Lords Sitting of 10 December 1974

Preamble
The House met at half past two of the clock: The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.
Prayers—Read by the Lord Bishop of Bristol.
The Lord Trevethin and Oaksey—Sat first in Parliament after the death of his father.
The Duke of Rutland—Took the Oath.
The Earl Bathurst—Took the Oath.

RATES: RELIEF FROM CHARGES
The Earl of DUNDONALD: 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:

(a) Whether it was the intention of the Chancellor of the Exchequer when making his Statement on 22nd July 1974 in connection with domestic rate relief (Commons Hansard, col. 1051) that the General Rate should be combined with the water rate before the 60 per cent. relief over the excess 20 per cent. is allowed.

(b) When domestic ratepayers who have no public sewerage disposal services will be relieved of the sewerage charge levied by districts this year on behalf of the new water authorities.

The PARLIAMENTARY UNDERSECRETARY of STATE, DEPARTMENT of the ENVIRONMENT (BARONESS BIRK): My Lords, the answer to the first part of the noble Lord's Question is, Yes. The answer to the second part is that domestic ratepayers whose properties are not connected to a public sewer will receive relief of 50 per cent. of the general service charge from 1st April next.
The Earl of DUNDONALD: My Lords, while thanking the noble Baroness for her Answer, may I ask her two further
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questions? In respect of the first part of my Question, would she not agree that when the Chancellor of the Exchequer made his Statement earlier this year he did not make that matter clear? It has come as a disappointment to ratepayers to find the water rate being amalgamated with the General Rate before obtaining relief. In respect of the second part of my Question, I was aware of the position as stated by the noble Baroness, but I should like to put it to her—
SEVERAL NOBLE LORDS: Question !
The Earl of DUNDONALD: My Lords, may I ask the noble Baroness whether she would agree that the 50 per cent. relief—while acceptable and beneficial—does not really achieve the object? Would she agree that the ratepayer who is not connected to main sewerage should not pay the sewerage charge at all?
Baroness BIRK: On the first supplementary question, my Lords, the position is that the amalgamation with the General Rate was generally known. This action to provide relief was considered extremely helpful. On the second question, I cannot possibly agree with the noble Earl's suggestion that this is unfair because the 50 per cent. pays for the protection of rivers and surface water drainings from which all with septic tanks derive some benefit. I would point out that this is the first time that there has been any relief for people with septic tanks given by any Government.
Lord MAYBRAY-KING: My Lords, as one who campaigned for some thirty years against the iniquities of the rates system, may I ask whether the noble Baroness will give serious consideration to the position of the County Councils Association and to the possibility of a local income tax as a very equitable way of carrying some of the burden of local finance?
Baroness BIRK: My Lords, as my noble friend is aware, the Layfield Committee is considering this topic currently. Therefore I can say nothing in that direction until the Committee reports.
Lord STRATHCLYDE: My Lords, may I ask the noble Baroness whether she can say if her first reply applies to Scotland as it does to other parts of the United Kingdom?
Baroness BIRK: I think it is doubtful, my Lords, because practically nothing applies to Scotland that applies to anything else! However, may I write to the noble Lord.
Baroness EMMET of AMBERLEY: My Lords, may I ask the noble Baroness to note that while the main drainage for the whole of our village goes through our land—development permission has been given for that purpose—both my house and three of the farm cottages are not on the main drainage system because they are slightly above the level, and yet we have to pay the full rate?
Baroness BIRK: The noble Baroness has my sympathy, my Lords.
Lord CLIFFORD of CHUDLEIGH: My Lords, is it not a fact that at this moment there is a case in progress in which the legality of the Statutory Instrument which puts into operation the sewerage charge is being challenged?
Baroness BIRK: My Lords, I cannot comment on anything that is in judicial process at the moment.
Lord ABERDARE: My Lords, while declaring the same interest in septic tanks as the noble Baroness, may I ask her whether our septic tanks will be cleaned free of charge now that we pay 50 per cent. of the charges?
Baroness BIRK: My Lords, I think I will have to let the noble Lord know about that position. I do not believe it comes under this particular Question.
Baroness WOOTTON of ABINGER: My Lords, may I ask the noble Baroness whether she will make it perfectly clear that if a resident has a septic tank, the main drainage system is introduced into the neighbourhood for the first time and the owner of the septic tank declines to join up with the sewerage system at a very heavy cost, the resident will be relieved of part of the rate?
Baroness BIRK: My Lords, I think that this is something which the resident would have to discuss with the relevant local authority or water authority.

ASHANTI REGALIA
2.40 p.m.
Lord MONTAGU of BEAULIEU: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether, with a view to fostering Commonwealth relations, they will use their good offices to facilitate the early return of the Ashanti regalia to the Ghana nation.
The PARLIAMENTARY UNDERSECRETARY of STATE, FOREIGN and COMMONWEALTH OFFICE (LORD GORONWY-ROBERTS): My Lords, the regalia is not at the disposal of Her Majesty's Government. The majority of it forms part of the collections of the British Museum and the Wallace Collection. Neither body may legally dispose of its exhibits.
Lord MONTAGU of BEAULIEU: My Lords, are the Government aware that I was aware that these relics are in fact in the British Museum and the Wallace Collection, and that that is why I asked them to use their good offices to facilitate their return? In view of the fact that these relics are, and were originally, war booty captured by the British Army, are Her Majesty's Government aware of the very deep feelings of the Ashanti people about the return of these sacrosanct objects, which are supposed to contain the soul of the Ashanti people? Is it also a fact that a special Act of Parliament may be needed to release these objects from the British Museum; and, if so, will Her Majesty's Government facilitate the passage of such a Bill?
Lord GORONWY-ROBERTS: My Lords, I certainly could not give an indication that we would seek the passage of such legislation—nor, indeed, could I advise that this should be so—because of the very far-ranging complications that might ensue from dealing with a case of this kind, for thereupon a great variety of other cases would immediately arise for consideration. On the question whether the Ghanaian Government have approached us, the position is that the Kumasi Traditional Council of Chiefs

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have petitioned Her Majesty's Government on this matter. We have replied in the terms of my reply to the noble Lord's Question, and so far they have not commented on that reply.
Baroness LEE of ASHERIDGE: My Lords, may I ask my noble friend to tread very warily when it comes to returning booty which we have collected in this country, because the process might turn into rather a strip-tease?
Lord GORONWY-ROBERTS: My Lords, perhaps the term "booty" is not quite appropriate, especially in this case. This is part of an indemnity which was agreed by the former King of Ashanti, the proceeds of which were devoted to compensation for dependants of British troops killed in the rather horrific conditions in that part of the world at that time. I sympathise very much with the motives behind the Question—namely, that we should do everything possible tot promote improved Commonwealth relations—but I do not think this is quite the best way of going about it.
Lord GISBOROUGH: My Lords, would it not be possible to keep the booty and return the souls?

VEHICLES: PRE-DELIVERY CERTIFICATION
Viscount HANWORTH: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether, in view of the most unsatisfactory state in which new cars are usually delivered to the buyer and of safety and other factors involved, they will bring in legislation making it compulsory for dealers or manufacturers to provide the buyer with a certified inspection document showing that all functional parts of the vehicle have been examined and, where appropriate, rectified before the vehicle is handed over.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, the civil law gives consumer protection rights to purchasers of new cars, in particular through the Sale of Goods Act 1893 and the Supply of Goods (Implied Terms) Act 1973. The Road Traffic Acts make
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the sale of unroadworthy cars illegal and also empower my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for the Environment to make regulations requiring new vehicle models to be submitted for official type approval. Under such regulations it would be possible to oblige manufacturers to certify that the new vehicles they supply conform to the model for which type approval has been given.
Viscount HANWORTH: My Lords, while thanking the noble Lord for that reply, it does not really answer my Question. Does he not realise that new vehicles are frequently supplied in a state which is illegal, whereas they are supposed to have been checked in a predelivery inspection? Further, does he realise that according to recent Which? reports there have been 20 defects or more in the average car on delivery which should have been attended to by the distributor before-hand, and that whereas perhaps six or eight of these concern only paintwork they also include far more serious matters which involve safety, so that the car as delivered is very often unsafe and illegal to put on the road—for example, to take a simple case, tyre pressures—and that very often a great deal of damage is done——
The LORD PRIVY SEAL (LORD SHEPHERD): My Lords, I wonder whether my noble friend would appreciate that he is now moving towards making a statement although his remarks began as a question?
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I am well aware of all that. I have read the Which? report and the article published by the AA in their magazine, which give details of these matters. A buyer has rights to take action against the supplier of a vehicle if that vehicle is not in a fit state, and these rights are publicised so that buyers can take advantage of the law.
Lord BLYTON: My Lords, does the Minister not consider that the indictments preferred by the questioner amount to a condemnation of private enterprise?
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I think it is more a condemnation of the predelivery inspection system.
Viscount HANWORTH: My Lords, may I further ask the noble Lord why,

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we having our MOT test, he is against introducing legislation in this very important area?
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, the Government are not against introducing legislation. I have already said that regulations will be introduced so that the Government can ensure that the safety and environmental factors involved in new cars will be checked and certificates produced. The Government's interest is limited to those areas, and private buyers already have rights under the existing law to take action if a car is not in a satisfactory state.
Lord PLATT: My Lords, will Her Majesty's Government please explain to me why, if cars are being sent out in conditions which the noble Viscount tells us are illegal, any change in the law is necessary?
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I think I have said several times that a change in the law is not necessary; that private buyers have rights under the existing law.
Lord DAVIES of LEEK: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that if we are to recapture the name for first-class engineering no laws will take the place of good workmanship and honesty of purpose on the job?
Baroness SUMMERSKILL: My Lords, as a private buyer before I had rights under the present law, I wrote to Lord Stokes and told him that the clutch on a new Triumph that I had bought from him was not functioning. He replied very cleverly, saying that it was not his clutch which was wrong, but my driving.

SCHOOL TRANSPORT REPORT
Lord ELTON: 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 decisions they have reached upon the recommendations of the Department of Education and Science Report on School Transport published in October 1973 and when those decisions will be implemented.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Education and Science has
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recently completed consultations about the recommendations in this Report. He will now proceed to consider those recommendations in the light of the views expressed to him by the bodies consulted. This consideration will be completed as soon as possible but in view of the complex issues involved it may be some time before he can make a statement.
Lord ELTON: My Lords, while wishing to thank the noble Lord for that reply, I should like to ask him whether he is aware that he said almost nothing, except that there would be no answer forthcoming for a good deal longer? Would he not agree that the present statutory walking distances of two miles for children under eight and three miles for older children exclude the vast majority from participating in free transport schemes; that these distances are unrealistic in view of present day traffic hazards, and that there is urgency in the present situation because the scheme that is recommended in this Report—
Several Noble Lords: Order, order!
Lord ELTON: My Lords, I am asking a Question. I am asking whether the noble Lord realises that the scheme recommended, by taking many private cars off the school run, will mean that everybody will save a good deal of petrol.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I am sorry that the noble Lord was not satisfied with my original reply. The Report was submitted to the Minister in October 1973 and it was published in December 1973—and not, as the noble Lord stated in his Question, in October. The Department wrote to local authority associations and others on 31st January 1974 and the most recent reply arrived only last month. In view of the complex issues involved, it is important that my right honourable friend should give the matter careful consideration. My right honourable friend is aware of the doubts raised on the current statutory walking distance. This is something that he will be taking into account in his consideration of the Report and of the consultations that he has had.
Lord ELTON: My Lords, may I ask the noble Lord to confirm that the question of fuel saving, so apposite at this moment, will be taken into consideration at the same time?
Lord MELCHETT: Yes, my Lords.
Lord LEATHERLAND: My Lords, will my noble friend try to persuade the Minister when he considers this matter not only to take note of the two miles and the three miles which are usually specified, but also of the dangerous nature of some of the roads that children must cross even within that mileage limit? Will he also try to persuade his right honourable friend when he makes his decision not to take up the brutal attitude that some Conservative Ministers took up when I led a deputation pleading for concessions from the Essex County Council some time ago?
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I will certainly draw my right honourable friend's attention to the first point. I do not think that there will be any need to draw his attention to the second.
Lord BELSTEAD: My Lords, could the noble Lord say what school transport costs per year, and whether the Department have quantified the costs involved in implementing the recommendations of the Report?
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I think that that is another question; but my right honourable friend will also consider that when considering the Report's recommendations.
Lord ROBBINS: My Lords, following the examination of the Question already made in this House this afternoon, would the noble Lord agree that the dates he has revealed might be taken to be a comment on the machinery of Government?
Lord MELCHETT: No, my Lords. I think that the Government have acted with commendable speed in these matters. The replies from the bodies consulted took some time to come in.
Lord SLATER: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that the regional question of transport for schoolchildren is not something new, and that it has been raised before successive Governments in the other place time and time again? Does it not seem strange that at this moment when this Question is asked the Government should ask for more time for further consideration on these issues? Docs my noble friend not agree that this
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is entirely wrong and that they ought to speed up the matter?
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, the last reply to requests for opinions on this Report arrived last month. One of the reasons why it has been under consideration for some time is that it is a complex and difficult matter. It would be wrong for my right honourable friend to rush out a Statement on the subject after having just received the Report's recommendations.
Lord SLATER: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that that answer is not satisfactory? He talks about it being a complex matter and says that it will take some time before the Government are able to arrive at a decision. Can it be so complex a matter? It has been raised in the other place on many occasions. Would not my noble friend agree that it ought to have been attended to before now and that because the issue is so serious a decision ought to be immediately forthcoming from the Government?
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, my right honourable friend is aware that this is a serious matter and one to which considerable thought has been given in many places. He will reach a decision about it as soon as he can.

STATUTE LAW (REPEALS) BILL [H.L.]
2.55 p.m.
The LORD CHANCELLOR (LORD ELWYN-JONES): My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be read a second time. The Bill proposes the repeal of 40 whole Acts and parts of 117 other Acts which are no longer of practical utility. There are 14 different categories of enactments proposed for repeal. Your Lordships will have noticed that this is the second Statute Law (Repeals) Bill to be introduced this year. This reflects a great deal on the hard work of the two Law Commissions in their continuing commitment to prune the Statute Book. I am sure that the House will be grateful to them for undertaking this valuable task.
I do not think that there are any particular points in the Bill which I ought to draw to your Lordships' attention, but if any noble Lord has any questions on the Bill I have conveniently

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available the Law Commissions' admirable notes upon it and I will try to answer them. There will be an opportunity to raise questions on any of the enactments proposed for repeal when the Bill comes before the House again on recommitment after being scrutinised by the Joint Committee.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
Lord JANNER: My Lords, may I add a few words to what has been said by my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor? Not only we in this House but the country as a whole should be grateful for the excellent work that has been done in respect of these matters. Those of us who are in practice in the law know very well how difficult it is to wade through a number of Acts which no longer have any significance. I remember that some years ago there was an Act in force which compelled every hackney carriage, which includes taxis, to carry a load of hay. That had not been repealed several years ago and I do not know whether it has yet been repealed. Perhaps my noble and learned friend will devote his attention to that aspect of a peculiar situation which may still exist. I believe that everybody in this House will approve what the Government have been doing in a very efficient way in accepting the recommendations that have been put forward.
The LORD CHANCELLOR: My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Janner for the tribute he has paid to the Law Commission and to the Law Commission of Scotland. Their hard work in this important task is of great assistance to Parliament and to the administration of justice. I will pass on this word of recognition to the members of the Law Commission. As to the esoteric matter that the noble Lord has raised, I will investigate it and communicate with him in due course.
On Question, Bill read 2a and committed to the Joint Committee on Consolidation Bills.

IMMIGRATION BILL [H.L.]
3.0 p.m.
Lord AVEBURY: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time. It was most encouraging to note the very favourable attitude that the House took over the Statute Law (Repeals) Bill that we have just dealt with; because the purpose of the simple Bill which I am presenting to the House this afternoon is, in effect, to repeal Section 1 of the Immigration Act 1968. If it is the general feeling of your Lordships that we should do away with as much antiquated legislation as possible, I hope that that attitude will prevail when your Lordships come to consider the arguments in favour of the Bill. I also hope that the Minister, in his reply, will not feel tempted to rest his arguments on any defects in drafting, which are entirely my own responsibility, bearing in mind that the purpose of the Bill, as I have already explained, is readily comprehensible and would, with suitable Amendments be able to achieve the objects which I have described.
Until the passing of the infamous and racist Commonwealth Immigrants Act 1968, citizens of the United Kingdom and Colonies were exempt from immigration control, no matter how their citizenship had been acquired. So long as they held United Kingdom citizenship, they were free to come and go as they wished or, in other words, the right of abode corresponded with the holding of United Kingdom citizenship. In the autumn of 1967 Kenya began to restrict the activities of non-citizens within her own borders, imposing a requirement that foreigners should have a permit to work or trade in the country, and it became clear that sooner or later all United Kingdom citizens who were living in Kenya would be deprived of any means of support for themselves and would therefore be compelled to seek entry into this country. That in turn generated a demand in Britain for additional controls to stop those people from coming here or at least to ensure that the numbers seeking to do so were held down to the minimum possible figure.
Seeing the way the wind was blowing, these United Kingdom citizens who were resident in Kenya came to Britain in fairly large numbers at the end of 1967 and in

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the early months of 1968, so as to get in before the door was slammed in their faces. The immediate effect of talk about restrictions was therefore temporarily to accelerate the flow of migrants into this country. From 1968 to 1970, the admission of United Kingdom citizens was limited to 1,500 heads of household a year, under a system, which was introduced in consequence of the 1968 Act, of special vouchers for this category of immigrant. The total allowed in during 1968, including dependants, was, for the Record, 6,043 and in 1969, 6,249.
As a result of these restrictive policies, the waiting list of applications had by the end of 1969 swelled to over 5,000 heads of household, the majority of whom were in serious difficulties in their own country, according to the information provided by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office to the Select Committee on Race Relations which examined control over immigration in 1969 and 1970. The majority of the people in question were under notice to leave their country of residence by a given date, or they were barred from obtaining employment or from trading, or they were school-leavers without the remotest possibility of obtaining a job, or they were people in difficult family circumstances, such as deserted wives with young children or elderly people with no means of support from younger relatives.
One of the consequences of forming such a large queue was that by the time the applicant finally received his entry certificate he was inevitably destitute and his children had fallen behind in their education because in the countries concerned the parents had to pay for their education. As a result, when the family finally arrived in the United Kingdom it was infinitely more difficult for it to adjust to a new way of life. Another result has been the growth of what is known as "shuttlecocking", in which a United Kingdom passport holder comes here in desperation without an entry certificate and then, after a period of detention of varying length either in a prison such as Canterbury or Pentonville or in a detention centre, he is sent back to his country of residence or to the last port from which he embarked.
During the last six years some 3,000 of our citizens have been forced by circumstances in their home countries in
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Africa and India to travel here in the hope of obtaining entry, only to be turned away after doing time either in Canterbury or Pentonville prisons or in the detention centre at Harmondsworth. Some have been stranded in third countries, such as Yugoslavia or Italy for varying periods of up to months on end, unable to communicate in foreign languages and barely kept alive by charitable agencies. For the purposes of this debate, I have found out how many of these United Kingdom citizens we know of at the moment: the figures which I propose to give to your Lordships are not exhaustive, but these arc United Kingdom citizens who are at present stranded and who arc known to the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants which has collected this information for me.
There are four such citizens in Frankfurt, three in Athens, one in Zurich and 20 in Harmondsworth. Of those 20, 15 came from India and five arrived from Tanzania the day before yesterday. The 15 from India include six who were originally from Uganda and who went to India temporarily in the hope of being able, ultimately, to enter the United Kingdom. There are two men, two women and two children. Your Lordships may well ask how it is that people who originally came from Uganda are still being shuttlecocked around the world so many months after we were supposed to have disposed of that problem. Perhaps the Minister could deal with this matter in his reply.
My Lords, apart from the immense damage which the 1968 Act did to individuals and whole families, it has had very serious repercussions on Britain's standing with other countries and, in particular, as your Lordships know, cases have been presented against us in the European Commission on Human Rights which were ruled admissible as long ago as January, 1971. Then, after an oral hearing of a complaint by 31 United Kingdom citizens who were originally refused leave to enter Britain, the Commission placed itself at the disposal of the parties with the hope of reaching an amicable settlement in accordance with the Convention.
However, so far as I am aware, during the three years which have elapsed since

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then, neither this Government nor their predecessors have made the slightest attempt to satisfy the complaints and, indeed, it is very hard to see how they could do so while the discriminatory legislation which gave rise to the hearing is still on the Statute Book. Meanwhile, the Commission has given its opinion that breaches of the Convention did occur and the matter was referred to the Council of Ministers, I believe, some time early in June.
I hope that that reference to the Council of Ministers will have assisted the Government to take a favourable attitude to the Bill now before your Lordships, even if they were not minded to accept it already on the basis of humanitarian considerations. However, if the Government do not intend to accept the Bill, I think that they owe the House an explanation of the arguments which they will present to the Council of Ministers, and also I suggest that they must tell your Lordships why it has taken six months since this reference by the Commission to the Council of Ministers for anything further to happen. I am told that this is an unusually long delay. What have the Government been doing to twist the arm of the Council of Ministers to get it to shelve this complaint, bearing in mind that it originated as long ago as 1970 and was ruled admissible in January, 1971?
People may well think that the European Commission is a poor safeguard of human rights when it takes so very long to reach a decision even on whether a contravention of the Convention itself has occurred. Mr. Alex. Lyon, Minister of State at the Home Office, wrote to me on 15th July, and said in his letter:
"I am anxious to deal effectively and speedily with the residual problem of United Kingdom passport holders from East Africa. The Government accept our commitment to allow them to settle in this country if they wish."
This Bill translates that admirable statement of principle into action, with a couple of further adjustments. It would of course be quite illogical to confine our attention to those United Kingdom passport holders who were living in East African countries, though in practice one recognises that Kenya and Tanzania represent the main problems. But I am sure Mr. Lyon would not wish to ignore the plight of United Kingdom citizens in other countries, including particularly
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Malawi and the people who went temporarily to India when life was made intolerable for them in East Africa. We also have a number of citizens in Malaysia and Singapore, and even though there is, so far as I know, very little demand for entry certificates from those countries—they were not even mentioned in the minutes of evidence of the Select Committee on Race Relations when it examined the control of immigration in 1970—the same rights should be extended to all citizens, irrespective of their need to exercise them.
We may draw an analogy here in respect of our commitment to the EEC, because in January 1973 it became possible for all nationals in the other member States to obtain the right of residence in Britain, though obviously only a tiny fraction of them would expect to take up that right. In theory, there arc nearly 400 million people living in the other eight member nations of the EEC who could migrate to Britain if they wished, but in the 15 months from January 1973 to April 1974 only 3,616 nationals of EEC countries were in fact accepted for settlement. I think these figures should be borne in mind if there are any opponents of this Bill who are disposed to argue against it on the grounds that it represents a great increase in the number entitled to enter without any restriction.
Your Lordships may also like to have regard to the 8 million patrials who were given the right of abode in the 1971 Act—a right which it is proposed to leave unaltered in this Bill. In this connection it is reasonable to suppose that, for example, an Australian whose father arrived in Australia from Dublin in 1921 is not very likely to want to settle back in Britain, any more than a Malaysian who worked for five years in the base at Changi is likely to want to do so. Yet the latter individual has a rather stronger claim to exercise the right of abode because of his connection with this country than the Irishman whose father emigrated to Australia in 1921.
This Bill also gives the right of abode to British protected persons who are resident in territories that were formerly protectorates but who did not acquire citizenship of the various independent countries those protectorates now form. According to the noble Baroness, Lady Tweedsmuir of Belhelvie, in an Answer she gave on 26th February, 1973, at

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column 520 of the OFFICIAL REPORT, the numbers are not large; and it is only right that we should take this opportunity of clearing up another of the minor anomalies left over from the days of Empire.
There may also be some cases of people who still hold dual citizenship of the United Kingdom and Colonies and of an independent Commonwealth country. It was alleged in evidence before the Select Committee on Race Relations in 1970 that about a million dual citizens were living in Malaysia, together with an unknown number in Singapore, plus a few thousand others in the West Indies and Cyprus. It is not very clear to me where this information came from, and I have been unable to verify it from inquiries made at the Malaysian High Commission. However, it seems that the purpose of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in giving the evidence they did before the Select Committee was to inflate all the figures so as to be able to justify the restrictions imposed in the 1968 Act. on the ground of numbers. Again, whatever the numbers may be, in practice there has never been any sign that these dual citizens, if they exist, would like to come here in droves, so there can be no more harm in restoring the privilege which was taken away from them in 1968 than there was in conferring similar new rights on the 400 million Europeans and the 8 million patrials.
It is a significant fact that numbers seem to be used as a justification for immigration policies only when they refer to non-whites. I had a very revealing correspondence with a lady in Bristol not so long ago. She first of all wrote to me and said that while she was no racist she was concerned, as a conservationist, with the effect of immigration on the population of this country, and hence on its environment. When I pointed out that migration had reduced our population and that the Registrar-General's projections included the assumption of a net outflow of 30.000 people a year continuing as far ahead as he could see, she wrote again, pointing out that most of the people arriving are black while most of those leaving are white. The true reason why United Kingdom citizens are being shut out is not because there are
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too many of them but because they are the wrong colour.
There is one group of people whose situation would be greatly improved by this Bill without affecting the rate of immigration at all. Those are the United Kingdom passport holders already living in this country, but subject to conditions. Largely, they came from Kenya or Tanzania, with some former residents of Uganda who left the country before the emergency to settle in India, mainly for the purpose of study. The practice of the Home Office has generally been to grant an extension of stay to these people, but seldom to revoke the conditions which were attached to their stay. As a result, most of these people are debarred from entering certain jobs, including in particular employment with London Transport and the Post Office. I should have thought that both could do with the additional labour they would provide. They cannot bring their dependents here and are effectively prevented from travelling outside the United Kingdom because of the risk that they might be refused readmission.
I do not think I need give detailed evidence of the suffering and hardship our citizens are experiencing in East Africa, in Malawi and in India. Mr. Alex. Lyon was saying on "Panorama" last night that he is dealing personally with some 400 to 500 immigration cases a week, and while he said this in the context of people and their dependants, he was no doubt also thinking about the large number of United Kingdom passport holders brought to his notice by the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants and Members of both Houses of Parliament. These Ministers, Mr. Alex. Lyon and his colleagues, know that our citizens are being forced into destitution and beggary, and in Malawi and in Tanzania they are even prosecuted in the courts for the "crime" of holding British passports. Mr. Lyon admitted candidly en television last night that our present system of entry certificates is more inefficient and more inhumane than that which operated prior to the 1968 Act. Again he said this was in relation to dependants, but this same system applied to our own citizens makes an absolute mockery of the words which appear in our passports, that the Foreign Secretary
"requests and requires in the name of Her Majesty all those whom it may concern to

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allow the bearer to pass freely without let or hindrance and to afford the bearer such assistance and protection as may be necessary."
Some people regret that Great Britain is no longer a world military Power with Armed Forces capable of making the world tremble. Others are sorry that we are no longer leaders in industrial and economic strength. I am not disturbed by the loss of those past glories, but I mourn the passing of any claim we once possessed to moral leadership. We have sunk to the depths of hypocrisy when Parliament can allow the names of Her Majesty the Queen and the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs to be used in such a way, calling for assistance and protection to be afforded to the very people whose lives have been ruined by our refusal to allow them to pass freely without let or hindrance into the country that pretended to give them those rights. My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Avebury.)
Lord MAYBRAY-KING: My Lords, before the noble Lord sits down, may I ask him a friendly question? Those of us who handle this problem know how great is the desire of people to come into Britain. Under paragraph (c) of the new Clause 2(1) the Bill extends the permission to those who are adopted by Commonwealth citizens. Does this not open the door to wholesale adoption of people who wish to come into Britain under this clause?
Lord AVEBURY: No, my Lords. My new Clause 2(1)(c) is simply a repetition of the patrial clause which appeared in the Immigration Act 1971, which, as I have explained, I have left unaltered in this Bill although it has had to be repeated. I am substituting a new clause for the whole of what was Section 2(1) of the 1971 Act, and I have therefore had to repeat the subsection which dealt with patrials.
3.22 p.m.
Earl COWLEY: My Lords, the main purpose of this Bill, for which the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, is requesting a Second Reading, is to alter drastically the categories of persons who have the right of abode in this country under Section 2 of the 1971 Immigration
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Act. That section provides that Commonwealth citizens and citizens of the United Kingdom and Colonies have the right to come here free of controls on the condition that they have close and substantial ties with this country either personally or through either parent. These so-called patrial ties are created by birth, naturalisation, adoption, or by five years' residence in this country.
The 1971 Act makes a distinction between patrials and non-patrials, the non-patrials being those Commonwealth citizens and citizens of the United Kingdom and Colonies who have no substantial connection with Britain. So far as the non-patrial Commonwealth citizens are concerned, in general the same sort of immigration controls are applied as are applied to aliens wishing to enter Britain. The noble Lord's Bill does not seek to alter that state of affairs, but is mainly concerned with the position of the non-patrial citizens of the United Kingdom and Colonies; or, in other words, the non-patrial United Kingdom passport holders. At the present time, their entry into this country is strictly controlled by quota. Under Clause 2(1)(a) of his Bill, the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, seeks to remove the distinction between patrial and non-patrial United Kingdom passport holders and consequently to get rid of the quota restriction on the latter category.
When the 25,000 United Kingdom passport holders were expelled from Uganda in 1972, the then Conservative Government recognised the responsibilities and duties to those people and agreed to their entry into this country. My right honourable friend the then Home Secretary said:
"Having accepted that burden, as we did, I do not believe that it would be right for any British Government again to accept a similar burden to that which we accepted last summer".
He continued:
"The vital qualification is that I would not say what I have just said without at the same time accepting absolutely an ultimate responsibility to take in our passport holders in a controlled and orderly manner under the voucher system".
My Lords, that is still the attitude of this side of the House. This Bill is designed to end this system, by giving all United Kingdom passport holders the immediate right of entry into this country.

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This does not mean that we are not concerned with the deplorable plight of the East African Asians, but we think that a large part of the responsibility for their plight rests upon the Governments of the countries concerned and their internal policies.
Furthermore the noble Lord is attempting to increase the right of entry of spouses by Clause 2(1)(d) of his Bill and to remove the restrictions on wives of non-patrial United Kingdom passport holders by repealing Section 2(2) of the 1971 Act. If this Bill became law, men or women of any nationality who were married to United Kingdom passport holders who were not even resident in the United Kingdom would have the right of abode in this country. I shall be very interested to hear what the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, has to say about this Part of the Bill in particular, especially since the present Government published new immigration rules at the end of last August extending the right of entry to foreign husbands and fiancés of British women. Also, it would help if the noble Lord could tell the House what factors made the Government change their mind, since it was a Labour Government that introduced the restriction in the first place in 1969. On 28th March this year, his right honourable friend the Home Secretary said in another place:
"Were I to admit husbands on the same basis as wives, in my view it would lead to a substantial and continuing new wave of male immigration, particularly from the Indian subcontinent. I cannot dissociate the problem completely from the cultural tradition of arranged marriages, but I must take into account the substantial effect upon the rate of immigration''.—[OFFICIAL REPORT, Commons, 28/3/74; col. 612.]
Since Britain is both crowded and possesses a labour force which for the moment appears ample for her needs, we on this side of the House believe that all permanent immigration must be restricted to the inescapable minimum and this can be achieved only by effective controls. However, we recognise that this country has a very real and continuing responsibility to those people who are still entitled to United Kingdom citizenship. Therefore, it is essential that as large a proportion as I possible of the limited numbers that this country can admit year by year are reserved for those people, but it must be
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done in a controlled and orderly manner. Likewise, we as a Party believe that it is only right to permit free entry to those people who have close and recent family ties with this country, provided of course that they create no significant pressure for permanent settlement. Our aim, both now and in the past, is to create an immigration policy which, within our overall need to limit severely permanent settlement in this country, is not only reasonably humane, but also recognises our obligations to other countries.
On the other hand uncontrolled immigration would create untold pressures upon community relations in this country. We believe that it is in the interests of good race relations and for the benefit of immigrants already in Britain, as well as for the wider community, that immigration should be strictly limited. I think that the whole House would agree that it is essential that there are no second-class citizens in this country. Everyone who is born here or who has lawfully settled here should be equal before the law and should be treated equally. I believe that this Bill threatens this aim.
In 1973, the total number of Commonwealth immigrants who came to Britain was just over 25,500—well under half the annual average of 63,000 in the last three years of the preceding Labour Government. It is estimated that there are some quarter of a million United Kingdom passport holders who have no other citizenship and who have the right of entry into this country. While we recognise their right to come here, it must be under firm and fair control. The noble Lord's Bill does not provide this. In fact, it creates the exact opposite situation, and after the experience of the Uganda Asians I do not believe that this country could, or would, be willing to absorb such a concentrated influx of immigrants.
However, this is not our only objection to the Bill. We believe that it is wrong for such an important area of any Government's policy, as surely immigration is, to be legislated upon by means of a Private Member's Bill. Before any change in the law is made it is absolutely essential that all interested parties, both in this country and abroad, should be consulted about any proposed changes. This is something that can be done only at Government level. This Bill is extremely

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unwise, especially since there have been no or, at least, very few Government statements since the Government took office last October as to what their policy is, or will be, in the area of immigration.
The Labour Party's so-called Green Paper of 1972, entitled, Citizenship, Immigration and Integration, advocated a policy which could in essence have meant a return to the right of colonial citizens to free entry into the United Kingdom. Also it would effectively have removed controls from United Kingdom passport holders, thus conflicting with the Labour Government's own Commonwealth Immigrants Act 1968. The Green Paper's principles were also inserted in the Labour Party's Labour's Programme 1973. While I fully recognise that the Government are in no way bound by their own Party's documents, over the last decade or so the Labour Party's policy on immigration, both in Office and out of it, has shown a certain amount of vacillation and ambiguity. Thus, it would be highly desirable, if not essential, that the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, should make a definitive statement on Government policy on this subject. I believe that the whole House would be interested to know whether, to use the noble Lord's own words:
"the Government recognise that there is still a need to maintain a balance between the number of immigrants entering this country and the capacity of the country to absorb them".
3.34 p.m.
Lord BROCKWAY: My Lords, on all sides of this House the term "compassion" is often used. It was used by the Leaders of the three Parties during the General Election. They were concerned, rightly, with the under-privileged in our own country. But the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, has done a great service to this House in introducing a Bill which shows that our responsibility in compassion is also for British citizens overseas.
I want to make only a brief reference to the speech which we have just heard from the noble Earl, Lord Cowley—if he will give me his attention. He has stated that this country is over-populated and therefore we have to restrict immigration. Since the last war there have been only two years when the number of immigrants to this country has been greater than the number of emigrants
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leaving this country. The second fact to which I draw his attention is that the number of immigrants in this country today from alien territories is very much greater than the number of immigrants who come from Commonwealth territories. I do not think that there is any doubt that the political concentration on Commonwealth immigrants is not because they are immigrants but because they are coloured peoples.
In presenting the Bill the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, dealt mainly with British citizens of Indian origin in East Africa. My references to them will be comparatively brief. I was in East Africa at the time when Uganda, Kenya, and Tanzania were granted independence. With Indira Gandhi, who is now the Prime Minister of India, and with the support of Pandit Nehru, who was then Prime Minister, I addressed large meetings of Indians urging them to accept the advice of their own leaders that they should become citizens of the territories in which they resided. A large number did so. A minority did not, preferring to rely upon their British citizenship and their right to hold British passports which would protect them in movement and allow them to come to this country. I pay tribute to the action of this country when in the most cruel way the Head of State in Uganda expelled the Indian population, although there are still some difficulties about their resettlement.
In Kenya the principle was adopted by the Government that the first priority in trade and in jobs should go to those who were Kenya citizens, not only Africans but the Indian population who had accepted Kenyan citizenship. Those who did not were denied the opportunity to trade, denied the opportunity to work, denied all opportunities of gaining a livelihood. That was a cruel step to take. They held British passports. They were entitled to come to this country. But the argument was put forward that if they came here in the large numbers which were excluded from gaining a livelihood in Kenya, there would be an extent of immigration which would destroy our community relations and be a severe burden upon our social services, upon our health facilities and upon our education.
I ask your Lordships to look at what has happened. Because we have had the restricted voucher system, allowing only

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1,500 to come here in one year, those Indians without any livelihood in Kenya have become poorer and poorer. Indeed, many of them have become destitute. When ultimately they reach the quota voucher system they come here without any savings, in a beggarly condition, and because their return has been delayed they are a far greater cost than they would otherwise have been to our community relations, our social services and to our health and education services. I think particularly of the children. Many of them have been without school for three years, they have lost their knowledge of the English language; and when, under this voucher system, ultimately they arrive they are a much greater problem in our schools than they would have been had they been allowed to return originally.
My Lords, I ask my noble friend Lord Harris of Greenwich and the Government to pay particular attention to one problem, that of the school leavers in Kenya. They leave school, they are not allowed to take work, they are not given any place in the quota voucher system because the priorities in that system are to those to whom work permits have been refused. They have never worked, they have not had their work permits revoked, and those young men are left in the position that they have no hope of getting on the quota voucher system. They probably are the worst off of all.
The noble Lord, Lord Avebury, has pointed out the international effects of our policy, the condemnation by the International Commission of Jurists and the fact that the European Commission of Human Rights has found admissible 39 cases which have come before it. I want to emphasise one further point. The reputation of Britain in other countries has been extraordinarily high because of our tolerance and our readiness to admit to this country those who are refugees. That reputation has been spoiled in the last three years by the number of those we have sent back from this country and who have found refuge in one European country or another. I think of 39 assisted—and I pay my tribute to the Catholic Church—by the Catholic organisation Mani Tesi, by the help of the Council of Turin. In Holland, in Belguim, in Denmark and in many other countries where help has been given to these stranded Indians there has
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been incredulity that this country, with its long traditions, should have denied entrance to refugees who actually hold British passports.
I want to turn from this question of Indians with British citizenship in East Africa to the issue of the dependants of Pakistanis who came to this country while their country was still a member of the Commonwealth. In the Bill which the noble Lord has presented there is a clause which would allow the spouses of those who are here to come to this country. I hope that at the Committee stage he will extend that clause to the children of those who are in this country. I begin by paying a tribute to the Government. Mr. Alex Lyon, the Minister of State particularly responsible for immigration, has decided, we hear today, to cut short his Christmas holiday, leaving on 27th December, in order that he may investigate the delays which are taking place in coming to this country of the wives and children of immigrants. He is to visit India, Pakistan and Bangladesh. I pay my tribute to him for that decision. I want also to pay my tribute to the Home Secretary, Mr. Roy Jenkins, who has said,
"These dependants have a statutory right to come here. I regard the extent of the delay as intolerable".
He has indicated that there will be staff reinforcements to make the situation easier. I entirely accept that reassurance. I know from personal knowledge that the Home Secretary is deeply concerned about civil rights and about justice, and in what I am saying now I do not want any criticism to extend to him.
In the Act of 1971, which came into force in 1973, Clause 1(5) reads:
"The rules shall be so framed that Commonwealth citizens settled in the United Kingdom at the coming into force of this Act and their wives and children are not, by virtue of anything in the rules, any less free to come into and go from the United Kingdom than if this Act had not been passed."
I am referring to Pakistanis who came in while their country was still a member of the Commonwealth. They are the great majority of the Pakistanis who are in this country. There is now a system by which their dependants (their wives and children) have to obtain entry certificates. The spouse in this country makes a declaration which is sent to the family, and the family then applies to the High

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Commissioner in the case of a Commonwealth country or the British Embassy in the case of Pakistan. I submit to this House that this system in practice is cruel, costly and not worth while.
There has just been a remarkable survey by the Birmingham Community Development Project. That is one of twelve projects which have been set up by the Government, and a quite detailed survey has been made in one area of Birmingham, Saltley, which is typical of areas where Pakistanis live. There were interviewed 491 immigrants, and all but 17 were from Pakistan. Nearly half of the Pakistanis in Saltley who came before they left the Commonwealth are still separated from some or all of their families. The number is 47 per cent., and of the 53 per cent. with families, 21 per cent. came here before entry certificates were even necessary.
I want first to speak of the delay. This is increasing. Under this survey, in 1969 56 per cent. had their entry certificates delayed for more than one month. In 1974, the 56 per cent. had increased to 82 per cent. There are cases where these Commonwealth citizens have had to wait three and four years before their wives and children have been allowed to join them. The average wait is two and a half years. Some of them are from Bangladesh. One Bangladesh man said:
"It is three years since I sent for my wife. She is still waiting. My children and wife are Jiving where famine is in full grip and I am worried for their welfare."
The second point to which I wish to draw the attention of the Government is the journey which the families have to take in order to give any evidence to the Commission at all. It is often a day-long journey and has to be repeated several times. One husband in Pakistan said this:
"My family lives very high in the mountains and it is very hard and very expensive for them to come again and again to Islamabad."
It is costly. Those who can afford it stay in hotels. Many of them cannot afford any accommodation at all and sleep out in the streets until it is time for their cases to be heard.
The third point to which I want to draw attention is the evidence which is required
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when they do appear before the Commission. Let us try to picture the situation. A peasant woman comes from a distant village. She may be illiterate, she may never have seen a white person before; she has been asked to come and there, at the British Embassy, she is interviewed by two white men in a closed office; she may be embarrassed and confused. One woman, who was educated, took a note of the questions which were put to her at her interview and I am going to read them out. She was asked all the names of the relatives of a neighbour in her village; how many windows there were in her neighbour's house; which direction the house faced; how many trees there were in the village; the names of the children of her husband's sister; the kind of house her husband was living in in England; why she married him; where they spent their first night; how much he earned in England; how many houses her husband's family owned; and how old his parents were. All of those questions were for the purpose of deciding her identity. She was told to come back in six months with her father and her husband's mother. Both in fact were too old and unable to take the long journey. In the meanwhile, the husband was being interviewed by police in this country to corroborate the statements which his wife had made. No final decision has yet been taken.
My Lords, I recognise that there is a right of appeal. The spouse can appeal, though the delays in appeal are considerable. Mr. "S" applied for an entry certificate for his son late in 1969. The son was interviewed in Pakistan three times, the last time over a year ago, and he was refused entry into this country. Mr. "S" has still heard nothing.
If the appeal is lost, the spouse can go to the Immigration Tribunal. This is the remarkable fact: when cases are taken on appeal, the number of people who are eventually refused entry is very small indeed. That illustrates the need for a review of this system. All of the suffering, humiliation, cost and long delays are in the last resort for nothing. Is it to be wondered at that many Pakistanis have given up trying to get their wives and children here. In Saltley, 60 per cent. of those who have so far failed to get their wives and children here have given

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up. This is an example of a man's despair; he said:
"I have served in the British Army, given them my blood, and spent five years as a Japanese prisoner of war for them, and now they do not let my wife and children in."
In conclusion, I would say that at the very least, if this system is to be maintained at all, it must be reviewed. The delays must be speeded up, the humiliating interviews must be ended. I hope very much that the visit of Mr. Lyon to India, Pakistan and Bangladesh will achieve that. I want to urge something further. In view of the small number of refusals which are ultimately endorsed, I should like to see the abolition of the system altogether. A woman and child arriving in this country would have nowhere to go if they were not bona fide dependants. A spouse wants his wife and children here: why should he want them if they are not his dependants?—he would become responsible for them while they were here. Before entry certificates were in operation, Indian and West Indian families could join their spouses here, and there is no evidence of bogus immigrants. My Lords, I ask that this Bill be supported because it represents the compassion which is perhaps the greatest value we possess.
3.59 p.m.
The MINISTER of STATE, HOME OFFICE (LORD HARRIS of GREENWICH): My Lords, it may be helpful if I intervene at this juncture to explain the Government's attitude to the Bill and the problem it is designed to solve. This is a complex subject and I shall need to go into some technicalities, but there are also issues of principle at stake and the House is indebted to the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, for the opportunity for this debate this afternoon.
Before I come to the contents of the Bill, I shall reply briefly to three points made by various noble Lords. First, in reply to the question of the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, on the European Commission on Human Rights, the Commission's report—which the noble Lord will recognise is confidential—is now with the Committee of Ministers. The United Kingdom Government have no control over the pace of these proceedings, and it is for the Committee of Ministers to decide the pace at which it works in this particular matter.
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On the second point, the noble Earl, Lord Cowley, asked for a definitive statement of the Government's position on immigration policy. I suspect that he will not be altogether surprised to learn that he will not be receiving that definitive statement this afternoon, although if noble Lords opposite feel strongly that they would like such a debate I am sure that arrangements can be put in hand. Thirdly, my noble friend Lord Brockway referred to the forthcoming visit to India of my honourable friend the Joint Minister of State at the Home Office. As my noble friend recognises, this is an indication of the seriousness with which my honourable friend, and, indeed, my right honourable friend the Home Secretary, view the present situation and I am sure that this visit will be welcomed in all quarters of the House.
If I may come to the Immigration Bill itself, may I say straight away to the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, that I sympathise with his motives in moving the Second Reading. The noble Lord has been a notable champion of the cause of civil rights both in this House and in another place, and I am sure it is appropriate that I should say so this afternoon on behalf of many of my noble friends and many others in other parts of the House. The Government have never made any secret of the fact that they, unlike, I fear, the noble Earl, Lord Cowley, are unenthusiatic about the concept of patriality or the right of abode as distinct from the right of citizenship which was introduced by the Immigration Act 1971. What divides us from the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, is how the problem of patriality is best tackled. The matter is not simple and we have to be quite sure that we replace patriality with a satisfactory alternative.
The 1971 Act made a broad division between those who have the unfettered right to enter this country as they please—that is, patrials—and those who are subject to immigration control. Those who have the right of abode are, first, citizens of the United Kingdom and Colonies who were born here or who have a parent or a grandparent who was born here; secondly, citizens of the United Kingdom and Colonies who have at any time been settled here for five years; thirdly, any Commonwealth citizen who had a father or a mother

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who was born here; and, fourthly, women who are Commonwealth citizens who are, or who have been, married to a man with the right of abode. Only those who are citizens of the United Kingdom and Colonies or Commonwealth citizens are patrials. No foreign national has the right of abode.
One striking feature of this concept is that there is no correspondence between citizenship of the United Kingdom and Colonies and patriality. We share a common citizenship with the inhabitants of the remaining dependencies while retaining the power to exclude them. Those who derive their citizenship from connections with a former dependency are often in the invidious position of having no immediate right to enter or remain in the country whose passport they hold. They are citizens of the United Kingdom and Colonies who cannot, at the moment of their own choosing, enter any part of the territories of which they are citizens. I think that the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, made that point with considerable force this afternoon. On the other hand, Commonwealth citizens with a parent who was born here and women from the Commonwealth who are married to men who were born here have the right of abode.
United Kingdom passport holders from the former dependencies in East Africa and, indeed, elsewhere have been made subject to considerable hardship as a result of their having been denied the right to come here when they wish. Since the coming into force of the Commonwealth Immigrants Act 1968 their entry has been regulated by the operation of the special voucher scheme, a control maintained by the 1971 Act. The current scale of issue of vouchers by heads of household is 3,500 a year. A point which was made by my noble friend Lord Brockway is that there is a valid criticism of the special voucher scheme in that it results in those who have lost their chance to work as a result of Africanisation being forced to live on their savings while awaiting their turn for a voucher, so they may well be destitute when they eventually arrive here. My Lords, that is neither in the interests of the persons concerned nor in the interests of this
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country. However, I do not believe that the right way to deal with this—
Baroness HORNSBY-SMITH: My Lords, is it not also true that most of the people who eventually obtain their vouchers are not allowed, anyway, to bring out of the country with them their assets and savings?
Lord AVEBURY: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that the Kenya Government permit United Kingdom passport holders to bring out assets with them, although the total amount of the assets which they can bring out has recently been reduced?
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: Yes, my Lords. The noble Lord, Lord Brockway, said that the situation is inevitably—and the Government recognise this fact—that quite apart from any arrangements which are made by the Government concerned, like the Government of Kenya, which the noble Lord has just mentioned, the very fact that there is delay means that these people are often put in a situation where they arrive here with extremely small funds available to them; and in the past there have been some problems of the kind which the noble Baroness has just mentioned. However, I do not think that the right way to deal with this problem is to seek to modify the law governing patriality, so as to give all United Kingdom passport holders the right of abode while leaving the law of citizenship undisturbed. The Government's view has always been that the only satisfactory approach is first to put our citizenship law on a proper footing, and that any attempt to modify the concept of patriality in the meantime is doomed to failure.
With the greatest respect to the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, I think that his Bill demonstrates some of the problems to which I have just referred. The noble Lord, Lord Avebury, said that he hoped that when I came to speak I would not spend too much time talking about defects in drafting. I think that that is a very fair point. Sometimes, members of all Governments tend to spend too much time making drafting points against Private Member's Bills. I think we should all recognise that the preparation of a Private Member's Bill requires a considerable amount of ingenuity, effort, and, very

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often, cost. Therefore, I certainly hope I make no petty points of the kind which the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, feared that I might make. However, having said that I fear that there are some substantial problems over the contents of the noble Lord's Bill as drafted, and I think that he probably recognises some of these problems.
First of all, the noble Lord's Bill would sweep away the existing definition of those who are free from immigration control. Certainly, we agree with him that this is an unsatisfactory definition. But what is to be put in its place? Under the noble Lord's proposals, the right of abode would be conferred on all citizens of the United Kingdom and Colonies and British-protected persons, but only while they are ordinarily resident outside the United Kingdom and Colonies. Nobody who is ordinarily resident inside the United Kingdom and Colonies would have that right. I find it a somewhat curious and undoubtedly unintended proposition that all of those who are ordinarily resident in this country, including all of us who are born here, would forfeit the right of abode and become subject to immigration control, while Commonwealth citizens who are living outside the United Kingdom and Colonies but who have a parent who was born here would have that right of abode. I should be surprised if that is what the noble Lord intended; obviously it is not what he intended, but it is, in fact, what his Bill provides.
Moreover, if we were to decide to migrate to some country outside the United Kingdom and Colonies which would have us, and established ourselves there in ordinary residence, then under the noble Lord's Bill we would acquire a right of abode here, but as soon as we exercised that right and settled here once again we would cease to be patrials. I do not think that it would be a practical arrangement if the enjoyment of the right of abode at any given time depended upon one's place of ordinary residence. There are other difficulties. The Bill would give the right of abode here not only to citizens of the United Kingdom and colonies living abroad who have no other citizenship, but also to the many dual citizens, numbering at least a million throughout the world, who are not in any
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difficulty or hardship because they have a right of abode in their own country of residence. Yet another difficulty is that those who derive citizenship from birth in a colony and who are living in a third country would also be able to come here at will.
I think that I have said enough to demonstrate that the Government, with regret, cannot support this Bill and that we must stand on the proposition that the right of abode should be left undisturbed until a review of nationality has taken place. The intention of the Government to undertake this review was announced earlier this year, and a good deal of preliminary work has already taken place on this subject. I am not able to announce today what form the review will take, but my right honourable friend the Home Secretary is fully aware of the importance of this subject and he intends to make progress with it. In the meantime, I would suggest that the problems of United Kingdom passport holders in difficulty in East Africa and elsewhere is best dealt with by a review of the number of special vouchers which are issued, and the Government now have this under urgent examination. In the light of what I have said, I hope the noble Lord will not press the Bill this afternoon.
Lord BROCKWAY: My Lords, before the Minister sits down would he say something about my special plea for the teenagers in Kenya who are not at present admitted under the quota voucher system.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: My Lords, I am much obliged to my noble friend. I will draw what he has just said to the attention of my honourable friend the Joint Minister of State and will discuss the matter with him, certainly well before the occasion of his visit.
4.12 p.m.
Lord AVEBURY: My Lords, I do not intend to press the Motion for the Second Reading of this Bill to a Division, but I should like to make one or two points about the speeches of the noble Earl, Lord Cowley, and of the Minister who replied from the Government Front Bench. With regard to the speech made by the noble Earl, Lord Cowley, he plainly put it that in the view

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of his Party all permanent immigration must be restricted to the inescapable minimum, but he did not comment on that part of my speech in which I referred to the removal of restrictions on the 400 million people living in Europe and the 8 million patrials. This is a perfect illustration of what I was saying during the course of my opening speech. Many people are not worried about the numbers so long as the people concerned are white, and it is no skin off the noble Lord's nose that all these people from Italy, Germany, France, et cetera are able to come here if they wish, and the 8 million patrials, including, as I have said, people remotely descended from people who emigrated from Dublin in 1921. All these people are welcome to come here so far as the noble Earl, Lord Cowley, is concerned because they are the right colour.
Earl COWLEY: My Lords, I would ask the noble Lord to give way for a moment. Actually, if he checks the information he will find that the position of EEC nationals is slightly different. If the EEC nationals are here for longer than two years and do not have a job they can be removed from this country.
Lord AVEBURY: My Lords, that may well be so, but the noble Earl's object is to reduce permanent immigration to the inescapable minimum; that is the way he put it. He does not seem to mind if there are large numbers here for a short period instead of smaller numbers for a long time. If one were to press this to the logical extreme one would ask why we have au pair girls coming into this country. After all, they are taking up residence here. They are using housing facilities—admittedly it may be in a house which anyway is under-occupied. They are taking up places in the technical colleges which could be given to natives of this country. However, nobody is worried about that. They are only worried about people coming into this country who happen to have other than white skins. This is a good example of the points which I made only 10 minutes earlier.
The noble Earl said that we should have a "reasonably humane" immigration policy—whatever that may mean. It rather reminded me of the phrase used by the Minister of Justice in Sri Lanka when he said that people could be guilty,
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not guilty, or partially guilty. I do not know what the noble Earl means by "reasonably humane": can one have a policy which is unreasonably humane? Then he said that uncontrolled immigration could create unfair community relations. I do not know how much he has had to do personally with community relations' organisations in this country—whether he has discussed this matter with CROs and with organisations representing the minority community—but he will find that the exact opposite of what he said is the view taken by those people, who after all ought to know more than the rest of us because they spend their whole time dealing with the problem. So why is it constantly repeated that the only way of improving community relations in this country is to keep down the numbers to the inescapable minimum, as if it was always an evil to have any of these people coming into the country, and that we do not consult those who really ought to know about the problem before making up our minds on it?
The other point I wanted to comment on in the speech made by the noble Earl was his remark that total immigration was reduced to 25,500 in 1973, which he said was well under half the average for the last three months of the Labour Government.
Earl COWLEY: Three years, my Lords.
Lord AVEBURY: My Lords, three years of the Labour Government. I regret any Party political connotations of that remark, although it may have been totally unintentional, because if the noble Earl has spent any time studying this matter he will know that the rate of immigration in recent years has been determined largely by the influx of dependants, and that in turn is roughly correlated with the heads of households who were coming in many years before. So one cannot look at the numbers in any particular year and say that they are the result of policies which have been adopted recently, when in fact, they stem from the legislation of many years earlier, and from the heads of households who were brought in under that legislation.
In conclusion, on the noble Earl's remarks as to whether changes of this nature should or should not be brought

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about by Private Member's Bills, that is a matter of opinion. All I would say on that matter is that quite frequently when Governments are slow to move they can be prodded in the right direction by a Private Member's Bill, even though, being a realist about it, one has no hope of ever putting that Bill on to the Statute Book. But it does at least compel the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, to stand up at the Dispatch Box and say a few words about Government policy which he would not otherwise have had an opportunity of doing. Being a realist, that was all I had expected from this afternoon.
Turning to the Minister's reply, he said that he was not able to tell me anything about the Report of the Commission which found that infringements of the Convention had taken place, because he said that the Report had been presented to the Council of Ministers and it was confidential. I should like to ask the noble Lord—and perhaps he will not have an opportunity of dealing with it in another speech this afternoon, but it is important—what is the reason for these Reports being confidential? Is it because we are ashamed of something that may be contained in them, that we would not want them to see the light of day? Does the Council of Ministers have any discretion to publish Reports which are placed before it, given the assent of both Parties, the complainants and the respondents? If the Council of Ministers does have that power, would the Government allow them to exercise it, so that everyone can see what the opinion of the Commission is and we can then judge for ourselves when we see any reply that is made by the Government to the allegations made?
The noble Lord said that the Government were not responsible for the delay in considering the Report, but I should like to know whether any communication whatsoever has taken place between the Government and the Council of Ministers since the matter was referred to it. Legal experts whom I have consulted say that it is extremely unusual for a delay of as long as six months to take place between a Report being made by the Commission and any further action being
568
taken on it by the Council of Ministers. I am sorry to say this, but perhaps the noble Lord, Lord Harris, has no knowledge of it. I really suspect that somebody has twisted the arm of the Council of Ministers so as to obtain the maximum possible delay until perhaps the noble Lord, Lord Harris, or more likely the Home Secretary himself, is able to announce some concession on the greater award of the special quota vouchers so that they hope may satisfy the complainants.
The noble Lord said he recognised that there was considerable hardship, particularly among the East African Asians, as a result of the policies being followed, and an urgent review was undertaken, as I understand it, with the aim of increasing the rate of 3,500 vouchers which is at present awarded. May I ask the noble Lord to take into account that the number of vouchers taken up is never the same as the number issued. If a figure of 3,500 vouchers was operating in 1973, it should be compared with the 1,994 actually taken up by the Africans. This is because of changes in the circumstances which occur over the very long time-scale which elapses between the first application and the final issue to the person concerned. Therefore, suppose one increases the num-of vouchers to 5,000 or 6,000. I am not suggesting that this would be a figure which would satisfy me, but if that were in the Government's mind, one of the points to take into consideration is that probably in only two-thirds to threequarters would the right actually be exercised.
My Lords, I am very sorry that the Minister was not able to tell us anything conclusive about this urgent examination of the voucher system which he says is under way. The problem has been going on for rather a long time. I can only hope that as a result of the debate this afternoon an announcement will be speeded up and made to this House or another place before Christmas, so that some reassurance can be given to the many thousands who have been in the queue for years.
On Question, Motion for Second Reading negatived.

SAFETY OF SPORTS GROUNDS BILL [H.L.]
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: My Lords, I beg to move that this Report be now received.
Moved, That the Report be now received.—(Lord Harris of Greenwich.)
Lord WIGG: My Lords, I had intended to put an Amendment on the Marshalled List, but time did not permit. As it is my intention to bring the matter to your Lordships' attention again on Third Reading, I thought it proper and for the convenience of the House if I said what was in my mind at this stage of your Lordships' proceedings, and that the Minister will convey it to his right honourable friend, or ask him to read it, in the hope that further consideration may be given to what is, after all, an extremely important matter.
My Lords, on Committee stage I moved an Amendment asking that money should be provided by the Government. That of course, was in accord with the policy advocated by the Labour Party when in opposition both in this House and in another place. I was turned down on the grounds that, "we could not possibly afford it; it would be quite wrong at this time of our economic difficulties to give any money at all for a purpose of this kind". Among the other peurile banalities we got from the other side of the Committee it was claimed, "How can we give money for such a purpose? What about the claims on social security, the claims for housing?" One noble Lord said that he hoped your Lordships would oppose my Amendment most strongly because, "What would our allies think of us if on the day we have a cut in defence expenditure we actually gave money in order to help British sport?"
I read with some amazement reports in the Press this morning, and again this afternoon. There have been murmurings over the last few days as to what is happening to the Arts Council. The Arts Council is to get £6 million more. The history is extremely interesting. I want to put these facts on the Record in the hope that the Government, at this eleventh hour, will realise the implications of their policy. In 1963, in the year before the Labour Government came to power, the total amount received by way of taxation,
570
right across the board, from betting and football pools, and so on, was of the order of £33 million. Under the authority of the Prime Minister it has now grown in this current year to be £240 million. At the same time, the Arts Council was getting just over £2 million. In 1972–73 that figure had grown to £13½ million. In the year covered by the last annual report published a few days ago by the Arts Council, the figure grew to £17½ million. In the current year, the Government, who cannot give a penny to anything else, are giving back £750,000 from VAT; an additional grant of £19½ million plus £1¾ million supplementary estimate, making a total of £22 million. Today, the announcement is made that the Council will get a further £6 million. This, from a Government who could not spend a "tosser", not even £500,000, to honour their own word, strikes me as odd. The figure for the Arts Council for 1974–75 is said to be £28 million. I do not think that is very accurate, but the Press never is. I think the figure is probably of the order of £25 million. My noble friend nods his head. I have been talking this morning to the Arts Council and, if my sums are right, without any shadow of doubt, the figure for this year for the Arts Council is £22 million. A jump in a couple of years from £17 million to £22 million is not bad to be going on with.
Therefore I give notice that I propose to put down an Amendment to give the Government a chance for second thoughts. I will not press it. I just want to give notice of the fact. I am not asking for anything from the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich. All I am asking him to do is to go back to the right honourable gentleman the Home Secretary. The Home Secretary is not the last word. The present Home Secretary was Chancellor of the Exchequer at the time when the Report on Football was presented by Sir Norman Chester and his Committee. That powerful Committee, appointed by a Labour Government, recommended that a grant should be given to enable football stadia to be used all the week for social purposes other than the playing of the game on Saturday afternoons. That Committee recommended a levy, but nothing was done about it. The noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, came along and

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said that one of the things the Government have in mind is a football levy. But I do not place much hope in that, if a recommendation was made six years ago and nothing has been done about it yet. We have the Departmental colleague of the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, saying the matter is complicated and controversial and holding out no hope of piecemeal legislation.
I am asking that British sport should have the same treatment as the Arts. My Amendment will ask for a subvention of £28 million. I frankly admit that I am using sports stadia as a peg on which to hang my argument because basically, in so far as an uncouth creature like myself can ever use the word "culture", we have a bifurcated culture, which is wrong. If we look at the Report of the Arts Council, we find no less than approximately £4¼ million spent on the Royal Opera House, the Saddler's Wells Trust, the National Theatre Board and the Royal Shakespeare Theatre. I do not begrudge a penny of it; I would give more. I go to see Shakespeare plays when I have the time, and when I can afford it. But the number of people attending those four institutions to which we donate a figure of £4¼ million, does not equal the attendance at one moderately successful football club game.
My Lords, I assert to your Lordships—and I am being a Philistine, which is by nature of my upbringing—that I am not opposed to the Arts. Every penny that can be given to the Arts I welcome. But I assert that there is no cultural difference between Pele and Pavlova, or even the Panovs. Pele is an artist, a supreme artist. He is subject to the same spiritual disciplines and the same disciplines in the development of his physique, and when he scores a goal he is expressing the same agility, the same qualities as indeed did Pavlova or as the Panovs do. And, to my mind, those who care to eat fish and chips in the betting shop or go to the bingo hall are just as good as any one of your Lordships. The only difference is that the members of the present Administration—as do your Lordships—all patronise the Arts; therefore, they are quite content to go on subsidising for ever and ever those activities in which they engage. But the activities in which I and my kind are engaged must not have
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a "tosser", even if it is to make a ground safe. I do not understand. I must confess that with my economics, poor as they are, learned in WEA classes, I just cannot appreciate that if a Government abandon the pricing system, as this Government have done; and rely upon subsidies, we should not all have a right to put our snouts in the trough. It must not be only a concern for those who have Firsts in Modern Greats or Firsts in Aesthetics. We are all entitled to put our snouts in the trough and get our share.
I will not detain your Lordships any further, except to say that I propose to raise this matter again on Thursday afternoon. I shall be entirely satisfied if the Government, through the mouth of the noble Lord, Lord Harris, will say, "Well, of course, this is complicated and it is difficult, but we promise to go away, without prejudice, and look at the problem and see what can be done". If he does not do it, the campaign will be carried on at every opportunity that is given both in this House and another place, on every platform open to us, because those who think like me assert that the Arts are important, and so is sport; they are all part of our national endeavour, and if the Government are to support one they should support the lot.
4.33 p.m.
Lord FORBES: My Lords, I should like to support what the noble Lord, Lord Wigg, has said in respect of more money for sport. But before I say anything more, I should declare an interest in that I am Chairman of the National Playing Fields Association in Scotland. This Government and all other Governments must understand that the future of this country depends not just on people but on people of character, and to achieve this we must have playing fields and recreational facilities so that young people have the opportunity to let off steam and build character.
I travelled down from Aberdeen to Edinburgh last Saturday. There had just been a football match in Aberdeen, and the train was full of young people returning from the match. Incidentally a lot of them started breaking up the train. There were four of them in my carriage, aged between 17 and 19. I asked them whether they ever played any games. They said they were all very keen on playing. They

573
had played a lot at school, but since leaving school they found it extremely difficult to find anywhere to play. I think that it is really disgraceful when young people in this country cannot find somewhere to play. We know that sport is something that goes a long way to build character. Governments spend money on hospitals to keep people alive and to repair the body, but yet they seem to do very little towards trying to develop the characters of people. It is the characters of people that will count and which will enable this country to get out of its present mire, if anything will.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Wigg, recognised when he spoke that I had had virtually no notice of the point he intended to make, and, therefore, I will, if I may, deal with the matter when the Bill comes up on Third Reading.
On Question, Motion agreed to.
Clause 3 [Applications for certificates]:
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH moved Amendment No. 1:
Page 3, line 21, leave out "the building authority and the fire authority" and insert "and the building authority".
The noble Lord said: My Lords, in moving this Amendment to Clause 3, it may be for the convenience of the House if I also deal with the Amendments to Clause 4, the Amendments to page 5 in Clause 5, and the Amendments to Clauses 11 and 16.
I foreshadowed these Amendments in my speech during the Committee stage of the Bill. Their purpose is to delete the present references in the Bill to the fire authority. When the Bill was originally introduced, there were in existence in England and Wales one or two combined fire authorities which were not the same as the local authorities in the Bill. Accordingly provision was made for the fire authority, if it was not itself the local authority, to be consulted about matters relating to safety certificates, so that the fire service point of view would not be overlooked. I remind your Lordships that the Government hope that the service will be the principal agent of the local authorities in enforcing the provisions of the Bill. However, with the reorganisation of local government, there
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are no longer any combined fire authorities and the need for this provision has consequently disappeared. My Lords, I beg to move.
Earl COWLEY: My Lords, I should like to thank the noble Lord for expanding the reasons which he gave at Committee stage for these Amendments. We have no grounds to oppose them.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 4 [Amendment etc. of certificates]:
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: My Lords, I beg to move Amendment No. 2.
Amendment moved—
Page 4, line 15, leave out "the building authority and the fire authority "and insert" and the building authority "—(Lord Harris of Greenwich.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: My Lords, I beg to move Amendment No. 3.
Amendment moved—
line 18, leave out "the building authority and the fire authority "and insert" and the building authority".—(Lord Harris of Greenwich.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 5 [Appeals]:
4.37 p.m.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH moved Amendment No. 4.
line 39, after "appellant" insert", the local authority".
The noble Lord said: My Lords, I now move the Amendments to page 4 in Clause 5, and it may be for the convenience of the House if I also deal with the Amendments to Clause 10. The main purposes of this group of Amendments are, first, to ensure that a local authority, in common with the appellant and other interested parties, have the right to be heard when an appeal against any of their requirements or decisions is being considered by the Secretary of State under the provisions of Clause 5; and, secondly, to ensure that a local authority, in common with other interested parties, have a right of appeal to the Crown Court against an order by a magistrates' court under the provisions of Clause 10.
I should perhaps add this. In addition, in the case of a sports ground which is

575
not the subject of a designation order, the management have no right of appeal at present because they do not qualify under Clause 5(5)(a) or (b). Obviously, they should have a right of appeal, and the new subsection (4) provides for this. The new subsection (5) makes a similar provision for Scotland. I foreshadowed the earlier points when I spoke at Committee stage, and I think I will probably carry the noble Earl with me on the latter points. My Lords, I beg to move.
Earl COWLEY: My Lords, could the noble Lord expand on the problem of costs? Who would pay the costs of local authority's appearance, or does that depend on the individual case concerned?
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: My Lords, is the noble Earl referring to the first point I mentioned, rather than the second?
Earl COWLEY: Yes, my Lords.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: My Lords, it is a question of the right of appeal that we are talking about. This matter was not recognised by the Government; it was, I believe, brought to our attention by the Greater London Council. It is remarkable that, given the fact that the Bill has now come here three times, there was at least this one point which had not previously been considered. It is an appeal right rather than anything else.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: My Lords, I beg to move Amendment No. 5.
Amendment moved—
Line 40, after "appellant" insert ", to the local authority".—(Lord Harris of Greenwich.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: My Lords, I beg to move Amendment No. 6.
Amendment moved—
Page 5, line 7, at end insert (" and ").—(Lord Harris of Greenwich.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: My Lords, I beg to move Amendment No. 7.
Amendment moved—
Line 8, leave out from "authority" to end of line 9.—(Lord Harris of Greenwich.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 10 [Emergency procedure]:
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: My Lords, I beg to move Amendment No. 8.
Amendment moved—
Page 8, line 15, leave out subsection (4) and insert:
"(4) In England and Wales any of the following persons may appeal to the Crown Court against an order under subsection (1) or (2) above or the refusal of an application for such an order, namely—

(a) the local authority;

(b) any person who is concerned in the management of the sports ground in question or the organisation of any activity there;

(c) the chief officer of police; and

(d) the building authority."—(Lord Harris of Greenwich.)

On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: My Lords, I beg to move Amendment No. 9.
Amendment moved—
Page 8, line 18, at end insert:
"(5) In Scotland, it shall be competent for any of the following persons to appeal against an order made on an application under this section or the refusal of such an application, namely—

(a) the local authority;

(b) any person who is concerned in the management of the sports ground in question or the organisation of any activity there;

(c) the chief officer of police; and

(d) the building authority,

notwithstanding that that person was not party to the proceedings on that application."—(Lord Harris of Greenwich.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 11 [Powers of entry and inspection]:
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: My Lords, I beg to move Amendment No. 10.
Amendment moved—
Page 8, line 22, leave out paragraph (c).—(Lord Harris of Greenwich.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 16 [Interpretation]:
Lord HARRIS of GREENWICH: My Lords, I beg to move Amendment No. 11.
Amendment moved—
Page 11, leave out lines 29 to 31.—(Lord Harris of Greenwich.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.

RESERVOIRS BILL [H.L.]
4.41 p.m.
Baroness BIRK: My Lords, I beg to move that this Report be now received.
Moved, That the Report be now received—(Baroness Birk.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
Clause 1 [Ambit of Act, and interpretation]:
Baroness BIRK Baroness BIRK moved Amendment No. 1:
Page 1, line 16, at end insert:
"For the avoidance of doubt it is hereby declared that the expression "reservoir" does not include a canal or inland navigation (but this Act applies to a reservoir notwithstanding that it may form part of a watercourse or be used for navigation)."
The noble Baroness said: My Lords, this Amendment arose out of an Amendment moved at the Committee stage by my noble friend Lord Stow Hill. On that occasion, at column 139 of Hansard of 3rd December, I said that there was no difference between my noble friend and myself over the aim to be achieved here. I then went on to say:
"The difference between us is whether in fact there is a doubt."
I later said:
"I must say after close consideration—and my noble and learned friend is right, I studied very carefully what he said—I do not believe that there is in this instance a doubt"
I am still of that opinion, but in view of the strong arguments put forward by my noble friend, and because I believe that if there are Members of your Lordships' House who feel that in a case of this sort there really is an area of doubt, although we are all agreed that the aim and the principle are the same, therefore it is my duty to do what I can to see that the matter is clarified, so far as possible, beyond any doubt. That is why this Amendment is before you today, put down in the names of my noble friend Lord Stow Hill and myself.
The purpose of the Amendment is to place it beyond doubt that canals are not within the ambit of the Bill. May I
578
just explain the words in brackets in the Amendment:
"(but this Act applies to a reservoir notwithstanding that it may form part of a watercourse or be used for navigation)."
This is because there are canal systems which have been formed by joining together lakes or lochs by canals, and the words in the brackets are included to meet this kind of case. If the provisions of the Bill would otherwise apply to such a lake or loch by virtue of subsection (2) of Clause 1, then the fact that the lake or loch forms part of a canal system would not exempt it from the provisions of the legislation. The Bill will not, of course, apply to those sections of canal which join the lakes or lochs. I beg to move.
Lord STOW HILL: My Lords, I desire to intervene shortly in this debate in order to express my cordial thanks to my noble friend the Minister for having put down this Amendment which we are at present considering. She has gone to an immense amount of trouble, and although I realise that she feels in her own mind that there is no real need to introduce this further provision in the Bill, I think she agrees with me that it is an improvement in that it will remove any possible doubt. I am quite sure that the British Waterways Board, who are directly affected, would wish to be associated with me in this expression of thanks. I support the Amendment, and, as I have said, am extremely grateful to my noble friend.
Baroness YOUNG: My Lords, I, too, should like to welcome this Amendment. We had quite a lengthy debate on this subject at Committee stage, and I am happy to support this Amendment, which makes the position much clearer. I am sure that one should accept the advice that perhaps it is unncessary, but on the principle that, at the end of the day, the definition will be decided in court and not on what is recorded in Hansard, I think that it is necessary to get an accurate definition of a reservoir.
Although this is not strictly on this Amendment, I should like to ask the noble Baroness, Lady Birk, one further point on definitions. She has most helpfully written to me two long letters on various detailed matters in this Bill, and I should be glad if she would confirm—I think this is the intention in the first

579
paragraph of the first letter she wrote to me—that a reservoir must be not only of a certain cubic capacity but must be above the level of the ground in order to be defined as a reservoir. I should be glad if she could give me the answer on that point.
Baroness BIRK: My Lords, the answer to that point is that under this Bill a reservoir has to be a raised reservoir.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 9 [Re-use of abandoned reservoirs]:
4.47 p.m.
Baroness BIRK Baroness BIRK moved Amendment No. 2:
Page 10, line 24, at end insert—
"(8) Where an enforcement authority propose to serve a notice under subsection (7) above requiring undertakers to carry a recommendation into effect, the authority shall consult as to the time to be specified in the notice a civil engineer, being a qualified civil engineer for the purpose of inspecting and supervising the reservoir under this section."
The noble Baroness said: My Lords, with the permission of the House, I think it would expedite matters if I spoke to what are really the twin Amendments Nos. 2 and 3. They stem from another Amendment of my noble friend Lord Stow Hill in Committee, which I said I would take back for consideration.
The purpose of these Amendments is to ensure that where the enforcement authority propose to serve a notice on a reservoir undertaker requiring him to carry out recommended safety measures, then they must consult a qualified civil engineer on the time limit to be specified in that notice. The enforcement authority will need professional advice to ensure that the time limit they fix is both reasonable from the undertaker's point of view and consistent with public safety. I beg to move.
Lord STOW HILL: My Lords, may I once again have your Lordship' leave to intervene in order to thank my noble friend for making these two changes to which she has spoken. I am deeply grateful to her, and I think they most certainly improve the Bill as it stands.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 10 [Periodical inspection of large raised reservoirs]:
Baroness BIRK: My Lords, I beg to move Amendment No. 3.
Amendment moved—
Page 11, line 44, at end insert—
"( ) Where an enforcement authority propose to serve a notice under subsection (7) above requiring the undertakers to carry a recommendation into effect, the authority shall consult as to the time to be specified in the notice a civil engineer, being a qualified civil engineer for the purpose of supervising under subsection (6) above the carrying into effect of the recommendatons."—(Baroness Birk.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 14 [Abandonment of large raised reservoirs]:
4.49 p.m.
Baroness BIRK Baroness BIRK moved Amendment No. 4:
Page 14, line 31, at end insert—
"(5) Where an enforcement authority propose to serve a notice under subsection (4) above requiring undertakers to carry a recommendation into effect, the authority shall consult as to the time to be specified in the notice a civil engineer, who, if the recommendation involves any alteration of the reservoir, shall be a qualified civil engineer for the purpose of supervising the alteration under section 13 above."
The noble Baroness said: My Lords, I beg to move Amendment No. 4, and to say that the purpose of this Amendment is similar to that of the Amendments to Clauses 9 and 10 which the House has just passed, to ensure that the enforcement authority takes professional advice before fixing the time limit to be specified in a notice requiring the undertaker to carry out recommended safety measures before the use of a reservoir is abandoned, or as soon as practicable afterwards. Where the use of the reservoir can be abandoned without alteration, the measures specified are likely to be simple. Accordingly, a civil engineer, not necessarily a panel engineer, would be capable of advising the enforcement authority on the time limit for carrying out the recommended measures. Where, however, alteration is required, the engineer consulted by the enforcement authority will be a qualified civil engineer. I beg to move.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 17 [Powers of entry]:
4.50 p.m.
Baroness BIRK Baroness BIRK moved Amendment No. 5:
Page 16, line 40, at end insert—
"or is being constructed or altered so as to be one, whether the reservoir being a large raised reservoir is being altered so as to increase its capacity, or whether the reservoir is or is not in use as a reservoir;
( ) for the purpose of carrying out any survey or other operation needed to determine whether any recommendation as to measures to be taken in the interests of safety has been carried into effect as required by section 9, 10 or 14 above or what period should be specified in a notice under section 9, 10 or 14 requiring the undertakers to carry such a recommendation into effect;".
The noble Baroness said: My Lords, the purpose of this Amendment is to secure that the powers of enforcement authorities to enter on land correspond fully to the responsibilities imposed on them by the Bill. As the Bill stands, a person authorised by an enforcement authority can enter on land to carry out a survey for determining whether a reservoir is within the ambit of the Bill; to carry out any inspection, survey or other operation in pursuance of the enforcement authority's reserve powers under Clause 15(1); to supervise the carrying out of safety measures where the undertaker has failed to put them into effect following a notice served by the authority; and for purposes connected with the authority's emergency powers under Clause 16.
The Bill does not, however, provide the power to enter on land in order to determine whether a large raised reservoir is being constructed or is being altered so as to increase its capacity; whether a large raised reservoir has been abandoned or whether an abandoned reservoir has been brought back into use. Neither are there any powers for an authority to enter on land for the purpose of ascertaining whether safety recommendations have been put into effect, and for determining what would be a reasonable period of time to specify for the carrying out of the work in a notice under Clause 9(7)(b), Clause 10(7)(b) or Clause 14(4)(b). Powers of entry for these purposes are essential if enforcement authorities are to be able to perform their duties effectively and reasonably. The Amendment is designed to fill this gap in the Bill.
Once again it refers back to the original Amendment of my noble friend Lord Stow Hill on Clause 10. My Lords, I beg to move.
Lord STOW HILL: My Lords, may I please express my feelings and thank the noble Baroness once again?
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Baroness BIRK Baroness BIRK moved Amendment No. 6:
Page 17, line 25, at end insert—
"A notice under this subsection shall specify the purpose for which entry is required and shall indicate so far as practicable the nature of any works to be executed on the land."
The noble Baroness said: My Lords, again this is an Amendment which during the Committee stage I took back for further consideration, it having been moved at the time by my noble friend Lord Stow Hill. The purpose of the Amendment is to require the enforcement authority to state in the notice of intended entry to be given under subsection (4) the purpose for which entry to the land is required, and to indicate so far as is practicable the nature of any works to be carried out on the land. The enforcement authority has to give notice before entering on land in all cases except in the exercise of its powers under Clause 16 to take immediate action in an emergency. My Lords, I beg to move.
Lord STOW HILL: My Lords, this is a point about which the Board were particularly concerned and I am indeed very pleased to see that my noble friend has been able to meet it.
Viscount SIMON: My Lords, may I ask the noble Baroness a question? I do not understand how the inspecting officer, before going on to the land, can indicate the nature of the work to be executed. Will he not require to see what needs to be done, and is it not unreasonable to say that before entering the land he has to notify the works that he intends to require to be done?
Baroness BIRK: My Lords, the point is that the Amendment says:
"A notice under this subsection shall specify the purpose for which entry is required and shall indicate so far as practicable the nature of any works to be executed on the land."
In other words, there are two parts to it. He will obviously know the purpose

583
for which he is asking for entry to the land, and, where he has some reason to believe that there are certain works that need to be done, then it seems only right to be able to expand a little on that, and give an indication of what he thinks at that point needs to be done. If, of course, he does not know this, he obviously cannot give the information. The whole purpose of almost bending backwards is to give as much information as possible, but where that is not possible it obviously cannot be given.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 22 [Criminal liability of undertakers and their employees]:
Baroness BIRK Baroness BIRK moved Amendment No. 7:
Page 21, line 41, at beginning insert "then unless there is reasonable excuse for the default or failure,"
The noble Baroness said: My Lords, the purpose of this Amendment is to bring the provisions concerning criminal liability of undertakers and their employees into line with present Government policy, which is that offences of absolute prohibition should be created only in very exceptional circumstances. Subsection (1) of Clause 22 creates offences of absolute prohibition in relation to failure by an undertaker to carry out specified provisions of the Bill, or to comply with notices issued by the enforcement authority. The Amendment would allow for the exceptional case where the undertaker had a reasonable excuse for his default or failure to comply. My Lords, I beg to move.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Baroness BIRK Baroness BIRK moved Amendment No. 8:
Page 22, line 2, after "fail" insert "without reasonable excuse".
The noble Baroness said: My Lords, the purpose of this Amendment is similar to the following one, but the principle is the same. It would allow the undertakers a defence on the grounds of reasonable excuse for failing to give notice in due time to the enforcement authority of any matter of which they are required to give notice. This would cover cases where notices had been sent but failed to arrive. My Lords, I beg to move.
On Question, Amendment agreed to
Baroness BIRK Baroness BIRK moved Amendment No. 9:
Page 22, line 7, after "them" insert "without reasonable excuse".
The noble Baroness said: My Lords, the purpose of this Amendment is similar to that of the two which I have just moved, and would allow the undertaker a defence on the grounds of reasonable excuse for failing to provide the required information for the supervising or inspecting engineer specified in subsection (5) of Clause 21. This would provide a defence for the undertaker where, for example, records had been destroyed accidentally by fire. My Lords, I beg to move.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.

NORTHERN IRELAND (VARIOUS EMERGENCY PROVISIONS) (CONTINUANCE) ORDER 1974
4.59 p.m.
The PARLIAMENTARY UNDERSECRETARY of STATE, NORTHERN IRELAND OFFICE (Lord DONALDSON of KINGSBRIDGE) rose The PARLIAMENTARY UNDERSECRETARY of STATE, NORTHERN IRELAND OFFICE (Lord DONALDSON of KINGSBRIDGE) rose to move, That the Draft Northern Ireland (Various Emergency Provisions) (Continuance) Order 1974, laid before the House on 28th November, be approved. The noble Lord said: My Lords, I beg to move that the Draft Northern Ireland (Various Emergency Provisions) (Continuance) Order 1974, which was laid before the House on the 28th November, be approved. This is a routine financial Order which will go for examination in another place on Thursday. As it is the custom in your Lordships' House to leave the main consideration of financial matters to another place, I have prepared only a brief introductory speech, but I will of course be happy to answer any detailed questions which noble Lords may wish to put. This Order, which appropriates the autumn Supplementary Estimate, is the second Northern Ireland Appropriation Order to come before this House for the 1974–75 financial year. The sum to be appropriated by this Order is very nearly £32 million. This brings the total Estimates provision to date for 1974–75 to approximately £650 million.
More than half of the additional provision is required to meet pay and price increases. The more significant items

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making up the balance are the £5·1 million in respect of the doubling of selective employment payments to employers in Northern Ireland; the Consolidated Fund contribution of £2·3 million to the National Insurance Fund; and the £1·5 million required for the Beef Marketing Subsidy Scheme. Nothing affected by this Order is new in the sense that everything has been previously considered and these are Supplementary Estimates of a routine kind. My Lords, I beg to move.
Lord BELSTEAD: My Lords, I am not quite sure why we are taking these items out of order.
Lord DONALDSON of KINGSBRIDGE: My Lords, I have been taking the Draft Appropriation (No. 2) (Northern Ireland) Order 1974. I am sorry. I have taken the financial Order first. Is it the wish of the House that I should continue in this way and take the financial Order before the others? I am informed from the Table that I am not allowed to do this. I must therefore apologise and withdraw what I have said on that Order.
My Lords, I now move that the Northern Ireland (Various Emergency Provisions) (Continuance) Order 1974, a draft of which was laid before the House on 28th November, be approved. This is a continuation of the Order which has been in operation since last year. It is hardly necessary to remind your Lordships that in 1973 it was enacted to deal with the emergency situation, and the second Act—the Northern Ireland (Young Persons) Act 1974—which is affected by this Order was brought in about three or four months ago in view of the same emergency.
The intention has always been that these provisions should be temporary and should lapse after a limited time, unless specifically renewed with the approval of both Houses of Parliament. In July in this House I moved the renewal of the 1973 Act for a further six months, and I stressed at that time that an emergency situation still existed and that extraordinary legislation was needed to deal with it. I mentioned that the noble and learned Lord, Lord Gardiner, had been appointed chairman of a committee to consider the powers and provisions which would be needed to deal with terrorism and subversion, while maintaining civil
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liberties and human rights to the maximum extent. I said then that pending the Committee's report it was considered essential that the powers of the Northern Ireland (Emergency Provisions) Act be renewed. The noble and learned Lord will, I believe, be presenting his report to my right honourable friend very shortly—certainly before Christmas and perhaps sooner.
Your Lordships may wonder, if this is coming so soon, why the provisions of these Acts should be renewed for a further six months. The answer is that otherwise we would not have the time to go into this very important report in the kind of detail it requires, before the existing provisions lapsed on 24th January of the coming year. In seeking approval for the renewal of the provisions for a further six months, we are not precluding the introduction of new legislation within that time. However, to ask for a shorter period would not be prudent in view of the very complex issues at stake.
I should like briefly to remind your Lordships of some of the more important provisions which these Acts contain and of what are their effects. First, there are court procedures and rules of evidence. So far this year, 1,305 people have been charged with scheduled offences, which entails their appearance before non-jury courts with modified rules of procedure. It would appear—and I have received no evidence to the contrary—that these courts are working well and that justice is being seen to be done. But intimidation continues, so there would appear to be no good reason to allow these provisions to lapse before hearing what my noble and learned friend has to recommend in his report on these matters.
There has been an improvement in the overall level of violence, as I told the House the last time we debated this subject, but in the past three and a half months, 41 people have been murdered, sometimes in front of their own children, for apparently no better reason than they happen to live in a certain area or hold certain religious beliefs. Moreover, 25 people have been "knee-capped" during the same period. This makes the grand score of this particularly atrocious and cruel punishment 129 in the current year. Since the middle of September, 47 gunmen have been arrested at road blocks

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and in random search operations, 12 people have been charged with murder and 24 with attempted murder.
Much of this would have been impossible without the present powers under which the Security Forces are operating. However, not all of these sectarian murderers have been arrested and charged. There has been evidence in some cases which has been sufficient to convince the Secretary of State that arrested men have been deeply implicated in murder and violence, and yet, as the organisers and members of assassination squads, no one has been prepared to give evidence in open court against them. It is difficult to blame people who hesitate to do this; it means risking their own lives and those of their families. But it is simply not acceptable that terrorists should be permitted to stay at large because their methods of intimidation are so successful. In fact, in the last 14 days the Secretary of State has signed 31 interim custody orders. This shows the pressure which the Security Forces have been putting on the terrorists, and it also shows the difficulty of getting convictions in ordinary courts—for whenever this is possible it is invariably done.
It is for these reasons that I ask for approval of the renewal of the powers of detention contained in the 1973 Act. This would allow the Government time to consider the recommendations of the Gardiner Committee, and to prepare any new legislation considered appropriate. If there were any question of violence ceasing or even easing in a major way, immediate steps could be, and would be, taken towards the ending of detention. My right honourable friend the Secretary of State has promised this again and again, but this is not the current position.
My right honourable friend has been carrying out a release programme of detainees since 9th July, showing his intention to bring detention to an end at the earliest possible opportunity, and since then he has personally released 71 detainees and the Commissioners have released a further 99. Regrettably, this earnest of intention has not met with any reciprocal action on the part of the terrorists. Murders are continuing and the campaign of violence has been spread to Britain. Therefore, during the same period he has had to make a further 96
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interim custody orders. This figure includes the 31 to which I have just referred.
The draft Order before the House extends the provisions of the Northern Ireland (Young Persons) Act 1974 for a further period of six months. Courts in Northern Ireland may remand a young person to prison only if they are convinced he is unruly or depraved. Accordingly, most young people were being held in remand homes pending trial. These homes are not secure establishments, and some of the young persons charged with serious offences used to abscond and immediately became involved again in terrorism. They regarded themselves as heroes on the run and their whole future was very much at risk.
This Act gives the Secretary of State power to direct that a young person charged with a scheduled offence who has been remanded or committed for trial may be held in a prison or other secure place. As well as preventing him from absconding, this works to ensure his own safety and that of those who look after him. We do not like the idea of sending young persons to prison, although it is done to some extent in this country. But in this particular case only eight young persons have been held in prison pending trial under a direction given by the Secretary of State. There are other young people there who have been sent by the courts under the "unruly" provision. They have all gone to Belfast Prison where a special unit of accommodation has been set aside for their use.
There have been no escapes. I have visited the young persons' accommodation more than once and it is entirely distinct from the prison itself in that the young persons do not actually see the prisoners moving to and fro. They have good educational facilities; there is a very wide spread of education. But quite a lot is being done there and they have very good recreational facilities. The authorities are very pleased with the centre and are quite reluctant to fake boys away and send them off to further treatment. I think, therefore, that we may say that it is working extremely well. Without these powers, there is no doubt that we should be back to the old system under which we sent dangerous young boys to a place like St. Patrick's Remand Home, which was quite incapable

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of containing them and from which they used to abscond and go on the run, very much to the distress of the school authorities.
My Lords, the provisions in both these Acts are considered essential by the Secretary of State and they must not, in our opinion, be modified except in the light of the Gardiner report. We shall have the opportunity to discuss at length and over a period what sort of modifications will be appropriate when we receive that report. Till then, my Lords, I beg to move.
Moved, That the Draft Northern Ireland (Various Emergency Provisions) (Continuance) Order 1974, laid before the House on 28th November, be approved.—(Lord Donaldson of Kingsbridge.)
5.12 p.m.
Lord BELSTEAD: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Donaldson, has reminded us that only in July the Emergency Provisions Act was extended for a period of six months but, as the noble Lord has explained, the continued necessity for this Order remains evident from the news which comes out of Northern Ireland. It is true, I understand, that the general level of violence has decreased, and this is of course a tribute to the unceasing work of the Security Forces; but, from what the noble Lord has just said, it is also clear that assassinations and intimidation are all too prevalent and it would be intolerable to cease detaining terrorists at such a moment, particularly when the Prevention of Terrorism Act has been passed only a fortnight ago. Having said that, may I say that we share the Government's hope that the forthcoming report from the noble and learned Lord, Lord Gardiner, and his Commission will shed fresh light on the intractable problem of detention, and we very much hope that it can be published before Christmas.
My Lords, I have only two questions to ask. It is six weeks ago that, following the rioting in the Maze prison, the Secretary of State, in a Statement on 30th October, announced that he had asked the retiring Chief Inspector of Prisons at the Home Office to prepare a confidential Report. I realise that it is confidential, but I wonder whether there are any aspects of that Report on which
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the Government feel able to give any information this evening. May I also ask about the up-to-date situation on plans to deal with the pressing need for a new prison in Northern Ireland?
I express my thanks to the noble Lord for giving us a personal view as well as a Government Statement on the continuing working of the Northern Ireland (Young Persons) Act. On that part of the Order, I am interested and most satisfied to hear what the noble Lord has said, and I have no questions to ask.
Lord DONALDSON of KINGS-BRIDGE: My Lords, I have seen the Clarke Report and it is extremely thorough and interesting. I do not think that it will be published, but there are three points which I believe are relevant to what the noble Lord, Lord Belstead, was asking. The first is that a very detailed examination of the extent of the damage in the Maze, which is a matter of a good deal of interest, was carried out. As a result of the damage, there is already a Working Group studying how to re-erect the Maze with less risk of damage. This task will be much helped by the comments which appear in the Clarke Report. Secondly, the Report suggests something that the Secretary of State had already decided upon, and his opinion is now confirmed, that it is desirable so far as is possible to segregate the Provisional and Official IRA on the one side from the Loyalists in their various groups on the other side. The plans for the rebuilding of the Maze include plans for doing this, but it will not take effect until the end of the rebuilding because people have to be moved around while different enclosures are being dealt with. But this has been accepted as a useful suggestion.
The third point, which I think is one of some importance, concerns administration: the Maze in its old form was extremely difficult to run and in its new form it may be a little, but not very much, easier. The Report suggests that perhaps more attention should be paid to methods of communication, and we have accepted this as a sensible suggestion. We shall be doing what can be done in conjunction with the governor and staff to make sure this happens.
The noble Lord asked me also about future plans. My right honourable friend

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announced last week that he had selected as the most suitable site for a permanent new prison an old aerodrome at Maghaberry in County Antrim. It may be necessary to use compulsory purchase, and of course this selection is subject to the decision of a public inquiry which will, I hope, be held by, or shortly after, the end of January. There is a certain amount of worry in the locality. This always occurs, but we are doing our best to defuse it and to make people realise that a modern high security prison, made of brick and two storeys high, with prisoners in fairly small groups, is something very different from the sort of thing everybody in Northern Ireland is frightened of. I hope therefore that we shall be successful in getting this project through. There will be a temporary prison on the same site which will house up to 700 men in concrete cells, as opposed to the Nissen huts in the Magilligan type of prison, but still using the compound system. This will be very much easier to deal with than the compound system because, if one has cells, prisoners can be isolated from the crowd. The lack of cells has been the great difficulty in the compound system. However, it is not intended that the prison should remain in that form indefinitely, and in due course the temporary buildings will be incorporated into the permanent prison. I think that those replies will answer the noble Lord's question.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

FINANCIAL PROVISIONS (NORTHERN IRELAND) ORDER 1974
Lord DONALDSON of KINGS-BRIDGE Lord DONALDSON of KINGS-BRIDGE rose to move, That the Draft Financial Provisions (Northern Ireland) Order 1974, laid before the House on 21st November, be approved. The noble Lord said: My Lords, this is a financial measure. It is the latest addition to a regular series of measures which have been enacted in Northern Ireland at intervals to deal with miscellaneous matters of a financial nature. The main purpose is to increase statutory limits on capital expenditure on certain services and on lending by the Northern Ireland Government Loans Fund. The Order does not vote
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or appropriate any additional expenditure. It will still be necessary for Northern Ireland Departments to seek the approval of Parliament for expenditure within the proposed limits on the services concerned by submitting Supply Estimates in the normal way.
In addition, the Order proposes a formula to fix the maximum size of the Northern Ireland Civil Contingencies Fund, and removes the duplicate provision for the statutory limit on capital expenditure on school meals. This Order, as a financial Order, is something for which I think a brief introduction is appropriate in this House. It will be considered in another place on Thursday. My Lords, I beg to move.
Moved, That the Draft Financial Provisions (Northern Ireland) Order 1974, laid before the House on 21st November, be approved.—(Lord Donaldson of Kingsbridge.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

APPROPRIATION (No. 2) (NORTHERN IRELAND) ORDER 1974
Lord DONALDSON of KINGS-BRIDGE Lord DONALDSON of KINGS-BRIDGE rose to move, That the Draft Appropriation (No. 2) (Northern Ireland) Order 1974, laid before the House on 21st November, be approved. The noble Lord said: My Lords, as I earlier suggested, abortively, this is a financial measure of a routine kind. It is not normally our practice to deal with finance, and I have therefore prepared only a short speech to introduce the Order, but I am ready to answer any questions which may be put. The Order will go before another place on Thursday. It appropriates the autumn Supplementary Estimate. It is the second Northern Ireland Appropriation Order to come before this House for the 1974–75 financial year and the sum to be appropriated by the Order is almost £32 million. This brings the total Estimates provision to date for 1974–75 to approximately £650 million.
More than half the additional provision is required to meet pay and price increases. The more significant items making up the balance are the £5·1 million in respect of the doubling of the selective employment payments to

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employers in Northern Ireland, the Consolidated Fund contribution of £2·3 million to the National Insurance Fund, and the £1·5 million required for the beef marketing subsidy scheme. My Lords, I beg to move.
Moved, That the Draft Appropriation (No. 2) (Northern Ireland) Order 1974, laid before the House on 21st November, be approved.—(Lord Donaldson of Kingsbridge.)
Lord BELSTEAD: My Lords, on the last of these Northern Ireland Orders today, there is one general question which I should like to put to the noble Lord. This Order, as the noble Lord explained, deals with some detailed sums of money which are scrutinised, I presume, by the Northern Ireland Department of Finance which, before Prorogation, was one of the Departments of the Northern Ireland Executive. Therefore these sums of money certainly went under the scrutiny of a Northern Ireland Department which had a Northern Ireland Head of Department. The question I want to ask the noble Lord is this: Is it not time that the Secretary of State considered providing some form of advisory committee so that he is not isolated from the views of people in Northern Ireland concerning legislation, which after all affects them, and so that Northern Ireland can see at first hand how money is being spent on services within the Province?
The kind of thing I find worrying and which I can foresee arising is what was referred to in a recent issue of Ulster Commentary, which said that the former Youth Employment Service—and education comes within this Order—was to be absorbed into a new all-age guidance and placement unit within the Northern Ireland Department of Manpower Services, and that both educational and industrial interests are to be represented on a new Youth Careers Guidance Committee. All this is going to require legislation, and presumably it will be by means of Order. This may well be right, but it is an important departure from existing practice in Northern Ireland. Therefore I should like to ask: In the interests of those affected by forthcoming legislation in Northern Ireland, and in the interests of those of us who are affected by the legislation because we are asked
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to consider it here at Westminster, is it not desirable now that the noble Lord's right honourable friend should consider that such Orders be looked at in Northern Ireland between the time that they are drafted by the Government Departments there and the time they are presented at Westminster?
I would only add that I have raised this point before with the noble Lord, though I deliberately have not pressed it because I realised the Government were bringing forward plans for the forthcoming Convention. However, it seems that the holding of the Convention and the ending of direct rule may be some time away, and it is for this reason and, having in mind that presumably further Orders are in the pipeline, that I venture to raise this matter again.
Lord DONALDSON of KINGSBRIDGE: My Lords, the noble Lord has raised a perfectly fair question. I should like to answer it in a rather roundabout way by saying that my right honourable friend the Secretary of State has recently let it be known that in conjunction with the right honourable gentleman the Leader of the House, he is considering setting up some kind of Northern Ireland committee. Details have not yet been released; but just as Northern Ireland is a part of this country it has its Parliamentary representatives, and provided they are represented in this way, that proposal might go some way towards answering the noble Lord's question. This is at the moment in hand, and I am inclined to think that an announcement has been made, though I have not had time to check that.
Secondly, once again I will report to my right honourable friend what the noble Lord has said. I did so last time and he was not ready to go into the matter in detail, for the reasons that the noble Lord has given. I think the answer may well be the same now, but such a course would require legislation—I am sure the noble Lord realises that—and there is a good deal of resistance to it. I think it is important to remember that Northern Ireland representatives in Westminster are going to be organised into some sort of committee in order to deal with these matters.
Lord SLATER: My Lords, would my noble friend state whether or not in

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another place the Government have been under severe pressure from representatives of that part of the United Kingdom in regard to private industry such as Harland and Wolff?—because many of us who come from there to here well remember the number of representations that were made to various Governments concerning the shipbuilding industry, which was responsible for a very large amount of employment within that part of the United Kingdom, and that they never missed a trick, so far as Governments were concerned, in regard to support grants for such a type of industry in Northern Ireland.
Lord DONALDSON of KINGS-BRIDGE: My Lords, I am not absolutely clear about the question which the noble Lord is asking. If he thinks that Northern Ireland business men never miss a trick, I think he is probably right—and good luck to them! But I do not think that is perhaps exactly what he meant. There are pressures, but of a perfectly normal kind, to assist major businesses that run into cash problems anywhere. I do not think that the problems of Harland and Wolff need to be looked at very differently from those of other major firms elsewhere; nor do I think that the Northern Ireland lobby is more effective than other lobbies; they all work hard.
Lord GARDINER: My Lords, I should like to ask my noble friend one question. These amounts, naturally, are mostly increases: indeed there are only three decreases. Why is the largest decrease under the heading of employment, training, rehabilitation and resettlement services? If my noble friend cannot give the answer today, perhaps he will be good enough to let me know later.
Lord DONALDSON of KINGS-BRIDGE: My Lords, I cannot tell my noble and learned friend today. What I can tell him is that these figures are bulk figures and certainly do not represent a decrease in the resettlement, after-care side of our business.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

HOME-GROWN CEREALS AUTHORITY LEVY SCHEME (APPROVAL) ORDER 1974
5.30 p.m.
Lord STRABOLGI Lord STRABOLGI rose to move, That the Home-Grown Cereals Authority Levy Scheme (Approval) Order 1974, laid before the House on 19th November, be approved. The noble Lord said: This Order provides for the industry's share of the Home-Grown Cereals Authority's finance to be raised in future by means of the levy on wheat, barley and oats purchased by dealers and processors from the growers. The Authority was set up in June 1965 for the purpose of improving the marketing of home-grown cereals. It has 23 members appointed by the Agricultural Ministers. Five Members, including the chairman and the deputy chairman, are independent, nine represent farming interests and nine represent dealers and processors.
Until the end of the 1972–73 cereal year, the Authority's main function was the operation of a forward contract bonus scheme under which bonuses totalling £1 million to £1·5 million annually were paid to wheat and barley growers who registered forward contracts. The Authority then decided to end this scheme since it had achieved its purpose persuading the growers that forward contracting was worth while. The Authority's main current activities are the provision of a market intelligence service for the cereals industry, and research and development. It has recently launched a wheat classification scheme designed to improve the marketing of home-grown wheat of good milling quality.
Apart from the forward contract bonus scheme, now discontinued, but which was financed entirely from the levy, and the cost of agency functions which are fully recouped, the Authority's activities have been financed half by the Exchequer and half by a levy on wheat and barley growers. This levy was collected by deduction from cereal deficiency payments, and it was recognised that with the phasing out of guarantees under the transition arrangements an alternative method of collection would have to be found. The need has been accelerated by the fact that, owing to high market prices, there are currently no deficiency payments from which levy could be collected.
The scheme that is now before the House was prepared and submitted to the Government by the Authority after consultation with the interests concerned. It provides for a levy to be paid to the Authority by dealers in, and processors of, home-grown cereals who purchase home-grown wheat, barley or oats from the grower. Dealers and processors in turn are empowered to recover 50 per cent. of the levy from the grower from whom they purchase and 25 per cent. from the dealer or processor to whom they sell. By spreading the levy liability in this way there is, I submit, only a very small burden on any one sector of the industry.
As required by Section 16(4) of the Cereals Marketing Act (as amended), the organisations representing the interests concerned have been consulted about the scheme. I am glad to report that all the interests agree about the scheme, which is considered to be the most convenient and equitable mehod of raising the levy under the provisions of the Act. The Scheme requires dealers and processors to register with the Authority, to keep records of purchases and sales of homegrown wheat, barley and oats and to submit returns. It also requires growers to keep records of sales of these cereals. The rate of levy to be charged per ton for the 1974–75 cereal year will be determined in a further Order under Section 13(3) of the Cereals Marketing Act 1965, which provided the present Order receives the approval of the House, will be laid before Parliament in the near future. It is expected that the Authority will need to raise about £50,000 by levy in the period from January to July 1975. The balance of expenditure in the 1974–75 cereal year—to be met from levy income—is being paid for out of levy money carried forward from a previous year.
The Government believe that the Home-Grown Cereals Authority is performing a very worthwhile service, and in accepting the new levy Scheme the cereals industry has indicated its willingness to make a contribution to enable it to continue its work. I submit that the scheme laid before your Lordships is as fair and reasonable an arrangement as could be devised within the provisions of the Cereals Marketing Act. I have no hesi-
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tation in recommending it to the House. My Lords, I beg to move.
Moved, That the Home-Grown Cereals Authority Levy Scheme (Approval) Order 1974, laid before the House on 19th November, be approved.—(Lord Strabolgi.)
5.35 p.m.
Earl FERRERS: My Lords, we are very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Strabolgi, for having explained the purpose of this Order, which is to make arrangements for the Home-Grown Cereals Authority different from those in the past. As I understand this, and I should be grateful if the noble Lord would correct me if I am wrong, 100 per cent. is to be found by the processor, of which he may collect 50 per cent. from the growers and 25 per cent. from anyone else to whom he may sell the corn.
The Home-Grown Cereals Authority has always been connected, certainly by most of us, with those forward contract schemes which it used to operate and to which the noble Lord has referred. One might think that as that scheme has now come to an end, the work of the Home-Grown Cereals Authority would be lessened considerably. If that be so, one might expect the expenditure of the Authority to be less in the future than it has been in the past. I wonder whether the noble Lord could let us know what has been the expenditure of the Home-Grown Cereals Authority over the last two years, and whether he could explain how it financed itself during this past year? As I understand it, it used to be financed from the deficiency payments scheme, but no deficiency payments have been made, certainly not over the last 12 months. It may be that it still has a reserve, but I should be grateful if the noble Lord would be good enough to explain whether or not its expenditure has decreased.
If he is able to give an indication of what the rate per ton is, although this may come in a later Order, it would be helpful. Although it is bound to be extremely small, would he give the assurance that the Authority will take every precaution—simply because it is such a small figure—to ensure that every possible economy is exercised, because it is very easy when the levy is small for the

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total to become rather large and for expenditure to become greater than it should be.
5.39 p.m.
Lord STRABOLGI: I am grateful to the noble Earl for the general welcome that he has given to this Order. He asked me various questions. With regard to the first question about the amount to be found and the proportions, it will be 50 per cent. from the growers, 25 per cent. from the dealers or processors who buy first-hand, and then another 25 per cent., as he surmised, from the dealers or processors to whom they sell. With regard to the Authority's expenditure, I can give the noble Earl some figures. The out-turn for 1973–74 was £351,377, which was made up of administration £304,018, and research and development £47,359. This will increase, of course, as does everything else, for 1974–75 up to £389,000 in roughly the same proportions, and again, for the revised estimate for 1974–75, up to £385,000.
The noble Lord asked me how the Authority was financed during the past couple of years in the absence of deficiency payments from which levies could be deducted. Since the wheat levy could not be collected in 1972–73, the Authority had to borrow from the banks in order to meet payments, mainly bonuses, to wheat growers under the forward contract bonus scheme, which would normally have been financed from the wheat levy. As the wheat levy could not be recovered in 1973–74, arrangements were announced in April to advance up to £700,000 to the Authority to the extent to which it was needed. Income from the barley levy in 1972–73 exceeded expenditure apportioned to barley, and although this money could not be used towards writing off the wheat deficit because the apportionment of the expenditure had been made between wheat and barley, there was no legal objection to using it towards expenditure in subsequent years and it is currently being used to meet 50 per cent. of the Authority's costs. The noble Lord also asked me about the rent of the levy; I think that this is 1p per ton.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

MORAL EDUCATION IN STATE SCHOOLS
5.42 p.m.
Lord HYLTON Lord HYLTON rose to ask Her Majesty's Government what is their attitude to the Social Morality Council and in particular to the need for moral education in State schools. The noble Lord said: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper. I should like to take this opportunity of thanking in advance those noble Lords who are to speak later this evening, and also a number of noble Lords who have written to me personally regretting their inability to be present. I should like to submit that the social wellbeing of the whole community depends on the social morality of each of its members. That will, I hope, be accepted. Nevertheless, social morality is such a new idea that it may be helpful to give one or two examples. It is perhaps first of all easier to think of examples of social immorality. The following examples occurred to me: littering towns or the countryside, polluting our rivers, drunken driving, misleading commercial and political propaganda. These things happen; they are restrained in varying degrees by law.
Going to the other extreme, and trying to give a few examples of positive social morality, I should like to put forward the work of those who promote in any way the sacredness of human life; those who strive for racial harmony; those who, in the present circumstances, are trying to keep the social contract. These things which, for the most part, are not called for by law, depend on the voluntary good will of the individual. Your Lordships will notice that I have deliberately not chosen any examples from the field of sexual morality. I have done so because it seems to me that sexual morality is sometimes a matter of personal, private morality, and it is sometimes a matter of concern to the general body of society and the community as a whole. Therefore it is sometimes one and sometimes the other; it is seldom clear cut. I also wanted to emphasise strongly that social morality is something much wider than just sexual morality.
If I may come to the Social Morality Council itself, I should declare an interest because I am an ordinary Back-Bench

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member of this Council. It was formed in 1966 in order to promote morality in all aspects of the life of the community. Its members include Christians, Humanists, Jews and Muslims. They are coming together because they want to replace sterile polemics such as have gone on down the centuries with constructive dialogue. They come together in search of fundamental values which can unite them despite their differences of religious belief or other matters which normally divide people. They are seeking the common ground between, on the one hand, authoritarianism and, on the other hand, permissiveness. The Council have promoted a number of conferences and have also published Reports. The first of these was the Report on Moral and Religious Education in County Schools.
This Report was produced in 1970 and it was mentioned in a debate in your Lordships' House on 31st March 1971. It was, I am glad to say, welcomed from both Front Benches by Lord Garnsworthy and my noble friend Lord Belstead. I am delighted to see that my noble friend Lord Belstead is speaking later this evening. Then came a Report on the future of broadcasting. That was published in January of this year. In January of next year there will appear a Report on education and drug dependence, and that will be followed by, as it were, the second volume on moral and religous education. This one will deal with primary and nursery schools. That is expected some time in the spring of 1975. The Council is a voluntary body, a very small one, almost a pygmy one but still, I hope, a significant pygmy.
I turn now to the question of moral education. This is not something new; it is something which has been on the agenda for many years. As long ago as 1843 the great Earl of Shaftesbury, when still in another place, moved a Motion on "Diffusing the benefits and blessings of a moral and religious education". I like the way he linked it because it is important to emphasise that moral education is not something to replace religious education; it is badly needed in the present climate to supplement and complement whatever goes on in the field of religious education. I should like to ask the Government whether they look on moral education as something of real importance. If they do, on what scale are they prepared to
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see it funded? We are aware that very large sums are spent annually on road safety education, some of it in schools, some of it outside schools. We know that about £1 million a year goes to the Health Education Council. We know £90 million goes to the Arts in one form of support or another. I hope that this evening the Government will be able to give us some idea of their thinking on the relative priorities which ought to be accorded to moral education.
Next I come to the national moral education project. The aims of this were stated in a letter to The Times on 21st October 1974, signed by Bishop Butler and Mr. H. J. Blackham, who were respectively the President and Chairman of the Social Morality Council. They said:
"The chief aims of the Project, given the resources, are first to create the comprehensive support and information service for teachers and parents, for which the need is felt and which has already led to the establishment of a small national centre; secondly, to promote a closer partnership in moral education between home and school, so that they do not, as too often happens, work at cross-purposes."
The small national centre referred to has, in fact, been established with premises in Goldsmiths' College, one of the component colleges of the University of London. It employs a full-time director. It has succeeded in enlisting the support of two Secretaries of State for Education in successive Governments, in the persons of Mrs. Thatcher and Mr. Prentice. It has had considerable co-operation already from the BBC and the IBA. It has formed an advisory council, of which the members are 43 of the major national bodies who are concerned, either professionally or voluntarily, with education; and the chairman of this advisory council is Sir Lincoln Ralphs, the Chairman of the Schools Council.
So the national moral education project has made a good start. It is important that it should have done so because, in my view, no teacher can teach in any school without conveying something of his own moral values to those he teaches. He or she is being assessed all the time, whatever the subject, by the pupils in the school. They may accept the moral values they are offered; they may reject them. But it is important that teachers should be aware of this, and should

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therefore carry out their teaching having been themselves educated as to moral values.
The finances of the moral education project, however, are most uncertain. It is costing at the moment something like £25,000 per year to run. The Department of Education and Science made a grant of £12,000 to cover the two years from July 1973 to July 1975. There is unfortunately at the moment, I understand, no guarantee at all that any further Government support will be available after the summer of 1975. It is quite certain, I am afraid, that the Social Morality Council as the sponsor of this venture will be quite unable from their own resources to fund the project in perpetuity. There is something of a deadlock, my Lords. The Government have said they would consider helping if other resources could be found. On the other hand, the grant-making trusts take the position that they will not carry the whole baby, but they might do something if the Government could be more forthcoming than they have been up to now.
So I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, will be able to give some positive and favourable news this evening on the question of finance for this moral education project. I think your Lordships will agree that it is important that a project of this kind should be organised and conducted by a voluntary body. This accords with our whole tradition in the field of education. It is perhaps even more important that the sponsoring body should be one which itself is based on a moral consensus between religious people and Humanists and free thinking people. My Lords, if the subject is important, and if the sponsorship is right, then I hope it will be possible for the Government to announce that national funding will be forthcoming and that there will be continuity in what I consider to be a most important matter.
5.55 p.m.
Lord BEAUMONT of WHITLEY: My Lords, my purpose in intervening in the Unstarred Question debate this evening is not to make an original contribution, but merely briefly to add my voice to the disquiet behind the Question which the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, is asking and which many of us are grateful to him
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for asking. I do not usually appear in your Lordships' House as one of those who are wagging their heads and complaining about the terrible immorality of modern days. But nobody in this society, or any other, can afford to be complacent about the standard of morals. I do not mean by this a number of the things which I would regard as a misplaced understanding of what is morality, and what is often meant when people speak about it in broad terms. I am certainly not prepared to say that we have any evidence to show that our present age is more immoral than any other. But I think that almost everyone in your Lordships' House would agree, unless chopping logic to the nth degree, that there is such a thing as morality, that it is an important part of the make-up of any coherent society, and that it is a good thing if it can be cultivated.
The simplistic reaction to dislike of any feeling that there is widespread immorality in society is that we should teach our children what they should believe, that there should be more definite Christian teaching and similar prescriptions. I believe—and I speak as a practising Christian—that, although there may be some element of good in these prescriptions, unless they are produced in the right way they can easily be counter-productive. We cannot in the last resort tell a person what he must believe. A person must come to his or her own beliefs, if those beliefs are to be productive of good and not of evil. People need to be able to work out rationally their own standards of belief and standards of behaviour. Good teachers in every type of school have always done this but they have often done it, almost literally, by guess and by God. Philosophers and moral theologians have always known that it is not so easy to know how to teach people to make their own moral decisions and to help them to do it, and that the problems involved are incredibly complex, and certainly not as simple as a great many of us who speak rather glibly in public may sometimes make out.
We are lucky in this country that in the past few years the pioneer work of John Wilson and the old Farmington Trust has progressed the ability to know how one sets about this kind of education. I think we are pioneers of the world in this area, and the work that has

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been done is tremendously exciting and can be translated into the kind of approach to teaching moral education which can relatively easily be used in the classroom. The Social Morality Council has taken up a great deal of this work and is seeing that it is broadcast and popularised and that it takes place, and I believe that its importance cannot be overestimated. It is far more important that citizens are helped to make up their minds rationally on moral judgments, than that they should know about chemistry, history or geography—even about the environment or about reading, writing and figuring.
We heard in the debate earlier this evening, when we were discussing the Committee stage of the Safety of Sports Grounds Bill, a passionate plea for sport as an important part of the formation of character. I would not underestimate that; I think it can be very useful. But it seems to me that what the noble Lord said was a real pointer to this debate—to the fact that to help people to form their own characters, and to form them well and on a true basis, is one of the most useful things that society as a whole can do. That is why, without knowing very much about the details of the Government's position apropos of the Council, I very much hope, as do a number of my colleagues, that they will give full backing to this tremendously important work.
6.2 p.m.
Lord SOPER: My Lords, I should like to thank the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, for raising this issue. Professionally I am almost irresistibly drawn towards the social morality, and I entirely concur with the last speaker, that if we are not in a terminal condition of immorality things are quite bad. I must declare an interest in the Social Morality Council. I am one of its advisers and what benefits I draw are purely spiritual and not financial. I know enough about the Council to believe that it is set upon the right lines and is doing a very good piece of social investigation, let alone the particular projects to which it has given its care and which have appeared in pamphlet form.
I should like to congratulate the Council on its President. I have the highest regard for Bishop Butler. I believe he is a very great man in many ways, and if his golden opinions, which I happen to
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share with almost every other Methodist, are heard by an apostolic delegate—and indeed that there were certain results which flowed from it—I, for one, believe that the Christian Church—evangelical, apostolic, catholic and reformed—would be the better for it. That may be a rather impertinent intrusion, but I hope it will be taken in the right spirit.
It happens that this debate coincides with a resurgence of clamour and sometimes of appeal for moral judgments, and it should surprise no one because were we to be asked what are three of the outstanding issues with which we are confronted, I daresay we should all include in that number the social contract, free collective bargaining and a plea for unity in the community in which we live. These are essentially moral propositions if they are to be worked out to any effective result. In fact they would seem to me to demand another triumverate: faith, hope and charity—probably also in that order—if we are to proceed to the eventual success which is anticipated through the proper use of these political and economic measures.
I think that there must be an increasing number of people who recognise that we need a better spirit—and a maintenance of that spirit if these projects are to fructify into a decent and civilised society. Therefore I would beg leave to introduce into this discussion some of the issues, complex and profoundly difficult, which must confront anybody who embarks on an adventure of understanding of this social morality problem. It is not easy and simplistic; it is the more difficult because of radical changes which have taken place since the first implementation of the religious syllabus in the 'forties, indeed since people have come to reflect upon some of the emergent disasters as well as effects of the Second World War.
The first of these is that there has been a progressive decline in religious belief, so that the trunk of the tree of morality has in very large degree been separated from the roots of theology in which alone I suspect it can finally be established and can fructify. I know that my friends the Humanists would want to paraphrase that statement, if they did not want entirely to contradict it; and I for one am more than glad that this Social Morality Council is on all-fours with a great many divergent and competing reviews about

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theology and the lack of it, the necessity of it or the necessary ambiguity of it. But I feel that, sooner or later, there must be some assertion as to the basic kind of world in which morality is to be expressed before we can embark upon what at worst can only be in those regards a hoax and at best a hazard. However, I would not press that point, but simply regard the problem of morality today as the more difficult to evaluate precisely because it falls within a category which regards itself as self-sufficient rather than a category of theological dependency.
In the second place, there is a marked change from the emphasis upon morality as being a purely personal relationship between man and his neighbour or man and his God and the social morality which is a much more complex issue. When I was a boy I was trained in the belief that I should observe a teetotal attitude towards alcohol, that I should not gamble and we, as Methodists, were not allowed to dance, though we were permitted rhythmic exercises—and it is astonishing what we were able to get in under that general category. But though I am still a teetotaller, and though I still do not gamble, and though my leg permits me very little dancing, I am certain that this emphasis upon morality, as if it has a purely personal relationship, has very properly given place to a much more complex attitude—morality as a social requirement—if society as a whole is to survive.
Here there is a paradox, that many a sinful individual has contributed majestically to the general progress of humanity, and I suppose the picaresque hero in this category would be none other than Kemal Attaturk. Therefore there is a difference between the piety which was regarded as the supreme expression of morality not so very long ago and the social content of that morality which in many cases, if not independent of the private moral behaviour of those who agitate in the interests of that social morality, nevertheless does not determine it. In other words, those who think that social morality is the finer breath and spirit of personal piety have a lot to learn about the way in which scoundrels can improve the society in which they live.
But I would submit to your Lordships that the greatest change that has taken
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place is that we now live a multi-racial society, and there has come to all kinds of people who hitherto were ignorant of the facts, the awareness of the competitive social claims of other religions. For many years I have been addicted to a practice which was very much the work of my spiritual forefather, John Wesley. So far as I know, though he got into all sorts of trouble in the open air, and on one occasion was assailed by a gentleman with a meat chopper in Nottingham, he was never confronted by Buddhist priests. I have been so confronted. Your Lordships may or may not know that not so long ago the Buddhist community in Asia decided to send a number of missionaries in order to prevent the final catastrophe of a violent Western Christiandom. They started, very properly, in the North of Scotland, but they worked their way South and I found them in Hyde Park. You will not be surprised to learn that these particular advocates of Buddhism knew rather more about Buddhism than I did. In a multi-racial society where there is the Hindu, the Brahmin, the Buddhist and the Islamic believer, the Humanist and the Communist—after all, Communism is one of the last of the heresies of the Christian faith—it is not surprising that to "railroad" people into an assumption that they can automatically see morality in terms of a Christian ethic is no longer tolerable and is an insult to other religions, since we do not hold in Christianity a monopoly of truth, let alone a monopoly of goodness. Here again is a problem for social morality which is comparatively new.
But, my Lords, there is one overarching problem in the field of social morality. If I were not to impinge upon the debate which will take place in your Lordships' House in two days' time, I should beg to remind myself and to offer to you as a proposition which is beyond dispute that we live in a society in which the social morality of the necessity for the abhorrence of violence is as yet an unsolved problem. To put it crudely, a bomber who, in the midst of war, kills indiscriminately hundreds of children as well as adults in Dresden may well be decorated. A bomber who the other week threw his bomb into a public house in Birmingham is very properly execrated. There is a double standard in the field of violence to which we give our assent or withdraw our assent, and one of the

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greatest difficulties that confronts anybody who endeavours to teach the practice of moral values is that he is confronted with this double standard.
I know that there are many things which can be said on both sides, and I have no wish in any way to be included among those who seek to palliate the crimes to which I have made reference. What I have said is that in the kind of multi-racial society in which we now live, with Bishop Muzorewa the other day signing again his own agreement to continued violent opposition to the apartheid proposals included in the programmes of Southern Africa, and with the World Council of Churches, through one of its committees, contributing to organisations which do not in fact prohibit violence but in some cases encourage it, there is a cruel dilemma; and if such a body as the Social Morality Council can do something to clear the minds of people who will be growing up in the world, dangerous as it is now and more dangerous as it is likely to be, then it will be rendering an incomparable service to people who are at one and the same time recognising in their very bones that a new moral spirit is required and yet are bewildered and become cynical, precisely because they can find no answer to the pressing problems and the urgencies of their daily life.
My Lords, I could have wished that the last thing I have to say had been said by a layman; I think that it would come more effectively from one who did not wear the kind of collar that I wear. I am completely and utterly convinced that although we may be no worse than our fathers, we are certainly not morally adequate to stand up to the stresses which are greater than those which they had to confront. Nothing seems to me to be more obvious than that we need neither a recrudescence of metaphysical theology—. I think we could give that a moratorium for quite a long time—nor the profession of denominational extravagances or peculiarities; but we desperately need a recognition of the fundamental moral issues which belong to any society which can claim to be civilised. I remember that on one occasion this question was asked of Dr. Eden. He was asked whether there are in the world, among all kinds of people, any absolute moral
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attitudes. After pondering for a moment he said this: "There are two things which are utterly wrong. One is cruelty. The other is mocking the insane". There may be many other things which are utterly and absolutely wrong and there may be other things which are utterly and absolutely right. Christians cannot pretend that they have a monopoly of intelligence to find out what they are—Humanists or atheists. Of course the Jews and all kinds of other people from East and West are required in this adventure.
If the last part of what I have had to say sounds rather like a sermon, then it is your fault, my Lords, because your Lordships have introduced a matter upon which ultimately religion and morals are not taught. They are caught, and they are caught by the infusion of a new spirit and by a new light. I, for one, am very glad to have taken part in this debate, and I hope that the Social Morality Council will be supported in the imperative work by which alone it seems to me that we still stand a chance of surviving our present dolours and entering into a Promised Land.
6.16 p.m.
Lord BELSTEAD: My Lords, the House will be grateful to my noble friend Lord Hylton for asking this Question of the Government this evening, for already the speeches which have been made in this debate—not least the speech which has just been made by the noble Lord, Lord Soper—have provided some answers to the question, why moral education? If my noble friend will forgive me, I will assume that the last part of his Question refers to all schools, because surely the pressures of society and the demands of life make it clear that each of us needs support and guidance, and I think it is interesting that this need is clearly understood by young people.
The Schools Council's project on moral education, Lifeline, which was made a publication in 1972, found that at least 70 per cent. of 15-year-olds wanted their school to help them in two ways—first by increasing their understanding of what makes an action good or bad, and secondly by assisting with solutions to their interpersonal difficulties. Guidance to choose what is right, support to withstand what is wrong and sympathy to help with personal problems lie, I suppose, at the core of

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moral education. To the layman it may seem that here there is a conflict, or at least an overlapping with religious education. It is for this reason that I personally am most grateful for the guidance which has been given in the speeches which have just been made and also for the fact that the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Bristol is taking part in this debate.
I think it is worth recalling that in 1970 the Social Morality Council published its report Religious and Moral Education in County Schools and that the Durham Commission published its Report on religious education only a few months later, which was entitled The Fourth R. Both of these Reports refer to the aims of religious education in similar terms. The Social Morality Council said that religious education should
"enable a boy or girl to have a proper understanding of what is meant by a religious approach to life."
The Durham Report defined the aim of religious education as
"to explore the place and significance of religion in human life and so to make a distinctive contribution to each pupil's search for a faith by which to live."
Noble Lords will correct me if I am wrong, and the right reverend Prelate will certainly do so in a moment if that is the case, but it would appear that there is therefore no difference of opinion about the value of religious education for educational purposes and that there is every reason for religious and moral education to exist together in the school curriculum.
Perhaps one of the most compelling arguments in support of moral education as it has been propounded by my noble friend Lord Hylton today is that delinquency and crime and all that is destructive for young people are threats which are surely never solved solely by repression. The rule of law must surely also be supported by positive reasoning. So far as the teaching profession is concerned, this is something which can entail a long and uphill struggle, often in very unpromising circumstances. But, my Lords, although I realise that teachers are faced with formidable doubts about the double standards to which the noble Lord, Lord Soper, referred, I feel that the struggle involved in trying to offer positive reasoning is something which the
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teacher simply cannot avoid. The Schools Council's Lifeline Report, in a striking phrase, declared that teachers must care for pupils if they expect their pupils to care for others, and it inevitably follows that the personal example of the individual schoolmaster and individual schoolmistress is crucial in this field.
Some time ago I visited a borstal which has been developed from an agricultural college. Many of the boys there spend much of their time working on the farm or in the extensive gardens which are attached to the institution and I was told that it is remarkable what an influence the agricultural and horticultural staff have, and that in several cases it is they who hear from boys after borstal release. The reason for this link remained unexplained. Perhaps it is due to a feeling of permanence or an example of consistency which, after all, are characteristics of many countrymen; possibly the bond was created by a sense of humour. Almost certainly I think it has been formed through the influence of an older man who is seen to be really competent at his job. At any rate, here is an example of young men, unusually resistant to authority, accepting guidance from the way of life and the outlook of other people.
This evidence rejects the notion that the teacher, like the chairman of a meeting, should preserve an air of fine impartiality. Of course I would accept that sometimes a non-committal attitude may be tactful or desirable, but in practice I do not believe that a teacher can or should avoid giving a lead on value judgments. At least that is my view, and I think I still hold to it despite what the noble Lord, Lord Soper, said, although I may very well be wrong. I say that provided that the lead on value judgments is given with fairness and is given with consistency, and if this seems to place a very heavy responsibility upon the teaching profession, at the same time it carries with it its own reward, for let us remember that "imitation is the sincerest form of flattery".
The Unstarred Question opens wide fields for education which other noble Lords may care to pursue. I will just mention four others. For some boys and girls perhaps boarding education, or at least a brief spell living and learning away from home, may help to promote the self-

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which is needed in any young person's development. Similarly, adventure training or remedial education may fulfil particular needs, perhaps at a critical moment in a young person's life. And for all concerned the community life of a school is bound to be a tremendous influence, provided that compassion, cooperation, the ability to accept responsibility and offer sympathy, the courage to face difficulties and reach decisions, can be developed naturally yet consciously within the school from day to day.
I hope your Lordships will not consider that I am steeped in immorality if just for a moment I criticise the name "moral education". It sounds just a bit too good to be true, but I must confess that I have no suitable alternative to offer except to point out that moral education can surely never be a single entity; it must be composed of a diversity of ways for developing social and moral responsibilities, whether at school or at home. However, so far as the schools are concerned there is, I believe, one common factor in moral education; namely, the need, in the teaching profession, for more in-service training. It was of course the most widely endorsed recommendation of the Committee chaired by the noble Lord, Lord James of Rusholme, that opportunities for in-service training should be expanded, and this aim was provided for in the education White Paper of 1972.
I should like to ask the Government what progress has been possible in these difficult times towards implementing the White Paper target of a 3 per cent. release to be achieved by 1981, and I would also hope that the Government still support, as a matter of policy, the intention that teachers in their first employment should be released and should receive the support of professional teachers within their own school. All these things result from the work done by the noble Lord, Lord James of Rusholme, and his colleagues. Increased opportunities for in-service training will surely assist the work of the Social Morality Council which, as my noble friend Lord Hylton has told us, is about to publish not one but two more reports, and of the Schools Council which has produced some interesting teaching materials as part of its Lifeline project. In addition to this, many people would argue that the relevance of subject disciplines to the lives of pupils can be
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explained and developed best by the discussion and study which in-service training can provide.
If in-service training is vital for the effective dissemination of research and ideas on moral education, for initial training there remains the responsibility for the colleges and departments of education to impart to their students the understanding that pupils must be helped to choose and to care. In this process, the voluntary colleges obviously have their part to play, and I should like to take the opportunity of this debate also to ask the Government whether they can give the House any information about the effect which the adjustment of teacher training numbers will have upon these valuable institutions; namely, the voluntary colleges of education. I ask this particularly because I understand that the Farmington Trust is currently undertaking work on this subject at Culham College.
My noble friend Lord Hylton has given the House an opportunity to discuss a subject which, on any calculation, must be of immense importance. In all of this the Social Morality Council has played, and is playing, a significant part and I hope that the Government will be able to help to ensure the continuation of the Council's work.
6.27 p.m.
The Lord Bishop of BRISTOL: My Lords, I cannot claim to speak with the intimate knowledge of some other contributors to this debate, either of the Social Morality Council or of the operations of the educational profession. But I welcome the opportunity of intervening, first because this project of the Social Morality Council seems to me characteristically to have the integrity and the competence which those of us who know anything about its work have learned to expect. I am not a member of the Council, but I was a remarkably ineffectual member of the Working Party which produced the report on the future of broadcasting, in which I was invited to participate on the strength of six years as chairman of the Religious Advisory Committee of the BBC and the ITA. There I caught a glimpse of the high standards of competence of the projects which the Social Morality Council undertakes, which therefore made me approach this project

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with expectations which are the more fulfilled as I look into it.
Secondly, I find myself speaking in some sense in tribute to the late Ian Ramsey, one time Bishop of Durham and a beloved as well as respected Member of your Lordships' House, because that report The Fourth R to which the noble Lord, Lord Belstead, has already referred, revealed a comprehensive and penetrating analysis of the contemporary educational scene, which I would agree is fully consonant with the kind of thing which this project of the Social Morality Council espouses.
There are just two points which I wish to make from that background. First, I want to emphasise from a particular angle a point which has already been made by my noble friend Lord Soper; that is to say, the significance of moral education in an increasingly pluralist society. Obviously, those who have religious convictions will continue to set extremely high store upon the opportunity for those convictions to be built into the educational structure of society in all possible ways. This was one of the cardinal points of the 1944 Act. There have always been those whose religious convictions remain dissatisfied with an educational pattern which seems to them to give less than complete expression to the convictions which they would convey.
If I might produce another quotation about religious teaching in board school in the 1870s, Lord Shaftesbury said:
"Such a meagre, washy pointless thing, that when thinking people might complain of what was left out no living soul could make a grievance of what was left in".
Even if religious education, to the more enthusiastic supporters of a particular approach, seems hopelessly watered down, there is still an important task to be done in that area. Religious education still has a part to play in the educational pattern of our times, and it is not incompatible with what is here meant by moral education. In a pluralist society of this kind, there is an even stronger case for saying that both should go on simultaneously.
My Lords, I am reinforced in this conviction by experience of the type of invita
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tation which I sometimes receive and which I find the most refreshing among the often tedious roles that a Bishop has to perform—that is, an invitation to take part in an open forum of fifth- and sixth-formers on the wider issues of social morality—for here is revealed a width of consensus which is not available in any single religious approach. Following the 1944 Education Act, one of the unhappy experiences was the discovery that the paucity of sufficiently committed Christian teachers means that if religious education is left in the hands of those who quite patently do not believe it (and who quite often say that they do not believe it) this does the cause of religion more harm than good. But I am convinced there is a possibility of a consensus in the area of what we are describing as moral education which is far wider, and which could be the subject of most searching and exciting teaching and learning relationships.
I greatly enjoy the sort of open forum in which—with all the images that one supposes that fifth- and sixth-formers have in their minds when confronted with a Bishop, alongside a whole lot of other people from different faiths and backgrounds—we enter into really lively, two-way conversation in the school conference about such things as why truth is better than lie, why kindness is better than cruelty, what race is, what pollution is, and, inevitably, though I share with others gratitude on finding the word "moral" being used for something else as well as sex, all the questions which the young wish to raise in that area as well.
In this concept of moral education, I believe it would be possible for the whole range of conviction which the Social Morality Council covers—Christians, Humanists and all those who take seriously the human personality and its sacredness, who take seriously the kind of moral laws of the eggshell thin civilisation which is so easily cracked—to be understood by a really honest sharing between pupil and teacher of the things that really matter. Here is a project which would find a very wide welcome and which opens up the possibility for in-service training, for the introduction into colleges of education, as part of the preparation for a teaching career, a concept of the whole approach to caring about truth.

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My Lords, my second concern is the wish to endorse that part of the social morality education project which sees it essentially as a partnership between the school and the home. I believe there are literally millions of parents who are unhappy with the moral bewilderment of their children. They feel sadly incompetent to give the children the sure morality they can see they need, because the parents themselves have had it shot from underneath them. So there are parents who, having their own clear standards of morality, find themselves unable somehow to communicate with their own young about those moral standards; and there are parents who, having their own standards, find that what is being taught in school is tugging in the opposite direction from what is taught at home.
There is no more disheartening experience for either the conscientious parent or the conscientious teacher than to become aware of a serious conflict between the values expressed at home and those expressed in schools. Therefore, it seems to me that any project of this kind to try to create a new seriousness of partnership between school and home in things of fundamental importance is one that ought to be greatly encouraged. My Lords, I join in the expression of hope which the Question of the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, brings before us, that a project of such value will certainly not fail for lack of financial support.
6.38 p.m.
Baroness MASHAM of ILTON: My Lords, first I should like to thank the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, for asking this Question. I should also like to congratulate the noble Lord on doing so, because when asking some noble Lords in your Lordship's House about their views on this subject, they told me that this is the subject from which they often shy away. Also, I have asked the noble Earl my husband, who is chairman of the schools committee of his local authority, about this, and he said, "They do not discuss the subject". The matter of morality, especially in our maintained schools, is of the utmost importance, as other noble Lords have said.
The noble Lord, Lord Hylton, like myself, has young children growing up.
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As parents, we are only too aware of the pressures on young people today. Many mothers must ask themselves the question, "Are we putting our children at risk in sending them to school?" But we have no option. The State tells us that our children must go to school. Many teachers and parents are disturbed by the increase in juvenile delinquency, often of a violent and vicious nature, by young teenagers resorting to drugs and alcohol, by the permissiveness which leads to the spread of VD and the procuring of abortions. We learn of increasing indiscipline in our schools and colleges of education; we learn of the alarming number of illiterate school-leavers, and the high number of truancies. I ask the noble Lord the Minister: Is moral education in our schools being sadly neglected? If so, what are the Government going to do about it?
My Lords, I really think that schools differ tremendously in their effect on children, and it is the example of the teachers which seems to be the main factor, especially the heads. To give a small example, our boy went to a school for two years. I found he was making little progress with his lessons, and I detected he was dyslectic. He had, however, learned and when he came home was using extremely bad language. With the support of an educational psychologist, we removed him from the school and sent him to another school which used more modern methods of teaching. He still finds learning extremely difficult, but within a few days he had stopped swearing and has not sworn since, and altogether he is a happier personality. The children at the two schools are of the same age group, but the attitudes and the results of the schools seem quite different.
I should like to ask the Minister whether he thinks that teachers and parents should together be aiming for the results of moral education to be the emotional stability of our children. It is difficult to teach children to understand their own and other people's feelings without giving them the chance to make moral decisions. Should not the development of sensitivity, understanding and conscience be brought into all school subjects, including sport? Does the

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Minister agree with what a Cardinal once said:
"The greatest good we can do to others is not to give them our wealth, but to show them their own"?
My Lords, the raising of this Question today in your Lordships' House will at least give encouragement to some teachers, parents and interested people who feel that there is an urgent need for more moral teaching. If the Government cannot give a hopeful answer today, these people who are striving for good will feel that they are fighting a losing battle, which in some schools is already evident. Also, I hope that the Government can give continued support to the Social Morality Council, so that its members can carry on working together for the betterment of our society and so that their work can become more widely known throughout the country.
6.43 p.m.
Lord BROCKWAY: My Lords, this is the second speech I have delivered today, and I am only intervening tonight because I am a supporter of the Social Morality Council. That Council unites Roman Catholics, Anglicans, Free Churchmen and Humanists. I am speaking tonight as a Humanist, and probably all those who have taken part in the debate earlier are Christians. I reject the theology of the Churches; I do not claim to be a Christian.
Nevertheless, my Lords, those of us who are Humanists are just as concerned about the need for a moral and ethical code as any Christian can probably be. Other speakers, including the noble Baroness, Lady Masham of Ilton, have referred to the fact that in our society today the impulses and inspirations of the past are disappearing, and no new moral and ethical code has taken their place, no inspiration. I am old enough to have lived through that experience, the experience when at the beginning of this century religion in the home, the influence of parents upon their children, the ethic which that involved, was a determining factor in conduct. That influence has decreased, and we are now passing through a transitional stage; the moral imperatives which prevailed when religion was dominant in the home have no longer that wide authority; yet we have not reached a moral and ethical code which can take their place.
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My Lords, I am very sensitive to the deeper convictions and feelings of people, and therefore I speak with some hesitation, but we have to face the fact that today the Christian religion and Christian theology is losing its hold upon a large section of the population. I do not believe very much in opinion polls, but there was recently an opinion poll, conducted by one of the recognised associations which devise these referenda, on the question of the acceptance of religion. I can hardly believe its return myself, probably greatly exaggerated, but still expressing something which is occurring today and which we must all face. In a poll of 1,093 persons, it showed that those who believed in God were 29 per cent., those who believed in a creative life force, which expresses my own philosophy, were 35 per cent., atheists were only 6 per cent., and the "don't-knows" were a large proportion, 39 per cent. It is in that situation that we now have to work out a moral and ethical code and an inspiration which will make for a better life.
There is the second difficulty to which my noble, and, if I may say so, revered friend Lord Soper spoke. We are now living in a community where there are not only those who have Christian traditions, but Hindu, Islamic, Buddhist, many races, and I think that most Christians today will recognise that those religions have contributed to good life as much as the Christian religion has done. This is a second reason why we must find a moral and an ethical code which will embody and combine the religious faiths and which will also be acceptable to those of us who do not accept the theologies of the religions. There is a third reason and it is that it is difficult today to know what the theology of the Christian religion is. In my young days it was the new theology of the Rev. R. J. Campbell. More recently it has been the theology of the late Bishop of Woolwich. To seek that teachers shall reflect that theology, and that theology only, has now become impossible.
For these three reasons we have to find a moral and ethical code deeper than all the separate theologies and acceptable to those who are religious and those who are not. We must have an inspiration of a society for which they would work, and which will be as compelling as religious motives in the past. For these reasons, I regard the efforts of the Social Morality

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Council, representing Christians of all the Churches and those of us who are Humanists as well, in trying to find a solution of this problem which is so deep in our society, as so important. I hope that they will enable us to go through this transitional period of disbelief into a more glorious belief, which will be an inspiration for the generations to follow to build the better human society which we are seeking.
6.52 p.m.
Lord VERNON: My Lords, as the last speaker before the Government spokesman in what has been an extraordinarily interesting debate, I wish to concentrate on an aspect of the subject which has not yet been covered, although it has been touched on. Most of us would agree that there is a need for greater moral education both at parent and at school level, but we perhaps differ on how far that education should go, and especially on the part which should be played by sex education. My noble friend Lord Hylton said that he was specifically excluding sex education.
Lord HYLTON: My Lords, if my noble friend will give way, may I say that I did not by any means exclude it. I simply did not draw my examples of morality and immorality from that field, because, if he recalls, sometimes it is a private and personal matter and sometimes it is a public matter.
Lord VERNON: My Lords, I am sorry if I misrepresented my noble friend, but I do want to touch a little further on this aspect. I am one of those who believe that the State should assume a much greater responsibility for sex education than it does at the present time. This is partly because parents so often fail to fulfil their responsibilities in this field—or, if they do fulfil them, they do so very badly—and partly it is because of the very serious situation which we now face over unwanted pregnancies. Of course it is possible to argue that any sexual relations outside marriage are immoral and that moral education should never, in any circumstances, encourage such relations. I am afraid that I believe that one has to be realistic in these matters, and one has to take account of prevailing sexual habits and seek to mitigate their worst effects,
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and in doing so one also has to strike a balance.
Consider some of the facts. According to the Registrar General's quarterly return, in 1972 about 70,000 (or nearly 10 per cent.) of the total number of live births were illegitimate, and in that year there were 116,000 legal abortions and perhaps 25,000 illegal abortions. Also in 1972—and this is a rather terrifying fact—74 per cent. of all recorded conceptions to girls aged 16 to 19 took place outside marriage. That is a mixture of terminations to single girls, pre-marital conceptions, and illegitimate births.
The Lane Committee, in paragraph 527 of its Report on the Working of the Abortion Act, stated that the problem of induced abortion, and many other problems as well, would disappear if unwanted pregnancies ceased to occur. The Committee also expressed its belief that a greater knowledge of unwanted pregnancies, and how they might be avoided, would lead to a considerable reduction in their numbers, and expressed the importance of information and education activities. I am sure we all wish to see a reduction in the number of unwanted pregnancies, and especially a reduction in the number of abortions. One of the most effective ways of achieving this, I submit, is that there should be given to children at school in their early teens a thorough grounding in responsible parenthood and in methods of contraception, and such guidance should form part of a general education in morality and civic responsibility. It is only a part, but it is a very important part. The Government may not be able to instruct local authorities on how they carry out their educational responsibilities, but they are in a position to give advice; and Government advice is seldom ignored.
The Government also have an opportunity to increase the use of contraception, and thus to decrease the number of abortions, by encouraging some of the public undertakings, such as London Transport, to withdraw their opposition to advertisement of contraception which so many of them practise at the present time. Such advertisements would in any case be less offensive to good taste than some of the thoroughly pornographic advertisements on clothing that

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one so often sees. This whole question of moral education was referred to in the Ross Panel Population Report—a Report which, as I understand it, the Government have generally accepted—and I should like to refer to paragraphs 42 and 44. Paragraph 42 deals with population size, and I make no apology for saying that I regard this as part of moral education. It says:—
"We think that facts about population size and growth should be widely known, so that the public at large can see population problems in better perspective and so that people can make decisions about family size knowing the implications of their decisions not only for themselves, but also for the country as a whole."
Paragraph 44 refers specifically to education:
"We have considered the role of education in establishing attitudes to family planning and we consider that sex education and family planning ought to be part of an overall approach to moral education."
The Panel goes on to say that these measures on family planning should go some way to eliminate unwanted pregnancy. I wish to ask the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, when he comes to reply—I have given him notice that I would ask this question—whether the Government accept these very important recommendations. If they do, what action are they taking to implement them?
7.2 p.m.
Lord SOMERS: My Lords, I must apologise to your Lordships for intervening when I have heard only the last two speeches of the debate but I feel that I cannot contain myself. This is a subject which is of greater importance, I think, than any with which we have to deal at the present time. In my opinion, sex education is totally unnecessary, except in one respect—and that is abstention; how to abstain from it. There was no sex education for our forefathers, but they did not seem to find difficulty in producing children. I believe most definitely that any form of sex relationship outside marriage is absolutely wrong. I say that not merely as a Christian, but also from the point of view of the medical results. Any doctor—and I see the noble Lord, Lord Platt, in his place—will confirm that promiscuity in sex relationship leads to an increase in venereal disease. The figures show that.
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As to unwanted births, I consider abortions to be equally wrong. Birth is not merely an accident; it is a deliberate act on the part of two parents. If we cannot teach them by ordinary practical standards to abstain, when it is not necessary or desirable, then there is only one means by which we can do so; and that is Christianity. It is on that basis, in spite of all that the noble Lord, Lord Brockway, has said, that I claim that Christianity is the only key to the solution of this problem.
I am tempted to quote the words from the Bible when God is saying that he is a jealous God visiting the sins of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation. Well, my Lords, we all know what that means. Immorality was considered one of the deadliest of sins—adultery in those days—and I still consider it so. That Biblical passage refers to what happens when one indulges in promiscuity. Venereal disease has effect upon not only the children who are born but upon their children as well. It is a very serious disease which ruins the lives of any children who are born and who suffer from it. I do not think this is a matter to be taken lightly. The advertisers of contraceptives place their goods on to the market and tempt young people to indulge in sexual promiscuity. They should be stopped. Contraceptives should not be available except on a doctor's prescription. I am absolutely certain of that and I shall remain certain of it until my dying day.
7.6 p.m.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I hope to be able to show tonight that the Government do think that moral education is important and that it has not been neglected in our schools. Before I attempt to answer some of the more specific questions about the Social Morality Council and about moral education in schools which have been raised in this interesting debate, I should like briefly to look at the more fundamental question of what relationship there ought to be between the Government and the prevailing moral ethos of the country. In particular, I will examine to what extent the Government themselves ought to be involved in establishing and promoting moral values and standards. I believe that the Government can influence

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the moral climate of the country through their legislative programme and through the expression of their broad political philosophies. But it is fundamental to this country's approach to moral, as to political, questions, that people must make up their own minds. Governments, of whatever political complexion, have always felt that there would be very grave dangers for individual freedom if this were not the case. This approach is embodied in our laws and in the form of many of our institutions.
This fundamental regard for the freedom of individual thought finds practical expression in the way in which responsibility for education is decentralised in this country. In England and Wales the Education Act 1944 provides that legal responsibility for the curriculum in maintained schools should rest with local education authorities and with school managing and governing bodies. In practice, of course, these responsibilities are largely devolved on school heads and school teachers themselves. We do not seek to ensure that all schools teach the same things or that all teachers teach in the same way. There may be arguments about the need for more or less consistency in what is taught, but in considering the way in which schools handle moral education we must realise that it is very largely for them to decide what to undertake and how to do it. The autonomy is a fundamental safeguard for our schools against political and bureaucratic interference, and it is also fundamental to our consideration today of what ought to be attempted by the schools in the field of moral education.
It is perhaps appropriate at this point that I should say something about the Social Morality Council. As the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, has already told us, the Social Morality Council has a wide range of support which it has secured from individuals of various religious beliefs and those with other reasons for being interested in moral issues. I am sure that it is most valuable for those concerned and the bodies they represent that there should be this opportunity for mutual consideration of moral issues. It is also very interesting for the rest of us to hear their collective views and the various reports which have already been mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Hylton.
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The Council's stated objective is:
"To promote morality in all aspects of the life of the community".
But I understand the Council have decided that for the next few years their work should be forcused on moral education in schools.
I sense one major concern is with the way in which moral issues are handled in our schools. One proposal is that there should be a greater investment of resources in helping the young to consider issues of personal choice and responsibility towards others. Let me say immediately that the Government value the work which the Council is doing in this field. The Council already knows that the Government have continued the present grant which the previous Government offered towards the cost of launching the Council's national and moral education project. The primary aim of this project is to assemble and collate existing material on moral education and to make it more widely available to teachers by conferences, courses and other means. The grant was a contribution towards this specific purpose, and it may be that this work will indicate ways, either within the education service itself or by other means, in which further work might be developed. But I cannot say now what resources might be available for this in the future.
The grant towards the Social Morality Council was offered in the expectation that the project would become self-supporting. It appears from what has been said today that the Council is not being as successful as it had hoped in obtaining other funds. If this is so and the project cannot, as a result, be completed, this is obviously a matter which the Council will have to discuss with the Department of Education and Science, but at this stage I cannot give any commitment about what the result of that discussion might be. I can however assure your Lordships that, valuable although the Social Morality Council project is, it is far from being the only work which is going on in connection with moral education in schools. I think it would be fair to say that to some extent a very great part of what is done in schools is concerned with moral issues, either to do with the welfare of individual pupils or in many of the different teaching subject areas.

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So far as the actual curriculum is concerned, I doubt whether it is possible to study, say, English or history, without being involved in the consideration of ideas and of social and moral questions. Schools also provide opportunity for deliberate discussion of moral issues. One would be unlikely to find "moral education" as such featuring on the timetable, as schools nowadays often use descriptions such as "learning for life" or "education in personal relationships." Many schools also enable their pupils to participate in community service, in which young people give a wide variety of practical help to their communities and are helped thereby to obtain a wider understanding of other people's needs and problems. It is vital that there should be adequate support for teachers in this field through curriculum.
Lord BEAUMONT of WHITLEY: My Lords, I am sorry to interrupt the noble Lord, but has the Minister, or any of his advisers for that matter, read any of the literature on moral education as a separate subject, which is totally different from all these things which he is putting forward as something on a par? He is talking as if the people who prepared the brief, which he is reading very charmingly and very nicely, have not read any of the literature, have not read any of the research which has been done in the last two or three years. This has got nothing to do with the work which the Social Morality Council is doing.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I can assure the noble Lord that this literature has been read by the advisers, and indeed I have studied the recommendations myself. Just before the noble Lord intervened I was talking about moral education itself, and I was merely saying that nowadays it is not likely to feature on the timetable in most schools under that label. I was not saying that it did not exist or that it was not a separate subject which was considered and taught in schools. I was going on to say that it was vital that there should be adequate support for teachers in this field through curriculum developments and the supply of teaching materials. I am afraid lack of time prevents me going into details, but I should like to remind your Lordships of the wide range of work which is
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being done of direct or indirect relevance to moral education. More has been done in the past decade or so than in any previous period. The Schools Council has two projects specifically on moral education, one of which is completed, and I gather that valuable teaching aids are already being widely used in schools as a result of that project.
Lord HYLTON: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord for giving way. I should like to ask him whether he is aware that the Schools Council curriculum development project will end in 1976. If the Social Morality Council project ends in 1975 and the Schools Council one in 1976, there will be no national body trying to do something in this field.
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I am sure that that is something which will be taken into consideration if the discussions between the Social Morality Council and the Government take place, as I suggested earlier. The Schools Council is also carrying out about 13 other projects in subjects relevant to moral education. The Health Education Council are also co-operating closely with the Schools Council in this area. Local education authorities are also doing a great deal of work, particularly in the 500-odd teachers' centres. Then there is the work of private trusts—I think the Farmington Trust was mentioned by one noble Lord in the debate—and the influence on curriculum development exerted by the BBC and the IBA through their educational programmes for schools.
Naturally, besides formal teaching and the more general work that I have mentioned schools do all they can to help individual children. They realise the importance of organising themselves so that there are knowledgeable staff to whom pupils can turn for advice, and who have responsibility for pupils' welfare and for liaison with their families. Also of enormous importance is the quality of the relationships between the teachers themselves, and between the teachers and pupils, parents and society generally. These relationships reinforce and give practical expression to the moral values that are expressed to pupils through the curriculum.
At this point I think I should say something about some of the background fac-

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tors that can affect schools and teachers when they are handling moral and behavioural questions. Teachers have to reconcile what they consider pupils ought to know, what the pupils themselves are asking to be taught and what society feels they ought to be taught. This is not always an easy matter when there are a wide variety of opinions and attitudes; and I would agree with the noble Lord, Lord Belstead, about the need for mutual respect in this area between teachers and pupils. Teachers and young people alike are also very conscious of having to consider moral questions within a climate of powerful countervailing pressures; for example, the tendency to glamourise sex, which generally means that women are being presented as objects to be used by men simply for sexual gratification.
The young sometimes sense an element of hypocrisy in public attitudes towards their education about contemporary moral and behavioural issues. Adult wisdom can sometimes look very like an apology or justification for the failure of society to take logical and comprehensive steps to deal with the many appalling problems that there still are in our society. Young people often feel very strongly about the rights and wrongs of moral questions, without needing any prompting from their teachers. Even if teachers want to indoctrinate their pupils with a particular point of view, they are unlikely to succeed in the sort of society in which we live today. I have already mentioned the countervailing pressures exerted by society as a whole. On top of this, most teachers are all too conscious that the ideas and the behaviour of young people may be as much or more influenced by their perception of adult attitudes and behaviour, particularly of their parents, as by the assimilation of information provided at school.
There are certain problems which your Lordships have raised tonight. One was sex education, which was mentioned towards the end of the debate. Nowhere are the pressures and difficulties more clearly highlighted. There are wide and sincerely held differences of belief, as I think is clear from the debate this evening. There are those who feel that children should always be given straightforward and accurate information about this subject, just as they are about any other. There are those who are disturbed by the current incidence of teenage preg-
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nancies abortions and venereal disease, and who in consequence feel that explicit and accurate sex education should be provided to counter this.
There are those, on the other hand, who feel that its provision, especially in its more explicit forms, amounts to a form of provocation of young people towards promiscuity; and there are those who wish to see sex education given, but want it to be combined with education which reinforces the attitude that there should be no sexual intercourse except within marriage. The majority of schools now regard it as part of their function to provide the biological information, together with opportunities to consider behaviour, in the feeling that this should form part of a positive approach to education for happy and healthy living. Our evidence is that most schools would want to ensure that parents were consulted and kept informed about the progress of such education.
I think we can all agree with the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Bristol and with the noble Lords, Lord Belstead and Lord Hylton, that religious education is not synonymous with moral education, but complementary to it. The scope of what is attempted in this subject has widened significantly over the last decade or so. While study of the traditional Christian scriptures and beliefs is more selective than formerly, there is now a greater tendency to link religious studies with those of contemporary social problems and with comparative studies of other faiths. Many of the syllabuses of religious instruction which have recently been agreed or adopted by local education authorities take account of developments of this kind.
The noble Lord, Lord Belstead, referred to the need for better in-service training for teachers. The rate at which expanded programmes of in-service training can be developed appears to depend essentially upon the staffing and other resources which local education authorities are able to devote to this purpose. In the particular field of moral and religious education, the Social Morality Council moral education project and the religious education resources centres to which I have referred are new initiatives which can make a valuable contribution. One year diploma courses in moral and religious education are available at a number of

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universities and colleges of education and a wide variety of shorter in-service courses is offered by local education authorities, area training organisations, Her Majesty's Inspectorate and other agencies.
The Government recognise the very valuable contribution which the voluntary colleges of education have made over the years to the education and training of teachers, and are concerned to maintain an effective voluntary presence in this field. The noble Lord will be aware, however, that the national requirement for national teacher training places is expected to fall substantially over the next few years. The voluntary providing bodies have accepted in principle that they should bear their fair share of the consequential reduction in provision. We are still discussing with them how this could best be done. The Catholic authorities for their part have already agreed that it is in the best long-term interest of the Catholic teacher training system as a whole that two of their colleges should close.
The noble Lord, Lord Vernon, asked about the implementation of the recommendations of the Ross Report that sex education and family planning ought to be part of an overall approach to moral education. I hope in what I have already said about sex education that I have made it clear that it would be usual for schools to approach these topics within this broader context, but I ought also to remind your Lordships of the statement about the Report of the Population Panel which my noble friend Lord Shepherd made to your Lordships on 22nd July. The position remains, as he said then, that
"…it is for the education authorities and schools themselves to decide what subjects shall be taught, but the Government hope that teachers will be encouraged to refer to family planning as an important issue in courses designed to help pupils to grow up into mature and responsible citizens."
My Lords, I started this evening by saying that it was fundamental to this country's approach to moral, as to political, questions, that people must be allowed to make up their own minds. Whether our present educational system succeeds in giving children the best opportunity to make up their own minds is possibly a matter for argument. What I hope I have stressed is the importance
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of diversity in tackling moral education in schools, a diversity fostered by lack of direct Government interference. While many of us may be able to agree on many matters, I do not believe that we should ever attempt to impose a rigid view of morality on anyone. People do not always agree on what is "moral" or "immoral".
I should like to say, if I may, on an entirely personal note, that I am quite convinced that people will look back on our society today, and see as utterly immoral our system of educating women. The system is, I know, slowly changing and the Government's White Paper Equal Opportunities for Women is a major step forward. But, on the whole, society still demands that women be educated to expect that at some stage in their lives they will stop working and become full-time housewives and mothers. So women are still being educated to believe, and educated as if, their intellectual development and career prospects matter less than those of men.
My Lords, may I say in conclusion that morals are not just, or even primarily, about sex. Morals are about whether or not people exploit each other; whether people have enough to eat; whether they have houses to live in. Morals are about whether wealth and privilege are distributed fairly in our society: about whether our society is concerned about, and protects, the lower paid, the needy, the pensioner and the handicapped; whether women and men are treated as equals. And morals are about equal opportunities and access to education, health care, and other social services.
Schools can try to help the young understand the issues. But, ultimately, what is important is the social fabric and attitudes of society as a whole; whether or not we are seen to be striving towards a just and compassionate society. It is my conviction that this Government, through the expression of our basic political philosophy, and in particular through our legislative programme, will make it easier for many young people to identify their moral aspirations with those of society as a whole.
Lord SOMERS: My Lords, before the noble Lord sits down, may I ask him

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this question? He said that it is for people to make up their own minds as to what is moral and what is immoral. Would he say the same about honesty?
Lord MELCHETT: My Lords, I had sat down and I think that having sat down I will not be drawn into a debate on a particular subject.

PROCEDURE OF THE HOUSE
First Report from the Select Committee made, and to be printed.
STATUTORY INSTRUMENTS
Fourth Report from the Joint Committee made, and to be printed.