Lords Sitting of 13 February 1969

Preamble
The House met at three of the clock: The LORD CHANCELLOR On the Woolsack.
Prayers—Read by the Lord Bishop of St. Albans

CHILDREN'S ANORAK CORDS
LORD CROOK: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
[The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they are aware that, despite the information as to children's deaths resulting from the use of anoraks, and the request of the Home Office, as indicated in this House, on July 9 last, that garments produced thereafter should have "certain safety modifications", a national Sunday newspaper has alleged that there were recent sales of dangerous garments at one store in Weymouth and three in Colchester which they are prepared to name; and what further action the Home Office is taking in this matter.]
THE MINISTER OF STATE, HOME OFFICE (LORD STONHAM): My Lords, I understand that the anoraks offered for sale in Weymouth were a small number from old stock. In the Colchester case we are pursuing the matter with the suppliers. We propose to remind the trade of the recommendations concerning children's anoraks which were issued last year.
LORD CROOK: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for his valuable Answer. Following on the excellent action taken last year, after several children had died, can the noble Lord inform the House what firm action is being taken by the Home Office to deal with this matter, and why it must be left to the People newspaper to maintain an agitation? Further, may I ask whether he is aware that since this Question was put down a firm of the mail order type has issued a catalogue with the same dangerous anoraks pictured in them?
LORD STONHAM: My Lords, we are very grateful to the People newspaper for the public-spirited attitude shown in this matter, and for bringing these exceptional—I think very exceptional—cases to light. With regard to the action that we have taken, the firm at Weymouth, Woolworth's, have said that as soon as the Home Office recommendations were issued they asked their suppliers to discontinue the use of draw-cords in the hoods of these anoraks. Apparently they continued to sell some stock, but since this question was raised some pile fabric coats having these hoods have been withdrawn from sale. There was one firm at Colchester which, in fact, ordered the right kind and had them delivered, but subsequently the suppliers sent the wrong type, and we are taking the matter up with the suppliers so that this does not occur again. With regard to the mail order firm, this was an old catalogue issued in August last year before they had our instructions. Their new catalogue contains only anoraks with hoods of the correct and safe type.
LORD CROOK: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for his reply.
LORD INGLEWOOD: My Lords, is not the same principle to be found in the construction of Peers' robes?
LORD STONHAM: Yes, my Lords; but Peers are not in the habit of sliding down those little children's chutes which causes the draw-cords to catch them by the throat.
LORD CROOK: My Lords, may I ask the noble Lord whether Peers' robes have toggles on them?
LORD STONHAM: My Lords, of course that is another point: Peers' robes have neither toggles nor acorns.

GATWICK AIRPORT: PROPOSED RUNWAY EXTENSIONS
3.8 p.m.
LORD MACPHERSON OF DRUMOCHTER: 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 progress the British Airports Authority has made in—
1. Building a second runway at Gatwick;
2. Extending the existing runway so that this Airport can handle the DC8s in the summer season of 1969.]
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, I understand from the British Airports Authority that these developments are under consideration but that they have, as yet, taken no decision on whether or not to seek planning permission for either project. Neither project can come into operation this summer.
LORD MACPHERSON 0F DRUMOCHTER: My Lords, while thanking the Minister for that reply, may I ask him whether he is aware that in their Annual Report for 1967–68 the British Airports Authority stressed the need for a second runway? I would also ask the Minister whether it is the intention that Stansted be used for these large DC.8 aircraft during the coming year, and is it the Government's intention to give permission for these huge aircraft to operate during the night?
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, the answer to the first of the three questions is, Yes; I did know that it was in the Report. As to the second question, if it is possible for the British Airports Authority to use the facilities now available at Stansted, then obviously they will do so before committing themselves to the expenditure necessary for the second runway at Gatwick.
BARONESS HORSBRUGH: My Lords, could the noble Lord say whether there is a priority list for these airports? Have they remembered Turnhouse?
LORD TREFGARNE: My Lords, reverting to the original Question, is it not the case that an additional runway at Gatwick will not result in doubling the capacity of that airport? Is it not the case that the topographical restrictions on the construction of a second runway will result only in some 15 or 20 per cent. increase in traffic there?
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, it is the case that if there were a second runway at Gatwick it would not double the capacity of the airport. It is also the case that the British Airports Authority have made provision for the necessary expenditure
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on a second runway within the next five years. All that I have said before—I know what the noble Lord is getting at—is that the British Airports Authority have made their calculations on the basis of a second runway at Gatwick.
THE EARL OF KINNOULL: My Lords, could the noble Lord confirm whether a public inquiry will be necessary before a second runway is built?
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, planning permission will have to be obtained in the usual way.
THE EARL OF KINNOULL: My Lords, would the noble Lord also confirm that the second runway is already in the development plan of the Surrey County Council, and therefore planning permission would not necessarily be required?
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, I can only repeat what I have said already: that if there is to be a second runway at Gatwick, planning permission will be required.
LORD MACPHERSON OF DRUMOCHTER: My Lords, could the Minister kindly answer my second point? That is, whether permission will be given for these DC.8 aircraft use Stansted during the night time.
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, as of now there is no embargo on night flying at Stansted.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: My Lords, were not all the calculations with regard to the time when a third London Airport would be required based on the assumption that long before then there would be a second runway at Gatwick? What is holding up the development of the second runway? The noble Lord said that the British Airports Authority have the matter under consideration. But surely it should be proceeded with if there is a real need for further airport access.
LORD BESWICK: Yes, my Lords; as the noble and learned Viscount has said, the calculations to which we referred in the discussions we have had on this problem took into account the traffic which would be possible at Gatwick if there were a second runway. But at the

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moment there are assets under-used at Stansted, and nothing has been said in this House, or in any other House, which suggests that those assets should not reasonably be used while they are there. But that does not mean to say that within the five-year programme a start would not be made on the construction of the second runway at Gatwick, if it is necessary.
LORD TREFGARNE: My Lords, can the noble Lord say whether it is the intention of the British Airports Authority to extend the hours of operation at Stansted this summer to continue right through the night, as happened last summer? I believe that at the moment it shuts at 11 o'clock at night.
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, I will find out the answer and let the noble Lord know.

STANSTED AIRPORT TRAFFIC
LORD MACPHERSON OF DRUMOCHTER: 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 was the number of air transport movements and the number of passengers handled at Stansted during the last six months of 1968 and similar figures for the last six months of 1967.]
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, there were 2,332 air transport movements at Stansted in the last six months of 1968, and 234 in the last six months of 1967. The numbers of passengers were 111,135 and 9,005 respectively.

DISPOSAL OF SEIZED ENEMY PROPERTY
3.15 p.m.
LORD ST. OSWALD: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
[The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what was the total value of assets taken over and lodged with the Custodian of Enemy Property during the Second World War; from which countries it was taken over; what
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part of the total was handed back to those countries or their nationals after the War, and what part still remains in the hands of the Custodian.]
THE MINISTER OF STATE, BOARD OF TRADE (LORD BROWN): My Lords, the Custodian of Enemy Property was concerned with the assets of both belligerent and technical enemies. After the war the assets of the former were passed over to Administrators of Enemy Property established under the Treaty of Peace Orders or similar British legislation. The amount involved for all these Administrators was about £34 million. Assets of technical enemies were returned to them either directly or through Money and Property Agreements with the countries concerned. The assets of technical enemies still held amount to about £7½ million.
LORD ST. OSWALD: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord for that answer. Unless I missed what he said, I think that he left out one point on which I required an answer, as to the total taken from the technical enemies. He helpfully subdivided it, but I should like to know what in fact was the total taken from the technical enemies.
LORD BROWN: My Lords, these may seem the sort of figures which should be easily produced, but I am sure noble Lords will realise in relation to these accounts that there has been a constant flow through of funds right from the beginning. Although it would be possible to produce a figure for a single large country, if that were desired, to produce figures for all the countries concerned would be an extremely arduous job. It would also probably require some further definition of phrases like "taken over", "lodged" or "handed back". This subject is a good deal more complex than perhaps the noble Lord realises.
LORD SEGAL: My Lords, in the case of the assets of so-called technical enemies, can my noble friend say whether it is intended to offset them against claims by British nationals for property in the possession of these particular Powers?
LORD BROWN: My Lords, this is the normal procedure in respect of some groups of countries where large counterclaims have not been easily realised. The noble Lord will realise that this has taken

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place with regard to certain Baltic countries in the last year or so.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: My Lords, the noble Lord said that the assets of some technical enemies were returned to them. Could the noble Lord indicate on what principles that was done, and also could he indicate who were the technical enemies who had their property returned to them?
LORD BROWN: My Lords, the technical enemies were, for example, the Channel Islands, France, Belgium and countries which were not directly in conflict with us at all. The procedure of returning funds to them varied considerably, but many of these funds were returned simply on the basis of application and proof that the persons applying had legal entitlement to the funds which were held by us.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: My Lords, leaving on one side for the moment the Baltic States and the ceded territories, can the noble Lord give any case where the assets of a technical enemy have been devoted to meeting other people's claims?
LORD BROWN: My Lords, I should need notice of that question. The question whether they have been used in compensation against claims by others is, I should think, likely to arise, but I should need notice in regard to a list of any specific cases.
VISCOUNT COLVILLE OF CULROSS: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Brown, said that the property still retained amounted to about £7½million. Could he say whether that relates to the technical enemies, or to the real enemies whose funds were dealt with through administrators, or both? Could he break down the figure?
LORD BROWN: My Lords, the £7½ million is made up largely of Baltic assets. The figure for these Baltic assets has already been given in a Written Answer in Hansard. It amounts to £6½million. The remainder, therefore, is £1million, and this applies to a fairly substantial range of countries and, of course, embodies fairly small amounts.
LORD ST. OSWALD: My Lords, I do not want to be over-persistent in this matter, since I appreciate that the noble
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Lord is trying to help, but I cannot understand—
SEVERAL NOBLE LORDS: Question!
LORD ST. OSWALD: Perhaps the noble Lord will explain to me whether or not what he calls the through-flow of these assets was not cut off at 1945. Therefore I am asking whether since 1945 the through-flow could possibly have continued. Is the noble Lord not able to deduct the £34 million from the total assets held by, or vested in, the Custodian and thereby arrive at the assets once taken over from technical enemies?
LORD BROWN: My Lords, I assure the noble Lord that this is a much more complicated issue than he imagines, as I myself discovered this morning when I had a discussion with the Comptroller. If it will help the noble Lord, I can certainly arrange for him to meet the official concerned, so that he nay go deeply into the matter.

BACON MARKET SHARING UNDERSTANDING
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, at a convenient moment after half-past three I shall be making a Statement on the renewed Bacon Market Sharing Understanding.
BRITISH TRANSPORT DOCKS BILL [H.L.]
Read 2a, and committed to a Select Committee.
LEVER PARK BILL [H.L.]
Read 2a, and committed to the Committee on Unopposed Bills.
LIVERPOOL CORPORATION BILL [H.L.]
Read 2a, and committed to a Select Committee.
PORTSMOUTH CORPORATION BILL [H.L.]
Read 2a, and committed to the Committee on Unopposed Bills.
AGE OF MAJORITY (SCOTLAND) BILL [H.L.]
Read 3a, and passed, and sent to the Commons.

SHARING OF CHURCH BUILDINGS BILL [H.L.]
3.21 p.m.
THE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY: My Lords, I beg to move that the House do now resolve itself into Committee on this Bill.
Moved, That the House do now resolve itself into Committee.—(The Lord Archbishop of Canterbury.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House in Committee accordingly.
[The EARL OF LISTOWEL in the Chair.]
Clause 1 [Agreements for sharing church buildings]:
THE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY THE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY moved Amendment No. 1:
Page 2, line 30, at end insert—
("() Where a see is vacant, or the bishop of the diocese is unable because of illness or absence to give his consent under subsection (4) of this section, the archbishop of the province may appoint by an instrument under his hand a suffragan or assistant bishop or an archdeacon of the diocese to act in place of the bishop under the said subsection for a period specified in the instrument; and in the event of a vacancy in the see of an archbishop or his illness or absence, an appointment under this subsection, either in respect of the see of the archbishop or another see in the province, may be made by the other archbishop.")
The most reverend Primate said: The purpose of this Amendment is to provide for what may happen at the time when a see is vacant and the problem of the sharing of a church building needs urgently to be proceeded with. The Amendment provides that in those circumstances the Archbishop of the Province may appoint a suffragan or assistant bishop or an archdeacon of the diocese to act in place of the Bishop for the purposes of the Bill. I beg to move.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 1, as amended, agreed to.
Clauses 2 to 13 agreed to.
Clause 14 [Extent]:
LORD STONHAM LORD STONHAM moved Amendment No. 2:
Page 12, line 8, after the second("such") insert ("exceptions, adaptations or")
The noble Lord said: This Amendment has been requested by the authorities in the Isle of Man in order that the subsection may use the customary formula of exceptions and adaptations, as well as modifications, when referring to the application of an Act of Parliament in the Isle of Man. I beg to move.
THE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY: I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Stonham, for moving this Amendment, which is an improvement of the Bill. I want to express my appreciation of his great interest and helpfulness.
On Questions, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 14, as amended, agreed to.
Remaining clause agreed to.
Schedule 1 agreed to.
Schedule 2 [Churches and their appropriate Authorities]:
THE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY THE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY moved Amendment No. 3.
Page 14, line 32, at end insert—

("Any Congregation of the Association of Churches of Christ in Great Britain and Ireland.

As respects section 1(3) and (4), the Annual Conference of the Association of Churches of Christ acting with the concurrence of the duly constituted Church meeting.

As respects section 1(7), the Annual Conference of the Association of Churches of Christ.")

The most reverend Primate said: The purpose of this Amendment is to add another Church to the list of those covered by the provisions of the Bill. When the Bill has been passed, it will be possible by a very easy procedure for other Churches to bring themselves within its operation, but already, before the Bill has passed, this particular Christian body —the Association of Churches of Christ in Great Britain and Ireland—has expressed a wish to be covered by the Bill. That is the reason for my Amendment, which provides for the inclusion of this

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Church within the Bill and which also states clearly the authorities entitled to act for it. I beg to move.
LORD SANDFORD: I am sure we are all glad to see a seventh denomination joining the six which took part in the framing of this legislation, but I think I am right in saying that there are a considerable further number of Churches—the Salvation Army, the Lutherans, the Greek Orthodox—who are all represented on the British Council of Churches. This fact prompts me to ask whether we are to infer that this Church—the Association of Churches of Christ—is the only one which at the moment feels it wants to join in this scheme. Or are we to infer that there are a considerable number of other denominations who are considering joining this scheme but have not yet decided what they are going to do?
THE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY: The noble Lord's phrase "joining this scheme" is a little misleading. The text of the Bill covers all Churches who are members of the British Council of Churches, which is a very large number of Churches in this country, and Churches not in that category can make a special application subsequently. The list in this Schedule is limited, because these were the Churches which took part in the negotiations for the actual construction of the Bill. I assure the noble Lord that there will be no difficulty whatever in other Churches enjoying with us the provisions of this Bill. I can also assure him of the fact that this Bill is widely known among all the Churches in the country.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Schedule 2, as amended, agreed to.
House resumed: Bill reported, with Amendments.

FOREIGN COMPENSATION BILL
3.30 p.m.
THE MINISTER OF STATE, FOREIGN AND COMMONWEALTH OFFICE (LORD CHALFONT): My Lords, I beg to move that the House do now resolve itself into Committee on this Bill.
Moved, That the House do now resolve itself into Committee.—(Lord Chalfont.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House in Committee accordingly.
[The EARL OF LISTOWEL in the Chair.]
Clause 1 [Extension of power to deal with property of Baltic States and ceded territories]:
VISCOUNT DILHORNE VISCOUNT DILHORNE moved Amendment No. 1:
Page 2, line 1, leave out ("or ceded territory").
The noble Viscount said: In the absence of my noble friend Lord Lansdowne, as I think this Committee stage has come on a little earlier than was expected, I beg to move the Amendment standing in his name and mine. This Amendment raises the question of whether the powers given to the Board of Trade and to the Custodian, about which I shall have something to say, should extend to the disposal or other dealing with "former property of" a ceded territory. I ask your Lordships to note that the words in the Bill are "former property" of such a territory, and the words "former property" are defined in Clause 3 as meaning:
"any property which on any of the relevant dates belonged to or was held or managed on behalf of an individual resident or carrying on business"
in any ceded territory; any property which, within a specified period, belonged to a body corporate or unincorporate; and also
"any gold, securities, or credit balance at a bank with respect to which a direction was given"
under the Defence (Finance) Regulations.
We are thus dealing with what was—and I do not think there can be any dispute about this—the property of individuals and bodies corporate and unincorporate, not with the property belonging to any State. This was, I think, frankly admitted by the Under-Secretary in another place when he spoke on November 19. So this clause purports to deal with the former property of these persons, and the first question to which I hope to get a clear and specific answer—and I am very glad to see that the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor is here—is: when did it cease to be their property?
Your Lordships will note that there is a discrepancy between the Explanatory Memorandum and subsection (1). The Explanatory Memorandum says:
"This Bill makes provision…for the disposal of…property…of persons formerly resident or carrying on business in one of the Baltic States"
or a ceded territory. It does not say, "for the disposal of property which was formerly the property of persons" so resident, and so on, but specifically treats the property as still belonging to those persons. Indeed, the Government appear to recognise that this is the position, for I put down a Question for Written Answer asking Her Majesty's Government:
"The appropriate value of the property of persons formerly resident or carrying on business in"
these territories
"now vested in the Custodian of Enemy Property".—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 11 /2/69, col. 411.]
Your Lordships will notice that the language of that Question was in accordance with that of the Explanatory Memorandum.
In his Written Answer the noble Lord, Lord Chalfont, did not say that such persons no longer had any such property; he did not say that their "former property" was worth so much; he apparently accepted that the property in the hands of the Custodian was still their property. Really, before we proceed much further with this Bill I suggest that we ought to be told in clear terms whether those persons have any rights at all to what was admittedly their property originally. If they still have some rights, then is the effect of the Bill to deprive them of those rights, and so is the Bill itself confiscatory? If, on the other hand, they have ceased to have any rights in respect of these assets, as the language of the Bill itself suggests, we ought to be told how and in what manner that came about. Of course, while this Amendment deals only with the property of people who were resident in the ceded territories, the same question arises with regard to the Baltic assets.
I assume that the assets in relation to the residents of the ceded territories, which the noble Lord, Lord Chalfont, stated amounted to about £35,000, reached the hands of the Custodian of Enemy
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Property as a result of an Order under the Trading with the Enemy Act 1939. Section 7 of that Act gave the Board of Trade power:
"With a view to preventing payment of money to enemies and of preserving enemy property in contemplation of arrangements to be made at the conclusion of peace…"
to appoint Custodians and by Order to require the payment of money to them, and power to vest in the Custodian any such enemy property as might be prescribed. It also gave the Board of Trade power by Order to
"confer…such rights, powers, duties and liabilities as may be prescribed as respects…property…so vested,…"
But I can find nothing in that Act which explicitly deprives, or gives power to deprive, the owners of such property of all their rights. It would seem that vesting in the Custodian operated merely to suspend until the termination of the war what were their clear rights.
Under that Act, the Trading with the Enemy (Custodian) Order 1939 was made, and under that Order certain powers were given to the Custodian with regard to the property which became vested in him. Paragraph 2(iii) of the Order says that a vesting Order made by the Board of Trade:
"shall be of the like purport and effect as a vesting order…made by the High Court under the Trustee Act 1925…"
But there is nothing explicit in that Order, so far as I can see, to deprive the owners of the property of all their rights with regard to it. Their right to have their property under their control is clearly suspended; the property has to go to the Custodian, and he has to hold it subject to any directions from the Board of Trade. Paragraph 3(i) of the Order says that, subject to such directions, he shall hold the property vested in him until the termination of the war,
"and shall thereafter deal with the same in such manner as the Board of Trade shall direct".
Paragraph 3(ii) is not unimportant. It gives the Custodian power, under directions of the Board of Trade, to transfer property vested in him
"to or for the benefit of the person who would have been entitled thereto but for the operation of the Act or any Order…"
The noble Lord, Lord Brown, has told us, in answer to a Question, that assets have been returned to technical enemies

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of this country since the termination of the war (and of course, in considering this Bill, and the assets which are the subject of this Bill, we are considering the assets of those who were technical enemies of this country), but he was unable to give a single instance where this Government had taken hold of those technical assets, had not endeavoured to return them to their former owners and had distributed them to meet British claims. The noble Lord, Lord Brown—I asked him only a few moments ago, as Members of the Committee will recollect—was unable to give a single instance of that; but that is what this Bill proposes to do.
I mention that Order in some detail because it appears to me that under this Order the Board of Trade have the power to direct the Custodian to dispose of the property vested in him, and indeed to return it to those who would have been entitled to it but for the operation of the Act. I put this question. If those are the existing powers, why then do we have Clause 1(1) in this Bill at all? If, as would appear, the Board of Trade under the Order can direct the Custodian to dispose of property vested in him to any person, why is it necessary to have this legislation with this provision? I must confess that I do not understand it. It is true to say that there is a positive jungle of Orders made under the Act of 1939, and I may have missed something—I should not be in the least surprised if that were so. But as I see it, in the light of such investigations as I have been able to make, all this subsection seeks to do in relation to property vested in the Custodian which belongs or belonged to individuals or bodies corporate or unincorporate, resident or carrying on business in the ceded territories, can be done under existing powers.
I therefore suspect that the real object of this Part of the Bill is to get Parliament to agree to the permanent extinction of the rights of the owners of this property and to agree to its being used to give to other persons; or, alternatively, that the Foreign Office are uncertain as to the position. There is not one word that I can see in the Act of 1939 or the Orders made under it to which I have referred which permanently extinguishes the rights of the owners. The Foreign
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Office and the Government may feel that if this Bill is enacted in its present form confiscatory though its effect may be, they are safe from criticism.
As I have said, Paragraph 3(2) of the Order obviously contemplates that property vested in the Custodian may be returned to the persons who would have been entitled to it but for the vesting Order. Here I want to ask this question. Have the Board of Trade given any directions in relation to these assets under the Order? If so, could we see them or be told what they are? The assets that we are dealing with in this particular Amendment are valued at only £35,000; but has any consideration been given to the return of any part of that sum to those technical enemies who would have been entitled to it but for the vesting in the Custodian? May there not be persons who were not in fact enemies of this country and who were treated as enemies only by virtue of the definition in the Act of 1939, as a result of these territories being overrun by the Germans, and who would now be in a position to establish their entitlement to some part of that £35,000?
If that is the case—and I shall be interested to know whether it has been found that it is not—if they can establish entitlement to any part of the £35,000, should not their claims be met first, before any of the money is used to meet in some part the claims of those who lost as a result of expropriation by the Soviet Union? I ask this question: ought not an opportunity to be given to persons to come forward to claim the property which formerly at least belonged to them? Perhaps such an opportunity has been given. If it has, nothing has been said about it in the debate on the Second Reading in this House or in the debates in another place.
If within a stipulated time no claims are preferred, then I myself can see no objection to the distribution of the unclaimed assets, or the assets to which no claim is established, to meet British creditors, British persons who have suffered as a result of Soviet expropriation. It may be that there will be no claims; that there are no persons or heirs who can prove entitlement to any of the assets. But surely, before disposing of them to meet claims arising out of the actions of the U.S.S.R., the original owners or their heirs should be given the opportunity

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of claiming. This Amendment deals only with the property of former residents and persons carrying on business in the ceded territories, but what I have said seems to me to apply, with at least equal force, in relation to the Baltic assets.
The next question that I should like to raise is about the distribution of the unclaimed assets. I myself would not object to the unclaimed part of the £35,000 being used to meet claims by those who lost in consequence of Soviet action in the ceded territories; but I cannot see that it is equitable or fair that those who lost on account of Soviet action in the Baltic States should have their prospects of compensation diminished because those who had chosen to invest in other countries under different conditions had also lost money. I have put a number of questions to the noble Lord. I hope that he or the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor will be able to give me clear and satisfactory answers to them. I beg to move.
3.47 p.m.
LORD CHALFONT: The noble and learned Viscount referred to the "jungle" of Orders. I have spent a great deal of my time in the jungle and I must confess that I should infinitely prefer to be there than to argue points of law with the noble and learned Viscount. Indeed, I shall make no attempt to do so. The points of law that he has mentioned will in due course be dealt with by my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor, either in the debate on this particular Amendment or at some later stage. That will be for the noble and learned Viscount to influence to a very large extent. What I should like to do is to deal with the specific point of this Amendment, which is to leave out the words "or ceded territory". As the noble and learned Viscount has said, that is really the effect of this particular Amendment. I think he will agree that there are further Amendments on the Marshalled List which are consequential upon it. They are Amendments Nos. 3, 5, 7, 8, 12, 13 and 14: and if the noble and learned Viscount agrees I propose to suggest that the arguments that I shall deploy in answering the moving of this Amendment should apply to those as well.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: May I interrupt the noble Lord? I agree that the
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other Amendments are entirely consequential upon the fate of this one. If this Amendment is carried I apprehend that the Government will accept all the other consequential Amendments; if it is not carried or not accepted then those other Amendments will fall.
LORD CHALFONT: I am indebted to the noble and learned Viscount for that very clear exposition of the situation. This Amendment, then, would have the effect, as the noble and learned Viscount has said, of omitting the assets of persons formerly resident or carrying on business in the ceded territories from the assets to be distributed. I assume that the intention of the Amendment is also that the Order in Council to be made under Clause 2(2) of this Bill should, in consequence, be drawn (if the Bill becomes law) correspondingly so as to exclude claims in respect of the ceded territories.
I should like to address myself simply to this suggestion that the ceded territories should be left out in the distribution of these assets. I must confess that I cannot see any justification at all for the departure from the principle of a common pool which the Government have proposed, throughout this procedure, to follow. The assets, as the noble and learned Viscount has said, have separate territorial origins, but those origins are not now represented by separate Sovereign States. We recognise the Soviet Government as the de facto Government of the former Baltic States and the de jure Government of all the other territories with which we are concerned.
As I explained on the Second Reading of this Bill, we agreed in 1959 to negotiate with the Soviet Union simultaneously on all the claims, together with the Soviet Union's counter-claims on the Soviet assets held in this country, whatever their origin. The Registration Order of 1959 provided for the registration of claims in respect of the ceded territories, and registered ceded territories claims were formally presented to the Soviet Government. The settlement that we reached with the Soviet Union was, as I said on Second Reading, a global one. The essence of it was that each side agreed not to pursue its claims against the other, although neither side recognised the title of the other to any of the assets which it held. The important point I have to make to the Committee is that

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any agreement on a narrower territorial basis would have been unobtainable.
Her Majesty's Government have now to decide what is the best method of compensating all the different categories of claimants out of the assets which the Soviet Union no longer claims. It is the actions by the Soviet Government, actions not confined to the Baltic States, that we are seeking to redress. I cannot believe that the noble and learned Viscount, Lord Dilhorne, is suggesting that there should be a separate fund for each and every territory. If he is, there is equally, it seems to me, no justification for lumping in all the three Baltic States together. But I cannot really believe that the noble and learned Viscount, or any noble Lord, would suggest that we should have a separate pool for each of the three of them.
The Government's view is that these Amendments are defective, since, as at present drafted, their effect is simply to exclude the ceded territories from the Bill without making any alternative provision for compensation of the ceded territories' claimants. These people registered their claims from 1959 onwards, knowing that they would then be put to the Soviet side in the course of the negotiations—
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: Before the noble Lord gets on to that matter, I wonder whether he will deal with one other thing. He referred to the ceded territories and said that we should have to distinguish between the Baltic States if we treated every fund separately. We recognise that territories have been ceded to Russia, do we not? Do we not recognise that in relation to the ceded territories the Russians are the de jure Government, and not de facto?
LORD CHALFONT: As I said earlier, we recognise the Soviet Union as the de jure Government in the case of the ceded territories and the de facto Government in the case of the Baltic States. As I have suggested, we think that this Amendment is defective because if it were accepted the people from the ceded territories would not be included in the distribution, although they registered their claims from 1959 onwards knowing that they would then be put to the Soviet side in the negotiations that we were having; and expecting, naturally, that they would
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benefit from any settlement reached as a result of the negotiations. This means that this Amendment, if accepted, would leave these British subjects with no immediate prospect of any compensation whatsoever, and I cannot believe that that is what noble Lords wish to achieve.
It has also been suggested that we ought to give an opportunity for people to come forward and claim their assets within a stipulated time; I think that that was the drift of one of the suggestions made by the noble and learned Viscount. The Soviet Union has put forward such claims as it considered it had in respect of Soviet nationals and has now, as part of the settlement which I mentioned on Second Reading, the settlement which we reached in February, 1967, undertaken not to pursue those claims against the United Kingdom. But individuals who apply for the release of property would have the benefit of this Bill. In fact, they would benefit from Clause 1(3)(b) and (c), and since the Agreement of January 5, 1968, applications for releases have been met under existing powers in all cases that were considered to merit it. I realise that in this reply I have not dealt with the legal points that the noble and learned Viscount raised. I think it would be wrong of me to attempt to do so. I have merely put to the Committee why I believe that this particular Amendment and those that flow from it are defective, and I must ask the Committee to reject the Amendment.
LORD BESWICK: For the purpose of hearing the Statement on bacon I beg to move that the House do now resume.
Moved accordingly, and, on Question, Motion agreed to.
House resumed.

BACON MARKET SHARING UNDERSTANDING
3.56 p.m.
LORD BESWICK: Negotiations for a renewed Bacon Market Sharing Understanding have now been completed and the new Understanding will be signed shortly. The basic aim of the renewed Understanding will be to provide for the orderly marketing of bacon in the United Kingdom and to preserve stable prices at levels reasonable to both producers and consumers.

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There are two main changes. First, there is no longer a specific percentage share of the market laid down for the United Kingdom. Instead, the United Kingdom, after consultation with the Bacon Market Council, will determine each year not only the total quantity of bacon required on the United Kingdom market but also the expected level of bacon production in the United Kingdom. The difference between these figures will be shared among the exporting countries. Secondly, the Understanding has been strengthened in order to ensure in a more positive way than in the present Understanding that our suppliers' market in an orderly and a regular manner, as our own industry will also be expected to do.
The new Understanding takes effect on 1st April this year and will run for a term of three years. The situation will then be further reviewed. The total market requirement for the first twelve months is 639,000 tons and the expected level of bacon production in the United Kingdom is 233,600 tons, an increase of about 15,000 tons on this year's estimated level. I am making a complete list of the tonnages for 1969–70 available now in the Library and I shall circulate it in the OFFICIAL REPORT. As soon as the Understanding has been signed, the full text, together with the letters continuing bilateral understanding with Denmark and the Irish Republic, will be published as a White Paper.
Following is the list referred to in the Statement:

Total

639,000 tons

United Kingdom

233,600 tons

Denmark

302,850 tons

Poland

50,310 tons

Ireland

28,180 tons

Sweden

11,010 tons

Netherlands

8,160 tons

Hungary

2,380 tons

Rumania

1,500 tons

Yugoslavia

1,010 tons

LORD NUGENT OF GUILDFORD: My Lords, may I thank the noble Lord, Lord Beswick, for giving us this Statement, and may I ask him two questions? First, will this new Agreement enable Her Majesty's Government to give greater consideration than in the past to British farmers' capacity to supply the home market with bacon? Secondly, as quality decides the housewives' choice and therefore the strength of demand, will the noble Lord tell us whether the Meat and
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Livestock Commission have the necessary resources and powers to encourage our farmers to increase the proportion of their total production which makes top quality bacon?
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, I quite agree with the noble Lord, There is a necessity to increase top quality production, and of course the Commission will be expected to do all possible to improve both the quality of marketing and the quantity produced. The Understanding will provide for an increased proportion next year, if we can meet that increased proportion. At the same time I should draw the attention of the noble Lord to the fact that we have this bilateral understanding both with Denmark and with Ireland and we shall, of course, honour the Agreement with those two countries.
LORD NUGENT OF GUILDFORD: My Lords, may I elucidate one point on my first question? Will this new Agreement enable Her Majesty's Government to give greater consideration to the home producers in filling the needs of the home market for bacon?
LORD BESWICK: Yes, my Lords, it will enable them to do that. What I was trying to emphasise was that to a large extent this is a matter for the producers and the curing industry. They have never yet been up against a ceiling, and an effort is required from them as well.
LORD HENLEY: My Lords, we welcome this Statement. The two changes seem sensible. I also welcome the answer which the noble Lord, Lord Beswick, has given to the noble Lord, Lord Nugent of Guildford, that in so far as the producers are capable of taking an increased share of production, this new Agreement enables them to do so.
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, I am much obliged to the noble Lord.
LORD HAWKE: My Lords, can the noble Lord say whether any calculation has been made of the effect on the balance of payments of this new Agreement? Will it make it more adverse or more in favour?
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, in so far as we produce more bacon in this country, it will help the balance of payments.
LORD BELSTEAD: My Lords, would the noble Lord accept the fact, despite what he said, that probably the farming industry and also the curers will be looking with some consternation at the forthcoming Price Review?
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, I think that I had better stick to the Statement I have just made.

FOREIGN COMPENSATION BILL
4.2 p.m.
Committee stage resumed.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: I have great sympathy with the noble Lord, Lord Chalfont, for not wanting to get involved in legal points, but I wish to raise with him now not a legal point but a point of fact. My noble friend Lord Dilhorne suggested that surely it was our moral duty to try to return to the rightful owners the assets that had become the property of the Custodian of Enemy Property and are held in this country. My noble friend asked the Minister whether any attempt had been made to find the rightful owners and, if so, could the noble Lord please tell us. Surely, if it is possible to return the money or assets, we should do so. This is not a legal point and I should be grateful if the noble Lord could give a reply to it.
VISCOUNT COLVILLE OF CULROSS: Before the noble Lord replies, I wonder whether I could make the question a little more specific. As I understand it, the situation in relation to the ceded territories—because although this Amendment relates only to them, the same applies to the Baltic States—is that registrations of claims made under the 1959 Order (No. 1968) were to be registered by British, Dominion and Commonwealth nationals in relation to expropriations of property in the ceded territories. Under this Bill it is now proposed that they should rank pro tanto with other claims on the fund which has been released, or is going to be released, under the Bill and which includes £35,000 of the money which belongs to people formally resident in the ceded territories and who are not necessarily the same people who are registering claims under the 1959 Order.
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The noble Lord, Lord Chalfont, said, and rightly, that so far as people who are now inside the Soviet Union are concerned, whether they live in the ceded territories or anywhere else in the Soviet Union, the Soviet Union has renounced any claims they may have on the £35,000 which we hold in this country, but probably there are people who are not nationals of or within the control of the Soviet Union who have claims on that £35,000. Some of them may be, here and some may be spread over the rest of the world.
The noble Lord has also said that under Clause 1(3)(b) and (c) there is power in the Treasury to direct that the Foreign Compensation Commission shall pay people who come forward with proper claims and who are not Soviet citizens but who are outside the Soviet Union, and they have done so. Is it the policy of the Government that anybody who produces a proper justifiable claim against this money shall be paid out of this fund of £35,000 or, if the moneys are going to be lumped together, put of the whole amount, before anybody else who registered their claims under the 1959 Order is paid? And if they are going to direct that, are they going to direct that those people who can make these justifiable claims be paid in full, notwithstanding that those who register under the Order may have to accept a partial payment of their claim because the fund is not large enough? If we could have an answer to this question, it would be extremely helpful and we should know to some extent where we are.
LORD CHALFONT: The position, as I understand it, and as the noble Viscount has said, is that the Soviet Union have now undertaken not to pursue claims against the United Kingdom and, so far as they are able to do so, they will discourage their nationals from pursuing such claims. Of course, as the noble Viscount has said, it is possible that others may come forward with claims and they would have the benefit of Clause 1(3) of this Bill. What we have tried to do here is to produce a Bill which will give some sort of finality to all these claims.
What has been happening over a great number of years, and what is likely to

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happen if this process goes on, is that people who have been waiting, in some cases for thirty years, for their claims to be made good, may have to wait for another thirty years. Some of them, indeed, will be dead by the time this issue is settled. So what we are trying to do is to produce a Bill which will lump all the assets together—surely this is the only sensible way of approaching this question—irrespective of whether they are the assets of people who formerly lived in the ceded territories or in the Baltic States, and claims will be settled from the whole of the assets. I think the noble Viscount will agree that the question of whether a person making a claim was formerly resident in one of the Baltic States or ceded territories is an historic accident and that we should not suggest that, because the assets relating to the ceded territories are only £35,000, while the rest belonged to the Baltic States, therefore the restitution should be made pro rata.
To answer the noble Viscount's specific question, we have not sought to find all the owners of this property, who may be scattered all over the world. I think he will agree that the onus is upon those concerned to come forward with their claims and not on the British Government to find them. After all, they have already had 19 years in which to do so. Some of them are coming forward and, as the noble Viscount suggested, they will get their share of the assets, which will include the £35,000 which are the assets relating to the ceded territories.
VISCOUNT COLVILLE OF CULROSS: With great respect, the noble Lord has not really answered either of my questions. May I take him up first on the last thing he said. If claims are put forward—I will come back to the question of whether the onus is on the owners or the British Government—is it the policy of Her Majesty's Government that upon making a proper claim and having it recognised against some part of this £35,000, the claimant shall be paid that claim in full? Or are they to rank so that they receive only the same proportion of that claim as others claiming against this fund, whether they claim as the original owners or as people whose property has been expropriated? That is the first question. I want to know why they are going to get paid in full if other
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people are going to be paid only in part —because, after all, ex hypothesi they will have established that it was their money that they are claiming.
The other point is this. I wonder whether the noble Lord would explain to the Committee a little further why the onus is upon the owners and not upon the Custodian to find out who they are. This money was vested in the Custodian, as I understand it, because it belonged to technical enemies, and in the case of Rumania to actual enemies—I cannot remember the exact dates, and it may be that they were only technical enemies. That money was invested because it belonged to specific people. Therefore, the Custodian must know to whom it originally belonged. Moreover, as I understand the Order under which he is holding it, he is holding it in a position which is akin to that of a trustee. I do not believe it accords with the normal way in which trustees deal with their property that they should say: "Although I know, or I have a strong suspicion, who this money belongs to, I am perfectly prepared to give it away to somebody else unless fairly soon the person to whom it belongs comes and puts in a specific claim to me." I do not think that this is the way that one normally deals with things as trustees, and I do not believe that this is the way that we should deal with things when we are acting as international trustees. I challenge the noble Lord about the onus, as to who it is who has to show that the people are entitled. I should like the noble Lord to answer those two points.
LORD CHALFONT: So far as the second part of the noble Viscount's remarks is concerned, this is, as he has made quite clear, a matter of opinion. He has said that in his opinion this is not the right way to conduct the affairs of the Custodian in the case of this particular property. I can only say that the Government's view is that the onus is indeed upon those who have a claim on this property to come forward and make it. That is our view. The noble Viscount may disagree with it, but this is not a matter of fact, or indeed a matter of law; and, as I say, it is our view that the onus is upon them. The answer to the first question, more specifically, is that if these people come forward and make a proper claim, which is authenticated, they

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will get the property standing in their name; that is to say, they will get it in full and not by way of dividend.
LORD HANKEY: As I was connected with these questions for some years—admittedly, it was some years ago—I hope that I may be allowed to intervene briefly in this debate. I do not see how the Government can be expected to find the owners of property, who may be anywhere in the world, and some of whom may be dead. But I suggest that the time has come when the Government ought to fix a date beyond which claims will not be accepted—or perhaps they have already done this; and, if so, I apologise for my ignorance.
I think the time has come to consider the rights of our own people in this matter, who have had very legitimate commercial and private claims against the Soviet Union and against the Baltic States, which have gone unanswered for years and years. All this time this money has been in the hands of the Custodian of Enemy Property, steadily depreciating, as money unfortunately does, and we have watched the rights of our people and their claims get smaller and smaller and smaller. After years (and heaven knows how long it has taken!) we have succeeded in reaching an agreement with the Soviet Union. It has required patience, persistence and an enormous amount of diplomacy, but at last we have reached agreement about the way in which this should be handled. I think that the rights of our own people ought now to be considered. There is no other way in which their claims can be met, and I think this represents a reasonable way of doing it.
I think that if the ceded territories were to be excluded, then all sorts of anomalies would result, and it would be most unfair to a number of people with very varied claims affecting the parts of the countries concerned which were ceded in full de jure to the Soviet Union. I feel that the Foreign Office and Her Majesty's Government would come in for great criticism if they settled one lot of claims without settling the other lot of claims. Therefore it seems to me better, both in practice and in equity, that all these claims should be taken together and settled as is now proposed. I venture
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to suggest that it would be desirable not to press this Amendment.
LORD CONESFORD: There is one point that puzzles me very much, particularly after the speech made by the noble Lord, Lord Hankey, in which he mentioned claims against the Soviet Union. I understand what he says, but what puzzles me so much about the ceded territories is why we separate them from the rest of the Soviet Union. I can quite understand the proposition that we have to legislate specifically for the Baltic States, because of the difficulty of there being nobody whom we recognise as de jure entitled to speak for them; but in the case of these ceded territories we recognise Russia as entitled de jure to speak for them. So I cannot quite understand the legal basis of this complete separation of the ceded territories from the rest of Russia.
LORD LEATHERLAND: I was rather staggered by the legal arguments put forward by the noble Viscount, Lord Colville of Culross, when he said that the onus should be upon the Government to go out and seek the claims, rather than that the claimants should put forward their claims to the Government. This all seemed to me to be contrary to what many of us who are ordinary, non-legal citizens encounter in our everyday lives. We see in our newspapers advertisements, inserted by solicitors, which say: "We are the administrators of Mr. Smith's estate. Will all people having claims against the estate of Mr. Smith please send details of their claims immediately to Brown, Brown and Jones, Solicitors? "Surely, that is completely in keeping with the line which Her Majesty's Government are now taking.
LORD HAWKE: Perhaps I might ask the noble Lord a question. This is getting very difficult legally, but this is a lay question of practical incidence which may clear up some things. Before the war my company used to ship cotton to cotton spinners all over Europe. Many of these cotton spinners were in Eastern Europe, and I have no doubt that some of them were "gobbled up" by the Russians. I am no longer connected with the firm, but I have no doubt that they have debts. Suppose we were owed £100,000 by spinner A, and spinner A

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had a balance in London of £5,000 with the Custodian of Enemy Property; and suppose we were also owed £100,000 by spinner B, who had no such balance in London, should we go to the Custodian and get our £5,000 in full, or would the two claims be put together, and should we get a dividend out of the £5,000 based on the £200,000 claim?
4.19 p.m.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: I have listened carefully to the answer given by the noble Lord, Lord Chalfont, to the questions raised in this debate. I should like to say, first of all, to the noble Lord, Lord Hankey, that I am the last person to wish that those who suffer losses as a result of Soviet action should not get some compensation for those losses. But that is a quite separate question from consideration of whether it really is right to use the moneys and property which formerly belonged to other persons to meet those particular claims, and to use that money without giving the former owners the opportunity of establishing their entitlement to it and the return of it.
As I said in moving this Amendment, I can see no objection to the distribution of the unclaimed balances, or of the balances which arise—because, although there are claims, they have not been established—among certain creditors. So, really, one of the questions here is as to that: the rights of the people to whom this property belonged. In that connection the noble Lord, Lord Chalfont, has, I think, with great respect, rather confused them with the people who are claiming in respect of losses. He said two different things, too. He said that these former owners would be able to claim and would get their share of the assets. Then he said a little later that if they established their claim they would get that claim paid in full.
May we have it from him quite clearly (I may have misunderstood him) first of all whether he would agree that nothing has been done so far to invite former owners to come forward and claim? Secondly, would he agree—I am not suggesting (I do not go so far as my noble friend) that the Custodian can trace all these people—that some opportunity should be given to them now, and
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announced, so that they can come forward and claim? As I said in moving this Amendment, if they do not claim within a stipulated period, then I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Hankey, all that is left can be treated as unclaimed and distributed.
Before we leave this Amendment, I hope that I shall get an answer from the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor on the legal points I raised, which are very relevant to this Amendment. The noble Lord, Lord Chalfont, said that if this Amendment was carried the claimants in relation to property in the ceded territories would not be included in the distribution and would be left with no prospect of compensation. I think those were his words. As I see the position, this particular provision, as I said, is wholly superfluous. If I understand the 1939 Order all right, the powers are already there for the Board of Trade to give directions to the Custodian to dispose of the property vested in him as the Board of Trade directs. That is one of the questions I want answered. Why are we making this provision? There can be a question of a difference of opinion—I recognise that—as to whether all the assets we have in our possession should be pooled, whether they arise from the ceded territories or from the Baltic States together, to meet the claims of claimants.
Another possibility is to say that the claimants in respect of the ceded territories can claim on what has been collected in respect of those territories; namely, £35,000. But I do not think that the noble Lord's position is really tenable in the light of what my noble friend, Lord Conesford, has said. Why distinguish between the claimants in relation to property in the ceded territories, over which we recognise the Soviet Union has de jure rights, and why distinguish them from claims from other persons in relation to other parts of the Soviet Union? It seems to me that the Baltic assets—what I might call the Baltic creditors—constitute quite a different class. I should have thought that it was morally right to treat that class as a separate class and not to lump all the ceded territories with the Baltic territories and, at the same time, leave out all the creditors in relation to other parts of Russia.

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That is one point on which, I agree, opinions may differ. But what I suggest is that there is no moral right to any distribution unless the former owners are given the opportunity of claiming and unless it is clear that their claims will be met in full before any distribution takes place. But I ask that I should get an answer, I hope from the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor, to the legal questions that I asked in moving this Amendment, because they are very pertinent, not only to the consideration of this Amendment but to our later consideration of other clauses of and other Amendments to the Bill. In the hope that we shall now receive an answer on those points, will stop talking.
4.25 p.m.
LORD HANKEY: Before the noble and learned Viscount sits down, may I ask him how his argument is affected by the fact that Article 4 of the Agreement in the White Paper under reference provides for
"a settlement, along with other claims, of claims by the holders of unredeemed notes issued by the Government of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics to the British Joint Stock Companies, the Tetiuhe Mining Corporation and Lena Goldfields Limited of London irrespective of the nationality of such holders"?
Does not that mean that claims against other parts of the Soviet Union are partly covered?
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: No, I certainly do not think it means that; and that is certainly quite a distinct and separate question, which is subject to a separate Amendment. We shall be discussing that in due course.
There is one other point I wanted to mention and the noble Lord's intervention has reminded me of it. It is this. There has been a discussion with the noble Lord, Lord Chalfont, about claims by persons residing in the Soviet Union —persons who were former owners and who are now in the Soviet Union. Surely they are bound by the words of Article 2 of the Agreement, whereby
"The Government of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics will neither on its own behalf nor on behalf of its physical and juridical persons pursue"
these claims. If that be so, the claims in relation to persons now in territory over which the Soviet Union rule de jure would surely be debarred completely.
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But with regard to the others who are not in that position, I suggest that we really have no right to dispose of what was their property without first giving them an opportunity, which I gather they have not had at present, of establishing their entitlement to it.
LORD CHALFONT: I will try to deal with the points that various noble Lords have brought up, not necessarily in the order in which they were brought up but in the order which enables me logically to try to point out to the Committee that what we are doing is not only necessary—the noble and learned Viscount has suggested that it is unnecessary —but right. Various noble Lords have suggested that it is wrong. First of all, the 1939 Act, to which the noble and learned Viscount referred, conferred powers for a specific purpose or for a series of specific purposes. The noble and learned Viscount will, I know, appreciate this if he refers to Section 7 of the Act. What we are doing now is not one of those purposes. Therefore, I think the noble Viscount is wrong in arguing that the Board of Trade already have adequate powers to deal with this situation. That is why we have felt it necessary to draft and introduce this Bill, in order to confer those powers.
The noble Lord, Lord Conesford, asked why other parts of the Soviet Union are not included in the Bill if the ceded territories over which the Soviet Government have a de jure authority are included. I think the point here is that all the post-1939 claims against the Soviet Union arose in connection with the Baltic States and the ceded territories—everything since 1939. In 1959 the then Government agreed to leave on one side all pre-1939 claims, and these were the ones that related to the revolutionary period and covered the rest of the Soviet Union.
May I now come to the vexed question of giving people the opportunity to come forward and make their claims for property which originally belonged to them? The Custodian, of course, knows (perhaps I had not made this sufficiently clear, although it may be clear to other noble Lords) to whom the property originally belonged, but if these people are in the Soviet Union, then, as the noble and learned Viscount has just pointed out, the Soviet Government has withdrawn its claim on their behalf. If they are

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not in the Soviet Union, who knows where they are? They have left the Soviet Union, they are somewhere else, and I do not believe noble Lords would suggest that the onus is upon Her Majesty's Government to go round the world finding them. The onus must be upon them to come forward and make a claim.
In answer to a point made by the noble Viscount, I repeat—and if I misled the Committee I apologise—that if they do come forward to make a proper, authenticated claim they will get the property standing in their name in full —not a dividend. We have not set a date for coming forward; Clause 1(3)(b) is open-ended. But eventually the fund will be exhausted. However, we want to hold something back from this fund to the very end for such claims, and we will consider setting a time limit when the end of this process is in sight. I think that the people concerned have had an opportunity to come forward and make these claims. I contest the assertion of the noble and learned Viscount that they have not had a chance to do so. They have had a chance and they have had a long time to do it. Some have done so, and some have not.
I come back to the point I made on Second Reading and made earlier in the Committee, the point made very forcefully by the noble Lord, Lord Hankey, which is that we must now as a Government look to the claims and rights of our own people in this matter. This has been going on for a long time. If we do not now produce an effective Act of Parliament in pursuance of the Agreement which after long and patient diplomacy we reached with the Soviet Union, these people who have been waiting for their money, or some part of it, for many, many years, will continue to wait for many more years. I believe it is the duty of the Government now to see that there is some finality in these claims.
I understand that the noble and learned Viscount has some very cogent points of law to argue here, and I have no doubt that my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor will deal with those in due course. I would simply urge upon the Committee the need for common sense in this whole affair. We are dealing here in the first Amendment with the question of whether we include people
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from the ceded territories in the provisions of this Bill. I believe that we should. I believe that the historical accident that they used to live on one side of a border or another is not sufficient reason for dealing with them in a different way. I believe that the sensible and humane and right thing to do is to lump all these assets together and to make payments to people, whether they come from the Baltic States or the ceded territories. May I answer a question put by the noble Lord, Lord Hawke. It was a hypothetical question and I realise, better than anyone else, the difficulty of answering such questions, but in this case I think the answer is that the person would get a dividend as a United Kingdom claimant on both elements of the claim the noble Lord mentioned. That is what I am advised.
We are obviously going to have a great deal of argument, but I believe that the arguments are perhaps more substantial on later clauses and later Amendments than upon this one. I urge upon your Lordships the common sense of including in the provisions of this Bill the ceded territories as well as the Baltic States, and I very much hope that the noble Viscount will not press his Amendment.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: I had hoped that we should hear the noble and learned Lord, the Lord Chancellor, on the points I raised. The noble Lord, Lord Chalfont, said in his first reply and has said again that we should hear his noble and learned friend on legal points. I raised several legal points in moving this Amendment. The noble Lord, Lord Chalfont, in his last reply has touched on a legal point in saying this: that it was necessary to put in this particular subsection because the provisions of Section 7 of the 1939 Act, to which I referred in my speech, do not cover this particular object That seems to me to be a fallacious argument and a fallacious reason for the inclusion of this subsection. No one suggests—at least, I do not—that the vesting order was not properly made at the time it was made. Section 7 gives power to make an Order that the property should be vested in the Custodian, and that was done under the objects that then existed. There is no need to add to the objects of Section 7 for that.

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Now we are concerned with getting the money out of the hands of the Custodian. What I suggest, in all seriousness, to the noble Lord—and I raised it in moving the Amendment—is that under the Order which is in existence, the Custodian of Enemy Property Order, the Board of Trade can now give directions to the Custodian which he is bound to obey. And I put this question: if that be so (and it appears to me to be so) what is the point of having subsection (1)? To that we have had no answer. I should like to have an answer to that from the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor before we pass from this clause.
I should like to have an answer also to the question, which is vital, of the right of property. I raised it on Second Reading and I raised it in moving this Amendment. I repeat it again. Were these people deprived of their property, of their rights to this property, or were their rights merely suspended when the property was vested in the Custodian? Or is it this Bill which is demolishing and destroying all such rights as they might have in what was admittedly theirs at one time? I think, and I hope I have the Committee with me, that we should have an answer to these questions before we proceed to consider other Amendments, because I think they are vital. I sympathise with the noble Lord, Lord Chalfont, in his difficulties. I have found the subject very difficult to understand, and I am quite prepared to be told I have not got it right. But I should like to be told, and I think that before I ask leave to withdraw this Amendment we really should be told. I do not wish to press this Amendment to a Division, but I do want to get that information now, because it might affect the course of later debates on these Amendments.
4.37 p.m.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (LORD GARDINER): I have been consulted throughout this Bill about Clause 2(4), and your Lordships may remember that I spoke on that on Second Reading. I have not considered the law in relation to any other clause. Indeed, I could not have guaranteed to say exactly what the Bill said; I have not had occasion to read the rest of it until yesterday, when the noble and learned Viscount, Lord Dilhorne, said that he would like me to deal with his Amendments—not
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the one we are now discussing, but Amendments Nos. 2 and 10, which are on Clause 1(2) and Clause 1(6). So, since last night, and subject to engagements which I could not avoid this morning, I have done my best to explore the situation, which is indeed an extremely complicated one.
Before one considers the law, one has of course to bear in mind the basic facts; and since the chronology is extremely long and involved it would take some considerable time to state. One starts, I suppose, from 1920, when the Government of Russia recognised the complete independence and integrity of the Baltic States. There were subsequent usual non-aggression treaties. The five points which it is desirable to bear in mind are these. First, in June, 1940, the Russians invaded the Baltic States and ordered the Dissolution of their Parliaments. Elections were held which resulted in Communists being returned to power. Secondly, those Parliaments pissed a large number of nationalisation measures expressed in general words— for example, "All transport undertakings are nationalised": just like that. The legislation purported to extend to all assets of the nationalised bodies, including assets situated in the United Kingdom. Thirdly, on August 3, 5 and 6, 1940, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia were incorporated into the Soviet Union as Soviet Socialist Republics. Further nationalisation measures were enacted which to some extent duplicated the pre-incorporation measures; for example, the measure relating to transport undertakings was supplemented by one in relation to the shipping undertakings. Subsequently, People's Commissions went to each shipping company's office and physically took over the business. The assets of the former companies were transferred to Soviet State trading agencies—for example, the Estonian State Steamship Line.
Fourthly, in the Summer of 1941, the German armies overran the Baltic States which thereupon became enemy territory. As a result., the assets in the United Kingdom of individuals resident and companies carrying on business in those States became subject to the Trading with the Enemy (Custodian) Order, 1939. And fifthly, on December 29, 1945, Her Majesty's Government first announced their recognition, de facto, but not de fore,

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of the three incorporations into the Soviet Union. This was done by a certificate given to the High Court in the Vapper case. The Court held that Her Majesty's Government's recognition was retroactive to at least August 6, 1940. There is a similar story involving far fewer assets from Memel and the ceded territories. Memel, being German territory, became subject to the Trading with the Enemy Act 1939 on the outbreak of war on September 3, 1939.
On these facts it would appear to me that the first thing one has to consider is: who owned these things before the German occupation? Clearly it could not have been the Custodian of Enemy Property. When I say "things", we are dealing, of course, primarily with gold formerly belonging to the Baltic central banks, but also with jewellery, share certificates and various other things. As a matter of English law, if I understand it aright, the nationalisation legislation had the following impact upon the assets in this country. A nationalisation decree is effective only with regard to property situated within the territorial jurisdiction of the Legislature making the decree. So one then has to see in relation to these things where the situs was. Under our rules of law, a chattel is situated where it lies; a debt is situated in the country where the debtor resides a negotiable instrument is situated where the paper representing the security is itself to be found; and shares in a company are situated where they can be effectively dealt with according to the law under which the company is incorporated, which is usually the place where the share register is.
So far as assets which are situated in accordance with these rules in the United Kingdom are concerned, I apprehend (I do not regard it as certain, but I would regard it as strongly probable) that our courts would not hold that the nationalisation decrees transferred the assets to the Soviet State trading enterprises. This of course, was the Russian claim. From this, it follows that since the former companies have ceased to exist, such of their assets as are situated in the United Kingdom would seem to be bona vacantia, that is to say the property of the Crown. Subject therefore to what I say later, I regard it as a matter of
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some doubt whether the assets did or did not vest in the Custodian of Enemy Property. O course, if they are bona vacantia, the claim of the Crown would be liable to be defeated by a winding-up Order under Section 400 of the Companies Act.
The position, therefore, during the period between June, 1940, and the time of the German invasion in 1941 would seem to me to be that the assets in this country of the nationalised Baltic companies were vested in the Crown as bona vacantia, and therefore probably did not become enemy property. The Crown, of course, has no intention of claiming the money for itself. It is naturally prepared, in accordance with the Anglo-Soviet Agreement, to make these things available for claimants; and the main object of Clause 1(2) is to perfect the title in the Custodian of Enemy Property so that there can be no question of this power to deal with this matter. The main object of Clause 1(6) is to prevent the filing of petitions for the winding up of companies; and the noble and learned Viscount has, I hope, observed that that is retrospective to January 5 of this year, which was the date of the introduction of the Bill.
Those are the objects of those two clauses. But all that, I should add, is subject to this: that the gold, as the noble and learned Viscount has said, was deposited with the Custodian subject to the directions of the Board of Trade. The then Government, on February 16, 1951, made an Order purporting to vest the gold in the Custodian, with power to sell. As I understand it, the reason why they did that was this. The Baltic gold was held under Defence Regulation 2A until 1951 when the Government were pressing to remove the Defence Regulations. The gold was then vested under trading with the enemy legislation. The gold was, however, subject to trading with the enemy control from the time the Germans overran the Baltic States. But as the Defence Regulation effectively prevented movement, it was considered unnecessary to take vesting action until the Defence Regulation was no longer in force. That is why nothing was done until February, 1951, when an Order was made purporting to vest the gold in the Custodian with power to sell.

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It is therefore, I think, a matter of some doubt whether the Custodian was entitled to sell the gold when he sold it. At all events I regard it as arguable. It may be that the position had not been as fully considered as it should have been; but I have been asked to say what I think, and this is what I think. The object of Clause 1(2)—highly desirable from the point of view of all the claimants—is to make quite sure of the Custodian's position. But this may be unnecessary, for this reason: that the then Government in 1953, appreciating, I think, that in many cases, owing to difficulties of one sort or another, the Custodian might have done things his legal title to do which may have been in doubt, in Section 3(1) of the Enemy Property Act 1953 validated (if that is the right expression) whatever the Custodian had done up to that date. The position therefore, I think, what with one thing and another, is extremely obscure, and if claimants want their share of what there is, the Committee would be well advised to agree to Clause 1(2) and Clause 1(6) which will put the Custodian's position beyond doubt.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: I am most grateful to the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor for the exposition that he has given, which in fact has gone on (I make no complaint about it) beyond the particular subsection with which we have been dealing, because he has referred to Clause 1(2) and Clause 1(6). I found his observations in relation to both of them most helpful.
The noble and learned Lord began his speech by referring to the short time that he had had to consider these points. I think it is only fair to say that I wrote to him last week. Although it is true that I mentioned particular subsections, my recollection is that I specifically mentioned that I would be raising this question of when, or if, the right of property changed. He has told me of the difficulties in relation to that, and I must admit that I am still finding it as difficult to determine whether the effect of an Order under the Trading with the Enemy Act 1939 operates to destroy rights of property or whether it does not. I still find that point unanswered. Indeed, as the noble and learned Lord indicated, it may be that there were considerable doubts
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whether some of this property came within the definition of "enemy property". I think that was all cured by the 1953 Act, to which the noble and learned Lord referred, but I still have not got an answer—I do not know that I need press for it now—as to whether the effect of vesting in the Custodian is so destroy the rights of ownership or not. If it does not destroy the rights of ownership, then the effect of what we are now doing under this Bill, if we pass it, will destroy them. I think we have spent quite enough time on this Amendment—perhaps too much, although I hope not. Certainly what has been said has helped me, and I ask the leave of the Committee to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
THE DEPUTY CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES (LORD CHAMPION): I should inform the Committee that if Amendment No. 2 were to be agreed to, I should not be able to call Amendment No. 3.
4.52 p.m.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE VISCOUNT DILHORNE moved Amendment No. 2:
Page 2, line 4, leave out subsection (2).
The noble and learned Viscount said: I beg to move Amendment No. 2. I can do this much more shortly in the light of what the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor has just said, and I hope that he will correct me if I misunderstood him. He dealt fairly rapidly with a very intricate situation. As I understand it, this power to make an Order is required to prevent a previous Order of the Board of Trade in relation to certain of this property being challenged. If that be right—I have no objection to it happening that way; this is ex abundanti cautela because of the 1953 Act—I should have thought that subsection (2) ought to have provided that the Order already made should be treated as valid, and you would not want to take a power to make an entirely fresh Order. That is perhaps a somewhat minor point. However, I must say to the noble and learned Lord that when I read this Bill and read this subsection it gave me a lot of worry to try to find out what it meant and what its purpose was, because nothing wises said about it, so far as I can recollect, in another place.
One point I should like the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor to confirm is this, if he would. As I see it, under this subsection as it stands, it would give power to the Board of Trade to make a new Order vesting in the Custodian property of someone who was formerly within the definition of an enemy but who, of course, has ceased to be so as we are no longer in a state of war; to bring in, as one might say, fresh property into the hands of the Custodian. I think the power given by this subsection would be wide enough to make such an Order. I take it from what the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor has said—and I hope he will confirm it—that there is in fact no such intention, and that this power is merely wanted to validate beyond all doubt action that has already been taken. I beg to move.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: No, I do not think that that is so. I think this subsection will give power to vest whatever the property is legally in the Custodian of Enemy Property. Indeed, it is desirable that that should be so. Under Clause 1(3)(b) and (c) it would be perfectly proper, of course, to allow a claim which may be made, even though it is not sustainable in law. But one must reflect here that there might be claims against the gold, or whatever may be here, by Baltic companies. All we have at the moment is an agreement with the Soviet Union that they will not let them claim, but I suppose if they did the agreement would not be an answer in law. We must also consider things which may belong to foreigners.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: I am afraid that I cannot have made myself clear to the noble and learned Lord. I am not objecting to an Order being made validating what has been done. This property has been vested. I should have thought that it could have been done in a more simple form by saying that the Orders which had been made were not capable of challenge. I am not trying to draft. I am not quarrelling with that, but the wording of this subsection seems to me to be so wide that a fresh Order could be made bringing into the hands of the Custodian property which he has not already got. I only wanted an assurance that there was no intention of using
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this subsection for that purpose despite the width of its language.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: As I understand it, vesting Orders may be made but they will relate only to what the Custodian already has physical possession of.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: in view of that assurance, which I find entirely satisfactory, I ask leave to withdraw this Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
4.56 p.m.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE VISCOUNT DILHORNE moved Amendment No. 4:
Page 2, line 13, leave out ("Articles 1 and 4") and insert ("Article 1").
The noble and learned Viscount said: I apologise for the late tabling of this Amendment which was by mistake omitted from the list I handed in. If this Amendment is accepted or carried, the effect will be that the Custodian could not pay out money, the property of residents or persons who carried on business in Baltic States and ceded territories, for the purpose of meeting claims by the holders of unredeemed notes issued by the Soviet Union to Lena Goldfields and the Tetiuhe Mining Corporation. That the Goverment have agreed to do, and we are, I think, entitled to ask why they have done it and what justification there is for taking over this liability of the Soviet Union.
The Committee will recollect that in an arbitration the Lena Goldfields were awarded £30 million. The Soviet Union did not accept the award and later agreed to pay £3 million and issued notes for that sum. Then when we refused to admit their claims to the Baltic gold, they retaliated by stopping payment of these notes. Mr. Whitlock, the Under-Secretary for the Foreign Office said in another place that £2·2 million was then outstanding. So only £800,000 of the £3 million the Russians agreed to pay has been paid by them, and we have now relieved them of the obligation to pay the balance. Even if we were wrong to reject their claim to the gold, that did not entitle them to dishonour the notes they had issued, and issued not only to British but to foreign persons. There can be no justification for their repudiation of their debts.
Now we have agreed to settle the claims on these notes with foreign and British holders, and to relieve the Russians of their obligation as if we were wrong in rejecting their claim to the gold. Mr. Whitlock described these notes as "deferred and inadequate compensation from the Soviet Government" and said:
"It is only just that the note-holders should be compensated, irrespective of nationality, since they all alike suffered loss as a result of the Soviet retaliation for the British action in blocking the Baltic gold in defence of British interests. That is the justification for Article 4."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Commons, 7/ 11 /68, col. 1101.]
If we were right in rejecting the Soviet claim to the gold, this is no justification at all for our relieving them of their obligation, just as there can be no justification for their action in repudiating their liability to the noteholders. I ask: why on earth did the Government agree to this? I think we should have a full explanation, but I cannot think that an explanation is likely to justify this extraordinary provision in this Agreement. Not only have we agreed to relieve the Russians of their liability, but we have also agreed to meet the claims of all the noteholders out of the Baltic assets and assets of the ceded territories, and no one can suggest that the noteholders have any claim at all on those assets.
We shall be discussing the payment of the £500,000 on a later Amendment. It is said that if we had not agreed to that, there would have been no Agreement. Was this the reason for taking over the Soviet liability? This is not all. We have also abandoned our claim for shipping services amounting to £1·2 million under the Ships Expenses and Freights Agreement with the Soviet Union of 1944. So, if my mathematics are correct, this Agreement, which the Foreign Secretary of the day said was very good business, is worth £4·1 million to the Soviet Government.
It was said in another place that the £500,000 tip was worth paying to get agreement. We have in fact agreed to pay that, and have paid it, and have agreed to relieve them of liability for £3·6 million—and for what? Just the assurance that they will not pursue their claims, claims which no Government has accepted and which, I suggest. do not bear examination. Surely, the right course would have been to say to the Russians,
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"If you have any honest belief in your claim, let us go to arbitration about it and settle it that way". But this Government did no such thing. They chose to buy the Russian signature by paying a price out of assets which have never belonged to this country and by charging those assets with liabilities of the Russians.
They endeavour to sweeten the pill by saying that the £500,000 will be spent on consumer goods in this territory, and, when pressed about it, they say: "If we had not agreed, the Russians would have retaliated if we had distributed these assets which were in our hands". The instance given is that they might have retaliated by repudiating a trade agreement under which the last instalment fell to be paid in 1963. The noble Lord, Lord Chalfont, referred to that. Are we to be deterred from doing what is right by fears and threats that other people will break their contracts? If the situation were to occur again, are we really not to block the Baltic gold because of the fear that the Russians would repudiate their liability on their notes? This argument about retaliation by breach of agreement seems to me to be no justification for entering into an agreement of this sort. I must say that this seems to me to be a lamentable transaction which should be both condemned and exposed. As I have said, the Foreign Secretary of the day said that it was very good business to get this Agreement. If that is what this Government regard as good business, I am not surprised at the state of the country at present.
The Foreign Secretary then said that the Agreement would be subject to the approval of Parliament. He signed it on January 5, and immediately above his signature appears Article 7, which reads as follows:
"The present agreement shall enter into force on the date of signature."
The Foreign Secretary cannot have failed to know that that Agreement did not require ratification. How came it, then, that on January 23 in another place he said that that Agreement was subject to the approval of Parliament? Signed on the 5th, the £500,000 was paid on the 12th, and the Agreement was not laid before Parliament until the 18th; and on the 23rd the Agreement was said to be

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subject to the approval of Parliament. The Foreign Secretary went on to say:
"If Parliament turns it down, that will be that."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Commons, 23/1/68; col. 210.]
I referred to this statement on Second Reading.
The noble Lord, Lord Chalfont, in his reply spoke about ratification, and when I directed his attention to this matter he said that he could not answer it then. I ask him to deal with it now and either to say that the Foreign Secretary was wrong, in which case he misled Parliament, or to justify that statement. If—and I do not think it is the case—the Agreement is subject to Parliamentary approval, I should have no hesitation in inviting your Lordships to support me in the Lobby so as to ensure that the Soviet Union are not relieved of their liability to pay the amount due on the notes on which they have defaulted, and to ensure that their obligations do not become a charge on the Baltic assets. I should like to be told whether, having relieved the Soviet Union of the liability of £1·2 million under the Shipping Agreement, the Government are making, or will make, a claim for that on the assets.
Despite the Foreign Secretary's statement, I think that nothing that we can do will alter or affect the Agreement. If that be right, the only course open to us is to condemn the Government for their action, and I hope that noble Lords will join with me in doing so. It is all very well to take pride—and pride was taken in another place—in continuing to deny Soviet claims to the gold, but that has a hollow ring when the Government's conduct appears justifiable only on the basis that we were wrong to hold the Baltic gold; and it is only on that basis, it seems to me, that our taking over the Soviet liability on these notes can possibly be justified. I beg to move.
5.7 p.m.
LORD CHALFONT: The noble Viscount in moving the Amendment spent a good deal of time attacking the Agreement and attacking the Government for coming to that Agreement with the Soviet Union. Therefore I think it logical that before I come to deal with the Amendment itself I should say a word, as he has asked me to do, about the status of the Agreement. He is, of course, right
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in saying that this Agreement is not subject to the approval of Parliament; it was never intended to be subject to such ratification. Both sides in the negotiations approached the Agreement in the belief that it was right to have an Agreement which was not subject to ratification. As I mentioned on Second Reading, one reason that Her Majesty's Government believed that it was wise to do this was a fear that the Soviet Government, perhaps for some reason or another, would think it unwise to ratify and we should then be back where we started. I know that noble Lords have criticised this approach, but I now merely wish, for the benefit of the Committee, to put the record absolutely straight.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: If the noble Lord is going to do that, I hope that he will explain the then Foreign Secretary's statement.
LORD CHALFONT: Yes, I shall hope to satisfy the Committee about the apparent discrepancy between the statement of the then Foreign Secretary and the actual situation as it is now. On January 23, 1968, as the noble Viscount has said, the then Foreign Secretary, I think in answer to a Question in another place, said:
"The Agreement will be subject in due course to Parliamentary approval".—["OFFICIAL REPORT, Commons. 23/1/68; col. 210.]
I promised last week during the Second Reading debate to say something about it at a later stage in the Bill. I have refreshed my memory about this subject. The position then, I think, was that when my right honourable friend made that remark the Agreement had already been signed some three weeks earlier and it had been laid before the House some days earlier—in fact, to be precise, on January 18. Whatever my right honourable friend said at the time, it was obvious from the context of the Agreement itself that it was not subject to Parliamentary approval.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: Well—
LORD CHALFONT: If the noble Viscount will allow me to finish, I think that he may conceivably be satisfied with what I have to say. I think that it was obvious from the context that it was not subject to Parliamentary approval. I believe that what my right honourable

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friend meant, and what it was evident he meant—it is apparent from the Preamble to this Bill—is that, as a result of the Agreement, legislation would be needed to authorise the distribution of the assets envisaged as a result of the Agreement. What he said may not have been that, but that is what he meant.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: The noble Lord will admit that, whatever he may have meant, he said quite specifically that the Agreement would be subject to the approval of Parliament.
LORD CHALFONT: Indeed, one only has to consult the OFFICIAL REPORT to see that that is so. I can only suggest that what my right honourable friend said on that occasion and what he meant were not entirely congruent.
May I now move on to the Amendment itself? When we approached the negotiations to this Agreement—and whether noble Lords believe this to be a good Agreement or not I can only say that Her Majesty's Government believe it to be a good one (and I might point out, in passing, that of course this is not a matter of the Government's gaining anything or engaging in some kind of tournament with the Soviet Union, about who can get the most out of a negotiation or Agreement of this kind)—the object was that the people making these claims could have them satisfied. And nothing would achieve that but Soviet renunciation of the claims against us, and a similar renunciation of our claims against them so that the assets could be realised and distributed. When we approached these negotiations it was on this basis, and on the basis, too, that the Government would submit all outstanding claims against the Soviet Union which arose after January 1, 1939.
Now in 1959, the two Governments agreed to include within the negotiations the question of the Soviet default on the Lena and Tetiuhe State Notes. The question of these outstanding Notes was discussed with the Soviet Union during the course of the detailed talks which we held between 1965 and 1967—the talks that ended in the Agreement. Article 4 of the Agreement of January 5, 1968, contains an undertaking that in settling the claims which they presented Her Majesty's Government will from the assets make a settlement of the claims of the Note
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holders. Whether the noble and learned Viscount believes this Agreement was a good one or not, the Agreement was made; it was not subject to ratification, and the Government undertook in that Agreement to settle from the assets the claims of the Note holders. The assets are those to which the Soviet Government renounced its claims in Article 2 of the Agreement.
That did not mean, of course, that the Notes would be settled in full; the holders would receive the same dividend as other claimants. These Notes were issued to two British companies and they were redeemable at intervals extending to 1949, in one case, and to 1954 in the other. They were redeemed regularly up to 1940, and as the noble and learned Viscount is well aware, in 1940 the Soviet Government stopped payment in retaliation for our action in blocking the Baltic gold. This was action which we took, as I have tried to convince the house, in defence of British interests generally. But there is every reason to suppose that had we not taken this action, the Notes would have been redeemed in full many years ago.
To sum up, then, the reasons why I am opposed to this Amendment are as follows. First, the Notes formed part of the negotiations with the Soviet Union and therefore helped to swell the size of our claim. Secondly, as I have said, they are the subject of an express provision in the Agreement of January 5 which we signed with the Soviet Union. Thirdly, although they represent—and I admit this to the noble and learned Viscount—a direct Soviet obligation, the fact remains that their default on this obligation occurred as a result of our blocking of the Baltic gold—an action which we took, as we believed, and still believe, in our: own interests. For all those reasons, then, we believe it right that the assets in this country which become available for distribution following on the Agreement, should be used to compensate not only the British claimants against the Baltic States and ceded territories, but also the Note holders. I hope that in the light of this explanation, the noble and learned Viscount will not press this Amendment.
LORD CONESFORD: May I express astonishment at one fact which I believe to be very important? The Foreign Secretary in another place made a state-

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mend of the greatest importance which was completely wrong. May I say at once that of course I acquit him of any bad faith. Ministers in both Houses, and of both Parties, from time to time make important mistakes in answer to questions. But I am quite certain—at least I hope I am right in this—that the very efficient Department, the Foreign Office, for which the noble Lord is a spokesman, noticed that mistake and informed the Foreign Secretary of it and of its importance when he returned to the office. I thought that the universal custom in such a case was that the Minister came down to the House on the following day and said, "Inadvertently. I am afraid I made a blunder yesterday and misled the House and then made the correction. I remember the noble Lord, Lord Shepherd, once doing this and saying that he had inadvertently make a mistake (I think in interpreting a Statute), and, of course the House at once accepted what he said. The Rules of our House say that one cannot even thank him for it; but the Minister comes and makes that statement and that ends the matter. That would have been the way to treat this case.
It seems to me quite appalling that on a matter of this importance the Foreign Secretary should, however inadvertently, have misled the House and then not sought an opportunity of putting matters right. It is all the more important because, as I endeavoured to show on Second Reading—I am now expressing only my own view—had this Agreement ever been submitted to either House of our Parliament for ratification, I do not believe it would have received ratification. I must say that for some years I listened with great respect (although I was in the opposite Party) to the late Ernest Bevin representing the Foreign Office and valiantly fighting, according to his lights, for British interests. What he would have thought of this Agreement almost passes one's imagination. I wish to confine myself to that single point. I think it is quite astonishing that the Foreign Secretary did not come to the House of Commons and correct his gross mistake.
LORD CHALFONT: Of course I take note of what the noble Lord has said. But I am sure the Committee will forgive
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me if I do not comment in any substance upon what occurred, or did not occur, in another place on that particular occasion. Perhaps I might, however, make one comment on the simple facts of the case, which are that whether my right honourable friend actually said what he meant to say on that occasion is one matter. But whether he actually misled anybody, in the serious way the noble Lord has suggested, I venture to contest, for the simple reason that, as I have said, when he made this remark the Agreement had already been signed and laid before Parliament, and it was clear for anyone who could read to see that the Agreement was not subject to the ratification of Parliament. Therefore, whatever may have been the mistake that was made, whatever noble Lords opposite may think about the failure to correct it formally, I suggest that it is a gross exaggeration to say that Parliament or anyone else was misled. The facts of the case were there for anyone to read.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: The noble Lord has done his best and I do not think he had too easy a task. But may I say this to him, before we leave the matter of this answer to a supplementary question? I cannot agree with him that Members of another House may not have been misled. I say that because this particular answer of the Foreign Secretary was referred to many times in the course of the debates on this Bill in another place. There was never any correction. There was never any explanation such as the noble Lord has given. I know that in another place—it does not matter to what Party a Foreign Secretary belongs—people pay great attention to his words, and one expects Foreign Secretaries to use words with great care, as they usually do. It may be that I would not have been misled. I might have thought that there was something which I did not understand when the Foreign Secretary came down and said something of that kind about that Agreement. But I must say that I think it was most unfortunate that all through the discussions on this Bill in another place the explanation which the noble Lord has given to the Committee to-day was not made. I thank him for that explanation to-day. I accept it, and I do not propose to pursue the matter.

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With regard to payment to the noteholders, I must say that the noble Lord's explanation of why that was agreed to does not seem to me to amount to the least justification for it. In moving this Amendment, I said that as I thought we could not affect the Agreement if we carried the Amendment it would mean that we were preventing the Government from implementing something that they had agreed to, however wrong it was of them to agree to it. If, of course, the Foreign Secretary's statement had been taken at its face value, that would have been a different matter. As my noble friend Lord Conesford has said—and I agree with him—I do not think either House of Parliament would have ratified this Agreement if it had been subject to ratification. But as it is there, I certainly do not think that it would be right for me to press this Amendment to delete this provision, however bad I think it is that we should relieve the Soviet Union of the liability which they have on the notes that they issued. I therefore ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
5.22 p.m.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE VISCOUNT DILHORNE moved Amendment No. 6:
Page 2, line 14, leave out ("or other similar claims")
The noble and learned Viscount said: This Amendment, again, is one which I can move, I hope, very shortly. It is a probing Amendment. The Explanatory Memorandum says that the purpose of the Bill is to make provision in order principally to enable compensation to be paid in respect of claims covered by Articles 1 and 4 of the Agreement. The inclusion of these words, "or other similar claims", means that the Baltic assets can be used to meet claims not covered by but similar to those covered by the Agreement. That is as I understand it. I ask this question: is it really thought that the Agreement is not comprehensive? And in the context here, how does one interpret the words "similar to" having regard to the variety of claims covered by the Agreement—the claims in respect of the Lena notes, the claims for shipping services and the claims in relation to property rights and banking, commercial and financial interests? One thing at least which is
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clear is that the inclusion of these words widens the Bill very considerably, and we have not heard a word so far about the reason for their inclusion.
Of course, the more claims there are which are included the less there viii be for each claimant. We know that the assets amount to £6,535,000. From that has to be deducted all the Custodian's costs, and—perhaps I may have the noble Lords' attention; I know he is having a little difficulty—we know that 13ritish claims amount to £15 million. We have been told by the noble Lord that those claims may be inflated, but we have been told of part of them which certainly, I should think, could not have been inflated. There is £2,200,000 due on the Lena notes, £2·75 million due on the external bonds, and:£1·3 million claimed by Her Majesty's Government. Surely that is not inflated. Could we b told what it is for? It is not for the shipping services, I hope, in respect of which we have relieved the Soviet Union of liability. Then, £1·25 million for commercial debts and hank balances, and £.7·5 million for nationalised properly and shareholding. That was the make-up of the £15 million as revealed in debates in another place.
If all the claimants are to be treated equally, it does not seem very likely that they are going to get a very large proportion of their claims. But by the inclusion of these words, "or other similar claims", it seems to me that the Treasury is given power to enlarge the number of claimants very considerably, and that will further reduce the share of the claimants who are covered by the Agreement. I do not know why those words are there, and I ask the noble Lord to explain. I beg to move.
LORD CHALFONT: Before I come to the question of this particular Amendment, I wonder whether I might revert. as I think it is an important matter that has been raised, to what the noble and learned Viscount said in his last few words before he withdrew the last Amendment. which meant that I therefore did not have an opportunity to intervene. He suggested, I think, that at no time during the debates on this Bill in another place was the disparity between what my right honourable friend said and what he meant referred to and made clear. I would

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refer him to a statement made by my honourable friend Mr. Whitlock in the course of the debate which appears in column 1130 of the Official Report of that debate.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: Which day?
LORD CHALFONT: On November 7, during the Second Reading of the Bill. If the noble Viscount will look at the second paragraph of column 1130 of the Official Report for that day, I think he will see that my honourable friend in fact referred to this disparity and explained to the honourable and gallant Member who had asked the supplementary question what he thought my right honourable friend had meant. I think it right to point out that this was referred to in the course of that debate, and was not ignored quite as comprehensively as the noble Viscount has suggested.
Perhaps I might now explain the underlying reasons for the phrase "or other similar claims "which the noble and learned Viscount has asked me to do—and I am glad to have an opportunity to do this. We know that there exist a few claims that were not registered under the Foreign Compensation Order of 1959. As noble Lords will recall the 1959 Order was closed for applications in 1964, but subsequently, and before settlement was reached with the Soviet Union, some additional claims were reported to us. These claims, it seems, could have been registered under the Order of 1959 if there had been more time. It was decided not to present any of these late claims to the Soviet Government, and they were not therefore the subject of negotiation. But the amount involved is not great—certainly not great enough to have affected the terms of the Agreement with the Soviet Union. As my right honourable friend the Parliamentary Secretary said in another place on November 7, it is the Government's intention to bring these late claimants within the terms of the distribution order; that is to say, everybody who could have registered a claim but failed to do so. That is the meaning of the words "or other similar claims", and in the light of that explanation I hope the noble Viscount will not press this Amendment.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: I take it from what the noble Lord has said that the
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"other similar claims" are all claims which have been received already, too late for admission before, and that there will not be any new class of claims which will be covered by these words.
LORD CHALFONT: That indeed is the position as I understand it.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: I regard that as satisfactory, and I ask leave to withdraw this Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
5.30 p.m.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE VISCOUNT DILHORNE moved Amendment No. 9:
Page 2, line 34, leave out subsection (5).
The noble and learned Viscount said: I am afraid I am moving a lot of Amendments to-day, but this, I think, is one of the more important. The subsection which this Amendment proposes to leave out is that which provides for repayment to the Treasury of the £500,000 which has been variously described as a tip" or "bribe" paid to the Russians. I should like to remind the Committee shortly of the history in relation to that. After Mr. Kosygin's visit in 1967 a communiqué was issued in which it was announced, with something of a flourish of trumpets, that a final settlement would be reached of these matters and that £500,000 would be paid out of the Baltic assets to the Soviet Union. It was almost a year later that the Agreement was signed and it was provided by Article 5 that the Government of the United Kingdom should from the Baltic assets—and I stress those words—pay the sum on January 12. The Government paid the sum to the Soviet Union, not out of the Baltic assets but from the Contingency Fund. So in fact the Government did not strictly adhere to the Agreement they had signed. Of course the Russians did not object to that because they got the money.
The Government duly paid the money on January 12; and it was paid, I think, without that payment being revealed at all to Parliament at the time. The first mention of it that I can find was on January 17 when, in a Written Answer to a Question—and, of course, Written Answers do not always attract attention—-the Government revealed what had been done. As the noble Lord has said, the Agreement was presented to Parliament on January 18. Curiously, the print of

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it does not contain the date on which it was presented. One wonders why. It contained the month; but it contained no full date. Why was that? The item was included in the Supplementary Estimates passed in another place. That is all the past history. Now we are asked to agree to the payment of £500,000 out of these assets—not to the Russians, because they have already been paid—to the Treasury.
I must say that the way in which the Government have handled this matter seems to me to show a contempt for Parliament. I think that through what is called the "pay-roll vote" they may think that they can get anything rubber-stamped in another place. Be that as it may, their course of conduct in relation to this matter seems to me to indicate a certain feeling of discomfort and disquietude about it. Without this payment they might not have had the Agreement. Be it so, it would have been much better not to have got an Agreement than to have agreed to pay this money out of assets to which the Soviet Union had no claim.
Mr. Whitlock the Under-Secretary, stated on the Second Reading in another place:
"Neither this nor any other British Government could have handed the assets over to the Soviet Union. I am sure that both sides of the House would have rejected such a solution as completely intolerable."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Commons, 7/11/68, col. 1132.]
I agree with him that to hand over the assets would be completely intolerable. But I find it equally intolerable that we should hand over £500,000 of these assets to the Soviet Union and so diminish the fund available to those who have suffered losses as a result of expropriation by the Soviet Union.
What can we do about it? It is perfectly clear that we cannot alter the agreement; but we can delete this subsection. If the Minister had been a member of a local authority which had behaved in such a way presumably they might be surcharged. That cannot happen. If we take out this clause we shall not be breaking any agreement with the Russians, but we shall be showing our disapproval in the only way we can; and we shall also give another place another opportunity of considering this matter. I feel at this moment that this is the course we should take. I hope
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your Lordships will agree with me and thus record our condemnation. I beg to move.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: I have little to add to what my noble and learned friend has said. I wholeheartedly support what he has said and I shall certainly follow him into the Lobby if we are not given satisfaction on this point. There is a further matter in relation to this subject to which I would call your Lordships' attention which makes it really even worse; that is, that a full month elapsed between the time the money was paid and the time when the payment was revealed in the Supplementary Estimates. This seems to me to be an extraordinary way to behave. The whole of this Bill seems to be regrettable in the extreme. I hope that noble Lords will support the suggestion of my noble and learned friend Lord Dilhorne that we show, in this House at least, our strongest disapproval of this sort of behaviour. We were not given the opportunity to do anything about it earlier. There was nothing we could do about this Agreement. I am quite certa n that it would have been strongly opposed had the opportunity been there to oppose it. Here seems to be an opportunity, at least for us in this House, to show how strongly we disapprove of the way Her Majesty's Government have behaved. I should like to say how wholeheartedly I support the Amendment of my noble and learned friend.
5.37 p.m.
LORD ST. OSWALD: Together with others, I support this Amendment partly in order to reverse an insult to Parliament. It is painful and deplorable, but I am afraid by no means untypical today, that the insult should be delivered by Ministers of Her Majesty's Government. There are, as has been pointed out, two offences contained in this subsection. The more obvious to the world at large is the payment itself: half a million pounds of somebody else's money, paid over as a "bribe" to the very felon who has robbed the victim of everything else that he possessed in the world, The second offence is that this act was carried out not simply without the approval of Parliament but without its knowledge. I am referring now directly to the £500,000 paid to the Soviet Union but slightly less directly to the realisation of

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the Baltic assets, the sale of gold, from which we are being asked to legalise the payment to the Russians that has already been made. My noble and learned friends Lord Dilhorne and Lord Conesford have stigmatised the Government on this point already. I think it pertinent to mention it as they did and that the Government should be reminded of it again in this context.
One of the qualities of the noble Lord, Lord Chalfont, which I think—perhaps I am wrong—is sometimes overlooked is that he is or can be a "comic" of some distinction. He is the rarest, or among the rarest, in that particular vocation. He is a "deadpan" comic. He can stand up and say, as he did last week at the Dispatch Box:
"A good deal of concern, and indeed some violent criticism, was expressed of the fact that this Agreement was reached without being subject to ratification. Perhaps at the outset I should say that neither side in the negotiations wanted to make this Agreement of 1968 subject to ratification".—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 4/2/69, col. 69.]
He also said—and he has repeated this to-day:
"I can only say that it was never the intention during these negotiations to have an Agreement subject to ratification" (col. 70).
It seems to me to be bad luck on the noble Lord that this did not, as it deserved—when he said it here last week and when he repeated it to-day—bring the House down. Indeed, neither side in the negotiations wanted to make the Agreement subject to ratification—but for quite different reasons. Mr. Kosygin knew that in his country ratification was a formality and a waste of time Mr. Wilson knew that in his country—in our country—had Parliament been given the chance before ratification or implementation, there was a lively possibility that Parliament would have chucked it out. In an axiomatic sense, Mr. Wilson's contempt of Parliament in this instance sprang from a respect for Parliament, in knowing what Parliament is likely to do if given the chance.
There was another aspect in which the noble Lord, Lord Chalfont, exercised his comic genius. He went through the performance of taking umbrage at expressions such as "tip" and "bribe" in describing this half a million pounds. He said at another point [col. 65] in answer
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to my noble friend, Lord Balfour of Inchrye:
"If you wish to say we 'bought' an Agreement, the fact is that we agreed with the Soviet Union that in return for this small and modest sum"—
everything would be "hunky-dory". That is not the expression he used, but mine is briefer and more descriptive.
It is interesting that in the calculation of the present Government half a million pounds is a small and modest sum when it belongs to somebody else. It could go some way to explaining the exuberant borrowing which Her Majesty's Government have done in their five eccentric years of office. The noble Lord said that the use of emotional and exaggerated terms such as "tip" and "bribe" and so on was "all good political knockabout '"—very fair and friendly of him. But a second or two later he said, and I quote directly:
"I do not believe that £500,000 was too great a price to pay for the advantages of an Agreement."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 4/2/69; col. 64.]
If that does not describe a tip or a bribe I wonder what it does describe. It is the noble Lord himself who is a master of knockabout, and in that guise we can raise our hats to him.
There was something else in his speech which could have been classified, I suppose, as humour in a Rabelaisian sense, but which I found far less to my taste in the context of this series of debates. He said:
"I was taken to task by one noble Lord for expressing the fate of the Baltic States in terms which he clearly thought were understated and objective…had t turned aside to deal one way or the other with the morals of this or that particular course of international action twenty, thirty or more years ago. I might indeed have kept your Lordships here until well into the night."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 4/2/69; col. 59.]
I do not know what the half-life of a moral principle may be in the calculations of the present Government, but the remaining part seems to have diminished pretty rapidly since 1964. We did not demand that the noble Lord should keep us well into the night, but to ignore the immorality of the Soviet action some 24 years ago, and to profit by it two years ago, was something he could not expect this House to allow to pass without comment and rebuke.

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The subsequent words which he quoted did nothing very much to exonerate him. It is true enough that in the course of his Second Reading speech the noble Lord expressed sympathy and compassion repeatedly, but not for the true victims of what he again and again called "this wretched history". It is because we think that the most wretched passage of this whole wretched history is being written now, at the dictation of Her Majesty's Government, that these Amendments are being moved.
The noble Lord, Lord Chalfont, said with feeling, on that earlier occasion, that the interest of the claimants is what is at stake here. In what way is Soviet Russia, who has been given first call on payment—advance call on payment—a claimant in this sense? He spoke of the legitimate preoccupation of the claimants. What was the legitimate preoccupation of Soviet Russia? In the next Amendment we shall be pleading the case of other claimants, equally deserving to those embraced by the noble Lord's compassion but which the Bill seeks to exclude. We shall come to that. Because it seems to us immoral and intolerable that the despoiler of those potential claimants should be rewarded eventually out of the money which belongs to them explains a certain ardour in my approach and the conviction with which I shall follow my noble and learned friend into the Lobby if he chooses to divide.
5.45 p.m.
LORD CHALFONT: I had thought, wrongly, that we were going to conduct this debate on a certain level of objectivity. I began to have doubts about that when I saw the noble Lord, Lord St. Oswald, enter the Chamber. He has indeed succeeded in lowering the debate to his normal level of pugnacity and personalities. I shall not attempt to refute any of the references he has made to my character or to my performance. I can only say that if he holds me in high esteem as a comic, I can think of no better judge.
LORD ST. OSWALD: That is burlesque.
LORD CHALFONT: I pass from this rather unsavoury exchange of personalities to deal with the Amendment which I understand the noble Lord was supporting. May I first explain to the noble and learned Viscount the apparent delay
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over the announcement of the payment of the £500,000 to the Soviet Union? It could not have been announced to Parliament on January 12 because Parliament was then in Recess. The earliest date at which a Written Answer could be laid was January 17, the date upon which that Written Answer was actually given. I mention this point merely to clear up the apparent delay in the announcement of this payment.
As to the question of the payment itself, I fear that my reply to the noble and learned Viscount's Amendment is bound to be a very brief one, and bound to be, in essence, a repetition of what I said on Second Reading. I suggest to the Committee that we shall get no further by referring to this payment as a "tip" or a "bribe" or in any other emotive and contentious way. We did pay to the Soviet Union the sum of half a million pounds. We could not have got the Agreement, which we think is essential to the claimants, had we not paid that money over. If noble Lords wish to call that a tip, a bribe, a consideration, a payment, a price or anything else, I invite them to consult Roget and use any term that they like to use. I can only say that we thought it essential to get this Agreement and we believed it right to make this payment in order to get it.
There is another aspect which is different from the question whether or not the Government were right do this, and that is the suggestion that in some way there has been a contempt for Parliament by the way in which it was done. I reject utterly the suggestion that the Government held Parliament in contempt in making this payment. The arrangement made with the Soviet Union was that the money should be paid over one week after signature of the Agreement. Noble Lords have attacked the Agreement and I have listened with great care to the terms in which they have attacked it. Nevertheless, the Agreement was made, and it was made not subject to ratification, because, as I said, both sides were anxious to resolve this long-standing question once and for all.
The Agreement included an undertaking to hand the money over to the Soviet Union one week after signature. We therefore did so in pursuance of the Agreement. It was not practicable at the

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time to make the payment direct out of the assets. Therefore the payment was made initially from the Civil Contingencies Fund and, as the noble and learned Viscount has said, in March, 1968, a Supplementary Estimate in respect of it was approved in another place. Subsection (5) of Clause 1, which the Amendment seeks to leave out, enables the Exchequer to be recouped from the assets. In effect the money was only lent by the Exchequer and it has now to be repaid.
I cannot really believe that noble Lords opposite, who have expressed such indignation—sometimes in what one might call almost theatrical terms—against this Agreement are moving this Amendment in order to suggest that this sum of half a million pounds paid to the Soviet Union should remain with the Exchequer rather than be paid out of the assets. That would seem to me an extremely perverse way of asking this Committee to register its disapproval of the Agreement; because what that would be doing would be saying that the small sum—and I repeat "small sum"—we paid to the Soviet Union in consideration of this Agreement should now be paid by the British taxpayer rather than by the claimants to the assets which we have realised. I cannot believe that that is the object of this Amendment, and I very much hope that, having expressed his indignation in suitable and measured terms, the noble and learned Viscount will not press it.
5.50 p.m.
LORD CHORLEY: I should like to say a word or two, having listened to this debate, I hope in a rather more objective way than noble Lords opposite. I find it very difficult to understand how noble Lords opposite can lash themselves into this state of white-hot indignation looking back on the way they behaved when they were in charge of the business of this country over a period of something like fifteen years.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: Thirteen years.
LORD CHORLEY: Thirteen years, if you like, but you did nothing to help these people during the whole of this time. Now, just because you dislike bargaining with the U.S.S.R. you whip yourselves up into this state of violent indignation
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about something you ought to have done yourselves. Very often in a situation of this kind it is impossible to negotiate without paying something. What does negotiation mean except doing one's best in a situation which is often a difficult one? Obviously in this case it was not an easy one. I think that anyone looking at this situation would say, "It is high time these people were no longer kept out of their money." Do noble Lords opposite want to go on keeping them out of their money for ever just for the purpose of spiting the U.S.S.R.? It is really ridiculous.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: As usual, the noble Lord, Lord Chorley, has shown his complete misapprehension of the case. He regards it as absolutely essential that we should get a Russian signature to a piece of paper before we can distribute assets which are in this country. The Government have also taken that view.
LORD CHORLEY: What did the noble Viscount do about distributing this money when he was a member of the previous Administration?
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: The noble Lord, I dare say, is fully in favour of distributing other people's property without any regard to who was the owner of it. The whole case for the Government depends upon the essentiality of getting agreement with the Russians before the distribution of any of these assets. That we challenge. The noble Lord, Lord Chalfont, says that it was worth paying £500,000 out of the Baltic assets to get the Russians' signature, because otherwise there might have been retaliation. They might have repudiated their obligation under an earlier agreement. Are we really to be deterred from taking a proper course by that kind of threat? Ought we not to have said that, if they want to persist in these claims, arbitrate about them and we will meet them in arbitration and thresh it out that way? But the Government did not do that. They said that they will not distribute until they have an agreement with the Russians that they agree to their dealing with this money which has been in their hands. They pay that price for it.
I am not going back over the whole field, but I share the view of Mr. Whitlock that both sides of this House would find it intolerable to pay over all these Baltic

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assets to the Soviet Union. And I find it intolerable that this Government should have agreed to pay over £500,000 of those assets as the price of getting a Russian signature to a piece of paper. We have known that the notes issued by the Russians for the Lena goldfields have been repudiated, but obviously the Government attach a great deal of importance to that signature. I am afraid that I cannot attach the same importance to it. I think that this is a very sorry story. The Agreement cannot be disturbed by anything we can do in your
Resolved in the affirmative, and Amendment agreed to accordingly.
6.5 p.m.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE VISCOUNT DILHORNE moved Amendment No. 10:
Page 2, line 42, leave out subsection (6).
The noble and learned Viscount said: This is a probing Amendment, and I am seeking to find out precisely what this subsection is intended to do. The Under-Secretary, Mr. Whitlock, in the Standing
Lordships' House, but we can mark our condemnation of this course of conduct by our Vote to-night, and I invite my noble friends to support me in cutting out this particular provision from this Bill.
5.54 p.m.
On Question, Whether the said Amendment (No. 9) shall be agreed to?
Their Lordships divided: Contents, 63; Not-Contents, 39.

CONTENTS

Abinger, L.

Drumalbyn, L.

Lansdowne, M.

Amherst of Hackney, L.

Dundonald, E.

Lauderdale, E.

Ashbourne, L.

Ebbisham, L.

MacAndrew, L.

Auckland, L.

Egremont, L.

Malmesbury, E.

Audley, Bs.

Elgin and Kincardine, E.

Merrivale, L.

Belstead, L.

Elliot of Harwood, Bs.

Milverton, L.

Bessborough, E.

Emmet of Amberley, Bs.

Mowbray and Stourton, L.

Bledisloe, V.

Falmouth, V.

Nugent of Guildford, L.

Brooke of Cumnor, L.

Ferrier, L.

Rankeillour, L.

Brooke of Ystradfellte, Bs.

Fortescue, E.

Rathcavan, L.

Clwyd, L.

Glasgow, E.

St. Aldwyn, E.

Colville of Culross, V.

Goschen, V. [Teller]

St. Helens, L.

Conesford, L.

Gowrie, E.

St. Oswald, L.

Cottesloe, L.

Gridley, L.

Sandford, L. [Teller]

Craigavon, V.

Grimston of Westbury, L.

Sempill, Ly.

Craigmyle, L.

Hawke, L.

Somers, L.

Cromartie, E.

Headford, M.

Teviot, L.

Daventry, V.

Horsbrugh, Bs.

Vivian, L.

Denham, L.

Inglewood, L.

Windlesham, L.

Derwent, L.

Jellicoe, E.

Wolverton, L.

Dilhorne, V.

Kilmarnock, L.

Yarborough, E.

NOT-CONTENTS

Addison, V.

Gardiner, L. (L. Chancellor.)

Phillips, Bs. [Teller.]

Beswick, L.

Hill of Wivenhoe, L.

St. Davids, V.

Bowles, L. [Teller]

Kennet, L.

Segal, L.

Brockway, L.

Kilbracken, L.

Serota, Bs.

Burden, L.

Kirkwood, L.

Shackleton, L. (L. Privy Seal.)

Burton of Coventry, Bs.

Latham, L.

Shannon, E.

Carron, L.

Leatherland, L.

Shepherd, L.

Chalfont, L.

Lindgren, L.

Sorensen, L.

Champion, L.

McLeavy, L.

Stonham, L.

Chorley, L.

MacLeod of Fuinary, L.

Strabolgi, L.

Crook, L.

Milner of Leeds, L.

Williamson, L.

Douglass of Cleveland, L.

Moyle, L.

Willis, L.

Faringdon, L.

Noel-Buxton, L.

Wise, L.

Committee in another place on November 19, gave an explanation which I must confess I find it somewhat difficult to relate to the terms of the subsection. The subsection purports to amend subsections (4) and (5) of the Enemy Property Act 1953. The Title of that Act says:
"An Act to make provision as respects things done, in relation to enemy property or property treated as enemy property, in excess of the powers conferred by the law relating to trading with the enemy…"

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That is part of the Long Title. That was, if I may summarise it, an Act to validate certain doubtful transactions under the Trading with the Enemy Act, and that, as we now understand it, is the purpose of subsection (2) of Clause 1.
Having done that, Parliament, in its wisdom, by Section 3(4) of that Act, provided that if at the time of the dealing the property was not in fact enemy property—if it did not come within the definition of "enemy property" under the Trading with the Enemy Act—the owner of that property could still recover it. But subsection (3) is limited in its scope by Section 1. Section 1 says that Section 2 and Section 3 relate only to transactions or dealings (as they are called) which took place within the period beginning September 3, 1939, and ended with the passing of the Act on November 29, 1953. So, as I understand it, if I have read it aright, under Sections 3, 4 and 5 of the Enemy Property Act, if those sections were not amended, and the dealings took place between those dates and the owner of the property could show that it was not really enemy property within the definition, then the owner of the property, whoever he might be, if he could trace the property into anyone's hands, could recover it. I hope that the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor will agree with me that that was the effect, putting it shortly, of subsections (3) and (4) of Section 3 of the Enemy Property Act.
It is against that background that one has to consider the terms of this subsection. So far as I can see, this subsection does two things. It says that these particular subsections of that 1953 Act,
"shall not operate so as to authorise the recovery after 5th January 1968 of any former property of a Baltic State or ceded territory, except property which on any of the relevant dates belonged to or was held or managed on behalf of an individual, or of any proceeds of such property…."
I will stop there. It seems to me that the effect, so far, of this subsection is to cut down the right to recover property which was wrongly treated as enemy property to property which was owned by individuals. I can quite see that, in this Bill or somewhere, you want to make it quite clear that the property with
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which we are dealing is to be treated as enemy property. But I cannot for the life of me see why, if you do that, you want to do anything affecting subsections (4) and (5) of Section 3 of the 1953 Act, because those subsections (and indeed, that section of the Act) apply only to dealings—and "dealings" means by the Custodian and others—in the period which I have mentioned.
The Under-Secretary, in the course of ate debate, said some things about this which I found very curious. He said:
"Subsection (6) relates to assets which were covered by Soviet claims and, therefore, by the Soviet undertaking in Article 2 of the Agreement. It does not relate to the privately owned assets of individuals, because the Soviet Government's claims were to businesses, partnerships, companies et cetera and not to privately owned assets."
Pausing there for a moment, is this particular subsection to be interpreted, when it talks about "property of an individual", as excluding any assets he holds in a partnership, or any assets he holds in the shares of a company? It would seem so from what the Under-Secretary said. He went on to say:
"Subsection (6) would prevent a Soviet State trading enterprise into which a former Baltic company's business had been taken from claiming the return of the company's property in this country, and also prevent a creditor of such a company from recovering the property. The subsection is completely justified by the terms of Article 2 of the Agreement."
I should have thought that that was certainly not the case, because Article 2 of the Agreement says in terms that the Soviet Union
"will neither on its own behalf nor on behalf of its physical or juridical persons pursue with the…United Kingdom or support claims arising after 1 January 1939."
and so on. Is it the case that the Government are not prepared to rely upon the signature of the Soviet Union to that undertaking and think it is necessary to bolster up the position by restricting the right to recover property to individuals, and only property in relation to dealings taking place within that area? Because if this Agreement means what it says as to the Russian obligation, it would seem quite impossible that you would have a claim to any of this property by a Soviet State trading enterprise, because that would be contrary to the Agreement signed by the Soviet Union.
I must say that I find the inclusion of this particular provision very puzzling; and I find the final words of this subsection even more puzzling, where it says:
"…any such property or proceeds (except as aforesaid) recovered by virtue of those subsections between that date and the passing of this Act shall be re-transferred or repaid, as the case may require."
That appears to me to mean that if anyone has recovered into his possession assets which were held by the Custodian under subsections (3) or (4) of the Enemy Property Act 1953, and he had only recovered on the basis that they were not really enemy property at all, then, if I understand these final words correctly, although he has succeeded in getting his property back into his own possession, they seem to me to re-transfer this property back to the Custodian. I find that very astonishing. I cannot believe really that I have interpreted it correctly, and that is why I say that this is a probing Amendment. But if it be the case that these final words are put in to deprive people again of property of which they were deprived, which they got back, and they are now to be deprived of it again, then at a later stage I certainly think we should have an Amendment to cut out those words, and I certainly should like to have an explanation in regard to the earlier words on the points that I have mentioned. I beg to move.
6.13 p.m.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: What the noble and learned Viscount has said about this subsection is, broadly speaking, correct, subject to the following. The subsection relates to assets which were covered by Soviet claims and therefore by the Soviet undertaking in Article 2 of the Agreement. It does not relate to the privately owned assets of individuals because the Soviet Government's claims were to businesses—partnerships, companies, et cetera, and not in general to privately owned assets. The subsection has the effect of preventing two possible types of action designed to recover assets. First, it would prevent a Soviet State trading enterprise from seeking the recovery of property standing in the name of a former Baltic firm which was nationalised under legislation passed in the Baltic States before they became enemy territory. This type of action is thought to
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be unlikely in view of the Soviet Government's undertaking, but it is thought right to provide for it. The second possibility is that a creditor of a nationalised Baltic firm might take proceedings for a winding-up. It is to deal with those two cases.
As I said very clearly when I was dealing with a previous subsection, it is retrospective to January 5, 1968, which I think I inadvertently described as the date of the introduction of the Bill: it is of course the date of the Angle-Soviet Agreement. It is intended to be retrospective to that date.
VISCOUNT COLVILLE OF CULROSS: I wonder whether the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor, or indeed his noble friend Lord Chalfont, could explain just a little more about this. My noble and learned friend Lord Dilhorne spoke about the assets of a partnership. I do not know whether or not those would be covered by the expression "held or managed on behalf of the individual". Equally, of course, I do not know what the assets are—and who were their owners—that are still in the hands of the Custodian in relation to either the Baltic States or the ceded territories. That is one point that has not been answered and I think it ought to be; because I cannot see any reason why the partnership should not claim, and it does not come within the definition of the type at claims what we have already heard are being put forward, or were being put forward, and have now been abandoned by the Soviet Union under Article 2 of the Agreement. That is one point that is not clear.
The other is this. The noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor did not deal with the last words. It is simply a matter of fact. Has any money been transferred since January last year or has it not? If it has not, then I suppose there is no harm in these words because they do not mean anything and never will mean anything. If, however, any money has been transferred—I appreciate that it does not cover the case of individuals; it covers only the case of companies—is this a case that has already happened whereby the Soviet Union has been in breach of Article 2? Because that must be the type of case that is being envisaged in this particular part of the subsection; and if so I think the Committee ought to know about it. If the Soviet Union, as I suspect, has put forward no

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claim in contradiction of Article 2 of their Agreement, what is the point of these words?
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: This does not really apply to individuals at all. It is really intended to apply only to Baltic companies and firms. It does not apply to individuals because the Agreement with the Soviet Union does not relate to privately owned assets of individuals at all—
VISCOUNT COLVILLE OF CULROSS: Or partnerships?
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: —and all this is dealing with, really, is the possible claim in winding up a company. This has not in fact happened.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: May I—
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: May I add just this? If an individual has a right of action which is preserved by the 1953 Act, Sections 3(4) or 3(5), that right will remain unaffected by Clause 1(6) of this Bill; and accordingly he can still bring his action if he wishes, instead of claiming under Clause 1(3), though he can claim under Clause 1(3) if he wants to do so. I think there has been a good deal of misunderstanding about it.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: I am grateful to the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor. I thought I had got it fairly right with regard to the first part of this subsection, but he has not said anything that satisfies me with regard to the last part. I refer to the words in subsection (6), beginning at line 4 of page 3 of the Bill:
"and any such property or proceeds (except as aforesaid) recovered by virtue of those subsections between that date"—
which I take to be January 5, 1968—
"and the passing of this Act shall be re-transferred or repaid, as the case may require."
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: At the moment there is not any.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: If there has been none which has been recovered the chances of its being recovered before the passing of this Act, I would think, despite anything I may say, would be very slight indeed. I do not think that any action could proceed to judgment in the
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time that I shall be speaking. I doubt the necessity for having those words. Perhaps the noble and learned Lord could look again at that point. I do not propose to press the matter, but those words certainly puzzled me a great deal, and what the noble Lord has said about it—I will not trouble him further about it—is not from my recollection quite in accord with what was said in another place about those final words. I do not think there ought to be any confusion about it. I will not press this point now. I ask leave to withdraw the Amendment, in the hope that the noble and learned Lord will look at those final words again.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 1, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 2 [Amendments of Foreign Compensation Act 1950]:
6.20 p.m.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE VISCOUNT DILHORNE moved Amendment No. 11:
Page 3, line 31, leave out subsection (4) and insert—
("(4) There shall be inserted at the commencement of section 4(4) of the Foreign Compensation Act 1950 'An appeal shall lie by way of case stated to the Court of Appeal whose decision shall be final, on a question of law relating to the jurisdiction of the Commission but save as aforesaid '.")
The noble and learned Viscount said: I beg to move Amendment No. 11. We had a very considerable discussion on this subject at the Second Reading. I listened with great interest to the speech of the noble and learned Lord, the Lord Chancellor, on it. There is, of course, no Party interest in this matter, and, as he rightly pointed out, no Government interest in it. The whole question is whether there should in certain circumstances which I will refer to in a moment be an appeal from a decision of the Foreign Compensation Commission. May I say straight away that I would agree with the noble and learned Lord, the Lord Chancellor, and anyone else who takes that view, that the decisions of the Foreign Compensation Commission on matters which are within the sphere entrusted to them, within their jurisdiction, should be final and unchallengable; and that, I believe, was always the intention of Parliament. Indeed, from the time that the Foreign Compensation

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Act was passed there have been, I understand, only two challenges of their decisions, one on the ground that they had acted contrary to natural justice—there had been some slip up, but I do not know the facts of the case—and that was admitted.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: If the noble and learned Viscount will forgive my interrupting, that was certainly not admitted. The claimant's claim was first disallowed at the preliminary hearing. On review it was allowed, though presumably for less than the claimant wanted, and he went to the court saying that he had not been allowed to call his evidence. The Commission said that that was absolutely untrue; they intended to file an affidavit and fight the case to the House of Lords. Then they realised that the effect on the other claimants would be years of delay, and accordingly it was arranged that there should be a statement in court that there had been misunderstanding and they would review the case.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: I am glad the noble and learned Lord intervened and corrected any misapprehension under which I was speaking. I am not seeking to blame the Foreign Compensation Commission. In any event, I think I am right in saying that there have been only two cases which have come before the courts since the Commission were created in 1950. One was the case to which the noble and learned Lord referred and the other the recent case. I do not know how many claims there have been, but the first thing that occurs to me is that if in all these years there have been only two claims going to the courts, is there any real need at all for a provision such as this subsection. Up till now, the noble and learned Lord will agree, the Commission could be taken to the courts on the grounds of breach of natural justice, or on the grounds that they had acted in excess of their jurisdiction, and that has happened only once.
I think it is right that it should be possible to take that action to the courts when the question is whether they have acted outside the sphere entrusted to them by Parliament. I do not think that Parliament ever intended to entrust to them the final determination of the limits of their jurisdiction. I am quite
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sure that Parliament meant that within their jurisdiction their decisions should be completely final. I think the noble and learned Lord, the Lord Chancellor, will agree that up till now, unlit this provision is enacted, one could bring this question of jurisdiction before the courts. The case for doing so seems to me to be slight if there has beer only one case in all these years. But, at any rate, it could be done.
I understand it is the intention to prevent that in future. The argument put forward is a powerful one and it is this, as I understand it: that any litigation in the courts delays the claims of all the other claimants. That is true, but there are countervailing arguments. It claims are admitted which are outside the jurisdiction of the Commission, the amount available to the other claimants will be correspondingly reduced, and it surely is wrong if someone is refused because someone else is dealt with at that way. The answer to this difficulty seems to me to be to try to devise some procedure whereby where there is a question of jurisdiction there can be one appeal—one speedy and final appeal. That is why I have provided by this Amendment an appeal by way of case stated to the Court of Appeal, whose decision shall be final. I believe that would be satisfactory and would not involve undue delay, because an application to the Court of Appeal to have the hearing expedited, when they knew that their decision would affect a large number of claims, I should expect to be sympathetically listened to.
This Amendment may be criticised by the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor on the ground that it is not complete, that it is defective in certain respects. I shall not seek to repudiate that. It does not quite meet all that I should like to see in it, and I will tell your Lordships why. I was not certain whether the appeal should lie from the provisional determination of the Foreign Compensation Commission or from the final review. I am rather inclined to think that it should run from the former, but that is a matter which is an expert matter; I should not mind which it ran from so long as it ran from one or the other. Secondly, I think there should be a time limit. If there is an appeal at all from the provisional review or the final review, whichever it be, notice of appeal

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must be given within a short period of time or the right to appeal must be completely lost. That could be dealt with, perhaps not under the section of the Foreign Compensation Act as it stands, but by rules of procedure.
I know that this Amendment is defective, perhaps, in not dealing with those two matters, but it states the principle which I should like to see embodied in the Act. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Denning, who regrets that he has had to leave us, has told me that he completely supports this particular proposal. I commend it to the Committee. The noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor said that he would deal with this, that the Government still have an open mind and that they want to know what everybody thinks about it. I hope I have left no doubt what I think about it. I beg to move.
6.28 p.m.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR: The Government have carefully reconsidered this matter, but they are not at the moment disposed to accept the Amendment. They still want to know what everybody thinks. I agree that it is a non-Party political question, a matter of opinion, but what has impressed the Government to some extent is that not one single person who is a layman, either in the Second Reading debate or when I looked round now in Committee, supports this Amendment. Lawyers, quite naturally, want everything to go to the courts. The sole support has been the noble and learned Viscount, Lord Dilhorne, and the noble and learned Lords, Lord Wilberforce and Lord Denning, but not a single layman.
May I shortly recapitulate what I said before? This actual clause does not do anything. All it does is to enable an order to be made at a future time. It is in no way retrospective; it does not apply to the case that went to the House of Lords or any of the Egyptian cases. This is simply looking to the future and enables an order to be made in the future. I should have thought that the best time to oppose it was when the order was made and not now. The sole question at issue is what the claimants would prefer. I should have thought that laymen were better qualified than
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the lawyers to judge what the claimants would prefer.
I reminded the House last time that ordinarily when a Government has certain money to distribute there is no legal claim on the money by the claimants, even when, as in the case in which China was concerned in the last century, we found out what the claims all came to, which was 3 million dollars, and we got 3 million dollars from the Government. There was a delay apparently in distributing that among the claimants, so somebody took proceedings. The courts said, "There is no legal claim to this. Of course there is a moral obligation on the Government who have got this money for distribution to claimants to make some fair distribution of it; but they are responsible only to Parliament; they do not hold the money as trustees."
For a hundred years or more this was always done by the Civil Service or the Foreign Office. Then, in 1950, it became too much for them, so this board of three lawyers was set up in effect to do it for them. But, of course, there could be no appeal from the Civil Service. So when this matter came before Parliament in 1950, Parliament put in this special clause saying that there should be no appeal to the courts. In your Lordships' House the noble Viscount, Lord Bridgeman, speaking for the Opposition, said:
"Those who are in any way concerned with these claims view with great relief the idea that the share in regard to each claim compared with the global total is to be decided in England and according to English legal procedure. Everybody will be very content with that. I think we can agree with the Lord Chancellor to leave the matter in the hands of the Tribunal, and in this case not to ask for appeal."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 27/6/50; col. 1117.]
Then the matter came before Parliament again, after the Franks Committee Report in 1958, because there were at that time a number of clauses in different Statutes saying, with regard to various kinds of tribunals, "No appeal to the courts". The Franks Committee did not approve of this; and so, in 1958, in the Tribunals and Inquiries Act those clauses were removed, including the clause in the 1950 Act with regard to the Foreign Compensation Commission. But the Government, on review, thought that that was wrong, and so there was a Government Amendment to make a

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special exception for the British Nationality Act and the Foreign Compensation Commission: The actual Amendment was:
"Nothing in this section"—
that was the section that was going to remove most of these clauses which ousted the jurisdiction of the courts—
"shall affect Section 26 of the British Nationality Act 1948, or apply to any Order or determination of a court of law or the Foreign Compensation Commission…"
Mr. Renton (as he then was), on behalf of the Government—and I notice that in Committee (because he made an observation at the same time) the then learned Attorney General, now the noble and learned Viscount, Lord Dilhorne, was there—said:
"I wish to refer to the position of the Foreign Compensation Commission. We are expressly providing here that it should not be possible for people to go to the High Court in order to get an order for certiorari or mandamus against the Foreign Compensation Commission. In taking those steps it is right that we should explain why we are doing so, and I hope that the Committee will feel that there is a valid reason for doing so. The Foreign Compensation Commission is concerned mainly with making ex gratia distributions to British subjects of such sums of money as the Foreign Office manages to obtain from foreign Governments for distribution among British subjects as compensation for the loss of their property in such foreign countries. When the total sum has been received from the foreign Government, British subjects are invited to make their claims, and sometimes substantial claims are made. Then the Foreign Compensation Commission makes an award which is an ex gratia award. I am sure that it will be seen that the very fact that it is an ex gratia award is a reason for not having an appeal to the High Court on certiorari or mandamus, and secondly, the fact that this is a running operation arithmetically means that the Foreign Compensation Commission from time to time needs to know how much is left of the cake for it to distribute in order that it may make these ex gratia awards. If the exercise is held up by substantial claims being taken to the High Court for certiorari it will be very difficult for this money ever to be distributed in reasonable time. For that reason we felt that we had to make an exception."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Standing Committee B, 15/7/58; col. 95.]
That exception was duly made in another place. When the Commons Amendment came to this House, with the support of the noble and learned Viscount the then Lord Chancellor, Lord Kilmuir, it was accepted by this House.
This is what the reason has always been: that if you are going to have lawyers, from the claimant's point of view he
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does not mind what kind of lawyer it is. Questions of construction are, in fact, from the layman's point of view always extremely "dicey". If your Lordships recollect the House of Lords case which arose under the Act, you will recall that eight judges of superior courts considered the question of construction; five of them made one answer and three made the other, but the three won because they were in the House of Lords. The other five were a unanimous Court of Appeal and two noble and learned Lords in the House of Lords. But, of course, that was not enough against three none and learned Lords in the House of Lords. It shows what a great "toss up" construction really is from a layman's point of view.
The curious thing is, that if the Amendment proposed by the noble and learned Viscount had been the position in that case, the opposite answer would have been given, since the Court of Appeal always said that they were not at all satisfied that the construction of the Commission was wrong. So I am really thinking of the people. I would quote two letters:
"I am 76 years old and I believe you could help me by giving me some part of my claim. I have no old-age pension because my late husband got ill in 1948. He wily paid six months' National Health Insurance stamps; therefore, I am not entitled as a widow or as an old age pensioner."
And again:
"I am a British war refugee. In 1939 I had to run for my life and abandon my property in Poland (Russian occupied). I lost houses, furniture and personal belongings, including income from rent. In 1963 I had coronary thrombosis, and since 1967 I am unemployed due to cataract. I had an operation nine weeks ago but unable to work. According to the enclosed documents it was up to the Russians to settle claims, but now it is up to the British Government only. Please, for the sake of justice to hundreds of victims as myself, vote in favour of the Bill".
These people have waited about thirty years. Those who are still alive are pretty old. What they really want is that somebody should make a determination and that they should get their money. Of course the Government have no interest in this, or no axe of any kind to grind and are simply doing what they think best for the claimants. But they find themselves in agreement with the Labour Government of 1950 and the Conservative Government of 1958, and they think

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that what is best in the interests of the claimant is not to bring in the lawyers but for the lawyers on the Commission to make a speedy determination of the claims so that they can get their money. It is on those grounds that I hope the Committee will not accept this Amendment.
6.39 p.m.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE: Since the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor has chided laymen for not having taken part in this discussion I shall risk sticking out my neck. On Second Reading I told your Lordships that as a layman I viewed this proposal with a considerable degree of anxiety. I also told your Lordships that I had read the observations of Professor Wade, and of the Chairman of the General Council of the Bar and the President of the Law Society, and that I was impressed both by their arguments and by their eminence. I went on to say that I realised that legal luminaries sometimes disagree. This is what is happening this evening. I told your Lordships that I proposed to listen to all the arguments and would then make up my own mind. I have now done so, and without any doubt whatsoever I wish to say to your Lordships, and to the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor, that I shall support the noble and learned Viscount's Amendment.
I personally regret that it does not include in it something to ensure expedition, but I understand that this can be achieved through a sympathetic attitude of mind. I do not know whether this is enough in itself, but I think I must just read again the words used by Professor Wade, in view of what the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor, has said—rather appealing, I thought, to our emotions. I understand that; I know that the noble and learned Lord is concerned with the feelings of the claimants, old people, who have had to wait a long time. This is the sort of thing that would appeal to my heart, but at the same time I think I must find myself in the strange position of being in disagreement with the noble and learned Lord on a point of law. Professor Wade wrote:
"The law's delay, like its uncertainty and expense, is a tempting reason for sacrificing justice to speed".
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I suggest that here the noble and learned Lord is inviting us to sacrifice justice to speed, and I would not wish to be a party to this. If it were possible to devise an Amendment along the lines that my noble and learned friend Lord Dilhorne has suggested, and somehow or other ensure that there is not unnecessary delay, I feel that this would be the right thing to do. The noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor has invited the opinion of a layman, and I have given it. Meanwhile, I shall support the Amendment of my noble and learned friend, and hope that perhaps something may be done to improve it in this one particular respect.
6.43 p.m.
LORD WILBERFORCE: I want to add only a few words, few because I speak as a lawyer rather than as a layman, and also because the main reasons for supporting something on the lines of this Amendment were already explained by me on the Second Reading. The alternatives before us are very narrow and very easy to state. The first alternative, which is the Government's alternative, is this. The moment this Bill is passed, and an Order in Council is made under it—and your Lordships know that such an Order cannot be amended when it is laid before the House— the whole thing will be handed over to the Foreign Compensation Commission for determination: a body which does not have to give reasons for its decisions, and whatever it does there is no recourse whatever to any court of law. That is one alternative.
The alternative which the Amendment would propose is that the whole matter should be left to the Foreign Compensation Commission—decisions on fact, decisions on construction—subject only to this: that the Judiciary, the Court of Appeal, as proposed, is to have the power to see that the guidelines laid down by Parliament when discussing this Bill are respected. That those guidelines are of importance is surely shown by this debate. Why otherwise have the House of Commons, and this House, spent a considerable time discussing the details of what is to go into the Bill, the ceded territories and all the other details, unless these are matters of importance which the Legislature desires to see carried out?

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The only question of principle is whether, should the Commission depart from those guidelines, somebody is to have the right to say so. If one may take a homely metaphor, which I hope is not too crude, it is as if you said to eleven people: "Right; you may go on to this field; you may play Association Football. You may appoint your own referee; you may have your own offside rules. You do the whole thing exactly as you like and nobody will interfere, but if somebody picks up the ball and runs with it, that is not Association Football and we have the right to stop you." That is the sort of area in which we are discussing this subject matter; the distinction between the fundamental guidelines and the matter of detail.
There are just two points in what the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor has said that I should like to take up. The first is this very important question of delay, which I imagine is the point to which he read out the letters that he had in his hand. That, as I said, and as everybody agrees, is very important, and it is a point to which the layman attaches the greatest importance. But it is necessary to put that in the right perspective. May I give the Committee a few figures which I think can be easily followed and which will show, I hope, that the fact that the case before your Lordships' Judicial Committee, the Anisminic case, did come before the Court, and ultimately here, did not in any way prejudice the distribution of the Fund with which it was concerned; namely, the Egyptian Fund? I have taken these facts from the reports of the Foreign Compensation Commission. The Anisminic case was determined by the Commission in May, 1963. Of course, the Commission had had it before then; they knew the claim as it was pending. But as at March 31, 1963—that is, before the determination by the Commission—they had distributed no less than £17 million out of the Egyptian Fund, which was basically £27 million plus some further money added by Parliament. That is the first figure.
The second figure is this. Up to March 31, 1968 (which was during the pendency of the appeal to your Lordships' House but before its determination), the Foreign Compensation Commission had distributed out of the
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Egyptian Fund over £29 million, which is more than the original £27 million allotted, and by all standards a very considerable sum. Not only that, but there were still 800 cases undisposed of. So while one has the greatest possible sympathy with the delay argument in principle, it does not seem from the Record as if the fact that the courts interfered in this one Anisminic case has had a very great effect or, one might say, any effect on the distribution of the money by the Commission. For that reason I warmly endorse what the noble Marquess said about the question of delay: that one should not pay for acceleration at the price of the rule of law.
There is one other point which the noble and learned Lord made: that until 1950—and indeed for about a hundred years—the whole of this matter had been handled by civil servants, and nobody had ever complained about that. They distributed it in their discretion. Why, therefore, when the Foreign Compensation Act is passed in 1950, and a Commission is set up, is provision for appeals allowed? My answer to that is this: that if you depart from a discretionary field to one of law, then you must get your legal process right. The fact that before that you operated under a different system is not a reason for operating a mutilated legal system. It is as if you have a factory which has been worked by men, by manpower, and you decide to go over to automation. That is not a reason for allowing the machines to operate without supervision. That is all that is suggested here; that there should be just this residuary final element of supervision by the courts over what the Parliament has laid down.
I will not detain your Lordships any longer. The reasons have been very well explained by my noble and learned friend Lord Dilhorne, and I simply wish to add my support for something on the lines of the Amendment, though with any necessary changes to get the machinery right and, if possible, to introduce a time limit.
VISCOUNT ADDISON: I can speak only as a layman, and only with great trepidation on this matter, but the point about the delay seems to me to be an exceedingly important one. What I cannot quite follow in the argument of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Wilberforce, is how it comes to be that,

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although the law is very well represented on the Foreign Compensation Commission, other lawyers, or lawyers generally, are not willing to consider that those eminent lawyers should be any more right, or any more wrong, than any other lawyers. Why should it be that those lawyers cannot themselves be regarded as the legal representation which is required so as to avoid the possibility, at any rate, of delay, even in a few odd cases that may happen when the matter has to go to appeal?
LORD CONESFORD: I agree so completely with what the noble and learned Lord, Lord Wilberforce, has said, that I should like to mention only two points. It is very bad for any tribunal to know that there is no appeal from it, no matter how much it exceeds its jurisdiction or indulges in what the law calls a nullity. That is not to make an adverse comment on a particular tribunal but applies to every tribunal of every kind.
I should like to pay my tribute to the complete respectability of the intentions of the Government in putting forward this clause—a clause which, nevertheless, I think to be wrong—since they desire speed, which is a proper desire. But the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor said something which is tempting to say but which, nevertheless, is wrong. He said that Parliament in 1950 intended that the view of this Commission should be final. I know that it is most tempting to read the words and to think that, but we ought to resist the temptation. There is at least a possibility that Parliament intended the law to be precisely what the supreme tribunal has decided that it is. Parliament may well have intended that on most points the view of the Commission should be final, but that if it went quite outside its jurisdiction—supposing the Order in Council said that there were four conditions which had to be satisfied and the tribunal itself said, "We require satisfaction on six conditions"—that would require correction. The point I am making was taken by my learned friend Sir John Foster in another place. I do not think we ought to say that, because a layman reading a section of the Act of 1950 thought that the determination should be final in every case, that really was the intention of Parliament.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: I have listened with the greatest care to the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor. If this Amendment is carried, I suppose the chances are about a thousand to one, probably more, against a case being brought to the courts, and it is a very narrow point. I entirely agree with the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor that the vast mass of the decisions of this Commission should be final and unappealable. The only issue is as to whether questions as to its jurisdiction should be subject to an appeal. The noble Viscount, Lord Addison said, "If they are all lawyers, why not leave it entirely to them." If we adopted that principle in the administration of justice, we could dispense with the House of Lords in its judicial capacity—not reform it—and could dispense with the Court of Appeal, and would have a mass of conflicting decision.
VISCOUNT ADDISON: I think that is rather an exaggeration. This is a matter involving the Foreign Compensation Commission dealing with specific cases, comparatively small in number. It is somewhat of an exaggeration, therefore, to raise the whole question of the jurisdiction of the courts and the House of Lords.
VISCOUNT DILHORNE: The noble Viscount says that, and one knows that the vast mass of claims could not possibly involve questions of jurisdiction. But when the noble Viscount says that it is a small matter, I think I am right in saying that the Anisminic claim was something like £4 million. A question as to jurisdiction certainly should be appealable. The Chairman of the Bar Council and the President of the Law Society have both expressed that view, and not only the opinion of people engaged in actual practice but also all the judicial opinion which has been given expression to is in favour of this Amendment. Those opinions are not expressed because judges want any more work. They are expressed because they think it is consistent with justice and will improve justice. I do not want to add anything to what was said by my noble and learned friend Lord Wilberforce in his persuasive and powerful speech.
The noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor said that he has heard the

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lawyers but has not heard the laymen; but lawyers in these matters are concerned with the interests of laymen and are very often the protectors of the interests of laymen. Since the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor wants to know what are the views of the laymen, there
Resolved in the affirmative, and Amendment agreed to accordingly.
Clause 2, as amended, agreed to.
Remaining clauses agreed to.
House resumed: Bill reported with Amendments.
is only one way to show him—that is, by dividing the House on this Amendment.
6.59 p.m.
On Question, Whether the said Amendment (No. 11) shall be agreed to?
Their Lordships divided: Contents, 55; Not-Contents, 32.

CONTENTS

Amherst of Hackney, L.

Elgin and Kincardine, E.

Merrivale, L.

Auckland, L.

Elliot of Harwood, Bs.

Milverton, L.

Audley, Bs.

Emmet of Amberley, Bs.

Mountevans, L.

Belstead, L. [Teller.]

Falmouth, V.

Mowbray and Stourton, L.

Bledisloe, V.

Ferrier, L.

Rankeillour, L.

Brooke of Cumnor, L.

Foot, L.

St. Aldwyn, E.

Brooke of Ystradfellte, Bs.

Fortescue, E.

St. Helens, L.

Burnham, L.

Goschen, V. [Teller.]

St. Just, L.

Clwyd, L

Gowrie, E.

St. Oswald, L.

Colville of Culross, V.

Headfort, M.

Sandford, L.

Conesford, L.

Henley, L.

Sempill, Ly.

Cork and Orrery, E.

Horsbrugh, Bs.

Strange, L.

Craigmyle, L.

Kinnoull, E.

Swansea, L.

Daventry, V.

Lansdowne, M.

Vivian, L.

Denham, L.

Lauderdale, E.

Wilberforce, L.

Dilhorne, V.

Lindsey and Abingdon, E.

Windlesham, L.

Drumalbyn, L.

MacAndrew, L.

Wolverton, L.

Dundonald, E.

McCorquodale of Newton, L.

Yarborough, E.

Egremont, L.

NOT-CONTENTS

Addison, V.

Gardiner, L. (L. Chancellor.)

Phillips, Bs. [Teller.]

Beswick, L.

Garnsworthy, L.

St. Davids, V.

Bowles, L.

Hall, V.

Segal, L.

Brockway, L.

Kennet, L.

Serota, Bs. [Teller.]

Brown, L.

Kilbracken, L.

Shackleton, L. (L. Privy Seal.)

Burden, L.

Kirkwood, L.

Shepherd, L.

Carron, L.

Leatherland, L.

Sorensen, L.

Chalfont, L.

McLeavy, L.

Stonham, L.

Chorley, L.

Milner of Leeds, L.

Strabolgi, L.

Crook, L.

Noel-Buxton, L.

Willis, L.

Delacourt-Smith, L.

Peddie, L.

NATIONAL INSURANCE &c BILL
House in Committee: Clauses agreed to.
House resumed: Bill reported without amendment; Report received.

NEW TOWNS BILL
7.9 p.m.
THE PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY, MINISTRY OF HOUSING AND LOCAL GOVERNMENT (LORD KENNET): My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time. This Bill which comes to us from the Commons has the single purpose of raising by £300 million the overall amount which may be advanced to development corporations and to the Commission for the New Towns, in order to sustain the New Towns programme. The present limit authorised by Parliament is £800 million, and on the last day of last year £750 million had already been committed for development approved by my right honourable friend the Minister of Housing and Local Government on New Town building in England, and by the Secretaries of State for Scotland and Wales for New Towns there. Therefore, we expect to reach the present limit of £750 million in the current Session of Parliament. The extra £300 million should be enough for another three years or so.
I would remind the House that this is a cumulative provision. Successive Governments come before Parliament from time to time to ask for a raising in the absolute total ceiling of money which may be kept in play for the purpose of the New Towns programme. I do not think that the House, thinly attended and at this time of the night, would wish me to give any account of that New Towns programme. It is not so very long since we debated it at considerable length, and I think it would be best if I sat down now and answered later any points which may be made. I beg to move.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Kennet.)
VISCOUNT COLVILLE OF CULROSS: My Lords, I agree with the noble Lord that we have had a debate on the New Towns fairly recently. On this Bill itself in another place the opportunity was taken by a very large number of honourable and right honourable Members to discuss many aspects of the New Towns programme. Many of them did so against the background that they had in their own constituencies a New Town, and they
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were able to discuss these matters with first-hand knowledge. I do not think that I have anything to add to that debate which so recently took place in the House of Commons, but I should like to ask the noble Lord, Lord Kennet, to deal with the only point on which I believe no answer was given by the Government spokesmen at any stage there. It was a point raised by my honourable friend the Member for Runcorn, and it related to the procedure at inquiries when a designation order is made.
May I deal very briefly with what happens? The designation order setting out the area for the New Town is made by the Minister, and if there are any objections to it an independent inspector, who has nothing whatever to do with the Ministry, is in due course sent to hold an inquiry into them. At the beginning of the inquiry a member of the New Towns Department of the Ministry comes to give a short statement and to answer questions of fact, although he is not allowed to go into questions of Government policy. If I may pay tribute to those in that position whom I have heard do this, I think they acquit themselves extremely well in that position. They are always very full and frank in their answers, and most helpful. But the difficulty arises in this way. It may be that there is a local authority or somebody else there who wishes to support the designation order that the Minister has himself made and about which the inquiry is being held. Most of the people, however, will be there to object to it in one form or another. If there is nobody there who supports it, then the whole thing is completely one-sided. As your Lordships can imagine, all the people get up and say that there is something wrong with the order, and there is nobody there who has any incentive to criticise their criticisms or to examine them to see whether they are valid.
The inspectors, who come from outside—sometimes they are clerks of local authorities; they are men of great eminence and great experience—must, I think, find it extremely difficult to make a fair assessment of the weight of those objections on which they have to report and recommend to the Ministry, if there is nobody there who has anything but a one-sided view of the matter—if there is no

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challenge, in fact, to the views which are put forward. I am not certain that I know what the answer is, because I can quite understand that it would be wrong for the Minister (who, after all, is going to make the decision on the designation order) himself actively to promote the order, as would happen, for instance, in a compulsory purchase case. It occurs to me, however, that there are procedures in the courts whereby, if there is a difficult point, the court can appoint amicus curiœ who will argue the case out, really for the benefit of the court, if there is nobody else to take that particular side, and who can be of great assistance in crystallising the issues and in testing the views of those who come before the court or the inquiry.
I would ask the noble Lord, Lord Kennet, not of course for any answer on this matter to-day but to see whether there is any validity in what I have been saying and whether inspectors have found themselves hampered in doing the difficult job that they have to do in listening to these inquiries and in reporting on them arising from the fact that in some cases, at any rate, there is nobody except the objectors present. If they do find that it is difficult, I wonder if the Department might consider whether there is any possible way—I do not think it would need legislation—to put the matter right; some arrangement which would have the effect of better informing the Minister about the strength of the objections. At the moment, the failing is really one of information. The Minister himself cannot judge from the inspector's report how strong and how valid these points of objection are because they have never been tested.
My Lords, that matter was briefly raised in another place; but I think all the other points—and there were many of them—which arose on the general subject of New Towns were examined and were answered by the Government, and I do not wish to go into them again. There is therefore that one point that I wish to ask in welcoming the Bill and hoping that your Lordships will give it a Second Reading.
LORD KENNET: My Lords, I fully take the point of what the noble Viscount, Lord Colville of Culross, has said, and will go into it and examine the matter together with my right honourable friend. I should not reply immediately off the
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top of my hat, but it seems to me that there may be a difficulty in the way of appointing a friend of the court, or of inventing some person to grill the objectors, because under the New Towns Act itself designation order inquiries are held with respect only to the objections. They are not held to inquire into the desirability of having a New Town there: they are held to enable the Minister to be fully informed about the nature and the strength of any objections to the designation order before he finally takes his decision on it. So he is not in the position of someone who comes along to say to the inquiry, "I think this would be rather a good idea; now let us discuss it on equal terms." He has already made a draft designation order as an act of Government policy, and it is then his duty to sit back and listen for a while to see what objections there are and whether he can amend the order a little to meet the objections. So it is not as if there were two equal parties before a neutral judge, arguing the pros and cons of the case and cross-examining each other, as one has in courts of law and in other types of planning inquiry. But, having said that, let me repeat that I will indeed go into the suggestion which has been made to see whether, in the opinion of inspectors and of those who follow this matter closely, this is a defect or a weakness in the procedure which might be amended.
On Question, Bill read 2a; Committee negatived.

CARAVAN SITES ACT AND GIPSY CAMPS
7.18 p.m.
LORD WILLIS LORD WILLIS rose to ask Her Majesty's Government: Whether they will make an order bringing Part II of the Caravan Sites Act 1968 into immediate operation. The noble Lord said: My Lords, I rise to beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name, and in doing so I should like briefly to remind your Lordships of the terms of the Caravan Sites Act 1968, to which I refer in this Question. This Act, which was sponsored by Mr. Eric Lubbock in another place, and which passed through both Houses in early summer last year, is divided into two Parts. We need not concern ourselves here with Part I, which is already in

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operation. Part II deals with the provision of properly equipped sites for gipsy families. It puts a requirement on local authorities—county councils, county boroughs and some London boroughs—to provide sites for gipsies residing in or resorting to their areas. The Act was so designed as not to put an unfair burden on one local authority as against another. For example, the London boroughs and county boroughs are required to provide a site and pitches for only up to 15 caravans, and once they have fulfilled this obligation under the Act they are given more effective powers to deal with any unauthorised camping by gipsies. Or, if some local authorities feel that they have no gipsy problem, they can apply for exemption from the requirement to build sites. That, briefly, is what Part II of the Caravan Sites Act is about.
May I remind your Lordships of the background to the Act and of the reasons why it was thought necessary to introduce and to pass this legislation? The term "gipsies", as used in the Act, is an umbrella term to cover Romanies, didekeis, mumpers, Irish tinkers—anyone, in short, who follows a nomadic way of life, except travelling showmen or circus people. It is estimated that there are about 15,000 such people in England and Wales, making up about 3,500 families. They are widely scattered. There are some gipsies in every county and in one out of every three local authority areas. They are without doubt the most harassed, neglected, downtrodden, poverty-stricken and persecuted section of our population. The conditions in which they are forced to live are a disgrace to any society, let alone a society like ours, which prides itself on its humane outlook. I believe that many of our dogs live better, and are treated better, than we treat the gipsies in this country.
For example, there are something like 6,000 gipsy children under the age of sixteen. A few get casual schooling; most get none; and the vast majority are growing up as illiterates, perpetuating the problem generation by generation. Only one family in three has access to mains water; only one family in six has access to a W.C.; the vast majority are without sanitary or other facilities—and the situation grows worse all the time,
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day by day, month by month. A few short years ago the "travellers" could roam the countryside and follow their traditional occupations without too much difficulty. But since the end of the war all this has changed. As more and more land is taken for new towns, urban expansion and new roads, the number of available camping sites, and back lanes in which the gipsies can camp, shrinks away.
New laws have been passed making it an offence to camp without proper authority. At one time it was possible for gipsies to band together and to rent or own a permanent camping site. Now the law itself, plus rising prices, makes this almost impossible. So, forced out of his usual camping areas, the gipsy has had no alternative but to turn to the main roadside. And because of the decline in his old trades he has had to find new ones—principally the breaking up of scrap cars and the sale of the metal and spare parts. As a result, area after area of roadside is occupied by travelling families and turned into a wilderness of ugliness and litter. We have all seen these eyesores and have all been appalled by them. I sometimes wonder whether the ugliness which they create is any worse than the ugliness we create with urban development but I will leave that point for the moment.
This situation, the situation that I have been describing, has simply created a new hostility between the local citizens and the gipsies. Force was used, and is still being used, constantly, day by day, week by week, to drive out the gipsies, as if they were dogs; to force them to move on. But this does not solve the problem: it merely transfers it next door; it enlarges it. Even when gipsies can buy a site to-day they are often met with the icy, bureaucratic face of local authority. Let me give your Lordships one example of a case reported by the Gipsy Council. There is a gipsy in Leicestershire who owns a piece of land on which he keeps four caravans. A few weeks ago he was fined £15 for not having a proper site licence. This man is prepared to put 15 pitches on his land with proper amenities. Permission has been refused. There may be a good reason for it; but the man is in this position. If he stays on his own land he will face more fines; if he moves he will

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be harried from pillar to post. My Lords, it is tragic, wasteful and frustrating. And those three words sum up the feelings of most gipsies to-day.
A few local authorities and a few private individuals deserve our thanks and praise because they have shown a glimmer of enlightenment and have tried to provide proper sites for some gipsy families. But I regret to say that they are the exception. By and large, the policy still is to keep out or expel the gipsy by main force. This is the background to the Bill. This was the situation which Eric Lubbock sought to check and to cure when he introduced the Bill.
Part II of the Act, in particular, could lead to the provision of about 200 permanent sites—a kind of national network covering England and Wales—where a gipsy family would have reasonable sanitary facilities and other amenities which would give his children some chance of a regular education. This, my Lords, is perhaps the most important and serious factor of all: the education of the children. It is not only wrong in the short term that a child should be denied schooling for reasons which are beyond his control; it is wrong and stupid in the long term—for it is only by educating the gipsy children that any real and permanent solution will be found to this problem. Part II of the Act would enable us to make a giant step forward in solving this problem. It would, it could—if it were implemented. But there is the big "if"! For all that we have done at the moment is to pass a paper resolution.
Part II of the Act can be brought into force only by order of the Minister—and so far he has not felt able to make that order. He has been pressed on several occasions to take the necessary action, and on each occasion his reply has been full of sympathy but empty of hope; warm with good will but cold and chilly in practical terms. The argument, in short, is that local authorities are being asked to cut back on expenditure and that it would be wrong to impose upon them at the moment this new burden of providing sites. I hope that we shall not hear that rotten, shabby argument to-day. It is true that the Minister has indicated that he would give sympathetic consideration to any application for loans sanction made by a local
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authority for the purpose of providing a site. This is something; but it is not enough, not nearly enough. It negates the spirit of the Act by which the burden of providing sites was to be spread evenly over all the local authorities concerned. To leave the issue to individual localities means that enlightened councils are penalised while others get away with doing little or nothing.
If Parliament had wanted to leave the matter to the initiative of local authorities, it would have said so. It did not. It made its view plain; and the Minister should take note of that.
We are bogged down now by the question of expense. I believe that my noble friend Lord Foot may have a word to say about this aspect. He may have some information about the expense involved in pursuing the present policy of harassment. Figures are difficult to get, but it is true that some local authorities are spending hundreds of pounds is each year on the negative policy of evicting gipsy families, on the erection of obstacles, on the blocking of camping sites. Some of them are even employing uniformed security men, with guard dogs, to harass these poor people.
My Lords, how much longer are we to allow this policy of neglect, persecution and brute force to continue? I venture to suggest that if any immigrant group were to be treated in this way there would be a national outcry—and I should be one of those who would join in it. But the gipsies are a small, scattered, inarticulate and largely unorganised group; and very few people seem to care. I should like to make this plea to the Government: perhaps you cannot give them the whole deal, but give them part of it, at least. Make an order instructing local authorities to set up temporary sites under the Act. Let us, at least, give the gipsy somewhere that he can bring his caravan to rest. The remainder can follow later.
The expenditure can be phased over two or three years. The gipsy is prepared to pay rent for his pitch, and most of them would be prepared to work to lay down the necessary hard-standing base to the pitches and to help in creating other amenities. But unless the Minister is prepared to act on these lines, it may be years before there is any hope for gipsies, because local authorities have

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already been told that their economies may have to continue into the '70s. Are the gipsies to be harassed from pillar to post for the next three or four years while we are waiting for the right moment to implement Part II of the Act?
My Lords, this is a human problem; it is a problem of people, of old people and of children; people who have become the victims of the development of our modern society. We have a choice. We can fight these people, we can turn guards and dogs on them, we can drive them aimlessly from one point to another—all at a great cost in terms of money and at a greater cost in terms of our self-respect. Or we can implement the policy that we have already decided upon and give the gipsies a place, some place, to live and perhaps to settle. It seems to me that there is no real choice. I thank the Government for the good will and sympathy that they have shown in the past, but I must frankly say that the time for words of compassion has passed, the time for words themselves has passed. We were all cold last week-end during the blizzard that shook this country. Can anybody in this House imagine what it was like for some of these poor devils on the roadside? Sympathy will not educate the gipsy children; good will will not keep them warm this winter or next, and compassion, by itself, will not lift the shadow from the lives of these people.
My Lords, I choose my final words with great care. In my view our present treatment of the gipsy is a national scandal, a mockery of all our pretensions toward building a Welfare State. When we wish we can find time and money for all sorts of causes and issues which are more fashionable and which can win more votes, or from which we can get greater publicity. But it seems that we cannot find the money that is necessary even to make a temporary start on these problems. For these people, who have hardly any voice and very little power, we can find nothing, it seems, except paper Acts, compassion and words of sympathy. I believe that if my noble friend Lord Kennet were not in the Government he would be making the same speech as I am making to-day; and that the Minister himself would do the same if he were on the Back Benches in another place. So I ask the Government
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to implement Part II of this Act now. Do not let any further delay add to the problems and to the tragedies. If it is the Treasury that is laying its icy hands on this proposal, I say that you will never find a truer cause on which to fight them, and to fight them until they give in.
7.32 p.m.
VISCOUNT COLVILLE OF CULROSS: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Willis, has deployed his case most powerfully, if I may say so, and I am sure that it is a very good thing indeed that the matter should be brought to the attention of Parliament on this occasion; as of course it was when the Caravan Sites Bill was being debated last year. But I think the House should remember that when the noble Lord stated what Parliament had done by way of expressing its views about this matter, it must also be borne in mind that Parliament accepted without any demur that Part II of the Act was to come into force only when an Order was made bringing it into force; and there was never any doubt at all about the reason for that provision because it was explained very carefully in another place and in this Chamber.
The reason for the provision was that the burden that might be, or would be, put on the local authorities by Part II of the Act was one which had to be judged in the overall financial view of the Ministry of Housing and Local Government to see what were the priorities at any given time, and to see which of the various matters which have to be laid upon local authorities should take precedence; whether it should be this or something else. Parliament accepted that at the time the Bill was before the House, and it therefore seems to me that it cannot now be said that Parliament has in any way departed from what the noble Lord himself has been putting forward, if Parliament is acquiescing at the moment in the Government not bringing in this Order.
The question about whether the Order should be brought in or not must be one for the Government of the day. It is for the noble Lord, Lord Kennet, and his Ministry to assess these priorities; and, of course, it is not only the gipsies who are asking for more money to be spent either publicly or locally. Noble Lords who sit on these Benches have fairly

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strong views about why it is that we cannot pay for all the things we wish to pay for in the public field, and I do not wish to go into that. The economics of the two Parties are probably very far apart on this matter. But the fact remains that when you get down to these small issues it is for the noble Lord, Lord Kennet, to judge the priorities at the moment.
My Lords, I suggest that the House should also remember this. The noble Lord, Lord Willis, has not mentioned at all the powers that local authorities have quite regardless of Part II of the Act. It is perfectly true that Part II lays a duty on the local authorities that are mentioned in it to provide in some cases the maximum number of sites and in some cases whatever is necessary for the demand in their area. But all that does is to turn into a duty what is now a power. There is a perfectly good power in Section 24 of the Caravan Sites and Control of Development 1960 Act which enables the local authority to provide these sites if it wishes to do so. A number of local authorities, as the noble Lord said—and he paid tribute to them—have done this. As a matter of fact, the New Forestry Rural District Council has done a slightly different thing under the National Assistance Act. That council has provided a different sort of encampment and apparently this has been quite a success. There is no lack of guidance or encouragement from the Ministry as to how local authorities are to do this.
There was a very interesting Circular issued by the Ministry in 1966, and I have no doubt that the noble Lord, Lord Willis, has read it. It not only set out some useful principles about how sites should be provided and how they should be run, but it explained also what various authorities have done and the difficulties they have run into in practice. There cannot be anything but good in that, and I wonder whether the Ministry have in mind to issue another Circular, bringing this guidance up to date and telling us what has happened in the two or three years since the 1966 Circular was issued.
My Lords, if there is financial stringency—and this is my last word on this subject— and if there are powers in
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the local authorities already to do exactly what the noble Lord is asking for, is it not really best that we should leave it to the responsible authorities on the ground to decide what are their own priorities within the budget, within the overall limit laid down by the Government? It is true that if it is a bad authority it may so arrange matters that the gipsies are driven out into the area of another authority. I entirely accept that point. But that is not what all local authorities do. If there is the force that I think there is in the argument advanced by the noble Lord, Lord Willis, there must he people who are either members of local authorities or who can approach and influence local authorities to use their existing powers.
I cannot see that the lack of art Order bringing Part II into effect over the whole country, providing a duty as opposed to a power, is going to make all that much difference, although obviously it would make some. I shall be interested to hear what the noble Lord, Lord Kennet, has to say about the timing, but for myself, I think that if it cannot be brought in at this moment because of financial stringency then at least the Ministry can continue with their encouragement and the guidance that they have carried out in the past. It may be that the good will that is roused by speeches like that of the noble Lord, Lord Willis, will enable something to he done, even if not on the scale for which he hoped.
7.39 p.m.
LORD STRANGE: My Lords, I am now doing something rather naughty in intervening at the final stage of the debate. I have not very much to say except to express the sympathy that I have with these nomad poeple. It is a tragedy of evolution that the less efficient get crushed out, and I think that they are being crushed out rather severely. There are two or three points which I would make. The position is the same in Ireland, as your Lordships will know. There they are called itinerants and they cause a lot of trouble. In their own way they are a charming crowd of people, who have done nothing really wrong, though they live on the land, and if people put up houses they are apt to take what is in the houses. The education of these people is extremely difficult because they move from one place to another.

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I would give your Lordships just one little anecdote about the mentality of gipsies. This happened about fifteen years ago. Two of them went to the local town and bought a radio set for two shillings. They took it back to their encampment, took down some fence wires, put them into the terminals and threw the wires over some 500,000 volt cables. They were both killed. I have the greatest sympathy with the gipsies but I cannot see how they can ever be educated. The question is how they can be left alone with some degree of toleration.
7.41 p.m.
LORD FOOT: My Lords, I should like to add my support to the plea made by the noble Lord, Lord Willis, for an early—indeed, immediate—implementation of this Part of the Act. It seems to me that we are not under any obligation to discuss the merits of this Part. When the Act was a Bill passing through both your Lordships' House and another place, the whole of it received almost unanimous approval and enthusiasm from the Government, and I have no doubt that the object which the noble Lord has in mind in asking this Question to-night will be sympathetically received by the Government.
Two matters, it seems to me, arise from the noble Lord's Question. First of all, what is the urgency in implementing the Act and where do we stand, as the noble Viscount asks, in the list of priorities? Secondly, is it right that the cost of implementing this part of the Act makes its implementation impossible in this period of financial restraint and stringency? On the first question of urgency, may I quote some words which were used by a former Minister in a foreword which he wrote to a survey of the gipsy problem made by Kent County Council? The words which he used seemed to me to sum up succinctly the status—or non-status—of the gipsy in our social system. These are his words:
"The report reminds us of the remarkable fact that for most travelling families there is nowhere they can legally put their home. They are within the law only when going along the road."
Those words were written, not last year or the year before, but in 1952, by Mr. Harold Macmillan, the Minister in charge at that time. They were quoted in the Second Reading debate on this
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Bill in another place by Mr. Skeffington, the Joint Parliamentary Secretary, and he added this comment, which surely is fully justified:
"Is this not an astonishing comment on the state of the law and on the legislative attention which we have given to the problem in the past?"
The description which Mr. Macmillan gave at that time of the status of the gipsies remains the description of their status to-day. It is a proved fact, not open to argument, that the status of the gipsy in this country is little better than that of the outcast. I would impress upon the Minister and the Government that this is a matter of the greatest urgency, because under this Part of the Act we are not trying to tackle a problem that has recently come to light; we are making a vastly belated act of retribution and recognition towards these people whose place in society has become increasingly difficult as the 20th century has rolled along. We are trying to redress an ancient and long-standing grievance from which these people have suffered for many years.
The Government's reason for feeling unwilling or unable to implement the Act now is financial. The noble Viscount, Lord Colville of Culross, said that it is for the Government to decide where this comes in the list of priorities. I accept that. What I am not sure about is whether the sums that the Government have worked out are right, whether the financial burden which will be thrown upon local authorities is of anything like the magnitude which the Government seem to think. The sponsors of the Act endeavoured to make some calculation of the overall cost of its implementation. They calculated that within a few years' time there might be as many as 4,000 gipsy families in need of accommodation of this sort. They calculated that the cost of providing a single pitch might be in the neighbourhood of £1,000. Multiplying these two figures, we get a figure of £4 million. On the face of it that is a formidable figure, but there are many other considerations by way of offsets which have to be taken into account, if we are to arrive at a real figure of the cost.
First of all, as the Government will know, the implementation of this Act does not mean that we are going to incur the expenditure of the whole scheme

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all at once. It will proceed by stages, and the first stages do not involve the incurring of any real expense. First of all, the duty is thrown on county councils and county boroughs to assess the need for pitches for gipsies in their areas. They have to make a survey and then make proposals for the siting of these pitches. Then, in the case of the county councils, they have to consult the district councils, who will later on have the duty of actually developing the sites. At that stage objections can be put in, either by the district councils or by individuals, and any objections made have to be investigated at a public hearing. All this will take a considerable amount of time, and it is not until all this has been gone through and the stage arrived at when the county council have to acquire sites that any serious expenditure is involved.
Nor must it be assumed, as I see it, that the different county councils and county boroughs and the rest will proceed at an even speed. Some will be dragging their heels, and others will be getting on with it. That in itself will defer part of the expenditure we are talking about. Then, secondly, as the noble Lord, Lord Willis, said, there is no need, in order to meet the imperative urgency of the gipsy problem, for all these sites to be brought up immediately to the maximum proper standards. It would be a great mitigation of the situation if we could think that in the next winter there would be provided substandard sites; that there would have been set aside by that time places to which these gipsies who are now being driven from one authorised site to an-other could resort.
What I should like to ask the Government is this. Why cannot they implement the Act now, so that these essential planning processes can be got through? Surely it would then be possible for the Government, having got rid of that and having got through those planning procedures, if they thought there was not the money available for the full implementation of the programme, to apply, if necessary, a regulator. But could we not get rid of these preliminaries, which are all being held up at the present moment because the Act is not being implemented?
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The noble Viscount, Lord Colville of Culross, said that all that Part II of the Act does is to turn a power into a duty, and he suggested that there were ample powers in the local authorities at the present time, if they were so minded, to provide sites. But I am sure the noble Viscount must be aware of what the real problem is. It is that if it is left to individual local authorities to make the decision for themselves, it casts an entirely unfair burden upon the authorities which accept the obligation, and at the same time attracts into their areas a greater number of gipsies. That, as I understand it, has been the common experience: that if an authority is enlightened, and establishes some pitch or site for these people, this automatically, attracts people from other areas, and the plight of the enlightened authority is greater than that of those authorities which remain indifferent to the problem.
The next item in the account is this. Once these sites have been established, it will be open to the local authorities to require rent to be paid for them. I am not suggesting that it will ever be possible for these sites to be made self-supporting; I have no doubt that this is impossible. But the rents which the gipsies would be able and prerared to pay would bring in a substantial contribution to the capital cost of setting up these sites.
Then there is a much more important point, if I may suggest it to the noble Lord; and it is this. At the present moment, we are engaging in a considerable expenditure on the harassing of the gipsy population which is pure waste of money. It is the expenditure which is involved in driving them from one site to another; in clearing up the sites after they have gone; in setting up fences, and posts and earth-banks in order to prevent them from coming back on to the unauthorised sites; and the expenditure which is incurred in enforcement orders, in criminal proceedings under the Highways Act, and the rest. All this expenditure is pure waste, and produces nothing. It is the bill which we face for trying to enforce this legal anomaly. It surely must be the falsest of economies to tolerate the continuation of this entirely unproductive expenditure as an alternative to the rather greater

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productive expenditure which would be involved in implementing the Act.
The sponsors of this Act have set out, I think as a result of conversations which they have had with the noble Lord, Lord Kennet, to try to ascertain from local authorities how much money is being spent by them in what I might call the general policy of controlling or harassing the gipsies; and many local authorities have been good enough to give a reply. It had been my intention to quote one or two examples to the House, but on reflection I do not think that would be very useful, because there are two difficulties about these statistics which we tried to gather together. The first is that the local authorities themselves, however anxious they may be to help, have difficulty in dissecting and isolating the expenditure which can be properly appropriated to the control of gipsies. The second difficulty is that the anwers one receives from the local authorities are necessarily very selective, and it is impossible to paint an overall picture of the full extent of this wasteful expenditure throughout the country as a whole.
I should like, however, to quote one letter from one borough council in reply to this inquiry. I do not think I need say which borough council it is; it does not matter very much. But the town clerk wrote, in reply to the Member of Parliament for this borough, saying:
"The council have not as yet spent any money in providing a site for itinerant caravan dwellers. Their policy is to evict the trespassers as quickly as possible, and to this end they have for the past four years employed a retired police inspector as security officer. I enclose a copy of the report which was circulated to members of the council in July "—
that was, July, 1968—
"of his activities in this field during the past 12 months. The figures speak for themselves."
My Lords, indeed they do, because the figures are that:
"during the 12 months ended 30th April, 1968, the security officer moved a total of 752 caravans in 161 operations. Details are attached."
Attached to this document there are three foolscap pages itemising the day-to-day activities of this security officer in moving these people as quickly as possible.
The report continued:
"During the previous 12 months 1,456 caravans were removed in 251 operations."
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It then went on to set out the expenses incurred by way of salary for this security officer—car allowance, hire of tractor and the like—and the figures were these: in 1964–65, £1,069, and in the three following years, £958, £1,480 and £1,647. It is an almost Dickensian document, is it not? Here are these people, as a deliberate act of policy, being harassed and driven from these sites on which they settle. The policy of the borough is "to evict the trespassers as quickly as possible" and to this end they have employed this retired police officer.
Then it goes on to say this—and I suggest that this is the answer to the noble Viscount when he talks about the local authorities to-day having the power to provide sites for these people if they so wish. These are the words of the town clerk:
"The council realise that eviction does not solve the problem, and last year they agreed to provide a properly equipped site on an experimental basis providing other local authorities in the area would do the same. Some councils did not agree with this policy, and not unnaturally this borough decided that they were not prepared to act in isolation."
That is the dilemma in which these authorities stand.
I will not trouble your Lordships with any further quotations. Indeed, I think it would be more profitable if I were to invite the noble Lord, Lord Kennet, to consider one or two questions. Will the Government look at their figures again? Will they tell us whether they have themselves tried to make some assessment of the extent of this wasteful and indeed almost penal expenditure in which all local authorities and public bodies, police and the rest, are involved? The Gipsy Council, as the noble Lord will know, last year attempted to make some estimate as to what this wasteful expenditure was going to amount to during the winter months through which we are now passing. The noble Lord may recollect that their estimate at that time was that the monthly expenditure of this sort, all thrown away, might be something in the neighbourhood of £100,000. That figure may be wholly wrong—I do not know—but it is impossible for people who do not have the facilities that the Government have to form any certain conclusion.

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What I should like to ask the Minister is this. Have the Government made their own assessment of the cost, and, if so, what relation does that bear, what proportion does that bear, to the overall cost of the implementation of this Act over the years? If they have made an assessment, may I ask what factors they have taken into consideration; how their calculations have been worked out? If they have made an assessment, may we be told what conclusions they have arrived at? If, on the other hand, they have not made an assessment, would they undertake to make one, and to make one urgently, so that we may all know what are the true facts and to what extent the implementation of this Act would involve the incurring of a real financial liability?
The other question I should like to ask the noble Lord is this. If the answer is going to be, "No; we cannot undertake to implement this Act now", is he prepared to give us a date when the Government might feel able to implement it? Because unless we can get an early date—and I mean by that a date within the next two or three months—it is absolutely certain that the situation next winter will be almost precisely what it is now. Indeed, I should have thought (I do not know very much about these things) that in the winter after that almost the same conditions will be prevailing because of all the preliminary steps which have to be taken before the Act can be brought into effect.
My Lords, I apologise for taking so long. Let me finish by saying that I recognise, as of course we all recognise, that this country and the Government are faced with grave problems of assimilating and integrating minority groups into society. It may well be that, because of political pressures and political tension and excitement, greater priority is being given to some of these minority groups than is being given to others. But would it not be very wrong, when we are spending money at all upon the integration of minority groups, for us to put at the end of the queue these people, the gipsies, who have been here with us for centuries and whose plight has not been becoming better, but becoming progressively worse, during the course of this century?
8.5 p.m.
THE LORD BISHOP OF ST. ALBANS: My Lords, I apologise because I was not present at the beginning of the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Willis, but I want to support his persuasive and compassionate speech and his plea to the Government to implement Part II of the Caravan Sites Act 1968. The noble Lord, Lord Foot, referred to this as a matter of first priority and as a belated Act of reparation; and I find myself in agreement with those words and in agreement with the two questions he has put to the noble Lord, Lord Kennet.
At this hour I shall be as brief as possible. I wanted to put three points before your Lordships. I have seen in Hertfordshire something of the problem of gipsy encampments. I know the careful thought and planning that has been given to this problem by a number of influential people in the county: by councillors, by the police, by social workers, by the Hertfordshire Council for Social Service, and others. I know, too, the strong local resistance that can be met when plans are under discussion for a gipsy encampment. I understand the hopes of the planners and the fears of the people who see a threat to their locality. I am well aware that on this subject a speaker needs to choose his words with care, and I shall attempt to do so.
I have tong felt some responsibility in this field, and though I claim no expert knowledge I wish to make these three points. I hope this debate will encourage local authorities to be more active. Section 6 makes the point that:
"It shall be the duty of every local authority…so far as may be necessary to provide adequate accommodation for gipsies residing in or resorting to their area".
A few local authorities, certainly, deserve our thanks, and it is well that our thanks should be given to them. Before coming on to that, though, I wish to distinguish between the two classes that come under this section to whom the noble Lord, Lord Willis, has already referred: the gipsies—the people of Romany blood with a high standard of morals and hygiene—and the didekei, the Romanies who marry outside the tribe and the travellers of various origins, including

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Irish tinkers and travelling scrap merchants. Coming to the first group, the gipsies, I visited a gipsy site and went over their caravans. A retired police officer was in charge of this small settlement and he took me round. I was impressed by the whole site, by its high standard of cleanliness and order and the obvious happiness of the wives and mothers. I visited the site on Derby Day and, not surprisingly, all the men were away on Epsom Downs.
I believe we need to be imaginative, particularly when we come to the didekei, to the travellers. We have to try to see the problem of accommodation through their eyes, and to encourage and educate them to behave responsibly when accommodation is found for them. A useful experiment is being made here in one of the boroughs in Hertfordshire, where a site was provided for six families of Irish travellers living in caravans. I believe it is still the only site of its kind in the country. A piece of council land, well screened and handy to the town, was made available. There were six fenced plots, with water and a chemical closet; there was a car park; there was a children's playground. Then, the Simon Community Trust was taking an interest in the site. This Trust, a voluntary organisation as your Lordships know, which takes care especially of people whom society is inclined to reject, provided two volunteers to work and live on the site. They live in their own caravan and they help the travellers with their social problems, their personal relationships, their adjustments. I believe that such an experiment is to be much commended, but I think it will work only if there are well qualified people at hand regularly to befriend the gipsies. The noble Lord, Lord Foot, referred to the non-status of gipsies, "a little better than outcasts", he said. If we can have these small experiments they will lose that sense of being unwanted and outcast; and what one authority is doing I hope this debate will encourage other authorities to attempt.
I come now to my second reason for supporting the noble Lord, Lord Willis. It is only when adequate accommodation is provided that the other problems can be faced with some hope of success—the control, for instance, of unauthorised
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encampments, to which the Act refers. Of course some of these places are eyesores. We know them well, and they tax the patience of those who live in the neighbourhood and of the police. I appreciate the problem, but I do not think it can be solved by the process of keeping people on the move—and keeping people on the move can lead to keeping people on the run. Adequate accommodation needs to be found, and I hope that some of the points that have been made—the possibility of providing semi-permanent sites in the very near future—will be considered by the Government.
I have referred to the position in Hertfordshire, and now may I mention something of the position in Bedfordshire. In a Bedfordshire local paper last week there was a complaint which illustrated the situation we face continually. There is an encampment by one of the main roads on land which is a catchment area for the drinking water supply of many villages. Local fears have been expressed that with no proper sanitation there is a possibility that this encampment will pollute the water supply; and this is an appeal which goes home to the people in the district strongly and widely. The Buckinghamshire Water Board has asked the Bedfordshire County Council to move the gipsies off the site. And so it goes on, pressure from one authority or another, for a good reason or not so good reason, to keep these people moving. Therefore we reach the position to which the noble Lord, Lord Foot, has referred, with a local security officer with 161 eviction operations in the year; and we find the unhappy state of affairs continuing. We need a lead from the Government if local authorities are to take appropriate action.
I come to my last point, a point already made by the noble Lord, Lord Willis, and the noble Lord, Lord Foot, which concerns the children of these people. We shall not make substantial progress with improving conditions for gipsies until we face the clear connection that exists between this rejected minority of adults and the kind of lives these adults had to lead when they were children. As children they were often being evicted; they often grew up thinking of the authorities, the police and others, as their enemies; through no fault of their own, they grew up illiterate; they were not trained to

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qualify for well-paid and interesting jobs; they were treated as vagrants. Is it surprising that they cannot, without solid and sustained outside help, overcome the difficulties that face them when they attempt to settle in an area? What chance has anyone of education, of benefiting from the National Health Service or of going to church, if he is continually on the move? From the camp site I visited on Derby Day, because the parents were settled, and because their local parson visited them regularly, a dozen or so gipsy children, of varying ages, had recently been baptised in the parish church.
As has been said, we are more conscious in these clays of our duty to act responsibly to men and women of other races. Africans and Asiatics are more in our minds and more on our consciences. But long before they came in numbers to this country gipsies were here, and we have neglected them and their children shamefully. I hope that this short debate will encourage the Government now to implement Part II of the Caravan Sites Act 1968, or at any rate to get on with the planning, so that even if it is to be only the provision of sub-standard sites in the next year or so, at any rate something is done to meet this urgent need. My Lords, I support the noble Lord, Lord Willis.
8.15 p.m.
LORD KENNET: My Lords, I welcome the opportunity given by my noble friend's Question to have another look at the situation of the gipsies and see in what respects it has changed, if at all, since we passed the Caravan Sites Act, and what relevance those changes, if any, have on whether or not the Government ought to bring Part II of that Act into effect. As all noble Lords remember, the Government said, when the Bill was going through, that we could not bring it into effect at that moment because the economic circumstances made it unjustifiable to lay extra burden on the local authorities when we were all the time urging them not to spend any more money than they were doing, and in fact not permitting them to spend more money than they were doing, on the full range of their services.
What is the present situation of the gipsies? During the passage of the Bill the noble Lord, Lord Willis, suggested
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that there was likely to be terrible hardship for many travelling people this winter. I do not think the hardship has been any more terrible than it was in the winter before, or indeed in the winter before that. There continue to be evictions and moving on, very much to the Government's regret. It is, I have to inform the House, impossible to be sure whether there is more eviction and more moving on: statistics do not exist. I should like to ask the noble Lord, Lord Foot, to send me the copy of the letter read about the borough which he did not name with the very high record of pushing around.
To look at the other side of the question, there are now 27 sites provided for gipsies by local authorities, compared with 13 in 1967. So that gives one a doubling of the number of sites in the country in only two years. I do not know whether the total will continue to double every two years. I very much hope that it will, but one cannot be sure. Therefore, there is the fact that the gipsies, so far as proper sites provided by local authorities are concerned, are now twice as well off as they wore two years ago.
Then there are 16 more firm proposals for local authority sites that have got as far as application for planning permission, and beyond that we know of quite a few more coming along where they have not yet got that far. It is encouraging to see from Press reports of local discussions about sites—here I can only relate an impression; but it is an impression I have—that the need for sites and the plight of gipsies are increasingly understood. Of course one still gets objections, and they are often totally unreasonable objections, to applications to provide gipsy sites. But we certainly have the impresion that now we more often find people moving in the opposite direction. More people are realising that the gipsies have to go somewhere, and that it is an insufficient contribution to public debate to say, "Well, let them go somewhere else". The voices of such people are heard increasingly.
It is not only in connection with sites where there is progress to report. Some local authorities, including some who do not yet provide any sites, are already taking water and refuse collection to the gipsies who have settled on waste land.

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It is the opposite approach. You get an unauthorised and unwelcome settlement of gipsies on waste land. Some local authorities move them on; others take water and refuse collection to them in return for payment. I think it is clear that progress in establishing sites is much less than we want it to be, much less than we would ask for it to be and much less than it will be when we bring the Act into effect. Yet the situation of the gipsies has not perceptibly deteriorated this winter, nor has it perceptibly improved.
I fully agree with what has been said, that of course the most urgent and deplorable part of their present situation is not getting the children to school. I am not sure that it is as many as 6,000. I have here a figure of 4,000; but at any rate it is far too many children to have not at school. Now if I may turn to one or two particular points made—
LORD WILLIS: My Lords, before the noble Lord leaves that point I should like to get one thing clear. This Bill was introduced, as we all know, to deal with what was generally admitted to be an appalling hardship in respect of the gipsies. Part II was deferred and not brought into effect not because the Government thought that there was insufficient hardship, but because they said they had not got the money. Is the noble Lord now telling us that he will not bring Part II into operation until he has evidence that the gipsies have hardship, or more hardship?
LORD KENNET: No, indeed; I was not telling the House that, and I shall not be telling the House that. I was saying that our impression was that the amount of hardship suffered by the gipsies was not increasing nor was it decreasing. I was repeating what was said both in this House and in another place at the time of the passage of the Bill, that Part II will be brought into effect as soon as there is money to do it, as soon as the economic circumstances permit a further upswing in local authority expenditure on this as well as other good purposes not related to the question of proving more hardship.
The noble Viscount, Lord Colville, raised the question of Circulars, and asked whether we would follow up our
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Circular of 1966 with another one. We have twice followed up that Circular with others. One in October, 1967, says:
"The Minister and the Secretary of State emphasised that needless moving on of gipsy families from one area to another should not take place".
This is firm language for a Circular to local authorities. Then there was a Circular dated August, 1968, which said:
"The Ministers have repeatedly emphasised that gipsies should not be needlessly moved on from place to place"
and again
"local authorities in whose area need has been shown to exist the Minister hopes will go ahead with arrangements for providing sites, whether on a permanent or a temporary basis. The problems facing gipsies in winter are immense. Loan sanction applications, whether for such proposals or for permanent provisions will be sympathetically considered".
The Government's policy in this is perfectly clear. It is to say to the local authorities: "You have the power to provide sites. We will give you loan sanction if your proposal is anything like a proper one. For heaven's sake! get ahead and do it." We say that to them at yearly intervals; some do, some do not. Lord Colville was perfectly right in saying that it is a question of turning a power into a duty. The power is there and has been there for some time.
There is also the question of what standard sites ought they to provide. Our thought traditionally has always been that only the best is good enough. But I am wondering whether this is necessarily so, and I am inclined to think that the Government ought to give loan sanction for the kind of economy style site, without necessarily a separate tap for each pitch and without the very high standards which can be imagined. I think this would be done if a local authority were to come forward and say: "Let us have a cheapish site, on the cheap in the right place". They will get loan sanctions if the place is right, just as much as if they were to come forward and say, "Let us have a site with more modern comforts". I think that also answers the point made by the right reverend Prelate about a lead from the Government. These Circulars are the lead. They are the best lead we can give until the Act is brought into effect.
I turn now to the remarks made by Lord Foot about cost. He asked me:

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have the Government tried to assess the diture takes place, and that is where evictions in large measure tend to present expenditure? He gave, if I may say so, a vivid account of the wasteful expenditure which is undertaken by certain local authorities in pushing these people about. I want to give him an exact answer to his question: have we tried to assess present expenditure? We have. Have we succeeded in doing so? Not very well, I am afraid. It is not possible to be certain what the local expenditure is because in most local authorities where anything is spent on this it is hidden in other expenditures. Somebody is sent out; it is part of his salary; it is part of the petrol for the tractor of the local authority, anyhow, whatever it may be. Only a very small number employ an identifiable person like the retired police officer referred to by Lord Foot.
Lord Foot mentioned the Gipsy Council and their figure of £100,000 per month throughout the country for moving on the gipsies, and he asked whether our assessment bore that out or whether it gave a different impression. I would say—with tremendous reservations, because our assessment is extremely approximate; it is indeed hypothetical—no, it does not bear out that figure, or anything like it. Lord Foot himself referred to a local authority which was spending £1,600 a year. That is a borough, I assume, which has a bad gipsy problem. There may be about 24 boroughs in the country which have a bad gipsy problem. Let us assume, wholly for the sake of argument and hypothetically, that they are each spending £1,600 a year on this problem—that might not be far out. Your Lordships will see that that takes us to about £30,000 or £35,000 a year, a long way indeed from the £1,200,000 a year postulated by the Gipsy Council. I need hardly add that if we thought there was any truth whatever in the Gipsy Council figure we would bring the Act into effect, because it would probably be a saving of money to do it in that way, besides providing all the social advantages for the gipsies.
LORD FOOT: My Lords, may I ask the noble Lord why he considers only the county boroughs?
LORD KENNET: Because experience shows that that is where the expen-
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take place, They have the bulk of the problem. I readily admit that one should count in urban districts and possibly counties as well, but it is still a long way from their £1,200,000 a year. I hope that the noble Lord will reflect on the figures and calculations. I do not state them; I suggest them to the House; and let me repeat that these are hypothetical in the extreme. But if there were any question of the expense being up to the level suggested by the Gipsy Council, it would put a totally different complexion on the matter.
I turn now to the opening remarks of my noble friend Lord Willis. His point that if Parliament had wanted to leave this matter to the local authorities they would have said so and not passed the Bill has, I think, been fully answered already by Lord Colville. If they had wanted the Bill to go into effect at once they would have said so, and not left it to the Minister. Lord Willis said the present situation of the gipsies was "a national scandal". For myself, I do not find that expression very much exaggerated, but I would point out that if it is a national scandal it is one that has been going on for an extremely long time. The same language as Lord Willis has used was used in the 16th century. You will find the same evictions and the same hardships for the last 400 years. I would repeat what I said when we were talking about the Bill. All we are talking about is: do we come to a great new drive for a new system for the gipsies in the 400th or 401st year they have been here? Although it is a bitter matter it is not one that is in any way new.
Lastly, Lord Willis said that he hoped the Government were not going to use the "rotten, shabby argument" about not having enough money to do it. I put that rough phrase down to his fiery generosity of soul, and I do not complain about it. It is not a "rotten, shabby argument". I believe it is the usual sort of grey and boring assessment of economic possibilities. Lord Willis said that if I were not a member of the Government I should be up there making his speech. I would say to him that if he were, he would be down here making mine.