Lords Sitting of 3 December 1964

Preamble
The House met at three of the clock, The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.
Prayers—Read by the Lord Bishop of Liverpool
Several Lords—Took the Oath.

NATIONAL SAVINGS CERTIFICATES AND CAPITAL GAINS TAX
3.5 p.m.
VISCOUNT MERSEY: My 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 whether they can give an assurance that neither existing holders nor new buyers of National Savings Certificates will be subject to capital gains tax.]
THE PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY, BOARD OF TRADE (LORD RHODES): My Lords, certain information about the proposed taxes will be made available by the Chancellor of the Exchequer next Tuesday, but I must not anticipate that information by saying exactly what question will or will not be answered.
VISCOUNT MERSEY: My Lords, I should like to thank the noble Lord for the information which he has given. We are all pleased to hear that at last we shall be told something next Tuesday. But I hope the noble Lord realises—
THE LORD PRIVY SEAL (THE EARL OF LONGFORD): My Lards, may I interrupt the noble Viscount to ask him to put his remarks in the form of a question?
VISCOUNT MERSEY: I hope the noble Lord realises—or, does he realise, if the noble Earl the Leader of the House prefers it that way—that this delay and these evasive answers a re hardly helpful to the National Savings Campaign, which I think all noble Lords on both sides of the House are anxious to promote?
LORD RHODES: May I say to the noble Viscount that another opportunity will exist later on to day to air this subject?

THE CONCORDE PROJECT
3.7 p.m.
LORD MERRIVALE: My 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 how they conceive "an amicable arrangement with the French Government on the Concorde agreement which would entail concellation of the project; and whether the only hope for an amicable solution between both Governments is not the realisation on the part of Her Majesty's Government that the aeronautical lead and technological advances to be gained by a continuation of the project outweigh the economic considerations.]
THE MINISTER OF DEFENCE FOR THE ROYAL AIR FORCE (LORD SHACKLETON): My Lords, Her Majesty's Government are exchanging views with the French Government on the future of the Concorde project. We are hopeful that we shall come to amicable agreement on the best way to proceed. On the second part of the noble Lord's Question, Her Majesty's Government will certainly bear in mind in the current review of the project considerations which are in favour of its continuance as well as considerations which are not.
LORD MERRIVALE: My Lords, I should like to thank the noble Lord for his non-committal reply, but when he says that Her Majesty's Government are exchanging views with the French Government, does he mean, as was mentioned in the Daily Express to-day, that at last the Prime Minister has replied to the French Prime Minister's letter which was delivered to him several weeks ago by the French Ambassador? There was a short article about it in this morning's Daily Express. Is it to be inferred that this was a reply from the Prime Minister to the French Prime Minister? Would he not agree that any cancellation of the project would be most detrimental indeed to our relations with France? Could I ask him—
SEVERAL NOBLE LORDS: Speech!
LORD MERRIVALE: I ask one more question. Would he say, if the project is

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continued, as we on this side of the House hope it will be, that it will be purely a European project?
LORD SHACKLETON: My Lords, the noble Lord has asked me a lot of questions. I cannot, as the noble Lord knows, and as noble Lords on the Opposition Front Bench know, be responsible for what appears in the daily Press. It is true that exchanges have been going on continuously—indeed, only to-day, I believe, a further message has been sent to the French Government—but this is part of a continuing series of discussions on how best to proceed with the matter. The noble Lord asked me whether I thought that cancellation would damage relations with the French Government. I must with complete honesty say that I have not heard that the word "cancellation" has been used in these discussions. I have inquired fairly carefully into this. We have asked for an urgent review of the project for a number of reasons about which, if the noble Lord wishes to press me, I should be glad to go further. I am afraid I have forgotten the noble Lord's third question and perhaps he would repeat it.
LORD MERRIVALE: What I should now like to ask the noble Lord is this. Is it not highly probable that if there is any question of cancellation the French Government will lose complete faith in any commercial agreement which exists between our two countries, for would the noble Lord not agree that in effect the agreement is a commercial agreement, not a political agreement, and a commercial agreement which is binding on both Governments? Therefore, the cancellation could lead to retaliatory measures being taken by the French Government.
LORD SHACKLETON: The noble Lord may know about what the French Government may do if a hypothetical situation eventuates. I certainly do not. I regard the question as extremely hypothetical. The noble Lord is not helping in what is an important and by no means easy series of discussions, by raising a hypothetical question of that kind. I have already said that, to the best of my knowledge, there has not been discussion of cancellation.
EARL JELLICOE: My Lords, I certainly do not wish to embarrass the
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Government on what is clearly a difficult issue. I wish only to say that I, for one, feel that this is not perhaps the happiest page in the Government's first chapter.
THE EARL OF LONGFORD: My Lords, may I, with great respect, suggest that the noble Earl phrases his remarks as a question? I am sorry to insist, but he is not posing any sort of question at the moment.
EARL JELLICOE: My Lords, if the noble Earl the Leader of the House had been able to contain himself for one second longer, he would have heard my question—and many of us have long memories of the last thirteen years on this matter. My question is this. Can the noble Lord assure us that, when he talks of a continuing series of discussions with the French Government, this means that there is really frank and free consultation going on, or is there merely a long-range exchange of communications? Is there really full consultation going on?
LORD SHACKLETON: My Lords, I think the noble Earl said that he had long memories of the last thirteen years. So have we. I do not think it is in the real interest of these negotiations to discuss them in detail. The noble Earl is well aware that my right honourable friend the Minister of Aviation has been to France, and that there have been a number of discussions of a kind which we hope will lead to a satisfactory and amicable result.
The noble Earl is also well aware, of course, that there are certainly difficulties in the situation, and I think this was a point made by the noble Lord, Lord Merrivale, when he was referring to the contract. It is a fact that there is no break clause in this contract. I am not going out of my way to blame the previous Government, but it is the situation which we find. Therefore we are talking against a background in which we see a very much greater increase than had been expected in regard to the costs of this project. The noble Earl will recall the further developments in this year in regard to this project, and of course the cost has gone up from something like £135 million to £275 million. I make these remarks to illustrate the difficulties

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which, very properly I think, should lead any Government to carry out a review of the project.
EARL FERRERSMy Lords, is there any question which noble Lords may ask of Her Majesty's Government, which will receive a clear and distinct answer?
LORD SHACKLETON: My Lords, I should be delighted to answer questions which were directly related to the facts, and were not as hypothetical as most of the questions I have had this afternoon.
LORD MERRIVALE: My Lords, as I understand that the present position is that the project is under review, may I ask the noble Earl the Leader of the House—as he likes questions—whether he remembers using these words on November 25 with regard to another review [OFFICIAL REPORT, Vol. 261 (No. 13), col. 846]:
"As a result of that review, the Government had decided that we can adhere to our usual and established policy of honouring firm contracts."
That statement was made with regard to the Buccaneer. But as this matter is rather similar, should not this contract be honoured as was the Buccaneer contract?
VISCOUNT ST. DAVIDS: My Lords, will the noble Lord not agree that, if this is a commercial contract, it is a most unusual commercial contract in that it seems to have contained neither arrangements for cancelling it if the price rose above a certain point, nor even arrangements for consultation? Is this not a most amazing contract?
LORD LUCAS OF CHILWORTH: My Lords, to whom is the noble Viscount addressing the question? He is allowed to address a question only to Her Majesty's Government not to a noble Lord opposite.
LORD SHACKLETON: My Lords, the noble Viscount is making helpful remarks in an interrogative form for the information of your Lordships. I do not really regard the further contribution of the noble Lord, Lord Merrivale, as adding anything at all.
LORD MORRISON OF LAMBETH: My Lords, is it always quite convenient
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in the middle of commercial negotiations to divulge the details? Is it not somewhat embarrassing, and liable to prejudice the interests of our country, if we go into details in the middle of commercial negotiations of an admittedly difficult character?
LORD SHACKLETON: My Lords, I entirely agree and I am very grateful once again to my noble friend.

INDUSTRIAL DEVELOPMENT CERTIFICATES
3.18 p.m.
LORD DRUMALBYN: My 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 in what respects and in what areas they have tightened up the issue of industrial development certificates.]
LORD RHODES: My Lords, my right honourable friend the President of the Board of Trade has instructed the Board's Regional Controllers to look more critically at applications for industrial development certificates in areas, for instance in the Midlands and the South East, where there is a serious shortage of labour.
LORD DRUMALBYN: My Lords, while thanking the noble Lord for that Answer, may I ask whether he is aware that the officials concerned have always been instructed to look as critically as possible at such applications? He says that they will look "more critically", but is he aware that it would be impossible for them to look more critically than they did before? If he wants to get more industry away from the congested areas to other areas, will he consider new methods of doing so? In particular, will he press for a look at the question of the occupation of existing premises, which of course is often an easy option for firms which are refused development certificates?
LORD RHODESMy Lords, may I say that that is a sensible suggestion. I will take it back to the President of the Board of Trade.

IMMIGRANTS: NATIONAL ASSISTANCE AND MEDICAL INSPECTIONS.
3.20 p.m.
LORD COLWYN: My 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 how many immigrants, including those from the West Indies, Pakistan, India, and possibly Hong Kong and Singapore, are living on National Assistance and how many are working; and whether, before they come here, they have a medical inspection to see whether they have T.B. or venereal diseases.]
THE PARLIAMENTARY UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR COMMONWEALTH RELATIONS AND FOR THE COLONIES (LORD TAYLOR): My Lords, figures giving the numbers of immigrants in receipt of National Assistance and in employment are not, I am sorry to say, available. Neither the National Assistance Act nor the Board's records discriminate in any way between immigrants and others. There is no power under the Commonwealth Immigrants Act to require medical examination other than at the port of entry to this country.
LORD COLWYN: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, but he has not answered the second part of my Question. It is not a supplementary question; but could the noble Lord say whether, before they come to this country, they have an examination for T.B. or for venereal diseases?
LORD TAYLOR: My Lords, I have in fact tried to answer it. The situation is that there is no power to enforce such an examination in the countries from which the people are coming. It might very well be undesirable to try to do so, for many of these countries are extremely short of medical facilities, and they might in fact be rather inefficiently examined. So I think it would be unwise to try to make such arrangements. For example, if they were invited to purchase X-ray films themselves before they came, there would be no guarantee of the quality of the radiological reports.
LORD COLWYN: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord again, but the main point, if I may ask this supplementary question, is that when I went to America eighteen months ago I went through a very strict medical examination. I spent three and a half hours in hospital, and they checked me from my head to my toes. Surely, to save the staff in this country, would it not be possible, while these immigrants are on their way over, for the people on the ship to do it, or for it to be done before they leave—in fact, anything like that?
LORD TAYLOR: My Lords, unfortunately, this would not be possible even if it were desirable—and there are pros and cons on this. The net inflow of immigrants from new Commonwealth countries alone—and, of course, we could not discriminate in this way between new and old Commonwealth countries—from July 1, 1962, to the end of October, 1964, was 124,000, and to have three-hour medical examinations for all these people before they come in would, I fear, be impracticable. We are, however, doing what we can at the points of entry by way of offering facilities, which really are, I think, helpful.
LORD NEWTON: My Lords, can the noble Lord say whether it is possible to provide better X-ray facilities at London Airport?
LORD TAYLOR: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Newton, for that question, for I know he took a great personal interest in this matter when he was at the Ministry of Health, and I am pleased to be able to tell him that, as a result of his activities, the job is now in hand. The difficulty was that the protection of the accommodation for radiological screening, so that there was not an escape of X-rays into the rest of London Airport, has taken a little time; but work has now begun, and it should be finished within ten weeks.
LORD NEWTON: I am much obliged to the noble Lord.
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: My Lords, am I right in saying that the medical officer at the port of entry does X-ray those cases where he suspects that there may be some infection, and could the noble Lord say what propor- that there may be some infection, and tion is X-rayed?
LORD TAYLOR: My Lords, I could not say, without notice, what proportion is X-rayed. It is at the medical officer's discretion. The main port of entry is, in fact, London Airport: this is where most of them come. They receive their medical examination; but, with the present arrangements, it would be impossible for such examination to be universal. When the plans of the noble Lord, Lord Newton, mature, which we hope will be very soon, it will be possible to X-ray more of these immigrants and to notify medical officers of health in receiving areas if people have an infection.
LORD WAKEFIELD OF KENDAL: My Lords, the noble Lord said that there could not be any discrimination between new and old Commonwealth countries. But why not? He gave as a reason for the impossibility of medical examination for all the shortage of facilities in some countries. But if there are adequate facilities for medial examination—X-ray and so forth—in some countries, why could it not take place in those countries? And, in tie case of countries where it was not possible to have such an examination, why could not other steps be taken to ensure that such people with diseases do not enter this country?
LORD TAYLOR: My Lords, I think that the noble Lord has a point there, and I accept at once that it would be possible to have reliable medical examinations in the old Commonwealth countries. But I would a your Lordships to think on the idea that such a principle should work both ways: if we are demanding that everybody coming in here should be medically examined then all of us going abroad, equally, should he medically examined.
SEVERAL NOBLE LORDS: Why not?
LORD TAYLOR: My Lords, I do not think this is necessary in every case, and think we must have a little common sense about this. Let medical examination be voluntarily offered to people who are coming in. We know that there are certain types of people who are liable to have certain types of infection. Let it be voluntarily explained to them what the problems are; let the service be offered, and let them be told that they can be treated and made better while
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they are here. Further than that I should not like to go.
LORD ROYLE: My Lords, relating to the first part of the noble Lord's Question, would my noble friend agree that if separate registers were kept it would be completely against the spirit of integration?
LORD TAYLOR: I would entirely agree, my Lords.
Loan COLWYN: May I thank the noble Lord very much indeed. There is one point about which I made a very slight mistake. May I give Her Majesty's Government notice that I intend to put down a Motion on this subject later on, probably after Christmas?

GAMBIA INDEPENDENCE BILL
3.27 p.m.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
THE EARL OF LONGFORD: My Lords, I have it on command from Her Majesty the Queen to acquaint the House that Her Majesty, having been informed of the purport of the Gambia Independence Bill, has consented to place Her prerogative and interest, so far as they are affected by the Bill, at the disposal of Parliament for the purposes of the Bill.
LORD TAYLOR: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time. The object of the Bill is to provide for the independence of The Gambia on February 18, 1965. I must begin by saying that many of your Lordships know a great deal more about this subject than I do, so if I make any howlers or boobs I hope your Lordships will be charitable to me. A Gambia Independence Conference was held in London in July, under the chairmanship of Mr. Duncan Sandys and the noble Marquess, Lord Lansdowne. There were at this conference representatives of all the Parties in Gambia. The Conference agreed on the date of independence for Gambia and on the form of the Independence Constitution. I think your Lordships would all wish me to say that the noble Marquess, Lord Lansdowne, played a considerable part in

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reaching this agreement, and to say that we and Gambia ought to be very grateful to him.
The Report of the Conference was presented as a White Paper, and those of your Lordships who are interested will have read it. It was the wish of all those represented at the Independence Conference, and it is the wish of the Government of Gambia, that Gambia should, on independence, be a full member of the Commonwealth. The Government and all the other Commonwealth countries have been informally consulted, and they have indicated their readiness to agree to the wishes of The Gambia people in this respect. I must say it gladdens all our hearts that the Gambians have decided to stay with us in this way. It was also the wish of all those represented at the Conference that Gambia should remain a Monarchy, with Her Majesty the Queen the Queen of Gambia. Her Majesty has consented to this request.
My Lords, I said I did not know much about Gambia. My advisers have endeavoured to coach me, and I was very fortunate in that the noble Lord, Lord Milverton, who is going to speak soon, did a bit of coaching at tea yesterday. I am therefore not quite as ignorant as I was. Gambia is an extremely interesting place. If I say some things which are familiar to some of your Lordships, I hope they will not be familiar to all of you and that you may find it as interesting to learn about it as I did.
English people reached Gambia very long ago, in 1587. A traders' federation on an island in the Gambia River was taken over in 1661 by an expedition of Royal Adventurers. I believe Prince Rupert was involved in this expedition. Then it became the centre of our influence until we built the present capital, Bathurst, in about 1816. It was called Bathurst after an ancestor of the noble Earl of whom we saw so much in the earlier part of the last Parliament. His ancestor was at that time Secretary of State for the Colonies. Incidentally, some people call it "Bahthurst", but we know that the proper way to pronounce it is "Bathurst".
From that time on, the main purpose for which we used Gambia was the sup-
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pression of the slave trade. I am afraid we had done something in the past to encourage this, but we gradually extended up the Gambia River in order to suppress the slave trade. In the last six decades we have done our best to help develop the social services and institutions of democratic government within The Gambia. Fortunately, it is the best which we have done for the Gambia rather than the worst which is now remembered by its people, and they have strong ties of friendship with this country and the Commonwealth.
We have promised them some aid, and I think I should record what we promised: a grant in aid to a maximum of £745,000 for the eighteen months ending June, 1966; £360,000 for the twelve months ending June, 1967; capital assistance of £800,000 per annum until June, 1967, for development purposes; and, then, an extra last resort loan of up to £400,000 to underwrite any short-fall of other loan resources within the Development Plan. In addition, the Overseas Service Aid scheme and the help of the Ministry of Overseas Development will continue to be available to The Gambia.
Your Lordships will know that the geography of The Gambia is very remarkable. It is a long, narrow country extending straight into French Senegal for a distance of about 300 miles, and most of the way it is only about twenty miles wide. It is just a hinterland to this great river and it really is the natural outlet to the sea for this area. For historical reasons, it is British and the surrounding territory is French. The people of The Gambia, the educated people of The Gambia, are very much at home in London. Many of them are training here; they are perfectly familiar with our institutions. Yet the people of Senegal go to the University of Paris, and they are as at home in Paris as the Gambians are in London. We have two cultures existing side by side, two economic structures; yet one is the natural method of transport and outlet to the sea for the other.
Future relations between Senegal and The Gambia are, of course, matters for their free, independent Governments. I think it would be reasonable to say that we would hope that their economies may increasingly work together over the years and that they may see the good sense of

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using this great waterway for the benefit of both. In July of this year there was a report from the United Nations team which investigated the workings of the two Governments. As a result, there was a treaty of agreement, initialled by both Governments, providing for cooperation in foreign affairs and defence, and joint committees are to be set up to promote co-operation. The agreements are to be signed after independence. We welcome this decision and think it is the obvious way that things ought to go.
Many people have helped and served The Gambia well. I should like to say one word of tribute to the noble Lord, Lord, Milverton, who was Governor of The Gambia for three years, and to the present Governor, Sir John Paul, and indeed to all members of the Colonial Service who have helped develop this country and now see their child growing up and becoming independent. The Prime Minister, Mr. David Jawara, has done a fine job of leadership in the past few years. He is a veterinary surgeon, and I must say I am always delighted when I find colleagues in politics. It is his work and that of his Ministers that have made it possible to launch The Gambia into independence with confidence.
I think we should not forget the Leader of the Opposition. Mr. N'Jie because in these new countries the job of an Opposition is not easy. Some people do not understand that you can have a constitutional Opposition and a constitutional Government and both can be loyal to the country and to the Queen. I think The Gambia very fortunate in having both and that they work well. The development of The Gambia in the past few years (which has had full internal independence for a number of years) is largely due to the excellent work of the Africa Ministers.
I have tried to find out the origin of the name "The Gambia". It was originally called The Gambra in 1455, but nobody seems to know how it got its present name. I knew there was a medical research unit working in The Gambia at a place called Fajara, and I have made a few inquiries about the health situation there. This unit is concerned with research into malaria and anæmia in rural African populations, and various virus infections. There is
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a M.R.C. Trachoma Research Unit, but one of the big problems of The Gambia is still leprosy. There is a leprosarium (Alanto Leprosy Camp) with 30 patients, and 46 clinics for leprosy have been established since 1958 under a leprosy scheme. I am pleased to say that they have drugs, equipment and a vehicle supplied by UNICEF. When your Lordships send off your UNICEF Christmas cards in a few weeks' time, you can rejoice in helping to defeat leprosy in The Gambia. It may be rather a remote action, but nevertheless it is bearing fruit. Rather more than half the estimated number of cases of leprosy in The Gambia (between 8,000 and 10,000) are under treatment.
I have said what little I want to say generally about Gambia. The Bill itself follows the usual lines. There is really only one special point that I should mention, in connection with the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council. It is a rather technical matter and the Gambia has, as I understand it, decided to retain appeal from the Gambian Courts to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council. But there is a provision whereby they may use direct access to the Privy Council instead of going through the Queen in Council should they so desire. This has been put in for a technical reason with which your Lordships will be familiar; but as it does not really arise—the Monarchy is continuing in the Gambia—I do not think we need to go into it further.
My Lords, a last word. One does feel that when these splendid new countries reach their independence it is rather like a graduation ceremony, and it is very nice when they decide to remain in the family. We know that when people grow up they have to decide what they do for themselves, and it is tremendously encouraging—I have just visited Trinidad and Jamaica—to see how independence acts as a most tremendous stimulant to getting on with life, to tackling problems and to energising the people. Sometimes they make mistakes. We all do when we are young and growing up. I hope the Government of The Gambia find their way ahead not too difficult. I do not see why they should. They have a fine Government and, I have every reason to believe, a fine Opposition. They have a very good Constitution, for which we can take no credit; but our predecessors

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can take considerable credit with the people of Gambia who worked it out. My Lords, I beg to move the Second Reading of this Bill.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Taylor.)
3.40 p.m.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: My Lords, I should like to take this opportunity of congratulating the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, on his appointment. I feel quite sure that his human approach and warmhearted way will be very valuable to our friends in the Commonwealth. This has been amply shown in his speech in moving the Second Reading of the Bill now before us.
It is true that I had the honour of presiding at eight of the ten plenary meetings of the Gambia Independence Conference, which was held here in London in July, and for this reason, and for many others, I am very glad to give a warm welcome to this Bill to-day. This is the tenth Independence Bill brought before Parliament in the last eight years. Having some experience of other independence conferences, I should like to record in your Lordships' House that the Gambia Independence Conference was notable for a remarkable spirit of co-operation. As the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, has said, they have great political wisdom in The Gambia, and this was most apparent throughout the course of our negotiations, negotiations which I personally very much enjoyed, because I had the feeling all along that everybody was trying to achieve the best solution for the country as a whole and not looking at political Party interests.
We all regretted, of course, that Mr. N'Jie decided that he could not sign the Independence Agreement, but I am quite certain that the reasons given by my right honourable friend Mr. Duncan Sandys in May of last year for the revalidation of the electoral register were absolutely sound; and the decision that he gave was in the best interests of The Gambia. Mr. N'Jie's decision may perhaps have created a somewhat false impression, for, as I know full well, throughout the course of these negotiations there were only very small differences between Mr. N'Jie and the Prime Minister, Mr. Jawara.
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Following the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, I would pay my own personal tribute to Mr. Jawara, the Prime Minister of Gambia, and express my admiration for his wisdom and statesmanlike leadership, both at the Independence Conference and during the two years when he has been Prime Minister. I should also like to record from these Benches our gratitude to previous Governors, certainly including the noble Lord, Lord Milverton, who I am glad to know is going to speak this afternoon, and, in particular, Sir John Paul, to whose guidance and sympathetic understanding Gambia owes so very much. I would also mention by name Sir Percy Wynne Harris and Sir Edward Windle.
But, my Lords, though I mention certain gentlemen by name, we do not, of course, on either side of the House, forget the work which has been done by our Oversea Civil Service—devoted, generous and selfless work over the years. Nor do we forget the contribution that has been made in The Gambia by the British traders, to whom the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, referred. They have been there for many generations. Indeed, our first permanent post was established in The Gambia as long ago as 1661. For this reason it is a source of great gratification to us that the people of Gambia wish to remain under the British Crown and within the British Commonwealth of nations. These 300 years of association are years that we shall not forget, and it is nice to feel that the people of Gambia do not wish to forget them either.
The Gambia has achieved a very rapid constitutional advance. During my limited experience, I was impressed by the political wisdom of those Gambian people with whom I worked. In 1954 there was an elected majority in the Legislative Council and an unofficial majority in the Executive Council. By 1960, the Protectorate had achieved universal franchise and in 1962, there were the elections, leading to full internal self-government. But though the people of the Gambia possess considerable political wisdom, and a real sense of co-operation, they are hampered by scanty economic means—and to these the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, has referred. For some time to come it will certainly not be possible for them to balance their budget, and it has been agreed, as again the noble Lord has told us, that they shall receive budgetary assistance from us, but

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on a tapering basis. until mid-1967. We are also to support their current development plan to the tune of £800,000 per annum, and this will run on until June, 1967. As the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, has said, the overseas aid scheme which we signed in 1961 will run on until 1971.
But despite all these provisions, which are absolutely vital to the economy of The Gambia, she still has a considerable economic problem to face up to, and I think that it is generally agreed by the Gambians themselves that their best hope for the future lies in as close an association as possible with the Republic of Senegal. Certainly this is my own opinion and I had the impression throughout the Conference that this was also the feeling of all the delegates. We, for our part, welcome the progress they have already made in this direction, of setting up an inter-Ministerial Committee, which I am sure is the right way to set about things, and they have decided to cooperate in foreign affairs and in defence.
The noble Lord, Lord Taylor, has referred to the peculiar shape of The Gambia. It is very peculiar indeed, purely through the accident of colonial history. It was, once upon a time, part of the country called Senegambia. The Gambia's main asset is unquestionably the Gambia River, which, I may perhaps remind your Lordships, is the great natural waterway of the Senegal—far more so than the Senegal River. And the Gambia River cuts the Senegal in two. Up to now, full use has not been made of this river. Of course, they have made one great step forward in creating the great Gambia Highway, which crosses over the river, and which links the two separated parts of Senegal together.
It is not for us to advise the people of Senegal or Gambia whit form their association with one another should take. The United Nations Expert Committee, to which the noble Lord referred, has suggested that some process of association should take place in successive steps. This, I am sure, is right, and whether this will be achieved quickly or slowly will be a matter for the people of Senegal and Gambia. But, of course, a country which is just becoming independent naturally has strong patriotic feelings. I am sure that all of us have every sympathy with the people of Gambia and respect their sense of patriotism and their new
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sense of dignity in being an independent people. At the same time, I believe that they have combined with this spirit a real appreciation of the interdependence of States in the modern world, and in this I find great hopefulness for the future.
I hope that, in considering future development projects, the Gambian Government will seek to co-ordinate those projects with those of the Republic of Senegal. At the same time, it seems to me that the two principal donor countries, Britain and France, should also seek to co-ordinate their programmes of aid, when considering development projects for The Gambia and for the Republic of Senegal respectively. In conclusion, I should like to send from your Lordships' House my personal greetings to all those Gambian delegates to the Independence Conference with whom I had the pleasure of working in July of this year. From these Benches, I offer our sincere good wishes to The Gambia, to the Prime Minister, Mr. Jawara, to his Government and to all the Gambian people.
3.50 p.m.
LORD MILVERTON: My Lords, I rise to support the Second Reading of this Bill. It has been my happy lot to serve in many Colonies and protectorates, most of which have now achieved independence, and as they emerge one by one into independent members of the Commonwealth they face the paradox of living in a world which is at the moment increasingly interdependent. Thirty years ago, when I was in The Gambia, if anyone had suggested to me that within the next thirty years this small country, with a population then estimated at about 170,000, was destined to become an independent member of the Commonwealth, I should have regarded him as an unreasonable optimist. Well, my Lords, the dreams of yester year have become the facts of to-day.
As the Secretary of State aptly said recently in another place, The Gambia makes up in history what it lacks in size. Early explorers of the interior of Africa had a way of starting via The Gambia—notably Mungo Park. From 1821 to 1843 The Gambia was governed from Sierra Leone. In 1843 it became an independent administration, and in 1902 its boundaries were defined and agreed with the French Government. As we know now, full internal self-government has

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been enjoyed by The Gambia since October, 1963.
The chief physical assets of The Gambia capable of development are the river and its port, at Bathurst, and the air station. The air station has quite a long history. In my time there it was the centre from which the Lufthansa used to mount their their attempts to fly by seaplane across the Atlantic. From then on the Bathurst Air Station has had an increasing part in air traffic, and no doubt in the future, possibly in association with its neighbour, it will have an even greater part to play. Another asset, perhaps, is that of its climate, which is benign and cool from December to about April. I can remember in my time in The Gambia having to sit during the day in my office wearing a sweater because it was so cool for the time of the year. It has, no doubt, a very possible tourist future.
The Gambia River, as has been said this afternoon, is by nature an important waterway. It is estimated that it is 700 miles in its sinuous length, and 300 miles from its mouth on the Atlantic to Yarbatenda, in the North, with a narrow strip of, on the average, about seven miles each side of the river. This makes up the territory known as The Gambia, 4,000 square miles in all of its extraordinary shape. It is surrounded, as we have been told, on all three landward sides by former French territory, now the Republic of Senegal. So geographically, ethnically, economically and socially it seems destined to close collaboration with the Republic of Senegal, since it controls one of the potential great waterways of West Africa. No doubt the political circumstances of the past have prevented the use being made of that waterway which might otherwise have been its lot.
This is not the time to go into elaborate details of The Gambia's long connection with Western Europe. Suffice it to say that our connection with the Gambia dates back 300 years, longer than that with any other African territory. Its pleasant people are thrifty and industrious, with very limited natural resources; and life is, and often has been, very hard for them. None the less, it is an outstanding example of a happy partnership leading harmoniously to the independent status of which the measure now
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before us is the enabling Bill. Already the two Governments of Senegal and The Gambia have entered into agreements providing for co-operation in foreign affairs and defence; and what form their future collaboration may take remains, as it should, within the free choice of the Gambian people.
The resources of The Gambia are so limited that for an indefinite future it cannot be economically viable, and one may confidently hope that the British Government will continue to give generously, not only budgetary aid, but also development aid and technical co-operation of every kind. I think I can say without fear of contradiction that the people of The Gambia—Mandingo, Tula and Woloff and others of smaller numbers—being predominantly Moslem in religion, regard their long connection with this country with affection and respect. Many of their present problems spring from a colonial past—not least the strange shape of their boundaries.
It is their own wish that they should become members of the Commonwealth and retain that connection which will give them a stronger background when they come to confer with their powerful neighbour, the Republic of Senegal, on the extent and method of their future collaboration. The problems—administrative, linguistic, cultural and economic—which lie ahead of them are not at all easy of solution, and a glance at the map will show that The Gambia is just a territorial enclave of Senegal. Just as Senegal has grown up in the French tradition, with all that that implies in the way of culture and otherwise, so The Gambia has grown up in the British tradition. The question which lies before them is how they can harmoniously coalesce in the future for the benefit of both countries.
I know that we all wish them well, and I should like to conclude with an expression of appreciation of the friendly and wise co-operation, and the mutual respect, which has guided the Prime Minister, Mr. Jawara (who I think was at school when I was in The Gambia) and the Governor, Sir John Paul, to this successful achievement of independent status. Sir John Paul has effectively continued the work of Sir Percy Wynne Harris and Sir Edward Windley. Some of us had the opportunity of meeting the delegates of The Gambia a few months

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ago when they came to this country—representatives both of the Government and of the Opposition—and I am sure that they are all determined to cooperate in promoting the future welfare of their country.
As is the custom in this House, perhaps I ought to have declared at the beginning of my remarks an interest in the Bill before us. The Bank of West Africa, which is the only bank functioning in The Gambia, opened there in November, 1901, and has done 63 years of service to that country in the way of providing for financial business. Over the past fourteen years, as a director of the Bank of West Africa, I have been able to pay one or two brief visits to the country which I used to know so well, and to meet again old African friends and others, now in leading positions, who were still at school when I was there. My wife and I retain the happiest memories of our three or four years of service in The Gambia, and we have gladly accepted an invitation from the Government of Gambia to be present at the Independence celebrations in February. I am glad therefore—gladder than ever—of this opportunity of supporting the Second Reading of this Bill.
4.3 p.m.
LORD TAYLOR: My Lords, I should like to thank the noble Marquess for his very kind remarks, and also the noble Lord, Lord Milverton, for what he has said. There is little that needs replying to, but I think I should say three or four things. I should like to say to the noble Marquess that I see very well his point about development aid being a coordinated effort, at both the receiving end and the giving end. I have noted it, and I will see that we do what we can to achieve this. It would be good for us and for France, as well as for Senegal and The Gambia.
The noble Lord, Lord Milverton, mentioned the air station. Hundreds of thousands of British people have visited The Gambia for one day on the staging route when the Mediterranean was closed. They know of the existence of The Gambia, and know a little more than some of us did before. I was glad also that the noble Lord mentioned the possibility of the development of the tourist trade. The tourist trade, if it is looked upon as a holiday trade and not
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as a luxury trade, where ordinary people can get plenty of exercise and exert themselves and not just sit about, is something entirely admirable. People of all social classes can now afford to have holidays abroad and the more everybody has them the better, but I do not think that sitting about in luxury does anybody any good.
LORD AMULREE: My Lords, I cannot see what is wrong in sitting about if that is what you want to do.
LORD TAYLOR: My Lords, I think it makes you constipated intellectually, morally and physically. I hope that it will be a good mixed class tourist trade, and not just an upper class luxury one.
LORD ST. OSWALD: My Lords, this is most interesting. I can see that the doctors are disagreeing, as usual.
LORD TAYLOR: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Milverton, mentioned that The Gambia is 4,000 square miles in area; and he also said (and the noble Marquess, Lord Lansdowne, indicated this, as my advisers certainly advised me) that economic viability will not be easy to achieve. I am not venturing to disagree with those noble Lords and with my advisers who say it will not be easy, but I think it can be done. I think The Gambia should not look forward to continuous aid for ever. That is a very bad approach to things. They can take encouragement from the fact that Jamaica has precisely the same area as The Gambia, 4,000 square miles; Jamaica has its problems, but it supports a population three times that of The Gambia.
I do not know what the geography is like, but The Gambia has this wonderful asset, this great river, which is a sort of St. Lawrence Seaway of the area. It could be a "St. Lawrence freeway" one day, and I hope it will. The people are full of life and "go". I think they should be full of life and economic "go", too. I hope the bank of the noble Lord, Lord Milverton, will supply the needful, to help them from the commercial point of view. The noble Lord mentioned how young Mr. Jawara was. I think he is only 44, and most of his Cabinet are under thirty—and that is not a bad state for a Cabinet to be in.
SEVERAL NOBLE LORDS: Hear, hear!
LORD TAYLOR: We are young in heart, too. I am delighted that the noble Lord, Lord Milverton, will be there for the Independence celebrations. I hope that some of us may get a free trip, too.
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

TRAVEL CONCESSIONS BILL
4.8 p.m.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
THE PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY, MINISTRY OF TRANSPORT (LORD LINDGREN): My Lords, before I introduce this Bill to the House, may I officially, from this side, say what I have said privately to the noble Lord, Lord Chesham, and congratulate him on the honour that was conferred upon him and announced last Tuesday, of becoming one of Her Majesty's Privy Council. I congratulate him most heartily.
The purpose of this Bill is to put right an unsatisfactory situation that has existed over local authority travel concessions since 1955. The Bill redeems a pledge given by the Labour Party in the last Parliament that this would be one of the first measures it would introduce. Before I describe the Bill, I should like to say a word or two about the history of travel concessions on municipal transport services. Local authorities which operate their own transport undertakings have by long tradition given free travel or reduced fares to special classes of passenger: children, old people, the blind and the disabled. The practice went on undisputed for many years, until 1954 when Birmingham Corporation decided by resolution to grant free travel on their omnibuses to certain classes of elderly people. A local ratepayer, a Mr. Prescott, challenged this decision in the High Court and obtained a ruling, which was upheld on appeal, that the Corporation's action was ultra vires.
Noble Lords will readily understand that the Court of Appeal's decision in the Birmingham case placed in jeopardy all the travel concessions that were being given by other local authorities. For this reason, Mr. Edward Short, the Member of Parliament, who in another place
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has been persistent in his endeavours towards a reasonable solution of these difficulties, introduced a Private Member's Bill designed to give local authorities general permissive powers to grant these concessions, and thus to restore the position to what most people had believed it to have been prior to the decision in Prescott's case. But, unhappily, my Lords, the Government of the day were prepared only to go so far as to confirm the right of local authorities to go on giving those concessions that already existed in November, 1954. Mr. Short's Bill was adopted to that extent as a Government measure and the present Statute—the Public Service Vehicles (Travel Concessions) Act, 1955—came into being.
The decision of the then Government was, in my opinion, unfortunate, because it meant that travel concessions were frozen in the exact form in which they happened to be laid down in 1954. Some noble Lords may recollect that at the time the 1955 Bill was before Parliament it was indicated that if local authorities wanted to give new or extended concessions they could seek powers by Private Bill in the usual manner. I am informed that there have been thirteen attempts to do this since 1955.
Certain of the local authorities which promoted Bills sought only to make minor alterations in their existing concessions. In Newcastle-upon-Tyne, for example, old people enjoyed a concession on the trolley-buses operated by the local authority, and the Corporation wanted to ensure that they would not lose the concession when the undertaking changed over to diesel buses. Liverpool, because of congestion in the city, had to rehouse many of its people outside the city limits, and it wanted to secure that old age pensioners who were rehoused in this way, but were still served by Liverpool Corporation buses, would continue to enjoy the concession they had had while they lived within the city boundary. Other authorities wanted, for example, to raise the age limit for children's fares from fourteen to fifteen, or to extend to disabled civilians an existing concession to disabled ex-service men. Then there were some authorities which wanted to give new concessions similar to those which were already being granted by local authorities elsewhere. In Scotland, for instance, Edinburgh and Aberdeen sought

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powers to give concessions to old people, such as were already in force in Glasgow and Dundee.
All these attempts, whether for adjustments to prevent existing concessions from being lost because of changed circumstances, or for small extensions of concessions, or for new concessions, met with failure. In fact, no alterations or extensions whatever of travel concessions have been accepted in Private Bills since 1955. And Mr. Short's efforts in another place to introduce further general legislation by Private Members' Bills were equally unsuccessful. Towards the end of the last Parliament the late Government promised to consult local authorities with a view to introducing legislation to secure that their powers to grant concessions under the 1955 Act were not eroded by changes in local circumstances since that date; such circumstances as I have already mentioned were worrying the Newcastle authorities in regard to changing over from trolley buses to diesel buses. But they were not prepared to go further than that. Therefore I should now like to torn to the attitude of the present Government.
My Lords, foremost in our minds is the fact that concessions of this kind are already a long-standing tradition with local authorities which have transport undertakings. They all give concessions to children; nearly all of them give concessions to the disabled; and about one-third to old people. Of the existing concessions, nearly all of those for blind and disabled people are for free travel: and so are about or e-third of those for elderly people. Very young children are also carried free. Tie remaining concessions are for reduced fares. The concessions that are given are usually subject to conditions. Very often they are restricted to off-peak periods, so that the passengers who are getting the concessions are carried on existing services. The buses or trolley-buses are running, in any case with empty seats, and there is therefore no extra operating cost to the undertaking.
We think it no more than reasonable that those local authorities which are already authorised to give concessions should be able to adjust them to meet changed circumstances; and that those authorities which do not at present give concessions should be able to do so if
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they wish, in the same way as other authorities already can do within the law. There is no new principle involved in this, and no obligation on local authorities to use the powers granted by the Bill if they do not want to do so.
Coming from the general to the particular, we know that many local authorities are anxious to be able to extend concessions to old people. The last Government's objection to this was that benefits to the elderly ought to be in cash, not in kind. This is also the main argument that was used in objection to the proposals for private legislation which have been before another place since 1955, and which were unsuccessful. The claim then was that social benefits should be given on a national basis, and in cash, not on a local basis and just for travel. And the present Government certainy do not consider that travel concessions are any substitute for an adequate provision in money which elderly people can spend in the way most suited to their own individual needs. Noble Lords will be well aware of the increases in the existing rates of National Insurance and other associated benefits which the Government have decided to introduce. We wholeheartedly accept that the well-being of old people is a national responsibility. But what we also feel is that if local authorities want to give to their own senior citizens on their own transport undertakings some little extra benefit by way of concessionary fares, as many other local authorities are able to do to-day, it is reasonable for them to have discretion to that extent.
The 1955 Act gives local authorities which grant concessions under the Act a discretion to charge the whole or part of the cost of those concessions to the rates, instead of letting it be borne out of the revenue of their transport undertaking. We propose to continue that discretion and to apply it to additional or extended concessions given under the new Bill. Of course, if there is any deficit in the account of the transport undertaking as a whole, it falls upon the rates in any event. It has been suggested that because the cost of concessions can be charged to the rates, authorities may be tempted to award these concessions extravagantly or irresponsibly. We do not think this fear is well founded. Local authorities will, as always, be answerable to their own ratepayers for the amounts

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they spend out of the rate fund and for the objects they spend them on. We have no reason to suppose that they will not exercise their discretion wisely in regard to travel concessions, as they do in other matters. And, as we have seen, many local authorities have the powers and are exercising them already.
My Lords, this is, therefore, a simple Bill. Its main provision is to remove the provision in the 1955 Act which ties local authorities to "established" travel concessions, that is, the concessions which they were giving in 1954. The effect will be to enable them to grant either extended or new concessions, provided they grant them to "qualified persons" as defined in the 1955 Act. Perhaps it will be helpful if I briefly remind noble Lords of what the categories of "qualified persons" consist. They are: men over 65 and women over 60; children under 15; full-time scholars between 15 and 18, travelling for educational purposes; blind people; disabled people; and council members travelling on council business. These are the statutory definitions, and they are in general terms. If individual local authorities want to define their own concessions more narrowly—if. for example, they wish to give a concession only to retirement pensioners instead of to all old people—they can do so.
We propose that the categories of "qualified persons" should, generally speaking, remain as at present. The categories in the 1955 Act reflect the general practice of local authorities, and hence, we think, the extent of the classes which are generally accepted as most deserving of special treatment. Local authorities have shown themselves content that these classes give them the scope they desire. We propose one minor revision only. This will have the effect of substituting 16 years for 15 years in the definitions for children's and scholars' concessions, when, at a later date, the school-leaving age is raised from 15 to 16.
As I have said, both the 1955 Act and the present Bill deal only with concessions on municipal transport undertakings. It has been represented to the Government, both from within and without Parliament, that the Bill should also provide for concessions to be given by private bus companies, or the London
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Transport Board, or British Railways. My Lords, there is no need for statutory provision to enable this to be done. These undertakings are all in a position to grant concessions if they wish, subject to the approval of the traffic commissioners or the Transport Tribunal, where appropriate. But the company bus operators operate as commercial undertakings, and that fact necessarily limits their willingness to grant concessionary fares, unless such fares can be justified on commercial grounds. They have great difficulty, as we all know, in keeping their ordinary fares down, under present-day conditions. Apart from the usual special children's and scholars' fares, and certain special arrangements for the blind, it is not their custom to grant concessions. The nationalised Boards are in a similar position owing to their statutory duty to pay their way.
I would say that it is generally recognised that these non-municipal undertakings cannot be pressed to do more in this respect than they are prepared to do out of their own resources. They cannot get help from the rates as the municipal undertakings can. Following indeed, from recognition of this fact, it has been suggested to us that local authorities, in London and elsewhere, should be enabled to reimburse the non-municipal undertakings, such as London Transport or a private bus company, for the cost of granting concessions to their citizens. This suggestion has come to us from places where the transport is provided entirely by a non-municipal undertaking and the municipality has no running powers; or where there is a borderline problem, because either the municipality has operating powers but does not exercise them or it provides the services jointly with a private undertaking but could relate the concessions only to its own services.
My Lords, we sympathise with the thought behind this suggestion, but after full consideration we do not feel that we can go so far as this in the present Bill. As noble Lords will know, local authorities have many powers under General and Private Acts to engage in activities of their own, but Parliament has granted them up to now very restricted powers to contribute financially to the activities of commercial undertakings. This is a long-standing general principle of local government. We do not feel that it

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would be right for us, in this Bill, to venture into this wide field by making provision for local authorities to make a financial contribution to transport undertakings, whether publicly or privately owned, which are not under their own control. We feel fiat the only course is to maintain the clear distinction observed under the 1955 Act, and in this Bill, for present purposes, to confine ourselves strictly to municipal transport. The wider issue is one which we shall bear in mind in the more general context of our transport planning in the interests of the community as a whole. I commend this Bill to your Lordships for Second Reading. I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Lindgren.)
LORD CHESHAM: My Lords, may I start on a personal note, too, by thanking most warmly the noble Lord, Lord Lindgren, for what he said, and through him extend those thanks to the House for the way it received his remarks? I think it was most kind or him to say anything like that. I hope he does not think I am sure he will not—that having said that is going to make the slightest difference to my views on the Bill that is before us. Naturally, I am in no mind at all to oppose this Bill, but I regret that I cannot welcome it to your Lordships' House any more than it was received with anything approaching an unqualified welcome on either side of the House in another place. The noble Lord has been good enough to explain some of the reasons why I cannot, for which I am grateful. But basically the reason is that I consider it to be a bad way of carrying into effect an underlying principle which basically and substantially is, of course, a good one which we should all support and which is to benefit the deserting people for whose cause the Bill is aimed. I quite accept from the noble Lord that this Bill is nothing but well-intentioned. I do not think it crossed our minds as being anything else. But, to my mind, it is clumsy, in that it will create many more anomalies and injustices of the kind that it seeks to remedy, although I agree that it remedies certain anomalies. However, I do not think that thereby there is sufficient justification for creating a good many more.
The noble Lord criticised the position—he described it as "freezing"—which
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came about in 1955. I should like to put the other side of the argument. I do not want to dwell at length on arguing exactly what happened in 1955, because I think the explanation will be equally apparent from the case and the remarks I make to-day; I think that they will cover that aspect of the matter just as well as to-day's situation. I could not help wondering whether, in the introduction of this Bill, there had not been a certain amount of—shall we call it?—political expediency. I thought that the noble Lord seemed rather to confirm that in his emphasis on redeeming Election pledges. It may or may not be, in his mind, a little bit of electioneering. It may be that his mind is even going forward to the next Election. He may be getting worried about that. If he were, nobody could blame him.
No one disagrees that the classes of people dealt with by the Bill are well deserving of benefit at the hands of the nation, or that they should get it; but I think that the benefits should be derived from some other method. I want to consider how the provisions of the Bill will apply. It is true that it is permissive; but that fact, I think, is as much its weakness as its strength. It is permissive, naturally, only in those areas where the local authority run their own public transport system. The situation arises that in different areas there will be different amounts of benefit to differing classes of people. Benefit will be received in districts where the authority run their own public transport, but the Bill does not apply at all where they do not. Therefore, the benefit is denied to those classes of people mentioned in the Bill who happen to live in areas without municipal transport.
I do not think that that is the right way to go about it. As the noble Lord explained to us, private bus companies have power to operate similar concessions, or virtually what concessions they like, provided they go through the proper procedure to the Transport Tribunal or the licensing authorities. He is perfectly right about that. He was also right when he said that, on the whole, with all the goodwill that they have and with a desire to do so, on the margins upon which they operate and the amount of unremunerative services they are running it is doubtful whether they will

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be in a position to contemplate doing it on anything like a really helpful scale. If the decision has been taken, as I gather it has, that there is not to be power for a local authority to help the private companies in the same way that they can the municipal undertakings, it seems to me somewhat unfair in its application towards those whom it is intended to help.
I think, to put it mildly, that it is at least open to some discussion, if not argument, whether the Government have got right the categories of people to benefit within the measure. I do not for a moment raise any dispute about the classes who are included; but I could not help wondering whether council members on duty are necessarily more specially deserving—and "specially deserving" was the phrase used by the right honourable gentleman the Minister in another place—than widows or some other classes of people, who may perhaps be in receipt of National Assistance but who do not fall within the scale of the Bill. In referring to that matter, there is one question I should like to ask the noble Lord which he might be good enough to reply to when he comes to wind up. It relates to the question of councillors on duty. I am not trying to catch the noble Lord out in any way; I just want the information. I am a little worried about the inclusion of this "specially deserving case" because I had thought that members of councils travelling on duty are entitled to charge their transport expenses in any event.
LORD LINDGREN: My Lords, I think I can answer the noble Lord immediately. There is a restriction placed on the distance between their home and the place of the meeting, and equally whether they are inside or outside the area of the authority where the meeting is held. If a councillor in an urban district has travelled to a meeting within his own district, he cannot charge. If he is going to a meeting outside, he can charge.
LORD CHESHAM: I am most grateful to the noble Lord. I have not even had to wait until his winding-up speech; he has answered the query. But, although his answer is perfectly genuine and correct, it does not do much to dispel from my mind the doubt that I mentioned
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before asking the question. I had always thought, and believed that your Lordships thought—and I think that the noble Lord, Lord Lindgren, must feel much the same, because he addressed himself at some length to this point—that a national responsibility to those less fortunate and less active was to create, for them and the general classes which are described in the Bill a level over the whole country which would enable them to take their own place in our society; and, having created that level for them, that they should then be free to utilise the benefit they rightly received in whatever way they thought fit.
It seems to me that there is some element of unfairness here between those who care to travel about, and those who do not care to travel about or are not able to travel about very well, in that the purchasing power is operated between the two in a way that does not seem to be quite equitable. It is with pleasure that I note that the Government have announced the increases in benefit which the noble Lord mentioned. It was to achieve this level throughout the country that they rightly did so. But I should much have preferred, if there is to be an element of what, for want of a better term, I will call a "transport subsidy," that that should be included as an element in those increases to take care of this particular problem, rather than to have this somewhat piecemeal and, to my mind, inequitable measure. I think that if the Government had thought a little longer and worked the thing right through to its conclusion; if they had worked out all the implications, which I am not sure has been done; and if they had consulted with the appropriate organisations and associations rather more (I have yet to hear that they did so consult), they would have done this, which is good in principle, in a better and fairer way. We all applaud the underlying principle and spirit behind the Bill to help people who are deserving of such help, and so we accept the Bill, but as a method of successfully achieving that object, this Bill leaves a good deal to be desired.
4.40 p.m.
LORD INGLEWOOD: My Lords, as this is the first time I have addressed your Lordships' House, I hope that I can rely on your traditional indulgence, but I must admit that it is not the first

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time I have made a maiden speech in this Chamber. Nor is it the first time I have considered this Bill, or something very like it, because the subject has been pressed for several years in another place.
We have just heard the background to this Bill, and I think we should all agree that the state of the law is not satisfactory, and has not been satisfactory for some time. It is easy to say that, but much less easy to see what the next step should be, II is fairly simple to resolve some of the apparent anomalies and create others at the same time. That is precisely what this Bill risks doing, I do not want to seem over-critical this afternoon, and I certainly recognise the great credit due to the Government Chief Whip in another place for his perseverance in this matter. He has been very fortunate, in that he has done what many a private Member always hopes to do: he has been able to sell his Bill, lock, stock and barrel, to the Government. I was never one who felt that the need for legislation in this field was so pressing, but, since the Government have introduced a Bill, we ought to examine it closely to see whether it is as fair as it can reasonably be made. It appears to me that for a Government Bill the drawing is extraordinarily narrow.
Let us examine who can benefit under this Bill. Who are the fortunate few? Well, they have to live in one of the 95 (I think that is the number) areas where transport is municipally run secondly, the responsible authority has to decide that it will operate a scheme under this Bill am: thirdly, the person concerned must fall not only in one of the classes listed in the Schedule but one of the classes for whom the relevant local authority proposes to authorise various concessionary fares. There are a great many other people who are equally deserving but for whom the Bill is going to do nothing.
I would ask the noble Lord, Lord Lindgren, for clarification on one important point. There has been some misunderstanding over the existing powers of a local authority and those which are to be given under this Bill. Is a local authority, where it operates public service vehicles, already empowered to give concessionary figures
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generally at off-peak times? That question was put to the Minister of Transport in another place and, off the cuff, he said "No". But I am not sure whether in fact he is right, provided that there is no distinction in the decision of the authority between different classes of ratepayers, and provided that it can show some practical or commercial reason. I think it is a relevant matter in these circumstances, and I hope that the Minister in his reply can clear it up.
We all appreciate that the decision of the Court in 1954 left a number of local authorities seriously put out: they wanted their power or discretion back. They succeeded in getting this in part under the 1955 Act, which was a sort of compromise. Looking back on the matter, I am not sure whether it would not have been better to accept the situation, rather than to have sought legislation. There was no uniformity and I do not think that the principle is really a very good one, as the noble Lord, Lord Chesham, has explained. There is very little support to-day for social welfare based on concessions. In fact, we try to achieve it by other means. Therefore, the proposals in this Bill reflect, in a way, the tobacco-token concession, only in some ways less satisfactory. For with the tobacco-token concession every smoker got some benefit: it did not matter who owned the tobacconist's shop in his area. But under this Bill it matters who owns the transport in his area before the old person, or other person who falls within the qualifying classes, is able to draw any benefit.
May I return to the question of transport which is not run by the local authority? There has been reference to London, which is the biggest example. But there are also rather different circumstances in the rural areas which have not yet been mentioned. Some might say, "The companies ought to fall in line with local authorities—they are surely big enough, and must be making profits." That may be true in some cases, but certainly not in all, and indeed not so if we consider the country districts, where often the bus operators work in a small way, with very few vehicles, and face increasing difficulties. The chief difficulty is that an ever-larger number of

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their former customers are now travelling in their own private transport. However little these concessions might cost, I doubt whether many of these smaller country operators have any profitable routes against which they could balance a concession of this sort and have any means of absorbing the extra cost. Hence, I fear that this Bill can do very little, if anything, to help those people who fall in these qualifying classes and who live in the more remote areas, areas where distances involved are longer and where fares are larger.
I therefore ask the Government whether they will not themselves table an Amendment so that it may be possible for a local authority to contribute towards the cost of any scheme of concessionary fares operated by arrangement, where they do not themselves own or run the public transport. Frankly, I was not convinced by the argument put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Lindgren, who brushed aside the possibility of extending the Bill in this way.
If we take a closer look at the qualified persons who might benefit, we find there is one change in the Schedule originally printed in the 1955 Act, resulting from a proposed future change in the school-leaving age. I appreciate that it is difficult to know where to draw the line in a case like this, but it seems strange that those on National Assistance should be omitted entirely. The circumstances of people drawing National Assistance vary greatly, but I should have thought that there must be some people who would be equally deserving as those who are already listed in the Schedules to the Bill.
There has been no mention yet as to the cost of any of these concessions. I should be surprised if in any case it amounted to a very large sum, but we are entitled to be given some indication of the cost of these concessions when they are operated in a typical area. I consider that the Bill ought to have made some provision for the local authorities which operate such concessionary schemes to make public, at the end of the year, some sort of annual report and accounts so that all concerned could see the result. We do not want any repetition of the Birmingham case, where, no
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doubt, exaggerated ideas were going round as to what the cost of such concessions might be. In such circumstances it is surely better that all should know what the actual costs are. I should have thought that a sentence or two could be included in the Bill to clear up that point. I should like to think, too, that the Government will advise local authorities before they come to decisions on such schemes. Some proper estimates should be made of the cost of running the scheme, and perhaps setting out the loss or benefit involved; in other words, some proper prior estimates. We do not want the decisions taken simply from kindness of heart.
I have ventured to make a number of suggestions as to how the Bill can be improved. I cannot believe that the Government and the original author of the Bill will not welcome them. At present the Bill is too much "hit or miss" to rank as good legislation. I am not suggesting that we should impose any system of concessionary travel on any local authority or transport undertaking, but we should put all local authorities in the country in the same position. They should all have an equal chance of considering such schemes if they think them appropriate in their areas. To my mind, nothing less than this would seem to be acceptable.
4.50 p.m.
VISCOUNT ST. DAVIDS: My Lords, in rising to welcome the Second Reading of this Bill. I am also very happy to be able to congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Inglewood, on a most professional maiden speech. It must be quite obvious to all your Lordships that he has addressed many other bodies, and of course the other House, on a great many occasions, and he is extremely expert at the art of making a speech. Therefore he need have absolutely no fear in addressing this House either on this occasion, when of course he receives some special consideration, or on any other occasion whatever on which he cares to address the House.
In welcoming this Bill, I should like, first of all, to make some remarks about the attitude which coloured almost the whole of the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Chesham. We often hear arguments of precisely this nature in this House. I am glad to say that they almost always

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come from the Conservative side. I personally have never understood the argument that because something is not all-inclusive we should therefore not do it. It is the argument for not giving to the poor because you cannot enrich every single one of them. It is the argument for not giving to one person who is needy, because some other person who is needy does not happen to be within the reach of your arm. This is an argument which I personally am never going to tolerate, and which I hope no other Member of this House will tolerate.
LORD CHESHAM: My Lords, may I just interrupt the noble Lord for a moment, because one thing I am afraid I cannot tolerate, either, is that he should say I put forward any argument of that sort at all? I did not say that because it was not equally distributed it should not be done. I said that it should be done but in some other way. I hope the noble Lord will bear that in mind and be fair to me in his speech.
VISCOUNT ST. DAVIDS: My Lords, I think I listened to the noble Lord's speech very carefully, and the argument of the noble Lord and, indeed, of his Government when they were considering this matter, when it came before us as a Private Bill, was that this should not be done because it was not all-inclusive. The whole argument at that time for not doing it was that we were providing benefits to some persons only and we were not providing benefits to some other persons. I think we should do whatever we can, and any argument that we should not give some benefit because it is not as widely spread as we should wish, is an argument which should never be tolerated.
In any case, this Bill permits us to allow local authorities, if they wish, to hand certain benefits to certain people who would very much welcome them and whom we should like to receive those benefits. I am very happy, too, to see that this is a permissive Bill. It does not force anything down anybody's throat. It permits local authorities, if they wish, and if they are in a position to do so because of ownership of local transport, to hand these benefits to these people. I am very glad of the permissiveness of this, because I think that we should leave something to local democracy. Why should not these
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various municipalities be allowed to make up their own minds as to what they want to do? Have they all to be rubber stamps of Whitehall, or may they not choose in their own councils what level of benefits they hand to various people? Let us have more of this local democracy and let them have something which they can chew on in their council chambers. That we are able to give them a freer hand is a great move forward.
What is more, this little Bill will to some extent benefit municipal transport by enabling them to spread the carriage of the people in their boroughs over a broader period. We all know that every transport body of any kind has to provide itself with vehicles to cover its peak periods, and of course the authority works far more efficiently if it can get some part of its peak load off into the other periods of its working. Surely it is very much to the benefit of a municipality if it can get many of these people who do not necessarily need to travel at peak periods to travel at other periods by allowing them benefits if they do so.
Many of the people on this list are not people who are forced to travel at peak periods. The retired people can often travel out of peak hours; school children often do not travel at peak hours; and for the blind, the disabled and so on, it is considerably to their advantage if they do not travel at peak hours, when there is a great rush of people getting on and off a bus. It does not help anybody, either the normal peak-hour travellers or the blind or the disabled or the bus organisation itself, if everybody has to travel together. It is a great advantage if these rather less active members of the community can travel at a time when they can get on and off a bus at their leisure. As we all know, if a bus is forced to stop even for an extra second or two at each stop over the period of its run, it can be quite considerably delayed. The fact that we can make it possible for municipalities to arrange that some of these less active people can travel at times when they can have more leisure in getting on and off these buses is surely of great advantage.
Therefore, my Lords, I welcome this little Bill. If we can spread it any further I shall be glad to hear arguments in favour of doing so. If, unfortunately,

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that cannot be done, we may well bewail that fact, but, nevertheless, let us welcome the fact that something can be done. Therefore let us welcome this Bill.
5.0 p.m.
LORD AMULREE: My Lords, before I make two not very big points on this Bill, I should like, on behalf of noble Lords on these Benches, to join with the noble Viscount who has just spoken in offering congratulations to the noble Lord, Lord Inglewood, upon his maiden speech. Like the noble Viscount, we hope we shall hear him speak a great many times in the future.
This is a Bill with which I have a great deal of sympathy, as I am sure most of us in this House have, but there are two points which I am a little doubtful about. I was rather sorry the noble Lord did not look further into the future, because what I should like to see is the pensioner—the old lady of 60 and the old man of 65—having enough money in his or her pocket not to need travel concessions, even though I think they may quite well need them at the present time. One would like to think that this is possibly going to be a temporary measure, and that one day it will not be necessary because at one time we did not like the great deal of talk there was about the evils of relief in kind, and yet it seems to me almost as if we are getting back to that now.
Another reason why I do not like the idea of making special concessions to the aged is that in all the work I have done for the old people I have always tried to keep them as part of the general living community, and not to segregate them into some kind of separate group, so that when you become 60 you do not suddenly become somebody quite different from when you were 59 and 11 months. Therefore, although, as I say, I do not object to this Bill at all, I should have liked us to look to the future when these concessions will not be be necessary.
There is one minor point, not of great importance, about councillors. I agree very much that councillors, when they are travelling on duty, should travel for nothing, but I should rather like to see it done by means of their filling in an expense account, rather than their being
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given a concession if they bring a little brass disc out of their pocket to show who they are, or something of that kind. That would seem to me a more satisfactory way of doing it. These are the only two points I should like to make, and apart from them, I welcome this Bill.
LORD BRECON: My Lords, I would ask one question of the noble Lord. He made a statement about councillors and how they drew their expenses. I have always understood that members of a local authority attending to local authority business charged their travelling expenses to that authority.
LORD LINDGREN: No.
LORD BRECON: I have myself been a member of a county council for many years. I have not drawn these expenses, but other members of the council do draw their travelling allowances plus a subsistence allowance as well. I think it would be only fair, as my noble friend has said, for a councillor to charge his travelling expenses to the local authority for attending all meetings of the council, but he should not be allowed to have a free bus ride if he wants to go round the whole of his ward seeing the members in his area. I say this because in a rural area such as that in which I live a member of the county council can travel ten miles, without getting any help or assistance, if he wants to see someone who is in need of his help. I hope this concession will be only for councillors actually attending council meetings and council business, and not for any other purpose.
5.6 p.m.
LORD LINDGREN: My Lords, may I first of all join with other noble Lords in congratulating the noble Lord, Lord Inglewood, on his maiden speech? Those of us who have been privileged to sit with him in another place know of the quality of his work in the other place, and we are delighted that we have him here and that he is going to join us in our debates. The noble Lord, Lord Chesham, in replying to my courtesies, said he was still going to be rough with me. My Lords, I do not mind that at all. In fact, on the occasion of the first speech I made in this House the noble Lord, Lord Chesham, took me to task for using House of Commons tactics here, and said that the longer I was here the

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less vicious I should become. I perhaps miss the "rough stuff" of the other place, but if the noble Lord wants it then perhaps we can indulge in it here.
I am not at all surprised that the noble Lord should be surprised that this Government should carry out its Election pledges. How different from the previous Government! Our first action, so far as this pledge is concerned, has been to help those who are least able to help themselves. As my noble friend Lord Mitchison will remember, the first action of the Tory Government in 1951 was to help the brewers. They amended the New Towns Act, 1946, to give authority to the brewers to develop the public houses in the New Towns as free houses. The first action of the Tory Government was, of course, for their friends the brewers—to give them back their opportunity to make more profits in the New Towns. Our first action has been to help the aged, the infirm and the schoolchildren. I prefer a Party which keeps its Election pledges—and the Tory Party did not even mention in their Election speeches their proposed amendment of the New Towns Act, 1946, to give the brewers their concessions back. I prefer our action.
LORD CHESHAM: My Lords, I hope the noble Lord will forgive me, but I do not want him to get it wrong, either. I do not think I detracted in the slightest from acknowledging the help the Government have begun to give already. I merely said that this particular part of it was being done in the wrong way; and I do not think I really deserved to incur these endless quotations from Transport House pamphlets from about 1927 that the noble Lord is heaping on my head.
LORD LINDGREN: There is a lot of difference between 1927 and 1951. I am talking about the first action of the Tory Government in 1951. The noble Lord took my noble friend Lord St. Davids to task, too.
LORD CHESHAM: He misquoted me. That is why.
LORD LINDGREN: The only argument the noble Lord has put forward is that, because we cannot give everybody everything they want, we should give nobody anything.
LORD CHESHAM: No.
LORD LINDGREN: Really, the argument of the noble Lord has been that this concession is to the aged, that it applies only in certain areas; and he asks: why do it piecemeal? My answer is that if you can help somebody but cannot help everybody, why should you not help somebody? Then, the noble Lord was equally inconsistent when he said, "Why do you make this power permissive? Some local authorities will use the powers given them and others will not". I should have thought that the noble Lord, Lord Chesham, would have been more informed in regard to local government activities. My Lords, 90 per cent. of the local government legislation of this country is permissive It starts off, "The local authority may". There are very few Acts of Parliament which start off, "The local authority shall"—and that is why, all over this country, we have a varying system of local government with the standard of services varying from area to area.
One may disagree with this. One may say that there ought to be higher standards. I agree that in a national service such as education there is a control by the Central Government as to minimum standards, but in most local government activity it is permissive. The noble Lord objects to a local authority being able to give a concession to an old-age pensioner on a bus, and yet local authorities are able to give concessions now. There is the opportunity for local authorities, if they so want, to contribute to "Darby and Joan" clubs. The noble Lord, Lord Chesham, is shaking his head, but he objects to this Bill because it does not apply to everybody.
LORD CHESHAM: It could.
LORD LINDGREN: So far as local government legislation is concerned, it is possible for a local authority to make grants towards "Darby and Joan" clubs. Not every local authority does it. But would the noble Lord stop those local authorities that do it and so prevent those old people who can go to "Darby and Joan" clubs from being able to go?
It is equally true that the local authority can make contributions to organisations such as the W.V.S., who do wonderful work with their Meals on Wheels service. Many old-age pensioners,

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particularly men, would never get a square meal if it were not for the W.V.S. and the Meals on Wheels service; but again, not every local authority operates it. Is the noble Lord, Lord Chesham, going to ask the noble Baroness, Lady Swanborough, and her W.V.S. organisation to desist from their Meals on Wheels service because not everybody has the benefit of it? If the noble Lord is not prepared to stop "Darby and Joan" clubs or, the Meals on Wheels service, why does he want to stop the local authority that is prepared to make a concession to its aged?
LORD CHESHAM: I do not.
LORD LINDGREN: Then what is the argument about? All the noble Lord says is: "I do not welcome this Bill but I do not oppose it, so we will do nothing."
LORD REA: My Lords, may I intervene as a non-combatant? Some of us understood the noble Lord, Lord Chesham, to say that he thought this was a good Bill, but that he could conceive of a better.
LORD LINDGREN: My Lords, he dare not say that, because the last Government did nothing. That is what he wants now.
LORD CHESHAM: My Lords, if I may put the record straight, I said it was a bad Bill to do something that was good in principle.
LORD LINDGREN: The noble Lord said it was a bad Bill because it did not distribute equally the benefits arising from it. There is no general social service which is uniform in its application, and therefore I would suggest that any failing was on the part of the last Government for doing nothing during its lifetime. I might suggest to the noble Lord, Lord Inglewood, who became so eloquent about rural transport and the cost of bus services in rural areas, that he consult with the noble Lord, Lord Chesham. The former Administration knew about this problem during their 13 years of government. They even set up the Jack Committee, and when they got Professor Jack's Report they put it in a cupboard; and
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nothing has been done about rural transport.
LORD CHESHAM: Nonsense!
LORD LINDGREN: We are only just taking the Report out to do something about it. So all I have to say is that this is a Bill, I will agree, that only does a little for some people. I have gone through life doing what I could for anybody I could whenever I could. If I could only get half a loaf for someone, then I got that half. Reference has been made to councillors, that they should not ride on buses. Even the noble Lord, Lord Amulree, objects to councillors having rides in buses.
LORD AMULREE: My Lords, on the contrary, I said I thought that councillors should be able to be refunded for any fares they spent when travelling on municipal transport. I said they should be refunded for everything.
LORD LINDGREN: The present law is that councillors cannot claim their fares within their own areas except where they travel over three miles. I never knew that noble Lords objected to railway directors, who used to have a golden pass and were able to travel anywhere. They had never done a job on the railways. All they did was to attend board meetings, yet they had concessionary fares, which were, in fact, free. My Lords, I think I have answered all the points except—
SEVERAL NOBLE LORDS: Oh, Oh!
LORD LINDGREN: Well, if any noble Lord wants any more answers I am prepared to give them. I think I have answered all points except the one with regard to cost. Of course the cost is very little, but it must vary. If you are going to apply this in a comparatively small borough, and then apply it in Manchester or in Birmingham, the difference in cost to the local authorities must vary. There will be a slight Exchequer contribution, because, as noble Lords know, the Government make a small grant to the local authorities in regard to the General Fund.
I am asked whether the local authorities approve the Bill. Yes, my Lords, they approve this Bill, but of course most of the municipal corporations and the urban district councils would have liked some extra concessions, in order that the local authorities should have the power to

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make a contribution to the non-municipal undertakings. The noble Lord, Lord Inglewood, said that he objected to the fact that the Bill does not give the local authorities the right, if they so desire, to make a contribution to the non-municipal undertakings. If they were allowed that, and did not take it, the situation would be worse than it is now. The claim he made earlier was that only 95 local authorities who run their own municipal transport undertakings could benefit by this.
My Lords, I know that a Second Reading will be given to this Bill. I think it is a good Bill because it does good to a good number of people. Later, I hope, there will be the opportunity to give the same advantage to other people.
LORD CHESHAM: My Lords, before the noble Lord sits down—
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (LORD GARDINER): My Lords, the noble Lord has sat down.
LORD CHESHAM: My Lords, with the greatest possible respect, I should like to use this formula to add one more question. All I was going to ask is, if it should be necessary, that the noble Lord will accept my apologies if in the course of my speech I did not make my arguments clear to his side of the House—although noble Lords on this side of the House seemed to have understood it—and whether, in that case, he will be so good as to read my speech in the OFFICIAL REPORT. In this case I think he would not have said the things that he did say.
LORD LINDGREN: Certainly, my Lords, I read all the speeches.
A NOBLE LORD: Good Heavens!
LORD LINDGREN: My Lords, that is one of the burdens of office.
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE BILL [H.L.]
5.18 p.m.
Order of the Day for the House to be put into Committee read.
Moved, That the House do now resolve itself into Committee.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House in Committee accordingly.
[The LORD MERTHYR in the Chair.]
Clauses 1 to 7 agreed to.
Clause 8 [Provision of money for making good default of Accountant General with respect to funds in Supreme Court]:
THE LORD CHANCELLOR THE LORD CHANCELLOR moved to leave out paragraphs (a) and (b) and to insert instead:
"has been guilty of any default with respect to any money, securities or effects in the Supreme Court".
The noble and learned Lord said: This is a drafting Amendment. The object of the clause was and is to protect a suitor's funds against any loss arising from an act of default of the Accountant-General, but as worded in the clause it applies only if the failure relates to money, securities or effects
"required by an order of the court or of the Mental Health Authority to be paid, transferred or delivered by"
the Accountant-General. This provision would not cover every failure on the part of the Accountant-General: for example, money paid into court in satisfaction of a claim may be taken out without a court order, and there are other such cases. The Amendment, by referring simply to "any default with respect to" any funds in the Supreme Court covers these possibilities.
Amendment moved—
Page 8, leave out lines 24 to 30 and insert the said new words.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: This is consequential on the previous Amendment. The words left out refer back to the words left out by that Amendment and are therefore no longer appropriate. I beg to move accordingly.
Amendment moved—
Page 8, line 32, leave out from ("for") to ("making") in line 34.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 8, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 9 agreed to.
Clause 10 [Amendment of section 171(1) of County Courts Act 1959]:
THE LORD CHANCELLOR THE LORD CHANCELLOR moved to leave out Clause 10 and insert the following new clause:
Provision of money for making good default of Accountant General with respect to funds in county courts.
10. If the Lord Chancellor, whether on a representation made to him by any person interested or not, certifies that the Accountant General has been guilty of any default with respect to any money or securities in a county court in England or Wales, such sum as the Lord Chancellor certifies to be necessary for making good the default shall be paid out of moneys provided by Parliament or, if and so far as it is not so paid, shall be charged on and issued out of the Consolidated Fund.
The noble and learned Lord said: This Amendment, in a sense, is consequential. It is giving the same sort of guarantee to the suitor in relation to funds in the county court as the Committee have just been considering in the case of the Supreme Court. The Amendment brings the guarantee given to suitors' funds in the county courts into line. As drafted, Clause 10 amends Section 171(1) of the County Courts Act so as to bring it into line with the unamended version of Clause 8. The Amendment substitutes a new Clause 10. This does not operate on Section 171 of the County Courts Act, but it provides for county court funds a guarantee corresponding to that given in Clause 8, as now amended. In consequence, there is no reason for retaining Section 171, which will be wholly repealed by Schedule 3, as is done by a later Amendment, at page 38, line 46. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Leave out Clause 10 and insert the said new clause.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clauses 11 to 17 agreed to.
Clause 18 [Interpretation of Part I and Schedule 1]:
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: The object of this Amendment is to correct a
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printing error. In a definition clause, it is usual to put the words or phrases to be defined in alphabetical order, disregarding the word "the". Owing to a printer's error, "Su"—for Supreme Court—is put in front of "St"—for statutory. If the Committee approve this Amendment, everything will be in beautiful alphabetical order, and then everybody will be happy. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 16, leave out lines 1 and 2.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: This Amendment is consequential. It is in substance the same point. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 16, line 10, at end insert "the Supreme Court means the Supreme Court of Judicature in England".—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 18, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 19:
Control in certain cases, of money recovered under Fatal Accidents Acts
19.—(1) Where, in any proceedings instituted in Her Majesty's High Court of Justice in England. a county court in England or Wales or the Mayor's and City of London Court,

(a) money is or has been recovered by or on behalf of, or adjudged or ordered or agreed to be paid to, or for the benefit of, a widow in satisfaction of a claim made by her or on her behalf under the Fatal Accidents Acts 1846 to 1959 or

(b) money paid into court is or has been accepted by or on behalf of a widow in satisfaction of such a claim as is mentioned in paragraph (a) above:

then, if the proceedings were for the benefit also of a person who, when the money is or was recovered, or adjudged or ordered or agreed to be paid, or accepted, is or was an infant, the money shall, so long as he remains an infant, be subject to be dealt with in like manner as money recovered in proceedings brought by an infant is subject to he dealt with.
THE CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES (LORD MERTHYR): It has been suggested that the four Amendments which are set down to Clause 19 may conveniently be debated together. It is not for me to say, but I apprehend that it may be convenient to the Committee to do this, but I must, of course, call the Amendments separately and individually.
LORD SILKIN: Before the noble Lord proceeds, perhaps I ought to make clear that we must reserve the right to ask the Committee to come to a decision on any particular Amendment, though I think that it would be convenient to discuss them altogether.
LORD DILHORNE: May I say a word before the noble Lord moves his Amendment? I was going to suggest taking this course, because the issue is plain, though the views on it may be very different. I think that it will be convenient to discuss the whole subject at one go.
THE CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES: As I said, it is a matter entirely for the Committee. But I must call the Amendments separately, if the noble Lord, Lord Silkin, wishes to speak on any particular one, he can do so, as many times as he likes.
5.23 p.m.
LORD CHORLEYmoved, in subsection (1), to leave out the words immediately following paragraph (b), down to and including "was an infant,". The noble Lord said: This is the first of three Amendments which go together and stand in my name. This matter is a good deal more controversial, though not in any Party sense, than anything that has happened so far this afternoon. The object is to give effect to a recommendation of the Pearson Committee that courts should still exercise control, within their discretion, of awards made under the Fatal Accidents Acts, to widows without children.
This matter was fairly and clearly put before the House or the Second Reading by the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor, who gave both sides, and we heard a speech from the noble and learned Lord, Lord Dilhorne, putting a case against the Pearson proposal. As the Bill stands, it is the Bill produced from the famous "cupboard", to which we have had so much reference. The noble and learned Lord who sits on the Woolsack said that we ought to go into this matter carefully at this stage of the Bill. I entirely agree and I expressed my agreement with him in my own Second Reading speech.
I find it difficult to make up my mind on this point, but I feel that we have a duty to the community to come to a
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decision on it. It is one to which the Pearson Committee gave a great deal of thought and it is a matter of considerable social importance. A few days ago, when I found that no Amendments had been put down, I felt that I was under a duty to move some sort of Amendment, and thinking that the easiest way of giving rise to a discussion about it was to move to leave out the clause altogether, this was what I did. Some of your Lordships will have seen the Amendment which I first put down. Afterwards, however, the Lord Chancellor's Department kindly provided me with a much better Amendment, or series of Amendments, which it was suggested I should put down, instead of the rather brutal course of just moving to leave out the clause; and I found myself happy to do so.
The Amendments are admirably drafted and have the effect of carrying out much more carefully the recommendation of the Pearson Committee, who advised that the position should be dealt with by Statute and not left as it stood. I hope to explain the reasons in a moment or two, but I think that it would be to the advantage of the Committee if, before doing so, I were to go over quickly the reasons of substance why I have come to the conclusion that the recommendation of the Pearson Committee is best both in the public interest and in the interest of the widows in question.
The Fatal Accidents Acts provide for compensation to widows whose husbands have been killed in certain circumstances. There are obviously two kinds of cases—widows with children and those without. In both cases, in the past, the courts have had discretion to keep their hand upon the money which is paid into court and not just to hand it over to the widow to deal with as she liked. I think that everybody agrees with the Pearson Committee that when there are children there should be some safeguard and some control over the money. My noble friend Lord Silkin is anxious to remove some of the control as well, but I am concerned with the position of the widow who has no children.
The question of substance is whether there should still be a discretion to the court, in proper cases, to keep control over this money, or whether in all cases it should be paid straight out to the

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widow, so that she is entirely free to deal with it in any way she likes. For instance, somebody might meet her outside court with an attractive proposition for the investment of the money in a fish-and-chip shop, and before she knows where she is, she may be landed with a shop which is valueless and the money will have gone down the drain.
Obviously there are arguments why women should be treated like everybody else, and if a woman in this position wishes to spend her money in that way, she should be free to do so. Naturally, the women's organisations have strongly pressed on the Pearson Committee that she should be free in that way. It is a matter of fairness between the sexes. It is also argued very much that so long as we subject women to controls of this kind they will not be free agents properly working in the community, but will continue to labour under the sort of disadvantages which have been only too evident in the past.
It has been pointed out that in Scotland, and I think in Northern Ireland, too, there is no such control—although it is significant that Lord MacDermott, Chief Justice of Northern Ireland, and a member of the Judicial Committee of your Lordships' House, having seen the Pearson Report, expressed the view, from his long experience of judicial administration, that it would be much better for Northern Ireland that there should be there the same sort of control that the Pearson Committee would like to retain in this country.
I do not think I can do better than read to your Lordships the argument as it is put in the Pearson Report, at the bottom of page 22, where they say:
"… we are of opinion that the Court's power to control the investment and application of widows' damages even in the case of widows without dependent children should be continued. The point which seems to us to be ultimately decisive is a very simple one. Take the case of a widow who has never before controlled any larger sum than £10 or £20 or £50 at most, and has no special education or training or experience of financial or business affairs, and suppose that she is awarded a sum which (as appears from the illustrations given in paragraph 15 of this Report) may be as large as £5,000 or £6,618. Is it sensible that a sum of that magnitude should be placed forthwith at her unfettered and unaided disposal, and is it fair to expect her to devise a sound scheme of investment
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and a proper regime of utilisation? In our view, plainly not. The majority of widows, used to receiving their housekeeping money weekly, have no training or experience in the handling of sums running into four figures. There is a minority of widows who are perfectly capable of handling large sums of money and of distinguishing clearly between capital and income. The Court should have a discretionary power and should exercise it in such a way that the majority will have their money controlled for them and the minority will have their money released to them immediately or at an early stage."
The Committee go on to underline the fact that this power is discretionary, and should remain discretionary. They say:
"We suggest that the money should be directed to be paid to the widow whenever the Court is satisfied that control of the money is not necessary for the purpose of securing the sufficient preservation and prudent application of the money: otherwise the money should be directed to be paid into or retained in Court. It should be incumbent on the widow, personally or by her solicitor or counsel, to satisfy the Court on this point, because the Court will often need information as to the widow's situation and resources and expectations as a guide to the decision …"
I think that that statement puts the case very well. It is not surprising, as the noble and learned Lord pointed out, that, on the whole, the weight of the evidence given to the Pearson Committee was favourable to that point of view. The Law Society were in favour of it. The Bar Council were divided, although it is true that a majority were in favour of the proposal in the Bill. The General Council of the Trades Union Congress has a large experience of this, because most of these cases arise from fatal accidents which occur in industry, and clearly most of them are cases in which those who are killed are trade unionists, whose widows are the claimants for compensation.
It seems to me that, in a sense, this is not the widow's accident. I appreciate that, on the technical legal side, it is a quite separate claim from anything the husband would have had if he had not died as a result of the accident. Nevertheless, taking it in a broad way, it is the husband's accident that has led to the claim. It is not like a case where a woman who has been injured in a motor car accident is awarded damages and should be allowed to spend them. This is a case where the compensation arises out of an accident to the husband; and if we ask ourselves what the husband

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would have wished. the answer obviously would be that his widow, in a proper case, should receive some protection.
It may well be that the husband would be satisfied that his wife was a woman who wore the breeches in the household and was competent to control any money awarded. But in a large number of these cases the women are middle-aged or elderly and, as the Pearson Report pointed out, have had little experience of handling large sums of money. That being so, it seems to me that in the national interest, in their own interest, and following out what one feels the husbands would have wished, on the whole, the arguments in favour of accepting the proposal of the Pearson Report are made out. Thy, main reason why it should be done in this way is that the courts have been exercising this jurisdiction for a long time without any clear authority to do so. I spent some time puzzling over this in the Library. There is nothing in the Fatal Accidents Acts which establishes the right. It is in the Rules of Court, but it is doubtful whether the rule-makers have the power to establish a rule of this kind. The Pearson Committee thought that, if this policy was to continue, it was only right that it should have statutory sanction.
There is another reason, perhaps not of quite such moment. The new clause, if it is put into effect, will result in putting the county court, in those rare cases where the county court might have jurisdiction over a case of this kind—and in the rather less rare case (because its jurisdiction is much wider) of the City of London Court—on the same footing as the High Court. It is obviously in the interests of everybody that there should be uniformity in regard to this matter. That is the reason why it is suggested that, instead of just excluding Clause 19 altogether, and leaving the matter as it stands at Common Law, it is desirable that this discretion in the court should be established by Statute, and that it should be established in such a way that county courts, the City of London Court and other courts which have jurisdiction over this type of case should be in the same position as the High Court, and there should be uniformity in regard to these matters. I hope that I have been able to explain this Amendment
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sufficiently clearly to your Lordships. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 16, line 25, leave out lines 25 to 27.—(Lord Chorley.)
5.38 p.m.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: I think it may be of assistance to the Committee if I say a word at this stage, because this is a question which affects quite a large number of people. So far as I can see, it has nothing to do with Party politics, and therefore is eminently a matter to be decided by the Committee itself. For a very long time the court has always exercised control over sums of money awarded to infants and to those of unsound mind. I am sure there is no member of the Committee who would not think that that was proper.
However, more than fifty years ago, in the Workmen's Compensation Act, it was provided that if a workman died as a result of an accident arising out of and in the course of his employment compensation was payable for the benefit of his dependants, including his widow; and that the payment in the case of death, unless otherwise provided, should be paid into court and any sums so paid into the court should be subject to the Rules of Court and so on. It further provided that it should be applied or otherwise dealt with by the court in such manner as the court in its discretion thinks fit for the benefit of the persons entitled thereto under the Act.
For the last forty years the High Court has done the same in the case of damages awarded to a widow in a fatal accidents case. The nature of those damages is this. These are not damages awarded for the pain and suffering caused to a widow by the death of her husband. It is an action which lies, not merely for widows, but for dependants of the deceased man, against the man by whose fault the death was caused; and it is monetary compensation to the extent of the degree to which the widow or children or other dependants were depending on the deceased. So normally the way of assessing the damages is to see what the deceased man earned, what he would have been likely to earn in the future, and for how long he would have been likely to remain in work. One then looks to see whether he gave the whole earnings to his wife, keeping only £2 or £3 for drinks and

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cigarettes, or whether he gave her £5 for the housekeeping money, and kept the rest for himself. Another question is who paid for the holidays. It is a cold assessment of the value of the deceased to dependants, both widows and children.
As between widows and children, while the court has to specify how much is awarded to the widow and how much to the children, in principle the greater part is awarded to the widow. For example, mention is made of specimen cases in the Pearson Report: £1,500 to the widow, £200 to the younger child, and £150 to the older child; £2,375 to the widow, £75 to one child, and £100 to each of the three other children; £5,000 to the widow, £150 to the elder son, £200 to the elder daughter; £6,618 to the widow, and £175 to each of the two children. The reason for the marked disparity, considering that the whole family was financially dependent on the deceased, is that the sums awarded to widows are awarded with the knowledge that she will spend most of her money, not only on herself, but also in bringing up the children.
It is usual for the money to be transferred to the county court, and thereafter the dependants can always apply to the county court to take money out for any purpose which the court may feel a perfectly reasonable purpose. The sort of purposes for which the money is in fact paid out on the application of the widow are for monthly payments—there may be a monthly payment over a long period—or for clothing for the widow or the children; the cost of a holiday; school fees; equipment and other educational expenses; tools of trade, books and special clothing (for example, for a boy being apprenticed, or a girl entering the nursing or other profession); the purchase of a house; repairs and decorations of a house or flat: purchase of furniture; paying off a mortgage; purchase of a business; purchase of a motor cycle or car, and expenses of the widow's re-marriage. The average period for which the money in fact remains in court is five and a half years.
It is in those circumstances that your Lordships have to choose between three alternatives—some purists say that you cannot have more than two alternatives, but on the assumption that you can, there are here three. One is to leave the law
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as it is giving the court a discretion, where the court thinks it right, to order damages awarded to a widow to be paid into court. I think it is true to say that normally it does so. But the judge sees the particular widow, and if she is a woman who has had her own business, and he thinks that she is obviously capable of looking after money, he does not make such an order. That is one alternative, and that is the alternative for which my noble friend Lord Chorley has contended—to leave the law as it is.
The second alternative, which I think my noble friends Lord Silkin and Lady Summerskill support, is to remove the control. The arguments for that have not yet been heard. They are fairly obvious. One is that there should be no difference between the sexes that a woman is as well able to look after herself as a man is. If a woman is injured and awarded £500, the court does not try to control that. Why, it is said, should they do so in a fatal accidents case? That is the second alternative.
The third alternative is that provided for in the Bill, which is to retain a power of control where there are dependent children, but not otherwise. I might remind the Committee that the Pearson Committee were not really appointed to look into this question at all. There had been no serious complaints against the law as it is. What there had been complaints about was the way in which the court had invested the money, notably in gilt-edged securities, so that many such people lost a good deal, instead of their money appreciating by the court's looking after it.
The object of this Bill as a whole is to make other arrangements, the nature of which were discussed on Second Reading. Some of those who gave evidence before the Committee referred to these points and, so far as the dependent children are concerned, the view expressed by many is that if a widow was persuaded by some plausible man to invest all the money in some bankrupt business and she lost it, then, of course, all that would he left for the family would be what had been awarded to the children and, obviously, must be had by them.
The National Joint Committee of Working Women's Organisations said:
"… there are important practical reasons for continuing the present practice in the case

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of widows with dependent children … But in many cases the widow concerned is in the same position as her deceased husband, in having had no experience of the control or investment of funds. If the money recovered in damages were placed at her own disposal, she might not know where to turn for good financial advice, and might take the advice of her friends, quite honestly given, to the financial disadvantage of herself and her family. The power of the Court to control her money is a protection to her and her children, and it is a relief to a widow. worried by her changed circumstances and anxious about her children's future, to have the matter taken care of by the court … The National Joint Committee believes that widows with no dependent children should be in the same position as other adult persons recovering damages."
So this was a middle view, and it is a middle view which the Bill—which, I make plain, had been prepared when the noble and learned Lord, Lord Dilhorne, was Lord Chancellor—propounds as a solution: the intermediate course of retaining control where there are children, but abolishing it where are none. At the moment, I do not propose to trouble your Lordships with my own view, but I thought it desirable at this stage to explain the way in which the matter comes before the Committee.
LORD DILHORNE: I am grateful to the noble and learned Lord, the Lord Chancellor, for his exposition. I should have been more grateful if he had explained his own view at this moment. I can say that when this Bill was being worked upon, I think the most difficult and controversial question was the question now before us. The views of members of all Parties differ on this matter, and there was a wide difference of view, both in the legal profession and in bodies outside the legal profession. I myself gave much thought to this problem, and I support, for the reasons I am going to indicate, the clause now nut forward by the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack.
As the Report of the Pearson Committee shows, and as we have been reminded by the noble Lord, Lord Chorley, the Trades Union Congress and the Law Society are of the opinion that the court should retain control over the sums awarded under the Fatal Accidents Acts to all widows, whether or not there are dependants. Their views are supported by Masters and others who have had experience in dealing with such widows, and the Pearson
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Committee recommended that this should continue. Of course, the recommendations of a Committee of that authority, backed as they are by those bodies, deserve the most serious consideration. Having reflected upon this, and having had discussions upon it with a number of people who have been interested, I must say that I do not myself share the view expressed by the Pearson Committee and expressed by the noble Lord, Lord Chorley, to-day. Of course, the power to exercise control is discretionary, but I do not think—and I shall be corrected if I am wrong—that there are many cases in which the courts have failed to exercise their discretion and retain control, and I doubt whether there will be very many cases in the future where they would not do so.
It must also be borne in mind that it is only the damages awarded to a widow under the Fatal Accidents Acts that are subject to control. If she suffers personal injuries so extensive as to deprive her of her earning capacity and she gets a substantial sum of damages, the courts exercise no control over how she spends those damages, part of which—and it may be the most substantial part—are assessed to compensate for her loss of income.
The Pearson Committee based their conclusion on the passage of their Report to which the noble Lord, Lord Chorley, referred. They stressed that the point which seemed to them to be ultimately decisive was a very simple one, drew attention to the fact that damages awarded might be £5,000 or £6,618, and posed the question:
"Is it sensible that a sum of that magnitude should be placed forthwith at her unfettered and unaided disposal, and is it fair to expect her to devise a sound scheme of investment and a proper regime of utilisation? In our view, plainly not."
That reasoning surely applies with equal force to a widow who receives, as it may be, an even larger sum for personal injuries.
Although, as the noble and learned Lord, the Lord Chancellor, has said, a claim under the Fatal Accidents Acts differs in essence from a claim for damages for personal injuries, the basis of the Pearson Committee's Report for their view that the control should remain was the largeness of the sum which might be awarded and the unfitness

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of the widow to look after it herself. Whatever force there is in that, the same must surely apply in relation to a large sum awarded for personal injuries to a widow who may be, as I have said, entirely deprived of her earning capacity. Yet it is not suggested—and so far as I am aware, never has been—that sums of that magnitude awarded for damages for personal injuries should be subject to control of the courts. Nor has one heard of such widows being assailed by vendors of bankrupt businesses and by people seeking to deprive them of their money; but that is the argument that is regularly advanced when this subject comes under discussion in relation to the damages obtained by a widow under the Fatal Accidents Acts.
I do not understand why it should be assumed that in these days a widow would be wholly unable to make proper disposition of a large sum awarded to her. After all, in these days a widow is likely to be advised by solicitors and counsel, and there may be a trade union behind her. What is there to stop the court saying to the widow at the time of the award something on these lines: "This is a very large sum. Our advice to you is to go straight away to a bank manager at your nearby bank and take his advice and lodge the money with him"? Why should we continue to have—I am leaving on one side for the moment widows with dependants—this rather paternal attitude on the part of the courts only where damages are awarded to a widow under the Fatal Accidents Acts?
I myself prefer the view of the National Joint Council of Working Women's Associations that widows with no dependent children should be in the same position as other adult persons recovering damages. This is the same position as the Bar Council accepted by a majority, and the Solicitors' Managing Clerks' Association, whose evidence was published in paragraph 29 of the Pearson Committee's Report, said that it was the opinion of the Association that widowhood does not of necessity entail diminished reasoning powers. They went on to say:
"In our opinion, when damages awarded under the Fatal Accidents Acts are being considered, it is not equitable that women should be placed in the same category as infants and
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persons of unsound mind because they have the misfortune to be widows."
I think the clause is right in removing the control where the widow has no infant dependant, but the noble Lord, Lord Chorley, takes the view that that control should remain. All I can say is that I know there is a wide difference of opinion about this, but I do not myself think the case for retaining that control is made out. I think, therefore, the clause is right in removing it where there are no infant dependants.
What I think is a more difficult question is whether there should continue to be control where there are infant dependants. The present practice, as the noble and learned Lord, the Lord Chancellor, has said, where there are dependants is to award the major part of the damages to the widow in the belief, which is usually well-founded, that she will use them for the benefit of her children as well as of herself. I think it is right that control over sums awarded to infants themselves should continue to be, and also that it is right that sums awarded to the widow in the belief that they will be used to some extent for the support of the children should also be, controlled.
When I was responsible for dealing with this matter, I considered the possibility of altering the practice by securing that larger sums were awarded to the infants and less to the widow, leaving the widow free from control. But I think the Pearson Committee are right in their conclusion that there is no advantage in such a change of practice. They deal with this in paragraph 27 of their Report: that there would have to be provided periodical contributions from the infants' funds for upkeep of the household, and cases might well occur where the widow, having spent her own funds, had to be supported and the family home kept going from drawings from the children's funds.
The noble and learned Lord, the Lord Chancellor, said that we have three alternatives; I would say, without any wish to be pedantic, that we have three choices. They are: leaving the law as it is, as the noble Lord, Lord Chorley, proposes; the choice of removing the control entirely even where there are dependants; and the course proposed by the Bill. Some may think that it is a compromise—it may be put forward as such—between completely opposed views; but

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whether that be the right view or not, I think it is right and justified for keeping control in that category of cases, but in that category of cases alone. I see no reason at all why a widow who has no infant dependants, because she has had a claim which has succeeded under the Fatal Accidents Acts, should be treated differently from any other adult male or female or spinster in relation to an award of damages under this heading, particularly when, no matter how large may be tie award, she is free to dispose of it as she wishes, should her action he for personal injuries, for negligence or nuisance or something of that kind.
While saying this. I hope, if the Bill stays as it now is—and I certainly strongly support the view that it should—that steps will be taken by the courts, when large awards are made to widows without dependants under the Fatal Accidents Acts, to draw to the attention of the widows the advisability of obtaining advice with regard to the investment of the money. If this is done, and done when the award is given, before any of these vendors of bankrupt businesses, et cetera, can approach the widow, I believe that in the vest majority of cases that advice will be taken and it will remedy the evil to which the Pearson Committee drew attention when they referred to the inability of such widows to look after their own affairs.
LORD SILKIN: Bath the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor and the noble and learned Lord. Lord Dilhorne, referred to three courses which it is possible to take on this clause under this Bill. The noble Lord, Lord Chorley, advocated complete control. He wishes to go further than the Bill itself. I have an Amendment on the Marshalled List which seeks to give to the widow complete control over any money that is awarded to her. That is to say, I neither agree with the noble Lord, Lord Chorley, nor agree entirely with the noble Lord, Lord Dilhorne.
I was very sorry indeed that Lord Dilhorne did not go a little further along his line of argument, because I agreed with almost everything he said, until he came to his conclusion that we ought still to retain control in respect of a widow with children. Once he has accepted the position that a widow with-
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out children should be allowed to deal with her damages as she likes, I cannot see that the fact that there are infant children, who are awarded monies for themselves which remain under control, should make any difference. She is no less able to look after her money because she has children than she would be if she had no children. I thought therefore that his argument was a non sequitur.
I want to look at this question from the human point of view. I regard all this control over widows' damages as being a piece of out-of-date sex discrimination. It appertains to the 19th century, and I thought that we had done everything we could and had gone a very long way to removing all sex discrimination. If you argue this on the basis that a widow is not fit to control a large sum of money and therefore you ought to control it, then you ought to take the same line with all other people who are not fit to control a large sum of money. Why do you restrict it to a widow? Why not a man? Would you suggest that every man who comes into a large sum of money and who has not had experience of dealing with big sums is fit to control a large amount? Why not retain damages that are awarded to a man in court, and ask him to go to the registrar every time he wants to buy a piece of furniture or go for a holiday or buy clothes, as at present widows have to do in this humiliating way?
After all, we have removed a great many sex discriminations since the time when the Fatal Accidents Acts were passed. Women now have the vote; they now sit in Parliament; they even sit in this House. I do not know what my noble friend Lady Summer-skill is going to say. But I think there is very little sex discrimination left. This is just one piece of it, one tiny piece. Even the widow who recovers damages in respect of her husband's death, if she is fortunate enough to come to an agreement without having to go to court, can retain all her damages and spend it just as she likes. It is only when the case comes into court that the court has control over her money. In my own experience, when I was in active practice dealing with this kind of case. I have settled scores of these cases before they actually went to court, before issuing a writ, and one was then able to hand over the whole of the money to the

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widow. I should like to say this—again I do not want to draw on my own experience, because it is limited. In fact, I have never come across a widow who has misused her money or got rid of it in an improper way. I found widows as careful as anyone else.
This restriction does not apply, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Dilhorne, said, to a woman who meets with an accident and recovers a large sum of money. If one wanted to protect her one ought to have the same principle of keeping the money in court. She may even have children, but we do not say, "Because you have children you are less able to look after your money and therefore you must keep it in court, and go to the registrar of the county court every time you want to spend a little money, and leave it to him to say whether the fur coat you may want to buy it too expensive or you ought not to have a grand piano or television set because you cannot afford it." We do not do that in the case of a person who has met with an accident, even if she is a widow with children. My own experience is that women are actually much more careful with money than are men.
It is true that the present practice has existed for a great many years. What an opportunity this Bill gives for reviewing the whole practice and removing the last piece of sex discrimination in this sphere! I hope that the Committee will be prepared to go one step further than the Bill itself. The Bill removes some of the discrimination; it goes a little of the way and deals with a widow without children. But I want to emphasise that the widow with children is just as capable of looking after money as is the widow without children. I hope that the noble and learned Lord, Lord Dilhorne, will be prepared, even after his speech, to travel this little bit of the way with me and support the further step I am asking the Committee to take.
It is, as I said, a human question. It is a question of how we regard one half of the human race. Are we men to say that women are not capable of looking after their affairs and therefore we must go on looking after them in this limited field? I think it is humiliating that a woman should be subjected to this kind
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of discrimination. I very much hope the Committee will be prepared to go all the way and remove this discrimination from the Bill.
6.9 p.m.
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: About 1880 (I think it was 1879; I am not quite sure of the date of the Married Women's Property Act) a Bill was introduced in this House, and it was framed in order that the husband's control of his wife's money should be removed. I would invite my noble friend Lord Chorley to read the reports of the debates on that occasion. I felt as I listened to him to-day that many of the men who spoke then, the ghosts of this House, would have applauded him. They said, "My Lords, how can we for one moment let a woman control her own money?"—not any of her husband's money, but money she had when she got married—"she is less intelligent than a man. She has little common sense. She is emotional. She will be so easily moved to do something wrong and wicked with any money she might control". When it was suggested that her husband could be a drunkard, a gambler, the worst type of tyrant or irresponsible individual, it was nevertheless said in that debate that he was male and, therefore, superior.
My noble friend Lord Chorley has pursued that argument to-day, and we come here and ask you, just as many progressive people in the 1880s came to this House and asked, that a woman should be allowed to control her own money. I do not think that now I have to argue with your Lordships—it has already been proved—that the convolutions of a woman's brain are exactly the same in number as those in a man. There is only one individual here (he is sitting on the end of the other Bench) whom I think I should have to convince that perhaps women might even serve his profession as well as a man. What we have to do to-day, if there is to be a Division, is to convince just a few here that the time has come when the law must be changed.
I was most moved when I heard my noble friend Lord Silkin speak. I had never heard him emotional before on behalf of women, and having sat behind him, listening, my respect for him soars. In fact, I thought that after his speech there was no need for me to speak. I

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came completely to support him. But I must tell him that if we support the attitude of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Dilhorne—and, in fact, the attitude of my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor—I feel that we shall have won 99 per cent. of the case.
Nevertheless, may I just remind your Lordships of the life of the individual whom we are discussing? I may tell your Lordships that I practised in medicine in a not-to-well-off part of London, and I have in mind a family that I know so well. The man might get killed and leave a widow. I must just say here, in parenthesis, that I have never known any of these women deceived by somebody with a bogus business. I want to remind your Lordships that in this particular family life the man, a trade unionist, uses an expression which always warms my heart. He says "I have earned so much to take home." He says "to take home": that is the accepted expression. And he takes it home and, in most cases, gives the majority of his earnings to his wife. She is the "Chancellor of the Exchequer." This is the woman who pays the rent, the coal, the heating, everything, and she makes the savings. We heard last year that savings in the country had increased. It all depends upon this efficient little woman, of high integrity, prepared to sacrifice things for herself if there is not enough to go round for her husband and children.
But suppose, one day, terrible accident comes, and the husband is killed. When that happens, this woman's basic character does not change overnight. She does not become a flibbertigibbet. She does not become irresponsible. She does not lose her common sense, her integrity, her shrewdness—the shrewdness which has helped her to maintain her family all these years. She is equally shrewd when somebody has a bogus business. This shrewd woman, who has conducted the home so well for years, does not become a changed individual.
Now and then, when I read the papers, I read the investment page, as I read fiction, because I know little about these things; but I am always struck by the fact that often the people who write about investments in the newspapers say that to-day the most successful investors are women, that they hold a vast number of shares in this country. I
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always read this comment with interest. The writers always say the same thing: that the women are so successful because they are shrewd; they always weigh up the position carefully, and they are not precipitate. I think that those words might well be borne in mind by many men.
And, by the way, women are not, by nature, gamblers. So many people say, when they look in betting shops, that women use them. I invite your Lordships to peep in sometimes, as I often do. You may see one woman there; but the place is packed with men. It is the men who gamble; it is the men who can be taken in by bogus vendors of some shop. It is not these shrewd women. Therefore, it seems to me quite absurd that, suddenly, when they have this appalling blow of losing the man they love—which is the worst blow to a woman—the law says, "Now we must see to it that this woman is controlled; that she must come to us if she wants some more clothes. She must come to us if she wants a little holiday." I feel that in this House, where I have recognised already that your Lordships are always responsive to an argument based on equity, your Lordships realise that the time has come when this state of affairs must be changed.
The other argument, of course, is: "Well, all this is very well. We will accept the fact that she is a good manager. But when her man goes, another man will come along, and then she will be a changed personality." We have heard already that most of these women are middle-aged and elderly; so do not let us be too worried about that possibility. I agree that a spinster with money who wants a husband, a home and children may be tempted to part with her money, because she knows that a prerequisite to a family is a man. Yet, curiously enough, apparently the law it prepared to allow a spinster to retain a large amount of money which she gets through damages. So it is the spinster who might need protection. We allow her to be vulnerable to any adventurer who might come along. We let her get married. So I am afraid that the law is not logical in these matters. The law does not understand the mind of women, because the law is always expounded by men; and, for the most part, the law

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is written by men. But on this occasion I am pleased to find that our lawyers here to-day, with the exception of my noble friend Lord Chorley, who I believe has a law qualification, realise that the widow should be given her freedom.
Finally, I should like to say that a widow with experience knows that her best friend is her bank balance. I think your Lordships realise that. If we were talking about protecting the widower, I would not be so dogmatic, because it is a commonplace for us to read of the children of a first marriage contesting a will because they allege that their father has been subjected to undue influence by a young woman who subsequently became his wife. We see this time after time in our newspapers. Do we often see that a widow has been exploited and deceived? Of course not. I ask your Lordships to realise that the provision which we are seeking to remove is an anachronism which stems from the 19th century.
6.20 p.m.
LORD COLERAINE: I am not a lawyer; nor am I one of those progressive persons to whom the noble Lady referred who existed, she told us, in this House even as long ago, as 1879. Perhaps it is inappropriate for me even to attempt to say a word on this subject, but I am emboldened to do so if only because this is the first occasion, either in this House or in another place when I have listened to a speech from the noble Lady and have entirely agreed with her.
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: Thank you.
LORD COLERAINE: I feel that that fact of itself is worth registering. As I understand this issue, it is the case that under the law as it stands a widow is treated as an infant. That may be the law to-day, but it seems to me quite inconceivable that we should allow it to continue to be the law in 1964, as I understand the noble Lord, Lord Chorley, would have us do. It seems to me to be a ludicrous conception that we should regard a widow, merely because she is a widow, as an infant.
The noble Lady produced some powerful arguments in support of her view. I myself, as a layman, think I would go a little further than she and agree with the noble Lord, Lord Silkin. It is
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surely reasonable, if the widow is not to be regarded as an infant, that if she is conjoined with an infant (if that is the correct term) in damages she should not be regarded as an infant so far as her own affairs are concerned merely because the infant is an infant. I gather that Lord Silkin proposes that the two should be separated, and that the widow should be regarded as an adult human being, while the infant's rights would be safeguarded by the court.
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: That is my proposition.
LORD DILHORNE: Does the noble Lord realise that that involves difficulty in the reassessment of damages? Now the major part goes to the widow on the basis that she will look after the infant.
LORD COLERAINE: I did not realise that. I can see that that would make some difference; but, as a layman, I would go as far as was practicable in recognising that a widow is, in fact, an adult human being.
BARONESS GAITSKELL: I should like to intervene, very briefly, in support of my noble friends Lord Silkin and Lady Summerskill. I do not always agree with Lady Summerskill on nonpolitical matters, but this is an instance in which I am wholly with her. But I am particularly with my noble friend Lord Silkin. I want to go all the way on this.
I am most touched by the gallant and old-fashioned legal argument which runs something like this. If a widow is only hurt and is compensated, she gets the money; if a widower is hurt and compensated, he gets the money; only if a woman's husband is killed does the law become solicitous and suddenly ask the question, "What would her husband have preferred? What would he have liked?" This seems to me to be utterly illogical, especially as we have heard this afternoon that, in some cases, the courts themselves which have held money in trust for widows have not on some occasions invested such money profitably, so they have been as feckless as the widows themselves might have been. The argument does not stand up at all.
In fact, I go much further. A widow should be given the compensation she is entitled to. Of course, as to the money

1261
held in trust for the children, that is all right. But if she is a gambler, I do not think that matters. We do not have laws prohibiting men or widowers from gambling. Therefore, why should we have laws to prevent women from gambling? I absolutely support my noble friends Lord Silkin and Lady Summerskill on this issue.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: The noble and learned Lord, Lord Dilhorne, asked me to express my opinion. It is very painful to me to find myself differing from so many of my noble friends, particularly as I have always regarded myself as a feminist. But when there are dependent children it does not seem to me that one can really separate the sums in this way. As the Pearson Committee pointed out, if there are dependent children and the wife loses the £5,000 which she has been awarded, there is nothing left, except the children's fund, for the family to look to. In the first place, I entirely agree with Lord Dilhorne that the widows would get very much less than they get at the moment, because the whole footing on which a widow is given £5,000 and each of the children about £150 is that the widow is going to spend her money in maintaining herself and the children. And, to be fair, this is what is usually done, and a widow usually leaves the money which is awarded to the children to the last.
But, of course, if that money, instead of being under the control of the court, was unfortunately to be invested in a hopeless business, then the people who were going to he affected would be the children. So long as one says, "Yes, of course, the children must be protected and the court must have this right in regard to the children", it is difficult where there are dependent children not to apply the provision also to the damages awarded to a widow. Therefore, I should personally feel compelled to vote against the Amendment of my noble friend Lord Silkin. There are, I am told, some technical reasons about it, but those no doubt could be resolved.
On the question whether the law should be left as it is, or whether widows should be free unless there are dependent children, I have no strong views. I think that if I had to vote I should be inclined to support the Amendment
1262
of my noble friend Lord Chorley, largely because everybody who knows the women who get the damages supports the Pearson Committee's conclusion that the law should be left as it is. It is quite right to say that the Bar Council took the view that control should be removed, but the solicitors (who know the women clients very much better than the barrister does), the Law Society, the Trades Union Congress, the Registrars of County Courts, who know the sort of purposes for which the widows want the money taken out of court, and the Masters of the Supreme Court, who have the same experience—all those who have experience of the actual women in question—feel that, for their protection, it is better that the money should be in court, provided, of course, as happens now, that for any sensible purpose for which they want it out they can have it out.
It is difficult for these widows to protect themselves against relatives who want loans. But if they can say, "I am afraid the money is in court, and I do not know whether the court would agree to my taking it out to lend it to you", it is in that sense a protection. All those of experience in these matters say that there are in fact men with businesses to sell, and so forth, who watch the newspapers and are only too anxious to take advantage of widows who have had no previous experience. My noble friend Lady Summerskill talked about the experienced widow's bank balance. But these are not experienced widows; they are very inexperienced widows. They are mostly widows who, apart from £5 a week or whatever sum it is, have never had any experience of handling capital monies at all. As the average period for which it remains in court is five and a half years, and it is gradually taken out for very sensible purposes, I should be inclined, on balance, to think that, there having been no real complaint against the law as it has been for the last forty years, it should be retained and my noble friend Lord Chorley's Amendment supported. But, at the least, I would suggest that the provisions made in the Bill should be supported—namely, that control should be retained where there are dependent children.
LORD CHORLEY: I think we really ought to find out what we think about

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this. I have moved only one of my Amendments so far. The other two I will move formally and divide the House.
On Question, Amendment negatived.
LORD SILKIN: If the Committee is content to have a Division on Amendment No. 6, I am content to move it formally and divide. But if it is thought that there ought to be further discussion, then I should like to say a few words in reply to the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor. But I am
Clause 19 agreed to.
Clause 20 [Increase of amount determining county court jurisdiction to make administration orders, restriction on presentation of bankruptcy petitions and minor amendments about such orders]:
THE LORD CHANCELLOR THE LORD CHANCELLOR moved, after subsection (1) to insert:
"(2) Her Majesty may by Order in Council vary the said section 148(1) and 148(3) by substituting, for the references therein to £250, references to such greater sum as may be specified in the Order."
The noble and learned Lord said: This clause deals with administration orders where a man is insolvent to a limited extent, and it enables an administration order to be made in a county court, which saves the costs of what I might call a full-scale bankruptcy. But there has, of course, to be some limit as to the amount of the debts in question, and the limit at present is £50. It was fixed at £50 in
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content to leave the decision to the Committee on the discussion as it stands now. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 16, line 28, leave out ("the money") and insert ("so much of the money as is or was recovered or ordered or agreed to be paid to or solely for the benefit of the infant").—(Lord Silkin.)
6.31 p.m.
On Question, Whether he said Amendment (No. 6) shall be agreed to?
Their Lordships divided: Contents, 11; Not-Contents, 34.

CONTENTS

Attlee, E.

Morrison, L.

Strang, L.

Champion, L.

Rennell, L.

Summerskill, B. [Teller.]

Gaitskell, B.

Silkin, L. [Teller.]

Winchester, L. Bp.

Mitchison, L.

Somers, L.

NOT-CONTENTS

Addison, V.

Dilhorne, L.

Lindgren, L.

Amherst of Hackney, L.

Falkland, V.

Merrivale, L.

Ampthill, L.

Ferrers, E. [Teller.]

Morris of Borth-y-Gest, L.

Auckland, L.

Forster of Harraby, L.

Oakshott, L.

Bossom, L.

Gardiner, L. (L. Chancellor.)

Rea, L.

Carrington, L.

Geddes of Epsom, L.

St. Oswald, L.

Chesham, L.

Goschen, V. [Teller.]

Sandys, L.

Chorley, L.

Greenway, L.

Shepherd, L.

Coleraine, L.

Guest, L.

Strabolgi, L.

Colville of Culross, V.

Ilford, L.

Tweedsmuir, L.

Craigton, L.

Kinnoull, E.

Wardington, L.

Derwent, L.

Resolved in the negative, and Amendment disagreed to accordingly.

1869, and, as a result of the fall in the value of money, the whole thing has become virtually a dead letter. The unamended part of the clause increases this to £250, which is about to-day's equivalent of £50 in 1869. It is always happening that laws become out of date and do not work properly simply because, since before the turn of the century, the value of money has steadily fallen and nothing could be done about it because of the difficulties of finding Parliamentary time to alter one figure in an Act of Parliament. The object of the present Amendment, therefore, is to provide that this new sum may itself be altered by an Order in Council by substituting for the reference to £250 references to "such greater sum as may be specified in the Order." It will, by the next Amendment, be subject to the Negative Resolution procedure. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 16, line 43, at end insert the said subsection.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: This is a consequential Amendment, and provides, as I said, that the Order shall be subject to the Negative Resolution procedure in either House. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 17, line 38, at end insert—
("() The power conferred by subsection (2) above to make an Order in Council shall include power to vary the Order; and an Order in Council under the said subsection (2) shall be subject to annulment in pursuance of a resolution of either House of Parliament.")—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 20, as amended, agreed to.
Clauses 21 to 26 agreed to.
Clause 27 [Amendment of War Pensions (Administrative Provisions) Act 1919]:
LORD AIREDALE: This is almost a drafting amendment. Clause 27 deals with the qualifications of Service members of appeal tribunals dealing with war pensions, and the Amendment seeks to amend the proposed new sub-paragraph (ii). It has several advantages. It reduces the sub-paragraph as now drafted from three lines to one line; it gets rid of the ungainly word "demobilised", which appears twice in the course of the three lines of the sub-paragraph as now printed; and it gets rid of the expression "an officer … or a man", which hardly seems an appropriate expression to use in relation to the Armed Forces nowadays. The expression "an officer … or a man" implies, I think, that for certain purposes a Service man is as good as his officer, and if that is so then I think that a Service woman is entitled to say that she, too, is as good as her officer for these purposes. As regards this part of this Amendment, I have received the greatest encouragement from the place that matters most upon these occasions, and I rather think that this Amendment may prove acceptable but we shall see. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 21, line 5, leave out lines 5 to 7 and insert:—
("'(ii) a person who has served in Her Majesty's Forces.'")—(Lord Airedale.)
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: This Amendment is clearly an improvement.
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I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Airedale. It will make for simplification, and I gladly accept it.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 27, as amended, agreed to.
Clauses 28 to 30 agreed to.
6.45 p.m.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR THE LORD CHANCELLOR moved, after Clause 30, to insert the following new clause:
Repeal of section 116 of Probates and Letters of Administration Act (Ireland) 1857. 1857 c. 79 (Ir.).
". Section 116 of the Probates and Letters of Administration Act (Ireland) 1857 (which requires the Treasury to prepare, and to present to Parliament, an annual return of fees and moneys levied, and salaries, expenses and superannuations, &c., paid, under that Act) shall cease to have effect."
The noble and learned Lord said: This new clause repeals Section 116 of the Probates and Letters of Administration Act (Ireland), 1857, under which the Treasury is required to prepare and present to Parliament an annual return of fees and expenses of the Principal Probate Registry, Belfast, and the District Probate Registry, Londonderry. The return, which involves not inconsiderable administrative expenditure, no longer serves any useful purpose: the expenditure recorded is borne partly on the Vote for the Supreme Court of Judicature, et cetera, Northern Ireland, and the remainder on the Consolidated Fund, details of which can be found in the Finance Accounts. The Accountant-General and the Chief Probate Registrar of Northern Ireland are both agreed that the return is no longer necessary. I beg to move the Amendment accordingly.
Amendment moved—
After Clause 30, insert the said new clause.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Remaining clauses agreed to.
Schedule l agreed to.
Schedule 2 [Obsolete, &c., Enactments ceasing to have Effect]:
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: This is the first of a number of Amendments which do no more than try to get rid of statutory provisions which, for one reason or another, are spent. The first Amendment repeals the Execution Act, 1664, the object of which was to prevent

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judgment debtors from taking advantage of certain technical difficulties inherent in the procedure for executing judgments against land by writs of extent. Writs of extent were abolished by Section 33 of the Crown Proceedings Act, 1947, and the Act of 1664 has therefore been obsolete for the last seventeen years. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 35, line 30, at end insert—

("16 & 17 Car. 2. C. 5.

The Execution Act 1664.

The whole Act.")

—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: This Amendment repeals Section 11 of the Quarter Sessions Act, 1849. This provision was designed, at a time when quarter sessions were responsible for the supervision of much administrative local government work, to simplify the procedure for obtaining, in certain cases where an appeal lay to quarter sessions, a decision of the superior courts on a point of law. It enabled the parties, after giving notice of appeal to quarter sessions, and with the leave of a judge, to agree a case for the consideration of the superior courts, whose judgment thereon was equivalent to a decision of quarter sessions, thus eliminating the hearing before quarter sessions. Since the transfer of rating appeals to the Lands Tribunal, there has been, in practice, no form of proceeding to which Section 11 can usefully apply. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 36, line 46, at end insert—

("12 & 13 Vict. c. 45.

The Quarter Sessions Act 1849.

Section 11.")

—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: This Amendment repeals Sections 341 and 342 of the Irish Bankrupt and Insolvent Act, 1857. These sections empowered the Court of Bankruptcy and Insolvency in Ireland to sell a debtor's interest in copy-hold land for the benefit of creditors, and made the necessary provision for the purchasers to be admitted as tenants of the manor. There is now no copyhold land left on which these sections can operate. I beg to move accordingly.
Amendment moved—
Page 37, line 4, leave out ("section 68") and insert ("sections 68, 341, 342")—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: The Court of Probate Act, 1857, set up the new Court of Probate and transferred to it the existing probate jurisdiction of the ecclesiastical and other courts. Sections 116 and 117 made provision for the old "College of Doctors of Law exercent in the Ecclesiastical and Admiralty Courts"; Section 116 extends its powers to let, sell or exchange its real and personal estate, and Section 117 authorised it to surrender its Charter, whereupon it was to be dissolved. The College in fact ceased to exist in 1858 or 1859, although there is no positive evidence that it ever surrendered its Charter. It has, however, certainly been out of existence for over a hundred years and the two sections are spent. Section 32 of the Irish Act empowers certain categories of court officers to administer oaths; the words repealed brought within these categories those who were at that time already acting as surrogates of ecclesiastical courts. These words are now spent. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 37, line 5, at end insert—

("20 & 21 Vict. c. 77.

The Court of Probate Act 1857.

Sections 116 and 117.

20 & 21 Vict. c. 79.

The Probates and Letters of Administration Act (Ireland) 1857.

In section 32, the words 'all persons who at the commencement of this Act shall be acting as surrogates of any ecclesiastical court, and' and the word 'other' (where first occurring).")

—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: This Amendment repeals Section 16 of the Admiralty Court Act, 1861, which made provision for the procedure to be adopted where a claim was made to goods seized in execution under process of the High Court of Admiralty. The matters for which the section provided are now covered by Rules of the Supreme Court and the section has not been invoked for a very long time. The President of the Probate Division and the Admiralty Registrar have been consulted and agree

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that Section 16 is now obsolete. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 37, line 9, at end insert—

("24 & 25 Vict. c. 10.

The Admiralty Court Act 1861.

Section 16.")

—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: Section 13 of the Court of Admiralty (Ireland) Amendment Act, 1876, made provision for the appointment of deputies by the registrars of the courts of the recorders of Cork and Belfast, but was limited to the registrars in office when the Act came into force. It is now spent. Section 1 of the Act of 1877 reduced the office of Chief Justice of the Common Pleas in Ireland to equality with that of a puisne Judge of the High Court and made similar provision prospectively for the office of Chief Baron of the Exchequer on the occurrence of a vacancy. Section 4 was consequential on Section 1 and provided for powers which had been exercisable under Sections 72 and 73 of the Supreme Court of Judicature Act (Ireland), 1877, and the Supreme Court of Judicature Act (Ireland), 1882 by the Lord Chancellor of Ireland in conjunction with the Chief Justice, the Chief Justice of the Common Pleas and the Chief Baron, to be exercisable without any reference to the Chief Justice of the Common Pleas. Section 5 provided for the interpretation of these and other expressions. There is now nothing left for Sections I and 4 to operate on. Section 72 of the Act of 1877 and the references in Section 73 of that Act to the Judges other than the Lord Chancellor were repealed by the Statute Law Revision Act, 1953. The functions of the Lord Chancellor are now discharged by the Lord Chief Justice of Northern Ireland. Thus Sections 1 and 4 are spent and with their repeal Section 5 becomes inapplicable. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 37, line 17, at end insert—

("39 & 40 Vict. c. 28.

The Court of Admiralty (Ireland) Amendment Act 1876.

Section 13.

50 & 51 Vict. c. 6.

The Supreme Court of Judicature (Ireland) Act 1887.

Sections 1, 4 and 5.")

—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: This Amendment relates to Section 11 of the Act of 1897 which made provision for the exercise of the powers referred to in Section 4 of the Act of 1887 on the occasion of a vacancy in the office of the Chief Baron of the Exchequer. It is now spent. The words repealed in Section 4(5) of the County Courts Act, 1924, made special provision for the retirement and pensions of the District Registrars of Liverpool and Manchester who were then in office. Section 5(4) made provision for the payment of a gratuity to certain categories of clerks in district registries who had attained the age of 55 by May 12, 1923. Both provisions are now spent. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 37, line 22, at end insert—

("60 & 61 Vict, c. 66.

The Supreme Court of Judicature (Ireland) (No. 2) Act 1897.

Section 11.

14 & 15 Geo. 5. c. 17.

The County Courts Act 1924.

In section 4(5), the words from 'but in the case' onwards.

Section 5(4).")

—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: The proviso repealed by this Amendment provides for officers of the Supreme Court, with some exceptions, to hold office during the Queen's pleasure. The proviso excludes from this rule officers appointed before October 1, 1925. There are now no such officers still in office. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 37, line 23, column 3, at end insert—
("In section 115(2), the proviso.")—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: This Amendment repeals Section 123(4) and the proviso to Section 126(1) of the Judicature Act. Section 123 provides for the appointment of registrars and clerks in the Chancery Division, and subsection (4) makes special provision (including pension provision) for those in post on August 19, 1921, which is now 43 years ago. There are now no such former clerks or registrars alive. Section 126(1) prescribes the qualifications required for certain officers of the Supreme Court. The proviso

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makes special provision for those in office on October 1, 1925. There are now no persons alive who can be affected by this provision. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 37, line 29, column 3, at end insert—
("Section 123(4). In section 126(1), the proviso.")—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: This Amendment repeals Section 2 of the Administration of Justice Act, 1928, which makes special provision for the pension rights of district probate registrars who, having been appointed before October 1, 1928, applied within a limited period to be allowed to retire from office. There are now no persons left alive to whom the section applies. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 37, line 41, column 3, at beginning insert—
("Section 2."—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: Section 2(3) of the Supreme Court of Judicature (Amendment) Act, 1935, made provision for the precedence of Lords Justices of Appeal in office on February 12, 1935. The provision is now spent since there are no such Lords Justices still in office. The surviving provisions of Section 8 of, and Schedule 1 to, the Act of 1955 made transitional provisions for proceedings begun in the Mayor's and City of London Court before January 1, 1956. While litigation may take some time, we are not quite so bad as to require eight years or more for an action in the Mayor's Court and those provisions are now spent. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 37, line 44, at end insert—

("25 & 26 Geo. 5. c. 2.

The Supreme Court of Judicature (Amendment) Act 1935.

Section 2(3).

4 & 5 Eliz. 2. c. 8.

The County Courts Act 1955.

Section 8. Schedule 1.")

—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Schedule 2, as amended, agreed to.
Schedule 3 [Enactments repealed]:
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: This Amendment is consequential on the Amendment to Clause 10, which the
1272
Committee will remember I referred to when dealing with the Amendment to Clause 10, and I pointed out that this Amendment would follow. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 38, line 46, column 3, leave out ("(2) and (3)").—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: This Amendment repeals words in Section 175 of the County Courts Act, 1959, which provide for the construction of references to Rules of Court Contained in Section 63 of the Trustee Act, 1925. These references are themselves deleted by the Amendment made by Schedule 1 and the words repealed will therefore become inoperative. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 38, line 47, column 3, at end insert—
("'In section 175, the words' section sixty-three of the Trustee Act 1925 and'.")—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: This Amendment corrects a mistaken citation of words in the Mental Health Act, 1959, which refer to Section 149 of the Judicature Act, 1925, and are repealed by Schedule 3. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 39, line 6, column 3, leave out ("fifty-nine") and insert ("forty-nine").—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Schedule 3, as amended, agreed to.
House resumed.
Bill reported, with Amendments.

CONSULTATIVE HEALTH CENTRES
7.0 p.m.
LORD AMULREErose to ask Her Majesty's Government whether they propose to advise local authorities to establish consultative health centres for elderly and other persons. The noble Lord said: My Lords, your Lordships' House has always been kind and indulgent to me when I have got up to speak about the problems and difficulties affecting, aged members of the community, and I trust that your Lordships will not mind at this late hour if once more I inflict a short speech on the House.

1273
One thing of great importance which we have to consider at the present time is to take what steps we can to avoid old people being forced to go into hospital or some kind of communal home. The cost of maintaining a bed in hospital is enormous. I cannot go into that now, but even coming down to a communal home, the capital cost is about £2,000 a bed, and the weekly cost is between £7 and £10. Therefore we have to think of as many ways as we can to avoid the necessity for people going into hospital or any kind of communal home. And the point I want to put before your Lordships to-day is that one of the things that might be done is to establish diagnostic and consultative clinics for elderly persons, which they could visit and see somebody who can help them in their troubles. I do not necessarily want to confine my suggestion to people of 60 and 65. There is no reason why people who are growing middle-aged should not be able to visit these clinics, because often the seeds of trouble in old age come in middle-age. We have seen the value of clinics in maternity and child welfare work since they evolved at the beginning of the century, and it seems to me that there is no reason why clinics such as I am talking about should not do similar good for elderly people.
There is one good example which I know in the borough of Rutherglen, just outside Glasgow—I hope your Lordships do not mind my mentioning it by name. Rutherglen is a burgh of 25,000 inhabitants, densely populated. The clinic was established in 1952. It took a certain amount of time to get going, and it was not until about three or four years after that it became really popular. It was established by the medical officer of health, working in conjunction with a consultant from o le of the big Glasgow hospitals, who is a physician in general medicine and who has a large number of beds for old people. The clinic is in the premises of the local authority, which is convenient, because people know where these premises are. Those who go to the clinic are recommended by their general practitioners. These arrangements seem to me to be a great advantage, because they bring the work of the general practitioner, the local authority, the hospital and the voluntary
1274
organisations together in one place for a certain section of the community.
At this late hour I do not want to go into any great detail, but the medical officer of health finds it possible to put one of his social workers in the clinic: one of the health visitors is there, too. She does not have a great deal to do. I think it is rather a pity. One of the troubles with health visitors in general is that they were appointed to take maternity and child welfare only. Then, in 1948, they were given certain other duties for the care of the elderly, but (I do not say that it was their fault) this side of their work does not seem to have gone very far.
During the past eight years, 1,250 people from this one little burgh have attended the clinic. Their ages ranged from 55 to 85, so it has not been dealing only with people of pensionable age. Roughly the same number still visit the clinic, which shows that the need for such a place is just as strong as it was. A certain number are admitted to hospital from the clinic, but not a great number—about 4 per cent. Many others come because they want to have something done to help them—perhaps about a family problem, or to know whether they should go on smoking or not; and a great many things which are not really for a practitioner but which have a strong bearing on the medical side. They can get physiotherapy and chiropody at the clinic. About one quarter of them need chiropody, something which is very important in dealing with elderly people.
One of the great strengths of the clinic, I think, is that those who go there know that they can come to people who know what they are talking about, and they can get reassurance from them. This reassurance is doubly welcome, being grounded on knowledge. I think that such clinics have great value. They would be very useful for lonely people, those who live by themselves in isolation. Often old people might be much more prepared to go there than to go to the hospital or general practitioner where the consultant waiting room can be crowded. The clinics would also be able to do a considerable amount of research into the troubles of elderly people which is difficult to do in other ways.
The point of my question is, why is it that the Ministry of Health have not

1275
done more to encourage (I do not mean to direct) local authorities to do the same kind of thing as they have done at Rutherglen? These clinics would not be a great expense. They could be held in the premises of local authorities and there would be plenty of time, because on Monday mothers and babies do not come because it is washing day, and they do not come in the mornings because they want to do their work, so there is plenty of time for the premises to be used for the purposes of the clinic I am suggesting.
The question of staff is no difficulty at all, except in so far as the employment of one consultant for one session goes. Where the money is going to come from I do not quite know, but there are a certain number of consultant posts which have now joint appointments between the regional health committee and the local authority, and I do not see why one session from a local health consultant, or a regional hospital board consultant, for that matter, could not be given to the clinic.
There are two other points which people say might be difficult. A medical officer of health may be reluctant to set up a clinic because of difficulty—I will not say, hostility—between general practitioners and the public health department at the Town Hall, which one thinks is dying out, but which may pop up in certain quarters. The other thing that might be expensive is transport for these people. At present, I think they all come up under their own steam, whereas if an ambulance service is run for them, this will be expensive. But these, I feel, are not the important points. The important thing is that you must get a first-class consultant coming to see these people; you do not want him to run some kind of second-class medical service for the elderly people, which may well arise if you do not get the first-class set-up.
That is all I want to say. I should now like to put my question again. Can the noble Lord who is to reply give me some idea whether I am talking complete rubbish, or whether there is some very good reason why the Ministry of Health have not done something in regard to the establishment of these things?
7.11 p.m.
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: My Lords, listening to the noble Lord, Lord Amulree, put his case, I think we are all impressed by the fact that his interest in the aged is as fresh to-day as it was many years ago when he decided to dedicate his life to their welfare.
SEVERAL NOBLE LORDS: Hear, hear!
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: I only wish I could come here and wholeheartedly dot his "i's" and cross his "t's". Theoretically the noble Lord is right: that any addition we make to our National Health Service, whatever clinic we establish which caters for some category of the population, must do good. Nevertheless, although I sympathise with the noble Lord, I cannot urge the Government to give this plea priority, for the strictly practical reason that in most areas we have not the buildings or the staff available. The noble Lord suggested that we might use the maternity and child welfare clinic rooms. Does he know that in some areas the maternity and child welfare clinic is held in the crudest possible place?
LORD TAYLOR: The church hall.
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: Yes. I will not give details, because I think it is invidious in your Lordships' House to mention places where clinics are held in such appalling conditions that the mothers fear to take their children there. To think that some of these old people would leave their cosy little warm homes and go to some of these church halls is absurd. Therefore, I think I am right when I say it is not quite so simple as the noble Lord suggests. We should need to have more buildings. At the moment, of course, the Ten-Year Hospital Plan is nothing but a mirage, and the Minister of Health, I understand, is to review the whole question. Therefore I think I am right in saying that it is rather unpractical at this moment to say to the Minister that these clinics should be established.
Then, what of the staff? The noble Lord said that he wants a first-class consultant, and not a second-class one; nothing but the best. It has been said, time after time, that our hospitals could not continue unless we had doctors from

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overseas. As for other staff, the social workers are desperately needed elsewhere; and our wards are closing because we have not enough nurses.
Nevertheless, I feel that this question gives us an opportunity to focus attention on these deficiencies in the Health Service which threaten to hamper its whole work. What the noble Lord is anxious to do, with his warm, large heart, is to save his children. He is a bachelor (I just cannot understand why women have allowed him to be a bachelor all these years), but he has embraced a vast family—people who have reached their second childhood and who are dependent on him. This vast family of helpless, lonely and many of them unhappy people he is seeking to help, and he wants to save them the sheer misery of going to a large hospital outpatient department and there sitting, sometimes for many hours, among unhappy people who, most of them, are not suffering from trivial illnesses, but from serious conditions.
Why is it that the noble Lord wants to do this? We were hoping that an appointments system would be established in all these hospitals so that this long, miserable waiting would cease. But it seems to me to have broken down in many places. The overcrowded conditions in our out-patients departments which were a feature of so many of our hospitals 25 years ago are now recurring. I would say to the noble Lord that this is not simply due to the failure of assessing the time needed for a consultation, but to the unpunctuality of the consultant.
LORD TAYLOR: Hear, hear!
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: I am glad the noble Lord said that, because it has to be said. In an out-patient department, if a nurse is late she is reprimanded by the sister; and if a sister errs, she is censured by the matron. It seems that nobody reprimands a consultant for keeping patients waiting. What category is there in the country which should have our greater sympathy in this matter than the seriously sick who are kept waiting in our out-patient departments?
The tragedy of old age is that the aged have plenty of spare time, but few friends with which to fill it. The noble Lord, Lord Amulree, quite rightly, mentioned just now that they go to their general practitioner, not necessarily because they have
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some pathological condition but because they have plenty of time: they want a chat; they want the warmth of human companionship. But what do they find? They find a tired, overworked man or woman, who recognises the old person's condition but has not the time for a long chat or for the frequent examinations which so often reassure the old patient. The noble Lord has described this clinic—I visualised it as he was speaking—with all the diagnostic paraphernalia which is necessary in these days, where the old person is being subjected to a thorough examination, although the doctor knows it is a physiological condition of deterioration and not a pathological condition. Nevertheless, it gives the old person comfort. Of course this would help the pressure on the general practitioner and on the hospital. But I feel it is difficult to establish these things, for the reasons I have put forward.
I say again, at the risk of wearying the House, that the alternative is a comprehensive domiciliary service, for which I have pressed again and again. It should be so comprehensive that the old people in their homes can be looked after by a domestic help; meals can arrive; there can be a chiropodist and physiotherapist, and someone to go in for a chat. I have mentioned this before, but nobody has ever acted on any of these suggestions over the last thirteen years, if I dare mention a period. You could have these married women with spare time, who could be remunerated, to go in and help these old men and women. Let us face up to it: the problem of the future is living too long. What the noble Lord has suggested is very practical if we are to handle this particular problem, and the time may come when he will look back and say: "Well, it has been necessary after all." The situation has deteriorated to such a state that the domiciliary service which I have mentioned is again impracticable, because all the professions which are supplementary to medicine are in such short supply that in most areas the domiciliary service just does not exist.
I was very impressed this morning when I read The Times to see a letter from a matron. Matrons are usually people who shun publicity, shun the Press, never write letters to the newspapers, because they feel somebody in authority might be annoyed. But to-day I find a letter

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from the President of the Association of Hospital Matrons in The Times. Here she says that the answer to the fact that our wards are closing for lack of nurses, the answer to the fact that the noble Lord's suggestion to-day has to be turned down, the answer to a very limited domiciliary service, is that
"the country has had its nursing on the cheap."
I can only say that what the matron has said about nurses in The Times to-day can, of course, be related to all forms of women's labour in the Health Service. It seems, therefore, that the clinics for which the noble Lord asked will have to wait until the Government can establish a national incomes policy. I am glad that my noble friend who is a member of the Cabinet is so near, listening to me. They will have to establish a national incomes policy in which those who serve the community with such devotion are adequately remunerated. That must be the direction. Our basis of remuneration in the future must be: what does an individual give to the community, whether it is in the factories, in industry, or whether it is in our social services? Let that be the criterion, and then the noble Lord opposite will not come and seek his clinics in vain.
7.22 p.m.
THE LORD BISHOP OF WINCHESTER: My Lords, I cannot claim the professional medical knowledge of the noble Lord who has asked this Question, or of the noble Baroness, Lady Summerskill. I rise only because of my pastoral concern for the care of the elderly. In these days, when we are confronted with so great a variety of human need and suffering, and when so many avenues of service are opened up before us, it is all too easy for the more spectacular forms of service to claim our attention and to attract enthusiastic response. It is all too easy to overlook the needs of a great section of the community that has a paramount claim upon our compassion and our care. There are, indeed, no persons more deserving of the attention and care of the whole community than the elderly.
I welcome the Question of the noble Lord, Lord Amulree, because whether or not the health centre is the best way of meeting the need, there is no doubt whatever about the need of those ser-
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vices which a health centre would be designed to provide. We can indeed be very thankful for the current provision of services to keep elderly people well and in their homes. This provision is very comprehensive. As your Lordships know, local authorities, with valuable help from voluntary organisations, provide a comprehensive range of services, including home helps, home nurses, health visitors, "meals on wheels", and chiropody. Local statutory and voluntary services between them provide for recreation and home visiting. The criticism of this provision is that it is often fragmented, unco-ordinated, and uneven in its distribution.
I am thankful to say that in my own county, Hampshire, which I think is second to none in its provision for the elderly, there is a very happy and close co-ordination between the statutory and voluntary bodies who are concerned with the care of the elderly. In my county also, as no doubt in many others, there has been a gradual reorientation of the health visitor service, and much of the health visitor's time is now devoted to visiting the elderly rather than the young infants. This seems to me to be a move in the right direction, now that most parents are able to take their children to clinics or to summon the doctor. Health visitors can render real service by keeping a check on old people who may become immobile or otherwise ineffective in seeking the attention they need.
Despite, however, all that has been done by statutory and voluntary bodies in caring for the health of the elderly, a consultative health centre might well fill a gap and meet a very real need. It is now generally acknowledged that everything possible should be done to provide a system of community care which would enable as many people as possible to remain in their own private homes until the need for constant attendance, which cannot be provided always by the family, makes residential care imperative, or illness necessitates removal to hospital. Furthermore, since people are living so much longer after retirement, and physical disability nowadays often preceeds the failure of mental powers, it is very necessary to do everything possible to ensure that lack of physical care does not result in immo-

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bility and inability to enjoy life to the full for as long as possible.
It is the fact that old people living on low incomes are liable to be housebound because they dc not get sufficient protein and fresh fruit and vegetables in their diet. Often their feet, teeth, eyes or ears need attention which they have not the energy to seek in a doctor's surgery or in the out-patient department of a hospital. This sort of disability might be diagnosed and remedies prescribed if, more often, old people were able and willing to attend central health centres. At such centres, as at, for example, the experimental centres at Dagenham and Twickenham (about which I cannot claim to have any intimate knowledge) elderly people can be given periodic general health checks. They can avail themselves of facilities for testing the heart, blood, digestive tract, sight, hearing, et cetera. They can also benefit by the facilities for chiropody and for obtaining special dietary supplements.
There are, of course, potential disadvantages in special health centres for the elderly. I will just touch briefly on some of them. Bearing in mind that there is already overlapping in the services rendered by statutory and voluntary bodies, the establishment of consultative health centres might encourage further overlapping and still leave had local gaps. It is generally known that shortage of manpower, to which reference has already been made, is possibly the biggest current factor operating against the efficiency of present services. Adding yet another form of care might well aggravate the situation. Secondly, the grouping together generically of everybody over a certain age could be objectionable to people coming within that age group, and it is probable that many elderly people would object to being placed in such a category. Thirdly, it is not necessarily desirable to focus the attention of the elderly on potential physical illness; and the provision of health centres especially for the elderly might do this. Furthermore, such centres might result in the social services for the elderly becoming clinic-orientated, and it is desirable that they should be kept a3 homely and as normal as possible.
It is clear, then, that there is scope for a wide difference of opinion about
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whether health centres especially for the elderly are the best way of providing certain necessary services, but there is a general consensus of opinion, reflected in previous debates in this House, about the need for these services, and the need for a general improvement in both their quantity and quality. I have reason for believing that voluntary bodies which are concerned with the care of the elderly would welcome a pronouncement from Her Majesty's Government as to whether or not local authorities should be encouraged to establish consultative health centres.
Finally, I would express my conviction that there is a fundamental need for the cultivation in the whole community of a Christian philosophy of old age, so that each old person is valued and cared for with as much enthusiasm as is now devoted to young children. Clearly in this sphere the Christian Church has a special responsibility for leadership, and I am encouraged to know that there is a ready response on the part of the laity of the Church, including young people, when the care of the elderly is presented, as it should be, as a challenging avenue for Christian service.
7.30 p.m.
LORD AUCKLAND: My Lords, the House will be grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Amulree, for having put down his Question, and I am sure that on these Benches we all endorse to the full the spirit behind the Question and recognise the stirring work which the noble Lord has carried out with regard not only to the elderly but to all forms of hospital patients and those who are ill. I should like to take this opportunity of congratulating the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, on his appointment as our spokesman for health in this House. In a Government in which not all its spokesmen are necessarily favourably approved of from these Benches, I can assure the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, that he is not in that category, and we look forward very much to his contributions; not only to this debate but to others, because he has himself rendered very valuable work in every branch of the Health Service.
My Lords, I, too, do not have the medical knowledge of the noble Lord,

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Lord Amulree, or of the noble Baroness, but this is a matter with which all those who are in public life should be very much concerned, and I hope that Lord Amulree's proposal will receive very serious consideration. I am not myself sufficiently technically knowledgeable to know whether it is administratively possible, but, so far as buildings are concerned, I should have thought that the industrialised building system, or even prefabricated buildings, could be erected to serve for this purpose.
The noble Lord, Lord Amulree, referred to Rutherglen. I should like to ask the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, whether the more remote areas would not benefit from this service. I am thinking particularly of the Highlands of Scotland. For example, between Fort William and Inverness, which are about 100 miles apart, there is no large hospital, and there are quite a number of elderly people living in villages and small towns in that area who would benefit by the establishment of one or two, or perhaps more, of these centres, to which elderly people, in particular, could go and receive treatment, such as physiotherapy treatment, instead of having to go to hospital in Inverness or Fort William, which involves travelling long distances. Many of the homes of these elderly people are probably not suitable for treatment of this kind. They may be small homes, and some may not even have electricity, which means that radiography, for instance, would be difficult to administer. Visiting a centre would give them the opportunity of seeing a doctor in private and would give the doctor an opportunity of giving the patient a detailed examination.
There is, as the noble Baroness, Lady Summerskill has said, a shortage of doctors in many areas, but under the late Government the supply of nurses and doctors has increased fairly substantially, although, I would immediately admit, not sufficiently, in certain areas, and we watch the progress of the present Government in this matter with added interest. But with a centre for these old people to attend, a consultant from Inverness, for example, could be brought in perhaps once a fortnight, or even more frequently.
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As the noble Baroness has said, some of these clinics are very unsuitable for their purpose, and here I would pay a very real tribute to those who run these clinics, to the doctors and the nursing staff. I have one such clinic in my own village in Surrey which is held in the local village hall. The accommodation is not all that one would wish for, but it is very well staffed, and treatment and examinations are very well carried out. But, as I say, although there is a building problem here, it seems to me that temporary building would be a solution. I hope that these few remarks will have given the noble Lord something to consider, and I would again thank the noble Lord, Lord Amulree, for once again bringing forward a very vital problem.
7.35 p.m.
Viscount ADDISON: My Lords, like the noble Lord, Lord Auckland, I should like to say a word of thanks to the noble Lord, Lord Amulree, for raising this matter, which is, I am sure, very close to your Lordships' hearts. There is a good deal of justice in what my noble friend Lady Summerskill says on the question of what might be described as a division of effort. I did not myself know about the establishment at Rutherglen, but I gather that it would be a purpose-built unit, and I think that if one were to develop this idea—although there may be many places like Rutherglen where it might successfully be arranged—there would be a danger of dividing one's effort and raising even graver difficulties with the staffing situation than we already face.
I should like to say a word in favour of the development of what, for want of a better word, is called the "day" hospital idea; in which there is a consultative clinic attached to, or within the curtilage of, a district hospital, where, of course, you have proper staffing arrangements, radiography apparatus, and all the requisite equipment, together with meals and all the necessary accoutrements at hand. Here elderly people can spend the day, perhaps dropped on the way to work by their children with whom they may be living, and collected by them on the way home again afterwards. They can spend the day receiving any treatment which may be appropriate to their case or getting encouragement and help. They can meet friends and make

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new ones. I think the Ministry of Health has already given some encouragement to this idea, although I think I am right in saying that they were somewhat against the idea of developing a club atmosphere, which I myself regard as rather desirable. Certainly this method might be pressed forward and it might perhaps be a fairly good compromise solution, speaking in general terms, which would meet the needs of the idea put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Amulree.
Once again I should like to express my thanks to the noble Lord for raising the matter, and I would add my congratulations to those of other noble Lords on the appointment of the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, to the Government Front Bench to speak on this subject.
7.38 p.m.
LORD TAYLOR: My Lords, I think it would be the wish of all noble Lords that I should not indulge in a general discourse on the care of old people but should confine myself rather strictly to answer the questions which the noble Lord, Lord Amulree, has asked and which have been asked by other noble Lords and by my noble friend Lady Summerskill in the course of this debate. I would thank noble Lords very much for their kind words, and I should like to endorse the words of my noble friend Lady Summerskill about the noble Lord, Lord Amulree. I feel that he is a "Dad" with a huge family. Whenever I go to his hospital I feel than he is just wonderful. I may say that I have personal reasons for feeling this, too. We batted together many a time when we were on the same side of the House, and let me assure the noble Lord that we shall be batting together again. But we also have sometimes differed a little, and I am afraid I am going 10 differ just a little with the noble Lord tonight.
Of course, we all agree about the importance of avoiding unnecessary admission to hospital; this is vital. The noble Lord gave us the capital cost of a geriatric bed as £2,000, and its minimum running cost as £7 to £10 a week. I am certain that the latter figure is right; I wish the former figure could be lower. I sometimes think it could be if we could build a little more simply. Then we come to the noble Lord's question of the diagnostic and consultative clinics for old people, and he took as his
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example the very interesting case of Rutherglen. Here we have a clinic which is a screening unit which sees old people who are nominally fit. They are in a sound physical, mental and social state. They are thoroughly examined, and it takes five hours on the first occasion to examine each one of them—that is a combination of medical time and social worker time, and the rest—and, as a result, a number have things discovered which nobody knew about before and which can be put right.
The noble Lord, Lord Amulree, said the scheme is extended to below the 65-year age group into the 55-year age group, and in eight years they have been able to deal with 1,250 people—that is, 150 new patients a year. That ain't good enough, chum! It just does not make sense to me. I have been doing a care of senior executives scheme for the past 14 years on one morning a week, and I can do two patients a morning, with a really thorough examination. Such a thing is a research project only, which can never be generally applied; you would require all your doctors to do this sort of thing, and not to treat the sick or deal with public health or maternity and child welfare. It just is a non-starter. It is very desirable there should be a few such places where research can be seriously done, and this is what, in my opinion, Rutherglen is; and it is a very good thing. I do not think it would be right, and I believe I am correct in saying—I hope, having read my brief, that I am right in saying—that Her Majesty's Government think as I do and that we should not generally encourage local authorities to establish these places. I am sorry, but I am sure this is the right answer, having regard to all the facts.
Now I come on to my noble friend Lady Summerskill. She really said what I am saying in another way, and we are at one on this. But then she went on to ask, "What should we do about it? What is the alternative?" And the first thing she said was, let these old people be received at the hospital with a proper appointment system, so that they do not have to hang about. And she said that unfortunately the system has broken down. I think she rather generalised about the consultants. In my experience

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it is 5 to 10 per cent., and probably nearer 5 per cent., of consultants who are extremely bad timekeepers. It is a shocking piece of behaviour. She said there is somebody to "tick off" the nurses; that is the matron. There is somebody to "tick off" the domestic staff, which is the catering officer. There is somebody to "tick off" the catering officer, which is the hospital secretary. But she said there is nobody to "tick off" the consultant if he does not turn up on time.
Well, there is somebody. There is my noble friend Lord Addison in his capacity as a chairman of a hospital management committee. There is my noble friend Lord Stonham, in his capacity as a chairman of a hospital management committee. Both of them, I know, have never hesitated to speak sternly and "tick off" a consultant who is not doing the job for which he is paid. That is one of the first and vital jobs of the chairman of every hospital management committee throughout the country: to see that his consultants are doing their jobs properly and serving their patients as they should, and that they are not exploiting their position, as some of them used to in the old days when they were voluntary workers, and a few of them still do.
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: My Lords, I must ask my noble friend—because I think he paints the system in rather bright colours—if that is so, why are there frequent complaints? I think the noble Lord, Lord Addison, is probably a perfect chairman, but I have known lots of chairmen who have never dared speak to consultants. Why are complaints so rife if the chairmen really do?
LORD TAYLOR: I said they ought to.
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: Yes, but they do not.
LORD TAYLOR: The sooner they do so, the better. I quite agree with my noble friend. Some chairmen have not got the guts to stand up to consultants, but they should. It is their duty to do so. That deals with the unpunctual consultant.
The next point the noble Baroness raised was in regard to a comprehensive domiciliary service, and here I think she
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is right. I believe this is what we ought to be aiming at, and it must be based on the general practitioner, because he probably knows where most of the old people are; they are on his list; they are likely to send for him when they are sick, and their relatives are likely to call him in. He probably knows more than any other single person where the old people are. The noble Baroness mentioned domestic help, "meals on wheels", and chiropody—domiciliary chiropody is vitally important for old people, but we are short of chiropodists. She mentioned health visitors for old people. That is vitally important.
Then she made a very important point about lay visitors, the kind of visitor who if one were in prison might be one's voluntary prison visitor. In a sense, old people who are confined by physical disease to one room at the top of a block of buildings in Lambeth or Kennington or Holloway are in prison, and need a voluntary visitor. I can tell your Lordships of an experiment being done in my new town of Harlow which provides a good answer. This is to get girls in their last year at secondary modem schools, when they are full of beans and zest, and some of them not very academically minded, to do social service on two afternoons a week. They do various things, and one thing is visiting old people in their homes and running their errands for them.
It is a splendid thing for the girls, because though they are not academically clever they feel they are wanted. It is splendid for the old people to have a young person taking an interest in them, and they can take an interest in the young person, too, because this is a two-way traffic. I think this is one of the very simple ways in which we can help in taking care of old people, with a continuous stream of these young people, particularly in their final year at school. The less bright girls, and perhaps boys, too, can help, and even some of the bright ones. My children are at Highgate, and some have been doing visiting on the Hill Homes. I think that having young people to do the visiting is very much better in many ways. Middle-aged or elderly people themselves are tired. That is the way we could do it.
With regard to the supply of the other ancillary workers, my noble friend Lord

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Stonham gave me a copy of a letter he sent to-day to my noble friend Lady Summerskill which shows that there is a steady improvement since the improvement of wages in almost every group of the ancillary workers. So I think things are beginning to improve. I do not say we should take the credit for it; I do not know how much we have done. It may be noble Lords opposite can take credit, but certainly there is an improvement.
Lord Auckland supported Lord Amulree; and we have already dealt with those points. He raised the important question about what to do in remote areas. This presents a problem. These consultative geriatric clinics are really screening clinics to detect disease in relatively healthy people. They are not treatment clinics. They are not social clubs. That is right, is it not?—the noble Lord, Lord Amulree, indicates assent. They are screening clinics. In remote areas you do not want screening clinics. I think you want a general practitioner who can get to people's homes if they are ill, and a day hospital, with an ambulance collecting service to take them to a place if they are disabled yet not ill enough for hospital.
I think that my noble friend Lord Addison was right in stressing the importance of the development of the day hospital for geriatric patients. I remember, not so many years ago, going to McGill Hospital, in Toronto, and seeing almost the first day hospital in the world. It was for psychiatric patients. This was in 1948. It is jolly good news to know that we in this country already have 60 day hospitals for old people. I must say that the Ministry of Health have not been idle, even under the previous Administration. Let us hope that we have many more of these hospitals, because this is a good way of achieving our objective.
My noble friend Lord Addison asked, "What about the club atmosphere?" This is a difficult matter. I think there is something in what he says, provided that the place is not too "clubby" and has constructive activity. People suffer from disuse atrophy if they do not do things—if they just sit around television, drinking cups of tea all day long. That is not really the function of a day hospital for geriatric people. They must be got moving. They do not at first like to be
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got moving. They must be kept moving intellectually, and doing things and making things, and not just sitting about like the rich tourists that we were talking about just now.
LORD DERWENT: Not even if they want to?
LORD TAYLOR: Well, "Sometimes I just sits; I just sits and thinks outside the pub, but I also do my ploughing." Surely, the answer is that it is a bad thing to sit about all the time. I imagine that even the noble Lord, Lord Derwent, will agree with that. I do not think that my noble friend Lord Addison raised any other points that I have not covered—
VISCOUNT ADDISON: My Lords, the only point I should like to make clear is this. Since last April I am no longer chairman of a hospital group; but it was not because I was rude to the consultants.
LORD TAYLOR: My Lords, I am sorry that my noble friend is no longer a chairman. I am sure we are all sorry—even the consultants. When they have been "ticked off", they generally do not mind it too much either.
I want to say one word in general about how this work should be undertaken. I am sure that the basis of the proper care of old people is a really good general practitioner service. If you start having special clinics for everybody you end up with nothing. You hive off the old people; you hive off the infants; you hive off the maternity, and you hive off the diabetics—that is the latest one. You hive off the people with eye complaints; you hive off the skin people, and you hive off industrial medicine. There is nothing left. You have a series of second-rate consulting clinics, because there are not enough first-rate consultants to go round.
I have spent the past fourteen years trying the reverse; trying to get the general practitioners working in groups in good buildings, themselves running the ante-natal clinics and child welfare clinics, with the health visitor working with them, with the health visitor doing not merely this but geriatric health visiting as well—doing the lot. I am sure that is the right answer. It is not so difficult to do, it does not take so long, and it does not cost so much. Thirty thousand pounds will build a six-doctor health centre, and at 6 per cent. that is paid

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for by the rents which the doctors and the local authorities and the dentists pay for it. It could be done in any new community.
My noble friend Lady Summerskill mentioned the problem of appointment systems. In my experience, more and more good general practitioners are running an appointments system, and making it work. They are most ready and willing to give up time in the afternoons to have a special appointments period for older people. I have known many general practitioners who have made it a habit, when things were a little easier in the summer (as they used to be in the old days, but not so much now), to do a special old people's round and to visit the old people at home, they being not under active treatment, but just to see that they were all right. They take their blood pressures when things are quiet and calm, and see that they are getting enough to eat.
That brings me to the last point I want to mention. The right reverend Prelate the Lord Bishop of Winchester mentioned one matter, and I am going to say only one thing about it. He spoke of the Twickenham Clinic, where Dr. Maddison is the M.O.H. There he has carried out some investigations which are in some respects somewhat controversial. But there is one finding with which I hope everybody would agree: namely, that if you visit old people and examine them in their homes—just taking a sample of old people—you find not a lot of gross malnutrition, but quite a lot of under-nutrition; old people who are not getting enough to eat and not getting the right things to eat. On the whole, this is not due to lack of money, though sometimes it is. It is much more due to ignorance, apathy and loss of appetite; to physical disabilities in obtaining, preparing or eating food. Things like ill-fitting dentures and such small things can make all the difference between health and ill-health, and the steady beginning of a physical decline.
That means that our next generation of doctors must be trained to deal with minor things in old people. It is all very well knowing about awful cancers and so on. But what matters are the simple things, the little things, and
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watching all the time for little things going wrong. If the doctors do that; if they visit their old people regularly, and if they have not got too much work to do—and that means if there are enough doctors, which, in turn, means if there are many more medical schools than there are at present—then I think we shall get a proper service for old people; and I do not despair that we shall make a jolly good foundation in the next few years.

RAIL FREIGHT FACILITIES
7.57 p.m.
THE EARL OF KINNOULL THE EARL OF KINNOULL rose to ask Her Majesty's Government whether they will urgently reconsider the policy of the Railways Board to reduce the railway wagon fleet, in view of the serious delay and loss of freight traffic caused by this policy in recent months.
The noble Earl said: My Lords, when I put down this Unstarred Question on the serious shortage of rail freight I did so for two reasons. The first is that throughout the country there are many trading firms and businesses who are alarmed by the shortage of rail freight facilities and the delay it is causing. Many of these firms rely exclusively on the rail freight service, and they consider that if nothing is done to correct the situation their trade may well be jeopardised.
The second reason, which I should like to come to in a moment, is that this shortage has shown up what I believe to be a serious weakness in the 1962 Transport Act—namely, that Parliament as a body, and the Minister, as its spokesman, has no power under this Act to prevent the withdrawal and closure of freight services, even if it is against the public interest. I have information with me to-night which has been sent in to the National Council for Inland Transport from all parts of the country. This voluntary body, which was formed some two years ago under the leadership of the noble Lord, Lord Stonham, was set up to act as a watchdog over the rail closure plans. It is not unfair to claim that this Council, which has supported many local bodies in their attempts to prevent the closure of rail services, has had a considerable

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success and braking influence on the closure plans of the Railways Board.
This freight shortage problem is a serious matter, and I think it would be best if I could shortly illustrate my argument with a few reports that have been sent to me. It is reported, for instance, from Perth, in Scotland, that seed potato growers are finding that there is an average daily shortage of some 69 wagons. This, I roughly calculate, means that some 700 tons of freight is lost per day, which is not only a loss of revenue to British Railways, but also possibly a loss of trade to the producers. A curious situation has arisen in this connection because British Railways offer, for a limited period, what is known as favourable terms to the growers to encourage the freight to be carried by rail. Now, due to the shortage of wagons, it would appear that many merchants will be unable to take advantage of these special terms. I should like the noble Lord to say when he replies whether he will draw the attention of the Railways Board to this situation and whether they will consider extending the "favourable terms period" to the growers, in view of the shortage of wagons.
Another example is the tin mining industry in Cornwall. This industry is most concerned as it has been informed that the container service, devised only a few years ago by British Railways, is shortly to be completely withdrawn. Yet another example is a food manufacturing company from East Anglia, a company which has actually beer. refused freight service by British Railways for the transportation of some 50 tons of tinned soups to the Midlands. I will not weary your Lordships with further individual oases, but I can assure you that there are a great number of firms and businesses which are being caused unnecessary hardship.
I should like at this stage to ask one supplementary question of which I have already given notice to the noble Lord, Lord Lindgren. I should like to know how many railway wagons are in use today, and how many wagons have been destroyed, sold or disposed of in the past year. The effects of this freight shortage are threefold First, the British Railways lose revenue; secondly, busi-
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nesses lose both time and money; and, thirdly, the public find that the roads are even more congested by freight lorries. It seems a little known fact that the freight revenue of British Railways amounts to some two-thirds of its total revenue. I appreciate that the Railways Board have on many occasions publicly announced that their desire is to take freight traffic off the roads and to organise a more efficient rail service by the use of liner trains. This is a praiseworthy intention, and I only hope that this intention will not be shunted on to a siding.
I should like to refer to a recent decision to close four out of eleven major freight depots in London and to dispose of the sites. There is considerable concern felt by firms in London, particularly by those using the South Lambeth depot, that this will aggravate even further the road congestion problem. Perhaps the noble Lord, when he comes to reply, will say whether he feels that this decision is in the best interest of the public.
To turn briefly to the 1962 Transport Act, its great weakness, as I see it, is that neither Parliament nor the Minister has control over the withdrawal of the railway freight services. The Minister has, of course, power to decide on a passenger service closure, but I submit that the objections to closing both types of service run parallel. Such considerations as hardship, social consequences, and whether it is in the public interest, all apply just as strongly to the freight services as they do to the passenger services. I should like to ask the noble Lord whether Her Majesty's Government will consider amending this Act to give the Minister power to decide on any future closures or withdrawals of freight services.
To conclude, I hope that I have persuaded your Lordships how serious this problem is. I do not think it would be a very satisfactory answer to the House to say that this is merely a seasonal or peak period and therefore delays are hound to occur. The peak periods do not come unexpectedly, and provision should be made for them by British Railways. In fact, one might add that they are not carrying out their responsibilities unless they do so. Who is the judge between the economic argument of Dr.

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Beeching, on the one hand, and the service to the public, on the other? Who is to judge what is best in the national interest? The answer to both questions is surely that Parliament should judge, and at present Parliament has no power to decide on freight services.
8.5 p.m.
LORD LINDGREN: My Lords, I should first of all like to thank the noble Earl for the manner in which he has put forward this Question. I hope that he will take it in the best of spirits when I first of all point out that there has been a long-established practice ever since we have had nationalised industries that Ministers have no responsibility for the day-to-day management of the various Boards, and that nationalised Boards, such as those dealing with gas, coal, electricity and the railways, must have commercial freedom and independence. Ministers are answerable, of course, to Parliament for any direction they may give to any of the nationalised Boards in the national interest, or for actions they take on matters submitted to them by the Boards in compliance with their statutory duties.
I would point out that, so far as this Question is concerned, on that basis which I have outlined, it is not for the Minister to consider the Board's policy. It can be done only by the Board itself. No doubt the Board will read the noble Earl's remarks and will reply to him if they think it necessary to do so. But, equally, matters of this kind ought to be put by noble Lords here, and by Members in another place, direct to the Board. It is their responsibility, and I am certain they will gladly give what information they can, always provided that it is not information which is likely to damage their commercial interests.
THE EARL OF KINNOULL: My Lords, may I interrupt the noble Lord to say this? Does not Parliament have control over the policy of the Board—not the day-to-day running, but as to policy? Therefore, when Members have questions on policy should they not bring them up before Parliament?
LORD LINDGREN: General policy is a matter of day-to-day management for the Board. So far as the Board is concerned, it presents its Report annually to
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the Minister; and both Houses of Parliament, at a time arranged through the usual channels, can discuss the Report. But day-to-day management is entirely a matter for the Board itself. It is generally accepted that a Board of a nationalised industry cannot really carry on its day-to-day commercial activities if it is all the while looking over its shoulder for Questions coming from both Houses of Parliament.
I want to be as helpful as I can, because most of the points raised by the noble Earl are public knowledge and there have been public announcements by the Board from time to time on this matter. The first point arose in the Report on Reshaping of British Railways. In that Report there were published many tables of figures which showed fairly conclusively that the wagon fleet was, to put it quite bluntly, excessive; that it was much too big for the normal, regular traffic for which the Board had to cater. The Board has stated publicly that it is able to deal with regular traffic and it is doing its best to meet the demands of its regular customers. I would agree with the noble Earl that the position might be better if we had an integrated road and rail system, but at the moment we do not have such a system and we have to deal with the situation as it now is.
The noble Earl mentioned the problems of certain traders. I know from my own experience as a railwayman that some traders use their own "C"-licence road vehicles for their normal traffic. They use road haulage until they get to the peak of their traffic, and then they come to the railways and ask them to provide wagons. I must say that I have some sympathy for the Railways Board in this matter. Their first duty, quite rightly, is to satisfy their regular customers.
I was a little disturbed at one point in the noble Earl's speech when he said that certain regular customers' requirements were not being met. But I do not think it is unreasonable for the Railways Board, if a person goes to them once a year for perhaps one week or one month and asks for wagons, to say, "We cannot supply them, because that really means that the wagons are standing and deteriorating in a railway siding for the other eleven months of the year." Their first job, of course, is to meet the demands of their regular customers.

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Equally, in so far as the peak traffic is concerned, they have a duty, to have wagons available to meet the requirement so far as they can, but not to excess, which was the position indicated in the Report. My experience is that if a fellow comes to the railways once a year for a wagon and does not get it because there is not one available, he writes to the Press complaining of the lack of service. But I think the first function of the Railways Board is to meet the requirements of the regular customers.
THE EARL OF KINNOULL: I am sorry to interrupt, my Lords, but surely this is the defeatist argument and the non-expanding argument. If the railways are never going to increase their numbers, they will never increase their trade.
LORD LINDGREN: Yes, my Lords; but at the moment, of course, the railways have an obligation to meet their costs so far as they can. You cannot make an industry viable if you are going to spend capital on a vehicle—and a railway wagon is quite an expensive vehicle—use it for one week in the year, and have it deteriorating in a siding for eleven months and three weeks. I do not think it is fair for traders when they sometimes require special vehicles to take their traffic, which is normally carried by their own vehicles or by road hauliers, to expect the railways to take the peak traffic for only two or three weeks in the year. I always remember, when I was working as a railwayman, a certain ice cream manufacturer who had his own arrangements in regard to the transport of his product all over the South of England. When we had a few days hot weather he expected us to provide refrigerated vans in order to get the additional requirements of ice cream down to Brighton and other seaside towns.
The problem is not confined to one aspect. Many traders look upon the railway wagon as a warehouse. They keep their traffic in it until it is convenient for them to take it out. But if you are going to get the best use out of a railway wagon there must be a quick turn round, in exactly the same way as with an aircraft or a ship. The Railways Board recently—I think it was
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from January 1, 1964—increased the demurrage charges in order to try to persuade traders not to keep the wagons too long under load and to release them as quickly as possible in order that there could be a quicker turn round and greater use.
The noble Earl was good enough to give me notice that he was going to ask questions in regard to freight traffic and wagons. Therefore, I have been able to get the figures for him. The operating stock of wagons at October 3, 1964, which is the last date for which I could get the figures, was 660,156. During the twelve months ended October 3, 1964, the wagons that were scrapped, sold or disposed of in one way or another numbered 93,882, and the new wagons of all types that were put into service numbered 792. So that made a net decrease in the wagon fleet of 93,090.
The noble Earl referred to the question of the control of freight services, and he quite rightly called attention to the fact that under the 1962 Act the Minister has powers in regard to passenger rail closures but no powers in regard to freight services. I do not really see how a Minister can have control over freight services. After all, it ought to be, and I hope it is, the policy of the Railways Board to secure the greatest possible amount of traffic because, as the noble Earl said, freight traffic is the major portion, and likely to be the profitable portion, of the traffic that the railways deal with. But how traffic is handled is surely a matter of skilled management and knowing how to do it.
The noble Earl referred to the question of closing certain goods depots. Surely it is a matter of commercial judgment whether you are going to concentrate traffic or concentrate depots and have collection and delivery services covering a wider area, or whether you are going to decentralise your collecting depots and have a smaller area for collection and delivery. I think it has been shown by Railways Board statements over the past two or three years that they are tending towards the centralising of rail traffic because, as was pointed out in the Reshaping Report, one of the difficulties of freight traffic previously was that a number of wagons were being used for a small quantity of goods.

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It is not economic to have 10 cwt. of freight in a 10-ton wagon. The obvious remedy is to concentrate your traffic so that you can as nearly as possible fill your 10-ton wagon with 10 tons of traffic. That is entirely a matter of management so far as the Board is concerned, and I think that perhaps they are in a much better position than those who look at the matter from outside to tell which is the more profitable course. I can only say that I will call the Board's attention to the debate that we have had tonight; and if there is a further answer to the specific points which the noble Earl raised, I am certain that the railway management will be only too happy to supply him with it.

ANNOUNCEMENT OF TAXATION PROPOSALS
8.18 p.m.
LORD DERWENT LORD DERWENT rose to ask Her Majesty's Government whether they will refrain from announcing proposals for taxation when their implications have not been considered, and financial losses may consequently be suffered by those invited to invest. The noble Lord said: My Lords, my noble friend Lord Dundee has asked me to put the Question which stands in his name, and to apologise for his absence; but unexpectedly he was called away. I do not intend to anticipate anything which will be better discussed in next Wednesday's debate, and when we put this Question down we intended to save time by getting this particular aspect of the matter out of the way. May I, first of all, make quite clear that we have no objection at all in principle to the Chancellor of the Exchequer's revealing what he intends to do five months in advance; but we feel rather strongly that before doing so, and before making any announcement of this kind five months in advance, he ought to be in a position to remove uncertainties which are likely to have bad effects on the economy, and, in particular, which might well have bad effects, and do have bad effects, on savings.
I would remind the House—and, as I say, we have no objection to the Chancellor's making statements about future taxes a long way in advance—that this is not the first time that this has happened.
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In July, 1961, my right honourable friend Mr. Selwyn Lloyd, who was then the Chancellor of the Exchequer, said that the following year he proposed to put a tax on speculative capital gains. But, my Lords, he at the same time did what I believe to be the essential thing: he stressed, not the details of the tax, but on what and in what direction exactly it was going to work. He said that the tax he intended to put on would not affect long-term investments; so there was no uncertainty at that time. He made it quite clear that any tax he intended to put on was with a view to short-term investments.
Again, although it is not an exact parallel, in 1962 my right honourable friend Mr. Maudling promised well in advance changes in capital allowances in order to increase investment; but that is not a complete parallel, and I do not think anyone particularly bothered about that advance notice, because it was a notice to reduce taxation and not to increase it, and people were therefore somewhat less excited about it. The present Chancellor of the Exchequer has already let it be known that the new corporation tax is not intended to result, for example, in double taxation of foreign holdings, and that the values of a capital gains tax may be computed either at cost price or at market value on Budget Day, whichever is the higher.
These little revelations, these hints, encouraged us to hope that the Chancellor might really have thought out well in advance all the implications of his future new taxes, and it was because we hoped for definite answers on particular matters that we put down the Questions that we did put down yesterday, seeking information. They were, I would remind your Lordships, questions on life insurance policies and National Development Bonds, and there was particularly the Question by the noble Lord, Lord Airedale, on the conversion of Defence Bonds. They were responsible Questions, they were legitimate Questions, and we considered that by this time the Government ought to have had the answers to them.
I think there are also other questions, which were not mentioned yesterday, to which the public are entitled to know the answers. They are entitled, at this stage, I think, to information as to whether

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gilt-edged stocks in general are to be exempt or not from this new tax. Will pension funds be exempt? Will investment trusts have to pay the tax if they do not distribute capital gains among individual investors? My Lords, we say—and this is the reason why we put this Question down to-day—that the Chancellor ought to have known (indeed, he may have known; we do not know, but we ought to have known) the answers to these questions much earlier, and that something ought to have been said much earlier, before unnecessary anxiety and unnecessary uncertainty had been caused.
My Lords, I hope I have not said anything to offend noble Lords so far, but I would introduce perhaps one note of asperity. I have not been as long in your Lordships' House as some noble Lords, but I have sat in this House for just on sixteen years. I have sat here under Conservative Governments, I have sat here under Labour Governments, and, my Lords, this is the first time since I have been in this House during those sixteen years that, time and again, we have not got any answers to questions, legitimate questions, which we have put forward in search of information.
We have got no answers at all—and of course, that can be for one of two reasons: it is either that the noble Lords opposite are unable to answer, or that they are not willing to answer. I hope it is that they are unable to answer, because I cannot imagine that if they could answer they would not. But from these announcements, not only by the Chancellor (and I would stress this) but in discussion by other Ministers over many weeks, and going back right through the Election to before the Election on many of these matters, I think we are justified in saying—and I am not saying this as a fact—either that these matters were not properly thought out before the announcements were made, in which case, in our view, the announcements were made too early, or, if they were thought out, that we should have been told the answers. We tried yesterday, and, quite frankly, we got from the noble Lord, Lord Rhodes, with great charm, no answer at all.
THE EARL OF LONGFORD: My Lords, may I interrupt the noble Lord? I was not anxious to interrupt him, but
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I think his remarks about the replies of the noble Lord, Lord Rhodes, are extraordinarily unkind and incorrect. I was very doubtful myself whether, as Leader of the House, I had responsibility yesterday for suggesting to noble Lords that they were going very wide of any ordinary Question Time; but the noble Lord, Lord Rhodes, gave answers which made a very good impression on many Members of the House, and why the noble Lord should suddenly denounce them in his absence I am afraid defeats me. I am afraid the whole attack yesterday on the noble Lord, Lord Rhodes, left rather a painful impression on me. The noble Lord, Lord Derwent, must know perfectly well that the first answers of that kind would not be given in this House; that they would be given in another place. And how, with his sixteen years' experience here, he should expect to be given to the House of Lords, on matters of taxation, answers which have not been given to another place. I am afraid defeats me.
LORD DERWENT: My Lords. I do not agree, I must say, with what the noble Earl has said. I was making no personal attack on the noble Lord, Lord Rhodes. I said that he answered the Questions with great charm (I think those were my exact words) but he did not give us any answers—and presumably he was unable to give us any answers, or he would have done so. There was no personal attack on him at all. I do not accept that noble Lords in this House are not entitled to an answer to a perfectly proper question, if the answer is available. I do not accept that from the noble Earl, and I think there are many noble Lords in this House who would agree with me on that.
My Lords, having got off that bit of heat, may I say that I was delighted today that the noble Lord, Lord Rhodes, was able, not only to give us information to-day which I think (I am saying nothing against him personally) might probably well have been given yesterday, but also to tell us that we are to have a statement from the Chancellor as early as next Tuesday. I think that is thoroughly satisfactory. I know that the noble Earl the Leader of the House will disagree with me, in view of what he said, but it might be—one is full of hope—that the Questions we asked yesterday might have had some effect in bringing it forward a day

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or two. I am sorry to gainsay this to the noble Earl, but I do not accept that perfectly proper questions are not entitled to an answer in this House if the information is available.
THE EARL OF LONGFORD: I must just intervene again to say to the noble Lord that if an answer is available then of course it will be given; but I think he was making a very great mistake in supposing that information would be given here first on matters of taxation before it was given in the House of Commons.
LORD DERWENT: That may be the noble Earl's view: it is not mine.
8.28 p.m.
LORD AIREDALE: My Lords, in view of the promised statement for next Tuesday, there is only one particular matter, which is one of some urgency, that I shall mention very briefly now. I would revert once more, very briefly, to this matter of the Defence Bond holders who have open to them this conversion offer from the Government—the conversion offer into National Development Bonds—which expires on Friday of next week, to-morrow week.
We are to have this statement from the Chancellor of the Exchequer next Tuesday. It will no doubt be of great interest to the holders of 3½ per cent. Defence Bonds, who are trying to make up their minds whether or not to accept the Government's offer of conversion into these National Development Bonds, which carry a 2 per cent. tax-free bonus—or, at any rate, as the law stands at the moment the bonus is tax-free—and these people will want to know, on the best advice, whether or not to accept the Government's offer. Now the keenest among them will presumably read the Chancellor's statement in their newspapers next Wednesday, and some of them, no doubt, will wish to obtain advice as to what they should do in the light of the statement. They cannot be expected to come to a decision and communicate it to the Treasury by Friday of next week.
In relation to the small altercation which took place just now between the noble Earl the Leader of the House and the noble Lord, Lord Derwent, may I just say this? The noble Lord, Lord
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Rhodes—again, I am quite sure that none of us intends anything personal—did not help the House yesterday when, in reply to me on this question about these people who have to act before Friday of next week, he said "You will have to be patient." That was not helpful. The only question I should like now to ask Her Majesty's Government is this. In view of the situation, do they propose to extend the time within which these holders of Defence Bonds may come to a proper decision, calmly and in their own time, and in the light of the statement from the Chancellor of the Exchequer which they will read in their newspapers on Wednesday, as to whether or not to accept the conversion offer?
8.32 p.m.
LORD SHEPHERD: My Lords, may I reply to the noble Lord, Lord Airedale? I have taken note of what he said, and while I am quite sure he will not expect a reply from me this afternoon as to what action the Government might or might not take, I will certainly see that the views he has expressed are conveyed to my right honourable friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer. And I will see that it is done tomorrow. I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Derwent, for asking this Question in the name of the noble Earl, Lord Dundee, and I was glad to see, when he used the word "we": that this was, in fact, an Opposition question and not one of an individual Member; because I have a number of things which I must say, not only to the noble Lord, Lord Derwent, who made a very fine speech this evening, but also to Members on the other side of the House.
My Lords, the Question is a strange one. It does not seek information; it implies that Her Majesty's Government have acted irresponsibly, in view of the Chancellor of the Exchequer's statement on November 11 in regard to various matters of tax reform. The question implies that there have been severe losses, or that losses are likely to be suffered by those who invest. This is a serious matter; I think it would perhaps have been better put in the form of a Motion, rather than in the form of a Question.
First of all, may I say this to the noble Lord? There is no evidence that the statement of the Chancellor of the

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Exchequer on November 11 in regard to a capital gains tax and corporation tax has in itself resulted in any losses to investors. As the noble Lord is no doubt aware, recent fluctuations on the Stock Exchange have clearly been influenced by a wide range of factors. Her Majesty's Government recognise that certain uncertainties exist: the Chancellor of the Exchequer is particularly aware of this and has been so for some time. As my noble friend Lord Rhodes indicated in this House this afternoon, the Chancellor of the Exchequer will be giving information to Parliament on Tuesday.
But my Lords, having recognised the uncertainties, I think it is fair and true to say that at any Budget time, and in particular during the weeks prior to it, there is always uncertainty, with wide-ranging speculation of what the Chancellor of the Exchequer proposes to do in the existing circumstances. Therefore I think the noble Lord was rather wide of the mark in suggesting that investors were being put into a particularly special position because of the Chancellor's statement. The noble Lord in putting this Question is asking Her Majesty's Government to
"refrain from announcing proposals … when their implications have not been considered."
I am bound to point out to the noble Lord that prior to the November Budget, in view of the gravity of the economic situation which we inherited—and I hope that he will not forget that—there was wide speculation as to what steps the Chancellor would take. Both corporation and capital gains taxes were often mentioned.
Perhaps I might remind the noble Lord of the reactions on the Stock Exchange after Budget day, when there was considerable relief about the Chancellor's Budget statement. Perhaps I may also remind the House, and the noble Lord, of the Labour Party Manifesto upon which this Party fought the Election. We clearly stated that we intended to undertake a major overhaul of our tax system. We also stated that taxes must be fair and must be seen to be fair, and that we regarded this as an essential support to any national incomes policy. We therefore said that we would tax capital gains and block up the notorious avoidance and evasion devices of which noble Lords are probably aware. These points were made
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by my right honourable friend the Prime Minister, and by other members of the present Government, and indications of tax reform were given in the Queen's Speech. Therefore, clearly, it cannot be said that the statement made by my right honourable friend on November 11 raised any new issue.
We, and I am sure noble Lords opposite—and, I hope, their Party, because I believe that there is some doubt about that—set great store in achieving an incomes policy. We firmly believe that these two proposals, particularly the corporation tax, will assist us in achieving what perhaps will be the greatest breakthrough in our effort to make this country dynamic and competitive. My right honourable friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer proposed in the 1965 Budget to introduce proposals for taxation of capital gains which, I understand, will exclude gains on owner-occupied houses, or on the principal house, where the taxpayer has more than one. But this tax will apply to gains arising from assets whenever acquired. The gains assessed for tax will not exceed the difference between the value of a particular asset at the time of the 1965 Budget and the amount realised when it is disposed of subsequently.
My right honourable friend on November 24 clarified the position. I do not propose to read what he said, but I would draw the attention of the House, and of any noble Lords who wish to read it, to column 1102, of Volume 702 (No. 19) of the OFFICIAL REPORT of the other place. I appreciate the point of view and position taken this week by noble Lords opposite, in particular the noble Lord, Lord Conesford, and the noble Lord, Lord Airedale. These views were noted and were, I know, conveyed to my right honourable friend.
I think perhaps I might say some words in regard to my noble friend Lord Rhodes. I was surprised at the words used by the noble Lord, Lord Derwent. The noble Lord has been a Minister in this House—
LORD DERWENT: My Lords, I am sorry to interrupt. The noble Lord said that I used words which were apparently regarded as derogatory to the noble Lord, Lord Rhodes. I wish he would quote them.
LORD SHEPHERD: The noble Lord used the phrase that my noble friend had provided this House with an inadequate answer or no answer at all. I would regard that as a reflection on any Minister called upon to perform a duty in your Lordships' House.
SEVERAL NOBLE LORDS: No.
LORD DERWENT: Not if the information was not available. He could not help it.
LORD SHEPHERD: The noble Lord indicated that he was not in a position to make a statement, and he asked the House to await a statement that would be made by his right honourable friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
LORD DERWENT: That is inadequate.
LORD SHEPHERD: My Lords, I do not want to go too far into this, but it is quite clear that in Treasury and finance matters this House is in some difficulty. Clearly we have an interest in financial matters. Clearly a Minister in your Lordships' House, if unable to give a reply, can only undertake to see that the message is conveyed to the right authority, and then come back and make a statement. That, I should have thought, was what my noble friend intended to do, and it was, in fact, what he did.
In regard to the corporation tax, my right honourable friend has in mind not only the simplification of the tax system, but also, as I think is generally recognised, that the present tax position of companies does not provide sufficient incentive for them to plough back profits, a factor which is of the greatest importance if we are to expand our economy and be competitive in world trade. I am sure that the noble Lord will agree with me. An incomes policy depends both on employers and employees and on an expanding economy, and my right honourable friend takes the view that revision here will stimulate production and make us more competitive. This is an essential part of an incomes policy.
In his Question, the noble Lord implied adverse criticism of my right honourable friend for making these statements. The noble Lord himself admitted
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that there are precedents for making statements of intention. We have clearly indicated in the statement that bodies which will play an essential part in obtaining an incomes policy will now know that our intentions in regard to taxation are fair. This was one of the purposes of making the statement. By making the statement my right honourable friend has also caused considerable discussion in the City and in industry. This also was one of his intentions, as he himself said in his speech. I think that this is important and it has not been considered by the House. I am sure that the noble Lord is aware that the Bank of England, on their own initiative, are carrying out inquiries in the City. Undoubtedly Her Majesty's Government will receive information and opinions from many quarters. All this will be borne in mind by my right honourable friend when he comes to make his final decision on this matter.
I am sure that the noble Lord would agree that, if we are to move forward, if we are to have a dynamic and progressive economy, this will depend on co-operation and understanding; and if we can obtain these, particularly in a major tax reform, there is something to be said for it. I think it is a good thing that the Chancellor of the Exchequer has adopted this method. I am sure that my noble friend Lord Rhodes would have been happier if he could have given an answer at Question Time that would have satisfied noble Lords, but clearly he was not in a position to do so. Frankly, the House has to take into account the fact that financial control does not lie with us but with another place, and though it is perfectly right that we should be able to express our views, we must be careful not to do anything that might upset this division on financial matters between the two Houses. I hasten to say that this does not preclude noble Lords from pressing their point of view, both in debate and in supplementary questions. But it is quite wrong to attack a Minister in this House when he clearly is not in a position to answer. Certainly, if we cannot answer, we will endeavour to see that the views expressed by noble Lords are conveyed to the right quarters. I hope that the information that will be available on Tuesday will settle most of the uncertainties which, I recognise, do exist. I

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will see that the views expressed by the noble Lord, Lord Airedale, are conveyed to the right quarters, and I hope that he, too, will be satisfied with the information that will be given on Tuesday.

CONSOLIDATION BILLS
Message from the Commons, to acquaint this House that they have appointed a Committee of eight Members
to join with the Committee appointed by this House to consider all Consolidation Bills in the present Session.

NEW TOWNS BILL [H.L.]
Referred to the Joint Committee on Consolidation Bills.
House adjourned at fourteen minutes before nine o'clock.