HL Deb 14 March 1957 vol 202 cc563-4
LORD LUCAS OF CHILWORTH

My Lords, I beg to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.

[The Question was as follows:

To ask Her Majesty's Government the purpose for which the twelve service personnel, the other passenger and the guard dogs were travelling in the Beverley aircraft which crashed at Drayton on 5th March, and how much petrol was being carried by the aircraft at the time of the accident.]

THE PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY, MINISTRY OF DEFENCE (LORD MANCROFT)

My Lords, the Beverley aircraft which crashed near Abingdon on March 5 was bound for Cyprus to move important technical stores from there to another point in the Middle East. This freight was urgently required at its destination and was too bulky to be carried in any other type of aircraft available. In addition to the crew of five, the aircraft carried a slip crew and eight airmen posted to Malta, where it was to stage, and Cyprus. The police dogs were also being taken to Malta and Cyprus. At take-off, the aircraft carried some 4,000 gallons of fuel.

LORD LUCAS OF CHILWORTH

My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Lord for the fullness of his reply. May I ask him this further question? Does he think that, in the national interest, at a time when the civilian population of this country are suffering under very restrictive petrol rationing, great care should be taken in future, that, if possible, stores of this description could be sent by some other form of transport than by utilising one of the largest types of transport the R.A.F. has, carrying, as the noble Lord has said, 4,000 gallons of petrol?

LORD MANCROFT

My Lords, I think that is a perfectly valid point. But, unfortunately, the only two aircraft in the Middle East which could have carried this load were not available at the right time, and to have sent the goods by sea would have imposed an intolerable delay.

LORD LUCAS OF CHILWORTH

My Lords, I am fully conscious of the correctness of what the noble Lord has said, but what I have in my mind—and the noble Lord will be aware of it—is the undertaking given by his noble friend Lord Gosford, that the R.A.F. were cutting their petrol usage down by about 30 per cent. I hope that that is still in the mind of the R.A.F.

LORD MANCROFT

It is still very much in the mind of the R.A.F.