Lords Sitting of 16 November 1937

Preamble
The House met at a quarter past four of the clock, The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.
SUPREME COURT OF JUDICATURE (AMENDMENT) BILL.
Brought from the Commons; read 1a; and to be printed.

EXPIRING LAWS CONTINUANCE BILL.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
EARL FORTESCUE: My Lords, in the absence of my noble friend Lord Templemore, who is kept away by other duties, it has fallen to me to move the Second Reading of this Bill. As this is the first time on which I have had the honour of addressing your Lordships, I would crave your indulgence. As your Lordships know, this is a Bill to continue for a further period certain statutory provisions which are found to be still required, and which would otherwise expire on December 31 next. A Bill of this nature is found necessary every year about this time. The Acts which are to be continued are enumerated in the Schedule to the Bill. Most of them were in the corresponding Bill last year but there is one to which perhaps I ought to draw your Lordships' special attention. I refer to Part I of the Coal Mines Act, 1930, which appears in Part II of the Schedule. The remaining Acts are to be continued for twelve months, but it is proposed to continue Part I of the 1930 Act for eight months only.
It is from this Act that the selling schemes in operation in the coal industry derive their statutory force, and provision for its renewal, subject to certain amendments designed to strengthen the constitution and powers of the committees of investigation—the safeguards for consumers against exploitation under the schemes—is made in the Government's Coal Bill, which has already been introduced in another place. It is clear that that Bill cannot become law before
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the end of the year, and in these circumstances it is necessary, in order that the arrangements for organised selling in the coal industry shall not lapse, for Part 1 to be continued until the new Bill is on the Statute Book. For this reason precision is made in the Expiring Laws Continuance Bill for an extension of the life of Part 1 of the 1930 Act for a period of eight months only. This broken period had been adopted instead of the normal period of twelve months in order to make it clear to consumers that the Coal Bill itself is relied upon to extend and amend Part I, and the Expiring Laws Bill is only being used to keep it alive until the Coal Bill is on the Statute Book. I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Earl Fortescue.)
THE CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES (THE EARL OF ONSLOW): My Lords, I am sure your Lordships would wish me to follow the usual practice of this House and offer our congratulations to the noble Earl who has just addressed your Lordships for the first time. We hope that he may, on many future occasions, give us the benefit of his views on matters which are entrusted to his care. But I was rather surprised, when the noble Earl introduced this Bill, that he made no reference to a matter which has been before your Lordships' House on every occasion in the last few years—I may say indeed a good many years—on which the Second Reading of the Expiring Laws Continuance Bill has been moved. Your Lordships will see in the Schedule that this Bill proposes to continue certain provisions of the Public Works Facilities Act, 1930. That Act, as you know, gives certain facilities to local authorities and statutory undertakers to enable them to execute works which would contribute to the relief of unemployment. The justification for these proceedings was the emergency which then existed, and it was declared that it was only a temporary measure. Indeed, the Bill became law, as the noble Lord behind me will remember, with the proviso that it should remain in force only until December 31, 1932. Ever since 1932 those provisions have been continued under the Expiring Laws Continuance Act.
On every occasion I have urged upon your Lordships that it is most undesirable

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that this, which is in the nature of permanent legislation, should be continued in this manner. I forget who it was who replied for the Government last year. It may have been my noble friend Lord Templemore, but I rather think it was my noble friend Lord Hutchison of Montrose. I then had a very solemn promise that the Government would take the matter in hand and introduce permanent legislation. I feel that it is most undesirable that we should go on in this way. It is not really business to go on year after year continuing what was meant to be a temporary measure without dealing with it by permanent legislation. In view of the fact that the Government have promised in your Lordships' House on more than one occasion that they would take the matter in hand, I would ask my noble friend if he would tell us anything he can about the matter, and whether he will renew the pledge given last year that the Government will take up this matter with the least possible delay and will in the very near future introduce permanent legislation. I am sure your Lordships will agree that the present method is not a satisfactory way of carrying on business and that advantage should not be taken of a purely temporary Act to carry this on indefinitely.
LORD STRABOLGI: My Lords, I do not rise to follow the Chairman of Committees because the important matter he has raised is, I am sure, very safely left in his able hands. I rise to congratulate the noble Earl, Lord Fortescue, on his maiden speech in your Lordships' House. I am sorry that he had so uninspiring a topic to enlarge upon, but I would like to echo what the Chairman of Committees has said, that we hope we shall hear him on many future occasions when he will have more scope for his undoubted ability. Certainly the Government are introducing in another place a spate of legislation which in due course will seep its way through to your Lordships' House and will, I am sure, give the noble Earl many opportunities of explaining the intricate and curious measures which the Government wish to place on the Statute Book. In this we wish him all successs.
EARL FORTESCUE: My Lords, the reply to my noble friend the Chairman of Committees is that the Minister of Health hopes to be able to meet requirements by including them in a Public Health Bill,
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and the Minister of Transport by including them in a proposed Electricity Distribution Bill.
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

QUAIL PROTECTION BILL. [H.L.]
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
VISCOUNT MERSEY: My Lords, I hope this Bill will prove a non-contentious measure. It is put forward in the first instance on behalf of the British Section of the International Committee for Bird Preservation in agreement with the Zoological Society and many similar bodies which look after such matters in this country. It is also put forward in agreement with several foreign Governments who are concerned. Even in a simple Bill of this nature many Government Departments in this country have to be consulted. The Home Office is concerned, the Foreign Office is indirectly concerned, as well as the Board of Trade and, I believe, the Ministry of Agriculture, the Department of Customs, the Treasury, and, last but not least, the British Museum, so that it is not quite so simple a project as might appear at first sight. I understand that none of these Departments have anything to say against the Bill, and I hope your Lordships on this occasion will follow their good example.
There is nothing sentimental about the Bill. It is not what might be called humanitarian. It is simply a Bill to prevent the total extermination in a comparatively short time of the quail, and I shall, if I can, in a few words explain the position to your Lordships. The quail, which is a small partridge, coturnix coturnix, spends its winter in Central Africa and its spring and summer in Europe. About the month of February it comes in flights down the Nile Valley or across the Sahara until it gets to the Mediterranean seaboard. It crosses the Mediterranean in three different directions. The eastern lot go across the Aegean Sea and the Black Sea to South Russia, the central lot go by Sicily and Italy, and the western lot go through Spain and France.
They very seldom come here, but in recent years a trade has grown up of

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importing these quails in large numbers alive. They are brought over in crates of fifty apiece just at the period when they would be mating. The mating season is between March and June, and the quails come over to the cooler climate of Europe for that purpose. They are not then really fit to be shot or eaten, but they are netted in Egypt and they are shot in Algeria. They are netted in Egypt and sent over in these large crates to this country—as many as a quarter of a million arrive here in the season—and they are sold in the London market. The Egyptian Government and the French Government are both conscious of the danger there is to the quail, and they have passed legislation dealing with the matter. The Egyptian Government prohibit the netting of the quail during the breeding season, and the French Government, as regards Algeria and those parts of Morocco which they control, prohibit the shooting of them. This Bill is proposed by way of complement to their action so that something effective may be done to protect this very desirable race of small birds.
We wish to prevent the quail being imported alive here during its breeding season. That is the whole object of the Bill. We have approached both the wholesale and the retail traders in this country, and both are in agreement with the objects of the Bill. The only firm of importers, an Italian firm, also offer no opposition to it. That really is the whole genesis and scope of the Bill. It is a one-clause measure. The first subsection says that no live quail shall be imported into the United Kingdom between February 14 and July, and the second subsection includes the quail among the goods enumerated in Section 42 of the Customs Consolidation Act of 1876, which imposes penalties and orders the destruction or disposal of the imported article—that is to say, the Customs can seize any quails brought over in these crates and can either destroy them or let them loose over the land. I think that is the whole of the Bill. We hope very much that your Lordships will pass its Second Reading to-day. I do not know if we may also hope that perhaps the Government will not only bless the Bill but will give it a rapid passage through the House of Commons. I beg
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to move that the Bill be now read a second time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Viscount Mersey.)
THE EARL OF ONSLOW: My Lords, I hope your Lordships will give this Bill a Second Reading, and I hope also that my noble friend was right when he told us that all the Government Departments—he enumerated a very formidable list—were in agreement that this Bill should go through. That being the case, I trust the Government may find themselves in a position to give such assistance as may be necessary to enable it to pass through another place as well ell as through your Lordships' House. My noble friend has told you the purpose of the Bill. It is a very simple matter. It is merely to prevent the import into this country of live quail during the breeding season. It is to supplement the efforts of the Egyptian and French Governments to preserve quails at that time.
The quail in this country has become a very rare bird, though curiously enough I had a letter the other day from Scotland in which it is said that quails occur in that country almost every year. I cannot myself remember seeing a quail in this country for very many years, though I recall that a great number of years ago, when shooting with the late Lord Long—Mr. Walter Long as he then was—on Salisbury Plain, long before the troops came there, there was always a bevy of quail every year. And indeed, in 1884, my father shot one on Merrow Downs, which seems almost impossible. In these days I do not think we ever see quail in the South of England. If my noble friend's Bill becomes law it is quite possible quail will then come over here, I do not say in considerable numbers but at any rate in appreciable numbers. I am sure your Lordships will regard that as a very desirable addition to the wild birds of this country and to the game birds of this country especially. I may say that the Zoological Society and all other kindred societies which interest themselves in these matters are entirely in sympathy with the Bill and hope it will pass. Therefore I hope your Lordships will give it a Second Reading to-night.
EARL FORTESCUE: My Lords, I beg to inform your Lordships that the Home Office and Scottish Office are in sympathy

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with the object of the Bill and there is no objection from the point of view of the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries. It will be observed that the Bill is drafted by way of adding live quail to the list of goods the importation of which is prohibited by Section 42 of the Customs Consolidation Act, 1875, and in this connection certain points have been raised by the Board of Customs. It is not, however, desired to object to the Bill receiving a Second Reading provided it is understood that further consideration may make it desirable to suggest some amendment of subsection (2) of Clause i at a later stage. I regret, however, to inform the noble Lord that I can give no pledge that the Bill will be facilitated in another place.
On Question, Bill read 2a. and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

MERCHANT SHIPPING (SUPERANNUATION CONTRIBUTIONS) BILL. [H.L.]
Order of the Day for the Third Reading read.
LORD TEMPLEMORE: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a third time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 3a.—(Lord Templemore.)
LORD THURLOW: My Lords, as a member of your Lordships' House who has spent many years of my life in ministering to the officers and men of the Mercantile Marine, I venture to ask your Lordships' permission to say a few words in support of this Bill. When I was sent out by the Missions to Seamen in 1901 to the Pacific Coast of North America, the conditions existing in the Mercantile Marine were very different from what they are to-day. Steam had not yet altogether ousted sail, and a great four-masted barque used to make a long and hazardous journey round Cape Horn. The greatest skill was required from the officers and men if they were to reach their destination safely, and when, after 150 or 180 days, they reached port, they were pestered by a gang of ruffians, crimps and harpies who did their utmost to bring them to ruin morally and in other ways. It was a rough school, but it produced the finest officers in the world.
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In the Great War they played a great part, and the Royal Naval Reserve became a household word for daring, efficiency and resource. In the lean years that followed many had to face long periods of unemployment, and they bore up with characteristic courage. As a personal friend of many master mariners who were known to me long ago as apprentices, I wish to pay my tribute to these gallant men who have so nobly upheld the traditions of the great service to which they belong. I would voice their gratitude to the great companies which have already provided a pension scheme for their officers, and welcome the extension of benefits as outlined in this Bill to those officers employed by other companies who have not hitherto profited by existing arrangements. I will not touch upon the details of the Bill, as these will be more fully considered in Committee, but I respectfully commend the measure to your Lordships' approval.
LORD TEMPLEMORE: My Lords, if I may speak again by leave of the House, I would point out that: the noble Lord is under a slight misapprehension. The Second Reading of this Bill was taken a week ago; this is the Third Reading stage, and I shall shortly move that the Bill be passed. However, as the noble Lord is, I gather, in sympathy with the Bill, I presume he would not wish to put any Amendments down at any stage.
On Question, Bill read 3a, and passed, and sent to the Commons.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF EDUCATION (EARL STANHOPE): My Lords, before the House adjourns I should like to remind your Lordships that we meet to-morrow at three o'clock.