Lords Sitting of 16 December 1929

Preamble
The House met at a quarter past four of the clock, The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.

LORD MERTHYR.
VISCOUNT ALLENDALE: My Lords, I beg to move that leave be given to Lord Merthyr to vote in the House for the remainder of the Session.
Moved accordingly, and, on Question, Motion agreed to.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: My Lords, I venture to ask the noble and learned Lord the Leader of the House if he can tell us what are the proposals of the Government with reference to the remainder of these sittings?
THE LORD PRESIDENT OF THE COUNCIL (LORD PARMOOR): My Lords, I am much obliged to the noble Marquess for asking me this question, and I hope that the proposals which I have to make will suit him and those with whom he acts here. To-day we propose to take three more or less formal matters to start with, and then we continue the Committee stage of the Road Traffic Bill. We propose to sit after dinner to-night, in order to make as much progress as we can. It will probably be convenient to adjourn about eight o'clock for an hour. Then there is a Question on the Paper by Lord Askwith. I will ask him to postpone that till to-morrow, as we have not been able to make the necessary inquiries. Tomorrow there will be the Report of Amendments to the Mental Treatment Bill, which Lord Russell tells me is likely to last up to about six o'clock. We will then proceed further with the Committee stage of the Road Traffic Bill. I find that it is not very convenient, at any rate in some quarters, that we should sit to finish that Bill after dinner to-morrow, and therefore we do not propose to sit after dinner on that day, but we want to finish the Road Traffic Bill Committee on Wednesday. There are also one or two Questions, which I do not think will take very long.
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With regard to Wednesday I have consulted Lord Russell's convenience, and we propose to continue the Committee stage of the Road Traffic Bill then. We shall know how far we can get, and if necessary we shall ask your Lordships to sit after dinner on Wednesday. On Thursday we propose to take the Second Reading of the Unemployment Insurance Bill. That will enable us to adjourn on Friday, which, I think, will be convenient to all of your Lordships. I believe there will be a Consolidated Fund Bill on that day, and it can be taken formally through all its stages. Also on that day there will be a Royal Commission, which, however, need not detain any of your Lordships. It is our responsibility to keep a House. It is proposed to come back on January 21, and the first business on that day will be the Committee stage of the Unemployment Insurance Bill. We shall proceed with that Bill, so that it may receive the Royal Assent as early as possible. That Bill ought to be finished and the Royal Assent given to it by the end of January. I think that will give plenty of time really. In particular, it will allow of a very long interval between the Second Reading and the Committee stage.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: My Lords, with reference to the closing words of the noble and learned Lord, I have already agreed so far as my voice is of any value, to taking the Second Reading of the Unemployment Insurance Bill next Thursday, although that allows a very short time between the First Reading and the Second Reading of a very important Bill. As regards January, well January is a long way off. I hope that the noble and learned Lord will not think that I have entered into any engagement whatever so far as I am concerned as regards the proceedings in January.
LORD PARMOOR: No, I did not mean that.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: It was only in case there might be a misunderstanding hereafter that I wanted to make that quite clear. I come back to the Road Traffic Bill. The noble and learned Lord has suggested that we should sit after dinner to-night. When I had the great advantage of private communication with him on this subject on Thursday, I think it was understood,

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though I may have been mistaken, that if the Government wished us to sit after dinner to-night they should intimate as much at the rising of the House on Thursday. Nothing of the kind was said in my hearing, though I think I was present at the adjournment. I do not want to tie noble Lords opposite down to a verbal bargain of that kind, but I do suggest to the noble and learned Lord and his colleagues that there is no great advantage in treating the Road Traffic Bill in the way suggested. It is a very intricate Bill and not a Party Bill, and the discussions upon it have not been of a Party character. There has been cross voting and noble Lords in different parts of the House have taken different views wholly without reference to any Party consideration, and I think I may say—although it is not unusual in your Lordships' House—that the discussion has been of a most businesslike character. I I do not think I have heard a bit of padding (if I may use the expression) from the very beginning of the debates to the end.
In these circumstances, if we sit after dinner I think the noble and learned Lord will be very much disappointed, because he will find a very limited number of people here and instead of having an adequate discussion of the Bill, he will have a very inadequate discussion. That is a great pity. Here is a Bill which has been received with a great deal of public favour, very well received by your Lordships' House and discussed in a most businesslike way. Unless, of course, there is some obscure reason which makes it important that this Bill should be passed by a certain date—of which I know nothing—I should have thought it was far easier to take the Bill in the ordinary way, sitting as your Lordships are accustomed to sit until about eight o'clock and not to press the matter forward in the way described. I feel very reluctant to seem obstructive and therefore do not use language of that kind, but I understand from those with whom I have spoken that it is not at all wished by noble Lords to sit after dinner; on the contrary, it is rather wished that we should not, and the only result of doing so would be a very inadequate discussion.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM: My Lords, may I point out that this Bill cannot possibly get to the Commons before the end of January? There is, therefore, no need whatever to hurry it. When we come back, in January and February we shall probably have nothing to do and we can, with great advantage to the Bill and to the country, discuss it in a proper manner; whereas, if we sit after dinner, the result is that there will be a perfunctory discussion, many people who desire to speak on the Bill will not be here and we shall lose the prestige which we have in the country of treating these things in a business manner. It is not as if Parliament were going to be prorogued within two or three weeks. We are going to sit here probably until the end of August. A simple calculation shows, therefore, that we have eight months before us. Having eight months before us, and having a Bill which is not a Party Bill and which deals with the every-day life of the people, is it not our duty to give that Bill every proper consideration? I think we have done that and in no Party spirit, but with a sincere desire to put a proper and good and workable measure on the Statute Book. In these circumstances, to ask us now on what will probably be a foggy night, to come back here and discuss with a few people over forty pages of Amendments, seems to me to be unreasonable. Personally I shall certainly move at eight o'clock that the House do now resume.
THE UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA (EARL RUSSELL): My Lords, perhaps I am to blame for not having made the announcement at the adjournment on Thursday of which the noble Marquess speaks. If so, it was due to some misunderstanding of what had been arranged. I certainly understood that we had definitely arranged to sit after dinner in any event to-night, because I knew it would be necessary for the sake of the progress of the Bill, and I had rot understood that it was desired that any announcement should be made at our rising on Thursday. But I do ask your Lordships to sit after dinner to-night, and in reply to the noble Lord, Lord Banbury, I would point out the considerations which are of importance. There are forty-three pages of Amendments. It is very important that those should be

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discussed. A great many are not of importance, but there are some of great importance. I am particularly anxious that the Committee stage of this Bill shall be concluded before we adjourn for the Recess in order that the Bill may be reprinted as amended in Committee, and that the Ministry of Transport and everybody else concerned may have a clear month in which to consider the Bill as amended before we take the Report stage. I think if we left the Bill half finished in Committee that would be a very unfortunate thing; and, so far as time in general is concerned, Lord Banbury is quite wrong. Unless the Second Reading of this Bill is got by, say, the middle of February in another place, its chance of getting through this Session will really be hopeless. I should be very much obliged to your Lordships if you would sit after dinner at any rate, and then we can see what progress we have made.
LORD NEWTON: My Lords, I do not wish to disagree with my noble friend Lord Banbury, but, if we are going to consider the question of the prestige of this House, the prestige of this House will suffer very considerably if it is published to the world that we are not prepared to come down here after dinner to consider an important Bill.

HIGHLANDS AND ISLANDS (MEDICAL SERVICE) ADDITIONAL GRANT BILL.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read:
THE PAYMASTER-GENERAL (LORD ARNOLD): My Lords, on behalf of my noble friend Lord Muir Mackenzie I beg to move the Second Reading of this Bill. It is a non-controversial measure, and I can outline its provisions in two or three minutes. It passed through another place without amendment, and it is, as a matter of fact, a Certified Money Bill. Owing to the exceptional conditions which prevail in the Highlands and Islands of Scotland—the great distances, the climatic conditions and the straitened financial circumstances of many of the inhabitants—it is exceedingly difficult for the people to obtain the proper medical attention which they require, and it was the recognition of this fact in 1913 which led Parliament, in that year, to give
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special State assistance towards the improvement of the Highlands and Islands medical services. In that year an annual Grant was made for these purposes of £42,000 a year, and out of that money there are paid grants to doctors for their services, chiefly so that they will attend cases irrespective of distance, which is vital. Moreover, some of the money has been used for better nursing and surgical services.
The amount is £42,000 a year, but during the War that £42,000 each year was by no means wholly expended, and a balance accumulated to the credit of the Fund. Since the War things have been more normal. What I may call the authorised scheme has been in operation and the expenditure has been increased; as a matter of fact for some time it has exceeded the income. For instance, in the current year, the expenditure will be about £70,000, and the accumulated fund, to which I have referred, has been used up, so that it is necessary for Parliament to provide some additional money. That is what this Bill does. It is intended that this shall be done in future by placing the amount on the Estimates of the Department of Health for Scotland year by year, and not by a fixed annual Grant. For the current year actually over £10,000 is required, which means that as far as the current year is concerned the £42,000 has been used, and also the £20,000 of accumulated balance, and a little more than £10,000 will be required. In the future the amount which will be required in addition to the £42,000 will probably be in the neighbourhood of £30,000. I hope I have made the position clear.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Arnold.)
On Question, Bill read 2a and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.
LORD ARNOLD: As this is a Certified Money Bill we propose, with your Lordships' permission, to take the Committee stage to-morrow.

WAR OFFICE STAFF.
THE EARL OF CRANBROOK: My Lords, I beg to ask his Majesty's Government for comparative figures of the staff of the War Office in 1914 and 1929.
THE UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR (EARL DE LA WARR): My Lords, I am glad to have this opportunity of correcting the figures which were given by the noble Earl, Lord Midleton, on a recent occasion when the staff of the War Office was under discussion in your Lordships' House. I had assumed that the noble Earl would take as the basis of his figures for 1014 those which were, I believe, supplied to him a year or so ago, and which have been given in answer to Questions in another place on more than one occasion, and that if he was in doubt as to the latest figures, or did not wish to use those for 1928, which were given in another place on February 11, 1929, he would have asked to be supplied by the War Office with the information. Unfortunately, he did not do so, and, speaking as I was immediately after him, I was unable to challenge his figures at the time. These figures were given considerable publicity by the Press, with the result that the public were misled, and the War Office staff which, as your Lordships know, is not in a position to defend itself, was unfairly criticised and attacked. In fairness to the War Office I trust the correct figures I am now about to give may receive equally wide publicity.
Lord Midleton stated that the Military Departments had increased from 660 to 903 and the Civil Department from 611 to 1,013—an increase in total from 1,271 to 1,916, or practically 50 per cent. If, as I gather, he has reckoned the Secretary of State and his staff and the typists and messengers who are common to the whole office as part of the Civil Department, the correct figures are as follow:—the Military Department, 741 in 1914, now 907; the Civil Department, 1,137 in 1914, now 1,391; and the present total staff of the War Office is thus 2,298 as compared with 1,878 in 1914; that is an increase of 22 per cent. and not 50 per cent. as the noble Earl said. Lord Midleton gave percentages of increase in the Secretariat, the Finance Department, the Contracts Department and the Local Audit Staff, varying from 65 per cent. to 72 per cent. The correct figures of increase are:—in the Secretariat, from 151 to 208, or 38 per cent.; in the Finance Department,
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from 243 to 303, or 25 per cent., and in the Contracts Department, from 56 to 78, or 39 per cent.; the Local Audit Staff is practically at pre-War strength.
Lord Midleton further stated that the figures of the War Office staff which he gave justified him in saying that the War Office came under the strictures of Sir Alan Anderson's Committee, an extract from whose Report he read in such a way as to convey the impression that the Report was an attack on the Civil Service, but the following two paragraphs, which I may perhaps be permitted to quote, put the matter in a very different light:—
"The increase in staff since 1914 is fully accounted for by the extra work which has been thrown on to the Civil Service since 1914, and the average individual output is certainly not less than in 1914."
"The immense increase in the Civil Service pay roll has been imposed on the taxpayer for reasons which commended themselves to various Parliaments before and since 1914, and the conclusion we reach is that no power except Parliament can materially reduce the load."
As regards the War Office staff, as I mentioned in reply to Lord Midleton's Motion, the size of the staff at the War Office is not only subjected to constant Departmental scrutiny but, since the War, has been examined by seven different Committees of Inquiry, in addition to annual examination by the Public Accounts Committee and two investigations by the House of Commons Select Committee on Estimates. In conclusion, may I repeat the assurance that my right hon. friend the Secretary of State for War is making every effort to secure yet further economy, but his efforts are, if I may be allowed to say so, not in any way assisted by attacks, based on inaccurate data, which cast aspersions on a body of hard-working and conscientious public servants.
THE EARL OF ONSLOW: May I ask the noble Earl if the figures he has given are the figure of the actual staff to-day or the figures which were in the 1929 Estimates?
EARL DE LA WARR: The 1929 Estimates.
THE EARL OF MIDLETON: My Lords, I do not propose to take up the time of your Lordships at this moment by rebutting

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any of the observations of the noble Earl the Under-Secretary of State for War, but I should like to be allowed to say that the figures which he has quoted do not in any way square with the figures which were published in the Estimates, and I would venture to say that after a whole month's incubation I think the War Office might have explained a little more clearly why it is that the figures to-day are not those which appeared in the Estimates. In one single matter I would like to refer to an observation made by the noble Earl. He said that the Committee who examined the War Department were satisfied that the average individual output was not less now than it was before the War. Well, I will give your Lordships one example which was brought up in another place last year, and has never been refuted, of the sort of individual output you may expect, and I would ask my noble friend to make a little inquiry into this point. In the Medals Department, which, of course, was enormously swollen by work after the War, there were, according to the Estimates last year, two officers and thirty-three other ranks at a cost of £5,000 a year. The number of medals issued was 28,500 and therefore each member of the staff was responsible for issuing three medals in the course of his day's work. I came to the conclusion that he must have had a tolerable adjournment for lunch in order to enable him to get through the day. I think if my noble friend would go into the individual output he would find the result much nearer my estimate than his.
EARL DE LA WARR: My Lords, it is only with your permission that I can add anything to what I have already said, but if the noble Earl would like to have explained to him why his calculations went wrong I should certainly be glad to send him any information he would like. Generally speaking, it was in regard to copyists, surveyors, messengers and so on that he was wrong in his calculation.

EXPIRING LAWS CONTINUANCE BILL.
Read 3a (according to Order), and passed.

ROAD TRAFFIC BILL. [H.L.]
House again in Committee (according to Order):
[The EARL or DONOUGHMORE in the Chair.]
Clause 10:
Rate of speed.
10.—(1) It shall not be lawful for any person to drive a motor vehicle of any class or description on a road at a speed greater than the speed specified in the First Schedule to this Act as the maximum speed in relation to a vehicle of that class or description, and if any person acts in contravention of this section he shall be guilty of an offence.
(2) A conviction for a first or second offence under this section shall not render the offender liable to be disqualified for holding or obtaining a licence, including a provisional licence.
(3) For the purposes of this section a person shall not be found to have been driving at a speed exceeding any specified speed merely on the opinion of one witness that the speed exceeded the specified speed.
(4) The Minister may by order vary, subject to such conditions as may be specified in the order, the provisions of the First Schedule to this Act in relation to any motor vehicles used for lire brigade purposes.
(5) Any person who aids, abets, counsels or procures any person who is employed by him to drive, or is subject to his orders in driving, a motor vehicle on a road to commit an offence under this section, shall be liable to a fine not exceeding fifty pounds, and in the case of a second or subsequent conviction, to a fine not exceeding one hundred pounds, or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding three months, or to both such fine and imprisonment.
(6) If a person who employs other persons to drive motor vehicles on roads publishes or issues any time fable or schedule or gives any directions, under which any journey or any stage or part of any journey is to be completed within some specified time and it is not practicable for that journey or that stage or part of the journey to be completed in the specified time without an infringement of the provisions of this section, the publication or issue of the said time table or schedule or the giving of the directions shall be prima facie evidence that the employer, as the case may be, procured or incited the persons employed by him to drive the vehicles to commit an offence under subsection (1) of this section.
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD moved to leave out subsection (1) and insert:—
".—(1) Any person who drives a motor vehicle at a speed greater than the speed specified in the First Schedule of this Act as the maximum speed in relation to a vehicle of that class or description shall be deemed to have been guilty of dangerous

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driving as hereinafter defined unless he can show that in the actual circumstances of the case such greater speed could not involve danger to the public."
The noble Viscount said: We now approach the part of the Bill which I suppose has been most discussed outside your Lordships' House—that is, the part dealing with the speed limit. As your Lordships are well aware the law at present is that no motor car shall go faster than twenty miles an hour on the public roads. At the time that that provision was made I do not think it was an unreasonable provision. Motor cars were not so powerful as they are now, they had far less good brakes, and they were an entirely new kind of traffic. A provision limiting their speed to twenty miles an hour was, I believe, a reasonable one. I think it was not only a reasonable speed but it was regarded as a reasonable speed by the great mass of opinion in this country at that time. Motor cars were regarded with considerable suspicion—not perhaps with quite the fear and terror which they now inspire, but with considerable suspicion—and they were certainly not popular at that time.
I am quite sure the general public de sired the enforcement of that law; but in point of fact the motorists, and particularly those who owned private cars, declined to be bound by the law. They habitually broke it and the efforts of the police and other guardians of the law to enforce it proved fruitless. In some counties they took very vigorous measures and in others less vigorous measures. Sometimes they acted foolishly, sometimes they acted, not particularly foolishly but in the only way that was open to them in order to enforce the law. But the law was defied and successfully defied. We have seen several instances in my lifetime of attempts to defy the law. Some of them have been successful and some of them have been unsuccessful. There was the passive resistance agitation. That was unsuccessful. There was the General Strike. That also was unsuccessful. There were the proceedings in Ireland which were successful. They were far more serious, of course, than anything we have to consider now, but the principle is the same.
I want your Lordships to realise if you will that we are now faced with a general agreement on the part of a
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section of the population to refuse to be bound by the law of the land, and we are in the extremely awkward and disagreeable position for any Legislature of having to make up our minds what is the best course for us to pursue in those circumstances. It would be possible, of course, to advocate a more rigid and more vigorous enforcement of the law. That is the view which I have often heard expressed from the Benches on my right, but I do not gather that it is the view which finds favour with the majority of your Lordships at the present time. They think that we have got to surrender to the law breakers. I am not clear that that is not the true view. I am not clear that there is any other course open to you, but if you arrive at the conclusion that it is essential that we should alter the law because we cannot enforce it and because it is habitually broken—and that is the ordinary reason which is given for the alteration of the law—then I do beg your Lordships not to enact any form of law which will bring us into the same predicament again, because I think your Lordships will all agree with me that it is not of advantage, but very much the reverse, that we should hold out to people great and small the proposition that if a section of the population is determined not to obey the law then the law must be changed.
I am sure that if that became the general opinion in the country it would be disastrous for the whole of our civilisation. Accordingly it is a serious matter—from one point of view much more serious than the question whether motor cars are to go at twenty miles an hour or thirty miles an hour. We have a very serious constitutional issue before us, and one to which I do not hesitate to ask your Lordships to give the most careful attention. The Government have brought in a proposal which, as I am aware, has the great advantage of being the proposal recommended by the Royal Commission, and yet I cannot bring myself to think that it is a wise proposal. What is it? It is to take away the speed limit with respect to one class of car and one class only, and incidentally the car that belongs to the richer section of the population. The limit is to be taken away only with respect to light passenger vehicles. It is to remain, in one form or another, with regard to all

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other vehicles on the road, light or heavy. I think I am not misstating the point, but I trust that my noble friend Lord Russell will correct me if I am misreading the provisions of the Bill. This seem to me, I confess, a most unfortunate proposal.
What is certain to happen? Does any one believe that, with this example before them, the owners of the other vehicles will obey the law? I cannot think that any single person in this House believes it. I am quite sure that these drivers will disregard the law in exactly the same way as their richer neighbours have already so successfully disregarded it in the past. Of course they will. The tradesman's cart, the char-a-bancs, the omnibus and all the other cars that are utilised for poorer persons who like motoring—the drivers of all of them will break the law in just the same way as the richer motorists have broken the law, and have obtained a change. I think that exactly the same difficulty will arise and, in a few years, you will have the representative of the Ministry of Transport corning down and saying: "We have not enforced this law and we shall have to remove this limit also." Surely that is a most undignified and worse than undignified position for the Legislature to take up. I cannot think it is right.
I am strengthened in that view when I come to look at the reasons that are assigned for the proposed change. The Chairman of the Royal Commission, Sir Arthur Griffith-Boscawen, contributed an article to a newspaper which I was fortunate enough to read. He gives three reasons why the Commission recommended the abolition of the speed limit. The first is that there is no particular speed that can be described as either a safe speed or a dangerous speed. I do not express any opinion as to whether it is right—I do not happen to agree with it—but, whether it is right or not, surely it applies to every kind of motor car as much as it applies to the light passenger car? How can you make any distinction between the two? His next reason is that the psychological effect of a legal limit on a motor driver is had. If it is bad for the driver of the light passenger car, it is equally bad for the driver of every other car. The third reason is that the existence of the speed limit caused
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the police to be used to set traps to catch motorists on open stretches of road. But if it has had that effect in the past—and no doubt, to some extent, it has—it will surely have the same effect in the future, only it will be confined to a different class of car, and will not embrace cars which are used by the richer classes of the community. I am quite satisfied that, if there are reasons for the change such as are indicated by Sir Arthur Griffith-Boscawen with respect to the light passenger car, they apply equally to other cars. I do not forget that in another part of his article Sir Arthur gave special reasons why the limit should be retained in respect of heavy cars, but that is not the point with which I am dealing at the moment. My point is that, if the reasons that he gave for abolishing the speed limit in the case of light passenger cars are valid, they are equally valid in the case of other cars.
I will, however, deal for one moment with the distinction that he suggests between the classes of cars. He says that it is right to impose a limit in the case of public service vehicles because it is right to take great precautions for the safety of those who are travelling in those vehicles. I may he very dense, but I cannot see why it is more important to take precautions for the safety of people who voluntarily go in these vehicles than to take precautions for the safety of those who are walking on the roads and desire nothing less than to be brought into contact with a motor car. I do not follow that reasoning. The other reason is that commercial vehicles weigh a great deal more. But he surely has not read the Bill, or perhaps he was only referring to the Report of the Commission on this point, of which I cannot remember the terms. So far as the Bill is concerned, it is not true to say that it depends only on weight. All these vehicles, whatever their weight, are to be subjected to a speed limit.
EARL RUSSELL: No; not under 2½ tons.
VISCOUNT CECIL OK CHELWOOD: I was referring to the First Schedule. I may have misunderstood it, and I am very much obliged to my noble friend. The Schedule, referring to goods vehicles, fixes a maximum limit for those without a trailer of thirty miles an hour

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if all the wheels are fitted with pneumatic tyres, and twenty miles an hour
"if all the wheels are not fitted with pneumatic tyres but are fitted with soft or elastic tyres."
There is no suggestion there as to weight. I may have misunderstood the point. I am quite aware that there is a distinction between motor cars and heavy motor cars, and that this distinction depends upon weight, but when you come to the Schedule, if I have not misread it, all goods vehicles are liable to a speed limit, and not only the heavier types. But, even if you take another case, all public service vehicles are subject to the speed limit. I may be wrong but, as I read it, any vehicle maybe a public service vehicle if it is constructed to carry more than eight passengers. Accordingly you may have a vehicle, as I understand it, constructed to carry nine passengers, and used for hire, which is subject to the speed limit, and you may have an even heavier vehicle, constructed to carry eight passengers, which is not used for hire, which will not be a public service vehicle and which will not be subject to the speed limit. I am not saying this by way of criticising the actual provision. The moment you lay down distinctions between cars, I do not care how you phrase them, you will find these anomalies. They are inevitable if you draw a line between two sets of cars. You will find it impossible to make any real distinction between the two sets. That is a great difficulty, as it appears to me.
I concede, though with the greatest reluctance and regret, that we have to give in. We cannot enforce the law that exists, and I am afraid that a mere change in the speed from twenty to thirty miles an hour would very likely not enable us to enforce the law. I admit that. I confess that, rather than have the proposal of the Government, I would prefer to have a speed limit applying to all vehicles. I think that the injustice of the proposal that the Government have indicated is impossible to defend. But I would rather try something which would be applied to all vehicles, and yet would not abandon altogether the conception of speed as a danger to the public, while not imposing an absolute, hard-and-fast line beyond which everyone was a lawbreaker. That seems to me to be the evil of the present system. The suggestion
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that I am laying before your Lordships is that you should have a speed which should be declared to be the proper, the safe speed—let me put it in that way—for all kinds of vehicles. No doubt very properly it would have to be very different in the case of heavy vehicles from what it was in the case of light ones, but it would be a safe speed. If then, any one driving beyond that speed was charged with dangerous driving on the ground that any speed greater than that was a danger in the condition of the road, it would be for him to say, it having been proved that he was going at a greater speed than the safe speed, that in all the circumstances of the case the speed was a safe one and that there was no danger to the public.
The case is put of a road on the top of a down with a perfectly clear line of vision all round so that there is no chance of anybody being hidden behind a bush or hedge and going across the road at the last minute, and it is said, on such a road as that is it not perfectly legitimate for any one to go as fast as he likes? I am not sure that any such road really exists. Such roads may exist but they are very rare. On all the roads I am acquainted with there are from time to time depressions in the ground and so on which may always conceal a child or something else. Supposing such roads do exist, it probably is safe to go at a very great speed, but if you are driving on the ordinary roads of this country I am satisfied that in the great majority of cases a speed greater than 35 miles an hour is commonly a dangerous speed, and the provision I should like to make is that anyone who drives at more than 35 miles an hour does it at his peril. He is prima facie driving dangerously unless he can show in point of fact that the circumstances were such as to make it safe.
With that provision there is no reason why it should not apply to vehicles of all kinds. You have a safe speed appropriate to each kind of vehicle and you say that, if the vehicle is going faster than that, then prima facie it is being driven dangerously. We are then never likely to be put in the humiliating position which we find ourselves now, a branch of the Legislature forced to admit that, because a branch of the law is habitually broken, it ought to be

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changed. We ought to avoid such a future contingency as that and it is for those reasons, broadly, that I propose the Amendment standing in my name.
Amendment moved—
Page 12, line 34, leave out subsection (1) and insert the said new subsection.—(Viscount Cecil of Chelwood.)
THE LORD CHAIRMAN: In order to save the rights of Lord Howe who has an Amendment later, I shall put the question in the form "That line 34 stand part of the Bill."
EARL RUSSELL: I have listened to the noble Viscount's arguments. They are arguments, of course, that we have heard before with I think one exception, which certainly has never been stressed so much before, and that is that the Legislature, humiliated by the motorist, is going to make this alteration because the country is not strong enough to enforce the law. That seems to me a complete mis-statement of the position. I am not prepared to admit that Parliament or the police are not strong enough to enforce any law in this country which it is thought proper should he enforced. The reason I ventured to give on the Second Reading is that public opinion condemns the law and does not believe in it. Public opinion thinks that the law has no moral sanction behind it and no reason behind it and that is why these police traps for speed alone have disappeared almost entirely in this country. I would recall to the noble Viscount on this point the evidence of a chief constable who was called before the Committee on his Bill. The question was put to him: "If you had had no Section 9 in existence in your county during the last three years would it have made any difference to you?" and he replied: "No difference whatever."
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD: I would remind my noble friend that there was very strong evidence from the Metropolitan Police to the exactly contrary effect.
EARL RUSSELL: But at the moment I was putting a case which was not that of the Metropolitan Police and I do not see why the noble Viscount wishes to correct me. The chief constable in question said he was able to manage his county—as is true of the majority of chief
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constables—without any reference to the existence on the Statute Book of Section 9 imposing a speed limit of twenty miles an hour. Since the noble Lord referred to the Metropolitan Police, may I say that a majority of chief constables at a meeting they held declared themselves against any fixed speed limit. It is perfectly true the Metropolitan Police and Metropolitan Magistrates have always taken a different view. They still take that view in spite of the Report of the Royal Commission. The law is not being altered because Parliament and the police are unable to enforce it. The law is being altered because the present law does not prevent motorists driving dangerously, and we desire to alter the law because we are quite certain a speed limit is not the way to stop it. That is the reason the law is being altered. This speed limit affords a protection which is entirely illusory. We want to afford a protection which is real and which will be insisted upon.
Then the noble Viscount said, as he was fully justified in saying as a debating point: "If what you say about the speed limit is true why does it not apply universally? Why should not everything go as fast as it can on all occasions?" There is no particular reason why it should not go as fast as is safe on all occasions, but it is obvious that what may be safe for a light motor car under proper control and with proper appliances is not safe for a large steam engine weighing from 11 to 15 tons. The same speed limit cannot be safe for both of them. My noble friend has delivered himself into my hands when he talked about a safe speed. I have already explained there is no such thing in all circumstances as a safe speed for any vehicle or at any moment. The speed which is safe is a constantly changing thing, no matter what the vehicle or what the circumstances. If you adopted the suggestion of the noble Viscount to fix a speed limit of thirty-five miles an hour on the ground that that is a safe speed, what is immediately the argument, what is immediately the psychological effect? It is that, in all save exceptional circumstances, thirty-five miles an hour is a safe speed and not a dangerous speed. That is exactly the psychology we desire to break down and put an end to. We desire to make it clear that any speed may be

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dangerous at any time and any place, that it must depend upon the circumstances and that you can never say ten miles an hour or fifteen miles an hour is safe any more than you can say twenty miles an hour or thirty-five miles an hour is safe.
This particular Amendment of the noble Lord suggests something to which I would have no objection as a test for myself. That is to say, that it puts the onus upon the driver of proving, if he is exceeding some arbitrary fixed speed, that he is not driving dangerously. So far as I personally am concerned I should not have the least objection to facing that test, but that is putting the law the wrong way round. The objection to it is what will follow when a speed limit is fixed and you have the necessary implication that speeds lower than that speed are safe. No speed is safe. You cannot have a safe speed either at the top or at the bottom of the scale. You must in each case take the circumstances as they stand. I am quite satisfied myself that the effect of this change and the administration of this new law by the police will be to impose greater caution upon motorists and not less. I should like to take this opportunity of thanking my noble friend Lord Brentford for what he said upon the Second Reading. Let no motorists suppose that what is intended by this Bill is to give them licence. It is not intended to convey to the motorist that because there is no speed limit he can drive as fast as he likes. Far from it. It is intended to convey to him that it is his duty at all times and in all places to drive at that speed which in the circumstances is safe, and if anyone makes the mistake of supposing that he will have a licence to drive furiously, I think and hope that the police will teach him that he has made a mistake.
Speed is now, under the old section which is included in this Bill, an element in dangerous driving, and may, if proved, be itself sufficient proof of dangerous driving in given circumstances. The old section, the words of which we have retained, provides that if any person drives at a speed which is dangerous to the public that will be an offence. I think your Lordships, if you adopted this Amendment, would check what I hope we are going to succeed in doing by this I
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Bill—namely, putting a new spirit into the motoring public—a spirit not of artificial limits but of caution at all places. I know the noble Viscount thinks that once a limit is fixed it will have some effect upon people. Upon reckless motorists it will have no effect. Upon the more or less careful motorist it may have the very dangerous effect of making him think that too high a speed is a safe speed. I hope that we may take this Amendment as a test Amendment.
THE EARL OF HALSBURY: After the noble Earl opposite has replied in that form, I feel great diffidence in saying anything more, but anybody who has dealt with the question of motorists, both in the civil and the criminal courts, knows perfectly well that every motorist, either upon a criminal charge or in civil litigation, always says at once: "Oh, I was driving under twenty miles an hour." We know perfectly well what the effect of having a speed limit has been. If you have a speed limit of twenty miles an hour everybody thinks he is entitled at all times to drive up to twenty miles an hour. If the noble Viscount would take out his car and drive it himself—
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD: I have not got one.
THE EARL OF HALSBURY: If the noble Viscount allowed himself to be driven past a school at an hour when the children were rushing out from that school, he would realise at once that a mile an hour might be too great a speed at which to go.
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD: No one doubts it.
THE EARL OF HALSBURY: If you have a thirty-mile an hour limit you get people to think that they are always entitled to go at thirty miles; and they are not. As the noble Earl opposite has said, you have to take into consideration every particular circumstance for a particular spot. The noble Viscount has put down an Amendment in which he puts it upon a person to prove a negative, which I thought was absolutely wrong from all ideas of legislation. The person has to prove that the speed could not involve danger to the public. How on earth is he going to prove that it could not be dangerous to the public? It is a perfectly novel idea in our jurisprudence.

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Then see what the effect is going to be. Has the noble Viscount looked at paragraph 5 of the First Schedule? Supposing you get an invalid carriage or ambulance coming up with a patient who is being rushed to hospital: are you going to involve the driver of that ambulance, in the penalties under Clause 101? That is the present proposal—namely, that he is guilty of the offence of dangerous driving under Clause 11, unless the driver can prove that it could not have been dangerous. Is it contemplated that in those particular circumstances the person is to be left to die upon the ambulance rather than that the driver should take upon himself the risk of going to prison for three months if he is not able to prove that his driving was not dangerous to the public? Again, who is the public? Is it the person on the ambulance or the person on the street? Your Lordships will also observe that there are very heavy penalties, unless the driver can prove a negative.
The noble Viscount has drawn attention to the fact that a difference is made between two different kinds of vehicles. Let me give your Lordships an instance. Take the motor car used by the ordinary man with an ordinary and not very great income. I resent very much that it should be suggested that these light Morris cars or Baby Austin oars should be necessarily the perquisite of the rich They are not, and they are to be exempted from the speed limit. Then the noble Viscount asks, Why not all? Can you really draw a parallel between such a car as a Morris-Cowley and a large char-a-bancs? In the case of the Morris-Cowley you are probably dealing with a person who both drives and owns the car. That is not the case of the char-a-bancs. There you are dealing with the unfortunate driver, who is scheduled to drive according to a time-table, and who knows that he will be dismissed if he does not keep to the schedule. If you look at this Bill, that is very nicely provided for by subsection (4) of Clause 101. There you are dealing with these big vehicles, and the owner has to show, not a negative but a positive, and a very good positive to. He has to show that he has "used due diligence to enforce the execution of this Act," and if he does not do that then the owner, as well as the driver, is responsible.
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD: It does not let off the driver.
THE EARL OF HALSBUKY: No, but it ropes in the owner, and it seems to me there is very good reason why there should be differentiation between the owner-driver of a light car, who is probably not a rich man, and the managing owner of a big char-a-bancs company, who probably is. I do not approve of a speed limit, and I hope your Lordships will not accede to this Amendment. If it be taken as a test on the question of a speed limit, I hope you will reject it, and certainly on its particular wording I hope you will have nothing to do with it.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM: I would like to ask whether, if we vote against this Amendment, it will be open afterwards to put in a speed limit? I am in favour of a speed limit, but I do not want to waste time by discussing it now if we can discuss it later on. I cannot support the Amendment, because it says there shall be a speed limit later on but that if a man can prove that he was not driving dangerously then the speed limit vanishes.
VISCOUNT SUMNER: I do not think the noble Earl opposite, or the noble Earl who spoke last but one, has really grappled with one point which stood out in the speech of Lord Cecil as a fresh point. It is a little difficult to discuss this because this Amendment involves a reference to the Schedule and to the Amendments to the Schedule, but we ought to bear in mind that this part of the noble Viscount's scheme will introduce into the Schedule that which is absent at present, a speed limit of 35 miles an hour for those private motor cars which are now, according to the Schedule, to have no limit. The point that he has raised, to which no answer has been attempted, and, I think, no answer is possible, is this: How do you think that you can enforce speed limits upon commercial cars when uncommercial cars are to be free from any speed limit at all?
The arguments that have been urged by the noble Earl opposite against speed limits upon the ground that they mislead the mind of the chauffeur into thinking that to him all things are lawful, and it docs not matter whether they are expedient

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or not so long as he keeps within his speed limit, apply equally to the driver of a commercial vehicle, who has a speed limit. And how does anyone who has witnessed the enormous driving force of the organised motoring interests, displayed through all these debates, think that it will be possible to choke off the opposition and the attacks of the organised owners and drivers of vehicles which are to be subject to a speed limit? Whatever else you must have in a Bill like this, it appears to me that in the matter of a speed limit it must be the same for everybody. That is the fundamental principle, I understand, of modern democracy—that everything must be the same for everybody; and at any rate if you keep up a speed limit for one class of motor car and none for another you only bring over again the sad chapter of our experiences now for nearly a generation, and, owing to what is called public opinion—which means the organised desire of motorists to go faster and faster and faster, and nothing else—the law will once more be defied and, a sufficient body of lawless persons having met with a sufficient body of inept magistrates, the result will be that the law will have to go by the board.
I should not like to see that happen again in my time. But that is what will happen. No democratic Government will stand up against the organised demand by the owners of commercial vehicles to have their speed limit abolished, if the Government propose to maintain a discrimination and to leave one class of cars free. I do not at this present moment wish to commit myself to a preference between speed limits for all or speed limits for nobody, but I am quite satisfied that you cannot have this half-and-half scheme anyway. If you are to have a speed limit, I think it is reasonable to make it high, that is to say, high in comparison with the capacity of the modern car, not only for speed but for stopping. If Parliament had done its duty twenty-years ago it would have amended the twenty-mile limit by a single-clause Act of Parliament, because when the motor car ceased to be an uncertain and often dangerous piece of mechanism, and had been developed far more rapidly than public opinion developed into a highly flexible and easily controllable piece of machinery, then was the time to have
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altered the speed limit and make it more rational. Then would have been the time when we might have hoped that benches of magistrates might have enforced the law, instead of betraying it.
But as it is, we have now reached a stage when, if there is to be a speed limit at all, it must be high. I cannot understand why, if there is one at all, it should not be a perfectly rational plan to adopt the noble Viscount's suggestion, not of proving a negative or any other chop-logic of that kind, but, by changing the burden of proof, calling upon the man who has exceeded the speed limit laid down for him to show that he did no harm. It is a thing that is perfectly familiar in the Admiralty Court, where, if you break the sea rules prescribed by law, you are held to blame unless you can show that you could not have done any harm—that it could not have led to an accident. In the same way, if you only use the positive expression here, and instead of saying "could not involve danger to the public" you say "was safe to the public" there will be no difficulty in the matter. I ask your Lordships to consider this, not as part of the trite and almost tedious controversy which has gone on between the speed men and those who wish to walk about peacefully, but as a matter of practical legislation, and I ask you to try the experiment of putting the burden of proof that he was doing right on the man who prima facie is doing wrong by exceeding a speed limit. And if you are going to decide to have no speed limit at all, I would like you to ask yourselves the question, considering the multitude of cars driving on the roads, and considering how much driving to the common danger can be done without breaking anybody's neck, what chance do you think the police have of proving a case against people who, if only let alone, will break every law on the subject that there is?
LORD DANESFORT: The question of the speed limit is one which affects the comfort and, it may be, the lives of almost every man, woman, and child in this country, and what we are considering at the moment is this: shall we, by abolishing the speed limit, reduce the appalling death toll consequent upon the driving of motor cars—some six thousand deaths every year—and shall we reduce the terrible injury to limb, something like

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150,000 a year from the same cause? I suppose we all have our own individual opinions, formed partly by prejudice—I do not deny that in my own case prejudice may exist—opinions formed very often by very imperfect experience. In a matter of this sort I suggest that it would be wiser to accept the opinion of experts who have had most opportunity of testing by actual practice what the best course to be adopted is. I look at the Report of the Royal Commission and I find that among those who are in favour of retaining a speed limit (and I do not say for the moment what it should be) is, first of all, the Commissioner of Police in the Metropolis. Well, he has an enormous experience, he has a huge area to cover, and his deliberate opinion is that there should be a speed limit. The majority of the city and borough chief constables with very wide experience are also in favour of retaining the speed limit. Then there are the Metropolitan Magistrates and also, as I understand, the Magistrates' Association generally, who are in favour of the speed limit. Surely the persons before whom these cases come, who hear the evidence in each case, know to what the accidents are due: they, too, are in favour of keeping the speed limit.
And what is the alternative? The alternative, if you abolish the speed limit, is to rely solely on the prohibition of driving to the danger of the public. I venture to say that that is no real protection. Driving to the danger of the public is very largely a matter of individual opinion, and very often a matter—as, indeed, the Royal Commission's Report finds—of the individual opinion of the bench before whom the case comes. The Report says that from the point of view of the Royal Commission it is very difficult to rely upon laws as to dangerous driving. In point of fact, the Commissioner of Police in the Metropolis says that it is very difficult to get a conviction for dangerous driving unless an accident has taken place. Now you are going to substitute for all speed limits for these lighter cars this question of dangerous driving, and yet we have evidence from the experts who say that many magistrates will not convict for dangerous driving unless someone has been killed or injured. Is that a right state of things?
It is quite true the Report also states that there are some chief constables who say that they can get convictions sometimes
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even though there is no actual accident. Other chief constables say they find a great difficulty in getting convictions if there is no accident. Surely the fact that there is this difficulty in getting convictions in cases where the charge is driving to the danger of the public, shows that you cannot rely alone upon danger to the public in order to protect the public from these terrible casualities which now take place. The Report suggests—and I think the Bill carries out the suggestion to a certain extent—that if you greatly increase the penalty for driving to the danger of the public you will probably have better results. Surely, if you are going to increase these penalties, you increase the difficulty of getting convictions. It is difficult enough now to get convictions in cases of driving to the public danger. Those benches of magistrates who already are averse from giving convictions in these cases would be far more averse from finding there is danger to the public when the penalties are greatly increased, as the Bill proposes to increase them.
I have given your Lordships a list of some of the experts who gave evidence. Who are the people in favour of abolishing the speed limit? They are all motor organisations, but, very significantly, the Report says, that is exactly as might be expected. They want their members to be able to drive fast. That is the inference which I gather from the Report. They do not want to have any speed limit put upon the people who belong to their associations. There are certainly some county councils who favour the abolition of the speed limit, and no doubt their opinions are of value—I do not suggest for a moment they are not—but taking the police and magistrates, and the chief constables whose opinions I have already cited, I think there is no comparison in the weight of evidence in favour of retaining the speed limit as compared with the evidence which desires to abolish it.
The noble Earl, Lord Russell, says—and I think my noble friend Lord Halsbury said something of the same kind—that motorists will think that if there is a speed limit they can always drive up to that limit safely. Supposing there is a speed limit of thirty-five miles an hour, is there any motorist so senseless, so reckless, so abandoned that, if the speed limit is put at thirty-five an hour, he will think that

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he can drive in a crowded street in London at thirty-five miles an hour, past all the side streets and everything else? If there is such a person the sooner he comes under the observation and the correction of the law the better. The truth is that motorists are not—I was going to say such fools—so reckless, perhaps I might say they are not such criminals as to suppose if the speed limit is thirty-five miles an hour, they can drive anywhere and everywhere at thirty-five miles an hour. Of course they will use their discretion, especially when they know that a penalty is attached if they are found exceeding the limit.
There was a reason given for abolishing the speed limit by certain of those who came before the Royal Commission. They said: "Speed is not in itself dangerous if the car is under control." That is just the question—if it is under control. If you have a heavy car going at thirty, forty or fifty miles an hour upon a road which may be slippery and if that car has to be pulled up suddenly it will skid and go into the bank or into some other car. The truth is when you have a car going at a high speed, especially a heavy car, it cannot be said that it is under control. Cars come from round the corner, and children and dogs come out of doors—and I do not think your Lordships will leave dogs out of the question—to cross the road, and the man with the best intention in the world cannot pull up. Therefore, this suggestion that speed is not in itself dangerous is a very misleading one and I would ask your Lordships to pay little attention to it. When I am told that speed in itself is not at all dangerous I ask myself: Why is it that when we had nothing but horse traffic the number of casualties on the road was exceedingly small, and why is it now that we have motor traffic we have 6,000 deaths a year and 150,000 injuries? Surely, the answer is: "Because the motor goes twice, thrice, four times as fast as the horse." Therefore, I beg your Lordships to have regard to the evidence that was given by the experts and to vote for the Amendment of my noble friend Lord Cecil.
EARL HOWE: Perhaps at this stage the noble Earl opposite (Earl Russell) would like me to say what I have to say on my Amendment, and I may be forgiven if I address my remarks on the
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speed limit upon the Amendment of my noble friend Lord Cecil. The Amendment we are discussing now proposes to raise the speed limit to 35 miles an hour. In my Amendment I desire to raise the speed limit to 40 miles an hour. The reason I want to have the speed limit is a purely personal one. I do not in any sense represent anybody except myself in speaking on this particular Amendment. A good deal has been said this afternoon upon the subject of the psychological effect of speed limits. At an earlier stage we decided the question of the examination of drivers. If the House had been able to agree to the Amendment, which in that case was moved by the noble Viscount (Viscount Cecil of Chelwood) and had set up a system of examination of drivers, I myself should not have desired to move my own Amendment. As the House was not able to accept that, I am to a certain extent afraid of the psychological effect.
I hold the view that there are a number of people in these days of mass-produced vehicles—an increasing number of people—who drive motor cars on the road with very little road sense and very little imagination. I do not believe that there are very many intentionally reckless drivers; in fact I am sure there are very few. I believe those who do err, err much more sometimes from inattention and sometimes from lack of imagination. I believe they err in many respects unwittingly, but I am a little afraid of the effect of the total removal of the speed limit. I am afraid that if it encourages a number of comparatively speaking inefficient drivers to put up their general speed it may result in an increase in disasters. The one thing I am most anxious about in this Bill is that whatever we do we should try to do something to lessen the appalling total of road casualties which are published from time to time.
Now in my submission the trouble with regard to the speed limit, and the reason why it has been so consistently disregarded, as it undoubtedly has been, is to be found in the altogether unequal operation of the speed limit clause. You go from a County like Kent where no one, I think, has ever seen a speed limit trap, to a County like Surrey where the police adopt methods which have in time become quite notorious in character. You go from there to Hertfordshire where

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again you will hardly, if ever, find a single speed limit trap. If there is going to be one you may perhaps see a notice in the newspapers from the chief constable warning everybody that he has had complaints about excessive speed and that unless the complaints are reduced he will have to set up a control. That is the reasonable way of doing things. A motorist, however, travelling from one area to another never knows how the speed limit will be administered. In one area he is subject to rigid control and in another no notice is taken of him so long as he does not endanger anybody in a town or in an urban area.
If we do away with speed limit offences and leave the motorist to be dealt with under the dangerous driving or careless driving clause, then I would like to submit to your Lordships that the matter will become very largely, or may become very largely, unless unhappily some accident results, a matter of personal opinion. On the other hand exceeding the speed limit is a question of fact. I was very much attracted by the argument put forward by the noble and learned Viscount, Lord Summer, when he alluded to that point. My noble friend Viscount Cecil gave us a very gloomy view when he said that those who wanted to do away with the speed limit were probably representatives of the rich. I rather traverse what he said, in company with what the noble Earl, Lord Halsbury said, because I think he must have forgotten that motor cycles are also included under this Bill, and that it is proposed that the speed limit for motor cycles also should be abolished. I do not think he was quite fair to people who use motor vehicles when he suggested that it was only people who are the fortunate possessors of this world's goods who desire to do away with the speed limit. Equally I do not think the noble Lord, Lord Danesfort, was quite fair to the motoring organisations when he said they wanted to drive fast. It is purely a difference of opinion as to whether it is better to control motor cars by limiting their speed or by imposing more severe penalties for dangerous driving, or perhaps both. I submit to your Lordships that there is a psychological danger that if you do away with the speed limit certain people who are not really qualified to drive their vehicles will be induced to
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go faster, it is for that reason that I desire to submit to your Lordships the Amendments I have put on the Paper.
EARL RUSSELL: When I was listening to the noble Earl I could not help asking myself one or two questions. He has put on the Paper an Amendment to impose a speed limit of forty miles an hour. That is the speed limit that he has chosen himself. I am not going to put questions to him, but I could not help asking myself one or two questions. If this is to be the speed limit, does the noble Earl propose invariably to observe it? That was one of the questions. When the speed limit was twenty miles an hour was the noble Earl never accused at any time of going at more than forty miles an hour even with that limit? Is it not true that these limits are to be merely fanciful things not intended to be observed and not intended to be a rigid code of law which people are bound to observe? I just want to add one other word in reference to the noble Lord, Lord Danesfort. He quoted a great many authorities, and most of those he quoted were of his own way of thinking, but he left out one authority. There was one authority that listened to the whole of the evidence, that heard what everybody had to say on all sides, and that was the Royal Commission. That authority would surely have no prejudged opinion and that authority came down unanimously against the continuance of the speed limit.
LORD RAGLAN: In many parts of the country and in one part of Scotland especially which I know very well there has been for many years no prosecution for exceeding the speed limit. I am not aware that anybody has suggested that there are more accidents there than in places where the speed limit is enforced. There is also, I believe, one county in England where for many years there has been no prosecution and there again I do not think there are any more accidents.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM: There are not so many cars perhaps.
LORD RAGLAN: Oh, yes there are. In many parts of the country this proposal in the Bill will not mean so radical a change as some of my noble friends seem to think.
THE EARL OF ONSLOW: There is one point which I should like to mention which has not yet been mentioned. I think there are countries abroad where there is no speed limit, and what happens, I think, is that people are rather inclined to break records in getting from one point to another—to do, say, 600 miles in a day. I must say I do not think that is a desirable thing. If there were a speed limit they could not do it. I have looked carefully at Clause 13 and I do not think it would cover that. My noble friend behind me suggested that the rate of driving all over the country would rise if we did not have a speed limit. I think that is probably true, and that people would set out to make records, and I think your Lordships will agree that that would be undesirable.
EARL HOWE: The noble Earl opposite has put some questions to me.
EARL RUSSELL: No, I put them to myself.
EARL HOWE: Perhaps I might claim the indulgence of your Lordships' House to answer the questions. As far as speed limits are concerned, personally I have observed or disregarded them as much in the past as the fortunate possessor of Motor Car A 1. If I might, I should like to suggest that if the noble Earl cannot accept my Amendment or the Amendment of the noble Viscount he might perhaps consider whether some sort of recommendation to this effect could not be included with advantage in the code which the Minister proposes to issue.
LORD ATKIN: I feel a little difficulty in seeing how we can determine whether a speed limit is desirable or not upon the actual proposal made in this Amendment, because I for my part am quite able to appreciate the point of view of those who say they think there ought to be a speed limit of some kind and yet may entirely object to the proposal of this Amendment. Certainly it seems to me that—unfortunately not for the first time—we have a proposal for a new criminal offence made in a way which is quite contrary to the spirit in which we generally provide for criminal offences. It is proposed that now and for the future there shall be the criminal offence of driving to the danger of the public and in certain circumstances the onus
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will be thrown upon the accused person of proving that he is innocent of that particular offence. I think that is wrong and I venture to suggest that the real objection to this Amendment is that it mixes up the question of the speed limit with the question of dangerous driving.
I had hoped, and I still hope, that as a result of passing this Bill there will be a new era in respect of the way in which people enforce the law as to dangerous driving and in saying that I particularly refer to courts of summary jurisdiction. In the past they have been careless and lax in respect of that offence, which is a very serious one, and I hope that in the future prosecutions will be more numerous, the attention of the police will be directed more to this offence, apart from any question of the speed limit, and punishment will be tightened up. I am quite sure that benches of magistrates have not in the past been severe enough in eases of dangerous driving, and I agree with what has been said that in some courts magistrates have taken the view—to my mind an entirely fallacious one—that there cannot be dangerous driving unless some person has been actually endangered at the time. That seems to me to be entirely wrong. I have always taken the view that the reckless driver who drives round a blind corner or up a hill with a blind brow is a very serious offender against the public interest and ought to be dealt with very seriously indeed. It is pure accident, in cases of that kind, that the man has not committed manslaughter. It is pure chance whether there was somebody round that corner or just beyond the brow of the hill. He takes the risk and, to my mind, he ought to be dealt with very seriously. You will never get magistrates to view the case from that aspect so long as the question of dangerous driving is mixed up with the entirely different question of whether or not a person has committed a breach of the speed limit. In itself the speed limit has no connection with the public danger.
You will observe that by this Amendment—
"Any person who drives a motor vehicle at a speed greater than the speed specified in the First Schedule of this Act as the maximum speed in relation to a vehicle of that class or description shall be deemed to have been guilty of dangerous driving as

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hereinafter defined unless he can show that in the actual circumstances of the case such greater speed could not involve danger to the public."
This involves the whole question of the speed limit, so that the magistrate will have to consider cases of a man driving a heavy lorry who is charged with exceeding twenty-two miles an hour, or a person driving a light van at thirty-two miles an hour or of somebody else driving at twenty-seven miles an hour. The court will have to assume that the man was guilty of dangerous driving unless he can prove that he had not endangered the public. That seems to me to be a very unfortunate state of things. It is confusing the speed limit with the entirely different question of driving to the public danger, and the result will be that the attention that ought to be directed to serious eases of dangerous driving will be deflected again to the question of the speed limit, which is much less important.
There is one other point to which I should like to call the attention of the Committee. It constantly happens in practice that a man charged with exceeding the speed limit will admit that it was quite true that he was driving at thirty-seven miles an hour, or whatever it may be. He pleads guilty and leaves it to the magistrate to impose a fine. But, if this Amendment is agreed to, if he is charged with exceeding the speed limit, in every case he may find himself convicted of dangerous driving unless he appears in court and proves a negative. This would impose a very serious burden upon him. I hope that in the interests of the country and in the interests of this Bill, which, I think, has made a clear distinction between the speed limit and dangerous driving, we shall concentrate on dangerous driving. Do not let us mix it up with the question of the speed limit. Driving at any speed may be evidence of dangerous driving, but do not let us mix it up with some statutory speed limit. I venture to suggest that it would be a very grave misfortune if we did any such thing, and accordingly, whether we have a speed limit or not, I hope that the House will decide against the Amendment of the noble Viscount.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: There is one point that has not been mentioned in regard to the speed limit. As the noble Earl will remember from the speech that
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I made on the Second Reading, I am not an advocate of high speed. I felt very considerable diffidence before I agreed to the proposal to eliminate the speed limit from the Bill. What I think caused me to agree to that proposal was the real difficulty of enforcing a speed limit. Whether you make it twenty or thirty-five or forty miles an hour, as my noble friend Lord Howe wants to make it, you can enforce it only by what are commonly called police traps. If the House now, after twenty years, is going to consider the question over again and definitely decide on a particular speed—let us say forty miles an hour—it must be that Parliament definitely decides that this speed limit is to be obeyed. It is quite impossible that we should pass a speed limit and not ask the police of the country to see that it is properly observed. One of my noble friends behind me has told the Committee of two countries that he knows where there is no speed limit in operation.
As your Lordships know, I was responsible for the administration of the police for some years and, from the knowledge that I have, I say that it is quite impossible to enforce a speed limit of any kind as it should be enforced with anything like the present numbers of police. All over the country the police are doing their utmost to cope with the ordinary duties that fall upon them, and if you are going to enforce a speed limit, as it has not been enforced for the last ten years, you will have to have an enormous number of policemen in addition to those you have at present to enforce the limit by the only possible means—namely, police traps. If you are going to do that, you will place a very heavy additional expense upon the ratepayers and upon the Government. Let me say at once what you are going to do. You are going to do what you did a few years ago—namely, to render the police more unpopular. There is no doubt whatever, as I said in a speech in the other House some years ago when the police of the country were passing through a clouded period, that a great deal of their unpopularity was due to the fact that in certain districts they were compelled, quite rightly, to enforce a speed limit which was not in accordance with public opinion at the time. As one who has been responsible for the police, I hate to see them engaged in a duty

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which has not the approval of the great mass of the people behind it.
I put it to your Lordships that, if you decide on a speed limit—decide if you like—you must be faced with the fact that you have to enforce it. Can you do so? Many of your Lordships are magistrates, many are on standing joint committees or are responsible for the administration of the law, and know exactly the position of the police forces in the counties. Are you prepared to go down to your counties and county benches and standing joint committees and say that this speed limit of forty miles an hour, or whatever it is, is to be enforced, that Parliament has decided the whole question over again and that, in the interests of public morality, you have to enforce it? I am sure your Lordships know that nothing is worse than to have an Act of Parliament, particularly a modern Act of Parliament passed after full consideration, if it is not, or perhaps cannot be, enforced.
I should like to add how entirely I agree with the speech of my noble and learned friend Lord Atkin. Some years ago, when I was addressing the Automobile Association—I resigned the Chairmanship of that body when I became a Minister—I warned its members that if they asked for the abolition of the speed limit, they would be subjecting themselves to a much more serious position. At whatever speed a motorist drives, if he drives dangerously it is right and proper that he should be most severely punished, and I believe that my noble friend will admit that is the right line. The main argument I have in opposing the Amendment is to ask your Lordships, are you going to enforce it or not? I do not believe anybody ought to Vote for the reimposition of a new speed limit unless he is prepared in his own county and on his own bench to see it carried out.
THE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY: I only want to make sure of one point which is of interest to all those who, like myself, are constantly on the road. I was much impressed by what my noble friend Earl Russell said about the mental effect of a speed limit which induces a driver to suppose that, if he is driving within that limit, he is driving safely. Why does not that apply equally to the speed limits which
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are specified in this Bill for other classes of motor vehicles than the ordinary kind of car? Surely the effect of each of these provisions of a speed limit must be to induce the drivers of the different classes of vehicles to suppose that, if they keep within those limits, they are driving safely. Whereas the whole argument of my noble friend Lord Russell was that it was very dangerous to make anybody suppose that observance of any limit whatever was necessarily safe.
Similarly, I should have thought that the tendency of retaining these different speed limits would be to induce magistrates to come to the conclusion that, if a driver of one or other of these specified classes of vehicles kept within the speed limits in the schedule, it would rebut any charge that he had been driving dangerously. I can understand entirely abolishing the speed limit and relying entirely upon the charge of dangerous driving. I can also understand retaining the speed limit everywhere. What I cannot understand is that you retain it in all these other classes of vehicles and abolish it in the case of the drivers of private cars. My own feeling, deepened by the tendency of this debate, is that probably the wisest thing is no longer to rely on speed limits of any kind but to induce a state of public opinion that calls for vigilance and care on the part of motorists and that insists on the part of magistrates that the least tendency towards dangerous driving should be severely punished.
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD: I do not wish to detain your Lordships but I should like to say a few words on the course of the debate. First of all with regard to the speech of my noble friend Lord Atkin, I really was very much interested by it. I have the greatest respect for him and I could not follow or agree with any single sentence he uttered. He began by saying it was a very wicked thing indeed to throw the onus of proof upon the accused. Surely, it is the commonest thing in the world, once a prima facie case has been proved against somebody in a number of different offences, for him to have to prove that in point of fact, though that was true, it did not amount to the offence with which he was charged. My knowledge of the law is infinitely inferior

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to his but my recollection is that in a great number of cases—in connection with adulteration for instance—that is the condition of the law and I have no doubt anybody more familiar with the law can give a great number of instances. It is applying no new principle but an ordinary principle, after proving a prima facie case, to ask the driver if he can show any kind of fact which proves that it does; not amount to causing danger to the public. Whether you accept the phrasing of Lord Sumner, which is very much better, or of myself, that is surely a very legitimate thing to do.
I press very strongly upon the noble Lord the great importance, even from his own point of view, of some such provision. He relies on dangerous driving. That is his great idea. He wants dangerous driving and a very severe penalty. I believe that is entirely wrong. It is not a question of very severe penalties. That has never been the way in which the law has been enforced. It has been enforced by certainty of punishment and not by very severe punishments and great uncertainty as to whether you are punished at all. The reckless man, if he thinks the chances are five to one against his being punished at all, will continue to be reckless and it does not make a great deal of difference to him whether the, penalty at the end is very severe or not. The thing is certainty of punishment and, if you rely on dangerous driving alone, you leave it in the greatest uncertainty possible. Dangerous driving is necessarily a matter of opinion. The noble Lord gave instances of going round a comer too fast, or on the wrong side, and things of that kind. Some people will think it depends upon the corner. There are extreme cases which everybody would agree are dangerous but, unless you lay down particulars to some extent, you will find the greatest uncertainty and variety as to what will happen in each particular case. You will encourage people by giving greater probability of their being able to escape. The noble Lord wanted to know whether speed may be dangerous driving. That has, been the condition of the law up till now. Dangerous driving has been one offence; exceeding the speed limit has been another. Is he satisfied? No. He wants to abolish speed as an
1302
element of dangerous driving. He wants to go further than the noble Earl, who says that speed is to be an element of dangerous driving, and to say that speed should not be an element.
He went on to say how difficult it would be to enforce my Amendment with its various speeds. That is a difficulty with the Bill as it is drawn. It is a very great difficulty which the noble Earl has said ought to be dealt with to some extent when he comes to the Schedule by reducing the number of categories. I do not want to go through all that has been said. With what has fallen from the most reverend Primate I entirely agree. You can rely on the conception of dangerous driving alone or on the conception of driving above a certain limit, but there is a third course, which is the one suggested in this Amendment—namely, that you should not regard exceeding the speed limit as conclusive but merely as prima facie evidence of dangerous driving. That seems to me a provision in the Amendment with which my noble friend Lord Brentford did not deal. He treated it simply as an Amendment in order to enforce a speed limit. It is not that. I quite agree with him that, if it was that, it would be open to the objection he raised, that you would have to have a large force of police to enforce it. In this Amendment that is not so. You concentrate the mind of the driver on what is safe. That is the whole point of the Amendment and you do so much more than you do under the Bill as it stands.
I shall not detain your Lordships any longer I only want to say one word as to what fell from my noble friend Earl Russell. He said that there is no such thing as a safe speed. I agree, but that is not the defence of his Bill. As the most reverend Primate pointed out, he relies on particular speeds as safe speeds or otherwise as scheduled for the great mass of vehicles other than these favoured and privileged private motor cars. I know that several noble Lords have taken me to task for suggesting that is unduly favouring a particular section of the population. I do not want to press that unduly, but it is a fact which your Lordships ought to bear in mind that in the main most of the people who will be freed from the speed limit will be the rich people of the country. You cannot get

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over it. I do not know whether it will be right or wrong, but it will be the fact.
I cannot help feeling that fundamentally, although Lord Russell did not use the expression, he has still got in his mind what I have often heard him state, that speed is not in itself dangerous. It is really a fallacy. It is a fallacy which I am surprised should have taken in so acute an intellect as that of my noble friend. Of course speed is not dangerous in itself. That is to say, if you take a car into the middle of the Sahara Desert you can drive it as fast as you like without danger, except to yourself, but it is much more dangerous, in the kind of conditions which you find on the ordinary English road to drive at sixty rather than thirty or twenty miles an hour. There cannot be any question about it. The case which you have to meet is the unforeseen danger, and you can stop much more readily, and take measures to avoid serious danger, if you are going slowly than if you are going fast, and if, unhappily, you do not succeed in avoiding an accident, you do less damage according to the slower speed at which you are going.
When you say that speed is not in itself dangerous, that is true, but no more is careless driving dangerous, or driving when you are drunk. It all depends upon the circumstances in which it is done. If you are in a desert you can drive at any speed, and be blind drunk, and yet do no harm to anybody except yourself. Speed is an element of danger, and nothing else. I do believe that it is an element. Much more than that, I believe that 99 per cent., or at any rate a very considerable proportion of accidents, are due in the end to driving too fast—not exceeding, I quite agree, this or that limit, but driving too fast. It is the general cause of accidents. Those who drive fast ought to know that they are encouraging, and deliberately encouraging, the fearful toll of accidents which take place. That is the whole truth. The parts of the roads where people in fact drive fast are the commonest places for accidents to occur. It is not in the crowded parts of the towns, where they have to drive slowly, but in the relatively open places, where they can get up a good speed. It is for that reason that I say it is perfectly legitimate and reasonable to say that speed ought to be
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recognised as an element in dangerous, driving, and unless we are going to leave it to be a matter of opinion, with all the uncertainty and consequent ineffectiveness of the law, then it is reasonable to say, broadly speaking, that on the roads of England at any rate you should not drive at more than 30 miles an hour, unless you are perfectly certain that you are not doing so to the danger of the public. For these reasons I feel that I must press my Amendment to a Division.
EARL RUSSELL: I am not at all surprised that the logical mind of the most rev. Primate put a question to me as to the difference between the speed limit for heavy cars and no limit for light cars. I shall be perfectly ready to develop that subject when the time comes, but I will merely say this now, that the conditions are altogether different. First of all those cars are generally driven by more or less responsible people, and the vast majority are under control. Secondly, and quite equally important, we have to regard, in connection with those vehicles and their lower speed, the wear and tear of the roads. That is one of the reasons, and a most important reason, for the lower speeds for these heavy vehicles. They do an infinite amount of damage to the roads when travelling at higher speed. I really rose in order to make a suggestion to the Committee, in the interests of convenience. Lord Cecil's Amendment has apparently a certain want of friends in its own substance, and I think that if the Committee would like to express its opinion as to the speed limit it might be well perhaps if we first negatived the noble Viscount's Amendment, and then took the question of speed limit on the next Amendment by Lord Howe. That will give us a clear-cut issue on the question of a speed limit.
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD: I shall certainly divide on my Amendment.
THE LORD CHAIRMAN: I will put the question in this form, namely: Clause 10, page 12, line 34, that line 34 stand part of the Bill.
On Question, Whether the words proposed to be left out shall stand part of the Bill?
Their Lordships divided: Contents, 64; Not-Contents, 8.

CONTENTS

Parmoor, L. (L. President.)

Falkland, V.

Hemphill, L.

Hood, V.

Manners, L.

Argyll, D.

Hutchinson, V. (E. Donoughmore.)

Marks, L. [Teller.]

Wellington, D.

Merthyr, L.

Monkswell, L.

Beading, M.

Southwark, L. Bp.

Oriel, L. (V. Massereene.)

Salisbury, M.

Ormonde, L. (M. Ormonde.)

Beauchamp, E.

Amulree, L.

Passfield, L.

Clarendon, E.

Armstrong, L.

Ponsonby, L. (E. Bessborough.)

Cottenham, E.

Arnold, L.

De La Warr, E. [Teller.]

Askwith, L.

Raglan, L.

Halsbury, E.

Atkin, L.

Redesdale, L.

Lauderdale, E.

Auckland, L.

Remnant, L.

Lucan, E.

Banbury of Southam, L.

Ritchie of Dundee, L.

Malmesbury, E.

Clanwilliam, L. (E. Clanwilliam.)

Russell of Liverpool, L.

Morton, E.

St. John of Bletso, L.

Russell, E.

Clwyd, L.

Sandhurst, L.

Stanhope, E.

Cornwallis, L.

Shandon, L.

Vane, E. (M. Londonderry.)

Darling, L.

Stanley of Alderley, L. (L. Sheffield.)

de Clifford, L.

Allendale, V.

Denman, L.

Swaythling, L.

Bertie of Thame, V.

Desart, L. (E. Desart.)

Teynham, L.

Brentford, V.

Dynevor, L.

Thomson, L.

Chaplin, V.

Faringdon, L.

Wavertree, L.

Churchill, V.

NOT-CONTENTS.

Cecil of Chelwood, V. [Teller.]

Gladstone V.

Sumner, V.

Knutsford, V.

Danesfort, L. [Teller.]

Falmouth, V.

Novar, V.

Newton, L.

Resolved in the negative, and Amendment disagreed to accordingly.
EARL HOWE EARL HOWE moved, in subsection (1), after "drive," to insert "any motor vehicle on a road at a greater speed than forty miles per hour or."The noble Lord said: I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 16, line 35, after ("drive") insert ("any motor vehicle on a road at a greater speed than forty miles per hour or").—(Earl Howe.)
EARL RUSSELL: It seems to me that this has been decided by the last Division. Of course, we shall resist this Amendment.
On Question, Amendment negatived.
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD moved to leave out subsections (2) and (3). The noble Viscount said: This is a very short point, but I do not understand on what ground the Bill says that it shall be impossible to suspend the, licence of a person guilty of an offence for the first or second time. I should have thought that it would carry out the wishes at any rate of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Atkin, not to limit the discretion of the tribunal in this respect. I should have thought that in
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every case of this kind there ought to be a power at any rate on the part of the court to suspend the licence.
Amendment moved—
Page 13, line 1, leave out subsections (2) and (3).—(Viscount Cecil of Chelwood.)
EARL RUSSELL: We certainly had thought this Amendment was consequential, but if the noble Viscount puts it as a substantive point I think the short answer is that, first of all, it has been the law now for a very long time that there should not be a disqualification on a first or second conviction for a speed offence; and, secondly, we do not think it is a proper penalty to impose, or that a mere excess of the speed in the Schedule is in itself a thing which should properly lead to a man being disqualified, unless he made a habit and practice of doing it. I am afraid we cannot accept the Amendment.
LORD ATKIN: The noble Viscount might consider the question of whether the Amendment of Lord Banbury, which follows this, is preferable. I can quite understand, of course, that in the case of a first offence it would not be right to make a man subject to disqualification, but in the case of a second offence it might be rather different. After all,

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now, for the first time as I understand, we are going to make a real speed limit. In the past it has been illusory; for the future the noble Earl and all of us desire that, where there is a speed limit, it should really be enforced. If that is so, I think there is some advantage in giving to the magistrates an option—they certainly ought not to be compelled. But if a man, say, within a fortnight is convicted of exceeding the speed limit again, the magistrate should have an option of suspending the licence for a time—quite a limited time.
EARL RUSSELL: The noble Lord, Lord Banbury, has already twitted me with my fondness for following precedent, and this Act has been in force for many years. We are not advised that there will be any great advantage in changing it. If the House thinks strongly about it, and thinks that a power of disqualification should be given for a second offence, I should be quite willing to leave it to your Lordships. But it is an undesirable and unnecessary change.
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD: I think it would be better for me to withdraw my Amendment, because it will be better to take the discussion on Lord Banbury's Amendment which follows.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM moved, in subsection (2), to leave out, "or second." The noble Lord said: The subsection as it stands says that—
" A conviction for a first or second offence under this section shall not render the offender liable to be disqualified for holding or obtaining a licence, including a provisional licence."
The effect of that seems to me to be that the person who drives at a greater speed than that specified in the First Schedule will know perfectly well he can do it twice and be convicted twice, and yet not be disqualified from holding or obtaining a licence. It seems to me this is such a very serious offence that, if a person has been convicted once, on the second offence he certainly ought to be liable to be disqualified from holding or obtaining a licence. We have heard a discussion during the last few moments as to the difficulty of enforcing the law. I do not believe it is so much because the police could not enforce the law, but because the penalties were so small that
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a large number of people thought it was safer to disregard the law: if they were caught the penalty would be very small. If we are in the future to endeavour to enforce the law we must see that the penalties are adequate.
Amendment moved—
Page 13, line 1, leave out ("or second").—(Lord Banbury of Southam.)
EARL HOWE: It seems to me that this Amendment will refer exclusively to the livelihood of the working man.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM: Why should we be killed by working men?
EARL HOWE: If the noble Lord will forgive me for a few minutes, it seems to me it would be a very severe penalty indeed to say that because, say, a light goods vehicle had exceeded a specified limit more than once, the man driving it should lose his licence automatically. It would probably be his only means of livelihood, at any rate, if he lose his job it is very difficult to get another in these days. I submit that we ought not to agree to the Amendment.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM: May I correct my noble friend? The omission of these words will not render a man automatically liable to lose his licence on the second offence, but it gives the bench an opportunity of saying: "You have committed an offence once and now you shall not have your licence." If it is not left out the bench cannot do that.
EARL RUSSELL: This really is a very small matter. I cannot conceive that an instance would arise where a bench would say the convicted man, on the second offence, merely for exceeding the speed limit, should be prevented from having a licence unless they were satisfied it was a case involving dangerous driving. If that were so then he ought to be prosecuted for dangerous driving. But if the House feels these words should be left out I will not resist it. I do not feel it is necessary myself.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: I think it is a little hard. These are all working men. They are men who have mostly been selected and trained by their employers. They see owner-drivers driving at any speed they like private cars of exactly the same weight as the small cars with

1309
which they are delivering goods on a round. These men are convicted of having transgressed the speed limit by a mile or two an hour, not driving dangerously at all; there is no element of danger in it. These men have done it without an accident perhaps, and there may be four or five years between the two convictions. To say that they are to be liable, in those circumstances to have their licences taken away by a bench of magistrates is very hard, while owner-drivers may drive the very same weight of car at any pace they like.
LORD BANBURY OF SOUTHAM: That is an argument for a speed limit.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: I do not think it is. I am all for strong punishments for dangerous driving, but I do not think this is the case.
VISCOUNT SUMNER: We were told just now the real point about having a speed limit for trade oars was that they broke up the roads.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: Big ones.
VISCOUNT SUMNER: This applies to them all—to every car in the Schedule that has a speed limit—and it depends upon their being trade vehicles not on their having any particular weight of car. Everyone that runs in excess of the speed limit will be pro tanto breaking up the roads. I do not understand why there is so much solicitude for destroying the road and so little about destroying human life. It may be explained later on. Still, a person who once and again, with a heavy car or a light one, does his best to break up the road which your Lordships have to pay for in the rates, seems to me to be a person who does deserve to have the hand of the magistrate laid upon him, and, if it does take away his livelihood, it is unfortunate, but he knows he should not do it, and he should not do it.
LORD PARMOOR: I hope the word "second" is retained. From one's experience of dealing with this question one knows that it is an extremely serious thing to deprive a man of his means of livelihood. That is what it means. A great deal has beer said about the rich and the poor man in these debates with which I do not agree. I think that aspect of it has been exaggerated by the noble
1310
Viscount, Lord Cecil. Surely this is a case where the poor employee ought to be fairly protected. This is the existing law and it is a very strong thing to change it. I hope therefore the word "second" will be retained.
On Question, Amendment negatived.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME moved, in subsection (2) to leave out "or obtaining." The noble Viscount said: These words "or obtaining" surely suggest that the driver has not got a licence and is therefore guilty of a double offence. I do not therefore think that the magistrate should be definitely precluded from preventing him temporarily from obtaining a licence. "Holding" is on a different footing, as the convicted person already had a licence, and is, therefore, only guilty of a single offence.
Amendment moved—
Page 13, line 3, leave out ("or obtaining").—(Viscount Bertie of Thame.)
EARL RUSSELL: Of course the disqualification applies to holding or obtaining a licence. A man may not have had a licence in the first instance and it means that if he has a period of disqualification he shall not during that period have any effective licence he can use. If he has a licence already it is suspended, but it would he ridiculous to allow him to take out a new licence during the period. The words must, of course, remain.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME moved, in subsection (2), to leave out "including" and insert "or holding." The noble Viscount said: This is on a different footing, I think, because the person who is referred to here is allowed as an act of grace to have a licence. If he drives without one surely that is a very dangerous thing. Therefore the word "including" could not be left in the clause but the words "or holding" should be inserted instead.
Amendment moved—
Page 13, line 3, leave out ("including") and insert ("or holding").—(Viscount Bertie of Thame.)
EARL RUSSELL: The words "including a provisional licence" simply extend the definition of licence. It means any kind of licence, including a provisional licence. The words are quite right.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME: But it means obtaining a licence surely?
EARL RUSSELL: Yes.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME: If that is so, I must ask your Lordships to divide on it. If this man chooses to drive without a licence he can still obtain one under the clause as it stands.
EARL RUSSELL: No. I really do not understand how the noble Viscount construes the clause. He is disqualified from holding or obtaining a licence, including a provisional licence.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME: Therefore it means he can obtain a provisional licence.
EARL RUSSELL: No, it means the exact opposite.
On Question, Amendment negatived.
EARL RUSSELL EARL RUSSELL moved to leave out subsection (3) and insert
"(3) A person charged under this section with the offence of driving a motor vehicle of any class or description on a road at a speed greater than the maximum speed allowed in the case of a vehicle of that class or description, shall not be liable to be convicted of the offence solely on the evidence of one witness to the effect that in the opinion of the witness the person charged was driving the vehicle at such greater speed."
The noble Earl said: This is really only a drafting Amendment. It is merely to substitute a better subsection.
Amendment moved—
Page 13, line 5, leave out subsection (3) and insert the said new subsection.—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME moved, in subsection (4), to leave out the first "order" and to insert "regulation." The noble Viscount said: If the Minister is allowed to make an order it means that the order will not be reviewable by Parliament. I think the tendency is to give too much power to Ministers, who are not only empowered to make orders but are frequently judges of their own conduct or misconduct. If the word "regulation" is substituted for "order" either House will be able to set aside such regulation.
Amendment moved—
Page 13, line 9, leave out ("order") and insert ("regulation").—(Viscount Bertie of Thame.)
EARL RUSSELL: What the noble Lord says is quite true, but does he see what the subject matter of the order is? It is merely a question of fire brigade vehicles. I should hardly have thought it necessary to lay a regulation affecting them on the Table of the House. But if the noble Viscount presses it we have no objection.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME: As long as the fire brigade is allowed to drive as it likes when it is actually doing its work I have no objection, but if it goes out for practice and does such things then I do object.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: I think it ought to be "regulation."
EARL RUSSELL: I am perfectly willing to accept "regulation."
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Amendment moved—
Page 13, line 10, leave out ("order") and insert ("regulation").—(Viscount Bertie of Thame.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
LORD DE CLIFFORD LORD DE CLIFFORD moved, in subsection (4), after "brigade" to insert "or ambulance." The noble Lord said: I am moving this Amendment on behalf of my noble friend the Earl of Cranbrook who is unable to be present. He put it on the Paper on behalf of the London County Council. I think it is quite reasonable that if fire brigade vehicles are to be allowed to exceed the limit in the course of fire brigade duties, ambulances which are used with the object of saving life should be put in the same position.
Amendment moved—
Page 13, line 12, after ("brigade") insert ("or ambulance").—(Lord de Clifford.)
EARL RUSSELL: An ambulance would weigh under two and a half tons and would be able to travel at any necessary speed without this Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
EARL RUSSELL EARL RUSSELL moved, in subsection (5) to omit the words "Any person who aids, abets, counsels, or procures" and to insert "If any person is convicted under Section five of the Summary Jurisdiction Act, 1848, of aiding, abetting, counselling or procuring." The noble Earl said: I beg to move the Amendment standing in my name.
Amendment moved—
Page 13, leave out line 13 and insert the said new words.—(Earl Russell.)
LORD AMULREE: I should like a point cleared up in reference to this Amendment. It seems to me that if the words are amended so as to read "If any person is convicted under Section live of the Summary Jurisdiction Act, 1848, of aiding, abetting" and so on, the clause will not apply to Scotland, because the Summary Jurisdiction Act only applies to England. If these words are introduced there will be no provision as far as I can see for dealing with this matter in Scotland.
EARL RUSSELL: if that is so the matter will be considered, but I should have thought that it was probably covered. This Amendment is to be read with another Amendment which I shall propose in line 16. If the Amendments are agreed to the subsection will then read:—
" If any person is convicted under Section five of the Summary Jurisdiction Act, 1848, of aiding, abetting, counselling or procuring any person who is employed by him to drive, or is subject to his orders in driving, a motor vehicle on a road to commit an offence under this section he shall instead of being liable on being so convicted to the same punishment as the principal offender be liable to a fine not exceeding fifty pounds, and in the case of a second or subsequent conviction, to a fine not exceeding one hundred pounds, or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding three months, or to both such fine and imprisonment."
I am told that, as the subsection is now drafted, some question might arise as to a new offence, and the object of the Amendment is to make it clear that it does not make another summary jurisdiction offence but only increases the penalty.
THE LORD CHAIRMAN: I think I should point out that the noble Lord, Lord Raglan, has an Amendment to line 13 to leave out "or procure" and to insert "procures or incites." I do not know whether the noble Lord desires to move the Amendment?
LORD RAGLAN: It is merely a drafting Amendment. The word "incites" appeared later in the clause and I thought it should be inserted here.
EARL RUSSELL: It is covered by this Amendment.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHAIRMAN: I do not know if the noble Lord, Lord Raglan, thinks that the next Amendment is necessary?
LORD RAGLAN: Yes, I think so. It is to omit from subsection (5) the words "who is employed by him to drive, or is subject to his orders in driving, a motor vehicle on a road." The noble Earl accepted a similar Amendment from me to a previous clause. I do not know whether he thinks that this is the same argument, but it ought to be an offence "to aid, abet, counsel or procure" someone to commit an offence. Another objection is that, as the clause now stands, a person might, let us say, offer a taxi-driver a pound to get to the station in five minutes, and would not be committing an offence. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 13, line 14, leave out from ("person") to ("to") line 16.—(Lord Raglan.)
LORD ATKIN: I think the noble Lord is mistaken. It is, under the Summary Jurisdiction Act, an offence to "aid, abet, counsel or procure" a person to commit that which is an offence. The only thing this clause does is to increase the penalty.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
EARL RUSSELL: My next Amendment is drafting.
Amendment moved—
Page 13, line 16, leave out ("shall") and insert ("he shall instead of being liable on being so convicted to the same punishment as the principal offender").—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
EARL RUSSELL EARL RUSSELL moved to add to subsection (5):—
" and if any person is convicted summarily of the offence of inciting to commit an offence under this section, he shall notwithstanding anything in proviso (c) to subsection (1) of Section twenty-four of the Criminal Justice Act, 1925, be liable to the same punishment as if he had procured the commission of an offence under this section."
The noble Earl said: The clause as drafted does not provide any special penalty for the offence of incitement. The object is to provide the same penalty as for aiding and abetting.
Amendment moved—
Page 13, line 21, at end insert the said words.—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
LORD SWAYTHLING LORD SWAYTHLING moved to add to subsection (5):—
"Provided that an owner or other person who is present in the vehicle at the time of the commission of an offence under this section by the driver shall not be deemed to be aiding, abetting, counselling or procuring the commission of that offence by the mere fact of his presence in the vehicle."
The noble Lord said: I have put down this Amendment in order to avoid any risk of passengers in a car being summoned for "aiding, abetting, counselling or procuring" the driver to commit the offence, merely owing to their presence in the vehicle at the time of the offence. It might be argued that this proviso is unnecessary owing to the fact that further evidence than mere presence is essential under the subsection as it now stands. For this reason I consulted the legal officers of one of the large organisations which concern themselves with motoring, and they agreed with me that a proviso, either in the form that I have suggested or in similar words, is advisable. They consider this Amendment desirable, and I hope that the noble Earl will accept it.
Amendment moved—
Page 13, line 21, at end insert the said proviso.—(Lord Swaythling.)
EARL RUSSELL: This is to avoid the conviction of a person in consequence of the mere fact of his presence in the vehicle. It is quite impossible that anybody could he convicted on the mere fact of his presence in the vehicle. He must do something more than that before any court could conceivably convict him and, if he does more than that, it may or may not be proper that he should be convicted. The fact of his presence could not possibly cause a conviction. I think this is really quite unnecessary.
On Question, Amendment negatived.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME moved, at the beginning of subsection (6), after "who," to insert "drives or." The noble Viscount said: This Amendment is intended to cover owner-drivers. There may not be many cases, but it is conceivable that six or more persons might enter into partnership, and in that way I think the clause could be evaded, as they could not be said to employ each other. If the noble Earl would prefer
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me to postpone this Amendment to another stage I am quite prepared to do so.
Amendment moved—
Page 13, line 22, after ("who") insert ("drives or").—(Viscount Bertie of Thame.)
LORD DANESFORT: I should like to say that I hope the noble Earl will accept this Amendment. It seems to me to fill a gap. If a man employs somebody to drive, there has to be a schedule of times, but, supposing he drives himself, there is no provision for a schedule, and yet the necessity for it is just as great as if he employed someone to drive for him. I think the noble Earl will probably see that this is only filling a hiatus.
EARL RUSSELL: No, I do not think it does. It is quite unnecessary, so far as I can see, and I do not think it makes sense either. This is the case of a person who employs someone to drive motor vehicles and issues a time-table or gives directions. How on earth could he issue a time-table or give directions to himself?
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME: He could issue a time-table.
EARL RUSSELL: He commits the offence himself, if he drives. The noble Viscount may wish to consider this point again, but, so far as I can see, it does not at all agree with the clause or make sense of it.
LORD DANESFORT: I am afraid I cannot agree with the noble Earl. Perhaps the matter can be discussed on Report. Surely a man can publish or issue a schedule, although he is going to drive himself.
LORD ATKIN: If my noble friend will consider the subsection, he will see that it begins:—
"If a person who employs other persons"—
and it goes on to say:—
"….The publication or issue of the said time table….shall be prima facie evidence that the employer….procured or incited the persons employed by him to drive the vehicles…."
and so on. I do not think it has any relation.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
EARL HOWE EARL HOWE moved to leave out Clause 10. The noble Earl said: The purpose of this Amendment is to raise the whole question of the speeds fixed in the Schedule. This clause governs the Schedule providing maximum speeds for different classes of commercial vehicles, and we want very much to discover the basis on which the Government have fixed the speeds they have selected for the various classes. I should like to submit to your Lordships that in certain circumstances it would be almost impossible to enforce the different rates of speeds laid down in the Schedule. Further, under certain conditions it might make matters very difficult for the drivers of other vehicles on the road. Suppose you are overtaking a vehicle whose maximum permitted speed is fixed, you have to judge, when you come up behind it, what class of vehicle it is. It will not always be very easy to distinguish between the various classes of commercial vehicles defined in the Schedule. I should like to submit that it would be very much more practicable and, I should imagine, much easier to enforce the necessary speed limits if they could be reduced to two or, at the most, four. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Leave out Clause 10.—(Earl Howe.)
EARL RUSSELL: I think I explained to your Lordships in my reply on Second Reading that we agreed that it would be better if we could manage to coalesce these numerous speeds, perhaps into four, and we are still hoping to do so. That I think would meet exactly the point the noble Earl has raised.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: Of course this clause must stand, I agree, but I should like the noble Earl to consider between now and the Schedule the question of the speed limit for the ordinary commercial van. I do not mean the char-a-bancs or the motor omnibus. When the noble Viscount was moving his Amendment it seemed to me that there was some little difference of opinion between the noble Earl and my noble friend as to whether the ordinary trade delivery van was included in the speed limit.
EARL RUSSELL: I was wrong.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: I am much obliged to the noble Earl. He is not
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very often wrong. Then we get this position. I shall not use the analogy of a Rolls Royce car, but I may have an ordinary small car, a Morris Cowley, for instance, and may be allowed to drive it at sixty miles an hour, but Mr. Brown, who uses the same car for taking goods home from his shop, is limited to thirty miles an hour. I will give a further example. I may be a shopkeeper and may drive my wife out on Sunday at sixty miles an hour, but if I drive cheese home on Monday for a customer I am limited to thirty miles an hour. It is quite impossible to justify that and I hope the noble Earl will consider it before the Schedule.
EARL RUSSELL: We have already noticed what the noble Viscount calls attention to and we shall give it all the consideration possible.
On Question, Clause 10, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 11:
Reckless or dangerous driving.
11.—(1) If any person drives a motor vehicle on a road recklessly, or at a speed or in a manner which is dangerous to the public, having regard to all the circumstances of the case, including the nature, condition, and use of the road, and the amount of traffic which is actually at the time, or which might reasonably be expected to be, on the road, he shall be liable—
(b) on conviction on indictment to imprisonment for a term not exceeding six months or to a fine, or to both such imprisonment and fine.
(2) The Court shall order particulars of any such conviction to be endorsed on any licence held by the person convicted.
(3) On a second or subsequent conviction under this section the convicting Court shall exercise the power conferred by this Part of this Act of ordering that the offender shall be disqualified for holding or obtaining a licence unless for special reasons the Court thinks fit to order otherwise, but this provision shall not be construed as affecting the right of the Court to exercise the power aforesaid on a first conviction.
(4) Where a person is convicted of aiding, abetting, inciting, counselling or procuring the commission of an offence under this section, and it is proved that be was present in the vehicle at the time of the commission of the offence, the offence of which he is convicted shall, for the purpose of the provisions of this Part of this Act relating to disqualification for holding or obtaining licences, be deemed to be an offence in connection with the driving of a motor vehicle.
EARL HOWE EARL HOWE moved, in subsection (1), to leave out all words preceding paragraph (a) except "on the road he shall be liable," and to insert
"A person driving a vehicle on a road shall drive the same with proper caution and at a speed not greater than is reasonable and safe having due regard to all the circumstances including the conditions at the time of any particular area, the traffic, surface and width of the highway, and no person shall drive any vehicle upon a road in such a manner as to endanger the life, limb and/or property of any person and if any person drives a vehicle in contravention of the foregoing provisions of this section."
The noble Earl said: I desire to move this Amendment, the purpose of which is to endeavour to define the offence of dangerous driving. I should like to submit that the clause as drafted in the Bill includes the very indefinite words "or might reasonably be expected to be on the road." Speaking from the point of view of one who is accustomed to cover great distances, and there are many people in this country who do, it is really an extraordinarily difficult thing for any driver of any motor vehicle to be aware of the traffic which might reasonably be expected to be on the road. In certain circumstances to pass through Epsom at certain times of the year might be very dangerous. Traffic might reasonably be expected to be on the road that would not be there at other times. The purpose of this Amendment is to try to embody in a form of words everything that a driver of a motor vehicle can actually see when he is driving. It brings in the circumstances, including the conditions at the time, the traffic, surface and width of the highway (both most important) and also goes on to the words as they stand on the paper. The Amendment is founded upon a dangerous driving law which actually exists in the State of California at the present time. I have no information as to how it has worked there, but it seemed to me and to many others to be much clearer in its meaning than the existing Clause 11 of the Bill.
I should like to recall to your Lordships what was said on the subject by my noble friend Lord Cecil on the Second Reading. The words he used were:—
"To have a definite standard I should have thought would have been much clearer to the motorist and much more satisfactory to everybody else because it throws upon the
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motorist the burden of showing, if he has broken those rules, that, in fact, he was not guilty of conduct that was likely to endanger the public."
I entirely agree with those remarks. The penalties that are now to be imposed for dangerous driving are extremely severe, and rightly so, but I think everybody, including even the motorist, has a right to absolute justice in the matter. If we can embody in our Bill some form of words which will define for the motorist that which really does constitute dangerous driving and which is satisfactory from the point of view of the Minister, the police, and the motorist, we shall have done a great thing. The question of dangerous driving is a very serious one indeed and I hope will always be looked upon as such by all those concerned.
Amendment moved—
Page 13, line 35, leave out from the beginning to ("on") in line 41 and insert the said new words.—(Earl Howe.)
THE LORD CHAIRMAN: In order to save the other Amendments, including one by the noble Earl, I shall put the question "that line 35 stand part of the clause."
EARL RUSSELL: I do not know that I am of opinion that American drafting is better than ours. I must say that I prefer the clause which has now stood the test of twenty-six years judicial interpretation. These words were in the Act of 1903. They have been in force ever since. They are perfectly easy to understand, they are general and they are simple. The noble Earl's object, I understand, is to define the whole set of things which you are to look at before one is guilty of dangerous driving. That may make it possible that there are some things that he has not included. I infinitely prefer the clause as it stands. They leave the thing where it ought to be:—
"drives a motor vehicle on a road recklessly, or at a speed or in a manner which is dangerous to the public."
They seem to me very apt and very proper words.
The Committee knows what happens in these cases. A jumble of facts is presented to the magistrates and, by the application of their common sense, they disentangle from that jumble of facts an impression, a conviction as to whether the driving was dangerous or not. We

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all agree there may be infinitely varied driving in different cases. Sometimes it may be one thing, sometimes another. The noble Earl wants to leave out any reference to the amount of traffic one may expect on the road. I was horrified to hear him say that yon saw nothing on the road. That is not the test. It is reasonable and proper that there should be a test of what you may expect to see on the road before you get to it, whether it is a cross-road, a lane, a cottage or a school. Because you see a road clear for 600 yards in front of you you are not entitled to assume it will be clear until you come to the end of that distance. It is precisely this assumption which has caused so many accidents and I hope the clause will be retained as it stands.
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD: My noble friend has referred to me and it gives me great pleasure on this occasion to support my noble friend Earl Russell. I do not think the proposed Amendment would make the meaning any clearer. Indeed, I would hesitate to ask your Lordships to insert here and now any thing like a code of dangerous driving. I have an Amendment, which I shall submit later on, in which I propose that, in the code proposed to be established, attention should be directed to this particular matter and attention should be called at any rate to some of the main principles to which everybody ought to adhere in driving. That will be a matter to be discussed later and that was the matter I had in mind when I made the observation on the Second Reading. I do not see that this Amendment will really make the matter more precise; than it is in the Bill because it expressly excludes from being an element of dangerous driving what there may be on the road, although it may not actually be in sight at any particular moment. I hope my noble friend will not press it.
EARL HOWE: I hesitate to intervene, but I think the noble Earl when he looks at the OFFICIAL REPORT to-morrow will see that he slightly misrepresented what I said. I did not state that the motorist did not see anything on the road. What I tried to do by my Amendment was to specify all the things you actually see from a motor vehicle when you are coming to a cross-road or anything else. "The conditions at the time" were intended
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to cover the cross-roads and the traffic. I tried to bring in every important item, with reference to the width of the highway and so forth. If the Minister is not able to accept the Amendment at this stage—I quite understand that—at the same time the matter might be further considered so far as the wording of the existing clause is concerned—namely "or which might reasonably be expected to be on the road," about which I have an Amendment at a later stage.
LORD SANDHURST: I cannot help thinking that it would be unfortunate to leave out these words. Not very long ago I read the report of a case before the magistrates, in which they refused to convict because there was no evidence that any person was actually in danger. That is the very thing which one wants to secure—namely, that magistrates should occasionally convict although no accident has happened and presumably nobody has been put in danger by reason of the motorist taking the risk. If you omit these words you will make it more difficult for the magistrate to convict where there has been no accident, and that is what one wants to prevent.
On Question, Amendment negatived.
EARL HOWE EARL HOWE had on the Paper an Amendment to subsection (1) to leave out "or which might reasonably be expected to be." The noble Earl said: In view of what has been said in the course of the debate I do not want to re-state the various reasons for this Amendment, except to point out that from the point of view of the driver the words of the subsection "expected to be on the road" are very ambiguous and very difficult indeed in certain circumstances to comply with. Anyone driving a car on the road must drive having regard to the conditions which he actually sees. He might not see possible causes of danger, and the retention of these words makes it exceedingly difficult for the driver who sincerely wishes to drive to the safety of everyone else. In the circumstances, however, I will not move this Amendment.
EARL HOWE EARL HOWE moved, in subsection (1), after "expected," to insert "by such person." The noble Earl said: The clause as it stands follows Section 1 of the Motor Car Act, 1903, and I submit to your Lordships that these words have

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caused a good deal of trouble in the administration of the Act. The Amendment which I move would make it clear that the person driving is to have regard to the amount of traffic which is actually at the time, or which might reasonably be expected "by such person" to be on the road. A local bench of magistrates might have a wholly different opinion of what is meant by "traffic which might reasonably be expected."
Amendment moved—
Page 13, line 41, after (" expected ") insert (" by such person ").—(Earl Howe.)
EARL RUSSELL: I have a little sympathy with the noble Earl on the question of what might reasonably be expected to be on the road. It is, of course, a thing which would be differently interpreted by different benches of magistrates. It might depend how well they knew the road, and I have no doubt the noble Earl would receive different treatment if he came up before my noble friend Lord Cecil from what he would receive if he came up before me.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: Where would he get it worse?
EARL RUSSELL: There. It introduces some element of uncertainty, but it is not what the driver might reasonably expect, but what any reasonable person might reasonably expect to be there, and I think we must keep the words of the clause as they are.
LORD DE CLIFFORD: I think it is rather hard upon a man who is driving a long distance, and goes into a part of the country which is unknown to him, and so far as he can see the road is clear of traffic and there are no warning signs. He is going along, and he does not think he is doing anything wrong, but if he were brought up before the magistrates for dangerous driving the magistrates might say: "We know that a lot of traffic is accustomed to use that road." It would be very difficult for this man to know of this traffic, and I think the Amendment is a very reasonable one.
EARL RUSSELL: I know I shall again get the applause of Lord Cecil for what I am going to say. I think the noble Lord has given us exactly an attitude of motorists which is to be deprecated. A motorist travels upon a road which he does not know and assumes that it is his
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private railway track. He takes it for granted that the road ought to be free for his passage. That is a frame of mind to which an end must be put. It is the cause of accidents.
LORD DE CLIFFORD: I do not think that that is at all the case. If a motorist comes to a road where the surface is good, and the road is wide, and there is apparently no turnings, I do not see how he can expect traffic to be upon it.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: I would like to say one word. The whole motoring community knew that if the speed limit was to be abolished they would be shot at under Section 1 of the old Act. They accepted that with their eyes open, and I do not think it is fair that we should now be asked to whittle down the bargain.
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD: It is the first that I have heard of this bargain, although I suspected it, and I should be glad if the noble Earl would give us the whole history of it, and then we shall know what Amendments to press and what not to press.
EARL RUSSELL: I knew nothing about it.
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD: I did not suspect the noble Earl did.
On Question, Amendment negatived.
EARL HOWE EARL HOWE moved, at the end of paragraph (b) of subsection (1), to insert "but a person shall not be convicted under the provisions of this subsection merely on the opinion of one witness." The noble Earl said: The purpose of this Amendment is to try to secure mere justice for the motorist. As the clause stands it is merely necessary to have one witness for a case of dangerous driving. There is always bound to be, and I suppose always will be, a tremendous difference of opinion as to what does, or does not, constitute dangerous driving. I would like to submit that there are two sorts of dangerous driving. There is one sort where the issue probably is really never in doubt and it is a question of fact where a person is injured as a result, and there is the other sort of dangerous driving where no one is injured, which is not a question of fact but merely a question of opinion.
I should like to submit most urgently that there is the danger of grave injustice being done to the individual if the charge is brought on the unsupported evidence of one individual only. The penalties under this Bill are very serious indeed, involving long sentences of imprisonment. If you can prove a charge of dangerous driving I think you are quite justified in sending the offender to prison, but the motoring community as a whole have a right to certain safeguards in the matter. After all, there are over two million holders of driving licences in this country, and every one of them will be seriously affected by the passage of this Bill. I do not believe that there are very many deliberately dangerous drivers. I believe there are a good many who err from carelessness or lack of imagination. There are all sorts of things about dangerous driving. Supposing a man to be driving a motor car and coming up to a cross-road at twenty miles an hour, with perhaps bad brakes: he will only just be able to stop in time if there is something coming. But another man who is coming to the cross-road at forty miles an hour, with perfectly good brakes, and on a road with a perfectly good dry surface, is easily able to stop. Yet the ordinary observer might very likely say that the man going at the higher speed was driving dangerously, whereas, in fact, he was driving much more safely than the other man. There will be a question of opinion and a conflict of evidence and, I submit, a grave danger of injustice to the individual.
It is not so much the rate of speed as the way in which people move about that causes danger. One of your Lordships, speaking this afternoon about a certain accident, said that if an accident happened it was obviously because somebody had driven too fast. That is not at all necessarily true. A man may be driving along at a perfectly normal and proper speed, but that will not save him from a pedestrian who suddenly steps off a side path in his way. I submit that if a motorist is to be sent to prison on this charge it should require more than one witness. Under the existing Motor Car Act an infringement of the speed limit clause necessitates two witnesses, whereas the dangerous driving clause only necessitates one. Everybody who has driven motor cars much knows perfectly well the way in which the police in certain areas have endeavoured to enforce
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the law. Their object in those particular areas has really been to raise money for the relief of local rates. Certainly it was so in the old days, though that was altered by the Roads Act of 1920.
Amendment moved—
Page 14, line 8, at end insert the said words.—(Earl Howe.)
LORD SWAYTHLING LORD SWAYTHLING moved to amend the proposed Amendment by leaving out "merely on the opinion" and inserting "on the uncorroborated evidence." The noble Lord said: I do not regard my Amendment as one of very great importance, but I think it would strengthen that of the noble Earl by the substitution of the words that I propose, and I hope he will accept them.
Amendment to the Amendment moved—
Leave out ("merely on the opinion") and insert ("on the uncorroborated evidence").—(Lord Swaythling.)
EARL RUSSELL: The noble Earl made a long speech dealing largely with the speed limit, which we have already decided. People are sent to prison every day on the evidence of one policeman, and I see no reason why a motorist should not be fined; £10 and have his licence suspended on the evidence of one person, if it is such evidence as the bench thinks it possible to accept. There is no reason for making any distinction between the motorist and any other class of offender.
EARL HOWE: I can assure the noble Earl that all the interests with which I am in touch are very anxious indeed about this point, and I think there is a danger of grave injustice being done and a possibility that thereby you may do moral harm to the Bill. If a case of real, proved injustice occurs it will destroy a good deal of the influence of this measure.
LORD DARLING: I think there must be some misapprehension about this. Nobody can be convicted of driving to the danger of the public on the opinion of any witness. The noble Lord, Lord Swaythling, saw one fault in the Amendment because he proposes to introduce the words "on the uncorroborated evidence." But the noble Earl has returned to the charge by saying that there are a lot of people who are very anxious that nobody should be convicted on the opinion of one witness. They cannot be, for the simple reason that in the court where the witness

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is giving evidence he could not be asked or allowed to answer such a question as: "In your opinion, was this motorist driving negligently or to the danger of the public?" He has to state what he saw. Matters of opinion may only be spoken to by experts, whose business it is to be experts in the particular matter as to which they express an opinion. Now, if I had been on the bench and anybody had come and said to me: "I am an expert in dangerous driving, and therefore I wish to give evidence," I should immediately see that the jury were inclined to pay no attention to that man at all. I should have had him first cross-examined as to where he had learnt the art, and how many times he had been convicted.
LORD SWAYTHLING: I understand that the noble and learned Lord's objection would not apply if the noble Earl, Lord Howe, accepted my proposed Amendment to his Amendment.
EARL HOWE: Yes, I accept it.
On Question, Amendment to the Amendment agreed to.
On Question, Amendment, as amended, negatived.
EARL HOWE EARL HOWE moved in subsection (2), to substitute "may" for "shall." The noble Earl said: The purpose of this Amendment is to provide that for a first offence against the dangerous driving clause it shall be at the discretion of the court to have the licence of the driver endorsed.
Amendment moved—
Page 14, line 9, leave out (" shall ") and insert (" may ").—(Earl Howe.)
EARL RUSSELL: This again is an attempt to whittle down the whole clause. The courts have always been required to endorse the conviction on the licence, and there is no reason to depart from it. Dangerous driving is intended to be a disgraceful offence, and the man is intended to carry it on his licence so that it can be seen.
On Question, Amendment negatived.
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOODmoved, in subsection (3), to leave out "a second or subsequent" and insert "any." The noble Viscount said: This is providing that, unless the court shall otherwise order, the licence shall be suspended
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on the first offence as well as on the second and subsequent offences. My noble friend Lord Russell said just now that if such an extraordinary thing were to happen as a charge against my noble friend Lord Howe being brought before a court of which I was a member I should punish him more severely than he would. I do not think so at all. I do not myself attach any great importance to the additional powers of imprisonment and so on which are to accompany the offence of dangerous driving. I do not attach any great importance to this one way or the other. I certainly do not attach the slightest importance to the increase of the fine. But I do attach immense importance to this question of suspending the licence, because I think that is the real thing that ought to be done in all cases where a person has shown that he is not really to be trusted on a road. I think it is the proper punishment for this kind of offence. I cannot see why, if it is appropriate on the second offence, it is not appropriate on the first offence.
I agree that there may be very hard cases which you must provide for, and the Bill does provide for them on the second offence. Where for instance the man's living depends upon his being allowed to drive a car, you would naturally hesitate to suspend his licence, unless it was a very clear or a very bad case. It is right in all cases of that kind that there should be a right to the court not to suspend the licence if they were clearly of opinion that it ought not to be suspended; but, subject to that, I think that prima facie it ought to be suspended. I feel most strongly that we should not be in half the trouble we are if the courts had freely exercised that power in the past. The fine is absolutely farcical in the case of a rich man. A fine of £5 or £10 or even £20 added to his costs of driving is so small in proportion that it really does not count at all. In my judgment you ought never to send a man to prison unless he is really a criminal—that is to say, unless he is guilty of something much more than recklessness or carelessness, unless he has really done something which, according to the ordinary judgment of the day, is regarded as a wicked thing. I do not think people ought to be sent to prison merely because they have made a mistake, or have failed to carry out their duty, unless they have done so wickedly.

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Therefore I do not defend sending motorists to prison, in spite of my noble friend's opinion of me. I do not think it is practicable.
I have sat as a member of Quarter Sessions and I know that the atmosphere in the Court makes it quite impossible to send a man to prison unless he has really been wicked or indifferent to life and limb. But what you want to do is to stop dangerous driving. The man is not wicked at all, but one who takes risks; he is very likely guilty of high spirits and things of that kind. Such men are the dangerous people. Why you should wait for a second offence to suspend their licences I do not know. Once you have proved in point of fact that a person is guilty of dangerous driving then I think that prima facie you ought to suspend his licence. While, as I say, there may be special and particular circumstances when it ought not to be done, and for them the Bill makes provision, I earnestly hope my noble friend will see his way to accept this Amendment. It would be such a pleasure to me to have one Amendment accepted.
Amendment moved—
Page 14, line 12, leave ("a second or subsequent") and insert (" any ").—(Viscount Cecil of Chelwood.)
LORD RAGLAN: The noble Viscount keeps alluding to rich people. I sit on a bench where nearly all the cases that come before us are motoring offences, and I do not think I have ever at any time had before me a person who can be described as a rich person. Nine-tenths of the persons who come before us are professional motor drivers in some form or another. The effect of this Amendment would be to make benches more unwilling to convict these people and so deprive them of their livelihood.
EARL RUSSELL: The noble Viscount in the greater part of his speech seemed as if he were talking about the penalties, but his Amendment has nothing to do with penalties. His Amendment merely has to do with powers of the court, and all he is asking your Lordships to do is to tell the court that, on a first conviction, they shall suspend the licence unless they decide otherwise. The Government think it sufficient to make it a second conviction. I do not think there is any necessity for this ferocity and I do not think it will do any good. They
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have already for a first conviction the power to suspend if they think fit. It is merely a difference in the way it is done. On the second offence the Bill puts it the other way round—you should suspend unless you give a reason why you should not. I hope the noble Viscount will not press the Amendment.
On question, Amendment negatived.
VISCOUNT BRENTFOBD VISCOUNT BRENTFOBD moved, in subsection (3) after "section," to insert "within three years after a previous conviction." The noble Viscount said: I hope I shall not be twitted with seeking to whittle down the old Act, but I do think here there may be some period of time fixed. The subsection says that "on a second or subsequent conviction the court shall exercise the powers" and so forth, of disqualifying. Suppose a man is convicted of dangerous driving when he is quite young and rash, and then later on, in ten, twenty or thirty years time, he gets another conviction? I think there might be some period of time fixed. It is not really very serious to have only had a couple of convictions in twenty years, and, after all, this does mean disqualification. It is only for a special reason they are not to be disqualified. I think if you are to have a disqualification you should put some period of time. I have suggested three years, but if that is thought not enough well then it might be even five years. I would not mind five years. I can see my noble friend Viscount Cecil looking at me sternly. He is kind-hearted, and he might perhaps help me in this by fixing a reasonable time within which a man should have a locus penitentix, if he is not convicted more than twice within five years. My noble friend shakes his head, so it is no good appealing to him. I will see if I can get better luck with the noble Earl opposite. He at all events looks more friendly. It is rather hard to have to look for one's friends on the opposite side of the House. If the noble Earl can give me any help in this direction I shall be very glad.
Amendment moved—
Page 14, line 13 after ("section") insert ("within three years after a previous conviction.").—(Viscount Brentford.)
EARL RUSSELL: I think the noble Viscount's object is quite a reasonable one, but would he attain it by these words? The court might perfectly well

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regard the lapse of time since the previous conviction as a special reason and a proper reason for not ordering disqualification. Then the alternative of two convictions in five years would not be covered by this. If you set out a hard and fast line I am rather inclined to think you make it more difficult to do. If between now and the Report stage the noble Viscount can think of some words that would carry out his intentions without excluding the court from considering other intentions he may let me know. It seems to me you would have this danger, that you may direct their minds to one thing when there are many other circumstances to which they might direct their minds.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: The noble Earl is more amiable than the noble Viscount. I will in the circumstances ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
EARL RUSSELL: The next two Amendments in my name are drafting.
Amendments moved—
Page 14, line 21, leave out ("inciting")
Page 14, line 21, after ("procuring") insert ("or inciting").—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendments agreed to.
LORD STANLEY OF ALDERLEY: I am not sure as to the period of disqualification. Have the magistrates a discretion as to the period to disqualify?
EARL RUSSELL: As I understand it—I speak without having referred to the clause—the magistrates may disqualify a man for anything from a week upwards.
Clause 11, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 12:
Careless driving.
12.—(1) If any person drives a motor vehicle on a road without due care and attention or without reasonable consideration for other persons using the road he shall be guilty of an offence.
(2) A conviction for an offence under this section shall not render the offender liable to be disqualified for holding or obtaining a licence.
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD moved to leave out Clause 12. The noble Viscount said: I am very doubtful about the wisdom of this clause and I hope my noble friend will consider it very carefully. This is a clause on which I think
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he has departed from the recommendations of the Royal Commission. As I understand it the Royal Commission—I may be wrong, but I think I am right in saying this—thought this should not be included in the Bill.
EARL RUSSELL: They thought it too vague.
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD: I am against this clause partly on the ground that it is too vague and partly on the ground that some benches of magistrates of whom your Lordships have heard in this debate—not from me, but from others—who are thought not to have carried out their duties with sufficient severity, will be given a bolt-hole. Whenever evidence is really clear that a man has been guilty of dangerous driving but they have a sympathy with him for some reason, they will be able to find him guilty of careless driving, and I am afraid they will. Indeed, there was a very disquieting phrase used by the noble Earl, Lord Russell, himself in moving the Second Reading to that effect—perhaps I should not say to that effect, but to the effect that this would be an alternative in a case where a man was charged with dangerous driving and the magistrate thought it would be better to convict him of careless driving. I do feel that is very dangerous.
I am beginning to be very much frightened of this Bill. I admit it. It seems to me that with the assistance of the noble Viscount, Lord Brentford, and the bargain of which he has told us, the Bill is gradually becoming a Motorists' Protection Bill to prevent anything happening to a motorist whatever he does. I am seriously afraid that this clause will undermine the one thing that so far we have got out of the Bill—namely, a somewhat increased severity of the dangerous driving provisions. That really is all that has been done so far for the safety of pedestrians. If you pass this clause enabling a Court to find a motorist guilty of careless driving rather than dangerous driving, you will, I am afraid, greatly lessen the force of the dangerous driving clause.
Here I must confess—no doubt the noble Earl will be surprised—to a certain sympathy with the motorist. Careless driving may mean anything. Anybody may be of opinion that a driver has

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been careless. There is no kind of indication of what it really amounts to. The clause speaks of driving "without due care and attention or without reasonable consideration for other persons." If a driver on a wet day drove through a puddle and splashed somebody I suppose that would be driving without reasonable consideration. It may mean a hundred things which would scarcely amount to any criminal offence though there might be bad manners. All these things may be offences in the eyes of some benches of magistrates. I think it is very doubtful if they should be treated as criminal offences. If there is financial injury you can always sue for damages, but I think we ought to confine the criminal law to what are really criminal offences. Both because I am afraid that it will diminish the effectiveness of the provisions as regards dangerous driving and on the ground that it will create a new and extremely vague offence, I would ask the noble Earl if he cannot see his way to have the clause removed.
Amendment moved—
Leave out Clause 12.—(Viscount Cecil of Chelwood.)
LORD RAGLAN: I venture to think that this may be a very useful clause. It will enable you to catch a dangerous driver in his youth and check him before he does any harm.
EARL RUSSELL: The clause is, of course, open to the observation which the Royal Commission made about it, that it is vague in language, but the penalties under it are far less severe than those under the previous clause. The noble Viscount spoke about a driver splashing persons. Suppose a motorist is passing a number of women coming out of church in their best clothes and splashes the whole of them: I am not at all sure that that is not a matter for which he might not very properly be fined. Under the Town Police Clauses Act you are fined for much smaller offences than that. Is it not as bad as leaving litter in the parks, for which you can be fined, or spitting in public places? It is a thing he ought not to do and it hurts people and I think he might quite properly be fined.
What exactly is meant by driving "without due care and attention" I do
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not know, but no doubt benches of magistrates will have no difficulty in construing it. If they find a man driving with one hand, for instance, and not paying attention to what is going on, or perhaps looking at a person beside him, that might be an offence. This clause may be useful and it is possible that it may ultimately come to be used for dealing with things which will appear in the highway code which, although they are not legal, are obviously things a careful driver would do. I think it would also serve, as the noble Lord opposite said, as an educational clause and a First Offenders Act for the driver who might otherwise become criminal. It would apply to all sorts of things. I think it has its uses and I should be sorry to leave it out. It is an experiment, but I think it will work and prove useful.
LORD ATKIN: I am a little alarmed about this clause and about the words "without due care and attention." That really means negligence. It will be the definition of negligence if a man drives without due care, and it is very difficult to see how a man can drive a motor car along a road negligently without really driving dangerously. I think there will be a very real danger that magistrates will adopt this as a loophole for escaping a conviction for dangerous driving and if a case were sent for trial a jury might do the same. We are, after all, desiring to concentrate upon dangerous driving. I feel great difficulty about this clause unless you put in words which one generally does in these circumstances, that if a man is charged with the major offence of dangerous driving he can be convicted of this offence. Otherwise you may try a man for dangerous driving and find that what he had really done was to drive to the inconvenience of the public without due care and attention. In that case unless you had such a clause you could not convict him at all. I am not at all sure that it would not be safer to confine this clause to driving without consideration for other persons. My own idea is that if you say a motorist who drives a motor car negligently, that is without due care, is only committing a minor offence, you are giving away a great deal of what you intended to do by creating the offence of dangerous driving. Although I am not inclined to leave out the clause altogether if the

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noble Earl adheres to it I think the phrase "without due care and attention" is really very dangerous.
EARL HOWE: I should like to ask a question of the noble Earl in charge of the Bill. The Minister is going to issue at a later stage a code for the highways. Would it be possible to provide that if anybody was proved not to have observed something laid down in that code he could be convicted under this clause?
EARL RUSSELL: I think not. We are most anxious that the highway code should not be regarded as a code of law. It is intended to be a code of advice and manners. In answer to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Atkin, I quite understand that a clause of this kind does cause lawyers a certain anxiety. I share his feelings about it and, if he can suggest to us before Report any words by which we can make it more successfully achieve its purpose, we shall be very glad indeed to consider them, or to consider advice from any of your Lordships. But I think this will be a useful clause. It is not really an alternative to Clause 11. If a man is accused under Clause 11, as it stands now, I do not think you can convict him under this clause. It seems to me that there might be quite appropriate cases of really minor offences that would properly come under this clause. I quite appreciate the objection to the words and, if any better ones can be suggested, we shall be only too willing to consider them, but we should not like to lose the clause altogether.
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD: After the two observations that this cannot be used as a "bolt-hole" on a charge of dangerous driving and that the noble Earl will consider the wording of the clause further, I beg leave to withdraw my Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 12 agreed to.
EARL RUSSELL: Perhaps it will be convenient to your Lordships to adjourn now until a quarter past nine.
[The sitting was suspended at ten minutes before eight o'clock and resumed at a quarter past nine o'clock.]
Clause 13:
Prohibition of motor racing and speed trials on roads.
13.—(1) Any person who promotes or takes part in an organised race or trial of speed between motor vehicles on a road shall be liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding three months or to a fine not exceeding fifty pounds, or to both such imprisonment and fine.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAMEmoved, in subsection (1), to leave out "an organised" and to insert "a." The noble Lord said: I do not quite understand why this clause is limited to organised races. Organised races may be much safer than impromptu races for the public. If the words "an organised" are taken out and the word "a" is put in, organised races will still be covered.
Amendment moved—
Page 14, line 37, leave out (" an organised ") and insert (" a ").—(Viscount Bertie of Thame.)
EARL RUSSELL: The object of this clause is the specific object stated, the prevention of the organisation of racing, and makes the promoters of a race liable. A private race between two or three people will be dealt with under the dangerous driving clause. The intention of this is to follow the Royal Commission's suggestion about the prohibition of organised racing.
THE MARQUESS OF LONDONDERRY: Does this apply to the international races which take place?
EARL RUSSELL: Which race? To be held in this country?
THE MARQUESS OF LONDONDERRY: In the Isle of Man.
EARL RUSSELL: That is not this country. It is a very different thing. That is held under a special Act of the Isle of Man.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 13 agreed to.
Clause 14:
Punishment of persons driving motor vehicles when under influence of drink or drugs.
14.—(1) Any person who when driving or attempting to drive, or when in charge of, a motor vehicle on a road or other public place is under the influence of drink or drugs to such an extent as to be incapable

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of having proper control of the vehicle, shall be liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding four months or to a fine not exceeding fifty pounds, or to both such imprisonment and fine.
(2) A person convicted of an offence under this section shall, and without prejudice to the power of the court to order a longer period of disqualification, be disqualified for a period of twelve months from the date of the conviction for holding or obtaining a licence, and the court shall order particulars of the conviction and of the disqualification to which the person convicted has become subject to be endorsed on the licence, if any, held by that person.
(3) A person liable to be charged with an offence under this section shall not be liable to be charged under section twelve of the Licensing Act, 1872, with the offence of being drunk while in charge, on a highway or other public place, of a carriage
(4) A police constable may arrest without warrant any person committing an offence under this section.
LORD RAGLAN LORD RAGLAN moved, in subsection (1), to leave out "or when in charge of." The noble Lord said: These words were inserted in the 1872 Act to cover the case of persons left in charge of a horse-drawn vehicle. In the case of a horse-drawn vehicle the person left in charge must be able, if not to drive the horse, at any rate to control the horse and this is essential for the public safety. In the case of a motor vehicle, however, thousands of people are left in charge every day who have never driven or had any intention of driving a car. These persons, who are merely sitting in a car to prevent any one stealing it, would, if they are slightly under the influence of drink, be liable under this clause as it stands to four months imprisonment and a fine of £50.
Amendment moved—
Page 15, line 8, leave out ("or when in charge of").—(Lord Raglan.)
EARL RUSSELL: I quite appreciate the point of the noble Lord. Without these words a great many people who cannot be properly convicted would escape conviction because you would not be able to convict unless there was actual evidence that the person had been driving or had attempted to drive. That is, unless someone has seen him doing so, whereas the policeman who found him had no doubt he was driving or intended to drive. I think I dealt with the point before. If a car was found smashed against a lamppost and a man was found asleep in the ruins of it you might then
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say he could properly be convicted for the words would cover his case. The Home Secretary attaches great importance to these words. His advice from the police of the country is that a great many who ought to be convicted would escape unless they were left in. I do not know whether the noble Lord desires to press his Amendment in view of that.
EARL HOWE: Might I ask whether the noble Earl has forgotten the illustration given to us by Lord Brentford on the Second Reading debate, where he cited the instance of a young lady who found herself unable to drive and was discovered asleep in the vehicle? She wisely had not attempted to drive.
EARL RUSSELL: I think it is perfectly clear that in such circumstances the court ought not to convict. First of all, if I were the chief constable I should not authorise a prosecution in a case of that sort, but if he has authorised it I do not know that the court is bound to convict, if she has done no act to show that she was in charge of the motor car. She might have been a stranger. There have been two hard cases within recent months, but I think you must leave it to the police and the justices.
EARL HOWE: I hesitate to take up time with this point, but is the noble Earl quite right when he says that a person found inside a vehicle under the influence of drink might be a stranger. Surely, in the eyes of the law, being inside the vehicle such a person would be in charge of it.
EARL RUSSELL: A person is not bound to be in charge of a house because he happens to be found asleep in it.
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD: I do feel that a strongish ease has been made out for moderation here. I agree that any one suspected of driving or attempting to drive in such circumstances ought to be punished, but the punishment is a very hard and severe one. I think if a person overtaken by drink has the good sense not to attempt to drive it is a little hard to say that he or she shall be necessarily disqualified for twelve months. I hope the noble Earl will reconsider the matter before the Report stage.
LORD ATKIN: I sympathise with the noble Earl here. A good many eases might escape because it might be said: "True, I am the chauffeur, but I was not driving at the time. I was at a parking place, and I committed no offence." I think it would be a little dangerous to say that such a person had not committed an offence, but on the other hand I think the punishment provided in the old Act, and now, is too severe. I was going to appeal very strongly to the Committee on subsection (2), and as I have not an Amendment down, perhaps I may refer to it now. My object throughout on this Bill has been to see that dangerous driving is capable of being severely punished. On the other hand I think it is of the greatest importance that, when dealing with punishment, you should not interfere with the discretion of the court which has to award the punishment.
These automatic punishments are to my mind the greatest mistake, and I will tell the House why. It arises particularly on these charges of drunkenness. As the law now is, if a man is convicted of being drunk in charge of a motor car, as well as of driving a motor car, then automatically his licence is suspended for twelve months. It is done under the Act of Parliament. While that may be a very proper punishment for 70 per cent. of the cases, there is a number of cases in which it would be too severe a one. You observe that being drunk in charge of a motor car has nothing to with danger to the public in itself. The man may be driving a motor car with complete safety to the public as far as they are concerned. The last case in which I was concerned was one in which the policeman said that he found a man proceeding (because vehicles and men always "proceed" when policemen are giving evidence) along the road in a zigzag course. He found the driver very drunk and fortunately the car drew up and almost ran into the police station, so it was very easy to deal with him. That man was no danger to the public, but he was convicted and fined and his licence was automatically suspended. He did not happen to be a young driver, but it does happen sometimes that men for the first time are charged when the offence does not demand this serious punishment of a year's loss of licence.
They have been to the public house and have had just the one drink too
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many and for the first time they are found in charge of a car or driving a car and a policeman, quite rightly, charges them, and a magistrate then has to consider what happened. If he convicts, a man loses his licence for twelve months and it means that he loses his livelihood. That is the result of the punishment and, although he can or could regain it within three months as far as his employer is concerned, he is out of action for twelve months. As a punishment that very often is too severe for the particular facts of the particular case. The result is that it happens, I am sorry to say, over and over again—I believe Lord Brentford will bear me out in this—that magistrates and juries have refused to convict just because of that particular punishment. If you do not have an automatic punishment, nobody could say to the jury:" Well, this is the result. You know, if you convict this man he is deprived of his livelihood for twelve months." More than that, the magistrate would have the right to consider what would be a proper term of suspension—very often a week, a fortnight, a month or two months, would be perfectly adequate for the offence, and would pull the man up at once.
What we really want is to create a better judicial opinion among benches of magistrates. I believe this is going to happen, but I think in order to do it the right thing to do is to make the punishment not automatic. I think it would be perfectly proper that, instead of having subsection (2) as we now have it, we should have subsection (2) as it stands in Clause 13, that is to say:—
"A person convicted of an offence shall, unless the court for special reasons thinks fit to order otherwise, and without prejudice to the power of the court to order a longer period, be disqualified for a period of twelve months."
I would accept that because that gives a discretion to the court for special reasons in special cases. I believe it would result in a very much better administration of the law in regard to these particular offences. It is very important that it should be dealt with. It is a very serious offence in nine cases out of ten when a man is driving a car at all, but there are exceptional cases which ought to be left to the discretion of the court, and if that were done I think there would

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not be this objection that is raised to including the offence by the person who is in charge of the motor, as in that case the magistrate would be able to exercise his discretion and say: "Here is a special case and we will not automatically suspend the licence." I should say that I have spoken to magistrates in a good many places and to a good many of the London Police Magistrates, and I have had very serious complaints about the operation of this very provision. It interferes with convictions for drunkenness.
LORD CLWYD: I am rather diffident to express an opinion opposed to that of my noble and learned friend; but my experience does not agree with his upon this point. My experience has been that when such a case as this has been before the magistrates we have been quite prepared to deal with it as the merits or the demerits of the case demanded. I do not know whether it is clear in the Bill as it stands that the man who has been convicted can within three months apply for a cancellation of the suspension. I take it that is so. In more than one case in recent experience that has been done, and we as a bench were able to reconsider the matter in the light of the assurance given and the financial loss inflicted upon the man who had offended. I only desire to say giving every possible weight to the importance of the opinion expressed by my noble and learned friend, that my experience has been somewhat different from his.
EARL RUSSELL: I think we had better be a little more orderly. At the moment we art on an Amendment to leave out "or when in charge of." On that point may I say that I do sympathise very much with the view that has been expressed by noble Lords. I would rather not accept it at this stage without an opportunity of consulting my right hon. friend the Home Secretary, because I know he does attach great importance to these words. I will see that the debate is brought to his notice, and that a further decision is taken on the matter before Report stage. I hope that will satisfy your Lordships for the present. If my noble and learned friend Lord Atkin should move an Amendment I shall be glad to consider it.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: So far as the first Amendment is concerned I apologise for not having moved it. What has been said would, I think, satisfy me. The noble Earl knows the points I put in the previous debate, and I will not detain your Lordships any further.
LORD RAGLAN: I think it is the wish of the House that I should withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
EARL HOWE EARL HOWE moved, in subsection (1), to leave out "motor." The noble Earl said: This is the first Amendment of this sort I have had an opportunity so far of moving. The purpose of this Amendment is to make this Bill apply to all vehicles and all road traffic. This Bill is called a Road Traffic Bill. As I pointed out in the few remarks which I ventured to make on the Second Reading the Bill deals almost exclusively with motor vehicles and with no other form of traffic. It does not very much matter what sort of vehicle is on the road, whether it be power driven or any other, if the person driving it or attempting to drive it is under the influence of drink it constitutes a public danger. Our object in this Bill should be to try to reduce public danger on the highway; therefore I submit this Amendment for your Lordships' consideration.
Amendment moved—
Page 15, line 8, leave out ("motor").—(Earl Howe.)
EARL RUSSELL: This really would be quite inappropriate. The punishment is inappropriate to a person driving a horse or any other vehicle. This is not a Bill dealing with the general highway law, and I hope the noble Earl will not press his Amendment here, for it would be quite unsuitable.
EARL HOWE: May I enquire then why the Government are calling this Bill a Road Traffic Bill? I submit the point is of some urgency and should receive a little more consideration. There is a very strong feeling about it on the part of quite a number of people.
On Question, Whether the word "motor" shall stand part of the clause?
Their Lordships divided: Contents, 26; Not-Contents, 14.

CONTENTS.

Wellington, D.

Cecil of Chelwood, V.

Atkin, L.

Chaplin, V.

Clwyd, L.

Clarendon, E.

Hutchinson, V. (E. Donoughmore.)

Danesfort, L.

De La Warr, E. [Teller.]

Denman, L.

Lucan, E.

Knutsford, V.

Marks, L. [Teller.]

Mount Edgcumbe, E.

Novar, V.

Newton, L.

Onslow, E.

Sandhurst, L.

Plymouth, E.

Alvingham, L.

Stanley of Alderley, L. (L. Sheffield.)

Russell, E.

Amulree, L.

Vane, E. (M. Londonderry.)

Arnold, L.

Wavertree, L.

NOT-CONTENTS.

Abingdon, E. [Teller.]

Bertie of Thame, V.

Dynevor, L.

Cottenham, E.

Churchill, V.

Faringdon, L.

Howe, E. [Teller.]

Raglan, L.

Lauderdale, E.

Auckland, L.

Redesdale, L.

Stanhope, E.

de Clifford, L.

Ritchie of Dundee, L.

Resolved in the affirmative and Amendment disagreed to accordingly.
LORD ATKIN LORD ATKIN moved in subsection (2), to leave out "A person convicted of an offence under this section shall, and without prejudice to the power of the court to order a longer period of disqualification, be disqualified for a period of twelve months from the date of the conviction for holding or obtaining a licence "and to insert" A person convicted of an offence under this section shall, unless the court for special reasons thinks fit to order otherwise and without prejudice to the power of the court to order a longer period of disqualification, be disqualified for a period of twelve months from the date of the conviction for holding or obtaining a licence." The noble and learned Lord said: I propose to put myself in order in regard to the speech that I inflicted upon your Lordships a short time ago. This Amendment would meet the hard cases that I referred to and, in my humble opinion, would very much assist in the administration of the law.
Amendment moved—
Page 15, line 15, leave out from "A" to "licence" in line 20 and insert the said new words.—(Lord Atkin.)
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: The House will remember that on an earlier occasion I made a statement in regard to the difficulty of obtaining convictions at Quarter Sessions. It was a very serious difficulty that I experienced when I was Home Secretary. We could not get convictions in regard to certain cases. I did not tell the House what those cases were but, as a matter of fact, they were these cases of drunkenness in charge of a motor car
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which, of course, involve the disqualification for twelve months of which my noble and learned friend has spoken. We could not get magistrates at Quarter Sessions or juries to convict of these offences except in very serious cases indeed, because they did not like this automatic penalty. I am sure it would be better if your Lordships could accept this Amendment and leave it within the power of the bench to inflict disqualification for any period they like. Under this Amendment, as I understand it, it might be for a month, or twelve months, or even longer. It would give magistrates discretion to impose a disqualification for as long as they thought fit, but it would not compel them to disqualify for twelve months if they thought a month's disqualification would be sufficient. I am sure your Lordships will realise that the form of Amendment proposed by the noble Lord is really much better for the administration of the law and will really not hurt the Bill at all. In those circumstances I hope the Government will accept it.
EARL RUSSELL: I have a special right to speak to your Lordships about this clause because it is my own baby. Having now considered it for some time I am prepared to hand it over to a new foster parent and to agree with the Amendment of the noble and learned Lord. I have received definite information similar to that which the noble Viscount has referred to, that all magistrates who understand the question think this is a dangerous way of doing things. Even when I put it in I thought it was a dangerous way. I think it better as is proposed here to say that the court

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shall disqualify unless for special reasons it thinks it should not. It will improve the Bill and I have much pleasure in accepting it.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
LORD RAGLAN LORD RAGLAN moved, in subsection (4), to leave out "committing" and insert "whom he believes to be guilty of." The noble Lord said: I think that in a case of this kind it would be for the court and not for the constable to say whether an offence had been committed. Some alteration is desirable and I would be prepared to support the Amendment of my noble friend Lord Howe except that it disregards the rules of grammar.
Amendment moved—
Page 15, line 30, leave out ("committing") and insert ("whom he believes to be guilty of)".—(Lord Raglan.)
EARL RUSSELL: It is perfectly true that no one can decide that a person has committed an offence under the clause until he is convicted, but this is the usual form of words, and I do not suppose it means more than the Amendment says. I think it better to leave the words as they are now. The constable can arrest a man now if he thinks on reasonable grounds that an offence has been committed. If in fact he does not think an offence has been committed he ought not to arrest him. This is the usual form and I think we ought to keep it.
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD: Does not this put the constable in a difficult position? If he arrests without warrant a person whom he believes to have committed an offence and that person—perhaps quite wrongly—is not convicted, is not the police constable liable to an action for having done something he is not entitled to do?
EARL RUSSELL: Are not all the powers of summary arrest by the constable in the same position? If he arrests a "drunk and disorderly" in the street he arrests him because he believes he is drunk and disorderly. It does not follow the man will be convicted.
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD: Is it not true that where a felony is committed a constable may arrest if he reasonably thinks that the person is
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guilty? It is "if he reasonably thinks." That is my impression of the law. Perhaps the noble Lord would look it up between now and Report.
EARL RUSSELL: I think I am right in saying that where a felony has been committed a constable can arrest on information, whereas anybody can arrest who sees a felony committed. How is a person to know whether what he sees is a felony or a misdemeanour? I think these are the usual words and that it would be unwise to change them.
LORD ATKIN: I cannot help thinking that perhaps it might be worth while giving a little more consideration to this matter before Report. Ordinarily speaking a constable can arrest from reasonable suspicion of a felony, whereas a private individual is not justified unless a felony has in fact been committed. When the question is whether a man was drunk or not drunk within the meaning of the Act there might arise a doubt which might prevent a constable being protected.
LORD SANDHURST: Might I call attention to a similar provision in subsection (2) of Clause 19, which relates to a constable arresting without warrant a person who within his view commits an offence under the Act? I think it may not be inappropriate to call attention to that now, in order that the noble Earl may look into it.
EARL RUSSELL: I shall be glad to take further advice on this matter, and to see what are the usual words, and what are the precedents, before the Report stage.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 14, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 15:
Restriction on pillion riding.
15.—(1) It shall not be lawful for more than one person in addition to the driver to be carried on any two-wheeled motor cycle, nor shall it be lawful for any such one person to be so carried otherwise than sitting astride the cycle and on a proper seat securely fixed to the cycle.
(2) If any person is carried on any such cycle in contravention of the provisions of this section, the driver of the cycle shall be guilty of an offence.
THE EARL OF ONSLOW THE EARL OF ONSLOW moved, after subsection (1), to insert as a new subsection

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"( ) A person under fourteen years of age shall not be carried on any such motor cycle."
The noble Earl said: I should like to call your Lordships' attention to this Amendment. In Clause 9 your Lordships have laid down restrictions on driving by young persons. It only mentions there the restrictions on driving. Clause 15 subsection (1) lays down regulations as to how people should be carried on motor cycles on pillion, but it does not say anything about the age of the young person who shall be carried on a pillion. It seems to me that you have here a rather dangerous state of circumstances. The Bill says that a young person under sixteen shall not drive a motor vehicle on the road. Over sixteen he may. But a boy of sixteen who purchases a motor cycle on the hire-purchase system may take his little sister, say twelve years of age, on the pillion, and if the machine is capable of it may drive at seventy miles an hour along the road. It seems to me that such a combination is a very dangerous one, and I suggest that young persons carried on the pillion shall be at least fourteen years of age, which is the age at which a young person may ride a motor bicycle at the present time. It has been suggested to me that the practice of carrying quite small children on push bicycles is equally, if not more, dangerous, but as this Bill deals only with motorists, I do not think I can raise that point now. I think, however, that some limit of age should be placed upon those people who can be carried on a pillion, because it is a dangerous way of riding.
Amendment moved—
Page 15, line 36, at end, insert the said new subsection.—(The Earl of Onslow.)
EARL RUSSELL: I should have thought it was a little hard that a boy of sixteen and a-half could not take his brother of twelve to school pillion riding on his motor bicycle if he had got a mile to go. It is really quite as safe as most things that boys of that age do.
THE EARL OF ONSLOW: I will put the age at twelve if you like.
EARL RUSSELL: I would rather, if I had to put it in, put it lower than that. The noble Earl knows perfectly well that children, particularly of the poor, very often have to look after themselves at a remarkably early age, and that quite
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competent sisters of younger children, aged about nine or ten, may be found looking after them in the poorer parts of the town. It is unnecessary to put in this limitation, and I would rather not put it in.
EARL HOWE: I think Lord Onslow has told us already that he does not drive a motor vehicle himself. Those who do will realise the truth of what I am going to say. One of the sights that personally I like seeing better than anything else is the poor people going out on their motor bicycles and side-cars into the country to get a day's fresh air at the week-end. I am perfectly certain that humble folk in our great cities get more enjoyment out of this than from anything else in their daily lives. Poor people are not able to afford to employ others to look after their children. They must of necessity take them out with them, and you do, in fact, see motor cycles and side-cars going out into the country with children.
THE EARL OF ONSLOW: It does not say anything about side-cars.
EARL HOWE: I agree, but I am trying to point out that it does mean a great boon for the humble folk to be allowed to take small children on their motor cycles. I do not see why we should always be told that it will necessarily be a young boy of sixteen who will be taking a small child out into the country. It does not happen in that way. As a matter of fact, you see very few young boys of sixteen. What you do see is very much older folk taking out women on their pillions. I hope we shall not introduce any more strict regulations on pillion riding.
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD: I think the noble Earl, Lord Onslow, has a better case than the noble Earl, Lord Howe, admits. Lord Howe has drawn a very attractive, idyllic picture of a family going out on a motor cycle to get fresh air in the country, but as a matter of fact under the Bill only one other person can go out on the motor cycle besides the driver, and the only question is whether it is safe to take a little child of perhaps eight or ten on a motor cycle or not. I must say that I have seen—more often I think in the case of push bicycles than on motor bicycles—cases which really did seem to

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me frightfully dangerous—little tiny babies being taken on a bicycle. Fourteen may be too high an age, but I should have thought some restriction of age was desirable in this case.
EARL RUSSELL: I agree. We have all seen these children on push bicycles, apparently in a very dangerous position. But let us remember that we are dealing with public safety—this is a question of the safety of the child looked after by its parents. I really think unless you can show that there is a mischief which requires curing, that is, that children are exposed to danger in this way and that dangers do occur in consequence, you ought not to go imposing restrictions on people who ought to be able to look after their own children.
On Question, Amendment negatived.
THE EARL OF ONSLOW THE EARL OF ONSLOW moved to add to subsection (2) "as well as any person or persons carried on any such cycle." The noble Earl said: This second Amendment is of a different character. I suggest that the person who rides improperly on a pillion should, if necessary, be liable. It may be that it is an older person who rides on the pillion, and who may bring undue influence on the person who drives the cycle. I do not see why both should not get into trouble if they are contravening the law and why the most responsible one should not be punished.
Amendment moved—
Page 15, line 39, at end insert ("as well as any person or persons carried on any such cycle").—(The Earl of Onslow.)
EARL RUSSELL: Your Lordships will remember that a moment ago you decided that it was possible that the person on the pillion should be ten years old or less. I think you can hardly make such a person responsible for the conduct of the person who is driving.
THE EARL OF ONSLOW: Not responsible for their conduct; responsible for their own conduct.
EARL RUSSELL: Do you not make them guilty of the offence? I think so. "The driver of a cycle shall be guilty of an offence as well as any person…" You cannot make them guilty of their own conduct. After all if they were in themselves taking any active part in doing anything wrong they could be convicted for aiding and abetting without any extra words.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 15 agreed to.
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD moved, after Clause 15, to insert as a new clause:
" .Any person who without lawful authority drives a motor vehicle upon any foreshore or upon any commons or waste lands as defined under Section one hundred and ninety-three of the Law of Property Act, 1925, or upon, any lands whatsoever to which the public have rights of access for air and exercise shall be liable upon summary conviction to a fine not exceeding ten pounds for the first offence, and to a fine not exceeding twenty pounds for every subsequent offence, provided that it shall not be an offence under this section—

(a) to drive a motor vehicle upon such foreshore commons, waste lands or land aforesaid for the purpose of saving life or extinguishing fire, or—

(b) to drive a motor vehicle upon any place, road or highway in or upon or through such commons, waste lands or land aforesaid which is built or provided for the purpose of driving motor vehicles or carriages thereon."

The noble Viscount said: The object of this clause is to restrain people from driving on common lands and downs and foreshores except on roads prepared for the purpose. I have to speak by hearsay here, because I am not familiar with the matter myself. I understand there is a considerable grievance, particularly on downs and foreshores, where motors are driven on what used to be entirely reserved for people who are on foot or horseback. It is, I am told, a very serious grievance in some places. I do not know whether this is the proper way of dealing with it, but I thought I would raise it for your Lordships' consideration.
Amendment moved—
After Clause 15 insert the said new clause.—(Viscount Cecil of Chelwood.)
EARL RUSSELL: It is a great pleasure to be able once in a way to go hand in hand with the noble Viscount. There is a grievance and great complaint in this matter, and I am very sympathetic. The Ministry of Transport is also sympathetic with the objects of this clause, but it would require a good deal more careful drafting to make it fit in. However, so far as the principle of the clause is concerned, we are very sympathetic, and we will certainly try to bring up a properly drafted clause on Report to meet the object.
EARL HOWE: While not wishing to abuse the noble Earl in charge of the Bill unreasonably, I hope from what he has said that we are not going to have imposed a severe set of new restrictions upon people who wish, quite reasonably, to go and enjoy a picnic in the country, for instance, or to camp by the roadside. I hope we shall not find an entirely new set of penalties devised against that. I am sure every reasonable user of a motor car is ready to do anything possible to assist the noble Earl in preventing the unreasonable use of any foreshore or other place where private rights or public amenities are unjustifiably interfered with. I would insist on consideration being given to humble folk with their motor bicycles and side-cars or with the cheaper forms of motor vehicles.
EARL RUSSELL: We have borne in mind what the noble Earl has just said, and it is for that reason this clause requires redrafting so as not to prevent anyone parking on the side of the road, which, I am sure, is not the intention of the noble Viscount. What we are not in sympathy with—and I do not know whether that is what the noble Earl suggests—is cars scampering up and down all over the downs, having trials of their own and manœuvring up and down the, South Downs. That use of the downs was not intended and we are not in sympathy with it.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
EARL HOWE EARL HOWE moved to insert as a new-clause:—
Motor vehicle lights to be lowered in lighted streets.
" . When a motor vehicle is being driven during the hours of darkness along a road lighted with street lamps it shall be an offence under this Part of this Act for the driver to maintain the illumination of the headlights of the vehicle at full intensity unless the beams of light are deflected downwards so as to avoid dazzling the drivers of vehicles approaching from the opposite direction."
The noble Earl said: This is a new clause which I most sincerely wish to commend to your Lordships' consideration. It has been the constant experience of many of us to have encountered motor vehicles being driven at night along well-lighted streets in our City and in the lesser lighted streets, using headlights to the full intensity to the inconvenience and danger of all other
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forms of traffic whether pedestrian or vehicular. The Amendment which I submit to your Lordships makes it an offence to maintain headlights at full intensity if the beams of light are not deflected. The expression "beams of light" has been inserted rather than headlights because that gets away from the recommendation of some form of proprietary article. At the same time it does allow the motorist in certain circumstances to use headlights, but he must do so in such a way as to avoid inconveniencing other people.
It may be necessary, for instance, to use headlights in fog provided the beams are dipped, but I submit it is an unjustifiable abuse of headlights to use them at full intensity where street lights exist. It may be said, of course, that street lighting is inadequate in the outskirts of cities. No doubt it is, but in foreign countries you are not allowed to use headlights. In France they are extremely strict about that. If you use headlights or other than the most severely limited lighting in the most humble French village you are likely to be stopped and, if necessary, hauled up by the gendarmes. I hope the noble Earl will give some promise in regard to this Amendment, which I may say receives the practically unanimous support of all motoring associations with whom I have been able to get in touch since I put the Amendment on the Paper.
Amendment moved—
After Clause 15 insert the said new clause.—(Earl Howe.)
EARL RUSSELL: This matter was really fully dealt with only two years ago in the Road Transport Lighting Act. Under that Act the Minister has full powers to make any regulation he thinks necessary in this matter. The noble Earl's clause is extraordinarily vague. It refers to a motor vehicle driven "along a road lighted with street lamps." Well, one knows a great many roads that are lighted with street lamps at such long intervals that it really makes it more dangerous than if there were no lamps at all. These alternations of little pools of light with long stretches of darkness would be extraordinarily dangerous without headlights. In appropriate cases the matter can be dealt with by the Minister under an Act which is only two years old.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: Can the noble Earl tell us whether the Minister has made any regulations? Those of us who drive are still very much worried by these huge headlights and I think all motor drivers are anxious that something should be done to stop the road hog who deliberately uses headlights while driving through towns. The noble Earl says there is power to make regulations, but has any Minister made them? If not, I think he ought to give us a little more indication that he is prepared either to make regulations or to adopt something in the nature of this clause.
EARL RUSSELL: The position is that it is extraordinarily difficult to know what to do about this matter. The Act-to which I have referred is only two years old. There have been trials of headlights that do not dazzle, trials of dipping headlights, trials of this and trials of that. I myself know how horrible these headlights are at night when you come upon them. But before the Minister can properly make an order he must be satisfied that on the whole he is going to do more good than harm and is not going to imperil people's safety on the road. He has not yet made an order because he has not yet been satisfied about this. If he made an order he would have to give some definition of the degree of street lighting required before it would be safe to make an order. He has powers to do it whenever it is possible to do it, and I have no doubt that, if any motion were made by the local authorities in the proper course, he would exercise those powers.
EARL HOWE: I do not want to labour the point. The noble Earl in charge of the Bill is one of the most experienced motorists in this country. He probably knows more about motoring than I am ever likely to know. I should like to submit to him that it is a most dangerous thing to encounter a car with these headlights at full intensity when it is raining and there are drops of water on the wind-screen. It produces conditions of the greatest possible danger. It is no use waiting for the local authorities to act. Local authorities are not necessarily impressed with the motorist's difficulties in this matter. The noble Earl speaks of little pools of light at infrequent intervals. I agree, but you could still use your headlights providing you did not
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use them in such a way as to get into people's eyes. They could be dipped or you could use the secondary lighting, which is the rule in France. It does not create any difficulties over there, it is strictly insisted upon and really enforced. I submit to the noble Earl that on practical grounds he might give us a little more hope in this matter than he has been able to give us so far.
EARL RUSSELL: What the noble Earl says is perfectly true. I have been on perfectly straight roads and I have been compelled at fairly frequent intervals, on meeting cars with very big headlights, to draw right into the side of the road and to go very slowly because I could not see. I agree that this is intolerable and an extremely annoying state of things. But really it is very difficult to know what is the remedy to apply. If the noble Earl, who is interested in the subject, after I am relieved from this task, will come and see us at the Ministry of Transport, we shall be glad to have any hints that he can give us as to what can be done. It is no use making an order unless it is one that everybody can obey and is quite reasonable.
THE EARL OF CLARENDON: I should like to say one word on this point. The Royal Commission, on which I have the honour to be serving, made a very definite recommendation with regard to dazzling headlights. I will not road it to your Lordships, but briefly the suggestion is that something should be done by way of dipping or swivelling headlights. I use them to any car, and the kind that I use seems to me to be very perfect, but I do not notice that there are many people who use them to-day. There is no doubt whatever that an advancing car with its headlights full on does blind you to such an extent that there are moments when you cannot see the left-hand side of the road. If you have dipping or swivelling headlights—I prefer the swivelling kind—you do at least see the left-hand side and know if there is any danger of running into something. I venture to submit that it might be possible for the Minister to advise manufacturers to put some such standard device of this kind on their cars. This might meet this great difficulty, do great service to users of the road, and tend to make our roads much safer at night.
EARL RUSSELL: That is perfectly true, and I think that, as a matter of fact, the thing is being considered. The noble Earl knows that it is not long since the Royal Commission reported. I will undertake, on the Report stage, to be able to furnish a full report of anything that is being done or contemplated in this matter. I think we are quite alive to this problem. It is a very great nuisance to everybody.
EARL HOWE: If I withdraw this Amendment now and put it down on Report, will the noble Earl be prepared to deal with it?
EARL RUSSELL: Certainly, put it down again on Report.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 16:
Requirements as to employment of drivers and attendants.
(3) For the purposes of this section the expression "trailer" shall not include any vehicle solely for carrying water for the purposes of the drawing vehicle or any vehicle not constructed to carry a load.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME moved, in subsection (3), to leave out "or any vehicle not constructed to carry a load." The noble Viscount said: Unless we clearly state what sort of vehicles these vehicles not constructed to carry a load are, there may be a danger in allowing this phrase to stand. Am I right in assuming that gypsy living vans come under this description? If so, if they are allowed to go in unlimited numbers without attendants, it must of necessity be courting disaster.
Amendment moved—
Page 16, leave out line 13.—(Viscount Bertie of Thame.)
EARL RUSSELL: It is not intended to cover gypsy living vans or anything of that sort. It is something of the same nature as the vehicle which is carrying the water barrel—some additional light vehicle constructed to carry agricultural tools or something like that.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME: If it is constructed to carry something, surely it is not a vehicle not constructed to carry a load. Agricultural implements are a load.
EARL RUSSELL: I shall find out what sort of vehicle is used to trail behind the water barrel. It is not of great importance and certainly it is not one that needs an attendant.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: I am told that when steam rollers are engaged in rolling the road there is only one man on the machine driving them. There are of course two when they are travelling about the country, but generally when the roller is actually working the second man is on the road. Will the noble Earl make inquiries about that and if I am right have a small Amendment on that?
EARL RUSSELL: I am not sure about that. The words in the Act as it stands say that two persons shall be employed in driving and attending the locomotive. I suppose the person on the road is attending to it. I shall find out anything my noble friend wants to know.
Clause 16 agreed to.
Clause 17 [Restriction on the number of trailers drawn]:
EARL RUSSELL: I have two drafting Amendments.
Amendments moved—
Page 16, line 18, leave out ("of any class")
Page 16, line 27, leave out ("any such vehicle") and insert (" vehicles of the respective classes aforesaid").—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendments agreed to.
Clause 17, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 18 [Limitation of time for which drivers of certain vehicles may remain continuously on duty]:
LORD NEWTON: On this clause I would make an appeal to my noble friend who is always so reasonable. This is a contentious clause and one of considerable complexity. I understand my noble friend is in communication with various associations concerned and I suggest he should withdraw the clause now and bring up a fresh one on Report.
EARL RUSSELL: There have been so many representations already received on this clause that we are satisfied it needs a great deal of consideration and redrafting. It does not, as it is now drawn, meet the normal and proper requirements of trade. If your Lordships

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will allow it to stand unamended, we will bring up a fresh one on Report.
Clause 18 agreed to.
Clause 19:
Duty to give name and address and power of arrest in certain cases.
19.—(1) If the driver of a motor vehicle who is alleged to have committed an offence under the foregoing provisions of this Act as to reckless or dangerous driving or careless driving refuses, on being so required by any person having reasonable ground for so requiring, to give his name or address, or gives a false name or address he shall be guilty of an offence.
(2) Any police constable may arrest without warrant the driver of any motor vehicle who within his view commits any offence under the provisions of this Act as to reckless or dangerous driving or careless driving, unless the driver on being so required either gives his name and address or produces his licence.
EARL HOWE EARL HOWE moved to leave out subsection (1). The noble Earl said: I am rather anxious to see this subsection omitted because it gives power to any person to demand a driver's name and address on the pretence that he has possibly been guilty of reckless, dangerous or careless driving. I submit that this may lead to dangerous or unreasonable interference with traffic and the annoyance, of quite innocent drivers. Take ladies driving motor cars by themselves, for instance. Is it reasonable that power should be given to any busybody to stop a lady, and ask for her name and address? I submit the subsection is quite sufficient which enables a constable to take names and addresses in case of accident as provided in Clause 21.
Amendment moved—
Page 17, line 27, leave out subsection (1).—(Earl Howe.)
EARL RUSSELL: This is quite an old clause and quite a necessary clause. It does not say that anything shall happen to them then and there on the road if they do not give their names to a private person, but they are merely liable to be summoned. Suppose what you have is merely the number of a vehicle, and you then make inquiries, and write a letter and ask for the name and address of the owner. It is perfectly right if you are prepared to allege an offence that you should be given the name and address. It does not give a right to a private person
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to stop a ear on the road, hold it up, and demand the name and address of the owner. It only says "on being required by any person having reasonable ground for so requiring, to give his name or address." Surely it is the duty of a person to give his name and address if, it is suggested that he has committed an offence, and I cannot see any harm in it. It is the law now and it works quite well.
On Question, Amendment negatived.
LORD NEWTON LORD NEWTON moved, in subsection (2), to leave our, "on being so required." The noble Lord said: As the clause reads it might appear that the motorist is liable to be arrested unless he is required by the constable to give his address.
Amendment moved—
Page 17, line 38, leave out ("on being so required").—(Lord Newton.)
EARL RUSSELL: I suppose what the noble Lord means is that if the constable chose not to require the name and address to be given he could proceed to arrest the man. That is not the intention, and I think these words might come out, subject to consideration whether the clause requires re-drafting.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 19, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 20:
Restrictions on prosecutions under the preceding sections.
20. Where a person is prosecuted for an offence under any of the sections of this Act relating respectively to the maximum speed at which motor vehicles may be driven, to reckless or dangerous driving, and to careless driving (other than subsection (5) of the section relating to maximum speed) he shall not be convicted unless either—

(a) he was warned of the intended prosecution at the time the offence was committed; or

(b) within twenty-one days of the commission of the offence a summons for the offence was served on him; or

(c) within the said twenty-one days a notice of the intended prosecution was served on or sent by registered post to him or the person registered as the owner of the vehicle at the time of the commission of the offence,

but failure to comply with this requirement shall not be a bar to the conviction of the accused in any case where the Court is satisfied that neither his name and address, nor

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the name and address of the registered owner of the vehicle, could with reasonable diligence have been ascertained within the said twenty-one days, or that there is other reasonable cause for the failure and that the accused has not been prejudiced thereby.
EARL RUSSELL: These are two drafting Amendments.
Amendments moved—
Page 18, line 2, leave out ("sections") and insert ("provisions of this Part")
Page 18, line 5, leave out from ("driving") to ("he") in line 6.—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendments agreed to.
EARL HOWE EARL HOWE had on the Paper an Amendment in paragraph (b) to leave out "twenty-one" and insert "fourteen." The noble Earl said: If I may shortly explain what I am anxious to do probably the Minister will be able to tell us what it is possible to agree to. The point of view that I desire to submit is this, that nobody minds when the summons arrives for a motoring offence. If a driver committed an offence under the Act and was going to be summoned and charged he would not mind how long afterwards the summons arrived, but what is of the greatest importance to the motor driver is that he should receive notice of the intention to summon him, with a rough idea of what the case against him is at the earliest moment. It is of some importance, if you are going perhaps on a long journey. It may be said that you have at 3.45 p.m. on a certain day committed an offence, but unless the warning reaches you very soon after it would be quite impossible for you to prepare a defence and to recollect the details of what happened. If the noble Earl could make some concession about this point I think we should be able to meet the desires of the police authorities, who, I understand, ask for a longer period for the service of the summons.
Amendment moved—
Page 18, line 10, leave out ("twenty-one") and insert ("fourteen").—(Earl Howe.)
EARL RUSSELL: I sympathise very much with the object of the noble Earl. I think it is very hard on the motorist if his first knowledge that he is alleged to have committed this offence arises even fourteen days after he has committed it. It is very difficult, if he had no reason to suspect that at the time he
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had done anything wrong—if there was no shouting, and so on—for him to say exactly where he was on the journey, what he was doing, to remember the conditions of the road or the weather. That, I suppose, is the penalty he pays for being able to travel 200 miles in a day. But it is not the service of the summons that matters; it is the difficulty of sometimes finding the man to give notice to. Where they could, I quite agree, the police ought to give notice on the spot. But when they cannot give notice at once their contention is that they often have great difficulty in finding out the man's address and reaching him, and that twenty-one days is the least they must have for extreme cases.
They do not in the least mean—and I hope that chief constables will see that they do not mean—that they are to take twenty-one days in every case. They ought to be as quick as possible. But if they do not have twenty-one days a great many people will escape who ought not to escape. It is very difficult to reconcile those two views. I cannot say how strongly I feel the injustice done to a man who does not suspect having committed an offence himself of first hearing of it a week or two afterwards. I hope the police will make a practice of giving notice as soon as possible, but as at present advised I am afraid I must ask the House to leave twenty-one days in.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: If the noble Earl looks at the clause I think he will find that the police are not damnified if they cannot get the name and address of the man. It says that
"failure to comply with this reqirement shall not be a bar to the conviction of the accused in any case where the Court is satisfied that neither his name and address, nor the name and address of the registered owner of the vehicle, could with reasonable diligence have been ascertained within the said twenty-one days…."
That extends the time. All that my noble friend asks is that when the name and address are known, the police shall give notice within fourteen days. I understand he is willing even to extend the time for the service of the summons, but that is not the point. The motorist wants to know within fourteen days that he is alleged to have committed an offence, and when and where.
EARL RUSSELL: It does not follow that his name and address are known at the time the offence is committed.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: If they are not known the concession he is asking for does not apply. The police have as much time as they like if they cannot find the name and address. If the noble Earl will carefully read the conclusion of Clause 20 he will see he could make the Amendment suggested by my noble friend Earl Howe at all events to paragraph (c), making that fourteen days instead of twenty-one. That would be a slight concession and of some benefit.
EARL RUSSELL: When I face the noble Viscount on this subject across this Table I am bound to confess I do feel a little like the poacher turned gamekeeper. I have taken the view before, when I was entitled to take views of my own, that twenty-one days was perhaps rather a long period. With the saving at the end it might be possible, but, as I said, I must consult my right hon. friend the Home Secretary on this. I will give it the most favourable consideration and will call attention to the proviso at the end. I think it desirable there should be the longest notice.
EARL HOWE: I have an Amendment in paragraph (c) to insert "giving particulars of the time and place and all details in the possession and knowledge of the police authorities." I do not know whether it will be possible for the noble Karl to meet me on that Amendment? I shall be rather glad to hear whether he can tell me anything about it.
EARL RUSSELL: Had we not better wait till we come to it?
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
EARL HOWE EARL HOWE moved, in paragraph (c), after "prosecution," to insert "giving particulars of the time and place and all details in the possession or knowledge of the police authorities of the occurrence which forms the subject of the prosecution." The noble Earl said: I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 18, line 14, after ("prosecution") insert the said words.—(Earl Howe.)
EARL RUSSELL: I do not know whether it is quite reasonable that particulars of the time and place and all details in the possession and knowledge of the police
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authorities should be given. It is not usual, I think, for a police prosecution, in the case of an offence, to give away its case before the trial. To give all details in the possession of the police, or the knowledge of the police authorities, is a good deal to ask for. I think the noble Earl has gone too far in this Amendment.
EARL HOWE: If I have gone too far could a summary of the alleged offence be delivered at the earliest possible moment? Under the Bill we are providing for two charges—dangerous driving and careless driving. Either or both may be of rather a serious nature and very difficult to defend. It is only fair to the man so charged that he should be given a chance to know roughly what the charge is against him.
LORD ATKIN: The noble Earl will see that (b) and (c) are alternatives. The summons would contain particulars of the offence having been committed at such and such a time on such and such a day, and I think the notice ought to contain the same particulars as are contained in the summons. I do not know if the noble Earl expects more than that.
EARL HOWE: That is all I want.
EARL RUSSELL: I think the time and place and some information of the nature of the offence should be in the notice.
EARL HOWE: That is what I wanted.
EARL RUSSELL: I do not accept the Amendment now
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: How long does the noble Earl propose that your Lordships should sit?
EARL RUSSELL: I hope we might go on till eleven. We have only sat one hour and a quarter since dinner.
Clause 20, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 21:
Duty to stop in case of accident.
21.—(1) If in any case, owing to the presence of a motor vehicle on the road, an accident occurs to any person, whether on foot or on horseback or in a vehicle, or to any vehicle or animal in the charge of any person, the driver of the motor vehicle shall stop and, if required so to do by any person having reasonable grounds for so requiring, give his name and address, and also the name and address of the owner and the identification marks of the vehicle.
(2) If in the case of any such accident as aforesaid there is no person capable of requiring or in a position to require the driver of the motor vehicle to give his name and address, or if in any case owing to the presence of a motor vehicle on a road an accident occurs to any vehicle or animal not in charge of any person, the driver of the motor vehicle shall report the accident at a police station as soon as possible, and in any case within twenty-four hours of the occurrence thereof.
(3) In this section, the expression "animal" means any horse, cattle, ass, mule, sheep, pig, goat, or dog.
Amendment moved—
Page 18, line 28, leave out ("the") and insert ("a").—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME moved, in subsection (1), to leave out "on horseback" and insert "riding any animal." The noble Viscount said: If I may be permitted to use a contradiction in terms this clause is so comprehensive that it is not quite comprehensive enough. As the clause stands only those on horseback are covered. This Amendment is intended to cover those riding mules, donkeys and circus animals to whom an accident might equally occur.
Amendment moved—
Page 18, line 29, leave out (" on horseback ") and insert ("riding any animal").—(Viscount Bertie of Thame.)
EARL RUSSELL: The noble Viscount said "circus animals." I suppose this is intended to cover any one riding a zebra. I will consider the words, but I think they might be improved to make clear what is meant. It might cover a boy riding a cow.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME: An accident might happen to a boy riding a cow.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME moved, in subsection (1), after the second "in," to insert "or upon." The noble Viscount said: As the clause stands those riding bicycles or tricycles are not covered, as they could not be said to be in their vehicles. They would be upon them.
Amendment moved—
Page 18, line 29, after ("in") insert ("or upon").—(Viscount Bertie of Thame.)
EARL RUSSELL: Yes, I suppose that is right.
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD: Might I ask the noble Earl when he is considering other things connected with this clause to consider whether these words are at all necessary, whether it would not be much better to say "occurs to any person"? Why say "whether on foot or on horseback"? Suppose he is lying down.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: Do you mean drunk in the road?
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD: Not necessarily drunk. He might be asleep by the side of the road, and the car might swerve.
EARL RUSSELL: Yes, I think that is the proper Amendment. The whole of this line really had better come out. Then it would read: "an accident occurs to any person, or to any vehicle or animal." There is no reason to describe what the person to whom an accident occurs is doing. I think we had better leave the line out. I will move that.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Amendment moved—
Page 18, line 29, leave out (" whether on foot or on horseback or in a vehicle").—(Earl Russell.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD moved, in subsection (1), to leave out "in the charge of any person." The noble Viscount said: I may have misread the clause but, as I understood it, this subsection merely provides that where an accident has happened to a person or animal or vehicle the driver of the motor car should stop. Then it requires that if any person is in charge he is to give his name and address. Then in the second subsection he is to give information, if there is no person in charge, at the next police station. If I may say so, that is a very proper provision. But why is it necessary to say "in charge of any person"?
Let me put an ordinary case. Suppose a dog is run over. Of course you must-assume the motorist sees he has run over it. If he has not seen it, it does not apply. Is it not much better that he should stop? How can he give any useful information at the police station unless he stops? If a dog was run over he could see if it had a collar and take the name and address and give information

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at the police station. If he was a humane man and the dog was only injured he might take it home. The same would apply to other animals. I only take the case of a dog because I know something of dogs and not of other animals. It does seem that he should stop and give such information as he can at the police station. That is the purpose of my Amendment.
Amendment moved—
Page 18, line 30, leave out ("in the charge of any person")—(Viscount Cecil of Chelwood.)
EARL RUSSELL: I think the idea in the first subsection is to indicate the person to whom the name and address shall be given. In the second subsection, there being nobody in charge of the animals, the driver has to go elsewhere. Would it not be proper to require him to stop in the second subsection?
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD: If my noble friend will forgive me, the driver is not required, in the second subsection, to stop at all. When the accident has occurred, it is dealt with in the first subsection. When he has ascertained, as I suggest he should, all the particulars, then, in the second subsection, he is required to give information at the next police station. The first subsection, surely, deals with what has happened at the scene of the accident, and the second with what he must do at the police station. I should have thought it only right that he should stop and see what he has done. I live on a common where there are rights of grazing. Nobody is in charge of the animals, of course, and if somebody runs into a cow or a sheep, why should he not stop and see what he has done? If the cow were slightly hurt, it might make a great difference as to what action should be taken.
EARL RUSSELL: These are alternative subsections, one providing for what happens when there is somebody there and the other for when there is not. In the first case the driver must stop and tell that person; in the second he must tell a policeman. I suggest that the point would be better dealt with in the second subsection.
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD: I beg your pardon. I am quite content.
EARL RUSSELL: I think that would be reasonable. I do not know how anybody is to know if he has stopped when there is nobody there.
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD: You will make it his duty.
EARL RUSSELL: If the noble Viscount will find the right place, and move accordingly, I shall be willing to accept.
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD: I will do so on Report.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
EARL HOWE EARL HOWE moved, in subsection (1), after the fourth "vehicle," to insert "and the person in charge of such vehicle or animal." The noble Earl said: The clause requires a driver to stop after an accident and give his name and address. This Amendment extends the obligation to all persons in charge of vehicles or animals. A horse-drawn vehicle might be responsible for an accident or the driver might be a material witness. The purpose of this Amendment is to extend the prevalent obligation to other persons using the highway, in accordance with the title of the Bill—the Road Traffic Bill. We want to see that it is one.
Amendment moved—
Page 18, line 31, after ("vehicle") insert ("and the person in charge of such animal or vehicle").—(Earl Howe.)
EARL RUSSELL: Now that the noble Earl has explained it, I see the object of his Amendment. I still think it is undesirable. This is not a general highway Bill. I suppose one reason for its present form is that the motorist generally has a reasonable chance of finding a man in another vehicle. A horse drawn vehicle does not usually pursue a motor car. This Amendment is unnecessary, and, for the same reason as the last Amendment, undesirable.
EARL HOWE: I submit that persons in charge of vehicles or animals may be material witnesses. Under the Bill we impose serious charges of dangerous and careless driving, and a great deal may turn on the evidence of such witnesses in court. The matter ought to receive the most careful consideration. Can the noble Lord assure me he will give further consideration on Report stage if necessary?
EARL RUSSELL: If the noble Earl can point out how it can usefully be worked, I shall consider it but I do not see what is to happen. If the man is there in charge of the vehicle, you can talk to him and ask his name and address. If it is suggested he will whip up his gig and drive away, well he will probably do it anyway and you can always follow him.
EARL HOWE: In view of the assurance from the noble Earl, I beg leave to withdraw.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD: I beg to move, in subsection (2), after "shall," to insert "stop and shall."
Amendment moved—
Page 19, line 1, after the word ("shall,") to insert ("stop and shall.")—(Viscount Cecil of Chelwood.)
EARL RUSSELL: I shall accept that Amendment subject to re-drafting.
EARL HOWE: I am not clear about the implication of this Amendment. Suppose you are driving across a common and run into something, how is one to know you have stopped? How long is a motorist to stop? If a motorist is unfortunate enough to run over a dog and kills it I believe he is liable to an action at law. I believe you are legally bound to let the poor brute suffer if you do what the law says.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: How can you report an accident without stopping? la it the idea that he flies past the police station at sixty miles an hour and yells out: "I have run over a dog"?
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD: I am merely trying in my Amendment to indicate what every decent motorist would do. He runs into a horse or over a dog. Any decent man would see what damage he had done, whom the dog belonged to and give the police any information available. I see a noble Lord laughing, but it is no laughing matter. When the Report stage comes no doubt these words may have to be redrafted, but I think they will show what is intended.
EARL RUSSELL: The noble Lord means stop at the scene of the accident. That was what I understood.
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD: Yes.
EARL RUSSELL: The words may have to be redrafted, but motorists do not always stop. I recollect in Devonshire seeing a car from London—they always say "a car from London "—drive furiously through a village, run over a dog and leave it howling. That is an intolerable thing. The noble Earl asks who will report the motorist if he does not stop. There is often a hedger or a ditcher in the country.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
LORD NEWTON LORD NEWTON moved, in subsection (2), after "station," to insert "or to a police constable." The noble Lord said: This is a very trivial Amendment and I have no particular desire to make things easier for motorists, but it does seem desirable that they should be able to report an accident as soon as possible and if it can be more conveniently done by informing a police constable than by going to a station I do not see why it should not be.
Amendment moved—
Page 19, line 2, after ("station") insert ("or to a police constable").—(Lord Newton.)
EARL RUSSELL: I will consult the Home Secretary about this. It is not quite certain whether it would be desirable. For instance, it might not be desirable to interrupt a police constable on point duty. Where practicable it is better that motorists should report at a police station
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
LORD RAGLAN LORD RAGLAN moved, in sub section (3), after "horse," to insert "head of." The noble Lord said: May I venture to suggest that the word "cattle" is a plural noun?
Amendment moved—
Page 19, line 5, after ("horse") to insert ("head of").—(Lord Raglan.)
EARL RUSSELL: I do not think it is necessary to accept this alteration.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME moved, in subsection (3), after "goat," to insert "cat." The noble Viscount said: Some people are as fond of cats as others are of dogs, and I therefore appeal

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to the noble Earl to insert this Amendment.
Amendment moved—
Page 19, line 5, after ("goat") insert ("cat").—(Viscount Bertie of Thame.)
EARL RUSSELL: I am just as fond of cats as of dogs, but I really think this Amendment should not be pressed. Cats, after all, are very irresponsible creatures, but they can generally look after themselves.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 21, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 22:
Inquiries into accidents.
22.—(1) Where an accident arises out of the presence of a motor vehicle on a road, the Minister may direct inquiry to be made info the cause of the accident.
(2) Where any such accident has occurred, any person authorised by the Minister in that behalf may at any time, on production if so required of his authority, inspect any vehicle in connection with which the accident arose, and for that purpose may enter any premises where the vehicle is, and if any person obstructs any person so authorised in the performance of his duty under this subsection, he shall be guilty of an offence.
THE EARL OF CRANBROOK THE EARL OF CRANBROOK moved, in subsection (1), after "accident," to insert "causing death or serious bodily injury to any person." The noble Earl said: This Amendment is designed to provide that the Minister shall not hold inquiries into every trivial little accident which occurs.
EARL RUSSELL: I have already stated, I think with the utmost clearness, that it is not the intention of the Minister to hold inquiries in every case. Very far from it. I even went on to say that very often the most important case was not one which aroused the most sensational headlines, because of the number of deaths. I think we must leave it to the Minister to select those accidents from which he is likely to learn useful lessons. "Causing death or serious bodily injury" is not the dividing line. I hope you will leave the Minister entirely free to enquire into those accidents from which he thinks he can usefully learn something.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: I think we are really putting into the hands of any future Minister tremendous power of multiplying officials and holding
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inquiries. There are 150,000 accidents every year, big and little, important and trivial, and the Minister is now going to take permission, at his own sweet will, to hold an inquiry into every one of them. The noble Earl says he will not do so, but there is the power to do it. We may have a Minister who likes to multiply officials and run all sorts of expensive inquiries, and I think the noble Earl might consult the Minister and get some limit on the power given by this clause. If we pass this measure without any qualification at this point, and in a year or two's time we find all over the country inquiries of all kinds being multiplied and he goes to Parliament and asks for more inspectors, there will be a revolt. Could not the noble Earl consult the Minister as to whether some means could not be found to limit this?
EARL HOWE: I hesitate to disagree with Lord Brentford, but I cannot support the contention he has put forward, and I desire to support the noble Earl in charge of the Bill. I have an Amendment down which would really extend the field of inquiry. The real aim of this Bill is to save life on the highways, and reduce the number of accidents. We can learn very much out of the accidents by carefully enquiring into them.
VISCOUNT CECIL OF CHELWOOD: I also wish to support the Minister. When I was concerned with trying to promote legislation on this subject, one of the great difficulties was the lack of information. You really did not know what were the causes of accidents and the best ways of dealing with them. I believe there is still a considerable lack of information on the subject, and I hope we shall not cut down the right of inquiry; it is extremely valuable. To say that it should only occur in cases of death would be unreasonable, because you have the coroner's inquiry, and that is the one case in which you do get information. There may have been a series of accidents at a particular place. You ought not to wait until one of them has caused serious bodily injury before you enquire. You should enquire immediately it becomes clear that the place is a dangerous one. I hope we shall not cut this down. My inclination, like that of my noble friend Lord Howe, is, if anything, to extend this clause.
EARL RUSSELL: I am very much surprised at the attitude that Lord Brentford has taken up. It is not so long since he sat in another place, where, as he knows, complete control of finance is exercised. No Minister could go in for increasing his staff largely without his being challenged on his Estimates. Really I do not know why it is assumed that a Minister is going to behave unreasonably. With great pains the London Traffic Advisory Committee made an intensive inquiry into the accidents to children in Greater London. They took note of the time of day at which they happened, the ages of the children, and all the material factors, by which it was hoped to arrive at some guidance as to what steps you should take to prevent the accidents and the deaths. It is precisely statistics of that sort that will be useful. In a very small number of accidents will anything in the nature of a formal inquiry be required, but it is necessary that we should have the statistics, and there are certainly a certain number of accidents in which formal inquiries will be most useful. The whole object of the inquiry is to try and reduce the roll of dead and injured. I hope nothing will be done to limit this power which we do regard as a very valuable and important one, which, after all, the Minister has in the London area and which he is not supposed to have exercised in any unreasonable way.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
EARL HOWE EARL HOWE moved, in subsection (1), to leave out "motor." The noble Earl said: The object of this Amendment is to enable the Minister to direct inquiries into all road accidents and not only to single out the motor. While horse-drawn vehicles are in these days a declining quantity it ought at least to be possible for the Minister to direct inquiries into all forms of accidents. The Minister ought not to be deprived of the opportunity of enquiring into an accident even though a power-propelled vehicle is not necessarily involved in it.
Amendment moved—
Page 19, line 9, leave out ("motor").—(Earl Howe.)
EARL RUSSELL: This is quite an unnecessary extension of the Minister's power. In any accidents worth enquiring into you may be sure there will be a
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motor vehicle involved. I think a collision between two farmers' carts would hardly be worth the inquiry.
On Question, Amendment negatived.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME moved, in subsection (2), to leave out "at any time." The noble Viscount said: Unfortunately my noble friend Lord Askwith is unable to be present and he has asked me to move the Amendments in his name. He is moving them on behalf of the Tramways and Light Railways' Association. What he does not want is for people to be rung up at any time of the night, and therefore he proposes to leave out the words "at any time."
Amendment moved—
Page 19, lines 13 and 14, leave out ("at any time").—(Viscount Bertie of Thame.)
EARL RUSSELL: I do not know why there is this general idea that Ministers behave unreasonably and do all sorts of unreasonable things. I do not think this Amendment will prevent ringing up in the middle of the night. It is desirable that the words "at any time" should remain. There may be cases in which it is important that the Minister, or his expert deputy rather, should be able to inspect the vehicle in the shortest possible time after the accident. The accident may occur at seven or eight o'clock at night and the expert might not got down till ten or eleven o'clock, and it might be very desirable to inspect the vehicle at the earliest possible moment. You must leave this to the judgment of His Majesty's Ministers.
LORD ATKIN: I think this power is a very extensive one and a very serious infringement of the ordinary rights of the individual. As a rule no police officer is allowed to enter the premises of a private individual without a warrant. In the present case it is not the Minister who is to go and inspect. No doubt he would adopt a reasonable attitude. It is any person authorised by him. He is to give authority to a particular person to inspect a particular vehicle on his behalf. Surely there ought not to be power to inspect at any unreasonable time and it should not be left to the agent of the Minister to determine the time. He might go into private garages at any time of the night simply because it might not be personally convenient to him to wait till the morning. He might do that because

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he wished to get away by an early train or something of that kind. This is a serious infringement of the ordinary rights of the individual and the inspection should be made at some reasonable time.
LORD SWAYTHLING: I foresaw the point which has just been made by the noble and learned Lord, and had put down an Amendment on the Paper to meet it. But I prefer the Amendment which Lord Bertie moved on behalf of Lord Askwith and I hope that the noble Earl will see his way to accept it.
LORD STANLEY OF ALDERLEY: I do not think that the noble Earl's explanation will hold much water. The clause appears to refer to an inspection authorised by the Minister. Is it assumed that he is to be in his office waiting for a telephone message ready to send his officers away? It is unlikely that it would be possible for the Minister to authorise an inspection at eleven o'clock of a motor car which had caused an accident at eight o'clock. The matter would not go before the Minister until the following morning and it seems clear that there can be no urgency to authorise this inspection the same night.
VISCOUNT BRENTFORD: I think it is quite clear that Lord Atkin is not correct in his view that the Minister would send a special man with special authority. Surely inspectors would have a general authority, and the Minister would know nothing of a visit of inspection to my garage. Some inspector—perhaps one of half a dozen having general authority—would look to that side of the business. The Minister is far too busy to deal with each single accident and to give a special order. That being so, I think the provision ought to be limited on the lines suggested by my noble friend.
LORD DANESFOBT: I hope the noble Earl will limit this power of inspection to a reasonable time. You are very seriously infringing what is considered one of the rights of the subject—to have his house free from intrusion. What possible objection can there be to putting in some such words as "at a reasonable time"?
EARL RUSSELL: If the precedent of railway inquiries is followed undoubtedly the inspector to make the inquiry would
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be appointed separately in the case of each accident. I do not say he is necessarily appointed under the signature of the Minister himself. It would be done of course by one of the principal officers, who would appoint him. But certainly the practice is to appoint an inspector ad hoc to enquire into the particular accident, and if that practice is followed here a definite order would be given on each particular occasion. If your Lordships feel that you must assume that the Minister or the subordinates of the Minister will be unreasonable I will accept the Amendment. But I really think there is no ground for the apprehension expressed and there may be occasions when it may be unfortunate. There may be something to conceal in the case of a vehicle involved in an accident. There may be some defect which may be concealed six hours later, but which might not be concealed if the inspector called at once.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME: I beg to move the next Amendment in the name of Lord Askwith.
Amendment moved—
Page 19, line 16, after ("may") insert ("during any reasonable hours of the daytime").—(Viscount Bertie of Thame.)
EARL RUSSELL: I cannot accept these words. I do not know what "reasonable hours of the daytime" mean. The word "daylight" might do, but I think the words of Lord Swaythling's Amendment "at any reasonable time" would be better.
VISCOUNT BERTIE OF THAME: I understand Lord Askwith is prepared to accept Lord Swaythling's Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Amendment moved—
Page 19, line 10, after ("enter") insert ("at any reasonable time").—(Lord Swaythling.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 22, as amended, agreed to.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: Does not the noble Earl think that it would be a good opportunity now to allow us to go home to bed?
EARL RUSSELL: I am given to understand through the usual channels that we are waiting for the Unemployment

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Insurance (No. 2) Bill to come up at half-past eleven. We could go on with this Bill until that time, but I am perfectly willing that the discussion should be adjourned now if the noble Marquess wishes.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: I think some one must wait for the Unemployment Insurance Bill. But there is no reason why the House as a whole should sit.
EARL BEAUCHAMP: After all, though there has been no obstruction of any kind, we have made very little progress. There are many pages of Amendments left, and at least I think we ought to sit until half-past eleven or twelve.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: I observe that the noble Earl has not been here the whole time.
EARL RUSSELL: I am entirely in the hands of the noble Marquess, but I was given to understand that your Lordships would be willing to sit until half-past eleven. If the noble Marquess wishes, I will move that the House be resumed.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: I would not insist. I do not desire to obstruct in the least, but I think the course I suggest would be convenient to your Lordships. I think it is wiser. May I move that the House do now resume?
EARL RUSSELL: Certainly.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: I beg to move that the House be now resumed.
Moved, That the House be now resumed—(The Marquess of Salisbury.)
On Question, Motion agreed to, and House resumed accordingly.
House adjourned during pleasure.
House resumed.
UNEMPLOYMENT INSUEANCE (No. 2) BILL.
Brought from the Commons; read 1a; and to be printed.
GLASGOW CORPORATION BILL.
Returned from the Commons, with the Amendments, agreed to.
MINISTRY OF HEALTH PROVISIONAL ORDERS CONFIRMATION (BRISTOL AND ROSS WATER) BILL. [H.L.]
Returned from the Commons, agreed to, with Amendments.
House adjourned at a quarter before twelve o'clock.