WESTERN HIGHLANDS AND IS- LANDS (TRANSPORT SERVICES) BILL. (Hansard, 19 December 1928)

THE UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR (THE DUKE OF SUTHERLAND)
My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a third time.

§ EARL BEAUCHAMP
My Lords, I am quite sure that you will be very much obliged to the noble Marquess, the Leader of the House, if he will be good enough to explain why there is such a hurry for this Bill. It was read a first time exactly a week ago and, although I have no wish to obstruct its progress, I think your Lordships will naturally be interested to know the reasons why the noble Marquess wishes us to depart from what is now so happily a custom of the House—namely, not to despatch our Bills too quickly and without full opportunity of considering them.

§ THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY
My Lords, let me say in the first place, in order to clear away any misconception, that although my noble friend the Lord Chairman called attention to the very exceptional character of the procedure under which this Bill has been submitted, yet he authorises me to say that he has no objection to this procedure in all the circumstances of the case. No doubt he would be extremely sorry, as all your Lordships would be, if it became the rule that Bills of this kind should be put through as Public Bills without any limitation, but in all the circumstances of the ease the noble Earl authorises me to say that he has no objection to that procedure. That, I think, is very important, because we rely so much upon the Lord Chairman to keep us straight in these matters.
As regards the reason for the precipitancy with which the Bill has been pushed forward, I think I may state it in this way. There was this service of boats in this area of the Highlands and Islands of 723 Scotland and, owing to a certain amount of friction into which I would rather not enter in your Lordships' House, the service of boats was suddenly brought to an end and the inhabitants of this area and those who were interested were put—I was going to say from one day to another, but that would be an exaggeration—were put in a very brief time in the position of losing this necessary means of communication, and it was necessary for the Government, as represented by the Secretary of State for Scotland, to intervene. The first thing that he did was what any of your Lordships would naturally imagine that he would do. He went to the appropriate railway company and asked them to take over this service of boats. The railway company, as I think I have told your Lordships before, were not prepared to do this. They said that it was of no special interest to them and, if I may use a vulgar phrase, they pointed out that there was no money in it. They were not prepared to do it and, moreover, they were not prepared to promote a Private Bill, which would be very expensive. From the point of view of the interests of their shareholders, they felt that there was no call upon them to take such a course.
Accordingly it came to this, that, except with the direct intervention of His Majesty's Government by promoting a Bill which did not require an appearance before a Private Bill Committee, there was no means of carrying out this necessary provision of communication for this remote part of Great Britain. I think that in the circumstances the Government were bound to intervene, and I do not think that any of your Lordships will have any doubt of that. As to the extreme hurry, there would have been no necessity, I dare say, as regards a few days, if Parliament had not been on the point of an adjournment, but, Parliament being on the point of an adjournment, the question was whether we were to call upon these unlucky people to wait for the replacement of their means of communication for another two months, or whether we were to proceed immediately. I have stated the matter very briefly, and without any notes to help me, but I hope that you will not interpret too literally what I said about things happening from day to day. It was a very brief period which was at the service of these people in order 724 that they should be provided with the necessary communications. I hope that I have said enough to account for the reason why I have been false to my profession of looking after the proper despatch of business in this House, and made an exception, and I hope that the noble Earl, who is a watch-dog even more stern than I am myself to prevent any failure in this respect, will acquit me of any grave dereliction of duty, and will cooperate in passing this Bill into law.