesterday evening but, as it is House of Lords property, it has been returned to the House of Lords, and this puts the Committee in a difficult position. I gathered that the Library is under confidentiality, but it was revealed to me that the document was about 15 pages long. It is important to have this document and, as it is no longer in the Library, we ought almost to seek to report Progress immediately so that the document can be obtained.

The Solicitor-General (Sir Arthur Irvine)

In reply to the point raised by the right hon. Member for Kingston-upon-Thames (Mr. Boyd-Carpenter), my understanding was—and I think it will be within the recollection of the Committee—that what my right hon. Friend proposed was that a message should be sent on the Resolution of this House if the House so wished. That was how the matter was interpreted by me. It will be appreciated that, as the matter developed and as the debate proceeded, the House did not express itself in that sense.

Mr. Heffer

Further to that point of order. The position is quite clear. The right hon. Gentleman said: I would be prepared to ask my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House to join me in sending the request to the House of Lords that it be made available as a document for the debate."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 18th March, 1969; vol. 780, c. 252.] That is a specific statement not hedged by any reference to the House wishing it. My right hon. Friend made it quite clear that he was prepared to join the Leader of the House in sending for that document. In those circumstances, surely we are entitled to know whether the document has been sent for, and when we shall get it so that we can consider it in the debate.

Mr. Powell

Further to that point of order. The intervention by the Solicitor-General was astonishing, running, as I am sure you would agree, Mr. Gourlay, having been present, clean contrary both to what was said and what was understood in the Committee yesterday afternoon.

The hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Heffer) has quoted the perfectly clear words which were used and at no time withdrawn or modified by the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for Social Services. No reference was made to a Resolution and, if a Resolution had been required in the view of the Government, then it was the duty of the Government to fulfil that pledge by tabling a Resolution there and then during yesterday's sitting, so that it would be on the Order Paper today. If a Resolution were required, then it was a requirement of honour on the part of the Government that they should forthwith table the Resolution which would carry out their undertaking. If, on the other hand, a Resolution were not required, then they ought to have fulfilled the undertaking which was given by the right hon. Gentleman and not withdrawn.

The whole of the previous proceedings of this Sitting have been conducted on the basis that this document was to be obtained for the Committee as soon as possible, and we are now told that all that is brushed away. It is regarded as having been passed by. I feel that the Solicitor-General has not only not helped the Committee by his intervention but has shown how serious and well-founded was the anxiety of my right hon. Friend the Member for Kingston-upon-Thames (Mr. Boyd-Carpenter).

Mr. Michael Foot

Further to that point of order. If there had been a question, as is suggested by the Solicitor-General, that this matter of the document would be disposed of by a Resolution of the House, presumably there would have been some discussion on this matter when we later had a debate upon the Motion to report Progress. But there was no reference to any Resolution, either by the Government spokesman or by anybody else. As far as I know, no one from any quarter suggested that it would be settled by a Resolution. So far from that being the case, in the last intervention which was made in the debate on the Motion to report Progress, referring to an intervention from the hon. Member for Macclesfield (Sir A. V. Harvey), the Secretary of State for Social Services said: The hon. Gentleman has the advantage over me. I have said that if there is a document, as I am sure there is, I am prepared to see whether it can be passed from the Lords to the Commons. I have since learned from my hon. Friend —that my hon. Friend the Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Mr. Sheldon). This was the interpretation put upon his speech by the Minister— and confirmed, that there is nothing in it which has not been published previously. That was an argument which had run throughout the debate.

Unfortunately it was not possible to continue that discussion, because my right hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasury and Deputy Leader of the House of Commons intervened with one of the most telling interventions in the whole of our debate.

So far from it being the case that the Committee left this matter, after we had discussed it on the Motion to report Progress, on the understanding that it might have been dealt with by a Resolution, in fact the Committee decided otherwise—which is what the Solicitor-General has just suggested now—the last words said by the Minister in charge of the Bill on this matter being: I have said that if there is a document, as I am sure there is, I am prepared to see whether it can be passed from the Lords to the Commons."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 18th March, 1969; Vol. 780, c. 296.] On any understanding of that language, it must be accepted that all of us assumed that some action would be taken by the Government to see that something was done about the document. It is an astonishing state of affairs that we should come back on the following morning not only to discover that nothing has been done about the document but also to be presented with an entirely different reason from any previously offered why this should be the case.

We are back again, I fear, in the situation which we faced at four o'clock yesterday; that is, that we are not able to proceed with the discussion in the manner in which the Committee would wish to proceed. Therefore, Mr. Gourlay, I hope that you will once again accept a Motion to report Progress. We must get to the bottom of this matter. We must have an authoritative statement from the Government whether they propose, as the Solicitor-General suggested, to deal with this question and whether we can obtain documents from our own Library only by Resolutions of the House of Commons, after having been given an undertaking that the Minister would take the action which the Committee thought desirable.

Everyone who heard the debate yesterday must have concluded that the document was to be dealt with by the Minister in charge in a manner which we hoped would be satisfactory to the Committee. We are now confronted with an entirely different state of affairs. I stress the point again which we had to make so often yesterday. The discussion on the Amendment is one which can be influenced by what may or may not be in the document which we have asked to see and which the Minister said he thought should be made available if the Committee wished to have it. There has been no suggestion that the Committee does not wish to have it.

I submit that it would be a further aggravation of the situation if it were now to be said that documents which it was important for hon. Members to have so that they could continue their debates, and which I think hon. Members on both sides would think to be substantial documents or, at any rate, documents which should be examined, should be made available only on a majority decision of the House of Commons. It would be an astonishing exercise of their power, if they possess such power, for the Front Bench to say that documents will be provided only on a Resolution of the House, particularly as we thought—admittedly after some time and trouble—that we had satisfactorily disposed of this aspect of the matter.

We all thought yesterday that the Government would dispose of the question of the document by inviting the House of Lords to enable it to be made available to hon. Members. We all thought that we should be able to obtain the document. Now we are suddenly confronted with an entirely different situation.

I submit, Mr. Gourlay, that those are substantial reasons why a Motion to report Progress is again the only way in which we can satisfactorily deal with the matter.

Dr. Bennett

On a point of order. While I feel that the arguments which have so far been put in connection with the point of order under discussion are paramount, it seems that it would be equivalent to asking a doctor to diagnose the illness of a patient when he has not had any sight of the patient or heard anything of his symptoms or to asking a lawyer to practise his profession when he has never read any law if the Government were to ask the Committee to legislate on this matter without any of the information which is easily available.

I ask you, Mr. Gourlay, first, to agree to accept a Motion to report Progress. Secondly, might I ask you to clarify what is most bewildering to me—whether the remarks of the Secretary of State last night contained a definite and well-founded assertion that a Resolution of the House would be necessary before that document could be applied for? Will the Chair kindly enlighten us whether that is so?

10.15 a.m.

Mr. Sheldon

Further to that point of order. Not only is the quotation which my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Heffer) put before the Committee important in that it was stated that the document would be available as a document for the debate, but there is another quotation which should be noted in which my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Social Services said: I have suggested to the Committee that, if it is the Committee's wish, this information, instead of being made available on a confidential basis, should be made available to the Committee as a whole."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 18th March, 1969; Vol. 780, c. 256.] I took this to be a final and clear statement of my right hon. Friend's intention. There was no doubt in my mind that we were to have this document made available.

In his earlier comment the Secretary of State talked about mystifying for mystification's sake. There is no greater mystification than that with which we are faced this morning, because we had a distinct undertaking that the document was to be made available. Although we were not to have the benefit of that document for the Amendment which we were then debating, I felt that at least we should have it for the very important debate on the Question, That the Clause stand part of the Bill, on which we could cover some of this ground with the great advantage of the figures and the documentation which would be available. This is of extreme importance. It looks as though we are to go forward without having any understanding of the important figures and of the basis of this decision.

If the House of Commons means anything at all, we should be able to rely on undertakings of this character. If not, our debates become very difficult to arrange. We are unable to decide how to fit in the kind of research project which we may have in mind or how to deploy our arguments. More important, we shall be under great limitations as to what we need to investigate. This undertaking was given and I ask that it be honoured.

Sir Lionel Heald (Chertsey)

I did not take part in the debate yesterday, but I was present during the whole of the discussion. I came here this morning, although I have to attend another Committee in a few minutes, with the expectation of getting the document, being able to study it, and then playing a useful part in the debate.

The hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Heffer) explained yesterday in the clearest possible way the importance and relevance of this document to the core of the Bill. It is the basis for the composition of the reformed House of Lords. I understood that the right hon. Gentleman undertook to let us have the document. I came here this morning expecting to be able to get it. I now learn that not only are we not to get it but that the right hon. Gentleman, or someone else, has taken steps to remove it from the jurisdiction of the House of Commons. I regard this is a very grave matter. If it cannot be raised now, it should be raised at the highest possible level—with Mr. Speaker in the House of Commons.

Mr. John Lee

Further to that point of order. It is many hours since this undertaking was given. It was given at a time when it was the confident expectation of many hon. Members that the Committee would be sitting all night and there would be plenty of opportunity, because the facilities of the House of Commons remain open all night, for a search and for the document to be produced. This does not appear to have been done. No attempt has been made to produce the document, although the House sat until 12.35 a.m. before being suspended.

I therefore endorse the suggestion made by the right hon. Member for Stafford and Stone (Mr. Hugh Fraser) that a Motion to report Progress should be accepted. If that cannot be done, should we not agree to suspend the sitting of the Committee until the document is sent for?

I do not know the right procedure— whether we ask that the Serjeant at Arms should be despatched to the House of Lords to obtain a copy of the document —but at least that is a proposal which I put before you, Mr. Gourlay, because this situation cannot be allowed to go on. We must have the document here.

It is right, too, that I should make this suggestion because this will be yet another reason for a debate on the Question, That the Clause stand part of the Bill. If, as I expect, there is an attempt to curtail that right—I do not know, but it is always possible—I shall be able to show that there will be many matters to raise in that debate. This document, if not produced soon, should form a subject of part of that debate.

The Solicitor-General

This matter is being dealt with by hon. Members on both sides of the Committee on the basis of an undertaking. I ask the Committee to consider what was said by my right hon. Friend. He said: I am making a suggestion to the Committee. I did not know of the existence of the document … the most courteous thing for us to do would be to send a message to the other place suggesting that it should be laid as a document on the Table here."— [OFFICIAL REPORT, 18th March, 1969; Vol. 780, c. 252.] Later he said: I have said that if there is a document, as I am sure there is, I am prepared to see whether it can be passed from the Lords to the Commons. I have since learnt from my hon. Friend, and confirmed, that there is nothing in it which has not been published previously."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 18th March. 1969; Vol. 780, c. 296.] My submission to the Committee is that that is not an undertaking in the proper sense and that it is clearly implicit that what is required in the procedure which my right hon. Friend has proposed is a Resolution of the House. I am sure that the right hon. Member for Kingston-upon-Thames (Mr. Boyd-Carpenter), with his commercial experience, will recognise that that has not the character of an undertaking such as is suggested. I suggest to the Committee that as the Amendment with which this controversy about the document is concerned has been disposed of, it is wholly appropriate that the Committee should go on with the business.

The Deputy Chairman (Mr. Harry Gourlay)

Having heard the numerous points of order, I must say that this is not a matter for the Chair, and I suggest that we should proceed with Amendment No. 121. Mr. Sheldon.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter

On a point of order. Mr. Gourlay, I know that the Committee always likes to accept your guidance and advice, but I am sure that you could not possibly expect us to leave the matter there in the light of what has been said by the Solicitor-General, including, as it did, a personal reference to myself.

As I understood it, the Solicitor-General said that a Minister's undertaking, unless tied up with the strictness required in a commercial contract, is not to be regarded as binding. This is a devaluation of ministerial assurances—

The Solicitor-General

rose—

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter

I am on a point of order. The Solicitor-General may seek to rise in a few moments when I have finished my submission. What the Solicitor-General said amounts to a devaluation of a Ministerial undertaking without precedent in my experience in this Committee or in the House. The words which the Solicitor-General read are clear and plain. I have some respect for the Secretary of State for Social Services, and I say that that undertaking was honestly and sincerely given. The words are absolutely unequivocal.

Though the Solicitor-General takes the view that he has been assured that the document contains nothing new, the Secretary of State for Social Services repeated for the third time in the hearing of the Committee his undertaking to get it. The Solicitor-General may take the view, as may his right hon. Friend, that there is nothing new in the document, but it is a new doctrine that where a document exists the Committee is bound to accept the judgment of Ministers whether there is anything of importance in it. It is the whole purpose of our Rules—the Rules in respect of which I made a submission yesterday—that the Committee must be the judge of that.

Mr. Gourlay, if you are not prepared, as I still hope you are, to accept a Motion to report Progress, may I put to you an alternative suggestion, namely, that if a Resolution to another place is required, and if one is submitted to you, as it can easily be submitted from this side or that side of the Committee in the next few minutes, you accept it and allow us to proceed and seek to have implemented a pledge given in good faith by a senior member of the Government as recently as yesterday?

The Solicitor-General

I rise because of the observations which the right hon. Member for Kingston-upon-Thames (Mr. Boyd-Carpenter) let fall. The right hon. Gentleman must not put into my mouth words which I did not utter. He had something to say yesterday about inconsequences. He has demonstrated that attribute today.

Mr. Nicholas Ridley (Cirencester and Tewkesbury)

Further to that point of order. Mr. Gourlay, I must ask you to consider the point which has been made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Kingston-upon-Thames (Mr. Boyd-Carpenter). The Solicitor-General quoted selectively from the Delphic utterances of the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for Social Services in his many interventions yesterday. In fact, it is possible to find in them categorical assurances that this document would be made available.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter

Even by commercial standards.

Mr. Ridley

That is so. Yesterday, because of the absence of the document, I found myself unable to contribute to the debate. It seemed to me that the debate was meaningless, and I therefore held back from seeking to catch the eye of the Chair.

The Secretary of State for Social Services said yesterday: I have suggested to the Committee that, if it is the Committee's wish, this information, instead of being made available on a confidential basis, should be made available to the Committee as a whole."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 18th March, 1969; Vol. 780, c. 256.] If that is not a Ministerial undertaking, whether commercial or not, I do not know what is.

Mr. Elystan Morgan

It is a suggestion.

Mr. Ridley

That is using double-talk to the worst extent that I have ever heard in this honourable House.

An undertaking was given by the Secretary of State for Social Services. We are told by the Solicitor-General that the undertaking can be honoured by means of a Resolution of the House. He has twice said that if the House passes such a Resolution the undertaking can be honoured. Without animadverting to the peculiar circumstances where by it seems necessary for the House to pass a Resolution before it can obtain documents from its own Library, may I ask you to press the Solicitor-General to agree to the tabling of the necessary Resolution so that the House can proceed to obtain the document?

It may be that it would be wise to adjourn for a few hours so that the Resolution can be drafted and laid in a constitutional manner. I am not a great expert in the procedures of the House. It may be that it would be expedient to send for Mr. Speaker and ask him to take us out of Committee. But one or other of these things must be done. The matter cannot be left where it is. The Government have given an undertaking to produce a document. They have said that the document can be produced by a Resolution of the House, and we want to know how we can proceed to obtain this Resolution so that the document can be produced.

I wonder, Mr. Gourlay, whether you would be kind enough to inform the Committee whether you would accept a manuscript Resolution drafted by my hon. Friends. I assure you that my hon. Friends and I could produce such a Resolution within a very few seconds so that the proceedings of the Committee need not be delayed. If you agree to accept such a Resolution, I shall proceed forthwith to draft it.

The Deputy Chairman

If the House wishes to communicate with another place, that is a matter for the House. The job of the Committee is to proceed with the Bill.

10.30 a.m.

Mr. Heffer

Further to that point of order. It is quite clear that the Committee cannot leave the position as it is at present. I left school at 14 years of age and had some education after that only off my own bat, but to me words are words and undertakings are undertakings. My right hon. Friend said clearly: I have said that if there is a document, as I am sure there is, I am prepared to see whether it can be passed from the Lords to the Commons. He went on: I have since learned from my hon. Friend, and confirmed, that there is nothing in it which has not been published previously."— [OFFICIAL REPORT, 18th March, 1969; Vol.780, c. 296.] He did not go on to say that therefore this document ought not to be produced. He said that although there was nothing in it, he was prepared to ask for it to be brought from another place. It was a very clear statement. The whole Committee understands that. It was not a suggestion but a clear statement which all hon. Members fully understand.

Under those circumstances, surely it is quite clear that before this Committee proceeds to discuss the Bill further, we ought to adjourn or to have the Resolution before the House which the right hon. Member for Kingston-upon-Thames (Mr. Boyd-Carpenter) suggested so that we can discuss the matter. We cannot proceed further this morning with debate on further Amendments until we either have the undertaking carried out by the Government or a Resolution discussed in the House, otherwise, we shall be making the whole business of Parliamentary democracy a mockery. I understand your view, Mr. Gourlay, that this is not a matter solely for you; it is a matter for my right hon. Friends. It is in their court to fulfil their previous undertaking and to let us have this document.

Mr. Powell

Further to that point of order. The Committee finds itself in exactly the kind of difficulty to which attention has several times previously been drawn by the hon. Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. Michael Foot). It will be within your recollection, Mr. Gourlay, that as a result of a point of order raised by my right hon. Friend the Member for Kingston-upon-Thames (Mr. Boyd-Carpenter) we have had two interventions by a Minister. Two statements have been made to this Committee, in the course of the raising of these points of order, on behalf of the Government. They were important statements and statements to which a number of hon. Members have obviously taken grave exception.

It is clearly intolerable that we should not be able to discuss, ask questions, about, and consider these two separate and important statements made by the Solicitor-General. At the moment we are able to do so only in the form of raising with you successive points of order. Because of that I wish to make a submission. I refer—briefly, since I am on a point of order—to those two successive statements, contradictory one with the other, which the right hon. and learned Gentleman made.

I refer first to his second intervention, which was contrary to his first intervention, in which he denied altogether that there had been an undertaking given by the Secretary of State yesterday. He referred to the wording used by the right hon. Gentleman as reported at column 252 and laid particular stress on the conditional mood of the verb—that his right hon. Friend "would be prepared". To treat a term of courtesy which we are all accustomed to using as though it modified what was clearly understood as an expression of Ministerial intention is unworthy of the right hon. and learned Gentleman.

It was particularly unworthy to couple it with an obscure reference to commercial practice in connection with my right hon. Friend the Member for Kingston-upon-Thames. If he does not like the conditional tense, he can find the indicative in column 296 where, in the last sentence but one before the Committee came to a decision, the right hon. Gentleman said, "I am prepared". In other words, the right hon. Gentleman, at the moment at which the Committee came to a decision, declared that he was prepared. But the right hon. and learned Gentleman told us that this was apparently taken back and cancelled by the following sentence in which, he claims, the right hon. Gentleman expressed the opinion that since there was nothing new in the document, all that he had said or offered before was withdrawn. I cannot believe that the right hon. Gentleman meant that.

It is impracticable for this Committee to proceed when it has been told by a Law Officer of the Crown that what the Committee regarded as an undertaking has been withdrawn. On the first intervention the Solicitor-General said that if we are to get this document, if the undertaking or suggestion of the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for Social Services is to be carried out, it must be done by a Resolution of the House. I assume for the purpose of my submission that that is correct, although I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Circencester and Tewkesbury (Mr. Ridley) that it would be a monstrous thing if whenever we wanted a document, and a Minister promised it we had to have a Resolution of the House asking for it.

The right hon. and learned Gentleman expressly suggested that the course of the debate indicated that the Committee did not want such a Resolution. There is only one way known to this House or this Committee of ascertaining the wishes of the House or the Committee. It is to put a proposition to the House or the Committee. We cannot ascertain whether the House or Committee would like a Resolution except by putting a Resolution and seeing to which conclusion the House or the Committee comes upon it. We must therefore be allowed to test whether the view of the Government is right or wrong that the Committee somehow, tacitly or by implication, indicated that it would not like a Resolution, if that be necessary to carry out the right hon. Gentleman's undertaking.

A few minutes ago, Mr. Gourlay, you advised the Committee that such a Resolution could be made only by the House and that for the wishes of the Committee on this matter to be tested, and for the matter to be decided which the right hon. and learned Gentleman has opened of his own accord today by his allegation, it would be necessary for a Resolution to be placed before the House. We cannot do that unless this Committee gives way to the whole House. I therefore submit to you that on the basis of what the Government themselves, through the mouth of the right hon. and learned Gentleman has said to the Committee, it would be appropriate for you, in order that a Resolution may be moved in the whole House, to accept a Motion now, That the Chairman do report Progress and ask leave to sit again. It is that Motion which I ask your permission to submit to the Committee.

The Solicitor-General

I rise because the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Powell) thought fit to refer to "unworthiness". I suggest that if the reports of my two earlier interventions are considered, they will be found not to have any contradiction whatever. I leave it at that.

On the issue which the right hon. Gentleman latterly raised, he and the Committee will appreciate that these alleged undertakings of my right hon. Friend—[HON. MEMBERS: "Alleged?"] —I have taken the point and I persist that this was not an undertaking—or the words referred to were said during a debate on a Motion, That the Chairman do report Progress and ask leave to sit again.

Sir D. Glover

It was on a point of order.

The Solicitor-General

They took place in the course of a debate on that Motion. One has the words of my right hon. Friend: I am prepared to see whether it can be passed from the Lords to the Commons. I have since learnt from my hon. Friend … that there is nothing in it"— that is, nothing in the document— which has not been published previously."— [OFFICIAL REPORT, 18th March, 1969; Vol. 780, c. 296.] The Committee then divided upon the Question, That the Question be now put, and then upon the Question, That the Chairman do report Progress and ask leave to sit again. The Committee, by a majority, rejected that Motion and by that Division indicated its attitude— [HON. MEMBERS: "No."]—to the matters which had been previously dealt with.

Mr. Maudling

Surely the Solicitor-General cannot expect the Committee to accept that. It is an astonishing argument. I understand that an undertaking was given by the Secretary of State for Social Services, when he said that he was prepared to do something. On the basis of that undertaking, the House took the vote. To say that the undertaking then disappears is an astonishing argument.

The Solicitor-General

I think that the right hon. Member for Barnet (Mr. Maudling), for reasons we can all understand, was not present when the earlier exchanges took place, in the course of which I put to the Committee, rightly or wrongly, my view that what my right hon. Friend had presented to the Committee was not an undertaking.

Mr. Hugh Fraser

The Solicitor-General has put forward the most extraordinary doctrine. It is one of the most amazing constitutional and political doctrines ever heard, namely, that any promise given can be destroyed by a vote forced on the House of Commons by the Chief Whip. This is the end of truth. I hope that the Solicitor-General will explain what he means, because it is the most dangerous constitutional doctrine. It is impossible for the Committee to proceed. I wish to move that we adjourn immediately so that this whole matter can be reconsidered by the right hon. and learned Gentleman.

Mr. Michael Foot

Mr. Gourlay, your last advice to the Committee was that we should proceed with the discussion on the Amendment. I want to reinforce some of the points of order why that is an impossible course for the Committee to adopt. I believe that if we adopted it, we should not be discharging the duties which we properly have to maintain the proper conduct of business.

I submit once again, on a number of grounds which I shall mention, that the only way in which the House of Commons makes provision under its Rules for dealing with a situation such as this is by a Motion to report Progress. Only by doing that can we extricate ourselves from difficulties which are becoming greater with every intervention by the Solicitor-General.

First, there is a dispute whether there was an undertaking. I do not say that it was an undertaking in the sense of being a firm, absolute contract, signed, sealed and delivered. I think that it was a statement made in absolute good faith by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Social Services. Contrary to the charges which are made against my right hon. Friend, I know from all my dealings with him over many years that he is a man of absolute integrity.

I believe that he gave the undertaking to the Committee partly because he believed that in one sense it might support his general argument on the Bill. He did not think there was any harm in it. His attitude was, "It happens that all this has been published, but if you want to have the document, and if the Committee feels as it apparently does, I give an undertaking", or "I give an agreement", or "I give an acknowledgment, that I will invite the House of Lords to agree that we should have it made available to us". There was no argument about it. Whatever may have been the vote subsequently, everybody assumed that the request would be made —in a courteous manner, of course.

We do not dispute the claim by the Secretary of State for Social Services that the matter would have to be dealt with as one of courtesy between the two Houses. We all understand that undertakings or agreements or acknowledgments between the two Front Benches, or even the back benches, and between the two Houses are dealt with on that basis. Therefore, my first submission why it is not possible to proceed with the debate and why there should be a Motion to report Progress is that there has at any rate been a misunderstanding between the Front Bench and the rest of the Committee this morning as to what was the undertaking or the agreement or the acknowledgment last night.

The second reason becomes more serious in my opinion. The Solicitor-General's first claim was that the matter could be dealt with only by a Resolution of the House of Commons. Presumably that was not an argument which he thought up on the spur of the moment.

The Solicitor-General indicated assent.

10.45 a.m.

Mr. Foot

My hon. and learned Friend acknowledges that. That was the Government's understanding, apparently. I am glad to have the Solicitor-General's acknowledgment, because I think that it greatly reinforces my point. A decision was apparently taken by the Government following our debate yesterday that, when the proceedings were renewed today, it would be announced from the Government Front Bench that the matter would be dealt with by a Resolution of the House of Commons. The Solicitor-General assents to that proposition.

The Solicitor-General

My hon. Friend has interpreted a nod of mine as an assent to a proposition. I do not want there to be any misunderstanding. At the end of yesterday's proceedings it was my understanding that, if the document were to be laid, it would require a Resolution of the House of Commons. That was my understanding then. It is my understanding now. My assent does not go beyond that.

Mr. Foot

I understand that. It was the Solicitor-General's understanding following our proceedings yesterday that the matter should be dealt with by a Resolution of the House of Commons. My hon. and learned Friend did not necessarily discuss this remarkable view of his with any of his hon. Friends, although he imagined that they would all concur in it. I accept entirely what my hon. and learned Friend says, but it is a very strange interpretation to put upon yesterday's events. In my experience in the House of Commons, I cannot recall an ocasion on which a question of having to send for documents had to be dealt with by a Resolution. There may have been such cases. I am not saying that there have not been. The rarity of such cases makes it all the more remarkable that the Solicitor-General should have reached this conclusion last night as the result of yesterday's debate and should not have confided it to anyone.

However, he has confided it to us this morning. In response to a question this morning, he told us that the proper way for this matter to be dealt with would be by a Resolution of the House of Commons. I submit as my second reason why we should not proceed with the debate that, if it is the Government's view—I am sure that the Solicitor-General is speaking for the Government —that the matter should be dealt with only by a Resolution of the House of Commons, then the Government should have first declared to the House of Commons how it could proceed to have a Resolution, and secondly, should have made the facilities available for us so to proceed. If it is the Government's view that this question of attending the document can be dealt with only by this elaborate paraphernalia of a Resolution, the obligation is on the Government to explain when that Resolution will be presented to us and how it will be presented to us.

I come to the third reason, arising from the Solicitor-General's intervention, why it is improper for us to proceed with the debate now. I do not know what other hon. Gentlemen think about it. When the Resolution is before the House, the matter will be debated. My first thought on the matter is that it is doubtful even whether the House should accept the proposition that such matters as these must be dealt with by Resolutions. After all, particularly when it is tied up with what the Solicitor-General said later about a vote, the implication of what he said is that we should be able to get the documents only if the Resolution were carried. The implication is that the Government might use their majority to decide whether such a Resolution should be passed.

In that case, what the Government would be asking us to accept by such a procedure is that documents, particularly documents concerning the relationship between the two Houses, should be made available only if a majority in the House of Commons voted for them to be made available. That would be a deprivation of the rights of back benchers. It would be a novel doctrine. This is why I think it so remarkable that the Solicitor-General should have announced it so casually. If we were to accept it, the provision of documents for Members of the House of Commons would be partly dependent upon the whim of the Government and the automatic majority, in so far as it exists, of the Government.

We come to the next implication of what the Solicitor-General has said to us, which, in my opinion, is even more important and is a further reason why we can deal with this matter properly only in a debate on a Motion to report Progress. He has put his own construction, the Government's construction, on the vote which we had yesterday on the Motion to report Progress, a construction which most of us, I think, find extremely far-fetched. Perhaps the Solicitor-General has powerful arguments in support of his view, but for him to say that he can put an interpretation on that vote which decides which form of documents are to be available to us and what is the meaning of what the Committee decided, is not, I submit, an approach which we can accept.

When the Committee decided yesterday not to report Progress and to continue the debate, there may have been many reasons for that decision. The Government may just have thought that they wanted to get on with the business. That is always possible. Some hon. Members may have thought that our arguments were not persuasive. But it is absurd for the Solicitor-General to say that the conclusion on that Motion meant that we had abandoned the demand to secure this document from the House of Lords.

The Solicitor-General

My hon. Friend will bear in mind that he himself cogently argued that the matter of the document was best dealt with in a debate on a Motion to report Progress. His words appear at col. 254 of the OFFICIAL REPORT. AS the matter was later dealt with in a debate on such a Motion, is he right to deny any significance to the Division at the end of the debate?

Mr. Foot

I am again grateful to my hon. and learned Friend for his intervention, for he is confirming what I said. True, I claimed that the matter of the document—I argued this on the points of order originally—would best be dealt with if we had a debate on a Motion to report Progress—

The Solicitor-General

And there was such a debate.

Mr. Foot

Yes, we got it. Not merely did we have the debate but, as a result of it, we secured what most of us thought was a concession, so to call it. I do not state that in any derogatory sense because I think that Governments should make concessions in these matters. Indeed, they would get themselves out of a lot of difficulties if they made more concessions. What we secured as a result of that debate was, so to call it, a partial accommodation to the views of those who wanted the document. Thus our oratory was not so dissuasive as might have been thought. We produced at least part of the result.

My hon. and learned Friend may ask why, in that circumstance, we proceeded, why did we not withdraw the Motion if that is what we wanted, why did we proceed to a vote? If my hon. and learned Friend will do me the courtesy of reading the rest of my speech, he will see that I, like others, adduced additional arguments showing why the debate should be postponed altogether. There were references in my speech to the fact that Amendments were not being called, to the question of a Report stage, and many other arguments.

What my hon. and learned Friend the Solicitor-General cannot escape from is the concluding words of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Social Services. I know that a peroration is sometimes not the most important part of a speech, but his peroration in this case was the conclusion of the whole matter, the climax to which he had been leading. In order to pacify the Committee—perhaps he got the vote by it; who can tell?—my right hon. Friend said that he would seek to secure the document from the House of Lords.

Now, in his last intervention, the Solicitor-General tells us that all that is wiped out by the vote, that because the vote went against those who were arguing that they wanted the document, that because it went against them on another a more embracing matter, the whole question is to be pushed on one side.

My submission is that it is not a proper course for a Committee of the House to go ahead with a discussion on Amendments standing on the Paper because, as was the case in the difficulties which we encountered yesterday, the Amendment next to be taken is one concerning matters in the document. That is so according to the statement of the Minister himself. Whether or not he considers that it should be published, whether he thinks that it is publishable or unpublishable, no one has denied that the matters in the document are relevant to the question of attendance at the House of Lords, and that is the subject of the next Amendment to be taken.

I submit, therefore, Mr. Gourlay, that a new situation has been created by the three interventions of the Solicitor-General. First, the Government have put upon themselves the obligation to tell us how we should proceed to a Resolution, when we are to have the Resolution, whether the Resolution is to be presented by the Government or by other hon. Members, when facilities are to be provided for that Resolution. We have had a firm statement from the Government that this is the only way by which we can obtain the satisfaction which we thought we had obtained by other means following our discussions yesterday.

I hope very much, therefore, that you will accede to our proposal, Mr. Gourlay, that we should move to report Progress. The Government will not gain otherwise. I realise that whether the Government gain or lose is not a matter for you. You are concerned solely with the orderly conduct of the Committee's business, and you are entitled in your discretion, as you did yesterday, to decide whether it is possible for the Committee to report Progress. There are some occasions on which it is done because substantial progress has been made, but there are many other occasions in the history of the House—this is exactly why that provision is available—on which it has been done in order to enable the House to escape in an orderly manner from a hopeless tangle.

No one who has listened to our proceedings this morning can deny that we are moving into a greater and greater tangle. The more we proceed in that tangle, the more interventions we have from the Government, the more does the question become enlarged, the more does the question of a Resolution enter into the matter, the more must we consider the question of which documents are to be the subject of such Resolutions, and so on. The stone has been thrown into the pool, and the circles are growing larger and larger. The only way in which our proceedings can be restored to a semblance of order, I submit, is by having a Motion before the Committee which will allow a wider discussion than points of order can properly permit.

I seriously urge, therefore, Mr. Gourlay, that that is the proper way for us to proceed. This is the reason why the instrument of a Motion to report Progress has been made so flexible. It is one of the glories of the House and its Committees that our procedure can be stretched to accommodate difficult situations. It is the way in which we try to ensure that, instead of clashes resulting in ill temper and misunderstanding, we so arrange matters that, when there happens to be a blockage, we can say, "Very well. Let us hold up the proceedings for a while and see whether we can untangle the tangle". That is what I suggest we should do now, in proper order, on a Motion to report Progress.

Several Hon. Members

rose—

11.0 a.m.

The Deputy Chairman

Order. Having noted the progress of the Committee this morning, and having very carefully considered the numerous and lengthy points of order, I cannot accept a Motion to report Progress at this stage. Whatever decisions on the matter of the document are taken, the duty of the Chair and the Committee, I suggest, is now to proceed with Amendment No. 121.

Mr. Ian Gilmour

On a point of order. The Committee finds itself in a painful, if not intolerable, situation. Both the Solicitor-General and the Under-Secretary of State has cast a slur on the reputation for integrity of the Secretary of State for Social Services. They, and I am sure the right hon. Gentleman if he were here, would repudiate that slur immediately. The Solicitor-General gave two quotations from what the Secretary of State said, but he did not give the third. The right hon. Gentleman said: I have suggested to the Committee that, if it is the Committee's wish, —and it plainly was— this information, instead of being made available on a confidential basis, should be made available to the Committee as a whole."— [OFFICIAL REPORT, 18th March, 1969; Vol. 780, c. 256.] That is not a conditional or indicative; it is almost an imperative. It is the plainest possible undertaking. The Under-Secretary, who has left, said that it was a suggestion, but it was a suggestion that this undertaking by the Secretary of State should satisfy the Committee. It was not a suggestion that this was what would happen. It was a suggestion incorporating a definite undertaking.

The Solicitor-General says, in effect, that the undertaking was washed out by the vote. By analogy, this would reduce every Government statement to a nullity. If the Government give an undertaking during the wind-up of a Second Reading debate on a problem which has troubled the Opposition, and then win their vote, according to the extraordinary doctrine put forward by the Solicitor-General that undertaking would be washed out by the Government's victory in the Division Lobby. That means that any Government undertaking during the proceedings on the Bill will be a nullity, which is not a way in which the Committee can proceed. With the greatest respect to what you said, Mr. Gourlay, it cannot do so until it has clarification from the Government on whether anything said by Government spokesmen is an undertaking or a suggestion or will be washed out by a subsequent vote.

Surely, these matters must be cleared up on a Motion to report Progress before we can have any meaningful discussion?

The Deputy Chairman

Order. This is an intervention similar to many which we have already had. I have already given my Ruling on those points of order, and I suggest that we proceed to discuss the Amendment.

Mr. C. Pannell

On a point of order. When I left here yesterday afternoon, I thought that the situation was completely clear in my mind. Undertakings were given, and there is no question that we face a breach of faith between the Government and the Committee. When I raised the matter yesterday afternoon, I doubted whether any document could be given on a confidential basis to the Library of the House of Commons. Certainly, the Library should not have received a confidential document which was not available to hon. Members.

The Deputy Chairman

Order. I have already been addressed on similar points of order. I indicated that this is not a matter for the Chair, and I suggest that we proceed with the Amendment.

Mr. Pannell

May I be allowed to continue on one other point?

The Deputy Chairman

Order. The right hon. Gentleman must resume his seat when I am standing. I have ruled that the point which he is raising has already been dealt with.

Mr. Pannell

On a point of order. I should like to address my hon. and learned Friend the Solicitor-General through you, Mr. Gourlay. I understand that he is under the impression that a Resolution of the House should have been moved. This is a completely different point. You and the Clerk will know, Mr. Gourlay, that by no stretch of Standing Orders could that have been done. Therefore, if I am compelled to resume my seat, I hope that the Solicitor-General, who is a man of honour, will look carefully at his words. I am sure that inadvertently he has misled the Committee. There is no question but that a Resolution could not have been moved during our proceedings. I notice that the Clerk is in attendance on you, Mr. Gourlay. This matter will not finish here. The question of the orderliness of the document will be raised in the House at 3.30 p.m.

I hope that we can make progress, not in the procedural sense but in the practical sense. The Committee has been badly dealt with. No one can suggest that we could have had a Resolution during our proceedings to implement what was a definite pledge from the Government Front Bench yesterday afternoon. That is my point. If I say nothing more about it, it is not because I do not feel strongly, but because I bow to your Ruling, Mr. Gourlay.

Mr. W. F. Deedes (Ashford)

Further to that point of order. I have not troubled you this morning, Mr. Gourlay, but I must advance a new point on why we cannot proceed further without resolving the matter under discussion.

The only person who can interpret what the Secretary of State for Social Services meant by what he said yesterday is the Secretary of State. He is not present. I make no complaint about that. We all know the problems of Sitings at this hour and senior Ministers' difficulties in attending them. This point was advanced by some of us when the right hon. Gentleman, as Leader of the House, thought that morning sittings were a good idea. It is impossible, as has been proved this morning, for another Government spokesman to seek to interpret what one of his right hon. Friends meant when he made observations.

The Deputy Chairman

Order. The interpretation of Minister's speeches is not a matter for the Chair. I have already given a Ruling on the points of order raised, and the right hon. Gentleman's point of order is similar to others. I suggest that we proceed with the Amendment.

Mr. Deedes

With respect, I must press a further point. The Committee is by no means satisfied that the interpretation given to us this morning honours the obligation which it is clear the Secretary of State for Social Services wished to offer yesterday. As long as that doubt remains, there is a doubt as to the honourable intentions of the Secretary of State, which I am sure is a most unfair doubt to be entertained. It would be unfair to him to leave matters in the present state of doubt and to proceed as you suggest, Mr. Gourlay. He must attend the proceedings before we can sensibly continue our discussions.

The Deputy Chairman

Order. The Chair has no power to compel Ministers to attend the Committee.

Mr. John Lee

On a point of order. A point was raised earlier on which no Ruling has yet been given. About half an hour ago the hon. Member for Cirencester and Tewkesbury (Mr. Ridley) sought your guidance, Mr. Gourlay, as to the way in which the doctrine of obtaining a document by Resolution should be implemented. If this is accepted—and it appears that what seemed to me a novel and bizarre procedural doctrine has now become part of the law of the House—there must be some way in which Members may be guided by the Chair as to the way in which the Motion should be put.

The Deputy Chairman

Order. It is not for the Chairman of this Committee to give procedural guidance on matters of that kind.

Mr. Lee

In that case, will you accept an oral Motion from me that the document be sent for?

The Deputy Chairman

Order. It is not within the competence of the Chair to accept such a Motion.

Mr. Hastings

During the past half-hour, Mr. Gourlay, you have assured us more than once that you have answered the points of order put to you in the past hour or so. Our difficulty, perhaps, is that some of us feel that you are not in a position to answer certain of them, particularly that raised by the hon. Member for Reading (Mr. John Lee) and by my hon. Friend the Member for Cirencester and Tewkesbury (Mr. Ridley). It seems to some of us that nothing short of a new doctrine has been brought to the Committee by the Solicitor-General. As the hon. Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. Michael Foot) said, every intervention by the hon. and learned Gentleman seems to get us into greater trouble.

The kernel of that proposition seems to be the doctrine that if we wish to obtain from our Library documents which, according to the general consensus of the Committee, are relevant to our discussions, there must be a Resolution before the House. This is the cornerstone of the difficulty. If it is impossible for the Chair to explain to us how we are to bring such a Resolution forward— and the right hon. and learned Gentleman said nothing to indicate how it should be done, or where the doctrine came from in the first place, which would be of considerable interest—we are in great difficulty. We are on a point of order which is concerned with a point of doctrine in respect of our Rules and procedure.

If it is impossible for the Chair to rule on the way in which we can obtain the document in question on the basis of a Resolution, should not we adopt the suggestion of my right hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Powell), namely, that the Committee should give way to the whole House? This seems to be the only answer. The position seems to be that the Chair, through no fault of the occupant, is in no position to advise us how we should go forward.

[Mr. Sydney Irving in the Chair.]

Mr. Ridley

Since I was the Member who originally brought this matter up, I should like to press it a little further. I believe that Erskine May would turn in his grave if he had been alive—[Laughter.]—

The Chairman

Unfortunately Erskine May is not in the Chair. I am not sure that the hon. Member is on a point of order.

Mr. Ridley

I meant no reflection on your occupation of the Chair, Mr. Irving, when I referred to Erskine May in that sense. I apologise for my mixed metaphor. The point is that we have established the position that the only way in which this document can be produced is by Resolution of the House. Your predecessor quite correctly ruled that this is not the House—this is a Committee— and that we cannot obtain the document by moving a Resolution in Committee. Although the Committee clearly wishes to transform itself into a House it appears that it has no power to do so. That is why I referred to Erskine May. We have arrived at the extraordinary position in which, simply by going into Committee, we disfranchise ourselves from obtaining the document necessary to carry on our discussions in Committee.

The Chairman

We are getting into the extraordinary position of conducting a debate on points of order. I have listened carefully to the hon. Member. Indeed I gave way to him without replying to the "point of order" from which this discussion arose—but that was not a point of order either.

Mr. Ridley

My point of order is that an undertaking has been given. If you had been here earlier, Mr. Irving, you would have heard the point established that the undertaking had been given by the Secretary of State that this document would be made available. Since then we have been told that this can be done only by Resolution of the House. Now we are told that because the House is in Committee we cannot move a Resolution.

The Chairman

The hon. Member cannot debate that matter. It is not a matter for the Chairman in Committee.

Mr. Arthur Lewis

I want to raise a fresh point of order affecting your position in the Chair. Mr. Irving. Every hon. Member knows that the Chairman acts quite impartially and pays no more attention to hon. Members on one side of the Committee than to those on the other side. On occasion the Chairman has to decide whether he should accept a Motion to report Progress. He decides that completely in his own right, on the basis whether there has been a sufficient opportunity—

11.15 a.m.

The Chairman

Order. I am grateful to the hon. Member for his opening remarks and for the fact that he feels that I am doing my best to interpret Standing Orders in the spirit in which they are intended to be operated, but that Motion has been rejected in the recent past, and it is not the practice of the Committee or the House to allow a submission without some progress having been made in the intervening period. Unless the hon. Member intends to put a fresh point of order, I must rule his remarks out of order.

Mr. Lewis

With respect, Mr. Irving, you had not listened to the point that I was about to put. [Interruption.] I wish that the Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department would not try to take on the Chairman's job. It is not his job to call me to order.

The Chairman

Order. I hope that we can get on.

Mr. Lewis

I was about to say that you had not yet heard my point of order, Mr. Irving, which is that, taking account of all the circumstances, the Chairman either accepts or refuses to accept a Motion to report Progress. I am not referring to any specific Motion at this stage.

If, as is now the case, in deciding whether he should accept a Motion to report Progress the Chairman takes into account a statement made in good faith both to the House and to the Chair that certain papers or documents necessary for progress to be made will be produced, does not that mean that the Chairman may have been inadvertently misled in accepting or rejecting a Motion to report Progress? Had the Chair known that the document which had been promised had, in fact, not been brought forward, might not the Chair then have said, as was said yesterday, "I will accept the Motion to report Progress" even though he had refused such a Motion a short time before?

The Chairman

Order. Unless the hon. Member is to refer to new matter, I must rule against him.

Mr. Lewis

About three-quarters of an hour ago, Mr. Irving, your predecessor said that at that stage he would not accept the Motion. That is exactly what he said yesterday when, after two hours' discussion, he refused to accept the Motion. Then, after another two hours, he did accept it. After what has been said since your predecessor made that remark, would you not consider a new Motion to report Progress, in the new knowledge of the difficulty in which the Chair has been placed?

The Chairman

I am sorry, but I cannot accept that submission.

Mr. Hugh Fraser

Without disrespect to your predecessor, or to Erskine May, may I say that I am pleased to see you in the Chair, but it is important to inform you as to what has gone on—

The Chairman

Order. I am afraid that the hon. Member cannot reiterate what has been said in the last hour.

Mr. Fraser

With great respect, one point has become obscured, namely, the fact that the document in question has been removed from the Library of the House of Commons. That is very serious.

The Chairman

Order. I am afraid that the document is not a matter for the Chair. The hon. Member must find other means to proceed if he wishes to follow up this matter.

Mr. George Lawson (Motherwell)

Is it not the case that there is a rule which applies even to point of order—the rule of tedious repetition? Is it not the case that if not merely one but many hon. Members insist upon tedious repetition it is the duty of the Chair to insist that such Members resume their seats and, if they refuse, to name them? Am I not entitled to ask—

The Chairman

Order. I understand that the hon. Member is trying to be helpful, but I hope that in the circumstances he will leave the conduct of the Chair to its occupant.

Mr. Lawson

Am I not entitled to ask that the Chair should give other hon. Members some protection? Is it not the case that this is just what we have not been getting on this Bill?

The Chairman

The hon. Gentleman is criticising the Chair.

Mr. Powell

Might I make a submission to you, Mr. Irving, on a point of order arising out of the advice which you gave to the Committee just now. That advice was that the Motion, That the Chairman do report Progress and ask leave to sit again, was one which the Chair did not, or did not normally, accept until progress had been made. Perhaps I may be allowed to put two points to you on that advice.

The first point is that, in fact, this present sitting is one with the sitting which was suspended at about midnight yesterday. I respectfully point out that progress has been made since the last consideration of this Motion, in that an Amendment—indeed, a whole group of Amendments—was disposed of by the Committee.

Might I further mention to you, Mr. Irving, that it will be within your recollection that at the beginning of this Sitting —suspended and resumed—yesterday afternoon, the Committee found itself in a difficulty which, after two hours, we were able to resolve, although progress had not then been made, only by the opportunity to debate the Motion to which you are referring.

If I might trespass upon your patience just so far, it is to emphasise the very close similarity between our difficulty now and that of yesterday; namely, that we have—and this is not the fault of the Committee—been confronted with, I think it is now three Ministerial statements [Interruption.] I am told four— which we are unable to examine, and which yet, from the very fact that they have been made, are germane to the whole matter.

The Chairman

With great respect, the right hon. Gentleman is covering ground that has been covered. To take the point that he made, which I think is one of substance, I did not say that as we had made progress yesterday we could not move to report Progress today. I said that the Motion had been refused quite recently and that the practice of the House was not to accept such a Motion again until some progress had been made.

Mr. Powell

May I put a different point of order, which, I think, calls for the assistance of the Chair. You will be aware, Mr. Irving, of the difficulty in which the House or a Committee finds itself when it has to resume a debate on the same subject in the morning after the debate had been adjourned late the previous night. One of the arrangements which I imagine your predecessors in the Chair made to assist hon. Members in this difficulty is that, since we do not have HANSARD for that part of the Sitting which takes place after half-past ten o'clock, the HANSARD record shall be placed in the Library so that hon. Members can consult it before the debate is resumed.

After half-past ten last night there was a brief but important intervention by the Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department which it is very important for us to be able to see for the purpose of the questions which are still to be put to the Committee. This morning, there fore, I went to the Library in good time in order to consult what is available for our purposes—the OFFICIAL REPORT. I was told in the Library that HANSARD was—

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter

Confidential.

Mr. Powell

Not confidential, no, but that it was not available—

The Chairman

Order. I think that I have the right hon. Gentleman's point, which is one of some relevance. Although I could not allow it to interrupt progress in the Committee this morning, it is a general question which may need looking into, and I shall be happy to look into it for the future. But I could not allow it to interfere with progress.

Mr. Powell

rose—

The Chairman

I think that I have dealt with the point made by the right hon. Gentleman.

Mr. Michael Foot

I refer to an entirely fresh matter, Mr. Irving, following from your most recent Ruling, when you said that you could not accept a progress Motion, on the grounds that it had been rejected fairly recently by the previous occupant of the Chair.

Bowing to that Ruling, might I submit that both you and the previous occupant of the Chair should take into account the obvious dissatisfaction which prevails in different parts of the House about the difficulties which we think we are in; and that, therefore, if we do proceed to the next Amendment you will be willing to consider, when the debate has proceeded for a reasonable distance, our being able then to propose such a Motion? We should be able then to have that Motion considered by the Committee and by the House before reaching a decision on this Amendment, so that the whole of the debate on this Amendment should not be conducted in circumstances in which we are denied access to the document in question.

I submit that this is an entirely fresh point. I understand that you do not wish to accept the Motion now, but I hope that at a later stage it may be possible for us to suggest that this might be the best course.

The Chairman

It is, for two reasons, very difficult for me to answer the hon. Gentleman. The first is that I should be committing the Chair to taking responsibility on a matter which is not within the province of the Chair— namely, the provision of documents. The second is that the Chair never rules hypothetically. That being so, I cannot help the hon. Member.

Mr. Powell

On a point of order, Mr. Irving. I thank you for the undertaking which you were good enough to give in reply to my previous submission that you would consider the difficulty. I ask you only to permit me to mention a further aggravation of that difficulty which occurred this morning, and about which I think you would wish to know if any thing is to be done to help the Committee in these circumstances. It is that the reason why the HANSARD report was not available to me in the Library was that it had been removed, quite properly and justifiably, for the use of an hon. Member, to whom I cannot properly refer as Mr. Gourlay but only as the previous occupant of the Chair—

The Chairman

Order. If the right hon. Gentleman will be good enough to consult me privately, I shall be very glad to listen to him.

Mr. Arthur Lewis

When the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Powell) referred to the availability or non-availability of documents in the Library, I think I heard you say, Mr. Irving, that this was a general question which could be looked into. If it can be looked into with regard to that point, why can it not be looked into by the Chair with regard to the other document?

The Chairman

I am afraid that the hon. Gentleman misheard me. I made it quite clear that it was not the responsibility of the Chair but that, while I could not allow the matter to hinder progress, in order to be helpful to hon. Members I would see what I could do in this respect.

Mr. Lewis

rose—

The Chairman

If what the hon. Gentleman wishes to say pertains to the point which he has made, I should be grateful if he, too, would consult me in private, when I shall be glad to devote some time to the matter.

Sir D. Glover

While I am sure that the House will be delighted, Mr. Irving, to know that you will have private conversations with the right hon. Gentleman—

The Chairman

Order. We have to include the hon. Member for West Ham, North (Mr. Arthur Lewis), too.

Mr. Sheldon

I, too, came especially early this morning in order to consult the OFFICIAL REPORT, because certain statements were made pertaining to the documents after the ordinary edition of the OFFICIAL REPORT was printed. This is quite relevant—

The Chairman

Order. I understand the hon. Gentleman's difficulty, and I have undertaken to see whether I can alleviate that difficulty in future, but I cannot allow further discussion on the matter.

Mr. Sheldon

Unfortunately, the point on which I wished to refer to the OFFI CIAL REPORT had direct relevance, in my opinion, both to the points of order which have been raised this morning and, possibly, to the debate on the next Amendment—

The Chairman

Order. The hon. Gentleman is assuming that I accepted this as a responsibility of the Chair. I made it quite clear, I think, that I was acting in another capacity only in order to be helpful to the Committee and that I could not allow this matter to hold up progress in the Committee.

Mr. Sheldon

Yes, but on this very important point of order—

The Chairman

Unless the hon. Gentleman has something new to put to me, I cannot hear him on that point.

Mr. Sheldon

I have something new on this point. If HANSARD had been available, it might have changed the attitude of some hon. Members and of your predecessor in certain decisions.

11.30 a.m.

The Chairman

That is just the submission which the right hon Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Powell) was making, that it would help him in his deliberations this morning. I made it clear that it was not the responsibility of the Chair.

Mr. Arthur Lewis

rose—

The Chairman

I hope that the hon. Member for West Ham, North (Mr. Arthur Lewis) will allow the hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Mr. Sheldon) to move the Amendment. We could then make some progress.

Mr. Arthur Lewis

On a point of order. If I understand aright, the hon. Member is unable to move his Amendment, because he does not have HANSARD.

The Chairman

The hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne will make up his own mind about whether to move the Amendment.

Mr. Sheldon

I beg to move Amendment No. 121, in page 4, line 18, after 'given', insert 'except on account of other public business when, if the House is sitting, it must be given before'. The purpose of this Amendment, which at this stage I do not wish to give any status higher than that of a probing Amendment, is to determine in the broadest possible way what kind of responsibility peers should have to other persons or other bodies. We know that at present, as long as they satisfy the minimum attendance requirement, no obligation is placed upon them to attend for any particular time of the day, or even for any length of time during the day. There is no requirement that they need do more than just attend the House of Lords, be noticed by one or two officials, and immediately depart.

If that is so, we, as responsible for the payment of public money to peers, have to make sure that there is some kind of responsibility attached to the position of voting peers. What we need to know and what we need to discuss is the kind of responsibility that we can inculcate in the peers as to the way in which they behave in the public service.

We all know, and in the past we have all been proud, of our reputation for pub-lice service, assuming that people were normally prepared to sacrifice themselves to a considerable extent in order to assist the public good. This has been a long and honourable tradition which has made our Parliamentary institutions among the finest in the world.

But when one creates a new constitution—and that is what we are doing—one must not assume that in a material age these attitudes will remain unaltered indefinitely. Once we offer the prospect not of public service but of reward, we must not assume that the attitude of considerations of duty, which were so important and, frequently, for which we must be grateful, of over-riding concern, will remain unaltered in the changing circumstances.

Because of this, we need to consider which kind of control, of checking, of minstering to the needs of the situation, we in the House of Commons should write into the provisions concerning attendance in the House of Lords. We are in the position of being the payers of peers for work which we consider needs to be done, and in our position of having to vote the moneys for the purpose we have the obligation as that which we have in every other kind of payment which we authorise. Not only do we have to make sure that the money goes to the people to whom we intend it to go; we have the more sophisticated requirement of having to make sure, having to convince ourselves in the most rigorous manner possible—be cause this has always been our attitude, and rightly so—that the money spent is spent on obtaining value and that, whether it be spent on any Ministry Vote or whether it be spent on payments to the House of Lords—

Mr. Arthur Lewis

On a point of order. This is an interesting speech and it deserves a bigger attendance. I therefore call a Count.

The Chairman

I cannot call a Count because we are in a suspended Sitting and the new rules do not allow a count to be called after ten o'clock.

Mr. Sheldon

We have the same obligation in connection with the House of Lord-; that we have with moneys voted to any of the Departments of State. It is to make sure that the money is used for the purpose which Parliament intends. This is the oldest and the most important of the controls that we have devised and employed.

But we also have, increasingly as it has come about—and this applies more to the House of Lords—to demand that we obtain value for the money. If we are to vote many hundreds of thousands of pounds—or much more if we include the other facilities—we have to account to the electorate, to the people, for the way in which value for the money spent is obtained.

As you know, Mr. Irving, I should have preferred to have devised a different system. I should have liked it to be conducted with a far better investigation and far better methods of study, but we are discussing the method which we have and, rather than being able to compare this kind of Chamber with what it could be and the costs and so on, we have to think of the Chamber proposed in the Bill and the cost of operating that Chamber and the results which we shall obtain.

We must insist that, whatever the peers do and however they act, the arrangements concerning their attendance and the broad way in which they conduct their business are designed at least partly to prove to the country that the money being spent is being spent for value. If as the result of this legislation the House of Lords becomes a place which people use rather than serve, we shall have been shown to have produced a wrong kind of second House and one for which we ourselves would have the blame.

The purpose of the Amendment is to ensure that the absence of peers through illness or because of Parliamentary duties is counted towards the one-third attendance required. In this category, too, is the situation concerning public business. The peer can absent himself on the grounds of public business and this also counts towards the one-third attendance.

Mr. Arthur Lewis

Does this mean that the noble Lord, Lord Hill, who is receiving about £5,000 or £6,000 a year, could be absent all the time on public business and still receive his peer's salary?

Mr. Sheldon

If he were a voting peer, I am sure that could well come into the category of public business. Although I have selected a few interesting examples to draw to the attention of the Committee, the one mentioned by my hon. Friend is not one which I have considered, and I am grateful to him for introducing yet another kind of public business for which payment will be made.

I am not sure whether the Under-Secretary of State has made any examination of the days taken for public business, for Parliamentary business and for illness. I know that he has information as to the numbers who obtained leave of absence, but I am not sure that he has information on these three categories of absence for public business, Parliamentary business and illness. If he has not, then I may be able to be of assistance to him, because the survey which I carried out made a specific request for information concerning absences due to illness, public business and Parliamentary business.

The figures resulting from the survey need to be treated with some care since they represent only the recollections of peers, but this probably represents more information than the miserably inadequate information of the Under-Secretary of State on all these matters. This at least may be better than the information which he has, and is certainly different from that which he may have.

The survey shows that the absences of peers due to illness, public business or Parliamentary business averaged 22 per cent. We know that in the session 1967–68 there were 137 sitting days. If absences in these three categories amounted to 22 per cent., the one-third attendance requirement, which would have been 46 days, would be reduced by 22 per cent. So the 46 sitting days which would be the normal requirement for one-third attendance would be reduced to about 35 days and a member of the House of Lords could receive his Parliamentary salary of £2,000, or whatever it may be, for attending only on these 35 sitting days.

When one bears in mind that days of absence on public business might be more readily accepted by members of the House of Lords, the number might increase. The 35 does not represent the minimum; it represents the minimum attendance with the average reduction. The survey showed that there were people who had absented themselves more than 22 per cent. of the time. At the moment there is no attendance requirement and, if an attendance requirement were to be imposed, it would not be surprising if some peers might wish to absent themselves rather more. Faced with the minimum attendance rule, they could well decide to attend less frequently in the performance of their Parliamentary duties.

11.45 a.m.

Mr. Arthur Lewis

I naturally accept the figures as correct. Am I to take it that for attendance on the 35 days, with the peer earning a minimum of £2,000 which has been suggested, a peer will get a salary representing on average around £20,000 per year—plus £6,000 a year if he has such a job?

The Chairman

Order. We are not discussing remuneration.

Mr. Sheldon

You are quite right, Mr. Irving, we are not discussing remuneration.

Mr. Lewis

It all comes in.

Mr. Sheldon

Obviously there will be resentment if the number of attendances is few and payment is made at the level which has been mooted. That would be a disgraceful situation. These considerations prompted Amendments earlier, and others which unfortunately have not been selected but which we hope to be able to discuss on the Question, That the Clause stand part of the Bill.

Parliamentary duties are easy to analyse. We know broadly what we mean when we talk of Parliamentary duties, and I will not say that all of them are onerous. There will be a number of mid-term Parliamentary delegations and so on which some of us feel are, for peers, of rather doubtful value.

Mr. Stanley Orme (Salford, West)

Whips' trips !

Mr. Sheldon

The term used by my hon. Friend is hard to better. Whatever they may be, they are not the important work of the House of Lords, yet it would be difficult to exclude that kind of operation. Some may be of more value than others, but they have been a part of Parliamentary life for so long that it would be wrong to attempt to exclude them.

The Amendment does not deal with illness. This is a matter which it is difficult to prove or disprove, and one must rely on the good faith of the people concerned. In passing, we must record that many people are in humbler positions in whom we do not place this degree of trust for sums of money much less important. To have one law for those who have means, giving them even greater means, and another for those who have less means is invidious. Nevertheless, there are problems in bringing suitable arrangements to bear on this point.

When we come to public business, the distinction becomes less rigid and we need to examine it more carefully. The distinction between some kinds of public and private business is not always easy to maintain.

I should like to give one or two examples. The Chairman of a joint stock bank, who might be a voting peer, for example, may have to go to the Middle East to get a sheik's bank account, or whatever it may be, and there may be some work attached to that. Is it public or private business if he visits him as a peer? How do we draw the distinction between one and the other? It may be a visit lasting several weeks and may include up to a dozen of the 35 days—

The Chairman

Order. I am having difficulty in relating the hon. Member's remarks to the Amendment, the terms of which clearly distinguish between public and private business. The purpose of the Amendment is to treat them differently in terms of notice.

Mr. Sheldon

The point to which I wish to address myself is the question of making sure that public business is delineated clearly from other kinds of business. When the peer gives notice in advance it can then be made quite clear what the nature of the public business is, so that it can be distinguished more readily from other kinds of business for which payment would not be made because it did not count towards the minimum level of attendances.

Another example of the confusion which might operate is the position of a voting peer who was the vice-chancellor of a university and who organised some jamboree somewhere in the world. Is that public business?

Mr. Arthur Lewis

rose—

Mr. Sheldon

Is this public or private business? Who is to judge? If there are those who become almost professional at these matters and they are to get a sinecure of £2,000 a year, we must see that the people of this country—

The Chairman

Order. The hon. Member is bringing in remuneration again.

Sir D. Glover

The hon. Gentleman refers to vice-chancellors and absence on public business. Would this include being detained in their rooms by rebellious students?

The Chairman

Order. I hope that the hon. Member will not pursue that point.

Mr. Sheldon

rose—

Mr. Arthur Lewis

Will my hon. Friend give way?

The Chairman

Order. I think we ought to have one intervention at a time. Mr. Sheldon.

Mr. Arthur Lewis

I was asking my hon. Friend to give way.

The Chairman

Order. I asked the hon. Member not to follow one intervention with another.

Mr. Arthur Lewis

My hon. Friend has given way.

The Chairman

Order. I was suggesting that it would be much more orderly and accord with the general practice of the Committee if we do not have two interventions together. Mr. Sheldon.

Mr. Sheldon

I should not like to follow the hon. Member for Ormskirk (Sir D. Glover) in that example. However, it shows the very blurred distinction between what, on the one hand, is private business, and what, on the other, is public business—when he receives payment and when he does not.

Mr. Arthur Lewis

I am obliged to my hon. Friend for giving way. I want to be helpful to him and to the Chair. I wish to quote an example which he might perhaps develop. Let us take the position of the noble Lord, Lord Wigg. He can be attending Ascot or the Grand National and be away for a week. That is probably a public job. Will he be getting his public salary, perhaps earning money backing horses, and also getting his £2,000 a year? Would this be public or private business? This is an example. Perhaps my hon. Friend will consider it.

[Mr. BRYANT GODMAN IRVINE in the Chair]

Mr. Sheldon

I am intrigued at the ingenuity of my hon. Friend in discovering yet fresh examples showing the blurred distinction between private and public business.

Mr. John Lee

What about the position of the Chairman of the Betting Levy Board, who might be a peer and be attending—

Mr. Sheldon

That was the example given by my hon. Friend the Member for West Ham, North (Mr. Arthur Lewis). Examples are coming forward so quickly. Perhaps I might give one last example: an industrialist concerning himself with mergers, perhaps in connection with the I.R.C. or some other body, and travelling all over the world in pursuit of business and pursuing other activities where the distinction between public and private business is not very fine. All this would not matter very much if there were no question of the minimum attendance figure or the salary being paid. But once we are committed to paying salaries to these people we have to exercise the usual rights of the House of Commons in making sure that the public are satisfied that for the money they pay out value is received.

Mr. John Ryan (Uxbridge)

My hon. Friend has raised many interesting examples which have considerably assisted the Committee about the distinction between private and public business. Will my hon. Friend consider the further example of a peer such as our noble Friend, Lord Brockway, who recently visited Nigeria as part of an attempt to secure a ceasefire? Would that be considered private or public business, in the sense that he was briefed by the Commonwealth Office before he went, and would he lose his salary while there? Some people would argue that that was a worth-while form of activity, as have been many of his activities. For example, I accompanied him to Paris to meet the N.L.F. in peace talks. Perhaps we can discuss that on another Amendment, but I ask my hon. Friend to bear that example in mind.

Mr. Sheldon

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for bringing into the debate a further difficulty concerning the distinction between public and private business.

The Amendment seeks to ensure that the leave of the House to attend on public business must be given in advance only when the House is sitting. This is naturally related to attendances. It should not be a difficult undertaking to make sure that, even at very short notice, a message could be sent describing in the broadest possible detail the nature of the business.

The important point is that we should get value for money. All people, whoever they may be and however exalted their positions, should have some body, organisation or institution surveying the work which they do. That applies to Members of Parliament. If we attempt to swing the lead this information is known to our electorate and may determine our future. This is a strong penalty which, in the last resort, can be used.

The Prime Minister has his responsibilities to this House. He has responsibilities to all sorts of organisations. He is not able to do exactly as he wishes.

The chairman of a public company, an exalted position, has responsibilities to the shareholders. Although we may feel that these responsibilities are not as ardous as we should wish, nevertheless they are used again and again and they do draw the attention of the Chairman of any company, however large or small, to the fact that there is another body of people or another organisation to which he is in some way responsible.

When we create this voting peer we say that as long as he attends one-third of the sittings he has no further responsibility. The system has worked well in the past, but now that we are to give peers £2,000 a year, there is a need for some control over this money.

12 noon.

The Temporary Chairman (Mr. Bryant Godman Irvine)

Order. I hope that the hon. Member will not refer to the question of remuneration.

Mr. Ridley

On a point of order. Mr. Godman Irvine, I submit that it would be impossible to debate this Clause properly without considering remuneration. The Clause was put into the Bill when remuneration was part of the bargain. Salary has been withdrawn from the bargain. The Clause, too, should therefore have been withdrawn. I do not see how we can have a meaningful discussion of the Clause without mentioning remuneration in passing.

The Temporary Chairman

I hope that the hon. Member appreciates that we are debating the Amendment and not the Clause.

Mr. C. Pannell

Further to that point of order. Mr. Godman Irvine, you cannot be conscious of what happened when you were not in the Chair, and you must rule as you see fit, but I have always understood that after an hon. Member has been warned, as my hon. Friend has been, about discussing remuneration he can use a figure in parenthesis to illustrate his argument. The argument cannot be conducted in vacuo. My hon. Friend is addressing himself to the question of responsibility, and responsibility arises out of the fact that public money is to be spent.

I understand the Chair saying that we must not go at length into how much money should be paid, or how it is arrived at, but the debate will be unintelligible —and nobody wants Parliament to be unintelligible—if my hon. Friend is not allowed to refer to remuneration, at least in parenthesis.

The Temporary Chairman

I was not present, but I understood that the Chairman had given a Ruling on this matter. I agree that remuneration can be referred to in parenthesis, but I hope that the hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Mr. Sheldon) will refer directly to the Amendment.

Sir D. Glover

On a point of order. Mr. Godman Irvine, how can we debate a Clause which lays down disciplines and conditions if there is no penalty for not complying with them? Remuneration must be at the back of everybody's mind when discussing the Clause.

The Temporary Chairman

I hope that hon. Members will keep it at the back of their minds and will address their comments to the Amendment.

Mr. Orme

On a point of order. Mr. Godman Irvine, you say that we cannot discuss remuneration. We know that allowances are paid to peers. The Government brought forward a proposal for paying a salary, and then withdrew it, but there is no undertaking that it has been withdrawn for ever. I therefore submit that my hon. Friend has a right to refer to what may happen in future, because there is no categorical denial from the Government that they may not again alter their minds on this issue.

The Temporary Chairman

That does not arise on the Amendment. All that I am trying to do is to keep the Committee on the lines laid down by the Chairman when he was in the Chair.

Mr. Arthur Lewis

Further to that point of order. When this question arose originally the Chairman said that pro vided we referred to what was in the White Paper we should be in order. The White Paper refers to a salary of £2,000, but that figure is not in the Bill—

The Temporary Chairman

Order. That was not a statement by the Chairman of Ways and Means on this Amendment.

Mr. Sheldon

I accept your Ruling. I am sure that there is nothing between us on this matter, in that the question of money arises because of the need to ensure that peers attend to their duties properly. If there were no payment, there would be no Amendment.

The important aspect of this is to ensure that when public business engagements are undertaken a distinction is made between public and private business and it is notified in advance. Before the House of Commons votes money it is given a chance to make sure that value will be obtained for that money. We know that £2,000 may be paid for a certain number of attendances in the other place. If that number were fixed at 20 or 15 genuine days, and all that was necessary was for a peer to put in an appearance in the other place on his way to his office, or on the way back from his office on the way home, or to drop in for a drink, we should be failing in our duty if we did not realise that some awkward questions would be asked by those whose incomes were very much more restricted and who could not understand why money of this sort was being paid to people who treated the other place as a club.

We know that the mystique of service is not what it was in former days, and if this mystique of great service goes we must examine the position very carefully. The cost of the House of Lords will be much more than it used to be. Under the old system of paying daily allowances, allowing for an average of 230 attendances, the sum paid out was about £170,000 a year. Paying a salary of £2,000 a year will almost treble that figure to about £460,000 a year. I therefore submit that if we spend so much more on salaries for peers we must make sure, not only that we are getting value for money, but that what we are doing is seen to be right.

Mr. John Lee

The Amendment deals with the notifying in advance of intended absence. If a peer gives notice of what he genuinely believes is absence on public business, and it later transpires that it is not public business, will the matter be reported to the Public Accounts Committee? Does my hon. Friend envisage a kind of surcharge, or a withdrawal of salary, related to the unauthorised absence?

Mr. Sheldon

Speaking as a member of the Public Accounts Committee in the presence of the Chairman of that Committee, I hesitate to commit myself at this stage.

Sir D. Glover

I think that the hon. Gentleman and the distinguished Chairman of the P.A.C. would want to be paid £2,000 a year if this were referred to us.

Mr. Sheldon

I am sure that the point has been well taken.

The important aspect of the Amendment is the necessity for some kind of supervision, just as there is supervision over all people who hold positions of importance. These peers are to get what for many people is a full-time salary, but they are not to be held accountable in any way, except on the basis of a minimum attendance, which can be reduced if "public business" is widely interpreted. If we are to have a Report stage —and J hope that we shall have one— I expect the Government to try to find some way of making sure that there is some form of supervision which is acceptable to the House of Lords and also acceptable to this House which will be responsible for paying these considerable sums of money.

There will be a fair number of younger voting peers. Those younger voting peers, presumably, initially will be very full of enthusiasm. Presumably that is one of the reasons why they would be selected. Throughout one's life there are times when for some reason or other one is particularly busy. One has obligations and commitments which are perhaps greater than one would have chosen but which have been thrust upon one or have been accepted rather too readily in a spirit of over-great enthusiasm. The remedies for us are to work perhaps at an unwise speed and at a level of intensity rather greater than that at which we wish to work.

The voting peer could readily dispense with certain of the activities for which he was being paid £2,000 a year. If he had attended 60 per cent., he could run that down to 33 per cent., and if he found the burden too much he could readily make use of the provision about public business and find excuses to be away from the House of Lords, or use it as a club on the way home in the evening.

Mr. Russell Kerr (Feltham)

The old wangle.

Mr. Sheldon

That is one description, but there is another.

Mr. Ryan

If one accepts that it is the easiest thing in the world to justify one's behaviour to oneself, could not my hon. Friend envisage a situation in which these peers might identify themselves with charitable organisations in great numbers? We have not considered whether working for a charitable organisation would be defined as public business. Would it be possible for the peer to spend very little time on this business but to justify to himself that it is public business?

Mr. Sheldon

My hon. Friend has a point there. In periods of very great stress for the peer concerned there will be a temptation to extend the public business side of his activities so as to reduce his attendances. He might not regard that as a wangle. I accept that many who will find themselves peers if this wretched measure gets on to the Statute Book will be men of some distinction. I hesitate to think that there would be more than a very few who would undertake the kind of wangle referred to, but many, faced with the difficulty of keeping up attendances of one-third because of extreme commitments, might resort to using the public business provision to reduce their attendances further because the penalty for not doing so would be to be put out of the House for life. That is an appalling penalty for a man of 40 or 50 who is interested in Parliament and who perhaps for one year finds himself in the dilemma whether to plead public business when it is not public business or to find himself disfranchised from the House of Lords and no longer a voting peer. That is an agonising decision for the peer concerned.

12.15 p.m.

That is a further illustration of some of the shoddy thinking behind the Bill. It has not been properly thought out. Although many of these peers will attend very well, the results of the survey which I outlined yesterday seem to suggest that nevertheless there is a need for flexibility. We do not attend in this place in the same proportion year in and year out. There are times when we have great difficulties of one kind and another and there are times when we are able, due to good fortune and everything going well, to be heavily engaged in this place. There are times when we see faces here that we have not seen for a very long time and when we find some hon. Members again taking their places day after day. We assume that that will not happen in another place, but if it happens and there are periods when these peers do not attend, they may resort to the temptation of the wangle.

Mr. Ridley

Would the hon. Member agree that there are some faces which appear here when it would be to the benefit of the House if they did not appear quite so often?

Mr. Sheldon

I accept that.

Mr. Powell

The hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Mr. Sheldon) referred to a peer whose attendance requirement would not be fulfilled as thereby forfeiting his voting membership for life. I wonder whether he is quite correct. I wonder whether it would not be for the remainder of that Parliament that he would suffer forfeiture. I agree with the general argument which the hon. Member is evolving, but perhaps on consideration, after looking at Clause 3 and at subsections (1) and (4), he would find that he is mistaken.

The Temporary Chairman

I hope that the hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Mr. Sheldon) will not look at Clause 3 but will relate his argument strictly to the Amendment.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter

On a point of order. The hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Mr. Sheldon), possibly unintentionally, may have misled the Committee on this complicated Bill. Surely it is in order for my right hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Powell) to draw attention to other provisions of the Bill to indicate that the hon. Member may have inadvertently misled the Committee? Otherwise intelligent consideration of this Bill in Committee—I remind you, Mr. Bryant Godman Irvine, that we are in Committee—becomes impossible.

The Temporary Chairman

I hope that the hon. Member will relate his argument strictly to the Amendment.

Mr. Sheldon

Thank you, Mr. Bryant Godman Irvine. I certainly intend to relate all my comments to the Amendment. The voting peer whose attendance record falls below that which he would normally wish to maintain will be placed in great difficulty through being excluded from some important matters which may be before the House of Lords.

A most important aspect of this matter deals with responsibilities and to whom they should be directed. We are creating a body which will be in receipt of moneys amounting to half-a-million pounds a year and we are stating that there should be no responsibility to anyone on any matter. This has gone too far. We need to make sure that some control of that money, by some means not yet properly discussed, is considered by the Government and brought before the Committee.

Sir D. Glover

The whole Committee is greatly indebted to the hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Mr. Sheldon), whose every speech on the Bill increases his stature in the House of Commons. Before our deliberations on the Bill are concluded, the hon. Gentleman will be one of the most experienced Parliamentarians of all time. If the hon. Gentleman continues in this way, by the time the Bill becomes law, if ever, he will be far too old to qualify for membership of the other place.

Many of the things the hon. Gentleman has said highlight even more clearly the absurdity of the Bill. I am not convinced that the hon. Gentleman's proposal would be wise, if the Lords is to work with reasonable efficiency, to have any dignity, or to be any parallel with the House of Commons. On the question of public service, for instance, will the noble Lord, Lord Wigg, when he is watching the Gold Cup at Cheltenham tomorrow, be absent on public business, or on private business? The hon. Gentleman, perhaps because he did not wish to weary the Committee, did not go at sufficient length into the question of who is to decide. Is there to be a committee of the House of Lords which will solemnly set out to decide whether the noble Lord, Lord Wigg, is entitled to go to Cheltenham?

Mr. Eldon Griffiths

Has my hon. Friend never heard of the old system of exeats?

Sir D. Glover

I do not know anything about exeats. Most of these peers will be getting exits, not exeats. If a committee were to decide afterwards that the noble Lord was not absent on public business, would that disqualify him for the rest of that Parliament? Would the noble Lord have to get approval before he went, or afterwards? How do the Government visualise this system working in the reformed Chamber?

It cannot and will not work. The whole basis of the Clause of putting conditions on the peerage will turn the Lords into a Chamber that will not work. Remuneration has been much discussed. It has been said that most of those who will be considered for these positions are men of considerable public stature, nor necessarily all wealthy. Many of them are already reasonably well-breeched. I do not think that they will accept these conditions. People will not volunteer for these positions. The Government may get it to work for the present House, after they have carefully gone into the matter on the mystical figure of 230. The Government have probably found that there are so many hereditary Tory peers and so many Tory peers of first creation; they have probably sounded them out and decided that, when and if the Bill ever becomes law, it will work. It probably would work for the first Session. In this important constitutional Bill we are trying to devise a system for a second Chamber which will exist, not for one Parliament, but perhaps for 50 or 100 years before it is amended. It will not work. Those already in the swim may continue, but once they have run out of steam others will not accept these conditions. The hon. Gentleman spoke about peers clocking in. If there is to be an attendance, there will have to be some form of clocking in.

Mr. Elystan Morgan

Does not the hon. Gentleman realise that subsection (3) deals with the retrospective granting of permission to leave in two cases where a person could not have foreseen that he would be absent? The first is illness. The second is when he is called away suddenly on public business. It does not deal with anything beyond that. Permission would be given beforehand in other circumstances.

Sir D. Glover

But it does not say so.

Mr. Powell

It is not even in the Preamble.

Sir D. Glover

If it is not in the Preamble, it cannot be of great weight. If there are to be these conditions, a day must be defined. Is it to be two hours, or the length of one speech? A peer might be called away on urgent public business after he had already spent an hour in the House. Would he qualify in those circumstances for a day's attendance? He might merely have called to collect his mail. Must a peer be there for lunch? Must he dine in, as they do at the Inns of Court? Must he take so many dinners a year before he qualifies?

Mr. Ridley

Is my hon. Friend aware that at present all that has to happen is that a noble Lord has to be seen by the Clerk and his name is entered in the bock? A peer does not even have to stay in another place long enough to drink a gin and tonic to qualify for a whole day's attendance. Presumably the same system will apply when the Bill becomes law.

Sir D. Glover

I am grateful for that intervention. That is what happens today when there is only an attendance allowance. Implicit in all our deliberations is the fact that there is to be remuneration. I do not think that what happens now has a cat in hell's chance of being allowed to continue. There would be far too much opposition to paying people who are not responsible to the electorate a firm salary with no conditions. Once conditions are laid down, they will have to be fairly onerous. Because the conditions will have to be fairly onerous, eventually the whole Bill, if it became law, would crumble into dust, because it would not work.

The hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne spoke with great intelligence about the narrow gap between public and private occupations. I do not think that the case he cited of a banker going to the Middle East to open an account would qualify as public service. I will cite a much more valid case. If the party in opposition has a young peer, perhaps aged 35, who it thinks will be Ministerial material when it gets to power, and if that young peer out of his own money pays for a trip round the world to investigate problems in Vietnam, Australia, New Zealand, Fiji, Mauritius, and even Anguilla, is that public service?

12.30 p.m.

I presume that, if there were a committee sitting on the matter, it might view such a question with kindness and be inclined to say that it was public service, but one of its members might well warn that one should be careful about it— "This noble Lord has some mining interests in Australia. When he goes to Australia, he will look after his mining interests, and he may be there for a month looking after them. We ought not to certify that it is public service".

The noble Lord is then absent from the House, he does not do his 33⅓ per cent. of attendances, and he is disqualified from voting, probably only for that Parliament, but disqualified none the less. It would not be easy for the leader of his party to put things right in the next Parliament unless the party won a great victory and came in with more members in this House. His leader would then be able to add his name to the list of voting peers because the party was qualified for another half-dozen, but not otherwise.

Would that be a sensible way of building up an informed peerage, a sensible way of building up a body which, despite the criticisms, is widely respected not for its composition and hereditary basis but for the intelligence and wisdom collected within its walls which is expressed in its debates?

I take another example. Perhaps the noble Lord, Lord Butler has qualified this year or in the particular year in question, 1967–68, which seems to be the basis of all wisdom. On the other hand, perhaps not; the year 1967–68 may have been a time when he was not a particularly good attender. On a statistical basis, he would not be likely to become a voting peer. As the hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne said, attendances in political life vary enormously.

There is something slightly indecent— I repeat the word "indecent" to the Under-Secretary of State, and I am sorry that he is the only Minister present—that we should be debating sanctions for attendance in another place at a time of day when we are not able to call a Count to find out how many Members of the House of Commons are sufficiently interested in the debate even to be on the premises. I doubt that we should have found 40 Members present if the hon. Member for West Ham, North (Mr. Arthur Lewis) had been able to call a Count. Yet we have the impertinence and arrogance to debate a Bill which would put sanctions, clocking-in and the rest on their Lordships in another place.

I accept that we in this House are responsible to our constituents; they can put a good discipline on Members of Parliament, though I am reminded of a story about a distinguished Member of this House who, at the beginning of every Session, gave his secretary some Questions for Written Answer and then went off to the South of France. For many years, his constituents thought that he was an assiduous and able Member, always "on the ball", and asking Questions in the House. It does not necessarily follow that Members' attendances are as reliable as might appear. However, there is a discipline which our electors exert upon us.

That discipline does not apply in the other place. So far, without pay but with an attendance allowance, there have been enough public-spirited people in the other place to produce the mystical figure of 230. Without discipline, without sanctions, the unreconstituted House of Lords with its hereditary principle and 400 Members not attending, is producing day by day and week by week the attendance which the Government want to produce under the Bill. The right way, therefore, is not to do what the hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne suggested, instituting a sort of factory clocking-in system, but to trust the peers in the same way as they have been trusted for many years.

Mr. Edward M. Taylor

In his study of the matter has my hon. Friend established how many Member of the other place are members of the boards of nationalised industries and whether attendance at a board meeting would qualify as public service under the Clause?

Sir D. Glover

My hon. Friend has made a valuable interjection. That also is a question which will exercise the leaders of the political parties. I assume that the noble Lords, Lord Melchett and Lord Robens, for example, will not be considered as voting peers because their leaders will say not that they are not valuable peers but that they cannot attend sufficiently often to vote.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter

They might be cross-benchers.

Sir D. Glover

That is another interesting point. Because of the difficulties, a tradition might develop that Lord Melchett and Lord Robens, for example, could become part of the so-called cross-bench or "C.B." peers. But the Members of the House of Commons would take a good deal of convincing that they had suddenly become men without political views. I think it only too likely that the leaders of the political parties will strain their consciences to the point of appointing peers who are members of the boards of nationalised industries in the quota of cross-bench peers, and that will show how "phoney" the cross-bench peerage will become in a short time.

Mr. Ridley

My hon. Friend is breaking some important ground on the Amendment. I gather that the conclusion to which he is coming is that in their Lordships House there ought to be a register of public interests, that just as in this House we are drawing towards a register of private interests of Members of Parliament, so in the House of Lords there should be a register of public interests so that peers may declare in advance the business on which they would claim exemption from the attendance record, so that everyone would know what was fair and what was not when first setting down his list of interests.

Sir D. Glover

; That is, perhaps, one of the most important points raised during the debate this morning.

I wish to make my position clear. I do not want the Bill to become law. The Bill will make the other place worse than it is. There are three solutions. The other place could be scrapped, left as it is, or turned into an elective Chamber. The Bill does none of those things. It is a nonsense, and if it produces a Chamber that will not work it may be necessary to have a register such as my hon. Friend suggests. But it would be a retrograde step, showing lack of interest and trust in the noble Lords, and putting them into the atmosphere of a schoolroom, which would not help their independence. But if that is the sort of Chamber that will exist, many of these disciplines may become part of the machinery of trying to make another place work.

Mr. Hastings

This is a substantial point. My hon. Friend the Member for Cirencester and Tewkesbury (Mr. Ridley) suggested that a register of public interests might be necessary under the Amendment in rather the same way as it is suggested we should have registers of our interests outside this place. But, even if it were a good idea, it would be impossible under the Bill as it stands, because we do not know what the Government consider a public interest to be. We should first have to have a comprehensive list of what the Government consider them to be before we could have any list of the public interests of peers.

Sir D. Glover

I am grateful for my hon. Friend's intervention. I partially raised this earlier in my speech when I asked who decided what a public interest was. Is there to be a permanent Select Committee in the House of Lords to which a noble Lord will say, "I have got this job, this appointment. Is it a public interest? If I go to Cheltenham, will it be allowed?" I am appalled by the mental picture of that. How would it work? Will the noble Lord, Lord Wigg, go to the House of Lords and order that the Committee should sit immediately because he wants to go to Cheltenham, or does he have to write in a month before? Who will decide—the Prime Minister, or a group of Privy Councillors? Somebody will have to settle these matters. The general impression in the Committee is that this will not work.

I do not want to mislead the Committee. I think that the hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne said that the Amendment was a probing Amendment. We should be grateful to him for moving it, and for his very able speech. But if he pressed it to a Division I do not think that I would go into the Lobby with him at this stage. He is trying to make conditions that would make another place even less workable than it would be under the present proposals, if that is possible.

Mr. Russell Kerr

Is the hon. Gentleman suggesting that a sum of money, whether £2,000 or any other amount, should be paid to their prospective Lordships irrespective of their performance? Does he say that there should be no criterion that we could apply to their performance in another place?

Sir D. Glover

That is a very valid question. I would say, "Yes", and I would trust the noble Lords to justify the payment, although I admit that a powerful speech could be made against that.

Mr. Kerr

How can the hon. Gentleman justify that, not only to the Committee but to the public at large, since we are in effect responsible for their money?

12.45 p.m.

Sir D. Glover

I accept that criticism. This question does not arise on the Amendment, and we shall deal with it at greater length later. Without getting too far out of order, I would say, if asked for a snap decision, that I would trust the noble Lords. The hon. Gentleman and I could argue all night on the rights and wrongs of this, and I accept that when payment is made to a non-elective Chamber there is a powerful argument for having disciplines to ensure that it is deserved.

I gave the hon. Gentleman a snap judgment, but I am prepared to be convinced. I am not dogmatic about it because I see that there is a real danger. Judging by the hon. Gentleman's speech, I think that he probably will not press the Amendment to a Division, but if he did I probably would not vote for it at this stage. However, he has done the Committee a great service in raising the whole problem of the working of this crazy scheme, if it ever gets on the Statute Book and some poor benighted people in another place have to try to make it work. It will be a disastrous failure. The present House of Lords, despite all its anomalies, is held in great affection by the public, and there is tremendous respect for it in the nation. It would be ruined by the Bill and ruined to no advantage to the nation.

Mr. John Lee

I share with the hon. Member for Ormskirk (Sir D. Glover), many misgivings about the mechanics of the Amendment. I am not entirely convinced that it will help us get very far, but I join with the hon. Gentleman in expressing the Committee's gratitude to my hon. Friend the Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Mr. Sheldon), for raising the matter. It is one of the characteristics of the long proceedings on the Bill that what seem to be quite small technical Amendments give rise to major matters and to problems of constitutional importance which might not otherwise have been drawn to hon. Members' attention.

The Amendment has certain advantages over the wording of the Bill. The Clause talks about leave of absence being given before, during or after the period for which it was given. That is an extraordinarily lax suggestion. How casual this all is? We are dealing not only with public money but with public resources—the use of the facilities of the second Chamber and the amenities attached to it, and with a Member seeking to do something which, by the very nature of things, is supposed to be exceptional. For the first time in history, the criterion of membership of the other place will include the requirement of presence in the Chamber, or at least within the Palace of Westminster, whereas it has been the practice for many years that the great majority of Members of the other House were engaged elsewhere and put in only an occasional appearance. For the first time, we are giving them permission to be away, subject to the possibility of certain sanctions if they do not conform to requirements to be laid down, yet we make this provision the subject of the most casual and loose arrangement.

It is not clear from the Bill how long after the period permission can be given. I shall have to criticise the Amendment itself at some length later. Whilst it seeks to procure approval in advance, it does not deal with the question of how far in advance this may be required. But it is far more satisfactory than having a Member taking himself off on something which he presumes to be public business, but which may turn out not to have been so, and then later on making an application.

The words at the end of subsection (3) are: or after the end of the Session to which it relates. How long after? What will the position be under the Bill if a peer seeks permission at the end of the final Session of Parliament? Would permission be forthcoming? Who would give it even if it were after the Proclamation of the Dissolution of Parliament at the end of the final Session? It is not clear. For that reason there is obviously a great deal to be said for making it obligatory upon the Member who seeks to be absent that he should make his application in advance of the time to which the application applies.

I regret that the Amendment does not make it entirely clear that a Member of the other place should seek permission in advance in any event, with the possible exception of certain cases where there may be an extraordinary emergency session, or something of that kind. If a peer seeks to go on public business and does not seek permission in advance, who is to say that he ought to be at risk and that he may be sanctioned if he finds himself doing something of which the House does not approve?

Let me draw an analogy. There have been occasions—there have not been many recently—when Members of this House have fallen foul of the technicalities of the House of Commons disqualification provisions by the holding of certain offices of profit under the Crown. Before seeking election to this House they had been required to say that they were not disqualified. Yet instances have occurred when Members, quite bona fide, have allowed their names to go forward as validly nominated candidates for election to this House and when it has subsequently transpired that they were not freed of their disqualifying offices.

Members of rent tribunals provide one example. That House has had to deal with the question of the validity of their election and in every case indemnification Bills have been forthcoming. The House always deals kindly and leniently with any Member who, bona fide, makes a mistake as to his qualifications.

I use that argument by way of analogy, and I would have said that if a Member of the other place bona fide went on a trip which he believed to be a business trip and sought permission for it, and if it turned out that although it could reasonably be imagined that it was on public business it was really of a private character, because it came in one of the border-line categories to which reference has been made, I am sure that the situation could be put right y way of an indemnification Bill.

But that is quite different from saying, "It does not matter if you do this. Do not bother to apply now. You can apply during or after the Session, when the whole matter will be over." That is a far-too casual approach to public business. For that reason I submit that my hon. Friend the Member for Ashton-under-Lyne was right to bring forward the Amendment seeking to improve the situation.

Mr. R. B. Cant (Stoke-on-Trent, Central)

My hon. Friend could have reminded the House of the vivid contrast that exists between the essentially casual approach to the problem of attendance in relation to remuneration in the case of the House of Parliament and the very strict rules and regulations laid down for the gift of financial loss allowances to local councillors who, in order to get their £2 financial loss allowance, must attend for not a minute less than four hours or, if they want a day's financial loss, not a minute less than 8 hours—or whatever the time may be. If they go to a conference their financial loss is related not to the time when they leave home and get back home but to the time at which their train leaves and the time at which it gets back into their home town or city.

I do not suggest that this creates the sort of scene that might exist at a death bed, when the recipients of gifts inter vivos are trying to keep alive an old man so that they do not forfeit them, but it does produce a situation in local government—

The Temporary Chairman (Mr. Bryant Godman Irvine)

Order. Interventions must be brief.

Mr. Lee

I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, Central (Mr. Cant) for his analogy, which is an apt one. It is one of the curiosities of public life that we seem to demand of our local authorities a much more rigid standard of probity in financial matters than we demand in respect of matters that come within the purview of members of this House or the other House. I do not know whether my hon. Friend was present during the earlier part of the debate, but we have already gone over some of the ground covered by the question of the extent to which we may be satisfied that a man is about public business, and the way in which the phrase "public business" is to be defined, and what is a bona fide attendance. It is extremely difficult to know, because it has never been laid down. It has always been accepted that people deal with these matters honestly and honourably. The Committee will agree that they do so, on the whole.

I have some sympathy with the hon. Member for Ormskirk when he says that we like to leave these matters to trust. In public affairs there must always be a considerable element of trust. No organisation of any size or calibre could be expected to function properly without a large measure of trust. Nevertheless it is clear for many reasons—not least from the way in which so much outside criticism of this House and Parliament in general has accumulated in recent years —that we have to be rather more strict about our own affairs and the affairs of the other place than we have been hitherto, in order to parry some of the criticisms levelled against us.

Although the Amendment lays down that the application should be made in advance in most cases it does not make it clear how far in advance it should be made. If an application is made only a matter of hours before the time limit, those to whom the application is made will be in some difficulty about investigation.

Again, what is the test of reasonableness? We do not know. It will depend largely on the type of business being undertaken. If it is in the form of a casual visit within this country which may take a Member of the other place away for a matter of hours, it may be that a few hours' notice would be adequate. Not many people would quarrel with that. But the business might involve visits abroad where what is indisputably public business is intermingled with indisputably private business—quite proper business— that the peer is proposing to undertake, and where there is also a shaded area in respect of which the work that he is doing may easily be construed either as public or private, and when only considerable investigation could satisfy an objective observer as to the category in which it should be placed. How far in advance should the application be made then? The Amendment does not make it clear. However much we are in my hon. Friend's debt, we cannot accept his Amendment without due examination and criticism of those parts which are not as precise as they should be.

Before the Committee can accept the Amendment, therefore, we must consider at what time in advance of the operative period the application should be made. We should also find out who is to do the investigating. Has the application to be made to the Lord Chancellor, or to the Lord Chancellor's office, or is it to be referred to some auditors? In the latter case, who is to appoint the auditors? The Amendment is defective in clarity there. It says that the application is to be made in advance, but does not clearly state who is to be the examining authority. We must not be left in doubt about that.

1.0 p.m.

Again, it is germane to ask who is to do the investigating when the House is not sitting and a lot of those staff to whom reference might be made may not be available. Who will investigate applications during the Summer Recess, and satisfy the House that the application is bona fide in respect of leave of absence, and should be granted? One must bear in mind that if it is held that the business concerned is not public business, that the person concerned has not acted reasonably or has not fulfilled his proper quota of attendances the penalty could be severe. But, quite apart from any financial penalty it will be a matter of great moment if, as a result of his conduct, that person finds himself debarred for a long or a short period from active participation in the work of Parliament. There is no comparable penalty that I know that is applicable to this House.

What happens if, after investigation has been completed, it transpires that the authority concerned is not satisfied that the application was not proper? To whom is notification of that fact to be made? Is the channel of notification to be the House, or the Lord Chancellor, or an official notifying privately in writing? The Amendment does not make it clear whether or not the application should be made in writing, but I assume that it will be.

The definition of public duties presents the most vexed problem of all. We are in some doubt about what is covered by the phrase "public business". A peer may be a shareholder in a public company such as B.P. which is, itself, Government-controlled. B.P. is not regarded, in colloquial terms, at any rate, as a nationalised industry, but it is an industry over which the Government, if they choose to exercise their authority—and some would say that, unfortunately, they do not often choose to do that—have an effective measure of control.

If a peer wants to go abroad to investigate some of the activities of B.P.—going not as a Government-appointed director, because that would obviously put him on the public side of the line, but as a shareholder—can it be said that his activities are merely those of a private citizen who has invested in an organisation in which the Government also have invested, though on a somewhat larger scale? Or is it reasonable to say that he is then performing a public service by carrying out a scrutiny of the activities of an organisation in which the Government— and, at one stage removed, the taxpayers —have a genuine interest? We do not know.

[Mr. Sydney Irving in the Chair.]

Even if we were to adopt the suggestion made by the hon. Member for Circencester and Tewkesbury (Mr. Ridley) and have a register of interests, what would we include? Is the instance I have given to be regarded as a public interest? Again, we do not know. Whether or not the Amendment is accepted, a peer might find himself in the greatest possible embarrassment merely because we do not know what the public interest is.

In addition to any penalty imposed by way of debarring a peer from operating as a member of his House because, for one reason or another, his application is either improper or has been rejected, are we to threaten him also with the pos sibility of having to refund his emoluments, or parts of his emoluments—

The Chairman

Order. Emoluments are not in the Bill. The hon. Member speaks out of order in referring to them.

Mr. Lee

With respect, Mr. Irving my remark relates to the Amendment to the extent of suggesting that it is relevant to whether or not the matter should be investigated in advance. Perhaps I may keep myself within the bounds of order if I say that one advantage in the Amendment, in addition to the advantages that have already been enumerated, is that if a Member of the other House were ever to find his remuneration or part of it at risk as a result of undertaking business which turned out not to be public, the more the matter could be investigated in advance the more likely a firm "yea" or "nay" could be given. Further, if application was made a reasonable time in advance and after prolonged investigation the application was not considered reasonable, it would be a reason able answer for the person to say that he had made a bona fide application—

Mr. Powell

One appreciates the difficulty of referring to the possible financial consequences of a refusal, after the event, by the House to give the necessary leave of absence, but I take it that the hon. Gentleman has considered that since, under the terms of the Clause, leave can be given in a subsequent Session, the person concerned might actually in that subsequent Session have cast a vote, on which a decision might have turned, but is then found not to have been qualified to vote at the time he did vote. That provision is in the Bill.

Mr. Lee

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman. That adds still further to the curiosities that this situation provides. I take the argument a stage further: what is to be the position if a decision in another place is taken by one vote and it turns out that one of those on the majority side had acted in a way in which he should not have acted and which at any rate raised the possibility of his vote being a nullity? What would happen to the decision of the other place?

That is another reason why I believe that this Amendment has its limitations, but I hope that the Under-Secretary, when he ultimately replies to the debate, will at least give an undertaking that he will consider something of its kind. Clearly the Bill's wording as it stands is inadequate. It is too lax and too casual by far for matters of this kind. At the same time, I do concede that the wording of the Amendment may be insufficiently precise to be accepted in its entirety.

Mr. Elystan Morgan

The effect of the Amendment would be to prevent the House of Peers from giving leave of absence retrospectively when it was sought on account of public business. Subsection (2) defines the attendance requirements in any Session as attendance at the sittings of the House (or sittings of Committees of the House) on a number of days equal to not less than one-third of the total number of days on which the House meets during the Session (other than … for judicial business … From the calculation of the total number of days sat during each Session there will be deducted under subsection (2)(b) any period during which a peer is absent, with the leave of the House, on account of ill health, or on Parliamentary or other public business.

The expression "public business" is not defined in the Bill and its interpretation would therefore have to be left to the House itself. It could cover periods of absence such as service as a chairman or member of a Royal Commission or Departmental Committee. Some difficult cases may arise which the House would have to judge on their merits, for example, absence at the Council of Europe, the United Nations Assembly, or an inquiry not directly sponsored by the Government. But no doubt there would develop suitable rules of practice in due course.

It has been put to us by my hon. Friend the Member for Reading (Mr. John Lee) that such a procedure would be extremely difficult to administer. The Committee should appreciate that the matter could be decided by the other place as a whole, but that in practice it is likely that this function would be delegated to a small Committee, similar to the Leave of Absence Committee which already exists. "Public business" would, therefore, be interpreted by the House or by this small Committee.

Mr. Hastings

This matter has formed the subject of a large part of our debate. As this is a Government Bill, what guidance is to be given to this Committee of another place by the Government as to the definition of public duty?

Mr. Morgan

I will deal with that. I am sure that hon. Members will accept that the House of Peers would properly be able to discharge this function either meeting as a whole, or through this small Committee.

1.15 p.m.

No better alternatives have been suggested by anyone. It is absurd to suggest that this arrangement would be entirely lax, or that leave should not be given retrospectively. Surely the House of Peers can be allowed to apply its own control in this matter. I am sure that hon. Members accept that it is an honourable House and that it would deal with genuine cases—and they are what the Bill involves—of leave sought for public business with a combination of sympathy and firmness.

Mr. Powell

The definition of "public business" has been a main point in the debate. The hon. Gentleman has indicated that in his view Royal Commissions and perhaps Departmental Committees would be included. Would he say whether in his opinion service on public boards, for example, would be included in the definition of "public business", or is that to be left unknown until it comes to be decided by some Committee of another place not yet existing? While he is doing that, would he also say whether in the advice which he receives the term "other" in the phrase "other business" is to be interpreted under the rule of ejusdem generis as meaning similar to Parliamentary?

Mr. Morgan

I do not think that the ejusdem generis rule would operate of necessity, or that "other" need of necessity mean business analogous to Parliamentary business. However, if there is a debate on the Question, That the Clause stand part of the Bill, it might be better for hon. Members then to be advised by one of the Law Officers. I think that it is obvious that it is not governed by the word "other" in that respect.

The right hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Powell) mentioned the membership of public bodies. This is a matter for the other House to consider. About 20 minutes ago, I made an interjection in the speech of the hon. Member for Ormskirk (Sir D. Glover) when I said that the purpose of subsection (3) was to deal with cases in which a member of the other place had suffered a sudden illness, or had suddenly and without previous notice been called away on urgent public business. I have reflected upon that and although that is the purpose of the provision, I think that we should direct our minds to the wording of the subsection: Leave of absence for the purposes of paragraph (b) of subsection (2) of this section may be given either before, during or after the period for which it is given, and either before or after the end of the Session to which it relates. Paragraph (b) relates to Parliamentary or other public business and it would be wrong for me to seek to put any restrictive gloss upon the interpretation of those words. Under subsection (3), leave of absence may be given before, during or after the period for which it was sought and before or after the end of the Session to which it refers. This provision has been included with the intention that it should allow not only for sudden illness, but also for circumstances in which a peer might go abroad on Government business at short notice, for example, the visit of Lord Hunt to Biafra.

The need to apply for leave of absence might have been overlooked, but a voting peer who was absent from the House for such reasons should not be penalised merely because of his failure to make a formal application in advance. I respectfully put it to the House that that is all that this Amendment refers to, and that it is to that narrow issue that the Committee should direct its mind. I invite the Committee, for the reasons which I have put forward, to reject the Amendment.

Mr. Hastings

rose—

The Chairman

Mr. Hastings.

Mr. Hastings

Before the hon. Gentleman sits down, may I ask him to apply himself to the important constitutional point raised by my right hon. Friend: if a voting peer, for any one of the reasons which the Minister and others in the debate have described, is disqualified in a subsequent Session, could not this result in a vote, or perhaps more than one vote, of this peer being entirely invalid?

To develop this point one stage further, may it not be that the conclusion reached by another place would equally be in question as a result—

The Chairman

Order. The hon. Gentleman is making a rather long intervention.

Mr. Hastings

Mr. Irving, I respect fully submit—

The Chairman

Order. I am not being addressed on a point of order at the moment.

Mr. Powell

With respect, Mr. Irving, I distinctly heard you call my hon. Friend. I recognise that he prefaced his remarks with the expression, "Before the hon. Gentleman sits down", but the House is in Committee and I would submit to you that an hon. Member who is called by you and speaks, irrespective of the phraseology which he may use at the beginning of his remarks, has the Floor in Committee.

The Chairman

I must make it clear to the right hon. Gentleman that I called the hon. Member, on the Minister sitting down, for an intervention and not to make a speech. Unless the right hon. Gentleman has a further point of order, I should like to proceed.

Mr. Powell

On a point of order. I put to you the question whether it is within the power of the Chair in Committee to call an hon. Member conditionally and only to intervene, even after the previous speaker has resumed his seat?

The Chairman

Order. The right hon. Gentleman is seeking to pursue a point of order. It is done quite frequently.

Mr. Elystan Morgan

Further to that point of order. Mr. Irving, as I understood it—

The Chairman

I hope that the Minister will not pursue the point of order which I have ruled not to be relevant to the debate.

Mr. Elystan Morgan

I wish only to explain that I was in the act of resuming my seat when the hon. Gentleman asked me to give way.

The Chairman

Order. I cannot allow anyone to debate a point of order.

Mr. Hastings

Further to that point of order—

The Chairman

Order. I cannot allow the hon. Gentleman to speak. I have disposed of the point of order. I have ruled, and the hon. Gentleman must submit.

Mr. Hastings

rose—

The Chairman

I will allow the hon. Gentleman to complete his intervention. I hope that he will be brief.

Mr. Hastings

If I may return to the matter, it seems to me to be as potentially important to the Committee as anything that has been debated on the Amendment, or perhaps anything that has been discussed since the beginning of our debate yesterday. It raises the possibility of a conclusion of a vote in the House of Lords at some future date being completely invalidated post facto. What sort of position will Parliament be in—

The Chairman

Order. The hon. Gentleman is seeking to raise a debate on an intervention. He must conclude it.

Mr. Hastings

Surely it is possible under the provisions of the Bill for a voting peer to be disqualified in a Session of Parliament subsequent to the Session in which he voted perhaps once, twice or thrice, with the result that the decision of the other place will be invalidated. Will the Minister please apply himself to that possibility before he sits down?

Mr. Elystan Morgan

This is a complicated question on which I should not like to give a definite opinion without carefully studying the Rules of Order of the other House, but perhaps I could put this matter to the hon. Gentleman: this situation in theory could occur under the House of Commons Disqualification Act

1957, republished this year. This is a situation which could already exist in relation to the House of Commons, in that a person would be a Member up to the moment that it had been decided judicially that he was disqualified from taking his seat.

On the more general question, it is a matter which often occurs in commercial circles. It is known in company law as the rule in Royal British Bank v. Turquand, and the fact that a person casts a vote which might affect the issue but is later found to be disqualified from so acting, does not affect the vires of the decision which has been effectively taken.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasury and Deputy Leader of the House of Commons (Mr. John Silkin) rose in his place and claimed to move, That the Question be now put.

Question put, That the Question be now put: —

The Committee divided: Ayes 151, Noes 71.

Division No. 129.]	AYES	[1.26 p.m.
Bacon, Rt. Hn. Alice	Forrester, John	MacColl, James
Bagier, Gordon A. T.	Fowler, Gerry	Macdonald, A. H.
Bence, Cyril	Fraser, John (Norwood)	Mackenzie, Alasdair (Ross&Crom'ty)
Benn, Rt. Hn. Anthony Wedgwood	Freeson, Reginald	Mackenzie, Gregor (Rutherglen)
Binns, John	Gardner, Tony	Maclennan, Robert
Blackburn, F.	Gray, Dr. Hugh (Yarmouth)	McNamara, J. Kevin
Boston, Terence	Greenwood, Rt. Hn. Anthony	Mahon, Peter (Preston, S.)
Boyden, James	Grey, Charles (Durham)	Mallalieu, E. L. (Brigg)
Bray, Dr. Jeremy	Griffiths, Eddie (Brightside)	Mallalieu, J. P. W. (Huddersfield, E.)
Brooks, Edwin	Griffiths, Rt. Hn. James (Llanelly)	Marks, Kenneth
Brown, Hugh D. (G'gow, Provan)	Hamilton, James (Bothwell)	Marsh, Rt. Hn. Richard
Brown, R. W. (Shoreditch & F'bury)	Hamling, William	Mayhew, Christopher
Buchan, Norman	Hannan, William	Mellish, Rt. Hn. Robert
Buchanan, Richard (G'gow, Sp'burn)	Harper, Joseph	Millan, Bruce
Cant, R. B.	Harrison, Walter (Wakefield)	Miller, Dr. M. S.
Carmichael, Neil	Haseldine, Norman	Milne, Edward (Blyth)
Carter-Jones, Lewis	Hazell, Bert	Moonman, Eric
Castle, Rt. Hn. Barbara	Henig, Stanley	Morgan, Elystan (Cardiganshire)
Coe, Denis	Herbison, Rt. Hn. Margaret	Morris, Alfred (Wythenshawe)
Coleman, Donald	Hilton, W. S.	Morris, Charles R. (Openshaw)
Concannon, J. D.	Hooley, Frank	Morris, John (Aberavon)
Cullen, Mrs. Alice	Houghton, Rt. Hn. Douglas	Moyle, Richard
Dalyell, Tam	Howarth, Robert (Bolton, E.)	Murray, Albert
Davies, G. Elfed (Rhondda, E.)	Howell, Denis (Small Heath)	Neal, Harold
Davies, Dr. Ernest (Stretford)	Hoy, James	Oswald, Thomas
Davies, Harold (Leek)	Hunter, Adam	Owen, Dr. David (Plymouth, S'tn)
Davies, Ifor (Gower)	Irvine, Sir Arthur (Edge Hill)	Pannell, Rt. Hn. Charles
Dell, Edmund	Janner, Sir Barnett	Parker, John (Dagenham)
Dempsey, James	Johnson, James (K'ston-on-Hull, W.)	Pearson, Arthur (Pontypridd)
Dobson, Ray	Jones, J. Idwal (Wrexham)	Peart, Rt. Hn. Fred
Doig, Peter	Jones, T. Alec (Rhondda, West)	Pentland, Norman
Dunwoody, Mrs. Gwyneth (Exeter)	Kelley, Richard	Perry, Ernest G. (Battersea, S.)
Eadie, Alex	Lawson, George	Prentice, Rt. Hn. R. E.
Edwards, William (Merioneth)	Ledger, Ron	Price, William (Rugby)
Ellis, John	Lee, Rt. Hn. Frederick (Newton)	Probert, Arthur
Ennals, David	Lee, Rt. Hn. Jennie (Cannock)	Randall, Harry
Ensor, David	Lipton, Marcus	Reynolds, Rt. Hn. G. W.
Evans, Fred (Caerphilly)	Loughlin, Charles	Roberts, Albert (Normanton)
Evans, Ioan L. (Birm'h'm, Yardley)	Luard, Evan	Roberts, Rt. Hn. Goronwy
Fernyhough, E.	Lyon, Alexander W. (York)	Roberts, Gwilym (Bedfordshire, S.)
Finch, Harold	Mabon, Dr. J. Dickson	Robinson, Rt. Hn. Kenneth (St. P'c'as)
Ford, Ben	McCann, John
Rodgers, William (Stockton)	Tinn, James	Williams, Mrs. Shirley (Hitchin)
Rogers, George (Kensington, N.)	Urwin, T. W.	Willis, Rt. Hn. George
Ross, Rt. Hn. William	Varley, Eric G.	Wilson, Rt. Hn. Harold (Huyton)
Rowlands, E.	Wainwright, Edwin (Dearne Valley)	Wilson, William (Coventry, S.)
Silkin, Rt. Hn. John (Deptford)	Watkins, Tudor (Brecon & Radnor)	Woodburn, Rt. Hn. A.
Silverman, Julius	Whitlock, William	Woof, Robert
Small, William	Wilkins, W. A.
Spriggs, Leslie	Williams, Alan (Swansea, W.)	TELLERS FOR THE AYES:
Taverne, Dick	Williams, Alan Lee (Hornchurch)	Sir Gerald Nabarro and
Thornton, Ernest	Williams, Clifford (Abertillery)	Mr. Ronald Bell.
NOES
Baker, W. H. K. (Banff)	Griffiths, Will (Exchange)	Page, John (Harrow, W.)
Bell, Ronald	Grimond, Rt. Hn. J.	Perry, George H. (Nottingham, S.)
Bidwell, Sydney	Harris, Frederic (Croydon, N. W.)	Pounder, Rafton
Booth, Albert	Hastings, Stephen	Powell, Rt. Hn. J. Enoch
Brinton, Sir Tatton	Hay, John	Rees-Davies, W. R.
Buchanan-Smith, Alick (Angus, N&M)	Heald, Rt. Hn. Sir Lionel	Rhys Williams, Sir Brandon
Chichester-Clark, R.	Heffer, Eric S.	Russell, Sir Ronald
Clark, Henry	Iremonger, T. L.	Scott-Hopkins, James
Cooke, Robert	Jackson, Peter M. (High Peak)	Shaw, Michael (Sc'b'gh & Whitby)
Corfield, F. V.	Langford-Holt, Sir John	Sheldon, Robert
Crowder, F. P.	Lee, John (Reading)	Smith, John (London & W'minster)
Dalkeith, Earl of	Lewis, Arthur (W. Ham, N.)	Speed, Keith
Dean, Paul	McAdden, Sir Stephen	Stoddart-Scott, Col. Sir M.
Drayson, G. B.	Maude, Angus	Taylor, Sir Charles (Eastbourne)
Dunwoody, Dr. John (F'th & C'b'e)	Mawby, Ray	Taylor, Edward M.(G'gow, Cathcart)
Evans, Gwynfor (C'marthen)	Maxwell-Hyslop, R. J.	Temple, John M.
Eyre, Reginald	Mikardo, Ian	Turton, Rt. Hn. R. H.
Fletcher, Ted (Darlington)	Mills, Stratton (Belfast, N.)	Waddington, David
Fortescue, Tim	Mitchell, David (Basingstoke)	Wall, Patrick
Fraser, Rt. Hn. Hugh (St'fford & Stone)	Montgomery, Fergus	Williams, Donald (Dudley)
Glover, Sir Douglas	Morgan, Geraint (Denbigh)	Younger, Hn. George
Goodhew, Victor	Murton, Oscar
Gower, Raymond	Nabarro, Sir Gerald	TELLERS FOR THE NOES:
Grant, Anthony	Nicholls, Sir Harmar	Mr Alan Fitch and
Griffiths Eldon (Bury St. Edmunds)	Osborn, John (Hallam)	Mr. Neil McBride.

Question put accordingly, That the Amendment be made: —

The Committee divided: Ayes, 26, Noes 150.

Division No. 130.]	AYES	[1.34 p.m.
Brinton, Sir Tatton	McAdden, Sir Stephen	Scott-Hopkins, James
Clark, Henry	Mackenzie, Alasdair (Ross&Crom'ty)	Stoddart-Scott, Col. Sir M.
Davideon, James (Aberdeenshire, W.)	Mawby, Ray	Taylor, Sir Charles (Eastbourne)
Goodhew, Victor	Montgomery, Fergus	Taylor, Edward M.(G'gow, Cathcart)
Gower, Raymond	Morgan, Geraint (Denbigh)	Wall, Patrick
Griffiths, Eldon (Bury St. Edmunds)	Murton, Oscar	Williams, Donald (Dudley)
Grimond, Rt. Hn. J.	Nicholls, Sir Harmar
Harris, Frederic (Croydon, N. W.)	Page, John (Harrow, W.)	TELLERS FOR THE AYES:
Hastings, Stephen	Powell, Rt. Hn. J. Enoch	Mr. Alan Fitch and
Iremonger, T. L.	Russell, Sir Ronald	Mr. Neil McBride.
NOES
Bacon, Rt. Hn. Alice	Davies, G. Elfed (Rhondda, E.)	Gray, Dr. Hugh (Yarmouth)
Bagier, Gordon A. T.	Davies, Dr. Ernest (Stretford)	Greenwood, Rt. Hn. Anthony
Bence, Cyril	Davies, Harold (Leek)	Grey, Charles (Durham)
Benn, Rt. Hn. Anthony Wedgwood	Davies, Ifor (Gower)	Griffiths, Eddie (Brightside)
Binns, John	Dell, Edmund	Griffiths, Rt. Hn. James (Llanelly)
Blackburn, F.	Dempsey, James	Hamilton, James (Bothwell)
Boston, Terence	Dobson, Ray	Hamling, William
Boyden, James	Doig, Peter	Hannan, William
Bray, Dr. Jeremy	Dunnett, Jack	Harper, Joseph
Brooks, Edwin	Dunwoody, Mrs. Gwyneth (Exeter)	Harrison, Walter (Wakefield)
Brown, Rt. Hn. George (Belper)	Eadie, Alex	Haseldine, Norman
Brown, Hugh D. (G'gow, Provan)	Edwards, William (Merioneth)	Hazell, Bert
Brown, R. W. (Shoreditch & F'bury)	Ellis, John	Henig, Stanley
Buchan, Norman	Ennals, David	Herbison, Rt. Hn. Margaret
Buchanan, Richard (G'gow, Sp'burn)	Ensor, David	Hilton, W. S.
Cant, R. B.	Evans, Fred (Caerphilly)	Hooley, Frank
Carmichael, Neil	Evans, Ioan L. (Birm'h'm, Yardley)	Houghton, Rt. Hn. Douglas
Carter-Jones, Lewis	Fernyhough, E.	Howarth, Robert (Bolton, E.)
Castle, Rt. Hn. Barbara	Finch, Harold	Howell, Denis (Small Heath)
Coe, Denis	Forrester, John	Hunter, Adam
Coleman, Donald	Fowler, Gerry	Irvine, Sir Arthur (Edge Hill)
Concannon, J. D.	Fraser, John (Norwood)	Janner, Sir Barnett
Cullen, Mrs. Alice	Freeson, Reginald	Johnson, James (K'ston-on-Hull, W.)
Dalyell, Tam	Gardner, Tony	Jones, J. Idwal (Wrexham)
Jones, T. Alec (Rhondda, West)	Morris, Charles R. (Openshaw)	Small, William
Kelley, Richard	Morris, John (Aberavon)	Smith, John (London & W'minster)
Lawson, George	Moyle, Roland	Spriggs, Leslie
Ledger, Ron	Murray, Albert	Taverne, Dick
Lee, Rt. Hn. Frederick (Newton)	Neal, Harold	Thornton, Ernest
Lee, Rt. Hn. Jennie (Cannock)	Oswald, Thomas	Tinn, James
Lipton, Marcus	Owen, Dr. David (Plymouth, S'tn)	Urwin, T. W.
Loughlin, Charles	Parker, John (Dagenham)	Varley, Eric G.
Luard, Evan	Pearson, Arthur (Pontypridd)	Waddington, David
Lyon, Alexander W. (York)	Peart, Rt. Hn. Fred	Wainwright, Edwin (Dearne Valley)
Maben, Dr. J. Dickson	Pentland, Norman	Watkins, Tudor (Brecon & Radnor)
McCann, John	Perry, Ernest G. (Battersea, S.)	Wellbeloved, James
Macdonald, A. H.	Prentice, Rt. Hn. R. E.	Whitlock, William
Mackenzie, Gregor (Rutherglen)	Price, William (Rugby)	Wilkins, W. A.
Maclennan, Robert	Probert, Arthur	Williams, Alan (Swansea, W.)
McNamara, J. Kevin	Randall, Harry	Williams, Alan Lee (Hornchurch)
Mahon, Peter (Preston, S.)	Reynolds, Rt. Hn. G. W.	Williams, Clifford (Abertillery)
Mallalieu, E. L. (Brigg)	Roberts, Albert (Normanton)	Williams, Mrs. Shirley (Hitchin)
Mallalieu, J. P. W. (Huddersfield, E.)	Roberts, Rt. Hn. Goronwy	Willis, Rt. Hn. George
Marks, Kenneth	Roberts, Gwilym (Bedfordshire, S.)	Wilson, Rt. Hn. Harold (Huyton)
Mayhew, Christopher	Robinson, Rt. Hn. Kenneth (St. P'c'as)	Wilson, William (Coventry, S.)
Mellish, Rt. Hn. Robert	Rodgers, William (Stockton)	Woodburn, Rt. Hn. A.
Milian, Bruce	Rogers, George (Kensington, N.)	Woof, Robert
Miller, Dr. M. S.	Ross, Rt. Hn. William
Milne, Edward (Blyth)	Rowlands, E.	TELLERS FOR THE NOES:
Moonman, Eric	Silkin, Rt. Hn. John (Deptford)	Mr. Russell Kerr and
Morgan, Elystan (Cardiganshire)	Silverman, Julius	Mr. Michael Foot.
Morris, Alfred (Wythenshawe)

Question proposed, That the Clause stand part of the Bill.

The Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons (Mr. Fred Peart)

The other evening my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Social Services made a suggestion about how we might obtain a document which has aroused controversy. I still believe—and I think that this was confirmed by the speech of the Solicitor-General—that no assurance was given, but I think that hon. Members might like me to take some action for the convenience of the Committee.

I believe that it is the desire of many hon. Members to have this information if possible. This involves another place, and I should like to contact the Leader of the House in another place to make arrangements so that we can have this document presented for the debate on the Question, That the Clause stand part of the Bill. In view of that assurance, which is to help hon. Members—and I mean that—I beg to move, That the Chairman do report Progress and ask leave to sit again.

Mr. Powell

I rise simply because the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the House—[Interruption.]—has, in so far as it lay with him, put right what many of us felt was done wrong this morning—

Hon. Members

Sit down.

Mr. Powell

I do not have to sit down. I wish to thank the right hon.

Gentleman the Leader of the House for having sought to help the Committee.

Sir G. Nabarro

On a point of order.

The Chairman

Order. I think that the whole Committee is anxious to go to lunch. I hope that the Committee will help the Chairman.

Sir G. Nabarro

On a point of order. Mr. Irving, I distinctly heard the hon. Member for Motherwell (Mr. Lawson) refer to my right hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Powell) as a Nazi. Would you ask the hon. Member to withdraw that opprobrious epithet?

The Chairman

I hope that the hon. Member will not pursue this matter. The Chair did not hear it. I should like the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Powell) to proceed.

Mr. Powell

I have no wish to detain the Committee, and no doubt a great deal will be said on the Question which you have just put to the Committee. Nevertheless, I feel, and I believe that those who have been in the Committee this morning share this feeling, that a word of thanks should be addressed to the Leader of the House for what he said.

Mr. James Hamilton (Bothwell)

On a point of order. The hon. Member for Worcestershire, South (Sir G. Nabarro) accused my hon. Friend the Member for Motherwell (Mr. Lawson) of calling the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Powell) a Nazi. The hon. Gentleman's allegation is totally untrue—[Interruption.]

The Chairman

Order. I thought that I tactfully prevented the hon. Member for Worcestershire, South (Sir G. Nabarro) from proceeding on that line. I hope that the hon. Member for Bothwell (Mr. James Hamilton) will allow me to do the same with him.

Mr. Lawson

Further to that point of order. The Committee having spent most of this morning, and most of yesterday, on points of order which were quite farcical, I protested at the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Powell) rising to speak on what he called a matter of courtesy, but which some of us felt was completely discourteous. I wanted to say that, and I have now done so—[Interruption.]

The Chairman

Order. That is not a point of order. I hope that the hon. Member will not pursue it.

Sir D. Glover

Further to that point of order.

The Chairman

I have ruled that it is not a point of order.

Question put and agreed to.

Committee report Progress; to sit again Tomorrow.

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1. ADJOURNMENT 28 words