§ VISCOUNT HAILSHAMMy Lords, I do not know if it is convenient to the noble and learned Lord the Leader of the House to tell us what procedure he thinks it convenient to recommend, having regard to the fact that there are a number of Amendments down to the Agricultural Marketing Bill on the Committee stage, which your Lordships will remember takes place to-morrow afternoon, and of the possibility that it may be very inconvenient for a great number of your Lordships to be here for any long period to-morrow afternoon in view of His Majesty's command to be elsewhere.
§ THE LORD PRESIDENT OF THE COUNCIL (LORD PARMOOR)My Lords, I thank the noble Viscount for asking me this question. We have carefully considered the matter to which he has referred and I hope he will think the arrangement which I propose is satisfactory. I propose to ask the House to meet to-morrow at 3 p.m. and to adjourn at about 4 or 4.30; at any rate in ample time for your Lordships to obey the invitation extended to all of us. If the proceedings in Committee on the Agricultural Marketing Bill are not finished—I do not think they will be—I propose that we should resume them at 11 a.m. on Friday. There is no judicial business at the present time and so the House will be free.
§ VISCOUNT HAILSHAMI cannot go so far as to say that I think the proposed arrangement is convenient, but I recognise that there is great difficulty because of the desire of the Government to get the Bill through all its stages, and the Amendments which are likely to be made in Committee considered by the Commons and returned here in time for the adjournment at the end of next week.
§ THE MARQUESS OF READINGMy Lords, I am prepared to fall in with the 1007 arrangement, but do I quite understand that it is proposed to sit after 4 o'clock to-morrow?
§ LORD PARMOORI said we would rise at 4 o'clock, but that we might wish to sit for a few minutes after that hour in order to finish any Amendment which might be under discussion. The arrangement I have suggested will give ample time to take the remainder of the Committee stage of the Agricultural Marketing Bill on Friday.
§ VISCOUNT HAILSHAMPerhaps the noble and learned Lord will notice that on the Order Paper at one time there was a certain amount of formal business put down before the Committee stage of the Agricultural Marketing Bill. I suggest that as we are to sit to-morrow for only a short time this formal business might be put last and, if necessary, considered on Friday morning.
§ LORD PARMOORWe of course have a Standing Order about private business, but with regard to other formal business—not private business—we will arrange for the Committee stage to come first.