COMMONS AMENDMENTS (Hansard, 23 July 1956)

§ THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY
My Lords, the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research Bill, to which your Lordships gave a Third Reading on April 19 last, and which has now been considered in another place, has returned to us with three Amendments, all of which I hope and think are entirely non-controversial and are closely allied. I hope, therefore, that the House will agree that I should deal with them all together. They arc, indeed, merely clarifying Amendments, in the sense that their purpose is to specify in detail points which were previously covered only by implication. All of them relate to subsection (3) of Clause 1 of the Bill. The first Amendment secures specific mention of technical colleges in the Bill as places in which the Council may encourage and support scientific research. Actually, as I expect most of your Lordships know, it has always been the intention of the Government that they should be so covered, and the general formula of, "university and other institutions" which found its place in the Bill., would, in fact, I believe, have included them in any case. But in view of the increasingly important part which technical colleges are playing in the nation's scientific life, it seems fitting that they should be mentioned explicitly by the side of the universities. I therefore warmly commend this Amendment to the House.
The second Amendment adds one further item to the list which is given in subsection (3) of the particular activities in which the Council may engage in accordance with its general duties as defined at the beginning of the subsection. The words of the Amendment relate to what may be called, in general terms, development work. Here, again, it was 10 always intended by the Government that such work should be within the ambit of the new Council, as it is indeed within the ambit of the D.S.I.R. to-day. But the task of seeing that the results of research are put into practice is so important that I am sure the House will agree that it is proper to pick it out for special mention in the Bill. That Amendment, too, I think will command general acceptance.
Finally, I come to the last Amendment. This, as your Lordships will see, is designed to make clear that in the field in which many organisations and individuals are engaged the Research Council may not have to carry on its work in splendid isolation, but can take account of what is being clone elsewhere. I do not mean by that that it is in the Government's mind that this new Council should try to act as a supreme organiser and co-ordinator of the whole scientific and industrial research of the country. That, I am quite certain, would be neither possible, nor, even if it were possible, desirable. What it does mean is that in planning the Department's research programme the Council will have regard to the total picture of the country's research effort. That ought to help to ensure, at any rate, that unnecessary overlapping will be avoided, while it leaves it open—and rightly open, in my view—to the Council, if for some special reason it is desirable to do so, to be able to engage in some particular field of research which is already being conducted elsewhere. I hope that the House will agree that these three Amendments represent improvements in the Bill, and that the House will also agree that it was proper that I should have explained them together. I beg to move that this House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendments.

§ LORD SILKIN
My Lords. I am very happy to agree to both proposals which the noble Marquess has put before the House. I think all three Amendments are an improvement on the Bill, and I certainly think it was appropriate that the noble Marquess should explain them to the House together. He has explained them so clearly that there is little left for me to say. The Amendments represent 11 an extension of the functions of the Research Council. My own view is that they go a little beyond mere clarification, but I think they are all the better for that. It would have been a mistake unduly to restrict the functions of the Research Council, or to have left it in any doubt as to whether it had the jurisdiction in any particular capacity. I am not sure whether, as the clause originally stood, functions of the Council would have covered technical colleges, but that is an argument which lawyers might have had if the words were not there. It is quite easy to put them in and to make quite sure that they have that jurisdiction. The same applies to the other two Amendments. I think they do extend the functions of the Research Council, but in a perfectly desirable manner. Therefore, we on this side have great pleasure in supporting these Amendments.

LORD REA
My Lords, I should like to support the words which have fallen from the noble Lord, Lord Silkin. I think it is commonly accepted that a research matter of this sort is welcomed by all Parties, and throughout the country. It is neither magisterial nor is this Council given any powers which we would grudge it. If it takes further extension of its powers, I think we should be grateful. both to the Council and to the noble Marquess that this extra work, valuable as it is, should be taken on.