Lords Sitting of 29 April 1970

Preamble
The House met at half past two of the clock: The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.
Prayers—Read by the Lord Bishop of Lichfield.

THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE: REDUNDANCY PAYMENTS
LORD SHERFIELD: 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 arrangements they have decided to make, in accordance with the recommendations of the Review Committee on Overseas Representation, for the payment of improved compensation terms to members of Her Majesty's Diplomatic Service who became redundant as a result of changes in the structure of that Service.]
THE MINISTER OF STATE, FOREIGN AND COMMONWEALTH OFFICE (LORD SHEPHERD): My Lords, the question of redundancy compensation for Diplomatic Service officers is under consideration by an inter-Depart-mental Working Group which was formed to study the subject of compensation for premature retirement in the context of a general review of Civil Service superannuation. The views expressed in the Dun-can Report are being fully taken into account and the Working Group is expected to submit its recommendations shortly.
LORD SHERFIELD: My Lords, arising out of that Answer, may I ask whether the noble Lord is aware that in the Committee's opinion an important question of morale is involved here? If there is to be any further restructuring or reduction of the Foreign Service on the lines recommended by the Committee, it is essential that the terms of compensation in these pending cases should be regarded by the Service as a whole as fair and generous. Will the noble Lord further bear in mind that the Committee regarded an improved
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compensation payment in these cases as directly related to their other proposals for reform?
LORD SHEPHERD: Certainly, my Lords.
LORD GORE-BOOTH: My Lords, may I ask whether the Government are fully aware that these people were retired prematurely in an emergency situation, and would not have been retired under any previous legislation, so that for general reasons, as well as those mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Sherfield, it is extremely important not only that justice should be done to them but also that it should be clearly seen to be done?
LORD SHEPHERD: My Lords, Her Majesty's Government are well aware of all the facts.
LORD BLYTON: My Lords, on the question of redundancy, is my noble friend aware that I hope that the same justice will be given to these people as has been given to the miners?
LORD SHEPHERD: My Lords, we shall seek justice.

FISH PROPAGATION AND ARTIFICIAL REEFS
2.38 p.m.
LORD WAKEFIELD OF KENDAL: 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 steps are being taken to use old tyres to create artificial reefs in estuaries and other suitable offshore places in order to encourage feeding and breeding of marine life, as is being done in Australia, America, Japan and elsewhere to assist inshore fishermen to increase food production, and provide facilities for research.]
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, we are aware of the work done overseas, and we are doing some ourselves. Artificial reefs have been shown to attract fish, and old car tyres are a promising material for constructing them. However, the advantages have accrued mainly to sports fishermen. Such reefs have the disadvantage that they tend to obstruct

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commercial fishing by trawl. Artificial reefs could help the commercial fishery for lobsters, and it is with this possibility in view that Ministry of Agriculture scientists are setting up an experiment at Conway, using old car tyres.
LORD WAKEFIELD OF KENDAL: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for that reply. May as much information as possible be given to this House, and to the public in general, about what is happening in connection with this kind of activity? Is it not fairly clear that if old tyres can be used for this purpose (and the British Isles would seem to be an ideally situated place for experiments and work of this kind) information about progress would be interesting?
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, I am not absolutely sure that the timetable allows for extended debates on the use of old car tyres, and there are other ways of improving the fishing around these islands. Commercial fish farming is, I think, a much better way of considering this problem.
LORD MERRIVALE: My Lords, from the amenity angle, can the noble Lord say how attractive old tyres are as artificial reefs.
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, I gather that they rank fairly well with old buses and old cars.

FOREIGN HAULAGE VEHICLES IN BRITAIN
THE EARL OF KINNOULL: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the first Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
[The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether it is the Ministry of Transport's policy to grant automatically permission for foreign haulage vehicles, of a size and weight greater than at present permitted by Ministry of Transport regulations, to enter Britain.]
THE PARLIAMENTARY UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR DEFENCE, R.A.F. (LORD WINTER-BOTTOM): No, my Lords. Foreign haulage
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vehicles entering Britain must comply with the current regulations relating to size and weight limits.
THE EARL OF KINNOULL: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for that reply. Can he say how soon the Ministry of Transport expect to announce their decision whether or not they intend to raise the present weight and length limits on road haulage vehicles?
LORD WINTERBOTTOM: No, my Lords; but I will make inquiries and write to the noble Earl.
LORD MERRIVALE: My Lords, if the Six (and later, we hope, the Ten) must gradually replace their national policies by a common transport policy along precise guidelines to ensure the unrestricted supply of transport services throughout the Community, would the noble Lord agree that the time may come when we should consider aligning our regulations regarding size and weight of haulage vehicles with Continental practice?
LORD WINTERBOTTOM: My Lords, when we are firmly established in the Common Market I suspect that that will happen.
LORD CONESFORD: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that many of us are very much against having our villages and historic towns destroyed by these vehicles?
LORD SEGAL: My Lords, is there not a strong case for extending the system of by-passing villages, so that vehicles are not tailored to our existing road system, but the road system tailored to allow foreign vehicles to by-pass towns of historic interest and villages where trans-port is hindered by narrow roads?
LORD WINTERBOTTOM: My Lords, I have great sympathy with the point of view expressed by my noble friend.
VISCOUNT ADDISON: My Lords, would it not be much better to replace some of the railway tracks that have been pulled up, instead of spending so much money on these new roads?

CIVIL AVIATION: PROPOSED NEW LEGISLATION
THE EARL OF KINNOULL: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the second Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
[The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government how soon they anticipate being able to introduce the long-awaited Civil Aviation Bill.]
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, as my right honourable friend the President of the Board of Trade said in another place on March 18, the legislation to implement the proposals set out by the Government in their White Paper is complex. A Bill will be introduced as soon as possible but I cannot give a precise date.
THE EARL OF KINNOULL: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for that reply. Can he say whether the setting up of the Civil Aviation Authority will be included in the Bill?
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, I under-stand that it is the intention to see that that aspect of the Report is dealt with first, and certainly to include it in the Bill-
THE EARL OF KINNOULL: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that the continued delay and uncertainty in the publication of this Bill is seriously affecting the long-term plans of the independent airlines and, for that matter, of the State Corporations?
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, I have some sympathy with what the noble Earl says, but, as with many other matters, once you get down to drafting the terms of the Bill this is rather more complicated than it appears.
EARL JELLICOE: My Lords, bearing in mind the sympathy that the noble Lord has just expressed to my noble friend, can he be a little more explicit? Is it the Government's intention to introduce this Bill before the next General Election?
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, the wording I used was, "as soon as possible."

FUTURE BUSINESS
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, I think it will be for the convenience of any noble Lords who wish to make arrangements if I inform your Lordships that dinner will be available to-morrow night, April 30, from 7 to 8.30 p.m., and again on Tuesday, May 5, between the same hours.
TEESSIDE CORPORATION (No. 2) BILL [H.L.]
Read 3a, and passed, and sent to the Commons.
OXFORDSHIRE COUNTY COUNCIL BILL [H.L.]
Read 3a, and passed, and sent to the Commons.
NOTTINGHAM CORPORATION BILL [H.L.]
Read 3a, and passed, and sent to the Commons.

REPUBLIC OF THE GAMBIA BILL [H.L.]
LORD SHEPHERD: My Lords, I beg leave to introduce a Bill to make provision in connection with The Gambia becoming a Republic within the Commonwealth. I beg to move that the Bill be now read a first time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read la.— (Lord Shepherd.)
On Question, Bill read la, and to be printed.

WALES RURAL DEVELOPMENT BOARD ORDER 1969
THE CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES (THE EARL OF LISTOWEL): My Lords, I beg to move the Motion standing in my name on the Order Paper.
Moved, That the Draft Wales Rural Development Board Order 1969, laid before the House on December 9, 1969, be referred to a Select Committee.—(The Earl of Listowel.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

AIRCRAFT HIJACKING AND KIDNAPPING OF DIPLOMATS
2.48 p.m.
LORD TWEEDSMUIR LORD TWEEDSMUIR rose to ask Her Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to concert action, with other countries, to meet the growing threat of hijacking of aircraft and the kidnapping of diplomats; and to move for Papers. The noble Lord said: My Lords, I ventured to put down this Motion because the two subjects to which it refers have to my mind now achieved an importance where they would be the better for discussion in your Lordships' House. The two subjects may seem extraordinarily dissimilar, but as we are now passing, and have since the middle 'sixties been passing, into an era which one might call an era of international violence, these two things are aspects of the same matter and I have ventured to put them down within the same Motion.
The Institute of Strategic Studies, in their Annual Report for 1969, said this:
"1969 offered evidence of a new style appeal by rebel movements and frustrated individuals to an international audience."
That is true of both the matters that I am bringing up in this Motion. I do not know whether "hijacking" has got into the Oxford Dictionary under its new meaning, but the Encyclopædia Britannica describes it as:
"The seizure of a ship or aircraft by pas-sengers or other unauthorised persons."
It is tempting to talk about "aerial piracy". As a matter of fact, you have to be a little careful about the use of the word "piracy" because in all the hi-jacking incidents that have taken place nobody has ever yet robbed a passenger, nor has the hijacker himself shown any sign of wishing to deprive the rightful owner of the aeroplane permanently of his property. I am keeping well away from legal technicalities to-day. I consulted a noble Lord learned in the law on a legal point about which I was con-fused. Five minutes later I was much more confused, but on a very much higher level. So I thought that I would leave the law on one side.
Hijacking is a very easy thing to do, and a very hard thing to prevent. Last year 81 attempts were made, 70 of which were successful. The weapons used
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varied from dynamite, machine guns, swords bought at a souvenir kiosk in Tokyo, a toy pistol and, in one particular case, a Schick razor blade. It is, as I say, difficult to prevent hijacking. The hijackers themselves represent a very broad spectrum of the wicked and the feeble-minded. It was a great latterday miracle that, of the 5,000 passengers on board the hijacked planes, only five per-sons lost their lives in the whole of last year, and three of these were hijackers themselves.
Until halfway through last year the destination of nearly all hijacked planes was Cuba: in fact, in 42 attempts to hi-jack planes in the first half of last year, 40 had Cuba as their destination. But this pest then proceeded to spread like an epidemic to other parts of the world. In the last half of the year there were 16 attempts to hijack planes with destinations other than Cuba, and as it became embroiled in the Arab-Israeli feud, six attempts were made to hijack planes bound for Arab countries.
We in Britain have rather taken the line that it cannot happen here. But, my Lords, it can happen to-morrow, with the greatest ease. The Japanese took the line that it could not happen to them. The Tokyo Convention is much the most sensible international instrument to be drawn up in recent years, but the host country, Japan, was the most notable absentee as a signatory when the Convention was prepared. But later, when she discovered that hijacking could hap-pen there—when some Japanese students, with, as I say, swords bought at a souvenir kiosk, held up a plane and took it to Korea—Japan had a rapid change of heart, and now wishes to sign that Convention as soon as possible.
Who are the hijackers? They are really of four different kinds. The first are the hard, calculating political con-spirators, such as those who shanghaied the late Moise Tshombe—very realistic men indeed, who could be deterred by law. The next kind is rather more un-common, the escaping criminal. The third is the man who complicates any kind of international agreement in the most admired way, and whom every country has always retained the right to welcome if he knocks on the door; that is, the man claiming political asylum, and he may be the best of men. But if you

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are to make an international agreement about returning hijackers, at is difficult to make an exception of those who are seeking political asylum. This is one of the principal complexities of the whole thing.
Recently, two young Poles hijacked a plane to Austria. Two young Germans, having made many attempts to get out of East Germany and finding it impossible to negotiate the Wall, made a short hijack of an East German plane and landed in West Berlin, where a French military court imposed a nominal two years' sentence. The last category is the sometimes almost demented desperado, who in the present-day paranoia of pro-test represents the peak. Those whom we see and hear protesting in this country merely inhabit the lower slopes, but this man is the absolute paranoiac and a person not easily deterred by any threat of any kind.
lnterpol, the International Police Organisation, held their annual conference last autumn. They rather shied away from hijacking, because they found it too political for their liking—and, in-deed, they should keep away from political subjects. But they made a rather useful analysis of 45 attempts at hijacking, of which only 34 were successful. They found that each of the hijackers claimed a political object, but they also said this:
"The hijacker's main aim, even more than the success of his project, is to hit the head-lines."
Hijackers must now be finding it progressively hard, because, if your Lord-ships read your papers on Monday, you will have seen somewhere about the fourth or fifth page of The Times, one small paragraph to the effect that a Brazilian Boeing had been hijacked to Cuba. It gave no details, except that saying that the hijacker was a very "polite" man. So getting the headlines is becoming a little harder than it used to be. But it is that kind of paranoiac, who feeds on such publicity, who is a very difficult antagonist.
I think it is probably fair to say that the air age in which we now live started about 1919 when the first persons or packages were transferred by air for money. The ancestor of B.O.A.C. who used to fly to Paris and were the first trans-salt-water service we ever flew
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from this country, used in the main to keep their schedules going quite well. But sometimes they did not, and one London to Paris flight took 48 hours, with 33 forced landings. But the massive growth of civil aviation has taken place since the last war You cannot say that it has exactly grown unnoticed—although it has for some—for those who live within earshot of airports have to struggle to retain their sanity. But now we have got to the point where the size, speed, power and ceiling of planes have spiralled steadily upwards, and if you cross the Atlantic now in a Boeing or a VC10 you are travelling at exactly the same speed as a Colt revolver bullet. All those things continue—faster aero-planes, higher and larger and carrying more.
But the size of the airports and the international regulations for the air limp along slowly in their wake. The Inter-national Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) was founded in 1944 when there were fewer than 9 million air passengers in the whole world. I would claim that its rules now call for drastic revision, because the size and scope of air travel is something that your Lordships would have to think hard about to take in. Probably some of your Lordships last Saturday saw the soccer match between England and Scotland at Hampden Park in Glasgow. Hampden Park is the biggest soccer ground in Britain; it can hold 130,000. To accommodate the passengers who travelled by B.O.A.C. alone last year you would require a ground a thousand times the size of Hampden Park, and even then there would not be enough room.
Aircraft sabotage made its ugly appearance early on in the history of aviation, and, like all freakish crimes, came in short-lived waves. But violent crime kept off the airlines until hijacking started. It occurred first in 1967 and it has doubled every year since then. Most European lines think that it will not happen to them. In Eastern airlines aeroplanes have been hijacked a great many times to Cuba, and they know that there is too good a chance. It has a curious effect on passenger traffic. After a hijacking the number of passengers from New York to Florida falls; but they always come back again after two or three months.
Last December matters were getting to crisis pitch, and a great effort was made to operate some diplomatic machinery which was never really meant to be worked at speed. The Tokyo Convention, which recognised the unlawful seizure of an aircraft as an offence, was at last ratified, but it left the definition and the punishment to the signatory Powers. The very next day the Sixth Committee of the United Nations passed a helpful resolution, and a week later the General Assembly also did so. All the machinery that can be used was used to try to get a move on. On December 16 the United States convened a conference with 13 countries who had major air lines, to support the Tokyo Convention. The International Federation of Air Line Pilots' Associations, who are an enormously powerful body, themselves convened a meeting, in case Governments would not be able to take an effective stand against what they called "hijackers' havens"; in other words, countries where hijackers could feel secure and from which they could issue out to carry out their crimes. One of the conclusions that came out of that conference was that it is now no longer a matter for the airlines, but one for Governments.
I should like to ask two questions: does all this international machinery keep pace with the needs? I would claim that it did not. Does it need a drastic over-haul now that we have passed into this era? It took six years to ratify the Tokyo Convention, and during that time air traffic had risen from 135 million passengers a year to well over double that number. In other words, while it was waiting to be ratified a completely new world came into existence. I am glad to say that there is going to be an extra-ordinary session of ICAO in Montreal in June which will deal with criminal actions against air transport and the bringing of such criminals to justice. At The Hague there will be another conference in December which will deal with the havens of the hijacker and their elimination. It seems to roe a very long time to wait. It is only six weeks to the holding of that conference in Montreal, but at the present rate another nine aircraft will have been hijacked by that time.
No airline can regard themselves as immune. Whatever treaties are signed, they must have reference to the extra-
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dition of the criminals. So far as any rule in the air exists on this problem, it is extraordinarily lopsided. We must also take account of the very thorny problem of those seeking asylum. So far as law goes, you may deter the cold-blooded conspirator or the escaping criminal, but you will never deter the half-demented desperado with a gun. You must then pass to the other side of prevention, which is detection. If United States technology is challenged, it is not very long before they come up with some kind of answer—and probably several of them. If any of your Lordships have travelled by T.W.A. recently from London Airport you will—possibly with-out knowing it—have been through a device called a "Friskem". This is a metal detecting device which makes allowances for the fact that you are carrying a pen and have buckles on your braces or belt. If you give a stronger reaction than that, they would like to know what metal you have on you. That is the first of the detecting devices.
The Astrophysic Research Corporation is working on a much more complicated and esoteric line, which is putting a trace element in cordite and gunpowder—the fillings of either a pistol or rifle cartridges—which will give a reaction that can be picked up on a sensitive reactor, and if any man is carrying a pistol which has this ammunition he can be detected. That is only the beginning of detection. This detection is a grand idea, and I believe that T.W.A. get a tremendous number of letters from their passengers thanking them for the very great extra care that they are taking. There is only one thing wrong: it ought not to be done by an airline at all; it ought to be done by the airport, under the aegis of Government. Every single international airport should be doing it.
I should like to put two questions to the noble Lord who is going to reply for the Government. Will he take that point up: that these detecting devices should be made mandatory by the signatory Powers of the Tokyo Convention and, indeed, if possible by all the members of ICAO, and as they are invented installed at every international airport. Secondly, will he take up the question of the machinery, which is undoubtedly moving too slowly with regard to ICAO and many of the other associations of the air, whose

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rules were drawn up in the days when things moved much more slowly.
The second half of my Motion I will touch on very briefly because I see rows of most experienced diplomats in your Lordships' House to-day, two of whom I am happy to say are to speak. I want to state the brief facts that are known only too well to everybody. On the question of kidnapping and ransom, one cannot help being reminded of the difficulties we used to have in the old days when the Danish invasions used to come, and we hit on the idea of paying them with gold to go away. We ensured one thing absolutely: they came back the next year. As Kipling said in his poem:
"If once you have paid him the Dane-geld You never get rid of the Dane."
There was the murder of Count von Spreti, whose kidnappers asked for 700,000 dollars and twenty-five hostages. In Brazil the previous September they had been paid off at a very much lower sum with only fifteen hostages, but that emboldened them to go on.
This problem is going to be with us for a very long time. This is part of appealing to the international audience which I mentioned at the beginning of my remarks. If your Lordships look in the Library you will see a brilliant red-coloured periodical called the New Left Review, Number 59, which covers January and February, 1970. This has an article which is reported to be a translation—and I am sure that it is— of a Latin American guerrilla's remarks commenting on the kidnapping of the American Ambassador in Brazil last September, in which he says:
"Armed struggle in Brazil has won inter-national notoriety with the kidnapping of the American Ambassador in Rio de Janeiro in September, 1969. It was not so much the action itself as the successful political resonance, that has made it a decisive advance in the development of the armed struggle in its present phase ".
It has happened before, and if one thing is absolutely clear it is that we are going to have to live with this problem. I read somewhere that we have 200 diplomats in Latin America. I am sure that we must have many more, when all those that we have in Embassies are included. So far as I know, an Embassy in a foreign country is part of your own country, so that within it you may protect
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yourselves. The American Embassy is always protected internally by United States Marines. I believe that when the Russian Embassy in Washington caught fire there was a frantic diplomatic exchange before the firemen could be given the extra-territorial rights to put the fire out.
I am not quite sure whether it is possible to protect one's nationals out-side the Embassy. The onus of that lies fairly and squarely on the country concerned. It bristles with the most obvious problems, because there is the difficulty of exerting any sanction which is not just as valuable, if not more valuable, to kidnappers than it is to possibly bringing a country to a better frame of mind. It is harder to kidnap somebody than to assassinate him. A sufficient entourage ought to be able to prevent absolutely someone from being kidnapped, although it may enormously circumscribe his activities. I am not going to say any-thing more about this subject, for we have two very distinguished ex-diplomats speaking. However, I would ask the Government my third question: have we received an assurance that these countries in South America which are rather particularly threatened accept their responsibility for the full guarding of our representatives? My Lords, I promised to be brief and I have done my best to sketch the position. I have asked three questions, and I hope that the noble Lord will see his way to answer them. I beg to move for Papers.
3.10 p.m.
LORD GLADWYN: My Lords, I had not realised that this was a Motion; I had it down on the Order Paper as a Question. But I am very glad to see that it has been transformed into a Motion. We are all extremely grateful to the noble Lord for having moved it. And that is not just a form of words, as it is sometimes thought to be. It is clearly right that this House should now discuss the growing threat to our society in the hijacking of aeroplanes and the kidnapping of diplomats. Both, as I believe the noble Lord implied, are manifestations of the growing lawlessness of our society, and both are obviously most dangerous. Clearly, unless they are checked both may have grave effects on international relations, already imperilled, by revolutionary movements all over the

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world, and not least by the dreadful situation in the Middle East.
Of the two, however, I myself would suggest—I do not know what your Lordships think—that the so-called hi-jacking of aircraft, which the noble Lord, for reasons we can appreciate, did not want to call "aerial piracy", is the lesser of the two evils. The noble Lord gave the actual figures for the hijacking of air-craft during the last year and mentioned, which I think is very significant, that the total number of people involved was 5,000, all of whose lives of course were endangered to some extent, but far the greater part of whom escaped without any damage to themselves, only five people being killed during the year, three of whom were themselves hijackers. Up to now, therefore, this has been perhaps more of a major nuisance than a menace, though if it goes on there is a strong risk of a major air disaster; and we must also presumably take account of the bad effect which hijacking has on the fortunes of the air companies and, indeed, on air travel generally.
As we know, and as has already been said, the 1963 Tokyo Convention, which was the first effort to cope with this situation—it is called a "Convention on Offences and Certain Other Acts committed on Board Aircraft"—has unfortunately done little to ensure the prosecution of those responsible for the hijacking. Nor can it do much, because it leaves the exact definition and punishment of what is called "unlawful seizure" to the domestic law of the signatory States. Since the majority of the characters who seize aero-planes, apart from the occasional lunatic, as I think the noble Lord, Lord Tweedsmuir, said, are, or think they are, in some way politically motivated, it must be clear that as often as not the country in whose territory they land the aircraft will not be prepared to extradite them on demand. Therefore progress towards complete international agreement on the extradition of such persons on demand, which would certainly be the best solution (I entirely agree with the noble Lord on that) must inevitably be slow.
It is also questionable, I suppose, whether even we in this country (again this is a point made by the noble Lord) would be prepared to extradite in all circumstances someone who had seized
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a foreign aircraft and landed it in Great Britain—I mean a British subject. Suppose, for instance, it was a British subject who was being carted off into some Communist country and managed to overcome the guards. I admit that that is a James Bond situation and not very probable, but there are other possible circumstances which may come to your Lordships' minds.
So if this line—the line of patiently progressing towards agreement on extra-dition—is lot very hopeful, what about sanctions? These have I think been mentioned by some people. How about a complete boycott of aircraft to or from an offending State? And by "offending State" I mean a State which refuses (shall we say?) to restore an aeroplane or passengers and crew, even if it does not surrender or extradite the hijacker. The difficulty here seems to be that even if we got agreement on such action it would obviously do little to stop the hijacker. Most hijacked aeroplanes are returned in any event, with their passengers and crew, so there would be little point in providing for sanctions in the event of a failure in this respect only. No doubt, if a convention providing for extradition were possible, there might suitably be sanctions—there presumably would be sanctions in such a convention—in the event of its violation. But otherwise sanctions would be rather useless and in any event they would be difficult to organise in practice.
So what should be done? As I under-stand it (and again I think the noble Lord mentioned this) ICAO is now preparing, or has now prepared, a new convention which is said to be a considerable improvement on the Tokyo Convention. It will, with luck, I am told, be open for signature at the end of the year. That seems to be terribly slow motion, but these international conventions are very difficult in the first place to negotiate, then to get signed, and finally to get ratified.
However, under this convention, if it ever comes into operation, signatories, as I understand it, will be bound either to return the hijackers or to prosecute them in accordance with their own domestic law. It does however, as I believe, lay down that in principle the hijacker should be returned; although exactly where he should be returned to may of course be

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a very difficult problem to determine under international law. Supposing the hijacker hijacks the aeroplane when it is 10 miles over the Atlantic. Under which jurisdiction does he fly, and to what country should the aeroplane be returned, and so on? All that arises. Whether this new convention will be signed even by a sufficient number of States is open to doubt, though we must hope that it will be. In particular, whether it will be signed by the Arab countries, to say nothing of Cuba, I should think is open to considerable doubt.
Is it possible, then, to think of anything else that might be done in the interval? The noble Lord made one suggestion; namely, that it war, publicity which drove on a good many of these hijackers, and that if they got no publicity there would be less inducement to perform the operation. It would obviously be a good thing if not only all the newspapers but all the media, as they are called, in the free countries did not publish any details at all of any hijackings. It is true that the bandit who seizes an aircraft is inspired, as often as not, by thoughts of glory and self-advertisement, and if there is no chance of that then it may be that the desire to strike will be less. But again I fear that if we look into this it seems to be a pretty impossible suggestion, because there is no doubt that hijacking as such is news, more especially if there is some incident on board involving the passengers. One cannot prevent it from coming out, and therefore it would be impossible to suppress it. One might as well say that the Press here, or the other media, should suppress all mention of incidents concerning drug takers. Unfortunately, if they did anything so sensible and public-spirited, they would probably all "go bust" in a fortnight; so that is unlikely, too.
Thus we presumably come down to the only likely deterrent, as I see it; namely, extra precautions by all the air companies concerned. I certainly would support the noble Lord in saying that there should be not only precautions by the air companies but suitable precautions taken by the airport authorities. Of course, if the precautions are to be taken by the airport authorities, it will presumably mean Government expenditure on a considerable scale. But if this practice continues I think that the Government will be com-
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pelled to face this possibility. I believe that El Al, for instance, the Israeli line, on all its flights now carries an armed detective who has in one case been known actually to shoot. Such a system must be expensive in itself, but I suppose it is possible that some sort of similar system, organised by the companies themselves, will, if hijacking continues, have to be applied, at any rate by all the major airlines; and it might even add 1 or 2 per cent. to the fares. Further than that I do not see where we are likely to go. It is of course conceivable that the whole thing is a bit of a craze and may even die down to some extent in the nature of things. Let us hope so.
I pass now from a subject of which I know extremely little—infinitely less than the noble Lord, Lord Tweedsmuir—to something of which I have luckily had no personal experience, but which I might be deemed to know a little more about, the kidnapping of diplomats. I think I said at the beginning of my remarks that I consider this to be an even more dangerous phenomenon than hijacking, and this is not only, I can assure your Lordships, because I am an ex-diplomat. It seems to me that if this practice really becomes widespread (and it may) the whole system of international relations may be endangered, with much more unfavourable consequences to all of us than the occasional diversion of a civilian aircraft.
As I see it—and here I agree with what the noble Lord, Lord Tweedsmuir, said—the only practically certain way of stamping out this horrible practice would be if all Governments could announce that while ransoms, as in the case of ordinary kidnapping, would no doubt have to be discussed, they would in no circumstances release any prisoner in exchange for a kidnapped diplomat. If this rule had been observed from the outset; that is to say, if the Brazilian Government had announced it when the American Ambassador in Rio was kidnapped, it is quite likely that there would have been no subsequent incidents, because the whole thing would have been, as it were, depoliticised. It is true that the unfortunate Ambassador might have been murdered, like his more unfortunate colleague in Guatemala. But if he had been, or alternatively if the revolutionaries' nerve had failed them and he had been released, it would at least have been made quite clear that no political end

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could be gained by what, after all, is a pretty risky operation in itself.
My Lords, in revolutionary countries—though presumably not in countries where the rule of law still prevails—I suppose it might in theory also be desirable for a Government to declare, not only that they will not surrender any prisoners in return for the liberation of a diplomat but, on the contrary, that in the event of the latter's murder, such prisoners would be instantly executed. However, as in the case of hijacking such proposals are really impracticable—they have been widely canvassed but they are impracticable—since it is entirely probable that both public opinion and the possible reaction of foreign Governments would simply not allow a Government in a revolutionary country to take up such a tough line in advance. In other words, the chances are still that they will, in such circumstances, release political prisoners. If that is the probability then perhaps we should not worry too much about the safety, as opposed to the convenience, of our representatives in such a country. However, I think it would be desirable for us to ask any Governments who might be in the same situation as that of Brazil what in fact their line was going to be in the event of the kidnapping of one of our diplomats.
If, on the contrary, there is reason to suppose that any Government in a revolutionary situation was going to take as tough a line as that of Guatemala, then we must face the unfortunate fact that, unless the tough line is going to be taken up by all countries—which seems quite improbable—as I said at the beginning of my remarks no Ambassador to any such country in which there is a revolutionary or even a potentially revolutionary situation has much real security at the present time. Therefore, in the event of further kidnapping it might be best to have small diplomatic relations with any country taking up what might be called a "strong attitude": in other words, any country which refused to give an assurance that in the event of the kidnapping of our representative or a member of his staff it would be prepared to meet the demands of the revolutionary kidnappers.
It is of course possible that as a result of security measures taken by all Embassies following the Guatemalan murder
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there will be no more incidents of the kind. That is possible. But if there are, and in the event of our not getting any satisfactory assurances of the kind suggested, there would seem to be only two practicable policies. The first is to reduce the Embassy in such countries to a skeleton staff, the Ambassador himself never going out except under guard, and the second is to withdraw the Ambassador, leaving what I think is called a chargé des archives, or a mere caretaker, and to conduct all business with the country concerned through the latter's mission in London, which might be suitably reinforced for the purpose.
Of the two alternatives, I should prefer the second, but I should be most interested to hear what the Government think of both of them. Obviously this would be a last resort, but in the event of a renewal of the kidnappings of one or more of our own people it would have to be considered. But, of course, any line which we may take up here may have some bearing, I suppose, on our own line in the event of any similar incidents occurring in this country.
I hear that there was a successful April fool's story in France this year. It was said, and widely believed, that M. Jean Monnet had been captured by British parachutists who were anti-Common Marketeers and who were threatening to shoot him unless Mr. Wilson withdrew our application to join the Common Market. It was believed by some, but it was of course a joke. But it is conceivable that unpleasant things could happen even here, and I think we should be attempting to make up our minds what in fact we should do if, as is reported in the Press, Lord Linley were to be kidnapped and threatened with assassination unless the Government liberated the Kray murderers. Presumably this sort of situation would be quite unlikely to arise since the Krays are not political prisoners and there is probably nowhere abroad where they could obtain asylum. But what would happen, if, for instance, the disgraceful Paisley were again committed to gaol and a member of the Royal Family was kidnapped and threatened with death unless Paisley was liberated and allowed to pursue his deplorable activities? What should we do?

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All these thing may be most improbable, and I hope sincerely that they are. But kidnapping does seem to be a growing menace, and in principle—and here I entirely agree with the noble Lord, Lord Tweedsmuir—there is no doubt that a determined line announced in advance is the best way of coping with it. The difficulty lies in applying the principle rigorously where, as for instance, in Brazil, immense pressure is exerted in a contrary sense. Maybe, as with hijacking, the only practical answer will lie in ourselves providing additional security locally for our diplomats at great expense, perhaps even going so far as to locate a reduced staff in a compound. But in all the circumstances it might perhaps be thought best either to raise the matter in the United Nations, or for some special conference to be held so that the majority of States, at any rate, can adopt a similar line in regard to such phenomena. In any case, as a result of this debate it is conceivable that some fruitful ideas may possibly emerge which the Government might propose or adopt in any such conference.
3.31 p.m.
EARL ALEXANDER OF TUNIS: My Lords, I should like to ask the indulgence normally extended to those speaking in your Lordships' House for the first time. We are very much concerned with the problem of hijacking, and I, too, am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Tweedsmuir, for bringing this Motion to our attention. International air travel is to us what the great shipping routes were to the 16th century traders, and, alas! we now suffer from much the same problem; that is, piracy. I will list a few of the hazards that face the airline pilot during a normal flight; and they may occur at any time without warning and they need vital action. Risk of contact with other aircraft, as we have all read in our newspapers, happens all too frequently. There is the possibility, among many others, of power failure, mechanical failure, instrument failure and fire.
To add to his burden the pilot is now faced with an armed and dangerous passenger whose instructions, however impractical, must be complied with. This is just the beginning of the unhappy story. First, can the hijackers' demands be met? Can the captain persuade this
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terrorist that it is impossible to do what he says? I believe the hijacker will not easily be persuaded so. But can the crew then be sure that the new destination really is within range? Will the runway be long enough? Does it have proper approach radar and landing facilities and so on? And what about the passengers? What about those with delicate health, or those who need drugs or treatment? How long might they be detained? There is no end to the extreme inconvenience these perfectly innocent travellers have to suffer, and this is the best that can be hoped for following a hijacking. I do not want to dramatise the situation, but it is only a matter of time before the hijacker throws his bomb, when the result could be a tragic disaster, causing grief for hundreds of others, bitterness between Governments and civil aviation bodies, as well as hastily conceived security measures that are sure to delay future passengers.
Political asylum is recognised by most people as being sacrosanct, and the man who seeks refuge in the country which shares his political ideals is entitled to its protection. But surely endangering the lives of innocent people in achieving this aim deserves severe punishment. It must be the clear intent of every country that boasts any form of law and order to let it be known that the hijacker forfeits this privilege of asylum and is dealt with as a common criminal.
We have heard with much interest what can be done at national level, and I should like to dwell on the steps that an individual pilot can take to safeguard his crew and passengers. They are in fact very few. Prior to take-off, he can, of course, examine any baggage or cargo, and he can order a passenger off the plane if he feels that he will imperil the safety of those on board. He can, with his crew, refuse to fly the plane at all. However, in the air there is precious little he can do. He can lock the door to the flight deck, which will at best give him a few seconds to transmit a distress signal. I understand from the executive Secretary of the International Federation of Airline Pilots that this is standard practice on most American air-lines. However, a really secure, and perhaps bullet-proof bulkhead in the door of the flight deck, which has been suggested, would be of little use and

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might even be a danger if the aircraft has to "ditch" or force land. For there is no door from the flight deck other than that through the front passenger compartment. To stop air piracy, I think there is a need for action at the highest level, for no country can "go it alone", and certainly no pilot or steward should ''have a go". It is up to the civil aviation bodies to press for concerted action to make hijacking plainly unprofitable.
3.37 p.m.
LORD SHERFIELD: My Lords, it is my agreeable task to congratulate the noble Earl, Lord Alexander of Tunis, on an interesting and admirable maiden speech. This gives me particular pleasure because for so many years I had a profound admiration for the character and achievements of his father. I hope the noble Earl will be encouraged to come often to this House and take a full part in its proceedings.
My Lords, I hesitated to intervene in this debate partly because, like the noble Lord, Lord Gladwyn, I have had, fortunately, no practical experience of the subject matter, and partly because I have really no original thoughts as to the remedies for what is an increasingly alarming situation. I will speak only to the second part of the Motion. Immunity of diplomatic missions has been for centuries the basis of secure communications between Sovereigns and sovereign States. True, there have been breaches of that immunity, but they have been rare. There is an old and probably apocryphal story of a Consul-General in China who concluded a dispatch to the Foreign Secretary of the day:
"The rebels are now hammering at the compound gates. Some are already beginning to scale the walls, and in a few moments, my Lord, I shall cease to have the honour to be your Lordship's humble and obedient servant."
Some recent events in Peking have brought that tale rather near to the bone, but these events were brought about at the instigation, or at least with the toleration, of the Government of the day and were controlled by them. Even so, diplomacy is becoming an increasingly dangerous occupation.
The new type of lawlessness and blackmail for political ends attacks the diplomat because he is a useful pawn in a political struggle. The kidnapping may
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not even have anything to do with the unpopularity or the actions of the Government he happens to represent. Moreover, the disease is extremely infectious and very difficult to treat. It is, like hijacking, too, for that matter, one more manifestation of the violence and the disregard for human life by certain types of criminal which has become a feature of society in advanced industrial States.
No doubt something can be done by intensified international action, though I think that this is more likely to be effective in cases of hijacking than in the case of diplomats. The noble Lord, Lord Gladwyn, made a number of interesting suggestions as to various things which might be attempted, but I am not sure that he had very much confidence in the efficacy of any of them. And, of course, the difficulty is in trying to get a code of behaviour agreed between Governments; that it is so very hard to hold them all in line.
It seems to me that the main remedy at present to hand consists of intensified intelligence and police action in all countries. But this, in itself, creates serious problems involving additional strain on already stretched and over-burdened security and police forces. I believe that in Washington, a city where crime and violence have increased very much in recent years, the task of protecting the enlarged diplomatic community is now creating a grave problem for the local police. At home this particular situation, though far from good, has by no means reached these proportions, but the police have many extraneous tasks, such as coping with the incessant demonstrations by students and others which have become a kind of national pastime. There is also the question of penalties, which is already in the minds of many people, and indeed on some of the front pages, in connection with crimes of violence generally; but this not the moment to debate that matter.
I hesitate to talk about a general subject of which I know very little, but the question that is in my mind in relation to both hijacking and kidnapping is what, if any, further action the Government have in mind to strengthen the police and the security forces to bring them up to full complement and to attract into them entrants of the highest intelligence and

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attainments; qualities needed to deal with novel and sophisticated crime. There are obvious difficulties in trying to improve security in our foreign missions. That requires increased resources in men, and everybody who has had experience of life overseas will realise the problems which are involved. There is the further question of international collaboration in this matter between police and security forces, and I have no doubt that, as in so many professional fields, this is already at a high level within the limits of the possibilities. I suppose that improvement will depend on the capability which would come from increased numbers and efficiency in the forces concerned, both in this country and in other countries. I too shall be very interested in the views of the Government on these two intractable subjects.
3.43 p.m.
LORD ERROLL OF HALE: My Lords, I should like to add my congratulations to those of the noble Lord who has just sat down to my noble friend Lord Alexander of Tunis on his admirable maiden speech. It had the great merit of brevity, and it also included in its short five minutes a great deal of common sense and a very practical point of view. I am sure I can say on behalf of all noble Lords that we look forward to hearing him on many occasions in the future on this or on other subjects.
In approaching this subject, which is rather off my familiar beat of economics and trade matters, I come before your Lordships as very much an individual, without any personal experience either of being hijacked or kidnapped. Also, as my noble friend who introduced the subject himself admitted, I too have no special legal knowledge of what must be a very difficult subject from an inter-national legal point of view. In looking at the matter I have tried to consider what practical steps Her Majesty's Government might take, and to offer suggestions and what, I hope, will be some helpful comments. I think there is a danger, not just on the part of Her Majesty's Government but on the part of us in Britain, of being somewhat complacent in this matter. It does not happen to B.O.A.C.; it does not happen to B.E.A.; our diplomats have not been kidnapped, and our
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Embassies in London, so far, have fortunately been free from suffering kid-napping by extremist groups in this country.
Therefore, it would be all too easy for us to take the lofty view and say, "This is an international question, and we can leave it to the other members of the inter-national community to take the lead in this matter". But I think that would be a dangerous course, because hijacking, which was formerly more or less a Latin American activity, is now extending into other countries as well. Noble Lords might like to know that the first recorded case of hijacking of an aircraft occurred as far back as 1930 in Peru. It was not considered a very serious problem before the 'forties, but the number of cases has been mounting rapidly in the last few years. An estimated 6,500 air passengers and no fewer than 750 crew members have had their lives jeopardised by such acts, and a number of airline crew members have been killed or injured. No fewer than 20 large commercial transports have been destroyed or damaged on the ground or in the air as a result of hijacking. There is no doubt that a dramatic increase in the frequency, international scope and seriousness of civil aviation incidents took place in 1968 and 1969, and it is clear from what we read in the papers that the increase is continuing in 1970.
My noble friend who introduced the debate attempted an estimate of the reasons behind the actions of the hijackers, and I should like to add one consideration, which is that the hijacker nearly always gets to his destination. If hijackers are to be deterred—and this is essentially a specialised form of crimi-nality—surely it must be made abundantly plain that they will not remain at their preferred destination, whether or not they are to be punished on arrival.
I understand from questions and answers given in another place, and indeed from the comments of earlier speakers in this debate, that there is a good deal of international work going on in the matter. It is very tempting for Her Majesty's Government of the day when confronted with an international problem, to say, "We must await an inter-national solution". The trouble is that international solutions can take a long lime to bring about, and while I should

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naturally deplore the time it is likely to take before there is an international solution, I accept the great difficulties of operating speedily in an international framework. I think the ICAO meeting is only due to take place in December this year, although I understand that the spokesman in another place said that he would do his best to bring forward the date. But even if the meeting takes place and agreement is reached, the Convention can become effective only when it is ratified. Our own Government very properly take the view that one cannot sign a Convention until one has passed the necessary domestic legislation to enable it to be carried out. It all can take time, so even with the best will in the world it might be nearly two years before a suit-able international convention could be said to be fully operative.
For that reason I should like to make the suggestion to Her Majesty's Government that in the meantime, and as a temporary measure, it might be possible to proceed on a bilateral basis, rather like double taxation arrangements. Her Majesty's Government could approach each country individually and say, "Will you do a deal with us that if one of our aircraft is hijacked to your country you will return not only the aircraft and the passengers"—because, as my noble friend has pointed out, they are usually returned—"but also return the hijacker to his point of departure, back to this country, and let us deal with him? We, for our part, will undertake to do the same." I should have thought that that would be a substantial deterrent to those hijackers who really want to get to some other country. I appreciate the problem referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Gladwyn, of offering political asylum, but when the matter is so serious, such as the hijacking of aircraft, the rights of political asylum should take second place.
We might not be able to get agreement with all countries, but if we made a start and got 20, 30, or 40 countries to agree with us on a purely bilateral basis we should be making progress and setting an example to other countries where the problem is more serious, so that they might do the same. I do not think that this would in any way imperil or inhibit the development of a fully fledged international convention. It is
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important, I believe, to demonstrate to the hijacker that he will never get to his chosen destination and remain there. Indeed, the news value is one of the problems of modern journalism referred to by an earlier speaker; it is news while it is going on, but we are very rarely told what happens to the hijackers after they have reached their destination. There was that highly dramatic case of the Japanese aircraft going to North Korea. We were told that the hijackers were given dinner on arrival in North Korea, but I certainly have not noticed in any newspaper since what their sub-sequent fate has been. Have they been feted? Did they go off to prison? Are they now fully fledged members of the North Korean Trotskyist Party, or what-ever it was that they were so keen about? We never learn the ultimate fate of these hijackers.
One also remembers the case of the American soldier who successfully hi-jacked an aircraft to go all the way from the western side of the United States to Italy, ostensibly because he wanted to see his daddy. He got to Italy, and I think he was arrested. What has happened to him since? Perhaps he has seen his daddy and is now back in America. It would be a great help if we could sometimes know what the end of these unauthorised expeditions to foreign parts may be. If only he had known that he would never be allowed to stay in Italy, he might not have started on his journey. So I suggest that the best deterrent of all is to make it widely known that whoever attempts a hijack will be returned to his starting point, there to await the punishment that that country is authorised to inflict.
I think that there is some responsibility on the airlines themselves to ensure a degree of in-flight security. I agree that armour-plated flight decks are probably out of the question because of weight and for other reasons, but it astonishes me, on reading about these matters, how extremely easy it appears to be to get on to the flight deck without having a pass to go there. Surely there could be some improvement in the control of passenger movement, which apparently makes it so easy for somebody to wander up to the captain and press a revolver into the back of his neck. Could not some-thing more be done to improve security?

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I do not expect that Her Majesty's Government would wish to reveal any investigations that may be going on to ensure a higher degree of in-flight security, but if we could be told some-thing in general terms I think it would help to reassure us.
For example, in the field of medical gases, is it possible to develop systems of sleeping gases which might be instantly released, with the crew being suit-ably prepared or protected against the effects of such gases? Many other suggestions have been made. An earlier speaker referred to the hundreds of letters that T.W.A. receive on the subject, so I shall not detain your Lordships by embarking on any of my own amateurish suggestions on this topic.
As regards pre-flight precautions here, surely we in this country could set an example to make sure that at all our air-ports suitable, though discreet, precautions are being taken. After one recent case when there was a bomb scare, I think the British airline concerned installed an investigatory machine which revealed something suspicious in an individual's luggage. It was promptly detained. A metal cylindrical object in a suitcase on being opened was found to be a tin of biscuits. So that there are problems in detection, whether of biscuits or of bombs. However, I hope that Her Majesty's Government will give us all the information that they feel expedient, consistent with national security.
We talk about the passengers. Before leaving this subject I should like to remind your Lordships of the great and harassing hardship suffered by wives and relatives of passengers on hi-jacked air-craft. It is not only the passengers who suffer. I can speak from close personal experience of this, because the wife of a great friend of mine suddenly learned that her husband was on a hijacked air-craft, which, incidentally, had left England and which turned up in Cuba. All was well, but she had a very painful and difficult 24 hours before learning of her husband's subsequent safety.
Turning to the question of the kid-napping of diplomats, I think my noble friend Lord Sherfield put it very well when he said that there is a tradition of diplomatic immunity which, by and large, is wonderfully observed throughout the
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world, but which is from time to time broken. The kidnapping of diplomats represents the latest lapse from good manners in this field. My noble friend referred to the recent difficulties which beset our Mission to Peking, but I might remind him and your Lordships that our representatives in Peking suffered similarly, and perhaps more severely, at the time of the Suez crisis, when the old compound was surrounded by many thousands of yelling Chinese demanding the blood of the British imperialist dragons.
Let us not forget the appalling disaster which befell our Embassy in Bagdad in 1960, when it was razed to the ground by a mob. Our diplomats fought very well, but I think two were wounded or killed in the incident. After that there occurred the seige of our Embassy in Jakarta, where the massed Indonesians were slightly dismayed and surprised to find that, instead of being frightened, our Ambassador simply walked up and down the Embassy grounds blowing on his bag-pipes. This so confused the mob that it went away in shame.
So far as our British representatives abroad are concerned, this is one of the greatest difficulties confronting the Foreign Office: we do not take kindly to showing cowardice, whatever we may feel inside. In a difficult situation we would be the last to run away or to give any appearance of being intimidated. It would be quite useless for the Foreign Office to say to our diplomats in a difficult country, "You must stay inside a compound or a ghetto. You must go out only in an armour-plated car". Immediately all the Third Secretaries would dive into the most doubtful Left Wing clubs in the country, in order to gain personal experience for themselves.
It is a peculiarly difficult matter for Her Majesty's Foreign Secretary to give advice to Her Majesty's foreign representatives abroad, but I should like to make one or two suggestions. I suggest that the Foreign Office might com-pile a list of, what I would call, "sensitive" countries. Rather than try to deal with the problem on a world-wide basis, pick out the ten or twelve countries which are most sensitive to political or diplomatic kidnapping and which plainly have what one might call political prisoners. Without seeking to define the term. I

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think your Lordships will know what I mean. Having picked out those countries, offer special methods of protection—discreet ones, of course—for our representatives there. For example, it would not be very expensive to fit the cars of those diplomats with radio phones or radio devices, which would enable them to give warning to a control point in the Embassy in the event of any trouble or difficulty. They might be persuaded to report on their movements, and always to return home by an agreed and well-policed route, as well as to use two oars instead of one when going out into the country, so that if one were taken the other would be able to raise the alarm. Here, again, I do not expect the Minister to give us details in his reply, because these are clearly matters which must remain confidential, but anything that he can tell us will be of considerable reassurance to noble Lords. Indeed, I hope that this debate will serve to show our devoted diplomats abroad that we have a very real feeling for their position, and are showing a proper concern for their safety and welfare.
As an earlier speaker said, this is not merely a matter of our diplomats abroad. Here in London we probably have one of the largest diplomatic colonies of any capital in the world. But there are not only the diplomats in London; there are all the consular posts throughout the various provincial centres of the United Kingdom. Here, again, there is a danger of complacency on our part, because, fortunately, we have so far been free from this sort of incident. But we have had some ugly incidents outside the United States Embassy, and there was an even worse incident when the Greek Embassy was invaded. Because of our freedom of entry, we have here so many different factions and groups, of Right and Left Wing varieties, that anything could happen; and what makes the problem particularly difficult is that the kidnappers do not necessarily select a diplomat from a country which they dislike. They may very well select some poor innocent man from a third country which has no part in the quarrel at all. Indeed, this was the case in Guatemala, where the German colony has behaved, I am told, with exemplary dignity and correctness in its relations with all shades of Guatemalan opinion, and the un-
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fortunate Ambassador was done to death nevertheless.
I thought the proposal of the noble Lord, Lord Gladwyn, was a particularly good one if it could be brought about; namely, that Governments in sensitive countries should state clearly in advance that in no circumstances will they release any political prisoners as a result of kid-napping. Whether they could be brought to the point of actually saying so is another matter; but undoubtedly we have seen that the kidnappers usually win the day or else carry out their threat. If this terrible state of affairs should come to this country, I think we can take comfort from the fact that our police are extremely efficient and are backed up by a very efficient system of intelligence. Therefore, if there was to be such an incident, with luck the perpetrators would be rapidly brought to book, although we have to remember how very difficult the case of Mrs. McKay has been, where considerable forces of police were deployed. So we are here very much at risk.
Here again I should like to offer a small suggestion to Her Majesty's Government, if not already being acted on; that is, that I would hope that the Embassies in this country would make avail-able to our police forces, through the Foreign Office, all possible information they may have on groups of one sort and another who may be in this country or who may be proposing to come to this country for subversive purposes. In that way, forewarned, we would to some extent be forearmed. In the last resort, my Lords, we are dealing with very difficult problems because we are dealing with crimes, albeit of a very specialised nature; and while we should like to say there shall be no more crime, it is very difficult to know where it will strike next. So I would not expect Her Majesty's Government to be able to give us a simple, complete answer this afternoon. Nevertheless, I hope that Her Majesty's Government can show that they are not only fully alive to these twin problems but are pursuing solutions with rapidity and energy.
4.3 p.m.
THE EARL OF LIMERICK: My Lords, I should like to add my congratulations to those already offered to the noble Earl, Lord Alexander of Tunis, on his maiden

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speech. I can speak with some feeling, having so recently myself emerged from that stage. My own intervention in this debate will be brief and confined to certain aspects of the problem of hijacking. This has become an international problem. I think the attitude which has been expressed, "It couldn't happen here", has dangers, and it is for this reason that I shall venture to suggest one or two ways in which we might take a lead in this field.
Analysing the features of the hijackings which have recently taken place, I find that they have several things in common. The first is that robbery, either of passengers or of cargo—remembering that these aircraft often carry large quantities of gold and other very valuable cargoes—is seldom, indeed probably never, the motive. Secondly, the air-craft itself has always been returned ultimately to its country of origin. Thirdly, to date, 36 airlines have been involved in hijack incidents, and although, as has been pointed out, no passengers have yet been killed in these incidents (the dead, apart from the three hijackers, are a captain and a first officer of Eastern Air-lines) it is inevitable, unless this tendency is stopped, that a major incident will occur involving disaster to an air-craft.
The fourth feature is that, to date, the hijackers themselves have seldom been returned to their country of origin. This presents a considerable problem unless there is a universal agreement covering this point. It seems to represent an impossibility in the present climate to get a consensus of definition of the conditions in which the hijackers would be returned from the countries to which they are liable to wish to divert the aircraft. It is, however, interesting to note recent experience on hijackings to Cuba. In the period from January to April of 1969, 14 aircraft were hijacked from the United States to Cuba. In the equivalent period this year, the number is only three. It is tempting to draw a conclusion here from the fact that Castro has taken to sending back a large number of the hijackers. The alternative, in certain cases, has been to put them to work for 18 hours a day in the sugar fields; and this message certainly seems to have got home.
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These hijacking risks are beginning to affect the commercial operation of air-lines. They do affect passenger decisions. Those of us who fly a great deal will I think agree that we tend now to inquire into the transit stops made by the aircraft in which we contemplate flying. Piracy has been mentioned, and it is tempting to suppose that by invoking the piracy law something could be achieved. Like the noble Lord, Lord Tweedsmuir, I have discussed this aspect with two international lawyers; and, like him, I emerged completely confused. The distinction, as was explained to me, of piracy from other laws is that it is a crime not against the State but against humanity. There-fore, if its provisions can be invoked it is truly universal, and this, I feel, is a point which merits further attention.
Now a word about possible remedies. Penalties, of course, should be mentioned. The equivalent tendency in the stage-coach days in the West was quickly checked by the use of armed guards, and by summary, hanging justice. Although armed guards are used on certain airlines, this practice, for obvious reasons, both political and physical, is hardly a real possibility. The second deterrent is a strong possibility of detection. Here, the Americans have achieved a considerable amount by the use of what they call a "psychological profile" on the hijacker. They rightly decline to reveal their criteria, but it has emerged that the typical hijacker is a young man, usually of the labouring class and of a nervous disposition. It has also been remarked that a high percentage of hijackers have beards. The conclusion from that was that anyone who was young, male, nervous and bearded would be liable to delay if he sought to travel on an American airline. Of course, we do not know how successful these techniques are. If, on the ground, a hijacker is foiled in a potential attempt, this receives no publicity. Indeed, it is impossible to infer from the mere fact that he is carrying a weapon which could be used in a hijacking that he is a potential hijacker. I have no doubt that there is an exchange of information among airlines, and indeed among Governments, on these subjects. It would be interesting if we could have confirmation on that point.
My Lords, I now come to the main point that I wish to make: that when

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an aircraft is in flight the hijacker, of course, by definition, is detected; and here the characteristics are as follows. The willingness of hijackers to "have a go" will depend upon their assessment of the chances of success. Roughly one-third of 200 hijack attempts in the last ten years have been foiled. If it becomes known that this percentage is rising, and rising sharply, then one may hope that the total number of attempts will correspondingly decline. In the first place, these hijackers are usually unable to fly the aircraft which they seek to divert. Secondly, more importantly, they are in a position that if they take such action as to destroy the aircraft they must also in the process destroy themselves. Third, they will have lost the game if the air-craft lands anywhere except at the destination of their choice. This leads me to believe that we might seek a solution in the country of origin of the flights rather than concentrating, as speakers hitherto have done, on the country of destination.
I would suggest four things that might be done. First, I would reinforce the plea that the use of detection devices should become mandatory, and I believe that some consequential delay to passengers would be acceptable. Secondly, we should encourage the ratification of the Tokyo Convention. Thirdly (this is a point that has not been made, but I regard it as most important) there should be the widest possible declaration that pilots from all the countries whose aircraft are liable to be hijacked are instructed to keep their flight deck doors locked during the flight, and, further, are enjoined to refuse to divert from their planned destination for what-ever cause, no matter what happens in the cabin behind them. We should remember that the pilot, who must have the ultimate say in this matter, is carrying a tremendous load of responsibility when he discovers that there is a threat to his cabin crew or passengers. If he is thus encouraged (and I am sure that the international pilots' brotherhood would welcome this: it is a very strong body, there is a very strong fellow-feeling between pilots) to take the view that he is not to be diverted, I think it would make his decision easier; and the publicity given to such pronouncements would, one hopes, deter many would-be hijackers. Finally, I believe that publicity
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to these attempts at hijacking, and to successful hijacks, should be discouraged by any means available.
I have one further point, my Lords, that I should like to make on the question of insurance. There is an unsatisfactory situation at the moment whereby in most standard policies in this country hijacking risks are now excluded from war damage cover, and there is a further limitation to 14 days of the cover available on the ground in the event that a hijacked airliner lands safely but is not speedily released by the country to which it was diverted. This is having a very detrimental effect on the attempts of several airlines to raise finance for new aircraft, and it is, I think, a problem that will grow unless we can find a solution to it.
I would make one point on the question of diplomats, and that is to agree with the noble Lord, Lord Gladwyn, that the only solution to this problem, and indeed also to the hijacking question, if one accepts that the ultimate aim must be to protect the innocent majority, is to see that it is made known as widely as possible that those who are subject to this pressure will not yield to it.
4.14 p.m.
THE EARL OF KINNOULL: My Lords, I join with other speakers in congratulating my noble friend Lord Alexander of Tunis on an excellent maiden speech. Any maiden speech in this House, even to the most seasoned campaigner, is somewhat of an ordeal, and I think that my noble friend came through that ordeal with considerable success. My noble friend Lord Tweedsmuir has raised two very important issues in his Motion. I should like to mention again the hijacking issue. We have heard with great interest two ex-diplomats on the question of kidnapping; and I am glad that neither had personal experience of it. I would agree in the first instance with other speakers that whatever preventive steps are taken, either by Governments or airline operators, it is very difficult in present conditions completely to stamp out hijacking to-day. Nevertheless, I believe that the present apparent increase in hijacking could be considerably reduced if certain steps were implemented.

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The first step, and one which my noble friend Lord Tweedsmuir has already mentioned, is the obvious need for firm international agreement between Governments. Here I believe that Her Majesty's Government have not been as active as they could have been to seek the now urgent requirement for international sanctions against hijackers. I agree with my noble friend Lord Tweedsmuir that ICAO is really proving too slow a body to move with the present trend of hijacking.
When a Government Statement on hijacking was made in both Houses last February, the Government were pressed whether they intended to take the question of international agreement to the United Nations. The noble Lord, Lord Beswick, replying that day on behalf of the Government, said that that form of suggestion would be studied with care. He went on to say that he personally had sympathy with it. He also said at that time that only a few days after the Statement an emergency meeting was to take place among the European civil aviation administrations. I should be interested to hear from the noble Lord, Lord Shepherd, when he comes to reply, what proposals came out of the emergency meeting and whether the Government are intending to pursue this matter at the United Nations.
I should like also to ask the noble Lord whether Her Majesty's Government agree that under any international agreement there should be two principal objectives. Both, I know, are being pressed by BALPA and I.F.A.L.P.A., the Inter-national Airline Pilots' Association. The first is the immediate safe return of all the crew, passengers and aircraft to the country of origin; the second, either the return of the hijackers, if there is no political motive, or, if that is not accept-able, some positive punitive action against the hijackers. My noble friend Lord Alexander of Tunis mentioned recent cases where the hijackers became some-what hero figures by being able to sell their life stories and even by being offered film contracts. Such cases I believe are deplorable and add to the importance of pressing for positive inter-national agreement.
As to the question of what airlines can do to prevent hijacking, the answer
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must lie in preventive measures on the ground. The difficulty facing any air-line or port authority is to strike a balance, a happy medium, between maintaining a civil airport with all the normal freedoms while at the same time increasing unobtrusively the security arrangements. A further difficulty with checking both passengers and baggage for weapons and bombs is the delay that results. We know of certain screening equipment which, as my noble friend Lord Tweedsmuir has already mentioned, is being tried out in Switzerland and America. My noble friend mentioned the Frisk'em; and I have been told of the decompression chamber in Zurich for testing baggage against bombs. In America there is the magnetometer which is used for the testing and screening of passengers. One hopes that these and other screening equipment will be introduced in time to add to the safety and security of passengers. I should like to ask the noble Lord, Lord Shepherd, whether, without giving away any secrets, he will be able to tell us to-night what studies Her Majesty's Government are giving to the introduction of screening equipment.
I would also in passing mention the question of the security of airports, particularly Heathrow, although one appreciates that this is a matter of some delicacy. It was disturbing to read recently in a Sunday newspaper a report of a member of BALPA who tested out the security arrangements and found them, to put it mildly, not very alert. This, we appreciate, was some months ago, and one hopes that it has now been put right. There is one matter of the security at Heathrow which a number of people find very puzzling, namely, the dual re-sponsibility between the British Airports Authority and the airlines. I think I am correct in saying that the airlines have the responsibility for security in their maintenance area and the British Airports Authority are responsible for the remaining parts of the airport. I understand that no other international airport has this dual arrangement. Perhaps the noble Lord, Lord Shepherd, could confirm whether Her Majesty's Government are considering making this the sole responsibility of the Authority in future.
My Lords, we have been very fortunate in this country in not having experienced

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a single instance of hijacking. One has heard of the case in America, on a domestic, New York to Miami, run where a passenger pushed his way forward and pointed a gun at the pilot and said, "Take me to Miami". The pilot, some-what surprised, said, "Don't you mean Havana?". The passenger replied, "No I don't, I mean Miami. I've been on this trip twice before, and both times I landed at Havana". One hears of other cases on domestic routes in South America where passengers are advised to carry their passports. Whether those examples are true or not, I believe they illustrate the necessity for urgent, firm action by Government with Government to help check this increasing and intolerable threat to civil air transport. I hope that to-day the noble Lord, Lord Shepherd, will be able to assure us that Her Majesty's Government are taking positive steps, because I believe that they cannot afford to be complacent about this very serious and hazardous issue.
4.21 p.m.
LORD SHEPHERD: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Tweedsmuir, has raised two matters which are of very deep concern to Her Majesty's Government and, I believe, to the general public. Before dealing with this highly complex subject I should like to congratulate the noble Earl, Lord Alexander of Tunis, on his maiden speech. The House always looks forward to maiden speeches. Noble Lords are always with the maiden speaker when he is making his speech and hope for his success. I am certain that all of us who had the privilege of hearing the maiden speech this afternoon will rank it as a success. Most of us who knew the noble Earl's father will be pleased, too, because not only was his father held in high esteem in this House but he was also a much beloved personality to those who knew him.
My Lords, we have recently seen emerging what one might call the related threats of attacks on aircraft on the ground and, worse still, the sabotage of aircraft, leading to their destruction in the air, with tragic loss of innocent lives. These problems are undoubtedly inter-national. I will take note of the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Enroll of Hale, who said that when things are difficult, Governments refer to them as "international problems". Anyone who
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looks at some of the recent cases of hijacking will see how truly international they are, certainly from the legal point of view. The passions that sometimes warp the minds of men and move them to seize control of aircraft know no frontiers. Not long ago there was an outrage which affected a, number of countries. Two men of different nationalities conspired, in a third country, to board, in a fourth country, an aeroplane registered in a fifth country. They seized control of it in the air space of a sixth country, and forced the pilot to land for fuel in a seventh; and, finally, to convey them to an eighth country.
Anyone who knows anything about international law will see that this is a highly complex problem. The rights, obligations and policies of all these countries may conflict and create a grave situation of legal complexity. There are, therefore, severe limits on the effective-ness of the action that any one individual country can take. The measures to be taken to prevent incidents, or to deal with those responsible for incidents, must be concerted on an international scale. As the House will be aware, this whole complex of connected problems is to be considered at an Extraordinary Session of the Assembly of the International Civil Aviation Organisation to be held in Montreal in June, at the request of ten European member States, including the United Kingdom. We intend to exercise all the influence we can to secure inter-national agreement on the measures required to reduce the risk and, we hope, in the end, to eliminate these menaces to the safety of the world's airways.
We regard ICAO as the most appropriate forum for the international consideration of these issues. As the Special Agency of the United Nations dealing with civil aviation, it has a great store of experience and technical knowledge in this field; and it has a membership of some 119 countries. To its credit, ICAO has already achieved much in this connection. In 1963, under its auspices was concluded the Tokyo Convention on Offences Committed on Board Aircraft. This Convention is the basic inter-national instrument for dealing with criminal jurisdiction over aircraft and the authority of their commanders. It also contains valuable provisions for the return of hijacked aircraft and their passengers and crew. The United Kingdom was

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among the twelve countries whose ratifications brought the Convention into force at the end of last year. The number of signatories to the Convention has since risen to 21. We hope that many other countries will accede to the Convention, and that its provisions will become the accepted practice all over the world.
The frequency of hijacking has in-creased at an alarming rate over the years since the conclusion of the Tokyo Convention. In face of this mounting threat ICAO has done a great deal of patient, detailed work, especially over the past year. It has made a two-pronged attack on the problem. On the one hand, it has provided information about the precautions which Governments, airport authorities and airlines (which are, in the end, responsible) can take to make the task of the potential hijacker more difficult. On the other hand, members of ICAO have considered together the problem of punishing hijackers and thus deterring others from following their example.
To take first the precautions, early in 1969 ICAO set up a Committee on Un-lawful Interference with Aircraft. This Committee collected evidence from interested parties, including the inter-national organisations representing the airlines and their pilots, as those most directly concerned. As a result, a report based on the accumulated experience of the problem was circulated to member Governments for their guidance. It covers a wide range of topics, such as national legislation, publicity to increase public awareness of the problem and to deter the potential hijacker, and methods of screening and checking of passengers to detect those intending to hijack an aircraft.
The extent to which particular recommendations are relevant necessarily varies from one country to another. Some of the security measures recommended were already in force in this country, but the airport authorities and the airlines, on whom the primary responsibility rests, have recently, in consultation with the Government, tightened considerably the security measures at our airports. Valuable work has also been done on a regional basis in Europe, under the auspices of the European Civil Aviation Conference. We believe that the development of such precautions on an inter-
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national basis will steadily reduce the risks of hijacking and the sabotage of aircraft on the ground and in the air. But I think that we must be frank with ourselves. The process cannot by its nature be spectacular, and it would clearly not be in the general interest to describe the details of what the British Airports Authority and the airlines in this country are doing. I should have liked to respond on this point, but the advice that I have been given is that the less said about it, the better.
At the same time, ICAO have been pursuing the complementary line of attack on the problem of hijacking by providing a framework within which those responsible can be brought to justice. It has become clear that the Tokyo Convention, to which I referred at the beginning of my speech, although an important step in the right direction, does not go far enough because, although it provides for the return of aircraft and its passengers, it does not touch the hijacker himself. To deter the potential hijacker, we clearly need to establish machinery to bring him to justice. I have no doubt that many hijackers would be deterred if they did not set out confident that they would escape scot-free after they had forced the aircraft to land in the country of their choice.
For this reason we greatly welcomed the decision of ICAO to set up a Legal Committee to draft a convention on the unlawful seizure of aircraft and we took a leading part in its deliberations. The Legal Committee of ICAO finished its work on the new convention last month and it has now been endorsed by the Council and circulated to Governments. The main provisions of this document are as follows. Each party would under-take to make hijacking an offence subject to severe penalties. Each party would also become obliged to establish jurisdiction over the offence where it was committed, on board an aircraft on its register, or where the hijacked aircraft lands in its territory with the alleged offender still on board. Each party would also undertake to take the alleged offender into custody or take steps to ensure that he did not get away pending possible criminal or extradition proceedings. Under the draft convention, hijacking would have to be treated as included among the offences listed in existing ex-tradition treaties between contracting

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States, who would also undertake to include it in any new extradition treaty.
The important thing is that the country where the hijacker lands should norm-ally have power to deal with him, so that extradition need be resorted to only when the country does not or cannot exercise its own criminal jurisdiction. If, however, the question of extradition should arise, it is implicit in the draft convention that it would be effected in accordance with the national law of the extraditing State. Thus, in this country, it would be open to an accused person to plead that he should not be extradited because he was wanted for a crime of a political character. Similar considerations would apply in many other countries. Therefore, it has been suggested in some quarters that this defence should be disallowed and no exception made for political offences. Grave, however, though the offence of hijacking is, it was not generally considered by the countries engaged in the preparation of the draft convention that it would justify a departure from the political safeguards customarily included in extradition law.
A much milder variant was put for-ward and discussed during the negotiations—that extradition should be automatic unless the accused faced capital or other severe penalties for political offences in the country which had demanded his extradition. Even this proposal received little support. It is important to note that because a State decides to extradite a hijacker, it does not mean that he will necessarily get off scot-free. Under the draft convention, the State where a hijacked aircraft lands with the hijacker still on board will have jurisdiction and can deal with him.
A convention on the lines now pro-posed should do a great deal to make hijacking less attractive to the potential offender, provided that a large number of States become parties. Our next objective, therefore, must be to achieve widespread agreement on the text, with the aim of bringing the convention into force by as many countries as possible and as quickly as possible. The noble Earl, Lord Kinnoull, said that the Government have not reacted quickly enough and I believe that view was expressed in another place. But anyone who has studied the ICAO rules of procedure will see that Governments must
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have at least six months to study a draft convention, after it has been approved by the Legal Committee and circulated to Governments, before it is considered and concluded at a diplomatic conference.
This conference has now been convened to meet at The Hague on December 1, at the invitation of the Government of the Netherlands. In view of the urgency of the problem, we have been taking soundings to see whether it would be possible to hold the conference earlier by general agreement. The House will realise that in considering this question we have to bear in mind that a conference of this kind needs a great deal of preparation to give it the maximum chance of success. Many Governments, which do not send representatives to the Legal Committee, are now seeing the text of the convention for the first time and naturally need time to study it in detail. Some of these have small staffs to deal with problems of this kind and it was partly with them in mind that the six months was originally instituted. The draft convention breaks a good deal of new ground and it is of the first importance that we should secure as wide a measure of agreement as possible.
The noble Lord, Lord Tweedsmuir, also raised the point about whether we are doing sufficient and doing it fast enough. The problem is, as I think the noble Lord, Lord Erroll of Hale, under-stood, that when we are dealing with a large number of countries, each having a different attitude and sometimes a different interest, it does take time to bring them together. It is the view of Her Majesty's Government that it is of little use to hasten the consideration of the final text, if the result is that many countries do not attend the diplomatic conference or, having attended, fail to sign and to ratify. What counts in our minds is to get the final convention into force as soon as possible over as large a part of the world as possible. We shall have that aim constantly in mind in our consultations, which are still continuing.
Nearly all the activities I have described so far have been centred on ICAO but we have been active elsewhere. A British delegation took part in a meeting of the 13 member States which are the leading providers of air transport, held in Washington in December. The pro

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ceedings were confidential to permit a full exchange of views between the Governments concerned, who were all deeply anxious about the hijacking threat to the world civil aviation. They discussed the need for an early and wide-spread ratification of the Tokyo Convention and the early bringing into force of the Hijacking Convention. They also discussed the difficult problems of extradition and co-operation between Governments on security measures.
The United Nations General Assembly, as the premier forum for considering international problems, rightly also concerned itself with this problem at its last Session. We gave full support to an important resolution which called upon States to ensure that their national legislation provides an adequate framework for effective measures against unlawful interference. The resolution also urged States to ensure that hijackers are prosecuted. In this connection, Her Majesty's Government will of course introduce any legislation that may be necessary in this country when the text of the Hijacking Convention has reached its final form. The resolution also urged full support for the efforts of ICAO in preparing the Hijacking Convention and invited States to accede to the Tokyo Convention. At its next Session the Assembly will no doubt take stock of progress in ICAO and consider the new threats that have emerged during the year, especially sabotage of aircraft.
There has been some suggestion that, pending the outcome of the diplomatic conference in December, no work is being done on these questions. This is, of course, far from the truth. Her Majesty's Government attach the greatest possible importance to the Extraordinary Assembly of ICAO which is due to meet in Montreal in June. We hope that it will be widely attended and will pro-duce constructive proposals. We are planning ourselves to contribute some suggestions for a possible international instrument to deal with other forms of attack against aircraft similar to the Hijacking Convention, and hope to circulate our proposals to the members of ICAO very soon.
Although many of the problems which we have been discussing this afternoon have their roots in intractable political differences which, unfortunately, are not
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likely quickly to be solved, I hope that I have convinced your Lordships that hijacking and aircraft security generally can and should be dealt with primarily as a civil aviation problem, with which the International Civil Aviation Organisation is peculiarly well fitted to deal.
The noble Lord, Lord Tweedsmuir, asked whether devices should be made mandatory, and also whether Governments should be responsible for them. I will look into this matter, but I think it would be difficult; and I am not certain whether, in the end, the airlines would find it satisfactory. Some of our airports in this country of course are under public authorities, and some are privately owned; and certainly in the United States there are many that are privately owned. I think it would be difficult to ensure that all airfields have a standard field of detection. But in the end this is, I suggest, a matter that needs to be considered by airlines themselves, who must have the primary responsibility to their passengers and also to Governments and the other various authorities.
The noble Lord, Lord Erroll, asked whether we could not undertake bilateral treaties with countries. On the face of it, this may appear to be a short cut and therefore attractive. But I cannot help feeling, considering the large number of countries with which we should have to negotiate, and certainly seek to have a standard treaty, that in the end it would be quicker to do it in an international forum rather than to seek to do it on a bilateral basis. However, this is a point that I will consider.
I turn now to the problem of the kidnapping of diplomats. The noble Lord, Lord Sherfield, said that diplomacy is becoming an increasingly dangerous occupation. This is a new threat, al-though it has happened before: it is new perhaps for the implications that lie be-hind the kidnapping. I can only say to the noble Lord, Lord Sherfield, that I have been in touch with our Diplomatic Service overseas, and particularly in South America, and they are taking their traditional view of the situation and are not unduly concerned. Although so far the kidnapping has occurred in a limited number of countries, I think it right that we should recognise that it could well occur in many other parts of the world. And while the activities of kidnappers

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have so far been directed against Ambassadors and senior diplomatic or consular staff, we cannot exclude the possibility that attacks of this sort might be made on junior staff, or even on wives and families of our diplomats.
The responsibility for the safety of an Ambassador and his staff lies with the host Government. This is stated clearly in Article 29 of the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, and is also established by long international tradition and precedent. Indeed, it is the basic to the efficient conduct of inter-national relations that accredited representatives should be free and secure to go about their business. I believe that virtually all Governments in the world are aware of and accept their responsibility. I am equally sure that the great majority take appropriate measures to protect the diplomats stationed in their countries.
At the same time, we have to recognise that, with the best will in the world, no country can give complete and absolute protection against the kidnapping of diplomats any more than against other forms of crime. In the last analysis, if inadequate protection is afforded to diplomats by the authorities in the country concerned, the only complete solution lies in the drastic reduction, or even total closure, of the diplomatic Missions concerned. Action of this kind would obviously be taken only in the very last resort, if it appeared that there was no other way of ensuring the safety of our diplomatic staff in a given country.
The problem is made all the more difficult by the readiness of kidnappers to seize hostages at random. The late Ger-man Amabassador to Guatemala, as the noble Lord, Lord Erroll, said, seems to have been seized by his kidnappers simply because he was a prominent person whose capture would, they believed, ensure them the bargaining power and publicity that they desired. It is thus necessary for a Government to provide adequate protection not just for the representatives of countries with whose policy the kidnappers may be assumed to disagree but for all diplomatic representatives, irrespective of the policy of their countries.
Although, as I have said, the host Government has the full formal responsibility for ensuring a diplomat's safety, we think
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it right that we should also take care to ensure that our staffs overseas are pro-vided with any additional help from our own resources which may seem practicable and desirable in the light of local circumstances. We had in fact issued guidance to all our overseas Missions last year on precautionary measures which might be taken to reduce the risk of kidnapping. More recently we have consulted many of our posts on the need for any additional measures. For obvious reasons, I cannot reveal in detail what these measures are, but I can assure the House that we are very concerned at the danger and have been active in trying to reduce it.
A security expert from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office is at present touring a number of our missions in Latin America to assess the situation at first hand, to advise missions on what further precautions should be instituted immediately and, where necessary, to make recommendations for action in the longer term that would reduce the risk to a minimum. I have seen the "shopping list"; I have also seen the action taken and would assure the House that where requests have been made action has been taken. We are also issuing further guidance to all our posts overseas, based on the lessons learned from recent events in Latin America. I sincerely hope and trust that no kidnapping attempt will be made against any member of our missions overseas. But if an attempt were made, they are as ready for it as they can possibly be, taking into account what their duties are. An overseas mission that is confined to its compound might as well not be there at all. The purpose of a mission is to be able to move around, not only between embassy and Government buildings, but also to sense what is going on in the country as a whole.
I need hardy add that Her Majesty's Government are also giving due attention to the protection of diplomatic representatives in London. Again it would be unwise for me to go into detail, but the House may wish to see the size of the problem. We have some 7,000 people, with their families, representing diplomatic missions. It is a very sizeable problem, but I have no doubt that Scot-land Yard, who have special responsibility, are fully aware of the dangers and are taking the necessary action.

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So far I have dealt only with the immediate question of how to avoid or deter potential kidnappers. While we have been taking action on this matter we have also been considering what measures would be taken internationally to put an end to this threat. Immediately after the murder of the German Ambassador to Guatemala we initiated consultations with a number of Governments who faced problems similar to our own. We have exchanged ideas, both on the immediate problem of protection and on the possibilities of a longer-term solution. We are anxious to ensure that all useful ideas are fully considered. It would, however, be wrong to suppose that any form of international action or agreement is likely to produce effective results in the short term. The legal position is already perfectly clear. Virtually no Government condones attacks on diplomats accredited to it or refuses to recognise kidnapping as a crime. The problem is therefore not to establish a legal basis for action against the kidnappers, but to find means of deterring kidnappers from violating existing laws.
Various ideas have been suggested. For example, there is the proposal to obtain international agreement that prisoners released as a result of kidnapping should not be granted political asylum in a third country. That idea has obvious attractions, but I am not at all sure that it would command universal acceptance. Leaving aside those countries which are ill-disposed towards the West and whose attitude towards kidnapping of a Western diplomatic representative elsewhere might be doubtful, many countries have long-established, honourable traditions of granting political asylum and might well be reluctant to limit their traditional freedom to decide for themselves in any individual case.
To sum up, I believe that there are two things that we should be doing and which we are doing. We are taking all possible measures to ensure the safety of our staff overseas. And we are exploring with our friends and allies all ideas that could help to solve this problem. But we have to recognise the very real difficulties of effective international action. Each case is different and each case involves a human life. We must there-fore take care to avoid any action that is
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of doubtful value but that might tie our hands if a British diplomat were kidnapped.
4.55 p.m.
LORD TWEEDSMUIR: My Lords, in withdrawing my Motion I should like to thank all those who have taken part in this debate and have thought out this abstruse subject in such depth. I would add my congratulations to the noble Earl, Lord Alexander of Tunis, for his maiden speech. The reception he received was not only because we held his father in such respect and admiration but because of the thoughtful and interesting speech that he himself made.
I am much obliged to the noble Lord, Lord Shepherd, for his full answer. There is much more that we should have liked to hear, but the House realises that there is a great deal that the noble Lord can-not say at this stage. I wish his delegation luck at the ICAO Conference in Montreal. I am full of admiration for the achievements of ICAO, but I still maintain, as I said in my speech, that the machinery that operates was constructed to work in a much slower gear. If they ever see their way to speeding it up to meet modern conditions, I shall be the first to cheer them. I should like to thank the noble Lord for going into such detail in his reply and I beg leave to withdraw my Motion.
Motion for Papers, by leave, with-drawn.

THE EASTER ACT 1928
4.57 p.m.
LORD MERTHYR LORD MERTHYR rose to ask Her Majesty's Government upon what date it is intended to bring into force the Easter Act 1928. The noble Lord said: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper. I ought to apologise for troubling your Lordships' House so frequently with this self-same Question, but in self-defence may I say that my reason for doing so is that in my respectful submission I never get an Answer, and I do not get a full or satisfactory reply. Her Majesty's Government have never said when they intend to bring this Act into operation, and that is what I want to know.
There may be one or two Members of the House who were not previously

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aware that in 1928—that is, 42 years ago—Parliament passed the Easter Act. I will pause at this point to put forward, very shortly, the advantages of a fixed Easter, because Parliament was well aware of the advantages in 1928. Parliament has been aware of them ever since, and I hope is aware of them to-day. I am going to shorten my speech by leaving out all the advantages, on the assumption that your Lordships are fully aware of them. I will mention not the most important advantage but the latest that has come to my notice. Only two days ago I had an entirely unsolicited letter from the British Resorts Association saying what a great advantage it would be for all the coastal resorts and others around the British Isles to have a fixed Easter. The Association listed hundreds of them.
In 1928 not only was this Act passed into law but there was virtually no opposition to it in either House. I say "virtually" no opposition because al-though in the House of Commons a Motion for the rejection of the Bill was put down, after debate the Motion was withdrawn, and the Act was passed into law without a Division in either House of Parliament. In your Lordships' House not only was that so but all the speakers who took part in the debate were in favour of the Bill. They were speakers from the Government and Opposition, Protestants and Roman Catholics. No-body spoke against the Bill, and nobody spoke more strongly in favour of it than the representative of His Majesty's Government. I have said all this in your Lordships' House before, and I do not propose to repeat it to-day. I can only hope that I shall receive credit for that.
In order to explain why I am asking this Question I should say that the Bill, having provided for a fixed Easter, went on to make two provisos. The first was that the Bill should not come into force without an Order in Council, approved by both Houses of Parliament; and nobody, certainly not I, has any objection to that. Nor have I any objection personally to the second of the two provisos, which is, however, for our purposes to-day, by far more important. That proviso said that before it came into force—I will quote the exact words because I think they are quite important:
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"regard shall be had to any opinion officially expressed by any Church or other Christian body."
Those are important words and I do not underrate them at all. I only plead that they should be read and interpreted exactly for what they say, and for no more.
Those important words provide the only discernible reason for not bringing the Act into force. I cannot see or find any other possible reasons. Your Lord-ships will note (I have pointed this out before) that in those words there is nothing at all about agreement. Parliament could have said, "We are not going to have this Act until all the Churches have agreed." It did not say so; there was not a word about agreement. And to say, "regard shall be had" is, I submit, different from saying, "agreement shall be obtained ".
So I have repeatedly asked this question: how many officially expressed opinions by the Churches have been received in all the time since 1928? How many have they sent in to His Majesty's and Her Majesty's Governments? In my submission, I have never received an answer to that question. The noble Lord, Lord Stonham, who was the last Government Minister to reply to me, said he had answered it; but I cannot find that he gave me an answer. The noble Lord, Lord Bowles, whom I am very pleased to see here to-day, went so far as to say that none has been received by this Government—which was not, with all respect, what I asked. He ventured that rather rash remark, and I was very pleased to hear it. But I wanted to know whether any such opinions had ever been received. Because in the absence of any answer to this question, I am going to invite your Lordships to agree with me that there never has been any opinion officially expressed by any Church or other religious body; that is to say, no Church has ever sent in any opinion on this matter to the Government. If I am wrong, I hope that I shall be corrected.
I therefore guess, and suggest, that the true answer to my question is, "None". If it is, will some Minister of the Crown— will the noble Lord who is to answer to-day—be good enough to say so? I shall be much obliged, and of course I shall be very glad to hear it. Because

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the answer to that question provides, in my opinion, the last remaining justification for delay. If no opinion is ex-pressed, and never has been, by a religious body, there simply is no justification for delay, at any rate if one reads the words of the Act of Parliament carefully, as I submit we all should. The last remaining excuse therefore disappears if the answer is "None". Is it possible that that is why I cannot get an answer to the question?
I submit, with all respect, that Her Majesty's Government are reading into this Act something which is not there. They keep on saying that they must get agreement from the Churches. I have said already that there is nothing in the Act about agreement by the Churches. What I am always told, every time I ask this Question—and I suppose I may be told it again to-day—is: "Wait another year." I do not know how many years it is since I was first asked to "Wait another year"; it is at least five. I am wondering very much whether I shall be told that again today. I am still waiting. My Lords, we are all waiting after 42 years. If, in 1928, any Member of either House had been told that 42 years later this Act would not be in operation, I do not think he would have believed the statement at all. It would have been thought that we were all rather mad to think it was possible for such delay to occur.
However, suppose that agreement were needed—I am not admitting that agreement was needed, but supposing it was. Let us see what the result would then be. The Church of England is certainly, I submit, in agreement. In justification for that remark, I quote the fact that 250 Anglican Bishops expressed unanimously the opinion that this Act was a good Act and ought to be brought into law. I was not in the House much yesterday, but I read in the Press this morning— and I say this with great respect to the right reverend Prelates—that they were not in complete agreement yesterday; and I believe that your Lordships respect them all the more for it. That they should express their own individual opinions in this House, I think is a matter for congratulation and for nothing else. As I say, we respect them all the more for it. Then all the more, perhaps, I can plead with justification that when we have 250
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right reverend Prelates saying the same thing—"I think Easter ought to be fixed"—that is a powerful argument in favour of bringing this Act into force. I would mention only incidentally (I have said it before) that the League of Nations took the trouble to inquire of 40 countries whether they were in favour of a fixed Easter. They all said, "Yes." I could quote many more figures, but I shall refrain.
I now pass to the Roman Catholic Church. Although I am not a Catholic, I agree that we ought to try to meet the views of the members of that Church, many of whom live in this country. What do we find? Until 1963, I know to my cost that it was rather difficult to find out what the Roman Catholic Church did think. But since 1963 it has not been so difficult. In 1963 a Vatican Council was held and, as I have said in this House before, a large number of people were voting in the Council. And if I may again translate the voting figures into the figures which the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor would have used had he been announcing the result of the voting, he would have said to your Lordships: "There have voted, Contents, 2,058; Not-Contents, 9", showing a majority in the Vatican Council of 2,049. My Lords, is that not enough?
Now may I remind the House (and I do so quite seriously) what the motion was that was passed by the Vatican Council. I think that this is important and we should know it. It said:
"The Sacred Council would not object if the Feast of Faster were assigned to a particular Sunday of the Gregorian calendar, provided that others whom it may concern, especially the brethren who are not in communion with the Holy See, are agreed on this matter."
That was the motion that was passed by such a vast majority.
I will not shrink from dealing with the proviso in that motion. I think we must all meet it. If it means that the agreement of every single other Church has to be obtained, then I admit straight away that we shall never get anywhere, because as I think the noble Lord, Lord Bowles, said on the last occasion, every Church is agreed, provided every other Church agrees. If we are going to wait until we get the agreement of the un-known number of Churches in the world

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—and I believe the number is unknown— we shall never get anywhere. But are we going to wait all that time?
I leave it at that, my Lords. But before I sit down I want to make a suggestion. If the Government are so reluctant to bring into force this Act of Parliament which Parliament has so decisively said it wants—and no body have said that they do not want it—if they are going to wait any longer, will they now lay before both Houses of Parliament an Order in Council to see whether both Houses will pass it, because both Houses must pass it before the Act comes into force. Would it not be a fair test if they would do that? If they agreed to that I would ask them not to put the Whips on because we want a real, independent vote showing the actual opinions of Members of both houses. Provided that the Whips are kept off, I would ask the Government to lay an Order now in order to see whether Parliament is of the same opinion as it was 42 years ago.
If the Government did that, all the arguments could be stated. As your Lordships know, there can be a debate on an Order in Council which requires the assent of both Houses of Parliament; and the great advantage would be that Parliament would decide this matter, I would hope, finally and for all. If Parliament said, "No", I would accept it and I would say no more, ever again, about Easter; but I would very much hope that Parliament might be of the same opinion as it was in 1928. Is there any other course consistent with true democracy than the one which I have suggested?
5.13 p.m.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: My Lords, I should like, if I may, to say a few words in support of the Question which has been asked by the noble Lord, Lord Merthyr. I am particularly glad to do this, for I believe that the subject is not an academic one but has much more practical importance to all of us than may appear on the surface. I cannot pretend to be an authority on the subject with which this Question deals, and I say this with the more deference in the presence of two distinguished members of the Bishops' Bench. How-ever, I have made such study as I can.
Since I have been in your Lordships' House there have been, as the noble
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Lord, Lord Merthyr, has already said, Motions and Questions on a number of occasions appealing on grounds of general national convenience for the establishment of a fixed Easter on the lines of the Act of 1928. But to the best of my recollection we have always had the same reply, to which the noble Lord, Lord Merthyr, has already referred. That reply is that communications have been addressed to all the heads of the Western Christian Churches in order to get uniformity, and that a number of these have not yet replied.
No doubt if uniformity could be obtained it would be most desirable. But, my Lords, is it really such a vital necessity? This great Feast of Easter— the greatest of all the Feasts in the Christian calendar—is held to record and celebrate the fact of Christ's Resurrection: not the date of it, otherwise the date would not vary from year to year Moreover, the whole idea of a uniform date for the celebration of Easter throughout Christendom—though it was hallowed, I believe I am right in saying, by a decision of the Council of Nicea in the year 325—was followed by further disputations, and it seems that for a very long time it was honoured in the breach rather than in the observance. For instance, I have found, from an exploration in that mine of information, the Encyclopædia Britannica, which I hope may be regarded as authoritative, that St. Augustine—who I am sure we may regard as dependable—said definitely that in his day, in the year 387, the Churches in Gaul kept Easter on March 21; the Churches in Italy kept Easter on April 18, and the Churches of Egypt kept it on April 25.
I will not go further into the discussions and disputations of those early days; nor will I refer to the complicated question of the Golden Number, for not only do I find it extremely difficult to under-stand but I believe it is entirely irrelevant to our present situation. Indeed, I apologise for going into such very ancient history at all. But I wanted to make it clear—and I hope I have done so— that though, since what I believe has been the last decision on this subject, at the time of the correction of the Gregorian Calendar in 1588, Easter has been celebrated over the whole area of Western Christendom on the dates laid down at

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that time, there is nothing which is fundamental to the Christian faith that such a thing should be so. In fact, I believe it has become steadily clearer that, though such a decision may have been justified 400 years ago, a system which results in Easter being celebrated in this country at widely differing dates, as between one year and another, is no longer suitable to the times in which we live.
In this country, Easter is not only a Feast of the Church, it is a public holiday; and in view of the idiosyncracies of our climate, all too often (as has happened in this very year) that holiday has had to be held far too early to be of any pleasure to those working people for whom it is intended. I do not know what the spring climate of Nicea was, but ours, as we all know, is extremely uncertain, and this is something that we ought to take into account. If a date were fixed—say the third Sunday in April—and if it were to be the same every year, everybody would be happier; it would be far easier for people to make their arrangements, and I cannot see that the basic principles of the Christian faith would suffer in any way.
Therefore, my Lords, if the reply we are to receive this evening, as in the past, is to be that answers have not yet been received from all the countries who have been consulted, my reply is, "Let us snap our fingers at those other countries and do what is most convenient to us". We have waited 42 years; we cannot wait for ever. If what we do is reasonable we may fairly expect that those other countries will in due course come round to our view. I submit, with great deference, that that is the sensible view. Therefore I hope that both the Government and the ecclesiastical authorities will on this particular occasion, in contrast to previous occasions, give a favourable reply to our request, and will make it clear that they are ready to bring a fixed date for Easter into operation, in accordance with what is already the existing law of the land, as soon as arrangements can be completed.
5.19 p.m.
THE LORD BISHOP OF SOUTHWARK: My Lords, I rise to support the noble Lord, Lord Merthyr, and the noble Marquess in what they have said. I hope very much that the noble Lord will
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extract from the Government their reason for not implementing the Act of 1928. All I can do is to state what I believe is the reason why there have been difficulties on the ecclesiastical side, though I hope that these difficulties will no longer stand in the way, because I believe that most of them are quite imaginary and irrelevant.
Let me say first that the present way of dating Easter comes, as the noble Marquess has reminded us, from the Council of Nicea, in A.D. 325, and the main intention of that Council was a common date acceptable to all Churches. It was not to be dependent on the Jewish calculation of the Passover, and was accordingly fixed as the first Sunday after the first full moon following the Vernal Equinox. But, as we have been reminded, there was a certain amount of disparity and differences of practice, and indeed following the famous Synod of Whitby in 664, when Northumbria adopted the Nicean principle and relinquished that held by the Celtic Church, we then had a difference of practice between Northumbria and the Celtic Church in this country.
In the course of time—this is where the real difficulty begins to come out— the Julian Calendar ruling at the date of the Council of Nicea was seen to be inaccurate, and in 1582 Pope Gregory introduced the Gregorian Calendar, which was adopted in England and Scotland only in 1752. The Western Churches have all based their Easter on this calendar, but most of the Eastern Churches base it still on the Julian. There can therefore be as much as five weks difference between the Western and the Eastern calendars, although occasionally they coincide. This year the Eastern Easter was exactly one month after the Western Easter, but, as we have already heard this afternoon, there is a great desire among most Christians to have a common date for Easter.
Perhaps I ought to say to the noble Lord, Lord Merthyr, that when he refers to the Second Vatican Council I am not quite sure that his deduction is correct. As he said, there was this notable vote, with the contents 2,058 and the not-contents only nine. But it was, I think, for a common date for Easter, rather than a fixed date. It may be that that implied a fixed date; but, on the other hand, one

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might say that what they were chiefly wanting was to bring East and West together with a common date. Fair enough; that is stage one, but if you get them to agree to stage one it will not be very long before stage two arises. There is no doubt that the Church of England want both stage one and stage two, because the Church Assembly, in 1966, in response to the question from the World Council of Churches whether the Church of England considered it desirable to have a common date for Easter throughout Christendom, debated a memorandum prepared by the standing committee, which recommended fixing Easter on the Sunday following the second Saturday in April. The Assembly passed this resolution:
"That this Assembly would welcome the introduction of a fixed date for Easter, prefer-ably on the Sunday following the second Saturday in April."
I would, however, hasten to assure the noble Marquess that that was really a suggested date, and if Parliament preferred another date I am sure that the Church would be as ready to accept it.
I am not sure whether the noble Lord, Lord Merthyr, knows that it is only recently that the World Council of Churches Faith and Order Commission, at their third meeting near Geneva last month, found two possibilities for fixing Easter: either the third Sunday following the vernal full moon or the Sunday following the second Saturday in April, which is again what the Church of England suggested through the General Assembly. Therefore we have the World Council of Churches and the Church of England and the Roman Catholic Church wanting certainly a common date, and, I should have thought, a fixed date as well.
What are the difficulties? As I under-stand it, they are these: that Rome, and I suppose perhaps the Anglican Church, does not like making decisions without consulting the great Eastern Orthodox Churches, which number among others the Churches of Greece and Russia. Customs there can be altered only by a Panorthodox conference; that is to say, there must be representatives from the many Orthodox Churches from the East under the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople. But at once you are landed into political difficulties, because I do not think there has been such a
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Panorthodox conference since the Revolution and it is very unlikely that there will be one in the foreseeable future, because of the political difficulties vis-à-vis Russia and Greece and Russia and some of the other Orthodox Churches. I say frankly that if we are going to wait for agreement and consultation between the Roman Church and ourselves and all the other Churches, on the one hand, and the Panorthodox Churches, on the other, we shall wait till Kingdom come, and I think it is just unrealistic. The only thing we can do is to go ahead.
My Lords, does it really matter? We have two Easters as it is. The worst that could happen is that just a. section of Christendom would still have a date for Easter which the great majority of Christians would not have. But that would be far better than what exists at the present time, where the great majority of Christians, those other than the Orthodox, are just going from one date to another date, to another date. At least we, the non-Orthodox—and I am using non-Orthodox in the strictest technical sense of those who do not belong to the Eastern Orthodox Church—would all have the one date. And does the fact that the Orthodox are going to have Easter on another date really affect us? Is it really going to upset the Orthodox?
I am rather in favour of two Easters. I was in the Middle East three or four years ago, representing the Church of England, and I had all sorts of most charming invitations from Archbishops, from the Roman Church and from other Churches in the Middle East. I went to one party after another for the best part of a week and felt rather sad, when the Thursday or Friday had come, that those parties were at an end; only to find that the Orthodox were starting their Easter the next Sunday and so a whole new series of invitations came. I went from one Patriarch to another and flew to Constantinople for a marvellous Easter banquet with the Ecumenical Patriarch. As far as I know, nobody was offended, nor did it do anything to create difficulties between the Churches.
Let us come home. Many Anglican churches in this country are used now by other denominations, to help them in their difficulties. There are many people who come into England from Cyprus

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and other parts of the Eastern Orthodox world, and we are glad to lend them our churches. I think there are three or four churches in my own diocese which are used for this purpose. Only last week the Eastern Orthodox were keeping the Holy Week, and only last Sunday their Easter Day, and I was privileged to receive a gracious invitation from one, who made use of one of my churches near Richmond, to be present at one of their churches. I cannot begin to see that this creates difficulties for the Church of England Orthodox Church.
So I hope very much that the Government will go ahead. I am sure that the Government will have the support of a great majority of Christians in all denominations. And if the Government are still hesitant about accepting the suggestion that has been put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Merthyr, may I suggest that in any case we have a trial period of ten years and have a look at the matter again; just as with double summer time we are having this trial period and presumably there will be a time when we shall look at it again if we feel that there are a sufficient number of people in this country who are really put out by double summer time. If, after ten years, it is found that this fixed date for Easter does put real hardship on Christians or other groups, which I believe to be most improbable if not impossible, then I am sure that the Government would be sufficiently gracious to have a look at it again. I should prefer the suggestion of the noble Lord, Lord Merthyr, to be accepted as it is, but I put forward this slight amendment to it, a trial period of ten years, merely to help the Government to make some move. That move is badly wanted, not least by the churches, because it will help us considerably if we can work to a fixed calendar.
5.31 p.m.
LORD HAWKE: My Lords, as the right reverend Prelate has just said, I cannot really see the necessity for agreement with the Eastern Church. Last year I had one Easter in Cyprus and another in Greece and there was one week's difference, but apparently Easters can get as far apart as five weeks, which I did not know. What does it matter if we con-
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tinue to have this difference through an act on our part? Eventually they may come to agree with our date. From the secular point of view, the great thing really is that the Eastern Orthodox people and the people of the Western Churches are separate. One does not get influxes of tourists from one area to the other, so from the secular holiday point of view, providing that the Roman Catholics and ourselves of the Protestant Churches agree on a date, it does not matter in the least if the Orthodox Churches find it takes them a long time to make up their own minds. If Her Majesty's Government can get some agreement between the Roman Catholics and the Anglicans I think they ought to go ahead, because I feel certain that the Free Churches will follow the date chosen.
5.33 p.m.
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, there have been such informed, confident and authoritative speeches made that I feel a little diffident in intervening in this discussion at all. There is one thing on which I think we should all agree, and that is that the noble Lord, Lord Merthyr, has absolutely no need to apologise for raising this matter again. I have never heard any matter raised in a more pleasing and agreeable fashion than has been the case this afternoon and on earlier occasions. When the noble Lord, Lord Merthyr, raised the matter in February, 1967, which was a year in which Easter Day fell on March 26, it was the noble Lord, Lord Airedale, who predicted that people would be spending Easter in "blizzard conditions". I am not sure whether that prediction was in fact fulfilled, but this year, with Easter Day on March 30, in Southern England at any rate we did have a blizzard. It may well be that this was the reason why the noble Lord raised the matter again to-day. I am bound to add that a more comprehensive analysis of the weather situation around this period shows that if we had a later Easter it would be a warmer, but a wetter, Easter. I am not sure whether the noble Lord, Lord Merthyr, and the noble Marquess, Lord Salisbury, prefer to be at the coastal resorts on a wet day or a cold day, but for myself I do not think the argument is absolutely conclusive that a later Easter would be better from the point of view of recreation.
LORD HAWKE: My Lords, the noble Lord is speaking with enormous confidence. Has the noble Lord taken the statistics from the Meteorological Office on this matter, or is this his own opinion?
LORD BESWICK: No, my Lords, I am taking the analysis which was supplied to me by the Department. I am not venturing to interpose my own personal view against the superior personal view of the noble Lord, Lord Hawke; I am merely giving him the view that was put to me, and saying that in my view—and I now come to my view—it is not necessarily conclusive that a later Easter would be more attractive, or more agreeable to all of us. Indeed, thinking of the weariness that was expressed by certain noble Lords when the House rose at Easter on the last occasion, I think it is not altogether certain—now that we have a fixed Spring Holiday—that if we were to extend the period from Christmas to a later Easter it would be in the best interests of all concerned.
Several noble Lords have referred to the Council of Nicea, and indeed the right reverend Prelate gave us the terms of the formula which they fixed. In fact it went a little further, and perhaps I can set out the three points which the Council at that time agreed should be satisfied: first, that Easter should fall on a Sunday; secondly, if possible, that Sunday should be the same Sunday thoughout Christendom; thirdly, that the Sunday should be the first Sunday—as the right reverend Prelate said—after the full moon following the Vernal Equinox. As has been said, some 1,600 years later this is still the basis of the calculation. The divergence between the date on which Easter is celebrated in the Eastern Orthodox and the Western Churches arises—as the noble Marquess said—from the alteration of the secular calendar, dating, in this country, from 1752, when we changed from the Julian to the Gregorian calendar.
It was in February, 1928, shortly be-fore the Second Reading of the Stabilisation of Easter Bill, that the then Arch-bishop of Canterbury set out the view of the Church of England in a letter to the Home Secretary. The noble Lord, Lord Merthyr, was very interested as to what correspondence there has been from any church body to the Home Secretary. At that date the then Archbishop of Canter-bury said:
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"So far as I understand there is at present no objection whatsoever on the part of the ecclesiastical bodies to the Fixed Easter being adopted provided the adoption be general and not confined either to one country or to one part of the Christian Church."
It is all very well to say that every-body wants a common date, but there has always been this proviso. The right reverend Prelate said that if there could be agreement as between the Roman Church and the Anglican Church, that is as far as one needed to go for agreement, but the 1963 Vatican Council resolution to which he referred said— and I quote the words which the right reverend Prelate used:
"The Sacred Council would not object if the Feast of Easter were assigned to a particular Sunday of the Gregorian calendar"—
with again the proviso—
"provided that others whom it may concern, especially the brethren who are not in communion with the Holy See, are agreed on this matter."
So that again, although they agree to have a fixed date, they only agree to this fixed date provided that it is in common with the other Churchss.
THE LORD BISHOP OF SOUTHWARK: My Lords, would not the noble Lord agree that for the reasons I gave it is impossible to have this agreement, because there is no organisation representing the Orthodox Church which is allowed to meet and which could possibly express an opinion?
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, possibly I could just finish what I am saying, and I hope to deal with that point. It may be of historical interest, if the hour is not too late, if I remind your Lord-ships of what was said in 1928, in that debate of which the noble Lord, Lord Merthyr, reminded us. On the occasion of the Second Reading of the Bill on February 17, Captain Bourne said:
"We do not want to have a civil and ecclesiastical Easter in this country and we do not want to have Easter in this country on a different day from the Easter in France, because that would cause intolerable inconvenience and great difficulty to certain people in regard to their religious beliefs."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Commons, 17/2/1928, col. 1099.]
That was his view, and it is a view to which many people would subscribe. So I do not really believe the noble Marquess is correct when he said, "Let us get on with it in this country". Those who have said in the past that we ought

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to do something about it have always had regard to the position in certain other countries, if not universally through-out the world.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: My Lords, the noble Lord may say that I am not correct, but that is what I think. What these people said 40 years ago has only led to a delay of 40 years, and it looks to me as if there will be a further delay of 40 years unless we take a line of our own.
LORD BESWICK: My Lords, I accept what the noble Marquess has said, but the point is surely that there were people at that time who thought, and there are people to-day who think, that it would certainly be a mistake if we had an Easter in this country which was different from Easter in France, for example. So that a measure of agreement is certainly required.
I have another quotation from the same debate on the same day, from a speech by a Mr. S. Allen, who said (col. 1115):
"If we accept the Bill in this House it will be necessary to make it quite clear in some way or another that there is no desire or attempt on the part of Parliament and the State to dictate to the Church as to Church Festivals ".
He went on to say that it would be absurd to have a change of this kind made here if the rest of the world did not follow; and other speakers went on on the same theme. So I think it is fair to claim that when the Act was passed it was the general opinion that it would not be right to impose a fixed Easter on the religious authorities unless there was wider agreement.
The noble Lord, Lord Merthyr, raised an interesting point about the provisos that were attached to that Act. The then Home Secretary, Sir William Joynson-Hicks (as he then was) had this to say on that point:
"The honourable and learned Member for South-East Leeds seemed to feel that, if the House were to pass this Bill they would put it in the power of some irresponsible Secretary of State—I supose he had in contemplation a change of Government, because I am sure he would not include myself in that category—to rush through an Order-in-Council without any communication with the ecclesiastical authorities, and get Easter established, so creating a very serious divergence of opinion in the secular and in the ecclesiastical world. Nothing could be further from my thoughts, and I am quite prepared to ask my honourable friends—
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in fact, I have asked them, and I am authorised by them to say that they will be perfectly willing, as I should, to insert a Clause in the Bill providing that the Order-in-Council shall not be made until after a Resolution has been passed by this House. That, I think, would give everyone complete assurance. Then the Government will be given the formal right to go to the ecclesiastical authorities, backed up by the decision of Parliament." [col. 1143.]
That is really the basis of the agreement of 1928—although I hasten to say to the noble Marquess that I am with him all the way if he says that we should not accept everything that was agreed in 1928—and that has been the policy of all Governments since that time. The Christian Churches were asked through their appropriate organisations to make their views known. As I understand it, the Churches feel that they must speak with one voice; but so far they have not been able to do so. The main difficulty, as the right reverend Prelate said, flows from the fact that the Eastern Orthodox Church con-ducts its affairs according to a different secular calendar from that adopted in the West. I have been asked: why can-not the Western Churches give their agreement and let the Eastern Orthodox Easter be fixed by reference to the views of that Church. But I am advised—and I quoted from the authority of the 1963 Resolution—that the Roman Catholic Church feels unable to agree to a fixed Easter which is not acceptable to their Eastern brethren.
The noble Lord, Lord Merthyr, has argued in the past—and he made the same point again to-day—that, in taking the necessary statutory action to fix a date for Easter, all the Government have to do is to have regard to any opinion officially expressed by any Church or other Christian body. But what he has not told us is how the Government are to measure one opinion against another. And I suggest that it is not reasonable to suppose that, at a time when the differences represented by national frontiers are continuing to diminish, each country should deal with this in isolation. He and I are at one about certain organisations' advocating a removal of sovereignty in so many fields, and I am sure that he thinks it would be a mistake for us to act unilaterally on this matter.
Then we had the point made that it would be sufficient if secular Governments agreed among themselves about the

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date of a fixed Easter. But this is simply shutting one's eyes to the fact that Easter is a Christian Festival, and one which forms the very bedrock of the Christian religion. I do not believe for one moment that secular Governments of countries where Christian beliefs pre-dominate would wish to run counter to their national Church authorities. If I may say so, I think that that is over-simplifying a complicated matter, and one in which at least ten Governments in 40 years have felt unable to proceed.
On the other hand—and I was asked: what correspondence has there been, and is this matter quite dead?—we have reason to believe that this matter is not being ignored by Church organisations. They are now seeking an agreed answer among themselves. There was the meeting in Geneva last month, convened by the Faith and Order Secretariat of the World Council of Churches, between representatives of the Roman Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox Church and the World Council of Churches on this matter. The results of those deliberations, I am told, are to be made known at the meeting of the Faith and Order Working Committee next August. It is reported in the Press (and I understand that it has been confirmed by the Church authorities here), that the World Council of Churches hopes to secure sufficient support for one of the suggestions to make a definite proposal which would carry the agreement of both Eastern and Western Churches.
I recognise that the noble Lord, Lord Merthyr, has been very patient in this matter, and I think I have recognised that the patience of the noble Marquess is tending to wear a little thin. But as we have waited for 40 years, I think it would be reasonable to see what emerges from that meeting in August.
LORD MERTHYR: My Lords, before the noble Lord sits down, can he deal with my suggestion that an Order might be laid before the House to test the opinion of the House? I mentioned it to him this morning, so I happen to know that he has a reply to it, and I should be sorry to deprive him of the opportunity of giving a reply.
LORD BESWICK: Yes, my Lords. I thought my quotation from the late Sir William Joynson-Hicks was in measure
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a reply to the noble Lord. But my answer to that question is that it is not proposed to take that action—certainly not before August.

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