Lords Sitting of 4 May 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 Worcester

CIGARETTE SMOKING AND HEALTH
2.35 p.m.
LORD AIREDALE: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
[The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether, in view of the virtual certainty that American cigarette packets will shortly be required by law to bear prominent warnings of the danger to health of cigarette smoking, they will introduce legislation to the same effect.]
THE PARLIAMENTARY UNDERSECRETARY of STATE FOR COMMONWEALTH RELATIONS AND FOR THE COLONIES (LORD TAYLOR): My Lords, I understand that legislation on this subject is under consideration in the United States Congress, but no final conclusion has been reached. Her Majesty's Government are at present considering whether further steps are needed here to strengthen the health education campaign on the risks to health of cigarette smoking, and if so what steps are likely to be most effective.
LORD AIREDALE: My Lords, I am much obliged to the noble Lord for his Answer. Is not this idea a rather better one than the poster campaign, reaching as it would the people who need to be warned on this matter, and at no cost to the taxpayer?
LORD TAYLOR: That is by no means certain, my Lords. The people who need to be warned most are youngsters before they start smoking. If at the outset they can be discouraged from starting to
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smoke there is much more hope that they may remain non-smokers. To that end, the Ministry have produced a special film for the nine to twelve year olds which is, I think, very effective.
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: My Lords, in view of the fact that there were 23,000 deaths from cancer of the lung last year, could my noble friend tell me how far the educational campaign has gone? For instance, what proportion of sixth forms or fifth forms and even fourth forms are taught that smoking is harmful?
LORD TAYLOR: My Lords, I cannot give any precise figures, but I can say that in the next twelve months £117,000 will be spent on publicity by film, poster and advertisement; in addition, as regards children, well-known sportsmen and sportswomen who are non-smokers have been featured in children's magazines, making the point that they do not smoke and that smoking is bad for health and fitness.
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: My Lords, I am sorry to press my noble friend, but he will agree that for years and years we have asked for this education to be undertaken. Can he tell me in writing just how far the Ministry of Healthhas co-operated with the Ministry of Education in this matter, and what proposition of teachers and others in charge of children are using their time and energies to warn theseboys and girls?
LORD TAYLOR: My Lords, in fact I have tried to discover these precise figures, but since they are a matter for local authorities it will be very difficult to obtain them. Nevertheless, I will do my best and write to the noble Lady.
LORD NEWTON: My Lords, does the noble Lord realise—I think he probably does—that one of the great difficulties is that a great many people who are responsible for the education services in this country do not accept that health education is part of education?
LORD TAYLOR: My Lords, that is a perfectly fair point. Health education is a part of education.

BRITISH FARMS IN KENYA
2.40 p.m.
LORD HURD: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
[The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether in recent discussions with the Government of Kenya equitable terms have been agreed, on which the remaining British farmers who so desire can transfer their farms to the Kenya Government for African settlement.]
THE PARLIAMENTARY UNDERSECRETARY OF STATE FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS (LORD WALSTON): My Lords, the British Government are now awaiting the report of the Mission led by the Honourable Maxwell Stamp, which was appointed to discuss with the Kenya Government the latter's request for further financial assistance to enable them to purchase additional areas of European mixed farming land, to examine the problem generally on the spot and to report to the British Government. As the noble Lord will appreciate, the Mission have a considerable amount of material to consider and the issues are large and complex. The Mission's final report is likely to be ready in July but they expect to present an interim report during the coming week. My right honourable friend the Minister of Overseas Development announced in another place on April 6 that it is her intention to enter into discussions with the Kenya Government as soon as possible after receiving these reports.
LORD HURD: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for that helpful Answer. May we take it that it is the desire of Her Majesty's Government that equitable terms should be agreed, upon which the European mixed farmers can relinquish their holdings if they so desire, and that the matter is not going to be shelved once again?
LORD WALSTON: My Lords, it is, of course, Her Majesty's Government's desire that equitable treatment should be meted out to everybody, and it is undoubtedly the desire of the Government that this matter should be dealt with as speedily as possible, not only for the sake of the farmers themselves, but also for the sake of the economy of Kenya.
LORD CAREW: My Lords, further to this, may I ask that Her Majesty's Government should consider particularly and especially the position of those farmers who served in the Armed Forces of the Crown, who were induced by schemes put forward, with either the knowledge or consent of Her Majesty's Government, and persuaded to start farming in Kenya after service in the war, who to-day are very worried about their position, and need financial assistance in the buying of their farms so that they may settle in a new country of their own choice?
LORD WALSTON: My Lords, I can assure the noble Lord that I have the greatest feeling for the cases of these particular ex-Service farmers to whom he has referred. I would remind him that my right honourable friend the Minister of Overseas Development has said in another place that she will bear their case in mind in considering the Stamp Report.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: My Lords, may I ask the noble Lord whether his right honourable friend recognises that what these people wantis not merely sympathy, but help? Help is the only thing that is of any use to them. They get a great deal of sympathy, but they have not had much help.
LORD WALSTON: My Lords, it is not for me to draw the attention of the noble Marquess to the reasons why in past years they have not had very much help. But I would make it perfectly clear that the reason for sending out Mr. Stamp and his colleagues on this Mission was precisely so that action could be taken rather than having pious expressions of sympathy.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE
LORD SHEPHERD: My Lords, at a suitable moment after 3.30 p.m. my noble friend Lord Champion will be making a Statement on the National Board for Prices and Incomes.
SAINT MARK, CAMBERWELL BILL
Read 2a, and committed to the Committee on Unopposed Bills.

MINISTERIAL SALARIES CONSOLIDATION BILL [H.L.]
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (LORD GARDINER): My Lords, I beg leave to introduce a Bill to consolidate the enactments relating to the salaries of Ministers, the pensions of Prime Ministers, the salaries of Opposition Leaders and Chief Whips and other matters connected therewith. I beg to move that this Bill be now read a first time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read la.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Bill read 1a, and to be printed.

NUCLEAR INSTALLATIONS BILL [H.L.]
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, I beg leave to introduce a Bill to consolidate the Nuclear Installations Acts, 1959 and 1965. I beg to move that this Bill be now read a first time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read la.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Bill read 1a and to be printed.

PROTECTION OF BIRDS [H.L.]
LORD HURCOMB: My Lords, I beg leave to introduce a Bill to amend the law relating to the protection of birds. I beg to move that this Bill be now read a first time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read la.—(Lord Hurcomb.)
On Question, Bill read 1a, and to be printed.

HOUSE OF LORDS OFFICES
2.46 p.m.
Order of the Day read for the consideration of the Third Report from the Select Committee.
The Committee's Report was as follows:
In its Second Report, agreed to by the House on Tuesday, 30th March last, the Committee reported that it had considered the Statement on the Palace of Westminster made
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by the Lord Privy Seal on Tuesday, 23rd March (Hansard, cols. 524 ff.), and had appointed a Sub-Committee to consider and report upon the administrative problems of the House arising out of that Statement, and to make recommendations.
The Sub-Committee has met on four occasions and has examined the "housekeeping" functions exercised by the Lord Great Chamberlain on behalf of the House and has reported and made recommendations.
Having considered the Report of the Sub-Committee the Committee recommend as follows: —
1. That, notwithstanding any previous order of the House, the control of the accommodation and services in that part of the Palace and its precincts now occupied by or on behalf of the House of Lords and at present exercised by the Lord Great Chamberlain be exercised in future by the House of Lords Offices Committee.
2. That the Offices Committee appoint a Sub-Committee, to be named the Administration Committee, to exercise on behalf of the Committee the functions of control referred to above.
3. That the Sub-Committee consist of the Chairman of Committees (as Chairman), the Chief Whips of the three main political parties, the Chairmen (for the time being) of the Sub-Committees on the Refreshment Department and the Library; and up to four more members, one of whom should be a woman, to be chosen by the Offices Committee from amongst its own members; the Sub-Committee to have power to co-opt any other Peer whether a member of the Offices Committee or not.
4. That the Sub-Committee have full power to act on behalf of the Offices Committee, subject only to an obligation to refer major questions of policy to the Offices Committee for decision; the choice of such questions to be within the discretion of the Chairman; the Sub-Committee to report to the Offices Committee from time to time; the quorum of the Sub-Committee to be four.
5. That the Sub-Committee appoint an agent to carry out on its behalf the functions of control referred to in 1 above; and that Captain K. L. Mackintosh be entrusted with these duties in addition to his existing duties as Secretary to the Lord Great Chamberlain, Yeoman Usher of the Black Rod and Serjeant-at-Arms, House of Lords; and that all duties on behalf of the Sub-Committee be carried out by him as Serjeant-at-Arms.
6. That, subject to the foregoing recommendations, all existing rules and regulations governing the administration, control and custody of the House of Lords area continue in force for the time being, unless and until altered by order of the Sub-Committee.
The Committee has considered the special position of the Custodians who in future are to be provided by the Minister of Public Building and Works. Since it is clearly essential that the House should retain in its own hands the control of access, both within and

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into the House of Lords area, the Committee recommend that the Custodians, like the Police, should receive their operational orders direct from the Sub-Committee through Captain Mackintosh.
THE CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES (LORD MERTHYR): My Lords, I beg to move that this Report be now considered.
Moved, That the Report be now considered.—(Lord Merthyr.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
LORD MERTHYR: My Lords, I beg to move that this Report be now agreed to. In so doing, I should like to say that the effect of the House's agreeing to it would be to bring into existence the proposed Administration Committee, and I think it might be for the convenience of your Lordships if I were to name the members of the Committee, in addition to referring to them, as the Report does, by the positions they hold. The Administration Committee will consist of myself, as Chairman; the three Chief Whips, Lord Shepherd, the Earl St. Aldwyn and Lord Amulree; the Chairmen of the Refreshment Department and of the Library Sub-Committees, Lord Strang and Viscount Simonds; and, in addition, the Marquess of Salisbury, the Earl of Listowel and the Baroness Swanborough, they being appointed by the Offices Committee from among its own members. There remains one vacancy, and the Sub-Committee have power to co-opt any other Peer, whether a member of the Offices Committee or not. The Committee will be attended by the Clerk of the Parliaments.
My Lords, if, in the future, any Member of the House has any question to ask, or any matter to which he would like to draw the Committee's attention, he may write to or approach personally myself or any member of the Committee, and we will do our best to deal with the matter appropriately. Perhaps I should add that the actual machinery for the organisation of the custodians is still subject to consideration.
Finally, I know that I speak on the Committee's behalf when I say that their hope is that the administrative functions referred to in the Report will be carried out in the future with the same smoothness and efficiency as they have been in the past. The Committee, I need hardly say, owe a very great debt of gratitude to
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the noble Marquess, Lord Cholmondeley, for the friendly co-operation which he has always shown to them. I beg to move.
Moved, That the Report be agreed to.—(Lord Merthyr.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

APPRECIATION OF THE MARQUESS OF CHOLMONDELEY'S SERVICES
2.50 p.m.
THE LORD PRIVY SEAL (THE EARL OF LONGFORD): My Lords, I beg to move, That this House hereby expresses and places on record its profound gratitude to the Most Honourable the Marquess of Cholmondeley, G.C.V.O., for his many services to the House during two Reigns; for his unfailing care of the interests and the comfort of its Members, and for his lasting achievements in the embellishment of its precincts.
The Motion which the noble Lord the Chairman of Committees has just moved, authorises the proposals for the new domestic arrangements of the House made by the Offices Committee. The adoption of these proposals marks the end of the outstanding services of this kind which the noble Marquess, Lord Cholmondeley, has rendered to this House, in all its manifold domestic arrangements, during two Reigns. I am delighted—I am sure we are all delighted—to think that our connection with him, though it cannot, alas! be as close as hitherto, is not being brought completely to an end, since he will continue to be responsible for the arrangements on ceremonial occasions, such as the Opening of Parliament. All of us know how much his magnificent bearing contributes to the dignity of these occasions.
Lord Cholmondeley has devoted so much of his time and energy to the House that it would be impossible, in the compass of a single short speech, to do justice to all the aspectsof his work. Perhaps I may be allowed to mention two: his care for this building, and his kindness to those who work in it. Those of us who have been comparatively long in the House will know how much the appearance of the Chamber and its precincts have been enhanced in the last fourteen

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years. Those noble Lords who are newer to the House may possibly be unaware how much of the beauty of their surroundings is due to the hard work and unremitting labours of Lord Cholmondeley. The splendid tapestries and furnishings that are to be found in so many rooms are a lasting tribute to his taste and discrimination, and it is indeed appropriate that our new dining room should bear his name.
Then there are Lord Cholmondeley's great kindness, consideration and approachability. These have been extended to all who work in the building, whether Members of the House or staff. His little-known acts of personal generosity have been countless and deeply appreciated. These are only two aspects of his unceasing concern for all that happens in this building and of his attention to all matters, whether great or small, which has been instrumental in making this House the agreeable place that it is. Noble Lords in all quarters of the House have reason to be deeply grateful to him for all that he has done—none of us has failed to be aware of this. I think that it is appropriate that we should take this opportunity of placing on permanent record our deep sense of gratitude and appreciation. It is with this object that I have much pleasure in moving the Motion that stands in my name on the Order Paper.
Moved to resolve, That this House hereby expresses and places on record its profound gratitude to the Most Honourable the Marquess of Cholmondeley, G.C.V.O. for his many services to the House during two Reigns, for his unfailing care of the interests and the comfort of its Members and for his lasting achievements in the embellishment of its precincts.—(The Earl of Longford.)
LORD CARRINGTON: My Lords, I should like to associate those who sit on these Benches most warmly with the Resolution which has been moved by the noble Earl the Leader of the House. I am sure that there is no one in this House who, however much he may approve of the new arrangements, will not feel that the House will miss the personal interest and care which my noble friend Lord Cholmondeley has taken during his long years as Lord Great Chamberlain.
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In paying tribute to him on a former occasion, I remarked, as the noble Earl has done this afternoon, on how much indebted the House was to him for the paintings and tapestries and decorations in the public rooms and corridors of this House, for which he has been responsible, and indeed, for the long hours he has worked on behalf of us all. But we shall miss just as much his presence, his authority and his courtesy in all his dealings with the Committees of this House, and with each individual member of them.
My noble friend Lord Cholmondeley has a most particular position in this House. For many years he sat regularly in one corner—in fact, rather more regularly than most of us; and he is recorded, I am glad to say, not only in the portrait in the room which bears his name downstairs, but also, sitting in that place, in the composite picture of the House in Session. Well, we have had to change sides but I hope that he will still be seen in the quarter where he is to-day as often as he feels it possible to come for though in future he may have fewer powers to perform as Lord Great Chamberlain, his advice and his experience will always be welcomed by all of us, just as he is always certain of thedeep affection of every Member of this House.
LORD REA: My Lords, on behalf of my Liberal colleagues and myself, I support most warmly and sincerely this tribute to the noble Marquess, who has been so outstanding in the Great Office of State which he holds. I think it is agreed that every Member of your Lordships' Chamber is indebted to him, not only for the many and notable services which he has rendered to the House, but also, if I may say so—indeed, it has been said already—for his personal kindness and interest, for his courtliness and his courtesy, and for the grace and dignity with which he has filled an historic and valued function, dear to the hearts of all who have digested, and value, the continuity of at least some of our Parliamentary traditions. I hope I am not out of order when I say, in respect of certain social ceremonies, that we should also like to add our tribute to Lady Cholmondeley, who has stood at his side with such graciousness and such charm.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: My Lords, I should like, not only as an old Member of this House but also as an old friend of Lord Cholmondeley, having in former times worked with him for a number of years over the affairs of this House, to say one word in support of the Motion which has been so well moved by the Leader of the House. I believe that nobody more deserves the thanks of your Lordships, for, as the noble Earl, Lord Longford, said, no one has done more work, untiringly, both in the embellishment of the House itself and for all of us who live and work in it, to whom it has become, as it has to me, almost a second home. Indeed, I truly believe that, before the recent changes, it had in many ways become almost the centre of Lord Cholmondeley's life. He had devoted himself for so long entirely to its service and he was always here, as we all know, watching out for some improvement that could be made. I am afraid we did not always ourselves realise all that he was doing, for I think he is the worst man I ever knew at blowing his own trumpet. He was, and is, and always will be, innately modest, and I suspect that he will be greatly surprised at the warmth of the tribute which we are rightly paying him to-day.
The word "hereditary" has, I am afraid, tended to become rather a naughty word in recent times when applied to a Peer. But, if one wanted to prove that such a view was at any rate not always correct, one might well, I think, point to the record of the noble Marquess, Lord Cholmondeley, who, quietly, unobtrusively, selflessly and if I may say so, extremely efficiently, without any thought either of reward or of public acclaim, has devoted himself for so long to the service of this House and all that this House stands for. I am sure we are all happy to know from the Leader of the House that, in some spheres at any rate, that work will go on in the future as in the past, for the benefit of us all.
LORD STRANG: My Lords, I should like to say a few words in warm support of this Motion. I speak both as a Cross-Bench Peer and as Chairman of the Sub-Committee of the House of Lords Offices Committee which is responsible for the Refreshment Department. For the past thirteen years Lord Cholmondeley has been a member of that Refreshment Committee, and his whole heart has been in
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the affairs of the Refreshment Department. It is not merely that he has attended to such operations as the modernisation of the kitchens and the creation of the new dining room downstairs. It goes much deeper than that. He has given constant and loving care to the amenities of the Refreshment Department and the embellishment of the Dining Rooms and of the Guest Room. It is therefore, as the Leader of the House has rightly said, fitting that the Lower Dining Room, which now houses the picture of this House in Session and a portrait of Lord Cholmondeley himself, should go down in history as the Cholmondeley Room. The Members of the Sub-Committee, and indeed all those of your Lordships who use the Refreshment Department, owe him a great debt of gratitude, which it is proper that we should acknowledge to-day.
LORD BARNBY: My Lords, may I ask the indulgence of the House to add a few words of personal tribute to Lord Cholmondeley? First of all, may I pay my tribute to Lord Longford for the gracious and generous way in which he has expressed the feeling of the House? My personal reason for speaking is that, after forty years in Parliament, the larger part of it spent in this House, I recollect that my earlier association with Lord Cholmondeley was at a very early stage in my life, not in politics but in recreation. At that stage I learnt to recognise him as a perfectionist in everything he did. He had talents of great versatility which he deployed in so many ways to the benefit of his generation.
What will always cause us to respect his memory is not only his physical qualities, his gifts and his abilities, but also his generous spirit and attitude towards those in the most humble positions in the service of this House. For myself, I would add only that what has been said in this House has been justifiably said in regard to those qualities of consideration and generosity, not only to Back-Benchers—and I have been one for a long time in this House—but also to those who comprise the personnel of this House who are not Members. Any of us who has been fortunate enough to receive a personal letter from him will know that in his superlative calligraphy he provides an example of something we can respect in a passing age.
LORD SALTOUN: My Lords, may I add one quality which I do not think has been referred to already? I should like to bear testimony to the extreme patience and sheer unalderated goodness with which Lord Cholmondeley met what was very often impatience. Thereby he gave me a lesson in how people as well as things should be handled.
On Question, Motion agreed to, nemine dissentiente.
THE MARQUESS OF CHOLMONDELEY: My Lords, I am overwhelmed by the tributes you have paid me. The Motion which has been passed is, I should say, a record for somebody like me—somebody who has really been behind the scenes and who has not actually taken a useful part in your Lordships' House. Most charming tributes were paid to me a few weeks ago, and to-day I have had warm appreciation paid to me by Members of this House. I value it enormously. Is it not a record for one to receive these wonderful tributes and walk out under one's own steam?
I could not have done what your Lordships say I have done had it not been for the loyalty and efficiency of Captain Mackintosh and his staff, the Doorkeepers, the Custodians, the Police, and the men from the Ministry of Works who are attached to this Palace. It is they who have helped me on my way and saved me an enormous amount of trouble. In a Palace like this there have to be rules and regulations, and it is those members of the staff who have had to carry them out; and I must say your Lordships have supported us throughout. I have no complaints, and they have carried out their tasks with the utmost tact.
When I took over the job I found there was scope to do things. The last person who did things for this House in the way of decoration was the Prince Consort. He was unable to finish his job, and I found many bare walls, empty spaces, and so on. I made an appeal to your Lordships and others, and in a short time tapestries and pictures came along and the Palace now looks more "lived in". From what your Lordships have said, I know you approve.
I shall have this Motion written out by the best scribe in Italic writing. It will become a treasured heirloom in my
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family, and those who come after will know what your Lordships thought of me. My Lords, I thank you with all my heart.

SWEEPSTAKES ON HORSERACES (AUTHORISATION) BILL [H.L.]
Read 3a (according to Order), and passed, and sent to the Commons.

LAW COMMISSIONS BILL
3.4 p.m.
Report of Amendments received (according to Order).
Clause 1 [The Law Commission]:
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (LORD GARDINER)moved, in subsection (1), to leave out "not more than". The noble and learned Lord said: My Lords, the first Amendment on the Order Paper raises a point which I undertook to consider when the Bill was in Committee. It is a short and narrow point. The Bill provided for not more than five Commissioners, and it was suggested in Committee that it would be wiser to fix the number at five. I had said that I proposed to appoint five, that I was sure that five was the right number, and that the number ought to be five for a long time to come. I explained that the only reason the Bill had originally provided for "not more than" five was that this is not an unusual form, and I thought that the day might come when a Lord Chancellor would feel that the work could be completed with three Commissioners, or with some lesser number than five. It seemed to me to be the general view of the Committee that it would be wiser to fix the number at five. There is really little to it. Having promised to consider it, I have no objection to that course, and have therefore put down this Amendment.
Amendment moved—
Page 1, line 8, leave out ("not more than"). —(The Lord Chancellor.)
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: My Lords, it would be ungracious of me, on my own behalf and on behalf of my noble and learned friend Lord Simonds, who wishes me to express his regret that he is unable to be with us this afternoon, not to thank the noble and learned Lord, the Lord Chancellor, for moving this Amendment,

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which is in the same terms as the first Amendment I moved during the Committee stage of this Bill. That Amendment led to a considerable amount of controversy and some rather heated debate. I can assure the Lord Chancellor that the same Amendment moved by him to-day will not have the same consequences. I feel tempted to remind the noble Lord of the unkind words which were said on the Amendment when I moved it originally and of the argument he then advanced, but I propose to resist the temptation completely. I consider that the Amendment improves the Bill, and I am very glad indeed that, after further consideration, the Lord Chancellor has decided to move the Amendment himself.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
VISCOUNT DILHORNEmoved, at the beginning of subsection (2), to insert:
"The Chairman shall be the holder of high judicial office or a person who has held high judicial office, and".
The noble Viscount said: My Lords, I have put down this Amendment (which is very similar to the one moved by my noble and learned friend Lord Simonds) because the Lord Chancellor said during Committee stage that he would think about the suggestion. The Amendment tabled by Lord Simonds provided that the Chairman of the Law Commission should be the holder of high judicial office. The proposal met with wide support—indeed, I think everyone who spoke expressed the view that that should be the case. In the course of the debate the noble and learned Lord, Lord Parker of Waddington, suggested a modification of that Amendment, and that the Chairman should be the holder of, or should have held, high judicial office; and this Amendment embodies that suggestion.
The noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor, when he came to reply, said that he would like to think about this suggestion. There is no Amendment on the Order Paper in his name giving effect to this proposal, and I have therefore tabled this Amendment to enable him to communicate to your Lordships the results of his thoughts on this point. I do not think that there was any dispute between us as to the desirability of having as the Chairman someone who is the holder of high judicial office or has
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held high judicial office, and the only question, as I see it, is whether this statement should or should not be included in the Bill. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 1, line 10, at beginning insert—
("The Chairman shall be the holder of high judicial office or a person who has held high judicial office, and").—(Viscount Dilhorne.)
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, I have given careful consideration to this point but I think that here the Bill as printed is preferable to the proposed Amendment. Again, the point is a very short one. We are all agreed that, if practicable, the Chairman of the Commission should be one who holds or has held high judicial office. But the last thing I am sure we should all want, if the Law Commission is the success which I believe it is going to be, is that its work should come to an end because it cannot function unless its Chairman holds or has held high judicial office—and there may be more than one circumstance in which it might not be practicable to obtain such a man as Chairman.
In the first place, a High Court Judge is a man who has devoted the whole of his life to the forensic battles of the Court, and holds a very high position in his profession. He spends his time trying cases—work of great importance, of course, to all our citizens. Such a man might well feel that he did not want to spend a period of years in an office working on matters of law with other lawyers. Therefore, it might happen at some particular time (as, of course, no Judge could be ordered to do this work) that there was no Judge who was so concerned for the future development of English law that he was willing to spend a period of years in this work.
Again, as I think I pointed out in Committee, there might be circumstances in which there was an increased pressure of work, with the Lord Chief Justice complaining to the Lord Chancellor that he did not have enough Judges to try the cases, and in particular the criminal cases. That might happen at a time when there was already the maximum number of Judges provided for by Parliament, and, until a further Bill had been obtained giving powers to Parliament to increase the number of Judges, the Lord Chancellor might find great

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difficulty in deciding whether he could legitimately take a Judge away from his ordinary duties to do this work. There is no real difference between us in intention, and I hope that the noble and learned Viscount will accept that it is my intention, just as it is his, that, if practicable, the Chairman of the Law Commission should always be one who holds or has held high judicial office.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: My Lords, of course the term "high judicial office" covers a much wider field than that of just a High Court Judge. I must say that I welcome what the noble and learned Lord has said, as to his views about the status of the person who should be Chairman of this Commission. I find it difficult to believe that any successors of the noble and learned Lord would hold a different view. I think it is a somewhat remote possibility that the Lord Chancellor of the day would not be able to find someone, either a current holder of high judicial office or someone who has retired from it, who would take on this work and be a suitable person to do it. But, as he says, there is the possibility of the position being otherwise, although I myself regard it as a very slight one. I do not propose to press this Amendment, because I believe that our discussion has served the useful purpose of showing what is at least the present view as to the kind of person who should hold this important office. I ask your Lordships' leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
3.15 p.m.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR THE LORD CHANCELLOR moved, in subsection (3), to leave out all words after "Commissioner shall" and to insert:
"be appointed for such term (not exceeding five years) and subject to such conditions as may be determined by the Lord Chancellor at the time of his appointment; but a Commissioner may at any time resign his office and a person who ceases to be a Commissioner shall be eligible for reappointment".
The noble and learned Lord said: My Lords, this is a good-will Amendment. I do not know whether such a thing exists as a matter of terminology. If it does not, then I have invented it. The point, again, is a fairly short one, but one which has introduced a good deal of
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discussion, and that is the question: should there be a maximum limit, and if so what, to the term of appointment of Law Commissioners? I confess I had thought, as one can never anticipate exactly what will happen and as circumstances may vary, that it would be wise to leave the matter entirely to the Lord Chancellor, but I had said that I did not propose to appoint any Law Commissioner for a term of more than five years, because it seemed to me that that would not be desirable in the case of first appointments.
In Committee various views were expressed and the Committee carried an Amendment, which I was unable to accept, limiting the period to three years, which as I think I then said would have reduced the number of possible Law Commissioners available in England and Wales to about half. One of your Lordships thought that there ought to be a maximum of seven years, but eventually it appeared that most of your Lordships thought that the term ought to be five years. When I say that I have accepted this as a matter of good will, I must say, if I am to be frank, that I am still inclined to think that we should have been wiser to leave it to the Lord Chancellor of the day.
Let us conceive the holder of a chair of law at the University of Oxford, whose services the Lord Chancellor might particularly want to obtain. If he is 58 and the retiring age for such holders is 67, he has nine years to go in the same position. Of course, if he goes to be a Law Commissioner for five years, he has then got four years left. He will not get another appointment in a university for those four years, so it seems to me that such a man might reasonably say, "I will split the difference with you, and I will come for a minimum period of six years, as I cannot really be left with four years". It might have been wiser to leave the matter to the Lord Chancellor, but a number of your Lordships—including the noble and learned Viscount, Lord Dilhorne, and the noble and learned Viscount, Lord Simonds—took a very strong view that there ought to be a limit and that it should be five years. As I say, for the sake of good will I have accepted that view, and beg to move accordingly.
Amendment moved—
Page 1, line 14, leave out from ("shall") to end of line 19 and insert the said new words.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: My Lords, the Lord Chancellor described this Amendment as a good-will Amendment. In speaking to it, I hope that I shall not be accused of lacking a similar spirit of good will in relation to it. The Amendment, of course, is one which replaces a good deal of subsection (3) of Clause 1 of the Bill, and it embodies, with the alteration from three years to five years, the Amendment that was moved into the Bill on a Division in Committee. As I recollect, the real controversy on that occasion was not on whether the term should be three years, four years or five years, but on whether there should be laid down in the Bill a maximum term for which any one of these people could be employed initially, while in no way restricting the power to appoint them for a further period. I am confirmed in that recollection when I look at col. 469 of Hansard of April 14, for I see that I suggested to my noble and learned friend Lord Simonds, who moved the Amendment initially, that we should make a slight amendment to it and carry that into effect, and that at a later stage, if need be, an Amendment could be moved to change "three" to "four" or "five", as the case may be.
That was the question of principle. I myself take the view that it is right to put in the Bill a maximum period of employment. I think it will be of very considerable advantage to the holders of the Lord Chancellor's office. Initially, I suggested that the period should be five years, but on reflection, bearing in mind the power to reappoint, I am not at all sure that there is not something to be said for the shorter period initially put forward by my noble and learned friend Lord Simonds. I say that for this reason: that cases certainly do occur when people, without warning, age very rapidly and become, sad though it is, unfit to discharge their duties, whatever they may be—and, as I say, they become in that condition very quickly indeed. It might be convenient that their appointment should terminate automatically without steps having to be taken on the grounds of some kind of incapacity. However, I am not stressing that aspect.
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I believe that we have reached a wise compromise in this Amendment, and I am very glad that the Lord Chancellor, on reflection, has thought it right to embody this Amendment in the Bill. I am also very glad that, by the Amendment that he has tabled, he has thought it right to insert it in such a place as to make it perfectly clear that, after serving a period stipulated in the Bill as being "not exceeding five years", it will be possible, in appropriate cases, to reappoint. After the Amendment had been carried into the Bill I think it might have been argued that it restricted the total employment to five years, and that in no circumstances could that period be extended. I do not think there is any room for that argument now, and I think the Amendment has been inserted in a better place. I am grateful to the noble Lord for the action he has taken.
THE EARL OF SWINTON: My Lords, having taken some part in this discussion on the last occasion, I should like to add my appreciation to the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor for having so gracefully accepted what I am sure was the general feeling of the whole House. I accept it in the spirit of good will. We all have good will towards this measure; and, now that it has become an agreed measure, one in which the whole House has joined in making a better measure, I hope that the child of the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor will grow in grace and wisdom and in the fear of the Lord.
LORD SILKIN: My Lords, I do not wish to disturb the harmony of the proceedings, but the two noble Lords who have so far spoken from the other side are both advocates of having a definite term incorporated in the Bill. The good will that the noble and learned Lord has extended has been to meet their views; but I should like to place on record the fact that, apart from that of the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor, there is another view, and that, I thought, was adequately expressed by the noble and learned Viscount, Lord Dilhorne, when he made the point that people age rapidly and that perhaps five years was too long. It occurs to me that that is possibly an argument for not having a period at all.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: My Lords, I do not think that that is an argument for not having a period at all. Not having a period at all would enhance the difficulty to which I referred. But I do think it is an argument—I do not want to develop it which might have been advanced on the last occasion. I am perfectly content with five years.
LORD SILKIN: Yes, I know; we are all content with five years. I am not speaking against the Amendment, but wanted to make it clear that some of us are going a good way towards this desire for good will in respect of the Bill. I, for one, should have preferred not to have a period in at all, for the reason (in spite of what the noble and learned Viscount, Lord Dilhorne, has said) that there might be circumstances in which it would be desirable that somebody should not be appointed for along period when obviously he was not able to carry on.
But I do not want to make this a controversial issue. I am merely giving one of the reasons why I should have preferred there to be no period at all. I accept the compromise, but I should like noble Lords to understand that it really is a compromise: that there are noble Lords, I hope in all parts of the House, who would have preferred not to put a fixed period in the Bill, and that there are others who would not otherwise have agreed to five years, including the noble Viscount, Lord Dilhorne, himself, who, on reflection, thought that perhaps five years was too long. However, we are all prepared to accept the Amendment, and, as the noble Earl, Lord Swinton, says, we hope the Bill will now go forward as an agreed measure.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR THE LORD CHANCELLOR moved, in subsection (4), to leave out "high". The noble and learned Lord said: My Lords, with your Lordships' permission, perhaps I may discuss Amendments Nos. 4 and 5 together, because they are really the same point. Your Lordships may remember that this was a point which, when it was raised on the Committee stage, I said I thought was a good point. I had contemplated Law Commissioners as being men of high standing, of rather more standing than metropolitan magistrates or county court judges, and accordingly financial provision had not been
838
made for such people, when appointed, to maintain their office. But as I myself have been in favour throughout of leaving matters as far as possible to the good sense and discretion of the Lord Chancellor, I agree that if some future Lord Chancellor should think some metropolitan magistrate or county court judge was suitable for a Law Commissioner, who am I to say that he is not? I agreed to consider the point, and Amendments Nos. 4 and5 now have the effect of meeting that point by extending the provision to all judicial offices. The following Amendment will cover the question as to how far, in the case of a part-time Commissioner, he is to continue his other part-time activities. My Lords, I beg to move accordingly.
Amendment moved—
Page 1, line 20, leave out ("high").—(The Lord Chancellor.)
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: My Lords, again I must express my gratitude to the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor for accepting this Amendment. It is one that I think I moved on the Committee stage. Again, I think it makes an improvement in the Bill. There is just one point which the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor did not touch upon. I said during the course of the Committee stage that if you were to appoint to the Commission the holder of a judicial office which carried a lower salary than the salary which was going to be paid to the Commissioners, I thought there ought to be provision, while he held the office of Commissioner, for paying him the difference between the two. There is no Amendment down to provide for that, and the noble and learned Lord did not touch upon it.
The reason may well be that that can be provided for in the terms of the appointment of such a judicial officer. If that is so, I shall be glad if the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor will confirm that it is so: and also if he will say, as I hope he will, that he accepts the view that, if such an appointment were made, then the salary of the holder of such a judicial office should, while he is a Law Commissioner, be brought up to the salary of a Law Commissioner.
LORD SILKIN: My Lords, does Clause 4(1) not deal with that? It says:
"…such salaries…as may be determined, with the approval of the Treasury," et cetera.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: No, I do not think so, if the noble Lord studies the effect of taking out the word "high". The holders of judicial office will go on being in receipt of their judicial salaries. I raised this point at the Committee stage, and, as I said, I think the answer may well be that there is no need for a provision in the Bill to deal with it, as it might be dealt with by the terms of appointment.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: Yes, my Lords, I confirm what the noble and learned Viscount, Lord Dilhorne, has said. The intention is that the judicial appointment and the judicial remuneration will continue and a sum in excess of that will then be made up. I am advised that it is not necessary that the Bill should go into any detail about it, because the financial provisions contained in Clause 4(1) are extremely fluid and leave the whole question of remuneration to be agreed by whoever is being appointed and of course, by the Lord Chancellor and the Treasury.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, we have already discussed this Amendment, which I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 1, line 22, after ("not") insert ("(unless otherwise provided by the terms of his appointment").—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 2:
The Scottish Law Commission
2.—(1) For the purpose of promoting the reform of the law of Scotland, there shall be constituted in accordance with this section a body of Commissioners, to be known as the Scottish Law Commission, consisting of a Chairman and not more than four other Commissioners appointed by the Secretary of State and the Lord Advocate.
(3) A person appointed to be a Commissioner shall hold and vacate office under the terms of the instrument by which he is appointed, but may resign his office; and a Commissioner who ceases to hold office shall be eligible for re-appointment.
THE EARL OF SELKIRK: My Lords, the words in this Amendment are the same as those moved by the Lord Chancellor under Amendment No. 1. One reason I have for moving this Amendment
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is to ask the noble Lord to tell us why he is not moving such an Amendment. I have no doubt that he has a good reason. The Lord Chancellor, in moving his Amendment, stated roughly what the procedure was intended to be in England. I should be grateful if the noble Lord could give us an idea now of what the procedure is intended to be in Scotland in setting up these Committees. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 2, line 4, leave out ("not more than"). —(The Earl of Selkirk.)
THE JOINT PARLIAMENTARY UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR SCOTLAND (LORD HUGHES): My Lords, the answer to the noble Earl's query is simple. The objection to the Bill in relation to Clause 1, as previously before the House, was that the Bill did not agree with the terms of the White Paper. If in fact we were to alter Clause 2 as Amendment No. 6 proposes, we should be creating a situation where in Scotland the Bill, which at the present time agrees with the White Paper on the Scottish proposals, would be taken out of agreement with it. That would not be a good reason for refraining from changing if there were other good reasons for changing.
The reason why, in the first instance, there was a difference was that the magnitude of the problem South and North of the Border was quite different. In the first place, I gather that the Commission for England and Wales will be almost entirely a full-time body. The intention North of the Border is that the Commission should be very largely a part-time body with a full-time Chairman and a number of part-time Commissioners. It may be that in the beginning it would be necessary to have as many Commissioners as five, although that is not absolutely certain. What is certain is that at some time, perhaps at a time not very far away, and perhaps even immediately, it will be possible for the work to be done with a Chairman and fewer than four other Commissioners; so to have the Bill as it stands, providing for not more than five, would adequately meet the situation in Scotland and yet leave us with the complete flexibility which is desirable in matters of this kind. I believe it is

841
more than likely that the Commission in the first instance will consist of a Chairman and three part-time members, although it might in fact be four. I hope therefore, on the assumption that I have given him the information he is seeking, that the noble Earl will find it possible in these circumstances to withdraw the Amendment.
LORD DRUMALBYN: My Lords, may I make a short point? It is that it might be of advantage to have somebody with sheriff-substitute experience in addition to the four categories mentioned in the Bill; that is:
"persons … qualified by the holding of judicial office"—
which was previously "high judicial office"—
"or by experience as an advocate or solicitor or as a teacher of law in a university."
I think it might be an argument for having five rather than four: but I am certain that my noble friend will not wish to insist on any lack of flexibility in this particular connection.
THE EARL OF SELKIRK: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord. I think the point that my noble friend Lord Drumalbyn made was a true one. I take it there will be at least four Commissioners for the time being and that the fifth postwill be left vacant for the moment, at least. I am happy with the information and I beg leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
3.36 p.m.
THE EARL OF SELKIRKmoved, in subsection (1), to leave out all words after "by the" and to insert "Lord Advocate after consultation with the Secretary of State." The noble Earl said: It is not only a question of appointing a Commission in Scotland and of who will make the appointments, but there has been a good deal of discussion on this and there are one or two points which I should like the noble Lord to clear up. I think the discussion has been in some measure due to our uncertainty about what is to be the scope of this Commission. At one point, one of the Scottish Ministers said it would include revision not only of the law but of social, economic and political law. If it does all that there will not be very much
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work for Parliament to do. I do not think it is intended to go as far as that. I am certain that a Commission of this character would be unsuited to that purpose.
There is one point I should like the noble Lord to clear up. He said this Bill makes no change. But up to this time the Secretary of State has never been responsible for the state of Law in Scotland. In going back it may be difficult to say who was responsible. But I think that since the Royal Commission on Scottish Affairs, of about ten years ago, it has been clear that the responsibility is with the Lord Advocate. I think, while not saying necessarily that a change is wrong, that it is important to note that a change is taking place. The noble Lord has given a reason for this. Indeed, the noble Earl, Lord Swinton, supported him in it. He said it gave the possibility of answering questions in Parliament when the Lord Advocate was not himself a Member of the other place. That of course is a good reason so far as it goes. I suppose, at a pinch, the Lord Advocate might be made a Member of this House if he did not wish to be a Member of the other place.
However, I think it is important to note that if this is a reason for invading the Lord Advocate's responsibilities, then if it is carried any further it will have rather wide constitutional repercussions. The Lord Advocate has certain functions in Scotland which the Secretary of State can never carry out and should never attempt to carry out. He is responsible for all criminal prosecutions of indictable offences and for the inquiry, if necessary, into sudden or suspicious death, and in so doing takes the place of the coroner in this country. If because he is not a Member of the other place it is possible to invade his responsibilities, it might precipitate a much wider constitutional change in the future. I would ask the noble Lord to try to make it clear. I think the easiest way to do so is by some Amendment such as I am proposing here (which, in fact, would not alter the say which the Secretary of State has) rather than to allow a position to be eroded away.
The noble Lord himself said the responsibilities for these matters will rest

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with the Secretary of State. He did not go as far as did a former Secretary of State in another place who spoke of two Ministers in one Department. That is a completely false presentation of the situation, and I should like the noble Lord to clear this matter up. I am not going to press this Amendment if the noble Lord will make it clear that he has no intention of further eroding the constitutional position of the Lord Advocate. Otherwise, I will press this Amendment which I think will not in any way impede the Secretary of State in what he has to do, but will make it clear that in this sphere the Lord Advocate's responsibility is direct and personal. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 2, line 5, leave out from ("the") to end of line 6 and insert ("Lord Advocate after consultation with the Secretary of State.")—(The Earl of Selkirk.)
LORD HUGHES: My Lords, I would go further than I have been asked to do by the noble Earl. He asked me to state that there was no intention of further eroding the responsibilities of the Lord Advocate. I do not agree that the word "further" is correctly placed there. There has in fact been no erosion of the Lord Advocate's responsibilities up to this moment. In fact, the specific recognition in this Bill of his right, jointly with the Secretary of State, is in fact the first time, so far as we can trace, that it has been placed on record that the Lord Advocate has a responsibility in these matters.
Another point on which I must disagree with the noble Earl is when he says that the Secretary of State does not have responsibility for recording the law of Scotland. That is very far from the case. I think perhaps the best thing would be for me to give a number of the examples with which I have been furnished. The Franks Committee suggested that the Lord Advocate should be given functions under the legislation required to implement their recommendations, but the subsequent legislation, the Tribunals and Inquiries Act, 1958, gives responsibility in this field in Scotland to the Secretary of State and, to a much lesser degree, to the Lord President. Then there are the Legal Aid Acts. In
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Scotland, the responsibility for the central administration of the Legal Aid and Advice Service rests with the Secretary of State. Under the Sheriff Courts (Scotland) Act, 1907, the powers in relation to the appointment of sheriffs and their removal, and the organisation of the sheriff courts, are given to the Secretary of State. In England, the organisation of the courts is, of course, a matter for the Lord Chancellor.
Under the Administration of Justice (Scotland) Act, 1933, the appointment of the officials of the High Court of Justiciary and the Court of Session is given to the Secretary of State. In some cases (the Principal Clerk of Justiciary, Accountant of Court, and Auditor of Court) the powers are exercised on nomination by the Lord Advocate. The Secretary of State is responsible for executive action under the Sheriffs' Pensions (Scotland) Act, 1961, while under the Sheriff Courts and Legal Officers (Scotland) Act, 1927, the appointment of sheriff clerks is a matter for the Secretary of State. The next example is the Justices of the Peace Act, 1949. The functions of the Act in relation to the appointment of justices were transferred by Statutory Instrument, by the Transfer of Functions (Justices of the Peace) (Scotland) Order, 1955, from the Lord Chancellor to the Secretary of State, as a result of the recommendation to this effect of the Royal Commission on Scottish Affairs (1952–54).
Under the Children and Young Persons (Scotland) Act, 1937, the rule-making functions of the Lord Chancellor in Scotland were transferred to the Secretary of State by the Transfer of Functions (Justices of the Peace) (Scotland) Order, 1955, as a result of the recommendation to this effect in the Report of the Royal Commission on Scottish Affairs. There are others, but I think it would be unduly boring if I were to go through them all. From 1885 to 1962 the pattern has been laid down that there is a definite responsibility on the Secretary of State in these legal matters. It does not in any way interfere with the functions which have been exercised over that period by the Lord Advocate, and I would reiterate, in as clear terms as I can, that the Lord Advocate's position is not eroded by this Bill in any degree whatever, but in fact is slightly enhanced. I hope, therefore,

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that the noble Earl will find it possible to withdraw this Amendment.
LORD DRUMALBYN: My Lords, may I just ask the noble Lord a question on this point? Has what he has been saying to-day been said after consultation with, and with the agreement of, the Lord Advocate, or has he been putting only the position of the Secretary of State?
LORD HUGHES: My Lords, I think it would be correct to say that I have been speaking from the brief provided by the Lord Advocate.
THE EARL OF SELKIRK: My Lords, I am grateful for the information which the noble Lord has given us, but in fact what he is dealing with is administration. What I was talking of was the law, which is rather different. I believe the Lord Advocate was represented on the Lord Chancellor's Committee, and of course that and his own Committee are the only organisations dealing specifically with this subject. I will not press this Amendment now. I am grateful to the noble Lord for making this clear-cut statement, and I hope that if necessary he or his lineal successor will be held responsible for what he has said. In those circumstances, I beg leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

CASES REFERRED TO THE NATIONAL BOARD FOR PRICES AND INCOMES
3.45 p.m.
THE MINISTER WITHOUT PORTFOLIO (LORD CHAMPION): My Lords, with your Lordships' permission, I should like to make a Statement similar to that which my right honourable friend, the First Secretary of State, has just made in another place in reply to a question about the cases which he proposes to refer to the National Board for Prices and Incomes. If I may, I will use his own words, which are as follows:
"The Government have decided to refer three price cases, those of standard bread and of flour used in its manufacture; of soap and detergents; and the rates for road haulage as recommended to its members by the Road Haulage Association.
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"These are all cases of special significance for the cost of living or for industrial costs and give rise to special concern. The price of the standard loaf was again increased last November following a series of increases as a result of which the price has gone up very substantially since the beginning of 1960. The prices of many soaps and detergents have increased substantially over the past year. In the case of road haulage rates, there have been three increases recommended in nine months. The Minister of Transport has asked the Road Haulage Association to postpone the effective date of their latest recommendation by a period not exceeding four weeks to give the Board time to make its Report.
"Representatives of the industries and trades concerned have been told of the Government's intention, and I am confident that they will co-operate to the best of their ability in the Board's inquiries."
THE EARL OF DUNDEE: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for repeating this Statement. In the November Budget there was a heavy increase in the price of petrol, and another in the April Budget in the motor vehicles duty, which, as we pointed out, are bound to raise the cost of road haulage and to reduce accordingly our competitive power. However, I am glad to hear from the noble Lord's Statement that the Government are doing their best to see that the damage to our economy from their own fiscal measures will not be any greater than is absolutely necessary. I hope that the incomes and prices policy will be successful, and I am sure your Lordships will wish to give every support to the National Board for Prices and Incomes in carrying out its functions.
LORD CHAMPION: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Earl for what he has said, except for the little sly dig that he always has on these occasions about the responsibility of the Government for any price increases which have taken place. Clearly, the increases which have taken place, both in the fuel tax and the vehicle Excise duties, will enter into the consideration of the Board when it has these matters before it.

LAW COMMISSIONS BILL
3.49 p.m.
Report stage resumed.
LORD HUGHES: My Lords, I need not take up much of your Lordships' time in moving this Amendment. This places the Scottish appointments under the same limit of five years, subject to reappointment, as your Lordships have already agreed to for the Commission under Clause 1. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 2, line 12, leave out from ("shall") to end of line 15 and insert ("be appointed for such term (not exceeding five years) and subject to such conditions as may be determined by the Secretary of State and the Lord Advocate at the time of his appointment; but a Commissioner may at any time resign his office, and a person who ceases to be a Commissioner shall be eligible for reappointment").—(Lord Hughes.)
THE EARL OF SELKIRK: My Lords, we discussed this matter on the Committee stage, and I should like to thank the noble Lord for the Amendment he has put down.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
3.50 p.m.
LORD HUGHESmoved, in subsection (4), to leave out "high". The noble Lord said: My Lords, with permission, I should like to speak to Amendments Nos. 9, 10 and 11 at one time, because they all bear on the same matter. These Amendments arise from the discussion which took place at the last stage. While the advice which I have been given is that the Bill, as amended, would not in any way restrict the opportunity for other members of the Judiciary—that is, other than holders of high judicial office—to be appointed under suitable terms, it is felt that if there is any doubt at all—and particularly since doubts have been expressed by members of the legal profession—it is better to make the position absolutely clear.
These Amendments place the Scottish Law Commission in exactly the same position as the other Commission. They remove any doubt which might be felt as to whether a sheriff could be appointed to the Commission without relinquishing his appointment as sheriff. The general effect of the clause, if it be amended, will be that if a member of any section of the
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Judiciary is appointed to the Scottish Law Commission, he will continue to hold his judicial office. But whether he will be required to carry out his judicial duties will depend on the terms of his appointment as a Commissioner. The principle that will apply is that if his work on the Commission is on a whole-time basis, he will not be required to carry out his judicial duties. This will be the case with the Chairman, if, as it is suggested, he is a Court of Session Judge. If, on the other hand, the appointment to the Commission is on a part-time basis, as is contemplated will be the case for the ordinary members, there will be no occasion for complete exemption from judicial duties. Thus, under the clause, as amended, a part-time sheriff appointed to the Commission would continue to hold office and perform all his duties as sheriff.
Amendment No. 11 deals with the position of sheriffs-substitute as I indicated at the last stage the Government contemplated. At the present time, the Act of 1907 makes the appointment of sheriff-substitute a full-time one and prohibits a sheriff-substitute from being appointed to any office except such office as shall by Statute be attached to the office of sheriff-substitute. In the way the Bill has developed, it is accepted by the Government that it would be undesirable and unnecessary that, in relation to the Law Commission, a sheriff-substitute should remain under such prohibition, and the Amendment removes this prohibition in so far as possible membership of the Commission is concerned. It does not in any way alter the position of a sheriff-substitute in relation to other appointments.
I hope that these Amendments will satisfy the wishes expressed at the last stage that there should be the maximum amount of flexibility in the possible appointments to be made, and that your Lordships will agree that in these three Amendments we make certain that every possible section of professional skill which is available to the Secretary of State and the Lord Advocate in making the appointments will now be open to them. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 2, line 16, leave out ("high").—(Lord Hughes.)
THE EARL OF SELKIRK: My Lords, I am very glad that this Amendment clears up the position of the sheriff beyond peradventure. I think it wise to include the sheriff-substitute, though I do not think that it will be often necessary to appoint one, though the practical experience which sheriffs-substitute get may from time to time be extremely valuable in the sort of work the Commission has to do. I should like to thank the noble Lord for all these Amendments.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
LORD HUGHES: My Lords, I beg to move this Amendment.
Amendment moved—
Page 2, line 18, after ("not") insert ("(unless otherwise provided by the terms of his appointment)").—(Lord Hughes.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
LORD HUGHES: My Lords, I beg to move this Amendment.
Amendment moved—
Page 2, line 19, at end insert—
("(5) Subsection (4) above shall have effect, in relation to a salaried sheriff-substitute, not-withstanding anything in section 21 of the Sheriff Courts (Scotland) Act 1907 (which among other things prohibit such a sheriff-substitute from being appointed to any office except such office as shall be by statute attached to the office of sheriff-substitute)").— (Lord Hughes.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 3 [Functions of the Commissions]:
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, this Amendment deals with the point raised by the noble and learned Viscount, Lord Simonds, on the Committee stage about the relationship between the Law Commission and the Statute Law Committee. The effect of the Amendment is to secure that the Lord Chancellor will remain in effective control of the consolidation programme and will be able to ensure that the Commission and the Statute Law Committee do not compete with one another in this field. The noble and learned Viscount had suggested that the subsection should be preceded by these words, and I have been happy to adopt that suggestion. I beg to move accordingly.
Amendment moved—
Page 2, line 41, after ("prepare") insert ("from time to time at the request of the Minister").—(The Lord Chancellor.)
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: My Lords, on behalf of my noble and learned friend, and on my own behalf, may I thank the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor for accepting the suggestion made by my noble and learned friend Lord Simonds?
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR THE LORD CHANCELLOR moved, in subsection (1)(e), to leave out ", at the request of the Minister, to". The noble and learned Lord said: My Lords, may I, in discussing this Amendment, speak also to Amendment No. 14? These Amendments give effect to the suggestion of the noble and learned Viscount, Lord Dilhorne, that the bodies to which the Commission may be required to give advice and information under paragraph (e) of Clause 3(1) should be restricted to authorities or bodies appointed by the Crown or by the Government.
The formula employed by the Amendment, "at the instance of the Government", will cover a body like a Royal Commission, which is appointed by the Sovereign on the recommendation of the Prime Minister, as well as other Committees which are directly appointed by Ministers. As I said on Committee stage, the reason why the clause was worded in that way was to give the Lord Chancellor discretion to enable the Commission to help bodies whose existence one is not able now to foresee, but I should be the first to agree that we do not want the Law Commission to go round assisting all sorts of miscellaneous bodies, otherwise they will never get their own work done, and the provision was intended mainly to help bodies like Royal Commissions. In these circumstances, I am happy to put down this Amendment, and beg to move accordingly.
Amendment moved—
Page 3, line 2, leave out from ("and") to end of line.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: My Lords, once again I must thank the noble and learned Lord for these Amendments. I think that they are entirely satisfactory and improve the Bill, not only by making it clear what are the other authorities or bodies to which the noble and learned Lord's mind was directed, but also by relieving the Minister of possible pressure

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by outside bodies which, as my noble friend Lord Swinton pointed out, might arise as a result of the inclusion of the words "at the request of the Minister". We have not taken long on Report stage, but we have accomplished a great deal, and perhaps I may conclude by saying, "Thank you", to the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor.
LORD CHORLEY: My Lords, I should like to say a word on this Amendment. It seems to me that the noble and learned Lord has found a way of going rather further than the noble and learned Viscount, Lord Dilhorne, wanted him to go—very nearly, if not altogether, as far as I was asking him to go. As I read it, it would still be possible for a body like the Institute of International and Comparative Law, provided that the Government indicated that they were to be given advice and information by the Commission, to apply for this and get it. In the words which he used in moving this Amendment the Lord Chancellor rather seemed to limit the advice and information to Royal Commissions or other institutions directly set up by the Government. I hope that he did not mean to limit it in that way, because it seems to me that it would to a considerable extent destroy the value of this provision.
I have already developed this argument previously. The absolutely essential matter seems to me that the Commission should be able to put out to learned bodies like the Institute and the law departments of universities a great deal of the spade-work in connection with the reforms of various aspects of the law upon which they are engaged, and obviously they will not be able to do that unless they are in a position to give some help themselves. The real question is whether the help is to be limited to Royal Commissions and Government-appointed bodies, or whether the Amendment will enable the Commission, provided that the Government give their backing to it, to get work done in the way I have suggested. I should be grateful if my noble and learned friend will deal with this point when he replies.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, my noble friend Lord Chorley
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will observe that this subsection does not deal with assistance which the Law Commission may obtain in their work from other bodies, but with assistance which the Law Commission may give to other bodies. The clause as originally drafted provided that they might give advice and information to Government Departments,
"and at the request of the Minister, to other authorities or bodies concerned with the proposals for the reform or amendment of any branch of the law."
That wording was very wide, and might well have meant that if the Boys' Brigade or, as was given as an illustration in another place, the Band of Hope were engaged in some work on law reform they might call upon the Law Commission to help them with it. That was not intended. It was intended to include only Government Departments and bodies like Royal Commissions. A Royal Commission set up to advise on questions of policy might well want some legal help, and it might be quite proper that the Law Commission should assist them. That was the original intention, and therefore when, in effect, the noble and learned Viscount said: "If that is intended to be the limit, why do we not say so?" I could see no objection; accordingly, I have provided so in this Amendment.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, this is the second Amendment on which I have already spoken, and I beg formally to move it.
Amendment moved—
Page 3, line 3, after ("concerned") insert ("at the instance of the Government").—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.

DANGEROUS DRUGS BILL [H.L.]
Returned from the Commons, agreed to.
CRIMINAL EVIDENCE BILL
Brought from the Commons; read 1a, and to be printed.

CONTROL OF OFFICE AND INDUSTRIAL DEVELOPMENT BILL
4.5 p.m.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
THE PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY, BOARD OF TRADE (LORD RHODES): My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time. After the felicitous and charming speeches in the tributes to the noble Marquess, Lord Cholmondeley, and the very sweet reasonableness which has been in evidence during the last Business, I expect noble Lords will find what I have to say a little prosaic; but, at any rate, it will be as brief as I can make it.
This is an important Bill, and it will go a long way to remedy one of the major economic problems of our times. For years those of us who have lived in the North have seen our young people drifting to the South. Noble Lords will probably have observed that "Stop-Go" policies seem to bite deeper in the North than in the South. Office work is regarded as regular work, and the office boom in London has been a very powerful magnet to thousands of our fellow citizens from the North. For ten years this pull has aggravated the problem of imbalance with the rest of the country. From 1953 to 1963, 56 per cent. of the total rise in employment in Great Britain, as a whole, was crammed into the South-East of England, though the area possessed only 35 per cent. of the population. Between the Census years 1951 and 1961, 400,000 new jobs were created in the London conurbation, of which only one-fifth went into manufacturing industry; and in Central London during the same period there was a rise of 200,000, and 150,000 of them were office jobs.
It seems that where you have a concentration, more and more concentration piles on top of it. I am reminded of a family in our village where there were two sons, one small and one big, who were having their dinner. The mother put the meat on the children's plates, and the small son said to the mother: "Why is it our John gets more meat than me?" His mother replied: "He's a bigger lad than thee." And the little
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lad said: "Aye, and he always will be, if he has more meat." It is illustrative, because this is precisely what has been happening.
The last Government caused the South-East Study to be made, but, apart from noting the problem, nothing effective was done about it. For the speculator there was money in it, and for the speculator there was a Government who believed in laissez-faire. How often in another place, when we warned about the consequences, did we hear: "The play of market forces will resolve this". It did, and through the roof—and with it there was the concentrated human misery in housing. Who among us has read the Milner Holland Report without having his bowels wrung by it? How often have we in the other place listened to the stories of London Members, telling us about the harrowing tales of housing in London?
The loss of population from our constituencies in the North has led to a quite hopeless situation in the London area. The sequence followed by the last Government seems to me to have been: acute problems—deserve a report—deserves a debate—and then forget all about it! How can a local authority find the land for housing without the price sky-rocketing if, at the same time, they are fighting a losing battle with the increase in population? It cannot be done. That is without going into the finer points about the inroads into the Green Belt.
Noble Lords who travel to this House and into Central London know the problem very well. Trains and roads are overcrowded. For ten years there has been an increase of 13,000 a year pouring into London; 1,350,000 people struggle into Central London every morning between the hours of 7.30 a.m. and 10 a.m., and 1,350,000, I suppose, limp out again at night—and when I am going home I always seem to be behind most of them. Whatever the Ministry of Transport has been able to do, the situation seems to get steadily worse. It slows industry down, it creates frustration and misery of all sorts, it contributes towards the blocking and frustration at the docks, and it also affects costs.
The labour shortage in the plethora of office employment means wage drift. Last year, over the country as a whole, wage drift was 2½ per cent. What, then,

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must be the wage drift in Central London when the employment exchanges have been reporting as many as 5,600 vacancies for female clerical staff? What has it been—3, 4 or5 per cent.? It must have been tremendous.
Then there is the regional imbalance. Before the war, there was 87 million square feet of office space in Central London. Now it is about 124 million square feet. It is estimated that Birmingham have 7 million to 8 million square feet; Manchester, 7 to 8 million square feet; Liverpool, 6 to 7 million square feet; Glasgow, 10 million square feet; and Edinburgh, 7 million square feet. This is one of the important facets of this position. Time and again in this country we have been faced with the dilemma of allowing excessive economic pressure in the South-East, with its bottlenecks, labour shortages and high costs, or of slowing down the economy as a whole, which included under-employment areas like the North-East, North-West and Glasgow, to mention only a few.
I believe that the steps which have been taken to deal with this matter have been quite inadequate. We believe that action had to be taken now. What the late Government did was inadequate. Some action was taken under the existing planning controls. The Location of Offices Bureau was set up in 1963, and here may I pay a tribute to what has been done by that Bureau. They have made a real, serious effort to deal with the job; but how limited they have been. Supposing it had been possible to have more powers and more opportunities, how much suffering and misery would have been averted. Most of the faith that the Opposition had on this matter was that the market forces would take care of it all. It is easy to see, by a cursory study of the figures of the potential office space which is no win the pipeline, how inadequate this was.
The Ministry of Housing and Local Government asked for a report from the planning authorities in the Greater London area at the end of last year which showed this: complete and vacant, 5 million square feet; under construction, 14½, million square feet; outstanding planning permission, 17½ million square feet. If we allow for some of the17½ million square feet being subject
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to control because the contracts had not been entered into before November 5 last, we can assume that between 25 million and 30 million square feet will be available for use.
LORD ERROLL OF HALE: My Lords, may I ask the noble Lord how much office space is going to be pulled down during the same period?
LORD RHODES: We will come to that later. I hope some of the old office space is going to be pulled down, because some of it is very poor indeed. Even on the generous basis of 150 square feet per person—
LORD DRUMALBYN: My Lords, will the noble Lord forgive me for interrupting because it is right that we should get these figures on the right basis? I am sorry I missed what he said, but could he tell the House again whether he is talking about the Greater London area, the Metropolitan area, Central London, or what?
LORD RHODES: I am talking about the Greater London area. Even on the basis of the generous allowance of 150 square feet per person, 200,000 additional office workers will be pouring into London every morning, and if we quietly ask ourselves a question whether this can go on unchecked, all reasonable people will answer, No. This extra office space alone is three times the size of total existing office space in the largest of the regional centres. This ominous figure meant that when we came into office last October we had to act. We did act, and we acted decisively. We made the operative date in November, otherwise a whole spate of building projects would have gone ahead if the announcement of the control had not been accompanied by an operativedate.
The Bill therefore applies the control initially to Greater London and the outer Metropolitan region, which we can roughly define as a 40 mile radius from Charing Cross. The Bill also gives the Board of Trade power to apply control in any other area in Great Britain. The orders will be subject to Affirmative Resolutions. We need this permissive power because, although the immediate objective is to relieve congestion in and around London, it may become necessary in the event of excessive fringe

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development and in the interest of a better regional balance of office employment throughout the country. We are going to use the industrial development certificate type of control, and we have chosen this because it works. For years we have had experience of I.D.C. It has been accepted and we propose to adopt this type of control. The advantage about it is the link this makes with existing planning authorities and existing planning law. In this connection, it is important to bear in mind that the Bill is an extension of existing planning legislation.
Clause 1 defines the type of office development which will need an office development permit, and also provides that an office development permit must be obtained from the Board of Trade before an application for planning permission is made. The clause also brings within the scope of the control any development of land involving the creation of officepremises—that is, building or rebuilding extensions or alterations and change of use. Clause 2 provides an exemption from the control of small offices. The exemption limit is 3,000 square feet. But, at the same time, we are making quite sure that in this clause what is known as creeping development does not occur through linking small schemes together.
Clause 3 provides that an office development permit is needed for outstanding planning applications for office development in the Metropolitan area on which no decision has been taken before the passing of the Bill. In Greater London, planning permissions granted before the passing of the Bill for new offices over 3,000 square feet are put into suspense, unless the planning permission was obtained before November 5 last, and either the building was completed or a building contract made before that date. Also in the Metropolitan region planning permissions granted after November 4 for any office development are put into suspense unless they are below the exemption limits. We want to keep the formalities as simple as we can, and we want to reduce inconvenience to applicants as much as we can. We are already considering applications for permits informally while the Bill is going through the usual process of being turned into law. We regret any inconvenience that
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may have been caused to some developers, but we know that many of them realise that it is more than outweighed by the knowledge that we have taken this action in the interests of the nation as a whole.
In Clause 5 we thought it reasonable to exempt from the more severe retrospective control in Greater London, industrial building with ancillary offices for which both planning permission and an I.D.C. were granted before November 5. I am sure noble Lords will agree that this is common sense. The remainder of Part I is largely consequential.
I should like to say a few words on the scope of the second Part of the Bill which deals with factory development. Unlike the first Part of the Bill, it does not introduce a new control; it amends an existing one. Industrial developments of more than 5,000 square feet are already subject to the grant of an industrial development certificate from the Board of Trade. Clause 17 of the Bill provides a measure of flexibility by enabling the Board of Trade to vary the exemption limit (at present fixed at 5,000 square feet for all parts of the country) at any time and in any place. It will thus be possible to set exemption limits appropriate to the differing conditions in the various parts of the country.
It might be asked, "What is the purpose of an exemption limit?" I would say this. The reason we have an exemption limit is to reduce the administrative burden of examining applications, and at the same time to relieve industrialists of the need to obtain Board of Trade approval for trivial building operations. The reasons that have prompted us to take this power to vary the exemption limit are as follows. The House knows that the limit of 5,000 square feet which applies to all parts of the country was chosen when the I.D.C. control was first introduced, because it was then thought that most projects of up to this size offered little choice of location and that they did not individually involve large increases in employment.
It has, however, I am sorry to say, become very apparent that a great deal of industrial building is going on under the 5,000 square feet limit, particularly in the South-East and the Midlands, areas where, because of the excessive pressure on national resources, it is necessary to

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operate a strict control over industrial expansion. A recent check over a period of twelve months has shown that in the Midlands and the South-East only about 10 per cent. in number of industrial planning permissions were supported by industrial development certificates. It does not need much imagination on anybody's part to know what has been going on.
This situation points clearly to the need for an examination of development which is at present escaping control under the 5,000 square feet exemption limit. Although much of this development probably takes the form of relatively small extensions to existing factories, we know that a good deal of it takes the form of new factory development in small units on speculative estates. We wish to be able to examine all this development, to see whether it is necessary for it to take place in the congested areas, and then, in appropriate cases, to steer it away from these areas of industrial congestion to places where there is a need to provide more employment. That is common sense. But we cannot do this while it remains outside the scope of the industrial development certificate control. It has therefore been necessary to amend the industrial development certificate control so as to enable the Board of Trade to vary the exemption limit in accordance with the requirements of the situation in the different parts of the country.
The limits for the various parts of the country will be laid down by order. Because of the urgent need to deal with the situation in the Midlands and the South-East, the first order, which will be made when the Bill becomes law, will set an exemption limit of 1,000 square feet in the London and South-Eastern, Eastern and Midland Regions of the Board of Trade. The 5,000 square feet limit will continue in all other parts of the country. It might be said, "Why 1,000 square feet?" That question has been asked in another place and in the country. I will try to answer it.
It is admittedly difficult to know just where to draw the line so as to avoid the imposition of vexatious formalities for trivial projects, while at the same time bringing under scrutiny the large amount of development which is taking place in the congested regions under the present
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5,000 square feet exemption limit. We know that it is possible to start up a new factory with less than 5,000 square feet of industrial floor space. Industrial estates can be built up of these small units, giving employment to large numbers of people. Until we have had some experience of looking at proposed developments of less than 5,000 square feet, we think that it is necessary to set the limit at a figure which will exclude only the very small ones. So we have chosen 1,000 square feet. If experience shows that this is too low, we shall be able to raise it at any time by an amending order.
It may be said, "Why reduce the exemption limit in the whole of the Midlands and the South-East?" We realise, of course, that not all of the Midlands and the South-East is suffering from industrial congestion. Of course it is not. It is not true, for example, of large parts of Norfolk, Suffolk and Cambridgeshire, in the Eastern region; nor of North Staffordshire and parts of Shropshire, in the Midland region. But we have thought it advisable to deal with these regions as a whole because we foresee difficulties and confusion arising from the application of different limits within the areas of responsibility of individual county planning authorities. But we shall naturally administer control at the lower limit with flexibility over these wide areas, varying our attitude in accordance with local conditions.
The introduction of a 1,000 square feet exemption limit in the Midlands and the South-East does not mean that all building above this limit will be prohibited in those areas, any more than building above 5,000 square feet has been prohibited in the past. We shall administer the scheme with common sense. Every application will be considered on its merits, and the needs of individual applicants will be taken fully into account; but we shall look most critically at proposals for the establishment of new undertakings in the more congested parts of the regions concerned. That is our main purpose, to check the establishment of new undertakings in those areas already suffering from industrial congestion, and so far as is possible and reasonable, to restrict the expansion of undertakings already operating in these regions and to divert this industrial growth to places

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where it is needed and where it can continue to grow healthily without creating inflationary pressures on the economy.
My Lords, I said I would be brief. I do not think I have wasted many words in putting forward the explanation of this Bill. Finally, may I say this? I am sure your Lordships will want to support it. It is socially good, it is economically right, and the sooner it is put on the Statute Book the better. I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Rhodes.)
4.30 p.m.
LORD ERROLL OF HALE: My Lords, the noble Lord who introduced this Bill certainly lived up to his promise to be brief, and as it is the first time I have heard him introduce a Bill in this House I should like to congratulate him on the clear way in which he explained a Bill which is complicated and involved, requiring, as it does, the bringing in of an entirely new class of control, namely, control over office development, and the savage extension of the system of I.D.C. for very small industrial developments.
I wish the Government, on taking office, had looked at the problem a little more carefully before rushing into the legislation provided by this Bill. We all knew there had been a problem about the development of offices, particularly in the London area. The erection of many new buildings in the period of prosperity from 1959 to 1964 was certainly causing an element of congestion. They were bringing a certain amount of additional employment into London and into the South-East. But the real point which I should have liked the Government to study was the extent to which we had already taken steps to solve the problem occasioned by this rapid growth of offices in the London area.
In my submission, we had already solved the problem, because the 1963 Town and Country Planning Act considerably tightened the control and removed the difficulty known as the "Schedule 3 difficulty" from earlier legislation. In co-operation with the local authorities, we had maintained strict control over the areas zoned for offices and over changes to office use from other uses; and we were also giving consideration to the possibility of
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rezoning some areas at present zoned for office development. Those were the measures we were taking. It was a Conservative Government which set up the Location of Offices Bureau. I was glad to hear the noble Lord pay tribute to it, but I think that if he had studied the matter a little more he would realise how effective it is proving to be. In the first 18 months of its existence it has been consulted by over 800 firms representing some 80,000 jobs, and of these, more than 116 firms, representing 12,000 jobs, have already moved from the Central London area, or will shortly be doing so; and in their first Report the Bureau say that they expect an annual exodus rate of some 20,000 a year for ten years, at present trends.
Furthermore, the Conservative Administration, following the publication of the Fleming Report in July, 1963, aimed to move out some 50,000 of the 130,000 civil servants who were at work in Inner London. There is no doubt that the problem was well on the way to being solved, because the market forces, which I am sorry that the noble Lord. himself a successful industrialist, should have so scorned, were already showing that the boom was over, that rents were going down and that "Offices for sale" notices were going up.
In regard to congestion of transport facilities, the Conservative Government sanctioned the construction work on the Victoria Line, which will not only make it easier for a number of people to get into London than in the past but will substantially ease congestion on other underground and railway lines, and possibly on bus services as well. The effect of the standstill announcement in November, and of the appearance of the Bill, has been to put up rents in the Central London area for office accommodation, in some cases by as much as 10s. per square foot. Vacant blocks which had been advertised for sale have been taken off the market, and in many cases, because of the uncertainties created, there has been a standstill on businesses about to move out.
As the restrictions and control of this Bill become more apparent when it is an Act and it is in working operation, scarcity values will be created—the very sort of values that the present Administration dislike and distrust so much; old

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and ageing office property will acquire a value out of all proportion to its true worth; rents will rise because of scarcity; and so, in the course of time, we shall have a highly artificial and inflationary system operating in regard to office accommodation in London. Furthermore, much necessary development work will be held up, especially the modernisation of offices to comply with the Shops, Offices and Railway Premises Act of 1963.
Certainly, there had been a problem, which we had solved, but no crisis; and I am sure that if the incoming Government had looked at the matter impartially they would have seen that there was no need for this measure at all. But one has to look at the doctrinal past of the Party which constitute the present Government. They have always disliked new office blocks. They have always felt that the proper work is done in the factory, and that nothing important is being done in offices, except possibly the making of money by stockbrokers. They have disliked particularly the new offices going up in London, in Birmingham and in many other centres. They hate the Shell Centre towering above Labour's beloved County Hall. They like control for control's sake.
I could not help abut notice the way the noble Lord relished the fact that they would be able to control so much. We were promised, of course, that the control would be wisely and humanely administered, but I am sure that the members of the present Administration are highly pleased that, if the Bill is passed, they will be able to exercise so much meddlesome control over the details of office organisation and administration, which will have to be revealed to them in the effort to obtain the necessary office development permits. I was sorry that the noble Lord was comparatively silent on the administrative problems which will be thrown up, and particularly as to how the Department, of which he is a Minister, will administer the stream of applications for office development permits which are bound to come in. He sought to assuage the mood of your Lordships' House by saying that his Department are already dealing informally and sympathetically with applications for permits. But we have heard
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nothing from him about the criteria to be followed for granting office development permits. Is it to be a tough policy? Did the noble Lord say "Yes"?
LORD RHODES: It will be a tough policy.
LORD ERROLL OF HALE: In that case it will be the small man who will be hit, because it is the small man who perhaps wants only a relatively small extension or a new office. He will have all the trouble and difficulty of applying for a permit, which will, I suppose, not be granted. It is the small man who cannot lease a complete building, who perhaps wants only a floor or a few rooms in an office block. The developer who provides the facilities for such people will not be able to say what the office is going to be used for because, until it is built, he cannot obtain the tenants for it. So small men, requiring relatively small amounts of accommodation, will not be able to get it, or, where it is obtainable, will have to pay scarcity values for it. Do not forget, too, the effect on office workers who, because of the growing scarcity of suitable office accommodation in the London area, will find that their desks are being moved ever closer together. On the other hand, were the applications to be granted freely, then there would seem to be no need to go through all the rigmarole of obtaining office development certificates.
The noble Lord was silent on what offices are to be included. In preparation for this debate this afternoon I had naturally turned to the Bill itself, and found that Clause 13 deals with the meaning of "office premises". At page 16 of the Bill it says
"office premises' means … premises whose sole or principal use is to be use as an office."
That gets us a long way further forward! Then, at page 17, as though the Bill were not long enough, we are told that "office premises"
"means premises falling within either of the following descriptions, that is to say—
(a) premises whose sole or principal use is as an office or for office purposes."
Perhaps we may come to this a little more fully in Committee.
But what I find as a most serious defect in this matter of definition is the problem of offices within factories, which fall into

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a special category. They are not office blocks per se; nor can outsiders rent such offices. But as industry becomes more modernised, the trend is towards having more office workers planning production and fewer workers on the shop floor. This is a desirable trend. It means that more office accommodation has to be provided, but with no extension to factory accommodation.
As I understand the Bill, and from what the noble Lord has been kind enough to say to-day, these offices which are part of the production process will nevertheless be subject to the new control. I regard this is as a quite unnecessary interference with the desirable evolution of the modern industrial process. Furthermore the supervisors' offices will presumably be brought into the net. The young designers whom firms are encouraged to employ and to make more use of have all to wait while the rigmarole is gone through for obtaining office development permits to put up a few partitions inside an existing factory building. The definitions given in Clause 13 are very uncertain in regard to an engineering drawing office. They refer, in line 21, to "drawing" as being something which would come into the net, but if engineering drawing offices are to be subject to control I suggest that we should consider the matter carefully in Committee and move the necessary Amendment.
There was another point on which the noble Lord might have said something, and that is the question of compensation. He referred to the need for making an immediate announcement and having retrospective provisions in the Bill. There is some reference to retrospection in Clause 3, but the abruptness with which the stop was put on has meant that a number of people inevitably have incurred expenditure in surveys, architects' fees, and the like which will now be rendered entirely nugatory. There is a strong case for paying compensation. Then in respect of others who have existing sites but have not obtained planning permission, the sites may well be frozen for a temporary period, seven years, with considerable losses to individuals or companies as a result. The fact that they may be well-to-do organisations is no ground for withholding the compensation which I believe will be properly due to them. There is, further, the unhealthy prospect that local authorities may acquire
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such sites by compulsory purchase orders, because the owners feel that they cannot wait for seven years, before the Act comes to an end, and then, once everything is free again, as it will be, those local authorities will be able to sell such sites for office buildings and make a substantial tax-free profit.
The other Part of the Bill deals, as the noble Lord explained, with industrial development certificates. Here I should like to mention to your Lordships the statement made by Mr. Jay in another place on November 12, 1964, reported in column 1226 of Hansard [Vol. 701], when he announced the policy of
"a tougher application of the I.D.C.s on factories being built in the really congested areas".
Because I was interested to see how he was carrying out that policy, I asked a Question, which was answered by the noble Lord, Lord Hobson, on April 1, 1965—it is set out in column 1138 of the OFFICIAL REPORT. The noble Lord said:
"For the London and South-Eastern standard region from November 1, 1964, to January 31, 1965"—
two and a half months of which are covered by the period after Mr. Jay had announced his tighter I.D.C. control—no less than
"70 industrial development certificates were issued for an area of 1·1 million square feet."
In a matter of three short months this was the amount of development that the Minister agreed to permit. I was not surprised at that Answer because I was dubious how he could implement a tougher policy, since the policy laid down already under the previous Administration was so tough that certificates were being granted only to those enterprises which could not move and for which there was great need in the congested areas of London and the South-East.
Having discovered, after he made his announcement, that he could not impose a tougher control on I.D.C.s the Minister decided to widen the net by lowering the exemption limit. On the question of control at 5,000 feet, that was just about "wearable". It was the right balance between the large and the small. One of the by-products of the system of I.D.C.s has been, as the noble Lord explained, to enable the Board of Trade to try to persuade firms either to set up new factories in development districts

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or to move all or part of their production from a congested area to an area of under-employment. But in our experience it was rarely possible to persuade a firm which wanted only 5,000 square feet to move—it just had not the resources. There was probably only one manager, and one could not divide him into two; there were probably only one tool-fitter, and only one accountant. These small entities could not be moved in entirety or in part. Therefore, there could be no question of being able, by lowering the exemption limit to 1,000 square feet; to secure the objectives which the noble Lord outlined to us.
I would remind your Lordships that 1,000 square feet is a small space indeed. I made rough measurements of your Lordships' Chamber, and the area enclosed by the rail surrounding the steps to the Throne represents about 500 square feet. Therefore, twice that area is the area for industrial development which would now be caught by this control—the space for about four lathes, or for one or two racks for stores and spare parts. This means that anybody who wants to put on a small extension to house two or three more machine tools, or to have a small warehouse so that he can have spare parts stacked ready to service goods which he has sent overseas, will have to go along, cap in hand, to overworked Board of Trade officials to obtain the necessary permission in the form of an I.D.C.I cannot see how the officials can possibly refuse the vast majority of these cases. If they are to be refused, the firms will simply be stopped from growing altogether. Once again, as with O.D.P.s, the small man is the one who will be hit.
If the small applications are to be freely granted, as I believe they must be, then why make these permits necessary? Is it so that the Board of Trade will be informed of what is going on—just a "nosey-parkering" attempt to find out what is going on in private business? If I.D.C.s are not freely granted, a great deal of time will be wasted in abortive argument. I know that the noble Lord was at the Board of Trade with the previous Labour Government, and he probably had experience then of the way in which small men fight so fiercely for relatively small I.D.C.s because they mean a great
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deal to them. Now many more such applications will be fought for. If certificates are withheld there will be a sense of exasperation and, inevitably, a strong temptation to evade the controls.
My experience in regard to L.D.C.s (this would apply equally to O.D.P.s) was that many individuals—most of the small ones, but sometimes the large ones, too—felt most bitterly that there was no right of appeal for the frustrated applicant. It is true that he could put his case up to the Minister. But if he did so, the case came to the Minister with a recommendation from the very official who had rejected the application. It takes a strong Minister always to override his officials, particularly when they are probably carrying out his policy. Then, of course, one can say that the applicant has the right of appeal to his Member of Parliament. The Member of Parliament writes a letter to the Minister and gets back a letter, signed admittedly by the Minister, but in all probability drafted by the official who turned down the application in the first place. There is at present really no means of appealing beyond the Minister.
LORD SILKIN: My Lords, in the matter of industrial development certificates there never has been an appeal, and it has worked quite satisfactorily.
LORD ERROLL OF HALE: My Lords, I suggest that it worked reasonably well for the larger ones and it was just workable down to 5,000 square feet, but a new situation arises over these large numbers of very small applications.
A new situation arises also in connection with office development permits, which have now been brought in for the first time. That is why I should like to make the suggestion to the noble Lord that the Government should set up an independent appeal tribunal whose decision would be binding on both the applicant and the Minister. I should like to see the Board of Trade publish as soon as possible an exact list of the criteria which applicants must follow, or try to observe, when applying for an office development permit, because it is clear that there is no expertise to go on. As the noble Lord, Lord Silkin, pointed out, I.D.C.s have been with us for many years, and there is a kind of established case law for I.D.C.s which architects and

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developers have come to understand over the years. But there is no such case law—naturally, there cannot be—in the case of O.D.P.s, and I hope that as soon as possible the Department or the Minister will publish detailed criteria which must be complied with when applications are being sent in.
Earlier this afternoon we had the Report stage of another Bill, and it was interesting to see that Amendments which had been put forward in the Committee stage and not given too good a reception by the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor, were nevertheless accepted. I think I should be less than fair to members of the Government if I did not make plain that we shall certainly table some Amendments on the Committee stage of this Bill, and we shall not be inhibited from re-tabling those which have been extensively discussed in another place if we think that they ought to be reconsidered in your Lordships' presence. I am trying to emulate the noble Lord who introduced the Bill by being brief. There are many other matters to which I should like to refer, but I am sure that my noble friends behind me will fill the gap in my opening remarks. I should like to conclude by telling your Lordships that I do not like this Bill. It will create unnecessary work. It will lead to endless frustration. It will hit hardest the small man in business or in industry. It is a typical piece of Socialist legislation of which we had so much in the dreary years from 1945 to 1951.
4.53 p.m.
LORD SILKIN: My Lords, may I first of all compliment my two predecessors on the good fruit which the debate of last Thursday has borne, in that speeches have been cut down beyond what they might otherwise have been? The noble Lord who has just sat down made it quite clear that he did not like the Bill; indeed, from listening to his speech, I do not think he could find a single redeeming feature. His attitude seemed to be that it was wholly unnecessary; it was a piece of control for control's sake; that noble Lords on this side did not like offices; we liked only factories, and all the rest of it. It seems rather odd, therefore, that in another place there was no opposition, either to the Second Reading or to the Third
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Reading. There were a number of Amendments pressed on Committee, but if noble Lords opposite feel so strongly about this Bill, and if they feel they have done so well in the past that no further action is necessary, one would have expected that that dislike of the Bill would have manifested itself in another place. Honourable Members in another place have shown no reluctance to vote against the Government, and one would have thought that they would take advantage of this Bill to do so.
I want to look at this Bill quite objectively, and I hope that my noble friend will not mind. The present Government are making an attempt, which has been made before, to restrict, in particular, the growth of London. I think the move was first started by Queen Elizabeth I (I am not sure whether King Canute took a hand in it), and there have been many attempts since. Queen Elizabeth I wanted to restrict London to a very narrow area in the City. The London County Council took a hand much later by having a Green Belt around London, but that has not stopped the growth. We have since had the Barlow Commission, which made certain strong recommendations in 1939, we have had the Abercrombie Report, and we have had all sorts of expressions of opinion—strong ones—as to the undesirability of allowing London to grow; and yet it has grown. I can only hope that the Government will have greater success than Queen Elizabeth I and all her illustrious successors.
The fact is that the population of London has grown, is growing and, in my opinion, will continue to grow. London is a most attractive capital city. I have just spent a weekend in Paris, an equally attractive city. That is also growing very rapidly. I think that every capital city in the world is growing at much the same rate as London. By all means let us do what we can to stop the growth, but I doubt whether, unless we can make other parts of the country equally attractive, we shall succeed in stemming the growth of London—at any rate, that growth which comes from immigration into London. But there is another factor—and we have to face it: that even if there were no immigration into London, the population of Greater London would grow in the next fifteen

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years by something of the order of one million persons. That involves not merely a demand for more housing but a demand for more employment, unless the people who are born in London, and are the children of London parents, are somehow attracted to leave London and go elsewhere; and that is not going to be a very easy proposition. If, however, one takes into account the fact that there will be a certain amount of immigration into London from other parts, as well as from the Commonwealth (and I am not assuming the whole extent of the immigration which the South-East Study makes, but, say, only half of it) it means that in the next fifteen years we may have to face an increase of two million people.
That is not the whole story. Whenever our demographers have attempted to forecast a future population, they have always gone wrong, and they have always underestimated the growth. While I do not think we can make plans on the assumption that on this occasion there is also an under-estimate, on past experience the odds are that the increase in population may well be even greater than is forecast in the South-East Study. That is a factor which we have to face up to, and for which we must allow in providing employment. I recognise that there is a great deal of office accommodation in the pipeline at the present time, but I should like to ask Her Majesty's Government whether they are satisfied that the increase in office accommodation which is in what I and the Minister himself called the pipe-line is sufficient in itself to meet the needs of the increasing population over the next fifteen years or so.
There are two other factors I should like to mention as tending to increase the demand for office accommodation. The first is one that the noble Lord, Lord Erroll of Hale, himself mentioned—and quite rightly. That is, the higher standard of office accommodation which is now required by law, and which will I presume be enforced by Her Majesty's inspectors. There is a great deal of slum office accommodation which ought to be got rid of, and the sooner the better: and a great deal of it is right in the centre of London. Some of the new accommodation that is actually being built is merely replacement. Furthermore, it follows from what I am saying that the area of replacement offices will have to
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be greater than the area of the existing offices which are being demolished. So some, at any rate, of the new office accommodation which is being provided to-day will go to merely replacing obsolete and even slum office accommodation.
There is one other factor—and this, I think, we must face. I want to read what the South-East Study said on this point. It is the fact that there is a growth in the demand for office accommodation. This is what the Committee say on page 38:
"The build up of offices in London has been supported by two long term trends. The first is the gradual shift of emphasis from making things to designing and marketing them. As growing mechanisation makes it possible for industry to produce more goods, and more valuable goods, with fewer workers, so more white collar workers are needed in the drawing shop and in the manager's office. A bigger selling organisation is required; advertising, for example, is one of the growth industries."
That is the first point. They go on:
"The second is the tendency for industry to organise itself in larger units; when a certain point is reached, the chances are that the head office will be found in London, rather than in the provincial towns which saw the origin of the component parts of the organisation."
My Lords, these are factors which will tend to create a greater demand for office accommodation per unit of population than exists to-day.
I should like to ask my noble friend Lord Champion, who is going to reply, to what extent the Government have taken this into consideration. The noble Lord, Lord Rhodes, in reply to the noble Lord, Lord Erroll of Hale—perhaps a rather hasty reply; I do not know—said that the Government were going to be very tough about granting industrial permits. Is it right that they should be very tough? I hope they will be reasonable, and I hope they will not be tough. I hope they will have regard to the conditions that I have just set out—and I will repeat them: the increase in population, the vital need for improving the condition of our offices and the changing demands that are taking place, with the result that there is an increased demand for office employment. I hope, therefore, that when the Board of Trade are considering an application for a permit they will take these factors into account, and not simply be tough for the sake of being tough. Anybody can say, "No".

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That is very easy; but one has to act with discretion, and not harmfully to the public interest. This toughness can so easily resolve itself into damaging the economy of the country.
I have said nothing about the export trade, but that is an additional factor which we have to take into account. While we recognise that the large growth in office employment has resulted in traffic congestion and inconvenience generally, in shortage of housing and so on, we must nevertheless have regard to the economy of the country, and I am most anxious that this control should not act in a way which will damage our economy. We have to face the fact, whether we like it or not, that every big concern, every important concern, wants to have its headquarters in London. It may be that they can deal with much of their routine work outside, and that is a matter for negotiation; but they all want to have headquarters in London, and it is important that they should have, because people coming from abroad and from other places to do business with them do not want to go to some place in Norfolk, which is most inaccessible, in order to meet the heads of the concern. They want to go to a place which is central.
Now I would refer to another fact which the noble Lord, Lord Erroll of Hale, mentioned, and with which I completely agree. One of the effects of this Bill has already been to create an artificial shortage of office accommodation. Offices on the outskirts of London which were very largely unoccupied have either been let or, as the noble Lord said, withdrawn from letting, and considerably higher rents are being demanded. We are in fact tending to create an artificial shortage and a virtual monopoly in office accommodation. Already I can support the figure the noble Lord mentioned, in that, certainly in the area around which my own offices are, Pall Mall, the rents have increased by, in some cases, as much as 10s. a foot. It would be an extraordinary result if, whereas under the Tory Government there were empty offices which could not be let at lower rents, the advent of a Labour Government should fill these offices at very much higher rents. I could have hoped that that would be foreseen, and that at any rate some
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restriction on rents would be incorporated in the Bill. After all, we are not unaccustomed to controlling rents. We do so under the Landlord and Tenant Act when a lease has expired; and it would not have been unduly difficult to provide that, where exorbitant rents are being asked or charged, there should be access to some tribunal for the purpose of providing for a reasonable rent.
There is one other point I want to mention before I close, and that is the fact that this Bill is negative; it is restrictive. I accept the need for something of this kind temporarily; but I would have hoped that alongside this we should be doing very much more than is at present being done to discourage immigration into London by making other areas far more attractive, not merely from the point of view of employment but also from the point of view of the ordinary citizen living there.
I am thinking of places where the housewife, if taken there, would say that she would like to live there—and there are very few places of that kind just outside London to-day. I visited one of our new towns, Harlow, yesterday and I felt that that was the kind of place where, if you took an ordinary housewife and asked her how she would like to live there, she might probably be attracted. At any rate the town has grown from 1,500 to 71,000 over a short period of years. But if we are thinking of the areas in the North where there is considerable unemployment and where we want to attract people, we ought to try to attract industry. We must make it attractive to the industrialist's wife and to the workers who will be imported there. I would hope something more would be done than merely the erection of a certain number of new factories.
As regards industrial development certificates, it is not in the Bill but I imagine that we shall have the opportunity of commenting on the Order when it is published as to whether it is right that we should come down to as little as 1,000 feet. My noble friend put the argument that we can always raise the figure if we find that experience dictates it; but, in fact, what he is asking is that every single piece of industrial development should now require an I.D.C. That is really

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what it amounts to in those cases where you come down to 1,000 feet.
LORD MOLSON: My Lords, may I interrupt the noble Lord at this point? Am I right in thinking that the procedure concerned is that of a Negative Resolution? Therefore, I do not think there would be an opportunity for the House to discuss an Order made under this Bill unless there were a Motion to reject it? I make that point because I think it is of some importance.
LORD SILKIN: One can discuss it and one can reject it. The purpose of a Negative Resolution is that it can be rejected by the House. I think that in practice the result is the same and that in both cases we can discuss it. One cannot amend an Order in any way. One must take it or leave it.
However, I would hope myself that the Government would reconsider this question of coming down to a figure as low as 1,000 feet which is really equivalent to saying that they are going to control every piece of industrial extension in those areas where control is operated. The Bill provides that, unless Parliament otherwise decides, it will come to an end at the end of seven years. I take it that Parliament could decide under this Bill (and I should be glad if my noble friend could give some guidance on this) that it should continue longer. It could cut both ways. Parliament can decide at the end of two years that this Bill should be in operation for more than seven years. I would hope that the period would be somewhat shorter, so that we could see how we were getting on without the necessity for Parliament to intervene. I would hope that we could cut down this period of seven years to something like four or five years, but that is a point that can be raised in Committee.
I think this is a necessary Bill. I am afraid, from my own point of view, it is a regrettable necessity but it is a necessary Bill, and, while it will require considerable examination in Committee, I hope the House will give it a Second Reading.
5.15 p.m.
VISCOUNT GAGE: My Lords, I do not propose to follow the noble Lord. Lord Silkin, in the wider considerations he has
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put forward regarding the growth of London, though I am sure that much of what he said is absolutely true. I want to speak on one particular aspect of this Bill. I think that most of us who have had anything to do with town planning were hoping that some measure of control would be introduced. In fact I must confess that, perhaps from ignorance, I often wondered by the London County Council themselves had not done a good deal more to restrict office growth under their town planning powers. I am aware that to do so comprehensively would have involved them in a great deal of compensation, but I still believe that they could have done much more than they have done without paying any compensation at all. I may be wrong; I stand open to correction: but that is what I believe.
On the whole, I welcome this Bill; but it seems to me that, now we are to have control, we are to have it with a considerable vengeance. The Bill seems designed to give the Minister complete power to give or to withhold permission to build an office anywhere, on principles that he need not disclose, without appeal and with very limited liability for compensation. These are very formidable powers. Moveover, it further seems that the objects of the Bill are two-fold. One of them is, as I understand it, to disperse offices from the centre of London. That is a conception which is familiar to us all, because it led to the setting up of the Location of Offices Bureau. The other is a much wider and vaguer objective. It is to discourage offices in the whole of the South-East of England, with the object of encouraging them elsewhere.
Because these powers are so formidable and because some of the objectives are vague, I feel that we ought to have a more complete explanation of Ministerial policy than we have had hitherto. In asking for this I am not speaking as a speculator or as a developer, and I am not even—like so many noble Lords on either side of the House—connected with property development. I am simply asking for this from one point of view only: the point of view of the local planning authority.
The procedure of this Bill is bound up with planning procedure and, I think, rightly so. Before an office can be built,

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as we have been told, two permits must be granted: a planning permit and a Board of Trade permit. So it is possible for the Minister to stultify a town planning scheme; it is possible for a local planning authority, if not to stultify the Minister, at least to stultify a particular O.D.P. It is possible, but obviously undesirable. Common sense seems to dictate that the local planning authority and the Board of Trade should work as closely as possible together. I suggest that common sense also dictates that we in the local planning world should have enough advance information to enable us to prepare or to revise our development plan and town map, with a view to our feeling that when they are submitted to the Ministry for approval they will not come back so amended that they will have to be recast all over again. It is a somewhat lengthy proceeding, preparing these development plans and town maps. In particular, I hope that a scheme of comprehensive redevelopment, involving as it does an even longer and more complex and more detailed procedure, will not be torpedoed at the last minute by a ministerial decision not to afford an office development certificate to a firm with which we might have been negotiating.
These may sound reasonable requests, and indeed I hope they will be so considered; but I shall be very surprised if they are met. There is a long and healthy tradition in local government that we should co-operate with the Government of the day, whatever complexion that Government may have; but in my experience, which is now getting rather long, one of our greatest difficulties is to discover what the policy of the Government of the day is, at least in sufficient detail to avoid our getting some very nasty shocks. There are various reasons for this. Any Minister of Housing and Local Government is apt to remind us that he has a judicial as well as an administrative function, and if his guidance is too definite it might tend to prejudice his position in the case of an appeal. Any President of the Board of Trade has in the past been apt to think that the issue of an I.D.C. must depend on conditions prevailing at a particular moment, and, of course, if there is a change of Government any Minister seems to feel at complete liberty
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to scrap the policy of his predecessor and to start something new.
For these reasons Whitehall policy over a number of years tends to become somewhat obscure, something which one has to discover by a process of trial and error; but when we do discover what it is, it tends to emerge as something pretty tortuous. One sometimes feels—and I say this in the presence of noble Lords on my own side of the House who have been Ministers—that Ministers are all in favour of long-term planning, providing it does not apply to them.
Perhaps I could illustrate my problem by producing quite a small instance of what is actually happening to-day. I do not expect the noble Lord to deal with it in detail, but I think it illustrates the sort of thing that is arising over a wide area. Some weeks ago a newly-constituted river board in my County of Sussex wanted, as a matter of urgency, to construct some offices. They selected as the location of these offices a small town called Burgess Hill, which is on the outskirts of the metropolitan area as defined in the Bill. In conformity with the White Paper issued before the Act came into force, they applied to the Board of Trade for permission. They got the consent, but attached to it was a number of conditions, one of which was that they could only regard it as a temporary consent. They could have occupation of their offices for only a temporary period, and there was no guarantee whatever that they would be allowed to continue in occupation of those offices permanently. Various suggestions were made as to exactly where they could go in the vicinity.
What are we to make of that kind of decision? The assumption is that henceforth the control of offices in Burgess Hill will be exceedingly rigorous. In some ways this is peculiar, because, being on the outskirts, five miles further to the South there is no control and we can have as many offices as we like. I know these lines of demarcation tend to produce anomalies, but it is rather difficult to see the logic when one is living in the locality.
I should like to make one further point in regard to this case. It so happens that two years ago I, as the chairman of a

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local planning authority committee, deemed it my duty to visit the Location of Industries Bureau with a view to persuading offices to migrate from London to Burgess Hill. It seemed to conform with the policy of the then Government, and we thought it might do something to relieve the serious commuter traffic problem that exists at this point. The chairman agreed it was a very suitable place for those offices, and accordingly we prepared plans for a town centre, including offices. What will happen to this plan I have not the slightest idea. I am not asking the Minister to tell me now. I am simply using this little story as an illustration. I am quite aware that the Bill has not yet finished its course in Parliament; I am quite aware that the South-East Study has not yet been reviewed; I am quite aware that the regional economic councils have not yet been set up in South-East England, and I am quite aware that the Land Bill has not vet been presented to Parliament. It may be when all these things have been done we shall be a lot clearer than we are at present. Or, my Lords, we may not be.
When the noble Lord, Lord Silkin, started his New Towns plan, in some extraordinary way he managed to get his colleagues to agree to perfectly definite long-term commitments in regard to housing, roads, the movement of industry and finance; and because he managed to get all those definite commitments to the long-term scheme, he was able to hand over to the development corporations, and they were able not only to plan in great detail what the New Towns were to be but actually to build them. They have been a very great success, and I think only because the noble Lord was able to do all those things. I wonder how he would have fared if one of his colleagues had said, "Of course, you cannot expect me to commit myself to anything definite, but I can assure you that if the application reaches me I shall treat it with the greatest possible sympathy and having regard to the national interest involved. You know from your own experience that all Cabinet Ministers are in complete harmony in every matter, so you need have no fear that one will say one thing and one another." I wonder where those New Towns would have got to? I do not think they would have got very far.
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I wish in our humbler schemes we could get some of this guaranteed and definite sense of purpose that Lord Silkin enjoyed with his New Towns. If, on the other hand, there is to be no continuity in policy, if every Minister is to be a law unto himself, particularly after a change of Government, if it is all right to have offices one year and all wrong the next—and, incidentally, industries too, which are quite important when preparing plans—we shall get a national planning policy which will be about as predictable as the movements of a grasshopper. Long-term plans will be more and more what they tend to be at present, a mere paper exercise without any real significance whatever. I think that would be a pity.
5.30 p.m.
LORD MOLSON: My Lords, I cordially welcome this Bill—I could not do otherwise without being entirely inconsistent with a number of speeches that I have made. I ventured to raise a debate on November 28, 1962, regarding the drift of population and industry to the South, and especially the invasion of London, largely due to the increasing number and size of offices. As long ago as that, I was able to quote a large number of publications dealing with this matter. Some came from the political Parties, including one published by the Conservative Party. There was the remarkable Report by the Civic Trust, which was produced by a Committee over which my noble friend Lord Mancroft presided. There was The Paper Metropolis, sponsored by the Town and Country Planning Association, and a number of others.
At that time there seemed to be a considerable measure of agreement among all those who had studied the problem that some deliberate and forceful policy was needed in order to prevent increased concentration of employment in London. This increase in the number of jobs in London was taking place simultaneously with the departure of people to live outside. Therefore, we had this ever-increasing commuter problem, of a great tidal wave coming in in the morning and the same tidal wave going out the same evening. Since then, there has been the setting up, by the

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spontaneous action of planning authorities in and around London, of the Standing Conference on London Regional Planning, and they are fortunate in having my right honourable friend Sir Richard Nugent to preside over them. They have produced a number of remarkable independent reports, some dealing with policy and some of a more technical kind, and have continued to produce these down to the present time. They have especially emphasised the need to deal with this problem of offices.
The late Government became convinced that something should be done, and they produced a White Paper, London—Employment, Housing, Land. In paragraph 19 of that White Paper they said:
"The Government intend to make the planning control over new office buildings still more effective".
I said then that I thought the steps they indicated were inadequate, and that seemed to be the view of the Standing Conference on London Regional Planning. Therefore, I find that I cannot agree with the views expressed by my noble friend Lord Erroll of Hale, when he says that this problem was well on the way to being solved at the time when the last Government went out of office.
The ever-increasing problem of commuters, the ever-increasing number of offices which are likely to be occupied over the next few years, prove conclusively that, bad as the evil is at the present time, it is going to get worse. In spite of this Bill, which I welcome, it is likely to go on getting worse for the next ten years. We know that, although the standstill has now been applied as from November 4-5 of last year, even the offices that are already in the pipe-line, those which will not be caught by even the retrospective operation of this Bill, will result (and I apologise if I am repeating the figures given by the noble Lord who introduced the Bill) in from 25 to 30 million square feet being built, which will mean, in turn, 200,000 more commuters. This probably means that, each year for the next ten years there will be an increase of some 20,000 in the number of commuters coming into London.
The present state of our roads morning and evening is pretty unsatisfactory. This is the result of 1⅓ million commuters coming in. Not more than one-seventh of them are at present using motor cars, but
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the proportion may well increase, if the prosperity of the country continues to increase.
LORD SILKIN: My Lords, the noble Lord keeps on talking about commuters, but is it essential that these additional workers should all live out of London? Is it not possible to provide accommodation in London?
LORD MOLSON: My Lords, I am most anxious that everything shall be done to provide additional accommodation in London. I think that one of the minor, and perhaps indirect, beneficial effects of this measure will be that, as a result of the standstill on office building, more labour and material and land will become available for housing accommodation, as opposed to offices. But this figure of an extra 200,000 commuters, on top of the ⅓ million we have at the present time, obviously indicates the gravity of the problem which we shall have to face over the next few years. And it is largely on these figures that I find myself obliged to dissent from the view expressed by my noble friend, that the problem was on the way to being solved at the time the last Government went out of power.
In addition to the large number of offices which are in the pipe-line, and which will not be caught even by the retrospective operation of this Bill, it is important to remember that, with every increase in the size of London, it becomes an ever more powerful magnet for what I might call the ancillary services—shops, garages, entertainments of every kind. All these are drawn into London increasingly by the increase in the population.
The standstill has caused a large backlog of applications, which I believe are now sitting on the desks of the officials in the Board of Trade. All these point to the need for very great firmness in the administration of this Bill. The President of the Board of Trade, speaking in another place, referred to the minor but important benefits which might result from this in relieving the burden upon the building industry in the South-East of England. I think that it will help with housing; it will help with exports, and, above all, it will help with what I am not ashamed to say I advocate—that is, a considerable measure of deflation, especially in the over-congested areas of South-East England.

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I hope that it may be possible for the noble Lord, Lord Champion, when he comes to reply, to give some indication of the criteria which will be applied by the Board of Trade in giving their office development certificates. We have had a certain indication of the spirit from the President of the Board of Trade. He said, in another place:
"… if we are serious about planning at all we must be resolute in applying this control. Applicants, therefore, will have to satisfy us, first, that the activity cannot be carried on elsewhere and that no suitable alternative accommodation can be found, and, secondly,"—
I want to emphasise the word "and"—they are not alternative conditions; both have to be satisfied—
"unless the project is so small that it would not add materially to congestion or pressure on labour in the location proposed. it is essential in the public interest. Mere inconvenience or extra cost cannot be accepted as grounds for granting permits."—[OFFICIAL REPORT. Commons, Vol. 705 (No. 47), col. 739; February 1, 1965.]
I regard that as being a promise that the President of the Board of Trade has made, and I hope—indeed. I am confident—that it will be fulfilled. I was glad indeed to hear the noble Lord, Lord Rhodes, intervene a few minutes ago to say that the administration of this Bill will be tough—I think that that is what he said.
I want to ask the noble Lord, Lord Champion, about the Third Schedule to the Town and Country Planning Act. The Act, which was passed by the late Conservative Government after and as a result of the White Paper, London Employment, Housing and Land, made an amendment in the Third Schedule to the Town and Country Planning Act. It was pointed out in the White Paper that when anyone rebuilt a building, or added to it, he could add 10 per cent. to the cubic area, and if planning permission to do so were refused, the local authority might be obliged to pay compensation.
Under the Act of 1963, the cubic content was replaced by superficial area. That was of great importance, because owing to new developments in the designing of offices, and so on, an increase of 10 per cent. in the cubic area might result in an increase of something like 40 per cent. in the number of people employed. I thought that this was a
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time to do away completely with the 10 per cent. tolerance, and I moved an Amendment in the Committee stage here to that effect, so that rebuilding could be only of the same floor space as the existing building. I remember that the noble Lord, Lord Silkin, while unable to support me in what I proposed, said that if it applied only to offices in London he would be disposed to support it. An Amendment similar to this had been moved by the Labour Party in the other place in the Committee stage of that Bill. Naturally, I had hoped that when this Bill was introduced to deal with offices in London, an Amendment which I had put forward here and which, indeed, had originally been moved at an earlier stage by the Opposition in the other place, might have found a place in it. I should like to ask the noble Lord, Lord Champion, whether he can deal with that point in his reply.
LORD HAWKE: My Lords, may interrupt my noble friend on a point of explanation? I understand him to be saying at the moment that his Amendment dealt with the question of floor space, whereas my recollection—it may be faulty—is that at the time it was dealing with cubic capacity. Is he quite certain which it is?
LORD MOLSON: I am obliged to my noble friend. Under the law as it was at the time when the Conservative Government introduced their White Paper, it was cubic content. In their White Paper, and in the Bill which they introduced afterwards, they did away with cubic content and substituted superficial area. I thought this did not go far enough, and that while we were amending the Town and Country Planning Act, 1947, as consolidated in 1962, the whole of this might be done away with. I would agree with the noble Lord, Lord Silkin, that, for lack of anything better, this might well be done in the case of London, even if it were not done in the case of the country as a whole. I am now saying to the Government that as they were in favour of going further in 1963, I wonder why it is, now that they are legislating in order to deal with this matter, they have not carried this further.
It may be that this point is covered by what the President of the Board of

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Trade said on February 1 when introducing the Bill. He then said:
"We should have to be sure that this would not expand employment"—
that is, as a condition of giving an office development certificate—
"and the applicants would have to give up the Third Schedule rights, inherited from past legislation, which have so aggravated the present congestion. In some cases the applicant would have to accept a reduction in office space."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Commons, Vol. 705 (No. 47), col. 739, February 1, 1965.]
Does that mean that under this Bill it will be possible, as a condition of granting the certificate, that the rights existing under the Town and Country Planning Act, 1962, will have to be abandoned?
I also welcome Part II of this Bill. I am sure it is important that control should not be too narrow and too detailed, but it may well be that 50,000 square feet is too high an exemption limit to apply in the busy, congested, industrial areas of the country. But I hope—this is a point that has been put to me, and I would ask for an assurance on it from the noble Lord, Lord Champion—that this increased strictness of control will not prevent old, inconvenient and insanitary offices in the industrial areas from being rebuilt in a more satisfactory and up-to-date way.
I believe that this Bill is necessary, and is overdue. I think that in general outline it is entirely right; but I hope that the Government will show a willingness to consider Amendments on the Committee stage, and that in their administration of it, while being firm to establish the principles they have laid down, they will show the necessary flexibility in order that it shall not handicap industry.
5.47 p.m.
VISCOUNT ST. DAVIDS: My Lords, it has been most interesting to me, sitting here listening to this debate, to find myself agreeing in large measure with noble Lords opposite, and particularly with the noble Viscount, Lord Gage, and with much of what was said by the noble Lord, Lord Molson. However, what staggered and horrified me was that the Conservative Party seemed to have another policy different from that of the noble Lords, which was enunciated from their Front Bench.
I listened to the noble Lord, Lord Erroll of Hale, and I was surprised, as
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I think every noble Lord in the House was, by his statement that when the last Administration went out of office they were then convinced that matters were starting to get better. I do not believe that to be true. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Molson, that we are still many years from seeing matters getting better. It is clear that they will get worse, as I believe he suggested, for another ten years; and it is not yet certain that even this Bill is going to turn the tide. How on earth the noble Lord, Lord Erroll of Hale, managed to think that the position had been dealt with, I just do not know.
I find this contrary even to what the Conservative Party said during the General Election. I spent a lot of time during the General Election, as I am sure many noble Lords did, going round and speaking for various candidates for Parliament. In particular, I was speaking in Devon and Cornwall. It was there stated—as indeed I know it was in my own native Wales; and, I am sure, in many other parts of the country—not only by the Labour candidates, but by Conservatives and by Liberals, as well, that they were all greatly in favour of bringing more industry, more housing, more of the activity of production and of the good things of living away from the London area and spreading them around the country, thus making not only the London area but the whole of the country equally fit to live in. This, I heard at meeting after meeting, by all political Parties, was their stated policy, and this obviously could be done only by legislation. I do not say that this Bill is the total of the legislation that is needed—in fact, I believe it to be only the start. But how any political Party could say that no further legislation was needed for this purpose I cannot understand. It seems to be contrary not only to common sense, but to already stated policy.
I do not wish to speak for very long. All I would say is that this is not a problem only of the London area. The overcrowding is London's part of the problem, but the problem for the other parts of Britain is the disuse and misuse of their manpower, their existing facilities and the taking of people away from homes of which they are fond and where they have been brought up, simply to

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stuff them into this already overcrowded corner of Britain. This Bill is notably a Bill for London and about London, but it does good to the whole of the country, and not only London. For that reason, I strongly support it, and I believe that every noble Lord here should do the same.
5.52 p.m.
LORD SOMERS: My Lords, I will not keep your Lordships for more than a moment. My noble friend Lord Molson referred to the "tidal wave" of commuter traffic which goes in and out of London, and I entirely agree with him that the tidal wave at the moment moves as though it were made of very thick black treacle. If, as he says, the prosperity of the country improves, it will soon be moving with about the speed of a glacier. I have once or twice in your Lordships' House made a suggestion which has not received a great deal of attention, and I should be most grateful if the noble Lord, Lord Champion (I am sorry to see that he is not here to hear what I am saying), would give me an answer to it.
I have felt for a long time that the solution might be to convert these large office blocks in London into half office and half residential flats, the flats to be tied with the jobs in the office. That, of course, would eliminate altogether the commuter traffic to those particular offices, because the ideal thing is to have the worker living on the spot where he works. I cannot see why such a scheme would not be workable. In these new very spacious office blocks—I cannot say beautiful ones, but very spacious ones—which have recently gone up in London the flats could be made extremely nice, and I cannot see that any worker would have the slightest reason for grumbling about them.
LORD SILKIN: Is the noble Lord suggesting that these flats should be tied flats, so that when a person leaves a job he would have to leave the flat?
LORD SOMERS: Yes, my Lords; I was suggesting that. That is the case with a great many jobs, and I do not think it is an undue hardship. I should be very glad to hear what are the objections, if any, to this scheme, and whether it would be possible to put it into operation.
5.54 p.m.
LORD HAWKE: My Lords, I apologise for intervening when I am not on the list of speakers, but I should like to support my noble friend Lord Molson in all that he said. I should like to outline one aspect of the problem which has not been touched upon a great deal, and that is the urgent necessity of converting a great deal of London back to residential dwelling. That, at the moment, is financially quite impossible, because the building trade have not yet discovered how to build houses, even on land which is given to it free, at such a price that people in the lower middle income groups can afford to rent those houses. That is the great problem. It is a very difficult one to solve, and it is beyond my capabilities to suggest a solution.
The other thing about which I should like to inquire, which emerges from this, is how our old friend the railway lands are getting on. The noble Lord, Lord Conesford, myself, and one or two others, have conducted a campaign in this House to make the railways disgorge their lands which they no longer require. Gradually, the land is being disgorged, but one would like to see a Report from time to time on the purpose for which it is proposed these lands should be used. The whole object of our exercise has been to get these lands for residential purposes, and one would like to know whether our efforts have met with any success. Perhaps the noble Lord, Lord Champion, in his reply could let me know.
5.56 p.m.
VISCOUNT STONEHAVEN: My Lords, I want to ask for a little clarification on the question of the 10 per cent. increase in floor area. My difficulty in understanding this arises because, if you are redeveloping an old building by substituting a modern and well-designed one, it is extremely difficult not to increase the accommodation in the new building by at least 10 per cent. The mere difference in thicknesses between walls of modern design and those of stone or brick and mortar design in itself quite often goes far towards creating an increase of 10 per cent. If you use the site economically out to the existing building lines—and, after all, we want economy in building as well as all these other desirable things—I do not see how in many cases

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you can avoid an increase of 10 per cent.—more in some cases. One would have thought that the increase in accommodation could be a matter decided for the individual site. I should like to know how Her Majesty's Government view that fact.
5.58 p.m.
LORD DRUMALBYN: My Lords, in what is a comparatively short debate we seem to have covered an extraordinary amount of ground. I do not wish to take up all the points. I do not know whether the noble Lord, Lord Champion, when he replies to the debate will attempt to do so. I wish him luck. I do not propose to deal with the various points that have been raised, and which can probably be raised better on Committee—for example, the question that my noble friend Lord Erroll of Hale raised on whether there should be an appeal against a refusal of an office development permit, and the rather important question of compensation. I have a feeling that this goes to the heart of the question my noble friend Lord Somers asked, about the alteration or change of use from office building to residential accommodation. If the use is to be restricted back to housing, then there will be a very serious loss indeed of development value. This, I think, goes to the heart of that problem. Nor do I propose to deal with the question of the definition of offices, which again, I think, is a question with which we can deal on Committee stage.
The noble Lord, Lord Silkin, described this as a negative Bill. I would go further and say that it is a distressingly negative Bill, to deal with a situation which has been recognised by all Parties and was well set out in the White Paper, London—Employment, Housing, Land (Cmnd. 1952), presented in February, 1963. I think the noble Lord, Lord Rhodes will agree, to be quite fair, that certain action was taken on that Report. I do not think it can be said that nothing was done. Moreover, the results of the South-East Study, which was announced in that White Paper, were published only in February 1964, so that there was not much time for legislative action, if legislative action was required, to be taken between that time and the General Election.
I should like to deal first with the industrial development certificates,
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about which the noble Lord, Lord Rhodes, said a good deal. My reason for speaking in this debate, I suppose, was that I had for two years to deal with industrial development certificates at the Board of Trade under the direction of, among others, my noble friend Lord Erroll of Hale, and 1 think I can claim at any rate a little knowledge about the factors involved.
The noble Lord referred to the intention, already announced and referred to in another place, to reduce the limit from 5,000 square feet to 1,000 square feet, I think he said in broad terms, in the Midland Region and in the Board of Trade South-Eastern Region. The question here, of course, is what is the right limit to which to reduce the level. The difficulties to be overcome are the fact that undoubtedly there has been a good deal of evasion of the control through the building on industrial estates of units which would subsequently link up to form bigger factories, and also that there has been a certain amount of what might be described as creeping development in already established factories, where increases of 5,000 square feet at a time have been made and in the end a very substantial addition has emerged. Those are two problems which ought to be dealt with.
I should hope that, in dealing with the problem as a whole, the Board of Trade would not be inclined in the ordinary way to refuse development certificates for the construction of factories of under 5,000 square feet, because, as my noble friend Lord Erroll of Hale said, these factories are generally extremely difficult to direct elsewhere. The Board may be able to suggest that a start should be made elsewhere with a view to the factory's growing up and, sooner or later, becoming a much bigger enterprise than could be accommodated in the London area (or in the metropolitan area for that matter), and for which the Board of Trade would not give further development certificates.
Whether 1,000 square feet is the right limit or not—and as my noble friend has said, it is a very small amount indeed—is something that we can discuss in Committee, and if the Committee were to think that a figure rather higher than 1,000 square feet should be the minimum, then no doubt that could be written into

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the Bill. Let us discuss it. I am bound to say that I think this would be a sensible Amendment to introduce. Clause 18 deals with another problem which has given the Board of Trade a number of headaches "for quite a time; but it is a subject on which it would not have been practicable for the Board alone to introduce legislation, and that is why it had to be tagged on to this Bill.
May I turn to Part I of the Bill, which, of course, is by far and away the most important part of it? May I say to the noble Lord, Lord Silkin, and the noble Viscount, Lord St. Davids, that there really is no dispute about the general objectives? We all want to see more offices moving out of London, and, where possible, well away from London. We all want to see office employment provided for the new communities and the expanding towns within reach of London. And we all want to see more offices, whether Government or public corporation or private, going to those parts of the country which have unemployment and migration problems. But what we have to examine, surely, is the method proposed in this legislation and the way in which that method is going to be implemented. In our view, the Socialist outlook suffers from a chronic defect; and that is the tendency to tell someone to "Go upstairs and see what little Johnny is doing, and tell him not to".
In the White Paper of 1963 we expressed our disbelief in this as a means of restraining office development in London. We said that we did not believe that
"it would be practical to administer a system of control of office occupation either effectively or equitably."
Now, why is that? Very briefly, it is because, unlike factories (other than, perhaps, Government advance factories and small factories on private estates), offices in London are not usually made to measure unless they form part of a factory. The developer often does not know who his tenants will be, so that it is quite impossible to judge whether it is desirable in the national interest that their activities should be carried out in one place rather than another. As the White Paper said:
"A Government Department trying to administer a control of this sort would therefore he without the basic information needed for the purpose."
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The essential thing for the efficiency of the economy is that in general activities should not be prevented from being located where they can best be done. I do not think noble Lords will object to that proposition in general. But the difficulty we are up against is that the Government will not have the information necessary to make a decision on the particular activities. All they can decide is whether or not the space should be there in cases of that kind.
In 1959 the President of the Board of Trade, on the other hand, expressed his belief in—and I quote:
"just as tight a national control over office development as over factory development".
That was said on November 9, 1959. But when it came to the point, he had to modify his zeal for national control, and has had to be content with a control limited, at least for the time being, to the metropolitan area. What we are entitled to ask is, how he proposes to implement control, and how the Bill is going to be implemented. During the passage of the Bill in another place the President said that the Government
"certainly does not contemplate that there will be no further office building in London".
And he said it more than once. But that does not take us very far; because, as the noble Lord, Lord Silkin, said, it would be absurd to stop all replacement.
Take offices to let. The Board of Trade attempt to steer applicants for industrial development certificates in London to areas of labour shortage in other parts of the country. But the applicant for an office development permit will have his money tied up in a valuable site in London and will not be willing, and often will not be able, to go elsewhere. In a case like that, there really is no scope for steering people; but the great usefulness of the industrial development control, from the Board of Trade point of view, is mainly in this ability to steer. This is the comparison between the industrial development certificate and the office development permit, if there is one. Of course, there might be a little "horse-trading". The Board of Trade might say, "You build an office at Newbury"—or Bletchley or Newcastle or Southampton, or even Livingston—"and we will give you permission to build in London." Or the applicant may wish to

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modernise. There is no scope whatsoever for steering there.
Take, again, offices which the applicant wishes to occupy himself. That, I take it, is the minority of cases in London, because most firms are tenants, either by choice or by necessity. No doubt the Board of Trade will have the opportunity to try to persuade the applicant to go elsewhere, and, of course, I agree that it is the opportunity which is valuable in the certificate procedure. But as the White Paper of 1963 said:
"The disadvantages of congestion at the centre are only too obvious in terms of rising costs and loss of time both to employers and staff".
In other words, the advantages of better working conditions outside, and cheaper costs, are already being recognised more and more.
Before the applicant applies for an office development certificate he will have consulted the Location of Offices Bureau. He will already have taken into account the advantages of moving out, and he will have concluded that they are outweighed by the disadvantages for his business—I am talking of one who applies for an office development certificate in London, and his business may be of national importance. If he is refused permission, in nine cases out of ten he will simply stay as he is, for often the object of such an application is to bring all the activities under one roof, or he will buy or lease premises in London. Again, there is no scope for steering there, either. Where is the scope for steering? It is not for applicants for office development permits in London, but for applicants already on the move.
The last Government set up the Location of Offices Bureau, and in its first Report the Chairman said:
"The rate at which firms seriously considering a move have been consulting the Bureau represents a potential decentralisation of 4,500 office jobs a month and shows no sign of slackening."
He went on to say that possibly half of these might go out. But there is the figure of 4,500 a month. The Bureau's task is to encourage firms to move out, and to give them information and help as to where they should go. The Government might think that the Board of Trade can take on this task and do it more effectively. I have the greatest respect, indeed real affection, for the
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Board of Trade, but it is idle to think that firms can possibly regard the Board of Trade and the Bureau in the same light. To the public the Bureau is "one of us". The great advantage it possesses is that it has no compulsory powers, no power of veto. That is its advantage. As it says in its first Report, its task is to help a firm to assess its own needs. Its approach is made clear when it says:
"The basic premise was that it was good business to move out if the organisation could do so"—
that is, either to move out entirely or to move out part of its activities, its routine activities in particular.
What the Bureau is considering is both the desirability of reducing office employment in London and the efficiency of the enterprise. I suggest that both are matters concerned with the national interest. Yet in the Bill the only consideration which the Board of Trade is to have particular regard to is
"the need for promoting the better distribution of employment in Great Britain"—
not to the efficiency of that employment and of the enterprises that provide it. The enterprise itself may well be more efficient if it moves out in whole or in part, or, equally, it may not. What the Location of Offices Bureau can do is to lead the firm to a decision because of the confidence that the firm has in it and in its complete impartiality. But we must face the fact that any branch of Government which has the power, by an arbitrary decision against which there is no appeal, to prevent a firm from doing what it believes to be in the interests of its own efficiency is bound to be treated at arms length, as "one of them", not as "one of us." This is a fact that must be faced in judging whether or not this is the proper kind of method to employ.
Remember, we are here dealing with those offices which are prepared to move, and the question is how far they can move without affecting their efficiency adversely. That is something which I think the Board of Trade would find it extremely difficult to judge. I say that on the basis of my own experience. Certainly they can cite experience of other cases, which may or may not be comparable. But the Bureau can already do that. It is obvious, therefore, that, to say the least, the introduction of the office

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development permit procedure has serious practical limitations. Psychologically it will have an adverse effect. Already people have been pointing to the amount of empty office accommodation in London. Offices are empty because rents are so high, because firms are already moving out, because people are coming to realise that they should only do the essential functions in London—functions that cannot be efficiently done anywhere else—and should move out their routine staff.
But what was the effect of the building ban in London? My noble friend Lord Erroll of Hale and the noble Lord, Lord Silkin, both agreed that the effect was that offices to let were taken off the market and then re-offered at higher rents. I must say that I was astonished at the conclusion that Lord Silkin drew from this—it just shows how one control breeds another. What he said was that therefore there should have been another control imposed simultaneously on rents as well. That is how controls breed. The fact is that if supplies are artifically restricted, prices go up.
LORD MOLSON: My Lords, would my noble friend not agree that that is an extremely desirable thing—that if rents in London go up as a result of that it will be a further inducement to people to move out?
LORD DRUMALBYN: My Lords, that certainly is a point of view, but it is one that is a little difficult to sustain in the light of the Incomes and Prices Policy. It seems to me to be had psychology to introduce this negative control. I agree it is a question of judgment and a question of the general philosophy of Government. By and large, I think it will generally be agreed that we on this side believe in persuasion as the best means of getting co-operation, rather than control. It has been suggested that office building in London acts as a magnet to attract offices to come to London. But, surely, the truth is that it is not empty offices that act as the magnet; it is London itself that acts as the magnet.
I want to have a look now at the steps that require to be taken. I believe that the Bill is misconceived. The main problem is not to stop office building in London, but to get firms already occupying
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office places in London to give up all or part of it. The Location of Offices Bureau reported in its first Report as follows:
"After discussions with the 358 firms that have approached it, the Bureau believes that at least half of them will eventually decide to move. In other words, if the response rate experienced in the first six months were sub-stained, it would eventually mean 27,000 jobs a year moving out (this may be compared with the average rate of increase of central London office employment over the last decade of 15,000 jobs a year)".
They concluded:
"It seems improbable that such a rate could be maintained indefinitely. On the other hand, the Economist Intelligence Unit's survey suggested that at least 150,000 existing jobs could well be decentralised. A rate of 20,000 jobs a year over the next decade therefore seems not impossible."
The main point is that these are jobs which are already in offices—they will not be touched at all by this Bill. It is the methods which we instituted in setting up the Location of Offices Bureau and the propaganda it will carry out, coupled with building outside, which will affect their movement.
If the movement takes place, demand for office accommodation in London will decline, prices will fall and new building—I am not talking about the replacement building—will stop. If the Bill becomes law there is a grave risk that people will be more inclined to hold on to what they have in London. But the Bill does nothing to encourage people to move. The Bill does nothing positive at all. It is purely negative. If a firm is thinking of moving out of London and is told that it will not be given a permit to build in the conurbation, or even in the Metropolitan area, it may well say, "Thank you very much—in that case we will stay where we are." And, far from reducing the number of office workers coming into London, the Government will be doing the opposite, for employment generates employment.
One way to get firms to move out of London is to provide more offices in the Metropolitan area and the South-East generally, so that people living in those areas will be employed locally and not have to commute into London; it will also deal with the anticipated 600,000 who will be moving out of London, 1,250,000 in all. The Government are

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going to exercise their veto in the Metropolitan area also. Is this really necessary? After all, there is nothing to prevent the Ministry of Housing and Local Government from calling in any application for planning permission already. They could equally call in all applications for office space of over 3,000 square feet if they really thought it essential for the proper location and phasing of the twenty-year plan.
In criticising the Bill, I am not doubting the need for planning. I am doubting the Bill's effectiveness for the purpose. Of course, I recognise the desirability of getting more office employment into other parts of the country and the conflicting interests of planning authorities in the South-East anxious to provide as much employment as possible for their own local inhabitants. The last Government set a very good example in this respect in relation to Civil Service employment. In passing, may I ask for an assurance that the Government intend to implement the Fleming Report so far as practicable? But this is a marginal problem in relation to the larger problem of finding office accommodation in the South-East area. It is quite plain from the Location of Offices Bureau Report that the vast number of existing offices in the Metropolitan region are not willing or able to move more than 50 miles from London; although, as the Bureau says, some larger firms are willing to consider moving further and can no doubt be encouraged to do so without any Government power of veto. Indeed, they are more likely to do so without it.
I recognise that the advantage of the veto to the Government is that they can go on saying, "No" to an application from an applicant who wants to house all his headquarters office staff under one roof in London or the Metropolitan area, and so force the firm to choose between, on the one hand, the adverse effects on efficiency in being outside the Metropolitan area and, on the other, the adverse effects of being split over several offices in London. That choice may be in the interests of better distribution of employment. It can hardly be said to be in the interests of efficiency.
It may also be said that the control of offices in the Metropolitan region should enable the Government to maintain a national control, so that office building
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in the Metropolitan region and elsewhere is located and phased in accordance with the employment needs, not only of the 3⅓ million anticipated growth in population in the South-East for whom homes have to be found outside London in the next twenty years, but of other areas as well. If that is the argument, we can expect a virtual cessation of office building to let in Greater London. Is that what the Government intend?
The 1963 White Paper put the dilemma very well indeed, so well that I venture to remind the House of what was said:
"There is a conflict of interests here. Business, banking and commerce are of the greatest importance to the national economy, and are increasingly taking up a larger share of the working population. London is overwhelmingly the centre for these; and will go on being so. More offices will be needed in London if these services are to function efficiently and under modern conditions. At the same time, the heavy growth and concentration of offices in central London is bringing formidable transport, housing and financial problems in its wake, and these affect the lives of every Londoner."
That is the dilemma.
I will conclude in this way. Do the Government accept that London will go on being overwhelmingly the centre for business, banking and commerce? If so, do they accept that more offices will be needed here? Do they accept that, unless London is to suffer a serious decline as a national and international centre, the process of modernising its offices must continue? Will office development permissions be forthcoming for that purpose? What the Government have achieved so far is a complete interruption of that process. For six months already it has not been possible to start any new office building in London for which a contract had not already been made. It has not been possible to obtain planning permission for any office building either in London or in the Metropolitan region, for the lack of an office development programme.
We certainly do not want to prolong this situation a day longer than is necessary for the proper examination of the Bill. How long will it be, from the time the Bill receives Royal Assent, before the Board of Trade starts issuing its office development permits? How long is the situation to continue? How many cases have already come to the attention

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of the Board of Trade of planning permissions in Greater London which have been put in suspense? And what floor space and office employment do these cases cover—what part of the 17½ million square feet mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Rhodes?
We will not delay the Bill. We will not oppose it, although we regret—my noble friend Lord Erroll of Hale and myself have made clear our regrets—the change from voluntary co-operation to veto. It is easy to set up a control, but controls breed controls. We warn the Government that by this step they may be retarding the voluntary movement out of London which was begun under the last regime and was so imaginatively stimulated by the Location of Offices Bureau. I have full confidence that the Board of Trade will exercise these new controls sympathetically, but everything depends on the directions they receive from Ministers; and what we want the noble Lord to tell us, as the noble Viscount, Lord Gage, said, is what those directions are going to be. What is the policy behind them?—that is the real content of the Bill. The rest is mere negation.
6.30 p.m.
LORD CHAMPION: My Lords, it seemed to me that the case for the Bill was admitted by almost every speaker in the debate this afternoon. The warmth of the welcome has varied very considerably. I did not see any particular warmth in the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Erroll of Hale; neither did I find any particular warmth in the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Drumalbyn. But certainly the noble Lord, Lord Molson, whose activities in connection with this matter I remember so well in the past, referred to the debate which he himself initiated; and I remember his interventions in connection with railway lands and the Transport Act, 1962, a point to which the noble Lord, Lord Hawke, referred in his speech. I can say straight away to the noble Lord, Lord Hawke, that this Bill will catch all railway lands. Indeed, the control which will be applied elsewhere will be applied also to the railway lands which are intended to come on the market as a result of the alterations which have been taking place in
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the transport world and in the railways in London, particularly.
I must admit that I looked down my nose a little at the Amendments which were moved in Committee on the Transport Bill, because as a railwayman I then thought that the railways should have the advantage of selling their lands at the highest possible figure and in the best possible market. But I must admit that, with the hat which I am now wearing in answering this debate, I have to look at the matter in a slightly different way—namely, that here we are setting out to control office development and to prevent the proliferation of office accommodation in London, if that can be done without any major difficulties to our economy. Here I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Drumalbyn, that this problem cannot be considered only in relation to offices; it must be considered in relation to the possible effects upon our economy as a whole. Of course, it will be the job of the President of the Board of Trade to consider all applications, not merely in the light of their immediate effect here but in the light of their possible effect upon the economy as a whole. That, clearly, must be part of the solution.
The noble Lord, Lord Erroll of Hale, wished that the Government had looked at this whole matter very much more carefully before making their announcement on November 4, and following it up with this Bill which we have before us to-day. He said something which absolutely astounded me. He said, "We had already solved the problem." That statement positively amazed me. When I look around London and see what is happening here, when I see the figures of developments in the pipe-line that were given to us by my noble friend Lord Rhodes, this surely does not indicate that this problem was solved, or was even on the way to being solved.
I am bound to agree with the noble Lord, Lord Erroll of Hale, that the Location of Offices Bureau did a good job, but it could do little more than highlight the problem. It could not hope to solve it by the means which has been placed at its disposal. It gave very sound advice, as the noble Lord, Lord Drumalbyn, has said, to people who made application or brought their problems to it—advice which in some cases was wisely taken.

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But, my Lords, I fear that the fact that that Bureau had no powers at all meant that this problem could not possibly be solved by it. It seems to me that that would have been an impossibility in the circumstances, when all action was to remain purely voluntary, and when the Government could act only if they felt that the persuasive powers of the Location of Offices Bureau were not sufficient.
The noble Lord, Lord Erroll of Hale, said—and this view was supported by my noble friend Lord Silkin and the noble Lord, Lord Drumalbyn—that rents will rise as a result of this Bill. That may well be one of the consequences; but surely, as the noble Lord, Lord Molson, pointed out, this may very well be one of the stimuli necessary to ensure that some of these people do see the economic advantages of moving out of London, rather than coming into this already very much overcrowded centre, with all the drain upon our resources that this involves, in transport, housing, roads, and all the rest of it. I should have thought that the drain upon our economy that might be caused by higher rents was trifling by comparison with the social costs inevitable in a continuation and further building up of office development in this great conurbation that we are talking about to-day.
Clearly, my Lords, a tremendous number of detailed or Committee points have been made in this debate. I am sure that my noble friend—and, if I have any part to play in it, I myself also—will be very happy to deal with those points in Committee. I may say to the noble Lord, Lord Erroll of Hale, that I shall certainly have no objection to his putting down any Amendments, even if they have been put down previously in another place, if satisfaction has not been given. I am bound to say that, in the case of the progress of the Bill through the other place, Amendments were in fact agreed to and alterations to the Bill were made in the various stages. But, clearly, there still must remain in many noble Lords' minds doubts upon these points, and if they put down Amendments we will do our best, in most cases perhaps, to reject them, and in some cases, I hope, to give them very favourable consideration. But this will depend, of course, upon the Amendments, and I am not promising the noble Lord too much in this connection.
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The noble Lord, Lord Erroll of Hale, said there was a strong case, arising out of this Bill and out of the decisions which have been taken by the Government, for paying compensation. I imagine that he will return to this subject on the Committee stage, but I do not invite him to do so. I am afraid that I shall not be able to give him much hope that there will be any considerable changes on this matter of compensation. After all, what we are doing by this Bill is simply to introduce a suspense period of seven years. This period of seven years has been called into question by one noble Lord, who suggested that there might be a shorter period. All I would say, in connection with the period of this Bill, is that if it were a shorter period we might well be running into the difficulty that developers will just wait; they will not do anything with their land during that period.
What I want to see, as a partial result of this Bill, is that developers will change their minds, and will put in applications for permission to develop for housing purposes—and housing is what we want. But, of course, even applications for housing purposes will have to be considered in the light of the facilities and services that are available in the particular area. Very much of the land intended for development for offices might well be used for housing purposes. This is a possibility which I was glad to see was welcomed by the noble Lord, Lord Molson, because he knows the problem. And, as I mentioned before, even in the case of the Transport Bill he fought for housing, as against offices, on some of these sites made available by the Railway Executive as a result of the alterations in the transport system.
LORD HAWKE: My Lords, may I interrupt the noble Lord on one point? I do not know whether he realises the colossal loss which any developer would have to face if, having paid an office development price for his land, he were reduced to having it developed for residential purposes. I desire this as much as the noble Lord does, but the loss will be quite colossal; and unless there is some financial easement it will not come to pass, I am afraid.
LORD CHAMPION: My Lords, I am not going to pretend that this is not one of the difficulties. I recognise very well

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that, in this question of preventing people getting compensation, very large sums are involved. I have been told that if we decided that it would be possible to compensate in all the cases where an office development permit was refused, it might involve the sum of between £100 million and £150 million. This, my Lords, is a tremendous amount of money, and the question arises whether the public should be mulcted in such vast sums when these decisions arise out of socially necessary decisions by the Government.
We cannot always compensate people who suffer as a result of decisions by a Government, whatever Government it may be. Budget alterations result in tremendous losses to some people, and you cannot compensate them wholly for that. Then there is the refusal of a planning permission. as my noble friend says. Here we are talking about planning permissions and some of the difficulties that may arise out of the revocation of planning permissions that have already been granted. There is a difficulty, and we recognise it. We recognise that some people will suffer as a result of this, but we do not feel that it would be right, in the circumstances of this case, to embark upon paying huge sums in the form of compensation to speculative developers—or, indeed, genuine developers who are perhaps not speculative in the rather abused sense of that term.
LORD DRUMALBYN: My Lords, may I ask the noble Lord, again, whether the figure that he has given relates only to the Greater London Area, to the Central London Area, to the Metropolitan Region, or what?
LORD CHAMPION: I am not going to go deeply into the figures, which are very round figures. I believe that they in fact relate to the whole of the area covered by this Bill—namely, the Metropolitan Region—but, frankly, I should not like to be too firmly held to this. I will look into it and perhaps let the noble Lord know, if he thinks it might be an advantage to him to know it.
LORD HAWKE: My Lords, may I ask the noble Lord one point on the figures? I take it that this enormous sum of money refers to compensation for all possible, potential development, right over the whole of the Metropolitan area. It
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does not refer, I imagine, to that comparatively smaller number of cases where the developer has received permission to develop but is now brought to a standstill.
LORD CHAMPION: My Lords, I am not going to go more deeply into this at this stage. It is an extremely difficult one, and I do not propose to be caught up too readily. I can well understand why the noble Lord, Lord Erroll of Hale. smiles at me: I am sure he has been in the same sort of position before. I definitely do not intend to be caught up too easily in this.
The noble Lord, Lord Silkin, hopes we shall succeed in the task that we are undertaking, but rather fears that it will be impossible. My Lords, we must at least try, and this Bill appears to us to be the sort of method that we must try initially. But the noble Lord, I thought rightly, went on to point out that we must try to take positive as well as negative action, and he told us that we ought to be trying to make other parts of the country more attractive for office and other developments—make them so attractive that people would be happy to move to them. I agree absolutely with my noble friend in this. I must say that, as I understand them, the regional plans that my right honourable friend George Brown is talking about are intended to do precisely this: to create in the regions conditions which will help to make them more attractive than they are.
The noble Lord, Lord Silkin, said, "London is the great magnet, the great attraction, for both men and women who want to come here to live". My Lords, I should hate the thought of living in London. It is just about the last place to which I should wish to come, and I cannot understand the tremendous desire to get up to this part of the country. Indeed, although I live in a fairly industrialised area in South Wales, I would not move from it for all the tea in China, or all the offices that somebody might be prepared to give me—I am not talking about offices in Government, because they can be highly remunerative. But one must give this point a little consideration.
LORD SILKIN: My Lords, would my noble friend not agree that, in spite of his dislike of London, there are millions

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and millions of people who disagree with him? They have been flocking to London.
LORD CHAMPION: Yes, I agree; and part of the reason why they have been flocking to London is that there have been these offices available to which they can come and work.
LORD SILKIN: That is not the only reason.
LORD CHAMPION: There it is. Human beings differ very much in this regard; but I agree with my noble friend that what we must try to do is to increase the attractive nature of some of the rest of the country, to provide the facilities, and so on, to remove some of the awful, long streets of slum dwellings which are a disincentive to people—and indeed much of the hideous squalor that followed the developments of the last century.
Now we cannot be completely satisfied on the point that this Bill will achieve what we have set out to do. Certainly it is worth trying; but we will continue to do precisely what the Location of Offices Bureau was trying to do, and that is to encourage the move of offices to other parts of the country. I am bound to agree with many of the noble Lords who have said, "It is essential that the head office of a particular firm should be in London because of the contact with other head offices, with other facilities and so on, that are available in a great Metropolis". But, my Lords, in so many of these cases, while it might be necessary for some of the head office staff to be in this position, it is not necessary for many of the ancillary functions of such a headquarter's staff to be located within this central area, or, indeed, in the Metropolitan Region at all, as so many firms have found when they have really looked at it. They find that they can send out much of their office work—and that this can be done without any disadvantage to the firm itself—to offices well outside this Metropolitan Region in the South-East. But, of course, this Bill is not a complete clamp-down. It is a control, and can be varied; and it is variable in the light of all the circumstances existing.
The noble Lord, Lord Silkin, said he hoped that we should not be tough
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merely for the sake of being tough. I hope we shall not, but I also hope that we shall be reasonably tough in our administration of this Bill, although always taking care, as I said before, that we are not tough to the point of damaging our economy. The noble Viscount, Lord Gage, rightly says that the whole control that we are now instituting in this Bill is bound up with planning procedures—planning procedures about which he, because of his associations, knows so much. As I understood it, he was referring in particular to comprehensive development schemes. He had one in mind, I imagine, although I do not know if he actually named it.
VISCOUNT GAGE: Several, yes.
LORD CHAMPION: He was thinking of the offices which go to support the financial commitments caused by the redevelopment of the centres of towns. This is one of the categories of office development which may not be able to pass the strict tests that the Board will generally apply to applications for office development permits, but we shall be prepared to grant permits in certain circumstances, and this is one of the circumstances where the Board may very well incline towards granting the necessary office permits. I do not guarantee that they will do this in every case. We recognise that there are a number of comprehensive development schemes which depend upon building offices for their economic viability. These range from the major traffic improvement plan already approved by the Minister of Housing and Local Government at Knightsbridge Green to the smaller town centre redevelopment schemes. There are also office development proposals which are linked with providing car parks and for redevelopment of railway sites.
We cannot contemplate giving any blanket approval for schemes of this sort, when we see the need for applying highly restrictive control to other meritorious development. They will each have to be examined carefully on their merits, with a view to avoiding any increase in office area; but although I cannot give the noble Lord the complete answer he wants, I can say that this comprehensive development scheme idea is one of the things in which we shall

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be prepared to give very careful consideration to the possibility of permitting a certain amount of office development in that particular scheme.
VISCOUNT GAGE: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord; but what I was aiming at was that in the future—whether schemes which are already approved will come into it or not—when a scheme of comprehensive redevelopment has been through all the routes, it should mean what it says. I do not know whether or not this is a Committee point. I do not necessarily wish to go into it in detail, but I want some certainty on the matter.
LORD CHAMPION: Yes, my Lords. The other point the noble Viscount was making in this connection is an extremely important one. It is whether one Government can bind its successors. Within the Constitution, as we know it, that cannot happen. We hope that there will be a reasonable continuity of ideas within a particular Ministry. I suppose that is why we have civil servants; they help to provide continuity, although there can be changes of direction when Governments change—as they did, rightly, a short time ago.
A NOBLE LORD: And will do so again.
LORD CHAMPION: They may do so again; but I doubt it.
The noble Lord, Lord Molson, argued that the Bill should also remove the 10 per cent. floor space tolerance under the Act of 1963. We say that this is unnecessary. With the new control which the Bill introduces there is no need at all to tinker with the Third Schedule. The Bill goes to the root of the problem by making all office development above exempted limits subject to control, which will be exercised by the sort of criteria I have been talking about: namely, fairly stringent ones. The problem of modernisation of offices would be considered only if there were no resulting increase in office development. Applicants will have to give up their Third Schedule rights and, in some cases, accept a reduction in office space. I hope the noble Lord, Lord Molson, finds that that answers his point. I believe it supports what my right honourable friend the President of the Board of Trade said in another place and
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which the noble Lord quoted. Indeed, I hope that I have added a little to that and made it a little more satisfactory to the noble Lord.
LORD MOLSON: Yes, my Lords.
LORD CHAMPION: The noble Lord, Lord Erroll of Hale, apologised for possibly having to leave; and on his behalf I will apologise to the House. He made the point that there is no formal appeal against a decision by the Board. This is also the case, as I understand it, with Industrial Development Certificates; but, within the chain of control there is the appeal from regional level to headquarters and, as the noble Lord, Lord Drumalbyn, pointed out, up to the President of the Board of Trade himself. Of course, there is always what I think is valuable—and I hope that we shall retain it for a long time—the right of any applicant to raise his case through his Member of Parliament.
This is the chain of appeal that has been recognised. It has been considered by various authorities in the past. The Justice Report of 1961, made by a group of lawyers led by the then Sir Hartley Shawcross, recognised the value of what they called "the internal system of hierarchic appeals" in cases where there was no formal appeal machinery, and accepted that it was sometimes in the public interest that the final decision should rest with the Minister who had to implement a consistent policy. Of course, in this case the President of the Board of Trade will, in fact, have to follow a reasonably consistent policy.
The noble Lord, Lord Molson, wondered whether the Bill is not so tightly drawn that it will prevent compliance with the Offices, Shops and Railway Premises Act, 1963—I think it was the noble Lord, Lord Molson who made that point. Obviously, there is a need to bring such premises up to the standard requirements of that Act. This is an important factor which will be taken into account by the Board in considering applications for permits. But this will not necessarily be a decisive factor for the Board's main task will be to promote the better distribution of employment. They will, of course, look sympathetically at all alterations of existing premises which clearly will not generate additional employment.

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I fear that I have rather strayed beyond the dictum of my noble friend Lord Silkin that all speeches should be very brief; but he himself asked me a number of questions which stimulated me into rather a long reply. If I have been rather long, I apologise. There are some points which I have left out, but they are mostly of a Committee nature, and I shall be happy, as will my noble friend, to try to deal with them on Committee stage. I would finally say to the noble Lord, Lord Drumalbyn, that the Fleming Report is one which we regard as of great importance. We hope to succeed in the job of decentralising Government offices in London beyond the hopes and suggestions contained in that Report. We recognise its importance, and we firmly believe that Governments should not just tell other people what to do but try to do those things in the right way themselves. I have not answered every point; we will try to deal with some of the other points at Committee stage; but I hope your Lordships will be prepared to give this Bill a Second Reading.
On Question, Bill read 2a, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

THE HOUSE-BUILDING PROGRAMME AND BUILDING SOCIETY LOANS
7.0 p.m.
THE EARL OF KINNOULL THE EARL OF KINNOULL rose to ask Her Majesty's Government whether they are aware of the acute shortage of funds available from building societies for prospective house-owners; and whether they consider this a serious threat to their national house-building programme. The noble Earl said: My Lords, when I put down this Question on house mortgages before Easter I did so without realising that the whole matter would be debated in another place last Thursday. I was on the point of withdrawing the Question when I noticed, so I thought, that there were some of your Lordships who wished to speak on the matter. I hope that this short debate will add some useful arguments to the matter and convince the Government that the present situation can be fairly described as a crisis and not just a temporary setback.
When I studied the Report of last Thursday's debate, with some care, I
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formed the impression that, although the Minister was commendably open and frank as to the concern he felt for his broken pledges and commitments on 100 per cent. mortgages and low interest rates, he was disappointingly vague as to the solution to the present situation. In fact, my Lords, he just simply refused to acknowledge the situation and calmly announced that we should have to wait until later this summer for his master plan. This disturbing attitude leads one to believe either that he wishes to be known as "unflappable" or that he is completely misjudging the seriousness of the situation. His description of the crisis as a temporary setback might have been perfectly fair if he had come forward with the solution. His claim that the housing programme was, as he graphically described it, "like an overheated engine" was hardly convincing when he took no steps to forestall the overheating. As to his comforting thought that this crisis would prove an advantage for his starting-off point in his national housing programme, this, I suppose, has the benefit only of original thinking.
I do not think it necessary to describe to your Lordships the very serious state of the house mortgage market to-day, except perhaps to say that it is now extremely difficult to obtain a mortgage, either through a building society or through a local authority. Perhaps when the noble Lord comes to reply he will tell your Lordships what percentage of applications for mortgages is at present being turned away through lack of funds. What I feel should be seriously considered to-night is what are the immediate and future effects of this crisis, and what solution can be devised immediately, without having to wait four or five months for the master plan.
The effects, as I see them, are quite simple. Lack of confidence leads to lack of supply. Evidence of this has already appeared with the announcement of contractors' cutting back their building programmes; and the Federation of Registered House Builders have stated that one in four people looking for a new house this year will be disappointed. It has been estimated that, due to the crisis, some 50,000 fewer houses will be built this year. If one takes on average three people per house, this will affect some 150,000 people.
Perhaps the noble Lord, Lord Mitchison, will be able to give the House an intimation of what estimate the Ministry have made of the number of houses and flats which will be completed this year. It may be of interest to note that building societies which last year loaned £1,087 million are estimating that this year the total loans will be some £300 million short of this figure. The Minister has so far turned his back on all the evidence of the slowing up of the building industry, and is coolly describing contractors as pessimistic or as having a sense of drama and political prejudice. Do responsible contractors honestly think like this? I very much doubt it. Have the Government forgotten the promise they made last November, through the Chancellor of the Exchequer, to take early action to assist the housing programme—a promise which has never been put into practice?
My Lords, I believe that there are many practical solutions which can assist the present crisis. Building societies, which finance some 75 per cent. of all private house building, should be, I believe, temporarily supported by the Government, either by a form of guarantee or by being directed to obtain loans from the various banks. The House Purchase and Housing Act, 1959, could be used to greater advantage to assist building societies in providing loans for older houses. Perhaps the noble Lord will tell the House what is the estimated capital which the building societies would require to tide them over this difficult period, if they were to meet all proper demands.
As for local authorities, which, I believe, are responsible for something like 15 per cent. of the total market for private house building, I am sure that their terms could be made far more favourable if the Public Works Loan Board were to grant them up to, say, 70 per cent. of the capital they require and not just up to the present maximum of 35 per cent. This would reduce their demands for raising capital on the open market and so make their terms far more attractive.
In conclusion, perhaps I may paraphrase an old saying to the noble Lord opposite: "Do not say in Opposition what you cannot do in power". I believe that the Minister has a genuine
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desire to meet his commitments and fulfil his pledges to the country, but unless he takes some immediate, imaginative and positive steps to solve the present crisis, I fear that his hopes will not be fulfilled for a very long time.
7.9 p.m.
LORD AUCKLAND: My Lords, my noble friend Lord Kinnoull was, I believe, absolutely right to raise this Question this evening. I have an interest to declare as a director of a very small building society in London, which was formed in 1935 and specialises in mortgage loans ranging between £2,000 and £4,000. It is particularly within these figures that the present difficulties lie, and I know from my own experience as an insurance broker with a firm which deals with this problem how very difficult it is at the present time—and "very difficult" is putting it mildly—to secure mortgage loans even up to £10,000 in many cases, let alone loans in the £2,000 to £4,000 range which many young people of moderate means who are hoping to set up a home of their own are seeking at the present time.
The picture as I see it at present is a dismal one. I have no wish to make any Party political capital out of this, because these young people and others who are seeking houses are not interested in the Party politics of this matter. I am bound to say, having read the Minister's speech of last Thursday, that like my noble friend I was profoundly disappointed at his apparent lack of understanding of this situation. This is no time to try to apportion blame, but I hope he will read very carefully the proceedings in this debate.
The London County Council, to be fair, have done their utmost to solve this problem, and the Greater London Council are now doing their utmost to solve it. I think it is only right to put this on record. However, delays of up to six weeks are being experienced by people who want their property to be surveyed, and this in itself creates considerable difficulties. There are estate agents in London and elsewhere who are being beseiged by people seeking house mortgages sometimes almost with a feeling of desperation, and they are being turned away by staffs who have nothing to do at the present time. I am informed that many of them are being

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passed on to finance houses, some of whom are making a very undesirable racket out of these unfortunate matters. I have no wish to criticise the bona fide finance houses, who do a very worthwhile job, but this present situation is bringing out the less scrupulous of these people, who are charging interest rates of 12 per cent., plus additional survey charges and other burdens.
As I have said, the building societies are not seeking to indulge in Party political pyrotechnics. The chairman of the Building Societies Association, in his paper of last February, spoke these words:
"Building societies have no desire to be dragged into the political arena. They are traditionally non-political and have always cooperated with the Government of the day to promote policies which are designed to encourage thrift and home ownership."
I should like to ask the noble Lord who is to reply whether his right honourable friend's attention has been directed to these vital words. He has suggested, at least by implication, that the Opposition Benches are trying to make Party politics out of the state in which the building societies now find themselves. I believe this to be quite untrue. As my noble friend has said, all Parties are desirous of solving this problem.
I will quote one more figure. Last year, young people of the age bracket 25 to 34, newly married and seeking houses of their own, formed 42 per cent. of mortgage seekers. I should like to ask the noble Lord whether he is aware that many of these will be profoundly disappointed by the present situation. I hope that he will have some reply to the questions which have been directed to him this evening.
7.40 p.m.
THE JOINT PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY, MINISTRY OF LAND AND NATURAL RESOURCES (LORD MITCHISON): My Lords, I have been waiting to hear what the present situation is supposed to be. So far I am a little disappointed. The noble Lord who spoke last said that it was very dismal. That is an expression of opinion. But it might be more useful to look at the facts. The noble Earl who initiated the debate started off by talking about broken pledges, but he did not tell us what pledges had been broken up to now.
THE EARL OF KINNOULL: My Lords, perhaps I should quote here the debate of last Thursday. I was referring to the pledge given by the Prime Minister and the whole of the Party in office at the moment, of 100 per cent. mortgages at low interest rates, at one stage the rate being quoted at 3 per cent.
LORD MITCHISON: My Lords, we have had this before, and by all means let us have it again; but if we are going to have it, let us have it right. What the Labour Party said was that they would reduce interest rates and, if necessary, have special rates in the case of both local authority houses and building society houses. I do not think that a specific figure was given. That particular pledge has been defended and repeated so often that it really seems a waste of time to do it again. In the debate to which the noble Earl referred it was again repeated, with a quotation from the Labour Party Manifesto.
It is perfectly clear that the pledge has not been broken. On the contrary, it is being carried out. But the difficulty is the financial mess in which we were left by the outgoing Administration; and upon that I shall have a word to say later—if the noble Earl wants me to answer his questions he had better perhaps let me answer them, and then interrupt me afterwards if he wants to. Let us proceed to see what this very dismal situation is—how the country is "going to the dogs", the building societies are "in the soup", the poor young couples are all weeping and nobody can do anything. All this is a misrepresentation and there is remarkably little behind it.
Let me give the noble Earl one or two facts. The actual rate of building at present is not worse than it was last year; in fact, it is rather better. If we take the starts in the first quarter of 1964 and the first quarter of this year, the starts of private dwellings, which are the ones with which we are concerned to-day, are a little higher in the first quarter of this year and the public starts are a little bit lower. When we come to the figures for this March it so happens that in the case of new houses in both sectors starts are up. Let us turn to completions. In the first quarter of 1965 more houses were completed both in the private and in the public sectors as compared with last year.

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These figures relate to England and Wales, but if one includes Scotland, exactly the same position applies. The net result, therefore, is that in this very dismal situation we are starting more houses and building more houses than we were at the same time last year.
Let us turn from that and see what is happening to these miserable building societies. The advances they made in the first quarter of this year were higher than those made in the first quarter not only of last year but of any previous year. There has been no general suspension of lending by building societies at all. It is continuing at a higher rate. I do not know about Lord Auckland's particular building society and what they are doing in any particular case; I am taking building societies as a whole. I hope the noble Earl can restrain himself—
THE EARL OF KINNOULL: My Lords, I can certainly restrain myself, but I thought that the noble Lord was moving on to a different point. The noble Lord has been quoting these figures of the past. I am talking about the present and the future, and when I do that I think of great firms like Wimpey, who are cutting back 30 per cent. of their housing programme. Does the noble Lord call this a healthy situation?
LORD MITCHISON: My Lords, I can deal with only one point at the time. I think that in a debate about building societies it is at least reasonable to point out that, so far from being in a very dismal situation, they are doing more work in the business of advancing money than they were at the same time last year. The noble Earl may be quite certain about the future, but I am not. I do however regard the present situation, which is what I am talking about, as not a very dismal one; and I think that to say that it is is quite unsupported by any evidence.
The Federation of House Builders, I think it was, quoted a figure of 50,000 fewer houses. All I can say on that is that I have never heard where this figure comes from. I cannot see what it can come from; and I cannot see how anybody can tell at this time how many houses will be completed by the end of this year. We can have targets and talk about them—and I should have thought that, of all "targeteers", the Party opposite
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were the leading exponents of rash targets. I should have thought, however, that this was a matter of mere common sense. It was one of the questions the noble Earl asked me. I see him shaking his head, but he must have a remarkable gift of prophecy if he can tell now how many houses will be completed by the end of the year. He may find the starting figures useful, and that is why I gave them. If the starting figures are completed, we shall do quite well.
May I give the noble Earl a rather rash estimate that was made? My right honourable friend the Minister saw the builders, and he told another place that the worst estimate he got from any builder was a figure that was only slightly lower than the total of last year. It was nothing like 50,000 from 400,000, but only slightly lower. I do not attach much importance to it, because I cannot see how a builder, a building society, a Minister or anybody else can tell, when he is speaking in May, how many houses are going to be completed at the end of the year. He may be in a better position to do this in October or November, but he cannot say this at present. That is the answer to that part of the noble Earl's Question.
Then there was a series of questions about how many people have been turned away by building societies. The short answer to that is that a great many people go to building societies and do not get the mortgages they want. Continuously, for years past, the building societies have been saying this. But one cannot say how many applications have been turned down, meaning how many applications would have been granted but for something or another, without making clear what the something or another is. That we have completely failed to learn from the noble Earl who asked the Question.
The other question was: how much money would be required to tide them over? To tide them over to do what? They are doing quite well. They are making their advances. The noble Earl shakes his head. He asked for the figures, and I have given them. If he refuses to accept them, then I cannot do any more about it. Where he gets his figures from, I do not know, because he has not produced any. If I may say so, this kind

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of attack should be founded on rather more facts and a rather more solid basis than it has been, not only to-day—I am not referring to this debate, or particularly to the noble Earl's speech—but by the Opposition, who made it in another place. The Press were really at the bottom of a lot of this, and they started this story on their own. Unless and until some further indication can be given of what really is the matter, I do not see how anybody can be expected to produce remedies for an entirely non-existent evil.
I should like to say one or two words about the position of young people. Young people want houses, and they want them very badly in London. And we all recognise that not only young people but a great many other people are in the kind of distress, in London and elsewhere, that was indicated, so far as London is concerned, by the Milner Holland Report, which we all have well in mind at the moment. But, as I think that Report made quite clear, the biggest gap in the machinery is not the house that the building societies will advance to supply, but the house which ought to be supplied in sufficient quantities by local authorities. It is to develop the activities of the local authorities further that my right honourable friend's attention is particularly directed.
But it is equally true that housing is not a matter just for the local authorities or for private housing. I heard the noble Earl (I think I heard him aright) suggest that 15 per cent. of the building was done by local authorities. That figure, I need hardly say, is quite incorrect. The proportion at present is roughly 40 per cent. by local authorities and 60 per cent. by private builders.
To look at the history of the matter, when the first Tory Government came in after we left office the amount of house building by public authorities that was taking place was far greater than the building being done by private builders. It was, however, the then Government's deliberate policy to encourage private house building at the expense of building by local authorities, and it is because of this that there are so many people now who ought not to have to ask for a mortgage. It is not what they want; but, finding themselves
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unable to get a local authority house, they have to see what they can achieve with building societies. That is the net result of Tory policy. That, as I said at some length the other day—and I hope I am not going to repeat it at great length this evening—is really the big gap, and that is what needs attention. But the two things must be kept in step, and it was to this that my right honourable friend referred when he spoke of having a meeting in the summer to get together the building programme, both as regards private houses and local authority building. That, I suggest, must be right.
There are two ways of looking at any building programme when you are finding out what you can manage. One way is to look at the financial side, and the other is to remember that there is a certain amount of building labour available in the country and that it cannot be increased immediately on any large scale. That being so, it is, as I see it, the business of the Government to keep in view the distribution of that building labour and the financial resources as between the various types of need: in the particular case we are discussing now, that of private houses for which building societies will make advances, and, on the other hand, that of local authority houses which are required to rent.
The difficulty about the building societies—and there is difficulty, though it was not mentioned by either of the two noble Lords who have spoken: but let me put it into their mouths; and I may be able to help them over this—is that the building societies, while they are getting a good deal of money, and much the same as they have always been getting, to use in advances, and while they are at the moment continuing to make advances, are having to suffer from fairly large withdrawals. That is the real difficulty from their point of view. It has nothing to do with actual building. It is the fact that because local authorities, for instance, are offering considerably higher rates to lenders than the building societies have been in the habit of offering, investors have drawn a good deal of money, particularly rather large investors, from the building society funds.

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This, in turn, is, of course, the result of, if you like, a "dear" money policy at the moment: the result of protecting ourselves against the situation which we found in this country when we came into power. We found an enormous sum (I have the figures here, and they were quoted in this particular debate by the Chief Secretary to the Treasury) for which we were in debt to foreign countries, and for which we had to make provision by temporary borrowings. This was a matter which had to be attended to in October, when in fact it had been going on since July—and, for that matter, even earlier.
What we hold against the former Government on that matter is that they did nothing before the Election; that they should have taken action many months previously, but left us to carry this extremely unwelcome baby when we got back in October. Perhaps the noble Earl will allow me to finish my sentence. It is as a result of that emergency measure that the building societies and the local authorities have been in some difficulty and in some competition in borrowing funds. Does the noble Earl wish to interrupt?
THE EARL OF KINNOULL: My Lords, I am sorry to interrupt, but I wanted to know how long this political excuse was going to go on, blaming the past Administration.
LORD MITCHISON: It is no excuse to owe foreign countries £850 million or £950 million; it is hard cash; and the next time the noble Earl is a bit short of money, is he going to call it a fiscal excuse, or is he going to recognise the fact that he has not got the money and had better find it somewhere? That was the position that this country was in. Really it is a ludicrous use of political language to call something of that sort a fiscal excuse. It is rather a gruesome reality. Does anyone suppose that an incoming Chancellor of the Exchequer puts a 7 per cent. bank rate on for fun; that he applies a credit squeeze unless he has to? And does anybody sup-
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pose that the outgoing Government, when this is in fact the position we found on taking office, can evade all responsibility for their own omissions and own misdeeds by saying it is a fiscal excuse? It is really, saving the noble Earl's presence—and by all means let him interrupt; I like interruptions; I am accustomed to them, but let me finish my sentence—ridiculous to talk about this kind of thing in terms of that sort.
THE EARL OF KINNOULL: Could I ask the noble Lord one question? As I said, the Chancellor of the Exchequer pledged last November to improve the housing programme. He has not done so. Does he intend to do so?
LORD MITCHISON: The housing programme is getting along rather well, as I have just indicated, and of course he intends to do so. What does the noble Earl think about the measures we have already introduced about protection from eviction; what does the noble Earl think about the interviews proposed in the summer, and what does he think of the concessions that have already been made to local authorities by way of facilitating their borrowings? What does he think that is all for, if it is not for improving the housing programme?
I hope we have demolished some of this fiction today, because it is founded on fiction. It has no real basis at all, and so far as there is anything to be said on the matter that has any importance, it is this. The key to the whole matter is the financial situation with which we were saddled by the outgoing Party and in respect of which we have had to make provision in certain respects, particularly in this instance by continuing a seven per cent. bank rate far longer than anybody wants to continue it. We have no wish to have it. We did not ask for this baby. If we have given it the right medicine, it is a very nasty and painful one. But nobody wants it.

ROCHDALE CANAL BILL [H.L.]
Reported, with Amendments.