§ 3.32 p.m.
§ THE PARLIAMENTARY UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE COLONIES (THE EARL OF MUNSTER)My Lords, will your Lordships pardon me if I intervene at this moment in order to make a statement on Government policy towards the Colonial Development and Welfare Acts? My right honourable friend the Colonial Secretary is asking Colonial Governments and other authorities concerned to provide him with material on which Her Majesty's Government can approach Parliament for further funds for Colonial development. He hopes it will be possible to introduce the necessary legislation early in the 1954–55 Session. Meanwhile, he is telling Colonial Governments that they may proceed on the assumption that the period in which the £140 million sterling provided under the Colonial Development and Welfare Acts of 1945 and 1950 may be spent will be extended by legislation beyond the period to March 31, 1956. He is also telling them that, where necessary for essential development, they may enter into commitments extending beyond 1956 and over and above the £140 million already provided, on the understanding that Her Majesty's Government will in due course ask Parliament to vote the 1211 necessary moneys. Such advance commitments will be limited to a total of £7 million and will not be made without the concurrence of the Treasury.
There is a further matter of which I should like to inform the House. Because of the serious world rice shortage, Her Majesty's Government have thought it necessary to make funds available to a maximum of £3 million for promoting the production of rice in the Colonies. Expenditure on such schemes is proper to the existing Colonial Development and Welfare Acts, but we do not wish it to displace desirable developments in other directions. These special schemes for growing rice may, therefore, in due course, involve allocations and ultimately expenditure in excess of the existing statutory limit of £140 million. The legislation to which I have referred will also, if necessary, provide cover for expenditure up to £3 million which may be incurred under these arrangements.
I should make it clear that there is no question of authorising in advance of the new legislation actual expenditure in excess of the existing statutory limits. But the House should be aware that Colonial Governments may in the interim be entering into commitments, to the extent to which I have indicated, on the understanding that the necessary funds to meet these commitments will be provided by Her Majesty's Government under the new legislation. My right honourable friend can see no other way of ensuring that the continuity of Colonial development is not interrupted, and he feels confident that he will have the full support of your Lordships' House in the action he is taking. I should like the House to be reminded also that the expenditure of Colonial development and welfare funds also opens up further fields for private investment.
§ 3.37 p.m.
§ VISCOUNT HALLMy Lords, on behalf of my noble friends on this side of the House, I should like to thank the noble Earl for making that statement, a statement which we welcome, as we do the proposal for the introduction of legislation for a continuation of the Fund next year. I should like to ask the noble Earl whether he can give your Lordships some information as to the amount of expenditure which has already 1212 been incurred out of the £140 million; also the amount which has been approved and any surplus that there may be at the expiration of the existing legislation. Can he give us some information as to what proportion, if any, of the £7 million to which he has referred in his statement will be used for the purpose of research?
§ THE EARL OF MUNSTERMy Lords, may I tell the House, in as brief a period as I can, that of the original sum of £140 million which was allocated under the Acts up to the year 1956 some £71 million has been spent up to date. Schemes have been approved for the expenditure of £110 million, and a sum of about £30 million has been earmarked for additional schemes which have not yet been wholly approved. The noble Viscount will see that the rate of expenditure has been £15 million a year, and it might conceivably rise within the very near future, including this and other years up to the end of 1956, to a figure of about £18 million a year. At the end of the period—that is to say, when the existing Act expires in about 1956—it is estimated that at that rate of expenditure some £4 million odd might be left as surplus, but I should not like the noble Viscount to tie me to that figure. It may well be that between now and the expiration of the Act the total sum may be, not spent on, but approved for, schemes which it is intended to bring into operation.
§ VISCOUNT HALLI am grateful to the noble Earl for that information. I wonder whether he could give some estimate as to the expenditure of the Colonies themselves on objects for which the Fund was provided? He may not have that information and, if not, perhaps he could let me have it in correspondence.
§ THE EARL OF MUNSTERI have the figures, which again I would ask the noble Viscount not to tie me down to firmly; they are the nearest figures which I think will be appropriate in reply to the question which the noble Viscount has addressed to me. We have estimated that the total Colonial development and welfare plan amounted to a sum of about £470 million. Of that figure the Colonial Development and Welfare Funds have provided about £100 million; loans on 1213 the market—that is, the open market—amount to the figure of £160 million, and the territories themselves have provided a figure of some £220 million. It is true that the debits and credits there do not actually balance, but those are the figures which I think as nearly as possible answer the query which the noble Viscount has addressed to me.
§ VISCOUNT HALLI am much obliged.