§ 3.8 p.m.
§ LORD WALSTONMy Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
§ [The Question was as follows:
§ To ask Her Majesty's Government on how many occasions in the past five years have protests been made to licensing justices against the renewal of licences on the grounds that the applicant has practised racial discrimination on licensed premises; and in how many of such cases has the renewal of the licence been refused.]
THE JOINT PARLIAMENTARY UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT (EARL BATHURST)My Lords, I regret that the information asked for is not available.
§ LORD WALSTONMy Lords, the noble Earl will remember that a short while ago the noble and learned Viscount who sits on the Woolsack specifically made use of some of these figures in rebutting an argument put forward 1066 in relation to the debate on the Racial Discrimination Bill, and he said he thought there were figures in the Home Office although he had not personally checked them. In view of that, could the noble Earl have a further search, because undoubtedly the noble and learned Viscount would not have made such a statement if figures were not available.
EARL BATHURSTMy Lords, the noble Lord will remember that in the course of his speech during our debate on racial discrimination he put a question to my noble and learned friend who was sitting upon the Woolsack and said (I paraphrase his words) that, so far as he knew, nobody had ever objected at a brewster sessions on racial grounds. My noble and learned friend, who received information from the Home Office, said that there had in fact been objections. That information had not come through official channels; we have not been collecting it. It is gained purely from reading the newspapers or from hearsay. So there may well have been many more objections than those odd few about which we have heard. That has nothing to do with the actual outcome that resulted from these objections. Again, we have no simple method of collecting the results of the objections which, of course, are already known in the courts, which are held in public. I suppose that the noble Lord could go round every single court and hear the results of objections. Certainly the newspapers could do so. But I rather doubt whether it would be in the interests of my right honourable friend's Department, the Home Office, to have to send officials round (there are some 900 licensing benches, and goodness knows how many times they sit!), and whether the results they would obtain would be worth the trouble. That is the difficulty.
§ LORD SHACKLETONMy Lords, if these figures are not available, was not the House rather misled by the perhaps rather lax statement of the noble and learned Viscount—almost amounting to slovenliness, I would say? This was one of the points which I thought was decisive in regard to the rejection of the Bill; it was certainly a point to which I listened. Now the Government tell us that they have no figures and that 1067 the indication is that the number of licences that are refused on this sort of ground may be absolutely negligible; it may scarcely be taking place at all.
EARL BATHURSTMy Lords, I do not think that the noble and learned Viscount on the Woolsack misled the House in any way. I am quite certain that he intended only to say that he was quite certain there had been occasions. What he did say was that there was information contrary to what the noble Lord believed. As the noble and learned Viscount said in his speech, there have been occasions but we have no official information about them—and in my second rather lengthy answer I pointed out the reasons to the noble Lord.
§ LORD LINDGRENMy Lords, but is the noble Earl not aware that these objections can be made only at the brewster sessions which take place four times a year? Surely, as there are only 900 licensing courts it would not be a difficult task to secure from licensing justices, or from the clerks to licensing justices, a return showing what has taken place and to ask for more details more often than once a year?
EARL BATHURSTMy Lords, I do not think that it would be possible to send civil servants around collecting this specific information. Nor do I think it would be possible for the courts to provide it. Of course it would be possible to do so in the future, if it were of vital necessity, but these sessions are held in public. Should there be any difficulty it would be a matter for the particular area. That is the reason that we do not feel it is necessary to collect this information.
§ VISCOUNT ALEXANDER OF HILLSBOROUGHMy Lords, do I understand that the Home Office have no method at all of being able to say at any time what are precedents in the country, whether they be brewster sessions or any other courts?
EARL BATHURSTMy Lords, I am quite certain that this is not a precedent. It is just a matter of whether it is really necessary to gain this very specific information; and, indeed, whether it is possible to obtain such information. There would be many other reasons for 1068 refusal of a licence other than upon racial grounds, which the noble Lord mentioned; and therefore even that information might perhaps be inaccurate.
§ VISCOUNT ALEXANDER OF HILLSBOROUGHMy Lords, would it interest the noble Earl to know that I and everyone else get so many requests from Government Departments to fill up forms that I do not think it would harm anyone of us to do once more what we have to do in so many other instances.
EARL BATHURSTI fully sympathise with the noble Viscount and with all other of your noble Lords and everybody in the country; but this would be still more information to be collected at considerable public expense. As I have said, this information could be collected, if it were absolutely necessary; but in view of the fact that these sittings are held in public, I cannot feel that it would be really necessary to set in motion the machinery for collecting the information.
§ LORD WALSTONMy Lords, as I understand it, the noble Earl has in fact told us that the remarks made by the noble and learned Viscount were in fact based purely on some newspaper reports and that there was no official backing for them whatsoever. Would the noble Earl not agree that it is desirable that Government spokesmen, no matter how eminent, should not base their rebuttal of certain assertions merely on certain unspecified newspaper reports, even though those reports may have come through a Government Department.
EARL BATHURSTMy Lords, supposing the noble Lord happened to read the particular newspapers which somebody at the Home Office had read, the noble Lord would not have put the question in his speech. My noble and learned friend was merely putting over what could be public knowledge—certainly to anybody who had read those newspapers—in order to show that what the noble Lord opposite was putting over was not exactly right.
§ LORD WALSTONMy Lords, since those newspapers have clearly been read in the Home Office, does that not mean that the Home Office should say how many newspapers they have read?