UNHALLMARKED ARTICLES (Hansard, 20 July 1973)

§ Mr. Wiggin
I beg to move, That this House doth agree with the Lords in the said amendment.
It should be made clear that this amendment implies that the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man are, for the purposes of the Bill, to be treated as foreign territory. That is the intention, and it relates only to the purposes of the Bill. This should be made clear since some residents in the Channel Islands have communicated with me about our legislation. I therefore thought that I should draw the House's attention to this point.

§ Mr. Wiggin
I beg to move, That this House doth agree with the Lords in the said amendment.
This amendment deals with a point that is quite small but is, I know, of interest. to hon. Members from manufacturing constituencies. The term "Britannia 1035 metal "is applied in other circumstances to a certain base metal and it would be very confusing if in the Bill we started involving ourselves with references to Britannia metal rather than to Britannia silver, which is something quite different. That being so, it was decided to exclude this phrase from the definition of Britannia silver as an indication that an article is made of silver and not of any base metal.

§ Mr. Emery
This is quite an important amendment because together with later amendments regarding millesimal markings the House will realise that we will be left with sterling and Britannia silver as the two types of silver rather than those stipulated by millesimal markings, which would be placed on the objects themselves. Britannia metal is metal containing between 84 per cent. and 97 per cent. tin, and to allow this term would not be fulfilling the object of the Bill.
In these groups of amendments we have also catered for the term "carat". It will be realised that the schedule deals with traditional terms which no longer are the official way of indicating the fineness of gold though they may still be used by traders and will be assimilated into the new system.
It is interesting to note that "carat" is also used to express the weight of precious stones. A later amendment provides that the use of "carat" in connection with precious stones will not bring the article within the scope of the Bill. When we begin using terms in different areas it is important that we should get the definitions absolutely right. That is what the amendment sets out to do.