HL Deb 02 February 1938 vol 107 cc603-10

LORD KILMAINE had given Notice that he would move to resolve, That the opening of cinemas on Sundays shall be legalised throughout the country during the six winter months, the times of such opening to be arranged by the local authorities. The noble Lord said: My Lords, the Motion that I have ventured to put on the Paper to-day will, I hope, commend itself to your Lordships and to the Government, and I will proceed to explain the reasons which have induced me to bring it forward. As I understand the position at present, the question of whether cinemas should be open on Sunday or not depends on local option; that is to say, on a poll of the householders or ratepayers of the district as to whether they wish them to be open or not. In the part of Sussex where I live there is a wide area, including the important towns of Hastings, St. Leonards, Royal Eastbourne (as it is called), Bexhill, Lewes, and Tunbridge Wells, where there are no cinemas whatsoever on Sunday afternoon. At Brighton, on the other hand, the cinemas are all open between a quarter past one and a quarter past two and they are well patronised by everybody. Recently I have talked to many of the working class and to shop owners in Hastings and elsewhere, and have seen letters in the Press from domestic servants all complaining bitterly that during the winter months when the weather is bad on Sunday afternoon there is absolutely nothing for them to do and nowhere for them to go.

After all, my Lords, who are they who want the cinemas? Are they the well-to-do householders? Certainly not. They have their own houses, they have their comfortable clubs—at least the men have—and their ladies can play bridge in their own or other people's houses; but the people who do want cinemas are the young men and women in the shops and the workers generally. Their only free afternoons on which they might go to the pictures are Wednesday afternoons, when there is early closing of the shops, Saturday afternoons, when the school children have holiday, and, most of all, Sunday afternoons. From their point of view, it is especially desirable to have the cinemas open on Sunday afternoons. I know for a fact that it is a cause of anxiety to many parents, poor people in Eastbourne and other places, that on Sunday their young daughters who are walking out with young men have nowhere to go and are compelled to park themselves in shelters on the sea front. Women policemen have said that the most anxious time for them is on wet Sundays and in the winter, because they have to keep a constant watch on these shelters. It can be understood, in the case, say, Of a poor shopkeeper with a pretty daughter who is walking out with a young man, that if he knows that the young couple are sitting in the cinema under the constant eye of the attendants, his mind is at rest; but if he knows that they are wandering about or sitting in a shelter the state of his mind is very different.

In Ireland the cinemas are all open on Sunday afternoon. In France, except in the biggest towns, the cinemas are open in the afternoon only on Sundays, on Thursdays, and on holidays—very often only on Sundays. Most of the householders in Hastings who have this voting power in their hands are people well over middle age. They do not want to go to the pictures themselves, and very many of them consider that the opening of cinemas on Sunday is a violation of the Sabbath day. These same people, however, do not object to sitting for two and a half hours listening to an orchestra of forty persons playing to them, nor do they object to taking their motor cars out for the entire day. It is very different for the poor people, and it is for their sakes that I bring this Motion forward. I earnestly hope that the Government will give permission for the cinemas to open on Sunday. Some of the smaller cinemas may not be able to do so because it would not pay them to open. I do not want to make it compulsory, but if they open on Sunday they can be given permission to close one day during the week. It could also be laid down that the films to be shown on Sunday should be suitable for exhibition on that day and not be gangster or sex films which are so common a feature of the cinema programme. I beg to move.

Moved to resolve, That the opening of cinemas on Sundays shall be legalised throughout the country during the six winter months, the times of such opening to be arranged by the local authorities.—(Lord Kilmaine.)

LORD STRABOLGI, in whose name stood an Amendment to leave out the words "during the six winter months," said: My Lords, this Motion of the noble Lord finds much support amongst the members of the Party for whom I have the honour to speak, in the country and in another place and also amongst my noble friends. We think, as the noble Lord has so admirably explained, that this is a matter which affects very largely the poorer people and particularly the busy housewives. The working man's wife with a family of children only has two evenings really in the week when she can go out to any place of entertainment. One is Saturday and the other is Sunday. On Saturday everybody tries to go, and the result is that you see people standing in long queues waiting to get into the cinemas. If you could spread it out and allow them to go on Sunday afternoon or evening and so on, by local adjustment of time, there would not be so much crowding and it would be a great boon to many hard-working women.

I cordially support what the noble Lord has said about the young people. Take a City like Liverpool, one of the greatest cities in the Empire, where no cinemas or places of entertainment are open on Sunday. The noble Earl, Lord Munster, knows that the museums are open in Liverpool on Sundays, and these museums are crowded, not with students, but with courting couples, young people who have nowhere else to go. In the crowded houses of large families there is nowhere to go, as the noble Lord has stated. The parlour perhaps is in use, and these young people must meet each other, and so they go to the museums and crowd these out instead. This, as the noble Lord has said, is a matter that does not so closely affect the well-to-do classes. Well-to-do people have their tennis, golf, and cricket. A lot of cricket is now played on Sundays. I was flying North one Sunday last summer, and was astonished to note the number of cricket matches in progress. We were not flying very high, and it was quite easy to pick out the white-clad players on the green fields. That was unheard of in my boyhood days, and shows how public opinion has changed. The well-to-do, as I say, can play golf or tennis or take their motor cars and go out of a district where cinemas are prohibited to another town where they are not prohibited. But the poorer people, who cannot afford money or time for transport, are penalised. Then you have the anomaly that on one side of a street cinemas are allowed to be open on Sunday, under arrangement with the local authorities, while on the other side they are not. That sort of thing leads to a feeling of injustice and impatience which is bad for the lieges of this country.

The Sunday Entertainments Act of 1932 has not been a success. It is very cumbersome, as those of your Lordships know who are familiar with the procedure. The poll or plebiscite has to be asked for as the result of a town's meeting. In the modern electorate, with thousands of voters on the register, you cannot have a town's meeting in an ordinary district. There is not a hall big enough to hold the people. In an ordinary constituency, as those of your Lordships know who have represented your Parties in another place—the noble Marquess, as Secretary of State for India, among them—you cannot get a hall to hold more than about 600 people. There are a few exceptions, like St. Andrew's Hall in Glasgow, the Free Trade Hall in Manchester, and the Albert Hall in London, but the ordinary town has not a great hall where you can get anything like a proper meeting of the townspeople. The result is that the town's meeting in the majority of districts can be packed by one side or the other and does not give a true representation of public opinion. A great deal depends on the composition of the town council whether you have a town's meeting or a poll, and this question has therefore entered into local politics. It is becoming an issue at local elections. Instead of electing councillors to represent the people who want certain housing or health questions attended to, the people who want this change support those candidates who are in favour of places of amusement being open on Sunday. I suggest to your Lordships that the Act of 1932 has not been a success. It was passed with the best intentions, of course, as all Governments pass all Acts with the best intentions, but, as often happens, it has not been a success.

I have ventured to put an Amendment on the Paper to strengthen the noble Lord's Motion. I hope he will agree with me and accept it. My Amendment is to leave out the words "during the six winter months." The noble Lord who moved this Motion desires this boon to the people who wish to take advantage of it to be confined to the six winter months. We sometimes have very wet summers. The winters in this curious climate of ours are sometimes finer than the summers. I suppose the reasons that weighed with the noble Lord were climatic reasons, or perhaps he was influenced by consideration of the longer hours of darkness. I suggest that if it is right to have cinemas open on Sundays in certain districts, as is at present the case, it is right to have them open on Sundays in all districts. Secondly, if it is right to have them open for the six winter months on Sundays by arrangement as to times so as not to clash with religious services—I quite agree with that—it is equally right to have them open for the six summer months also. I think my Amendment is reasonable and I hope the noble Lord will see his way to accept it.

LORD KILMAINE

The only reason I did not suggest the whole year was that I did not like to ask for too much at once. I thought I might possibly be able to carry the six winter months.

LORD STRABOLGI

I have consulted a great many of my friends in another place and elsewhere who take an interest in this subject—members of my Party and so on—and they all agree that if it is going to be done at all, it ought to be done all the year round. If the cinema proprietors find that there is not enough custom in the summer, as happens now in some cases during an ordinary week, then they do not open. Therefore, why not leave it free and open to an arrangement locally with the local authorities? I entirely agree that the times should be such as would not clash with the opening of places of worship. I also think that the present arrangement whereby a certain part of the profits is made over to the local authorities for charitable objects should be retained. That is a thoroughly good arrangement.

Just one word on the religious issue. I know how very deeply and sincerely many people feel on this issue, but the Churches themselves, I am very glad to say, are adopting this new art of the cinema screen for teaching their faith. The spread of the religious film is very extraordinary, and is very successful as well. With the greatest respect to my friends, who take a very rigid religious attitude on this question, I would say that they themselves should take a leaf out of the book of the entertainment world and should extend and support the growth of the religious film movement. I have ventured on a previous occasion to say in your Lordships' House that some of the religious films that I myself have seen are very beautiful and impressive. In the past the Churches have drawn very largely on the art of the musician and the painter and the architect, and I am glad to say that many of my ecclesiastical friends are now drawing on this new art of the cinema screen. Those people, after all, who do not want to avail themselves of the opportunity of attending cinemas on Sunday need not go, but why deprive others, who probably have been to their places of worship in the morning and who lead an entirely Christian and wholesome life during the week, of this pleasure, which, to many, is all they can look forward to on the Sunday? That is often the only day on which they can avail themselves of this opportunity. In any case I would venture to support the noble Lord in his Motion and I hope he will accept my Amendment. I beg to move.

Amendment moved— Leave out the words ("during the six winter months.").—(Lord Strabolgi.)

THE EARL OF MUNSTER

My Lords, this is not the first occasion on which the whole subject of cinematograph performances on Sunday has been raised in your Lordships' House, and the Resolution which has been moved by my noble friend who sits behind me has, I think, been brought to its logical conclusion by the Amendment moved to that Resolution by the noble Lord who sits in front of me. I have no idea as to whether noble Lords in this House are in favour of the Resolution or the Amendment of that Resolution, but I think it is well worth while

Resolved in the negative and Motion disagreed to accordingly.

recalling certain facts to your Lordships' minds. On this matter there are in this country two sections of public opinion violently opposed to one another. One advocates the opening of cinemas throughout the country on every Sunday of the year and the other is diametrically opposed to such opening. I do not wish, nor indeed do I intend, to examine the views of either of those parties which were expressed and debated at unending length during the passage through this House of the Sunday Entertainments Bill in 1932. I have little doubt that that measure was a compromise, and it was accepted by both parties in that spirit. The Act may not be perfect, but I am reminded that perfection in anything is the acme of monotony. My right honourable friend, since the passing of that Act in 1932 up to now, has received no representations that the Act is working unduly harshly, and therefore I am somewhat bewildered to understand what my noble friend opposite means when he says that the Act of 1932 has not been a success. I am afraid that if your Lordships should accept the Resolution on the Paper today we shall be opening the whole of this discussion again, and as no representations have been made to my right honourable friend I would venture to suggest to my noble friend behind me that the wisest course for him to take would be to withdraw his Resolution and to let sleeping dogs lie.

On Question, Whether the original Motion, as amended, shall be agreed to?

Their Lordships divided: Contents, 20; Not-Contents, 30.

CONTENTS.
Abingdon, E. Bayford, L. Moyne, L.
Carnwath, E. Digby, L. Olivier, L.
Denbigh, E. Holden, L. [Teller.] Ritchie of Dundee, L.
Kilmaine, L. [Teller.] Russell of Killowen, L.
Colville of Culross, V. Manners, L. Sempill, L.
Marley, L. Strabolgi, L.
Allen of Hurtwood, L. Merthyr, L. Wyfold, L.
Balfour of Burleigh, L.
NOT-CONTENTS.
Hailsham, V. (L. Chancellor) Addington, L. Middleton, L.
Cadman, L. Mildmay of Flete, L.
Halifax, V. (L. President) Cautley, L. Rankeillour, L.
Cawley, L. Redesdale, L.
Lucan, E. [Teller.] Charnwood, L. Rockley, L.
Munster, E. Clwyd, L. Rushcliffe, L.
Poulett, E. Cranworth, L. St. Levan, L.
Denham, L. Stonehaven, L.
FitzAlan of Derwent, V. Fermanagh, L. (E. Erne.) Templemore, L. [Teller.]
Mersey, V. Forester, L. Teynham, L
Kenilworth, L,. Wolverton, L.
Newcastle, L. Bp.

On Question, Amendment agreed to.