HL Deb 10 June 1971 vol 320 cc395-8

3.28 p.m.

LORD GARDINER

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 when the Minister of Trade and Industry is likely to introduce legislation—

  1. (a) to improve the law on the sale of goods and in particular on exemption clauses therein;
  2. (b) to implement the Report in 1957 of the Blagden Committee on Bankruptcy Law and Deeds of Arrangement Law Amendment;
  3. (c) to modernise the law of hall-marking in accordance with the re- 396 commendations of the Select Committee of 1856, the Select Committee of 1879 and the Departmental Committee 1959;
  4. (d) to improve the law of Insurance in the ways adumbrated in the 5th Report of the Law Reform Committee in 1957;
  5. (e) to improve Company Law.]

THE MINISTER WITHOUT PORTFOLIO (LORD DRUMALBYN)

My Lords, without giving a definite undertaking, Her Majesty's Government hope to propose legislation to amend the Sale of Goods Act next Session. They see no prospect at present of legislation on the Blagden Report on Bankruptcy. Good progress has been made in the current review of the law of hallmarking. but it is not possible to predict when legislation will be introduced. Account will be taken of the Fifth Report of the Law Reform Committee in the review now being made of insurance legislation. As I informed the noble and learned Lord on April 20, Her Majesty's Government hope to propose companies legislation in the present Parliament.

LORD GARDINER

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for that Answer. May I ask him, first, which Minister in this Department is now responsible for law reform? Secondly, does he agree that in successive Governments the Board of Trade's name has been a byword for not reforming those branches of the law for which it assumes responsibility? Thirdly, am I right in thinking that it has more lawyers than the Lord Chancellor's Office and the Law Commission combined; and if so, what on earth do they do?

LORD DRUMALBYN

My Lords, on the first point, the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry is obviously the person responsible for policy in these matters. On the second point, the Board of Trade has now been absorbed into the Department of Trade and Industry, which is a very active Department. On the third point, concerning the legal establishment of the Department of Trade and Industry, I should need notice before I could answer it.

LORD GARDINER

My Lords, does the noble Lord really defend a Department which was told more than a hundred years ago by a Select Committee that our hallmarking law needed reform; was told the same thing by a second Select Committee, and was then told it a third time by a Departmental Committee; and still, after a hundred years, has not got the legislation ready?

LORD DRUMALBYN

My Lords, regarding hallmarking, the fact of the matter is that it is not very easy to reach any sort of agreed solution to the problem. The mere fact that that has been the case for a hundred years does not alter the fact.

LORD GARDINER

My Lords, is it not the fact that the Blagden Committee Report on reform of our law of bankruptcy set out 50 recommendations of much-needed reform, which have been accepted by successive Governments, and that for 14 years the Board of Trade has said that the legislation will be introduced so soon as Parliamentary time permits? May I ask whether the Bill is now ready and, if not, how do the Department expect to get Parliamentary time if, after 14 years, its lawyers have not yet got round to drafting the Bill?

LORD DRUMALBYN

My Lords, successive Government have been faced by many acute problems. Bankruptcy law does not present an acute problem, and for that reason successive Governments have not found time to put forward legislation on the recommendations made in 1957.

LORD GARDINER

My Lords, will the noble Lord ask his right honourable friend the Prime Minister whether he does not think that this is becoming something in the nature of a public scandal, and will he consider transferring this branch of the law, for which this Ministry is responsible, to the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor, whose past and present record looks like getting the job done?

LORD DRUMALBYN

My Lords, I take note of what the noble and learned Lord says, but the fact is that there is only a limited amount of Parliamentary time, and this is a question of priorities.

LORD ST. HELENS

My Lords, may I ask my noble friend the Leader of the House whether it is in accordance with the practice of your Lordships' House to ask an omnibus Question of this nature?

THE LORD PRIVY SEAL (EARL JELLICOE)

My Lords, I think that my noble friend has bowled me a fairly fast ball. Thinking aloud on my feet, as it were, I would say that there is absolutely nothing in our procedures which runs counter to an omnibus Question. I think, if I may say so with all deference to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Gardiner, whose flow of supplementaries has enlightened us this afternoon, that there is a danger in omnibus Questions: they can give rise to omnibus supplementaries.

LORD CONESFORD

My Lords, can my noble friend inform the House what was done in the matter of hallmarking either by the Lord Chancellor's Department or by the Board of Trade during the period of office of the Labour Government?

LORD DRUMALBYN

My Lords, I understand that in 1969 a start was made to look at this question again.