Lords Sitting of 11 February 1969

Preamble
The House met at half past two of the clock (Prayers having been read earlier at the Judicial Sitting by the Lord Bishop of St. Albans):
The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack

RAIL CLOSURES: EDINBURGH/CARLISLE LINE
LORD KILMANY: 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 the Ombudsman has now agreed to examine the case against closing the Edinburgh to Carlisle railway line and whether an assurance can be given that no more rails will be removed from this line pending the result of the Ombudsman's inquiry.]
THE MINISTER OF STATE, FOREIGN AND COMMONWEALTH OFFICE (LORD SHEPHERD): My Lords, I understand that the Ministry of Transport has been asked by the Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration to comment on a complaint about the provision of alternative bus services for former users of this line at Newcastleton. The Railways Board are free to remove track and signalling equipment from a closed line. But they do not dispose of the route formation itself without first seeking my right honourable friend's agreement.
LORD KILMANY: My Lords, while accepting the noble Lord's assurance that the railways will not proceed totally to remove the line that at present stands, is the noble Lord not aware that already some of the rails have been removed from Newcastleton? Who in fact is to pay if, in the event, the Ombudsman sustains the case and if, furthermore, the case sustained for Newcastleton is referred to him and sustained for a wider area?
LORD SHEPHERD: My Lords, I think the noble Lord is under some misapprehension. The matter, I understand, has been referred to the Parliamentary Commissioner on the adequacy of the alternative bus services that are required following the closure of the railway line. Under Section 56 of the Transport Act the Minister is empowered to permit the Railways Board to close a line. As the noble Lord is aware, he has no power to rescind such an order.
VISCOUNT ADDISON: My Lords, has not the noble Lord given the view in this House that the railway line will not be closed until adequate and equal bus services have been provided?
LORD SHEPHERD: My Lords, that is quite correct, but my right honourable friend is certain that adequate services have been provided. For my noble friend's information, we are dealing with a small section of the line which has only some 20 to 30 passengers per day. These things were all taken into account. The T.U.C.C.s made recommendations and those recommendations have been complied with.
VISCOUNT ADDISON: My Lords, if the bus services are sufficient, why has the matter been referred to the Ombudsman?
LORD SHEPHERD: My Lords, I have no idea what was behind the mind of the honourable gentleman in the other place when he referred it to the Parliamentary Commissioner, but in regard to this one particular station involved only one complaint has been registered.
LORD KILMANY: My Lords, is it not the fact that what we are concerned with is the event that the Ombudsman finds that the bus services are totally inadequate? What is to happen then?
LORD SHEPHERD: My Lords, I am not sure whether the Parliamentary Commissioner would come to that judgment, but if the noble Lord would care to see the letter which the Minister of Transport sent to the Railways Board when he set out his conditions for closure—that is, provision of adequate bus services—he would see that it was made quite clear that if, particularly in the view of the traffic commissioners, further services should be provided, these would be provided. But certainly the whole matter would then be looked at.

B.O.A.C. PILOTS DISPUTE
2.35 p.m.
THE EARL or KINNOULL: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the first Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
[The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what further progress has now been made towards the settlement of the B.0.A.C. pilots dispute; and whether the Woods Report and recommendations arising out of the Prices and Incomes Board Report No. 88 have now been implemented.]
THE LORD PRIVY SEAL (LORD SHACKLETON): My Lords, negotiations on a new pay structure for pilots are continuing between B.O.A.C. and the British Airline Pilots' Association under the independent chairmanship of Professor Wood. These negotiations are the direct consequence of the agreement reached under Professor Wood's chairmanship in August last year. I understand that Professor Wood and the parties have the conclusions of Report No. 88 of the National Board for Prices and Incomes well in mind.
THE EARL OF KINNOULL: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for that reply. Bearing in mind the background of this unhappy dispute and both the findings of the Pearson Report and the Prices and Incomes Board Report, would not the noble Lord agree that it is now time for Her Majesty Government to advise both parties to refer the matter to the Prices and Income Board to settle the valuation of the pay structure? With B.O.A.C.'s own deadline of March 31 for a settlement in mind, are the Government aware of any sign that the four outstanding issues are likely to be settled by that date?
LORD SHACKLETON: My Lords, I always think it is very difficult to discuss on the Floor of the House industrial negotiations while they are going on. We have noted what the noble Earl has said. We certainly hope that there will be a satisfactory outcome. I would not minimise the fact that there are difficult areas to cover. But I think it would be quite wrong to suggest that the negotiations should be taken away from their present forum. I think we must hope for a satisfactory solution.

AUTOMATIC LANDING EQUIPMENT AT BRITISH AIRPORTS
2.37 p.m.
THE EARL OF KINNOULL: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the second Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
[The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what progress has been made with the installation of blind-landing equipment at British airports, and on the aircraft of the national airlines.]
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, Heathrow, Gatwick and Liverpool airports are expected to have facilities to support automatic landing operations in runway visibilities of 500 metres during 1969. The Air Corporations are providing an automatic landing capability for a substantial part of their fleets and it is expected that they will be cleared for operations in these visibilities on the same time scale. Clearance of aircraft and improvement of ground facilities for automatic landing in lower visibilities will follow. The ultimate ideal of a safe system of automatic landing in nil visibility must be approached by stages.
THE EARL OF KINNOULL: My Lords, while thanking the noble Lord for that reply, may I ask whether he could advise the House what types of aircraft and how many aircraft are in fact being fitted with this automatic landing equipment and when it is expected that category IIIB equipment will come into operation?
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, on the question of how many aircraft—of course I am referring this answer to the main Question of the noble Lord which deals with the Air Corporation's aircraft—I understand that their Trident aircraft will be cleared for category II operation this year and for category IIIA operations also this year. The BAC 1-11s are being cleared for category II at the moment. The VC 10s of B.O.A.C. are being cleared now for category II and also, it is expected, this year for category IIIA operation.
LORD GRANVILLE OF EYE: My Lords, may I ask my noble friend whether the blind-landing equipment to

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which he referred is capable of dealing with had fog conditions, and, if not, what progress is being made to deal with this serious hazard at the major airports of this country?
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, the term "blind landing" is rather misleading. I am really referring to automatic landing capabilities, both of the aircraft and at the airports, and it is expected gradually to bring down the criteria to the point at which planes can land safely in bad fog. The noble Earl, Lord Kinnoull, asked me when it is expected that it will be possible to come down in so-called category IIIB conditions—that is to say,
"operation to and along the surface of the runway and taxiways with visibility sufficient only for visual taxi-ing comparable to a runway range value of the order of 150 feet"—
which would be very considerable fog. That state of affairs, my Lords, it is expected will be reached by 1971 or 1972.
THE EARL OF KINNOULL: My Lords, in regard to the ground aid equipment at Heathrow, could the noble Lord say what the capital cost of installation will possibly amount to? And is it in the mind of the Government to offer assistance to other airports for the installation of this equipment?
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, the I.L.S. facility is a matter for the Board of Trade; the other ground equipment is a matter for the British Airports Authority, and I am afraid that I cannot give the noble Earl that information. It is expected that on the present programme category II operations will be available for London (Heathrow) on four runways, for London (Gatwick) on two runways, and for Manchester, Liverpool, Prestwick, Glasgow and Birmingham airports; and, later on, for the others.
THE EARL OF SELKIRK: My Lords, do I understand the noble Lord correctly?—that this is strictly an improved blind-approach system, not a blind-landing system?
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, I really thought I had explained that. I am talking about an automatic landing system which, if the pilot so desires, can be used in conditions of quite clear visibility but which will also be usable in conditions of poor visibility. Getting
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down to conditions of nil visibility is a programme which will be carried out in stages.
LORD ST. HELENS: My Lords, will the Minister be kind enough to tell me whether the passengers in the aircraft will be told whether the aircraft is to be landed by the pilot or by automatic machinery?
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, up to now, not only have they been told that but they have been given a free tie, which I thought was most generous on the part of the manufacturers concerned.
LORD BALERNO: My Lords, is the Minister aware that at Turnhouse, Edinburgh, there is probably a greater need for blind-landing facilities than at almost any other airport in the country, owing to the wrong siting of the runways and the costs which are incurred?
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, the first question I asked was about Turnhouse airport, knowing that I should get a supplementary question from the noble Lord, Lord Balerno. I am sorry that this is not one of the first airports to be fitted out in this way.

NIGERIA: ARMS BLACK MARKET
2.44 p.m.
LORD BROCKWAY: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
[The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they support the proposal that the Council of Europe shall investigate the black market in arms and take action to control and end it.]
LORD SHEPHERD: My Lords, I presume that my noble friend is referring to the Motion for a resolution tabled recently in the Consultative Assembly of the Council of Europe in the name of my honourable friend the Member for Kingston-upon-Hull (West Division), a draft of which I have only just received. I understand that this Motion has been referred to the Assembly's Political Committee who will consider it in due course, and we shall be better placed subsequently to take a view.
LORD BROCKWAY: My Lords, while thanking my noble friend for his Answer.

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may I ask whether he is aware that when recently I was in Biafra and Nigeria with the ex-Colonial Secretary, Mr. James Griffiths, we found evidence of a highly financed and organised black market from Europe which was supplying both sides? Is he further aware that we then took the initiative to raise this matter in the Council of Europe, and that a Motion has now been put forward from five delegations, I am glad to say on the initiative of the British delegation, that European Governments should prohibit the export from their territories of this black market supply? Will the Government give an assurance that they will support such a resolution?
LORD SHEPHERD: My Lords, as my noble friend is well aware, both sides in Nigeria have been purchasing arms from many countries in Europe, and also from China. We have made our position quite clear. We are prepared to co-operate in any agreement reached by the two sides as part of a cease-fire agreement not to receive arms. But while arms continue to be supplied from various sources to both sides it is important that the position of Her Majesty's Government as a traditional supplier of arms to Nigeria should be maintained.
BARONESS SUMMERSKILL: My Lords, can my noble friend tell me what is the moral difference between the "black market" and the "white market" supply of arms?
LORD SHEPHERD: My Lords, I have stated on many occasions the position of Her Majesty's Government to a Commonwealth country, and I do not believe that any further words of mine are either going to change my noble friend's attitude or give any added information to your Lordships' House. But there is a considerable difference between our position with the Federal Government and those other people who supply arms for financial advantage.
LORD GLADWYN: My Lords, would not the noble Lord think that there is perhaps a case for raising this matter in the Council of Ministers of the Western European Union, a more political body, rather than the Council of Europe? I do not say that it is a bad thing to raise it in the Council of Europe, but it might be preferable to raise it in the Western European Council of Ministers.
LORD SHEPHERD: My Lords. I say, and I have said this on a number of occasions to my noble friend Lord Brockway, that while it is a most tragic matter and one which raises strong feelings in this country and in Europe, this is an African problem; a problem of Nigeria. If we were to raise this matter in this type of forum, I fear that many people in Africa would regard this as a form of colonialism. I know that is hard to take, but it is a fact.
LORD BROCKWAY: My Lords, may I ask my noble friend whether he is aware that I saw arms supplied to the Federal side on the black market from eight different European countries? Is lie also aware that the Biafran Administration have said that 40 per cent. of their arms come from black market countries? This is a different question from Government supplies. Surely it should be possible for Governments to refuse the export from their territories to both sides of black market supplies which are made merely for profit and which are not meant for the support of the aims of one side or the other?
LORD SHEPHERD: My Lords, I sympathise with the approach of my noble friend, but this is a most difficult problem. Black market arms supply has been one of the most difficult problems to control. In the end, if there is to be a control it must be by the co-operation of both sides; and I think that my noble friend will appreciate that such an agreement can only arise when the two sides agree to a cease-fire.

BEDFORD CORPORATION BILL [H.L.]
Read 2ª, and committed to a Select Committee.
BLACKPOOL CORPORATION BILL [H.L.]
Read 2ª, and committed to a Select Committee.
CHELSEA COLLEGE, UNIVERSITY OF LONDON BILL [H.L.]
Read 2ª, and committed to the Committee on Unopposed Bills.
COVENTRY CORPORATION BILL [H.L.]
Read 2ª, and committed to the Committee on Unopposed Bills.

CUSTOMS DUTIES (DUMPING AND SUBSIDIES) BILL [H.L.]
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (LORD GARDINER): My Lords, I beg leave to introduce a Bill to consolidate the Customs Duties (Dumping and Subsidies) Acts, 1957 to 1968 and related enactments. I beg to move that this Bill be now read a first time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read l2ª.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Bill read 2ª, and to be printed.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE
LORD SHACKLETON: My Lords, I beg to move the Motion standing in my name on the Order Paper.
Moved, That Standing Order No. 41 (No two stages of a Bill to be taken on one day) be dispensed with for the purpose of taking the Consolidated Fund Bill through its remaining stages this day.—(Lord Shackleton.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

CONSOLIDATED FUND BILL
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2ª.—(Lord Beswick.)
On Question, Bill read 22ª: Committee negatived.
Then, Standing Order No. 41 having been dispensed with (pursuant to Resolution), Bill read 32ª, and passed.

AGRICULTURE (SPRING TRAPS) (SCOTLAND) BILL
2.51 p.m.
THE JOINT PARLIAMENTARY UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR SCOTLAND (LORD HUGHES): My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be
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now read a second time. This Bill deals with a matter which has given great concern to many people in Scotland; namely, that it is still legal there to use the gin trap for catching foxes and otters. My right honourable friend, the Secretary of State for Scotland, indicated in December, 1967, that he intended to introduce legislation to make its continued use illegal for any purpose and this is the proposal in the Bill.
I do not think that any reasonable person would deny that the trap known as the gin trap is a most cruel method of capturing any animal. In the Scott Henderson Report it was described as a
"diabolical instrument which causes an incalculable amount of suffering".
Because of this, it has been banned for more than ten years now in England and Wales; and in Scotland its use has been restricted to two animals—foxes and otters. This Government feel that it is not right to tolerate its continued use in Scotland for a further indefinite period, and that steps must be taken now to provide for its abolition as soon as is reasonably practicable.
The abolition of the gin trap was indeed strongly recommended 18 years ago by the Scott Henderson Committee on Cruelty to Wild Animals; but the Pests Act 1954, which gave effect to some of the recommendations of that Committee, provided for abolition in England and Wales only. For Scotland, it was decided at that time that retention of the gin trap was necessary and accordingly, although the Act in general prohibited the use of traps which had not been approved by the Secretary of State, he was given a specific power to authorise the use of unapproved spring traps which in effect means the gin trap. Using this power the Secretary of State made the Agriculture (Spring Traps) (Scotland) Order 1954, approving generally the use of unapproved traps against any wild animals in Scotland. This provision was later (in 1958) restricted to the use of unapproved traps against foxes and otters only, as during these four years satisfactory humane traps had been developed and approved for use against the other wild animals for which unapproved traps had hitherto been necessary.
When the 1954 Act was passed, it was clearly envisaged that a humane alternative would be found fairly soon, and the

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Act therefore provided that authorisations given for the use of unapproved traps could be withdrawn by the Secretary of State if a humane alternative became available. To encourage the development of such an alternative, the Humane Traps Panel, which was established in 1954 to advise the Agricultural Ministers on the approval of new traps, has, since 1958, devoted its attention to trying to find a humane alternative to the gin trap and so make it possible for the Secretary of State under the law as it stands to prohibit the use of the objectionable gin.
The Humane Traps Panel has applied itself very attentively to its task and the Government have made it possible for the Panel to offer sizeable rewards for any design of a suitable alternative. Nevertheless, so far, the Panel has not been able to recommend any design to the Secretary of State as being a satisfactory humane alternative to the gin. While my right honourable friend and I do not despair of some alternative trap being found, we feel that it is quite wrong to go on year in year out allowing the use of the gin and that it is necessary now to fix a firm date when we can say that the gin trap will be abolished. We propose that this date should be April, 1, 1973.
Your Lordships may ask why, if we are so sure that the gin trap should be done away with, we are not prepared to do this forthwith. We would, of course, like to do this very much; and I must say that personally it would give me the greatest possible pleasure if I could think it possible to do this immediately. But we must realise that there are a number of farmers, particularly in certain areas of Scotland, who have hitherto relied on the gin trap to enable them to control the predation of foxes on their stocks, and it is only reasonable that they should be given some time to consider what alternative methods may be most suitable for their particular circumstances. After consultation with the various organisations who are representative of the interests most affected, we concluded that four years was about the right time to enable those affected to look into their arrangements and explore the best methods of alternative control. I should say that we, in the Government, will do whatever we can during these four years to assist in this. I know that the
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Humane Traps Panel will continue with its search for alternative traps.
The Agricultural Departments will continue to foster research into maters relating to the fox population and its control, and will maintain contact with other agencies in this country and abroad undertaking work of this kind. We also propose to examine our present arrangements for encouraging farmers to undertake co-operative fox destruction activity. Moreover, the field staff of the Department of Agriculture and Fisheries are always ready to help the farming community by giving advice or demonstrations of control methods to individual farmers or groups of farmers.
It is up to all of us, therefore, to use the coming four years to best advantage to ensure that there will be the minimum difficulty in controlling foxes when it is no longer permitted to use the gin trap. I know that some of your Lordships may feel that there will be difficulties in some areas, and I would agree that particularly in the remoter places it may take rather greater effort to control the fox without recourse to the gin trap; but I would not agree that it would therefore be right to sit back and accept for all time reliance on this barbarous method of control.
I should say a word finally about the provision which appears in the proviso to Clause 2 of the Bill allowing the Secretary of State to bring the appointed day forward to a date earlier than April 1, 1973, but not earlier than two years after the passing of the Act. There is, as your Lordships will know, much public feeling against the gin trap and no doubt its immediate prohibition would be widely welcomed. For the reasons I have outlined we feel that immediate prohibition would be inadvisable and we have therefore specified April 1, 1973, as the appointed day. We have, however, inserted this proviso which would enable the Secretary of State, if he were really satisfied that circumstances justified it, to bring the effective date forward to a date not earlier than two years after the passing of the Act. In such circumstances, he would have, as provided for in Clause 2(2), to give one year's notice. I should say that the Government do not at present envisage there being any great possibility of the date being advanced in this way; but this provision

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does introduce a small measure of flexibility into the provision.
I should also perhaps remind your Lordships that under Section 50 of the Agriculture (Scotland) Act 1948, as it now appears in Section 10 of the Pests Act 1954, the Secretary of State has power to make an Order forthwith withdrawing his authorisation of the use of the gin trap if at any time he is satisfied that a humane alternative trap has been found and is available in the necessary quantities. This provision will remain until the appointed day, so that the Secretary of State could immediately withdraw authority for the use of the gin if the conditions relating to the availability of alternative traps were satisfied. I hope it will be agreed that we have taken reasonable decisions on this very difficult question. We feel that we cannot defend the continued use of the gin for very much longer, but in giving effect to our resolution to abolish it we are trying to give the notice which will enable the farmers to work out the best methods of dealing with the fox problem.
Moved, That the Bill be now read lª.—(Lord Hughes.)
3.0 p.m.
LORD MOWBRAY AND STOURTON: My Lords, it is always a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, who so lucidly puts everything into such a favourable light. I must apologise to him for not being in my place when he began his speech, but my friends have told me what he said. Obviously, we on this side support 100 per cent. the remarks that the gin is a diabolical instrument. About that none of us has any doubts at all. At the same time, we regard the fact that small lambs and poultry are attacked and eaten by foxes as a not very pleasant experience for those animals. As we depend on foodstock, and since the prosperity of many hillside farms depends upon their lambs, we need to worry a good deal about how they are going to be protected. I very much welcome, as I am sure do all Peers on this side of the House, the remarks by the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, about encouraging farmers to get together to work out something in the next four years. That is a wish which we shall foster and help in every way possible, but in the light of past
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experience I do not see much likelihood that anything definite will emerge.
I should like Her Majesty's Government to consider, even at this late time, the possibility of allowing in the crofting counties the form of gin trap known as the island set. This is used with water, the fox goes into it and is drowned within a very short space of time. That eliminates what we all object to, an animal lingering for a long time with the cruel claws of the trap on its face. In the case of the island set that does not happen. It is interesting to note that the Humane Trap Panel conducted an exercise in the year 1965–66 to find out how foxes were killed. They found that in the crofting counties nearly as many foxes were killed by the island set as by the open trap. The actual figures in the particular crofting counties were 677 for the open trap and 607 for the island trap. Therefore, in those crofting counties nearly 50 per cent. of the foxes accounted for by the gin trap were in fact taken by the island trap, which all open-minded people will agree is not to be regarded with the same degree of horror or to involve the same amount of pain as the ordinary gin trap. Therefore, could we not consider the possibility of allowing these crofting counties to continue using the island trap?
One must also bear in mind the fact that in the crofting counties, where distances are great and farms large, it is not possible to cover every trap every day, as one would expect a self-respecting man to do, but in the case of the island trap this need is not so evident. If one is certain that the animal, when caught, will be drowned, one does not have the same feeling of worry; and for people who live in the towns and people who love animals that feeling would be removed.
The Under-Secretary of State in the Commons, when this Bill first came up, expressed a personal opinion that it would be a good thing for a definite date to be appointed, but he several times said that he also thought it was advisable to provide for some flexibility. He wished to leave the Secretary of State a certain discretion. Those sentiments were expressed only two months ago, and it is a slight pity that he allowed himself to be overruled by the Grand Committee in another place into fixing a definite date,

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thus removing from the Secretary of State the power to defer. Supposing in the four years no viable solution is found, it would be very hard on the farmers to face more enormous losses. For example, in 1965–66 losses of 4,000 head of poultry and lambs were reported by the Humane Traps Panel. I think that the figure is very much larger, and we know that the number of foxes is increasing rather than decreasing.
I am talking particularly of the crofting counties, which are a well-understood geographical part of Scotland. There is no doubt or query about them; there is no difficulty in drawing up special circumstances for those areas, as has been done. Everyone recognises that they are part of a community which is not having things all its own way. They have to struggle, they have to be helped, and this particular measure, although humane to our hearts, is not going to help them to prosper. Therefore, I earnestly ask the House to consider whether we should not utter some slight protest that this power has been removed from the Secretary of State. I think it is a pity because we do not know what will happen.
In the other counties, such as Banff, Kilmarnock, Aberdeen and Ross and Cromarty, we have evidence that there has been an enormous increase in the numbers of foxes. It is one of those problems which one is never going to solve until some wonder trap comes along, and it is hard to see the way forward in this matter. This Bill is not going to help solve the problem, except that one knows there will be no ordinary gin traps. As I have said, we will help in every way we can. Having made these few remarks, I should like once more to thank the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, for the way in which he introduced the Bill.
3.8 p.m.
THE EARL OF MANSFIELD: My Lords, it is entirely justifiable that the use of the gin trap for catching otters should be prohibited—in fact, I should have liked to see that done eight years ago. But the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, has skated all too lightly over the effect which the prohibition of the use of the gin trap against foxes is going to have in many of the Highland areas. As the noble Lord, Lord Mowbray, has said, foxes are increasing almost everywhere;
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they are certainly increasing in my own area. In the Lowlands it is possible to use snares against foxes with very good effect, although even a snare on occasion can be a rather cruel method of destruction; but in the Highlands there are many areas composed largely of broken rocks where the snare is absolutely unusable.
The noble Lord, Lord Hughes, said that over the next four years farmers should consider what they are going to do. But there is nothing whatever they can do until a really efficient substitute for the gin trap for use against foxes is evolved. In fact, the noble Lord himself had to admit that there is no sign of any such trap coming on the market in the immediate future, or indeed within any reasonable period of time so far as one can see. In the broken rock country, which covers a great deal of the Highlands and a certain amount of other areas of Scotland as well, you cannot use snares. For technical reasons they are nearly always entirely inefficient. You cannot gas foxes in cairns, because the gas merely spreads in every direction. You very often cannot use terriers in driving foxes over large expanses of moor. Although you will reduce their numbers in a few cases, this method is by no means satisfactory in the majority of cases. You can usually get foxes in woods, but you cannot get them in the great expanses of moor, particularly where they border upon the deer country, where foxes find a great many refuges among rocks.
For that reason, until the really efficient substitute that we hope to see for the gin trap is produced—it may well be that it will not appear before 1973—this measure is going to impose a very definite hardship on the sheep farmer in a considerable number of the sheep-farming counties of Scotland. Such a trap must not merely be produced within a certain period of time but must also cover certain requirements. Obviously it must be merciful, it must be really efficient, it must be reasonably cheap and, most of all, it must be portable. The noble Lord, Lord Mowbray and Stourton, talked about the animal falling into a tank and being drowned. That is an efficient method in the low ground, but you cannot carry a great tank and get water to fill it right up in the hilly districts of

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Scotland. However well intentioned this little measure may be, it is going to be one more blow directed against the sheep industry of Scotland, which has already had a great many more blows than it can well tolerate.
3.12 p.m.
THE EARL OF HADDINGTON: My Lords, I have no objection to the noble Earl's jumping the queue, but I disagree with a great deal of what he said. The question of gin traps has been discussed in your Lordships' House and in another place throughout the past years. In 1951 we spent a whole afternoon—nearly four hours, I think—discussing a Bill introduced by the noble Lord, Lord Elton, who made a most masterly survey of the whole business. That Bill to abolish the gin trap was unfortunately defeated. But I think that the climate of opinion has changed very much since then, and it is a measure of the feeling that now exists against this hideously cruel instrument that this Bill has passed so smoothly through the other place and come into your Lordships' House. I am sure that we shall not hear all the arguments which we heard many years ago, going backwards and forwards for and against the gin trap, and I shall detain your Lordships for only a few moments.
Let us remember that the gin trap is not an instrument designed to kill. It is designed to catch an animal alive, and it was a godsend to the old professional trapper in the old trapping days. In the debate which took place fifteen years ago, there was talk about 3 million or 4 million rabbits being killed in a year in Britain by the gin trap, and I think of the abominable cruelty that must have been inflicted in all that time. But foxes seem to be what we are concerned with to-day. I do not know why the noble Earl cannot shoot foxes. We shoot them in East Lothian. It is only a question of taking a little more trouble, with people—whether Forestry Commission employees, keepers or whoever they are—lying out at night to wait for them, and shooting them. I admit that you cannot gas foxes, although you can, thank goodness! gas rabbits. We gas them now and it is a painless way of dealing with them. But you can shoot foxes—
THE EARL OF MANSFIELD: My Lords, I did not say that foxes should not or could not be shot. I pointed out that driving across very large expanses of ten or more square miles of the Highlands is impracticable if you want to have a considerable reduction in the number of foxes. You will get some, but a great many will get away.
THE EARL OF HADDINGTON: My Lords, I apologise to the noble Earl. I am getting rather deaf and I did not hear every word he said.
I want to tell your Lordships one story. I was out shooting many years ago and game was being driven up to me. I saw an animal coming towards me and I heard a clanging noise. It did not take a very good shot to dispatch that wretched animal because it hardly moved, and when it was dead we went to look at it and there was a gin trap. The teeth of the gin were firmly embedded in the animal's leg, with the skin and bone grown all around it. We reckoned that that animal must have been carrying that trap about, which it had pulled out of the ground, chain and all, for at least six months, if not a year.
Think, my Lords, of the abominable cruelty involved there. That is the sort of thing we want to avoid, and I earnestly support this Bill which the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, has introduced this afternoon. The only thing I could possibly say against it is that the appointed day is four years from now, and I hope he may be able to bring the day forward considerably. I hope that I have not bored your Lordships with this little story, but it is a true one and it created a profound impression both on me and on other people who saw that wretched, emaciated animal. I hope that your Lordships will give this Bill a Second Reading.
3.17 p.m.
LORD SORENSEN: My Lords, as I am sure many English people would do, I hesitate to intervene in this debate, because we do not know, nor do we appreciate, the different conditions prevailing in Scotland from those in our own country. Of course I know that there are very great distinctions—geographical, psychological, linguistic and

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otherwise; and another difference, apparently, is that in this country we are more quickly humane than Scotland has been. Therefore, I should like to put these questions to the noble Lord, Lord Hughes.
First of all, what has been happening since the abolition of the gin trap in this country? Has some other device been operated; and, if so, to what extent has it been successful compared with the barbarous gin trap? If it has been successful, why cannot that substitute device be employed in Scotland? For the life of me, I cannot see why it is apparently assumed that we can introduce more humane devices in this country but that we must wait a long time for the same more humane devices to be employed North of the Border. Secondly, why wait four years if the use of the gin trap is a barbarous practice? Surely a year would be quite sufficient, and in that time we could speed up the investigation into means by which these vermin could be destroyed much more humanely than now. These are two simple questions which puzzle me, and I am sure other noble Lords, and I should be very glad if the noble Lord could enlighten me in this respect.
LORD BOOTHBY: My Lords—
LORD HUGHES: My Lords, I hesitate to intervene, but we have a list of speakers which has not yet been exhausted.
LORD BOOTHBY: My Lords. I beg the noble Lord's pardon. I did not realise that.
3.19 p.m.
VISCOUNT MASSEREENE AND FERRARD: My Lords, I should like to thank the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, for suggesting that I speak, since I have put my name down. Also, I should like to give my wholehearted support to this Bill. As the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, has said, the Scott Henderson Committee of 1951 described the gin trap as a "diabolical instrument", which it certainly is. I have known of two cases where foxes have left a leg in a trap. They must have bitten it off, presumably. The gin trap is a fiendishly cruel method of destroying foxes.
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The trouble is that there are certain very wild areas of the Highlands, I agree, where it may perhaps inconvenience farmers not to have the gin trap because, whereas in the old days there were plenty of keepers to trap foxes, and to destroy them by other means, we do not now have them; and, owing to the shortage of labour, the gin trap is of course the easiest method of destroying a fox in these very wild areas. But in spite of that, I am all for having it abolished by 1973.
THE EARL OF HADDINGTON: My Lords, may I interrupt the noble Viscount? He said that this is a way of destroying a fox. The point of the people who support this Bill is that it does not destroy a fox. It catches a fox by its leg; it breaks the leg, and perhaps in this sort of winter weather, when the snow is lying three or four feet deep in the Highlands, it may keep that fox suffering in the trap, day after day, before a man can go and despatch it.
VISCOUNT MASSEREENE AND FERRARD: I am in complete agreement with the noble Earl. I am entirely for abolishing the traps by 1973. I was only saying that in the past there were plenty of gamekeepers who could control the foxes. But I do agree that, although there are certain areas of the Highlands where it may create difficulties if the gin trap is abolished, it must be abolished. It is an appallingly cruel instrument. The extraordinary thing is that, although it would of course be very difficult legislation to enforce, there is no legislation to ensure that a man visits his traps regularly. A fox might be in a trap for three days. It is an atrocious situation. The gin trap must be abolished; and I completely support the Government in this Bill.
My Lords, I am a big sheep farmer but I am rather fortunate because in the part of the Highlands where I farm sheep the foxes all disappeared a long time ago. They apparently got some form of mange. But I also farm sheep in the South-East of England, and we have a great number of foxes there. We have now had the gin trap abolished in England and Wales for ten years. Of course, this does not apply to the Highlands, but the point is that if you can bring your sheep into a park then all

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you have to do, as is done in the lowland areas—and this applies in the Lowland areas of Scotland as well—is to have the shepherd handle the lambs. Because if a lamb has been handled by a human, or if you just put a touch of tar on the lamb, a fox will never touch that lamb, since he cannot stand the scent of humans; with a touch of tar or creosote on the lamb, the fox will never go near it.
In the Highlands, the fox is, I think, maligned, because, although it is true enough that if you go near a fox earth you will find the remains of lambs in the lambing season, there is no evidence to show how many of those lambs were stillborn. In my opinion, the fox nearly always takes the stillborn lambs and the very weak lambs. I think my noble friend Lord Mowbray mentioned 4,000 hens or 4,000 lambs.
LORD MOWBRAY AND STOURTON: I said 4,000 head.
VISCOUNT MASSEREENE AND FERRARD: That might be hens or lambs. Of course, I have no sympathy at all with poultry keepers who have their poultry taken by foxes, because it is only necessary to build a proper fence and a proper house, and see that poultry are locked up at night, and they will be quite safe from foxes. Regarding lambs, we have no statistics, so far as I know (it would be impossible to compile them), as to how many lambs are killed by foxes. It is quite impossible to know. The number might be 2,000 or 10,000.
LORD MOWBRAY AND STOURTON: My Lords, with great respect to the noble Viscount, for the year July, 1965, to July, 1966, the Humane Traps Panel gave the exact figures county by county. The figures were: 2,187 lambs, 140 sheep and 1,979 poultry. They were proved.
VISCOUNT MASSEREENE AND FERRARD: My Lords, it would be very interesting to know how they were proved. What about golden eagles? I have a lot of eagles on my estate, and the golden eagles take a great many lambs. But eagles are protected, so they have to be allowed to go on taking them. A golden eagle will also take a fox sometimes; they will kill a fox. But I stick to my point that it is very difficult to prove how many live lambs the foxes take.
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My Lords, we have large areas in England—we have the Yorkshire Moors, we have Cumberland and we have Westmorland, and other hill areas—where they have not had the trap for ten years, but where they appear to be able to keep foxes under control. There are other methods of control, of course. We have heard about shooting and gassing; and you can dig a fox out. But you cannot do that in cairns, and it is not very effective to gas in cairns. Nor do I think that gassing is all that humane. Also, shooting is not a very good method, because a great number of foxes go away wounded if they are shot with shot-guns. The only really effective method, if you want to do it with the least suffering, is to get up early in the morning, be a good shot with a rifle, have a telescopic sight and go and wait opposite the fox's earth or den. He will come home in the morning after hunting, and you can shoot him then. But, of course, there are few people who will do that because it involves getting up very early in the morning, and, as I said before, there is a great shortage of manpower in wild hill areas. But if you want to be really humane, that is an effective method. Then, in hill counties like Cumberland, they use two or three couples of hounds to hunt the fox, which again is quite effective.
My Lords, I think one noble Lord said that it was rather bad luck on the lambs. That is a poor argument. I think somebody mentioned that we have to protect the lambs. Of course we do; but that is no argument for protecting them by a diabolically cruel instrument. The noble Lord, Lord Hughes, mentioned a reward being given to anyone who could invent a suitable trap. Perhaps I might ask the noble Lord to say, when he replies, how much this reward is, because it seems to me extraordinary that we can fly round the moon to-day but cannot invent a humane trap. I can personally think of two or three methods now. Surely it is not outside the bounds of human endeavour to invent a stupefying drug which could be put in a bait and which would make a fox unconscious for 24 hours, or whatever the time required. You can then come along and destroy the fox. After all, by means of trip wires we can take photographs of wild animals in the night. You have a camera, the animal touches the trip wire and so takes its own photograph. I should not have

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thought it beyond the bounds of possibility to have a pistol with a shot-gun cartridge in it connected to a trip, so that when the fox comes along, instead of having its photograph taken, it is shot in the head. It would appear to be a perfectly easy thing to do. It is quite feasible.
A NOBLE LORD: And what happens when I come along?
VISCOUNT MASSEREENE AND FERRARD: The noble Lord is too tall to be in danger.
My Lords, before ending I should like to support my noble friend Lord Mansfield when he says that the gin trap ought to be prohibited at once for otters. Surely there is no excuse for keeping it on for these animals. Otters do very little damage, and if they do take a salmon it is usually a diseased or weak one. I should like to make the point that I hope that when the gin trap is abolished in 1973 the manufacture of such traps will be prohibited. If not, then certain people will break the law. So when this does come into force in 1973 I hope that the manufacture of these traps will be prohibited.
My Lords, I am sorry that I cannot completely support the farming community in this matter. I am a farmer: but perhaps I may be biased because I do not have foxes on my land in the Highlands. But this trapping is so cruel that I think, even if it were perhaps to cause inconvenience to farmers in some of the Highlands counties, it ought in the interests of humane treatment to be abolished. I support the Bill.
3.32 p.m.
LORD BURTON: My Lords, the Bill before us is, unfortunately, very different from that which entered the other place originally. It is indeed a totally different Bill from that which was discussed with the Landowners' Federation and the N.F.U., the two bodies most concerned. I am sure that none of us has any liking for the gin trap, described as "a diabolical instrument" by the Scott Henderson Report. On the other hand, if this Bill goes through I am afraid that the position in parts of Scotland and particularly in the Highlands will be rather serious, unless we find an alternative. There was an Amendment tabled in another place—it was defeated by the
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casting vote of the Chairman—which would have made a considerable difference. I hope that when we come to the Committee stage we may be able to have some similar Amendment put down.
The Government have it within their power to abolish the gin trap just as soon as a suitable alternative is perfected. As my noble friend Lord Massereene and Ferrard has said, it is surely not beyond the wit of man to find some alternative. We all want to have the gin trap abolished, but I am sure that most noble Lords would not like to put the sheep industry into a much more difficult position than it is at the present moment. The question was asked: how much money is there available to find a humane alternative to the gin? I believe that the amount originally was £5,000, bat it is now down to £2,000, at which figure it has been for some time. Unfortunately, however, very few people know about this. Perhaps the Government will do something more to publicise the fact that this amount of money is available and how it can be claimed.
Only last week I was talking to a trapper who had devised a snare-type trap. With certain limiting restrictions, it was rather an effective trap. But he knew nothing about the possibility of getting an award for having found something like it. I feel that more should be done to publicise this matter. What worries me is that the Government are taking power to abolish the gin trap without finding a suitable alternative and apparently without fully considering the implications—or, if they have considered them, then their action is likely to be more reprehensible than if they had not.
I feel that first we should look at the overall problem of pest control. As this Bill presumably aims at alleviating cruelty, we should look at the whole problem and not at just a small section of it. Wild life is one of my interests and studies and it is becoming increasingly clear to me that the problem of pest control has never been grasped. Some of your Lordships may have heard of the song that includes the words,
"They all live in little boxes."
How true that is! I get a great deal of pleasure from going out at about 4 or 5 o'clock on a summer morning to see what is going on in the countryside. It is very pleasant at that time because practically

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everyone else is tucked in his "little box" sound asleep. At that hour one can see what is going on in Nature.
My Lords, we are becoming more and more urbanised and getting more and more remote from nature. One small example to illustrate this is that of the population of Inverness, which is about 50,000. I doubt whether anyone knows—or whether many care—that a vixen is planning to cub within half a mile of the borough. I may say that she is planning to cub on State-controlled ground, and I dare say they may catch her in due course; but she would not have been allowed to survive if she had been a mile to the other side. It seems to me, therefore, that no one has been able or bold enough to lay down a firm policy on what to do with pests. Such a policy would no doubt be controversial and contenious, but I feel that it is becoming more and more essential that we should have some firm decision.
I wonder whether the Minister can answer this question. Do we want to contain the foxes and rabbits, and so on, at approximately their existing level, or do we want to reduce them or even, in certain parts, to exterminate them? I hope that he will consider this question because I do not think it has been looked at. What do we want to do with pests? I can imagine the outcry if it were suggested that there should be a general extermination of foxes. A lot of people would be up in arms. On the other hand, there are areas where no one wants foxes and there are others where rabbits are a plague. The present procedure causes a great deal of cruelty and damage and is wasteful and expensive. We are doing no more than maintaining a healthy population of a great many of these pests by cutting off some of their number and keeping those healthy that are able to support themselves on the food supplies that are available.
It was only in the last ten or twelve years that any foxes were known to exist in the Black Isle, in Ross-shire. They have now become a menace. I do not think anyone wants foxes there; but no one has got down to eliminating them. Why not? I believe we should get a lead from the Department of Agriculture here. In Skye there are two fox clubs which are costing the farmers, owners and taxpayers
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a great deal of money each year to keep going. Why not remove the foxes entirely from Skye? I do not think there would be any objection. Some may feel that this is not possible; but I can assure the House that it is possible. Only two years ago we set up a fox club in the Glenelg district, a wild area in the West, partly in Ross-shire and partly in Inverness-shire, to cover 50,000 acres. We engaged a trapper and had excellent cooperation from the crofters and the land-owners, with one exception—luckily, he was on our flank—and now within two years there is hardly a fox left. I talked the other day to the trapper who had been round in the snow. He said that he was finding no marks of foxes. Last year he knew almost exactly the number of foxes that were left. He got eight of the 11 dens whose location he knew. One was got over the boundary and two escaped as they had gone to new places.
If we are going to deal effectively with pests like this—and I know it will not be popular—there must be a certain amount of compulsion. You cannot have someone breeding pests in the midst of an area while everyone else is trying to get rid of them. If a certain proportion of the people in an area wants something, there must be compulsion. I know that on this point I probably shall not find support from some of my fellow members on the Landowners' Federation, but I know that this is a fact. I am being "stymied" at the moment in this particular fox club area by members of a sheep stock club who will not join—crofters, who have some very "foxy" ground.
Another small point I should like to make, my Lords, is that there has been talk about having overall pest clubs. This is not "on". A fox has a completely different habitat from a rabbit and the type of man who traps or kills them is different. But that is by the way. I am quite certain that none of your Lordships likes this weapon of pest control. Furthermore, we would not use it if we did not feel that it was absolutely necessary. What are the alternatives? The country dweller will not stand by and watch his lambs and other stock being taken year after year by an increasing number of foxes. If he is not allowed to use a gin trap he will try to employ some other means to exterminate them. To me the

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first alternative appears to be poisoning. This is illegal and I am quite certain that your Lordships would much less rather have poisoning than the gin trap. I agree that strychnine is very difficult to obtain, but there are other poisons on the market and I am afraid that poison is being used fairly extensively. If you ban the gin trap, you will undoubtedly increase the amount of poison used, and I am quite sure that none of your Lordships would desire that.
There is shooting, but there are comparatively few marksmen capable of dispatching a fox humanely. A fox presents a very difficult target with a rifle, and if you use a gun, you have to use big shot. I have taken part in fox drives; they are of little effect, and consume an enormous amount of manpower. The number of foxes that get away wounded is fairly high in proportion to the number killed. A good many suffer gangrene and die a horrible death which might be even worse than being caught in a gin trap. Many foxes are killed in the Highlands by terriers which go into the earths, or "dens" as we call them in the Highlands. But it is only a percentage which is killed, because inevitably foxes have their dens in new places and one misses them, or badgers dig out new sets. If terriers get in with badgers they are soon in a mess. Furthermore, at the dens one is likely to get only a proportion of the vixens. A good man will get a high proportion of vixens but he will get only a small proportion of dog foxes.
There is also extermination by gas, and we have heard of its effect among rocks. You do not know whether you have killed any of the adult foxes because you do not know whether you have killed anything inside the den. Snares are effective only on enclosed ground. The wily fox will not go into a bit of wire sticking out on the open hillside. Where there are deer and sheep the snares will not be effective because deer or sheep may be caught in them and a great deal of cruelty may be caused. I have seen deer with snares in their legs which were every bit as painful as a gin trap. Snares are indiscriminate. They will take badgers. A Forestry Commission trapper to whom I was talking the other day said that unfortunately he had killed no fewer than six pine martens in the past year with
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snares. The Forestry Commission use only snares—they do not use gin traps—and it was something that the trapper could not help. In another place we had mention of the pill, which I think is still very much a pipe dream.
We were asked why there has been no outcry and demand for the reintroduction of the gin trap in England and Wales. My Lords, the answer is quite simple. Control by snaring is possible in practically all of England, and in most of the areas where it is not possible there is hunting which undoubtedly keeps the number of foxes at a level at which a proper balance is maintained. If the gin trap is banned in the Highlands, I wonder whether the Government would aid the John Peel type of hounds. I can well imagine that some of those who have been most vociferous in shouting for the banning of the gin trap would be pretty peeved if the Government were to aid foxhounds. But what is the alternative?
There has been a suggestion that there should be a bonus per brush or tail, or whatever you like, for foxes. This my Lords, has always been a mistake. We are spending a great deal of money every year on the bonus payment system, and all it means is that a nucleus of animals is left every year, because a trapper is not going to lose his bonus. He will leave some stock so as to get his bonus next year. If you are going to put a reward on foxes the only method would be to mark one or two animals and release them and put a premium on them. If you released a fox somewhere in the Highlands with a bonus of £500 on it, I am sure that a lot of people would start killing foxes.
How much damage do foxes do? Some of your Lordships may have seen Dr. Lockie's report on a study in Wester Ross. He said that during part of the year 15 per cent. of the foxes diet is lambs. We have heard different reports of how many lambs are killed, but no one really knows. No one can tell, but let us assume that over 2,000 lambs are killed, though I think that is probably a low figures. There are also chickens, ducks, grouse, pheasants and deer calves. I am quite sure that the damage done by foxes in Scotland each year must

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exceed £10,000. Probably the figure is £50,000. This must be looked at.
Where the area has been cleared in Glenelg I am told that there has been the best deer calving that anyone can remember. It has been extremely difficult to find any yeld hinds this year, although this sometimes happens when the weather is particularly open. But that does not apply this year, and I am quite certain that the reason is that the foxes have been brought down to a low number. In another area which I know well there were more dead deer calves found at dens than the number of adult deer which were shot. At least 5 percent. or 10 per cent. of the deer born in Scotland are destroyed by foxes. I attended an excellent conference at the Rowett Research Institute at the beginning of January, where it was agreed unanimously that we ought to maximise the amount that we can do as much as we can with deer. Reducing the fox population would be one way to maximise the amount of venison which would be available.
The Secretary of State stated only three years ago that the banning of the gin trap would cause serious losses on our hill and sheep land. What has happened to change his mind? I suspect that he has been submitted to very severe pressure from certain people. In another place the other day the Under-Secretary stated that there will be practical difficulties. I know there will, my Lords, and I am not sure that even the Under-Secretary appreciates how practical the difficulties will be. To take away the most efficient weapon of control in our armoury and to offer no replacement is, I think, a very dangerous thing to do.
My Lords, I suggest that the foxes will multiply until they come to a certain stage, when they will undoubtedly take mange. I do not know whether your Lordships have seen an animal suffering from mange. There was an outcry about myxomatosis, but I am quite sure that mange is worse. Rabbits suffering from myxomatosis die in a comparatively short time but mange can go on for many months. It does not usually kill an animal; the animal is killed from some other cause, but it gets thoroughly emaciated and mange is a horrible thing. If the fox population becomes too large, undoubtedly that is
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what will happen. When playing about with nature one has to be very careful to avoid being cruel over one thing while trying to be kind about another. If foxes are allowed to get too old, or if they are killed only in their dens, as was suggested, the foxes that get away will be the old dog foxes and they will lose their teeth. That is one of the first things that happen to these animals. When a dog fox loses his teeth he has difficulty in feeding. I know of one dog fox who was left with just his four tusk teeth and could not chew meat, so he killed a ewe nearly every night purely by catching her by the throat and sucking her blood. It was the only way he could survive. We have already heard about the difficulties of poisoning, snaring and shooting.
I should like now to give some constructive suggestions as to how this matter could be looked into. First of all, we want a proper pest control policy. This, I hope, would reduce the number of pests and the number which would have to be killed, and consequently, the overall amount of cruelty. Secondly, we should remove the otter from the list of animals to be caught. The population of otters throughout Great Britain as a whole is going down, and by encouraging the killing of others the Government could imperil the existence of this species. Thirdly, there are two different sorts of gin traps. There is one with horrible great spikes. I saw the other day some of them lying at the door of a shop in Inverness. It is quite unnecessary to have these big spikes, and I believe that this type should be banned straight away. I do not see any reason why trapping should not be restricted to pool trapping, or island trapping, as it is called.
I would ask the Government to press on with the designing of a humane trap. Unlike another noble Lord, with whom I disagree, I believe that there are good prospects of producing one. At the moment, there is one called the Phelps trap, but it is expensive. It has a metal bottom which is difficult to cast, but as this is not the part which holds the animal, there is no reason why the bottom should not be made of plastic and the moulds turned out cheaply. I do not know whether this has been considered, but it has been tried and I understand that it is effective. I believe that a seagull was caught in one of these traps and

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that it was released without any damage to its legs, and this trap should equally be able to catch foxes and other animals.
An Amendment was proposed in another place suggesting that the gin trap should be removed from certain areas. This, I can see, has practical difficulties, but I wonder whether it might not be possible, not to ban it altogether, but to give the Department powers to allow its use where they consider it is essential. This might be a reasonable compromise. It was mentioned that its use might still be permitted in the crofting counties, but of course this does not get over the difficulties of the high areas in Aberdeenshire and Banffshire. Finally, I apologise for being so long, and again press the Government to see that a humane alternative is expeditiously sought.
3.54 p.m.
LORD BOOTHBY: My Lords, I must apologise at the outset for attempting to jump a queue of which I was unaware and had not seen. I am sorry. It was the speech of the noble Earl, Lord Mansfield, that has driven me to my feet. I do not always, or indeed often, agree with the sentiments of the noble Earl, but I think that he made an extraordinarily good, and brief, speech this afternoon. I am delighted that he came to the rescue of the otter—something which ought to have been done long ago. He made his point most forcibly, and I beg the Government to give us an assurance that they will give this matter serious consideration, because killing otters by means of gin traps seems to me to be almost criminal.
Having represented a North of Scotland constituency in another place for 34 years, I entirely sympathise with the views of the noble Earl about the danger of foxes and the damage that they do, and about the difficulty of getting rid of them by any other method than this cruel gin trap. On that matter I am on his side. It is a tremendous problem in Scotland. We have to tackle it as best we can, but gin trapping remains a brutal way, a barbarous way, of tackling it. Here I come down on the side of the noble Earl, Lord Haddington, when he said that wherever it can possibly be used the gun is better than the gin trap. Shoot them. Foxes (and I say this with some
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temerity in the face of a largely English audience) were born to be shot. I think that some day the English may well follow our Scottish example. In some ways I hope that they do, for the fact remains that it is the most humane way known now of killing foxes and getting rid of them. Shoot—and shoot to kill—with the gun or rifle. That is the best thing to do.
Meanwhile—and these are my last words, my Lords—we live in the Space Age: every conceivable invention is being produced, not only from day to day but from hour to hour; and it seems to me almost inconceivable that we should not yet have devised a more humane method of killing animals than the gin trap, which we all know inflicts unfathomable suffering on animals who have done nothing to deserve it. I beg the Government to say that they will conduct some research into this problem of more humane killing than killing by this brutal gin trap.
LORD MOWBRAY AND STOURTON: My Lords, may I ask the noble Lord whether he realises (though I agree with much of what he said) that his point about shooting being the kindest way of getting rid of foxes is a doubtful proposition. It is a fact that in open country, using an ordinary shot-gun and ordinary cartridges, the kill is reckoned to be only about one in three, and, as my noble friend Lord Burton said, when a fox is wounded gangrene sets in, and this is just as bad, if not worse.
LORD BOOTHBY: My Lords, the only answer is that one must shoot when the fox is within range.
3.58 p.m.
LORD LEATHERLAND: My Lords, I am not a Scot. Probably that is my misfortune. I never thought that I would hear in your Lordships' House, as we have heard this afternoon, noble Lords advocating the shooting of foxes. This sounds to a countryman almost like sacrilege. Many pleas have been made to my noble friend to modify this Bill in one way or another, but I hope that he will reject them all. I hope that the Bill will be pressed forward and that it will ultimately reach the Statute Book in its undiluted form.
I should like to say something that nobody else has said this afternoon. The

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fox is really a beautiful animal. I do not know how many noble Lords have taken their grandsons out for a country walk and suddenly put up a fox and have been able to point to one of the few wild animals we have left in this country and about which their grandchildren have only read in their story books, and say, "Look, John, there is a fox".
LORD BOOTHBY: And met the Quorn hounds chasing him.
LORD LEATHERLAND: I will come to that in a moment. The fox is a beautiful animal, but it is also a menace, particularly in the Highlands of Scotland, as we have heard this afternoon. And if it is to be a choice between the fox and sheep and deer, then I come down on the side of the sheep and deer every time: and something must be done to keep the foxes under control. I have done my own little bit in the saddle to keep foxes under control during ten or eleven seasons, but I do not look on that as a particularly humanitarian exercise; nor would it be possible to keep the fox under control in the Highlands by this method, although they come fairly near to it in John Peel's mountainous country.
We have wandered a long way in this debate from the stark original proposal in the Bill. We have heard what is happening in Russia, about flights to the moon, about the eagles of the noble Viscount, Lord Massereene and Ferrard, about pine martens being trapped in State forests and about making foxes trip over a wire and take their own photographs. And we have heard of gamekeepers—although I presume that in these days gamekeepers are met more frequently in English literature than in the landed estates. I am against the shooting of foxes. I think it is cruel. A man has to be a real marksman, with a very heavy missile, to kill a fox. Moreover, foxes frequently maraud in the night, when a good aim is not possible. Even when you do hit a fox, it is ten to one that you do not kill it outright, and it wanders away to lie in some hedgerow, to die from bleeding after three or four days. I think that to set out to exterminate foxes by shooting is very cruel indeed, and almost parallel with the cruelty which is inflicted by the gin trap. We have heard of gas, which obviously is cruel;
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we have heard of poison, which is equally cruel.
As I have said, I am convinced that this Bill should not be diluted. I am convinced that if our inventive genius were brought to bear, and if the offer of this prize were sufficiently publicised, we should be able to find some adequate substitute for the gin trap within four years. We are not justified, despite all the pleas made by noble Lords, in keeping this gin trap for more than four years, and I sincerely hope that the Bill will go through without modification.
4.2 p.m.
LORD BALERNO: My Lords, I should like, with the indulgence of your Lordships, to intervene for a few moments. I speak as a farmer who has never used a gin trap, and I hope never will, but I have a certain sympathy with those who have to rear sheep in the Highlands of Scotland, where it is not easy to organise a pack of hounds as is done, as Lord Leatherland said, in the John Peel country. Nor am I an early riser (advancing years preclude that), like the noble Viscount, Lord Massereene and Ferrard, or the noble Lord, Lord Burton. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Leatherland, that the shooting of the fox is a chancy business and is no more likely than the gin trap to kill the fox outright.
I have one question that I should like to put to the noble Lord, Lord Hughes. I think we ought to be informed what the Government have done to enable a substitute for the gin trap to be discovered. We have a tendency towards making legislation which wills a very good object but we are unwilling to provide the means towards that object. I think it is incumbent on any Government which brings forth a Bill of this nature to accept the responsibility of prosecuting vigorously the means by which the object of the Bill can be fulfilled.
4.3 p.m.
LORD BELHAVEN AND STENTON: My Lords, I hope your Lordships will forgive me for intervening: I will do so quite briefly. As the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, no doubt knows, farmers talk a lot of hot air about foxes. I have no doubt that foxes do a great deal of damage, but I have no doubt also that

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they are credited with a great deal of damage which they do not do. I ran a remote hill farm in the South of Scotland, and I herded my own sheep for eight years. At no time did I see any necessity to use a gin trap, and I never used one. I think the only action which was taken against foxes was that I had a man working for me who dug up some young foxes. Apart from that, we did not take any action against them; and, so far as I know, apart from the disappearance of the odd twin lamb we never lost a lamb. I could hazard a guess that 60 or 70 per cent. of the lambs which foxes take are either lambs that are so weak that they would not live or lambs that were stillborn.
It seems to me, from the tone of the debate, that some of your Lordships have been listening to your gamekeepers. I have been a small landowner, without the benefit of one of these gentlemen, for a long time, and I have come to the conclusion that gamekeepers look on almost every wild animal, whatever it may be, as a pest. I hope that the Government will not fall into this trap. I should like to make one point about the speech of the noble Viscount, Lord Massereene and Ferrard, when he talked about putting tar on lambs. I have tried that. The fox would not take the lamb, it is true; but the mother would not take it back either.
VISCOUNT MASSEREENE AND FERRARD: I have not found that. Creosote, too, is all right. I have not found that the ewe would not take the lamb back. It depends how much you put on.
4.6 p.m.
LORD HUGHES: My Lords, this has been a most interesting debate, and although I am not at all certain that my colleagues South of the Border waiting for the other business will agree with me, I have found it most enjoyable. There has been so much to-ing and fro-ing on the Benches opposite that I almost feel like an interloper coming back again. I must say right away how pleasantly surprised I am at the strong support which has been given by noble Lords opposite to this Bill. Those who have defended the retention of the gin trap have done so with considerable apology. What I did not expect was to find so much outright support for its abolition.
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Although I have enjoyed the debate, I must say, quite frankly, that nothing which has been suggested as an alternative to the Bill is new to me. For two years my responsibilities in the Scottish Office were in the Department of Agriculture and Fisheries and almost immediately on coming into office I started to be subjected to pressure. I think it was the noble Lord, Lord Burton, who talked about pressure having been put on the Secretary of State for Scotland. On coming in as a new Government we were almost immediately subjected to pressure from the lobby against the use of the gin trap. As a townsman, with little knowledge at that time—and perhaps I must confess little knowledge still—of some of the problems that beset the farmer, I was much impressed by the evidence that was put to me. I rave in my room some of the photographs of animals and birds caught in these gin traps, and was tempted to bring them to the House so that some of your Lordships could see them. But it seemed to me that, if I had done so, the only purpose it would have served would have been to intensify the pressure on me—which I should have reluctantly had to resist—not to wait for four years. Anyone looking at these photographs must, I think, say that to wait for hours is perhaps indefensible, let alone to wait for four years. But we have to try to balance the interests of the humanitarian with the interests of the farmer. It is that, and that alone, which has persuaded us to allow so long a period as four years to elapse before the complete abolition comes into effect.
The noble Lord, Lord Mowbray and Stourton, referred to the use of the island or drowning set. I would agree right away that compared with the other use of the gin trap this is relatively humane: but only if it works properly. There are so many cases, in fact, where it dogs not work properly; and if it does not., it is just as cruel as the other set. Furthermore, the difficulty is that as soon as one allows a gin trap to be used legally in certain circumstances, one opens the door to its illegal use. I must say that was impressed by the point that we shall not have complete success in this matter until we make it illegal to manufacture the trap. That, of course, is a different proposition which we may yet have to come to consider.

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The noble Lord, Lord Mowbray and Stourton, also asked why we had abandoned the provision for postponing the appointed day which was in the Bill originally. We have, in fact, been living since 1954 under legislation which effectively permits the postponing of action until some other satisfactory device has been found; and we came to the conclusion that if we were to continue the provision that was in the Bill originally, either to bring forward or to put back the date, we should not in fact be changing the law at all and should be just as likely to find the same situation a dozen years from now. We therefore felt that we had to put a definite period on it. Lord Mowbray also raised a question about the possible rise in the fox population. This is a matter of speculation. All I can say is that it has not happened in England and Wales during the ten years that the gin trap has been abolished there.
That brings me to the point raised by my noble friend Lord Sorensen. He asked why were we so prepared to tolerate for another four years something which the English had recognised as barbaric ten years ago. I do not suppose he was joining the noble and gallant Viscount, Lord Montgomery of Alamein, who some time ago talked about the "tribal areas", the inference being that when one got a little too far North one ventured beyond the fields of civilisation. It is not that we are less humane; it is simply that the then Government, and this Goverment, have perhaps leant over backwards too long in the interests of farming, and perhaps we have closed our eyes, as they closed their eyes, to the dreadful cruelty which this trap inflicts on animals. After all, it has been ten years under the previous Government and will be four years under this Government before this action is taken. We say, "Enough is enough", and we are now prepared to ban this trap, as it was banned in England.
The noble Lord said: Why wait for four years? Well, for the reasons which I stated. We cannot expect farmers who have been given this right for so long—and if people say, "for too long" I shall not disagree with them—to be able to change over to satisfactory alternative methods of control overnight. There must be a period of adjustment. I must
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admit that during that time a number of animals are going to die a very cruel and lingering death. If I could see my way in fairness to cut that period down, then I should be delighted to do so. What I hope is that during this period something will happen which will enable us under the existing law to bring it to an end immediately. I have already pointed out that the law at present allows the Secretary of State to ban the gin trap if there is a satisfactory alternative trap.
LORD SORENSEN: My Lords, may I ask the noble Lord whether a similar period of four years operated in this country before the gin traps were entirely abolished; and if not, why not?
LORD HUGHES: My Lords, I was coming to the main reason why we did not ban the trap at the same time. The fact is that they are different countries. The terrain is different. Methods which are successful over the greater part of England and Wales are difficult to apply. We are not now accepting that they are impossible to apply. We have in the past been perhaps over-persuaded about the impossibility of using these methods, and we have had conflicting statements from noble Lords opposite on the merits and effectiveness of shooting foxes. But because of the type of terrain there are large areas of Scotland where, for instance, gassing is ineffective. If one uses gas in the case of an ordinary earth it works, but if a fox has its den in an area of rocks, all you are doing is pumping the gas in at one hole and it is coming out somewhere else, with the fox perhaps just sitting and laughing at you.
THE EARL OF HADDINGTON: My Lords, may I raise just one point? The noble Lord realises, I take it, that there will be very little incentive for people, even the best brains in the country, to invent a substitute to the gin so long as the gin is allowed to be operated. That is why we hope the period may be shortened from four years to perhaps two years.
LORD HUGHES: My Lords, noble Lords South of the Border will be quite willing to believe that the best incentive that can be offered to any Scot is a monetary reward. Yet the fact that a substantial sum has been available has not yet, in 14 years, produced a satisfactory alternative.
THE EARL OF MANSFIELD: My Lords—
LORD HUGHES: Will the noble Earl allow me to finish this point? A question was asked about the amount and the noble Lord, Lord Burton, correctly gave the information, with perhaps the wrong emphasis. He said it had originally been £5,000 and it had now been reduced to £2,000. Your Lordships might assume from that that in the interval the Government had become parsimonious. The figure has come down from £5,000 to £2,000 because £3,000 has been paid out for the traps which were successful against anything other than foxes and otters. That was why a number of years ago the trap was made illegal for use against any other wild animals; the awards made it possible for other traps to be approved.
THE EARL OF MANSFIELD: My Lords, I was going to ask the noble Lord whether much greater publicity could be given to the fact that there was still £2,000 for award? And would it not be as well to raise that figure to £5,000 for a really satisfactory trap? Then we should be able to get rid of the gin trap at a very much earlier date, which we all want to do.
LORD HUGHES: My Lords, considerable publicity has been given. The matter has been publicised on television; it has been publicised in the Press; it has been publicised on the radio. The most effective publicity was perhaps in the Press, with the photographs, the revolting photographs, of animals caught in traps. I am afraid that what has happened is that nowadays we have become accustomed on television, in the newspapers and on the radio, consciously or subconsciously, to pass over the items in which we are not especially interested. I do not know how we can increase the publicity, but we certainly will do what we can to bring the matter to people's notice. Unfortunately, we do not have any lists of potential inventors to whom we could send a circular. That would provide a nice, easy way to do it.
I should like to close my reply to my noble friend Lord Sorensen by saying that there is no method, including hunting, which is used in England which is not used in Scotland. The fact, of
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course, is that so long as the gin trap is there there will be less encouragement to use these more difficult and perhaps less satisfactory methods in other parts of the country. And we are now prepared to take the risks—because risks are involved in doing away with this barbarous method.
I thought that the noble Earl, Lord Mansfield, was a little unfair to me—but that would not be the first time that that had happened—when he said that I had skated lightly over the effects of abolition and that I had had to admit the difficulties. My Lords, I do not admit that I did either of these things. It is because we fully recognise the facts of abolition, because we fully realise the difficulties, that we are waiting for this period of four years. The only possible justification for accepting the continuation of this abominable cruelty for another four years is the fact that we are accepting the difficulties. As I say, I hope that something will come along which will enable us to shorten this period, because it is only the economic necessity of looking after the interests of sheep farmers which provides the slightest justification for accepting so long a period as four years.
I am most grateful to the noble Earl, Lord Haddington, for his speech. I disagree with only one remark that he made, when he went into past history and said that the gin trap was a Godsend to the trappers. I do not think the Almighty had anything to do with the gin trap; if it had any origin outside this world it was from another direction altogether!
LORD BOOTHBY: Hear, hear!
LORD HUGHES: My Lords, reference was made to the killing of lambs. The noble Lord, Lord Mowbray and Stourton, gave statistics and it is true hat a certain number of lambs are killed by foxes, but at least we have the knowledge that although the lamb's end is no doubt violent and painful, it is relatively swift. The fox's end in the gin trap is neither; it may be hours, it may be days, because the trap is not designed to kill, it is designed to trap, and the animal can suffer the most appalling cruelty for a very long time indeed.
The noble Lord, Lord Burton, with the noble Earl, Lord Mansfield, was alone

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among your Lordships in seeking to wish to continue for a more indefinite period—because I do not think either of them wish to continue it in perpetuity—the use of the gin trap against foxes. The noble Lord, Lord Burton, referred to what my right honourable friend the Secretary of State said three years ago and he asked what had happened in the interval. He asked: "Has he been subject to pressure?" Of course he has. We have all been subject to pressure on this matter, but it was not pressure that determined that the Bill should be brought in at this time; it was the realisation that, unless we took a step of this kind sooner or later, we were just as likely to find ourselves in exactly the same position ten, or even twenty years from now. The passage of time without any satisfactory result is the justification for this Bill.
The noble Lord went on to suggest six proposals, the first of which was proper pest control. He spoke of his experience with fox clubs and he gave rather interesting evidence of the value which can be attached to alternative methods of getting rid of foxes.
LORD BURTON: My Lords, I must say that the fox trapper to whom I referred killed nearly all his foxes with gin traps.
LORD HUGHES: My Lords, I rather think the noble Lord must carefully have concealed that, because I certainly did not get that impression. I was going to say that the Government would look with interest at proposals to help fox clubs, but not in that direction. I would not give a single penny of public funds to a fox club using that trap, but for other things I am certainly most interested in the possibility of giving assistance. Indeed we do this at the present time. It depends on the area in which the club operates and the resources available to it. There are places where the club cannot possibly carry on with just its own resources, and in those circumstances the Government have given a grant of up to 50 per cent. It is supposed to be on a diminishing basis, but that is difficult in some cases because the other resources are not there. Therefore I agree with the noble Lord on proper pest control, subject to not going all the way with him in regard to his methods. He then
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said that we should remove otters from the list, and there he was in agreement with the noble Earl, Lord Mansfield, and the noble Lord, Lord Boothby. I should like to look at that suggestion and if an Amendment along those lines were put down I would undertake to give it the most careful consideration.
The other suggestions, some of which I have referred to, really all boil down to permitting the use of the gin trap in a limited form or in limited areas for an indefinite period. We considered this; we considered the possibility of specifying areas in which it might be permitted, but we came to the conclusion that at the end of any given period of time we were unlikely to be any nearer a solution and that it was better to do it in the way suggested by the Bill.
I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Leatherland for his support, although I was somewhat confused by the time he had finished because although he was completely in support of the Bill, he did not favour gassing or shooting or the use of gin traps. He thought the animal was beautiful—
LORD BOOTHBY: But he hunts it!
LORD HUGHES: —looking at it from the back of a horse. Eventually I thought he was saying that what the Bill was doing was the best of a bad job. For that I am grateful. The noble Lord, Lord Balerno, asked what the Government were doing in regard to finding a substitute. We cannot do anything in this case other than what was done by our predecessors and what we ourselves have done, that is, to give every encouragement to the invention and the production of a suitable alternative. The noble Lord, Lord Burton, referred to the fact that there was a Phelps trap. This is one of two that is being investigated at the present time, but the present opinion is that neither of the two is likely to be a satisfactory substitute which would enable the Secretary of State to alter our existing legislation.
I would remind your Lordships that if the Secretary of State is satisfied that there is a humane alternative he can ban the gin trap right away. If we were unscrupulous and just took something that came from the panel and said, "Let

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us say that this is a satisfactory alternative and get rid of this abominable thing right away", we could do it, but that would not be honest. The law says that it must be a satisfactory alternative. A panel has been set up and so far they tell us they have not got a satisfactory alternative.
LORD FERRIER: My Lords, the noble Lord speaks of encouragement to the inventor. May I ask him whether the reward given to the inventor is taxable, even though he may classify himself as an inventor by profession?
LORD HUGHES: My Lords, I have the most excellent brief; I think I was briefed on everything under the sun, but the noble Lord, Lord Ferrier, has chosen the one item that is not there. I do not know the answer. Of course, the real incentive to the inventor is what he is going to get out of it after it is made, and I should think at the end of the day that would amount to a great deal more. I have never invented anything, so I cannot say from the receiving end whether the sums payable to inventors are tax free. It would be surprising if they were, because very little escapes the eye of the Chancellor in this 20th century.
LORD FERRIER: My Lords, I have invented something and certainly the reward I sought was not in terms of a reward by the Government. My question is really whether the reward offered by the Government is to be tax free in the hands of the successful inventor.
LORD HUGHES: My Lords, the noble Lord already has my answer, that I do not know.
LORD BALERNO: My Lords, carrying on the point on which the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, was speaking, the development of a suitable trap is surely a technological problem. Merely offering a prize to people who are not technologists is not necessarily likely to produce the answer. It might. But have the Government considered the possibility of approaching the technological universities in Scotland and offering them, say, £10,000 in order to conduct research into this acute problem? I think there would be a good chance of getting a solution if the Government did that.
LORD HUGHES: My Lords, I hope that what the noble Lord, Lord Balerno, is saying is not to be regarded as a typical approach, that as soon as you propose to give money to universities it has to be five times as much as to anybody else and with the certainty that it is tax free. I will consider the noble Lord's suggestion, but not necessarily am I committed to the amount.
The debate, I think, has shown that the Government have correctly gauged the state of public opinion on this matter. Ten years ago such a Bill could not have received the reception it has received from your Lordships to-day. We were reminded that a Bill of this kind—not in identical terms, but a Bill to abolish the gin trap—was rejected, and if this Bill had come ten years ago I am certain that it would not have got a Second Reading. I am quite happy in its reception. I am reasonably satisfied that it is likely to go on the Statute Book in the form in which it is, or even in an improved form if we can do something about the otters, as has been suggested.
On Question, Bill read 2ª, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

REPRESENTATION OF THE PEOPLE BILL
4.32 p.m.
THE MINISTER OF STATE, HOME OFFICE (LORD STONHAM): My Lords, I beg to move that the House do again resolve itself into Committee on this Bill.
Moved, That the House do again resolve itself into Committee.—(Lord Stonham.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House in Committee accordingly.
[The Lord Jessel in the Chair.]
Schedule 1 [Miscellaneous amendments of parliamentary and local elections rules]:
LORD BROOKE OF CUMNOR LORD BROOKE OF CUMNOR moved Amendment No. 25:
Page 22, line 5, leave out paragraph 2.
The noble Lord said: I beg to move Amendment No. 25. Before I expound

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this Amendment perhaps I may be permitted to say to the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, that there was no need for him to apologise to the non-Scottish members who listened to the preceding debate. I, for one, regard it as one of the fascinating privileges of membership of your Lordships' House that one has the opportunity of studying further the Scottish way of life.
LORD HUGHES: If the noble Lord would forgive me, I would say that I am most grateful to him for his having said that, because I am aware of the fact that we are not continuing with Scottish business at this point because on Thursday he referred to the fact that there is a good deal of miscellaneous business of less importance than this Bill. I was grateful to my noble friend Lord Beswick when he said he would have hesitated to describe Scottish business as "miscellaneous". I am glad the noble Lord has found it worth listening to.
LORD BROOKE OF CUMNOR: I trust that the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, will continue to listen to the business on which we are now embarking, for he should be aware, as a member of the Government, that the Representation of the People Bill applies to Scotland as well as to England and Wales.
After that prelude, I am moving here to delete from the Bill the provision that would alter the closing hour of the poll at Parliamentary elections throughout Britain from 9 p.m. to 10 p.m. Let me say straight away that this is clearly a matter on which those in another place should have the final word; it is for them, I am sure, ultimately to decide how they should proceed to Parliamentary elections. For that reason if my Amendment to-day is carried and if in another place it is not accepted I would not dream of advising your Lordships to stand firm on it. But in view of the almost complete lack of support for this proposal among the electors, and the total lack of enthusiasm for it anywhere, it seems to me an outstandingly clear case for the Second Chamber to act in such a way as to afford time and opportunity for further consideration of the matter. That is my sole purpose in moving this Amendment to-day.
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Let me first of all state the case against myself, because I have read the Home Secretary's words on this in another place carefully. We should all, I think, agree that the election arrangements should be such as to give, in his words, "the longest possible reasonable time" for the electors to cast their votes. He was repeatedly asked for the reasons why the Government had proposed this change in the voting hours, when there seemed to be no evidence of any representations to this effect or pressure in this direction from any quarter. What the Home Secretary said, when a similar Amendment was being discussed in Committee in another place was this:
"It was the Government's collective view, having discussed and considered the evidence, that there was a case for extending the time to 10 o'clock."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Commons. 11/12/68, col. 524.]
Well, my Lords, it is not surprising, after that statement by the Home Secretary, that he was then pressed vigorously to state what the evidence was, as this evidence had not come to light, either in the preliminary debate on the White Paper which was held in another place in October, or in the Second Reading debate on the Bill. Finally, being challenged, the Home Secretary intervened thus:
"When a challenge such as this is issued it is easy for an hon. Gentleman to go on and say,'As the Minister did not rise, clearly he had no evidence'. So I intervene. The evidence is that people have been shut out of the poll at 9 p.m."—[Col. 529.]
That is the principal evidence on which in another place the Home Secretary and the Government relied for this change. He did, in the course of his remarks, add one other argument. He said:
"Working hours may be shorter than they used to be … but there is much more travelling than there used to be. Although no one can prove that any particular hours are right, there is a case for extending the time to 10 o'clock."—[Col. 525.]
Those were the arguments on which the Government relied in another place.
None of us, I think, would challenge the statement that there is a case for extending voting hours; but there is also, as I shall show, a case against it, and ultimately we all have to use our own judgment as to where the balance of rightness lies. In reaching such a judgment, clearly one of the factors one has to consider is how many additional

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electors would in fact cast their votes. Nobody is going to dispute that if voting hours are extended by 60 minutes some electors will during this extra 60 minutes cast their votes. The first question at issue is whether these will be people who could not have cast their votes within the original hours, which now, as your Lordships will recollect, are 14.
The poll at Parliamentary elections is open from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. But I submit that, whatever addition one made to polling hours, there would always be some people who would come along in the extra time. The argument on which the Government have relied could equally well be used to justify a closing hour of 11 p.m., or midnight; or even for keeping the poll open for the full 24 hours, so as to give everybody the finest possible chance. But I think all of us realise that extreme solutions like that would not be sensible, and therefore what we have to judge is whether an extension such as this one hour proposed by the Government is so sensible that it overcomes the disadvantages entailed.
Having repeated the case for this change as stated by the Home Secretary in another place, I come to the case against it. First and foremost, there is not the slightest sign that it is wanted by anybody outside Parliament. There have been no representations on the matter; no evidence has been put in to any quarter or any body that this change would be desirable. In a democracy I should have thought that that was quite a considerable argument.
Secondly, there is no disputing the fact that it would cast extra strain on staff during what is already a day of considerable strain. As I have explained, polling time now occupies 14 hours. The staff have to be at the polling station before 7 a.m. to get everything ready, and in general it is not possible for returning officers to arrange relays: the same staff have to be on duty throughout the whole of those 14 hours. What Parliament is now proposing is that they should be on duty not for 14-plus hours, but for 15-plus hours. It is going to be more remunerative for them, but it will impose upon them an exceptionally long day. In many cases, though not all, these are the same people who go on to the town hall or the council offices to
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take part in the count, so that their day under the present system is already much more than 14 hours; and unquestionably, we should by this proposal be adding another hour to that day.
What I am now going to say I do not stress particularly, but it is a consideration. Polling day is a day when it is extremely important that no mistakes should be made. Everybody becomes more tired as the hours of duty get longer, and I cannot help thinking that to impose this long day on the key staff throughout the country will increase the number of mistakes.
Of course, it is not only the staff who are affected; the political workers, too, are concerned. A good many of us have at one time or other taken part in Parliamentary elections, not only as voters. I myself fought eight Parliamentary elections, and I am sure that some of your Lordships have longer and better records than that. But even if we have not been in the thick of it ourselves, we know well the splendid people supporting the different Parties who carry the weight of the day. The weight of that day does not fall on the candidates. The nervous strain may be grave for them, but the task of getting people to the poll, and of ensuring that everything that needs to be done on polling day is done, falls on the devoted Party workers.
I do not know what my political opponents would say, but my experience was that those who were working for me were dead tired at the end of the day. Under the Bill's proposal we are going to make that worse; we are going to give them an extra hour. I accept at once that if, in the name of democracy, this extension will secure a substantial additional poll, then the extra tiredness and the extra strain must be borne. But if in fact the additional votes are going to be only a trickle, if the increase in the percentage voting is going to be only marginal, then I am bound to ask whether it is right to impose that serious extra burden both on the official staffs and on the political workers.
I have never rested my argument in this matter on the cost, but it is, I think, relevant to consider what the extra cost would be. I asked the noble Lord, Lord Stonham, whether he could help us on this point. He gave us as detailed a

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reply as he was able to without notice. It may be to-day that he can give us further information, but on the Second Reading of the Bill he explained that the cost of the 1966 General Election was £630,000. And if payments to presiding officers and polling clerks at polling stations had to be made for 15 hours instead of 14 hours, on the simplest mathematical calculation that would be an increase of one-fourteenth, and one-fourteenth of the sum that I have mentioned is £45,000. But he frankly added these words:
"The returning officers have, however, expressed doubt whether such an increase would be sufficient, but it is something of that order."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 23/1/69, col. 1089.]
I would certainly judge that more than a mere mathematical increase would be required to secure the staffs to carry on this additional work. That is not the only additional cost. Later in his speech the noble Lord said (col. 1089):
"… it will be necessary to alter 9 p.m. to 10 p.m. on about 100 million poll cards for Parliamentary elections, and it will be necessary to pay for a considerable amount of extra clerical time, but we cannot at the moment estimate what it will be."
Well, there is something extra. To my simple mind, the thought of altering 100 million cards for any purpose is somewhat frightening, but I know that it can be done, provided, on the facts, that it is really worth while spending the manpower and the mechanical power required to do it. All I am concerned to show here is that there is an element of extra cost involved.
May I say, in passing, that if one really wants to improve the percentage voting at Parliamentary elections I am convinced that what requires highest priority is further attention to the accuracy of the register. I made that point on Second Reading. Best of all, of course, would be to have two registers a year, as I believe all the Parliamentary Parties would like. That, of course, involves considerable additional cost. But, again, what I want to show is that if it is desired to secure a perceptible increase in the percentage voting at Parliamentary elections, this proposal here is not the only way to do it.
At this point in my speech I feel sure that your Lordships will also have perceived that the count, which to many people is the most exciting part of polling
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day, will throughout the country be delayed by one hour. That does not matter at all to the result of the election and it is important that one should get the right people and the right Government elected. But I think all of us would be rather naïve if we imagined that the British public, as a whole, would welcome a delay of an hour in the count and a delay of an hour in the declaration. Following results on radio and television has become quite a feature of British life: staying up late on polling day to hear the results. Well, one will have to stay up an hour later. I suspect, too, that one will not hear so many results, because I should imagine that a number of constituencies which are now just managing to count on the same night would decide, if they cannot get started until an hour later, that they will put off counting the votes until the next day.
I have no doubt that it is on considerations like these that the all-Party Speaker's Conference, which considered this, among other matters of election law, before the present Bill was introduced, unanimously declared against any change in polling hours. The evidence submitted to a Speaker's Conference and the reasons for their conclusions are not published and we have no means of probing them, but one cannot help supposing that the considerations which secured a unanimous decision by the Speaker's Conference were broadly the considerations and the arguments that I have mentioned to your Lordships this afternoon.
Quite distinct from the Speaker's Conference I understand that the Home Secretary arranged for the local authority associations to be consulted on a more limited proposal; that is, a proposal to extend polling hours not by 60 minutes but by 30 minutes, from 9 to 9.30 p.m.—not so far-reaching a proposal, and with the arguments against it proportionately less strong than those I have set out this afternoon. The local authority associations, I understand, unanimously advised the Home Secretary not to go forward with the proposal to extend the poll from 9 to 9.30 p.m.
LORD STONHAM: May I interrupt the noble Lord? The Home Secretary did not consult the local authority associations; indeed, the noble Lord must be aware that the local authority associations have no direct interest in the matter.

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My right honourable friend did, however, consult returning officers on the Home Secretary's Electoral Advisory Conference.
LORD BROOKE OF CUMNOR: I am grateful to the noble Lord for having corrected me, and having stated exactly what happened. I think I have to-day repeated in Committee just what I said on the Second Reading debate; and as the noble Lord did not correct me then I supposed that what I was saying was correct. What the Home Secretary did, I quite appreciate now, was to consult returning officers, whose views are likely to be typical of the views of local government officials, and as being typical they are the people who are consulted on that electoral conference. I do not think that the noble Lord will correct me when I say that they advised the Home Secretary against adopting the suggestion on which they had been consulted.
I am not surprised about that from any point of view, because I have no doubt that those returning officers also perceived another point which I have not yet mentioned; that is, that it is going to cause great inconvenience to electors, and annoyance to the general public, if we have a different closing hour for Parliamentary elections from the hour we have for local government elections. Suppose that a General Election takes place in March or April one year and the Bill goes through unamended, anybody can vote at the Parliamentary election up until 10 p.m. In the second week of May numbers of the same people come along to cast their votes at the municipal elections; they find that if they are after 9 o'clock they cannot get in. They say, "Why didn't anybody tell us?", and the only answer is because Parliament in its wisdom, or unwisdom, has decided that the rules should be different and more restricted for local government elections than for Parliamentary elections. I believe that, in practice, this is going to prove one of the strongest arguments against this change. I think there will be a very powerful revulsion of feeling against the idea of having different closing hours for the two sets of elections.
The noble Lord, Lord Stonham, said—and I think said quite truthfully—in his speech on Second Reading:
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"… this is a question of judgment and not of statistics, and we feel that the interests of the electors should prevail."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 23/1 /69, col. 1088.]
I too feel that the interests of the electors should prevail; and for the reasons I have given I am virtually certain that the interests of the electors, if we could consult them by referendum, would be powerfully in favour of keeping the closing hour for Parliamentary elections at 9 o'clock, and keeping the same closing hour for Parliamentary and local government elections.
However strong the case, one might wonder whether it was proper to discuss this matter again in your Lordships' House if, in another place, views had been decisive in favour of a change. They were not. The Home Secretary, speaking on Second Reading of this Bill, said:
"I cannot claim that our decision to extend the hours of poll at parliamentary, although not local government, elections, met with universal enthusiasm in the debate on the White Paper in October."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Commons, 18/11/68, col. 927.]
If any of your Lordships care to read the debate on the White Paper they will find that that is an understatement. The matter was then considered in detail in Committee in another place—in Committee of the Whole House, not in Standing Committee—and seven speeches were made, one by the Home Secretary and six by other Members. All six other honourable and right honourable Members spoke against this proposal. All six. It was a case of all-Party unanimity among the speakers. There were three Conservatives, two Labour Back-Benchers, and one Liberal, all solid against this proposal.
In these circumstances which I have described, I submit to your Lordships that it is not unreasonable for your Lordships' House so to act that there may be time and opportunity for further consideration of the matter. I beg to move the Amendment.
4.58 p.m.
LORD STRABOLGI: I hope that the Government will reject this Amendment. Although, of course, the noble Lord, Lord Brooke, has put forward his arguments most skilfully, I thought, if I may say so, that he made rather light of the convenience of the public, which was the main reason given in the Government White Paper Cmnd. 3717. I should have

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thought that that was paramount. Also, the noble Lord said that the Home Secretary had brought forward no evidence that there was support for this change among the public. On the other hand, the noble Lord, Lord Brooke, himself brought forward no evidence that there was lack of support for it amongst the electors.
To the people who live at home and factory people who work in the locality, it probably will not make very much difference; but nowadays, particularly with office workers, municipal workers, and shop workers who very often travel tremendous distances, I think this extra hour will be of great importance to them. It will be of particular importance to those who travel into the bigger cities and have to go back again at night. I know from my own experience and that of business friends and colleagues that it is always necessary to let the people who work in offices go home much earlier on the day of the election. No employer grudges this at all, but I should have thought that there was a tremendous wastage of man hours through this very natural and public-spirited gesture. The extra hour will give people the opportunity to get home, particularly if there are train delays, and so on, so that they will not lose their vote.
There is another matter to which the noble Lord, Lord Brooke, did not refer. He mentioned the fears of the returning officers, and gave as one of the reasons against the change the fact that in some cases the poll count might have to take place the next day. But the noble Lord, Lord Brooke, did not mention the question of modern voting techniques. In the Second Reading debate in the other place on November 18, the Home Secretary mentioned the matter of voting machines; he also confirmed that the Government have put in hand a feasibility study on the use of new techniques for voting and vote counting and that the report is expected in about the middle of this year. If we could bring in some of these modern techniques, such as those used in the United States in the Presidential election, surely it would make the whole machinery of vote counting far easier and much quicker and would do away with the natural but fundamental objection mentioned by the noble Lord,
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Lord Brooke. Therefore, I should be interested to know from my noble friend Lord Stonham whether the Government know any more than was said by the Home Secretary about when the study is expected. Quite apart from that matter, I feel that the extra hour will be a considerable boon to the working and voting public, and for that reason I oppose the Amendment.
LORD BYERS: The noble Lord is really making a plea for the convenience of people who leave home before 7 o'clock in the morning and return home after 9 o'clock at night. Could he say how many people are in that category?
LORD STRABOLGI: I am afraid I probably did not make myself clear. I was not making a plea for those people. I was making a plea for people who do not necessarily leave home before 7 o'clock, but may leave home later; people who do not work in factories from, say, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., but who work in offices from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. or 6.30 and who then have to get from the big city where they work to their home far away. Some people, for example, have to travel from London to the South Coast, and it is those people I have in mind. So far as numbers are concerned, I am afraid that I have absolutely no idea.
LORD ILFORD: I should like to support my noble friend in this Amendment. I have had an opportunity of ascertaining the views of some of those who are responsible for the conduct of elections. They bear out very strongly the view put by my noble friend, that there is no public demand for the extension of polling hours and that those who will be responsible for the conduct of the elections are, not unnaturally, strongly against it. The views also bear out strikingly the point made by my noble friend that in the last hour of polling the degree of error is much greater than it is in the earlier hours. My inquiries have confirmed that view, and I believe that there will be a very much greater degree of error in the conduct of an election if the polling hours are extended to 10 o'clock than is the case at present.
I should like to say a few words about the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Strabolgi. I cannot think that there are a great many people who do not return home in sufficient time to cast their votes

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before 9 o'clock. It is true that in London people travel quite long distances, but I should be very surprised if there were many persons (this perhaps excludes persons in exceptional employment) who find it difficult to get to the poll before it closes at 9 o'clock. I speak from some experience of the London suburbs. I am quite sure that there is no public demand for this change, and I hope your Lordships will accept my noble friend's Amendment.
VISCOUNT ECCLES: I should like to ask the Minister a question before he replies. I cannot quite make up my own mind about the politics of this matter in relation to the closing of the pubs. at 10 o'clock. Clearly, the object of the Bill is to increase the proportion of electors who do vote. If one has to vote by 9 o'clock, one can vote and then go to the pub. and have a drink—and we know that a great many people do so on election night. But suppose there is this extension to 10 o'clock, and the voter goes to the pub. and forgets to come out in time to vote—for what reason I do not know. I think it is quite possible that this would be a non-productive change in the law, and that the result would be that quite a large number of men voters, at any rate, who would have voted if the closing time had been an hour before the pubs. shut would be absent. I think that would be a pity.
LORD STONHAM: I have not had quite such extensive experience as the noble Lord, Lord Brooke of Cumnor, in that I have fought only five elections and not eight, as he has, but I have done a lot of doorstep work. I have had all sorts of excuses given to me when I have been canvassing or knocking up people to come and vote: "I am coming out when I have got my boots on"; or "I will come when I have had my supper"; or "I will come when I have got somebody to look after the baby." But I have never heard the excuse given, "I can't come out until the pubs. shut", which was suggested by the noble Viscount, Lord Eccles, and I do not think that what he put up will be a serious disability. In fact, had it been regarded as a serious disability, I am sure the noble Lord, Lord Brooke, would have thought of it and mentioned it, for he seemed
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to think of everything else. On the point of the shutting of the pubs., we are suggesting that the poll should close at 10 o'clock. The pubs. do not shut until 10.30. Therefore, it can scarcely affect the matter, since they will still have plenty of time. I do not think that it will be a serious difficulty, quite apart from the fact that it is highly probable there will be an extension of licensing hours on election night to cope with problems of this kind.
The noble Lord, Lord Brooke, quite rightly said—and I agree—that this was a matter on which those in another place should have the final word. Therefore, I am the more surprised that early in his speech, before he had heard the arguments, he declared his intention to press the matter to a Division in your Lordships' Committee. He had studied only the arguments of my right honourable friend the Home Secretary. The noble Lord, Lord Brooke, fairly and properly told us about the speeches made in another place and said that six people in support of the Amendment spoke against the extra hour and only the Home Secretary spoke in favour of it. But what Lord Brooke did not tell us was that, at the end of the day, 110 people voted for the Amendment and 171 voted against it. I think that 171 to 110 is a pretty good majority, both relatively and quantitatively. What is quite remarkable to me is that on a subject about which official Conservatives apparently felt so strongly and so hotly, only 110 could be mustered to vote for it—less than half the possible number.
Before the Representation of the People Act 1948 the hours of poll at Parliamentary elections were from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m., with an option for the candidates to apply for an hour's extension at either end. The present statutory hours of 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. were substituted by the Representation of the People Act 1948. This change implemented the recommendation of the 1944 Speaker's Conference. I mention this as a fairly recent indication—it is only twenty years ago—that polling hours are not immutable, and when there is a review of electoral law it is reasonable to take a further fresh look at polling hours, which is precisely what we did.

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I submit that it would be difficult to produce indisputable evidence that any particular length of polling hours was the right one. Increasing the total number of hours by one hour, from 14 to 15, unquestionably gives rise to administrative difficulties. I recognise and acknowledge that. But we must have a sense of proportion about this. It will mean adding one more hour to 14—an increase in time of about 7 per cent. It does not seem to me that it is going to lead to anything like the extraordinary consequences which the noble Lord, Lord Brooke, envisages. While I acknowledge these extra administrative difficulties, they have to be balanced against other considerations.
Of course it is right to consider the interests of the election officials, of the candidates and of their agents; and I join with the noble Lord, Lord Brooke, in his tribute to the probity, the quality, the courtesy and the devotion of election officers which I have never known to fail at any time. It is quite right that we should acknowledge this. But, even so, the election is not for the election officers. The election is for the electors and it is their interests which are paramount; it is their election. But you would not imagine, from the speeches we have heard from the other side of the Committee, that the electors have got very much to do with it at all. We have heard about everything else except the electors, apart from the fact that the noble Lord, Lord Brooke, said, rather rashly I thought, that there was a complete lack of support among the electors. He was careful not to indicate his evidence for that complete lack of support. He did not read any letters of protest about the possibility of an extra hour and I certainly have not heard any protests about it.
LORD TREFGARNE: Is not the onus of proof on the Government to show the evidence in favour of this change, rather than for the noble Lord merely to decry our apparent lack of evidence against the change?
LORD STONHAM: The noble Lord's experience in this place is not very long. Is he suggesting that on a matter of this kind the Government should conduct a referendum among the electorate, when
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we believe from considerable experience that an extra hour would be a considerable convenience—I do not want to overdo it—to electors?
Parliamentary elections occur on the average about every four years, and we just cannot accept that all that is necessary is for the poll to be open only for the minimum number of hours necessary. The emphasis must surely be on giving the longest possible reasonable hours, as my right honourable friend the Home Secretary said. From the point of view of the public, it surely cannot be said that 10 o'clock is a late hour at which to be about; and though working hours may be shorter there is much more travelling than there used to be. My noble friend Lord Strabolgi made the point that it is quite impossible to say how many people are affected. I am sure that the noble Lord, Lord Byers, accepts that. One could not say how many. But there are many people affected, and from the noble Lord's own election experience in the West Country he must be aware of people who could not get back in time to vote. If he is not aware of them, I am.
5.16 p.m.
LORD BYERS: What we are arguing about is that, from the point of view of the noble Lord, Lord Strabolgi, people require something like an extra three and a half hours after 6 o'clock to get to the polls. I think that merely by adding on this extra hour people who now vote before 9 o'clock are going to vote between 9 and 10.
LORD STONHAM: It may be that some will avail themselves of the opportunity to vote between 9 and 10 but that is not an argument in favour of this Amendment. It is an argument in favour—
LORD BYERS: But it means that the declaration of the poll is that much later, and everything is moved on. People get more tired and so on.
LORD STONHAM: I shall come to the declaration of the poll point in a moment. I am dealing at present with electors. Although I cannot give the noble Lord any statistics—no one can—of how many more people would be able to vote in a General Election than are able to vote now, I say (and the noble Lord cannot refute it) that there are

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people who will be able to vote with an extra hour who would not otherwise be able to vote.
I remember an election at which I was a candidate in a country constituency, very much like the one which the noble Viscount, Lord Eccles, used to represent, where we had a 93 per cent. poll on a wet February day. It was an extraordinary poll, but still there were some people within my own knowledge who did not vote, and who would have been able to vote had the poll been open an hour longer. For example, there were the railwaymen on the old Great Western, as it used to be. Some of them told me afterwards how deeply they regretted the fact that they had not been able to record their votes in a close election. I can assure the noble Lord that there are people who are affected.
The Government accept that in many areas where at present the count takes place on the evening of the day of the poll, it would have to be postponed until the following day. But I really cannot see that that matters. My own first three elections were fought in a rural division which counted and declared the next day. No one thought it strange, no one complained. In a great many constituencies now, particular country constituencies, the count already takes place on the day after the poll; and if satisfactory arrangements in divisions covering perhaps hundreds of square miles and with 80 to 100 polling stations can be made now, as indeed they are, for the count taking place the following day—which involves custody of the ballot papers overnight—there is no reason to expect any greater difficulty in other areas where, generally speaking, the distances are much less.
A great deal has been said about fatigue of the assistants to the returning officer, and about the fact that it is tiring day. It is a matter great responsibility. It is 14 hours now, and we are proposing to make it 15 hours. But the noble Lord, Lord Brooke, was talking about fatigue in the count after the poll, and he said that this extra hour could well mean that more mistakes would be made. I think there will be less fatigue, because if the returning officer decides to have the count next day then, of course, the counting can be be done under much better conditions with much less fatigue and with less likelihood of mistakes. That argument therefore
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turns round the other way. Many of the returning officer's assistants who will be assisting at the count will have been at a polling station all day, and I think it is far better in such circumstances that the count should be next day.
I do not believe that there will be any difficulty. These are some of the matters which the returning officers discussed when my right honourable friend the Home Secretary consulted them. I do not think there will be any real difficulty in mustering sufficient counting agents to oversee the count on the candidates' behalf. In my previous experience, there has never been any difficulty in getting counting agents. The difficulties were that you had to disappoint people and upset good supporters who thought they ought to be in at the count but to whom you had to say, "No" because you were allowed to have only a limited number.
VISCOUNT MERSEY: May I ask the noble Lord one question? He referred to the returning officers having discussed these matters. As a result of that, were the returning officers in favour of these new hours?
LORD STONHAM: No. I did not know the noble Viscount was not in the Chamber when this point was raised. It was the noble Lord, Lord Brooke of Cumnor, who raised this point. He said it was the local authority associations, but I put that point right. It was the electoral officers whom we consulted on the point about closing at 9.30, which was a tentative proposal at the time. They were indeed against it, and advanced quite a number of arguments against it which of course we have considered, to some of which I am now referring.
The noble Lord, Lord Brooke, quoted from my Second Reading speech about the extra cost. Obviously, we cannot say exactly how much more it is going to cost because we do not know how many constituencies which at present return on the day of the poll are going to return the next day. Also, we do not quite know about the printing costs. One estimate which I gave, which I said was not complete, was an extra £45,000. Although we do not want to have unnecessary cost, if the extra cost was £100,000 that, among 30 million people voting, would mean an extra cost of

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one-twelfth of a penny per vote. In the Government's view, if this enables more people to record their vote and one can have a truer election, then that cost of one-twelfth of a penny per elector is well justified and worth it.
The noble Lord, Lord Brooke, also suggested that confusion would arise in persons recording a vote because the hour of closing at local government elections has to remain at 9 o'clock, and some people who had voted at 10 o'clock in a Parliamentary election might turn up after 9 o'clock at a local government election and could then be told only that Parliament in its wisdom (or its unwisdom, as he put it) had decided that there should be different times. Parliament, in its wisdom or unwisdom, decvided that a long time ago because now, to-day, there are plenty of local government elections which close at 8 o'clock, whereas others close at 9 o'clock. There is no fixed time, in fact. So the confusion exists now. We are not adding to it—and that was, as I say, Parliament's wisdom some time ago. But there is no fixed rule for a time of closing for all elections.
Now it is true that some mixed urban and rural constituencies which have hitherto managed by dint of great effort to get the result out by midnight or soon after may have to decide to wait until the next day. In fact, I think that quite a number will. I do not think this would be a bad thing. I do not know whether your Lordships feel that the kind of stuff we have seen turned out on television hour after hour into the next morning, the next day, the next afternoon, is an edifying kind of spectacle. I should think that, this way, there may be much less frenzied excitement. Everybody will be able to go to bed, including the T.V. commentators, if many counts are taken the next day. But what I do say, whatever the T.V. and radio commentators may think about it, is that an hour extra will be much more convenient to the electors, and the Government think that in elections it is the electors' interest which should be paramount.
My noble friend Lord Strabolgi asked me about the feasibility study which is being conducted. We expect to receive the results of that study by the middle of this year. I cannot of course say in
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advance whether this is going to affect the issue or not. I should not think that, in a major sense, it would at present, although we may—indeed, I hope we shall—find some things that will be helpful. But even if one assumes that nothing of a mechanical kind is found as an aid which could be put into operation before the next Election, I ask your Lordships to accept it from me that this decision was taken by the Government wholly in the electors' interests; and it is in the name of the electors that, if this matter is pressed to a Division, I ask your Lordships to reject this Amendment.
5.27 p.m.
LORD AUCKLAND: I think this particular matter is a good deal more difficult than may be seen at first sight. I have a certain sympathy with the Government on this matter because, having had experience not only in a young person's group within a political Party in a marginal seat in London but also of canvassing in two or three rural areas, I can see the force in the Government's argument that in rural areas, where there may be a shortage of polling stations, there may be a case for extending voting hours. I think it is possible to make a little too much of the voting convenience of the public, although I would immediately accept that the public's case must come first. But I have also had experience as a scrutineer in two elections in London, and that gives one sight of the enormous strain which is imposed on those counting the votes, not to mention the scrutineers themselves, who are all volunteers and who have probably done a day's work before they come to carry out their tasks. So we are up against this dilemma.
I agree with what the noble Lord, Lord Stonham, seemed to imply: that more constituencies should have their counts the day after the poll. I do not know very much about electoral law, and I do not know how feasible it is to bring, I will not say pressure, but persuasion, on those concerned to see that this takes place. The sight of people milling around the town hall after the count may be edifying to those of us who are interested in the political fight, but to a great many people it gives some vestige of mob rule, particularly when scenes of a somewhat disorderly nature occur. So I should like the Government to consider—not necessarily now but when the

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next occasion arises—whether, to resolve this problem, we should have a kind of two-tier system whereby, in the very rural constituencies, where there may be a need to extend polling hours, this is done, and in other cases to prevail upon constituency officials to have the count the day after the poll.
LORD STONHAM: On the second of the noble Lord's two points, I may say that this is entirely a matter for the decision of the local returning officer. No legislation is needed. Of course, no persuasion ought to be applied. But it is entirely in relation to circumstances that the returning officer should decide whether to have the count on the same day of the poll or on the next day.
LORD AUCKLAND: I am grateful to the noble Lord for his statement. I wonder whether a recommendation could be made at the next Speaker's Conference that this discretion should be more widely applied.
LORD CONESFORD: I am puzzled by the last speech to which we have listened, and especi0ally by the mention of the Speaker's Conference; because, whatever else the Government's action does, it seems to throw considerable contempt on the conclusion of the Speaker's Conference. I cannot make out which of the considerations the noble Lord, Lord Stonham, put forward he imagines had been missed by the Members of all the Parties who sat in the Speaker's Conference and unanimously decided against the course that the Government are now proposing. Neither could I understand what my noble friend meant by people coming round to the town hall to hear the result and thus indulging in mob rule. If coming round to the town hall could influence the result in any way, I could at least understand his argument. But it is too late to influence the result. They have come to hear it.
It seems to me that, whatever else may be the consequences of the proposal—and I agree with what everybody has said: that, of course, the decision in this matter must be for the House of Commons—the only question is: should not the House of Commons have the chance to consider again whether their own representatives on the Speaker's Conference
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may not have been right? I am a little interested—as the Government in their more sober moments may be interested—in what may be the effect on work the following day if all the results are to come out in the middle of the next day and if people wish to come round to the town halls to hear the results. Would it not become a general public holiday? Would it not be an enormous interference with the work done in industry on the following day? I should have thought that that was at least a possibility.
My last reason for doubting the wisdom of what the Government propose is that the declaration of the polls on the final night of the General Election is one of the comparatively few occasions in the Election which the public rather enjoy. I think that we should be rather killjoys if we were to make it quite impossible for the B.B.C. and the I.T.V. to have their fun, with all these funny people working with computers, and so on. The public rather enjoy it. There may be reasons which the Government have not given to explain why they have come to their decision; but their decision does involve thinking that the Speaker's Conference was unanimously wrong. I should also have thought that it is doubtful whether it is in the public interest to have the next day made into what would almost amount to a public holiday.
5.35 p.m.
LORD SILKIN: I thought that the main case that the noble Lord, Lord Brooke, made for supporting this Amendment and for taking it to a Division—as I imagine he intends—was to give the other House an opportunity of thinking again. Well, that is a laudable thing in certain circumstances; but I hardly think it laudable in this case. After all, they must have thought very seriously about this to disagree with the unanimous decision of the Speaker's Conference. I cannot think they did that lightly. It is a weighty decision. To disregard it as they did must have been done after a great deal of consideration. It seems to me that if that is the main reason for our deciding to accept this Amendment it is hardly likely to meet with success. I had hoped that the noble Lord, Lord Brooke, would have been satisfied with his great success on an earlier Amendment and would have put all his money

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on the chance of the other House thinking again on that. On that I had hoped that he would have a better chance; but in this case I do not think he stands very much chance.
I am sure that he thought that that was his main argument, because I did not think much of the rest of the case that he made: for instance, the cost. The cost is really trifling in comparison with the cost of the Election. I do not think that we ought to weigh a matter of £20,000, £30,000 or £40,000 against the opportunity, the increased opportunity, which it might give to people to exercise their vote. The noble Lord, Lord Brooke, said that there was no demand for this and that there was no case made for the extension, and that probably all that it would do would be to encourage people to go to the poll an hour later than they would otherwise feel able to go. May I give a personal experience of what is involved? I was not a Parliamentary candidate eight times; I think in my case it was four. But on each occasion I have personally seen people locked out of the polling stations at 9 o'clock. I know that people have tendency to go at the very latest moment. Nothing will eradicate that; but they went at the last moment up to 9 o'clock. I have seen considerable numbers of people—at times very considerable numbers—locked out of polling stations and unable to vote.
It might be said that this may happen if the closing time were extended to 10 o'clock; but I doubt that. I do not know at what time the public houses close; but people probably like to get their vote in before closing time elsewhere. Nor do I think it is a disadvantage that, by and large, the count will take place on the next day. In a considerable number of constituencies it already takes place the next day. Even in London, in some constituencies it takes place on the same day and in others on the day after. I should have thought that there would be some advantage in uniformity and in receiving declarations on one day.
The noble Lord said that it would become a public holiday, that the public would congregate outside the town halls to await the results. In so far as the count takes place the following day in a number of constituencies in
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London, that is already the case. I cannot think that it would make a great deal of difference or that such a large number would be so concerned about the results as to sacrifice a day's work. I think the noble Lord, Lord Brooke, is making heavy weather about this. I think it would be a great mistake to divide the Committee, and I hope that my speech will give him the opportunity of thinking again.
LORD COLLISON: I should like to make one comment, because it has been said that there was no evidence that people would welcome this extension of time. I have not been able to make a survey of the attitude of trade union members on this matter, but I certainly think I can speak for them and can tell the Committee what I believe they would say. As is known, I represent agricultural workers. I am quite sure that agricultural workers, who often have to work, say on milking and other jobs on the farm, for long after normal hours, would say that this was an advantage, and an improvement for them which they would certainly welcome.
I think the same thing applies to workers in industry. I know many of them, and I know that when they have done a day's work they want to go home first. Many of them want to change out of their working clothes. It may be argued that it is not necessary; that they could go straight to the poll; but they like to go home, wash and change and have a meal, and after that they will go to the polling booth. So I think that, without offence and without prejudice, I can tell the Committee that the work-people of this country in industry, and certainly in agriculture, welcome the Government proposal.
5.41 p.m.
LORD CHORLEY: I should like to add a reminiscence which very much supports what the noble Lord, Lord Silkin, has said about people being prevented from voting by getting to the polling booth too late. The one occasion when I was a candidate was in the 1945 election which your Lordships will remember was held in the summer months when haymaking was going on. What has been said about agricultural labourers was very true on that occasion. They were working, and some in my constituency failed

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to get to the polling station in time for that very reason. Other voters on that occasion were either working outside the constituency or were away on holiday. I lost that election by 15 votes, and I calculate that there were at least double that number of voters who failed to get to the polling station by 9 o'clock. If this 10 o'clock business had been operating—
LORD SILKIN: May I slightly correct my noble friend? I was referring to people who were actually queueing up to get inside the polling station, but when 9 o'clock came they were not allowed to go in and vote.
LORD CHORLEY: The people to whom I was referring actually got there a few minutes after 9 o'clock.
LORD BROOKE OF CUMNOR: The noble Lord, Lord Collison, has sincerely put forward one of the first pieces of hard information that we have had on this question. I have no doubt that there are various categories of people who would like longer polling hours. Having listened to his speech, however, it seems to me strange that the agricultural workers whom he particularly had in mind are exactly those people who live in areas of the country where they do not seem to make any representation for the poll to be open longer at local government elections. It is my experience that in the country areas no advantage is taken of the opportunity to get the polling period lengthened to 9 p.m. in local government elections; whereas generally it is in the hard-fought urban areas where the poll at local government elections is almost invariably ended at 9 o'clock. That is my answer to the noble Lord, Lord Stonham, who sought to argue that there would be no confusion. I think it is in those places where there has been positive evidence in years past of people wishing to vote right up to 9 o'clock that the local government polls are always extended to 9 o'clock.
LORD LEATHERLAND: Will the noble Lord pardon me? I do not like interrupting, but he said there is no evidence that country people seek an extension of hours. Since the war I have been responsible for five or six elections throughout the County of Essex and we invariably found that the people in the
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country constituencies were eager to have the permissible hour's extension.
LORD BROOKE OF CUMNOR: I am very glad to hear that, because it has always seemed strange to me that it in so many parts of the country there is no move to have longer hours. I never suggested that it was universal throughout the countryside.
I am extremely grateful to my noble friends who have supported this Amendment by their speeches, and to the noble Lord, Lord Byers, for his intervention. I feel that I must press the Amendment because there is here a genuine case for asking that further thought should be given to the matter. The noble Lord, Lord Stonham, drew attention to the fact that a similar Amendment was lost in Committee in another place. I did not think it necessary to mention that, because had that Amendment been carried there would have been no need for me to move this Amendment here. The fact is that it must have been a somewhat uncomfortable Amendment for the Government, because they could not find a single Back Bencher to support them, and a very senior member of the Labour Party indicated that he must abstain because he thought that this plan would be advantageous to nobody.
The noble Lord, Lord Strabolgi, accused me, charged me, reprimanded me, for having made light of the convenience of the public and for having failed to adduce any evidence that there was lack of support from the public. I hope that when he reads my speech he will see that I certainly did not make light of the convenience of the public. I was seeking to set out the arguments in full force on either side, but I think that the onus of proof in this case is on those who desire a change. I was a Member of another place for 22 years and I cannot remember having received a single letter in that period from any of my 70,000 constituents urging that the polling hours should be extended; that was a constituency where normally there was a heavy poll between 8 p.m. and 9 p.m. I understand that in general in London constituencies the time of the heavy poll is edging forward somewhat and it is now more often between 7.30 p.m. and 3.30 p.m. than between 8 p.m. and 9 p.m. But I cannot help thinking that if the 25

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or 30 members of the Speaker's Conference, all elected Members of another place, had had strong indications from those whom they were elected to represent that a longer polling day was desired, they would have put that forward in the Speaker's Conference; and at any rate some of them would have come down in favour of a longer polling day. Those are the people who should be in closest contact with the electors and I think it significant that not one of those members of the Speaker's Conference came out in favour of the Government's proposal. No, this is something which the Government have thought up and have taken through Committee in another place with the Whips on.
I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Stonham, on having produced one more argument for the Government plan than was mentioned in another place. I indicated that the arguments there adduced by the Home Secretary were very few in number. To-day the noble Lord told us that it would be a good thing if more of the counts were postponed until the next day, because then they would be done more accurately. I am very doubtful that his statement about its being a good thing for the counts to be postponed to
the next day is in accord with public opinion, but he will no doubt have an opportunity—
LORD STONHAM: Will the noble Lord allow me to interrupt him? He made a great point that the extra hours would make people very fatigued and that then they would have to go to the count and mistakes would be made. I said that if they did the count next day they would not be so fatigued and there would not be so many mistakes.
LORD BROOKE OF CUMNOR: I think that is quite possible, but I do not think it is a conclusive reason for this change. I am certain that if they were consulted, a large majority of the people of this country would say that they would like the count to continue to be on the same day as it now is, on the evening of polling day. I leave it at that. The Government were able to produce hardly any speaking support in another place for their scheme. I think that is sufficient reason why we should ask them to think again.
5.50 p.m.
On Question, Whether the said Amendment (No. 25) shall be agreed to?
Their Lordships divided: Contents, 72; Not-Contents, 69.

CONTENTS

Ailwyn, L.

Emmet of Amberley, Bs.

Merrivale, L.

Airedale, L.

Ferrers, E.

Mersey, V.

Albemarle, E.

Ferrier, L.

Milverton, L.

Audley, Bs.

Fisher, L.

Monsell, V.

Balerno, L.

Fortescue, E.

Mowbray and Stourton, L.

Belhaven and Stenton, L.

Goschen, V. [Teller.]

Napier and Ettrick, L.

Blackford, L.

Gridley, L.

Nugent of Guildford, L.

Brooke of Cumnor, L.

Grimston of Westbury, L.

Rankeillour, L.

Brooke of Ystradfellte, Bs.

Henley, L.

Ridley, V.

Burton, L.

Hertford, M.

St. Aldwyn, E.

Byers, L.

Howard of Glossop, L.

St. Helens, L.

Colville of Culross, V.

Hylton-Foster, Bs.

St. Oswald, L.

Conesford, L.

Ilford, L.

Sandford, L.

Cork and Orrery, E.

Inglewood, L.

Sempill, Ly.

Craigmyle, L.

Jellicoe, E.

Somers, L.

Cromartie, E.

Kilmany, L.

Stradbroke, E.

Daventry, V.

Lambert, V.

Strathcarron, L.

Denham, L. [Teller.]

Lansdowne, M.

Swansea, L.

Derwent, L.

Lauderdale, E.

Teviot, L.

Dilhorne, V.

Lucas of Chilworth, L.

Trefgarne, L.

Drumalbyn, L.

Mancroft, L.

Tweedsmuir, L.

Ebbisham, L.

Mansfield, E.

Vivian, L.

Eccles, V.

Margadale, L.

Wakefield of Kendal, L.

Elgin and Kincardine, E.

Massereene and Ferrard, V.

Wolverton, L.

NOT-CONTENTS

Addison, V.

Bowles, L.

Chalfont, L.

Archibald, L.

Brockway, L.

Champion, L.

Beswick, L.

Buckinghamshire, E.

Chorley, L.

Blyton, L.

Carron, L.

Collison, L.

Crook, L.

Lindgren, L.

Serota, Bs. [Teller.]

Donaldson of Kingsbridge, L.

Listowel, E.

Shackleton, L. (L. Privy Seal)

Douglass of Cleveland, L.

Llewelyn-Davies of Hastoe, Bs.

Shepherd, L.

Energlyn, L.

McLeavy, L.

Silkin, L.

Faringdon, L.

Maelor, L.

Snow, L.

Gardiner, L. (L. Chancellor.)

Mais, L.

Sorensen, L.

Garnsworthy, L.

Milner of Leeds, L.

Stocks, Bs.

Geddes of Epsom, L.

Morris of Grasmere, L.

Stonham, L.

Granville of Eye, L.

Morris of Kenwood, L.

Stow Hill, L.

Hankey, L.

Morrison, L.

Strabolgi, L.

Headfort, M.

Moyle, L.

Swanborough, Bs.

Heycock, L.

Noel-Buxton, L.

Taylor of Gryfe, L.

Hill of Wivenhoe, L.

Phillips, Bs. [Teller.]

Taylor of Mansfield, L.

Hilton of Upton, L.

Popplewell, L.

Tayside, L.

Hughes, L.

Raglan, L.

Willis, L.

Hunt, L.

Rennell, L.

Winterbottom, L.

Kennet, L.

Rusholme, L.

Wootton of Abinger, Bs.

Kilbracken, L.

St. Davids, V.

Wright of Ashton under Lyne, L.

Latham, L.

Segal, L.

Leatherland, L.

On Question, Motion agreed to.

Resolved in the affirmative, and Amendment agreed to accordingly.
Schedule 1, as amended, agreed to.
Schedule 2 [Consequential and supplementary amendments of Representation of the People Act 1949]:
LORD STONHAM: Amendment No. 26 is consequential on Amendment No. 6 to Clause 8, dealing with candidates' expenses when a poll is countermanded or abandoned by reason of the death of a candidate. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 30, line 37, at end insert (",and after section 64(4) there shall be inserted as a new subsection (4A) a subsection in terms of section 8(1A) of this Act.").—(Lord Stonham.)
LORD STONHAM: This Amendment, No. 27, is consequential on Amendments Nos. 17 to 20. I beg to move.
Amendment moved—
Page 31, leave out lines 9 to 11 and insert ("any bank holiday under the Bank Holidays Act 1871 (in England and Wales, in Scotland or in Northern Ireland, as the case may be) which is not included in the Christmas break or the Easter break and the period beginning with the last weekday before that bank holiday and ending with the next weekday which is not a bank holiday under that Act:
Provided that SO much of this subsection as includes in bank holiday break a period before and after a bank holiday shall not apply in Scotland or Northern Ireland to a bank holiday which is not also a bank holiday in England and Wales, except in Scotland New Year's Day.").—(Lord Stonham.)
LORD STONHAM LORD STONHAM moved Amendment No. 29:
Page 34, line 24, after ("Schedule 2") insert ("and rule 41(4) of the local election rules in Schedule 3").
The noble Lord said: Paragraph 31 of Schedule 2 to the Bill provides for the omission from Parliamentary Elections Rule 48(4) and Local Elections Rule 43(5) in Schedule 2 to the Representation of the People Act 1949 of the concluding words which enable a counting agent to copy the statement of rejected ballot papers. It is no longer necessary to give this right to counting agents because paragraph 13(4) of Schedule 1 to the Bill provides for such a statement to be published along with the result of an election. The purpose of the Amendment is to provide for the omission of similar words at the end of Scottish Local Elections Rule 41(4) in Schedule 3 to the Representation of the People Act 1949. Provision for a statement of rejected ballot papers to be published along with the result of a local government election in Scotland is made by paragraph 13(5) of Schedule 1 to the Bill. I beg to move.
Schedule 2, as amended, agreed to.
Schedule 3 [Repeals]:
LORD STONHAM: With your Lordships' permission, I should like to move this Amendment No. 31, and Amendments Nos. 32, 33, 34 and 35 together. All these Amendments remove the following words from the particular sections of the Representation of the People Act 1949:
"The reference in this subsection to rules of court shall not include a reference to rules made before the passing of the Corrupt and Illegal Practices Prevention Act 1883."
There are no longer any such rules as are excluded by the subsection. Similar words to those quoted above also appear

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in Section 145(4) and 152(6), of the Representation of the People Act 1949. Amendments to remove the words from those sections were made on Report stage in the other place. The present Amendments complete the exercise of removing these unnecessary provisions from the Representation of the People Act 1949. I beg to move.
Amendments moved—
Page 36, line 42, column 3, at end insert ("Section 66(6) from the words 'The reference' onwards").
Page 36, line 45, column 3, at end insert ("Section 74(9) from the words 'The reference' onwards").
Page 36, line 46, column 3, at end insert ("Section 91(6) from the words The reference' onwards").
Page 36, line 47, column 3, at end insert ("Section 109(8) from the words 'The reference' onwards").
Page 36, line 49, column 3, at end insert ("Section 128(6) from the words The reference' onwards").—(Lord Stanham.)
Schedule 3, as amended, agreed to.
Remaining Schedule agreed to.
House resumed:
Bill reported with the Amendments.

SALMON AND MIGRATORY TROUT (PROHIBITION OF DRIFT-NET FISHING) (EXTENSION) ORDER 1968
6.9 p.m.
LORD HUGHES: My Lords, I must apologise to your Lordships for not being in my place, but I did not expect my noble friend to proceed at such great speed with the last Amendments.
I beg to move that the Salmon and Migratory Trout (Prohibition of Drift-Net Fishing) (Extension) Order 1968, a copy of which was laid before your Lordships' House on December 18, 1968, be approved. Noble Lords will be familiar with the background to this Order, which has the same purpose as the one we debated briefly on January 31, 1967. This purpose is to extend for a further two years, this time to February, 1971, the prohibition on drift-net fishing for salmon and migratory trout in a defined area of sea off the coast of Scotland. The
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prohibition was first imposed by noble Lords opposite in 1962. As we have debated this matter on several occasions since then, perhaps I need not take up your Lordships' time by a detailed account of the original circumstances. What we are now asking for is a continuation of the status quo.
We have two reasons for thinking that the prohibition must continue, at least for the time being. The first has not altered since our last debate on this subject: it is the difficult issue of the Report of the Hunter Committee on Salmon and Trout Fisheries in Scotland. Much as I personally had hoped—and indeed expected—at the time of our last debate that the extension of the drift-net ban for which we asked then would have been sufficient to enable us to deal with the Report, wide-ranging, complex and controversial though it has turned out to be, I greatly regret that we are not yet in a position to say what action we propose to take on it. We have had the long series of meetings and discussions with interested organisations which I mentioned in our last debate, but these have served to illustrate the more clearly, if this were needed, how many problems, practical and financial alike, would be involved in implementing the Report's recommendations as they stand and how many different views there are about the wisdom of doing so.
We think in these circumstances it is right to take time, to take even a very great deal of time, to consider all these implications, to examine other possibilities that have been thrown up in discussion and to make sure that we get the right answers in the interests of all interested in salmon and trout fisheries, anglers and proprietors alike, before we take steps to dismantle and rebuild a structure of law and practice that has lasted for over one hundred years. I assure your Lordships, however, that, although I cannot prophesy the nature or timing of our solution, we are, and have been, working very hard on it. In the meantime, we think it inescapable that the ban on drift-net fishing, which is an integral part of the fishing régime proposed by the Hunter Committee, should not be relaxed for the present.
The other reason is one which was debated in detail in your Lordships' House as recently as December 10 last

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and on which, because of this, I need not speak at length. I refer to the recent rapid and substantial development of fishing for salmon at Greenland—both by coastal nets and, more ominously, by drift-net boats in the Davis Strait and elsewhere. I gave the House a full account of the action Her Majesty's Government have taken—action which we are continuing and extending—to secure an end to this high seas fishery, or at least a limitation on fishing effort. But we could not argue convincingly in the appropriate international forum about the need to secure sensible management of our salmon resources by prohibiting the international high seas drift-net fishery, if at the same time we were to allow the resumption of the indiscriminate drift-netting for salmon by our nationals which roused such fears when it expanded so rapidly in 1962. Few people are ever impressed by the argument: "Don't do as I do; do as I tell you"; and if we were to relax the ban on drift-netting this is the position in which we should be placing ourselves vis-à-vis the Danes or anyone else. That is the other main reason for maintaining the ban for the present.
Your Lordships have demonstrated the considerable anxiety that is felt over this matter of the high seas fisheries, and we have taken due note of it in formulating the Government's attitude to the problem. I trust that the House will assist us by approving the Order. My Lords, I beg to move.
Moved, That the Salmon and Migratory Trout (Prohibition of Drift-net Fishing) (Extension) Order 1968, be approved.—(Lord Hughes.)
6.15 p.m.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: My Lords, I must apologise to the noble Lord for not having been in the Chamber at the outset of his remarks. My noble friends on this side of the House welcome the extension of this Order. As the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, has told us, it is unlikely that our case will be heard with favour when we come to raise it in the International Commission of the North Atlantic Fisheries, if we ourselves are indulging in this particularly devastating form of netting. For this reason, certainly I, for one, welcome the extension of this Order. The Order, as your Lordships
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know, has already been extended a number of times, and this is really only temporary legislation; it runs until February 15, 1971. What happens after that none of us knows.
I know that many interested parties have reservations about the Hunter Report. I, for one, hope that an early opportunity will be presented for us to consider closely the various aspects of the Hunter Report. I understand from what the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, has told us that this temporary measure is really linked with a lack of decision—and I do not say this in any spiky way, because I think all of us, both Her Majesty's Opposition and the Government, are finding this problem extremely difficult. But there has been a lack of decision on what should be done about the Hunter Report. I personally hope that an early opportunity will be taken to discuss the Hunter Report in very great detail. If the present rate of salmon destruction (I think I must use this expression) continues, it is more than probable that within the lifetime of even some of the oldest Members of your Lordships' House salmon will become extinct. Therefore it is important that we should set this example by prohibiting to a certain extent the drift-netting off these Islands, so that we can speak with greater authority when we come to negotiate with other interested countries.
Once again I wish to repeat the plea to the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, that I made on December 10 last year: that we should do our utmost to take the necessary steps to prepare other interested countries for the forthcoming International Commission of the North Atlantic Fisheries meeting which is to take place later this year. The noble Lord, Lord Hughes, was good enough to assure me that such steps are being taken, and he warned me that it might be undiplomatic if I were to say too much about this matter. Sometimes when I stood at that Dispatch Box I used to hide behind a similar excuse, that something would be undiplomatic. But I hope, whether it is diplomatic or not, that Her Majesty's Government will do everything in their power to take the necessary preparatory steps before the International Commission meet. With that, I should

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like to give my support to the extension of this Order.
6.18 p.m.
THE EARL OF MANSFIELD: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, will be relieved to know that on this occasion, at least, both the contents and the manner of his speech have my unqualified approval. That no doubt will be of relief to him. But there is one point I should like to make which I do not think was mentioned either by him or by the noble Marquess and which is an additional reason why this prohibition on drift-netting should be maintained. That is the way in which so many rivers in Great Britain and Ireland have been affected for the last few years by the very unpleasant disease ulcerative dermal necrosis, known for short as "U.D.N.". Although there is little doubt that this was the same disease as occurred about fifty years ago, and previously probably another half century before that, very little is known about it. However, we are confident once more that after a year or two it will recede. But in the meantime, and so long as it maintains its present proportions, any further diminution of our salmon stocks would be a matter of very great concern, particularly in view of what the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, has said about this ever-growing menace of drift-netting in the Northern waters.
I entirely acquit the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, of any blame for the delay in the production of any forms of proposals for acting upon, or not acting upon, the Hunter Report. I urge him to do everything possible to get this important matter accelerated. It is particularly vital to those of us who have interests on the Tay, because it was suggested that the Tay should be used as a guinea-pig for a revolutionary scheme, the details of which I will not bore your Lordships with but in which there should be one netting station for the whole river. If successful, the scheme would be extended to the other rivers in Scotland which have a considerable amount of netting. It is obvious that the fishing interests on the River Tay and on other rivers are bound to be deleteriously affected as long as we do not know what is going to happen. Therefore I ask the noble Lord,
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Lord Hughes, to obtain some information as to when the Government propose to implement, wholly or in part, the recommendations of the Hunter Committee.
6.22 p.m.
LORD HUGHES: My Lords, I will be equally brief in reply. I am grateful to the noble Marquess and to the noble Earl for the reception which they have given to yet another renewal of this Order. On the question of the attempt to control the fishing in international waters, may I say that it is perfectly true that I wished to discourage the noble Marquess from being too explicit in what he proposed. I do not at all object to the greatest possible pressure—and continued pressure—being put on the Government to do something about this matter, because that cannot be other than helpful. All I wanted to do was to ensure that when the noble Marquess made some useful suggestions to me about the way in which it should be done he should not make those suggestions in your Lordships' House, because in my view it is much better that our opponents should hear about them from us, when we press them in due course.
I thought the noble Earl, Lord Mansfield was right in making reference to the effects of disease. As he said, we still do not know exactly what it is and, even more unfortunate, we do not know how to get rid of it, but as long as the salmon are afflicted with this unknown disease it is yet another reason why man himself ought not to add to the difficulties of the situation by allowing indiscriminate fishing of this kind.
As to the early implementation of the Hunter Report, I wish I could be more sure about this. When we started there was widespread support which indicated that it would be fairly easy to get a majority of people who are interested in fishing, one way or another, in condemning the existing law. But the one thing which has emerged after examination is that it is just as easy to get a majority against any proposal. So we must go on investigating all the suggestions in order to find out what is most likely to gain sufficient support to justify changing the law. The Hunter Report has said that the law ought to be changed, and it has suggested particular ways in which it should be changed.

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So while I hope for an early end to the uncertainty, I am afraid I cannot be optimistic as to when it will be forthcoming. The noble Marquess apologised for being late in coming into the Chamber. It may be a source of relief to him to know that I had to apologise for being late, because I was not here when the debate was due to start.

AGE OF MAJORITY (SCOTLAND) BILL [H.L.]
House in Committee: Clauses and Schedules agreed to.
House resumed: Bill reported without amendment; Report received.

POSTAL DELIVERIES: THE TWO-TIER SYSTEM
6.26 p.m.
EARL FERRERS EARL FERRERS rose to ask Her Majesty's Government what steps they intend to take to improve the present two-tier postal system. The noble Earl said: My Lords, I rise to ask Her Majesty's Government the Question which stands on the Order Paper for one reason: that I have for a long time been an admirer of the postal service. It has worked efficiently and quickly, and relatively inexpensively, but since the introduction of the two-tier system on September 16 last year the postal service appears to have gone to pieces. I do not wish to "knock" the Post Office in any way—that is not my intention. What I am concerned with is seeing that the postal service which we have continues to be of the outstanding quality to which we have been accustomed.
I appreciate the arguments of the right honourable gentleman the Postmaster General—and doubtless the noble Lord, Lord Bowles, will recite them again this evening: that the mail is increasing at a tremendous rate and that something had to be done to take the pressure off the peak period of 4 to 6 o'clock in the evening; and hence the introduction of the two-tier system. Then in the next breath the Government say that they had to put up postal charges in order to raise revenue. The Government cannot have it both ways. If the object was
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to raise revenue then they have diverted so much of the mail to the secoad-class service that they have failed in their object. If the object was to deflect first-class mail into second-class why then, when the numbers of first-class mail are so much smaller, is the service less good?
I know that the noble Lord, Lord Bowles, will produce a whole lot of statistics showing how much mail now reaches its destination the next day, as compared with the position previously; and he will try to convince your Lordships—and, indeed, even to convince himself—that the service offered by the Post Office is better now than it was before. I would only say, in advance, and with great respect to the noble Lord opposite, "Fiddlesticks to the statistics!" The noble Lord knows, and everyone in the country knows, that in fact the service offered now is less good than it was before, and I ask the noble Lord: "What do the Government intend to do to improve it?" The Postmaster General has shown himself to be a man of great individuality by being prepared to recognise bad schemes when they are put up to him, and to dispose of them, as indeed he did when it was proposed that the London Telephone Directory should be split up into 36 books. The public clamour was so great that he dispensed with the idea. He was not despised for this, but was respected for recognising that in fact the most well-intentioned schemes can be proved to be wrong, and I hope that the right honourable gentleman, through the noble Lord this evening, will stop trying to shore up a scheme which has proved to be unsuccessful. In another place on January 27 the Postmaster General said
"We have been able to give a better guaranteed reliability for the first class service than applied before two-tier."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Commons, 27/1/69, col. 1062.1
Whatever the statistics may say, with respect, every person knows this to be manifestly not so.
On what does the Postmaster General base this assertion? That under the old system 93 per cent. of the first-class mail was delivered the day after posting, and the proportion is now 94 per cent.—an improvement, I suppose, by statistics, until one realises that previously 60 per cent. of the mail went first-class and now only 30 per cent. does. If one

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takes 36 million letters a day as being the average number posted, the fact is that, before two-tier, some 20 million letters arrived the day after they were posted; and now only 10 million do. Hardly an improvement. I am bound to say, my Lords, that it is surprising how many of the 6 per cent. that do not reach their destination the day after posting seem to be ones that are posted to me. Under the old system I frequently used to get letters posted from Hurst-pierpoint, a little town in Sussex, at 7.40 in the evening, delivered to my house in the country in Norfolk at 6.45 the next morning.
LORD BOWLES: My Lords, may I intervene? The noble Earl wrote me a letter dated February 7 which was posted in Bungay at 11.15 on the 8th and it arrived the first post to-day. He had not addressed it properly; he put W.1. instead of S.W.1.
EARL FERRERS: My Lords, I was perhaps "doing the noble Lord a little prouder" than I should have done, and I apologise. But the letters previously addressed to me correctly used to arrive by the next post. The noble Lord may have been unfortunate in having a letter addressed incorrectly. I had a letter to-day addressed correctly with a 5d. stamp, posted on February 7 and it arrived to-day, February 11—that is, four days after it was posted.
My Lords, I am not alone in this. The noble Lord, Lord Hawke, on November 12 asked Her Majesty's Government what they were going to do to ensure that letters with a 5d. stamp posted on one side of Lincoln's Inn Fields reached their destination on the other side of Lincoln's Inn Fields the next day. Recently there was a report in the Evening Standard which said:
"My colleague, Robert Carvel has just received a letter from the Liberal Party Headquarters. It was posted a week ago from their new offices close to the Strand. Using my ruler on a map of London, I calculated that the distance travelled by the letter was about 1½ miles. Allowing for certain factors like wind resistance, the letter travelled approximately 1/112th of a mile per hour or 16 yards per hour. Is this a record for a letter with a 5d. stamp?"
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My Lords, I can beat that. A fortnight ago (this was after I had tabled my Question) I wished to contact a Member of another place who I knew was not in London, because he was ill. I did not know his address in the country, so I decided to send the letter to the House of Commons with a 5d. stamp, saying, "Please forward". It so happened, after I had written my letter, that your Lordships' House had risen early that day, and there were no Doorkeepers here. So I posted my letter in the box outside the Prince's Chamber in the full knowledge that it would of course reach the House of Commons the following morning. I posted it on Tuesday, January 28, and it arrived the following Monday, February 3. It took six days to go down the passage to the House of Commons, and I calculated that I could have walked it there and back in four minutes.
LORD BOWLES: Why didn't you?
EARL FERRERS: Because I did not want to; I was relying on the noble Lord's postal services. I did some arithmetic and I discovered that in the time it took I could have walked there and back 2,010 times. It worked out at 1/1179th of a mile per hour, which is 5 feet per hour—and all that with a 5d. stamp.
What about the 4d. post? That does not seem to be much better. We are told that there is no deliberate delay at all. Before this debate I asked to see over the sorting office in Norwich; and a fascinating experience it was. The head postmaster could not have been more kind or more courteous. He showed me exactly what happened and answered all my questions. He also assured me that there was no deliberate delay of 4d. mail; it was merely that the 5d. mail was dealt with first, and after that the 4d. mail. And I of course entirely accepted this. But is this so everywhere? The Western Mail on January 31 carried an article by Peter Tinniswood in which he interviewed various postal workers, and one said referring to the 11.30 despatch to the North of England:
"Before two-tier we used to send as much as we could on that 11.30. Now we do not even look at the 4d. mail. We stick this to one side until the afternoon. What I am telling you is true. We could send all the mail off on the 11.30 if we were not instructed to keep back the 4d."

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Again my information is that in Havant the Post Office delivers 4d. and 5d. mail in separate bags to the railway station at the same time. The 5d. mail is despatched on the quick train to London; the 4d. mail is sent to Portsmouth. It is double-labelled. When it gets to Portsmouth the top label is removed, revealing the London label, and it is then put on the London train and goes to London. I gather that, in true British tradition, a committee is now considering the matter. I wondered why somebody could not take the simple decision and decide to put both lots on the quick train to London. Then there was the famous case in Lincolnshire of the postmen who collected the mail out of the box, sorted the 4d. and 5d. and reposted the 4d. I am glad that the Postmaster General has now issued a directive saying that this practice should stop.
My Lords, what has gone wrong? First, in my view, the whole postal charge should have gone up by 1d. Of course, it is true that, had that been done, all Hell would have been let loose. That would have continued for about a month, and then everyone would have accepted the increase in cost. Such an increase, incidentally, would also have given the Postmaster General an extra £15 million per year. "Ah", says the Postmaster General, "but this would not have solved the problem of rush-hour peaks". This is perfectly true. But I wonder whether we do not perhaps make too much of rush-hour peaks". This problem is not something that has suddenly come upon us and taken us by surprise. It has always been with us, and over the years we have coped with the rush-hour peaks and coped with the increased mail that has appeared. I do not deny that this is a problem, but I wonder whether we have done, and are doing, enough mechanisation to cope with this problem. I told your Lordships that I went to see the sorting office in Norwich. Perhaps it was not the most representative place to go to, because I believe that it is one of the most efficient in the country: and the degree of mechanisation was astonishing. By machine letters were checked, they were stamped, they were turned over, they were sorted into first-class and second-class streams. They were carried about by conveyor belts and shot automatically into the correct boxes for their
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destination. This is very impressive, but does this happen everywhere? Is mechanisation anywhere near what it should be and could be?
Here I want to ask the noble Lord, Lord Bowles, a few specific questions of which I have given him notice. I should like to know how many sorting offices there are under the Postmaster General's control? Of those, how many have automatic letter-facing machines, commonly known in the Post Office as "Alf", which sort the first-class from the second-class mail? How many have single position letter sorting machines which automatically sort the mail into the appropriate destination boxes? How many have coding desks and high speed automatic coding machines? Are the people who use these machines specially trained high-speed operators, or are they just ordinary sorters given another job? We lead the world Post Office sorting equipment. People from all over the world come to Norwich to see it in operation, and this is something of which we can be proud. But do they equally come to Brighton and Birmingham, to Manchester, Leeds and Coventry? Or is Norwich about the only place which has this very sophisticated equipment? Indeed, Norwich has operated the postal code for, I think, some seven years. If this has been so successful, which I do not doubt, why has its use not spread more widely and more quickly?
I believe that the psychology of the change to two-tier was wrong. The old two-tier system should have remained, because, after all, the second tier was mostly mail that one did not notice or, if one did notice it, one did not want because it was mainly circulars or bills. The budgeting was wrong, in that part of the objective of the new system was to reduce overtime, and yet in practice it has resulted in even more overtime being done than was done before—22,000 hours more in October and 33,000 hours more in November than in the same months twelve months previously.
The forecasting by the Post Office was also lacking, as they had anticipated a drop in traffic of 2 per cent., which is normal after a price increase. In fact, it was 4 per cent., an error in calculation of 100 per cent. The Christmas

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mail also dropped by 11 per cent. So that, all in all, the Post Office is down and the public has suffered. The only person to have benefited is, of course, the Postmaster General under his other hat, as being in charge of telecommunications, because the only way one can get an answer to one's letter is to ring up and find out whether it has arrived.
I repeat what I said at the beginning. We in this country have been used to and expect, and rightly expect, a first-class postal service. If we are to have two tiers, at least the first-class tier must be first-class. The fact is that since the introduction of the new system the standard in both tiers has deteriorated, and I ask the noble Lord, Lord Bowles: what steps do the Government intend to take to see that there is an improvement?
6.43 p.m.
LORD GEDDES OF EPSOM: My Lords, in introducing this Question the noble Earl referred—at least, I thought he did, and I apologise if I misunderstood him—to the two-tier system which was introduced in September last year. I agree that subsequently he referred to the previous two-tier system. I think it is absolutely necessary that we should clearly understand, as the noble Earl undoubtedly knows, that the present concept of the two-tier system has been in force in the Post Office for 100 years. The present concept is precisely the same as the one that has always been there, which is that you have two services, one for which you pay a little more and get a better service, and one for which you pay less and get not so good a service. This is precisely what has happened.
I entirely agree with the noble Earl that what was really necessary was merely an increase in price, the 3d. to become 4d. and the 4d. to become 5d., because this was completely justified. I agree that when one is dealing with statistics—and if I may for a moment disgress, the noble Earl discouraged all statistics that were likely to come from the Minister, and then proceeded to produce a string of selected incidents which were statistical in order to prove his case—you can always prove a case if you select your statistics; and in an enormous organisation like the Post Office, dealing,
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as noble Lords know, with millions of letters and other things a year, of course you have what is known as the unlucky letter or telephone call. Even if noble Lords opposite were running the Post Office they could not avoid this. I can assure them of that. So that if you select a number of what I call unlucky letters and say that this condemns the whole system, I suggest, with respect, that that condemnation is completely unjustifiable.
When we come to the question of price, it is true that the price has gone up, but, I repeat, on precisely the same system as hitherto held good—a better service for the higher price, and not quite so good a service for the lower price. This completely ignores the quite considerable concessions that were made by the Postmaster General when he increased the price. I would submit to noble Lords opposite that when they increase prices in their business, they do not make concessions as well; they just put up the price: because they believe that nationalised industries should be run on business lines, and "business lines" means that when costs go up prices go up, because profits have to be maintained.
The Postmaster General made considerable concessions. It is true that the 2 oz. letter costs 25 per cent. more, but the 4 oz. letter is 17 per cent. cheaper. Who send most of the letters between 2 and 4 oz? Without any question whatsoever it is industry. This was a considerable concession to industry. In order, as it were, to relieve the burden of the extra cost from 4d. to 5d., when it came to the heavy letter they were going to get it cheaper than before. It cost 6d. before; it costs only 5d. now. Surely nobody will deny that this was a considerable concession.
Now let me come to the 4d. rate, which was 3d. This has been completely revolutionised to the advantage of the user. It was said some years ago in another place that only two people in the Post Office understood the regulations governing the cheap rate, and that they did not agree. This is the position. Under the old cheap rate system there were complex regulations governing the procedure, and if you were going to use it you ought to consult, although you did not always do so, a complicated list to know whether or not you could send your letter by the cheap rate.

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What is the position now? Wisely, the Postmaster General, from an administrative point of view as well, has abolished the whole of these regulations and the same regulations apply to the cheaper rate as to the higher rate. This means that instead of having to consult your list of "Do's" and "Don'ts" and of what you may or may not send, you have only one decision to make when you are considering whether you are going to use the 4d. or the 5d. post. The one decision is: "Do I want the faster service, or do I want the slower service?" Not, "Can I do this" or, "Cannot I do this", but "Which one do I want?" Then you make the decision. It is quite simple. Hitherto, if you used the cheaper rate in the majority of cases you had to post your letter at 3.30 or before. Now you can post it at any time and it will get the same treatment. If you post it at 12 it does not mean that it will get the same treatment as if you post it at 6, but it will get the same treatment as all other mail posted at the lower rate.
When we come to the question of the vital difference in procedure—it is only a difference in procedure—the major difference is this, as I understand it. Previously the separation took place at the delivery stage; in other words, it was sorted and then the time came when the postman had to decide from the amount he had to deliver whether he was going to take the cheap rate out with him or not, and he made this decision subject to the superviser. He said: "I will not take that out because I have a lot of first-rate mail". The decision was made at that point. Under the new system it is done at the sorting point. You now sort it out and deal only with the top rate.
The effect of this is that you have materially improved the conditions of the workers. This is a perfectly justifiable thing to do. Whereas previously a large number of duties were finishing at 9 o'clock and 10 o'clock at night—unsocial duties, sometimes after 10 o'clock at night—many of these have now been eliminated, and the postman higher grade, instead of getting home at 9, 10 or 11 and sometimes at 12 o'clock at night now gets an early duty. This is one result of the introduction of the new system. I submit to the noble Earl
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that this is an advantage of the new system.
When we come to consider this question, what is really happening? It is that the business and the postal users are making a choice; the choice is before them. It happens that business people, generally speaking, because they object to the increased price (which the noble Earl admitted—at least I think he admitted—was justified) have decided that they are not going to pay it. The result is that instead of sending their mail, as they did before, at full rate, they are now sending a much larger amount at the cheaper rate, with the inevitable result, and one that no Post Office could have foreseen, that the cheap rate is being overloaded. Because of that you are not getting the service from the cheap rate that could have been had if people had carried on in the same way that they did before the charges went up.
EARL FERRERS: My Lords, may I interrupt the noble Lord? I quite see that if one overloads the cheap rate that rate will suffer; but why should the expensive rate suffer also?
LORD GEDDES OF EPSOM: My Lords, I agree with the noble Lord that it should not suffer. In so far as lie has quoted examples where it has, I must give way to them, but my understanding is that the full rate has not suffered; in fact, by and large, it is better. You can always destroy that argument by saying, "This letter was posted here and it took five days". Before this change we had reports in the newspapers of somebody who got a Christmas card, or a postcard, that was posted ten years before. It is not very difficult to understand, because when being sorted into a frame it is quite easy for one to get stuck in the frame and it is not always possible to see it. However, that is beside the point. The fact is that the user, not the Post Office, has decided how this new procedure—not new system—shall work.
I put it to the noble Earl that there are many commodities that you can buy at a different price and of a different quality. For example, if I want to buy tea I can make up my mind whether I shall pay a good price for a good quality, or a cheaper price for not so good a quality. If I decide to buy the cheaper tea, I am not justified in going to the

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shopkeeper and saying, "Look, you have put up the price of your tea. I am not going to pay the higher price. I am going to buy your cheaper tea, but you must make the quality of the cheaper tea as good as it was when it was dear". You cannot do that; it is impossible. But that is what the public, and particularly business, is doing. It is saying—and the noble Earl has practically said this—"We are going to have nothing to do, or very little to do, with your full rate. We are going to concentrate on the cheap rate, but you must make the cheap rate as good as the full rate".
EARL FERRERS: My Lords, I must interrupt the noble Lord. I never said anything of the sort, and if he studies what I said in Hansard he will see I never said anything remotely appertaining to that.
LORD GEDDES OF EPSOM: My Lords, I withdraw the suggestion that the noble Earl said that. What I say is that, in view of what is happening, it is a sound inference that this is what business people are saying. When you criticise the system, that is, in effect, what you are saying. My submission to the House is that it is a question not of the Post Office improving the system so much as of the users using it properly, using it in the same way that they did before, accepting the increased price as being completely justified, as being required, as being a businesslike act, and then coming to the conclusion that they will use one system or the other. It is their choice—it is not the Post Office's choice—whether they will use the higher rate or the lower rate, but they cannot expect, and nobody can expect, to get the same service for the lower rate as they do for the higher rate.
6.55 p.m.
LORD TEVIOT: My Lords, I should first like to thank my noble friend Lord Ferrers for putting down this question and giving us such an interesting debate. I would very briefly outline the situation as it was and as it is now, as the last two speakers have already done, and I hope I shall not repeat too much of what has already been said. As we all know, the reason for the present two-tier system was that the old system was becoming overloaded and the Post
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Office were unable to deal with 5 per cent. of their commitments. Moreover, the greater percentage of the mail was being concentrated into the period from 4.30 to 5 o'clock and later. I was delighted to hear the noble Lord, Lord Geddes of Epsom, state that the postmen were getting home much earlier than the higher grade sorters, but I have a suggestion to make later in my speech that I hope will get them home even earlier.
It has been said that previously 80 per cent. of all mail was delivered by the first post the following morning. Personally, I think that percentage is rather high. I believe it would be reasonable to submit that it was round about 60 per cent., and allowing for the 5 per cent. which they could not manage it was, let us call it, 55 per cent.
To move on now to the present two-tier system, I believe I am right in saying that the Postmaster General recently announced in another place that the ratio between first-class and second-class post was 70 to 30. On top of this 30 per cent. of first-class mail we can allow a further 10 per cent. for second-class local mail being delivered the following morning. If your Lordships' have done your sums correctly—and I hope I have—that means that 15 per cent. less mail is being delivered by first post on the two-tier system than was the case before. What is happening to that 15 per cent.? Arising out of these figures I should like to ask the noble Lord the following question; namely, has the Post Office made a saving on this 15 per cent. on overtime, or are they in fact spending more money in implementing and administering the two-tier system? There is no doubt, as my noble friend Lord Ferrers has said and I am sure other people will say, that the G.P.O.s reputation for reliability was much higher before than it is now. The suggestion I should like to put forward to get round this crush is that if the 4d. or second-class mail is posted, as I am sure some businesses could do, before 2 p.m.—the noble Lord, Lord Geddes, said that previously some mail had to be posted before 3.30 p.m.—it should be treated as first-class mail. That would cut out the peak and also cut out some of these anomalies.
There are two other minor points—I hope noble Lords will not mind my

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mentioning them. The first is the way the public showed utter contempt for this system last Christmas. I think I am right in saying that it was the lowest Christmas mail we have had for some years. Many more casual staff were employed than was necessary, and many people were taking their own local cards round by hand and were putting, where they could, perhaps three cards in one envelope. That just shows the public's feeling in this matter. The second point is this. Your Lordships will remember that the noble Lord, Lord Boothby, asked a question about the "stickability", the adhesiveness, of postage stamps. In case the noble Lord, Lord Bowles, thinks the view expressed was the opinion of a few eccentric noble Lords, I can assure him it is not. People are going into post offices all day, complaining that the "stickability" is not what it was. That is a very minor point, but I ask the noble Lord to look into the matter again.
I hope the noble Lord will not think me impertinent, but I believe that if the Postmaster General wants to make economies he can do so with impunity by saving on advertising. The general public are getting fed up with their money being spent on half-page advertisements in newspapers telling them how to dial and how splendid are those "yellow pages". In The Times only to-day there was a half-page presentation of rather seedy looking gentlemen in white collars and bowler hats saying how splendid are the yellow pages. Surely those advertisements cannot be justified. Therefore, I urge the Government to take immediate steps to restore the good name of the Post Office in this country—it was, and still is, incidentally, the cheapest service—and to make it again the best in the world.
7.0 p.m.
LORD AIREDALE: My Lords, my favourite anecdote about the operation of the new first-class 5d. mail service is the one which was set out in a letter to The Times on January 2, about a very important document which was posted in the City of London addressed to Portsmouth bearing a shilling stamp to secure the first-class service. It was posted on the day that astronauts Borman, Lovell and Anders left for the moon, and it reached Portsmouth 17 hours after splashdown. However, I was not proposing to
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follow that up, but to deal with one rather narrow aspect of this matter, about which I have given the Minister notice, otherwise I should not have expected to receive a reply this evening.
This matter relates to the treatment of newspapers since last September under the new two-tier system. I put down a Starred Question on this subject about a month ago and we had an exchange across the Floor of the House, but did not get very far. The position, as I understand it, is that before last September a newspaper—it did not matter who posted it—was given the first-class service, although it had to be stamped only at the second-class rate. I understand that this still applies to newspaper proprietors and news agents; they pay the second-class postage rate but get the first-class service. But for ordinary, humble citizens who post newspapers, if they pay the second-class postage rate they get second-class service; and if they want the first-class service they must pay the first-class postage rate. In the exchange at Question Time we got bogged down in a discussion about the bulk posting rate. That is not what I am talking about at all. What I am talking about is the fact that if a newsagent posts one copy of one newspaper, he gets first-class treatment at the second-class postage rate. But if an ordinary citizen posts one copy of one newspaper, he gets only second-class service unless he pays the extra for the first-class postage rate.
The other ground on which my Question was criticised from the Government Benches was that an exception should be made in the case of newspapers because there was an urgency about them since they contain "hot" news, and if they were not transmitted rapidly they lost their value. I entirely agree that sonic newspapers sometimes contain "hot" news, but one should remember that from the point of view of the Post Office "newspapers" includes practically all the weekly magazines. It includes children's comics, women's weeklies, weekly magazines about hobbies or sports, political weeklies, literary supplements, educational supplements, and so on, and it cannot be said that in the case of these newspapers there is any tremendous urgency about the moment at which they are received. I do not believe there is anything in it for

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the Post Office as a result of its having made this change since last September. I do not believe, for instance, that the number of newspapers posted by ordinary people is so great that it would keep sorters up later at night sorting them; and I do not believe the Post Office will get any greater revenue from people being willing to pay the first-class rate for newspapers, because I do not believe they will.
I regard this as a nasty piece of work on the part of a State monopoly which is refusing to treat people the same and is denying to all citizens alike its facilities upon equal terms. I have nothing against newspaper proprietors or their agents, but I do not see why they should get better treatment when they pay the same postage rate as ordinary people. I say that if a newsagent sends a gardening magazine to somebody and if by the same post I send a gardening magazine to somebody and we both pay the same rate, we ought to be entitled to expect both copies to arrive at the same time.
If this were a bigger matter and affected more people more seriously, I do not believe the Post Office would have attempted to "put it over" on us. It is simply because it is a rather small matter that the Government have got away with it up to now. I believe that it is quite wrong to treat people in this discriminatory manner, and I hope that the Post Office will think very seriously about this matter and restore the position to what it was before last September. It does not matter who posts a newspaper—if they pay the same rate of postage they should get the same treatment in delivery.
7.5 p.m.
LORD DENHAM: My Lords, in preparation for this debate, I tried a small experiment which, whatever had happened, would have been statistically useless. I posted to myself three letters. On one I put a 5d. stamp, on the next I put a 4d. stamp, and on the third no stamp at all. The one with the 5d. stamp reached me first post the next morning, as did the one with no stamp at all; but the one with the 4d. stamp on it took two days to come to me. There may be a moral in this somewhere. I cannot support my noble friend Lord Ferrers all the way in agreeing that the
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two-tier system is of itself bad, but I can support him in criticising Her Majesty's Government's handling of it.
LORD BOWLES: My Lords, could I get one thing clear from the noble Lord? Did he have to pay a surcharge on the letter which was not stamped, or how did he get the letter? Secondly, may I ask him whether the stamp might have been knocked off in the course of delivery, and, if it had been a 5d. stamp, might that not be the explanation?
LORD DENHAM: No, my Lords, I did not have to pay a surcharge; but I am not going to tell the noble Lord at which address I posted it to myself. There definitely was not a 5d. stamp on it beforehand.
As I was saying, I feel that I cannot support my noble friend Lord Ferrers in feeling that the system is wrong, but I think that the method of introducing it was wrong. From the moment the new postal system was brought in, in the way that it was introduced, it was bound to end in tears. Her Majesty's Government wrecked the start of what was basically a sound idea by making two fundamental mistakes. The first was that they confused the issue by introducing the new two-tier system concurrently with, and mixed up with, a 25 per cent. price rise. The second, which springs from the first, was that they let the country get the idea that they were being offered, as an alternative to the existing service, a better one at the new price, whereas in fact they were being offered as an alternative a worse one at the old price.
If Her Majesty's Government had put up the price of the letter post to 5d. and then, after a period, introduced the new second-tier service at 4d. as an alternative, the public might well have complained at the first but subsequently they would have welcomed the second. Even with the change in price and the change in system being brought in together, things could have been managed better. If people had been told, "We are sorry, but if the postal service is to be kept at its present standard, the price will have to go up to 5d.; but for those who are prepared to put up with a slower service, we will run a secondary one for 4d.", this could have been generally understood. As it is, the

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method of presentation muddied the Post Office, and it muddled the general public.
Lack of communication within the Post Office has led to the sort of case to which my noble friend Lord Ferrers and the noble Lord, Lord Airedale, have referred, and of which one heard of hundreds of examples in the early days, where the second-class post was purposely delayed. Lack of preparation within the Post Office led to the situation where more overtime had to be paid to get less work done. And now, as we see from the latest figures (and I have slightly different and slightly more accurate figures than my noble friend Lord Teviot) a smaller percentage of all mail is getting first-class treatment than before the introduction of the new system.
Previously, 80 per cent. of all mail had first-class treatment, whereas now, of the 32 per cent. of the total post which is sent first-class, 94 per cent. actually gets quick delivery and, of the 68 per cent. which is sent second-class, 41 per cent. gets quick delivery. To save your Lordships working it out for yourselves, that means that, irrespective of the postage paid, 57·96 per cent. of all mail gets first-class treatment—which is quite a drop on the previous 80 per cent. All this can be, and no doubt, is being sorted out. It is only a pity that better planning did not prevent these muddles from happening in the first place.
But the effect on the public is even more serious. The noble Lord, Lord Geddes of Epsom, said that it was not so much a matter of the Post Office running the system wrongly as of the public using the system wrongly: and this may well be so. But the reason the public are using the system wrongly is that the idea of the new system was presented to them so badly in the first place. Previous experience has shown that putting up the cost of postage usually leads to a 2 per cent. drop in the amount of mail posted. This time the drop has been 4 per cent.—exactly double. With the small margins on which the Post Office works, this could be disastrous. In the past, the 2 per cent. loss has been made up after a month or two, but in the present instance, with the general sense of confusion in the country to-day about the post, how soon can we expect the 4 per cent. loss to be made up?
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The two-tier post has divided the posting public in a rather odd way. The very reasonable intention was that everybody should send important or urgent letters by first-class mail, and other items by second-class mail. But what has actually happened is this. On the one hand, there are people who make it a point of honour to deny the extra penny to the Post Office, and they send everything, no matter what its importance, by second-class mail. On the other hand, there are people who feel that it is somehow a breach of manners to the recipient to use a 4d. stamp, and they are inclined to send most things by first-class mail. This may, in a way, carry out the wishes of the Post Office to divide mail into two classes, but surely it is the letters and not the senders that should be divided into the sheep and the goats.
But, my Lords, the worst effect of the lot is the complete loss of public confidence in the Post Office. The public feel, perhaps wrongly, that there has been an attempt to pull the wool over their eyes. They thought they were being offered something better for the extra 1d. They did not believe at the time that they would get it, and they now feel that they were right.
My noble friend Lord Ferrers is asking what steps Her Majesty's Government intend to take. I should like to ask Her Majesty's Government to do three things. The first is to admit, if not in public at least to themselves, that they have made a fundamental nonsense of the introduction of this new system. As my noble friend said, the noble Lord, Lord Bowles, will no doubt produce figures in abundance to prove that the two-tier system is a success. He may well tell your Lordships that 94 per cent. of all first-class mail is being delivered quickly now, compared with 93 per cent. before. But against this we must put the 4 per cent. drop in the quantity of mail and the large drop in the quick delivery of all mail. The essential point is that, although the system may be right, the method of introducing it was wrong. If you are to learn from mistakes, to put right the effects of mistakes and to avoid repeating the same mistakes, you must first recognise them as mistakes. Secondly, I ask Her Majesty's Government to do at they can to increase the flexibility and efficiency of the new system. Lastly, and

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most important of all, there must be an all-out effort by the Postmaster General and the Post Office, at all levels, to regain the confidence of the public which they have lost.
7.15 p.m.
LORD FERRIER: My Lords, I agree very much with what the noble Lord, Lord Denham, said, and would add the suggestion that his first point might be thought over carefully. It might be worth while actually admitting to the public that the scheme was badly presented. It was badly presented, and many people feel that they have been "had". But in regard to the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Geddes of Epsom, one can appreciate that they have not been "had" all along the line.
That brings me to my real point. I have heard all the speeches except the opening passages of the noble Earl, Lord Ferrers, and I have heard no word said about the humble postcard. It just so happens that in my pocket I have a postcard. It is absolutely fortuitous. It was written to my club barber and posted at Biggar, in Lanarkshire, on Friday, making an appointment for this morning. But I arrived before the postcard so I said to the barber, "Let me have it. I will take it back to the Post Office in Lanarkshire": because our Post Office there is very well run—there is no question about that.
So I want to ask the noble Lord, Lord Bowles, to urge his right honourable friend to give another thought to the humble postcard. The other day I found among my father's papers, in an old writing case, a postcard with a halfpenny stamp embossed on it. Admittedly, it was a King Edward VII stamp, and it was unused but my mind went back to the days when you could go into a post office, put down ld., get a post card, scribble, "Arriving by so-and-so-train", post it, and know that it would get there the next day. Here I come back to my opening remarks. Is it possible, as a step towards convincing people that they have not been "had" (and I refer particularly to Scotsmen), for the postcard to go as first-class mail for 4d., because to many people—and far more humble people than those in industry or anything else—the postcard has always been a most convenient, highly economical
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article by which to send a message in this country? Of course, with modern sorting machinery and so on, this suggestion may not work out. I do not know. But the sole object of my taking part in this debate is to say a word for the humble postcard, and to ask whether it could go as first-class mail for a penny less than the full 5d. stamp.
7.18 p.m.
LORD BOWLES: My Lords, we have had a very interesting debate. I should like to thank the noble Earl, Lord Ferrers, for initiating it and all the other noble Lords who have taken part, as well as those who have stayed behind to hear the Answer. It is important that we should have the most efficient postal service for our commerce, our industry and the community as a whole. Therefore it is just as well that the whole subject should be adequately discussed.
It is not underrating the position—and this has been brought out this evening—to say that before the new system was introduced in September last year there was general acceptance of the standard and reliability of the service given. That is not to say that everything was perfect, but there was no general complaint against the service as a whole, such as those which have been voiced over the last few months. It may well be the case that the publicity associated with the new venture has brought the service very much more into the limelight, and certainly a great deal has been said, both in this House and elsewhere, about its shortcomings. This has given rise, I am sorry to say, to an atmosphere of misunderstanding and, indeed, of mistrust of the new service which is entirely unwarranted.
I shall of necessity repeat things which have already been said, but I hope your Lordships will feel that I can best serve the House if, in replying to the debate, I bring into proper perspective the situation leading up to the introduction of the two-tier letter service. The postal side of the Post Office is, to use a modern phrase, a labour intensive industry, and its finances are particularly vulnerable to increases in staff costs, which account for almost 75 per cent. of all expenditure. When faced with the prospect of a deficit arising from

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increased costs, Her Majesty's Government decided against any worsening in the services given, and faced up squarely to the need for increased postal charges, unpopular though such a step was bound to be. Even so, the new tariffs were not introduced until justification for the increased charges had been the subject of searching examination by the National Board for Prices and Incomes. My Lords, I told the House previously that our prices represent very good value in comparison with postal charges elsewhere, as has been admitted to-night, and that remains true to-day. From the point of view of revenue alone, it would have been sufficient to put a penny on ordinary letters and a penny on printed papers, and to leave the services as they were. This would have had the merit of simplicity and, although unwelcome, it would have been comprehended by everybody. But there was much more to the problem which faced the Post Office than that.
The ideal, as the House will know, is to sort and dispatch the same evening all letters posted by the end of the normal working day and deliver them, save in some very remote areas, next day, and preferably early the next morning. It has long been recognised, however, that this ideal could not be attained in practice because of the bulk of letters to be handled. For many years before the present system was introduced postings had been divided, as has now been understood, into two main streams with fully paid letters in one and printed papers at a lower rate of postage in the other. As my noble friend Lord Geddes of Epsom pointed out, it was only by deferring treatment of printed papers until later that the post offices were able to ensure that fully paid letters received priority for inclusion in mails giving, for the most part, delivery the next day. The principle of segregating and deferring lower-paid mail is not, I must emphasise, a new one.
One of the operational problems over the years has been that too much mail reaches sorting offices after 4 o'clock in the afternoon, and, in spite of publicity campaigns for earlier posting, the peaks of traffic received during the evening have become more acute. At some offices evening postings account for 75 to 80 per cent. of the total postings for
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the day, and, even though printed papers were put on one side, it was becoming increasingly difficult to sort and dispatch the fully paid letters within the time available. These letters had to be processed within an hour or two of receipt to catch the night trains and air services to all parts of the United Kingdom, and it was clear that, with their number increasing year by year, an almost impossible operational problem would develop. Something had to be done to prevent the serious undermining of the vital overnight service given to fully paid letters. Experience over the years showed that appeals to post early in the day were unlikely to have anything more than very marginal effect, and other means had to be sought to reduce the peaks of work.
LORD WAKEFIELD OF KENDAL: My Lords, may I ask the noble Lord one question at this stage? Is there any reason why everybody posting a letter before noon (shall we say?) should not pay 4d. and everybody posting a letter after noon pay 5d.? In that way you give an incentive to post early, rather than just asking them to do it.
LORD BOWLES: My Lords, I answered a Starred Question on this point in this House by the noble Lord, Lord Inglewood, before the last Recess. My right honourable friend also answered a Question the other day in another place. What he said was:
"No. The increase in postage was necessary to enable the Post Office to meet its financial target.
"We have for many years encouraged the early posting of printed papers by despatching on the same day those posted before an advertised time, but the quantity posted early remained very small.
"If we arranged that letters posted after a fixed time would be delivered next day at an extra charge, there would be serious practical difficulties in preventing posting of lower-rate items after the prescribed time and in handling them. A better way of meeting customers' posting needs, and of assisting postal operations, is to give the customer a choice of service throughout the day …"—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Commons, 17/10/68, col. 160.]
If the noble Lord would be good enough to look up the debate on the Starred Question in this House—he can find it through the Library—I am sure he will

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find that the noble Lord, Lord Inglewood, was quite satisfied that, even if he posted his letters in Carlisle, where I think he lives, before 11 o'clock or 12 o'clock, or whatever time the noble Lord thinks, they still would not get to Manchester before 5 or 6 o'clock, which is the peak time there. That is really the answer. It was a sensible thought on the part of the noble Lord. I had it myself once, but I have since given it up.
My Lords, it may be argued that one way out of the dilemma would be to recruit more staff, but this has its difficulties. I would ask noble Lords to think for a moment about the conditions in which many of our postal staff have to operate. Some are regularly on late night duties, missing the normal social intercourse with their families and friends taken for granted in many other walks of life; and some come on duty at 5 a.m. or earlier and go out on delivery by 7 a.m. in all weathers. Some work at these hours is inevitable, but surely the Post Office was right in endeavouring to ease the burden placed on its staff by seeking other means to reduce the peaks of work.
It was known that many letters sent by ordinary post were not urgent, and that senders would have been content for them to go by the slower printed paper post had they been admissible in that service. My noble friend Lord Geddes pointed out the difficulty of this. The illogicality of the old system was simply that senders could choose the cheaper and slower service only if their mail happened to fall into certain categories, as he pointed out. These categories bore no relation to handling costs or other operational requirements. Moreover, the alignment of lower price with contents meant that all printed paper mail had to be in envelopes left open for inspection. This was a nuisance to many business houses, and was becoming increasingly a nuisance to the Post Office because such letters could not easily be handled by the mechanised sorting equipment which the noble Earl. Lord Ferrers, must have seen at Norwich. I was very glad that he went there. He seemed very surprised that I knew he had been there, but we are a communications Department. He said that people came from all over the world to admire the sorting office there
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because it was the best in the world, and then went on to run it down and say that it was much less satisfactory. How can he contradict even himself so much as that without noticing it?
EARL FERRERS: My Lords, with great respect to the noble Lord, I think he has taken the thing slightly out of context. I did not denigrate the Norwich sorting office. I said that it was the best in the world. All I was asking was: Why are the others not like it?
LORD BOWLES: I am coming to that point when I deal with the noble Earl's speech in a little more detail. The fact is that he said that people come from all over the world to see it, and then went on to contradict himself in his next sentence. The noble Earl will see when he reads his own speech to-morrow, as I hope and am sure he will, that I am not misrepresenting what he said.
As has been said, prior to the introduction of the two-tier system postings were roughly in the proportion of 60 per cent. fully paid mail to 40 per cent. at the printed paper rate. To put it sharply and simply, the Post Office wanted to have a minority of the mail fully paid instead of vice versa. This could be achieved only by the movement, through exercise of consumer choice, of a great mass of mail from the more expensive into the slower and cheaper service. This the two-tier system was designed to achieve, and the forecast made before it was introduced, of 32 per cent. in the first-class and 68 per cent. in the second, was in practice very near the mark. At present, 33 per cent. of all postings are first-class; so that estimate was not too bad.
I think it will be agreed that action was necessary to safeguard the overnight service for higher-paid letters, and I believe that the course adopted was the only one open to my right honourable friend the Postmaster General. My Lords, I can say quite categorically that the new arrangements have not brought about any deterioration in the service given to the higher-paid letters. Routine sampling undertaken at Post Offices up and down the country shows that 94 per cent. of 5d. stamped letters are delivered the day after posting. This compares more favourably with 92 per cent. of

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fully paid letters during the year preceding the change.
The Post Office was not content to rely on these samples alone, and there are many facts to support the figure I have quoted. There have been special examinations, both at postal delivery offices and upon receipt of the mail at the premises of business houses and commercial undertakings. I do not propose to burden your Lordships with too many examples; but those that I give will, I am sure, impress the House and perhaps will make certain noble Lords feel a little sorry for what they have said. At Oxford and Cambridge, Post Office representatives visiting a number of large business firms found that 97 per cent. of the first-class mail received from all over the country was delivered by the day following.
Two large mail order firms at Bradford advised the Post Office that they had received 95 per cent. and 97 per cent. respectively of their mail the day after it was posted. Examinations of mail for firms in the North-West of England showed that, in the main, at least 94 per cent.—in some cases as much as 97 per cent. and 98 per cent.—was received the next day. In South-West England special examinations at six large Post Offices showed the figure as 97 per cent.
In Wales. checks at customers' premises showed the position at both Cardiff and Swansea to be 96 per cent. At Chester a similar check revealed 94 per cent.
In Sheffield visits to major firms showed that 99 per cent. of first-class mail secured next-day delivery.
Support for the good standards of service comes not from noble Lords in this House, but from the Chairman of the Sheffield Post Office Advisory Committee. At a Post Office Users' Council meeting with Chairmen of Post Office Advisory Committees in North East England he said:
"Sheffield Post Office Advisory Committee has conducted independent inquiries into the quality of service since the two tier system was introduced. The evidence shows that in Sheffield 97 per cent. of the first-class mail is being delivered by first post the next morning and has convinced us that nearly all the delays for which the Post Office is blamed originate with the senders, particularly post-room staff misdating meter franks or posting at
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places remote from the place of origin and later than they are supposed to."
Then my right honourable friend Mr. Stonehouse, in a speech on November 4 last said:
"I have a number of examples here: for instance, 12,000 items between 10th and 20th October, from leading firms in the City, with a whole number of irregularities, mail sometimes being posted with the date on the envelope six or seven days before the actual date of posting."—[OFFICIAL., REPORT, Commons, Col. 613; 4/11/68.]
You get this and you make up your mind that this is really what is happening. It is not done by the Post Office; but by people who are careless or perhaps trying to obstruct the general acceptance of this scheme by the public as a whole. My right honourable friend continued:
"There are these irregularities, and the failure rate on the part of some of these business firms in posting their mail is far greater than the one per cent. failure rate for which the Post Office itself may be responsible.
"I have here a whole bundle of irregularities committed by business firms which then complain because their mail appears to be delivered late. Last Friday, for example, in Central London, 2,700 items were handed in with Thursday's date, 31st October, on the envelopes. I could cite many other examples."
I warn my noble friends on both sides of the House to go easy on this.
Again, at a recent meeting members of the London Chamber of Commerce (perhaps the noble Lord, Lord Erroll of Hale, if he had been here might have made some comment on this), major users of the post, commented favourably on our arrangements. Elsewhere the Post Office Advisory Committees in Aberdeen and Edinburgh and the Chamber of Commerce in Aberdeen have all expressed satisfaction with the service given.
I agree that these results have been achieved against the background of a smaller volume of first class mail (33 per cent. of total postings) as compared with the fully paid mail prior to September (60 per cent. of all mail posted). But even so, they are encouraging. During the early days of the new service, there was considerable criticism of the treatment of second-class mail and many complaints about unnecessary delay. At that time full priority was given to first-class mail and the locally posted second-class mail was not then included in first deliveries the next day. This was because we did not know what the proportions of first and second-class mail were

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likely to be. My right honourable friend decided however, after the Post Office had experience of the division, that some relaxation could be made. In full co-operation with the union concerned it was arranged that first deliveries should be filled up with second-class mail when this could be done without prejudice to first-class mail. Since then the quality of service of second-class mail has improved and routine sampling shows that 94 per cent. of letters stamped 4d. are delivered within two days of posting. This is borne out by special examination at Birmingham where the figure was 95 per cent. At Sheffield it was 96 per cent; at a mail order firm in Bradford 96 per cent. also. At Cardiff, Swansea and Chester checks at customers' premises showed 98, 95, and 96 per cent. respectively. Examinations made in the North-West of England, including Liverpool and Manchester, revealed that in some instances 98 per cent. was delivered within two days of posting.
The noble Earl, Lord Ferrers, may feel very suspicious of statistics. These are not from the Post Office. Some are from their soundings but others are from very responsible bodies. If he can disbelieve these figures and believe the handful of five or six letters that he showed us, then he must be easily convinced. I do not think this is like him. I know him well. I have no ill feelings about this whatever.
I trust, my Lords, that there is no misunderstanding about the quality of service for second-class letters. About 41 per cent. of letters with 4d. stamps are delivered with first-class mail by the next day and about 53 per cent. the following day. The decision taken by my right honourable friend which I have already mentioned means that many letters for local delivery get first-class treatment for 4d. But a service of this sort cannot be guaranteed or advertised, for the principle of priority for 5d. mail is inviolate and we must look to the occasions when 4d. local letters have to take second place to first-class mail. The period of very heavy postings before Christmas is always an anxious time for the Post Office, but it was decided that to give the maximum benefit possible to 5d. mail the segregation of first and second-class letters would continue throughout the period. This was a cal-
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culated risk, but I am happy to say that the result was an appreciably better service for higher paid mail than in previous years. At times of pressure such as Christmas the routine records of quality of service cannot be maintained, but it is known that in some parts of the country around 90 per cent. was delivered within two days of posting. A service of this kind at this time of year was particularly appreciated by commerce and industry, and it is fair to say that it could not have been achieved but for the two-tier system.
At the beginning of November my right honourable friend the Postmaster General arranged for one of the postal regional directors to conduct a full survey of the two-tier system and to report at the end of six months. One of the matters the survey is covering is the identification, with a view to their elimination, of weak points in the mail handling and transport systems which can lead to failures in service. Already certain improvements have been made and others found to be possible will be implemented without awaiting publication of the report. In the meantime, the issue of the new 4d. definitive stamp, red in colour, on January 6 should lead to improved segregation of first-class and second-class letters at the first handling stage. This in turn should reduce the risk of first-class letters receiving second-class treatment.
The noble Lord, Lord Airedale, was kind enough to write me a letter, and this is the reply that I should like to give him. The noble Lord suggested that the Post Office had not saved much money by confining to newly published newspapers the concession of being given first-class service at second-class rates. He feels that this concession should be extended also to people who are sending old newspapers to their friends. In reply to his point I would ask the House to recall what is one of the main reasons for the introduction of the two-tier service; namely, the need to reduce the volume of mail being handled during the expensive evening peak of work in sorting offices. If someone wants to have a newspaper, or any other letter or package, handled urgently during the peak period, he can choose to do so by paying the first-class rate. If he does not mind desperately about its being delivered a

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day later, he can freely decide to post it at second-class mail rate. Naturally, many people who are sending on newspapers which are already old choose the latter alternative, since speed is no longer of the essence, and I see little reason or justification for giving these old newspapers any preferential treatment over ordinary correspondence.
When it comes to new newspapers, however, there is some reason for a concession. The simple fact is that many new newspapers have to go first-class if they are to go by post at all. People do not like to pay for newly published newspapers that arrive a day late. Thus, if there had been no concession, publishers of newspapers, or perhaps their subscribers, would have been more or less obliged last year to take on a double increase in postage, from 3d., the old printed paper and newspaper rate, to 5d., the new first-class letter rate. In addition, newspapers are generally posted in bulk, so that they are simpler for the Post Office to handle than those posted singly. Finally, I would stress to the noble Lord that the concession extends only to newspapers registered at the Post Office. The qualifications for this are fairly strict. For example, all fortnightly or monthly periodicals are excluded, but a local weekly newspaper, if registered, may be sent under the terms of the concession if it is posted by the publisher or the newsagent.
The noble Lord, Lord Denham, referred to the introduction of the scheme, and I am authorised to say that if he cares to read the Report of the debate in the House of Commons last week he will find that the Postmaster General said all this quite clearly. But just to have it on the Record here I would say this. It was in some ways a pity (we are admitting the mistake as he asked us to do; and we do not mind) that the new service was introduced concurrently with the tariff increase. Had it been possible to have a straight price increase, followed six or nine months later by the introduction of the two-tier system, it would have been acknowledged as a worth-while concession. As it is, the two-tier system is fulfilling the purpose for which it was designed; that is. to reduce the traffic peaks and safeguard the priority of higher-paid letters.
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The noble Earl, Lord Ferrers, asked about Havant. I hope that by now the noble Earl understands what the answer is going to be—though I do not know: he could not have learned very much from his visit. Let me try to explain again. The noble Earl referred to the treatment of first-class and second-class letters posted at Havant, Hampshire. The House is aware that the aim is to get all the first-class letters away by the key night trains for delivery next day. For example, the first-class letter posted at the main post office at Havant by 6.30 p.m. should catch the mail train serving the Western, North-Eastern and North-Western parts of the country; and a first-class letter for London should be delivered next day if posted as late as 8.30 p.m. But the Post Office cannot deal with second-class letters at this speed, and the course adopted is to get the 5d. letters on their way as early as possible and to let the 4d. letters follow later. Most of the second-class mail is, in fact, despatched from Havant to all parts of the country by 8.30 p.m., but where direct mails to distant parts are not warranted, the remaining correspondence is sent to Portsmouth at the same time for inclusion in mails front that office. Generally the 4d. mail is delivered as advertised by the next but one working day.
EARL FERRERS: My Lords, I think the noble Lord has missed the point altogether. My information is that both 4d. and 5d. mail goes to Havant station. The 5d. mail goes in one direction and the 4d. mail goes in the opposite direction, although they are both designed to go to London. Does the noble Lord say that this does not happen?
LORD BOWLES: No, my Lords, I say that it does happen.
EARL FERRERS: Then is not that a very odd thing?
LORD BOWLES: My Lords, the noble Earl does not seem to follow very much of what is going on in this debate. The whole point is exactly that. We give priority to letters that are stamped 5d. and do not give priority, or the same priority, to those not stamped so much.
EARL FERRERS: My Lords, I really must interrupt the noble Lord. if the 5d. letter goes on the fast train to London, does he say that, because the 4d. letter gets a lesser priority, it therefore has to go in the opposite direction to Portsmouth?
LORD BOWLES: My Lords, it gets on the Portsmouth train which is not getting in the way of the first-class mail from Havant.
EARL FERRERS: Why cannot it go on the train to London?
LORD BOWLES: I do not think that the noble Earl will ever understand.
EARL FERRERS: I do not think the noble Lord opposite does, for he has not answered the question.
LORD BOWLES: Yes I have: five or ten times.
Now, my Lords, we have had a lot of talk about the Post Office. We admit—
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some of us— that it is the best in the world. I do not know whether any of your Lordships have ever been to the United States. People do not talk very highly of the post there. I should like to tell the House, and the country, and the B.B.C. and everybody else, that the United States Post Office runs with a large deficit. The deficit is of the order of over £400 million a year. This loss is greater than the total postal income of the British Post Office, which, for the year ended March, 1968, was a little under £360 million. So the United States Post Office is losing each year more than the whole of our postal revenue.
My Lords, I remember having a very amusing conversation with the noble Earl a little while ago. He said that an ancestor of his on the way to his execution wore the same clothes as he did on his wedding day. He was asked why this was so and he said, "Well, these are the two unhappiest days of my life." I hope that after this debate the noble Earl will not feel so depressed.