Lords Sitting of 6 July 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 St. Albans

DETENTION OF BRITONS IN BURMA
2.35 p.m.
LORD CARRINGTON: 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 what representations they have made to the Burmese Government about their refusal to grant exit permits to the partners in A. Scott & Company.]
THE PARLIAMENTARY UNDERSECRETARY OF STATE FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS (LORD WALSTON): My Lords, A. Scott and Company owned a mineral water factory in Rangoon which was taken over and subsequently auctioned on December 4, 1964, in part satisfaction of income tax liabilities claimed by the Burmese authorities. The four British partners are being prevented from leaving Burma principally because they have no funds to meet the remaining tax liability, and there may also be a court case pending against them in respect of certain alleged business irregularities. Against two of the partners there is also a longstanding court case concerning alleged foreign exchange offences some years ago.
Her Majesty's Government are not in a position to judge either the merits of these court proceedings or the equity of the tax assessments. Her Majesty's Ambassador at Rangoon has, however, now followed up earlier representations to the Burmese authorities with a personal appeal to the Burmese Foreign Minister to allow these businessmen to leave. I myself have been personally assured by the Burmese Ambassador that he has requested his Government to ensure that the cases of these business-
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men are dealt with as speedily and as sympathetically as possible.
LORD CARRINGTON: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord for his Answer to my Question, so far as it goes. But is he aware that the penal taxation which these four British subjects are expected to pay has made them absolutely destitute? They have not the smallest chance of being able to pay off this taxation and, as he knows, they are unable to leave the country. May I put down a further Question in a week or so to find out from the noble Lord what has happened? It is really a disgraceful thing that four British subjects should be put in this position. I hope that Her Majesty's Government will make very strong representations in this matter.
LORD WALSTON: My Lords, I should be most grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Carrington, if he would put down a further Question. In the meantime, I assure him that both Her Majesty's Ambassador and I myself, personally, are pursuing this matter as best we can.

LEPROSY AMONG IMMIGRANTS
LORD ELTON: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the first Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
[The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what proportion of the registered sufferers from leprosy now in the United Kingdom are Afro-Asian immigrants; whether they have noted the reported statement of Dr. Cochrane, adviser on leprosy to the Ministry of Health, to the effect that, if health controls are not tightened, the disease is likely to spread in this country, and whether they propose to take any action on this advice.]
THE PARLIAMENTARY UNDERSECRETARY OF STATE FOR COMMONWEALTH RELATIONS AND FOR THE COLONIES (LORD TAYLOR): My Lords, the proportion of registered sufferers from leprosy in England and Wales who are Afro-Asian immigrants is not known, but in all these cases, with one doubtful exception that is at present the subject of inquiry, the disease is believed to have been contracted abroad. My right honourable friend the Minister of

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Health is aware of Dr. Cochrane's reported statement. The figure of eight years attributed to Dr. Cochrane in the Press should have read "eighty years". It is Dr. Cochrane's considered view that the likelihood of acquiring leprosy in this country is almost negligible at present, but there is always a potential hazard, and the need for health control measures in relation to this and other diseases is kept constantly under review.
LORD ELTON: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for that Answer, the second part of which, at any rate, is satisfactory. Of course the first part, as one knew, he really could not answer. The absence of statistics in respect of immigrants in this matter is of minor importance compared with their absence in respect of other aspects of immigration, and does the noble Lord realise how strange it will seem to future historians that a Government whose whole political creed is founded on a belief in the necessity for planning should be fumbling about with immigration—the gravest problem since the Industrial Revolution—without providing the necessary statistics?
LORD TAYLOR: My Lords, I think that that supplementary question refers more to the next Question than to this one.
LORD PEDDIE: My Lords, could my noble friend indicate the reason why there is no knowledge of the number of people who are suffering from leprosy in this country, whether or not it is a certifiable disease?
LORD TAYLOR: My Lords, the number is known: it is, in fact, 340. It is the number of Afro-Asia immigrants among that total which is not known.
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: My Lords, in view of the fact that the number of notifications is so small, in proportion to the number of general notifications covering the country, why is it so difficult to find out the origin of a patient?
LORD TAYLOR: My Lords, it would present no difficulty at all to find out the origin of a patient, but it is thought wrong so to do.
SEVERAL NOBLE LORDS: Why?
LORD TAYLOR: Such information has no relevance at all. A number of these people are missionaries who have contracted the disease, and a number of them have been here for many years. To pick out the Afro-Asian immigrants from this group and treat them as a special group, and to start dividing statistics on racial lines, seems to me to be quite wrong.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: My Lords, do I understand the noble Lord correctly: that, with one exception, all these were cases where it was thought that this disease had been contracted abroad? If that is so, would it not be possible to distinguish between those who are recent immigrants and those who are not?
LORD TAYLOR: The difficulty is that the incubation period for leprosy is up to five years.
LORD SEGAL: My Lords, could my noble friend say whether any certificate of clearance is required from a medical authority in the country of origin by intending immigrants before they are considered for entry into this country?
LORD TAYLOR: My Lords, as I have answered several times before, it has been thought extremely difficult to get in the countries of origin satisfactory clearance certificates that would have validity. That is why examinations of immigrants have been confined to the port of entry.
EARL FERRERS: My Lords, if there are only 340 people in this country suffering from leprosy, is it not possible to know precisely the origin of the disease and where the sufferers came from?
LORD TAYLOR: These facts are known to the technical people concerned with the disease, but I think it would be wrong for Her Majesty's Government to attempt to break down statistics of leprosy, or of any other diseases, by racial origin.
LORD DERWENT: My Lords, the noble Lord says it is known to the technical people. I think the important thing is, is it, or is it not, known to Her Majesty's Government when they are considering statistics of various kinds? What we want to know is whether Her Majesty's Government are going to ask

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for this information from the technical sources.
LORD TAYLOR: No, my Lords, I do not think it would be of any value to Us.
LORD BOSSOM: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that there are five societies in this country which endeavour to help leprosy cases all over the world, and tomorrow afternoon in this House there is going to be a film about leprosy under the auspices of an organisation whose chairman is in this House?
LORD TAYLOR: I was aware of that.
BARONESS HORSBRUGH: My Lords, would the noble Lord say whether it would not be possible to give the place of origin of each of the 340 who are now suffering? That would be making no racial distinction at all—to give the origin of each one.
LORD TAYLOR: My Lords, in order to do this it would be necessary to conduct a special inquiry, and it might indeed be necessary to have special legislative powers to get this information. These people are registered under the Public Health (Leprosy) Regulations, 1951, and there is a leprosy register which has been kept since 1951, so all the cases are known to the Minister of Health's advisers; and to make a special analysis of their origin would require certainly examining all these people, and I think would require special powers for Her Majesty's Government to obtain the information.
BARONESS HORSBRUGH: Did not the noble Lord say that the place of origin was known to a certain number of people?
LORD TAYLOR: Yes; I said it was known to the doctors in charge of them.
EARL FERRERS: My Lords, as Her Majesty's Government are reluctant to state the origin of these cases, would one be wrong in assuming that the majority are Afro-Asian immigrants?
LORD TAYLOR: I think the majority of them are persons of overseas origin; almost all of them, except one possible case, are among persons who have lived abroad for a considerable time. Whether they are Europeans who have lived abroad working in leper colonies, or Afro-Asians or West Indians I should not like to say.

STATISTICS REGARDING IMMIGRANTS
LORD ELTON: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the second Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
[The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they realise that one of the chief obstacles to a wise handling of the problems arising from Afro-Asian immigration is the almost complete absence of the necessary Government statistics (as distinct from fragmentary evidence from voluntary organisations or local authorities) as to, for example, the birth-rate of immigrants resident in the United Kingdom, their health, their distribution and the value of the sums annually transferred by them to their countries of origin; and whether they will at least see that records of the birth-rate to resident immigrants are henceforth compiled.]
LORD TAYLOR: My Lords, statistics of the distribution of immigrants in Britain in 1961 are available from the 1961 Census of population, and similar figures will also be available from the Census next year. Statistics are also available from the operation of the Commonwealth Immigrants Act and more recently from the International Passenger Sample Survey of the number of immigrants coming into the whole country year by year. It would not be possible to produce statistics of the distribution of immigrants within Britain for years between Censuses without new legislation. It is expected that statistics of the birth-rate of immigrants in 1961 will become available from the 1961 Census of population at the end of this year.
Other information about the immigrants who were here in 1961, in particular their occupations and their household and family structure, will also become available from that Census and again from the 1966 Census, which is a sample Census. National morbidity and mortality statistics do not record immigrants separately from the rest of the population. As to the sums of money transferred by immigrants to their countries of origin, I have nothing to add to the Answer given to the noble Lord by my noble friend Lord Shepherd on May 11.

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The wise handling of the problems arising from immigration depends more on a full knowledge of the local picture by local authorities than on the collection of national statistics. The channelling of more information to local medical officers of health by port medical officers, which is now developing, will provide local authorities with a great deal more knowledge about new immigrants.
LORD ELTON: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for that very complete range over my Question, and I will ask a supplementary about only one aspect of it, although I should like to ask about several. Does the noble Lord not realise the extraordinary importance of knowing something definite and accurate about the immigrant birth rate at times other than the Census? Does he realise, for example, that estimates of the probable future Afro-Asian population 50 years hence, from the most respectable and reliable quarters, have varied between 4 million and 10 million, and does he think that this uncertainty is a sound basis on which the Government can consider, as we understand they are considering, what further restrictions on immigration are necessary?
LORD TAYLOR: My Lords, I was not aware of the estimates given by the noble Lord. But to collect additional information about birth rate among immigrants would require additional legislation, and it was found in practice that the questions in the Census about birth rate relating to demographic problems were the least popular questions. I should add that I am advised that it is the general demographic experience that immigrant populations tend to assume the fertility pattern of the society into which they are assimilated.
LORD DERWENT: My Lords, the Minister used the phrase "household structure". Does that refer to the house or not?
LORD TAYLOR: No, it refers to the human beings within the house.
LORD BARNBY: My Lords, does the noble Lord not think that the situation now requires that all non-resident visitors to this country intending or desirous of being here more than a short time
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should be subject to permit with a definite limit to it, and that this should refer to all other than visitors from Europe or the white Dominions?
LORD TAYLOR: I think that is another question, outside the scope of the question I have been trying to answer.
LORD BARNBY: My intention was to ask the Minister whether he would not give consideration to it.

BIRKENHEAD CORPORATION (MERSEY TUNNEL APPROACHES) BILL
Read 2a, and committed to a Select Committee.
RENT BILL
Brought from the Commons yesterday, and printed, pursuant to Standing Order No. 44A; and read 1a.

PROTECTION OF BIRDS BILL [H.L.]
2.51 p.m.
Report of Amendments received (according to Order).
Clause 1 [Extension of protection for eggs of wild birds]:
LORD HURCOMB LORD HURCOMB moved to add to the clause:
"() The prohibition imposed by section 6(1) of the principal Act on a person's selling, offering for sale or having in his possession for sale, and by section 7(1) of that Act on the importation of, the eggs of a lapwing. save as may be authorised by a licence granted under section 10 of that Act, shall, instead of being limited to the period in any year after 14th April have effect throughout the year; and accordingly in that Act section 6(1)(iii), in section 7(1)(c) the words on or after the fifteenth day of April in any year' and section 9(4)(c) and (d) are hereby repealed.
() In subsection () of this section any reference to sale shall be construed as including a reference to barter and exchange."
The noble Lord said: My Lords, this Amendment accepts the view expressed by many of your Lordships, that it should be lawful to continue to take the lapwing's eggs in this country up to April 15. But it also proposes what I understood to be the view of many

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of your Lordships, that their sale and importation should be prohibited not only up to April 15 but for the whole nesting period. I am assured that there is no difficulty on the part of the Customs in administering the law which now prevails after April 15 as from some earlier date; and I hope that your Lordships will agree that, while the owner or occupier of land should continue to be entitled to take the eggs, there should not be commercial exploitation by authorising all and sundry to search for them and to put them on sale. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 1, line 11, at end insert the said new subsections.—(Lord Hurcomb.)
VISCOUNT MASSEREENE AND FERRARD: My Lords, as I put down the original Amendment on the Committee stage regarding this question of plovers' eggs, I should like to thank the noble Lord, Lord Hurcomb, for coming so far in my direction with this Amendment. The trouble is that, although the noble Lord's Amendment prohibits the sale of plovers' eggs, there is nothing to stop a farmer or a landowner or, so far as that goes, any private individual from saying to a tractor driver, "If you find any plovers' eggs, I will give you 10s. a clutch for them". I personally should have preferred this question of sale of plovers' eggs up to April 14 to be left as it was, but I should like to thank the noble Lord for having come so far regarding this Amendment.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 3. [Disturbance of nesting birds]:
LORD HURCOMB LORD HURCOMB moved, after subsection (2), to insert:
"() An officer of the Nature Conservancy, or any person for the time being approved by the Nature Conservancy for the purposes of this subsection, shall not be guilty of an offence by virtue of subsection (1) of this section or of any order made by virtue of subsection (2) of this section by reason of anything done by him for the purpose of examining the nest of any wild bird for scientific purposes."
The noble Lord said: My Lords, this Amendment gives the Nature Conservancy power to authorise approved persons to visit the nest of one of the rare birds described in Schedule 1 to the principal Act. It may indeed be necessary,
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in the interests of conservation, that members of the Conservancy staff or the wardens of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, and other people concerned with the protection of birds, should be able, for scientific purposes, occasionally to inspect the nests of some of these rare birds. One of the points which have emerged is the risk that many of the rarer birds of prey run from eating food contaminated by toxic chemicals, and it is necessary that the period of incubation should be watched and checked and for infertile eggs to be removed.
I am assured by the Nature Conservancy that approval will be given only to carefully selected persons, and subject to all proper conditions and, indeed, to strict supervision of their activities. I suggest, therefore, that your Lordships can accept this degree of latitude without feeling that the general purposes of the Bill will run any risk of being infringed. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 2, line 24, at end insert the said subsection.—(Lord Hurcomb.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
LORD HURCOMB: My Lords, this is part of the same intention and allows the Conservancy to authorise people to take the nest or eggs of any wild birds in the circumstances which I have described. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 2, line 35, after ("birds") insert ("or to take the nests or eggs of any wild birds.")—(Lord Hurcomb.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 7 [Additional matters for which licences may be granted]:
LORD HURCOMB: My Lords, when the Bill was in Committee some of your Lordships expressed the view that this Protection of Birds Bill might read better if its plumage was a little more carefully preened. While not at all altering in substance the Amendment which, on the Motion of the noble Viscount, Lord Massereene and Ferrard, was carried in Committee, this Amendment perhaps tidies up the English and makes the intention of the clause somewhat clearer. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 4, line 34, leave out from beginning to ("wild") in line 35 and insert ("to kill, in the course of falconry, within any area specified in the licence").—(Lord Hurcomb.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
LORD HURCOMB: My Lords, this Amendment and the following Amendment are part of the same plan of tidying up the English of the clause. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 4, line 40, leave out ("paragraphs (a) and (c)") and insert ("paragraph (a) or (c)").—(Lord Hurcomb.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
LORD HURCOMB: My Lords, I beg to move this Amendment.
Amendment moved—
Page 5, line 3, after ("(b)") insert ("and (c)").—(Lord Hurcomb.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 10 [Amendment of Section 12 of principal Act]:
3.0 p.m.
LORD AIREDALE LORD AIREDALE moved, after "or has", to insert "recently". The noble Lord said: My Lords, this is a formal Amendment to Clause 10, which was a new clause introduced into the Bill on the Committee stage by means of an Amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Tweedsmuir. Your Lordships will see that Clause 10 empowers a constable to enter upon land and, without warrant, stop and search any person whom he has reasonable cause to believe is commiting the offence of egg-stealing, or has committed that offence. I think that the intention was to refer, in so far as an offence already committed is concerned, to an offence committed recently. I think that is the case, because the words used by the noble Lord, Lord Tweedsmuir, in his argument were in relation to the case of a person who has climbed down the tree from the osprey's nest and the kite's nest and who was not seen taking the eggs. Therefore, I think that a recent offence is clearly indicated here.
I have therefore ventured to put forward this Amendment, which introduces the word "recently", to make it clear that a recent offence is intended, and that if it were a stale offence, an offence which
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might have been committed at some time in the past, that would not be an occasion which would entitle the constable to go and search a suspected person without warrant. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 5, line 25, after ("has") insert ("recently").—(Lord Airedale.)
LORD HURCOMB: My Lords, I concur in what the noble Lord, Lord Airedale, has said and I for my part willingly accept his Amendment, subject to anything which my noble friend Lord Tweedsmuir or the noble Lord, Lord Bowles, may wish to say. As we are discussing this clause, I ought to explain to your Lordships why I have not put down a further Amendment. While in fact I do not see very much the matter with the clause which Lord Tweedsmuir carried in Committee, I agree that the important point is to have this power to search for the purpose of checking offenders in respect of birds' eggs, and particularly rare birds' eggs. I need hardly remind your Lordships that when the ospreys nested in Scotland again after the lapse of nearly a century, their eggs were in fact taken by somebody who did it at night and escaped the watchers. I might perhaps also remind your Lordships that since then some ill-advised persons have actually tried, in the wintertime, to saw the tree down and bring down the nest. It is offences of this kind which we need to take every possible step to prevent so that the rarer birds are protected.
With regard to its being a trivial matter, as one noble Lord said in Committee stage, I should like to remind your Lordships that every year thousands of people go to look at the osprey nests. I do not exaggerate when I say that over the last few years ten of thousands of people have been to see them. It is not just the fad or hobby of a few cranks or scientific people. Because they are a very important part of the recreation and enlargement of the understanding of our environment among people at large, these interesting creatures should be protected. If it will help the Home Office and the Secretary of State to overcome their reluctance to accept the wide powers in the present clause, I shall be very glad to see an Amendment limiting the power to

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search offenders in respect of taking the eggs of the birds set out in Schedule 1.
I accepted the offer of the noble Lord, Lord Bowles, to discuss this matter further with the Home Office, but I find that time has not permitted them to suggest to me a form of words which would give effect to that intention. Although I am not implying that the Home Secretary or the Government are committed to acceptance of the principle of the clause, I look forward to having their assistance in devising the necessary form of words to restrict the scope of the power as it now stands in the Bill. But, as I have said, reasons of time alone have made it impossible to do that, and it will have to be left, perhaps, to be put right in another place if, as I hope, the Bill makes some progress when it goes there.
The only other point I would make on the clause is that it has not appeared necessary to make any alteration to deal with the point raised by the noble Lord, Lord Burden, that "land" does not include "the highway". I am informed that, in the official view, the phrase "any land" does not exclude "highway". I therefore hope the House will accept the Amendment proposed by Lord Airedale.
LORD TWEEDSMUIR: My Lords, as the mover of this particular Amendment on the Committee stage, I would point out that I find the addition of the word "recently", as suggested by Lord Airedale, acceptable; and I entirely concur with the restriction of the ambit of the clause as described by Lord Hurcomb.
LORD BOWLES: My Lords, it may be helpful if I explain the Government's attitude to this Amendment. It will be recalled that at Committee stage I explained the doubts which the Government felt about the case for extending police powers of search, on suspicion, as provided in the clause which the noble Lord, Lord Tweedsmuir, moved and which was subsequently accepted by the Committee without a Division. I think there is general agreement that the clause as it now stands goes too far in providing for search without warrant, and the noble Lord, Lord Hurcomb, made it clear at the time that his mind was not closed to the possibility of restricting the Amendment to smaller dimensions. The noble Lord
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has already explained the position to the House.
After the debate he discussed with officials of the Home Office a more limited proposal, with the objective of limiting the new powers to offences against the eggs of rare birds. We have been looking carefully into the merits of this proposal, but we have met several difficulties which have made it impossible to find a satisfactory formula in the time available since the debate. The Government are not therefore in a position to offer any advice to the House to-day on the acceptability of the noble Lord, Lord Airedale's Amendment. We are, of course, grateful to the noble Lord for drawing attention to one of the weaknesses in the present clause, but there are several others. It may be that the noble Lord will wish to withdraw his Amendment in view of the further consideration which the Government intend to give to the clause, in consultation with Lord Hurcomb. I cannot give any undertaking to-day that a solution may be found before the Bill is passed by your Lordships' House; nor can I give an undertaking that the Government will feel bound to give support to a more limited extension of police powers of search than the clause now provides.
I made it clear at Committee stage that the Government fully appreciated the value to be placed on the national heritage in wild life and the problems of enforcing protection in present circumstances. We are not yet persuaded, however, that the original provisions of Section 12(1) of the Act are, in practice, as defective as has been suggested, but we are keeping an open mind on the matter and, as I have said, will have further discussions with the noble Lord, Lord Hurcomb, in the hope that a generally acceptable solution may be found.
LORD AIREDALE: My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords who have taken part in this debate. I do not feel inclined to accept the Minister's invitation to withdraw the Amendment. After all, to do so would reduce the scope of the clause, which was originally agreed to without a Division in Committee, and I do not think that I ought at this stage to withdraw the Amendment.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.

GAS BILL
3.10 p.m.
Order of the Day for the Third Reading read.
LORD SHEPHERD: My Lords, I have it in command from Her Majesty the Queen to acquaint the House that Her Majesty, having been informed of the purport of the Gas Bill, has consented to place Her interest, so far as it is concerned on behalf of the Crown, at the disposal of Parliament for the purposes of the Bill.
THE MINISTER WITHOUT PORTFOLIO (LORD CHAMPION): My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a third time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 3a.—(Lord Champion.)
On Question, Bill read 3a,with the Amendments.
LORD CHAMPION: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill do now pass.
Moved, That the Bill do now pass.—(Lord Champion.)
LORD ERROLL OF HALE: My Lords, I wish to rise only to say that we on this side of the House are delighted to see that this Bill has had such a rapid passage. We wish it all success and hope that as a result of its passage underground storage in the United Kingdom will become a practical reality in the near future. We should also like to thank the noble Lord, Lord Champion, for the courteous way in which he has explained the complicated details of the Bill.
LORD CHAMPION: My Lords, may I reciprocate the kindly remarks of the noble Lord? I must say that discussions on this Bill were all sweetness and light, and set a good example for any other Bills sponsored by the Government which may come from another place.
On Question, Bill passed, and returned to the Commons.

STATUTORY ORDERS (SPECIAL PROCEDURE) BILL
Read 3a (according to Order), with the Amendment, and passed, and returned to the Commons.

HIGHLANDS AND ISLANDS DEVELOPMENT (SCOTLAND) BILL
3.12 p.m.
Order of the Day for the House to be put into Committee read.
Moved, That the House do now resolve itself into Committee.—(Lord Hughes.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House in Committee accordingly.
[The LORD MERTHYR in the Chair.]
Clause 1 [Establishment of Highlands and Islands Development Board]:
On Question, Whether Clause 1 shall stand part of the Bill?
LORD DRUMALBYN: I should like to raise a question on subsection (2) of Clause 1. In another place there was considerable debate on the subject of the area within which, or in relation to which, the functions of the Board shall be exercised. By far and away the easiest solution, of course, would be to confine it to the crofting counties. On the other hand, there are areas which seem to conform to the noble Lord's own description; that is to say, where there is a great similarity in
"problems of remoteness, of land use, of land quality, of social history and conditions, and the ever-present problem of depopulation."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Vol. 267 (No. 93), col. 732, June 29, 1965.]
Some of these areas would not create any difficulty of definition. One, in particular, which I think we all have in mind, is an island. One reason for restricting the definition—and we appreciate this very much—is that if the Government were once to give way on a particular area, there would be clamour and demand for other areas to be included. But, of course, the nearer one gets to the enactment of the Bill, the less danger there is of that. So I should like to ask just two questions. First of all, would the noble Lord be prepared to consider an Amendment at the Report stage, to include any of the areas which have this close similarity of conditions? Secondly, if he is not prepared to do that, will he at least say that there will be no undue delay in defining such areas and bringing them within the scope of the Board?
THE JOINT PARLIAMENTARY UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR SCOTLAND (LORD HUGHES): I find it difficult to give an assurance to either one or the other, because I think that at this stage that might precipitate quite a bit of pressure for the extension of the Board's area, before the Board had even got down to considering the problems. In this matter the advice of the Board itself as to the extent to which its area will be extended will be of very great importance. It would have been easy for us to name one or two areas which are almost so identical with the crofting counties as to justify their inclusion, but as soon as we departed from the crofting counties we should have opened a door which would admit a variety of areas with problems not completely identical with those of the crofting counties. More detailed consideration is needed than would have been possible from looking at the matter only from a general point of view. I think, therefore, that it will be to the advantage of all concerned if, the Bill is left as it is, with the assurance, which I can most readily give, that if there were representations from the Board, once it was in existence, that its area ought properly to include certain other counties, or parts of counties, the Secretary of State would consider and give a decision on such representations without any delay.
LORD DRUMALBYN: I am very grateful to the noble Lord, and I accept his assurance most willingly. I think that what he has said is probably the right way to tackle this problem.
Clause 1 agreed to.
Clause 2 agreed to.
Clause 3:
Duties of the Board
3.—(1) In pursuance of their general function described in section 1(1) of this Act the Board shall have the following duties—
(b) after consultation with such local authorities and other bodies as appear to the Board to have an interest, from time to time to prepare and submit to the Secretary of State for his approval proposals, whether general or specific in character, for the economic and social development of the Highlands and Islands or any part thereof;
(e) as soon as possible after the end of each calendar year to make to the Secretary of State a report as respects that year on the exercise and performance of their functions
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under this Act; such report shall set out any directions given to the Board under section 2(1) of this Act, a summary of any proposals submitted to the Secretary of State under paragraph (b) of this subsection, and, where he has refused to approve any such proposals, a summary of his reasons for so refusing, but shall not disclose any such information as is referred to in section 12(1) of this Act without the consent referred to in that subsection.
(2) The Secretary of State may approve in whole or in part, any proposals submitted to him under paragraph (b) of the foregoing subsection, or may refuse to approve them.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL THE DUKE OF ATHOLL moved in subsection (1)(b), to leave out "from time to time". The noble Duke said: This is a very small Amendment. As subsection (1)(b) of Clause 3 reads at the moment the Board have
"from time to time to prepare and submit to the Secretary of State for his approval proposals".
It seems to me that the words "from time to time" are unnecessary. I am sure that no reasonable Secretary of State would expect the Board—or, indeed, would be grateful if the Board did so—to produce proposals continuously for him to consider. I am also quite convinced that the Board would be incapable of doing so. If the words "from time to time" are left out, presumably the Board would submit proposals as and when they thought fit, which is what I should have thought was intended by this paragraph. I should have thought that, in order to save a little space, we could quite well do without the words "from time to time". I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 2, line 28, leave out ("from time to time").—(The Duke of Atholl)
LORD HUGHES: I am afraid that the noble Duke has looked at these words in completely the wrong way. They were not put in because the Secretary of State expected the Board to be continuously in session putting proposals before him. Having looked at it from that point of view, the noble Duke has completely overlooked the other aspect. If the words "from time to time" are not in, the most likely interpretation of the clause would be that the Board would have a once-and-for-all opportunity of submitting proposals; and having submitted one set of proposals, if these words are omitted, they would never again be

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able to put anything further forward. That would completely stultify the operation of the Board; and, as I know that that is not the noble Duke's intention, I have not the slightest hesitation in asking him to withdraw his Amendment.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: Of course, in view of what the noble Lord the Under-Secretary of State has said, I shall be delighted to withdraw this Amendment. He is quite right: I had overlooked that particular angle of the case.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
3.21 p.m.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL THE DUKE OF ATHOLL moved, in subsection (1)(b), to leave out:
"and submit to the Secretary of State for his approval".
The noble Duke said: With the permission of the Committee, perhaps I could speak to Amendments Nos. 2, 3 and 6, which stand or fall together.
LORD HUGHES: May I suggest that the noble Duke should also include Amendment No. 14?
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: I quite agree. I shall be delighted to include Amendment No. 14, too. On the Second Reading of this Bill, I ventured to suggest that, in my opinion, the Board would be rather hamstrung by the fact that time and time again, under the Bill as drawn, it had to go and seek the approval or permission of the Secretary of State before it could do something. I fully realise that in some cases it is probably very necessary, as for example under Clause 8, by which they have the power to give grants and loans. I am sure that in that case, or at any rate in any major case, it is right that they should go to the Secretary of State, but I cannot see why they should have to submit their proposals to the Secretary of State for his approval. I would have thought that it would have been much more interesting if they published their proposals, and if we then had the reaction of the Secretary of State.
Presumably, even if the Board did not submit their proposals to the Secretary of State he would be allowed to see them and read them after they had been published, and he could say what the official Government view was towards them, just
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as other people could express their view. I feel this would be much more satisfactory, and would give the Board far more power than they would otherwise have. I therefore move that, in line 29 on page 2, we should leave out the words
"and submit to the Secretary of State for his approval";
and I propose to move that in line 44 we should leave out the words from "a summary" to the end of the paragraph, which is purely consequential to the above Amendment, and then that we should leave out subsection (2) of this particular clause. I feel that the calibre of the Board is going to be much improved if they do not continually have to go to the Secretary of State for approval of their schemes and proposals, and that they should only have to go in those cases in which they are going to spend, comparatively speaking, large sums of money. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 2, line 29, leave out ("and submit to the Secretary of State for his approval").—(The Duke of Atholl.)
LORD DRUMALBYN: Perhaps I might be allowed to say a word on this Amendment at this stage. Of course, I am sure we would all agree—indeed, the noble Lord the Under-Secretary of State has himself said—that the Board would be expected to run its own day-to-day affairs once it had had the approval of the Secretary of State to its proposals in general. I wonder whether it would be in order, and in line with the Committee's wishes, if I were to carry this debate on the proposals a little wider, because this seems to be rather fundamental to the whole status of the Board and to the general control exercised over the Board.
I would suggest to my noble friend that what is really at stake here is whether the Board should go to the Secretary of State and be in pretty well continuous consultation with the Secretary of State, as many Boards are, and which may well give the best results. In any case, since the Secretary of State is bound to act to a large extent as the banker of the Board, it is only reasonable, when you are expecting to spend a good deal of money which somebody else has to find, that you should go and consult the person (your banker, if it is he) who is expected to put up the money, and should explain your proposals to him. I should

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not have thought that that was unreasonable.
My noble friend draws a distinction between small proposals and big proposals. The noble Lord the Under-Secretary of State, in carrying out the undertaking he gave because he was not able to deal with all the points raised in the debate, has written to me dealing with some of the points that I made. In particular, I asked what the Board would do; in other words, for what sort of proposals the Board would seek permission. Perhaps I may be allowed to read an extract from his letter. The letter says:
"The Board will give grants and loans. In short the Board will exercise all the functions (and in this context functions include powers and duties) conferred on them by the Bill. The Board's powers would enable them to build hotels, or motels, set up restaurants, reclaim land and create new farms, build small factories for light industry or erect a processing plant, construct a new ski run with all the attendant facilities, or set up tourist information centres".
The noble Lord goes on:
"I do not say that they will in fact need to do all these things themselves. They will of course seek to assist and stimulate private and public enterprise in a variety of fields. But they will have extensive reserve powers and we intend them to be a resourceful and energetic body".
The particular paragraph that we are dealing with here begins:
"after consultation with such local authorities and other bodies as appear to the Board to have an interest, from time to time to prepare…";
and the next one talks about concerting and promoting. I think that my noble friend is on a very good point in seeking to draw a distinction between small and medium-sized proposals and proposals of considerable scope. I find myself in some disagreement with him about this, because it seems to me that, where the proposals are of considerable scope, there may be a case not only for the Board to consult the Secretary of State but for the Secretary of State to lay the proposals before Parliament. In many of these cases the acquisition of a considerable amount of land may be involved.
I think the closest parallel—and I am glad that my noble friend the Chairman of the Hydro-Electric Board is present to-day—is the Hydro-Electric Develop-
1178
ment Act. I will, if I may, remind the Committee of what that Act lays down in regard to constructional schemes, because I think it is very germane if you are going to have any big or extensive scheme involving widespread interference with private interests. First of all, the Board submits the scheme to the Secretary of State and publishes it in such newspapers as the Secretary of State may require. Secondly, and at the same time, the Board sends copies to the owners and occupiers—and it may be very important that, at the time when the proposals are sent to the Secretary of State, the owners should know about them in so far as they are affected by them. Thirdly, they have to keep copies available for inspection and sale at offices of the Board and at one or more convenient places. Fourthly, they have to specify a period of 40 days for objections. Then, after the 40 days are up, the Secretary of State has to consider objections and may hold an inquiry—and he must hold an inquiry at the request of any objector unless the objection is frivolous. Then, after that—and then only—the Secretary of State may make an order confirming the scheme with or without amendments, and the Secretary of State must lay a confirming order of the scheme before Parliament. Either House may pray against an order within 40 days, excluding any days when Parliament is dissolved or prorogued or adjourned for more than four days.
Lastly, the Board must deposit copies of the schemes that are confirmed and give notice where copies are available for inspection and sale. I think the Committee should be grateful to the noble Duke for raising this particular point, because it enables us to probe and to see whether the Secretary of State proposes that some of these schemes should be widespread. I would draw the Committee's attention to the fact that schemes mentioned in the letter that the noble Lord sent to me are of a minor character. On the other hand, of course, the Board can concert and promote and that will involve carrying various bodies with them: local authorities, statutory bodies and the like.
I should like to ask the noble Lord at this stage this question arising out of subsection (1)(b). The Development Board will be required to consult with local

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authorities to the extent that the Board thinks they have an interest. Will the Board be able to put up proposals which the local authorities and the statutory bodies do not like, or from which they dissent? The next paragraph says, "concert"; so perhaps until the whole thing is concerted and agreement has been attained all round they will not be able to do so. This is not yet clear in the Bill and it is important that the Committee should know whether the Board is going to have power to make recommendations that are not agreed to by the bodies with which they have to work.
In the course of the Second Reading debate the noble Lord referred to this problem in these words:
"I would emphasise that once the proposals have been approved by the Secretary of State, the various authorities concerned will all play their part."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Vol. 267 (No. 93), col. 733, June 29, 1965.]
Does this mean that any compulsion will be brought upon the local authorities and the statutory bodies to play their part? Or does it mean that unless there is agreement all round no such proposals can go forward? I think it is important in considering this that we should be clear in these subjects. I should like in particular to know whether the Government do not envisage the possibility, at any rate, of schemes of such size that ought to be submitted for Parliamentary approval.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: Before the noble Lord replies, I should like just to add a few words. These Amendments in the name of my noble friend the Duke of Atholl have my sympathy. The Committee may remember that during the Second Reading debate I expressed a view that this Board was going to have rather too little power, in that it would too frequently have to run to the Secretary of State or the Treasury, or both. Except in the case of Clause 11, I thought that the Board had too little power and the Secretary of State too much.
It seems to me that my noble friend Lord Drumalbyn has raised the possibility of an interesting compromise here. The noble Duke has referred to the possibility of giving the Board freedom, except in so far as it is likely to spend large sums
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of money, I do not wish to misquote the noble Duke, but that is what I understood him to say. My noble friend Lord Drumalbyn, quite properly, said that if you are spending money you may need to go to your bank for an overdraft, and he felt that the question of accountability was very important.
Perhaps the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, when he replies, may be able to help us on this matter. I hope that we may be able to consider it further on Report stage, and consider inserting in the Bill a specified sum up to which the Board may go without need for consultation. This seems to me a possible course, and I should like the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, to consider it. In so far as the suggestion of my noble friend Lord Drumalbyn is concerned, I support him on this. It seems to me that this Bill, which at the moment seems to be a small one, may become an important Bill. If it does, there may be matters which should not be decided by the Secretary of State on his own and which should come before Parliament. In this respect, I would support my noble friend's proposal.
LORD BROWN: Before the noble Marquess sits down, I wonder if I might make this request. It would be of immense help if either the noble Marquess or his noble friend Lord Drumalbyn could indicate, however vaguely, what is intended by "large expense"; because there seems to me to be vagueness on this issue.
LORD HUGHES: With respect to my noble friend, I should like to intervene at this point, because, for reasons which I hope the Committee will accept, it would be quite impossible to put in a figure, as has been suggested by the noble Marquess. In the first instance, so much of what the noble Lord, Lord Drumalbyn, was saying on this was so acceptable to me that I almost looked around to the Officials' Box to find out whether by any chance, they had provided him with the same brief on this matter as I have. In order that I might not forget any of the important points which the noble Lord, Lord Drumalbyn, raised, I will deal with them before coming to the Amendment itself.
The noble Lord put two questions to which the Committee are entitled to a

1181
complete unequivocal answer. First, will the Board be able to put forward policies which are not agreed by all the bodies? I think it would be an unnecessary restriction on the functions and powers of this Board if I were to say that it would not be allowed to do so. The Board must be allowed to submit to the Secretary of State anything which, in its discretion, is a proper carrying-out of its functions. In so far as it is putting forward proposals the implementation of which is not entirely in its own hands, it is in danger of frustrating its own schemes if it cannot persuade the other partners of the desirability of carrying them out. So there is a strong urge on the Board to obtain agreement on proposals of which it is only part-implementor.
The noble Lord's second question was, if one of the Board's schemes could not be carried out in its entirety, because one of the local authorities or another of the bodies concerned was not co-operative, would the Secretary of State have to apply compulsion? The answer must be, No. There is no power under this Bill, as I understand it, or under any legislation, to compel a local authority to do anything unless the Secretary of State already has power under existing legislation to make it mandatory on these bodies to carry out their functions. As the Committee know, the general position in relation to local authorities is that so many of their powers are permissive rather than mandatory. So we would not, by this Bill, turn the permissive power of the local authorities into a mandatory one. I would not however expect a local authority (and in this context, the term "local authority" covers any other bodies which might be affected: and the Crofters' Commission, the Forestry Commission are two cases that spring to mind) to be reluctant to play its part in a proposal. If it were it would have to be strongly convinced that it was right, because it would have to stand up to the force of public opinion in the Highlands if its refusal to undertake its part were to prevent a very much larger scheme from being carried out. I think, therefore, that we shall find that a reasonable attitude is adopted by all the people concerned.
Having, I hope, answered these two points fully I will now come to the reasons why I would advise the Committee not
1182
to accept the series of Amendments which have been coupled together by the noble Duke, the Duke of Atholl. The reason why we cannot put in an amount is that one of the main functions of the Board is to co-ordinate proposals for Highland development. During the Second Reading debate I emphasised that it was not to be part of the functions of the Board to take over the functions of local authorities. It may be that what an individual local authority could do on its own in trying to solve a particular problem would be comparatively meaningless, but that if this were added to what other authorities would do, and what the Board might do in supplementation of these activities, a comprehensive, sensible scheme might result. So one of the first duties of the Board will be to carry out the business of co-ordinating proposals.
It would be nonsensical to give a Board of this kind power to proceed with such proposals without reference to the Secretary of State. The example quoted by the noble Lord, Lord Drumalbyn, relating to the Hydro-Electric Board—we know the extent to which that Board has in the past been involved in public inquiries into its activities—shows what a tremendous power would be conferred on the Board were we to do what the noble Duke suggests. After all, as I said during the Second Reading debate, the area of the Board as constituted, without anything being added to it, is one-sixth of the total land area of the United Kingdom. To allow it to pursue a course, however well-intentioned, without reference to national considerations would be quite out of the question. The Secretary of State has responsibility for national planning. It would be his duty, in relation to Scotland, to ensure that anything proposed by the Board fitted in with national policy. Because proposals would be of a comprehensive nature, involving a number of authorities, the approval of the Secretary of State would be necessary to ensure that the various bodies carried out, and, where necessary, were enabled to carry out, their part of the proposals.
In this connection I remember that before the Second Reading debate the noble Lord, Lord Drumalbyn, wrote asking for information about grants given to local authorities, and during the debate he quoted some of the figures. In one of the counties concerned there

1183
might, for instance, be an approved road proposal, and the extent of the grant received from the Exchequer by direct grant, Exchequer Equalisation Grant and so on, might amount to 93 per cent. of the cost of the proposal; so that the ratepayers would pay only 7 per cent. There could be a situation which, looking at the matter only from the point of view of what the Board was doing, might cause people to say, "This is a very small proposal, which involves the Highlands and Islands Development Board in an expenditure of only £50,000." But, in approving the comprehensive proposal, the Secretary of State might be accepting responsibility for finding half-a-million pounds in terms of grants to local authorities for their part in the proposal.
For that reason it is quite impossible to put into this clause any figure relating solely to the cost of the part played by the Board. Its major contribution might not be by way of finance but by obtaining co-ordinated development, and the Secretary of State would then have the responsibility, if he had approved the proposal, of making the resulting money available to the other authorities to enable them to carry out their part. One of the things which always proves a stumbling block to Highland local authorities is lack of finance.
3.45 p.m.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: I must thank the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, for his reply. Before seeking to withdraw this Amendment, I should like to clear up two points. When my noble friend Lord Drumalbyn suggested that there might be some limitation by cost, with which I agree, I am sure that he meant the total cost of the project and not just the cost to the Board. It seemed to me that this would be possible, but we need not go into the matter in discussing this Amendment. We can discuss it in more detail later. After reading subsection 1(e), I think I am right in saying that the Secretary of State will have to give reasons in the Annual Report of the Board for turning down, or partially turning down, any project. If the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, would confirm that, I should be very grateful.
LORD HUGHES: Yes, that is the position. Of course, there is nothing to pre-
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vent the Board, if it has submitted a proposal to the Secretary of State which he is unable to approve, from making known in the area that the proposal has been put forward. We are not seeking to bind the Board to secrecy on matters which have not been approved. It is possible that the Board might put up something at a given time which, in the existing circumstances, the Secretary of State would not be able to approve. The Board, if public opinion in the area was behind it, might feel encouraged to bring the matter forward at some more propitious time, six months, a year, or two years later. So the answer to the question from the noble Duke is, "Yes".
LORD DRUMALBYN: Will the noble Lord go a little further? One can easily envisage a situation in which it would not be desirable for the Board to publish its proposals at the time it made them to the Secretary of State, but, as I have indicated, the constructional proposals of the Hydro-Electric Board are published at the same time as they are sent to the Secretary of State. Unless there was a strong reason against publishing them, it would be much more desirable to publish them and get the play of public opinion on them at the earliest possible moment. I do not think it matters whether or not they are accepted then or later, or rejected altogether. What does matter is the play of public opinion on them.
LORD HUGHES: What the noble Lord, Lord Drumalbyn, said in his opening remarks about almost continuous conversations between the Board and the Secretary of State would, I think, resolve these matters. It would be a waste of time for the Board to publish a proposal, even in the preliminary stages, when it was persuaded that there was no chance at all of its being acceptable. As soon as the Board became aware from its discussions that a proposal was the sort of thing to which sympathetic consideration would be given, there would be no objection, and a great deal to be gained, by giving publicity to its proposals as early as possible.
I am not at all certain that the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, would wish to have thrust on the Highlands Development Board the very complicated, cumbersome and time-wasting procedure which the hydro-electric legislation

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compels that authority to adopt. In some cases it is completely justified, as where a scheme is of major importance, but it has been found recently that in respect of a comparatively minor scheme, where there was no objector, the same procedure was enforced on the authority. It is perhaps partly the responsibility of Her Majesty's Government that the Board has not yet received approval in that case.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: In the light of what the noble Lord has said, I beg leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
3.50 p.m.
LORD DRUMALBYN: A report from the consultative council is attached to the report of the North of Scotland Hydro-Electric Board and it would seem to be a useful practice. Since it seems to have proved itself, I see no reason why it should not be put into the Bill and made mandatory on the Board. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 3, line 6, at end insert ("and such report shall include a report from the Council".).—(Lord Drumalbyn.)
LORD HUGHES: The proposal in Amendment No. 4, which I think must be coupled with Amendment No. 46 to Schedule 2, appears so eminently reasonable that when I was first faced with the word "Resist" in my brief, I thought that I was being asked to do something quite unjustified. I ought to have known better, because I have had experience of these matters in the past.
I think it is very likely that the Council would wish to make a report of this kind, but the Government think that it would be a mistake to make it mandatory. A successful relationship between the Council and the Board will the more likely arise, the more informal is its nature. There will be a number of items on which the Board will wish to have the guidance of the Council. I must draw your Lordships' attention to the fact that the functions of an Advisory Council in relation to the Highlands Development Board are much wider than those of a Council in relation to an Electricity Board, which is concerned principally with charges and with the creation of conditions which have an effect upon the consumers. The functions of this Advisory Council go much
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beyond this, and if they are to be carried out the Council must feel free at all times to give advice which is in the best possible interests of their area. From time to time, they might not wish the exact nature of their advice to be known publicly. For instance, when a board are making appointments they sometimes ask applicants, instead of submitting references, to submit the names of referees; and sometimes it happens that if an applicant is a bit "dodgy", instead of writing, a referee will ring up and say some things about the applicant which he would not wish to put on paper but which he thinks the Board should know. This is the sort of thing which may well happen in relation to the functions of the Council.
A Council wishing to be helpful and to give advice in the best interests of the area might not give information in quite the same form, or perhaps any advice at all, if it knew that that advice was to be published, either in its own report of in the report of the Board. On many occasions it may be that the advice given by the Council to the Board will be published. Certainly the Board would wish to do this in cases where the advice strengthens their hand, but I think it would be published only with the consent of the Council which had tendered the advice. I would expect it to be the normal procedure that from time to time the Board would wish to report its activities and these reports might well include the annual report of the Council. The Council has the power to publish such a report if it wishes to do so, but it might well be published by the Board as part of its report.
It could also be the case that the Board might prefer from time to time to make public the advice of the Council when matters were fresh in the minds of those concerned, rather than at the end of the year, when they were no longer of topical interest. As we visualise it, there will be no restrictions on the publicity which the Council may seek for themselves—of course, within certain limits. For instance, they could not, without reference to the appropriate authorities, who would include the Secretary of State, take the front page of the Scotsman, assuming that the Scotsman departed from its present policy to enable them to take the front page. We assume that the Council

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would proceed in the same way as other advisory bodies of the kind.
It is the intention of the Government that the Council should be free to publish what they wish, as much as they wish or as little as they wish. We think that the interests of a policy of concord between the Council and the Board would be best served by leaving things as they are, with the greatest degree of informality between them. I hope, therefore, that the noble Lord will feel able to withdraw this Amendment.
LORD DRUMALBYN: I am grateful to the noble Lord for the full and well-reasoned reply he has given, and I am sure that noble Lords on both sides will have listened to it with great attention. If I may say so, he has been able to say a good deal of what he has said because he has taken the two Amendments together. It would be perfectly possible for the Board to publish an annual report without actually giving the exact information my noble friends and I ask for in Amendment No. 46. It would be possible to make it mandatory on the Board to publish the Council's report in this way. The mere fact that an annual report has to be published does not preclude the Council, if they so wish, from making their views known from time to time. All it does is to enable the Council to give a review annually of their own activities. I should not have thought there was any great objection to that. I do not think it would in any way destroy flexibility or have any adverse effect on the relationship between the two bodies. In the circumstances, it may be advisable not to move No. 46, when we come to it, but we should like to consider what the noble Lord has said and perhaps he will also consider what I have said on this matter, to see whether it may not be desirable to accept this Amendment at the next stage, while putting in a slightly different obligation on the Council in Schedule 2. I would ask leave to withdraw the Amendment, so that we may have an opportunity of considering it further.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
4.0 p.m.
LORD DULVERTON LORD DULVERTON moved to add to subsection (1):
"and shall have regard to the importance, in the national interest, of the preservation and
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enhancement of the natural beauty of the Highland scene and countryside".
The noble Lord said: As a Sassenach, once again having the temerity to speak on a subject relating to Scotland, I owe some explanation to the Committee of my interest in the Highlands, where for a good many years I have studied and tried to apply on a patch of ground in the West Highlands some of the principles of development and land use which this Bill seeks to foster. Moreover—and perhaps this is the best excuse for intervening—I must own to a great love of the Highlands.
I welcome the general intent that lies behind this Bill; and this Amendment is not moved from any unrealistic motives. We are dealing, as was well recognised on both sides of the House last week, with a particular countryside which is a national heritage of great value. Moreover, the needs of development and the interests of amenity are not, and need not be, always incompatible, certainly not when care is taken. They can even on occasions bring about improvement of the scene. In this connection, I feel that a bouquet is earned by the Fort William Pulp Mill. I lived part of my life within a few miles of the mill and the promoters and its architect have certainly taken care over it for which they deserve our gratitude.
But without care and consciousness of beauty and the destructibility of beauty, Clydeside, as a noble Lord said last week, could easily be reproduced over vast areas. This is recognised in the guardianship which has already been entrusted to the local planning authorities and a good many other statutory and non-statutory bodies. It is a consideration which does not figure among those mentioned in the Highlands Development Bill. Perhaps it is assumed that this is a sine qua non. But the Highlands Development Board will be composed, we hope, of able and diligent men. They, as individuals, are very likely to be aware of the value of the Highlands scene, but because they are diligent, they will, I suppose, try to carry out their terms of reference in the Bill. The Bill does not mention any duty on their part to have any regard whatever for the beauty of the Highlands, which has been enjoyed, and will be enjoyed by an ever-increasing multitude of people.
Could it not be that this lack of reference to the subject I am talking about might lead the Board to suppose that this aspect of things is one which they should disregard in the pursuit of material objectives? I think it could, and that for this, future generations could have cause for recrimination against us.
What has happened to our sense of values if we allow this to occur? I should like to quote from the noble Lord, Lord Cobham, in a speech made in completely different circumstances, during his term of Governor-Generalship of New Zealand. He said:
"Posterity will measure our achievement, not in the number of megawatts we produce, but by what use we have made of the light."
Is this to be taken literally or metaphorically in connection with the country and the North of Scotland Hydro-Electric Board? May I say that I mean it metaphorically, in the widest sense? Let us have the megawatts, metaphorical and literal ones, by all means. But what use will future generations judge that we have made of the light if, through any neglect of care, we unnecessarily damage or destroy the most beautiful countryside in the world? I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 3, line 6, at end insert the said words.—(Lord Dulverton.)
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: I should like to support my noble friend Lord Dulverton on this Amendment, and perhaps I might remind the noble Lord, Lord Hughes—although I think he needs no reminder—of the relevant section in the Hydro-Electric Development (Scotland) Act, 1943. It is Section 9, and it says:
"In the exercise of their functions, the Board shall have regard to the desirability of preserving the beauty of the scenery and any object of architectural or historic interest.…"
This seems to me to have been an oversight, and it is eminently reasonable that the words in the Amendment should be included in the Bill. Therefore, I earnestly beg the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, to accept this Amendment.
LORD HENLEY: I feel a little uneasy about this Amendment. On the face of it, I think it is entirely unexceptionable, but I wonder whether it is really necessary. It seems to me that it is not on a parallel with the Hydro-Electric
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Bill, which was dealing with the building of a specific large object. In this case I should hope, in spite of what the noble Lord, Lord Dulverton, said, that it would be covered in the Bill, possibly under Clause 3(1)(a), "social well-being". I agree that this is rather wide, but I should hope that this sort of thing could be considered as social well-being. If that is not so, then I think it should be covered again under town and country planning legislation. Therefore, although, as I say, I entirely support the sentiment behind the Amendment, I am doubtful whether it is necessary, because I think it is already covered; and also I am a little afraid that by being put specifically into the Bill it might be used to stultify some of the purposes which we feel the Bill is there for. I should like to hear what the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, has to say about this, because, as I say, I am a little uneasy about it.
LORD BURTON: I believe that this Board can by-pass the local planning authorities, and consequently I feel that the Amendment of my noble friend Lord Dulverton is desirable. I hope that the Minister will be able to accept it.
LORD SOMERS: Before the noble Lord replies, may I point out to the noble Lord, Lord Henley, that the Board's idea and the residents' idea of what constitutes social well-being may differ widely. For instance, when I was in a small village in Wiltshire the county council decided to put street lighting in all the small villages round about. It was completely useless and unsightly and nobody wanted it. But the county council insisted on doing it, because they considered that it constituted social wellbeing, which we certainly did not. Therefore, I think that my noble friend Lord Dulverton's Amendment is very necessary.
LORD HUGHES: If I may deal first with the last point, I think the possibility of this happening with Highland local authorities is remote in the extreme. Their sense of the value of money would stop them from doing anything which they were firmly convinced would only have the effect of losing them votes at the end of the day. The general thing is that one spends money to get votes and not to throw votes away. I would agree that the purpose of the Amendment is one

1191
to which exception could not possibly be taken, and repeatedly in another place, and in your Lordships' House on Second Reading, this point was emphasised from the Benches opposite, as it was by my noble friend Lord Greenhill during his contribution. It is therefore accepted by everyone that this must be a duty which the Board would keep in mind.
It might be held that what the Amendment does is only spelling out what everybody tacitly accepts. I would, however, draw your Lordships' attention to the actual wording of the clause, and you will see that Clause 3(1) lists five broad duties placed upon the Board. In every one of these categories, from (a) to (e), it is a broad general range of duties which they are given to undertake. In not one of these is there a specific item, and the advice which I have been given on legal grounds is that when you give a body broad general duties, and then you place at the end of the list of their duties one specific item, you immediately cast doubt on how wide the generality is.
It has been held in the past that, where a particular thing has been specified, a body was thereby precluded from doing something else which was not so specified. I am not absolutely certain that in that case this would be the position. I am a little influenced in that by what the noble Marquess has quoted in relation to the powers of the Hydro-Electric Board, and the duty placed upon them of preserving amenity. I would remind your Lordships, however, that that was at a time when there was no experience of activity of this kind in the Highlands, and the general fear, perhaps, of Parliament, and of many people outside, was that hydro-electric schemes to be started in the Highlands would have the unavoidable and inevitable effect of destroying natural beauty. I think even the strongest opponents of the Hydro-Electric Board will always admit that the Board have gone out of their way to preserve amenity, sometimes at considerable cost, with a resultant increase in the cost of producing electricity at the end of the day. They have never niggled only on grounds of expenditure.
The pattern which the Hydro-Electric Board have so well established in more than twenty years of operation in the
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Highlands is one which any other body would have great difficulty in escaping from. So the pattern is there. This is one of the reasons why there is advantage from time to time in requiring the approval of the Secretary of State. The Secretary of State must look at things in their whole context. It is undoubtedly part of the duty of the Board—a point to which the noble Lord, Lord Henley, has directed our attention—to look to the social well-being of their area.
One of the existing important developments in the area is tourism. It could not be regarded as furthering the interests of the area in that direction if we encouraged them to go out of their way to destroy part of their assets in that connection by doing things which would interfere unnecessarily with the amenity of the area. There might even be cases where the choice was between utility and amenity, where the overriding value would be to preserve amenity and abandon utility.
For that reason, I wish to invite your Lordships not to accept this Amendment. But I would give the undertaking that I wish to look again at the reference which the noble Marquess has made to the Hydro-Electric Board's responsibility in this matter, and see the context in which it appears. If it could be inserted in this clause without in any way risking the impairment of the Board's general powers, then I shall be quite happy to see something done at the next stage. If, on the other hand, the advice which I receive on legal grounds is that it would so impair the general powers, then I should be obliged to resist it at the next stage. But what I would do would be to have this matter looked at speedily, and I will write to the noble Lord, Lord Dulverton, so that he may have the earliest opportunity of considering the matter himself and of having such consultation with his friends as he might wish, to decide whether or not to press the matter at another stage.
LORD BOOTHBY: The noble Lord, Lord Hughes, whose reputation in this House rises not only every day but every hour, has once again made an eminently reasonable reply and a thoroughly sensible one. In the circumstances, I hope that the noble Lord who moved the Amendment will withdraw it and leave

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it to the noble Lord, because I feel that in doing so he will leave it in extremely competent hands.
BARONESS HORSBRUGH: My Lords, the noble Lord has told us that he does not want a separate paragraph (f) added to Clause 3 as it might have a bad effect on the sense of the other paragraphs. Would it not be possible to add part of this Amendment to paragraph (a) relating to the economic and social well-being and development of the Highlands and Islands—
"and also the preservation and enhancement of the natural beauty of the Highland scene "?
Could it not be added to that paragraph on the same terms, as it were, of the social well-being?
LORD HUGHES: Might I deal with that point first? That is a possibility which could be considered, but I should like to point out to your Lordships that what was suggested was not a new paragraph (f) but a continuation of the opening remarks. One has to read the Amendment as starting off with the words:
"In pursuance of their general function described in Section 1(1) of this Act the Board shall have the following duties."
Then it goes from paragraph (a) to (e) and then, as the Amendment is worded, the words proposed would be the conclusion of that opening paragraph. But I should be happy to look at this matter in the general context, in the way in which the noble Baroness has suggested.
THE EARL OF CROMARTIE: I am not going in any way counter to what the noble Lord the Minister has said. I am merely asking for information as to what extent the Board, when it decides on certain things, will be subject to the Town and Country Planning Act in the county councils.
LORD HUGHES: The position is that when the Board submit proposals for the approval of the Secretary of State, and the Secretary of State approves these proposals, approval will carry with it a town and country planning consent in so far as that is necessary. The Secretary of State, before giving his approval, will consult the local planning authority so that he may have their observations before him in arriving at a final
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decsion. While the authority will not be directly conferring or refusing a planning consent, their views will be known and will be one of the factors which the Secretary of State will take into consideration in arriving at his decision.
THE EARL OF HADDINGTON: I sincerely hope that the noble Lord who moved this Amendment will not withdraw it. After all, what the Amendment asks is that when the Board are carrying out these duties they shall have regard to the importance in the national interest of the preservation and enhancement of the natural beauty of the Highland scene and countryside. It does not prevent the Board from carrying out their duties. It only asks that, when they do so, they will bear in mind the importance of the natural beauty of the Western Highlands.
The noble Lord, Lord Dulverton, has said, and he is not making an overstatement, that this is one of the most beautiful countrysides in the whole world. Wester Ross, the Western Highlands, the islands and all the crofting counties covered by this Board form a special case, and special cases surely demand special words in a Bill. If it is not customary to put such words into a Bill of this description I think they should be put into this particular Bill because we are dealing with a special case. I wholeheartedly support the noble Lord and I hope he will not withdraw his Amendment.
THE EARL OF PERTH: My Lords, having listened to the noble Earl, Lord Haddington, and other noble Lords who have spoken, I am sure that we all have great sympathy with the purpose of this Amendment. On the other hand as the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, has said, there may be difficulties in putting it in the place suggested. For example, I was wondering—and again this would be something for the noble Lord to consider—whether it might do as well in Clause 5 when we come to the question of the erection of buildings. It is surely when buildings are erected that this danger arises. We might possibly put it in that place rather than in Clause 3. I should be ready to leave it to the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, to look at it again, now that he has given us the assurance, and if we do not get satisfaction to consider it at Report stage.
LORD HUGHES: I should like to reiterate that I have stated that I would write to the noble Lord, Lord Dulverton, in ample time for him to consider whether what I have said is satisfactory, and to give him time to consult with his friends on the action which should be taken. I will not give him the letter when it is too late to act in the matter.
LORD DRUMALBYN: May I make three brief points on this matter? I respectfully agree with what my noble friend Lord Boothby has said as to the manner in which the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, has dealt with this subject. Secondly, I think we are bound to take his technical advice on the effect of the drafting, at the moment at any rate, to give him further time to examine the situation. Thirdly, the Hydro-Electric Board is advised by an amenities committee, and he might like to bear that in mind in considering the attitude he takes towards this Amendment. It may even be desirable to have the same amenities committee advising the Development Board.
LORD DULVERTON: I thank the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, for what he said a few moments ago. I accept what he said with as much alacrity as did the noble Lord, Lord Boothby. I thank all noble Lords who have spoken in support of the general sense of this Amendment and I look forward to hearing from the noble Lord, Lord Hughes. I beg leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
4.24 p.m.
On Question, Whether Clause 3 shall stand part of the Bill?
LORD DRUMALBYN: May I just say a word now, because there was one point which the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, did not deal with when he dealt extensively with my previous remarks in relation to the Amendment moved by my noble friend the Duke of Atholl? I did not mention a figure in regard to this, because I realised what the difficulties were, but it is the question of the possibility of dividing in some way or another the kind of proposals which ought to be referred to Parliament and those which need to be referred only to the Secretary of State. I would ask the
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noble Lord to give consideration to this point, because, as he himself indicated, some of the proposals may cover a wide number of authorities, involving the acquisition of a great deal of land, and in any case probably any compulsory purchase orders involved will be called in and all considered at one inquiry. All that would be needed in addition would be Parliamentary approval as a further safeguard.
I do not think it could possibly be said that this is in any way undesirable. I think it would improve the Bill and it would reinforce the confidence in, and the acceptance of some of the more startling powers in the Bill which perhaps the public in general has not been so much aware of, in regard to the general benefit that the Highland Development Board could confer. Therefore I hope the noble Lord will look at this possibility again. I think it is a suggestion that is worth considering, but I should not like to press it any further at the present time.
LORD HUGHES: It would be indeed churlish of me if I were to say that I would not look further at this suggestion. I would just enter one caveat. One of the difficulties in a matter of this kind is to get sufficient money to undertake all the projects which the Highlands themselves might consider necessary, and I should be reluctant to put in what might prove to be another financial hurdle for the Board to get over. Having said that, however, I readily say that I will look at this aspect to which the noble Lord, Lord Drumalbyn, has directed my attention, provided it does not unduly strengthen the hands of those who are seeking to stop us from spending money. While I do not specify any particular organisation, I would say that the primary objective of both sides of the Committee is to see this thing work with the maximum success to all concerned, and in that spirit I will look at the proposal that the noble Lord has made.
LORD DRUMALBYN: I am much obliged to the noble Lord.
Clause 3 agreed to.
Clause 4:
Acquisition and disposal of land
4.—(1) For the purpose of any of their functions under this Act the Board may—

(a) with the approval of the Secretary of State, by agreement acquire land, whether by way of purchase, feu, lease or excambion;

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(b) acquire land compulsorily, if so authorised by the Secretary of State;

(c) hold and manage land acquired under this subsection and with the approval of the Secretary of State, and subject to the subsequent provisions of this section, dispose of or otherwise deal with such land.

THE DUKE OF ATHOLL THE DUKE OF ATHOLL moved, in subsection (1)(a), to leave out "with the approval of the Secretary of State,". The noble Duke said: This Amendment is purely exploratory, as I wish to know when the Board have submitted some proposals to the Secretary of State and they have been approved, and it is obviously necessary for those proposals that the Board should acquire some land, whether once again they will have to go back to the Secretary of State when they actually have the agreement to acquire the land drawn up, or whether the Secretary of State and the Treasury in the first place will give them sufficient money to go ahead with those proposals without further reference to the Secretary of State. I feel that the latter would be a more efficient way, and I hope the noble Lord will be able to console me to this extent. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 3, line 15, leave out ("with the approval of the Secretary of State").—(The Duke of Atholl.)
LORD HUGHES: I thought probably the noble Duke was exploring when he put down this Amendment, and I hope he will be satisfied when he finds the territory into which he has landed. In general, proposals involving the acquisition of land will be submitted by the Board to the Secretary of State under the procedure provided in Clause 3, and, in that event, his approval under Clause 4(1)(a) would be signified at the same time. Minor transactions involving the acquisition of small portions of land for a particular purpose—for instance, tourist information kiosks, to mention a trifling thing which springs to mind—could be dealt with under the "category" approval provisions of Clause 14(1). But it is possible that the Board may wish to consider acquisition of land other than that arising from proposals under Clause 3, and it would clearly be wrong for such acquisitions, possibly of a substantial nature, to be carried through without the approval of the Secretary of State.
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Moreover it is possible that acquisition of land might form part of a proposal submitted to the Secretary of State and not approved by him, and if this Amendment were accepted the Board would be able to go ahead with such an acquisition and then subsequently be unable to put the acquisition to the use for which they had acquired it. For these reasons, I hope I have been able to satisfy the noble Duke that the Board will not be required to go chasing twice for approvals to each individual acquisition, but that major proposals of land acquisition, and of course similarly of disposal, which is the subject of his next Amendment, would require a specific approval from the Secretary of State. I hope that in these circumstances the noble Duke will feel able to withdraw Amendments No. 7 and No. 8. because it will save the time of the Committee if I say that the arguments in favour of Amendment No. 7 apply with equal force to No. 8.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: I would thank the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, very much for his explanation of why he does not feel able to accept Amendment No. 7 and I am happy to withdraw it. I should like to say something further on No. 8. I hope very much that when the Board acquire land and when they come to sell such land they will first offer it back to the person, concern, organisation or body from which they acquired it, even if they have not acquired it compulsorily. In many cases people might sell land unwillingly rather than put the Board to the trouble of going through the compulsory process, but would still like first refusal to buy it back if the Board had no further use for it. This situation might arise where the Board wished to see a ski-lift built. They might acquire land for building the pylons and then, when the thing is finished, might wish to sell the land back and just have a wayleave for the pylons concerned. I hope that in those cases the Board would offer the land back to the person from whom they bought it in the first place. I beg leave to withdraw Amendment No. 7.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
4.32 p.m.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: I beg to move Amendment No. 8. I have already spoken on it.
Amendment moved—
Page 3, line 21, leave out ("and with the approval of the Secretary of State,").—(The Duke of Atholl.)
VISCOUNT MASSEREENE AND FERRARD: I should like to support my noble friend, because we have had such instances. There was one quoted only the other day, where Her Majesty's Government had compulsorily acquired some land—I think it was for a post office—at a very low price. Then they sold it to a third party at an enormous profit. I think that if the Development Board are to be allowed to acquire land compulsorily they should first offer it back to the original owner, if they intend to dispose of it; and in offering it back they should bear in mind the price they paid for it. My experience is that the Government, somewhat naturally, usually try to buy land as cheaply as possible—and of course under this Bill the owner can be forced to sell cheaply on their own terms. I hope the Government can give my noble friend some satisfaction on this point.
LORD HUGHES: In relation to the disposal of land which has been acquired by compulsion, I would remind noble Lords of the principles under which Government Departments have operated since the Crichel Down case; and in the case of any compulsory acquisition by the Highland Development Board, there would be no departure from the principles now generally accepted. Noble Lords will remember that if ground has been acquired by a Government Department (and sometimes it is necessary to acquire a complete parcel since, although the acquiring body may not need the whole area the owner will not wish to be left with only the remnants which the acquiring body did not want), it may be in the public interest that those unwanted areas should be disposed of to other Government Departments that may have a use for it. But subject to that sort of restriction—and I think that is the only one—if land has been acquired by compulsion, and is subsequently not used, the general procedure is that the opportunity is given first to the original owner to acquire it.
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It may be that even in the case of ground acquired voluntarily the same principles would apply. If the Board did acquire more land than it needed, and subsequently wished to dispose of some of it, if the original owners had an interest in getting it back, I am quite sure that the Board would deal with them as sympathetically as it would, by mandate, be required to do in the case of compulsory acquisition. But in the case of voluntary acquisition it is much more likely that the Board have had to acquire more land than they wished because this is the basis on which they have got it by agreement, that they take the whole parcel, so that in many cases the owner would not be interested in taking part of the land back.
There is another aspect to which perhaps I should refer, the question of minor transactions. I should like to give the same assurance to the noble Duke—he did not specifically raise it, but that may be my fault in dragooning him into taking Amendments No. 7 and 8 together. I think he would be interested in some direction to the Board in minor disposal as in minor acquisition. We should not expect the Board to require specific approval for each individual minor sale any more than for each individual minor acquisition. The same principles would apply in both directions.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: I should have liked the noble Lord to go slightly further on this question of people who sell voluntarily—if "voluntarily" is the right word, when there is the threat of compulsion behind the transaction. I feel that it would encourage people not to force the Board to acquire land compulsorily if it could be laid down in the Bill that, in the event of the Board's acquiring any land, whether by compulsion or not, it would offer it back to the person who sold it.
As T understand it, if I want to make sure of getting land back after the ski-lift has been built, I must force the Board to acquire the land compulsorily, and then, following the Crichel Down case, they will be obliged, when they come to sell it, to offer it back to me. Once the ski-lift is built I should have thought they could not possibly want the land. If I sell it voluntarily, so far as I can make out, we have to depend on the good will of the Board to offer this land back. If the noble Lord could think of a form

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of words that could be written into the Bill to instruct the Board that it should offer the land back to the people from whom it was acquired, this would be a great help and would make the Board's job much easier, because people would not be so ready to insist on having the land acquired compulsorily.
LORD HUGHES: That is an interesting suggestion, but it could not possibly be incorporated into the Bill. It would have to be a matter of general policy, to be operated by the Government generally in relation to acquisitions voluntarily for any purpose. If it were the wish of Parliament that it should be done, it should be done in a completely separate measure, relating to conditions under which land is acquired and disposed of. It would be quite wrong for the Government, in the context of this particular Bill, to undertake something which could have such tremendously wide repercussions.
All I can say—and I think it is helpful—is that we should expect the Board, unless there were good reasons to the contrary, to give the same sort of opportunity for reacquisition by the original owner in the case of voluntary acquisitions as would apply if the acquisition had been by compulsion. But I must stress the fact that I am attaching strings to that, because it might well be that what the Board had done in the interval had so completely changed the character of the land that it would be wrong altogether even to offer it to the original owner. But, other things being equal, I would say that the original owner had, perhaps, a better claim than other people. After all, the Board is not only going to work in the area but, by and large, is going to live in the area, and it is pretty good common sense not to be falling out with all your neighbours at one time.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: On the strength of what the noble Lord has said, I feel that I must withdraw this Amendment. But I warn him that I may try to think of a form of words that would cover the point I am thinking of, and put clown an Amendment on Report stage.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
4.42 p.m.
LORD DRUMALBYN LORD DRUMALBYN moved, after subsection (1), to insert:
"() The powers conferred under paragraph (b) of the last foregoing subsection shall relate to
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(a) any land in any of the counties specified in section 1(2) of this Act or in any area designated under that subsection.

(b) any land in proximity to any county or area mentioned in the last foregoing paragraph which the Board require in connection with any measure under section 3(1) of this Act."

The noble Lord said: The noble Lord, Lord Hughes, will be fairly familiar with the purposes of this particular Amendment, which has to do with compulsory purchase. Clause 4 covers purchase both by agreement and compulsorily, and, as I understand it, extends to any part of Scotland. My noble friends and I felt that it would be desirable, if possible, to restrict the compulsory purchase to the crofter counties and any areas in proximity to them which would be required for carrying out the particular function which the Development Board had in view. It is easy to understand that it might frustrate a scheme altogether, or at any rate severely hamper it, if it were not possible to purchase land perhaps just over the border of the crofter counties—such a thing, for example, as an access road or something to do with land drainage: anything of that sort. We certainly do not want to stop that.
In another place there was some argument as to what the word "adjacent" meant, although it had a perfectly reasonable parentage in Section 4 of the New Towns Act, 1946. But so as to remove that objection, we have used the word which the Government themselves have put into this Bill in subsection (2) of Clause 1, namely, the word "proximity", which certainly cannot only be contiguous. Curiously enough, anyone who looks up the word "adjacent" in the dictionary will find that it is defined as "near or contiguous", but if you look up "contiguous" it is not defined as "adjacent". So to avoid any possible doubt we have used the word "proximity".
I think it is generally agreed that it is highly desirable not to extend compulsory powers further than they are absolutely needed. The noble Lord himself said, in winding up on Second Reading, that
"it is not expected that the Board would ever need to acquire land outside its own area except in the contiguous area."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Vol. 267 (No. 93), col. 826, June 29, 1965].

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We have gone a little further here, so far as compulsory acquisition is concerned, and made it "in proximity to" in order that no scheme related to the functions of the Development Board need be frustrated. We feel that in all other cases it should be possible to acquire land by agreement. For example, if one wanted a tourist office, in Edinburgh or something of that kind, somewhere fairly remote, it should be possible to acquire land by agreement. The actual piece of land that has to be acquired is not so essential that it needs to be acquired compulsorily; some other piece of land could just as well be acquired. It is only the contiguous or adjacent areas, and those in proximity, where the particular piece of land is so important that it must be acquired compulsorily if necessary. That is why we have put down this Amendment. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 3, line 23, at end insert the said subsection.—(Lord Drumalbyn.)
THE EARL OF SELKIRK: I should like to support my noble friends in this Amendment. I think it is up to the Government to show why they should require compulsory power which would fall neither under Clause 1(2) nor under Clause 3(1). If they really want additional powers I think they should show what the purpose is. This is not holding up the main object of the Bill at all, but I think the clause shows a wider sweep of the pen than is absolutely necessary.
LORD HUGHES: I should like to say right away that there is no ulterior motive in the broadness of the drawing of this particular power; it is simply because of the difficulty in confining it. In another place this matter received a lot of consideration and, as the noble Lord, Lord Drumalbyn, has indicated, many variations were considered. "Adjacent areas", "contiguous areas", "areas in proximity"—all these have been considered, and rejected by Her Majesty's Government as being too imprecise.
I would congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Drumalbyn, in having picked out the word "proximity" from the Government's own clause. But I would suggest to him that it is a little easier to use so vague a word as "proximity" when
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the body which is first of all inserting it into the legislation is the body which is going to take the decision ultimately, because it is Parliament that says under the preceding clause that we take into the Board's areas other areas which are in proximity to the seven crofting counties; so that Parliament is interpreting what it means when it subsequently agrees or refuses to agree to take in other areas. But if we use "proximity" in this clause, it is not Parliament which is going to interpret it; it is perhaps the Court of Session which will have to do so.
As I understand it, there is nothing in existing Case Law—at least, nothing that I have been able to find—which would give any backing as to what is meant by "proximity". Of course, matters could change. I was going to mention a particular area which might be taken in, but, on second thoughts, it might not be advisable because it might raise needless hopes. But, let us say, if area "A" is brought into the Bill a particular town might well be obviously in proximity to that area; whereas if the area is not in, that would cease to have any validity in relation to proximity.
Frankly, I cannot see the occasions when it would ever be necessary to apply compulsory powers outside the areas envisaged in this Amendment. If it were only a case of finding words which would give effect to what is done, I should have no hesitation at all in accepting them. I think that on Second Reading I mentioned the possibility that we may wish to acquire a publicity centre say in Edinburgh or Glasgow—as a matter of fact, I think I said London, but that was a slip of the tongue, because of course we have no power to acquire anything outside Scotland. I can see a much greater need to have a publicity centre for the benefit of the benighted industrialist down here, in Birmingham or London, rather than in Edinburgh or Glasgow. If the Board wanted to have such a centre, because they have no compulsory powers outside Scotland they would have to proceed in the ordinary way by acquiring premises which they wanted. I can see no reason why the same procedure should not be adopted in Edinburgh and Glasgow. I very much doubt whether there is any likelihood of seeking to apply compulsion in these areas. I could be wrong, but I do not think I am. We wish to

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protect the rights of the Board in acquiring land compulsorily which is necessary for the purposes of their area, even though it may be outwith their area.
The advice I have been given—and in saying this I do not wish to be thought to be insulting the legal profession—is that one cannot apply what appears to the laymen to be common sense; one must apply what is legally workable. Although the wording which has been brought forward is an admirable effort to accomplish all that would be necessary in relation to the Bill, it would, I am advised, possibly frustrate the Board in some of their operations. A water scheme in which they were interested might have its connections thirty miles outside their area; a drainage scheme might have its effects twenty miles outside their area. It might well be that in one court twenty miles would impress one judge as being not "in the proximity", whereas a judge in another court might consider thirty miles to be "in the proximity". Therefore the Amendment introduces an element of doubt. I hope that the Amendment will be withdrawn for the simple reason that, well-intentioned as it is, it could frustrate the operations of the Board in regard to their essential functions.
Some of your Lordships may say, "It is all very well to take a power and promise not to use it". I suppose Ministers have been doing this since Ministers first started giving undertakings, but, in fact, the Scottish Electricity Boards have the power to acquire by compulsion land outside their own areas without any restriction whatsoever, and, to the best of my knowledge, in all the time that the Electricity Boards have been in existence this power has never been exercised. It was not given then with the purpose of acquiring land outside their area, but for the purpose of acquiring land inside, or in the proximity of, their area, but the wide power was necessary in order legally to accomplish the narrower intention. I suggest to your Lordships, having regard to the way in which existing authorities have not abused the principle, that it is reasonable to confer the same power on a new publicly-accountable authority.
LORD DRUMALBYN: We are grateful to the noble Lord for his explanation of the Government's attitude on this mat
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ter. Part of our difficulty arises from the very width of the functions involved. As the noble Lord said, one wants to have this power in reserve just in case it is necessary somewhere, but he thinks that it will never be used, and in fact can practically guarantee that it will not be used. But one is alarmed when one sees the opening words of the clause which include the word "any", that is to say:
"For the purpose of any of their functions…".
One is alarmed because the Government do not, of course, know what the functions may be. They are able to define certain functions which obviously would tie down the use of the powers in any case which is related to land, water and so forth, but with regard to their industrial functions, for example, it is possible that they might want to acquire compulsorily in some part of the country.
We should like to see some limitation here if a sensible way can be found to do it, but, in view of what the noble Lord has said, we are bound to accept his advice that the word "proximity" might give rise to difficulties of interpretation. We do not want to hamper the Board in the exercise of any of its functions for the Highlands, and therefore at this stage we are bound to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment—although we still feel that the compulsory powers under subsection 4 (b) should be limited. We do not mind what they acquire by agreement, whether it be in Scotland or outside. In fact, if the noble Lord could make it possible for the Board to acquire an office in London, we should not object to its doing so, so long as it is done by agreement. We do not agree, however, that they should do so compulsorily. I should have thought that it was possible for the legal brains to put this into words which would be watertight. I would ask the noble Lord to look at this again, and I hope he will be able to do something. However, I do not want to hold up proceedings now, and I beg leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 4 agreed to.
Clause 5 agreed to.
Clause 6 [Carrying on of business]:
On Question, Whether Clause 6 shall stand part of the Bill?
LORD DRUMALBYN: There is an Amendment a little later which is related to Clause 6 and I think that what I have to say will be more conveniently said at that point, although to some extent it involves a debate on Clause 6. I think that it will be easier to debate this matter then.
Clause 6 agreed to.
Clause 7:
Advisory and other services
7. The Board shall have power—
(a) to provide or assist in the provision of advisory, training, management, technical, accountancy and other services to persons engaged in or proposing to engage in business in the Highlands and Islands;
4.58 p.m.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL THE DUKE OF ATHOLL moved to add to paragraph (a):
"for which the Board will make charges on the scale laid down by the professional body concerned."
The noble Duke said: This is a simple Amendment, the object of which is to give a small measure of protection to solicitors, accountants and people of that kind who are at the moment in practice in the Highlands. Under this Bill the Board will have power
"to provide or assist in the provision of advisory, training, management, technical, accountancy and other services to persons engaged in…"
et cetera. All this Amendment will do will make it compulsory for the Board to charge the recognised fees for services, such as accountancy services, which they give. There otherwise might be a danger (I do not think that it is likely to happen, but there could be a danger) that the Board would undercut the accountants and solicitors practising in the smaller towns in the Highlands, and might even drive them out of business. If the Government find the basis of my Amendment acceptable, I would add that I gather that I should have used the word "shall" rather than "will". My Amendment ought to read:
"for which the Board shall make charges on the scale laid down by the professional body concerned."
Amendment moved—
Pa2e 4, line 41, at end insert the said words.—(The Duke of Atholl.)
LORD HUGHES: I am very much surprised at this Amendment, which indi
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cates that the noble Duke had tired of reading the debates in another place before he got to the end of them. In fact, it is quite embarrassing to me that he should have moved this Amendment, because if it were carried it would in fact be restoring the Bill virtually to the condition in which it was presented to Parliament in the first instance. Although the wording would be a little different, the effect would be the same.
The Bill as it now stands is in this form because the official Opposition Amendment was eventually accepted by my honourable friend the Minister of State. In fact, I do not think I am going beyond the bounds which I am allowed when I say that the Amendment giving effect to the present situation was moved by Mr. Wylie—I am not going to quote what he said—and was strongly supported by the former Secretary of State, Mr. Noble. It was one of a series of Amendments designed to remove some of the restrictions placed upon the Board. The argument advanced then, which was accepted by the Government in another place, was that while normally it would be the position that professional services provided would be charged for at the ordinary professional rate, there could be circumstances, as Opposition Members indicated, when the contrary was not only desirable but essential if the clause was to fulfil its proper function; and after debate the Minister of State agreed to accept the Amendment.
I would therefore point out that the position is that under normal circumstances professional services, which were rendered, say, in competition with existing professional services, would be charged at the appropriate professional rate. But the main reason for this provision being inserted is not to give competition to the people who are there, but because in so many parts of the Board's area there is in fact no available professional service, or because the people to whom the need for service applies could not possibly avail themselves of it at professional rates.
The Opposition persuaded Her Majesty's Government that it was wise to give the maximum amount of discretion to the Board in this matter; and if the noble Duke pressed his Amendment, and if it were accepted by the

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Committee, it would be removing this discretion from the Board. That, of course, is contrary to the general tenor of his intentions in other directions. I doubt very much, therefore, whether the Amendment would commend itself to many of the Members of another place, nor would I expect that it would commend itself to many of the Members of your Lordships' House.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: I should like to thank the noble Lord for his reply. However, I would point out that I am not a member of the official Opposition, and that my Amendments in no way follow theirs. But after what the noble Lord has said I shall, of course, withdraw this Amendment, although I am slightly worried that the position could create difficulties for a small accountant operating in a town on the West Coast of Scotland. But with the noble Lord's undertaking that the Board will not operate in such a manner, I shall be only too pleased to withdraw my Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 7 agreed to.
Clause 8 [Grants and loans]:
5.4 p.m.
LORD DRUMALBYN LORD DRUMALBYN moved, after subsection (2) to insert:
"( ) For the avoidance of doubt, nothing in section 2 of the Local Employment Act, 1963 shall prevent the Board from making a grant towards the cost of providing a building or an extension of a building in addition to any grant made under that section by the Board of Trade in respect of that building or extension."
The noble Lord said: The point of this Amendment is quite simple. Under the Local Employment Acts, the only building grant the Board of Trade can give, on the advice of the Board of Trade Advisory Committee, is a grant of 25 per cent. In the course of the Second Reading, we had some discussion as to whether the Development Board should take over entirely the functions of the Board of Trade in giving assistance to industry in the Highlands. The noble Lord, Lord Hughes, said he did not think that it should; that the existing procedure should continue to operate, and that the kind of grant given by the Development Board would be subject to the condition laid down under the Local Employment Acts: that the assistance
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given should enable the firm assisted eventually to stand on its own feet and be viable.
That is not the case with which I am dealing here. The case with which I am dealing here is that in which BOTAC thinks that the firm will become viable but is still restricted, not in the amount of grant or loan that it may give apart from the building grant, but in the amount of the building grant that it may give. It is fairly well known that in the Highlands building costs may run up to 50 per cent. higher than building costs in other parts of the country, and so it seems, on the face of it, that the building grant that is available from BOTAC is not enough. The purpose of this Amendment is merely to make it clear that, if BOTAC decides to recommend the giving of the building grant, that will not necessarily be the whole of the amount that can be made available from Exchequer funds to the firm concerned; that they may get, say, 25 per cent. building grant from BOTAC, and another 25 per cent., or 15 per cent. or whatever is thought necessary, from the development fund.
In conclusion, I would just remind your Lordships of the history of the building grant. It started off with what was, in effect, a kind of deficiency grant, to cover the difference between the actual cost of the building put up and the price at which it could be sold when completed in a development district, which was its market value. It was a variable figure and the Highlands stood to gain most from this, because the market value would be less and the grant would be greater. Now that we come to a fixed grant, the Highlands have lost that advantage altogether, and it may be that the building grant, by itself, is not sufficient to give the encouragement that is desirable. That is why this Amendment seeks to make it quite clear that the Highland fund will be able to give a building grant, in addition to the building grant received from the Board of Trade. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 5, line 17, at end insert the said subsection.—(Lord Drumalbyn.)
LORD HUGHES: I find it impossible to disagree with what the noble Lord, Lord Drumalbyn, has said. I wish to confirm that when I spoke on Second

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Reading of the possibility of the Development Board giving a grant where the Board of Trade considered that they could not risk a grant, I was not intending to convey that their field of intervention would be confined. I confirm that it will be possible for the Development Board, having regard to the circumstances, to give grants additional to those being provided by the Board of Trade. Of course the scheme may not work in that way. I may say that at the present moment, in anticipation that the Bill will soon be law, discussions are taking place at official level between the Scottish Office and the Board of Trade as to how this particular aspect would work. One of the possibilities might well be that applications, say, of a given value would be channelled through the Development Board rather than go direct to the Board of Trade.
Of course, these are matters upon which no final decision can be taken until the Board is in existence, because we must be guided to some extent by the way in which the Development Board wishes its powers to be exercised. Even in a matter of this kind we would not seek to lay down a pattern before the Board comes into existence. I am a little surprised that the noble Lord should in fact be moving this Amendment, in view of his previous connection with the Board of Trade, because he is doing less than justice to his own legislation. There is nothing in either the Local Employment Act, 1963, or the original Act of 1960—and, after all, the 1963 Act is merely an amendment of the 1960 Act—to prevent another statutory body from making a grant additional to that made by the Board of Trade under Section 2 of the 1963 Act or Section 3 of the Local Employment Act, 1960, which Section 2 of the 1963 Act amends and which contains the basic power to make grants. Therefore, in the way in which the Board of Trade framed their legislation in 1960 and 1963 they were even more competent than they were aware, because they covered the powers of the Highland Development Authority in advance. We are perfectly happy to rest on that; and, simply because of the fact that it is clear beyond any shadow of doubt that these powers exist, the Amendment is unnecessary. I hope,
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therefore, that the noble Lord will be content to rest on his 1960 and 1963 laurels.
LORD DRUMALBYN: I am grateful to the noble Lord. I am not quite sure that I entirely agree with his interpretation of the Act—
LORD HUGHES: It is not mine.
LORD DRUMALBYN:—when he suggests by implication that two Exchequer building grants (because this is, in effect, an Exchequer building grant) could be obtained for the same building. I am not certain that that is so; but, in view of the assurance that he has given, that it will be possible for this indirect grant to be given through the Development Board, I think the purpose of my Amendment has been amply served, and I am very willing to ask leave to withdraw it.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 8 agreed to.
Clause 9 [Ancillary powers of the Board]:
5.12 p.m.
On Question, Whether Clause 9 shall stand part of the Bill?
LORD DRUMALBYN: There is a point that I should like to raise on this question, because I am not certain that it has been discussed to any extent. Subsection (2) says:
"For the purpose of the exercise of any of their functions the Board may, with the consent of the Secretary of State and the Treasury, borrow money".
I think it would be desirable to know what that is intended to imply. Does it mean that it is intended that they should be able to borrow money simply for current expenses, or will they be able to borrow money as an alternative to getting advances from the bank? If so, will they have access to the Public Works Loan Board? Perhaps the noble Lord can give us a little more indication as to what this is intended to imply.
LORD HUGHES: It is not the intention that the Board should be allowed to float loans and involve themselves in the money market. This provision prevents the Board from doing this except when the Secretary of State and the Treasury approve. The intention is that such

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approval should be given only in exceptional circumstances or for temporary borrowing by bank overdraft to meet day-to-day requirements, because, apart from any income (or gifts) which they may receive, the Board will normally be financed out of monies provided by Parliament, and the necessary provision to this end is contained in Clause 17. I hope that fully answers the noble Lord's question.
LORD DRUMALBYN: I am grateful to the noble Lord for the explanation he has been able to give.
Clause 9 agreed to.
Clause 10:
Powers of entry
10.—(1) Any person duly authorised in writing by the Secretary of State or the Board may, at any reasonable time, enter upon land in order to survey it—

(a) for the purpose of determining whether, and, if so in what manner, any of the functions of the Board or of the Secretary of State under this Act should be exercised in relation to the land;

(b) in connection with any proposals for submission by the Board to the Secretary of State under section 3(1)(b) of this Act or with such proposals so submitted;

(c) where the Board have under consideration the purchase of the land or the carrying out on the land of any of the operations described in section 5(1)(a) or (b) of this Act;

(d) for any other purpose in connection with the exercise or performance of their functions under this Act.

(2) A person authorised under this section to enter upon any land, shall, if so required, produce evidence of his authority before so entering, and shall not demand admission as of right to any land which is occupied unless forty-eight hours notice, or in the case of land occupied for residential purposes seven days notice, of the intended entry has been given to the occupier.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL THE DUKE OF ATHOLL moved, in subsection (1), to leave out "the Secretary of State or". The noble Duke said: This Amendment is on a slightly different point from that involved in some of the other Amendments I have put down. Under the Bill as it at present stands anyone duly authorised in writing by the Secretary of State or the Board may at any reasonable time enter upon land in order to survey it. I thought the object of this Bill was to set up and give powers to the Highland Development Board. This clause, it seems to me, gives powers not only to the Highland Development Board,
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but to the Secretary of State, to authorise anybody he cares to appoint to enter upon land for the purpose of surveying it. I feel that that is wrong. The Bill is not for that purpose.
Furthermore, there is the danger that both the Board and the Secretary of State, unbeknown to each other, might give two different people power to enter upon land for exactly the same purpose, which would be an unnecessary waste of time for one of the two parties concerned. I would therefore suggest that it would be much better if this power were removed from the Secretary of State, so that, if the Secretary of State wished to obtain information in this way, he would have to do it through the Board. I cannot see that this would cause him any great trouble, and it might avoid the odd duplication of effort. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 6, line 29, leave out ("the Secretary of State or").—(The Duke of Atholl.)
LORD HUGHES: I must ask the Committee not to accept this Amendment. I doubt very much whether there would be many occasions on which there would be a duplication of effort, but it is clearly possible—in fact, it is clearly likely—that there might be occasions on which proposals to, say, acquire land on an extensive scale would require the Secretary of State to have an independent assessment of the requirements, and when he might wish to have one of his own consultants or advisers in these matters express a view from a position quite independent of the one taken up by the Board. If the noble Duke's Amendment were withdrawn, the Secretary of State would be denied that opportunity and would therefore have to rely on the information which the Board had obtained for this particular purpose.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: The noble Lord said, if my Amendment were withdrawn. I imagine he means if it were carried.
LORD HUGHES: I am sorry; if the noble Duke's Amendment were not withdrawn. In most cases it would perhaps be possible for the examination which is being made for the purposes of the Board to be equally acceptable for the purposes of the Secretary of State, but it is in the cases of very large acquisitions that the

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maximum of trouble might well arise, and it is in those very circumstances that there is an especial obligation on the Secretary of State to assure himself that all the relevant factors have been taken into account. That obligation might well be best carried out by having the matter investigated by an independent valuer or surveyor, rather than by relying on the information which the Board had acquired for their own purposes. It is therefore in the public interest that the Secretary of State should be given this power.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: Do I understand from the noble Lord that the Secretary of State will normally inform the Board when he is giving people this power? If so—and I can see the noble Lord's argument only too well—would it not be possible for the Board to authorise these people at the request of the Secretary of State?
LORD HUGHES: I think that is rather putting the thing the wrong way round. What I should expect is that, if it were a major proposal, there would in fact be consultation. As the noble Lord, Lord Drumalbyn, envisaged in the early stages of our debate, there will no doubt be much coming and going between the Board and the Secretary of State, and it is quite probable that the report of the person whom the Secretary of State had asked to get the information for him might well be acceptable to the Board also. But, in so far as the job might be done by somebody who was outwith the Board's employment, and as they will in fact have somebody on their own staff, one of their own employees, competent to do the job, then, unless this authority were given specifically to the Secretary of State it might raise the question, "Why do the Government employ somebody else to do the job when they have already got somebody sitting in Inverness who is being paid a salary for doing this?" The whole purpose of getting an independent person to do it could be lost sight of in these circumstances. I assure the Committee that it is essential that the Secretary of State should have this power.
LORD DRUMALBYN: May I ask one question? The answer is not entirely apparent. Anybody reading this for the first time would suppose that the power
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to enter would be limited to the crofter counties; but, of course, it is limited only by relation to the functions of the Board. I wonder what is intended here. Is it the intention that anyone should be able to go on any land connected with the function in any part of Scotland? If that is so, is it the intention in any circumstances that the Board shall be entitled to authorise a person to go on land outside the area of their own jurisdiction?
LORD HUGHES: Only in so far as it is governed by the wording in the clause: in relation to the exercise of their functions.
LORD DRUMALBYN: This, of course, is a question, to some extent, of public presentation. I wonder if the noble Lord could consider this matter a little further. We have considered the general aspect of acquisitions outside the crofter counties; but it may be that it would create a bad impression if the Board were to give authorisation to people to go on land outside the area of their own jurisdiction, whether or not it is extended under Clause 1(2). I wonder whether the noble Lord will consider this. It may be a good deal better in practice if such authorisations were to come from the Secretary of State rather than from the Board.
LORD HUGHES: I think I should direct the noble Lord's attention to the actual wording of the clause:
"Any person duly authorised in writing by the Secretary of State or the Board may, at any reasonable time, enter upon land in order to survey it—
(a) for the purpose of determining whether, and if so in what manner, any of the functions of the Board or of the Secretary of State under this Act should be exercised in relation to the land;"
and so on. It is in relation to the functions of the Board. The functions of the Board are applicable—and I think we are all generally agreed on this—to land in the area; or, if we could define it, to land in the proximity of the area. I do not think I can go further than that. I doubt very much whether it is possible to be more precise without restricting the operations of the Board. They are not seeking a roving commission. They have enough to do in one area without concerning themselves with other parts

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of Scotland. That is the principal protection: their job is in relation to their functions and their functions are in relation to a particular area.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: In view of what the noble Lord has said, I beg leave to withdraw my Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
5.25 p.m.
LORD DRUMALBYN LORD DRUMALBYN moved, in subsection (2), to leave out "if so required". The noble Lord said: This Amendment, as the noble Lord will appreciate, stands on its own. Its purpose is to remove the words "if so required", so that a person authorised under this section to enter upon land would have to produce evidence of his authority before so entering. This seems a matter of normal courtesy, and I should have thought that it would normally be done. I do not think that there is very much more to say on this point. I think that any person who wants to enter upon land must produce evidence of his authority to do so; but I would ask, in this connection, whether this comes under Clause 15, which refers to the notice which has to be served in writing. I ask for this reason: if the notice has to be served in writing, it will be very difficult, in the very short period of time allowed, for anyone who has received the notice to serve a counter-notice saying that the person must produce evidence of authority before going on to the land. I do not see how this could be done within the period of 48 hours.
That again raises the question of when the 48 hours' period starts. Is it upon receipt of the notice? If it is not, it is quite impossible for anybody to require a person to produce evidence before going on the land. The person will just come and go on the land; the counter-notice telling him to produce his credentials before he does so will perhaps arrive two days after he has been on the land. I hope that I have made myself quite clear. First, as a matter of courtesy this should be done. Second, in the Highlands, where the postal services have to cope with considerable distances, it may be quite impracticable to require the person to produce the evidence of his authority before going on the land. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 7, line 2, leave out ("if so required").—(Lord Drumalbyn.)
LORD HUGHES: I assured myself before coming as to what was meant by the period which is to operate; the 48 hours or seven days, whichever it may be. It does not start from the time the notice is despatched. The point is covered, I understand, by the ordinary interpretation procedure. The period starts at the time at which the information would normally be expected to have reached the applicant; in other words, if it normally takes two days from the time of posting in "A" to the arrival at "B", the 48 hours would be timed from that arrival. It may be said that things do not always work normally, and that the post might arrive a day or so late, or that it might not arrive at all. In these circumstances the matter would be dealt with according to actuality. This is what is laid down in the procedure. It will cover the great variety of circumstances.
Frankly, we cannot see any useful purpose being served by removing the words "if so required". The words are included so that when someone comes along and says that he wants to read the gas meter it is ordinary procedure that the occupant may want to be sure that he is from the Gas Board and not some enterprising man who wants to remove the contents of the meter for his own purposes. He may have to give evidence of the fact that he is authorised. The same thing applies here. Nothing could work more against the sort of reasonable attitude that we wish to prevail than if somebody came along and flourished a document and said "I am from the Highlands Development Board; this is my authority. I am here in pursuance of so-and-so. May I come in?" That might create the appearance of officiousness, which is the last thing we want. This does give protection to the occupant of the land or premises, if someone comes along and says, "We wrote to you about this; I am from the Highlands Development Board"; and the occupant says: "What evidence can show that you are from the Highlands Development Board?" The caller then says: "Here is my authority". This, I think, is perfectly satisfactory.

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Quite honestly, it would possibly be an impairment of the good relations we hope for if we made the first meeting between the man from the Board and his intended co-operator—or his victim, however you may care to look at it—a flourishing of an authority. I do not think that that is the right way to proceed. I hope that I have persuaded the noble Lord not to press his Amendment.
LORD AIREDALE: There is a difference. When the gas man cometh, he cometh in uniform, and 99 times out of a 100 he is recognised by the uniform in which he comes. Presumably, these people will not come in uniform, and the chances are that no one will know who they are, unless they explain.
LORD HUGHES: For "gas" substitute "electricity", and withdraw the uniform.
VISCOUNT STONEHAVEN: That does not happen in practice. I have been "inspected" by various Departments of the Scottish Office for various reasons, all of them perfectly genuine, but never yet, during the ten or fifteen years in which these inspections have taken place, has anyone come to the house and said, "I want to inspect so-and-so. Do you mind? When will it be convenient to do so?" I am now about to say something which I seldom mention and I think that even to-day it is a bad thing to say it, because there is no one present to refute what I say. There is a good deal of dissatisfaction created, not by all of them, but by certain inspectors who deal with these matters, because of the very high-handed manner they adopt. I should have thought that making it obligatory for them to announce their presence would be a good thing, and so I should like to support the Amendment.
LORD DRUMALBYN: I must point out that this does not relate only to the employees of the Board. As was said by the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, in the course of their business or contacts with the Board other people may be authorised to go on to the land. I remember vividly that in respect of one of the more important enterprises in Scotland terrible trouble resulted from
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the start because someone went on to land without first calling on the owner. In that case it may well be that the owner had not required the visitor to call, but if these words are not in the Bill, an owner would not have to require a visitor to call; a call would be made in the ordinary way.
I agree that to suggest that someone should flourish the evidence is not the best way to describe the process. It may be better to alter the drafting, but, as has been said by my noble friend Lord Stone-haven, it should be the normal practice to call without anyone having to require that a call should be made. The visitor should say, "Here I am. I am now going on the land." I do not care what documents he may have which he could produce because, if asked to produce the documents, he would do so. We ask that the person shall report and be prepared to produce the evidence.
LORD HUGHES: That will be done. May I remind noble Lords that the appearance of the individual is not the first intimation? There would have been proposals in writing, and an intimation that an officer, or a representative of the Board or its contractors, would be calling. Not less than 48 hours' notice would have been given. It is not a case of someone descending on the landowner out of the blue. He comes and he says, "I am from the Highlands Development Board", or, "I am from such-and-such contractors, about whose visit the Board has written to you." The visitor will identify himself by relating himself to a notice which has already been served. Only when the person on whom he is calling still has any doubts about the matter and says, "What evidence do you have that you are the person whom I was expecting to see?" will the visitor produce his written authority. There is ample protection for the landowner. The principal protection is not the notice of authority which is produced, but the notice which was served by the Board in the first instance, 48 hours or seven days beforehand.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: If the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, was the officer in question, I am certain that no offence would be taken because throughout our discussions the noble Lord has shown himself to be a very understanding person. In the first instance, a letter is

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received. I accept that this is the first intimation received by the proprietor or whoever may be involved. What happens after that? Perhaps an official is found wandering about in the perfectly lawful exercise of his duties. Only if he is required to do so must he say why he is there, who he is, or what he is up to. My noble friends and I were hoping that the official concerned would have the common courtesy to call on the proprietor and say, "Here I am. I have arrived today and I propose to carry out certain investigations in accordance with the notification you have received." I think that would be a much more civilised way to carry out this duty, and I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, will give the matter further consideration.
LORD HUGHES: In most cases undoubtedly that would happen, but we must remember that in some cases the area involved would be very great. The point where the inspection was to take place might be far removed from the home of the owner. Having been given notice that entry was proposed on such a date, the owner has an opportunity to be present if he wishes. If he is, obviously the officer will present himself to the owner; but it would be ridiculous to require an officer, who was proposing to inspect something on the owner's estate twenty miles away from the home of the owner (and following a notice given 48 hours earlier), to call on the owner at his home and say, "I now propose to go back twenty miles to do the job about which you were notified 48 hours or seven days ago." I know what would happen. There would be letters in the Press about the wicked waste of public money involved in writing a letter and giving 48 hours' notice and then, 48 hours later, saying, "I now propose to do the thing about which I wrote to you two days ago."
What would be reasonable in relation to a small area of land becomes completely unreasonable in respect of the vast areas which could be involved. It would be quite wrong for somebody to call at a house where there was only an acre of land attached and wander all over the ground without reference to the proprietor. I am quite certain that the Board would very quickly rap the knuckles of any official who behaved in that fashion,
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but we cannot adopt the procedure suggested in cases where the area involved might be 2,000 acres or even 20,000 acres.
I will look at the matter to find out whether we can do anything to accomplish what is intended—because I accept that no one wants to have someone wandering about his premises without any apparent reason for being there—and whether it is possible, without wasting money or causing needless inconvenience, to notify the owner, or the tenant or the person concerned, and for the visitor to say, "Here I am, in pursuance of my duty. Is it all right to go ahead? "It is the obtaining of permission, or the acknowledgement of the actual presence there, which I think the Amendment seeks to cover, rather than the flourishing of authority.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: As the clause refers to "occupier" and the noble Lord has referred to the "owner" almost throughout, am I to gather that he proposes to accept Amendment No. 22? If that is so, I am delighted to hear it.
I should like to point out to the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, that notices have been known to go astray, particularly in the case of occupiers. We had a case where the main road between Perth and Inverness was to be drained. We were given notice and an agreement was drawn up and notices were sent to the tenants. We had two tenants with the same name, and the notice happened to be sent to the wrong tenant. He was slightly surprised, because he lived a good mile from the main road, and wondered why it should be taken through his land. But he felt that, if we had agreed, it was probably all right and his rent would be adjusted. The person whose land it was in fact going through was surprised one bright morning to find the bulldozers already beginning to move on to his land. This seems to me a reasonable Amendment, particularly in the case of occupiers, as opposed to owners. This story is a perfectly true example of how notices can go astray. I hope that the noble Lord can do something about it, or that my noble friends will put down the Amendment again at the next stage.
LORD HUGHES: I do not see what this incident has to do with the Amendment. Simply because the notice had

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gone astray, perhaps it was inevitable that it happened in that way. Taking out the words "if so required" would not have helped that situation. With reference to my perhaps mistaken use of the word "owner", all I would say is that as we are not discussing the Amendment in question, let joy be unconfined at the moment.
LORD DRUMALBYN: In view of the undertaking the noble Lord has given, I beg leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
5.43 p.m.
LORD DRUMALBYN LORD DRUMALBYN moved, in subsection (2), after "required" to insert:
"by any person interested in the land or any person employed by a person interested in the land".
The noble Lord said: May I suggest that Amendments Nos. 16, 17 and 24 should be taken together? Perhaps I could draw your Lordships' attention, first of all, to subsection (6) to which No. 24 refers. This subsection deals with persons wilfully obstructing any person in the exercise of his powers and provides that, in the case of a first offence, he may be subject to a fine not exceeding £20, and in the case of the second or subsequent offence to a fine not exceeding £50.
What kind of people are likely to do the obstructing? I should have thought that they were any persons interested in the land or any persons employed by a person interested in the land. These people may not have had notice. As my noble friend has said, notices may go astray. The person may be a shepherd or gamekeeper working a long way away; or it may be that the occupier does not live on the premises. It may well be that the staff of an occupier have not been warned of the coming of the person authorised under the clause. I think that their natural reaction would be to ask him, "What are you doing here?" They may tell the person to go away, and that may be taken at law to be obstruction. What we are suggesting here is that the words "before so entering" should be removed, because it is while he is on the property that the person concerned may be asked to show why he is there by somebody interested in the land. Incidentally, I
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think that this would cover the point of owner as well as occupier. If these Amendments were agreed, the subsection would read:
"A person authorised under this section to enter upon any land, shall, if so required by any person interested in the land or any person employed by a person interested in the land, produce evidence of his authority before so entering …"
Obviously, it would be a defence under subsection (6) that the person in question had failed to produce the evidence of his authority. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 7, line 2, after "required" insert the said words.—(Lord Drumalbyn.)
LORD HUGHES: I am not in a position to accept these Amendments, because we are not persuaded that they are necessary. If an officer of the Board is required to show his written authority, it will be only to some authorised or interested person. The Amendment makes it possible for every tenant or employee on the land successively to ask for the authority, as well as any domestic servant of the occupier or owner; but it excludes a number of persons who, while neither employed nor persons having an interest, might have a mandate, express or implied, to deal with unauthorised intruders and to require production of the authority under the clause as it stands—for example, a member of the family of the owner of an estate or, where the estate is owned by a limited company, a shareholder or a contractor employed on a project on the land in question. In fact, the Amendment would give protection to a whole host of people whose interest would arise successively only if they were obstructing an officer in the execution of his duty, but would not give any protection to someone who might legitimately be asking for this information.
I do not envisage that this would arise in a small area; it would occur only in a large area of ground, where someone is found wandering about. If the inspection was being done in a proper fashion, one would expect the officer to say, when asked, that he was from the Development Board following a notice served on the occupier that he was coming there that day; and if the question were raised in a bona fide fashion, that would be the end of it. It is possible that the officer's operations would take the greater part of

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the day. If two or three people legitimately asked the same question, I am certain that they would be given the same information. But if a policy of obstruction was being carried out, and the officer had to answer successively a number of people, he would be in danger of spending his whole time producing his authority rather than getting on with the job. This Amendment gives a licence to that very sort of thing. It may be said that this is most unlikely to happen. I would say that it is most unlikely to happen anywhere outside the Highlands.
If I may speak on Amendment No. 46, presumably it is intended that the wilful obstruction of an officer of the Board who had not, on being required, produced evidence of authority to enter, or had not given due notice of entry, should not be made an offence. If that is the intention of the Amendment, it is unnecessary, as the penalty provisions of subsection (6) apply only to persons wilfully obstructing any person acting in the exercise of his powers under Clause 10. A man cannot be said to be exercising his powers under Clause 10 unless he has complied with the statutory provisions governing the exercise of these powers—that is, that he has produced evidence of authority to enter when required to do so, and has previously given due notice of his intention of entering upon the land. If he was obstructed when he had done neither of these things, or when he had complied only with one or the other, then there would be no offence created, and therefore there would be no penalty to be applied.
If one takes any one of these in isolation, it looks reasonable; but one has to take the three together to get the effect, and it is when one gets to Amendment No. 24 that it becomes apparent that the Amendments are seeking to give protection against an offence which will not arise, because if the circumstances are as narrated there will be no offence, and therefore no additional protection could be given. In the circumstances, I am afraid I cannot accept any of these Amendments.
LORD BURTON: I am sorry to hear the noble Lord give this reply, because he seems to take it for granted that all officials are sweet reasonableness. He has already told us that the distances may be
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very great. If we are only to have 48 hours' notice, it is difficult for us to get word to the parties that an official may be coming. I hope that later on he will alter this period. But this is the case at the moment. If stalkers or managers or anybody else in a remote area are not allowed to ask an official for his credentials, or he is not bound to produce them, then it seems most unreasonable.
LORD HUGHES: But he is allowed to ask the official for his credentials. The words are, "if so required". Anyone who has a reasonable vestige of authority to ask will do so, and he will see the credentials. This is not by any means sprung upon your Lordships as unprecedented legislation; there is plenty of precedent for it. In the very area with which we are dealing, the almost identical wording (there is a difference of wording, I admit, but it has exactly the same effect) is in the Crofters (Scotland) Act, 1955; it is in the Town and Country Planning (Scotland) Act, 1947, and in the Agriculture (Scotland) Act, 1948. I quoted the Crofters (Scotland) Act, 1955, first because I thought it might perhaps commend itself more to noble Lords on the opposite Benches if I quoted something for which they had responsibility under the last Administration. But I can quote the Food and Drugs (Scotland) Act, 1956—that is the same thing—and the Local Employment (Scotland) Act, 1960. So it is a well precedented form of authority.
The only difference between what we are doing in this Bill and what was done in the others is that, whereas in the others the time limit is 24 hours, this Bill started off in that way, but it was amended in another place to increase the period of notice to 48 hours. The 48 hours cannot be taken as relating merely to the Highlands as against other areas, because the period of notice in the Crofters (Scotland) Act, 1955, is only 24 hours.
THE EARL OF SELKIRK: May I ask the noble Lord what is the significance of the words "before so entering"? I should have thought that this would have happened after entering. Are you excluded from producing your evidence after you have entered? If not, what is the point of the words "before so entering"?
LORD HUGHES: I should have thought that this was a protection for the occupier of the land: that he was entitled, if he had so inquired, to be at his boundary, and even before the man put a foot on the land could say: "I am entitled to ask you to produce your authority." It does not mean that the official is not under any obligation to produce it after he is on the land. After all, he is merely inviting the possibility that he will be thrown off if he does not produce evidence of his authority, so that, in self-defence, he would normally produce that authority if he was asked for it after he had entered on the land.
What one envisages will be done in the case of a major operation is, not that somebody in the Board will write a letter saying: "In 48 hours someone proposes to arrive on your land for this, that or the other purpose". This will be a formal procedure, which would possibly arise after a fair amount of discussion. What will take place is that the occupier of the land—and it may include the owner—will be there for the purpose of being with the officer of the Board or his representative when the visit is being made, so that he can answer questions, or so that he can ask questions, and be fully aware of what is taking place. It is not a question of seeking authority from the occupier, the occupier then disappearing, and the officer of the Board doing the job. I should expect in most cases that it would be a joint operation. If it were not, it would be because the occupier of the land had no desire to accompany the officer of the Board during his operations. It would be for him to decide whether he was to be there or not.
LORD DRUMALBYN: I have no doubt that, by and large, these arrangements work tolerably well, but one has to take into account the odd case and the time where it does not work so well. If the debates on these two sets of Amendments have brought out one thing, it is that there are two different sets of circumstances. The first is what you do before you enter at all; whether you come along and say: "Here I am. I am now going on to the land", if you are required to do so. The second is, once you have gone on to the land, whether you get challenged in any way, and whether that challenge would constitute an obstruction. I do not think we should
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carry on with legislation which appears to be rather slipshod, even if it is precedented. I hope the noble Lord will look at this matter again. We do not want to press him too far on it, but I suggest that my noble friend Lord Selkirk has put his finger on the point by saying that "before so entering" has no relevance at all to the case of a person who is, as we say in Scotland "stravaiging about the land". I think this is a matter, from the case I quoted from my experience, that can cause a disproportionate amount of dislocation on a whole lot of plans, if it goes wrong. Therefore, the great thing is to have arrangements which are as foolproof as possible, and I hope the noble Lord will try to achieve that.
LORD HUGHES: I shall be happy to look at Amendment No. 17 to find out whether the position would be improved, or whether it would be worsened, by leaving out the words "before so entering". I readily give that assurance. I can give no assurance in relation to Amendment No. 16, because it is our considered opinion, and that of our advisers, that this Amendment would be a licence to obstruct.
THE EARL OF SELKIRK: May I ask the noble Lord a question? We have here the words "if so required". This means that not only the people under Amendment No. 16 can certainly inquire, but anybody can inquire. Therefore, as the Bill is drafted, the number of people who can inquire of anyone coming on to land is far greater than it would be under Amendment No. 16. I only want to know what is in the noble Lord's mind, because it seems to me that anybody, whether he has any interest in the land or not, can ask: "What are you doing here?", and be answered: "I am representing the Highland Board". The other chap may say: "So am I". They may not know each other. Anybody can ask that. I do not see at the moment that Amendment No. 16 is anything but a restriction on the Bill as at present drafted.
LORD DRUMALBYN: May I at this stage withdraw the Amendment? I think the noble Lord has gone as far as we could expect him to go at this stage. I regret it if the Amendment which I have put down is inexpertly drafted, but it might be possible to cover the people who should be entitled to ask for

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authority and not leave it as wide open as my noble friend suggested.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
LORD BURTON: With one or two notable exceptions, the Government seem to object to any extra words being added into the Bill, particularly surplus ones. But I am legally informed that any land which is not tenanted is, in legal terminology, occupied by the owner. Consequently, I am moving the Amendment to delete the unnecessary words.
Amendment moved—
Page 7, line 4, leave out ("which is occupied").—(Lord Burton.)
LORD HUGHES: Amendments Nos. 18 and 22 probably go together, and if I say anything on Amendment No. 18 which applies more properly to Amendment No. 22, it is not intended in any way to take away the rights of the noble Lord, Lord Burton, when we come to Amendment No. 22. I would point out to your Lordships that this is not a matter which is being raised for the first time. It was very carefully considered in another place, and it was argued there that entry on to land impinged on the rights of the owners. The Amendments were negatived, and were not pressed to a Division, which is one way of indicating that those who proposed the Amendments were largely persuaded by the arguments but not, perhaps, completely convinced. When one thinks one is right in an Amendment, at some stage or another in another place it goes to a vote, rather than be negatived.
The effect of the first Amendment—and I will try to confine myself to the first Amendment—would be to deprive the Board of the ability to obtain statutory right of entry to any unoccupied land, since the clause as amended would require them to give notice to an occupier who was not there, the land not being occupied. I am told that there is land in the Highlands which comes quite definitely into the category of being unoccupied in the sense that there is no occupier of the land, and there is no known occupier of the land. The Department for which I have responsibility have more than once come into contact with arrangements where the physical owner of a piece of apparently worthless land is a trust which has gone out of existence; the last trustees have died, and no one has been appointed. There
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is, therefore, no owner of the land in existence. If these words were not put in, when the Board came to a piece of land of this kind they would be placed in the ridiculous position of having to take the course of tracing the descendants of the last known trustees, and perhaps seeking to enforce upon them something which they had no desire to undertake. It is because these circumstances are known to exist that there has to be separate reference to unoccupied land.
Having said that, one must admit that what the Board must do is to satisfy itself that land is in that position, and if anyone claims or purports to be the occupier (which, in the event of what is physically unoccupied land, would be virtually claiming ownership and occupation by virtue of being the owner) the Board would in fact serve the notice on anybody who was so claiming. That would not confer any rights of ownership which the claimant did not otherwise have, but it would protect the Board from any consequences of failing to serve notices if in fact it ultimately proved that he was the owner of the land. So the normal procedure would be that the Board would seek to establish who was the occupier of the land and give the necessary notice, and only where in the course of their normal inquiries they failed to find any such occupier would they then proceed on the basis that the land was unoccupied. That seems to me a reasonable basis on which to proceed, and in another place they accepted, at least to some extent, by allowing the Amendment to be negatived, that it was a reasonable basis for procedure.
LORD BURTON: In view of the eminently reasonable reply the noble Lord has given, I would with leave withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
LORD DRUMALBYN: This Amendment is moved for two purposes, the first of which has already been served. It was to establish from when the notice dates. We understand that it dates from the time at which the notice would be expected to arrive if it was posted when the sender thought it had been posted. The first purpose has been satisfied. The second purpose is to establish that when we say 48 hours we mean at least 48 hours, otherwise, of course, it would

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be nonsense if exactly 48 hours' notice had to be given. Those are the only two purposes, and I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 7, line 4, after ("unless") insert ("at least")—(Lord Drumalbyn.)
LORD HUGHES: In my discussions this morning on this Amendment it seemed to me that putting in the words "at least" was a safeguard for the officer of the Board, because if 48 hours meant 48 hours exactly, then if a person, whom one visualises may exist, wished to be obstructive he could say, "I am sorry you have not turned up until 10 o'clock. The 48 hours expired at half past nine and, therefore, you have no business to be here." If by leaving out the words "at least" we envisage that situation, then obviously it would be better to have the words "at least" in. I am assured by the legal officers in the office that it has been well established in legal practice that when a period is stated as 48 hours, it by implication means at least 48 hours, and stating 48 hours accomplishes exactly the same object as if we were to put in the additional two words.
On that basis, therefore, I ask the noble Lord not to press the Amendment, because there is ample precedent that this is how the law interprets a specified period—as if in fact the words "at least" were there. It will be so interpreted whether they are in or not.
BARONESS HORSBRUGH: May I ask the noble Lord whether there is any objection to having the words added?
LORD HUGHES: Yes, there is one very reasonable objection. I would be disgusted if I accepted this unnecessarily, and then found that this was the only Amendment which took the Bill back to another place.
BARONESS HORSBRUGH: Now we know.
LORD DRUMALBYN: The noble Lord has let the cat out of the bag, but I think we can reasonably expect that, when he has had the opportunity of considering some of the previous Amendments at the next stage, and is able to make some alterations in the Bill, he will also accept this Amendment. But in the
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meantime, I beg leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE moved, in subsection (4), to leave out "forty-eight hours" and insert "twenty-one days". The noble Marquess said: The noble Lord, Lord Hughes, was unable to help us over Amendment No. 16, but I suggest that perhaps he might be able to help us on this Amendment. What the noble Duke and my noble friends were envisaging was the possibility that it might be extremely difficult to let people know in sufficient time. I know that the noble Lord wants to be reasonable over this matter. He stressed in his admirable speech on Second Reading that what he wanted to achieve was an attitude of cooperation between the owners, occupiers and other interested people, and the officers of the Board. If the noble Lord wishes to achieve an attitude of co-operation, he should go as far as he can to engender a spirit of co-operation.
We now know what "48 hours" means. My noble friend Lord Drumalbyn's Amendment has elicited the reply we want—"at least 48 hours" and it means from the time the intimation would normally be expected to have reached the recipient. But this still seems to me to be a very short time. I put it to the noble Lord that three weeks is not excessive, particularly when we are dealing with large areas, some of which are in the same ownership. The letter would be written to the laird, and he would have to transmit its contents to the people concerned—to the gillie, or the shepherd or the forester—and let them know what was going to happen, so that when the representative of the Board arrived all would be ready for him. I cannot believe that the Board will have such urgent work to carry out that three weeks' notice will be impossible. I hope the noble Lord will be able to help us on this point, even if he cannot help us on Amendment 16.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: I support this Amendment, because I also feel that a period of 48 hours could lead to many difficulties. For instance, at lambing time it might be most inconvenient for the minions of the Board to go pussyfooting over one's hill at the same time

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as the ewes are lambing. I cannot believe that the Board's purposes would really be thwarted if they had to give three weeks' notice, or come to some agreement with the occupier about the amount of notice they should give in advance of their coming. It might also be inconvenient if one had arranged a large grouse-shoot on that day. A shoot takes a lot of organisation, and it is difficult to alter the day at a moment's notice, just because some members of the Board wish to come and look at one's land and see if one has a gold deposit under it—although personally I should be delighted if they would come and look at mine for that purpose.
I am personally not wedded to the idea of a period of 21 days. I would be prepared to consider any length of time, and I think that our Amendment may be defective in that we have not put in some such words as, "unless shorter notice is agreed to between the occupier and the Board". Obviously, nine times out of ten no reasonable person would mind any member of the Board coming at much shorter notice, and if they did agree that a shorter notice would be adequate, I imagine (although I may be wrong, because I am not a lawyer) that that would be all right, even if our Amendment were incorporated in the Bill. There is another reason why 21 days would be better. In many cases, the owner or occupier of the land may have the information which the Board is seeking, and by giving him sufficient time to produce this information the Board may save itself a lot of trouble. Therefore I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, will give us some little comfort over this Amendment.
VISCOUNT STONEHAVEN: I must point out that there are, believe it or not, quite a number of telephones in the Highlands. They actually have a directory of their own. Usually when one wants to ring up somebody he is in the wrong directory—but that is another matter. However, I think it is normal practice for people to use the telephone, and the Forestry Commission are excellent on this. They usually want to inspect plantings once a year, sometimes more, and they always ring up or write and ask which day will be convenient. Having arrived at a decision
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their officer comes over; we have a most interesting walk around my woods, seeing what I should have done, what I have done and what I have not done, and then we have luncheon together and we are all jolly good friends. Why in the world can we not run this Bill on that basis? The noble Lord says that he wants co-operation, and that is the way in which to get it. When all is said and done if you write a letter to the Scottish Office you will not get a reply in three weeks.
LORD BURTON: There is one other small reason why the period of 48 hours is too short. There may not be time to get the reply back to the Board, and it is most important, particularly in the initial stages, that the owner or occupier, or one of his representatives, should meet the person going round. Once a junior official gets something on his books, though he may have got the wrong idea, it is exceedingly difficult to overturn that decision. On the other hand, if one can talk to him, so that he gets the right idea in the first place, that saves a tremendous amount of trouble.
LORD HUGHES: Not for the first time I have cause to be grateful for the intervention of the noble Viscount, Lord Stonehaven, who always seems to manage to bring a degree of common sense to these things when we are discussing the matter on a basis of formality which we know will not be there during the event. It has not escaped the notice of those who have written my brief that there are telephones in the Highlands, and this business of giving notice is something which is laid down in the Bill for the protection of the occupier of the land. However, that would not normally be the end of it. One would not merely serve a formal notice. There would almost certainly be either some informal correspondence or, much more likely, a telephone message; and it is quite certain that the normal way of proceeding would be as the noble Viscount has indicated is followed by the Forestry Commission.
On the other hand, there could be great inconvenience and a waste of public money if a much longer period were laid down. I indicated to your Lordships earlier that in many other Acts, including the Crofters Act, the period of Statutory notice is 24 hours. This Bill originally

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had 24 hours' notice for this purpose, and an Amendment from the Opposition in another place to increase it to 48 hours was accepted. If a much longer period were given as the notice, the effect would be that the officer would not be safe in proceeding before that period of notice had expired. In many of the areas the Board will be having this done by an officer when he is in a particular area. The officer might receive a message from Inverness, "When you are there, will you go ahead with such-and-such a project". Visualise, for instance, a man in Shetland. He would not normally expect to be there for a period of 21 days or more, and obviously if he could do all these things during the one visit he would; but if the business to be undertaken required the presence of the occupier of the land no useful purpose would be served by proceeding after an interval of 48 hours if he did not have the owner there to co-operate with him. In those circumstances, what would obviously be done is exactly what the noble Viscount has indicated.
There is no reason to suppose that something which is put in as a legal safeguard for the protection of the occupier of the land will be regarded by the officers of the Board as being the way in which they must proceed. It would be the minimum which they would legally be required to do, but quite obviously the sort of thing that would happen is that they would get into touch with the owner and say, "We are sending you a notice. What would be a convenient date for us to do this? Shall we come along next week? "Or they might say," Our officer is to be in your area at a certain time, and it would be helpful if he could come on that day."
If we were to require this 21 days, for which there is no precedent anywhere, we should be making it most difficult for the Board to carry out its operations, because it would be legally prevented from acting before the 21 days had expired; whereas with a 48 hours notice, if common sense and reason required them to wait a week or so to do the thing by agreement, they would not legally be prevented from taking the longer period that common sense would prescribe. If we have this very long period we shall be preventing the Board and the occupiers of the land from doing the job in a
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reasonable way. My colleagues in another place showed willing to the extent of accepting an Amendment to double the period, but I think that there is no justification for going beyond that, except in the case of dwelling-houses, where the period is seven days.
LORD FORBES: The noble Lord seems to have based the whole of his argument on the fact that the Board is going to do something which is extremely reasonable but which is not in the Bill, but is not going to do something which is in the Bill and is unreasonable. I cannot accept that argument at all.
LORD AUCKLAND: I have listened with great interest to most of this afternoon's proceedings, and I think the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, is trying to be reasonable on this and other Amendments. It certainly seems to me that on a matter of this kind, where one has geographical considerations, weather considerations and others, it is difficult to fix a definite statutory period of time. Could not there be written into the Bill some such words as "agreed between the parties concerned", because one can assume that in most cases the parties concerned will be reasonable people? If this could be done, it would to some extent obviate the difficulties of having a statutory time limit which it may not always be possible to keep. I should be grateful if the noble Lord could consider that suggestion.
LORD HUGHES: I do not know if it is possible, but I should like to look at it. If it is possible to put it into words, it will be putting in the Bill what will be done. I do not think I made it quite clear that the serving of a notice is not necessary to carry it out. The serving of formal notice would be carried out only where the procedure had not been agreed. The normal thing would be to try to make arrangements when it would be convenient to come. The serving of statutory notice is intended to cover the situation where the occupier of the land is not being helpful at all and will not fix any time. There must be a point at which the Board can say, "We are very sorry; but we have spent the last fortnight, or a month, trying to fix a time when we can come, and we now hereby serve notice that we are coming in 48 hours".

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If I had created the impression that the first intimation that would be received would be a formal notice saying, "We are coming along in 48 hours", I should have been misleading your Lordships. The informal procedure will be followed: the formal procedure is only the last resort. I do not know whether there is a possibility of incorporating that whole procedure in the wording of the clause. If it is possible to do so, I shall be quite happy to put it in. But it may not be possible. I would remind your Lordships that when bodies are publicly constituted, and firm undertakings have been given in Parliament about the way in which they are expected to operate, they override those undertakings, even if they are not legally binding, at their peril.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: Could not the noble Lord consider the suggestion of the noble Duke and say three weeks or "such shorter time as may be agreed". I understand that he expects and hopes to get agreement.
LORD HUGHES: I do not think so, because I have drawn your Lordships' attention to the fact that the serving of the formal notice arises only after there has been failure to get agreement. Therefore to put in "or such shorter period as may be agreed", when the formal notice has become necessary only when it is impossible to get agreement, would not assist.
VISCOUNT STONEHAVEN: Could you not start off by saying "In the event of failing to get agreement 48 hours' notice shall be given"?
LORD AIREDALE: The clause says that the representative of the Board shall not demand admission as of right unless 48 hours' notice is given. It does not say anything about what may happen by agreement or consent. It is clearly referring to the last resort, as the Minister said, when the demand has been made. That is where the 48 hours comes in.
LORD BURTON: I do not think there is anything which specifies that the Board must try to make prior arrangement before serving notice. The noble Lord has said it is the intention, but I do not think there is anything in the Bill.
LORD AIREDALE: The Board would get into bad odour if it did not try to get agreement.
LORD BURTON: There are certain bodies which already do so.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: I do not know whether I have the authority of the noble Duke to withdraw the Amendment, but I think I have. I understand that the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, would like to look into this to see whether it is possible to put into words what he says will happen. With that assurance, I am happy to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: This is a much smaller point and not of very vast importance. I am absolutely fascinated to know why "land occupied for residential purposes" cannot be described as "dwelling-houses", which would seem a far more simple term and would mean far more to the average person who has the misfortune to have to read this Bill. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 7, line 5, leave out ("land occupied for residential purposes") and insert ("dwelling-houses").—(The Duke of Atholl.)
LORD HUGHES: The answer to this is very simple. "Land occupied for residential purposes" includes dwelling-houses, but "dwelling-houses" does not include the garden or the garage or outbuildings. So if we put in "dwelling-houses", all it would relate to would be the actual building. "Land occupied for residential purposes" is the dwelling-house and its appurtenances.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: I cannot see why the garden should be treated in a different way from a farm. Really, one is only an extension of another. Also, am I to understand that this expression includes farm buildings and therefore my cowshed would be safe for seven days? It seems to me that the house demands special dispensation with regard to notice, but I cannot see why the garden or even outhouse should demand special dispensation.
VISCOUNT STONEHAVEN: Would the word "policies" cover what is meant?
LORD HUGHES: I am afraid the word "policies" in Scotland has a rather grander purpose than land occupied for residential purposes. It might inflate the ego of quite a number of owners of small bungalows or semi-detached villas if their twenty poles were described as "policies", and I do not think it would commend itself to the common sense of Scotland. When the noble Duke said that he could see no difference between the piece of garden attached to a small dwelling-house and the land of a farm, the thought passed through my mind, perhaps quite unjustly, "There speaks the resident of a large mansion house and, quite obviously, not the occupant of a bungalow on twenty poles; and what may happen some twenty yards from the living room window of a bungalow carries quite a different connotation from what may happen half a mile or even 200 yards away from a farmhouse window".
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: I can assure the noble Lord that in this commercial age I am only too delighted to see enormous numbers of people wandering around within twenty yards of my living room.
LORD HUGHES: But those are the people who pay the noble Duke half-a-crown a head.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: On the strength of what the noble Lord says, I beg leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
6.31 p.m.
LORD BURTON: I have real hopes that the noble Lord will accept this Amendment. I think he almost accepted it before when on a previous Amendment he referred to "owners" rather than "occupiers"; and, in view of what has been said about the desirability of the officials meeting people on the site and doing away with formality, I hope that he will be able to accept this Amendment, which I now move.
Amendment moved—
Page 7, line 7, at beginning insert ("owner and the").—(Lord Burton.)
LORD HUGHES: I am sorry if I have given the noble Lord a quite erroneous impression. This is perhaps because I read only the first half of my brief which covers both of these Amendments. In
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fact it is quite impossible to accept this Amendment, for the reasons which I referred to in relation to unoccupied land. There are many cases where it would be virtually impossible to contact the owner. In some cases it would be impossible to contact an owner because there is no known owner in existence, and we should have to prove that. I referred to that case in the example of the lapsed trust. I would assure your Lordships that that is not an isolated case; it crops up with alarming frequency.
The second case was where the owner may in fact be at the other end of the earth. The purpose of giving this notice is to minimise inconvenience, to make certain that even in those cases where people have not been co-operating you try to cut down the inconvenience to them by specifying that you will do such-and-such a thing at a given time. If the owner is not in fact the occupier, there can be no possible inconvenience to him if the notice is not given to him, because it would be immaterial to him whether the inspection or examination or discussion with the occupier took place on one day or another; he would not be there in any event.
If there is anything to be done by the Board which involves negotiation with the owner of the property, that is a quite different matter. Obviously, things which affect the owner will be discussed with the owner. But that is not covered by Clause 10, and to add "the owner" would in fact add enormously to the Board's difficulties in many cases, without there being any corresponding advantage in others. For that reason, I am doubly sorry that I cannot accept the Amendment, first because I have reached the stage where I should like to be able to say "I accept this Amendment", and, secondly, because I appear to have raised the hopes of the noble Lord. But I did say something about unconfined joy.
LORD BURTON: This is particularly disappointing, because I have a case in mind where a considerable land drainage survey was undertaken and was overseen by the chief engineer of the Department of Agriculture. He said that a scheme was not feasible. Then the Crofters Commission was set up and, unbeknown to me as owner, the tenant went to it and the whole

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survey was done again. The tenant was encouraged to think that the scheme was going to take place. Eventually I got to hear of this. I referred those concerned to St. Andrew's House, and they were able to produce the original survey. There was a considerable waste of money simply because they did not come to me. I wonder whether the noble Lord might accept the phrase, "owners, where they are known to exist".
LORD HUGHES: No, I am afraid I cannot. To do it in this way would be quite unworkable. The noble Lord has given a personal experience, and one which I am quite certain will arouse in the Board the desire to be most careful when dealing with his property.
VISCOUNT STONEHAVEN: I wonder whether, when a letter is sent to the tenant, a carbon copy might be sent to the owner, where known, as that would not be a matter of great expense or difficulty.
LORD HUGHES: I should like to have an opportunity of talking to my advisers on this matter. It is quite possible that this is the sort of thing which would normally be done, that an owner would be acquainted even though there is no legal obligation for it. It may be that the objection to making it a legal obligation is the difficulties of finding an owner in so many cases. If it could be part of the administrative arrangement that where the owner was quite well-known within an area the information given to the occupier was given also to the owner, I personally can see no great difficulty in that, so long as it is not imposing a legal obligation on the Board to go and look for an owner who might not exist.
LORD BURTON: I am most grateful to the noble Lord for doing his best to try to meet this point. I beg leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL THE DUKE OF ATHOLL moved, in subsection (4), after "therein" to insert: "except in dwelling-houses.". The noble Duke said: As the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, has said that he is getting to the time when he would very much like to accept an Amendment, I hope that this will be the lucky one. I put it down because I woke up from a terrible night-
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mare, that perhaps someone might be able to bore for oil in my noble friend Lord Burton's cellar. This seemed to me an acute disaster and to be entirely unnecessary. I should like to know whether, under subsection (4) of this clause, the power to search and bore for the purpose of ascertaining the nature of the subsoil or the presence of minerals therein can be done in or under someone's dwelling-house (and here I mean "dwelling-house" as opposed to "garden"), because I feel that this would be an unnecessary power. Surely one could bore to one side or the other of the house. There are few houses in the Highlands which are so large that the subsoil radically changes underneath them. I feel that if the Board have this power it is undesirable, and that we ought to put in some proviso such as I have suggested. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 7, line 17, at end insert ("except in dwelling-houses".)—(The Duke of Atholl.)
LORD HUGHES: I have not reached the stage where I can accept this Amendment, but I am satisfied that I can reassure the noble Duke and persuade him that his Amendment is quite unnecessary. In the first instance, in the Interpretation Act, 1889, there is a definition of "land" which lays down that "land" includes buildings, but it goes on:
"unless the contrary intention appears".
In the context of Clause 10(5) I am informed that it is clear that "land" would not extend to cover a building, and even less a dwelling-house. I can go even further than that. The Board would be likely to be interested in probing for minerals only if it had reasonable cause for believing that they were present in such quantities as to make their exploration worth while. If the minerals were suspected to exist only under the area of a man's dwelling-house, the quantity which would be available would obviously be so small as to make it quite worthless for the exploration to be pursued. The compensation which would have to be paid for damage to, or destruction of, the dwellings would obviously exceed any return from the operation. So that both the Interpretation Act and the fact that we do not intend to scour the lunatic asylums for members of the Board are all the safeguards that are necessary.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: In view of what the noble Lord has said, I see why he has not been able to accept this Amendment. None the less, I hope that we shall have better luck in the future. I beg leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 10 agreed to.
Clause 11:
Power to obtain information
11.—(1) The Board may by notice served on the owner or occupier of any land in the Highlands and Islands or on any person carrying on a business or undertaking therein require him to furnish them with such information as may be specified in the notice with regard to the land, business or undertaking and with regard to such other matters relating thereto, as the Board may reasonably require for the execution of any of their functions under this Act in relation to the land, business or undertaking.
(2) Any owner, occupier or other person on whom a notice has been served under the last foregoing subsection may within one month of the service of the notice appeal to the sheriff on the ground that the information or any part thereof specified in the notice is not reasonably required by the Board for the execution of any of their functions under this Act in relation to the land, business or undertaking, and the sheriff may make such order either confirming or quashing or varying the notice as he thinks fit.
LORD BURTON LORD BURTON moved, in subsection (1), to leave out the first "any" and insert "such". The noble Lord said: I gather that this Amendment has caused some confusion, but it might help if I take with it Amendment No. 27, for the one does not really make sense without the other. The intention here is that, now there is a right of appeal to the sheriff, it is only reasonable that the person who appeals should know what he is appealing about. At the moment nothing has to be specified in the notice to say for what reason the notice has been served. For instance, if the authority wish to take the premises over for a hotel they are not required to say that that is the purpose for which it is required. All they have to say is that they want to take over the premises, or to search them. Consequently, I feel that it is only reasonable that the few words in my Amendment should be added. Therefore, I hope that they can be accepted.
Amendment moved—
Page 8, line 3, leave out ("any") and insert ("such").—(Lord Burton.)
LORD HUGHES: It is not quite acceptable, but it is the nearest approach yet. The brief I was originally given started off with the word "Resist", but after a long discussion with my colleagues this morning I was able to persuade them to allow me to say that I was prepared to consider the matter. I wanted to hear exactly what the noble Lord proposed. There is a possibility that this could be done in the particular way he suggests, and therefore I would ask him to withdraw the Amendment on the assurance that I am prepared to consider the Amendment.
LORD BURTON: I am indeed grateful to the noble Lord that we have got this far. Consequently, I beg leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
6.44 p.m.
LORD DRUMALBYN LORD DRUMALBYN moved, in subsection (1), after "Act" to insert: "other than under section 6 thereof". The noble Lord said: Noble Lords will be aware that Clause 6 deals with the power of the Board to
"acquire by agreement and carry on or set up and carry on, directly or through an agent, or themselves carry on as agent, any business or undertaking which in the opinion of the Board will contribute to the economic or social development of the Highlands and Islands … ".
In the course of the debate on the Second Reading on June 29, the noble Lord said in his opening remarks [column 737]:
" … the Board could not seek information from a firm"—
presumably, he meant demand it com-pulsorily—
"to enable the Board to set up a business in opposition to that firm."
If they cannot seek it to enable them to set up in opposition, still less I should have thought would they be able to seek it in order to acquire a firm by agreement. Therefore, it would seem that the words here merely reflect what is the law. In order to make certain that they reflect what is the law, or what will be the law under this Bill, I beg to move this Amendment, so that the power to obtain information compulsorily will not apply to activities under Clause 6.
Amendment moved—
Page 8, line 4, after "Act" insert the said words.—(Lord Drumalbyn.)
THE EARL OF SELKIRK: I should like to say one word in support of my noble friend. I think that it is intolerable that this Board should be entitled, by compulsory powers, to obtain information which they want for some conceivable development in the Highlands from those who are at present engaged in business in the Highlands. The important thing is that the existence of such a power would act as a material deterrent for anybody to set up business there, because he would know that power could conceivably be used. I believe that the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, would agree with that—in fact, I think he said it in moving the Second Reading of the Bill. I therefore hope that the noble Lord will recognise that this Amendment is a perfectly reasonable proposal which does no more than fulfil, not only the undertakings which he has given, but a number of undertakings which have been given in another place, so that these powers will not be used for examining and cross-examining existing firms in the Highlands.
LORD HUGHES: I start off by saying that I entirely agree that the situation which the noble Earl, Lord Selkirk, described would be intolerable. But the situation which he described is not the situation which will exist under Clause 11. I go further than I went on Second Reading, but no further than my right honourable friend and my honourable friends have gone in another place. It would not be possible under this clause to acquire by compulsion information which would be used to the detriment of the firm or company from which it was being acquired. On Second Reading I used the words "… to set up a business in opposition." If I had used the expression "to the detriment of a business" that would go still further. It is conceivable that information could be acquired and used detrimentally against a firm without setting up somebody else in opposition to them. If the Board sought to obtain information of this kind from a firm and appealed to the sheriff, it is inconceivable that the sheriff would agree to the information's being given.
On this matter I am in danger of talking about the appeal procedure on which there is a separate Amendment, so I will say no more about that point at this stage. If the Amendment were accepted,
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the advice I am given is that it would unduly and unwisely hamper and restrict the Board's operations. The right to obtain information by compulsion is very much circumscribed in the form in which this Bill has now reached your Lordships. The overlying qualifications throughout are that it can only be information which the Board reasonably require for the exercise of their functions in relation to the business or undertaking from which the information is required. In my brief, the words
"in relation to the business or undertaking from whom the information is required"
are underlined. A number of things could be involved. For instance, the Board might be asking for information in regard to tourist facilities. In discussions, the hotel proprietors might say, "There are ample hotel facilities in this area. We can accommodate the people who come along to us; in fact, we can take even more people. But regularly we have complaints from people that this, that or the next thing is not being done. There are inadequate parking facilities. More needs to be done in connection with ski-ing facilities and so on."
To enable the Board to decide whether something was in fact reasonable, they might require to get information, even by compulsion, to enable them to arrive at a decision on the matter which would be in relation to the activities of the undertaking. Such information could come only from the people concerned, and if the Board were not given it willingly it might have to come by compulsion because the Board might be persuaded that if they could get the information they would really want to do something. Having got the information, and having decided to go ahead and extend the facilities and provide the car park or provide the service, whatever it may be, it could not possibly be argued that the doing of this was something which was detrimental to the interests of the people from whom the information was received. But unless the Board were in a position to get the information, they might be deprived of the opportunity of going ahead.
I should like to refer to a suggestion which has been discussed from time to time and which has come from the Shetlands County Council. It is that it would be a desirable thing to set up a

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spinning mill in the Shetlands, to spin the wool which is produced there. In order to find out what were the possibilities, the Board might seek to get information from the producers of wool about their production and about existing outlets of wool in the islands. It might be that from half of the people concerned they would get the information quite freely, but that this did not give enough information to enable them to decide whether or not it was worth going ahead; and in order to arrive at a decision they would need information from a larger number of people.
It would be quite wrong if a potentially viable project had to be abandoned because the Board had no way of getting the rest of the information to enable them to make a proper decision. In these circumstances it would be perfectly proper to compel the other producers of wool to give the information which the Board needed, because the resultant use of the information, even if the wool mill was set up, could not possibly be regarded as something which was detrimental to their interests, as they would not be under any obligation to sell their wool to the mill if they could find a better market for it elsewhere.
What the Board would want to have in mind is whether there was very much certainty of a mill being able to get from the producers the wool it would need to make its operations viable. If the receiving of this information persuaded the Board that they would only be wasting their time by setting up such a mill there, because most of the producers would follow the arrangements they already had, which might mean exporting the wool to Aberdeen or to other areas, then, obviously, the Board would not go ahead with the project. It is very difficult to think of a great variety of examples, but there are two—the first one, the one about the facilities helpful to hotel owners being wholly hypothetical; the second one not being hypothetical at all, but something which has actually arisen and which, without the presence of these powers, could be completely frustrated. For that reason, I have no hesitation at all in asking the noble Lord to withdraw this Amendment.
THE EARL OF SELKIRK: I am grateful to the noble Lord for saying that it would be intolerable for the power to be used as stated here, but I find that the example he gave us about wool is as thin as anything could possibly be. There is never the slightest difficulty in finding out what is the production of wool. Indeed, unless they had some special reason for wanting to deceive, the producers would be delighted to tell you. I think the noble Lord has not made out a case. I do not propose to press this matter unduly, but I find it very hard to believe that this power is necessary for the purpose for which it is intended.
LORD HUGHES: The noble Earl says that I have made out a very thin case in connection with wool. If the case is as thin as he would imply, one wonders why the spinning mill is not there at the present time.
LORD DRUMALBYN: There may be many reasons for that. One can well imagine many answers to that question; among others, that the whole supply of wool is taken up at the present time and that it is very profitably used as things are. As my noble friend has said, I do not think we ought to press this Amendment at the present time. I share with him the feeling that the two examples which the noble Lord gave do not really support the case for rejecting this Amendment. But, together with my noble friend, I should like to examine the examples between now and the Report stage, as this is rather a complicated matter, and if necessary we will refer to it again then. In the meantime, I beg leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
LORD SHEPHERD: I wonder whether I may suggest an alteration in our business this evening. Obviously, we should like to see the Committee stage of this Bill completed, but one recognises that some noble Lords, particularly the Minister, have borne a very heavy burden. If I may say so, I think that my noble friend Lord Hughes has done extraordinarily well. Since some noble Lords who wish to take part in the next debate are present, I wonder whether I could suggest to the noble Earl, Lord Selkirk, that after the next Amendment we should take the debate which he has on the Order Paper. After that break we can then

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come back to complete the Committee stage. That is what I should like to propose.
THE EARL OF SELKIRK: I should be very happy to fall in with that arrangement. Indeed, I am filled with admiration for the stamina of the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, in this business. I am only too willing to co-operate.
LORD DRUMALBYN: I think that the next Amendment may take a little longer than some others, and it might be more convenient to adjourn at once to take the next business. I am sure we have all had enough.
LORD SHEPHERD: I think that is right.
LORD HUGHES: I beg to move that the House do now resume.
Moved, That the House do now resume. (Lord Hughes.)
On Question, Motion agreed to, and House resumed accordingly.

REPORT OF THE AIR TRANSPORT LICENSING BOARD
7 p.m.
THE EARL OF SELKIRK THE EARL OF SELKIRK rose to call attention to the Fourth Report of the Air Transport Licensing Board, and in particular to paragraphs 40 to 43; and to move for Papers. The noble Earl said: My Lords, at this hour, and with the shadow of the noble Lord, Lord Egremont, in front of us, I will endeavour to be as brief as I can. I want, if I may, to say first of all that it is possible that the way I have worded my Motion may not have made it quite clear to everyone reading it exactly what it is that I am seeking to say. I wish to draw attention to what I regard as the urgent need for direct air services from points outside London to points overseas, and I want to give the reasons why I think this is a major element in (shall I say?) the lack of balance in the air services in this country, and concerns an urgent economic need of the country at the present time.
Since the war we have seen a considerable development of the air services in this country, as indeed there has been elsewhere. I do not wish to criticise in principle the two great air services we
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have, both of which are now among the leading air services in the world to-day. I accept that. I could criticise them on many grounds; but I think the ground I am putting forward now is one of the major defects in the general lines on which aviation has developed in this country to-day. In this connection, we have recently shown a steady annual development of the order of 15 per cent. With an expansion of this sort you are in a position to mould the direction of development far more than you would be if you were dealing with a static organisation. Therefore, there is the chance of developing the course of evolution properly. The major defect from which we suffer is over-concentration on London. Many of us, when we discussed the formation of these Corporations twenty years ago, anticipated that this might happen. To my mind, this has happened at least as fully as I ever expected it would, and perhaps more so. The control of aviation has been centred on London, and the whole emphasis has been on making the services London services rather than provincial services.
My Lords, how bad is the situation? I do not want to go into a lot of detail. I want, if I may, to put forward one or two general statistics to show just how bad it is. I put down a Question the other day, which I am afraid must have entailed rather a lot of trouble to those people who had to answer it, but certain statistical facts emerged from it. The first is that 85 per cent. of our overseas services take off from London and the Home Counties—that is, from the South-East of England—and the rest of the country has to do with 15 or perhaps 16 per cent. of the services to overseas points. May I put it in a different way? Weekly—and these figures are for a given week at the beginning of May—1,600 British and foreign aircraft take off for points overseas. As we look round the country we see that Wales has 5, Northern Ireland has 10, Yorkshire has 18 and Glasgow and Edinburgh airports have 34, but none of them are British. That means that these areas (which, if you like to put it in this way, are the capital areas outside London) have an almost negligible overseas air service. These figures compare with that of 1,600 a week for the two main airports of London. Indeed, on the map of Europe which B.E.A.

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publish there is no sign at all of Cardiff, Belfast or Edinburgh. I should have thought that, even from the point of view of the tourist, it might be of some value to include them.
Three things have happened in the last six to nine months to which I should like to draw attention. The first is that last autumn the Air Transport Licensing Board described as satisfactory the situation that overseas services should come into London and that the rest of the country should be content with feeder services. This view was put forward and explained, as I have said, in paragraph 41 of the A.T.L.B. Report which was published last year. They said that the acid test as to whether any proposals were right or wrong was profitability. I am not against any organisation making a profit, but I would say that, so far as a semi-monopoly or a monopoly is concerned, profitability is not the acid test. This is not the test to which we should put an organisation of this sort.
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, would the noble Lord excuse me one moment? I did not quite get the source of that statement.
THE EARL OF SELKIRK: The source of that statement is the Report of the Air Transport Licensing Board which it put out last October, and with which the noble Lord is, I am sure, familiar. One of the first statements it makes in paragraph 41 is—and I will read the words out so that there will be no doubt about it:
" … to be justified commercially by reference to the acid test of profitability; …".
All I am saying is that I am not against profit—I think every organisation ought to make its own ends meet properly—but this is not the acid test when you come to a monopoly. The second point the Board makes, of course, is that aerodromes cost money, and are expensive. But I am not raising this question in regard to new aerodromes. I am saying: use the existing aerodromes, and I am saying that the philosophy of the A.T.L.B. as shown in this Report is wrong.
The next thing that has happened is that the Minister has rather tightened the monopoly. I am not quite certain what the point of this is, but I think it
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is that he does not want any increase in the competitive running on trunk routes. The third thing that has happened is this. I am informed—and I should like the noble Lord to confirm it or otherwise—that the Minister of Aviation has in at least one case told the Air Transport Licensing Board that they should not even hear an application; that is to say, it is not a question of hearing an application and then refusing it, but the Minister has actually told the Board that they should not listen to an application. I mention these things because most of us, I think, foresaw this development, this concentration of overseas services on London, but we hoped that, in due course, probably through the Air Transport Licensing Board, there would gradually be an expansion of those services from the areas outside London. I have therefore got to say that these recent developments have been extremely discouraging to independents which might take part, and have increased our dependence on the monopoly which exists.
I should like to make this point, too, if I may. The noble Lord may say that they have not had any applications to start up new services. But, of course, applications made before the Air Transport Licensing Board cost money. Not only that, but to survey a route, whether it be between Manchester and Dusseldorf or Glasgow and Hamburg, costs the developers money. The cost may run into tens of thousands of pounds before it can be shown to be worth doing. Therefore, unless these independents are given some encouragement, they will not put forward their serious suggestions. If we do not use the independents, then I think we must go back to giving instructions to B.E.A. I must, in fairness, say that I think this is sufficiently serious for the Minister either to get someone else to run services to provincial areas or, alternatively, to give instructions to B.E.A.
I should like, if I may, just to state the situation as I see it, which I think is fairly stated in the Guardian. It says:
"Passengers are not forbidden to leave England, but they must leave by the right pen."
That was in a leading article on February 20. They have all got to go through the right pen. From the same paper,

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I would also quote from an article by a gentleman who feels very strongly about it. Writing on May 18, he said:
"Manchester can boast one of Britain's most modern, best-equipped and—other than Prestwick—least-used international airports. This is a great pity, not only from the point of view of the ratepayer who is responsible for this magnificent installation, but even more so from that of the air passenger on business, who is forced by the fiat of the State airlines to travel to most destinations abroad either at ridiculous hours, or via London".
I am quoting that to show that there is considerable feeling in many parts of the country about what is happening.
I suspect that the noble Lord will say one of two things. He will say that the other lines from provincial centres do not pay. There is no answer to that; for no one knows until it is tried out. If he thinks that, then I beg him to let those people try who wish to try. Or he will say that there are great difficulties about landing rights. I do not know the position about landing rights; and nobody does, except the Minister of Aviation. Frankly, it may be argued—though I am not going to argue strongly on this—that this work could be done better by the Foreign Office than by the Ministry of Aviation. I am not expressing an opinion; but I am asking, if we cannot get landing rights to enable us to provide essential services, what are we doing about it? Is the Minister complaining to those countries which will not provide us with adequate landing rights at the present time?
It is common knowledge that the services to Paris are highly inadequate to-day. What is being done to supplement them? Or are we in a position where, in fact, the whole of aviation in Europe is being held up by a form of Governmental cartel using its own air services really as a mean of "skinning" the flying public? Is this the situation? Are we up against a cartel of Governments in Europe using the facilities of aviation to get as much money as they can from the travelling public, and not providing adequate services? I do not know whether the noble Lord will say this. If so, let him explain what action is being taken to overcome the difficulty and the reluctance of other countries to provide the adequate services which we can provide; because, in fairness, I must say that in this country the number of
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domestic services is high. It is, I believe, nearly double the equivalent domestic services in North America at the present time. There is plenty of room, I believe, for development in this.
May I say why this is important? This Report, the fourth Report of the Air Transport Licensing Board, says that we must not give way to local pride. I agree that this is not a question of local pride. This is a question, first, of over-congestion in London, of over-congestion from the point of view of passengers, which makes London Airport a very unpleasant airport, indeed, and one which I hope Mr. Peter Masefield will be able to improve, but I believe, with regret, that there is an Augean stable to be cleared out there. Secondly, I believe that a development of this sort is essential for export trade. As I have said, on the map of Europe used by B.E.A. you do not see Newcastle, Leeds, Bristol and a number of other towns. It is a matter of tremendous importance to trade. It is not enough simply to have feeder services. If you have someone coming from Germany, say, to see your plant, then it is better that he should be able to come direct from Hamburg to Glasgow, for example. It is a tremendous encouragement to him; besides which, of course, there is the saving of time.
We are to-day talking about, and have been talking about for a long time, a better-balanced spread of economy in this country. I believe that this is the Government's policy. I hope it is. I am sure that this is essential for the well-being of the country. But we shall not get this unless we get better facilities for travelling all over the country. I will end by saying this. We have been warned for twenty-five years that the drift of the industrial population to London and the Home Counties constitutes a social, economic and strategic problem which demands immediate attention. It may not be a strategic problem, but I am sure that it is still a social and economic one, and it is one to which I believe very few Governments have paid more than what I would call lip-service. Twenty-five years is a long time. I am going to ask the noble Lord three questions. First, will the noble Lord say that he does not accept the philosophy in paragraph 41 of the Fourth Report of the Air Transport Licensing Board? Will he recognise that

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better air services are urgently required to the provincial centres of this country? Will he say that he is open to receive any suggestion on how those services could be provided? I beg to move for Papers.
7.15 p.m.
LORD ST. OSWALD: My Lords, this debate has opened later than many of us expected, and I have to say at this moment, to my great regret, that I shall have to leave before being able to hear the speech of the noble Lord who is to wind up. I have expressed my regret; and it is a particular regret in view of the fact that I know how informative he always tries to be. He has assured me that he does not regard this as a discourtesy. I shall be questioning, though less captiously than I should have been had I been able to remain to the end; and I propose to follow my noble friend in calling particular attention to paragraphs 40 to 43 of the Report we are now debating.
If I had to declare an interest, then it would be an interest shared by all of those in this country whose homes and businesses lie beyond easy reach of London Airport. But I believe the interest is, in fact, more widely embracing than that. I believe that London and the South-East will themselves benefit if further overcrowding of Heathrow Airport is avoided. Clearly, one means of avoiding such overcrowding would be the expansion and creation of other airports. I am going to ask the Minister whether the disadvantages of this solution have been fully taken into account and whether the advantages of regional international airports have been fully examined. Together with my noble friend, I doubt whether they can have been fully examined.
To me, the opening sentence of paragraph 40 is defeatist in its essence, and all the conclusions flowing from that opening sentence tend to be defeatist in character. The opening words read:
"For good or ill, London is the hub of the nation's international air services."
In conceding that it may be for ill, I should have thought that the authors of this section of the Report would have applied themselves to the possibility of overcoming this ill. In fact, they do the reverse. They follow with an assumption
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that this ill must always be with us. I find this regrettable and unnecessary. I agree that this is a problem which successive Ministers have found difficult. Modern airports require a great deal of capital, and Ministers of spending Departments very properly question whether the fruits of such expenditure are in large-scale demand—and whether they will bring in returns. It is especially hard to calculate what demand there is, for instance, among businessmen and others—I say "for instance"—in the North of England for better air facilities. But that, it seems to me, is no reason for making no effort to calculate that demand. I have tried to discover what effort, if any, has been made, and all the evidence I have found is negative. The Minister will correct me if I am wrong in thinking that the Ministry of Aviation has almost no idea as to the origin and final destination of passengers using London Airport.
I quote, in support of my belief, from the Report of the Technical Panel of the Standing Conference on London Regional Planning, from the printed agenda of November 25 last year:
"We thought it very desirable to know something of the origins and destinations in Britain of air travellers using the London Airports; how much of the traffic is for business purposes, how much is for holidays, and how much of the expected increase might be of the latter. We also thought it important to know the extent of the freight traffic increase referred to in the Report and how much of it would need to be based on the London airports. The data available is very limited. A recent survey at Heathrow showed that about three-quarters of all outgoing passengers originated in South-East England."
My noble friend gave the figure of 85 per cent. of passenger-carrying capacity leaving for abroad on international flights from London Airport. I think he spoke in those terms.
THE EARL OF SELKIRK: My Lords, I said: "from South-East England". This, of course, includes Gatwick, Southend and Lydd. I should like to be clear about that.
LORD ST. OSWALD: I stand corrected; I am sorry. I should have expected that to be the terms in which my noble friend was speaking.
Clearly, the Technical Panel was not satisfied with the precision of these data. So far as this serves at all, it poses the

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question: why did only one-quarter of all the outgoing passengers originate from other regions? May it not be that other air-minded businessmen capable of making their contribution to the export drive—this reinforces the point made by my noble friend—were put off by the difficulties and delay, the obliqueness of reaching London and continuing from there to their destination?
I am told that businessmen from Hull frequently drive to London Airport to fly to the Continent, but I believe that a time-and-motion study would condemn the inconvenience and delay thus imposed upon them, and would recommend a more direct and streamlined journey. As noble Lords will doubtless know, a survey has been carried out by a body of people who have formed themselves into "The Yorkshire Airport Development Association". I should like to know how carefully the report on this survey has been considered by the Ministry and by the Air Transport Licensing Board. It happens that I live in the West Riding of Yorkshire, and the recommendations in the Report would greatly benefit that area; so I must be explicit in saying that I introduce this survey only as an example of what could be done for other regions in the country according to their characteristics. My noble friend has already spoken of the benefits to Scotland.
The report is quite firm and, to me, convincing in finding a demand for regional international air facilities and a dissatisfaction with the present state of affairs; that is to say, the lack of these facilities. If I may, I will quote three short paragraphs describing the principal factors which it claims have brought these demands to a head:
"The drift to the South and West of the younger and more skilled population, and the greater concentration of new industries in Southern England.
"The inadequacy of the air transport facilities for passengers and cargo east of the Pennines, the inaccessibility of Ringway to most of the North-East area, and the lack of scheduled air services from points within the eastern sector of Britain bounded by Newcastle, Leeds, Derby, Coventry and Cambridge.
"The economic need to strengthen the marketing position of the North-East, bearing in mind the growth of trade with Europe, whether Britain moves within or remains without the Common Market area, and the wider need to avoid segregation from the political and social forces now shaping the growth of all countries of the Western Alliance."
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To my mind, in the paragraphs we are discussing the Board does not face these factors. The members tend to avert their eyes from the need, and from the dissatisfaction involved. They point out in paragraph 42 that airports are expensive—which we all know—but assume that, because they are expensive, they must be rejected. Obviously, cost effectiveness must command, but I see no sign that the possible cost effectiveness has been allowed for. In fact, the Board says:
"The financial side of this equation is outside our terms of reference and is of only indirect interest to us."
It is, however, very much within the terms of reference of industry, and of the most direct interest to industry in all parts of Britain within and beyond convenient range of the South-East boundaries.
At this point I think I might ask, what is to happen when Heathrow Airport reaches saturation point and Gatwick has to take more and more international flights? Many of the transit passengers will be obliged to cross from Gatwick to Heathrow, or vice versa, a thoroughly inconvenient and doubtless irritating additional "leg" to their journey. The situation would be further complicated by the proposed new airport at Stanstead. Is it right to condemn from the outset the solution proposed by certain thoughtful people in other areas, to take the increasing pressure off London Airport by direct links, in increasing numbers, between the major industrial areas and their counterparts in Europe or the capitals of European countries? As I said earlier, it seems to me defeatist to suggest that this solution does not exist, and never will.
There is, of course, the argument that the English weather imposes problems on regular flying which do not exist in other countries, but with the development of automatic landing, this is becoming a less and less important factor. I am told that within eight years it could disappear. As many noble Lords will know, the de Havilland element of the Hawker-Siddeley Aviation Company is taking us ahead of other countries in this branch of technology, and it seems to me that this development offers particular benefits to our country and its industry. It would be lamentable if we left it out of account in our long-term planning.

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My Lords, I do not think it can be denied that the provision of direct international air services from strategic industrial points offers a substantial benefit to the economy of the area so served. This is recognised in the Report which we are debating. The service from Newcastle to Paris is specifically referred to as having been licensed. I believe that it is now in operation, but it can serve only a smaller industrial area than would be served by international flights from other industrial areas. The speed of modern communications undoubtedly requires direct services to make us truly competitive with other industrial nations. The more congested Heathrow Airport becomes, the less competitive we shall be, and I do not believe that three airports, widely spread and at different compass points from the centre of London, can be expected to overcome this disadvantage.
I cannot see where or how it can be argued that our industrial effort can be properly expanded without a communications system which keeps pace with this modernisation. It must be right to enable, indeed to encourage, all those who wish to contribute to this modernisation to do so. How far are the Government looking ahead in the matter of those requirements? In the United States of America a vast and comprehensive review of present and future requirements is produced in the form of the "National Airport Plan". The hard factors of demand and cost efficiency are tabled and the deductions are drawn. What is there to parallel this in our own preparations for the future? All the Report has to say is:
"Hurtful though it may be to local pride, London will for many years to come be able to offer a range and frequency of services to places overseas that cannot be matched by direct services from other places in the United Kingdom."
Is this true; is this desirable, and, if so, why?
7.29 p.m.
LORD POLWARTH: My Lords, I should like warmly to support the noble Earl, Lord Selkirk, who has raised this most important subject. He mentioned policies of regional development. There is, I think, no disagreement between noble
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Lords on both sides of the House in wanting to see policies of regional development succeed. We want to see industry more evenly spread throughout the country. Unless we develop to the full the economic resources of all parts of the country, and unless we put a halt to the overcrowding of the South of England, with all its inflationary effects, we shall not solve the national economic problem.
In the development of new industry the key is communications, because it is by the meeting of minds that results from personal contact that all the main processes of industry develop, whether it be research, invention, production or sales and very important export sales. This meeting of minds from personal contact is one of the key factors. We know from experience that the greater the distance from the main centres of population, the greater becomes the importance of communications.
The first question that many companies ask when looking for a new location is, "What are the air services?" The availability or otherwise of these has influenced many decisions, as I am personally aware. That is why those of us who are working in the regions to make these development policies a success are insistent on the need for speedy and direct air communications overseas, not only from London, but also from other parts of the country. We are not so much concerned with long-haul inter-continental services. For one thing, the time factor is not so vital, and, for another, there are adequate and good transatlantic services, certainly out of Scotland and to some extent out of the North of England. One interesting result of that is that in Scotland a large number of North American companies have taken root there because they have direct access to the home country.
The real problem is access from these parts of Britain to the continent of Europe. That is the reason why we take great exception to the views on this subject expressed in the paragraph of the Report to which the noble Earl has drawn attention, the view that, by and large, it is profitable to channel air traffic with the Continent through London Airport. As most of us know, the conditions for transit through London Airport are nothing short of disgraceful at the present time. I say this not lightly, but from

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recent personal experience, both there and of other international airports on the Continent and in North America. That even B.E.A. recognise this situation is shown by a note appended to one of the recent timetables, saying that the minimum connecting interval for passengers transferring from domestic to international flights of B.E.A. will in future be one hour, and therefore certain connections shown in the timetable will no longer be valid. That is a situation which surely does not reflect a satisfactory state of affairs. For further evidence, I commend the report, referred to in The Times yesterday, of a study of the Westminster Junior Chamber of Commerce, who have been investigating the state of affairs at the airport.
Let us hope, as did the noble Earl, Lord Selkirk, that the new management will bring much-needed change. Like the noble Earl, we should all wish the new Chairman well in taking on this immensely important job. But the last thing that will help him in that job is to allow more and more services to go through London Airport. I know that, on one side, it is argued that if there were the demand for services from the regions, if there were likely to be enough traffic to make them profitable in the foreseeable future, then they would be provided either by B.E.A. or by private British operators, or by overseas airlines. This is an over-simplification of the state of affairs because, unfortunately, as the noble Earl pointed out, there are too many vested interests conspiring against the travelling public. The B.E.A. argument on profitability was used frequently fifteen and more years ago when, as the noble Lord, Lord Beswick, may remember, the noble Earl, Lord Selkirk, and I were both advocating more frequent services between Scotland and London. The argument always was that there was not enough traffic to justify them. Look at what has happened. To-day there are over 2,000 seats a day in each direction between Scotland and London, and at this time of the year they are just about all full.
Of course, these services require money to develop. The trouble is that, with their existing profitable network, their main base in London and their effective shelter from competition, there is no inducement for B.E.A. to go out and
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pioneer these routes. It is all very well for the Minister of Aviation to say that he will encourage private operators to open up any new route. They cannot be expected to do so unless they are given, first, enough flights to occupy fully a minimum number of aircraft and enable them to be in the right places for those flights, and, secondly, an opportunity to operate some profitable routes to enable them to build up the new one.
Finally, there is the question of the foreign operator. Here we have the restrictive situation of the international Agreement about services between one country and another. Many foreign operators are aware that they can get a right to operate to a British provincial centre only by surrendering a right to operate into London, and that they can hardly be expected to do. A year or more ago, there was a regrettably restrictive affair, when Scandinavian Airlines were cut back on services which they operated directly from Scotland to Scandinavia.
I think that this is a clear case of double thinking in the Government and in their creature, the Air Transport Licensing Board. On the one hand, they are seeking to encourage the economic development of the regions and expressing concern at the growing congestion at London Airport—indeed, the near-saturation of it—and, on the other, they are giving no encouragement—in fact, I fear, active discouragement—to the provision of direct overseas services from other parts of the country which would both help the regional economies and relieve congestion at London.
I do not blame B.E.A. in this matter. In many spheres, they are doing a first-rate job. They brought me from Edinburgh between lunch and tea to-day, smoothly and efficiently. I am glad to see what might be the beginning of a new policy in the recent announcement that they are starting more direct services from Manchester to Continental centres, with adequate connections from Scotland. If this comes about, we shall indeed be grateful for them. But, after all, they are in a privileged position, almost of monopoly on some routes. They are perfectly entitled to take advantage of it. It is up to the Government to ensure that the privileges are matched by obligations.

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One of them is to pioneer these direct services to the Continent. I am sure, from what I have seen, that it will not be long before they come into operation.
The alternative is for the Government to give private operators a real chance to operate these new routes and not a mere shadow of one. Finally, if it is international Agreements that are preventing the start of these services by overseas airlines, then I hope that the Government will openly denounce the restrictive Agreements which are in operation in this whole field of aviation between one country and another and which operate so greatly to the detriment of the travelling public. In any case, like the noble Earl, Lord Selkirk, I sincerely hope that they will dissociate themselves from the line taken in this paragraph in the Report.
7.39 p.m.
LORD FORBES: My Lords, I shall be even briefer than usual to-night because I am not feeling in the best frame of mind at the moment. Having failed to get a seat last night, I had to get up at half past five this morning to get a seat in order to reach your Lordships' House this afternoon. I should have liked to be able to support wholeheartedly the noble Earl's plea that some Continental traffic should be syphoned off from London Airport, but I am not sure that I can go the whole way with him, because I feel that the timing is not quite right for that. I do not think that the noble Earl need shed a tear, because I am certain that it is something that is going to come about, whether we want it or not. There is a big jam of traffic at London Airport at present, and we are told that traffic will probably double there in the next four to six years.
Apart from the difficulties at London Airport, I am doubtful whether this is the right time to move Continental traffic from London. The reason is that domestic flights are absolutely the lifeblood of Scotland, not only for industry and business, but also for the remoter parts. At last domestic flights are beginning to get going. And, what is more important, domestic flights are also the feeder services for the Continental services: in other words, these services are dual purpose, and this is a tremendous help. This is an important fact that we
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simply must not lose sight of. Whatever happens, we must not at present take away traffic from our domestic routes until these have been fully developed. The Air Transport Licensing Board recognised this in their Report, and I think they have come to the right conclusions at the moment.
Another point is that it is far better to have a regular service than to have an irregular service which is split between London and Scotland. The Air Transport Licensing Board have a vital part to play over air transport. I believe that they should insist that we should have maximum expansion of domestic routes, even if this leads to increased competition. Operators must be able to expand on an equal footing. Some time ago, one of the independent operators got a licence to put a second 'plane on to a route on which B.E.A. already had seven or eight 'planes running a day. This operator, having obtained the licence, had to find a time to put this 'plane on, and they found that B.E.A. in the summer had been running a 'plane leaving (I think it was) at 5 o'clock. Winter was approaching, and the independent operator found that B.E.A. were not going to continue this 'plane in the winter-time. So they published their schedule showing their 'plane leaving at 5 o'clock. B.E.A. had already published their winter timetable. But, believe it or not, about a week later B.E.A. published an amendment to their timetable showing a 'plane leaving at a quarter to five. That is more than cutthroat competition; it is what I call unfair competition.
Another matter which I suggest the Air Transport Licensing Board should look into is the question of issuing licences. I believe that licences should be issued for at least ten years. 'Planes are extremely expensive these days, and operators should not suddenly find themselves with a number of 'planes on their hands, their licence taken away, and nowhere to fly.
Air transport is vital to England, but owing to the distance factor and also the fact that London is situated where it is, it is doubly vital to Scotland. This is not a Party political matter. No Government of recent years has had the right attitude of mind towards air transport. Here I believe we have absolutely the wrong attitude of mind to air transport. We look at air transport rather like a vehicle in

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the air—like travelling by train. If you are lucky, you get a sleeper; but more often than not you are on the waiting list; you do not hear anything for some time, and eventually a second train is put on: it is all a question of uncertainty. Air travel is a completely different concept. The ultimate aim of air travel must obviously be the walk-on/walk-off service. We must realise the vital role that air transport can play in this age of speed, when time is so precious. Our whole approach to civil aviation needs reconsideration. The main consideration for the Government and for the Air Transport Licensing Board is to have the right attitude of mind. The Government themselves must become air minded. Otherwise, it is not just going to be a question of people being left behind on the waiting list; this country will find that it has missed the bus and is itself on the waiting list.
7.45 p.m.
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, first of all, I should like to congratulate the noble Earl, Lord Selkirk, on the adept way in which he switched at a moment's notice from a consideration of the Highlands and Islands to this Motion which we have before us at the moment. Indirectly and directly, of course, as the noble Lord, Lord Polwarth, mentioned, there is a connection between the development of air transport and the development of the Highlands and Islands. I have always taken the view, as the noble Lord, Lord Polwarth, probably remembers, that the key to the development of Scotland is possibly the development of the air transport service. I remember once, after a convivial evening with the late Sir Patrick Dollan, making a great speech in which I talked about the development of air transport in Scotland. Re-reading it now, I do not think I should disagree with anything I then said, even though the enthusiasm of "Paddy" Dollan was greatly responsible for the terms in which the speech was couched.
I am glad that the noble Earl has raised this matter this evening. If I may say so, I was particularly glad that he should have put so forcibly a Socialist philosophy. I do not think all noble Lords heard what he said about the iniquity of regarding profitability as the acid test of a public service. I absolutely agree with the noble Earl.
THE EARL OF SELKIRK: My Lords, the noble Lord must complete my sentence. I said that profitability was not the acid test of monopoly.
LORD BESWICK: The noble Earl said that profitability should not be the acid test. I must say that I only wish my noble friend Lord Stonham had had his vigorous support when he was having controversy with Dr. Beeching over profitability as the test of transport services.
The issues which have been raised today are important. I am certain that if our air transport affairs were discussed rather more publicly, and in a proper and constructive way, as we have had them discussed this evening, there would be a much greater likelihood that we should evolve, in the changing circumstances, a transport policy which is understood and accepted. On behalf of the Government, I welcome this opportunity of stating the attitude of my right honourable friend the Minister of Aviation upon these issues, dealt with in paragraphs 40 to 43 of the Report of the Air Transport Licensing Board.
May I say straight away that I absolutely agree with the noble Earl that we want to see more international scheduled services starting from centres other than London. This I say as a matter of Government policy: to the extent that the noble Earl has proposed that the international network should be thickened, from centres other than London, he has the sympathy and support of my right honourable friend and of the Government.
Apart from its desirability of giving better air transport services to the growth points in the Provinces, there is another practical reason why it would be foolish to try to attract all international air services to London. The noble Lord, Lord St. Oswald, mentioned that there is a problem developing in the air space over London. Congestion is a serious problem. In the early 1970s almost certainly it will be necessary to sectorise the traffic in London's air space as between London Heathrow, London Gatwick and the third London airport. I cannot see that this will be popular with the operators, who will have to divide their administrative services as between three airports, and

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may not be entirely advantageous to the travelling public. But this will be necessary because of the volume of traffic which is expected in the 1970s.
To the extent that we can encourage more services to use to the maximum extent airports in the Provinces, we shall set back the time when it will be necessary to make this division within the London area. Although the Minister of Aviation, in his quasi-judicial capacity in relation to appeals from the decisions of the Air Transport Licensing Board, will obviously listen to each case on its merits, as a general principle there is no intention at all on his part to restrict the development of these provincial services and, on the contrary, there is every reason why they should be encouraged.
In this connection one might misconstrue the Statement of policy made by the Minister of Aviation and by my noble friend Lord Shackleton in this House on February 17. I think it was possibly from that Statement that the noble Earl, Lord Selkirk, took one phrase about refusing to consider certain further applications. But this Statement was not a discouragement to the line of development we have been talking about. On the contrary, this Statement made it quite clear that any operator, whether public or private, who wished to provide a genuinely new service, or open up some fresh market for British aviation, would have the full support of the Government.
Those words were in the same Statement as that in which he said he would not be prepared to accept further applications for running a parallel operation on an international route when there was already a British operator providing the service. Even this was not a decision to eliminate competition, because there would already be competition as between the British operator and the international operator.
Having dealt with the position of the Government, I now turn to the Report and the views of the Air Transport Licensing Board. I must agree with the noble Earl that the paragraphs to which he has called attention this evening have given rise to criticism before they were discussed this evening. It seems to me that there has been misapprehension about the Board's intentions and con
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ceivably there was some room for misunderstanding. May I therefore try to make the position clear? The Board, of course, are a licensing authority who cannot themselves operate services, nor have they the power to compel others to operate services. The provision and development of British air services is the commercial responsibility of the operating corporations or companies, subject, of course, to their securing the necessary licence from the Air Transport Licensing Board or, in appeal cases, from the Minister of Aviation.
As I understand it, in paragraphs 40 to 43 the Board were considering, or ruminating over, or cogitating upon, the kind of consideration which they have in mind when deciding whether to grant a particular licence, and they were trying to analyse the reasons why the development of provincial air services had been slower than would have been hoped. They were not laying down a philosophy, as the noble Earl seemed to think. They were certainly not laying down any doctrinaire opposition to provincial services. They were trying to warn against unreasonable optimism, and trying to show why it was that, so far, we had not gone along more rapidy in this field than had been hoped for.
At this point, as criticisms have been made of the Board I think I ought to say—and I have no doubt that noble Lords would agree with me—that, whatever controversy there may be about particular decisions of the Board, and although I know they are often criticised for not doing things which the Act says they should not do, I am sure we all recognise that their care, courtesy, and impartiality in dealing with applications is absolutely impeccable.
THE EARL OF SELKIRK: My Lords, may I warmly second what the noble Lord has said?
LORD BESWICK: I am very much obliged to the noble Earl. It seems to me that it was with their readiness to help that they went out of their way to analyse in these four paragraphs some of the factors involved, without making it clear that the views they were stating were not always their own views. They were trying to interpret what was in the

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mind of a variety of people in these various independent operators and Corporations who had the responsibility for operating services. It is, of course, as noble Lords will know, part of !the statutory duty of the Board to assure themselves that an applicant for a licence is competent, economically and technically, to operate the public service which they want to licence. Similarly, the Board have to take into account the possibility of a new service draining off traffic from existing services which are probably already having a struggle to remain viable. There really is no point in licensing a second service from a given area if this means that in the long run neither service survives. Obviously, in the short run it may be said that the travelling public are benefiting from competition. But in the long run if, because of the economic difficulties of both operators, the services are curtailed or run in an unsatisfactory manner, then the travelling public does not benefit.
I would say that probably it is only natural that in the first place the services in this country should have developed much more rapidly from London. It may be hurtful to local pride to say that London is the hub of our international airport system but, surely, this is one of the facts of life. It was natural that London should develop more rapidly, and I agree absolutely with the noble Lord, Lord Forbes, that it is desirable, in the first place, to see that there is a high frequency of service available to the travelling public, especially the businessman, and one cannot have a high frequency if there is a low traffic offering. To the extent that it has been possible to have a very high frequency from London, it may have been desirable in the first place to have a degree of concentration within the London area.
But, having said that, I return to my original point, that we have now reached the stage when it ought to be possible to do much more from the provincial centres. Looking at the record, I cannot say that the provincinal centres have been absolutely discouraged in the way in which the noble Earl rather suggested. I find that there are international scheduled services to Continental destinations from some twenty places in Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland, the Midlands, North, South and South-West England. Man
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chester and Prestwick, of course, have very important transatlantic services to various points in North America. There are also numerous inclusive tour services to the Continent which provide for holiday traffic from most of the large centres of population throughout the country. I will not bore the House with a list, but I have the list here and it makes quite an impressive service altogether.
I have said that the Board are not expected to initiate services. But it is a fact that, again in an effort to be helpful, they have recently undertaken a survey into the possibility of developing freight services from Northern Ireland. The noble Lord, Lord St. Oswald, asked whether it is possible to say from which parts of England traffic originates, and what the terminal points are. It has not been possible to say that with any degree of certainty, simply because in the past we have not always insisted that the travelling public should fill up forms, and unless they put it on a form one cannot have this sort of information collected. The Ministry has now undertaken a survey of points of origin and destination, and this background information will be available to companies or corporations, enabling them to estimate the sort of services which in the future might be worth while operating. Of course it will still be a matter for the corporations and companies to do research further in depth and make the ultimate decision. Nevertheless, this information is now being collected. My personal view is that this kind of information or market survey is something which, either in the Ministry or the Board, ought to be taken very seriously indeed in the future.
There is one other development which I think is of some interest, and that is the way in which B.E.A., sometimes criticised for not wishing to encourage services in the Provinces, have taken a financial interest in Cambrian Airways, operating from South Wales, and in B.K.S., operating from North-East England. Both these companies operate a number of flights to the Continent from their respective centres, and of course the technical and financial backing of B.E.A. is not unimportant.
The point was made by the noble Lord, Lord Polwarth, about the services to Prestwick from Scandinavia, and I think reference was also made to the fact that

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traffic rights were denied to Sabena in the case of services from Manchester. Here it was not a question of discouraging a service from Prestwick to Scandinavia, or from Manchester to Brussels; it was simply a matter that in both cases these carriers were using the British centres for the purpose of picking up trans-Atlantic traffic. We placed absolutely no limitation upon the S.A.S. services to Prestwick from Scandinavia. The difficulty arose when they wanted to exercise their fifth freedom traffic rights and carry an undue amount of British traffic from Prestwick across the North Atlantic.
LORD POLWARTH: My Lords, might I just say that of course these things are all interlinked, and a mere Scandinavia-Prestwick service would not necessarily be viable except as part of an overall operation?
LORD BESWICK: No my Lords; but the criticism in the first place was that we were discouraging services from this country to the Continent, and what I am saying is that there was absolutely no limitation upon services from Prestwick to Scandinavia, or from Manchester to Brussels. It was simply that S.A.S., in the one case, and Sabena, in the other, were carrying traffic which properly should be carried by the British operator. I might say that the Minister has undertaken to discuss this matter further with S.A.S. in the winter, and I understand that these discussions are likely to take place.
In this connection, I would also point out that a number of foreign operators have traffic rights to provincial centres in this country but have not taken them up. I think the number of cases in which licences have been granted certainly runs into double figures, but the services have not been operated. This does not seem to suggest that there is an undue restriction placed upon these services by the Board, and certainly not by the Government.
I hope that I have lived up to the reputation given to me by the noble Lord, Lord St. Oswald, of being as informative as possible. In any case, I trust that the noble Earl, Lord Selkirk, will feel that this discussion has been worthwhile
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and that some of the fears he expressed were possibly unfounded.
THE EARL OF SELKIRK: My Lords, I certainly should like to thank the noble Lord for replying as fully as he has done, and I am glad to find a measure of agreement in principle, as I expected there would be. I am not wholly happy that anybody is going to do anything about it, and I say again to the noble Lord that I think this is a matter of far-reaching importance. The whole economic development of this country will in certain measure be affected by it. The noble Lord says that we have to weigh these things up; in fact they generally come down in London Airport, and I will only say that I beg to withdraw this Motion.
Motion for Papers, by leave, withdrawn.

HIGHLANDS AND ISLANDS DEVELOPMENT (SCOTLAND) BILL
8.6 p.m.
House again in Committee.
THE CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES: In calling Amendment No. 28, I should point out to the House that it is desired to move it in a different form from that set out in the Marshalled List, and it now reads:
"Page 8, line 8, leave out from the word ("notice") to the end of line 14 and insert the words as printed."
LORD DRUMALBYN LORD DRUMALBYN moved, in subsection (2), to leave out all words after "of the notice" and to insert:
"apply to the Sheriff for an order calling on the Board to show that the information or any part thereof specified in the notice is reasonably required by the Board for the execution of any of their functions mentioned in the last foregoing subsection, and the Board shall within twenty-one days of the issue of the order comply with the order; and unless, after hearing the parties or their representatives, the Sheriff is satisfied that all the information specified in the order is reasonably required as aforesaid he shall make an order discharging the applicant from complying with the notice to the extent specified in that order and may make such award as regards expenses as he may think fit".
The noble Lord said The noble Lord said: As this Amendment has been changed, I think I should repeat the form of the Amendment as it now stands. Instead of the Amendment which appears on the Marshalled List,

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the Amendment I now move is to leave out all the words from "notice", in line 13, to the end of line 14 and to insert the words which appear on the Marshalled List. The effect of the change, of course, is to keep in the words, "within one month of the service of the notice". I think it is fairly obvious that some period within which action should be taken should be preserved.
As the noble Lord is well aware, we on this side of the Committee have been disturbed at the immense width of the powers given to the Board for obtaining information, due of course to the immense width of the powers of the Board. Quite apart from this, I think there would be a danger in the early stages after the formation of the Board for it, in the absence of anything else in particular to do, to seek a great deal of information. I agree that it wants to inform itself, but I think there has to be careful restraint exercised in the degree to which it puts people to trouble and expense. As it is, it could ask for absolutely any information concerning the Highlands and Islands, because there really is nothing at all that does not fall within the scope of the economic and social development of the Highlands and Islands. They could even ask about churches. It is not that the Board might want to do it, but certainly it concerns social development.
The noble Lord said in the Second Reading debate that the Board in its activities—and here I quote—
"must not cut across the existing responsibilities of local authorities nor take over the responsibilities of other statutory bodies"—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Vol. 267 (No. 93), col. 731, June 29, 1965.]
But those activities do not relate to the information they can demand. I will tell the noble Lord why. It is because all they have to do is to murmur the mystic word "concert" and quote Section 3(1)(c). There is absolutely nothing they cannot ask, whether it is within the purview of the local authorities or statutory bodies or anything else. All they have to say is "concert", in order that they may concert, and nobody can challenge. How can anyone say what they are going to propose to the Secretary of State? How can anyone say what is within their functions of concerting in addition to their other functions of promoting, assisting or under
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taking "measures to implement any proposals so approved?" How on earth is it possible to check on this? The fact is that nothing is easier than to ask for information. All of us remember the "phony" period of the war and the battle of paper that went on there—I happened to be a junior staff officer at the time—and the amount of paper one had to fill up, calling for information of all descriptions to be reported by such-and-such a date. Everybody knows what happened. Nothing is more impossible than to prove that the information is not needed, yet this clause, as it stands, enables any owner, occupier or other person on whom a notice has been served to appeal to the sheriff
"within one month of the service of the notice … on the ground that the information or any part thereof specified in the notice is not reasonably required by the Board for the execution of any of their functions under this Act"
and it goes on:
"in relation to the land, business or undertaking".
It is almost impossible to prove a negative; this is well known in law. So this wording represents no real brake at all, yet I think that anyone in his senses would realise that some brake is needed. I think the least we can ask is that the Board should have to justify to the sheriff, if they are challenged on it, that they really do need the information for which they ask.
In another place it was argued that this could be used for obstructive purposes. It was argued that as the Amendment was framed, it laid on the Board the onus of making the counter-claim and it was unreasonable to put the onus on the Board to go to the courts. This Amendment, however, does not do that. The onus rests upon the "owner, occupier or other person on whom the notice has been served", and all the Board are asked to do is to show that the information for which they ask is genuinely required. There is no real difference in the braking power, so far as the information is concerned, between the clause as it stands in the Bill as it is now and our Amendment, because in each case it is the "owner, occupier or other person" who must make application to the Board; and if the application is frivolous, they will have to pay the costs. So the brake is the same in either case.
I hope that the noble Lord will not argue—because it would be quite untrue—that this would be putting a spanner in the works, and would enable anybody who wanted to to hold up the proceedings. There is no difference, so far as the application to the court is concerned. The sole difference lies in the onus of proof, and that is the important thing here. It is only right, if the Board are challenged as to whether the information they are asking for is really needed, that they should have to show that it is. Nobody else can show it is not. I hope that the noble Lord will consider this point with an open mind, and will not on this occasion bother too much about his brief. If he will, I am sure he will realise that it is only fair that the Board should have to justify their claim that they require the information if somebody, not frivolously, and ready to pay the costs of the application, applies to the sheriff in this way. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 8, line 8, leave out from ("notice") to end of line 14 and insert the said words.—(Lord Drumalbyn.)
THE EARL OF SELKIRK: I should like to support my noble friend for the reason of logic, if nothing else. In the first paragraph it says:
"… specified in the notice with regard to the land, business or undertaking and with regard to such other matters relating thereto, as the Board may reasonably require .….".
All our Amendment does is to say if they are challenged the Board must show that they reasonably require the information. There is a direct sense of logic between them. We have had a little argument as to what exactly is wanted. The noble Lord, Lord Hughes, is always very skilful in trying to find ingenious explanations of Acts of Parliament, which are not always in line with what is printed, but even he was in difficulty about this one, and he has not given a wholly satisfactory explanation of what is required. I do not think this appeal will ever take place—or not very often. This is to ensure that both parties will have to behave reasonably. I think the Amendment meets what the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, has constantly sought: that the Board must show it is reasonable. That is all we are asking, and for those
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reasons I hope the Amendment will be accepted.
LORD HUGHES: I was amused to find how easy it is to shed the responsibilities which are on the shoulders of a Minister merely by crossing the Floor. When the former Minister of State at the Board of Trade so light-heartedly commends to me that I should disregard my brief, I am quite certain that when he sat on these Benches he would have taken a very dim view if any of my colleagues had proffered that advice to any of his colleagues. I am not going to disregard my brief, for this reason: I had a very strong suspicion that this was one of the Amendments about which noble Lords opposite felt most strongly. There were clues to that because of the amount of time that was spent on discussion of this subject in another place. There was a further clue in that the appeal machinery which is in the Bill now arose from the discussion which took place in another place, and the machinery which is there was felt by my colleagues elsewhere to be a very reasonable way of settling it.
I spent a very long time with the officials this morning because I wanted to be quite convinced in my own mind that what they wanted me to say was the right thing to say. I know that when a man has spent a long time, whether as a draftsman or a senior civil servant, working out the best way to accomplish a particular object, he cannot lightly be persuaded that somebody else looking at the thing for a day or two has found a better way of doing it than he has found over many months of study; and, generally speaking, as noble Lords opposite who have held office know, he is right in that. It is not often that any of us can, in a short time, hit on a better way of doing it, although it is not impossible. Therefore, I did not go into this matter on the basis that what had been done in the Scottish Office must of necessity be right and that it was impossible to find a better way of doing it.
One difficulty in which I now find myself is not of my seeking, but is perhaps unavoidable. I did not know that the Amendment was not going to be moved in the form in which it was printed and, quite frankly, I do not know the extent to which leaving in the

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words which specify the period during which action must be taken alters the arguments in relation to this matter. The point at which the Amendment proposed to delete the proceedings might in fact have been an encouragement to delay, an obstruction, which does not now exist in the form in which the Amendment is moved. I am not quite sure on this matter and this is one aspect at which I must look. However, as the Amendment was originally drawn, the opinion of my advisers was that it was a charter for obstruction; that it would enable actions to be taken which the objectors had no intention of following through, but which were calculated to put the Board to the maximum of expense and inconvenience. That may not be the position with the Amendment in the form in which it is now moved.
I have doubts as to whether that is the position, but I must challenge some of the things which the noble Lord, Lord Drumalbyn, said. When he was reading the wording of the clause he read down so far, and then he said, "and it goes on to say ' in relation to the land' and so on", as if this was something which was comparatively unimportant. But because he used that phraseology he was in fact ignoring what was the complete qualification, that there is no opportunity, as he stated in his opening remarks, for the Board to seek information in relation to a piece of land, in relation to a business or an undertaking, for any of the purposes of the Board. It is specifically restricted to the purposes of the Board in relation to the piece of land, the business or the undertaking. So they cannot use any broad description that they are seeking to concert proposals for this area; they must be able to relate them to the business on which they are seeking the information. That is the first point, and it is a fundamental point upon which the noble Lord has, I am sure quite unwittingly, misled the Committee by looking at these final words much more lightly than they deserve.
The second one is the argument which the noble Lord put forward, that the Board were seeking to place the occupier or the owner of the business or undertaking in an impossible position, in that he was being compelled to prove a negative, which would always be exceedingly difficult to do. This is one of the reasons
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why I spent some considerable time on this matter this morning, after we had the benefit of an informal chat about this last night, when he used these words to me about the impossibility of proving a negative. We therefore went into that aspect quite fully.
I wish to suggest to your Lordships that this is not the position. Under the procedure as it is, let us see what would happen. There are discussions. The Board seek to get certain information from the owners or operators of the undertaking. They do not wish to give the information. The Board tell them why they want it. After all the discussions take place, the person from whom the information is sought remains convinced that he ought not to give this information, and he therefore refuses to do so. That being the case, the Board then serve an order or notice on him that they are seeking this information, and if he is still not disposed to give the information, he must within 21 days lodge an appeal with the sheriff against the requirement of the Board.
The noble Lord, Lord Drumalbyn, seemed to assume then that the position from that point on would be that the appellant would have to satisfy the sheriff that it was not reasonable that the Board should require this information from him, and that this would be either difficult or impossible for him to do because he was seeking to prove a negative. But I am advised that that is not in fact what would happen. After the legal formalities have been gone through, of the appellant's lawyers lodging his case and the Board's lawyers lodging their answers, a point is reached where the matter is debated before the sheriff. The sheriff is not going to act on the basis that he says to the appellant's lawyers, "Let me hear what you have to say on this matter" and when he, the appellant, has said all that is to be said, the sheriff then says, "I am sorry, but you have not persuaded me that the Board are unreasonable. The appeal is dismissed." It will not go that way at all. Both the appellant and the Board will have to state their case. The appellant states the reason why he does not think that the information should be given, and the Board state the reasons why they think that they are entitled to get the

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information. On the basis of what is said by both parties to the sheriff, he will then, either immediately or after consideration, arrive at his conclusion as to whether the appeal should be granted or whether it should be dismissed. As your Lordships will see, we should have exactly the same procedure in the debate before the sheriff whether it is done according to the present drafting of the Bill or in the way suggested in the Amendment.
It may be that the noble Lord will ask me why, if exactly the same procedure would be followed, I am arguing against it. I have no difficulty about its being one way or the other, once the matter gets to the sheriff; and I am quite certain that justice, both to the appellant and to the Board, will be done in regard to the way the case is dealt with in the sheriff court. But what I am advised is that the Amendment as printed (I must emphasise that it is the Amendment as printed which is the only matter to which I can talk completely at this stage) would be a charter for obstruction, and would involve the Board in the pursuit of many possible cases the only object of which would be to delay the Board in its operations and which would not necessarily be carried to a conclusion.
I greatly regret that I have not had the opportunity to look at it, because I have a fear, a suspicion, that the deletion from the Amendment of these first words may considerably alter the force of some of these things. If, in fact, the taking out of these words, or rather the leaving in the Bill of the words which formerly were to be taken out by the Amendment but which are not now taken out, helps the appellant without in any way adding to purely obstructive processes, then I should think that a great deal of force of the argument which I am putting forward against the Amendment might well be withdrawn.
But I think the noble Lord will agree with me that this is a legal point and, as I am not a lawyer, I am not really in a position to say whether it fundamentally alters the argument or not. The one thing which I am quite convinced of is that I am not prepared to accept an Amendment the purpose of which would be to further the interests of those who wish to obstruct the Board rather than of those who wish to help the Board.
8.30 p.m.
LORD DRUMALBYN: This illustrates in an interesting way both the advantages and disadvantages of these agreeable informal discussions. I pointed out to the noble Lord my side of the question, and at the same time he told me that he thought that my Amendment was a charter for obstruction. Therefore. I had a look at the matter to see why he should think that to be the case. I then found—and I much regret this—that I had wrongly drafted this Amendment and excluded a line which I had intended to include. I see his position on this, and I very much welcome the attitude which he has taken and his willingness to have another look at it. I am advised legally that, other things being equal, it is better to put a thing positively than negatively. That was why I drafted my Amendment in this way, so that I hope the noble Lord will look at it from that point of view. I am sorry to have made such a long interruption.
LORD HUGHES: I thank the noble Lord. What he has said is extremely helpful. The best I can do in these circumstances is to invite the noble Lord to withdraw the Amendment on the basis that I may look again at the new situation which has been created by the tabling of the Amendment in this slightly different form. I do not want him to take more out of this than I can reasonably put into it. As to some of the things I have undertaken to have a look at, there is a fair chance they are workable, and I can probably accept them because they are not points which have already been considered at great length and rejected in another place. If we are discovering—as we have on one case, if not two cases—a completely new approach to a matter, then if it is workable we are justified in putting it into the Bill. But this is not approaching a problem which has not been thoroughly ventilated in another place, and what is in the Bill is a result of that very considerable ventilation.
I readily accept the proposition that when an individual is having to fight a public body, and when the interests of that public body can be as well served at the end of the day by wording the Bill so that every possible advantage is given to the individual in presenting his case, rather than to the public body, then

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that is the better way to do it. I hope that Governments will always seek to do things in that way. But we must never allow the interests of the individual, one person or one undertaking, to override, by being awkward, the public interests. I must be certain in looking at this that I am not opening the door to those who are being obstructive—although I accept that there is no intention of obstruction in this Amendment, and that the alteration made in the Amendment, at the last moment, is an endeavour to protect the interests of the individual without impairing the interests of the community at large. I hope that the noble Lord will now feel able to withdraw his Amendment. I have spoken to those who advise me, on the basis that I want to have all the answers some time to-morrow to all the undertakings which I have already given. I should therefore be in a position, before going off on Thursday, to contact the noble Lords concerned as to whether or not an Amendment on the lines proposed can be accepted. We can either agree with them to put down a Government Amendment, or invite the noble Lord concerned to put his Amendment down in that form. I want to be in a position to do that before going North again on Thursday.
It depends on when we finish whether I am able to do that in relation to the whole Bill, but if we make reasonable progress from now on I might well be able to do it in relation to every one. As to this Amendment, I should require my colleagues to look at it, even as a matter of priority compared to some other perhaps less important undertakings, because this is a point in the Bill on which there are legitimately grave doubts. If we can reach agreement on a form of wording which is acceptable to my advisers as being workable, we shall have gone a long way to allay fears that have been expressed, even though, as I believe, without any real foundation. But it is better to remove the fears than to have to wait perhaps six months or a year in order to be able to prove that such fears are without foundation.
LORD DRUMALBYN: I am sure the noble Lord is right. The only matter on which he is a little optimistic is that one would prove it in six months or so. Once one gave ground for a feeling that
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the fears were justified, it would take a lot longer than that period of time to eradicate it.
LORD HUGHES: If things went the way the noble Lord anticipated, we should be able to prove it very quickly. He envisaged that the Board would be spending the first months doing the sort of things that would result in a flood of appeals to the sheriff.
LORD DRUMALBYN: The noble Lord is entitled to make that observation. We on this side are very grateful for the way in which he has dealt with the matter. I do not want to delay the Committee in any way at present. The noble Lord has shown himself a hard taskmaster, so far as those in the Officials Box are concerned. We are grateful for the efforts he and they will be making in order to meet the points we have made. With those observations, I beg leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
LORD DRUMALBYN LORD DRUMALBYN moved to add to the clause:
"( ) For the avoidance of doubt, for the purposes of the foregoing subsection the expression reasonable cause ' shall include the fact that the information required in the notice could be furnished only at excessive cost to the owner or occupier, as the case may be."
The noble Lord said: This Amendment deals with the cost of providing information. The noble Lord quoted certain examples of the sort of information which would be demanded. On the whole, the cases he quoted were in regard to information of two kinds: first of all, information to support some kind of application for aid or grant or assistance, or where grant or assistance is involved. The point about costs is that it is precedented for those who require information actually to be in a position to meet costs. It so happened that yesterday we were dealing with a Bill stemming from an Act which was originally called the Monopolies Restrictive Practices (Inquiry and Control) Act. In Section 8(4) there appears the following:
"The Commission may pay to any person attending under this section to give evidence"—
that is not important—
"or producing documents thereunder, and to any person who, whether in pursuance of a requirement under this section or not, furnishes

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estimates, returns or information to the Commission for the purposes of any such investigation as is referred to in the preceding provisions of this section, such sums in respect of his expenses as they think fit."
The point here is quite clear. In that case the Commission does not expect a great deal of expenditure to be incurred by a body which ultimately shows that it is not in breach of the Act in any way and is not conducting itself in a manner contrary to the public interest. It does not expect such a body to bear the whole cost of finding the information which is required. So I think there is a good precedent for limiting to a considerable extent the amount of cost burden that can be laid upon any particular owner or occupier who is called upon for information. That is why in this Amendment we say:
"For the avoidance of doubt, for the purposes of the foregoing subsection the expression reasonable cause ' shall include the fact that the information required in the notice could be furnished only at excessive cost to the owner or occupier, as the case may be."
This is one way of dealing with the problem—challenging the need to provide the information, on the ground that it is going to cause excessive cost.
Another way of dealing with the matter where excessive cost was going to be caused would be to accept estimates. But if you were to accept estimates, I suggest you would then have to qualify "recklessly" in line 26, so as to make it clear that supplying an estimate which you honestly believed to be substantially correct was not supplying information recklessly but was a reasonable attempt to meet the request for information. But, as was pointed out in another place, it may well be that the information requested is not readily available. It may require measurements which the Board could probably do much more easily than the proprietor, if it comes to that, and the proprietor might well say, "You come and get the information. You are welcome." I should like to know what the noble Lord's reaction to such a reply would be, but, quite clearly, as the Bill stands it would be in breach of the requirement.
So to a certain extent this is a probing Amendment. It is designed to ensure that excessive burdens, so far as the cost in time and money of collecting the in
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formation is concerned, will not be imposed by the Board, and that the Board will be open to reasonable argument as to whether exact information at immense cost should be provided, or whether a reasonable estimate should be given. I hope that the noble Lord will be able to satisfy us that in this respect, as in others, the Board will act reasonably and will not expect other people to do their job for them, because that is really what this would amount to if the cost of the information for which they were asking was excessive. T beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 8, line 29, at end insert the said subsection.—(Lord Drumalbyn.)
8.44 p.m.
LORD HUGHES: I think I shall be able to satisfy the noble Lord in the answers which I propose to give to his questions in putting forward this Amendment. Of course, I accept that it is perfectly reasonable that the Board, for the purposes of their operations, even although at the end of the day the undertaking itself may be a direct beneficiary of what they propose to do, should not, for that reason alone, be able to require the individual firm, company or undertaking to be put to excessive cost in supplying information in a detailed form, if, as was suggested by the noble Lord, a reasonably close estimate would serve the same purpose. I also accept that the Board would not be entitled, if they could not be satisfied by an estimate easily ascertained, to require the informant to go to excessive cost in providing the information. Having said that, I do not think that the method proposed is either necessary or desirable. I do not think it is desirable, because it would enable an applicant, if he felt so inclined, at the expiry of the period of three months, in an appeal to the sheriff, or, if the alternative procedure was adopted, in reply to an action raised by the Board with the sheriff—
LORD DRUMALBYN: May I correct the noble Lord right away? That was not the alternative suggested in our Amendment. In each case the actions are brought by the applicant. The only difference—and I again repeat this—is as to the onus of proof.
LORD HUGHES: I am sorry, but I put that the wrong way. The onus is on the applicant to raise his action. But the point is that by the Amendment as it stands he would not be obliged to take this action until the end of the three months' period which is laid down. He is given three months in which to furnish this information, and if the individual or the company did not wish to give the information they might spend three months finding all sorts of reasons why it should not be furnished, and they might raise this question of excessive cost only when it was decided to go to the sheriff on the matter. Frankly, if a person is objecting on the ground that it would be too costly to do so, I should have thought that was a matter which would be raised quite early on in the proceedings.
I am reluctant, only because of the criticisms that are made that there are too many interventions from the Secretary of State to the Board, to suggest doing too many things by administrative action, but, frankly, this is the sort of thing which would best be taken care of by administrative action. I think it is quite proper for the Secretary of State to give guidance to the Board. In matters of this kind he would expect them to have regard to the expense to which an individual was being put, and he would regard it as a proper exercise of their powers under Clause 9(1)(d) that they should agree to pay him for the cost of extracting the information. It is rather difficult to put that in the Bill, because if you did that you might find that nobody would give any information unless he had a payment for it; and it is not the primary purpose of the Bill that we should provide anybody with an easy way of getting an income by selling information to the Board, whether it was costing him anything to find it or not. But it is reasonable that the Board should reimburse an individual for what has been described as excessive cost.
It is not usual, I am informed, in these cases to attempt to define what "without reasonable cause" means. It is a phrase which is very frequently used and it covers a very wide range. In my own Department, for instance, in connection with the payment of applications for agricultural grants, the illness of the recipient or the accidental destruction of records has been accepted as a reason-
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able cause. But we have never defined an illness or the accidental destruction of records as being among the things which can be described as "reasonable cause". Any attempt to do this within the Bill suffers from the same defects as I have previously objected to; that as soon as you seek to put a definition on one particular aspect of a power or on a cause for objection, then, by implication, you limit the range by directing attention to that particular aspect. You tend to narrow it to that and the things which are very much like it, and that is not 'our intention. The intention is that "without reasonable cause" should be interpreted as a reasonable man would do it.
Frankly, if the only argument against the provision of information between the required informant and the Board is the question of the cost of doing so, and the possible appellant makes it perfectly clear that he does not think that it is reasonable that he should have to pay this cost and if need be will appeal to the sheriff on this ground, then I am quite certain that the Board would not fall down on that aspect, particularly when they have power to pay his costs in this matter.
8.50 p.m.
VISCOUNT COLVILLE OF CULROSS: I wonder whether the noble Lord could tell me this. My noble friend Lord Drumalbyn has framed his Amendment to refer to subsection (3) of Clause 11, which is the penal part of the clause, and what the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, has just said leads me to think that a ground for an application to the sheriff, under either the present subsection (2) or any substitution therefor, might be that the information was not reasonably required, on the grounds that it would be too expensive. Would the noble Lord think that that would be within the terms of an application under subsection (2) to the sheriff? If not, might it not be possible to amend the Bill, if he is going to look at this whole matter again, in such a way that it might be included there, rather than in relation to subsection (3)?
LORD HUGHES: But, as I understand it, as the Bill now stands, it could be part of the ground of objection to giving the information: that, because of excessive cost, it was not reasonable for the Board to require him to give the information.

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If this were the only difference, then it would be quite easily resolved between the Board and the applicant. After all, it must relate to circumstances. I mean that a sum of £5 might be excessive in relation to a crofter with an income of £300 a year, whereas £50 might not be excessive in another connection altogether. The Board would be reasonable in this matter; and, if they were satisfied that this was the only point, then I am quite certain that they would say, "If it in fact costs you more than £20 to take out this information, we will pay any costs which you can satisfy us you have incurred in getting it. "Alternatively, they may say, It is going to cost £500 to take out this information. You can give us a reasonable estimate within the next two weeks. This will serve our purpose just as well, and we will accept it."
I am not just doing that "off the cuff"—although, if I had not abandoned my brief, I might not have said that—because, having argued the thing, I will now tell you what my advisers wanted me to say. It is not visualised that the Board will require any owner, occupier or other person on whom a notice has been served to furnish information which can be obtained only at excessive cost to the person concerned. If a person feels that information is difficult to procure, or is likely to incur him in excessive outlays, the Board could reasonably be expected to listen to his pleas and to modify their plans accordingly. Alternatively, they might agree to use their powers under Clause 9(1)(d) to pay him for the cost of extracting the information. That really fits in very well with what the noble Lord, Lord Drumalbyn, asked.
While I think it would be going too far, and would be too difficult, to put this sort of thing into the Bill, I can see no difficulty—nor do I think that the Board would regard it as an undue restriction of their activities—in including administrative guidance along these lines among the things which the Secretary of State would place before the Board when they came into existence. And, I know from past experience, when I have accepted assurances from the noble Lord, Lord Craigton, that the best way of dealing with a matter of this kind is by administrative action. Because of the
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informality which attaches to proceeding in this way it can be done far more effectively than by trying to find a form of words for the Bill through which a cart and horses cannot be driven.
LORD DRUMALBYN: Again, I am grateful to the noble Lord. I would commend to him what my noble friend Lord Colville of Culross has said. The noble Lord is himself quite right in saying that the real objection to this is that you will not know whether an objection on these grounds is going to be made until the period for giving the information has expired. But, of course, my noble friend's suggestion would get over that, quite apart from the fact that this is in the criminal part of the clause, because it would enable somebody immediately, or as soon as he had made his estimates, to apply to the courts on the ground that finding the information would cost too much. I think it is worth looking at that, because, although what the noble Lord says is perfectly right—that it is best, if possible, to deal with this difficulty by administrative means—differences of opinion are bound to arise, and it is probably just as well to provide for those in favour of one side as it is to provide for those in favour of the other.
I think this has been a useful discussion, if I may say so, and I am very grateful for the assurances which the noble Lord has given. Of course, we always like to see assurances of this kind written into the Bill where that is at all possible. I would again commend to him the terms of the Monopolies and Restrictive Practices Act, Section 8, as a possible way of dealing with this matter. I should have thought that there are not very great dangers in being specific about it. It might well reassure people and, by reassuring them, make the Bill that much more acceptable. I beg leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn
On Question, Whether Clause 11 shall stand part of the Bill?
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: Much as I dislike the whole of Clause 11, and although I think it will have the opposite effect to that which the Government intend, and will make any new industry contemplating going into the Highland

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area think very hard and long about doing so, I do feel that, if the noble Lord can see his way to accepting an Amendment on the lines suggested by my noble friend Lord Drumalbyn, we shall have made some progress. Therefore, I do not think there is any point in pursuing this matter any further at this moment, but rather that we should wait for the next stage and see what materialises.
LORD DRUMALBYN: May I raise one point on this, arising out of what the noble Lord has said? Throughout, in arguing this matter, the noble Lord has been directing the attention of the Committee to the kind of case where the Board asks a particular individual, and that individual only, for information. Of course, as I read the clause, it is perfectly possible for the Board to ask for a return from everybody concerned;n a certain kind of business—all crofters, or something of that sort. It seems to me that, provided that it is for the purposes of their functions, the Board can ask for returns—a kind of census of production, or whatever it may be, in certain sectors. I am not really sure that the noble Lord understands how people have read this clause. Quite frankly, we do not know what is in the mind of the Government as to the way in which they think it will be carried out. It could mean asking for information from particular individuals, or it could mean a kind of minor census. Or, of course, it may mean both. But I think we are entitled to ask the Government how they envisage the collection of this information.
LORD HUGHES: I did not exclude the possibility that a number of people may be asked, because, if the noble Lord will recollect the example which I gave, and which singularly failed to impress the noble Earl, Lord Selkirk—the example of the wool mill in the Shetlands—he will remember that I said that the position might arise where the Board had got from half of the producers, quite voluntarily, the information which was necessary to arrive at a decision, but where, in order to find out whether the thing was viable, they needed information from a wider range and therefore might have to seek to acquire by compulsion the information from those who had declined to give it voluntarily. So I certainly did
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not exclude the possibility that information might be required from a group of people.
The other example I gave also envisaged the possibility of a group of people being asked to provide information which would be for the benefit of their own businesses; but it would not be confined to one business. I spoke, for instance, about the need of extending a scheme for providing public parking facilities. That parking would not be related to one hotel but would be available for the generality of hotels in the district. So, obviously, there would be occasions when the Board would be seeking information from a number of people with like interests.
But I should hope that the number of occasions, if any, when the Board would feel it necessary to put out a general form which would have to be filled in by everybody in sight would not arise; because people can be persuaded to give information if they can be told the purpose for which the information is required. I think a lot of this discussion will prove to be unnecessary at the end of the day; because most people, when they know why it is wanted, unless they are firmly persuaded that their own interests are going to be directly harmed by giving the information, will make it available. I think that because of this it will not arise in many cases. But the best way to make certain that you do not get information from people is to put out a multiplicity of forms for them to fill up so that they come to the conclusion: "Here is another form from the Highland Development Authority. What will they think of next?" The Board would frustrate their own objects if they sought to gather information only for the purpose of creating statistics. If prosperity could be brought to the Highlands merely by getting out statistics, the Highlands would be flourishing at the present moment.
Clause 11 agreed to.
Clause 12:
Restrictions on disclosure of information
12.—(1) No information with respect to any land, business or undertaking which has been obtained by virtue of section 10 or 11 of this Act shall, without the consent of the owner and occupier of that land or, as the case may be, of the person carrying on that business or

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undertaking, be disclosed otherwise than for the purposes of the execution of this Act:
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL THE DUKE OF ATHOLL moved, in subsection (1), to leave out "otherwise than for the purposes of the execution of this Act:" and insert:
"to anyone other than a member or official of the Board:".
The noble Duke said: I think this Amendment is of some importance. Clause 12(1) limits the number of people Ito whom information obtained under Clauses 10 and 11 can be given without the informant's consent. As the clause is drawn up at the moment, so far as I can make out, the Board can give information obtained under Clauses 10 and 11 to any person or any body which has an interest in any scheme they have proposed and which has been approved by the Secretary of State. This seems to me to be far !too wide, because, so far as I can see, they can, without a person's consent, give this information to a county council, the Red Deer Commission, the Forestry Commission or even possibly another private individual who had an interest—although I am less confident about that. This is farther than the inspector of taxes can go, for instance. We return less information to him than is demanded or could be demanded under Clause 11 of this Bill. Yet we do so in perfect confidence, knowing that it will not be passed on to outside bodies—not even to the Secretary of State for Scotland. I must confess to a feeling of gloom at knowing that he will have power to get almost any information he likes from the Highlands.
I certainly feel that this clause is far too widely drawn. I have therefore tried, in an amateurish way, to limit the passage of this information to the Board and its officials. It seems to me that they are the people immediately concerned with it. I might point out that the present returns of salmon fishing caught in nets at the mouth of estuaries in this part of the country can be disclosed only to the Secretary of State for Scotland, and not even to the river boards concerned. So up to now, the Government do not seem to have worried to disclose information—even important information like that, which would enable the river boards to do their job properly
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—to authorities who had an interest in it. Though I doubt that the noble Lord will be able to accept this Amendment—for I am sure he will say that he would like the Secretary of State for Scotland to be among those to whom information can be disclosed—I hope he will consider that an Amendment drawn an similar lines (and, perhaps, including the Secretary of State for Scotland) might be acceptable at the next stage of the Bill. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 8, line 34, leave out from ("disclosed") to end of line 35 and insert ("to anyone other than a member or official of the Board:")—(The Duke of Atholl.)
LORD HUGHES: I think the noble Duke and myself must be basically the same sort of simple person; because I felt much as he did when I first saw this Amendment. But I have the benefit of officials to talk to and he has not. The officials find out all the things that are wrong with the Amendment; and at the end of the talks I find myself in complete agreement with them—to the subsequent regret, I have no doubt, of the noble Duke.
But it does not need much probing to find out what are the defects of this Amendment. By confining the information to members or officials of the Board it could be that the object for which the information is sought would be completely frustrated. The Board are not seeking information of this kind just in order to satisfy their curiosity; they are seeking it for the purposes of the proposals they may make. These proposals go beyond the Board. There will be a number of cases—there may be many of them—in which, in order to justify the proposal, the Board have to furnish the Secretary of State with the information. The Board may have to go further. They may have to make the information available to the Treasury in connection with the giving of grants or loans by Government Departments.
In the course of this debate there have been frequent references to BOTAC. I am sure that the noble Lord, Lord Drumalbyn, would confirm the fact that an application for BOTAC assistance requires the most detailed information to be submitted for consideration—perhaps much more information about

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the finance of an undertaking than the Board might require when seeking to obtain similar information if, for example, there was a proposal to give additional financial aid to the undertaking. That is given to BOTAC which does not include a member of the Government or officials of the Board of Trade. It is a body of outside businessmen who give their services. The information given to these people has never been abused and I am certain that some of it goes beyond BOTAC to the Board of Trade when it is decided whether or not a grant is to be made, and the extent of it.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: I am sorry to interrupt the noble Lord, but surely in the case of Bonc—I am a child in these matters—the firm is applying for a grant, and therefore would be only too delighted that the information supplied should be given to BOTAC, to the Board of Trade, and to the Treasury, and the Secretary of State, if they were interested. I am prepared to admit that, had I known the noble Lord would exclude all my other Amendments relating to the Secretary of State, I should have included the Secretary of State in this Amendment, but I thought I ought to be logical and exclude him.
LORD HUGHES: Even if the noble Duke had reversed his procedure and included the name of the Secretary of State instead of, as in other Amendments, "shooting him down", the case would not have been met. I began to think that every time the noble Duke saw the name "Secretary of State" he put down another Amendment. The case would not be met by including the Secretary of State in this Amendment. The Secretary of State would not get anywhere with the Treasury if all he could say was, "I have the most convincing information, if I could only pass it on to you, but my colleague in the House of Lords accepted an Amendment which allows me to get information but prevents me from giving it to you". I know what the result would be on that application—we should not get a bean out of the Treasury.
Under the existing legislation previous Secretaries of State, and perhaps the existing one, have on occasions furnished confidential information to the Highland Panel when asking for advice on par
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ticular problems. Never once has there been occasion for complaint that the Panel abused this confidence, and no one has ever complained about confidential information being made available to the Panel. But the information which the Secretary got in return was so much more valuable because it was based on the valid foundation which he had been able to give to the Panel.
If we are to get the results flowing back into the Highlands, we cannot deny the authorities reasonable information on which to arrive at their conclusions. The penalties imposed by the provisions in the clause for improper disclosure of information are severe, and intended to make certain that there is no improper use of information. I cannot accept that a Department or authority considered appropriate by the Secretary of State or the Board to receive information should be struck at in the way the noble Duke suggests.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: Of course, I should not object to information being passed on to any Government Department. I was worried that it should be passed on to outside individuals and other bodies. I do not think that we can take the argument further. I am sure that my Amendment is defective and therefore I ask leave to withdraw it.
Amendment by leave, withdrawn.
On Question, Whether Clause 12 shall stand part of the Bill?
LORD DRUMALBYN: I should like to ask one question. On page 8, line 36, the Bill states:
"Provided that nothing in this subsection shall apply to any disclosure of information made for the purposes of any legal proceedings pursuant to this Act or any criminal proceedings, whether pursuant to this Act or not …".
I thought of putting down an Amendment to leave out the words "whether" and "or not". It is difficult to see why the Highlands Development Board should be used as a collecting agency for the police and the procurator fiscal. I ask the noble Lord to tell us why these words are in the Bill, and whether it is desirable to retain them.
LORD HUGHES: I do not suppose that the noble Lord, Lord Drumalbyn, wishes an answer to that question immediately. If he does, I would say that he

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has a positive genius for picking out, without previous notice, things on which to put questions to which I could not possibly be expected to know the answers.
Clause 12 agreed to.
Clause 13:
Accounts of the Board etc.
13.—(1) The Board shall keep proper accounts and other records in relation to the accounts and shall prepare in respect of each of their financial years a statement of account in such form as the Secretary of State may, with the approval of the Treasury, determine.
(5) The Board shall provide the Secretary of State with such information relating to their activities or proposed activities as he may from time to time require, and for that purpose shall permit any person authorised in that behalf by the Secretary of State to inspect and make copies of their accounts, books, documents or papers and shall afford to that person such explanation thereof as he may reasonably require.
9.14 p.m.
LORD DRUMALBYN LORD DRUMALBYN moved, at the beginning of the clause, to insert as a new subsection:
"( ) Where any business or undertaking is carried on by the Board, whether directly, through an agent or as agent, the Board shall keep separate accounts either for each such business or undertaking or for any group of such businesses or undertakings, and the accounts of each such business or undertaking or group of businesses and undertakings, as the case may be, shall be audited by an auditor to be appointed annually by the Board.
( ) No person shall be qualified to be so appointed auditor unless he is a member, or in the case of a firm all the partners therein are members, of one or more of the following bodies:—

The Institute of Chartered Accountants of Scotland,

The Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales,

The Association of Certified and Corporate Accountants,

The Institute of Chartered Accountants in Ireland,

Any other body of accountants established in the United Kingdom and for the time being recognised for the purposes of section 161(1)(a) of the Companies Act 1948 by the Board of Trade."
The noble Lord said: This looks a fairly formidable Amendment, but the point is simple. On an earlier stage of the Bill, it was argued that because there are some activities of the Board not intended to
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show a return, no part of the Board's undertakings should be subject to audit in the usual way. I think that that is a non sequitur. Where the Board engages in any undertaking—that is, broadly, where it exercises its functions under Clause 6—those undertakings, either individually, or, if it is more convenient to the Board, grouped together, should be audited in the same way as any other commercial undertaking and as those commercial undertakings with which it is in competition. That is the sole purpose of the Amendment.
Amendments Nos. 33 to 38 are consequential. I am inclined to think, though this is a matter of drafting, that having used the "accounts" in line 1 and in line 3 the words "statement of account", it would probably be more logical to keep "statement of account" separate from "accounts" and make it throughout the statement of account that has to be returned to the Comptroller and Auditor General. If these Amendments were accepted, the effect would be that all those activities which are really an extension of Government activities would be audited in the usual way by Government audit, whereas all those which are commercial activities would be audited by chartered accountants in the usual way and the statement of account of the Board would be accompanied by the audited accounts duly certified. I should have thought that this was a sensible arrangement, and I hope that the noble Lord will feel able to accept it. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 9, line 1, at the beginning insert the said subsections.—(Lord Drumalbyn.)
LORD HUGHES: I am very sorry that I cannot accept this Amendment. This is another proposal which looks so reasonable at first glance. I am not going to advance the argument which the noble Lord has anticipated, not because it is without validity, but because it has been argued and cross-argued to such an extent in another place that it would be a waste of time to go over it again in your Lordships' House. It has been argued that the Board would not be undertaking operations of a commercial nature, but of a pioneering, launching and rescue character. But no useful purpose would be served by going over the ground again, because one either accepts or disagrees

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with the argument and there is no convincing of one by the other.
By the practice established in another place over many years, undertakings which are financed out of monies advanced by Parliament must be subject to audit by the Comptroller and Auditor General, and it is not possible to exempt any part of the monies which are used by the Development Board from the audit of that august officer and his Department. If we made provision that certain aspects of the Board's activities are to be subject to audit by private accountants operating in the usual commercial way, we should be laying down a procedure by which part of the accounts of the undertaking would be audited twice, once by a chartered accountant or similarly qualified individual (if a chartered accountant will permit me to say that anybody can be similarly qualified) and all over again by the Comptroller and Auditor General. Audit by the Comptroller and Auditor General we could not prevent, because he would not be doing his job properly if he did not do so.
However, there are several objections. To do what is required would be asking for accounts to be published in much greater detail than is necessary for the purposes of the Board or of Parliament. That does not mean that if the Board undertook a rescue operation which did not come off, they could lose the resulting information by concealing it somewhere in the accounts. This is the sort of thing that noble Lords might suspect would be happening. The idea of intervention by the Secretary of State is criticised, but this is the kind of situation which justifies the action which we propose the Secretary of State and the Treasury should be able to take, in that it gives the Secretary of State and the Treasury ample power to determine the form of accounts. The Secretary of State, I can assure your Lordships, will certainly have regard to the need for lucidity and informativeness in the statement of accounts, and if it is felt that he is not achieving this, there is the normal Parliamentary remedy, because these accounts will be capable of being discussed by Parliament.
One knows how frequently public Boards are required in their accounts to provide information in a particular form,
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because, arising from a discussion of their Annual Report, Parliament has asked that certain things be done in a particular way. I know from my former membership of the North of Scotland Hydro-Electric Board the extent to which the form of accounts of the Board is governed by instructions coming from the Secretary of State and the Treasury, so that information may be clearly available to any qualified person who reads the accounts. The whole purpose is always that the accounts should be framed in such a way as to give the maximum of information, and never on any of these public bodies have they been encouraged or allowed to frame their accounts in such a way as to conceal information. That is the first point.
The second point I have already referred to. The Amendment would make it mandatory to publish a publication of accounts of a detailed nature, which would be unnecessary in some cases and undesirable in others. The third one, the question about rescue and so on, I will not refer to. In any event, even in the detail required by the Amendment it would not necessarily accomplish the purpose it seeks to achieve, because it could well be defective in the completeness and accuracy of the picture it would present (I do not say that this is a major point, but it shows that the officials think up every possible argument against the proposal)—for example, because of the difficulty of checking overheads, such as the Board's overheads.
I think the best safeguard for publication of that amount of information which can legitimately be expected by any reasonable person is the fact that these accounts are subject to discussion by Parliament, because it is an expenditure of monies which are voted by Parliament. It may well be that the first time, and the second time, the accounts are presented, Parliament seeks to get more information than is in them; but over a period I am certain that the accounts will be put in a way which will give the sort of information that noble Lords seek.
On the point to which the noble Lord referred, about the wording of "accounts" and "statement of account", the only answer is that this prevents (and this must be a serious drawback to civil servants) a certain slight untidiness of

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language, which I should think is almost a No. 1 crime, but which would cause no difficulty in practice. On this aspect, if other Amendments are being made I should think that we should take the opportunity of bringing these two statements into accord with each other, so that at the end of the day, at least inside St. Andrew's House, they would be happy that the untidiness did not survive to the end. I must therefore invite the noble Lord to withdraw this series of Amendments, which I cannot possibly accept. I hope that I have been able to assure him and his noble friends that ultimately, if not immediately, he will obtain all the information that is available. One thing which I cannot guarantee, of course, is that any chartered accountants will have any fees out of the matter; but that, I presume, was not the object of the exercise.
LORD POLWARTH: I wonder whether I might ask the noble Lord for a little elucidation on two points. Before doing so, I should clearly declare my interest as a member of the first-named and senior body of accountants referred to in the Amendment. Although technically an accountant in practice, I am, in fact, very much an accountant out of practice, and it is therefore highly improbable that I should ever be personally involved in this matter. The first question I ask in ignorance. Does the office of the Comptroller and Auditor-General maintain any staff in Scotland who are familiar with Scottish conditions, and particularly Highland conditions? The second question I ask more in anxiety. The noble Lord referred to the desirability, or otherwise, of publishing information relating to these accounts. Can he assure us that, in relation to commercial undertakings carried on, we shall be given no less information than would be required to be given by a public company under the Companies Act?
VISCOUNT COLVILLE OF CULROSS: I wonder whether I could re-echo what my noble friend Lord Polwarth has just said. I think the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, said that under this Amendment in some cases more accounts would have to be provided than were either necessary or desirable. I am sure the noble Lord
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ought to have the information that the noble Lord, Lord Champion, is giving him now, but I should like him to listen to me.
LORD HUGHES: The noble Lord would not expect me to get up and answer him immediately until I have been provided with the answer to the first question of the noble Lord, Lord Polwarth.
VISCOUNT COLVILLE OF CULROSS: The noble Lord, Lord Hughes, was speaking about the possibility of examining these matters in Parliament, and I have no doubt that that is right. Of course, the clause provides it. What concerns me a little is that supposing—and I appreciate the arguments about the rescue operations—there are commercial undertakings being carried on by the Board, the phrase used by the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, that there might be some undesirable element of the accounts which should not be disclosed, seems to me to preclude the effectiveness of Parliament in being able to examine these accounts. I do not think the noble Lord intended to suggest that anything was going to be concealed, but he used a particular epithet which might arouse considerable disquiet. I think it would be of great assistance to the Committee if he would go a little further and explain what he meant by saying that this particular Amendment would require accounts to be kept which were not necessary or desirable, because, of course, the desirability or otherwise of making the contents of the accounts public, either in Parliament or elsewhere, is exactly what this Amendment is intended to deal with. I hope that he may have an answer to that point, as well as to the question of my noble friend.
9.30 p.m.
LORD BURTON: I was rather surprised at the answer on auditors, because I tried to do some research and I could not find any organisation at all similar which did not have auditors appointed. There is the Electricity Act, 1947, the Transport Act 1947, the Gas Act 1948, the White Fish Authority, the Herring Industry Board, Harbours, and even the Airports Act, 1965—in all cases auditors had to be appointed and I could not find any body that did not. I know some

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people consider that the Highlands are an unusual place, but I do not see why we should have an unusual Board.
LORD HUGHES: The answer to the first question raised by the noble Lord, Lord Polwarth, is that the accounts are first of all examined by people in the Department in Scotland, and that is a detailed examination and therefore is by people qualified from a Scottish point of view. Then further examination which the Comptroller and Auditor General's officials wish to make is whatever may be necessary in order to supplement what is done virtually on his behalf by the Departments in St. Andrew's House.
I was rather surprised at what the noble Viscount, Lord Colville of Culross, attributed to me. I certainly hope that I did not say there would be undesirable things in the accounts.
VISCOUNT COLVILLE OF CULROSS: Oh, no.
LORD HUGHES: Yes, that is what the noble Viscount said the first time, that there would be undesirable things in the accounts, but when he continued the noble Viscount said I had said that there were things which it would not be necessary or desirable to publish. It is one thing to say that it may not be desirable to publish, but it is another thing to say that the items are in themselves undesirable. I do not believe for one moment that there would be anything in the accounts of this body which would be undesirable.
VISCOUNT COLVILLE OF CULROSS: I think the noble Lord has missed the point. He was suggesting that there might be some things which it would be undesirable to put into the accounts but not that there would be anything in the accounts which was undesirable.
LORD HUGHES: I would commend the noble Viscount on that effort, but it still does not meet the point. It is the trained legal brain thinking on its feet, but sometimes the untrained legal brain sticks to the point, which is what I intend to do. I did not say anything about the desirability or undesirability of the information, but it is not always desirable or necessary to publish everything in the sort of detail which this Amendment
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would require to be done. The extent to which Parliament considers that information is not being given in as much detail as it would wish is a matter upon which Parliament can comment and give decisions.
I should hope that the form in which the accounts are published, having regard to the fact that they will be prepared under the guidance of the sort of information which the financial departments and the Treasury would want, would in fact give all the information they expect Parliament would want. In so far as they give instructions which Parliament seeks to override because they are not satisfactory, this is in fact a criticism of the officials, that they have not done the job in the way that Parliament considers competent, and that is the best safeguard. No official likes to be told by the Accounts Department of another place, for instance, that they do not think the accounts give all the information to which Parliament is entitled. They lean over backwards to avoid that one. So I think there is no fear at all that the accounts which will be available from the Board will not be fully informative.
It is quite possible that the accounts might be regarded by Parliament as fully informative for their purposes without of necessity being in the exact form or giving all the information which a public company would have to give in its form of accounts, because there are many variations in the accounts of public bodies at the present time. Some of them would give information which a public company is not obliged to give, whereas in other directions they do not give information which a public company would be expected to provide. But neither one nor the other is necessarily right or wrong.
Lord Polwarth's intervention and his disclaimer of other than a qualification of a chartered accountant without the desire to become a practising auditor, reminds me that he is actively engaged in banking activities. One knows, for instance, that banks are permitted to do certain things which no other public company can get away with, although many of them would like to. No one suggests that because a bank is allowed to withhold certain information it is

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indulging in sharp practice. For that reason I believe that this is a perfectly reasonable way in which to work. The only item which I cannot satisfy is in regard to the accountants, who might have been paid fees for doing this job. But as a number of these undertakings may be very small in total, fees are probably small in extent, and accountants at least have the consolation that there are no terribly big fish escaping.
LORD DRUMALBYN: The general impression the noble Lord has left, with me at any rate, is one of great gloom about the activities of the Board under Clause 6. If the Government intend that the businesses and undertakings which the Board might acquire or set up are really to be so hoplessly uneconomic that it is not a good thing to treat them like ordinary commercial undertakings and they must be dealt with as Government expenditure departments, then I think the outlook is very poor. I had hoped, in reading Clause 6, that it was the intention of the Board to pave the way for viable undertakings and for industries in Scotland that would be viable. There is not the slightest reason why they should pay their way at once. Even if an industry were to be set up and get BOTAC aid it would not necessarily be expected to pay its way at once. But one was hoping in the long run that it would become economic and, in the end—I expressed the hope on Second Reading—it could be hived off and take its place in the economy of Scotland as a going concern. There could be no better training, surely, for the concern than to be audited as a commercial concern from the start, because this puts it on a par in its methods, and it would get guidance from commercial auditors right away. It would not be a bad thing if these concerns were subject to taxation like other bodies that have to compete.
I think the noble Lord does not really understand the dangers in leaving undertakings of this kind in the hands of Goverment accounting. For one thing, it is rather a slow process. First of all, you have to make the accounts and then pass them to the Comptroller and Auditor General; and one of the great criticisms of our system, I am afraid, is that the Public Accounts Committee is working on
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such very dead meat. I think I am right in saying that the noble Lord, Lord Champion, has been a member of that Committee. They are very old accounts indeed by the time the Comptroller and Auditor General draws attention to any particular thing which he thinks is not right and should be considered by the Public Accounts Committee.
I do not think this is the right way to deal with the accounts of businesses and undertakings which are intended to be commercial, and this is why we try to make this distinction here. I do not think that the criticism that this would mean duplication is valid. If the account is audited and certified it would save an immense amount of the time of the Comptroller and Auditor General, even if he did a quick check. I am afraid the real fact of the matter is that the Government have not really thought out what the Board are going to do and what their objectives are, because if they had done so, I feel sure that if they really want to set up viable undertakings they would want those undertakings to be financed in an ordinary way, and the accounts audited in an ordinary way, from the start.
I am not certain that all of my noble friends on this side were here at the time, but earlier this afternoon we asked about subsection (2) of Clause 9, and we were told that in the ordinary way money would be borrowed only on overdraft and would never be borrowed on the market. I agree that in a way that weakens the proposal that there should be an audit by chartered accountants. Nevertheless, I think that, as my noble friend Lord Polwarth suggested, it is essential to accept the discipline of commercial accounting from the start if these undertakings are to have any chance of paying their way.
I think it is not too late to hope that the noble Lord will think again on this matter. But even if it is too late at this stage, and would not be easy to do, I would still express the hope that the objective, at least, should be that at the earliest possible moment these businesses and undertakings should move on to a full commercial basis, with an audit and all the rest of it. I do not think there is much point in pursuing this matter. Does the noble Lord wish to say something?
LORD HUGHES: Yes. I think the noble Lord is going to withdraw the Amendment. But before he does so, I should like to remind him that on Second Reading I did say that the intention was that we should expect that the best use of funds would be to offer money on a circulating basis. There have been so many conversations that I forget what I said in the debate and what I said in the Lobby, but we do not expect to use a lot of the Board's money in setting up undertakings which we do not expect to succeed. If we or the Board are persuaded that there is no chance of an undertaking's succeeding, then it will not be set up, because I completely accept the argument which was advanced, that at the end of the day it will not help the Highlands if we set up an undertaking which can continue to exist only by being subsidised from beginning to end. That will be of no use. Therefore, the Board will be setting up only schemes which they anticipate will be a success.
I think that the noble Lord, perhaps rather unwittingly, attributed to me a fear, which underlay what I sought to do, that the undertakings would have something to conceal. That is not the purpose at all, because at the end of the day it will certainly be possible for people to find out from the accounts which undertakings are viable and which are otherwise. On that I can assure the noble Lord. So that it is not out of any desire to conceal information that we are seeking to proceed in this way. My final word on this point before, as I hope, the noble Lord withdraws the Amendment, is that I am quite certain that if the noble Lord had been speaking from these Benches, and moving this Bill, he would have been advancing the arguments which I have put forward in favour of the Comptroller and Auditor-General, and it is not beyond the bounds of possibility that I should have been saying what he has said.
LORD DRUMALBYN: I am not quite sure about that last remark. It is an entirely hypothetical argument, and I should not like to say "Yes" or "No" to it. But I might at any rate have tried, perhaps harder than even he did, to convince the Civil Service on this occasion that the right thing to do was to have an audit; because I believe that he probably argued this quite strongly but that cir
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cumstances overpowered or over-convinced him in the end, with the result that he is now putting forward this argument. If I remember rightly, the noble Lord, Lord Champion, and I served together at the same time on the Public Accounts Committee, and I would not suggest for an instant that the purpose of this kind of arrangement would be concealment. That is not what I would say at all. I feel that it may have the danger that it will not contain the necessary spur to incentive and profitability. That is why I express the hope once again that the noble Lord might be able to reconsider this. I know that it is a complicated matter; I am not extremely hopeful. If the noble Lord had told us this afternoon that the Board was to be able to borrow on the open market, I should have taken a totally different view. As it is, all one can do is to rest on the assumption he has given, that there will at least be the objective that commercial accounting and auditing will be adopted as soon as possible. In the meantime, I have no option but to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
THE CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES: Before I call Amendment No. 39, may I point out to the Committee that No. 39 pre-empts No. 40? In other words, if Amendment 39 is agreed to, No. 40 cannot be called.
9.47 p.m.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: Having failed on Amendment 31, I was sorely tempted not to move this one, but I will move it formally. I should like to have a little elucidation about the person who is going to be authorised by the Secretary of State to inspect and make copies of the accounts, et cetera, of the Board. What sort of person does the Secretary of State have in mind?
Amendment moved—
Page 9, line 17, leave out subsection (5).—(The Duke of Atholl)
LORD HUGHES: I am quite certain that if I answered the noble Duke's question by saying, "A perfectly respectable person to whom the noble Duke would take no exception", he would not consider that to be a satisfactory answer. In fact, it would of course be a responsible official of one of the Secretary of

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State's departments, qualified to examine these matters. The purpose, of course, was to seek information in connection with the Secretary of State's responsibilities in order to help him to arrive at a proper decision on a proposal. I inquired into this rather carefully this morning, and I wanted to know the extent to which there was a precedent for this sort of thing. It is very regularly done, say, in relation to new town development corporations who may wish to examine particular aspects in detail, and a spot-check may be made on certain items; or the Board may be asked to furnish more intimate details than they normally would do in relation to that particular item. It may be done by an officer going from St. Andrew's House to discuss the matter with the Board's officials on the spot, or it may be accomplished by the information being transmitted to St. Andrew's House. I can assure the noble Lord, returning to my initial facetious comment, that the people who will undertake the job will undoubtedly do it beyond reproach.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: I thank the noble Lord for that reply. I was wondering whether "any person" might include a member of Lord Polwarth's institution, or something like that. I gather that it will not. I beg leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 13 agreed to.
Clauses 14 to 17 agreed to.
Clause 18 [Interpretation]:
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL THE DUKE OF ATHOLL moved, in the definition of "land" to leave out "salmon fishings". The noble Duke said: This is a very simple Amendment and it is to alter the definition of "land" contained in Clause 18(1). I wish to alter this definition because salmon fishings are, on the whole, not under-used in Scotland. In fact, I think there are only two rivers which one could possibly describe as being under-used. In most other rivers the opposite is the case, and they are very much overused. Therefore I cannot see that the Board would wish to acquire them in order to increase their use. Secondly, and more important, we are told that the Hunter Committee is going to report in
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the very near future. It will undoubtedly make recommendations for salmon fishings over the whole of Scotland, and I feel that if we could get salmon fishings out of this part of the Bill the Government would have an even greater incentive to act upon the recommendations of the Hunter Committee when they are eventually produced.
Thirdly, I should like to suggest that, as the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, has already said, land is defined in the Interpretation Act as including buildings but not, so far as I am aware, salmon fishings. So far as I know, salmon fishings are included only in certain Acts which obviously had to include them because they were dealing directly with water, such as the Hydro-Electric Development (Scotland) Act, 1943, and the Land Drainage (Scotland) Act, 1958. In both of those Acts it was obviously advantageous that land should include salmon fishings, because in many cases the salmon fishings would no longer exist when the schemes proposed under those Acts had been completed. So far as I can make out, the Board will not enter into any major hydro-electric works, and I hope it will not engage in any land drainage scheme of such magnitude that it would destroy salmon fishings; if it did, I feel that it ought to acquire them by consent of the owner and not by compulsion. Therefore, I hope that the words "salmon fishings" will be excluded from this Bill. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 11, line 16, leave out ("salmon fishings").—(The Duke of Atholl.)
LORD BURTON: I must declare a considerable interest in this subject, because I am a director of two salmon fishing companies, one on the East Coast and one on the West Coast, both in the Highlands, and I also own substantial rod fishings. However, my object in getting up is to find out for what possible reason the Board could want to acquire salmon fishings. As my noble friend has said, they are already overused in most cases, and the only possible reason I can think of is that they might be attached to some hotel which was not paying its way, to try to make it pay its way. I think this would be the wrong type of use to put these fishings to, and I should be most grateful if we could get some elucidation as to what other uses they might be put to.

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Finally, I feel that the nationalisation of salmon fishing is not a good basis on which to work, as in the cases where they are publicly owned they have been grossly over-used. The Crown Commissioners own a great many fishings around the coast, and I think they let all their fishings on blind tender to the highest bidder, regardless of whether or not they are already over-used. I approached them in one case where I considered fishings were considerably over-used and asked them to join me in stocking a certain river. But they refused to cooperate, because they said that if they started on one river they might have to do it all round Scotland, which I think was a very weak excuse. Another example is a local authority which owns some salmon fishings. They are trying to get as much as they can out of the fishings in the way of rent, and have threatened to open up the nets again which have been off for a number of years.
9.55 p.m.
LORD HUGHES: I assure noble Lords that there is no ulterior motive in this. "The definition of "land" as including salmon fishings is well precedented in Scotland. I am not absolutely certain whether Scotland is alone in regarding salmon fishings as not being a separate estate from land, but it is certainly the position in Scotland that salmon fishings are included in "land ". So the definition of salmon fishings as being part of land is not something which is novel. I must admit that it is not in the definition of "land" in the Interpretation Act, so far as I know, but the references which I have given are admittedly the main Acts where there is a reference to water—the Hydro-Electric Development Act, the Drainage Act and the like; but they are not completely confined to that. For some reason, which is not immediately obvious to me, Section 66(1) of the Pipelines Act, 1962, also has some reference to salmon fishings, where they are defined as being part of the land. Whether they contemplated that pipe-lines would be running through salmon fishings in the North of Scotland or not, I do not know, but it is certainly within that particular Act—once again a tribute to the efficiency of the Civil Service in foreseeing all sorts of possibilities, even although they may never in fact take place.
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The noble Duke, in speaking to his Amendment, has really spoken—and so also, I think, has the noble Lord, Lord Burton—from the point of view of the compulsory acquisition of salmon fishings; and I may say that I am interested in the fact that the noble Lord, Lord Burton, simplifies these matters even more than I do myself. He has no difficulty in equating compulsory purchase with nationalisation—not always the normally-used definition of nationalisation; but we will not quarrel with him on that aspect. But, of course, the effect of the Amendment would be to deprive the Board of any opportunity of acquiring salmon fishings at all, whether by agreement or by compulsion; and if they were unable to acquire salmon fishings, even by agreement, it might prevent them from acquiring the land itself, because there have been occasions when an owner in whose land a public body has had an interest was prepared to sell only if the body would buy the lot, salmon fishings included. I admit that it has also been very frequently the practice that an owner, having got the price for the land and the salmon fishings, has proceeded to negotiate a lease of the fishings back to himself; so that in many ways he had the best of both worlds.
I would not hold out the possibility that this would happen in relation to the Highland Development Board, because there will not be many cases in which they would be interested in acquiring the salmon fishings as a primary objective; and, if the acquisition of the salmon fishings was only incidental to obtaining the land, it might well be that the easiest way of dealing with the matter would then be to lease the fishings to someone, who might well be the original owner. Although I have treated the matter in somewhat light fashion, that has proved to be the most advantageous way of handling the proposition. So the Board obviously must have power to acquire salmon fishings if it is a necessary part of the operation of acquiring the land.
But, having said that, I would not be prepared to agree lightheartedly that there could be no circumstances in which the acquisition of the salmon fishings themselves might not be part of the Board's procedure, and that it might not therefore be necessary at some point to acquire both land and salmon fishings by

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compulsion, simply because there was the difficulty of separating the estate in one from the estate in the other. The noble Lord, Lord Burton, shakes his head. I am afraid that sometimes during the course of this debate I have shaken my head—not because I was unconvinced; but because I did not want to be convinced. I know that on this matter the noble Lord does not wish to be convinced of the validity of the argument; so I write him off in despair. I would remind him that he has half an offer—he should be grateful for small mercies.
I think that the owners of salmon fishings have nothing to fear in this. One would expect it to be unlikely or improbable that the Board would acquire salmon fishing's ever by compulsion; but it may be that salmon fishings would be acquired along with a proposal compulsorily to acquire a piece of land. But it has been indicated, both here and in another place, that it is not the Government's intention that the Board should proceed, except as a last resort, to acquire by compulsion. In fact, the merits of compulsory powers are largely lost if they are used. The real value of compulsory powers (I remember that I indicated this in a talk in the Lobby with the noble Lord, Lord Burton, and others) is to enable the Board to negotiate with somebody who, if there were not the possibilities of compulsory powers, might be completely unreasonable. Therefore, I must ask the noble Lord not to press the Amendment, if only for the first of the reasons I have advanced: that it goes very much further than he intended, in that it would prevent the Board from acquiring fishings from a willing seller.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: Of course, I see that argument; and, if I was not aware of it before, I am now aware that if these words were not in the Bill the Board would not be able to acquire salmon fishings, even from a willing seller. I consider this would be a disadvantage to the Board's activities in, for instance, a case where they bought an hotel which had salmon fishing attached. In order to put the undertaking on its feet, the Board would obviously require to buy the salmon fishing also. Therefore, I can see that our Amendment goes too far.
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But I wonder whether the noble Lord would consider putting down an Amendment himself—since I could not attempt to draft it—whereby, if salmon fishings were acquired compulsorily for any reason and were afterwards let or leased to someone, the person from whom they were acquired should have the right to lease them back at a reasonable rent. This is, in fact, what the noble Lord said did happen. All I ask is that he should put it somewhere in the Bill. So long as the Board act in a reasonable way and we have a reasonable Secretary of State there is no worry; but one does not know what is likely to happen in a few years' time. As it appears to be the intention of the noble Lord and his right honourable friend that this should be the case, I feel it would be helpful if this were in the Bill.
LORD HUGHES: The noble Duke is inviting me to enunciate a new principle—the "Crichel Down Salmon (Amendment) Principle, 1965". I do not think that could possibly go into the Bill; although, as I have indicated, it is a likely way in which the Board could operate. But if this were incorporated in the Bill, I think the noble Duke would realise that it would be very difficult for the Board to extract in the lease what they consider would be a fair rental in return—if it was more or less laid down that the Board could only stipulate a rental acceptable to the original owner. To say that they should be required to lease it back to the owner at a reasonable rent raises the question of who should consider what is a reasonable rent.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: I should imagine it would be the district valuer. Presumably he fixed the price at which it was compulsorily purchased in the first place, and I should have thought that he would be the person to fix the reasonable rent in the second place.
LORD HUGHES: If I could be sure that we could have the valuer who valued the salmon fishings purchased by the Hydro-Electric Board I should be agreeable to that, but we cannot guarantee that it would be the same person. I cannot refuse to look at this point, but I should not be honest if I invited the noble Duke to place too much hope on what would emerge from further consideration.
THE DUKE OF ATHOLL: Obviously, on that I cannot not ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 18 agreed to.
Remaining clause agreed to.
Schedule 1 [Provisions as to the Highlands and islands Development Board]:
LORD DRUMALBYN: The hour is late and I think it would not be the wish of your Lordships that I should move the last four Amendments to the Schedules. Naturally I reserve the right to put them down again at the next stage. I should like to ask a question about Amendment 43, if the noble Lord would be so kind as to move the Schedule.
On Question, Whether Schedule 1 shall be agreed to?
LORD DRUMALBYN: Paragraph 12 states:
"Subject to the foregoing provisions of this Schedule, the Board shall have power to regulate their own procedure and that of any committee appointed by them."
I wonder whether the words
"which may include persons other than members of the Board"
should be added. It is not at all clear that there are powers to appoint committees which would contain members who are not members of the Board.
LORD HUGHES: I am grateful to the noble Lord. It was my intention, had Amendment No. 43 been moved, to give the information that the powers given to the Board to regulate their own procedure and that of any committee appointed by them cover the power to bring into membership of a committee people who are not members of the Board. The legal advice is that it is quite permissible for them to do so. They could set up an advisory board consisting of people outside the Board to advise on a particular subject, although I am told that if they did so, it could not properly be regarded as a committee of the Board if it did not include at least one member. What is clear is that in setting up a committee of the Board, the Board will have freedom to co-opt other people into membership. That is a legitimate use of the power to regulate their own procedure and that of any committee appointed by them.
On Question, Schedule 1 agreed to.
LORD DRUMALBYN: I should like, on behalf of all my noble friends and myself, to express our great appreciation of the courtesy shown by the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, throughout our proceedings, our admiration for his staying powers and his ability to remain lucid to the end.
LORD HUGHES: I am most grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Drumalbyn. I can assure him that the various things which I have undertaken to look at will be in the hands of the noble Lords concerned in ample time to enable them to decide a course of action for the next stage of our proceedings.
Remaining Schedule agreed to.
House resumed: Bill reported without amendment.

GREATER LONDON COUNCIL (MONEY) BILL
Reported, without amendment.
ROCHESTER BRIDGE BILL
Reported, with Amendments.