Lords Sitting of 9 February 1965

Preamble
The House met at half past two of the clock, The Lord CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.
Prayers—Read by the Lord Bishop of Oxford
The Lord Clifford of Chudleigh—Sat first in Parliament after the death of his father.

REPRESENTATION ON SCOTTISH HOSPITAL BOARDS
2.35 p.m.
LORD FERRIER: 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 will consider amending the Statutory Rules applying to hospital boards of management in Scotland so as to ensure that there is on any board a representative for each burgh having a population in excess of 7,500 and having at least one hospital unit within its boundaries.]
THE JOINT PARLIAMENTARY UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR SCOTLAND (LORD HUGHES): My Lords, the procedure for the appointment
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by Regional Hospital Boards of hospital boards of management in Scotland is laid down in the National Health Service (Scotland) Act, 1947. Her Majesty's Government have no proposals to amend these provisions.
LORD FERRIER: My Lords, while thanking the noble Lord for his reply, I would ask whether in the case of the Burgh of Lanark, which in fact is the Burgh to which I particularly refer—it has a population of 8,000 and two busy hospitals, one of which is a maternity hospital which I understand it is proposed to close down—he will ask his right honourable friend if he will use the powers which he possesses under Section 11 (6) or (7) of that Act to ensure that this Burgh is represented on the management board for South Lanarkshire hospitals?
LORD HUGHES: My Lords, there is at present a vacancy on the board of management for the South Lanarkshire Hospitals, and I can assure the noble Lord that in making an appointment to fill this vacancy, the Western Regional Hospital Board will consult the board of management for South Lanarkshire hospitals and will take into account the various representations that have been made on this subject, including the representations made to-day by the noble Lord.
LORD FERRIER: I thank the noble Lord.

PROTECTION OF WILD BIRDS
2.37 p.m.
LORD HURCOMB: 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 are yet in a position to state when it will be possible to introduce the long-awaited Bill for the amendment of the Wild Birds Protection Act, 1954.]
THE JOINT PARLIAMENTARY UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE, HOME OFFICE (LORD STONHAM): My Lords, the Advisory Committees on the Protection of Birds for England and Wales and for Scotland put forward at the end of 1963 recommendations for amendment of the Protection of Birds Act, 1954. These took account of suggestions made in 1958 by the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds. The views of interested organisations have been obtained on a number of proposals. My right honourable friend and the Secretary of State for Scotland are at present studying the proposals in the light of the views expressed. I cannot say at present if it will be possible for Her Majesty's Government to take any legislative action.
LORD HURCOMB: My Lords, while thanking the noble Lord for that reply, may I emphasise to him that the matter has been under consideration for a very long time and that, as he has pointed out, I myself took a deputation to the Home Office in 1958? May I ask him further whether, if there are difficulties about the timetable, which we all recognise, it would not be possible for him to arrange for some noble Lord to introduce the Bill, as was done by a Member in both Houses of Parliament in relation to the Act of 1954?
LORD STONHAM: My Lords, I am, of course, aware that six years have passed since the noble Lord, as Chairman of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, led a deputation to the Home Office. But the delay cannot be laid at the door of the present Government, nor indeed is it the fault of our predecessors, because advisory committees took 3¾ years to make their suggestions
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and since then we have had to consult interested parties. With regard to the question of legislation, it is not only a question of timetables; it is also, of course, a question of content. But if the noble Lord would himself consider initiating legislation, then I should be very pleased to discuss the matter with him. However, I cannot give any undertaking that Her Majesty's Government will be able to find time for amending legislation here or in another place during the present Session.
LORD HAWKE: My Lords, before considering any amending legislation would Her Majesty's Government be careful to obtain the views of horticulturists?
LORD STONHAM: My Lords, I understand that the views of all interested parties have been obtained during the last twelve months.

DISPOSAL OF SURPLUS RAILWAY LAND
2.40 p.m.
LORD MOLSON: 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 have any statement to make with regard to the disposal by the Railways Board of surplus railway land in London and the Provinces.]
THE PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY, MINISTRY OF TRANSPORT (LORD LINDGREN): My Lords, in general, the disposal of surplus railway land is a matter within the management responsibility of the British Railways Board. As your Lordships will be aware, the disposal of such land in London has been the subject of consultations between my right honourable friend the Minister of Housing and Local Government and the Board. The latter have given an assurance that they are willing to make available for housing and associated purposes all their surplus land in the Metropolitan area that is suitable for those purposes. Negotiations to this end are proceeding between the Board and the Greater London Council.
LORD MOLSON: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that the only reason why this land is now available is that this House insisted that the Railways Board should not dispose of all land in London for the highest possible financial reward, and that, as a result of the defeat of the then Government on an Amendment moved by my noble friend Lord Conesford, Section 87 of the Transport Act was introduced? Will the noble Lord explain how the state of affairs which he has now described arises out of the operation of Section 87 of the Transport Act?
LORD LINDGREN: My Lords, of course it arises out of Section 87 of the Transport Act and, in fact, it shows that this was an embargo, or restriction, or handicap placed on a nationalised board, which would not have been placed upon private enterprise. It shows the value of land being held in municipal or national Board ownership and thereby gives any Government the opportunity to direct the use to which that land is likely to be put.
LORD MOLSON: My Lords, does the noble Lord the Parliamentary Secretary regret having voted against most of his noble friends on that side of the House and some of my noble friends on this side of the House and having supported the Government of that day?
LORD LINDGREN: My Lords, this is hardly the place for confession, but I then took the view that no Conservative Government had a right to place on a nationalised Board restrictions which they were not prepared to place upon private enterprise.
LORD HAWKE: My Lords, will Her Majesty's Government suggest to the Greater London Council that the largest of these estates, presumably on the Marylebone Road goods sidings, might be called the Conesford Estate?
LORD LINDGREN: My Lords, I should like to take this opportunity to say that, although this Section 87 placed a commercial restriction upon the Railways Board, as Parliament had decided the line of policy the Board have faithfully co-operated with the London County Council, with the Ministry of Housing and Local Government and now with the Greater London Council to the extent
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that over 700 acres of land are being made available on 144 sites, and even on 85 sites outside the Greater London Area.
LORD HAWKE: The noble Lord has not answered my question.
LORD BROCKWAY: My Lords, are the Government aware how most Members of this House will welcome the fact that this land is to be made available for the thousands of homeless who are in London?

COMMONS MOTION AND COURT OF APPEAL JUDGMENT
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: 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, as reported, it was with the approval of the Government that a Motion was tabled in another place which has been described as an attack on Her Majesty's Judges and which suggests that, in the discharge of their judicial functions, they have usurped the legislative function of Parliament.]
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (LORD GARDINER): My Lords, the Motion tabled in another place criticising the decision of the Court of Appeal in the case of Ward v. James neither required nor received the approval of Her Majesty's Government.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: My Lords, in view of the noble Lord's Answer, does he not regard it as most astonishing that The Times, with its high reputation, should assert positively on its main page, at the very beginning of an article, that this Motion was tabled with the approval of the Government? Am I to take it from the noble and learned Lord's Answer that there was not the slightest justification for this statement? Further, would he not regard it as very shocking if the Government had given their approval to the tabling of any such Motion?
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, as to the first part of the supplementary question, I am never surprised at mis-statements which I read in Conservative newspapers about the Government. As to the second part, I think it is perhaps

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undesirable that your Lordships' House should comment on what is or is not tabled in another place.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: My Lords, may I further ask the noble Lord to take note of the fact that it will be very wounding to those responsible for The Times that he should describe it as a Conservative newspaper?

RHODESIA
LORD SHEPHERD: My Lords, at a suitable moment after 3.30 p.m. my noble friend the Lord Chancellor will be making a statement on Rhodesia.
ABERDARE MARKETS AND TOWN HALL COMPANY BILL [H.L.]
Read 2a, and referred to the Examiners.
BARCLAYS BANK D.C.O. BILL [H.L.]
Read 2a and referred to the Examiners.
BRIGHTON SKYDECK BILL [H.L.]
Read 2a, and referred to the Examiners
CRUDE OIL TERMINALS (HUMBER) BILL [H.L.]
Read 2a, and referred to the Examiners

SALMON AND MIGRATORY TROUT (PROHIBITION OF DRIFT-NET FISHING) (EXTENSION) ORDER 1964
2.47 p.m.
LORD HUGHES LORD HUGHES rose to move: that the Salmon and Migratory Trout (Prohibition of Drift-Net Fishing) (Extension) Order, 1964, a copy of which was laid before this House on December 17, 1964, be approved. The noble Lord said: My Lords, the purpose of this Order is very simple. It does nothing more than extend for a period of one year the operation of the Order which at present prohibits fishing for salmon and migratory trout by drift-net in an area of sea off the coast of Scotland. This prohibition was imposed by the previous Government, and I think it is fair to say that they
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did so because, as they admitted, they did not really know what the effect would be on salmon stocks of the new practice of drift-net fishing off the Scottish coast which had developed in the two or three preceding years.
Some of us may have had our doubts as to whether this complete prohibition was essential, but with the inadequate information available it has been very difficult to say conclusively what the effects of drift-net fishing might be on the salmon stocks in Scotland. It was no doubt because of this that the Government of the day decided, in 1962, to refer the matter to a Committee, under the Chairmanship of Lord Hunter, who were asked to review the whole law relating to Salmon and Trout Fisheries in Scotland.
The Committee were asked to consider first the drift-net issue. They did this, and in July, 1963, submitted an Interim Report, in which they said that they had reached the conclusion that an unregulated drift-net fishery would quickly deplete salmon stocks in some rivers. They also said that they had looked at various suggestions which had been made to them for regulating the fishery, such as the licensing of boats or the introduction of catch quotas, but in the end had to report that none of the possible methods, either singly or together, would be a satisfactory means of control; and that they had not been able to find any system of control which would be workable under the existing law.
In these circumstances it has seemed to us that the only reasonable course is to continue the present prohibition on drift-net fishing for salmon for a period until the Hunter Committee have completed the examination, on which they are now engaged, of the whole law relating to salmon fisheries. When the Committee's Final Report is received, which we expect will be in the early summer, we shall have to look again at this whole question of drift-net fishing for salmon. Meantime, this Order maintains the position for a further year after the present Order expires on February 15. As I have said, there is no other change made by the Order, which continues the present prohibition of drift-net fishing for salmon in exactly the same area off the coast of Scotland as that in

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which the prohibition at present applies. I hope the House will agree that this Extension Order should be made.
Moved, That the Salmon and Migratory Trout (Prohibition of Drift-Net Fishing) (Extension) Order, 1964, be approved.—(Lord Hughes.)
VISCOUNT MERSEY: My Lords, before the Motion is agreed to, may I ask the noble Lord why this Order applies only to Scotland? Surely rivers in this country, in certain cases, also need this protection? And although it may not be within the powers of our authority to do so, I should have thought it was worth consulting the Government of the Irish Republic to see whether they might be willing to co-operate in some way. There are rivers in that country which are also affected. It is difficult to say, with any given area, whether the salmon will run up an English or an Irish river, but it must be to the benefit of all concerned that as large an area as possible is controlled from drift-net fishing.
LORD HUGHES: My Lords, I have no doubt that the Hunter Committee, who have been a long time on this job and have been looking at this matter from all aspects, will have had these aspects, among others, under consideration. In so far as the rest of the United Kingdom is concerned, the position South of the Border is totally different. The method by which salmon are fished for in English rivers is not the same as in Scotland. The ownership of the fishing is not the same as in Scotland. Methods which have proved satisfactory on English rivers are not capable of solving the problem in Scotland owing to the differences in fishing laws. And it is because of these differences that we have had to wait for the final recommendations of the Hunter Committee on the reform of the fishing laws as a whole. I would point out that they say in their Interim Report that they have not been able to recommend a satisfactory solution within the existing law.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: My Lords, do I understand that the Government hope to introduce by this time next year legislation based on the Hunter Committee recommendations?
LORD HUGHES: My Lords, there is no prohibition on hope.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

PROCEDURE OF THE HOUSE COMMITTEE
THE CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES (LORD MERTHYR): My Lords, I beg to move the Motion standing in my name on the Order Paper.
Moved, That the Earl of Listowel be proposed to the House as a member of the Committee in the place of the late Earl Alexander of Hillsborough.—(Lord Merthyr.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

REGISTRATION OF BIRTHS, DEATHS AND MARRIAGES (SCOTLAND) BILL [H.L.]
2.54 p.m.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
LORD HUGHES: My Lords, the last time that the Scottish law of registration of births, deaths and marriages was before your Lordships' House was 28 years ago. The first time was in July, 1854, when a First Reading was given to the Bill which became the Registration of Births, Deaths and Marriages (Scotland) Act, 1854. With the principal Act still in operation 110 years later I feel that I need scarcely apologise for taking up some time in your Lordships' House with a new Registration Bill. This new Bill repeals the 1854 Act and six amending Acts and re-writes them in the legislative and administrative language of to-day and also adds some new provision to meet present needs.
There are, therefore, two reasons for this Bill. The first is that the Act of 1854 is out of date in language and also in many of its practical applications. Simple consolidation would not be enough. To modernise, we have had to re-write. The second reason is that there are a number of improvements which should now be effected and which, I am sure, will be welcomed by the Scottish people. I should add at this point that there is no corresponding English Bill, as the English Registration Acts were consolidated in 1953. The two countries differ in this field in both law and practice, and I am assured that the contents of this Scottish Bill will not cause embarrassment on this side of the Border.

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The Bill is based upon a four-year study undertaken by the present Registrar General, and also consultation with a wide range of interested bodies. This study resulted in broad agreement that the basic functions and structure of the registration service do not need radical change. I shall therefore describe the provisions of the Bill with emphasis on what is new rather than on what is already law.
The Bill has five Parts. Under Part 1 the broad structure of the registration service remains the same. There is a Registrar General with his head office in the new Register House in Edinburgh, and a network of district registrars (at present over 900) throughout Scotland. All are statutory officers with functions laid down in the Bill. The registrars are appointed by the local registration authority, but in the exercise of their statutory duties they are under the supervision of the Registrar General.
The Bill makes one significant change in the central organisation. The Registrar General is at present faced with an overcrowding problem. The annual intake of registers needs 110 linear feet of shelving, and at this rate the New Register House will be full probably within five years. It is therefore proposed to microfilm the registers as they come in from the local registrars, deposit the originals in a proper repository elsewhere, and retain (for search and extract purposes) the microfilms, which will take up only 3 feet annually instead of 110. Clause 3 is vital to this proposal, because it gives the Registrar General authority to deposit the registers elsewhere than the present New Register House. I should like to emphasise the fact that at the present moment there is no power to take the registers outside the building of New Register House.
In the local administration, which is covered by Clauses 5–12, an endeavour has been made to simplify the statutory arrangements so as to ease the work of the local registration authorities and to clarify the relationship between the authority and the registrar as employer and employee. I shall not go into detail on this matter, but I ought to mention that one of the steps taken to meet these objectives has been to omit certain administrative functions which were assigned to the sheriff under the 1854 Act.
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Part II of the Bill re-writes the existing law on the registration of births—along with several improvements, a few of which I shall mention. Under the existing law all births must be registered by the registrar for the district in which the birth occurred. This can be an unnecessary inconvenience attaching to the policy—which your Lordships' House has often endorsed—of encouraging confinements in maternity hospitals, because it often obliges a parent to make a special journey (in some cases quite a long one) to have the birth registered. To help such parents Clause 13 will allow them a choice—provided that they reside in Scotland and that the child is born in Scotland—of having the birth registered either in the district in which the child was born or in the district where the parents reside.
Clause 15 deals with foundling children. One of its purposes is to give the foundling child a birthday. It still occasionally happens that a child is found on a doorstep. As a matter of fact, there was a case reported in the Press just within the last few weeks. At present the child is saddled for life with a birth certificate which shows that he was found at that particular address on such-and-such a date. Under Clause 15, if a medical certificate gives an approximate date of birth, that date may be entered in the register as the date of birth of the child.
Clause 17 deals with delayed registrations, and one of its objects is to meet the very real difficulties of some grownup people who have found that their births have never been registered at all. Under the present law they cannot act as their own informants if their parents or elder relatives are dead. In those circumstances it is impossible at present for a registration to be effected, but the change in Clause 17 will enable the person concerned to do so.
Under Clause 19, the abbreviated birth certificate instituted in 1934 will be issued to all informants free when a birth is registered. This certificate, unlike the ordinary full extract, does not contain names of parents and thus makes no distinction between legitimacy and illegitimacy. We hope that this free issue will bring it into more common use. The full extract will still be available on payment of the appropriate fee. Perhaps, as we are talking about Scotland,

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I should have put it the other way round. We hope that the imposition of the fee of 5s. 3d. for the whole certificate will make it more customary to accept the abbreviated one.
An important point is that when the abbreviated certificate was brought in, in 1934, the purpose was to enable a birth certificate to be available which did not indicate to anyone seeing it that the child was illegitimate. In fact, because it has not been as widely used for all practical purposes as we should have liked, the use of an abbreviated certificate immediately raises the suspicion in somebody's mind, "Is this a reference to a child of illegitimate birth?" We hope, therefore, that by making this the standard certificate it will be the one which is regularly used, so that the original intention in 1934 will now be carried out, some thirty years later.
Part III deals with the registration of deaths. There is no radical change in existing arrangements, except for a provision in Clause 22 enabling a death to be registered either in the district where it took place or in the district where the deceased was ordinarily resident before his death. Clause 24 brings the statutory arrangements for the supply of a medical certificate of cause of death into line with current practice, and provides some latitude for improvements in the future. As I imagine your Lordships are aware, the particulars in death registrations, including the cause of death, are transferred to anonymous punched cards which are processed in order to produce a wide variety of statistical tables. I recently visited the machine room in the New Register House where this work is done and was much impressed by the tremendous variety of services given in this way to medical research workers in hospitals and medical schools.
Part IV relates to registration of marriages. It is not among the objects of the Bill to make any change in the marriage law of Scotland. In substance it consolidates the present law on the registration of ecclesiastical marriages, and it leaves untouched the Marriage (Scotland) Act, 1939, which deals with both the contracting and the registration of civil marriages.
Part V modernises the procedures for indexing, copying, and correcting registers.
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Photographic or other reproduction methods will be used when this is possible and desirable. If a photographic extract is issued it will be authenticated in the same way as one written by hand or provided by typewriter. Clause 43 contains new proposals for recording changes of name and surname already made in accordance with the Common Law of Scotland. There is nothing in Scotland exactly corresponding to the deed poll procedure in England and Wales, and there has been some demand in Scotland for many years for a convenient method of recording such changes. It occasionally happens, for example, that a young man or a young woman is applying for entry to higher education or employment and is suddenly faced with the fact that he or she has been brought up with a Christian name or a surname different from that in the birth entry. In these and similar cases it will be possible to have established changes recorded in a separate register. The original entry will not be altered, but when an extract is obtained the change or changes will be shown in addition to the original name or surname. I believe that these provisions not only will be found convenient, but will often relieve some real personal distress.
Clauses 45 to 47 remind us that Parliament in its wisdom did something for Scotland a hundred years ago which it did not do for England and Wales. It made it a statutory requirement that all surviving parochial registers up to the year 1854 should be deposited with the Registrar General. He has them still—4000 volumes of them. I saw them recently in the New Register House, where they are in regular use for genealogical, historical and biographical research. I am told that they are also much used in the tourist season by Canadian and Australian visitors, who come to the New Register House to trace their ancestors.
May I conclude by making the point that the registration service continues to serve in an ever-increasing degree the two main purposes for which it was established over a hundred years ago. On the one hand, it supplies records for legal, personal and scholarly purposes. On the other hand, it provides the raw material for vital and social statistics, and these statistics are linked

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with Census results to provide an important part of the factual background on which social, economic and land use planning must be based. I am happy to commend to your Lordships a Bill which modernises the law on a matter which concerns every Scot and has a contribution to make to the social and economic progress of Scotland. I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a,—(Lord Hughes.)
3.5 p.m.
LORD CRAIGTON: My Lords, I am sure that the whole House is most grateful to the noble Lord for the clear and concise explanation which he has given of this very important Bill. We sympathise with him in realising that he was much gayer and uninhibited when in Opposition. We on this side of the House welcome the Bill. Inevitably, my noble friends and I have some doubts to voice, and we have, too, some suggestions—some of which, in fact I hope all of which, will be constructive. We shall study with care the noble Lord's replies to the points we make. Finally, we have a number of minor Committee points which I do not propose to raise to-day, but we shall put them down for the next stage.
Before turning to the Bill, I have three questions which I should like to ask the noble Lord. First, this Bill, as the noble Lord has said, touches on many aspects of life. Can he tell the House about the various bodies which have been consulted in its preparation, which, as we all understand, has taken such a long time? Secondly, can the noble Lord confirm that no change is proposed in the degree and the nature of the access which is now afforded to the public to the entries in the registers of births, marriages and deaths? Thirdly, the noble Lord spoke about correction of errors. Is it going to be any easier to get ordinary spelling errors corrected in the register entries? At present, as I understand the position, a simple correction of a spelling error requires a formal petition to the sheriff, which must be inconvenient and perhaps expensive for some people.
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To turn to the Bill itself, Clause 3 (1) requires that the General Register Office shall be maintained in Edinburgh. It seems to be a very unusual provision to put into a Statute that an office should be maintained in Edinburgh. The noble Lord pointed out to the House that it had been 28 years since a Bill of this nature has been before your Lordships. This is the sort of Bill which remains unchanged for many years. We are facing big changes in Scotland. Who knows what the future will bring? Some Registrar General, some Secretary of State for Scotland, may have very good reasons for wishing to move the office to Livingstone, or Glasgow, or Fife. But, as the Bill stands, he must come to Parliament with an amending Bill. I feel strongly that this is a most unusual provision to go into a Bill. I know the Register Office will be in Edinburgh; it may be in Edinburgh for all time. But I am going to suggest that we should substitute the word "Scotland" for the word "Edinburgh" and not create what, I believe, is a quite unusual precedent.
On Clause 6 and other clauses, I am concerned about the effect on the present staff in some of the registration districts. Their districts will alter quite properly: they may contract, they may enlarge, and the volume of their work may be greater or less. Would it not be proper and in conformity with the normal practice—we put this in so many Bills—to include in this Bill a compensation clause for any officers or servants who may suffer detriment as a result of the Bill?
To turn now to Clauses 7 and 53, my noble friends and I know that many of the staff are concerned about the arrangements in the Bill for such things as the fixing of salaries, the engagement of staff, and the appeal procedure over salaries and over dismissals of part-time registrars. As I have investigated the situation, and as I hope the position is, the staff of the district registrar's office will all be treated for this purpose as normal local authority employees, whether they are full-time or part-time. I understand that the part-time registrars may join the Association of Registrars of Scotland. I ask the noble Lord whether I am right. I hope the noble Lord will clarify this matter in his reply. There is misunderstanding, there are fears, and it would be very good to have the answer on the record from him.

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On Clauses 13 and 22, the Bill departs, as the noble Lord told us, from the present practice of registering births and deaths in the district where they occur, and I agree with him that the present provision has caused some inconvenience. The present practice in England is to give the particulars to any registrar. The registrar then sends the declaration for registration to the registrar of the district in which the event took place. This is clearly a more convenient practice, though, of course, because the declaration has to be handed on from one registrar to another, this may lead to some delay. I do not think the English system causes any trouble over signatures, because, presumably, the informant advising the original registrar's office can sign the form giving the particulars.
Both systems seem to have the advantage that the district where the event occurred is the one place to look for the particulars. Under the Bill, the record need not be in the district where the event occurred; it can be in the district where either parent was living at the time. But how is one to find which district this is? Will it not be necessary, in far more cases than at present, to go and consult the central register? This is what I do not understand. I am not at all sure that the noble Lord is not curing one difficulty by creating another. We try in Scottish Bills to do things better than they are done in England, and I hope that the noble Lord can convince me that this is the case here. As of now, I and some of my noble friends have considerable doubts on this matter.
The noble Lord mentioned Clause 19, which discontinues the free issue of a full birth certificate. Of course, this is something which we in Scotland do better than England does, and such a certificate has not been charged for in Scotland. I am glad to see that the Bill keeps ahead of England by giving a free issue of the abbreviated certificate. As the noble Lord knows, there has been some criticism of this change, and I am grateful to the noble Lord, who suddenly became so lucid in departing from his brief, for telling us in words that we could well understand the reason for this departure.
Finally, my Lords, there is Clause 46 under which all the parochial registers not already returned must be returned to the Registrar General. I feel that some of
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these registers are prized historical documents, possibly kept now in a place of honour where they have lain for so many years. I do not see why they must be returned to the Registrar General. Should not provision be made so that, with or without payment of a small fee, the Registrar General would be satisfied with a photographic copy, allowing the original to remain where it has lain for so long—that is, of course, if the present custodians so desire? That is something which we can talk about at greater length in Committee. Those are the points I have to make. My noble friends have others, and I hope they will support and elaborate some of the points I have made. Our one desire on this side of the House is to send this good Bill on its way as an even better Bill.
3.16 p.m.
LORD DRUMALBYN: My Lords, perhaps it may not be inappropriate, in opening my remarks on this Bill, to look back to the 1854 Act, the purpose of which, as described in its preamble, was
"that a complete and uniform system of registration should be established and maintained."
Lord Elcho, who introduced the Bill in another place on April 7, 1854, claimed that compulsory registration was
"the greatest boon which an enlightened Government could confer upon the people."
In his peroration he said:
"While the rich have their title deeds, their parchments and their sculptured monuments, there is literally no record of the poor man's birth or death except the parish register, which may not inaptly be called the charter of the poor man."
And he sought, in effect, to convert the parish registers into a national record.
My Lords, what are the tests by which a measure of this description should be judged? The first I suggest is: will it improve the system of registration so as to make it more uniform and complete? The second is: do the changes proposed make registration easier and more convenient for the citizen, with due regard for economy and administrative efficiency? The third is: are the interests of those who carry out the registration—the registrars—properly safeguarded? The first question on which we have to make up our minds is whether registration should be regarded as a local or as a national service. I would suggest that, where it is desired that in meeting human

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needs different methods should be employed to conform with differences in life, thought and habit in different areas, then it is natural that the service concerned should be local rather than national. But where the very essence of the service is uniformity throughout the country, it is reasonable, at least, to put the case for a national rather than a local service.
Under this Bill, it is the Registrar General who is to give the registrar instructions and directions in the exercise of his functions under the Act. That comes under Clause 7. Under the same clause, it is also the Registrar General who is to prescribe the appropriate qualifications for registrars. Indeed, it is really not too much to say that responsibility is placed upon the Registrar General for the efficiency of the service, for Clause 1 (3) empowers him,
"to do all such things as appear to him necessary or expedient for maintaining the utility of the registration service in Scotland."
There are, of course, powerful arguments in favour of local administrative control. First of all, that is where the control now lies. Secondly, it is in many ways economical and administratively convenient. Registrars may well combine their functions as registrars with other local authority duties, and there is a close link between local authority health services and registrars, each relying on the other for much of the information required. On the other hand, local authority boundaries may not always result in the registrars' offices being located in the most convenient place for the people in the surrounding area, or even in the most economical distribution of offices throughout the country. For example, one office situated on the boundary between two local registration authorities might replace two or more registration offices, yet Clause 6 of the Bill does not seem to make provision for one registration office to cover parts of two or more local registration authority areas. This is something we can look at in Committee.
There are also frontiers of jurisdiction which may cause trouble. For example, there is the small one of office hours. I believe that, under the original Act, the hours of opening were laid down in the Act; and I think they were to be from eight to six for six days a week. But
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now, under this Bill, they are to be fixed by the local registration authority with the approval of the Registrar General. What happens if the Registrar General does not approve? It may well be that in certain areas which have gone over to a five-day local authority week the Registrar General may feel that it is for the convenience of the citizens, many of whom come into the centre on a Saturday, that the registration office should be open on that day.
Then there is the question of discipline. The power of dismissal is given to the local registration authority, although it must first of all consult the Registrar General. But it is the Registrar General who issues instructions as to how the registrar is to carry out his functions; and if they are not carried out efficiently, then it is presumably the Registrar General who will want to have the registrar removed. It is not easy to be sure where the balance of advantage lies in the interests of uniformity and efficiency, and the choice is perhaps made more difficult because of the review of expenditure falling on the rates which I believe the Government are undertaking. If local authorities were to be relieved of the cost of registration services, the balance would be tipped in favour of a national service. Conversely, if Parliament felt strongly that the service is primarily national rather than local, there would be a strong case for relieving local authorities of the rate burden of the service.
My own view is that much depends on the extent to which local authority officers act as part-time registrars. It seems to me significant that the cities are in favour, I believe, of registration being a national service; for in cities, no doubt, registrars all have a whole-time job and do nothing but registrations. But I am sure that the answer ought to depend on the convenience of the individual, rather than on administrative convenience; and I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, will be able to convince us that in fact the two coincide. Personally, I want the Bill to go as far as possible to enable every individual to fulfil his registration obligations at the office which is most accessible to him—which, of course, is not necessarily the nearest office.
On the score of remuneration, even if local authorities are to continue to be the employers of registrars there seems

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no reason why, in a uniform service such as this, there should not be uniformity of remuneration, at least for whole-time registrars and those who are only part-time employees of local authorities, or in some cases, perhaps, not employees at all, but independent people carrying out the functions of registrars. Again, this is a matter which we can perhaps consider in Committee.
My Lords, it is at least surprising that there should be no mention in the Bill, that I can find, of any arrangements for the negotiation of salary scales or for arbitration in case of disagreement. If it is the intention that reorganisation of districts should take place on a considerable scale—and this was something that I think the noble Lord did not mention in the course, of his observations—then surely provision should also be made for compensation for loss of office or for down-grading of office. There is also the effect on salaries of those of the Bill's provisions which give a choice of the place of registration. That choice, I should have thought, would be likely to increase the work for some registrars and perhaps reduce it for others, although the mere fact that a choice is given will not mean that the amount of the reduction will be as much as the amount of the increase, because of the necessity to consult between registrars.
My noble friend Lord Craigton has referred to the question of where registration takes place. This, I think, is perhaps one of the most important changes made by the Bill. On the face of it, one would say that the right place to register is where the event took place. In the less mobile days of 1854, where the event took place was in most cases probably also the district of residence. Nowadays, in a far higher proportion of cases children are born in hospitals, and those hospitals may be quite a long way from home and in a different registration district. I am sure it is right at least to allow notice of a birth to be given to the registrar in the district of residence, and perhaps even to go as far as is the case under the English procedure, and allow notice to be given to any registrar—that is to say, the registrar who is most conveniently situated for the individual. Because, I repeat, it is the convenience of the individual that we want to study most in this matter. I am also sure that it is right to allow parents to notify a birth
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in the district of residence. That is not quite the same thing as allowing the birth to be registered in the district of residence. In England, as my noble friend has said, one may give notice to any office, but registration will take place in the district of birth.
It can hardly be said that to adopt the English system would greatly increase the work of registrars, since in every case the registrar in the district of birth will have to verify that the registration has duly taken place elsewhere whenever, indeed, it has not been made by him. Otherwise, one could never be certain that there had not been double registration. The most cogent reason for an event always being recorded in the district in which it took place is perhaps that where it took place is a matter of fact: in contrast, a person's district of residence is a much less clear-cut concept. There are many nuances between "Where I lived" and "Where I was" at any particular time.
If the Bill becomes law, what is to happen on the Borders? I thought that perhaps the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, did not quite cover all the points here. No doubt a Dumfriesshire or Berwickshire parent whose child is born in a Carlisle or Berwick hospital will want to register the birth in Scotland, for reasons of national sentiment. I gather that he will not be able to do so. Why should the Scottish registrar not be empowered to send the notice of birth to his English counterpart to be registered in England? Why should the Bill not provide for that? Or will notification of the birth have to be given in England, since there is to be no machinery in Scotland for notification as the Bill is now drafted?
What happens if a woman who is ordinarily resident in Carlisle has her baby, perhaps prematurely or unexpectedly, in Dumfries while on a visit there and is sent back to Carlisle quite soon after the birth, as sometimes happens? If the father gives notice of the birth to the Carlisle registrar, the registrar has no power to register the birth but must send the notification to the district of birth. So it looks as if in such cases, even though the mother may be already back in Carlisle, the Dumfries registrar will have to do the registration. Surely the Dumfries registrar could be empowered to receive the registration

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from the registrar in Carlisle. Otherwise, obviously, the parents will be compelled to go back to Dumfries to make the registration.
My Lords, there are two main purposes in this Bill. One, has been referred to by the noble Lord, and that is the question of changes of name and surname. He referred, in particular, to children; and I think that what I have to say also covers children. The Bill maintains the Scottish tradition that the name of a person is his Christian name and that the surname is an additional name. Until I looked into this I confess that I was not aware that it is customary, but not necessary, for a father in Scotland to confer his own name on his children born in wedlock; and that, to quote the authority I consulted:
"unless any obligation exists, freedom of selection is unrestricted."
—that is, selection of name. Such obligation arises in cases of "names of dignity". A person, according to the law as stated by Lord Adam:
"has a perfect right to change his name and no-one can prevent him from adding to it or altering it."
At the same time, it is clearly desirable that some formal step be taken so as to establish the identity of the person.
I understand that in Scotland the commonest ways of establishing a new name are by Lord Lyon's certificate, which confers official recognition of the change of name, or by public advertisement. Once the formal step has been taken, and the new name is in use, there seems to be no reason why application for registration of the new name should not be made. But Clause 43 (5) allows application after the name has been in use for two years, and not before; and the registrar can insist on a further insertion in a newspaper, this time giving notice of the intention to apply. I quite appreciate that where no formal act has taken place, this delay may be justified. I realise that the period of the delay may in some circumstances provide some protection for the community. But surely at least where official recognition has been given to a change of name it is not necessary that there should be this two-years wait before the change is recorded in the register. I should
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have thought that in the particular case that the noble Lord cited, that of children, this might be very disadvantageous. These are the points, and some others, which we shall consider in Committee. With that I welcome the Bill and wish it well.
LORD STRATHCLYDE: My Lords, I wonder whether the noble Lord could indicate to us the situation of that place he refers to as "elsewhere", that is; the place where the Registrar General might deposit the document other than in the New Register House. Is it by any chance a certain church situated in Charlotte Square, or is it some other place?

MINISTERS' VISIT TO RHODESIA
3.35 p.m.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, may I, with your Lordships' permission, read an Answer that is being given by my right honourable friend the Prime Minister in another place in reply to a Question asking whether he will make a Statement about his correspondence with the Prime Minister of Southern Rhodesia? The Answer is as follows:
"My correspendence with the Prime Minister of Rhodesia remains confidential. I can, however, inform the House that when I met him in London ten days ago I suggested that my right honourable friend the Commonwealth Secretary and my noble friend the Lord Chancellor should visit Rhodesia to have discussions with the Rhodesian Government and to meet a representative cross-section of opinion. The Rhodesian Government has agreed to the visit, which is expected to last about ten days. My colleagues will be seeing any persons they wish who are not in prison for criminal offences. They expect to arrive in Salisbury about February 22."
My Lords, that is the end of my right honourable friend's Answer. Assuming that my visit lasts for about ten days, I should be returning to London on or about Wednesday, March 3, and I should like to inform your Lordships that the Counsellors of State have been graciously pleased to consent to my being absent from the country for this period. So far as I can judge, I am likely to be away from the House for about five sitting

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days. I ask your Lordships to agree to my being absent from the Woolsack during that time.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: My Lords, while we shall all of us no doubt miss the noble and learned Lord during his absence from the Woolsack, I am sure he will embark on his mission with your Lordships' good wishes; and it is the hope of all of us that the discussions which are to take place may result in some alleviation of the problems of Southern Rhodesia. May I take it that the object of the visit is solely to have discussions and not to reach decisions, and that the noble and learned Lord and the Commonwealth Secretary will be reporting to Parliament the results of those discussions? There is one further matter that I do not think is quite clear from the Statement. There is a reference to seeing any persons whom the noble Lord and the Commonwealth Secretary may wish to see who are not in gaol for criminal offences. May I ask the noble and learned Lord this? Will he and the Commonwealth Secretary be able to see Mr. Nkomo and Mr. Sithole, should they wish to do so?
LORD REA: My Lords, may I add our good wishes from these Benches? We shall indeed miss the noble and learned Lord. We are very glad that we shall be so very well represented on his journey. May I thank him for his courtesy in notifying us of his intentions, and wish him full success in his mission?
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, I welcome the observations that have been made both by the noble and learned Viscount, Lord Dilhorne, and by the noble Lord, Lord Rea. It is correct that the purpose of the visit is to have discussions both with the Government of Rhodesia and with representatives of all shades of opinion in the country. We shall return and report in the first instance, of course, to the Government, and it will be for the Government then to decide what is the next step to take. In answer to the last question raised by the noble and learned Viscount, Lord Dilhorne, we shall not be able to see Mr. Sithole, who is in prison as a convicted man, but we shall be able to see restrictees, including Mr. Nkomo.

REGISTRATION OF BIRTHS, DEATHS AND MARRIAGES (SCOTLAND) BILL [H.L.]
3.38 p.m.
Second Reading debate resumed.
BARONESS ELLIOT OF HARWOOD: My Lords, to return to the Second Reading of the Bill so ably moved by the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, I intervene, for only a short moment, because I have had considerable experience—some twenty years' experience—of the importance of registration in Scotland, since I have been a member of a local authority, and a rural local authority at that, for all those years. I should like to testify to the value of local registration and the local registrar. He is often the key person in a village and is someone to whom people will go to register those events in their lives which are associated with the most fundamental of life's happenings—namely, births, deaths and marriages. These words themselves evoke in all of us very many memories, and how vivid they still remain although the events may be a long way off!
I believe registrars are very important people, and although this Bill stresses to some extent the importance of central registration and of the central Registrar, my feeling is that the local influence and the local importance of registrars are very great indeed, certainly in village areas. I am speaking thus because in my area at the present moment I have the secretary of the Registrars Association of Scotland, who is registrar in the Burgh of Selkirk, and I take this chance of raising with the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, some of the points I have discussed with him.
The first thing of importance to realise is that in Scotland, out of 950 registrars, approximately 900 are part-time and only 50 or so are full-time registrars. This, in itself, is proof of the value and importance of the local aspect of registration. The 900 cover small areas, perhaps, but in their areas they will know almost everybody in the community and this is very important. Therefore, in my experience, registration is first of all a local service, although the Bill stresses its national aspect. It is also a local government service.
It is not always easy to get people to take on this job, because, as well as

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being interesting, it is exacting. A registrar never knows when people are going to call on him and give him vital information to be registered, and he has really to be available at almost all hours. I have found, in the area which I know best—the Borders—that the local registrars are devoted people. And I hope very much that their interests will be safeguarded in this Bill. My noble friend Lord Drumalbyn referred to this. Being part-time and in local government service, they cannot speak up for themselves in the same way as the full-time registrars, who have an association to speak for them. Clause 7 of the Bill refers to the dismissal of local registrars, and I hope that the Minister is sure that they will be properly represented in such an event and will get proper compensation.
With reference to the registration of births, dealt with in Clause 13, about which other noble Lords have spoken, there is a change in principle. I agree with what my noble friend Lord Drumalbyn said: We want to make it as easy as possible for people to register, but there is a great deal to be said for registration by declaration and for information to be sent to the home registrar of the person concerned. All the information regarding a family would be passed on to the place where the family lives. Sometimes it might not work that way, if people were migrant, but in my experience, although now in the modern era people may move about more, on the whole people stay very much in the same areas, certainly in the rural areas. It is important to send information from the places where family events have occurred—in hospitals, for example—to where a family actually lives and where most of the information about the family and its forbears is registered.
On the point about the new certificate of birth, I see that it might be valuable to have the abbreviated certificate. We do not want to stress the problem of illegitimacy, which, alas! arises rather often these days. On the other hand, a great many people prefer the full certificate they have been used to getting, which records information which over many generations forms an interesting record, and I hope that there will be no discouragement to getting a full certificate, if it is indeed the policy now to stress the abbreviated certificate.
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The hours of attendance of local registrars has been mentioned in the course of the debate. There is a difficulty here, since most local government officers work only five days a week and an important event might have to be registered on a Saturday. In villages the registrar is often very well known. Perhaps he is someone who has a small business in the village. And the information gets to him almost at the moment it has taken place, so that information is almost constantly made available. In the cities it must be quite different. Yet I think, that with a little arrangement of hours, it would be possible for registrars to cover the whole of a 5½ -day week at least, which I believe would be of great value to people who may want to make registrations. Certainly a rota of some kind could be organised in the smaller areas and, I hope, in the cities, too.
I agree with what noble Lords have said about the value of records in a locality. I would suggest that they need not all be sent to the central register. By the use of microfilm and other photographic means of recording, a record could be sent to the centre and the local areas might be allowed to keep their own records.
I hope that this Bill will go through. It is a valuable Bill. But I should like to suggest to the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, that he should consider these points, in which registrars in Scotland are keenly interested, and I hope that he will be good enough to allow us to discuss these points, perhaps in the form of Amendments to the Bill, on Committee stage. I support the Bill very much indeed.
3.48 p.m.
LORD BALERNO: My Lords, may I crave your Lordships' indulgence for intervening in this debate? I do so as a geneticist, who is consequently much interested in pedigrees and in ensuring their accuracy. As the law stands at present, the new-born child must be registered in the registration district of its place of birth. As the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, has pointed out, with the development of maternity hospitals, as well as for other reasons, it makes sense to extend this to the registration district where the parents usually reside and from that to where the mother is living shortly after the birth.

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But I cannot see any good reason for extending this to the registration district where the father is living, and there are many reasons against so doing. To take the best aspect of those circumstances—that is, where the father at the time of the birth or immediately thereafter is living elsewhere than with his wife by reason of employment—I can find it of no great convenience that he should effect the registration. If his wife is still confined, then she can persuade any of the persons mentioned in Clause 14(2) to effect the registration on her behalf. But if a third registration district is possible, then there is the probability of confusion due to duplication, which may be accidental or may be deliberate. For who will name the child? And if the child be given different names and if in any case the surname be hyphenated, it may be very difficult for the Registrar General to discover that a duplicate registration has been made. In cases where the paternity is suspect there is more likelihood of deliberate misinformation, and the duplication will be more difficult to discover. The argument that the father is the best person to acknowledge paternity falls to the ground in cases like this. I trust that the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, will take another look at this matter so that the Bill may be amended and confusion avoided.
In Clause 19 another change is made in the existing law, also, I think, for the worse. It substitutes the abbreviated certificate of birth for the full excerpt which is at present given free on registration. There are two important points in favour of the continuation of the issue of a full gratis extract at registration. First, the person to whom the possession of documentary evidence of his birth is most important is in later years the child himself. Obviously he can exercise no choice when his birth is recorded. Whether or not a full extract is obtained (if not to be issued gratis) depends entirely upon the parents, who may or may not, for financial reasons or otherwise, obtain such a full extract. It seems reasonable that there should be provided in every case a full extract so that complete documentary evidence is given in the first instance. Where desired an abbreviated certificate
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could be obtained on request. To suggest the substitution of an abbreviated certificate for the present full certificate, so that by the wider use of the former a minority would be spared embarrassment, seems to me to be unfair to the large majority.
Secondly, the recording of particulars of parentage for the registration of marriage and deaths is necessary, and with the setting up of a system of record linkage in the General Register Office must inevitably be more so. All registrars, I believe, would agree that it is because of the availability of the birth certificate (that is, the original gratis full extract) that the records of marriages and, in particular, deaths are as complete as they are. Registrars are the only persons who can speak with assurance on this point, and I understand that they do so with the complete conviction that the disappearance of the full gratis extract will lead to an increase in the incompleteness of records or a considerable inconvenience to informants who may not otherwise have particulars of parentage available.
The importance of many a Bill is emphasised by saying that it affects the life of every citizen. In the literal sense this can be said more truly of this than almost any other Bill. For it most certainly affects the life of every Scot who does not emigrate. Although, in its ultimate application, we Scots may not be able to enjoy personally the fruits of this Bill, nevertheless, for the convenience of posterity and the justification of generations yet unborn it behoves us to deliberate to-day with wisdom and circumspection.
3.53 p.m.
VISCOUNT COLVILLE OF CULROSS: My Lords, I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, will be pleased with the welcome that his Bill has received from this side of the House this afternoon, and, indeed, I do not want in any way to detract from that welcome. On the contrary, I think that when one looks at Schedule 2 to the Bill and sees the legislation that is repealed, then this Bill must be very welcome indeed. The law that is repealed is in some cases to be found in books so archaic that it required a longer walk in the Temple this morning than I was prepared to undertake to find them. This must in itself be justification for what the noble Lord said in opening.

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There are, however, one or two matters with which I should like to deal, as have other of my noble friends this afternoon. I would take up the invitation of my noble friend Lord Craigton to elaborate one point in particular; that is to say, the provisions of Parts II and III of the Bill about where and how registration of births and deaths is to take place. As most noble Lords have said, the present law, both in England and Scotland, is that registration of birth and death can take place only in the district, or the sub-district in England, where the event took place. In England there is a mitigation of this rule only so far as birth is concerned, and not death, in that the person qualified to inform the registrar on this subject may make a declaration to any other registrar who will pass on the information to the registrar concerned. This Bill provides for the continuance of that type of system. It is provided for the general public in a slightly different way, and it extends that convenience also to the case of registration of death. In view of what has been said in your Lordships' House this afternoon, I am sure that the noble Lord opposite will have a further look at this point.
But perhaps I should tell the noble Lord what I think would probably be an improvement on what the Bill says. As I understand it, there must be three criteria of this sort of registration—and I do not know in which order they come: the public convenience; the accuracy of the entry; and the certainty that the registration takes place, and takes place once only. I think that for the purposes of carrying out those three intentions behind the law it would be better if registration took place in the district where the event took place, and there only, but that there should also be a declaratory system, both for birth and for death, so that the information required might be passed on by any registrar in Scotland to the registrar in whose district the matter had to be registered.
To take the point that you must have certainty that the information is registered, and registered only once, surely it must be the registrar in the district where the event takes place who is most likely to know about the event. Furthermore, if he, and he only, has the responsibility
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—as I think ultimately he has under this Bill, because in the end he is the person who has to chase up any defaulters who have not done their duty under the Bill—then no other registrar in the areas where parents live, or in which a person has lived and then unfortunately has died somewhere else, need be worried about what has happened outside his district, He need concern himself only with what goes on inside his district. Both of these points, I suggest, are going to lead to greater certainty that the matter is properly carried out.
My noble friend Lord Drumalbyn mentioned the difficulty about the Border country. It is, indeed, going to be strange for Scots people, if this Bill comes into law in the form in which it now is, that if they have lived all their lives in Scotland and they should happen to die in England across the Border, or if they have lived all their lives in Scotland and given birth to a child South of the Border, they or their relatives will find that, instead of being able, as the Bill provides under Scottish law, to register in the district where the residence normally was, this cannot be done and the registration can take place only in England. Equally, there will be confusion for English people living South of the Border when they find the difference in the Scottish law that would be brought about by this Bill. This, I think, could be largely overcome if the suggestion I am putting forward were adopted by the Government.
There is also the difficulty that my noble friend Lord Balerno mentioned of the possibility under the provisions of the Bill of more than one registration taking place. As he said, there can be up to three registration districts where birth can properly be registered, and in order to prevent duplication of the sort that I have in mind there has had to be provided the specific provisions of Clause 14 (4), so that the Registrar General can sort out any muddle that may occur. I should have thought that the necessity to put in that type of provision pointed to the possibility that a considerable amount of administrative time and trouble would be involved in checking all those matters.
Then, as to the accuracy of the registration, I think some people would say it is important that the information in the

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register should be accurate; and I would not disagree with that. They might also say that one of the things that should appear in the register is the signature of the informant concerned. Under a declaratory system of registration of both births and deaths, I do not believe there is any reason why inaccuracy should occur. After all, any registrar to whom the declaration is made will be perfectly familiar with the process that is being carried out. He will know precisely what questions it is customary for himself to ask when he is registering somebody in his own district, and if he is in charge a perfectly accurate record ought to be able to be sent on quite easily to the registrar in whose district the event took place. Moreover, if there is a necessity for a signature to be available for later inspection there cannot, particularly now that we have moved into the realms of microfilm and photography, be any insuperable difficulty about it, because the declaration could be signed by the informant when the registrar asks him the questions; and the document itself could be passed on to the registrar who is actually going to effect the entry in the register, and it could there be kept or photographed, or whatever is suitable, and there the signature would be.
One thing I do feel is that a declaratory system would be of even greater convenience to the public than are the provisions in the Bill at the moment. Any registrar would be available for the informants to visit in order to go through the proper statutory provisions of the law. I appreciate that with this system a birth certificate might be a little delayed, but I do not think that there would be a great difficulty. I also appreciate that a death certificate might, in some cases, be delayed. This might present a greater problem, but I would invite the noble Lord, if he has not already done so (and I am sure he has), to look at the provisions of Section 24 of the 1953 English and Welsh Act, which provides for the issue of a death certificate under proper safeguards, even before the death has been registered in the register in the ordinary way. It may be that any practical difficulties which would be involved in that particular instance could be overcome as they have been, I think, in England. I believe there can be no difficulty now about the
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idea in Scotland of having deaths registered in a different place from that where they actually occurred, because this, after all, is what the Bill itself is providing. Therefore, I see no reason why the curious anomaly of English law should have to be perpetuated North of the Border. I hope, therefore, that the noble Lord will look most seriously at this point again to see whether the Bill cannot be improved. He will be given an opportunity at a later stage to do so.
There are three points that I should like to mention about the effect of the Bill upon illegitimate children—and this is a matter which I consider to be very important indeed. First of all, the provisions of Clause 18 (1) which provide for the father's name to be entered in the register by means of a statutory declaration are something that I welcome very much. I do not remember whether this is a change in the law, but it is certainly something that does not occur in England, and the fact that it should be in the forefront of the Bill for Scotland is something I applaud. The further provisions in subsection (2) of Clause 18, for the subsequent entry of the name of the father of the illegitimate child in the Register of Corrections Etc., in the circumstances set out, I also find very welcome indeed. The English provision is very much more narrow and, I think, certainly is lacking in some of its respects, and if the Scottish law is going to provide for this type of registration it will do a great deal to satisfy the inevitable anxiety of an illegitimate person to know who he is, and who his father was, which is a very real problem. It will also ease the situation which is now involved where the father of an illegitimate child seeks access or custody under recent Acts of Parliament, and it may also allow upon the register itself the appearance of a legitimacy if the mother is living with the father, and has, as is possible in Scottish law, quite easily, taken his name.
I should like also to comment on Clause 19 of the Bill, and to part company, I am afraid, most profoundly here with my noble friend Lord BalerNo. 1 believe this provision is absolutely right, and that the encouragement of the shortened birth certificate is a very great service to the illegitimate child. I do not believe that, on balance, the disservice, if any, to the legitimate has any comparison

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whatsoever. The shortened birth certificate has not in fact, as the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, said, been as widely used as it might have been, and its mere production still involves a grave suspicion that it is merely a covering up of the illegitimacy that the person does not wish to admit. If there is one thing that one would not wish to do if one could help it, it is to saddle an illegitimate child with an extra stigma or extra occasion for distress or grief which his birth involves, and for which he cannot be blamed in any way whatever. So I hope there will be no change whatever in the noble Lord's approach to Clause 19, and that he will retain the provisions of the Bill here exactly as they are.
I hope also that if there are any institutions—I think there are a few—which still require the long form of birth certificate for some purpose, be it good or bad, they will take the opportunity presented by this Bill to have a good look again at the reasons why they do so, and to make quite certain that they really cannot, in the present circumstances, accept the shortened form which, after all, will now become standard in Scotland.
I believe there are now to be a few changes in the law, set out in Clause 28. I do not believe they are very important, but if the noble Lord is going to look over the Bill again, I do not know whether he would agree to change the sidenote to that clause, because although we all know that death is certain to everybody, I am not sure that I wish the procurator fiscal to intimate the fact to me.
There are one or two very small points regarding the end of the Bill. In Clause 35—and this really ties up with Clause 44—I hope that the modern reproduction systems that are set out are going to be of the type which ensure that a copy of the original entry in the register is available to those who wish to see it, not in the form of a Roneod sheet or a typescript, but as a photograph or some other suitable reproduction of the actual entry which took place. If there are to be signatures on these documents it is not the slightest use, when the original register is sent to Edinburgh, or wherever the central registry may be, for the copy to be sent back and not to look exactly the same as the original register was.
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If there is going to be, as there is, a Register of Corrections, et cetera, at the central point, I am sure that it is very important, as the noble Lord said was going to be done, that there should be a full cross-reference system between corrections made in that register and the copies of the original registrations in the local registries, so that when someone goes to search at the local registry he may be quite certain that by some reference, asterisk or sidenote, he will realise that since the date of that original copy a correction has been put in. While talking about these systems, I wonder whether this is the first Act of Parliament which has used the word "xerography"? If so, I congratulate the noble Lord upon this very up-to-date drafting and also upon the introduction of a word beginning with "x".
My noble friend Lord Drumalbyn—and this is my last point, I promise your Lordships—was talking about the ease with which names may be changed in Scotland. I look at the provisions of Clause 43 (7), and I do not know, incidentally, whether a name like Macpherson is counted as a non-English name and, if so, what is its English equivalent. But I do not understand the provisions of this subsection at all. If in fact there is a perfectly good provision in the Bill for somebody to change his name and to have it registered, why is there any necessity for someone, perhaps of European origin, to have two names which are apparently valid in Scotland? Surely he ought to be required to choose one or the other, and if he chooses the so-called English variety, why can he not have that registered as his proper, legitimate name in Scotland? I suggest to the noble Lord that this provision is a little strange, and I would ask whether that subsection might with advantage be left out. With these remarks—and I am sorry for keeping your Lordships so long on them—I join with the rest of my noble friends in welcoming this Bill and hoping that, amended I trust, it will have a speedy passage through Parliament.
4.10 p.m.
LORD BURDEN: My Lords, it is with considerable temerity and trepidation that I venture to intervene in a debate on Scottish affairs conducted up to now by Scottish Peers and the noble Baroness, Lady Elliot of Harwood. My only

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reason for doing so is to underline the point which was made by the noble Lord, Lord Craigton, that in this Bill there is no provision at all for officers and staff who may be adversely affected by the operation of the Bill, if and when it becomes an Act of Parliament. This omission is all the more surprising in view of the fact that it is now a well-established principle that where a general Act of Parliament adversely affects officers and staff, arrangements may be made for compensation provisions to be included in that Act.
I do not propose to argue the matter further than that this afternoon. I hope that between now and the Committee stage the Government will put down an Amendment and that, if not, the noble Lord, Lord Craigton, or other noble Lords will do so. I would support such an Amendment. It is well that the noble Lord in charge of the Bill should know that this is a point of interest not only to the other side but to his own colleagues.
4.12 p.m.
LORD HUGHES: My Lords, in the first instance I should like to express my thanks to all noble Lords who have taken part and for the general welcome that they have given to the Bill. Many points of possible amendment have been raised but, having regard to the number of noble Lords who had given me previous notice of the points which they wished to raise so that they could hear what the answer might be, I am persuaded that in no case is a point being brought up merely for purposes of embarrassing debate, but that all are designed to do what the Registrar General himself is trying to do in working out the details of this Bill: to make it a more efficient machine for the operation of the registration of births, marriages and deaths in Scotland.
It is in that spirit that I propose, so far as I can in the time, to reply to the points that have been raised. I do not know that I shall necessarily deal with all of them, but I doubt very much whether I shall miss many because of the care with which noble Lords primed me in advance so that they would get good, rather than impromptu, answers.
The first point which the noble Lord, Lord Craigton, raised was about consultation. Consultation has been on the widest possible basis. In fact, in addition to the Government Departments affected,
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more than thirty bodies having some interest or other in registration have been consulted. We are not aware of any body with the slightest connection with registration who has not been consulted at some time or other during the four years that this Bill has been in preparation. If this had been a more political debate, I rather think the point would have been made that as it had taken four years this is very much more Lord Craigton's Bill than mine.
On the subject of correction of errors, the noble Lord, Lord Craigton, asked if it was going to be easier to get spelling errors corrected. Yes; it is a cumbersome procedure at the moment and it is going to be made very much easier. Clause 42 is the clause designed to that. Most of the errors are errors of spelling and sometimes of dates. Sometimes, for instance, a name may be spelled "Mc" and it should be "Mac"; or a wife discovers to her horror that her husband has given her age as 35 when, in fact, it should be 32. One doubts very much that she would rush to correct the error if her husband had given her age the other way round. In future these errors are going to be much easier to correct.
Item 5 of the notes that I have here is on compensation for loss of earnings, a point made by a number of noble Lords, including the noble Lord, Lord Craigton, and my noble friend who raised it just a moment or two ago. This is a very difficult point. One appreciates that some of the changes, particularly those in relation to the registration of births and deaths other than in the place in which they occurred, could cause quite a diminution in the number of entries in the offices of particular registrars. One thinks, for instance, of the registrar in whose district is located the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary. If a great deal of use is made, as it would be expected to be made, of the opportunity of making the registration at the place of residence, it could cause quite a bit of diminution at any of the large hospitals.
The difficulty of putting a compensation Clause 1n an Act of Parliament is that this is only one of the causes by which a man's work could be varied. The operations of local authorities themselves in demolishing old houses in one area and creating new housing schemes in different districts altogether can also have the effect of changing

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very much the incidence of work as between one local registrar and another; and it seems to me, at first glance, that it would be exceedingly difficult to make provision in the Act for compensation for one particular change alone and to ignore all the others which could take place in the ordinary course of local authorities' execution of their duties and which could have as great, or even greater, effect on registrars' volume of work.
However, in view of the fact that we are continuing in the Bill, as in the present Acts, to combine what is a national system of service with local administration, the question of the salary that the registrar has to be paid remains a matter for the local authority; and speaking with more than a quarter of a century's membership of local authority behind me, I know it is one of the grievances of the ratepayer that local authorities are very reluctant to diminish the salary of their officer whose circumstances of employment may have changed through no fault of his own. It is very much the case that local authorities tend to preserve the salary which the man has achieved, although not necessarily guaranteeing to him any future increases that he might have got if the circumstances had remained as they were. However, in view of the fact that a number of noble Lords have raised this question I will certainly undertake to look at it, but I do not offer a great deal of hope that we shall put in a compensation provision, because we feel that it would create more problems than it would cure.
The free abbreviated certificate of birth has met with a varied reception. I must say that I was very pleased that the noble Viscount, Lord Colville of Culross, found it possible to give it the same sort of reception as I greeted it with when I first saw it. I cannot bring myself to agree either with the noble Lord, Lord Balerno, or with the noble Baroness, Lady Elliot of Harwood, on this point, although I appreciate the value of the full certificate. All I would say, if I may, with Lord Craigton's permission, to return to my Opposition manner, is that they have only to pay 5s. 3d. and they can have it; and if a child who grows up feels that his parents were not sufficiently interested in him, or were too much interested in
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the 5s. 3d. to get him the full certificate, he can still get it on payment. But, things being what they are, I would not guarantee that it will necessarily still be 5s. 3d. in twenty years' time.
With regard to the old parochial registers, this is a point which more than one noble Lord has raised. The noble Lord, Lord Craigton, raised it first, and I think there is some substance in what has been said: that people might value the actual possession of the old register, and some authorities or associations or churches with these in their possession would perhaps wish to keep them. Personally, I do not see any difficulty in accepting the microfilm or photograph or other processed copy of the register. I will undertake to go into this point with the Registrar General and if it would be acceptable for his purposes, as I suspect it would be, we will make an Amendment to accept either the register or a copy, as the present owners or apparent owners would wish.
The subject of the declaration system for births and deaths, instead of what is proposed in the Bill has been raised, particularly by the noble Viscount, Lord Colville of Culross and the noble Lord, Lord Craigton; and I think the noble Lord, Lord Drumalbyn, also spoke on this point. Having come so recently, I think I can say without any fear that your Lordships may think I am prevaricating that I have a completely open mind on this subject. I am not wedded to what the Registrar General has to say. These are the proposals of the expert in this matter; and, of course, it is well known that it is very easy to get experts to differ. I should not like to swear on soul and conscience that what is in this Bill is necessarily the best way of doing it. But what I am prepared to say is that, from all the inquiries that have been made by the Registrar General in seeking to improve it, it is what he believes to be the best way of doing it. Having regard to the convenience of the general public, I do not think it can be contradicted that this makes it the easiest possible way for the citizen to register either a birth or a death. I am, however, impressed by the stress which has been put on ensuring that there is only one registration taking place of each event, and I would wish to look at this matter from that point of view.

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I must say that I approach this matter—and my colleagues will forgive me for saying so—from the point of view that I do not necessarily work on the basis that anything done in England is right, and that when we are making a change in the law in Scotland the first thing to do is to prove that we ought not to accept the English system. We try to work out what is the best way of doing it. If we decide that it is what the English are doing, then we give that way our approval, but not otherwise. I do not, therefore, approach this from the point of view that this is something which works in England, so let us do it in Scotland. After all, twelve years has elapsed since the last English Bill, and quite a number of changes have taken place, particularly in social habits.
In this connection, I think that the figures in Scottish cities show that the proportion of births taking place in hospital is well in excess of that with many English authorities. We show a lead in this, as the noble Lord, Lord Craigton, well knows. In any event, as the noble Viscount, Lord Colville of Culross, said, in the question of registration of deaths we are going further than the English law at the present time. Without giving any undertakings on the matter, I will read in the Report of to-day's proceedings all that has been said on this particular subject, and will go into the matter very thoroughly with the Registrar General, so that we may decide whether in fact we can combine convenience to the public with the accuracy of the records better by the system which he has proposed in the Bill or by the alternative which has been suggested by your Lordships this afternoon.
The noble Viscount, Lord Colville of Culross, referred to xerography, and we thought that he was going further than that by asking what was meant by "any other convenient process". But he must have found out in the meantime, because he did not ask that question. Not only have we got to the letter X in the alphabet in Scotland, but we are assuming that xerography is not necessarily the last provision, and we are providing for the Registrar General to be able to take advantage of anything that is here now or anything that may be invented in the years to come.
VISCOUNT COLVILLE OF CULROSS: My Lords, with regard to the inventions that are either present or to come, will only those which result in a photographic or other precisely similar representation of the original be available at the local register? Will typescripts and Roneos, which will not give exact representation, be avoided?
LORD HUGHES: It is difficult to be certain, but one presumes that there would be continued reliance on a system which reproduces the document as it is, with both typewritten and written material on it, including signatures.
The noble Baroness, Lady Elliot of Harwood, stressed very much the importance of local registrars—and I agree entirely with what she said in this connection—and she went on to speak about the five-day week. This is something which does not affect the local registrars in the area which she knows very well—in fact, there the registry system is really round the clock. The registrar in some of these small areas, where he knows every man, woman and child in the district, is prepared, if need be, to get up in the middle of the night to effect registration. So that this is principally a worry of the cities. It is a problem which is already with us and one does not know where it is going to end.
I read the other day in my local newspapers of a firm in Scotland which is taking the opportunity of reducing the 42-hour week to a 40-hour week by working on 4½ days, finishing at lunch time on Friday, so that the women workers will have the same opportunity of recreation as their husbands and will get the shopping done on Friday afternoon. Obviously, if there is a prospect of a further reduction in the working week one cannot have a system under which the registrar's office is closed on three or four consecutive days. I am told that at present where there is a five-day week arrangements are made wherever possible for the registrar or his assistant to be available on Saturday morning to deal with urgent business, although I cannot answer the question put by my noble friend Lord Mitchison who, when Lady Elliot of Harwood spoke of an important death, asked, "When is a death important?"
The noble Lord, Lord Drumalbyn, also spoke on a number of points in

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connection with salaries and staffing arrangements. The position here is that we have continued in this Bill a combination of national and local service. The conditions under which registrars work are national; they work to rules laid down by the Registrar General, so that the same system is applied, whether it is in Aberdeen or elsewhere. But the question of the conditions of employment is a matter for the local authority in whose area they are. The negotiation of these salaries is a matter which rests almost entirely—it is almost out of the hands of local authorities—in the hands of the Whitley machinery. More and more the system is growing up that what is paid in the area of one local authority is comparable with what is paid for a similar job in another area, and we are content to leave this to the good sense of the local authorities concerned.
I must say that this was one of the points upon which there was most consultation, and the counties of cities wished the whole service to be taken over and run as a Government service. On the other hand, the County Councils Association and the Convention of Royal Burghs, representing at least as large a section, if not a larger section, of the population than is covered in the cities, and certainly representing a much greater preponderance of local authority opinion, wished to have the present system, which they felt combined the advantages of a national service with the opportunity to apply to it local knowledge. The Government have no strong feelings on the matter. If the general feeling of local authorities had been that they wished to have this taken over and run by the Registrar General from Edinburgh as a uniform system, then consideration certainly would have been given to it. They do not wish necessarily to take it away from the local authorities. The balance of advantage therefore rested with the majority, taking it on heads, of those concerned who wished it to remain a locally administered service. The Government thought it was better that they should accept that majority opinion and let it so rest.
LORD CRAIGTON: My Lords, before the noble Lord passes from that point, may I say that he was asked whether the staff of the district registration offices will
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be treated, whether part time or whole time, as normal local authority employees. Is that the position?
LORD HUGHES: Yes. I was coming on to that.
LORD CRAIGTON: I apologise to the noble Lord.
LORD HUGHES: I was going through the pieces of paper that have been passed from the Officials Box in the course of the debate. There is one important point before I come to this matter—namely, the question of the location of the office. The Bill states that the office of the Registrar General shall be at New Register House in Edinburgh. It will be no surprise to the noble Lord, Lord Craigton, that the views he expressed on this matter had already occurred to me. It would be completely wrong, at a time when the present Government are pursuing with even greater vigour the idea of their predecessors in Scotland to have Government offices winkled out of London, that we should present Ministries down here, which are most anxious to keep their Departments in London, with such a ready-made excuse as that when we ourselves are presenting a Bill, not only do we say that the Department is to be in Scotland, but we put in that Bill that it is to be in Edinburgh.
We have decided—I am sure that Lord Craigton will welcome this—not to substitute for "in Edinburgh" the words "in Scotland", but to take out the words "in Edinburgh" and just leave the clause without them. It will serve the purpose. We cannot conceive of any Government ever coming into power in this country who would wish to have the office principally in charge of the registration of births, marriages and deaths in Scotland located either in England or in Northern Ireland; so we do not think it necessary to put this in the Bill. We reserve full freedom in this respect. But this does not mean that there is any present intention or idea at all of moving it out of Edinburgh. If, however, circumstances should ever make it as desirable that the General Register Office should be out of Edinburgh, as it is that certain Ministries or offices should be out of London, then I hope that we shall be as forthcoming ourselves as we should wish our English colleagues to be at the present time.

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The noble Lord, Lord Craigton, referred just now to part-time registrars. He asked whether they would be treated as local authority employees. He went on to ask whether they could join the Association of Registrars. The answer in both cases is, Yes. The noble Lord, Lord Drumalbyn—he was supported by the noble Viscount, Lord Colville of Culross, in this matter—raised a question about the registration of a birth taking place, say, in Berwick to someone who was normally resident North of the Border, or taking place in Scotland to someone who was normally resident in Carlisle. I will have a look at this. I will read out the answer which the Registrar General has passed over to me and then I will say what I want to say. He says
"This would require simultaneous legislation in both countries. The present Bill applies to Scotland only. In any event a reciprocal arrangement of this kind would be very difficult indeed."
If he had left it at the first two sentences I should not have bothered to say any more about it, because it would have seemed to be insuperable; but when he added the words about being "very difficult indeed" it makes me feel that I should look at it to see if anything could be done from the point of view of simplifying events for the citizen. It may be that the unanswerable part is in the first two sentences—namely, that it would require simultaneous changes of the law, and that it may not be possible to do this. While it is a common custom to have a long Bill dealing with English affairs and then to have a sentence or a clause added on at the end saying "This applies to Scotland", and for this purpose "refer to Schedules 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6", I doubt whether an amendment of the English registration law to this effect would meet with a welcome South of the Border. However. I will look at it.
My noble friend Lord Strathclyde—it he will permit me to use this less customary term in your Lordships' House—asked what we meant by "elsewhere". By "elsewhere" I mean what he would mean by "elsewhere". Then he went on to say, had it anything to do with a
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church in Charlotte Square? In fact no decision at all has been taken about where the surplus records could be stored. All the Bill does is to make it legal for them to be stored somewhere other than in New Register House; and the decision on where they will be taken will depend, I suppose, on terms of acquisition, and so on, and it will be taken in good time.
There was one other point which the noble Lord, Lord Balerno, raised—namely, as to the residence of the father being a qualifying place under Clause 14. I do not think we have had this point raised previously by anyone else. I must say, as against the reception which I gave to his proposals about a full certificate, it seems to me that this point in connection with the residence of the father is one which we ought to look at from the point of view of the security of the register. I certainly should wish to look at that point most particularly.
In regard to some of these matters, and some other items to which there has been no reference, a number of Government Amendments will be put down. As the noble Lord, Lord Craigton, in particular, will not be surprised to know, quite a number of them will be of a purely drafting nature. I thank the noble Lords for the helpful reception that they have given to the Second Reading, and with their co-operation in succeeding stages I am quite sure that we shall be able to pass on to another place a Bill of which this House need not be ashamed.
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

KENYA REPUBLIC BILL
Brought from the Commons; read la, and to be printed.
RIVERS (PREVENTION OF POLLUTION) (SCOTLAND) BILL
Brought from the Commons; read la, and to be printed.

AIRPORTS AUTHORITY BILL
4.41 p.m.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, I beg to move the Second Reading of the Airports Authority Bill. This is not a controversial measure as between the political Parties, a fact which at first sight may seem a little strange, since the Bill establishes yet another public authority. In other words, it provides for another piece of practical and applied socialism. It was described in another place by a member of the Opposition as an excellent Bill. While that in itself may not commend the Bill to my noble friends in this House, I hope that it will set the tone for the comments made from noble Lords opposite.
The Bill was, of course, drafted by the preceding Government, and I understand that the proposal to establish a public authority for the administration of our main airports was first put forward some twenty years ago by the noble Lord, Lord Reith, than whom there is no greater authority on these matters of public administration; and I hope that that opinion will carry considerable weight. The immediate purpose of the Bill is to transfer the four main international aerodromes of the United Kingdom, Heathrow, Prestwick, Gatwick and Stansted to a new and, it is considered, more appropriate form of ownership and control—namely, to the British Airports Authority.
Before going on to discuss the proposal for the future, I should like to say something about the present position and about those who have been responsible for the achievements of the past. A good deal has been said from time to time in "Letters to the Editor", and indeed when the Bill was passing through another place, about dirty teacups and untidy lounges, poor service, and high aircraft landing charges. I consider that often a good deal of this criticism has been unfair, inaccurate, mostly out of proportion and certainly unjust to those devoted public servants who have had responsibility for the administration of these airports up to the present time. It is conceivable that on occasions,
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when noble Lords or some of these television personalities go up to London Airport, especially after a delay when there has been a rush through of passengers, one may find a dirty teacup. On the other hand, I have noticed elsewhere that not everything has been above criticism when large crowds have passed through a public place.
I myself have watched the development of London Heathrow. Over the past twenty years I have seen it grow from one runway and one tent to its present quite enormous industrial complex, in which 20,000 people earn their living and serve their country—and I include, of course, men and women other than those employed directly by the Ministry. No fewer than nine million passengers passed through this airport last year. The figures show a rate of growth of 600 per cent. more passengers in ten years, and a most surprising increase in revenue. I see that over a period of ten years the revenues collected for the services offered at London Airport, Heathrow, have gone up from £844,000 to £10,295,000. All this—in a highly technical operation where the safety factor is absolutely paramount—reflects credit on those who until now have borne the responsibility and who have brought us to this position of economic viability.
As for airport charges, I have seen a good many figures about costs, and I know that it is possible, if one is sufficiently selective, to prove almost anything about the charges for landing of aircraft at Heathrow and elsewhere, Possibly one ought to take with more than a grain of salt the airline operators' own selection of charges. It is difficult to get a perfectly comparable set of Costs. Probably the fairest comment was that made by the Select Committee which reported in 1960–61 and which, after examining this matter, stated:
"Your Committee has experienced considerable difficulty in obtaining facts of comparable costs, but they consider that the costs to operators using London airports are not unreasonably high."
This does not mean, of course, that further improvements are not possible. And the purpose of this Bill is to facilitate these improvements.
Many developments and improvements are already in progress. New passenger piers are planned; multi-storey car

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parks, a new passenger building, an extension of No. 1 runway, and the development of the freight area are among the improvements which are either in course of construction or planned. But the point is that now that the need for public subsidy has gone, now that there is this trading surplus for the group of four international airports, we believe that it is both possible and desirable that management should be transferred from a Government Department to a separate authority which is able to exercise more flexible commercial methods in their management.
The success of the British Airports Authority will depend to a large extent on the calibre of the members chosen to control it, as well as of the staff who are employed to run it. With regard to the members of the board, the Minister stated in another place that within the maximum of eight and the minimum of four members provided for by the Bill, in addition to the chairman and Deputy chairman, he will be inclined to appoint mearer the lower limit. Having looked at the qualifications which the Minister is required to have in mind some may say that the is now guided by a set of very comprehensive, one might say complete, qualifications and that he could not possibly appoint from, outside them. I know that some noble Lords have questioned the wording in Clause 1 (4). All I would say about this at the moment is that the qualifications there set dowa certainly have been increased over the years, but have been increased because Parliament itself has demanded that the qualifications should be listed. And in setting down those qualifications the Minister has been following the wish of Parliament. The qualifications were added to during the progress of the Bill in the other place.
I should like to emphasise, in regard to the constitution of the board, that, once having been appointed, it will be expected to use both the responsibility and the powers granted to it. It is in no sense intended that this new Authority shall be tied to the apron strings of the Minister. It is true that in certain matters—for example, when framing proposals involving substantial outlay on capital account, or involving wider economic or national aviation policy; and in two matters specifically
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mentioned in the Bill, air traffic control and aircraft noise, to both of which I shall return later—there are reserved ministerial powers. Nevertheless, it remains true that this body, the Airports Authority, will have, in fact and in name, the authority to carry out the duties all located to it.
The staff, who will number about 2,000, will consist initially of the civil servants, both. industrial and non-industrial, who operate these aerodromes at the present time. To provide for the smooth transfer of the functions to the Authority they will be seconded to the Authority for a period during which time most classes will have an opportunity of deciding whether to accept any offer of employment which the Authority may make or to return to the Civil Service. For certain classes of staff, however, the Department will have no alternative post to offer in their existing grades, and to this extent if the staff concerned do not wish to transfer to the Authority, alternative arrangements will have to be considered. No civil servant will lose by his temporary secondment to the Authority, since his pay and conditions of service will remain unchanged. Furthermore, staff who decide to transfer permanently to the Authority can expect terms and conditions of employment at least broadly comparable with those which they now enjoy.
Your Lordships will probably be aware that for good reasons the two functions which I previously mentioned—namely, air traffic control and consideration of noise—are not being transferred under this Bill, but will be reserved to the Minister. Provision of navigation services— the air traffic control and function Associated with that control, which guid the approach, landing and take-off of aircraft at the aerodromes—will remain the responsibility of the Minister. In this respect, the British Airports Authority will be in the same position as the major municipal aerodromes—Manchester, Liverpool and Birmingham. The reason for this reservation of functions to the Minister is that at important aerodromes such as these, where the technical control of aircraft movements to and from the aerodromes is closely linked with the complex State-controlled en-route navigation services along the air corridors through out the country, it is important from the

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point of view of both safety and economy that the services are provided by one agency.
The other function over which the Minister will continue to have control is the regulation of aircraft noise on and in the vicinity of the Authority's aerodromes. Aircraft noise, as most noble Lords will know, is a very difficult and a very vexed problem and it was considered—I think father courageously—that a Minister directly responsible to Parliament, and directly responsible to Members of Parliament, who in turn are often very closely in touch with the constituents affected, should retain responsibility. The Minister will therefore continue to monitor the noise made in the vicinity of the Authority's aerodromes, and to lay down the anti-noise requirements, such as the current limitations on jet night flights at Heathrow. If there is any infringement of the Minister's requirements in respect of noise, the Authority can be required to take steps to see that the infringement does not recur—if necessary, by excluding any offending pilot or airline from its aerodromes. With these exceptions, the British Airports Authority will be given as much freedom of decision and action in the day-to-day commercial management of its affairs as is possible, and the provisions of the Bill follow the line set down in a number of post-war nationalisation Statutes.
Clause 1 specifies the aerodromes to be transferred, and takes the necessary provision for the appointment of members. The four airports—Heathrow, Gatwick, Stansted and Prestwick—although at varying stages of development, and of utilisation and profitability (especially profitability), are essentially a coherent group of international aerodromes whose fortunes are linked, and I think we shall all agree that it is reasonable that the one Authority should undertake the management and development of the whole group, and not just the more profitable London (Heathrow). The inclusion of Stansted in the group will in no way prejudice the outcome of the forthcoming public inquiry, which the Minister of Housing and Local Government will be holding on the proposal to develop Stansted as the third London airport. The special position of Prestwick in the Authority is recognised
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in Clause 1 (5), which requires the Minister to see that the interests of Scotland are fairly represented on the Authority.
Schedule 1 details the arrangements for the terms of appointment of members, for the Authority's proceedings and for staff consultation. Schedule 2 sets out the arrangements for transferring from the Crown to the Authority on the vesting date land and other property, together with rights and liabilities. The vesting date will be as soon as possible after the passing of the Act, although it is not anticipated that it will be before the autumn of 1965.
Clause 2 deals with the duties and powers of the Authority, and the power of the Minister, which is a standard one in Acts creating public authorities of this kind, to give the Authority general directions in the national interest. The powers include the power, subject to the Minister's approval, to provide new aerodromes or to acquire or assume the management of an existing one. This power is not intended for be used, to take over existing aerodromes against the owners' Consent, but it will obviously be needed if the Authority develops a fourth London airport—or even if it has to look for an alternative site to Stansted for the third London airport. It will also be required if the Authority establishes a Central London heliport.
Clases 3 to 8 are fairly standard financial clauses. The Authority will inherit an initial capital debt equivalent to the written-down book value of the inherited assets, plus a sum for working capital, and this debt together with any other capital loans will be constituted by means of Exchequer loans. The Authority's revenues will derive mainly from landing fees, rents and services, and trading concessions. There is every reason to believe—and this, of course, is the expectation—that the Authority will be able to meet from the start its statutory duty to pay its way—as the phrase goes, taking one year with another.
Clause 9 empowers the Authority, through whose aerodromes several millions of people and vehicles pass each year, to make by-laws regulating the use and operation of its aerodromes, and the conduct and safety of people using them. There was some criticism in the other

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place, that London Airport was at times a meeting place for "Teddy boys". I am informed that under the new powers, although the situation has already improved to some extent, it will be possible to rectify some of those complaints. Schedule 3 sets out the procedure for confirming and promulgating the by laws.
Clause 10 deals with the Authority's constabulary, which will be recruited in the main from the Ministry's constabulary who currently perform the policing functions at these aerodromes. Clause 11 deals with the constable's powers of search and arrest in respect of thefts at the airports. These powers are similar to those held by the railway and the Port of London Authority police who are confronted with similar problems. Clauses 12 to 15 make the necessary provision for the control and management of road traffic, port health functions, noise and lost property at the aerodromes.
Under Clause 16 and Schedule 4 the Authority will be able to acquire land by agreement or, with the support of the Minister, compulsorily. In fact, the powers given are similar to those held by a local authority which already provides an aerodrome. The clause also provides for the Minister of Aviation or the Minister of Transport to exercise in favour of the Authority his power to obtain rights over land, to impose control over laud or to stop up or divert highways. Clause 17 provides for the Authority to pay compensation or to purchase the land in cases where planning permission is refused or revoked in the interests of the Authority's aerodromes; and Clause 18 makes the Authority a statutory undertaker for the purpose of certain named Acts and thereby gives it the same sort of protection from unreasonable interference by a local authority or another statutory undertaker as is afforded to existing transport undertakings such as railways, inland navigation, and dock and harbour authorities.
In conclusion, my Lords, I think I I should say something about the task ahead. I have referred to the very considerable growth in air traffic at these four airports over the past two decades, and undoubtedly there will be a considerable expansion in the future. But I think it would be wrong not to recognise that some advantages which these British
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international airports have enjoyed in the past will be less evident in the future. Much has been said about the international airports of Britain being the gateway to Europe. This they have been, and this, I trust, they will remain. But, with the development of the longer-range aircraft, there will be an increasing possibility of transatlantic aircraft overflying London and making directly for the European Continent. To the extent that this tendency is encouraged by the development of new aircraft we shall have to ensure that it is counteracted by the increasing attraction and efficiency of our airports. This is a challenge that I have no doubt the new Authority will accept, and in their work I know noble Lords on all sides will wish them well. My Lords, I beg to move that the Bill be now read a second time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Beswick.)
5.3 p.m
THE EARL OF SELKIRK: My Lords, I am very honoured to follow immediately after the noble Lord, Lord Beswick, and to be the first to congratulate him on, I believe, the first Bill he has presented in this House. I am sure he will wish that all the Bills he presents here will be received as well as I believe there is a good chance that this one will be. I should like straight away, if I may, to join with him in offering our regard and congratulation to the many public servants who worked at the aerodromes owned by the Ministry of Aviation. I am bound to say that I think many of them have not worked in the easiest circumstances, and not least, perhaps, because of the organisation which has been imposed.
The noble Lord talked a little of the tasks ahead. I am going, if I may, to try (shall I say?) to prise open some more ideas of what does lie ahead, and see whether Her Majesty's Government have in fact considered a number of the difficulties which are likely to arise, and perhaps fairly soon. Before doing so, however, I should like to call attention to the actual format in which this Bill has been presented. Perhaps I should particularly address these remarks to the noble Earl the Leader of the House. When this Bill was presented in the other place, it had an Explanatory Memorandum—I never quite understand where

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Explanatory Memoranda come from—which was divided into two. When it comes into this House, one finds that the second half of the Explanatory Memorandum has been cut off; and I do not quite know why that has happened.
The second part is called, "Financial effects of the Bill". I do not know whether this is due to the fact that your Lordships' House is so learned in financial matters that it is wholly unnecessary to offer any explanation; or whether the opposite view should be taken, that it is wholly improper for your Lordships to consider any financial matter at all. Whichever it is, I think it is wholly false. It is nothing to do with the Parliament Act. It may conceivably have something to do with the Resolutions passed in the time of Charles II, I think, about 1670: something which said that aid and supplies are solely the province of the Commons. Nobody is questioning all this, but we in this House have always been entitled to the fullest explanation of all matters in Government policy, including financial matters, and we are fully entitled to make any comment we like on them. I merely put to the noble Lord that I think it is a pity that there should be any suggestion that this House is not entitled to all explanations, whether financial or otherwise.
THE LORD PRIVY SEAL (THE EARL OF LONGFORD): My Lords, if I may interrupt the noble Earl, since he has referred to me, I apologise to him for the fact that I may have to leave the House in a few minutes, but the noble Lord, Lord Shackleton, who is going to wind up, is very well equipped to deal with this point, among others.
THE EARL OF SELKIRK: I thank the noble Earl very much. I would not dream of retaining the noble Earl unnecessarily on it. The noble Lord mentioned two subjects which are going to be reserved to the Minister of Aviation, and the first of those is noise. I wonder if the noble Lord could state whether, in the event of any damage arising from noise, the Minister of Aviation accepts full responsibility. This, I know, is a very tricky subject, and I expect the noble Lord may have difficulty in answering me in categorical terms, but I think it is a point of very considerable public importance.
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The second point I should like to make is on the other reservation. It is put in the Bill as being "navigation", but if your Lordships turn to the Interpretation Clause 1t will be found that "navigation" can in fact cover a much wider sphere than one would normally imagine. It covers, in fact, all facilities provided in connection with the movement of aircraft and of vehicles on the airport. That means that the Airports Authority will have nothing to do with aircraft except when they are parked. I bring this out in no sense of criticism, but simply because I think that, in aviation particularly, direct and clear lines of responsibility are of great importance. This means, then, I think, that all the equipment connected with flying—that is to say, blind-landing equipment, I.L.S. or any other form of blind approach system, or any other form of radar connected with aerodrome control—will be wholly the responsibility of the Minister of Aviation and not of this Authority.
I make this point because I think it is very important that we should know who is going to be responsible for developing blind-landing equipment—which, of course, among other things, and among other forms of control, we are looking forward to coming quickly. It is important, I think, that this Authority should know where they stand in this. I am aware that this arrangement can be changed by a letter; but, frankly, if there is a clear decision to be made, it should be made, I think, in the Statute, and not in a personal letter from the Minister to the Authority.
There is one thing, however, which is quite clearly the responsibility of the British Airports Authority, and that is car parking. For a long time we have been far behind the world in our car parking arrangements, and we should have reached the stage when a car is not regarded as an unusual luxury for which people are very lucky to have any provision whatsoever. A large number of those employed in different capacities in airports come in cars. It is high time that at aerodromes, at least, proper car parking facilities were provided; and I should be glad to see some indication of this in the Statute itself, because this matter has become very badly out of hand in a great many places.

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If I may go on from that, I am not entirely happy about the title British Airports Authority. In the first place, it is not British in the full sense of the word, because it represents only a comparatively small number of British airports; and, secondly, it is not really an Authority, because all it is doing, in fact, is being a stationmaster for an airport which is operated for the Ministry of Aviation. I am bound to say that the expression is slightly grandiloquent and, in a way, rather misleading. I do not know that that matters very much; but I should like to ask whether it is intended that this should, in fact, cover a large number of additional airports. For instance, I take it that there will be no attempt to take over the municipalised airports in Group 2. Whether the intention is to find an agency to run what is called Groups 3 and 4, I do not know; but I should be interested to know whether the Government have that in mind. What I am really concerned about is the structure of our air services in the immediate future, because they will, and could, considerably affect the economic evolution of this country and the distribution of industries and, accordingly, of population.
My Lords, the great failure of our air services in this country since the war is that they have followed the railway line far too closely. They have perpetuated and continued the concentration which the railway line started a hundred years ago. I think this is a very great pity. They had the opportunity to break away and they did not do so. I am hopeful that they may yet do so. At the present time, the first thing you do, if you want to leave this Island, is to buy a ticket to London. That has always been the case with the railways. I had hoped that with the development of aviation that would cease to be the case. But what has happened? Naturally, London Airport has become horribly overcrowded. It may be it is not designed as well as it should be; but from the passengers' point of view it is really one of the least pleasant airports in the world to-day.
This is something which can very well be got over by greater diversification of the terminal traffic and by stopping the channelling of all traffic to Heathrow. It is really curious that the Air Transport Licensing Board has taken the line
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that this is the only way in which the airlines can be commercially operated in this country. That may be true if you disregard the personal comfort of the passengers and the broad economic planning requirements of this country. But if you do regard them it is wholly untrue.
My Lords, I am asking only this: does this Bill affect this proposition? This is fundamental; it is important to know how our evolution in air planning is to take place. Does this Bill, as it now stands, affect it at all? If so, how far are we going to be able to maintain control of proper aerodrome services? I should like to ask this: will the Government recognise that the shape and form of aviation services is going to play a fundamental part in the broad economic planning of this country? I should like to have an answer, either "Yes" or "No", on that. Let us not forget that it is the North and West of this Island which have been traditionally deemed most concerned with the export trade; yet it is from these areas that it is almost impossible to get out of the Island, either to the Continent or to any part of the world, without travelling first through London. To get round this, I suggest that more attention should be devoted to the provincial services outside London, instead of doing what at present is the apparently accepted policy: feeding all the services from all over the country into London Airport.
I should like to deal specifically with the subsection to which the noble Lord referred and which deals with Scotland—Clause 1 (5). This, in common terminology, is called a gesture to Scotland; but if I may say so, it is a pretty feeble gesture. What it says is this: that one member of the Authority will be familiar with the general circumstances in Scotland. Frankly, with four airports, I should hope that all the members will be familiar with the general position in Scotland. Indeed, if you take its meaning further, it implies that the other eight or nine members will be unfamiliar with the position in Scotland. That is ridiculous. I would rather have no paragraph at all than that. I know this is a difficult point; I am aware of it. It is not easy, because it is not always easy to get the right man. And if the man lives in Scotland, it is sometimes difficult for him to attend

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meetings in London. It is not easy; but in this case, where there is an obvious possibility of a conflict of interest between, say, Prestwick and London Airports, I think stronger assurances must be given that Prestwick Airport will not be strangled by London.
The position, bluntly, is that London Airport is crowded at the present time and is making money; and Prestwick Airport is losing money. It will be obvious that an Authority such as this, which is clearly designed to be commercial, will put all its money into the paying side of the proposition and leave the other side undeveloped. There is clearly a financial incentive to do so. In these circumstances it will be necessary to put down an Amendment to ensure that there will be a clear-cut expression of those who are resident in Scotland on the Board of this Authority. I will only add this. I am glad that, as I understood it, the noble Lord, Lord Beswick, said it was his intention to make this Authority independent, or, at least, not tied to the apron strings of the Ministry. I am delighted to hear this. I hope he will get people of standing for this important work; and with those words I, personally, welcome this Bill.
5.17 p.m.
LORD REITH: My Lords, I got far more from the noble Lord, Lord Beswick, than from the Bill. It is true that I tried to have an aerodrome authority created after the last war, and what it is proposed to do now is, in my view, entirely right in principle. But, according to the Bill as it now stands, how it is proposed to do it, the institutionalisation of the Authority, is in so many paragraphs so horrible as almost to make the original right a wrong. I have made myself clear, I hope; and I have also made clear, as did my noble friend who has just spoken, one's immense relief that the Bill should have been interpreted in a much more satisfactory way than eyesight entitled one to expect.
I think most of us agree that it is right that there should be such an Authority, but I say that at the moment this Bill is giving birth to an Authority in a straitjacket. What are we to believe: the clauses of the Bill or the statements of the Minister?—because they are delightfully
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and most satisfactorily different. And I am sure the noble Lord means what he says. But I find that this Authority is, according to the Bill, merely a proxy for the existing Civil Service control.
In general, I want to make an appeal to the noble Earl the Leader of the House, or to the Minister, or to whomsoever it may be. I believe profoundly in the public corporation system—I was responsible for the first one and for five others and I have managed six—so long as proper institutionalisation is given to the Authority; so long as one can depend on the decent. right attitude from the Minister (with the approval, forsooth, of the Treasury), from the Treasury, from both Houses of Parliament and from the civil servants of the Ministry concerned; without all that I should oppose the public corporation system, either for this particular service or for almost any. After all, both Houses of Parliament, in letting a Bill through for the creation of a public corporation, have passed a self-denying ordinance—have they not, my Lords?—withdrawing from themselves the right to interfere in management.
Now that affects this tremendous issue of accountability. And my appeal to the noble Earl, in his absence, through whomever it may be, is this. Would he consider, and if his considerations are as I think they might be would he recommend to his colleagues, the establishment soon of a Royal Commission to consider this new—relatively new, anyway—and tremendously important instrument of government, which has had no official consideration, none at all, so far as one knows, and in which practice varies immensely as to accountability and in many other ways as well? Could we have consideration given to the appointment of a Royal Commission, so that in fact this system gives what it is designed to give—namely, the best of both worlds: public control over major policy when necessary or desirable, but no public interference in management (or, if you prefer it to be put positively, relatively commercial freedom of management) so that those two essential characteristics may be realised?
So much for the general. Let me turn to the particular. I am going to say very little indeed, because this is Second Reading and not Committee stage. But in

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my view it really is an awfully bad Bill as it stands. I think it could be two-thirds of the length, with far greater clarity. It is too bad to establish an Authority with a borrowing power of £70 million with an initial capital debt commitment of £56 million-plus. How delighted I was to hear what the noble Lord called it! It was not what the Bill called it at all, but the initial capital debt; not, forsooth, the "commencing capital debt"—in one's prep. school the word "commencing" was as much an offence as a split infinitive. The Authority will have this initial capital debt of £56 million-plus, and for the first two years they may have another £4 million added and no consultation or say. What a task— £70 million borrowing power and committed already to anything up to £60 million!
Equally important—could they not be allowed to borrow in the cheapest market? I think your Lordships will agree that the clauses read now as if the borrowing, the repayments, the interest and all the rest are to be controlled by the Minister. Surely we can trust the Authority to look after their own affairs as to borrowing reserves, repayments and statements of accounts. But the particular matter I am referring to is the borrowing and repayment.
Please, could the Authority be allowed to appoint their own auditors? There have been many Scottish accents in the House this afternoon, so I will use a Scottish word. I think that to make the Authority take auditors appointed by the Minister is "scudgie". Please let them appoint the auditors, if you like with Ministerial approval. Could consideration be given to that?
I have nothing more to say, except to repeat that, despite what the noble Lord has said—and he said a great deal that is most relieving—these things are here in black and white. Could some of them be modified to make it statutorily clear that what the noble Lord said will be implemented and that the Authority will be a real authority, trusted by the Government?
5.25 p.m.
LORD POLWARTH: My Lords, I can only hope that the worst fears of the noble Lord, Lord Reith, are not realised. On the whole, I welcome this
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Bill, and I am very glad that it should be introduced in this House by a noble Lord who had such a close connection with the subject fourteen years ago, and who, in addition, must be one of the few Ministers in the Ministry of Aviation to be experienced in piloting an aeroplane. I think that he speaks to us with great authority.
I believe that the Bill is a very necessary step towards placing our major airports on a businesslike and commercial basis. The demands of air travel change so rapidly that the development and management of airports is a science which calls for a high degree of business sense, imbued with foresight, imagination and courage. It is no reflection on those Ministers and their servants who have been responsible in the past to say that a Government Department is not the best sort of organisation for this purpose.
We all know the trials and trouble at Heathrow. It has never been adapted for the traffic, constantly growing, which has been brought to it. At one time or another, most of us have suffered discomfort, delay and frustration there. Until very recently the conditions in the domestic departure and arrival area would have disgraced a cattle market. Fortunately, some improvements have been made; and more, I am glad to see, are on the way. Again, these conditions are no reflection, as the noble Earl, Lord Selkirk, said, on those who work there, doing their best in the face of heavy odds. They are the consequence of early mistakes of design and subsequent indecision on future needs and planning. I am glad to say that at last there are more signs all around London Airport that we are beginning to put these things right.
I am glad that the noble Earl said a few words about the future of the staff, because it struck me as peculiar that in the Bill the only reference I could find to staff was to the Authority's power to pay them pensions, and I am relieved to find that that is not all they are going to do with the staff. This is reassuring, because an enterprise like Heathrow is very much dependent on the staff. It is a remarkable mixture of a small town and a sizeable industrial enterprise rolled into one.
May I say a word on the communications to and from airports? I know

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that the Authority's responsibility ends at the perimeter of the airfield, but that does not lessen the vital importance of public communications from the neighbouring town. We all know the problems of getting to London Airport. Fortunately, they will be considerably eased by the opening of a new road in the spring. I think that they would have been even more eased if, years ago, the various plans for a railway line or monorail line had been taken a great deal more seriously; and I hope that, even at this stage, the new Authority will not rule out something of this kind.
There is one particular point which, though I do not think that it is covered by this Bill, deserves the Government's attention—that is, the question of the fares charged for taxicabs from London Airport to the centre of the city. I know that they come under ancient legislation, which refers to them as hackney carriages, and that the jurisdiction of that legislation does not extend as far as London Airport. But the fact remains that if a passenger arrives at London Airport and takes a taxicab outside, as a friend of mine from America recently did, the taxicab driver can charge anything he asks, if the passenger is prepared to pay. It may be said that one should take a bus or hired car; but, after all, the foreigner arriving and seeing a London taxicab probably regards it as much a part of the image of British respectability as he would a London policeman. Moreover, the end of a long and tiring journey is no time for argument. To be charged, as my friend was the other day, the sum of £4 10s. to be conveyed from London Airport to Hyde Park Corner is an utter disgrace when it is possible to hire a car, with driver, for less than half that sum.
I should like to say something, in particular, about Prestwick, because it occupies a position somewhat distinct from the other three airports covered in the Bill. When the White Paper was first published some voices in Scotland suggested that Prestwick should be included in a Scottish Airport Authority, as distinct from the rest. I am sure that this would have been a mistake and it is right for it to be in this group
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which is essentially one of international airports. It is only in this way that its equipment facilities and status can be properly maintained.
Prestwick has come a long way since before the war, in the days when it was a grass airfield and its potential had been appreciated by few people, including the noble Earl, Lord Selkirk, his brother, the Duke of Hamilton, and that great pioneer of aviation, the late Group Captain Macintyre. It was the war that brought Prestwick into its own. It was vastly developed with Government money, and was brought to its position because of its location for the shortest crossing of the Atlantic and because of its climatic conditions as the most fog-free airport in Britain. It was reported in a headline last week that Prestwick had been blacked out by fog for a whole day. That was news because it was the first time this had happened since the end of the war. I believe it was that quality of being a fog-free airport more than anything else that saved it at the end of the war, because its value as a diversion was considerable, and it still is most important to-day, as you will discover at any time when there is fog in London.
There is, however, another reason why it survived, and that is that there was a strong realisation in Scotland after the war that our own transatlantic airport was essential for the development of our industry and trade. Those were the days when United States companies were first coming over and setting up branch plants in Britain, a great many of them in Scotland. They have now swollen to some 70 in number, making everything under the sun; and many of these, I know, might well have gone elsewhere if they had not direct communications with their parents in the United States. It is this question of direct air communications that is so important: they are the lifeblood of industry and trade. And I say direct, as opposed to hampering bottlenecks, like the procedure of changing planes at London Airport.
To-day Prestwick is a great gateway for our export salesmen and the goods they send out, and also for the growing incoming tourist trade. That is why we have always kept up the pressure and wrung out of successive Governments, as the noble Lord knows well

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from his earlier experience, assurances about Prestwick's future. We have constantly done so because there have been times when it looked as if there was a danger that Prestwick would be relegated to a second-class status, and also because the Ministry of Civil Aviation (as it was then) seemed to enjoy (if that is the word) an unusually high rate of turnover in Ministers. Our aim has always been to secure that Prestwick should continue as the second international airport of Britain, and that it should be developed to handle all aircraft capable of being handled, and on the same terms as at London Airport. An assurance to that effect was given categorically by the then Minister to the Secretary of State for Scotland and to the Scottish Council, which I was representing, in December, 1958. The assurance was honoured, if only in the nick of time, by the extension of the main runway for the accommodation of jet aircraft when they came into service. If this had not been done, they might well have overflown on their regular schedules for ever.
The new terminal building at Prestwick is a fine building. This has now been completed, and so have other facilities. Prestwick is now well up to date and an airport to be proud of, with the exception that it lacks a hotel. The old one had to be demolished in the interests of safety—not of the occupants, but of the occupants of the aircraft. The late Government negotiated with various developers for the building of an hotel, but nothing came of this because the requirements of the Ministry were for something much too grandiose and expensive. I hope that they will reconsider this as a matter of urgency, because there must be an hotel there.
The assurance about Prestwick was given about six years ago. I would ask the Minister who is to reply if he will be good enough to repeat the assurance for us to-day. I say that because there has recently been some talk of further extending the runways at London Airport for the requirements of the supersonic aircraft. We are most anxious that there should be full provision for these at Prestwick, too. That is why we attach such importance to Scottish representation on the Authority. The noble Earl, Lord Selkirk, said something
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about this. I would only add that the expression in the Bill regarding this is not only verbose, but verging on the evasive. Clause 1 (5) says:
"The Minister in appointing the members of the Authority shall have regard to the desirability of ensuring"
that there is at least one Scottish member. If there is a "desirability", presumably it is desirable; and if the Minister is to "have regard to the desirability", surely he must do something about it. I would suggest that it can be simply put (I know that we can raise this in Committee) as "shall" and "should".
In Clause 7 there is mention of provision for consultation with various local interests. I am not sure how much value one can attach to this kind of consultative committee, but I would suggest that in the case of Prestwick the locality of the airport is not strictly relevant in the normal sense. The area served by the airport is the whole of Scotland, and if there is to be some consultative body for Prestwick, then I suggest that it should be on an all-Scottish basis.
I should like to ask one other question. What in future will be the status of the Scottish Advisory Council on Civil Aviation, which has a duty to advise the Minister on matters affecting Scottish airports? How will this be affected by the advent of the new Authority? As we have been told, the Authority is bound, under the Bill, taking one year with another, to make ends meet financially. Prestwick does not yet do so. The overall profit of the four airports covered in the Bill last year was some £1½ million. But London Airport alone made a profit, or, as it is described, net operating surplus, of £2¾ million. This was offset partially by a deficit at Prestwick of £250,000, and even more by a deficit at Gatwick of nearly £1 million.
What we have to do is to build up the traffic, particularly through Prestwick. For this reason we were disturbed at the late Government's action last summer in placing restrictions on the number of services that Scandinavian Airlines could run through Prestwick Airport on the ground (which I think was somewhat dubious) of international agreement. Certainly that was not the interpretation of the agreement by the Scandinavians, to whom I know, from a visit at about that time, we caused a great deal of offence.

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There is a rumour that other overseas airlines may be similarly restricted. I should like to point out that these services are valuable, not merely for the crossing of the Atlantic, but as direct air links of the kind mentioned by the noble Earl, Lord Selkirk, from Scotland to the Continent of Europe, and they are widely used by our visitors. I hope that rumours of further cuts are false.
It is understandable that the Government should want to give some protection to our national carriers. But B.O.A.C. can stand on their own feet against this kind of competition. In fact, they are doing an excellent job in building up air traffic from Scotland and the North of England to the United States. They are running a daily service called the "Scottish Monarch, "which originates from Manchester, calls at Prestwick, and flies to New York every day of the week, in addition to services to Canada. For the benefit of our friends embarking at Manchester, I think the least they could do would be to call it the "Lancastrian," or something similar, on one day of the week. This service has the added advantage of taking away traffic that would otherwise be channelled through London Airport, so adding to the congestion there. I also think that every possible encouragement should be given, and everything possible done, to increase the service through Prestwick and other airports, rather than place a restriction on them.
On the accounting side, there is one technical branch on which I should like to put a question to the Minister. I think it is a matter of bookkeeping. Last year, over 20 per cent. of the total landing fees at Prestwick were not paid in cash, but were a bookkeeping entry from another Government Department for aircraft, mostly military, which enjoy rights of landing free of landing charge. Under the new Authority, how will this be dealt with? Will the Government promise to make good to the Authority this shortfall on a cash basis, instead of merely treating it as a shortfall?
I know that I have spoken rather a lot about Prestwick, but it is only because I believe that, important though it is to Scotland, it is equally important in its r^ le of being one of Britain's great international airways. It is important that Prestwick should not be left behind or
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forgotten just because the other three airports covered in the Bill are London airports. The new Authority has, as has been said, a challenging and exciting task. With the powers in this Bill, and if it is given the right membership and left unhindered to get on with its job, I believe that we stand a chance of regaining for our international airports their rightful place among the leading airports of the world. And in this I would certainly join the noble Lord, Lord Beswick, in wishing the Authority very well.
5.43 p.m.
LORD FERRIER: My Lords, I will not detain your Lordships long, nor will I say much more about Prestwick. If I do not, it will not be because I do not, as a fellow Scot, support all that has been said on the subject. There are two points I should like to emphasise. One is the reference to supersonic aircraft and the importance of Prestwick in terms of the supersonic boom for outward bound planes. We do not know much about the boom, but it has an effect upon a coastwise airport of that nature. The second point which was touched upon by the noble Lord, Lord Polwarth, was the trade between Scotland and Canada. When I have travelled in and out of Prestwick, as I do quite often, I have been greatly struck by the enormous volume of the Scottish-Montreal traffic flowing inwards and outwards, almost like commuters.
Mention was made of the need for rail connection with London Airport, and noble Lords may remember that I have asked a question in this House on that subject before. Of course, it is a pity that, when the Airport was developed after the war, the rail communications were not completed as originally planned, due, I am informed, to the absence of sufficient bridging spaces at Victoria across the river at that time. That accommodation in tracks across the river is now there, and if it is not too late I feel that, whatever may be said about the future of a highway to the West and a road to London Airport, the speed with which road traffic is growing may still make us face the same kind of problem in ten years' time-the problem of linking the centre of London with the Airport, which can be overcome only by some sort of rail connection.
Reference was made to the taxi service at Heathrow, and I think it is perhaps a

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little off the beam to develop here what the noble Lord, Lord Polwarth, said. I got in a taxi at Heathrow the other day and asked to go to Osterley Park Tube station. The taxi driver told me he could not take me there, but that he would take me to the taxi pool. I motored in the taxi until it had 3s. 6d. on the meter. When we got to the pool I offered to pay, but the taxi driver said, "No", and told me that this was a service they rendered free. I got in a taxi which took me to Osterley Park, and I got in a Tube to the City. It is clear from this that there is a problem which must be overcome by the authority in the future. I mention this only because it seems that something might be done now; and I believe the taxi people would co-operate to enable one to take a taxi from there to any part of the Metropolis, within reason. With those few remarks, I support the Bill.
5.46 p.m.
EARL JELLICOE: My Lords, I hope it is in order for a mere Englishman to venture into this discussion, and I should like to start with a brace of congratulations. I had the good fortune to be able to congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Beswick, only a few days ago on his recent debut in your Lordships' House. But, as my noble friend said, this is certainly the first time that he has introduced a Bill to your Lordships, and I am sure that the noble Lord, Lord Reith, is not alone in being grateful to the noble Lord for the helpful and lucid way in which he introduced us to this Bill.
My second meed of congratulation is to the Government themselves. It is no secret that this Bill was prepared by the last Administration. It is one of the many good things which the present Administration found waiting for them when they took office, and I should accordingly like to congratulate the Government on their good sense in taking over this measure. Given the Bill's respectable parentage, I think it would only be right and charitable for me to put right any uncertainty which the noble Lords, Lord Beswick and Lord Shackleton, may be feeling, and to tell them straight away that I, for my part, have No 1ntention of disinheriting this child. I can straight away endorse what my noble friends have said: that we generally welcome this Bill, and we welcome
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the improvements which were made to it in another place. I am particularly glad that the interests of the consumer and the user are now specifically provided for in the membership of the Authority itself. There may well have been very good reasons in the post-war years for our international airports being subject to tight ministerial control. But they should now be well able to stand on their own feet; and we agree that it is certainly time now for them to be free from the ministerial apron strings. The reasons for this are perfectly simple. It was put very succinctly. I feel, in the evidence which B.E.A. gave to the Estimates Committee three or four years ago, as they then stated:
"An airport is potentially a keenly commercial undertaking, and for this reason should be run on competitive business lines. A Civil Service approach is very often quite inappropriate."
As an ex-civil servant, I should like to associate myself with those words.
That said, I think I also agree that the Minister has in all probability been right to reserve to himself the two areas of activity, air traffic control and noise, to which the noble Lord, Lord Beswick, specifically referred. It is quite clear from what has been said in your Lordships' House this evening that the new Authority is to have a considerable job on its hands. This is one of the fastest growth points in our economy and, like much growth, this particular growth has been accompanied by growing pains.
I certainly do not wish to disparage Heathrow and other great airports, and I certainly do not wish to disparage the achievement of those responsible for them and who have been working there, but if there was any part of Lord Beswick's introductory speech which gave me some concern—and I hope I am not putting it too strongly—it was the rather complacent way in which he dismissed some of the criticisms which have been made of these airports and of Heathrow in particular. It is true that they have a proud safety record and I think that their traffic control is unrivalled in its efficiency. The Foreign Airlines' Association in their statement to the Select Committee said that in operation London Airport is one of the best in the world. If anything, I think that is an understatement.

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But the criticisms which have been made of London Airport, and of Heathrow in particular, go a lot deeper than the question of whether there is, or is not, dirt on teacups. They go very deep indeed. I will not go over the ground, but a number of telling points have been made by my noble friends on this subject. I do not intend to elaborate on this point, if only because I could not possibly put the critical case against Heathrow better than it was put by the noble Lord, Lord Shackleton, in your Lordships' House three years ago on February 23, 1961. I would endorse and echo many, if not all, of the strictures which he then passed on Heathrow. I do not think we help ourselves or help the cause of British aviation by overlooking the warts on London Airport.
I know that up to a point all airports are being overtaken by events these days. However, compared with the new Rome Airport or Orly or Kennedy Airports, or those fine airports at Copenhagen and Zurich—I am just mentioning one or two which are personally known to me—Heathrow, in certain important respects, certainly as far as the convenience of the passengers is concerned, does not come off too well. But it handles more international traffic than any other international airport, and it should, and must, therefore, be a shop window for British aviation, and not least for Britain. It is not yet that shop window, and I am sure that most noble Lords will agree with this and will also agree that this is part of the challenge that the new Authority are facing.
I hope I have said enough to show that we on this side feel strongly that this new Authority will have a big job on its hands and will need big thinking. Any indication which the noble Lord, Lord Shackleton, can give us in his concluding speech of what is contemplated in this respect will be very welcome. For example, what is the programme of material improvement at Heathrow? When will the new freight area, about which we have heard and which is very important, be ready? Do we really have to wait four years for the new domestic terminal? What about Stansted? When is the inquiry to which the noble Lord, Lord Beswick, referred likely to be held?
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Perhaps most important of all, there is the question of communications and intercommunications between the London group of airports, a point on which a number of my noble friends have touched. Is there anything which the noble Lord can tell us about this, and of the monorail project, of Tube extensions, of the use of helicopters, of the pet project of my noble friend Lord Bossom for hovercraft, of road improvements, and so on? These things are not directly relevant to the Bill, but they are the long-term setting in which the new Authority is going to have to work, and I, for one, would welcome any glimpse which the noble Lord can give us of what is the Government's future thinking on these important matters.
Big thinking is certainly required here, and big thinking needs big minds and big men. The stronger this Authority can be made and the sooner it is set up the better. I am glad that the Minister prefers a smaller rather than a larger Authority. I suppose we must accept the fact that it would be difficult to get the new Authority constituted until, say, the middle of next year, but can the noble Lord tell us anything more about the Minister's intentions here? I think he said in another place that it was the middle of next year.
LORD BESWICK: In 1965.
LORD SHACKLETON: It was last year that he said it.
EARL JELLICOE: I am delighted to hear that.
LORD SHACKLETON: The noble Earl should have looked up the debate in another place. It took place last year, so "next year" has now become "this year".
EARL JELLICOE: I am grateful to the noble Lord for exhibiting his remarkable arithmetical prowess to us and the House as a whole. Can the noble Lord tell us anything else about the Minister's intentions regarding this new Board? I remember having something to do a year or so ago, with my noble friend Lord Hastings, with the establishment of the Water Resources Board, and we then gave your Lordships a fairly clear indication of the then Minister's intention in that respect. What sort of Board does the present Minister of Aviation have in

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mind? Does he, for example, propose to appoint a full-time chairman? I hope that the noble Lord can give us the answer to that, and that the answer will be affirmative. What about the remuneration of the chairman and other members of the Authority? These men will have a pretty big job on their hands, and I trust that the noble Lord, in winding up, will be able to tell us what sort of remuneration is proposed.
Finally, my Lords, while I am on the question of the composition of the Authority itself, I should like to add my support to what my Scottish noble friends have said about the Scottish provision in Clause 1 (5). It seems to me that the simplification of this as proposed by my noble friend Lord Polwarth could be very easily achieved, and it would be right to achieve it.
My Lords, if big plans and big thinking are required, big money is likely to be needed; and here, in an exploratory way I should like to reinforce the question put to the Government by the noble Lord, Lord Reith. I note from subsection (2) of Clause 4 that the commencing or initial capital is not to exceed £56 million. I see from the Explanatory Memorandum that probably a figure of £50 million is in the Government's mind. Can the noble Lord, Lord Shackleton, confirm that this figure cannot be exceeded? In that connection, may I ask whether I am right in thinking that subsection (3) of this particular clause cannot override subsection (2)? Finally, can the noble Lord assure us that, in the Government's view, the borrowing powers of the Authority are really adequate for the foreseeable future?—one of the points on which I think the noble Lord, Lord Reith, touched. I must confess to some doubts about this. If the initial capital debt is, say, going to be £56 million and the ceiling is £70 million, that will represent a margin of only £14 million; and another place was told in the debate last year, I think on the Second Reading, that the proposed extension of the freight area might itself cost £10 million. It seems that the margins here are very slender. Can the noble Lord give us any assurance about this particular aspect of the matter?
This Bill was examined carefully in another place, and some of my noble friends have asked a number of quite
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searching questions about it. I trust that the noble Lord will be able to satisfy your Lordships on the points which I have put to him and, more important perhaps, the points which my colleagues have put to him. But, that said, I should like, in any event, once again to congratulate the noble Lord on the way he introduced this Bill to your Lordships, and from these Benches to wish the new Authority well.
6.0 p.m.
THE MINISTER OF DEFENCE FOR THE ROYAL AIR FORCE (LORD SHACKLETON): My Lords, my noble friend Lord Beswick, as noble Lords have indicated, has brought to this debate a great deal of experience and interest; indeed I am not sure that London Airport was not in his constituency, or an adjoining one, at one stage. I would certainly agree with noble Lords opposite that we have had an accession of strength to this side of the House and to the Government. Since the noble Earl, Lord Jellicoe, was so generous with his congratulations, let me congratulate him on leading for the Opposition on the Airports Authority Bill for the first time. He was perfectly right; this was one of the things we found in the cupboard, along with £800 million deficit in foreign exchange. I am glad that there were some "plums". I think the Bill was beginning to get a little bit mouldering at the edges, and the present Government have hastened to bring it forward.
It is clear that your Lordships generally accept and welcome the Bill. A large number of questions have been asked, and practically every noble Lord—or every noble Lord who was aware that he was going to speak—has given me notice of points that he intended to raise. I should like to express appreciation to noble Lords for that, and it means that I shall be able now to deal more effectively with many of the points raised. The noble Earl, Lord Jellicoe, added a few at the end of his list, and I may not be able to answer them all; but I will do my best.
The noble Earl, Lord Selkirk, raised one or two issues of a procedural nature, of which he had been good enough to give me notice. As to why the financial memorandum to the Bill has not been prefixed to the Bill as printed for the

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House of Lords, I can assure the noble Earl that this does not date back to some historic practice from the time of Charles II, or an earlier age. The actual history of this is that in the House of Commons the Treasury, on a recommendation from the Estimates Committee in 1927, require the financial memorandum to be prefixed to all Government Bills involving expenditure, and the memorandum sets out briefly the financial effect of the Bill and, where possible, contains estimates of the money involved.
Of course, the inclusion of this memorandum to some extent reflects the predominant r^ le of the House of Commons in matters of finance; and, furthermore, your Lordships' House has never expressed the desire for the same information to be attached to the House of Lords print of Government Bills involving expenditure. I must say that I find it hard to see any reason in principle why we should not have this. As the noble Earl said, we have always exercised our right to discuss these matters and to be as fully informed as possible. My noble friend Lord Longford heard the observations of the noble Earl, and I suspect that this is really a matter of the procedure of the House, rather than one for me to deal with in any more detail now. But certainly I congratulate the noble Earl on hitting on what now appears to be an extremely obvious point, but one that appears to have escaped the notice of your Lordships ever since another place introduced this.
THE EARL OF SELKIRK: May I thank the noble Lord very much. Perhaps I might read one passage which is really quite interesting:
"In the financial year 1963–64 the expenditure incurred by the Exchequer in respect of the four aerodromes is estimated to have amounted to £12 million (including £4-3 million on capital account) … "—
That information is not known from other sources—
"These figures include the cost of navigation services, which will not be transferred to the Authority but which cannot be estimated separately".
I think that passage is very relevant to the Bill we are discussing.
LORD SHACKLETON: I accept that it is, and it is clearly the desire of this Government, and I believe of any Government,
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to give the House as much information as possible. At any rate I think this is a matter of which we have taken note, and I congratulate the noble Earl on raising it.
The noble Earl raised a number of points, some of which he seemed to think I might not be able to answer right away. There was one on the question of liability on the part of the Authority for damage in regard to noise. I can say specifically that under the Civil Aviation Act and the Noise Abatement Act the Authority is exempted from legal process in this matter, and will not, therefore, be liable. This is one of the reasons why power is retained in the Bill for the Minister himself to ensure that the necessary measures are taken. He is retaining the control because, clearly, the Authority, which no doubt will have regard to public convenience, none the less will have No 1ncentive—indeed, there would be a financial disincentive—to restrict the number of night landings, and so on, in order to deal with the matter.
The noble Earl also mentioned the question of navigation services and definition, and I agree this is a matter which, when I first read the Bill, caused me a little concern, because it appeared that the definition was taking navigation services very much wider than one had anticipated. There are technical reasons, and if the noble Earl wishes I could go into these; or we could deal with it at Committee stage. But I can assure the noble Earl that no difficulty is anticipated in making the dividing line. There are certain powers put into the Bill which are necessary but which, none the less, must be a matter of sensible agreement between the Authority and the Ministry of Aviation. I am assured that in fact no difficulty is anticipated in this matter, which clearly is of great importance, especially as further developments of instrument landing, blind-landing devices and so on, come along. In regard to other facilities, I doubt whether one wants to write into the Bill the obligation to provide car-parking facilities. It is an interesting idea, but I think it would be going a little far to write it into the Bill. However, the need for the provision of car-parking facilities is not in question, and of course there are a number of proposals—indeed,

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certain steps are being taken—to increase car-parking facilities.
The noble Earl also referred to the Title of the Bill and of the new Authority. This was a matter of some contentious discussion in another place. It was doubted whether British Airports Authority was the proper title for this new body. But, frankly, I do not think anybody has been able to come up with a better one. It is unquestionably British. This we know will at least not be offensive to the Scots. And I think it is as good a title and as fair a title as can be found. But if any noble Lords wish to make other suggestions they are welcome to do so. I think that to call it the Airports Authority would, in effect, give it even too wide a connotation. Nor would it be entirely satisfactory to call it the International Airports Authority. I am inclined to think that British Airports Authority is as good a name as we can find.
The noble Earl also asked whether there was any intention to take over additional airports. I think my noble friend Lord Beswick dealt with this point fairly fully. Of course there is No 1ntention of taking over the other groups of airports, either the Ministry's own airports or municipal airports. This Bill follows closely the White Paper which the previous Government produced, and certainly there is no definite proposal in this matter. There is no total exclusion, but, as noble Lords will see, the Minister retains certain controls. Certainly there is nothing planned or intended in this regard at the moment.
There were a number of other interesting points raised by the noble Earl concerning wider issues in regard to planning, which I do not think I will go into. I followed what he had to say, but I think I should not go further than saying that I noted it with interest. I would fully agree with the fact that there is scope for original or fundamental thinking in this matter, and any contributions of this kind are valuable.
The noble Earl and several other noble Lords, including the noble Lord, Lord Polwarth, referred to the question of the Scottish representation dealt with in Clause 1, subsection (5) of which says:
"The Minister in appointing the members of the Authority shall have regard to the desirability
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of ensuring that there is at least one member of the Authority who is familiar with the requirements and circumstances of Scotland."
I realise that this is a most delicate subject, and I share the concern of the noble Earl, Lord Jellicoe, in taking part in a debate on it at all. I think it is perhaps safer for the Scots to debate it than the Welsh. But there is of course no requirement that any member of the Authority should be familiar with the requirements and circumstances of England. I think that occasionally the Royal Society for St. George might have something to say on that. But the Government would, I think, be prepared to consider any further representations on this matter. I should not like at this stage to undertake to strengthen the clause, but certainly I will discuss this with my right honourable friend and, if there is anything more that can be done to meet the noble Earl and other noble Lords on the point, the Government would wish to do so.
THE EARL OF SELKIRK: My Lords, may I ask the noble Lord this question? Suppose you put it this way, that it is desirable that one member of the Authority should be familiar with the situation in London. That is utterly absurd. To put that in would be just as absurd.
LORD SHACKLETON: My Lords, I think it would be desirable that more than one member should be familiar with the situation in London. I am not sure what the noble Earl wants. I think he wants this clause out, and other noble Lords want it in in a more explicit form. We will do our best so far as possible to meet these views. On the whole, I think I am slightly more inclined to favour the views of the noble Lord, Lord Polwarth, but again I do so without any undertaking.
The noble Lord, Lord Reith, in a rather short speech raised some most fundamental questions. As the noble Lord himself demonstrated, and indeed as we all know, it is clear that no noble Lord has greater experience of public administration. Indeed, perhaps I may say, as one of the last of the talks producers in the B.B.C. to have the famous Reith interview on appointment, that there is no man who has made a greater mark of value on this country in the

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matter of broadcasting. Therefore, there is no question but that we respect anything he has to say on this matter. I think, however, that he is unnecessarily concerned. I was a little worried that the noble Earl, Lord Jellicoe, appeared to be listening to the siren voice (if one might apply such a term) to the noble Lord, Lord Reith, and applying it to his argument.
The noble Lord was good enough to write to me raising a number of points of drafting, but I will deal only with those points that he mentioned. First, I should like to emphasise what Parliament has made clear—whether Parliament is right or wrong is another matter, but I think it is right. In setting up a public Authority the Government, as my noble friend Lord Beswick said—and I do not myself regard the noble Lord's speech as inconsistent with the Bill; certainly it was more agreeable, but then sometimes speeches are more agreeable than Acts of Parliament—certainly had every intention to set up an Authority which is free to do its job and to run its affairs. But there have always been certain matters over which Parliament wishes to retain some control. These are covered in the Bill. In fact it follows closely the pattern of previous legislation.
The noble Lord, Lord Reith, would say that this is part of the dangerous hazards of certain kinds of institutionalism which we have got ourselves into. But the examples he gave I did not find convincing. I think that the right balance is struck in this Bill. There are, as again I stress, certain matters in which the Government, clearly acting for and responsible to Parliament, have to exercise and retain some control. When you set up a public monopoly like this it is of the essence that this control should be retained.
The noble Lord objected, for instance, to the fact that the auditor is appointed by the Minister. But this is traditionally something which a company or the board of a company does not do for itself, for certain obvious reasons. One may say that one ought to be able to trust the Authority. I would accept this. But traditionally, as the noble Lord, Lord Reith, knows, practically the only business at some company meetings, after
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passing the accounts and possibly declaring a dividend, is the appointment of an auditor. This is done by the shareholders. This seems to me to be perfectly analogous and consistent, and not an interference in the management freedom of the Authority.
The noble Lord asked why should not the Authority shop for its capital in the cheapest market. It will in fact do so. This is precisely what the Bill provides. It will go to the cheapest source. This is in fact laid down. The noble Lord also objected to the figure of £56 million. I think the noble Earl, Lord Jellicoe, also asked whether £70 million was enough. In setting up this Authority the Government and the Ministry of Aviation are not just trying to saddle the Authority with some big debt. These figures are most carefully arrived at and are regarded as the proper figures. Certainly I am not competent to question a figure which I should be surprised that the Authority itself would question—namely, whether the total figure of £70 million is enough.
If I may deal with the point of the noble Earl, Lord Jellicoe, over the five-year period until 1970 the total capital expenditure is expected to be £34 million, of which the Authority can be expected to find £23 million from their own resources. This leaves approximately £11 million to be obtained by borrowing. The Bill provides for a total borrowing limit of £70 million, including the initial capital debt, before further reference has to be made to Parliament. This, again, is a well-established practice. When the airlines wish to increase their borrowing powers, the Minister comes to Parliament and brings in legislation to do so. After all, this is consistent, to take the analogy of a limited company, with a proposal to increase the authorised capital of a company, which has to be agreed to by the shareholders. This enables Parliament usefully to retain a control, and on previous occasions we have had useful discussions on the airlines in relation to such matters. I do not regard this as an interference with the independent management of the Authority.
There is one small point which I cannot resist referring to, and it is the noble Lord's objection to the use of the word "commencing". I would best answer this by referring him to a document, with

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which I am sure he is very familiar, namely Gowers' Plain Words, where a very firm differentiation is made between the language of literature, writing or conversation and legal language. I should regard it as rather strange if one were suddenly to start changing accepted legal phraseology. I can assure the noble Lord that this is not due to some passionate belief, on the part either of this Government or of the previous Government, in words of Latin derivation. It just is the accepted phrase which draftsmen have continued to use.
The noble Lord, Lord Polwarth, raised a number of Scottish points, with some of which I should briefly like to deal. He mentioned the problem of providing an hotel at Prestwick. This does not seem to me to be a matter for the Authority but rather a matter for private enterprise. I hope that there will be an hotel. Perhaps the various Scottish bodies may be able to stimulate some public-spirited entrepreneur to set up an hotel. I believe certain proposals have been put forward, but it must pay its way. The hotels around Heathrow have not been set up by an authority or by the Government, but by private enterprise.
LORD POLWARTH: My Lords, may I ask the noble Lord to put one point straight? I am not asking the Authority to build an hotel, but I think that it was the case under the recent Administration that the only suitable sites were on land owned previously by the Ministry and now, presumably, by the Authority. It would be a question of negotiation by the Authority with private enterprise to provide a site on certain terms. This was the difficulty previously.
LORD SHACKLETON: This is clearly a matter on which the Scottish Advisory Committee on Civil Aviation could make representations to the Minister, or indeed to the Authority. In that connection, I should imagine that the Scottish Advisory Committee would be able to approach the Authority direct; but, as the noble Lord knows, my right honourable friend the Minister of Aviation had intended to visit Scotland to-day in order to meet them to discuss some of these matters. They have the right of access, which will continue at all times.
The noble Lord wondered whether Scottish representations in the consultative
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r^le would be confined to the locality of Prestwick, or whether Scotland could be regarded as local for this purpose. I understand, from the strict drafting of the Bill, that there is nothing to prevent Scotland from being regarded as "local" for this purpose. Here again, this is a matter which could well be settled by discussion. I would only say that the noble Lord's point is taken.
The noble Lord also asked about reimbursement in regard to the mainly military air traffic landing free at Prestwick or at any of the Authority's airports. Hitherto, these have not been charged, on the reasonable grounds that transfers of this kind are not made between different Votes, but in future it is intended that reimbursement shall be made. To this extent the Authority will not suffer from traffic of this non-fee-paying kind, of which Prestwick carries a great deal. I noted that the noble Lord was concerned that Prestwick was not paying its way and that it was, in a sense, being subsidised by London and by Heathrow. This is the essence of the problem, and is inescapable. The solution contained in this Bill—that is, the setting up a national Authority—will ensure the continuation of Prestwick as a first-class international airport.
In regard to the point made by the noble Lord about the landing of supersonic aircraft, I cannot answer straight off, but there is no reason to suppose they will not. It has been the Government's intention that Prestwick should be able to take any aircraft, and I assume that this will apply in the future. As to the other points the noble Lord made, they are, I suggest, Scottish points and it would probably be better for him to tackle the Minister direct. As to the exact status in the league of international airports, that is something into which I would prefer not to be drawn to-day. Certain facts in the development of Manchester and other airports may increase the numbers of movements, but whether on a strict comparison it equals Prestwick in the international r^ le I cannot say.
The noble Lord, Lord Polwarth, referred to restrictions on foreign services at Prestwick; I believe he was referring to the limitation of Scandinavian air services. These restrictions, I am advised, have been more than counter-balanced

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by increased services which B.O.A.C. have been able to introduce. On balance, the Authority's revenues will be the gainer. While we want to see the airports play a full r^ le in the country's communications, we also want to see British airlines carrying as much as possible of the traffic.
The noble Lord and others mentioned the taxi service. I agree that there have been some disgraceful episodes. This is a difficult one to answer. The Bill will have one effect—that taxis coming into London Airport will be obliged at least to pick up fares within the six-mile limit and will be obliged to accept fares. But the problem of driving into London is, of course, limited by the out-dated provisions of the Hackney Carriage Act, 1831, I believe it is. This is a matter on which discussions are taking place; the Home Office are actually discussing it with the London cab trade. I cannot say that a decision is imminent, but I hope very much, and I know that the House will agree, that this matter will be put right. Noble Lords who raised this matter can accept that the Government are doing their best.
The noble Earl, Lord Jellicoe, made a number of points, and I do not wish to go through all the developments which are taking place at London Airport. I thought that he was a little unfair in saying that my noble friend Lord Beswick was complacent. I did not think he was complacent. London Airport has had so many "knocks" from so many of us, including myself, that it is right it should also receive its true meed of praise. I was interested to see how closely Lord Jellicoe, who thinks on similar lines to myself on these things, had drawn on the speech which I made three years ago. I can only say that I am slightly better informed now that I have seen some of the facts, but this Bill and the measures which the last Government set in hand and which this Government are setting in hand will, we hope, contribute greatly to improving the facilities of London Airport.
The delay in building piers is something on which we have commented in the past and these, of course, are under way. There are a number of proposals
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which will contribute to improvement in these matters and which I should like to relate to the House now, but I have already taken up a lot of time. On this vexed problem of communication, I cannot offer any hope of any break through, whether on the subject of monorail, Underground or Southern Rail link, beyond saying that there is a committee which is sitting—and they must be getting fairly tired of sitting on this subject—and which is considering these matters. But, of course, the most striking development will be the completion of the M.4 with the direct link into London Airport, and we shall see how that works out.
If the noble Lord wishes to pursue these others points, I think there may be an opportunity on the Committee stage. I am afraid I am not able to give him any definite information on the composition of the board. If it is possible to find out what is in my right honourable friend's mind on this matter before a later stage of the Bill, I shall try to do so and will give this information to the House. Again, the question of whether there should be a full-time chairman will depend on whether a man of the suitable calibre, willing to take a full-time chairman's position, can be found. Of course, this ties up very much with the rate of salary which it is proposed to pay, and it is important that it ensures that we get people of the calibre we want. Certainly, I agree that on the quality of the members of the board of the Authority will, to a large extent, depend its success.
I am grateful to your Lordships for the welcome you have given to the Bill. I do not think there is very much between us but, undoubtedly, we shall have many debates in the future on the development of airports. I doubt whether we shall always get them satisfactory, but the Government are determined to do their best to improve London Airport. On Stansted, I should say that the public inquiry is expected to be in the autumn. On the development of this complex of airports depends a great deal of the prosperity of this country.
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

COMMONS REGISTRATION BILL [H.L.]
6.33 p.m.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
THE JOINT PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY, MINISTRY OF LAND AND NATURAL RESOURCES (LORD MITCHISON): My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time. Now that the functions of the Minister of Agriculture in relation to commons have been transferred to the Minister of Land and Natural Resources, it falls on me to present this Bill to your Lordships. Its object is to get registers made throughout England and Wales of common land and of town and village greens, and the purpose of doing so is to ascertain what common land there is and what claims there are to rights of common or ownership in respect of it. There is a similar purpose in relation to town or village greens. When the registers have been prepared in a provisional form from claims made, there will be time for objections to be made and decided; and once the registers have been finalised they will be conclusive as to what is common land or a town or village green, and they will also be conclusive as to rights of common. It will then be possible to make provision by further legislation for the better management and use of the land.
"Common land" is a phrase used with various meanings. One would hope that it was like the elephant—difficult to define but easy to recognise. Unfortunately, even recognition is not always easy, and the exact extent of common land is unknown or at least unrecorded. But, to take rough figures, out of 32 million acres in England, slightly more than 1 million are common land. In Wales, the proportion is higher, and out of slightly over 5 million acres, nearly half a million are common land. So, in England and Wales together, there are some million and a half acres of common land; say, an acre out of every 25 acres in the country. This is of course a considerable area, and commons vary widely in their type, their size and their geographical distribution. Most of them derive from the common use of grazing land lying outside some centre of arable land, the arable land being farmed in individual holdings. The
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great extent of common land, some four-fifths of the total common land in England, is found in the hill-farming areas of the Pennines, in the Lake District, the heart of Wales, and the uplands of Devon and Cornwall. In the Midlands and in the South and East of England there are now fewer commons, with a rather patchy distribution as between one county and another. It is the case, however, that a substantial area of common land, some 70,000 acres, lies within 50 miles of the centre of London, and the social importance of such an area is obvious.
Common rights derive from early systems of land tenure; so early, that the late Lord Jowitt complained in this House on February 23, 1955, that we were encumbered by a mass of Anglo-Saxon laws and he wished to goodness that someone would send those laws packing, bag and baggage! In those early times there was room for everyone; but as the population grew so did the process of appropriating common land into private ownership. During the eighteenth century and the first half of the nineteenth century enclosure seems to have been usually by Private Act of Parliament, and the process amounted to an agrarian revolution resulting in some 6½ million acres of land in England and Wales ceasing to be used as an open field or common. Legislation from 1836 onwards has led to the protection of the commons, partly in the pastoral interests of the commoners and partly in what I may call the access interests of the public. The Commons, Open Spaces and Footpaths Preservation Society was founded in 1865, and celebrates its centenary this summer. In 1898 the Corporation of the City of London bought some 6,000 acres of Epping Forest and, two years later, nearly 500 acres at Burnham Beeches.
As your Lordships will gather from those purchases, the importance of land open to the public near London was by this time becoming fully appreciated, and in 1866 the Metropolitan Commons Act forbade any enclosure of Metropolitan commons. Ten years later, the Commons Act of 1876 put further restrictions on the enclosure of commons, and made some special provision for suburban commons. There was, however, no general right of public access except

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where commons had been set aside by enclosure awards for the recreation of the inhabitants of the parish. There were customary rights of access to town or village greens, which are separately treated in this Bill.
Even to-day the public has no right of access to a common in every case, but the Law of Property Act, 1925, provided for public access in some cases—those of Metropolitan commons, of commons which are wholly or partly within a borough or urban district, and of waste land of a manor similarly situated, whether or not that land is subject to rights of common. Moreover, the same Act allowed the owner of the soil of any common to declare it open to public access if he deposited the appropriate deed with the Minister of Agriculture. This last provision has now been applied over a total area of slightly more than 120,000 acres. Another section of the same Act forbade any building or fencing except by the consent of the Minister, if such building or fencing hindered access to common land; and the Minister for this purpose had to take into account both the benefit of the neighbourhood and private interests, those interests being obviously the interests of persons having rights in the common. The view has been taken that the Minister's power to consent is a restricted one, and less than 3,000 acres in all have been allowed to be fenced or built on.
It seems, therefore, that although people sometimes think that anyone can go on to a common, there is no right of access except in a minority of cases; but, of course, the minority includes the commons particularly important for this purpose in the Metropolis and in other borough and urban areas. These urban commons amount in England and Wales to just over 150,000 acres, and if we add the commons which have been declared open by the owners of the soil, we get about 270,000 acres in England and Wales open to public access out of a total extent of about 1½ million acres of common land.
To turn from one use of commons, for public access and recreation, I would point out that many of them, particularly in the upland areas, are still most important for agriculture; but their very nature as commons has led to a steady
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diminution of their agricultural use. I do not think I can do better than quote paragraph 163 of the Report of the Royal Commission on Common Land, published in July, 1958 (Cmnd. 462). It is as follows:
"Taking common land as a whole we are left with the impression that it is the relic of an ancient system of land management which has caused it to lag well behind other land in agricultural production. To a large extent. the commoners have remained outside the scope of recent agricultural legislation, ineligible for either its benefits or penalties, and incapable, as commoners, of contributing to the industry's increased productivity. The administrative machinery through which their use of the land might have been adapted to modern conditions has mostly disappeared, and they themselves have in consequence become increasingly uncertain of their rights and unable to co-operate. Lacking vitality locally, the whole system which legislation over the last century aimed at preserving has tended to ossify instead. The result has all too often been the neglect of the land with the loss of production to the commoners and of amenity to the public."
Public anxiety about the state of commons has led to various inquiries and Commissions, of which for the moment I need only mention a return made in August, 1873, to the House of Commons by the Inclosure Commissioners, and the 1958 Report, from which I have just quoted. The 1873 return shows well over 1½ million acres of common land in England, as against the 1958 total of slightly over 1 million; and the Welsh total in 1958 is also about two-thirds of what it was in 1873. This reduction is too large to be explained by lawful enclosures, having regard to what was lawful at the time, and there must have been a great deal of eating away of common land by neighbouring proprietors—and also, indeed, some actual disappearance for practical purposes of the treatment of common land as such. Some of the reductions in individual counties are startling. In England, the West Riding is said to have had about 226,000 acres of common land in 1873, and just about half as much in 1958. In Wales, 109,000 acres in 1873 in Montgomeryshire had been reduced to under 9,000 acres of common land in 1958. It is more than doubtful whether we have any accurate general picture of what is now treated as common land throughout the country. It is certain that we have no such picture of what is in law common land.

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There is a similar uncertainty about rights. In some cases the Lord of the manor is well known, the commoners are well known, and the common is managed carefully by them or on their behalf; but in many other cases the Lord of the manor has been lost, and goodness knows who the commoners are. There is always the prospect that an improvement of the common may be made at the expense of those known to be interested, and that others unknown may then appear to prove their rights and claim the benefit of the improvement. There is even the wider prospect that no one interested can be found and that there is no one concerned to make the improvements required, whether in the interests of agriculture or of public access.
I now turn to the 1958 Report, which was made between December, 1955, and July, 1958, by a distinguished and expert body of Commissioners under the chairmanship of Sir Ivor Jennings. Their terms of reference were:
"… to recommend what changes, if any, are desirable in the law relating to common land in order to promote the benefit of those holding manorial and common rights, the enjoyment of the public, or, where at present little or no use is made of such land, its use for some other desirable purpose."
The Commissioners collected a mass of evidence, including evidence from some noble Lords who are Members of this House, and they produced a Report which itself is the best possible tribute to their industry, their expert knowledge in various fields and their sound judgment in forwarding, through all this difficult and complicated material, the public purposes in their terms of reference. I have rarely, if ever, seen such an excellent and interesting Report, and I am sure that the public are indebted, not only to the members of the Royal Commission, but also to those who so carefully gave evidence. I may perhaps add that the Report is well illustrated throughout, and, if I may be allowed a personal word, I took particular pleasure in the photograph of the jury of the Court Baron of Painswick and in that of the members of the Potboilers' Management Committee looking over Hatherleigh Moor in Devon.
The extensive recommendations of the 1958 Royal Commission are contained in two chapters and summarised in a third, at the end of their Report. The first
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is concerned, as is this Bill, with the registration of rights, land and title. The second is concerned with public access and the management and improvement of common land. The recommendations in the latter chapter are not within the scope of this Bill, but I hope that I have indicated the lines on which action is required.
The Report was published in July, 1958. Two years later, on July 26, 1960, the Minister of Agriculture, in a Written Answer to a Question in another place, stated that the Report brought out clearly the difficulties caused to all concerned, including commoners and the general public, by uncertainty as to the nature, ownership and extent of common land and common rights. He commended as valuable the recommendations for establishing the facts and interests by means of registration. He thought it possible that the Commission's proposals for registration might be effected in a shorter time than they suggested. There would then be much to be said for making provision in a later measure for the better management and improvement of common land, its preservation, the public right of access and the wholesale repeal of existing legislation. It would be difficult to make worthwhile progress on those matters until more was known about the facts and interests involved. A further statement was to be made after discussion with local authority associations and other interests. In fact, the Minister of Agriculture also organised a Working Party in which valuable help was given by some distinguished local government officers.
More than a year later, on November 6, 1961, the right honourable gentleman's successor in the Ministry stated, again by way of written reply, that suggestions had been made to the local authority associations and other interested bodies for a scheme of commons registration, broadly on the lines recommended by the Royal Commission, but taking considerably less time than the twelve years envisaged by the Royal Commission. He said that he was now satisfied that such a scheme was practicable, and legislation would be prepared for the purpose, though it could not be introduced that Session—that is to say, the Session 1961 to 1962. He had it in mind to allow three years for the registration of claims and two years for the registration of

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objections. Registration, he said, was a desirable step in itself, and the establishment of the facts would pave the way for action on the remaining recommendations of the Royal Commission.
My Lords, the road to General Elections is paved with good intentions, but in this case, at any rate, the good intentions were not followed up. There was unlikely to be great dispute about the need for registration, or indeed about the form and scope of it. But more than three years have now elapsed since the last-mentioned statement, and it now falls to a Labour Government to find time, pending the introduction of much more controversial legislation on other matters, to bring forward what I suggest is a much-needed Bill and one which is unlikely, I trust, to be contested in principle, even if there may be differences on minor details. I am not, of course, suggesting that there is no room for controversy about what will be required at the next stage, after registration.
I now turn to a summary of the clauses of the Bill, some of which necessarily reflect the involved character of the whole subject. I will not try to deal with minor points, but I will, of course, do my best to answer any questions which may be put in the course of our discussion. The Bill does not apply to Scotland (there are no commons there), and it will come into force not immediately but on an appointed day or days. Clause 1 deals with the registration, which I have already mentioned, and provides that if, after a period, land which could have been registered has not been registered, that land shall cease to be common land or a town or village green. Similarly, after the same period, any rights of common which have not been registered will lapse. The period is to be fixed by an order of the Minister and must be at least three years from the day when the Act comes into force. My right honourable friend intends the period to be a minimum of three years, and I shall have more to say about that later.
A further provision relates to land to the ownership of which no claim is made. As regards unclaimed town or village greens, there is provision later on in the Bill, in Clause 8, for vesting in borough or county district councils and in one
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event in parish councils. The future of unclaimed common land, however, is left to be determined by subsequent legislation. Some rights of ownership have been registered under the Land Registration Acts; so, too, have some rights of common. The rights of ownership or of common so registered are safeguarded; but there is to be no further registration under those Acts of rights of common capable of being registered under this Bill.
Clause 2 constitutes the Greater London Council and county or county borough councils, as the case may be, as registration authorities. Clause 3 makes it clear that in the first place registration shall be provisional, and ensures that the local authorities concerned shall take steps to inform the public. Clause 4 is concerned with the arrangements for provisional registration, and enables a registration authority to register as common land, or as a town or village green, land about which no application for registration has been made.
Clause 5 deals with objections to entries made by way of provisional registration. Unless such objections are withdrawn or conceded, the registration authority is to refer the matter to a Commons Commissioner. Where no owner is registered, the registration authority itself may lodge an objection to a claim that land is common land or to a claim of rights of common. Clause 6 deals in a general form with the disposal by Commons Commissioners of disputed claims and with arrangements to cancel or confirm them, as the case may be. Undisputed registration claims—that is to say, registrations to which no objection has been made within the period allowed for objections—become final under Clause 7.
Clause 8 deals with unclaimed land. To begin with, mere must be an inquiry by a Commons Commissioner as to ownership, and if he succeeds in finding an owner appropriate entry will be made in the register. If he does not, then, as I have already indicated, a town or village green vests in the local authority. Clause 9 provides that, subject to the machinery for objections, an entry in the register shall be conclusive evidence that the land is common land or, as the case may be, a town or village green

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and conclusive evidence of any rights registered over it, but not, of course, of ownership.
Clause 10 exempts from registration not only the New Forest, Epping Forest and the Forest of Dean, but also any land indicated in an order of the Minister. The Minister, however, in making such an order is restricted to cases where the land is already regulated under other Public or Local Acts and where no rights of common have been exercised for at least thirty years past and the owner is known. Clauses 12 and 13 provide for the amendment of the registers under regulations in certain rather special cases, or by the High Court in cases of fraud in connection with the withdrawal of objections or the failure to make them, as also in some other special circumstances. Clause 14 deals with a rather technical matter, the quantification of indefinite grazing rights; while Clause 15 is concerned with some special points in the application of the doctrine of prescription.
Clause 16 prescribes the appointment by the Lord Chancellor of the Commons Commissioners, who will have legal qualifications, and one of whom will be the Chief Commons Commissioner, as well as with the appointment of Assessors to help them in cases calling for special knowledge. There is provision for costs, on a county court scale, and for the fees and allowances of the Commissioners. Clause 17 allows appeals from the Commissioners to the High Court on points of law. Clause 18 deals with regulations that the Minister may make and Clause 19 with his orders. The regulations will be mainly concerned with questions of form and procedure, and with information for the public and local authorities. Both regulations and orders are subject to the usual Negative Resolution procedure.
As to the closing clauses of the Bill, all I need say at this stage is that, while in Clause 21 the definition of "common land" and the reference to "rights of common" are not as clear as ideally one would like them to be, that comes from the nature of the subject. They have been drafted on expert advice and after full consideration of possible alternatives. On past experience we do not expect that they will give rise to any serious practical difficulties, and the best advice I can give
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to those concerned is: "If in doubt, claim—or at least consult a solicitor; and remember that claims may be not only for rights of grazing, but for rights to cut turf, to take fish, brushwood or sand, and so on." An explanatory note will be made available to and by the Commons Registration Authorities.
My Lords, I must now indicate the principal departures from the recommendations of the 1958 Royal Commission. The most important point is the shortening of the time for registration. The Commission recommended the following timetable: first, a year between the coming into force of the Act and the opening of the registers; then eight years, during which claims and objections could be made; and then a further four years only for objections. The period of one year corresponds to the arrangements now made for an appointed day on which the Act will come into operation. The remaining twelve years seem unnecessarily long; and they so seemed to both the Ministers of Agriculture whose statements I referred to earlier in my speech. It is now proposed to have three years for registration and two years afterwards for objections. It seems convenient, however, to divide the three years registration period into two equal periods of eighteen months, and it is hoped that those periods, between them, will run from the beginning of 1967 to the end of 1969.
In order to keep the public fully informed, there will have to be an interval of three months or so before each objection period begins. It is hoped that most of the claims will be put forward in the first eighteen months' period so that any objection to them can be disposed of by October, 1970, and during the first registration period there will be no charge for registration. There will be a charge of £5 for claims notified during the second claims period, but the fee will be waived if prior notice has been given.
The reason why the Commission recommended as long a period as twelve years for claims and objections seems to have been that they intended the register, once finalised, to be conclusive not only as to the status of the land, whether or not it was common land, and as to rights of common over it, but also as to the ownership of the land. I think, however, as did the two Ministers whose statements I have quoted, that that is an unsatisfactory reason for long delay. We

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feel that it is better to have registration of title to land dealt with only under the Land Registration Acts, and to provide, as the Bill does, for the necessary steps to that end. That is another divergence of a rather procedural character from the recommendations of the Commission.
A third divergence from the recommendations of the Royal Commission is on their recommendation that the ownership of any unclaimed land should vest in the Public Trustee. It seems that such an arrangement would put unfamiliar duties on the Public Trustee; and, in any event, we must surely find out a good deal more about the commons and rights over them before we make any arrangements for their vesting in some public authority. A minor divergence is that the Royal Commission recommended a right of appeal from a Commons Commissioner to the Lands Tribunal, but the limited right of appeal to the High Court seems preferable.
My Lords, the uncertainty about the extent of commons, about the rights over them and the individuals interested has not, of course, applied to every case; but it has been widespread and it has led to a broad acreage of our country being ill-maintained and inadequately used, whether for purposes of public access and amenity or for agriculture. We have let outmoded customs and institutions get the better of us; and in the modern world an element of the traditional or the picturesque is not necessarily a sufficient reason for the preservation of the useless or the harmful. Our first step must be to remove the uncertainty; and that is the object of this Bill. We hope by the means I have outlined to get enough information to see what further action is required. On that subject there are about fifty recommendations in the Report of the Royal Commission, and it is clear that in most cases we shall be called on to strike a proper balance between the need for public access and enjoyment, on the one hand, and agricultural and pastoral needs, on the other; and, while having due regard to all such private rights as are in active use, to take as our final aim the public advantage in the widest sense of those words.
Your Lordships will see why, pending fuller information, I do not wish to comment
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in detail on the fifty recommendations I have mentioned. They are the fruit of careful inquiry and sensible consideration, and they should not be neglected or overruled without good reason. I will allow myself one comment, and one only. The more I look at the matter, the more impressed I am with the differences in circumstances, not only between one district and another but often in particular cases. It seems possible that the Royal Commission, having cleared away much of the fog surrounding the whole question, may have thought the way forward a little clearer than it may prove to be. We shall have to be sure that future legislation is sufficiently elastic to deal with local and particular differences, and we shall have to give full scope to the knowledge and, I hope, the good will of the local authorities concerned. They took an active interest in the work of the Royal Commission and spent time and trouble to provide it with local information and, in some cases, with suggestions by way of evidence. For that, we owe them warm thanks; and, whatever legislation we pass, it will be largely on their interest and their co-operation that a better use of common land in the future will depend.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—Lord Mitchison)
7.3 p.m.
EARL FERRERS: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Mitchison, has introduced this Bill, if I may say so, with great detail and great clarity and the House will be very grateful to him for the trouble which he has taken over this. I must say that this is a fascinating subject, although a highly complex one, for the law of commons stretches back, as the noble Lord has pointed out, over hundreds of years. Not only does it become in the process mightily complicated and diverse, but the language it uses seems to come out of a vocabulary entirely of its own. And one of the most valuable parts of the Report of the Royal Commission on Common Land, I found, was the very last part to be written—namely Appendix VI, which provides one with a glossary of all the words used in the law relating to common land and translates them for one.
For one who is not well versed in the law, and particularly in mediaeval law, I

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found this glossary required almost continual reference to discover who was or what was or what were the duties of such names as "Ffridds" and "heafs", "balks" and "botes". So obscure are the functions of many of these entities that I could not help calling to mind the words of a puzzle poem I remember learning, not on my master's instructions, when I was a child, relating to someone or something whose purpose was not readily apparent from its nomenclature. It goes something like this:
"Who or why or which or what
Is the Aquand of Swat?
Does he sit on a chair, or a sofa, or squat?"
I could not help feeling that that might be applied to some of the people whose names are referred to in this Report. It is interesting to find that a landgrave is not, as the innocent might be expected to consider, a receptacle for the deceased, but none other than a human being who has certain interests in a common in Cumberland; and, as the noble Lord pointed out, a potboiler is not a facet of modern sophisticated engineering, as one might expect, but somebody who may have an interest in a common in Devon.
These names go far back into our history and with them go back a wide spectrum of rights and privileges, permissions and sometimes obligations. The rights of commons and commoners and, indeed, of the public are jealously guarded. In every case, they are individual and by no means universal. Every common has its own specific rules and rights and they may not be the same as that of any other. Frequently, the owners of the commons may be in doubt. Frequently, the rights of the commoners may be in doubt and may not even be known. Frequently, it may not even be known whether a place is in itself a common.
"Common land" conjures up a picture of a village green, and possibly a game of cricket on it, but of course it can stretch from such a common or even a roadside verge right up, as the noble Lord explained, to the vast and rolling areas of Devon and Yorkshire. Often these commons are places of beauty and of agricultural value. Often they require modernisation and better husbandry. But how can one start with this, when often it is not known what the law is or who are the interested parties? Often the law
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affecting a common may be the custom handed down from one generation to another.
I hope that the law relating to common land will be tidied up, and well tidied up, in future. This Bill can be welcomed as a first partial step in this direction. The preparation and consideration of this Bill has been going on ever since the Royal Commission reported in 1958 and it follows fairly closely the recommendations of the Royal Commission, except for the fact that the period of time in which people may register is greatly reduced. This I would certainly welcome, for I cannot believe that twelve years would be required in order to effect a registration. But this is merely the first step to be taken over common land. It is merely the compiling of a register of people who have interests in the common land—that and nothing more. I hope that the Government will not hesitate to put on their thinking caps and draw up a Bill for the second stage in the modernisation of the law of common land. Of course, there is the probability that they may not be here to present it themselves, but at least they can follow the example of their predecessors, which was to leave to their successors a Bill which, if not ready, is at least very nearly ready to be presented to Parliament.
The noble and learned Lord who sits on the Woolsack has frequently castigated the laws of the country for being out of date and inadequate. Indeed, he is setting up law commissioners to rectify this. And if I may, with the greatest and humblest respect to the noble and learned Lord, put forward a suggestion, it would be this: that the law commissioners might like to try their hands out on the law of common land. They certainly could not do any damage. It would occupy them for something in excess of a hundred days. And it would be a long overdue and fascinating reform, which would perform a highly useful service to the Statute Book, to the public and to the people who have an interest in the common land.
It is considered that 1½ million acres of land in England and Wales are common land, much of which is unproductive. Of course, it may be in the national interest that it should be unproductive, but to my mind it is indefensible that it should

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be so because the law relating to it is so chaotic that nobody knows how to make it productive or, if they do know how to make it productive, they do not know whether they would be allowed to do so. It is for this reason that the Royal Commission was set up, and it was not long before they realised how complex the law was. It took them three years to deliberate and gather information, and they made a variety of recommendations. This is, of course, the first step, and we welcome it. We look anxiously forward to the second step.
7.11 p.m.
LORD MOLSON: My Lords, in what I am going to say to your Lordships I am expressing generally the views of the Commons Preservation Society, of which I have the honour to be Treasurer. We welcome this legislation: indeed, we have been asking ever since the Royal Commission reported in 1958 that legislation should be introduced as soon as possible. As regards the Bill and its provisions, we welcome it, so far as it goes; and we particularly welcome the frank and unequivocal assurance that the Parliamentary Secretary has given us that it is the Government's intention to follow this registration Bill with a further Bill which will be of a more constructive kind. It is, of course, impossible to do that until the existing rights have been defined, which is the purpose of this Bill.
Commons, certainly in the parts of this country which are thickly inhabited, have become of immense importance for reasons quite different from those which led to their original growth. The common land was owned by the Lord of the manor, and the commoners had strictly limited agricultural and rural rights in connection with them. But, as the Parliamentary Secretary has said, in the 19th century, with the immense increase in population in this country, it came to be seen, particularly by the remarkable body of public-spirited men who formed the Commons Preservation Society—men most of whose names are well-known in Parliamentary history—and by Parliament, that in many parts of the country the greatest importance of the Commons was that they should be available for access for walking and riding by the general public.
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When we reflect that it was only as a result of the Parliamentary activities of these men that Wimbledon Common, Hampstead Heath, Berkhampsted Common, Plumstead and in large measure the Forest of Epping, were preserved from being enclosed and used as building spaces, it is obvious what an important task it was to preserve them. It is, of course, necessary that agricultural rights should be preserved in places where they can be usefully exercised; and, as the Parliamentary Secretary has said, it will be important that the substantive Bill, which is some day to follow this one, should hold a balance beween the rights of access of the urban masses and the rights of the commoners.
I think the machinery of this Bill is well calculated for this purpose. We first of all have the provisional registers in which will be set out, first, the extent of the commons; secondly, their ownership; and thirdly, the rights of the commoners. During the time that these registers are provisional, it will be possible for anyone to raise objection, and matters in dispute will be decided. After the lapse of a period of time, as defined and laid down in Clause 1 of the Bill, the registers will become conclusive evidence of the existence of these rights. That seems fair and practical. But it is important, first, that under that procedure all rights should be registered; and secondly, that registers should be complete and exhaustive of known rights.
It is not clear from the wording of the Bill whether anyone may register rights or whether it is limited to those who have an interest in the land. I am inclined to think that probably it is limited to those who have an interest in the land, because Clause 5 (4) provides that local authorities may, even if they have no right in the land, intervene. If persons who have No 1nterest in the land cannot register, then no member of the public can register a right of access in the case of a large number of commons. In many cases—and the Parliamentary Secretary in his speech said in the majority of cases—the public have no right of access. Under the Law of Property Act, 1925, and other legislation the right of access is given in a number of cases which the Parliamentary Secretary set out, and I need not quote them. But the fact that in a large number of cases no right of access exists

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as of right, means that no member of the public will be able to register such a right in the case of those commons. I say "as of right", because often there is practically no way of preventing the public from enjoying the use of those lands. But it is important, I think—and I hope in the Committee stage to probe this matter further—that the public should have the right to register.
Will all commoners register their common rights? Many of them may not know what their rights are. A great many of them may not care to exercise their rights. One only has to think of the right of pannage—that of allowing pigs to run freely and gather acorns at certain times of the year—on many of the commons, especially those with modern roads and transport crossing them, to appreciate that it is not a right which is of any value.
Will the owner always register his ownership? What inducement will he have to do so if there is any chance that no one will register common rights? In that case, it might well be that the period of three years will elapse without the fact that this is a common having been registered under this Bill; and I presume that in that case the owner, instead of being the owner of the land subject to extensive commoners' rights, will, in fact, acquire a freehold unencumbered estate in fee simple. The Parliamentary Secretary in his speech lent support to the point that I am making when he spoke of the eating away of common land by neighbouring owners, and of cases where the Lord of the manor was lost and goodness knows what had happened to the commoners. This is an important point which we shall have to pursue in the Committee stage, in order to ensure that the machinery of this Bill does not lend itself to a deliberate act on the part of the owners of commons of not registering in order that they may secure an unencumbered freehold estate.
Will local authorities register? Some of them certainly will, and others may not. The Commons and Footpaths Preservation Society has experience of local authorities, and some of them have been most diligent in seeking to preserve rights of way. Others have been most apathetic in the matter. It is extremely important that we should make certain that this apathy should not result in the loss of valuable rights under this Bill.
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Those points have been made on the assumption that no one without an interest in the land can register. But if I am wrong in my interpretation of the Bill, and if anyone without an interest in the land may register, I must ask the Government whether it is likely that anyone will do so. In the first place, a person without an interest in the land very likely lacks the information upon which to base an application for registration. Secondly, he has No 1ncentive to do so, and, thirdly, he may well be deterred from doing so because, under Clause 16 (4), he may incur costs on the level of county court proceedings if he does so and fails. Fourthly, where ownership of common land cannot be ascertained, it is not vested under this Bill in any body. It is the view of the Commons Preservation Society that this is almost an invitation to neighbouring owners to seek to extend their property at the expense of land which, ex hypothesi, under this Bill cannot be vested in anyone to hold it in the interests of the public as a whole. That is all I need say at the moment about the danger that rights will not be registered under this Bill. If they are not registered under it then, with the efflux of time, under Clause 1 (2) they will be extinguished for ever.
I now come to the second main point that I want to make. It appears to us that these provisional registers ought to be comprehensive. But they will not be. Clause 4 (3) provides that:
"No person shall be registered under this section as the owner of any land if the land is registered under the Land Registration Acts, 1925, and 1936 … "
Clause 11 (b) provides for deletion from the register if, after land has been registered under this Bill, it is found that it had previously been registered under the Land Registration Act, 1925. We think that the register of commons should be a comprehensive list of all the commons and common rights. It is only in that way that the public can know what is common land.
I would point out to the Government that under Section 112 of the Land Registration Act, 1925, the public have no general right to inspect the land register set up under that Act. The wording of the Section 1s:
"… any person registered as proprietor of any land or charge, and any person authorised

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by any such proprietor, or by an order of the court, or by general rule, but no other person, may inspect and make copies of and extracts from any register… "
It is therefore a matter of great importance, to enable the public to ascertain what common rights are, that they should not merely be included in the land register set up under the Act of 1925. Even when these registers cease to be provisional (and under Clause 12 they may be amended), there is still no provision in Clause 12 enabling them to be amended to include rights of ownership excluded under Clause 4 (3) of this Bill, which is what is included in the register of the Act of 1925. Finally, the fact that there is no registration of ownership of unclaimed commons also means that there is a serious further lacuna.
Those are three points that I have made: first, that registers may not include all rights; secondly, that registers must not include ownership already registered, and, thirdly, that where ownership of common land cannot be ascertained it may not be registered. In order to deal with these three points we recommend the creation of a Custodian of Common Land. This is a modification of the recommendation referred to by the Parliamentary Secretary in his speech, contained in the Report of the Royal Commission, that in such cases the ownership of common land should be vested in the Public Trustee. We are disposed to agree with the Government that the Public Trustee, with his multifarious responsibilities and financial outlook, is probably not the best person to administer a number of pieces of common land scattered throughout the length and breadth of the country. We therefore make the alternative suggestion that there should be set up a Custodian of Common Land who should be entitled, first, to register all rights that are claimed, including the right of the public to free access, and, second, to claim for himself, and be vested with, ownership of commons if the owner negligently or wilfully declines to register his ownership himself.
While on this point of the law of commons, I should like to say to the Parliamentary Secretary that the Ministry of Agriculture, from which his new Minister has taken over these responsibilities, was, I regret to say, under Ministers of both political Parties, guilty
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first of requisitioning common land in war time, in order to increase food production; of extinguishing commoners' rights, and then of selling the land, as ordinary freehold, to private individuals. I am not criticising the requisitioning. But I do say that to requisition common land and extinguish the commoners' rights, and then to sell it as ordinary freehold, is the kind of thing that we should regard as reprehensible in private individuals, and we regard it as equally reprehensible in a Government Department.
I need not go further into past wrongdoing, but 475 acres are left and still owned by the Minister. I ask that this new Ministry of Land and Natural Resources will make a good start to its career by giving to this House an assurance that it will not dispose of that land but will restore it to be common land. If the Government, wisely, were to accept the Amendment regarding the Custodian of Common Lands which I propose to move, it would be very appropriate, as a birthday present, if they vested in that Custodian of Common Lands the land of which they remain still possessed.
My Lords, Clause 18 gives very wide powers to the Minister to make delegated legislation. I dare say that it is quite all right; but we shall have to look at it at the Committee stage. I think that perhaps the definition of common rights in Clause 21 is not quite as comprehensive as it should be. We can have very interesting debates on some of those words to which my noble friend Lord Ferrers has referred from the glossary containing the delightful and romantic rights that were exercised over the waste of manors in mediaeval times.
I welcome this Bill, and I believe that the Government's intentions are exceedingly good. But, at the same time, I feel that it does not make sufficiently clear the public interest in commons as a whole, especially those near large centres of population, and I hope that the Government will be sympathetic to any Amendments which my noble friends and I may move in order to try to improve this Bill.
7.32 p.m.
LORD INGLEWOOD: My Lords, I rise to make only a very brief intervention. I have had a long-standing interest

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in this problem of commons and common land and I must confess that I was one of those who ventured to give evidence before the Royal Commission. I live in a district where large areas of land are grazed in common and are most important to the economy of many farms, and there is also, by tradition, a very wide measure of access; but I hope that noble Lords will see that I shall be speaking rather more from the agricultural point of view than that of my noble friend who has just sat down.
We are, I think, all glad to see this Bill, the first stage of overdue common land legislation. My memory is fairly good, if not such as to remember every detail of a draft Bill I may have seen some time ago, but I do not believe there is very much here in print to-day that was not in print several years ago, and since that time the Bill has been slowly moving up the list, hoping for space in an overcrowded legislative programme. But I am glad that noble Lords opposite have given it their support and a deserved priority, and I should not like to miss this unusual chance of being able to pay tribute to something they have done.
The whole concern of this Bill is registration. Registration is very important, but it is not an end in itself; it is only the means to an end. We naturally cannot expect even an outline of any Bill or Bills which may follow in several years' time, but at least I hope that the Government will give, not only us here but the many commoners up and down the country some idea of their thinking at this stage. Those people are entitled to ask for this. We heard that the Government are going to pay respect to the "proper balance". This is a good Front Bench phrase, but it is very difficult for any individual in a remote part of the country to assess how that is going to be applied to his particular problem.
I take it, from what the noble Lord has said, that the Government are in general support of the Commission's principal recommendations, but I hope that when the noble Lord comes to wind up he will tell us something about Recommendation 25, which is on page 131 and is a recommendation about access which has aroused a great deal of interest in some areas. Nobody wants to see traditional access curtailed but, equally, the noble Lord would not wish, if he had common rights over
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fell in his home district, suddenly to find that those rights were so crystallised that he could no longer run a bull with his heifers on the common, which is the sort of consequence which could follow turning this traditional permission into a proper statutory right.
More particularly, I hope that the noble Lord, when he winds up, will give us more information on several points which are of the greatest interest to commoners with agricultural interests. While no-one in an area like the Lake District wants to see any diminution of public access which has grown up and been welcomed over the years, none the less, I hope that the noble Lord will make it clear now, to avoid difficulty and misunderstanding later, that common land is not the same as public land. A lot of people think it is. Various interlocking private rights in and over common land, although many are quite small rights, are very valuable to those who enjoy them. I do not think that that distinction is sufficiently clearly understood by many.
Secondly, when we come to common land which has a significant agricultural value, I hope that this will be given full recognition and that those who own the soil and the rights of common will be able to regulate such commons with a view to their improvement and to the increase of agricultural production. At present it is virtually impossible to effect any such regulation; the law is too complicated. I believe there is one successful example somewhere in Northumberland where a scheme of regulation has been worked out in our time, but since any scheme in most districts is liable to be blocked by one awkward man, there is no purpose in embarking on anything so difficult and where success is so unlikely. Time has marched on, as the noble Lord said, and no one to-day can expect a manorial court really to take control over schemes of regulation of commons.
But, having said that, we must admit that common land remains part of the pattern of our countryside, even though there are too many examples of derelict land and overstocked or over-sheeped hill grazings in those areas. The Ministry of Agriculture may be a little timid of seeing increased production of any commodity to-day, but by the turn of the century who knows whether the increased food from the improved million acres or

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thereabouts of common land may not be needed and may not be very valuable, not only for the people of this country but for peoples in other parts of the world? Hence I hope that the Government will not overlook the significance of the opportunity they have of improving agricultural production from this very large area.
There is then the question of the production of timber, which is a subject on which I ventured to give evidence. Commons to-day are mostly bare enough. There were trees on them to give shelter and they added to the amenity, but such timber has largely disappeared to meet our needs in two wars. Although the Lord of the manor in many cases would be within his rights in attempting to replace this timber, he would be a fool if he tried, since he has no right under the law to protect the young trees, and there would be a complete certainty that no young plantation could possibly become established under existing conditions. I would say that there is need for rapid action here for the re-establishment of these lost timber stocks, which were considerable, and, further, to make it possible for willing commoners and their Lord to regulate commons in the interests of agriculture.
There are many facets of this problem which are very complicated and may take a long time to consider, even after all this evidence has been collected, but there are other problems of which I venture to think these are two which are much less complicated. I believed that they could even be brought within the scope of a Private Member's Bill, and I tried in the past to see whether that could be done, but the "Establishment" always seemed to be against me and thought and spoke in terms of comprehensive legislation, of which we are considering the first stage here to-day.
My Lords, this Bill may concern only registration, but I think it is meaningless when looked at from one direction unless we do know a little more. I pay tribute to the noble Lord who introduced this Bill. He gave an immense amount of information in a relatively short time. He was very clear and easy to listen to. None the less, I hope that when he comes to wind up he can tell us rather more about the Government's thinking. I am
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sure we are entirely justified in asking the Government to confirm their policy, which must be of the greatest interest to the very many commoners up and down this country; and in one particular regard I hope he can tell us something: that it is not the Government's intention to pursue any wide policy of compulsory acquisition of large areas of common land, for whatever purpose. No doubt there are certain nationalisers within the Government's ranks who will urge them to do this, but I should like to think that the others were strong enough to resist this temptation. I would think it a pity, too, if even, in their quest for more land, too large areas of our commons in fact became Forestry Commission land and completely covered with uniform forests. For the rest, I hope we can all make progress, not only with the Bill but also with the registration and with the subsequent stages, and do this with the minimum of controversy and the maximum of agreement.
LORD CHUTER-EDE: My Lords, the House is indebted to my noble and learned friend the Parliamentary Secretary for the disclosure of the Government's intentions that he made in the course of his speech, and I share with the noble Lord, Lord Molson, the feeling with regard to the ultimate end of what we are now embarking upon in this Bill. For it is quite clear that this first Bill will not do more than provide us with a list, and once one has a list it is always very dangerous to wonder what the next thing will be, and particularly to take any steps in making use of the list for the promotion of one's own ideas.
The noble Lord, Lord Molson, said that he was Treasurer of the Commons, Open Spaces and Footpaths Preservation Society. For five years I was the President of that organisation, and from the information that was given to us it is quite clear that that organisation was started about one hundred years ago. It is some proof that at odd times progress is made in this country that, at the end of one hundred years, we have got as far as this first Bill. How many centuries it is going to take us to see through the issues that really arise on this measure it would be very dangerous to prophesy; the only certainty is that one would not be here at the end of any time that one was tempted to mention.

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The noble Lord, Lord Molson, mentioned several matters that arise on this measure and I hope that the Government will tell us that they intend to tackle this task, not in this Session but in a series of Sessions, steadily moving from the vantage point that they have established for us by introducing this particular Bill. Among the difficulties that will confront us is that not many people know that they have rights of common. In the promotion of two important Private Bills on behalf of local authorities the persons who were associated with me had to advertise for persons who claimed rights of common to notify us that they possessed them, and in neither case did we get a single reply. And one of these was a particularly important Bill that was promoted for the regulation of Epsom and Walton Downs, two very valuable commons, especially to the people of London, although of course they have as such no right in them at all. And the curious thing is that commons are now sought to be preserved in the main for the recreation of the urban population, and all connection with agriculture appears to have disappeared from the agitation in respect of them.
If when people are asked by local authorities to intimate that they have rights of common they take no steps to notify the persons advertising that they possess them, I think it is clear that the collection of the information required for the registers will be a task that will take a very long time, and that we shall have to take some pains to stress the importance of the information being supplied. The society which the noble Lord mentioned has plenty of evidence that it is exceedingly difficult to get any information on the point from people who undoubtedly possess rights of common. In fact, I sometimes thought it all depended on how the people in the big house treated the villagers whether you could ever get any information at all. If the people in the big house behaved as reasonably good neighbours to the poorer section of the population you got No 1nformation at all, but if the people in the big house had acquired the reputation of not being very good neighbours you could get so much information that it would appear that seventy or eighty years ago the main task of very many children in working-class cottages was listening
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to their grandparents telling them where the rights of way and rights of common were. In such cases there was no difficulty at all in getting the evidence, if you could only find somebody who would believe it when you presented it.
It is important, now the Government have decided to implement at any rate some parts of the Report of the Royal Commission, that we should steadily go forward with it and in future years, no matter what Party may be governing the country, we should have a continuous succession of Acts bringing this matter fully up to date and making the information as wide and as reliable as possible. The reception of the Report when it appeared was sufficiently good to assure the Government that there would be plenty of interest in the matter.
It may be that I am not holding out a very inviting prospect to the Minister, who is not generally anxious to have to ask for time in successive years to carry through a policy, but unless the Government and successive Governments are prepared to regard this as one of the routine tasks to be performed by Government during the next twenty years, the Royal Commission and all the good will that it engendered when its Report was published may very well have been in vain, and that would be an appalling responsibility for this generation to take on in regard to the needs of posterity in the relatively near future.
7.50 p.m.
LORD CHORLEY: My Lords, I must apologise to the noble Lord who has just resumed his seat for rising a few moments ago. However, when I saw that he was on his feet it made me sit down firmly. I had the honour to follow the noble Lord, Lord Chuter-Ede, as President of the Commons, Open Spaces and Footpaths Preservation Society, and therefore it is fitting that this evening I should follow him in your Lordships' House. I also wish to have the opportunity of congratulating him on behalf of your Lordships for the contribution which he has made to our discussion, I think his first. It was a great pleasure for many of us to know him in another place. We all know him as an authority on a wide range of matters of great interest

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to the citizens of this country, on which his observations are always of the greatest value. I, at any rate, who have spent a good deal of my life in this movement feel that it is a compliment to the open spaces movement, as I believe Lord Eversley once described it, that Lord Chuter-Ede should have chosen this particular occasion on which to make his maiden speech to your Lordships. There is a wide range of subjects on which he is a great authority, and we hope that on other occasions he will again address us on many of these subjects.
Although it is late and few of your Lordships are left here, I should like to take up a little time this evening on this topic in which I have been interested for a long time. Incidentally, although this Bill itself is, in a sense, a technical measure and within a limited compass, every speech which has been made has encouraged us to look at the wider horizons with which the Bill is concerned. I think it is unfortunate that a matter of this importance should be relegated to a late hour after other measures, and to a House which is, in effect, almost empty. A better time ought to be found for discussion on a measure the implications of which are so wide. I was glad that the noble Lord indicated that, and that it has emerged in every speech which has been made tonight.
The noble Lord, Lord Molson, and I approach this with a rather different attitude from that of the noble Lord, Lord Inglewood, although I do not think there is any necessary enmity between us. I think our common objectives work well in with each other. This enormous area of common land which is left in this country is to me a great reservoir for the ordinary citizens to get the healthy recreation in the country which they need, and which it is imperative that they should have; and it is because it is a preliminary step to that end that this Bill is so important.
It is quite true, as Lord Inglewood says—and of course everybody here knows it quite well, although in the country it is not so well known—that common land is not public land in the sense that everybody has the right to use it. It may be that from time to time, under that impression, damage has been done to
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agricultural interests, and an enmity for a long time undoubtedly existed between the agricultural interests and those of us who like to go into the country and walk across the commons. To a large extent I think that has disappeared, although not entirely so. To me, one of the really important things is that this right should be extended. I am not going to cross swords at the moment with the noble Lord about the nationalisation of land. I think the needs of the young people of this country, particularly the right to walk across these commons and to enjoy themselves there, can be secured without necessarily going as far as that.
LORD INGLEWOOD: My Lords, I think the noble Lord is quite right in saying that there is really not a great deal between us, and he knows that I am a great lover of the Lake District and like to walk around it as he does. Nevertheless, I think we ought to be quite clear at this stage as to what we are doing. I am as proud as he is of the traditional access which, in fact, everybody enjoys over enormous areas of country in the North of England, with the absolute minimum of trouble. I would say that this state of affairs has grown up quite happily by friendly understanding on both sides.
LORD CHORLEY: I am not challenging the noble Lord. It was he who trailed his coat. Both of us do our best to defend the Lake District, which is under considerable pressure from other interests further south, as he and many of your Lordships know.
I was grateful to the Minister for referring to the centenary of the Commons, Open Spaces and Footpaths Preservation Society. Looking back at the early days of the Society, it was founded by Lord Eversley. He was the principal force behind it a hundred years ago. A most remarkable man, he was in fact a son of a Clerk of the Parliaments. He lived to be 97, and he said that he had known personally thirteen Prime Ministers, seventeen Lord Chancellors and seven Archbishops of Canterbury. That is a pretty good score. He gathered round him some of the most remarkable men of that mid-Victorian period—men like John Stuart Mill, Forster and Leslie Stephens, and others, who are household names in literature and politics. They built up an organisation which, as can be seen from

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Lord Molson's speech, is still much alive, and obviously would be much alive when it has had the Presidency of Lord Chuter-Ede for all these number of years. There is a mass of informed information there and an enormous experience of this problem, which I hope that the Minister and the new Ministry will feel themselves not only free to call upon but encouraged to call upon, because I am sure that we can give them a great deal of help.
This Bill is machinery, and if it is to work in the right way it will be valuable machinery. But it is not impossible that it will not work in the right way. If it does not, it may prove a two-edged sword and do a great deal of damage, especially when one considers the three-year rule. I am not altogether happy about the three years, because at the end of that period, as Lord Molson has pointed out, rights will be extinguished for ever. This is an area where the interests of the general body of citizens are so vague, and there are so few organisations there to protect them and to forward them, that it might easily be that in the short period of three years rights of the greatest value will be lost to young men and women, indeed to all the citizens of this country. Therefore, I feel that this proposal that it should be the definite job of somebody like a Custodian of Common Lands, is an important and vital proposal, and I hope that the new Ministry, to which we are all looking forward with eagerness and expectation, will be able to see its way to meet us on points of this sort.
I think that the Minister pulled his punches in a way, because it is a scandal that it is now some seven or eight years since the Jennings Report was published, and that we have had to wait for this Government before a Bill was introduced. The noble Lord, Lord Inglewood, was doing a good job of work at the Ministry of Agriculture and was doing his best to get this over. This small Bill is not going to take a great deal of time, either here or in another place. It is a scandal that it should have had to wait so long. I echo what the noble Earl. Lord Ferrers, and other speakers have said, in encouraging the new Ministry, which, after all, has such a wide area of interest to cope with in the Ministry of Agriculture, to devote particular attention to this important problem of the commons, I hope they will not be
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satisfied with getting this Bill through Parliament and then saying, "We can sit back and spend a lot of time thinking". I hope that they will be thinking hard from the word "Go", because, as my noble friend Lord Chuter-Ede said, unless they are doing so through these coming years very vital and most valuable interests of the community will be lost for ever.
It is late; I have a number of other points I should like to make, but the noble Lord, Lord Molson, has indicated them effectively. Therefore, I hope that this is just the beginning of a long period of intensive thought and work on the protection of these really wonderful areas. Many of them are places of outstanding beauty, some of them in the most lovely areas of the whole country, like the Lake District and Wales—places not just where one can get fresh air and have recreation, but where one can do so in some of the loveliest country in the world. Therefore, I feel that this is, in a sense, an historic occasion, and that in passing this Bill we are at the beginning of a long and fruitful prospect of saving these wonderful parts of the countryside for the people of our islands.
8.3 p.m.
VISCOUNT GOSCHEN: My Lords, I rise not to address your Lordships on the Bill under discussion but to offer to the noble Lord, Lord Chuter-Ede, from noble Lords on this side of the House, congratulations on his maiden speech. He, of course, comes to us with a great reputation, and I am sure that all of us, wherever we sit in this House, will much look forward to hearing from him often in the future.
SEVERAL NOBLE LORDS: Hear, hear!
8.4 p.m.
LORD MITCHISON: My Lords, I think that it verges on the impertinent for me to congratulate my noble friend Lord Chuter-Ede on a maiden speech, but I know that he will not take it in that way. He has always recognised the real good will which he has had from Members of the other place, on both sides of the House, although I sometimes feel that he has never quite recognised how very large that good will is. On this particular occasion I am especially glad that he chose to speak, for I know his interest in

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this subject. I know, too, that he understands full well what I believe to be a most important side of it, and that is the r^ le that will necessarily have to be played by county councils up and down the country. I agree that county boroughs are also concerned, but that is a rather different matter. I do not want to develop this at great length, but I have known the noble Lord ever since I have been in Parliament. I have never heard him say a word that was not both wise and timely. I have never known him fail to be kind to anybody who needed kindness. And I have never known him fail to make a really funny remark when it was appropriate to make it. I cannot say more to him than that.
I have listened with great interest to all the suggestions made on this Bill. Some of them will be raised again in Committee, and therefore the noble Lord, Lord Molson, will hardly expect me to deal with them in any detail now. I want to say one or two general things which I hope may help him a little in his consideration of what he has put forward. The first thing I would say is that I do not think there are nearly so many loopholes in the Bill as he thinks he has found. The answer, in a good many cases, is to be found in Clause 4 (2). The local authority is to represent the public, and in those cases the local authority will be the appropriate local council. I mentioned this in my opening speech, but only very shortly.
I agree with the noble Lord that the claim under Clause 4 (1), except for status, must be by someone interested, and I think that he will find confirmation of that if he looks at the provision in a later clause for enabling either a landlord or a tenant to make a claim for registration. That provision would obviously not be necessary if people having No 1nterest could make claims, as they will be able to for status. I think it is pretty clear therefore—indeed, I doubt if it needs amendment—that it must be someone having an interest, save in the case I have mentioned.
Another point which I hope to deal with is this. We came to the conclusion—and I am certain it is right—that one cannot have two systems of registered ownership side by side. Either the registered ownership has no meaning in one
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case or they will conflict. What, in effect, we have done is to make the registration of ownership here for the purposes of this Bill an inconclusive registration—one which is really a peg, as it were, on which one has to hang a certain amount of other things. But we have avoided a conflict with the land registration authorities on the matter. I feel quite certain in my own mind that that is really inevitable, given the land registration legislation.
I see the difficulty about public access. Possibly something might be done to meet that point, but I think the cases in which owners fail to register will be rare. When one looks at it carefully one sees that it is not in the interests of an owner simply to fail to register because he thinks that no one will claim rights of common, for in that case the local authority would step in and apply to register the land as common land. Consequently he would find himself not with unencumbered freehold but with somebody concerned to have the land registered as common land.
One other point about ownership is that it is not only a case of registering the ownership of the actual land. There may be questions of registering ownership of what I suppose one should call dominant land—that is to say, land to which these rights of common appertain. Though it is not the same land as that over which the rights are exercised, a man holding a farm may have rights of common in the ground in front of the farm and it may be necessary to get some indication of what the dominant land is, as well as of the land over which the rights of common are exercised. We are not quite certain—and I want to look at it again—that we have provided for that being indicated; and this is the point on which we may have to consider an enlargement of the registration-making power. We may have to ask for a little more information from people on that particular narrow, technical point. On the regulations generally I have looked at the clause very carefully, and I am far more afraid that the powers are too little than that they are too large. The Clause 1s very tightly drawn, and if one looks at what it provides for, one sees that it is confined to the things I said: to the giving of information to the public and other important but procedural matters.

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I turn to the apparent conflict—it really was no more—between Lord Molson and Lord Inglewood, the one upholding the rights of public access and the other saying that agricultural interests were vital. I do not think that there is any real conflict. If one looks at Recommendation 25 of the Royal Commission, one finds that it is subject to the conditions in the National Parks Act. One of those conditions, the last one printed, is that the public in exercising their rights shall not interfere with the rights of other people. So that the apparent conflict is not, I think, there in that case.
But what I think is indicated quite clearly is that there will have to be schemes of management, and so on—the recommendations, in fact, of the Royal Commission—and that they will differ widely in different parts of the country. As regards some of the upland commons in the Lake District there is already in fact, if not in law, public access, and the real difficulty is that it is necessary to go a very long way to get to this land. If I read the Report rightly, not only humans but sheep find it a long way to go, so the commons are neither fully grazed nor fully used for public enjoyment. I do not think these problems will prove too difficult, but I must repeat what I said at the end of my opening speech, which I think answers a good deal of what was said to-day.
This is a case where the success of what we do, however many thinking-caps we put on, is going to depend on the co-operation and good will of local authorities. In my view, they will find more reason for co-operation in the terms of this Bill, and the possibilities it opens to them, than they have found in the past. It is quite true that there is much more inducement in some cases than in others. In Northamptonshire, for instance, I think I am right in saying that there
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are either no commons at all, or only a very negligible quantity, but a number of village greens, which are rather a different kettle of fish, if I may use that expression. The authorities were, on the whole, good as regards the Royal Commission—or so I understand—and I feel that when you appeal to people to do a thing of this sort you can get co-operation if you make it clear that you really intend business yourself.
May I say to my noble friend Lord Chuter-Ede, and to everybody else concerned, that I hope we shall not have to have periodic legislation. We are trying to avoid that. But I agree that we shall have to keep this business actively going, with or without other legislation, and that it is no use just getting this Bill passed and then sitting back and doing nothing. For one thing, an explanatory leaflet is going to be a very important document. A good number more things may be wanted for which it is not necessary to provide in the Statute but which may matter a good deal in practice.
In the last resort, my Lords, what are we really doing? We are trying to make proper use for public purposes of no less than 1½ million acres in this country, where our institutions or our laziness, whichever it is, have got the better of us in the past; and where people over the centuries have been infringing public rights and the rights of commoners simply because no one was looking and no one bothered. Surely there could be no better subject about which to call for real help from local authorities than 1½ million acres of the country, which, after all, we all love, or we should not be having this debate or this Bill.
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.
House adjourned at thirteen minutes past eight o'clock.