§ 4.7 p.m.
§ Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
§ THE LORD CHANCELLORMy Lords, if you have possessed yourselves of a copy of this Bill you will see that it is a long and complicated measure and I would add the information that it is in some respects a very dull measure, although it is a Bill of the greatest importance and of much urgency. I think I am bound to give your Lordships somewhat full information as to its contents, although I trust that the conclusion will be that after it has been very considerably modified in another place, it will be found now to be in a state which will receive your Lordships' approval. This is a measure which is quite essential for the transition from war to peace. It is essential among other reasons for the protection of vast sums of the taxpayers' money which have been expended during the war and which to a certain extent may be recovered. At the same time, opportunity has been taken in it to make certain improvements in the machinery for derequisitioning property, to which reference will be found in Part VI, and in certain instances some improvements in the provisions for compensation. Those will be found in Part IX.
This Bill deals with a number of problems arising out of the use by the Government, for war purposes, of land which remains in private ownership. Of course, if the land has been acquired under the Defence Acts and has become the property of the Government, there is nothing more to be said. But vast areas of land have been made use of by the Government during the war without being purchased by the Government. Some of the land has been requisitioned and the ownership remains where it was. In some cases possession has never even been temporarily taken because by Defence Regulation No. 50 there was power for Government Departments to do work on land without even so much as taking possession. You might have an anti-aircraft gun put in the corner of some field without actually taking possession of the ground upon which it was placed. Owing to the necessity for speed in erecting factories, the creation of airfields, the improvement 342 of communications, providing accommodation for troops and workers and so forth, very large sums of public money have been spent on buildings and other works which have been erected on land which the Government have never acquired, for the most part on requisitioned sites.
The question now is: What is to be done? On the one hand, all proper respect ought to be paid to the owners of property who have willingly agreed that their land should be used, and one does not overlook the rights of such people, in appropriate cases, to ask for it back. On the other hand, there are many cases in which the land which was requisitioned were unimportant areas and on those lands there have been erected at Government expense enormously costly and valuable buildings, factories and all sorts of things. Therefore your Lordships will see that there is a very nice question here as to how we are going to adjust these rights. Sometimes works have indeed been constructed, largely or wholly at the expense of the State, by arrangement with the owner of the land, without the exercise of any statutory powers at all— a very strong illustration of the universal public spirit with which everybody behaved during the war.
I cannot give the House exact figures, but to show your Lordships what a really serious problem this is, I am provided with an estimate that the past expenditure of the Government in these matters is of the order of £700,000,000. That is very largely in connexion with these modern airfields, with their immense cement runways and the like; and I am told that £60,000,000—a small sum compared with the amount I have just mentioned, but quite a considerable figure— represents factories built at the Government expense on ground that they have not acquired. Your Lordships know that if we left things as they were and simply retreated, this enormously expensive construction which has been put on the top of the soil would belong to the owner of the soil, who in the first instance let us have it as bare land.
Of course a very large part of that expenditure will simply have to be endured, it will be part of the war debt. The Scripture enjoins us to beat swords into ploughshares. Well, that is very good, and the more economical the Government are the more this admirable transforma- 343 tion will take place, but there will be a certain amount of loss in the process, and the object, or one of the objects, is, while doing everything fairly, to do it without putting an undue burden upon the public. Whatever happens, a disagreeably large proportion will have to be borne as war debt. The question is what are we to do with this large collection of public assets in the shape of buildings, airfields and so on, which possess great value and a high degree of future usefulness? As I pointed out, unless we do something these things will all revert to the persons who own the land on which they were constructed, and there is no question, of course, of any adjustment being made.
Now what are the reasons why the State may be concerned to obtain ownership of the original land? Thinking it out, I feel that there are perhaps three reasons. The first and most obvious reason is that the State continues to need for its own use— urgently needs— the land and the buildings that have been erected upon it. You may have a military camp or barracks which will be needed for the post-war Army. There are many airfields which will doubtless be needed for the post-war Air Force. Some factories and other establishments may be needed for continued Government production and storage space. That is one consideration, which will apply in instances which need not be multiplied.
Then there is a second reason. The second reason would be that the Government may find it essential that we have the right to determine the post-war use of the property. I do not desire, especially to-day and at this hour, to have any controversy about the continuance of any control, but I think people who feel most deeply the necessity of promoting by every means in their power the export trade may think it not unnatural, within certain limits, that there should be some security that the public whose money has built the factory should not find the whole of their money wasted, and the factory used in directions which are of no assistance at all to the real needs of the country. We want to promote production to the maximum of our power, we want to take the steps, or encourage the step, which will secure the maximum amount of employment. And so it is important that the Board of Trade, the 344 Department specially concerned, should have some say in the way in which the Government-built and Government-paid-for factories are used. I think a reference to Clause 8, subsection (5), will trate what I mean. That is the second reason.
And there is the third reason, and the third class of case is this. It is the case in which the Government may have no particular interest as a matter of policy in the future use of what the taxpayer has built and constructed, but yet it may be very sound public policy that, instead of retreating and giving this windfall to the fortunate subject, the Government should have in the name of the public the right to sell the factory, or dispose of it in some other way, so that it really may at once be put to a good use and may provide some measure of contribution to meet the public outlay.
What I have said has been in the endeavour roughly to sketch the needs of the situation. The next question is: If those are the needs which have to be met, what should the powers be that will enable those needs to be satisfied? A great many Departments are involved in this complicated matter. Certain of the Departments concerned— the three Service Departments, the Ministry of Supply and the Ministry of Aircraft Production— have power under the existing law to buy for defence purposes under the Defence Acts. Not everybody can do it— the Home Office cannot do it— but those Departments can do it. In this Bill steps are taken to ensure that the position of the Ministries of Supply and Aircraft Production is to be in substance the same as the position of the Fighting Services, who have always had rather more extensive powers. If your Lordships care for a reference you will find it in Clause 33, subsection (2), of this Bill. Apart from those Departments, there really is no need to go much further, except to say that the Ministry of Works have a general right to buy for all sorts of Departments what is necessary.
But there is another side to this, the importance of which your Lordships will be the first to recognize. There is one thing more we really must be sure of, and that is that when there is a question of giving notice to acquire what is at present not Government property, the Government pay the right price. There are some cases, of course, where if you left things 345 as the law now is the Government will pay a great deal too much. Let us take the case of bare land on which, at the public expense, there have been great factories built. As I have already said, they might let things be, the requisition would cease, the Government would retreat, and the fortunate owner of this piece of bare land would find himself the owner of a vastly more valuable building. If instead of retreating the Government said, "No, after all, we want your factory, we must buy it from you," and the ordinary notice to treat is given the Government have to pay not merely the price of the bare land but the value of the factory, too, because the notice to treat requires that the value to be paid is the value of the whole property at the time when the notice is given. It would be the height of absurdity, if the taxpayer first of all found the money to build the factory and then proceeded to pay the money over again to somebody else who acquired the property under the existing land laws.
That is a case where far too much will be paid; but there are also cases in which, under the present system of compensation, much too little would be paid, because it may be that the result of the use of this requisitioned land has been to ruin it. You run tanks for three or four years over good ploughed land, wear off the good soil and get the whole thing in a hopeless state of ruin and decay. The same principle that you only pay compensation for the thing in the state in which you find it when it is acquired would enable the State to acquire that property at a cheap price, and of course it ought to pay more than the value of the land when it acquires it. Therefore we have to take great care that this is adjusted and you will find in Part VIII of the Bill a series of provisions, very cleverly drafted I think, which you may say in summary mean that you take the land and treat it as though it were conventionally taken back to the condition in which it was when the land was first requisitioned, and pay compensation for it. That is perfectly just and absolutely right to both sides.
Then there is a further thing I must mention. There are many Departments which have been vested, under the Defence Regulations, with power to requisition or otherwise make use of land, but they have no power compulsorily to 346 acquire it at all. The Ministry of Works is a notable example, and there will be cases where the Services and Supply Departments themselves will need to purchase for a purpose, for example for resale, which they have no right to do as the present law stands. They had temporary powers but we want to provide that those powers shall go on a little longer, and the temporary powers of compulsory purchase taken in the Bill will endure for the remainder of the war period and a further two years thereafter. The war period ends when the emergency powers end.
A great deal of thought has been given to this matter. Nobody wants to maintain these exceptional powers longer than is needed but, it having been looked at very closely, there is no doubt at all that you have to provide longer than just the war period, and a further two years is the right period, as I think everybody now agrees. Ministers other than those at the head of the Service and Supply Departments to whom these temporary powers are given would be, for example, the Minister of War Transport, in connexion with the roads; the Postmaster-General, in connexion with telephones, telegraphs and all that sort of thing; and the Minister of Works. The Minister of Works comes in as a generally useful office boy. Of course, the Minister of War Transport and the Postmaster-General have their definite fields, but the Minister of Works is the general agent for everybody else, and it is much better that these dealings in the nature of land purchase should be in the hands of a limited number of Departments and not generally conferred on the whole range of Ministerial Departments.
The next point is one which was a very troublesome one and required a great deal of analysis. Power is taken in this Bill to acquire easements and rights restrictive of the use of land, subject to the payment of compensation. It is really very important. There is no such adequate power now and, as things stand at present, if you are not able to acquire the easement— that is to say, to acquire, for instance, the right of the neighbour to cross a field— you have to buy the whole field. It is plainly right that the Departments should in proper cases be given this power, so that, for example, when land is being acquired for use as an aerodrome 347 less land would need to be acquired to get free access.
You may think I have plunged into the middle of a complicated affair and should have begun at the beginning. The first part of the first clause sets up a new Commission. It is called the War Works Commission and the Chairman of it is to be appointed by His Majesty. In Part II of the Bill you have provisions which show what is the degree of control over all this business which this Commission will exercise. That has been the subject of very long and careful debate in the other House, and it is in respect of this Part of the Bill that considerable changes have been made, with the result, I am glad to say, that both the Second Reading and the Third Reading of the Bill in the other place were carried unanimously, though there were considerable alterations in Committee.
I would wish to say, on behalf of the Government, that we do most fully appreciate that the mere fact that during the war the Government have had the use of somebody's land and have spent a lot of money on it does not, in itself, entitle us to say we will deprive the private owner of this land. It is necessary to do it where the case is fairly proved, but it is not in the least necessary, nor would it be right, to do it as a matter of course. You therefore want a War Works Commission and this is what the Commission is going to do. When objection is taken by anybody interested in the Department's proposal, if the Department makes a proposal to acquire land which it does not at present possess but which has on it the buildings which I have described, the objection to the Department's acquiring the land under these new proposals in the Bill has to be referred to this independent Commission. The intention is that the Commission shall be as strong and impartial a body as we can put together; and it will adjudicate, I have not the slightest doubt— it is not an instrument of Government in any way— as fairly as ever it can between the interests of the Government on the one hand and private interests on the other.
I may point out to your Lordships who are interested in this perennial controversy about private enterprise and Government, that this present topic presents a pleasing variation to the normal tune, because not only is there a possibility 348 of controversy between the Government, on the one hand, and the private owner, on the other, but it is quite possible that there may be very considerable controversy between one Department of the Government and another Department of the Government. You will have the Minister of Town and Country Planning, who probably does not care so much about recovering money for the Treasury as does the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
There is the amenity consideration and there is the industrial consideration. Although properly under our Constitution different Ministers and different Departments will look after these different aspects, I anticipate that the Commission will not spend the whole of its life applying in a practical way the considerations which distinguish between private enterprise and the State. It will spend quite as much of its time in determining which view is right between, let us say, the Air Ministry on the one hand and the amenities on the other. I think I heard the noble Lord, Lord Strabolgi, in an earlier debate to-day, observe caustically that it was no good arguing with certain Government Departments about the historic importance of Runnymede. There is a Department which is interested in that aspect and I dare say this may be the sort of thing in which it may be very useful to have the War Works Commission.
Suppose the War Works Commission has one of these disputes brought before it because the Government plan is opposed, what is the degree within which it can decide the matter? There are two cases in which the decision of the War Works Commission— I am assuming for this purpose that it vetoes this proposal— is absolutely final. There are two other cases in which it is not final, but Parliamentary intervention is provided for. These are the two cases in which, if the Commission reports against the Department's proposal, that is the end of the whole matter. Noble Lords who are following with the Bill might like to know that it is Clause 5 (1) (a) combined with Clause 9 (1) with which I am dealing. The first case is that where the Government's reasons for wanting to purchase are purely financial, which is no more than saying, "We have spent a vast amount of money on this and we want to save on the deal." If in a case like that the Minister asks to exercise compulsory powers and the Com- 349 mission says "No" (but of course before it says "No" it hears all sides) then that is the end of it and the Government have got to accept this as the final decision.
Perhaps as we are doing this a little carefully, I may refer to Clause 11 by which the Commission is required to address its mind not merely to the cost of works to the Government but the advantages or disadvantages which would accrue to any objector if the land were or were not acquired. As I pointed out, there will be many cases where if the land is not acquired the private objector will go off with a substantial booty. Another clause to be looked at in this connexion is Clause 10. The Commission can report that the land should not be acquired if any interested person is prepared to pay a reasonable sum, the sum specified by the Commission in respect of the value of the Government's works. Obviously that is quite reasonable. It may be that the owner of the land will come forward and say: "I recognize that you have built these splendid premises on my land and of course it is a great advantage to me. If you leave my land alone and if you let me have the buildings, I will make you a fair payment." If the Commission say that is the proper thing to do then what the Commission says goes. That is a case in which the decision of the Commission is quite final.
We have also thought that we ought in this Bill to give a very special protection in the case where the land that is claimed by the Government consists of dwelling-houses or gardens and things of that sort. The case is very much stronger for giving these things back than it is for giving back the bare land. I have in mind dwelling-houses, gardens and grounds essential for their proper enjoyment. Here again any negative report by the Commission saying that the Government ought not to acquire, although they want to do so, is final, and the Minister is required to report against the proposal to purchase unless such important conditions as those in Clause 11 (4) are fulfilled. One can easily see how an exception might arise. You might have the case, say, of a farmhouse which is now incorporated in a series of buildings connected with an airfield. You could not disentangle them and in a case like that it might be quite right to acquire 350 the farmhouse. But that will all depend upon the circumstances of each case. That is the pleasant side of the matter from the point of view of the private owner.
Here are the two instances in which, even though the Commission do report that an acquisition should not take place that is not the end of the matter. There are cases in which the Government of the country, whatever be the composition of the Government, cannot surrender all their responsibility to the Commission. There may be cases where the Government feel that it is absolutely essential in the public interest that they must have a certain property, or at any rate the right to control its use, and that they cannot simply accept the decision of the Commission and there be an end of it. But if the Commission's report is adverse the Minister is not stopped from proceeding with his proposals for a purchase. There now comes in a parallel process very familiar to us all— namely, that the Minister would have to lay the Commission's Report, which of course, would be adverse to the Government, with its reasons and his own reasons before both Houses of Parliament. Provision is made that within the next forty sitting days a Motion in either House can reject the Minister's claim and then it is finally defeated. In other words, the House will appreciate the position that the Government will really depend upon the support of Parliament. The action of Parliament will be quite enough to prevent an acquisition taking place if that is the view which Parliament of the time takes.
It will be said that in another place they are sometimes so busy that it is not easy to get time for all this, for really these negative Resolutions depend for their success on getting a House after eleven o'clock. Well, your Lordships' House, sitting in a more confined space but possibly with less continuous preoccupation, will, I apprehend, be able without inconvenience to entertain such a proposal before five o'clock in the afternoon. I do not think myself there will be many such cases because by that time the rights and the wrongs will have been fully worked out. Though very unkind things are sometimes said of Departments, especially by gentlemen who for the moment are not in the Government but who hope shortly to be so, the real truth 351 is that one does arrive in the end at a reasonable conclusion. I do not at all anticipate that there will be very fierce and constant Parliamentary wrangles on this subject. Public policy must have the support of Parliament. If Parliament rejects this as a definite piece of un-wisdom, then that will put an effective stop to the activities of the Minister.
I hope I shall be forgiven for a rather long speech, but the Bill is of great importance and it may be that future stages will not occupy much time. I must call attention to Part III. That deals with cases where highways have been stopped up or diverted under emergency powers to facilitate operations in airfields or factories or other war services, or which have been interfered with by the laying of mains, cables, railways, tramways and other things. There again the question is whether these war works should be retained. In some cases no doubt the tramway will be ripped up and the cable will be no longer needed, but where the retention of the war works is authorized it may be either impracticable to restore the original highway or, alternatively, restoration might seriously diminish the value of the Government asset. Therefore we have a provision closely parallel to those I have already explained. In such cases the Minister of War Transport may, by Order, authorize the permanent stopping up or the diversion of a highway if he is satisfied that it is necessary or expedient.
Such an Order may provide for the provision of a substituted highway going further round instead of straight across, if that is really necessary, and proper compensation will be paid. If you force a local authority to maintain a road that is four miles long because you have stopped up a road that is three miles long, the local authority has the burden of maintaining an extra mile and must be paid for that. Public notice must be given of this proposal and if any objection is received the Order has to be referred to this War Works Commission for report. The Commission may report that the Order should be made as proposed without modification, or may say that there ought to be certain modifications, or may say that the Order ought not to be made at all. If the Minister of War Transport still feels that in spite of 352 that impartial pronouncement he must proceed in the face of an adverse report, he has to lay before Parliament a copy of the Commission's report and a copy of his own reasons for disregarding the recommendations. Again, a negative Resolution in either House within forty sitting days would stop his attempt.
In Part IV there are clauses which deal with work done under emergency powers during the war by the post Office. I see my noble friend Viscount Samuel making a note. Nobody knows the way to the Post Office better than he does because he used to preside over it. The point here is not so much the need to purchase the land as the need to maintain the works. That is the important thing. You may have great difficulty in doing it under the existing law and so we provide that telegraph lines, constructed under emergency powers, are to be treated as having been constructed under the ordinary powers of the Post Office, under the Telegraph Acts, subject to the rights of any person, whose consent to construction would have been required under those Acts, to require the removal of the lines. There are cases where quite grave inconvenience would be caused to the owner or occupier. There is power to the Postmaster-General to refer the question to the appropriate tribunal.
Part V deals with cases where not the Government but the local authorities are primarily concerned. What has happened during the war— probably only those closely interested in local government work are aware of it— is that we have used emergency powers to enable local authorities to occupy or use land for a purpose which in peace-time would only have been possible if they had bought under compulsory powers. I believe there is one case— there may be others— where houses for factory workers have been constructed on requisitioned land by a local authority. The Bill does not add to the power of compulsory purchase possessed by local authorities, but enables them to buy in such cases under a simplified procedure. If a local authority had it in mind to acquire land and construct houses upon it, the matter would begin with a local inquiry at which evidence would be given in order to get a report from the inspector of the Ministry of Health as to whether it was a good or bad scheme. It is no good going through all that if you have 353 the houses on the land already. Therefore we have got round all that by a simplified procedure which I think I need not further describe.
Lastly the Bill contains a number of very important miscellaneous provisions. I ought perhaps to mention briefly one or two of them. The power of compulsory purchase is not the only power needed. We also need power to remove valuable works and we need power to repair damage clone to land which there is no need to purchase. In many cases the Government have put into a factory most valuable plant which under the ordinary law of landlord and tenant could not be removed, although of course it ought to be removed. It has been paid for by the Government, the Government want it, and in the end no doubt will sell it. There must be power for that. Again, you want power by which you can repair damage clone to the land, because sometimes land has been most frightfully damaged. In proper cases it ought to be possible to repair the land and so reduce the amount of compensation ultimately to be paid.
§ THE LORD CHANCELLORThis is contained in Clauses 28 to 30.
LORD STRABOLGIMay I ask a question? I am sure my noble and learned friend will not mind the interruption. In Part VI power is given to enter upon land to remove property, but if I read it aright there is no obligation to remove obstructions. For example, there are cases, with which no doubt the noble and learned Viscount will be familiar, of road blocks or anti-tank obstructions on private property. There is power to enter the land to remove, but there is no obligation to do so if I read the Bill aright. Perhaps the noble and learned Viscount will explain that. The compensation seems to be only for damage in removing the obstruction and not for any damage done to the unfortunate occupier when obstructions are not removed.
§ THE LORD CHANCELLORI think the noble Lord will find that the position is this. There is provision for payment of compensation. If you leave on the premise s some obstruction such as he described, compensation would have to be compensation which took info account the 354 fact that the land was suffering from that obstacle. Alternatively, if the obstruction is something which should be removed then, of course, there is power in the Bill to remove and there is provision for payment for the damage done in the course of pulling it out. I think that the noble Lord will see therefore that the scheme operates one way or the other. It compensates the person whose place was left in this damaged condition and ensures that something may be paid to him for the depreciation of the value to his property caused by the presence of the obstacle there. That is to say where the Government do not pay for leaving the obstacle there, they may pay what is right for the damage that may be done in removing it.
§ LORD MOTTISTONEI should be glad if the noble and learned Viscount could make this plain. Are we to understand that a citizen has not got the right under this Bill to require authority to remove the obstruction? Is he only compensated if the obstruction is removed by the Government? The removal of these things is vitally important in the case of many gardens and areas of agricultural land.
§ THE LORD CHANCELLORI am fully alive to this point. I think the explanation which I have given is clear. I do not think that the citizen, under this Bill, can ask for a mandatory injunction because the thing is settled either one way or the other. If the Government should leave on the noble Lord's property some unsightly pyramid, which it was hoped would check the advance of the largest German tank, no doubt that would cause injury to the noble Lord— though, of course, he could grow creepers over it. If it is left there he would be compensated for the damage done to his property, for he would have a proper claim. May I just add this? Part VIII of the Bill, as I think I have already said, provides for the necessary adjustment of compensation. We must be sure that we pay fair compensation, but not pay over again for something which we ourselves created and yet do not ourselves acquire at what may now be a very small value, because of the damage that exists because we ourselves have smashed it up. That is the object of Part VIII and it has indeed a very wide application.
My Lords, I am afraid that I have done what is not uncommon in a long speech and have said prematurely that there is 355 only one more thing I wanted to say. I hope that I may be forgiven. This Bill comes winding its great length along and you hardly know when you have got to the end of it. The only remaining clause to which I must draw attention is Clause 52. It is not always that the doing of war work on land by the Government enhances the value of that land. In some cases it depreciates 'the value. There are cases where the provisions of the present Compensation Act are not wholly adequate. I will not go into detailed explanations after what already I have tried to say. The Bill has been before the public and it has been very much examined by a wide range of critics now for I think five months. It has been very closely scrutinized, I am sure, by some of your Lordships, and I should not be surprised to learn that some of you did not think that the Bill as introduced was satisfactory. I believe, though, that you will be very much more disposed to accept it now that it has been altered in quite important respects.
One of the things which at one time greatly stirred public feeling was the treatment of open spaces. I have not mentioned this matter in the résumé which I have given, because really, the point has disappeared. Originally, it may have seemed harsh that open spaces should be dealt with as the Bill when introduced provided. But now the open spaces clause is quite in line with the rest of the Bill, and if I do not spend time to defend it or expound it, I am sure that your Lordships will be satisfied. Commons or open spaces may not be purchased under Part II of the Bill without an affirmative Resolution of the House of Commons— not a negative but an affirmative Resolution. You have got to get this positive authority before you can do anything at all, unless the appropriate Minister certifies that equally advantageous land is being given in substitution. There are cases in which that might be so. Clause II, subsection (5) provides:
Where the proposals are for the acquisition of any land under Section five of this Act and—That will, I believe, relieve a great deal of anxiety.356 the Commission shall, notwithstanding anything in the preceding provisions of this section, report that the proposals, so far as they relate to land consisting of or forming part of the common, open space or fuel or field garden allotment shall not be proceeded with.
- (a) the land to be acquired consists of or includes the whole or any part of a common, open space or fuel or field garden allotment; and
- (b) the Commission are of opinion that the works in question are not both substantial raid permanent in their nature,
The Bill has now had introduced into it in all appropriate places directions as to the necessity of getting the opinion of the Minister of Town and Country Planning, and his view as to whether a particular acquisition is justified will naturally turn on his opinion as to whether these valuable schemes, either local or national, are interfered with. He is given a position of special prominence in the Bill with special powers in order that he may be quite certain that that most important aspect of the matter is not overlooked.
There is the Bill. A number of very important changes have been made in it, in the course of its passage by the whole House of Commons, in order to improve it. Efforts have been made not only for the purpose of providing protection for private interests but even more with a view to safeguarding public amenities, commons and open spaces. As a result of this I can only tell your Lordships that in my belief your Lordships will think that the Bill as it now stands does represent a just balance and a fair solution of what I am free to confess I have been led to regard as perhaps the most difficult and complicated subject arising out of the war that I have ever had to handle. I beg to move the Second Reading of this Bill.
§ Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
§ 4.59 p.m.
§ VISCOUNT SAMUELMy Lords, the Lord Chancellor has clearly shown to your Lordships that a Bill of this nature is quite essential in the public interest. The amount of Government work involved is enormous. The noble and learned Viscount who sits on the Woolsack mentioned the figure of £700,000,000. We have been dealing with such colossal sums during the years of the war that anything less than £1,000,000,000 is hardly noticed. In fact it is regarded almost as something in the nature of petty cash. But this sum of £700,000,000 is about equal to the whole of the British National Debt immediately before the last war, and in addition there 357 are apart from this matter of money some 800,000 acres of agricultural land affected by these works— a most important consideration.
This Bill was introduced in January and in a form which led it to be regarded, and properly regarded, as a very highhanded measure. It gave the Ministers most arbitrary powers. It gave those who objected to the exercise of those powers recourse, it is true, to a Commission, but to a Commission which was to be appointed by the Treasury, and which evidently was expected to deal mainly with financial considerations. It showed scant regard for many public rights and amenities, and no regard at all for town and country planning. The Minister of Town and Country Planning was not even mentioned in the Bill in its original form, and apparently the Departments concerned with the drafting of the Bill had never heard that there was such a thing as town and country planning which was a matter of national importance. Land, it appeared, could be requisitioned by the Government, and then, if afterwards retained but not found to be necessarily needed for Government purposes in perpetuity, and therefore sold to private owners, it would be sold having been freed from all town and country planning restrictions by having been converted for a time into Crown property. I say this on the authority of one of the leading town planners, Sir Patrick Abercrombie, who gave the facts in a letter to The Times at that period. Commons and amenities were injuriously affected.
The result of all this was a storm of protest against this Bill. The town and country planning movement was naturally indignant; the National Parks Committee protested; the Commons Preservation Society made complaints, and in the House of Commons the Bill was most strongly criticized. The result of all that was quite effective, and it shows the valve of Parliamentary control over a bureaucracy, and the usefulness of stern and vigorous criticism in Parliament. The Bill has now been transformed. The Minister of Town and Country Planning has been given a proper status and an opportunity to speak on behalf of the interest with which he is charged. Amenities are dealt with in Clause 8 (2), and commons in Clause 12. All these matters have been treated to the 358 satisfaction on the whole, I think, of the interests concerned. In the process, the Bill has been extended from forty pages to fifty-two. As to the War Works Commission, which has to-day so important a role in the whole matter, that is not now to be appointed by the Treasury, but by His Majesty. That applies not only to the Chairman of the Commission, as I think the noble and learned Viscount said by a momentary slip, but to all the members of the Commission also.
§ THE LORD CHANCELLORYes.
§ VISCOUNT SAMUELThat Commission will perform a useful function, as the noble and learned Viscount said, by on occasion arbitrating between two Departments which may easily come into conflict with one another and have differences of opinion on some of these matters. My noble and learned friend was good enough to refer to the fact that: more than thirty years ago I held the office of Postmaster-General. At one time I also held the office of Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, and at one moment. I found myself in one capacity involved in quite a bitter controversy with myself in the other. As Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster it was my duty to claim certain sums as wayleaves from the Postmaster-General, while as Postmaster-General it was my duty to resist that claim, holding that the Duchy of Lancaster was a quasi-public Department, and therefore could not claim such way-leaves. The correspondence between us (if I may use the word "us") became at one time quite heated, and was liable to cause a breach in our normal friendly relations. Fortunately, when the matter was just approaching a climax and both Departments were becoming seriously disturbed, I surrendered the Duchy of Lancaster to another Minister, and I do not know to this day which side won; because very soon after that I ceased to be Postmaster-General and became Home Secretary, and the keen and warm interest which I took in the controversy at one stage was dissipated.
That this War Works Commission under the Bill does not have ultimate authority to reject representations from a Minister is something of which I do not complain. I think it is right that, as provided in the Bill, the Minister may have recourse to Parliament; because, after all, this Commission is an indepen- 359 dent body, responsible to no one, while the Minister is responsible to Parliament, and, as these are not judicial matters proper to be treated by a court of law, it is, I think, the right conclusion of the whole matter that a Minister, if he is dissatisfied with the verdict of the Commission, should be allowed to have recourse to Parliament.
I and my noble friends on these Benches support the Second Reading of this Bill, and we have no Amendments to propose. I can assure the noble and learned Viscount, however, that if the Bill had been first introduced into this House in the form in which it reached Parliament, it would have had a very different reception. Indeed, I feel bound to say that the Government are open to much criticism for having permitted a Bill so drafted to be introduced into Parliament by them. It caused a great deal of trouble. It gave rise to the necessity for a considerable amount of agitation in other quarters, and it took up a good deal of Parliamentary time. To-day, however, my only duty is to shake a warning finger and to advise the Government not to do it again.
§ 5.8 p.m.
LORD SALTOUNMy Lords, I cannot agree with the noble and learned Viscount that this Bill is dull; it is one of the most exciting Bills which has ever been before your Lordships' House. While I have great sympathy with his exposition, to which I have listened with care, it does appear to me that we may have in this Bill the principle that a man who has laboured all his life to acquire property may find in the end that he has a weaker claim to it than somebody else whose principal claim to it is that he wants it. I can illustrate the whole matter, out of many examples known to me, by one case which may turn out to be a case of particular hardship, and with which I am sure that every member of your Lordships' House will have the greatest sympathy.
A farmer of my acquaintance, towards the end of a long life, purchased a farm of which he was the tenant; and, being very skilful in the art of drainage, in a very short time he improved this farm considerably. He had associated with him on the farm his son, whose health had been broken by service in the Merchant 360 Navy in the last war. During this war, a very large number of sites had been taken from his farm for use in connexion with an air station. I say "taken," because, as I expect many of your Lordships know, in most cases these sites were taken and occupied and works constructed on them before they were requisitioned. In nearly every case the first intimation which this man had of any works supposed to be done on his farm was the actual construction of the works concerned. On one occasion, however, he ascertained what was going to happen; and, as it involved a good deal of unnecessary damage, he asked me to go with him to the authorities to find out what was going to be done and to ask that some change might be made. I went with him, and we were able to obtain an alteration of the site which in fact has done no harm to anybody and has been satisfactory all round, but during the course of the conversation we pointed out that in no case had either of them been approached with a requisition or consulted about the work, and as a result in many parts of the farm the whole system of field draining had been cut, considerable areas of the best land had been flooded, and valuable crops had been lost. Moreover, the drains had been connected up in such a way that all the cattle troughs were filled with sewage. When this was pointed out the contractor merely said, "We will alter the connexions."
By this Bill it appears to me that the whole of this trouble is going to be perpetuated. When we complained to the requisitioning authority about the drains we were told that the agricultural executive committee knew all about them and had given permission for the work to go on. That, of course, is an absurd statement. Among other things a dwelling site was erected on the catchment area of the water supply to a populous village. Most of the enlightened county councils— I think Dumfries is one of them— insist that where a sewage-pipe crosses a water main the whole crossing should be shrouded in concrete for 30 feet on either side. Your Lordships will realize, therefore, the risks to which disregard of this kind of provision has subjected all the people in that parish. These things may very well go on during the war. These two farmers have said all along: "We can make a fuss, but we are not going to. This is only 361 going on until the end of the war, and anything we do now will merely hamper the national war effort, and we are content to suffer all this until the end of the war." But, if the provisions of this Bill are exercised against these people, they will have a very serious grievance. There is no compensation which can compensate them for taking away some of the most valuable land on the farm. Everybody in your Lordships' House knows that the capital and fixed equipment for a large farm is quite uneconomic when it is applied to a much smaller farm. I have searched the Bill in vain for any provision which enables the whole farm to be acquired. One might say: "We have done a great deal of damage, and so we will buy the whole property;" but even so I do not think that the Bill does justice to the private owner, because you assess this farm on 1939 prices and he will have to buy another farm on the basis of prices in 1946, and I do not think anyone can say that that is fair and just treatment.
I should be happier about the Bill if in Clause paragraph (c) in subsections (2) and (3) had been paragraph (a), and if (a) had become (c). I do not like it to appear that hardships should be the last consideration to which the Commission should have regard. I think that change would greatly improve the Bill.
§ THE LORD CHANCELLORWhat is the suggestion?
LORD SALTOUNIt is with reference to Clause II, subsections (2) and (3). In subsections (2) (c) and (3) (c) you will see that "the degree of loss or hardship" is the last consideration. I should like to see that in the place of paragraph (a). I think that might even alter the spirit of the Bill. I feel that these are points which deserve consideration and I venture to bring them before your Lordships.
§ 5.17 p.m.
§ THE LORD CHANCELLORThe details of the case to which my noble friend refers are quite unknown to me. Even if the details have been checked I do not really think that those who are interested in the case need, be too much concerned, nor do I consider that the suggested change in Clause 11 would result in altering the spirit of the Bill. If you have got to list three things, (a), (b) and (c), (c) is just as important as (a). It is not a class list. It is not something which 362 places the least deserving at the bottom; it is simply arranged for convenience. The consideration in paragraph (c) is just as much and as forcibly in our minds as the question of (a). If part of the farm is bought, it is quite true that there is no way in which the man who is going to lose that part can compel the Government to buy the whole of it. That is not the way in which our law works. If part of the farm is bought the amount to be paid is not merely the value of that part considered by itself; the compensation would also have to include what was considered to be appropriate for what is called injurious affection and for the severance which would have taken place. That is part of our regular law. I think there is no reason to believe that, because part of the property is taken, it would necessarily result in injury to the loser; you have to include an additional amount as a compensation for injurious affection, as the land may be made less valuable by the fact that it is divided into two. I cannot give any particular assurance, but I think the noble Lord should bear that in mind.
§ On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.