HL Deb 08 July 1926 vol 64 cc920-7

Order of the Day for the Third Reading read.

Moved, That the Bill be now read 3a.— (The Earl of Donoughmore.)

LORD DANESFORT

My Lords, with the permission of the House I should like to make a few remarks of a general character about this Bill, which is strongly opposed by the National Association of Street Traders, a large and important body, and a good many other street traders have signed a petition against it. It is only fair to say that a considerable number of street traders signed a petition in its favour. As your Lordships are well aware these street traders are not a wealthy body and it is entirely beyond their power financially to enter a formal Petition against a Bill or to incur the heavy expense of employing Parliamentary Agents and Counsel to oppose the Bill. Therefore, it was necessarily considered in the Committee of the House of Commons without their having an opportunity of being heard by the Committee or of putting their views forward.

I need hardly remind your Lordships that, as a class, street traders are an industrious and hard-working portion of the community, who do a valuable service by keeping down the price of foodstuffs and other articles, especially in the poorer neighbourhoods of London, and it has been found by a Parliamentary Committee which sat to consider the matter of street trading in 1922 and published an important Report, that these street traders supply an important public want, particularly in the poorer neighbourhoods to which I have already referred. I need only add that since the War their numbers have been largely increased from the ranks of ex-Service men, who, for various reasons, have been unable to return to their original employment.

There are many provisions in this Bill to which the street traders take objection. I do not propose to trouble your Lordships with the details of those objections because the main and chief objection to the Bill, as I think, is that, while it cannot be disputed that proper control of street trading is necessary, it is absolutely essential in the interests of the public and of the street traders themselves that, subject to some local variations, there should be uniformity throughout the twenty-eight London Boroughs. There ought not to be a large number of separate Boroughs bringing forward Bills, of which the present Bill is the first instalment, dealing piecemeal and in a varied fashion with street trading in each Borough separately. I confess I shudder at the thought of the expense that would be thrown upon the funds of these Boroughs if a dozen Borough Council Bills, dealing piecemeal with this subject and possibly in a, manner inconsistent with each other, were brought into Parliament, entailing the enormous expense of each Bill being promoted and carried through Parliament separately.

The question of the desirability of uniformity was considered by a very strong Departmental Committee appointed by the Home Office. That Committee reported in 1922 and decided that, broadly speaking, uniformity was necessary. The Committee sat for thirty-three days and examined fifty-two witnesses, including representatives of different Government Departments, the Police, the Borough Councils and street and other traders, and they made a series of recommendations of which I will mention only one or two. They recommended unanimously that a general code of Regulations governing street trading, a draft of which they submitted at the end of their Report, should be made by the Home Secretary to apply to the whole of the Metropolitan Police District. And they went on to recommend that the different local authorities should be given statutory powers (and this is of importance) subject to the-approval of the Commissioner of Police, to do various things each in their own Borough, such as, for instance, to select the places for street trading within the Borough, taking care not to disturb any existing street market; to issue licences to street traders and to exact a small fee for them; to allow particular pitches for a limited period, and to make by-laws not inconsistent with the general Regulations.

This Bill, to a large extent, ignores and violates the recommendations I have mentioned, more particularly that which advises the formation of a general code of Regulations for London. On this I need refer only to one further point. There is now, as I understand it, before the General Purposes Committee of the Standing Joint Committee of the London Boroughs a resolution which was passed by the Lambeth Borough Council, urging that a Bill should be promoted on the lines suggested by the Departmental Committee applying to all London Boroughs. I am informed and I believe that it is correct, that this proposal is likely to receive favourable considera- tion. When I am told, as I gather from some of the evidence given before the Committee of the House of Commons, that eighteen of the London Boroughs have expressed approval of this Bill, the importance of their action is gravely diminished by the fact to which I have just refered. In those circumstances there appear to be considerable reasons for not passing this Bill into law.

On the other hand, it would, perhaps, seem a somewhat drastic step to ask your Lordships to take to reject this Bill or Third Reading after the promoters have been put to the expense of passing it through Committee of the House of Commons. Your Lordships will not forget what I have already mentioned—namely, that the street traders who objected had, owing to poverty, no opportunity of bringing forward their objections and making their voice heard. Nevertheless, I think it would be a strong measure to ask your Lordships to reject the Bill on Third Reading now. There is one other point and it is this. The promoters are willing, in pursuance of a pledge which was given on their behalf in the House of Commons on May 13 last when the Bill was being discussed, to accept the insertion in the Bill of the clause which stands in my name on the Order Paper. That clause indicates a general approval of the principle of uniformity in dealing with this matter. That being so and in those circumstances I do not propose to ask the House to oppose the Third Reading, and if the Third Reading be passed I shall move the new clause standing in my name.

LORD JESSEL

My Lords, I am somewhat astonished at the speech of the noble Lord who has just sat down, because in the first place he advocated the rights of street traders and rather argued against their being dealt with at all.

LORD DANESFORT

No.

LORD JESSEL

Well, my noble friend said that they had had no opportunity of being heard and that they were a deserving body of men who were going to be harmed by this Bill. Now it appears that the noble Lord objects to this Bill not so much because it may harm street traders but on account of want of uniformity of legislation for London as a whole. Therefore the noble Lord wants to penalise the street traders not only in one Borough but in the whole of London. I do not think that is a reason for throwing out this Bill. May I point out that it has been the invariable rule and practice in London for many years for separate Boroughs to bring in separate Bills, not on questions affecting London as a whole, but on matters that affect their own localities. Only this Session the big Borough of Hackney brought forward a Bill, which was seven days in Committee in another place and which had many provisions that might or might not be adapted to the rest of London. When it came to this House not one word was said against it and it received the Royal Assent.

Why is Bermondsey singled out? Bermondsey has only followed the usual procedure, which, as I say, has been practised for many years. Westminster has done it on two occasions. Bermondsey, however, is singled out for chastisement. Why? Bermondsey is not a Borough for which, from a political point of view, I have any great regard. It is represented by the members of the Party opposite and its Borough Council is as Red as these Benches. May I point out further that this Bill has received the blessing of eighteen of the Borough Councils of London at the Metropolitan Standing Joint Committee. As a matter of fact, I think Bermondsey is very much to be congratulated on having brought this thorny question to a head. In the first place, the Metropolitan Borough Councils asked the London County Council to bring in a Bill and I recall that in this House my noble friend Lord Onslow brought in a Bill dealing with street trading on behalf of the Government. That Bill was dropped.

Now, at last, Bermondsey has made an arrangement with its street traders which has lasted for the past nine months and under that agreement they consider that the whole system of street trading in the Borough has worked in a very satisfactory manner. Yet, because Bermondsey has had the temerity to lead in the van of progress in this matter, it is to be penalised. I cannot see any harm in this Bill. What is the position? Here we have a great congeries of big cities. Bermondsey itself has a population of 120,000 inhabitants and a rateable value of more than £1,000,000. My noble friend who led the attack on this Bill represented a very important City for many years—with a slight lapse on one occasion, which we: all regretted—with a population of 84,000, yet he comes forward and denies to these immense Boroughs, these immense cities, the right which they have had since 1899 of promoting legislation on their own behalf.

LORD DANESFORT

May I interrupt my noble friend for a moment? I am really doing nothing of the kind. I do not deny in any shape or form the right of a Borough Council to legislate in a proper manner for itself. The point that I made was that street trading is something which extends to every part of London and that there should be uniformity in legislation.

LORD JESSEL

I dare say, but the Bermondsey Council have agreed that when the London County Council introduce their Bill these powers shall lapse in a General Bill. For twenty-five years or more this question of street trading has been agitated in London. When a Bill was brought forward on the question of combined drainage and when Hackney presented their solution, why did not my noble friend come forward and say that the limitations in the clause which he is going to move should be applicable to Hackney? There are certain things required in Westminster that are not required in other Boroughs. My point is that these Boroughs have done very great service in bringing these matters forward. They are not averse, and never have been averse, when general legislation is passed from falling into line with it, and I do protest against the idea that a Borough is to be penalised because it has been able to find a method of solving a great problem and has been enterprising enough to be in the van of progress, which is for the benefit of London. I think the House would be well advised to give a Third Reading to this Bill.

THE EARL OF DONOUGHMORE

My Lords, this is an important matter and I am glad that the noble Lord has drawn attention to it. At the same time, I am equally glad that he has not put down a Motion for rejection of the Bill on Third Reading. The noble Lord speaks on behalf of many street traders who, he tells us, are opposed to this Bill, but it is fair to say that they did not deposit a Petition against the Bill cither in the House of Commons or in your Lordships' House, no doubt for the reason which the noble Lord gave. Therefore, this Bill, so far as the Committee Stage is concerned, passed through both Houses as an unopposed Bill, subject, of course, to the usual criticism from Government Departments, with whose procedure all your Lordships are familiar. The noble Lord laid stress on the desirability of uniformity. I agree with him and I am glad that the Amendment of which he has given Notice is accepted by the promoters, as being as satisfactory to them as it is to the noble Lord.

Having said that, I would only add one sentence. In one way I think this is an ideal piece of private legislation. Your Lordships will realise what has happened. The Bermondsey Borough Conned, realising that here was a problem to be dealt with, got into touch with their street traders and initiated a system without any Parliamentary authority by agreement with all concerned. That system has been at work for some months in Bermondsey and has been found to be a success. The Borough Council, therefore, have come to Parliament to put it on a much more powerful footing—to give it legal sanction by being authorised by law. I think that if all parties all over the kingdom did that a little more often we should get through our work much better and more expeditiously.

On Question, Bill read 3a.

LORD DANESFORT moved, after Clause 22, to insert the following new clause:— . If within five years from the passing of this Act an Act shall be passed (in this section referred to as 'the general Act') embodying general legislation dealing with the control of street trading for all the Metropolitan Boroughs or all the Metropolitan Boroughs other than the City of London the provisions of this Act shall cease to have effect on and from the date on which the provisions of the general Act become operative and the general Act shall have effect in the borough Provided that any licences granted under the provisions of this Act and in force at the said date shall notwithstanding anything contained in this section continue to be valid until the expiration of the period for which such licences were granted or renewed and shall for the purposes of the general Act be deemed to have been granted or renewed under that. Act Provided also that any by-laws made by the Council under the provisions of this Act and in force at the said date shall continue to have effect and be enforceable until the expiration of three months after the general Act shall become operative but no longer.

The noble Lord said: My Lords, after all I have said already, I do not think it will be necessary to add anything in explanation of the clause which I now move. That clause has been agreed to between the Borough Council and myself. They very properly, if I may be allowed to say so, gave me a pledge to accept it. Perhaps I ought to read the clause:— If within five years from the passing of this Act an Act shall be passed (in this section referred to as 'the general Act') embodying general legislation dealing with the control of street trading for all the Metropolitan Boroughs or all the Metropolitan Boroughs other than the City of London— which, as your Lordships know, is in a special position— the provisions of this Act shall cease to have effect on and from the date on which the provisions of the general Act become operative and the general Act shall have effect in the borough— That is the Borough of Bermondsey— Provided that any licences granted under the provisions of this Act and in force at the said date shall notwithstanding anything contained in this section continue to be valid until the expiration of the period for which such licences were granted or renewed and shall for the purposes of the general Act be deemed to have been granted or renewed under that Act provided also that any by-laws made by the Council under the provisions of this Act and in force at the said date shall continue to have effect and be enforceable until the expiration of three months after the general Act shall become operative but no longer. The object of this proviso is to avoid having a gap between the time when this Act ceases to be operative and the time when the General Act is passed and becomes operative.

Amendment moved— Clause 22, page 8, line 32, after Clause 22, insert the said new clause.—(Lord Danesfort)

On Question, Amendment agreed to.

Bill passed, and returned, to the Commons.