Lords Sitting of 20 December 1927

Preamble
The House met at a quarter past four of the clock, The EARL OF KINTORE on the Woolsack.

MENTAL DEFICIENCY BILL.
Order of the Day for the House to be put into Committee read.
VISCOUNT GAGE: My Lords, I beg to move that the House do now resolve itself into Committee. In doing so perhaps it would be as well if I made a few observations in regard to this Bill. It is very similar to the one passed by your Lordships' House without any opposition last year, when it was lost in another place. On this occasion it has passed through all its stages in another place and my right hon. friend is very anxious that your Lordships should pass it before the Session ends. The whole subject of mental deficiency was investigated by a Royal Commission prior to the introduction of the Mental Deficiency Act in 1913. Since then, I understand, there has been no Commission dealing with this particular subject, but experience has shown that the definition of mental deficiency is not really sufficient. The present definition includes the words "from birth or from early age," in the description of a mental defective, and magistrates and doctors in all parts of the country have given quite different meanings to those words. Some have adopted a narrow interpretation and have not found themselves able to give the protection of the Act to defectives who clearly were in need of that protection; and some have considered that a mental defect due to disease or injuries is outside the scope of the Act altogether.
One of the principal causes why this amending Bill has been found necessary is the prevalence of a disease known as encephalitis lethargica or sleeping sickness. This disease, I understand, produces an effect in adolescent individuals which is very similar to that of mental deficiency as from birth, and the authorities have considered it necessary to apply institutional treatment in those cases, but have been prevented from
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doing so owing to this narrow definition. The real object of the Bill is to amend that definition and the amending Bill, in Clause 1, puts the age now at eighteen years. That has been arrived at after full consideration by lawyers, doctors and others, and it has the approval of the Minister of Health and the Board of Control. Clause 2 provides that the local authority may deal with the case on the representation of the parent or guardian that the defective is in need of care or training which cannot be provided in his home. The original Bill specified that the child must be neglected before such treatment could be given. It was considered very cruel in cases where a child had a good home, that this word should be used, because neglect in such cases would only be purely technical neglect. It is obvious that a disease such as mental deficiency cannot very often be properly treated in a child's own home. The use of the word neglect does imply general neglect. That is the generally accepted sense of the word and it is usually only interpreted as meaning general neglect in the home.
Clause 4 safeguards the position of the child if the parent or guardian is abroad, and I do not think I need say anything more about that. Clause 5 was inserted at the request of the local authorities. Section 8 (1) (a) of the principal Act provided that in certain circumstances a court may postpone passing sentence upon a person charged with a criminal offence, and direct that a petition be presented to a judicial authority with a view to obtaining an order that he be sent to an institution for mental defectives or be placed under guardianship. The court is empowered to order that the person be detained in an institution or place of safety "for such time as is required for the presentation of the petition and adjudication thereof." Cases have arisen in which the court has given such directions, but as the result of further examination and observation or by reason of a divergence in medical opinion it has been found impossible for the local authority to present a petition, and cases may arise where such petition is presented and dismissed. In such cases it is conceivable, I am informed, that the accused person may escape justice altogether. Clause 7 requires the local authority to provide suitable training or occupation

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for defectives who are under supervision or guardianship or have been sent to a certified institution. That is of special importance in the case of defectives who are under supervision but remain in their own homes. Clause 10 empowers a local authority to take cases under contract from other local authorities whose own institutional requirements may be small. Very small institutions do not admit of proper classification of defectives, and on grounds of economy as well as of efficiency multiplication of small institutions is very undesirable. I do not think it is necessary to say any more about the Bill at this moment, as it has been previously passed by your Lordships in very much the same form, but I shall endeavour to satisfy any noble Lords who may desire further information.
Moved, That the House do now resolve itself into Committee.—(Viscount Gage.)
VISCOUNT HALDANE: My Lords, I do not rise to make any objection to this Bill, which I think is a useful one, but there are two points which I should like to put to the noble Viscount who has just sat down. This Bill relates to mental defectives. I understand from the noble Viscount that it is not intended to cover all the cases of people who are imbecile but only those who are mentally deficient within the meaning of this Bill. That means, I understand, people who become mentally defective, or incipiently so at least, before the age of eighteen. Others, I presume, are left to be dealt with by the ordinary law. That was the subject of investigation by the Macmillan Commission, and I presume it will be dealt with by separate legislation. At any rate, it has not yet been dealt with. This Bill, I understand, is confined to the limited class of mental defectives who are defined by Clause 1, subsection (2). I should like to ask the noble Viscount whether there is anything in this Bill which comes into conflict with the recommendations of the Macmillan Commission. Those are the two points on which I wanted to ask for information.
LORD CHARNWOOD: My Lords, I happen to be what members of my family persist in calling "the mentally defective chairman" of a great authority. I do not know whether any of your Lordships have a prior claim to that honour, but I should like on behalf of the Mental Deficiency Committee of a great
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county to thank the Government very warmly for this Bill. I do not think it is necessary to add anything to what has been said so clearly by the noble Viscount opposite, but from very considerable experience of practical dealings with cases that come, and others that should have come, under the existing Mental Deficiency Act, I can assure your Lordships that all the amendments made in the law by this measure have proved themselves in practice to be very seriously wanted. There is one question I should like to ask. As I understand the Bill, it enlarges the definition of mental defectives who are to be treated to the extent of allowing that the deficiency may have been set up at any time before the age of eighteen. Is the Government advised that this clause sufficiently covers cases of encephalitis lethargica, to which the noble Lord referred? That is the only question that I wish to ask, and I rose chiefly because I thought that perhaps somebody should express the extreme satisfaction with which this Bill has been received by a great many authorities throughout the country.
LORD JESSEL: My Lords, before the noble Viscount answers these questions, I should like to ask, as one who took part in Committee on the original Mental Deficiency Act, 1913, whether the Government can see their way to consolidate these Acts. I should like any noble Lord who has this Bill in his hands to look at it. It is nothing but amendments—very proper amendments, but they make it extremely difficult for those who have to interpret or to read the Bill to understand all its provisions. There is a very long substitution in the first clause, and all through there is a series of amendments. Clause 7 is particularly difficult. I am sure that there is no opposition to the Bill and that its proposals are most excellent, but the Government will be doing a great public service if next Session they bring in a Bill to consolidate these Acts. I hope that the noble Viscount will bear my request in mind.
EARL RUSSELL: My Lords, as my noble and learned Leader quite correctly stated, the subject of this Bill was not within the purview of the Macmillan Commission, on which I had the honour of serving, but of course it was impossible

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to deal with the question of insanity without becoming concerned with this branch of mental unfitness, and I have taken an interest in consequence in the fate of this Bill. I am bound to say that, like other speakers, I welcome this Bill and I only regret that it was not passed some years ago, owing, I understand, to difficulties in another place. I think that it will undoubtedly do a great deal to help these afflicted people when it becomes law.
VISCOUNT GAGE: My Lords, in reply to the noble and learned Viscount, the Leader of the Opposition, I understand, though I speak subject to correction, that this Bill does not affect the recommendations of the Macmillan Report. There is, of course, a difference between lunacy and mental deficiency which is well understood in specialist circles. I do not think any of the recommendations of that Report affecting lunacy really apply to this Bill, except indirectly. However, I will make particular investigation and, if there is any further information to be given, I will give it at a later stage of this Bill. I understand that the age limit of eighteen was arrived at after very careful consideration by the technical experts and is fully approved by the Board of Control and, as this question of encephalitis lethargica was one of the principal reasons for introducing the Bill, I feel convinced that this point has been specially considered. In reply to Lord Jessel, I am not in a position to say what steps my right hon. friend is prepared to take in the matter of consolidation, but I will certainly call his attention to the point and I have no doubt that something will come of it, though at this stage of the Session such consolidation would be impossible.
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House in Committee accordingly: Bill reported without Amendment.

CONSOLIDATED FUND (APPRO- PRIATION) (No. 2) BILL.
Brought from the Commons; read 1a; and to be printed.

EXPIRING LAWS CONTINUANCE BILL.
Order of the Day for the House to be put into Committee read.
Moved, That the House do now resolve itself into Committee.—(Lord Cushendun.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House in Committee accordingly:
[The EARL OF KINTORE in the Chair.]
LORD JESSEL: I do not know if I am in order, but I should like to ask the Government how long they are going to continue the Local Government (Emergency Provisions) Act, 1916, and the Local Government (Emergency Provisions) (No. 2) Act, 1916.
THE LORD PRIVY SEAL (THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY): That arises on the Schedule.
Clauses 1 and 2 agreed to.
Schedule:
LORD HARRIS: At some stage I want to have an opportunity of saying a word about the Increase of Rent and Mortgage Interest (Restrictions) Act, 1920. I do not know whether this is the occasion. The procedure has been so rapid that it is scarcely possible for me to know where I come in. I am in your Lordships' hands.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: If my noble friend will excuse me for one moment, there is no difficulty about order. The particular Acts which are the expiring laws to be continued are all in the Schedule, and therefore it is upon the Schedule that the discussion should take place. The subject that my noble friend desires to raise is, therefore, quite in order if he raises it now.
LORD HARRIS: I wish to say a word about the Rent Restrictions Acts and their application to the agricultural cottage. I raised this question in the summer and I was then told by a noble friend that we might think ourselves very lucky because there was a process by which the farmer could recover the use of his cottage. I am aware that there is such a process, but it is a very devious one and is not very easy and not always very satisfactory. What the farmer has to do when he wishes to recover the occupancy of a farm cottage is to get an order from the agricultural committee of the county council, and having got that he then has to go either before the petty sessions or County Court Judge, and it depends entirely upon the fancy of the court what

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period of time must then elapse before he regains the cottage, because in some cases the court takes the view that an alternative cottage must be found. Observe the result. An unfortunate farmer wants an expert hand, and he can find one. The man of course says: "Can you put me into a cottage?" The farmer replies: "Not at the moment, but I hope to get one in a week or two." Possibly the expert hand will wait a week or two, but no more, and the farmer goes on losing the chances of getting an expert hand week after week, because of the lengthy process which he has to go through before recovering occupancy of the cottage.
I am not speaking from hearsay. I know these things. The fact is that agricultural cottages ought never to have been included in the measure. I remember the original Act being passed. It was during the War. It was a very compassionate Act, but it has done immense injustice in many cases. So far as agricultural cottages are concerned the Act was never needed. There was no crowding in those cottages at that time, and why we did not oppose their inclusion I cannot conceive. I repeat that there was no crowding. It does not matter how many bedrooms you put into a labourer's cottage, he will always find room for a sub-tenant, in order to help pay the rent. The application of the Rent Restrictions Acts to these cottages was unnecessary, and so far as farmers are concerned a grave injustice. I expressed a hope in the summer that this Act might be withdrawn from the Expiring Laws Continuance Bill, because it was impossible to amend the Act except by Motion to reject the Bill altogether. I rise to express a very strong hope that the Ministry will take this matter up next Session and endeavour by some process or other to exclude agricultural cottages from the process of the Acts, thereby doing a necessary act of justice to farmers.
VISCOUNT FITZALAN OF DERWENT: My Lords, I wish to say one word in support of what has been said by my noble friend. I most earnestly hope that the Government will next year deal with this anomaly of agricultural cottages, and that we shall not again find this Act included in the Expiring Laws Continuance Bill.
VISCOUNT NOVAR: My Lords, there is a wider aspect of this question, which causes anxiety or uncertainty among those interested in urban building. So long as this Act re-appears in the Expiring Laws Continuance Bill it is a bar to a great extent to private enterprise in building, and coupled with the subsidies for housing it reacts on all agricultural building, because the cost of any construction for agricultural requirements is raised to an abnormal level. If you want to carry out any improvements in your farm buildings the cost is now almost prohibitive, and this is largely because of the artificial cost which follows the subsidies and the Rent Restrictions Acts. So long as the Rent Restrictions Acts last one cannot expect the private builder to do the work which he did before the War. We hear that a million houses have been constructed since the Housing Acts were passed and subsidies granted, and I think everyone will admit that at one time there was a strong reason for such an exceptional course, but the time, I hope, will soon come when these subsidies and the rent restrictions provisions can be withdrawn. Then the industry will be once more placed on a natural economic basis, which served for the whole wants of the country before the War, and which I am sure many of your Lordships would wish to see serving the needs of the country again.
VISCOUNT GAGE: My Lords, I have to say on behalf of the Ministry of Health, with reference to the question of the Rent Restrictions Acts, that it was raised by the noble Lord, Lord Harris, on July 19 last, and there is really nothing to be added to the answer given by the Government on that occasion. It is considered that it would be impossible to deal with agricultural cottages without raising the whole question. At the same time I am sure that the Minister will listen with great interest to what has fallen from the noble Lord, who has so much experience of this subject.
LORD JESSEL: My Lords, I desire to refer to a matter which has affected London for a considerable period, and that is as to the Local Government (Emergency) Provisions Act, 1916, and the Local Government (Emergency Provisions) (No. 2) Act, 1916. The effect of those Acts roughly was to throw upon

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the Metropolitan Poor Law Fund the relief of the able-bodied poor. An Act was brought in when there was a great deal of distress, and I dare say your Lordships will remember seeing large processions of unemployed going through London at the time. It was then decided to put a good deal of the cost of the able-bodied on to the Metropolitan Poor Law Fund, which up to that date had been used for the sick and infirm and for the support of the Metropolitan Asylums Board. It is, of course, right and just that those boroughs in London—something like eight in number—which are the richer and wealthier boroughs, should contribute their share towards the aid of the poorer boroughs, but what has always been pointed out is that there practically is no control over the expenditure of the money, and it, of course, does bear hardly upon the poorer ratepayers in the richer boroughs. Year after year we have been promised that some measure or steps would be taken by the Government to adjust those differences of opinion, that is to say, enable somebody to have some control over the money that is expended.
I do not want to trouble your Lordships at any length, but I would like to call your attention to the way in which this sum has mounted up. Take the City of Westminister. I see a noble Lord on the Front Opposition who is a High Bailiff of the City of Westminster, and who takes great interest in its concerns. In 1920–21 the amount expended was £137,000; in 1921–22 it was £272,000; in 1922–23 it was £672,000; in 1923–24 it was £868,000; in 1924–25 it was £789,000; in 1925–26 it was £742,000; in 1926–27 it was £783,000; and this year our estimate is £840,000. The City of Westminster raises about £4,000,000 from rates, and out of that £4,000,000 about £600,000 only is spent on local concerns and to satisfy local needs; the rest of the money is paid over for the benefit of the whole of London. But it is this particular part of the money of which we complain. It is used for the purposes of the police, the fire brigade, the London County Council and part—I do not wish to exaggerate—for the Metropolitan Poor Law Fund as regards that portion which relates to the sick and infirm who come under the Metropolitan Asylums Board, and for the able-bodied poor of other boroughs, over whom we have no control.
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We do not mind paying a certain amount, but we do object to this large sum being poured out year by year, without any control on the part of anybody. We have been promised time after time that the whole matter would be gone into. It does not affect Westminster only—I have only referred to Westminster as an example because I do not want to weary your Lordships with a lot of figures—but it affects all the other paying boroughs in London.
I do hope the Ministry of Health next Session will take this matter up seriously. It is not good for the poorer boroughs themselves that these men should get relief in the haphazard way in which they do. It demoralises and pauperises them, and there is no doubt that even the Labour Party themselves are waking up to the very grave national aspect of this question. Mr. Snowden the other day, in a very weighty speech, said that it should not be all "take" on the part of the community, but that there should be a certain amount of "give," and that people in every class of life had their responsibility and should not be dependent on the State entirely, or look to the State entirely, for assistance. For these reasons I hope that the Government will seriously take up the matter, not only because of its financial aspect, which is serious, but from the point of view of the moral interests of the people of this country and the welfare of the nation at large.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: My Lords, my noble friend is certainly entitled to raise this subject upon this particular Bill, and the Government certainly have no right to complain that he availed himself of the undoubted right of a member of your Lordships' House to ask us a question. But, with very great respect, I think he would get a very much better answer if he would give some indication beforehand that he was going to raise these questions, some of which are very intricate and require careful study in order to do real justice to the subject in reply to a question. I listened to my noble friend, and if the burden of his speech was really to the effect that these rating matters in London require to be overhauled and brought up to date, I feel very little doubt that he is absolutely right. But the rating question is not singular in that respect among

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political questions with which we have to deal. There is a very large number of matters of local government, and other government indeed, which require to be overhauled.
But when I leave that general consideration and go more into particulars, I confess I was left at sea by my noble friend's complaint. I do not gather that he calls in question the principle, which is pursued undoubtedly in London, that the richer boroughs should share the burden of the poorer boroughs. I gathered, then, that his complaint is really one of degree: how much ought the richer boroughs to bear of the burden of the poorer ones? That, of course is a very intricate matter indeed, and would require very elaborate statistics before it could be dealt with to any advantage. But broadly, I think, we must admit that the principle under which we work in London must be maintained.
LORD JESSEL: There is practically no control.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: Does my noble friend mean that there should be representatives of the City of Westminster in control of the expenditure of the Borough of Poplar?
LORD JESSEL: No.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: What I mean is that we should have to go very much more elaborately into this question in order to have a discussion worthy of the House. It is quite true that the contributions of the ratepayers of Westminster are larger than are required for the purposes of Westminster, and they are larger because a certain amount of their contribution goes to maintain, let us say, the poor of Poplar. That is quite true. My noble friend says that there ought to be more control. Speaking theoretically, I think that that is perfectly true, and that if the ratepayers of Westminster are to be taxed for the purpose of maintaining the poor of an East End borough, then there ought to be some kind of control. As to whether that is feasible—whether a practicable proposal could be made—is quite another question, and I should not be prepared, certainly at this moment, to pronounce any opinion upon it. But I can promise (and I hope my noble friend will accept this promise) that the attention of my right hon. friend the Minister of Health
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shall be drawn to this subject, and if any time can be found within the near future for dealing with this intricate topic no doubt my right hon. friend will be the first man to avail himself of it.
LORD HARRIS: I must express my regret that the noble Viscount who replied on behalf of the Minister did not deal with the subject of the Rent Restrictions Acts, and that the noble Marquess has not thought fit to make any promise with regard to next year, or even to extend a word of sympathy to the people who are suffering by the Acts. I say so with some special regret because a by-election is taking place in my neighbourhood within two or three weeks, and it might have been rather useful if the noble Marquess could have extended a word of sympathy to those who are suffering under those Acts.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: I must apologise to my noble friend. I am afraid I had forgotten that he required a further answer. Indeed, I hoped he would have been satisfied by the answer of my noble friend behind me. The noble Lord's complaint is that the Rent Restrictions Acts are continued under the present Expiring Laws Continuance Bill. I think it is common knowledge that the Government are very anxious to amend the Rent Restrictions Acts. That has been announced over and over again, and if it had been possible to repeal them altogether, or rather to do without them altogether, that would have been a very simple way. If the Acts had been simply left out of this Bill they would have expired; but unfortunately we find that we cannot altogether do without them. Then the question which the Government had to determine was a very simple one—whether it would be better to continue the Acts, with the bad provisions in them, or to do without them altogether and lose provisions which were still essential. On the whole it was thought better to take the first alternative. But I quite agree with my noble friend, if he will allow me to say so, that the time has arrived when the Acts ought to be amended. Amendment is required in many respects.
At the same time, I ought to say that I do not quite agree with him in his reading of the provisions of the Act which deal with agricultural cottages. It may be that my noble friend is quoting

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some high authority of the County of Kent, in which case I should be very loath to appear to be so impertinent as to differ from him, but my reading of the Act is different. My attention has been drawn to the Act (and I suppose that every one of your Lordships who owns agricultural property is in the same position), and I should have said that agricultural cottages were placed in a specially favourable position; that is to say, that in their place alternative accommodation has not to be provided if the landlord can show that the cottages are required for the working of the farm. My noble friend shakes his head. I had to go into this very thoroughly not very long ago and, although it was in my private capacity that it arose, I took the precaution of consulting the Ministry of Health as to whether my interpretation was not right and they said it was absolutely right.
LORD HARRIS: It depends what view the court takes.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: But the court is not binding on a question of law of that kind, and if my noble friend differs from the county court he can take it to a higher court, and he should do so if the county court has decided wrongly. But I cannot help thinking that if he looks into it he will find that my statement can be reconciled even with the decision to which he refers. At any rate, I am quite clear that that is the law. I see many lawyers here, among them the noble and learned Viscount opposite; generally speaking they are very much in evidence and I am sure they would correct me if I am wrong. But my strong view, not depending upon my own knowledge I can assure your Lordships but upon the assurance of the Ministry of Health itself, is that my interpretation of that provision of the Rent Restrictions Act is correct. I hope my noble friend will be encouraged to return to the charge in his own County and I hope he will receive the assurance there that even the Rent Restrictions Act is not quite so bad as it is painted.
Schedule agreed to.
Bill reported without amendment.

ROAD TRANSPORT LIGHTING BILL.
Order of the Day for the House to be put into Committee read.
THE FIRST COMMISSIONER OF WORKS (VISCOUNT PEEL): My Lords, I beg to move that the House do now resolve itself into Committee on this Bill. In making this Motion I desire to address a few words to your Lordships because it will be remembered that the Second Reading was taken sub silentio. This Bill originated as a Private Member's Bill, but it corresponded very closely with Part II of the Road Transport Bill which had been circulated by the Government to all the authorities concerned. As it was so excellent a copy and in some ways, I believe, an improvement on that portion of the Bill, the Government decided to take it up, and they made it a Government Bill.
The main object of the Bill is to secure uniformity in the requirements as to the lighting of road vehicles and to do away with by-laws which, in view of the wide radius of action of motor vehicles and the changed character of road traffic, are no longer an appropriate way of dealing with this matter. As an example of the very unsatisfactory state of things prevailing I might mention that while in England and Wales only one front lamp is required by the general law in the case of all vehicles, in two counties and in nine boroughs two such lamps are required. A driver whose vehicle complies with the general law may, therefore, find himself liable to penalties if he transgresses some of the purely local requirements of which, of course, he must necessarily be ignorant. Another defect in the law is that the lighting requirements for road traffic are not very easily discoverable. They are contained in eight General Acts, two Orders and a large number of local by-laws. Most of these will be superseded by the present Bill, and I think your Lordships will agree that it is rather a strain on the ordinary driver to have to master this collection of Orders and Acts.
EARL RUSSELL: Why only most of them? Why not all of them?
VISCOUNT PEEL: Because some of them may still be valuable and useful; I mean, in spite of the amendments brought in under this Bill. The general requirements for the lighting of vehicles at night are contained in Clause 1 of the Bill, which provides for the carrying of a minimum of two white lights to the front and one red light to the rear. In

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cases where this requirement would operate rather harshly, there are some exemptions and also some modifications contained in subsequent clauses. For instance, horse-drawn vehicles engaged in conveying inflammable agricultural produce in the course of the internal operations of a farm are not required to carry any lights at all. Taking the case of bicycles, in the case of a pedal bicycle the Bill gives the option of carrying either a red rear lamp or an efficient red reflector. At present these vehicles only carry one lamp showing a white light at the front, and the absence of lighting in the rear has been the cause of a considerable number of accidents. This is a very important provision indeed and I trust your Lordships will assent to it because it would have the effect of saving a great many lives. In regard to the question of dazzle, no means have yet been found of providing an effective travelling light for motor vehicles without a certain difficulty in the matter of dazzle. If any satisfactory device is discovered in the future for dealing with this problem, the provisions of Clause 3 would enable the Minister of Transport to secure its adoption.
There is one point which no doubt will be fully considered on the Committee stage and I want now to make a short reference to it. There is a good deal of diversity of opinion as to whether the concession made in Clause 6 in regard to horse-drawn agricultural vehicles is justified. In regard to this provision vehicles would be required to carry only one lamp instead of two, showing a light to the front. The organisations representing motorists are strongly of opinion that this would be a source of danger to other users of the road. They think that the concession should be limited to vehicles engaged in the internal operations of the farm. Whether this opinion is shared by the farmers themselves I am not quite clear. The limitation desired by the motoring organisations would secure that horse-drawn vehicles carrying agricultural produce to market or to a railway station, and therefore proceeding in some cases for long distances along the highway should be required to carry the statutory two front lights, and that the concession in respect of the single light should be limited to
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agricultural vehicles travelling short distances along or across the highway when engaged in the internal operations of the farm. This proviso, as it stands in the Bill, was accepted in another place without a Division and as far as the Government are concerned I propose on their behalf only to move such Amendments to it as will have the effect of making the proviso clearer. But there is an Amendment to be moved, I understand, by my noble friend Lord Montagu of Beaulieu, limiting the proviso to the internal operations of the farm. On that Amendment I do not desire to take any part as representing the Government. I desire that that matter may be left entirely to the advice and opinion of your Lordships' House.
There is only one more point I might make. As your Lordships have seen, there are a certain number of Amendments standing in my name. At a certain stage of the Bill in another place it was thought better to put into statutory form some of the regulations which might have been otherwise left to the Minister to make and, as a result of putting those in, there are a certain number of, I hope on the whole, trifling verbal Amendments which I should propose to your Lordships. Those are very generally the provisions of the Bill and I do not think, except on one or two of those matters to which I have alluded, there is any real difference of opinion. I understand the Bill represents a compromise between the views of those who use the roads and the agricultural interests and other bodies interested. Again, it represents another interesting compromise between motorists on the road and bicyclists on the road that has been for some time a matter for keen discussion. I believe they have at last reached an agreement which is embodied in this Bill and which I hope your Lordships may see fit to respect. I beg to move.
Moved, That the House do now resolve itself into Committee.—(Viscount Peel.)
EARL BEAUCHAMP: My Lords, the noble Viscount rightly emphasized the fact that in its origin this Bill was not a Government Bill, that it was introduced by a private member and only taken up by His Majesty's Government at a later period. It is none the less a matter of

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some considerable importance. It is quite likely to lay down the law for the roads of this country for the next twenty-five years. In those circumstances I venture to protest that your Lordships' House ought to have had a very great deal more time in which to consider the matter. The Bill was only brought up here for Second Reading on Friday last. The least sanguine of us hoped there would be a Prorogation on Friday next and your Lordships' House is asked to take the Second Reading, Committee stage, Report and Third Reading of this very important measure all within the space of one week. It is a sample of the way in which His Majesty's Government are always treating your Lordships' House, even in matters of considerable controversy and of some very real importance.
As time goes on traffic upon the roads is going to increase more and more. Surely we ought to be very careful as to what we are going to do on this matter. It is obvious that the Bill is a very imperfect one as submitted to your Lordships' House. The noble Viscount himself has put down a number of Amendments which are bound to require discussion this afternoon—a number of Amendments which show that His Majesty's Government themselves and those who are responsible for the drafting of this Bill are far from satisfied with it and the condition in which it reaches your Lordships' House. Therefore we ought to have more time in which to consider it. I confess that the Amendments which I have put down will not really bear very close scrutiny, but that is not, if I may say so, entirely my own fault. The Second Reading was passed silently and the period during which I had hoped to draft important Amendments passed by as a flash. No discussion took place on Second Reading and I was obliged to draft the Amendments as best I could in the hurry of the moment. In those unexpected circumstances to which we are forced by the action of His Majesty's Government, my Amendments, I am quite sure, are not really so water-tight or so complete as I should have wished them to be.
There are, of course, two matters of conspicuous importance which arise on this Bill. One of them deals with bicycles and how they are to be provided with lights. I cannot understand why
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it is that cyclists in their own interests are not anxious that they should be so well illuminated that there would be no possibility of accident. It seems to me that they are wholly misguided as to their own interests in not wishing to be better illuminated. Your Lordships will see how, under this Bill, although there is an alternative between a lamp and a red reflector, the Minister of Transport is allowed to choose between them. I think I shall probably put down to-morrow for discussion on Report an Amendment eliminating that option to the Minister of Transport and saying he must insist upon a red lamp being put on the back of bicycles. After all these lamps can be secured for a comparatively small sum of money. You can get them for something like 3s. That is not a great burden to put on the users of bicycles and it would ensure their safety far better than these reflectors, which, especially in these days of dazzle, are very difficult to see. That is one of the difficulties in regard to this Bill.
The other is in regard to agricultural vehicles. I think it is most important, whatever the time of day may be or whatever part of the country you may be in, that you should be perfectly certain the rules are the same, and no agricultural vehicle ought really to be allowed to carry just one light on one side and be content with that. It must be most misleading for all motorists. Again, for their own interest, it must be better for users of agricultural vehicles that they should put on the same number of lights as other people do. I would make one exception and that is in regard to very well lit towns where, perhaps, it is not necessary they should have the same number of lights. But dealing for a moment with agricultural vehicles, on a dark and possibly foggy night if they are to be content with one light, it seems to me very dangerous for the agricultural vehicles themselves as well as for motorists. I hesitate, again, to give the Minister of Transport so much power in regard to the question of dazzle. We have an immense number of able people at this moment trying to deal with the question of lighting during a period of fog and I hesitate very much to give the Minister of Transport so much authority as is given in this Bill to deal with this matter. I would like something far more elastic than is provided in the clauses

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of this Bill. I would like at the same time to assure the noble Viscount, though I make these remarks only as preliminary to what we shall say in Committee, I have no wish to delay any action he wishes to take in regard to the matter and if he finds it desirable to take Report and Third Reading to-morrow I shall certainly offer no objection, because I think that may be for the convenience of another place as well as for the convenience of your Lordships' House. I hope, however, that he will be able to say something in the course of our Committee stage which will relieve my anxiety with regard to those three different points.
EARL RUSSELL: My Lords, I desire in the first place to associate myself most strongly with the noble Earl who has just sat down as to the inconvenience of dealing with this very complicated Bill in this hurry and at this stage of the Session. I have followed the arguments and the discussion on this Bill probably more than the noble Earl himself, but even so I cannot help feeling that this is a Bill in regard to which we should very much have liked to have an interval of a clear week between Second Reading and Committee and a whole afternoon in Committee to enable us to discuss and consider Amendments. It is a very complicated Bill; it deals with an enormous mass of detail and many of its provisions are the result of compromise and want very careful consideration. It is extraordinarily difficult at such short notice to deal as we ought to deal in this House with so complicated a measure. I know the noble Viscount is not to blame, and no doubt he will say, as his noble Leader always does, that he is very sorry it has happened, but in this case it really is very unfortunate.
If I may say a word on the last part of the noble Earl's observations, I am not sure whether I can agree with him about the Minister of Transport. What he seemed to ask for was flexibility. I should have thought that if things are done by regulation that gives more flexibility than if they are put in a Statute. As things change and the Minister of Transport is advised from time to time, he can make or alter regulations to fit changing conditions. I should not be against the Minister of
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Transport having a reasonably free hand to alter the regulations when conditions change. This Bill is very much to be desired for the sake of uniformity, as the noble Viscount said. I recollect a case in which I myself was engaged more than fifteen years ago, in which an unfortunate man who was driving a lorry on a cross-country journey—a much rarer thing then than now—found himself had up in Staffordshire because he had contravened a local regulation of which he was totally ignorant. Of course he was convicted; he had no answer. That is the sort of thing you get when there is confusion between local regulations. Uniformity is well worth having.
Perhaps I might be allowed to ask when we are to have an amendment of the Motor Car Act, 1903. It used to be in the Expiring Laws Continuance Bill. I have looked for it but I do not see it there now. I forget what happened. Perhaps it was renewed for three years or something of that sort. The whole Road Bill is years overdue. It has been promised by this Government for the last three years and they ought to have the courage to produce it and carry it forward. I welcome this portion of it, and particularly the provisions as to cyclists. The noble Earl referred to the attitude of some cyclists in the matter. Like him I have never been able to understand why cyclists are so passionately suicidal. They all desire to travel on the roads and they much prefer to travel on the roads and be killed than carry a rear light. We know how little a lamp costs, but one difficulty, I think, is not having a certainty of its being alight when it is behind you. Unless you have a good lamp that is a little difficult to guarantee. The same thing often happened to motor cars before lamps were all electric. I am very glad, however, that cyclists have at last been brought into some comprehensive scheme, even if it includes red reflectors. I believe that was the subject of compromise in another place and has brought them in.
I have not been able to understand—no doubt it is my own fault—what is the position of agricultural vehicles. Probably it will be discussed later, but if the noble Viscount in his reply could give some general indication of the extent to which they are exempted I should be very glad to hear it. I do not know what

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the case is for having only one light instead of the regular lights. I suppose it is on account of economy, but I should be inclined myself to call it idleness on the part of the farmer. Though it is true that if you see any light on the road ahead of you you ought to take care and make sure what it is before you come up to it, still it is also true that when you come on a single light at a corner or see it through fog you may be apt to think it is a bicycle when you are expecting that a four wheeled vehicle should have two lights.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: My Lords, I should like to say that I agree with a good deal that has been said by the two noble Earls opposite. I think it would have been a very good thing if we could have had longer time in which to consider this Bill. It has been the subject of a great deal of compromise with various interests—as probably the noble Earl knows—and it has emerged in this form. Nobody thinks it perfect from the motorist's point of view, whether he drives a heavy or a light car or is a motor cyclist, but it is the best we can get at present. In regard to reflectors on bicycles, personally I think that a good reflector is much better than a bad lamp. The dim glow from some lamps is so bad that a good reflector is better than a bad lamp, and I have always said so. In regard to the question of farm vehicles, originally it was proposed that the farmer should be brought under the general law and that there should be no exception. It was found, however, that there was great objection to that, and so vehicles engaged in harvesting operations are to be exempt. That may be accounted for because at such times you have hay and straw, which are of an inflammable nature, being carried.
I have an Amendment on the Paper which, if it is passed, will provide that vehicles which carry less than the standard number of lights should only be engaged on the internal operations of the farm—that is, passing from field to field or from field to farmyard—and that the exemption should not extend to vehicles carrying produce, say, from the farm to the local market or to a railway station. In the latter case they would be very likely on a main road and not only a source of danger to themselves but a source of danger to other people. I
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think the House would agree that in that case they should be treated in the same way as other vehicles. As regards dipping and swivelling lamps, I think it is right that the Minister should have power to make regulations about them. Probably noble Lords know that the latest and best advice on the subject is that head lamps should be made to swivel to the left. That takes dazzle out of people's eyes and also is very useful when driving in fog.
VISCOUNT PEEL: My Lords, I will be very brief, but there are one or two points which I can conveniently deal with now before we come to specific Amendments, I will take first of all the charge which the noble Earl, Lord Beauchamp, brought forward with some vigour against the Government because your Lordships had not had an earlier opportunity of considering this Bill. On that matter I most profoundly sympathise with him. I regret very much that in the case of a Bill of this complicated nature we should not have had at least a week between the Second Reading and the Committee stage and then plenty of time for the Committee stage, so that your Lordships should have been able to apply to the matter all that knowledge and experience which you have on this as on other subjects.
May I, however, say a word in defence of the Government? I am quite aware of its many iniquities and I do not want it to be charged with one particular iniquity for which it is possibly less responsible than others. I discussed the matter with the Minister of Transport yesterday and I said: "Why did we not have this Bill rather earlier"? He told me that the difficulty was that the Government meant very well when it was introduced at an early date. At the time of the adjournment for the Summer Recess the Bill had got through all its stages except the Third Reading. There seemed therefore every hope that your Lordships would be able to deal with it at an early period in the autumn. What happened, as very often happens in these cases, was that those interested did not concern themselves very much with the earlier stages of the Bill, but when it got to the Third Reading stage there was an awakening among them. They began to think that something was in the wind and that they must make an effort to take

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action. It was really due, not to the Government, but to those interests that the Third Reading of the Bill in another place was postponed. They did not want the Minister of Transport to part with the Bill until they had had full opportunity of stating their views to him. Really that was the cause of the delay and in this case I think the Government has a fairly clean record. I will not deal now with the question of bicycles, because that will be raised on an Amendment and the point has been partly dealt with by my noble friend Lord Montagu of Beaulieu.
A point was raised by the noble Earl, Lord Russell, who said that he thought the provisions concerning farm vehicles a little complicated and asked whether I would make a statement on that point. It might be convenient if I were to do so before we go into Committee. I felt that difficulty myself, and I dictated a note this afternoon which, I think, makes the subject fairly clear. I am referring to the general subject of horse-drawn vehicles, of which the class of horse-drawn vehicles engaged in agricultural operations is, as it were, a subdivision. Horse-drawn vehicles need not carry a red light in the rear if the front lights show a red light to the rear—that is, if the backs of them show red—provided that this red light is reasonably visible to a certain distance and also that no part of the vehicle is for the time being more than six feet behind the light. This would obviously apply to gigs and carts and smaller horse-drawn vehicles of that kind. So much for horse-drawn vehicles generally. Then we come to farm vehicles, and in regard to these there is one class of operation in which the vehicle is exempted from carrying any lights. Vehicles carrying produce of an inflammable nature need not have any lights at all if they are working in the internal operations of the farm. That, as the noble Earl sees, is a complete exemption.
There is, however, a general mitigation or concession for vehicles or implements engaged in agriculture. These vehicles or implements must carry one off-side light to the front and need not carry a red light if a good red reflector is carried or if the front light shows a red light to the rear; and the same provisions about reasonable distance and about the vehicle
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projecting six feet behind the light are also embodied. The noble Earl will see, therefore, that there are three provisions: (1), a provision affecting horse-drawn vehicles generally; (2), a provision affecting horse-drawn carts or vehicles engaged in farming operations; and (3), a provision which is, as it were, a subsection, that vehicles carrying inflammable produce are exempted from carrying any lights at all. That is how the matter stands in the Bill. I need not allude to the Amendment of my noble friend Lord Montagu, which we shall discuss when we come to it.
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House in Committee accordingly:
[The EARL OF KINTORE in the Chair.]
Clause 1:
Obligatory lights to be carried by vehicles at night.
(2) The Minister shall have power by regulation to exempt either wholly or partially, and subject to such conditions as may be specified in the regulation, from any of the requirements of this section—
(b) vehicles when standing or parked in accordance with any Act, order, by-law, or regulation for the time being in force;
(c) vehicles drawn or propelled by hand, save as hereinafter provided.
(3) The Minister shall have power by regulations to add to, or vary, or grant exemption (whole or partial) from, the requirements of this section, to permit the carrying of additional lamps, and to prescribe the number and position of the lamps (if any) required or permitted to be carried and the colour of the lights (if any) required or permitted to be displayed, and the conditions under which they are required or permitted to be used, in the case of—

(a) vehicles used as public service vehicles within the meaning of this Act or any class or description thereof or hackney carriages;

(b) vehicles used for naval, military, air force or police purposes, or as ambulances, or for any other special purposes mentioned in the regulation;

and, where distinctive lamps are so prescribed to prohibit similar lamps being carried by any other vehicles.
VISCOUNT PEEL: My first Amendment is drafting.
Amendment moved—
Page 2, line 4, leave out ("section") and insert ("Act").—(Viscount Peel.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
VISCOUNT PEEL VISCOUNT PEEL moved to leave out all words in paragraph (b) in subsection (2) after "vehicles when standing or parked in." The noble Viscount said: As the Bill is drawn the Minister's power to exempt vehicles in parking places from carrying lights would be limited to such parking places as are fixed by "any Act, order, by-law or regulation." There are some recognised parking places which are not governed by any special order and in regard to which it may be convenient for the Minister to make this regulation. This Amendment gives him power to do so.
Amendment moved—
Page 2, line 14, leave out from ("in") to end of paragraph (b) and insert ("places specially set aside for the purpose").—(Viscount Peel.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
EARL BEAUCHAMP EARL BEAUCHAMP moved, in subsection (2), to leave out paragraph (c). The noble Earl said: I confess that this Amendment possibly goes rather far, because it would prohibit perambulators being taken along the road unless they had two lights in front and a red light behind. This goes much further than I should wish to go, but there is, on the other hand, the case of a builder's cart, sometimes drawn by hand, with a long ladder behind. Would it not be possible—I put this to the noble Viscount—for this builder's cart with its long ladder behind to take advantage of some little loophole in the Orders made by the Minister of Transport and to be without lights along the roads during the night? I am sure your Lordships will agree that nothing is more dangerous than a long thing like a ladder going along the road, and that in any case it should not be possible for a ladder to be taken along the road at night without any light at all. I am quite sure that the noble Viscount would not wish this to be done, but can he give us any assurance that the regulations made by the Ministry of Transport would prevent it from being done?
Amendment moved—
Page 2, line 17, leave out paragraph (c).—(Earl Beauchamp.)
VISCOUNT PEEL: I am very glad that the noble Earl is not pressing the whole of the Amendment, because I was looking forward to some trouble in having to wheel my wheelbarrow along the road with two white lights in front and a red
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light behind. I understand that I am relieved from that necessity. The noble Earl took the case of a cart with a ladder behind. I think that this is covered by regulations, but if the noble Earl would like me to consider that point before the Report stage I shall be very glad to do so.
EARL BEAUCHAMP: I am much obliged to the noble Viscount, but I want a little more. How will it come up on Report? Would he be good enough to promise me that, if it is possible for these ladders to be carried or drawn along in this way, he will put down an Amendment on Report in order to prevent it from happening?
EARL RUSSELL: May I suggest that this is not necessary? The Minister has power to exempt certain vehicles by regulation. All that you have to do is to have an understanding that the Minister would not exempt the long ladder. Is not that so? You do not require an alteration in the Bill.
EARL BEAUCHAMP: I have not that confidence in the Minister of Transport that the noble Earl has, nor do I think that he himself has always had complete confidence in that Minister. I should like to ask why on this occasion he is willing to trust the Minister when on other occasions he is not? I would put it to the noble Viscount that I should be satisfied if he would assure me that the Minister will look into this case and see what can be done.
VISCOUNT PEEL: I will endeavour to ascertain the intention of the Minister of Transport before the Report stage, and will try to satisfy the noble Earl.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
EARL BEAUCHAMP EARL BEAUCHAMP moved, in subsection (3), to leave out "or grant exemption (whole or partial) from". The noble Earl said: Here is another case of the difficulty in which we find ourselves in discussing a somewhat complicated Bill at very short notice. It appears to me that here we have once more a power given to the Minister of Transport to allow all kinds of vehicles to use no lights at all. He has power to grant exemption to vehicles used as public service vehicles and vehicles used for naval, military, Air Force or police purposes, or as ambulances, from carrying

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any light at all. I am sure that the Minister of Transport does not wish to do this, but I do not think he ought to be given power to do it if he does not wish to exercise that power. Surely there are great dangers here. We all know that ambulances—quite properly—travel very quickly, but surely there ought to be no power to allow ambulances to travel by night very quickly without carrying any lights. Possibly I may be wrong, for we have had no time to go into this Bill, but it seems to me that power is given to the Minister to exempt all ambulances from carrying any lights at all. There are some public services which are supposed to drive faster than other public services, and here again we have power given to the Minister of Transport to exempt them from having lights. Surely the Minister does not want to have a power of this kind. If he does not wish to have this power, as I am sure that he does not, I do not see why he should ask your Lordships for a power which he does not wish to exercise.
Amendment moved—
Page 2, lines 20 and 21, leave out ("or grant exemption (whole or partial) from."—(Earl Beauchamp.)
VISCOUNT PEEL: Powers, I understand, are taken to deal with exemptions on rather specific and particular occasions. It is limited to public service vehicles and vehicles used for naval, military, Air Force or police purposes, or as ambulances. There is no intention of having a general exemption for these, but it may be necessary to do so on certain exceptional occasions—military manœuvres or special emergencies of that kind. That is really the sort of case at which the exemptions are aimed, giving the Minister power to make particular exemptions in particular cases. I do not think there is any likelihood of these powers being widely stretched, but, as the noble Earl will recognise, they may be very useful on certain occasions.
LORD DANESFORT: I would like to support the objection taken by the noble Earl to the very great widening of these powers. The Minister of Transport may exempt totally from the necessity for carrying lights. As we know, there has been an enormous extension of motor traffic of late years on our country roads. Omnibuses run from village to village. I am sure that my noble friend Lord
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Peel does not intend to give the Minister of Transport power to exempt all these omnibuses, which are very large and cumbrous things, from carrying lights altogether. If he does not intend to exempt them, I hope that before Report he will put down some limitation of this power of exemption, which will bring the Bill more into conformity with what he says is the object of the proposal—namely, in the case of public vehicles used for military and similar purposes. He really must see that as the Bill stands it will give power far beyond what the framers of the measure desire, and what is either necessary or desirable.
EARL BUXTON: The object of my noble friend, Earl Beauchamp, is to prevent a general exemption of vehicles coming under paragraphs (a) and (b) with regard to lights. As I understand from the noble Viscount in charge of the Bill, the Minister of Transport has no idea or desire that there should be a general exemption. If these words are omitted, surely there will remain in the clause sufficient to allow the variation to which the noble Viscount has referred. Would he be prepared to consider on Report some words which would make quite clear what my two noble friends have urged—namely, that there should not be a general exemption introduced? Would the noble Viscount consider the introduction of such words as "on special or urgent occasions" grant exemption?
EARL RUSSELL: I am very glad that the noble Earl has called attention to this subsection, because so far as I can make out it applies to taxicabs as well as omnibuses, and I do not know on what occasion a taxicab should be exempt from carrying two white lights in front and a red light in the rear. Of course requirements for military purposes would be very easily met by very much narrower words than the wide words of this section. Unless the noble Viscount can give us any better reason why this subsection is required I do not think we should keep it as it is. I do not know whether it is for additional lights as well as for fewer lights that it is required, but if it is only to be exemption, I cannot see why it should apply to public service vehicles at all.
VISCOUNT PEEL: I think it is rather intended to do both things I understand it is power to add to or vary or grant exemption. I think the exemption would only apply in the case of vehicles used for naval, military, Air Force or police purposes, or as ambulances, etc. The sort of cases I have stated.
EARL RUSSELL: It should be so stated.
VISCOUNT PEEL: The power to permit the carrying of additional lamps and to prescribe the number and position of the lamps, and the colour, and so on, would mainly apply to paragraph (a), vehicles used in the public service. I understand the point is made that there should not be power to exempt vehicles in (a). I will certainly consider that point before the Report stage, and see if it is necessary to introduce any change by way of limitation if that will meet the wishes of the noble Earl. Of course he will see that there is a necessity for having flexibility in making regulations with regard to additional lamps, and the number and position and so on.
EARL BEAUCHAMP: It is really a question of granting exemption, and I think I must ask your Lordships' House to divide upon the matter. The example given by the noble Viscount seems to prove the importance of the matter all round. He said that this power was necessary in the case of manœuvres. It seems to me that it would be most dangerous to exempt motor cars from carrying lights during the period of man œuvres. Surely lights are needed then more than at any other time, in order to protect our soldiers. Surely you want more lights during manœuvres than at any other time, and the instance given by the noble Viscount seems rather to go against the point which he has made. I am not quite sure what rules may be made by the Army Council, but it seems to me most important that we should not add to any powers which may exist at present, allowing exemptions in the case of lights. More than once I have heard of accidents to men going through a little mist and being run down from behind by a motor car. Such accidents are very likely to occur during manœuvres, when we have more men than ever going along our roads, and of course not carrying lights, and I should depre-
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cate any additional power being given to the Minister to put the lives of our soldiers in greater danger than they are at present.
EARL RUSSELL: The clause, as it stands, seems to me to be so very dangerous that it the noble Earl goes to a Division I shall support him. I think the best course would be to take these words out at present, and if the noble Viscount, Lord Peel, is able to give reasons on Report for re-introducing them, that can be done.
VISCOUNT PEEL: I should, of course, be rather sorry if the noble Earl should persist in taking out the words "whole or partial," because those words, of course, have reference to (b) as well as (a) and it would prevent the Minister from dealing with them. If, however, the noble Earl presses it very much I will not offer any objection at this stage. If he will allow me to consider the point I will do so, though I may bring up an Amendment on Report stage, and I hope then that noble Lords will treat it as kindly as they can.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
VISCOUNT PEEL: The next two Amendments are drafting.
Amendments moved—
Page 2, line 21, leave out from ("this") to ("in") in line 27, and insert ("Act, and to require or permit distinctive lamps to be carried displaying lights of such colour and used under such conditions as may be prescribed")
Page 2, line 35, leave out ("prescribed") and insert ("required or permitted").—(Viscount Peel.)
On Question, Amendments agreed to.
Clause 1, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 2 [Restriction on the number and nature of lamps to be carried]:
VISCOUNT PEEL VISCOUNT PEEL moved, in subsection (1), to leave out "carry a lamp showing," and to insert "show." The noble Viscount said: This is really drafting also. Although the lamp may not show a red light to the front, such a light may be shown indirectly.
Amendment moved—
Page 3, line 4, leave out ("carry a lamp showing") and insert ("show").—(Viscount Peel.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Amendment moved—
Page 3, line 6, leave out ("carry") and insert ("show").—(Viscount Peel.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 2, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 3:
Conditions regulating the use of lamps on vehicles.
3. The Minister may by regulations prescribe the conditions subject to which lamps, showing a light to the front, may be used, and such conditions may include conditions under which lamps interconnected with the steering mechanism and moving with the movement of the front wheels may be used, and conditions as to the angles at which beams of light may be projected, the height, width and the range of illumination (to be ascertained in accordance with the regulations) of such beams of light, the extent and method of obscuration to be employed, and the position on the vehicle of any lamps.
VISCOUNT PEEL VISCOUNT PEEL moved to leave out "under which lamps interconnected with the steering mechanism and moving with the movement of the front wheels may be used, and conditions." The noble Viscount said: These words are unnecessary. This is really a drafting Amendment.
Amendment moved—
Page 3, line 18, leave out from ("conditions") to ("as") in line 20.—(Viscount Peel.)
EARL BEAUCHAMP: My Lords, I should like a little more explanation of this, because it seems to me that this may be one of the possibilities under which we may be able to deal in the future with the very difficult matter of having good lights which help us to get through fog. Would the noble Viscount be good enough to explain this matter?
VISCOUNT PEEL: The words as to the use of the lamps are unnecessary, because they could be allowed by regulations made by the Minister under Clause 4. The words were inserted in another place before Clause 4 was dealt with.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 3, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 4:
Restriction on movement of lamps.
4. Unless otherwise provided by the Minister by regulations no lamp carried on a vehicle, other than a dipping head lamp, shall be moved or swivelled while the vehicle is in motion.
VISCOUNT PEEL VISCOUNT PEEL moved to leave out "lamp carried on" and to insert "light shown by." The noble Viscount said: This Amendment is necessary because I understand that a new type of head lamp has been introduced since the Bill was drafted, and in this type the lamp itself does not dip, but the dipping effect is imparted to the beam by moving the reflector. The new words are rendered necessary by that invention.
Amendment moved—
Page 3, line 28, leave out ("lamp carried on") and insert ("light shown by").—(Viscount Peel.)
EARL BEAUCHAMP: This really will not do. The noble Viscount would not explain this on Clause 3 because he said that the matter really arose on Clause 4 and certain words had been introduced in another place before Clause 4 was dealt with. Will he be good enough to give us the explanation which he denied to us on Clause 3, and tell us exactly what it is that all this means? I really think we ought to have some explanation as to why these things may possibly be prohibited in the future, because—I must repeat, as we have had no reply—it seems to me that this may be one of the methods of dealing with the difficulty of fogs.
VISCOUNT PEEL: I think it is fairly clear on the clause because it begins:—
"Unless otherwise provided by the Minister by regulation …"
so that he has power to provide for regulations, and this is merely an exception. It says:—
"Unless otherwise provided by the Minister by regulations no lamp carried on a vehicle, other than a dipping head lamp, shall be moved or swivelled while the vehicle is in motion."
I think it refers only to those special cases.
EARL BEAUCHAMP: I have no doubt it does, but will the noble Viscount be good enough to tell us why it is that unless allowed by the Minister, no lamp should be swivelled? Why should they not be swivelled? Because I must say I understood that it was quite possible that this might have been one of the methods of dealing with the difficulty of fog.
VISCOUNT PEEL: I should have thought that this was a matter better

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left to regulation by the Minister. The noble Earl asked: why should you not swivel your lamps if you choose? Surely regulations of this kind are much better left to the Minister, because otherwise all sorts of head lamps might be used, and it is better that motorists in that respect should be restrained or directed by the Minister.
EARL RUSSELL: Perhaps the noble Earl does not know that it has always been the policy to forbid these swivelling lights for the best of reasons, because before they were forbidden motorists used to carry very powerful searchlights and flash them to and fro as they went along the roads, thereby dazzling the whole of the other traffic. It was therefore thought better to prohibit any moving of the lamps in the motor car. Now what you are doing is to allow the head lamps to dip, and, no doubt by regulation later on, to allow a sideways movement which would be useful, as the noble Earl suggests, in fogs. But the original reason for the prohibition was a very strong one.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: Perhaps I may be able to clear this up. At the present moment there are several methods of trying to get rid of dazzle. One is dipping lamps down. Another is dipping down and sideways to the left, which is a good plan. There are also other methods, by altering the focus inside the lamp, and also by altering the reflector. I gather that by this clause the Minister has power to authorise that. At the present moment there are a great many dipping head lamps, and I am not quite clear whether they are within the regulations now. I believe they must be.
EARL RUSSELL: No, they are illegal now.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: I accept that from the noble Earl. I am therefore guilty of an offence every time I use my motor car at night. The system is either winked at by the police, or nobody wishes to prevent it being used, because it is for the public safety. I think it is very desirable that all these experiments should be made both in regard to fog and in regard to preventing dazzle, and therefore the Minister should have power to authorise these experimental methods.
EARL BEAUCHAMP: In view of the explanation given by the noble Lord and the noble Earl, I do not press my objection.
VISCOUNT PEEL: I am very much obliged to the noble Earl.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
VISCOUNT PEEL: The next two Amendments are drafting.
Amendments moved—
Page 3, line 29, leave out ("lamp") and insert ("light").
Page 3, line 29, leave out ("or swivelled") and insert ("by swivelling, deflecting or otherwise").—(Viscount Peel.)
On Question, Amendments agreed to.
Clause 4, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 5:
Special provisions as to bicycles and tricycles.
5.—(1) The foregoing provisions of this Act shall apply to bicycles, tricycles and invalid carriages subject to the following modifications:—

(a) in the case of bicycles not having a sidecar attached thereto, whether propelled by mechanical power or not, and in the case of tricycles not propelled by mechanical power, and in the case of invalid carriages, only a single lamp showing a white light to the front instead of two such lamps need be carried;

(b) in the case of bicycles and tricycles and invalid carriages not propelled by mechanical power, subject to compliance with the regulations (if any) made under this section, it shall not be necessary to carry a lamp showing a red light to the rear if the bicycle or tricycle has attached thereto a red reflector in efficient working order.

(c) in the case of bicycles not having a sidecar attached thereto, whether propelled by mechanical power or not, and in the case of tricycles not propelled by mechanical power, no lamp need be carried if the bicycle or tricycle is being wheeled by a person on foot as near as possible to the near or left-hand edge of the carriageway.

(2) The Minister may, if he thinks fit, by regulations prescribe the conditions with which the reflector must comply, and the manner in which it is to be attached.
EARL BEAUCHAMP EARL BEAUCHAMP moved to omit all words after "modifications" in subsection (1) immediately preceding paragraph (a). The noble Earl said: It is quite obvious that on this Amendment of mine it will probably be most convenient for the House to take the general discussion

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upon the lights which are to be used by bicycles. To put one point on one side at once, may I say that I am glad to think that on this clause an Amendment is to be moved by the noble Viscount, very similar to an Amendment of mine, dealing with invalid carriages. For the moment I do not want to discuss that. The object of my Amendment now is to deal with the whole question of bicycles. Surely, as has been said on the Motion to go into Committee, it is immensely to the advantage of everybody using bicycles that they should be obliged to use lamps on the back of their vehicles for their own safety. I do not wish to repeat what I have already said upon this point this evening. The cheapness of these lamps puts no great burden upon people. After all, of all the bicycles used in this country only a comparatively small number are used at night and very few people would feel it a burden if they were obliged to carry these lamps. If I was so rash as to ride a bicycle on a public road at night I should feel it was for my own safety to carry as strong and as good a lamp as I possibly could, and it is in order to elicit the views of your Lordships' House and to know what you think about this matter that I have placed this particular Amendment on the Paper. Whether some alternative might be found if the noble Viscount is not able to go the whole way with me I will not say now. I have a possible modification in my mind; but I should like to hear what he has to say upon this Amendment before I adumbrate what that modification is.
Amendment moved—
Page 3, line 33, leave out from ("modifications") to the end of Clause 5.—(Earl Beauchamp.)
LORD DAWSON OF PENN: If the question of bicycles has not passed beyond consideration, there is an especial reason why a bicyclist riding at night should have a particularly strong light behind. When, for instance, two cars are approaching each other a bicyclist inevitably moves towards the near side of the road and the driver of the car that is coming in the same direction as the bicyclist is upset by the dazzle of the light of the approaching car, with the result that he cannot be quite sure that he keeps sufficiently far from the near side; that is, the pavement if there
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is one. Unless, therefore, the bicyclist is adequately and very specially protected on that occasion the vision of the motor driver is for the moment a little bit impaired and, with the best will in the world, it is extremely difficult sometimes to avoid an accident. Anybody who has had a considerable experience of driving at night, as certain of your Lordships have, will realise at once that there is more risk of danger at the particular moment when two cars are approaching each other to a cyclist on the near side of either of them. That is why the cyclist needs an especially strong light behind. I would suggest for the consideration of the Ministry of Transport, and it would not add materially to the expense, that there should be both a light and one of those reflectors. The reflector could be made part of the rear lamp, and you would get by that means a double protection without any appreciable increase in cost.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: I entirely agree with what the noble Lord, Lord Dawson of Penn, has said save in one point. In this as in other things the Bill has been the subject of a compromise. I drive as much by night as any member of this House, and nothing is so dangerous as when you are overtaking a stream of cyclists going, for instance, out of town about five or six o'clock in the evening. If you are motoring in the same direction as they are going and another car approaches you, you go off to your near side in order to give plenty of room to that car, and suddenly out of the darkness there looms up a grey coat against the grey road and very often a cap of the same colour, with the result that happened to me quite lately, when I almost touched a man before I saw him. The point on which I disagree with the noble Lord is this. With my considerable experience I would prefer to have good reflectors to bad lamps. The difficulty, as anybody knows who has administered justice in a court of summary jurisdiction, is to get the rule observed in regard to lamps that show a light in front and it would be no more difficult to get a light shown behind which would show strongly. After careful consideration I do not think the Government ought to disturb the compromise arrived at, to allow reflectors to be used by bicyclists so long

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as the reflectors are judged to be of an efficient kind for the purpose by the Ministry of Transport.
EARL RUSSELL: Any of your Lordships who have driven at night must have noticed on the road comparatively recently signs reflecting the light from an approaching car, which are remarkably clear to see and which stand out on the road. I would endorse the appeal of the last speaker that a reflector well constructed, as it can be now, is probably a good deal more reliable than a bad lamp which might jerk out. It is also, as he says, very desirable not to disturb the compromise which has been arrived at and I hope the noble Earl will not press his point.
LORD SWAYTHLING: Might not the compromise be helped in this way? If reflectors are made compulsory could not the rear mudguard of a bicycle be painted white? Noble Lords who have driven on the roads lately will have noticed that a number of cyclists have adopted this plan. To my mind, it adds considerably to the use of the reflector if it is backed by a white mudguard. It makes the reflector far more efficient and, perhaps, something could be put into the Bill to that effect.
VISCOUNT PEEL: If I may say so, this question is one of the crucial points of the Bill and, as my noble friend behind me quite rightly stated, it has been the result of discussions going on for the last three or four years between the motoring associations and the cyclists. I would therefore urge your Lordships to think long before you disturb that compromise. I am informed that it really would have a very serious effect indeed upon the fate of this Bill if this long-fought battle was reopened. The compromise is certainly a compromise; that is to say, both sides have moved, I will not say from extreme positions but from outside positions towards each other. A great deal of surprise has been expressed by noble Lords that bicyclists do not want to protect themselves from destruction by carrying proper lights. That has also filled me with astonishment; but I know that quite sensible people sometimes differ from me on certain points and I recognise that they have a right to do so. The view of the cyclists is, and I think it ought
to
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be stated, that the whole of the onus of avoiding them must be thrown upon the motorists. They think the motorists ought to go so slowly, so carefully and so deliberately when they come up to them that there is really no difficulty and they must pull up. Your Lordships will not be surprised to learn that this view is not shared by the motoring associations. I do not think it is shared by anybody who has driven a motor. But there are two sides. One side says: "They must have the regular red lamp behind like any other vehicle on the road"; and the other side says: "We do not want one at all." So that the compromise is a real compromise; that is to say, they agree to have a reflector.
I was very glad that the noble Lord behind me and the noble Earl urged that a reflector was really a very useful thing. I have experience of it myself and I know how well one does see it. If you take away the option and say that they are only to carry lamps then you get into a sea of difficulties at once, because of course a reflector remains a reflector. Whereas you can never be quite certain when riding a bicycle whether your light behind is alight, and, of course, the jolting of a bicycle is very detrimental to many classes of lamps. In that case all sorts of difficulties would arise. Excuses would be pleaded and probably yon would not get the same degree of security as you will get when you have the consent of the whole bicycling world to carry these red reflectors. I do not know about the question of the white mudguard, but I suppose it would be difficult to keep the white part free from dirt. I am, however, dealing with the question of red reflectors. I urge noble Lords to be satisfied with this as a compromise and the noble Earl especially to leave it as it is because, being the result of these long discussions, I think it would be almost impossible to re-open the whole question again. I think motorists and bicyclists are fairly well secured. The Amendment, as drawn, if taken literally, would mean that pedal bicycles and also tricycles and invalid carriages would have to carry two front lights and one rear light. That, no doubt, is not intended. It is quite clear what the intention of the noble Earl is, but I hope, after the explanations that have been given, he will not press this to a Division.
EARL BEAUCHAMP: I certainly will not press this Amendment to a Division, but before withdrawing it I should like to make one or two remarks. I am sorry the noble Viscount has not received more sympathetically the suggestion made by my noble friend behind me with regard to what I think is called a white splash on the mudguard. I have noticed more than once lately in various trade journals, remarks approving of this suggestion as helpful to all motorists and of value as a safety device to all cyclists, and it is a suggestion which would not involve much expense to them. I am sure a white splash on the mudguard, even if it does not go over the whole of the mudguard, would be a great help to motorists. Apart from that we have been asked to withdraw this Amendment on the ground that what is contained in the Bill is a compromise. Unless my memory is at fault I have heard the noble Marquess the Leader of the House fulminating on previous occasions on this side against compromises entered into in another place by which, he said, your Lordships were in no way bound.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: Nor are you bound.
EARL BEAUCHAMP: On those occasions I tried to lay emphasis on the fact that they were bound; to-night I would say they are not bound, though no doubt I shall take the other point on another occasion.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
VISCOUNT PEEL VISCOUNT PEEL moved, in subsection (1), to leave out "and invalid carriages." The noble Viscount said: I move this because the present text of the Bill is not consistent with the definition of invalid carriages given in Clause 14. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 3, lines 41 and 42, leave out ("and invalid carriages").—(Viscount Peel.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
VISCOUNT PEEL VISCOUNT PEEL moved, in subsection (1) (b), to leave out "subject to compliance with the regulations (if any) made under this section." The noble Viscount said: These words are inappropriate because it is proposed to leave out subsection (2).
Amendment moved—
Page 4, lines 1 and 2, leave out ("subject to compliance with the regulations (if
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any) made under this section".—(Viscount Peel.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
VISCOUNT PEEL VISCOUNT PEEL moved, in subsection (1) (b), to leave out "a red reflector in efficient working order" and insert "an unobscured and efficient red reflector." The noble Viscount said: This Amendment is intended to cover a case where the red reflector may be obscured by the rider's coat. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 4, line 5, leave out ("a red reflector in efficient working order") and insert ("an unobscured and efficient red reflector").—(Viscount Peel.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Amendment moved—
Page 4, lines 14 to 17, leave out subsection (2).—(Viscount Peel.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 5, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 6:
Horse-drawn vehicles.
6. The foregoing provisions of this Act shall apply to vehicles drawn by horses or other animals, subject to the following modifications:—

(i) A separate lamp showing a red light to the rear shall not be required to be carried on vehicles drawn by horses or other animals if the lamps showing a light to the front required by Section one of this Act to be carried show also a red light to the rear visible from a reasonable distance and no part of the vehicle or of any load carried thereby extends more than six feet behind such lamps;

(ii) Vehicles drawn by horses or other animals engaged for the time being in carrying agricultural produce of an inflammable nature either to stack or barn in the course of harvesting operations, or in connection with the internal operations of the farm, shall be exempted from carrying lights:

Provided that the foregoing provisions of this section shall apply to vehicles constructed for and used for the time being in agricultural operations, subject to the following modifications:—
(a) Only one lamp showing a light to the front shall be required to be carried, which lamp shall be attached to the off or right-hand side of the vehicle; and
EARL BEAUCHAMP EARL BEAUCHAMP moved to leave out paragraph (i). The noble Earl said: We have now dealt with matters connected with bicycles and turn to another important

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question that in regard to agricultural vehicles. I am very anxious not to detain your Lordships by repeating what has already been said. I think it most desirable that all vehicles should be treated in exactly the same way and that we should be perfectly certain, in whatever part of the country we may be, that if we see a light ahead of us of a certain kind that it means there is a vehicle in the way. If agricultural vehicles are to be treated differently we are surely opening the door to a very large number of accidents. I am not particularly enamoured of the Amendment which I myself have put down and I hope the Amendments which have been put down by the noble Lord, Lord Montagu of Beaulieu, may be accepted by His Majesty's Government, although I do not think they go nearly far enough.
We are once more dealing with the protection of people who ought for their own sakes to consent to what is proposed, although they may not think it desirable. We ought to be able to see a little bit further than they do themselves and insist on their being given the security which is demanded for them in the various Amendments that are before your Lordships' House. I look with a great deal of apprehension upon the way in which agricultural vehicles are treated differently from other vehicles. It means a danger to motorists as well as to the vehicles themselves. I suppose, in accordance with the usual custom, this will probably prove to be the Amendment on which a discussion may be taken on this subject, but, whether the discussion be on this Amendment or on some subsequent Amendment, I leave myself entirely at the convenience of your Lordships, only wishing to emphasise that agricultural vehicles ought to be treated in the same way as other vehicles which use the roads.
Amendment moved—
Page 4, line 21, leave out paragraph (i).—(Earl Beauchamp.)
VISCOUNT PEEL: This paragraph does not apply specifically or only to agricultural vehicles. That question might very well be taken on the Amendment to be moved later by my noble friend Lord Montagu of Beaulieu. This paragraph deals with horse-drawn vehicles generally and the effect of this Amendment will be to require that all
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horse-drawn vehicles should carry a red rear lamp. The concession in the Bill is that if the vehicle or its load does not extend more than six feet behind the front lamps a red rear lamp need not be carried, provided that each of the front lamps shows a red light to the rear. This was a concession that was put in the Bill in order to cover short, two-wheeled vehicles such as gigs and pony traps. I submit that the position as it stands in the Bill is really sufficient to give security and that it is not necessary to put this class of vehicle on the same basis as all motor vehicles—that is to say, bring them back to the two white lights in front and the red rear lamp. I think the suggestion in the Bill is a reasonable one and I hope the noble Earl will not press his Amendment. The paragraph is limited in its application and the concession granted is one which might quite fairly, I think, be given in the case of these smaller vehicles. As noble Lords will see, if the vehicle or its load projects more than six feet behind the lamps the concession does not apply.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: May I appeal to the noble Earl to allow this, which is a compromise, to become law. No doubt the noble Earl has logic on his side. A horse-drawn vehicle, being the slowest on the road, ought if anything to have a stronger light behind than the faster vehicle because the faster vehicle overtakes it, whereas these smaller vehicles do not, as a rule, overtake motors. But if the two lamps do show a red light behind I think that is all we can reasonably require and I appeal to the Committee to confirm the compromise.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Amendments moved—
Page 4, line 22, leave out from ("carried") to ("if") in line 23.
Page 4, line 30, leave out ("drawn by horses or other animals").—(Viscount Peel.)
On Question, Amendments agreed to.
VISCOUNT PEEL VISCOUNT PEEL moved, in paragraph (ii), to leave out "either to stack or barn in the course of harvesting operations or in connection with" and to insert "in the course of." The noble Viscount said: The words "either to stack or barn in the course of harvesting operations" are not necessary because they are covered by the words "internal

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operations of the farm." I propose to substitute for the words "in the course of the internal operations of the farm" the words "in connection with the internal operations of the farm." The reason for that is that they might otherwise be open—or so it has been suggested—to an interpretation rather wider than was intended.
Amendment moved—
Page 4, line 32, leave out from ("nature") to ("the") in line 34 and insert ("in the course of").—(Viscount Peel.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Amendment moved—
Page 4, line 36, leave out ("lights") and insert ("lamps").—(Viscount Peel.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
VISCOUNT PEEL VISCOUNT PEEL moved to leave out the provisos and insert:—
"(iii) In the case of an agricultural implement and in the case of any vehicle used for the time being by a person engaged in agriculture for the conveyance of his agricultural produce or articles required by him for use in agriculture, otherwise than as aforesaid:

(a) Only one lamp showing a light to the front shall be required to be carried, which lamp shall be attached to the off or right-hand side of the vehicle; and

(b) A separate lamp showing a red light to the rear shall not be required to be carried if an unobscured and efficient red reflector is carried, or if the lamp showing a light to the front shows also a red light to the rear visible from a reasonable distance and the vehicle or any load carried thereby does not extend more than six feet behind such lamp."

The noble Viscount said: This Amendment is really a redrafting of the paragraph in order to make it a little clearer. It is difficult to define the precise extent of the concession to agricultural vehicles proposed in Clause 6 and so I propose this Amendment to the wording of the proviso. The words "vehicles constructed for and used for the time being in agricultural operations" are not quite precise enough, and therefore we propose to define the exact nature of vehicles and the operations which are intended to be covered. That is done in the first part of the proposed paragraph (iii) and we propose to define the expression "agriculture" by an Amendment which I have placed on the Paper to Clause 14. I have already stated on the Motion to go into Committee the main object of this
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proviso and of the concession given to agriculture.
Amendment moved—
Page 4, line 36, leave out from ("lights") to the end of the clause and insert the said paragraph (iii).—(Viscount Peel.)
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU moved, in the proposed paragraph (iii), after "conveyance," to insert "in the course of the internal operations of the farm." The noble Lord said: My Amendment is designed to make this concession a purely agricultural concession and not a general concession. It is intended to provide that the concession should only apply to vehicles moving produce from one part of the farm to another, or, in the case of harvesting operations, from the field to the farmyard, and that vehicles should not be exempted from the general law if they are moving produce to or from a railway station or from one farm to another along the high road. It is very important, I think, that this should be defined. The wording of the noble Viscount's Amendment, it seems to me, might be held to cover the case of a load of potatoes going from a farm to a railway station many miles away on a main road. I think the words which I propose provide a useful definition and that it is in the interests of public safety that my Amendment should be passed.
Amendment to the Amendment moved—
Line 4, after ("conveyance") insert ("in the course of the internal operations of the farm.").—(Lord Montagu of Beaulieu.)
LORD CLINTON: This clause is the only clause which pays any consideration to any interest whatever except the interest of motor users. Almost all the speeches we have heard to-night have been entirely from the motorists' point of view. I regret very much that the noble Lord below me should endeavour to extinguish this very small spark of sympathy which, somehow or other, has worked in the mind of the Minister of Transport. Agriculturists, after all, should get reasonable consideration.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: They have got it.
LORD CLINTON: The farmer makes roads at very great cost to himself, or at any rate contributes to a very large

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extent to roads which are of very little use to him and are laid out entirely for the benefit of the motor user. The whole trouble to my mind is that every motor driver in the country drives much too fast. If a motorist drives at a reasonable rate of speed a single light is quite sufficient to guard him and the drivers of horse-drawn vehicles from any danger. I hope very much that the noble Viscount will refuse to accept this Amendment.
LORD DANESFORT: I entirely agree with the noble Lord who has just spoken. In my judgment there is far too much attention paid, not only in this Bill but in many other Bills, to the interests of motorists who want to go at 50 or 60 miles an hour along the roads to the detriment of agriculturists and other people who want to use the roads in a reasonable manner. My noble friend Lord Montagu of Beaulieu wants to cut down this relatively small concession which is given to agriculturists and to hamper, as I venture to think, the agriculturist in carrying on his farm. He wants to draw a distinction between the man who takes grain from the field to the stack yard and the man who wants to take grain from the field to the railway station. I think that is entirely unreasonable. Surely this is not a time to hamper agriculture in any way. I should have thought we ought to take the opportunity as far as we can of assisting the operations of agriculturists. I have had occasion before now to say that enormous expense is being incurred to-day upon country roads, straightening roads when there is no occasion to straighten them, widening where there is no reason for widening except to give facilities to motorists who want to drive at 50 or 60 miles an hour. All these costly road operations are entirely misconceived. They are against the interests of the country people and they involve enormous expenditure in rates as well as in taxation. Therefore I sincerely hope that the Government will stand fast and not allow agriculture to be prejudiced in the way which Lord Montague of Beaulieu desires.
VISCOUNT NOVAR: I should like to support very strongly what was said by Lord Clinton on this subject. There is a great deal of feeling in the agricultural industry on this particular subject. Personally I do not think farm carts ought to be obliged to carry lights at all.
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It is a very great inconvenience and I entirely agree with what the two noble Lords have said that farming interests are being sacrificed to motorists. In fact I sometimes think that the one thing that keeps the motorist in some sort of order after dark is the knowledge that there may be a good solid farm cart with no lights on it in the road. I know of nothing else that exercises any good influence over him. We have these roads laid out at extraordinary expense. The Government may give a couple of millions towards a road between Glasgow and Edinburgh, or on the same scale elsewhere, and the road is sometimes abandoned, as in a well-known case in the West of Scotland lately. Nevertheless the expense is the heaviest burden that many counties have to bear, and in no way has the agricultural industry been considered in connection with motorists and the particular kind of roads that are provided for them, on which our horses can hardly stand when they try to drag a load. I sincerely hope that every possible concession will be made to the requirements of agriculture. We are not in a position at this moment to have any additional burdens put upon us.
VISCOUNT PEEL: It may be convenient if at this point I state the attitude of the Government regarding this Amendment. Let me make the proposal of the Bill quite clear. What is the concession proposed in the Bill as it was brought to your Lordships? The concession is that these vehicles or implements engaged in agriculture shall carry one light as against two offside lights to the front, and they need not carry a red light if a good red reflector is carried or if the front light shows a red light to the rear. The lights must be visible for a reasonable distance and the vehicle must not project more than six feet behind it. That is the concession to agriculturists, and my noble friend seeks to limit this concession to implements or farm carts when they are engaged in the internal operations of the farm. If there is a road running between two portions of a farm and if, in the course of agricultural operations, a cart has to move a little distance along that road to get from one to the other, then, if the Amendment is carried, this concession will be enjoyed. But if the cart or implement is going to another farm or to the railway station—
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: Or to the market.
VISCOUNT PEEL: Or to market, then the Amendment of my noble friend excludes it. The provision in the Bill was accepted in Committee in another place, and I do not think that it was discussed on Report. I am not sure that there was much opportunity for discussion on that occasion. To tell the whole story, I believe that the Conservative agricultural committee in another place was ready to accept an Amendment in the terms proposed by my noble friend. This Amendment is, no doubt, strongly pressed by the motoring associations. They object very strongly to the provision as it stands in the Bill on the ground that one front light would not indicate the width of the vehicle, which would consequently be a source of danger to other road users. That is the position of the motorists. On the other hand, you have the position of the farmers, whose view is that this concession should not be diminished to the extent to which it undoubtedly would be diminished by my noble friend's Amendment. It is not for me to say that there may be some practical difficulties—for they are obvious—in knowing whether a cart that is going to pass along the road should have one light or two. There may or may not be practical difficulties, but your Lordships can judge of that point extremely well for yourselves. On behalf of the Government I should like to say that they desire to leave this matter entirely to the views of your Lordships. Accordingly I do not desire, as representing the Ministry, to press either view upon you. So far do I go in my impartiality that I do not wish to press or to impress even my personal view of this particular Amendment.
THE PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY OF THE MINISTRY OF AGRICULTURE AND FISHERIES (LORD BLEDISLOE): Thanks to the dispensation which the noble Viscount, my colleague, has just permitted even to members of His Majesty's Government, I find it possible to support with considerable enthusiasm the opposition to this Amendment which has been so well voiced by the noble Viscount, Lord Novar, and others. Let me put this point of view. My noble friend Lord Montagu of Beaulieu has provided for an exception in the case of a farm cart crossing a road where one part of a
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farm lies on one side of a road and another on the other. Can you conceive of anything more dangerous than a vehicle going at right angles, as compared with a vehicle going along the road with other vehicles in front and behind? In fact, the noble Lord has allowed to remain, if I may venture to say so, the very position in which farm vehicles are more dangerous than in their ordinary travels along the road.
Consider for a moment the position of the farm vehicle. After all, it is a horse-drawn vehicle, and it is, speaking generally, the slowest-moving of all horse-drawn vehicles on the road. The Bill specially provides that it shall have a bright light in front on the offside, which makes it clear to any other vehicle passing that the farm vehicle is there. It also provides most specifically for a red light behind. But it does not stop there. The noble Lord, Lord Montagu of Beaulieu, in the course of the discussion on the Motion to go into Committee, talked about the farm wagon. But the British farm wagon is more than six feet long, and therefore the Bill does not even apply to the wagon. It applies only to the ordinary short farm cart, generally known in country districts in England as a dung cart, and practically to no other farm vehicle.
Surely, as my noble friend Lord Novar has said, this is not a moment to add any sort of burden of any kind to the agricultural community. Goodness only knows, they are "under the weather" in several senses at present, and they very strongly object to this change in the form of the Bill as it left the House of Commons, where, after all, their representatives are mainly to be found. I thought that I should hear something about compromise but, after the speech of the noble Earl opposite, I gather that he hesitates to offer a compromise in this connection. It is the fact, I believe, that my noble friend Lord Montagu of Beaulieu, with his usual eloquence and diplomatic zeal, somehow or other persuaded the Conservative agricultural committee in the House of Commons, I will not say to fall in with his views, but at any rate to acquiesce, I think rather reluctantly—
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: I had nothing to do with it.
LORD BLEDISLOE: If the noble Lord had nothing to do with it, the association of which he is such a distinguished representative did enter into negotiations, and those negotiations, I am told, were successful in bringing about a compromise. For my part I entirely agree with the view of the noble Lord opposite—his present view—about compromises made behind the back of the two Houses of Parliament, and for that among other reasons I hope that your Lordships will reject this Amendment.
EARL BEAUCHAMP: I am sorry to say that I do not find myself in complete harmony with the noble Lord on the subject of compromises. There are compromises and compromises, and it seems to me that on this occasion a compromise that has been entered into after so much discussion and by general agreement carries, or ought to carry, a good deal of weight in your Lordships' House. I would venture to submit to your Lordships that this is a matter which we should really consider for ourselves. Is it not really rather a serious thing that we should entirely exempt all marketing carts coming into any town? Do not let us think of London with its improving arterial roads. Think of the smaller towns, such as are in the county with which the noble Lord is so largely and well connected. Is it not really rather much to ask that every single cart coming into every market town, carrying produce, should be exempt from the general rule of carrying two lights in front? It would largely increase the danger upon our roads. After all we have to think of every single town in this country, which is provisioned day by day in the way of vegetables by carts coming in from outside. In every one of those cases we shall find the danger of the roads added to by this regulation, and I think that your Lordships will be well advised in accepting the Amendment of Lord Montagu of Beaulieu.
EARL RUSSELL: Lord Bledisloe knows very well that I accept him unhesitatingly as my guide in matters of agriculture, about which I know nothing, but surely the Conservative agricultural committee to which he referred is also competent to speak for agriculture, and if they have been persuaded, not as it appears by the words of the noble Lord but by the merit of the case itself, without
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his assistance, to regard this proposal as reasonable, I think we must not look upon it as entirely concluded on the side of agriculture. They have at any rate an open mind, like the noble Viscount in charge of the Bill. Surely it is not too much to ask that horse-vehicles going, perhaps eight miles, along our roads from the farm to the market town, should be lit like other vehicles. The noble Lord is merely seeking to say that when a farm vehicle becomes an ordinary road user, and joins in the general traffic of the road, it ought to conform to general law, because otherwise it will cause a great deal of confusion. I cannot help thinking that no hardship has been shown to be put upon the agricultural industry by this Amendment. I am told they do not like it, and I heard what was said about the burdens upon agriculture, but what real hardship is it to light vehicles in the way proposed? I hope that before your Lordships leave the Bill you will consider whether it is wise to add this danger to traffic, and what justifies the farmers in asking for this exemption.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: I want at once to say that I have nothing whatever to do with the drafting of the words, or with the agricultural committee in the House of Commons when this was agreed to as a compromise. With regard to the pathetic description of a dung cart by Lord Bledisloe, and the inability of the farmer to provide a light, which costs but half a crown, to light his cart from the farm to the market, I may remark that the word "agriculture" is defined at the end of the Bill as including "the use of land as meadow or pasture land, or orchard land, or for market gardens or allotments." That covers every cart coming into and going out of a big town, and the nightly traffic into London, which is already a great source of difficulty and danger. The broad principle, I think, is this: so long as a cart is used for purely agricultural purposes, on the farm and between the farm and the fields, special exemption is quite fair, but if that vehicle is used between the farm and the market, which may be ten miles away, or more, then it ought to be subject to the same regulations as other vehicles on the road. Just think of the illogical position, when you can have a dealer's cart bound to conform to the general law, and a

1203
farmer's cart, doing exactly the same thing, not having to conform to the general law. I think it would be better to adopt the words which are on the Paper.
VISCOUNT COWDRAY: My Lords, the proposal does not seem to me to be quite so simple as the noble Lord thinks it. To start with, there is the question of a windy day. After working on the farm all day a labourer has suddenly got to light hurricane lamps and hitch them on to the wagons, to get home. If it were possible to define it so that it was restricted to genuine work on the farm, I should be in sympathy with the Amendment.
LORD MONTAGU OF BEAULIEU: It is so.
VISCOUNT COWDRAY: My reading of the clause may be wrong, but I do not find it as clear as is suggested. As I read this wording a cart has to be laden with the produce which it has been working on to be exempt, and supposing it has been working in the fields all day
Resolved in the negative, and Amendment to the Amendment disagreed to accordingly.
EARL RUSSELL: My Lords, I want to ask the noble Viscount a question about the last paragraph of this clause. By that paragraph, if the vehicle is not more than 6 feet long it is not required to
and then goes back to the homestead empty, it appears to me that it is not exempt under the clause as drafted. I think it comes back to the point raised by the noble Earl below me, that we are rushed into considering this Bill and really ought to be given more time to see what it means.
LORD CHARNWOOD: I come from a county where the requirements which obtain in the Amendment are actually in force under existing by-laws. It is true that it gives rise to a few cases of hardship where a wagoner from an adjacent county ignorant of the by-laws comes over the border, but among the many complaints which I am accustomed to hear from agricultural friends in my own neighbourhood, I have never heard one single word of complaint that the proposal now being advocated is a hardship upon the agricultural community.
On Question, Whether the said words shall be inserted in the Amendment?
Their Lordships divided: Contents, 23; Not-Contents, 26.

CONTENTS.

Airlie, E.

Bertie of Thame, V.

Fairlie, L. (E. Glasgow.)

Beauchamp, E.

Haldane, V.

Hampton, L.

Clarendon, E.

Merrivale, L.

De La Warr, E.

Arnold, L.

Montagu of Beaulieu, L. [Teller.]

Iveagh, E.

Ashton of Hyde, L.

Russell, E. [Teller.]

Charnwood, L.

Muir Mackenzie, L.

Sandwich, E.

Clwyd, L.

Swaythling, L.

Cottesloe, L.

Thomson, L.

Astor, V.

Dawson of Penn, L.

NOT-CONTENTS.

Salisbury, M. (L. Privy Seal.)

Leven and Melville, E.

Clinton, L. [Teller.]

Lucan, E.

Danesfort, L. [Teller.]

Onslow, E.

Dynevor, L.

Northumberland, D.

Plymouth, E.

Gage, L. (V. Gage.)

Stanhope, E.

Harris, L.

Winchester, M.

Kintore, L. (E. Kintore.)

Cowdray, V.

Lawrence, L.

Buxton, E.

Novar, V.

Lovat, L.

Cranbrook, E.

Peel, V.

Olivier, L.

Grey, E.

Iddesleigh, E.

Bledisloe, L.

Stanmore, L.

On Question, Amendment agreed to.

carry a red light to the rear if the red light at the front shows a red light to the rear or has a red reflector "visible from a reasonable distance." If this vehicle is carrying a load, and therefore is of a certain height, can its red light be seen except from directly behind? Will not there be a very large number of positions askew to that position, from which a red light shown from the front

1205
will necessarily be invisible, and will the provision therefore not be ineffective as a protection?
VISCOUNT PEEL: In that case it would not meet the provisions of the paragraph, because the paragraph states that the light must be "visible from a reasonable distance," and in the case propounded by the noble Earl the user of such a lamp would not be covered.
EARL RUSSELL: I think that unless, after the words "at a reasonable distance," you insert "and at a reasonable angle" he may be, because you might perfectly well see the light at a reasonable distance of, say, one hundred feet, if you were straight behind, but not from a distance of ten feet if you were across the other side of the road. Perhaps the noble Viscount will consider it before the Report stage.
VISCOUNT PEEL: I will, but I should have thought "a reasonable distance" implied "at a reasonable angle."
Clause 6, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 7:
Vehicles carrying overhanging or projecting loads.
7. Subject to the foregoing provisions of this Act—

(1) On any vehicle carrying a load overhanging laterally more than twelve inches from the centre of the nearest side lamp, an additional lamp showing to the front a white light visible from a reasonable distance shall be carried on the side or sides on which the load so overhangs, and shall be so placed that no part of such load shall project outwards more than twelve inches beyond a vertical line through the centre of such additional lamp;

(2) On any vehicle carrying a load projecting to the rear more than six feet behind any lamp showing a red light to the rear carried in accordance with the provisions of this Act an additional lamp showing to the rear a red light visible from a reasonable distance shall be carried so that no part of such load shall project to the rear more than six feet measured horizontally beyond such additional lamp.

VISCOUNT PEEL VISCOUNT PEEL moved, in paragraph (1), to leave out "an additional" and to insert "a". The noble Viscount said: This is to make it clear that the lamp which indicates the width of the overhanging load may be in substitution for, not in addition to, the existing lamp, so
1206
that you would not have two lamps on the same side.
Amendment moved—
Page 5, line 13, leave out ("an additional") and insert ("a").—(Viscount Peel.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Amendments moved—
Page 5, line 15, after ("shall") insert ("in substitution for or in addition to such side lamp").
Page 5, line 16, leave out ("sides") and insert ("each side").
Page 5, line 20, after ("such") insert ("substituted or")—(Viscount Peel.)
On Question, Amendments agreed to.
VISCOUNT PEEL: The next two are drafting Amendments, dealing with the same point. I beg to move.
Amendments moved—
Page 5, line 24, after ("rear") insert ("or the red reflector").
Page 5, line 26, leave out ("an additional") and insert ("a").—(Viscount Peel.)
On Question, Amendments agreed to.
VISCOUNT PEEL: The next Amendment also deals with the same point. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 5, line 28, after ("carried") insert ("in substitution for or in addition to such lamp or reflector").—(Viscount Peel.)
LORD CLINTON: I presume that can only apply to reflectors used on bicycles, and I would like to ask the noble Viscount whether that is so or not. I imagine it is only in connection with bicycles that reflectors are allowed and the reason is due to the difficulty of keeping the rear lamp alight and because reflectors are exceedingly useful. Another case in which it is extremely difficult to keep a lamp alight is on that somewhat dangerous vehicle, the timber haulier's wagon. Timber hauliers themselves have made considerable experiments in the carrying of lights on the wagon tail, and they cannot keep any light going owing to the vibration of the wagon itself and the jolting of the load. I should like to know whether the reflectors mentioned in this clause can be made compulsory upon those wagons. If there was any better way of lighting their wagons I think the timber hauliers would agree to it. They consider that in order to get safety they should have a light.
VISCOUNT PEEL: I do not know whether this closely arises under this Amendment, but the point raised by my noble friend is with respect to timber hauliers, I understand. If he will look at the Amendment which deals with the definition of agriculture he will there see that woodland is excluded; that is to say, this particular advantage which applies to agriculture will not apply to those who are drawing wood, and I think the reason is obvious. Some of the most dangerous things on the road are these long timbers which are being hauled. I understand that my noble friend would like them to have reflectors and not lights; but if you have a reflector at the end of these long poles, the poles may wobble and waggle about in all sorts of ways and the reflector will not really make the poles or the wagon very visible to a motorist who is coming behind. I understand there is some objection, on the ground I think of expense, but I am told there is a very cheap dry battery those concerned could acquire which would fulfil all the requirements of a lamp. I do not think it would be possible to permit them to have these reflectors which are put upon bicycles. They are easily fixed upon bicycles, but it is extremely difficult to fix them upon the end of these long timbers in such a way as to make them efficient. I know my noble friend is very much interested in this question as Chairman of the Forestry Commission, and I hope he will accept this exemption and not insist that a reflector shall be applied to a vehicle to which it is not so applicable as it is to a bicycle.
EARL RUSSELL: Where is the definition of agriculture to which the noble Viscount has referred?
VISCOUNT PEEL: It is in the Amendments later on.
LORD CLINTON: As the noble Viscount says, timber is not included in the expression "agriculture." He also said that it would be very simple for the timber hauliers to get another form of light which would serve the purpose, and he suggested a cheap dry battery. The cost of such a cheap dry battery is small and would not amount to more than 4d. or 6d. a day; but the difficulty is that these men are working sometimes at very great distances from places where refills
1208
can be obtained and that would mean difficulty in keeping the lights going. As a result you will have cases in which these wagons are short of light through no fault of their own. I believe a way could be found of fixing reflectors, and that would certainly take away the main part of the danger and would be very acceptable to the timber hauliers themselves.
VISCOUNT PEEL: I should be very glad to have that question examined into and to see by experiment with reflectors whether they would be useful in meeting this difficulty. I will certainly do that, but I think my noble friend very well understands the danger.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
VISCOUNT PEEL: The next Amendment is drafting. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 5, line 30, after ("such") insert ("substituted or").—(Viscount Peel.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 7, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 8 [Special provisions as to vehicles towing and being towed]:
VISCOUNT PEEL VISCOUNT PEEL moved to insert after subsection 1:—
"and
(ii) if a vehicle being drawn or any load carried thereon projects laterally on either side more than twelve inches beyond the outermost of the lamps showing a white light to the front on that side carried by the vehicle by which it is being drawn or by any preceding vehicle which is also being drawn by the same vehicle a lamp showing to the front a white light visible from a reasonable distance shall be carried on the side or each side on which the vehicle or its load so projects and shall be so placed that no part of the vehicle or its load shall project outwards more than twelve inches beyond a vertical line through the centre of such lamp."
The noble Viscount said: The Amendment is expressed at some length but it is perfectly simple. It is a case of where one vehicle is dragging another which is a good deal wider. Clearly you must have a light on the wider vehicle to show the limits on each side of that wider vehicle otherwise the motorist might think the vehicle behind was of exactly the same width as the one in front which was carrying its lights. That is really

1209
the whole point, and I think the Amendment is essential.
Amendment moved—
Page 6, line 4, at end insert the said new paragraph.—(Viscount Peel.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 8, as amended, agreed to.
VISCOUNT PEEL VISCOUNT PEEL moved, after Clause 8, to insert the following new clause:—
Regulations as to reflectors.
" . The Minister may if he thinks fit by regulations prescribe the conditions with which reflectors carried on vehicles in accordance with the provisions of this Act or of any regulations made thereunder must comply and the position and manner in which they are to be attached."
The noble Viscount said: This Amendment is rendered necessary because reflectors are no longer confined to bicycles and regulations will have to be made. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
After Clause 8, insert the said new clause.—(Viscount Peel.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clauses 9 to 12 agreed to.
Clause 13:
Application.
13.—(1) This Act shall not apply to tram-cars or trolley vehicles, but save as aforesaid shall apply to vehicles of every description, and shall apply to machines and implements of any kind drawn or propelled along roads whether by animal or mechanical power as it applies to vehicles.
VISCOUNT PEEL VISCOUNT PEEL moved, in subsection (1), after "This Act shall not apply to," to insert "railway locomotives, carriages and trucks or to." The noble Viscount said: I move this Amendment because railway locomotives and wagons are occasionally used on roads near the docks but are subject to their own regulations for lighting. Therefore, it is not necessary to make rules.
Amendment moved—
Page 7, line 18, after ("to") insert ("railway locomotives, carriages and trucks or to").—(Viscount Peel.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 13, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 14 [Interpretation]:
EARL BEAUCHAMP EARL BEAUCHAMP had given Notice to move to leave out the definition of
1210
"invalid carriages." The noble Earl said: I understand that at an earlier stage of the proceedings the noble Viscount successfully moved out the words "invalid carriages."
THE LORD CHAIRMAN: Yes.
EARL BEAUCHAMP: Does it not, therefore, become necessary that this Amendment of mine should be accepted, or else how does the Bill affect invalid carriages? The noble Viscount moved an Amendment to Clause 5 (Page 3, lines 41 and 42) to leave out "and invalid carriages." That, I think, is the only reference to invalid carriages in the whole Bill. If that is so it is unnecessary to refer to them in the definition clause.
VISCOUNT PEEL: Is not this consequential on the noble Earl's Amendment to Clause 5 and stands or falls with it?
EARL BEAUCHAMP: I think it is consequential upon the noble Viscount's Amendment which leaves out of Clause 5 the words "and invalid carriages." I think that is the only place in the Bill where they are referred to; but if there is any misunderstanding in the matter I am prepared to do whatever the noble Viscount wishes, if he will be good enough to look into it between now and the Report stage to-morrow.
VISCOUNT PEEL: Certainly. We seem to be at issue about the consequential nature of our respective Amendments.
EARL BEAUCHAMP: Yes. I do not move the Amendment.
VISCOUNT PEEL VISCOUNT PEEL moved to add to the clause:—
"The expression 'agriculture' includes the use of land as meadow or pasture land or orchard land or for market gardens or allotments but does not include the use of land as woodland, and the expression 'agricultural' shall be construed accordingly."
The noble Viscount said: This is a definition of agriculture. It is rather a remarkable definition. The object of it is to exclude forestry. As I have already said, timber on the road is one of the most dangerous things and therefore we cannot give the concession to that portion of agriculture. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 8, line 13, at end insert the said definition.—(Viscount Peel.)
EARL DE LA WARR: Does this include arable land?
VISCOUNT PEEL: I am interested in the noble Earl raising that point. I raised it myself with the draftsman. I said it was a remarkable thing that the only kind of agriculture that apparently was not excluded is that which I should specially call agriculture, but I was told by the draftsman (and I accept it) that arable land is inherent in the very term agriculture.
EARL RUSSELL: The draftsman may be technically right, but I think it may be put in. To the ordinary person it looks as if arable land was the one thing left out.
VISCOUNT PEEL: As an ordinary person I thought the same as the noble Earl, but I was assured by the draftsman that it was not necessary.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 14, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 15:
Short title, commencement and extent.
15.—(1) This Act may be cited as the Road Transport Lighting Act, 1927.
(2) This Act shall come into operation on the first day of January, nineteen hundred and twenty-eight.
(3) This Act shall not extend to Northern Ireland.
VISCOUNT PEEL VISCOUNT PEEL moved, in subsection (2), to leave out "first" and insert "twenty-second." The noble Viscount said: This and the following Amendments are to give a little time to people to adjust themselves to the new rules which are to come in with summer time.
Amendment moved—
Page 8, line 16, leave out ("first") and insert ("twenty-second").—(Viscount Peel.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Amendment moved—
Page 8, line 17, leave out ("January") and insert ("April").—(Viscount Peel.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 15, as amended, agreed to.
Schedule:
VISCOUNT PEEL: The provision to be repealed is one applicable to hackney carriages in London. As they would now be subject to the general provisions of
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the Bill, this particular provision is not necessary.
Amendment moved—
Page 9, line 4, insert:

("32 & 33 Vict. c. 115.

The Metropolitan Public Carriage Act, 1869.

In section nine the restriction numbered (3).")

—(Viscount Peel.)

On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Schedule, as amended, agreed to.

SHERIFF COURTS AND LEGAL OFFICERS (SCOTLAND) BILL.
House in Committee (according to Order): Bill reported without amendment.

NURSING HOMES REGISTRATION BILL.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
VISCOUNT GAGE: My Lords, I beg to move the Second Reading of this Bill. It is a Bill of some importance. It emanates from the Report of the Select Committee set up in the House of Commons in the summer of last year. That Committee heard evidence from a very large number of sources and came to the conclusion that there was a real need for the registration and supervision of nursing homes throughout the country. The Government concurred with that conclusion and this Bill is the result. The special points that emerged in the evidence given to the Committee were, firstly, that the premises of many nursing homes were structurally defective and unsuitable for the purposes to which they were devoted; secondly, that they needed supervision, particularly that class of nursing home that caters for poor and senile patients; and, thirdly, that the accommodation of the nursing staff was often seriously defective.
I might perhaps quote one passage from the Report of the Committee as follows:—
"The Society of Medical Officers of Health state that they are convinced of the urgent need for registration of maternity

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homes and still more, for the registration of other nursing homes, that the registration of all nursing homes is a most necessary corollary to the registration of maternity homes and that privately-owned nursing homes form the source of constant complaint to medical officers of health all over the country, but no powers exist, at present, whereby such complaints may be investigated and the matter put right."
There was other evidence, of a rather sensational kind, which led the Government to believe that legislation was absolutely essential. I may point out that already there is an Act which deals with the registration of maternity homes, the Midwives and Maternity Homes Act, but the Select Committee came definitely to the conclusion that registration and supervision of maternity homes should be part of one comprehensive scheme covering all nursing homes. The present Bill, accordingly, repeals Part II of the Midwives and Maternity Homes Act, 1926, and brings the supervision of maternity homes within the scheme for nursing homes generally.
The chief objections to this Bill have not centred round the principle that some kind of supervision should be exercised. It has been urged that steps should be taken to prevent the unauthorised nursing home exploiting the public, and that has been more or less admitted. But there have been considerable criticisms of the machinery proposed whereby the inspection may be effected. If your Lordships would turn to Clause 8 it would perhaps be convenient, because this clause defines the local authorities who will administer the Act. Following the principles adopted in the Midwives and Maternity Homes Act and the recommendation of the Select Committee, it is proposed that the county councils and county borough councils should be the local supervising authorities. This is largely to ensure that the medical inspection should be of a high standard, but after considerable negotiation in another place, it was agreed that the smaller authorities shall not necessarily be excluded from the administration.
The case was argued that there were many non-county boroughs of a large size more suitable to deal with these nursing homes within the boundaries of the non-county boroughs than the county councils. The Bill therefore proposes
1214
that the county council may delegate its powers to a district council and there shall be an appeal to the Minister of Health if the district council is aggrieved by the refusal of the county council so to delegate powers. This compromise has been reached after prolonged negotiation and my right hon. friend hopes that it will be agreed to in its present form. It will be observed that by entrusting the duties of registration and supervision to local authorities the Bill avoids undue centralisation of machinery.
If your Lordships turn to Clause 1 you will see that it provides that all nursing homes must be registered and lays down the method of application for registration and the qualifications which are necessary for registration to be granted. I do not think the clause needs very much explanation although it is a rather long one. There is a special proviso dealing with existing homes and there is exemption of homes from the necessity of having a qualified nurse in charge provided that the person who superintends the actual nursing has the necessary qualifications. Clause 3 prescribes in detail the notices which the local authority must give if it is proposed to refuse an application for registration, and subsection (3) of that clause provides that any person aggrieved by such a refusal may appeal to a Court of Quarter Sessions. The Select Committee, I think, recommended that such appeals should be submitted to a referee appointed by the Minister of Health, but the Minister prefers that appeals should be heard by a Court of law. Clause 4 empowers local authorities to make necessary by-laws in regard to records and notifications. Clause 5 is an important clause dealing with the inspection of nursing homes. In accordance with the recommendations of the Select Committee the duty of inspection will be carried out by officers of the local authority, but there is a proviso that there shall be no inquiry into the medical record of any individual patient. That is designed to ensure the necessary privacy for patients under treatment. In Clause 6 there is a provision, again following the recommendation of the Select Committee, enabling a local authority to grant temporary exemption to establishments of a charitable character. Appeal against refusal to exempt is in this case also to the Minister of Health.

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Perhaps I may call attention to a clause which was inserted following this clause in respect of Christian Science nursing homes. This clause was inserted in the House of Commons in response to considerable demand. It will be noted that there are special restrictions laid down in the case of these homes. The applicants will have to satisfy the Minister that the home is a bona fide Christian Science home and it will have to be described as a "Christian Science house." The intention of the Minister in putting those conditions into the Bill was that the State should not take responsibility in any way for the treatment given in these homes and that the patient should realise before going into the home that it was a Christian Science house. The requirement that the house should be so described was inserted in the Bill so that no mistake should be made. Clause 10 defines nursing homes and excludes from the operation of the Act certain classes of institutions. In Clause 11 provision is made by paragraph (iii) for the repeal of local legislation. The object of that is to secure that in future registration of nursing homes and maternity homes should be governed by one comprehensive Act, as proposed by the Select Committee.
I have dealt with this Bill perhaps rather rapidly, but I hope what I have said is sufficient. The Bill is submitted to your Lordships as affording adequate safeguards against abuses which undoubtedly exist without unduly interfering with well-conducted establishments or impairing the privacy of treatment. It makes use of existing machinery and is in many ways complementary to existing legislation. The Bill aims at ensuring a better standard in nursing homes from the point of view of management, of structure, of accommodation, of equipment and of staffing. I hope that it will commend itself to your Lordships.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Viscount Gage.)
VISCOUNT HALDANE: My Lords, in different circumstances I should have wished that we might have taken time to discuss various incidental topics which arise, such as Christian Science exemption, the delegation to district councils and various other details. But this is what impresses me: the Bill is an extremely
1216
valuable one and it would be a public misfortune if it were to be lost. I have been carefully through it and I have consulted experts, and the desire is universal that it should pass into law as quickly as possible. It is founded on a careful Report made by an expert Committee. It is a Bill that is wanted to raise the level of these nursing homes to such a condition as makes them compatible with safety. I am not going to say a word more than is necessary at this hour when your Lordships are pressed for time. I will only say, speaking for myself, that I am very anxious that, late as it is in the Session, this Bill should pass.
LORD HARRIS: My Lords, there is another point of view which you are entitled to take as regards this Bill. This is an instance of the Government—no doubt pressed by worthy people—thinking it necessary to impose registration upon these nursing homes. I dare say it is very possibly necessary. The matter has been carefully considered by a Committee of the House of Commons and the result is this Bill. There is no question, where the Government imposes this class of work on the county council, of the expense that will fall upon the ratepayers. There is no suggestion in the Bill that the Government will contribute anything. As a matter of fact, in other cases of mental homes and so on, the Government contribute sometimes as much as one-half, but I cannot see in this Bill any provisions for pecuniary help from the Government. The whole cost is thrown upon the rates, except such fees as the authority can collect, I suppose for registration. I bow to the judgment of the noble and learned Viscount opposite, and I am not prepared to oppose the Bill, as I have been requested to do by my own County Council in Kent and by another council from which I heard yesterday. They both assure me that the County Councils' Association strongly oppose some of the provisions of this Bill. The noble Viscount who moved the Second Reading referred to negotiations that had taken place. I suppose that the blessed word "compromise" comes in here again, and that this Bill is the result of negotiations, possibly with the County Councils' Association.
What I have to point out to your Lordships is that this Bill is in one particular

1217
a retrograde measure. Clause 8, as originally introduced, provided that county councils should be the supervising authorities for the purposes of the Bill within their respective areas, and this was following the previous practice regarding similar homes. But now the Bill allows the county council to delegate their responsibility to a minor authority, and furthermore, if the minor authority wants this delegation, they have the right to appeal to the Minister to override the county council. I assure your Lordships that this is absolutely contrary to previous practice. The noble Viscount has told your Lordships that the Government are anxious that maternity homes and nursing homes should be brought under one Act, and therefore they propose to repeal certain words in Part II of the Midwives and Maternity Homes Act, 1926. I should like to call your Lordships' attention to the fact that the Departmental Committee which reported on the working of the Midwives Act, 1902, reported strongly against any delegation by county councils of their powers in relation to midwifery. The Committee stated that the practice of delegation had been found—
"to operate detrimentally to the purposes of the Act, and to introduce elements of confusion and uncertainty into administration."
Following this Report, Parliament, in 1918, repealed the earlier statutory provision enabling county councils so to delegate their powers. The orders of Parliament only nine years ago are now going to be upset, and we are going back to the possibility of a difference of treatment in different places and to the delegation of powers to subordinate authorities.
I imagine that this Bill has had very little chance of being considered fully by the county councils, but I am given to understand through the medium of the County Councils' Association, that many councils are opposed to it. It comes up at a very late period of the Session, and there are, as the noble and learned Viscount opposite says, various provisions in it which certainly ought to be discussed. Take, for instance, the length of time that may elapse after notice has been given to close a nursing home. The period seems to me to be very short. If the home is a bad one it ought to be closed as early as possible, but what
1218
about the people inside? They have to be moved somewhere and some time will have to be given to them and their friends to find other quarters. Again, this is a penalising Bill. It provides for a fine of £50 for offences. Then there is an exemption, of which no explanation was given by my noble friend below me, of Christian Science nursing homes from the provisions of the Bill. Why should they be exempted? Those are my objections to the Bill, which I think would occur to anybody who peruses it, but I do not think that they are of such material importance as to justify my carrying out the wishes of the county councils which have addressed me, and I am not prepared to oppose the Second Reading.
LORD DAWSON OF PENN: My Lords, I agree entirely with the noble Lord who has just spoken that there is by no means a universal approval of this Bill. On the contrary, there is considerable divergence of opinion not only among the laity but among the professional men who will have to carry the Bill out. To my mind, the sole justification for the Bill is that the Committee of the House of Commons did disclose very serious abuses which had occurred in certain nursing homes in various parts of the country. These places were being used for improper purposes and the public were being exploited, and I think that everyone who studied the Report will agree that there was an aggregate of abuses that justified action on the part of the Government. But so far as improvement of nursing homes goes, I look from a professional point of view with considerable scepticism on the idea that you are going to improve them by any system of inspection. The best way to improve nursing homes is to assist the building of proper institutions. In proportion as you do that, inefficient nursing homes will go out of existence. That is actually taking place at the present time. Larger institutions are being built and inefficient homes are being compelled to go out of business.
I think it necessary to draw your Lordships' attention to the very considerable powers which this Bill gives. Under Clause 1 the authority may refuse to register an application if any person employed at the home is not a fit person either by reason of age or otherwise. This is left entirely to the discretion of

1219
the inspector. Then it is stated that the application may be refused if
"for reasons connected with situation, construction, accommodation, staffing or equipment, the home or any premises used in connection therewith are not fit to be used for a nursing home. …"
and so on. The drafting of the Bill is such that it gives powers of a most extensive character, and unless those powers are used with great discretion they might lead to an intolerable tyranny. I ask myself what sort of inspectors it is hoped to obtain for work of that character. The local authorities will certainly not be able to pay a large enough salary to get efficient inspectors. They will be forced back on what I might call the ordinary wooden type of inspector, a very worthy person with a very limited outlook. It is obvious that the medical officer of health himself cannot undertake work of this character, but must employ other persons for the purpose, and it is quite easy to see that, instead of getting a living inspection that would give inspiration and encouragement and lead to a real improvement, you will get that pettifogging form of inspection which does harm rather than good.
To show that there is some truth in that, if one asks anybody connected with that most important of all services, the maternity service, you will be told that it is the most difficult thing in the world, or rather that the difficulties of obtaining educated women to undertake the work of midwives is increased by the difficulty of finding those who will tolerate the frequent interferences and inspections and annoyances, to which they are put by well-meaning but rather narrow-minded inspectors. One of the obstacles to the improvement of the midwifery service is the fact that already the inspection provided in that service is far from what one would wish from a broad-minded point of view.
Next, I must draw your Lordships' attention to the incidental evils which result from legislation of this kind. Is it not obvious that the more you put the medical profession, and its appurtenances and machinery, under local authorities, the more easy you are going to make it to municipalise medicine in this country? I can quite understand anybody who is in favour of a universal State service in medicine being in favour
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of this Bill. I should advise them to vote for it, because you are providing machinery by this Bill which enables interference of all kinds to be undertaken which will, I think, control, and I think control unwisely, the practice of medicine in the various districts. If that control were placed in the hands of what I may call a modern and enlightened authority there would be less objection to it, but it is a fact that the machinery of the health services in this country has been outgrown by the number of services. I am the last person in the world to give the smallest impression that I wish to criticise medical officers of health. Far from it. They are able men and conscientious public servants, but if you take the last few years you will see, year by year, new services being set up which are placed on the shoulders of the medical officers of health, who are responsible to the local authorities—even, it may be, to a rather small authority. You are placing therefore in the hands of a perhaps very imperfectly informed local authority, great responsibility and wide discretion, which I think they are ill-fitted to bear.
I venture to suggest that if Bills of this kind are going to be brought in which add to the powers of local authorities, it will be increasingly necessary that the machinery of health in the district should be altered, and that in some way machinery should be set up which would correspond to the education committees in the counties and county boroughs. The bringing in of this Bill brings home to one the large powers which are being conferred by Parliament, and draws attention to the fact that it gives opportunities to those who wish to bring about municipal services, to do so by stealth, for that is taking place year by year. If your Lordships will compare the amount of what I may call official medicine with the amount of official medicine twenty years ago, you will find that more and more of what I may call the practice of medicine is getting under the control of the official world. If this Bill would lead to a consideration on the part of the Government of whether the time has come for bridging over that gulf between the men who practise medicine and who constitute the majority in this country, and the officials, who are increasing—if you were to bring those two sections together and then were to establish a

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health committee with power of co-option on the same lines very much as the educational committees which now exist, then good might result.
I return to the point with which I began. This Bill, I think, has round it many dangers, but I think the real case for the Bill, and what would lead me not to push my opposition too far, are the agreed evils disclosed by the Committee of the House of Commons—evils so great that I think, whatever may be done in the future, I can quite see there is a good case for passing this Bill, if it is only to prevent the abuses existing in and around about the country.
EARL RUSSELL: My Lords, the noble Lord began and ended his speech by referring to the great and admitted evils which this Bill is intended to cure. In the course of his speech he complained of the drastic and large powers given in the Bill. But he cannot have it both ways. If you want to cure those evils you must obviously have adequate powers for dealing with them, but it is necessary, as he says, that those powers should be well and reasonably administered, as of course it is the intention of the Government, and of the supporters of the Bill, that they should be. That brings me to my first objection to the Bill as it stands, and that is the power of delegation. You have two delegation clauses in this Bill—Clause 11, delegation for London, and Clause 9, delegation for the country. In the country you are going not only to give power to the county council to delegate to district councils, which I think in itself is undesirable, but to allow this authority to compel delegation, if the Minister of Health thinks fit. I think the district council is a very small authority, and that the number of them in the country fit and proper to have such powers delegated to them is very small. The power would be much better left with the county council, particularly because the powers are drastic and because they will have to be exercised in a common sense way, and with the minimum of friction, and also possibly against strong vested interests.
Under Clause 11 you give the London County Council power to delegate to the Metropolitan Boroughs everything in this Act except power to make by-laws. I think you do not under Clause 11 give any compulsory delegation to the Metropolitan
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Boroughs, but you do allow this delegation. Could anything be more undesirable in London, which after all is more or less of a unit, than that nursing homes should be differently administered in different parts of London, and that a nursing home in Marylebone should be subject to different restrictions and a different kind of inspection from a nursing home in, let us say, Mayfair or Lambeth? I think that is most undesirable. I feel very strongly about that, and unless some good reason is given I should be very much disposed when we come to the Committee stage, if we have any time at all to deal with it—I may be told that it is too late to move any Amendments—to move the omission of those clauses.
May I now refer to the most amazing clause in the Bill, Clause 7? I do not know whether to call Christian Science a religion, or a faith, or a practice that appeals to people, with whom I am bound to say I have no sympathy myself. It is neither Christianity nor science, and in this Bill it is given a clause to itself, and is to be granted exemption from the operation of this Bill in respect of any nursing home. What on earth does that mean? Does it mean that a nursing home which performs the ordinary functions of a nursing home, that is to say, in which there are nurses and doctors, and in which there is medical attendance, is to be exempt from the operation of this Act if it is run by Christian Scientists? Or does it mean that a Christian Science home is to be exempt on the ground that it is non-medical and that no medical treatment is given there?—because I think I am right in saying that one of the articles of their faith is that Christian Science is superior to doctors. If it means non-medical I would very much rather that it exempted homes where no medical treatment was given, instead of advertising this dreadful religion, if it is a religion. And then, not satisfied with that, you say that the home is to adopt and use the name of "Christian Science house"; it is to be officially labelled with that label. Why? No reason has been given by the noble Viscount who moved the Second Reading. I understood him to say that a request was made to the Minister, to which he acceded. But why is this particular curious brand of religion to be given

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this particular name in this home, and to be exempted? If it is non-medical say it is non-medical, and put it on that ground; but that does seem to me a clause of the most objectionable character.
Then there is quite a small point in which I dare say the Bill is right, and that it the paragraph of Clause 10 which states that a nursing home is not to include "any institution for lunatics within the meaning of the Lunacy Act, 1890." Of course, the House is aware that it is very much desired that incipient lunatics at any rate should be treated at early stages, and in the view of the Royal Commission it is very desirable that they should be treated in the ordinary surroundings of ordinary ailments, when that is possible. I think this would not prevent treatment of that sort, because a person in that condition would not, I think, be a lunatic within the meaning of the Lunacy Act, and if and when, as I hope may some day be the case, legislation is introduced to deal with that, no doubt any amendments that are necessary may be made to this Bill. But I do feel strongly on these points, and unless I am given satisfaction on them I shall certainly raise them again in Committee.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: My Lords, I do not complain for a moment of the noble Earl's speech, which appears to me not only to be as able as his speeches always are, but very moderate and very fair. There is no reason to complain at all of the debate, but undoubtedly the Bill has been exposed to a good deal of criticism from quarters to which we are bound to pay attention. The noble and learned Viscount the Leader of the Opposition was good enough to say that the Bill was on the whole so good that he would not interfere with its passage at all, although, of course, he might very properly, if he thought fit, take exception to certain of its provisions. The noble Earl has criticised the Bill severely, and so also has the noble Lord, Lord Dawson of Penn, who speaks on questions of this kind with very great authority. The broad defence of the Bill is quite clear. These nursing homes are very often very much to be criticised. Some of them are definitely scandals, others certainly require very careful supervision. If that is so the rest of the main provisions of the
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Bill follow as a matter of course. You have to have the homes registered, and you have to have inspectors, because without inspectors there is no security that the provisions which you insist upon will be carried out. Therefore the main provisions of the Bill follow as a matter of course in exactly the same way as they did in the case of the Midwives Bill, on which your Lordships were engaged last year or the year before, and which you thought fit to pass into law.
Therefore the main argument for the Bill is quite clear, and it is only when we come to details that there are difficulties. Lord Dawson has made some very severe criticisms on the details, and he did, I thought, very much hesitate as to whether inspection was right, but I think he will see himself that if you are to have any kind of control you must have inspection. Then, if you are to have these things run on a county basis, it must be under a county medical officer, or somebody appointed by the county. That is the provision of the Bill. I am quite aware that a question arises when you come to the delegation clause, about which the noble Earl has just spoken. Undoubtedly there you may criticise not only the fact that the power is delegated from the counties to the districts in certain circumstances, but you may specifically criticise the fact that that carries with it the inspection of a district medical officer, instead of a county medical officer. But all I am trying to show is that the thing is quite consistent; it all works upon an obvious plan. All the points which were urged by the noble Earl in his criticism were points which really are Committee points, and undoubtedly we must postpone them till the Committee stage. He asked me whether there would be any Committee stage. Yes, I hope your Lordships will allow the Committee stage to be taken to-morrow.
EARL RUSSELL: No, I did not ask whether there would be a Committee stage. I said I supposed I should be told that at this period of the Session it would be hopeless to propose Amendments.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: May I say in the most straightforward manner that, as far as I am concerned,

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I am going to put no pressure whatever upon your Lordships to abate your rights in these matters. I realise that this Bill has been brought before you at a time which makes the exercise of your functions very difficult, and I shall try to do my utmost to give every opportunity which the time still at our disposal would give us to enable your Lordships to exercise your functions in any way you think fit. I do not say that I shall, on behalf of the Government, agree with all the Amendments which your Lordships may suggest, but I do not want in any way to limit the power of your Lordships to act on this Bill as you would on any other Bill. No, I hope that the noble Earl will raise these points in Committee, and we shall, of course, answer them and deal with them when they are raised.
I should, however, like to say one word upon the criticism which he made of the Christian Science clause. May I say with very great respect to the noble Earl—for he knows I have a great respect for him—I do not think that he is quite entitled to say what he did say as regards Christian Science views of religious matters? I do not share them at all, but at the same time I quite recognise that people are entitled on these difficult subjects to their own opinions, and when you have a very large body of opinion which does not believe in medical science at all, then it appears to be very absurd to subject them to limitations which involve the provision of medically-trained persons in the homes to which this Bill applies, and it would apply to them unless they were exempt. How could it possibly work? You would have practically to forbid a Christian Science nursing home if you placed them on the same footing as others. For those reasons it appeared right to my right hon. friend in another place to make this exemption. If the noble Earl wishes to raise that point in Committee he will do so; but that is the broad answer to his question. I hope your Lordships will give a second reading to this Bill and that the Committee stage will be allowed to-morrow. I am bound to say that I was going to propose to your Lordships that the other stages should also be taken
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to-morrow. I desire to repeat in the most emphatic manner that if there is any influential body of opinion in your Lordships' House which would wish not to proceed in that hasty way, I will not put any pressure on behalf of the Government on the House. It is only with their consent that I propose to proceed. I recognise the right of noble Lords opposite, I recognise most especially the right of my noble friend Lord Harris to raise these questions of the delegation by the county to the district.
LORD HARRIS: And the costs.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: And the costs if he likes, although that does not, perhaps, come so much within the purview of your Lordships as the rest of the Bill.
LORD HARRIS: It comes within the Government's purview.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: It certainly comes within the Government's purview, but my noble friend is aware of the limitation under which we discuss questions of cost. That is the position. I do not desire to detain your Lordships any longer to-night and I ask you to give the Bill a Second Reading.
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE BILL.
Read 3a(according to Order), and passed.

AUDIT (LOCAL AUTHORITIES) BILL.
Read 3a(according to Order).
Clause 1:
Disqualification of persons surcharged more than five hundred pounds.
(3) If any person acts as a member of any local authority when disqualified under this section he shall for each offence be liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding twenty pounds.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME moved, at the end of Clause 1, to insert "and

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any member who is presiding at a meeting of such authority and wilfully accepts the vote of any such disqualified person on any matter shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine of a like amount and such vote shall be void and of no effect." The noble Viscount said: My Lords, I have been informed that under the Summary Jurisdiction Act, 1875, people who aid and abet others to commit an offence are also liable to penalties. In this case I think it would be useful to the people themselves to know the position in which they are, and I propose, therefore, to put in what is really a short statement of the law so that they cannot pretend that they do not understand, nor can they make themselves out to be martyrs. It is fairer to them, I think, that they should know exactly the position in which they stand. If a chairman accepts the vote of a disqualified person I am not quite certain whether that vote would stand or not in law and I have added the words "and such vote shall be void and of no effect." The noble Marquess may say that having regard to the law the Amendment is not necessary; but I submit that, although it may not be necessary, it is advisable. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 2, line 18, at end insert the said new words.—(Viscount Bertie of Thame.)
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: My Lords, I think there is a broad rule in legislation that anything that is not necessary is always inadvisable. If you enact things which are not necessary it raises a doubt about the other legislation to which those things are attached. The Court at once asks: "Why did Parliament legislate in that way and put in an unnecessary provision?" That throws doubt upon Parliament's work. So, broadly speaking, I think I am right when I say in your Lordships' hearing that whenever a thing is unnecessary it ought never to be put into a Bill. When I come to consider my noble friend's Amendment I find it has two points. He is afraid, in the first place, lest these disqualified councillors should vote notwithstanding and that their votes should be valid. As I am informed, there is no question about it: the vote of a disqualified councillor is void. It does not matter in the least whether the chairman accepts his vote or not, it is void. It is essentially void and nothing can make
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it valid. Therefore, all that part of my noble friend's Amendment is unnecessary.
When we come to the other point as to whether the chairman who admits an invalid vote ought to be punished other considerations apply. We have some experience in this matter because this is not the first time that members of local authorities have become disqualified by actions of their own which have rendered them liable to that penalty under the law. It happens in respect of other matters. For example, if a member of a local authority is a party to a contract in which that local authority is engaged and he nevertheless acts he may be disqualified. I have not the exact provision in mind but that is the kind of thing. The councillor being disqualified under the law—and there are many such cases—the noble Viscount says that the chairman who admits his vote ought to be punished. In the practice of local government we have found no such thing. It happens though not continually, because there are not many councillors who are delinquent; but where there is a councillor who is delinquent in these specific matters he is disqualified and there is no difficulty in respect of the chairman in those circumstances. We do not find that chairmen allow a void vote to be registered and, consequently, there is no difficulty.
All that it comes to, then, is that my noble friend would like to provide by a penalty against the chairman against the possibility of such a happening. I think it is unnecessary. We need not undertake such legislation unless a case is shown for it. Supposing it was shown that chairmen in such circumstances were likely to make a mistake of that kind—to make a mistake on purpose—then my noble friend would have made a case for his Amendment. But as things stand it is better not to carry it further than is absolutely necessary in order to meet the difficulties with which this legislation is intended to deal. That is done. I think I have shown that one half of my noble friend's Amendment is unnecessary and that the other cannot be defended in any instance that he can give. On those two broad grounds I ask him not to persist in his Amendment.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME: My Lords, after the very lucid statement of the noble Marquess I, of course, withdraw my Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Bill passed.

DESTRUCTIVE INSECTS AND PESTS BILL.
Read 3a(according to Order), and passed.
House adjourned at ten minutes past eight o'clock.