GENERAL IMPLEMENTATION OF TREATIES

HC Deb 24 May 1972 vol 837 cc1452-586

Mr. Shore

I beg to move Amendment No. 221, in page 2, line 34, leave out subsection (2).

Today once more we are dealing with the central issue of the Bill, the surrender of law-making power by the House of Commons to the non-elected institutions of the Community and the manner in which European laws, past and future, are to be imported into the law of this land. The fact that in Clause 2(2), which we are seeking to delete by this Amendment or to amend by other Amendments associated with it, Parliament is allowed to consider Orders in Council and even to vote on them should deceive no one, for beyond this apparently normal requirement of seeking parliamentary approval there lies the reality of prior decision-making and prior law-making by the Council of Ministers and the Commission as laid down in Article 189 of the Rome Treaty.

Community law-making takes a number of forms, but the one with which we are most concerned today is the power to issue directives. Article 189 of the treaty says: a directive shall be binding as to the result to be achieved on each Member State to which it is addressed. But, unlike regulations which are self-enacting, a directive shall leave to the national authorities the choice of form and methods. Let us be clear that we are not free agents as to the substance of any directive that is issued. The decision of substance will already have been taken by the Council of Ministers. The freedom of action of the House of Commons will be limited to the method of carrying it out. This is an improvement on the outrageous procedures in Clause 2(1). There, the Council and the Commission both have the right to make law by edict and Parliament has no standing in the matter. We shall not even be informed of the content of the legislation until we read the Official Journal, and on present form, as we have heard in our earlier exchanges, there may be a time lag of as much as six months before the new laws of England are even translated into the English language, and they may well be subject to correction.

At least with Clause 2(2) we shall know what our new laws are, and we may even be able to discuss them before they take effect. But it is only by comparison with Clause 2(1) that Clause 2(2) appears to have any merit. At any other time in British parliamentary history Clause 2(2) would itself have excited the most violent denunciation as conferring on the Executive almost unprecedented power in time of peace.

Let us consider what it enables Ministers to do. First, it enables them to make regulations: for the purpose of implementing any Community obligation". Second, it enables them to make regulations: for the purpose of dealing with matters arising out of or related to any such obligation or rights connected with Clause 2(1). That is consequential upon the self-enacting legislation under Clause 2(1). Third, it permits not only Ministers but Departments to make regulations and that is the subject of several Amendments which are being taken with Amendment No. 221. Fourth, there is the blanket permissiveness for Ministers and Departments that, in exercising their statutory powers and in making regulations, they: may have regard to the objects of the Communities". That is something of a mystery which we have not yet had the opportunity of exploring. We had a glimpse into the meaning of those Delphic words on 16th February, when the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry said: It will be noticed that there is no specific reference to the Ministerial power to give general directions… that refers to the present Ministerial power— …to the National Coal Board and the British Steel Corporation, a power which, as was pointed out in the July, 1971. White Paper will have to be modified. The required modification is covered by a general provision in Clause 2(2) read in the context of our treaty obligations. The relevant words in Clause 2(2) are: …in the exercise of any statutory power…including any power to give directions…the person entrusted with the power may have regard to the objects of Communities and to any such obligation or rights as aforesaid'."—[OEFICIAL REPORT. 16th February, 1972; Vol. 831, c. 449.] I understand that what the Minister is saying there is that by the use of these somewhat Delphic words, and taking account of the objectives of the Communities and without any other authorisation, he will not use substantial powers of direction which he at present enjoys under the Acts of Parliament which set up the National Coal Board and the British Steel Corporation. It is an interesting example, but I do not think any hon. Member on either side of the Committee, however gifted, could unaided have discovered the buried implication of this part of Clause 2(2) without the voluntary help of the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry. But who will help us to understand what else lies within the ambit of these words? I hope that we shall have from the right hon. and learned Gentleman a forthright, frank and full statement on what changes in the use of existing powers that Parliament has given to Ministers are expected as a result of incorporating these words into Clause 2(2).

The only Measures in any way comparable to Clause 2(2) that I can discover are the Emergency Powers Acts and the Supplies and Services Acts relating to the two world wars and their immediate aftermath. Clause 2(2) is a European Supplies and Services Act, and it differs from earlier Measures only in the fact that the authors of the regulations to be issued under it are not the British Cabinet but the Council of Ministers and the Commission in Brussels.

The House of Commons and the nation would hardly have thought this was so, or that we were dealing with an important matter, if they had been content with the presentation of the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster in our Second Reading debate: …there remains a miscellany of minor matters which are not included in the Bill but for which some legal provision is needed by accession or shortly afterwards. The provisions are generally in new fields for legislation and regulate such minor and, I hope, uncontroversial matters as textile appellations and the markings on wood in the rough. These matters are appropriate for subordinate legislation. It is necessary to take a general power in order to deal with them…A general power to make subordinate legislation for these purposes is contained in Clause 2(2)…"—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 15th February, 1972; Vol. 831, c. 281.] That is very disarming. In the same debate the Chancellor of the Duchy told us that he did not see much need for Clause 2(2). He told us that in 1972 he expected that only four instruments would be required and in 1973 another 12.

Since then I have asked the right hon. and learned Gentleman questions about the subject matter of these instruments, and I had from him a Written Answer on 18th May. On the face of it, it is difficult to judge the importance of the matters listed, although there is a reference to motor insurance to cover compulsorily insurance liabilities in other member States, which could prove to be of interest to several million British motorists. The matters to be dealt with in 1973 include farm modernisation and structural reform, licensing of proprietary pharmaceutical products, the classification, packaging and labelling of dangerous substances, the application of social security schemes to individual persons and their families moving within the enlarged Community and discrimination in rates and conditions for the transport of goods.

All these, clearly, will touch upon the affairs of many people. Even so, they represent no more than the tip of the legislative iceberg that lies beneath the calm surface of the right hon. and learned Gentleman's soothing words. The truth is that Clause 2(2) gives the Minister immense and far-reaching powers to make new laws in Britain without enduring the detailed scrutiny and prolonged debate involved in the passage of Acts of Parliament.

4.30 p.m.

Wherever, under Article 189 of the Rome Treaty, the Council of Ministers seeks to issue a directive, Clause 2(2) is there waiting to receive it and to turn it by Order in Council into the law of the land. The fact that the Minister has a relatively short list at the present time of measures which he is going to subject to the Clause 2(2) procedure only reflects two facts. The first is that in the Community itself the preponderant legislative process is the regulation, which is self-enacting and which, therefore, does not have to come under any kind of scrutiny. The second reason why it is such a short list today is that most of the directives issued by the Council of Ministers so far are dealt with in Part II of this Bill, in Clauses 4 to 12, and the Schedules or in other Acts of Parliament which already contain the necessary powers for issuing further Statutory Instruments.

Let us consider some of the crucial matters that have been the subject of directives under Article 189 and which could, therefore, have been given the force of law without legislation in this country but with only the limited procedure for scrutiny laid down in Clause 2(2) and Schedule 2. I will not attempt to give more than a few examples.

First let me take the free movement of labour. Under Directive 360 of 15th October, 1968, which fixes the conditions for freedom of movement for workers within the Community, member States must: abolish restrictions on the movement and residence of nationals of the said States and members of their families. They must grant the right of residence in their territory to any nation who can produce two documents: his passport and a letter from his prospective employer. His right of residence will be valid for at least five years and his whole family will have the right to accompany him.

This is not the occasion to discuss the merits of such a law and it might well be that after proper discussion these proposals would commend themselves to Members of Parliament on both sides, and, indeed, to the British people. But that is not the question. In the whole history of our democracy have we ever done anything comparable to the opening of our labour market to 200 million people on terms of total equality with our own work force here in Britain at a stroke and without approval or even mention in the House of Commons?

Mr. Nicholas Ridley (Cirencester and Tewkesbury)

Does the right hon. Gentleman not know, as does the whole nation, that this idea was implicit in joining the Common Market? How does he say that this is a surprise to him and that he did not already know that it would be one of the conditions on which we gained entry into the Community?

Mr. Shore

The hon. Gentleman betrays a limited knowledge of these things because this regulation was dated 15th October, 1968, as I indicated. Indeed, to go back to old ground, this was one of the major acts of legislation passed by the Community in between the two applications.

Under Clause 2(2), this Directive 360 of 15th October, 1968, and any successive directives in the same field can be contained in an Order in Council, and perhaps all we should have would be a one and a half hours' debate upon it.

As I am on this subject of Directive 360, may I inquire of the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster exactly where it is? I do not see it in the Bill and I do not see it in any of the Schedules. Only by the most methodical searches have I found it even in the Treaty of Accession. This crucial matter is dealt with, the Committee may be interested to know, in Article 30 of the Treaty of Accession. It reads as follows: The adaptations to the acts listed in Annex II to this Act made necessary by accession shall be drawn up in conformity with the guide lines set out in that Annex and in accordance with the procedures and under the conditions laid down in Article 153. That is not the most illuminating piece of prose.

We turn to Article 153. This tells us that such acts made by the European institutions before accession shall enter into force on accession. So at least we know that it is going to take effect on accession.

We still have not found Directive 360 of 15th October, 1968. For that we must turn to Part II of the Treaty of Accession, to Annex II 2 therein, and in particular to page 154. There we shall find it listed in the illuminating words: Council Directive No. 68/360/EEC of 15 October 1968 OJ No. L257/ 13, 19 October 1968". That is all that is said in both volumes of the Treaty of Accession, and there is no mention, apart from that, in the treaties or in the Bill which we are debating of the most major change in the whole law concerning the movement of people and the right of access to jobs affecting the people of this country.

But even now it is not clear to me how and through what legislative act this directive No. 360 of 1968 is to be given authority in this country. I hope that the Minister or whoever is replying will explain how that directive is to be given effect. But my point is that this is the kind of matter that could in future come within the purview of Clause 2(2) of this Bill.

I could give many other examples, but I am going to give only very few. In the field of weights and measures the directive of 18th October, 1971, requires us to make major changes in our units of measure and introduces the metric system according to the time table there laid down.

Again, major changes are to be made in our exchange control policy affecting the movement of capital between this country and Western Europe. Once again, it is Community directives that give the initial force of law to these changes, and once again, although in this case there is an exchange control Act that will be used for the purpose, there is the power under Clause 2(2), if such power is needed, for a Minister simply to issue the relevant order to give effect to the Community directive.

Then, to quote my last example, there are the proposed changes in the maximum length and weight of heavy road vehicles, which have yet to be finally decided. I make no comment on the merit of the matter—there is not time to comment on the substance and the merit—but surely I am right in believing that under the powers of Clause 2(2), if the Community agreed on a heavy road vehicle directive, it would be open to the Minister to legislate by Order in Council, unless he already had another bit of legislation which enable him to do the same thing by a Statutory Instrument, which could be the case, of course.

Mr. J. Enoch Powell (Wolverhampton, South-West)

Has the right hon. Gentleman any reason for thinking that that matter would be dealt with by a directive and not by regulation?

Mr. Shore

The right hon. Gentleman has made an extremely important point, and, arising from that, I would like to put a question to the Government Front Bench, because it is a point that has worried me very frequently and I am sure it has worried other hon. Members on both sides. What is the philosophy, the thinking, that distinguishes a regulation from a directive? I know the form of words in Article 189 but I have found when I have tried to think this thing through that there really is very considerable overlap and confusion between the two methods of law-making. To increase the complication there are many examples in which both a regulation and a directive are used. Indeed, the one I cited to the Committee, Directive No. 360 on freedom of movement of labour, is a very important one, and on the same date there is also a regulation which does substantially the same thing and indeed goes rather further than the directive. This is the sort of question on which we would be indebted to have an answer from the Government. It is intolerable to be placed in a position in which we cannot carry out the kind of exchanges that Parliament is used to carrying out in enabling us to probe such a matter. The fact that it cannot be probed worries me very much indeed.

I come back to my point—which was not to comment on the substance of the question about the right weight of vehicle to be allowed into this country, but to make the simple point that the matter could be agreed by Ministers in Brussels and could be subject to 1½ hours' discussion in the House of Commons. I do not know how the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster could describe these matters as "minor and uncontroversial" in terms of the possible use of the provisions of Clause 2(2). On one or two other occasions he has given—I hope inadvertently—a rather misleading impression of the importance of a particular provision in his effort to soothe the anxieties of hon. Members.

I expect we shall hear a great deal from the right hon. and learned Gentleman about the alleged safeguards and, in particular, the limitations set down on the use of Clause 2(2) in Schedule 2. It is a substantial Schedule. Although I hope that we shall have an opportunity later to probe the Schedule separately, I hope it will not be wrong for me to make a few points about the Schedule now since it is closely related to the Clause.

It is true that the Chancellor of the Duchy cannot use the Order in Council procedure according to the Schedule to impose or increase taxes, which was one of the first things to be set down. But then we turn to Clause 2(3) and look at the successor provision to that which we are now discussing. We see that the Chancellor of the Duchy has equipped himself with a blanket power to charge on and issue out of the Consolidated Fund…the amounts required to meet any Community obligation to make payments to any of the Communities or member States…". We are delighted to learn from Schedule 2 that the penalties attaching to the enforcement of his powers do not exceed a two-year prison sentence. We are delighted to learn that the edicts and decrees which he has the power to issue will not be retrospective in their effect. Those are not safeguards of a particularly substantial kind. I cannot imagine a Minister daring to come forward with anything less than this, and it is extraordinary that it should be claimed to be a safeguard at all.

More substantial at first sight is the requirement in Schedule 2 that when the right hon. Gentleman makes an Order in Council by regulation he has either to get the specific approval of both Houses of Parliament or must make the order subject to a negative Resolution procedure on which there can be a Prayer. At first sight it appears to be a safeguard, but the right hon. Gentleman was careful on Second Reading to make clear that his own approach to the alternative methods of either affirmative or negative Resolutions would be flexible. The affirmative Resolution procedure would at least make it necessary for the Minister to move an order in the House, for a discussion to take place and for the House to have an opportunity to vote upon it. That is something, even though the discussion would normally be limited to one-and-a-half hours. But the Minister is far more likely to use the negative procedure, which, as we know, operates only if hon. Members take the initiative in praying against.

We come to a formidable problem. There are an increasing number of orders which Members have sought to annul within the required 40-day period and for which the Government have failed to supply the necessary time for debate. If the Government cannot even provide time to debate orders under our own domestic legislation and are prepared unlawfully, as they have been, to govern by decree, how can we believe that they have either the ability or the intention to provide adequate time for the discussion of the new flow of Community directives entailed by our membership?

When the right hon. and learned Gentleman spoke about this subject on Second Reading, he referred to the joint committee which is now studying these matters under Lord Brooke. The Chancellor of the Duchy then said: As to the use here of the affirmative or negative procedure, the Bill is drafted to ensure flexibility, pending the report of the Joint Committee of both Houses…"—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 15th February, 1972; Vol. 831, c. 285.] That committee is at present considering the whole question. May we be told when it is expected the report will be received and what plans there are for delaying discussion of the Bill if that report is not available. Will the Chancellor of the Duchy take some action, in concert with his right hon. Friend the Leader of the House, to see that the evidence and papers submitted to that joint committee are made available even prior to its full report. I hope we shall have a very clear reply on this matter.

[Sir MYER GALPERN in the Chair]

4.45 p.m.

We have every reason to fear Government by Euro-decree and the fact that matters of vast importance to the welfare and livelihood of millions of people in this country will be decided in the Council in Brussels and be made the subject of orders in London, laid before the House under the negative procedure, and will be brought into effect without this House having an opportunity to discuss them. If it were not for Clause 2(1), Clause 2(2) would be seen for what it is: a constitutional outrage. For the Minister to include among those who have the right to operate these procedures not only Ministers of the Crown but Departments, too, is beyond belief.

We believe that the Clause should go. We feel it is unnecessary. We prefer that legislation should be introduced, if and when legislation proves to be necessary, to carry out any Community obligations. We insist on legislation for the overriding reason that, unlike any other regulations with which we shall be dealing under ordinary legislation, this is not British legislation but European legislation. It has an extra and special quality—namely, that no future Parliament, according to the doctrine which is being laid down by the present Government, will have the right to repeal it.

Sir Derek Walker-Smith (Herefordshire, East)

We have now embarked on the discussion of an important subsection of the vitally important Clause 2. The right hon. Member for Stepney (Mr. Shore) in his interesting observations included some reference to the Delphic words in lines 5 to 10, on page 3 of the Bill. Those words are the subject of a group of Amendments, namely the third group to be taken today which includes one of my own. I apprehend that any observations I wish to make on that subject will be better reserved until that group of Amendments is reached. I wish now to make a few remarks about the more general matters with which we are here concerned.

We are now concerned with the implementation of what the Bill calls "Community obligations" as distinct from "enforceable Community obligations" with which we were dealing in subsection (1). The Community obligations are defined in Part II of Schedule 1. In fact, there is no direct definition of "enforceable Community obligation". That is approached more circuitously and delicately in that we have to understand the definition of an "enforceable Community obligation", which is not given, from the definition of an "enforceable Community right" which is given. But we are concerned here with the non-enforceable Community obligations, that is to say, the non-self-enacting obligations.

As we see from Article 189, the Regulations are those which in the language of the Bill are called "self-enacting", and we have dealt with them in the previous subsection. Directives with which we are concerned here, because of their definition in Article 189, are intended not to be self-enacting but to have their effect translated by each member State into the idiom of its own law through the mechanism of its own constitutional procedures. In Britain, this means that there must be some form of statutory enactment because, pending the coming into operation' of Clause 2(1), there is no other method in Britain of making new law. Therefore the Government have a free choice under the terms of the Treaty, either to employ full legislative processes or to employ the abbreviated processes of subordinate legislation, that is to say, some form of statutory instrument.

In their formulation of this subsection, the Government have chosen the second of those two methods. That brings with it the clear consequential disadvantages of limitation of the scope of Parliamentary action and of the time afforded to Parliament's consideration of these matters. There is the concentration of Parliamentary consideration into a single and short stage. There is the exclusion of any power to amend. There may be restriction to the negative procedure by paragraph 2(2) of Schedule 2. Taken together, these matters constitute a serious diminution of the parliamentary function where the power to improve and correct may be just as valuable as the power to reject. Anyone with experience of this House knows how often that has proved to be the case.

The right hon. Member for Stepney has testified to the fact that it is not as if directives are concerned only with minor matters. That is far from being the position. For example, the Community's requirements in regard to harmonisation have tended to take the form of directives, as the Committee can see by glancing at page 43 of volume 42, the index volume of the secondary legislation. The Community's requirements in regard to motor vehicles have tended to take the form of directives. The Community's requirements in regard to poultry, whereby the presentation of what is known as cleaned plucked poultry will not be allowed, take the form of directives. Directives are not merely a minor form of regulation.

It is true that Article 189 provides that regulations under the Treaty must be of universal application. But the converse is not true. It is not true that directives cannot be of universal application. In fact, as one can see by looking at the form of Article 189, there is nothing to prevent matters of universal application—that is to say, those applying to all member States—being dealt with by directives rather than regulations. There is nothing to prevent major matters being dealt with by directives rather than regulations. The appropriate instrument for Community requirements applying only to a minority of member States or to a single member State is the "decision", which ranks only third in the hierarchy of Community instruments. There is the advantage with directives that member States are given a discretion as to the form of enactment so long as they reproduce the substance.

On Second Reading, I gave the House figures which showed the changing trend in the use of regulations and directives within the Community in the quinquennium 1966–71 whereby the earlier trend to make more use of directives is being reversed and there is now a much greater use of regulations. There is a strong case for a reversion to the earlier position and a greater use of directives giving the member States the discretion as to the form and method of enactment. That is especially important from our point of view since, as we see from subsection (1), Parliament has no say in regulations.

I believe that Members of this House of Commons should pursue two associated objectives in this matter. First, in the event of British entry to the Community, we should seek a greater use of directives as against regulations by the Community for the reasons that I have given—greater flexibility and discretion as to the form and method. Secondly, we should seek here and now in this Bill wider and more effective Parliamentary participation than is afforded by Clause 2(2)—either full statutory processes or, at the least, affirmative procedures in all cases.

If Britain enters the Community we shall not find ourselves alone in our anxiety for greater parliamentary participation and an infusion of greater democracy into the workings of the Community, especially the decision-making processes. In his interesting and informative Chatham House study of the workings of national Parliaments within the Community, Mr. Michael Niblock has identified …the problem of the democratic gap in the Community decision-making processes. He has referred also to the anxiety of the Bundestag …about the clearly adverse consequences which the process of integration was having on the system of democratic government in West Germany and other Community countries. Therefore many would share with us a concern with our first objective of seeking a greater use of directives rather than regulations. I believe that here and now we can give encouragement to those like-thinking people by achieving the second objective, which I have defined, by showing an insistence on a full measure of Parliamentary participation, scrutiny and control, as the Treaty allows to us.

5.0 p.m.

It would be especially appropriate to do that here today because, as I understand it, on Friday there is to be a meeting in Luxembourg of Ministers of the Six and of the applicant countries to discuss amongst other matters methods of improving the decision-making processes within the Community. Yesterday the Daily Telegraph reported a Common Market delegate to this Luxembourg meeting as saying: All eyes are now on Britain which, it is hoped, will make a determined stand to bring adequate democratic machinery into Common Market decision-making. I always read the Daily Telegraph with care and attention for its authoritative observations. I only hope that my right hon. and learned Friend will not disappoint the Common Market delegate in Luxembourg on this matter. Certainly he will have every assistance and sup- port from both sides of the Committee regarding improvements in the democratic processes. After all, this is an objective which can and should be shared by hon. Members concerned with parliamentary government and democratic processes, irrespective of their views about the propriety of entry.

Mr. Deakins

Would the right hon. and learned Gentleman make it absolutely clear, however, that when the Daily Telegraph and other pro-Market organs talk of improving the democratic processes of the Community, what they are talking about is strengthening the central democratic processes in the Community and not restoring to national parliaments powers which have been taken away from them? We ought to be very clear, when discussing the issue of democratic control of Community institutions, that what we intend is a restoration of the rights of national parliaments, and not an extension of the rights of a central European Parliament.

Sir D. Walker-Smith

The hon. Gentleman points to the distinction between the two possible ways of extending the democratic machinery. I do not know to which democratic machinery the Common Market delegate was referring, but there are those two possibilities and they have been much canvassed by parliamentarians within the Community countries over the years, as the hon. Gentleman knows. But the cause of the European Parliament and the case for extending its functions gains strength amongst parliamentarians when they see that their own activities and control within their national parliaments are "cabin'd, cribb'd confin'd" by the processes of the Community. If the hon. Gentleman reads Mr. Niblock's very interesting work—if he has not already done so—he will see the various essays and efforts made by not all but some of the national parliaments, the Bundestag in particular, and in Belgium and the Netherlands. They have made very interesting efforts, which have been by no means wholly successful—I do not think that they or Mr. Niblock would claim that, and certainly I would not—to infuse a greater degree of democratic control within the national parliaments.

I am not privileged to know the terms of reference at the Luxembourg meeting, but any extensions of democratic control in particular to the national parliaments which my right hon. and learned Friend can commend would no doubt be very welcome to parliamentarians and democrats within the countries of the Six generally, in addition to being welcome here. Every hon. Member sitting in this House of Commons, in which these parliamentary and democratic processes have been cradled and have survived over the generations, irrespective of his general views on the propriety of entry, would wish to strengthen democratic control and parliamentary processes. It is that which is being sought to be done in the Amendments. I would think that not even the most vivid imagination, not even the most hyperbolic utterance, could classify the Amendments as wrecking Amendments in any shape or form. On the contrary, the Treaty leaves to us here a clear discretion as to, in the Treaty's words, choice of form and methods. We should, therefore, use that discretion wisely, as given to us, and we should choose a form and method which would give this Parliament a useful fuction and enable it, at least to this extent, to ensure that our Treaty obligations are carried out as far as possible in accordance with our constitutional procedures and with the rights and liberties of the British people.

Mr. Douglas Jay (Battersea, North)

Before rather hurriedly leaving the Chamber, the hon. Member for Cirencester and Tewkesbury (Mr. Ridley) apparently tried to argue in an intervention that we need not worry all that amount about these legislative powers we are handing over to the European Economic Community because it has all been known for many years past. If all this were clearly known to the Government and to the hon. Gentleman last year, it is rather extraordinary that they omitted any mention of this from the White Paper and the shortened version of it which they distributed, in millions of copies, throughout the country. If the hon. Gentleman understood it then, it was highly dishonest of him and his Government to try to conceal that fact from the country as a whole.

The Committee has now reached the rather extraordinary position, as we discovered earlier this afternoon, that we are not merely being asked to legislate in a way which is unknown and on the strength of documents which have not been published, but we are even being asked, apparently, to pass laws which are subject to correction and alteration, by whom we are not quite clear, after the legislative Act has gone through the House of Commons. If this is an example of the sort of parliamentary and legislative system into which we shall be forced in the EEC, it is one further salutary lesson which is being made clear by these debates.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Stepney (Mr. Shore) and the right hon. and learned Member for Hertfordshire, East (Sir D. Walker-Smith) have discussed the general nature of the Statutory Instruments which will arise under Clause 2(2). I should like to ask the Government one or two more detailed questions, but on issues which are nevertheless crucially important. Clause 2(2) applies to legislative acts of the Council or of the Commission which are not directly applicable, and it provides for these to be made effective by Orders in Council or regulations. The right hon. and learned Member for Hertfordshire, East is perfectly correct in saying that there was nothing in the Treaty of Rome which compelled the Government to make these directives enforceable by Statutory Instrument and not by the full process of legislation. That is a decision of the Government, for which they must take responsibility, and it is nothing to do with the Treaty of Rome.

The first question which arises and which, so far as I know, the Government have not clearly answered, is this: to which instruments under the Treaty of Rome does this subsection apply? From Article 189 of the Treaty, we know that regulations are directly applicable and, if the Government have their way, would be given the force of law in this country without further enactment. We know that in the case of directives the Treaty, in the words of Article 189, leaves to the national authorities the choice of form and methods. I take it that this subsection would make an Order in Council, whether affirmative or negative, or a regulation necessary to enforce such a directive.

But what about decisions, the third type of legislative act of the Council and Commission? Under the Bill, will they require a statutory instrument before the House of Commons or will they not? The Solicitor-General, in an earlier debate, said, "No". The Minister of State for the Treasury, coming fresh on the scene, said, "Yes". The Minister of State made that pronouncement on 3rd May. From the Treaty of Rome it seems plain that the Minister of State is right and that the Solicitor-General is wrong. Article 189 clearly says that regulations are directly applicable. It refrains from saying the same thing about decisions. It merely says: A decision shall be binding in its entirety upon those to whom it is addressed. Since the Treaty does not say that decisions are directly applicable, those of us who are not lawyers must presume that they are not directly applicable. But this point must be cleared up before we pass on from the subsection. Do decisions, as opposed to directives or regulations, require further enactment or not? If the Solicitor-General maintains that they do not, can he show us the authority in the Treaty of Rome for that document?

Clause 2(2) speaks not merely of Orders in Council but of regulations, and this means in this case United Kingdom regulations made by the EEC. Later on it speaks of: rules, regulations or other subordinate instrument". Perhaps the Government will explain the rules, regulations or other subordinate instrument which will be used to enforce EEC legislation, which of them are subject to the approval of the House, and which are not. We should know that also before we part with this subsection, because it is crucial to the whole legislative change that we are being asked to make.

There is a third point which I do not believe has been answered so far in the debates about what happens if an Order in Council under this subsection is rejected by the House. We are still ignorant about this. Presumably the Government are sincere in providing for Orders in Council to be subject to a decision by the House.

I suppose they contemplate that from time to time the House might reject such an order. They are not saying, I assume, that the whole thing is a farce and a mockery, and even if the House rejected a directive it would have the force of law just the same. What then would be the legal position if a directive were rejected? Should we be in breach of the Treaty of Rome?

We were told much earlier in the debate that certain other Amendments were out of order because their acceptance would involve a breach of the Treaty. Obviously this Amendment cannot be out of order, because if it was we should not be discussing it now. Does it follow that if one of these Orders in Council was rejected we should not be in breach of the Treaty? This seems to be of considerable importance, since it goes to the root of the power of the House as to whether there is any reality in the Statutory Instrument procedure and Orders in Council? I hope that at last question before we leave the Clause.

Will the Minister who is to reply to the debate tell us clearly what the position would be if we rejected one of these Orders in Council? I hope that a last we will have clear answers to the questions that I have put.

Mr. Rippon

I will, if I may, answer the right hon. Gentleman's point immediately. If the House rejected an Order in Council obviously we should be in breach of that particular obligation and we should have to consider the consequences, just as the right hon. Gentleman had to consider the consequences of the 10 per cent. surcharge which the Labour Government imposed and which was illegal under the EFTA treaties.

5.15 p.m.

Mr. J. Enoch Powell (Wolverhampton, South-West)

Like the right hon. Member for Battersea, North (Mr. Jay), I wish to put a series of specific questions about the subsection before I come to my general observations upon Clause 2(2). It is one of the disadvantages under which we labour in being bound by a Guillotine Motion that in dealing with specific points of interpretation it is not practicable, because of time, to have question and answer and question and answer, which is a useful part of Committee proceedings, and which alone can produce satisfactory elucidation. I say this simply in order to ask my right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor of the Duchy, or whoever will reply to the debate, to take particular note, since in this case we shall have only one shot.

My first point relates to the expression in the subsection "or department" and later on "or Government Department". It is at least extremely unusual that the power to make regulations shall be given not only to a Minister of the Crown, but to a Government Department. It may be that my right hon. and learned Friend can produce some precedents for this, but it is certainly extremely unusual.

There is one apparent exception, which is not a real exception, and that is the commonly found power of the Treasury to make regulations. But that is the exception which proves the rule since "Treasury" is an abbreviation for "Lords Commissioners of the Treasury", and is the designation not of a Government Department, but of a collectivity of Ministers. Apart from that only apparent exception, I do not think I can be faulted in saying that it is at least extremely rare for the power of regulation-making deliberately to be given not to a Minister but to a Department.

It is difficult to see what are the reasons for this, because presumably there is a Minister responsible for any Department of State, a Minister who will have to answer for any regulations made if they are challenged; and therefore I would like my right hon. and learned Friend to explain why this apparently offensive and unnecessary provision, to give a regulation making power directly to a department, is included.

I would ask him, if it can be dispensed with, that he should dispense with it. The criticism to which this subsection is liable is severe enough, and the anxieties of hon. and right hon. Gentlemen in all parts of the House are deep enough, for no unnecessary infringement of their susceptibilities and fears to be made; and surely it was unnecessary to do that by including a specific regulation-making power for Government Departments.

Now that my right hon. and learned Friend is working under the guillotine and his anxieties about time are thereby presumably diminished, if not removed, I hope he will regard himself as being at liberty, where a case is made out, as this has been, for a minor Amendment to the Bill, to make it. I press upon him, therefore, the Amendment in my name and that of other right hon. and hon. Gentlemen which would have the effect of restricting the regulation-making power specifically to Ministers of the Crown alone.

I direct my right hon. and learned Friend's attention to subsection (2)(b), for it contains a number of matters which require careful examination and elucidation. I take first the first part of the paragraph. The Order in Council or regulation power is to be used under this paragraph for the purpose of dealing with matters arising out of or related to any Community obligations or rights. Now, we are already familiar from these debates with the fact that Community rights and obligations—my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Hertfordshire, East (Sir D. Walker-Smith) pointed out that we are not restricted here to enforceable Community rights and obligations—are extremely wide in their ambit; and as time passes, it is intended they shall become ever wider still. Consequently matters which not merely "arise" out of such obligations and rights but are "related to" them cover an extremely wide area.

The Committee should realise what is the ambit of the power it is giving by the words in paragraph (b). It would be very difficult to limit the scope of matters "relating to" any of the rights, liabilities, obligations and so on, arising out of the Community as the Community develops. When we think of the economic, the monetary, the agricultural, the commercial rights and obligations which exist already and which will gradually grow, we ought to realise that, as this wording stands, the regulation-making power will be extended not just to the implementation of directives falling within their scope but to matters which can be regarded as "related to" them. Great though our jealousy is already about the implementation of the rights and obligations themselves by means of subsection (2), we must be all the more anxious when that procedure is to be extended to matters which are only quite vaguely related to them.

Mr. Nicholas Ridley (Cirencester and Tewkesbury)

My right hon. Friend mentions economic and monetary matters Can he say when last there was either a Bill or an order before the House to determine our economic or monetary policy? These are matters which are in any case left to the Administration, and my right hon. Friend is in a sense, I believe, trying to claim rights to control aspects of policy which have always been the prerogative of the Executive.

Mr. Powell

If I am claiming the right to control them, so is the Bill. The Bill of course deals with matters of law, with the creation of new legal rights and obligations now and in the future. I am surprised that my hon. Friend should deny that, as the economic and monetary policies of the Community develop, new rights and obligations which would have to be clothed in legislative and legal form—not all of them, of course; some of them would be prerogative, but many of them—could and would fall within the scope of paragraph (b).

Mr. Ridley

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend, because he has brought out the point that under subsection (2) Parliament would have more control over its economic and monetary destiny than it has had in the past.

Mr. Powell

I wish I could follow my Friend in that. I take encouragement from his evident sympathy with the object of myself and many of my right hon. and hon. Friends to secure an increase of Parliamentary control. But I must tell him that the Bill—I can quote my right hon. and learned Friend to this effect—does only what is necessary where the law must be altered to enable us to comply now and for the future with our duties, and to obtain our rights, as members of the Community. It does not, and it cannot, enlarge the scope of the control of the House over the Executive. Much the contrary, there are many respects in which the control of the House over the Executive outside the legislative process would be diminished if this country were to join the Community.

I return to my argument. The second point I ask my right hon. and learned Friend to address himself to is the apparently extreme breadth of the expression, "matters related to any Community obligation or rights." Is it really necessary that in such sweeping terms the regulation-making power should be extended so far? I ask him to look again at the scope of the powers for this legislation by regulation which he is taking.

Now I come to the second part of paragraph (b). Again I construe the purposes for which these powers of subordinate legislation are to be used. I hope I have construed correctly. I do so as follows. They are to be used for the purpose of dealing with…the coming into force, or the operation from time to time, of subsection (1) above". I ask the Committee particularly to note the precise wording, because I think it has not so far received sufficient attention. It does not say, the coming into force of new law under subsection (1) above. It says: the coming into force of subsection (1) above". The natural meaning is that subsection (1) will not come into force at all unless and until a regulation for the purpose is made under subsection (2). I should like my right hon. and learned Friend to say whether that natural interpretation is or is not correct. If it is, as I think it must be, will he tell us more about the commencement date of subsection (1)? We have spent an appreciable amount of time in the Committee looking at subsection (1), and I think we did so without realising that its coming into force is in terms dependent upon a regulation to be made under subsection (2).

It may be that this is just a device of convenience, that the date 1st January, 1973, perhaps out of deference to the hon. Member for West Ham, North (Mr. Arthur Lewis) might not be regarded as convenient for the whole of the Community legislation in regulation form to be loaded on to the shoulders of this country. Perhaps my right hon. and learned Friend has in mind that the wind should be tempered to the shorn lamb, and that successive dates of coming into effect should be prescribed by regulation. But at any rate I think he owes the Committee an explanation of what is meant by, and what is intended by, the words for the purpose…of dealing with…the coming into force…of subsection (1) above". He may be able to stimulate in the breasts of some of us the hope that we do not have to make a regulation under subsection (2) for that purpose at all, in which case many of the anxieties expressed in previous debates in the Committee will have been unnecessary.

But that is not the only part of the paragraph. Let me take the other part of the construction: for the purpose of dealing with…the operation from time to time, of subsection (1) above". How does my right hon. and learned Friend intend to deal with the operation from time to time of subsection (1) above"? We have been given rather to understand that subsection (1) was a take-it-or-leave-it matter. My right hon. and learned Friend spent many speeches telling the Committee we were in the hands of a superior power. "After all", said he, "Article 189 of the Treaty of Rome is a take-it-or-leave-it matter. This is self-enacting Community law." He repudiated the notion that any Parliamentary process in this country could stand between self-enacting legislation of the Community and its having the force of law in this country. If that is so, what are the regulations to be about which deal with the operation from time to time of subsection (1) above"? I hope my right hon. and learned Friend will not misunderstand me. I am not asking him to take those words out. I am asking him to take encouragement from them, to take heart from them, and to tell us if he can that he still intends to keep control, and to enable the House to keep control, of the blocks or masses of new law which are to be introduced into our domestic law by subsection (1). I hope he will not dash the incipient expectations which a strict construction of the paragraph might inspire.

Those are three of the specific points to which I should be grateful if the Treasury Bench would address itself.

5.30 p.m.

My fourth and last is this, and it arises out of Schedule 2. When we look at Schedule 2, as did the right hon. Member for Stepney, we find, with some reassurance, that, wide though the powers are in subsection (2), they have their limits, and in particular that they cannot be used to impose or increase taxation or to create criminal offences of a certain defined character. So we appear to know what are the limits of the implementation of directives by subsection (2). If a directive, in other words, did require the creation of such criminal offences, did require the imposition or increase of taxation, then subsection (2) would not be usable for the purpose of implementing it and it would be necessary for the Government of the day to legislate. I take it that that is the significance—I hope this will be confirmed—of the safeguard embodied in Schedule 2.

But then one reflects that this is all about directives. Suppose there were a regulation which imposed or increased taxation, or which created a new criminal offence of this character? Schedule 2 does not bite on regulations. It does not bite on subsection (1) of Clause 2. We should be presented, if this were the case, with an intolerable anomaly, the paradox that the Government of this country could not legislate by regulation in order to impose or increase taxation or to create these criminal offences, but a bureaucracy outside this country could do so without let or hindrance—the paradox that our own Government would need to legislate if they wanted these powers, but, of course, if these powers were given by the method of regulation—and the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Shore) was surely right when he said that the line of demarcation between regulation and directive is far from clear or sharply marked—then the Commission or the Council of Ministers could penetrate directly, by-passing all Parliamentary procedures, into the law of this country.

Mr. Jay

The right hon. Gentleman will also agree that it is not clear who decides whether a given enactment shall be by way of regulation or directive, but it would appear from the Treaty of Rome that the Commission itself could decide to act by directive and not in any other way.

Mr. Powell

That is how it looks, and I have followed with interest the right hon. Gentleman's earlier arguments on this point. I cannot believe that it can be the Government's intention that there should be such a glaring paradox. I cannot believe that they have, quite rightly, limited the regulation-making power of Her Majesty's Government, as they have done in Schedule 2, without seeking to place any limits upon self-enacting law under subsection (1). I therefore ask my right hon. and learned Friend to give the Committee one or two alternative assurances which would remove this intolera-able paradox.

The first assurance is that no Community regulation, no self-enacting law of the Community, will do what Schedule 2 says a regulation under Clause 2(2) cannot do. I ask him if he can give that assurance. I hope he can; bust I must say that I was a little alarmed by the report—and we are getting these reports almost daily now in The Times—of the case of Signora Leonisio v. the Italian Revenue Administration, in the course of which the Community Court declared not only that …the Council regulation was directly applicable… and so on, but went on to say: Payments…accruing from such regulations became due once the pre-requisites laid down in the regulation had been complied with, and could not be made subject to rules of implementation other than those for which express provision was made in the regulation itself. So I just hope that it will be possible for my right hon. and learned Friend to assure us that no self-enacting, self-operating law of the Community, is going to be able to do any of the things set out in Schedule 2. However, in case my right hon. and learned Friend is unable to give that assurance, I fall back upon the alternative assurance which I think would perhaps equally satisfy the anxieties of the Committee.

Mr. Heffer

I have had experience in the House of assurances given by Ministers with the Act concerned saying something else. Therefore, the interpretation outside the House is quite different very often from any assurance given by a Minister. Would it not be better if the Government on this occasion went further than merely giving the right hon. Gentleman his assurance and said that they would look at this matter again and bring back an Amendment which would take his point into consideration?

Mr. Powell

The hon. Gentleman will realise that the Amendment we are discussing would leave out subsection (2), and the Committee might feel that, if the reply of my right hon. and learned Friend were not satisfactory at this stage, the only right course would be to omit subsection (2). Perhaps the knowledge that the hon. Gentleman can vote subsection (2) out in the Lobby may be some reassurance to him.

I was just indicating the alternative assurance which I was seeking—perhaps the terms are conventional—from my right hon. and learned Friend. This is that, if there are to be any Community regulations which would do what Schedule 2 says that domestic regulations cannot do, he should bring them into force in this country by legislation.

In fact, as I have argued, and as is clear from the wording of subsection (2), there is a choice; for although we have been told that subsection (2) is concerned with directives, and subsection (1) with regulations, subsection (2) is quite unlimited in its application and any Government could perfectly well use subsection (2), if they wished, in order to implement a Community regulation; and if they found a Community regulation which involved, for example, the creation of major criminal offences or the imposition or increase of taxation, they could perfectly well legislate.

That brings me to the major observation which I have to offer upon this subsection. The effect of the subsection is to make it possible for this or any future Government to change the law of this country by order or regulation when it would otherwise be necessary to do so by legislation. They have deliberately chosen to introduce into the Bill a means of short-circuiting parliamentary procedures which they were not compelled to do in order to comply with the Treaty. After all, if they were compelled to do so in order to comply with the Treaty, then, in the first place, as has been pointed out, we would not be allowed to debate these Amendments at all, and in the second place we would not have Schedule 2, which in certain cases obliges the Government actually to legislate. So it is a voluntary choice on the part of those who drafted this Bill to provide the power to make law without going through the normal parliamentary procedure.

On that, I have two observations to make. The first is that the Government cannot ride out of this difficulty by saying that, as we have to comply with directives anyhow, an order is just as good as legislation—indeed, perhaps better than legislation, since in the last resort Parliament cannot refuse to implement a directive. This is very difficult ground. Of course we all recognise that a directive is binding in its effect, just as we recognise that a regulation is binding, short of breach of the Treaty. Yet here we have a Bill, many of the Clauses of which are making by legislation exactly the sort of changes in our domestic law which, as a result of 2(2), will in future be made by regulation or Order in Council. If that can be done legislatively in this Bill, why cannot it be done legislatively in future as and when necessary? Every hon. Member knows the answer. It could be done, but it would be inconvenient, it would be time-consuming. Therefore, as a sop, in this Bill we have been given a few Clauses, about half a dozen, which use legislation to implement Community law, but, having been given that sop, we are asked to agree in 2(2) that there shall be no more of that in future—that in future, short of the cases set out in Schedule 2, it shall always be done by Order or by Regulation. My right hon. and learned Friend by his Bill is estopped from arguing that 2(2) is necessary. The very form of the Bill is the proof that it is unnecessary, an unnecessary invasion of the legislative rights of Parliament.

That brings me to a consideration of what those legislative rights are. Many times in the debate the terminology of Article 189 about directives has been quoted. It says that directives: leave to the national authorities the choice of form and methods. We are told that in such cases we can have a regulation and we can debate it, if we like, for an hour and a half. If the usual channels bring sufficient pressure to bear on the Lord President of the day, we might even have a whole day with the regulation before us, to debate the form and method.

But a great part of the legislative work of Parliament lies in the consideration of form and method. There are two aspects to legislation. One is the principle, whether it is right at all to change the law for the purpose proposed. There we are bound by the directive of the Community. The other purpose of legislation is to see that the form and method are as just as possible, as convenient as possible and as intelligent as possible. That is what most of the procedure on Bills is about: the greater part of it is concerned with form and method. We would certainly not be satisfied if in any other context a Government were to say to us—although I must admit that in this context this Government have come perilously near to it—"Now you have decided the principle, all you need is one day to say 'Yes' or 'No' to the entire text, however detailed and lengthy."

On the very wording of the Treaty, the very requirements of Article 189, it is the legislative procedure which is required, because the legislative procedure is about form and method. We have not spent several centuries refining our peculiar method of discussing form and method in order to be told in the year 1972, "All that is now old hat and you can look at form and method in one day's sitting."

There is a certain line which my hon. and right hon. Friends on the Front Bench take when thus challenged. They say, "Ah yes, but when the directive has been made eventually, after all the goings-on at Brussels, why, it will be as familiar to you as an Act of Parliament which has gone through all its stages. It will have been discussed there year after year; the CBI will have been at it; the TUC, perhaps a Committee of the House in one form or another will have been at it. It will be familiar ground, trodden over and over. You will be in tears with boredom. Bless your hearts, you will not want a Committee and Report stage to consider it in the form of a Bill." Will we not? There is the world of difference between preliminary consultation, whatever may be its form, its length, or its thoroughness, and the presentation to the House of a definitive proposal by the Government of the day which the House then considers as prospective law.

These things are utterly different and it is a denial of the Parliamentary process to suppose that it is possible to substitute prior consultation of any kind for the process of legislation. If this is true even of the regulations, of which the essence is that their form and method is to be universal throughout the Community, how much more does it apply to directives, which leave the form and method to the national Parliaments? No amount of consultation at Brussels will have covered what is the business of this House, the form and method to be employed in adapting the directive to the law of this country. There is no ground on which this subsection can be justified as being necessary. Since it is not necessary, it ought to be taken out of the Bill. Its presence there is a direct affront to, and a denial of, the essential procedures of the House of Commons.

5.45 p.m.

Mr. English

May I add to what the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Powell) has said about there being a great difference between prior consultation and prospective law-making and say that there is a great difference between the prior consultation of unelected people and asking elected people to make law. Hon. Members will be aware that my principal objection to British entry to the Common Market has been the undemocratic quality of the institution. I never thought that I would be forced to say of a Government taking us into the, Community, it might have been a Labour Government, that they were undemocratic too.

It would have been perfectly possible for a Government desiring to go into the Common Market to say that they too did not like the undemocratic quality of the Communities. There are people in favour of British entry who have said this, but their answer is, "Let us get in and then change it". This Government never say that. They never say that they want to go into the Communities but do not like its undemocratic aspects and when they are in will try to change them. Not only that, but they go further and try to be undemocratic themselves in ways in which the Communities and the treaties under which the Communities are set up are not.

Subsection 2(2) is a perfect example. The Treaty has no requirement whatever that we should legislate in any other way than by our normal processes. The Government, for purposes that can only be described as undemocratic, wish to restrict the normal processes of legislation, and to restrict them to the Executive rather than to the normal Legislature of the country.

It is worse than that. My right hon. Friend the Member for Stepney (Mr. Shore) said that the insertion of the word "department" had enabled hon. Gentlemen opposite to put down Amendments about that. Let us consider how the directives can come about. The choice between a regulation and a directive is made, not here, but in Brussels. The contents of the directive are decided, not here, but in Brussels. By whom will the decision be made? It could be made by a Council of Ministers. It could be made by members of our own Front Bench. But it need not be, because the Ministers themselves often delegate things to a Committee of permanent representatives. They often delegate things to their civil servants meeting in committee there. And then the matter could come here and be dealt with entirely at civil service level without a Minister of State ever seeing the British regulation which resulted from the directive. All this could happen because of the insertion of the word "department". An Under-Secretary or an Assistant-Secretary could write out the regulation and sign it, and under this subsection that would be the necessary regulation. The Minister might not even see it.

Not only is power being taken away from the House of Commons and given to the Executive, but it is being taken away from those members of the Executive who are Members of the House and given to a great mass of civil servants below them. This may be convenient, but it is not democratic, and one wishes to know why this is being done. At the moment this is a totally sovereign country, with its sovereign legislature. We govern every aspect of our affairs. We do the necessary law-making for every aspect of the affairs of this country. By the Bill we are subtracting from that totality certain powers which we are passing across to the European Communities. Whether one agrees with that principle or not, that is what is happening. We are not adding any power to our sovereignty, because it is not possible to add to absolute sovereignty. We already have a totality of power.

All that will happen in Brussels is that within a limited respect they will have certain powers which we now possess. When they say to us in relation to matters over which we possess sovereign power, please legislate on, say, transport, VAT, indirect taxation, or anything of that character, what we are saying is that after 1st January we shall not be able to do what we have the time to do now under our own sovereignty and totality of power. There is no reason for it. We cannot on the occasion of a request from Brussels say that we do not have time to do on the Floor of the House what we have the power to do now and what we often do. We cannot on such an occasion say that Ministers do not have time to sign the orders. We cannot say that we have not the time to do what we already have the power to do, and are doing in certain respects.

The right hon. and learned Member for Hertfordshire, East (Sir D. Walker-Smith) said that regulations were once less frequent than directives, but that the proportion has been changing, and instead of the Communities suggesting or issuing their directives on changes in the law of the Communities, they have been issuing regulations. No one would challenge that. In the past the tendency has been to endeavour to change the law of the Community States by directives. There is slowly developing a tendency to change the law by regulations.

The right hon. and learned Gentleman argued that that was undesirable. I can understand why people who hold the views that I do, and others who are opposed to the principle of the Bill, believe that to be so. Although on matters of principle I agree with the right hon. and learned Gentleman, in fact it is the whole principle of directives that is bad, because when there is a federal State or a federal institution there are various ways of enacting law within it. The normal way in all federal States or institutions is clearly and closely to define the legislative power of the federation as a whole, and of its subordinate parts, and then to say that within those clearly defined limits it can exercise its lawmaking or, for that matter, executive powers. That is a relatively simple thing.

In this case there is a federal power to legislate by regulation, and subordinate States have powers to legislate—in so far as they have not been taken away—but there is a third factor, and the mere existence of that factor complicates the law-making process for all individuals subjected to the law.

But it is worse than that because, in Community terms, the directive is itself law. But it is law which is not applicable to everybody. If a regulation or an Act of Parliament is passed it applies to every person within the jurisdiction of Parliament. Everyone must obey that regulation or Act. But that is not so with a directive. The only people obliged to obey it are the member States, the Six, or, as it may be, the Ten. They are obliged to obey it, but nobody else.

The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster was a little slipshod about this. All that the member States are obliged to do is to carry out the directive at some time, unless a time is specified. When the right hon. and learned Gentleman said that if the House of Common rejected a British regulation of the kind that we are discussing we would be in breach of a directive, he was being slipshod, because it depends on the terms of the directive. If the directive said that something had to be done within two years, and only six months had elapsed by the time we rejected the Government's proposals, we would not be in breach of anything at all. We would merely be saying that that is not the way we want to do it, and we would not be in breach of anything.

Furthermore, as we know from what has happened in Italy about VAT, and as the Chancellor said, we can go back to the Commission and say that for certain technical or political reasons—perhaps because a General Election is due—we should like the directive to be deferred; that we should like to do X within a certain time, and therefore would like the directive to us changed. It is this last feature which all lawyers in the Committee will realise is bad, because a directive of this nature is a cause of inequality.

If we change the law relating to taxation, or if we legislate to impose VAT, we impose that law on everybody. We debate at the time who will have VAT imposed upon him. We debate whether somebody will be exempted, zero-rated or charged a different rate. A pharmacist knows that when the law relating to him comes into force every pharmacist will be subject to the same taxation. But that is not so in this case, and if a directive is issued saying that every State in Western Europe shall impose VAT, and some do and some do not, or some do and some do not on different dates, the situation will be far worse than receiving complaints from pharmacists about the transition from purchase tax to VAT.

One gets the situation that despite the free movement of goods and labour some people are subject to tax from, say, this month, but people on the other side of the Channel in the same industry are not subject to the tax because that State has not obeyed the directive. They have no right as individuals in this respect. I suggest, with all respect to the right hon. and learned Member for Hertfordshire, East, that he thinks of the problems involved by directives as distinct from regulations once we are inside the Common Market.

6.0 p.m.

The last problem is that, unlike a regulation, a directive cannot be enforced. That is so because no one has a right to bring an action against a member State. It is the law imposed by the member States that no individual or corporation has the right to bring an action against a member State except another member State or the institutions of the Community. I cannot, as I can with the Executive of this country, say to a court that the Minister is not doing what the law says. In this case I or any individual, or any corporation, however great it might be, could not go and say, "This is not being obeyed by some countries or by another country other than our own."

Nobody can go to a court and say that. Only the Government could do so in relation to other Governments. If the Government did so, because of the way in which the institutions of the Community are set up and the powers of the court of the Community, there is no means of enforcing any decision of the court against a member State.

In all the textbooks on Community law the point is firmly made that there is no effective means of enforcement against a member State. It is natural enough. One cannot enforce laws against people who possess real power. That is the situation and that is the difference between law making in this way and law making in the normal sense in which we are used to it.

It is for those reasons, not merely that this Clause is needlessly undemocratic, as the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West pointed out, but also that it is a bad system of legislation or possible legislation imposed on us by the treaties, that it is even more important that the House and the Executive should consider the details of directives so imposed upon us.

Mr. Michael Grylls (Chertsey)

I was following the hon. Gentleman's last point carefully. Does that not clearly make the point that a country's sovereignty in the end is unimpaired by joining the Community? That is the point we have been making throughout these debates and the hon. Member has made it with great eloquence.

Mr. English

The hon. Gentleman is confusing sovereignty with power. I use sovereignty as a term of international law and not as a question of power. I meant by my earlier statement that one cannot in practice enforce law upon people who possess arms in their hands. So long as the control of armed forces rests with a given authority one cannot ultimately enforce law, but that does not say it is not the law.

[Miss HARVIE ANDERSON in the Chair]

Mr. Charles Fletcher-Cooke (Darwen)

Clause 2 is not so important as Clause 1, but it is much more difficult. It is more difficult because the Committee has laboured under the ignorance of why the Commission chooses directives rather than regulations in certain circumstances. This was pointed out at the beginning of the debate by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Stepney (Mr. Shore). He rightly gave some examples of subject matters and topics which one would have thought more suitable for a regulation since they were important. He confused us—I am not complaining as he confessed he was confused—by the fact that in certain circumstances the same subject matter appears to be dealt with by both directives and regulations and they overlap.

Therefore, it is difficult for the Committee to decide a suitable means of translating these directives into our national legislation since we do not know the quality of subject matter that makes it a directive rather than a regulation. I had thought up to now that minor or ancillary matters were the subject of directives rather than regulations, but from the examples the right hon. Gentleman has given that is clearly not the case. In particular, the movement of persons and families between member States, which is an absolutely fundamental matter, is apparently dealt with more by directive than regulation.

I suppose the best estimate one can make of the way in which Brussels draws the distinction is that where the Commission has made up its mind about policy but not about method, and in the case of regulation when it has made up its mind both about policy and method, it has concentrated its mind sufficiently to draft into legislative form the regulation which has instant or nearly instant effect.

If that be right, if it is the distinction between a White Paper and a Bill, as it were, it makes the method of translation from the White Paper into the Bill of great importance. Anybody who has served in the House of Commons for any length of time knows that there are many differences between a White Paper and the final Royal Assent to the Bill. If it is that the directive method is employed not just for ancillary or minor matters but for matters where the Commission, having made up its mind on policy, has nevertheless not been able for one reason or another to concentrate its mind on the text of a Bill, it shows that the process of mind concentration is to be left to the individual legislatures of each nation.

If that is to be done because the matter is so intracable, so difficult, that it cannot be dealt with by a regulation as far as the text is concerned, surely it means by that difference that this Parliament like the other parliaments of the Ten have a particular obligation to do the textural work which the Commission finds itself unable to perform. That being so it seems that there must be some power of amendment in the parliamentary process. I am not asking for the full panoply of legislation, although since the Schedule provides it in many cases I do not see why we should not have it. However, one cannot ask for the whole loaf all the time.

What I am urging is that if one has the affirmative procedure, in practice that means one can have amendment. I have discovered in the course of time that since the affirmative procedure involves the Government in laying the matter before it comes into force, as opposed to the negative procedure where the Prayer often takes place after the regulation has come into force, in practice the negative procedure can never procure amendment. By amendment I mean the withdrawal of the regulation and the laying of the new one. That has often been done in the affirmative procedure because, if for no other reason, there is time to do it. However, in the negative procedure there is not this rather rough and ready method of amendment open to the Government because, as has been pointed out from time to time, the Prayer often comes on not merely 40 days after it has been brought into force and become the law of the land but often much later than that by some perfectly legitimate device used between the usual channels because of the cluttering up of parliamentary time.

That makes the process of de facto amendment even harder. Therefore, I ask my right hon. and learned Friend to preserve to the House of Commons a great deal of power for the purpose of amending the form and method by considering whether we can have the affirmative procedure for all these regulations. It is not too much to ask. It does not mean that every regulation, which may be very small, should be subject to the legislative process of a full Second Reading, Committee, Report in both Houses, and Third Reading. That is asking a good deal in cases which may be fairly trivial. If they are so simple, hon. Members may ask: why not do it? Because it would take time. We who live in the world of politics know that the most trivial of Bills can take a very long time indeed—perhaps for collateral motives or someone on the Opposition being anxious to embarass the Government. That argument will not wash.

I think a fair argument is that since most or many of these regulations are trivial, we must have this special procedure. However, for those regulations which are not trivial, I suggest we should have the affirmative resolution and that we should have an undertaking on that point.

Mr. Powell

My hon. and learned Friend says that the affirmative procedure makes amendment de facto possible. Does he agree that indeed it makes possible amendment on some particular point, which may be important, but that it does not make possible the consideration and amendment in detail of the whole scope of a long and complicated regulation?

Mr. Fletcher-Cooke

I am not sure I accept that from my right hon. Friend. If a long and complicated regulation has been laid before the House before it comes into force and in the course of a day's debate many features of drafting or more than drafting are criticised, I should imagine that in those circumstances the Government would take it back and pay attention to those criticisms. It is not as satisfactory as the Committee stage of a Bill, but it is better than the negative procedure. It is important because the House should have the chance of saying, "We agree that the Government are translating the intentions of the directive into action. We are not opposed to that. We cannot be opposed to that. However, we think they have gone too far; they have added something that they are not obliged to do. Alternatively, we think they have misconceived the purpose of the regulations. We think they are doing something contrary to its spirit in some particular, though not in the whole of the text".

These things are often done in the spirit of co-operation and good will. If the negative procedure had been adopted, then, even if the Government agree, as often as not it is much too late.

With that very moderate plea, I hope my right hon. and learned Friend will assure the Committee that he will look at this problem of the affirmative procedure again. That is the least we should have. It is a very modest request.

6.15 p.m.

Mr. Emlyn Hooson (Montgomery)

As I listened to the hon. and learned Member for Darwen (Mr. Fletcher-Cooke) dealing with the difference between trivial and important regulations and suggesting that the affirmative procedure should be used for the latter whereas the negative procedure could be used for the former, I could not help thinking: who is to decide whether they are trivial or not? The great problem in the hon. and learned Gentleman's suggestion is that whereas the Executive may decide the matter is trivial, the House may regard it as very important. Therefore, I found his argument unacceptable, though I accept it was well meant.

When the House voted on the principle of entry into the Common Market and on Second Reading, it was well understood by all right hon. and hon. Members that the House was agreeing voluntarily to surrender a certain degree of sovereign power. That was one argument that undoubtedly affected people in deciding whether to vote or not. It was one argument which certainly persuaded me to vote against entry.

Some exchange has taken place across the Floor of the Committee today about the distinction to be drawn between democratic control at the centre and democratic control in the national parliaments. There was an exchange between the right hon. and learned Member for Hertfordshire, East (Sir D. Walker-Smith) and an hon. Member on this side about that matter.

We must face the fact that there is virtually no democratic control at the centre in the European Communities today. Whether one is for or against entering the Common Market, whether one is for or against the Bill, the only kind of democratic control on which we can insist today is in the House of Commons. It may be that in future, when there has been great evolution in Europe and a degree of democratic control brought in through the European Parliament, the view of this Parliament may be different. However, I have never been against surrender or partial surrender of parliamentary sovereignty, provided that I am satisfied it is being replaced by an equal democratic control.

We are dealing with Clause 2(2) which the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Powell) rightly pointed out is a voluntary choice by the Government as to how we should deal with certain regulations. As the right hon. Gentleman so cogently argued, the Bill, by its very provisions, shows that the normal legislative processes could be used for enacting the regulations which will apply to this country, but the Government are deliberately choosing the form laid down in Clause 2(2) to enact regulations which will apply to this country.

The real issue on the series of Amendments before us is whether we think that we shall have sufficient democratic control here, appreciating that democratic control at the centre virtually does not exist at the moment. There is no reason why we should allow the Government to adopt this method. Why cannot we follow the normal legislative process? If we cannot do that, I suggest that at the very least there should be an affirmative resolution for all the regulations brought before the House. The suggestion of the negative procedure is simply not good enough when we consider the vital matters which we are to discuss.

The right hon. Member for Stepney (Mr. Shore) referred to the regulation dealing with the free movement of labour. I do not agree that this is unprecedented in our history. Before 1963 or 1964 there was free movement of labour from the Commonwealth to this country in possibly the same way as will happen in the Common Market. Nevertheless, that in no way detracts from the point that this is an important matter to be dealt with by negative Resolution.

I support this series of Amendments though I regret that I have been unable to persuade my right hon. and hon. Friends to support it.

I turn my attention now to another Amendment in the name of the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West, which I am happy to say that my right hon. and hon. Friends support, as I do. This Amendment is designed to delete "or department". Why should we on such an important issue allow, not only the designated Minister, but the Department to bring in orders and regulations? This is a vitally important matter.

The Government select this procedure, yet they insult the House of Commons by allowing, not only the designated Minister, but the Department to introduce orders—not only on the trivial matters that the hon. and learned Member for Darwen suggested, but on important matters as well. The Executive could at any time decide that it was not necessary for the designated Minister to take the steps and could let the Department take them.

Why should the Committee approve of this? A heavy onus rests upon the Chancellor of the Duchy and the whole Government Front Bench to satisfy the Committee, whether hon. Members are in favour of our joining the Common Market or not, that a Department, without any reference to the designated Minister, could legislate. It is not good enough. I hope that all hon. Members who have the interests of democracy at heart, whether they are for the Government in the Bill or not, will at least have sufficient respect for our Parliamentary institutions to insist upon this Amendment being carried.

Sir Robin Turton (Thirsk and Malton)

I wish to follow what the hon. and learned Member for Montgomery (Mr. Hooson) and my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Darwen (Mr. Fletcher-Cooke) have said on the question of delegated legislation. I never liked the much-quoted Legal and Constitutional Implications of United Kingdom Membership of the European Communities which was brought in by the Labour Government, but at least Cmnd. 3301 paragraph 21 of that 1967 White Paper made it clear that The necessary provisions could be enacted by Parliament, or possibly by delegated legislation •". That seemed to get the priority right.

The Bill as drafted has the priority wrong. Usually, the directives should be enacted by Parliament, because that is why the Commission has caused them to be directives: they are matters which the Commission believes should not be directly applicable but should be modelled to suit the parliamentary system of the Member State.

Except in France, all the Community countries are dealing in this way with directives. The parliaments of each of the five countries have a hand in enacting the directives. We shall be denied that under Clause 2(2) for a fairly wide area of directives. There are exceptions in Schedule 2 which take out certain directives such as those imposing charges.

I beg my right hon. and learned Friend to realise that if he loses subsection (2) he is only being forced to enact by legislation, as was foreshadowed in the White Paper of May, 1967; he is not losing the Bill. This is not a wrecking Amendment. It is an Amendment designed to put more parliamentary control over the consideration of directives.

As the right hon. Member for Stepney (Mr. Shore) said, directives deal with highly contentious matters. For instance, the hairdressing directive is a matter of very grave concern to all British hairdressers, because they are disturbed about the directive and how it is to be applied. Equally, the whole of the poultry trade is very worried over the evisceration provisions in the poultry directive. The application of a contentious Community directive in Britain should be done by enactment.

The difference between the affirmative and the negative procedure is even worse than my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Darwen said. I agree that, if it is to be done by regulation, it must be by the affirmative procedure. If it is a minor matter under the affirmative procedure, it can go through quickly late at night. The affirmative procedure allows for debate, though I do not agree with my hon. and learned Friend that it allows for Amendment.

I have no wish to see the House of Commons and the Government running into a road block over affirmative resolutions. It is far better for this to be done by legislation. Then Amendments can be tabled as to how it should be carried out. My hon. and learned Friend's idea that an affirmative resolution would be opposed and that the Government would presumably have no majority to enforce their will and would then courteously withdraw the Measure and bring back another regulation was slightly unreal in the parliamentary scene.

I agree with my hon. and learned Friend that in this Parliament the negative procedure is very improper. Only last year the Select Committee on Procedure pointed out that, without the whole flood of negative procedure Regulations or Statutory Instruments coming under the Bill, 30 per cent. of the Prayers that are tabled and which hon. Members want to debate cannot be and are not debated. That figure applied to 1968. The figure for the following year was slightly higher.

We were so concerned, as was the Chairman of the Select Committee on Statutory Instruments, that we asked the Government to look into the matter at once and to set up a committee. That committee is still sitting. While the Lord Brooke of Cumnor Committee is sitting, it is most improper for the Government to put in the Bill the extra burden of Statutory Instruments under the negative procedure.

I beg my right hon. and learned Friend, who I know is worried about the parliamentary aspect, to think again and to amend the Bill accordingly. This is a desire to see proper parliamentary control within the limits of the Treaty of Rome if, unfortunately in my view, we join the Community.

My right hon. and learned Friend, in discussing this matter on 15th February, expressed appreciation of the problem and said this: …there is a need for the House to have special arrangements, under which it would be apprised of draft regulations and directives before they go to the Council of Ministers for decision."—[OFFICAL REPORT, 15th February, 1972: Vol. 831, c. 275.] This was dealing with the pre-directive stage. Unfortunately, nothing has been done. My right hon. and learned Friend realised the need, but he has not provided any solution. At that time he suggested the appointment of an ad hoc committee to advise him. My right hon. and learned Friend has not appointed such a committee.

The Committee is in difficulty. We know from the Minister that there is a parliamentary gap that somehow must be filled. It has not been filled. Instead, he has introduced a Bill which would allow matters of high concern to our constituents, matters of such importance as the movement of capital which is vitally important to the country, to be dragged through the House by the negative procedure at a time when the Committee set up to advise the House on procedure has said that this method of parliamentary control is at present deficient and therefore a Committee is inquiring into it.

I beg my right hon. and learned Friend, with whom I am not always in agreement on these matters, as a parliamentarian to realise that he has to do something about this Bill. In my view the easiest way would be to leave out subsection (2) and to rely on the provisions which he already has in subsection (4).

6.30 p.m.

Mr. Norman St. John-Stevas (Chelmsford)

Despite the arguments and eloquence of a number of hon. and right hon. Members—I am thinking of the contributions by the right hon. Members for Stepney (Mr. Shore) and Battersea, North (Mr. Jay) and, on this side of the Committee, my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Hertfordshire, East (Sir D. Walker-Smith) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, South-East——

Hon. Members

South-West.

Mr. St. John-Stevas

Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Powell)—never will those two meet—there is nothing very new about this subsection. The problem that is raised by it is the whole problem of the rôle of subordinate legislation generally in the modern State. If one has a modern State with a high degree of organisation, one must have subordinate legislation. One cannot pass all the necessary directives, regulations and so on in the classical statutory form. The objections that have been raised against this subsection are objections against the whole of our legislative system. If one is objecting to this subsection, one is objecting to the whole of modern society. Does my hon. Friend the Member for Yarmouth (Mr. Fell) wish to intervene?

Mr. Fell

I was merely thinking that my hon. Friend was going a little far. I thought that there was quite a will in this House and even in the country to preserve the legislative process which we use, even though sometimes it may seem a little slow—but more certain.

Mr. St. John-Stevas

Of course there is a consensus on that point, but that was not the point I was making. I was making a much narrower point. One cannot deal with all these questions directly by Statute. One has to use means of subordinate legislation and this raises problems, I do not deny, of parliamentary control and so on. There is nothing new about that. That was raised in the 'thirties in that famous book by Lord Chief Justice Hewart, "The New Despotism", and we have been discussing these questions ever since. This was the point made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton (Sir Robin Turton) when he referred to the great difficulties there were in the House when dealing with matters which have nothing at all to do with the Common Market. One must see this problem as part of a wider issue which confronts Parliament as a legislature irrespective of our relations with the Community.

While legislation is one thing and prior consultation is another—I should be the last to suggest that one is a substitute for the other—one should be aware of dismissing prior consultation as being, of no importance whatever. It is a regrettable fact that so often in legislation it is the prior consultations that in practice are perhaps more effective than parliamentary debates. So often when we as Members of Parliament are consulted, the vital decisions have been taken. Although we may occasionally manage to shift a Government from the courses on which it is set, that unfortunately is rare. So it is extremely important that there should be adequate means of prior consultation on regulations, directives and so on, and that is provided for. Let us not dismiss that as of no importance for it is of immense practical importance.

Mr. Fell

Surely it is not true that Governments are seldom shifted by the conversations which go on in Committee in this House. Time and time again Amendments are made in important matters which are discussed in Committee.

Mr. St. John-Stevas

The point I was making was that they are not shifted often enough, which is putting the same point in a different way. I know the desire of my hon. Friend the Member for Yarmouth to assist me, but he must allow me to make my own speech in my own way.

A second rather major point was made by my hon. Friend the Member for Cirencester and Tewkesbury (Mr. Ridley), when he pointed out that the speeches of the right hon. Member for Stepney and various of his supporters were actually directed against the Treaty of Rome as such. That is a perfectly legitimate attitude to take up, but it is not the official attitude of the Opposition which does not object—or so we are told—to the Treaty of Rome but to the terms under which we are acceding to it. It is no good the right hon. Member for Stepney trying to counter the very valid point made by my hon. Friend with a debating point worthy of the Cambridge Union about the fact that a particular regulation or a particular policy originated only after the application by the Opposition to join the Common Market had been made.

The right hon. Member knows the Treaty of Rome as well as anyone. He must know that the idea of creating a common market in labour was fundamental to the whole Treaty. The idea of a free movement of labour was central to the discussions in the Community on the relevant Articles in 1951. Those who will the end must be taken to will the means and the Opposition does will the end, apparently, of an enlarged Common Market. Therefore it is not open to hon. Members opposite to make that sort of criticism of the necessary means which everyone has known for years are involved in the implementation of the Treaty. It is open to individuals to take that line, but it is not open to the official spokesman of the Opposition as such.

The subsection we are considering is narrow. The wide subsection is subsection (1), which we have already discussed. We know that under that subsection Community rights and liabilities created by the Treaty are automatically enforceable under our system without further enactment. That of course is the very wide-reaching measure which has been discussed, but that in itself is not enough. We also know that under the EEC system the EEC and various other bodies issue directives, or directives as the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton, SouthEast—[HON. MEMBERS: "South-West"]—insists on calling them. Presumably it sounds more sinister to call them directives I do not know why he did not call them regulations to be more consistent. These directives leave the actual form and method of legislation to the member States.

There is the further reason for the subsection that Measures may need auxiliary provisions to make them effective; for example, directives to reconcile and to approximate national laws; and those will be dealt with under this subsection. In practice it may be possible to deal with directives under relevant legislation, but there will be a whole bundle of miscellaneous matters which cannot be so dealt with and which will fall to be dealt with by this residual subsection. Hence the general power of subordinate legislation provided by the subsection.

As my right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor of the Duchy pointed out in his speech in February, the scope of the subsection is likely to be quite small. In the course of this debate the scope has been grossly exaggerated by those who have been attacking the subsection for their own purposes. The powers that are immediately to be exercised will concern minor matters. One subject mentioned was textile appellations and technical matters of that kind, but in the future the scope of the subsection may be wider. However, Parliament is not powerless; Parliament continues to watch the legislation it passes and is able to make its views felt. If a Minister, of whatever party, attempts to abuse a subsection, we can rely upon the House of Commons to enforce its rights and to call him back to the right use of it. That is why these debates are important. Although the statements of the Minister are not binding in a court of law in the sense that they are enforceable, they are persuasive pieces of evidence of the intention of the House of Commons when it passed the legislation.

It has been objected that under the subsection we could produce provisions to amend an Act of Parliament. To assess the importance of that we must look not only at the form but at the content. What is in a Statute is just as important as the amendment and the reason for the amendment. For example, it may be desirable to amend an Act of Parliament in order that important existing statutory codes should continue to be used in the fields which are covered by Community requirements. It would not be possible to do that without the subsection because it would be necessary to resort to a separate Statute and the House of Commons simply has not the time to deal with matters in that way, so in that event it would have to go by default.

We should also remember the value of the subsection to the House of Commons. Without it we should have to proceed by Statute all the time, which would mean that the whole legislative programme would be dictated from Brussels. This subsection safeguards the freedom of the House——

Sir Robin Turton

In one part of his speech my hon. Friend refers to a great many matters having to be dealt with and in another part he refers to my right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor of the Duchy, who on 15th February, as reported in column 282 of the OFFICIAL REPORT said that there would be four Statutory Orders in 1972 and 12 in 1973. Is my hon. Friend agreeing with my right hon. and learned Friend, or is he, like us, disagreeing with him and saying that there will be far more?

6.45 p.m.

Mr. St. John-Stevas

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for the opportunity to clarify my position, if it were in doubt. I was agreeing with my right hon. and learned Friend's analysis of the situation as it exists now and in the immediate future, but I was looking beyond the context in which his remarks were made to the future operation of the Community. The Community will be with us for a long time, as my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Hertfordshire, East is so fond of saying. The Community, like diamonds, is for ever. I was looking ahead to see what were the likely developments of the Community in future.

That brings me by a rather roundabout way to my final point on the subsection which concerns the safeguards. These were entirely ignored by the right hon. Member for Stepney, and my right hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, South-West attacked them in an extraordinary way by questioning whether they applied to the first subsection of the Clause. By doing so he was able to present them as a sleight of hand by which we were being asked to consent to wider powers than had been supposed earlier when that subsection was being discussed. No doubt my right hon. and learned Friend will deal with the query about whether the Schedule applies to the first part of the Clause, but that is irrelevant to our discussion this afternoon.

We are concerned with the limitations of the subsection and the powers that are conferred by it. The limitations imposed by Schedule 2 are considerable. The operation of the subsection is limited to Treaty obligations and rights as laid down in paragraphs (a) and (b). There are direct limitations on taxation. Taxation cannot be imposed or increased under the subsection—I suppose no one would object if it were reduced. The subsection cannot be used to apply any directive or regulation retrospectively. There can be no further delegation, and the subsection cannot be used to create punishable criminal offences save within very narrow limits. Those are important limitations and safeguards which should go a long way to meet the fears which have been expressed today.

No one likes delegated legislation, just as no one likes the guillotine. Both, however, may be necessary evils. In an ideal world neither would exist. In the parliamentary and legal world in which we have to operate they both exist and we have to get on with them as best we may. Here we have a minor example of the application of delegated legislation in a narrow field. It is ridiculous to attempt to blow it up and to make it into a major constitutional point.

Mr. Rippon

Perhaps it may be helpful if I state at the outset the Government position on the points which were made earlier this afternoon about the publication of instruments. I should reiterate that the Government entirely accept and have always accepted the need to let the House have English translations of Community regulations and directives and to do so promptly and on a continuing basis. We shall do our best in this regard, as I have said on many previous occasions, to bring the necessary literature before Members of Parliament as it appears.

I think it is important, however, to be clear about the status of these instruments. That was the point which was in issue earlier this afternoon. They are official translations published by the Government through Her Majesty's Stationery Office for the convenience of Parliament and the public. They have accordingly been made available in the Vote Office for hon. Members, but they were not I am advised, presented to Parliament in any formal sense. It is incorrect to speak of these instruments, as one hon Gentleman did, as being incorporated into the law of the land by Clause 2 Clause 2(1) gives the force of law not to these instruments as such but to the rights and obligations under the Treaties. One has to look at the Treaties to find out what the Community obligations are. That will be found in the instruments as published by the Community in the Official Journal. As each of the 42 volumes makes clear on its cover, it is the authentic texts eventually published in the Official Journal which will be the formal texts binding on this country.

The right hon. Member for Stepney (Mr. Shore) expressed the fear that there might be a time-lag from 1st January, 1973, before Community instruments were published in English. That is not so. Our problem as we have said before, is essentially one of the interim period before we become full members of the Community. It is a provision of the Treaty of Accession that English will be an official language of the Community as from accession, so Community instruments will be published in English at the same time as in other languages.

Mr. Deakins

Is the right hon. and learned Gentleman saying that every regulation which will have the force of law in this country from 1st January, 1973, will be published in an authentic English translation in the Official Journal of the Community in time to be available to the British Parliament and people on 1st January, 1973?

Mr. Rippon

The position is perfectly clear. They will be available as from 1st January, 1973, and for everything that happens thereafter; that is, as far as future regulations and directives are concerned. In the interim period, while we have provided texts for the information of the public and the Committee and they are as accurate as we can make them, before any of these instruments can be binding on the courts there will have to be an authentic official translation, and that process will be completed in order to establish the rights of citizens before 1st January, 1973.

Mr. Jay

Is the right hon. and learned Gentleman saying that he is asking us to enact this Clause without having the final authentic version of these regulations before us?

Mr. Rippon

It has to be accepted that English does not become an official language of the Community until 1st January, 1973. We have discussed this problem of the interim period before. A very great effort has been made by those responsible for this intricate and sometimes difficult work to give all the information the Committee really requires. If we analyse what it is that people want we find that it is that particular interests outside this House and inside it are supplied with sufficient information on which to base a decision as far as the consideration of this Bill is concerned.

I turn to the Amendments, which raise general questions about the purpose and effect of Clause 2(2)—why the Bill includes this power of subordinate legislation and how the power is likely to be used, and so on. These Clause 2(2) powers may be exercised for any one of five purposes, three of these being specified in paragraph (a) and two in paragraph (b). I need not go through them all in detail because I believe I am right in saying that the anxieties, such as they are, have arisen about the powers under paragraph (b), to which my right hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Powell) referred. He was concerned about two matters: first, why the powers were necessary and, second, how they became operative.

As far as the width of the powers is concerned, I would put it to the Committee that a power of subordinate legislation which was limited to the matters in paragraph (a) would risk being incomplete. For example, there might be a Community directive requiring food of a paticular kind to be packed in a specified kind of container. If Clause 2(2) stopped at (a) the powers could be used to do that and no more, even if the result in terms of existing legislation were a nonsense. So paragraph (b) gives the necessary flexibility—and I tried to explain this partly in the speech I made on Second Reading—to produce a sensible result in terms of our existing legislation. I submit that this is a sensible and, in all the circumstances, not unduly wide power.

Mr. Powell

Could my right hon. and learned Friend kindly say why, if this is the object, such a wide expression as arising out of or related to has been used rather than the much more customary terminology where subsidiary purposes such as he has mentioned are involved?

Mr. Rippon

It is true that the question of related powers and having regard to other matters was also raised by the right hon. Member for Stepney—the powers and duties which arise under other statutes—but I think that is better dealt with when we reach Amendment No. 416, which is the subject of a separate debate. It must be accepted, in looking forward to the future in regard to this Bill, that the power needs to be expressed in wide terms in order to cover all possible contingencies.

With regard to the point raised by my right hon. Friend about the date of coming into operation of the power, I can assure him that there is no question of the coming into force of subsection (1) depending in any way on the coming into force of an Order in Council. I think he will find on examination that that is a perfectly reasonable provision to make and that it is expressed in a way that does not have the effect he suggests. The provision will come into force and operate from time to time of its own motion. The difficulty that arises is that where some self-enforcing provisions of Community law operate by virtue of subsection (1) as law in the United Kingdom it may be necessary to amend the United Kingdom law consequentially so as to make it fit, or even to repeal it if that is required as a result of the provisions of the directive.

Mr. Powell

I have to confess that I have not understood my right hon. and learned Friend's explanation of the meaning of the words for…dealing with…the coming into force…of subsection (1) above". This must mean that specific provision of some kind has to be made for the coming into force of subsection (1). It also must mean that specific provision has to be made for its operation from time to time. Can my right hon. and learned Friend explain what is meant by that, what sort of regulations would be made under that power?

[Sir ROBERT GRANT-FERRIS in the Chair]

7.0 p.m.

Mr. Rippon

I have had some difficulty in trying to follow my right hon. Friend's explanation and I hope that when he reads my explanation the matter will be a little clearer to him. The position as I have explained it on subsection (1) comes into operation of its own motion from time to time as the occasion arises. That is the explanation of the position. It must be expressed in that way because of the wide variation in the matters with which the Community deals. The object is to comprehend virtually every conceivable proposition which the Community might put forward and which might affect our existing law, as well as bringing into force the operation of the regulations.

I turn to deal with the general question of why the power is needed. In regard to subsection (1) the Committee was concerned with the Community measures, such as regulations and the like, which take direct effect. On subsection (2) we turn chiefly to the implementation of non-direct provisions such as those in the Community directives. We implement those measures under our national law. The directives of themselves do not create legal rights or obligations for individuals. This is left to member States to do what is necessary by putting them into effect.

A number of right hon. Members have wondered about the philosophy behind the choice of a regulation or directive. To some extent this is governed by the provisions of the Treaty which lays down how the matter should be dealt with. In other circumstances it is impossible to draw any absolute distinction. The Commission and the Community appear generally to have employed the regulation-making power to effect the general principles and to leave the more detailed implementation to directives. This is what applies in the case of the movement of workers, to which the right hon. Member for Stepney referred. The regulation lays down general principles; the directives deal with some of the aspects of the modus operandi.

Mr. Jay

May I ask two questions of the right hon. and learned Gentleman? First, is it true that in a great many cases the Commission would decide whether there should be a regulation or a directive? Secondly, could he tell the Committee where the principles are laid down to say how the various regulations and directives are to be adopted?

Mr. Rippon

There are certain matters which are indicated in the Treaty, but I do not think one will find a very clear distinction between the use of the regulation and the directive. In practice the way in which the existing Community has acted is to make this distinction. We would be members of the Community and would take a view in the Council of Ministers whether a particular matter should be dealt with one way or the other.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Mr. St. John-Stevas) pointed out in his admirable speech, there is a somewhat distorted view of the area in which these regulations and directives operate. There has been some tendency in this debate to give the impression that over a wide range of activities many thousands of directives will be brought into force by means of the Order in Council procedure or by the making of regulations by Ministers or Departments, as the case may be. I shall come to that in a moment.

The Committee should look at the Bill itself to get an idea of the range of matters which might properly be dealt with under this provision. The Bill makes certain changes in our law, for instance in company law. My right hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, South-West suggested that these matters were put into the Bill as a sort of sop, but as I explained on Second Reading what we have done is to give effect in the legislation to matters of major concern—matters to which we shall have to give effect either on the date of our accession or immediately after.

The Bill also contains certain specific new powers to make subordinate instruments within the framework of existing provisions—for example, those related to the standard of food and drugs. In addition to these new powers, there are powers in existing statutes which can be used for some purposes. Such powers will be sufficient to enable us to effect the bulk of what is suitable for legislative action by subordinate instruments for the immediate purpose of acceding to the Treaty. As new matters arise to be dealt with, the Government of the day will, as in regard to the first instruments, have to decide whether to proceed by Statute. This point was made by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Darwen (Mr. Fletcher-Cooke).

It is obviously reasonable that we should adopt a flexible attitude. Nothing in the Bill prevents Parliament by these various processes from adopting what procedure it likes in due course to deal with these matters and to decide whether to use the affirmative or negative resolution. It is true that hon. Members opposite did not want to proceed through the normal channels in the way of an ad hoc committee, but I would point out that the Brooke Committee is now sitting. The right hon. Member for Stepney asked when we might expect to have its report. I understand that a preliminary report should appear before the Summer Recess. But those are not matters which are appropriately dealt with in the Bill.

Mr. Shore

Would the right hon. and learned Gentleman confirm that the power which the Bill would give to Ministers is a power which he could use to cover not only all the matters in the rest of the Bill, but matters which in future might or might not be the subject of legislation—in other words, that the Bill will give Ministers in future all the powers they need to deal with matters simply by Order in Council? That is the important point, and there could he no limitation on the use of ministerial power in future other than what might be the good sense and good conscience which resides in the democratic instinct, or the lack of it, in particular Ministers. That is not good enough.

Mr. Rippon

This is a weakness of Amendment No. 414 and this is connected with the difficulty of defining for the purpose of an Act of Parliament what is a major change. It must be left to the good sense of the Government of the day, bearing in mind that any Government is subject to the approval of the House. I cannot conceive of circumstances in which a future House of Commons would allow the Government arbitrarily to put into subordinate legislation what should be dealt with by statute. Whatever view one takes of what is or is not a major change, there is no difference of opinion on either side of the Committee that some changes are on any view suitable for subordinate legislation.

I said something on Second Reading about a miscellany of minor matters for which subordinate legislation seems appropriate. This matter was also referred to by the right hon. Member for Stepney. I dealt with the general background of this matter in our debate on 15th February and my remarks are set out in column 283 of the OFFICIAL REPORT of that date. I will not go into all those general matters.

I gave them the picture as it appeared to us on the nature and the number of the subordinate instruments which would be required this year and next year. I brought that picture up to date in the reply that I gave to the right hon. Member for Stepney on 18th May. I hope that that programme will demonstrate to the Committee that Clause 2(2) does not imply any fundamental change in the present principles governing the use of delegated powers.

The right hon. Gentleman asked what might happen in the future. We made an analysis of the numbers of directives and regulations that the Community had issued in 1971. There were something in the nature of 2 per cent. which might have been dealt with under the provisions of this Bill if at that time we had been a member of the Community. Perhaps that gives an indication of the order of magnitude of the use of the provisions of the subsection.

A number of right hon. and hon. Members have been concerned about giving the powers not only to Ministers but to Departments to make these regulations. My right hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, South-West said that it was an entirely unusual practice in any event. I suggest that it is an entirely normal practice and that there are very large numbers of precedents for dealing with matters of making regulations through Departments. The income tax reglations, for example, empower the Board of Inland Revenue to make regulations about PAYE and double taxation relief. My right hon. Friend referred to this type and said that he thought that that was not unreasonable. There is also the Customs and Excise Act, 1952, which contains a number of powers for the Commissioners to make regulations about the import and export of goods. There are a great many examples of Statutes which empower the Treasury and the Board of Trade to make orders and regulations in the respective areas with which they are concerned.

In these circumstances, the need for regulations to be made by Government Departments cannot he excluded, and that need is especially clear in the case of the Board of Customs and Excise. After all, the Community is based on a customs union, and although nearly all the immediately foreseeable powers needed by the Board are provided elsewhere in the Bill in Clause 5 and Schedule 4, further needs may arise in future. The Commissioners already have under the Customs and Excise Act the power to make regulations of an administrative nature in certain well defined matters. For example under the Customs and Excise Act they may make regulations prescribing the procedure to be followed by a ship arriving at a port and regulating the unloading, landing, movement and removal of goods. It seems reasonable that the Bill should make provision for practical questions of that kind.

Perhaps I should mention that no regulations may be made by any Government Department until that Department have been appropriately designated in an Order in Council, and that will come before Parliament in the manner provided by the Bill. There will be the opportunity for Parliament to make its views known on the proposition that the Department should be designated, and therefore there is no question of the Departmental regulations in themselves bypassing Parliament in any way. They will be subject to Parliamentary scrutiny as all subordinate legislation is at present.

Mr. Neil Marten (Banbury)

If Parliament then rejects the proposition that the Department should be nominated to do this, what effect will that have on this Bill? Will it have any effect?

Mr. Rippon

Then the Department cannot act and some other arrangement will have to be made. This is not always understood by some right hon. and hon. Members. Parliament has the authority to reject, and then the Government of the day must mend their fences accordingly. They may choose to be in breach of a treaty obligation, as the right hon. Member for Battersea, North (Mr. Jay) did in the case of the surcharge on EFTA countries, when he said that it was illegal and had been done deliberately by the Government in breach of that obligation. If the Government were forced into a breach because this House would not agree to proceeding in the way proposed, either the breach would have to be tolerated by the Community or the Government would have to proceed in a different way. Departments are not in some curious way outside the normal conventions of Ministerial responsibility. They act on behalf of the Crown. Ministers are answerable to Parliament for what they do and could be called upon by Parliament to justify the case for regulations on a specific matter.

For all these reasons, I hope that the Committee will not accept any of these Amendments, which are either undesirable or unnecessary.

7.15 p.m.

Mr. Ronald King Murray (Edinburgh, Leith)

The nub of this debate is democratic control, that is to say, parliamentary control. In this connection one of the more pathetic arguments to have been repeated in this, as in previous debates, is the suggestion that there will be better control for us inside the Common Market than outside. It is rather like saying that Jonah was better off inside the whale because he could control it better from within. Some of us have our doubts about that.

The right hon. and learned Member for Hertfordshire, East (Sir D. Walker-Smith) said that there seemed to be no reason why most of the legislating under the Treaty of Rome should not be done by directive. I think that is so, and it will have the obvious consequence of giving more democratic control. It would mean that member States had a chance of exercising some sort of deliberation upon the promulgations from the Community. If Jonah has any influence on the whale, I hope that it will be exercised after 1st January, 1973, in that direction. I commend that point strongly to the Government.

I go on to point out that the distinction between regulations, directives and decisions is not quite as hard and fast as some hon. Members seem to assume. I shall do a short exercise to show that by pointing out that amongst the many decisisons of a legal nature in the Community a number bear upon this point. I think that it is right that the Committee should have the substance of some of those decisions before it.

The meaning of "regulation" was laid down in the Zuckerfabrick Watenstedt case, decided on 11th July, 1968, and reported in the Common Market Law Reports. The court held that To be a regulation an act (of the Community) must apply to objectively-determined situations and have legal effects upon persons defined in a general and abstract manner. On the face of it, what seems to be a regulation is not necessarily a regulation. It has to meet that test.

I come, then, to the meaning of "directive". In the case of Corvelyn v. The State of Belgium, a Belgian case decided on 7th October, 1968, dealing with Community law, the court took the view that A directive which is sufficiently clear and complete can have direct effect in invalidating subsequent action by a national authority which is inconsistent with it. Again it appears that directives, which are held up as being comparatively innocuous and not having direct effect, can have this sort of direct effect.

Then, on decisisons, in the Compagnie des Forges de Châtillon case it was said: A decision must appear as an act originating from the competent organisation intended to produce judicial effects constituting the ultimate end of the initial procedure of this organisation and according to which such organisation makes its final ruling in a form allowing its nature to be identified. I should be more than surprised if that makes hon. Members any clearer about it.

Finally, I take an example of the blurred borderline between regulation and decision. I shall not have time to deal with other blurred borderlines. In the Confédération Nationale de Producteurs de Fruit case the question of distinguishing between a regulation and a decision was mooted and the court took the view: The question whether an administrative act is a regulation or a decision is to be determined in the first place by its object and content—whatever official label has been given to it by the Council or the Commission. One does not just look at the label. One does not find it there. One has to look somewhere inside to discover what it does.

It is against that background that the Committee ought to look at the Amendments. In doing so, it is clear that Amendment No. 221 has been supported on all sides of the House as being the kind of wholesale amputation that is necessary in this matter. I commend that Amendment to the Committee. We should leave out the subsection altogether. The Government can return with an amended subsection which would do what they want to do properly.

The other major Opposition Amendments, Nos. 414 and 417, are a bit of major surgery. If we have to have subsection (2) substantially as it is, we commend this major surgery. The right hon. Member for Thirsk and Malton (Sir Robin Turton) pointed out the proper priorities. Amendment No. 414 puts the priorities right: an Act of Parliament for major measures and subordinate legislation for subsidiary matters.

If that major surgery does not operate, we fall back on another Amendment, which has the support of both sides of the House and now, I believe, the support of the Liberal benches. That is Amendment No. 142 and its associated Amendments. It is a piece of delicate surgery which I should have thought the Committee ought to accept. This is an occasion for swallowing party differences and differences about whether one is for or against the Community. Let us have a vote on the democratic principle here because nothing has been said by the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Chancellor of the Duchy to satisfy hon. Members in any way that this kind of delegated legislation is at all necessary. Why on earth should it be necessary to delegate to a Department? Surely we

must retain this last minimum of parliamentary control and the direct responsibility of a Minister to the House of Commons. I commend that series of Amendments most strongly.

In conclusion, the Chancellor of the Duchy seemed to be suggesting, in a rather surprising statement, that subsection (1) of Clause 2 is intended to operate "from time to time". This was a surprising comment. It seems to suggest that this is a sort of bouncing subsection. We shall be bounced into the Community. Not only will the Bill take us, Parliament, blindfold, bound and gagged into the Community, but we shall be bounced into it in this miserable condition.

The right hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Powell) made a very cogent point about the protection provided by subsection (2). It was a point which was also behind the Opposition Amendments. It is a very cogent and vital point that the safeguard, such as it be, which subsection (2) appears to provide through Schedule 2 is of no assistance, so far as one can tell, to the open floodgates of subsection (1). Therefore, it is useful to see what are the relative quantitative amounts of regulations, directives and decisions that the Community makes in any one year. I have the figures for the Council for 1970. According to the information I have, which comes from a Community journal, during 1970 the Council adopted 249 regulations, 25 directives and 71 decisions.

That is the measure of the loss of democratic control that we shall suffer unless we amend the Bill in accordance with the substance of the Amendments.

Question put, That the Amendment be made:—

The Committee divided: Ayes 255 Noes 269.

Division No. 193.]	AYES	[7.24 p.m.
Abse, Leo	Biffen, John	Cant, R. B.
Allaun, Frank (Salford, E.)	Bishop, E. S.	Carmichael, Neil
Allen, Scholefield	Blenkinsop, Arthur	Carter, Ray (Birmingh'm, Northtfield)
Archer, Peter (Rowley Regis)	Boardman, H. (Leigh)	Carter-Jones, Lewis (Eccles)
Armstrong, Ernest	Body, Richard	Castle, Rt. Hn. Barbara
Ashton, Joe	Booth, Albert	Clark, David (Colne Valley)
Atkinson, Norman	Boyden, James (Bishop Auckland)	Cocks, Michael (Bristol, S.)
Bagler, Gordon A. T.	Brown, Bob (N'c'tle-upon-Tyne,W.)	Cohen, Stanley
Barnett, Guy (Greenwich)	Brown, Hugh D. (G'gow, Provan)	Coleman, Donald
Barnett, Joel (Heywood and Royton)	Brown, Ronald (Shoreditch & F'bury)	Concannon, J. D.
Baxter, William	Buchan, Norman	Conlan, Bernard
Benn, Rt. Hn. Anthony Wedgwood	Buchanan, Richard (G'gow, Sp'burn)	Cox, Thomas (Wandsworth, C.)
Bennett, James (Glasgow, Bridgeton)	Butler, Mrs. Joyce (Wood Green)	Crawshaw, Richard
Bidwell, Sydney	Campbell. I. (Dunbartonshire, W.)	Cronin, John
Crosland, Rt. Hn. Anthony	Jenkins, Hugh (Putney)	Pannell, Rt. Hn. Charles
Cunningham, G. (Islington, S.W.)	Jennings, J. C. (Burton)	Parry, Robert (Liverpool, Exchange)
Dalyell, Tam	John, Brynmor	Pavitt, Laurie
Darling, Rt. Hn. George	Johnson, Carol (Lewisham, S.)	Peart, Rt. Hn. Fred
Davidson, Arthur	Johnson, James (K'ston-on-Hull, W.)	Pendry, Tom
Davies, Denzil (Llanelly)	Jones, Barry (Flint, E.)	Pentland, Norman
Davies, Ifor (Gower)	Jones, Dan (Burnley)	Powell, Rt. Hn. J. Enoch
Davis, Clinton (Hackney, C.)	Jones, Rt. Hn. Sir Elwyn (W.Ham,S.)	Prescott, John
Davis, Terry (Bromsgrove)	Jones, Gwynoro (Carmarthen)	Price, J. T. (Westhoughton)
Deakins, Eric	Jones, T. Alec (Rhondda, W.)	Price, William (Rugby)
de Freitas, Rt. Hn. Sir Geoffrey	Kaufman, Gerald	Probert, Arthur
Dell, Rt. Hn. Edmund	Kelley, Richard	Rankin, John
Dempsey, James	Kerr, Russall	Reed, D. (Sedgefielo)
Doig, Peter	Kilfedder, James	Rhodes, Geoffrey
Dorman, J. D.	Kinnock, Neil	Richard, Ivor
Douglas, Dick (Stirlingshire, E.)	Lamborn, Harry	Roberts, Albert (Normanton)
Douglas-Mann, Bruce	Lamond, James	Roberts, Rt. Hn. Goronwy (Caernarvon)
Driberg, Tom	Latham, Arthur	Robertson, John (Paisley)
Duffy, A. E. P.	Leadbitter, Ted	Roderick, Caerwyn E.(Br'c'n&R'dnor)
Dunn, James A.	Lee, Rt. Hn. Frederick	Rodgers, William (Stockton-on-Tees)
Dunnett, Jack	Lestor, Miss Joan	Roper, John
Eadie, Alex	Lever, Rt. Hn. Harold	Rose, Paul B.
Edwards, Robert (Bilston)
Edwards, William (Merioneth)	Lewis, Arthur (W. Ham. N.)	Ross, Rt. Hn. William (Kilmarnock)
Ellis, Tom	Lipton, Marcus	Rowlands, Ted
English, Michael	Lomas, Kenneth	Sandelson, Neville
Evans, Fred	Loughlln, Charles	Sheldon, Robert (Ashton-under-Lyne)
Farr John	Lyon, Alexander W. (York)	Shore, Rt. Hn. Peter (Stepney)
Faulds, Andrew	Lyons, Edward (Bradford, E.)	Silkin, Rt. Hn. John (Deptford)
Fell, Anthony	Mabon, Dr. J. Dickson	Silkin, Hn. S. C. (Dulwich)
Fernyhough, Rt. Hn. E.	McBride, Neil	Sillars, James
Fisher, Mrs. Doris (B'ham,Ladywood)	McCartney, Hugh	Silverman, Julius
Fitch, Alan (Wigan)	Mackenzie, Gregor	Skinner, Dennis
Fletcher, Raymond (Ilkeston)	Mackie, John	Small, William
Fletcher, Ted (Darlington)	Maclennan, Robert	Smith, John (Lanarkshire, N.)
Foley, Maurice	McMaster, Stanley	Spearing, Nigel
Foot, Michael	McMillan, Tom (Glasgow, C.)	Spriggs, Leslie
Ford, Ben	McNamara, J. Kevin	Stewart, Donald (Western Isles)
Forrester, John	Mahon, Simon (Bootle)	Stoddart, David (Swindon)
Fraser, John (Norwood)	Mallalleu, J. P. W.(Huddersfield,E)	Stonehouse, Rt. Hn. John
Freeson, Reginald	Marks, Kenneth	Strang, Gavin
Garrett, W. E.	Marquand, David	Summerskill, Hn. Dr. Shirley
Gilbert, Dr. John	Marsden, F.	Swain, Thomas
Ginsburg, David (Dewsbury)	Marshall, Dr. Edmund	Taverne, Dick
Golding, John	Marten, Neil	Thomas, Rt. Hn. George (Cardiff,W.)
Gordon Walker, Rt. Hn. P. C.	Mason, Rt. Hn. Roy	Tinn, James
Grant, George (Morpeth)	Mayhew, Christopher	Tomney, Frank
Grant, John D. (Islington, E.)	Meacher, Michael	Torney, Tom
Griffiths, Eddie (Brightside)	Mellish, Rt. Hn. Robert	Tuck, Raphael
Griffiths, Will (Exchange)	Mendelson, John	Turton, Rt. Hn. Sir Robin
Hamilton, James (Bothwell)	Mikardo, Ian	Urwin, T. W.
Hamilton, William (Fife, W.)	Mlllan, Bruce	Varley, Eric G.
Hamling, William	Miller, Dr. M. S.	Walnwright, Edwin
Hannan. William (G'gow, Maryhlll)	Milne, Edward	Walker, Harold (Doncaster)
Hardy, Peter	Mitchell, R. C. (S'hampton, Itchen)	Walker-Smith, Rt. Hn. Sir Derek
Harrison, Walter (Wakefield)	Moate, Roger	Wallace, George
Hart, Rt. Hn. Judith	Molloy, William	Watkins, David
Hattersley, Roy	Molyneaux, James	Weitzman, David
Healey, Rt. Hn. Denis	Morgan, Elystan (Cardiganshire)	Wellbeloved, James
Heffer, Eric S.	Morris, Alfred (Wythenshawe)	Wells, William (Walsall, N.)
Hooson, Emlyn	Morris, Charles R. (Openshaw)	White, James (Glasgow, Pollok)
Horam, John	Moyle, Roland	Whitphead Phillip
Houghton, Rt. Hn. Douglas	Mulley, Rt. Hn. Frederick	Whitlock, William
Howell, Denis (Small Heath)	Murray, Ronald King	Willey, Rt. Hn. Frederick
Huckfleld, Leslie	Oakes, Gordon	Williams, Alan (Swansea, W.)
Hughes, Mark (Durham)	O'Halloran, Michael	Williams, W. T. (Warrington)
Hughes, Robert (Aberdeen, N.)	Oram, Bert	Wilson, Alexander (Hamilton)
Hunter, Adam	Orbach, Maurice	Wilson, William (Coventry, S.)
Hutchison, Michael Clark	Orme, Stanley	Woof, Robert
Irvine,Rt.Hn.Sir Arthur (Edge Hill)	Oswald, Thomas
Janner, Greville	Padley, Walter	TELLERS FOR THE AYES:
Jay, Rt. Hn. Douglas	Paget, R. T.	Mr. Ernest G. Perry and
Jeger, Mrs. Lena	Palmer, Arthur	Mr. Joseph Harper.
NOES
Adley, Robert	Balniel, Rt. Hn. Lord	Boscawen, Robert
Alison, Michael (Barkston Ash)	Batsford, Brian	Bossom, Sir Clive
Allason, James (Hemel Hempstead)	Beamish, Col. Sir Tufton	Bowden, Andrew
Amery, Rt. Hn. Julian	Bennett, Dr. Reginald (Gosport)	Bralne, Bernard
Astor, John	Benyon, W.	Bray, Ronald
Atkins, Humphrey	Berry, Hn. Anthony	Brinton, Sir Tatton
Awdry, Daniel	Blaker, Peter	Brocklebank-Fowler, Christopher
Baker, Kenneth (St. Marylebone)	Boardman, Tom (Leicester, S.W.)	Brown, Sir Edward (Bath)

Bruce-Gardyne, J.	Holland, Philip	Price, David (Eastleigh)
Bryan, Paul	Holt, Miss Mary	Prior, Rt. Hn. J. M. L.
Buchanan-Smith, Alick(Angus, N&M)	Hordern, Peter	Proudfoot, Wilfred
Buck, Antony	Hornby, Richard	Pym, Rt. Hn. Francis
Bullus, Sir Eric	Howe, Hn. Sir Geoffrey (Relgate)	Quennell, Miss J. M.
Burden, F. A.	Howell, Ralph (Norfolk, N.)	Raison, Timothy
Butler, Adam (Bosworth)	Hunt, John	Ramsden, Rt. Hn. James
Campbell. Rt.Hn.G. (Moray & Nairn)	Iremonger, T. L.	Rawlinson, Rt. Hn. Sir Peter
Carlisle, Mark	James, David	Redmond, Robert
Carr, Rt. Hn. Robert	Jenkln, Patrick (Woodford)	Reed, Laurance (Bolton, E.)
Cary, Sir Robert	Jessel, Toby	Rees, Peter (Dover)
Chapman, Sydney	Johnson Smith, G. (E. Grinstead)	Rees-Davies, W. R.
Chataway, Rt. Hn. Christopher	Johnston, Russell (Inverness)	Renton, Rt. Hn. Sir David
Churchill, W. S.	Jones, Arthur (Northants, S.)	Rhys Williams, Sir Brandon
Clark, William (Surrey, E.)	Jopling, Michael	Ridley, Hn. Nicholas
Clegg, Walter	Joseph, Rt. Hn. Sir Keith	Ridsdale, Julian
Cockeram, Eric	Kaberry, Sir Donald	Rippon, Rt. Hn. Geoffrey
Cooke, Robert	Kellett-Bowman, Mrs. Elaine	Roberts, Michael (Cardiff, N.)
Cordle, John	Kershaw, Anthony	Roberts, Wyn (Conway)
Cormack, Patrick	Kimball, Marcus	Rodgers, Sir John (Sevenoaks)
Costain, A. P.	King, Evelyn (Dorset, S.)	Rossi, Hugh (Hornsey)
Critchley, Julian	King, Tom (Bridgwater)	Rost, Peter
Crouch, David	Kinsey, J. R.	St. John-Stevas, Norman
Crowder, F. P.	Kirk, Peter	Scott, Nicholas
Davies, Rt. Hn. John (Knutsford)	Kitson, Timothy	Scott-Hopkins, James
d'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Sir Henry	Knight, Mrs. Jill	Sharpies, Richard
d'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Maj. -Gen. James	Knox, David	Shaw, Michael (Sc'b'gh &p; Whitby)
Dean, Paul	Lambton, Lord	Shelton, William (Clapham)
Deedes, Rt. Hn. W. F.	Lamont, Norman	Simeons, Charles
Digby, Simon Wingfield	Lane, David	Sinclair, Sir George
Dixon, Piers	Langford-Holt, Sir John	Skeet, T. H. H.
Dodds-Parker, Douglas	Legge-Bourke, Sir Harry	Smith, Dudley (W'wick & L'mington)
Drayson, G. B.	Le Marchant, Spencer	Soref, Harold
Dykes, Hugh	Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)	Speed, Keith
Eden, Sir John	Longden, Gilbert	Spence, John
Edwards, Nicholas (Pembroke)	Loveridge, John	Sproat, lain
Elliot, Capt. Walter (Carshalton)	Luce, R. N.	Stainton, Keith
Elliott, R. W. (N'c'tle-upon-Tyne, N.)	McAdden, Sir Stephen	Stanbrook, Ivor
Emery, Peter	MacArthur, Ian	Steel, David
Eyre, Reginald	McCrindle, R. A.	Stewart-Smith, Geoffrey (Belper)
Fenner, Mrs. Peggy	McLaren, Martin	Stodart, Anthony (Edinburgh, W.)
Fidler, Michael	Maclean, Sir Fitzroy	Stoddart-Scott, Col. Sir M.
Fisher, Nigel (Surbiton)	Macmillan, Maurice (Farnham)	Stokes, John
Fletcher-Cooke, Charles	McNair-Wilson, Michael	Stuttafford, Dr. Tom
Fookes, Miss Janet	McNair-Wilson, Patrick (New Forest)	Tapsell, Peter
Foster, Sir John	Maddan, Martin	Taylor, Sir Charles (Eastbourne)
Fowler, Norman	Madel, David	Taylor, Frank (Moss Side)
Fox, Marcus	Mather, Carol	Tebblt, Norman
Fry, Peter	Maude, Angus	Temple, John M.
Gibson-Watt, David	Maudling, Rt. Hn. Reginald	Thatcher, Rt. Hn. Mrs. Margaret
Gilmour, Ian (Norfolk, C.)	Mawby, Ray	Thomas, John Stradling (Monmouth)
Gilmour, Sir John (Fife, E.)	Maxwell-Hyslop, R. J.	Thomas, Rt. Hn. Peter (Hendon, S.)
Glyn, Dr. Alan	Meyer, Sir Anthony	Thompson, Sir Richard (Croydon, S.)
Godber, Rt. Hn. J. B.	Mills, Peter (Torrington)	Tilney, John
Goodhart, Philip	Miscampbell, Norman	Trafford, Dr. Anthony
Goodhew, Victor	Mitchell, Lt.-Col.C. (Aberdeenshire, W)	Trew, Peter
Gorst, John	Mitchell, David (Basingstoke)	Tugendhat, Christopher
Gower, Raymond	Money, Ernie	Van Straubenzee, W. R
Grant, Anthony (Harrow, C.)	Monks, Mrs. Connie	Vaughan, Dr. Gerard
Gray, Hamish	Monro, Hector	Vickers, Dame Joan
Green, Alan	Montgomery, Fergus	Waddington, David
Grieve, Percy	More, Jasper	Walker, Rt. Hn. Peter (Worcester)
Griffiths, Eldon (Bury St. Edmunds)	Morgan-Giles, Rear-Adm.	Wall, Patrick
Grimond, Rt. Hn. J.	Morrison, Charles	Walters, Dennis
Grylls, Michael	Mudd, David	Ward, Dame Irene
Gummer, J. Selwyn	Murton, Oscar	Warren, Kenneth
Gurden, Harold	Neave, Airey	Weatherill, Bernard
Hall, John (Wycombe)	Noble, Rt. Hn. Michael	White, Roger (Gravesend)
Hall-Davis, A. G. F.	Normanton, Tom	Wiggin, Jerry
Hamilton, Michael (Salisbury)	Nott, John	Wilkinson, John
Hannam, John (Exeter)	Onslow, Cranley	Winterton, Nicholas
Harrison, Col. Sir Harwood (Eye)	Oppenheim, Mrs. Sally	Wolrige-Gordon, Patrick
Haselhurst, Alan	Osborn, John	Wood, Rt. Hn. Richard
Hastings, Stephen	Owen, Idris (Stockport, N.)	Woodhouse, Hn. Christopher
Havers, Michael	Page, Graham (Crosby)	Woodnutt, Mark
Hawkins, Paul	Page, John (Harrow, W.)	Worsley, Marcus
Heath, Rt. Hn. Edward	Pardoe, John	Wylie, Rt. Hn. N. R.
Heseltine, Michael	Parkinson, Cecil	Younger, Hn. George
Hicks, Robert	Peel, John
Higgins, Terence L.	Percival, Ian	TELLERS FOR THE NOES:
Hiley, Joseph	Peyton, Rt. Hn. John	Mr. Kenneth Clarke and
Hill, John E. B. (Norfolk, S.)	Pike, Miss Mervyn	Mr. Tim Fortescue.
Hill, James (Southampton, Test)	Pink, R. Bonner

Question accordingly negatived.

Amendment proposed: No. 142, in page 2, line 36, leave out 'or department'.—[Mr. Powell.]

Question put, That the Amendment be made:—

The Committee divided: Ayes 260, Noes 265.

Division No. 194.]	AYES	[7.38 p.m.
Abse, Leo	Fisher, Mrs. Dorls(B'ham,Ladywood)	McCartney, Hugh
Allaun, Frank (Salford, E.)	Fitch, Alan (Wigan)	Mackenzie, Gregor
Allen, Scholefield	Fletcher, Raymond (Ilkeston)	Mackie, John
Archer, Peter (Rowley Regis)	Fletcher, Ted (Darlington)	Maclennan, Robert
Armstrong, Ernest	Foley, Maurice	McMaster, Stanley
Ashton, Joe	Foot, Michael	McMillan, Tom (Glasgow, C.)
Atkinson, Norman	Ford, Ben	McNamara, J. Kevin
Bagier, Gordon A. T.	Forrester, John	Mahon, Simon (Bootle)
Barnett, Guy (Greenwich)	Fraser, John (Norwood)	Mallalieu, J. P. W. (Huddersfield, E.)
Barnett, Joel (Heywood and Royton)	Freeson, Reginald	Marks, Kenneth
Baxter, William	Garrett, W. E.	Marquand, David
Benn, Rt. Hn. Anthony Wedgwood	Gilbert, Dr. John	Marsden, F.
Bennett, James (Glasgow, Brldgeton)	Ginsburg, David (Dewsbury)	Marshall, Dr. Edmund
Bidwell, Sydney	Golding, John	Marten, Neil
Biffen, John	Gordon Walker, Rt. Hn. P. C.	Mason, Rt. Hn. Roy
Bishop, E. S.	Grant, George (Morpeth)	Mayhew, Christopher
Blenkinsop, Arthur	Grant, John D. (Islington, E.)	Meacher, Michael
Boardman, H. (Leigh)	Griffiths, Eddie (Brightside)	Mellish, Rt. Hn. Robert
Body, Richard	Griffiths, Will (Exchange)	Mendelson, John
Booth, Albert	Grimond, Rt. Hn. J.	Mikardo, Ian
Boyden, James (Bishop Auckland)	Hamilton, James (Bothwell)	Millan, Bruce
Brown, Bob (N'c'tle-upon-Tyne, W.)	Hamilton, William (Fife, W.)	Miller, Dr. M. S.
Brown, Hugh D. (G'gow, Provan)	Hamling, William	Milne, Edward
Brown, Ronald (Shoredltch & F'bury)	Hannan, William (G'gow, Maryhill)	Mitchell, R. C. (S'hampton, Itchen)
Buchan, Norman	Hardy, Peter	Moate, Roger
Buchanan, Richard (G'gow, Sp'burn)	Harrison, Walter (Wakefield)	Molloy, William
Bullus, Sir Eric	Hart, Rt. Hn. Judith	Molyneaux, James
Butler, Mrs. Joyce (Wood Green)	Hattersley, Roy	Morgan, Elystan (Cardiganshire)
Campbell, I. (Dunbartonshire, W.)	Healey, Rt. Hn. Denis	Morris, Alfred (Wythenshawe)
Cant, R. B.	Heffer, Eric S.	Morris, Charles R. (Openshaw)
Carmichael, Neil	Hooson, Emlyn	Moyle, Roland
Carter, Ray (Birmlngh'm, Northfield)	Horam, John	Mulley, Rt. Hn. Frederick
Carter-Jones, Lewis (Eccles)	Houghton, Rt. Hn. Douglas	Murray, Ronald King
Castle, Rt. Hn. Barbara	Howell, Denis (Small Heath)	Oakes, Gordon
Clark, David (Colne Valley)	Huckfield, Leslie	O'Halloran, Michael
Cocks, Michael (Bristol, S.)	Hughes, Mark (Durham)	Oram, Bert
Cohen, Stanley	Hughes, Robert (Aberdeen, N.)	Orbach, Maurice
Coleman, Donald	Hunter, Adam	Orme, Stanley
Concannon, J. D.	Hutchison, Michael Clark	Oswald, Thomas
Conlan, Bernard	lrvine,Rt.Hn.SirArthur(Edge Hill)	Padley, Walter
Cox, Thomas (Wandsworth, C.)	Janner, Grevllle	Paget, R. T.
Crawshaw, Richard	Jay, Rt. Hn. Douglas	Palmer, Arthur
Cronin, John	Jeger, Mrs. Lena	Pannell, Rt. Hn. Charles
Crosland, Rt. Hn. Anthony	Jenkins, Hugh (Putney)	Pardoe, John
Cunningham, G. (Islington, S.W.)	Jennings, J. C. (Burton)	Parry, Robert (Liverpool, Exchange)
Dalyell, Tarn	John, Brynmor	Pavitt, Laurie
Darling, Rt. Hn. George	Johnson, Carol (Lewisham, S.)	Peart, Rt. Hn. Fred
Davidson, Arthur	Johnson, James (K'ston-on-Hull, W)	Pendry, Tom
Davies, Denzil (Llanelly)	Johnston, Russell (Inverness)	Pentland, Norman
Davies, Ifor (Gower)	Jones, Barry (Flint, E.)	Powell, Rt. Hn. J. Enoch
Davis, Clinton (Hackney, C.)	Jones, Dan (Burnley)	Prescott, John
Davis, Terry (Bromsgrove)	Jones, Rt. Hn. Sir Elwyn (W.Ham,S.)	Price, J. T. (Westhoughton)
Deakins, Eric	Jones, Gwynoro (Carmarthen)	Price, William (Rugby)
de Freitas, Rt. Hn. Sir Geoffrey	Jones, T. Alec (Rhondda, W.)	Probert, Arthur
Dell, Rt. Hn. Edmund	Kaufman, Gerald	Rankin, John
Dempsey, James	Kelley, Richard	Reed, D. (Sedgefield)
Doig, Peter	Kerr, Russell	Rhodes, Geoffrey
Dormand, J. D.	Kilfedder, James	Richard, Ivor
Douglas, Dick (Stirlingshire, E.)	Kinnock, Neil	Roberts, Albert (Normanton)
Douglas-Mann, Bruce	Lamborn, Harry	Roberts, Rt. Hn. Goronwy (Caernarvon)
Drlberg, Tom	Lamond, James	Robertson, John (Paisley)
Duffy, A. E. P.	Latham, Arthur	Roderick, Caerwyn E.(Br'c'n&R'dnor)
Dunn, James A	Leadbitter, Ted	Rodgers, William (Stockton-on-Tees)
Dunnett, Jack	Lee, Rt. Hn. Frederick	Roper, John
Eadie, Alex	Lestor, Miss Joan	Rose, Paul B.
Edwards, Robert (Bilston)	Lever, Rt. Hn. Harold	Ross, Rt. Hn. William (Kilmarnock)
Edwards, William (Merioneth)	Lewis, Arthur (W. Ham, N.)	Rowlands, Ted
Ellis, Tom	Lipton, Marcus	Sandelson, Neville
English, Michael	Lomas, Kenneth	Sheldon, Robert (Ashton-under-Lyne)
Evans, Fred	Loughlin, Charles	Shore, Rt. Hn. Peter (Stepney)
Farr, John	Lyon, Alexander W. (York)	Silkin, Rt. Hn. John (Deptford)
Faulds, Andrew	Lyons, Edward (Bradford, E.)	Silkin, Hn. S. C. (Dulwich)
Fell, Anthony	Mabon, Dr. J. Dickson	Sillars, James
Fernyhough, Rt. Hn. E.	McBrlde, Neil	Silverman, Julius
Skinner, Dennis	Tinn, James	Wells, William (Walsall, N.)
Small, William	Tomney, Frank	White, James (Glasgow, Pollok)
Smith, John (Lanarkshire, N.)	Torney, Tom	Whitehead, Phillip
Spearing, Nigel	Tuck, Raphael	Whitlock, William
Spriggs, Leslie	Turton, Rt. Hn. Sir Robin	Wllley, Rt. Hn. Frederick
Steel, David	Urwin, T. W.	Williams, Alan (Swansea, W.)
Stewart, Donald (Western Isles)	Varley, Eric G.	Williams, W. T. (Warrington)
Stoddart, David (Swindon)	Wainwright, Edwin	Wilson, Alexander (Hamilton)
Stonehouse, Rt. Hn. John	Walker, Harold (Doncaster)	Wilson, William (Coventry, S.)
Strang, Gavin	Walker-Smith, Rt. Hn. Sir Derek	Woof, Robert
Summerskill, Hn. Dr. Shirley	Wallace, George
Swain, Thomas	Watkins, David	TELLERS FOR THE AYES:
Taverne, Dick	Weitzman, David	Mr. Ernest G. Perry and
Thomas,Rt.Hn.George (Cardiff,W.)	Wellbeloved, James	Mr. Joseph Harper
NOES
Adley, Robert	Fletcher-Cooke, Charles	Knight, Mrs. Jill
Alison, Michael (Barkston Ash)	Fookes, Miss Janet	Knox, David
Allason, James (Hemel Hempstead)	Fortescue, Tim	Lambton, Lord
Amery, Rt. Hn. Julian	Foster, Sir John	Lamond, James
Astor, John	Fowler, Norman	Lane, David
Atkins, Humphrey	Fox, Marcus	Langford-Holt, Sir John
Awdry, Daniel	Fry, Peter	Legge-Bourke, Sir Harry
Baker, Kenneth (St. Marylebone)	Gardner, Edward	Le Marchant, Spencer
Balniel, Rt. Hn. Lord	Gibson-Watt, David	Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)
Batsford, Brian	Gilmour, Ian (Norfolk, C.)	Longden, Sir Gilbert
Beamish, Col. Sir Tufton	Gilmour, Sir John (Fife, E.)	Loveridge, John
Bennett, Dr. Reginald (Gosport)	Glyn, Dr. Alan	Luce, R. N.
Benyon, W.	Godber, Rt. Hn. J. B.	McAdden, Sir Stephen
Berry, Hn. Anthony	Goodhart, Philip	MacArthur, Ian
Blaker, Peter	Goodhew, Victor	McCrindle, R. A.
Boardman, Tom (Leicester, S.W.)	Gorst, John	McLaren, Martin
Boscawen. Hn. Robert	Gower, Raymond	Maclean, Sir Fitzroy
Bossom, Sir Clive	Grant, Anthony (Harrow. C.)	Macmillan,Rt.Hn.Maurice (Farnham)
Bowden, Andrew	Gray, Hamish	McNair-Wilson, Michael
Braine. Sir Bernard	Green, Alan	McNair-Wilson, Patrick (New Forest)
Bray, Ronald	Grieve, Percy	Maddan, Martin
Brinton, Sir Tatton	Griffiths, Eldon (Bury St. Edmunds)	Madel, David
Brocklebank-Fowler, Christopher	Grylls, Michael	Mather, Carol
Brown, Sir Edward (Bath)	Gummer, J. Selwyn	Maude, Angus
Bruce-Gardyne, J.	Gurden, Harold	Maudling, Rt. Hn. Reginald
Bryan, Paul	Hall, John (Wycombe)	Mawby, Ray
Buchanan-Smith, Alick(Angus,N&M)	Hall-Davis, A. G. F.	Maxwell-Hyslop, R. J.
Buck, Antony	Hamilton, Michael (Salisbury)	Meyer, Sir Anthony
Burden, F. A.	Hannam, John (Exeter)	Mills, Peter (Torrington)
Butler, Adam (Bosworth)	Harrison, Col. Sir Harwood (Eye)	Miscampbell, Norman
Campbell, Rt. Hn. G.(Moray & Nairn)	Haselhurst, Alan	Mitchell, Lt.-Col. C.(Aberdeenshire, W)
Carlisle, Mark	Hastings, Stephen	Mitchell, David (Basingstoke)
Carr, Rt. Hn. Robert	Havers, Michael	Money, Ernle
Cary, Sir Robert	Hawkins, Paul	Monks, Mrs. Connie
Chapman, Sydney	Hayhoe, Barney	Monro, Hector
Chataway, Rt. Hn. Christopher	Heath, Rt. Hn. Edward	Montgomery, Fergus
Churchill, W. S.	Heseltine, Michael	More, Jasper
Clark, Wiliam (Surrey, E.)	Hicks, Robert	Morgan-Giles, Rear-Adm.
Clegg, Walter	Higgins, Terence L.	Morrison, Charles
Cockeram, Eric	Hiley, Joseph	Mudd, David
Cooke, Robert	Hill, John E. B. (Norfolk, S.)	Murton, Oscar
Cordle, John	Hill, James (Southampton, Test)	Neave, Airey
Cormack, Patrick	Holland, Philip	Noble, Rt. Hn. Michael
Costain, A. P.	Holt, Miss Mary	Normanton, Tom
Critchley, Julian	Hordern, Peter	Nott, John
Crouch, David	Hornby, Richard	Onslow, Cranley
Crowder, F. P.	Howe, Hn. Sir Geoffrey (Reigate)	Oppenheim, Mrs. Sally
Davies, Rt. Hn. John (Knutstord)	Howell, Ralph (Norfolk, N.)	Osborn, John
d'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Sir Henry	Hunt, John	Owen, Idris (Stockport, N.)
d'Avlgdor-Goldsmid, Maj. -Gen. James	Iremonger, T. L.	Page, Graham (Crosby)
Dean, Paul	James, David	Page, John (Harrow, W.)
Deedes, Rt. Hn. W. F.	Jenkin, Patrick (Woodford)	Parkinson, Cecil
Digby, Simon Wingfleld	Jessel, Toby	Peel, John
Dixon, Piers	Johnson Smith, G. (E. Grinstead)	Percival, Ian
Dodds-Parker, Douglas	Jones, Arthur (Northants, S.)	Peyton, Rt. Hn. John
Drayson, G. B.	Jopling, Michael	Pike, Miss Mervyn
Dykes, Hugh	Joseph, Rt. Hn. Sir Keith	Pink, R. Bonner
Eden, Sir John	Kaberry, Sir Donald	Price, David (Eastleigh)
Edwards, Nicholas (Pembroke)	Kellett-Bowman, Mrs. Elaine	Prior, Rt. Hn. J. M. L.
Elliot, Capt. Walter (Carshalton)	Kershaw, Anthony	Proudfoot, Wilfred
Elliott, R. W. (N'c'tle-upon-Tyne, N.)	Kimball, Marcus	Pym, Rt. Hn. Francis
Emery, Peter	King, Evelyn (Dorset, S.)	Quennell, Miss J. M.
Eyre, Reginald	King, Tom (Bridgwater)	Raison, Timothy
Fenner, Mrs. Peggy	Kinsey, J. R.	Ramsden, Rt. Hn. James
Fidler, Michael	Kirk, Peter	Rawlinson, Rt. Hn. Sir Peter
Fisher, Nigel (Surbiton)	Kitson, Timothy	Redmond, Robert

Reed, Laurance (Bolton, E.)	Spence, John	Vickers, Dame Joan
Rees, Peter (Dover)	Sproat, lain	Waddington, David
Rees-Davies, W. R.	Stainton, Kelth	Walker, Rt. Hn. Peter (Worcester)
Renton, Rt. Hn. Sir David	Stanbrook, Ivor	Wall, Patrick
Rhys Williams, Sir Brandon	Stewart-Smith, Geoffrey (Belper)	Walters, Dennis
Ridley, Hn. Nicholas	Stodart, Anthony (Edinburgh, W.)	Ward, Dame Irene
Ridsdale, Julian	Stoddart-Scott, Col. Sir M.	Warren, Kenneth
Rippon, Rt. Hn. Geoffrey	Stokes, John	Weatherill, Bernard
Roberts, Michael (Cardiff, N.)	Stuttaford, Dr. Tom	White, Roger (Gravesend)
Roberts, Wyn (Conway)	Tapsell, Peter	Wiggin, Jerry
Rodgers, Sir John (Sevenoaks)	Taylor, Sir Charles (Eastbourne)	Wilkinson, John
Rost, Peter	Taylor, Frank (Moss Side)	Winterton, Nicholas
St. John-Stevas, Norman	Tebbit, Norman	Wolrige-Gordon, Patrick
Scott, Nicholas	Temple, John M.	Wood, Rt. Hn. Richard
Scott-Hopkins, James	Thatcher, Rt. Hn. Mrs. Margaret	Woodhouse, Hn. Christopher
Sharples, Richard	Thomas, John Stradling (Monmouth)	Woodnutt, Mark
Shaw, Michael (Sc'b'gh & Whitby)	Thomas, Rt. Hn. Peter (Hendon, S.)	Worsley, Marcus
Shelton, William (Clapham)	Thompson, Sir Richard (Croydon. S.)	Wylie, Rt. Hn. N. R.
Simeons, Charles	Tilney, John	Younger, Hn. George
Sinclair, Sir George	Trafford, Dr. Anthony
Skeet, T. H. H.	Trew, Peter	TELLERS FOR THE NOES:
Smith, Dudley (W'wick & L'mington)	Tugendhat, Christopher	Mr. Kenneth Clarke and
Soref, Harold	van Straubenzee, W. R.	Mr. Hugh Rossi
Speed, Keith	Vaughan, Dr. Gerard

Question accordingly negatived.

[Mr. BRYANT GODMAN IRVINE in the Chair]

Mr. Anthony Wedgwood Bean, (Bristol, South-East)

I beg to move Amendment No. 406, in page 3, line 2, after obligation', insert: 'except such obligations arising under or pursuant to Articles 92 and 93 of the Treaty of Rome, which obligations shall be binding after enactment, but so however that no such enactment shall bind future Parliaments'.

The Temporary Chairman

With this Amendment it is convenient to discuss Amendment No. 415, in page 2, line 34, after 'Act', insert: 'except for any provision implementing or dealing with any obligation or right arising out of the Decision of the Council of Ministers 65/271/CEE of 13th May 1965 concerning state aids to rail, road and water transport, and out of the Directive of the Council of Ministers 69/262/CEE of 28th July 1969 concerning state aid for shipbuilding'.

Mr. Benn

Before I speak to my Amendment, I must say that we now have an interesting definition of full-hearted consent. It seems that the Prime Minister and four other Members constitute all the mandate the right hon. Gentleman feels he needs.

The Amendments deal with two aspects of industrial policy. Amendment No. 406 deals with general State aids and Amendment No. 415 deals with two specific examples, one of a decision in connection with transport and the other a directive in respect of shipbuillding. We are now looking at the nuts and bolts, and how this legislation would apply in practice.

Article 92 of the Treaty makes it quite clear that Save as otherwise provided in this Treaty, any aid granted by a Member State or through State resources…which distorts or threatens to distort competition…shall, in so far as it affects trade between Member States, be incompatible with the common market. That is the basic statement on State aid. The Article then lists three types of aid that shall definitely be compatible. One is aid having a social character, granted to individual consumers". The next is support following natural disasters. The third refers to the areas of the Federal Republic of Germany affected by the division of Germany. Those are the only statutory provisions for exceptions. It then lays down three types of aid which may be considered to be compatible. The first is, aid to promote the economic development of areas where the standard of living is abnormally low or where there is serious underemployment; That is the area which will deal with regional policy. The second is, aid to promote the execution of an important project of common European interest which no doubt would cover major technological projects. The third is, aid to facilitate the development of certain economic activities or of certain economic areas, where such aid does not adversely affect trading conditions to an extent contrary to the common interest. The next sentence refers to …aids granted to shipbuilding • for which, of course, there is a special directive.

To understand the operation of these provisions, it is necessary to turn next to the way in which the machinery works, because any other category of aid has to be specifically approved by a qualified majority of Ministers on a proposal from the Commission. The key to the operation of Article 92 is contained in Article 93.

It is clear from Article 93 that it is the task of the Commission to …keep under constant review all systems of aid… and that if there is any doubt in the mind of the Commission about the acceptability of aid it is for the Commission to …decide that the State concerned shall abolish or alter such aid within a period of time to be determined by the Commission. We are now dealing with the powers of the Commission to bring to an end State aid to industry, and if the State concerned does not comply with what the Commission provides, then the Commission refers the matter to the Court of Justice direct. It is true that the Council of Ministers may intervene, but only by acting unanimously, and since the case that the Commission may well wish to make against a State would be that its aid distorted competition, it is inconceivable that the Council of Ministers unanimously would validate that aid. Indeed, if the Council takes more than 12 weeks to reach a judgment, the Commission has the final say and member States must in any case halt their aid until the Commission has come to a judgment.

This is an absolutely central provision of the Treaty of Rome, and it is against this provision that we now have to test some of the legislative measures and practices by which all Governments operate in respect of industry. Before I come to the detail of the way in which this applies, I turn to Amendment No. 415 because it bears upon this aspect. The Shipbuilding directive of 28th July, 1969, lays down that the distortions in competition caused by subsidies of shipbuilding make it permissible to give a 10 per cent. grant by contract for the sale of any seagoing vessels or certain modernisation work.

This provision on shipbuilding was due to expire at the end of last December, and I have not seen the extent to which it has been renewed, but we are arguing the effect of this type of method of deciding on intervention. It runs counter to the Industry Bill, to which we gave a Second Reading on Monday. That Bill provides a whole range of criteria by which the Government may intervene to promote development or modernisation. Part II of the Bill says it is intended …to promote efficiency…to create, expand or sustain productive capacity…to promote…reconstruction…to encourage…growth…to encourage arrangements for…contraction…". all of which powers are being sought by the Government against a background of this Community legislation which will make it quite invalid and ineffective if the Commission operates in the way we think it will.

For example, the statement made by the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry about Govan and the Marathon support shows that this is not even to be done under the shipbuilding provisions of the Industry Bill but under the general powers of financial assistance for industry, extracts from which I have just quoted. I go further and draw attention to the fact that the naval orders announced last October for £70 million, designed, very understandably, to support the shipbuilding industry at a time when orders were in very short supply, come under another provision of the Treaty, relating to free access to public contracts. If we really want to understand the thinking of the Commission, it would be helpful to refer to the long memorandum from the Commission to the Council, adopted two years ago. It concerns industrial policy, including public contracts. Page 20 of the English text says: The practice of reserving public or semipublic contracts to national industry may appear to be in the best immediate interests of industry in each member State. That is where the naval orders come in, I believe. However, this practice has the effect of depriving certain key industries in the Community of the advantages of a large internal market. Such practices became completely illegal on 1st January, 1970. Therefore, as far as the Commission is concerned, it would no longer be open to the Government to use public contracts in order to support industry, as has traditionally been done in terms of naval orders and things of that kind. It is that defence has been thought of as rather different and the Commission recognises this on page 173 of the memorandum, but what it says there is even more threatening: …the problems of industries engaged in national defence cannot be solved satisfactorily unless considerable progress is made towards political union. The absence of a European political union represents in particular a major handicap for the rational organisation of technically advanced military production. That is to say, the Commission is drawing attention to the fact that public contracts for the shipbuilding industry would be illegal unless thrown open to tender, so that the French or the Germans, for example, could build ships for the Royal Navy. It suggested that this pointed to the need for the rationalisation of military production throughout the whole of the Community. This is a very important political doctrine and I read it out because the Commission has the power—not the Council of Ministers—to determine who shall and who shall not give the aid.

Let us look more broadly than the shipbuilding case. Large sections of the Industry Bill are going to be incompatible with the provisions of Articles 92 and 93, and therefore either the Committee is legislating ineffectively because of the way leigslation will be illegal before we start, in the sense that after 1st January Parliament has to apply Community regulations, directions or directives, or, if the regulations, directives, directions or decisions are laid down after we go in, a Minister or a Department, by a regulation under this subsection, will be able to set aside the decision of Parliament in respect of the Industry Bill—by then an Act. Again, the Act could be disallowed by the courts on an application by the Commission, whose decision, of course, would have to be applied through the British courts.

I hope I have established the point that the European Communities Bill, in the form presented by the right hon. and learned Gentleman, who is a former Minister of Technology, moves central decisions on industrial policy completely from Parliament and the relevant Departments which look after things in Whitehall, and takes them elsewhere to the Commission. That is the point in practice, and when we talk about sovereignty and all these great constitutional principles we must not forget that the powers we are talking about are powers that historically and traditionally and necessarily British Governments have taken and exercised in defence of the interests of the people in the regions and constituencies of this country. There can be no shadow of doubt that the essential decisions are transferred under this Bill from Whitehall to Brussels.

8.0 p.m.

The next aspect of our Amendment is to do with transport, which is also covered by Amendment No. 415. We are talking about a decision of the Council of Ministers on state aid to rail, road and water transport. I could have picked a large number of similar Amendments but this exactly illustrates what I am dealing with. The decision in Article 8 of the 1965 decision of the Council of Ministers proves the point. First it says: provisions governing the financial relations between railway undertakings and States shall be progressively harmonised. This issue lies at the very heart of the present industrial dispute between British Railways and the workers, because, although we do not yet know the outcome of this dispute we know very well that it is quite possible, if not likely, if not certain, that the Government will solve this problem in the way they accepted the Wilberforce award with the miners—by giving a subsidy to pay the wages.

The question that arises under Article 8 if harmonisation is to he demanded is: will it be open to a Minister to give a subsidy to the public sector to deal with a problem of this kind? I am talking of transport, but it could be any other part of the public sector.

Article 10 of the same decision makes it clear that laws, regulations and provisions relating to working conditions in the railways are to be harmonised. Article 11 says that the manning provisions for each mode of transport shall be standardised and Article 12 says: From 1st January, 1967, provisions concerning working and rest periods in each mode of transport shall be harmonised. The Industrial Relations Court now gives judgments about whether a person must work on his rest day, it deals with arguments about manning, and there is this prohibition against a subsidy. At the same time therefore the essential power of the Government to deal with the present railway situation is taken out of their hands by this decision of the Council of Ministers. These are very grave matters not to be brushed aside as the right hon. and learned Gentleman tries to do by saying that when we get there, we will be there, and it will be all right because nothing that will happen can happen to damage our interests.

This does the right hon. and learned Gentleman, who is a learned and skilful administrator and politician, less than justice. He knows very well indeed that decisions of the kind to which I have referred are already taken, will be applied and cannot be changed without unanimity in some cases. He knows that it is quite untrue to say that this will be all right simply because he will be sitting there on the Council of Ministers instead of in the House.

The other reason why it is argued we should not worry about these things is that we would never agree to anything harmful to our national interests. But the whole of political argument in a democratic society is about just what is in our national interests. If it could be said objectively that this Government will never damage the national interest, never agree to anything which would do that, then the Opposition need have no fear. But in saying that we are excluding the whole question of what is in the national interest. The whole election choice which we open up to our electors is about the extent to which there should be intervention in some of the areas to which I have referred.

What the Government would have been ready to have agreed to two years ago, when they came into office, in terms of State intervention, as being well within their own assessment of the national interest is totally different from what the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry now regards as essential. It is not only that an Opposition coming forward with an alternative policy would find that its position had been pre-empted by the previous Government which had agreed to regulations or decisions which were unchangeable, but no Government would be able to change their policy in accordance with a developing situation.

The second argument is that anything that is central to our national interest will not be forced upon us. I have heard that argument being used time and again. Let me quote from what the Commission says on industrial policy. I am referring to the conclusions of this major memorandum which, I think, is known as the Colonna Memorandum written by the Commission. This says: For reasons which have been stated in this chapter, the Commission believes that it is no longer possible to postpone the confrontation and co-ordination of action by member States in these different fields. That is to say that the Commission as it examines the role of industrial policy and the development of the Communities does not believe that it is possible to avoid confrontation with member States on matters which are central to those touched on in the Amendment.

The final argument used by the Chancellor, I heard it again a few moments ago, was, "Don't worry, no one takes these regulations very seriously". I tried to write down his words and they were something to the effect that Parliament has power to reject, after that the Commission would have to "tolerate" what we have done, or the Government would have to "mend their fences". It may be that tensions could arise, between Parliament and the Community. For the right hon. and learned Gentleman who is advocating entry under this legislation to say that if we do not like the law we can break it is no different from what the Transport and General Workers' Union is saying about the Industrial Relations Act. It is very dangerous for the right hon. and learned Gentleman to sell quietly to the British public, in language that is sufficiently vague not to get him into trouble in Brussels, the idea that if the British public does not like what it finds it will not have to take any notice of it.

We are talking about the whole process of the machinery of Government and how it interacts on both sides of industry, and we are discussing the whole electoral process. The main safeguard of our society is simply stated. It is that when there is a grievance or injustice it is open to a political party to advocate a course of action, be it in industrial, social, fiscal or in any other sphere, to seek support for its view and, if elected, to implement its policy. Move the central area of industrial policy to Brussels and the whole of that democratic interplay is destroyed.

It is not a matter of nationalism versus internationalism as is sometimes argued. I greatly resent the idea that we are somehow clinging to an island answer compared with the European answer. The difference is that within our system, as it has evolved, it is possible for remedies to be found to grievances, and Ministers have the incentive to find those remedies, or they will not be returned to power. This is the heart of what we call the parliamentary system. It is more than that; it is the way by which a society learns by its experience. No one learns except by experience.

Mr. Douglas Dodds-Parker (Cheltenham)

The right hon. Gentleman does not seem even to learn from that.

Mr. Benn

That does the hon. Gentleman less than justice. He is a member of a party that has learned by bitter experience the necessity to modify its industrial policy, and it hardly lies in his mouth to make that comment. Both parties change their policies in the light of a developing situation. The difference between the civil servant and the politician is that the politician has an incentive to change because pressures are being brought upon him. The civil servant in Whitehall or Brussels is doing a job—and a good job—but he is statutorally protected from experiencing the consequences of his own policies. That is what is destroyed by changing the centre of decisions from Parliament in Westminster to Brussels.

We have moved a simple Amendment in No. 415. It is that the points referred to in that decision and that directive should not apply, because we know that in practice they do not make sense. We say, too, that regulations flowing from Articles 92 and 93 should not be binding on a future Parliament, because they cannot be. If they were binding they would deny to both parties the right to put forward policies to meet development needs of those policies were counter to what had been agreed by the Commission and the Community before we got there.

I hope that in giving his answer to the Amendments the right hon. and learned Gentleman will address his mind to the guts and substance of them, and not give all sorts of reassurances which will not satisfy those whose livelihood depends on the policies to which I have referred. If he does the former, he will do the Committee a service. If the right hon. and learned Gentleman rejects the Amendments, the implications of what he has in mind will become so clear that the country, in observing the way in which the Bill is proceeding through Parliament, will, for the first time, realise that the Chancellor of the Exchequer was right when he said that if the Bill goes through we shall come to the end of an era.

Mr. John Loveridge (Hornchurch)

I rise to support the view that subsection (2) should be retained in its present form and not altered in accordance with Amendment No. 406. As the right hon. Member for Bristol, South-East (Mr. Benn) said a few moments ago, Articles 92 and 93 of the Treaty of Rome are central provisions of that Treaty, and Amendment No. 406 is virtually a wrecking Amendment to the whole sense of the legislation.

The right hon. Gentleman said that it was possible for remedies to be found by Ministers. He was, of course, speaking of the pressures which could be applied in this Chamber to our legislation, and have been almost from time immemorial. The right hon. Gentleman spoke of the difference between a civil servant and a politician and told us that politicians could be moved to learn from experience by the pressures applied to them, presumably by debate in the House, and by pressures outside, too. He claimed that all this would be destroyed by the movement of legislation to Brussels, and that case has been made many times.

It is true that we shall not, by our vote in the House, be able to force changes in legislation emanating from the Commission or from the Council of Ministers, but the Committee should consider seriously any proposed Amendments to the Clause because it contains provisions affecting the rights of this Chamber to debate many matters that will come to our country as a result of the Treaty. We shall not, however, be able to fulfil our obligations under the Treaty as a whole unless the powers asked for and set out in the Bill are granted and these must be granted by Parliament today.

8.15 p.m.

There is some legislation which takes effect on being initiated by the Council of Ministers itself. Other legislation comes from the Council of Ministers after it has considered proposals put forward by the Commission. Yet other legislation comes to us in a form which allows the Government to choose their own method of implementing in order to bring it into effect in the United Kingdom.

On major matters there is an obligation on the Commission and its officials to consult members of our Government or officials in this country. In reality the Government will, in effect, have a veto in such matters. They will be able to choose not to accept for Britain something put forward by the Council of Ministers, but it may be asked what rights this Chamber will have in such matters. We would like to have our say in good time before the final legislation is in print and is fully enacted.

Will that he so difficult to arrange? I do not think that it will, so long as the proposals initiated by the Commission or by the Council of Ministers are put into print at an early date in the publications of European business; and we do not see them only after they appear in the Official Journal which lists formal legislation. In the interval between the proposals first being printed and finally appearing in the Official Journal listing Legislation there should be opportunities for us in Parliament to debate laws emanating from Europe.

Mr. J. T. Price (Westhoughton)

I think that the hon. Gentleman's argument entirely misses the point made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Bristol, South-East (Mr. Benn). In the final analysis the sanction which remains in our hands under our national sovereignty is to refuse to grant money to the Crown if grievances are not dealt with. This academic argument about printing and the time schedule for the publication of documentary evidence is beside the point.

The historic right and role of the House is to refuse to grant money to the Crown unless grievances are redressed. That is the final sanction which will be denied to us when we become a member of this European organisation. That is our case. The whole principle is embodied in the one pregnant phrase—no grant of money to the Crown without redress of grievances.

Mr. Loveridge

The hon. Gentleman knows that quite often we have to fork out funds under treaties, including defence treaties, into which we have entered, and in other ways, as well. The point that I am trying to make is that if the Government follow my suggestion it will be of great help to the hon. Gentleman and to all our colleagues.

What is important is that the Government should press the Europeans to ensure that the printing to which I have referred takes place in time to enable us to get the necessary documents from the Vote Office and to debate them in this Chamber. That will enable us to make such suggestions as we consider appropriate, and if the Government accept our suggestions they will be able to put them to the Commission and to the Council of Ministers and say that they have the support of Parliament for doing so. It will be helpful to the Government if they are able to do that. We would like there to be an obligation on Ministers to bring matters of public concern before the House in good time so that we can air our views on them before they become law. I see no difficulty about that.

We shall not, of course, by our vote in the House be able to force any provisions which we would like to see embodied in European legislation included in it, but under the procedure which I have suggested we shall be able to have our say in the matter. The Europeans expect us to set an example of Parliamentary control over legislation, and by doing what I have suggested we shall have an opportunity of giving a lead. I hope, that if that is done some of the sincere anxieties which many hon. Members have expressed about this legislation will be assuaged. Many people have felt that this House will not be able to debate matters at all, but if the process that I suggest is brought into effect, considerable debate on legislation emanating from Europe will be possible in this Chamber. I hope that the House will accept the Clause and reject the Amendment.

Mr. William Molloy (Ealing, North)

One is almost frightened at the complacency shown by hon. Members opposite, and particularly the complacent speech to which we have just listened. The danger facing some hon. Members opposite is that they believe some of the excuses and plausible arguments which the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster is submitting. We know that he does not mean them. He is far too able and astute to believe some of the things that he has been telling us. The tragedy is that many of his hon. Friends believe some of the things he says. He has never been able to give an assurance on any of the fundamental points that we have raised through these debates.

The splendid speech by my right hon. Friend the Member for Bristol, South-East (Mr. Benn) should be read by the nation. It was a reasoned, calculated and well-delivered exposition of the thoroughness of the Opposition's case. When my right hon. Friend was talking about the dilemmas regarding subsidies and the effect on our economic problems, which in turn will lead to employment problems, or, as far as this Government is concerned, unemployment problems, he was talking about the lives of the British people. That is why hon. Members opposite should have taken cognisance of the matters about which my right hon. Friend has been talking, from subsidies tight the way through to contracts, building ships, the effect on the steel and coal industries and all the great features of the economic strength of our nation. When it is all brought down to the final analysis we are talking about the standards of life of the people who elect us. We all stand in grave charge of possibly jetting down the nation if we do not take cognisance of what my right hon. Friend said. The Government should accept the Amendment.

When the hon. Member for Horn-church (Mr. Loveridge) talked about our having to follow the good example of the EEC in our democratic behaviour, how wrong can one be——

Mr. Loveridge

I did not say that we should follow their good example. I was conscious in my mind that although the German Parliament sometimes gets and is supposed to get information in advance of decisions, occasionally it is disappointed in that hope. It was to set an example from this Parliament and country to our European colleagues that I made the suggestions which I believe would be effective.

Mr. Molloy

The hon. Gentleman is saying that we should be prepared to surrender the sovereignty of the House of Commons to join an organisation which is not yet as good as we are. I do not find that an attractive argument. In my lifetime history has shown that if there is any form of society that, in the end, is fundamentally stable, despite the economic problems that we have had between and after the wars, it is to be found in the British Isles and this House. By comparison with any nation of the EEC, it is superior. Rather than our accepting some of the practices which they have invented, they would be much better off adopting some of the practices which we have tested and never found wanting.

The threat from the Bill is that this House, which has been the pioneer of democracy, stands in grave danger of becoming the lackey of an EEC bureaucracy. If for no other reason we should give serious thought to the fundamental argument of my right hon. Friend. I appeal to hon. Members opposite, as well as to my hon. Friends, that if ever there were a time for taking courage in their hands and voting as their consciences dictated, rather than at the Whips' sanction. that time has arrived.

Mr. Fell

I hope that the Committee will bear with me for a few minutes. I want to support the right hon. Member for Bristol, South-East (Mr. Benn), in what he said about Amendments Nos. 406 and 415. Before I do so, I hope that you. Mr. Godman Irvine, will grant me a certain amount of latitude, as you have granted latitude to some other hon. Members who asked my right hon. Friends to consider the position into which they have got themselves. They are the spokesmen for a great Government on a matter that is of such importance that it dwarfs everything else any Government could do.

It is a sobering thought that had the Labour Party won the last election my two right hon. Friends might conceivably have been the spokesmen occupying the seat which the right hon. Member for Bristol, South-East now occupies. I gather that my right hon. and learned Friend denies that such a thing is possible, yet history shows that a man of his great calibre, when his party falls out of favour and goes into opposition, can find some excuse for changing his attitude to an important part of policy. We have the odd situation in which some of us—I almost fear to say this—can claim to be fairly consistent in this matter whereas not all hon. Members can make that claim.

I hope that my right hon. and learned Friend and my hon. and learned Friend the Solicitor-General realise the added responsibility they now have to this nation, for it is impossible for either of them to claim that they have the full-hearted consent of either Parliament or the people. An enormous responsibility rests upon them to bend over backwards, as it were, to look at the Amendments which are suggested in good faith from both sides of the Committee.

The Temporary Chairman

Order. I think the hon. Member has had his latitude. I must ask him to come to the Amendment.

Mr. Fell

Indeed, Mr. Godman Irvine, I have been here all afternoon except for a very short interval, and it would be wrong of me not to accept exactly what you say. I will try to keep to the spirit of these Amendments, which is the spirit of most—[Interruption.] It is all very well for my right hon. and learned Friend to correct me from his seated position. I should be delighted if he would stand up and correct me. I should then know what to do. Apparently he does not wish to do so.

8.30 p.m.

The Amendments are a protest at the very essence of this part of the Bill. People are crying out to the Government to save the sovereignty of this nation. So far we have had no luck. I have hopes that my right hon. and learned Friend, when he comes to give us further of his views on the Amendments, will give us more help on Amendment No. 416, as he promised a little while ago.

I cannot believe that it is possible for us to go through this Committee stage, even under a guillotine, with no ideas put forward from either side which are acceptable to either of the senior Ministers responsible either as Amendments or as proposals about which they will at least say, "We will think about them and let the Committee know our views on Report".

It is an impossible situation when my right hon. and learned Friend time after time—no doubt we shall have similar arguments against these two Amendments—puts forward staid, static arguments which are simply a put-off. I do not think that my right hon. and learned Friend does it so skilfully as my hon. and learned Friend the Solicitor-General. The reason is that the Solicitor-General has a different way of putting things and perhaps gets more joy in the spirit of his argument than my right hon. and learned Friend who realises he has to put over a rotten case.

I hope that in considering the Amendments, ably proposed by the right hon. Member for Bristol, South-East (Mr. Benn), my right hon. and learned Friend will seriously take into account what will happen if he goes on with a straight bat blocking every single proposal which the Committee in its wisdom puts forward.

Mr. Denzil Davies (Llanelly)

I agree with the hon. Member for Yarmouth (Mr. Fell) that the Government have put forward a rotten case. Not only has it been a rotten case, but it has been a deceptive case from the very beginning. I, as a new Member, have been slightly shocked at the way this whole operation has been carried out. There has been no attempt at objective analysis or to look at the matter rationally. A decision was taken and everything else must apparently fit into that decision and premise.

This is why we are again seeking to debate regional policy. Article 92 and 93 are of crucial importance to the older industrial and development areas. Unless we can insert strong provisions into the Bill, a future Government will be unable to introduce into this country the radical proposals which I believe will be necessary to counteract the strong market forces which will be unleashed by the enlargement of the Community. We will be unable to do so because we will be hidebound by Articles 92 and 93 of the Treaty of Rome.

Our concern is the greater because the Treaty of Rome does not contain any provision for the setting up of a common regional policy. We heard very little about the need for a common regional policy before the vote on principle and we heard very little about the need for a common industrial policy before Second Reading. Now not a day goes by that a Minister or an enthusiastic pro-Marketeer is constantly making a speech pointing out the need for some such policy if and when we enter the Community. We heard none or very little of this before the crucial votes were taken.

Some pro-Marketeers have awakened with surprise to find that the Treaty of Rome does not provide for a common agricultural policy. It provides for freedom of movement of capital, for the movement of goods freely between different countries, for the movement of labour, but it does not provide for a common regional policy.

The whole essence of a regional policy is that it should counteract the movement of capital and labour and work against the very market forces which are enshrined and codified in the Treaty. It is therefore logical that the Treaty contains no provision for a common regional policy.

This is why we in the regions are afraid. Unless there is a regional policy covering a whole area over which capital, labour and goods are free to move, any national measure to try to counteract those market forces is unlikely to be successful.

I suppose that one day we shall have a common regional policy. If we have one, it will be a regional policy agreed by compromise between 10 nations with different interests and problems. The problems of the French and the Italians are different from our own. If we have a common regional policy, it will be based on a weak compromise decision arrived at by a large number of nations each legitimately trying to safeguard its own political and social interests.

It is shocking that we have not fully debated Articles 92 and 93. We have tried to raise these matters in the debates on the White Paper and on Second Reading, but those were not the occasions on which these matters could be fully discussed. Ofter we got no answer. Even when we got an answer, it was inadequate and incomplete.

It is clear from Article 92 that our fears are not unfounded. Article 92 is a prohibitive article. It does not mention "regional aids". It says: aid…which distorts or threatens to distort competition… shall be prohibited. There is little doubt that most aids that encourage capital investment in areas in which investment would not take place apart from those aids are aids which distort competition; because, if the market was left to its free play, investment would go, not to the less well off areas, but to the more prosperous areas.

Article 92 also establishes exceptions, but the exceptions are restrictive and they do not give much help to older industrial areas. These exceptions were not framed with our problems in mind. Paragraph 3(a), which presumably comes closest to our problems, talks about areas where…there is serious under-employment". That looks all right on the face of it. However, throughout these texts, in every case the word is "underemployment" not "unemployment".

I do not quibble, but it would seem that those who drafted the Article chose the word "underemployment" with great care, because they were considering a situation in Europe between six regional countries, when the problem was in the old rural and semi-agricultural areas in which people suffered from under employment. They were thinking of the French and Italian peasants who worked on the land for a few months in a year and then got another job for a few weeks and did no work for the rest of the year.

This is why so many people are saying that the Treaty of Rome does not provide for our problems; it provides only for the problems of the original six Member States, which are not the problems of the declining industrial areas. Our fears are not unfounded in this respect. We have serious fears in the regions that because of Article 92 there is unlikely to be a common regional policy and that we shall see the same happening in the European Common Market as has happened in the British common market in the last 50 years—a draining away of our young people with disastrous effects on the social and cultural life of development areas.

We have been told especially by my right hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Cheetham (Mr. Harold Lever) in a remarkable speech to this effect—do not worry about the terms of the Treaty, you lawyers are too pernickety, you should not worry about the small print; no one worries about the terms of the Treaty, for these matters are discussed and decided upon in Brussels by men of realism and common sense. But the record does not bear this out and I do not think that many in this Committee would now take that view. The provisions of the Treaty are constantly being enforced. One of the duties of the Commission is to be the guardian of the Treaty and to ensure that it is enforced. We have found that countries such as France, Belgium and Germany have been taken before the European Court, or threatened to be taken before it, because of the regional aids which they as sovereign Governments decided would be in the best interests of their own people.

The Treaty is being applied and as the court finds confidence and gets stronger and the movement towards federalism gets stronger, who knows whether another Chief Justice Marshall will appear and Articles of the Treaty will be more rigidly enforced against sovereign States? It is our fear that the problems of the future, because of the codification of market forces enshrined in the Treaty, may become more considerable for the regions. Quite apart from the Treaty provisions themselves, unless we have an enactment which provides that any directives shall not be binding on future Parliaments, I am also afraid that the courts of this country might try to strike down future legislation passed by this Parliament if it is considered to be contrary to any directives or regulations issued under Articles 92 and 93.

I believe that this Bill has been drafted so far as possible with that object in mind. It has been provided so that a judge in a court, looking at a future piece of legislation, would try to construe it as being in conformity and not against the provisions of this Measure. Many provisions of the Bill are designed for that purpose, to fetter the future power of this Parliament to alter the application of directives and regulations under the Treaty of Rome. So it is important that we should write into the Bill a provision stating that any future directives shall not be binding on the House of Commons so that we may adopt policies which we consider to be in the best interests of our people.

This Amendment is not a wrecking Amendment. It does not destroy the case for Common Market membership, but merely prescribes that Articles 92 and 93 shall be implemented by enactment and not by resolution—by enactment debated in the House. Secondly, it provides that any such enactment shall not bind a future Parliament. We are told that Parliament is sovereign and that we cannot bind our successors. Therefore, let us make absolutely certain and put this suggested provision into the Bill so that not only the House but the courts will realise what our intention is and that we have no intention of binding ourselves either on this subject or any other matter arising from the Treaty of Rome. For these reasons, I would hope that pro-Marketeers will be able to support the Amendment without fear of wrecking the Bill or the Treaty.

8.45 p.m.

Mr. Grylls

I am sure the Committee will welcome the presence of the right hon. Member for Bristol, South-East (Mr. Benn) in this debate. We have known for some time that he is absolutely against our entry into Europe in principle, and that is fair enough. It is perhaps timely that he should pick out Articles 92 and 93, as quoted in the Amendment, and say that they are not consistent with the Government's industrial and regional policy. Any one who is against the Community is also against the harmonisation of industrial and regional policy or anything else, because he is against going into the Community in principle.

We have had several debates on regional policy, and I am convinced that the harmonisation of regional policy is vitally in the interests of the difficult regions of our country, as is more even and fairer competition within a wider Europe. The crux of the belief in a community of nations working together for the common good is that we should try to level out these differences. Only by doing so shall we be able to help the regions as we all want to do.

It is clear to anyone who follows the developments of the Community and the Commission that there is an increasing interest within the Community and within the candidate countries in a co-ordinated regional policy. I am sure that, once we are inside the Community and are playing our part, we shall ensure that regional policies move in the best way for this country and therefore in the best way for the Community as a whole.

What is so often brushed aside—and the right hon. Member for Bristol, South-East did so this evening—is the progress that has already been made. The right hon. Gentleman also brushed aside the European Social Fund and the contribution it has made in many difficult regions of the Community, and the European Investment Bank, in an attempt to frighten us about the effects of Community policy on our legislation and on the Government's recently announced plans for the regions. The principle of establishing Community rules to ensure fair competition should be acceptable to the Committee and is certainly acceptable to the country. I find it hard to believe that the Opposition, with their understood and accepted interest in industrial development policy and in proving the conditions in the regions, cannot agree that the establishment of common Community rules is in the interests of the country as a whole. It is clear that harmonisation between the various modes of transport, be it road, rail or water, will not affect the steps that the Government have taken or are contemplating taking.

[Miss HARVIE ANDERSON in the Chair

As so often in our debates the Opposition have been talking with two voices. In January, 1971, the right hon. Member for Leeds, East (Mr. Healey) said that he did not think that supranationalism was in itself a bad thing. That is something with which I generally agree. If we accept that, it is perfectly appropriate for us to accept the sort of harmonisation about which the right hon. Member for Bristol, South-East tried to spread unjustifiable alarm and despondency in the Committee.

I would ask the Opposition this: when their Government, in their White Paper Command No. 3301, accepted the Treaty of Rome as a whole, did they miss Articles 92 and 93? Did they skim over those Articles? Were the pages stuck together? Because these Articles were in the Treaty of Rome from the beginning. Why did they not raise these issues then? Why is it that in their opposition to the Bill at the present time they appear to have resurrected and taken an interest in these two Articles? I believe, on the contrary, that it can be shown very easily that the conditions expressed in paragraph 3 of Article 92, to take just one example, are very much in the interests of this country. Article 3(a) reads: aid to promote the economic development of areas where the standard of living is abnormally low or where there is serious underemployment. Are the Opposition saying that they do not agree with that? Then there is 3(c): to aid to facilitate the development of certain economic activities or of certain economic areas… I should have thought that of all the parts of the Treaty of Rome those are two at least which this House could join together in thoroughly applauding.

Therefore I ask the Committee tonight to reject these Amendments, for they are a continuation of the Labour Party's outright opposition to our entry into Europe. If these Amendments were allowed to pass we should not be able to become members and we should certainly not be able to play our part in the Community, as those of us on this side believe we should.

Mr. Robert Maclennan (Caithness and Sutherland)

I will not follow the hon. Member for Chertsey (Mr. Grylls) in seeking to attribute to my hon. Friends in moving this series of Amendments the motives which he attributes to them. I think it was both right and extremely welcome to all of us in this House that an opportunity should be provided in the course of the debate on this Bill for us to consider the impact of these very central articles of the Treaty of Rome upon this country.

Having said that, however, I must put forward a small and modest dissent from the interpretation put upon both the Articles themselves and the practice of the Community by a number of my hon. Friends who spoke earlier in the discussion tonight. I listened with very great attention to what my right hon. Friend the Member for Bristol, South-East (Mr. Benn) said about this. What I thought most striking about his intervention was not so much that he underlined the legal powers of the Commission in regional aid or State aids to industry as that he said that in practice the decision-making would be transferred from this House and Government Departments to Brussels. In fact, as I understood him, he was objecting not so much to the legalities of the position as to what was, in fact and in practice, occurring. Indeed, my hon. Friend the Member for Llanelly (Mr. Denzil Davies) prayed in aid what he considered to be the experience of the Community in the interpretation of these Articles and the effect which was given to them by the institutions of the Community.

I would simply dissent from the interpretation of both my hon. Friend and my right hon. Friend of the practice of the Community. I know of no example, although my hon. Friend spoke of several, of a member State being hauled before the International Court by the Court itself or indeed by the Commission and taken to task for its formulation of aid or State aids to industry. I do not believe that this has happened at all.

My hon. Friend the Member for Llanelly mentioned aid being given for regional purposes and its being disallowed by the Commission. I know of no such case. [Interruption.] If any of my hon. Friends wish to intervene to prove that I am wrong, I shall be happy to give way.

Mr. J. T. Price

I should like to ask my hon. Friend, before he goes any further with this academic discourse, whether he supports or opposes the Amendment. Let us not fill in the time that is left to us in the debate before the guillotine falls by indulging in academic arguments. Let us be told where my hon. Friend stands.

Mr. Maclennan

My hon. Friend is entitled to consider my intervention academic, but I think that I am entitled to examine the arguments to see whether there is any force in them.

The experience of the Community in interpreting these treaties has been that in practice, though the Commission is empowered to issue embargoes, it has in every case on any question of intervention examined the practices at great length with the member countries concerned. The deadlines which have been referred to have never been met in practice and the flexibility of the various institutions and the Commission has been quite remarkable.

It is somewhat ironic that we who in this country regard our liberties and democratic freedoms as resting so much on convention and on the absence of a written constitution, should seek at this time to reverse the whole process of history by spelling out and adding to the provisions of the Treaty the kind of precise limitations which I understand they consider necessary to safeguard our national position.

Mr. Denzil Davies

This is absolutely right. The reason that we in this country observe conventions and practices is that we have a democratically elected sovereign Parliament. The reason we distrust the conventions and practices in the European Community is that they have no such thing in the Common Market.

Mr. Maclennan

It would be unwise to embark on a discussion of the democratic or other nature of the member Governments. I am convinced that the member Governments with whom we are to join are elected freely in a democratic society. [Interruption.] If my hon. Friends would allow me to finish my speech in my own way, I should probably get on a lot faster.

The most telling point against the view put forward by my right hon. Friend the Member for Bristol, South-East stems from the example he gave, namely the hypothesis which he put forward that the Community would in some way seek to cut down the regional aid which the Government have introduced in the Industry Bill. We learned on Second Reading of that Bill that the Communities had been informed of the Bill's contents and had raised no objection. This is highly instructive of the method by which the Commission and the Communities operate.

9.0 p.m.

Our differences in this matter stem from a fundamental doubt, not so much about the interpretation of an item of the constitution upon which the Community is based as, rather, about the underlying philosophy of the Community. Is it engaged in bureaucratic intervention to bring about a situation in which neighbours are beggared, or is it trying to work out policies which are for the interests of all its members?

I think that the experience of the Community shows that the areas in which it has developed common policies—and this matter of State aids is paramount—have been areas in which there has been a common will to assist industries in the Community and a common will to harmonise and to remove the kind of national advantage which in practice brings about a beggar-my-neighbour attitude.

The case of the Belgian Government's State aid has been cited more than once in the debate. That was a case in which 80 per cent. of the national territory of Belgium was argued to be in need of development. As a result, 80 per cent. of the country was treated as a development area. It had the effect in Belgium of depriving needy areas of aid. It also had the effect of putting Holland, across the border, at a great disadvantage. It seems to me that those were compelling arguments which led the Community to take the action that it did.

Mr. Powell

Would the hon. Gentleman say the same about the designation of 50 per cent. of this country?

Mr. Maclennan

I say about the designation of this country that there is a far better chance of justifying 50 per cent. of the country as being in need of assistance under this Government than there is of justifying 80 per cent. of a country like Belgium in the European Community——

Mr. J. T. Price rose——

Mr. Maclennan

No, I shall not give way to my hon. Friend again——

Mr. J. T. Price

My hon. Friend dare not.

Mr. Maclennan

I have given way about six times already in the course of a brief speech in a very short debate—

Mr. Molloy

Six times?

Mr. Maclennan

I am glad that I have stimulated some discussion, because i is my view that a very useful purpose has been served by discussing these points.

Unless one takes a very different view of the nature of the Community from that which I take, I cannot see that there is any need to exclude from the operations of this Bill obligations arising under Articles 92 and 93 of the Treaty of Rome.

Mr. Dodds-Parker

I had not intended to intervene in this debate, but I have been stimulated to do so by the useful intervention of the hon. Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Mr. Maclennan), who represents a very happy if not yet fully developed part of our country.

I regretted the reaction in certain parts of the Committee when the hon. Gentleman spoke about the emerging democratic institutions in Europe—[Interruption.] Right hon. and hon. Members below the Gangway opposite laugh at that. They were with me at the Council of Europe last week. If they do not understand that after 30 years democratic institutions are emerging which say themselves that they did not exist 30 years ago, it is about time that they did. This is not a laughing matter. It is a great pity that hon. Members laugh at it.

A great number of hon. Members on both sides of the Committee are trying and have tried to help in this democratic progress, which is widely welcomed on the Continent. I hope that this will come and that it will assist also in what the hon. Member for Caithness and Sutherland mentioned, the common will to help industries. That was the other stimulating point from the hon. Member for Llanelly (Mr. Denzil Davies), who made a useful speech. He said that he was depressed when he came here. It was not clear what depressed him most. Possibly it was the split voice on his side of the Committee, following their past support for joining the Community and now the way that they are apparently going back on that. But it has given us a chance to talk briefly about regional policy, in which a large number of hon. Members on all sides of the Committee are interested, under Articles 92 and 93 of the Treaty.

This point has been discussed at the Council of Europe and other gatherings, and hon. Members on both sides of this Committee make very useful contributions to those discussions. All parts of the Continent and this country have different problems. In the United Kingdom I represent a transitional area. It is not a development area, but we have our problems, too. The problems differ between Scotland and Wales and the rest of the United Kingdom. But on the Continent they also have their problems, and they are approaching them in a number of different ways.

The Amendment was originally stimulated by the idea of communications, roads, telecommunications and the air. It would be out of order for me to plug the Channel Tunnel, although I have the honour of being the chairman of the all-party parliamentary Committee in relation to that. But there could be quite a reasonable effect on our regional policy if, as I hope, a decision is made before too long to go ahead with it. But there must be co-ordination. Whatever the criticism may be in the House of Commons, I know of no one who has found a better proposal than that this should be co-ordinated through the enlarged European Economic Community. There is no other group, including particularly social democratic groups on the Continent, that I have been more proud to work with for longer than I care to think about, which has a better proposal.

We can claim without arrogance a knowledge of democratic institutions and of not entirely unsuccessful regional policies, and we can make a contribution. I hope that we shall reject the Amendments which, whatever else may be said, would wreck the whole object of the Bill.

Mr. J. T. Price

I have no wish to be unkind because I am always prepared to believe that hon. Members who address the House of Commons say honestly what they believe is true. I have listened to a number of speeches on both sides of the argument, for and against the Amendments. But I do not want to beat about the bush or to get bogged down in academic arguments about the meaning of these very important Amendments.

Fundamentally, they are about Articles 92 and 93 of the Treaty of Rome. Anyone who cares to refresh his memory by referring back to the documents on which all the argument is based, whether he is for or against the Common Market in principle, will agree with me that whatever those two Articles do or do not do, they most certainly remove from this country the sovereignty of taking economic decisions on very important matters affecting the livelihood of our people. For my part, the matter rests upon the solid foundation of one's philosophic attitude towards what we are sent to this place to do as Members of Parliament representing the British people, who elected us to do their work and to be their representatives in the House of Commons.

I listened with respect and perhaps a little dismay to my hon. Friend who represents the most northerly part of the British Isles, my hon. Friend the Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Mr. Maclennan), that remote part of Britain which some of us have visited on odd occasions when we have tried to get back to nature and to see it in the wild in all its natural beauty. This is strictly germane to the Amendment, so please do not look discouragingly on my remarks, Miss Harvie Anderson, because I am trying to be complimentary to my hon. Friend.

But when we consider the prospects that are held forth inside the EEC, of which we must become enthusiastic partners—in spite of the vote this afternoon in which the Goverenment's majority fell to five, and which was supposed to be a token of the wholehearted consent of this House and the British people—we begin to wonder just what is in store for the people of Caithness and Sutherland and the other remote parts of these islands. They will be even more remote from the centre of economic control in Brussels than I am in Lancashire.

We are complaining of a very fundamental matter. I listened with rapt attention to the speech of my right hon. Friend the Member for Bristol, South-East (Mr. Benn) this afternoon and I considered it one of the best I had ever heard him make. He dealt with the fundamental objetives of the Amendments, which are challenging the selling out of the sovereignty of this country by economic decisions which will affect the livelihoods of the people in the regions who are in the greatest distress. It is no use employing academic arguments against us. For many years I have sought humbly to represent a part of Lancashire in this House and in that time I have been associated with many activities des;gned to draw attention to the special regional problems of my constituency.

We recently had some small success in being upgraded even by this Government to a new regional status which will give us concessions and economic benefits which we have never before enjoyed. But what is the use of the Government making pious professions that they want to assist the regions towards greater activity and more fruitful employment prospects if they intend to bypass regional policies in this country by selling out to Brussels the essential decision-making function that has always been held by this House.

I am not a little Englander. I would strongly deny that I am anti-European. I have served my time on the Council of Europe, like many other hon. Members. I served for three very interesting, but not always fruitful years, taking part in the deliberations at Brussels, Strasbourg and elsewhere. I have often spoken in hostile terms about the Common Market and I need not apologise to anyone for what I say, for I have never stood on my head or turned somersaults. One of the experiences which helped me to form a hostile opinion about this proposal was my experience on the Council of Europe with its bureaucratic nature, its over-documentation, and the texts and statutory orders which in Britain are replaced by discretion and commonsense. I include also the tortuous texts which so delight their lawyers and others.

The Amendments are intended to express as dramatically as possible our rooted objection to the destruction of this country's regional policy. I am not denying the good intentions of the pro-Marketeers. Nietsche once said that all men have good intentions, that it is their motivations that count. We give credit to the good intentions of those from Caithness and Sutherland and everywhere else. What I want to know is what they will do when the Division bells ring tonight. They must let their vote follow their voice, following the practice of this House and not a continental complex about politics which we do not share.

9.15 p.m.

Right hon. Members who occupy seats of great authority on the Treasury Bench try to beguile us with all kinds of evasive arguments. In their hearts they must be worried to death because they have received no assurances from our continental neighbours about the acceptability of our regional policy. There is no coherent regional policy in Europe under the existing Treaty. That is why there is the enormous aberration of the state of desperate poverty in southern Italy, where I have been on several occasions, as contrasted with the comparative wealth and affluence of Turin, Milan and the other industrial parts of Italy. That is what all the turmoil is about in Italy. It is the absence of a regional policy acceptable to the Community, of which Italy is a part, that has estopped the Italians from applying those correctives within their own State which we have claimed for ourselves to try to deal with our own regional problems.

As a Lancastrian, I sometimes wonder why we have such strange men rejoicing in the title of Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster. I suppose it is a convenient handle to give to someone who has a rather off-beat job to do, and he is given that office because it carries status.

I am sure that no guarantees have been given to the Government that will satisfy even the Prime Minister, with all his dedication to the Common Market ideal. That is why we are deeply concerned. I know that I am pushing at an open gate when I address some Conservative Members who share my strong convictions on the matter. The hon. Member for Cheltenham (Mr. Dodds-Parker) is a good friend of mine, but I strongly disagree with his jibe tonight about the dissensions on this side and the two voices with which he says we are speaking. The division cuts right across parties. The matter is far more than a party issue for me; it is a British issue in which the future prospects and livelihood of millions of people are concerned.

This may be regarded as something of a Second Reading speech, but I make no apology. I have not intervened very often in these debates. Some of my hon. Friends are disappointed that I have not been backing them up on the barricades.

I strongly support the Amendment, because it goes to the root of the whole matter. Articles 92 and 93 are a sell-out of the powers of economic decision-making of this country as a sovereign nation. I am not satisfied by the sophisticated Ignatius Loyola type of argument. to use a phrase from the old Society of Jesus, that the end justifies the means. I am a democrat, and do not believe that the end justifies the means. People piously support the æsthetic notion of a wider Europe, identified in common interests and harmonising this and that. But it is not a recipe for harmony. In the final analysis, it is a certainty of discord. One can never get agreement on this sort of issue.

We cannot get agreement in our own country on some regional issues. There is competition between our regions for what economic assistance is going. How much more difficult it will be to get economic assistance for Caithness and Sutherland, Wick and Tongue, at the tip of our island home, remote places in the North, in competition with the claims of Taranto or some other place in Southern Italy, or of Sardinia or other Italian offshore islands. We should not have a cat in hell's chance of succeeding.

We protest mildly and modestly that the British Government are wrong in bulldozing this kind of legislation through Parliament. One looks in vain for any substantial Press reporter present to record these proceedings. The whole thing has become such a hopeless bore to the Press that the most important legislation this country has had to deal with this century is being bulldozed through by a determined and stubborn Government with little publicity, supported, I am sorry to say, by some of my right hon. and hon. Friends, quite mistakenly. I do not doubt their honesty or their motives or their purpose, but their naivety shocks me. I shall never cease to protest as long as I am here. I shall vote on every occasion against these infamour proposals. And that is my little sermon for tonight.

Mr. John Biffen (Oswestry)

At least my sermon will not match the length of the sermon given by the hon. Member for Westhoughton (Mr. J. T. Price). I do not cavil for a moment at the time he took—it is merely that I admire the intensity of his feelings and very much share them. The view I express is a shade different, although that will not in the least prevent me from going into the Lobby in support of this welcome Amendment.

We are confronted with the proposition that we shall move towards a monetary union. No one doubts that, unlike some continental assemblies, this House does not have to be consulted about such a move. It can be conducted by the Chancellor of the Exchequer in conjunction with the banking authorities and the City without particular regard to what the House of Commons feels or says. One has only to read the Financial Times of a few days ago to discover that the narrowing of the parity of the Belgian franc had to be put through the Belgian Parliament. We know from our own conventions—I make no complaint—that that does not apply here.

If we are in the situation of a monetary union and we then find that the differential growth of the various components of the Community throws up different economic consequences, regional problems within a Community context will become national problems, because within the wider context of the Community in some instances whole nations will become potenial Community development areas. Indeed, this must have been in the minds of the negotiators for the Republic of Ireland for them to have insisted, as they did, on the codicil in the negotiations in respect of making their own arrangements on regional policy.

Therefore, we have to view the whole prospect of Community membership in the context of a monetary union which we know cannot be accompanied by a parallel course of fiscal harmony because each national Parliament will fight fiercely to retain its own distinctive taxation. We have only to reflect on the behaviour of Italy towards the value added tax to underline that reality. Therefore, we should think whether we ought not to give to Parliament a kind of monitoring power envisaged in the Amendment to see how this development towards an economic union is proceeding because we know that monetary union can run so far ahead of other aspects.

The other reason why we should have this monitoring power is to enable a check to be made upon one of the fascinating aspects of this argument which is that out of the Community regional policy we shall, somehow or other, be financial beneficiaries, as though the French and the Germans will pay back to us something as a recompense for our contributions to the common agricultural fund.

Mr. Grylls

Why not?

Mr. Biffen

My hon. Friend asks "Why not?". I will tell him why not. I do not think the French will pay that unless they see very good reasons why they should. If they have struck a good bargain they will not reopen it to our advantage. This is why the argument proceeds that regional policies are essentially matters for national governments. I do no more than repeat what my right hon. Friend the Minister for Industrial Development said in winding-up the Second Reading debate of the Industries Bill. At the moment there is no suggestion that regional policy will be other than left to national governments and this point requires particularly careful examination.

A lot of the arithmetic about the prospective benefits supposed to accrue to this country in financing our regional policies from without this country can proceed only on the premise that there is a Community regional policy which will adopt a Community yardstick. If we accept that there will be applied a Community yardstick in terms of the intrinsic income of an area and in terms of the level of unemployment, are we not likely to find that, far from this country being a major beneficiary, there are still many areas on the periphery of the enlarged Community which will come much nearer the top of the priority list than we shall?

When my hon. Friend the Member for Cheltenham (Mr. Dodds-Parker) talks about the development of the Channel Tunnel as being part of the beneficial consequences of Community membership, I wonder whether he thinks that that will so alter the balance and distribution of industry in this country as to be advantageous to Caithness and Sutherland. The danger must be that as we lock economies together we shall create major centres of prosperity lying near the heart of the Community—and the Channel Tunnel is a good case in point. It will facilitate exactly that.

If we think that it will not have severe consequences for those areas on the periphery of the enlarged Community, then we delude ourselves and we fly in the face of so much of our experience in our national history and what we also see in many larger-scale economies in other parts of the world.

Mr. Dodds-Parker

If my hon. Friend looks into it he will find that by the use of differential freight rates the drift to the South East could be checked.

Mr. Biffen

This is a fascinating subject. I hope that my hon. Friend will take the opportunity to discuss this with the road haulage authorities in this country who, on examining the transport regulations of the Community, have concluded that if we were to adopt them it would disadvantage this country. I am sure that we shall have other opportunities to discuss this, but it is precisely the kind of attitude which my hon. Friend is exhibiting which makes me so fearful that unless Parliament possesses a continuing monitoring process we shall abdicate responsibilities which rightly belong here, and which should not be surrendered in a fit of enthusiasm.

9.30 p.m.

Mr. E. Fernyhough (Jarrow)

I am astounded that people who call themselves democrats can object to the Amendment. It says, in essence, that this Parliament has no right to bind future Parliaments. That principle has been part of our constitutional understanding almost since the beginning of our democratic history, and we are now told that it is democratic for this generation, this Parliament, to bind for ever the Parliaments of our children, and our children's children.

I do not believe that any Conservative Member has ever made clear to his electorate that he was supporting the view that this Parliament should make decisions which future Parliaments would not be able to change. I do not believe that anyone can go on a democratic platform and ask for a mandate of that kind. All that we are seeking by the Amendment is to ensure that future Parliaments are not bound by what this Parliament does.

Mr. Paul B. Rose (Manchester, Blackley)

Why not?

Mr. Fernyhough

My hon. Friend could never have been elected to this place if he had said that he was not going to try to change what previous Parliaments had done. He was elected here because he wanted to change some of the things done by previous Parliaments. There would be no purpose in coming here if we could not change things which had been done by bad Parliaments. That is the purpose of elections. There is no purpose in having elections if we cannot change anything.

I listened with interest to the hon. Members for Cheltenham (Mr. Dodds-Parker) and Chertsey (Mr. Grylls). One would think that there had never been Members in the House who shared my view. Articles 92 and 93 deal with a range of industries, and in particular with coal and steel. What did we do in 1950? What did Ernie Bevin do? We could have joined the Iron and Steel Community. I hope that the hon. Member for Cheltenham does not think that Ernie Bevin was not a good European, or was not a good internationalist. He and the Cabinet decided that it was not in the best interests of the British people that we should become a party to that treaty, and I think that they were right. I believe that theirs was a wise decision. It is no good saying that Ernie Bevin was a little Englander, that he did not have a great international outlook. Ernie Bevin realised that he had a duty to the people of Britain and that he had to go a long way towards solving their problems before he began to take too deep an interest in the problems across the Channel.

I do not think that hon. Gentlemen opposite have yet understood what this means. The hon. Member for Chertsey spoke about co-ordination. I wonder whether hon. Gentlemen opposite realise that possibly within five years from now, under Articles 92 and 93, this nation will be told that it has to drive on the right. That is what co-ordination means. Has anybody looked at what that change would cost? It is estimated that it will cost £700 million for us to change the signs and strengthen the roads. Yet less than 12 months ago the House of Commons determined that vehicles of a certain size should not be permitted on our roads because they are not strong enough. There was a clamour also from many citizens about the disadvantage to the environment. They did not want jugger- nauts driving through residential areas There were many protests.

Mr. J. T. Price

They are still letting them in.

Mr. Fernyhough

If there is to tie co-ordination and we are to compete, they will come. We will have to have vehicles as big as theirs. They will come freely into the country and at present prices we will have to spend £700 million to strengthen the roads and change the signs.

Mr. Marten

Much more than that.

Mr. Fernyhough

I am a modest man. I underestimate because it has always been my policy not to overstate my case.

And now I will ask the right hon. and learned Gentleman one or two questions. Under Articles 92 and 93 will we be able to save another Rolls-Royce? Will we be able to respond to the final pressures of future Jimmie Reeds as we had to respond in the case of Upper Clyde? Will we be able to do a rescue operation under Articles 92 and 93 of the magnitude of Rolls-Royce? Can we do a rescue operation along the lines of Upper Clyde? Will the £70 million of naval contracts be legal if they have not been signed on 1st January? If in two or three years there is a miners strike and the Government are determined that the price of coal shall not rise and therefore they have to introduce a subsidy to provide the money for the increased wages which the miners rightly demanded and got, but could not have got if the price of coal had not been allowed to go up, will that be looked upon as the coal industry having an unfair advantage over oil?

We already apply a surcharge on oil. That was done to protect the coal industry. Will the right hon. Gentleman tell me whether that will be fair competition under Articles 92 and 93? If that surcharge, which is put on oil to enable coal to be more competitive than it otherwise would be, were taken off it would lead to increased oil consumption, decreased coal consumption and a bigger regional policy than we have now.

When the hon. Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Mr. Maclennan) suggests that we shall have a lot of regional benefits by going in, I look at the figures. We are paying a high price to go into the club. If they were having to pay us to get us in, we should not be allowed to go in. Nobody else will pay a subscription fee anything like as high as we shall pay. The estimates are anything between £500 million and £1,000 million. Who would not let one into the most luxurious club in the world if one was prepared to pay such a generous subscription fee?

Mr. J. T. Price

A year.

Mr. Fernyhough

A year's subscription, I accept that. A subscription between £500 million and £1,000 million is coming from us and going to them.

If it were £500 million to £1,000 million coming from them to us, that might help to resolve our regional problems. But the main purpose of the common agricultural policy is to protect their regional problems. If anyone believes that our small voice will be so persuasive there, that we shall reverse the figures and somehow be the beneficiaries, the recipients, they being the givers, instead of our being the givers and they being the recipients, they do not understand that there are no Socialist Governments in Europe in the sense I understand a Socialist Government, not even in Germany, because they do not want to control the commanding heights of the economy as I do.

Articles 92 and 93 deal with the commanding heights of the economy. Transport, steel and coal are the life-blood of this nation. More of our people earn their livelihoods in those industries than in any other industries. We shall not be able to safeguard the jobs and environment of the people in these declining, contracting industries as much as we have been able and still have to do if we have to observe Articles 92 and 93.

I hope that the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster will answer some of the questions which have been put to him. I hope he will not think it offensive that some of us should still believe that it is not a bad thing democratically that one man during his term of office should not be able to bind his successors. That is what we are asking the Government to take into account tonight. We arc asking them not to bind future Parliaments. No man elected to this place by the people of this country can justify denying them the right at subsequent elections to elect Members who will change what this Parliament has done.

Mr. Deakins

I am grateful to be called. I have a great deal of sympathy with my right hon. Friend the Member for Jarrow (Mr. Fernyhough). However, I hope that he will forgive me if I do not follow him directly in my few remarks. I shall confine myself to the burden of the Amendments as they relate to Clause 2(2).

In my opinion, the more we examine Clause 2(2) the more we begin to realise that it is not only as important as subsection (1) but in some respects is even more important. This has tremendous implications for our regional policy, even without regard to Articles 92 and 93 of the Treaty of Rome.

The wording of the Clause is very wide. The right hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Powell) referred to subsection (2)(b). Regulations which can be issued under the Clause which could affect regional policy deal not only with matters arising out of Community regulations but with matters which are "related to" Community regulations. I suggest that the words "related to" give a wide increase of power to the Executive in this country to legislate by subordinate legislation on any matters whatsoever, including regional obligations.

Furthermore, after paragraph (b), in lines 5 to 10 there is the extraordinary passage, which is the subject of a later Amendment, that the Minister may in the exercise of any statutory power or duty…have regard to the objects of the Communities". The expression any statutory power or duty does not arise under the obligations we are taking upon ourselves by joining the Common Market. The subsection says that in future, in all delegated legislation under any Act of Parliament, the appropriate Minister may have regard to the objects of the Communities when he is exercising his statutory power or duty.

9.45 p.m.

This is not what the Government had been telling us about the effect of the Common Market on our national life. The Government have been saying that the effect of Common Market laws will be related to narrowly and carefully defined areas. This is a form of drafting which imposes on Ministers virtually an obligation to have regard to matters which were not in the original Act of Parliament under which they derive the authority for the delegated legislation. This may well have an effect on regional policy.

To prove my point, I will ask a question which no one has yet asked in the debate: what are the objects of the Communities to which the subsection asks Ministers to have regard in relation to regional policy? The first thing to be said about the Treaty of Rome is that it nowhere mentions regional policy. There is a minor reference in Article 130 to the objects for which the European Investment Bank can lend money. That in itself is unexceptionable and has no real bearing on regional policy as we understand the term.

Further, there is no commitment in the Treaty of Rome to policies of full employment, either specifically or in the objectives of the Treaty. Here the EFTA Convention of 1960 was a very much better safeguard for our depressed areas and declining industries, because there was therein a commitment to full employment. There is nothing in the Treaty of Rome on this point. The whole emphasis in the Treaty of Rome is on the removal of barriers to free competition.

Mr. Percy Grieve (Solihull)

Has not the hon. Gentleman overlooked Article 3(i) of the Treaty which provides for the creation of a European Social Fund in order to improve employment opportunities for workers and to contribute to the raising of their standard of living as one of the objects of the Community?

Mr. Deakins

I had not overlooked that. I read carefully the Articles relating to the European Social Fund. There is no mention in those Articles of the purpose of that fund being specifically to help workers in depressed areas or regions. It could apply to workers anywhere. It is a general and not a specific article.

If capital is free to go where it is most profitable and labour, because of mobility of labour, is expected to follow the capital and go to where the jobs are, what effect will this have on our regional policy? Our present regional policy is not necessarily that labour should go to where the jobs are, but that the jobs should be taken to where the labour is, for reasons of social and housing policy and for reasons of depopulation of the regions.

The Common Market formula is a recipe for greater social mobility, a recipe for that depopulation of our peripheral areas and for concentration, not only of capital and jobs, but of labour and of people and, therefore, of the social problems that they bring with them when they get together in large conurbations in the centre of the community.

In view of this open purpose of the Treaty of Rome, it is even more necessary that any future British Government should retain the power to carry out those regional policies they feel are necessary to mitigate the effects of entering the Common Market. We have not even had from the Government in any of these debates an assurance that our present regional aid policies would be allowed. Some of my hon. Friends may say, "Ah yes, we shall not be allowed existing regional policies, but all will be well because the Community will have a regional policy".

I want to shoot down that canard—to mix my metaphors. Community policy for the creation of employment in those areas will be dealing with regional problems which are not those which we confront in this country. The regional problem areas in Europe are areas where there has been a flight from the land, where agriculture is becoming unprofitable because they are peripheral districts which are a long way from the markets. The policy there is to soak up the drain from the rural areas when people are trying to get work in the towns. That is not the regional problem in this country.

When the Common Market started, about 18 per cent. of the workers in Common Market countries were engaged in agriculture. That has been reduced to 12 per cent. By the end of the century it will probably be about 4 per cent., which it was in this country in 1947. The regional policies there are designed to meet that position and they will not help us in any way. We shall be paying towards the cost of those policies by vast contributions to the Community budget with no countervailing benefits for this country. The second Mansholt Plan specifically states that it is related to the needs of agriculture, not to the needs of traditional industries such as coal and railways.

Mr. Maclennan

Has my hon. Friend looked at the example of the decline of the coal industry of the Ruhr and the use made by Germany of money canalised to it through the Social Fund? Has he noticed how that problem has been virtually eliminated?

Mr. Deakins

The amount of money in the European Social Fund is a mere pittance compared with the £1,000 million or more in the FEOGA Fund, the bulk of which will inevitably go to relieve European regional problems if and when the Community develops a regional policy. It is absolutely essential that we should retain the right to ensure that in the absence of an adequate regional policy being developed in the Community to help our depressed areas—which is not on the cards, and the European Social Fund cannot claim to be a substitute for regional policy—we can give aid to areas which have special problems and can safeguard jobs in those areas, to prevent population movement to the South-East of the country and in general to provide a balanced community in this country.

If and when we go into the Common Market, we shall need such aids more than we do at present because the drain of capital will be much bigger. There will be greater opportunities and incentives for British industrialists to invest near the heartland, and that will not help the regions. Unless we can redirect that capital to the peripheral areas, we shall be faced with a future in which those of us who are fortunate enough to live and work in the south-east of London may be very prosperous, but those to the north and west of the Midlands will be in an even worse condition than now.

[Sir ROBERT GRANT-FERRIS in the Chair]

Mr. Rippon

The right hon. Member for Bristol, South-East (Mr. Benn) has introduced a very valuable debate on regional policy as it might be affected by adherence to the Communities. This gives me an opportunity to remove a number of anxieties and misconceptions about the position. There was some debate about these matters on Monday when the Industry Bill received its Second Reading. I shall not go over that ground again.

What is significant is that when the Bill was debated it was perfectly clear that the proposals in the Bill are not regarded by the Government as being in any way incompatible with our obligations to the Community. That is one indication over a wide range of matters of the way in which we can carry out our own individual regional policies without getting into difficulties.

The hon. Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Mr. Maclennan) dealt with some of the practical aspects of the way in which the Community works, and that is important. It is necessary, as he said, to distinguish between the central areas, which in Belgium are right in the heartland of the Community, and our own position where we can say that our measures are genuinely selective and are not open to similar objections. We shall certainly have discussions with the Commission on the central areas and agree with it, as a result of the provisions of Article 154 of the Treaty of Accession, which areas of the United Kingdom will be central and so subject to a limit of aid under the Council Resolution of October, 1971. Because the proposals which we have made for our regions are genuinely selective we do not think that they will cause any difficulty.

It should also be noted that Article 154 specifically recognises that regard has to be paid to the new situation after enlargement——

Mr. Benn

The right hon. and learned Gentleman has said that he does not think that any proposals made by the Government would be found to be unreasonable, but has he made proposals to the Commission about which areas would be central and which not, and have these proposals been made available so that they can be discussed?

Mr. Rippon

We have had discussions about central areas and general regional policies in the general debate leading up to the vote in October of last year, in the Second Reading debate and in our debates on the Industry Bill. I have said what is the position about the central areas, and we have always stated we shall have to discuss this with the Community. We have made provision for that, and that has always been known.

The hon. Member for Caithness and Sutherland is absolutely right—and certainly it is the Government's view—that there is a great distinction between our regional aid which is genuinely selective and the cases that have arisen in Belgium and Italy. That is our view, and we stand by it. Certainly there has to by some selectivity in regional aid. Presumably there would be anxieties in Scotland and Wales if we sought to say that regional aid should be given to South-East England and the Midlands.

Mr. Benn

The right hon. and learned Gentleman has not quite understood my question. Have the Government already laid before the Commission draft maps indicating what they would like to see regarded as central areas? That is the reading I took from what he previously said.

Mr. Rippon

The Treaty provides that we must settle these matters by 1st July of next year. The Community has seen, for instance, draft White Papers and our Industry Bill and has made no comment. There is no reason why it should.

Mr. Benn

I am sorry to persist, but I am not talking about the date by which it has to be agreed. A moment ago I thought I heard the right hon. and learned Gentleman Say—HANSARD will confirm it—that he saw no reason to believe that the proposals that he had put to the Commission about our central areas would create any difficulties. If proposals have been put to the Commission, in however tentative a form, with maps of the United Kingdom indicating which areas in the proposals of the Government are to be central areas and which are to be regions, these proposals must be presented to the House of Commons before we proceed further with the Bill.

Mr. Rippon

I make it clear that we have not reached that stage. I am say- ing that we have to have these consultations in due course.

Mr. Benn

Have they begun?

Mr. Rippon

No, they have not begun because we have been saying all along that our regional policies are absolutely compatible with our treaty obligations, and that view we shall hold to.

10.0 p.m.

It is quite right that there should be discussions about a whole range of matters of that kind. Certainly I do not think that we have any reason to dissent from the general objective of the Treaty of ensuring free competition within a common market. We clearly have an interest of our own in seeing that if there is a common market people keep to the rules and regional aid is not a hidden subsidy. It is true, and a number of right hon. and hon. Gentlemen have pointed this out, that there is nothing specific in the Treaty dealing with the subject of regional policy, and certainly the Community has got to go a long way to have a common regional policy although, provided it develops in the right direction, I think we might welcome this.

We wish to see, for example, that there is a proper emphasis on regional policy as it affects urban areas, and not simply consider the problem of the less-developed areas. We are a country which, almost above all in the Community, has an interest in the regional policies of the Community being developed, and it is not wholly true to say, as I think the hon. Member for Walthamstow, West (Mr. Deakins) said, that there is really nothing at all in the Treaty about it.

If we think about the sort of community we are seeking to join it will be seen that on any sensible reading of the Treaty of Rome and what has been happening it is absolutely crucial to the future of the Community that regard should be had to raising the standard of living of all. In a phrase which President Kennedy once used. "When the tide rises, all the ships rise", and that ought to be our objective. The Preamble to the Treaty of Rome says that the contracting parties are, among other things: Anxious to strengthen the unity of their economies and to ensure their harmonious development by reducing the differences existing between the various regions and the backwardness of the less favoured regions". And Article 2 of the Treaty provides that: The Community shall have as its task, by establishing a common market and progressively approximating the economic policies of Member States, to promote throughout the Community a harmonious development of economic activities, continuous and balanced expansion, an increase in stability, an accelerated raising of the standard of living and closer relations between the States belonging to it. It is because I believe, and many right hon. and hon. Gentlemen on both sides of the Committee believe, that that is a sensible objective to which the Community has started working that I think it is right that we should be joining the Community and taking part in its work. There is no conflict on either side of the House, I think, about the regional policy aims which we would seek to achieve.

The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Jarrow (Mr. Fernyhough) put to me a number of questions—would I confirm that we can still do this and that—and inquired if there was anything to which I might say, "No". I am happy to say that as far as I can judge all the things lie worries about we can do. We cannot be made, for instance, to drive on the left-hand side of the road—[Laughter.]—I mean, of course, that we cannot be made to drive on the right-hand side of the road.

The hon. Gentleman raised a more important point perhaps about the £70 million naval shipbuilding orders, and that was raised also by the right hon. Member for Bristol, South-East. These would not be influenced by the public works directives to which the right hon. Gentleman referred or by the shipbuilding directive which is referred to in the Amendments. The directives to which he referred deal with building and civil engineering, and the shipbuilding directive does not apply to naval vessels. I would also point out that Article 223 of the Treaty gives member States autonomy in security matters.

Mr. Elystan Morgan (Cardigan)

The Minister will appreciate that many of us who are Members for Wales and the South-West of England would like a more specific assurance as far as the future of our regions is concerned. We appreciate that it is possible for aid to be given under Article 92 only if it comes within one of the exceptions. Could he tell the Committee whether, for example, it was decided that areas would come within the exception where the standard of living is abnormally low or where there is serious unemployment? Has there ever been specific discussion in Brussels of that point? If not, does he base his optimism on only a general expectation?

Mr. Rippon

We have stated our position, and that is the position we shall adopt in any negotiations that take place, but we are not in a position to make unilateral declarations within the framework of the Community. One can only give the assurances I have given and which successive Ministers have given in various debates.

Mr. Marten

My right hon. and learned Friend will recall, if he has been following the debate in the Irish, Danish and Norwegian Parliaments, that the Common Market has been "sold" in those countries on exactly the same basis—namely, that if they join the Common Market there will be a benefit in terms of regional policy. The implication is that the existing Common Market will get less. Are they aware of it?

Mr. Rippon

I am not sure that it necessarily follows that the existing Common Market will get less. The object is to work out development policy regionally so that all member countries will benefit. There is no reason to think that if one member country benefits it will be to the detriment of the others. On the contrary, if we think in terms of the Community as a whole, then the benefit will spread to all the member countries.

It is right that we should be thinking of the question of benefits because Clause 2(2) is related not only to obligations to be implemented but to enabling rights to be enjoyed. We might cheer ourselves up from time to time by considering the rights that will be enjoyed by the Community and not just the obligations to be accepted.

Mr. Marten

What are they?

Mr. Rippon

My hon. Friend the Member for Banbury (Mr. Marten) asks, "What are they?". I hope he heard the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Chertsey (Mr. Grylls) which drew attention to some of these matters.

Mr. Marten

Yes, I did hear it.

Mr. Rippon

It may be that regional policy is seen primarily by the Community as a matter for national governments, but we should bear in mind, for example, that the Coal and Steel Community has helped to retrain over 400,000 ex-miners and steelworkers, has lent over 1,000 million dollars to modernise the coal and steel industry; that the European Investment Bank has lent roughly 1,500 million dollars for regional development projects; and that the European Social Fund has helped retrain over 1,300,000 workers for new jobs. We can help to participate in those regional institutions to the best of our ability.

Mr. Richard Body (Holland with Boston)

My right hon. and learned Friend mentioned the rights that we might enjoy. Since the Government of Ireland secured a right connected with its regional policy and set out this right in one of the declarations, may I ask whether this point was pursued by the Chancellor of the Duchy? Did he seek the same sort of right for us?

Mr. Rippon

Of course we considered that matter and we debated it in the House. If one thinks of the position of Southern Ireland as a whole, they have a case for a protocol treating the whole of Southern Ireland as an area to which regional aid can be given. I am not sure that we would wish to have a similar protocol because we need to make some distinction between the problems of the South-East of England and the problems of, say, Wales. We have borne this in mind and we have told the House all about it. That deals with the general merits of the matter.

The other Amendment, Amendment 415, deals with a number of specific regulations involving aid to transport undertakings and in particular the directive on shipbuilding. It is clear that it would be invidious to single out State aids for exclusion from the Clause 2(2) powers. The right hon. Member for Bristol, South-East said that he had made a rather arbitrary selection. I think that that is understood.

What the debate has done is to give an opportunity to raise these anxieties about specific matters. But there is no reason to believe that Community secondary legislation will affect existing United Kingdom practices in relation to any of them. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Hornchurch (Mr. Loveridge) that we shall have to keep Parliament continually informed about the progress of discussions within the Community. But the measures of assistance which have been announced and are envisaged by the Government will not be affected by either the existing directive or the proposed directive.

In these circumstances, I hope that the Committee will feel that these Amendments ought to be rejected, as either misconceived or unnecessary.

Mr. Michael Foot

I shall be extremely brief, because in the short time available it is necessary for the Committee to deal not only with an Amendment that we have discussed already but with the other matters which are on the Notice Paper to be dealt with tonight. Earlier in our debates my right hon. Friend the Member for Birkenhead (Mr. Dell) moved Amendment No. 7 which falls to be voted upon, if it is to be voted upon, tonight. If we are to secure a vote on that matter, it must take place before 11 o'clock I hope that the Committee will understand that it would be an outrage against our procedures if anything were to occur which made it impossible for the Committee to express its opinion on a matter of this nature, which is not a matter which affects entry into the Common Market one way or the other and which is different from many of the other subjects that we have discussed——

Mr. Grieve

Will the hon. Gentleman concede that over an hour was wasted earlier this afternoon in unnecessary points of order?

Mr. Foot

The hon. and learned Member for Solihull (Mr. Grieve) should not abuse his rights of interruption to make an intervention of that character. So that there shall be no mistake, I emphasise that we wish to vote on Amendment No. 7 before 11 o'clock. Unfortunately, that means that our debates on the extremely important Amendments Nos. 416, 181 and 144 are bound to be severely truncated. In that, we shall be repeating the situation that we have experienced on the present Amendment. Anyone who has listened to our debates today and who is treating these matters seriously will all the more be convinced that it is a scandal that a Bill of this nature should be discussed under the abuse of the Guillotine.

Perhaps I might first deal with the comment made by the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster earlier on the secondary legislation and the corrected form, because some of the secondary legislation dealt with under these corrections comes into this series of Amendments. When speaking on the matters earlier, the right hon. and learned Gentleman made a statement in defence of the Government's position about these documents which should also be understood by the Committee.

The right hon. and learned Gentleman said that the reason why we do not have to take too much reckoning of the corrections is that the pieces of secondary legislation themselves, even before they are corrected, have no real status as documents presented to this House. They do not qualify for the status of documents presented to this House until they reach their final form. Therefore, the right hon. and learned Gentleman says, what we have is for the guidance of the House.

It is a very peculiar state of affairs that the secondary legislation that we are incorporating into our law on a scale never previously conceived or carried through in the whole history of Parliament is such that even the form of it is not an exact or authentic form and does not become authentic until many months hence.

For example, I have here one of the corrections. We are told how flexible they are in the Common Market in dealing with these questions. They deal with some quite precise matters. At page 104 of the corrections appear these words: The common standards of quality for lettuces, endives (curly green) and batavia. The quality specification is as follows: The salads must be whole, sound, of fresh appearance, clean and prepared…not run to seed, free from unusual external moisture, free from any foreign smell or taste. They must also be turgescent.

That word is spelt TURGESCENT—and this is the corrected document. This is the corrected form that the right hon. and learned Gentleman presents to the Committee. Unfortunately, he will not have time to explain to us what a turges- cent salad is. But that is the kind of matter that we are incorporating in the law of the land at a time when the right hon. and learned Gentleman has been telling us how flexible is the legislation now before us.

10.15 p.m.

The most important matter, in one sense, that has been discussed in the debate has been regional policy. I do not propose to go over this matter again because, unfortunately, we do not have the time to deal with it properly. But the right hon. and learned Gentleman seemed to get himself into a greater and greater tangle every time he attempted to tell us afresh exactly what the situation was. The Committee is still not clear whether he has presented to the Commission the proposals that the British Government would like to see, with all the forms, maps and provisions. I gather from the right hon. and learned Gentleman's last reply that such forms, maps and proposals have not been presented to either the Commission or to those other parties with whom we were negotiating. If such proposals were not presented, what were we negotiating about on the question of regional policy? If such matters as those were never presented, what were the negotiations about?

We remember from earlier debates that very little was said in the original White Paper on the subject of regional policy, and many protests were made from different sides of the House of Commons. Many of the questions put by my hon. Friend the Member for Cardigan (Mr. Elystan Morgan) were also put by others of my hon. Friends and by hon. Members on the Government benches. We said that these were the matters that must be determined before we voted upon these questions. But these questions have not been determined and we cannot deal with them adequately in this debate because they are matters which we should have been allowed to discuss during the debate on the Treaty of Accession itself. We have never been able to debate the detailed terms and the outcome of the negotiations that the right hon. and learned Gentleman conducted under the Treaty of Accession. That is one of our disabilities. Therefore, we have to debate the matter in Committee form.

It is not the case, contrary to what was said by some hon. Members who rushed to the aid of the Chancellor of the Duchy during our debates, that this Amendment is a wrecking Amendment in any sense. I hope that my hon. Friend the Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Mr. Maclennan) fully appreciates that. There are no such things as wrecking Amendments allowed to this Bill. You, Sir Robert, would be the first person to pounce on any suggestion that any such thing has been attempted, because at the beginning of our debates we spent two or three days debating what a wrecking Amendment was. I am sure that you, Sir Robert, would confirm my assertion that this is not a wrecking Amendment. However, I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Caithness and Sutherland that although it is solely concerned with parliamentary control and the retention of some remnant of it, the Amendment is designed to impinge on some of the merits of the question of Articles 92 and 93 of the Treaty of Rome. We are perfectly entitled to do that.

Hon. Members on the Government side of the Committee have said—this has figured prominently in our debates because of the latest actions of the Government—that there is no incompatibility between Articles 92 and 93 and the Government's Industry Bill, which received a Second Reading on Monday.

If that is their case, why do they object to the Amendments? If they accepted them, there would be no difficulties or embarrassment for them. They would not be taking action to wreck the Treaty of Rome. They would merely be saying that so compatible is the Treaty of Rome with the Industry Bill that it should be brought before the House according to our procedure, not to upset the proposals and not to upset those two Articles but to ensure that the House shall be able to satisfy itself, as the Government are satisfied, about these two propositions.

Colonel Sir Tufton Beamish (Lewes)

The hon. Gentleman is obviously genuinely worried about the extent to which this House will have the chance to scrutinise the legislation which emanates from Brussels. Will he be good enough committee which my right hon. and to explain, therefore, why the Opposition have refused to take part in the ad hoc learned Friend the Chancellor of the Duchy has suggested should be set up?

Mr. Foot

This has been explained on many occasions through our debates. We do not believe, while a debate is taking place in the House about what should be the provisions for parliamentary control, that the same discussion should be taking place in some other ad hoc body. We believe that it is this House in Committee which should settle these questions.

If the Government's claim is that there is no compatibility between the two propositions, let them accept these Amendments. They would have committed themselves only to what is set down in the Amendments. There would have to be a surveillance of what is done in the Treaty of Rome. It is impossible that any wrecking Amendment of the Treaty of Rome could have been set down under the provisions of these debates, and therefore if we have a vote every hon. Member should understand that. On the Government's own test there is no difficulty in accepting the Amendments. On the Government's own test the principal Amendment in no way interferes with their own Industry Bill or with how they wish to deal with these regional matters.

But throughout these debates the Government have been saying persistently that they reject every single possibility whatsoever of any Amendment to the Bill. They have said it on this Amendment and on earlier Amendments. They said it on the Amendment when we were seeking to deny to Departments the right to issue orders under the new provisions, and if we come to the later Amendment No. 7 they will say it once again.

They are saying that the Bill, which is an unprecedented Measure dealing with unprecedented matters, having combinations and permutations and possibilities in the future that no man can possibly foresee, is perfect in every detail. They are saying that they will not have a single comma, subsection, Clause or nuance altered. They are demanding that it shall go through the House on that basis. There is not one hon. Member who believes that it is that kind of Bill, so why do they do it?

We all know that they are doing it in order to deny the House the right that we would have if the Amendment were accepted—the right to a Report stage. If the Government persist in refusing every Amendment, even the most modest Amendments moved by pro-Marketeers from the Government side, and if they say they are determined to drive the Bill through, even with their narrow majority of four, five or six, if that is their policy and their strategy, then the House of Commons will have to seek its own remedies.

Some of us are not prepared to be denied the right to amend a Bill of this character because the Government say, "We will not have a Report stage to a Bill of this importance". If the Government say that, we shall have to have our own remedy. One of the remedies to which we could turn is to ensure that every Statutory Instrument that is required to be presented to the House in the coming weeks and months shall be

debated. The right hon. and learned Gentleman nods his head. Let him talk the matter over with the Patronage Secretary; let him think the matter out. If he and the other Ministers in charge of the Bill propose to drive the Bill through the House with the slender majority that they happen to possess, still proclaiming all the time that they have the full-hearted consent of Parliament, when everyone knows they have not, they have an even bigger fight coming than many of them have expected.

Question put, That the Amendment he made:—

The Committee divided: Ayes 257, Noes 274.

Division No. 195.]	AYES	[10.26 p.m.
Abse, Leo	Dormand, J. D,	Hutchison, Michael Clark
Allaun, Frank (Salford, E.)	Douglas, Dick (Stirlingshire, E.)	Irvine, Rt. Hn. SirArthur (Edge Hill)
Archer, Peter (Rowley Regis)	Douglas-Mann, Bruce	Janner, Greville
Armstrong, Ernest	Driberg, Tom	Jay, Rt. Hn. Douglas
Ashley, Jack	Duffy, A. E. P.	Jeger, Mrs. Lena
Ashton, Joe	Dunn, James A.	Jenkins, Hugh (Putney)
Atklnson, Norman	Dunnett, Jack	Jennings, J. C. (Burton)
Bagier, Gordon A. T.	Eadle, Alex	John, Brynmor
Barnett, Guy (Greenwich)	Edwards, Robert (Bilston)	Johnson, Carol (Lewisham, S.)
Barnett, Joel (Heywood and Royton)	Edwards, William (Merioneth)	Johnson, James (K'ston-on-Hull, W.)
Baxter, William	Ellis, Tom	Jones, Barry (Flint, E.)
Benn, Rt. Hn. Anthony Wedgwood	English, Michael	Jones. Dan (Burnley)
Bennett, James (Glasgow, Bridgeton)	Evans, Fred	Jones, Rt. Hn. Sir Elwyn (W.Ham,S.)
Bid well, Sydney	Faulds, Andrew	Jones, Gwynoro (Carmarthen)
Biffen, John	Fell, Anthony	Jones, T. Alec (Rhondda, W.)
Bishop, E. S.	Fernyhough, Rt. Hn. E.	Judd, Frank
Blenkinsop, Arthur	Fisher, Mrs. Dorisi (B'ham,Ladywood)	Kaufman, Gerald
Boardman, H. (Leigh)	Fitch, Alan (Wigan)	Kelley, Richard
Body, Richard	Fitt, Gerard (Belfast, W.)	Kerr, Russell
Booth, Albert	Fletcher, Raymond (Ilkeston)	Kilfedder, James
Boyden, James (Bishop Auckland)	Fletcher, Ted (Darlington)	Kinnock, Neil
Brown, Bob (N'c'tle-upon-Tyne. W.)
Brown, Hugh D. (G' gow, Provan	Foley, Maurice	Lamborn, Harry
Brown, Ronald (Shoreditch & F'bury)	Foot, Michael	Lamond, James
Buchan, Norman	Ford, Ben	Latham, Arthur
Buchanan, Richard (G'gow, Sp'burn)	Forrester, John	Leadbitter, Ted
Butler, Mrs. Joyce (Wood Green)	Fraser, John (Norwood)	Lee, Rt. Hn. Frederick
Campbell, I. (Dunbartonshire, W.)	Freeson, Reginald	Leonard, Dick
Cant, R. B.	Garrett, W. E.	Lestor, Miss Joan
Carmichael, Neil	Gilbert, Dr. John	Lever, Rt. Hn. Harold
Carter, Ray (Birmingh'm, Northfleld)	Ginsburg, David (Dewsbury)	Lewis, Arthur (W. Ham. N.)
Carter-Jones, Lewis (Eccles)	Golding, John	Lipton, Marcus
Castle, Rt. Hn. Barbara	Gordon Walker, Rt. Hn. P. C.	Lomas, Kenneth
Clark, David (Colne Valley)	Grant, George (Morpeth)	Loughlin, Charles
Cocks, Michael (Bristol, S.)	Grant, John D. (Islington, E.)	Lyon, Alexander W. (York)
Cohen, Stanley	Griffiths, Eddie (Brightside)	Lyons, Edward (Bradford, E.)
Concannon, J. D.	Griffiths, Will (Exchange)	Mabon, Dr. J. Dickson
Conlan, Bernard	Hamilton, William (Fife, W.)	McBride, Neil
Cox, Thomas (Wandsworth, C.)	Hamling, William	McCartney, Hugh
Crawshaw, Richard	Hannan, William (G'gow, Maryhill)	Mackenzie, Gregor
Cronin, John	Hardy, Peter	Mackie, John
Crosland, Rt. Hn. Anthony	Harper, Joseph	Maclennan, Robert
Cunningham, G. (Islington, S.W.)	Harrison, Walter (Wakefield)	McMillan, Tom (Glasgow, C.)
Dalyell, Tam	Hart, Rt. Hn. Judith	McNamara, J. Kevin
Darling, Rt. Hn. George	Hattersley, Roy	Mahon, Simon (Bootle)
Davidson, Arthur	Healey, Rt. Hn. Denis	Mallalieu, J. P. W. (Huddersfield, E.)
Davies, Denzil (Llanelly)	Heffer, Eric S.	Marks, Kenneth
Davies, Ifor (Gower)	Hooson, Emlyn	Marquand, David
Davis, Clinton (Hackney, C.)	Horam, John	Marsden, F.
Davis, Terry (Bromsgrove)	Houghton, Rt. Hn. Douglas	Marshall, Dr. Edmund
Deakins, Eric	Howell, Denis (Small Heath)	Marten, Neil
de Freitas, Rt. Hn. Sir Geoffrey	Huckfield, Lesile	Mason, Rt. Hn. Roy
Dell, Rt. Hn. Edmund	Hughes, Mark (Durham)	Mayhew, Christopher
Dempsey, James	Hughes, Robert (Aberdeen, N.)	Meacher, Michael
Doig, Peter	Hunter, Adam	Mellish, Rt. Hn. Robert
Mendelson, John	Price, J. T. (Westhoughton)	Swain, Thomas
Mikardo, Ian	Price, William (Rugby)	Taverne, Dick
Millan, Bruce	Probert, Arthur	Thomas, Rt. Hn. George (Cardiff. W.)
Miller, Dr. M. S.	Rankin, John	Tinn, James
Milne, Edward	Reed, D. (Sedgefield)	Tomney, Frank
Mitchell, R. C. (S'hampton, ltchen)	Rhodes, Geoffrey	Torney, Tom
Moate, Roger	Richard, Ivor	Tuck, Raphael
Molloy, William	Roberts, Albert (Normanton)	Turton, Rt. Hn. Sir Robin
Molyneaux, James	Roberts, Rt. Hn. Goronwy (Caernarvon)	Urwin, T. W.
Morgan, Elystan (Cardiganshire)	Robertson, John (Paisley)	Varley, Eric G.
Morris, Alfred (Wythenshawe)	Roderick, Caerwyn E.(Br'c'n&R'dnor)	Wainwright, Edwin
Morris, Charles R. (Openshaw)	Rodgers, William (Stockton-on-Tees)	Walker, Harold (Doncaster)
Morris, Rt. Hn. John (Aberavon)	Roper, John	Walker-Smith, Rt. Hn. Sir Derek
Moyle, Roland	Rose, Paul B.	Wallace, George
Mulley, Rt. Hn. Frederick	Ross, Rt. Hn. William (Kilmarnock)	Watkins, David
Murray, Ronald King	Rowlands, Ted	Weitzman, David
Oakes, Gordon	Sandelson, Neville	Wellbeloved, James
O'Halloran, Michael	sheldon, Robert (AShton-under-Lyne)	Wells, William (Walsall, N.)
Oram, Bert	Shore Rt. Hn. peter (stepney)	White, James (Glasgow, pollok)
Orbach, Maurice	Shore, Rt. Hn. Peter (Stepney)	Whitehead, Phillip
Orme, Stanley	Short, Rt. Hn. Edward (N'clle-u-Tyne)	Whitlock, William
Oswald, Thomas	Silkin, Rt. Hn. John (Deptford)	Willey, Rt. Hn. Frederick
Padley, Walter	Sillars, James	Williams, Alan (Swansea, W.)
Paget, R. T.	Silverman, Julius	Williams, W. T. (Warrington)
Palmer, Arthur	Skinner, Dennis	Wilson, Alexander (Hamilton)
Pannell, Rt. Hn. Charles	Small, William	Wilson, William (Coventry, S.)
Parry, Robert (Liverpool, Exchange)	Smith, John (Lanarkshire, N.)	Woof, Robert
Pavitt, Laurie	Spearing, Nigel
Peart, Rt. Hn. Fred	Spriggs, Leslie
Pendry, Tom	Stallard, A. W.	TELLERS FOR THE AYES:
Pentland, Norman	Stoddart, David (Swindon)	Mr. James Hamilton and
Perry, Ernest G.	Stonehouse, Rt. Hn. John	Mr. David Coleman.
Powell, Rt. Hn. J. Enoch	Strang, Gavin
Prescott. John	Summerskill, Hn. Dr. Shirley
NOES
Adley, Robert	Costain, A. P.	Gurden, Harold
Alison, Michael (Barkston Ash)	Critchley, Julian	Hall, John (Wycombe)
Alason, James (Hemel Hempstead)	Crouch, David	Hall-Davis, A. G. F.
Amery, Rt. Hn. Julian	Crowder, F. P.	Hamilton, Michael (Salisbury)
Archer, Jeffrey (Louth)	Davies, Rt. Hn. John (Knutsford)	Hannam, John (Exeter)
Astor, John	d'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Sir Henry	Harrison, Col. Sir Harwood (Eye)
Atkins, Humphrey	d'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Maj.-Gen. James	Haselhurst, Alan
Awdry, Daniel	Dean, Paul	Hastings, Stephen
Baker, Kenneth (St. Marylebone)	Deedes, Rt. Hn. W. F.	Havers, Michael
Balniel, Lord	Digby, Simon Wingfield	Hawkins, Paul
Batsford, Brian	Dixon, Piers	Hayhoe, Barney
Beamish, Col. Sir Tufton	Dodds-Parker, Douglas	Heath, Rt. Hn. Edward
Bennett, Dr. Reginald (Gosport)	Drayson, G. B.	Heseltine, Michael
Benyon, W.	Dykes, Hugh	Hicks, Robert
Berry, Hn. Anthony	Eden, Sir John	Higgins, Terence L.
Blaker, Peter	Edwards, Nicholas (Pembroke)	Hiley, Joseph
Boardman, Tom (Leicester, S.W.)	Elliot, Capt. Walter (Carshalton)	Hill, John E. B. (Norfolk, S.)
Boscawen. Robert	Elliott, R. W. (N'c'tle-upon-Tyne, N.)	Hill, James (Southampton, Test)
Bossom, Sir Clive	Emery, Peter	Holland, Philip
Bowden, Andrew	Eyre, Reginald	Holt, Miss Mary
Braine, Bernard	Fenner, Mrs. Peggy	Hordern, Peter
Bray, Ronald	Fidler, Michael	Hornby, Richard
Brinton, Sir Tatton	Finsberg, Geoffrey (Hampstead)	Howe, Hn. Sir Geoffrey (Reigate)
Brocklebank-Fowler, Christopher	Fisher, Nigel (Surblton)	Howell, Ralph (Norfolk, N.)
Brown, Sir Edward (Bath)	Fletcher-Cooke, Charles	Hunt John
Bruce-Gardyne, J.	Fookes, Miss Janet	Iremonger, T. L.
Bryan, Paul	Foster, Sir John	James, David
Buchanan-Smith, Alick(Angus,N&M)	Fowler, Norman	Jenkin, Patrick (Woodford)
Buck, Antony	Fox, Marcus	Jessell, Toby
Bullus, Sir Eric	Fry, Peter	Johnson Smith, G. (E.Grinslead)
Burden, F. A.	Gardner, Edward	Jones, Arthur (Northants, S.)
Butler, Adam (Bosworth)	Gibson-Watt, David	Jopling, Michael
Campbell, Rt. Hn. G. (Moray & Nairn)	Gilmour, Ian (Norfolk, C.)	Joseph, Rt. Hn. Sir Keith
Carlisle, Mark	Gilmour, Sir John (Fife, E.)	Kaberry, Sir Donald
Carr, Rt. Hn. Robert	Glyn, Dr. Alan	Kellett-Bowman, Mrs. Elaine
Channon, Paul	Godber, Rt. Hn. J. B.	Kershaw, Anthony
Chapman, Sydney	Goodhart, Philip	Kimball, Marcus
Chataway, Rt. Hn. Christopher	Gorst, John	King, Evelyn (Dorset, S.)
Churchill, W. S.	Gower, Raymond	King, Tom (Bridgwater)
Clark, William (Surrey, E.)	Grant, Anthony (Harrow, C.)	Kinsey, J. R.
Clarke, Kenneth (Rushcliffe)	Gray, Hamish	Kirk, Peter
Clegg, Walter	Green, Alan	Kitson, Timothy
Cockeram, Eric	Grieve, Percy	Knight, Mrs. Jill
Cooke, Robert	Griffiths, Eldon (Bury St. Edmunds)	Knox, David
Coombs, Derek	Grimond, Rt. Hn. J.	Lambton, Antony
Cooper, A. E.	Grylls, Michael	Lamont, Norman
Cordle, John	Gummer, J Selwyn	Lane, David
Cormack, Patrick

Langford-Holt, Sir John	Page, John (Harrow. W.)	Stewart-Smith, Geoffrey (Belper)
Legge-Bourke, Sir Harry	Parkinson, Cecil	Stodart, Anthony (Edinburgh w.)
Le Marchant, Spencer	Peel, John	Stoddart-Scott, Col. Sir M
Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)	Percival, Ian	Stokes, John
Longden, Gilbert	Peyton, Rt. Hn. John	Stuttaford, Dr. Tom
Loveridge, John	Pike, Miss Mervyn	Tapsell, Peter
Luce, R. N.	Pink, R. Bonner	Taylor, Sir Charles (Eastbourne)
McAdden, Sir Stephen	Price, David (Eastleigh)	Taylor, Frank (Moss Side)
MacArthur, Ian	Prior, Rt. Hn. J. M. L.	Tebbit, Norman
McCrindle, R. A	Proudfoot, Wilfred	Temple, John M.
McLaren, Martin	Pym, Rt. Hn. Francis	Thatcher, Rt. Hn. Mrs. Margaret
Maclean, Sir Fitzroy	Quennell, Miss J. M.	Thomas, John Stradling (Monmouth)
Macmillan, Maurice (Farnham)	Raison, Timothy	Thomas, Rt. Hn. Peter (Hendon, S.)
McNair-Wilson, Michael	Ramsden, Rt. Hn. James	Thompson, Sir Richard (Croydon, S.)
McNair-Wilson, Patrick (New Forest)	Rawlinson, Rt. Hn. Sir Peter	Tilney, John
Maddan, Martin	Redmond, Robert	Trafford. Dr. Anthony
Madel, David	Reed, Laurance (Bolton. E.)	Trew, Peter
Mather, Carol	Rees, Peter (Dover)	Tugendhat, Christopher
Maude, Angus	Rees-Davies, W. R.	van Straubenzee, W. R.
Maudling, Rt. Hn. Reginald	Renton. Rt. Hn. Sir David	Vaughan, Dr. Gerard
Mawby, Ray	Rhys Williams, Sir Brandon	Vickers, Dame Joan
Maxwell-Hyslop, R. J.	Ridley, Hn. Nicholas	Waddington, David
Meyer, Sir Anthony	Ridsdale, Julian	Walker, Rt. Hn. Peter (Worcester)
Mills, Peter (Torrington)	Rippon, Rt. Hn. Geoffrey	Wall, Patrick
Miscampbell, Norman	Roberts, Michael (Cardiff, N.)	Walters, Dennis
Mitchell, Lt.-Col.C.(Aberdeenshire,W)	Roberts, Wyn (Conway)	Ward, Dame Irene
Mitchell, David (Basingstoke)	Rodgers, Sir John (Sevenoaks)	Warren, Kenneth
Money, Ernie	Rossi, Hugh (Hornsey)	Weatherill, Bernard
Monks, Mrs. Connie	Rost, Peter	Wells, John (Maidstone)
Monro, Hector	St. John-Stevas, Norman	White, Roger (Gravesend)
Montgomery, Fergus	Scott, Nicholas	Wiggin, Jerry
More, Jasper	Scott-Hopkins, James	Wilkinson, John
Morgan, Geraint (Denbigh)	Sharples, Richard	Winterton, Nicholas
Morgan-Giles, Rear-Adm.	Shaw, Michael (Sc'b'gh & Whitby)	Wolrige-Gordon, Patrick
Morrison, Charles	Shelton, William (Clapham)	Wood, Rt. Hn. Richard
Mudd, David	Simeons, Charles	Woodhouse, Hn. Christopher
Murton, Oscar	Sinclair, Sir George	Woodnutt, Mark
Neave, Airey	Skeet, T. H. H.	Worsley, Marcus
Noble, Rt. Hn. Michael	Smith, Dudley (W' wick & L'mington)	Wylie, Rt. Hn. N. R.
Normanton, Tom	Soref, Harold	Younger, Hn. George
Nott, John	Speed, Keith
Onslow, Cranley	Spence, John
Oppenheim, Mrs. Sally	Sproat, lain	TELLERS FOR THE NOES:
Osborn, John	Stainton, Keith	Mr. Tim Fortescue and
Owen, Idris (Stockport, N.)	Stanbrook, Ivor	Mr Victor Goodhew

Question accordingly negatived.

Mr. Shore

I beg to move Amendment No. 416, in page 3, leave out lines 5 to 10.

I will move this Amendment formally. I hope that the Committee will understand the reasons why I do so.

Mr. Ernie Money (Ipswich)

I should like the right hon. Gentleman to explain in a little more detail what is intended by this Amendment. Throughout the Committee stage and on Second Reading we have been reminded that this was a matter of general interest and not a question of lawyers' law. When we come to the fine points involved in this Amendment, and Amendment No. 276, I should like the right hon. Gentleman to tell us what is intended by taking out these parts when the objects of the Community are already to be found in Articles 2 and 3 of the EEC Treaty, in Articles 2 and 3 of the European Coal and Steel Community Treaty and in Articles 1 and 2 of the Euratom Treaty. All these Articles must be read in the light of the treaties as a whole. The effect of the Amendment would be to limit the objects of the Communities to which regard must be had in exercising powers under other Statutes. The objects are defined in those specific Articles.

Although the Amendment has been moved formally, I ask the Committee to accept that it has become a matter of purist drafting.

Mr. Fell

Is my right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster aware that in an earlier debate he promised my right hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Powell) that he would use the occasion of the debate on Amendment No. 416 to deal with those matters with which he did not deal on that occasion?

Mr. Rippon

I do not want to take up the time of the Committee, for reasons which I am sure hon. Members will understand. I thought then that the question of having regard to all the matters which arise under the treaties would be dealt with during the debate on Amendment No. 416. We have had debates on this matter before.

The Amendment relates particularly to whether the Minister should or should not issue directions to the Coal and Steel Board, for example on how far one can proceed by not using that power and therefore no further statutory arrangements are made. That is really putting the matter quite shortly, and I hope that the Committee will forgive me if I do not reiterate the arguments which have been made before.

Mr. Dodds-Parker

This is an important Amendment. [Interruption.] The right hon. Gentleman made the same speech for the 193rd time. I shall take it from anyone else, but not from him and that an hon. Member does not have a right to stand upon an occasion like this and ask for an explanation of the Amendment. [Interruption.] If the hon. Gentleman wants to talk about guillotines, let me tell him that I have been a Member of the House since 1945 and I know that the guillotine was used a number of times by Socialist Governments after the war to railroad through Measures relating to industries which they talked about raising to the peaks of the economy but which, having been nationalised, are at the other end of the scale.

The Committee is entitled to some explanation of these Amendments which seem to be designed to limit the application of the Clause to Article 2 of the Treaty of Rome, Article 2 of the Coal and Steel Community Treaty and Article 1 of Euratom. There are many objects in those treaties other than those three.

Hon. Gentlemen opposite must have taken all these matters into account when the Labour Government were preparing to join the Community. As the right hon. Member for Stepney (Mr. Shore) was a member of the Cabinet at the time, surely he knew what was proposed. I cannot believe that he is proposing that the Amendments should be applied to those three Articles only.

10.45 p.m.

I cannot believe that the right hon. Gentleman wishes to limit this to the points raised by him in his Question of 18th May to my right hon. and learned Friend giving the details which have been put before the Committee. In the last two major debates we have had there has been great exaggeration by the Opposition about the difficulties which might arise. I suggest that we are entitled to a further explanation from the Opposition about their reason for putting down these Amendments.

Amendment negatived.

Amendment proposed: No. 7, in page 3, line 15, at end insert:

1. (3) It shall be the duty of the Law Commissions for England Wales and for Scotland to bring and keep under review the coming into force and the operation from time to time of subsection (1) above and to report thereon to Parliament within not more than six months of the date upon which by virtue of such operation any enforceable Community right, power, liability, obligation. Restriction, remedy or procedure takes effect;
2. (4) Every such report as is referred to in subsection (3) above shall
3. (a) state the relevant enforceable Corn munity right, power, liability, obligation, restriction, remedy or procedure;
4. (b) report upon all matters arising out of or related thereto:

(c) report upon any other matters which in the opinion of either of the said Commissions ought to be considered by Parliament in consequence of or in connection, whether direct or indirect, with any such matter; and

(d) make such recommendations to Parliament as may appear to be appropriate.

(5) In the exercise of the powers arising by virtue of subsection (2)(b) above the person entrusted with such power shall have regard to any such report as is referred to in sub section (3) above:

(6) Any such report as is referred to in subsection (3) above may be made by the said Commission windy or by either or each of such Commissions separately, as the circumstances of the case may require.—[Mr. Dell.]

Question put. That the Amendment be made:—

The Committee divided: Ayes 260 Noes 271.

Division No.196.]	AYES	[10.46 p.m.
Abse, Leo	Davis, Clinton (Hackney, C.)	Harrison, Walter (Wakefield)
Allaun, Frank (Salford, E.)	Davis, Terry (Bromsgrove)	Hart, Rt. Hn. Judith
Archer, Peter (Rowley Regls)	Deakins, Eric	Hattersley, Roy
Armstrong, Ernest	de Freitas, Rt. Hn. Sir Geoffrey	Healey, Rt. Hn. Denis
Ashley, Jack	Dell, Rt. Hn. Edmund	Heffer, Eric S
Ashton, Joe	Dempsey, James	Hooson, Emlyn
Atkinson, Norman	Doig, Peter	Horam, John
Bagler, Gordon A. T.	Dormand, J. D.	Houghton, Rt. Hn. Douglas
Barnett, Guy (Greenwich)	Douglas, Dick (Stirlingshire, E.)	Howell, Denis (Small Heath)
Barnett, Joel (Heywood and Royton)	Douglas-Mann, Bruce	Huckfield, Leslie
Baxter, William	Driberg, Tom	Hughes, Mark (Durham)
Benn, Rt. Hn. Anthony Wedgwood	Duffy, A. E. P.	Hughes, Robert (Aberdeen. No)
Bennett, James (Glasgow, Bridgeton)	Dunnett, Jack	Hunter, Adam
Bidwell, Sydney	Eadie, Alex	Hutchison, Michael Clark
Biffen, John	Edwards, Robert (Bilston)	lrvine, Rt. Hn. Sir Arthur (Edge Hall)
Bishop, E. S.	Edwards, William (Merloneth)	Janner, Greville
Blenkinsop, Arthur	Ellis, Tom	Jay, Rt. Hn. Douglas
Boardman, H. (Leigh)	English, Michael	Jeger, Mrs. Lena
Body, Richard	Evans, Fred	Jenkins, Hugh (Putney)
Booth, Albert	Faulds, Andrew	Jennings, J. C. (Burton)
Boyden, James (Bishop Auckland)	Fell, Anthony	John, Brynmor
Brown, Bob (N'c'tle-upon-Tyne, W.)	Fernyhough, Rt. Hn. E.	Johnson, Carol (Lewisham, S.)
Brown, Hugh D. (G'gow, Provan)	Fisher, Mrs. Doris (B'ham, Ladywood)	Johnson, James (K'ston-on-Hull, W.)
Brown, Ronald (Shoreditch & F'bury)	Fitch, Alan (Wigan)	Johnston, Russell (Inverness)
Buchan, Norman	Fitt, Gerard (Belfast, W.)	Jones, Barry (Flint, E.)
Buchanan, Richard (G'gow, Sp'burn)	Fletcher, Raymond (Ilkeston)	Jones, Dan (Burnley)
Butler, Mrs. Joyce (Wood Green)	Fletcher, Ted (Darlington)	Jones, Rt. Hn. Sir Elwyn(W. Ham, S.)
Callaghan, Rt. Hn. James	Foley, Maurice	Jones, Gwynoro (Carmarthen)
Campbell, I. (Dunbartonshire, W.)	Ford, Ben	Jones, T. Alec (Rhondda, W.)
Cant, R. B.	Ford, Ben	Judd, Frank
Carmichael, Neil	Forrester, John	Kaufman, Gerald
Carter, Ray (Birmingh'm, Northfield)	Fraser, John (Norwood)	Kelley, Richard
Carter-Jones, Lewis (Eccles)	Freeson, Reginald	Kerr, Russell
Castle, Rt. Hn. Barbara	Garrett, W. E.	Kilfedder, James
Clark, David (Colne Valley)	Gilbert, Dr. John	Kinnock, Neil
Cocks, Michael (Bristol, S.)	Ginsburg, David (Dewsbury)	Lamborn, Harry
Cohen, Stanley	Golding, John	Lamond, James
Concannon, J. D.	Gordon Walker, Rt. Hn. P. C.	Latham, Arthur
Conlan, Bernard	Grant, George (Morpeth)	Leadbitter, Ted
Cox, Thomas (Wandsworth, C.)	Grant, John D. (Islington, E.)	Lee, Rt. Hn. Frederick
Crawshaw, Richard	Griffiths, Eddie (Brightside)	Leonard, Dick
Cronin, John	Griffiths, Will (Exchange)	Lestor, Miss Joan
Crosland, Rt. Hn. Anthony	Grimond, Rt. Hn. J.	Lever, Rt. Hn. Harold
Cunningham, G. (Islington, S.W.)	Hamilton, James (Bothwell)	Lewis, Arthur (W. Ham, N.)
Dalyell, Tam	Hamilton, William (Fife, W.)	Lipton, Marcus
Darling, Rt. Hn. George	Hamling, William	Lomas, Kenneth
Davidson, Arthur	Hannan, William (G'gow, Maryhill)	Loughlin, Charles
Davies, Denzil (Llanelly)	Hardy, Peter	Lyon, Alexander W. (York)
Davies, Ifor (Gower)	Harper, Joseph
Lyons, Edward (Bradford, E.)	Orme, Stanley	Smith, John (Lanarkshire, N.)
Mabon, Dr. J. Dickson	Oswald, Thomas	Spearing, Nigel
McBride, Neil	Padley, Walter	Spriggs, Leslie
McCartney, Hugh	Paget, R. T.	Stallard, A. W.
Mackenzie, Gregor	Palmer, Arthur	Steel, David
Mackie, John	Pannell, Rt. Hn. Charles	Stoddart, David (Swindon)
Maclennan, Robert	Pardoe, John	Summerskill, Hn. Dr. Shirley
McMillan, Tom (Glasgow, C.)	Parry, Robert (Liverpool, Exchange)	Swain, Thomas
McNamara, J. Kevin	Pavitt, Laurie	Taverne, Dick
Mahon, Simon (Bootle)	Peart, Rt. Hn. Fred	Thomas, Rt. Hn. George (Cardiff.W.)
Mallalieu, J. P. W. (Huddersfield, E.)	Pendry, Tom	Tinn, James
Marks, Kenneth	Pentland, Norman	Tomney, Frank
Marquand, David	Perry, Ernest G.	Torney, Tom
Marsden, F.	Powell, Rt. Hn. J. Enoch	Tuck, Raphael
Marshall, Dr. Edmund	Prescott, John	Turton, Rt. Hn. Sir Robin
Marten, Neil	Price, J. T. (Westhoughton)	Urwin, T. W.
Mason, Rt. Hn. Roy	Price, William (Rugby)	Varley, Eric G.
Mayhew, Christopher	Probert, Arthur	Wainwright, Edwin
Meacher, Michael	Rankin, John	Walker, Harold (Doncaster)
Mellish. Rt. Hn. Robert	Reed, D. (Sedgefield)	Walker-Smith, Rt. Hn. Sir Derek
Mendelson, John	Rhodes, Geoffrey	Wallace, George
Mikardo, Ian	Richard, Ivor	Watkins, David
Millan, Bruce	Roberts, Albert (Normanton)	Weitzman, David
Miller, Dr. M. S.	Robertson, John (Paisley)	Wellbeloved, James
Milne, Edward	Roderick, Caerwyn E.(Br'c'n&R'dnor)	Wells, William (Walsall, N.)
Mitchell, R. C. (S'hampton, Itchen)	Rodgers, William (Stockton-on-Tees)	White, James (Glasgow, Pollok)
Moate, Roger	Roper John	Whitehead, Phillip
Molloy, William	Rose, Paul B.	Whitlock, William
Molyneaux, James	Ross, Rt. Hn. William (Kilmarnock)	Willey, Rt. Hn. Frederick
Morgan, Elystan (Cardiganshire)	Rowlands, Edward	Williams, Alan (Swansea, W.)
Morris, Alfred (Wythenshawe)	Sandelson, Neville	Williams, W. T. (Warrington)
Morris, Charles R. (Openshaw)	Sheldon, Robert (Ashton-under-Lyne)	Wilson, Alexander (Hamilton)
Morris, Rt. Hn. John (Aberavon)	Shore, Rt. Hn. Peter (Stepney)	Wilson, William (Coventry, S.)
Moyle, Roland	Short,Rt.Hn.Edward (N'c'tle-u-Tyne)	Woof, Robert
Mulley, Rt. Hn. Frederick	Silkin, Rt. Hn. John (Deptford)
Murray, Ronald King	Silkin, Hn. S. C. (Dulwich)	TELLERS FOR THE AYES:
Oakes, Gordon	Sillars, James	Mr. Donald Coleman and
O'Halloran, Michael	Silverman, Julius	Mr. James A. Dunn.
Oram, Bert	Skinner, Dennis
Orbach, Maurice	Small, William
NOES
Adley, Robert	Clegg, Walter	Gilmour, Ian (Norfolk, C.)
Alison, Michael (Barkston Ash)	Cockeram, Eric	Gilmour, Sir John (Fife, E.)
Allason, James (Hemel Hempstead)	Cooke, Robert	Glyn, Dr. Alan
Amery, Rt. Hn. Julian	Coombs, Derek	Godber, Rt. Hn. J. B.
Archer, Jeffrey (Louth)	Cooper, A. E.	Goodhart, Philip
Astor, John	Cordle, John	Gorst, John
Atkins, Humphrey	Cormack, Patrick	Gower, Raymond
Awdry, Daniel	Costain, A. P.	Grant, Anthony (Harrow. C.)
Baker, Kenneth (St. Marylebone)	Critchley, Julian	Gray, Hamish
Balniel, Rt. Hn. Lord	Crouch, David	Green, Alan
Batsford Brian	Crowder, F. P.	Grieve, Percy
Beamish, Col. Sir Tufton	Davies, Rt. Hn. John (Knutsford)	Griffiths, Eldon (Bury St. Edmunds)
Bennett, Dr. Reginald (Gosport)	d'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Sir Henry	Grylls, Michael
Benyon, W.	d'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Maj.-Gen. James	Gummer, J. Selwyn
Berry, Hn. Anthony	Dean, Paul	Gurden, Harold
Blaker, Peter	Deedes. Rt. Hn. W. F.	Hall, John (Wycombe)
Boardman, Tom (Leicester, S.W.)	Digby, Simon WIngfleldDixon, Piers	Hall-Davis, A. G. F.Hamilton, Michael (Salisbury)
Boscawen, Hn. Robert	Dodds-Parker, Douglas	Hannam, John (Exeter)
Bossom, Sir Clive	Drayson, G. B.	Harrison, Col. Sir Harwood (Eye)
Bowden, Andrew	Dykes, Hugh	Haselhurst, Alan
Braine. Sir Bernard	Eden, Sir John	Hastings, Stephen
Bray, Ronald	Edwards, Nicholas (Pembroke)	Havers, Michael
Brinton, Sir Tatton	Elliot, Capt. Walter (Carshalton)	Hawkins, Paul
Brocklebank-Fowler, Christopher	Elliott, R. W. (N'c'tle-upon-Tyne.N.)	Hayhoe. Barney
Brown, Sir Edward (Bath)	Emery, Peter	Heath, Rt. Hn. Edward
Bruce-Gardyne, J.	Eyre. Reginald	Heseltine, Michael
Bryan, Paul	Fenner, Mrs. Peggy	Hicks, Robert
Buchanan-Smith, Alick (Angus,N&M)	Fidler, Michael	Higgins, Terence L.
Buck, Antony	Finsberg, Geoffrey (Hampstead)	Hiley, Joseph
Burden, F. A.	Fisher, Nigel (Surbiton)	Hill, John E. B. (Norfolk, S.)
Butler, Adam (Bosworth)	Fletcher-Cooke, Charles	Hill, James (Southampton, Test)
Campbell, Rt. Hn. G.(Moray&Nairn)	Fookes, Miss Janet	Holland, Philip
Carlisle, Mark	Fortescue, Tim	Holt, Miss Mary
Carr, Rt. Hn. Robert	Foster, Sir John	Hordern, Peter
Channon, Paul	Fowler, Norman	Hornby, Richard
Chapman, Sydney	Fox, Marcus	Howe, Hn. Sir Geoffrey (Reigate)
Chataway, Rt. Hn. Christopher	Fry, Peter	Howell, Ralph (Norfolk, N.)
Churchill, W. S.	Gardner, Edward	Hunt, John
Clark, William (Surrey, E.)	Gibson-Watt. David	Iremonger, T. L.

James, David	More, Jasper	Skeet, T. H. H.
Jenkin, Patrick (Woodford)	Morgan, Geraint (Denbigh)	Smith, Dudley (W'wick & L'mington)
Jessel, Toby	Morgan-Giles, Rear-Adm.	Soref, Harold
Johnson Smith, G. (E. Grinstead)	Morrison, Charles	Speed, Keith
Jones, Arthur (Northants, S.)	Mudd, David	Spence, John
Jopling, Michael	Murton, Oscar	Sproat, Iain
Joseph, Rt. Hn. Sir Keith	Neave, Airey	Stainton, Keith
Kaberry, Sir Donald	Noble, Rt. Hn. Michael	Stanbrook, Ivor
Kellett-Bowman, Mrs. Elaine	Normanton, Tom	Stewart-Smith, Geoffrey (Beiper)
Kershaw, Anthony	Nott, John	Stodart, Anthony (Edinburgh, W.)
Kimball, Marcus	Onslow, Cranley	Stoddart-Scott, Col. Sir M.
King, Evelyn (Dorset, S.)	Oppenheim, Mrs. Sally	Stokes, John
King, Tom (Bridgwater)	Osborn, John	Stuttaford, Dr. Tom
Kinsey, J. R.	Owen, Idris (Stockport, N.)	Tapsell, Peter
Kirk, Peter	Page, Graham (Crosby)	Taylor, Sir Charles (Eastbourne)
Kitson, Timothy	Page, John (Harrow. W.)	Taylor, Frank (Moss Side)
Knight, Mrs. Jill	Parkinson, Cecil	Tebbit, Norman
Knox, David	Peel, John	Temple, John M.
Lambton, Lord	Percival, Ian	Thatcher Rt. Hn. Mrs. Margaret
Lamont, Norman	Peyton, Rt. Hn. John	Thomas, John Stradling (Monmouth)
Lane, David	Pike, Miss Mervyn	Thomas, Rt. Hn. Peter (Hendon, S.)
Langford-Holt, Sir John	Pink, R. Bonner	Thompson, Sir Richard (Croydon. S.)
Legge-Bourke, Sir Harry	Price, David (Eastleigh)	Tilney, John
Le Marchant, Spencer	Prior, Rt. Hn. J. M. L.	Trafford, Dr. Anthony
Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)	Proudfoot, Wilfred	Trew, Peter
Longden, Sir Gilbert	Pym, Rt. Hn. Francis	Tugendhat, Christopher
Loveridge, John	Quennell, Miss J. M	Van Straubenzee, W. R.
Luce, R. N.	Ralson, Timothy	Vaughan, Dr. Gerard
McAdden, Sir Stephen	Ramsden, Rt. Hn. James	vickers, Dame Joan
MacArthur, Ian	Rawlinson, Rt. Hn. Sir Peter	Waddington, David
McCrindle, R. A	Redmond, Robert	Walker, Rt. Hn. Peter (Worcester)
McLaren, Martin	Reed, Laurance (Bolton, E.)	Wall, Patrick
Maclean, Sir Fitzroy	Rees, Peter (Dover)	Walters, Dennis
Macmillan, Rt. Hn. Maurice (Farnham)	Rees-Davies, W. R.	Ward, Dame Irene
McNair-Wilson, Michael	Renton, Rt. Hn. Sir David	Warren, Kenneth
McNair-Wilson, Patrick (New Forest)	Rhys Williams, Sir Brandon	Weatherill, Bernard
Maddan, Martin	Ridley, Hn. Nicholas	Wells, John (Maidstone)
Madel, David	Ridsdale, Julian	White, Roger (Gravesend)
Mather, Carol	Rippon, Rt. Hn. Geoffrey	Wiggin, Jerry
Maude, Angus	Roberts, Michael (Cardiff, N.)	Wilkinson, John
Maudling, Rt. Hn. Reginald	Roberts, Wyn (Conway)	Winterton, Nicholas
Mawby, Ray	Rodgers, Sir John (Sevenoaks)	Wolrige-Gordon, Patrick
Maxwell-Hyslop, R. J.	Rossi, Hugh (Hornsey)	Wood, Rt. Hn. Richard
Meyer, Sir Anthony	Rost, Peter	Woodhouse, Hn. Christopher
Mills, Peter (Torrington)	St. John-Stevas, Norman	Woodnutt, Mark
Miscampbell, Norman	Scott, Nicholas	Worsley, Marcus
Mitchell, Lt.-Col. C.(Aberdeenshire, W)	Scott-Hopkins, James	Wylie, Rt. Hn. N. R
Mitchell, David (Basingstoke)	Sharpies, Richard	Younger, Hn. George
Money, Ernie	Shaw, Michael (Sc'b'gh A Whitby)	TELLERS FOR THE NOES
Monks, Mrs. Connie	Shelton, William (Clapham)	Mr. Kenneth Clark and
Monro, Hector	Simeons, Charles	Mr. Victor Goodhew
Montgomery, Fergus	Sinclair, Sir George

Question accordingly negatived.

Mr. Molloy

On a point of order, Sir Robert. May I seek the protection of the Chair against very unseemly conduct by hon. Members opposite? They voted for a guillotine on this Bill in Committee and then in turn they have charged us with not explaining Amendments we have put forward, although they knew full well that they voted in that way precisely to prevent our explaining Amendments. Can we be defended from that form of abuse of procedure of the House, not to mention the vile hypocrisy that is involved in it?

The Chairman

That is not a point of order for me. I should be in great trouble if I started worrying about that sort of thing.

It being Eleven o'clock, The CHAIRMAN left the Chair to report Progress and ask leave to sit again, pursuant to the Order of 2nd May.

Committee report Progress; to sit again tomorrow.