Lords Sitting of 12 February 1948

Preamble
The House met at four of the clock, The Earl of Drogheda on the Woolsack.
Prayers.
  BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
  LORD AMMON: My Lords, we propose to hold a formal sitting for public business to-morrow afternoon at 2.30 o'clock, in order to receive the Cinematograph Films Bill which is expected to come up from another place by that hour. We hope to take the Second Reading of that Bill this day week, Thursday, February 19.

ROYAL MARINES BILL.
4.5 p.m.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
The FIRST Lord of the ADMIRALTY (Viscount Hall): My Lords, the Bill of which I am asking your Lordships for the Second Reading this afternoon is, I think, uncontroversial. The Bill has two objects designed to one main purpose, and that is to increase the reserves available to the Royal Marines on mobilization. Although the numbers involved in this Bill are small, I am sure that your Lordships will all recognize that it deals with a very fine body of men. The Corps of Royal Marines was first raised from trained bands of the City of London about 300 years ago. From the outset it was constantly in use for naval purposes, and the first major engagement on land took place in the capture of Gibraltar in 1704. This was the beginning of a long record of gallant service and proud tradition, culminating in the actions of the Second World War in Crete, France, Holland and elsewhere. Many of our famous Service leaders have spoken in the highest terms of the value of the Marines to the country. Admiral Lord St. Vincent actually used the words:
"If ever the hour of real danger should come to England they will be found the country's sheet anchor."
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Times change and this can no longer be said of what, for all the glory of their past, is now a comparatively small body of men. Nevertheless, for its size the Corps is now no less a vital component of our Armed Forces than it has been in earlier times, a fact brought about no more by the increased functions lately assigned to them than by the conspicuous gallantry which they have displayed in all those actions in which they have taken part.
As I have said, the purpose of this Bill is to increase the reserves available to the Marines on mobilization. The present system of reserves relies only on pensioners who are over forty years of age and on voluntary entrants into the Royal Fleet Reserve, and we consider that these will no longer be sufficient to meet requirements. The reason is that the functions of the Marines have increased considerably. Before the Second World War their main function was to provide detachments on board ship—and only on large ships—to man parts of the armament and to be used on operations on shore under the Naval Commander-in-Chief. Their functions have now been extended, principally in the all-important field of combined operations. They have now to undertake the manning of assault craft and the provision of commando and special amphibious assault units. In addition, they have duties in connexion with beach communications, beach control and naval bombardment. It is for these purposes that we need an increase in the number of Royal Marines. The Bill therefore provides, as a first object, for the creation of a Royal Marine Forces Volunteer Reserve, on the model of the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve, the members of which will, when called up, serve as Marines. This means that their terms of pay and conditions of service will be those of the Marines, and that their disciplinary code will rest on the Naval Discipline Act or the Army Act, according to whether they serve afloat or ashore.
The second object of the Bill is to provide for the enlistment of Royal Marines for Special Service; that is, to serve part of their twelve years on active service and the rest in the Royal Fleet Reserve. The actual periods of service are left indefinite in the Bill, for they will be determined by regulation, as in the case of the Royal Navy. For the Royal Navy the periods of active service and service in the Reserve are normally seven years and five

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years respectively, and it is contemplated that the arrangements for the Royal Marines will be similar. Provision is made for a Royal Marine so enlisted to be transferred to a long-service engagement by mutual consent, thus bringing the engagement systems of the Royal Navy and the Royal Marines into line.
Your Lordships will see that Clause 1 of the Bill is devoted entirely to the first object, and, similarly, Clause 2 to the second. Clause 1 (1) makes it lawful to raise a Volunteer Reserve for the Royal Marines. The number is not limited by law, but for a start we aim at a figure of about 1,500. I cannot say what the ultimate figure will be, but 1,500 is the immediate aim. Subsection (2) places the Reserve in the same legal position as the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve, with the proviso that when mobilized its members serve as Marines and not as seamen. This has been done by applying the Statutes which govern the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve. Subsections (3) and (4) add the Royal Marine Forces Volunteer Reserve to the list of Naval Reserves in the various Acts and Statutes where they are already mentioned. Subsection (6) repeals the long obsolete Section 2 of the Naval Forces Act, 1903.
Clause 2 (1) allows Marines to be entered for Special Service on the lines I have indicated. Subsection (2) is technical. The Royal Marines Act says that at a certain point in his service a man may do certain things. For example, he may re-engage for service or he may have certain things done to him; he may be brought home from abroad. This subsection provides that for a Special Service Marine the: date to which those things are related will be the end of the active service part of his engagement, rather than after his completed service which, legally, includes his period with the Reserve. It is made clear that a Royal Marine may transfer from Special to Continuous Service. There is a similar provision in the Royal Navy. In conclusion, may I repeat that the Force for which we now desire to form a Voluntary Reserve, and to provide for Special Service enlistment, has a splendid tradition of action and gallantry. There can, I think, be no possible doubt but that the men required will come forward, and that in emergency they will follow honourably and with distinction in the
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footsteps of those who have made the title "The Royals" what it means to the world to-day. I feel sure that your Lordships will welcome this Bill and it is therefore with confidence that I ask for a Second Reading. I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Viscount Hall.)
4.11 p.m.
Viscount BRIDGEMAN: My Lords, we on these Benches are very grateful indeed to the noble Viscount, Lord Hall, for moving the Second Reading of this Bill, for his clear and detailed explanation of what it involves. He may have no doubt hut that we welcome this Bill. We on these Benches yield to no one in our admiration of the fine traditions and the magnificent work of the Royal Marines through the centuries. We do not dispute that it is absolutely right to bring the arrangements of the Royal Marines in the matter of reserves into line with the rest of he Forces, and we are particularly pleased to notice the proposal to bring them into line with the Royal Navy in regard to the Volunteer Reserve, the Regular Service and the Special Service which the noble Viscount has mentioned.
That, I am sure, is absolutely right. It is not only right, but it is extremely important, because of the decision which was confirmed again by the noble Viscount that the Forces necessary for Combined operations, for the commandos, and so forth, are to be raised from the Royal Marines. I take it I am right in thinking, from what the noble Viscount said, that the war-time expansion of the requirements for combined Operations and commandos are to be met by the expansion of the Royal Marines as and when necessary. If that is so, your Lordships will see at once that it is most important that the manpower arrangements for the Royal Marines should be Properly conceived. That must be done, not only in the way in which this Bill sets out to do it but also from the point of view of the likelihood of getting the, Proper number of personnel to fill the Royal Marine units, both of Volunteer Reserve and Special Service.
There are one or two points upon which I would like to touch, because I think Your Lordships will all agree that the special duties connected with combined operations require a state of much greater

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readiness than perhaps is necessary with other sections of His Majesty's Forces. Combined operation units are no good, in fact, unless they can be maintained in a high state of readiness for war. It is easy to be under an illusion regarding the state of readiness of a Volunteer Force. I imagine that the Royal Marine Forces Volunteer Reserve will cover all Marine service; that is to say, Marines who go to sea with the Royal Navy and also the commandos. Presumably the Special Service men from that Reserve will be training with their counterparts in the Royal Navy, and presumably also there will be units of the Royal Marine Forces Volunteer Reserve as a nucleus of the commando units and beach groups.
I do not know whether any decision has yet been taken as to where these R.M.F.V.R. units will be located, and whether they are to be located elsewhere than in main centres of the Royal Marines. If they are to be more widely spread, I wonder whether any attempt has been made to co-operate with the Territorial Associations. I am quite sure that such co-operation could be extremely useful to newly-formed units, besides being very necessary for the avoidance of overlapping in the country districts, and so forth. Another point I wish to make is that I hope His Majesty's Government, having taken the decision to establish a Royal Marine Reserve, will see that there is no cheeseparing and no skimping the job. That job is so important that we feel it must not be skimped; but no doubt the Admiralty will live up to the traditions which it has always maintained in the past in such matters. So, my Lords, we welcome this Bill, and we support it. I am not saying that we wish this infant a long life, although we like to be here at its christening. The reason that I do not wish the Bill a long life is because I hope that, before very long, when it becomes an Act, it may be consolidated into a bigger measure, and we need not have these small Acts lying about on the Statute Book. With those words I welcome the Second Reading of this Bill and I support it.
4.15 p.m.
LORD MARLEY: My Lords, I should like to say one word in support of this Bill, partly as to its merits, and partly because I am one of the two Regular Marine officers in your Lordships' House.
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The noble Viscount, Lord Cecil, speaking in relation to the Parliament Bill a day or two ago, defined members of your Lordships' House as highly qualified experts or normal citizens. The other ex-Royal Marine Artillery officer is number one in that categor—I refer to my noble friend Lord Hankey, the qualified expert. I am, as I trust, merely a normal citizen, being the other of those two ex-Royal Marine Artillery officers—the Royal Marine Artillery because some years ago the two branches of the Royal Marine Force were joined and became the Royal Marines. I thought that that was a good thing, although I know my brother officers in the Royal Marine Artillery did not agree with me in that, and I was not surprised that they did not.
The main reason why I want to support this Bill is that for many years it has been a piece of traditional knowledge among the Royal Marines Force that our strength resembles the teeth of a saw. When a war comes, up goes the curve of numerical strength of the Royal Marines, and directly that war is over down comes the other edge of the teeth of the saw; we diminish in numbers, and we diminish in expenditure upon our training and strength until we reach the bottom of the valley. Then another war, or fear of war, comes along; again, up go the teeth of the saw and we strengthen our numbers. That is entirely inefficient. It is quite inefficient to expect to train to the highest pitch of efficiency in a few weeks or months the numbers required for this Force to carry out the duties placed upon its shoulders with this minimum of training. For that reason, I welcome this method of evening up the numbers available for the work to be done. I think it is a wise precaution. Just as in industry efficiency is secured by joint consultation, by combination of management and workers, so, in all Service operations, I think we will get much greater efficiency by the use to an increasing extent of combined operation of the three Services. That, I think, will be facilitated by this Bill. For that reason I would like to add my word of support and welcome to its introduction.
4.20 p.m.
Earl BEATTY: My Lords, as a naval officer who had a great deal to do with the Royal Marines in combined operations in 1942 and 1943, I also would like to offer

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my word of congratulation to the Government for bringing in this Bill. In those years, as your Lordships will remember, we were concerned in building up the amphibious Forces by which ultimately the offensive was taken; and, naturally, a large part of the burden fell upon the Royal Marines. They had to expand beyond all expectations; they had to train their gun crews for anti-aircraft work and men for support craft duties for combined operations. All this was in addition to their normal other duties relating to ship detachments and training, and to forming new commandos at that time. It was always amazing to me how the Royals—as the First Lord has said—in the short apace of training time available were able to maintain that high state of morale, efficiency, discipline and smartness for which they have always been renowned through the centuries of their existence. This great variety of duties, which commenced then, has now come to stay, and it will require a great deal more diversified training, ranging from boatwork with landing craft to work with support craft and the manning of many different types of guns, as well as training in fighting ashore as commandos.
I am doubtful only as to whether this number of 1,500 contemplated will be sufficient, and I was glad to hear the noble Viscount, the First Lord of the Admiralty, say that this is only the beginning. I hope that he will not hesitate to increase these numbers if he can, for surely without doubt the experience of this recent war has shown the importance of all those units connected with combined operations. Naturally, at the moment, we have sufficient reserves. I quite appreciate that. But as the years pass, the reserves will naturally become smaller in numbers and less efficient. I should like to ask the First Lord, therefore, whether he feels that he will be able to obtain those 1,500 for the Volunteer Reserve if in the future the national service men are to be almost entirely absorbed by the Army and Air Force, as it seems may be the case. Nevertheless, this Bill is a step in the right direction, and it is a well-merited recognition of the fine work of the Royal Marine Corps in the last war. I am sure that your Lordships will wish to give warm support to this measure.
4.25 p.m.
LORD STRABOLGI: My Lords, as a naval officer of an older generation than that to which my noble friend who has just sat down belongs, one who saw service with the Marines in the First World War, I hope that I may be allowed to intervene for a few moments in this debate. I would very much like to echo what the noble and gallant Earl, Lord Beatty, and my noble friend Lord Marley have said about this splendid Corps. It is a very remarkable thing, in a way, that this Bill gives the Marines a new lease of life by introducing a Volunteer Reserve. I am old enough, and so is the First Lord or the Admiralty, to remember the important reforms which were introduced by that great seaman and administrator, the late Admiral of the Fleet Lord Fisher—Jackie Fisher. He did wonderful things for the Navy, but one of his proposals was to abolish the Marines, and it was only the resistance of naval officers who knew their worth from first-hand experience that eventually fought off this proposal. And here we are, with the Marines again covered in laurels and glory gained in the two greatest wars of all time. We all know that their record in the two great wars of recent times has fully entitled them to all the praises which they have received from so many speakers. My noble friend Lord Marley referred to the amalgamation of the Red Marines and the Blue Marines. I was one of those who fought that in another place. At the time I thought it a mistake. My noble friend tells me that it was not. I hope that we shall hear what my noble friend Lord Hankey has to say on this question I always thought' that we lost more by destroying the tradition of the Blue Marines—-the Royal Marine Artillery—than we gained as a result of administrative economies. But no doubt that it a matter on which opinion may vary.
I wish to ask my noble friend this question, which I am sure he will be able to answer, though I did not give him notice of it. It refers to the numbers of recruits now volunteering for the Royal Marines as long-service men. I am sure that all your Lordships who have knowledge of these matters will agree with me that the Royal Marines are essentially a long-service Corps. How one can make an efficient Marine—that is, a man who is both soldier and sailor—in twelve months,

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I really do not understand. If my noble friend really thinks he can do it, and does it, then he will prove himself a far greater administrative genius than any we have ever had at the Admiralty before. As I say, the Royal Marines are essentially a long-service Corps. I would like the noble Viscount, the First Lord, if he can, to tell me how many volunteers for long service we are getting. I presume that for the Royal Marines we can get all we seek. I hope so, and I hope that no attempt has been made to take more than the minimum as conscripts under the present Service Acts. My noble friend referred to the Marines as the "Royals." We used to know them by much more affectionate names; we called them either "bullocks" or "leathernecks." They were the butt of many jokes among other Service men—quite undeserved of course—about their supposed credulity. My experience of them—and I know that it is the experience of every other officer who served with them—was that they were a splendid body of men in any emergency; they were utterly reliable during the long, humdrum, trying days of peace and in dull routine operations in war. With those few words I also gladly welcome this Bill.
4.28 p.m.
LORD HANKEY: My Lords, as the other Royal Marine officer in your Lordships' House, I must say a few words on this Bill. It has warmed my heart to hear all the tributes that have been paid to the grand old Corps in which the best years of my life were spent. I thank the First Lord warmly for his remarks, and I also thank all the other speakers, particularly the officers of the sister Services with whom I have always lived—indeed, the Royal Marines have always lived—on terms of the greatest affection. I was asked just now to say a word about the Blue Marines and the Red. I differ from my noble friend Lord Marley in this respect. I fought very hard for the retention of the Blue Marines because, of course, of the question of tradition and esprit de corps and the magnificent record that both services had. It is no exaggeration to say that in the year I joined the Corps, when I knew very little about it, they won almost every event at the Royal Military Tournament; they won many naval prizes for gun firing and
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musketry and many other trophies. But still the thing has been done and the grand old Corps preserves now the magnificent tradition of both Services. I would like to mention one point in the history of the Royal Marines, even though to do so is wasting your Lordships' time. One of the first reasons why the Royal Marine Artillery was raised was to man rocket ships (a weapon we consider to be the most modern of all) in the Napoleonic wars. They were used with considerable effect in the Straits of Messina.
I was particularly glad to hear what my noble friend, the First Lord of the Admiralty, said about the use of the Marines for combined operations. I prefer another term—amphibious warfare—because the function of the Marines is wider than the important function of providing the spear-head of a landing operation. I fought for this amphibious warfare for years. The first public reference to it will be found in a Blue Book of 1904, about the question of the efficiency of the Royal Marines. I then urged that they were being misused, and that they would make a magnificent force for amphibious warfare. I did not win my way then, and I did not win it for a great many years. I had the rather exasperating experience during the Washington Naval Conferences of 1921-1922 of being taken by the American Marines to the United States Marines Base at Quantico on the Potomac, and seeing that they had realized all the schemes I had advocated. Latterly amphibious warfare has been used to the full—a good deal in the First World War and even more in the Second.
Why I use the larger term is this. The Marines can be used very effectively in small bodies—no more than the detachment from a cruiser. Such a body, often with their naval colleagues, sometimes by themselves, were landed for a thousand operations in the Peninsular War and in the two last wars. They have been used to improvise coastal defences again and again all over the world—in the Mediterranean, in the Persian Gulf, and elsewhere, and they manned the defences of Scapa Flow in both wars. I agree with the First Lord of the Admiralty that their great function is that of combined operations, and I very much welcome that fact. I do not think I have anything to say

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about the Bill itself. I am glad it was introduced as a separate Bill, so that it gave an opportunity for this debate, which I hope will result in an uplift to the Royal Marines.
4.35 p.m.
Viscount HALL: My Lords, I would like to express to those of your Lordships who have taken part in this debate my gratitude for the appreciation which has been voiced of the work of the Royal Marines. I am sure that those in command and all other ranks will be pleased to know from the mouths of so many noble Lords who have served with the Royal Marines and in the Royal Navy that there is this great appreciation of their services. I am sure that it has been as pleasing to your Lordships to pay the tributes as it has been to those of us who are associated with the Admiralty to hear them: being made. The noble Viscount, Lord Bridgeman, in a helpful and constructive speech such as he usually makes on occasions when we are dealing with any branch of the Fighting Services, has asked some questions particularly with regard to training. First of all, there was the question of location. We are hopeful that this Corps of reserves will be drawn from a wide field—not only from centres like London and the naval ports, which will provide a substantial number, but from all other parts of the country. Consideration of the training facilities will therefore be necessary.
As the noble Earl, Lord Beatty, rightly said, training must not be confined to one particular branch, but must be spread among the various branches of the service now rendered by the Royal Marines. We are hopeful that permanent centres may be established not only in the places I have mentioned but in other cities. We hope that where we have facilities for the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve and where there are facilities provided by the Territorial Associations, arrangements may be made for the training of scattered units. Consultations are proceeding in that direction. I shall be very happy to keep the noble Viscount, Lord Bridge-man, informed on this matter, when the consultations are completed and arrangements can be made. He also asked that facilities should not be scamped. Of course, those responsible for providing facilities would always prefer to say that there is no possibility of them being
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scamped, but we an: confined to the amount of money allowed to us. Nevertheless, the House can be assured that this new Reserve Corps is not being set up for show, but for use. We shall do all we possibly can to give them the facilities which will be required to enable them to be a very useful Service.
I was pleased to hear the tributes from noble Lords who have actually served with the Royal Marines. I am not go: ng to deal with the old controversy whether the amalgamation of the Blue Marines and the Red Marines was right or wrong. The fact is that the Service has not suffered unduly, or indeed at all, as a result of the amalgamation which took place twenty-five years ago. It was one of the results of the Geddes axe. When we look at the great contribution the Royal Marines made during the course of the last war, I do not think it can be said that they have suffered as a result of this amalgamation. The noble Lord, Lord Strabolgi, asked me whether I could give the number of recruits volunteering for long service. Of course, Royal Marine recruitment is at present entirely for Continuous Service, and will be until the passing of the present Bill, with the exception, of course, of the entry of national service men. With regard to the latter, we are at the moment, as the noble Lord knows, just taking a token figure for the Royal Navy, and the token figure applies to the Royal Marines as it does to the Naval Service as a whole. Recruitment of Regulars is not quite so good as we would like it to be. It now averages about eighty a month for long service. We could do with a few more than that number, but, in proportion to the other Services, apart from the Royal Navy, the rate of recruitment is not unsatisfactory.
It was very pleasing to hear the noble Lord, Lord Hankey, taking part in this debate. I agree with him that possibly certain of the operations which the Royal Marines now have to undertake could easily be combined—as he so properly put it—in amphibious operations. But the Marine is a very strange chap. He is a handyman. He is called upon to do all sorts of jobs; and, as he has been so called upon in the past, so am I su"e that he will be called upon in the futu: "e—if it is necessary. Your Lordships can be assured that everything that the Admiralty can do will be done to make this Reserve a very great success.
Viscount BRIDGEMAN: I would just like to say how grateful we are to the noble Viscount for the trouble he has taken to answer the questions we have asked.
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

POST OFFICE AND TELEGRAPH (MONEY) BILL.
4.43 p.m.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
LORD AMMON: My Lords, the Bill to which I ask your Lordships to give a Second Reading is a Money Bill. Its object is to give authority to raise capital to the extent of £75,000,000, of which £71,000,000 will be devoted to developing the telephone service. That amounts to about £24,000,000 a year, and a few years ago would have represented about £12,000,000 or £13,000,000. The prewar capital expenditure on the telephone service amounted annually to £18,000,000. When this Bill was introduced in another place Mr. Grimston—who, I believe I am right in saying, was at one time an Assistant Postmaster-General in a former Government—while deploring, as we all do, the general gloom overhanging industry, said:
"In all the circumstances, the Post Office and all those in it are to be congratulated on what they have done in spite of the difficulties."
I would like for a moment or two to draw your Lordships' attention to some of those difficulties, and the great efforts that have been made by the Post Office to overcome them. As your Lordships will readily understand, it is quite natural that when war is declared the Post Office Engineers, particularly those in the telephone Service, are one of the first services to be called upon. Immediately the call came, no fewer than 16,000 skilled engineers left to join up. This meant a considerable depletion of the service, and while many recruits were brought in later—many of them were women—they were barely enough to maintain the service with reasonable efficiency during the war. At the end of the war there were no fewer than 300,000 applications for the telephone service, and six years leeway had to be made
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up. That number has increased at the present time to about 450,000.
Having said that, I think that your Lordships should know what the Post Office have done to make up that deficiency. Prior to the war, the peak years were 1936 and 1937, when no fewer than 791,000 installations were made. But in 1946 and 1947 no fewer than 1,322,000 instruments were installed which represents an increase of 67 per cent. over the peak years before the war. When we are all complaining about the Post Office it is just as well sometimes to take notice of the efforts which they are making, and of what they have done in this particular respect. I think they have a right to feel proud of the fact that one in three of the telephones now in use has been installed since the war. That means a good deal more than just what those figures represent, because tremendous difficulties have had to be overcome, including shortage of staff, the necessity to take on a great many unskilled assistants, and so forth. As your Lordships will appreciate, that rapid development has eaten deeply into the resources and reserves of cables and the various implements which are necessary. We are all inclined to think at times that the telephone consists only of what we see on our desk, or in our hall, as the case may be, forgetting all the work that has had to go to bring it into operation. The fact is, the installation of the telephone itself is the last stage of a rather complicated affair.
Since the war the efforts of the Post Office to keep pace with the demand by installing new capital equipment have been hampered by shortage of man-power and supplies. In that connexion I would like to draw your Lordships' attention to the measures which have been adopted to overcome those difficulties. The Postmaster-General has decided that essential subscribers, such as businesses on export trade, public utilities and health services, will have first claim to a telephone. He will do his best, too, to see that farmers also get a telephone. He will see that the trunk network, the nervous system of industry and commerce, receives the equipment and the service it wants.
If your Lordships will bear with me for a moment or two longer, I would point out one particularly notable development that has taken place since the war, apart from those I have already indicated. It is the installation of the

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Anglo-Dutch cable, opened a few weeks ago by the Postmaster-General. That is able to carry no fewer than eighty-four simultaneous conversations and, in addition, it can be developed to carry more than twice that number. It is now giving a first-class service to Holland, Scandinavia and to Central Europe. With regard to the trunk services, these are being provided as speedily as possible. Here again tribute should be paid to the Post Office for the efforts which they have made in that connexion. In September, 1939, there were 6,700 circuits, and to-day there are 14,000. I have no hesitation whatever in submitting this Bill for your Lordships' approval. Before I sit down, as one who served for many years in this service, I think I should be lacking in my duty—and I am sure your Lordships will agree with me—if I did not pay tribute to the men and women who, under very difficult circumstances, have carried on this service. We have sympathy for all people who, due to frustration, are unable to carry out their services as efficiently as they would like. I think the Post Office staff will appreciate our expression of appreciation for all they have endeavoured to do under very trying circumstances.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a. —(Lord Ammon.)
4.50 p.m.
Viscount BRIDGEMAN: My Lords, once again noble Lords on these Benches desire to welcome the Bill, and, if I may say so, to endorse the tributes which the noble Lord, Lord Ammon, has just paid to the Post Office staff, whose interests we all know he has so much at heart. I believe that it is common knowledge that a tremendous amount of work was carried on in the Post Office and by its staff in the last war. I am not quite sure whether it is equally well known how much the efficiency of organizations such as the air raid warning system and Anti-Aircraft Command depended upon the skill and devotion of the Post Office engineering department. I should like to emphasize that now. Whatever tributes we pass, it does not alter the fact that because of the war there is a big back-log in the maintenance of the postal services. If this £75,000,000 is designed to help to overcome that back-log, and if it means that the material and the labour are there we welcome this Bill
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with all our heart. It occurred to me that the provision of this £75,000,000 might not have been necessary if in the past the Post Office surplus had not been—to use modern language—clawed back into the Treasury each year. If the Post Office had been allowed to retain those surpluses and they had been, so to speak, credited in the profit and loss account, there would be no need for this Bill. As it is, the Treasury have taken all this money which they are now to give back—and a very good thing too.
There is only one other point I would like to mention, arising out of this list of priorities, and that is with regard to our friends, the farmers. There was one slight difference in the wording which the noble Lord used about the farmers and the other people, and I cannot help wondering whether there will be difficulty in providing telephone poles for the farmers, a difficulty which would not arise in the case of the other people the noble Lord mentioned. If I am right, and there is a difficulty in supplying these telephone poles, I hope the difficulty may be overcome. With those words I will say once again how much we agree with this Bill.
4.52 p.m.
LORD JESSEL: My Lords, I should like to say one or two words in approval of what has fallen from my friend on the Front Bench in tribute to the efficiency of the Post Office staff. We in London have a wonderful service. If one rings up the telephone office to find where a mistake has been made one always receives courtesy; they do their very best to help the users of the service. With regard to what has been said about the air raid warning system, everybody who was in London during that time knows how extremely efficient that was and how the Post Office staff stuck to their job. As a Londoner, I believe that we have a far greater number of consumers of this service, in proportion to population, than any other part of the country; and we are indeed most indebted to the Post Office for their work. There is some delay sometimes in getting toll calls—and I am glad my noble friend is with me there. I do not live in the country and, therefore, I do not experience that difficulty, but I think that that might be surmounted. On the whole I think the public are given very good service.

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We all recognize what a job it has been for the officials of the Post Office to get that service going, and especially what has been done since the war in providing accommodation for new subscribers. I am sure that this debate, like so many other debates in this House, has been of use in showing what has been done in this country, and also to show how much we appreciate the services rendered to us by the Post Office.
4.54 p.m.
LORD AMMON: My Lords, it only remains for me to thank your Lordships for the kindly sentiments which you have expressed with regard to the service and, of course, for your forbearance. Like everybody else, I have said things about the telephone at times, and may yet do so again. I am confident that in the Post Office they are exercising every effort they can to catch up with their arrears. I know that they have recruited staff, and the matter of material, of course, depends on efforts from outside. With regard to the manufacturers of the material, they have to consider the export trade which we have no wish to lose. With regard to the point raised by the noble Viscount, Lord Bridgeman, I am empowered to say that the hope is that within two years every farmer who needs it will have a telephone, and that every effort is being made to supply them. That is placed high on the priority list.
On Question, Bill read 2a; Committee negatived.

REQUISITIONED LAND AND WAR WORKS BILL.
4.56 p.m.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
LORD CHORLEY: My Lords, in asking your Lordships to give a Second Reading to this rather difficult Bill, I do not propose to attempt the task of discussing its provisions in great detail. Like the celebrated curate's egg, its composition is somewhat complicated. Your Lordships will recollect that parts of it were excellent, and we must infer that other parts left not such a pleasant taste in the mouth. Undoubtedly what one must frankly admit to be the major purpose of the present Bill—which is to extend the powers conferred in the Act
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of 1945 up to December 10, 1952—has not been received with enthusiasm anywhere. Although that is the most important of its purposes, the Bill has other purposes of less importance which I am sure your Lordships will agree are the excellent parts. In the first place, it proposes to bring the compensation sections of the Act into relationship with provisions of more recent Acts. That is to say, it proposes to depart from the flat 1939 value which was taken in 1945. It also contains important provisions for the purpose of making permanent the oil pipe-line which, your Lordships will remember, was constructed as one of the great war works during the period of the war.
May I deal with those three major aspects a little more in detail? The Act of 1945 contained various provisions relating to the compulsory acquisition of land. Part II of the Act gave powers for the permanent acquisition of land in certain cases—broadly speaking, for the purpose of preserving to the nation erections which had been in a substantial number of cases placed on land which had been requisitioned during the war. Therefore, if a valuable Royal Ordnance factory had been erected on a piece of land which had been requisitioned, the return of the requisitioned land to the original owner would not carry with it, as it would otherwise have done, that valuable erection. Then in Part V certain powers were conferred upon local authorities about which I do not think I need say more. In Part VI, which was, in some ways, the most important part of the Act, the power to remain in possession was conferred upon Government Departments for purposes of making use of erections which have been placed on the land, or for the purpose of rehabilitating the land, or removing erections which were no longer required. That is the Part which deals with the position of the Government Department in possession of the land where it is desirable for reasons of that kind that possession should be retained.
The 1945 Act, as your Lordships will recollect, fixed a period of two years during which these powers might be exercised, and that period of two years will expire on February 23 next, so that the date is getting rather near. But it does not mean that all the powers of the Act of 1945 come to an end on February 23 next, because it was provided that, by

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certification, an extension might be obtained to a date two years beyond the period of the Supplies and Services Act of the same year. That extension can be granted only for the purpose of what has been described as the "transitional economic powers" of the Act. The powers of the Act, broadly speaking, may be divided into two main types: powers relating to military purposes and powers relating to the economic purposes for which these lands might be used by Government Departments during the difficult transitional period. In that particular type of case, by certification, the powers may already be extended up to December 10,1952; so that in this part of the Bill which is before your Lordships to-day we are dealing with the question of extending the other powers which would otherwise expire on February 23 next.
It has been suggested that under the Supplies and Services Act, especially as amended by the Act which was before your Lordships only last year, the necessary powers may possibly exist, and it is possible that that is so. But the Government felt that this was a case where, as the powers had been originally conferred under the 1945 Act by Parliament, it: was right and proper that they should come back to Parliament and ask for a renewal of the powers, so to speak, in terms. Therefore we are asking for an extension of all the powers, both the powers for military purposes and the certificated powers for transitional economic purposes, up till December, 10,1952. In any case it is important that the two types of powers should be extended to the same date, because in actual practice it has been found rather difficult to draw a sharp dividing line between the two. It is pretty clear that if the one set of powers were to lapse and the other set of powers, by certification, were to continue, many borderline cases would arise which might necessitate considerable litigation and would undoubtedly give rise to a great deal of trouble.
Let us look a little more at the actual provisions of Part II of the original Act which gives power to acquire land. It has been thought by many people that the Government's prime object was to enable large areas of land up and down the country to be acquired for military training purposes. That is not the case. The Defence Departments already have
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ample powers under the Defence Acts for the permanent acquisition of land. The main reason why the powers under the old Act need to be extended is that the War Department and other military Departments are in possession of tracts of land which were requisitioned during the war, and which they used for training and for other military purposes during that period. It is obviously essential that they should take great care in making up their minds as to how much of that land they need permanently to acquire. The actual acquisition might be under this Act or it might be under the Defence Acts. Actually from the point of view of the people—and they are many—who dislike this acquisition of large tracts of land it is much better that those acquisitions should take place under the 1945 Act as extended, because under that Act there is the War Works Commission to which these cases have to be referred. That is a quasi-judicial and independent body which gives an independent and sound judgment on each case which is referred to it.
More important than Part II is the right to retain possession under Part VI of the original Act, which we are also asking your Lordships to extend. It has been unfortunate that the necessary decisions could not be reached by this month in connexion with what particular areas it is desired to retain. The Government sympathize with the landowners who have been put into a difficult position as a result. When the Supplies and Services Bill was before your Lordships in 1945, my noble friend Lord Pakenham expressed the hope, which was then the hope of everybody concerned, that it would, in fact, be possible to come to the necessary decisions before the end of 1947. For a number of reasons, however, this has not been so; particularly, I think, because of the great public interest in the question, which led the Prime Minister himself to intervene in November, 1946, to set up new administrative machinery in order that each particular case might be carefully considered. From that time a number of inquiries have been held, and that has been one of (he main reasons why it has not been possible to come to definite decisions by February of this year. Therefore, we have had to introduce this Bill in order to ask Parliament to extend the period. Those

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are the main points in regard to this important matter which is dealt with in Clause 1 of the Bill before your Lordships this afternoon, and the effect of which is to grant this extension.
I will turn now to the compensation aspects which are dealt with in Clauses 7 to 11. Compensation in respect of requisitioned land is of two main sorts—the rental compensation which is payable during the period of the requisition, and the terminal compensation which, as your Lordships are aware, is payable for damage done or alteration to the character of the land or building during its requisition. The effect of the present law, broadly speaking, is to establish the 1939 value, whether it is the 1939 rental value or the 1939 capital value, as the ceiling beyond which the compensation cannot go. It might be less but, normally speaking, it would be the 1939 value.
As your Lordships are aware, an attempt was made for a very long time to hold to 1939 values, but it has, during the past year or two, become more and more clear that it is not equitable to hold to those values. In Statutes like the Town and Country Planning Acts the 1939 values have been departed from. Therefore, the Government have taken advantage of the present Bill to go away from the 1939 ceiling resulting from the Requisitioned Land and War Works Act, 1945. So far as the rental compensation is concerned, we are taking the current market value, restricted, of course, to existing use. There are other uses that might have a higher value, so the current market value must be restricted to the existing use and be subject to a maximum, in the case of rent restricted properties, of the standard rent.
A substantial number of houses which have been taken over are smallish houses requisitioned by local authorities—for example, for purposes of housing homeless people. There is a substantial number of cases of this kind, and it would obviously be unfair that a greater rent should be obtainable because the houses were being used in that sort of way than houseowners might obtain by letting them in the ordinary way in the market. Therefore, in the case where properties are within the Rent Restriction Acts, the standard rent is the ceiling. In other cases, the ceiling is 160 per cent. of the 1939
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value; that is to say, we are allowing an increase, so to speak, of 60 per cent.
This method has been criticized because it is felt that there is a good deal to be said for the view that valuations on the 1939 basis are difficult, and it would be preferable to introduce some other method of assessment. If a better method could be found, we should be very glad. However, taking everything by and large, and considering the very different types of property which are in fact involved in this problem, the Government are satisfied that the method which they are suggesting is the only really practicable one. Turning to the terminal compensation, I may say that here we have been able to depart entirely from 1939 values. The basis in this case is the current cost of rehabilitation, subject to a maximum of the diminution in the value of the property due to such damage as may have been done or such alteration as has taken place. That can be calculated quite simply by taking the difference between the current capital value of the property as damaged or altered and the current capital value which it would have if it were in its original condition and in no way damaged or altered. I am sure your Lordships will agree that that is a very reasonable and equitable basis to take.
The third main purpose of the Bill, as I indicated at the beginning of my speech, is to deal with the oil pipe-lines, that most important war work which was carried through during the war, and which was of such great value. Under the Requisitioned Land and War Works Act, 1945, power was taken to maintain and use the pipe-line on a temporary basis, and it was then intended that the permanent structures that had been erected here and there for the purposes of effective use of the pipe-line should be permanently acquired under the provisions of the Act, and that easements should be obtained over those parts of the pipeline where it was just going through or under property. Experience, however, has shown that, owing to the very large number of landowners who are interested in this matter, it is a most protracted business to get all the necessary easements, and the Government are satisfied that a much more expeditious and less cumbersome process must be provided. Therefore, they are providing perfectly

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simply, by a Clause in the Bill, that the temporary use shall become a permanent use. However, this does mean, of course, that the owners must be told what is happening; they must know where the pipe-line is; they must understand what obligations are imposed upon them, and also they must be granted compensation. Provision is made for the compensation. That is a perfectly straightforward matter, and I do not think it calls for any particular comment.
With regard to the other side of the question, the Bill provides that the necessary rights must be endorsed on the title deeds of the property, or else must be entered upon the register of local land charges. It is intended that in the normal case they will be endorsed on the title deeds. Obviously, from many points of view, that is much the more satisfactory way of doing it. It may be thought that it is rather difficult to get hold of the title deeds, and an attempt is being made to get over that difficulty by a provision that the compensation shall be dependent upon the necessary endorsements being made. It is hoped that, by that means, in a comparatively short time all the necessary easements will have been obtained. The Bill provides that all this must be done before the end of 1949, so that a date is fixed.
Those are the main provisions of the Bill. No doubt your Lordships will have a number of points to bring forward in regard to the different clauses. Some of the subsidiary clauses deal with matters which are not without importance, such as, for example, those relating to the stopping-up of highways. I shall be very glad to try to deal with any problems of that kind. I think your Lordships will agree that I have placed the main purposes of the Bill before you. With those words, I beg to move that the Bill be read a second time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Chorley.)
5.20 p.m.
The Earl of MUNSTER: My Lords, I think I should not be exaggerating this afternoon if I said that, throughout the twenty years that I have been a member of your Lordships' House, I have never seen a. more complicated and difficult Bill to decipher. I have always understood that the traditional patience of Job in all his sufferings and maladies must have
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been of the highest quality; but he could never have read this Bill! I need not read to your Lordships the whole of Clause 1, but I merely ask you to cast your eye over the first subsection of that clause. He would be a very remarkable person indeed who understood its contents. As I said, this is a very complicated Bill. It refers to other Acts of Parliament which, in their turn, refer to previous or to associa: ed Acts, all of which adds to the complexity of the Bill.
I have tried my best to understand what is intended and, as I see it, he measure is divided into three parts, none of which is dependent upon any other, and indeed none of which bears any reference to any other parts. The first six clauses, is the noble Lord said, amend Parts II, V and VI of the principal Act of 1945; the next little batch of clauses amend the compensation provisions of the Defence Act of 1939, and the last few clauses of the Bill deal with oil pipe-lines. The powers under the three Parts of the 1945 Act expire two years from the end of the war period, as I understand it, but for the purposes of those three Parts the Supplies and Services Act extended the war period to December, 1950, and their validity for a further two years, to December, 1952. Those Parts, if I have understood them correctly, deal with cases where works were performed or where their use was continued after February, 1946, and purely for transitional purposes. Your Lordships will, therefore, observe that in cases where the land was held or the works were used for economic purposes, as mentioned by Lord Chorley, the powers expire in 1952. But the powers which are exercised over land requisitioned for war purposes, and which has not been used for any other purpose, expire in 1948, and it is with these points that this. Bill deals.
I would agree, on the facts of both cases, that perhaps there would be little to say if it were not for the fact that procrastination is made possible after the Bill becomes an Act. By its very terms it seems to me that it must encourage the Service Departments to postpone or delay reaching decisions over land which has been requisitioned and which was needed for war purposes until almost February, 1952, four years hence. We all know that any amount of land was requisitioned for war purposes and is now no longer used.

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In many cases it has been abandoned to neglect and decay. And, quite apart from the heavy loss of agricultural land, there are any number of persons with small means who have had their land and buildings taken and have no idea when their property will be returned to them. The noble Lord says that he and the Government have sympathy for them; but sympathy is not enough. In many cases they have had their only assets taken and they can find no redress or information whatever from Service Departments as to when these assets will be returned; and now it is intended to prolong this delay for a period of four years. I believe that it is contrary to public interests to leave these persons of small means in a state of constant uncertainty.
None of us on these Benches, and I am sure none of your Lordships on the Government Benches, wishes to leave the Service Departments without sufficient land to meet all their requirements. But what is the real reason for authorizing so long an additional period? The noble Lord gave us no indication of that in the course of his remarks. Is it a fear of war? Is it the lack of knowledge and decision by Service Departments as to their real requirements? Or is it—as I believe it to be—a delay on the part of His Majesty's Government in presenting a proper and comprehensive defence programme to the Service Departments? We have had many debates in this House on the subject of requisitioned land. My noble friend who leads the Opposition has raised this question before, and I think I am correct in saying that members upon all sides of the House were somewhat critical of the Government's lack of decision. In passing from that I would ask the noble Lord this: What guarantee can he give to your Lordships that when we approach that date in 1952 we shall not suddenly find this Act further extended for another period of time?
I now pass to Clause 3 of the Bill, which regularizes any illegalities which may have occurred over the permanent stopping-up of highways between a period in 1939 and February, 1946. The second purpose of that clause, as I understand it, is to extend the validity of the powers, which are at present held under the 1945 Act, to close permanently any highway which has been used continuously for any war purpose. As the noble Lord must
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know full well, this is a direct contradiction of the undertaking which was given by the Home Secretary in another place in presenting the Supplies and Services Act of 1945. It is quite true that these same powers were in the Act of 1945 when it was a Bill, but they were withdrawn after considerable pressure in another place; and in withdrawing them the Home Secretary stated that from the passing of the Act of 1945 there would be no power to make any new decisions or closure of highways except in the three ways well known to the law—by a special Act of Parliament, under the orders of justices or under a town and country planning scheme. What has changed since that guarantee was given by the Home Secretary?
From the speech which the noble Lord made in introducing his Bill, I have been unable to appreciate why it is necessary to obtain these autocratic powers and to close existing highways which have been used by the general public for years. Let me give the House an indication or explanation of what I mean. Let us suppose that the Pilgrims' Way—a well-known highway in this country—or perhaps a portion of it, was closed continuously during the war; under this clause, as I read it, that closure could become permanent and for ever. Let me ask the noble Lord this: What would be the position if, in regard to land acquired by the Government, it appeared that after a certain length of time it was no longer required, and it had a famous highway running through the area? If the Government sold that land would the highway then be open again to the public, or would it remain closed for ever to the inhabitants of that locality and other people who might go there? Those are questions that I ask on this first Part of the Bill.
I turn now to deal with even more complicated matters—rental compensation and terminal compensation. It is true, as the noble Lord says, that under the terms of the Bill, rental compensation is to be adjusted to the current value for existing user, subject to the ceiling of the 1939 values plus 60 per cent. Why, when we endeavoured so laboriously, with the help of the noble Lord, Lord Henderson, to get rid of the 1939 standards from the law of compensation for the acquisition of land, is it necessary in 1948 to introduce it for the first time

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into the law of rental compensation? The Government may defend their action by referring to the prevalence of scarcity values. We have never regarded this as an excuse, because the owner turned out by the Government has to re-accommodate himself at present-day values. If the Government insist on eliminating this element, I cannot for the life of me understand why they have not applied to the problem in this Bill the ingenuity which enabled them to escape from the 1939 standards under the Town and Country Planning Act of last year. The noble Lord, Lord Chorley, said that only small homes had been taken to accommodate the homeless. But these are the very people for whom I am appealing; these people who have had small homes—
LORD CHORLEY: My Lords, I was referring to the standard rent restriction, which I said was an important restriction because a substantial number of small properties which came within the Rent Acts had been requisitioned.
The Earl of MUNSTER: The noble Lord says that a number of small homes have been taken, I think by the local authorities, to house the homeless. These people have to find other accommodation. Why in the world they should be tied down to the 1939 values, plus 60 per cent., puzzles me. Perhaps the noble Lord will tell me the reason when he replies. Anyhow, I certainly intend to put down an Amendment on this for consideration at the next stage of the Bill, and we can then thresh the matter out.
I now wish to refer to the provisions in Clause 8 which deal with rent-restricted land. I do not think that we on these Benches would argue that the owner of rent-restricted property which was held on a tenancy when the requisitioning occurred should receive any higher rent merely because the Government have become his tenant. The case, which seems to me so utterly unjust, however, is that of property which comes within the rent-restricted limits of value and which, at the time of the requisitioning, was not and perhaps never had been, subject to any tenancy. As I understand it, the effect of this case is that the owner-occupier who but for a requisitioning would now be able to let his property at current values, is even excluded from the measure of justice which is dealt out under the pro-
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visions of Clause 8. I am sure that the noble Lord, Lord Chorley, knows as well as I do the views which we hold on the whole question of rent restriction. Will he, between now and the next stage of the consideration of the Bill, look at the definition of "rent-restricted land" as drawn in Clause 8. This again we should like to discuss on a future occasion, and We shall put down an Amendment dealing with the point.
Next, I come to the matter of terminal Compensation, which I am told is legal terminology for compensation for damage done during the period of requisitioning. That is subject to a ceiling which is the pre-emergency value of the property. Terminal compensation, which is dealt with Under the Bill, alters the maximum compensation from the 1939 value of property to the difference between the present compulsory purchase value in a damaged state and the compulsory purchase value in a prerequisitioned state. It is difficult to follow, I know, but the proposal at its face value seems fair and equitable. But in certain types of case it is bound to bear very heavily. The cases I am thinking of are commonly those of agricultural land, where; the costs of restoration are extremely burdensome, and are generally incurred over long periods following derequisitioning. We all know that the total of those costs may—in fact they always must—greatly exceed the difference between the purchase price in an undamaged condition and the purchase price in a damaged condition. Let us take the case of agricultural land which, undamaged, is worth, say, £50 am acre. Even if it is seriously damaged it has obviously some value; let us put it at £10 an acre. Now to put that land back into good heart is bound to take some years. It cannot all be done at once, and it is going to cost a gnat deal more than the difference between those two sums. Where there has been open-cast mining, I am told that it takes a vast number of years and the cost is in many cases quite prohibitive. The Government—although the noble Lord did not do so to-day—admitted this problem in another place, and they gave statements of a somewhat reassuring nature. I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Chorley, will be able to give these definite undertakings in this House, even if it is not possible to insert some Amendment in the Bill.

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There is one other problem which relates to terminal compensation and the question of leasehold property which has been requisitioned. There may well, in these cases, be a single dwelling house which is under lease, and which the lessee covenants to keep as a single dwelling house. The local authority may have come along and requisitioned the house and turned it into flats for housing the homeless. In that event, the market value of the house is, of course, considerably enhanced, but the leaseholder will receive nothing. On the other hand, the freeholder can enforce the covenant, and the leaseholder will bear the whole expense and cost of converting the house back to a single dwelling house. I am well aware that when the lease expires before the end of requisitioning this problem is already dealt with, and is covered by, the Landlord and Tenant (Requisitioned Land) Act of 1944. But the case is not covered, and never has been, when the lease expires after derequisitioning has occurred. I hope that the noble Lord will be able to give us some information on that point.
I turn, finally, to one brief point on the Government's intention regarding oil pipelines. As the noble Lord rightly says, compensation is provided for owners of land through which the pipe-lines are laid, and the existence of these pipe-lines must be registered in the local land charges register or it will be endorsed, as the noble Lord has said, on the title deeds. I am told that in a number of cases this pipeline runs underneath the property of innumerable people, in most cases of very small holders. I think it should be laid down quite plainly in the Bill that they must be advised that they have a claim for compensation to make and that if the pipe-line runs underneath their ground that fact should be either endorsed in the title deeds or inserted in the local land charges register. So many people fail to understand what the local land charges register does, and still fewer understand a title deed dealing with land. I think the Government should make arrangements for people to be informed. I am going to put an Amendment down on that clause of the Bill and I trust that it will have at least the sympathy of the noble Lord.
I have been much too long in dealing with the Bill, which is very important,
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but I have given the House an indication of the Amendments which we intend to move at the next stage of the Bill. I know that the noble Lord and his colleagues are extremely anxious to obtain this measure and to give it the Royal Assent. We on this side shall do nothing to retard the progress of the Bill, so long as we can have proper discussion during the Committee stage to deal with the Amendments that I have suggested. When all is said and done, it is no fault of ours that so little time is left for consideration of this very important Bill by (as we so frequently describe ourselves) this competent revising Chamber.
5.43 p.m.
LORD LLEWELLIN: My Lords, I do not want to add more than a few sentences to what my noble friend has said, but I must say that although the noble Lord who introduced this Bill did it with great clarity, I thought he did not do it with a great deal of enthusiasm. He said the Bill was like the curate's egg. I understand that was only good in parts, and I can very well understand the noble Lord, Lord Chorley, thinking in his heart that this Bill is not very good in, at any rate, that part which allows the military to retain some of the pleasantest beauty spots in this country. I regret that very much. I do not know whether the blame lies with the Government. I do not know whether the Government have yet laid down a proper policy for the Armed Forces. If they have not, the blame lies with them; but if they have, it lies with the Service Departments.
For two-and-a-half years vast areas of land have been taken up for practice grounds and ranges. Some of that land, and perhaps the greater part of it, ought by now, in my view, to have come back into use for producing food. Every single acre in this country that is food producing land ought to-day to be producing food. That land is now merely producing a crop of thistles, briars, and nettles. The longer it goes on doing that, the more difficult it will be to get it back into food production. That remark applies equally to buildings on the land. Farm buildings and cottages for the workpeople, when left as part of a derelict ex-Army range, deteriorate every month and every year they are not lived in, and by 1952 those buildings will be quite uninhabitable. Then we will need more

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labour to build new cottages, and that will put back for another year the time when these farms will return to production. For those reasons I deplore giving the Service Departments another four years in which to make up their minds. I always think it a jolly good thing to follow up any decision by saying, "Come back in a fortnight's time and show me what has been done." In this case, we are saying," Come back in three and three-quarter years' time and show what has been done." That is too long. I hope that pressure will be brought on the Service Departments to see that that land is released at the earliest possible moment.
If the noble Lord had said that they wanted another year to get things straight, everybody would have considered that in the circumstances it was quite reasonable. It seems, however, that the period of four years was taken merely to make this uniform with the supply side of the requisitioning of land. I hope the noble Lord will be able to tell us that pressure is to be put on the Service Departments to make up their minds to release a great deal of this land earlier, in spite of the fact that they may be given these powers for three and three-quarter years. That is the reasonable thing to do. I hope instructions will be given by the Cabinet to the Secretary of State for War, because it is the War Office which is the biggest holder of land, although I do not entirely acquit the Air Ministry, which is retaining quite a number of airfields which could easily be turned back to the farmers.
It is not necessary to dig up the concrete runways; they can be left down. In a market garden area a runway would make an extremely good road. Many people would like to have such a road through the middle of their farms. I plead with the Government to put pressure on the Air Ministry to allow all parts surrounding the airfields not in present use to be rented and go back to food production, even if, in the event of another war, the tenants have to be turned out. I should like the House to get it impressed on the minds of the Service Departments that it is unpatriotic to keep out of cultivation a single acre of land which they are not using because they cannot make up their minds whether or not they want to use it.
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The only other thing I would like to lay stress upon is that I did not quite understand the noble Lord, Lord Chorley, when he said that we have got away from 1939 values in this Bill, because what we are doing is getting back to 1939 values plus something. We got rid of the 1939 value in the Town and Country Planning Act, but in this Bill, or, at any rate, in one part of it, we are getting back to it, though it is true we are adding "plus sixty" to it. I thought that old controversy had been amicably settled once and for ail on the Town and Country Planning Act. It is extremely loyal of the noble Earl, the Under-Secretary of State to the Ministry of Agriculture, to come and sit next his colleague, but I am sorry he was not here a moment or two ago when I was criticizing the noble Lord for asking power to occupy agricultural land for another period of four years. But if the noble Earl will look up what I have said and kindly add to the pressure I am trying to put on the Service Departments to give the land up, I shall be extremely obliged to him.
On the question of the oil pipe-line, let me say this. I think it is perfectly right for the Government permanently to take over that line. It took an immense amount of trouble to instal, and required a large amount of steel. At that time I was allocating steel, and I had to allocate it for that pipe-line. I believe it is one of those permanent measures which may well be used in peace time, and which certainly ought to be used in war time. It was a great relief to our railways, under the pressure of war, that we had not to use tank wagons but could get the oil by pumping it through under the ground. I would reinforce what my noble friend Lord Munster has said. You are putting an obligation on the owners of the land through which the pipe-line passes. That is contained in Clause 12 (6), which says:
"If without the consent of a Minister any building or structure is erected over a Government oil pipe-line or work-; accessory thereto or the site of such a line or such works, or so near thereto as to obstruct the use of the line or works or access thereto or to the site thereof, a Minister may cause the building or structure to be removed and may recover the cost of the removal from the person by whom the building or structure was erected."
I do not know whether any noble Lord has tried to trace the drains that go from his house, but I have always found it

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an extremely difficult thing to do. Even if they have been down for only a year or two, the exact course which they take is very difficult to follow. What in reason ought to be done, and can easily be done, is at any rate to give notice to the occupier. My noble friend has mentioned an Amendment which we may put down, providing that owners and occupiers should be given notice; but we are very reasonable people, and if the "and" should be changed to "or" it probably would meet the case. It may, of course, be difficult to find the owner. It seems to me that it ought to be pointed out to the occupier that the pipe-line goes through the land he is occupying. The course of it should be shown to him on a plan, so that he may put it on his estate plan, if he has one, or on the plan of his field. He will then have adequate notice that he can claim compensation. As my noble friend has said, there are few people who go and look at land registers; and very often those registers are kept quite a long way from the place where the occupier is working. We shall press the Government to ensure that these people are given notice of the exact location of the pipe-line by those who know where it runs, so that afterwards labour and material will not be wasted in erecting some barn or other building over it that eventually has to be pulled down. I think that is very reasonable. I, too, deplore the fact that we have not much latitude in regard to time for consideration of this Bill, but I can assure the noble Lord—I say this most handsomely—that if he will meet the three simple Amendments which we propose to put down, the Bill will go through in double-quick time.
5.55 p.m.
LORD CHORLEY: My Lords, I should like to express my appreciation for the comparatively cordial welcome which your Lordships have given to this measure. If I may, I will deal first with the points which have been made by the noble Lord, Lord Llewellin. I think his main anxiety—and it is certainly one which I myself feel—is that these areas, whether they are beauty spots, areas over which people take their exercise, or areas which have been taken away from agriculture, should as soon as reasonably practicable be returned to their owners. I can assure
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the noble Lord that His Majesty's Government have these matters very much in mind: indeed, it is partly because of that that this protracted period has resulted.
LORD LLEWELLIN: May I suggest that the Government get them out of mind and deal with them?
LORD CHORLEY: They have to be borne in mind in order that they may be dealt with; and the more constantly they are borne in mind the more rapidly they will be dealt with. I can assure the noble Lord and the noble Earl that it is not a question of the fear of imminent war, or anything of that kind; or, indeed, that the Government have not been working hard upon the requirements for military training and military matters generally. Obviously, the problems of making provision for military training in the conditions of modern war are quite different from those which existed before the recent war. With the test will in the world—quite apart from anything else—it would have been impossible for those responsible for military training, and for the other aspects of this business, to complete the job in two years.
As noble Lords are aware, the Departments concerned have indicated in the recent White Paper their global requirements; but those requirements have got to be broken up and the detailed work of dealing with them will obviously be very substantial. Quite apart from the possibility of doing it within the period in question, the intense interest shown by the public in the preservation of all these different areas, led, as I indicated in my opening speech, to the intervention of the Prime Minister himself and to the setting up of new machinery. This has been working well, but it must obviously take considerable time, because a careful hearing on the spot has to be taken; all sorts of interested bodies and people have to give evidence; and then reports are made. In those circumstances, clearly it would be impossible to get this thing done in the short period which has been available—and it has, after all, been a comparatively short period.
Moreover, the labour situation has become even more difficult during this period. A great deal of this land has been retained, as your Lordships are aware, in order that the problem of clear-

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ing up may be more effectively dealt with. From the landowner's point of view, if much of this land were returned to him, it would be impossible for him in the present situation to take effective steps to rehabilitate it. The Government's object was that the rehabilitation should be carried out, and the Government are in a better position to carry it out than the landowner. The labour position has grown worse and worse, and that is another reason why, in the cases of the smaller areas, where it is a question of rehabilitating the land, it has not been possible to get the job finished.
From the point of view of agriculture, if the noble Lord, Lord Llewellin, will look at Clause 2 of the Bill he will find a provision, the whole object of which is to enable those lands which have been cut up by airfield runways to be acquired for the purpose of dealing with them more efficiently as agricultural units.
The noble Lord, Lord Llewellin, then dealt with this question of the 1939 values. It is quite true that in respect of the rental compensation we are tacking a percentage on to the 1939 value, but in regard to the terminal compensation we have been able to get away from 1939 altogether. Of course, 60 per cent. on to 1939 is a substantial advance on the position as established by the Act of 1945. The noble Earl, Lord Minister, asked: "Why cannot it be dealt with in the same way as it is dealt with under the Town and Country Planning Act?" I think if he would consider the matter in a little more detail, he would see that the two cases are not in any way on a par. What we are dealing with under the Town and Country Planning Act is the capital value of the land, and not the rental value. In that Act we assumed a notional lease which would not be a practicable method of dealing with rental compensation of this kind. Moreover, very many of these requisitioned properties are parts of buildings, single floors or something of that kind. I do suggest that the method used in the Town and Country Planning Act would be quite incapable of application in this sort of case.
Both the noble Earl and the noble Lord said: "What sort of guarantee have we that if we grant this extra period of four years it will not just be frittered away, and that in 1952 the situation will not be just as bad as now?" A great deal of progress has been made. Much the largest
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proportion of the lands which were requisitioned have, in fact, already been returned, and derequisitioning is going on the whole time. The Service Departments are under constant pressure, and I think they are only too anxious to get this problem effectively dealt with, because they want to know where they are for the purposes of their own training programmes; they want to make their own arrangements. Noble Lords may be quire satisfied that this matter will be continually under review and that every pressure will be brought to bear upon the Departments to see that the necessary arrangements are carried out as promptly as possible.
Viscount BRIDGEMAN: May I interrupt the noble Lord? Surely this was not a question only of bringing pressure to bear, but of letting the Service Departments know what their commitments are to be in the future. The reason that the land is retained is not out of malice or ill-will, but simply because they have not yet been told what their commitments are to be. Until they know that they do not know what land they can spare and what land they must retain.
LORD CHORLEY: I cannot accept the noble Viscount's view of the matter. According to my information the Departments in question have, to a very large extent, worked out their training programmes.
Viscount BRIDGEMAN: I apologize for interrupting once more. I never suggested that the Departments in question had not worked out their programmes. I suggested that those programmes had not been finally accepted or approved.
LORD CHORLEY: The difficulty about the final acceptance and approval of the programmes is that one element in them is the question of this land being available, which involves the consideration of all these important tracts of land—Dartmoor and the other places—where local inquiries have in fact been held over the last few months.
May I now pass to the question of highways? It is perfectly true, of course, that the provisions in the Bill before your Lordships depart from the undertaking of the Home Secretary in another place in 1945. It was then hoped that

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it would be possible to bring this matter of stopping up highways to an end; but obviously there are two matters here which made it impossible to leave the situation as it was. In the first place, it has been found that quite a number of highways have been diverted or stopped up, and at the time it was not realized by the people who stopped them up that they were highways. Therefore, the arrangements which were provided for under the 1945 Act could not be put into operation. The Bill is necessary, therefore, for a case where there is a highway going across a field upon which a factory or some other building has been erected, but where it was not realized at the time there was in fact a highway, and where the provisions of the Act could not be complied with. Obviously it would be absurd to extend until 1952 the period for remaining in possession of the land, and not to give the powers in respect of the footpaths until the same period. I am sure that the noble Earl will realize, if he looks at it in the light of those considerations, that the proposals in the Bill relating to highways are perfectly reasonable.
LORD LLEWELLIN: May I interrupt the noble Lord? Is it not a fact that once these powers are used in regard to a footpath it is extinguished for ever?
LORD CHORLEY: Of course that is so. Like any other footpath which is stopped up, whether it is stopped up by Quarter Sessions, or whether it is stopped up under the provisions of this Bill, it is, of course, clearly stopped up; if it is to become a footpath again it must be re-dedicated. That is an answer to a question put to me by the noble Earl. The noble Earl is aware that a departmental Committee has dealt with the whole question of footpaths in the country, but that is a matter which is rather apart from the purposes of this particular Bill. The noble Earl raised questions on both aspects of the compensation and indicated that he was intending to move Amendments with regard to both those matters on the Committee stage. In those circumstances, I think it will probably be more convenient if we discuss these matters in detail when that stage is reached; similarly in regard to the oil pipe-fine, about which the noble Earl was
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so anxious—and properly anxious—that the owners of the land across which this pipe-line goes should be made aware of their responsibilities under the Bill. I doubt at a first sight whether the particular method which he suggested for dealing with the problem was the best possible one, or indeed a practical one, but obviously we shall have an opportunity of looking at that more in detail when the Amendment is put down.
The Earl of MUNSTER: I never made any proposition except broadly that the Government should see that these people were advised that the pipe-line runs across their land. If the noble Lord has any other suggestion, I shall be only too delighted to listen to it.
LORD CHORLEY: Possibly I misunderstood the noble Earl. I thought he was suggesting that at the time of registration there should be some compulsory notification from the Registry to the owners. It was that which at first sight struck me as being possibly impracticable. I would not like to give any categorical answer at the present time, but I can assure the noble Earl that the Ministry of Works are already aware of almost all of these owners, and in many cases, where they are aware of the owners, have already taken steps to bring the position to their notice. Indeed, negotiations have been going on with the vast majority of them. It is a separate negotiation in each case. It leads to very protracted delays, and involves an enormous amount of work at a time when solicitors and members of the legal profession are very much overworked. Therefore the Bill seeks to avoid these individual transactions in connexion with each small plot of land across which the pipe-line goes. I suggest that this matter can be gone into more effectively during the Committee stage. In these circumstances I hope that your Lordships will now give the Bill a Second Reading.
On Question, Bill read 2a and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

SALFORD CORPORATION BILL. [H.L.]
Report from His Majesty's Attorney-General: Received and ordered to lie on the Table.