TELEVISION BILL

HL Deb 22 July 1954 vol 188 cc1332-55

2.40 p.m.

Order of the Day for the Third Reading read.

THE POSTMASTER GENERAL (EARL DE LA WARR)

My Lords, after the noble and learned Earl's remarks I can promise that I shall make my speech with my eye firmly on the clock. Before I say anything in general, there are just two points that I was asked on Report stage specifically to deal with. Perhaps your Lordships will allow me to plunge into them straight away. The first was on the question of recording of programmes. I have been into this matter and I find that a programme of a complete film would cost something of the order of £1 to £3 a minute—those are the figures given me by the B.B.C. I have found also that the B.B.C. keep records of their news, talks and discussions—items which I imagine are the most likely to arouse controversy afterwards. This, I think, would be the normal practice of anyone undertaking broadcasting. It is a comparatively simple process and the I.T.A. could, of course, do it quite easily. I will definitely and firmly undertake to the House to draw the attention of the Authority to this matter, so that they will ensure that records are kept, and kept for a reasonable time afterwards—say, three or six months.

The other point was one raised by the noble Lord, Lord Lucas of Chilworth, in regard to "give away" programmes. The noble Lord said that he could not be here to-day, but that he would leave the matter in my hands to be dealt with. I have been into the question most thoroughly and have again looked at the Bill, and I have come to the conclusion that it is not necessary to do anything. I say that for several reasons. In the first place, advertisements are subject to an advertising advisory committee, the setting up of which is mandatory, working under the Authority itself. But behind the Authority lie the powers of the Postmaster General (they appear in subsection (5) of Clause 4) to control every type and class of advertisements. I can myself deal with the matter under those powers. The Postmaster General, of course, is responsible to Parliament, and therefore if the Minister does not satisfactorily operate these powers, Parliament can challenge him.

2.43 p.m.

VISCOUNT ALEXANDER OF HILLSBOROUGH

My Lords, I should like to say a word on that. As the Postmaster General is aware, I was very interested in this matter, more particularly so because of the remarks that were made the other day. I understand that there is no actual ruling in the Bill which is soon to be put on the Statute Book, but I should like to put on record our view with regard to the co-operative societies, which were mentioned, I think, by the noble Viscount, Lord Swinton. Our view is that the fact that co-operative societies distribute dividends to their owner-member shareholders could not possibly be interpreted as meaning that there would be a gift passing. That is their method of distributing their general profits. We should object very strongly should any subsequent Postmaster General take the line that these dividends are a gift. It was not a line taken definitely by the noble Viscount, Lord Swinton; it was merely suggested to the House as an example of what might be.

EARL DE LA WARR

That is a rather difficult legal point. I think, on further reference, that the noble Viscount is quite right; the noble Viscount, Lord Swinton, only threw it out as an example in debate.

We have now reached the last stage of a very long controversy. The main difficulty we have all had (certainly the difficulty I, on behalf of the Government, have felt) is the strength, depth and sincerity of feeling shown on both sides of your Lordships' House. I believe that noble Lords on all sides will admit that from the very beginning of this controversy the Government have tried hard to recognise the complete sincerity of their opponents and their strength of feeling. We have sometimes been a little sad about what we have felt to be the arrogance and sense of superiority shown on the part of some noble Lords opposing the Bill; but we have never doubted their sincerity. I believe, too, that by the end of these discussions our opponents had just begun to get perhaps a slight feeling that we had some sincerity on our side. If only because of the strength and depth of feeling shown in this controversy, I should like at this last stage to say that I do not regret any single point by which we have tried to meet our opponents' views. I have long felt, and have frequently said in your Lordships' House, that, on a subject of this character, even if we could not reach agreement, we could at least respect each others' views. I will frankly admit that many of the suggestions or criticisms which have come from our opponents have resulted in Amendments, either made by ourselves voluntarily or put forward in one of the Houses of Parliament by the Opposition, which have improved the Bill.

There has been one clear principle on which we could not compromise. We said from the beginning that there must be an alternative programme, and with that view many noble Lords opposite have been prepared to agree. Where we have gone further is in saying that the alternative programme or programmes must be produced by a totally different type of mind from that which we have in the present system; and therefore we should not be satisfied with merely a second B.B.C. We have firmly intended that these programmes should be produced by private enterprise. For that reason we have been unable to accept a great number of Amendments which would have resulted in making the I.T.A. responsible for the main bulk of the programmes. Subject to this principle, we have tried to meet every reasonable fear—including fears that we do not ourselves feel, because we believe in the dignity and traditions of British trade and commerce, and those who run it. As the result of all these discussions we have, I believe, arrived at an extraordinarily sound scheme.

If I may refer to a now departed subsection in the Bill, it is a scheme essentially British in "tone and style." We have provided for competition, subject to certain safeguards. Those safeguards have two essential characteristics: they are strong and effective for dealing with offenders, and they are to be kept in the background, so that they may not hamper those who are doing a good job. I believe that one characteristic is as important as the other. But behind those statutory safeguards in the Bill there lie two others at least as important, if not more so: the essential decency of those engaged in British commerce and the essential decency of the British people who will look at the programmes.

All noble Lords on this side of the House will join with me in saying that the Opposition, on all sides, have fought this Bill hard, but they have always been fair; and in spite of all the Amendments which were put down, we on this side certainly do not want to accuse anyone of obstruction. Many of the Amendments put down we were able to accept, not only because we were anxious to meet opposing points of view but because we felt the Amendments to be quite genuine improvements. This Bill will now go back to another place, not, I am afraid, with the agreement of your Lordships' House, but, I believe, improved by the joint wisdom of noble Lords in this House.

Moved, That the Bill be now read 3^a.—(Earl De La Warr.)

2.50 p.m.

VISCOUNT HAILSHAM

My Lords, the noble Earl the Postmaster General is always so personally agreeable in his approach to controversy that I think those of us who oppose this Bill in principle would be glad, if we followed our own inclinations, to smash a bottle or even a Rehoboam of champagne upon the bows of this singularly unseaworthy and ill-constructed vessel as it proceeds on its melancholy way down the Parliamentary slips towards the inscrutable ocean of political history. I was particularly glad that the Postmaster General said that he recognised the sincerity of those who oppose this Bill, because if he at times felt inclined to accuse us of superiority and arrogance, I will confess to him frankly that there have been times when I have suspected that the Government were prepared to tolerate criticism only on condition that it was ineffective, and to encourage opposition only so long as it had no influence whatever on policy; and there have even been moments of time when, in my sadness, I have reflected that the occupants of the Front Bench have thought, and indeed often said, that even such qualities as sincerity and honesty of purpose are to be considered at a discount unless expression of them was bowdlerised and censored in order not to offend the susceptibilities of the majority, which I think occupants of the Front Bench are a little too apt to identify with the interests of this House or even of Parliamentary Government itself.

I must say that no man of honour, although he may be very reluctant to attack persons, will ever submit to the tone or quality of his censures on policy being dictated to him by the leader of the majority, however eminent or however respected. And I must say frankly that I have thought from time to time that the majority have been a little intolerant of the views of the minority in this matter, especially having regard to the invincible character of the Conservative Two-Line Whip which, if nothing else, has been demonstrated during the course of the passage of this Bill. I have, as I have been reminded, been a member of your Lordships' House for only some four years, but I think I can honestly say that since my father took office in Mr. Bonar Law's Administration in 1922 I have followed in record almost every major Parliamentary occasion in either House of Parliament. I must say that I can recall no occasion whatever in your Lordships' House during that period of time in which a major Bill proposed by a Conservative Government has met with such a chorus of opposition from quarters normally either independent or friendly to the Conservative cause, stretching from the most reverend Primate to noble Lords of unrivalled experience in public service on all sides of the House.

I must say that I should have thought that if ever there was a Bill which deserved attention from the delaying power of this Second Chamber it was the present measure. Unfortunately, as the noble Viscount, Lord Samuel, pointed out during the Second Reading debate, in the face of the Conservative Two-Line Whip there is no such thing as the delaying power under the British Constitution as it is at present composed, so we have been unable to discharge that part of our constitutional function. The Bill is essentially one which offends against principle. I beg your Lordships to believe that in the several years now that I have been a fairly consistent broadcaster I started with no particular prejudice in favour of the B.B.C. Certainly it was not until I had been broadcasting for some eight years that I found that I had any definite or firm views upon this subject. But shortly after the publication of the Beveridge Committee's Report, I found that I had come to conclusions rather similar.

In the first place, it has never been demonstrated in the course of these proceedings that there is any valid reason for differentiating television from sound broadcasting, and the Bill infringes that principle. In the second place, it has been demonstrated, and expressly accepted by the Postmaster General, that over thirty years of sound broadcasting the principle of British broadcasting, which has been based upon the exclusive public service, as a principle, has been triumphantly vindicated. I cannot but think that the Bill infringes that principle. The contrary principle of commercial broadcasting in America has not been such a triumphant success, though I know that some noble Lords, flattering the national vanity, would have us believe that that was because the Americans have a double dose of original sin whereas we are happily exempt from it. Personally, I think it is due principally to the organisation of their broadcasting services—I being, like the Prime Minister, a man with an American mother.

Nor have I seen any evidence at all that any advantage is to be gained from erecting the two principles side by side, as they have done for quite a long time now in Australia and Canada and indeed as is now proposed to be done here. I do not believe that the empirical success of British broadcasting was an accident. On the contrary, I think there were important theoretical reasons why it should be so, reasons based not on preconceptions of political ideology but on the technical nature of broadcasting which differentiates it from many other vehicles for the communication of ideas, with which, superficially, one might be inclined to draw some analogy. Lastly, I must say that I am unalterably of the belief that in broadcasting in a free country there are two equal evils to be avoided. The first is Government control which offends against the principle of freedom; the other is the tyranny of commercialism, by which in relation to broadcasting an editor of a broadcast programme unlike the editor of a newspaper, even though the editor of a newspaper may derive a great portion of his revenue from advertisements, is compelled to study not the real desire of his viewers but how to achieve the highest common factor of what those viewers will tolerate at a moment of time when the advertisements come on the air.

It is true, and I think it would be unfair not to concede, that the Government have made a number of important concessions on Report, if not in Committee. I was very glad to see the end of the barbarous and philistine sub-paragraph (a) about British tone and style. I should have been very glad to see the end of the clause imposing secret justice by arbitration, for which no valid reason was ever advanced in the course of these debates, at least in public, except the spurious arid wholly inaccurate argument that those who desired to resort to the courts in some way wanted the Authority to be its own judge.

But the concessions made have been made as the result of fruitful conversations in private, and even there—and this is almost my last sentence—I think there is a case for a grievance. I do not in the least reproach my noble friends opposite for having indulged in these discussions, which were most fruitful, and, may I say in passing that I owe a great deal to noble Lords opposite for their personal kindness to me in the course of our debates. But discussions in private are not a substitution for Parliamentary debate. Discussions in private are, in fact, legislation in camera, using the House as a forum for registering decisions privately arrived at. I do not regard that as a satisfactory general principle. Most of the Amendments which were granted had been on the Order Paper for some time and could have been granted as a result of public debate in the House. Private discussions inevitably place too much power in the hands of the Front Benches and remove authority from private Members, already sadly diminished in both Houses of Parliament. They also tend to rely upon the rigid framework of Party government, so that those who happen to be not of the official Opposition but still in opposition to a Parliamentary measure are wholly unrepresented in discussions of this kind.

For these reasons I feel convinced, not less now than at the beginning of this controversy, that the Government have done a disservice to British radio in introducing this Bill. I believe they have undermined both its integrity and its efficiency. I believe they have done a disservice to parliamentary government, and I believe they have to a great extent done a disservice to bicameral government, a feature of our national life which, though ancient, is not so universally beloved that it can afford to receive injuries at the hands of its friends. I must say (and this is really the end of what I have to say) that when two years ago the Government first introduced this policy, I knew that for my own part I had a most thankless and unprofitable task in front of me and that it would be the more thankless and the more unprofitable because it involved an unqualified condemnation of the policy proposed by those whom I would normally regard as my political friends. But I did not realise quite how thankless or how unprofitable it would prove as I did it. Nevertheless there is one treason to parliamentary government which no adherent of it would willingly commit, and that is to withdraw or modify the terms of his censure either because of reluctance to face the consequences to himself or for fear of causing resentment amongst those whom he would prefer to think of as his friends. For this reason, therefore, though I am grateful to the Postmaster General for the manner in which he has proposed the Third Reading of the Bill, I am afraid he must forgive me if my opinion on the merits of the proposal is as adverse as ever.

3.3 p.m.

VISCOUNT WAVERLEY

My Lords, I am grateful for the opportunity of saying a few words before we finally part with this Bill. I have noticed that in a leaflet circulated a short time ago by an organisation with which I believe some noble Lords are associated, the defeat of the opposition on the Second Reading of this Bill was hailed as a resounding victory over the champions of monopoly. Now, whoever wrote that must have known perfectly well that it was a complete and most unscrupulous misrepresentation. From the very beginning we who have opposed this Bill, not all on the same grounds but in general, have made it perfectly clear that we accepted the case for some effective competition with the B.B.C. Since the earliest stages of the debate there has been left no room for doubt as to our attitude on that point.

I think there has been some misunderstanding—perhaps some slight misrepresentation, but some genuine misunderstanding—as to our basic attitude towards advertisement. Some of us have tried time after time to be reassuring on that point, but I fancy that even my noble friend Lord Bennett of Edgbaston, who is not in his place to-day, was not entirely consoled by what we had to say. In the speech to which we have just listened, the noble Earl the Postmaster General referred to the dignity and traditions of British trade and commerce. The dignity and traditions of British trade and commerce have not suffered any stigma or any smear as the result of anything we have said. I feel justified, however, in reminding your Lordships that it is now many years since advertisers were free to exercise their talents at their own sweet will. It is many years since the first Advertisement Regulation Act was passed. I remember that I was at the Home Office at the time.

I have occasion, from time to time, to go up and down the River Thames. I am not going to say anything about the "inscrutable ocean" or even anything about "Sweet Thames," but one thing that has impressed me is that throughout the length and breadth of the Thames, with all the interesting, historic and inspiring scenes on which we can feast our eyes, there is not to be seen one single advertisement. From Teddington to the Nore, you will not see one single advertisement—but what an opportunity if the advertisers were free to do as they liked! Is the home to be given a lower standard of protection than the River Thames? Are advertisements to be introduced into the privacy of the home with the freedom that this Bill clearly contemplates? I had hoped that it would not be so. Many of us are honestly, seriously concerned about the ultimate consequences of associating advertisement with the use of this immensely powerful new instrument of television.

In the main, I think, we have been willing from the beginning to accept the strong case, moderately argued and argued with conviction, against our views, for establishing a system of television deriving some revenue from advertisements. When I urged that the new Television Authority should be given some substantial source of income independent of advertisements, I had hoped that that might be a means of enabling Her Majesty's Government to make a modest beginning with this plan. In that hope I have been completely disappointed. We are going to have from the beginning a system which is 100 per cent. based on advertisements, and I am bound to say, as I said before, that I think that is quite deplorable. I had thought that it would have been perfectly possible to arrive at some modus vivendi, at some agreement with the Government, which, although it was not wholly acceptable to the opposition and, of course, as a compromise not wholly acceptable to the Government, would have allowed those who are convinced, and I am sure honestly convinced that we are treading the right and wise path in this experiment—and it is an experiment, say what you like, because we are at the very beginning in this matter and have a great deal still to learn—to establish their case on a basis of actual experience, which at the present time, so far as this country at any rate is concerned, is entirely lacking. That hope has been disappointed. I regret it greatly on public grounds. I believe that, as time goes on, more and more of us will have cause to regret it.

In conclusion, I can say only this: that while I recognise, as do also my noble friends, that the Government have sought to meet the arguments of their opponents in a variety of respects and that a number of improvements have been made in the Bill—it would be churlish not to recognise that—I hope that, in bringing this new plan into operation, the Government will take every care to see that they do nothing which would make it unduly difficult to introduce changes if experience should show, as I believe it will, that changes are urgently required.

3.10 p.m.

EARL JOWITT

My Lords, I have very little to say. I should like to thank all those who have assisted us in our deliberations. I should like to thank, particularly, the noble Viscount, Lord Hailsham. It is not an easy thing to stand up and express your views when almost the whole of your Party are against you; it requires courage, and I should think, that in politics, courage is one of the rarest qualities there are. I am grateful to the noble Viscount for the undoubted assistance that he gave us on this Bill.

I want to say quite definitely, and with deep sincerity—and I am not for a moment questioning the sincerity of those who differ from me—that this is a sad occasion. I believed that we had got here in television a new powerful force which might have a profound influence over the character and well-being of this country; I believed that it might have done an immense amount for the children, and much to do away with the solitude of the countryside; and it might have been a great force for good. All those ideals seem to me now to have been made subservient to the idea of selling cigarettes, or drink, or what you will. I feel bound to say—and I say it with all sincerity—that I think it is an absolutely deplorable decision that Her Majesty's Government have taken.

I want to say one other thing about this Bill. I feel that the circumstances in which this Bill has been brought before this House have been such as to make it impossible for this House to do its work efficiently. If I were to have a dictator, there is no dictator I would rather choose than the noble Marquess who sits opposite, because he is a most tolerant and reasonable man; and I am sure that the iron hand would be covered over with several layers of velvet glove, until he almost made you feel that you liked being dictated to. But what are the circumstances in regard to this Bill, apart from the Parliamentary discussions we have had here? Here is a Bill the subject matter of which was not mentioned in the programme of any Party. It is a Bill which excites considerable opposition. It was exposed to the guillotine in the other House but, in spite of that, I think I am right in saying that they spent nine days in Committee on it. It was in those circumstances that the Bill came to this House. If ever there was a Bill, therefore, which this House, if it is to be an efficient Second revising Chamber—and that is the test—ought to have had ample time to consider, this is that Bill. What are the circumstances? We had our First Reading of the Bill on June 23; we had the Second Reading debate on June 30 and July 1; we then went into Committee stage on July 12, 13 and 14. We had three days in Committee, sitting at hours which aye unusually late for this House, because we are specially blessed in that way. Then, six days later, we had the Report stage; and to-day, two days later, we are having the Third Reading.

I know that the noble Marquess, Lord Salisbury, would say to me—and he would say it perfectly truly—that when the Labour Government were in power they were faced with this dilemma, just as Her Majesty's Government are now: that Bills come up from the other place at the late end of the Session, and, however sorry the Government may be, they have got to be got through. But there was no earthly reason, in my submission to your Lordships, why this Bill should have been rushed through in this way. There was no earthly reason why it should not have gone over, as the Town and Country Planning Bill has gone over, and been dealt with when we return after the Recess. We should then have had proper time within which to deal with it. I know the difficulties of the noble Marquess, and I say, quite frankly, that given that essential, that the programme has got to be got through, then he has done all that he can to meet us, as he always does. But it is the postulate that the Bill must be got through by the end of July that, to my mind, is so intolerable. We have all done our best to see that the time was properly allocated. We had down 100 Amendments. Each Division takes a quarter of an hour, and if we bad wanted to strike, by Divisions alone we could have spent twenty-five hours. The noble Earl, the Postmaster General, has been good enough to realise that we have not tried to do that; we never do; there is no point in trying to obstruct in this House, and I hope that we never shall.

I want to make this further comment —not so much about this present Bill, but about your Lordships' House. When my Party were in office, and in this House had a great majority against us, in order to get our Bills through we had to conciliate and give way wherever we could; and so long as we maintained the essential structure of our Bills, that was the most we could hope for. In those circumstances, I have said—and I believe it to be true—that this House worked extraordinarily well as a Revising Chamber and a watchdog, and was a valuable piece of the Constitution. I am bound to say —I say it with regret, and after consideration—that in the very different circum- stances of to-day, where there is a vast majority which can be summoned against us, and where every Amendment we move can easily be voted down, whatever the arguments may be in its favour, I do not believe that this House is an efficient Revising Chamber. I regret to say that, but I think it ought to be said.

I feel rather like a certain cricket team that went out to a foreign land and came to the opinion (rightly or wrongly) that the decisions of the umpires were not fair; and in those circumstances an unfortunate situation developed. I certainly do not think that your Lordships' decisions are unfair, because they are decisions to which you honestly come; but I would ask your Lordships for a moment to consider the position from the point of view of the Opposition. "What is the good," I asked myself, during the course of this Bill, "of what we are doing? What is the point of it? Why are we sitting up relatively late at night when we know that, however good our arguments are, and however strong our case may be, we can be quite easily voted down?" How can this House, in those circumstances, be an effective Revising Chamber? I do not think there is any doubt that those are considerations which we have got to look at at the present time. I think the corollary from that follows. When we move an Amendment in this House, although, as I said the other day, I am not so foolish as to imagine that there is any duty on the Government to accept that Amendment, nevertheless, I do say that in those circumstances, with the vast weight on the one side as opposed to ours, there is an obligation on the Government to see that our Amendments are properly met and countered by argument. I cannot feel that that has always been done.

The objections, for instance, to the very title of the new body, the Independent Television Authority, are obvious; and everybody knows them. I suggested all sorts of other adjectives which would, I thought, have been better; but they were all turned down. I do not mind their being turned down, but what I do mind is to find, on reading through the Report of these debates, that throughout the whole discussions no reason whatever was given for turning them down. That, I think, is hard. I give one other illustration. I suggested that there should be a right to recover the penalty provided for breach of contracts, not necessarily by arbitration but by going to the courts, which is surely a sensible point of view. I am told, in a blustering kind of manner, that I ought to be ashamed of myself for making such a suggestion as an ex-Lord Chancellor. It is just left in this way, in my mind: that I do not understand what the answer to the argument is. Unless we have simple answers to our arguments, then I do not think, in those circumstances, that this House is going to be at all an efficient Revising Chamber.

Let me add this. We did the best we could to recover what we could from the wreck. We met the Postmaster General and some of his colleagues and, as always when we meet outside this House, they met us with extreme courtesy and, I believe, gave us what they could. I am very grateful to them, and I still think that that sort of discussion, which started in the old days, should be continued to-day. I hope that I have not said anything which shows any acerbity. If there was any acerbity, any harshness—and I am afraid that I was guilty of it once or twice—it is a fact that we were sitting rather long hours and working under obvious pressure of time. I am perfectly certain that the noble Marquess was himself sorry that we had to work under those considerable limitations. I quite realise that he has got to get the Bill through, and when it comes up as late in the Session as this it was necessary to sit late. I have thought it right to say what I have said. This Bill will soon be passed. I have nothing more to say about it. I hope that my worst fears will not prove to be true. I hope that this scheme is not going to let down the whole standard of televising. We have done our best to make our point of view felt, and I am very grateful to your Lordships who have listened to me so long throughout these debates. I hope that in making these observations I have not drawn interminably upon the draughts of your kindness.

3.22 p.m.

EARL WINTERTON

My Lords, I wish to trespass upon your Lordships' time for only five minutes, and my reason for doing so is that it is difficult to have spent fifty years in public life, most of it in another place, and to listen to such speeches as we have just listened and with which one is in such fundamental disagreement, without expressing one's opinion, I hope in a manner which will cause offence to nobody. I must take up two points which the noble and learned Earl, Lord Jowitt, has just made. He complained, in the manner in which the Opposition always complain, and as they have a perfect right to do, about what he regarded as the paucity of time or the attempt to compress into a shorter period than is desirable the consideration of this Bill. That, if I may say so—and I do not say it in any offensive manner—is the ordinary complaint of every Opposition.

He then dealt with a much more serious matter which does not arise on this Bill, but to which the noble and learned Earl was perfectly entitled to call attention—that is, what one may call the one-sided nature of your Lordships' House. I know that the noble and learned Earl, who is an old personal friend of mine in private, though a political opponent, will not resent my saying that not only is that a matter which cannot be discussed properly on this occasion, but that the responsibility for it does not rest wholly with the Conservative Party. Over forty years ago Mr. Asquith, the Leader of a Party of which the noble and learned Earl was himself then a member, said that the question of the reform of your Lordships' House "brooked no delay." Personally speaking, I should have a good deal of sympathy with the point of view which has been put from the Benches opposite, that for the purpose of doing its due work as a Second Chamber in this country this House is one-sided in its political views. But the way to deal with that is by the reform of the constitution of your Lordships' House. I think it would be very dangerous to say—as I understood the noble and learned Earl to say—that because the members of the Labour Party and the Liberal Party are in a minority, therefore it should be necessary for the Government to accept Amendments in order to show that they are fair-minded.

EARL JOWITT

I was most careful not to say anything of the sort. Indeed, I said in express terms that the Government are, of course, not obliged to accept Amendments. What they are obliged to do is to meet the Amendments by arguments, and explain why they do not accept them.

EARL WINTERTON

I quite agree. I am sure the noble and learned Earl will not resent my saying so, because he and I have spent our life in politics both in another place and in this House, but that is the old argument—that the Government produce no reasons for resisting an Amendment or supporting an Amendment; they rely merely upon their majority. I have heard that said dozens of times in another place, and I hope the noble and learned Earl will not mind my saying that that argument does not make a great impression on my mind.

The only other thing I have to say is in reference to what was said by my noble friend Lord Waverley. I deeply regret that my noble friend should be on the other side, because I hope he will not think it effusive of me to say that every one of us on this side has the greatest regard for my noble friend's views on most questions—as, I am sure, have the Government. But my noble friend suggested a most extraordinary argument. I took down his words, I hope correctly. After referring to the fact that there were no advertisements on the banks of the Thames—a fact which may or may not be a good thing—he said: "Is the home to be given less security than the Thames?" Is there anything wrong in the coming of advertisements into the home? They come in every day in the newspapers, and it seems to me to be indicative, I will not say of the reactionary view, because that would be offensive, but of the old-fashioned view which the opponents of this Bill have, that they should think that there is something inherently wrong in advertisements. I am particularly astonished to hear this argument from someone who himself has done so much for British trade and industry.

LORD WAVERLEY

My Lords, I am sorry indeed to interrupt my noble friend, and he is most courteous in giving way, but I expressly disclaimed any thought of attaching any stigma or smear to advertisers. The tenor of my argument was simply this. Parliament has thought fit to place some restraint upon advertising in other spheres—and I instanced the case of the Advertisement Regulations Act, and the effect that that Act and other similar regulations had had on the aspect of the River Thames. I wanted to ask this simple question: Is the home to be subjected to having advertisements injected into its privacy, at any time of the day or night, at the sweet will of the advertiser?

EARL WINTERTON

I did not suggest that my noble friend said there was any stigma. I do not want to enter into an argument with him, but I do not see how he is going to keep advertisements out of the home unless he cuts all the advertisements out of every newspaper. I do not myself see a great difference between advertisements in newspapers and advertisements on television. There may be a difference, but I do not know what it is.

LORD MATHERS

The difference is that impressionable children do not read the advertisements in the newspapers.

VISCOUNT HUDSON

Nonsense!

EARL WINTERTON

My noble friend used an expression which I would not dream of using—"Nonsense!" I should like to assure the noble Lord, Lord Mathers, that I cannot regard his as a very valid argument, because I think they do read the dvertisements—I have seen them read them. But I do not wish to pursue that subject. When my noble friend, Lord Waverley, quite properly interrupted me, he said that he was not opposed to advertisements. I hoped he would not be, because I should have thought that any industrialist among your Lordships would agree that the one thing we in this country need is more advertisement of British goods. We need to advertise our goods throughout the world, and I myself see nothing wrong in advertisements.

We all admit the courage of my noble friend Lord Hailsham. The noble and learned Earl, Lord Jowitt, said that courage was a rare quality among politicians or in politics. I think that is rather an excessive statement. I know many politicians who are extremely courageous and many who are cowardly, but, on the whole, I think the courage shown by British politicians is considerably greater than that shown by politicians of some other countries. My noble friend Lord Hailsham—perhaps I do him an injustice; perhaps I did not listen sufficiently carefully—seemed to give the impression that there was some attempt on the part of the Government and the supporters of the Bill to suppress the views of those who oppose the Bill, and that the position of the opponents of the Bill was a very difficult one. I cannot see that it is difficult. I think that one of the most pleasing things about your Lordships' House is that anybody, on whatever Bench he sits, is allowed to express his opinion. He does not get the Whip taken away, as he would in another place. I hope my noble friend will not think I am "mooning" when I say that I see no merit, I see no reason for patting oneself on the back and saying, "I am a most gallant person. I am opposing my own Party. It is a most unpleasant thing to have to do; it is all very difficult." I do not see any particular merit in that particular attitude. I should have thought the merit of this House was that we could express opinions opposed to the Government.

Far from agreeing with the three noble Lords who have spoken in opposition to the Government on this Bill, I think the Government have shown great patience over this matter. The noble Earl, Lord De La Warr, has shown great patience. He has endeavoured to meet every point that has been put. I think my noble friend the Leader of the House has shown great patience, and I am most emphatically denying—and these are my last words—the sort of impression that has been put about by the noble Viscount, Lord Hailsham, and by the noble and learned Earl, Lord Jowitt, that in some way the opposition to this Bill has been suppressed. They have had a fair chance to put their points of view and the Government have dealt with them.

VISCOUNT HAILSHAM

My Lords, I never said the opposition had been suppressed; I merely said it had not been answered.

3.31 p.m.

THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY

My Lords, I do not propose, in the few words which I shall address to your Lordships this afternoon, to traverse again all that ground which has been fully covered in this debate. We all already know our views on those points arid I do not think I should convert anyone at this late hour—perhaps not "hour" in its usual sense, but "hour" in relation to the passage of the Bill. I should like, if I may, to confine myself briefly to the more general matters with regard to the conduct of this Bill which have been raised by the noble and learned Earl, Lord Jowitt.

Frankly, I am not at all surprised, if I may say so, that he said what he did. I know that, during the time I have been in this House, I have made almost exactly similar speeches when I was sitting on the other side of the House. It is, in fact, the classic speech which is always made by the Leader of the Opposition at the end of a Bill. Moreover, as the noble and learned Earl quite rightly said, we all know that, at the end of every July, this House is in the same position. It is flooded with legislation which comes up from another place. It has to get through that legislation as best it can, I think I agree, very often in a shorter time than any of us would like. The noble and learned Earl said that that argument ought not to have applied to this Bill. I understood the noble and learned Earl to say: "Look at the Town and Country Planning Bill. That has been held over until after the Summer Recess. Why could not the same thing have been done with this Bill?" The noble and learned Earl must know that they could not both have been held over. If we had taken the Town and Country Planning Bill and had held over the Television Bill, we should have had exactly the same complaint about the Town and Country Planning Bill. The honest truth is that every Government has to get through a certain amount of legislation, and that means a certain measure of intensification of the Business of Parliament, and especially of this House, at the end of the summer.

With regard to his complaint about the dreadful hours which we had to sit, I know that there are noble Lords here who have not been in another place and have not had the opportunity of enjoying the conditions which prevail there; but, really, the fact that two nights in the year we had to sit up—never, I think, after midnight; and only twice after 11 o'clock—is surely not a hardship that ought to deter your Lordships from giving proper consideration to the Bill. If we had had to do that every night for a fortnight, I do not think it would have been too much to ask of this House—but two nights in the year! I really think that, when the noble and learned Earl reads these remarks in print, he will feel that his complaints have not quite the validity that they may appear to him to have at the time.

I do not in the least complain about the conduct of the Opposition. On the contrary, I entirely agree that, as I should have expected, the Opposition have been extremely co-operative and have done their best not to make the job of the Government impossible. For that we are sincerely grateful. But, in fact, there were, as we all know, a certain number of points which, if I may say so, the noble Earl, Lord De La Warr, was quite right to leave over, even at the risk of having a longer Report stage, for further consideration: and as a result of that procedure, as so often happens here in the light of discussions which take place "through the usual channels," we were able to find a number of Amendments which were agreed, and points were ironed out in a way that might not otherwise have been possible. I think the noble Viscount, Lord Hailsham, was a little shocked by that procedure.

VISCOUNT HAILSHAM

No, not at all.

THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY

He thought it was not constitutional; it savoured rather of secrecy and diplomacy—a little old-fashioned perhaps. But the truth is that, both when noble Lords opposite and when we have been in office, we have always used this machinery. We have found that it enables us to get a much greater measure of agreement than otherwise would be practicable. I suggest that—however it may appear to some of us—we should continue it because I believe that, for practical reasons, the results are better.

EARL JOWITT

There is much to be said for open covenants secretly arrived at.

THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY

I would quite accept that. On the general issue, which was raised by the noble and learned Earl, he said, as I understood him, that this House is not a Revising Chamber when the Conservative Party are in power and, indeed, that it performs no useful function with regard to legislation while the Conservative Party are in power. Surely it is not quite fair to say that; for it indicates that, whenever we have a majority, we insist on the full extent of power which that majority gives.

I should like the noble and learned Earl to cast his mind back to the earlier years after 1945, when the Labour Party first came into power, with a great majority in another place but as a very small minority in this House. We had put up to us in this House for our approval, with a Conservative majority, a number of Bills of which we fundamentally disapproved—the nationalisation of the Bank of England, transport, electricity, gas, iron and steel, and many other Bills of that type. If we had conducted ourselves as the noble and learned Earl suggests we do, we should have thrown out all those Bills that we did not like. But we regarded ourselves as in the position of trustees. Our object was to make the British Constitution work: and, therefore, except in cases where we felt the issues were too grave and we were bound to make our views prevail, we did our very best to accept what we believed to be the opinion of the majority in another place.

EARL JOWITT

I think I said—I certainly intended to say—that, in those circumstances, I thought the noble Marquess and his followers had acted with great restraint and discretion, and that the House had then been a very Rood Revising Chamber. My complaint is that it is a good Revising Chamber when there is a Labour Government in power but that it is not a good Revising Chamber when there is a Conservative Government in power.

THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY

We made concessions to the noble Lords opposite far greater in character than the kind of things of which they are complaining now. These are comparatively small Amendments. I think it would be true of any Government to say that, on every Bill, they do not give quite so many Amendments as the Opposition think they ought to do. That is common ground; the Opposition always complain bitterly of that, and that is quite natural. But I think, looked at over the period of ten years since the war came to an end, it will be found that, taking into consideration the character and the composition of this House, the concessions made from this side have been far greater than the concessions which have been made from the other side.

With regard to the lack of balance in this House, which has also been mentioned, I would only say this. Of course, we are all very much alive to the fact that the Conservative Party have a much larger representation in this House than the Party of the noble and learned Earl opposite. It would be very foolish if we did not recognise that fact. But if noble Lords opposite complain of that—and certainly the noble and learned Earl indicated this afternoon that he thought it was a subject of criticism—one would have expected that, when we wanted to reform the composition of the House, to make it more even, we should have had the enthusiastic co-operation of the Labour Party—and not only that, but that we should have been subject to constant and unremitting pressure on this point. But or the contrary, when, the other day, the Government indicated that they were considering this matter further, the noble and learned Earl took the earliest opportunity of saying, quite bleakly, coldly and curtly, that he would have nothing whatever to do with any reform. If I may paraphrase an old proverb, the position of noble Lords opposite seems to me rather like that of the man who likes to eat his grouse and have it—and he is having his grouse now. But that attitude does not, if I may say so, strengthen the position of the Labour Party in the country on this particular issue of the House of Lords.

Now, my Lords, if I may end on a perhaps slightly less controversial note, may I say that I wish it were possible to find some remedy for the congestion of Business which always occurs in this House at the end of this term. I think it is a weakness in our machinery of Government, and I wish we could find a way out of it. We are all aware of the problems which it raises; they are constantly in my mind, as I am sure they are in the minds of noble Lords opposite. I have thought of one conceivable remedy, though I do not think it is easy to apply it practically—namely, that more major Bills should be first introduced into this House than is the present practice, or was the practice at the time when noble Lords opposite were in power. But we must recognise the difficulty of that: Members of another place would not like it. They say, quite truly, that nowadays they are the senior partners in the Constitution, and that great Bills should come before them first. But I do not think that view is always wise.

Of course, we are debarred from discussing Money Bills—in any case they could not be introduced here first; and no doubt there are other matters which arouse great controversy, which are better dealt with in the House of Commons. But there are a certain number of Bills which could be introduced here first, and in my view would be better introduced here first—Bills, for instance, upon which the great legal authority which is represented here could make its views felt before the other House had considered the problems and it had become a question of disagreeing with conclusions which had already been reached. I think that is a matter which all Parties might explore, and if we can find some means of doing that, then I think that the difficulties that have occurred over this Bill, and do occur over other Bills of the same kind, will not have been entirely valueless.

My Lords, that is all I wish to say. I am grateful to the House for the spirit in which they have discussed this admittedly extremely controversial Bill, and I am happy that we have now brought it to a conclusion.

3.43 p.m.

EARL, DE LA WARR

My Lords, there is little that remains to be said after the speech of my noble friend. There is only one point to which I should like to address myself for a moment, and that is the suggestion from the noble and learned Earl, Lord Jowitt—and indeed other noble Lords—that in fact there have been no considerable Amendments inserted during the Committee and the Report stages of the Bill. I must confess that I felt a good deal of surprise when I heard the noble and learned Earl say that. If any noble Lord would care to take up the Bill at the present moment, it will be seen, starting at the beginning, that the Government accepted an Amendment with regard to the life of the Authority—something that we had refused in another place; but as your Lordships felt strongly on the matter we accepted it. We accepted Amendments that almost completely satisfied the Council of Churches. I do not think I am misrepresenting the position when I say that, in regard to religion, we have met the problems which were worrying them. We accepted an Amendment that satisfied those concerned with charitable appeals; we gave powers to the I.T.A. to call for documents from the programme companies. At the request of the noble and learned Earl, we increased the penalties in the Bill in regard to offences committed by programme companies. Also at the request of the Opposition, we completely altered the clause relating to sporting events. We placed a requirement on the advertising Committee to present an Advertising code.

Then, my Lords, there was one Amendment, which concerned the hours of broadcasting, which was turned down on Committee—indeed, not only was it turned down, but your Lordships divided upon it before coming to that decision. I myself felt strongly that we should not make an alteration giving the Postmaster General powers to regulate, hour by hour, the broadcasting hours. We divided and the House decided heavily against the Opposition. In spite of that fact, and as a result of appeals to us between the Committee and the Report stages, I deliberately inserted, on the Report stage, an Amendment giving noble Lords opposite three-quarters of what they wanted on that point. Finally, very much against my desire, but solely in order to meet noble Lords opposite, I inserted an Amendment providing for a special Children's Advisory Committee. In principle, I was in favour of having a Children's Advisory Committee but I did not want to be driven into the position of inserting in the Bill a long list of committees. For the reasons that I have given, my Lords, I felt a little regretful at the suggestion of the noble and learned Earl that in fact we had done nothing to meet the suggestions of noble Lords opposite, and that the time of your Lordships had been wasted.

On Question, Bill read 3^a, with the Amendments, and passed, and returned to the Commons.